The Postscript

I used to take pride in traveling light. I fit all my clothes and everything I needed in a small backpack or a carry-on suitcase and hit the road with little idea of where I was going. Then I met Peter.

We might be starting from scratch, but we’ve got a head start. We might be trying something new, but we get credit for time served.

The farmhouse is where I thought I’d grow old. I planted a lot of trees. I had a garden. I painted every wall, inside and out. I thought there was a strong likelihood I’d die in that house. Now I’ve put it up for sale.

I have no cowboy credentials. So, when Bob suggested I perform with a cowboy singer, I was more than skeptical—I thought it was a dumb idea.

The funeral home had been converted into an Airbnb. It was on our way—and suspiciously cheap.

A dog keeps us tethered in the here and now and reminds us that we are living in this moment—and that every moment in the future is imaginary.

More than once in my life, I’ve been accused of having a “Pollyanna attitude.” I didn’t actually know what this meant, except that it was not a good thing.

I don’t think I have envied many people many times in my life, but I very much wanted to whistle when I was six.

I thought things were going pretty well until I remembered the push-ups—and Bob.

I now realize that no one—not even the most popular person in high school—self-identifies as popular.

My heart hurt, reading this forty-year-old letter. I wondered if I wrote back. I hoped he was doing well.

My grandma’s wedding dress was more than a little worse for wear. It had been folded up in a small box and kept safe by my cousin, Jill. (How Jill ended up with it, I do not know.)

“Jonie, come downstairs!” Dad hollered. “I think there are bats in the birdhouse!” Mom came running and they carefully lifted the back off the birdhouse.

My parents are great planners so there was no chance they were out of coffee, but where they might be keeping it—that was another issue.

My first thought was, “I’ve never had my head vacuumed before.”

My teacher says I have a perfectly serviceable voice—and I am 100% sure she says this to all her students—but I still find it reassuring.

Ayo said, “Don’t burn yourself out. Give yourself permission to stop. Don’t use your head to break a coconut.”

The whole refrigerator had begun to resemble some archeological site with mysterious remnants of a past life that we could now only guess at.

Traveling in Norway with close relations -- sometimes a little too close.

On the joys of discovering unplanned personal growth.