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Totally Wired: The Rise and Fall of Josh Harris and the Great Dotcom Swindle
by Andrew Smith&“The Social Network meets Hammer of the Gods&” in this story of a 1990s web titan who made a fortune and lost it all—and what happened afterward (The Independent). One day in February 2001, Josh Harris woke to certain knowledge that he was about to lose everything. The man Time magazine called &“The Warhol of the Web&” was reduced to a helpless spectator as his fortune dwindled from 85 million dollars to nothing, all in the space of a week. Harris had been a maverick genius preternaturally adapted to the new online world. He founded New York&’s first dotcom, Pseudo.com, and paved the way for a cadre of twentysomethings to follow, riding a wave of tech euphoria to unimagined wealth and fame for five years—before the great dotcom crash, in which Web 1.0 was wiped from the face of the earth. Long before then, though, Harris&’s view of the web had darkened, and he began a series of lurid social experiments aimed at illustrating his worst fear: that the internet would soon alter the very fabric of society—cognitive, social, political, and otherwise. In Totally Wired, journalist Andrew Smith seeks to unravel the opaque and mysterious episodes of the early dotcom craze, in which the seeds of our current reality were sown. Drawing on in-depth interviews with Harris and those who worked alongside him in downtown Manhattan&’s &“Silicon Alley,&” the tale moves from a compound in Ethiopia through New York, San Francisco, Las Vegas, London, and Salt Lake City, Utah; from the dawn of the web to the present, taking in the rise of alternative facts, troll society, and the unexpected origins of the net itself, as our world has grown uncannily to resemble the one Harris predicted—and urged us to evade. &“Raucous, whimsical, sad and very funny…a fascinating account of what could have been, what briefly was, what almost lasted.&” ―TheWall Street Journal &“Told with verve and style…A valuable history.&” ―Kirkus Reviews &“A brilliant exploration of madness and genius in the early days of the web.&”―The Guardian &“Dark and compelling.&”―Daily Mail &“This is a book whose time has come.&”―Sunday Times
Toto: Memorias y confesiones de Jorge Da Silveira
by Marcelo InversoUn libro revelador sobre uno de los periodistas más populares, controvertidos y directos en la historia del deporte uruguayo. Jorge da Silveira es un referente del periodismo deportivo uruguayo que se hizo a sí mismo a fuerza de trabajo y conocimiento. Trabajó con los más grandes en Uruguay y recorrió el mundo detrás de la celeste y los equipos uruguayos. Siempre dijo lo que pensó. Aunque fuera difícil e impopular. Nunca comulgó con los poderes de turno en el fútbol y denunció los abusos de las estructuras que rodean al deporte rey, hasta el punto de arriesgar por ello su trabajo. El "Toto" no tiene pelos en la lengua, y así lo deja claro en este libro, en el que repasa lo principal de su vida y el fútbol sin escatimar detalles sobre las principales polémicas que rodearon su trayectoria. El enfrentamiento con Tenfield; el distanciamiento de Oscar Tabárez; los claros y oscuros del proceso de selección; las posibilidades de Uruguay en Rusia 2018; Nacional y Peñarol, los grandes y los chicos en Uruguay; la corrupción en el fútbol; aciertos y errores; la vida, la muerte, la fe y la política. Los diálogos y recuerdos de una vida llena de momentos con los jugadores más notables de la historia. No queda nada fuera de una agenda tan vasta como la propia carrera de uno de los periodistas con más mundiales en sus espaldas.
Totto-Chan: The Little Girl at the Window
by Dorothy Britton Chihiro Iwasaki Tetsuko KuroyanagiThis engaging series of childhood recollections tells about an ideal school in Tokyo during World War II that combined learning with fun, freedom, and love. This unusual school had old railroad cars for classrooms, and it was run by an extraordinary man-its founder and headmaster, Sosaku Kobayashi--who was a firm believer in freedom of expression and activity.In real life, the Totto-chan of the book has become one of Japan's most popular television personalities--Tetsuko Kuroyanagi. She attributes her success in life to this wonderful school and its headmaster.The charm of this account has won the hearts of millions of people of all ages and made this book a runaway bestseller in Japan, with sales hitting the 4.5 million mark in its first year.
