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My husband often hears me say that all I need to be happy is a sunny day and a pool. (He would argue that I don’t say this so much as I whine it.) No matter how bad a day I’m having, if I can squeeze in just 10 minutes coursing through the water, watching the dappled sun reflect off my arms, life feels bearable again.

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Unless you inhabit a hermit cave with no internet access, you’ll know that we live in the Age of Offense. With high levels of polarization and innumerable ways to broadcast one’s every thought to strangers far and wide, it is easier than ever to lob insults and to denigrate ideological foes.

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The guest on this episode of Radio Atlantic would not describe herself as “fun at parties,” but at least she knows it. “I’ve never really liked my personality,” wrote Olga Khazan in 2022, “and other people don’t like it either.” A few years ago, Khazan set out to change her personality, a task many people think is impossible.

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Five years ago, as the streets ran hot and the body of George Floyd lay cold, optimistic commentators believed that America was on the verge of a breakthrough in its eternal deliberation over the humanity of Black people.

Until last week, the future of vaccination for human papillomavirus, or HPV, in the United States seemed clear.
For several years, a growing body of evidence has suggested that just a single dose of the vaccine may be as effective as two are, offering decades of protection against the virus, which is estimated to cause roughly 700,000 cases of cancer each year.