Michelle Hiskey is a freelance writer and writing coach based in Decatur, and her day job is senior editor on Emory University's development communications team. Michelle worked at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution for 22 years as a sports reporter, columnist and Sunday feature writer, and her stories of recovery and redemption bridge unexpected places and people across Atlanta. She lives in Decatur with her husband Ben Smith, also a journalist, and their two awesome daughters. She can be reached at michelle.hiskey@gmail.com.
The two men, connected by a last name and DNA, separated by two generations and different dreams, together reflected on the forces that have driven their family.
Driven Jimmy Carter past national vilification for his presidential failures, driven him into the humanitarian work that has changed the world, and driven his grandson to appreciate the example set by the older generations – especially the women behind the men.
Now is the bosom of advertising season, after the new Super Bowl commercials reveal what we “need” to feel really good about ourselves, and right before the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue arrives.
We women – and the men who love us — should attend to a basic way to uplift our bodies and spirits: A properly fitted bra.
Ambitious women in business are often advised to learn to play golf, for greater success in law, banking and such careers. Julia Forbes used her lifelong passion for the sport to move up in the museum world, by curating the new exhibit at Atlanta’s High Museum, “The Art of Golf.”
Ben Dempsey says of his lifelong battle against overeating,
“I had done all kinds of strange diets, like eating tofu straight for six weeks, but when I lost 30 pounds, I would gain 40. At the rate I was going, I would have weighed 420 pounds today.”
From his work in physical therapy, he knew change was possible if he could just slip that elusive mental switch.
Last fall, Mitchell Anderson decided to revive his acting career in “Next Fall,” now playing at Actor’s Express on Atlanta’s west side.
After a successful TV and movie resume – you may have seen him in the series “Party of Five” or as Richard Carpenter in “The Karen Carpenter Story,” or as the kid who got eaten by a shark in “Jaws” — Anderson had left Hollywood to settle into a new life in Atlanta.
An apprenticeship in the kitchen of Jenny “Souper Jenny” Levison led to him opening his own restaurant, Metrofresh in Midtown, and a spin-off bistro at the Atlanta Botanical Garden.
At 50, his culinary stage kept him plenty busy – but what pulled him back to acting was what he loved about cooking, too: friendships and a unique, exquisite creation.
Describing a recent, resonant visit to the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial in Washington D.C.:
“Against a brilliant sky rose King, almost three stories high, partially emerged from the stone, his arms crossed and eyes to the horizon. The chill seemed to bring him even more in relief, the sculptor’s lines more edgy, bare as the young trees nearby.”
Atlanta native Peter Linz talks about finding his identity by becoming a Muppeteer:
“The character of Walter hits really close to home for me. I’ve always been an enormous Muppet fan who dreamed of one day working with the Muppets, and that’s basically who Walter is. How flipping crazy is that? It’s mind-blowing. I could have been cast as a monster or a chicken or someone’s right hand, but instead, I got cast to play the guy who is the world’s biggest Muppet fan who literally dreams of working with the Muppets. Apart from my wedding day and birth of my children, being cast as Walter, was one of the greatest moments of my life. I was beyond happiness.”
The work ethic and energy of the dancers from Moving in the Spirit is remarkable.
Every day they are moving against the tide of childhood obesity, too common in poorer neighborhoods. Their personal work ethic contrasts to the cheating educators in the Atlanta Public Schools, where many of these dancers learn.
Their Holiday Store helps teach them financial literacy and credit lessons that too few of us grasp.
While Atlanta Braves and their fans break for the winter, the team’s quirkiest personality — Matthew Kaminski, the twittering organist of Turner Field — stars in another arena.
Kaminski moves from brushback pitches to Broadway when he plays a tribute to Cole Porter on Dec. 28 at Eddie’s Attic.
Munson’s final bequest was the latest resurrection of the memory of Noah Harris, who epitomized the passion for the red and black, and a commitment to do what he could to make a difference.
Atlantans are known for volunteering, but be careful when you help others.
You may instead end up helping change your own heart and mind. That’s what happened to a pair of volunteers who pitched in for the AIDS epidemic in the early 1990s.
The epidemic provoked an epidemic of fear, prejudice and isolation, and profound change in volunteers as well.
Could rats bring out the best in a restaurant?
That’s the crisis in an unexpected tail, er, tale of a neighborhood tavern in Decatur.
