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" For many writers, the endless performance of being a writer - tweeting, appearing, making the rounds - is required simply to attract enough attention to make a living. "

Rumaan Alam

Enough

Performance

Attention

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Rumaan Alam

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" I am not anti-Internet, and I don't think smart phones are a social ill. "

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" I didn't know, at 22, that everything that happens to you, the good stuff as well as the less-good stuff, accrues and becomes your life. "

" Among this country's enduring myths is that success is virtuous, while the wealth by which we measure success is incidental. We tell ourselves that money cannot buy happiness, but what is incontrovertible is that money buys stuff, and if stuff makes you happy, well, complete the syllogism. "

" I'm not black myself, but my sons are. "

" Parenting advice is mostly useless because every family is uniquely its own; artistic advice is mostly useless because every artist works in their own way. Thus, figuring out how to balance the two has an intense specificity. "

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" Does a bona fide chimichurri have cilantro in it? Who cares? Cooking for your family, unless your family includes Joel Rubouchon, is liberating in that regard. "

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" The culture looms much larger than you do as a parent, and one can hardly rely on the culture to impart the lesson that womanhood is valuable. "

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" Obama-as-dad is my favorite Obama. Obama-as-executive, with his stubborn faith in reasonableness in times absent of reason, presided over the country during its descent into madness. I find it a comfort that Obama-as-dad presided over a family that leaves the White House healthy and happy. "

" History is a story like any other, but black history is a story so devoid of logic that it frustrates the young reader. The young readers in my house, told of slavery and segregation, asked in disbelief, 'What? Why?' We - the parents of black children, the parents of all children - still need to tell that story. "