I am pleased to introduce Howard Marks as our Saturdays with Seniors guest blogger today. The essay he wrote when I assigned “My Grandfather’s Job” pays homage to his maternal grandfather for exposing 12-year-old Howard to the merits of quality journalism. After graduating high school, Howard studied at the University of Illinois-Chicago and became editor-in-chief […]

I am pleased to introduce Anu Agrawal as our Saturdays with Seniors guest blogger today. Anu immigrated to America from India in 1969 and is a writer in the “Me, Myself and I” memoir class that is meeting via Zoom now. Her husband Pawan sat in for a while when the class was meeting at […]

Some Sunday reading brought me back to last week’s topic of immigration. This Sun-Times piece, about White Sox pitcher Lucas Giolito being outspoken about his opinions, illustrated how his personal experience shaped his views on immigration, legal and illegal. Giolito grew up in affluence—his mother a successful actress and his father an executive at a […]

I’m not quite at full speed, as I have contracted the cold from hell that I’d managed to avoid—until last week. I’ve thought I was over the hump more than once, but the virus just won’t take a hint. So, with my thinking and writing faculties compromised, I’ll just share a few pieces by some […]

Two of the “What My Parents Believed” essays read out loud at our Printers Row memoir class last week seemed perfect for a Fourth of July post, and writers Robert and Maggy generously agreed to let me share excerpts from each of their essays here. Three cheers for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Robert’s […]