Belly Breath Pause

Take one deep, intentional breath. Work up to 10 breaths.

Digital Device Pause

Screen fatigue, anyone? Create a new recharge rule or ritual. No news after 6 p.m., maybe, or
only 15 minutes of social media a day.

Expressing Pause

Give yourself the gift to express yourself. We are all having a lot of feelings right now. Write
or journal. Dance. Name a feeling. Have a conversation. When we express ourselves, we honor how we feel as we connect with ourselves or others. The benefit is we feel recharged, more
alive, and more engaged afterward.

—Rachael O’Meara is the author of Pause: Harnessing the Life-Changing Power of Giving Yourself a Break (TarcherPerigee, 2017) and host of Pausecast, a podcast featuring interviews with experts on emotional intelligence and mindfulness. She earned an M.B.A. at Fordham’s Gabelli School of Business in 2004 and has worked in sales and client services at Google for more than 10 years.

plucked from the folds of my skirt
and perfumed with citrus and sweat.

Behind me, las cabras and my cousins
calling baaaa-baaaa-baaaa.

In front, foggy glass pitcher
of sugar water in her hands.

I want to steal a lemon, feel the sting
of spring on my pursed lips.

Want to see her, squeezing
fruit again. Her, filling

the pitcher. Her, filling
each of our glasses to the brim.

—Li Yun Alvarado, Ph.D., GSAS ’09, ’15

About this Poem

My brother and I spent our summers with our extended family in Puerto Rico when we were kids. My grandparents had a limón tree in their backyard, and beyond the yard’s chain link fence there was a huge field full of goats that my cousins, brother, and I would spend hours imitating. I wrote this poem to honor Mama Merida, who passed away in 2007, and the many happy memories we had in that backyard. This poem has even more significance for me now that my papi, Jun Alvarado, has joined Mama Merida after he passed away in December.

About the Author

Li Yun Alvarado is the author of Words or Water (Finishing Line Press, 2016). She earned a Ph.D. in English at Fordham, where she also served as the graduate assistant for the Poets Out Loud reading series. A native New Yorker, she lives in California and takes frequent trips to Salinas, Puerto Rico, to visit la familia.

Pope Francis: In Your Eyes I See My Words

This spring saw the publication of the second volume in Fordham University Press’ collection of homilies, letters, and speeches by Jorge Mario Bergoglio, archbishop of Buenos Aires, in the years before he became Pope Francis. (The third and final volume is due in October.) In an introduction to this book, which covers 2005 to 2008, Patrick J. Ryan, S.J., the Laurence J. McGinley Professor of Religion and Society at Fordham, writes about the future pope’s focus on “ecological ethics” during this time, and his growing ability to “[enter]into the tragedies of his fellow citizens” and “speak truth to power,” particularly after 194 people were killed in a fire at a nightclub whose owner had ignored the fire safety code in the building’s construction.

For Marina A. Herrera, Ph.D., GSAS ’71, ’74, who translated the pope’s words into English, the book highlights the pope’s “boundless linguistic creativity” and gives readers an opportunity to see how “a mind destined to lead the Church in this turbulent time was shaped in the laboratory of a life lived among the people he served, traveling in public buses and shunning the trappings of hierarchical privilege.”

That Further Shore: A Memoir of Irish Roots and American Promise

In this memoir, John D. Feerick, FCRH ’58, LAW ’61, dean emeritus and Norris Professor of Law at Fordham Law School, reflects with characteristic humility and humor on his upbringing as the eldest child of Irish immigrant parents in the South Bronx, his landmark role in framing the U.S. Constitution’s 25th Amendment during the 1960s, his leadership as dean of Fordham Law for 18 years, and his commitment to a life lived in the service of others. The Prayer of St. Francis (“Lord, make me an instrument of your peace”) hung on a plaque on his Fordham office wall for many years, he writes, a reminder of “the importance of being a bridge builder” and “not letting the pressure of everyday life take away from our capacity to feel for one another.”

Related Story: On May 27, Joseph M. McShane, S.J., president of Fordham, served as guest host of the show Fordham Conversations to interview John Feerick for WFUV, the University’s public media station. 

Lady Liberty: An Illustrated History of America’s Most Storied Woman

In a series of brief essays—richly illustrated with 33 full-page reproductions of paintings by Antonio Masi—Joan Marans Dim recounts the epic struggle to create the Statue of Liberty and transport it from France to the U.S. during the 19th century. She also writes about the immigrant experience, and how “The New Colossus,” an 1883 sonnet by Emma Lazarus (“Give me your tired, your poor,/ your huddled masses yearning to breathe free”) helped transform the statue into a symbol of American freedom and economic prosperity for arriving immigrants—an ideal often at odds with U.S. immigration policy and Americans’ shifting attitudes toward immigrants through the years.

There are bears still, said the man. They come and go, but keep to themselves.

I like that the mountaintop looks like one. And that it will always stay right where it is, said the girl.

That’s why I put her there, the man said. The bear is a companion to her while she sleeps. I hope one day I’ll sleep there, too.

The girl was quiet for a moment, then asked, What are they really like?

Bears?

Yes. Are they nice?

They’re shy, the man said, if that’s what you mean.

I mean will they roar at us and come eat our food if they’re hungry? The real ones?

No, said the man. They don’t roar unless you bother them. Or threaten their young. My father once told me they will travel a long way to do good, for their own or another. It’s a promise they make when they are very young, whispering it to their mothers even before their eyes are open.

