Secrets, Meddling, and Regrets
I regret not only some of my meddling on my children’s behalf, but also having kept a secret.
I regret not only some of my meddling on my children’s behalf, but also having kept a secret.
This story about saying what you mean when it comes time to paying or splitting the bill makes me sad.
If there’s a heaven,
Will they offer me a key,
Given how mean I was to Barbara Satinsky?
Will Barbara Satinsky forgive and invite me to tea?
I’m sorry, Barbara Satinsky. In 5th grade I had no reason to be a bully. In addition to being one of the leaders of Harum Scarum, the cliquey girls’ handball club, I had kind parents and good friends. So why did I take pleasure in playing a cruel trick on Barbara …
We already have Madoff, as well as Gingrich’s billionaire SuperPacSuperMacher Sheldon Adelson, so I’m glad that, even though Sandusky sounds like a Jewish name, he is not one of ours. Sandusky’s name is misleading, because the “sky” at the end could be construed as belonging to our tribe. But is …
Honestly, I don’t know what I would do without gradual. When my firstborn was an infant, I tried to imagine how I would ever entrust her to a kindergarten teacher.
I check out my perky housewife (minus the wife) reflection, and my mind flashes on memories of mom who was also once middle-aged and active.
Often, searches such as “mommy died today” land on my blog because of the post I had written on the day my mother died.
At Alcatraz, a former prisoner spoke. He said those who obsessed about getting out “didn’t make it.” Cognitive Therapy would have helped.
He is always on time.
She is sometimes late.
He ends the session after exactly 45 minutes.
She ends the session when we are finished talking,
Each of my girls could keep some of me in a gorgeous mosaic urn, personalized with photos under glass beads, like the ones my friend Sybil Sage makes for ashes of your cat or your mother.
With the kerfuffle about Ann Romney having been a stay-at-home mom, I thought I would put in my two cents about stay-at-home moms.
Easter Egg Roll 2012 observations: Most children seemed to be having a swell time, the parents were the happiest people there, and President Obama’s khakis were a perfect fit.
I was happy that my mind was still logical enough
Early in our relationship, on warm Friday evenings, my boyfriend Steve (who later became my husband) and I frequently squished onto a Long Island Railroad car to spend summer weekends with his parents. On one such trip a muffled siren began to blare. I turned to Steve and shouted, “Sounds …
I’ll give you a moment to digest what it is like for a worrywart to write a book. Try to imagine all there is to worry about.
Casey is healthy, spunky and—at 13 1/2—still learning new tricks, like wagging his tail. Yet today I awoke vocalizing a name for my next dog.
It’s a common occurrence in New York and other cities. You put your key in the lock of your apartment building and someone is about to follow you inside. What do you do? Usually in the interest of security I ask if the person lives there and then request they …
My New Year’s resolution is to learn how to play Angry Birds. But an essay in the New York Times suggests that daydreaming increases creativity. Daydreaming requires time, time I dump into playing Words With Friends. Words With Friends, though, is more than just words. It’s confirmation that my sister, my …
On an ordinary afternoon in 1998, Eliza, my sixteen-year-old daughter, plopped her backpack at my feet, waved a brochure so close it grazed my nose and declared, “I’m signing up for the Marine Corps Marathon. I’ll be running with a group that raises money for AIDS and trains Sunday mornings …
When I, always the initiator, smile at a stranger and the stranger smiles back, it puts a musical note in my step. Or in my pedal, as was the case on Christmas Eve day. I was on a long bike ride from New Jersey to Staten Island and, when a driver …
In my post My Year of Blogging, I noted that writing personal essays involves catching yourself in the act of thinking and then exposing and exploring it on the page. Here’s something I do every single day, and it was not until this morning that I caught it in my …
‘Tis the season to obsess . . . about gifts. For someone like me, who gets overwhelmed by choices, and–even when the options are narrowed to two–can’t decide, this can be a hard time of year. So I resort to creative gift-giving, like ice cream sodas for the third night …
Note to those of my peeps to whom Twitterspeak is as foreign as Uz-beki-beki-beki-stan-stan-ese: You may not want to slog through this one. If you do, RT means retweet. I spend a lot of time on Twitter sharing links to articles I write. I have cultivated a variety of followers. …
Is it a worrywart trait to seek pleasure on the highest plane? To always be wondering whether–no matter how good something is–it could be better? That’s how it is with me and eating. It’s a similar quest with family time. When I hear about a family who acts out Shakespeare …
If our family were contestants on a TV know-your-family game show, and the emcee were to ask, “Who is least likely to be a pest?” we would all shout “Emy!” The rest of us can be annoying, not least of all yours truly, but never Emy. When my three daughters were …
1955 After a swallow of dinner, I dirty my face with burnt cork and, on my shoulder, rest a broomstick with a bundle of rags tied to its end. I then prepare for the battle with my mom over not wearing a coat. I step into the hallowed night, wondering …
For my recent article on Home Goes Strong about Happiness at Home, I interviewed my blog crush Gretchen Rubin, whose book The Happiness Project–the same name as her blog–was a #1 New York Times best seller. Gretchen keeps a one-sentence journal, which she admits sometimes expands to 4 sentences. Says Gretchen, …
The other day, I bike downtown to the Newseum to hear a panel discussion by New York Times columnists. I leave home early enough to swing through McPherson Square, D.C.’s Occupy Wall Street venue. My immediate sense is a blast from the past, a hippie and flower child commune ambience. …