One of my earliest memories is the realization that chickens are people, too. When I was still small, my dad set up a chicken coop in our backyard, built a pen, and headed off to various livestock auctions and hatcheries …
Author: Jonathon van Maren
The incomparable glory of traveling in trains
Earlier this year, the great British columnist Peter Hitchens wrote a lovely essay for First Things titled “Why I Love Trains.” He mused that the restrictions of the COVID-19 pandemic have triggered reflections on his commute between Oxford and London. …
How the Sexual Revolution has left young people empty and longing for genuine love
And all around us in our society we see the price that people pay for their addictions: a sense that no pleasure is forbidden, but all pleasure is stale. –Sir Roger Scruton *** A couple of weeks ago, I was chatting with …
‘The careless people’: The dark, real-life inspiration behind ‘The Great Gatsby’
Last week my wife and I headed up to Lake Huron for a few days, and I finally had the chance to sit down and read a few books cover to cover. I’d been intending to revisit The Great Gatsby, …
Don’t let the secondhand bookstores die
I was perched on top of a stepladder scanning the top shelf of a tall bookcase when I hit the jackpot: an old leather-bound edition of Gladstone’s memoirs. Heading north on a road trip, my friend and I had stopped …
Walking in Heidi’s footsteps
I thought, as I carried Charlotte on my shoulders down the darkening path and she rested her cheek on my head and heaved a contented sigh, that this was all going to be over too soon.