The girl swung slowly in the hammock, wondering what a bear’s whispered promise might sound like, until the man asked, Would you like to hear the story my father told me about a bear who saved an entire village by keeping that promise?

Yes, the girl said, and sat up so quickly that the hammock almost overturned them onto the pine-needle floor. The man grabbed hold of the tree just in time, and after a good laugh, he began to tell this story to the girl.

Once upon a time, in a place along a wide and winding river, there lived a king who demanded the villagers in his kingdom give him all of the silver and gold they possessed. They were good farmers on fertile land, but he was the king. So they gave him their silver and gold and went out to their fields to grow the food they would eat, thankful at least for the fruit of their labors. Summer went by peacefully and the villagers were about to take in one of their best harvests ever, when the king demanded they give him all of the grain they had grown.

They resisted, asking, Why would you do this to us? What will we eat? But the king answered none of their questions. He sent his soldiers and took everything the people had harvested, so that they had to live on what they could glean from the dust on the floor.

That winter, not long before the calendar said it was spring, and with the people on the brink of starvation, an old but affable bear came through the village on his way to the fair. When he saw what a state the villagers were in, he asked them why. So they told him.

And after our children die, the village elder said, we will die, and then, of whom will that king be king?

The bear scratched the hair under his hat and asked for a small wagon, a bundle of hay, and a large coat. He put the hay in the wagon, threw the coat over the pile, and set off with the wagon in the direction of the king’s palace.

When the bear arrived, he asked for an audience with the king, and when he stood before him, he asked the rich king if he would like to see a dance.

The king said yes, because he was lonely, and so the bear danced.

And when the bear had finished with the performance, the king was so delighted, he asked the bear if he would dance for him again in the morning.

Yes, said the bear. If you give me some food from your stores.

The king agreed, and this was how the bear found out where the king kept the grain he had taken from the villagers. That night the bear filled his wagon and left in the storeroom the hay he had brought.

In the morning, after the bear had danced again for the king, he said that he would come back the next day if the king let him retreat to the other side of the river so that he could practice a new dance. The king agreed, and the bear wheeled his wagon out of the castle grounds, with the grain piled high beneath the cover of the large coat. The palace guards saw the same wagon leaving as the one that had arrived, and so they suspected nothing.

The bear did this from the first quarter moon to the full, leaving only large piles of hay in the king’s storehouse. In that time, he gave all of the grain back to the villagers, without so much as the king’s cook knowing that it was gone, for he thought the bear had simply eaten his fill and the hay had been there all along.

Now, when the full moon was waning and the villagers could feed themselves again, they asked the bear if he had seen their silver and gold. He said he had, for it was kept in the same row of locked storehouses where the king kept the grain. With their money back, the villagers said, they could raise an army and overthrow the king. And yet, they despaired of ever seeing their fortunes again.

The bear had missed the fair by now and had become fond of the villagers. He scratched his head again and said, I will get your silver and gold back. I ask only that you wait to overthrow your king until I return with my own army to help you.

The villagers couldn’t believe their luck.

You have an army? they asked.

Of course, said the bear. It’s made up of every animal and tree in the forest.

So the villagers agreed and the bear left for the palace.

The king was overjoyed to see the bear, for he needed cheering up. All of the food he had stored away from the harvest was gone and he didn’t know what he could offer.

A piece of silver will do, the bear said, and then I will be on my way.

The king agreed, and the bear danced his best dance ever, after which the king bade the bear to follow his guards to the storeroom and take whatever amount of silver he thought was a fair price for the dance. The bear, true to his word, took one piece of silver and placed it in his pocket. Then he asked if he could sleep there, as it was late and, with the moon on the wane, there would be robbers in the forest.

Now, while the king and all of his court slept, the bear bribed the blacksmith with a silver piece to start his forge, after which the blacksmith could go back to sleep. And when the forge was hot and the blacksmith was snoring away like flabby bellows, the bear melted down all the silver and gold in the storehouse. Then he poured the silver into four molds of four wheels, and the gold into the mold of a wagon.

In the morning the bear took ashes from the forge and blackened the silver wheels and the golden wagon, then wheeled his pile of hay covered with the large overcoat away from the palace, through the forest, and into the village, giving back everything the king had stolen from his subjects in the form of the wagon.

The villagers were beside themselves with joy. They wanted to melt down the silver and gold right away and get to work on their army, when the bear reminded them, Wait for me before you go into battle. Otherwise, it will not go well.

The villagers all agreed. The bear waved good-bye and walked off along the road that led into the forest.

One season went by, then another, and another, and the bear did not return. In time, the villagers went back to their farming, the old king died, and his daughter ascended to the throne. This young woman was intelligent and kind, forgiving and fair. She treated her subjects well, and they worked for her in return. And no one in that village ever again set eyes on the bear.

After the man had finished the story, the girl sat in the hammock, rocking still, and stared off in the direction of the forest.

Have bears ever really talked to people? she asked her father. I don’t mean in the stories. I mean when there were people to talk to.

I’ve never heard one, the man said. The bear we saw was quiet, but maybe he didn’t see us, or didn’t have anything to say. So I don’t know.

He saw us, said the girl.

Well, there’s your answer, said the man.

Excerpt from The Bear. Copyright © 2020 by Andrew Krivak. Published by Bellevue Literary Press: www.blpress.org. Reprinted by permission of the publisher. All rights reserved.

