My sister, my mom and me May 1949

My Mother’s Loving Legacy

Living in the Present Filled with Memories

Estimated reading time: 3 minutes, 40 seconds

As I was leaving Apartment 3B for my regular morning walk, I noticed the World Wildlife Fund calendar on the door. The peaceful image of a smiling Giant Panda calmed me as I prepared to head out. I glanced at September 2, 2024, just before turning off the light. This day is unique; it would have been my mother‘s 109th birthday. Balancing my hands full of recyclables, I walked down the hallway, lost in thought. It struck me that my mother had almost reached the remarkable age of 100 – a feat I had once hoped for her and me – ninety-eight years and nearly a half year more make up a rich, meaningful life.

My mother’s teachings have been invaluable, even though I have sometimes forgotten them or not credited her for them at crucial moments. My parents were actively involved in charitable activities, such as delivering food to the Rescue Mission, volunteering for the Council on Aging Meals on Wheels, and supporting the refuge house for abused spouses. Their selfless dedication to these causes left a profound impact on me. I often reflect on their influence, feeling grateful for the values they instilled in me. Unsurprisingly, I have dedicated my career to making the world a better place, a decision that is a testament to their enduring influence on my life.

Meeting Lilah-RaeMy mother endeared herself to friends and family with her gentle and sweet nature, reminiscent of a panda bear, and a charming Southern ladylike demeanor. While I’m not likely to be thought of in the same way, I carry the traits of both my parents within my DNA. I firmly believe in the equality of all individuals and the importance of mutual support. This belief, instilled in me by my mother, has fostered a sense of connection and value for others, making each feel integral and valued in our shared journey.

My mother had four grandsons—Kevin, Steve, Jon, and Mike—and one great-granddaughter, as well as my siblings, David and Becky. I vividly recall a particular moment captured in a photo when my mother, at the age of ninety-five, met Lilah-Rae for the first time. Frozen in Kodachrome, the image perfectly encapsulated the love and warmth that filled the room that day, a testament to the enduring bond of family that we all share and cherish. Unfortunately, neither my mother nor Jan lived to meet Wes and Jack.

Crossword PuzzleAs my mother’s eyes began to weaken with age, my wife, Jon, our oldest son, and I visited her. Occasionally, we would sit together and work on crossword puzzles, providing her with mental stimulation and companionship even when she could not read the clues or see the puzzle. It was a bittersweet reminder that life presents challenges. Still, we must always find ways to adapt and continue living to the fullest, empowering us to be resilient and face life’s challenges head-on.

I have developed a daily routine that involves solving the New York Times mini-crossword before heading out for my walk. This simple act is more than just a mental warm-up; it’s a way for me to connect with my mother’s love for puzzles and to keep her memory alive. It lets me kickstart my brain and prepare for the day ahead. It’s my way of staying mentally sharp and engaged, ensuring I approach each day with vigor and enthusiasm, just as my mother did.

As I ascend the long staircase to the train platform, I ponder my mother’s strength and perseverance. These are attributes I aim to embody, influenced by her example. After my dad‘s passing, my mother lived alone for twenty years and four months. When I last saw her two months before she passed away, she admitted that she thought about him every day. I couldn’t fathom missing someone for such a prolonged duration. Relying on old actuarial tables to predict life expectancy, I was sure Jan would outlive me.

Now, as I approach being a widow for three years, four months, and one day, I still bear the emotional wounds and scars from losing my wife. I wonder if I will find the strength to live alone for the next two decades as my mother did. Yet, each day, I strive to move forward, accepting and embracing the future as best as possible, carrying the hope and optimism that my mother’s example instilled in me, a beacon of light in the face of life’s challenges.

Love is a Magical Force!

Whenever I fall in love, I do so with all my heart and soul, leaving no room for half-steps. My love is unconditional and knows no boundaries. My wife knew and accepted me for who I am. Together, Jan and I created a legacy for ages to come.

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My sister, my mom and me May 1949

Birthdays and Holidays

Living in the Present Filled with Memories

Estimated reading time: 3 minutes, 40 seconds

Individuals born on specific holidays, such as July 4th or December 25th, often experience a sense of overshadowing, feeling as though the more significant holiday festivities diminish their birthday celebrations. In my early childhood years, I held a different perspective. I perceived my parents’ birthdays, on September 2nd and November 28th, as special holidays dedicated to honoring and celebrating them. I remember feeling a sense of pride and joy, knowing that everyone celebrated their birthdays. It’s fascinating how, during our formative years, dates, times, and calendars carry profound significance and shape our perceptions of events and celebrations.

