Love

This summer, hair weaves are taking a turn for the kinky, the curly and the wavy. Why is this news? When black women first started sewing hair onto their scalps during the 1990s en masse, the resulting shoulder-length bobs were as much about achieving a smooth texture as it was about having length. Fabulous hair was defined as long and straight. However, as more black women have come to terms with their natural curl pattern, store-bought tresses are trending toward the fuzzy rather than the flat-ironed.

A dream had carried the boys so far from home, some 5,000 miles across the ocean to a cramped and dingy apartment in Philadelphia: a hope that ice hockey could change their lives. Ivan Pravilov could fulfill that dream, they were told. He could take them from the daily grind of post-communist Ukraine to the gleaming ice of the NHL. He'd done it before. He'd done if for Andrei Zyuzin, who went on to play for six NHL teams. He'd done it for Konstantin Kalmikov, a third-round draft pick of the Toronto Maple Leafs in 1996.

In the first few years of the last decade, a lot of assumptions were made about aging baby boomers, their parents, their children, and their housing needs. Boomers would begin downsizing as soon as the children flew the coop, starting at about 55. Boomers would move to communities filled with their own kind. Elderly parents would be accommodated in a casita — a part of the house — until they needed continuing care. The casita would then be converted to a crafts room.

DEAR ABBY: I'm a 42-year-old woman who has been living with my boyfriend, "Matt. " He has asked me to marry him, and I said yes. The problem is, Matt is still married. Matt and his wife have been separated for eight years. I keep telling him to see if she filed for divorce, but he keeps putting it off. I love this man, Abby. Matt is good to me and to my children and grandchildren, but I don't know what to think or do. I want us to buy a house, but I'm scared that if we do, she'll try to take it from us. He says she wouldn't.

Whitney Houston was lying face down in her bathtub of her Beverly Hilton room when she was discovered by her personal assistant on Feb. 11. This and other sometimes grisly details about the diva's death were revealed with the release of her official autopsy report by the Los Angeles Coroner's Office. Houston's cause of death remains the same: a combination of drowning, heart disease, and cocaine use. But the report suggests the cocaine, and other drugs, played a much larger part in her death.

People buy flowers for their sweethearts all year round, but Valentine's Day is the day to go public with love. A simple bunch of daisies will not do. No, for maximum points, a long white box must arrive, a box that can contain only one thing: a dozen roses. Yesterday, Charles F. Kremp 3d Florists of Willow Grove was busy delivering these fragile symbols of love.

Does this describe your job? You hate the politics. The bureaucracy drives you crazy. Sometimes your boss does, too. But the actual work is enjoyable. Tell us what you love about your work and why you find it fulfilling. Responses should be no more than 250 words and must be submitted by Aug. 30. A collection of the best essays will run on Labor Day - Sept. 6. Mail your comments to: Metro Commentary Page The Philadelphia Inquirer Box 8263 Philadelphia 19101 E-mail: metroletters@phillynews.

The curtain between theater and life is thin, almost sheer, in actor/director John Turturro's rhapsodic tribute to love, the stage, and love of the stage in Illuminata. Set in a turn-of-the-century New York that more resembles the jewel-toned reveries of the Pre-Raphaelites than it does a pushcart paradise, the film is as voluptuously lovely as its players. These include Susan Sarandon as a Bernhardt-like diva named Celimene, Katherine Borowitz as the sternly beautiful leading lady Rachel, and Beverly D'Angelo as the theater owner Astergourd.

Frank Diamond is a freelance writer in Langhorne When Bernie met Mary, he was a budding scholar and she looked like Goldie Hawn: short skirts, nice legs. Hey, love happens. There were flowers, dinner dates, movies - plenty of what's celebrated on St. Valentine's Day. They married, settled in the Olney section of Philadelphia, and raised four children who are now successful, good-hearted adults. They were active in their church and maintained a large network of friends. Every Christmas they were hosts to a huge party where songbooks were distributed and carols sung.

HARRISBURG - He is being picketed almost daily by demonstrators in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh - a tin man without a heart, they call him. His Facebook page teems with complaints from angry Pennsylvanians. And his poll numbers have started to sag. Enough, say top political advisers, supporters, and fund-raisers to Gov. Corbett. Though they have anxiously watched for months as Corbett has fielded political hits on everything from policy to personality, they are now encouraging the governor to shake things up in hopes of shaking off what they think is turning into a growing image problem.