Andrew Krivak, GSAS ’95, is the author of three novels, including The Sojourn, which was nominated for a National Book Award in 2011. He is also the author of A Long Retreat: In Search of a Religious Life, a 2008 memoir about his eight years as a Jesuit. He lives with his wife and three children in Somerville, Massachusetts, and Jaffrey, New Hampshire, in the shadow of Mount Monadnock, which inspired much of the landscape in his latest novel.

Anne Fernald’s “Whatever” Soup

Anne Fernald, Ph.D., professor of English and women’s, gender, and sexuality studies, has maintained her Sunday night efforts to cook for the work week. “I realized that if I did not do it, I would revert to my natural diet, which is bread and cheese with some butter,” she says. “I do nothing but teach and cook these days and, in a welcome development, my husband has been cooking a tiny bit, too.” Her favorite recipe hails from The New York Times’ Samin Nosrat. It’s called Whatever You Want Soup, and it “serves as a canvas for any kind of chunky soup,” Nosrat writes. Here is Fernald’s take on it.

Ingredients
4 tablespoons butter, olive oil, or neutral-tasting oil
2 medium onions, diced
3 cloves garlic, sliced
Kosher salt
6 to 8 cups meat, vegetables, or other add-ins
Ground turkey
Shredded cabbage
Carrots, cut into rounds
Tomato, chopped
Green onion, sliced
1 1⁄2pounds raw, boneless chicken (optional)
8 cups water or chicken stock, preferably homemade

Steps
1. Set a large Dutch oven or stockpot over medium-high heat and add 4 tablespoons butter or oil. When the butter melts or the oil shimmers, add onions and garlic, and a generous pinch of salt.
2. Reduce the heat to medium and cook, stirring occasionally, until the onions are tender, about 15 minutes.
3. Place the meat, vegetables, and other add-ins in the pot, along with the raw chicken (if using), and add enough liquid to cover. Season with salt. Increase heat to high and bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer.
4. Cook until the flavors have come together and the vegetables and greens are tender, about 20 minutes more. If you added raw chicken, remove it from the soup when cooked, allow to cool, shred, and return to the soup. Taste and adjust for salt.
5. Add more hot liquid if needed to thin the soup to desired consistency. Taste and adjust for salt.
6. Serve hot, and garnish as desired.

Yield: 6 to 8 servings l Time: About 45 minutes
Base recipe courtesy of Samin Nosrat/The New York Times

The Raffetto Family’s Pink Rice

Raffetto’s has been selling made-in-house pasta and other Italian specialties on New York City’s Houston Street since 1906, spanning four generations of the family. The two most recent generations include brothers Richard, FCRH ’82, and Andrew, FCRH ’84, and Andrew’s daughter Sarah, PCS ’13. Romana Raffetto, Richard and Andrew’s mother, made this dish many times over the years. The Raffettos still make it regularly, Sarah says, because it is so delicious, comforting, and easy. “We use the Reggiano crumbs because, like Nonna taught us, we try not to waste anything, and while cutting wheels of cheese for retail we save the broken crumbs for future recipes.”

Ingredients
1 cup Arborio rice
1 ice cream scoop of salt (a common measurement in our kitchen)
4 tablespoons (1⁄2 stick) butter
4 tablespoons Raffetto’s tomato and basil sauce (or a similar sauce of your choice)
Parmigiano-Reggiano crumbs to taste

Steps
1. Bring a pot of salted water to boil. Add rice, cover, and cook for 20 minutes.
2. While the rice is cooking, you can get the butter ready by melting it in a bowl. Otherwise, make sure that the butter is out long enough to soften so it will melt easily when the rice is done cooking.
3. When the rice is cooked, strain with a fine mesh strainer and add to the bowl with butter. Stir in Raffetto’s tomato and basil sauce (or any red sauce) in tablespoon increments, adding more or less as desired.
4. Stir in Parmigiano and eat immediately while everything is warm and the cheese melts, resulting in a beautiful light pink color with chunks of tomatoes.

Note: “Nonna Romana hardly ever measured anything,” Sarah says. “She was a casual cook who
knew by eye more than numbers. Modify slightly to your needs and enjoy!”

Yield: 4 to 6 servings l Time: About 20 minutes

Taylor Ha’s Whipped Coffee

Fordham graduate student and Fordham News staff writer Taylor Ha recently recorded herself making a drink that’s gone viral amid the pandemic. Whipped coffee, a four- ingredient beverage that originated in South Korea, was recently featured on TikTok’s trending page, with more than 312,000 videos using the hashtag #whippedcoffee, according to ABC News. In their home kitchen, Ha and her mother created their own version of the popular drink, complete with a slow-motion video of the production process. They also made spaghetti aglio e olio. “Both were delicious and super satisfying to make,” Ha says. “I’ll admit I didn’t actually cook, since I was filming everything, but it was nice to bond with my mom at home.”

Ingredients
2 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons instant ground coffee
2 tablespoons freshly boiled water
1 cup almond milk or any other milk (enough to fill a glass 3⁄4 of the way up)

Steps
1. Combine the sugar, instant coffee, and boiled water in a small bowl, whisking the mixture until it becomes silky smooth and turns a light shade of brown. Set aside.
2. Place a few ice cubes in a glass cup and fill the cup three-quarters full with almond milk.
3. Add a few dollops of whipped coffee on top and gently stir the whole thing.