Touch Me, I'm Sick: A Memoir in Essays
by Margeaux FeldmanReject the stigmas of trauma and chronic illness by fostering queer forms of intimacy—and embracing the many ways humans can care for one another.The writer behind the popular @softcore_trauma Instagram offers a deeply personal memoir for folks seeking healing and better care.The forms of intimacy and care that we&’ve been sold are woefully inadequate and problematic. In a world that treats those who are sick and traumatized as problems in need of a cure, nonbinary writer, artist, educator, and Instagram creator Margeaux Feldman offers a different story.Trauma, which all too often manifests as chronic illness, tells us that there is something deeply wrong with the world we live in. A world that promotes individualism, fractures us from community through violence and systemic oppression, and leaves us traumatized. That is what we need to cure.While unveiling their own lived experiences caregiving for their sick father, losing their mother, surviving sexual abuse, and grappling with their own chronic illness, Feldman provides roadmaps for embracing queer modes of care, or &“hysterical intimacies,&” that reject the notion that those who have been labeled sick are broken. Feldman looks at the lengthy history of branding girls, women, and femmes–and their desires–as sick, from the treatment of hysterics by Jean-Martin Charcot and Sigmund Freud in the 19th and 20th centuries. What emerges is a valiant call for rethinking the ways we seek healing.This compelling blend of theory, personal narrative, and cultural criticism offers a path forward for reimagining the shapes and forms that intimacy, care, and interdependence can take.
Touch The Top Of The World: A Blind Man's Journey To Climb Farther Than The Eye Can See
by Erik WeihenmayerThe incredible, inspiring story of world-class climber Erik Weihenmayer, from the terrible diagnosis that foretold of the loss of his eyesight, to his dream to climb mountains, and finally his quest to reach each of the Seven Summits. Erik Weihenmayer was born with retinoscheses, a degenerative eye disorder that would progressively unravel his retinas. Erik learned from doctors that he was destined to lose his sight by age thirteen. Yet from early on, he was determined to rise above this devastating disability and lead a fulfilling, exciting life. In Touch the Top of the World, Erik recalls his struggle to push past the limits placed on him by his visual impairment--and by a seeing world. He speaks movingly of the role his family played in his battle to break through the barriers of blindness: the mother who prayed for the miracle that would restore her son's sight; the father who encouraged him to strive for that unreachable mountaintop. Erik was the first blind man to summit McKinley. Soon he became the first blind person to scale the infamous 3000-foot rock wall of El Capitan and then Argentina's Aconcagua, the highest peak outside of Asia. He was married to his longtime sweetheart at 13,000 feet on the Shira Plateau on his way to Kilimanjaro's summit, and recently Erik scaled Polar Circus, the 30,000-foot vertical ice wall in Alberta, Canada. Erik's story is about having the vision to dream big; the courage to reach for near impossible goals; and the grit, determination, and ingenuity to transform our lives into "something miraculous. "To download an audio excerpt from Touch the Top of the World, visit the American Foundation for the Blind Web site.
