Welcome back to The Weekend Press! Today, Joe Nocera on why America chooses to shoot for the moon. Will Rahn makes the case for churchgoing—even if you’re not a believer. River Page prays for a Kristi Noem biopic. And: Imagine finding out your wife is cheating on you by stumbling across a review of her memoir.
But first: On the way to the butcher, farmers sometimes get cold feet.
If you’re celebrating Easter this weekend, perhaps there’s half a lamb in your freezer right now, waiting to be roasted. If you eat meat at all, you probably get it from a grocery store. But once upon a time, people would’ve been involved in the care and killing of the animals that fed them.
If anyone now understands what that’s like, it’s our columnist Larissa Phillips, who runs a small farm with her husband in upstate New York. When they first moved there, 12 years ago, they wanted to breed animals with the utmost care, then kill them with the utmost respect. “We knew it would be hard,” she writes. “I didn’t realize that every single animal would be fodder for this existential battle.”
Growing up in a city, she was fed stories like Charlotte’s Web and Babe, “morality tales” designed to make meat-eaters feel better, because in fantasy-farmland the very sweetest animals get saved from slaughter. But as a real-life farmer, she couldn’t afford to feed an animal that wasn’t pulling its weight.
Then along came a young ram with a little spot on his nose, who let kids eat out of his hand, and her husband said: “Let’s keep him.” And as a family they were forced to confront what happens when you fall in love with an animal that’s destined for the oven.
This week, the launch of Artemis II—the first crewed trip to the moon in nearly 50 years—captivated the country. But for Americans of a certain age, it was impossible to watch without thinking back to the first time: Apollo 11, on July 20, 1969. Joe Nocera was 17 years old on that day, and in this week’s Things Worth Remembering, he writes that the miracle of seeing a man on the moon didn’t just spring out of the blue—it began seven years earlier, when President John F. Kennedy delivered the words that galvanized a nation: “We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy but because they are hard.”
If you spend too much time on the internet, as The Free Press’s Will Rahn does, you get a hypermasculine idea of Christianity: Catholic influencers love to share “videos that, at the very least, strongly imply that the Crusades to capture the Holy Land were a good idea,” he writes. But guys, he insists, you don’t have to buy into all that nonsense; the true value of making religion part of your life isn’t that you’ll reach alpha male status. “Pretending to be a crusader is probably more exciting,” Will concedes. “But going to church will probably make you a bit happier.” That’s been his experience, anyway.
During their four decades together, John Koyles and his wife raised two children, cared for aging parents and mourned their deaths, held full-time teaching positions, and published over 20 books between them. Part of what kept them together was a shared pact: Unlike other writer couples, they never read each others’ work. But one day in 2019, that all changed when John stumbled across a review of his wife’s recent memoir, describing her “lengthy adulterous affair.” Today, John tells the story of the revelation that broke his marriage open—and ultimately sent it crashing down.
Speaking of a memoir gone awry and an alleged affair—Kristi Noem will never be president, but she’s the most fascinating government official of our time. After recent revelations about her reportedly cross-dressing husband, does Trump’s favorite dog-killing diva deserve an incredibly fierce miniseries directed by “Veep” creator Armando Iannucci? River Page writes the first scene, and more, in this week’s Second Thought. He’s also got thoughts on the drama around Zendaya’s new dark rom-com, “The Drama”—which asks: What’s the worst thing you could find out about your financée a week before your wedding?
Knock Knock, It’s Cupid!
A fresh batch of ads from single Free Pressers is live on the site! Click here to meet a bike-riding cinephile in Düsseldorf; a “very” left-leaning graphic artist in Vermont; or a British expat and ex-military theologian working in tech.
Your special someone could be just one email away! If you’d like to take a chance at Free Press love, write a paragraph that defines you, your age, where you live, and what you’re looking for, and send it over to Cupid@TheFP.com.
We’ve published plenty of other pieces this week worth catching up on, including Frannie Block’s rocket-watching dispatch from Cape Canaveral, and Freya India’s reaction to Meta being found guilty of profiting from kids’ distress:
How should you spend your weekend? We asked the aforementioned pewsitter Will Rahn for his recommendations…
📺 Watch . . .How did I not know about Shoresy until its fifth season recently dropped on Hulu? Created by and starring Jared Keeso, this Canadian sitcom about an aging minor-league hockey player is exceptionally crude. It also somehow has a heart of gold, and is high in the running for the funniest show made this decade. You now have 30 episodes to watch before the sixth season arrives next year.
⚾Go…to a baseball game. There’s a reason our national pastime may have once again secured its place as America’s second-most popular sport, and it’s not just because Shohei Ohtani and Aaron Judge are doing their best impressions of Babe Ruth and Ted Williams. Get in a game or two this spring while the weather is nice and (almost) every team still has a shot at making a miracle run to the World Series. It’s practically a civic duty.
🍿See...Yes, it’s true: Project Hail Mary, starring Ryan Gosling as a lonely science teacher turned Earth-saving astronaut, is both quite good and deserves to be seen on a big screen. It’s beautiful to look at, and while the plot is familiar—think Interstellar remade as a buddy comedy—it’s fun, well done, and a great excuse to hit up your local cineplex.
Last but not least, a beautiful thing to feast your eyes on: Our art director Clara Grusq recently visited The Frick collection and found herself especially moved by one of Anthony van Dyck’s most exquisite paintings: Lady Anne Carey, Later Viscountess Claneboye and Countess of Clanbrassil, circa 1636.
That’s all, folks! Have a great weekend.
I would like to see this lamb letting kids eat out of his hand. LOL.
River Page needs to read this part: "as a real-life farmer, she couldn’t afford to feed an animal that wasn’t pulling its weight." Kristi Noem comes to mind. Understanding is better than ridicule!