“A seminal and groundbreaking cultural, political, and medical history of American abortion law and practices, “Given No Choice: A History of Abortion Rights” by journalist Cody McDevitt is a meticulously presented, impressively informative, and definitive study of one of America’s most divisive and politicized social issues today. A fascinating and unreservedly recommended addition to personal, professional, community, and college/university library Abortion/Birth Control collections and supplemental curriculum studies lists.” -Midwest Book Review
@followers #abortion #abortionishealthcare #abortionrights #politics
“A seminal and groundbreaking cultural, political, and medical history of American abortion law and practices, “Given No Choice: A History of Abortion Rights” by journalist Cody McDevitt is a meticulously presented, impressively informative, and definitive study of one of America’s most divisive and politicized social issues today. A fascinating and unreservedly recommended addition to personal, professional, community, and college/university library Abortion/Birth Control collections and supplemental curriculum studies lists.” -Midwest Book Review
@followers #abortion #abortionishealthcare #abortionrights #politics
Taxi drivers were once treated like a city’s unofficial nervous system—always moving, always listening, always aware of where the pulse quickened and where it flatlined. Long before GPS or ride-share apps flattened the mystery out of urban travel, the cabbie knew which streets breathed easy at night and which ones held their breath. They learned the city not as a map but as a mood: how the air changed after midnight, how a neighborhood’s silence could be louder than traffic, how a passenger’s hesitation at the door told you more than their destination ever would. This was knowledge earned the hard way—mile by mile, fare by fare—and it gave taxi drivers an aura of street wisdom that couldn’t be taught in classrooms.
What made cab drivers seem especially street smart was their constant exposure to human variety. In a single shift, a driver might carry bankers, sex workers, tourists, addicts, politicians, thieves, and grieving widows—often within the same hour. They learned how to read voices from the back seat, how to tell when someone wanted conversation and when silence was safer. They understood shortcuts not just through traffic, but through people: when to nod, when to joke, when to shut up. In a world obsessed with credentials, taxi drivers possessed something more valuable—pattern recognition born of repetition and risk.
Journalists and filmmakers loved this about them. The taxi driver became a kind of urban chorus, a witness who saw everything but belonged nowhere in particular. He didn’t own the city, but he understood it. He knew where trouble brewed before it boiled over, which bars were friendly, which cops were bored, which nights were going to end badly. Calling someone “street smart” was often shorthand for saying they had the instincts of a cab driver—the kind of intelligence forged not by theory, but by staying alive, staying alert, and getting home at the end of the night with the meter still running.
During my travels through Santorini and Crete, I was completely taken aback by the island culture that thrives there. From the moment the ferry docked, it felt like stepping into another world — one where whitewashed houses cling to cliffs and every turn opens to a new vista of sea and sky.
The bus ride up to Oia village wound along narrow, dizzying roads, each bend revealing a view more breathtaking than the last — blue-domed churches, terraces draped in bougainvillea, and the Aegean shimmering like glass below. The landscape feels carved from myth itself, shaped by volcanoes and centuries of human tenacity.
There’s something humbling about how life unfolds here — unhurried, sunlit, and full of quiet resilience. The people, the food, the rhythm of the day — all seem to conspire to remind you how beautiful it is to simply be somewhere.
Visited Ephesus today—walked marble streets where Rome’s world still breathes. The Library of Celsus once held 12,000 scrolls, toilets funded the great theatre, and philosophers taught that harmony at home sustains peace. Wisdom, beauty, and balance—foundations of every empire.
Standing in the cradle of the ancient Olympic Games, it’s easy to imagine the roar of the crowd and the heartbeat of agon — the Greek word for contest or struggle. Every race, every throw, every feat of strength was more than a bid for victory; it was a living expression of arete, the pursuit of excellence.
For the ancient Greeks, the point wasn’t just to win — it was to strive. To enter the agon was to test the limits of the body and spirit, to measure yourself against others and, most of all, against your own potential. The champion’s wreath was an honor, but so was the act of striving nobly, of showing the courage to compete.
There was only one victor, but there were no “losers” in the modern sense. Defeat wasn’t shameful if one had shown arete — the dignity of effort, the grace of discipline, the pursuit of one’s highest form. The Games reminded every Greek that excellence wasn’t inherited; it was achieved through struggle.
The Olympic ideal still carries that echo: that our greatest triumphs are not trophies, but the moments when we rise fully into who we are meant to be.
The Theatre of Epidaurus, nestled in the sanctuary of Asclepius in the Peloponnese, is one of the most enduring monuments of classical Greece and a masterpiece of ancient architecture. Built in the 4th century BCE, it was designed by the architect Polykleitos the Younger and could seat approximately 13,000 to 14,000 spectators. The theatre was part of a larger healing complex dedicated to Asclepius, the god of medicine, and drama was viewed as a form of therapy for both body and soul. The Greeks believed that the experience of tragedy and comedy could bring about catharsis—the emotional purification Aristotle would later describe—making the theatre an integral part of spiritual and physical restoration.
Epidaurus became a vital link in the evolution of Greek drama. It was here that the plays of Sophocles, Euripides, and Aristophanes—masterworks of human psychology and political reflection—were revived in performance long after the playwrights’ own time. The theatre’s design, celebrated for its exceptional acoustics and harmonious proportions, reflects the Greek ideal of arete—perfection through balance and proportion. Even a whisper from the stage can be heard clearly in the upper tiers, a feat of engineering that continues to awe modern visitors and scholars alike.
Through the centuries, the theatre lay dormant during the Roman and medieval periods but was rediscovered and excavated in the late 19th century. Since 1955, it has hosted the annual Epidaurus Festival, a modern continuation of the ancient tradition of live drama. Each summer, actors perform Greek tragedies and comedies in the same setting where audiences once gathered under the open sky more than two millennia ago. The Theatre of Epidaurus thus stands not only as an archaeological wonder but also as a living symbol of Greece’s enduring connection to drama, ritual, and the human spirit’s quest for healing through art.
