Dears, I had a nice conversation with a new friend last night. Although I’m out of conversing practice,  she asked a question for which I might have some answers. She mentioned that she would like to write a book, but was having trouble getting started. “How do you carve out the time,” she asked, “and…

Dears, There are two “things,” or human behaviors, I witness daily that are perplexing when considered in tandem. Heck, they are vexing when contemplated in solitary. Thing One: The obsessiveness with which we hold doors open for one other. Seriously. Everyone holds the door for the next person coming through. I see it, day in…

Dears, I’ve been thinking long and hard about landscape and identity. Perhaps these thoughts began on the day I was born in an Eastern sea to a Southern family. Any mention of the Philippines causes me to imagine an ocean breeze coming into my nursery at Clark Air Base and lulling me to sleep. The…