THIS MORNING, AS I WALKED OUTSIDE in the unseasonably gentle weather, my breath was taken away by the sky. Dark, purplish blue clouds stretched across the dome of heaven in the north, south and west. In the east however, the low ridges of the clouds glowed a deep orange through the bare branches of the…
I’M AN IMPOSTOR. When people ask me how Mary Elizabeth is doing, I don’t really know who I am when I respond. Almost three years later I’m still trying to figure it out. Am I the cheerful and confident spouse, saying “Fine!” with a bright smile and a thumbs-up? Or am I the lugubrious,…
WHEN I WAS A BOY I spent every summer in the Adirondacks at a sleep-away camp on Lake George, not far from Ticoderoga, New York. It was a welcome respite from Manhattan in the summer, and was a much-needed break from life at home. One of the highlights of camp (and there were many) was…
Today I saw along with everybody else the news that Gabby Giffords resigned from congress to focus on her recovery from being shot in the head a year ago. In many ways, her recovery felt very familiar to us, which shouldn’t be too surprising since both Mary Elizabeth’s and Rep. Giffords’ cases involve recovering from…
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…
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…
Well, Mary Elizabeth finally had her surgery this afternoon. After all that delaying, it was pretty anticlimactic – just a relocation of the EVD, and an all-new haircut. After a lovely dinner last night with Peter, an old friend from high school who’s visiting London from Barcelona, I had a long, difficult day today. Getting back…
That title sounds like a philosophy course but perhaps I’m feeling philosophical because I had dinner tonight with Michael, who’s writing a paper right now on John Locke. At any rate, “knowing and not knowing ” pretty much sums up my life right now. It struck me today that each time I walk up the 200-year old steps…
Moved in Sundry Places 