Podcasts about macalester

Rob Grace IV is used to being around a basketball court.  As a youngster he used to run around the gym at Minneapolis Southwest High School when his dad was the coach.  He was also present at Target Center for many NBA games as his father was creating excitement with fans as “hoop man” as those fans try to make a shot into basket hovering above his head. Now Rob is grown and is a senior at Macalester college and also shoots content for the Minnesota Timberwolves.  Rob had a great career at The Blake School where he was an all-conference player as well as a 1,000 point scorer.  He then went on to play college hoops locally for Macalester but it was a simple Instagram message that helped spark his career to where he is today filming content for an NBA team. 

Introduction: Host Michael Rand starts with the juxtaposition of his social media timeline on Tuesday, which was a lot of election coverage interspersed with the NFL trade deadline in the afternoon and the Wild game at night. The Vikings didn't make any more deals, but they added a kicker and long snapper because of injuries. The Wild, meanwhile, continued to struggle on the power play and lost 5-1 to the Kings. 8:00: Star Tribune Gophers football writer Randy Johnson joins Rand for a breakdown of the red-hot Gophers. They've won four straight, three of them with fourth quarter rallies. Max Brosmer is giving them the best QB play in five years. Will they seek a similar veteran solution in 2025? 21:00: Star Tribune columnist Chip Scoggins on the early risers at Macalester. 28:00: Baseball revenue and a beginning for Gophers men's basketball.

In this week's episode of Taylor Made with Hamline University Head Football Coach Chip Taylor, the Coach discusses the big contest against Macalester, he talks about recruiting, the Coach shares his thoughts on superstitions, Plus, Coach Taylor talks some NFL. This and much more. Enjoy!

I recognize that another event outside this building has the attention and hearts of many of us in this room this morning.Show of hands: How many here know and remember Pastor Kenny and his wife Malaina, who we sent out last year to plant a church in the Orlando area? Well, as we meet here this morning, Horizon City Church, led by Kenny, is having their first public gathering in Winter Garden, Florida.I don't think it's any coincidence that at the very time when we're turning our focus to being welcoming witnesses that we remember, and pray for, a man who embodies what it means to be a welcoming witness. So, if you feel a little distracted this morning, I get it. In fact, you might do well to keep Pastor Kenny in mind during this message, as a living lesson in being a welcoming witness.To be clear, what's going on in Winter Garden, and what's going on this morning at 1524 Summit Avenue, is vastly more important that any marathon or any American football game in London or anywhere else in the world.Growing Up and OutThis is now the fifth in a series of six sermons, called “We Are Cities Church,” on our vision and values. As we're approaching our tenth anniversary as a church (this January), we have found ourselves in a new season of church life. In broad strokes, you might see our first five years, from 2015 until COVID, as a time of being planted. And these last four years have been a time of becoming rooted here on Summit Avenue. Now we sense ourselves coming into a new season — of what? What would you call it? What do you call the next phase after being planted and rooted? What is an acorn planted and rooted for? To grow tall and wide. To stretch up high in worship and spread out in witness to the world. We're in a season of new growth and stretching and spreading our branches — of bearing fruit, we pray, and dropping acorns we hope will become new churches.So, for this new season, we've considered how we might freshly express our unchanging mission: we want to make joyful disciples of Jesus who remember his realness in all of life. And we have a fresh fourfold way of talking about the kind of disciples we hope to be and multiply. Each of the four brings together two realities to clarify with an adjective what kind of nouns we mean.First, we are Jesus worshipers. This is the vertical aspect, the up-reach. We are not just theists, or even monotheists; nor do we simply admire Jesus as a great moral teacher. Rather, we worship Jesus. That's what it means to be Christians. We not only worship God but worship his Son.Second, we are joyful servants. That is, we are not dour servants, doing our duty while biting our lip. Nor are we shallowly happy sluggards sitting around dedicated to self-service. Rather, we aim to have happy hearts behind our helping hands. We gladly provide shade for those scorched by the sun, and strong branches to give safety for those harassed by wolves.Third, we are generous disciplers. What do we say here — providing life-giving sap? We are not miserly mentors, nor generous donors, but generous disciplers — up close, involved, giving of our own time and energy to help others grow in the faith. Last week we saw this vision in Acts 20 of personally speaking God's word and living his word in real life while investing in the lives of a few. “Disciplers” is the big addition to our previous way of talking about a threefold calling as worshipers, servants, and missionaries. We still say worshipers and servants, but now we've added disciplers, and updated missionaries to witnesses.So, fourth and finally, we are welcoming witnesses. Here we're talking outreach in particular. Not just up in worship, and in through service and discipling, but out in Christian witness to an unchristian world.Welcoming witness means we are not okay being cold, off-putting witnesses; nor are we warm, welcoming pushovers. We are welcoming witnesses: those who open wide their arms to others to make Jesus known and enjoyed.So, we give the rest of this message to welcoming witnesses, and here's how we'll proceed. First, let's go to Acts 2, and the string of texts that follow it, and see the welcoming witness of the early church, and how it grew. Then let's consider what it means to be a witness, and then what welcoming adds to witness. You can call these three truths for our welcoming witness.1. The church and the gospel grow together.Acts 2:40 says that Peter “bore witness” to the gospel of Jesus, and verse 21 says that the people “received his word” — we'll come back to this. Then twice we hear about additions, that is, growth:Verse 41: “there were added that day about three thousand souls.” Verse 47: “the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.”And this is the beginning of this remarkable theme in the book of Acts — the word growing, increasing, multiplying.So we hear in Acts 4:4: “many of those who had heard the word believed, and the number of the men came to about five thousand.” So the (gospel) word is heard and believed, and the number grows.Then Acts 6:7: “the word of God continued to increase, and the number of the disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem . . . .” Number grows, as word grows. Specifically, number multiplies as word increases.Then Acts 12:24, very simply: “the word of God increased and multiplied” — many more heard and believed and joined the church. So too in Acts 19:20: “the word of the Lord continued to increase and prevail mightily.”The word, the message of the gospel, grows as people hear and believe in Jesus and are added to the church. Word growth and church growth go together.What If GodNow, I know that some of us hear that — all that adding and increasing and even multiplying — and think, Oh no, I just want a small church. We look around this room and think, There's already enough people here. Already too many! No more increasing, please. Okay, maybe just a little adding here and there, but no multiplying!We might think of it in terms of church size, but perhaps that's really a misplaced diagnosis. I suspect it's not really about church size as much as the rush and pace and complexities and relentless frenzy of city life. Our modern metropolitan lives are so crazy, we just want church small and simple, thank you. But our discomfort with gospel growth may really have more to do with our unrecognized calling to the city.You know what's good about city life? There are so many people nearby. And you know what's so hard about city life? There are so many people nearby.To be honest, just about all of us at Cities Church have small-church preferences. And you know what? It turns out a lot of us have small-church preferences. So many of us, in fact, that after a while, we small-church people find each other, and don't have a small church anymore.What might help us is to do business with the time and place to which God has called us. Brothers and sisters, you live in a very large city. Twin Cities. Depending on who's counting, this is the 12th to 16th largest metro in the United States. And this is where God has put you, whether you own it or not. Maybe God's loosening your roots and means for you to head to the hinterlands, but for now, if you live in the TC metro, you live in a very populated urban and suburban area. My hope for us as a church is that we would recognize our present calling, and embrace it, and persevere in it, and let it inform our expressed desire for small church.I get it. Most of us have some native bucolic longings that in the complexity and stress of city life we might try to pour into church life. Brothers and sisters, there are other ways to channel your rural dreams than into a church on Summit Avenue. Drive out-state to an apple orchard next Saturday, or get an AirBnB for a weekend. Take a trip in Duluth; visit the Brainerd Lakes area or Boundary Waters. Explore MN. Drive across South Dakota. And then come back to the big city, and own that we are a church in the city, and that it is good to have so many people nearby, and so many people to bring close to Jesus and into joyful discipleship.It would be very easy to look around week after week and think we don't have any more space. We don't have room for witness. We don't have room to welcome others in. We don't have space for more baptisms, at least not many.As pastors, we are wrestling in this season, and want you to wrestle with us, Lord, what are you calling us to? We want the gospel to increase and multiply. We want the church to grow and mature. We want to generously disciple many, and send them out like Pastor Kenny, and add to our number those who are being saved. Would you join us in praying for it? And would you join us in praying for Macalester? Amazingly, we've been seeing a new trickle of students from Macalester. What if God would be pleased to turn that into a stream, and into a river? What if God sent us 100 Macalester students? What's your gut response to that? Is it, “Oh no! We don't have room for many more people!” Or does your heart burn, “Yes, yes, do it, Lord, answer our prayers, make us a welcoming witness to Macalester, and Summit Avenue, and in these surrounding neighborhoods”?2. You are never alone when you witness to Jesus.The key verse that sets the program for the whole book of Acts is Acts 1:8: “…you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”Because of Acts 1:8, we often use this word “witness” for “sharing our faith” or “speaking the gospel.” Have you ever stopped to ponder what this word “witness” means for us as Christians?What is a witness? A witness is someone, who, for the good of others, chooses to testify to something they have seen or heard. Usually the witness did not choose to see or hear what they did. They didn't initiate the experience. The event chose them, so to speak. And then, for the good of others, they choose, they agree, to testify in court.So, to be a witness is both humble and brave. Something happened that you didn't do, but you saw it or heard it. And now, for the benefit of others, you testify to what you saw or heard or know.John the Baptist is a classic example of the witness: He came as a witness, to bear witness about the light, that all might believe through him. He was not the light, but came to bear witness about the light. (John 1:7-8)Brothers and sisters, pressure's off! You're not the light; you're just the witness. Jesus is the light, not you. It's his work, not yours. It's his grace, not yours. But this I know: I once was blind, but now I see. I'm not the light; he's the light. Look at the light!And not only do we witness like John but we never witness alone, but as we witness to Jesus, and what we have seen and heard and experience, we simply add our voice to the company of witnesses: to the witness of nature (Acts 14:17), and the witness of conscience (Romans 2:15), and the witness of Scripture (Acts 10:43), and to the cloud of witnesses that surrounds us (Hebrews 12:1).But the one I find most encouraging of all is that the Holy Spirit witnesses. Acts 5:32: “we are witnesses to these things, and so is the Holy Spirit, whom God has given to those who obey him.”The Spirit is the divine Person who works through and with the word to give it life and growth and increase and expansion. And God has given him to us; he dwells in us. You never witness alone when you bear witness to Jesus.Over and over again in Acts, the Holy Spirit fills Christians and empowers them for witness (Acts 2:4; 4:8, 31; 13:9), just as Jesus promised in Acts 1:8: “you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses...”3. We adorn our witness with hearts and hands that welcome.Witness is the noun. Welcome is the adjective. Welcoming witness means that we adorn our gospel witness with the warmth and deeds of Christian love. Word is central in witness, and welcome adorns word.Biblically, a related concept to “welcoming witness” is hospitality, which is literally “love of strangers.” There is usual human kindness, where we welcome and love those who love us, and there is the unusual kindness of Rahab welcoming the Israelite spies (Hebrews 11:31) or the natives of Malta showing hospitality to the shipwrecked apostle Paul (Acts 28:2, 7). Love for strangers is so important to Christianity that hospitable is a requirement for office in the church (1 Tim 3:2; 5:10; Titus 1:8).For Christians, love for strangers means both that we welcome fellow believers in uncomfortable ways (Romans 12:13; 14:1; 1 Peter 4:9) as well as that we welcome strangers and unbelievers (Heb 13:2; Matt 25:35, 38, 43).Why would we do this? I remember I had a book as a kid called Never Talk to Strangers. It was not a Christian book. So, why would we do this? Why would we talk to strangers? And have a heart for strangers to know Jesus? And take action that we might welcome strangers to Jesus and witness to him?Because this is what Jesus has done for us. We were hungry and he fed us with the bread of life. We were thirsty and he gave us to drink from the well of living water. We were strangers, sinners, rebels, estranged from God, and he welcomed us.Christians learn to love strangers, and learn to be welcoming witnesses to those strange to us and estranged from God, because God himself loved us when we were yet strangers. His love for strangers compels us to be welcoming witnesses, rather than fearful of and suspicious of the strange and God-estranged.Three Spheres for WitnessSo, I end with three spheres of our welcoming witness, perhaps in increasing importance:1) We are a welcoming witness at 1524 Summit Ave. Each Sunday, we have a welcome team. You can participate in that. And let's not leave all the welcoming of each other, and strangers, to the welcome team. So, some welcoming happens on the way into this room, but mainly, after we worship, oh what amazing ministry, what welcoming witness happens on these grounds. Please don't run as a pattern. Linger and be welcoming witnesses.Then all week, as we meet people nearby, and represent our church, as we frequent businesses nearby, as we repair the steeple, and keep the lawn, we want to be together a welcoming witness to Jesus on Summit Ave and to these surrounding neighborhoods.2) We are a welcoming witness as we go out into other spaces during the week. So, your work, your school, coffee shops, gyms, ballfields. Just Thursday, I was given a new book called You Will Be My Witnesses (by Brian DeVries). I got it from someone in another city who had no idea I was preaching on “witnesses” this Sunday. It's very good. Chapter 5 summarizes the pattern of Christian witness in Acts like this, which is very applicable to our relationships with unbelievers across the metro: Christian witness is (1) usually preceded by prayer, (2) often explicitly Spirit-directed, (3) generally spontaneous, (4) with the church community itself as the dominant form of witness (DeVries talks about “contagious Christian living within an attracting church community,” 120), and all that, as we've seen, (5) with gospel communication central (and “authenticated by . . . faithful living,” 121).3) We are a welcoming witness in our homes.Sometimes we talk about someone having “the gift” of hospitality. It may be true that some are more naturally inclined toward good hosting, but hospitality is not something that falls from the sky (or not). It is first God-given love for strangers in the heart, and that love is either cultivated and grown (whatever your natural inclinations), or neglected and suppressed; and if it's cultivated, then that love overflows into practical, tangible outward deeds and welcome.I close with five practical, nitty-gritty ideas for welcoming witness in our homes.1) Pray about being hospitable and budget for it. Pray over who you'd like to invite into your home, and don't let the very minimal costs keep you from the very maximal rewards.2) Think in concentric circles of “strangers”: first, those who are not strangers at all: friends and family. Okay, that's very normal hosting. Then think of those who are strangers in that they don't live in your house but are fellow believers. Then don't forget those who are strangers according to faith. In other words, Christian hospitality incorporates both fellow believers and nonbelievers. Make use of it for both, for hosting Community Group and hosting unbelieving neighbors.3) A word for dads. I wish this lesson didn't take me so long to learn, and that I didn't still have room for growth. But it did, and I do. I'd love to save some younger husbands some grief if you'll hear an old man's counsel: dad's energy is key for hospitality. Husbands, fathers, we don't wave a wand and expect wife and kids to start singing, “Be Our Guest” — not for long. Dad, your masculine heart and hands and arms are critical; and so is her feminine heart and touch — and everyone knows her part is vital, but yours can get forgotten, especially by you. Don't forget it. Brothers, lead the way in prayer, planning, preparation, service, and cleanup. Put your male body to some use. Many marriages (not saying all) would be helped if dad sweated hospitality prep for more, and mom sweated it less.4) So, a word to the ladies: some of you may have to lower your expectations for domestic and culinary excellence. I promise, it is worth being hospitable, even if a perfect pic doesn't wind up on IG. You don't need to impress; just love. Use paper plates, and the house doesn't have to be perfect.5) A next-level consideration might be having a guest room, or plan for overnight hosting.Making a practice of welcoming others into our homes can be good for your marriage, in having shared mission and ministry together. It can be good for our kids, in the people they'll meet and interact with and learn from. And it's good for us to have open homes, open doors, open lives. An open home brings accountability with it that does us all good. Satan loves isolation and closed doors. And welcoming others into our homes might be not just an important way, but the key way in our times to witness to our faith in Jesus.Housekey?I remember the moment in evangelism class in seminary. The professor's name was Steve Childers. He asked the class, “You know what will be the key to evangelism in the 21st century, don't you?”I'm sure he could see on our faces how eager we were for his answer. Wow, the key, we were thinking. This is huge. He knew he had us. So he paused and smiled and waited. And he waited. And just when I was almost ready to burst with, “Just c'mon already!” finally he lifted the curtain: “Hospitality.”In an increasingly post-Christian society, he said, the importance of hospitality as an evangelistic asset is quickly growing. Increasingly, the most strategic turf on which to engage the unbelieving with the good news of Jesus is the turf of our own yards and homes.When people don't gather in droves for stadium crusades, or tarry long enough on the sidewalk to hear a gospel presentation, or look up from their phones, or take out their earbuds, what will you do? How will we be welcoming witnesses? Where will we testify to the unbelieving about what matters most?Invite them to dinner. Witness and Welcome at the TableEach Sunday, this Table forms us to be welcoming witnesses. First, this Table witnesses. It speaks a visible word to us about Jesus, his sacrifice of his body for our sins, and his new covenant inaugurated in the shedding of his blood. This Table witnesses to him, and as we partake we proclaim his death until he comes.And this Table welcomes — not without spiritual conditions but indiscriminately within the conditions of confession this Jesus as Lord, Savior, and Treasure and having had his name put on you publicly through baptism.