The owner spent 17 years attracting regulars with simple delicious fare, specialty beers and word of mouth. Melton’s App & Tap became an “everybody knows your name” watering hole.
By Michelle Hiskey
The best holiday gift this year may be a common object refashioned through the creative eye of an artist like Dominique Lacey, and her re-born mother’s heart.
She and more than 100 edgy local artists will sell their unique creations this weekend at the Indie Craft Experience – ICE – near downtown Atlanta.
Many use recycled materials simply to be green, but Lacey’s art represents her personal renaissance after unnamable grief.
From old license plates, Lacey fashions one-of-a-kind cool things like $10 bangle bracelets and $75 large ornamental stars. From discarded auto tags, she
By Michelle Hiskey
Friday is 11-11-11. If that’s just trivia to you, read on. There’s much more to this number 11 than meets the eye.
Eleven is a powerful number on my family calendar. Both my children were born (unscheduled) on the 11th. On that day of the month, my husband was diagnosed with diabetes, and his mother died. And then there’s Sept. 11, and the Japan earthquake on March 11.
So yes, when it comes to the number 11, I do have confirmation bias.
“That’s when you start to notice something you think is special and then you notice more of it,” said Emory University mathematician Michelangelo
By Michelle Hiskey
When you see the stark ads of fat kids in Georgia, don’t turn away from the scariest thing you may see this season.
As hard as it may be, take a long look. What’s happening to their health should shock everybody – and lead us to fitter future generations.
The ads, which have been running in print, outdoors and on TV, are black and white and right to the point.
“I’m 7 years old. I don’t like going to school because all the other kids pick on me. That hurts my feelings,” says a local girl named Tina, among the child actors who answered a casting call for the ad campaign commissioned by Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta.
The TV ads end with a boom, like a
By Michelle Hiskey
Even after the Atlanta Braves season ended like a pileup on the Downtown Connector, hardcore baseball fans in Atlanta still care about this World Series.
Not only that, they care enough to preserve and deepen our knowledge of the personalities that popularized baseball.
One devotee even spent a decade piecing together a more complete picture of a misunderstood, part-Cherokee slugger from Georgia named Rudy York.
The detective work began with a tender story of brokenness between a father and son. This digging revealed how stereotyping separates us from the truth.
By Michelle Hiskey
The “Occupy Atlanta” protesters have set up in a downtown green space they call “Troy Davis Park.” For them, the recently executed Georgia man symbolizes how the strong oppress the weak.
But for a more creative, stronger message, they should play up their site’s name. Woodruff Park was named for a rich, powerful Georgia man who used his wealth to empower the weak – and the rich and powerful today could use a role model like Robert Winship Woodruff.
Robert Winship Woodruff’s name is on our main arts center, all over Emory University (including the main library and the Health Sciences Center) and his money seeded the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
By Michelle Hiskey
Before dawn Sunday morning, police said, a dog woke up his sleeping family in Lawrenceville and saved them from a fire.
At dusk the same day, 75 people gathered on a church lawn near Emory University to celebrate their pets.
Sunday marked the Feast of St. Francis of Assisi, the patron saint of animals. Even if you don’t believe in saints or God, you should appreciate them as a symbol of living simply, with love and forgiveness.
By Michelle Hiskey
On fall Saturdays in the South, yard sales start early and end before afternoon football games. That makes Saturdays full of compelling narratives.
What’s inside the rest of the week – the clutter, the loyalty, the vision of something better — gets a stage for full public view. Saturday is the South’s big peephole.
Tom Zarrilli spent six years of Saturdays photographing and blogging yard sales around Atlanta (and some Friday afternoons for estate sales). As part of a citywide photographic exhibit, 19 of his color photographs are on display through Nov. 11 at the Callanwolde Arts Center.
“Faces of the Yards of Clutter” captures
By Michelle Hiskey
Isn’t watching a fall football or softball game always more about the players on the field than the ones on the sideline?
Unless you’re Peyton Manning (the only 4-time Most Valuable Player in the NFL), few fans will give attention to an injured athlete.
A hobbled player, though, can still demonstrate the power of desire to shape a team – and herself.
Meet Sarah Grace Stafford of Decatur, and find out how coaches like Vince Dooley (of University of Georgia football) and Marynell Meadors (WNBA Atlanta Dream) harness the spirit of injured players to keep their team on track and boosted.
