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Hillary Clinton's next act
Hillary Clinton's next phase of life — the co-leader of a family foundation — has officially begun.
She's coming in to her husband's signature foundation, which has been renamed for all three Clintons — their daughter has an increased presence. It's the first time the two elder Clintons, both of whom have led independent careers as political actors, are yoking their careers together doing essentially the same type of work at the same place and at the same time since the 1992 campaign. It also comes after the foundation's first ever internal review, which was driven in part by Chelsea Clinton, officials said.
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There's a new CEO at the foundation, one who hails from Clinton's former consulting firm, McKinsey & Company. Hillary Clinton's new office at the foundation's Manhattan headquarters is slowly taking shape as the chiefs of staff to all three Clintons hold a standing meeting every Monday to arrange schedules and events — three offices staffed with people who have worked together for years.
Her arrival comes two years after a period of review and, to some extent, self-reflection at the foundation, one that coincided with daughter Chelsea's increased role.
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Exactly how it will all work remains to be seen: How often will the Clintons travel together? What types of projects will they take on together? How much of an expansion will Hillary Clinton provide the foundation?
And one early challenge for Clinton is clear: using an exceptionally visible platform to focus on issues she cares about, and would be key to a presidential campaign if she runs, without getting roped into the daily morass of churning politics in Washington.
Clinton is joining the foundation launched by her husband and a coterie of former White House aides and advisers — former counselor to former President Bill Clinton, Doug Band, and later, health adviser Ira Magaziner as well as others 12 years ago. She joins it two years after her daughter, Chelsea, expanded her role and as the foundation is seeking to become a permanent structure instead of what officials describe as a "startup," one with an endowment that can fund it well into the future and survive beyond the former president's lifetime.
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The foundation provides her with a formal apparatus at a time when she has no government staff structure for the first time in decades. And the foundation is also the structure that has provided sustenance for the extended Clintonland for over a decade, a sprawling world of donors, supporters and close friends who have done projects with, or have worked for, the organization at different points.
"I think having a place such as this for a platform gives her a great launching pad into 2016," said former White House press secretary Robert Gibbs. "It gives her, quite frankly, a great place with which to create or begin to create the message she would use should she decide to run."
He added, "The people that ultimately are successful [between public service and a campaign] have an apparatus with which they can devote their energy into something they're going to talk about again. Those that don't have that, that just sort of float between one or the other without something strong to give them a sense of direction and purpose, those are the people I think tend not to be a success."
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Recent history is rife with examples of national candidates who ran for the presidency while they were out of government office and failed to use the time wisely. Instead of diving into a singular issue set and letting it become his defining cause, Mitt Romney roamed the country raising money and collecting political chits. When he finally ran for president, he had never managed to create a platform that would help him politically. And Rudy Giuliani was unable to parlay six years of paid speeches and political appearances into something more substantive in his 2008 presidential campaign.
Clinton is in a different category than Romney or almost any other potential nominee has been. She is not at risk of a lack of political definition; overexposure is a bigger concern. The foundation provides a chance to talk about a specific issue set while also giving her an organizational buffer from the press and the daily grind of politics, at least for a time.
"It gives her a chance to work on important, discreet issues," said David Axelrod, President Barack Obama's longtime adviser. "She would be wise, however, to stay out of the updraft of the Washington tizzies du jour for as long as possible. It is a mixmaster that grinds you down."
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It will also be an early test of a question that has bedeviled Hillary Clinton since her 2008 campaign — and that abated during her time at the State Department: Can she manage a more functional entity? And her work at the foundation will invite fresh scrutiny of an entity that has generally received positive coverage for Bill Clinton's work with the Clinton Global Initiative, a signature project, and his work in Haiti, Indonesia and Africa over the years on health and, in some cases, post-disaster recovery.
"She has a stress-free path to being an extraordinarily relevant and extraordinarily change-making" public figure, said former Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell, a Clinton supporter. But he added, "Everything comes under increased scrutiny. Although, if she said she wasn't running for president, I think that would all change."
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Hillary Clinton made clear in a speech at a Clinton Global Initiative event in Chicago recently exactly how she plans to channel her work — by focusing on issues related to women and girls, early childhood development and economic development.
In her speech in the Windy City, she thanked her husband for giving "philanthropy and problem-solving a new paradigm. … I am very proud of what he has accomplished."
She also described Chelsea Clinton's "expanding" role, saying, "This is truly a labor of love for our entire family. In just a few short years, she has helped the foundation widen our reach to a whole new generation of young people. … We are so excited and thrilled to have this be a full partnership among the three of us."
The Clinton Foundation, which has 351 employees, states as its mission: "The Clinton Foundation works to improve global health, strengthen economies, promote health and wellness and protect the environment by fostering partnerships among governments, businesses, nongovernmental organizations and private citizens — leveraging their expertise, resources and passions — to turn good intentions into measurable results."
In addition to CGI, the foundation projects include the Clinton Climate Initiative, the Clinton Health Access Initiative, the Alliance for a Healthier Generation — which has focused on ending obesity — and solving poverty, as well as reducing chronic health issues like, AIDs in Africa. CGI, which attracts top-tier participants for a $20,000 registration fee and requires them to make a good-faith effort to meet commitments for the public good by the following year, was turned into a separate entity while Hillary Clinton was at the State Department but was recently folded back in.
Clinton's arrival is during a new chapter at the foundation — as Chelsea Clinton has stepped up her role and after the organization's first outside review in a decade ended with a number of recommendations for tightening structure and management.


