Blog Post
Late Last Night, Somewhere West Of The Twin Cities
“If you think you’re in command of a single thing in this world, little man, you are sadly mistaken, and badly mistaken as well. You are in command of nothing. Your brain is shot full of holes that reveal nothing but dark cataracts of ceaselessly roiling ignorance.” The Devil tossed his chin in the direction … Read more
From A Painting By Piero Della Francesca
People pay for what they do, and still more, for what they have allowed themselves to become. And they pay for it simply: by the lives they lead. —James Baldwin, Nobody Knows My Name These angels do not look like angels. They look like old people, stooped and weary, clothed in the rags they have … Read more
Cord Wood
A slightly earlier, tongue-twistier version of last night’s MPR commentary: Probably many Minnesotans have been happy that, so far, it’s been a pretty mild winter. My family is on one of those stabilized payment plans where we pay the same amount for heat each month of the year, even in the summer months–not because I’m … Read more
Stating the obvious
The Minnetonka police officer who gave U of M student Nick Stremer a ticket for underage drinking, it could be argued, was just doing his job. It could be argued, I said. But, arguing with a fool is always a bad idea. Like a lot of the people quoted in today’s Strib story and on … Read more
Night Stand
We are contemptuous of transient well-being, as if there were any other kind. Routinely discounting the preponderance of evidence is not the behavior of reasonable people, nor is devaluing present experience because it may be overtaken by something worse…. Powerless people can hardly demand coherency of themselves, since they must always react to forces they … Read more
Klobuchar the Elder
Klobuchar Pere: “l’etoile c’etait moi” For those of you who remember afternoon newspapers, you know that one of the best things about the Minneapolis Star was columnist Jim Klobuchar. When it came to homespun humor, he was Garrison Keillor before there was a Prairie Home Companion. Characteristic, often, of his portraits of typical Minnesotans, was … Read more
This Business, This Project
Hardening your heart is difficult, stressful, and taxing work. You’ve never been much good at it. You’re getting better, though, as you learn to accept how necessary this work is to your survival in a world where the heart is mostly useless anymore beyond its function as pump and plumbing. The heart, you recognize, has … Read more
This Post More Interesting & To-The-Point Than The Next
New issue is up. Print edition–the real thing–will hit the streets on Monday. This is what we’re doing most of the time.
The Narcissist At Work
With the news that our publisher and son have taken the reins of the ab fab MNSpeak, I was reminded of an ongoing monologue I’ve been developing (I know, among all the other ongoing monologues) about the variety of blogs. Just within any particular medium, there are so many varieties that creating a typology is … Read more