Blog Round-Up: Baltimore Loses ‘Best Mayor in America,’ Magical Mount Airy and a Personal Journey with Breast Cancer

Here’s a roundup of what the best bloggers in our area are writing about:

Perhaps there is no better piece that describes the heart and soul of the late Maryland governor and Baltimore mayor, William Donald Schaefer, than the beautiful 1984 Esquire story by Richard Ben Cramer. In honor of Schaefer’s death, the story was reprinted by the magazine this week and tweeted across the Internet. It documents in tight narrative the mayor who remade Baltimore with his big personality, temper tantrums and all.

Blogger Erin Sullivan, an artist and mother in Carroll County, writes about seeing the beauty and art in every day life as she and her husband raise their baby daughter, Leilani. In a recent post, she runs several photos of the idyllic Mount Airy-- its bridges, bakery and town hall. Check out her paintings in progress posts and her insights into what inspires her as an artist and a mother.

Deneitra Hutchinson, the host of Columbia Matters, the Columbia Association’s television show, blogs about her feelings about her new body after surgery. She’s frank about her disappointment with what she hoped would be sort of an upside to getting breast cancer. “I was expecting bigger and better,” she wrote.

Writer Thien-Kim Lam, who also contributes to Colesville Patch, blogs about growing up in rural Louisiana and hearing this question day after day: “Do you consider yourself black or white.” She writes that she would shrug and say, “Neither,” but wondered why she needed to explain.