Susan Baskin has always loved trees. When a 100-year-old tree in her backyard died earlier this year, it led her to reflect on the importance of trees—and love.
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Thomas Belton was trained as a classicist. But his brother’s leukemia and subsequent death led him to question the toxic environments where they lived and played, setting him on a new career path.
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Ron Broglio had chosen a religious life with the Jesuits. Then an unexpected session involving a toy heart and a dinner with a friend in London sent him in a new—and more loving—direction.
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In 1985, when animosity between the US and Iran was raging, Pardis Mahdavi returned home to find an angry message scrawled on her front door. It was a day that changed her and her family’s life forever.
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At just 13 years old, Meskerem Glegziabher left her home in Ethiopia as war threatened. She’s spent decades seeking to find the place she can truly call home.
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Robin Wall Kimmerer thought she could teach her students about science by taking them to the forest. But she discovered it was the land itself, not her, that did the deeper, more important work.
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When Ayanna Thompson saw little white children wearing blackface makeup, she was stunned and angry. She wrote her book to confront and remember this collective American history.
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Rolf Halden found relief and faced life-threatening danger in nature. Over time he realized that humans are not separate from the environment—and he has a duty to help protect it.
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Greg Marshall didn’t want to walk down the aisle. But it wasn’t because of the rain or second thoughts about getting married or doubts about how lucky he was to find his husband.
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After an exhausting 2019 and a tough pandemic year, Christopher Schaberg found time to teach his children to ride bikes. Unexpectedly, he rediscovered hope and promise for the future.
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As a middle-schooler, Sarah Viren shared her most intimate thoughts and feelings by writing in her journal to God. Over time, she began to question both her own life and the destination of her writing.
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Witnessing the death of a classmate’s brother made Isaiah Matthew Wooden realize he lives in a world hostile to Black being. But it was only later, after further loss, that he fully grasped how vulnerable he is to plunder.
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Max Bernstein struggled with the terror of drowning, until they decided to embrace their fear and learn how to breathe under the ocean.
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Cindy Lee, born in America to Korean immigrants, never thought her race or ethnicity made her “other.” Until the coronavirus—and rising prejudice against Asian-Americans—changed that.
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Bobby Malley talked openly in his high school class about his Syrian background. Soon he faced an unwelcome reality as some classmates imagined him supporting the terrorists who caused 9/11.
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Brian K. Goodman, researching the experience of Beat poet Allen Ginsburg in 1965 Prague, met a man who matched his romantic idea of a Czech dissident. He later discovered how wrong he was.
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In Nigeria as a child and later on Wall Street, Nnamdi Igbokwe personally faced the reality of corruption. Those experiences convinced him he needed to dig deeper and understand the nature of this criminality.
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Raheem Hosseini remembers some awfully awkward get-togethers, but he’d give almost anything for more adventures with loving family members now gone.
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Steven Beschloss planned on making New Year’s resolutions in New York. But he and his wife soon realized they had no idea how to plan for the future with the coming arrival of their first-born child.
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When her dad passed away several days after Christmas, Sally Kitch wondered if she would ever be able to enjoy the holidays again.
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