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It’s awfully quiet around here. Oh, there’s the noise of a mini bulldozer moving dirt at the neighbor’s house and a ridiculously loud motorcycle going by and a dog barking down the street. There’s the hum of the microwave running as my husband reheats his coffee and the dryer tumbling. I can create more sound...
I’ve always been a rapid-fire communicator. I think fast, talk fast, and process my thoughts out loud. When I was in high school, my mother once dared me to talk for two minutes straight without a single pause. “Time me,” I said, and then I did it. 120 seconds of babbling about nothing without a...
I’m pretty sure I’m the best darn dishwasher loader in the world. That’s a bold statement, I know, but since the pandemic started, I’ve had even more opportunity to prove my expertise. The trick to being a Grand Master of Dishwasher Loading is what I call, “working the puzzle.” You’ve got to get as many...
A friend e-mailed the other day to say, “It must be hard for you this week. You always throw a big party on your birthday and, this year, it’s going to be so quiet.” Indeed. It’s the little things that make you realize how much our lives have changed. Take coffee, for example. In the...
I was talking to an intuitive friend and expressing to her how lost I’ve felt lately. The pandemic, the failing economy, the social unrest, the political turmoil, and my own business downturn are always on my mind and weigh heavily on my heart. I’ve thought of myself as a driver. Someone who jumps in and...
“I just can’t wait till things go back to normal.” How many times have you heard someone say that on a news broadcast lately? How many times has that thought crossed your own mind, even if you don’t believe it’s really possible? Living in this time of COVID-19 is hard, and one of the things...
I’ve always turned down invitations to join book clubs. Not because I don’t see the value in them and definitely not because I didn’t like the people inviting me, but because I always seem to have stacks of books of my own to read. Lately, though, I’ve found myself in three book groups. It so...
I’ve been feeling really down about this pandemic the past few days, as the numbers swing upwards again. It was taking too much energy to feel sorry for myself, though, so I decided to create a list of good things that will come from several more months of “safer-at-home” orders. My list didn’t get very...
Several dear friends sent me e-mails a few weeks into the lockdown that said variations of, “Are you okay? I’m worried about my extroverted friends. I know this whole thing is harder for people like you.” Then they’d say something like, “Well, at least you have Zoom, and now so many people are livestreaming their...
I was flipping through a book called When Things Fall Apart by Pema Chodron and came across this line. “Wisdom and ignorance cannot be separated.” I cannot comment on that sentence within the context of what she is writing about, because I have not yet read the book, but I can comment on what that...