Our year to break free

Are you stuck in a rut? Set in your ways? Afraid to take risks or try something new? The start of a new year is the perfect time to break free of our self-sabotaging beliefs and habits. My January column in Michigan Prime highlights several brave people who’ve taken the leap in midlife, plus I’ve provided […]

A light to warm our winter

This essay was originally published in The Daily Tribune on December 24, 1998, and is included in my book, Writing Home.   Over the centuries, Christmas has been reinvented and repackaged, promoted and pummeled, like the cookie dough we cut into festive shapes and decorate every year in December. Christmas is a mass of contradictions. The […]

October memories

Sorting through my mom’s papers after she died last month, I found a copy of this essay, which I wrote after my father’s passing in 1992. First published in the October 1998 edition of Mary Engelbreit’s Home Companion, it’s also included in my book, Writing Home. Lately I’ve been thinking of these lines from Anne Mary Lawler’s poem […]

After the flood

If your home suffered serious flood damage in Macomb, Oakland or Wayne County on August 11, you’ve probably spent the last half of your summer finishing basement repairs as well as finding safer ways to store your keepsakes. My new column in the October 5 issue of Michigan Prime chronicles what we lost and what we […]

Remembering my mother

Friends who attended my mother’s funeral on Tuesday asked if I would post a copy of the eulogy I wrote. In loving memory of Carlesta (Geisel) Gullion, the following was read at her memorial service on September 16, 2014. When you’re deep in the trenches of caring for a parent who’s battling advanced dementia, it gets […]

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