"Radio is not a visual medium" but Brian and Dave discuss the most memorable images in sports. Dave Hoops brings his usual optimism to the world of brewing and Minnesota sports! CSS Football coach Mike Heffernan previews homecoming against Macalester

Kendall Qualls joins to start the show with ideas on the future of education. The mayor wandered around Macalester yesterday but couldn't get into any buildings. The state's list of DEI employees. Reusse with his weekly sports report. Johnny Heidt with guitar news.Heard On The Show:Woman killed in shooting outside Lowertown Lofts Artists Cooperative identifiedMPD adds 23 new officers, including first Somali woman and non-citizenRescuers race to free people trapped by Hurricane Helene after storm kills at least 30 in 4 states Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Kendall Qualls joins to start the show with ideas on the future of education. The mayor wandered around Macalester yesterday but couldn't get into any buildings. The state's list of DEI employees. Reusse with his weekly sports report. Johnny Heidt with guitar news. Heard On The Show: Woman killed in shooting outside Lowertown Lofts Artists Cooperative identified MPD adds 23 new officers, including first Somali woman and non-citizen Rescuers race to free people trapped by Hurricane Helene after storm kills at least 30 in 4 states Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

GL'ers meet Macalester professor Brian Lozenski. He wants to overthrow the Government. Latest word salad from Kamala Harris. State flag and seal redesign will cost MN's millions of dollars. Johnny Heidt with guitar news.Heard On The Show:Family identifies man shot by police in Belle Plaine; incident linked to Lowertown homicideBrooklyn Park public works director arrested on rape charges in GeorgiaHelene races toward Florida as a major Category 3 storm Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

GL'ers meet Macalester professor Brian Lozenski. He wants to overthrow the Government. Latest word salad from Kamala Harris. State flag and seal redesign will cost MN's millions of dollars. Johnny Heidt with guitar news. Heard On The Show: Family identifies man shot by police in Belle Plaine; incident linked to Lowertown homicide Brooklyn Park public works director arrested on rape charges in Georgia Helene races toward Florida as a major Category 3 storm Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

So today we're starting a new sermon series that's gonna go on for the next six weeks, and the title of the series is: “We Are Cities Church.” The goal is simply to tell you who we are.The reason we wanna do that is because, going back to last year, the pastors recognized that God was bringing our church into a new season, and so we took that as an opportunity to hit pause and begin a process of re-clarifying our mission and vision as a church. We wanted to get down to the foundations and ask, in a fresh way, who has Jesus called us to be and what does he want us to do?So this series is about that — and if you've been around Cities for a while, I don't expect that you're gonna be surprised by anything you hear … if you're brand-new, I'm excited for you to meet our church … and if you're semi-new, I hope this might fill in some gaps for you. Today I'm talking about our mission and we're gonna be looking at Colossians Chapter 1, verse 28. We're gonna focus on just this one verse, and I'd like to ask you to do whatever you gotta do to get this verse in front of your eyes. Father in heaven, thank you for the Holy Scriptures, and thank you that we have them! In our hands, we have your very word to us, breathed out by you. Your word is “more to be desired than gold, even much fine gold; sweeter also than honey and the drippings of the honeycomb” — and we know that your word is for our good. So, by your Holy Spirit, we ask, speak to us, in Jesus's name, amen. Colossians Chapter 1, verse 28. Everybody look at verse 28.Verse 28 starts with the word “him” — Paul is talking about Jesus:“[Jesus] we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ.”Now when it comes to the mission of our local church, there are at least three things we learn here from the apostle Paul, and #1 is this …1. Know the play you're running. So when I was a kid I played a little football — I didn't play a lot of football, just a little — I pretty much peaked in 8th grade. But that's when I played for the Four Oaks Middle School Cardinals, and I was the starting quarterback (and the only reason I was the quarterback, I think, is because I could say “down, set, hut” in the deepest voice). Because it really didn't matter who the quarterback was. We ran an I-Formation and every play I was either giving the ball to Melvin, my tailback, or to Jason, my fullback.We ran a true smash-mouth offense and it worked. All we had to do was get at least 2½ yards every carry, and we did most of the time. We were pretty good, but we were good not because we had the best talent, but because we knew our game. We knew the play we were running.And I think we see the same thing in the example of Paul in verse 28. We're gonna look closely at verse 28, but first let me back up a second and show you how we get there.Paul's Mission StrategyBefore verse 28, in verses 24–27, Paul says that God has given him an assignment for the sake of the church. God has called Paul to make “the word of God fully known” (verse 25). What used to be a mystery is now out in the open (verse 27) — and it's “Christ in you, the hope of glory.” Now remember Paul is saying this to the church at Colossae. Paul is saying to this Gentile church that an amazing thing has happened: It's that Christ is in you, Gentiles! Christ, the Jewish Messiah, is a global Savior. He's not just the hope of Israel, but he is the hope of all nations — Jesus is for everybody from anywhere who trusts in him.And when you trust him, you become united to him — His Spirit lives inside of you and you become so joined to Jesus that all of his benefits as the Son of God become your benefits: you are declared righteous before God; you are forgiven for all your sins, you are adopted as a child of God with a future. And you have the hope of glory, which means, you will be with God in his joy forever.God has sent Paul on a mission to make that known! That's verses 24–27, and then in verse 28, Paul tells us what he does because of this mission. I think we can call verse 28 Paul's mission strategy. And if you'll bear with me for a minute, I want to explain a little distinction between the idea of “mission” and “mission strategy.” Think about it like this: A mission is what you're sent to do; and a mission strategy gets into how you do it.Now we know as a church that our mission is to make disciples of Jesus. This is what Jesus has sent us to do. He tells us this in Matthew 28, the Great Commission, that because he has all authority over all things, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations.” That's what we're called to do as a local church and it's non-negotiable.And now when it comes to how we do that — when it comes to our strategy — we're supposed to learn from the apostle Paul. This is how the New Testament is set up: in the Gospels we have the life of Jesus and his commission to us; in Acts we see that commission happening and the gospel advancing; and then in the letters we get into the details of gospel transformation and practice.“Christ Clear for Christlikeness”Look again at what Paul says in verse 28. Because of Paul's mission to make the word of God fully known — to witness to Jesus and make disciples — he has a simple strategy. It's a straightforward action-purpose. He does an action for a desired purpose.ACTION: Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom.PURPOSE: So that we may present everyone mature in Christ.Do you see that? Action-purpose. Paul is saying I preach Jesus for the purpose of making mature Christians.Or another way I think we could summarize Paul's mission strategy is to say: Make Christ clear for Christlikeness. Now there are more details and tactics when it comes to how we work this out, but I want you to see that this is the basic strategy — for Paul and for us. For our mission to make disciples of Jesus, the most important thing we can do is show people Jesus, and the highest goal we could aim for is that everyone become like Jesus. And it's not complicated. One of the things I love about this strategy is that we don't have to be superstars to do it. All we need is 2½ yards every carry — we just need to know the play we're running. It's been the same play we've been running since the very beginning. Back on January 18, 2015, in our very first church service together, I preached this verse, Colossians 1:28.In that first sermon, I highlighted two things: I called it our work and our goal. I said our work is to proclaim Christ and our goal is for us and others to be complete in Christ.Christ clear for Christlikeness — same thing. That's the play we've been running, that's the play we're going to keep running. Church, know the play. Here's the second lesson from Colossians 1:28 …2. Remember Jesus is the ultimate difference-maker.1928 was a rough year for the St. Louis Cardinals (we got swept by the Yankees in the World Series and we've had hard feelings ever since), but '28 was a great year for moms.Because in July of 1928, a man named Otto Rohwedder from Iowa, finally debuted this machine he had spent years inventing. It was a power-driven, multi-bladed bread slicer. And it was shocking. It could take an entire loaf of bread, and in seconds, it could make a beautiful block of perfectly identical bread slices each about an inch thick. It was incredible, and of course what do you do with bread like that? You bag it, distribute it, and sell it.Within two years, bags of pre-sliced bread were in grocery stores all over the country, and the first major brand to do this called itself Wonder Bread. And there's no doubt how big a deal this was. You may not realize this, but your life has been impacted by the bread-slicer. You have never had an experience with bread that was not affected by this machine. This doesn't mean that you always eat pre-sliced bread, but it means that if you're not, you know you're not. Like, if you want unsliced bread, you intentionally have to go out of your way to make that happen. The bread-slicer was a difference maker. Centered on JesusAnd in the same way, but on a more cosmic, ultimate level, Jesus is a difference-maker. Here's what I mean: ever since Jesus came into this world two-thousand years ago, nobody has been able to think about God or this world the same way. Now this doesn't mean that everybody believes in Jesus, but it does mean that you cannot ignore him. You either believe Jesus to be who he says he is, OR you have to come up with some theory that denies him (and those theories have been attempted since he was actually on the ground here). So there have always been only two options: you either believe Jesus OR you don't believe Jesus — and if you don't believe Jesus then you know you don't believe him. You intentionally do not believe him.Whatever you do, you can't ignore Jesus — the magnitude of his claims and reach of his impact are both too great. Nobody has changed the world like Jesus has and said the things that Jesus said. So you can't side-step him. Everybody must make a decision about Jesus.And because this is true, it makes sense that our mission strategy centers on him. It's him we proclaim.And look, I'll tell you, the pressure is always to make it about something else. We've felt that here at times over the last ten years. You've probably felt it in your relationships, with your friends and family and co-workers.I was having lunch with a friend last week over at Macalester and we were brainstorming the idea of starting a Bible study on campus, and he said Well, you know, the thing is with college students is that they just wanna talk about the issues. “The issues.” And I get it, but here's the thing: Jesus is real.We can get to the issues, but the question that every thinking person has to deal with first is Who is this man? Who is Jesus?So we talk about him. What we need is to see him and keep seeing him, and to show him and keep showing him — first and foremost, beginning, middle, end. Everything absolutely comes back to Jesus Christ. Who do you believe he is? Jesus is the ultimate difference-maker, and so Paul says, Him we proclaim. Sweeping and BuildingAnd then Paul explains more of what that means. He says it means that he warns everyone and he teaches everyone with all wisdom. Warning and teaching. That word for warning is sometimes translated “admonish.” It's the idea of putting things in order, or clearing things up. The word “teaching” is the idea of positive construction. It means we're building something. And there's an important dynamic between these two. It reminds me of when I was a kid … my dad used to bring me to his job sites and pay me to sweep the floor. And there was a little bit of a process involved. The first thing I had to do was get rid of all the big leftover material, and then I got the broom, and the whole idea was to make the place ready for the next subcontractor, so that construction could continue. Because, see, something was being built.And this happens when we proclaim Christ. Sometimes the reality of Jesus means that people (including us!) need to do some sweeping. I wrote an article for you two weeks ago called “The Vital Unmasking” and it was about the Holy Spirit's ministry to convict the world of sin, righteousness, and judgment. It's that if we're trusting in false saviors, we need them to be exposed, right? No alternative to faith in Jesus ultimately works, and if you're not trusting in Jesus, you're trusting in an alternative. We need the Holy Spirit to convict us of that (which he can do even right now; you can ask him to do that). If you're here this morning and you know you're not a Christian, you are trusting in some kind of fake savior and that doesn't end well. The proclamation of Jesus warns you. He's the only way.Sometimes we're sweeping, but then we're also building. We're seeing Jesus, and then we're seeing all of life in the light of Jesus. We're learning how to build the house of our lives on the rock, because the rain will fall, the floods will come, and wind will blow, but our house will stand because it's founded on the rock. That's a big part of what we're doing in our Sunday morning classes and in The Cities Institute (mark your calendars, November 1). We're building, teaching. This is our strategy: Make Christ clear. It really does all come back to him. Jesus is the ultimate difference-maker. Third thing we learn from Paul for our mission strategy …3. Aim for Christlikeness from the heart.This is more on the purpose, the goal. Paul says we proclaim Christ “so that we may present everyone mature in Christ.” That means to be complete in Christ, to be grown-up in Christ. Paul is talking about Christian maturity — true Christlikeness.And I wonder what you think when you hear the word Christlikeness? What does it mean to be Christlike?If you're like me, you probably think that to be Christlike means to act like Christ. It's about what we do, how we behave. I used to think that, and to give credit where credit is due, the writings of Dallas Willard have really helped me here. Willard pointed out something so obvious that it feels crazy to think we could miss this — He points out that Jesus teaches that the heart is the center of the human person. Jesus says that our sinful behaviors flow out of our hearts. That's the problem. So then, when we imagine Christlikeness, how can we imagine anything less than our hearts being transformed? Willard says conformity to Christ must arise out of an inner transformation. The main goal, then, of Christlikeness, is not that we act like Christ, but it's that our hearts become like Christ's heart. I don't want to just appear like Jesus, but I want my heart to be like Jesus's heart, which means my thoughts and my feelings and my dispositions and my choices become what Jesus's would be if he were in my shoes, because they're flowing from my heart which has been made like his. This is heaven. Does anybody want heaven? In heaven, we will be transformed to be like Jesus, not just in how we look, but in our truest self.And get this: how God effects that transformation is not by just zapping us and making it happen out of nowhere, but it's a work that he is doing now, a little bit at a time, by the Holy Spirit. And we want it. For this we toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within us. There is grace-fueled, Holy-Spirit empowered effort to reach this purpose, for all of us, for everyone. For me and for you. That's the purpose of making Christ clear. Christ clear for Christlikeness. It's like what the Scottish pastor Robert Murray M'Cheyne said (in his 20s). He prayed, “Lord, make me as holy as a pardoned sinner can be.” We want to be as Christlike as is possible this side of heaven.” Christlikeness from the heart.Joyful Disciples of JesusNow imagine that … Take a second here and picture yourself being more Christlike from the heart. If you are that kind of Christlike, how are you? What are you like? … picture yourself.Now I would bet that a lot of you have just pictured yourself as having less fun and being more serious.Now why do we think that?Did you not know that God is happy?In his presence there is fullness of joy. At his right hand are pleasures forevermore. We have the glorious gospel of the happy God! And if we are made to be more like him, doesn't that mean that we will be happy, too?The Bible teaches that God in his essence is love, and therefore, joy. “This is the my beloved Son in whom I'm well-pleased!” — the Father says of Jesus, This is my eternal Son I love, in whom I delight! This means that joy is deeper than the universe. We came from joy, and headed back to joy, and that means the more Christlike we become, the more joyful we become. This is so fundamental to being a disciple of Jesus, and it's so important to our church, that we want to be more explicit about this in how we talk and what we do. We want to be and make joyful disciples of Jesus.What's New and ComingThis is a new way we want to start talking about our mission. Our mission has always been, and will always be, to make disciples of Jesus. That's what Jesus tells us to do. And when it comes to what we mean by making disciples, we want to make joyful disciples of Jesus who remember his realness in all of life. That's why we make Christ clear for Christlikeness. And over the next four sermons, we're going to tell you more about this. There are four aspects to being joyful disciples of Jesus. It means … We are Jesus worshipers.We are joyful servants.We are generous disciplers.We are welcoming witnesses. That is who Jesus has called us to be and then to multiply — That is Cities Church.Now we come to this Table.The TableThe Lord Jesus Christ is everything to us, and he has given us this Table to remember him together each week. The bread represents his body broken for us and the cup represents his blood shed for us, and when we come here to eat the bread and drink the cup, him we proclaim. We are making Christ clear to one another — we are saying that Jesus is our hope. We have been saved by him, and we adore him. And if that's your story this morning, we invite you to eat and drink with us.

