The recipe I am making for dinner calls for a garnish of thin apple slices. Hoping to find an apple, I search the refrigerator and bowl of fruit on the counter, but to no avail. I know the decorative slices of apple aren't necessary, but...
There is a book called The Carrot Seed that I remember reading to the girls when they were little. In the story, a little boy plants a single carrot seed. He is certain it will grow. With each turn of the page, the little boy’s mother...
In the wild, parrots thrive in large, social flocks. But for the 20 million birds who are kept in captivity, such as in people’s homes as pets, these social creatures often spend much of their day alone. Lonely parrots can be unhappy parrots, so some clever...
As I inched along in the drive-through coffee line, I counted 133 partially written blog entries in my drafts email folder. I was not happy to realize I had this many abandoned stories; musings started and left incomplete for one reason or another. In some, I couldn’t...
The picture of the house was taken at night. The moon cast a soft glow on its weathered facade. There was no light coming from within the house. The windows were dark. The blinds were tightly closed. The driveway and walkway were outlined with luminarias; small paper...
Imagine that a single life preserver is randomly dropped somewhere within the 139 million square miles of Earth’s oceans. And now imagine that somewhere, in one of those oceans, a single turtle is swimming underwater. The probability of that lone turtle sticking its head out of the...
Ella’s scowl deepened as she peered ahead at the traffic jam that threatened to make us late to school. “What bad luck,” she said, noticing that we were stuck in the slowest-moving lane. “Good luck? Bad luck? Who knows,” I replied. I offered a smile, secretly hoping Ella...
Our summer vacation was coming to an end. As we packed our suitcases in the hotel room in Kenya, I noticed Emma had tears running down her cheeks. I stopped what I was doing and walked toward her. “What’s bothering you, Emma?” I asked gently, kneeling...
There were 37 tabs open on my web browser. My computer was not happy about this. I knew this because a notification popped up, warning me that some of the webpages were using too much memory and suggesting that I close some tabs. I don't know...
The social media posts show children with smiling little faces who are headed back to school. In their hands, they hold boards with their age, grade, school and teacher’s name. Some signs include their favorite color or food or what they might want to be...