At a pre-covid dinner party, I made one of my usual off-hand provocative remarks a propos of I can't remember what. I said: "Well, of course, time doesn't really exist." This elicited skepticism and doubt and I launched into my usual minimally-informed blather about Einstein and Entropy. But I think in this very strange …
There is no silver lining today
Yesterday was another especially brutal day in the US in terms of racial justice. Or not. It's just we now have the videos to show what is simply another day for the black citizens of our country. Life-threatening harassment while bird-watching, being murdered for going on a run, police brutality ending in cruel death. Not …
Silver Linings (68) The Masked Birder in Central Park
Silver Linings (67) Gardens
Happy Memorial Day. This is from my run in Riverside Park. And thanks to the Royal Academy, here are some mini tours (under three minutes) through the gardens of Claude Monet at Giverny Pierre Bonnard at Vernonnet Emile Nolde in Seebull Max Liebermann in Wahnsee and Henri Le Sidaner in Picardy And for some meditative walks …
THIS IS HOW I FEEL…
On a good day... https://media.giphy.com/media/5dkiNJvWnL1RK/giphy.gif And this is how I feel on a bad one... https://media.giphy.com/media/BmP44PntOd6eI/giphy.gif
Silver Linings (66) Dante’s Bones
A virus projected to kill off half the world’s population is set to be released within 24 hours. A demoniacal billionaire geneticist created the pathogen in order to solve the world’s overpopulation problem. Dante’s apocalyptic vision of the underworld swirls around the race to find the virus, a crucial clue to the evil plan hidden …
Silver Linings (65) The Lyric Essence of the Moment
I want to recommend four classic short stories I have recently read or listened to that, though written long ago, capture, in their own particular and peculiar way, "The lyric essence of the moment," a phrase taken from... Willa Cather's short story "A Death in the Desert" which I listened to this morning on The …
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Silver Linings (64) The King’s Highway
Please join me tonight for a discussion with my colleague, the brilliant cartoonist and 18th-century literature scholar, Andrew Dicus, who has just published the perfect book for our times. You can RSVP here.
Silver Linings (63) Princeton Public Library
Growing up, Princeton Public Library is where I dreamed of living. I spent so many afternoons there after school waiting for my mother to finish work, wishing she would be late, which she always was, so I could keep wandering among the stacks surrounded by books, whom I considered to be my closest friends. At …
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Silver Linings (62) More On How We White People (Even With The Best Intentions) Continue To Uphold White Supremacy Culture And How We Can Educate Ourselves Not To And Take Action
On my run today, I listened to this excellent, revelatory podcast, entitled "Race Traitor: Who Taught You To Be White?" the first of a miniseries, from The Heart, a community of writers, radio makers, and artists committed to radical feminist artmaking. I highly recommend it. And I also recommend this article on the history of …
Jenny McPhee 
