Season Opener
Last night, at 10:42 p.m. Eastern, summer arrived in the Northern Hemisphere. With it, a major heat wave is affecting large swaths of the U.S. Keep yourself safe and stay cool however you can this weekend. If you can find your way to some water — a pool, a lake or a river, the ocean, your trusty old bathtub — do it.
Not only will you cool off, but you'll also get the benefit that my friend Lori pointed out to me recently: Swimming is one of the only activities in modern life during which it's nearly impossible to be on your phone. (Fine, it's possible in the bathtub. But why are you on your phone in the bathtub?) The ideal of summer, the one that plays in my imagination during the colder months, is totally tech-free. It's all real life, all sensation: sun on skin, sand between toes, picking the corn cob free of its waxy silk, always smelling something grilling somewhere. There's no phone in this film, no text message or push alert, nothing vibrating in anyone's pocket.
My colleagues on the Travel desk have a new story this morning about far-flung resorts where people pay up to $32,000 a night to get away from civilization, to unyoke themselves from the stranglehold of Wi-Fi. This seems extreme. But I still get nostalgic remembering the phone-free week I spent in the woods nearly two years ago, what a relief it was not to have that parallel life to tend to for a spell.
Last week, I wrote about how to find a middle ground between obsession and retreat in the face of what feels like an impossible-to-process volume of information. The solution, as with so many of our persistent complaints, is presence. The phone takes us out of the present like nothing else. I've been thinking about the moment when you return, after having been deep in your phone, oblivious to your surroundings. There's this feeling of dislocation, like waking up. You have been traveling, you've been elsewhere, totally disconnected from the world, your home. You have this second where you aren't sure where you were, as if you've lost your place.
You lose bits of your life when you're lost in your device. You know this, I know this, but somehow, in summer, it seems even more regrettable to miss out on the moment. It's finally warm enough to linger outside. There's enough daylight that, on a Saturday, you can get your chores done and still have time to lie in the grass with a book, to contemplate the leaves against the sky. On hot days in the city, you can see and smell the sun acting on the asphalt, refracting in blurry, mineral-y waves. The roses are almost obnoxious in their exuberance. Why would you want to miss a minute of this?
Politics
Mahmoud Khalil, the pro-Palestinian campus protester detained by the Trump administration, was released on bail, ending his three-month imprisonment.
A federal judge sided with Harvard and barred the Trump administration from rescinding the school's right to host international students. The university has restarted talks with the White House to potentially settle their acrimonious dispute.
The Trump administration laid off more than 600 workers from the federally funded news outlet Voice of America, leaving the broadcaster with fewer than 200 staffers.
On Juneteenth, Trump did not utter the name of the federal holiday. It's part of a broader playbook to minimize the Black experience in America, writes Erica Green, a White House correspondent.
This week, the Supreme Court upheld a Tennessee law that prohibits some medical treatments for transgender youths. In the video below, Adam Liptak, who covers the Supreme Court, describes the three factions within the 6-to-3 decision. Click to watch.
Iran-Israel War
A day of talks between the European Union and Iran yielded no significant breakthroughs. An Iranian official said there would be 'no room for talking' until Israel stopped its attacks.
Israel and Iran traded fire for the ninth consecutive day after a European diplomatic effort — dismissed by President Trump — made little immediate progress in preventing the exchanges of fire from spiraling into a broader war.
In a fiery U.N. Security Council meeting, Israel and Iran blamed each other for the war, and their allies took familiar sides.
Trump says he wants to make a nuclear deal with Iran in two weeks. Veteran diplomats warn that his timeline may be too short for a notoriously slow process.
More International News
Microsoft recently suspended a European official's email account, under orders from the Trump administration. The move stoked fears abroad: Can Trump use U.S. tech dominance as a cudgel?
The crash of an Air India flight last week highlighted the danger of building busy airports within dense city neighborhoods.
Vladimir Putin's insistence on maintaining the Russian offensive in Ukraine has come at a diplomatic cost.
Other Big Stories
A law student at the University of Florida won a class award for a paper he wrote promoting racist views. It set off months of campus turmoil.
The Republican plan to terminate billions in clean energy tax credits would result in a hotter planet, scientists warn.
Trump's funding cuts are forcing universities to consider tuition hikes and layoffs.
Some New York City leaders want to include nearly two million noncitizens in the next census.
Film and TV
Flesh-shredding creatures are wandering, crawling and, most worryingly, running amok in '28 Years Later,' the third installment in the zombie film series. Read the review.
Three directors are credited on Pixar's 'Elio,' about an orphaned boy who dreams of being abducted by aliens. But they're not all listed onscreen at the same time. Here's why.
Times critics put together a list of the best TV shows of 2025 so far, including the animated conspiracy thriller 'Common Side Effects.'
In an era of skepticism around live-action remakes, Universal believed a new 'How to Train Your Dragon' would draw audiences. Read the inside story of the studio's big bet.
More Culture
Many modern video games take inspiration from Studio Ghibli, the famed Japanese animation studio.
FIFA, soccer's governing body, unveiled a luxury fashion line at a starry party in L.A. See inside.
New York City restaurants won three of the six major awards at the James Beard Restaurant awards this week, including outstanding chef and outstanding hospitality.
After a ban last year, Joey Chestnut will return to the Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest.
Leonard Lauder, the visionary executive behind Estée Lauder who died last week at 92, was the original beauty influencer.
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