There’s a reason why women don’t earn as much as men, and discrimination isn’t the cause.  It stems from a female’s cultural role as a caregiver. In fact, 81 percent of people who tend to a family member in the home are women. Unsurprisingly, most of them are mothers and

Our president, Donald Trump, is doing a great job of alienating most of the world.  Certainly, he earned us no goodwill when he refused to shake hands with  Angela Merkel, Chancellor of Germany, and, arguably, the real leader of the free world. Beyond insulting an ally, he p

When I was a child of five, one of the first books I read in school was about Dick, Jane and a dog named Spot.  They lived in a house with a picket fence on a sunny street with a mother and father named Mr. And Mrs. Little.  Dick, Jane, and Spot had many adventures and I lov

In the last two years of my political life, I served with 4 other women as a county commissioner.  I was the fiscal conservative in the bunch but shared their liberal persuasion for social concerns.  About money, I saw it as a fickle friend, not to be relied upon as the answ

Recently, my mother celebrated her 100th birthday.  I took her to lunch at a restaurant we’d frequented over the years.  The proprietor doesn’t open in the afternoons, but for us he did. To make the occasion festive, I brought a  balloon and birthday cards sent by my friends wh

A reader wrote to say she had some questions about Alice Munro’s short story, “Wenlock Edge,” and wondered if I had any insights.  Curious, I read the story then searched for reviewer’s remarks on the web.  I found few.  One commentator did point out that the tr

“Getting knocked down is one thing—being a coward is something else.” So says, Sally Field who knows a thing or two about getting knocked down. She won her first Academy Award for her performance in the film, Norma Rae, (1979) but it was a role for which she was not the studio�

Because I’m short, I have trouble finding slacks that don’t need to be altered.  The additional expense takes the fun out of finding an Eileen Fishers garment on sale. Frankly, when I shop for long pants, I look for a knitted band rather than a cuff at the end of the leg. A o

Some have argued the question of abortion rights should be left to the states as the U. S. Constitution contains no language that speaks directly to it.  The Constitution does speak to the right an individual has to pursue happiness, however, and fundamental to that right is the free

In the summer of 1947, I took a walking tour of Boulder Dam with my mother.  That’s when I met my first Texan, an encounter I never forgot.  Though it was hot, maybe 90 degrees, our guide for the afternoon paused above the dam’s large reservoir and asked us to look down.   “