in sickness and in health

Sure health and wealth and party vibes are mostly what I love to remember when I think of my past three decades being married to this one. The pastel sunsets and dance floors, the brimming table with family laughing through the holidays and the nights of crazy merrymaking until we dropped, mostly documented with silly selfies and glam shots but nonetheless all seared into memory. Thanks to social media we can look like the rest of the shiny populous celebrating every coffee or salad in joyful glee. But the real test of this marriage, and I will say yours too, is how you creep through the hard stuff. Together we have buried all four of our parents. Mourned friends who passed too young. Lost our home. Lost jobs. Held our children as they shattered over breakups or disappointments. We have stood united. And fallen apart. Indeed we have for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, forged a solid bond.

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What I Never Really Understood About My Father

If you know me at all, you know that my father was not only a doctor of medicine, but a surgeon. I am the first to give this information out. Pride for sure directs this pronouncement, but also because the title was who he was to the world around me. His hands had that careful attention, that steady strength, a surety that I and his patients could rely on. His journey to achieve his professional status was a place of pride too. I grew up hearing stories of how his family all worked together to fund his college education, his long hours of study that earned him scholarships to medical school, his dedication to master his craft: all of it rolled into that one title added to his name, Doctor Donovan. There were odd days here or there when I’d accompany him on hospital rounds or visit him in his office at New York’s Columbia Presbyterian Hospital, but regardless of everything I thought I knew about what his professional responsibilities were, last Friday afternoon it struck me, I knew nothing.

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metal and stone

Gold and silver and diamond and citrine and peridot: metal and stone fashioned and finessed into beauty and charm that keep me grounded in ancestry and lift me up into the glittery now. These metal and stone pieces of art hold my attention. Remembering the hand that wore it first. Seeing the new place on a younger finger. Fidgeting with it on my own hand. Timeless pieces are powerful enough to send you far. They move you.


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