Being the Change I Need

Estimated reading time: 7 minutes, 16 seconds

One Day At a Time,
I Am Becoming the
Best Version of Myself

During a dinner in Philadelphia, the night before the Flower Show, my good friend Hugo noticed a significant change in me. He remarked that over the past three years, since the loss of my wife, Jan, I had changed. Intrigued, I asked him to elaborate. Hugo explained that during the first year after Jan’s death, I would break down in tears at any mention of her. But he had noticed my improvement since then, as I appeared more relaxed and content. I agreed, acknowledging the progress I had made. Then, with the wisdom of an old man, I said, “We often seek positive change in times of loss. To make it happen, we must be willing to become the change we desire.”

During my conversation with Hugo, I shared how people often told me and other widows that our lives would become a “new normal” after losing our loved ones. However, life is a constant stream of ups and downs, with or without such a significant loss. Najwa Zebian‘s thoughts on change are very insightful in this regard, as change is an inevitable part of life, and we are constantly evolving and adapting to new situations.

Sitting at the restaurant table, I ask Hugo, “Should we split a dessert?” The waiter returns and, regretfully, informs us that the two options we were considering are no longer available. We settle on an alternate selection and continue our conversation.

After taking a sip of water, I cleared my throat and shared a personal insight. I explained that throughout my Life, I have always been someone who wears their heart on their sleeve. Stoicism is not a trait that defines me. If I were to hide my emotions, I would not be the same person I am today.

Being honest about my feelings is crucial to who I am and aspire to become. It allows me to connect with others more deeply, empathize with their experiences, and create meaningful relationships.

As Hugo and I waited eagerly for our dessert, the waiter returned with an apologetic smile. He regretfully informed us they had run out of dessert for the night. We couldn’t help but laugh at the absurdity of the situation. “Do they have bananas?” Despite our disappointment, we knew there was no point in getting upset over something as trivial as dessert. At that moment, I was reminded of a powerful quote by Najwa Zebian:

Life is about giving and taking. You cannot expect to give bad and receive good. You cannot expect to give hate and receive love. So, if you’re willing to see positive change in your life, you must be willing to be that change itself.”

Najwa Zebian

Have I Changed?

The morning of the Flower Show was chilly and crisp, but it didn’t deter me from waking up at 5:30 am with a sense of purpose. For the past 1042 days, I have walked every morning, no matter the weather, ever since my wife passed away. During my walk, I took the time to let my thoughts wander and reflect on the changes I have been through over the last few years. Without the distraction of music or podcasts, I could focus on my innermost thoughts and realize that I have changed and will continue to change.

As I approached the Liberty Bell, I suddenly realized that my friend Hugo’s observation was correct—my tears had become less frequent. Nowadays, when tears well up in my eyes, they are usually brought on by positive memories or unrelated matters.

I have documented my thoughts as an initial step to determine if I have genuinely transformed or am pretending to be myself. These thoughts are raw and unpolished, without any editing.

Throughout the past three years, I have developed daily walking, reading, and writing habits, which have kept me engaged and focused even when I felt like staying in bed all day. These habits have played a crucial role in helping me to overcome my grief and stay on course.

Before my wife passed away, she expressed concern that I would be alone for the rest of my life. Her words made me realize that I needed to expand my social circle and try to meet new people. Today, three years later, I have more friends than I did before, and I have become closer to people I knew before my wife’s death. They have been a great support system for me in my time of need.

I have also positively impacted my community through hard work, dedication, and financial contributions. One of my proudest achievements has been the creation of Jan’s Memorial Garden in Hanson Park. It’s a beautiful space that provides comfort and solace to visitors. As the Board Chair for Bridges, I am committed to supporting their mission to end homelessness. After leaving my job five months before my wife’s lymphoma diagnosis, I thought my days of actively working on causes I care about were over. However, I remained patient and open to new opportunities, eventually leading me to work with Hanson Park, Bridges, and other groups.

Attending Friday night services at Temple Sha’arey Shalom has been a surprising but rewarding experience. These services have done wonders for my faith and have provided me with a sense of renewal and peace. The spiritual leaders of the temple have challenged me to think in new ways, which has helped me to release the painful memories that once haunted me and embrace the tranquility of Shabbat.

Standing alongside others in mourning and sharing the names of those who need healing has been a humbling and rewarding experience. But what’s been particularly valuable to me is the Oneg, where I can connect with others, learn from them, and support them. All in all, attending these services has been an incredibly enriching and fulfilling experience for me.

