Category: America Collection

America Collection/General interest
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How to Sleep Tight, All Night 

by Fran Johns

WHY IS EVERYONE (ELSE) HAVING INSOMINIA PROBLEMS?

Photo by DON RANASINGHE on Unsplash

What’s with all these stories about insomnia? I feel as if every time I open up my laptop there’s another piece about someone having trouble sleeping.

I went looking for what’s keeping us up nights.

Maybe it’s the total chaos we wake up to? Snowstorms and firestorms and windstorms? Maybe we’re all getting older? Nahh, couldn’t be.

In any event, I sleep like a baby. So I decided to go public with the answers to insomnia. Herewith:

Weighted blanket. Just take my word for it. Or read one of those surveys about how they relieve anxieties and calm your aches and pains. (As long as you’re older than two; don’t weight down your two-year-old please.)

Forewarning: The rest of these solutions should be read in light of the fact that I lost my sleeping partner seven years ago; the following might require partner buy-in. Since I still have the California King-size bed, though, that leaves room to strew books and magazines all over the duvet and still allow for the following: 

Food and drink. Cozy camomile tea is good for bedtime. But what if you feel hungry during one of those bathroom wake-up moments? (Taking bathroom breaks without really waking up is a learned skill. Work on it.) Still . . . I keep a glass of ginger beer on the bedside table just in case.

More food and drink. If a swig of ginger beer as you slide under the weighted blanket doesn’t do it, a few minutes of a good book and in-bed snack time generally work for me. To that end, along with the reading matter atop the duvet I keep a ziplok bag of peanut butter filled pretzels. Unfortunately I shared this information once with my dentist, Dr. Suezaki, who shook his head sadly from side to side and said, “No bueno.” Don’t discuss this with your dentist. No bueno will stick in your head and try to wake you up. We do what we have to do.

Dealing with the cares of the world. Even if you studiously avoid thinking about the news after three in the afternoon, the brain sometimes still kicks in. How to save democracy — a problem that can rarely be solved at three in the morning, can nevertheless be sublimated to worrying about problems closer at hand: a deadline looming on a job not even started, a leaky faucet you meant to fix, a letter un-written or email un-sent. Once you’ve reduced wakefulness to a personal level — 

Turn on the light. Did I warn you about partner buy-in? I think so. Once the anxiety bots are awake in your brain you go on counter-offensive. To this end I keep a pen and notepad handy so without rummaging around I can make a list. The list will include, item-by-item, everything I will get done first thing in the morning. This does not mean it ever really gets done; but the anxiety bots don’t know that because they’ve all been moved from your brain to that notepad. Five minutes later — 

Back to the blanket. Slide underneath, gently weighted back to sleep for the rest of your requisite eight hours. Possibly even sated with a few pretzels and a swig of ginger beer.

Please don’t tell Dr. Suezaki I wrote this.

America Collection/General interest
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AIDS: Victories and Sorrows

by Fran Johns

A PERSONAL STORY OF LOVE, LOSS & DISMAY ABOUT TODAY’S LEADERSHIP

Photo by Everton Vila on Unsplash

In the 1990s I led an HIV Support Group that was officially part of my church and comprised of an evershifting number of men I loved best of any motley crew I’ve ever known. They were of every known religion and degree of irreverence. Jim, the last surviving member of the clan, died of natural causes last year, having dodged AIDS along with his partner; partner Richard was lost to a freaky post-surgery accident more than a dozen years ago.

Every new disastrou healthcare headline reminds me of Jim.

Jim was the #1 source of my pandemic survival. Having lost my husband in 2019, not that long after Richard had died, the two of us found a spectacular anti-loneliness mechanism for negotiating those pandemic days . . . and eventually, years.

Mobility-challenged from a long-ago case of Guillain-Barré Syndrome, Jim was pretty much confined to the third floor apartment he and Richard had shared for decades. As it happened, their place was on one of the steepest blocks of San Francisco’s Mason Street, making its front window almost level with the sidewalk a few yards uphill. I would stand precariously on the sidewalk while he leaned out his window; he always promised to call 911 if I lost my balance so they could dredge the Bay for my body after it rolled downhill and into the waters.

