O.W. Root

Michigan

Contributor at Enjoyer

Columnist at Blaze Media

Host at Pleasant Peninsula with O.W. Root

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Articles

When did America's public libraries become homeless encampments?

1 week ago | theblaze.com | O.W. Root

What happened to libraries? No, I’m not talking about school libraries being turned into propaganda factories, shelving what amounts to textual pornography for middle school students, all justified under the guise of “inclusivity.” That’s a discussion for another time. One December, as my wife left the library, a homeless man spit across the stairs onto the back of her dress. She turned around to find him quite satisfied with himself.
Want Outdoor Kids? Don't Let Them Inside

1 week ago | enjoyer.com | O.W. Root

Petoskey — Kids are in trouble. They are wasting their days inside on iPads, frying their attention spans and crushing their imaginations. Screens make good children into worse children. On a robust diet of iPad consumed in a climate-controlled living room, children grow up dull, weak in spirit and body, unsettled, distracted, and poorly behaved. The more TV, iPad, and YouTube kids consume, the worse their manners become. They take cues from the stupidity on the screen. They become what they watch.
Why Yoopers Have Their Own Chocolate Bars and We Don't

2 weeks ago | enjoyer.com | O.W. Root

Escanaba — The U.P. isn’t so far away. On one side of the water there are the trolls, and on the other are the Yoopers, those hardy (read as “insane”) individuals who live way up there. On one side are Hershey’s bars, those generic chocolate bars that all good Americans seem to eat around the campfire while swatting mosquitoes every summer. On the other side are Yooper Bars, the candy bar you’ve never heard of. What is a Yooper Bar? It’s the chocolate bar of the U.P. It’s the opposite of generic.
We're all 'too busy' to eat dinner as a family — but we should do it anyway | Blaze Media

2 weeks ago | theblaze.com | O.W. Root

What does it mean to eat dinner together as a family? Why do we do it? Or rather, why did we do it? It seems the number of families who eat dinner together every night is shrinking. I remember that if the phone rang during that time, my parents would look at one another shocked. 'Who would be calling during dinner?'It feels like every year it becomes more rare.
It's not just nostalgia: The '90s really were better

3 weeks ago | theblaze.com | O.W. Root

Nineties nostalgia is big these days. Some are into the music. Distorted guitars and drum sets. Something more human than samples and synths. People dressed better in the '90s. Even considering grunge culture, people dressed better. There were no Crocs in 1994. Some are into the clothes. Old Polo Ralph Lauren on one hand and grungy baggy jeans on another. From time to time, I see young people crossing the street, and those memories of the JNCO years come rushing back.
How Sea Stacks Emerged From a Prehistoric Mega-Lake

3 weeks ago | enjoyer.com | O.W. Root

St. Ignace — What in the world are sea stacks? Some kind of utilitarian architecture you might find on a Norwegian fjord? A card game sailors used to play below deck on dimly lit ships in the late 1800s? Sea stacks are ancient rock formations, remnants of the prehistoric past. Defiant and craggy, they are obstinate relics. They stick straight up and out of the rough water. They line the rocky shore.
My first sign of spring? A peach-colored OCBD

4 weeks ago | theblaze.com | O.W. Root

Even for those who profess no particular interest in clothing, its practical value is relatively uncontroversial. It covers our bodies, ensuring we aren’t completely naked, standing embarrassed in the middle of the road. It keeps us warm, preventing us from dying in the middle of a snowbank in January. And most people will concede that clothing reflects our culture and history. No, there isn’t much history in the pair of sweatpants, but there is in the Oxford shirt or the necktie.
Looking for a glimmer of light

1 month ago | theblaze.com | O.W. Root

The past few years have been hard. Illnesses and deaths in our families. Other stuff too. It’s felt like a lot of the things that really matter haven’t really gone so good for a while. Work is fine. Actually, work is better than ever. But I don’t really care if I’m honest. It’s not what matters. When things were better, work was worse. I don’t really like this trade so much. Can I do an exchange? In the case of the flickering bathroom light, assuming the worst only made more work for myself.
Leelanau, the Last Holdout Against Dollar General

1 month ago | enjoyer.com | O.W. Root

Glen Arbor — Dollar General has invaded Michigan. The company has conquered both the Upper and Lower Peninsula. They have set up shop peddling cheap garbage in almost every corner of our lovely land. In 2025, Dollar Generals can be found in every single county in Michigan, save one. Yes, there is one place where they have been stopped, one last county that refuses to fall victim to this rapacious junk monger. Leelanau County is the final holdout. The final refuge.
Why Rogers City Never Became Charlevoix

1 month ago | enjoyer.com | O.W. Root

Rogers City — Pull up a map of Michigan. Find Charlevoix and Rogers City. They appear like a pair at the tip of the Lower Peninsula. One western, one eastern. Charlevoix on Lake Michigan. Rogers City on Lake Huron. On paper, they are strikingly similar. But on the ground, they are strikingly different. Both cities sit at nearly the same latitude. They are both, decidedly, Up North. To get from one to the other is an 81 mile drive straight through the northern wilderness. Both are practically the same size.