Daejah Woolery’s Jamaican Dumplings with Jerk Chicken and Butternut Squash

When Fordham College at Lincoln Center sophomore Daejah Woolery moved off campus, she started cooking more. She says she doesn’t always have the time to make elaborate dishes, but as a Jamaican, “food is super important to the culture,” so she makes an extra effort to cook from scratch. “I’m excited to make this for my family and show them my slight twist on Jamaican boiled dumplings with chicken!”

Ingredients
Boiled dumplings
2 cups flour
5 teaspoons salt
1⁄4 cup cornmeal
1⁄2 cup cold water
Jerk seasoning (Note: bottled jerk seasoning can be substituted.)
1 tablespoon garlic powder
2 to 3 teaspoons cayenne pepper
2 teaspoons onion powder
2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon paprika
1 teaspoon ground allspice
1⁄2 teaspoon black pepper
1⁄2 teaspoon dried crushed red pepper
1⁄2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1⁄4 teaspoon cinnamon
Butternut squash, as much as you like, cut into cubes
Chicken, any cut, as much as you like, cut into cubes
(Note: I typically use 2 boneless chicken breasts and 12 oz. frozen, pureed butternut squash.)

Steps
1. Bring a large pot of water to a boil.
2. Combine flour, salt, cornmeal, and cold water. Adjust until you have a dough that doesn’t stick to your hands.
3. Make small disc-like shapes and drop them into the boiling water for about 10 minutes. Try not to overcrowd your pot! Remove from heat and set aside. Or they can remain in the water with the heat off.
4. Combine all jerk seasoning ingredients and set aside.
5. Bring another large pot of water to a boil and add squash cubes.
6. When squash is softened, after about 15-20 minutes, puree or mash it finely.
7. Heat pureed squash in a saucepan on medium-low heat and add some of your jerk seasoning to taste. Switch to low heat after you see bubbles. Add about 1⁄4 cup of water if you want a thinner sauce.
8. Season the chicken with jerk seasoning and cook it however you like; throw it in the air fryer if you’re in a rush or sauté it like I usually do.
9. Once the chicken is cooked, add it to the saucepan with the squash and resist the urge to eat it immediately. Let it simmer together on medium-low heat for 5 minutes. Make sure the chicken gets surrounded by the sauce. The sweet and nutty taste of the squash will interact really well with the jerk seasoning.
10. Transfer the dumplings to a plate and put some chicken and squash directly on top!

Yield: 4 servings l Time: About 60 minutes

Clint Ramos’ Filipino Chicken Adobo

Clint Ramos, head of design and production in the Fordham Theatre program, has won several awards, including a Tony and an Obie, for his set and costume designs. He posted a photo of his chicken adobo on Instagram that prompted inquiries about the recipe. With roots in the activist street theater scene in Manila, he advises that one eat the dish while pondering “how much of what you enjoyed was indigenous or a result of Spanish colonialism.”

Ingredients
2 pounds boneless chicken thighs (I like skin but you can also do skinless)
4 dried bay leaves
8 tablespoons dark soy sauce (I use Kikkoman)
8 tablespoons coconut vinegar (apple cider vinegar will also do well)
8 cloves garlic, peeled and crushed
11⁄2 cups water
3 tablespoons cooking (canola or any high heat) oil
1⁄4 teaspoon salt (optional—the salinity from the soy may be enough)
1 teaspoon whole peppercorns
1 teaspoon brown sugar

Steps
1. Marinate chicken in soy sauce, vinegar, and garlic for at least 3 hours or overnight in the fridge.
2. Separate chicken from marinade, removing as much of the liquid as possible. Save all of the marinade (this will be your braising liquid).
3. Heat oil in a pan on medium-high heat and brown chicken on both sides (about 2 minutes per side).
4. In the same pan, pour in the marinade (garlic and all) and water. Bring to a boil.
5. Add bay leaves and peppercorns and reduce heat to low to simmer.
6. Simmer for 30 minutes or until chicken is tender. I completely cover it for 15 minutes and let some of the steam out for the remaining 15 with a wooden spoon lodged between lid and pot. Important: Watch that the liquid reduces to a slightly thickened sauce but not completely.
7. Add sugar and cook for another 5 to 10 minutes.
8. Serve over hot white or brown rice and enjoy!

Yield: 6 to 8 servings l Time: About 60 minutes

Loren Avellino’s Banana Lace Cookies

As a first-generation Italian-American woman, Loren Avellino, FCLC ’07, says she practically grew up in the kitchen. In fact, when she got the opportunity to live in McMahon Hall for the summer as an orientation coordinator at the Lincoln Center campus, she hosted pasta nights for fellow summer residents. Today, she has a degree in culinary arts, a catering company, and a food blog. She recently started a video cooking series on her Instagram page, @lo_go_cook. “When I’m in the kitchen, my anxiety seems to melt away, and if I can take others on that journey with me, especially during these uncertain times, then I’ve done a tiny part to help during this crisis,” Avellino says.

