
Casper ter Kuile spoke at the Salisbury Forum on Friday, May 9 at the Salisbury School offering insights on the impact of higher rates of people living alone and fewer close relations among all age groups.
Alec Linden
Casper ter Kuile spoke at the Salisbury Forum on Friday, May 9 at the Salisbury School offering insights on the impact of higher rates of people living alone and fewer close relations among all age groups.
SALISBURY — Writer, podcast creator and relationship theorist Casper ter Kuile spoke at the Salisbury Forum May 9 to offer his insights on the modern loneliness crisis, delivering a stimulating talk on how the ancient act of covenant may offer a salve for increasing social disconnect in the United States.
The evening was hosted at Salisbury School’s Miles P.H. Siefert ’53 Theater.
Early in the presentation, ter Kuile related an anecdote from his youth at a boarding school: “Being in this beautiful school campus is reminding me a little bit of that childhood.” He said he was an “awkward” child when he was around 10 and struggled with friendships with his classmates.
As a solution, he developed a points system for each other boy based on “how nice he’d been to [him] that day.” At the end of the week, “whoever had the highest score was my best friend,” he related to a chorus of laughs from the audience.
“It was a lonely childhood,” he said, breaking into laughter himself.
The loneliness his talk addressed though was a more pervasive kind than mere adolescent awkwardness, one that is deeply rooted in culture and economics and affects many in the U.S. and beyond.
“Hanging out with friends, dating people, working life — all drastically down amongst our younger generation,” adding that the phenomenon of loneliness is not unique to young people, but other factors such as higher rates of living alone and fewer close relationships — both family and friends — affect all age groups. “One in four Americans say they have no one to talk to about the most meaningful things in their lives,” he added. “And that includes family members.”
Ter Kuile explained that these statistics are not without cause. Individualism, as it is “baked into” Western politics, democracy and culture, has turned us largely away from each other and toward ourselves.
Ter Kuile’s practice of scoring his classmates is an example of the “commodification of relationships,” he said — a “give and take” model of connecting with others.
New technologies have also contributed in surprising ways. He recounted an example told to him by a fisherman about a practice in bygone days of sharing the catch with neighbors when there was surplus. Since the advent of the freezer, the fisherman told him, the tradition disappeared as people could store their fish for themselves to have later.
One of ter Kuile’s major points described the disappearance of “containers” for social connection, the term he applies for large cultural meeting points and organizations, such as a church. With an academic background in theology, he said he’s curious about what happens when these centers for community ritual disappear.
He posited the “philosophy and practice” of “covenant” as a balm to these disappearing and eroding social resources — a vulnerable, commitment-oriented relationship that helps people transition from “independent to mutually dependable.”
Ter Kuile asked audience members to turn to their seat neighbor and talk about covenants they would like to forge in their own lives. Beth and Bruce, a couple from Cornwall, said that they both had ideas: Beth would like to be a resource and helpful presence in her grandchildren’s lives as they “spread their wings” into adolescence, while Bruce said he’d like to help a former coworker navigate the retirement process.
When ter Kuile opened the floor for questions, an audience member called for Mary Campbell to stand and speak about the non-profit she founded in 2006, Walking our Talk. Based in Berkshire County, the group offers a community hub for women both established in the area or new to town, which Campbell said had been deeply valuable for herself and other women as a new type of social “container.”
After the event had ended, Campbell said she had been “just so inspired” by ter Kuile’s words as they helped her reflect on her own experiences of community and intimacy. “Everything he talked about just jazzes me up,” she said.
As the audience filtered out of the theater, several attendees approached Campbell hoping to learn more about the non-profit.
Ter Kuile’s most direct summary of his philosophy of connection was in response to a question posed by Salisbury Forum Vice President Sarah Tennyson, who asked about the value in forming a covenant with oneself.
“I think we’re a little obsessed with ourselves,” he responded. Rather than follow the age-old guidance of looking within for answers, he suggested that perhaps it is time to look towards each other.
SHARON — Angela Derrick Carabine, 74, died May 16, 2025, at Vassar Hospital in Poughkeepsie, New York. She was the wife of Michael Carabine and mother of Caitlin Carabine McLean.
A funeral Mass will be celebrated on June 6 at 11:00 a.m. at Saint Katri (St Bernards Church) Church. Burial will follow at St. Bernards Cemetery. A complete obituary can be found on the website of the Kenny Funeral home kennyfuneralhomes.com.
Sam Waterston
On June 7 at 3 p.m., the Triplex Cinema in Great Barrington will host a benefit screening of “The Killing Fields,” Roland Joffé’s 1984 drama about the Khmer Rouge and the two journalists, Cambodian Dith Pran and New York Times correspondent Sydney Schanberg, whose story carried the weight of a nation’s tragedy.
The film, which earned three Academy Awards and seven nominations — including one for Best Actor for Sam Waterston — will be followed by a rare conversation between Waterston and his longtime collaborator and acclaimed television and theater director Matthew Penn.
“This came out of the blue,” Waterston said of the Triplex invitation, “but I love the town, I love this area. We raised our kids here in the Northwest Corner and it’s been good for them and good for us.”
Waterston hasn’t seen the film in decades but its impact has always remained present.
