Fourth Grade

Fourth Grade

Fourth grade marked my life with three events that vibrate in my heart and mind to this day. I wish I had a better eraser. I moved to a new school. Friends were hard to make. While I’d moved when I was two years old, then again when I was six, this one was more...

Stage 2b

I was working my network to be a back-up singer for John Mellencamp, another Hoosier transplant to crazy California, in 2005. I was giving it my best shot when it hit me: a cancer diagnosis on this date, that year. ‘Twenty feet from stardom” was not going...
Blend an UPside

Blend an UPside

One of my friends has an ulcer, a condition now known to be a disease. She’s on a medication that brings relief and cure; back in the day, it was diet-controlled 100%. I know because my family endured the dietary constraints of my father’s ulcer treatment:...
Open Heart

Open Heart

I’ve just returned from an echocardiogram appointment. The results were reassuring; especially because I am almost exactly one year older than my dad was when he had his first pacemaker installed. My dad died of a broken heart in 2008. The young technician was...
Blueberry Pancake

Blueberry Pancake

I began a new exercise class this summer: Pilates Mat. The plan: to develop my core muscles without injury to ankles or knees, as sometimes induced by yoga poses, to foster good posture and to ease back injuries. Besides I already had a mat. As I looked among the...