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The Extinction of Irena Rey

Read: April 2024

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The Extinction of Irena Rey

by Jennifer Croft

I began reading “The Extinction of Irena Rey” by Jennifer Croft today. The novel is about eight translators searching for a world-famous author, Irena Rey, who has gone missing in a primeval Polish forest. The translators have come from eight different countries and share a deep admiration for Irena Rey. Their mission is to translate her masterpiece, “Gray Eminence,” but their task takes an unexpected turn when Irena disappears within days of their arrival.

The translators begin to investigate where Irena may have gone while continuing to work on her book. They explore the ancient wooded refuge, with its intoxicating slime molds and lichens, and study Irena’s exotic belongings and layered texts for clues. However, their search reveals secrets and deceptions that they are unprepared for. As they grow increasingly paranoid in this isolated and obsessive fever dream, the translators are forced to confront their differences, and their rivalries and desires threaten not only their work but also the fate of Irena Rey herself.

This debut novel is a brilliant exploration of art, celebrity, the natural world, and the power of language. It is a thought-provoking narrative blends humor and adventure, taking readers on an unforgettable journey with a small yet diverse cast of characters. These characters, shaken by the shocks of love, destruction, and creation, find themselves in one of Europe’s last great wildernesses, where the fate of their beloved author hangs in the balance.

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The Swimmers: A Novel

Read: October 2022

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The Swimmers: A Novel

by Julie Otsuka

The Swimmers: A Novel by Julie Otsuka is a novel about what happens to a group of obsessed recreational swimmers when a crack appears at the bottom of their local pool. This searing, intimate story of mothers and daughters—and the sorrows of implacable loss—is the most commanding and unforgettable work yet from a modern master. I highly recommend The Swimmers: A Novel by Julie Otsuka.

The novel was a page-turner from the first to the last page. It had been on my to-read list for months, and I am happy to start reading The Swimmers: A Novel by Julie Otsuka

Memory loss is a frightening situation for anyone. Ms. Otuska writes powerfully and eloquently about Alice’s loss of her memory. I felt as if it was one of my loved ones.

The Goodreads summary provides an overview,

The swimmers are unknown to one another except through their private routines (slow lane, medium lane, fast lane) and the solace each takes in their morning or afternoon laps. But when a crack appears at the bottom of the pool, they are cast out into an unforgiving world without comfort or relief.

One of these swimmers is Alice, who is slowly losing her memory. The pool was a final stand against the darkness of her encroaching dementia for Alice. Without the fellowship of other swimmers and the routine of her daily laps, she is plunged into dislocation and chaos, swept into memories of her childhood and the Japanese American incarceration camp where she spent the war. Alice’s estranged daughter, reentering her mother’s life too late, witnesses her stark and devastating decline.


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Read: September 2023

Normal Rules Don’t Apply: Stories

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Today, I commended reading Normal Rules Don’t Apply: Stories by Kate Atkinson, is a dazzling collection of eleven interconnected stories from the bestselling, award-winning author of Shrines of Gaiety and Life After Life, with everything that readers love about her novels—the inventiveness, the verbal felicity, the sharp observations on human nature, and the deeply satisfying emotional wallop.

Nothing is quite as it seems in this collection of eleven dazzling stories. We meet a queen who makes a bargain she cannot keep, a secretary who watches over the life she has just left, and a man who bets on a horse that may—or may not—have spoken to him. Everything that readers love about the novels of Kate Atkinson is here—the inventiveness, the verbal felicity, the sharp observations on human nature, and the deeply satisfying emotional wallop.

A startling and funny feast for the imagination, these stories conjure a multiverse of subtly connected worlds while illuminating the webs of chance and connection among us all.


The Jan Lilien Education Fund sponsors ongoing sustainability and environmental awareness programs. Gifts made this month; I will match dollar-for-dollar. All donations are tax-deductible.

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Flight: A Novel

Read: January 2023

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Flight: A Novel

by Lynn Steger Strong

Flight: A Novel by Lynn Steger Strong is a novel about family, ambition, precarity, art, and desire, forming a decisive next step from a brilliant chronicler of our time. The book has been on my to-read list for a few months. A New Yorker Best Books of 2022, it seemed like a good start on my 2023 Goodreads Reading challenge. Flight is the first book I read in 2023. Last year I read seventy-four books, and each helped me with my grief journey.

I recommend this novel as it is a page-turner highlighting the difficulty families experience after a loss. As a culture, we are experiencing declining social connections, including within families. Flight is an excellent effort to define the crisis.

Although several possible resolutions to the conflict became clear by the middle of the novel, Ms. Strong told the story so that until the end, it was unclear how or if it would be resolved. In addition, enough unresolved issues remained so that.

