Blog

I remember many things about my mother’s kitchen. It was so clean you could have eaten off of the floor. It had a pantry that was always well stocked. No matter where she lived, there was always something yellow in it and many things that came from the Mexican heritage. (She LOVED Mexican food, and people and things!) But mostly, I remember the cookie jar, Dumbo the Flying Elephant, who was always full of some kind of homemade cookie!

In the beginning, Dumbo looked exactly like the cute little gray Dumbo in the Disney movie. As the years wore on , the color wore off of Dumbo. And, most of my life he looked as he does now. Off white everywhere but still recognizable.

He is a two-sided Dumbo… one side shows Dumbo with the feather in his mouth; the other side shows him without it. I use to imagine that story as a child, and say to myself that the feather was love… someone wanting to help Dumbo find his place in the world for the unusual individual that he was. The side without the feather? That was Dumbo

It used to be that people wrote letters on paper to one another. Soldiers wrote home to family and girlfriends. Girlfriends wrote back to boyfriends. Grandchildren jotted thank you notes to their grandparents. Many have saved those letters over the years and for one reason or another, we would go back and re-read the letters again and again.

In my desk drawer are all the letters that my beloved brother wrote to me. They are kept in a light green leather-like box. When I open the box, I see his handwriting with its many flourishes and in some small fashion, this brings him back to me. His words, like “Sis… of all people, you and I know and understand each other best of all.” I did know him best. He is in heaven now, and has been for many years. And Tommy knew me. So when he says those words, I know exactly what they mean. They mean, “like old times, Sis, when we could finish the sentences of one another, and loved each other with our whole hearts.” I can touch the stationery and almost feel

It was not just cold, it was damn cold! I know I know… it snowed in the Rockies. Well, they haven’t been living in triple digit heat for months. We Arizonans have. So I’m saying, “Brrrrrr!”

And I’m talking about swimming in it! I like cold but swimming in 50 degree temperature? “That’s cold,” I’m thinking, “to swim.” I decided to wait maybe two hours.

Now it’s 54 degrees. Can’t put it off any longer. Into the car and off I go to the community pool.

As I entered the center and had my entrance card scanned, I could see the beautiful Olympic sized pool to the left outside. One guy in a suit and goggles occupies one of the nine or so lanes. The clerk who scans my card is commenting on my going swimming… She thinks I’m nuts to go out there much less to get into the water. I’m saying to myself, “Don’t think, just go do it.”

I chose a lane and dump my bag. I strip down to my suit. Brrrrrrr! There’s a wind. Nice! Not! I get into

Things that sit on some of our noses. Those things that, as children, earned us the nickname of “four eyes.” Spectacles. Yep, I’m talking about specs!

If I sound terse it’s because I have lost my glasses for the ump-teenth time. Yet again, I find myself running around the house trying to find the hiding place… the spot where while I was multi-tasking or shoved so far into my head thinking, I took them off and absentmindedly left them to lie in waiting. (And how am I able to see to write this? I’m wearing my back-up pair and my old prescription.) Argh! Glasses. The joy of my life and the bain of it.

And yes, I once had wonderful vision… until fourth grade when a Rocky Ford optometrist told my parents that I needed them. I still recall picking out those first frames. I must have fawned over 30 or 40 pair before I chose one. You’d have thought these were my shoes for the prom! I recall thinking I looked pretty good in them… Well… I thought that until I stuck them on my face

Every woman who has ever loved a man is familiar with The Cave. It is that place where all men go when they don’t know what to do with the women in their lives. This is where they can hide out with the remote in one hand and a beverage in the other (or some version of same). They know what to do with this! It’s familiar! And more than this, it’s comfortable. Having lived much of my life with five men (Hubby and four sons) I have had a steady diet of The Cave.

