Commentary

As Canadian wildfire smoke passes over Baltimore City again, I sit in deep contemplation about how to show up as a good community organizer. I run a program called Free Baltimore Yoga, and we host more than three free yoga classes a week. Many are outdoors. When the first wave of wildfire smoke passed over the city and the Air Quality Index soared to 150, Free Baltimore Yoga canceled all classes until the air quality was below 100.

Frederick’s mayor and aldermen have some important development decisions ahead as they consider two proposals that will have a major impact on the future of the city. The first, and far easier, decision is whether to rezone the site of the Westridge Square shopping center along West Patrick Street, which could be a major step in the revitalization of the city’s troubled Golden Mile.

I feel like I write this column over and over again. It’s probably not the last time. About a month ago I explained that my long-planned Amtrak trip to Montreal, for which my son and I were learning French, had been canceled because of the heat from Canadian wildfires, a literal casualty of climate change. Undeterred, I pivoted, adding stops in Mystic, Connecticut, and Maine, with a longer stint in New York on either end.

The recent news regarding retired Baltimore Ravens star and Hollywood melodrama subject Michael Oher is distressing in a number of ways. The protagonist of the Oscar-winning film “The Blind Side,” based on a book by Michael Lewis of the same name, Oher has long been at the center of a number of compelling themes related to sports, class, and race in America. While many have encountered his story as a rags-to-riches narrative seen through the lens of a white family’s benefaction and love, Oher’s new allegations of financial exploitation suggest a darker side to the story — and speak to a history of the exploitation of Black bodies for white financial gain.

“I, Steven Howell Wilson, do solemnly swear or affirm that I will uphold and support the constitution of the United States; be faithful and bear true allegiance to the state of Maryland and uphold the Maryland constitution and laws thereof; abide by the constitution and bylaws of the Maryland Republican Party; and faithfully execute the office upon which I am about to enter with diligence to the best of my skill, abilities and judgment without partiality or prejudice.”

I finally settled a long curiosity about American history: Did any member of Congress from Maryland vote against the 13th Amendment to the Constitution? The 13th Amendment abolished slavery in 1865, in the final months of the Civil War. I’ve wondered about this for a while, but more recent history — the 2020 presidential election and the loser’s bogus claims that it was stolen, insurrection against the national government, regressive rulings of the Supreme Court, Donald Trump’s indictments, the Orioles climb to first place in the American League East — created distractions.

For a moment, 29,000 pounds of thrust from a Southwest 737 flying overhead was alive in my chest. Standing on the lot of a Glen Burnie car dealership, I had to tell the salesman to pause his pitch until the jetliner, its noise and the deep, body rumble I was feeling, had passed. This is what it’s like some days for roughly 140,000 people in Howard and Anne Arundel counties living directly under the flight paths of Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport. Airplane noise can be an engine scream high in the sky or the distant roar of a waterfall down the street.

For a woman of a certain age out here in these online dating streets, Felicia Pride’s short film “Look Back At It” is painfully funny, because so much of what 40-something single Baltimore mom Lanae experiences is the stuff of margarita-fueled nightmares. Even better is recognizing people who look like me on screen in a way I don’t usually see myself. It’s not about violence or crime, but just about normal middle-aged Black lady stuff, with a Royal Farms chicken reference.