Watching Felix Baumgartner’s jump from 24 miles up at the edge of space I’m reminded of how basic is that fear of falling. As I watched the video I had two, opposite reactions. What must it be like to leap from such magisterial heights? (What is it that makes us back away from precarious heights […]
Freedom
Frantically Eating Chocolates
“The whole fall, back-to-school just hit me like a truck.” That’s the way a mother described the first days of September as we talked last night. Me too. It all comes on so fast. Summer seems to start gradually, as things wind slowly down. But it always ends with a bang. A gun goes off. […]
Forgiving 911 Times
On this anniversary of 9/11 the papers are full of stories about fisticuffs over the memorial at ground zero. It’s NYC and Bloomberg versus NY and Cuomo, fighting over who gets to control the memorial, who has to pay for it (it costs $60 million a year to maintain). This is about all the little […]
Dropping Keys
We are living in a time when the standard versions of religion are losing their appeal. The spirituality offered by these traditions seems small and niggling. Whatever is intended, the message people are getting is mostly about who’s got the truth and who doesn’t, who belongs inside the circle and who doesn’t, who’s having the […]
The Spirituality of Mad Men
I love Donald Draper, even if he makes me cringe. He’s the star ad exec in the TV series Mad Men, and season five premiers this Sunday night. Donald Draper is a mystery. He is the picture of 1950s perfection—“has it all”—and yet his life is wildly out of control. It always seems […]
Staying Home–For Fear
If like me you loved to read Shel Silverstein to your kids (or you’re lucky enough to be doing it now), you remember “Where the Sidewalk Ends” and “The Giving Tree.” Here’s another Silverstein poem I found, one I didn’t know. It’s a riff on the Pied Piper myth. It’s a poem about staying home—for […]
Learning from Whitney Houston
When a “star” like Whitney Houston dies in a Beverly Hills hotel bathtub, everyone is shocked. We shouldn’t be, of course. Whitney Houston, like so many stars and starlets before her, slid into drug abuse, did stints in rehab, and lived in an abusive marriage. She was hugely successful—selling over 55 million albums—but like every […]
You’re Not Gonna Wanna Hear This
“No! I told him I wasn’t coming!” The woman answering her cell phone was talking way loud. I was five rows back on the train and the noise disrupted my conversation with Pam. “I don’t care—I’m not going!” Now the whole car was awkwardly silent, forcibly listening. A young man across the aisle from the […]