Two little words can carry a wealth of promise. A promise of adventure, magic, nourishment of the soul, and, you know, margaritas. What are these two mystical words? “Girls’ trip.” I recently spent almost a week in the beautiful Cabo San Lucas area of Mexico’s Baja Peninsula with two dear friends I’ve known for four […]
vacation
Teaching an Old Dog New French
Earlier this year, I decided to learn some travel-related French. Or, as we Francophiles like to say, “Arrgghh.” As a youngster, I took Introductory French 6 times. I was an Air Force brat and every time we’d move to a new school, they would be teaching an introductory language class that year, and somehow all […]
I Drifted in a Hellcat for Research Purposes Only. Honest.
“Write what you know,” they say. Well, the protagonist in one of my WIPs (works-in-progress, and yes, plural, because doesn’t everyone work on multiple novels at the same time? No? Hmmm…) is a committed lone wolf caught up in a controversy he’s not interested in being caught up in. There are bad guys. Missing friends. […]
A Book-Lover’s Birthday in New York City
A few weeks ago, a dear friend of mine and I decided the sting of our March birthdays could be made more bearable by celebrating them in New York City. We were right. We’d originally decided to go because one of our favorite playwrights, Tom Stoppard (Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, Arcadia, Shakespeare in Love, […]
Touching Down in a Foreign Land (Flamingo International Airport, Bonaire)
To step onto land unfamiliar is to invoke a kind of magic. It’s a magic of expansion—of the mind, of the spirit, of the air in my lungs too long compressed by stillness. It’s a magic of discovery, of anticipation. It’s a magic of hope. As I step onto that land, I pause, feeling for […]
Small, Extraordinary, Everyday Moments in Bonaire
An island of fossilized coral sits surrounded by Caribbean waters about 50 miles off the Venezuelan coast. This island is home to 1,100 wild donkeys, 15,000-20,000 pink flamingoes, and 30,000 wild goats. And only 20,000 people. What this not-so-typical Caribbean island, Bonaire, lacks in glitzy nightlife and casinos, it makes up for with some of […]
