Growing with gratitude for life's challenges
The nurse has just left and with her all the warmth in the room. I close my eyes and try to hold onto her essence a little longer: soft brown eyes tenderly gazing into mine, the gentle way in which she tucks me in, how she twists the blinds to blot out the night sky, […]
Read MorePerspective is everything and seldom appreciated until the offending circumstances are well in the rear view mirror. When my former marriage fell apart, I did the unthinkable and moved out. The one that leaves loses, I’d heard over and over. I was hell-bent that I would not lose. What I failed to do was consider […]
Read More“Grandma, when will you be better?” It is 5:00 on a school morning, and I am sitting at my granddaughter’s bedside nursing her through a sore tummy. “Not sure, Honey.” “Oh,” she shrugs. She is four and has never known me any other way. Later, we snuggle up and watch Moana. “You are just like […]
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Explosive, sometimes irrational, anger is a steady companion of addiction. Anyone who has lived with or been an addict will recognize the pattern played out in the pages of Mishka Shubaly’s memoir : I Swear I’ll Make It Up To You. Shubaly holds nothing back in the telling of his story, subtitled: A Life On […]
Read More“You’re abandoning me for the summer? Is that what you’re telling me?” I reel at my mother’s response when I tell her we have parked the motor home at the lake for the summer season. This is the place she always goes to: how it affects her and I feel the talons of guilt closing […]
Read MoreWearing a bright yellow taffeta dress, a sash of satin ribbons at the waist and flowing with swirling layers, my granddaughter arrives for the movie. We’ve been trying to get in to see Beauty and the Beast for weeks now and finally secured tickets. “Well look at you!” I exclaim, arms open to receive her […]
Read MoreI keep dreaming about young men: confidant, seductive, virile young men. In my dreams, they cozy up to me, offer promises of love, and always, I remember who I am – a dried up old woman condemned to disability – and wake up…reluctantly. Thing is, men have always been a mystery to me, like a […]
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My husband is googling “The Declaration of Independence”. I am just trying to breathe: a tempest of emotions, thoughts, and fears attacking rationality. I try to think back to another time when I felt such terror…to reassure myself that this will all pass…but I think about my son who recently converted to Muslim for the […]
Read MoreA forty-one foot Alfa See Ya sits in the driveway awaiting take off. Ric has had to get medical clearance after two heart attacks and triple bypass surgery in the spring. He has also had to get special licensing to drive our new soon to be home. We have purchased a mobility scooter for yours […]
Read MoreThe longest my family ever lived in one place was when I was aged four to eleven. We lived in a house, built by my father, with a fortress of cedars on either side of the backyard to “keep out nosy neighbours”. Behind was a farmer’s field and beyond a wooded area. My father had […]
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One Woman's Quest II 