Trump has the same attitude toward college [admissions] spots that he has toward immigration and imports. To him, everything is just a lump of fixed size — a pie to be divided. In his mind, if you kick out immigrants, the number of jobs doesn’t go down — the jobs just get parceled out to native-born Americans instead. If you ban imports, Americans don’t consume less — they just buy American-made products instead. And if you kick out foreign students, the number of college spots doesn’t go down; American kids just get more.

     Of course, Trump is wrong about that . . . .

(This is an excerpt from Noah Smith’s “NoahOpinion” substack. Click here to read the full article, where he provides evidence to back up these points.)

      Progress toward freedom and equality came at an enormous price in the 1960s for the courageous leaders of the civil rights movement. Some, like Martin Luther King, gave their lives to the struggle. Others endured jail, beatings and threats to carry on the fight.

      On March 7, 1965, Alabama state police pummeled and fractured the skull of John Lewis on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma on a day that became known as Bloody Sunday. Lewis went on to become a highly respected congressman from Georgia. He fought for social justice and civil rights throughout his career, using the term “good trouble” to describe the kind of courageous, nonviolent protest that defined his life and career.

      Today, we are seeing too little “good trouble” from our leaders and, quite honestly, from ourselves as the Trump administration works to obliterate the progress of the civil rights movement and much more. . . .

      . . . The sad experiences have faded. They do not hold a central place in my psyche, but are instead filed deep in the cabinet of my mind under despair, “do not open.” How fortunate am I that the joys of life dance in my memories and the sadnesses are mostly forgotten?

      With what I believe might be the last few years of my life, it’s up to me to figure out what I hope to accomplish with what time is remaining. What are my priorities, goals, dreams, aspirations, focus and must dos?

      At the top of my list is the need to ensure I am never a burden to my family. Beneath that there are the little things: keeping the hummingbirds well-nourished throughout the summer; planting milkweed for the monarch butterflies; keeping the bluebird boxes clean and ready for nesting; piling rich compost on all my shrubs, plants and trees; protecting the family home for future generations; and fighting for a country that resembles the one I love because liberty and justice is the American Way . . . .

This is the second in a series about what we still want to accomplish. Here’s a link to the first. Write to us at writingaboutourgeneration@gmail.com about what you still want to do.

      I began sobbing at a concert the other night. In a stadium. In Lille, France.

      I don’t cry easily. A handful of movies maybe. A performance of “Porgy and Bess” some years ago. And it has been, happily, a while since someone close to me died. I certainly had never before cried at a concert.

      It was a Bruce Springsteen concert. . .

      . . .  For I realized, or just felt, that what Bruce wanted to say on this tour, when he sang, “Dreams will not be thwarted … Faith will be rewarded . . . Bells of freedom ringin',” is that maybe the America of our “hopes and dreams,” not the current Republican party’s survival-of-the-richest America (though guess who has now apparently become a billionaire?); the America that reaches out a hand to immigrants and the less fortunate at home and overseas; the America we knew and perhaps insufficiently treasured; maybe that America will somehow survive “the criminal clown” and his “corrupt, incompetent and treasonous administration.”

     Maybe it will survive, which of course leaves open the possibility that maybe it won’t. . . .

      The headline on the New York Times feature article—“Honey, Sweetie, Dearie: The Perils of Elderspeak”—caught my eye. So that’s what they call it!

      But it was the subhead that really annoyed me: “A new training program teaches aides to stop baby talk and address older people as adults.”

      Wow. What a concept.

      Even though I didn’t know there was a name for it, I remember cringing instinctively when I first encountered instances of it years ago. Long before I too was an “older adult,” I bristled when well-meaning but tone-deaf nurses and aides talked to my elderly, formal/dignified father that way when he was in the hospital. . . .

      Perhaps the greatest fictional immortal being is Wowbagger the Infinitely Prolonged, from the Douglas Adams Hitchhiker’s Guide series. After being made immortal by “an unfortunate accident with an irrational particle accelerator, a liquid lunch and a pair of rubber bands,” Wowbagger eventually soured on life. 

“To begin with it was fun; he had a ball, living dangerously, taking risks, cleaning up on high-yield long-term investments, and just generally outliving the hell out of everybody.

“In the end, it was the Sunday afternoons he couldn’t cope with, and that terrible listlessness that starts to set in at about 2:55, when you know you’ve taken all the baths you can usefully take that day, that however hard you stare at any given paragraph in the newspaper you will never actually read it, or use the revolutionary new pruning technique it describes, and that as you stare at the clock the hands will move relentlessly on to four o’clock, and you will enter the long dark teatime of the soul.” …

      This is an excerpt from the Substack of Brian Klass an associate professor of global politics at University College London. An earlier, related excerpt explained why the increase in life expectancy is slowing.

