Forty-one years have passed since the year 1984 of George Orwell’s imagined dystopian future in his 1949 novel, “Nineteen Eighty-Four.”  As the old saying goes, “Fiction is the lie that tells truth.”

 * * *

    “We have glorious news for you. We have won the battle for production! Returns now completed of all classes of consumption goods show that the standard of living has risen by no less than 20 percent over the past year.”
— 1984
      “Prices are going down, not going up. I see that we had a couple of states where gasoline was at $1.98 a gallon. Nobody thought they’d see that for years maybe. And as you know, the cost of eggs has come down like 93%, 94% since we took office, and they’re pretty much normally priced now.”
— Donald Trump . . .

This is an excerpt from The RooneyReport, an email newsletter from Brian Rooney, a longtime television journalist.

. . . . The great Ruth Gordon (read her remarkable memoir “Myself Among Others”) was once quoted as saying her circle of friends had a pact stipulating that they’d never discuss health matters for more than a minute. And there’s a piece of smart advice undoubtedly rarely taken.

      Swapping the numbers of weekly doctor appointments, and the like, ad infinitum, means, of course, the chats are with friends and family still extant. It’s when they’re no longer there that the pain takes hold. Indeed, how many of us have hoped to predecease this or that relative or friend, because we can’t bear the thought of living without him or her.

      So, dwelling on these more and more unavoidable, perhaps maudlin, thoughts recently, there’s one that suddenly jumped to the head of my line: private jokes. . . .

Here’s some of what we have seen recently that might be of particular interest to our generation. (Apologies for any pay walls.) Send us what you have seen at WritingAboutOurGeneration@gmail.com.

• “The New Science of Aging Can Predict Your Future,” Eric Topol, New York Times, April 21, 2025

• “Grandparents Are Reaching Their Limit,” Faith Hill, The Atlantic, April 13, 2025

• “5 lifestyle habits that can help you live to 100, according to leading longevity researchers,” Renee Onque, CNBC, Oct 15 2024

• “These Roadies Help Stars Rock ’n’ Roll All Night. They’re in Their 70s,” Tim Sommer, New York Times, Jan. 9, 2025

• “At 77, she’s as fit as a 25-year-old. What her body tells us about aging,” Marlene Cimons, Washington Post, April 22, 2025

• “How Well Are You Aging?” Rachel Nania, AARP, Nov. 21, 2024

Click for more

      For a few days in 1985 my family and I enjoyed a period of forced relaxation that most people will never know again.

      My husband and I were moving back to the States after living in France. We’d left New York City childless and carefree with the idea of staying a year or two. We were returning nine years later with our five-year-old child in tow.

      Instead of the backpacker-filled student charter flight we’d left the States on in 1976, this time we were traveling in style: aboard the Queen Elizabeth the 2nd, the glorious ocean liner commonly known as the QE 2.

      Though we were more comfortable financially than we were in ’76, as struggling freelance writers this was still way above our pay grade. Luckily, we’d managed to score a significant press discount for writing a travel piece about the cruise. . . .

After filling my backpack

with a few generations

of chargers and wires,

and two different types

of plugs,

…after winnowing out

my t-shirts and jeans

but still having to kneel

on top of the carry-on

to close it, . . .

I’ll admit to the existence

of a moment

when we could see

in each other’s eyes

the desire just to stay

home. . . .

(Note: This is not a poem. The author just liked the rhythm provided by short lines.)

. . . .In September 1971 I satisfied the draft board in Lynchburg, Va., that I met all the qualifications for Status I-O: Conscientious Objector. They notified me that I would be required to serve two years of alternative service, working in a hospital, for instance.

      Having anticipated this, I had previously asked my boss at the lab if I could continue working there. Not only did he grant that request, but volunteered to state this arrangement in the formal letter of recommendation to my draft board he intended to write for me. All that remained was the formality of the physical and mental examinations, the same ones required of all military-service members.

      I reasoned with all the wisdom of a 19-year-old boy that I could save myself from two years of indentured servitude if I were to flunk the physical exam. 

      To explain how I planned to cheat on the Selective Service Physical Examination . . . .

