We have an eclectic mix on this edition of "Two Way Street." Because it’s summertime (and the livin’ is easy), it seemed like a good time to start the show with something light and fun; and so, we do.

Just the other weekend, my family was out to dinner celebrating Father’s Day. While typically my family’s gatherings are a time to catch up on everyone’s lives, this dinner conversation was different as it was surprisingly centered around men’s clothing.

Our guest on this edition of ”Two Way Street” is New York Times best-selling author Sebastian Junger. Junger wrote the international blockbuster “The Perfect Storm,” the harrowing true tale of the doomed efforts of a boat of commercial fisherman struggling to survive a raging North Atlantic storm. Later, the book became a hit movie starring George Clooney and Mark Wahlberg.

As a teenager growing up in the Midwest, I watched the Southern civil rights movement unfold from a distance. I was in high school in a suburb just outside of Chicago when the Selma to Montgomery march took place and a college student when Dr. King was murdered. Like many Americans, I grew to have enormous admiration for the men and women who were courageously confronting racism and bigotry through non-violence.

On this Memorial Day weekend, as millions of people look forward to summer vacations at the ocean, it seemed like just the right time to revisit one of our favorite “Two Way Street” conversations – our talk with the heroic ocean swimmer Diana Nyad. Like many people, I had a vague awareness of Diana Nyad’s many attempts, failures and ultimate success in making the swim from Cuba to Florida. But I never gave much thought to the life-threatening dangers and the almost impossible physical prowess

If I could say only one thing about my conversation with author Lee Smith for this edition of “Two Way Street” it would be this: Listen to her voice.

Some artists live in a city, others are of the city. Phillip Depoy and Beverly “Guitar” Watkins, our two guests on this edition of "Two Way Street," are in the latter category. Yes, they both make their homes in Atlanta – Watkins in the Old Fourth Ward, Depoy in Decatur – but Atlanta and Georgia also are deeply influential in the art they produce.

Make no mistake: Faith Salie’s book, “Approval Junkie: Adventures in Caring Too Much,” is a thoughtful account of the price Salie paid for her obsessive need to win applause and approbation. She examines her thirst for approval unflinchingly. In doing so, she gives us, the readers, the opportunity to examine the lengths we may go to win approval. But here’s the thing: the book is also very funny; and so, when she came to the studio to record our show, I thought: don’t fight it – just allow the

It was more than 48 years ago, but I remember vividly the night of March 31, 1968, when Lyndon Johnson surprised the world by announcing he would not run for a second full term as president. The stunning news came at the end of a speech from the Oval Office in which Johnson announced he was halting the bombing raids over North Vietnam – and it took my breath away. My anti-war friends and I had been demonstrating against the Vietnam War and against LBJ for many months (“Hey, hey, LBJ, how many

After opening his first Broadway show “In the Heights” to great acclaim, composer, lyricist and performer Lin-Manuel Miranda took a vacation to Mexico. At the airport, he picked up a book to read while he was gone. It wasn’t exactly a beach read. Miranda bought Ron Chernow’s 800-page biography of Alexander Hamilton; and as he read it, it occurred to him that Hamilton’s life would make a great musical.