I stand at the podium, sweaty hands clinging to my notes. My right knee shakes a little. I shift my weight and it stops. My mouth feels dry and my heart is pounding. I take a deep breath, look down at my notes, and then look up again at the…
Note: This post was in response to a question posed by the TODAY Parenting Team, in which they asked members to share their summer stories, advice and survival secrets. This post can be seen on the TODAY Parenting site here. ************ In summers past, I have alternated between counting down…
Though the weather here in the Midwest indicates otherwise, we are firmly entrenched in Spring. It is now mid-May. Or maybe even late-May depending on your definition. How is that possible? Wasn’t I just writing 2014 on my checks? Wasn’t there just snow on the ground? And weren’t we all…
You do not have to be good. You do not have to walk on your knees For a hundred miles through the desert, repenting. You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves. — Mary Oliver, from “Wild Geese” In March, our family…
“How to write: Butt in chair. Start each day anywhere. Let yourself do it badly. Just take one passage at a time. Get butt back in chair.” — Anne Lamott My first job out of law school was at a large law firm in Chicago. I had a small-ish office…
“And I urge you to please notice when you are happy, and exclaim or murmur or think at some point, ‘If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.’” — Kurt Vonnegut Years ago I used to work in a big office building in downtown Chicago. Most weekday mornings, I…