My son Ethan just graduated from college. I’m immensely proud of him, though I’ve been that since the nurse at St. Luke’s Hospital handed him to me, wrapped in a soft blanket and sporting the hair of Mitt Romney (it later turned blonde).

I must say I love weddings and graduations. Weddings rarely fail to raise both a tear from my eye from the sheer beauty of hopeful love and exciting potential, and a bellylaugh from some hilarious product of nervousness, excessive worrying or the antics of some crazily eccentric relative.

And even though this country does graduations terribly–long, schmaltzy speeches and glacially-paced proceedings, you get to look into the faces of graduates and see something rare: pure, unadulterated hope and excitement.

Ethan’s graduation was better than most. Skies that threatened rain but never delivered seemed to encourage most of the speakers to speed up their delivery, and it seemed like no time before we were hoisting glasses at a celebratory dinner.

So, here’s to my son, you may occasionally think wistfully of those days of epic parties, fraternal brotherhood, late nights, later mornings, beer pong and flip-flops, but I assure you you’re going to find the real world much more cool.

Just don’t be late for work.

On May 31 Cathy and I will celebrate 29 years of marriage. It’s an event I’m approaching uneasily.

On the one hand, I want to rub the fact in the face of everyone I meet.

I have been married nearly three decades!

Is that not a titanic achievement?!

I want buttons and t-shirts printed up with the number 30. I’ll wear them and people will ask: “what’s with the 30?” And I’ll reply: that’s how many years I’ve been married.

“Damn,” they’ll say.

Damn right.

But on the other hand, the pride melts into a messy goo of guilt and humility.

The fact is, we never reach 29 years without some sensationally practiced forgiveness.

For my part, I’ve generously forgiven Cathy for everything I’ve understood to be her fault, which is to say every single bad thing that has ever happened to us since the day we were married.

And Cathy has forgiven me, too. She’s forgiven me for countless acts of rudeness, cruelty, selfishness and weakness. She’s forgiven me for clinging to dim-witted ideas of what it means to be a husband.

She’s protected my pride when it didn’t deserve to be protected. She has endured a million haughty “I told you so’s,” and has silently allowed to pass twice that number in opportunities to reciprocate.

An example: Years ago, the kids, barely out of diapers, are asleep in the back of the car as we begin a five-hour drive home from a rainy week of camping at Pennsylvania’s Prince Gallitzin State Park. It’s been a tiring week and Cathy falls asleep soon after we get on the southbound state highway that will take us to the PA turnpike, which we will then drive east to get home.

We’re still on the state highway when Cathy wakes up and says, “We should be on the turnpike by now. I think you missed a turn.”

Irritated (she’s been asleep, how could she know this?) I reply “no, I haven’t. Go back to sleep.”

But she bolts upright and asks to see the map, which triggers a 25-minute argument of increasing intensity. I’ve already wakened the kids and am in mid-bellowing-sentence asking that she SHUT THE HELL UP when we top a crest and see the sign: “Welcome to Maryland.”

While I silently turn the car around and wonder why God hates me so, she soothes the kids and settles back into her nap without so much as a weary sigh in my direction.

Thirty years of marriage. Four apartments. Three houses. Two dogs. Four cats. Two hamsters. One snake. A strapping son (his snake). A perfect daughter. Ten cars. Lots of loving, fighting, forgiving, learning, breaking, fixing, apologizing and promising to try to do better.

Incredible messes.

Indescribable joys.

I have long been awed when, at wedding receptions, long marriages of 40, 50 and 60 years are recognized.

I’ve searched the eyes of those honored, looking for some sign of special wisdom or endurance.

But only one common thing has been reflected back from those eyes: a simple look of gratitude.

That look must be in answer to all those shared acts of mercy and forgiveness that made those many years possible.

I want to try to remember that look and let it inform my relationship with the wonderful girl I married, the wonderful woman who is my wife.

I still want those buttons though.

My son and I spent the weekend on an Ontario farm where he got to escape the final throes of college and I got to escape suburban life. The weekend was a weird and wonderful mix of calm and excitement; work and relaxation–just as you might expect farm life to be:

* We worked around the place, repairing fences and cleaning up after winter, ate hearty meals and played with four dogs: an aging-but-lovable Labrador Retriever, a Golden Retriever, a young, irrepressible Royal Poodle, and a pregnant Standard Poodle. We hoped she’d deliver while we were there. She didn’t disappoint us.

* We watched a rafter of more than 20 Wild Turkeys forage on a nearby hillside, lead by an enormous displaying tom (a younger tom would occasionally fluff himself up then, when the older one noticed him, would quickly and comically “defluff.”

* We helped care for nine goats–four of which are pregnant.

