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  • a listener of last resort

    “Via a parent or sister or nun or friend, a spouse or former spouse, names and addresses of the AIDS afflicted had a way of making their way to Dan. One visit tended to lead to another until death intervened. A typical first sentence: ‘I heard from so-and-so that you were ill and thought I would drop by to see how it’s going.’ He never identified himself as ‘Father Daniel,’ just Dan. ‘I wanted to make it as clear as possible that I was seeking no conversions or last-minute confessions,’ he told me. Dan often presided at funerals of people whom he had met only months or weeks before. He described himself as ‘a listener of last resort.’”

    Jim Forest, At Play in the Lion’s Den: A Biography and Memoir of Daniel Berrigan.

    → 10:35 PM, Apr 7

  • Kinda mad no one told me about Clare Carlisle before now. Glad that Transcendence for Beginners is in the mail.

    → 3:19 PM, Mar 31

  • Sperm whales gather up to help birthing mothers and babies.

    → 9:05 PM, Mar 27

  • no amount of debunking multi-tasking will diminish the behavior

    Went to a recent school district committee meeting and: almost all council reps on laptops the whole time. Annual symposium at my university today: laptops during presentations. Was visiting consultant to big tech company to speak with staff about an r&d mandate that is open-ended, well-funded, ambitious and: laptops. Endless scrolling while presentations, hearings, talks are happening. I make an absolute rule in my classrooms or it would be the same. At this rate I could run for president if only because I actually sit and pay attention.

    → 12:16 PM, Mar 23

  • Chocolate chip pancakes on World Down Syndrome Day.

    On the griddle, three pancakes feature chocolate chips in the shapes of the numbers three, two, and one, respectively

    → 10:40 AM, Mar 21

  • Currently riveted by this book — told by a man who was a young Catholic Worker in the mid 20th c, in the circle of both Berrigan brothers, plus Day, Merton, so many others. If you only see the draft-card-burner rabble-rouser in this character, you’re missing so much.

    The cover of Jim Forest’s At Play in the Lion’s Den. Fr Berrigan stands in handcuffs and making a peace sign.

    → 12:43 PM, Mar 18

  • I’ll be speaking with my philosopher colleague Jacob Stump at a Veritas Forum event on March 25 on Northeastern’s Boston campus—a dialogue about the nature of anger. Register with this form.

    A poster for the event reads with the title: Can rage be righteous? There are headshots of the two speakers and a QR code to register. Thai food for dinner is provided; the event is on March 25 at 7:30 pm in Mugar Hall 201.

    → 10:08 PM, Mar 11

  • on labels and kids and schools

    I need to write a long post about the many parents I know who come to me for advice about accepting an ADHD/related dx and the requisite IEP or 504 bureaucracy for their very average kids. It’s a well-meaning move from all parties to “do everything we can to help” by intervening. But the longitudinal data on labels is pretty damning and on medication is mixed at best. Again: good intentions from everyone. But parents need to be ruthlessly honest with themselves: Will intervening and saddling kids with labels really enhance the child’s school experience? Or will it salve a parent’s need to have a self-concept of Good Parent, one who Fights for the Child? Or will it solve a teacher’s (sometimes justified) need to have an optimized classroom? Those questions have very different protagonists. So much of parenting requires tolerating the inner uncertainty about how to attend closely to one’s individual children, including the attendance that is the most challenging and vital: watching, listening, and waiting.

    → 7:53 PM, Mar 11

  • Friends in MA and NY: Skylark Ensemble performs a Lent program this weekend. I am so sorry to miss it — this group is incredible.

    → 2:14 PM, Mar 10

  • Officially: gonna make it

    In a patch of ground next to a fence, the tiniest green shoots spring up.

    → 12:05 PM, Mar 8

  • Currently reading: Burdened Agency by Travis Pickell 📚So many strong concepts and integrated thinking here.

    → 8:41 AM, Mar 7

  • Glad to see my colleague in disability/design @pauldefazio here on Micro! Do please welcome him.

    → 9:58 AM, Mar 5

  • A student-built ice cathedral at Notre Dame.

    → 3:19 PM, Feb 13

  • My PhD student is being advised left and right to let Claude do her lit review, write her qualifying presentation, summarize the books she needs to read to prepare. She is holding fast to the conviction that this slow, frictionful work is the work she signed on for. Immensely proud of her.

    → 1:09 PM, Feb 13

  • My son Malcolm (15) and I are on our fourth watch-through of Band of Brothers — a winter tradition. I think I’ve seen it twice more before that, so I’m officially versed in the 101st airborne. Other fans here?