Send us a Text Message.Talk'n Throws with Micah Guthland-Currently the throws Coach at Sam Houston State University, 2021-24 Colorado Mesa University Mavericks' assistant track and field coach, 2019-21,  Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore assistant track and field coach, 2012-2019 Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota strength and conditioning coach, 2006   University of St. Thomas in Saint Paul track & field team.USATF Level 2: Throws USTFCCCA Strength and Conditioning Specialist,USTFCCCA Sprints Hurdles and Relays Events Specialist US Weightlifting Level 1  Sam Houston Coaching Accomplishments: -Two West Region Qualifiers in the Men's Hammer- First Team Conference USA Men's Shot Put (2nd Place)-First Team Conference USA Men's Hammer (2nd Place)-First Team Conference USA Women's Shot Put (3rd Place) CMU Coaching Accomplishments: -Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference (RMAC) Men's Javelin Champion,- Second Place Men's Javelin First Team All-RMAC 2023-Second Team All-Conference Men's Javelin 2023-Second Team All-RMAC Men's Shot Put. -First Team All-RMAC Women's Discus 3rd Place and First time Female making the podium. - Second Team RMAC Conference Men's Shot Put, Men's Discus, Men's Javelin Outdoor 2022. -Second Team RMAC Conference Men's Shot Put Indoor 2022. - USTFCCCA All-South Central Region Men's Javelin Throwers 2023.- USTFCCCA All-South Central Region Men's Shot Put 2022. - School Record Holders in Men's Outdoor Discus, Javelin, Shot Put, and Indoors Men's Shot Put. -School Record Holders' in Women's Outdoor Discus and Shot Put and Indoors Women's Shot Put and Women's Weight Throw.  John's Hopkins Coaching Accomplishments: -Record Holders in the Men's and Women's Weight Throw and Women's Hammer Throw. -All-Conference Honorable Mention Women's Shot Put Indoor 2019, -Second Team All- Conference Women's Javelin 2021, -Conference Champion Women's Hammer 2021, -Second All-Conference Honorable Mention Women's Shot Put Outdoor 2021. -2021 All-American Female Javelin Thrower; -USTFCCCA All-Mideast Region Female Javelin Thrower Macalester Coaching Accomplishments: - Record Holders in the Men's and Women's Hammer, Women's Weight Throw. -Rewritten Macalester All-Time Performance list in all four throwing events- every athlete has appeared during the tenure. - Throwing events for multi-event athletes: Men's and Women's Macalester All-Time Performance list appearances. - Male Javelin Thrower to 3-time All MIAC and 2-time All-Central Region of the USTFCCCA-Women's Weight thrower All MIAC Honorable Mention and Women's Javelin thrower All-MIAC honorable Mention.Texas Track and Field AssociationInformative website for all things Texas Track and Field4Throws.comFamily owned business offering all quality implements at reasonable prices. Code Talkinthrows10Big Frog of ColleyvilleHandles all printing and embroidery. FiberSport DiscusWe are taking the guess work out of discus selection. It is not just about rim weight. NTX TimingNTX Timing a professional timing group that can handle any level of event.Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.

Lapsed catholic woman finds need to confess. By MarthaMcKinley - Listen to the Podcast at Steamy Stories. I'm driving back to see my priest, from the college parish.  Yeah, this catholic girl needs deliverance from some major guilt. No, let's see; how many years has it been? It hit me yesterday, as Robbie & I were driving home. Oh, Gawd! Oh Gawd!Why shouldn't I worry? This probably changes things. No. It definitely changes things! Every thing. I had sex with Bart, a married man. Get it, you rash brain. I'm a married woman who just had sex with another woman's husband. And not simply another woman, but one of my friends. What was I thinking? Obviously, I wasn't. There we were. Robbie was driving. I glanced over at Robbie, driving us home, tapping on the steering wheel and belting out the words to Billie Joel's Only the Good Die Young coming over the radio. “You Catholic girls start much too late.” Did Billy Joel know, too? The irony of it all. I was one of them: a graduate eight years ago of St. Margaret's Academy, an all girls' high school run by the Sisters of Notre Dame. In my four years there, I had had negligible experience with boys-just a handful of dances in the gym at the neighboring Catholic boys' school. I never had a boyfriend. I was never even confident enough in myself to flirt, for I never found the girl looking back at me in the mirror to be anything but plain. In college, no one had even asked me out until my junior year when Robbie did. I was so flummoxed, so flattered, so sure it must be a charity act that I spent the next two years at Macalester in perpetual gratitude, satisfying his every need. And right after graduation, with a BFA in painting, Miss flat chested and shy, but virgin no more Mary Johnson married Mister handsome, self-assured, going places Robbie Dwyer. “I'd rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints…” he sang, glancing over at me, suggestively. Did he do it, too? Did he have sex with Robyn in the hot tub after Bart and I got out? It was entirely possible. In the four years since we were married, he had confessed to at least a half dozen women who turned him on. The Swedish lab tech at work with the impossibly long lashes. The buxom Australian hostess at the Sunshine Factory, our friday night watering hole. The neighbor from Kenya with the wide hips and muscular buttocks bulging out her short shorts as she dragged the sprinkler across the lawn. The Vietnamese manicurist, where I got my nails done, with the alluring-demurring smile on her face. My God, he had a fantasy girl from almost every continent. At least he was ecumenical. But had he ever acted on any of these urges…other than acting them out in our bedroom? For whatever reason, his fantasies turned me on. They were so absurd, and far from making me suspicious, when he brought them up in bed at night, I wanted to play along. I became the big-bosomed Aussie who smothered him with her tits, or the wide assed African who yanked on his hose. We would start assuming these roles in all seriousness, but soon be laughing so hard that Robbie would get massive, I would become sopping wet, and we'd fuck fast and furious until we came in great gasps. Then we would kiss and hug, saying all those wonderful words of love to each other, before falling asleep entwined. You know, it's amazing when you find yourself. All my scholarly life I had struggled with reading, writing essays, taking multiple-choice tests. But one thing I loved to do-and was good at-was rendering landscapes in pastel: layering wheat fields with raw sienna, coating barns and silos in brilliant cad red and alizarin crimson, foliating giant cottonwoods with varying shades of sap green, and stretching cobalt shadows across lawns and patios, bending them up walls of grand white farmhouses. I guess, in retrospect, it was how I sublimated my sexuality as a teenager. Years later, post art school-and after having given up on Catholicism-I discovered the co-existence of the creative impulse and drive for sexual gratification. It was then that my artistic successes began. People seemed to respond passionately to my new work. Collectors bought four, five, or six of my pieces. Each new series-the Dakotas, the Mississippi-won me acclaim at venues in Minneapolis, Santa Fe, Denver, and Chicago. I almost couldn't make enough for all the enthusiastic gallery owners. The result was gaining a measure of confidence, not only in art, but in love, which I had formerly never known, and which seemed so natural for others, like Robbie, Bart, and Robyn. Oh my God, I forgot about Robyn, the red-haired nurse-midwife whose house we were just leaving. Robbie fantasized the most about that little spitfire-at least, she's the one who seemed to augment his cock the greatest. I remember his last “Robyn dream,” a mere week ago: he and she were wrestling at the pond's edge after they emerged from a skinny dip on a sultry afternoon. They had started slinging playful insults at one another, until one literally slung a handful of mud, at which point the real fun began. Soon they were coated with a burnt sienna glaze and needing to go back into the water to wash each other off. It made sense, that fanciful notion of his. Water was their thing. Robyn got covered in amniotic fluid when her patient's “water” broke, and Robbie worked as a field biologist with lake flora and fauna. Two science types, always with liquid things to talk about. We had left them in their element, soaking in the hot tub, when Bart and I got out to look at one of his new pastel paintings-our element. Robbie drummed on the steering wheel. “You know that only the good die young…Tell you baby…Only the good die young…” I was feeling really clammy now. What if he and Robyn did fuck in the hot tub? Would that be better-for me? After all, if he did it, why couldn't I? Or… did it spell the end of our marriage? Were we going to become one of those pairs of swinging couples whose relationship divided along fault lines? Little things that once seemed endearing qualities-my need to have everything in its place at home-would become an annoyance to him and an excuse for fleeing to Robyn. Or his insistence in correcting my retelling of a mutual experience-that I formerly had allowed with amusement-would become the hurt driving me to Bart and the consolation of his touch. Jesus, what have I done? What have we done? We? Maybe we didn't do anything. Maybe only I did? And Robbie's trust in me will be shattered forever. I reached over to touch his head, to pull my fingers through his dark, dark umber hair, with waves as luscious as my grassy prairies at sunset. He looked over and smiled, his gaze penetrating my eyes briefly before it returned to the road. “I love when you do that, Georgia,” he teased, using the name of the artist, Georgia O'Keeffe, whom I had been the most influenced by in college. He hadn't fucked Robyn after all. Great. Now I'm the fucker. “I love doing that,” I replied. “You know how much I crave your textures!” Did I sound like the same me? Could he tell anything from the dampness of my fingers? “We'll be home in ten minutes,” he proclaimed. "Can't wait to be in bed with you.“ Suddenly feeling queasy, I replied, “Are you wide awake? I'm so tired, I think I'm going to close my eyes for a bit.” “I'm fine. Another good song!" And he was off, singing in perfect pitch, "But you gotta keep your head up, oh-oh, and you can let your hair down, eh-eh…” Maybe he's too exuberant? I bet he did do it? Do it. Do it. Did I really do it? Did we? Bart and I? Do it? Oh, Father Duffy, it's times like these when I miss those confession sessions… …Bart and I had dried off in front of his fireplace. The bromine from the hot tub was so strong we had taken turns rinsing off in the shower. With towels wrapped around us, we ascended the stairs to his studio and his magnificent nudes. If I relished the feel of textures through my fingers, my eyes delighted in the virtual touch of the skin tones in his paintings: strokes of raw sienna melding into caput mortuum, Indian red into purple violet and Thalo blue. His pastels had been blended with infinite patience, layer upon layer of pigment to create arm, chest, torso, groin, giving the effect of a radiance emanating from within. For someone not in possession of the endowment, he painted the most sensuous breasts-with thick areolas and erect nipples-seemingly emerging from the paper, begging to be sucked. I touched his arm to point out, on a nearby easel, the pair of lovers he was finishing, a man standing behind a woman, their hands holding five passion fruits against her chest. Excitedly, I inquired as to how he got her skin to glow with such warmth of golden ochre and crimson. He nestled my elbow in his palm as he eased me toward the painting and explained his artistic process. It was fun having another artist to talk with, to puzzle out problems of color and value, to compare favorite painters and art philosophies. In college, I had been so head over heals involved with Robbie, that I did my course work, rushed back to the dorm to be with him, and didn't give myself the time to make friends, let alone hang out with established teacher-artists in the art department. My BFA degree had landed me a graphic arts job with Minnesota Life, a glossy recreation magazine, and I spent over a year doing computer artwork, but again, no real artist contacts-and no art opportunities. When my school loans were nearly repaid, and Robbie was making enough for both of us to live on, I went back to painting with pastels. Within two years, I was showing in the Twin Cities; then, six months later, in three other major metropolitan areas. That experience brought me into contact with other artisans, most of them women, all of us doing different subjects. We exhibited together on occasion, got together for group-show receptions, but I never really developed an artistic kinship with any painter-until I met Bart. He leaned into me as we conversed, and I maintained our inertia by pressing back. He took my left hand in his, and slipped his right arm around my back, supporting me as we talked about his lovers' faces; the aura of contemplation; the mysteries of connection, communion, and commitment. I told him how much I liked the piece, and he hugged me with appreciation. And that's when we should have stopped. I could have inquired about the adjacent painting, the woman with the large guava facing the viewer and the man turning away with his smaller one. But I didn't. His hug felt so good. As did the wine, our soak in the hot tub, my newly-found confidence. We rotated toward each other. He brought his lips to mine, and, rather than turn to accept his kiss on my cheek, I met him full on with my own. As our embrace progressed, intoxicatingly, I encircled his lanky waist and felt our towels drop away. With his manliness expanding against my belly and his hand raising tingles up my spine, I devoured his lower lip, squeaking a little in excitement when I felt his tongue enter my mouth. With both hands he lifted up my tiny breasts, his fingers running over my nipples, as ripe as his painted ones, then pulled each with gentle traction, making them ache all the more. I moved off his mouth, and began kissing his chest, lightly brushing the russet hairs with my lips in an ever-expanding oval. Initially passing over his nipples, I returned to suck each to hardness and heard him groan as I bit down on them tenderly. His finger pads moved down my spine to buttocks, backs of thigh, up to hipbones, and, twisting his hands around, his finger nails grazed across to my pussy tuft and up my abdomen to my back again, in a repeating hypnotic loop of arousal. When my tongue repaid his kindness, creating a saliva trail down his midline, my cheek butted into his erection. I turned deftly toward the large head, now deeply violet and glowing as hot as his figures' skin tones. Clumsily, we maneuvered our entangled selves to his model stand, and found our way to sitting upon the shag carpet remnant atop the platform, my mouth locked around him, my juices oozing into the rug. His hand found my slot, and as I drew my teeth up and over his rim, I felt his fingers close around my clit, pinching it rhythmically to our breathing. My shrieks of pleasure were stifled by taking more of his cock deeper in my throat, and, as I rocked onto his hand, he began thrusting into my mouth. “I'm gonna come,” he whispered, urgently. Having climaxed once already, and about to scream again, I was fully prepared to grant him his pleasure. Within seconds a hot bolus shot into my mouth, and this time I gurgled with delight as his flood of warmth quieted my cries. One hand circled my head, his fingers pushing through my perspiring hair. The other, perfumed by my cunt-flower, was rubbed against cheek, neck, and shoulder, all the while he praised my beauty in muffled tones. I regained my resting breathing tempo, but all I could mumble was, “Wonderful, wonderful,” as his cock slowly deflated in my mouth. “You guys up there?” Robbie had hollered from the bottom of the stairs. “Just gazing at some nudes,” Bart had called back, so nonchalantly, I thought that perhaps I had been dreaming all the while. But of course I wasn't. Bart and I had hurriedly wrapped our towels around us. He went ahead of me down the stairs, as I ducked into their bathroom to do a bidet-cleansing of my mouth, then joined everyone below to get dressed and prepare for our departure. “We're home,” announced Robbie. “Let's get right to bed. I love it when you're brominated.” I awoke from one nightmare to go back into what I feared was another. What Robbie pronounced was true. Being brominated meant that by soaking in the hot tub, I was disinfected everywhere, and his tongue could explore my private place with relatively impunity. Any other time, his suggestion would have made me forgo my nightly mouth care, but this evening, I delayed our entry into bed by flossing and brushing-with lots of toothpaste. That would cover up any telltale tastes, but I didn't know if the delay would allow my brain to become re-engaged in love making. Robbie and I have been very honest with each other. Well, I felt I have been completely honest, and I trusted full revelations would have been forthcoming from him. So as we pulled the sheets over our nakednesses, I wondered if I should bare all? “Do I tell him,” I asked myself? Did I want him to tell me-if there was anything to tell? What I knew more than anything was that I needed to have Robbie inside me right now. I had made a terrible mistake, but I needed to be loved by him for who I was-his imperfect wife. The one he comes home to. The one he treasures. The one to him, for all her faults, is the most important woman in the whole world. That's the way I felt about him, after all. My decision was made by default. He began to kiss me on my mouth, his hands roaming over my breasts, his warmth surrounding me, making me forget all about the tryst of two hours prior. I felt wholly consumed by this man, desired in a way I hadn't felt before. He was possessed it seemed, and he ravaged me with his mouth, his tongue, his teeth, gnawing on my neck muscles, biting my nipples, tonguing deeply into my belly button as his fingers poked into my buttocks, scraped down my outer thighs and stroked back up the fronts. His rigidity pressed against me, but I wasn't about to let this end too quickly. I kissed him back. Roughly. Biting his lip, his chin, then along jaw bone to ear lobe. He writhed with the discomfort, but moaned in pleasure, calling out, “Mary Johnson, I love you, love you.” In a trice he was upon me, kissing me with abandon. I carved my nails down his backside, and his tempo accelerated. “Fuck me, Robbie! Fuck me hard!!” I urged. As I gripped his flanks, he pounded me, rocking our bed, the headboard cracking like a sledgehammer against the wall. In a voice an octave higher, I began to whine, inhaling sharply to fill my chest, about to explode into an earsplitting orgasm, when Robbie stopped. Pulled out. Rolled me over. “What the…?” “I need you completely tonight, M.J. All of you.” And he separated my ass cheeks and began nibbling that tender flesh around my anus, which drove me into the pre-ecstasy shudders. I knew what was coming next: his tongue would dive deeply into me, and I would light up our room with carmine, magenta, and cerulean lightning bolts, before flooding the bedsheets with a cloudburst from my womb. And he did. And so did I. I screamed and screamed. When I was sated and the bed soaked, he turned me over and had his way with me, and I came for a fifth or sixth time-but who's counting when your man is shouting into your ear and filling your vaginal cup with the most exquisite of liqueurs. As we lay aside each other in the warm puddle of us, both sweating from the physical effort, he professed just how much he cared for me. I knew exactly what he meant: I couldn't imagine loving another being more. Well, yes I could. With his hand moving over my hair, and warm exhalations against my cheek, he offered, “M.J., I got something to tell you.” Sighing in relief, I answered, “And I got something to tell you, too.” Which leads me to say; Bless me father; for I have sinned. By MarthaMcKinley for Literotica

