#456: Athens, Revised

Plus: Trad wives, sacred mountains, and Christian airport greeters

Dear Loyal Readers,

School starts next Monday, which means I’m running around supporting teachers as best I can, reminding them they’re great. It also means this introduction will be shorter than usual, given all my running around.

So let’s get to it. This week’s lead article, “Athens, Revised,” is one of the most powerful pieces I’ve read in a long time. (I’ve read it three times already.) Author Erin Wood reminds us of the importance of constructing our life narrative — that no one else, besides ourselves, can write and revise our story.

Because the content of the lead article may be triggering, I’ve included three other great pieces for you in today’s issue. They’re about:

• a trad wife who doesn’t like that label

• a sacred mountain and the people who want to keep it that way

• an ex-Christian who wants to find the origin of his parents’ beliefs

If you like one or more of the articles, go ahead, hit reply or email me. I’d love to hear from you. Or if you prefer, tell your friends and family to sign up for Article Club.

⭐️ I warmly invite you to this month’s discussion of “Is the hardest job in education convincing parents to send their kids to a San Francisco public school?” Written by Gail Cornwall and published in The Hechinger Report, the article explores how an urban public school district is trying to boost enrollment, despite the following challenges (and more):

• Decades of racism, white flight, and failed attempts to desegregate

• A bewildering lottery system that determines where students go to school

• White parents who say they want diversity but don’t want their kid sitting next to a Black kid

Interested? We’re meeting on Zoom on Sunday, August 25, 2:00 - 3:30 pm PT. It’d be great to see you there. All you need to do is sign up below. If you have questions, feel free to hit reply or email me here.

1️⃣ Athens, Revised

When she was 26, Erin Wood was on the last leg of a trip to Greece. On the afternoon before her flight, a man approached her, offered her a free tour of the Acropolis, a recommendation to a quality hotel, a meal, and a drink. Early the next morning, Ms. Wood woke up in her hotel bedroom, naked from the waist down, her body heavy, her sheets wet. “What have I allowed to happen?” she asked.

In this article, Ms. Wood explores the answer to that question. At first, she considers two versions of what happened. She writes two narratives. They both don’t feel right. Then, after unhelpful couples therapy with her unhelpful husband, she realizes that she’s been asking herself the wrong question. One night, unable to sleep, Ms. Wood reads an essay online about a woman who survived a serial killer. “What if I am not alone?” she asks. This new, revised question — it’s the one.

By Erin Wood • The Sun Magazine • 23 mins • Gift Link

✚ If you read Amanda E. Machado’s “The Abstract Rage To Protect,” June’s article of the month, this piece is a perfect complement.

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2️⃣ The Queen Of The Trad Wives

Back in February, I devoted an entire issue to the phenomenon of the trad wife. The articles explored the lifestyle (or is it a movement?) from various perspectives, with the goal of noticing nuance. This profile of Hannah Neeleman, a 34-year-old mother of eight children who lives in rural Utah, continues the conversation. Ms. Neeleman embraces traditional roles but also believes in paving new paths for women, balancing motherhood and entrepreneurial success. Yes, she makes dinner from scratch. And she runs a business. And she maintains 9 million followers on social media. And she gives birth without pain relief. And if that’s not enough, she participates in beauty pageants 12 days postpartum. For Ms. Neeleman, of all this fulfills a divine purpose.

By Megan Agnew • The Sunday Times • 14 min • Gift Link

Chewy, who belongs to loyal readers Alicia and Eric, enjoys swimming, snoozing, and consuming large amounts of human food “retrieved” from the kitchen counter. Want your pet to appear here? hltr.co/pets

3️⃣ Born Was The Mountain

By definition, what is sacred is different for people. I say a place is sacred when the chants link me to it. When I am chanting and the chant said the mountain was born and then you were — from the gods and from the goddesses, from the heavens and the earth, the mountain was born — that already tells me it holds a special, sacred place in my genealogy. I descend from that mountain, but also the mountain has taught me, has spoken to me, has shaped me, has transformed me in how I walk in this world.

In this well-researched article from 2018, Chelsea Steinauer-Scudder eloquently investigates the profound spiritual significance of Mauna Kea, known as Mauna a Wākea to Native Hawaiians. The piece weaves together the cultural heritage and the contentious debate surrounding modern development on this sacred mountain, urging us to reflect on the importance of honoring ancestral connections to the land.

By Chelsea Steinauer-Scudder • Emergence Magazine • 41 mins • Gift Link

✚ You can read about the conflict’s recent developments here and here.

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4️⃣ Children Of Dave

Usually I don’t select episodes of This American Life, because (a) the podcast is everywhere, (b) many of you already listen to it, (c) we’re Article Club, not Podcast Club. Nevertheless, when something is truly excellent, I can’t pass it by.

I loved this audio story by Boen Wang. For many years, Mr. Wang has blamed being raised Christian for his negative self outlook. In short, he says, Christianity has taught him to feel like “a worthless piece of shit.” In addition to being a child of God, he’s a child of Adam, an inheritor of original sin.

Mr. Wang realizes that his parents converted to Christianity after immigrating from Beijing. How did this happen? he wonders. This question leads Mr. Wang to the Oklahoma City Airport, where one August evening in 1989, his father found himself stranded on his first day in the United States. That is, until a kind white man named Dave said hello, gave him a place to stay, and presented him a Bible.

By Boen Wang • This American Life • 59 min • Apple Podcasts

Thank you for reading this week’s issue. Hope you liked it. 😀

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