Ferida Wolff

Rose Madeline Mula: If You Can’t Stand the Heat

Rose Madeline Mula Writes: “It was with considerable trepidation, therefore, that I entered the kitchen of my hostess, the legendary actress, Joan Fontaine, one long-ago Thanksgiving morning, to offer my assistance. Acting was not Miss Fontaine’s only talent. Not by a long shot. She was also a hole-in-one golfer, a prize-winning fisherwoman, a hot air…
An Undocumented Childhood by Rose Madeline Mula

Rose Mula Writes: Some people never leave home without their American Express card; I never leave home without a camera. Digitized pictures of the twenty-five countries and forty-plus states of America that I’ve visited since my first tour of exotic New Hampshire constantly flash on my computer monitors and digital frames throughout my home, helping…
Julia Sneden Wrote: Love Your Library

Julia Sneden Wrote: My mind’s eye can still see the face of the Children’s Librarian, although I have long since forgotten her name. We will be wise to continue to back up our knowledge of history and literature and art and science with hard copy. She kept up with my reading level, suggesting writers and…
Julia Sneden Wrote: If The Shoe Fits … You Can Bet It’s Not Fashionable

Julia Sneden Wrote: My mother was a mini Imelda Marcos. She kept upwards of 40 pairs of shoes well into her 80’s, and was crushed when she had to give up high heels following a heart attack at the age of 89. Her sole criterion in buying shoes was style, not comfort, and she was…
Joan L.Cannon Wrote: A Family Inheritance: More Than ‘Things’ … Emblems of Our Lives

Joan Cannon wrote: As one advances in years, one accumulates possessions the way a caddis fly larva accumulates grit. The glue that makes us carry it all along with us is in a way self-secreted as well. However, it’s psychic rather than physical — emotional rather than material. Perhaps the most obvious example is a…
Julia Sneden Wrote: Old Dogs, New Tricks

Julia Sneden wrote: At the age of 37, I started a new career as a kindergarten teacher. My first day on the job, the lead teacher, who was in her 70’s and scared me every bit as much as she scared the children, watched me writing a note. “You’ll have to change the way you…
Joan Cannon Writes: Finding the Right Excuse; Committing Words to Paper Because …

Joan Cannon Writes: Think of the poets and novelists and playwrights whose words sink into the consciousness of thousands and even millions and remain there, as emblems, guides, beacons of hope or warnings of disasters, and the excuse (as if one is needed) presents itself. Maybe there’s information or a revelation for some unknown viewer…
Joan Cannon Asked: What is a Book Club? An Old-Fashioned Book Report? A Program Given By an Author? What Is the Accepted Practice?

Joan L. Cannnon wrote: A year or so ago, I was invited to attend a tea given by the combined membership of all the book clubs in the town where I now live. A presentation was scheduled for the proprietor of the much-loved local independent book store cum gift shop. She is a legend in…
Life, Love & Marriage Chests in Renaissance Italy at the Frist* Museum

During the Renaissance, a period spanning from the fourteenth to the sixteenth centuries, elaborately decorated wooden wedding chests known as cassoni were an integral part of Italian marriage rituals. Commissioned in pairs and shaped like ancient sarcophagi, they were paraded from the bride’s house to her husband’s after the wedding. Throughout the marriage, the chests…
Hear Ye, Hear Ye, Congress Has Reopened; Sen. Amy Kobluchar & Rep John Emmer’s Bill to Improve Handling of Crimes of Domestic Violence, Dating Violence, Sexual Assault, and Stalking

A bill to increase the credit for employers establishing workplace child care facilities, to increase the child care credit to encourage greater use of quality child care services, to provide incentives for students to earn child care-related degrees and to work in child care facilities, and to increase the exclusion for employer-provided dependent care assistance. A…
Sex, Race and Religion Flood the Streets of Washington, DC Over MLK Weekend

Jo Freeman writes: Sex, race and religion marched through the streets of Washington, DC over the long holiday weekend dedicated to the memory of Dr. Martin Luther King. There wasn’t much brotherly (or sisterly) love, which would have been a more fitting tribute to Dr. King’s memory; neither was there any physical violence, though there…
Dreading the Doctor’s Office: An Interview With the Author of Invisible Visits; Black Middle-Class Women in the American Healthcare System

“Being a racial minority is usually equated with being poor, and so it’s assumed that black middle-class women should be fine because they’re not poor. But they’re not fine. They face substantial health challenges and differences in health outcomes. My work points to the persistence of racial discrimination across class, resulting in lower life expectancy…
From Anti-Communism to Anti-Semitism: Guilt by Association Is Still Being Used to Attack Movements for Social Change

Jo Freeman writes: Are we really as threatened by #MeToo and marching for women’s rights as white Southerners were by the civil rights movement? Haven’t we learned to talk about issues and not about people? Why is guilt by association still being used to attack social movements? As the anniversary of the Women’s March and…
Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General: Many Children Separated from Parents, Guardians Before Ms. L. v. Ice Court Order and Some Separations Continue

As of December 2018, HHS had identified 2,737 children who were separated from their parents and required to be reunified by a June 2018 court in the Ms. L v. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) litigation. However, this number does not represent the full scope of family separations. Thousands of children may have been…
Dr. Abraham Verghese On The Charm, Magic and Importance Of The Bedside Manner

“Foreign doctors have all kinds of different forms of training. But many are united by one common factor that seems to be operative especially in the Commonwealth countries — a great emphasis on the bedside exam and on clinical skills. In part, [this approach] was driven by the lack of ready access to all the…
The First Biography of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Crusader Without Violence, Is Reissued 60 Years Later

Jo Freeman Reviews: In a long chapter on Family, we learn why the name on his birth certificate is Michael Luther, and why he was called ‘Little Mike’ in his early years. In fact, Martin Luther King wasn’t named for Martin Luther, but you’ll have to read the book to find out why. Nonviolence came…
Rose Mula Writes: If You Can’t Stand the Heat … How About a Subscription to One of the Popular Meal Preparation Kit Services; What an Inspired Idea!

Rose Mula writes: First I had to liberate corn from a plastic-coated box which had been glued together with an impenetrable industrial-strength adhesive strong enough to attach the wings onto a 747. I was supposed to stir the corn frequently and cover the pan if it started to pop. Of course, every time I uncovered…
Too High To Drive: States Grapple With Setting Limits On Weed Use Behind Wheel; Rhode Island, Pennsylvania and Indiana are Among States That Forbid Driving at Any THC Level

Brain scientists and pharmacologists don’t know how to measure if and to what extent marijuana causes impairment. Existing blood and urine tests can detect marijuana use, but, because traces of the drug stay in the human body for a long time, those tests can’t specify whether the use occurred earlier that day or that month.…