Once again I find myself posting in response to a funeral. Positive message of the post: live each day as if there were no other, gather around you the people that mean most to you, create community in your life. My mother in law died several weeks back. I never expected that would move heaven and earth. You are where ... Read More »
In the summer of 1996, I traveled with my family to Germany for my cousin’s wedding. I was seventeen at the time, with questionable fashion sense that I blame on the unfortunate sartorial offerings of the decade and a formerly bad haircut that was growing out nicely. It was my first time in Europe and there were many moments that left ... Read More »
How many times do I tell my kids they should learn from their mistakes the first time? A mistake is no big deal if you learn from it. Take Dennis, for example. At 3 years old, he needed to stick his finger in the VCR, then push “eject” a full THREE times before the lesson was learned. Thankfully, no one ... Read More »
I am really struggling with this… It just… looks so… BAD! For the third time in three years, I am heading out to Spain at the end of the semester. And every time I arrive in Madrid, I feel like I have come home. ARGH! Elitist, arrogant, snobby, Western-European-promoting, blinders-on-to-diversity JERK! Yes, that is me. This is how it started: ... Read More »
I survived the college search – as parent – once, and here comes the second round. “I’m wishing I was grown up, but I am really really really scared!” Or maybe it was … “Let me go! Let me go! Let me go!” Or in this latest round of college visits… “Do I really have to go? Can I just ... Read More »
I’m new to the hashtag game. Thankfully, Jimmy Fallon, Justin Timberlake and Questlove helped explain things to me with their Late Night video. But even so, I was a bit confused when I stumbled across #tbt on Instagram a few months earlier. Thankfully, I know how to use Google and within a millisecond I was learning all about “Throwback Thursday.” ... Read More »
Are you present? Or not? Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (click here for the trailer if you have no clue what I am talking about) may well be the classic analogy for modern life. Are you here? Or have you skipped out? I am a perhaps addicted complete fan of modern technology. I am one of the few parents who knows ... Read More »
As time passes and our life circumstances change (read “kids are growing up and will eventually move on”), Stephen and I sometimes now ask the question, “Do we want to stay here?” We live in the Town of New Scotland, in the Voorheesville School District, waaaaay out in the country. We often talk about the idea of having a condo ... Read More »
There’s been a lot written on the power that Internet anonymity has given us to express ourselves in a manner that we probably wouldn’t have the guts feel comfortable doing in a face-to-face conversation. Louis C.K. did a typically beautiful profane/profound rant on Conan about why his children aren’t getting smart phones (click here to get enlightened). Among one of his ... Read More »
I feel Anna’s pain. Desserts are too demanding! Don’t sift your flour? Get ready for heaviness in your concoction. Don’t have a silicone pad for your baking sheet? Get ready to soak, scrub, soak, scrub, and probably give up and heave the messy pan. I used to love making desserts as a teenager. It was my “thing”. It was also ... Read More »
Sauced In New York Sometimes the food is in the sauce, sometimes we are