Lapsed catholic woman finds need to confess. By MarthaMcKinley - Listen to the Podcast at Steamy Stories. I'm driving back to see my priest, from the college parish.  Yeah, this catholic girl needs deliverance from some major guilt. No, let's see; how many years has it been? It hit me yesterday, as Robbie & I were driving home. Oh, Gawd! Oh Gawd!Why shouldn't I worry? This probably changes things. No. It definitely changes things! Every thing. I had sex with Bart, a married man. Get it, you rash brain. I'm a married woman who just had sex with another woman's husband. And not simply another woman, but one of my friends. What was I thinking? Obviously, I wasn't. There we were. Robbie was driving. I glanced over at Robbie, driving us home, tapping on the steering wheel and belting out the words to Billie Joel's Only the Good Die Young coming over the radio. “You Catholic girls start much too late.” Did Billy Joel know, too? The irony of it all. I was one of them: a graduate eight years ago of St. Margaret's Academy, an all girls' high school run by the Sisters of Notre Dame. In my four years there, I had had negligible experience with boys-just a handful of dances in the gym at the neighboring Catholic boys' school. I never had a boyfriend. I was never even confident enough in myself to flirt, for I never found the girl looking back at me in the mirror to be anything but plain. In college, no one had even asked me out until my junior year when Robbie did. I was so flummoxed, so flattered, so sure it must be a charity act that I spent the next two years at Macalester in perpetual gratitude, satisfying his every need. And right after graduation, with a BFA in painting, Miss flat chested and shy, but virgin no more Mary Johnson married Mister handsome, self-assured, going places Robbie Dwyer. “I'd rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints…” he sang, glancing over at me, suggestively. Did he do it, too? Did he have sex with Robyn in the hot tub after Bart and I got out? It was entirely possible. In the four years since we were married, he had confessed to at least a half dozen women who turned him on. The Swedish lab tech at work with the impossibly long lashes. The buxom Australian hostess at the Sunshine Factory, our friday night watering hole. The neighbor from Kenya with the wide hips and muscular buttocks bulging out her short shorts as she dragged the sprinkler across the lawn. The Vietnamese manicurist, where I got my nails done, with the alluring-demurring smile on her face. My God, he had a fantasy girl from almost every continent. At least he was ecumenical. But had he ever acted on any of these urges…other than acting them out in our bedroom? For whatever reason, his fantasies turned me on. They were so absurd, and far from making me suspicious, when he brought them up in bed at night, I wanted to play along. I became the big-bosomed Aussie who smothered him with her tits, or the wide assed African who yanked on his hose. We would start assuming these roles in all seriousness, but soon be laughing so hard that Robbie would get massive, I would become sopping wet, and we'd fuck fast and furious until we came in great gasps. Then we would kiss and hug, saying all those wonderful words of love to each other, before falling asleep entwined. You know, it's amazing when you find yourself. All my scholarly life I had struggled with reading, writing essays, taking multiple-choice tests. But one thing I loved to do-and was good at-was rendering landscapes in pastel: layering wheat fields with raw sienna, coating barns and silos in brilliant cad red and alizarin crimson, foliating giant cottonwoods with varying shades of sap green, and stretching cobalt shadows across lawns and patios, bending them up walls of grand white farmhouses. I guess, in retrospect, it was how I sublimated my sexuality as a teenager. Years later, post art school-and after having given up on Catholicism-I discovered the co-existence of the creative impulse and drive for sexual gratification. It was then that my artistic successes began. People seemed to respond passionately to my new work. Collectors bought four, five, or six of my pieces. Each new series-the Dakotas, the Mississippi-won me acclaim at venues in Minneapolis, Santa Fe, Denver, and Chicago. I almost couldn't make enough for all the enthusiastic gallery owners. The result was gaining a measure of confidence, not only in art, but in love, which I had formerly never known, and which seemed so natural for others, like Robbie, Bart, and Robyn. Oh my God, I forgot about Robyn, the red-haired nurse-midwife whose house we were just leaving. Robbie fantasized the most about that little spitfire-at least, she's the one who seemed to augment his cock the greatest. I remember his last “Robyn dream,” a mere week ago: he and she were wrestling at the pond's edge after they emerged from a skinny dip on a sultry afternoon. They had started slinging playful insults at one another, until one literally slung a handful of mud, at which point the real fun began. Soon they were coated with a burnt sienna glaze and needing to go back into the water to wash each other off. It made sense, that fanciful notion of his. Water was their thing. Robyn got covered in amniotic fluid when her patient's “water” broke, and Robbie worked as a field biologist with lake flora and fauna. Two science types, always with liquid things to talk about. We had left them in their element, soaking in the hot tub, when Bart and I got out to look at one of his new pastel paintings-our element. Robbie drummed on the steering wheel. “You know that only the good die young…Tell you baby…Only the good die young…” I was feeling really clammy now. What if he and Robyn did fuck in the hot tub? Would that be better-for me? After all, if he did it, why couldn't I? Or… did it spell the end of our marriage? Were we going to become one of those pairs of swinging couples whose relationship divided along fault lines? Little things that once seemed endearing qualities-my need to have everything in its place at home-would become an annoyance to him and an excuse for fleeing to Robyn. Or his insistence in correcting my retelling of a mutual experience-that I formerly had allowed with amusement-would become the hurt driving me to Bart and the consolation of his touch. Jesus, what have I done? What have we done? We? Maybe we didn't do anything. Maybe only I did? And Robbie's trust in me will be shattered forever. I reached over to touch his head, to pull my fingers through his dark, dark umber hair, with waves as luscious as my grassy prairies at sunset. He looked over and smiled, his gaze penetrating my eyes briefly before it returned to the road. “I love when you do that, Georgia,” he teased, using the name of the artist, Georgia O'Keeffe, whom I had been the most influenced by in college. He hadn't fucked Robyn after all. Great. Now I'm the fucker. “I love doing that,” I replied. “You know how much I crave your textures!” Did I sound like the same me? Could he tell anything from the dampness of my fingers? “We'll be home in ten minutes,” he proclaimed. "Can't wait to be in bed with you.“ Suddenly feeling queasy, I replied, “Are you wide awake? I'm so tired, I think I'm going to close my eyes for a bit.” “I'm fine. Another good song!" And he was off, singing in perfect pitch, "But you gotta keep your head up, oh-oh, and you can let your hair down, eh-eh…” Maybe he's too exuberant? I bet he did do it? Do it. Do it. Did I really do it? Did we? Bart and I? Do it? Oh, Father Duffy, it's times like these when I miss those confession sessions… …Bart and I had dried off in front of his fireplace. The bromine from the hot tub was so strong we had taken turns rinsing off in the shower. With towels wrapped around us, we ascended the stairs to his studio and his magnificent nudes. If I relished the feel of textures through my fingers, my eyes delighted in the virtual touch of the skin tones in his paintings: strokes of raw sienna melding into caput mortuum, Indian red into purple violet and Thalo blue. His pastels had been blended with infinite patience, layer upon layer of pigment to create arm, chest, torso, groin, giving the effect of a radiance emanating from within. For someone not in possession of the endowment, he painted the most sensuous breasts-with thick areolas and erect nipples-seemingly emerging from the paper, begging to be sucked. I touched his arm to point out, on a nearby easel, the pair of lovers he was finishing, a man standing behind a woman, their hands holding five passion fruits against her chest. Excitedly, I inquired as to how he got her skin to glow with such warmth of golden ochre and crimson. He nestled my elbow in his palm as he eased me toward the painting and explained his artistic process. It was fun having another artist to talk with, to puzzle out problems of color and value, to compare favorite painters and art philosophies. In college, I had been so head over heals involved with Robbie, that I did my course work, rushed back to the dorm to be with him, and didn't give myself the time to make friends, let alone hang out with established teacher-artists in the art department. My BFA degree had landed me a graphic arts job with Minnesota Life, a glossy recreation magazine, and I spent over a year doing computer artwork, but again, no real artist contacts-and no art opportunities. When my school loans were nearly repaid, and Robbie was making enough for both of us to live on, I went back to painting with pastels. Within two years, I was showing in the Twin Cities; then, six months later, in three other major metropolitan areas. That experience brought me into contact with other artisans, most of them women, all of us doing different subjects. We exhibited together on occasion, got together for group-show receptions, but I never really developed an artistic kinship with any painter-until I met Bart. He leaned into me as we conversed, and I maintained our inertia by pressing back. He took my left hand in his, and slipped his right arm around my back, supporting me as we talked about his lovers' faces; the aura of contemplation; the mysteries of connection, communion, and commitment. I told him how much I liked the piece, and he hugged me with appreciation. And that's when we should have stopped. I could have inquired about the adjacent painting, the woman with the large guava facing the viewer and the man turning away with his smaller one. But I didn't. His hug felt so good. As did the wine, our soak in the hot tub, my newly-found confidence. We rotated toward each other. He brought his lips to mine, and, rather than turn to accept his kiss on my cheek, I met him full on with my own. As our embrace progressed, intoxicatingly, I encircled his lanky waist and felt our towels drop away. With his manliness expanding against my belly and his hand raising tingles up my spine, I devoured his lower lip, squeaking a little in excitement when I felt his tongue enter my mouth. With both hands he lifted up my tiny breasts, his fingers running over my nipples, as ripe as his painted ones, then pulled each with gentle traction, making them ache all the more. I moved off his mouth, and began kissing his chest, lightly brushing the russet hairs with my lips in an ever-expanding oval. Initially passing over his nipples, I returned to suck each to hardness and heard him groan as I bit down on them tenderly. His finger pads moved down my spine to buttocks, backs of thigh, up to hipbones, and, twisting his hands around, his finger nails grazed across to my pussy tuft and up my abdomen to my back again, in a repeating hypnotic loop of arousal. When my tongue repaid his kindness, creating a saliva trail down his midline, my cheek butted into his erection. I turned deftly toward the large head, now deeply violet and glowing as hot as his figures' skin tones. Clumsily, we maneuvered our entangled selves to his model stand, and found our way to sitting upon the shag carpet remnant atop the platform, my mouth locked around him, my juices oozing into the rug. His hand found my slot, and as I drew my teeth up and over his rim, I felt his fingers close around my clit, pinching it rhythmically to our breathing. My shrieks of pleasure were stifled by taking more of his cock deeper in my throat, and, as I rocked onto his hand, he began thrusting into my mouth. “I'm gonna come,” he whispered, urgently. Having climaxed once already, and about to scream again, I was fully prepared to grant him his pleasure. Within seconds a hot bolus shot into my mouth, and this time I gurgled with delight as his flood of warmth quieted my cries. One hand circled my head, his fingers pushing through my perspiring hair. The other, perfumed by my cunt-flower, was rubbed against cheek, neck, and shoulder, all the while he praised my beauty in muffled tones. I regained my resting breathing tempo, but all I could mumble was, “Wonderful, wonderful,” as his cock slowly deflated in my mouth. “You guys up there?” Robbie had hollered from the bottom of the stairs. “Just gazing at some nudes,” Bart had called back, so nonchalantly, I thought that perhaps I had been dreaming all the while. But of course I wasn't. Bart and I had hurriedly wrapped our towels around us. He went ahead of me down the stairs, as I ducked into their bathroom to do a bidet-cleansing of my mouth, then joined everyone below to get dressed and prepare for our departure. “We're home,” announced Robbie. “Let's get right to bed. I love it when you're brominated.” I awoke from one nightmare to go back into what I feared was another. What Robbie pronounced was true. Being brominated meant that by soaking in the hot tub, I was disinfected everywhere, and his tongue could explore my private place with relatively impunity. Any other time, his suggestion would have made me forgo my nightly mouth care, but this evening, I delayed our entry into bed by flossing and brushing-with lots of toothpaste. That would cover up any telltale tastes, but I didn't know if the delay would allow my brain to become re-engaged in love making. Robbie and I have been very honest with each other. Well, I felt I have been completely honest, and I trusted full revelations would have been forthcoming from him. So as we pulled the sheets over our nakednesses, I wondered if I should bare all? “Do I tell him,” I asked myself? Did I want him to tell me-if there was anything to tell? What I knew more than anything was that I needed to have Robbie inside me right now. I had made a terrible mistake, but I needed to be loved by him for who I was-his imperfect wife. The one he comes home to. The one he treasures. The one to him, for all her faults, is the most important woman in the whole world. That's the way I felt about him, after all. My decision was made by default. He began to kiss me on my mouth, his hands roaming over my breasts, his warmth surrounding me, making me forget all about the tryst of two hours prior. I felt wholly consumed by this man, desired in a way I hadn't felt before. He was possessed it seemed, and he ravaged me with his mouth, his tongue, his teeth, gnawing on my neck muscles, biting my nipples, tonguing deeply into my belly button as his fingers poked into my buttocks, scraped down my outer thighs and stroked back up the fronts. His rigidity pressed against me, but I wasn't about to let this end too quickly. I kissed him back. Roughly. Biting his lip, his chin, then along jaw bone to ear lobe. He writhed with the discomfort, but moaned in pleasure, calling out, “Mary Johnson, I love you, love you.” In a trice he was upon me, kissing me with abandon. I carved my nails down his backside, and his tempo accelerated. “Fuck me, Robbie! Fuck me hard!!” I urged. As I gripped his flanks, he pounded me, rocking our bed, the headboard cracking like a sledgehammer against the wall. In a voice an octave higher, I began to whine, inhaling sharply to fill my chest, about to explode into an earsplitting orgasm, when Robbie stopped. Pulled out. Rolled me over. “What the…?” “I need you completely tonight, M.J. All of you.” And he separated my ass cheeks and began nibbling that tender flesh around my anus, which drove me into the pre-ecstasy shudders. I knew what was coming next: his tongue would dive deeply into me, and I would light up our room with carmine, magenta, and cerulean lightning bolts, before flooding the bedsheets with a cloudburst from my womb. And he did. And so did I. I screamed and screamed. When I was sated and the bed soaked, he turned me over and had his way with me, and I came for a fifth or sixth time-but who's counting when your man is shouting into your ear and filling your vaginal cup with the most exquisite of liqueurs. As we lay aside each other in the warm puddle of us, both sweating from the physical effort, he professed just how much he cared for me. I knew exactly what he meant: I couldn't imagine loving another being more. Well, yes I could. With his hand moving over my hair, and warm exhalations against my cheek, he offered, “M.J., I got something to tell you.” Sighing in relief, I answered, “And I got something to tell you, too.” Which leads me to say; Bless me father; for I have sinned. By MarthaMcKinley for Literotica

E360 – "Inner Voice: A Heartfelt Chat with Dr. Foojan Zeine." In this episode, Dr. Foojan Zeine chats with MIA NOSANOW, MA, LP, a licensed psychologist and longtime therapist specializing in college mental health. For twenty years, Mia worked at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota, seeing thousands of students for individual and group counseling since Macalester is one of the most culturally diverse undergraduate colleges in the United States, with students from every state and ninety-nine countries, including many first-generation college students. Mia created The College Student's Guide to Mental Health to address this growing need, a complete resource for students, the professionals who work with them, and parents and loved ones. Drawing on her more than twenty years of experience counseling a diverse set of college students, she has written the first comprehensive mental and emotional health manual designed specifically for those in college. More information at MiaNosanow.com 20 Best California Mental Health Podcasts https://podcasts.feedspot.com/california_mental_health_podcasts/ Check out my website: www.FoojanZeine.com, www.AwarenessIntegration.com, www.Foojan.com Summary: Dr. and Mia discussed the importance of mental health and wellbeing for college students. They also discussed the connection between physical and mental health, with Mia stressing the importance of essential self-care for mental wellbeing. Both shared their experiences as college students, highlighting the need to prioritize self-care and balance academic and social activities. They discussed the impact of technology and social media on young people's health and learning. Mia expressed concern about the constant input and lack of balance in young people's lives, leading to potential health issues. Dr. noted how social media can interrupt the learning process and lead to anxiety and substance abuse. Mia shared her insights from her book, emphasizing the importance of self-awareness, understanding one's values, and making informed choices based on accurate research. She also highlighted the significance of managing time, maintaining a healthy lifestyle, and seeking help. Dr. agreed with Mia's approach and stressed the need for students to be aware of common issues, understand their struggles, and develop strategies to overcome them. Both underscored the importance of individuality and tailoring approaches to one's unique needs and circumstances. Dr. and Mia discussed the importance and benefits of counseling for college students. Mia highlighted the challenges students face in adulthood and the pressures of college life, emphasizing the need for a safe, non-judgmental space for support. They discussed the importance of mental health and wellness, focusing on various aspects such as sleep, nutrition, movement, and substance use. Mia shared her strategies for improving sleep, emphasizing the significance of creating a conducive sleep environment and managing disturbances. They also discussed the negative impact of social media on one's ability to relax and focus and the importance of socializing and having fun for mental health. Lastly, they highlighted the significance of sleep for academic performance, with Mia sharing her research that suggests getting at least seven hours of sleep before exams improves test results. Dr. and Mia discussed the prevalence of drug and alcohol use among young people and its impact on mental health. They highlighted the need for self-awareness and understanding of the effects of different substances on one's wellbeing. Mia emphasized the importance of reflecting on personal values and experiences with substances, as well as the role of family dynamics in shaping one's relationship with drugs and alcohol. Dr. pointed out the high levels of depression, anxiety, and suicide attempts among young people, underscoring the need for effective coping strategies and emotional regulation. Mia's book, which includes sections on identity, emotions, and coping skills, was presented as a resource to help young people navigate these challenges. Mia and Dr. discussed the importance of acknowledging and managing one's emotions, emphasizing that it's crucial for personal growth and achieving goals. They highlighted the shift in societal attitudes towards emotions, from suppression to valuing them as essential signals. They also discussed the need for self-reflection, mental health, and developing these skills as a lifelong process. Lastly, they introduced their book, "The College Student's Guide to Mental Health: Essential Wellness Strategies for Flourishing in College," and agreed on the necessity of a culture change to value mental health and learning.

