Six years before the 1992 Dream Team exploded onto the scene, a creeping realization had grown in American basketball circles that we could no longer win on the international stage with college athletes.

A short, stocky man of about 40 wearing a Hawaiian shirt was speaking English loudly to the hotel concierge. Another ugly American, I grumbled as I waited behind him and his companions — a young woman and girl.

As the specter of inflation swirls around us and random supply chain challenges continue to disrupt the status quo, I am reminded of living in Brazil in the 1980s, where inflation ran rampant and supply chain disruptions were a way of life.

I once had a great friend named Alison who so loved her dog that when it died she commissioned a sculptor to honor its memory by creating a life size replica. Working from a photograph, and using memorabilia contributed by the family, the artist fashioned a collage from wood, metal and plastic replicating the dog’s dimensions with precision.

Harold Bradley Jr. led a renaissance life: 1950 University of Iowa football MVP, two-time NFL champion with the Cleveland Browns, a promising painter who began winning art prizes in grade school, an actor who appeared in two dozen movies, numerous television shows and plays.

The COVID-19 pandemic, spiraling costs, a growing mental health crisis and a variety of other concerns have raised the debate about the value of the residential college experience.

I have taken the U.S. Postal Service for granted my entire life — that is, until the pandemic and the 2020 presidential election brought a new appreciation for the much maligned institution. The post office is nearly as central to my experience on this planet as is the sun rising each morning; I can’t always see either, but I know that I can depend on both.

Every one of us has things we’ve desperately missed during the pandemic. Very high on my list is experiencing live music. As my excitement builds to see live shows again soon, it also reinforces how much I took live music and its benefits for granted.

Dr. Michael Main is a native Iowan who grew up in Johnston and attended Central College in Pella before going to medical school at the University of Iowa. Today he is a board-certified cardiologist living in Kansas City who practices at Saint Luke’s Mid America Heart Institute, one of the largest cardiology clinics in the country.

Speeding down the New Jersey turnpike while drinking a double espresso, I felt a sudden thumping in my chest followed by a rapid-fire series of beats; breathing was no longer effortless. When the chaotic beating wouldn’t resolve, I pulled over at a rest stop and took my pulse. It was 150, two and a half times my normal heart rate.

When Dave Gould asked Ashton Kutcher if he was interested in participating in a virtual commencement address, the Iowa native and Hollywood star didn’t hesitate.

The memory of hunting morel mushrooms with my dad in the Iowa woodlands sprouts each spring like daffodils — radiant and precious.

Every conversation I’ve had about Iowa basketball this year sooner or later pivots to appreciation or even marvel at the tireless energy, zeal and passion Luka Garza brings to the game.

One could argue that Kobe Bryant never would have become a Los Angeles Laker had it not been for former Iowa Hawkeye basketball great Ronnie Lester.

If you caught the Iowa men’s basketball game a few weeks ago from the Palestra, you know how closely coach Fran McCaffery’s identity is tied to Philadelphia’s storied basketball past.

One brisk autumn morning, my daughter and I happened upon a rundown apothecary-looking bookshop in Dublin, Ireland. Slipping through weathered French doors, I was met by a woman smiling at me over readers as she thrust an opened copy of James Joyce’s "Ulysses" into my hands. The tiny shop was crammed with people each holding a book and following along as a gentleman read aloud.

For the past year, I’ve been pondering whether the alternative football uniforms the Iowa Hawkeyes wore against Ohio State last November influenced their uncharacteristic, 55-24 thrashing of the No. 3-ranked Buckeyes.

When my mother was diagnosed with ovarian cancer, I spent a lot of time at the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics (UIHC). There was chemo to shrink her tumors, surgery, an unexpected visit to the intensive care unit, stints in a rehab facility, then a month to heal before more rounds of chemo. One of the bright spots — besides the nursing staff and oncology surgeon Dr. David Bender — was the hospital art collection.

How does one measure the impact of a life? I’ve been pondering this question ever since my former University of Iowa basketball teammate Kenny Arnold died in May after a long illness.

As a fourth-grader, I remember visiting the Dubuque post office with my mother and being captivated by two towering murals bookending the entranceway. These vibrant snapshots of early life on the Mississippi River fascinated me. They still do.

With seventh grade winding down and hints of summer teasing, my mother did something that would forever change the course of my basketball career. She challenged me to a free throw contest.

My first journaling experience came on advice from the Des Moines Register. After mustering the courage to propose writing an article about playing on the University of Iowa basketball team in 1981, the Register suggested – with no guarantee they’d publish it – that I keep a diary over the final month of the season detailing our pursuit of a Big Ten championship.

I was fortunate to have walked on to the Iowa basketball team in 1979-80, the same season it would reach the Final Four.

I was just a teenager in 1974 when the defunct Parsons College in Fairfield became Maharishi International University. I remember feeling a tinge of sadness that Parsons' century of tradition had died, and yet also a peculiar sense of pride —Transcendental Meditation (or TM) was hip after all, made famous by celebrities like the Beach Boys and the Beatles.

Grant Wood’s painting "American Gothic" has filled me with both pride and unease since I was a kid. I want to be a fan of Wood because he is Iowa’s most famous painter, because his family and mine share a Jones County heritage, and because Wood holds the distinction of creating arguably the most recognizable painting in the world besides Leonardo da Vinci’s "Mona Lisa."

On the evening of March 17, 1980, we returned to Iowa City victorious after defeating Georgetown in the NCAA East Region Final, advancing Iowa basketball to its first Final Four in 24 years.

When a business trip took me to Australia recently, I jumped at the chance to see my former Iowa basketball teammate and good friend Steve Carfino.

“Don’t judge a man until you have walked a mile in his shoes” is a memorable line from Harper Lee’s racially charged classic "To Kill a Mockingbird" when Atticus Fitch speaks to his daughter Scout about the importance of empathy. It is an appropriate reference in this Christmas/Hanukkah/Kwanzaa season when the spirit of giving is at the forefront of our minds. I’m reminded how exposure to race shaped my ability to show empathy to those whose color and culture differ from my own.

When I told my friends in Austin, Texas, that we were moving to Iowa, I received looks of shock and dismay — even pity. It was amusing had it not felt sad that people can so easily write off an entire state.