As a child, my grandmother taught me to associate my parent’s birthdays with the nearest holiday so I would remember their birthdays, and this connection became deeply ingrained in me at a young age, around 6 or 7 years old. In 1957, I vividly remember studying the wall calendars, eagerly checking when significant dates would occur—that year, my birthday coincided with a Saturday. As I flipped through the calendar, I noticed that the red color denoting Labor Day and Thanksgiving matched the hue of my hair at the time. I excitedly informed my teacher that my parents must be so significant that they had national holidays. She explained that Labor Day falls on the first Monday and Thanksgiving on the fourth Thursday, with the actual date changing annually. Frustrated and embarrassed, I consulted the calendar, determined to prove my point.

With age, I have come to understand and appreciate the accuracy of my teacher’s perspective. Despite my parents’ birthdays aligning in some years with holidays, it’s clear now that the two hold distinct significance. It’s interesting to note that in 2024, my parents’ birthdays will once again coincide with the holidays. This journey of understanding the evolving importance of dates and holidays has been a reflective one, shaping my perceptions and experiences.

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My sister, my mom and me May 1949
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My sister, my mom and me May 1949
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The Book of Love: A Novel

Read: March 2024

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The Book of Love: A Novel

by Kelly Link

I started reading “The Book of Love: A Novel” by Kelly Link today. The book showcases her exceptional writing skills, where she channels different forms of love, including friendships, romance, and family ties, with her trademark compassion, wit, and literary prowess. Readers can expect to experience joy, a little terror, and an affirmation that love endures despite challenges.

The story revolves around Laura, Daniel, and Mo, who mysteriously vanished from their hometown in Lovesend, Massachusetts, and were presumed dead. However, almost a year later, they find themselves in a high school classroom with their unremarkable music teacher. The teacher seems to know why they disappeared and what brought them back. They agree to undertake magical tasks to reclaim their lives, allowing them to return to their families and friends, but they can’t reveal where they’ve been. The tasks would lead to winners and losers.

Their resurrection attracts the attention of other supernatural beings with their agendas, which puts the community in danger and chaos. As Laura, Daniel, and Mo try to piece their lives together, and Laura’s sister Susannah tries to make sense of what she remembers, they must solve the mystery of their deaths to prevent a looming disaster.

The story takes place in Lovesend, where readers will experience love and loss, laughter and dread, magic, karaoke, and some delicious pizza.

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Being Mortal

Read: August 2019

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Being Mortal

by Atul Gawande

Before departing for Toronto to celebrate our 44th Wedding Anniversary, I went through the e-library. Everything on my list that I wanted to read was not available except for this book. Being Mortal by Atul Gawande is the book I read on our vacation before Jan’s diagnosis of non-Hodgkins Large B cell Lymphoma.

Selecting Being Mortal might seem an accidental choice to some, and I believe it was a divine intervention. It prepared me to be a caregiver to my wife over the nineteen months of her fight with cancer. It helped me focus on the good life that my wife lived and not the pain and suffering.

Atul Gawande describes his book as “riveting, honest, and humane, Being Mortal shows that the ultimate goal is not a good death but a good life – all the way to the very end.”

When I read the book, I wondered what I could have done to help my mother in her final years. The book provides an excellent overview of how nursing homes and assisted living have not been able to meet the needs of the residents.

Dr. Gawande provides an extensive overview of the benefits of hospice. Although I knew of this option, reading this book helped me understand that I was ready for hospice when my wife came home for the last time.

He reminds us that “when it comes to the inescapable realities of aging and death, what medicine can do often runs counter to what it should.” As he writes in the book, the current system does not work and, in many cases, actually shortens life.

This book has had a lasting impact on my life. It allowed me to be a loving caregiver to my wife when she needed it more than anything else. I read it when it would be most beneficial to me.

I highly recommend this book.


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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An American Marriage

Read: September 2024

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An American Marriage

by Tayari Jones

Today, I started reading “An American Marriage” by Tayari Jones. It is a masterpiece of storytelling that delves into people’s souls as they confront the past and move forward into the future with hope and pain. The book, which has won numerous awards and was selected as one of The New York Times’ 100 Best Books of the 21st Century, is a must-read for any contemporary fiction enthusiast.

Newlyweds Celestial and Roy embody both the American Dream and the New South. He is a young executive, and she is an artist on the brink of an exciting career. But as they settle into their routines, they are ripped apart by circumstances neither could have imagined. Their story reflects the complexities of modern relationships and the impact of the criminal justice system on individuals and families.

Roy’s arrest and subsequent twelve-year sentence for a crime he didn’t commit shatters their world. Though fiercely independent, Celestial finds herself adrift, seeking solace in Andre, her childhood friend and the best man at their wedding. As Roy’s time in prison stretches on, she struggles to hold on to the love that has always been her anchor. When Roy’s conviction is finally overturned after five years, he returns to Atlanta, ready to pick up the pieces of their shattered life, a testament to their resilience and enduring love.

