I recently received a text from one of my students, whom I helped with his dental school applications and, more recently, his residency applications. This is what he wrote: Good morning, Len! I hope everything has been well with you and your family, as well as your recent publication. I wanted to update you on…
Tag: Writing
The Quiet Language of Touch
I have a strong memory of spending a lot of time when I was a little girl snuggled up in bed next to my mother, her skin warm and her smell comforting. In that memory, my mother is always reading, and her arm is around me so that I am nestled next to her. I…
All Abroad: The Train’s A’Coming
The anniversary of my mother’s death is tomorrow. She’s been gone 26 years. I wrote this piece a while back, but I think it expresses some of my thoughts on my mother’s passing. I loved her very much and miss her every day. A train is a means of conveyance that moves on a track…
For Nico, on His Tenth Birthday
Today, my grandson Nico turns ten years old. As his grandma, I want to say a few things about this young man, who is so special to me. I don’t quite know how to express all the love I feel and am already certain that my attempt will not measure up to what’s in my…
Nothing Like a Good Binge
Sleep. I need eight hours of sleep a night. That’s usually fine—but when Ray and I stumble upon a compelling series, it’s much easier to forgo sleep than to exercise a little discipline and go to bed at 10:30 or 11 instead of 12:30 or 1. I tend to do better with a 10:30–6:30 (or…
Sharp Edges, Softened
This blog post was inspired by a college essay question one of my students was required to answer: Give a brief self-interview that will help us get to know you better. Reading the prompt, I realized it invited deep reflection, so I decided to answer the prompt myself. 1) You have clearly done quite a…
Outrunning Your Inner Critic, Twenty Minutes at a Time
Today is the first day of Story Circle Network’s 20 Minutes a Day Writing Challenge. This is a program that my daughter, Liz Beaty, SCN’s program director, and I, SCN’s educational coordinator, developed a few years ago, and we are proud to bring it back by popular demand. The concept is simple: Writing for 20…
A Wander Through the Rain and My Earlier Life
My feet are cold. I am wearing my trusty rubber boots because we got another big drippy rain today here in Ojai. However, I am now in my office, where there is heat and no rain. Why the cold feet? We all know that lack of good circulation is probably the answer. I have, after…
Until Life Turns a Corner
When I was nineteen, I transferred from the University of Texas to the University of Utah. My sister was getting a divorce that summer and asked if I would come out and be there in Salt Lake City with her and her kids. I was happy to do that since I knew she needed some…
A Mile in Someone Else’s Shoes
When I was growing up, I took piano lessons from Miss Virginia Baird. She lived in a brown-boarded two-story house on the corner of Main and 9th Streets, and she had at least thirty cats that lived in that great big house with her. Miss Virginia loved best to talk about what was happening in…
20 Minutes a Day 