      We’re not far enough into the current Trump era to know how this chapter ends. But more than 100 days in, we know these things:

•       That the only effective limits on Trump/Doge/Vought outrages and demands can come from people acting together.

•       But that before people can act together, someone needs to go first.

      This is what academics call the Collective Action Problem. In pop-culture terms, it’s known as “I am Spartacus.” . . .

This is an excerpt from the Breaking the News Substack by James Fallows, a long-time journalist and former presidential speechwriter.

      I believe, and I believe that most of the readers of Writing About Our Generation believe, that President Donald J. Trump represents an existential threat to democracy in the United States.

      But I also believe that the best way to begin the process of ridding the government of the United States of Trump and his henchmen is not to focus on the constitutional issues but to focus on the economic ones.

      Yes, the threat to the U.S. democracy—the oldest continuing democracy on earth—is clear, present and terrifying. But . . . .

     I’m 79, had a near-fatal heart attack not that long ago, and now have to decide if I want surgery for a completely different issue.

     It’s elective surgery—that is, I could continue more or less as I am without getting the procedure. The condition could—almost assuredly would—eventually get worse, but it’s not currently life-threatening and for the time being I’m pretty sure I could steel myself, just deal with whatever discomfort arises. I could get by—at least for the immediate future—without heading into the operating room.

     No doctor has yet told me I absolutely need to get it done right now. It could wait, at least a bit. it would be my choice to go ahead with it. Which is what makes the decision so damn difficult. . . .

     This is a short video, filmed in France, on the inescapable requirement, in life, that we do difficult things. For example:

• Things that we don’t want to do, like apologizing when we were wrong.

• Or things that we don’t want to do, like apologizing when we are not convinced we were wrong.

     Most of the videos I’ve been experimenting with cut rapidly among numerous shots. This includes just one shot. It is rich, however, in moral questions.

click here for the video

     I almost died before I got old, and with all due respect to Pete Townshend, that wasn’t the plan. 

     There had been broken bones, heel spurs, cataracts, sleep apnea, and plenty of therapy, but none of that was going to get in the way of a long, active, happy, productive life. Then one afternoon a year ago, I wrote an email to a friend cancelling our weekly walk. I had a headache and felt a cold coming on. After that–nothing.  My wife tells me she came home from dinner with friends that night and found me on the couch, unresponsive (she’s been kind never to “more unresponsive than usual”). When I woke up weeks later, much weakened but still myself, they told me that I’d experienced a stroke . . . .

       The Neville Chamberlain Award is given to the most cowardly effort to appease a tyrant.

      Last week’s original winners had been Shari Redstone and Paramount, for intruding on the editorial independence of “60 Minutes” in order to suck up to Trump, so he’d settle his frivolous lawsuit against CBS—thereby allowing them to sell off a chunk of CBS for billions.

      But the bigger winner is now Jeff Bezos. . . .

This is a short excerpt from Robert Reich’s excellent Substack. For the full post or to subscribe, on paid or free plans, click here.

      So, who might lead this fight?

      Too many Democratic Party leaders have rolled over and played dead while Trump and his hench-people are dismantling our republic, while this wave of fascism breaks over us.

      In this moment of absolute urgency, who are the politicians, who are the community leaders, who are the institutions and the individuals who are standing up?

     Who are the ones who have given us hope? Who are the ones who we want to follow into the streets? Who are ready to lead the charge?

There are some. . . .

      Here is how Donald Trump’s administration is “Making America Great Again.”

·       By deporting a 4-year-old citizen undergoing treatment for cancer.

·       By eviscerating, if not outright killing, “Meals on Wheels,” a vital program that feeds the sick and elderly.

·       By unveiling plans to end the federal program that distributes life-saving Narcan, a cheap and highly effective way of preventing drug overdose deaths.

·       By crippling supply chains.

·       By arresting and filing felony charges against a judge for the unspeakable crime of allowing an immigrant in her court out through a side door.

·       By investigating the main fundraising arm of the opposition Democratic Party.

