The Blur

2020 Won't End, Making New Friends

Of course Biden has tested positive for Covid. Because it's still 2020. Covid? Still here. The debates over whether we should have shut down schools or worn masks—representative of a broader debate about the value of science and scientists? Still here. Traumatic, historic events that should have brought us together but instead drive us further apart? Yup. A national obsession with breaking news that is breaking our minds? That feels worse than ever. Heated debates over what happened during events we all saw with our own eyes? Still here. The Big Lie? It's as big of a driving and dividing force as ever. Biden v Trump? At least for now, yes. Seriously, at this point would you be that surprised to see cardboard cutouts in the seats at major league baseball games? My book about that year was subtitled Breaking News and Nervous Breakdowns in the Year That Wouldn't End. I thought I was speaking metaphorically. It turns out that line works better as a prediction. We boarded a roller coaster that won't let us off. We haven't cured Covid. We haven't cured Trumpism. I'm not sure we've even begun to deal with the trauma of that year. All the ultraviolet light, injected disinfectants, and ivermectin in the world can't release us from the grip of the past. Hindsight is supposed to be 20/20, but 2020 was a blur. And ... it ... will ... not ... end.

+ "A summer covid wave has washed over most of the United States, bringing yet another round of gatherings turned into superspreaders, vacations foiled by illness and reminders that pandemic life has not been fully erased." WaPo (Gift Article): Covid summer wave spreads across U.S., even infecting Biden.

2

Blunt About Trauma

"Jack was home safe. He had survived his kidnapping. But the actual kidnapping is not what this story is about, if you can believe it. It’s about surviving what you survived, which is also known as the rest of your life." While we're on the topic of life traumas and just how long they can impact you, here's an amazing piece by Taffy Brodesser-Akner in the NYT Mag (Gift Article): The Kidnapping I Can’t Escape. "Happy, well-adjusted people are all different. The traumatized are exactly alike. I’m about to tell you a story that is nothing like a violent kidnapping — almost laughably so — but what I’ve learned over the years is that trauma is trauma. Something terrible happens, beyond what is in our own personal capacity to cope with, and the details don’t matter as much as the state we’re thrown into." (As a writer, I feel traumatized by the quality of this article...)

3

The Calls Are Coming From Inside the House

A couple weeks ago, I explained that the media momentum of stories suggesting that Biden step aside were accelerating. At this point, the leaks from top Dems are even more extreme. Pelosi. Schumer. Jeffries. Obama. The messages suggesting a step-aside are consistent and the messages that suggest fighting the good fight are emanating from a smaller and smaller circle. It's hard to imagine that this headline from The Atlantic (Gift Article) won't be proved accurate. The End of Biden’s Candidacy Approaches. That said, none of us really knows whether Biden will step down. And none of us really knows how things will play out if he does.

+ The Biden story is about power, media, politics, democracy, and lot of other big issues. But it's also a story about something else much more core to who we are. It's a story about aging, and in this case, a powerful person aging in public. Sally Quinn in WaPo (Gift Article) on the decline of Ben Bradlee. My husband was slowing down. He needed protecting. "I don’t pretend to know what ails Joe Biden. I do know what it is like to walk the hard road of age with someone you love."

4

Alone in the Friend Zone

"I am not alone. (Except, I guess, literally.) Americans have become terrible at making and keeping friends. Here’s an incomplete list of phenomena that experts in the subject have blamed for this: apartments without dining rooms, Covid-19, 'technology,' babies, not enough hiking. Whatever the cause, we’re a nation afflicted. This is particularly true for men. (If you cannot name even a single close friend, you’re not the only one: 20 percent of single men are stuck in the same position, trapped in what is being dubbed a 'friendship recession.')" Kelly Stout in Esquire: I Gave Myself a Month to Make One New Friend. How Hard Could That Be? "Americans have become terrible at forming and keeping friendships. But there must be somebody out there who wants to grab a burrito with me." (Kelly, I'll join you. But between doctor's orders and nagging glucose monitor alarms, I'm trying to cut back on tortillas, rice, sour cream, and cheese, so can we just grab a plate of pinto beans?)

5

Extra, Extra

Rallying Cries: "The call to let the rally go ahead while law enforcement looked for a potentially dangerous person is one of many Secret Service decisions now being called into question. The agency is also under scrutiny for allowing a building within a rifle’s range to be excluded from its secure perimeter, creating a blind spot close to the former president that the gunman exploited." A Blind Spot and a Lost Trail: How the Gunman Got So Close to Trump. There's no doubt there were major security flubs at the Trump rally. But does it seem OK that a group people "chased Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle through the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, shouting that she has refused to answer questions regarding the assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump." Before you answer that, I should mention that it was a group of US senators. And MoJo on The Troubling Mystery of the Trump Shooter’s Motive. "That information void, unusual after a high-profile attack, may have its own repercussions after being filled by a maelstrom of partisan exploitation and conspiracy theories."

+ Euro Step: Ursula von der Leyen secures five more years in top EU job. "She said the result showed she had been right to focus on 'bundling the democratic forces together' and to offer to work together with 'all those who are pro-Europe, pro-Ukraine and pro-rule of law." (I don't suppose she's available to bundle those forces here in America...)

+ An Own Goal: "Instead of hiding from authorities, [the kingpin] had used his fortune to purchase and sponsor soccer teams across Latin America and in Europe. U.S. and South American investigators would learn that he was using those teams to help launder millions in drug proceeds. Along the way, Marset, now 33, deployed his power and wealth to fulfill a boyhood dream: He inserted himself into the starting lineups." Kevin Sieff in WaPo (Gift Article): A double life: The cocaine kingpin who hid as a professional soccer player. (Let the story-rights bidding among streaming giants begin!)

+ Kick Start: "Cavan Sullivan, at 14 years and 293 days old, stepped onto a Major League Soccer field Wednesday night and, in the 85th minute of the Philadelphia Union’s match against New England, made all sorts of history. He became the youngest player to ever appear in an MLS game ... Sullivan is also the youngest kid to ever appear in any major U.S. team sports league." (When I was 14, my mom had my sister park on a hill above my high school to secretly watch my football practices to make sure I didn't have an over-exertion related medical emergency.)

+ Newhart: "Before his TV success, Newhart’s comedy albums were wildly popular for their at-the-time new approach of observational humor. He ruled TV for the better part of two decades, first with “The Bob Newhart Show” as a befuddled Chicago psychologist and then on “Newhart” as an equally at-a-loss New England innkeeper." Bob Newhart, Comedy Icon, Dies at 94. (Here's a nice, short doc about Newhart's friendship with Don Rickles: Bob and Don: A Love Story.)

+ Hundred to One: ESPN's ranking of the top 100 professional athletes since 2000 is one of those clickbaity lists published just to get people to mindlessly argue over a meaningless topic. In other words, it's exactly what we need right now.

6

Bottom of the News

"I was thinking about going to India with Hannah, or Bali with Ashlyn, maybe Morocco with Emily Rose. But then I came across Yosemite with Haleigh. Haleigh looked so happy. So carefree. Her arms open wide, embracing the wilderness. I, too, wanted to clasp my coffee mug while watching the sunrise and swing in a hammock slung between pines. It had been too long since I’d gone backpacking! I didn’t know Haleigh’s last name or anything about her. No matter. Haleigh made life outdoors look so easy. So perfect. On Instagram, at least." Don’t Forget to Like and Follow. "New booking sites are connecting travel influencers with their followers to take trips all over the world. But should you go? I headed to Yosemite with an influencer and her fangirls to find out."