* We watched the late-night birth of six puppies (well, I only saw two of them. The rest were born after I went to bed at 3 a.m.) Interested in a Golden Doodle? (It’s a mix of Golden Retriever and Poodle) Click here to see them.

On the drive home I recalled a story I had read about an organization committed to getting us all to slow down and recapture the art of savoring life.

It’s an idea I want to try to keep in front of me. Visiting that farm sure helps.

Dear personal shareholders,

With Q1 09 nearly gone now is a good time to report progress on New Year’s Resolutions:

_________________________________________________________________________________

1) Check out weird noise car brakes are making.

2) Lose 10 pounds. (Dropped lazy cat off at pound).

3) Dump Lehman stock.

4) Clean golf clubs.

5) Deal with all those ‘outstanding’ warrants.

6) Water dying fig tree in family room.

7) Go bowling for Obama.

8) Design ‘perfect’ grilled cheese sandwich. Stole one off Food Network.

9) Find ‘meaningful’ work.

10) Rake leaves.

_______________________________________________________________________________

In short, things are progressing nicely.

Right on the heels of Jon Stewart’s spectacular evisceration of CNBC’s Jim Cramer, CBS’ 60 Minutes scores an incredible “get”–an interview with Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke.

This should be good, right? Um, no. CBS Correspondent Scott Pelley makes Jon Stewart look like Lowell Bergman. Half of Pelley’s interview consists of sophomoric questions like: When will it end? Will unemployment get into double digits? Are we out of the woods yet?

You know. The sort of questions only an idiotic Fed Chairman would try to answer.

The other half of the interview (incredibly!) consists of gosh-and-golly commentary on the Fed’s fancy meeting room and B-roll footage of pallets of cash robotically scooting around in its vaults.

If Stewart had been conducting the interview, I can’t help but believe it would have been a lot more entertaining (e.g., “so, who decided to skip the place cards, and go with bronze nameplates embedded in the backs of chairs? Why not put the names on individual Jumbotrons? The room seems big enough…”), AND would have included questions like:

What are we to make of the market’s schizophrenic activity? Which regulatory changes are needed most? What advice do you have for Americans whose retirement 401k plans have been vaporized?

So, in the year 2009, we’re getting our best corporate journalism from Comedy Central? This just in from national correspondent Amy Poehler: “Really? Really?”

Join the chant: Support PBS! Join NPR! Support PBS! Join NPR!

The trolls delighted in The (Allentown, PA) Morning Call newspaper story about the local United Way falling short of its fundraising goal. Moments after the on-line version of the story was posted, their comments poured in. From them we learned that United Way is a hopelessly corrupt system staffed by loafers and supported by idiots.

At one point in the commentary it was somewhat gleefully noted that not one of the dozens of comments were sympathetic to United Way.

Being a former United Way employee I had first-hand experience with the organization, so I entered my own comment: “I used to work for the valley’s United Way and found it to be an excellent organization staffed by dedicated, hardworking people,” it began.

Most of the next 20 or so posts in reply were seething rants accusing me of being either an unwitting shill or a liar. One definitively announced that the only reason I was defending United Way was because it had paid for my drug rehabilitation treatment.

Well, that certainly shut me up. Not because the claim was true–it was not. I backed out of the conversation because, like most of the public commentary on the newspaper’s news forums, it was being dominated by trolls.

They are more than a nuisance. They are crippling what could be a boon to social and political discourse.

What many describe as the death of the newspaper is also the beginning of the bravest of new worlds—one that promises to connect people as they have never been connected before; one that holds the possibility of providing an unparalleled platform for community discussion. The new media organizations that are replacing traditional newspapers have the ability to not only make news reporting immediately available, but truly interactive. Consumers can add to the quality of reporting and develop it into community discussions.

Such a platform is already in place at The Morning Call. All that is keeping us from it are the trolls.

* * *

There is a virtual sign planted at the entrance of National Public Radio’s on-line community:

“Don’t Feed the Trolls.”

In an explanatory post, Eyder Peralta, an editor at NPR.org, describes trolls as “people who say just about anything to get a rise out of others. Trolls … turn perfectly interesting threads into festering cesspools of resentment.”

The community at NPR.org is encouraged to not “feed” the trolls by simply ignoring their posts. It’s an imperfect response. For one, it does nothing to address the substantial time that is wasted slogging through the hateful, pointless drivel that trolls create. But other remedies, such as filters that enable readers to view only editor-approved or highly rated entries, look promising.

But snarks are another matter altogether.

“Snark: It’s Mean, It’s Personal, and It’s Ruining Our Conversation” a recent book by New Yorker magazine film critic David Denby, ably identifies the rampaging nature of snarkiness and the toll it is extracting from the quality of on-line public discourse.

But Denby’s book misses the greater point about Snarks, whose name comes from combining the two-word product of their “work:” Snide Remarks.

