Mike Pilewski writes about life, politics and culture in the United States
My eight-year-old cousin Trevor wrote to me recently from Pleasant Gap, Pennsylvania, to ask for my help with a school project. Dear Michael, We are working on a Flat Stanley project. Stanley is a character in our book, Flat Stanley. He was flattened when a big bulletin board fell on him while he was in bed sleeping. In the book, … >>
Dear readers, I hope you can forgive me for abandoning two of my principles. The first is not to revisit a topic too soon after having written about it. I thought I was done with tornadoes, but they kept coming. After those in North Carolina, there was the one that destroyed the airport in St. Louis, Missouri. Then a major … >>
That Barack Obama! You never know what he’s going to do next. One night, he’s cracking jokes at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner. The next night, he tells us Osama bin Laden is dead. I have to offer my congratulations. Obama had promised to go after bin Laden, and he got him. I’m happy to see that the president can … >>
Every little girl wants to be a princess — and my five-year-old niece is no exception. If she had her way (which she often does), she’d wear a fancy dress and a tiara every day. It goes without saying that she’d always be the center of attention. There’s something deep in the female psyche that responds to fairy tales — … >>
When my uncle moved from Pennsylvania to North Carolina, he no longer had to shovel his driveway. Instead, he almost got hit by a tornado. “One of the first tornadoes touched down just nine miles [15 km] north of us,” he wrote in an e-mail this week. One of the first, that is, of 25 tornadoes that hit the state … >>
Of all the villains in the world, Mu’ammer Gaddafi is the one I’ve liked best. That’s because he always follows through. He’s not only talked about a pan-Arab or pan-African union; he’s tried to create one — first by attempting to persuade his neighbors, then by trying to annex two of them. Gaddafi designed the Libyan flag himself: a solid … >>
Picture this: Last October, a group of American exchange students is walking through a pedestrian plaza in downtown Wiesbaden late at night. Suddenly, they’re approached by a gang of young ethnic Turks who don’t like the fact that one of the students is speaking English. “Hey!” the gang leader barks at him. “You’re American, aren’t you?” “Keep walking, Sam,” I … >>
This column was originally written for Spotlight Online. There’s a tradition at Spotlight Online: every afternoon, we take a short break and have a cup of tea with colleagues from our youth magazine, Spot on. We discuss our various travels and the news of the day, and exchange ideas that we can share with you, our readers. When the tragedy … >>
Suppose you have a persistent admirer. It doesn’t matter that you live in a different city. Nor does the fact that you don’t know her. She finds out where you live, which university you’re going to and which courses you’re taking, then signs up for the same ones. She travels across the country to live near you. She is driven … >>
Women with abusive husbands make all sorts of excuses for them: “He’s normally not like that.” “He’s sorry.” “He’s trying to change.” “He provides for me.” “I don’t have to worry about things.” “I’d never survive without him.” “There’s no alternative.” (Men can experience this, too, as the target of emotional abuse. The scars are on the inside.) We can’t … >>