This post originally appeared on Murder Is Everywhere. Like so many Baltimoreans, I spent yesterday on the phone telling friends and relatives that I was alive. No, I hadn’t been anywhere near the Francis Scott Key Bridge early Tuesday morning. But I was following the news from before sunrise, because my email carried an emergency bulletin … Read more
This post originally appeared on Murder Is Everywhere. I grew up in a gray house in Minnesota that didn’t get much light. Yet because my mother lined all the windows with plants, it never felt dark. Everywhere, there would be an African violet, or a frilly fern, or leggy begonias. In May, one family chore was … Read more
This post originally appeared on Murder Is Everywhere. I consider myself tolerant of heat. Yet over the last few days, I’ll admit that the air in Baltimore, Maryland, has felt like a poison gas sauna. And it’s not just me. Even Daisy, my energetic Yorkshire terrier, refuses to take a walk. At the same time, the … Read more
This post originally appeared on Murder Is Everywhere. Have you ever thought about what happens to a particular book after it’s been read? Does it settle into a gentle slumber on a shelf, or a haphazard spot on the floor? How will it continue to do its work? I love having a house full of books; … Read more
This post originally appeared on Murder Is Everywhere. The songs are playing day and night. Some of them are tentative, while others blow the dust off the steep wooden staircase. My son is home from college for the winter holidays and nestled in his third floor bedroom with all his electric guitars—and the amplifiers. The improvisations … Read more
This post originally appeared on Murder Is Everywhere. A Thanksgiving movie is as much of a tradition for me as the cooking. When I used to return from Baltimore to St. Paul, Minnesota, in November, my sisters and mom and I always endeavored to find a special film to watch at an art house theater like … Read more
This post originally appeared on Murder Is Everywhere. All over Maryland, there’s one sweet word I hear every day: cicada. The cicadas are here. Or, should I say, Magicicada? Or to be very precise—I can’t say it, but I can spell Magicicada septendecim, Magicicada Cassini and Magicicada septenecula, the three species making up Brood X which … Read more
This post originally appeared on Murder Is Everywhere. Have you heard? Another historic myth is being pulled apart like a sweater with moth holes. Johns Hopkins, the great Baltimore businessman and founder of a university and hospital, wasn’t quite the social reformer that history told us. Recently, Hopkins historians shared news that he was a slave owner, rather … Read more
This post originally appeared on Murder Is Everywhere. Have you ever frequented a bookstore so often it became a second home? From the moment in childhood that my parents permitted me to walk to our neighborhood bookstore, I’ve engaged in this kind of squatting. From Micawber’s Books in St. Paul, to long-gone independents in Baltimore and … Read more
This post originally appeared on Murder Is Everywhere. People around the world are saying, when? Over eight weeks ago, business as usual stopped for most of us. Not just working: but shopping, learning, socializing, being out in society. Some are saying enough already! and demanding that their states’ governors reopen all non-essential businesses and get children back to school. … Read more