Good morning. Senator Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican, has died at 71. Read his obituary here. We have more on his life below. We’re also covering Iran, which is firing at United States allies in the Persian Gulf after a night of intense American attacks, as well as the White House’s involvement in the investigation into New York Times reporters. But first, a writer reflects on the healing powers of trying new things.
Take the plunge
I’m not really a joiner. I mostly regard cultural trends as a shoe that’s about to drop, and I mostly regard my life as too busy to consider improvements of my general experience. Why would I go on a meditation retreat when I haven’t read “Middlemarch” yet? Why would I do stand-up paddleboarding when what I really want to do is watch the season finale of “Widow’s Bay?” I turned 50 last year. One of my resolutions for my remaining few years is to stop asking why I am the way that I am and to start wondering if I should just feel lucky — not just that I have a job that pushes me toward new experiences, but that sometimes we accidentally choose a life that gives us what we need. I was reminded of this resolution recently when I went downtown for a cold plunge, a so-called contrast therapy wherein I spent a half-hour in a sauna followed immediately by two minutes in an ice bath. I’d been told by various people that cold plunges were the cure for nearly everything — panic attacks, arthritis, depression, confidence issues, “brown fat.” I don’t know exactly what it cured, but I do know for a few days afterward I found a little less pain in my knees and, beyond that, some inner peace. There’s no study that can quantify why I felt this way, at least not yet. Because how do you measure a treatment in the category where the disease you are seeking to cure is … you? Because I have been changed by all the strange missions my job as a magazine writer has sent me on, from the brutal (multiday juice fasts that had me eyeing my toddler like he was a turkey dinner) to the truly bizarre (colonics!). I would never have gone further than a movie theater if it were up to me, but I find that I think more about the experiences I’ve had doing strange experiments for my job than I think about even the movies I loved the most. I think a lot about the hypnotist who held my hand while I told her about the grandmother I missed. I think about my mother and me going to a medical marijuana convention together to help find her some relief from her insomnia and the way we talked when we — me and my mother — were high. I think about the team of geologists in Iceland who had to drive me down what I think I remember correctly was a volcano because I’d made a wrong turn. They laid me down in the back footwell of the car because they had to drive backward and I was too afraid to look and had to disassociate — all because I was sent to figure out why Icelandic people are so happy. I think about a life coach teaching me how to make fire with my own hands, and how I didn’t believe it could happen until it did. I think of the hours I spent making a simple roast chicken with a world-class chef as she psychoanalyzed my fear of cooking. This somehow allowed me to put to bed my distress over said fear: I don’t cook; it’s fine. I think about a woman I met at a spa who blessed me during my treatment, who placed me on a literal throne and said to me — I went back to the story to find the quote — I want to tell you something while you’re here. I want to tell you that your life could be good now. I want to tell you that you don’t have to make it through your problems in order for your life to be good now. I want you to know that you have a power within you that is unique, and that is only yours, and that when you learn how to harness it, you are going to make a real difference in the world. You are really going to change the world, Taffy. How I cried when she said that. How the 50-year-old version of me is made of all those moments, and now is also made of this cold plunge. I often wonder, if I stopped working as a journalist, if I’d still choose to do these things. Then I wonder if I’m thinking about it wrong. I did choose it. I said yes to those assignments when there were others that would have kept me at my desk. I think this and realize that maybe I’m not as far gone as I thought. Read Taffy’s column about the cold plunge, along with these specially selected stories. We’ve made the link above, and those below, free for you to read:
Senator Lindsey Graham
War in Iran
Subpoenas
Around the World
Other Big Stories
Tick-borne disease cases are surging in America. Now is the time for the federal government to step up and win the war on ticks, Jonathan Mingle writes. Serena Williams’s recent return to professional tennis is an inspiring reminder of the power of embracing desire and possibility in adulthood, Lizzy Goodman writes. What explains the looksmaxxing movement? The male gaze, long trained on women, has come for straight men too, Kate Manne writes. Deeply reported journalism needs your support. The Times relies on subscribers to help fund our mission. Become a subscriber today.
World Cup
Wimbledon
“The Shampoo Effect” by Jenny Jackson: Welcome to Greenhead, Mass., a quaint beach town where the flies are as vicious as the secrets threatening to unravel a group of friends. Jackson’s second best-selling novel (after “Pineapple Street”) unfolds from the perspectives of four women — an aspiring writer who falls in love with a local, the pregnant ex-girlfriend of that local, an old-money type with her head in the sand and a perennial caretaker who’s tired of cleaning up other people’s messes. Their lives are as |