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It's never the changes we want that change everything.
This is how it all starts: with your mother calling you into the bathroom. You will remember what you were doing at that precise moment for the rest of your life: you were reading "Watership Down" and the bucks and their does were making the dash for the raft and you didn't want to stop reading, the book had to go back to your brother tomorrow, but then she called you again, louder, her I'm-not-fucking-around voice, and you mumbled irritably, Sí, señora.
She is standing in front of the medicine-cabinet mirror, naked from the waist up, her bra slung about her hips like a torn sail, the scar on her back as vast and inconsolable as the sea. You want to return to your book, to pretend you didn't hear her, but it is too late. Her eyes meet yours, the same big smoky eyes you will have in the future. Ven acá, she commands. She is frowning at something on one of her breasts.
Your mother's breasts are immensities. One of the wonders of the world. The only ones you've seen that are bigger are in nudie magazines or on really fat ladies. They're forty-two triple Ds and the aureoles are as big as saucers and black as pitch and at their edges are fierce hairs that sometimes she plucks and sometimes she doesn't. These breasts have always embarrassed you and when you walk in public with her you are conscious of them. After her face and her hair, her tetas are what she is most proud of. Your father could never get enough of them, she always brags. But given the fact that he ran off on her after their third year of marriage it seemed in the end that he could.
You dread conversations with your mother. These one-sided dressing-downs. You figure that she has called you in to give you another earful about your diet. Your mom's convinced that if you only eat more plátanos you will suddenly acquire her extraordinary train-wrecking secondary sex characteristics. Even at that age you are nothing if not your mother's daughter. You are twelve years old and already as tall as her, a long slender-necked ibis of a girl. You have her straight hair, which makes you look more Hindu than Dominican, and a behind that the boys haven't been able to stop talking about since the fifth grade and whose appeal you do not yet understand. You have her complexion, too, which means you are dark as night. But for all your similarities the tides of inheritance have yet to reach your chest. You have only the slightest hint of breasts: from most angles you're flat as a board and you're thinking she's going to order you to stop wearing bras again because they're suffocating your potential breasts, discouraging them from popping out. You're ready to argue with her to the death, because you're as possessive of your bras as you are of the pads you now buy yourself.
But no, she doesn't say a word about eating more plátanos. Instead, she takes your right hand and guides you. Your mom is rough in all things, but this time she is gentle. You did not think her capable of it.
Do you feel that? she asks in her too familiar raspy voice.
At first all you feel is the density of the tissue and the heat of her, like a bread that never stopped rising. She kneads your fingers into her. You're as close as you've ever been and your breathing is what you hear.
Don't you feel that?
She turns toward you. Coño, muchacha, stop looking at me and feel.
So you close your eyes and your fingers are pushing down and you're thinking of Helen Keller and how when you were little you wanted to be her except more nunnish and then suddenly you do feel something. A knot just beneath her skin, tight and secretive as a plot. And at that moment, for reasons you will never quite understand, you are overcome by the feeling, the premonition, that something in your life is about to change. You become light-headed and you can feel a throbbing in your blood, a rhythm, a drum. Bright lights zoom through you like photon torpedoes, like comets. You don't know how or why you know this thing, but that you know it cannot be doubted. It is exhilarating. For as long as you've been alive you've had bruja ways; even your mother will not begrudge you that much. Hija de Liborio, she called you after you picked your tía's winning numbers for her and when you guessed correctly how old to the day she'd been when she left home for the U.S. (a fact she'd never told anyone). You assumed Liborio was a relative. That was before Santo Domingo, before you knew about the Great Power of God.
I feel it, you say, too loudly. Lo siento.
And like that, everything changes. Before the winter is out the doctors remove that breast you were kneading and its partner, along with the auxiliary lymph nodes. Because of the operations, your mother will have trouble lifting her arms over her head for the rest of her life. Her hair begins to fall out and one day she pulls it all out herself and puts it in a plastic bag. You change, too. Not right away, but it happens. And it's in that bathroom that it all begins. That you begin.
A punk chick. That's what I became. A Siouxsie and the Banshees-loving punk chick. The Puerto Rican kids on the block couldn't stop laughing when they saw my hair; they called me Blacula. And the morenos, they didn't know what to say; they just called me devil-bitch. Yo, devil-bitch, yo, yo! My tía Rubelka thought it was some kind of mental illness. Hija, she said while frying pastelitos, maybe you need help. But my mother was the worst. It's the last straw, she screamed. The. Last. Straw. But it always was with her. Mornings when I came downstairs she'd be in the kitchen making her coffee in la greca and listening to Radio WADO and when she saw me and my hair she'd get mad all over again, as if during the night she'd forgotten who I was.
My mother was one of the tallest women in Paterson and her anger was just as tall. It pincered you in its long arms, and if you showed any weakness you were finished. Que muchacha tan fea, she said in disgust, splashing the rest of her coffee in the sink. Fea had become my name. It was nothing new, to tell the truth. She'd been saying stuff like that all our lives. My mother would never win any awards, believe me. You could call her an absentee parent: if she wasn't at work she was sleeping and when she wasn't sleeping all she did was scream and hit. As kids, me and Oscar were more scared of our mother than we were of the dark or el cuco. She would hit us anywhere, in front of anyone, always free with the chanclas and the correa, but now with her cancer there wasn't much she could do anymore. The last time she tried to whale on me it was because of my hair, but instead of cringing or running I punched her hand. It was a reflex more than anything, but once it happened I knew I couldn't take it back, not ever, and so I just kept my fist clenched, waiting for whatever came next, for her to attack me with her teeth like she had this one lady in the Pathmark. But she just stood there shaking, in her stupid wig and her stupid bata, with two huge foam prostheses in her bra, the smell of burning wig all around us. I almost felt sorry for her. This is how you treat your mother? she cried. And if I could I would have broken the entire length of my life across her face, but instead I screamed back, And this is how you treat your daughter?
Things had been bad between us all year. How could they not have been? She was my Old World Dominican mother who had come alone to the United States and I was her only daughter, the one she had raised up herself with the help of nobody, which meant it was her duty to keep me crushed under her heel. I was fourteen and desperate for my own patch of world that had nothing to do with her. I wanted the life that I used to see when I watched "Big Blue Marble" as a kid, the life that drove me to make pen pals and to borrow atlases from school. The life that existed beyond Paterson, beyond my family, beyond Spanish. And as soon as she became sick I saw my chance and I'm not going to pretend or apologize; I saw my chance and eventually I took it.
If you didn't grow up like I did then you don't know and if you don't know it's probably better you don't judge. You don't know the hold our mothers have on us, even the ones that are never around—especially the ones that are never around. What it's like to be the perfect Dominican daughter, which is just a nice way of saying a perfect Dominican slave. You don't know what it's like to grow up with a mother who never said anything that wasn't negative, who was always suspicious, always tearing you down and splitting your dreams straight down the seams. On TV and in books mothers talk to daughters, about life, about themselves, but on Main Street in Paterson mothers say not a word unless it's to hurt you. When my first pen pal, Tomoko, stopped writing me after three letters my mother was the one who said, You think someone's going to lose life writing to you? Of course I cried; I was eight and I had already planned that Tomoko and her family would adopt me. My mother, of course, saw clean into the marrow of those dreams and laughed. I wouldn't write to you, either, she said.
She was that kind of mother: who makes you doubt yourself, who would wipe you out if you let her. But I'm not going to pretend, either. For a long time I let her say what she wanted about me and, what was worse, for a long time I believed her. I was a fea, I was a worthless, I was an idiota. From ages two to thirteen I believed her and because I believed her I was the perfect hija. I was the one cooking, cleaning, doing the wash, buying groceries, writing letters to the bank to explain why a house payment was going to be late, translating. I had the best grades in my class. I never caused trouble, even when the morenas used to come after me with scissors because of my straight straight hair. I stayed at home and made sure my little brother Oscar was fed and everything ran right while she was at work. I raised him and I raised me. I was the one. You're my hija, she said, that's what you're supposed to be doing. When that thing happened to me when I was eight and I finally told her what our neighbor had done she told me to shut my mouth and stop crying and I did exactly that, I shut my mouth and clenched my legs and my mind and within a year I couldn't have told you what he looked like or even his name. All you do is complain, she said to me, but you have no idea what life really is. Sí, señora.
When she told me that I could go on my sixth-grade sleepaway to Bear Mountain and I bought a backpack with my own paper-route money and wrote Bobby Santos notes because he was promising to break into my cabin and kiss me in front of everyone I believed her and when on the morning of the trip she announced that I wasn't going and I said, But you promised, and she said, Muchacha del diablo, I promised you nothing, I didn't throw my backpack at her or pull out my hair, and when it was Laura Saenz who ended up kissing Bobby Santos, not me, I didn't say anything, either. I just lay in my room with stupid Bear-Bear and sang under my breath, imagining where I would run away to when I grew up. To Japan maybe, where I would track down Tomoko, or to Austria, where my singing would inspire a remake of "The Sound of Music."
All my favorite books from that period were about runaways—"Watership Down," "The Incredible Journey," "My Side of the Mountain"—and when Bon Jovi's "Runaway" came out I imagined it was me they were singing about. No one had any idea. I was the tallest, dorkiest girl in school, the one who dressed up as Wonder Woman every Halloween, the one who never said a word. People saw me in my glasses and my hand-me-down clothes and could not have imagined what I was capable of. And then when I was twelve I got that feeling, the scary witchy one, and before I knew it my mother was sick and the wildness that had been in me all along, that I had tried to tamp down with chores and with homework and with promises that once I reached college I would be able to do whatever I pleased, burst out. I couldn't help it. I tried to keep it down, but it just flooded through all my quiet spaces. It was a message more than a feeling, a message that tolled like a bell: Change, change, change.
It didn't happen overnight. Yes the wildness was in me, yes it kept my heart beating fast all the long day, yes it danced around me while I walked down the street, yes it let me look boys straight in the face when they stared at me, yes it turned my laugh from a cough into a wild fever, but I was still scared. How could I not be? I was my mother's daughter. Her hold on me was stronger than love. And then one day I was walking home with Karen Cepeda, who at that time was my friend. Karen did the goth thing really well; she had spiky Robert Smith hair and wore all black and had the skin color of a ghost. Walking with her in Paterson was like walking with the bearded lady. Everybody would stare and it was the scariest thing and that was, I guess, why I did it.
We were walking down Main and being glared at by everybody and out of nowhere I said, Karen, I want you to cut my hair. As soon as I said it I knew. The feeling in my blood, the rattle, came over me again. Karen raised her eyebrow: What about your mother? You see, it wasn't just me—everybody was scared of Belicia de León.
Fuck her, I said.
Karen looked at me like I was being stupid—I never cursed, but that was something else that was about to change. The next day we locked ourselves in her bathroom while downstairs her father and uncles were bellowing at some soccer game. Well, how do you want it? she asked. I looked at the girl in the mirror for a long time. All I knew was that I didn't want to see her ever again. I put the clippers in Karen's hand, turned them on, and guided her hand until it was all gone.