Touch and Go: A Memoir
by Studs TerkelThis memoir by the oral historian and Pulitzer Prize–winning author of The Good War is &“a masterpiece about a life which itself is a sort of masterpiece&” (Oliver Sacks). Chosen as a Best Book of the Year in 2007 by the Chicago Tribune, Publishers Weekly, and Playboy, Studs Terkel&’s memoir Touch and Go is &“history from a highly personal point of view, by one who has helped make it&” (Kirkus Reviews). Terkel takes us through his childhood and into his early experiences—as a law student during the Depression, and later as an actor on both radio and the stage—offering a brilliant and often hilarious portrait of Chicago in the 1920s and &’30s. Describing his beginnings as a disc jockey after World War II, his involvement with progressive politics during the McCarthy era, as well as his career as an interviewer and oral historian, Touch and Go is a testament to Terkel&’s &“generosity of spirit, sense of social justice and commitment to capture on his ever present tape recorder the voices of those who otherwise would not be heard&” (The New York Times Book Review). It is a brilliant lifetime achievement from the man the Washington Post has called &“the most distinguished oral historian of our time.&” &“The master storyteller tells his own story, as no one else can, irresistibly.&” —Garry Wills
Touch the Future: A Manifesto in Essays
by John Lee ClarkA revelatory collection of essays on the DeafBlind experience and the untapped potential of a new tactile language. Born Deaf into an ASL-speaking family and blind by adolescence, John Lee Clark learned to embrace the possibilities of his tactile world. He is on the frontlines of the Protactile movement, which gave birth to an unprecedented language and way of life based on physical connection. In a series of paradigm-shifting essays, Clark reports on seismic developments within the DeafBlind community and challenges the limitations of sighted and hearing norms. In "Against Access," he interrogates the prevailing advocacy for "accessibility" that re-creates a shadow of a hearing-sighted experience, and in "Tactile Art," he describes his relationship to visual art and breathtaking encounters with tactile sculpture. He offers a brief history of the term "DeafBlind," distills societal discrimination against DeafBlind people into "Distantism," sheds light on the riches of online community, and advocates for "Co-Navigation," a new way of exploring the world together without a traditional guide. Touch the Future brims with passion, energy, humor, and imagination as Clark takes us by the hand and welcomes us into the exciting landscape of Protactile communication. A distinct language of taps, signs, and reciprocal contact, Protactile emerged from the inadequacies of ASL—a visual language even when pressed into someone’s hand—with the power to upend centuries of DeafBlind isolation. As warm and witty as he is radical and inspiring, Clark encourages us—disabled and non-disabled alike—to reject stigma and discover the ways we are connected. Touch the Future is a dynamic appeal to rethink the meanings of disability, access, language, and inclusivity, and to reach for a future we can create together.
Touch the Sky
by Eric Velasquez Ann MalaspinaBare feet shouldn't fly.Long legs shouldn't spin,Braids shouldn't flap in the wind."Sit on the porch and be a lady," Papa scolded Alice.In Alice's Georgia hometown, there was no track where an African American girl could practice, so she made her own crossbar with sticks and rags. With the support of her coach, friends, and community, Alice started to win medals. Her dream to compete at the Olympics came true in 1948. This is an inspiring free-verse story of the first African American woman to win an Olympic gold medal. Photos of Alice Coachman are also included.
Touch the Top of the World
by Erik WeihenmayerErik Weihenmayer was born with retinoscheses, a degenerative eye disorder that would leave him blind by the age of thirteen. But Erik was determined to rise above this devastating disability and lead a fulfilling and exciting life. In this poignant and inspiring memoir, he shares his struggle to push past the limits imposed on him by his visual impairment-and by a seeing world. He speaks movingly of the role his family played in his battle to break through the barriers of blindness: the mother who prayed for the miracle that would restore her son's sight and the father who encouraged him to strive for that distant mountaintop. And he tells the story of his dream to climb the world's Seven Summits, and how he is turning that dream into astonishing reality (something fewer than a hundred mountaineers have done). From the snow-capped summit of McKinley to the towering peaks of Aconcagua and Kilimanjaro to the ultimate challenge, Mount Everest, this is a story about daring to dream in the face of impossible odds. It is about finding the courage to reach for that ultimate summit, and transforming your life into something truly miraculous."I admire you immensely. You are an inspiration to other blind people and plenty of folks who can see just fine." (Jon Krakauer, author of Into Thin Air)
Touchdown Tony
by Tony NathanIn the movie tie-in to the Fall 2015 film, Woodlawn, Tony Nathan (the central character of the film) shares his experiences as an African American running back on a mostly white team in 1970s Birmingham, Alabama. His courage and superb ability helped heal a city and propelled him to a successful football career as both a player and coach in the NFL. The movie stars Jon Voight, Nic Bishop, and C. Thomas Howell.When Tony Nathan got his hands on a football, it was like Superman putting on his cape for the first time. He stepped onto the field and became a different person--a hero destined to change the course of Alabama history. Somehow, when he held a football, he knew exactly what to do, and it was those instincts that helped him navigate life in one of the most tumultuous cities in America. In this powerful memoir, Tony reveals how he summoned the courage to "run with purpose" during the times when racial tensions ran high as he grew from a boy trapped by the racial divide in Birmingham, Alabama, into a successful man and football hero. Tony's courage, character, passion, and strength contributed to his impressive career on the field--including two Super Bowls with the Miami Dolphins--and then as a coach who helped train other winning players. Inspirational and uplifting, Touchdown Tony is not only a behind-the-scenes look at a great football player's life and career, it is also a story of redemption and one man's hope to change the future.