Ingredients
1⁄2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
1 cup white sugar
1 teaspoon white or apple cider vinegar
1 cup mashed brown bananas (about 2 large bananas)
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup almond flour*
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup dark chocolate chips
*Almond flour is important for crispy, lacy cookies (see tip on next page about using only all-purpose flour)

Steps
1. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Beat together the butter and sugar until fluffy.
2. Add the vinegar and vanilla and continue to beat until incorporated. The vinegar helps to offset the sweetness of the ripe bananas.
3. Add the baking soda in with the mashed bananas, then mix into the butter mixture.
4. Whisk together the all-purpose flour, almond flour, and salt. Add to the batter and mix until just combined.
5. Fold the dark chocolate chips into the batter.
6. Drop tablespoon-size amounts of batter onto parchment or silicone-lined baking sheet, making sure they are about 2 inches apart. You should have 42 to 48 cookies.
7. Bake 12 to 14 minutes until the edges are dark brown. (The dark color is important for crispy cookies). Let the cookies cool on the cookie sheet for at least 10 minutes before moving to a wire rack to complete cooling.

Tip: You could use only all-purpose flour, but the cookies will be denser and less crispy than the almond flour version.

Yield: 42 to 48 cookies l Time: About 45 minutes

B.A. Van Sise’s Ricotta Gnocchi with Roasted Pepper Sauce

Photojournalist B.A. Van Sise, FCLC ’05, jokes that his mother preferred food “so heavy that a black hole would not easily escape its pull.” For her homemade gnocchi, she’d replace the potato with rich, creamy ricotta and make the supple dough herself, rolling it and cutting it by hand. “It’s an easy activity that does not need but asks for six hands,” Van Sise says. “Recruit your kids for help, if you’ve got them. Trust me: they’ll remember it, fondly.”

Ingredients
Pasta
2 pounds ricotta cheese
4 eggs
4 cups flour
2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon pepper
Sauce
1 16 oz. jar roasted red peppers
1⁄2 cup heavy cream
4 tablespoons garlic
2 tablespoons butter
1⁄2 teaspoon dried basil
black pepper

Steps
1. In a large mixing bowl, mix the ricotta and eggs. Gradually add the flour, salt, and pepper.
2. Knead well on a floured board and roll into finger-sized long rolls, then cut into pieces about 3⁄4 inch long.
3. Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Add the gnocchi, stirring gently from time to time to make sure they don’t mingle too much. Cook for 8 minutes.
4. Meanwhile, in a blender, add the roasted red peppers as well as about 2 tablespoons of liquid from the jar, and puree.
5. In a saucepan, sauté the garlic and butter for approximately 2 minutes until both the butter and garlic soften; add the pureed peppers, the basil, and a little bit of black pepper. Simmer for 5 minutes, then add the heavy cream and simmer for 5 more.
6. Cover the drained gnocchi with the sauce, and either serve right away or put into a preheated oven at 350 degrees for 10 minutes to crisp them up.

Yield: 4 to 6 servings l Time: About 40 minutes

Serving Those Who Are Hungry

The economic impact of the coronavirus pandemic has led to an increase in the number of people who can’t afford food and are at risk of going hungry. Fordham graduates are among the many professionals working to meet the challenges of this deepening public health crisis. Read our interviews with Camesha Grant, Ph.D., GSS ’00, ’07, vice president of community connection and reach at the Food Bank for New York City; and Janet Miller, GSS ’97, senior vice president at CAMBA, a Brooklyn-based nonprofit that provides social services to New Yorkers in need.

Additional reporting by Tom Stoelker.

A new music recommendation from Russ Borris, music director at WFUV, 90.7 FM, wfuv.org.

“Hollywood”
by Car Seat Headrest
From the album Making a Door Less Open
Car Seat Headrest began as a solo project for Will Toledo about a decade ago. In the beginning, Toledo’s brand of indie rock was searing and guitar-driven, but “Hollywood” bears more resemblance to Beck’s Odelay (1996) than to Toledo’s previous work. It’s clear that 1 Trait Danger, Toledo’s more electro-sounding side project with drummer Andrew Katz, had an influence on the new album.

With the refrain “Hollywood makes me want to puke!” this track may not be your traditional song of the summer, but then again, this summer is shaping up to be anything but traditional. “Hollywood” is hooky and catchy and a completely fun listen that is likely to turn a whole new audience on to the music of Car Seat Headrest.

NFR!
by Lana Del Rey

Lizzy Grant, FCRH ’08, is better known as Lana Del Rey, her professional moniker as a singer, songwriter, and musician. Del Rey’s sixth album, Norman _______ Rockwell! was released in August 2019 to wide critical acclaim, with The Guardian, NPR, Pitchfork, and others naming it the best album of the year. The record is both personal and outward- looking. Del Rey describes intimate relationships and the increasingly precarious state of the world with the same biting wit and cool, deadpan vocal delivery, all over some of the most lush and intricate melodies she’s ever written. While her early work was sometimes described as “detached” or “ironic,” on NFR! the listener is plugged in to the funny, profound observations of an artist watching the world around her warp at high speed. As she croons on album highlight “The greatest,” “If this is it, I’m signing off … I hope the livestream’s almost on.” —Adam Kaufman

The Hunt
starring Betty Gilpin, FCLC ’08

Fordham Theatre alumna Betty Gilpin has had a big couple of years, earning Emmy nominations in 2018 and 2019 for her role as wrestler Liberty Belle in the Netflix series GLOW. But in The Hunt, she takes on what may be her biggest role yet. The film, described by its director and producers as a satire of the left-versus-right divide in American politics, sees Gilpin play Crystal Creasey, one among a group of captives who are kidnapped and hunted for sport. The film attracted a good deal of controversy, and its release was delayed in the wake of mass shootings in Dayton and El Paso, but it is now available on streaming services after a theatrical release in March. “It’s supposed to be a movie that you can [watch with]your family member who you can’t make eye contact with at Thanksgiving and you … laugh at each other and laugh at yourselves,” Gilpin recently told The New York Times. Katie Walsh of Tribune News Service wrote that the movie “is worth the price of admission for [Gilpin’s] performance alone,” and Vulture’s Alison Willmore wrote that Gilpin plays Crystal “with the kind of delectably unflappable timing ’80s action franchises were once built on.” —Adam Kaufman