    → 3:32 PM, Feb 12

  • Hundreds of tasks to go and still more snow coming down, but we’re in to our new place! It’s very quiet here.

    A shot of our living room with furniture, records, artwork strewn about.

    → 10:01 AM, Feb 7

  • here we go

    A bunch of moving boxes by a wall in our old apartment, ready to head out

    → 10:13 AM, Feb 4

  • I have plenty of complaints about the UI of Substack, but there is a burgeoning network of professors there sharing principled and ingenious pedagogy for the age of LLMs.

    → 9:14 AM, Feb 2

  • Current status: moving week, new apartment! We’re having to get snow removal just to fit the truck out front, but such is the process.

    Our bare living room and dining room, gleaming white walls and wood floors.

    → 11:14 AM, Feb 1

  • You guyssss Bruce Herman’s latest work.

    Three photos of the tortured fleshy figures chased by skeletons in Bruce's latest paintings.

    → 4:20 PM, Jan 31

  • I’ve been in San Francisco for a few days enjoying a break from winter, but this polar bear is living her best life.

    Our Great Pyrenees, Agnes, stands white and fuzzy in a snowstorm.

    → 3:58 PM, Jan 31

  • Currently half-nursing along an idea for a book—intellectual memoir, I guess?—called After Sustained Reflection, I Changed My Mind.

    → 3:16 PM, Jan 31

  • Coming your way soon if you’re a Comment subscriber!

    The cover of the spring issue of *Comment* has Christian Smith on sociology, L.M. Sacasas on AI, and me on pattern recognition (design and architecture).

    → 2:40 PM, Jan 29

  • A great salve to trudge through the tundra yesterday for the 5 pm mass.

    In a blizzard, the entrance of a church welcomes with its warm light.

    → 12:17 PM, Jan 26

  • The soup kitchen at my church has an ongoing Amazon wishlist of clothing items for guests. Deep winter is a good time to re-up it, if you’re looking to help.

    → 6:33 AM, Jan 26

  • It’s so good to see George Scialabba really read Christopher Lasch and understand his neither-right-nor-left critique of modernity. Lasch “insisted on the fact of human scale.”

    → 7:14 AM, Jan 25

  • Our daughter’s boyfriend 3D printed her a paintbrush holder. Romance!

    On our daughter's desk, two white plastic paintbrush holders sit with arrayed brushes, like fingers of a hand, standing neatly inside.

    → 5:20 AM, Jan 21

  • On prevention design.

    → 2:53 PM, Jan 20

  • → 1:33 PM, Jan 20

  • One day I really will write about how going to Wheaton College — where dancing and drinking and sex and drugs were verboten — was an absolute riot of creativity among my friends. We just unearthed these tapes, just some of the many bands and solo acts who wrote and recorded original music.

    → 11:28 AM, Jan 19

  • “In such situations, I have to learn the meaning of simply standing by.” On an ethics of life and accompaniment at a Vienna hospital, in Plough. Thanks to @isaacgreene for the link.

    → 11:20 AM, Jan 19

  • Our little public domain symbol goes official in Massachusetts. Surprises from that project abound.

    → 5:02 PM, Jan 15

  • Is it…wholly accidental that my students struggle to find the bookstore plugin on Canvas to see their required paper book titles?

    → 10:26 AM, Jan 15

  • Friends: if you can think of an academic journal article in any field that is both well written and (sorta) accessible outside its subfield, I’d love a rec. (I don’t need to explain why finding these can be… difficult.)

    → 1:06 PM, Jan 13

  • Notable uptick in people reading paper books on the train. My love for my fellow human creatures abounds.

    → 6:32 PM, Jan 12

  • I’m in a podcast rut and would love some suggestions. I like conversations on: intellectual history, philosophy and theology, the craft of fiction and creativity generally. And strong narrative-led documentary production on literally any subject except true crime. If it’s told well, sign me up.

    → 9:08 AM, Jan 9

  • lost causes

    Great to hear Matt Dinan further expound on his last couple of years in the classroom on Know Your Enemy (after publishing this post). Dinan’s experience echoes so much of my own, and it feels amazing to be starting 2026 with confidence and clarity about what I’m doing in the classroom, even if it’s rare in my institutional setting. And Dinan’s aside that he is hopelessly devoted to a triad of lost causes — cooperativism, the Catholic church, liberal education — made my heart swell.

    → 4:22 PM, Jan 4

  • Looking forward to George Scialabba’s forthcoming collection.

    → 3:15 PM, Jan 4
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