Dear Martha,
A split second before my daughter flew home for Christmas, she called to exclaim, “Let’s make the pies!” I paused. I’d planned to dole out that assignment to a family member. My tight choreography to execute the perfect Christmas feast did not factor pies into the agenda. Throwing organization to the wind, I replied with can-do enthusiasm, “Let’s!” And then I turned to you, Martha.
Truth is, pie crusts scare me. But I’ve seen you whip them up with ease in your down-home country kitchen. […]

How can I tell you? What would be an appropriate way to state what must be said without being ridiculed. I suppose it’s best to just to come to the point.
Well, okay. I am emotionally involved with a…zucchini plant. Oh it’s not the sordid matter you imagine. Nope! As a matter of fact, it is an extremely healthy attachment.
THE FACTS: Last year I planted a garden and for the first time after several tries where weeds and gophers were my companions, […]

As you navigate middle school, I have a few things I’d like you to know:
Not everyone will get you. Be patient. You will continue to find your people.
Even if you aren’t a natural athlete, GRIT will be the characteristic that separates you.
When you run, you have an angel on your shoulder.
Friends aren’t meant to be collected. Good ones last a lifetime.
Wear deodorant.
Girls. It’s ok for them to be “just friends” […]

My husband wanders into the kitchen.
“Notice anything?” he asks.
I glance up from the myriad of morning chores I am multi-tasking.
He is dressed for work. Pants belted. Fly zippered. Dress shirt buttoned. Hair combed. Nothing seems amiss. Nothing pops out, screaming for attention.
“Not a thing,” I say.
He humps. “What about my socks?”
My eyes travel to the floor. His left big toe is poking through a practically new black dress sock. […]

Our bed has a smoldering pile of blankets in the middle of it. It serves as a burn barrier for the innocents who don’t teeter on the verge of spontaneous combustion at least three times a night. Namely, my husband and the cats.
After several months of menopausal volcanic flashes of heat that somehow erupt from my body without vaporizing everything in the general vicinity, they’ve all become used to interrupted sleep. When I leap out of bed screaming to shed my clothes, […]