Opinion

Dear Annie: It will soon be my 40th birthday, and I’m feeling a tremendous amount of anxiety with this pending milestone event. Intuitively, I understand that it is an arbitrary number. My body feels the same as it did yesterday, and nothing appears to be changing. However, emotionally, it feels like everything is changing. And I feel that when I wake up on my birthday, all will change, suddenly.

“When she was in the room, you knew she was in the room,” my mother, professor Judith Stiehm observed of Janet Reno, the first woman to serve as U.S. attorney general. They were friends and my mother wrote Reno’s biography after she died in 2016 at age 78.

How worried should we be about artificial intelligence? Popular culture is rife with terrifying tales of insane or malevolent AI, from HAL-9000 in “2001” to Skynet in the “Terminator” films and the machines that turn human beings into living batteries in the “Matrix” movies. Rogue AI is a sci-fi cliche.

Dear Annie: I’ve been seeing a therapist for around five years, and I find myself unsure what to say. My wife first encouraged me to speak with a professional to help me better understand myself and deal with some buried anger. One of my major realizations in therapy has been that I have difficulty sharing my thoughts and emotions, and this can make therapy difficult. I’ve realized this is a common theme throughout my life, as nobody in my childhood ever tried to engage emotionally with me. My therapist will encourage me to discuss what I’m thinking; yet, I struggle to articulate it.

Put a Big Smile on Your Face with a Dental Savings Plan I opened my inbox and right near the top was a frantic letter from Lisa, who’s facing an emergency dental situation with a $15,000 price tag on it. She is desperate for options that will let her keep her teeth while not plunging her into debt.

Officials at Stanford University could learn something from the New York City Police Department about defending free speech while maintaining order. When hecklers prevented an invited speaker from addressing an audience at Stanford’s law school, what could have been a peaceful protest turned into an act of verbal violence. It’s easier to stop people from crossing these boundaries when you’ve established boundaries.

Apr. 9—MILWAUKEE — A mix of milestones ranging from the deeply personal to the potentially historic to the absolutely necessary merged together for the complete kind of game the Cardinals have promised.

Dear Annie: I have been a practicing attorney for six years. My current job as an in-house attorney was my first job out of law school. My employer was taking a big risk on me, as in-house positions are usually given to attorneys who have already done their time in big firms. My boss said that she saw a lot of potential in me, and even though she knew it would take more time to train me, she thought it was worth it.

It’s unintentionally laughable when cable news hosts like Rachel Maddow break in to announce that MSNBC will not be airing any of Donald Trump’s post-arraignment speech live because “there’s a cost to us as a news organization of knowingly broadcasting untrue things.”

In a Pinch, You Can Use This for That Have you ever discovered you’re all out of a certain ingredient when you’re in the middle of preparing a recipe? I hate when that happens. And I don’t want to run to the store.