A Love Story about a Ring

by Saralee Perel

What is it about estate jewelry that captures us? I think part of it is the intimate connection we feel in having something touch our skin that has long ago touched someone else's.

We picture the slender ruby necklace resting on young sunburned freckled skin. We see the simple strand of elegant pearls on a youthful wrist that has yet to know much of life.

And the cameo brooch, so big, that laid against silvery silk on a grandmother's breast, as she attended her granddaughter's wedding, seizing one last celebration of life while wearing the dress she loved.

Shortly before our last anniversary, my husband Bob said, "Now that we've been married for over thirty years, it's time you had a diamond engagement ring."

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Drowning in Cookies

by Katie O'Sullivan

I've been drowning for the last few months.

It's not the cold blue waters of Nantucket Sound that are pulling me under, but the myriad waves of Girl Scout cookies that have been crashing through my living room and my life.

The title of "Cookie Mom" should never be taken lightly.

I shouldn't complain. I've been Cookie Mom for my daughter's Girl Scout troop before. For some reason, this year, I felt overwhelmed.

Hundreds of boxes of cookies have passed through my hands, my minivan, and my living room.

One thousand eight hundred and eight one boxes, to be exact. Their names and brightly colored packaging haunt my dreams.

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LENT: How to Give up Stuff and still be Really Happy

by Jonnie Garstka

When I was a kid, things were different. The air was fresher, pleasures were simpler and Lent was much, much harder to live through.

I'll give you the air. We lived seven miles from town and it was a small town at that. Country air is still cleaner, even now.

Pleasures, maybe I mean expectations, were easier to live up to. We would form clubs that would keep us busy all summer.

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No Woman Is an Island

by Jonnie Gartska

Business trips are not my idea of a fun time. In fact, they're right up there with liver on the list of things I can do without.

Last week, Paul went on a business trip. I stayed home with the kids and Jay Leno. For some reason, I can't seem to sleep when Paul is away.

It's not that I'm afraid – it's just that I develop an amazing awareness of everything that lives and breathes within a two-mile radius of my home.

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