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Guestwords

Guestwords: A Day With Pelé 

Pictures of Pelé flashing on TV as FIFA World Cup fever spreads from Qatar to Queens bring back memories of a writer’s sort-of date with him.

Dec 1, 2022
Guestwords: The Real Thanksgiving

Was it a quirk of history or the hand of God that brought Squanto and William Bradford together?

Nov 23, 2022
Guestwords: Rethinking Preservation

The Nov. 3 vote in the Sag Harbor School District to approve buying five lots near the high school with C.P.F. help was significant. It forces all of us to rethink what preservation means for the East End.

Nov 17, 2022
Guestwords: Fork Play: Remembering Gael Greene

As New York magazine’s pioneering “Insatiable Critic” and the first foodie, a term she coined, Gael Greene made dining out a sensual experience to be savored.

Nov 10, 2022
Guestwords: Fuel Lessons From History

The Group of 7 has decided to cap the price it will pay for Russian oil. There may be lessons for that challenge in U.S. history, from World War I to the coal wars of 1922.

Nov 3, 2022
Guestwords: Hope vs. Despair

Last year a group of us decided to tackle our ecological despair with action in a landscape we love — East Hampton and eastern Long Island. We started in our own yards.

Oct 27, 2022
Guestwords: Jeremiah, Jesus

Oct. 22, 1962: I was ordained to ministry in the Presbyterian Church, and President Kennedy addressed the nation on the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Oct 20, 2022
Guestwords: What’s in a Name?

I have a gripe with people who pin appellations on inanimate objects, or on almost anything and everything. I draw the line at labeling automobiles, apartment complexes, houses . . .

Oct 13, 2022
Guestwords: My Dear Feet

I suspect that I haven’t given enough credit to my feet for what they’ve done for me. It’s time to correct that.

Oct 6, 2022
Guestwords: Beach Plum Days

Memories of picking beach plums in Shinnecock Hills, and how they were lovingly jarred in a grandmother’s sweet-smelling kitchen.

Sep 29, 2022
Guestwords: The Queue for the Queen

I hereby pay my respects to this woman who so impressively embodied Britain’s history and spirit.

Sep 22, 2022
Guestwords: Surfing the Birds and the Flies

A road trip to a pioneering surfer’s favorite East End haunts brings a family together.

Sep 15, 2022
Guestwords: Never Too Old for the Book

For years my grandson had been writing in the brown leather visitors’ book after every summer stay at our beach house. Then one day he stopped.

Sep 8, 2022
Guestwords: Memories of Simon Perchik

I got to know Simon Perchik — prolific poet, friend, disputator, World War II vet — when he was barechested and in boxer shorts.

Sep 1, 2022
Guestwords: Ladies and Gentlemen, the Roiling Stones

I've had some amusing experiences while passing stones. Have you?

Aug 25, 2022
Guestwords: Summer Vacation, 1973

It was the summer my family discovered “the Black Hamptons.”

Aug 18, 2022
Guestwords: What Lincoln Left Us

A close-up look at Abraham Lincoln’s presidency offers possibilities for our own political polarization.

Aug 11, 2022
Guestwords: God Bless Pig Latin America

For me Pig Latin is a little like Swedish. Everyone who speaks it reminds me of the characters in a Bergman film who have lost their faith in God.

Aug 4, 2022
Guestwords: The Springs Cathedral

This year our little church by Accabonac Creek, the Springs Community Presbyterian Church, celebrates its 140th year. I call it one of the great cathedrals of the world.

Jul 28, 2022
Guestwords: One Phone Call

All our decades of planning were working to create the family we’d always wanted. Until, late in my pregnancy with our fourth child, a nurse called.

Jul 21, 2022
Guestwords: My Vietnam

Vietnam was my war, even though I never served there. It framed my youth and I longed to see the country. I finally got there at age 69, in early 2020, just before Covid hit.

Jul 14, 2022
Guestwords: Emulsion of Deliciousness

A family tradition of clamming and an everlasting appreciation for the chowder of Mary Emma Bunn of the Shinnecocks.

Jul 7, 2022
Guestwords: Like a Snake Bite

The summer of 1977, the summer of Son of Sam, brought trauma and fear, and the poison of trauma doesn’t just go away.

Jun 30, 2022
Guestwords: ‘Casablanca’ Revisited

Again today, the world is witness to invasion, resistance, and the need to escape repression.

Jun 23, 2022
Guestwords: Listening Is Not Enough

We are seeing a resurgence of attitudes antagonistic to correcting systemic racism. After two years of listening, there is not only fatigue around these conversations, but also significant pushback. So we must act.

Jun 16, 2022
Guestwords: At War With Ourselves

Nature on Earth is in a man-made death spiral, but imagine how much faster we would be killing life as we know it if everyone on this fragile orb followed the lead of America’s most “successful.”

Jun 9, 2022
Guestwords: Ghosts of Harmony

I satisfied my departed dad’s spirit as Rosanne Cash sang about enshrining her departed dad during a benefit concert at the State Theatre, a plaster palace in Easton, Pa.

Jun 2, 2022
Guestwords: Fishing for the Uninitiated

If you’re like me, a fishing greenhorn after you’ve already gone gray, I’ve got a few tips.

May 26, 2022
Guestwords: Swarm Season

Honeybees will not make a hole in your house, but they will take advantage of an existing one. So be sure to take a good look around your property and seal up all cracks and crevices.

May 19, 2022
Guestwords: The Meat of Memory

These days, “one could do worse than yield to the power of food.” And poetry.

May 12, 2022