Commentary

Everybody likes a happy ending, at least once in a while. So you will be pleased to hear that Katherine Carver’s book on abandoned dogs is full of happy endings — that is, lots of adoptions. Most of the dogs she photographed and profiled found new homes. But Carver’s book, “Abandoned: Chronicling the Journeys of Once-Forsaken Dogs,” is not all warm and fuzzy.

My sister called me in tears after her first supplemental oxygen delivery. It was July 2013. At the time, she was a 41-year-old mother to a 4-year-old and a 1-year-old, and worked part-time as an occupational nurse practitioner at the University of Maryland. We have a rare lung disease called primary ciliary dyskinesia (PCD), and because of the resulting lung damage, called bronchiectasis, we were both prescribed supplemental oxygen.

I’ve spent the last month time traveling back to the ’90s in a marathon rewatching all seven seasons of my favorite show, “Homicide: Life On The Street,” finally streaming on Peacock. Filmed largely in and around Fells Point, it’s a sometimes grim but achingly hopeful love letter to Baltimore. Taking it in again, all these years later, I realized I’d missed the characters like they were dear friends, none more than tragically cocky hot shot Detective Mike Kellerman, a former arson squad detective whose meteoric rise and spectacular fall are a focus in seasons 4-6.

Last month, Denise Prudhomme, a 60-year-old Wells Fargo employee from Tempe, Arizona, was found dead at her desk by a bank security guard who was investigating reports of a foul odor in the building. Records show that Ms. Prudhomme scanned into the office early Friday morning on August 16, and she was discovered on Tuesday, August 20 — four days later.

For decades, overdoses and other substance use-related harms have ravaged our city. Like communities big and small across the country, Baltimore has been hit hard, but the situation has worsened in recent years as the drug supply continues to change. Today, fentanyl and adulterants like xylazine are unavoidable in the street drug supply. Overdose rates and the incidence of serious wounds have soared.

As communities across the globe continue to face extreme heat, intense storms and other extreme weather, it is clear that there is no time to waste in making serious and enduring investments to combat the climate crisis. Thanks to President Joe Biden’s Investing in America agenda, we are tackling climate change head-on while sparking job growth and ensuring that every community shares in the economic opportunities of this new era.

I spotted the last seahawk of 2024, talons briefly clutching the tips of a tree above as my dogs, oblivious, sniffed the ground below. For many, fall arrives with the equinox at 8:43 a.m. Sunday. It’s when the hours of night and day balance and pumpkin spice overwhelms. For me, the shift begins when osprey cries are replaced in the sky above my home along the Chesapeake Bay by barking Canada geese. It means change is coming.