So now you're punk? Karen asked uncertainly.
Yes, I said.
The next day my mother threw the wig at me. You're going to wear this. You're going to wear it every day. And if I see you without it on I'm going to kill you!
I didn't say a word. I held the wig over the burner.
Don't do it, she said as the burner clicked. Don't you dare—
It went up in a flash, like gasoline, like a stupid hope, and if I hadn't thrown it in the sink it would have taken my hand. The smell was horrible, like all the chemicals from all the factories in Elizabeth.
That was when she slapped at me, when I struck her hand and she snatched it back, like I was the fire.
Of course everyone thought I was the worst daughter ever. My tía and our neighbors kept saying, Hija, she's your mother, she's dying, but I wouldn't listen. When I hit her hand, a door opened. And I wasn't about to turn my back on it.
But God how we fought! Sick or not, dying or not, my mother wasn't going to go down easy. She wasn't una pendeja. I'd seen her slap grown men, push white police officers onto their asses, curse a whole group of bochin-cheras. She had raised me and my brother by herself, she had worked three jobs until she could buy this house we lived in, she had survived being abandoned by my father, she had come from Santo Domingo all by herself, and as a young girl she'd been beaten, set on fire, left for dead. (This last part she didn't tell me, my tía Rubelka did, in a whisper, Your mother almost died, she almost died, and when I asked my mother about it at dinner she took my dinner and gave it to my brother.) That was my mother and there was no way she was going to let me go without killing me first. Figurín de mierda, she called me. You think you're someone, but you ain't nada.
She dug hard, looking for my seams, wanting me to tear like always, but I didn't, I wasn't going to. It was that feeling I had that my life was waiting for me on the other side that made me fearless. When she threw away my Smiths and Sisters of Mercy posters—aquí yo no quiero maricones—I bought replacements. When she threatened to rip up my new clothes I started keeping them in my locker and at Karen's house. When she told me that I had to quit my job at the Greek diner I explained to my boss that my mother was starting to lose it because of her chemo, and when she called to say I couldn't work there anymore he just handed me the phone and stared out at his customers in embarrassment. When she changed the locks on me—I had started staying out late, going to the Limelight because even though I was fourteen I looked twenty-five—I would knock on Oscar's window and he would let me in, scared because the next day my mother would run around the house screaming, Who the hell let that hija de la gran puta in the house? Who? Who? And Oscar would be at the breakfast table stammering, I don't know, Mami, I don't.
Her rage filled the house, like flat stale smoke. It got into everything, into our hair and our food, like the fallout they told us about in school that would one day drift down soft as snow. My brother didn't know what to do. He stayed in his room, though sometimes he would lamely try to ask me what was going on. Nothing. You can tell me, Lola, he said, and I could only laugh. You need to lose weight, I told him.
In those final weeks I knew better than to go near my mother. Most of the time she just looked at me with the stink eye, but sometimes without warning she would grab me by my throat and hang on until I pried her fingers off. She didn't bother talking to me unless it was to make death threats: When you grow up you'll meet me in a dark alley when you least expect it and then I'll kill you and nobody will know I did it! Gloating as she said this.
You're crazy, I told her.
You don't call me crazy, she said, and then she sat down panting.
It was bad, but no one expected what came next. So obvious when you think about it.
All my life I'd been swearing that one day I would just disappear.
And one day I did.
I ran off, dique, because of a boy.
What can I really tell you about him? He was like all boys: beautiful and callow and, like an insect, he couldn't sit still. Un blanquito with long hairy legs who I met one night at the Limelight.
His name was Aldo.
He was nineteen and lived down at the Jersey Shore with his seventy-four-year-old father. In the back of his Oldsmobile on University I pulled my leather skirt up and my fishnet stockings down and the smell of me was everywhere. I didn't let him go all the way, but still. The spring of my sophomore year we wrote and called each other at least once a day. I even drove down with Karen to visit him in Wildwood (she had a license, I didn't). He lived and worked near the boardwalk, one of three guys who operated the bumper cars, the only one without tattoos. You should stay, he told me that night while Karen walked ahead of us on the beach. Where would I live? I asked, and he smiled. With me. Don't lie, I said, but he looked out at the surf. I want you to come, he said seriously.
He asked me three times. I counted, I know.
That summer my brother announced that he was going to dedicate his life to designing role-playing games, and my mother was trying to keep a second job for the first time since her operation. It wasn't working out. She was coming home exhausted, and since I wasn't helping, nothing around the house was getting done. Some weekends my tía Rubelka would help out with the cooking and cleaning and would lecture us both, but she had her own family to look after, so most of the time we were on our own. Come, he said on the phone. And then in August Karen left for Slippery Rock. She had graduated from high school a year early. If I don't see Paterson again it will be too soon, she said before she left. Five days later, school started. I cut class six times in the first two weeks. I just couldn't do school anymore. Something inside wouldn't let me. It didn't help that I was reading "The Fountainhead" and had decided that I was Dominique and Aldo was Roark. And finally what we'd all been waiting for happened. My mother announced at dinner, quietly, I want you both to listen to me: the doctor is running more tests on me.
Oscar looked like he was going to cry. He put his head down. And my reaction? I looked at her and said, Could you please pass the salt?
These days I don't blame her for smacking me across my face, but right then it was all I needed. We jumped on each other and the table fell and the sancocho spilled all over the floor and Oscar just stood in the corner bellowing, Stop it, stop it, stop it!
Hija de tu maldita madre! she shrieked. And I said, This time I hope you die from it.
For a couple of days the house was a war zone, and then on Friday she let me out of my room and I was allowed to sit next to her on the sofa and watch novelas with her. She was waiting for her blood work to come back, but you would never have known her life was in the balance. She watched the TV like it was the only thing that mattered, and whenever one of the characters did something underhanded she would start waving her arms: Someone has to stop her! Can't they see what that puta is up to?
I hate you, I said very quietly, but she didn't hear.
Go get me some water, she said. Put an ice cube in it.
That was the last thing I did for her. The next morning I was on the bus bound for the shore. One bag, two hundred dollars in tips, Tío Rudolfo's old knife, and the only picture my mother had of my father, which she had hidden under her bed (she was in the picture, too, but I pretended not to notice). I was so scared. I couldn't stop shaking. The whole ride down I was expecting the sky to split open and my mother to reach down and shake me. But it didn't happen. Nobody but the man across the aisle noticed me. You're really beautiful, he said. Like a girl I once knew.
I didn't write them a note. That's how much I hated them. Her.
That night while Aldo and I lay in his sweltering kitty-litter-infested room I told him: I want you to do it to me.
He started unbuttoning my pants. Are you sure?
Definitely, I said grimly.
He had a long thin dick that hurt like hell, but the whole time I just said, Oh yes, Aldo, yes, because that was what I imagined you were supposed to say while you were losing your virginity to some boy you thought you loved.
It was like the stupidest thing I ever did. I was miserable. And so bored. But of course I wouldn't admit it. I had run away, so I was happy! Happy!
Aldo had neglected to mention, all those times he asked me to live with him, that his father hated him like I hated my mother. Aldo, Sr., had been in the Second World War and he'd never forgiven the "Japs" for all the friends he had lost. My dad's so full of shit, Aldo said. He never left Fort Dix. I don't think his father said nine words to me the whole time I lived with them. He was one mean viejito and even had a padlock on the refrigerator. Stay the hell out of it, he told me. We couldn't even get ice cubes out.
Aldo and his dad lived in one of the cheapest little bungalows on New Jersey Avenue, and me and Aldo slept in a room where his father kept the litter box for his two cats, and at night we would move it out into the hallway, but he always woke up before us and put it back in the room: I told you to leave my crap alone! Which is funny when you think about it. But it wasn't funny then. I got a job selling French fries on the boardwalk and between the hot oil and the cat piss I couldn't smell anything else. On my days off I would drink with Aldo or I would sit in the sand dressed in all black and try to write in my journal, which I was sure would form the foundation for a utopian society after we blew ourselves into radioactive kibble. Sometimes boys would walk up to me and throw lines at me like, Who fuckin' died? They would sit down next to me in the sand. You a good-looking girl, you should be in a bikini. Why, so you can rape me? Jesus Christ, one of them said, jumping to his feet. What the hell is wrong with you?
To this day I don't know how I lasted. At the beginning of October I was laid off from the French-fry palace; by then most of the boardwalk was closed up and I had nothing to do except hang out at the public library, which was even smaller than my high-school one. Aldo had moved on to working with his dad at his garage, which only made them more pissed off at each other and by extension more pissed off at me. When they got home they would drink Schlitz and complain about the Phillies. I guess I should count myself lucky that they didn't decide to bury the hatchet by gangbanging me. I stayed out as much as I could and waited for the feeling to come back to me, to tell me what I should do next, but I was bone dry, bereft, no visions whatsoever. I started to think that maybe it was like in the books: as soon as I lost my virginity I lost my power. I got really mad at Aldo after that. You're a drunk, I told him. And an idiot. So what, he shot back. Your pussy smells. Then stay out of it! I will!
But of course I was happy! Happy! I kept waiting to run into my family posting flyers of me on the boardwalk—my mom, the tallest blackest chestiest thing in sight, Oscar looking like the Brown Blob, my tía Rubelka, maybe even my tío if they could get him off the heroin long enough—but the closest I came to any of that was some flyers someone had put up for a lost cat. That's white people for you. They lose a cat and it's an all-points bulletin, but we Dominicans lose a daughter and we might not even cancel our appointment at the salon.
By November I was so finished. I would sit there with Aldo and his putrid father and the old shows would come on the TV, the ones me and my brother used to watch when we were kids, "Three's Company," "What's Happening!!," "The Jeffersons," and my disappointment would grind against some organ that was very soft and tender. It was starting to get cold, too, and wind just walked right into the bungalow and got under your blankets or jumped in the shower with you. It was awful. I kept having these stupid visions of my brother trying to cook for himself. Don't ask me why. I was the one who cooked for us. The only thing Oscar knew how to make was grilled cheese. I imagined him thin as a reed, wandering around the kitchen, opening cabinets forlornly. I even started dreaming about my mother, except in my dreams she was young, my age, and it was because of those dreams that I realized something obvious: she had run away, too, and that was why we were all in the United States.
I put away the photo of her and my father, but the dreams didn't stop. I guess when a person is with you they're only with you when they're with you, but when they're gone, when they're really gone, they're with you forever.
And then at the end of November Aldo, my wonderful boyfriend, decided to be cute. I knew he was getting unhappy with us, but I didn't know exactly how bad it was until one night he had his friends over. His father had gone to Atlantic City and they were all drinking and smoking and telling dumb jokes and suddenly Aldo says, Do you know what Pontiac stands for? Poor Old Nigger Thinks It's A Cadillac. Who was he looking at when he told his punch line? He was looking straight at me.
That night he wanted me but I pushed his hand away. Don't touch me.
Don't get sore, he said, putting my hand on his cock. It wasn't nothing.
And then he laughed.
