Currently, the number of states that require sex education to be medically accurate is 17. You read that number right. Only 17 of the 39 states, plus DC, that mandate some form of sexual education and/or HIV education require it to be medically accurate. Furthermore, even though sex education is mandated in 39 states, abstinence-only is still considered sex education despite it being proven not to work.

When I opened them I marveled at a large dinner plate adorned with a vivid orange monarch and then I , like all the times before, meticulously repackaged it, placing the boxes in the back of my closet. They were stunning and I dreamed of the day that I would have a home for myself and use them. As I mused, however, I never suspected that nearly two decades would pass before I would open those boxes again.

Prayers, as a treatment, are cheaper. Like pharmacy shopping on the way to a party you’re late for, Rite Aide cards for tangent condolences, they do the job for which they were made; broken arrows of the spirit, loosed from the hole inside our gut, messengers from the seat of the soul.

I’m visiting my mom in Wilmington, Delaware for a few weeks in the summer of 2006. I’m fifteen. Mom drank and did a few lines before retiring to the bedroom we shared during our visits. My younger brother stays up with her as she looks out the window for cops, while I escape downstairs to watch MTV. I know from bits I’ve heard on the radio and seen on the Internet that “Miss Murder” is in the top 10. I have to see Davey. I have to hear his voice. I need the song to enter my bloodstream. I don’t care if I had to stay up through the witching hour to hear it. I need it now. 

Recently, a person said to me, “The ONLY good Beatles song is ‘Get Back’ and this is undisputed.” (*COUGH* co-editor of Olney Magazine *COUGH* *COUGH*) In response to this drastically mistaken opinion, I decided to list twenty of my favorite Beatles songs, with some context added, all mainly for the benefit of one of our editors. This was magnificently difficult considering the unfathomably high number of great Beatles songs, but my hand was forced. You won’t enjoy reading this as much as I enjoyed listening to The Beatles, but I hope you might enjoy it a little—somehow.

For many in gym culture, this is the point where things can get very toxic. “If you wanna get big, you gotta eat big!”, “Train hard to get hard!”, and so on. Next thing you know, you’re eating until you’re uncomfortable, ever chasing the “pump”, all while trying to cover over a deep, amorphous something-nothingness. It’s not all bad, and I’m not trying to be dramatic, but as I was in the thick of becoming a competitive powerlifter, I started to see how this hobby can quickly become an unhealthy culture.