Dorothy Day: Dissenting Voice of the American Century
by Blythe Randolph and John Loughery, FCRH ’75

In his last book, John Loughery focused on Fordham’s founder, Archbishop John Hughes, a key figure in 19th-century U.S. history and tireless advocate for struggling Irish immigrants. In his latest book, co-written with Randolph, he chronicles the life of Dorothy Day, co-founder of the Catholic Worker movement, outspoken pacifist and advocate for the poor, and critic of institutions both left and right. Judging by the reviews, Randolph and Loughery have provided the definitive biography. Writing in The New York Times, Karen Armstrong called it “precise and meticulous” and a “vivid account of her political and religious development.” The authors have revived a “voice for our times,” Samantha Power wrote in The Washington Post, noting Dorothy Day’s stances that have modern-day resonance—her attacks on corporate influence on public policy, her advocacy on behalf of refugees, and her “suspicions of an overzealous federal bureaucracy,” among others. —Chris Gosier

“My father was British, so we always heard about the English Channel. He used to say, ‘If you’re a real swimmer, you’ll swim the English Channel,’” said Fry, who earned an M.B.A. from Fordham’s Gabelli School of Business in 1987.

She completed her first channel crossing in 2003 at the age of 44. Little did she know then that it would be the start of a 16-year quest to complete six more of the world’s most challenging and rewarding long-distance, open-water swims.

Looking back, Fry, who was already a marathon runner and had been a member of the swimming team as an undergraduate at the University of Connecticut, said that she thinks marathon swimming was a natural next step.

“When I was swimming in the English Channel in Dover, people from all over the world were training there, and that’s when I heard about these other swims” that would eventually make up the Oceans Seven, she said, referring to the marathon swimming challenge devised in 2008 and modeled on mountaineering’s Seven Summits.

The other bodies of water are the Catalina Channel off the coast of California, the Strait of Gibraltar from Spain to Morocco, the Molokai Channel in Hawaii, the Tsugaru Channel in Japan, the Cook Strait in New Zealand, and the North Channel from Northern Ireland to Scotland.

“I had already put it on my list that I wanted to go to Japan—I had met the person that organized the swims over there,” Fry said. “So that’s kind of what started it, and then at some point during my journey the Oceans Seven became a goal for people, and so it just seemed like a natural thing [to complete the challenge]. Most of my swims are really about going to these places and meeting people that I had heard about or were just inspiring to me.”

‘It Was Cold. It Had Jellyfish. It Had Currents.’

Fry said her seventh leg, the North Channel swim, which she completed in August 2019 at the age of 60, was one of the most challenging.

“For the North Channel, it had everything—it was cold, it had jellyfish, it had currents, but it was still just beautiful,” she said. “I really was quite fearful of that channel, mostly because I would say I am hypersensitive to toxins and I have asthma, so all that stuff plays into it.”

That swim, however, allowed her to check off another accomplishment—becoming the oldest person to complete the Oceans Seven, according to Guinness World Records.

“I don’t know that I ever dreamed that I would be the oldest doing anything,” Fry, now 61, said with a laugh. “I have been inspired by so many people older than me, so my hope is that being the oldest person to swim the Oceans Seven will inspire other people to just keep on swimming.”

Fry attributes much of her success to having a well-prepared crew to help guide her and feed her during these swims, some of which have taken more than 24 hours to complete.

“My most important asset is my crew, and I’ve been really lucky—my sister Peggy has been my crew chief for almost all of my swims, and I don’t even have to say anything,” she said. “Having a well-trained crew and having someone that knows [what I need]is probably the most important and biggest safety thing that you can have out there. They never take their eyes off me.” That can be important, she said, because out in the water, it can feel like she’s all alone.

“I don’t think I’ve ever felt as tiny, like a little speck, as I did swimming in between Molokai and Oahu,” she said. “I mean the waves were massive, you’re just all alone out there, you can’t really see the shoreline.”

‘A Dynamic Meditation’

For Fry, though, once she’s in the water, she said her mind “goes blank.”

“It’s like a dynamic meditation for me—some people sing, some people know exactly how many strokes they’ve swam across,” she said. “I typically finish up the swim, and it’s like, ‘Oh yeah, I kind of remember that—what hour was that?’ I’m typically just really enjoying the water—even if it’s cold and dark, even in the darkest, the water will be phosphorescent. It’s just beautiful and tranquil, and I just love it so much, I don’t even notice that I’m getting pounded by waves.”

To prepare for her swims, Fry said, she spends as much time as she can in the water during the week, but particularly on weekends. In the winter, that means going to the local YMCA in Westport, Connecticut, her hometown, but in the spring and summer, she heads out to the Long Island Sound. To prepare for certain swims, such as swimming both ways around Manhattan Island—counterclockwise with the current, and clockwise against it—she’s gotten creative.

“I actually trained in Connecticut at a dam that used to release [water],” she said. “I used to swim against the dam release and just figure I’d make a little headway and get used to kind of swimming in one spot.”

