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Mother May I?

Okay, so I should probably start by explaining that my kids never actually said, “Mother, may I...” although I tried. And I’m not talking about the game we played in the 70s where we stood in a line and one person got to choose who would be “Mother” next by allowing that person 5 steps forward to the everyone else’s 3 paces backward. The title of my column this month is just my cheesy way of using ‘Mother’ and ‘May’ together since Mother’s Day is this month (hint, hint). But my story is a mother’s tale. A few weeks ago, my son drove home from college miserable with a 102 fever. I offered to drive up to see him, but he preferred coming home for some “fresh air, peace and quiet.” I’d like to say I felt bad for him, but if I did that paled in comparison to the major mom-high I was on. In a few days he’d be better and I’d go back to being the nag who still from afar manages to ask just enough questions to garner an eye roll. I’m pretty sure that’s why we don’t Skype. In the meantime, ...

How Did We Get Here?

  People are asking that a lot lately, and unfortunately, the answer just seems to be, “It’s their fault.” The blame game  gives politicians plenty to exploit as they hope to rile us all up to vote this way or that. I see no sense in Republicans or Democrats claiming to know how to effectively govern in tumultuous times. This is a new historical moment. No one has the answers. None of us knows how to deal with global pandemics, artificial intelligence, and disinformation campaigns on the levels we are seeing today. No one. Because we have not been here before. We have, however, throughout the history of civilization, experienced tumultuous times. And we have not, historically, handled them well. It has been our human tendency to become ethnocentric to the detriment of entire peoples and continents. This we have seen again and again, and the rhetoric of politicians and political leaders around the world today is reminiscent of past turbulent times. From the invention of the whe...

START SPREADING THE GNEWS

Definition: gnews [nyooz] noun: good news; information presented about positive things happening in the world. The thing about news is it no longer means what it was meant to. The term “newspaper” derives its meaning from the idea that each day new events around us were reported to us. There is nothing really new about news today. Sure, the headlines change, but there is nothing fresh about the stories on any given day. Even the most prudent reporters hardly offer us an objective picture of what is truly going on in our world. We learn only about what goes wrong. It would be great if the media felt they had an obligation to report what happens in our world, not just what goes wrong, but news is big business, and the 24/7 news cycle has only exacerbated the “if it bleeds it leads” mentality. Ironic, really, because it would seem that more time to fill would bring more variety to the news space. This has not, however, been the outcome. Thirty years ago, a research group ...