Okay, I’m prefacing this post with a disclaimer: I love the Interwebs, I’m crazy about my blog, I work electronically from home, my cell phone is always on my person, and I read on a Kindle. So this mini-rant doesn’t come from a place of dial landlines, a typewriter, and snail mail (although I do love to receive letters on pretty stationery…). I don’t get the need for constant communication and contact. It irritates the crap out of me to sit with someone at a restaurant or even at their home or mine and have them constantly eying their smart phone. They set it next to them on the table…

I talk a lot about words on this site—probably because that’s how I make my living and because language is my passion. My mom insisted that we all have strong, extensive vocabularies, so word play is inevitable whenever we have a family event. We are voracious Scrabble and Boggle players, and we just discovered Apples to Apples, a words and definitions game that is loads of fun. So you see, I love words. I collect them the way other people collect Hummel figurines or coins or antiques. But I’ve always been of two minds about profanity—you know, the bad words. I used them in college because I was away from…

…is, interestingly, how I think of Bucky, my friend, Patty’s horse. Bucky died on Friday, after living with Patty for 32 years—and in case you don’t know, that’s a really long life for a horse. Mostly their average lifespan is about 25 years. Bucky was a buckskin pony—almost tall enough to be considered a horse—that babysat anyone who rode him and always moved out with unflagging energy. Patty and Bucky grew up together, riding in 4-H horse shows, trail riding in the hills and hollows of southern Indiana, and later riding the GBRA (Girls Barrel Racing Association) circuit around the Midwest. I loved to watch Patty make a running leap…

This weekend is our first holiday in the new lake cottage. PJ and my brother-in-law have spent a couple days with us and yesterday, we floated and swam in the lake, drank good wine; and cooked out. The neighbors are coming by regularly to introduce themselves and Husband and I are enjoying ourselves immensely in this new place, this new life. It’s so much fun to get to know all these good folks–everyone’s been warm and welcoming and incredibly generous. “Hey if you need any tools, feel free to come up to my workshop, I’ve got anything you need…” or “Hog Roast on the Commons on Sunday, hope you’ll come…

I was just in the kitchen putting baked bean together and it occurred to me how much of my Mom’s way of doing things I’ve brought to my own adulthood. Like, for instance, baked beans. Mother was always horrified at the idea of dumping a can of baked beans into a pot and warming it up right from the can. Instead, she drained the beans, put them in a casserole dish, added barbecue sauce, mustard, a chopped onion, and brown sugar. Then she placed two strips of bacon across the top in an X and put them in the oven. She baked them until they were dry enough that when…

I just spoke to my friend Martha, and we are celebrating. Last week, her daughter  received distressing news when she had an ultrasound of her first baby. We’ve been praying and sending the pregnancy out into the Universe, asking for God’s gracious grace. Today, they received the news that Martha’s little grandbaby in the womb is healthy and perfect. The relief in my dear friend’s voice was audible, and the situation made me think of how parenting is a “forever” job and how Martha’s daughter is having her first taste of that before her baby is even born. We never ever stop being parents—once you have a child, you’re signed…

I know, I know…there’s a movie by the same name, and although this has nothing to do with Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock, it does have to do with time. In The Lake House, time is a secondary character, playing against the two main characters as they try to figure out a way to meet at the Lake House. Time has been a secondary character in our effort to fulfill a dream. For almost 40 years, Husband and I have talked, dreamed, planned, fantasized about having a lake house. Each time we considered it, something got in the way, finances mostly. Seemed as if each time we thought we were…