A father and son go to a pharmacy to get the child vaccinated against COVID. After administering the vaccine, the pharmacy employee offers a bin of small toys and the child picks one -- a tiny, squishable duck. On the way home, the child starts to complain that one of the duck’s eyes is smaller…
In my community of Oak Park, the high school just canceled extracurricular activities for the next two weeks, until winter break, due to a rise in COVID cases at the school. A number of students and parents in the community are frustrated about this cancellation, and some of them staged a protest this past weekend…
All people are concerned about their own safety and that of their families and friends. This is a basic human need and is the reason that communities fund police and fire services -- to protect the safety of their residents. Oak Park, the community where I live, is no different: 30% of our overall village…
On a national scale, Thanksgiving contains the legacy of Europeans pushing Native peoples off their lands, killing them, taking their lands. It contains the legacy of the collapse of Indigenous populations. It contains the legacy of how white people have used that land -- for slavery, for settler colonial capitalism. It contains the exploitation of…
The three men who murdered Ahmaud Arbery were found guilty today. It's not enough. It doesn't change what has happened before. It doesn't predict what will happen in the future. But on this one day, in this one case, for this one family, there was some measure of accountability. May we take what lessons we…
Kyle Rittenhouse was a child when he carried a rifle across state lines to role-play as a vigilante justice officer in the streets of Kenosha. He inserted himself, fully armed, into a space of civil unrest, shot and killed two people, and injured a third. He was charged with intentional homicide, reckless homicide, and attempted…
I recently visited Brookfield Zoo with my family during their Halloween event. We purchased a zoo membership in the summer of 2020 so we had a place to go drifting COVID and we renewed it this summer. We've been there many times over the past year and a half. A sign at Brookfield Zoo This…
I grew up in Wisconsin. I was raised a Green Bay Packers fan. I endured the horrible teams of the late 80s and early 90s. I celebrated the Super Bowl wins in 1997 and 2011, enjoyed the play of quarterbacks Brett Favre and Aaron Rodgers for almost 30 years. But loving a team is a…
Last week, I attended a memorial service for a colleague of mine who passed away about a year ago. We originally worked together as teachers, and later he worked with me as a teacher at a school where I was principal. He was only about 15 years older than me -- his passing was such…
This essay was also published in the Oak Park newspaper Wednesday Journal. For too long, Oak Park River Forest High School (OPRF), like secondary schools across the country, has restricted access to advanced courses to a select group of students. This has led Black and Latinx students to be underrepresented in advanced coursework at OPRF,…
Entwining 