So what did I do a couple days later—a really dumb thing. I called home. The first time no one answered. The second time it was Oscar. The de León residence, how may I direct your call? That was my brother for you. This is why everybody in the world hated his guts.
It's me, dumb-ass.
Lola. He was so quiet and then I realized he was crying. Where are you?
You don't want to know. I switched ears, trying to keep my voice casual. How is everybody?
Lola, Mami's going to kill you.
Dumb-ass, could you keep your voice down. Mami isn't home, is she?
She's working.
What a surprise, I said. Mami working. On the last minute of the last hour of the last day my mother would be at work. She would be at work when the missiles were in the air.
I guess I must have missed him real bad or I just wanted to see somebody who knew anything about me, or the cat piss had damaged my common sense, because I gave him the address of a coffee shop on the boardwalk and told him to bring my clothes and some of my books.
Bring me money, too.
He paused. I don't know where Mami keeps it.
You know, Mister. Just bring it.
How much? he asked timidly.
All of it.
That's a lot of money, Lola.
Just bring me the money, Oscar.
O.K., O.K. He inhaled deeply. Will you at least tell me if you're O.K. or not?
I'm O.K., I said, and that was the only point in the conversation where I almost cried. I kept quiet until I could speak again and then I asked him how he was going to get down here without our mother finding out.
You know me, he said weakly. I might be a dork, but I'm a resourceful dork.
I should have known not to trust anybody whose favorite books as a child were Encyclopedia Brown. But I wasn't really thinking; I was so looking forward to seeing him.
By then I had this plan. I was going to convince my brother to run away with me. My plan was that we would go to Dublin. I had met a bunch of Irish guys on the boardwalk and they had sold me on their country. I would become a backup singer for U2 and both Bono and the drummer would fall in love with me, and Oscar could become the Dominican James Joyce. I really believed it would happen, too. That's how deluded I was by then.
The next day I walked into the coffee shop, looking brand-new, and he was there, with the bag. Oscar, I said, laughing. You're so fat!
I know, he said, ashamed. I was worried about you.
We embraced for like an hour and then he started crying. Lola, I'm sorry.
It's O.K., I said, and that's when I looked up and saw my mother and my tía Rubelka and my tío Rudolfo boiling out of the kitchen.
Oscar! I screamed, but it was too late. My mother already had me in her hands. She looked so thin and worn, almost like a hag, but she was holding on to me like I was her last nickel, and underneath her red wig her green eyes were furious. I noticed, absently, that she had dressed up for the occasion. That was typical. Muchacha del diablo, she shrieked. I managed to haul her out of the coffee shop and when she pulled back her hand to smack me I broke free. I ran for it. Behind me I could feel her sprawling, hitting the curb hard with a crack, but I wasn't looking back. No—I was running. In elementary school, whenever we had field day I was always the fastest girl in my grade, took home all the ribbons; they said it wasn't fair, because I was so big, but I didn't care. I could even have beaten the boys if I'd wanted to, so there was no way my sick mother, my messed-up tíos, and my fat brother were going to catch me. I was going to run as fast as my long legs could carry me. I was going to run down the boardwalk, past Aldo's miserable house, out of Wildwood, out of New Jersey, and I wasn't going to stop. I was going to fly.
Anyway, that's how it should have worked out. But I looked back. I couldn't help it. It's not like I didn't know my Bible, all the pillars-of-salt stuff, but when you're someone's daughter that she raised by herself with no help from nobody habits die hard. I just wanted to make sure my mom hadn't broken her arm or smashed open her skull. I mean, really, who the hell wants to kill her own mother by accident? That's the only reason I glanced back. She was sprawled on the ground, her wig had fallen out of reach, her poor bald head out in the day like something private and shameful, and she was bawling like a lost calf, Hija, hija! And there I was wanting to run off into my future. It was right then that I needed that feeling to guide me, but it wasn't anywhere in sight. Only me. In the end I didn't have the ovaries. She was on the ground, bald as a baby, crying, probably a month away from dying, and here I was, her one and only daughter. And there was nothing I could do about it. So I walked back and when I reached down to help her she clamped on to me with both hands. That was when I realized she hadn't been crying at all. She'd been faking! Her smile was like a lion's.
Ya te tengo, she said, jumping triumphantly to her feet. Te tengo.
And that is how I ended up in Santo Domingo. I guess my mother thought it would be harder for me to run away from an island where I knew no one, and in a way she was right. I'm into my sixth month here and these days I'm just trying to be philosophical about the whole thing. I wasn't like that at first, but in the end I had to let it go. It was like the fight between the egg and the rock, my abuela said. No winning.
I'm actually going to school, not that it's going to count when I return to Pat-erson, but it keeps me busy and out of trouble and around people my own age. You don't need to be around us viejos all day, Abuela says. I have mixed feelings about the school. For one thing, it's improved my Spanish a lot. It's a private school, a Carol Morgan wanna-be filled with people my tío Carlos Moya calls los hijos de mami y papi. And then there's me. If you think it was tough being a goth in Paterson, try being a Dominican york in one of those private schools back in D.R. You will never meet bitchier girls in your whole life. They whisper about me to death. Someone else would have had a nervous breakdown, but after Wildwood I'm not so brittle. I don't let it get to me.
And the irony of all ironies? I'm on our school's track team. I joined because my friend Rosio, the scholarship girl from Los Mina, told me I could win a spot on the team on the length of my legs alone. Those are the pins of a winner, she prophesied. Well, she must have known something I didn't, because I'm now our school's top runner in the four hundred metres and under. That I have talent at this simple thing never ceases to amaze me. Karen would pass out if she could see me running sprints out behind my school while Coach Cortés screams at us, first in Spanish and then in Catalán. Breathe, breathe, breathe! I've got like no fat left on me and the musculature of my legs impresses everyone, even me. I can't wear shorts anymore without causing traffic jams, and the other day when my abuela accidentally locked us out of the house she turned to me in frustration and said, Hija, just kick the door open. That pushed a laugh out of both of us.
So much has changed these last months, in my head, my heart. Rosio has me dressing up like a real Dominican girl. She's the one who fixes my hair and helps me with my makeup, and sometimes when I see myself in mirrors I don't even know who I am anymore. Not that I'm unhappy or anything. Even if I found a hot-air balloon that would whisk me straight to U2's house I'm not sure I would take it. (I'm still not talking to my traitor brother, though.) The truth is I'm even thinking of staying one more year. Abuela doesn't want me ever to leave—I'll miss you, she says so simply it can't be anything but true—and my mom has told me I can stay if I want to but that I would be welcome at home, too. Tía Rubelka tells me she's hanging tough, my mother, that she's back to two jobs. They sent me a picture of the whole family and Abuela framed it and I can't look at it without misting up. My mother's not wearing her fakies in it; she looks so thin I don't even recognize her.
Just know that I would die for you, she told me the last time we talked. And before I could say anything she hung up.
But that's not what I wanted to tell you. It's about that crazy feeling that started this whole mess, the bruja feeling that comes singing out of my bones, that takes hold of me the way blood seizes cotton. The feeling that tells me that everything in my life is about to change. It's come back. Just the other day I woke up from all these dreams and it was there, pulsing inside of me. I imagine this is what it feels like to have a child in you. At first I was scared, because I thought it was telling me to run away again, but every time I looked around our house, every time I saw my abuela the feeling got stronger, so I knew this was something different.
I was dating a boy by then, a sweet morenito by the name of Max Sánchez, who I had met in Los Mina while visiting Rosio. He's short, but his smile and his snappy dressing make up for a lot. Because I'm from Nueba Yol he talks about how rich he's going to become and I try to explain to him that I don't care about that, but he looks at me like I'm crazy. I'm going to get a white Mercedes-Benz, he says. Tú verás. But it's the job he has that I love best, that got me and him started. In Santo Domingo two or three theatres often share the same set of reels for a movie, so when the first theatre finishes with the first reel they put it in Max's hands and he rides his motorcycle like crazy to make it to the second theatre and then he drives back, waits, picks up the second reel, and so on. If he's held up or gets into an accident the first reel will end and there will be no second reel and the people in the audience will throw bottles. So far he's been blessed, he tells me while kissing his San Miguel medal. Because of me, he brags, one movie becomes three. I'm the man who puts together the pictures. Max is not from la clase alta, as my abuela would describe it, and if any of the stuck-up bitches in school saw us they would just about die, but I'm fond of him. He holds open doors, he calls me his morena; when he's feeling brave he touches my arm gently and then pulls back.
Anyway I thought maybe the feeling was about Max, and so one day I let him take me to one of the love motels. He was so excited he almost fell off the bed, and the first thing he wanted was to look at my ass. I never knew my big ass could be such a star attraction, but he kissed it, four, five times, gave me goose bumps with his breath, and pronounced it a tesoro. When we were done and he was in the bathroom washing himself I stood in front of the mirror naked and looked at my culo for the first time. A tesoro, I repeated. A treasure.
Well? Rosio asked at school. And I nodded once, quickly, and she grabbed me and laughed and all the girls I hated turned to look, but what could they do? Happiness, when it comes, is stronger than all the jerk girls in Santo Domingo combined.
But I was still confused. Because the feeling, it just kept getting stronger and stronger, wouldn't let me sleep, wouldn't give me any peace. I started losing races, which was something I never did.
You ain't so great, are you, gringa, the girls on the other teams hissed at me, and I could only hang my head. Coach Cortés was so unhappy he just locked himself in his car and wouldn't say anything to any of us.
The whole thing was driving me crazy, and then one night I came home from being out with Max. He had taken me for a walk along the Malecón—he never had money for anything else—and we had watched the bats zigzagging over the palms and an old ship head into the distance. While I stretched my hamstrings, he talked quietly about moving to the U.S. My abuela was waiting for me at the living-room table. Even though she still wears black to mourn the husband she lost when she was young she's one of the most handsome women I've ever known. We have the same jagged lightning-bolt part, and when I saw her at the airport, the first time in ten years, I didn't want to admit it but I knew that things were going to be O.K. between us. She stood like she was her own best thing and when she saw me she said, Hija, I have waited for you since the day you left. And then she hugged me and kissed me and said, I'm your abuela, but you can call me La Inca.
Standing over her that night, her part like a crack in her hair, I felt a surge of tenderness. I put my arms around her and that was when I noticed that she was looking at photos. Old photos, the kind I'd never seen in my house. Photos of my mother when she was young, before she had her breasts. She was even skinnier than me! I picked the smallest photo up. Mami was standing in front of a bakery. Even with an apron on she looked potent, like someone who was going to be someone.
She was very guapa, I said casually.
Abuela snorted. Guapa soy yo. Your mother was a diosa. But so cabeza dura. When she was your age we never got along. She was cabeza dura and I was . . . exigente. You and her are more alike than you think.
I know she ran away. From you. From Santo Domingo.
La Inca stared at me, incredulous. Your mother didn't run away. We had to send her away. To keep her from being murdered. To keep us all from being murdered. She didn't listen and she fell in love with the wrong man. She didn't listen. Jesu Cristo, hija—
She was about to say something more and then she stopped.
And that's when it hit with the force of a hurricane. The feeling. My abuela was sitting there, forlorn, trying to cobble together the right words, and I could not move or breathe. I felt like I always did in the last seconds of a race, when I was sure that I was going to explode. She was about to say something and I was waiting for whatever she was going to give me. I was waiting to begin. ♦