“It was a major event in my life at the time,” Waterston said of filming “The Killing Fields,” “and it had a big influence on me and my life ever after.” He remembers the shoot vividly. “My adrenaline was running high and the part of Sydney Schanberg was so complicated, so interesting.”
Waterston lobbied for the role of the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist for years, tracing his early interest to a serendipitous connection while filming in England. Even before Joffé’s production was greenlit, he had his sights set on playing the role. “I knew I wanted the part for years even before it was a movie that was being produced.”
What followed was not just critical acclaim, but also a political awakening. “The film gave all of us an intimate acquaintance with refugees, what it is to be a refugee, how the world forgets them and what a terrible crime that is.”
In Boston, at a press stop for the film, two women asked Waterston a pointed question: now that he knew what he knew, what was he going to do about it? “I said, ‘Well, you know, I’m an actor, so I thought I’d go on acting.’ And they said, ‘No, that’s not what you need to do. You need to join Refugees International.’” And join he did, serving on the organization’s board for 25 years.
Both Schanberg and Dith Pran, whose life the film also chronicles, were “cooperative and helpful … in a million ways,” Waterston said. Upon first meeting Pran, Waterston recalled, “He came up to me, made a fist, and pounded on my chest really hard and said, ‘You must understand that Sydney is very strong here.’ He was trying to plant something in me.”
There were more tender gestures, too. Schanberg used the New York Times wire to relay that Waterston’s wife had just given birth while he was filming in Thailand, adding to the personal and emotional connection to the production.
Though “The Killing Fields” is a historical document, its truths still resonate deeply today. “Corruption is a real thing,” Waterston warned. “Journalism is an absolutely essential part of our democracy that is as under siege today as it was then. It’s different now but it’s the same thing of ‘Don’t tell the stories we don’t want heard.’ Without journalists, we are dust in the wind.” Waterston added, “Democracy is built on the consent of the governed but the other thing it’s built on is participation of the governed and without full participation, democracy really doesn’t stand much of a chance. It’s kind of a dead man walking.”
When asked what he hopes the audience will take away from the screening, Waterston didn’t hesitate. “This is the story that puts the victims of war at the center of the story and breaks your heart. I think that does people a world of good to have their hearts broken about something that’s true. So, I hope that’s what the impact will be now.”
Tickets for the benefit screening are available at www.thetriplex.org. Proceeds support Triplex Cinema, a nonprofit home for film and community programming in the Berkshires.
Scott Reinhard, graphic designer, cartographer, former Graphics Editor at the New York Times, took time out from setting up his show “Here, Here, Here, Here- Maps as Art” to explain his process of working.Here he explains one of the “Heres”, the Hunt Library’s location on earth (the orange dot below his hand).
Map lovers know that as well as providing the vital functions of location and guidance, maps can also be works of art.With an exhibition titled “Here, Here, Here, Here — Maps as Art,” Scott Reinhard, graphic designer and cartographer, shows this to be true. The exhibition opens on June 7 at the David M. Hunt Library at 63 Main St., Falls Village, and will be the first solo exhibition for Reinhard.
Reinhard explained how he came to be a mapmaker. “Mapping as a part of my career was somewhat unexpected.I took an introduction to geographic information systems (GIS), the technological side of mapmaking, when I was in graduate school for graphic design at North Carolina State.GIS opened up a whole new world, new tools, and data as a medium to play with.”
He added, “When I moved to New York City, I continued that exploration of cartography, and my work eventually caught the attention of the New York Times, where I went to work as a Graphics Editor, making maps and data visualizations for a number of years.”At the New York Times, his work contributed to a number of Pulitzer Prize winning efforts.
In his work, Reinhard takes complex data and turns it into intriguing visualizations the viewer can begin to comprehend immediately and will want to continue to look into and explore more deeply.
One method Reinhard uses combines historic United States Geological survey maps with “current elevation data (height above sea level for a point on earth) to create 3-D looking maps, combining old and new,” he explained.
For the show at Hunt Library Reinhard said, “I knew that I wanted to incorporate the place into the show itself. A place can be many things.The exhibition portrays the exact spot visitors are from four vantage points: the solar system, the earth, the Northwest Corner, and the library itself.” Hence the name, “Here, Here, Here, Here.”
He continued, “The largest installation, the Northwest Corner, is a mosaic of high-resolution color prints and hand-printed cyanotypes — one of the earliest forms of photography. They use elevation data to portray the landscape in a variety of ways, from highly abstract to the highly detailed.”
This sixteen-foot-wide installation covers the area of Millerton to Barkhamsted Reservoir and from North Canaan down to Cornwall for a total of about 445 square miles.
For subjects, he chooses places he’s visited and feels deeply connected to, like the Northwest Corner.“This show is a thank you to the community for the richness that it has brought to my life. I love it here,” he said.
The opening reception for the show is on June 7 from 5 to 7 p.m. On Thursday, June 12, Reinhard will give a talk about his work from 5:30 to 7 p.m. at the library.“Here, Here, Here, Here” will be on display until July 3.
Scott Reinhard’s 16-foot-wide piece of the Northwest Corner is laid out on the floor prior to being hung for the show. L. Tomaino