Finding my Way Inside and Out

When Barry’s misdiagnosed broken hip and sudden, unexpected hip replacement surgery a month later plunged him into pain and complications, I fell into fear. Anxious thoughts imprisoned me: What if he doesn’t get better? How could I possibly live without him? Am I making the best choices to help him heal? Thoughts of our joyful…

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Love in the Lost and Found

In January, 2016, my 94-year-old mom, Ruby, fell in her bathroom in Tucson, Arizona. A blood clot traveled from her hip, still bruised and sore from two falls the previous week, to her brain, causing a massive stroke.  Minutes after the ambulance crew wheeled Mom into the hospital, my brother, John, who’d moved to Tucson…

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A Free-Roaming Cat Family and Me (Part 5)

My cat family lived contentedly outside. The only times we touched were when Mama Kitty cautiously rubbed her furry back against my leg. She trusted me to feed her and her offspring, now longer than she is, but not nearly so rolly polly. I guess she ate as often as she could get me to…

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Gates, Dreams, and Feral Chickens

Suddenly, I awoke from a dream: I look through my sheer living room curtains. Barry’s BMW and my Hyundai sit side by side in the darkened garage. The streetlight shining in front of our house illuminates a man between our cars walking toward our house. He doesn’t look threatening. I don’t know him. I’d recognize…

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A Free-Roaming Cat Family and Me (Part 4)

During frequent downpours in our rainy mountain valley, the cat family stayed dry. Mama Cat moved them from patio to under the house when they turned six weeks old. They were safer there, sleeping on top of boogie boards and ice chests and Barry’s and my cardboard boxes. I’m glad this is Mama Cat’s last…

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