Former Macalester star and 2023-24 1st Team MIAC player, Caleb Williams joins "Not Even D2" on this week's episode. After a senior season averaging 20.0 points per game, Caleb is taking his talents to the Division 1 level. Williams had a historic performance in an exhibition game against Minnesota (D1) scoring 41 points. Shortly after his season ended, Caleb heard from plenty of high major Division 1 schools, and ultimately decided to commit to Minnesota. Hear more about Caleb's career at Macalester, the popularity after his 41 point performance, and what Caleb's goals are heading into his final season of college basketball playing in a Power 5 conference. This episode is available wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe to the podcasts YouTube channel for more Division 3 content. Enjoy the episode! Intro- 00:00-04:20 Off-season Focus: 04:20-05:02 NBA Finals Predictions: 05:02-06:13 Recruitment Process/Choosing Macalester- 06:13-08:25 Basketball in Wisconsin- 08:25-09:40 Expectations for Senior Season- 09:40-10:47 Developing a Scoring Bag- 10:47-12:17 Dealing with Challenges at Macalester- 12:17-13:29 41p Performance @ Minnesota- 13:29-16:29 Going Viral after Minnesota Game- 16:30-18:05 Impact Minnesota Game had on Macalester- 18:05-19:32 51p Performance Against Concordia- 19:32-21:00 Break- 21:00-21:07 Committing to Minnesota- 21:07-23:33 Potential Role at Minnesota- 23:33-24:32 Mindset Ahead of Playing in the Big 10- 24:32-25:56 Advice from Former MIAC Players- 25:56-26:49 Perspective on Division 3 Basketball- 26:49-28:32 Opinion on the MIAC: 28:32-30:03 Excelling as a Student: 30:03-31:49 Changing from the D3 to D1 Lifestyle: 31:49-33:32 Rapid Fire: 33:32-35:35 Starting 5: Players Played With or Against- 35:35-37:31 Outro- 37:31-38:14

On today's Locked On Golden Gophers, host Kane Rob, former collegiate football video coordinator and recruiting assistant, discusses how the Minnesota Gophers could be after Macalester hoops star Caleb Williams who gave them 41 points in an exhibition. We then discuss why Minnesota should absolutely add Texas Tech to the Non-conference schedule for Men's basketball. Finally we discus another Gophers WR hitting the portal!Follow Us on Twitter:  Kane Rob - @GophersKaneRobLocked On Golden Gophers - @LOGoldenGophers  Email: LockedonGoldenGophers@gmail.comSupport Us By Supporting Our Sponsors! Monopoly GO!Get in the game and join your friends. Click HERE to Download MONOPOLY GO! now free on The App Store or Google Play.LinkedInThese days every new potential hire can feel like a high stakes wager for your small business. That's why LinkedIn Jobs helps find the right people for your team, faster and for free. Post your job for free at LinkedIn.com/lockedoncollege. Terms and conditions apply.GametimeDownload the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDONCOLLEGE for $20 off your first purchase.FanDuelFanDuel, America's Number One Sportsbook. Right now, NEW customers get ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY DOLLARS in BONUS BETS with any winning GUARANTEED That's A HUNDRED AND FIFTY BUCKS – win or lose! Visit FanDuel.com/LOCKEDON to get started. eBay MotorsFrom brakes to exhaust kits and beyond, eBay Motors has over 122 million parts to keep your ride-or-die alive. With all the parts you need at the prices you want, it's easy to bring home that big win. Keep your ride-or-die alive at EbayMotors.com. Eligible items only. Exclusions apply. eBay Guaranteed Fit only available to US customers.FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN)

The Macalester Swim and Dive teams have started to make a run to the top of the MIAC and a large part of the is due to Coach Kyllian Griffin. Here what attracted him to the Macalester program, what his vision is for the program and how they keep getting better and faster while maintaining that high academic standard and having fun.

Matt sits down with Krystle (Kallman) Seidel to talk about her playing career at West Virginia and Minnesota, coaching her hometown Gophers and at Macalester, and her new role on staff at Wright State in the Horizon League. Show presented by Pentz Homes and Modist Brewing!

When a global event shakes our world, who has the responsibility to speak up or respond?Since the murder of George Floyd, companies, organizations and schools have spoken out, or been pressured by the public to do so. With the war in Gaza, there is renewed pressure and scrutiny, specifically in higher education. The presidents of Harvard University and University of Pennsylvania resigned after speaking out about free speech on campus and the war. In a recent article in Inside Higher Ed, Macalester College President Suzanne Rivera said it's time that expectations for university leaders change. Rivera joined MPR News host Cathy Wurzer to talk about why making statements on world events shouldn't be in the job description.

Laura Kaub, director of the Duolingo partnership with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees program, talks about keeping refugees and African students out of the "hole" in holistic admission so they can get into the economic, educational and political systems that can bring about change. She provides examples of U.S colleges that "get it right," including Macalester and Northwestern, as well as models around the globe, like Rwanda and Uganda.Contact Laura directly if you're interested in talking with her about the students she serves.ReferencesPresident's Alliance on Higher Education and ImmigrationMasterCard FoundationWorld University Services of CanadaDuolingo English TestRapid DescentWalkout song: Ghostwriter RJD2Best recent read: The Expanse Series by James S.A. CoreyEager to read next: Old World, Young Africa, a New York Times series Favorite thing to make in the kitchen:  Sparkling conversationTaking and keeping notes: 2/3 paper and pen (no ball points, please!); 1/3 open email to herselfMemorable bit of advice: A whole lot of what's going on [in the college search] is not as big a deal as it seems.Bucket list: Ever since watching Ugly Delicious, I've wanted to do a food tour of Japan and South Korea with David Chang.The ALP is supported by RHB. Music arranged by Ryan Anselment

 Roopali Phadke joined Vineeta live, from Dubai on The WCCO Morning News. 

Hour 2 of Drivetime with DeRusha, hosted by Henry Lake features a talk about Florida State and some arguments being made around the College Football Playoff. Later on Macalester Basketball Coach Abe Woldelassie and standout guard Caleb Williams join Henry in studio to talk about their team.

Henry Lake talks with Macalester Professor Duchess Harris about book banning being on the ballot in Minnesota Tuesday, what Critical Race Theory really is, the misperceptions of "Black Lives Matter", how traditional law is viewed, and more.

In this week's episode of Taylor Made with Hamline University Head Football Coach Chip Taylor, the Coach talks about the the big victory over Macalester and the challenges of facing St. Scholastica, he talks about the big plays by the defense, and the Coach talks some NFL. Plus, Coach Taylor has some great words of wisdom.  In addition, defensive back Rahim Avery joins the show to talk about why he chose to transfer to Hamline, he shares the joy of making his first collegiate interception, and Rahim tells us why he loves being a Hamline Piper. This and much more.  Enjoy!

In this week's episode of Taylor Made with Hamline University Head Football Coach Chip Taylor, the Coach talks about the struggles against Bethel and what he expects to see against Macalester, he tells us if prime time games will come back to Hamline, and the Coach shares his thoughts on former players becoming assistants. Plus, the Coach has some great words of wisdom this week. In addition, running back Nicholas Vasko joins the show to talk about why he came to Hamline, moving to a new position, and what his future career goals are. Plus, he tells us why it is great to be a Hamline Piper. Enjoy!

The opioid epidemic is a serious issue in Minnesota. Opioid deaths here have more than doubled since 2019. Some communities are more impacted than others. Black Minnesotans are more than three times as likely to die from a drug overdose than white Minnesotans.A new documentary zeroes in on opioid addiction in the East African community. It's called "The Forgotten Ones: Unveiling the Opioid Effect."You can see the film at a screening this Friday at Macalester college in St. Paul. MPR News guest host Emily Bright talked with producer Abdirahman Warsame about the inspiration behind the film.

Andrew Peterson, Director of Programming of the Provincetown International Film Festival that takes place June 14th to June 18th in Provincetown, MA talks to Emmy Winner Charlotte Robinson host of OUTTAKE VOICES™. PIFF is celebrating its 25th year with over 100 films that include diverse BIPOC and LGBTQ filmmakers as well as wildly talented first-time filmmakers along with PIFF's longstanding commitment to gender parity. The opening night film will be “Cora Bora” starring Megan Stalter and directed by Hannah Pearl Utt. Written by Rhianon Jones “Cora Bora” follows the story of Cora a messy millennial and struggling musician. When she goes home to Portland to win her girlfriend back Cora realizes there's a lot more than her love life that needs salvaging. As we announced earlier Stalter will receive the festival's Next Wave Award this year. “Theater Camp” from directors Molly Gordon and Nick Lieberman is set to close the festival. It tells the story about staff members of an upstate New York theater camp who must band together when their beloved founder falls into a coma. Also honored this year will be Bruce LaBruce with the Filmmaker on Edge Award, Billy Porter the Emmy, Tony and Grammy Award-winning actor will be honored with this year's Excellence in Acting Award and along with Megan Stalter, writer, director and actor Julio Torres will receive the Next Wave Award. There will also be lots of fabulous special events and parties. We talked to Peterson about what he hopes to accomplish at the 25th annual Provincetown International Film Festival and his spin on our LGBTQ issues.  Andrew Peterson has served as the Director of Programming for the Academy Award Qualifying Provincetown Film Festival for the last 21 years. Peterson is also the Executive Director of FilmNorth one of the largest filmmaker service organizations in the country. Previously he was Vice President of Production for Werc Werk Works where he co-produced Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman's “Howl”, Todd Solondz's “Life During Wartime”, Jill Sprecher's “Thin Ice” and Lawrence Kasdan's “Darling Companion”. Andrew holds an MFA from New York University Graduate Film School and has taught filmmaking at Macalester and Middlebury Colleges. The Provincetown Film Society, Inc. (PFS) is a non-profit year-round organization and home of the Provincetown International Film Festival. PFS is dedicated to showcasing new achievements in independent film and honoring the work of acclaimed and emerging directors, producers and actors. This is our 16th year covering PIFF for OUTTAKE MEDIA™.  For Info & Tix… LISTEN: 600+ LGBTQ Chats @OUTTAKE VOICES

Emma Torzs is a professor at Macalester and just authored the hit book of the Summer: Ink Blood Sister Scribe. She joined Jason to talk about the process.

Ahmed Aldirderi Abdalla Graduating this weekend from Macalester-parents got out of Sudan last month before the war and will be here for graduation Angelica Franaschouk. graduating from University of St Thomas-first one in family to do so.

Hello Interactors,I've been absent the last few weeks. First our kids were back for spring break and then I was off to the American Association of Geographers (AAG) national conference in Denver, Colorado. Both were fun, exhilarating, and inspiring and I'm bursting with things to write about!We're officially in spring here in the northern hemisphere. I now turn to cartography and the role mapmaking plays in shaping how we interact with people and place. There will be themes of cartography in this initial spring post, but first I'm offering my impressions of the conference.As interactors, you're special individuals self-selected to be a part of an evolutionary journey. You're also members of an attentive community so I welcome your participation.Please leave your comments below or email me directly.Now let's go…BURRITO BOYS“It's got a nice kick to it”, he said, as I sat down to join him for breakfast. He introduced himself as Mark. He lifted his attendee badge that hung around his neck. It read, Mark Schwartz. We broke the awkwardness by talking men's basketball. The Kansas Jayhawks, my mom's beloved team, had recently been eliminated from the NCAA tournament. He informed me he got his PhD from Kansas in 1985 and is now teaching and researching at the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee in the geography department.Mark is a climatologist. More specifically, he's one of the foremost experts in phenoclimatology which looks at the effects of climate change on seasonal variability. We humans look to the calendar to tell us when spring arrives, but what if you're an ant or a plant? They already know, so phenologists look for the biological responses to seasonal changes. Phenology comes from two Greek words that roughly combine to mean ‘the study of bringing to light'.Mark co-founded the National Phenology Network (NPN). This is where the world turns to see when spring is officially arriving across the United States. Including journalists. Here's a story in the Washington Post on this spring's arrival and the NPN website. It features quotes from Mark.“‘What I like to tell folks is that you still need to be prepared for considerable variation from year to year. You won't simply be able to start planting your garden earlier each year…”Before long, another gray-haired man joined us. I observed older attendees at this conference naturally congregated. Gerontology...from geron and logia (the study of old men). Our new guest introduced himself as Ron. I could tell he was older than Mark and myself and I was right. When I was three years old, in 1968, Ron Abler was getting his PhD in Geography from the University of Minnesota. Soon after, in 1971, he was the lead author on an influential geography textbook on spatial organization. He went on to teach and conduct research at Pennsylvania State University and was the President of the AAG from 1985-86. There's an AAG award named after Ron, the Ronald F. Abler Distinguished Service Honors. Mark was a recipient in 2005.We were soon joined by another older gentleman, but closer to my age. He introduced himself as Joseph and I read his badge as Joseph Oppong. He was the recipient of the Abler award in 2021 and studies medical geography at North Texas State University. He received his masters in 1986 and PhD in 1992 from the University of Alberta in Canada and his bachelor's at the University of Ghana in 1982. Joseph was one of a few at the conference of African descent, but like the rest of America the geographic, cultural, and biological diversity of this academic community is increasing. This was apparent in my first session of the first day of the conference.JUST GEOGRAPHYThe morning before my breakfast with the burrito boys, I attended a panel consisting of four young academic women of Indigenous, Hispanic, Black, and mixed heritage. It included Fantasia Painter, an Assistant Professor of Global and International Studies at UC Irvine, Elyse Hatch-Rivera, a student seeking a law degree at Macalester in Minnesota, Gabriella Subia Smith, a PhD candidate in geography at the University of Colorado, and Dr. Danielle Purifoy, a geography professor at the University of North Carolina with a law degree from Harvard.Fantasia's paper: Our Lands, Your Lines: How Inter and Intra National Borders Try and Fail to Contain Indigenous Land. She argues “that inherent in the idea of “the desert” is the undoing of the settler colonial bordering project. This is not a desert. This is O'odham land.” Elyse's paper: The Right to Secure: The 100 Mile Border and the Making of a Carceral Geography. She “explores the emergence of the 100-mile border zone (HMBZ) in order to argue that the U.S. has expanded its borders inward and redefined notions of national security and our modern understanding of human rights.”Gabriella's paper: The Evolution of Colorado's Third District. She argues “Looking at the evolution of congressional districts can help us to better understand both the possibilities for equitable political representation and the limits of borders for fixing politics in place.”Danielle's paper: Setting [Futile] Boundaries: Black Municipalities in the White Settler State. She uses two case studies showing how decades work of “scholars of law, geography, and political science have taken up the social, political, and environmental impacts of this largely white municipal practice of geopolitical exclusion on Black, Brown, and Indigenous communities.”Here's a video of Fantasia introducing herself and her work at UC IrvineThe conference theme was Toward More Just Geographies and this session was a fitting kick-off. It was titled Futile Borders: Why Borders Fail and How Borders Function in the Incomplete Project of Settler Colonialism. These scholars, all of whom have a legal focus to their work, challenged the popular and simplified notion of borders as articulated in both popular culture and the legal text of the United States. They drew attention to the violence these words perpetuate through legal acts of interdiction, deterrence, and deportation.The panel description cites research pointing to “[s]ettler state violence and legal-spatial violence” that “permeate borders through border enforcement practices of surveillance and detention and also through attempts to map over Indigenous lands and nations by creating colonial certainty over jurisdiction and national membership.”While these laws exists to protect the rights of some “it is through law, legal decision-making, and formal processes, policies, and practices that legal-spatial border violence is enacted and sustained.” It is the law, as currently written, that “help to form, manage, and control borders and mobility [that] weaponize state violence and operate to assert settler legal authority.”During the discussion, one of the presenters positioned legal text as a form of fiction that feature fantasy borders on maps that ignore the non-fiction realities of plant and animal existence, persistence, and relationships – including with humans. These fictions provide the “legal reach of the state [to] extend externally and outwards in order to preserve imperial power while regulating and restricting immigration and mobility through racialized strategies.”This panel was a powerful introduction to the conference. It featured perspectives of bright, ambitious academic women of color who are bringing miles and piles of fresh knowledge to the academy and students. Many similar sessions were offered by women and BIPOC scholars who seek to challenge traditional institutional geographic histories, knowledge, and perspectives pervasive in the field of geography. I attended at least one a day for five days straight, but there were so many I couldn't attend them all.The field of geography, and cartography in particular, was invented in large part to discern and delineate the natural world for the purpose of dispossession and ownership of land and people for and by private and government actors. As one attendee told me, “Cartography barely has a just leg to stand on.” Consequently, these forums and platforms act as a mirror to the discipline of geography. They offer opportunities for scholars and practitioners to become more self-aware, reflective, and critical of geography's past and future. If sustained, this focus, attention, and prioritization of pluralized perspectives has the power to transform the discipline – to tilt the world toward more just geographies.It's a tilting earth that brings about seasonal change. Mark Shwartz and his team of geographers maintain a map that chronicles the bringing of light to the natural world. It offers no human bias, no imperial agenda, and reveals just how fictional borders really are. Phenoclimatology reveals human-induced climate change is causing spring's arrival to become increasingly meteorologically erratic and extreme.Many scholars at this conference pointed to how settler-state induced human and environmental violence have contributed to these climatic changes. They also showed how these forms of legal, economic, and spatial geographies are causing increasingly erratic and extreme societal injustices and imbalances. They're chronicling and remapping a discipline by bringing light to the world of geography. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit interplace.io

