In the late 14th century, Geoffrey Chaucer wrote an unfinished collection of stories titled “The Canterbury Tales.” The stories, written mostly in verse, explore a number of aspects of contemporary English life from the perspective of a group of pilgrims traveling to the shrine of St. Thomas Beckett in Canterbury, England. Considered the first modern novel, Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra published “The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha” in 1605. The plot centers around a strange and capricious old man named Alonso Quixano, who travels around the Spanish countryside as a self-…

On October 4, 1987 the Washington Redskins took the field against the visiting St. Louis Cardinals at Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Stadium in Northeast DC in front of 55,000 fans. Televised by CBS, the game started at 1 p.m. In the first quarter, the Redskins got off to a good start when Ed Rubbert completed a 34-yard touchdown pass to Anthony Allen. The two would eventually connect on touchdown passes of 88 and 48 yards to put the game away and bring the Redskins' record to 2-1 on the season. The Redskins would later go on to win Superbowl XXII against John Elway’s Denver Broncos. But both Ed …

On a recent podcast, author Chuck Klosterman asked an important but ostensibly silly question, “If you watch ‘Saved by the Bell’ in 2011, do you enjoy it because you’re entertained, or do you enjoy it ironically?” I don’t know the answer. So much of American pop culture, particularly in the life of young people, intertwines itself with our identity. The connection becomes so tight that its difficult to separate something objectively enjoyable from something pseudo-nostalgic. Loving “Saved by the Bell” in spite of and because of it’s faults, represents one example of this phenomena.So the real…

"The biggest tragedy in America is not the waste of natural resources, though this is tragic. The biggest tragedy is the waste of human resources." -Oliver Wendell HolmesOn December 17, 1903, Orville and Wilbur Wright awoke to a freezing morning in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. For the fourth year in a row, the Wright brothers returned to the beaches at Kitty Hawk, each time leaving with new information on aeronautics and a growing confidence in their gliders.Now the brothers tested not a glider, but a self-propelled airplane. From a 200 foot wooden track the 750 pound plane made four flights …

On October 8, 1902, Wilbur Wright stood on a beach in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, holding a camera. A dozen or so meters away, his brother Orville lay face down on a large wooden glider. The glider, perched atop a sand-swept ramp, was the product of hours of engineering, hours of wind tunnel experiments, mechanical tweaking, and three previous visits to Kitty Hawk. As the rickety wooden and canvas plane made its way down the ramp, the aeronautical engineering that Wilbur and Orville pioneered took over. The structure took Orville into to the air and did something no aircraft had ever done …

Around 563 BCE, five days after the birth of his son, King Suddhodana, the leader of the Shakya clan in what is modern day Nepal, gathered eight brahmin scholars together to give his son a name. They chose Siddartha. In Pāli his name meant, “he who achieves his aims.” The brahmin prophesized that Siddartha would either become a great ruler or a great religious leader. Siddartha Gautama grew up among the riches provided to a prince of his era. Restrained to the palace walls by a worried father, at the age of 29 Siddartha ventured into the surrounding village to meet his subjects. Despite his …

On November 8, 1519 Hernán Cortés marched peacefully into the great city of Tenochtitlan, perhaps the largest city in the world at the time. There, he and his 600 or so soldiers encountered an empire whose wealth, complexity and creativity rivaled any the world had ever seen. He met Moctezuma II, ruler of the Aztec people, and observed strange I-shaped ballcourts where the Aztecs played a game reminiscent of basketball. While the playing field varied from ballcourt to ballcourt, the general principles remained the same. During play, two teams met in the center of a roughly 20-foot-high stone …

For me, the definition of a great television show is its staying power. Do the characters seem believable after x number of years or decades? Would the plots work if applied to contemporary shows? Do I watch the show and immediately know I’m watching something old? The primary reason for Seinfeld’s staying power lies in the universal themes Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David explored, pinpointing human irrationalities so accurately and lampooning them so magnificently. Despite being off the air for 13+ years, I’m entertained by Seinfeld as much now as I was when I watched during the 1990s. I’ve …

Heritage High School in Ashburn is a gorgeous school. The main hallway is reminiscent of a college hall with high ceilings and well-appointed floors and walls. Despite the school’s newness, there’s a sense of weight, a sense of importance to the building, most likely derived from its stately appearance. When I taught Spanish at Heritage in early 2009, I appreciated how much the school reflected the growing diversity of Loudoun County. The school seemed dynamic. The energy beamed through the students, through their engagement and their appreciation of each other’s differences. Everyday when I …

Growing up, one of my father’s favorite pastimes involved describing people I’d meet during my life. So-and-so will be this, so-and-so will make you feel this way or that way. So-and-so was a jerk, a good guy, or so-and-so was a fool. His stories were peppered with archetypes I’d meet one day. Most interesting was how he made his ultimate character analysis. He often concluded by deciding whether or not he’d want that person/archetype living on his street. “He was an interesting guy,” my dad used to say. “He’s someone I’d want living on my street.” After college and everything after, I came …