New Year, New…??

I have notebooks from when I was younger…my journals.  At times when I was chronicling My Former Life (lives?) they were at times helpful in remembering those long forgotten details of those dusty memories from so long ago.  And most of them include a few New Year’s Day entries, most of them either trying to [...]

A New Reality

It should have been more momentous. Sitting there, in a classroom last week, listening to my autistic son’s teacher tell me that he was doing well in all his subjects was the stuff of my dreams a few years ago.  A reality I couldn’t imagine, but one I hoped to attain in the far away [...]

Confusion and Grief

I didn’t know her well.  But when I heard that an acquaintance of mine had a heart attack a few weeks ago, I was still stunned.  A peer, someone I’d volunteered with at the kids’ school, who’d attended our PTO meetings, who lived around the corner from me,  was Just Like Me had had a [...]

Survival

No one believed the forecast. When our weather forecasters started talking about snow in the forecast last Thursday, those of us in SW CT were incredulous.  Snow is virtually unheard of in October here.  Sure, I grew up in Michigan; I remember several Halloweeens spent with winter coats and flakes in the air.  Nothing significant, [...]

Death and Dying

My great aunt is sick. Well, it’s more than that, I suppose.  My great aunt is more than sick. My great aunt is dying.  Right now. My great aunt Katie is my mother’s aunt, her favorite aunt, and we were very close to her when my mother was alive.  Most of my happiest childhood memories [...]

After the Hurricane

We made it through the hurricane, though it was an interesting time for us.  The winds started around midnight and by three in the morning, they were howling and rain was falling in sheets and sideways from the sky.  I finally got out of the bed at five thirty, tired of listening to it and [...]

Hurricane

So, it’s hurricane time where I live. My daughter asked if I had ever been through a hurricane before, and the answer is a solid “no”.  I grew up in Michigan, the land of snow and construction.  It gets cold there, but you don’t get hurricanes.  I’ve always been fascinated by them, riveted by weather [...]

What We Did

Thursday, September 1, 2005: I can’t tell you all how amazed I am at the response to the Hurricane Katrina Relief Project. I am sure you’re all watching the news as much as I am, and what I’m seeing makes me feel even more strongly than ever that we must do whatever it is each [...]

Little Boys and Big Tests

“But what did he say?” I groaned into the phone. I couldn’t believe it when I had started vomiting the night before Michael’s scheduled hydrocephalus check at the Children’s Hospital.  I had never felt so ill in all of my life.  I spent the evening on the sofa in order to not infect R, who [...]

What Had I Missed?

I sat there, with my baby in my arms, wondering. Had I missed something?  Nothing seemed wrong with him.  He smiled, he ate, he held my finger as he nursed, he sat up in his high chair just like my other two children had.  Nothing seemed different to me, nothing seemed out of the ordinary. [...]