The Goodreads summary provides an overview,

It’s December twenty-second and siblings Henry, Kate, and Martin have converged with their spouses on Henry’s house in upstate New York. This is the first Christmas the siblings are without their mother, the first not at their mother’s Florida house. Over the course of the next three days, old resentments and instabilities arise as the siblings, with a gaggle of children afoot, attempt to perform familiar rituals, while also trying to decide what to do with their mother’s house, their sole inheritance. As tensions rise, the whole group is forced to come together unexpectedly when a local mother and daughter need help.

With the urgency and artfulness that cemented her previous novel Want as “a defining novel of our age” (Vulture), Strong once again turns her attention to the structural and systemic failings that are haunting Americans, but also to the ways in which family, friends, and strangers can support each other through the gaps


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Wild Houses: A Novel

Read: April 2024

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Wild Houses: A Novel

by Colin Barrett

Today, I started reading “Wild Houses: A Novel” by Colin Barrett and was impressed by the author’s ability to blend dark humor and intense emotions. Colin Barrett, the award-winning author of “Homesickness” and “Young Skins,” has crafted a debut novel that takes readers on a rollercoaster ride of crimes committed out of desperation, abandoned dreams, and small-town secrets that won’t stay hidden. The story is presented with a wry wit that adds to its appeal.

The story is set in the quaint town of Ballina, located in picturesque west Ireland, as it prepares for its biggest weekend of the year. The simmering feud between small-time dealer Cillian English and County Mayo’s fraternal enforcers, Gabe and Sketch Ferdia, spills over into violence and an ugly ultimatum, painting a vivid picture of the town’s underbelly.

The story’s protagonist, Dev, is a reclusive man unwillingly drawn into the Ferdias’ revenge fantasy when he answers the door and finds Doll, Cillian’s bruised, sullen teenage brother, in the clutches of Gabe and Sketch. With the help of his dead mother’s dog, Dev is jostled by his nefarious cousins and is struck by spinning lights as he is goaded into their plan.

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Wild Houses is a beautifully crafted and thrillingly told story of two outsiders striving to find themselves as their worlds collapse in chaos and violence. It is the long-anticipated debut novel from award-winning and critically acclaimed short story writer Colin Barrett.

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O Beautiful A Novel

Read: March 2023

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O Beautiful: A Novel

by Jung Yun

O Beautiful: A Novel by Jung Yun, the critically acclaimed author of Shelter, has written an unflinching portrayal of a woman trying to come to terms with the ghosts of her past and the tortured realities of a deeply divided America. With spare and graceful prose, O Beautiful presents an immersive portrait of a community rife with tensions, competing interests, and one woman’s attempts to reconcile her anger with her love of beautiful but troubled land. I highly recommend O Beautiful!

I finished reading O Beautiful on International Women’s Day. It might have been coincidental, but in my humble opinion, it was the perfect book to read on this important day. Ms. Yun has written a novel that touches on the intersectionality of the core issues of our divided land. The misogyny, the racism, and the impact of capitalism out of control are all related and are affecting the quality of life in the early twenty-first century.

Elinor Hanson, the protagonist, is so vividly written that she jumps off the page and becomes someone we know as a family member. When she returned home to write about the Bakken oil boom in North Dakota, I felt I had known her all my life. Unfortunately, the novel ended when she finally understood the issues and was in touch with her anger. I wish it would have continued so that the problems might have been addressed. Despite this, I highly recommend this novel.

O Beautiful is the twenty-first book I have read this year! My goal was twenty-three.

The Goodreads summary provides an overview,

Elinor Hanson, a forty-something former model, struggles to reinvent herself as a freelance writer when she receives an unexpected assignment. Her mentor from grad school offers her a chance to write for a prestigious magazine about the Bakken oil boom in North Dakota.

Elinor grew up near the Bakken, raised by an overbearing father and a distant Korean mother who met and married when he was stationed overseas. After decades from home, Elinor returns to a landscape she hardly recognizes, overrun by tens of thousands of newcomers.

Surrounded by roughnecks seeking their fortunes in oil and long-time residents worried about their changing community, Elinor experiences a profound sense of alienation and grief. She rages at the unrelenting male gaze, the locals who still see her as a foreigner, and the memories of her family’s estrangement after her mother decided to escape her unhappy marriage, leaving Elinor and her sister behind.

The longer she pursues this potentially career-altering assignment, the more her past intertwines with the story she’s trying to tell, revealing disturbing new realities that will forever change her and how she looks at the world.


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