What We Believe When We Are Fifty

A follow-up to my last post, in which we reflected on what we believed when we were six:


Now that I'm fifty, I realize I may still know more than my young adult children, but that the gap is quickly narrowing.

I believe that no one should ever try to run away from their problems, but that a temporary escape into a great book or movie can be a life-saver.

I've concluded that each time I watch the movie Groundhog Day, I learn as much about how to live one single day as Bill Murray did, while laughing twice as much as the first (or eighth) time.

I realize my parents didn't know everything, but they weren't too far off about much.

I may be fifty, but I still believe in magic.

I've learned that pets may interfere with my independence, my housekeeping, and my sanity, but that I still wouldn't want to live without them.

After studying old photos, I now know the tight perm and oversized glasses I wore in the eighties were not, in retrospect, such a good idea after all.

I've come to accept I may never again be a size six, but that being healthier and happier are still good and achievable goals.

I realize that I've sometimes succeeded and sometimes failed, but that the two weren't always mutually exclusive.

I know that yesterday lingers and tomorrow beckons. And I believe that what's important, today, is to make the most of them both.


What have you learned, at your age?

Notes of Interest

I went to lunch last week with two close high school friends with whom I hadn't spoken in twenty years. Inconceivable, wasn't it, that we'd go from being nearly inseparable, to sending Christmas cards, to... nothing?

Yet over our salads and sandwiches, the years melted away. One moment we were middle-aged near-strangers, and the next, we had managed to conjure up some semblance of what is was to be fifteen.

As we reminisced about our collective pasts and caught up with our current lives, my friend Sue reached for her purse.

"I put these aside to bring to our last class reunion, but I never made it there," she said. "So I figured I'd bring them along today." She pulled out a plastic baggie stuffed with paper and handed it to me.

I opened the baggie and began unfolding one of the pages. "Dear Susie Baby," it began. The writing, in faded purple ink, seemed familiar. I squinted at the page and glanced up at her.

"These are all the notes you wrote me in high school. Most of them during biology class in sophomore year," she said. "I saved them all, in a cookie jar."

"You're kidding."

She shrugged and smiled. "Every time I moved, I'd find them and think about tossing them, but I never did. I don't know why. But they're a hoot. You should take them home and read them."

And so I did.

I'd like to say she saved them for thirty-five years because I was a teenage prodigy and the words I wrote as a high school sophomore were already Pulitzer-worthy. They were, indeed, sometimes funny and heart-warming.

But what they contained wasn't some award-winning writing. What was meaningful about these words, scrawled during a single hour each day during a single school year, was that they provided a written snapshot: a clear image of one short but meaningful time in each of our lives.

What I read reminded me about events I'd fully forgotten. About our favorite catchphrases and favorite people. About the person my friend was at fifteen, and the person I was then, too.

My last words were written in June 1977. "Well, Big Baby, this is the last note I will ever write to you in biology class... I hope you have kept all my notes this year. It's a valuable collection!"

None of my high school scribblings would net a dime on Pawn Stars. But valuable? Ah, such a subjective term when it comes to pieces of our past.

Stashed away in my basement, amidst holiday decorations and cartons of books, are cardboard boxes filled with mementos. Among these are countless handwritten memories: postmarked envelopes with letters written in a long-gone aunt's cursive script. Handmade birthday cards from my sons, in a child's clumsy printing. And somewhere, for certain, contraband notes from old friends written during school days when we knew friendships to be far more important than any teacher's lectures.

Will today's generation still have the ability to capture this magic of their past, thirty or more years from now? Will they be able to scroll through old text messages and emails and Facebook posts from long-lost friends or deceased loved ones? If so, will those electronic words in some computer-generated sans-serif font still hold the same meaning?

I hope so.

The passing of years turns our memories into muddied images. But what remains behind in paper and ink enlightens the past in vivid detail, often more so than a photograph. It recaptures meaningful moments from the writer's point of view. It reminds us of who and what was once important to us, and often explains why we are whom we are today.

I might not still be that fifteen-year-old telling bad jokes, practicing even worse Spanish skills and plotting big plans for the weekend.

But thanks to my words, preserved by a friend for thirty-five years, I had one hell of a time getting reacquainted with her.


Do you still believe in paper and ink? When's the last time you sent snail mail? Who were you at fifteen?

Friends Indeed

Sometimes you have no idea where a road will lead you until you've been wandering it a while.

