This week’s top 5 long reads

In this edition, we recommend the following:

• A journalist’s essay about her childhood and finding her voice through words.
• The story of a life-saving drug overdose prevention hotline operator.
• Examining whether it is possible to communicate with whales using AI.
• A portrait of Louisiana and singer-songwriter Lucinda Williams.
• Get a glimpse of sumo, a sport that is growing in popularity in America.

Jenisha Watts | The Atlantic | September 13, 2023 | 11,129 words

Journalist Jenisha Watts grew up in Kentucky with her mother, Trina Renee Watts, and her grandmother. Once upon a time, Trina was an up-and-coming track star. Her love of words got her accepted to Western Kentucky University. However, when she became pregnant with her girlfriend Jenisha, she dropped out. Soon, Trina had her five children from her five different fathers, and she often left her children alone when she left home to get high, and she was addicted to drugs. I became addicted.How could everything go wrong, seemingly so suddenly? Jenisha, Senior Editor atlantic, unraveling skeins of tangled family history and discovering that Trina was sexually abused by her stepfather, Big Dishman. Her childhood trauma has been passed down through her generations as Trina descends into addiction. Jenisha goes to Florida to live with her relatives. Her brother entered the child welfare system. They never had a stable living environment and caused harm that fueled their own addictions. This is a very difficult reading. It’s a masterclass in craft and a bold testament to courage in the face of repeated humiliation. The last line of this piece is the most triumphant and inspiring passage I have read this year. I won’t give any spoilers. It speaks the truth. Unless we can stand up, pick up a pen, and start writing our own stories, we come into this world with parts of our stories written for us. —K.S.

Ayman Ismail and Mary Harris | Slate | September 10, 2023 | 3,418 words

“Being alive is better than being clean.” This belief is echoed by the Talk to Drug Users, who dial the Never Use Alone (NUA) hotline, a service that drug users can call when using alone. This serves as a guideline for the operator. If there is no answer during a call, an operator will send help. This moving story by Ayman Ismail is a sister work to Mary Harris. this american life This episode depicts Jessica Blanchard, one of the operators in Southwest Georgia, receiving these calls on her cell phone. Blanchard, a former nurse and director of education at NUA, is also the mother of an addict. She has a “mommy soul,” a sixth sense. I know Within minutes of talking to someone if you need to call EMS. Critics ask: Does this approach to preventing overdose enable drug use? Wouldn’t giving her own daughter a clean needle be a step in the wrong direction? Blanchard is nonjudgmental, caring, and a literal angel who gives each caller a second chance. As Ismail shows, NUA’s work makes a strong case for harm reduction and shows how treating others with dignity is not only compassionate but can also save lives. —CLR

Elizabeth Colbert | The New Yorker | September 4, 2023 | 8,276 words

David Gruber is the kind of person who ponders questions like, “What does a fluorescent shark look like to another fluorescent shark?” He’s the kind of guy I want to read about. Gruber, one of the founders of the Cetacean Translation Initiative (Project CETI for short), is currently trying to decipher the click patterns of sperm whales. In short, he wants to talk to whales. (I’m sure he has questions for animals, too.) Animals with language can be a touchy topic in the scientific community, but Gruber has assembled an impressive group that includes some of the biggest names in the field of artificial intelligence. I did. The theory is that with enough data machine learning, an algorithm could be trained to understand whale clicks. But getting the data requires attaching a recording device to the whale’s back with a suction cup, which is no mean feat, especially when reporters are watching. The team perseveres, despite a strange and wayward recording device happily flying around the Caribbean. I am glad. A lot is at stake in developing AI models, and a deeper understanding of nature will be a positive factor. This work will make you think a lot, but will reward you with some great scenes, so read on and discover. —C.W.

Wyatt Williams | Bitter Southerner | September 4, 2023 | 6,303 words

When I opened the email from bitter southerner On September 5th, I saw they shared a new article about Lucinda Williams. They had my attention. That’s when I realized the author was Wyatt Williams (no relation). I sat up straight. Reminds me of Williams in “Eat the Whale” harpers magazine, a work that I enjoyed from beginning to end. How good is that feeling when you know something is going to work? I had it. I took a few days to ingest this piece because I didn’t want it to end. Williams’ mother and singer-songwriter Lucinda Williams were born a few months apart in Louisiana in 1953, but this is not just a profile of Lucinda or a survey of the author’s personal history. Williams traces her voice throughout her life, from car rides in her childhood to nights spent on the porch with her mother listening to her songs. The song brings to mind the “Idea of ​​Louisiana” where flooded areas are slowly being washed away and people are trying to survive despite poverty. , abuse, alcoholism. What fascinated me about this piece was that even after studying Lucinda’s work in depth, Williams never came to terms with her complicated feelings about her hometown, saying, Her only answer is the same reason I hate it. ” What you end up with is a profound portrait of a place and a family, and even if you look closely enough, there’s still beauty there if you’re willing to look. —K.S.

jackson waldo | GQ | September 13, 2023 | 2,725 words

When you first meet James Grammer, the central figure in this underdog sports story, you could be forgiven for thinking: This again? The seeming isolation of white wrestlers, or athletes in a sport deemed by tradition (or racism) to be “not their own,” has inspired much of the fish-out-of-the-water works. Thankfully, Jackson Waldo’s story completely ignores that trope, making Grammer one of the most interesting characters I met this week. Although sumo has grown in the United States over the past few years, it remains a curiosity. When Grammer and his fellow enthusiasts began practicing in Brooklyn parks, they had to deal with onlookers attending and betting on the games. Grammer wants to be a champion, but the appeal of his story lies less in his quest for greatness than in his human complexity. Most sumo wrestlers think about their opponent’s weaknesses before the match. It’s not glamorous. “As a practitioner of Tibetan Buddhism, he believes in a series of gods, including fierce and angry gods, and he looks directly into the eyes of his partner, imagining himself and his partner as arms and legs.” Waldo wrote. The hair of one of the evil gods sways in the wind. “Yes, you can find an excellent niche characteristic of his sports works. A giant boa constrictor, a wannabe samurai, 340-man glamour, and Valdo sparring with predictable results. But that’s the glamor itself. Remember, especially someone he is outside of society. sumo ring. —PR

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