Category Archives: aging

Exploring Fear and Freedom in Writing

I am the first to admit there are subjects I might want to write about, but haven’t. I rarely write about politics because it’s unlikely to change anyone’s mind, and today’s worries will soon be behind us. I avoid writing about old age. Many social media and blog posts focus on illness, surgeries, or theContinue reading “Exploring Fear and Freedom in Writing”

Using Writing as a Pathway to Healing

I have found, over the last 16 years of running our Women’s Writing Circle, that writing has helped countless women heal from traumatic events, including myself. As Virginia Woolf once said about writing painful experiences, “Nothing has really happened until it has been described.” And by recording the trauma, the writer transforms into a survivor. WhenContinue reading “Using Writing as a Pathway to Healing”

Winter’s Gospel of Comfort and Time

This weekend, I attended the celebration service for Absalom Jones, the first African American Episcopal priest ordained in Philadelphia in 1802. As the choral group of young girls and boys sang in the high-ceiling cathedral with windows showcasing snow-draped fields, I remarked to my friend, “I can’t believe I was ever that young. They haveContinue reading “Winter’s Gospel of Comfort and Time”

Reflections on Exceptional Moments…Joy and Despair

We spoke of what is known as “toxic positivity,” which is the idea that one must be grateful for the life they do have, no matter what, and always put on a brave face. Yet, you cannot deny the complexity of life or the reality of death, and negative feelings are not a failure but a normal part of the human condition—nor is gratitude always a solution to pain.

This Place Called Home

Last week, I drove back to the old neighborhood where I grew up, where my parents lived across the street from a military academy, where I met my future husband. In the place of a once stately house where the head of the school lived, a skeletal structure under construction with a three-car garage juttedContinue reading “This Place Called Home”