Late last summer, while anxious and sleep deprived, my doctor asked me if there were any anniversaries of traumatic events I was remembering. I half laughed, it seems there is always a traumatic event to remember. I told her which one correlated with that time of year. However, I’d not been ruminating or brooding on it as I tended to do in the past. In fact, I’ve spent the last seven years since I started writing my first book working on healing and strenuously moving through the past into the… Read more Just Another Day →
If you are like millions upon millions of people and like me, you might have heard the name Kitty Genovese in a psychology or sociology class. You might have read her case study where supposedly 38 human beings passively witnessed her murder in Queens in 1964. It was a watershed moment in America, so when I passed by a book with her name and photograph on the cover this weekend, I checked it out from the library. I devoured it in less than 12 hours. This book, by Kevin Cook,… Read more Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell →
My daughter turns twelve tomorrow. Today I went to a jewelry store with a silver charm that I received for my own twelfth birthday. The jeweler cleaned the charm and placed it on a new silver chain. The charm is round and reads “Grown Up Twelve.” But I was not a grown up at twelve and neither is my daughter. She may stop growing soon, like I did when I was ten, but we were both still little girls at twelve, despite looking like women well before our time. This… Read more grown up twelve →
Dear Shaun White (and your mom), Almost three years ago, I wrote you an open letter. It is best described as a missive of scathing accusation. I was angry when I wrote it, and I was wrong to write when I was so angry. I channeled a lot of my anger at you, and that was misplaced. I apologize sincerely and without reservation. Quite simply, I was wrong. I do not know if you ever read my letter, but your mom did (she emailed me). I did email her back but never heard from… Read more An Open Apology to Shaun White (And His Mom) →
I have made a commitment to limit how much of Liam’s personal information I share publicly. Because of this I’m trying to balance important and helpful information for those parents… Read more How Far We’ve Come →
The Denver skyline shot up during early 1980s, and, my dad helped build it. Dad, a welder, came to Colorado in 1979 for the construction boom. However, for much of his… Read more States of Permanence, States of Grace →
The Privilege Papers is a new series of blog posts I’m writing about White Privilege and my efforts to teach my children and myself about racism in America. People who follow me on Facebook may have noticed that I’m sharing a lot of great posts about racial disparity in America. Someone I know joked, “Who called Amanda a racist?” and I know that the assumption was that these posts were shared in defense or contrition, but that is not the case. I’m not making amends. I’m not clutching my pearls of white guilt.… Read more The Privilege Papers: No One Ever Called Me a Racist →
Aphasia from ancient Greek ἀφασία (ἄφατος, ἀ- + φημί), “speechlessness”[1]) is an impairment of language ability. This class of language disorder ranges from having difficulty remembering words to being completely unable to speak, read, or write. ~ Wikipedia My first migraine occurred at age seven. Sobbing made it worse, so I was still, for days. By fourteen migraine visited every twenty-eight days until contraceptives regulated my hormones. On the pill migraines vanished for a year but returned with aphasia. The first time I lost my words I laughed. It didn’t last, then the pain… Read more At a Loss for Words →
