Being a writer remains an unrelenting quest
Social Security again in peril if politicians fail to act on shortfall of funds
Please consider supporting The Front Page with a paid subscription: HERE
My father loved to tell this story.
When I was asked as a toddler what I wanted to be when I grew up, I said I wanted to be a banana man.
It's hard to know now what that toddler was thinking.
By the time I reached adolescence in junior high, my future ambition was to be a lawyer, yet, something else was percolating beneath the surface, something - oddly enough - I could not yet put into words.
As a reward for my junior high graduation, I asked for a typewriter.
I wanted to be a writer.
It would be the last of my professional ambitions.
Since then, the unrelenting goal was to be great at this, to put all those words in the right order in hopes they might make sense, make a difference or move people to live their lives at a higher level.
That’s the ulterior motive of all writers - you want to change the world.
The best advice in those early was if you wanted to be a good writer, you had to read good writing.
That manifested itself in a weekly subscription to Sports Illustrated and I read obsessively cover-to-cover for decades.
Every single story.
There was something magical about discovering the contents beneath that glossy cover each week.
So there I was on Saturday morning, in the middle seat of a Southwest flight heading to New Orleans when I opened up The Atlantic magazine and was transformed back to those formative days.
After "Signal-gate" this spring, when The Atlantic's editor Jeffrey Goldberg was invited in on a national security chat and all hell broke lose, I felt compelled to support the latest big thing in journalism with a print subscription.
But the April issue sat there untouched with the May and June issue stacked upon it without a glance. But since I was packing light for this trip and the magazine fit nicely into my small satchel, I took two issues along.
Newspapers were always part of my daily diet, but magazines were at a higher level whether it was SI, Playboy, Rolling Stone, Time or Newsweek. And The Atlantic appears as good as any of them at its peak. Reading them was part of my weekly homework, my ongoing master’s degree in writing.
“If you want to be a great writer, you have to read great writing!”
It reminded me of those humble beginnings when I desperately wanted to be, first professional, then good and those weekly and monthly journals made me a smarter person.
This was way before search engines.
From that middle seat, I was shocked to learn you can have your pet cloned for $50,000 and that researchers are already cloning cattle to ensure the perfect steak. This piece of science fiction was now a reality - I had no idea - and it seemed like only a matter of time before Elon Musk cloned himself.
There was a profile about the political and personal transformation of our new vice president.
And while I saw other people reading during my trip, I was the only one reading a magazine, really the only one reading anything on printed paper.
I was a dinosaur.
It made me wonder why I wanted to be a writer in those formative years, why it was so important to tell those stories and maybe most importantly of all, why someone who had never written anything thought they could.
It seems absurd in retrospect.
But I did become a writer - with lots of help - a newspaper writer.
Many would argue that is the cheap working-class version and there is some truth to that, but as a sat there reading The Atlantic and the miles flew by beneath me, I was reminded of the power contained in those pages and a time when we read, not so much to be informed, but to be smarter.
I was reminded our lives should be a life-long search of a knowledge and truth.
And that sometimes you actually find what you are looking for between the glossy pages of a magazine.
At the back of The Atlantic I found a thought-provoking piece of short fiction a father, a bad father, and the haunting relationship with his son.
It seemed an odd choice during the month of Father’s Day.
It was a reminder of the how different our lives and experiences can be and a reminder those words and stories often move us to, well, think deeply.
I wondered if some of that was gone as we swipe at our phone.
I'm not sure what kind of banana man I would have made, but this writing gig continues to as alluring a proposition as I have ever experienced. And the best part of all, there is always room to improve, especially when you a reading a good magazine.
ATF promo
The Adirondack Theater Festival's first show of the season - The Village of Vale - open on June 27.
Don't miss it.
That's not an advertisement as a bit of advice to take advantage of something that is a gem in our community. I've been going for more than 25 years.
So go spend a few hours in our local community on one of those balmy summer nights being glad you are alive.
Going bankrupt - again
When people talk about Social Security running out of money, especially younger people, I tell them I've been hearing those dire warnings my entire life.
It influenced my own financial planning to the degree that I never factored Social Security dollars into my retirement plans.
If it was still there - and it is - it would be a bonus, but if it wasn't I wanted to be prepared.
There was another warning this week that Social Security would be depleted by 2033.
The Associated Press reported the most recent setback was driven by the Social Security Fairness Act which increased benefits for 2.8 million government and public sector workers.
But other contributing factors included a lower birthrate (fewer people paying in) and more workers making less meaning they will pay less into the system.
It was also reported Medicare would be unable to pay all its bills by 2033 because of increased costs of hospitals - not fraud - and that trend was expected to continue.
And that has not factored in economic concerns that the economy will be weakened by tariff when prices go up and cost of living adjustments raise Social Security payouts.
Fewer immigrants - lawful or unlawful (they all pay into Social Security too) means less revenue as well.
There is an easy solution. Social Security taxes are only applied to the first $176,00 of income. The reason you don't know that is because most of us don't make above $175,000. Raise that ceiling - how about $500,000 - and you solve the problem.
Oddly, none of our politicians ever propose that.
One win, one loss
The governor of in Texas wasn't paying attention to the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals in Louisiana when it ruled Friday that posting the Ten Commandments in schools was unconstitutional.
So Gov. Greg Abbott signed a bill into law requiring all public schools in Texas to display the Ten Commandments.
Lawsuits are expected soon.
Ken Tingley spent more than four decades working in small community newspapers in upstate New York. Since retirement in 2020 he has written three books and is currently adapting his second book "The Last American Newspaper" into a play. He currently lives in Queensbury, N.Y.
I wonder how the good teachers in Texas will explain to their students how the US has a president who thinks he is God, golf on Sunday instead of attending church, has committed adultery numerous times, lies, cheats and steals, yet many think he is blessed by God?
Or are the commandments supposed to be posted without comment?
Color me ...perplexed. And confused.
Raise the cap. Simple, easy, painless, and we’re done. But of course, that’s beyond the capabilities of the political class. You know, the ones we elect to serve US. 😔