“My one year challenge is to live in clothes that are solely farmed, created, treated, and colored all within 150 miles of my front door,” Rebecca Burgess said in an interview last April. Burgess is a textile artist living in Fairfax, California, a small town just north of San Francisco. Like most of the United…
My article, “Raising Babies in Prison,” which appears in the Winter 2011 issue of YES! Magazine, is now available online. The article begins: Like most new moms, Erika Freeman is enchanted by her baby, nine-month-old daughter Riley. She decorated her daughter’s room in pink, with pictures of princesses and “Princess Riley” on the wall in…
Last week a couple of news stories made me look at my drinking water a little differently: The U.S. Department of Health and Public Services proposed that utilities sharply reduce the amount of fluoride being added to municipal water supplies, because many children are being exposed to levels that exceed recommendations. According to the Environmental…
I’m thrilled to announce that my article, “Raising Babies in Prison”, appears in the Winter 2011 episode of YES! Magazine. It’s about the Residential Parenting Program at the Washington Corrections Center for Women, which allows selected pregnant, non-violent inmates in the minimum-security wing to raise their babies for 30 months in prison. I’ve interviewed many…
The supermarket near my house has five self check-out stations. Often one or two is down, and sometimes, you have to jab at the buttons on the screen multiple times to get your choices to register. Regardless, a line for the automated cashiers usually snakes around the tabloids. When I go to this supermarket, I…
I used to love compiling Hopeful Weekend Links to post here every Friday. But some weeks it was difficult to find six hopeful stories. I found myself flipping through one depressing story after another. And I’ve become increasingly aware that most of the news I consume is bad news. For instance many Sundays the front…