We’re All Anxious, Sweetie

The sign said, “Keep your windows rolled up. Pull up slowly to the first table, put your car in park, and wait for instructions.” A masked and energetic man came to the driver’s side of my car and held a printed sign up to my window which read: “Please call me on this...

Blue Skies Ahead

Here’s an imaginary public address announcement that airline passengers might hear in the early fall, 2020: “Ladies and Gentlemen, this is from the flight deck, your captain and her crew. We have been warned that we will encounter some turbulent skies and we all...

We Need Our Women Friends At Every Stage of Life

We are more complicated as women than we know. We are more intense about what matters most in life as we age. We earn a deep sense of gratitude across our life span, and it just keeps growing, the longer we live. Overall, women’s happiness ratings are consistently...

May You Never Lose Your Sense of Wonder

“Always be on the lookout for the presence of wonder.” E.B. White Seeing something wondrous—a baby’s toothless sweet smile, a soaring hawk circling silently in a blue sky, the full moon floating on a dark velvet curtain of night—evokes a sense of awe and reverence...

A Thousand Beautiful Things Are Waiting For You

The year 2019 is ending, only hours remain and our reflection fills the space until the New Year arrives. For me, there were significant endings during 2019: • I facilitated and hosted my last Carmel Death Café after five years of meeting some of the nicest, most...

Gratitude Changes the World You See

The book table looks just right with my maternal grandparents’ framed photo, the small pot of Christmas cactus, the wooden sign that says “Family Forever”, the Dove chocolates in an Italian candy dish, and the mandala tablecloth I brought back from Japan many years...