My husband, Rick, keeps telling me we have too many mugs — that they are taking up too much space on our shelves, and I need to get rid of some of them. But which ones? How about this one — my Mama Bear mug? It’s the companion to his…

After my father died too soon from Parkinson’s complications, my mother’s older sister Dorothy Ellen, in no uncertain terms, assumed the mantle of family matriarch. …

Still Crushing It After All These Years — Were he still with among us, John Ernst Steinbeck, Jr. would have turned 118 years old today. The acclaimed author knew by age 14 that he wanted to be a writer, and once inspired never abandoned that calling. Over the course of his career, he wrote twenty-seven books, most notably…

When I cannot recall your face or name, Come visit me. Sit close and paint my memories with your words. When my joints are gnarled and useless, Hold my hand. Warm my tangled fingers between your praying palms. When my bones ache and my body fails, Take me to the ocean. Let me face the falling tide and breathe in sea’s last light. When my words are gone and evening falls, Sing me Shenandoah. Hold me close and let the last notes ring, long after I am sleeping.

{Father’s Day, 2013} A man walked by me in Safeway wearing Old Spice the other day. The smallest things are reminding me… Father’s Day is here again. Last Thursday, I stood in the Hallmark store at the mall, searching out two Father’s Day cards — one being for my husband. My girls aren’t…

I can no longer sit quietly by: I have too much skin in this game. …

We choose a table in the sun this evening at Greek Cusina, my husband and I, and talk about old friends while we wait for our dolmathes to arrive. You drift toward us like coal smoke, charred and unruly, and begin pacing back and forth in front of the restaurant. …

A few late night reflections on parenting When I was a young mother, pony-tailed and skipping over stairs strewn with toppled towers and dress-up silks, I was sure that by the time my baby was in high school, my floors would be clean, my laundry folded, my walls painted, my garden abundant, and the first of my…

{An International Women’s Day Tribute} Our Auntie Dorothy Ellen, my mother’s older sister, was ninety-four when she passed away. …