subset: commoncrawl


text:
In Search of My Homeland
In Search of My Homeland
Among numerous memoirs by Chinese authors, In Search of My Homeland stands out as an eloquent testimony to the violation and destruction of humanity. This revered scholar of aesthetic theories has written not only about his personal suffering in the remote labor camps and the political persecution he and his family experienced, but also about the fates of many common people. His style is fortified by concision, elegance, restraint, and depth. Each chapter here stands alone as a story and together they form a historical panorama of the Chinese society in the second half of the twentieth century. However, this is not just a book bearing historical witness; it is authentic literature.
-Ha Jin
Writer, critic, painter and scholar Er Tai Gao was born in 1935 near Nanjing. A former member of the Council of the National Association of Art and Literary Theory, he is widely known in China for his contributions to aesthetic theory. In 1957, he published an essay, "On Beauty," that challenged the prevailing Communist stance on aesthetics and objectivity. Gao was quickly branded a "rightist" and sentenced to three years of hard labor in the Gobi desert, where nearly three-quarters of his fellow prisoners died. Over the next forty years, as the Cultural Revolution overtook China and ensuing campaigns toward "eradicating spiritual pollution" rose in its wake, Gao's strong humanist views, which he expressed through his writing and teaching, made him a target of the Chinese government. He was sentenced again to hard labor from 1966 to 1972, and later dismissed from his duties at Lanzhou University and prohibited from writing and publishing. He was arrested in 1989 following the Tiananmen Square protests, and, after spending nearly a year in prison, was again prohibited from teaching and publishing. In 1992, he and his wife, the painter Maya Gao, escaped to Hong Kong and now live in exile in Las Vegas, Nevada. Gao's published works include The Struggle of Beauty and Beauty, The Symbol of Freedom (1987). His memoir, In Search of My Homeland, was published October 20, 2009 by HarperCollins.
Gao has been a member of the faculty at the Dunhuang Cultural Relics Research Institute and the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences Institute of Philosophy, and a professor at Lanzhou University, Sichuan Normal University, Nankai University, and Nanjing University.
Er Tai Gaos visit to CMC, his second, is sponsored the Gould Center for Humanistic Studies as the 2009 Golo Mann lecture. This lecture is made possible through the generosity of CMC alumnus Eugene Wolver '51. Several works of art by Er Tai and Maya Gao will be on exhibit at the Athenaeum for this presentation, in anticipation of a full exhibition of their work beginning in January, 2010.


text:
A Rusty Barge and a Memory of Daddy
When the food arrived, Daddy was in a grand mood. The platters were covered with fried flounder, shrimp, oysters, and deviled crab. We were at Smitty's Restaurant in the little square that was, in those days at least, the business district for the town of Kure Beach. I'm pretty sure we were in the same building Robert Ruark wrote about in The Old Man and the Boy when he talked about the crowd who fished the Kure Beach Pier. The waitress was Daddy's favorite, a rotund little silver haired lady who whistled while she strolled about the restaurant filling tea glasses and coffee cups. Daddy had named her "Whistler" and she liked the name, her face spreading into a warm smile when he said it. Now, we were celebrating the day and Daddy was picking up the tab.
We'd had a great day of fishing. There were several of us, and we'd fished below the rocks at Fort Fisher. I had a four wheel drive truck, the first in our family as far as I know, and we'd piled on and driven a couple of miles down below the end of the road towards what I believe Robert Ruark referred to as Corncake inlet, though I'm not sure. If you crossed the dunes, you could see an old rusty barge that had been swept into the salt flats behind the beach by the hurricane, Hazel, who left it there to rust. It was a landmark I used for years afterwards. The first cast had yielded a puppy drum and afterwards, we'd caught eating sized bluefish all afternoon long. Somewhere, there's a picture of me, holding a stringer loaded down with two pound blues and with a big smile on my face.
I can still see him on that beach. With his pants rolled up around his ankles and his feet, misshapen from wearing the wrong sized boots in World War II, wading out and casting the surf rod and reel that now grace the wall in my sun room. Along with his salt water and fresh water tackle boxes, his Mitchell 300 and his fly rod, they're all reminders of a man who shaped who I am today. In my mind, I can see him in a lot of scenes, riding his old John Deere Tractor, laughing at the supper table, or leaning on a white Rambler station wagon. I can even see him when I look at my own hands, the index fingers slightly twisted inward; they look like the same hands that showed me how to hold a rifle or cast a Zebco.
My eyes get wet when I write about him. I miss him so. But I also think about what he did and how he taught me to be a father. Once, when my Julie was a little girl, I was working for Thomasville Furniture and had dozens of burnt out fluorescent light tubes replaced from the plant. They were put back in the boxes the new bulbs came in. Instead of putting them in the trash, I loaded them up in my pickup and brought them home. Julie liked to ride with me to the dump.
We rode to the dump and I gave her gloves and safety glasses. I took each glass tube out of the carton and let her smash every one into the big long dump box. She had a ball smashing all that glass. Later, I told Daddy what I'd done and he just laughed. "She'll remember that," he said. She still does.
He knew how to be a real father. Not just a dad who gives his children what they want, a dad who gives them what they need. When I messed up, I had him to deal with, and it was not pleasant. I still remember my last whipping as a boy. He sternly told me I'd been inconsiderate of my grandmother and I knew he was right. He used a switch and the whipping hurt. He wasn't mad at me, he was molding me, and I was old enough to know it. I cried after that whipping but I cried because I was sorry I'd disappointed him, not because my legs stung. I loved him more after that day and respected him more, too. I understood the discipline more clearly than I ever had, and resolved to try to be as good as he was in my role as a father. I don't think I succeeded.
This is a day we honor fathers, but I'm not writing this to make the fathers who read it feel good about themselves. I'm writing it because I want them to aspire to be better fathers. I know I was luckier than most in being sired by Lewis Thomas Jones. I know many who read this had dads who might not have done such a great job of fatherhood. If you're in that category, you should honor your father anyway. The point is, some have more room for improvement than others, and all fathers could do a better job of parenting.
Parenting isn't just providing for your kids and giving them what they need and want. Parenting is being wise in foreseeing the qualities that will take your children through life, and doing your best to instill those qualities in them. Parenting is doing things your kids don't like if those things are the best for them. Parenting is setting an example in the way you live your life.
Many years later, I had occasion to drive down that same beach. Daddy had passed away a year or so earlier and, after his long illness, suffering the horrible end that comes with dementia, I didn't cry at the funeral. It was a relief to know that he now knew where and who he was again. As I drove down the beach, I saw a place that looked familiar. For some reason, I stopped. All parts of the Atlantic coast look similar and a single storm can change the way a beach looks. No other landscape changes as rapidly as a beach. Somehow though, this stretch reminded me of the place we caught the blues. I parked the truck and walked to the top of the dunes and there was that old rusty barge just where it had been on that day. I sat at the edge of the dunes and cried for an hour.
To everyone whose father is still with us, celebrate him today. To all fathers who have offspring young or old, think about your legacy and be the best father you can be. If you screwed up early, it's not too late to change. It is the most important thing you will do in your life.
Dick Jones is a freelance writer living in High Point. He's a member of the board of directors of the Southeastern Outdoor Press Association. He writes about hunting, fishing, dogs, and shooting for several NC newspapers as well as national and regional magazines. If you'd like to have him speak to your group, he can be reached at email@example.com or offtheporchmedia.com


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NEWS- SNL abroad: Local firm expands globally
It was less than three years ago that SNL Financial moved out of its digs in the former Miller & Rhoads building on the Downtown Mall and into the fully renovated former spy center at the corner of Seventh and Market streets. And now the company has another new building– this one a bit further from the Downtown Mall. In fact, a whole lot further– in Ahmedabad, India, to be precise. But don't worry– SNL isn't leaving town.
"We opened an office in India in 2003," says SNL founder Reid Nagle. "We'd been leasing space, but we decided to purchase space because it gives us greater control over the standards and conditions."
The new building– at 32,000 square feet– is less than half the nearly 80,000 square feet of the Charlottesville headquarters. But it has ample space for SNL's 150 Indian employees– in fact, according to SNL, there's room for up to 375 employees in the new building.
Outsourcing labor to the third world– and in particular to India– is a popular practice thanks in part to the low cost of labor in those countries. But it's also a controversial practice.
"The question is, 'Does it take jobs away from people in the United States?'" asks Darden professor Patricia Werhane, an expert in the field of business ethics. "It probably does take jobs away from people in the U.S. How should we deal with that?"
Werhane says the answer is not yet clear.
"We can whine, because we're very good at that," she laughs. "But how can we think of other ways to have the competitive advantage? One of the ways is to have technical people who can do what people in other countries can't do. That's not true anymore, and that's a challenge for us."
Nagle defends his company's outsourcing practice, calling it good for business– and good for employees in both countries.
While he acknowledges in India the pay is lower and hours longer– "standard business hours are six days a week," he says– the building is new, clean, and provides employees with state-of-the-art technology. The building is not a customer service call center. Instead, the employees there are highly educated analysts– many with graduate degrees– who provide support through data entry and dissemination. The company, which publishes financial publications, offers benefits and ample holiday time to its Indian employees, Nagle says.
SNL's legal counsel, Dennis Rooker (also an Albemarle County supervisor), negotiated the purchase of the building with the help of Indian attorneys. He points out several other benefits of the deal.
"You have the time difference. Work can be done there while employees are sleeping here and vice versa," he explains. In addition, he agrees with one of Werhane's assertions. "They have excellent technical education in India," he says. "Consequently, it's probably easier to find technically qualified people there than it may be here at times. It's allowed [SNL] to expand the business and do a better job for customers."
Here in Charlottesville, SNL employees also have reason to cheer, says Nagle.
"One of the interesting things in terms of the economic dynamics is that our employment base has still risen in Charlottesville," he explains. SNL has grown from 231 employees in 2003 to 282 today. In addition, says Nagle, "SNL's wages and benefits have nearly doubled per person since 1998. It's enriched the employment opportunities for SNLers in Charlottesville and has dramatically reduced turnover."
In addition to the Charlottesville and Ahmedabad locations, SNL has offices in Pakistan, New York, New Jersey, Denver, and London.
SNL moved more than 250 employees into the former National Ground Intelligence Center building in July 2003.
The 32,000 square-foot building in Ahmedabad, India can provide workspace for up to 375 employees.


