A tale of smashed pumpkins transforms into a heartfelt reflection on resilience, gratitude, and the sometimes messy—but deeply human—journey of turning life’s disasters into something meaningful... even if it’s not perfect pie ..read more

My favorite description of Día de los Muertos is “like a joyful family reunion where some family members happen to have already passed on to Heaven”. In English it’s Day of the Dead, and it’s one of many examples of the blending of Mesoamerican (Aztec/Mayan)  ..read more

A couple of Tuesdays ago, I was standing at my standing desk like I always do nowadays on a workweek day, when I heard a shrill intermittent beeping from somewhere in the house. It was like every 5 seconds, a beep, not a full-on fire  ..read more

It was after 2 a.m. night before last, when Hubby’s and my phones started dinging. Imagine our joy upon seeing this missive from our 12-year-old daughter: You may ask, why the heck was our daughter awake at 2 a.m.? Right. Let’s address that one first: Did we ask her to go to bed earlier? Yes. Did she? No. Were Hubby and I sufficiently exhausted that we didn’t even try to argue and just went to bed ourselves? Yup. After all, it’s summer vacation, and she has no responsibilities this week, so, no point expending energy on bedtime enforcement. So here we are, 2 a.m. on a workweek, and there’s th ..read more

Here it is the end of May, and I’m again scrambling to get a post up. So I went back in time to see what I was up to 10 years ago. That’s when the kids were 3 and 4 years old, and I was immersed in clinical practice. The first May 2014 thing I read made me all emotional and weepy, in a good way, so I think it’s worthy of re-sharing: ******* A Mom Moment (Originally published May 6, 2014): I pulled into our driveway yesterday around six-thirty in the evening, though it was still light out. Nana had just dropped off the kids; they were out back with Hubby, chatting with a neighbor. I could see B ..read more

The afternoon of February 3rd, 2017, my cousin John Vincent Sciaba went for a winter hike on his own land, an eleven-acre expanse of dense Maine forest. He told his longtime girlfriend and soulmate Jen that he needed to clear his head. He packed a bag with some provisions, threw on a few light layers and sturdy boots, and headed out. That was the last time anyone saw him alive. John Vincent, thirty-four years old, had long preferred the woods to the town; animals to people; the outdoors to indoors, weather be damned. Even as a kid, he would camp out in my aunt and uncle’s backyard in the ..read more

It’s been a crazy time, people, absolutely crazy, and I’ll have to tell you all about it NEXT month. Just now I was digging back in my blog archives for something interesting I can upcycle so that March 2024 doesn’t go by without a post. I came across this insanity from March 2013, when I was on call covering our inpatients as well as the practice pager for the weekend, and it was a really hard call, and my kids were both toddlers, and my husband was traveling for work, and I lost my sh*t in a bad way. As I read the post, I felt so many things… But I’ll spare you my reflections and just go rig ..read more

The surgeons are waiting in the ambulance bay. An ambulance screeches to a halt in front of them. A paramedic jumps out, and breathlessly gives report: “Speedboat accident! Nineteen year old female. Lost vitals twice but BP’s holding in the low 80’s. Both arms amputated at the scene and right leg is holding on by a thread.”  Owen Hunt, tall redhead trauma doctor, asks: “Did you recover either of the arms?” The paramedic shakes his head. “No, they’re probably at the bottom of Puget sound. She was thrown from the boat and got pulled into the propeller.”  Hunt grunts. “Okay, get a centr ..read more

It happened so fast.   It was 5 pm and I was driving home from running errands. It’s January so it was already dark. I was stopped at a stoplight at a well-known 5-way intersection in my town. The walk signal was just ending and the light turned green.  Just then this kid on a motorized scooter came flying down the road and tried to cross the intersection diagonally. As in, not in the crosswalk, just right through the middle of the intersection.  He was of course wearing dark colors with nothing reflective. Meantime, the cars who had the green light had revved up and were accel ..read more

“Mom, it looks like it’s going to rain, we should not be going for a walk right now,” warned my twelve-year-old daughter.  “It’s done raining,” I reassured. “Let’s just go. Get some fresh air.” Neither she nor our thirteen-year-old son were really happy about it, but off we went.  It was Saturday of the long weekend, the whole family was home, and no one wanted to leave the house. Almost everyone had been some kind of sick. Hubby had come down with COVID mid-week, just days after his team’s last football game. Weirdly, this is exactly what happened in 2021. Back then, COVID infection ..read more