As I walk through the few remaining rows of Christmas trees, I attempt to sort out my feelings. Growing up, there were hundreds of acres of trees. These few are all that remain. I should feel something, I tell myself. While a little part of me wants to cry, the emotion that’s bubbling up instead is joy.
Read MoreI can still picture it. We’re on a plane and I have the window seat. After hours over the Atlantic Ocean, the landscape that appears below is the prettiest shade of green. Of course it is. After all, it’s called the “Emerald Isle”. Our dream trip to Ireland is about to begin.
Except that it doesn’t.
Read MoreWhen my husband and I later visited the Big Apple in 2015, we spent over four hours at the World Trade Center 9-11 Memorial. Thinking back, I remembered my high school days and how I had seen the Empire State Building, the Statue of Liberty, and other New York landmarks.
But I couldn't remember the World Trade Center. I wondered, "How is that even possible?”
Read MoreEven though the tears have mostly dried up, at times the sadness envelops me and I feel that dull ache of emptiness. I often remember the mountaintop days of February 2020, and I’m astounded at how much I took for granted.
Read MoreFor most of our lives we think of family as a top-down arrangement. Parents and grandparents care for children. Grandparents advise parents. Older siblings watch out for younger ones.
But at some point along the way, this structure shifts and what feels like the natural order of things flips upside down. As our parents age, we begin to care for them.
Read MoreI wonder what good stuff I'm missing when I’m not paying attention.
During this unprecedented pandemic, we would all do well to pay attention to the good stuff. To put our devices and media and entertainments away and listen. To place productivity on pause and pray. To lay our anxieties and fears aside and practice mindfulness instead.
There is good stuff happening right now.
Read MoreAs empty-nesters, we’ve been forced to give up the lives we had grown accustomed to. Gone are the days of simple meals for two, lower grocery bills, quiet evenings, empty guest rooms and uncluttered hallways. We now run the dishwasher once or twice a day instead of every other, find an empty coffee pot by mid-morning, and have given up our “assigned” chairs at the dinner table. Our empty nests have been interrupted.
Read MoreToday, the 26th of March, was the day we would have boarded a plane for our dream vacation to Ireland and Scotland.
Obviously, that is not happening.
Just three weeks ago, our youngest daughter was studying abroad in Ireland and my husband and I were planning a grand trip to visit her. I busily mapped out our itinerary and made hotel and Airbnb reservations.
Then came the rumblings of a pandemic.
Read MoreWhether our days are too slow or too fast, too empty or too scary, the change has been sudden and shocking. And more than a little unsettling.
How do we adapt when the tempo of our lives has changed so drastically? When the mood has gone from happy and buoyant to melancholy and ominous?
I don’t have the answers.
But I have noticed in difficult times, people turn to music.
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