Build Me Up, Buttercup

(re-run) There’s a new Geico commercial for motorcycle insurance that starts out with the introduction to one of my favorite songs – Build Me Up, Buttercup. Of course, I have to sing along. Why do you . . . build me up, buttercup baby, just to let me down, and mess me around . .… Continue reading Build Me Up, Buttercup

The Burden of Being an Empath

Yesterday several TV stations reported the death of a six-year-old girl while on a free-fall ride built into a mine shaft in Glenwood Springs, Colorado.  She fell 110 feet to her death. There was no age or height restriction for the ride.  She was with her parents and older sibling.  Something went terribly wrong. My… Continue reading The Burden of Being an Empath

His Baby, She Wrote Him a Letter

(re-run) Holly moved from San Francisco to the East Bay and missed her old classmates. The smart kids and the popular kids had already established their cliques. She was an outsider. Holly had no close friends to share her excitement and concerns at Bishop O’Dowd High School, even though she was kind of cute, smart,… Continue reading His Baby, She Wrote Him a Letter

Mother-in-law and the Birth Control Device

Years ago, visiting my mother-in-law in Omaha with my husband and two (or three) kids, I faced a dilemma. What to do with my diaphragm as it air-dried after I washed it?  There was no discreet place to put it, since we all shared the same bathroom. Instead, I elected to put it up in… Continue reading Mother-in-law and the Birth Control Device

Waitresses Make the Best Tippers

(re-run) After moving to Omaha and teaching for a couple of years across the Missouri River in Council Bluffs, Iowa, I grew tired of driving a car that smelled like a mildewed basement. My poor Chevy Monza had suffered through a Nebraska flood back at the farmhouse, and the car stank. I couldn’t afford a… Continue reading Waitresses Make the Best Tippers

Abortion, High School Pregnancies and Memories

(re-run) It amazes me how one memory leads to the next and so on and so forth. Our brains are a beehive of memories, each one stashed in its own little honey-comb hexagon that doesn’t break out until something triggers it. Today it was talk of abortion and how a friend told of hers at… Continue reading Abortion, High School Pregnancies and Memories

Blind Date in a Castle

(re-run) Lynne was studying abroad at a university in Sweden. One of her friends convinced her plus another young woman to be blind dates. The friend’s boyfriend’s military school was hosting a fancy dinner and ball at a castle in Stockholm. The Swedish school was inviting guys from Denmark and Norway for the event, and… Continue reading Blind Date in a Castle