Opinion

I had three babies in four years. I worked the overnight shift as a nurse practitioner. I was constantly on edge, trying to hold it all together — at home, at work, and inside my own mind.

Somewhere in Boston right now, a teenager is feeling stressed. They watch their parents struggle to make ends meet. They work after school and try to make sure their homework is done. Their mother works a night shift, their father juggles Uber with a full-time job. They hardly see them. They are lonely.

As publisher and editor of the Bay State Banner, I am occasionally invited to take part in media events around the city and most recently had the pleasure of attending a GBH media forum where I met Carla Hayden, the Librarian of Congress.

When I first created Best Dirty Lemonade, it wasn’t with business in mind, it was personal. My mother had been diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer’s, and I was desperate to help ease her symptoms. I experimented with cannabis-infused drinks as a natural way to provide her relief.

Public education in America stands at a crossroads. Across the country, schools face political attacks, funding threats, and efforts to roll back diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives that have barely begun to correct the harm from centuries of racial discrimination.

A quick dive into housing statistics across Massachusetts produces a discouraging picture for the future of the commonwealth.

Songs matter. The music we take in matters because it’s so much of our social and cultural environment. Songs can be a barometer, a compass, or a representative form of art that best meets your inner needs and sets you into a happy place, no matter what.

It’s hard to believe it’s already been 100 days since Donald Trump’s return to the White House, and at the same time, that it’s only been 100 days. The shape of his second term quickly came into focus.

Since taking office, President Trump has signed more than 90 executive orders. None has focused explicitly on Puerto Rico, but many of them will affect the territory more than they will impact states like Massachusetts. 

As we mark President Trump’s first 100 days in office, it’s hard to decide where to begin to assess the damage he has done to the nation.

These days, it is becoming harder and harder to keep up with the rampant disinformation that the radical right is pushing. On day one, the new administration took a sledgehammer to long-established diversity, equity and inclusion efforts.

When I began researching the downside of AI, I decided to run a few chapters from my book “Miss Pearly’s Girls” through one of those popular AI detectors—you know, the kind that schools, editors and employers are using to “verify” whether work is human or machine-made.