"Change, Change, Change"

If you can't find the humor in it, growing older will amount to nothing more than a long, ugly slide into hot flashes, brittle bones and St. John's Wort. Read how I have embraced middle age (and my midriff bulge) here and how we women of a certain age are affirmed here .

Celebrating "Tyrone"

The foul-mouthed MC, the selfish athlete, the irresponsible baby daddy. Negative images of black masculinity are ingrained into pop culture and constantly reinforced by the media.

Natalie Hopkinson and Natalie Y. Moore try to debunk some of those myths in their book, Deconstructing Tyrone, which I discuss in today's column.

If you're like me, you know more Everyday Tyrones then the aforementioned stereotypes. If that's the case, click here to celebrate Tyrone, the kind of black men we know and love.

Unexcused Absence

That doesn't refer to me, though I have been gone for a while. I'm talking about the truancy epidemic among high school students that is sweeping the country.

Around 50 percent of kids drop of out school nationally, and that number is higher among black and Latino students. Lots of reasons for this, none of them simple, which makes solutions even more difficult. I try to address the dilemma in this week's column.
Meanwhile, here's a link to some useful information.

What do you think? We need some answers.