Last week, after appearing on CBS Sunday Morning, Three Little Engines became the top selling book on all of Amazon. It is crazy to see your book ahead of the likes of Stephen King. A week later, I received word from my publisher that the book had made the New York Times best seller list. I would be lying if I said I wasn’t overwhelmed and thrilled by both results.…
What is the purpose of the fourth line of a short story?
According to author George Saunders, it’s quite simple. “Give the reader enough of a jolt to go on to line five.”
His new book, Swimming in a Pond in the Rain, is explicitly a course on writing and reading short stories. Implicitly it also serves as a metaphor for how we write our own lives.…
Consider the parable of the two fish swimming in the ocean. As one swims by the other it pauses to ask, “How’s the water?” The other replies, “What the hell is water?”
It is an admonition for us to stop and look at our surroundings. To not go about our days unconscious of the world in which we live.
In the daily deluge of information and activity, it is easy to miss what is right in front of us.…
On any given day, approximately 800,000 people in the United States will celebrate their birthday. When we are young, we sit with a birthday cake before us, surrounded by friends and families and we make a wish to blow out the lit candles marking our years.
In any given year, many of these wishes bear some semblance to one another despite the diversity of the wish makers. …
While walking my dog in the woods nearby, I stopped to marvel at a giant fallen oak. Uprooted from the ground, it was hard to surmise what had toppled this mammoth tree. I was full of wonder at the extensive roots laid bare for all to examine the many connections severed. Feelings of both loss and hope filled me as I was reminded that soon that tree would decompose with its nutrients revitalizing the soil that it would soon become part of.…
I’m not sure I’ve ever felt as blessed as I did this Thanksgiving. It was a day of almost complete harmony among my wife and I and our three daughters.
Our day began with a simple exercise of writing down the many people and things we were grateful for this year, in spite of all that has engulfed our nation and impaired our daily lives.
Under different circumstances, this request could have been met with eye rolls and pleas to watch the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade.…
Which word do you use more often, “We” or “I”?
David Brooks’ column “How to Actually Make America Great Again” reflects on the new book by Robert Putnam and Shaylyn Romney Garrett called The Upswing. It chronicles America’s swing from solidarity (we) to individualism (I) over the last fifty years.
As one point of evidence, the authors cite that the use of the word “I” in American books has doubled between 1965 and 2008.…
Two weeks ago my daughter asked me for some help on a school math assignment. She was given an imaginary $100,000 to invest in ten stocks and track how they performed over the course of two weeks.
In selecting her stocks, she picked things she believed in or liked. She likes to listen to music, so she chose Spotify. She loves to read, so she chose Scholastic.…
There are so many things about life that are beyond my current understanding. Chief amongst these are the experiences of people whose backgrounds are different from my own.
I do not understand what it feels like to be the victim of an injustice or to perpetrate it.
I do not understand what it is like to be discriminated against daily, to patrol the streets, to fight in a war, to live in fear for myself or my family.…
It happened as the parade of cars drove through our town, our children’s teachers beeping and beaming as we waved.
It happened as I attended the virtual graduation ceremony at City College and read the students and parents’ supportive and proud comments and emojis scroll down the Youtube Live chat box for an hour.
It happened as I watched each episode of Some Good News, as each story chronicled one beautiful act of appreciation after another.…
My two favorite parts of “It’s a Wonderful Life” are both born out of crisis.
The first comes as there is a run on the Bailey Building and Loan, the small community bank led by the movie’s protagonist, George Bailey. Fearing insolvency the customers descend on the bank with the hope of withdrawing all of their money out of fear caused by the stock market crash.…
One of the defining American debates is the ongoing question of Public vs. Private. Another way to think of it is — what is mine vs. what is ours? This question runs through issues related to economics, rights, education, health, property and so on.
Some see these ideas of public and private mostly at odds. An example of zero-sum thinking (see here for a great summary of research on how this thinking plays out politically). …
In the face of our current challenges, I’ve heard many echo my own feelings that our personal actions have been insufficient. This is especially true when we compare ourselves to others whose roles are deemed essential and actions heroic.