      Billionaires are, pretty deservedly, getting a bad rap these days. They are, rightfully, being accused of torching our government to satisfy their own insatiable greed. They are seen widely, and generally correctly, as predatory grifters using their financial power to steal from all the rest of us.

      And yes, of course, the whole capitalist system is unfair and there shouldn’t be any billionaires at all in a just world, in a fair society.

      But despite overwhelming evidence that they are mostly a bunch of avaricious vultures, I’ve come to say a few good words about a few billionaires—and how it’s best not to focus on the billionaire class too much, too exclusively, as many of us have been doing.

      Because when we repeatedly say we don’t want a government run by billionaires, it’s an easy pejorative. It’s a safe applause line, a hit at demonstrations and protests. But it’s reductive. . . .

      Unless I’m mistaken—and I don’t think I am—I never have done The New York Times crossword puzzle. I do remember decades ago sitting on the D train in the Bronx with one of my high school teachers and watching amazed as she settled into her seat beside me and eagerly started doing the Times crossword—in ballpoint pen.

       It’s not that I don’t like word games; actually I love them. In fact, while vacationing in Maine over the years, members of my family would groan whenever I would say after dinner: “How about we play some Scrabble?”

       But never the Times crossword—until now. . . .

      Earlier this month I was invited to show some of my videos at a Disability Arts Festival hosted by the University of Alabama’s Arts in Medicine program in Birmingham. While there I witnessed a remarkable performance, From Where I Sit, which was the culmination of a three-year cross-country program that began with writers gathering monthly online to journal about their realities of living with spinal cord injury, multiple sclerosis and transverse myelitis.

      Suzanne Costello tailored their words into a script, and Anita Hollander composed songs. Participating artists flew in from all over the country and worked with Costello to create a show in two weeks of intensive rehearsal in Birmingham. Remarkably, many of them had never performed before. . . .

      . . . .Here’s a link to a video of the live performance.

This is the first in a series. Write to us at writingaboutourgeneration@gmail.com about what you still want to accomplish.

. . . .Marathons were things committed fanatics did—a challenge for the much younger, the much fitter, the anorexic. Why would anybody want to torture themselves like that, why would anybody commit to a regimen that would preoccupy them for months, exhaust them for days, torture them for hours?

This I saw my daughter run the New York City Marathon.                

      It was a beautiful day across the boroughs and it seemed like we were engulfed in a citywide party. There were crowds cheering everywhere, runners enveloped in good wishes, smiling through their pain. Despite what must have been the agony—at miles 20 and beyond—we were all transported for a short time to a genial place of possibility.

      At the end of the race my daughter was tired but exhilarated, undamaged but bubbling. I envied her. . . .

     Plenty of studies and news stories lately noting a decline in dating, in relationships, in having sex, in falling in love—among young people, the people who would be most expected to indulge in such behaviors. But the decline has not just been observed among young people. This two-and-a-half minute video is a meditation upon such behaviors—all of which might fall under the heading, “romance”—and their apparent decline, which has been dubbed: “A Romance Recession.”

Click here to view video

. . . So, we all should just continue to go about our business as if this is just another conservative administration and politics as usual. We should let our president—that noted humanitarian; that unrivaled deal maker, who only went bankrupt six times; that economic tinkerer with some 19th-century ideas on tariffs; and that self-proclaimed patriot who demonstrates little understanding of or support for the Constitution—do whatever he feels is best.

       When they said back in the 1930s that “it can’t happen here,” they were right. It didn’t. And maybe those who think Trump and the Republicans would cede power after a loss in the midterms or in 2028 will prove right. However, Donald Trump did encourage an insurrection at the Capitol last time he lost an election.

I am by nature an optimist. But, as I’ve written here, my optimism is rapidly fading.

      It is all no big deal. Until it is.

There is reason to believe we are the frogs, and the water in our pan is about to boil.

      I am definitely running out of time, and I have (mostly) made peace with that.

      When I was a child, one of the most important events of the year was the county fair. My friends and I would go on all the carnival rides and eat all the carnival food. But around 10 p.m., someone would notice the time. We’d have only an hour until our parents arrived. Suddenly we had a new clarity of purpose. We stopped wanting to ride the Gravitron or eat more cotton candy. We wanted to get one more funnel cake and then head for the Ferris wheel. This is what aging feels like. You suddenly realize you’ve got one hour left at the fair, and you get serious about how you are going to live. . . .

This is an excerpt from a column by Anne Lamott, written for the Washington Post.