Lapsed catholic woman finds need to confess.By MarthaMcKinley - Listen to the Podcast at Steamy Stories.I'm driving back to see my priest, from the college parish.  Yeah, this catholic girl needs deliverance from some major guilt. No, let's see; how many years has it been? It hit me yesterday, as Robbie & I were driving home. Oh, Gawd! Oh Gawd!Why shouldn't I worry? This probably changes things. No. It definitely changes things! Every thing. I had sex with Bart, a married man. Get it, you rash brain. I'm a married woman who just had sex with another woman's husband. And not simply another woman, but one of my friends. What was I thinking? Obviously, I wasn't.There we were. Robbie was driving. I glanced over at Robbie, driving us home, tapping on the steering wheel and belting out the words to Billie Joel's Only the Good Die Young coming over the radio. “You Catholic girls start much too late.” Did Billy Joel know, too?The irony of it all. I was one of them: a graduate eight years ago of St. Margaret's Academy, an all girls' high school run by the Sisters of Notre Dame. In my four years there, I had had negligible experience with boys-just a handful of dances in the gym at the neighboring Catholic boys' school. I never had a boyfriend. I was never even confident enough in myself to flirt, for I never found the girl looking back at me in the mirror to be anything but plain.In college, no one had even asked me out until my junior year when Robbie did. I was so flummoxed, so flattered, so sure it must be a charity act that I spent the next two years at Macalester in perpetual gratitude, satisfying his every need. And right after graduation, with a BFA in painting, Miss flat chested and shy, but virgin no more Mary Johnson married Mister handsome, self-assured, going places Robbie Dwyer.“I'd rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints…” he sang, glancing over at me, suggestively.Did he do it, too? Did he have sex with Robyn in the hot tub after Bart and I got out? It was entirely possible. In the four years since we were married, he had confessed to at least a half dozen women who turned him on. The Swedish lab tech at work with the impossibly long lashes. The buxom Australian hostess at the Sunshine Factory, our friday night watering hole. The neighbor from Kenya with the wide hips and muscular buttocks bulging out her short shorts as she dragged the sprinkler across the lawn. The Vietnamese manicurist, where I got my nails done, with the alluring-demurring smile on her face. My God, he had a fantasy girl from almost every continent. At least he was ecumenical.But had he ever acted on any of these urges…other than acting them out in our bedroom? For whatever reason, his fantasies turned me on. They were so absurd, and far from making me suspicious, when he brought them up in bed at night, I wanted to play along. I became the big-bosomed Aussie who smothered him with her tits, or the wide assed African who yanked on his hose. We would start assuming these roles in all seriousness, but soon be laughing so hard that Robbie would get massive, I would become sopping wet, and we'd fuck fast and furious until we came in great gasps. Then we would kiss and hug, saying all those wonderful words of love to each other, before falling asleep entwined.You know, it's amazing when you find yourself. All my scholarly life I had struggled with reading, writing essays, taking multiple-choice tests. But one thing I loved to do-and was good at-was rendering landscapes in pastel: layering wheat fields with raw sienna, coating barns and silos in brilliant cad red and alizarin crimson, foliating giant cottonwoods with varying shades of sap green, and stretching cobalt shadows across lawns and patios, bending them up walls of grand white farmhouses.I guess, in retrospect, it was how I sublimated my sexuality as a teenager. Years later, post art school-and after having given up on Catholicism-I discovered the co-existence of the creative impulse and drive for sexual gratification. It was then that my artistic successes began. People seemed to respond passionately to my new work. Collectors bought four, five, or six of my pieces. Each new series-the Dakotas, the Mississippi-won me acclaim at venues in Minneapolis, Santa Fe, Denver, and Chicago. I almost couldn't make enough for all the enthusiastic gallery owners. The result was gaining a measure of confidence, not only in art, but in love, which I had formerly never known, and which seemed so natural for others, like Robbie, Bart, and Robyn.Oh my God, I forgot about Robyn, the red-haired nurse-midwife whose house we were just leaving. Robbie fantasized the most about that little spitfire-at least, she's the one who seemed to augment his cock the greatest. I remember his last “Robyn dream,” a mere week ago: he and she were wrestling at the pond's edge after they emerged from a skinny dip on a sultry afternoon. They had started slinging playful insults at one another, until one literally slung a handful of mud, at which point the real fun began. Soon they were coated with a burnt sienna glaze and needing to go back into the water to wash each other off.It made sense, that fanciful notion of his. Water was their thing. Robyn got covered in amniotic fluid when her patient's “water” broke, and Robbie worked as a field biologist with lake flora and fauna. Two science types, always with liquid things to talk about. We had left them in their element, soaking in the hot tub, when Bart and I got out to look at one of his new pastel paintings-our element.Robbie drummed on the steering wheel. “You know that only the good die young…Tell you baby…Only the good die young…”I was feeling really clammy now. What if he and Robyn did fuck in the hot tub? Would that be better-for me? After all, if he did it, why couldn't I? Or… did it spell the end of our marriage? Were we going to become one of those pairs of swinging couples whose relationship divided along fault lines? Little things that once seemed endearing qualities-my need to have everything in its place at home-would become an annoyance to him and an excuse for fleeing to Robyn. Or his insistence in correcting my retelling of a mutual experience-that I formerly had allowed with amusement-would become the hurt driving me to Bart and the consolation of his touch.Jesus, what have I done? What have we done? We? Maybe we didn't do anything. Maybe only I did? And Robbie's trust in me will be shattered forever.I reached over to touch his head, to pull my fingers through his dark, dark umber hair, with waves as luscious as my grassy prairies at sunset. He looked over and smiled, his gaze penetrating my eyes briefly before it returned to the road. “I love when you do that, Georgia,” he teased, using the name of the artist, Georgia O'Keeffe, whom I had been the most influenced by in college.He hadn't fucked Robyn after all. Great. Now I'm the fucker.“I love doing that,” I replied. “You know how much I crave your textures!”Did I sound like the same me? Could he tell anything from the dampness of my fingers?“We'll be home in ten minutes,” he proclaimed. "Can't wait to be in bed with you.“Suddenly feeling queasy, I replied, “Are you wide awake? I'm so tired, I think I'm going to close my eyes for a bit.”“I'm fine. Another good song!“ And he was off, singing in perfect pitch, "But you gotta keep your head up, oh-oh, and you can let your hair down, eh-eh…”Maybe he's too exuberant? I bet he did do it?Do it.Do it.Did I really do it?Did we? Bart and I? Do it?Oh, Father Duffy, it's times like these when I miss those confession sessions……Bart and I had dried off in front of his fireplace. The bromine from the hot tub was so strong we had taken turns rinsing off in the shower. With towels wrapped around us, we ascended the stairs to his studio and his magnificent nudes. If I relished the feel of textures through my fingers, my eyes delighted in the virtual touch of the skin tones in his paintings: strokes of raw sienna melding into caput mortuum, Indian red into purple violet and Thalo blue. His pastels had been blended with infinite patience, layer upon layer of pigment to create arm, chest, torso, groin, giving the effect of a radiance emanating from within.For someone not in possession of the endowment, he painted the most sensuous breasts-with thick areolas and erect nipples-seemingly emerging from the paper, begging to be sucked.I touched his arm to point out, on a nearby easel, the pair of lovers he was finishing, a man standing behind a woman, their hands holding five passion fruits against her chest. Excitedly, I inquired as to how he got her skin to glow with such warmth of golden ochre and crimson. He nestled my elbow in his palm as he eased me toward the painting and explained his artistic process.It was fun having another artist to talk with, to puzzle out problems of color and value, to compare favorite painters and art philosophies. In college, I had been so head over heals involved with Robbie, that I did my course work, rushed back to the dorm to be with him, and didn't give myself the time to make friends, let alone hang out with established teacher-artists in the art department. My BFA degree had landed me a graphic arts job with Minnesota Life, a glossy recreation magazine, and I spent over a year doing computer artwork, but again, no real artist contacts-and no art opportunities. When my school loans were nearly repaid, and Robbie was making enough for both of us to live on, I went back to painting with pastels. Within two years, I was showing in the Twin Cities; then, six months later, in three other major metropolitan areas. That experience brought me into contact with other artisans, most of them women, all of us doing different subjects. We exhibited together on occasion, got together for group-show receptions, but I never really developed an artistic kinship with any painter-until I met Bart.He leaned into me as we conversed, and I maintained our inertia by pressing back. He took my left hand in his, and slipped his right arm around my back, supporting me as we talked about his lovers' faces; the aura of contemplation; the mysteries of connection, communion, and commitment.I told him how much I liked the piece, and he hugged me with appreciation. And that's when we should have stopped. I could have inquired about the adjacent painting, the woman with the large guava facing the viewer and the man turning away with his smaller one. But I didn't. His hug felt so good. As did the wine, our soak in the hot tub, my newly-found confidence.We rotated toward each other. He brought his lips to mine, and, rather than turn to accept his kiss on my cheek, I met him full on with my own. As our embrace progressed, intoxicatingly, I encircled his lanky waist and felt our towels drop away. With his manliness expanding against my belly and his hand raising tingles up my spine, I devoured his lower lip, squeaking a little in excitement when I felt his tongue enter my mouth.With both hands he lifted up my tiny breasts, his fingers running over my nipples, as ripe as his painted ones, then pulled each with gentle traction, making them ache all the more. I moved off his mouth, and began kissing his chest, lightly brushing the russet hairs with my lips in an ever-expanding oval. Initially passing over his nipples, I returned to suck each to hardness and heard him groan as I bit down on them tenderly.His finger pads moved down my spine to buttocks, backs of thigh, up to hipbones, and, twisting his hands around, his finger nails grazed across to my pussy tuft and up my abdomen to my back again, in a repeating hypnotic loop of arousal. When my tongue repaid his kindness, creating a saliva trail down his midline, my cheek butted into his erection. I turned deftly toward the large head, now deeply violet and glowing as hot as his figures' skin tones.Clumsily, we maneuvered our entangled selves to his model stand, and found our way to sitting upon the shag carpet remnant atop the platform, my mouth locked around him, my juices oozing into the rug. His hand found my slot, and as I drew my teeth up and over his rim, I felt his fingers close around my clit, pinching it rhythmically to our breathing. My shrieks of pleasure were stifled by taking more of his cock deeper in my throat, and, as I rocked onto his hand, he began thrusting into my mouth.“I'm gonna come,” he whispered, urgently.Having climaxed once already, and about to scream again, I was fully prepared to grant him his pleasure. Within seconds a hot bolus shot into my mouth, and this time I gurgled with delight as his flood of warmth quieted my cries.One hand circled my head, his fingers pushing through my perspiring hair. The other, perfumed by my cunt-flower, was rubbed against cheek, neck, and shoulder, all the while he praised my beauty in muffled tones. I regained my resting breathing tempo, but all I could mumble was, “Wonderful, wonderful,” as his cock slowly deflated in my mouth.“You guys up there?” Robbie had hollered from the bottom of the stairs.“Just gazing at some nudes,” Bart had called back, so nonchalantly, I thought that perhaps I had been dreaming all the while. But of course I wasn't.Bart and I had hurriedly wrapped our towels around us. He went ahead of me down the stairs, as I ducked into their bathroom to do a bidet-cleansing of my mouth, then joined everyone below to get dressed and prepare for our departure.“We're home,” announced Robbie. “Let's get right to bed. I love it when you're brominated.”I awoke from one nightmare to go back into what I feared was another. What Robbie pronounced was true. Being brominated meant that by soaking in the hot tub, I was disinfected everywhere, and his tongue could explore my private place with relatively impunity. Any other time, his suggestion would have made me forgo my nightly mouth care, but this evening, I delayed our entry into bed by flossing and brushing-with lots of toothpaste. That would cover up any telltale tastes, but I didn't know if the delay would allow my brain to become re-engaged in love making.Robbie and I have been very honest with each other. Well, I felt I have been completely honest, and I trusted full revelations would have been forthcoming from him. So as we pulled the sheets over our nakednesses, I wondered if I should bare all?“Do I tell him,” I asked myself? Did I want him to tell me-if there was anything to tell?What I knew more than anything was that I needed to have Robbie inside me right now. I had made a terrible mistake, but I needed to be loved by him for who I was-his imperfect wife. The one he comes home to. The one he treasures. The one to him, for all her faults, is the most important woman in the whole world. That's the way I felt about him, after all.My decision was made by default. He began to kiss me on my mouth, his hands roaming over my breasts, his warmth surrounding me, making me forget all about the tryst of two hours prior. I felt wholly consumed by this man, desired in a way I hadn't felt before. He was possessed it seemed, and he ravaged me with his mouth, his tongue, his teeth, gnawing on my neck muscles, biting my nipples, tonguing deeply into my belly button as his fingers poked into my buttocks, scraped down my outer thighs and stroked back up the fronts.His rigidity pressed against me, but I wasn't about to let this end too quickly. I kissed him back. Roughly. Biting his lip, his chin, then along jaw bone to ear lobe.He writhed with the discomfort, but moaned in pleasure, calling out, “Mary Johnson, I love you, love you.”In a trice he was upon me, kissing me with abandon. I carved my nails down his backside, and his tempo accelerated.“Fuck me, Robbie! Fuck me hard!!” I urged.As I gripped his flanks, he pounded me, rocking our bed, the headboard cracking like a sledgehammer against the wall. In a voice an octave higher, I began to whine, inhaling sharply to fill my chest, about to explode into an earsplitting orgasm, when Robbie stopped. Pulled out. Rolled me over.“What the…?”“I need you completely tonight, M.J. All of you.”And he separated my ass cheeks and began nibbling that tender flesh around my anus, which drove me into the pre-ecstasy shudders. I knew what was coming next: his tongue would dive deeply into me, and I would light up our room with carmine, magenta, and cerulean lightning bolts, before flooding the bedsheets with a cloudburst from my womb.And he did. And so did I. I screamed and screamed. When I was sated and the bed soaked, he turned me over and had his way with me, and I came for a fifth or sixth time-but who's counting when your man is shouting into your ear and filling your vaginal cup with the most exquisite of liqueurs.As we lay aside each other in the warm puddle of us, both sweating from the physical effort, he professed just how much he cared for me. I knew exactly what he meant: I couldn't imagine loving another being more.Well, yes I could.With his hand moving over my hair, and warm exhalations against my cheek, he offered, “M.J., I got something to tell you.”Sighing in relief, I answered, “And I got something to tell you, too.”Which leads me to say; Bless me father; for I have sinned.By MarthaMcKinley for Literotica

It's week 10 of college football, and we get game reports from a few local colleges including Macalester, Augsburg and St. Johns. 

In this week's episode of Taylor Made with Hamline University Head Football Coach Chip Taylor, the Coach talks about the the tough loss to Augsburg and the game against Macalester this week, he discuses advancements in sports medicine, and he tells us what songs get him pumped up. Plus, the Coach shares some words of wisdom. This and much more. Enjoy!

We're back with an Emily Online episode — and this time we're talking about Daniel D'Addario's piece in Variety, Why Does ‘Emily in Paris' Make People So Mad?We dig into the article (originally published December 2021) to talk Emily in Paris in contrast to Ted Lasso, A League of Their Own, and the rise of tv as a place for "high art." We consider — Are we made at Emily? Why should we be if so? What is there to say about this Netflix show that sometimes feels as empty as cotton candy but as delicious as crème brulée.Read the full piece here: https://variety.com/2021/tv/reviews/emily-in-paris-season-2-review-1235129953/As always, we want to hear from you! Follow the show wherever you listen to podcasts and be sure to leave us an Apple Review. You can always connect with us over instagram @hmrehak or @nsles.  Happy listening!

Ugochukwu Chuwkwujiaka sat down with Brian Rosenberg to discuss his ideas on the purposes of education, and how and why education needs to evolve especially in developing nations. Brian Rosenberg is currently President in Residence and Visiting Professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. From 2003 until 2020, he served as the 16th President of Macalester College. His articles on higher education appear regularly in The Chronicle of Higher Education and have also appeared in publications including The New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Los Angeles Times. He serves as Senior Advisor to the President of the African Leadership University and as a member of the boards of the Teagle Foundation, the Haas Center for Public Service at Stanford University, and Allina Health. Rosenberg received his B.A. from Cornell University and his Ph.D. in English from Columbia University. Prior to arriving at Macalester, he served as Dean of the Faculty at Lawrence University and as Professor and Chair of the English Department at Allegheny College. He is the author of two books and many articles on Victorian literature.

In this  episode, we're back with a Character Study — and this time we're talking about resident Hottie Chef— Gabriel. We ask the essential questions like, what makes Gabriel hot? Is he? Do we need more from him? Why isn't he more like Carmy from The Bear? As always, we want to hear from you! Follow the show wherever you listen to podcasts and be sure to leave us an Apple Review. You can always connect with us over instagram @hmrehak or @nsles.  Happy listening!

For the last hour of tonight's show: Macalester men's basketball coach Abe Woldeslassie The excitement of basketball's Elam Ending 60-plus baseball player/manager Pat Thompson

The head coach of Macalester's men's basketball team doesn't quit stalking the sidelines during the Summer.  He tells us about the local league that brings some big names to the court.

