When the news came about the massacre in the synagogue in Pittsburgh, we were all horrified, but I don’t think anyone was really surprised. The question of “ it happening here” in recent years has been more a matter of “when” than “if.” Rhetorical violence begets real violence. The news cycle for mass shootings have become shorter and shorter. A brief flare of outrage; some people say there are too many guns; idiots like our president complain that there aren’t enough guns. The news media shares and milks the grief of the loved ones of the victims for a few days, impotent anger at the inability to change the political dynamic is expressed; the next big story emerges, and the caravan passes on. read more

Last Sunday, I was worried. My wife, Jane, was worried. I had been diagnosed with a retinal detachment in my left eye. We would be driving the next day to Atlanta, about a two and a half hour drive (traffic permitting, which it usually doesn’t) for a second opinion. Often for retinal detachments one is instructed not to read for a period of time, and I was thinking about what it would be like not to be able to read for any length of time. My wife was worried about me and worried about having to take care of me. For me, reading, right after eating and sleeping, has been an essential function of my life as long as I can remember, and I was thinking of how much I take for granted my ability to read, and how much I owe to the marks on a piece of paper or pixels on a screen that allow me to summon whole worlds. read more

After a rainy morning, the sun came out as we gathered around Susan B. Anthony’s gravesite on Mt. Hope cemetery. There were some thirty of us, three-generation families, some veterans of vigils, several children and baby Dror, at four months, in a stroller. We held a vigil for justice during the infamous week of a Senate sham investigation, and just two days before the Republicans voted to put Brett Kavanaugh, an accused sexual assaulter, on the Supreme Court.

We chose Mt. Hope cemetery because in every corner of this land there are statues, monuments and cemeteries reminding us of a long history of struggle for democracy. In places around the country there have been Americans who have acted with courage and determination to make the Declaration of Independence a social reality for all. And so we chose to have our vigil at the Susan B. Anthony gravesite. read more