text:
JERUSALEM, April 15 (UPI) -- Israelis observed 2 minutes of silence Monday morning as sirens rang out across the country in honor of Remembrance Day.
Fifty-two official memorial services for the war dead and victims of terror attacks were held in Israel, drawing approximately 1.5 million Israelis to the country's cemeteries, the military estimated.
President Shimon Peres and Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu attended a ceremony at Mount Herzl, Israel's national cemetery in Jerusalem while Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon attended one at the Kiryat Shaul military cemetery near Tel Aviv, Israeli broadcaster Arutz Shiva reported.
During the ceremony in Jerusalem, Netanyahu criticized Israel's enemies, who "massacre us and criticize us for [defending] ourselves."
"We will not give up and we will pursue the terrorists and strike them in every place," he added.
Netanyahu and Peres both laid wreaths for victims of terror attacks at the cemetery, The Jerusalem Post reported.


text:
Mentalism and Readings At Employees Only Hong Kong
Follow the Calendar below to See where you can catch Stuart Palm's public performances.
Use this link or the link at the bottom of the calendar to sign up for EO time slots.
*note: End times for EO events are subject to change depending on the nature of the night.
Back to All Events
Earlier Event: September 12Uncensored Cabaret, HK Int. Laugh Festival
Later Event: September 14Employees Only, Hong Kong


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State humanities councils, reading, and literacy, 2013
"How can we model the behavior we seek to inspire? Do our boards, staff and volunteers reflect the diversity of the communities we serve? How can we be more inclusive?"
In the January 2013 newsletter, Federal/State Partnership announced that each issue of the newsletter through October will address issues raised by the theme of the November 2013 Federation of State Humanities Councils conference in Birmingham, Alabama. The primary source for these surveys is the contextual section of councils' self-assessment report. We will use examples from all 56 state and jurisdictional humanities councils in this series. This article first appeared in the April 2013 newsletter. Links to all the articles will be attached to the lead article to the series as they appear in the newsletter. Each will also be posted as a separate article in the Resource Library.
A printable pdf of this article is attached.
State humanities councils are filled with book people. They celebrate books and words and ideas and ways to talk about all of them. According to the 2012 compliance plans submitted annually to NEH by councils, every council but one supports reading and discussion programs, 51 councils carry out programs in libraries, and 37 support family and adult literacy programs. Thirteen councils host or support book festivals and six are actively involved with statewide "one book" annual reading programs. Ten serve as their state's Center for the Book in affiliation with the Library of Congress. Councils not only program around books, a number also publish books, some of which are bilingual.
Councils use books to broaden their audience reach. Virginia Foundation for the Humanities' Virginia Arts of the Book Center, for example, is holding a six-week class in book-binding in April and May. Humanities Tennessee has a book review website, Chapter 16. Humanities Washington's annual fundraiser, "Bedtime Stories," features critically acclaimed Northwest writers unveiling original short stories created specifically for the event. The Maine Humanities Council's "Winter Weekend," a retreat with discussions focused on one book—Dickens' Great Expectations in 2013, Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment next year—uses the net income from the fees it collects from older wealthier patrons to help fund its "New Books, New Readers" program. The Maine Humanities Council also founded the acclaimed "Literature & Medicine: Humanities at the Heart of Healthcare" reading and discussion program for healthcare providers that has state humanities council partners around the country, and can be found in veterans' hospitals and in Argentina.
Discovering U.S. literacy rates is challenging and what exists is fundamentally flawed. The latest such data collection was done in 2003 by the U.S. Department of Education, Institute of Education Sciences, National Center for Education Statistics, in its National Assessment of Adult Literacy. The title of the piece indicates its lack of reliability: "State & County Estimates of Low Literacy." This analysis is of those over age 16 who lack basic prose reading skills and carries the caveat that these data also reflect "those who could not be tested due to language barriers." A result is that there appears to be higher levels of reading skills in smaller or more homogeneous states and counties than in those with diverse populations. For example, South Dakota ranks high whereas New York ranks low. The key thing is to see these data as suggestion of rather than as demonstration of reality. Nonetheless, they suggest that the U.S. literacy rate is approximately 86% for those age 16 and older. That is in the ballpark with UNESCO's assessment of global literary, released in September 2012. Using adults age 15 and older, UNESCO rates global literacy (not including the English-speaking world and Western Europe) at 84%.
In the following council thumbnails, we will look at the contexts affecting reading and literacy in nine states. Of these nine, South Dakota, Wisconsin, and Maine have high literacy rates (93%); Washington (90%), Maryland (89%), and Tennessee (87%) fall above the national average; and both Nevada and Mississippi at 84% and New York with 78%, fall below the national average. Of these councils, seven host or support book festivals; two have state-wide "one book" programs, five do literacy programs of various sorts, one has an book-themed fundraiser and sponsors its state's poet laureate, and all have reading and discussion programs. Here is the landscape in which they support books and literacy, as described in their self-assessment reports.
- Eighty-six percent of South Dakota's overall population is identified as "White persons not Hispanic," indicating significant racial homogeneity. With less than 11 people per square mile, South Dakota nonetheless supports a subtle "global village." Its indigenous population includes members of the Lakota, Nakota, and Dakota tribes, and it is home to descendants of 19th-century northern Europeans and increasing numbers of Africans and Hispanics. Over one-fifth of the population holds a baccalaureate or higher degree, although only 30% of its American Indian young people graduate from high school. Rural libraries often serve wide stretches of countryside and only 48% of libraries across the state are open full time. Yet in the recent difficult economy, libraries have tended to increase rather than decrease their public service hours.
- The University of Wisconsin continues to believe in the Wisconsin Idea, that the boundaries of the classroom are the boundaries of the state. The recent merger of University of Wisconsin-Extension and the University's network of two-year liberal arts campuses has shaken up these institutions in ways that may increase the interest of some chancellors and scholars in doing more public humanities work. There are hundreds of programmatically active libraries, historical societies, museums, and local arts organizations, including in many small communities. Milwaukee presents challenges because of its size and other realities such as its infamously troubled school system, segregation, and poverty. Of the relatively small anticipated growth in the population in the next ten years, two-thirds is expected to be among minority communities.
- Cultural life in Maine is alive and well, if very unevenly distributed. That is not to say that both nonprofit and state-supported cultural organizations and institutions are not financially stressed, cutting hours and services, but there is a sense of the crucial nature of their offerings and an understanding that when everything else fails, it is to culture—the humanities—that one turns. This claim however, is qualified by a recognition that, given Maine's widely dispersed population, there are areas and populations that are desperately underserved. Maine's non-white population has increased from 3% to 5%, largely because of an influx of political refugees from Central Africa. These immigrants, who speak dozens of languages, have meant unprecedented challenges to the education and social service systems.
- The 13th most populous state, Washington is 72% white (not Hispanic) but its cities have an influx of Asian, Latin American, and Russian immigrants. Over 70 languages are spoken in Seattle public schools. The liberal arts and humanities are taught in all four-year colleges and universities and in many community colleges. Ninety percent of Washingtonians have high school degrees and 31% have college degrees. Eastern Washington is predominantly rural and agricultural, with a smaller and primarily white and Latino population; the far western Olympic Peninsula is also rural. The highly urbanized I-5 corridor is ethnically diverse and has the majority of the state's population. The biggest industries are aviation, technology, agriculture, forestry, and fisheries/maritime.
- Despite the fact that Maryland has a higher percentage of minority populations than the U.S. overall, its diversity is localized. Over 91% of Western Maryland is white. Central Maryland, including counties such as Prince George's, Baltimore, and Montgomery, are more evenly mixed, averaging 66% white. Prince George's county and Baltimore City, however, consist of a predominantly minority population with nearly 65% Black or African American residents. Maryland is the wealthiest state in the nation, yet 22% of the population of Baltimore City lives in poverty. It is also well-educated in terms of public education at all levels, including higher education. The Maryland State School System has been ranked first in the nation for the last five years. Nonetheless, Maryland ranks only 10th out of the 50 states for child well-being.
- The landscape of Tennessee is largely sprawl with urban clusters serving the functions cities used to serve. Communities of place, when they exist, are tenuous and fragile. The state is 79% white and 17% African American. Four percent of the population is now Hispanic. Tennessee does not have an income tax and though its sales taxes are among the highest in the nation, budget crises are routine and the state educational and cultural organizations continue to suffer. There are ten state-supported universities and thirteen community colleges, along with thirty-five private colleges and universities. There are no longer book editors in Tennessee newspapers and in 2010 the last independent bookstore in Nashville closed. A new independent bookstore, however, has since been opened by writer Ann Patchett.
- Seventy-three percent of Nevada's population lives in the Las Vegas metropolitan area and 15% of the population lives in the state's other major metropolitan area, Reno. The remaining 12% of the population resides in the remaining 14 counties which make up the majority of the geographic area of the state. Nevada is simultaneously one of the most urban and one of the most rural states. Some of its counties are classified as "frontier" because they have less than six people living per square mile. According to recent census data, Nevada is 62% White and 27% Hispanic. The state's demographer, however, estimates that the number of Hispanics living in the state may be closer to one-third. The National Cowboy Poetry Gathering is produced by the Western Folklife Center and held annually in Elko.
- A state of contrasts, Mississippi's contributions to American and world culture in the 20th and 21st centuries are unparalleled, particularly in literature. Call to mind William Faulkner, Richard Wright, Eudora Welty, Tennessee Williams, Margaret Walker Alexander, Shelby Foote, Walker Percy. Think of Eli Evans, Willie Morris, Natasha Trethewey. Then be reminded that Mississippi is number one on far too many lists of other kinds: inadequate education for its children, the number of families and children at or below the poverty level, illnesses and diseases often related to poverty and lack of education, obesity on the one hand and food-challenged children and elders on the other, inadequate health care, low-level and non-readers, single-parent households, lack of infrastructure to meet the needs of its poorest citizens.
- Twenty-two percent of New Yorkers are foreign-born, almost 10% above the national average. New York has an overall population that is 58% non-Hispanic White, 18% African American, 18% Hispanic, and 8% Asian. It continues to be an immigration hub: in Queens, the most diverse county in the country, 138 languages are spoken. Beyond New York City, there is an increasing trend among immigrants from all over the world to settle immediately in suburbs and smaller towns and cities. Central New York, for example, has encouraged refugees to settle there from Eastern Africa and Serbia. The collective education level for New Yorkers (32% of citizens over age 24 hold at least a bachelor's degree) is 4% higher than the national average; Rochester once boasted the highest number of PhDs per capita in the nation.


