Photo: Ella Haddix, first 18-year-old to register to vote in the US in 1971. Here she speaks to high school students in 2006 about the importance of the 26th amendment, giving them the right to vote. I came of age in the late 1960’s. I grew up with Republican parents, and until I was about sixteen, I believed the [...]

  Is life today significantly different for women than it was one hundred years ago? [Photo: my grandmother with her second husband in about 1940] My grandmother bore fourteen children with my grandfather, who was a railroad engineer, gone much of the time. Some of their children died, but over eighteen years, they created a houseful; sometimes twelve people were [...]

This blog is meant primarily for anyone who is feeling as deflated, disappointed and disheartened as I have felt for the couple of days since the US election. But you're welcome here, whoever you are. I was stunned that Trump was re-elected, but not surprised. I had hoped the US was ready for a stable, well-organized, intelligent, knowledgeable, compassionate, strong [...]

Here are reviews of some early-to-mid twentieth century historical fiction novels that I particularly liked. If you liked them, you may well like mine, A Wolff in the Family: A Novel, which spans the era from 1918 through 1958 in the western US. The Four Winds: A Novel  -  Kristin Hannah I liked this book especially because it gives such [...]

Sometimes I feel like my effort to be a good recycling and sorting citizen owns me. I have been recycling for about 53 years. My first foray was that I had to drive about 10 miles to drop off my small amount of single woman recycling maybe once a month. Fast forward to the last few months. We have no [...]

Assuming that you may not know what post-polio sequelae involves, I’ll tell you briefly, because fatigue is the primary aspect that nearly all polio survivors experience, even if they never had paralysis (which most polio patients did not). I have had a mostly paralyzed leg and fully paralyzed foot for 72 years, for my part. What happens with this syndrome [...]

I’ve just finished writing a novel. My editor and I have passed it back and forth, and I sent what I think and hope is my final version back to her this afternoon. Although it’s my third book, it’s my first work of fiction. It started as a nine-page essay, a summary of what I knew about my maternal grandfather. [...]

If you’ve read my memoir, you may recall that I had a conflicted relationship with my mother. (If you haven’t read it, it’s still available to order anywhere books are sold and at libraries.) But right now, I would like to share with you some better memories of my mother and some of what I feel she gave me in [...]