Dearest Neighbor, One of the number one stresses, concerns, and fears surrounding holidays and other celebratory events has to do with relationships. Think about all the jokes you’ve heard and possibly made about those crazy family get-togethers, the family tension, or worries about Who is going to say What. Some of the most common culprits of family rifts are miscommunication, … Read More
Ask Annah: Why Do Friendships Change After a Significant Loss?
“Friendships are discovered rather than made.” ~ Harriett Beecher Stowe Dear Journeyer, “Why do friendships change after a significant loss?” is a question and conversation I hear regularly from people of all ages and across all loss forms. If you have discovered that your relationships with friends or family feel strange or estranged since a Significant Life Loss Event entered … Read More
Re-Routering
Right now I’m feeling a great sense of relief and accomplishment! We’ve been having problems with our bandwidth usage for months now, with some device siphoning off our daily allowance. It’s an intermittent problem and one I haven’t been able to pinpoint the cause. Earlier this week I followed the advice of a quick Google search and reset my router. … Read More
50 Shades of Color
Happy Sunday, Journeyer! The clock in the lower right-hand corner of my computer screen says 10:04 p.m. I find it hard to fathom that eleven hours have passed in this day and even more difficult to comprehend that an entire week has come and gone! Blip… More daily work drama… BLEK! There are a few self-centered and childish people at … Read More
Field of Dreams
Journeyer, do you know that feeling you get when you are able to something that brings another person joy? The warmth that envelops you and the smile that practically makes your jaws ache? On Thursday, Warren and I were a part of something so simple, and yet, something so profound for another young couple. You know that rehabbed house … Read More
Paesanos
Yesterday, I spent a gloriously exhausting day at a TEDx event, where I met with many wonderfully new and exciting ideas and people. One speech brought together those two entities in the form of a single word: Paesano. Paesano, as he told us, literally translates to countrymen or villager, but the truest essence of what it represents is friend. Not … Read More
The Gift of Receiving
I find great joy in giving. And following my recent surgery, I acknowledged how great it felt when friends delivered food to my back door. But there was more to that story. An uncomfortable more that made me stop and access my behavior. The third bearer of gifts sat down at the table and chatted with me as I scarffed down … Read More
On Living in the Present
Two days ago I had an epiphany: I’ve been living in the past. And I had no clue because I had cloaked the behavior in a thick veil of distorted language. I was thinking about how relationships with my friends have changed in recent years. How we are all at different emotional, physical, and social stages in our lives. How … Read More