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Nonprofit Fundraising Startup iPrytaneum Selected to Join Constant Contact's Small Business Innovation Program
iPrytaneum announced today that they have been chosen to join the Constant Contact, Inc. Small Business Innovation Program, a residency program supporting entrepreneurs and startups. - Read More
Sarasota-Bradenton Florida Gold Star Manatee Limousine Service Celebrates 23 Years in Florida's Gulf Coast
Since 1992, visitors and residents in Florida's Manatee County have been able to rely upon Gold Star Limousines for a memorable, pleasant, first-class limousine experience. - Read More
Inc. 500 Entrepreneur-Turned-Activist Unveils Evidence of Ancient Flying Machines and Primitive Nuclear Weapons in New Documentary Film
In 2012, a childhood obsession drew Inc. 500 entrepreneur Amish Shah to the sunken city of Dwarka, off the Indian coast. Today, his new documentary film promises to reveal never-before-seen truths that challenge not only the established history of this mysterious city, but of early human civilizations and technology. - Read More
A Secret City Beneath the Indian Ocean: Nonprofit Movement Challenges History Books in New Documentary Film, Dwarka: Atlantis of the East
Is the buried city of Dwarka the oldest civilization known to man? Did it house anachronistic technologies like flying machines and even nuclear weapons? The Ancient Explorers Movement answers these questions in the world premiere online screening of their debut documentary film, "Dwarka: Atlantis of the East". - Read More
Cure Type 2 Diabetes Website Launches To Help Type 2 Diabetes Patients
It is estimated that 347 million people in the world have diabetes. Traditional medicine offers no cure. However, a Bristol UK man, diagnosed as diabetic in 2001, now claims he is off all diabetes medications, and has launched a website to help others with Type 2 Diabetes. - Read More
Featured News Releases
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Canadian Business Directory CliqueCanada Expands Free Online Classified Ads Section
CliqueCanada has recently launched a Canadian business directory designed to connect people to quality local business and professionals. The company has now expanded the site to include free classified ad postings for virtually every major city in Canada.


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"Alicia" Touch-Activated Interactive Baby Girl Doll
First-ever interactive African-American baby doll by Linda Murray curls her hand around your finger. Hand-painted with sweet knit dress and headband.
Measures 55.9 cm L
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Few things are as precious as the first time your baby responds to you by wrapping her tiny hand around your finger and giving it a squeeze! Now, recapture that tender moment again and again with Alicia, the first-ever African-American realistic interactive baby doll by Master Doll Artist Linda Murray. Available only from The Bradford Exchange, this So Truly Real® collectible baby doll responds to your touch by curling her little fingers around your finger in an amazingly realistic way!
Lovingly handcrafted to look amazingly lifelike, Alicia's baby-soft RealTouch® vinyl skin is hand-painted and her wispy baby hair is carefully applied by hand. She comes to you wearing a finely knit aqua and white dress with a matching headband. Demand is likely to be high, so don't wait for this little charmer to melt your heart with a gentle squeeze. Order now!
- Alicia is the first-ever African-American realistic interactive baby doll by Master Doll Artist Linda Murray, available exclusively from The Bradford Exchange
- This So Truly Real® baby doll is sculpted by artist Linda Murray and then cast in baby-soft RealTouch® vinyl to look and feel so real, with adorable hand-painted features and wispy baby hair
- She responds to your touch! Gently press her hand, and her tiny baby fingers will curl around your finger in such a realistic and endearing way
- Baby Alicia comes to you wearing a finely knit aqua and white dress with chocolate brown ribbons on the bodice, sleeves and socks, plus a delicate matching headband
- Premiere issue in the Gentle Touches Baby Doll Collection
- Requires 3 "AA" batteries (not included)
- Certificate of Authenticity
- Measures 55.9 cm L
©2012 The Bradford Exchange


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Ros Furley
Ros Furley
The Awards and Recruitment Committee also gave a Highly Commended Award to Ros Furley for her contribution to cycling in her region.
Ros has been a tireless campaigner for Reading Cycle campaign since Alan Furley, her husband, passed away. She has risen to become the formidable campaigner Alan was, and has gained a reputation far beyond the town where she campaigns. She has fought to get cycling taken seriously by the Reading Borough Council, which has been a Herculean task.
Her success has been measured in small improvements which the council should have been able to do without her input, but who knows just how poor things would be in Reading without the continued and charming efforts of Ros.
She has fitted her campaigning work in, which has not only included attending meetings with the council, but hosting committee meetings at her house and helping to lead Cycle Campaign rides in bike week, with being a very busy grandmother.
She is leaving Reading Cycle Campaign with a strong committee that she has been instrumental in establishing and motivating.
Members of the campaign will sorely miss her presence but as she is going to move to be closer to her family we wish her all our thanks.


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Get to Know the Greenway Guided TourDec 12 , 2018
New to the area or just want to get a little more information about where things happen on the Greenway? Here's your chance to take a van tour with the director. Learn more about the activities, events, venues, a little history, and how to get around the Greenway. Tour will leave the Greenway HQ promptly at 9am and lasts approximately an hour. No hiking required. Space is limited to 8. Click here to register.
Event is free but registration is necessary due to limited van capacity.
250 Dairy Barn Lane
This event has already occured.


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61 HCMC physicians named "Best Doctors" by Minnesota Monthly magazine
Congratulations to the 61 Hennepin County Medical Center (HCMC) providers who were selected as "Best Doctors" by their peers and recognized in the October 2014 issue of Minnesota Monthly magazine. HCMC's Best Doctors are listed in 38 different specialty categories. For more information … Continue reading
Posted in HCMC News Tagged Aarom Brosam, Abigail Holley, Andrew Kiragu, andrew schmidt, Anne Lambert, anne murray, Anthony Severt, arthur ney, Bradley Bart, Bruce Bart, Carl Smith, Charles Reznikoff, Constantin Starchook, Craig Peine, David Hilden, David Plummer, David Stuart, David Templeman, David Williams, Dean Tsukayama, Douglas Brunette, Douglas Rausch, Eduardo Colon, Elizabeth Doty, Gautam Shroff, Gavin Bart, Gopal Punjabi, Gretchen Crary, Helen Kim, James Leatherman, Jeffrey Albrecht, Jeffrey Albrecht - Gastroenterology, Jeffrey Morken, Jeffrey Rubins, Joan Van Camp - Breast Surgery, john Sweet, Keith Eidman, Kevin Engel, Lawrence Kerzner, Liver Specialist, Marjorie Hogan, Mark Hill, Mark Odland, Mark Sprenkle, Martha McCusker, Michele LeClaire, Minnesota Monthly Best Doctors, Peter Schlesinger, Prateek Sahgal, Richard Reut, Robert Shapiro, Ronald Schut, Ryan Fey, Sarah Rockswold, Scott Bundlie, Scott Davies, Steven Lockman, Tara Gustilo, Thomas Varecka, Virginia Lupo, William Heegaard, William Marinelli, woubeshet ayenew