This stirring love story is a profoundly insightful look into the hearts and minds of three people who are at once bound and separated by forces beyond their control. “An American Marriage” is a masterpiece of storytelling—an intimate look deep into people’s souls who must reckon with the past while moving forward—with hope and pain—into the future.



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The Outrun: A Memoir

Read: October 2022

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The Outrun: A Memoir

by Amy Liptrot

The Outrun: A Memoir by Amy Liptrot is about her return to Orkney after more than a decade; she visits the Outrun on the sheep farm where she grew up. Approaching the land that was once home, memories of her childhood merge with the recent events that have set her on this journey. My current grief journey is not like Amy Liptrot‘s, but I learned from her struggles as we all need the support of family and friends.

Amy’s long walks, detailed description of bird watching, and life on a small island were very moving. I might have moved from one apartment to the adjacent one, but I learned from Amy’s journey and feel more confident facing life’s uncertainties.

I highly recommend this memoir.

The Goodreads summary provides an overview,

Amy was shaped by the cycle of the seasons, birth and death on the farm, and her father’s mental illness, which was as much a part of her childhood as the wild, carefree existence on Orkney. But as she grew up, she longed to leave this remote life. She moved to London and found herself in a hedonistic cycle. Unable to control her drinking, alcohol gradually took over. Now thirty, she finds herself washed up back home on Orkney, standing unstable at the cliff edge, trying to come to terms with what happened to her in London.

Spending early mornings swimming in the bracingly cold sea, the days tracking Orkney’s wildlife—puffins nesting on sea stacks, arctic terns swooping close enough to feel their wings—and nights searching the sky for the Merry Dancers, Amy slowly makes the journey toward recovery from addiction.

The Outrun is a beautiful, inspiring book about living on the edge, about the pull between island and city, and about the ability of the sea, the land, the wind, and the moon to restore life and renew hope.


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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The Brighter the Light

Read: June 2022

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The Brighter the Light

by Mary Ellen Taylor

The Brighter the Light by Mary Ellen Taylor was my eighty-ninth book since the beginning of 2019. After reading about Thomas Cromwell, I needed a change of pace. With the start of the Hurricane season, it seemed as good a time as any to read a novel by a fellow Southerner. That the book is also an “evocative dual-timeline novel detailing one woman’s journey to discover the hidden stories of her family’s seaside resort” seemed a perfect match.

I highly recommend this book. As a Southerner, I found the revealing of the hidden secrets accomplished in a style that makes this a page-turner.

The Goodreads summary provides an overview.

When a shipwreck surfaces, old secrets are sure to follow.

Or so goes the lore in Ivy Neale’s hometown of Nags Head, North Carolina. When Ivy inherits her family’s beachfront cottage upon her grandmother’s death, she knows returning to Nags Head means facing the best friend and the boyfriend who betrayed her years ago.

But then a winter gale uncovers the shipwreck of local legend—and Ivy soon begins to stumble across more skeletons in the closet than just her own. Amid the cottage’s clutter are clues from her grandmother’s past at the enchanting seaside resort her family once owned. One fateful summer in 1950, the arrival of a dazzling singer shook the staff and guests alike—and not everyone made it to fall.

As Ivy contends with broken relationships and a burgeoning romance in the present, the past threatens to sweep her away. But as she uncovers the strength of her grandmother and the women who came before her, she realizes she is like the legendary shipwreck: the sands may shift around her, but she has found her home here by the sea.


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Us Fools

Read: November 2024

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Us Fools: A Novel

by Nora Lange

Today, I embarked on the journey of Us Fools by Nora Lange. This poignant and personal American narrative is about two remarkable sisters who, against all odds, come of age during the Midwestern farm crisis of the 1980s. In her debut novel, Nora Lange has crafted a lively, ambitious, and heart-wrenching portrait of two unique sisters determined to persevere despite the harsh realities of capitalism and their circumstances. After a pivotal national election, this seemed like the perfect book to read.

Joanne and Bernadette Fareown, born and raised on a family farm in rural Illinois, are deeply impacted by their parents’ tumultuous relationship and mounting financial debt, haunted by the unsettling history of the women in their family. Left to fend for themselves, the sisters delve into Greek mythology, feminism, and Virginia Woolf. As they grapple with these trying circumstances, they must devise unique coping mechanisms and question the validity of the American Dream. At the same time, the rest of the nation disregards their struggling community.

Jo and Bernie’s imaginative efforts to escape their parents’ harsh realities ultimately fall short, prompting the family to relocate to Chicago. There, Joanne—free-spirited, reckless, and struggling to manage her inner turmoil—rebels in increasingly desperate ways. After undergoing her most significant breakdown yet, Jo goes into exile in Deadhorse, Alaska. Bernadette takes it upon herself to apply everything she has learned from her sister to rekindle a sense of hope in a failing world.

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