Touched By God: How We Won the Mexico '86 World Cup
by Diego Maradona Daniel Arnucci'Brilliant' Guardian'Exuberant' Financial Times'Colourful' The TimesIn June 1986 Diego Maradona, considered by many to be the greatest footballer of all time, proudly hoisted the '86 Mexico World Championship Cup in his hands.Now over thirty years on from that magical game, and after a life in sports marked by controversy, Maradona tells, for the first time, the untold stories behind that one-of-a-kind World Cup. Mexico '86 was the pinnacle of Maradona's career, and in this book he reveals all about every game, what happened afterwards in the locker room, the months leading up to the World Cup, when the team had to go to Mexico City a month early to avoid the overthrowing of the technical director by the Argentine president, Alfonsin, the mystery behind 'El Gran Capitán' Passarella ('78 World Cup Champion), the strategies and tactics that revolutionised the game, training in a country that was recovering from an earthquake, the public's hostility, the jerseys they went out to buy in Mexico City, the meeting in Colombia where the team really came together, his relationship to drugs: the clean World Cup, and the best goal in football history. Mexico '86 is Maradona's World Cup and Maradona is who he is because of that World Cup. Explosive, gritty and unapologetic, Touched by God tells the inside story of one of the greatest football victories of all time.
Touched by Biko (30 Years of Democracy in South Africa)
by Andile M-AfrikaIn Touched by Biko, Andile M-Afrika writes about his memories of Ginsberg, the black township across the Buffalo River from central King William’s Town which was also home to Steve Bantu Biko. The book has been developed from his MA Creative Writing thesis, which he completed at Rhodes University in 2013.Print editions not for sale in Sub-Saharan Africa. This book is part of Routledge’s co-published series 30 Years of Democracy in South Africa, in collaboration with UNISA Press, which reflects on the past years of a democratic South Africa and assesses the future opportunities and challenges.
Touched by Evil
by Michele KnightMichele's childhood was a nightmare. Her mother was a gifted psychic but highly unstable, unable to control the dark forces her powers unleashed or to look after Michele. When she was six her beloved father died and the last shreds of normality were gone forever. From then on Michele was at the mercy of sexual predators and her mother's violent lovers. Evil surrounded her... But Michele wasn't alone. The presence of her twin sister Lucy was constantly at her side, comforting and inspiring her. Lucy had died when the twin girls were babies. But her spirit stayed behind to watch over her little sister. Time and again, when Michele reached her darkest hour, Lucy reached out with a deep sense of love and gently guided her to safety. This is the heartbreaking, but ultimately inspirational story of a little girl, who was beaten, raped, neglected and despised, but rescued from despair by her faith in the power of love.
Touched by Evil: The True Story of the Psychic Powers That Saved Me From A Life of Abuse
by Michele KnightMichele's childhood was a nightmare. Her mother was a gifted psychic but highly unstable, unable to control the dark forces her powers unleashed or to look after Michele. When she was six her beloved father died and the last shreds of normality were gone forever. From then on Michele was at the mercy of sexual predators and her mother's violent lovers. Evil surrounded her... But Michele wasn't alone. The presence of her twin sister Lucy was constantly at her side, comforting and inspiring her. Lucy had died when the twin girls were babies. But her spirit stayed behind to watch over her little sister. Time and again, when Michele reached her darkest hour, Lucy reached out with a deep sense of love and gently guided her to safety. This is the heartbreaking, but ultimately inspirational story of a little girl, who was beaten, raped, neglected and despised, but rescued from despair by her faith in the power of love.
