Love Notes

Welcome to August in Love Note land.  You can rest assured that here, we are still in high summer mode - corduroy and chocolate brown be damned.  Fall will not appear on these proverbial pages until the thermometer drops significantly and the sun moves west in the late afternoon sky.    

Today we're going retro.  If you're reading this on your phone, the top of the header image actually says V O G U E (not O G U).  I couldn't figure out how to fix that, so let's just say my techy skills are going retro as well.

Come with me back a few decades, to when French Vogue was 500 francs.  Do you remember packing your beach tote with a stack of fabulous magazines, a few cold drinks (Tab, anyone?),  a bit of needlepoint and a good book?   I bet you can close your eyes and conjure the scent of Sea & Ski.  Or maybe you were a baby oil and tin foil reflector kind of girl?    READ MORE

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Autumn arrives with shorter days and brisker nights, and suddenly the comforts of home feel like treasures to be gathered close.   Perhaps it's our response to the return of a regular (perhaps even bustling) routine - following on the heels of August's dreamy la la land of seemingly endless daylight and loosened schedules.  Or maybe it's just our primordial call to bake.  Whatever the reason, fall seems to call us back to our nests.     Here are a few little indulgences to just sprinkle a little fall stardust into your world:  READ MORE

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Life can change in an instant.  The last few weeks reminded us to love a little harder and hug a little longer. 

Last Tuesday, at 2:30 am, a drunk driver hit a telephone pole near my house.  He and his passenger walked away miraculously unscathed.   And he left a large wake of debris for the road crew to clean up, as well as three downed power lines - plunging our neighborhood into total darkness.  I woke to a group text from a thoughtful neighbor summarizing the situation and the expected time of power restoration:  3:00-5:00 pm or possibly tomorrow.  READ MORE

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I stumbled upon this curious shell tree during a March beach walk in Boca Grande, and got to wondering about its architect ...  was he or she a he or she?  Young or old?  A local or a visitor like me? 

Several decades ago, while I stumbled along towards an unpreventable divorce, a therapist told me I was "a searcher".   Well I certainly was searching then -  for a way to mend this enormously sad situation I was facing.   But what else did she really mean?

I'm still searching for the answer.  READ MORE

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I am a book nerd.  I aspire to be even more of a one.  My reading goes in phases, and I am getting back into a good one.   Books do so many things - they make us put down our phones, transport us to nooks and crannies all over the globe, allow us to time travel, spark conversations with people whose opinions we value, help us question what we assumed we already knew, allow us to bear witness to the the struggles, decisions and triumphs of others.  Reading sparks curiosity.  Books make us grow.   READ MORE

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