Celebrating freedom this Fourth of July
Independence Day, our opportunity to celebrate freedom, is almost here and people are engaging in cookouts, neighborhood parties, parades and fireworks around the country. Most of the celebrations started this past weekend. And the weather is perfect – hot and humid. Just what you’d expect at the halfway point of the year in the deep South. What’s it all about? Guilty as anyone else for enjoying a good party, I also like to at least take a few minutes and explore what’s behind the celebration. Reflection helps me be more appreciative. The Fourth of July – Independence Day...
Read MoreNever forgotten
In 2006, realizing the ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were not going to end anytime soon, editors at The Tuscaloosa News began looking for a way to put a more personal spin on reporting these wars. We wanted to bring the experience home in such a way that our readers would be able to connect with what was going on halfway around the world. The idea we liked best was to develop a series of profiles on the Alabama servicemen and women who had died since Sept. 11, 2001, when the active War on Terror began. The goal would be to bring the statistics to life by giving our state’s casualties...
Read MoreThe best Mother’s Day gift ever
On Mother’s Day 2002 I was living in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, but visiting a friend in Macon, Georgia, that weekend. My son, Nate, still in the Army and in Germany, was already engaged to his now wife, Sarah. I planned to stop by that Sunday afternoon to visit Sarah, who also lived in Macon, a little while before making the four-hour drive back to Tuscaloosa. Although it had been only a few days since I talked to Nate, I was fairly certain he would call again that day because it was Mother’s Day. He had even said as much, so I expected it to happen. When I woke up that morning, it was...
Read MoreA Mother’s Day memory
When my son was 12, he came to me about a month before Mother’s Day. He had figured out — all by himself — that the big day was coming up, and he was going to need some money to buy a gift. Being too young to get a real job, he turned to the one ready resource he knew — good old Mom. At least he asked about “earning” money instead of asking me to “give” him money. I told him if he wanted to start receiving his allowance again, all he had to do was consistently complete the list of chores that we had developed a while back. They weren’t that hard — in fact, were very...
Read MoreHot off the presses
It took a bit longer than I anticipated to get my new book in shape. But it’s now complete and all set to go public. For a sometimes sentimental, sometimes poignant, other times hilarious trip into the throes (and joys) of parenting, get your copy of “The Nathaniel Chronicles” today. For 20 years, I wrote and edited in the features section at two newspapers – one in Macon, Georgia, and one in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Part of my writing many of those years included a weekly personal column covering all sorts of conundrums I found myself in or topics I thought would be interesting to our readers....
Read MoreWhat would Daddy think?
My father would be 98 today, October 10, if he were still living. I’ve often wondered over the years since he died in 1986 – at the young age of 66 – what he would be thinking about the world if he were still with us. I’m pretty sure he would be astounded to see people of all ages walking around seemingly talking to themselves. In fact, I’m still occasionally taken off guard by it myself and I’ve been exposed to the phenomenon for years. I was in the grocery store this past weekend and heard a woman talking about how mad she was. I looked around to see if I had somehow offended her....
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Jane Self, PhD, was assistant features editor for the Macon Telegraph and features editor for The Tuscaloosa News. She received her master's degree in secondary education from Louisiana State University in New Orleans and her PhD in education administration from the University of Alabama. 
Jane Self was features editor at The Tuscaloosa News when the Fallen Warriors series began. Although she left the paper, she continued to write these profiles on a freelance basis for The News until the series was stopped in May 2009. Jane has since updated and published them as an E-book. 
In 1991 "60 Minutes" aired a story that attempted to destroy the life and work of EST founder Werner Erhard. Award-winning journalist Jane Self suspected there was more to these allegations than being reported. She discovered an amazing plot of espionage, conspiracy, and sabotage.