This is my night.
Interview #4 between Harrell and his four-year-old daughter Beatrice
Beatrice: I want to be a dentist, I mean a hair doctor.
Harrell: What does a hair doctor do?
B: They brush people’s hair and look in there to see if they have any mice in their hair. (She tries to spin my chair around.) You need to do some hip hop.
H: I’ll take that into consideration.
B: My brain doesn’t go away when I go to sleep.
H: What happens when you go to sleep?
B: Get bad dreams, hurt, pain.
H: What kind of bad dreams and pain?
B: About rotting onions and carrots.
H: That was what your bad dream was about?
B: Someone ate a molded carrot.
H: Very scary sounding.
B: Mama is arting in her workroom.
H: Arting?
B: Yeah, making dresses, and watching movies.
H: Do you like flying on airplanes?
B: No, but when we were landing in Nevada everything looked like toys. Toy houses, toy cars, toy everything.
H: Tell me about the turbulence that we felt on the airplane, what was that like?
B: We shook around like a bowl of soup.
H: What do you know about science?
B: Don’t waste gravity.
H: Interesting, what else?
B: Candles are so beautiful they come on like little stars.
H: What are stars made of?
B: A person star, or not a person star?
H: Well, I was thinking of the not a person star, but whatever you want to respond to is fine.
B: I don’t know. When I go to sleep I disappear.
H: You disappear?
B: No, I stay. I’m just wiggling my brain.
H: Anything else you want to say? This is our last interview.
B: Write down my song. (She then sings…) Good bye, good bye, good bye.
I love this. Children are so imaginative.
The economics of unpaid internships are obvious. Employers are desperate for cheap work, and “free” is pretty cheap. Workers are desperate for, well, anything, and students and recent grads are willing to negotiate their wages down to zero. But the ethics aren’t so clear-cut. If unpaid internships are the key to better jobs and bigger salaries, should we be concerned about the millions of lower-class students who can’t afford to work for free?
Yesterday, I asked you to tell me your experiences and opinions about unpaid internships. Hundreds of you responded.
What say you, Tumblr? Are unpaid internships unethical?
What’s everyone doing?
The first time I woke up was at seven in the morning, after a text from a friend telling me he was heading to the hospital because his baby was on the way. I had a fleeting moment of happiness for him and his wife before I drifted soundly back to sleep.
I awoke again at nine. An hour later than most days. Most days I am on a schedule. Not today. I changed into my favorite pair of ratty cut-off jean shorts and an old striped t. I got on my bike and raced through the streets of downtown. The first ride of the season is always the best. It reminded me of the first days of summer back when I was a kid in grade school. I was as careless then as I was in this moment. I raced the passing cars and turned tightly around the city corners. I let my hair flow freely and tangle as the wind danced so effortlessly through each strand.
When I arrived home I couldn’t stop. There was this strong urge pressing me to keep moving. So I hopped in my car and drove towards the sun, and it led me straight to the river. I settled on the east and tied my laces taut. And I ran. My legs carried me a long distance before I doubled over in the bed of grass overlooking the Mississippi. It was breathtaking and I realized in that moment I have all the time in the world. I soaked up every last minute of this beautiful day, the scenery around me, the sunshine. Because tomorrow is the beginning of a celebration of an ending- and I may not feel this great for longevity, and this day wasn’t intended to be taken for granted. No. I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of today; the day after my undergrad career came to an end.
And now I’m sitting with my windows open while I lay in bed, and I’m hoping that my peers have had equally pleasant experiences today. Because it was revitalizing, and calming, and peaceful, and we all needed a day like today.
My friend Carl has got a life a city dweller could get sickeningly jealous of.
For example: Me. I’m jealous.
I started writing a short story… but I’m too tired to finish it. Maybe someday I’ll finish it. If not I can always think about the night I started writing grandiose lies about my childhood, all for the fun of it. Fabrication at 1 in the morning gets wild.
zzzzzz
Steven Soderbergh and Rooney Mara on set - “The Bitter Pill”
I wouldn’t have ever recognized Rooney Mara in this role. Holy shit!
They told me the big black Lab’s name was Reggie, as I looked at him lying in his pen. The shelter was clean, no-kill, and the people really friendly. I’d only been in the area for six months, but everywhere I went in the small college town, people were welcoming and open. Everyone waves when you pass them on the street.
But something was still missing as I attempted to settle in to my new life here, and I thought a dog couldn’t hurt. Give me someone to talk to. And I had just seen Reggie’s advertisement on the local news. The shelter said they had received numerous calls right after, but they said the people who had come down to see him just didn’t look like “Lab people,” whatever that meant. They must’ve thought I did.
