Would you read a 10 page article on nausea?

Last summer, a doctor who regularly contributes articles to The New Yorker, wrote one on nausea. Like many New Yorker pieces, this was one long article, about 10 pages if I recall correctly.

I could not put it down. The sun set, the spouse, eager to head out for supper, paced. But still I read on, transfixed. Into the story of a young woman, delighted to be pregnant with her first child, but near death from morning sickness that would not stop, this author wove the history of nausea, and its probably causes.

Racing to finish, I learned that car sickness most probably occurs because man was not designed for passive locomotion. Our brains look for the feel of wind on our skin when we move, and tend to rebel when we move along without physical effort. Also, I weighed the doctor's conjecture that spicy food, even the smell of spicy food, makes many women ill in the early stages of pregnancy because the bland food they eat in its place is better for a barely developed fetus. And all the while, I wondered if his patient would survive her pregnancy -- she did -- and learned that nausea can be so extreme that some women choose to end their pregnancies.

That's the New Yorker. Every single week, it presents unexpected topics handled masterfully by skilled writers. Sometimes the topic is religion, sometimes politics, and often the structure of society. On that last topic, the magazine included an extremely long essay on the divide that exists between Manhattan's Upper East Side and its Spanish Harlem neighborhood, which run into one another. Another powerful page turner, that essay went on for pages talking about ways that residents of the two neighborhoods differ, including a fascinating look at pant lengths: Upper East Side residents always show some ankle, Spanish Harlem residents generally don't.

A year later, I think about that observation every time I go near the great divide between the two neighborhoods.

Not every feature hits a bulls eye with me. I gave up halfway through a treatise on how Ken Starr's office blew the Clinton investigation. It just never grabbed my attention. But it is the rare week when at least one article will jump out.

Short features are good too, and I especially look forward to appearances by Christopher Buckley, whose dry wit is always on target.

Oh, and I can't forget the reviews. I especially enjoy the movie reviews, but also look for theater and book reviews. All are entertaining and well written.

Known for its fiction, the New Yorker publishes all-fiction issues in addition to occasional fiction pieces. I will never forget a story I read in its pages several years ago. It was about a young man's return to the United States after several years in a Third World country. After living in an environment where starving children were too weak to take food when it finally was offered, the young man was taken from the airport directly to a restaurant by his family. There he became completely disoriented, mistook a fellow diner for a wild boar and bit off his ear.

I told a friend who also has spent a great deal of time in Third World countries about this story, and though she has never bitten anyone's ear off, she said the story was right on in its dipiction of the sense of overwhelming plenty and choices that greet returning Americans and cause a sense of unreality.

In addition to the features, short essays, reviews, fiction, commentary on current events (Talk of the Town), the New Yorker, of course, is known for its covers and for its cartoons. Sometimes I rip out the cartoons and save them, and sometimes, like Elaine in a Seinfeld episode, I don't find them particularly insightful or funny. But, again, overall they are outstanding and thumbing through the magazine to find the latest is always a relaxing ritual.

I have framed covers here and there throughout my house, mostly they are yard sale finds. I also save covers with the vague thought of getting them framed; many are a delight to keep around.

The New Yorker's subscription rate is never terribly robust, and I do hope that this magazine itself stays around. It is one of a kind, and would be sorely missed.