Someone complimented me the other day, when I was least expecting it. I had taken my glasses off, and this person said, “You have beautiful eyes!” I just smiled and said “Thanks!” The fact that this person was a woman, and someone I know, made…

I used to be a pretty good cook. I sautéed shrimp scampi. I filled crepes suzette. I spread two-layer heart-shaped cakes with chocolate frosting, the cake and the frosting both made from scratch. I made everything that way – buttermilk pancakes, French baguettes, banana cream…

Where I come from, the Mississippi River runs west. I know where it starts and have, in fact, walked right over that stream that trickles out of Lake Itasca in Minnesota, only to widen and grow in size and depth and sheer immensity. Of course…

One test of character is whether or not, if you’re asked about a book, you pretend to have read it if you’ve only read the review. Do you claim familiarity with Donna Tartt’s new sensation, “The Goldfinch,” or Harper Lee’s “To Kill a Mockingbird,” a…

It all started with a plastic folder. No, wait, it started with magazines. “Seventeen” was my first, with “Glamour” and “Mademoiselle” following close on its heels. My mom subscribed to dozens of magazines, so it’s no wonder I did, too. Each would arrive in the…

When I was in college, I began to hear voices in my head. Actually, it was entire conversations, with one voice saying something and then another one answering or changing the subject or making a joke or pointedly ignoring the first speaker. In psychiatry, this…

When our first child was due, my husband and I thought we had it all covered. We would bring everything we needed, from a polka-dot onesie for the baby to wear home to a pair of baggy sweatpants for her mother to do the same.…

Lately I’ve been noticing a term that really should have been put to rest years ago: the “stay-at-home mom.” Even the most enlightened magazines and newspapers are still using this dismal moniker to refer to a woman who has chosen to raise her children, at…

Many years ago, I had a brush with homelessness. I knew I had a home to return to, but sofa-diving for three weeks was pretty uncomfortable. My first graduate degree was finished, and my roommate had departed. Without Jane in the apartment, I couldn’t afford…

When my husband Bob and I went house hunting some years ago, I thought it might be nice to live in a ranch. Now, if by “ranch” you think I’m talking about two acres and a mule on the lone prairie, you’ve got your ranch…

I used to say that my Olympic sport was typing. I could type like the wind, whether on a typewriter or a computer keyboard, although any time I have to use a laptop, I plug in an emergency-backup Real Keyboard. Now that using a computer…

You know how it goes. At first, everything is wonderful and right, and after being together, you always feel like your best self, certain you must be glowing. This person you’ve found brings out the best in you, and you never want to let him…

I’ve been asked to write a poem. My husband is putting together a show, with songs by him and poems by me. He’s already got all the songs lined up, and all but a few of the poems. That’s because I let him have not…

I am not a big fan of scary movies. I am not a little fan, either. I don’t go to scary movies, and if a movie I’m at turns out to be – gotcha! – scary, I will leave, at least for the scary parts.…

Long ago (autumn, 1971) in a galaxy far, far away (Cedar Rapids), two eighteen-year-old girls spent their first few months of college drifting off to sleep each night with the same album on the turntable. The music was side B of the album “The Circle…

I love reading letters to the editor. Sometimes I agree, sometimes I disagree, but every time, I feel good that someone has taken it upon herself (or himself) to publicly voice an opinion. I used to do a lot writing to editors. I wrote to…

There it sat, a message in my in-box, supposedly from Capital One. It had the logo and everything, but I know how these scammers work. It was probably a phishing scheme, trying to get my card number and PIN. It said I’d earned enough miles…

At our house, we get three newspapers. This may seem a bit much, but each fills a niche that cries out to be filled. There is the local paper. You have to get the local paper. How else do you know about scandals on the…

There are very few announcements a mother expects when her son comes to visit, along with his long-time girlfriend, and declares – as they sit beaming together, side by side on the sofa – “We have some news.” There are some possibilities, among them: “We…

When I say I like old things, I don’t mean antiques. I mean things from my childhood, which took place during that time designers have so kindly labeled “mid-century.” The fact that it’s last century doesn’t bother me; any year from 1950 on sounds modern…