Sounds of Blackness is more than a band, it's a cultural institution. That, says the group's longtime director Gary Hines, was the mission given to them by a mentor at Macalester College in St. Paul, where the group was founded more than 50 years ago.  American Public Media special correspondent Lee Hawkins recently spoke with Hines about the early days of Sounds of Blackness and its role in the larger Black consciousness movement.  Hines talked about how Sounds of Blackness has stuck to its mission, which has at times put it at odds with music industry leaders. A native of Yonkers, N.Y., Hines also describes what it was like for him to move to Minneapolis in the mid-60s and he spoke about his relationships with some of the other pioneers of the “Minneapolis Sound.” The following are transcriptions of selected segments from the interview, edited for clarity. Click the audio player above to listen to the full conversation. Gary Hines reflects on attending the same school as Prince and musical talent in schools Hines: I was blessed to go to the same junior high and senior high — not at the same time — but as Prince did, Jam and Lewis. All of us are products of the Minneapolis Public School System. Nothing private. Nothing suburban, but even at the time, brother Lee — and a shout out to my beloved, mighty Minneapolis Central High School. At the time that inner city urban school — you know, they love to put those labels on us — we had jazz band, stage band, orchestra, marching band, pep band and everybody took music. I mean, it wasn't a question of if you're going to take music, it was which one. And some of us in several. So now that that's gone, we go into some of the schools, and the very two things are children need the most: physical education, and the musical stimulation are often the first things to be cut. That evidence is itself in the deterioration of musicianship. Hawkins: From people who I've spoken with, who went to school with Prince, they talked about how he was a band nerd. That he was a person who would like a band rat, who would hang out in that area and just pick up different instruments and take a little bit of time to figure out how to play. Hines: I'm a personal witness to the fact brother Lee that that is not a fairy tale. That is a definitely true story. And I'll tell you how I know. When I was a senior at at Minneapolis Central, and Central High School and Bryant Junior High School, which is now Sabathani Community Center. There was a lot of interaction between the junior high and the high school, both athletically, scholastically and musically. And I remember my senior year, I started hearing rumors about this dude down at Bryan Junior High that was a beast on every instrument. And you know, one guess who that was? Okay. So yeah, that's an absolute true story. And brother Jimmy Hamilton — rest his soul, a great pianist, and he accompanied my mom many times. They work together — actually was Prince's music teacher at Minneapolis Central. I'm going to say this, I love my north side and Prince love the north side. But a lot of times he's mislabeled. He spent a lot of time over north, he loved the north side, he loved Minneapolis. But Prince was a south-sider. Prince lived over south. Prince went to Bryan Junior High School and then went to Minneapolis… in fact the other thing, and I'll stop… for those that don't know … because I remember the routine on Saturday Night Live and a lot of people thought it was a gag. But no, he was an all-city basketball player despite his height. On leading Macalester College's Sound of Blackness Hines: It was this 50-voice choir called the Macalester College Black Voices, of course, under the direction of my dear friend and brother Russell Knighton. Long story short, in 1971, Russ was you know, preparing to graduate and asked me on as director. And I was honored to do that, because, you know, they were excellent back then. To end the answer, brother Lee. The reason we changed the name from Macalester College, Black Voices to Sounds of Blackness. The vision God gave me was to follow the mold of Duke Ellington. Now I say that — and it surprises a lot of people frequently — because we're often mislabeled as a gospel group. But we mean Sounds of Blackness, every sound of Blackness: jazz, blues, reggae, rock and roll — yes, rock and roll is Black music — hip hop, R&B. And so a lot of people don't know that Duke… we hear his name, and we think of jazz as we should. But Duke wrote and recorded spirituals, blues, gospel anthems, African music, every sound of Blackness, so we can't take credit for that template. Hawkins: I think of the group is more of a Black consciousness. Hines: Yes, absolutely. Hawkins: Then a gospel group that you're really proficient with all of it. But I think that when I think back to that, I got to think that the consciousness movement and all of the energy all of these Black students converging on Macalester in an instant, right? What was that like? Hines: It was amazing. It really was, because we created and nurtured, we supported each other. And got good support from the college as well. There was a Black House, which you may remember that was the center of our activity there. Black House, you know, like one of the other campus I was like, you know, French house or that kind of they did from culture and language houses. So we had Black House and that was our fortress of solitude. Gotta think so. We studied there professor Mahmoud El Kati. We were blessed to have him on campus. And he also mentored us and told Sound of Blackness from day one to be more than just a band, but to be a cultural institution to pass on to generations. And by the grace of God, we've been blessed to do that, because a number of our members now … are actually offspring of original members. So we had professor Mahmoud and many others … many others that mentored us. And it was really a great time. Struggles, of course, you know, to keep the program going and all of that, but a great experience. On the combination of music and social activism Hawkins: This was at a time when Marvin Gaye was on the radio with “mercy, mercy me” and “What's going on...” Hines: Yes Hawkins: And Dr. King had been assassinated. Hines: Yes. Hawkins: And the Vietnam War. We're most of the students in this group activist, not just through music, but also outside of that? Hines: I love your questions. And the answer is absolutely yes. And, let me tie that in two things about that, brother Lee. One: social consciousness and activity as students and particularly as Black students was such the norm, that it was never a question of if you are part of the movement, the only question might be, “which part of the movement or how many parts of the movement were you in? Because like you say, there was, you know, the Black Power movement, and civil rights, human rights, the women's movement, Vietnam, the ecology, all of that was there. And so we were all part of it. And the other reason I'm so glad you asked that question is, and I'm gonna fast forward to the murder of George Floyd. When Sounds of Blackness came out with “Sick and Tired: the words of Fannie Lou Hamer” … and Black radio was looking for us at that time because I was told by a lot program directors across the country, they wanted Sound of Blackness to come out with another optimistic, a happy song. That's just not how God led us. There was too much righteous indignation and anger that needed to be expressed. That's why we came out with “Sick and Tired” and for them, those radio stations and I get it they thought it was an aberration for Sounds of Blackness to do protest and social justice music. But we let them know “no, no, that's our roots and foundation week began in conscious music. And so it was just a continuation of that for us.” Hawkins: That's really powerful because I can remember having a conversation with you online where you talked about the song “Reparation.” And there was some initial work a long protracted kind of resistance towards that from Black radio. Hines: Yeah. Hawkins: And radio stations were intimidated by the concept and not wanting to upset white owners. Hines: Right, right. Hawkins: Let's just put it out there. I remember that's what you said. And it really was profound to me. And here's why. When you look at the things that radio stations do play that are not considered controversial, right? The n-word, the denigration of our women, right? Hines: Women, Yes. Hawkins: In all kinds of things like that, that are not considered to be fighting words, that a discussion about reparations would be fighting words. Hines: The irony is just staggering. Hawkins: Of course, this is a business, this is your life's work. And this is the kind of music you want to do. What does that mean for you as a musician? Hines: What it means for us Brother Lee, Sounds of Blackness is to continue again, with the admonition of brother Mahmoud El Kati. To be an institute, a cultural institution, musical speaking voice of and for a Black America. And we bring Black music to all people, but unapologetically from our frame of reference. And so I tell new and younger artists all the time, to not only to yourself be true but to be clear about who you are and what you're about. Because the industry will invariably try to change that if you let them. And that's just never the case with talented Black because we are who we are and again, proudly and unapologetically. Click the audio player above to listen to the full conversation.

Welcome back to our Out of Office extended season! In each episode we dive into the cultural conversation happening online about Emily in Paris, do a character study focusing on one key player from the show, or have a general catch up and check-in. In this fourth episode, we're back with an Emily Online episode — and this time we're talking about Kyle Chayka's piece in the New Yorker: "Emily in Paris" and the Rise of Ambient TV. We dig into the article (originally published November 2020) to talk about the pandemic, our addiction to screens, the way we use ambient media to survive these tough times and how it all comes back to our gal Emily. Read the full piece here: https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/emily-in-paris-and-the-rise-of-ambient-tv?source=search_google_dsa_paid&gclid=CjwKCAjwq5-WBhB7EiwAl-HEkosM6nkZZygDhegkWm6hJRCDDC75Ng2LE0RDx32quparcpH5bKlsbRoCXiMQAvD_BwE As always, we want to hear from you! Follow the show wherever you listen to podcasts and be sure to leave us an Apple Review. You can always connect with us over instagram @hmrehak or @nsles.  Happy listening!

As we anxiously await Season 3 of Netflix's Emily in Paris we decided to continue putting out episodes! So welcome back to our Out of Office extended season! In each episode we'll either dive into the cultural conversation happening online about Emily in Paris, do a character study focusing on one key player from the show, or have a general catch up and check-in. As always, we want to hear from you! Follow the show wherever you listen to podcasts and be sure to leave us an Apple Review. You can always connect with us over instagram @hmrehak or @nsles.  Happy listening!

Here are just a few of the quotes and resources featured in the article, “The Power of Podcasting,” in my alumni magazine, Macalester Today: https://www.macalester.edu/news/2022/04/the-power-of-podcasting.Podcasting officially became a thing when Adam Curry began sharing audio recordings of his everyday life in 2004. Many people consider his podcast, Daily Source Code, as the first podcast.But many listeners began seriously listening to podcasts ten years later when Serial, a true crime podcast, first became available in 2014.51% of Americans over the age of 12 listened to a podcast in 2021 (Edison Research).32% of Americans listen to at least one podcast every month.There are about a million podcasts being created and distributed daily, weekly, monthly, or for a limited series (10 to 12 episodes).Because podcasts are portable and many episodes are moving or informative, podcasts can create a real intimacy between the podcaster and the listeners.Podcasting has the power to deliver exceptionally good stories. Many of the most listened-to podcasts feature stories. That’s why podcasts of novels and works-in-progress can generate such large audiences and dedicated fan groups. If you are a novelist, you should be podcasting your stories as you write them (or podcast previous novels, one page or one chapter at a time).Audio communication fills a unique niche for people, with podcasting in particular lending itself to engaging and deeply investigative storytelling. — Curtis Gilbert, correspondent, American Public MediaStudents find podcasting fun, flexible, and interactive. Plus, it’s relatively easy to do. … Podcasting helps students build digital literacy skills while learning to communicate information to a broader, more general audience, rather than a strictly academic one. — Tamatha PerlmanPodcasting, especially audio drama, gives storytelling a different dimension than TV or books. It’s an engaging, immersive experience that’s intimate, close, and allows you to be an active listener. If it’s done well, you don’t want to miss a minute. — Davy Gardner, curator of audio storytelling at Tribeca EnterprisesPodcasting is a step toward helping Global Teck Worldwide up our branding. My advice? If you own a business and you’re not podcasting, you should be. — Rolando Rosas, founder of Global Teck WorldwideMy advice? If you are a book author and you’re not podcasting, you should be.Need help with recording and editing your podcast? Check out The Podcast Shop, founded by Katharine Heller, another Macalester alumnus.Book Marketing Success is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, become a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit bookmarketing.substack.com/subscribe

Abraham Woldeslassie is the Head Basketball Coach at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota. Macalester is a Division 3 college and coach Abe knows exactly what that means. Abe takes the time to break down some of the misconceptions around Division 3 basketball. D3 is more than you think. You can receive scholarships and you can play very high-level basketball. Check out the Macalester College website. Listen now to learn more! ---------------- The Youth Hoops Pod covers topics such as: High school & AAU basketball College basketball recruiting NCAA basketball NBA & professional overseas basketball Mental health & performance Leadership Basketball Coaching And much more! __________ ⭐️ PLEASE LEAVE A 5-STAR REVIEW If you enjoyed our podcast, would you please take a minute and leave us a 5-star review? It would mean the world to us as we are beginning to grow our voice in the podcast sphere. To leave a review on Apple: 1) Click this link 2) Scroll ALL THE WAY DOWN 3) Look for the 5 stars and leave a review! __________

Thomas Liebert a voracious childhood reader, searches for ancient artifacts and makes historic connections in his backyard in Albany, New York and while on a family vacation to the Scottish island where Mary, Queen of Scots, was imprisoned.

Welcome back to the podcast! Sorry that I've been gone so long, with the way 2021 was, I needed to find a new way to approach recording this podcast. Now that I've started doing that, expect more episodes in the future. Today's episode is just a quick recap, so I hope you enjoy.

