what’s in a name (part 2)

So we’re back to the name game. Have you ever felt disconnected from your own name, as though it wasn’t really you? My problem initially stems from having a fairly common name. While living in Virginia, I discovered that not only were their five other women in my city who shared both my first and […]

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unveiling the mask

Below is a short essay I wrote more than eight years ago (on an even older experience), about the masks that we wear in our day-to-day lives, disguising us from each other and even from ourselves. I have found myself repeatedly challenged — with increasing frequency — to “speak my truth.” Such a simple directive […]

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the passing of a pontiff

When I read on Thursday afternoon (Pacific Time), that Pope John Paul II had received last rights, I was both saddened and relieved. This man had suffered through numerous and chronic health problems in recent years, and had spent the past month with a tracheotomy tube in his throat. For a man of humble origins […]

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drawing the line

When I graduated from college, I was part of an influx of new workers into an already depressed economy. Jobs were few and far between, and many of us took whatever we could get. My first couple of jobs after college were pretty dismal indeed. I was overly qualified and likely took these low-paying jobs […]

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what’s in a name (part 1)

This will likely be an ongoing topic here…. My mother recently was divorced from her second husband. What was surprising to us both was that she had to file a second set of papers petitioning the court for the right to use her own name (without her former husband’s name as a hyphenate). Let me […]

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IMAX censorship

When I first saw this article about some Southern theatres rejecting the IMAX movie “Volcanoes” based on concerns about evolution, I could feel a blog coming on. I wasn’t the only one, of course, and some friends beat me to it. Here’s the lowdown, from the CNN.com website: CHARLESTON, South Carolina (AP) — IMAX theaters […]

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death with dignity

I had been putting off writing on this topic. My mother’s sister has begun her own death walk, and while I am a firm supporter of and believer in the right to die, I am only just starting to sort through all of my feelings about facing death with such courage and grace. But the […]

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