I’ve posted a few times about feeling like I was mourning the loss of the old Mary Elizabeth and our life before her stroke. It felt good to type it out loud, and was I’m sure therapeutic to acknowledge the loss. But it was of course confusing to grieve for somebody who was still very…
As some of you know, I was given up for adoption at birth. I always knew I was adopted and had constructed scenarios over the years about who my birth family was, and what the circumstances were that made them give me away. I never felt badly about being adopted, but the irony wasn’t lost…
Perspective can be a funny thing. Since Mary Elizabeth’s stroke in December 2009, I was focused first on her survival, then her recovery and now her adjustment to daily life. Every day, I looked for changes. Had she gotten better? Had she gotten worse? Was there a trend? In the last few weeks I’ve been…
Many years ago – long before I met Mary Elizabeth – I used to drive out west every summer and go camping in and around the mountains of Wyoming and Montana. I remember the first time I went to Wyoming’s Bighorn Mountains in 1986. Simon, David and I – along with all our gear –…
Hurricane Irene came barging into Long Island early on Sunday morning and while we’re safe and sound, there’s a lot of mayhem in her wake. We went to bed on Saturday night, the kids in our room in sleeping bags with flashlights at the ready – and drifted off to sleep with the news people…
As some of you may know, the planet earth passes through a meteor belt every August, giving rise to the Perseid meteor shower. The first time I saw it in 1981, I wasn’t expecting it. I was walking down 57th Street in Chicago’s Hyde Park on my way to a mid-August dinner party and saw…
Sorry, I guess I haven’t talked enough about change. I’m still thinking a lot about coping with change – particularly how Mary Elizabeth’s post-stroke capabilities have been hard for me to accept, but somehow seem to be easier for everybody else to adjust to. I’ve talked about the feelings of loss and mourning that I…
Some schools have great mottos. Yale’s “Lux et Veritas” and Harvard’s “Veritas” spring to mind. What could be better than Truth and Light? My high school’s motto, Labore et Virtue, was equally impressive. The University of Chicago, my alma mater, has a clunkier one: “Crescat Scientia Vita Excolatur” which trippingly translates into “Let knowledge grow…
Mary Elizabeth has a few big “To-Do’s” on her list and one is to go swimming. We usually go to the beach several times a summer, and have generous friends with pools who entertain us frequently. However, given Mary Elizabeth’s stability issues with walking, I’ve been hesitant to let her attempt swimming. It’s not so…
Several years ago, Mary Elizabeth used to write a newsletter column for the Nassau County Mothers of Twins Club, of which she was an active member before her stroke. The column was called, “When Does It Get Easier?” and included a few paragraphs on our own experiences with a particular aspect of raising our twins,…
Moved in Sundry Places 