Bourekas (savory stuffed pastry) and shakshuka (eggs cooked in a spicy tomato sauce) are favorite foods for some Jewish people, while knishes (pastry filled with mashed potatoes) and potato latkes…
Imagine discovering that the man who raised you is not your biological father. That your mother’s race differs from how she presented herself. That the person you are attracted to is your sibling…
When the library closed almost three months ago, I checked out eight books. I’ve finished two of them. This is unusual for someone who reads everywhere—in checkout lines, on the Metro, at Dodger…
Before Barack Obama, Hiram Revels and Shirley Chisholm helped govern the nation. William Wells Brown wrote a novel before Toni Morrison. Phillis Wheatley published poems before Langston Hughes. And…
They work in Watts, Chicago, Oakland, and Harlem, go on vacation in Provincetown, MA, and return home to Otis, South Carolina (pop. 5,000). They include an Ivy League professor, an ex-CIA agent, a…
If you could find out how long you're going to live, would you want to have that information? If you knew you'd die in fourteen years, would you still marry or have children? Would you tell your parents?
What if the person you're dating snoops and breaks up with you...
Lydia Rosen’s inane chatter about bourekas during the flight to Israel baffles Matt Greene. To his partner, Daniel Rosen, his mother’s preoccupation with the stuffed pastry makes total sense. “She’s trying not to have to imagine how much of her son’s body has been blown to bits,” he explains. But...
For as long as anyone can remember, a caravan of gypsy traders provides the Jews of Kreskol with their only connection to the outside world. Situated in a remote part of a forest in Poland, the town was inexplicably overlooked by the Nazis, and has retained the traditions of eastern...
A facetious question posed by an NPR radio host lured me into reading Steve Young’s memoir, QB: My Life Behind the Spiral. Did the pro football Hall of Famer receive special treatment at Brigham Young University where he played quarterback because he is the great-great-great grandson of Brigham Young?With outstanding...
When U.S. soldiers died during the First World War, their relatives were given the choice to have the remains shipped home or buried in an American cemetery in Europe. A lobbying movement on behalf of those who selected overseas interment resulted in Congress financing close to 7000 pilgrimages for mothers...