Touched by the Sun: My Friendship with Jackie
by Carly SimonA chance encounter at a summer party on Martha’s Vineyard blossomed into an improbable but enduring friendship. Carly Simon and Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis made an unlikely pair—Carly, a free and artistic spirit still reeling from her recent divorce, searching for meaning, new love, and an anchor; and Jackie, one of the most celebrated, meticulous, unknowable women in American history. <P><P>Nonetheless, over the next decade their lives merged in inextricable and complex ways, and they forged a connection deeper than either could ever have foreseen. The time they spent together—lingering lunches and creative collaborations, nights out on the town and movie dates—brought a welcome lightness and comfort to their days, but their conversations often veered into more profound territory as they helped each other navigate the shifting waters of life lived, publicly, in the wake of great love and great loss. <P><P>An intimate, vulnerable, and insightful portrait of the bond that grew between two iconic and starkly different American women, Carly Simon’s Touched by the Sun is a chronicle, in loving detail, of the late friendship she and Jackie shared. It is a meditation on the ways someone can unexpectedly enter our lives and change its course, as well as a celebration of kinship in all its many forms. <P><b>A New York Times Bestseller</b>
Touched by the Sun: My Friendship with Jackie
by Carly SimonA chance encounter at a summer party on Martha's Vineyard blossomed into an improbable but enduring friendship. Carly Simon and Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis made an unlikely pair - Carly, a free and artistic spirit still reeling from her recent divorce, searching for meaning, new love, and an anchor; and Jackie, one of the most celebrated, meticulous, unknowable women in American history. Nonetheless, over the next decade their lives merged in inextricable and complex ways, and they forged a connection deeper than either could ever have foreseen. The time they spent together - lingering lunches and creative collaborations, nights out on the town and mundane movie dates - brought a welcome lightness and comfort to their days, but their conversations often veered into more profound territory as they helped each other navigate the shifting waters of life lived, publicly, in the wake of great love and great loss.An intimate, vulnerable, and insightful portrait of the bond that grew between two iconic and starkly different American women, Carly Simon's Touched by the Sun is a chronicle, in loving detail, of the late friendship she and Jackie shared. It is a meditation on the ways someone can unexpectedly enter our lives and change its course, as well as a celebration of kinship in all its many forms.
Touched with Fire: Morris B. Abram and the Battle against Racial and Religious Discrimination
by David E. LoweMorris B. Abram (1918–2000) emerged from humble origins in a rural South Georgia town to become one of the leading civil rights lawyers in the United States during the 1950s. While unmasking the Ku Klux Klan and serving as a key intermediary for the release of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. from prison on the eve of the 1960 presidential election, Abram carried out a successful fourteen-year battle to end the discriminatory voting system in his home state, which had entrenched racial segregation. The result was the historic &“one man, one vote&” ruling of the U.S. Supreme Court in 1963. At the time of his selection—the youngest person ever chosen to head the American Jewish Committee—Abram became a leading international advocate for the Jewish state of Israel. He was also a champion of international human rights, from his leadership in the struggle to liberate Soviet Jewry to his service as permanent representative to the United Nations in Geneva. In Touched with Fire David E. Lowe chronicles the professional and personal life of this larger-than-life man. Encompassing many of the contentious issues we still face today—such as legislative apportionment, affirmative action, campus unrest, and the enforcement of international human rights— Abram&’s varied career sheds light on our own troubled times. Abram was tapped for service by five different U.S. presidents and survived a battle with acute myelocytic leukemia. He never abandoned his belief that the United States might someday become a colorblind society, where people would be judged, as his friend Martin Luther King dreamed, not by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. This elegantly written book is the biography Abram has long deserved.
