Monthly Archives: December 2017

For four years now, I have been writing 3000-plus words a week, spread over at least three entries a week. What a ride. What tremendous responses from friends old and new. My blog has been cross-posted in places like AwardsDaily, Sound on Sight, and Filmotomy, and the exposure has led to appearances/citation in The New Yorker, Al Jazeera, and The Christian Science Monitor. My blog has become part of a thriving and extraordinary community of blogs by parents of autistic […]

I love the line in that song “When Christmas Comes to Town” – “On Christmas it’s hard to be alone.” It somehow captures three different kinds of poignancy – it’s hard if alone-ness happens to you, it’s also sometimes hard to get away from people, it’s also sometimes about loving the crowd of people. Wishing you poignant association with art today and every day.

My last post about Dar’s autism and daily challenges was pretty personal, and I heard from SO many of you…it really meant a lot. Also made me re-think rushing out the next blog post. Maybe I need to spend a little more time working on Dar’s condition, a little less on blogging. With you inspiring me, that’s what I’m doing this week. Thanks a lot. Again.

Dar just had an existential crisis of a week. Every Wednesday morning, I take Dar to a private therapist for speech therapy. We’ve been doing it for five years. Last Wednesday was unprecedented. He refused to do or answer anything at all, even the most benign of questions. He was, as I say, “on freakout” for the entire first fifteen minutes. Of course we dialed back session and tried to be playful with him, but he wasn’t having anything. We […]

Last night was a triumph for Doug Jones and for Alabama. But it was also a triumph for the Democrats who called for the resignation of their fellow Senator, Al Franken. The other day, Senator Al Franken resigned his Senate seat over a number of allegations that he had, in the past, behaved inappropriately with women. My friends on social media have been having a collective freakout. I believe these friends have been misguided. This comment is representative: “You can’t shame […]

Don’t believe I’ve ever before titled a post “Punt.” But this week’s autism post has to be punted. Too many deadlines over here. Will come back with double content next week. Thanks for keeping up with me!

This is from a section of my book, due to come out next year, called “Blockbuster Performances.” I argue that despite critics who typically dismiss acting as a tertiary concern of blockbuster movies, in fact strong performances make strong blockbusters, and in particular, the success of Titanic, especially compared to 1997’s only other $100 million+ film, Batman and Robin, proved that excellent acting was more important than “star” casting. Now that Titanic has returned to theaters for its anniversary, it […]