Strasbourg straddles the border between France and Germany. I spent a long weekend there with my husband, in 2007. He lived there from the time he was 8 until his family up and moved to the States, when he was in high school. My favorite part of
Read more →I’ve spent only one day in Antibes, so I can’t fairly answer the question in my headline. Still I pose it, because the weather was volatile during my hours in Antibes. I wonder what it’d be like on a calmer day. The storminess has cast my memory
Read more →Ahead of daylight on a chilly October morning, we stirred, shuffled into a boulangerie for a petit déjeuner, and caught a tour bus from Paris to Normandy. I slumbered on the several-hour journey. When I woke, this was my view: A dream on a hill–otherwise called Mont-Saint
Read more →The most famous places in Paris–like Le Tour Eiffel and the Arc De Triomphe–are stunning. On any given street, there’s a line of uncommon beauty, too. Symmetrical bliss in design and layout. An eye-catcher in the distance. The city bears the scent of perfume, Vespa fumes and
Read more →I miss France. I’ve never lived there, I can barely scrape together enough French for a sensible sentence—let alone match the language’s dreamy lilt. I’ve only passed through on trips, mostly for pleasure, and once on the tail-end of a business trip. Not nearly as put-together as
Read more →I’ve known the month of September to be a wily foe. Perhaps her cunning is a mere protesting of the confusion that comes with bearing two seasons at once. Still, I haven’t liked her much. It was during her days that I lost my mom to breast cancer 26
Read more →It’s late June, a golden-blue day wrapped in soft, honeyed rustles hinting at untold promises and glories of the summer at hand. My small children are gliding into a friend’s home, their goodbye kisses and laughter floating through tousles of hair. The sparkles fade to dust, swallowed
Read more →My mom died of breast cancer when I was 15. At first, I missed the short-term comforts she brought. No more Chinese-takeout dinners on Friday. No more special trips to Canada or Florida. Soon I missed the lack of love and attention. I grew to believe there
Read more →Kara Tippetts, a wife and young mother, died recently. I didn’t know her. Like many, though, I feel as if I did–from the words she shared in her book, on her blog and in her radio interviews. Tippetts, 38, was a warrior. She lost a battle with
Read more →In the days after my brother’s suicide, my cousin asked me how often I found myself sighing. She said, “When I’m too tired to cry, I sigh. I sigh a lot.” After the exchange I noticed my own frequent sighs. According to one study, sighing serves as
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