But at first, I thought the shelter had misjudged me in giving me Reggie and his things, which consisted of a dog pad, bag of toys almost all of which were brand new tennis balls, his dishes and a sealed letter from his previous owner.
See, Reggie and I didn’t really hit it off when we got home. We struggled for two weeks (which is how long the shelter told me to give him to adjust to his new home). Maybe it was the fact that I was trying to adjust, too.
Maybe we were too much alike.
I saw the sealed envelope. I had completely forgotten about that. “Okay, Reggie,” I said out loud, “let’s see if your previous owner has any advice.”
____________ _________ _________ _________
To Whomever Gets My Dog:
Well, I can’t say that I’m happy you’re reading this, a letter I told the shelter could only be opened by Reggie’s new owner. I’m not even happy writing it. He knew something was different.
So let me tell you about my Lab in the hopes that it will help you bond with him and he with you.
First, he loves tennis balls. The more the merrier. Sometimes I think he’s part squirrel, the way he hoards them. He usually always has two in his mouth, and he tries to get a third in there. Hasn’t done it yet. Doesn’t
matter where you throw them, he’ll bound after them, so be careful. Don’t do it by any roads.
Next, commands. Reggie knows the obvious ones —-“sit,” “stay,” “come,” “heel.”
He knows hand signals, too: He knows “ball” and “food” and “bone” and “treat” like nobody’s business.
Feeding schedule: twice a day, regular store-bought stuff; the shelter has the brand.
He’s up on his shots. Be forewarned: Reggie hates the vet. Good luck getting him in the car. I don’t know how he knows when it’s time to go to the vet, but he knows.
Finally, give him some time. It’s only been Reggie and me for his whole life. He’s gone everywhere with me, so please include him on your daily car rides if you can. He sits well in the backseat, and he doesn’t bark or complain. He just loves to be around people, and me most especially.
And that’s why I need to share one more bit of info with you…His name’s not Reggie. He’s a smart dog, he’ll get used to it and will respond to it, of that I have no doubt. But I just couldn’t bear to give them his real name. But if someone is reading this … well it means that his new owner should know his real name. His real name is “Tank.” Because, that is what I drive.
I told the shelter that they couldn’t make “Reggie” available for adoption until they received word from my company commander. You see, my parents are gone, I have no siblings, no one I could’ve left Tank with .. and it was my only real request of the Army upon my deployment to Iraq, that they make one phone call to the shelter … in the “event” … to tell them that Tank could be put up for adoption. Luckily, my CO is a dog-guy, too, and he knew where my platoon was headed. He said he’d do it personally. And if you’re reading this, then he made good on his word.
Tank has been my family for the last six years, almost as long as the Army has been my family. And now I hope and pray that you make him part of your family, too, and that he will adjust and come to love you the same way he
loved me.
If I have to give up Tank to keep those terrible people from coming to the US I am glad to have done so. He is my example of service and of love. I hope I honored him by my service to my country and comrades.
All right, that’s enough. I deploy this evening and have to drop this letter off at the shelter. Maybe I’ll peek in on him and see if he finally got that third tennis ball in his mouth.
Good luck with Tank. Give him a good home, and give him an extra kiss goodnight - every night - from me.
Thank you,
Paul Mallory
____________ _________ _________ _______
I folded the letter and slipped it back in the envelope. Sure, I had heard of Paul Mallory, everyone in town knew him, even new people like me. Local kid, killed in Iraq a few months ago and posthumously earning the Silver
Star when he gave his life to save three buddies. Flags had been at half-mast all summer.
I leaned forward in my chair and rested my elbows on my knees, staring at the dog.
“Hey, Tank,” I said quietly.
The dog’s head whipped up, his ears cocked and his eyes bright.
“C’mere boy.”
He was instantly on his feet, his nails clicking on the hardwood floor. He sat in front of me, his head tilted, searching for the name he hadn’t heard in months. “Tank,” I whispered.
His tail swished.
I kept whispering his name, over and over, and each time, his ears lowered, his eyes softened, and his posture relaxed as a wave of contentment just seemed to flood him. I stroked his ears, rubbed his shoulders, buried my
face into his scruff and hugged him.
“It’s me now, Tank, just you and me. Your old pal gave you to me.” Tank reached up and licked my cheek.
“So whatdaya say we play some ball?” His ears perked again.
“Yeah? Ball? You like that? Ball?”
Tank tore from my hands and disappeared into the next room. And when he came back, he had three tennis balls in his mouth.”
