The Captain's Log

There are very few indignities of middle age and parenting to which Dan Zevin has not subjected himself. But there is one:

“You know those milking devices they have for men–they have them in bra and vest form?” Zevin asks.

“No.”

“Some fathers wear them and it’s equipped with two fake boobs,” Zevin explains, “with baby bottles in there and people nurse the infant like they’re a lactating mom. Well that’s one thing I’ve never gone for.”

I suppose every man has his limits. With Zevin’s latest offering, Dan Gets a Minivan: Life at ...

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Family Matters

“When a writer is born into a family, the family is finished,” goes the maxim by Polish poet Czeslaw Milosz. Okay, but what happens when a family is born finished? Like the Octomom or the Kardashians? On the other hand, there are certain families who, when a writer appears in their midst, couldn’t give a damn–they’re all too busy finishing themselves.

That’s often the case with the Mulgrews, a blue-collar family from South Philly, whose exploits, indignities and implosions are chronicled by the eldest son, Jason Mulgrew, author of the memoirs, Everything Is Wrong with Me ...

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