….These experiences leave me wondering how this country has become so divided and whether even the growing extremism of Trump’s second term can bring us back to something approaching a reasoned and rational center.

      But how? The headlines at least give hint of people’s priorities.

      Today I decided to drop in on Alabama, one the three states, along with Alaska and Mississippi, that I’ve never visited in person and a state in which President Trump recently gave a commencement speech at the University of Alabama.

      The state’s capital is Montgomery, the newspaper of which, the Montgomery Advertiser, has been around since 1829. It opposed secession in 1861 but aligned itself with white supremacy after the Civil War and was an avid supporter of Gov. George Wallace. It has also won its share of awards, including three Pulitzer Prizes.

      On May 6, 2025, the lead story is titled “Mothers’ Day is on the way and so are these Montgomery events.” Lower on the homepage can be found the headlines, “Alligator harvest permit applications start in June” . . . .

Jerry Lanson is a writing consultant at Harvard’s Kennedy School. He is a professor emeritus at Emerson College. A version of this article first appeared on his Substack.

      Derek Thompson, writing in The Atlantic, describes us as living in the “anti-social century.” He cites all the statistics you’ve probably seen about the increase in loneliness in the United States in the last few decades.

      Some statistics were surprising to me: Dining alone has increased by 29 percent since 2022. The frequency of people hosting friends for parties, games and dinners has declined by 45 percent. “Men who watch television now spend seven hours in front of the TV for every hour they spend hanging out with somebody outside their home. The typical female pet owner spends more time actively engaged with her pet than she spends in face-to-face contact with friends of her own species.” 

      In an interview, Thompson talks about the decline in the number of “third places”—“a place that you choose to be with people you’re not related to and you’re not financially obligated to be around” (the bar in “Cheers,” the cafe in “Seinfeld”). Not only are these places not being built, but people are not seeking them out.

      I’d been thinking about this idea of a third place recently. After I retired, I joined a gym for older people. . . .

      Is Joe Biden still president?

      Is he the one at this very moment who is dismantling our democracy? Is he tanking our economy and isolating us from the rest of the world? Is he buddying up to dictators and white supremacists and spouting nonsense and vengeful lies? Is he eroding our moral fabric and corrupting our ethical standards? Is he the one who is turning our country into a semi-fascist state and each day transgressing what remains of our values?

      Well, no, he isn’t. But you sure would think so if you’ve been following the news. . . .

      Like the rest of us, you’ve lived a pretty long life, and for the most part, we hope, a pretty good life.

But what do you still want to accomplish?

      .Like us, you’re in your seventh, eighth or ninth decade and, let’s be frank, you don’t have all that much time left. So, in that remaining slice of your life, what do you still want to do? What do you still want to accomplish? What’s our there on the horizon that entices you?

      Maybe you’ve noted it down already—it’s on your bucket list— or maybe you haven’t really thought about it seriously till now.Let us know what you still want to accomplish by commenting here or writing to us at writingaboutourgeneratin@gmail.com. . . .

(Excerpt above from Andrea del Sarto by Robert Browning.)

      What is happening to me? When I should be sleeping I am awake and when I am supposed to be awake I fall asleep.

      Dozing off during the evening news is commonplace. Waking up at 2 a.m. is a recurring occurrence. They say that REM (rapid eye movement) sleep is important to your mental acuity and well-being. Well, that explains a lot about my state of mind at the moment.

      For a time, I wore a Fitbit that tracked my sleep. I became seriously paranoid when it recorded that I had little if any REM sleep. This means that I am rarely in a deep sleep which supports mental and physical wellbeing.

      It also recorded that I toss and turn often. I became so upset by these Fitbit reports that the stress added to my sleepless nights. . .

      (From the class of a very long time ago)

      Dear soon-to-be college graduates,

      Thank you for having chosen me to be your commencement speaker even though it was probably because Chappell Roan, whoever that is, was not available. I also want to thank you, in advance, for not checking your texts during my talk.

      Although I am very grateful to be here today, and in fact I am grateful to be anywhere, I will not offer you simple platitudes like saying I am very grateful to be here today. Instead, I will offer you several more complicated platitudes that, I hope, will make you forget, if only briefly, that starting next month you will have to begin paying off your student loans with most of your beer money. . . .

       Okay, 30 or so minutes at the gym have passed—with the help of a podcast—almost pleasantly. And after pushing and pulling in various directions, on a bunch of machines, I was ready for some leg work.

      Moreover, as I have made my peripatetic wanderings among the machines, I note that the guy on the leg machine—one of a kind at this modest gym—has been sitting at it more or less since I entered the gym. He should be moving on soon.

      But he shows no signs of moving on, or of using that machine for that matter. . . .