Once we found a rather healthy midland water snake curled up in our toilet. My husband and I were out with the dogs when we got a text from your youngest, Anna. “There’s a snake in the toilet!” I asked Anna to send a picture and even I was a…

We had some friends over last week to watch Monterey Pop, the documentary movie about the historic music festival, directed by D. A. Pennebaker. How nice to have vaccinated guests over after this awful hiatus! We vacuumed! We tidied! I made brownies with a dash of lemon (yes, and they…

My grandmother Frances had a chiseled chin and huge, haunting eyes. Maybe her eyes are just huge, but because she has always been a specter in my life I feel them haunting me. I’ve always known of her, that she died when my dad was only four years old and…

Delightful Distractions During Online Teaching I’m no air traffic controller, but I do keep watchful eyes on multiple screens at one time. In accordance with one of the three “bottom lines” of Magic Ears, one of the companies I contract with to teach English to Chinese children, I am careful…

One day a friend from work dropped by unexpectedly. She handed me a Tupperware container. “Here,” she said, “I thought maybe you could do something with these guys.” I cautiously pulled back the cracked plastic lid. Inside was a little nest with three naked, shriveled baby birds in it. My…

A Boomer’s Unsolicited Advice on Keeping a Journal — How old are you? Blink once and add ten years, blink twice, add twenty. That’s what happened to me. I blinked twice and twenty years is gone. Something traumatic happened in my life twenty years ago, and I recently decided it was time to write about it. There are reasons…

How one man’s poop might be another man’s treasure in the fight for a trim physique You’ve tried everything! You’ve fasted intermittently, counted points on color-coded charts, tracked your 10,000 steps a day, committed to Yoga with Adriene, and still that stubborn weight just won’t budge. What gives? Maybe it’s not you. Maybe it’s your microbiome. By now you’ve probably heard some amazing tales about your…

How “Women-of-an-Age” give me quiet courage and hope for the future In our daily dose of disgusting news, this week brings the Trump administration’s move of rolling back the protections on our waterways. He claims it’s to benefit farmers, but in fact it is the real estate developers who have the most to gain. …

A reflection on happy days at Krystal Long Live Krystal, home of the soggy square buns and my first job. Upended by the news of bankruptcy and hoping this is just some kind of business move and that Krystal will always be there for my annual binge, I’m moved to…