Elizabeth Catlett & Alberto Beltrán, Untitled (Composition for a Peace Poster), c. 1950 www.artic.edu/artworks/222...

Having teachers through eighth grade note their intelligence, pleasantness in class, and absolute inability to stop getting in trouble for talking too much.

Anyone else having flashbacks to Dorothy Zbornak’s ill-fated birthday visit to Mr. Ha Ha’s Hot Dog Hacienda?

The first time I went into a prison for research, as we were being taken inside, the state police located next door started doing very loud target practice. Not knowing that fact, we thought we were walking into a prison break. Side note: the series Prison Break was filmed just a few miles away.

My job as a parent is done. The 16 year old just came home, not only playing The Gap Band’s “Outstanding”but singing the hell out of it. Charlie Wilson would be proud.

First, the protest a couple blocks away, then the sound of whistles and now multiple helicopters flying over head. ICE is definitely back in town.

The number of times I’ve invoked the memory of the first “When Keeping it Real Goes Wrong” skit while in meetings. I also fantasize about my last day of work looking something like this.

Grading on a snowy December day in suburban Chicago and Gil Scott Heron's "Winter in America" just started playing. Listening to him describe being "taken over by the season of ice/ICE" almost seems too on the nose. Now if I was grading assignments for my class on Octavia Butler's Parables series...

Sing a song…

I feel an overwhelming need to deep clean my kitchen. That can mean only one thing—it’s time to sit down and tackle the mound of grading, reviews, letters of recommendation, and writing that must be done within the next two weeks.

This is pretty close to what driving at night through Chicago has started to feel like for me (thus my not doing it any more).

The irony of Kool Moe Dee on Rock the Bells radio.

Chicago has had one 9/11 worth of people disappeared since the attacks began in September. Los Angeles has had two 9/11s since June.

The viewer in me has enjoyed All Her Fault but now the Black Chicagoan in me is giving major side eye to a white character not only being from South Shore but having his white foster mom describe the whole neighborhood as being destroyed by OxyContin. South Shore deserves better than this depiction.

When it comes to innovating structural racism

In giving a student feedback on an assignment, I typed government “shitdown” and now I’m very reluctant to correct my spelling. It’s so apt as the government is ensuring all this shit rains down on us while destroying the few umbrellas we had.

Thanks to the student who shared on our discussion board that Nat King Cole’s “‘Tis Autumn” is his favorite fall song. I’m listening now for the first time and ‘tis perfect. Found my grading soundtrack for today!

“Chicago is the future.“ @joseolivarez.bsky.social for @chicagomag.com

Well, I know what I’ll now be using as an example of a racist policy that is racially neutral on its face (no pun intended).

@authorwinifred.blacksky.app, my mom is on vacation with her cousins & they were talking about family history. She just texted to let us know they were talking about the midwives who delivered my grandmother and her sisters in rural Alabama. Of course, I thought about you carrying on this legacy.

@tennillenallen.blacksky.app's project is so so cool and necessary; I'm so honored to get to help her bring it to light check out this AMAZING primary source introduction and keep an eye out for further amazing developments!! www.beyondtheconfinesofplace.org/the-brown-book

Today is the launch of my video series & website on “The Brown Book”, a guide to Black Joliet, Illinois in the late 50s. The streets that were once the heart of a bustling community are now home to the county jail and vacant lots. We document that here www.beyondtheconfinesofplace.org/the-brown-book

Once again, the limits of autocorrect reveal themselves. I’m a sociologist and am pretty certain that I meant to type data and not Sara in the text I just sent. This might be the first time I’ve ever actually typed that name on this phone so I have no idea what would have sparked that little moment.

If this older white woman in the nail salon is any indication, there is much anger and outrage at the ICE invasions in and around Chicago. She’s talking about what she sees as the role and responsibility of older people like herself.

This explains why I started hearing so many low-flying helicopters as I was reading on my patio.

I live less than five miles from Broadview and I have not heard this much helicopter activity in my nearly two decades of living here.

There are multiple assignments I’ve retired now that I can’t recommend a number of federal websites or most major newspapers in good faith.

Chante Moore’s Bitter is full of hate and it’s amazing. youtu.be/HjyHl_Zlymo?...

Share a favorite black and white movie. Paris Blues

The differences can be even more granular than that. My husband and I are both Chicagoans, both born in the 70s, both middle class. He’s from the South Side and I’m from the West Side. We do not always know what the other is saying.

I think about this whenever I listen to blues/blues soul singers like Bobby Blue Bland and Tyrone Davis. Also Lenny was real vulnerable in Cause I Love You—he was risking the old hot grits treatment if not his life, wailing about his ex. He was grieving his old woman to his new woman far too hard

The white women were raging against tariffs and saying “Thanks Donnie” all up and down the aisles during my trip to HomeGoods today.

David Brooks stays committed to proving that he never should have been awarded with anything by the American Sociological Association.

What is perfect timing? Finishing a peloton ride just as my husband walks in the door with dinner.

My first concert was when I was five years old. It was Miles Davis.

I always wondered who that was rapping. Now that I know this story, I’m definitely giving The Roots all the side eye.

Holy Smokes and Gee Whiz is perfection.

We were discussing drug policies in class one day and a student said they and the other DARE peer counselors would do presentations and then go get high behind their school.

You couldn’t turn on basic cable without a deluge of Girls Gone Wild commercials. A quick scan of women’s music from the 90s would be revelatory. TLC’s music was a counternarrative. Lilith Fair existed for a reason. What was Riot Grrl was rioting against? Queen Latifah gave us a whole anthem.

I’m always open to surprises but I have to say that I was certainly not expecting to hear my 15 year old blasting and signing along to The Commodores’ Easy on this late July Wednesday morning.

Very much making me think of the first Sun Ra (and of course the Chicago through line between him and Chess Records) I introduced my kids to. youtu.be/IFJpnVFfF8Y?...

I’d never seen any of this brother’s posts b4 but was delighted to see he was recommending Kincaid’s A Small Place & Larsen’s Passing. I was even more delighted when he recommended the Larsen edition w/ the wonderful introduction by the wonderful @dem8z.bsky.social! www.instagram.com/reel/DMK5TJf...

It is 87 degrees on a July day and I am watching leaves fall from the trees in my neighborhood. Wtaf?!?!?!

For the first time in my 22 years of parenting, I cannot rely on the scientific accuracy of advisement posted on the FDA and CDC websites when figuring out the best course of action re: one of my children’s health. It hit me after I read both that I can’t trust what either is posting now.

Yo—is this why (men’s) underwear is called “drawers”?

@dem8z.bsky.social, I wanted to let you know that thanks to your posts, whenever I see “Maryland” used as a modifier, I now expect to see it followed by the word “Farmer” 😉 😆.

So many songs to choose from. Here’s the one that’s top of mind right now. m.youtube.com/watch?v=VbN3...

Shortly after my dad died, I was working on my Mac desktop (which was set up to receive calls from my iPhone). I received a call from Dad Cell & panicked. I knew I had to take it but was so shook by what the call would entail. It took me 3 rings to remember that my mom’d given his phone to my niece

First year of college and my roommate and I got an antiquated answering machine from a thrift store and used the beginning of this as our message. m.youtube.com/watch?v=wZ9H...