This week on the Reformed Journal: what do we need to celebrate? Real friends.
Ann Arbor, Michigan, is a transient college town. A lot of friends and colleagues from my first years here have long since moved on; most people who live here are from somewhere else. We all seem to have some other “real-er” community to which we imagine we belong–hometowns or families or groups of scattered friends, our “people.”
My closest group chat buddies are two hours away. The last three people I texted live in three different time zones. My parents won’t be at my graduation; they’ll be on another continent entirely. For a long time, I didn’t think I wanted to walk. No point in making a fuss, or tracking down regalia – my people wouldn’t be there anyway.
But lady (I say to me, this time)–this is your real life.
Things I have been reading and thinking about:
Caught up on some more Ezra Klein podcast episodes, including this one on America’s abortion politics, and why it’s so detached from real human people and actual public opinion.
An interesting hypothesis about the gradually-all-at-once nature of social change, and how we might our relationship with the internet might change, mostly because it is so boring. (This piece is from October 2023– because one feature of this iteration of the internet is the way it serves up old stuff at random.)
Muslim comedian Ramy Youssef’s SNL monologue from last week, including some funny and moving reflections on prayer in this awful moment.