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Amanda Pell

I'm just a lady who loves a good story, whether or not I'm the one telling it. I'm a New York-based frequent flyer, intersectional feminist, political junkie, and occasional comedian. I rode in an elevator with Walter Cronkite in 1997, and I've been doing my best to tell it the way it is ever since.

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You’re getting ready for a date. It’s time to pick the place. Where do you go?

You want to consider price — not too cheap, not too expensive — and ambiance; you want it to be conveniently located, with a good menu and perhaps some alcohol offerings. And if you’re gay in Indiana, you also need to pick somewhere you know you won’t get harassed or downright thrown out.

“Any service provider in Indiana can turn anyone down,” says Amy Shaw, who identifies as a lesbian and has lived in Indiana for the past 14 years. “People get assaulted for being queer. So it’s important to know where those safe places are, where you’ll get served, where people are going to treat you like anyone else.”

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People on SNAP aren't who you think. Case in point, this hard-working couple.

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Gideon and Lina Ramirez are college-educated, employed parents of three kids. They’re also living on food stamps.

“We’re a happy family of five,” says Lina. She works part-time from home as a graphics designer while Gideon is in his last year at Sidney Kimmel Medical College in Philadelphia.

“He’s training to be an emergency room doctor,” says Lina proudly. “If anyone can do it, it’s him. He’s probably the most calm and cool-headed person on the planet.”

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When my boss fired me, I said "Yup, that makes sense," and gathered up my things to go.

He didn’t mince words and neither did I — we wished each other well and that was that. I had been eating tortilla chips at my desk before he called me into his office, and the thing I remember most was my face flushing at how loud the bag crinkled as my coworkers watched me pack my things.

My firing didn’t come as a surprise to anyone. My team and I had struggled for months, and it was obviously due to my inexperience and subsequent unhappiness working in an environment fraught with stress. In fact, I’d already interviewed for a few different positions and was planning to leave the company soon.

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Amanda Pell

You’re getting ready for a date. It’s time to pick the place. Where do you go?

That’s why now, a small sticker is showing up in storefront windows across the state carrying a big message: “these businesses serve everyone.”

It’s incredibly important — to customers, companies, and communities at large — for everyone to be allowed to participate in society equally.

The sticker is a big step in the right direction, but those who use it still admit that they wish they didn’t have to.

The LGBT community and allies continue to fight for legal protection against discrimination. But in the meantime, the sticker — and the people who use it — have a big impact.

Gideon and Lina Ramirez are college-educated, employed parents of three kids. They’re also living on food stamps.

But then their son, Sebastian, was born around the same time that Gideon got into medical school, and their situation became exponentially more difficult.

Now, Lina has time to raise her kids as best she can — which includes cooking with the groceries she buys with her SNAP benefits.

Lina’s no longer embarrassed about using food stamps — and she is adamant that no one else should be either.

If what they say is true, 2018 is shaping up to be the year of the woman.

Congresswomen are extremely capable. Just take a look at what they’ve done already.

There are men in Congress who are critical advocates for women. But that’s not enough.

Of course, women are also well-suited to accomplish more than just progress on “women’s issues.”

While there are more women entering politics, the job is not done quite yet.

When my boss fired me, I said "Yup, that makes sense," and gathered up my things to go.

This isn’t a thinkpiece on millennials, but I’d be remiss if I failed to acknowledge that I am one.

If you’re planning on raising a kid, I highly recommend not letting them get to 22 without experiencing at least one real, crushing failure in their life.

Being unemployed taught me how to function as an individual instead of an employee or a student for the first time in my life.

What I ended up learning while I was unemployed is that I'm not cut out for office life, and that there are other options.

When Josh Kaplan was a kid, he had a pretty hard time fitting in.

Soccer had helped Josh fit in — now he realized he could help others do the same thing.

But it wasn’t always easy. In fact, Kaplan's first organized game was almost a failure.

The games afford kids an amazing opportunity to understand and interact with kids who might be different from them.

Most importantly, though, is the fact that everyone gets a chance to play, interact, and be part of a team.

"I’m definitely really comfortable in my skin," Kody says. But a few years ago, that wasn't the case.

Free to start expressing himself without shame, Kody began to explore. He found his passion somewhere unexpected: in makeup.

But makeup didn’t just help Kody find his identity. It also helped him find his purpose.

Kody wants to spread the message that makeup isn’t something you should use to hide. It’s something you should use to reveal who you truly are.

One of today's most innovative forms of sustainable farming is old. Like, really, really old. Aztec Empire old: chinampas.

The Aztecs used stunning floating gardens — otherwise known as chinampas — to grow their crops without harming the environment.

This wasn't just a feat of incredible gardening — chinapas took a lot of complicated work to create.

So don't call it a comeback. Chinampas have been here for years.

The success of chinampas is a testament to the fact that sometimes the most innovative solutions don't involve looking to the future, but to the past.