Stories From The Other Side
Rumblings Among the Dispossessed
| By Sjors Roeters
Shelter in place, they ordered. Stay home, they said. Tonight I have neighbors for a change. I’m new on the block. I parked my van next to a family along the Pacific Coast Highway, half an hour west of […]
April 28, 2020
Dutch doctors in the epicenter in New York City
| By Jaap Jan Boelens and Leontine van Elden
Every evening at seven o’clock we listen to the tens of thousands of New Yorkers cheering in support of all the healthcare workers and other essential workers in emergency rooms, outpatient clinics and nursing homes. Our kids are proud […]
April 24, 2020
My Life as a Dog
| By Leon Neyfakh
I had gotten pretty good about feeling lucky even before all this happened. But I’m now more conscious of my luck than ever, both in terms of the big picture – I am young, healthy, self-employed – as well […]
April 21, 2020
Quiet Spring in Rock Creek Park
| By Bas Blokker
Rituals Every morning my editor calls from the Netherlands. We discuss what we think is happening in the United States, what we’ve read or seen, and what could be a topic for me to write about. He used to […]
April 17, 2020
All In All We Be Blessed
| By Michael Martin
After leaving the Netherlands ten years ago my family and I moved to Raleigh, North Carolina where we still rent an old red-brick parsonage adjoining a Moravian church. Directly across our street is an elementary school and around the […]
April 13, 2020
False Reassurance
| By Casper Thomas
Life under lockdown in Washington DC has quickly led to new habits. The daily late-afternoon walk ranks in the category ‘pleasant’. The Corona-crisis has turned parts of DC into what sometimes resembles a Southern European city: countless people just […]
April 10, 2020
How We Live Now
| By Russell Shorto
My wife and I both work from home. We live in a small town in the mountains of western Maryland, which is always quiet. So: not much change. Except that our 10 year old is no longer in school, […]
April 6, 2020
A Stage Set without Actors or Audience
| By Brian Rose
As a photographer, the concept of sheltering in place is foreign to my instincts, but here in New York, in the midst of this invisible infectious storm, we have been ordered to stay at home. However, we are permitted […]
April 3, 2020
Celebrating a Birthday – via Zoom
| By Deborah Frieden
It was time for my first social distancing Happy Hour. On the block where I live, in Oakland, California, my neighbors stepped out onto their porches or front yards with a drink and we all toasted each other from […]
March 30, 2020
At Sea Without A Captain
| by Kim Wehle
The question of how America is dealing with COVID-19 warrants a response on at least three levels: the personal, the political, and the ethical. On a personal level, the feeling in the United States seems to toggle between anxiety […]
March 27, 2020
Can New York City Lose its Twinkle?
| by David van der Leer
Questions are typically more appealing to me than the right answers, but tonight I realized I am yearning for answers to questions I had been avoiding for weeks. It is 9 pm and I am standing on the roof […]
March 24, 2020