In late April, Mitt Romney hired Richard Grenell as his campaign spokesman on foreign affairs. Grenell is impeccably qualified in foreign affairs but not, apparently, in domestic affairs. He wants to marry a man. U.S. Sen. Bob Casey and I watched with interest as the right wing of the Republican Party, a/k/a the Republican Party, denounced the appointment. Bob employs more than a few LGBT staffers, and, so far, he hasn't fired them. The senator and I are proud of this. But faster than you can say 8.2% jobless rate, Mitt The Presumptive, champion of jobs for Americans, had rendered Grenell jobless.

In January 2008, Stephanie was visiting a friend's MySpace page, then clicked onto one of that friend's friend's pages. Adam had written a comment there, and Stephanie couldn't help but admire the picture that went with it. "He was cute," she said. She clicked on his page, and saw he was single. "I sent him an e-mail to start a conversation, asking if he knew one of my guy friends. " Adam replied that he didn't, and was rather confused when Stephanie e-mailed him back. The cause of his confusion: Stephanie's profile said she was engaged.

LeBRON JAMES. The very name brings out the haters among us. How many athletes have a book written about them? This one's titled "The Whore of Akron: One Man's Search for the Soul of LeBron James" by Scott Raab. Tuesday night, people across the nation will tune in to root against him as his Heat team hosts the Pacers in Game 5 of their tied Eastern Conference semifinal series. James isn't the first athlete/coach/owner people haved loved to hate. The following list, in no particular order, struck us as a good first draft.

Isabelle Thompson Kelly was a woman full of love. "All she did was give love," said her granddaughter Dawn Moore. "Every day, all the time. All she talked about was her family. She was the family backbone, our matriarch. " Isabelle's love was expressed mostly toward her family, but she also loved her neighbors, and her fellow parishioners of Corinthian Baptist Church of Germantown, and — you got the impression — nearly everyone she encountered in her long life. Isabelle Kelly, a homemaker and cook whose macaroni-and-cheese and peach cobbler were near legendary, a mainstay of her church who lent her fine singing voice to the church choir, a Girl Scout and Brownie leader, died May 16 of a heart attack.

DEAR ABBY: I'm a 42-year-old woman who has been living with my boyfriend, "Matt. " He has asked me to marry him, and I said yes. The problem is, Matt is still married. Matt and his wife have been separated for eight years. I keep telling him to see if she filed for divorce, but he keeps putting it off. I love this man, Abby. Matt is good to me and to my children and grandchildren, but I don't know what to think or do. I want us to buy a house, but I'm scared that if we do, she'll try to take it from us. He says she wouldn't.

The graphic came up on the big video scoreboard, and suddenly tension gripped the rambunctious sellout crowd at the Wells Fargo Center. Celtics vs. Sixers, Game Six, Wednesday. Tickets available for purchase behind Section 122.   At the time, the score in Celtics vs. Sixers, Game Four was 88-83, and there were 33 seconds left in regulation as Jodie Meeks stepped to the free throw line. In 33 seconds in the NBA, you can consume a full-course meal. Kiss of death?

Welcome to Clark's Park, a dedicated piece of newspaper real estate where Philadelphian is spoken fluently. My name is Clark, and I'm the groundskeeper here. In Clark's Park you will find expressions of heartfelt affection and swaggering addy-tood, civic pride and righteous outrage, earnest discussion and whimsical pursuits, all of which combine to create the unique and irresistible texture, the effortless grace, that reveals the quality and subtle difference that surrounds Philadelphia like an aura and generates the fierce loyalty of residents who can't imagine calling any other city home.

Family Philadelphia on Parade at the Mann Center. Saturday is a day of performances, dance workshops, and other activities of the second annual Philadelphia on Parade at the Mann Center for the Performing Arts, a free family arts festival presented by PNC Arts Alive. The celebration begins with a parade led by the 130-member marching band from the Girard Academic Music Program. The festival will offer five stages with more than 100 performers, including the Rock School for Dance Education, Sinfonia Youth Orchestra, Sharon Katz and the Peace Train, and the Universal African Dance and Drum Ensemble.

FRENCHTOWN, N.J. — Elizabeth Gilbert is standing at her stove, stirring flour into melted butter, attempting a simple white sauce for the base of an oyster bisque. As she slowly adds the milk, just as directed in the recipe, the sauce clumps. "I don't know about this, I've never made a white sauce before," she says, stirring furiously to smooth out the lumps. The best-selling author of Eat, Pray, Love is the first to admit her greatest talent is not in the kitchen.