I had no real expectations when I began this blog over two years ago. I figured it to be a short-term device to keep my creative juices flowing while I took a break from writing a novel. Any actual readers, outside of obliging family members and a few close friends, would simply be an unexpected bonus.

What I never fathomed were the friends with whom I'd reconnect, nor the new ones I'd make, along the way.

Through this little internet writing gig, I've rekindled friendships with people I haven't seen in thirty years. And I've struck up electronic relationships with dozens of readers whom I've never met and likely never will encounter in person.

But the greatest phenomenon of all has been developing a community of fellow writers and bloggers. And eventually meeting some of them face-to-face.

Who'd have thought writers are real people? That the words appearing each day on my computer monitor were typed by hands I would one day shake? That the personal stories shared with me grew from the creative minds--and warm hearts--of people whose arms might eventually wrap around me in a mutual bear hug?

First, I met the fabulous Amanda. Except little did I know when I read her comment on another blog and followed it back to her own website, that I'd actually seen her around and said hello in passing because she worked in my own office building? (Seriously, what are the odds?)

Then, I spent a weekend this past June with Betsy. Including Betsy as part of my own writing community is either a clear understatement or a vast overstatement, since she is the queen. An award-winning author and kick-ass literary agent, her two books (especially the one with the warm and wonderful personal inscription) hold prominent places on my bookshelf. Her blog is the first I ever read--and it's still the best. So is she.

I met Bluzdude in August. He's originally from these parts, and if we'd known each other when we were teenagers, we surely would have been great friends then, too.

This past weekend, I traveled to Chicago for the biggest meet-up of all. Four of us--a group of women writers who met through Betsy's blog and have become fast friends in a circle of more than a dozen--spent the day together.

AmyG, Lyra, Teri and I talked for hours. We shared our thoughts about writing, about our day jobs, about our mothers and our children, about our successes and our struggles.

We discovered how different we are from each other, yet how very much alike. We talked. We listened. We nodded. We hugged.

If we'd had a full week to spend together instead of a single afternoon, I doubt the conversation would have ever run dry.

Some relationships, even ones forged through printed words on a computer monitor, end up meaning so much more.

I never dreamed, when I typed my first story on this blog in April 2009, that people like you might see it. That you'd find anything I said worth reading. That you might take the time to comment and then come back the next week, and the next.

Writing, so often, seems a solitary and lonely effort.

Until it's not.


Not going to bother with any trite questions here. Just two words: Thank you.

Miles on the Minivan

I stared at the blank page for twenty minutes. Little chance of any thoughts forming into articulate sentences, not with the pulsating music from the next room where Son #1 sat working on a new song.

He'd been at it for hours. Sigh. At least one of us was a writing wiz tonight.

He hasn't been a devoted musician all his life. He flirted with piano and guitar lessons when he was very young, but he soon grew tired of practicing and I grew tired of nagging. He abandoned the interest in music and moved on to other things, one after the other.

And so it goes with so many childhood activities.

Between my two sons, we dabbled in nearly every kind of lesson and organized activity on God's green and synthetic-floored earth. We tried music: piano, guitar, clarinet and choir. We played sport after sport: gymnastics, swimming, soccer, baseball, basketball, football, weightlifting and rowing. We ran through the endless gamut of school clubs, from Power of the Pen to Quizbowl. We gave art lessons a shot and took part in a dozen plays. We enrolled in weeks and weeks of summer camps, ranging from glass-blowing to horseback riding (which resulted in lots and lots of envy from their office-dwelling mother).

We exhausted every available creative, academic and athletic opportunity in which our children took a trifling interest--and exhausted the family minivan and its driver along the way. We filled our children's days with sidelines and structure, yet ensured they still found time to play with Legos, read Harry Potter and watch Star Wars.

We wanted them to learn the meaning of discipline and teamwork. We wanted them to exercise their body and their brains. We wanted them to grow up well-rounded.

But mostly we hoped, through their exploring the world around them, they would find something--that one special thing--that struck them straight in the heart. And we were compelled to help them discover it.

What if Beethoven never touched a piano? Or if Steve Jobs never sat down to a computer?

Even so, as we exposed our children to all these opportunities, we never knew what might stick for good. Who could really guess what might be a passing fancy, become a lifelong hobby or lead to a fruitful career?

It's difficult to categorize these two young adult sons of mine. At 20 and 22, they both have an interest in history and the Beatles (thank God). They each love a pick-up football game but enjoy an occasional theatrical production, as well. They did indeed grow up to be well-rounded.

