Going home for the holidays with your girlfriend may be scary but it doesn’t have to be stormy...
I am out with a friend at a Mexican restaurant one evening when the conversation turns to our mutual friend who is in a dysfunctional relationship and considering ending it. Between bites of chips, we discuss the ways it’s so completely obvious it’s over. By our second round of margaritas we are talking as if […]
A few weeks after 9/11 I was sitting at an outdoor mall watching some children running through a fountain, squealing with delight. Their laughter was so contagious that as time went on the adults sitting in the area began to smile too. I looked around and it occurred to me that this was the first […]
Several years ago, I was in the most toxic relationship I’ve ever been in. After a year of ups and downs (mostly downs), it was one relatively minor incident that pushed me to have the courage to leave for good. Toxic and I were having some landscaping done in the yard and she was overseeing […]
I used to blame my tendency to be drawn to women who were vaguely disinterested in me on my first love, a boy I met just before college. Before I knew I was a lesbian, he was my Dawson’s Creek boyfriend, innocently hanging out together one summer, dealing with the drama of dysfunctional families, not […]
I am standing on the shoreline of a lovely beach in Maui, carefully reading the signs (hoping to avoid a repeat of what was almost was my last vacation in a surfing accident). I read aloud, “Polarized sunglasses may help you see rocks and other obstacles in the water before entering.†Turning to my partner, […]
I am driving down the freeway during my lunch hour, leg propped up against the door, window down. It’s a beautiful afternoon. I should be having a coffee and walking along the beach, I think. I sigh, glancing over at my to do list for this hour: Target, Trader Joe’s, car wash. Glancing back at […]
It was running that taught me the best metaphors for hard times. Just put one foot in front of the other. Healing isn’t a steady upward trajectory. Last week, I stood in my backyard, hands on my hips, watching the steady demolition of my 80-year old garage. As the whole thing came down and eventually […]
It was a punch in the arm that caught me off guard enough to wake me up to the reality that I was in a toxic relationship with an emotional abuser. Life was an addictive cycle of highs and lows that ate away at my sense of who I am to the point that I […]
Years ago, scientists examined thousands of effective teachers to identify the factors that made them so successful. Researchers looked at education, age, income, socioeconomic status, family background, and many other factors. After countless hours of data collection, they found one single factor determined the success of a teacher. With-it-ness. That is, people who are aware […]
Hang on, it's going to be a wild ride!
Robin
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