Virginia Buckingham - Marblehead Current

26 Apr

EVERYTHING WILL BE OKAY: A more nuanced ‘Boston Strong’

Virginia Buckingham0 CommentsOpinion, Virginia Buckingham

I‘ve devoted a lot of my life to finding the right words — to explain, to explore, to sometimes inspire. The phrase “Boston Strong” didn’t sit right with me 10 years ago after the Marathon bombings. No, that’s an understatement. It made me ache and seethe. I’ll explain why in a minute. But I’ve come to understand the solace those words provided and still do. For a lot of people, the call to be “Boston Strong” was necessary to get through those terrifying days and…

19 Apr

EVERYTHING WILL BE OKAY: Unplug the outrage machine

Virginia Buckingham0 CommentsOpinion, Uncategorized, Virginia Buckingham

Why are people so angry all the time? And how can we help calm things down? My questions are prompted by two completely unrelated incidents, one in western Massachusetts and one in the western part of the country. First, let’s turn to “Ladies-Gate” in Easthampton. There, outrage has been directed at the chair of the school committee for overreacting to an email where she and the board’s executive assistant were addressed as “ladies” by a prospective job candidate. That’s how I see it. She overreacted.…

12 Apr

EVERYTHING WILL BE OKAY: Driving Miss Ginny

Virginia Buckingham0 CommentsOpinion, Views & Reviews, Virginia Buckingham

I got my first car when I graduated from college — a basic Chevy model with a stick shift, but I remember driving it home to Boston from the Connecticut dealership like I was behind the wheel of a Ferrari. Where I come from, owning a car in high school or college was a luxury, unless it was a total junker. For my parents, a purchase of a new car was akin to the excitement of bringing a new baby home, and they had eight…

05 Apr

EVERYTHING WILL BE OKAY: Home state advantage

Virginia Buckingham0 CommentsOpinion, Views & Reviews, Virginia Buckingham

May we dwell for a minute on Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. Don’t worry, I’m not going to talk politics in this column. I’m not promising not to ever, just not today It’s not DeSantis’ politics or policies per se that have my attention, but his promise to make every state just like his. If you missed DeSantis’s book tour kickoff — in that literary capital also known as Des Moines, Iowa — the backdrop was a big sign that said, “The Florida Blueprint.” OK, it…

22 Mar

EVERYTHING WILL BE OKAY: Grow old along with me

Virginia Buckingham0 CommentsOpinion, Views & Reviews, Virginia Buckingham

We snore. Our eyesight is getting worse. We both gained weight during the pandemic. We walk slower. We’re easily distracted. Our joints hurt. We don’t like spending too much time alone. And, oh, do we love our afternoon naps on the couch. Our cockapoo April and I are aging together. How I wish she would continue to “grow old along with me” as the Robert Browning poem and John Lennon song entreat. I picked up April in New Hampshire during a nor’easter not unlike the…

15 Mar

EVERYTHING WILL BE OKAY: Positively triggered

Virginia Buckingham0 CommentsOpinion, Viewpoints, Virginia Buckingham

Google being “triggered” and content is served up about the psychological effect of being returned to a traumatic experience, a terrible inheritance for those with painful pasts. I recently had two experiences, though, which made me wonder why “triggering” is only associated with pain. Google “recalling happy memories” and the results include terms like “reminisce” which doesn’t come close to capturing what it feels like to revive a happy moment in the same way triggers revive trauma. To reminisce is what you do when those…

01 Mar

EVERYTHING WILL BE OKAY: Reconsidering the seagull

Virginia Buckingham0 CommentsOpinion, Viewpoints, Virginia Buckingham

“Rats with wings.” That’s the common derogatory descriptor about that common sea bird, the gull. Last summer, one wily airborne rodent grabbed an entire overflowing lobster roll from my hand just as I was taking a first bite. Darn rat! Mostly though, gulls are a casually observed but uncontemplated part of our daily landscape. We might notice one pecking at an unlucky crab or perched on a neighbor’s chimney. But we don’t give their presence a second thought, even seconds later. Unexpectedly for me, the…