For a year or two now, my husband has been trying to get me to go out to breakfast with him at Frank’s Restaurant in Parkville, MO, not too far from our home. On Saturday, September 29, it finally happened. Our breakfast date was possible because Al didn’t have to […]
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Middlebury College: Teaching Maturity Along with Liberal Arts
I’ve often said that the best thing my parents ever did for me was to send me 3,000 miles away from home. At age 17, I went from home in Washington State to Middlebury College in Vermont. And I grew up very quickly. I hadn’t liked myself very well in […]
Continue readingYou Know Your Children Are Grown When . . .
1. You find a long list of alcoholic beverages in your car in your son’s handwriting, and realize there’s nothing you can (or should) say to him, because he’s thirty years old, and he was on a liquor store run for his grandmother. 2. Your daughter tells you not to […]
Continue readingGrandpa and the Grandchildren’s Gallery
This past weekend we buried my father-in-law. He was the first grandparent my children and their cousins lost. As the family mourned, of course, we told our stories. The four cousins – my son and daughter, and my nephew and niece – were close in age, born between 1978 and […]
Continue readingCentral Planning . . . or Planning Central
I’ve written before about my planning abilities. They are being severely taxed this week, as we gather the family for my father-in-law’s funeral. Throughout the week, we are coordinating the arrival at the Kansas City airport of my two adult children, and my husband’s sister and her husband, cousin, niece […]
Continue readingDeath and Taxes
As the saying goes, nothing is certain but death and taxes. My father-in-law died this past weekend, and I am with my mother-in-law. Please re-read my June 11 story about my father-in-law and the fireflies to see what a fine man we lost. But I will have to get back […]
Continue readingTwo Degrees of Separation from the Oregon Trail, and an Old Murder
I’ve just begun to realize what a gift my father gave me in having our old family movies saved to DVDs. Each time I watch them, I remember something new – or something old – in our family history. You’ve seen a few of my family stories in earlier posts […]
Continue readingMemories of Desert and Lakes . . . and Our Rainy Respite
As a desert-born girl, I hate the rain. I don’t like it dripping on me. And I hate the Midwestern humidity – I’ve never adapted to it in 33 years of living in Missouri. This hot, dry summer of Midwestern drought has brought back many memories of the hot, dry […]
Continue readingFamily Pictures: Capturing History As the Mind Cannot
Both my dad and my mother’s father took lots of pictures over the years. As kids, my siblings and I were always smiling at the camera for my father or grandfather, and often both of them at the same time until my grandfather died. There were four standard poses for […]
Continue readingThe Pitfalls of Planning
I am a really good planner and organizer. I don’t say this boastfully, but as a matter of fact. I keep a detailed to-do list, complete with due dates and timeframes. I schedule work time on my calendar, with specific things to finish in each block of time. I relish […]
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