Together - a Column by Mark Harrington

My mother was not a quilter. In 87 years, I don’t think she ever gave quilts a thought. It wasn’t until I was an adult living in the South that I became aware of the craft’s popularity. I learned about quilting weekends, magazines, stores, group chats, and more. I saw…

Every eight weeks, when I sit in an infusion chair, I can’t help but think of the small, patient labor that had to happen before the medication Ultomiris (ravulizumab-cwvz) ever found my veins. Myasthenia gravis (MG) doesn’t care much about history, but I do, and Ultomiris has one worth…

I have an unusual and slightly weird affection for old-time hymns. Something in me responds to the great hymns that have endured for thousands of years, such as “Sub Tuum Praesidium,” one of the oldest known hymns in Christianity. I feel a physical reaction to them. I also…

Texas in July is rough. By 9 a.m., the light is blinding and the heat is oppressive. The grass has given up and gone the color of straw. Cicadas saw away at the heat. You move from one air-conditioned location to another. The spaces in between are brutal reminders that…

It’s sweltering here in Texas. The air quality is abysmal, and a sense of “blah” seems to be everywhere. For somebody like me living with myasthenia gravis (MG), daily life is significantly more difficult this time of year. I’m forced to be semi-monastic, only crawling out of my lair,…

Before I was diagnosed with myasthenia gravis (MG) and neurologists started timing how long I could hold my arms in the air, I had another name altogether. To my family, I was never really Mark. I was Boo, a shortened form of Booza. Usually, we don’t choose our nicknames.

“And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation worketh patience; And patience, experience; and experience, hope.” The apostle Paul was not writing about myasthenia gravis (MG) with those words. He was speaking instead about the whole human condition, the arc of a…

Here’s a riddle: What has more compartments than a tackle box, more variety than a buffet, and takes longer to sort than a load of laundry you’ve ignored until you ran out of clean underwear? If you said my weekly pill organizer, congratulations! You clearly know me or someone like…

On Memorial Day, my sister posted a photograph on Facebook that made me stop and think. There was my father, a World War II Navy veteran, standing in front of our town’s monument to all those who served in the military. He stood straight, with the assistance of a cane,…

When I was diagnosed with myasthenia gravis (MG), I believed I understood it. My father had lived with it, and from a distance, his struggle seemed manageable. But MG has a way of exposing illusions. It teaches, often brutally, the difference between what appears strong and what actually endures.