Among the reasons why I love my mother, her contempt for Mother's Day is in the top 10. The year is 1983, and our dad has arranged for us to have Mother's Day dinner at Pautipaug Country Club, where he plays golf. The Southeastern Connecticut Restaurant scene of the early 80's left something to be desired, and even if there was decent dining, it would be wasted on a family with 3 sullen kids ages 11-16. Here's what I remember about that dinner. Though we had a reservation, it took forever to be seated. When we finally got...
When I moved into the house I bought 16 years ago, I inherited some odd things: a hospital-style tv attached to a wall in the bedroom, a hand-painted mural on bathroom ceiling capturing the POV of someone/thing looking up at the sky from the bottom of the ocean floor, a room cast in the color of painter's tape blue. All of it had to go. But something that I regret tossing out in the cleanup was a piece of paper found behind the refrigerator, titled "Things To Do", written and illustrated fancifully in colored pencils. The author prescribed a list of...
If you are reading this, congratulations: Not only are you a subscriber to my newsletter (you lucky thing), but you've made it to the finish line of 2020 with your reading and comprehension skills intact, which is no small feat.
Joking aside, there is no one I know who hasn't faced loneliness, economic insecurity, health concerns, and/or existential ennui this year. And if you didn't have a challenging 2020, I probably don't want to know you.
It feels like a typo when I write 2019. Anyone else? In the last weeks leading up to the New Year, I spent a lot of time doing very, very little. I have come to discover that having a full-time job while launching a product into the world can get exhausting at times, especially around the holidays, and especially if you are a lazy introvert by nature. I am fortunate that the company I work for shuts down between Christmas and New Years, which amounts to almost 2 weeks of downtime when you factor in weekends. Prior to this break,...
