October is here, and it’s feeling pretty anticlimactic. October is the month I desperately look forward to each year. For more than a decade, Octobers have been a carefully planned and meticulously executed string of events, carrying us from one weekend to the next until suddenly, it’s All Saints Day. It’s a whirlwind of orange …
Do you have dreams? Not middle-of-the-night visions, but goals for your life? If you’re reading this, you probably know that my biggest goal is to be a traditionally published historical novelist. There’s a lot that I can do to make this dream come true. I can write; obviously, I won’t be published if I don’t …
I read an article recently about the pandemic, and how because of our greatly increased bandwidth, employers everywhere have realized that it’s just not that important for employees to be in the office. Zoom and other virtual meeting platforms have taken the place of in-person meetings, and office buildings, especially in New York City, could …
When I was in college, my mom and my aunt took up the hobby of quilting. More specifically, they did strip quilting, which is basically making quilts via assembly line. I decided I wanted on that bandwagon, too, so I asked them to teach me. Both of their moms also quilted, so we had some …
Being a writer can be very isolating. I can’t tell you how many times I wished I was cuddled on the couch next to my husband, watching a movie or reruns of “The Office.” But instead, I was sequestered in the other room, furiously typing out my story. Even last Saturday, I was upstairs at …
Our family has been no stranger to The Unexpected over the past couple of years. And yet, this COVID-19 crisis, and quarantine, and a quarter of the school year left unfinished, and now my 8-week furlough from my still-new job, still took us by surprise. When we found ourselves suddenly in a position of having …
One of my dad’s favorite sayings is, “Good luck is the residue of hard work.” Typically I would think of this in terms of sports. In fact, he mentioned it a lot in regards to my high school tennis career, as well as my brother’s baseball playing. And I could see what he meant. The …
I don’t know about you, but I’ve had a few discussions lately about whether or not this year (2020…can you believe it?) is the beginning of a new decade. And while it is technically not a new decade (because we didn’t start with year zero), I get that a new number in front really makes …
I am the mother of four children under the age of ten, and if I had a dollar for every time someone told me to cherish these moments because the time goes by quickly, I could fund the research to build a time machine so I could actually hold onto these days forever. This is …
Every year on December 10, I take a nostalgic look at this photo, and I share it on social media (which for me, is just Facebook). I can’t believe it’s been seven years since our second daughter was born, and seven years since our doula captured this moment. It is one of the most important …