To be confessionally honest, toward the end of the pandemic I did sneak inside a couple of times for us to remember what indoor face-to-face encounters had been like in days gone by. 

In those olden days Jim and I had witnessed the worst of the AIDS pandemic and, finally, its slow but eventual end. We remembered one longtime member of the AIDS Group who said, at what would be our last formal gathering, “I’ve spent more than a decade focusing on death; now I just want to focus on living for a while.”

That shift from death to life was thanks to development of antiretroviral therapies that slowly transformed HIV from a death sentence into a manageable chronic illness. It was work that required public and private cooperation and the dedicated efforts of local, state and national agencies. It led, eventually, to San Francisco’s being at the forefront of a global challenge to “Get to Zero” — zero new HIV cases, zero deaths and zero stigma. In three decades there has been almost uninterrupted progress toward this lofty but attainable goal.

The current administration has thrown everything into reverse.

Some $8 million have been stripped just from local agencies doing this humanitarian work. If you can look up the chain to the destruction of science-based agencies and communities all the way to the formerly unequalled CDC without tears you must be without a heart.

Our old HIV Group had one confirmed curmudgeon who regularly proclaimed there was no hope for himself or the world. Everybody else would find something that made that one day worth living and would wear ourselves out saying “C’mon, Tom. One day there’s going to be a cure. A vaccine. A treatment.” Tom died early on, angry and cursing fate as with so many young men who had good reaason to curse.

When Jim and I talked about those olden days, as we invariably did, we often joked about how Tom had been proven wrong, because vaccines and treatments were indeed on the way to eradicating the scourge of HIV-AIDS; and how Tom would’ve scoffed and said, “Just wait. Something’s going to screw it all up.” I sorely need a chance to joke around with Jim today.

So where, in this column that regularly looks for good news, is the good news for the future of American health?

“Don’t quote me,” said another old friend recently — so of course I’m quoting him, “but there are sane scientists everywhere who are just waiting out the ignoramuses in charge of our national health today. We’re still moving forward. Despite the tragic losses of the last year, science is still science and those of us comnitted to it are not going to give up. We’ll get to zero.” He teaches at a prestigious California university. He’s tenured. He believes most who have lost their good jobs will come back once U.S. healthcare gets back on track.

RIP Jim and Richard and Tom and so many beloved others. We’re on a dark detour but we’ll still Get To Zero.

America Collection/General interest
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Tips from a Master Storyteller

by Fran Johns

GEORGE SAUNDERS HAS A FEW GOOD WORDS FOR WRITERS (AND READERS)

Photo by Lê Tân on Unsplash

George Saunders’ interviewer led off with a semi-familiar quote: “People forget what you said, and they forget what you did, but they never forget how you made them feel.” Saunders makes you feel better about yourself, and the world in general.

Speaking to an overflow crowd in San Francisco while on tour with his new book, the renowned writer (Congratulations, by the Way; Lincoln in the Bardo and many others) and teacher (in the creative writing program of Syracuse University) stuck largely to discussion of his new novel, Vigil. Vaguely reminiscent of his Booker Prize winning reimagining of Lincoln’s struggle to accept the death of his young son, Saunders’ new novel takes place at the bedside of an oil tycoon en route from this world to the next.

But in almost throw-away comments during his recent talk were several gems worth sharing. The talented writer/teacher, whom you would imagine to be well in control of his thoughts, more than once spoke of “blurting out” something, and whether or not the writer can “trust that blurt.” What a literary comfort: the notion that the blurts we all have — sometimes rapid fire all day long — might be worth trusting.

I may steal another phrase from a passing commentary. Speaking of raising characters (and events) “to the highest level,” Saunders asserted there’s value even with unsavory characters being raised “to the highest level of jerkitude.” Jerkitude is everywhere today.

