I have a question: is there anybody out there for whom 2020 is the year you dreamed of? Or planned for? Or, ok. . .just expected? I don’t mean to be silly or to rub your face in your disappointment, but I just want to establish that I am not the only one who is […]
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Relationships and Our Needs In this day of a global pandemic, many people of all ages, especially those who live alone, are faced with some of the experiences large numbers of older people have known for years. If we had a dozen single-word descriptors of aging and we took a poll of the […]
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A sweet woman named Lois lived across the street from us for about ten years. She and I used to take our afternoon walk together, going all the way to the end of our road where there was a closed gate. She taught me that you have to touch the gate or you can’t claim […]
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Two or three days ago I got a note from someone who had just finished reading Helping Yourself Grow Old. She wrote: “What you said about dealing with old age, works too in dealing with a pandemic.” Really? I guess I hadn’t thought of that. But it’s reasonable, because old age is definitely a pandemic. […]
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Two weeks ago everything was coming up roses for me and my new book. Though the existence of a new virus for which the world was ill-prepared had shown its ugly face in Seattle, I was getting on an airplane headed for the far side of the country, excited about every author’s dream—a book tour. […]
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People who have read Helping Yourself Grow Old are already asking if I am working on a sequel. The answer is that I can’t even think about another book, because I am too busy trying to make this one fly. But the other day I posted on facebook, feeling a little bold and saying so, […]
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So much has happened in the short time since I finished Helping Yourself Grow Old. I read the page proofs in defiance of my knowledge that it is nearly impossible for a writer to accurately proof-read her own work. (Our brains tend to see what we meant to say, missing little things like transposed letters.) […]
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“The mayors of Bethlehem and Wadi Foquin are traveling to Washington, D.C. to tell Congress how illegal Israeli settlement expansion impacts the daily life of Palestinians in their communities. You can help make sure their voices are heard! Contact your members of Congress and ask them to attend the Tuesday, November 14 Hill Briefing “Israeli Settlements, Bethlehem […]
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On October 19 on the evening newscast, NBC reported these words out of North Korea: “Negotiation is only possible if America’s nuclear weapons are also on the table.” Days later the words are still ringing in my ears, in spite of perpetual static on every other topic imaginable. I have heard over and over […]
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Donald Trump’s belligerent words in the United Nations have made plain our desperate need for a Department of Peace. For months Trump and Kim Jong-un have been exchanging taunts like school-yard bullies over North Korea’s testing of nuclear weapons. And now the president in his first appearance before the United Nations, has told the […]
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