“The most basic of all human needs is the need to understand and to be understood.”  – Ralph Nichols “You’re not listening to me!” “Don’t you hear what I’m saying?” “You don’t understand me at all.” “You’re twisting my words.” “That’s not what I said.” “Stop putting words in my mouth!” Is there any human…

Do you have a place in your home where clutter seems to grow?  I do.  It’s my kitchen counter.  It’s like a petri dish for extraneous stuff.   Sometimes just an hour after cleaning, you can no longer even decipher the color of my countertops because they are so riddled with unopened mail, dead batteries, flashlights,…

One night over winter break, I was stressed and sore, so I decided to skip my usual workout and head for the hot tub at the gym instead.  Just as I settled into the bubbly heat, I heard someone say, “Can I ask you a question?” I glanced around the hot tub and saw only one…

“I wanna watch a movie,” Huckleberry Finn screamed at me yesterday, in exasperation.  “But I don’t have enough!” It was a snowy day, I was preparing lunch, we had been homebound all day, and I was losing my mind.  A movie sounded like a fabulous idea.  I was confused by Huck’s proclamation of not having…

I was scrolling through Facebook before bed a few nights ago when I got had a brilliant idea to look up an old friend I hadn’t heard much from recently.  Let’s call him Joe.  When I got to Joe’s page I was a little startled to see an icon next to his profile encouraging me…

The blaring strains of “Livin’ on a Prayer” racketed out of my phone at 5:07 a.m. today, startling me out of a deep sleep.  I shoved my poor snoring cocker spaniel out of the way to grab my phone, pushed a few wrong buttons, and then eventually heard a recorded message from the school district. …