Missing the Home We Knew

How often do we return to a place where we once lived, or loved, during a different period in our lives, only to find it changed? Last week, Brad and I went back to San Francisco’s Bay Area, the wealthy suburbs just south of the city. He and I had lived and worked there for…

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Legacies of Love

Sometimes the years shift forward abruptly, like an earthquake: so much changes in the space of a second. This last Friday I was caught up short as I sat down at my desk and opened my computer.  Nestled in my inbox was an email from the son of my best friend, Myrna, who died from…

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To Understand And Be Understood

How many of us have friendships that span decades and still remain intact? From my childhood, I have only one such remaining–the eleven year old girl that I called my best friend during grammar school. While there was no such thing as a BFF at the time, the acronym captures our relationship most precisely. So,…

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What The World Does When You Are Doing Nothing

In the wee hours of Sunday morning, just as Daylight Savings Time kicked in, my delayed flight from Florida finally touched down in Baltimore, which is my home airport. I had been in Tampa for the previous four days, attending an enormous convention of writers, publishers, agents and representatives of writing programs. Each day there…

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Coast To Coast

Last week, I went back to California for the first time since we moved to Maryland in September. The Bay Area south of San Francisco remains unchanged: still beautiful with its sunlight and winter green hills; still frustrating with its traffic and congestion; still costly to live and wine and dine in. Nevertheless, as the…

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Stripping Down

It’s October 11th and Yom Kippur is almost here. I’m writing this just about one week before you will be reading it. I’m at my kitchen table, typing, thinking, wondering–maybe making a little prayer. It’s three o’clock, and in a few hours, at sundown, millions of Jewish men, women and children all around the world will…

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Tea For Two

Recently, I was asked to do a Q & A for another writer’s blog, and one of the questions was very thought-provoking. “If there was one person, dead or alive, that you could spend an afternoon with, who would it be and why?” I considered my answer with care. All of my initial responses seemed…

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A Dog Is A Dog Is A Dog

A second chance is one of the most miraculous and elusive gifts we can give. But why is it so hard to forgive–not only the ways in which we let others down, but also the ways in which we disappoint ourselves? Over the past two years, there has been an aspect of my life in…

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MARGARITAS, FIRE ALARMS, SHIPS, AND SHOWS!

A road trip! A road trip! Who doesn’t love a road trip! While mine down to Southern California thirteen days ago wasn’t exactly filled with Jack Kerouac moments, it was nevertheless an exhilarating break from the pressures of daily life about which I wrote in my previous newsletter. The Thursday before last, I went south,…

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THE RISK IT TAKES TO BLOSSOM

At some point in our lives, all of us feel insecure—whether because we are rejected by someone we love, or because we make a hash of a good career opportunity, or because we choose poorly and discover ourselves in a situation in which we do not want to be, or simply because we allow ourselves…

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