December 6th, 2019 | Architecture and Design, Cooking, Kitchen and Table, Europe, Family, Genealogy, General, Health, literature and poetry, Travel, visual arts
My Dear One, noticing that we had a lot of empty calendar space from the end of October to the beginning of November, suggested that we fly off to somewhere in Europe. France? Italy? It took almost no time to decide on the Veneto. For ten days we nested in the...
May 10th, 2018 | Education, Family, General, literature and poetry, Memory, Society at Large
Violence, incest, abuse of every stripe: such horrors fill both narratives by these relatively young writers. In the words too are moving reflections on salvation: the selfless love and sacrifice of siblings, the insight and enduring patience of peers and educators;...
March 13th, 2016 | Education, General, transportation, Travel, United States
The most common comment on any report card I received in elementary school was, “Ellen would do well if she would just learn to follow directions.” Teachers stopped saying that as I got older but only because the grading system was about the mark and not about any...
January 9th, 2012 | Popular Culture, Time Passes, United States, visual arts, Women
January 5th is the best day to have a birthday and there seemed to be no shortage of warm wishes from the cosmos. 2012 is, I hope, an auspicious moment to enter, along with the Today Show, a seventh decade. My Dear One devised the perfect plan: leave the car in...