Search Results for: Gretchen Hanson

Loving America is painful when America’s love is unequal

by Gretchen Hanson I love my country. When I was a child I canvassed door to door for George McGovern. I must have been incredibly cute in strawberry blond pigtails with my patent leather Mary Jane’s and, my basket full of red, white and blue pamphlets, and strawberry blond pigtails knocking on doors in Southern California. I had listened to the evening news with Walter Cronkite every night of my short little life and as that generation did, I believed…

Read More Read More

My America

by Gretchen Hanson It all started with a misplaced bottle of water. I left my idyllic little resort town of Rehoboth Beach in Delaware early Friday morning. A dear friend was being laid to rest in Cumberland, Maryland, and I was facing a long, difficult, five hour drive. I packed road food (because I am always hungry) and water bottles and put them on the back seat. The food, which was to last me all day, I finished in twenty…

Read More Read More

Global Flavors: A Love Letter to Athens

by Gretchen Hanson “Business or pleasure?” My customs agent eyes me up and down and perfunctorily questions the purpose of my journey as he must do a thousand times a day. He is young and could easily be one of the carved marble sculptures on the frieze above the Parthenon. You can tell his interest in my answer is only relevant to his job. I smile sadly, and tell him nothing even close to the truth. “Pleasure.” I smile to…

Read More Read More