Tag: relationships


Paying the rent is just one way of taking care of your spouse

Paying the rent is just one way of taking care of your spouse

Much fuss was made over the January release of a Pew Research Center study showing women’s incomes had grown much faster than men’s from 1970 to 2007. Women increasingly have more education and make more money than their husbands, the headlines shouted. Can V-Day survive shifting roles? For some women who earn more than their husbands, more money means more…

What are you doing to be happier?

What are you doing to be happier?

If happiness is good for your health, what are you doing about it? Yesterday I blogged about new research that shows a connection between mental and physical health. Deborah Kotz at U.S. News and World Report blogged about the same topic — but took it much farther by interviewing Gretchen Rubin, a New Yorker who spent a year working on…

Party pointers from a hostess who learned later in life

Party pointers from a hostess who learned later in life

John and I like to host parties. In our dozen years together, we’ve hosted multi-course dinner parties, booze-fueled cocktail parties and backyard barbecue parties. John grew up with parents who threw parties so whether through nature or nurture, it comes naturally to him. Though my mom often had friends pop over for a beer, other than her 30th birthday, I…

Day 30: Giving thanks, social media style

Day 30: Giving thanks, social media style

Leading up to Thanksgiving, each day I will blog about what I’m doing to be more grateful. I invite you to join me in a Month of Thanksgiving, and to share your thoughts, observations, suggestions and ideas. Day 30: Tweeting about thankfulness and getting ideas from a blog Thanksgiving is this week and that means lots of other people are…

Day 29: Life's messy and that's OK

Day 29: Life's messy and that's OK

There are certain life events that seem to amplify our natural tendencies toward perfectionism — planning a wedding and hosting Thanksgiving dinner among them.
We pull out a Martha Stewart yard stick to measure our efforts and almost certainly fall short. In real life, most of us don’t have a staff of dozens invisibily helping and we won’t make five turkeys so we can photograph whichever one looks most perfectly golden, then Photoshop out any flaws.
In short, real life is messy.

Day 28: Giving thanks for my family

Day 28: Giving thanks for my family

Leading up to Thanksgiving, each day I will blog about what I’m doing to be more grateful. I invite you to join me in a Month of Thanksgiving, and to share your thoughts, observations, suggestions and ideas. Day 28: Giving thanks for my family The New York Times had an article earlier this week about breathtakingly bad behavior family members…

Day 22: Finding gratitude in grief

Day 22: Finding gratitude in grief

Leading up to Thanksgiving, each day I will blog about what I’m doing to be more grateful. I invite you to join me, and to share your thoughts, observations, suggestions and ideas. Day 22: Finding gratitude while we grieve It’s been a sad weekend for us. On Friday, we put down our 18-year-old cat, suffering from advanced heart disease.  Then…

Day 20: The value of giving and receiving praise directly

Day 20: The value of giving and receiving praise directly

Leading up to Thanksgiving, each day I will blog about what I’m doing to be more grateful. I invite you to join me, and to share your thoughts, observations, suggestions and ideas. Day 20: Why should you bother to say thank you to someone who’s made you grateful? All week I’ve been writing about not only feeling gratitude but expressing…

Day 18: Thank you for your thoughts on thank yous!

Day 18: Thank you for your thoughts on thank yous!

Leading up to Thanksgiving, each day I will blog about what I’m doing to be more grateful. I invite you to join me, and to share your thoughts, observations, suggestions and ideas. Day 18: Clearly my mother wasn’t the only one brainwashing kids about thank you notes I love when a post gets people talking! Your input makes the conversation…

Day 17: Pay it forward

Day 17: Pay it forward

Leading up to Thanksgiving, each day I will blog about what I’m doing to be more grateful. I invite you to join me, and to share your thoughts, observations, suggestions and ideas. Day 17: Give someone a gift that reminds you of your gratitude Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it. ~William…

Day 16: Saying thank you in writing

Day 16: Saying thank you in writing

My mom was the thank you note enforcer. Writing them was non negotiable.
When I graduated from high school, Mom took custody of my graduation presents. Only after I had written a thank you note could I get possession of each gift.
So I admit to having a strong bias but I believe in the power of the thank you note — especially of the hand written and mailed variety.

Your comments make this a real conversation. Keep 'em coming!

Your comments make this a real conversation. Keep 'em coming!

A few recent blog posts got conversations started, though most of the insights were shared elsewhere. I’m bringing some of it back here to make sure you get to enjoy input from other readers. My post on the dancing baby video and why adults should follow the little ones’ example drew some comments on WordPress, plus several more on Facebook.…

Lucy and Ricky beds might help your marriage

Lucy and Ricky beds might help your marriage

What do you think when you watch re-runs of old TV shows where married couples retire to a bedroom with two twin beds a very safe distance from one another? You might make a joke about how Lucy got pregnant with Ricky way over there — remember, it was a time when you couldn’t even say “pregnant” on TV —…

Is happiness catching? Two social scientists say yes.

Is happiness catching? Two social scientists say yes.

Keith Ferrazzi, author of Who’s Got Your Back and Never Eat Lunch Alone, recently tweeted: Over time, we will be within 10 % of income of our closest friends. Similar for weight, health. A story in this weekend’s New York Times magazine, headlined Is Happiness Catching?, went deeper than 140 characters on the influence of our friends. The story about…

Rob Pasick coaches leaders on finding balance

Rob Pasick coaches leaders on finding balance

I met Rob Pasick years ago, when I was business editor at the Ann Arbor News and he was an interesting local character — a psychologist and executive coach and who was working the media not about his day job but about his book “Conversations with My Old Dog.” We’ve stayed in touch off and on over the years, and…

John Hughes defined the middle-class teen experience

John Hughes defined the middle-class teen experience

Much has been written since Michael Jackson’s death about his huge influence on pop culture. Don’t get me wrong, I listened to Thriller on the cheap little turntable in my bedroom nonstop, but I think John Hughes got overshadowed because he had a heart attack while everyone was still fixated on the King of Pop. John Hughes transformed my teenage…