Working poor need decent place to live

by Mitch Albom | Aug 21, 2011 | Detroit Free Press

You smell it the minute you enter. An inspector said it was one of the worst cases of mold he’d ever seen. Kristy and Amando Wilson walk you to the basement, which has been flooding on and off since last year. Some kind of pipe problem, they were told. The floor is stained. There is wet, dark sewage. The odor clogs your head. You get halfway down the steps and you want to turn back.

You can. They can’t. For the Wilsons, this is home. Married nine years and raising eight children (four from an earlier marriage), they found it one of the few places they have been able to rent.

Flash mobs: Quick start, hard to stop

by Mitch Albom | Aug 14, 2011 | Detroit Free Press

Andy Warhol once predicted everyone would be famous for 15 minutes. He didn’t say we would all be connected in an instant.

But we are. One touch of a button. One group e-mail. One Facebook post. And boom! Everyone knows everything. Or everyone is in one place. They call it a flash mob. And it recently has shown its dark side, in London, Philadelphia and other places.

Crowds gather. Crowds turn to mobs. Mobs turn to riots. And they were all invited.

Frank’s the coach – now where’s team?

by Mitch Albom | Aug 4, 2011 | Detroit Free Press

Determination? In high school, Lawrence Frank tried out every year for the basketball team. Every year, he’d wait for the roster to be posted. Every year, it was the same.

Cut.

“Finally, my senior year,” Frank recalled, “the coach put his arm around me and said, ‘Son, you’ve got a lot of courage … but you’re still cut.'”

Determination? Frank so loved his sport, he played for a Catholic Youth Organization team AND a Jewish Community Center team – at the same time.