Category: Storytelling

Language Old Is New Again

I may not here omite how, notwithstand all their great paines and industrie, and the great hops of a large cropp, the Lord seemed to blast, and take away the same, and to threaten further and more sore famine unto them, by a great drought which continued from the 3. weeke in May, till about the midle of July, without any raine, and with great heat (for the most parte), insomuch as the come begane to wither away, though it was set with fishe, the moysture wherof helped it much. Yet at length it begane to languish sore, and some of the drier grounds were partched like withered hay, part wherof was never recovered.

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Thanks Isn’t Enough

Thirty years ago, on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, I knuckled down for a lonely holiday with the mainly foreign students on the University of Maine campus. I had no way home but was ready to tough out the long weekend with the other students.

With a difference: Many of my companions came from countries with no Thanksgiving. They didn’t have the memory of family and feast for this particular holiday. I was a freshman, too. Some of the guys planned to hang out in the computer center and play keyboard games and read the print-out action on teletypes. I would join them. 

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The iPhone Moment

Maybe the iPhone phenomenon is about purpose or community, making people feel like they can participate in something important or unusual.

My wife put forth that theory this morning as we discussed my experiences covering the iPhone launch at Montgomery Mall in Bethesda, Md. No question, the people I talked to in line yesterday had a sense of being caught up in a historical moment.

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Thanks, Mom

I was 14 when my mother saved my life. It was, in fact, my 14th birthday.

Dad, mom, my three sisters, and I had gone to my grandparents house to celebrate. Nana made tasty pork chops, for which I had no appetite. For dessert, there was fresh baked chocolate cake—yum, my favorite—and actually two. I had no taste for cake, either. Instead, after picking at my food, I lay down on the couch. My sister Annette, who is closest in age to me, also was ill. We both had fevers, and I assumed that we shared the same flu.