Yesterday marked an anniversary: It was on April 4, 2020 that the City of Chicago officially released me from my voluntary COVID quarantine at a city-operated hotel. I was self-isolating after a weeklong stay at Northwestern. Doctors didn’t want me to go home until I was fever free for three days—the worry was that I […]

Back when we could still do such things, we took Wisconsin Highway 26 on the last leg of our journeys to visit our son Gus in Watertown. A few years ago, the State of Wisconsin redid a stretch of that highway: Lanes were added and eventually, instead of a ramp and a traffic light, we […]

On this date last year, Illinois Governor Pritzker ordered all bars and restaurants closed as of March 17 until …  March 30. On March 17, I walked across the street to our polling place and voted in the Illinois primary. Then I went home to get back to work, when working from home was still […]

I have a friend who grew up on Long Island whose mother lived in a nursing home in New York. Lived, as in past tense. She died of COVID last year. Now, she lived a very, very long life—she made it to 99 (she would’ve been 100 last week). Still, my friend was suspicious, skeptical, […]

On Friday I opened an email from Bethesda Lutheran Communities, the operator of the group home where our son Gus lives in Watertown, Wisconsin. The gist of the message was that Bethesda had agreed in principle to sell its Watertown services to another organization, Broadstep. For those who don’t know what the heck I’m talking […]