Back in the 20s and 30s, when I was a tweenie, I grew up at a time when people tried to gain self-mastery by optimistic auto-suggestion. These were disciples of a French psychologist/pharmacist, Emile Coue, whose mantra was, “Every day, in every way, I am getting better and better.” They repeated this at the [...]
It’s no consolation to learn from The New York Times of a few weeks ago that tens of millions of baby boomers are having memory lapses, better known as senior moments These indicate the decline of the brain’s acuity. To give these boomer lapses an appropriate name, we might call them midlife lapses. I used [...]
I’m beginning to feel a little like a vintner, not a merchant rich with money but someone rich with decades of accumulated experience who can review them, study them, and draw out the best of the cache. And hopefully, with this treasure, see my way with some degree of equanimity towards the future. Hopefully this [...]
My mother who has been dead 30 years spanned two centuries, the 19th and the 20th. She was born in a small village northeast of Naples in 1895 and died in New York in 1978. Her descriptions of the Italian village, and of her relatives and neighbors who contributed to her growth, peopled my [...]
It’s odd that the word “retiree” now refers, not to me, but to baby boomers born in the decade after World War II. Boomers are beginning to retire, men at 63 and women at 62. As retirees, they certainly qualify to be called senior citizens
But what about me? I am nearly 20 years [...]
I am puzzled and shocked by your death. Your doctor has announced that an autopsy found that you had an enlarged heart and significant coronary artery disease.
But that condition is subject to medication and many people afflicted with it live into their 70s and 80s. As a young woman, I was told my heart was [...]
I read today that after the boffo success of “Sex and the City,” Hollywood is planning to capitalize on another mass of female viewers, whom I call the tweenies, girls who are 8, 9, l0, 11, and 12 year-olds. The moguls are starting to work on a series about a tweenie called Kit Kittridge. All [...]
Having just realized that most wristwatch ads set the time at l0:08 (more or less), Henry, my husband, wondered why that particular time. (AM or PM is never revealed.) I came up with the suggestion that perhaps l0:08 is indicated for design and balance. Both hands set on the left half or right half would [...]
I had been a constant reader of Jane E. Brody, the veteran personal health columnist for the New York Times, always finding her as solid and level-headed as could be desired in a health journalist. Then, for no reason at all, I stopped reading her. Perhaps it was all the newsletters that began popping up [...]
Chipped nails are in? This is the most astonishing bit of trivia reported yesterday in a 3/4 page piece in the NY Times. How far can today’s fashion go? You can polish your nails, then for fun, sit down and start chipping at the polish–and be truly fashionable! There’s a photo of a beauiful lady [...]
