Tag: learned

What I wish I’d known before I had to learn it.

Thump, Flutter, Gak

I looked up from the computer, wondering about the “thump.” Then I saw the robin on the patio — fluttering wings outspread, struggling to get up. Outside, through the gate, into the side-yard. “Are you okay?” I asked reflexively. She…

Feel The Fear

When Ann and I joined the small synagogue in our Northern California town back in 1998, it was with the understanding that we would get involved. Neither of us had been, when we were younger. But especially since 2000, when…

Why We Teach

from a pre-Blogger blog Conversation with a 12-year-old bat mitzva candidate, who I’m tutoring by probing the meaning of the prayers: Okay, read me the first part of the Sh’ma in English. “Hear O Israel, the Eternal is G-d, the…

Rumpled Colleagues In Truth

from a pre-Blogger blog ATTENDING A DINNER FOR THE Society of Professional Journalists’ Northern California chapter, as a co-recipient of their annual James Madison Freedom of Information Award, I’m in the presence of real journalistic heroes: men and women quietly…