Last weekend my family enjoyed a festive reunion to celebrate two high school graduations, two college graduations, a 40th, 60th and 90th birthday! Big families come with BIG celebrations because there are so many milestones to commemorate. As she was leaving, a niece I don’t see often said something that hit a cord:

One of the tips I learned at last week’s Frederic Buechner Writer’s Conference was to always have a killer headline. So I stole this one from a class I attended. What else did I learn? Who Frederic Buechner* is and that if I had a day job, I shouldn’t quit!

As of last Monday, Mom and Pop Movers has officially gone OUT-OF-BUSINESS. After driving a 15’ U-Haul into the city and back, Bob & Co. is eager to pay for professional movers in the future. When you include parking tickets, overpriced sandwiches ($100 for four sandwiches large enough to feed a small country), the bottle of wine needed to recover from the traffic and the lunch bill, plus the massages we both needed afterward...
 

Memorial Day represents more than a three-day weekend, barbecues and fireworks marking the official start of summer. Unfortunately, its true meaning has been diluted by retail sales and festivities that do little to commemorate the men and women who have died in service to our country. Originally.......

No post last week because I was too busy lugging ‘stuff’ – my daughter’s stuff, my son’s stuff and my stuff, which needed to be rearranged to accommodate their stuff. AND, we’re not done yet. One more move in June where we will attempt to squeeze my daughter’s bounty of belongings into a miniscule New York walkup apartment. Her hair products alone will take up much of the coveted shelf space. Luckily, I’ve developed......

Mother’s Day this year marks my advancement to yet another phase of motherhood. Today my daughter graduates from college. I couldn’t think of a better gift to celebrate Mother’s Day. It’s true that you never actually graduate from motherhood as it is a life-long commitment. Still, you certainly experience many transitions during your tenure.

Driving with two little friends recently made me nostalgic for the car conversations I often had with my kids. Grace (3) asked if I knew there was once a Princess Grace – for real!" I answered, “Oh, yes. She was incredibly beautiful.” Without skipping a beat, she replied with complete confidence, “Not as beautiful as me.” God bless the innocence of youth. When do we lose that? When do we start comparing ourselves to others and find ourselves lacking? 

A friend came over last weekend to assist with some gardening. She’s the kind of friend who doesn’t hesitate when agreeing to help, despite some odd requests over the years. She’s similar to Lucy’s Ethel, Laverne’s Shirley, or even Thelma’s Louise, though we haven’t driven off any cliffs – yet.

Every year, around this time, we have a robin that returns to wage war against the window in our kitchen.  I’m assuming it’s the same one, but they all look alike to me. You’d think ours would have a distinguishable flat beak from his constant pecking battles over the years. I thought we had an incredibly stupid bird on our hands, but after some research, I discovered that this behavior is a common phenomenon. It’s simply the robin attempting to establish and defend his territory during the nesting season.

Returning to Pilates this week marked the passing of my last milestone. I am now officially back to “normal” – or as close as I ever was. I entered class tentatively, as my muscles had atrophied from two months of sedentary living. It’s amazing how quickly you lose muscle tone. It hardly seems fair after all the time and effort you exert to achieve it. And the older I get, the more time and effort it takes. Simply maintaining these days feels like a full-time endeavor.

My huusband and I have spent the past few weeks cleaning out the Florida house his parents had been living in for the past 30 years. Gone is the infamous ‘Depend-able’ cocktail table, remnants of past appliances, every supermarket bag that ever came into the house, along with an enormous collection of empty boxes, jars and Folgers coffee containers. It’s amazing how much useless junk we can accumulate over the course of our lives. It was cathartic heaving the mountain of debris cluttering the garage into the dumpster, which was overflowing, yet somehow the garage remains full!

Choosing to visit South Beach while attempting a Lenten fast is equivalent to traveling to Sodom and Gomorrah for a spiritual retreat! I doubt there are many Lenten observers in Miami, unless fasting from wearing clothes counts. I certainly wasn’t going to find any encouragement within a community of excesses in every imaginable form – which brings me to my first choice point and an important admonition Paul gives the Corinthians: “Do not be misled. Bad company corrupts good character.” Not that I’ve ever needed any help with pushing the envelope.

The funeral for my father-in-law took place last week complete with full military honors. Having never witnessed a military ceremony, I was overwhelmed by the gratitude, respect and honor awarded for Paul’s dedicated and impressive service to his country. Can anyone not be moved by the mournful melody of Taps?

I recently wrote about the angels that surrounded and supported me through this most recent health challenge. I’m happy to report that the Colonel was similarly blessed. He had his own little harem of caretakers managed beautifully by my sister-in-law, Sharon. She is the Colonel’s winter next-door neighbor in Florida. For the past few years she and her husband, Paul Jr., have lovingly watched over my in-laws all winter, making sure their needs were met. This even included a subterfuge a couple of years ago to catch a thieving caretaker in the act with a ‘granny cam.’

My father in law, Paul, passed away this week at the age of 98. Having spent his entire career in the military, he was affectionately known as “The Colonel.” He was one of a dying breed: a chauvinist who said whatever he thought without filter or apology. Some might be tempted to attribute that to his advanced age, but he’d been doing it all his life. His political incorrectness knew no bounds,

Someone commented to me this week, “I’m sure you’re making it seem easier than it sounds.” Not really. I’m just choosing to focus on the positive aspects of this experience rather than the pain. Does that negate the fact that this surgery was probably the biggest physical challenge I’ve ever experienced (other than the Brazilian wax my girlfriend persuaded me to try)? No. But that’s the paradox of life, isn’t it? The parallel paths of joy and suffering. 

Last Saturday night I enjoyed a farewell meal with one of my guardian angels, Noonie, who slept by my side in the hospital every night. She was a Godsend – literally. Her calming presence and caring ministrations got me through many a rough night – with a little help from our adorable night nurse, Joe, who we both developed a little crush on. The best part of having Noonie there was that we managed to have a lot of laughs, despite the circumstances, and kept the staff entertained with our antics.

I know I said I wasn’t going to be writing, but I couldn’t resist getting in one more story. Last Monday I was thrown a curveball in the form of a sore throat and threatening cold, which I thought might mandate a postponement. I had finally caught my husband’s ‘man cold,’ which females know all too well is a life threatening illness. I was upset and could only respond honestly, “Really God? Are you kidding me?” Actually, what I said was more off color than that, but this is a Christian blog so I will keep that between God and me.

Anyone with children is familiar with the ubiquitous homework assignment to create an autobiographical illustration for the class. It‘s an annual elementary/middle school exercise whereby the student tells the story of their life thus far. My children surpassed my academic abilities in the fourth grade, but I was all in when it came to ‘creative’ homework assignments. The one my daughter and I came up with for her last autobiographical

I find the first week of January anticlimactic and a bit melancholy. In our family the Christmas season doesn’t officially end until the Feast of the Epiphany on January 6th, which commemorates the arrival of the Wise Men. Even so, come January 1st, there’s no denying the festivities are over. Everyone is returning to their respective lives, and the onerous job of ‘undoing’ Christmas looms. As I took the Christmas trees down, I was faced with an unpleasant truth – my own epiphany of sorts. Let me explain.