ArcaMax

BOISE, Idaho -- When Michelle Short, 52, was diagnosed with a brain tumor in 2019, her first thought was about how she’d maintain care for her son.

Then a single mother to a 12-year-old with severe intellectual and developmental disabilities, Short made a decision she thought she’d never have to make: She put her son, Riley, in a group home...Read more

'WHITE BIRD'

PG-13 for some strong violence, thematic material and language.

What it’s about: An older woman recounts her childhood experience in the Holocaust to help her grandson learn a lesson about kindness.

The kid attractor factor: This young adult-aimed film has appeal for older kids and teens in its characters, story and lessons.

...Read more

Q. My ex and I have been separated for 6 months. Yesterday my ex refused to drop our kids off at my home because my girlfriend’s car was in the driveway. I think she thinks my girlfriend and I were seeing each other prior to our breakup, but we were not. She was a co-worker and that is against company policy. I was recently transferred to ...Read more

It has been 10 years since we bought a new car, which puts us roughly 2,000 light years behind the curve on automobile technology.

Our new car has smart car features, not to be confused with one of those little Smart cars that looks like it fell out of a Cracker Jack box and can be washed in a dishwasher.

We are still learning about all the ...Read more

Staying fit was important to Linda Griffin, especially after she was diagnosed with high blood pressure. That came after the birth of her third child, April, when Linda was 29. Since then, she'd taken medication to control her blood pressure.

She was also concerned about heart disease because her father had two bypass surgeries. He later died ...Read more

As a captain of the Chicago Luvabull dancers in the late 1990s, Natalie Poli gasped for air after performing elaborate dances on the basketball court for Chicago Bulls fans.

Poli had danced her whole life – she started at age 3. In her eighth-grade graduation program, her answer to "What do you want to be when you grow up?" was "Dance for the...Read more

B is surviving, but not living. Existing with unconscious effort for over eighty thousand years, brought forth by a myth-spinning mother and lightning bolt of a father, he has been a weapon from birth and cannot avoid a life dedicated to killing, though he cannot die himself.

Such an existence must be exhausting, and in actor Keanu Reeves‘ ...Read more

On the first day of their honeymoon, they had planned to sleep in, relax, then explore their Sandals resort in Saint Lucia.

But when Nate Kuhlman, 23, awoke that sunny morning, he couldn’t wait to hit the waves. He convinced Mari, 22, to go water skiing.

With a driver and spotter on the boat, there was only room for one of them. Mari watched...Read more

'MEGALOPOLIS'

Rated R for sexual content, nudity, drug use, language and some violence.

What it’s about: A sprawling epic about a misunderstood genius who wants to build a futuristic utopian community.

The kid attractor factor: Not much attraction for kids here. This is for adults only.

Good lessons/bad lessons: Daring thinkers will always...Read more

One of the promises of autumn where we live comes when the university marching band starts practicing on the front campus up the street from us.

Time was, I’d hear the unmistakable rat-a-tat-tat of the snare drums, and I’d grab my youngest by the hand and run the five minutes to the field in front of the music building where we would take ...Read more

Q. I have a 9-year-old son from my first marriage. My ex-wife (from my second marriage) and I raised my son together for 5 years. We split up 2 years ago, but she is still in my son’s life and spends a few hours with him every week. My new partner is resentful of even the smallest amount of time my son spends with her and demands that I no ...Read more

New research suggests that our thinking about aging is, well, old and outdated. A recent study claims people do not age gradually in a slow, linear fashion, but age in waves.

From what I gather, these are not gentle waves we are talking about, but waves more like tsunamis.

The first tsunami hits around age 44. Check and done.

My experience ...Read more

“The man who comes back through the Door in the Wall will never be quite the same as the man who went out. He will be wiser but less sure, happier but less self-satisfied, humbler in acknowledging his ignorance, yet better equipped to understand the … systematic reasoning to the unfathomable mystery which it tries, forever vainly, to ...Read more

The morning of Terrianne Zonca's grandfather's funeral in Honolulu, she was so busy getting ready that she forgot to eat breakfast.

Before going to the mortuary, Zonca's family gathered at her parents' house. They shared a glass of sake in honor of her beloved grandfather.

When the service started, Zonca's heart was racing. Her palms were ...Read more

It’s been said before that most poetry is autobiographical. Poetry is known to draw from a place of truth — whether emotional truth, universal observation, or personal anecdote. But "Recalibrating Gravity" by Mary Keating is a true memoir, told through a series of poems. In many ways, verse is the ideal form for Keating to share a story that...Read more