But today I celebrate five years without a cigarette — I considered having a cigarette. To celebrate quitting. Like the vegetarian I know who eats bacon or steak or bacon-wrapped steak or some kind of decadent meat every year on the day he became a vegetarian. It makes an inverse kind of anniversary sense. The unexpected thing about radically changing…

Russell Simmons knew he had “made it” when he could procure and consume human beings like drugs — Russell Simmons isn’t the first celebrity to consume women like commodities or to equate that lifestyle with success. He’s definitely not the first man to laugh about it and remember it fondly. And he won’t be the last. When “Christmas Rappin’” propelled Kurtis Blow and Simmons to international success, Simmons…

Reading Tom Robbins makes me want to write less. Maybe even quit. I don’t know why he wears sunglasses all the time like an 80s actor or a 60s singer. Or why he seems to blithely delight in the #MenWritingWomen tropes, anachronisms, and deplorable underage sexualization that land even a…

The Economics of Consent vs. Opportunity — An estimated 31 million Americans are projected to bet $7.6 billion on the Super Bowl this weekend on anything from how long the national anthem will be sung to the color of the Gatorade dumped on the winning coach. Money and football are as red, white, and blue as the…

Vaccinations save lives, get your booster shot! — I was going to go to my first hockey game last Saturday. I couldn’t wait. Socially distanced seats were available and it was going to be a great night in Portland. I’m home for the holidays and this was also to be my family’s third attempt at celebrating Christmas together…

Every January 22nd, Catholics across America hold vigils and organize protests to defend the sanctity of life, to protect the not-yet-born, and to definitively oppose the 1973 Supreme Court Roe v. Wade ruling that access to abortion is a constitutional right. But instead of carpooling to state capitals or standing…

My fellow American, you are free to not get vaccinated. We are free to do or not do countless things. But no one is, in turn, obliged to cater to the consequences of our choices. We are free to spend all our money and go into debt. But banks aren’t…

How to Support Women Who Are Sick of Bad Guys — We told him everything. The keys between our fingers in parking lots, checking your backseat before getting in the car, waiting until the garage door closes all the way before going into the house. We told him about supervisors who abused their authority and dates who pushed us farther than…

And I ask you, anti-vaxxer — what about my rights? What about the rights of children who aren’t old enough to get vaccinated? What about the immunocompromised who can’t get vaccinated? Are they not as American as you? Do they not have a right to live? …