A Message From Beyond the Grave   “Who do you think you are? Don’t get too big for your britches, young lady.” This is what she seemed to be saying.   “Wait, what?” I heard myself think. She even used the scolding phrase, young lady. Twice. She was talking to me like a mom who’d … Read more

Fleeting   On my desk, I have a Post-it that says, “Fleeting” to remind me that good or bad, it’s temporary.   It’s good to know. Because it’s so freaking easy to forget.   I Facetime with my two-and-a-half-year-old grandson, Brooks, just about every day. He’s been saying a line to me lately that just … Read more

  Hail to the Chief   Today I streamed last night’s episode of SNL. I’ve been faithfully watching the show since high school, around the time of its debut (I’m kind of old). Back in those days, before the internet, DVR, VCR and the automobile :), I watched “Saturday Night Live” live, and so I … Read more

Breathless   When my friend Jennifer responded by saying that she loved me, I quickly shot back with, “I love you more I win.” I was being cute, with a competitive…I’m gonna say it without taking a breath and without punctuation to convey my race-to-the-finish-line-declaration-that-I-loved-her-more-and-so-I-win.   After I wrote it, I looked at that breathless … Read more

Manners   Yesterday on the San Juan Creek Trail bike path coming back from Doheny, I came up behind an elderly woman in a dress ambling along the concrete river bed. From the back, she was a dead ringer for my late grandma Josephine. Same frame, same manner—and most striking was that beautiful silver bun … Read more

Difference Makers for Little Details   I’ve always assumed the family was seated all together on the pew, in that Wednesday night church service in San Fernando Valley, California. When the minister said there was a local family in need, and asked if anyone could take “the baby” home (18- month-old me), I thought my … Read more

  Has God Faded?   Far from the crowds and on a dirt path along the ocean, I was riding just south of the San Clemente pier yesterday when I saw “Save 2020.” You’re telling me, I thought, 2020 is a mess. (Just when I thought it couldn’t get much worse, my dad—on his 91st … Read more

Meeting My Muse   I was so excited, I forgot about my mask.   This is Vijay. Ever since I wrote about him in one of my stories, I’ve hoped to cross paths with him so that I could say hello. Today, as I was finishing up my ride and not far from home, I … Read more

  My grandson knows that, recently, he couldn’t go outside for ten days or so because of the toxic air quality from the horrendous wildfires. He looked up into the sky so high and said it was “Sooooo smoky.”   The sky is better now, thank God.   He doesn’t know what else is in … Read more

  I’m not liking people very much lately.   It’s not all people, but a healthy chunk. And those in that chunk who had already bugged me before “lately”? They really bug me a lot right now. I blame it mostly on the train wreck that has been 2020. There are just so many topics … Read more