But it was the kindness factor this writer was listening for, and Saunders did not disappoint. In a recent New York Timesinterview, David Marchese mentioned Saunders’ being thrust into “a public role as something close to a guru of goodness after his convocation speech to Syracuse graduates.” That speech, “extolling the life-altering virtue of practicing kindness” evolved into his wildly popular book Congratulations, by the Way. It was interesting to find, in discussions with a few of the 1,000+ attendees before and after the San Francisco event, how many had come just wanting to be reassured of goodness in the world.

Saunders with interviewer Vendela Vida (Author photo)

I spoke with a half-dozen attendees afterwards, none of them disappointed. “Even if his satire is sharp and sometimes wicked,” said one; “somehow his characters embody basic goodness.”

After his talks, Saunders traditionally stays to personalize signed books and be snap-photographed with fans and readers. With lines snaking around blocks it has to be an exhausting time even if you know you’re selling a lot of books. (I passed on the line, but had bought a ticket that included a signed copy of Vigil. Now a few chapters in, I give it multiple thumbs-up.)

Bottom line: Reading (books!) is essential, especially if you want to write. Writing is a craft that needs constant work; drawing tips from a master, when you get the chance, is a bonus. Also:

Kindness is never wrong.

America Collection/General interest
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When the Glaciers Melt Away . . .

by Fran Johns

WATCHING THE PASSAGE OF TIME AT THE ENDS OF THE EARTH

Svalbard 2019 (Author photo)

There were polar bears — though far fewer than we’d hoped; there were walruses and seals and the occasional reindeer or Arctic fox. But what took my breath away was the beauty: shimmering white and muted azure as far as the eye could see. 

I visited the Svalbard archipelago, between the coast of Norway and the North Pole, in June of 2019 on a trip sponsored by Climate One. Spotting wildlife and taking in the beauty of the scenery were high on everyone’s list, but the main purpose of the expedition was to see — up close and personal — what the warming climate is doing to this northernmost cap of planet earth. It is not pretty.

Everywhere were the signs of melting sea ice and shrinking glaciers. Probably the most dramatic moment of the entire trip came when we witnessed glacier calving, as a giant chunk of a nearby glacier sliced off and into the sea. (Climbing on land was its own additional reward.)

Hiking the Svalbard mountains (Author photo, 2019)

Today there’s an expedition underway — this one seriously scientific and definitely not for tourists — at the other end of the world. They are already gathering important data and with a little luck they’ll be able to leave instruments in place deep under the sea that can prove invaluable to climate scientists (and others) going forward.

I’ve been following independent journalist Miles O’Brien (you can too!) who is aboard the South Korean icebreaker Araon near the Thwaites Glacier in Antarctica. Thwaites is also known as the Doomsday Glacier, for reasons you probably don’t want to focus on right before you try to go to sleep. Hint: Thwaites is melting faster than we might wish, especially any of us living on a coast that would vanish under a ten-foot sea level rise.

It’s been several weeks since the Araon left New Zealand, and much success has been recorded, including arrival at Thwaites on a crystal clear day. But the weather didn’t cooperate long enough for helicopters stashed onboard to fly to the glacier itself and stay long enough for scientists to drill deep into the ice and position their instruments.

According to O’Brien’s latest interview with crew members, the window of opportunity will close in another three or four days. Those of us following along are crossing fingers and sending up prayers to the weather gods. The expedition won’t be a failure if scientists are unable to leave instruments on the glacier — but that’s the holy grail and everyone’s hope.

Remembering lessons of the North Pole seven years ago, and watching these fascinating scenes at the other pole in real time reinforces the bottom line to this observer: climate change is here; it’s happening. The more we know, the better we understand.

Meanwhile the current administration pushes ahead with policies to boost fossil fuels, cut funding for clean energy and renewables, eliminate environmental protections . . . as if there were no tomorrow.

Which will some day be true.

America Collection/General interest
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My Mom, & Likely Yours, on Civility

by Fran Johns

Some lessons never die . . . and maybe that’s not such a bad thing. Here’s to a kinder, gentler New Year

Photo by A A on Unsplash

My mother, Helen Hardy Moreland (1897–1967, may she Rest In Peace) set great store in being Proper. One of my favorite memories is a mental image of her, in the blue hat with a small veil, one white glove on her left hand properly holding the other white glove while she shook hands with someone in a receiving line. Or performed some other gloveless task.