When it first showed up in my life, I was frantic to get them to come out. “What have I done?” and, “How can I help?” or, “Can we talk about it?” But The Cave is so comfortable. They just sit there and what? Eat! Watch Sports! Read! You are standing or sitting right there and it’s as if you aren’t even in the room. And when they leave, and don’t say goodbye, or won’t talk and communicate, well… that’s just flat out painful; and they don’t even know this because they’re

We live in a country where the clothes we put on our backs are so prevalent, that we have an entire industry dedicated to it. This industry makes a pile of money every year off of our decisions. What should I wear? Does this make me look fat? Is this color good next to my face? Does that make me look fat? Shall I dress for fad or go for the sophisticated look? And, again, does this make me look fat?

Wives all cross this country buy more clothes every year while their husbands mourn the loss of closet space. And we’re not talking just clothes… we’re also talking shoes, handbags, scarves, hats, gloves, coats. And then there’s the jewelry!

The very fact that we can make a choice in garments is exceedingly heady to me when there are so many across the globe that have nothing. So, I decided to clean out my closet and give away a lot of clothes and accessories. I went into my closet and took a look. And holy cats! I have a lot of stuff! I don’t need anything

Shakespeare said, “What’s in a name?” At 5:00 in the morning I’m wondering about it too. Do you know what your name means? Mine, I’ve been told, means “noble woman.” I’ve often wondered if my parents really knew what they were doing when they stuck that handle on me… it is a lot to live up to! So in naming my children, plenty of thought went into the process.

Torrence: This is my husband’s mother’s maiden name. It is also a Teutonic name and it means “tender heart.” I believe that Tory thinks he’s been stuck with everyone else’s name instead of his own (his middle name is my grandmother’s maiden name). But the “tender heart” part has rung true with him. Example: He and number two bro were very small and I had decided to take them to see a children’s cartoon movie. It was near the end of the flick and one of the beloved dogs in the film had been injured and was dying… Number two bro was chomping on popcorn just watching to see what would happen next; and Tory looked in my face

At this time of year, many in the United States are all aglow with Halloween and the joy of children and adults alike dressing up as someone they are not. We revisit scaring the living daylights out of one another. We may even decorate our yards with spooks and goblins. But most of all we revisit the joy of candy!

Tonight I needed to run down to the neighbor’s house to fulfill a promise. I entered their home to the smiles and enthusiasm of their three children. They are delightful… I love them as if they were my own! But let me tell ya… the biggest kid in the house is their dad!

This is a man who is president of the “Back to School Clothing Drive” (one of the largest, oldest and most successful nonprofits in the greater Phoenix area). He was super involved in his very large TV screen watching a football game… curled up on the sofa in shorts and tee shirt with bare feet. Now this doesn’t sound too much like a kid, I agree. That didn’t happen until his wife hauled out a cardboard box that

The most painful thing in family living is when family does not get along well… when there cannot be love between all members of the family. Now, it’s bad when a family member dies. But when one person or another doesn’t or won’t love another, that’s death that won’t die. That’s experiencing the death over and over and over again.

My family was and is the love of my life. When I was a child, from the first day I can remember, my mother and her mother-in-law didn’t get along. It wasn’t that my grandmother disapproved of my mother; it was that my mother didn’t understand (or care to learn to understand) my grandmother. And the amazing part was that they were both wonderful loving, caring and responsible people. I have these visions in my head of different scenes when my father had to make a choice between these two women he loved. And I am sad to say that my mother pushed it by constantly telling Dad how irritating she found my grandmother. It was as if Mom went out of her way to recall the things that Grandma did

I picked him up at Vacation Bible School and we went together directly to the food store. He was all excited about having had a nurse come to visit them that day. “She told us that our bodies are our temples and we need to protect them from illness… That this is one of the things we do to please God.” He went on and on about the many parts of the body that he had learned about that morning. His energy to talk and share was endless.

At last we were at the food store and I began to pick out the items that were on my shopping list. He usually stayed right next to me and visited with everyone that passed us while we traveled up and down the aisles of the store. And then I missed him. Instantly I began to search. I left the shopping cart where I had been and went up and down the aisles to find him. I was approaching the meat counter in the back of the store. Relief flooded through my soul. I could hear him.

There he was standing in