Fannie Flono

As a girl of 16, I left a party with a friend – a male friend – who agreed to drop me off at my house to meet my midnight curfew. My house was only a few blocks away, and I trusted him to get me there safely. But as I got in the car, a couple of his male friends got in too. And when he drove off, it was not in the direction of my house.

I know there are more important things going on in the world. Syria’s Bashar al-Assad is apparently killing his people with chemical weapons. The FBI is grilling three other suspects in the senseless Boston Marathon bombing. Bangladesh is still recovering from the toppling of an illegally constructed garment building where a mind-boggling 410 people (at least) died and thousands more were injured.

Charlotte’s Johnson C. Smith University has been on a transformative journey the last few years. In the words of its president Ron Carter, the college is redefining the urban university. The new urban university, he said, develops viable and sustainable partnerships as well as the intellectual capital in the communities that it is a part of.

In a week where one senseless, horrendous act of violence claimed the lives of three and maimed or injured more than 170 others, the U.S. Senate’s vote Wednesday against sensible gun control measures felt like sacrilege.

This week some N.C. lawmakers are putting an exclamation point on the line from Forrest Gump: “Stupid is as stupid does.” A bill proposed by two of them that says North Carolina and its counties and towns have the right to establish an official religion is getting the loudest national heehaws at the moment, and deservedly so. This crackpot bill states boldly that though the U.S. Constitution prevents Congress from creating an official religion, that ban does not apply to the states.

I kept looking around the Grand Ballroom at Charlotte’s Westin hotel Wednesday afternoon hoping I’d see some top N.C. legislative leaders. They’ve been busy crafting policies and laws they say will align what businesses need in employees with what educators need to teach to supply a skilled workforce. If they weren’t there – I didn’t spot any – they missed an insightful and engaging symposium that explored that link.

Several years ago, I tried to get inside the head of an executioner.

A refrain from a Beyonce song swirled through my mind when I read a report compiled by Meredith College titled, “The Status of Girls in North Carolina 2013.” The words? “Who run(s) the world? Girls!”

Ben Carson already has worldwide fame as a gifted pediatric neurosurgeon who made medical history in 1987 when he was the first surgeon to successfully separate twins who had been joined at the back of their heads. His accomplishments were even more remarkable because of his life story.

2013 is turning out to be quite the year for remembering. Some events will get more attention than others. For instance, this year marks the 25th anniversary of the Civil Liberties Act of 1988. Stumped? With that law, Congress redressed interning Japanese Americans during World War II.