But as far as that one special thing? That much is still proving to be a surprise.

My son who once far preferred making music to playing sports now rows in college; he talks of coaching. The son who spent most of his youth on the ballfield has recaptured a brief childhood interest in music and sits right now in the next room, perfecting a song on his keyboard.

Who knows where their lives will truly take them. Maybe further along these same tracks, or maybe down another. What's for certain is, if we'd labeled them and limited them early on, they wouldn't be enjoying the lives they have now.

And the beautiful strains of music from the next room tonight? Maybe not such a terrible distraction after all, for either of us.

Perhaps all those miles on that minivan, long since retired, were well worth it.



Did you follow your early childhood dreams or go another route? Are you raising the next Beethoven or Steve Jobs? Is your minivan worn out too?

Read 'Em and Reap

Books. Remember those? As the new TV season begins, I hope you are fitting in a few minutes to read a good book, too.

I'm curious about each of your reading experiences and your opinions about books. In my quest to learn more about my readers, to encourage reluctant commenters to finally chime in (it's painless, really), and to keep my local Barnes and Noble in business, I offer the following short quiz.

You'll be glad to know there are no right or wrong answers, and you won't be evaluated on being creative or witty. (Although wit and creativity aren't discouraged either.) Simply answer the following questions, and you may win a gift certificate for B&N in a random drawing.

1. What's the best book you've read in the past couple years?
2. What book didn't live up to its hype?
3. What book kept you awake at night (for any reason)?
4. What book have you read over the years again and again?
5. What writer (dead or alive) would you most like to have dinner and drinks with?
6. If you were a character in a novel, what would the genre be (romance, mystery, etc.)?
7. What's the next book on your reading list?

I will assign each comment a number and choose two winners in a random drawing, one for a $25 gift certificate and the second for a $10 certificate.

Note: If you post your comment as anonymous, you may have to click "Post Comment" a couple of times for it to publish (according to some commenters). BE SURE TO WRITE YOUR NAME (at least first name and last initial) at the bottom of your comment. If you continue to have difficulty posting, email me your answers at sherry @ sherrystanfa-stanley.com (no spaces) and I will post them for you.

The deadline is midnight, Wednesday, Sept. 28. I will post the winners here on Sept. 29.

Ready? Set? Go.

To Have and to Hold

Traditional wedding vows spell out what is expected of us in marriage: "To have and to hold, from this day forward, for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health, until death do us part."

Parenthood requires no such verbal agreement. Yet these same vows surely apply to having a child. Most of us who sign on acknowledge this, understanding this is one irrevocable deal.

The To Have part generally proves unpleasant, especially for the mother. We endure nine months of anxiety, emerging stretch marks and intrusive medical instruments. The incubation period culminates in a formidable event purported to be part of the cycle of life, but which seems to indicate God has a rather sick sense of humor.

But the To Hold component wipes the slate clean. As soon as we hold that infant in our arms, we've already--in our minds--ushered in the For Better part.

Oh, the For Better! It's the stuff parental dreams are made of. The first smile and first steps, the soccer goals and dance recitals, and that march across the stage for the happy hand-off of a diploma. We cling forever to the moments--and the memories--of the For Better.

Yet, in between, lurk those For Worse times. Lord, we struggle with those. The grocery store tantrums, the turmoil of that first broken heart, the wild arcs of teenage rebellion or withdrawal. Sure, we've been warned, but nothing truly prepares us for them. If we've ever considered backing out of the deal, it's during the For Worse.

And For Richer? Well, that's a misnomer. From the cost of diapers to college tuition, parenthood sucks us dry. Once children enter the picture, it's always, always For Poorer. We can only sigh at our pile of bills and write another damn check.

We welcome In Health with a different sort of sigh--one of relief and gratitude. As we look around and view children who are the victims of fatal genetic diseases, cancer or life-altering accidents, we reconsider the possibilities of what we once believed to be For Worse. Nothing puts our own In Sickness experiences--the middle-of-the-night ER visits and basketball injuries--more in perspective than a child with a brain tumor.

None of us chooses to dwell on the idea of Until Death Do Us Part. We can endure almost anything. Except that.

We strive to keep our unspoken vows to our children as they grow up. And even as they grow--or move--away.

We'd like to be by their side for everything they experience: for the agony and the ecstasy. But from that first slumber party to their first night in a new apartment eight hundred miles away, we realize we must allow them to inch away from our arms. To become self-assured, self-motivated and self-sufficient.

