The Bennies of CBD By Tracy E. Hill, Ph.D. CBD has been around since the early 1900’s when chemist Roger Adams isolated cannabidiol compound while researching prophylactics to potential gas attacks during the trench warfare in Europe. Working at the National Research Council in Washington DC a few decades later, Adams presented a paper to Read more
Stories in Old Furniture by Lucy E.M. Black None of the furniture in our house is particularly valuable but each piece priceless in terms of the memories and history it represents, and each has its own story. There’s a stuffed armchair where my brother sat, me curled on his lap covered in a big quilt Read more
The Memory of Pain Book Review by Jude Joseph Lovell If there is anything that unites us all, no matter who we are or where we come from, it is that we cannot pass through this life without pain, sacrifice, even suffering. This is one of our few guarantees. The question becomes: What do you do Read more
Cherry Garcia Daydreaming by Kathleen M. Schurman Mucking horse stalls is an adventure in random and rambling thoughts, and with a twenty-six-stall barn to clean every morning, I have plenty of repetitive, mind-numbing shoveling to take me on imaginary adventures throughout the multiverses. Unfortunately, that’s not what usually happens. My thoughts are typically more mundane Read more
Opera Singing & The Performing Arts by Cathleen McGowan The fear, uncertainty, and grief brought on by these many months of pandemic isolation have taken their toll on everyone. The performing arts have been very hard hit—stages have “gone dark,” performance opportunities have been postponed indefinitely, traveling to gigs has become nearly impossible, students have Read more
A House with Many Rooms Book review by Jude Joseph Lovell Throughout his distinguished career, much has been made of the novelist Kazuo Ishiguro’s “mixed” heritage—the fact that he was raised in England by his Japanese parents. Since his novels tend to raise questions that strike to the core of humanity—who we really are, and Read more
I Love You, Marie Kondo by Grace Ann Stevens I have never had an addiction, at least not until now. But I recently have fallen madly in love with Marie Kondo and her Netflix show Tidying Up. I have known for a long time that I needed to clean out my closets but have been procrastinating Read more
Once Upon A Time in the West Book review by Jude Joseph Lovell Here we are in the U.S.A. in “the evil of its winter,” to lift a phrase from the celebrated Irish fiction writer Kevin Barry’s brand-new book of stories, That Old Country Music (Doubleday). “But then,” he notes, “I suppose January is a tough Read more
Love in the Time of COVID: How to Celebrate Valentine’s Day Safely by Lucy E.M. Black It’s approaching that time of year when many of us acknowledge the special people in our lives by giving them Valentine’s Day cards, organizing small celebrations, or preparing other small loving gestures. This is yet one more occasion, unfortunately, Read more
15 Social Protocols for the Working World by Lucy E.M. Black As a writer of historical fiction, I am happy to own Social Etiquette: or Manners and Customs of Polite Society, published in 1878.* Books like this serve me well as useful references for nineteenth-century life, and, while some chapters of this book are obscure Read more
