I grew up going to church, I met my former husband at church, and I was always taught and always believed that love, including romantic love, should be unconditional. Or I thought I believed it.
Conditional Romantic Love?
A Humanitarian Wedding Feast in Turkey
A Turkish bride and groom opted to feed 4,000 Syrian refugees instead of holding a traditional wedding reception. Fethullah Üzümcüoğlu and Esra Polat weighed feeding their family and friends against feeding those […]
Freshman Parents and Letting Go
by Suzannah Gilman It seems like it wasn’t long ago when I’d pack my four children into my mommy-van, making sure everyone was buckled in, prepared for the shopping trip in which I […]
Playing Around
by Suzannah Gilman I’ve been playing around for so long. For years, really. I travel with my partner while he’s working, acting as his part-time assistant and full-time helpmate, but when he’s […]
Married People
I especially want to say to the people I know (and love!) who have lived decades wishing today would come– or not daring to wish that today would come, only wishing that something much less significant than today might come…
Sharing the Good News
When I heard that the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that our Constitution guarantees a right to same-sex marriage I couldn’t wait to text my gay daughter. I hoped to be the first […]
Will the Real Cheryl Strayed Please Stand Up?
I watched as Cheryl went from person to person like a hummingbird gathering nectar, engaging people as though she were truly interested in them– and I’m sure she was. She told me that she asked so many questions of her mother’s friends and house guests when she was young that her mother gave her a limit of how many questions she could ask each person. What were the types of questions she asked? “Who do you love? Why do you love them?” All questions of the interior life. Imagine a five year-old engaging you in such a conversation.
Lucky 13, Rita Bornstein
Alma mater, translated from Latin, means “foster mother.” My alma mater, Rollins College, was established on November 4, 1885. One hundred and five years later, the first female president was sworn in– as the […]
Nobody’s Perfect: Strong Women and Strong Drink
At a reception a couple of years ago, I had the good fortune to be introduced to Gloria Steinem. I held back tears of awe. (The tears were also borne of peri-menopausal hormones.) All […]
Self-styled Anti-hero Amanda Palmer
When I read this article by Rachel Edidin on Wired, I knew I had to share. In “The Art of Asking Why We Hate Amanda Palmer,” Edidin boils it right down: Amanda […]
The Gloria Sirens 