We take a forever-vow to Hold them, yet we can't hold our children in our grasp forever.

All we can do, ultimately, is hold them close in our heart.

And have them promise to call us, frequently. They can keep that one little vow, right?


Any trouble letting go? What's the For Better or the For Worse you've experienced?

Take a Sad Song and Make It Better

When I was a teenager, my life was defined by music and words. And these two forces culminated in a special sort of ecstasy every time I bought a new record album.

Each step of the ritual remains as engrained in my memory as the grooves in the now dusty and warped vinyl disks.

I cradled my new record between both hands. Gently placed it on the turntable. Dropped the needle. Rushed to sprawl across my twin bed in the room I shared with my older sister, and picked up the stiff cardboard album jacket.

Only then, once the music began, did I allow myself the magic of studying the album's back cover and--if I was particularly fortunate--the lyrics printed on the liner. A song never hits its mark, never fully transported me from my parochial world, until I read the lyrics.

My friends and I listened to all the popular rockers. My first concerts included Aerosmith and the Stones. We all had our favorite Party Music and later, our favorite Cruising Music, enjoyed on tape by the lucky few with an eight-track or cassette deck in their car.

But at fifteen, I envisioned myself a poet. And, especially when I was home--alone in my room--I gravitated toward the musical poets: the brooding deep-thinkers, the songwriters who wrote of soul-searching, lost love and loneliness.

Not that I personally knew much of those emotions, except a bit of youthful discontent and rebellion. I'd been enveloped within a safe harbor, with loving parents and a secure neighborhood. I was never sexually abused nor truly socially maligned. The worst horror I'd experienced was the betrayal of a teenage boyfriend.

So what drew me to these types of songs? Did I simply want to open my arms to the shower of all human emotions? Was I under the power of hormonal overdrive? Was I suppressing a buried sadness I wasn't willing to acknowledge or admit?

Even at those occasional moments in which I did feel burdened by some teenage angst or weepiness, I immersed myself in it. I listened to my old favorites: The Beatles, Bob Dylan or Neil Young. I'd hear Cat Stevens' Father and Son, and know my feelings were universal. Or read the lyrics to The Needle and the Damage Done, hug myself and hold out hope that my life would end less tragically. I'd drop the needle on the stereo a second time, a third.

I'd listen and sing along, until feeling worse somehow made me feel better.

Later, I'd find myself writing my own poetry. I configured pieces of my emotions into rough words I might decide to submit to my high school paper, but more often than not would just hide in a notebook under my mattress.

I haven't written a poem in thirty years. My writing has changed, as have my reading tastes. Yet nothing still touches me more than a melancholy melody or an introspective tune.

Oh, how I still love a sad song.

It's not the same now, of course. I seldom buy a CD. When I do, I don't sprawl across my bed, pull out the paper insert and attempt to memorize every tiny printed word.

If songs still came embedded in scratchy 33 1/3 rpm disks, with full-size graphics and lyrics, I wonder how music might affect me now. Would it still encourage me to dig deeper within myself? To try to connect with others through their musical words? To live fully--for a few moments--within someone else's soul-searching short story?

Or do we view the world in a whole different way when we're young?

All I know is I never felt so sad, so often, as when I listened to music at fifteen.

Man, did it make me happy.


What kind of music moves you? Does a sad song make you better? Do you still hoard all that vinyl, inside dusty boxes in your basement?

To Be or Not to Be--Guest Post by Gloria Stanfa

After my month-long hiatus, I'll be back on the blog-wagon next week. Meanwhile, I'm pleased to share a guest post by none other than Gloria Stanfa, AKA my mother. (Her first-ever attempt at writing something like this. Don't hate her for being naturally talented.)


I had an interesting daydream the other day, nothing mind-bending but it was thought-provoking. Come along with me as I share my would've, should've, could've world!

What do I wish I did in my life? Had the big wedding? No, not particularly. Got a degree at The University of Toledo where I was employed? No, my few credits and our girls graduating is sufficient. Learned to swim? A small maybe. Lost at least 20 pounds? Yes, still!

I was a loved, overprotected only child, who in grade school wrote stories, poems, and took art classes at the museum. In high school I majored in art and was in the drama club, appearing in one-act plays. In our junior play, Men Are Like Streetcars, I waltzed across the stage with an imaginary partner as the curtain opened. I was hooked!