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You don't need to be a car buff to enjoy the Chicago Auto Show taking place Friday through Feb. 19 at McCormick Place. The 104th edition of the show will once again feature several Chicago athletes appearing on behalf of various manufacturers.
Guests can line up to meet the Bears' Earl Bennett Friday and Feb. 18, the Blackhawks' Patrick Kane and Jonathan Toews Sunday (maybe you've seen their Chevy commercials?) and the Bulls' Joakim Noah and Ronnie Brewer Feb. 17 and Feb. 19, respectively.
Manufacturers will likely book more celebrity appearances at the last minute, as in years past. Each will have its own set of rules for the meet-and-greets. Chevy is limiting fans to one autographed item and no personal photos during Kane and Toews' appearance, but other manufacturers might be more lenient.
"(Blackhawks legend) Bobby Hull was here last year with Bridgestone and he signed everything but the dinner check," said Paul Brian, spokesman for the Chicago Automobile Trade Association, which produces the Auto Show.
Guests likely won't see any cars from the entertainment world such as the Batmobile or Bumblebee from "Transformers." Brian said you're more likely to see those sort of cars at World of Wheels, set for March 2-4 at the Donald E. Stephens Convention Center in Rosemont. But the Auto Show has featured its share of stars from the entertainment industry, including actors Kevin Bacon and Anthony Edwards, singers Cyndi Lauper and Kelis, and "Entertainment Tonight" host Nancy O'Dell.
"Cyndi Lauper danced on the hood of a Mercedes SL when she performed at First Look For Charity (in 2004)," Brian recalled. "She dug her heels into the aluminum and left her heel prints. They had to replace the whole hood of the car."
Help wanted: The people behind "Ace of Cakes" and "Flipping Out" are looking for married and soon-to-be daughters-in-law and mothers-in-law who have a "complicated" relationship for a new cable reality show. If you fit that description and would like to resolve your issues, call 323-250-2278 or email firstname.lastname@example.com with your name, contact number, email address, city/state and a description of the relationship. The show's producers will be in Chicago next week to meet with select applicants.
On the record: "At guard, No. 1, his favorite movie is 'The Notebook' -- Derrick Rose." - Actor Will Ferrell, who handled player introductions before the Bulls-New Orleans Hornets game at New Orleans Arena Wednesday.
Heads up: "Project X" stars Thomas Mann, Oliver Cooper and Jonathan Daniel Brown will meet with media in Chicago February 23 to promote the upcoming comedy. "Project X" hits theaters March 2. … "E! News" host Giuliana Rancic will appear at Fab-Fest 2012 at the Four Seasons Hotel April 15. Sign up at fabfest2012.org. … Former WWF Superstar Ultimate Warrior will appear at the Oak Lawn Pavilion in Oak Lawn March 24. … "Degrassi" cast members Luke Bilyk, Jahmil French, Aislinn Paul and Melinda Shankar will attend the "Party with Degrassi" screening at Harris Theater in Millennium Park Monday. For tickets, go to Degrassi's Facebook page.
Sightings: Actor and Cubs fan John Cusack and Cubs president of baseball operations Theo Epstein had dinner at Chicago Cut Steakhouse Tuesday. Cusack is a regular at Chicago Cut Steakhouse and celebrated his 45th birthday there in June. … Director Spike Lee had lunch at Wave in the W Hotel – Lakeshore Wednesday.
Twitter @aboutluisgomez


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Bunny Girl Personalized Kids Plate
$ 26.00
Bunny Girl Personalized Childs Plate by Mayfly and Junebug Designs
Our 10" personalized melamine kids plate features original hand-drawn and painted art by Kelly Kirkland. Choose your border pattern and type style. Matching 7" bowl, 8" plate & placemat available- see our other listings. These make great gifts for children of all ages! Sturdy, dishwasher-safe, and BPA-free.


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LONDON (Reuters) - The board of Vodafone (VOD.L) would seriously consider any offer for its 45 percent stake in Verizon Wireless if it offered more value to investors than the current status quo, its chairman said on Tuesday.
Vodafone's partner in the United States, Verizon Communications (VZ.N), has made little secret of its desire to buy out Vodafone from its joint venture in a deal that would be one of the largest of all time, with a possible price tag of around $120 billion.
But the U.S. business has become central to the British group in recent years after its fortunes waned in core European markets due to a poor economy, strict regulation and increasing competition.
Gerard Kleisterlee, speaking at Vodafone's annual meeting in London, said his board regularly reviewed the holding in the highly successful U.S. business but added that he did not have anything new to announce about the relationship.
"If we see proposals that generate more value for shareholders we will consider them," he told investors in a meeting that was dominated by questions about the U.S. sale and its European strategy.
"There is ongoing communication (that involves) the full board. Both executives and non-executives are involved in those negotiations with Verizon."
The two owners of Verizon Wireless, the biggest U.S. mobile operator, are in constant contact about day-to-day operations.
Vodafone's finance director Andy Halford said most of the discussions about Verizon in Vodafone's own board meetings were centered on the performance of the business.
"There is absolutely nothing that has changed (regarding a sale)" he told reporters after the meeting.
"The discussions we have are about the business primarily, and the business continues to do very, very well."
Two people close to the situation have told Reuters that Verizon is working on a $100 billion offer, which was seen as an opening gambit by investors. A deal of that size would rank behind only Vodafone's purchase of Mannesmann and Time Warner's AOL buy.
Halford said the company was in a very strong position, and happy with the status quo.
"Over the years both sides have had an interest in buying the other side out, and it ebbs and flows," he said. "The great thing is the business is a good one, most people would love to own that business, so it's just a nice position to be in."
Vodafone Chief Executive Vittorio Colao said in May he would stake his reputation on selling the group's prized stake at the right time and right price, saying he would not bow to pressure to do any deal.
Reporting by Kate Holton and Paul Sandle; Writing by Sarah Young; Editing by David Cowell and Louise Heavens


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Wüsthof Gourmet Tomato Knife
- Special Offer
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- Summary
In its seventh-generation of family ownership, Wüsthof has been making some of the finest kitchen cutlery in the world since 1814. The Gourmet line features precision stainless-steel blades that resist stains and rust and hold an exceedingly sharp edge.
- The tomato knife's serrated blade effortlessly cuts through tough skins and rinds and features a two-pronged tip for lifting slices of food.
- Stamped blade is made of high-carbon stainless steel for top performance and durability.
- Triple-riveted high-impact plastic handle provides a secure, comfortable grip.
- 5"-long blade; 4 1/2"-long handle; 1.75 oz.
- Made in Germany.
- Use & Care
- Always use caution when handling sharp objects.
- Avoid cutting on hard surfaces such as stone, metal or glass.
- It is not advisable to use any knife but a meat cleaver to cut through bone, as other blades can be easily damaged.
- Hand-wash with warm water and a mild detergent. Rinse and dry immediately.
- Sharpen your knife at home using a sharpener specifically designed for a serrated blade, or have it sharpened by a professional.
- Store knife in a safe place to protect its edge and prevent injury.
- Shipping
Shipping Information
UPS can deliver most in-stock items within 3–5 business days. UPS is unable to deliver to P.O. boxes.
Shipping Rates
The shipping rate varies depending on your order total and shipping destination. View Shipping Options and Charges.
Next Day Delivery
For an additional charge of $26 per address, we can expedite delivery to most destinations. This service is not available for some oversize items, items shipped directly from the supplier (including perishable and custom-manufactured items), out-of-stock items and items to be shipped outside the contiguous 48 states.
Orders received by 9:00 p.m. ET Monday through Thursday will arrive the next business day; orders placed Friday through Sunday will arrive on the following Tuesday.
Return Policy
At Williams Sonoma, we take great pride in the quality and craftsmanship of our products. Attention to design, materials, safety and construction are our priority. Upon receipt, please inspect your purchase and notify us of any damage; we will arrange for a prompt replacement.
If within 30 days, you are dissatisfied for any reason, you may return your purchase for a refund of the merchandise value. An original receipt or gift receipt is required for all returns and exchanges. Returns with a gift receipt will be refunded in the form of a Merchandise Credit for the amount indicated on the gift receipt. Returns with original receipt will be refunded in the original form of payment, cash and check refunds over $100 will be issued as a company check (may take 14 business days from time of request).
For all cutlery returns (knife sets, single knives, cutting boards, knife sharpeners and knife storage), please contact us at 888.922.4108 to initiate the return.
We cannot accept returns on monogrammed, personalized, special-order items, custom upholstery, food, items shipped direct from the vendor or on items damaged through normal wear and tear. Final sale items ending in .97 or .99 cannot be returned.
Made to Order and Final Sale Furniture items are non-returnable and cannot be cancelled once the order is placed.
For returns of items purchased from your Williams Sonoma Gift Registry, we will gladly provide a refund or exchange for the merchandise within 90 days of your event or within 90 days of purchase, whichever date is later. View Full Returns Policy.
- Gift with Purchase
Receive a $25 Williams-Sonoma Gift Card with your purchase of Wüsthof cutlery. Print Coupon
Registrant: Receive a free gift when you add qualifying Wüsthof products to your registry. Print Coupon
Rated 5 out of 5 by sjsg from Everyone needs one of these Upon the recommendation of the specialist at the Annapolis W/S store, I purchased my first tomato knife and as she indicated it would become my go-to knife for everything. I then purchased one for my daughter and having just purchased a lake cottage, I then made it my first purchase for my new kitchen! Needless to say, I can't imagine a home without this indispensible knife.Date published: 2017-01-03Rated 5 out of 5 by WisMary from A Necessity Great knife for tomatoes and vegetables. I've given tomato knives to my daughters and friends. I definitely recommend this knife for every cook.Date published: 2015-11-20Rated 5 out of 5 by Postmaster from Fantastic Knife I have bought 4 of these so far. This is a fantastic knife and solves the problem of slicing tomatoes without crushing them! The end is designed to take the core out of the tomato. Every one that uses mine wants one.Date published: 2013-12-02Rated 5 out of 5 by TheCookingVet from The Only Knive I Use on Tomatoes This knife makes cutting tomatoes super easy. You'll wonder how you ever cut tomatoes without it.Date published: 2013-10-25Rated 5 out of 5 by kitchenguyMA from Excellent slicer! Even with very ripe tomatoes. Can get paper thin slices. Also a great sandwich slicer so I don't need to dirty a second knife when making a sandwich.Date published: 2013-10-18