Once More Across Home Plate

I turned 51 a couple of weeks ago. I like birthdays. And no cancer survivor in their right mind complains about getting another year older. It’s kind of like a lopsided baseball game — even though the winning team is far ahead, they still try to cross home plate one more time. You can certainly [...]

Sunset or Sunrise?

lake-sunset-deck

It was a beautiful sunset — or was it a sunrise? I watched it from our deck of my family’s house overlooking Greers Ferry Lake. Sara Ann was about to begin her senior year in high school, my last school year with a child at home. Prelude to the empty nest. Between the uncharacteristically cool [...]

Mother’s Day X 20

girls.92

This photo of my girls was taken in 1992. This past Sunday, Mother’s Day, I celebrated my 20th anniversary of motherhood. It began about this time of year in 1988 — my first pregnancy. While lying on the couch one afternoon, I felt a strange fluttering in my abdomen, which I immediately recognized as life. [...]

Strollers to Car Keys: Already?

girlsinpool

This photo was taken in the summer of 1994, when my girls were two and five-and-a-half. They are now 16 and 19. Time flies. About 19 years ago I read a magazine article that talked about how we often wish our children’s lives away. I can’t wait until the first smile, can’t wait until they [...]

Parents: A Wake-up Call

By now you have likely seen and/or heard the story: a group of teenage girls beat a former friend severely enough to cause unconsciousness, damage to her vision and hearing, not to mention what I’m sure were plenty of scrapes and bruises. Inexplicably, they videotaped the incident for the purpose of posting it on the [...]