Frankly, in a world of micro-managed brand images and billion-dollar public relations spin, a little razor-edged sarcasm that surgically reveals the heart of a matter isn’t an altogether bad thing.

It can take some getting used to–especially if it’s your pet ox being gored by it–but at a time when we are being inundated with manipulative messages, it can be nice to have someone get to the point quickly and clearly.

Yes, sarcasm can get tiresome, but the real enemies of excellent electronic public discourse are trolls that pose as snarks. Their angry, factless diatribes are pitiful attempts to appear smart and in-the-know, but add nothing of substance to the debate.

Trolls are typically easy to ignore except for that one unforgivable sin: the time they waste for people interested in grown-up conversation. With trolls on the loose, no one will be willing to invest their time and insight into the conversation. That is a loss of profound dimensions.

They are unlikely to change on their own. The only solution to the trolls is to filter them out. Do that, and the community benefits of this new world of American journalism will begin.

Of all the facile, empty management sayings ever uttered, that’s my favorite: don’t work harder, work smarter.

A colleague in an overworked newsroom once heard that line and muttered “great, now they’re asking me to alter my DNA, too?”

Nick Kristof’s column in today’s New York Times actually describes a context in which that saying really means something.

Kristof’s subject is a great example of the optimism we should share in addressing world poverty. Because the media spends so much time reporting new and developing examples of impoverishment, there is little reported about the astonishingly effective strategies available to eradicate it. (One of my favorites addresses the plight of children who can’t attend school because they must spend the day collecting water for their families: build wells at schools so that the children can incorporate learning with getting water.)

Kristof cites a report in The Lancet, a British medical journal, that “Iodine deficiency is the most common cause of preventable mental impairment worldwide.” This simple, common supplement to salt could increase IQs around the world about one billion points, he estimates.

A panel of the world’s top economists describes micro-nutrient projects such as iodized salt supplements for pregnant women, are the most cost-effective tools available for fighting entrenched poverty, Kristof reports.

It’s a typically fascinating and uplifting Kristof column (his genius is not simply reporting horrors, but intimating hope that they can be ended if only more people would act.)

Read his column here (requires registration but it’s free and provides access to what is hands-down the best newspaper website in the world (though this one is a close second).

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A game that began with a deluge has washed away an epic drought.

Tyler Kepner
New York Times, October 29, 2008

In 1968 my family moved from southern Indiana to South Jersey, and there, 16 miles from Philadelphia, was born my affinity for Philly sports teams.

Twelve years later, in the same year I married my wife, I would sit in Veterans Stadium’s right-field upper deck with her and my brothers and watch Tug McGraw strike out Willie Wilson with the bases full of Kansas City Royals, to win the franchise’s first World Series title.

It was an event of incredible joy, ranked in my memories just below the birth of my children and my wedding. The memory is marred only by the images of Frank Rizzo’s cavalry and police dogs encircling the field in the bottom of the 8th.

* * *

It’s funny how Philadelphia sportsdom is driven by hate. Hate of the NY Mets and NY Giants, and especially hate of the Dallas Cowboys. There has been a lot of speculation over the roots of that Cowboys hate. Here’s what I think:

It’s not the Cowboys Philadelphia fans hate. It’s the Cowboys’ fans–especially those that live in our midst, with no real connection to Dallas, Texas, beyond a shallow desire to be associated with a winner. That is no reason to support a team. We support these millionaire players and billionaire owners not to steal their achievements, but to cheer their pursuits. We support them as representatives of our place in the world–of our community.

When we do that–and only when we do that–do we win when they win.

Pure sports fans are loyal to the marrow. A lot of us see all those fans of “America’s Team” as nothing but fair-weather friends who will never appreciate the joy of a national championship because they have never earned it.

Philadelphia fans have earned their joy. Just recently, the Phillies marked the franchise’s 10,000th loss. In its vast 125-year history, the franchise has given its faithful much more to lament than to celebrate.

At right is a picture of my ticket for the clinching game of the 1980 series. My wife and I spent six hours in a ticket line at Veteran’s Stadium to make sure we would be there (actually, Cathy could have done without it, but she endured for my sake).

In the ecstatic moments of triumph we shared with our boys in 1980, I actually thought for a moment how tragic it is for the Cubs and Red Sox fans that have lived and died without seeing their team reach the top.

Cole Hamels, the MVP of the 2008 series, was not even born when Pete Rose, Manny Trillo, Bake McBride, Schmitty, Larry Bowa, Lefty, Sarge, the Bull and the rest of that pluckiest of teams won it all.

Twenty-eight years later, our boys are winners again. The celebration is sweetest for those who shared those years of failure and heartbreak. There is a profound thing to be learned in that.