The Week in Media Stories

What a week in media we've had!  Let me recap.

--When I think about the week in media, I am guessing that I will most remember the two suicides of the week:  Kate Spade and Anthony Bourdain.   I never had a Kate Spade purse and can't imagine a bag so wonderful that I'd spend hundreds of dollars on it, but I respected her as a designer.  I may be the only writer who has never read Bourdain's Kitchen Confidential, but I read parts of his work and respected him as a writer and as a TV persona.

With both of those deaths revealed as suicides, my first thought was, but they had it all, life on their terms, why suicide?  I realize the error of my thought, but I wanted to record it anyway.

I feel like I should have something more profound to say about these deaths, but right now, I'm at a loss.

--Yesterday, after a morning hearing and reading about Bourdain, I read Charles Krauthammer's goodbye column.  His cancer has returned, and he's not expected to live long.  A wave of sadness washed over me.  I didn't always agree with him, but his stances were full of clear thought and explanation.

He finished his column this way:  "I leave this life with no regrets. It was a wonderful life — full and complete with the great loves and great endeavors that make it worth living. I am sad to leave, but I leave with the knowledge that I lived the life that I intended."

I hope that I can say the same at whatever point I go.

--It's been the week of the 50th anniversary of Bobby Kennedy's death.  After hearing so much analysis of that time in politics, I feel both fear and wonder.  We don't seem to have candidates like Kennedy right now, but maybe these difficult days will prompt some to come forward.  I take heart in remembering those difficult days in 1968, when it seemed the nation would be ripped to shreds but somehow, we persevered.  I hope it will be the same now.

--Last night, my dad and I had a great conversation on the phone--I mention that we were speaking on the phone because I think that I hate talking on the phone, but some of my best conversations are on the phone, especially with my family.  We dissected the week in Trumpian politics:  a trade war declared on our allies in Europe and Canada, the upcoming summit with North Korea, the horror of children being separated from parents at the border.  We talked about what good citizens can do.

Part of me was marveling at the fact that after almost my entire life, my dad and I are on the same side politically.  I know that Trump has torn apart many families, but that's not the case in my immediate family.

--Yesterday afternoon, I had the kind of conversation that I think that I prefer:  lunch at Panera with a writer friend.  It was a stormy afternoon, and the skies opened up as we were thinking of leaving.  So we settled in, and I got a mocha and a scone.  We talked about the oldest media of all:  books and further back, Shakespeare and Homer.  We talked about the different Ulysses we had read.  What a treat to be with someone who knows the Tennyson poem as well as I do.

Because we are female writers of a certain age, our conversations often come back to our work and our publishing progress.  We take heart in writers who come into their own after age 50, since we are both in our early 50's.

--Driving home, I heard a story on NPR about the fact that 20 years ago this week, the first episode of Sex and the City aired. While the story did make me wish that I was drinking a craft cocktail with a view of metropolitan skyline, I came home and wrote a poem instead. It's not what Carrie Bradshaw would have written, at least not what she'd have written back when the show premiered. Maybe now, 20 years later, she'd have spent Friday night thinking about Jesus and wedding cakes for gay people and answering the question, "What would Jesus bake?" Now that would make an interesting relationship column!

--And now, on to the week-end, which I hope to spend immersed in Meg Wolitzer's latest novel, which I was lucky enough to find at the library.  Oh, how I love the public library, full of all sorts of media and joy.