Cloe Axelson

Massachusetts

Senior Editor at WBUR-FM (Boston, MA)

Senior editor @cogwbur at @wbur. Writer, runner, Cubs fan, mom of three girls. “Let’s play two.”

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Articles

'By Power and Pride': A Minuteman for life

1 week ago | wbur.org | Cloe Axelson

If a cat has nine lives, I bet Carl Sweeney has 11. He is a Renaissance man. The 69-year-old is a retired educator (for 24 years, he was a beloved custodian at Willard Elementary in Concord, where he also he had an alter ego — “Captain Zero, the Math Superhero”); an award-winning golf coach; a veteran of the Massachusetts National Guard; a one-time traffic reporter for WBZ and WRKO; and a poet (more on that later). He’s got three kids and nine grandkids.
It's the small stuff that endures

2 weeks ago | wbur.org | Cloe Axelson

Editor's Note: This essay appeared in Cognoscenti's newsletter of ideas and opinions, delivered weekly on Sundays. To become a subscriber, sign up here. My college softball coach has given me loads of good advice over the years on matters big and small: the proper technique to lay down a bunt, the best strategy to pursue in a cut-throat game of Hearts and the value of hand-written correspondence.
When your reporting beat becomes personal

1 month ago | wbur.org | Cloe Axelson

Editor's Note: This essay appeared in Cognoscenti's newsletter of ideas and opinions, delivered weekly on Sundays. To become a subscriber, sign up here. As you probably know, Cog is part of WBUR, Boston’s NPR station. We sit in WBUR’s newsroom — though as a journalistic institution, Cog is editorially independent. Our newsroom colleagues don’t tell us which political commentaries and personal essays to publish; our small but mighty team gets to decide.
It's our job to remember the pandemic - even as the beat goes on

1 month ago | wbur.org | Cloe Axelson

Editor's Note: This essay appeared in Cognoscenti's newsletter, delivered weekly on Sundays. To become a subscriber, sign up here. The New York Times published 30 charts last week showing how American life has changed since the pandemic began in March 2020. The Times’ data journalists created bar charts and line graphs showing dramatic swings in the average time spent commuting, alcohol sales, the share of women in the labor force, online shopping, marriage rates and a whole lot more.
Lies are not truth

1 month ago | wbur.org | Cloe Axelson

Editor's Note: The Firehose is a regular column in which Cog contributors provide a high-level recap of what actions the Trump administration has taken in the preceding two weeks, and help us make sense of it. Imagine you and your partner are planning what to prepare for dinner. Without a common definition of nouns like “chicken” and verbs like “bake”-- even of adjectives like “spicy” or “sweet” — the meal will likely turn out to be an unpleasant surprise for at least one of you.
How to endure a partner who snores

1 month ago | wbur.org | Cloe Axelson

How to endure a partner who snoresHaving a partner who snores can be a challenge. WBUR's senior editor Cloe Axelson shares her own journey in this essay. This segment airs on March 6, 2025. Audio will be available after the broadcast.
The cost of being a baby-making being

1 month ago | wbur.org | Cloe Axelson

Editor's Note: This essay appeared in Cog's newsletter, sent every Sunday. We share stories that remind you we're all part of something bigger. Sign up here. My mother tells me menopause can be summed up like this: “There’s a cost to being a baby-making being.”It’s such a good line. But she knows — and I know, too — that there’s much more to it than the symptoms that have been the punchline of jokes for eternity: hot flashes, insomnia, brain fog, hormonal rage.
Q&A with Theresa Okokon: She wrote a memoir for her future self

2 months ago | wbur.org | Cloe Axelson

Editor's Note: An excerpt of this interview appeared in Cognoscenti's weekly Sunday newsletter of ideas and opinions. To become a subscriber, sign up here. Having the opportunity to work with writers of all backgrounds and experiences is one of my very favorite things about working at Cog. Just this week, I got to work with Anita Diamant on the second installment of “The Firehose” and chat with Julie Wittes Schlack about her lifelong obsession with the Guinness World Records.
We've entered a time warp

2 months ago | wbur.org | Cloe Axelson

Editor's Note: This essay appeared in Cognoscenti's newsletter of ideas and opinions, delivered weekly on Sundays. To become a subscriber, sign up here. When my kids have a snow day, we hear about it via an automated text and a phone call from our school district, usually at an ungodly hour in the morning. But when I was a kid, finding out you had a snow day meant listening to the radio or watching the local news for minutes that felt like hours.
What will not burn

Jan 19, 2025 | wbur.org | Cloe Axelson

Editor's Note: This essay appeared in Cognoscenti's newsletter of ideas and opinions, delivered weekly on Sundays. To become a subscriber, sign up here. I’ve been thinking lately about what it means to remember. We all want to believe that our most salient memories are seared into our brains forevermore — that we’ll never, ever forget what it felt like to drive for the first time or watch our children take their first steps or say goodbye to someone we love. Though, of course that’s not true.