A confession: I read Women of the Way: Discovering 2500 Years of Buddhist Wisdom because it was written by Sallie Tisdale. I know very little about Buddhism. I have been an admirer of Tisdale’s writing for more than a quarter of a century, ever...
Humans name their babies and their pets and their battleships. And their buildings. I’ve lived in Chicago buildings by the names of 135 N. Leamington Ave. and 7943 S. California Ave. and 1129 W. Wellington Ave. Addresses, after all, are simply...
Christopher Chandler, a former journalist at the Chicago Sun-Times and WBBM-TV (Channel 2), was an important press aide for Harold Washington. He organized news conferences, planned media strategy and dealt directly with reporters and editors...
In July, 1864, Gen. Jubal Early and his 15,000 Confederate troops were again raiding the North and threatening the federal capital of Washington, D.C. It was a maneuver aimed at forcing Gen. U.S. Grant to weaken his siege of the Southern capital...
I vote for wonder. Amid the mudslinging of political campaigns, despite the reports of all that is going wrong across the world, I vote for joy and amazement at the richness of life. Photo by Remi Lanvin Many days, I see the sunshine strike the...
In Amsterdam, on the sunny and otherwise quiet morning of Friday, August 4, 1944, a car pulled up in front of the Opekta warehouse at 263 Prinsengracht. That is all one needs to write, and already the reader knows who was hiding in the attic and...
When I was laid off by the Chicago Tribune five and a half years ago, I lost my desk and my byline, but also the community of smart, curious and generally wacky people who had surrounded me in one way or another for more than three decades. Not...
It was maybe an hour after I finished reading Laird Hunt’s new novel Neverhome that the gears of my mind suddenly shifted and fell into place.. Up until that point, I had been alternately impressed by the novel’s quietly dazzling...
Sigmund Freud once said that, if you take a widely diverse set of people and starve them, soon all their differences will fall away to be replaced by “the uniform expression of the one unstilled urge” for food. That didn’t happen “in the filth of...
. I answer the door. The bear is there. He says, “Fear not.” He is cold and wants a fire to sit by. In he comes. Snow White raises her eyebrow as we brush the snow off his fur. We play with him. We tickle him. We cover his eyes with our small...
(A) New born, I shine as gold. My blue eyes glow. Seven steps I take, a lotus in each footprint. Pointing to the sky, I say: “I am born for the welfare of the entire world.” . (B) The shock again. The pain, weight, edge of body. Seeing. Trek...
Give David McCullough credit. After a hugely successful career as a historian, he set out, in his late 60s, to write a book that was a far cry from his earlier bestsellers. McCullough had made a name for himself by writing big books that told big...
Dear Archbishop-elect Cupich: Eat at Burger King. By yourself. In street clothes. If you want to get to know Chicago and those of us who live here, go to the Burger King on Lawrence Avenue, just west of Western Avenue. And, as you’re eating your...
The bust of Abraham Lincoln IIMy suspicion is that you don’t know that there was an Abraham Lincoln II. I hadn’t until I read Treasures of the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library, edited by Glenna R. Schroeder-Lein, a spirited and beautifully...
Miriam is dying. Her twin brother Antonio has brought to her hospital room her two young sons 12-year-old Chris and 10-year-old Tony. Her ex-husband Charlie, whose idea of a good time is getting a lot of sleep, opts out of the visit, just as...
Pavement cave-in around manhole. Excavated on the fallen side of the brick chimney to the deep sewer. A small pit, earth here, damaged brick tower there. Mason climbs down with mortar bucket. Summer laborer, son of friend of legislator, throws...
On Facebook, Andy Bourgeois posted a list of books that had stayed with him, and suggested that several people, including me, do the same. Andy is a real-world friend of mine. We played basketball every week for about five or six years, and...
Clutch, clench, the back of the thigh. Then, emptiness, a hollow, danger, a hobble, a caution, a warning. Tendons wear. Skin thins. The final hollow. Patrick T. Reardon...
The prophet Jeremiah got exasperated with God: “You duped me, O Lord, and I let myself be duped; you were too strong for me, and you triumphed. All the day I am an object of laughter; everyone mocks me.” On this Labor Day weekend, it’s important...
This essay initially appeared in the Chicago Tribune on 7.27.14. When I was a young man, I reveled in my physical strength and intellectual acuity. Today, I’m very aware of my fragility. When I was younger, I was hungry for new mountains...
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