In order to feed an insatiable desire for new clothes, and bring multiple “seasons” of clothing to market within an actual calendar season, stuff has to be made on the cheap. And fast- as the name belies. Millions of children throughout the world are employed to help make this possible.

Ralph Yarl, sixteen, shot in the head for being black while ringing the wrong doorbell.

A gorgeous, thick snow fell overnight Monday and as my husband and I worked to shovel it in the pre-dawn light Tuesday, I wondered: has Donald Trump ever known the pleasure of shoveling snow? The muffled sound of shovel on concrete; the heft of snow on shovel; the invigorating feel in the legs as white stuff is shifted from pathways to piles? Does he know the satisfaction of clearing and cleaning and stomping and drying, and afterwards warming up ‘round a fire and- maybe- popping a couple of ibuprofen? Or… is he like the folks in a neighborhood where I once lived…

Human. Humanity. What do they mean?

Two words so familiar I have never stopped to ponder their meanings until recently, with a surfeit of calamities mercilessly altering every aspect of life as we know it. 2020 has been… quite a year. Rumor has it from now on the number itself will be used as a verb. As in: “The toddlers twenty-twentied their playroom in no time flat.”