Beignet Day I don’t know where the idea to celebrate holidays originated with saying “Happy (blank).” Was it Hallmark? However it started, I think some holidays for some don’t begin and end with happy. I don’t mean to be a downer, people, I really don’t. But it has become increasingly clear to me that sometimes…

  Have One Best Spoon     Two months ago: I wanted to send our Airbnb host a thank-you gift for her hospitality. A nice friendship had sparked while I was staying at her bungalow in March, and one of our conversation themes revolved around coffee. So, after I returned home, I found the perfect…

What You See is Not All That Is     I think what I have is a broken blood vessel in my right eye. Google says so. The white of my eye is blood-red and my vision is a little blurry, too. I currently look like a zombie cast member out of “The Walking Dead.”…

      Grace Under View     We sometimes debate whether a professional comic went too far to make a joke or a point. The argument is like Ping-Pong. What’s vile, what’s funny, what’s mean, what’s PC, what’s art, what’s provocative, what’s smart—whatever. This post is not about that. It’s just not.   This…

Shorties at the Bar     With two empty seats between us, I sat on a stool at one end of the bar dividing the kitchen and dining room, and my dad sat on the other end, his feet barely touching the ground. Figuratively speaking, he had “the floor.” My mom stood spaced between the…

Ponytail Tale   I must keep Goody Ouchless Elastics in business. I lose these ponytail bands all the time and everywhere. I’ll often see one on the ground in public—I spot them in foreign countries and sometimes on the concrete floor in Costco—and I wonder if it’s mine.   It goes without being said that…

Sacred It was a couple of weeks ago when I sat in a Portland Baja Fresh choking back tears over my Diablo burrito and having a devil of a time. (For the record, this was the first time I’d gone to a chain restaurant in Portland after years of dining there. If you don’t understand…

See   See, this is what I’m talking about:   “We get so preoccupied with ourselves, the words we speak, the plans and projects we conceive that we become immune to the glory of creation. We barely notice the cloud passing over the moon or the dewdrops clinging to the rose leaves. The ice on…

I am Glad   Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.–Helen Keller   I’m leaving Portland today. While I spent the past two weeks celebrating the blessed event of my first born grandbaby, I also celebrated my birthday a little, too. This mostly meant justifying eating my way through this foodie town most evenings….

Carry-on “Grand-son” sounds a whole lot like “carry-on.” (As in luggage.) Coincidence? I think not. #carpebaby When it registered in my heart that my time here in Portland meeting and bonding with my first grand baby was drawing to a close, things got real real fast. As I’m typing this little note with one thumb…