IRRESPONSIBLY GROWN POTATOES 0:00 / 0:00 Irresponsibly Grown Potatoes Recently, as I walked through the produce section of a grocery store, I passed a sign that said, “Responsibly Grown Potatoes.” Naturally, I began to imagine “Irresponsibly Grown Potatoes.” Would they be grown by a chain-smoking farmer, one who flicks his carcinogenic ashes on the crop? […]
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A TALE OF TWO DOGS SADIE 0:00 / 0:00 A Tale of Two Dogs Growing up, my main interactions with dogs involved being chased by the junkyard variety. Years ago, my ten-year-old son, Ian, began lobbying for a dog just before his remaining sibling headed off to college. This last child desperately did not want
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THE SOUND OF A 106 YEAR OLD GIGGLING My grandmother, Benedetta Boccaccio, turned 106 in January. She was born in 1909 in Lawrence, Massachusetts. That year, our country commemorated the 44th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln’s death. On average, a worker earned 22 cents an hour. Sugar cost 4 cents a pound and a dozen eggs would
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CHANNELING YOUR INNER LUDDITE 0:00 / 0:00 Channeling Your Inner Luddite When people ask if I watch much television, I always say no and leave it at that. Maybe they assume I’m too busy with important stuff. But the truth is that I simply don’t have the emotional energy to face the daunting task of
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EXPECTATIONS 0:00 / 0:00 Expectations “Expectations lead to tension, “ said Susan McCulley, my dance instructor. Then she told us to look at ourselves in the mirrored wall. She asked, “Does what you see meet your expectations?” Nope. Not so much. I was expecting to appear a little taller. I stood near the front of
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GLUTEN FREE RANGE BANANAS 0:00 / 0:00 Gluten Free Range Bananas Every morning, I eat a banana for breakfast. My banana is not a gluten free-range banana. Nor is it a banana with a sticker that proclaims, “No tarantulas were harmed in the picking of this fruit.” It is a plain old banana. When
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EXTENUATING CIRCUMSTANCES 0:00 / 0:00 Extenuating Circumstances This essay just aired on NPR-member station WVTF and appeared in the Washington Post. *** EXTENUATING CIRCUMSTANCES Years ago, right before an end-of-the-term field trip, my son brought home a notice from his middle school. The body of the letter included the usual information: dates, cost, arrival
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WHAT KEEPS US TOGETHER 0:00 / 0:00 What Keeps Us Together My granddaughter Campbell is 2 and lives about 6,900 miles from Charlottesville. My grandmother, Benedetta, is 105 and lives in Connecticut, about 600 miles from here. I chat with Campbell by Skype and Facetime. I communicate with Benedetta by snail mail and telephone. Unfortunately,
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SMOKIN’ SCIENCE 0:00 / 0:00 Smokin' Science One day, my seventh grade physical sciences teacher announced mandatory participation in a science fair. Up to the day before the event, I hadn’t prepared. Hadn’t determined a research question. Hadn’t developed a hypothesis and definitely had not come to any conclusions. In my mind, the scientific method
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THE SIXTY-FIVE DOLLAR QUESTION 0:00 / 0:00 The Sixty-Five Dollar Question This essay aired on this NPR-member station and appeared in The Washington Post. THE SIXTY-FIVE DOLLAR QUESTION The last time my folks visited, our whole family swapped tales around the dining table. Our topic? Marriage proposals: who proposed to whom and how. My husband, Bruce,
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