Smarties candy rolls
Smarties candy rolls. (LaurelG / Wikimedia Commons)

This week, we’re sharing stories from Aaron Hamburger, William Finnegan, Cecilie Maria Kallestrup and Katrine Jo Anderson, Hannah Jane Parkinson, and Amy Westervelt.

Sign up to receive this list free every Friday in your inbox.

* * *

1. Sweetness Mattered

Aaron Hamburger | Tin House | June 27, 2018 | 14 minutes (3,575 words)

A small romantic gesture, even though unrequited, helped the author recover from a violent teenage assault.

2. Can Andy Byford Save the Subways?

William Finnegan | The New Yorker | July 2, 2018 | 37 minutes (9,389 words)

The new president of the New York City Transit Authority is smart, seems almost unfailingly polite, and is very English. Whether that’s enough to enable him to wrangle the system he’s been tasked with fixing remains to be seen. William Finnegan paints a deft portrait of Andy Byford settling into his new job and getting his C train legs.

3. Rejected by A.A.

Cecilie Maria Kallestrup and Katrine Jo Anderson | The New Republic | June 27, 2018 | 19 minutes (4,945 words)

Is the 12 Step program’s decades-old philosophy exacerbating the opioid crisis by discouraging medication-assisted treatment like methodone?

4. ‘It’s nothing like a broken leg’: why I’m done with the mental health conversation

Hannah Jane Parkinson | The Guardian | June 30, 2018 | 14 minutes (3,513 words)

Hannah Jane Parkinson responds to so many empty refrains encouraging mentally ill patients to just ask for help, a beyond frustrating suggestion “when you’ve been asking for help and not getting it.”

5. Japan’s Vegetable-Eating Men

Amy Westervelt | Topic | June 29, 2018 | 13 minutes (3,312 words)

Recent cultural and policy shifts in Japan have made a previously hard-to-find species far more common: the stay-at-home dad.