My creative energies have been directed toward a lecture that I’m giving this week in South Carolina.  So I’m leaving you with one of my first blogs, but one that many of my readers have found touching . . . 

Harold is waiting to die.  There were six of us at his bedside in the county nursing home, leaning toward him singing softly, “Amazing grace . . . how sweet the sound . . . “  Tears in his eyes, he shook each of our hands saying, “Thank you, you don’t know how much that meant to me.”  Little did he know how much it had meant to us . . . ..how much he meant to me. (more…)

I recently had a SMM (Seasonal Meal with Mom) with my daughter Victoria.  As we listened to mariachi music, she looked intently into my eyes and asked, “Mom, would you change anything about your past if you had your life to live over?” (more…)

They flew overhead all day long, the sun glinting off their wings.  We must have been right on their flight path since they came repeatedly, even into the night.  “Honk” “Honk” “Honk!” (more…)

The waitress placed the mushroom, egg, and pecorino risotto in front of me.  I inhaled the intoxicating woodsy aroma.  The man at the table next to us leaned over conspiratorially and offered, “I had the risotto too . . . it’s to die for . . . it’s absolutely to die for.

His choice of words floored me.  I had literally just gotten off the phone with my sister, who shared that our childhood friend had died at the tender age of 44.  My fellow diner’s casual expression has continued to resonate in my head as I celebrate my 48th birthday this week.

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My chin rested in the optical machine.  The doctor had me read from the eye chart and puffed air into my eye.  I, a glasses virgin, waited with trepidation for his diagnosis.

Over the last few years, I had taken to squirreling away reader glasses in every corner of the house.  I had complained indignantly that the font in restaurant menus was too small.  But now, I was tired of tolerating my world as a blur. (more…)