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I, like many Americans, have a relative serving time in prison. Ten years. People like me don’t usually talk about it. I recently visited him. If you’ve…
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Recently, work took me to Las Vegas, where I lodged at an off-strip hotel with a casino. I was there for a popular culture conference, and I found myself…
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Recently I promised to give a poetry reading with the stated plan of dividing my recitation between poems about dogs and poems about cats. I’d thought I’d…
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This week at my house we performed the biannual washing of the dog. Our dog Luna has a sort of self-cleaning mechanism—not just the licking, but also fast…
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People can become depressed on social media, threatened by comparisons with other people whose celebratory photos of successful children, talented pets,…
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Never underestimate the value of becoming enthusiastic about something in life—especially a hobby, a more or less purposeless enthusiasm not involving any…
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Amid debates over the costs of higher education, I’ve been reflecting on what it means to be a student. What kind of citizen are we trying to produce, and…
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The best art is not tame, but wild, like a caged animal whose enclosure seems at first to be a protective barrier but expands and grows around us, so that…
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Before the winter weather hit, my wife and I were deeply into the quest of finding a new house. Nothing is forcing us to move. Maybe we’re driven partly…
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My resolution for the new year is to become more formal. As a professor, I have to decide whether my students should call me Professor Chaney, Dr. Chaney,…