This sentiment at times comes when people reflect on their relative good fortune or privilege. But it is not limited to the lucky.
I’ve also spoken to those directly impacted by events.…
They came one after another. A work event I’d been helping prepare for months. Both universities where I teach canceled classes and would move the rest online. A trip to Boston with my youngest daughter for her first basketball tournament. Another local tournament for two daughter’s soccer teams. Then the postponement of the youth soccer season altogether. Then their basketball season. Then one’s theatre program, another’s gymnastics etc.…
Recently, we took our daughters to go see the play, Come From Away. It tells the story of how the small town of Gander, Newfoundland came to the aid of over 7,000 passengers whose planes were forced to land as American airspace was closed in the minutes after the 9/11 attacks. They provided not only lodging, food, and clothes, but also comfort, compassion and love to the strangers who doubled the size of the town’s population for almost a week. …
Every holiday season, AMC puts the Godfather trilogy in heavy rotation. The timing is ironic on many levels. Including that one of its most iconic lines, “I made him an offer he couldn’t refuse” is antithetical to the very idea of giving.
As a verb, an offer is “to present something for someone to accept or reject as so desired.” As a noun, it is “an expression of readiness to do or give something, if desired.”…
With just one month left in the year, it is natural to look back at the previous eleven. For some it will feel like a blur, others a slog, others yet a mixed bag.
In the context of our life, it is likely that only a handful of memories from this year will remain lodged in our consciousness this time next year, joining the handful of others from each previous year of our lives. …
This week provides a welcome respite for many, as we put aside our daily troubles, gather with family and friends, and pause to give thanks for what we have and those who helped make it possible.
It can come in the form a few words over a meal, a phone call or a prayer. All are valuable practices in gratitude.
But often these moments can be fleeting and soon replaced by Black Friday sales, workouts, and holiday movies.…
Hot dogs didn’t come to America until the 1860’s when a German immigrant began selling them off a cart in New York’s Bowery.
Apple pie came to America courtesy of England – via Geoffrey Chaucer’s recipe. But apples originated from Asia – which is also where fireworks were created.
Baseball, our national pastime, may actually trace its roots back to Egypt – where the first use of a bat and ball were discovered.…
By definition, wealth is “an abundance of resources.” In other words, you have more than you need.
It may seem counterintuitive, but research shows the primary determinant for wealth is not how much we make (income) but how much we are given (intergenerational transfer).
This can come in three forms.
Across the country today, graves will be marked by American flags and adorned with flowers. Each will be a poignant reminder to honor those who have made the ultimate sacrifice.
The origin of Memorial Day is not without controversy. Many date its unofficial beginnings to the period immediately after the Civil War when southerners began decorating the graves of fallen soldiers. What was seen as an incredible act of conciliation, the women of the South who led this effort, treated the graves of Confederate and Union soldiers that same – decorating both. …
One of the best things about writing these weekly notes is the response I get from readers like you.
Some share a brief thumbs up or question, a related link or recommendation. Other share personal stories or reflections on their own.
All are so appreciated, so please keep them coming.
Among the emails I received recently were three that go to the heart of these Monday morning notes.…
The opening of David Brooks new book, The Second Mountain: The Quest for a Moral Life reads:
Every once in a while, I meet a person who radiates joy…They are kind, tranquil, delighted by small pleasures, and grateful for the large ones. These people are not perfect. They get exhausted and stressed. They make errors in judgment. But they live for others, not themselves. They’ve made unshakable commitments to family, a cause, a community or a faith.…
I’m sitting here paying my bills and just kicking myself. Not over money spent but on money not.
Before sitting down, I went to Spotify and stumbled on Springsteen Live on Broadway. When it came out, the reviews were stupendous as were the first hand accounts from friends who had shelled out significant money to see it.
Within five minutes of listening, I could tell that this would have been money well spent.…
Consider these three stories:
A couple in Newton Massachusetts give birth to a daughter who is deaf. In response, twenty of their neighbors learn sign language and have been speaking to that child regularly for the last two years. Rather than having to travel hours away to learn how to sign at a school for the deaf, the little girl is able to stay in her community and learn by signing with her family and friends.…