      And that’s all just in the last several days. …

    Okay, here is proof that in creating such lists we are not limited to Jews. Although on this one I did have to make use, here and there, of ChatGPT4o.

      Below is a list of the 15 most significant historical Buddhists, ranked, more or less, in increasing order of overall cultural importance or importance to Buddhism itself—with, admittedly, a very strong “our-generation,” American bias.

      The Buddha, there being no reliable evidence that he existed, did not make the list—just as neither Abraham nor Yahweh made our list of the most significant Jews.

      Whom did I overlook or rank too high or low?

15.  Herbie Hancock (born 1940) . . . .

      It was 50 years ago today. Doesn’t it seem much more recent than that—and also much more distantly in the past?

      But on April 30, 1975, the Vietnam War—one of our generation’s defining issues—finally came to an end.

      It was the day after Armed Forces Radio had begun playing “White Christmas,” to signal that an evacuation was underway. It was the day of those ignominious photos of fleeing U.S. staff and South Vietnam supporters being helicoptered off the roof of the U.S. Embassy.

      It was the day a North Vietnamese tank crashed through the gates of the presidential palace in the city that was then called Saigon. The country that was then called South Vietnam officially had surrendered. …

      It’s by no means the worst thing about Trump and his administration, but it may be the most viscerally annoying: how he has invaded all our conversations, how he has dominated all our thoughts, how he is the first thing we read online in the morning and the last thing we hear about before we go to bed at night. It doesn’t matter if what we’re thinking or talking about has any relation to these last 100 days; the last 100 days just worm themselves in.

      His inevitability is even the subject of a recent Onion headline: “Happy Monday, Everyone,” it read over an imaginary post from the president. “Looking Forward to Another Week of Infecting Every Aspect of Your Daily Lives!”

      The Czech novelist Milan Kundera, who lived under a totalitarian Communist regime, wrote how through the manipulation of history, memory and personal identity, totalitarianism invades every part of life, including thought and emotion. Autocrats don’t just control through force; they control through dominating not just our public lives, but our private ones, too. …

      They are all significant, influential, important. They are just not as significant, influential or important as the 20 people who just made our list of the 20 Most Significant Jews in History.

  These Jews, sprinkled throughout history, deserve mention, however, and below they get it. Here are the runners-up to our Top 20 list. In a number of cases, they missed the list by just a fraction and if we did it again, one or two of them might rise up after more careful consideration to the higher list.

Madeleine Albright

First female U.S. Secretary of State.

Lauren Bacall

Legendary actress known for her husky voice and classic Hollywood films.

Irving Berlin

One of America’s greatest songwriters; composed classics like "White Christmas" and "God Bless America."

Louis Brandeis

The first Jewish Justice on the U.S. Supreme Court; champion of privacy rights and free speech. . . .

      It started as sort of a joke. Maybe it was because we had recently heard the Adam Sandler Hanukkah song. Or maybe we had been talking about Dylan (no surprise: Mitch is obsessed), born Robert Zimmerman.

      And that led us—two non-observant Jews—to think of other prominent recent members of the tribe. But we like to think big here at Writing About Our Generation, and we’ve already done a number of Top 10 lists here (the top ten athletes of our generation; the top changes in the U.S. in our lifetime). So this little idea about prominent modern Jews grew. And instead of recent Jews, we decided to delve into history and do all Jews; and instead of 10, we decided to do 20. (Hey, history is long, you know).

      However, we decided we’d only choose Jewish people here for whose actual existence historians have found some contemporary evidence—beyond the oral tales eventually collected in the Tanakh or other religious texts. So no Moses. . . .

      Now that my birthday officially has passed and I am a year older, I know that getting older for many of us is really getting old. It’s tough being an aging boomer now, even if we do qualify for Senior Day on Thursdays at the supermarket.

      Frankly, it’s tough because despite serious efforts to stay current, up-to-the-minute and chill, many of us still don’t know the difference between hip hop and rap. We update our LinkedIn profiles, just in case, although there’s nothing much to update. We eat ceviche, even if we don’t know what it is or how to pronounce it. We wonder why we are physically incapable of being able to call anybody “bro” or “dude” . . .