Touching Cloth: Confessions and communions of a young priest
by Fergus Butler-Gallie'Touching Cloth can be compared to Adam Kay's This Is Going to Hurt and the writings of the Secret Barrister' Observer'I laughed my way through this... Funny, fascinating, and gorgeously humane' Marina Hyde'Funny and touching in equal measure' Tom HollandA laugh-out-loud memoir of becoming a 21st-century priest, Touching Cloth is also a love letter to the Prayer Book, Liverpool, funerals, cake tins, lager and, above all, to what the Church of England can be at its best. The very word 'reverend' inspires solemnity. To be a priest is to dedicate one's life to quiet prayer and spiritual contemplation. Isn't it?Fergus Butler-Gallie reveals what it's like to become a priest in the twenty-first century. Find out why black really is slimming, how to keep a straight face when someone is inadvertently hot-boxing a funeral, and which royal-themed biscuit tin can best contain a very loud personal alarm that no one knows how to switch off. Spot a sweet old lady trying to pay for a taxi with coinage from fascist Spain? Congratulations, shepherd, she's your problem now.Behind the daily scrapes is an all-too-human love letter to the Church of England, and the amazing variety of people who manage to keep it going, providing a listening ear, company and community at a time when so many people desperately need it, as well as a reflection on what it means to follow a spiritual path amid the chaos of the modern world.
Touching Distance
by Beverley Turner James CracknellDouble Olympic gold-medal winner, James Cracknell. His story before and after his life-changing accident.In October 2011 James Cracknell, two-time Olympic gold-medal rower and one of the greatest endurance athletes the world has ever known, suffered a seizure at home as his young son looked on in horror. A man who had known no limits, a man who had practically achieved the impossible, was now struggling to master life's simple challenges.A year earlier, as James undertook yet another endurance challenge in Arizona, he was knocked off his bike by the wing mirror of a petrol tanker. It had smashed into the back of his head at high speed, causing severe frontal lobe damage. The doctors weren’t sure if he would recover and, if he did, whether he would ever be the same again.Touching Distance is an extraordinary, honest and powerful account as James and his wife Bev confront for the first time the lasting effects that the accident has had on their lives. It is the story of a marriage, of a family and of one man's fight back to be the best husband and father he can be.
Touching Greatness: Memorable Encounters with Golfing Legends
by Dermot GilleeceTales of golfing stars and memorable moments from Ireland's best-loved golf correspondent.In almost thirty years as Ireland's leading golf journalist, Dermot Gilleece has met and interviewed numerous heroes of the game.Join Dermot on the course as he looks back over many wonderful years of golf with the greats - from Jack Nicklaus' first game on Irish soil, to sympathetic accounts of the declining skills of iconic golfers such as Seve Ballesteros. Packed with stories and insights about legends from Gene Sarazen, Tom Watson and Tiger Woods to, of course, 'Himself', Christy O'Connor Snr, Touching Greatness offers highlights from Dermot's much-loved column in the Irish Times, as well as more recent observations on the game. There are unmissable insights into illustrious characters from the amateur game, women's golf, Irish involvement in major team competitions like the Ryder Cup, and the history of Irish golfers in the Open, including the double Open and PGA Champion, Padraig Harrington.At turns moving and funny, and always beautifully written, Dermot's tales bring you right onto the fairway as you soak up the very best stories from inside the world of competitive golf.
Touching Ground: Devotion and Demons Along the Path to Enlightenment
by Jaimal Yogis Tim Testu Emma Varvaloucas Jeanette TestuThe vivid story of a hippie, a carpenter, a Vietnam vet, an alcoholic, a marine engineer, and a great dad who battled his demons on the Buddhist path.From October 16, 1973, to August 17, 1974, Tim Testu walked all the way from San Francisco to Seattle, bowing his head to the ground every three steps. And that’s not even the best part of his story. Tim Testu was one of the very first Americans to take ordination in Chinese Zen Buddhism. His path—from getting kicked out of school to joyriding in stolen boats in the Navy to squatting in an anarchist commune to wholehearted spiritual engagment in a strict Buddhist monastery—is equal parts rollicking adventure and profound spiritual memoir. Touching Ground is simultaneously larger than life and entirely relatable; even as Tim finds his spiritual home with his teacher, the legendary Chan master Hsuan Hua, he nonetheless continues to struggle to overcome his addictions and his very human shortcomings. Tim never did anything halfway, including both drinking and striving for liberation. He died of leukemia in 1998 after packing ten lifetimes into fifty-two years.
