Happy Anniversary
It is April 6, the anniversary of Maya’s death in 1992, a day when my internal clock stopped. My daughter is dead. After more than two decades, I am still not used to that. I see Maya as a vibrant 19-year-old. But she would be turning 41 this October. Her grave lies...
How I Learned to Grieve – and Heal
Six months after Maya died, I was at a business meeting where a colleague shared her devastation over the death of her dog. All I could think was, “You can replace a dog but I can never replace Maya.” I ran from the room and barely made it back to my desk before I...
Finding Words
Talking about the death of my daughter detonates every parent’s worst fear. “That’s the ultimate loss,” they say. “I can’t even imagine it.” Telling people you are a bereaved parent is like telling them you have cancer. In the early years of grief, I felt like a...
How we Die
In the movies, relatives gather around for last words from their dying loved one. They lean in for that last pearl of wisdom or poignant plea for forgiveness. Real life is a little different. My sister Cathy bent over my father’s bedside and said, “Dad we all love...
Writing as Healing
After my daughter died, I knew I had been handed my writing assignment for the rest of my life. If I had been a painter, I would have painted Maya. If I had been a dancer, I would have danced my sorrow. But I was a writer. So I did the only thing I knew. I wrote one...
Pancakes
I made raspberry pancakes this morning in honor of my 92-year-old father. Dad has become a will o’ the wisp of himself, gasping for air, his cheeks and eyes sunken, barely able to sip water, drugged to the gills on morphine and Atavan. But when the nurse came in and...
In Praise of the Microchip
The New York Times blog “Well,” reports the improbable journey of a lost cat named Holly from Daytona Beach – where she ran away from her owner’s RV – back to her old neighborhood in West Palm Beach. She traveled 200 miles in two months. Holly was found about a mile...
A Child’s Wisdom
Here's the story of why I named this blog "That's the Way Life Lives." When Maya was five years old we moved to California. In Swimming with Maya, I recount the joys and difficulties of adjusting to life in the Sierra foothills outside of Nevada City. Just six weeks...
True Love
Scott Peck says in The Road Less Traveled that love is not a feeling. It’s an action. I show my love for the cats by the things I do each day, like cleaning the freakin’ litter boxes. Every morning, two littler boxes, very fragrant. Made pristine before I leave for...
Ten Quotes
My publisher asked me to identify ten quotes from Swimming with Maya for promotional blurbs. OK, I thought to myself, how hard can that be? But I delayed, blaming it on the demands of the holidays. Finally, on New Year’s Day, I sat down with a hardback copy of my book...