Several years later as a young mother of three girls ages 6, 5 and 3, we made our way into a local production of Gypsy as walkons, with my oldest daughter Lori getting the role of Baby June. Naturally, our daughters discovered their own niches as time passed.

Their mom dabbled in a couple local art classes for fun and one for college credit with Sherry. I took creative writing at UT and yoga classes with DC.

Ah yes, the belly dancing lessons.

After one home demonstration, my husband Denny asked me, "What was that?" My response: "It was a hip roll."

He replied with our Stanfa sarcasm, "Oh, I thought you were having a seizure."

Not long after, Sherry, my friend Barb and I took acting at the Toledo Rep from a wonderful actress/instructor. I found it more intriguing than my oil painting or writing. Our acting teacher saw potential in me, complimented what I did and said I'd be a great Auntie Mame (the famous Rosalind Russell role).

Life and perhaps a lack of confidence in remembering some lines led me away.

Several years flew by and sadly Denny passed on, yet four wonderful grandchildren entered my life. I enjoyed delightful travels and times with family and friends. I wrote several eulogies and poems, but my daughters are the writers and story-tellers now.

Eventually, Sherry and her two boys (then in grade school) and I took acting classes one summer. Wow, I was still smitten!

I've seen many singers, such as Elton, Tony, Rod, Paul, Jimmy Buffet, even Frank back in his day! But the plays and stage productions are where my heart lies. The Phantom in London, Cats in Toronto, Mama Mia in Vegas, The Producers in New York (even Gypsy for my 70th in NYC) were some of my big ones. Florida, Michigan and Ohio have also given me great productions. Our local playhouses are to be remembered as well. In fact, we just saw Denny's cousin, Martin Boyer, locally in Bye Bye Birdie.

Would've, could've, should've... I still have the acting bug in my heart. Does this one dream that stands out above the others make me feel sad after all these years?

No. I'm smiling as I write this, and I feel quite confident and content.

I see the audience through the bright lights, as I walk out slowly and dramatically, entering stage right. I clearly look it, I feel it, I own it and I don't forget one line!

I am Auntie Mame, just as I always knew I could be.

Any dreams you still ponder or wish to fulfill? Any regrets of doing or not doing so? Better yet, in line with my theatrical thoughts, who do you think could play you--or whom would you like to portray--in a stage production or movie?

Superheroes in the Waiting Room

So Blogger.com ate my May 12 post the same day I published it. (I won't take it personally, since writers everywhere experienced the same fate.) I've been out of town at the FABULOUS Midwest Writers Workshop Retreat and couldn't deal with it before now.

It has miraculously reappeared in my draft folder, but the handful of reader comments made before it disappeared are gone for good...

Shall we try this again? New--and old--comments are welcome!

Superheroes in the Waiting Room

As they spill through the doctor's office door, every head in the waiting room turns. We crane our necks from the TV and peek over our outdated issues of Good Housekeeping. Those here for our weekly or biweekly allergy injections have learned to expect this procession. Yet we still can't keep our eyes off them: the five blond little girls, all under the age of eight.

We divide our attention for the next half-hour or so between each of them and the mother who every week single-handedly accompanies, corrals and cares for them. We're mesmerized.

Large families weren't once such an aberration. Two of my dad's uncles each had ten children. And even in the sixties and seventies, most of my Catholic school classmates hailed from families of six or seven siblings. My family fell in the minority: I was the last of just three (much to the relief of many of our teachers and our principal, Sister Mary Sadistic).

Whether due to the expense or the physical and mental exhaustion of raising a large litter, even Good Catholic parents gradually caved to the accessibility of reliable birth control. That's not to say big families are fully extinct. The omnipresent media reminds us of the extreme examples, such as Octomom and the Duggar family (population currently 21). The public seems to view those as freakshows. And perhaps some parents do procreate in great quantities for questionable reasons.

Yet isn't it possible some people want a large family simply because they love children? Because they welcome the joys and feel fairly equipped (no parent possesses total confidence) to accept the challenges? I recall a family from my two sons' grade school: eight stair-step children, all who seemed to thrive and excel, whose parents somehow found the time and energy to be engaged in their schooling, their sports and their scout troops--and still keep their sanity.

What does it take to successfully raise a big brood like this? Time management skills? Fortitude? Damn good luck?

The doctor's office buzzes with the sound and activity of the five little girls. Their mother simultaneously assists one with a hand-held DVD player, oversees the oldest's homework, reads a picture book to another and breaks up a squabble between the other two.