Touching the Art
by Mattilda Bernstein SycamoreA daringly observant memoir about intergenerational trauma, fine art, and compartmentalization from a returning Soft Skull author and Lambda Literary Award winnerA mixture of memoir, biography, criticism, and social history, Touching the Art is queer icon and activist Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore&’s interrogation of the possibilities of artistic striving, the limits of the middle-class mindset, the legacy of familial abandonment, and what art can and cannot do.Taking the form of a self-directed research project, Sycamore recounts the legacy of her fraught relationship with her late grandmother, an abstract artist from Baltimore who encouraged Mattilda as a young artist, then disparaged Mattilda&’s work as &“vulgar&” and a &“waste of talent&” once it became unapologetically queer.As she sorts through her grandmother Gladys&’s paintings and handmade paperworks, Sycamore examines the creative impulse itself. In fragments evoking the movements of memory, she searches for Gladys&’s place within the trajectories of midcentury modernism and Abstract Expressionism, Jewish assimilation and white flight, intergenerational trauma and class striving.Sycamore writes, &“Art is never just art, it is a history of feeling, a gap between sensations, a safety valve, an escape hatch, a sudden shift in the body, a clipboard full of flowers, a welcome mat flipped over and back, over and back, welcome.&”Refusing easy answers in search of an embodied truth, Sycamore upends propriety to touch the art and feel everything that comes through.
Touching the Dragon: And Other Techniques for Surviving Life's Wars
by James Hatch Christian D'AndreaFrom former special ops Navy SEAL senior chief; master naval parachutist (four Bronze Stars with Valor, Navy and Marine Corps Medal recipient, etc.); fighter in 150 missions (Iraq, Afghanistan, Bosnia, Africa); expert military dog trainer and handler whose SEAL dogs were partners and medal winners--a fierce, moving tale of a return from hell, being badly wounded on a special ops mission that ended his two-decades-long military career, his searing recovery, and the struggle to live life off the speeding train of war.In Touching the Dragon, James Hatch, Naval Special Warfare Operator, expert commando, tactical master in deadly operations, twenty-four years in service to his country (he enlisted in the Army National Guard at age seventeen), writes of his years of military service, from joining the Navy at eighteen, becoming a SEAL, to his joining the Naval Special Warfare Development group ("If I died in a gunfight, it would be doing something I loved"). He writes of the harrowing secret missions (Iraq, Bosnia, Africa); and of the fateful final mission (Afghanistan), that left him badly shot (a bullet exploding through his femur and out the back of his leg) as Hatch and his SEAL team crew were attempting to rescue a rogue soldier--Pvt. Bowe Bergdahl, who deserted his post, was captured by Al Qaida and Taliban militants, and was set to be smuggled to a part of the world where Americans could never reach him. Hatch writes of the horrific wound to his leg; of having no choice but to end his military career; of coming home to the country he'd spent his life defending; of the ordeal of getting well physically (eighteen surgeries; twelve months of recovery; learning to walk again); of having to find out who he was as a man apart from the chaotic world of special operations missions; of days and months of despair, alcoholism, the pull toward suicide; and of finally, through love of family, friends, soldiers, and his specially trained military dogs, touching the dragon, of going through the fear of feeling unfit for society, of finding a purpose and a way back to life.
Touching the Jaguar: Transforming Fear into Action to Change Your Life and the World
by John Perkins"This eloquent book inspires us to create a new reality of what it means to be humans on this magnificent planet."—Deepak ChopraThis all happened while Perkins was a Peace Corps volunteer. Then he became an "economic hit man" (EHM), convincing developing countries to build huge projects that put them perpetually in debt to the World Bank and other US-controlled institutions. Although he'd learned in business school that this was the best model for economic development, he came to understand it as a new form of colonialism. When he later returned to the Amazon, he saw the destructive impact of his work. But a much more profound experience emerged: Perkins was inspired by a previously uncontacted Amazon tribe that "touched its jaguar" by uniting with age-old enemies to defend its territory against invading oil and mining companies. For the first time, Perkins details how shamanism converted him from an EHM to a crusader for transforming a failing Death Economy (exploiting resources that are declining at accelerating rates) into a Life Economy (cleaning up pollution, recycling, and developing green technologies). He discusses the power our perceptions have for molding reality. And he provides a strategy for each of us to change our lives and defend our territory—the earth—against current destructive policies and systems.