’60 is the New 40′

Fry said that swimming has helped her in her professional life as a financial services consultant, and has also provided opportunities to get involved in her community. She helps organize the SWIM Across the Sound event off the coast of Connecticut each year, with the proceeds going to the St. Vincent’s Medical Center Foundation.

Fry said she hopes that people can see her story of finding her passion in midlife and really hitting her stride in her 60s as an example of never thinking it’s too late to do anything.

“I started late in life,” she said. “I was 44 when I started open-water swimming and marathon swimming, so for those folks [in midlife]now, I like to say, ‘60 is the new 40,’” she said, smiling. “I am swimming as fast as I ever have and … I’m as strong as I’ve ever been.

She and other Fordham experts offered advice for coping with the psychological effects of this pandemic while also strengthening overall well-being.

Give Thanks

David Marcotte, S.J., is a Jesuit priest, clinical psychologist, and associate professor who teaches a popular undergraduate course on the psychology of well-being and living  a happy life.

“Negative events are like a sponge” in the mind, he told students in one class session last year. “When [sponges]get wet, they start getting bigger and bigger, and if we’re not doing something to counteract that, the sponge gets so big that it fills our head.”

He begins each class with a five- minute mindfulness meditation and teaches other techniques for building resilience and keeping calm. Gratitude is better than optimism, hope, or even compassion for boosting mental health and satisfaction, he said.

Studies have shown that people who practice gratitude generally fare better than people who don’t. They cope better with stress, take a rosier view of life—and recover faster from illness.

Journal writing is one of many ways to practice gratitude. Carol Gibney, GSS ’03, an associate director of campus ministry at Fordham, said that she and her friends have started a daily text thread, sharing “three things that we’re grateful for.”

Find Community and a Sense of Purpose

In times of crisis, “what we know is important is a sense of family and community and connection,” even if it’s attained virtually, Mamber said.

Dr. Philip A. Pizzo, FCRH ’66, a pediatric oncologist and immunologist and former dean of the Stanford School of Medicine, has called for physicians to prescribe ways for their patients to foster this sense of community and connection. In a January 2020 article in the Journal of the American Medical Association, he noted that poor social relationships are tied to a greater risk of cardiovascular disease and strokes.

“Having a purpose, seeking social engagement, and fostering wellness through positive lifestyle choices (e.g., exercise, nutrition, mindfulness) are important in reducing morbidity and mortality and improving the life journey,” he wrote. “These variables are important at all stages of life and particularly for those in midlife and older.”

Volunteer

Finding ways to help  others,  like making phone calls to seniors or sewing protective masks, can provide purpose and address the sense of helplessness associated with not knowing what to do, Mamber said.

It’s also a way to cope with any sense of guilt at being spared others’ suffering, said Hilary Jacobs Hendel, GSS ’04, a psychotherapist and author of It’s Not Always Depression: Working the Change Triangle to Listen to the Body, Discover Core Emotions, and Connect to Your Authentic Self (Random House and Penguin UK, 2018).

Helping others could mean bringing food to a neighbor’s doorstep, for instance, or simply doing your part to contain the virus, she said. “Just taking care of your family and staying at home is being a good citizen,” she said.

Feel Your Emotions

Hendel emphasized the need to address and validate the emotions triggered by distressing news. It could be as simple as taking five minutes a few times a day to tune in to them. “If you start to just block the emotions, eventually it’s going to make one feel worse,” possibly leading to anxiety and depression, she said.

One tool for addressing strong emotions is the change triangle. Detailed in It’s Not Always Depression, it’s a way to identify blocked emotions, work through them, and keep them from becoming debilitating, Hendel said. Other techniques for managing anxiety include going to a quiet room, closing your eyes, and imagining a favorite place as experienced through all five senses.

Change Your State of Mind

Also helpful is keeping a list of “state changers” such as exercising, taking a bath, playing with a pet, calling a friend, watching a funny show— anything that can reliably help you feel better, Hendel said.

“The tiniest bits of relief are good enough just to take the edge off,” she said. “If the nervous system is firing away ‘danger, danger, danger,’ releasing adrenaline into the system, we don’t have conscious control over it. All we have conscious control over is how to try to calm it.”

She noted the many support groups that can be found online, as well as apps that help with meditation. Also useful are simple things like positive self-talk or mantras—“this is temporary,” “one day at a time.”

Take Time to Grieve

It’s important to balance empathy for others’ travails with self-care, she said, noting that highly sympathetic people can be “triggered all day long by the suffering.”

“Find your own balance, because it’s unique for everybody,” she said. “It’s an ongoing lifetime practice of getting to know yourself and what you need and what’s best for you.”

Be Kind to Yourself and Your Loved Ones

Jeffrey Ng, Psy.D., director of counseling and psychological services at Fordham, noted the importance of self-compassion.

“The current circumstances will likely make it more challenging for us to stay on track or get things done as effectively as we might have wanted or planned for,”  he said. “Being kinder, gentler, and more patient with ourselves when this happens will go a long way toward preserving and enhancing our mental health and well-being.”

Also, parents should be sensitive to all the events—concerts, plays, sporting events, graduations—that their children are missing because of school closures, said John Craven, Ph.D., associate professor of education in the Graduate School of Education.

“The impact of this pandemic on students emotionally may run in deep, quiet waters,” he said.