The waiting room crowd watches, all eyes riveted. We steal a smile at each other as one two-year-old twin climbs over the back of a chair and the other twin drops her drawers in the middle of the room.

A few of us seem to be awaiting the train wreck: the final crash and explosion. But while the train occasionally coughs and sputters, rocks and shakes, and maneuvers its way over a stretch of rough tracks, no train wreck is in sight. Because this appears to be one well-oiled machine.

We're not witness, of course, to the daily challenges that may erupt from the time their parents get them all dressed each morning until they finally fall asleep each night. But having to haul five young children to a doctor's office each and every week? This must surely rate among the greatest potential nightmares any parent can imagine.

One of the twins wanders across the room to admire a newborn in his carseat. Her mother drops the other toddler from her lap and rushes over, to intercept any unacceptable interaction.

"Sorry," she says in apology to the newborn's mother.

"No problem," the other mother replies. "She's just curious. All of your girls are so well-behaved. They seem so happy. And you're great with them."

The rest of the women in the room nod our heads and murmur, "Yes, they are. Yes, you are. Yes, we're amazed."

She thanks us and sighs. "It's not always easy. But sometimes it's really great. Five is enough though. These youngest two will definitely be our last."

At those words, every smile in our group fades.

When someone appears so successful at something--whether it's making music, running a business or raising children--we tend to hope they'll never stop. One mere mortal becomes our personal superhero. We don't ever want to see them give up their gig, especially when we know few people would be willing or able to put on the cape and take the job.

Superhero capes, especially in the world of parenting, aren't one-size-fits-all.

Not every mother or father is equipped to oversee Metropolis. Most of us peer down at our tiny kingdom of one or two, occasionally don a mask and just hope for the best.

Yet whether we're the parent of one or of ten, we devote a lifetime of love and attention and energy to that responsibility. No matter the size of our own kingdom, surely our own role is equally important--and something to be admired.

And that makes every one of us a superhero.


Any of your own large family experiences to share, as either child or parent? What superhero powers does parenting require? Do you ever get a whiff of baby powder, sigh and wonder 'what if'?

Playing Truth or Dare

Our favorite game in junior high was Truth or Dare.

Nearly everyone at my Catholic school picked the Dare, even when playing the game in our most reckless venue of all--weekly Mass. (Years later, I've come to hope God possesses a good sense of humor. And a short memory.)

We believed choosing the Dare proved our confidence and our courage, two attributes that play heavily in a thirteen-year-old's popularity.

Even then though, I knew the Dare was the safer choice. Answering a difficult personal question with honesty? This required true bravery. At thirteen, we're far too guarded and insecure to open ourselves up to that transparency, vulnerability or potential peer disapproval. It's a self-defense mechanism which becomes even more ingrained as we grow older.

Hiding from the Truth is a game we play much of our lives.

When we confront difficult personal issues, we tend to evade. We conceal. We occasionally outright lie. Sometimes we're not honest with someone else. Sometimes we're not honest with ourselves. Denying certain Truths, especially troublesome ones, is always easier than acknowledging them.

On a night out a few years ago with a group of girlfriends, someone suggested a grown-up game of Truth or Dare. We quickly dismissed the option of Dare. What are we, kids? No, we most certainly are not. We laughed. Just as friends don't let friends drive drunk, middle-aged friends don't let middle-aged friends run outdoors in their skivvies.

The rules were simple: Each woman in the group would ask one question, and everyone had to answer. We agreed the questions should be thought-provoking yet benign. After all, we were out that night to relieve our stress, not to magnify it.

Choice of plastic surgery? Nose, boobs and all the usual suspects.

Biggest fear? We toyed with the common themes of flying, of tornadoes, of heights. But every one of us with children eventually gave the same answer.

Number of men with whom you've slept? Ah, maybe not such a benign query, this one! Of all the questions, it caused the most consternation and cringing. We tried to veil our surprise at the woman who answered "just one" as well as the woman who said she'd long ago lost count.

Then we came to my--seemingly mild--question:

If you could succeed at being anything in life (actual talent not a factor), what would you be?

We nodded and smiled at the responses: Broadway actress, singer/songwriter, president of the United States. We turned to the last friend in the circle, awaiting her answer.

"My dreams aren't as exciting as all of yours." She hesitated. "Because honestly, if I could choose to be anything, I'd still choose to be a housewife." She looked away, then added in a near whisper, "But I would want to be a happy one."

