Don’t worry, I’m a subscriber, so didn’t pay anywhere near $10.99 for the current New Yorker. Although, considering that it’s a weekly and I’ve usually not glanced at the last one when the next one shows up, a financial adviser would probably tell me not to renew. The main loss would be that I don’t get to work the crossword at the back of the magazine with my daughter. The puzzle is labeled either “challenging,” “moderately challenging,” or “beginner friendly.” We work the two easier kinds. If it’s “challenging,” I’m on my own, and generally can finish it only with some assists from Google.
But the above issue is a gem: a nice tribute to Dolly by Kathryn Schulz; “Anatomy of a Siege,” about Operation Metro Surge, reported by Minneapolis native Emily Witt; “The Scare” about divorced parents fighting over whether to vaccinate their kids; a short story by Helen Simpson about some middle-aged London women facing mortality by way of aging parents; a book review I haven’t yet read that’s tagged “Jamaican gay life in Marlon James’s new novel”; a couple of poems more comprehensible than is common; a “challenging” crossword, &c.
I read Witt’s article first, and it was engrossing, but the piece on family court and children’s medical care was a punch in the stomach. It features a divorced West Virginia couple. The mom is a kind of displaced hippie into “natural healing” and other such rubbish, including preeminently RFK’s MAHA agenda–predictably, she didn’t want her kids to receive the normal childhood immunizations. I feel I know that type, but her ex is arguably a more interesting case: a Trump-supporting Covid skeptic who is driven, partly by the impulse to disagree with his ex and partly by the sight of his sick and vulnerable children, to accept the recommendations of orthodox medical practice. The last straw for their marriage occurred when the fellow, noticing his wife’s increased and secretive preoccupation with her phone, got his hands on it late one night. He was expecting to discover texts to a boyfriend but found instead that she was corresponding with an online “spiritual adviser and healer.” The article reproduces a couple of the exchanges; here’s one–Donnie is one of their sick kids:
“Offering.” “I thought I said 20.” “What time tomorrow.” Jeezus. These are people whose troubles included having their mortgage foreclosed.
The article highlights medical disagreements and legal struggles, but honestly, I just ended up feeling awful for their three kids. The oldest is 8 years old. What chance do they have in life? At one point, it is revealed that they are being home schooled by their mom. Of course! The woman who is sending Bitcoin to the fraudster she found online! That’s who’s in charge of the kids’ education! In an intrusion of sanity, a family court judge ruled that the children had to attend public school, but, all things considered, my dim view of West Virginia lives on.
Leave a comment