Tag: place
Castles Built on Sand
Even for the average homeowner, ownership all too often is imagined as a way of gaming income flow and consumption over a lifetime, accumulating enough to spend down before one has to become a ward of the welfare state. It is part of consumer society, not a buffer against it.
Imitation and the Art of Flattery: the Cold War of the...
Washington, Connecticut. At the end of his introduction to a re-publication of the Marquis de Custine’s "Empire of the Czar, A Journey Through Eternal...
Sewers and Leashes: A Local Story
Hillsdale, MI. This is a true story. It happened once upon a time in a place I do not now live.
After an arduous...
… Neither Proud Nor Lonely
C.S. Lewis noted that “If you had asked Lazamon or Chaucer ‘Why do you not make up a brand-new story of your own?’ I...
Jawboning: A Tale of Two Hardware Stores
Hamilton, Ontario. The other day I was standing in a cavernous mega-chain hardware store looking for gardening supplies. This was not an easy task...
The Stories We Tell…
Philadelphia, PA. If you have read just one of Wendell Berry’s novels or short stories, then you have glimpsed this Kentucky farmer’s love for family,...
Waiting for the Americans…
In the late 1970s, my grandfather’s older brother, already in his nineties, was pressing his almost deaf ears to a little portable radio still...
Thoughts on the Return of College Football
Holland, MI. The beginning of the college football season is the closest thing to a state holiday in Michigan. The release of the new auto...
The Reluctant Southerner: Reflections on Home and History
Moorpark, CA. In October of 1997 I attended the Southern Historical Association’s convention in Atlanta because I wanted to hear Paul Conkin’s presidential address,...