Close-up photo of a tumbling mass of white star jasmine flowers.

Stop and smell the jasmine

Lately my neighbors’ tumbling mass of super sweet jasmine stops me in my tracks on my morning coffeewalks and reminds me of a children’s story that made a big impression on Small Me: There’s a very poor old man living in a very small village. He’s so poor, he can only afford one very small […]

Vintage image of the outside of a factory with a scruffy lawn in foreground, with a caption saying "General Electric Buildings, River Works, Lynn, Mass."

When one door opens

On my mind this Monday morning, a story from my grandfather about the meaning of work: Grampa spent his career at GE back when that was a thing. He was an inventor with an insatiably restless mind. At one point, GE was building a huge new factory. Grampa was one of the earliest to move […]

My shadow stretching out very long on a patch of very green lawn

The Big Time

My college classmates group is all abuzz over the Cabinet confirmations of a couple of our alums, and it is triggering me right in the Shoulds, big time. Because that’s what it seems like so many of my classmates are: Big Time. Now, it’s a huge school, so I’m not implying I’m BFFs with these […]