Dr. Suzanne Rivera is the President of Macalester College. She also is a Professor of Public Affairs, and her scholarship focuses on research ethics and science policy. Rivera has written numerous journal articles and book chapters, and she co-edited the book Specimen Science. Her research has been supported by the NIH, the NSF, the DHHS Office of Research Integrity, and the Cleveland Foundation. She is engaged in numerous civic and municipal leadership roles, including Chair of the Board of Public Responsibility in Medicine and Research (PRIM&R), Appointed Member of the Executive Council for Minnesota's Young Women's Initiative, Board Member of the Science Museum of Minnesota, Board Member of College Possible, and Member of the TeenSHARP National Advisory Board. Rivera received a BA in American Civilization from Brown University, an MSW from UC-Berkeley, and a PhD in public policy from UT Dallas. Head Start ProgramsBrown University Undocumented, First-Generation College, and Low-Income Student Center  Transcript SUMMARY KEYWORDSstudents, people, brown, feeling, college, Headstart, Minnesota, Posse, support, low income students, financial aid, St. Paul, sponsored, day, job, brown university, group, Marian Wright Edelman, graduate, phd SPEAKERSResa Lewiss, Sue Rivera Resa Lewiss  00:36Hi, listeners. Thanks so much for joining me with today's episode and I'm gonna start with a quote. You can't be what you can't see. One more time, you can't be what you can't see. Now this was said by Marian Wright Edelman. She was the founder of the Children's Defense Fund and was one of the original founders of the Headstart program. She graduated Spelman College and Yale School of Law. Now Marian Wright Edelman is not my guest in today's conversation, however, she was an inspiration for my guest. Today I'm in conversation with Suzanne M. Rivera, PhD MSW. Sue. Dr. Suzanne Rivera is the president of Macalester College in Minneapolis. She's also a Professor of Public Affairs. Her scholarship focuses on research ethics and science policy. She received her BA in American civilization from Brown University, a master's in social work from UC Berkeley, and a PhD in public policy from UT Dallas. Now Sue and I have a few areas of overlap. Number one, we graduated college one year apart. Number two is the Headstart program. Growing up in my small town, Westerly, Rhode Island, I was exposed to the Headstart program through my mother. My mother is an elementary school educator, and she did preschool testing for children. And my knowledge at the time was she helped with evaluating children for learning disabilities, for challenges with speech, sound, and sight. Let's get to the conversation where when we get started, Sue is explaining her ideas about mentorship, and who her mentors were, or at least a few of them. Sue Rivera  02:47I mean, one thing I tell young people all the time is, don't hold your breath waiting for a mentor who shares all of your attributes who can inspire you because especially if you're from a historically excluded or underserved group, the likelihood that there's going to be some inspirational leader who shares all your attributes is pretty small. So the mentors and sponsors who've made the biggest impact in my life have all been men. They've all been white men, they've all been white men who were significantly older than me and much more accomplished, and who came from backgrounds that were, you know, that had a lot more privileged than my own. And yet, we were able to connect on a deep level and they really opened doors for me. So a couple exams for Harry Spector at UC Berkeley was a great mentor is no longer with us. Another great mentor, for me was a guy named Al Gilman, a Nobel Laureate, who, who I worked for at UT Southwestern in Dallas, Texas, opened a lot of doors for me, encouraged me to go back and get my PhD when I was a 35 year old mother of two school aged kids. And once I got it, promoted me and then what, and then once I had a faculty appointment, invited me to co author a chapter for him with him in the kind of most important pharmacology textbook, that he was responsible for publishing, which means My name is forever linked with his in the literature, which is an incredibly generous gift for him to give to me. People like that have sort of stepped in at at moments where, if not for them, I might not have seen in my self potential that was there. Another person I would mention is a professor from my undergraduate days. Greg Elliot at Brown University in the sociology department, who sort of encouraged me to think about my own interests in social inequality and poverty as things that were worth studying things that were worth studying in a rigorous way as a scholar and not just sort of feeling badly about or complaining about or having a personal interest, but really taking them on as an intellectual project. So he sponsored me for a summer research assistantship, he had me serve as a TA in one of his classes. And he sponsored a group independent study project for me and a bunch of other students. And I'm still in touch with him to this day. He's somebody who certainly helped me think about myself as a scholar at a time where I was really thinking, I was just barely holding on, like, hoping I could graduate with a BA, I wasn't imagining that I could go on to become a professor and eventually a college president. Resa Lewiss  05:36People saw in you what maybe you hadn't yet seen for yourself. I was a sociology concentrator, and I took Professor Elliott's class, and I remember him reading from Kurt Vonnegut Mother Night, and it was really moving, he sort of cut to the punch line of we are who we pretend to be, so we must be very careful who we pretend to be. And that stuck with me. And that also launched a whole lollapalooza of reading Kurt Vonnegut. Sue Rivera  06:07Yeah, actually, this is one of the beautiful things about a liberal arts education, I think is that you know, so you became a physician after being a sociology undergraduate concentrator. I dabbled in a lot of different things as an undergrad did not imagine I would eventually become an academic, but I feel like the tools I got, from that degree have served me really well, moving between jobs. You know, I originally went to go work for the federal government thinking I was going to do policy work. Eventually, I worked in higher education administration, then I went back and got a PhD in public policy. But, you know, all along as I was making career changes, the tools I got as an undergraduate to think critically and communicate effectively and, you know, think in an interdisciplinary way work with people who have really different perspectives than I have. All of that is just priceless. I mean, so so incredibly valuable. Resa Lewiss  07:02Speaking of liberal arts education, let's jump right in and talk about Macalester for audience members that aren't familiar with the college. Tell us about the college and tell us about how it's been to be President. Sue Rivera  07:14Well, it's a wonderful college. It's it's almost 150 years old, and it's a originally was founded by Presbyterians and although still Presbyterian affiliated his is a secular liberal arts college, a small private liberal arts college in St. Paul, Minnesota. It has a deep history of being committed to social justice. It was the first college in the United States to fly the United Nations flag, which is still flying outside my window in my office here. And in fact, Kofi Annan was a graduate of Macalester the four pillars of a Macalester education as they're currently described, our academic excellence, internationalism, multiculturalism and service to society. And I think the character of this place actually is not that dissimilar from the brown that you and I know, in the sense that social justice is really important part of the character read institution, but it also attracts people who dispositional li are attracted to activism, to wanting to make a more just and peaceful world who think about their education in a sense as not only a privilege, but also an obligation to go out and make things better. And so the students we attract at Macalester are really sparky, in the sense that they, they, they're, you know, they're really passionate. They all come with it, let's just set aside that they're really academically talented because they all are so that no longer is a distinguishing characteristic once they get here because they're all academically talented. So what distinguishes them when they get here is all the other stuff in addition to being bright, you know, they're, they're committed athlete, they're a poet. They're a weaver. They're a dancer, they're, they're an aspiring politician involved in political campaigns mean that they're all just how they're debater, you know. So whenever I meet students, one of the first things I say to them is, well, what are you really loving right now? Or, you know, what's keeping you really busy right now, instead of saying, you know, what are you taking? Or what's your major, I'm much less interested in what their major is. And I'm much more interested in like, you know, what's got them really jazzed? What are they spending their time on? What's what's so exciting that they're staying up into the middle of the night working on it, Resa Lewiss  09:40The timing of your start.  There was an overlap with the murder of Mr. George Floyd. And I'm wondering if you can share with the audience how that sort of set a tone and set an inspiration for your work. Sue Rivera  09:55Yeah, it was a really difficult time I actually accepted the job. On January 31, of 2020. So at that time, if you can remember back to the before times, none of us had ever heard of COVID. And the board of trustees who offered me the job, were saying, this is going to be a turnkey operation for you, the previous president had been here for 17 years, smooth sailing, really easy transition, you know, easy peasy. And three weeks later, you know, every college in America started closing because of COVID. And I realized, wow, this job is about to get a lot more challenging. I was in Cleveland, Ohio at the time at Case Western Reserve University. And I was sort of watching as the news was unfolding, but also doing my job at another higher ed institution. So I could anticipate how it was going to get more difficult to come to McAllister, then literally on the day that I got in my car to drive to Cleveland, to drive to St. Paul from Cleveland to take this job was the day that George Floyd was murdered. So as I was driving all day, north of Michigan, and then across the up of Michigan, going west to St. Paul, I would drive all day and then turn on the TV at night and watch the news. And as we approached St. Paul, the city was deeper and deeper in grief and righteous anger and fear National Guard troops were coming in, there were fires all over the place. In fact, I was supposed to start the job on a Monday and arrive on a Saturday and I got a call on that Saturday while I was on the road saying don't try and come into the city because we've got a curfew. And it's not feeling safe right now. Just get in a hotel outside of the city and try and come in tomorrow. So I arrived really on Sunday in St. Paul to start the job on Monday. And I and I recognize that my first day was going to be very different than what any of us had imagined. Because what the, what the moment called for was to name the pain and grief and anger everyone was feeling. And to try to address people's grief in a way that was honest about the challenges offer some comfort, but also a call to action about how we could be how we could be of help how we could be of service. So you know, the first couple things I did that week were one was I attended a silent vigil that was organized by the black clergy of St. Paul from various different faith, faith communities, I also attended a food and hygiene drive that was organized by our students, you know, it's just a lot, you know, we stood up a mutual aid fundraising drive, within the first couple of weeks, it was just a lot of attending to the immediate needs of the community. And also, all of this was complicated by having to do almost everything by zoom, you know, so, you know, Zoom is good for a lot of things. But when people are crying when people are scared when people, you know, our international students, many of them couldn't go home, because of COVID. So they were staying over the summer, it was just very, very complicated and didn't look anything like what we thought it was going to look like. And what I didn't have was a reservoir of trust built up with this community. And the only way I could talk to people was on a computer screen, which doesn't give the full benefit of body language. It doesn't give all you know, everything you learned from being in a room with somebody. The various facial expressions, the way the way that when you talk to a roomful of people, you see two people make eye contact after you've said something and you recognize you have to go follow up with them and see what that was all about. You know, none of that is possible on Zoom. And, and it was just it was just an impossible summer. It was very, very difficult. I was trying to introduce myself at a time where I also had to deliver a lot of bad news to people. You know, we were having to take all sorts of difficult decisions about keeping the residence halls densifying the residence halls by telling some people they couldn't move back in August that was disappointing for them taking decisions related to the college's finances, like suspending contributions to employees retirement accounts for six months until we could understand how we were going to do financially. arranging for testing COVID testing was incredibly expensive and something we hadn't budgeted for figuring out where to put hand sanitizer and plexiglass and what our masking policy should be. I mean, really, it was like being a full time disaster management person not being a college president. And in many ways, the whole first year was was not being a college president. It was it was just one really challenging, ethical or logistical decision after another all year long. Resa Lewiss  14:50According to my reading in 1991, you delivered your graduation class orration and I'm wondering if you can fill us in on about what you spoke Sue Rivera  15:04well, I, you know, I basically I talked about my unlikely journey to being an Ivy League graduate and what that could mean for all of us about the possibilities of you know pathbreaking of moving into uncharted territory. When I, when I went to college, we didn't have the expression first gen, and we didn't have really a sense of pride around being a financial aid student to the contrary, my experience at an elite institution was that if you were there on financial aid, and came from a low income background, that you tried to hide it as much as possible in order to fit in, you know, back then Brown had a policy of limiting financial aid students to 30% of the student population. And that meant even just students who only had loans and got no grant awards. So just imagine an environment it's not like that anymore, I should clarify, Brown is not like that anymore. But back then 70% of the student body were full pay, meaning their parents could write the whole check. And just imagine what that means when the tuition is significantly more than the, you know, median income for a family of four in this country. It means you're, you're in a really elite and I daresay elitist environment. So what that meant if you were a student on financial aid was that it was kind of a scary place, it was kind of an alienating place. And when I arrived there, I really felt like a fish out of water. I thought about transferring, had a job in the Ratty in the dining hall. You know, my work study job, where I was sort of serving other students and feeling I don't know if I would say inferior but definitely had a sense of imposter syndrome. Like you know, one of these days somebody is going to figure out I don't really belong here. And the turning point for me was that in in the spring semester of that first year for me, a chaplain, Reverend Flora Kashagian who I don't know if that's a name, you know, but she offered like a discussion group, she and Beth Zwick, who was the head of the Women's Center offered a discussion group for students struggling with money issues. So I opened the school newspaper one day, and there's an ad in there. That's like, I don't even remember what it said. But it was something like are you struggling with money issues? Are you on financial aid, you know, are things tough at home, and you don't know how to talk about it come to this discussion. And let's rap about it. And for whatever reason, that spoke to me and I, I went, and there were like, 11 or 12 people in the room for this discussion group. But it was like the Island of Misfit Toys. Do you remember that, that that Christmas cartoon where like, every toy is broken in some kind of way, but they all have their gifts, right? Every student who showed up for that thing had a different non traditional path to get to brown and we were all broken in some kind of weird way. You know, for me, I had grown up in an immigrant home on was on public assistance, food stamps, free lunch, you know, you name it. I was there on a on a Pell Grant, which are, you know, the neediest students. And there were other people in the room who came from really different environments. I grew up in New York City, but there were other people who were like, from a rural farm family, or, you know, I mean, just all everybody had different reasons for why they came to that discussion group. But it was magical because we all saw each other in a really like, pure and non judgmental way. And we could all be real with each other. As it turns out, one of the other 11 people was the person who would eventually become my spouse. And other people in the room that day are lifelong friends. I mean, we really bonded, we ended up forming a club called sofa students on financial aid. We even have little T shirts made up that said, so far, so good. And it had like a picture of a couch that was all ripped and torn on on the front. And by making it a student club, that got incorporated by the student government, we kind of created legitimacy for ourselves on campus, and started to create a way of talking about being from a low income background that didn't feel shameful, that felt prideful, not prideful, in the sense of hubris, but in the sense of like, acknowledging the distance traveled was great that we were not born on third base. And yet we were here sort of competing with people who had every advantage in the world and having a sense of deserving to be there or belonging there. So by the time I was a senior and I got selected to give the one of the two oratory addresses at graduation, the theme for me really was one of triumph of having overcome all of those hurdles and feeling like finally I feel like I deserve at this place. I earned my spot here. Resa Lewiss  19:57In my freshman unit, there was a woman with whom I'm still very, very close. She is an attorney. She's an LA county judge. And she transferred from Brown for some of the reasons that you considered transferring. And she to this day says that it's one of her biggest regrets. And also she really feels if they were more visible vocal support for first gen students than she thinks it would have made a huge difference for her. Sue Rivera  20:29Yeah, no doubt and and Brown has come a long way. In this regard. I consider them a real leader. Now they have this you fly center. It's like it's an actual center on campus for people who are undocumented first gen or low income. And they get extra support. They have a dedicated Dean, they have programming. I think it's a real testament to the seriousness with which Brown has taken the unique challenges that face low income students going to a place like that. It also helped a lot that between Vartan, Gregorian and roof Simmons, two presidents, who I greatly admire from Brown, they were able to raise the money to provide financial aid to students who need it, but also to go need blind. So I told you that at the time that I went there, they limited the number of students on financial aid to 30% of the student body, that's no longer true. Now, when you apply to brown, you are admitted without regard to ability to pay and they commit to meet full need. So I think it's a much more socio economically diverse student body today. And I think Brown has really been a leader in how to increase access and support low income students when they get there, because I think it's a two part problem. You know, just letting people in. But allowing them to sink or swim is really not helpful. You need to increase access, but then also provide the support necessary so that the that educational opportunity is a ladder to economic mobility, people have to actually be able to finish, you know, complete the degree, and then go off and have a career afterwards in order for the opportunity to really, you know, fulfill that promise. Resa Lewiss  22:16Yeah, it reminds me a bit of what you described with the Headstart program of not just, you know, supporting this one individual child, but it's actually the system in place. So similar, like it's one thing to get in, but you have to help the student, succeed, thrive. Be healthy in that environment. I believe I've read that you that you're actually doing work to increase access and admission of students that may have fewer resources in the state. Can you talk a little bit about that initiative? Sue Rivera  22:47Yeah, I'd love to. So when I arrived at Macalester again, just like a little over a year ago, Macalester already had a relationship with the quest Bridge Program, which is one way to recruit first gen and low income students. But of course, we take those from all over the country. We also had other cohort programs like the Bonner Scholars Program and the Mellon Mays program. But after the murder of George Floyd, one thing that I heard a lot from people on campus was that while Macalester had done a great job recruiting a diverse student body from not only all over the country, but also all over the world. We have a very international student body that we hadn't done as much to focus on students from right here in Minnesota, especially talented students from historically excluded groups from right here in Minnesota. So we did two things last year. One was that we established a new fund called the Minnesota Opportunity Scholarship Fund, which is an effort to raise scholarship dollars that will be targeted specifically to talented students from Minnesota. And the second thing we did was that we joined forces with the Posse Foundation to sign on as a posse school, whereby Macalester will become recipients of the first posse from the state of Minnesota. I don't know if you're that familiar with posse, but that's a program that's 30 plus years old, that that's based on the Really clever idea that that their founder Debbie Bial had, which is that if you pluck one student from an under resourced High School, and you send them across the country to a private liberal arts college, they may feel like a fish out of water. But if you cultivate a cohort of students from a city, and you give them in high school leadership training and other kinds of support, and you foster trust and friendship among them, and then you take a group or a posse, if you will, and you take those 10 students and send them all to the same liberal arts college, the chances are, that they're going to be better equipped to persist and complete because they have each other you know, they don't have that feeling of walking into the dining hall and not seeing any familiar face. We're not having anybody who knows what it's like in their home city neighborhood. You know, the same feeling I had when I walked into that room and I saw the other Misfit Toys sitting around in a circle. The posse already formed a trusting cohort that can keep each other company and offer support through the four year experience of college. So we are adding posse to our other cohort programs here on campus. But we've specified that the posses gotta come from here in Minnesota, they will come from the Twin Cities, either Minneapolis public schools or St. Paul Public Schools. And we're going to get our first group of 10 in September, and we will give them all full tuition scholarships. It's really exciting. Yeah. Resa Lewiss  25:47Wow. What a conversation and honestly, I could have kept speaking with Sue for quite a while. I think she enjoyed the conversation too, regarding my friend that I referred to in the conversation. Attorney judge Serena Murillo. As I said, we're still friends, and she knows that I had tipped her during this episode. And all I can say is, listen to your heart. Listen to your brain. Have a growth mindset and know that your professional path is not linear. Thanks for joining and see you next week. The visible Voices Podcast amplifies voices both known and unknown, discussing topics of healthcare equity and current trends. If you enjoyed this episode, please rate and review us on Apple podcasts. It helps other people find the show. You can listen on whatever platform you subscribe to podcasts. Our team includes Stacey Gitlin and Dr. Giuliano Di Portu. If you're interested in sponsoring an episode, please contact me resa@thevisiblevoicespodcast.com. I'm based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and I'm on Twitter @ResaELewiss. Thank you so much for listening and as always, to be continued

Nina and Hannah are back to (kind of) recap the Season Two trailer of Netflix's Emily in Paris. If you thought season one was fun, you're going to be erratically enthused (a la our heroine Emily) by the plan for Season Two. Tune in for some big reveals about life the last ten months (i.e. life imploding, Covid still being a thing, the state of Nina and Hannah's friendship, etc), predictions based on the recently released trailer, and what we have planned for Season Two upon the December 22nd release of amour Emily in Paris (does the pun work visually?). Be sure to subscribe and leave a review with your predictions for Season Two of Emily in Paris, your desires for Season Two of Nina, Hannah, and Emily in Paris, and maybe some compliments for your two Chicago gals offering a Chicago take on Emily, a Chicago girl, and her life in Paris. We want to know what you want and what you think— your wants and thinks, as  they say.À bientôt! Note: You simply do not have to have watched or enjoyed Emily in Paris to listen to Nina, Hannah, & Emily in Paris.Follow us on Instagram @hmrehak & @nslesMusic by Sabine Happart

Andres Oppenheimer habla con Andrew Latham, de la Universidad de Macalester, y William Spindler, vocero de ACNUR en América Latina, sobre el régimen talibán en Afganistán y los refugiados que huyeron de ese país. Y con José de Córdoba, periodista del Wall Street Journal, y Amaury Pacheco, uno de los artistas del Movimiento San Isidro, habló sobre lo que ha cambiado en Cuba desde las manifestaciones antigubernamentales del 11 de julio. Para conocer sobre cómo CNN protege la privacidad de su audiencia, visite CNN.com/privacidad

Six-time National Coach of the Year Glenn Caruso is the head football coach at the University of St. Thomas in Minnesota and says that in order for one to perform at a high level, they must have the ability to recalculate…and do so quickly. Since his hiring in 2008 at St. Thomas, the Tommies have won 126 football games and have made two trips to the Division III National Championship game. According to the St. Thomas athletics website, “Caruso accomplished something unheard of in college football coaching: He improved his won-loss record in each of his first seven seasons as a head coach. He inherited a Macalester program that was 0-9 the previous fall and guided the Scots to records of 2-7 then 4-5. He took over a St. Thomas program coming off a 2-8 season and has posted records of 7-3, 11-2, 12-1, 13-1 and 14-1 in his first five seasons.” In 2021, the St. Thomas football team will compete at the Division 1 level, a tall task that only coaches like Glenn Caruso would be ready, willing, and able to handle. Buckle your chin strap for this powerful conversation with a high-performing leader and coach who chooses to talk more about the good stuff off the field – family, daily actions, and eliminating apathy – more than he chooses to talk about his success on the field. 

The guys link up with Abe Woldeslassie, the Head Men's Basketball Coach at Macalester College, to discuss D3 hoops, culture vs. commitment, and running a program during the Coronavirus pandemic. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/the-green-light/support