Imagine the power of something thousands and thousands of times greater than the force of a nuclear bomb; a blast heard ‘round the world and reverberating across endless miles of ocean. Something that size seems almost incomprehensible, but it happened—courtesy of a small, seemingly insignificant dot in what is now Indonesia. In 535 AD, that…
I saw a back and forth the other day about singer Halsey’s looks, after she appeared on the covered of Rolling Stone magazine looking quite a bit less, ehem, “white” than people are used to seeing. Some assumed the singer had gotten a tan and a wig in what they called “cultural appropriation at its…
“So, what—are his hats gonna say MAMA?” my husband quipped between sips of coffee, corralling children and getting ready for work. I had been sharing something I read about everyone’s favorite gaffe-prone septuagenarian—who also happens to be the Democrat primary front-runner in the 2020 effort to unseat President Donald Trump. Joe Biden—good ol’ “inappropriate…
In high school, we had a science teacher who had an affinity for showing videos in class. That class also had a couple of guys who used the darkness of the back row (and its unfettered access to the chemistry supply stash) to their full advantage. One time, a shout of pain had us all…
There’s a picture hanging on the wall at my parents’ house—it’s a beautifully ornate wedding certificate that makes mine look like a piece of trash (no seriously—mine looks a piece of paper you might find on the floor of the copy room at work, whereas this one looks like this). It’s got to be at…
I remember the very first time I got hate mail for something I wrote. I was 16 and had just landed a gig as a junior columnist at a local newspaper. I wrote about everything from school issues to exchange programs and cultural profiles—by and large it was pretty chill, uncontroversial stuff. I was so…
You might wonder why Mommy didn’t go and march for you. You might wonder why there are no Facebook pictures of us two out there together, like so many of your future counterparts’ mommies posted.
That’s why I’m writing you this letter.
Yes, by all means, let’s judge this president by his actions. But, Congressmen and women, that also means we get to judge you by yours.
Have you ever seen the movie “Inside Out”? It’s a pretty adorable look at the imagined inner workings of the human psyche. Each human has a set of emotions (Joy, Sadness, Anger, Disgust, and Fear) operating inside a command center (the brain). There’s also a vast bank of memories, and a smaller set of “core”…
Have you seen this guy? South Korean native Nam Seok Byun can literally balance anything on top of stacked stones. Washing machines, laptops, bikes, mopeds—you name it. It almost looks unreal. What’s the secret to this guy’s seemingly superhuman skill? It’s simple: he’s just figured out how to find the center…
A Future Free 