I have a pretty good idea of what I would say matters to me. Family. My health. Work I care about. Time outside. Experiences. The projects I’ve chosen because I want to see what I can make of them. I could probably make the list without thinking very hard. Where Is Your Time Actually Going? … Read more
I spend a lot of time thinking about what comes next. There are trips Tom and I want to take, things we want to do to the house, work I want to do with Handcrafted Adventure and Four Robbins, and changes I’m making with my health. Some of those things have dates attached to them. … Read more
Looking back, August had a lot of unfinished things in it. The yard is still unfinished. Handcrafted Adventure is still something I’m figuring out. There are things I want that I don’t know exactly how to get yet, and things I’ve stopped wanting enough to keep giving them my time. Apparently I spent a good … Read more
Tom’s birthday was Saturday and mine was Sunday. Next year, I turn 60. I’ve known that, obviously. Birthdays aren’t exactly sneaky. But sometime recently I started thinking differently about the year between 59 and 60. I don’t want to arrive at 60 and realize I spent most of the year doing whatever was already in … Read more
We spend a lot of time thinking about what we want. Much less time thinking about what getting it will require—from us and from the people around us.
When we moved into this house last year, the back of the yard was basically a honeysuckle forest, a dense wall of green stretching across the hillside. We couldn’t even walk through it to get to the dogs if they wandered back there, and all that thick growth was ideal tick habitat. With two dogs … Read more
Some days it isn’t the big decisions that wear you out. It’s all the little ones. What’s for dinner? Should we go somewhere this weekend or stay home? Do I answer one more email or call it a day? None of those decisions are especially important. Yet by the end of the day, they can … Read more
Looking back, July felt like a month of doing things a little afraid, a little unprepared, and going anyway. We took our first Amtrak trip and weren’t sure how any of it would go.Tom sent a message to a band we’ve loved for years and didn’t expect anything back.I wrote about two of the hardest … Read more
It’s the last week of July. I just looked at the calendar and realized we’re four days from August. I seem to have this realization every year. Summer always feels longer when it’s ahead of you than when you’re living it. We’ve had a good summer. We took the train to Chicago, went to a … Read more
Last Tuesday wasn’t the day I planned. Work ran long. I came home tired. The workout I’d mapped out wasn’t going to happen. A few months ago I probably would have skipped it entirely. I’d tell myself I’d do it tomorrow instead. Instead I did a shorter version. And then something hit me. I don’t … Read more