Hello, Friends. How are you? How was your week? I just landed from a 24 hour trip to Utah for a wedding. It was lovely — the bride’s family is English-speaking, and the groom’s family is Spanish-speaking, and the whole ceremony, and the toasts, and all of it were done bi-lingual. Just delightful — the event was full of love and so inclusive.
We’re looking forward to a summery weekend. We have another wedding reception on Saturday (this one is local), a swim meet, a scouting event, and a few other odds and ends. How about you? Any plans for the weekend?
Ready for your link list? Here are a few things I’ve been wanting to share:
–A Dallas-born citizen was put in a cell for 3 weeks by U.S. Customs and Border Protection, with no phone and no shower. He lost 23 pounds while detained. He had his passport, and birth certificate on him when he was detained.
–On women and writing and time to oneself. “Researchers have also found that many women don’t feel that they deserve long stretches of time to themselves, the way men do. They feel they have to earn it. And the only way to do that is to get to the end of a To Do list that never ends.”
-A remarkable letter written by Amelia Earhart to her soon-to-be husband on their wedding day. “…for I cannot guarantee to endure at all times the confinement of even an attractive cage.”
-After a public school district in Pennsylvania threatened to place children in foster care over their school lunch debt, offers poured in to cover the entire debt. But the school district declined. (My take? It’s not about the money, they just want to shame, torture and punish people who are already struggling.)
–Interesting research on brains and gender. It turns out much of what we’ve been told is a lesson in bad research practice.
–Abstract Aerial Art. Don’t miss the photo of the container ship, with a shadow that looks like a graph of each row’s containers.
–An article on Nadia Marcinko, the teen Epstein called his “Yugoslavian sex slave” and who he claimed to have straight-up bought. She became his accomplice, and then got free and became a daredevil pilot.
–Unmarried Women with No Kids Are the ‘Healthiest and Happiest Population. “If you’re a man, you should probably get married; if you’re a woman, don’t bother.”
-The New York Times collected a whole bunch of life advice from readers. Some good stuff.
-What if it was illegal to keep your maiden name?
-Is it time for backpack shopping? We bought this set for June last year and it’s held up super well! She’ll be using the same set this year. These floral options from the same brand are pretty too.
-“I am sorry my doing genealogy has opened up Pandora’s box.”
A few Twitter threads you might enjoy:
-He asked users to describe a historical event like you’re writing an episode description for Netflix. The responses are smart and interesting and clever (and sometimes sad).
-A surprising thread about health insurance fraud.
-A fascinating thread (with tons of sources) about gerrymandering in Ohio.
I hope you have a wonderful weekend. I’ll meet you back here on Monday. I miss you already.
kisses,
Gabrielle
I look forward to your link list every week. Thanks so much for posting these!
My favorite is Amelia’s. I’m a pilot, and a student of history, so I knew about this – but isn’t it great to remember great things?
Many thanks, for all this.
The school lunch article disgusts me. Children are not pawns. How could we allow such things to happen in our country. This should be bigger news. More should be done to protect all children. I’m mad. I’m crushed. Thank you for putting this further out there for more to hear about this atrocity.
Love your links list each week! Related to the “married women are miserable” article, the BBC’s More Or Less did a great episode debunking this article. Have a listen! https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p07ckl40
School lunch.
As an adult I can look back on my childhood with perspectives that add clarity, understanding, and also so much head shaking. I am the child of a mother who was never without a well paying supervisory job. Educated and highly intelligent, she was an RN, a surgical nurse, an ER nurse, OBGYN L/D nurse, she did it all and with awards and accolades! She even taught nursing, was an administrator of hospitals, and yet, because of *her choices* we constantly struggled to have enough money to pay bills and or even buy groceries.
None of my siblings nor I can enjoy a pancake to this day because we went literally a month and a half eating nothing other than a pancake for every meal. “I can afford flour. Do you know how many kids would LOVE to eat pancakes every day? You. Are. LUCKY!”
Grade school (and even through HS) children have zero control of what groceries are or are not purchased for their benefit. If they attempt to make their own lunch “…because, dammit! YOU’RE 8 YEARS OLD! MAKE A DAMN SANDWICH AND STOP WAITING LIKE THE QUEEN FOR ME TO DO THAT FOR YOU!” and that sandwich is judged by other adults as “inappropriate” or “unsuitable” who is really at fault for that? So, although there were means for packed lunches, there were no packed lunches, which meant I went to school many many days with an empty paper sack, which was also reused until it literally broke apart and then got a “lesson” on being more careful and less wasteful.
No lunch meant an adult at school would “give” you lunch. The child was not allowed to refuse the lunch. A note was made and sent home for the parent to pay for the meal. At one school, children who required a “free” lunch were required to work along with the lunch ladies and wash the dishes in the back of the school kitchen using huge sinks with spraying faucets hanging from spring loaded arms, and then also receiving a note for payment. Once home, in *our* family, the child would present the note to the parent and then receive a harsh lecture on the value of money and the importance of never embarrassing the parent.
After a while, I learned it wasn’t worth the lecture and subsequent spanking or other punishment, so I learned that if you told an school adult that you needed to use the restroom at the beginning of the lunch period, you could just hide out in the bathroom and listen for the other children playing on the playground -only then would it be safe to leave the stall.
My very long point here is this: Why do we collectively as a society, still to this day, blame children for adult decisions? The idea that any child goes hungry is appalling and a shame on the “Greatest Nation in the world.”
and a sad p.s. to all of this is we are continuing the idea that child rape is still just “having sex with a minor”. If one person is under the age of 18, no consent is possible, no matter the situation, it is rape, not sex with a minor. Rape.
Thank you for sharing this painful childhood memory. Thank you for putting into words what many of those children needing food can not say. I am sorry for the times you went through, but it is clear you journeyed to become so much more.
Thank you for sharing your experience. It’s important for everyone to hear the experience from a child’s point of view. The wider perspective benefits us all.
On your PS: Yes! And the same goes to “underage women”!
As PTA President in our elementary school, I found out that there is a family in our community that makes a quiet donation to cover all school lunch debt. They have done this every year for 10 years.
This in our local paper regarding unmarried women living healthier, longer lives. Sigh.
i dont buy my kids new backpacks every year. I expect them to last at least 3 years. Lunch bags even longer