Statement from Michael and Susan Pretti Parents of Alex Jeffrey Pretti “We are heartbroken but also very angry. Alex was a kindhearted soul who cared deeply for his family and friends and also the American veterans whom he cared for as an ICU nurse at the Minneapolis VA hospital. Alex wanted to make a difference in this world. Unfortunately, he will not be with us to see his impact. I do not throw around the ‘hero’ term lightly. However, his last thought and act was to protect a woman. The sickening lies told about our son by the administration are reprehensible and disgusting. Alex is clearly not holding a gun when attacked by Trump’s murdering and cowardly ICE thugs. He had his phone in his right hand and his empty left hand is raised above his head while trying to protect the woman ICE just pushed down, all while being pepper sprayed. Please get the truth out about our son. He was a good man. Thank you.

Kare 11 local news just read, in full, this statement from Michael and Susan Pretti, the parents of Alex Pretti.

"Please get the truth out about our son."

it was prescient as hell when smashmouth said “the years keep comin and they don’t stop comin”

Lingering Inland

Check it out: the pre-order link for Lingering Inland: A Literary Tour of the Midwest! This book collects dozens of #LiteraryLandscapes essays, and pre-orders will ship in November—perfect for Christmas! www.press.uillinois.edu/books/?id=p0...

Happening now: in Chicago's Rogers Park neighborhood, students at Sullivan High School are walking out this afternoon in protest of ICE and Trump's deportation regime.

Trying to do anything in the house without alarming my cat

New poem up today with @pinehillsreview.bsky.social!

On parenting, work, and taking walks in winter I’m not on social media much these days other than posting Rohan’s latest train track design, so I miss things like a guest essay in the NYT by a father who...

Reflecting on a silly essay about parenting in the NYT

buttondown.com/possumnotes/...

Parks that deliver, parks that don't Judging small parks by the stakes they set

Sometimes it’s okay for a park to be a park. A park-flavored park. Yes I’m 32 why do you ask

buttondown.com/possumnotes/...

A newsletter is a blog you get in your email. You could get blogs in your email but newsletters are different, somehow, in a way that makes people read them. And I think that’s great

BREAKING: The biggest strike against Amazon in U.S. history is happening right now.

The Teamsters are picketing facilities across the country.

The union has organized workers at 10 Amazon locations AND they're putting up picket lines at hundreds of other Amazon sites nationwide.

congrats to Outlook on making email (the sending and receiving of digital messages) a bewildering and upsetting experience

Amazon Doesn’t Want You to Stream This Gripping New Documentary. This Weekend, You Can. Union won raves and an award at Sundance, but executives have been afraid to make it available. Now it is.

I wrote about UNION, the gripping and much-needed documentary about the Amazon Labor Union, and why it hasn't gotten a distribution deal (spoiler: Bezos has too much money/power). You can stream it on Gathr this weekend and you should! slate.com/culture/2024...

NEW POEM #138: "Other Lives" by Conor Gearin (@conorgearin.bsky.social)

"If I was a
lavender seed, on
gravel or on good soil.
If I was a gull on kitchen
scraps or a pile of
confiscated weed."

stonecirclereview.com/other-lives/

#Poem #PoetryCommunity #Poetry #NewPoem

are indoor soccer shoes back in style? 6th grade me is vindicated at last

Gaza's catastrophic food shortage means mass death is imminent, monitor says Extreme food shortages in parts of the Gaza Strip have already exceeded famine levels, and mass death is now imminent without an immediate ceasefire and surge of food to areas cut off by fighting, the global hunger monitor said on Monday.

www.reuters.com/world/middle...

A Bronx Teacher Asked. Tommy Orange Answered. When the author received an impassioned email, he dropped everything to visit the students who inspired it.

www.nytimes.com/2024/03/18/b...

Redcedar - Conor Gearin

Gray whale, extinct in the Atlantic, seen in southern New England waters - New England Aquarium In an incredibly rare event, the New England Aquarium aerial survey team sighted a gray whale off the New England coast last week, a species that has been extinct in the Atlantic for more than 200 yea...

A gray whale near Nantucket! The archeological evidence has gray whales here up to about 450 years ago, and then scattered sightings into the 18th century, so it’s been a long long time!

www.neaq.org/about-us/pre...

Rejection can be brutal! 🙃 First drafted this while trying to find work before I found Our Climate.

Full poem here: www.sierranevadareview.com/eben-bein-2024

What would you call this form? Considering "a disintegration" or "a mutation". #rejection #poetry #funny

One of the strangest and shortest poems I’ve published

The Canal The board where the tall old man wrote fossil data in chalk blurred in my still-waking eyes and is this what's needed, not sharper sight but little give, allowance of blur—as if Whistler, painting gra...

I drafted this poem roughly 10 years ago. It’s been getting tweaks and revisions ever since. I’m glad it finally found a home with @eunoiareview.bsky.social

eunoiareview.wordpress.com/2024/03/03/t...

New poem out today

[nixon voice] slack it…to me??

On Kaho’olawe, new technology could restore a sacred Hawaiian island To bring seabirds back to Kaho‘olawe, you need to first find the cats. And to find the cats on Kaho‘olawe, you need to know where to find the bombs. Eleven kilometers, about 7 miles, off the coast of ...

I'm incredibly proud to share my latest for @mongabay.bsky.social: the story of the Hawaiian activists, scientists, and technology wizards working to restore an sacred island from military destruction, erosion, invasive plants and... cats. news.mongabay.com/2024/02/on-k...

Zoomed in picture of a stag beetle's head with an excerpt from the poem Common Descent "This is an insect with zest, with heft enough to take down others of his kind... true mouthparts tucked discretely beneath the massive grapplers—I, too, hide my real mouth behind something bigger."

Childhood hero: David Attenborough. Kinship with the living world he instilled in me has only grown.

Thx Radar Poetry for celebrating this at www.radarpoetry.com/common-descent & to my #chickadeecollective, especially @conorgearin.bsky.social who helped identify the heart of this poem early on.

Some of the most thoughtful science writing I've read have been in non-sciencey pubs (e.g. airline magazines); on topics that don't scream "science" (e.g. local communities, cultural history); by reporters who might not identify as science writers. Tell someone you know to enter NASW SciWriAwards!

Here’s the story for those wondering. What brought it to light was a missing persons case. Turns out the police ran over a guy, then just buried him out back of the jail without bothering to notify next of kin even though there was ample ID on the victim’s body.

I'm referencing this poem: www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44394/...

Farrier’s Work by Conor Gearin Farrier’s Work After Gerard Manley Hopkins I have never held the hammer and tongs, smacked sparks from orange iron, in fact it turns out I’m anemic, not even enough iron in my blood— so why am I...

New poem out today, my first one in years. This one's a deep cut for you Gerard Manley Hopkins heads out there. More to come in February! Stay tuned!
oneartpoetry.com/2024/01/19/f...