Blog
I launched my blog in 2009 when I was wrestling with a midlife crisis. Since then, the digital world has changed so much. I was new to both Facebook and Twitter when I started blogging, and I was still rocking the BlackBerry for email. Instagram hadn’t launched yet. Podcasting and short videos are what the cool kids do these days, blogging is considered old fashioned. But I still find it the best way to share my thoughts and to profile people who inspire me.
I hope you’ll find something here that inspires you, or at least sparks a conversation. Some of my favorite posts are pinned to the top, scroll down a bit more to find the most recent, or check out the categories in the sidebar.
I’ve written quite a bit about how grateful I am for my fabulous piano teacher, but today I need to give a little equal time to my personal trainer, Cory. It’s a little confusing why I’m paying someone to torture me – after our first session, I literally could not walk down stairs without a sad, painful little…
Preservation Hall Jazz Band plays New York tonight and I’m such a geeky fan girl that I’m going even though I think I’ve seen them five times already this year. Traditional jazz is my soul music. It never fails to make me happy. Whether I am covered in mud on a rainy day at New Orleans Jazz Fest or packed…
I’m no Pollyanna about our political system. From negative campaign ads to the influence of money, I get that American democracy suffers numerous problems. AP’s Liz Sidoti wrote of Washington, D.C. recently: This is still a city of red-hot polarization, gridlock the norm, with partisan rancor from the Capitol to the White House. Neither party is giving the country what…
This post continues an occasional series on writers — how and why they write, what inspires them and how they overcome challenges like writer’s block and rejection. Previously we’ve heard from Jim Ottaviani, Lara Zielin, Bruce DeSilva and Jennifer Worick. Today’s Q&A features a baker’s dozen questions with Jim Tobin, a newspaper reporter turned author and college professor. From the…
A guest post by Christine Kane: Let’s say you had a baby. Congratulations! Your baby is the best human ever! You love your baby. You celebrate as it starts to crawl. You and your partner delight in this baby’s every new adventure. Then, one day, the baby stands up on her own. “Yaaaaay!” you cheer. You clap your hands. The…
Thanksgiving is about a month away — on Nov. 25, in case you haven’t checked your calendar. That means I’m getting ready to do another Month of Thanksgiving. Maybe you recall that last year I did a post every day leading up to Thanksgiving, focusing on gratitude and getting in a thankful mindset. What’s so cool is that Paul Taubman,…
“No one should come to New York to live unless he is willing to be lucky.” ~ E.B. White I have loved that quote since I decided I simply had to live in New York. It feels like it’s simultaneously a challenge and a promise of great opportunity. So I loved stumbling onto this post on the blog “explore. dream.discover”…
One of my most popular posts ever was about the artist Chuck Close reinventing himself after a blood clot left him physically unable to use his hands the way he used to. So of course I was intrigued to start seeing AOL ads featuring Chuck Close. To celebrate their 25th anniversary, AOL commissioned Close to do a “Project on Creativity.”…
Have you heard about Dan Savage’s It Gets Better project? Upset by yet another gay young person committing suicide, Savage used his relationship column to call on gay adults to tell their stories and assure teens that if they can endure the persecution they’re experiencing, life will get better as adults. There was so much I hated about high school.…
Before we moved to New York, some friends shared their strategy for successfully living in NYC’s small apartments: every time they brought something new in, something old had to go. Sharing an apartment smaller than the one I rented as a college senior has forced us to be ruthless in casting off anything unnecessary. This has been liberating. We’re such…
This year I’ve embarked on a tour of what are considered some of the best farmers markets in the country. I consulted a variety of sources that rank the best markets, including: An Alice Waters interview with USA Today Eating Well Huffington Post MSNBC American Farmland Trust I marked their favorites on a big map of the U.S. to…
And just in case you haven’t gotten enough on Bruce DeSilva, click “read more” below for his first-person account of getting his novel, Rogue Island, published. Of course I have to point out the Michigan connections: Otto and Larry are Michigan alumni, and Susanna represents my friend, Lara Zielin, who edits an alumni magazine at Michigan. I love that even…
This post continues an occasional series on writers — how and why they write, what inspires them and how they overcome challenges like writer’s block and rejection. Previously we’ve heard from Jim Ottaviani, Lara Zielin and Jennifer Worick. Today’s Q&A features Bruce DeSilva, a retired journalist now putting his writing skills to work in longer form. From his bio: Bruce…
Well, maybe all that time you spend looking at LOLcats is lost. Then again, maybe it’s the missing piece to your great, long-simmering idea? With thanks to Mary Jean for pointing it out, here’s a wonderful four-minute video on where good ideas come from. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NugRZGDbPFU&feature=player_embedded]
It’s Eat Drink Local Week in New York and I feel pretty good about representing. Among the items Edible Manhattan throws down as a challenge: 10. Cook your cast-offs! Think corn cob stock, sauteed beet tops, and pickled watermelon rinds. >> Maybe it’s my poverty mentality or perhaps my waste-nothing husband, but I’m a big fan of putting everything to…
We all get mad about something — coworkers, family, neighbors, bad drivers, lousy service, too much to do … I’m getting mad just thinking about the possibilities. That’s why I liked this post from “How To Become a Better You in 365 Days.” It’s a normal human reaction to get angry, but if you can’t control the things that make…
Did you hear the recession is over? And has been for a year? As the blog Death and Taxes wrote this week: The recession is over. It is official. According to The National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), our “Great Recession” lasted 18 months, beginning December 2007 and ending June 2009. Monday’s announcement from the NBER probably came as a…
Can I just say how much fun this series is? I’m learning a lot by getting a wonderful peek inside the brains of some excellent writers. Today we get the third installment of an occasional series on writers — how and why they write, what inspires them and how they overcome challenges like writer’s block and rejection. Previously we’ve heard…
Maybe a year ago, I made a quickie list of five people who inspired me that I’d like to meet. I reviewed the list earlier this week, after checking off my fourth: Mark Bittman. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iXfarIbdaVA] I’m working on a freelance story about food and it was a great opportunity to interview one of my kitchen icons. I got off the…
I love serendipity. Tuesday night, with my blog post about the connection between relationships and happiness still fresh, I stumbled onto a tweet from VenessaMiemis: 10 Things Science Says Will Make You Happy The Yes Magazine article is approaching two years old but the advice sounds timeless — savoring every day moments, exercising and helping others, for example. The suggestion…