As I often do in the days before Passover, I’m thinking of the women without whom we not only wouldn’t have the Passover story, we wouldn’t have Judaism: Yocheved — Moses’ mother, who hid him; Shifra and Puah — the midwives who refused to kill the male Hebrew newborns; Miriam — Moses’ sister, who kept watch; and Pharaoh’s daughter.

The layers of bravery! Imagine the bravery that must be called upon to resist a king consumed by evil — from a young girl who had the courage to speak to that very king’s daughter when summoned, to that daughter, who…

One night at the dinner table my kids asked which I like better: Star Wars or Star Trek. I demurred; they insisted; I insisted I couldn’t possibly; “no, Mom, it’s a desert island, you have to-”

“Oh, well then,” I said. “Firefly.”

When Firefly premiered in 2002, I was busy. I have a vague memory of being dimly aware of it, thinking I might like it, then dimly realizing it was gone. I didn’t catch up until 2011, and — well. Here I am. Massive poster above my desk, action figures scattered across it, the entire post-series run of graphic…

On May 27th, when I’d been in isolation with mild COVID-19 for 71 days — a period during which I experienced constant low-grade fevers along with a battery of other standard symptoms, including respiratory distress; constant, often debilitating fatigue; g/i issues concerning which I will not overburden you here; and oh, did I mention the day-in-day-out fevers?— I discovered, to my absolute shock, that a subsection of Twitter — hundreds of accounts, some with between ten and twenty thousand followers— had made mocking me their quarantine project.

What? You ask. And not unreasonably! I don’t know how it started, but…

America is reeling from its losses. Mourners aren’t able to find comfort in rites & rituals; we can’t hold those mourners in their grief. For many, sympathy notes will be the only memorial they get or can participate in. Those notes can be hard to write; here’s a thread with some guidance.
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(This is an unrolled, slightly edited version of a Twitter thread I first wrote when Chris Hayes reported that there was a shortage of sympathy cards; it’s very clearly & painfully relevant regardless, whether the death is from Covid-19 or anything else. I’m hoping to get the…

One day, five months into the presidency that threatens even now to undo the American experiment, I heard someone on the radio sing “there can’t be more of them than us, there can’t be more,” and burst into tears.

I was in my car, maneuvering an entrance onto the I-290 known among Chicagoans for its potential lethality, and tears were ill-advised. But what could I do, just seconds earlier Jason Isbell had also sung “I know you’re tired/ And you ain’t sleeping well/ Uninspired/ And likely mad as hell,” and let’s just say I was primed.

I’d never heard his…

Want to listen along as you read? Click here for the playlist on Spotify.

Very early in his career, Jason Isbell revealed himself to be an uncommonly empathetic songwriter. Almost immediately after joining the Drive-By Truckers, he wrote “Decoration Day,” a track that places the listener not just in the shoes but behind the eyes of its narrator, and “Outfit,” in which a father speaks with such frank love that it can move the stony to tears. And all that at age 22.

Empathy is tricky, though. It can easily tip over into a pressing urge to step in, to…

Want to hear the radio show in question? You’re in luck! An hour of pure dreams-come-true, in three parts: Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

What are your dreams? Like: Dreams-dreams. Dreams so fantastical, so far outside the walls of your actual lived-life, that you never actually dream them. One of mine is to be a rock DJ, spinning tunes and talking about tunes and spinning more tunes — but, psht, you know, that’s not even —

wait, what’s that? *puts finger to ear* I was on the radio?

I WAS ON THE RADDIIIOOOO!!!!!!

I was on the radio!

WEXT…

Maybe you’re not particularly political, or you’re extremely political and you’ve already got a lot on your plate. Maybe you’ve got tickets, you’re exhausted, or you’re not sure you understand what’s going on. Let me start by saying that all of those are actually good reasons for not going to protests. I understand all of them, and have chosen not to attend any number of demonstrations in the course of my life for some of those same reasons. And now I’m going to tell you why you really need to go to Tuesday night’s Impeachment Eve rallies, anyway. A brief…