By March 2020, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), the incurable illness also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, had already ravaged Ron Deprez’s once-strong body with particular cruelty. He needed help with one last thing: to die. It fell to his … Read more
After 19 students and two teachers were gunned down in a classroom in Uvalde, Texas, the chorus rose: “Enough!” It came with a sad refrain: “It will happen again.” And it did. As many as 15 mass … Read more
For all my life, I’ve been a baseball agnostic. The thing I like most about baseball is that, by and large, it is played outside in the summertime, generally in the cool of the evening. Johnny … Read more
How much difference does three days make? Too much, at least when it comes to our gnat-like attention span. Three days is the time it takes for the public to shift from outrage to resignation in response to a … Read more
EDITOR’S NOTE: All time codes in this post correspond to the YouTube version of “The Queen of Basketball.” It’s also available, with an introduction by filmmaker Ben Proudfoot, on The New York Times site. Read more
Lauren Hough has been a bouncer and a barista, a cable guy and a member of the military. But in a recent piece for Texas Highways, the acclaimed essayist shows off another role: eagle-eyed excavator … Read more
If you want to see some creative short-form storytelling, you can skip right past Twitter and TikTok and head straight to the news. Newspapers, news sites, TV news — any with cred are running images of demonstrations rising up … Read more
When I began reading Evan Allen’s powerful, critically acclaimed Boston Globe story about Anthony Pledger, all I could think about was Jimmie. Jimmie is a violent offender — a sanitized way of saying he is a murderer and a … Read more
In 2001, hospice nurse Dottie Kluttz started practicing “story medicine.” She’d sit with patients nearing the end of their lives, turn on an audio recorder and ask them questions about themselves. “I believe the person dying, who is the … Read more
A friend came to the house on a recent evening with all he needed in his grocery tote. He took over my kitchen and let me chatter as he made a remarkable dish: Tender pork medallions with rosemary, prunes … Read more
