It happened three weeks before Christmas. My husband and I dashed into Bed, Bath, and Infinity to find a _____ [details deleted to ensure my 30-something daughter is ecstatically surprised by the gift we bought there] and were confronted by one of those pre-holiday displays…
Just in time for Christmas, scientists have discovered a surefire way to fight impulse shopping. The trick is simple: when you see something you suddenly feel you must have, think instead of all you’re grateful for. The emotion of gratitude can, when called to mind…
December is the perfect month to be a Doozer. If you remember “Fraggle Rock,” you’ll recall the Doozers. These cute little creatures went about their industrious way, oblivious to the dramas of the larger, fuzzier Fraggles. Doozers were always at work, wearing tiny hardhats, driving…
After retiring from a column-writing gig lasting eleven years and yielding over 300 personal essays, I find I still have something to say. My thoughts range far and wide, and occasionally deep, on subjects including being an Iowan who misses Colorado; surviving marital violence; raising an amazing daughter and an equally amazing son; being justifiably angry about the world “these days;” writing poetry and plays; wondering if I’ll get Alzheimer’s like my mom and her two brothers; wanting to write about my twin granddaughters without sounding all Hallmark-y; fixing OCD-ish food; making sense of pants that come in shorts / crops / ankle-grazing / bootcut; being a librarian in public, academic, archival, and medical libraries; waiting 46 years to attend my high school reunion; having a gorgeous garden I can’t take care of; seeing a shaman; loving good men despite all the bad ones; and trying to wrest a little joy from life despite an 11-year-and-counting chronic migraine.