All the Beauty in the World, Patrick Bringley's memoir (回忆录) about his 10 years working as a guard at New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art (Met), brings new meaning to the term "art appreciation". During 8-12 hour shifts spent among the galleries, he takes advantage of the gift of time to study the masterpieces he's been hired to protect and to think about the role of art throughout history.

Bringley is not the only Met staffer to write about the institution. But Bringley's "guard's-eye view" is unique, and he presents his personal story with sincerity. After his brother Tom's death from cancer in 2008, Bringley gave up his job as a journalist for a job in which "I was happy to be going nowhere". He explains, "I had lost someone. I did not wish to move on from that. In a sense, I didn't wish to move at all." Bringley doesn't say when he decided to channel his experience of finding peace into art, but this story about jumping off the career ladder in order to find the space for quiet reflection is surprisingly suited to our times.

All the Beauty in the World offers well-chosen facts about the museum to support Bringley's personal tale. As interesting as these facts are, it's Bringley's reflections on dozens of individual paintings, photographs, sculptures and ancient artifacts that turn this book into a tribute (致敬) to the power of art. Discussing Alfred Stieglitz's photographs of his wife, he writes, "I think that sometimes we need permission to stop and adore things, and a work of art gives us that." In a Vermeer port rait of a dozing maidservant, he is moved to see that the artist caught "that feeling we sometimes have that a private setting possesses a holiness (神圣) of its own. It was my constant feeling in Tom's hospital room".

As rich in moving insights as the Met is in treasures, All the Beauty in the World reminds us of the importance of learning not about art, but from it. This is art appreciation at a high level.

I recall when I was a young girl back in Canada, I was sitting and watching a baseball game on TV with my father and we started to debate the importance of sports. Different from my father, I argued with all the overconfidence of a teenager that sports is more than just a hobby to keep us physically healthy and went as far as claiming that "There would be more wars if we didn't have sports!"

As an adult, my teenage tendencies of exaggeration (夸张)may have faded but I still firmly believe that sports is more than just a hobby for both participants and audience. The challenging times we are all living through right now with coronavirus is proof to this. The effect of cancelling all sports from professional leagues right down to amateur budding athletic programs, can be felt by millions of people worldwide. To many the social emotional impact is stronger than the physical. The loss of the sense of community, of belonging, and of an extended family is real for many girls, boys, men and women everywhere. Others are feeling physical challenges as well as they are struggling to stay active during these times.

But the human race is incredible and adaptable in tough situations, and sports once again is playing a role. Sports teams are staying in touch online and are a source of much needed support, love and laughter in these times. So many professional athletes are playing vital roles through this crisis by sharing their messages of support and at times, making valuable monetary donations to the cause. Even in areas of isolation, people are coming out on their balconies and leading their neighbours through a workout programme to help them stay active. Others are turning to online workout programmes to follow. Once again, sports is finding its way.

So, in challenging times such as now, people are still empowered to continue their sports journey and stay strong and healthy.

I live in an area where most parents would rather cut back on personal hobbies for themselves than stop paying for their children's activities.

Music lessons, horseback riding, summer camps, sports teams — the list goes on and on. Often, so do the costs. And even if the money is not there, some parents find a way. I know people who have borrowed from family and run up their credit cards to pay for all the stuff they believe their children just cannot miss.

"The experiences we thought kids had to have before high school have moved down to junior high and now elementary, " said William Doherty, a professor of family studies and director of the marriage and family therapy program at the University of Minnesota. Soon, we'll be talking about leadership opportunities for babies.

"Somehow, not offering our children every possible opportunity feels like bad parenting, " said Wendy Mogel, a clinical psychologist.

But in an effort to give their children everything, some parents end up not just using up financial resources, but also their own emotional energy. "A lot of parents are exhausted by their own overparenting, " said Bryan Caplan, an economics professor at George Mason University. "They make so many sacrifices and are so stressed out by driving around so much that they explode at kids for changing the radio station. "

"It's easy to take a look at the more successful kids and assume that all the activities are why they are more successful, " Professor Caplan said. But research doesn't bear that out. On a recent National Public Radio program, Steven D. Levitt, a professor of economics at the University of Chicago, said he and another economist could find no evidence that that sort of parental choices could be correlated at all with academic success.