Catherine Hurley

Not to be corny, but one of my favorite essays is “Journalism: A Love Story” by Nora Ephron. While a researcher at Newsweek Magazine, Ephron wrote a New York Post parody so well that the paper offered her a tryout for a reporting job there. She got the job, and after a drink with a Post reporter, they passed the Newsweek building in a taxi on Madison Avenue.

On June 13, 1971, the New York Times ran front page coverage of Tricia Nixon’s wedding day. Three columns over and far less attention-grabbing, another story — “Vietnam Archive: Pentagon Study Traces 3 Decades of Growing U.S. Involvement.” “Most of the study and many of the appended documents have been obtained by The New York Times and will be described and presented in a series of articles beginning today,” it read. The source of the now-infamous Pentagon Papers? Former RAND Corp.

You can also listen to this article on the Nothing/Unsaid Op/Ed podcast I’ve had more than a few weekend breakfasts ruined at Hampshire Dining Commons. Over a plate of pancakes and Hamp’s fine variety of fruit offerings — cantaloupe and honeydew melon — I’d typically spend my Sunday mornings writing this very column. My soundtrack? A choppy, grating rendition of “Für Elise” echoing downstairs, over, and over and over again.