Music and Cats

When I made a third batch of bread and butter pickles last week, I emptied the second (or was it the third?) 10-pound bag of sugar that I’ve bought this summer. I also bought another box of canning jars into which to put those pickles, though I had purchased three 12-count boxes at the beginning […]

All three of our cats love to be snuggled, but Sergei is the only one of the three who is regularly a lap cat. But not my lap, oh no! Only Paul’s lap will do for our tuxedo boy, who flops down, hooks a couple of claws into Paul’s jeans, and hangs on while Paul […]

Few things bring me more joy than watching young children dance to live music. While toddlers lack fine motor skills, they come to dancing with a delightfully unselfconscious exuberance. (Yes, the same can be said of some adults, but they are rare, as our culture sadly tends to discourage dancing among the less coordinated.) […]

… and the livin’ is easy.
For our sixth wedding anniversary (a year ago last May), I gave Paul a hammock. While a hammock is neither the traditional gift of candy or iron (what an odd pair of choices!), nor the modern one of wood, Paul enjoys it a lot, particularly on warm summer Sunday […]

I’ve been trying for several months to write about my experience of Paul’s first battle with cancer: how it felt to be twenty-one and madly in love with a man who appeared to be dying; how my family history and psychological makeup affected my reaction to his illness; how I failed to find the psychological […]