Essays

I will soon turn 66. I had thought that by this age, I would mostly be doing the two things

”That is the way we plan to lead,
clear on our values.”
— Clare Oumou Verbeten, newly elected Minnesota senator

I have refused to compromise on my autonomy. I choose to fight every day for the life that I have built in Minnesota. It has been a choice to embrace and love my existence as a disabled person, exactly as is.

When it comes to behavioral change, and beliefs, this is not simply a Greater Minnesota challenge, nor a Minnesota challenge — it is a national challenge. It is THE challenge of our time. How do we find our way back to each other and to the values that connect us?

Making a documentary film is like buying a one-way ticket to an unknown destination, starting out with the belief that an idea or a person is amazing and committing to following the journey.

She witnessed the power of standing up, facing fear, and finding one’s agency — a power she has guided other women to unearth within themselves over the past 25 years.

Seraphia Gravelle (Aguallo) was 17 years old when she moved to Minnesota’s Iron Range from Texas to be close to

The events of 2020, from the outbreak of the pandemic to the uprising after the murder of George Floyd, sparked

“We have never been represented by somebody like me, with this voice, with the communities that I am bringing in.”

We listened to some of the voices, and saw some of the villages, at three locations on election night in Saint Paul. Here are a few highlights.

At the state capitol, there is a historic slate of LGBTQ+ candidates and Native candidates. Here are parts of our conversations with some of them.

Particularly in policing, but in every facet of civic life, what we need is to recenter the forming of partnerships as the heart of the activity, as both the means and the end.