In the midst of their most severe drought since the 1930s, Washington D.C. residents received a set of instructions from the federal government on how to ease the "emotional stress" that may result. The following guidelines were released to the public by Curtis R. Austin, director, Office of External Liaison, Center for Mental Health Services, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services:

• When brushing your teeth, you can tune in and focus more on the actual brushing, and not what was once the din of the continually flowing water in the background, which surprising[ly] can be a very subtle source of agitation.

• You can commune with nature by finding more water conservation methods for watering your plants. For example, by not exposing those plants to the intense rays of the sun during the day, but instead partially shading them, allows you to save water. At the same time, you are spending time communing with nature and learning how growth occurs.

• Another way to conserve water while simultaneously reducing stress is to resist the reflexive action of automatically flushing the toilet if you awaken at night and there is only liquid waste. Simply wait and flush in the morning. Believe it or not, flushing itself can add to the stress of awakening in the middle of the night because of the noise element.

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The Ohio Division of Watercraft threatened to fine owners of the St. Helena III, a recreational barge that travels on the Ohio & Erie Canal, $75 a day because it was not equipped with life preservers. The horse-drawn barge holds as many as 60 people, travels at about three miles per hour along a 1.25-mile stretch of canal, in water that is only three feet deep. Since the tourist boat is defined as a commercial vessel, it must carry Type I preservers—the most expensive available, the same kind used in freighters. Ed Shuman, president of the Canal Fulton Heritage Society, hopes the local community will contribute the $3,600 necessary to outfit the boat.

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From an extraordinary interview with Hillary Clinton, conducted by Lucinda Franks, in the premiere issue of Talk magazine, September 1999:

"Bill has been subjected to so much abuse.... He doesn't make any excuses for what he did. But the reaction was unprecedented and harmful to the country.... People are mean. I think it's a real disservice, the way we sort of strip away everyone's sense of dignity, of privacy. People need support, not disdain."

"And you know we did have a very good stretch," she adds later, referring to the period after Gennifer Flowers. "Years and years of nothing." ...

"My husband is a very good man," Hillary insists. "They are jealous of him. Yes, he has weaknesses. Yes, he needs to be more responsible, more disciplined, but it is remarkable given his background that he turned out to be the kind of person he is, capable of such leadership.... Can you imagine what it took for him to go on after losing everything, to still get up each morning and do your job? You know in Christian theology there are sins of weakness and sins of malice, and this was a sin of weakness."

I tell Hillary I read his mother's autobiography, in which she wrote about the atmosphere of alcohol, violence, and chaos that forced her son to be the man of the house while he was still a child. Hillary leans over and says softly, "That's only the half of it. He was so young, barely four, when he was scarred by abuse that he can't even take it out and look at it. There was terrible conflict between his mother and grandmother. A psychologist once told me that for a boy being in the middle of a conflict between two women is the worst possible situation. There is always the desire to please each one." ...

"He has been working on himself very hard in the last year," she tells me. "He has become more aware of his past and what was causing this behavior." Public office has prevented the president from seeking therapy, but friends told me they expect him to after leaving the Oval Office.

Does she believe, I wonder, that you don't leave someone you love under any circumstances?

"You have to know the real quality of the person," she says thoughtfully. "You have to be alert to it, vigilant in helping. I thought this was resolved ten years ago. I thought he had conquered it; I thought he understood it, but he didn't go deep enough or work hard enough."

"What's the part of the Bible that deals with this?" she had asked at one point.

"Corinthians?" I suggested.

"Love endures all things? No, I love that, but I was thinking of when Peter betrayed Jesus three times and Jesus knew it but loved him anyway. Life is not a linear progression. It has many paths and challenges. And we need to help one another."

"And it is love, isn't it?'

"Yes, it is," she said. "We have love."

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