The table fell silent. None of us would ever have guessed her wish. Because most of us had no knowledge of her reality.

We weren't able to provide a solution to her situation. What we offered her that night was a roundtable of empathy and sympathy, and a bit of friendship-inspired therapy.

I can't be sure she's found peace even now, but just maybe she feels less burdened and less alone in facing the Truth. Maybe she's succeeded at the first crucial step which will allow her to face the next step, whatever that might be.

Truth or Dare is a tough game at any age.

But by daring ourselves to acknowledge one key Truth, maybe we can find answers to other important questions in the bigger game of life.


Have you ever lied to yourself? What's the most frightening or embarrassing Dare you ever accepted? If you could be anything, without the possibility of failure, what would you be?

It Only Takes a Moment

The law says we become adults at the age of eighteen. Yet no one turns into a grownup at that particular midnight hour. No magical hour or legally defined day determines when we truly cross over from child to adult.

There are simply a handful of tiny defining moments.

We all experience single instances which cause us to pause and think, Damn. I guess I'm an adult now.

Many of us feel initiated into adulthood the first time we flash a legal driver's license to buy beer. (Years later, when a store clerk glances at our face and doesn't bother asking for an ID, we experience yet another defining moment.)

We know we're adults when we first feel the freedom of making our own decisions and choices: the first time we buy a painting and decide where to hang it, in our very own home. Or bring home a stray animal--without needing anyone's permission to keep it.

The epiphany of adulthood often surfaces when that new-found freedom is accompanied by responsibility: paying our own rent or buying groceries from our own paycheck. Applying for our first credit card, mortgage or life insurance policy. (Only adults even consider the long-term need for life insurance.) Or glancing around our trashed apartment and realizing our mother won't simply get fed up and clean it for us. Yes, we grow up quickly the first time we have to unplug a clogged toilet.

We seem to transform into adults the very moment we first mark the "married" box on a doctor's office form. Many of us experience a similar but more sobering feeling the first time we're forced to check the box "divorced."

And some of us feel we're forced to grow up overnight when one of our parents is suddenly gone forever.

Not all the defining moments of adulthood are easy ones. We know we're adults in the instant we accept that life changes and that the most well-adjusted adults are those who learn they must keep moving on.

Perhaps nothing initiates us more into the world of adulthood than becoming a parent. We realize we've crossed the threshold that very first time we carefully lay our newborn baby in his crib and think, I brought this child into the world, and my life has changed forever because of it. Every tiny step that child takes throughout his own life is another defining moment: his first day of school, first soccer game, first driving lesson.

And when that child begins experiencing his own defining moments? There is no question then. The parent of an adult clearly must be an adult herself.

Strange how we sometimes feel sixteen still in our heart.

But as I knock cautiously at the door of age fifty, I know a lifetime compilation of such moments signals--undeniably--that I am an adult. Each of those moments defined not only what I am but who I've become: a grownup with my own set of strengths and faults, successes and failures, disappointments and dreams.

And I wonder: Does being grown-up mean we've fully finished growing? Or is growing up simply an endless stairway we climb for all of our lives?

Perhaps it's a journey, and not a final destination.

Maybe the defining moments never end.


When did you first feel like an adult? What were your defining moments? How do you still hope to grow?

(And a note to my regular readers: Writers are fickle. I am now blogging on Thursdays. Look for me then--barring, as my bio reads, any emergencies or extreme laziness.)

Be a Man, Reprise

If I could teach a boy to be a man, I'd tell him to play football. Or take up theater. I hope he'd learn that neither measures the man.

I'd tell him his mother may have read his mind when he was eight, but it was an easy guess that he felt sad after losing his soccer game. Mature men must communicate their feelings and needs--with mature words.

I'd advise him that sending flowers is always, always good. Sending them for no reason at all? Even better. And when he calls the florist, he should be sure to remember his mom.

I'd explain that being a father requires that he discipline. And also that he hug. Real men know the appropriate time for each and that the two actions are not mutually exclusive.

I would tell him to compromise when he should and apologize when he's wrong. Being a man does not mean command and control. Nor does it mean blind surrender.

I'd suggest that it's all hunky-dory if she cooks and he mows the lawn, but that defined roles only work if both partners embrace them. I'd add that raising children is a tag-team sport, even if she happens to be a stay-at-home mom. I'd remind him, softly, that his six-year-old son won't be there for bedtime stories forever.

