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There Are The Ones We Push, The Ones That Hold Everything Together, And The Ones We Replace. “The simplest toy, one which even the youngest child can operate, is called a grandparent.”  Sam Levenson I dug into my old sewing basket that sits on top of the washing machine and resurrected seventeen distinctive yet exclusive […]

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I’m reading Ernest Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea, alongside Joan Anderson’s A Year by the Sea, after recently finishing Ann Patchett’s Pulitzer Prize Finalist novel The Dutch House.  What a twisted reading experience if there ever was one, but then again, it’s the beginning of my new life, half of me is enmeshed […]

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I’ve come to believe the gift of storytelling is our most evolved attribute as a species, the heritage of humanity if you will, but the truth is our most powerful stories often come about as a result of something tragic. They emerge unexpectedly, as if Moses from a basket in the river of time, swaddled […]

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I am settling into retirement as if a bull in the chute before a rodeo. All I can say is someone was a little overzealous with the flank strap.  All I do is run in circles creating dust, bucking the system, and getting nowhere.  Oh, and my cowboy, has been avidly vocalizing his displeasure with […]

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Last week I was all about Ice Cream Theology, living in the moment, enjoying the sweetness of life. Well, that melted. This week I’m fretting (occasionally) over the footprint I’ll be leaving on my children’s mental health after they’re forced to sift through my clutter when I’ve lost the race and I’m six feet under. […]

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They’re back! I’m referring to the relatives from Missouri, the ones I feared might be ax murders a few years back (see; 5 Reasons to Choose Happy), who have finally returned to the lake, and they came bearing gifts. You’ll be relieved to know they brought us a custom-made set of Cornhole boards, instead of […]

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Did you know the Mayflower, not only transported my ancestors across the Atlantic in 1620, but landed at Plymouth Rock because, the crew feared, the Pilgrims were going through the beer too quickly? According to Kate Julian, the ship was headed for the mouth of the Hudson River, until the beer ran low and the […]

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“I am not a grace graduate,” I speak this out loud to an empty room, because I am continually in need of rescue, not from the world, but from myself. That was easier to type than to finally realize. A grace graduate knows when to let things go, she’s wise, compassionate, tolerant, and frugal with […]

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Larry and Cheryl sitting in a tree, K…I…S…S…I…N…G, first comes love, then comes marriage, then comes the baby in the baby carriage(I took those jingles a little too seriously)…and then what? Bertrand Russell says, “those who have never known the deep intimacy and the intense companionship of happy mutual love have missed the best thing […]

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This is the first day of the rest of my retired life and just like Douglas Adams, I discovered, “I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by.” My blog is so tardy I gave myself a detention and for good reason, there’s been a run on words and my […]