My mother was very much of the White Glove generation. One would not even THINK of appearing at a public event gloveless. What her daughters (I was the youngest of four) would know, though no one else did, was that no two of her white gloves ever matched. Most, well worn, had carefully-darned fingertips, some had frills or decorations — they just never matched. This was because she had neither time nor funds to have matching gloves, so she would just grab any two out of her glove drawer, pull one on and hold the other. 

I was reminded of this emphasis on propriety recently in a discussion of What Really Matters over a holiday dinner. It in turn reminded me of my mother and the Midnight Fire story.

Fresh out of college in the still-proper 1950s, I shared an apartment at 9 East Franklin Street in Richmond VA with my sister Mimi. An easy walk from WRNL Radio where she worked, and The Richmond Times-Dispatch where I had my first major newspaper job, it was also close to the Medical College of VA. Those blocks were full of press types and med students and a good time was frequently had by all.

One night, when Mimi forgot to turn off the sunlamp with which she’d been stylishly tanning her face, it shone unattended into the overstuffed chair until setting a fire that woke us at about midnight. I took off knocking at the doors of other units in the converted antebellum house while Mimi called the fire department. I may or may not have grabbed some slippers; Mimi was calmly taking the curlers out of her hair while she gave them our address.

For the next hour we gathered with friends and neighbors in the middle of downtown Franklin Street, watching the firefighters toss our scorched furniture off the balcony, sipping mugs of brandy-laced coffee thoughtfully passed around by a news photographer who lived across the street. It was, we would later agree, the social event of the season.

But it was also more than a little scary. If Mimi hadn’t sounded the alarm, sensing the smoke before it overcame us, the century-old house would quickly have gone up in flames, taking the inhabitants of six apartments with it. So it was in this spirit of high drama that we re-told the story to our mother the following day (one day before it appeared in the Times-Dispatch.) But oops, while describing the details of her daughters’ brush with death I happened to mention the kind stranger who produced an overcoat as I stood shivering in my nightshirt.

And that detail was the whole story for my mother.

“Oh, dahling,” she said, with genuine remorse. “Any lady would have taken time to get a bathrobe on before leaving the apartment.” 

I don’t miss white gloves, or tanning lamps, but occasionally while listening to the president of the United States (and others) I miss both the customs and the language of civility. A college student once said damn in the presence of my mother, causing him to fall all over himself apologizing for such an unforgiveable breach of etiquette. My mother laughed, assured him that she knew the word — she may have mentioned that Shakespeare used it — and she was not the least offended.

But the lesson was clear: respectfulness never hurts. Whatever Mrs. Trump taught her son when he went off to school, it did not include courtesy, respect or civility.

To be fair, and I do try to be fair most of the time, Donald Trump didn’t invent foul language. Nor are disrespect, incivility and four-letter words limited to any age, social demographic or political party these days. (As far as four-letter words go, they have totally eliminated the former delights of creative cursing, which used to be an entertaining skill for the cursed and the curser alike. That’s another loss.)

No one with a brain would wish for a return to white gloves and tanning lamps. But someone with a soul would know the personal damage caused by coarse, cruel words flung at other human beings. Add to that the societal damage of disrespectful words and uncivil behavior that has become as accepted in today’s public life as propriety was a few generations ago.

Going backwards seldom makes sense unless you’re about to step off a cliff. But we could, in fact, go forward in these troubled times. We could, with a little effort, swear less and tell the truth more. We could think first and swallow hate speech. Talk less and listen more. Bring back civility as a New Year’s gift to the universe.

Our mothers would be proud.

America Collection/General interest
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Looking Back at a Roller Coaster Year

by Fran Johns
Sunrise

Chainsaws, axes and masked militias must still contend with ordinary people standing up for justice 

Photo by Quino Al on Unsplash

(As a rule I avoid talking politics on this platform, although I mourn the days when we could talk political differences with civility. Or without offending. Some readers, though — thanks, both of you! — asked that I not withhold some essays that are posted on Medium &/or Substack. The following recaps a dark year.)

