A friend’s wife died suddenly a week ago. She was just a few years older than me and, as far as I knew, she wasn’t sick. When I called him to find out what happened, I was stunned to learn that she had an addiction, one that took its toll last weekend. He said it was something she had battled for a long time, and obviously he battled right alongside her.

This couple had an amazing love for each other, yet outwardly there was no sign of the struggle they endured…

This week my thoughts will be devoted to the upcoming birthday of my German Shepherd dog Daisy who died a year and a half ago. Daisy came to me as a puppy at a 5K-road race. It was the last one I attended, realizing that entrance fees would get expensive if I kept bringing stray dogs home.

Although I didn’t realize it at the time, she was a very special dog, the kind of dog that we feel lucky to have in our lives. She didn’t ask for much. She wasn’t a fan of being…

For several weeks, I’ve been finding a coin a day. On Wednesday and Friday, I found a quarter each morning, unusual because I usually find dimes and pennies. On Friday night it was two pennies. Then Saturday morning it was another penny. While most of these were out on my walks or my run, a few of them were as I walked into a store.

After the coin Saturday morning, I realized that they were about Father’s Day. And it made me wonder, would I find a coin on Father’s Day…

Recently, I sat at dinner with my friend Fred discussing a writing project that involved using my high school journals and the lessons I learned from my years of running competitively in cross country and track. I said something about the difficult relationship I had with my dad and how I debated including that. Fred looked puzzled and asked, “I thought you and your dad were good buddies?”



At that point, I realized that Fred didn’t know about those years with my dad, the…

On my second trip to Australia, I was in a Melbourne restaurant with several friends for dinner when one of them, an Australian, went with me to pick out a dessert. There was this gloppy mess of a cake and I asked Susan what it was. “Oh, that’s very Australian,” she said. “It’s sticky date pudding.” As she would later say, it’s mostly made up of butter and sugar (plus some dates). While looking quite like a messy cake, and obviously very sticky, it’s a wonderful dessert that I…

Several days ago I had a birthmark removed from the side of my head. While the chances of it becoming cancerous are relatively small, the dermatologist was concerned because I turn forty later this year and the incidence of cancer in these particular birthmarks goes up at that point. Although my hair covers up the shaved spot and my Franken-girl stitches, I didn’t sleep that first night. Everything was turned around from my usual routine. I had to sleep on one side the entire night, they…