Go On a News Diet

Mamber advised moderating one’s consumption of pandemic-related news to avoid being overwhelmed. “I have to monitor that for myself, something I learned during 9/11. You feel compelled to watch the news to learn what’s going on, but find it hard to disconnect. Finding the right balance will help support your natural resilience.”

Hendel recommended scheduling news watching for the least disruptive time of day (not right before bed if it impedes your sleep). Ng recommended focusing on more factual news rather than sensational pieces that could spread misinformation.

Get Outside If You Can

Unless there’s a public advisory to the contrary, “social distancing doesn’t mean never leaving our homes, going for a walk, shopping for groceries, or interacting at all with others,” Ng said. “What it does mean, though, is that we’ll need to be doing these in a more limited, intentional, and conscientious manner.”

Gibney said one of her favorite ways to feel centered is to explore nature. “The great outdoors always speaks to me. Looking at the clouds, looking at a tree, being aware of nature’s beauty— [these]are ways that can help people find consolation,” she said.

And then, sometimes, consolation comes from displays of community. Mamber said it’s been inspiring to hear people in her Manhattan neighborhood open their windows and call out in support of health care workers every night at 7 p.m.

“It’s amazing to hear that, to know that people in that moment are apart, yet together,” she said. “Creating something beautiful, a new social ritual and structure, out of the uncertainty and fear gives us hope for the future.“

When to Seek Help

Seeking help is “a sign of strength and maturity rather than weakness,” said Jeffrey Ng, director of counseling and psychological services at Fordham. He encourages people to seek professional help for any of the following:

• persistent sadness, anxiety, anger, irritability, hopelessness, or feelings of being overwhelmed;
• sustained loss of interest in social or pleasurable activities;
• significant impairments or changes in daily functioning, such as sleep, appetite, or hygiene;
• thoughts about death, dying, or suicide; or
• impulsive, reckless, or risky behaviors, such as substance abuse or self-injury.

Mental health resources have been posted online by these and other organizations:

• The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: cdc.gov
• The American Psychiatry Association: psychiatry.org
• The American Psychological Association: apa.org

Her California home is filled with what she calls her miniatures—expansive, intricate dollhouses depicting Lilliputian versions of scenes from her mystery novels. The miniatures, like their creator and her murderers, are careful, meticulous—every bit in its proper place, no table turned over but for plot.

“In the end, it’s all the same thing,” Minichino says. “Physics, mystery, even the houses. It’s about taking the unknown and working, step by step, to know it, to make it real.”

She is effortlessly eloquent discussing physics—in which she earned master’s and doctoral degrees from Fordham’s Graduate School of Arts and Sciences in the 1965 and 1968 before embarking on a long career studying and teaching high-temperature, high-pressure physics—and points out warmly that all physics is commanded by different flavors of quarks, including up, down, strange, and charm. “Come to think of it,” she says with a chuckle, “mystery stories are built on those same elements, too.”

She’s been to college three times. Now, at 82, she’s enrolled in school again, getting a second master’s degree in creative writing—a certification whose lack has always troubled her, regardless of the 27 novels to her name. She has no trouble explaining why, in spite of all her achievements, she’s back taking classes. “There’s so many days, still,” Minichino says, “and every day you’re not learning is a waste of a day.”

Minichino’s latest novel is Mousse and Murder (Berkley, 2020), the first book in the Alaskan Diner Mystery series she’s writing under the pen name Elizabeth Logan.

The key to making great investments, Don Valentine once said, is to “assume that the past is wrong, and to do something that’s not part of the past, to do something entirely differently.”

He did just that in 1960. Having studied chemistry at Fordham, he quickly grasped how silicon would transform the electronics industry. He joined the seminal startup Fairchild Semiconductor and was among the first to market and sell the silicon chip, the technological breakthrough at the heart of the digital age.

In 1972, he established the venture firm Sequoia Capital. Its first investment was in Atari, the pioneering arcade and home video game company. Valentine later met a young Atari employee named Steve Jobs, and with a $150,000 check in 1978, became one of the earliest investors in Apple Computer.

“When we invested in Apple … nobody had a personal computer,” Valentine said in a 2009 oral history interview. “The cheapest computer was $250,000. And Steve’s vision was, we’re going to make them so that everybody will have one. Pretty simple.”

Throughout his career, Valentine funded and advised entrepreneurs who went after big markets—the one for personal computers with Apple, for databases with Oracle, and for routers with Cisco Systems, the networking company Valentine led as chair for three decades.

He was known for asking startup founders, “Who cares?” in response to their pitches, urging them to hone their own ability to ask the right questions. It’s a habit of mind he attributed in part to his Jesuit education at Fordham, where he said faculty favored the Socratic technique of teaching. “My middle initial is T for Thomas, the doubting person,” he said in the 2009 oral history interview, noting that his natural “inquisitiveness and inclination not to believe what I was told or heard” had served him well.

Valentine died last October at his home in Woodside, California, at the age of 87. He had stepped aside from leading Sequoia in the mid-1990s, though he stayed involved with the firm, which has since partnered with Google, LinkedIn, WhatsApp, and YouTube, among other companies.

In recent years, he met with students and alumni of Fordham’s Gabelli School of Business at the University’s annual entrepreneurship dinner in Silicon Valley.

“Don Valentine was an incredible pioneer in so many ways,” said Gabelli School Dean Donna Rapaccioli, Ph.D., GABELLI ’83. “It was a privilege to spend time with him on several occasions—he pushed me and everyone around him to think more strategically and to tell a more compelling story.”