A little over a year ago I took a deep breath and started a Substack.

Writer friends had been suggesting such a move for years, but I had resisted. I already write on Medium and WordPress, I argued, and my learning curve bends about as slowly as the arc toward justice. One more technology? No, thank you.

But I needed help. My country had just elected a man who is the antithesis of everything I hold dear — an egotistic narcissist who lies with abandon, abuses women, denies science, craves power and cares not a fig about our fragile planet. He pledged to trade longtime allies for alignment with autocracies around the globe and to destroy institutions that had been built over decades and centuries to protect our freedoms.

I sank into a pit of despair. For a while I found myself saying, “OK, I’m done. I’m 91 years old, and I don’t want to live in this kind of a world. I’m done.” After a while, though, despair does not work very well as Lifestyle.

So I began The Optimistic Eye (Substack) with the express purpose of writing once a week about something politically encouraging or some positive action that was underway or could be taken. With that in mind, the daily task became that of sifting through the rivers of chaos and destruction that began even before Trump 2.0 took control to find reason for hope. 

It worked. The enterprise began with an interfaith Thanksgiving prayer breakfast that was all about light shining into the darkness. Once the Trump regime was in place we saw right away just how dark things would get — but there have always been people shining light. That long-ago breakfast featured prayers in just about every known religion and a few you hadn’t heard of: Native American, Christian, Jew, Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu . . . and the Brahma Kumaris, who are all about inner light and peace.

The year would see a great deal more chaos and darkness than peace and light. But even as the doom squad swooped in, with Donald Trump and his then-best-friend Elon Musk leading the charge, forces for good could also be found mobilizing.

Over the year I wrote about Climate One and the fight to save Planet Earth despite the swift removal of environmental protections, about the healing power of music and the multitudes of individuals standing up for democracy one by one. Quickly, those single souls coalesced into like-minded groups and took to the streets. 

The No Kings marches were as satisfying to write about (well, almost) as to participate in. Below is the flip side of my all-purpose demonstration sign. Its front reads KAKISTOCRACY: Government by the worst. The least qualified. The most corrupt. More ordinary Americans turned out in 2025 to shine the light of truth than ever before in history. All. Year. Long.

For every destructive DOGE cut there was someone working against the destruction. As springtime eased into summer the Optimistic Eye spotted individuals and groups quickly picking up pieces. I even found people in Europe — where head-spinning executive orders were turning longtime allies into foes — who were still our friends. “We can’t understand what’s happened to your country,” one Sicilian homemaker said, “but we still think the Americans we know are good people.” 

Darkness spread. Our Republican-led Congress utterly abdicated its oversight responsibilities; even the Supreme Court caved. But the Optimistic Eye was always able to find a ray of light. Beginning with District Court Judge John Coughenour way back in January there were justices upholding the Constitution and keeping Mr. Trump from running totally amok. There were the ACLU and the Southern Poverty Law Center and other nonprofits pitching in to help.

Then the cracks in Humpty Dumpty’s shell began to appear and the mad king was suddenly not all-powerful. In what has to be the most poetic justice ever known, serial abuser Jeffrey Epstein may play a major role in stopping Donald Trump’s tsunami-level abuse of humankind. Not even his MAGA warriors could stomach the stonewalling to protect himself against whatever incriminating messages lurk in the Epstein files. Atop that bit of good news — the truth of that long, sordid story will (largely) eventually be told — lo and behold the Supreme Court finally weighed in to limit the power of the mad king.

And ordinary citizens, the stars in the skies of democracy, continue to protest against ICE, to protect their immigrant neighbors, and take to the streets in defense of democracy. It ain’t over, Yogi Berra (and Lenny Kravitz) would have us know, ’til it’s over. 

This essayy also is The Optomistic Eye post #77. In the first essay of The Optimistic Eye (12/13/25) was this quotation from the SFIC interfaith proyer breakfast, “Candles of liberty flicker and dim; there will always be those to light them again.”

Happy 2026 to us all. Bring it on.

