In a recent interview, Nobel winner Toni Morrison talked about growing up as an African American and what color and beauty meant within the black community.  At Howard University, which she attended, she said there was a test for beauty.  The ideal was to have skin no darker than th

When they return from a vacation, I suspect my readers have an experience similar to mine.  I’m surprised the hurley burly of the everyday world has changed not a whit.  Old political feuds continue.  North Korea has fired another rocket. China remains complacent.  Russian hacke

My material grandmother used to warn her daughter that by laughing so much her teeth might freeze — no easy feat in the tropical country like Costa Rica.  Happily the threat didn’t dissuade my mother who loves to laugh to this day.  As she’s passed her 100 birthday, it’s

My mother turned 98 in February. She does pretty well for her age but of late, I’ve noticed changes. She has trouble finding words to express herself and little skills, like knowing how to use a knife and fork, sometimes escapes her. When I intervene by filling in the missing word o

THE SECRET OF FRIDAY LUNCHES Yesterday, I didn’t take my usual walk through the park. I walked to my bank instead. It took me through an area I seldom pass and I was surprised to discover the changes taking place. Several businesses, most of them restaurants, had sprung up and as I�

I recently acquired a Facebook contact who quotes the Bible daily.  As I am an atheist, I’m puzzled by his reason for seeking me out.  Perhaps he hopes to save my soul. More likely, however, he added my name to his list through a mutual friend.  For reasons I find unfathomable, s

I was going to write about oil today, until I came across a scathing article about Ivanka Trump.  At the  Berlin conference on women entrepreneurship, which she attended as a guest of German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, the audience booed when she responded to a question about her fa

A jealous boyfriend murders his pregnant lover and is charged with a double homicide. Two lives are lost, are they not? 38 states believe this is the case and have enacted fetal homicide laws.  (“Some Form of Punishment,” by Nina Liss-Scultz, Mother Jones, May/June 2017 pgs. 48-5

Margaret Atwood’s novel, The Handmaid’s Tale, shows us a world where women’s roles can change overnight as might soon be the case in Turkey. Tayyip Erdogan, his power rooted in the conservative Islamist AK Party, has recently managed constitutional changes that make him a  near

I’ve never been clear how Hillary Clinton, who left the Secretary of State’s office with a 65% approval rating, could fall into disgrace the moment she decided to run for President of the United States.  (“Hillary: Should she just go away?” The Week, April 21, 2017, pg. 17.)