America Collection
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The Huggable Christmas Tree

by Fran Johns
Christmas tree-shaped pillow resting on sofa

How I found the perfect tree, and regained the holiday spirit

(Author photo)

OK, it’s not your grandmother’s Christmas tree; it’s a pillow. But it was a gift from a favorite friend last year, and when I pulled the holiday box down off the shelf, there it was on top, just begging to be The Tree.

How could I not?

If ever proof was needed for that old truism, ‘The bigger your children, the smaller your tree,’ I’m it. With the kids long grown and my enthusiasm for dealing with tinsel, glitter, angel hair and tangled strings of lights correspondingly diminished I was about to be tree-less several years ago. My faraway daughter couldn’t handle this idea, and promptly sent a lovely, if artificial, little three-foot-tall tree complete with lights already circling its piney green limbs and miniature baubles ready for hanging. The problem? Assembly required. I finally threw a party for a half-dozen dextrous friends and after several bottles of wine (I served, they drank because I don’t any more) we got it done.

I had to work through my inborn antipathy to artificial trees, but I became downright fond of the little faux pine with its twinkling lights and tiny baubles. The initial assembly was the most complicated; after that it folded back into its box and required only a few tricky openings-up and fittings-together to reappear the next holiday season. A small hassle to start the season.

It’s been a fine tree. I’ve had some great tree-assembly parties. But after the daily chaos of the past year I could not deal with even minimal holiday stress in my own home. I walked to town to soak up the wonders of the season at San Francisco’s Union Square:

(Author photo)

The Union Square tree is a beauty, though I do believe it’s artificial too, and you’d think we might have sprung for a giant spruce in a forest that needed to be thinned. Furthermore, couldn’t the Union Square people also strike a deal with whoever’s in charge of the giant billboard featuring a handsome hunk who seems to be stressing out over the scene? For a while there my Christmas spirit faltered.

I bought a cup of white chocolate mocha and sat down at an outdoor table with a couple from Denver who brought my spirits right back up. Their tree was up and decorated back home, and their children and grandchildren would all be coming, but they were having a holiday getaway first and they love San Francisco. I love tourists who love San Francisco.

I walked back home and contemplated the pillow-tree. Made of the softest velvet imaginable, it begs to be stroked. If you snuggle down on the sofa with a good book, it is happy to rest against your cheek. Even its little Star of Bethlehem is soft and cushy.

’tis the season to be comforted. Peace on earth.

America Collection/General interest
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What Goes Around Comes Around

by Fran Johns

THE UNIVERSE PAYS ATTENTION TO KINDNESS. BELIEVE.

Photo by Mei-Ling Mirow on Unsplash

Did it again yesterday. Left my wallet — it’s one of those mesh things that fit so easily into the back pocket — in the unisex bathroom of Kaiser Medical Center in San Francisco. Not your ordinary nobody’s-around-here spot.

Did I notice? Of course not. I was merrily walking home about ten blocks east, listening to a good book via my one earbud, trusting the other ear to pick up any beeping bike about to wipe me out as it whizzed around the corner.

Instead, my phone beeped, interrupting the book narrator. Given no choice, I answered. An unknown male voice was speaking calmly over the traffic noise. “Are you Fran Johns?” he asked. Who else would I be? Didn’t he know who he was calling? “I am,” I replied, anxious to get back to my book.

“This is Kaiser Family Medicine. Someone just brought your wallet to the check-in desk,” he said. Oh, dear. I patted my very empty back pocket.

This would be the same wallet I have left in countless coffee shops and bookstores, other miscellaneous bathrooms and twice in airport security areas. One of those was in Madrid. Some people learn; some don’t.

I did an about-face and returned to the check-in desk, where three or four Kaiser people were busily working. “Ummm,” I said, “I don’t have any identification, but someone found . ..” One of the clerks looked up with a broad smile. “I’d know you anywhere,” he said, handing it over.

Moral? One kind stranger turned what would’ve been a nightmare of changing passwords and obtaining replacement cards into one more happy San Francisco day. Thanks, whoever you are.

In my (self) defense, I am notorious for tracking down errant library books or returning found objects to safekeeping, once including a frightened three-year-old in Macy’s.

The universe notices.

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