I'd warn him that being a hard worker is an asset, but caring about nothing but his career will just make him an ass.

I would ask him to call his mother--and his father--more often. Mothers may be more vocal about it, but fathers miss their grown children too.

I'd let him know that it's OK to cry if his favorite pet dies. Tears won't make him less manly, only more human.

I would tell him he's free to ignore anyone's advice or opinion. But a real man takes the time to listen before he disagrees.

And if he disagrees with me, I hope I'm woman enough to admit if I am wrong.


If you could teach a boy to be a man, what would you tell him?

Looking Past the Obvious

I wasn't the worst behaved child in Mrs. Kasper's sixth grade class. I don't doubt that at least one has a nice mugshot plastered on a post office wall somewhere. But if she ranked the students who made her head--and her ears--hurt most at the end of the day, I'm sure I'd rate right there at the top.

At age eleven, I'd finally managed to step out from the shadow of my two, more outgoing older sisters. I'd acquired my first boyfriend and experienced my first kiss (a closed-mouth, snot-smeared meeting of shivering faces on a sledding hill). And I was just popular enough to enjoy a bit of attention through my adolescent wisecracks and ill-advised antics.

Looking back, I realize I was exactly the kind of preteen girl whose screeching dialogue and megawatt giggling at the movie theater now makes me want to bury my head in my bucket of popcorn.

When you're in the sixth grade, however, you embrace whatever notoriety you can get.

Mrs. Kasper was no newbie to irreverent young girls though. I spent more than my share of time banished to the hallway or repenting my classroom sins in the office of our Catholic school principal, Sister Mary Sadistic.

Yet strangely, even as I knew Mrs. Kasper frowned on my endless chatter and bad behavior, she never once showed signs that she disliked me as a person. God knows a few other teachers throughout my academic career weren't so thoughtful. Such as the one the very next year who glared at me and announced in front of the entire class: "Miss Stanfa, for such a little girl, you have the biggest mouth I've ever heard." (Granted, the embarrassment shut me up for the rest of the day.)

Mrs. Kasper saw every one of the faults and failings I displayed as an annoying and immature adolescent. Yet she also managed to look past the obvious. She sought the diamond in the rough.

By sixth grade, I'd already taken an interest in writing. Our English class assignments encompassed a number of creative writing projects. Throughout the school year--even as she punished and pleaded with me to change my wayward behavior--Mrs. Kasper encouraged my writing ability. An occasional compliment in front of the class, a few nice words when we talked one-on-one and a host of supportive comments noted on my papers.

The last note she wrote, in her impeccable cursive script, read: "You better do something with all your talent, or I will come back to haunt you."

Given what I'd dealt her all year, she easily could have written instead: "Your smartass remarks and incessant chatter will come back to haunt me." But she didn't. She pushed aside the obvious negatives and focused on the single, most positive attribute she could find.

That sixth-grade short story, with her last comment, is stored away in a box of school mementos. Her encouraging words have lodged themselves in my memory for nearly forty years. They still bring me confidence in moments of self-doubt. Because, all else aside, someone believed in me.

I'm sure Mrs. Kasper has nearly forgotten me, yet I will never forget her.

We may never know the impact our words have upon those we meet, however brief our relationship. Most times, we never even consider it.

But maybe, if we choose to look past the obvious in people, we can give them just what they need to search for their own diamond in the rough.

A Cupful of Memories

I grasp my grandmother's hand as we wait for the bus. She squeezes back, and I peer up at her. Even at age six, I recognize she's the kind of woman who draws admiring looks from others. Dark with high cheekbones and a slightly beaked nose, traces of her Algonquin Indian blood from generations past.

I do not know, until years later, the effort she makes each day to mask the wear her daily factory work takes on that beauty: the ointment she applies every night upon her face and arms, to soothe the wounds from the flying metal fragments embedded in her skin. The wigs she wears to cover the hair that grows thin from similar spots on her scalp.

In 1967, I realize none of that.

We climb on the bus for the ride from the Old South End to downtown Toledo. I've just become accustomed to my bus ride to my suburban school, where I'm in the first grade. This bus ride is markedly different. Grandma, who doesn't drive, appears used to this route and its array of passengers.

"Grandma," I announce with wide eyes, "look at all the chocolate people!"

"Shh," she whispers. "They're called colored people. You know, like Moms Mabley."

I nod, still staring at the dark woman across from us. I don't know any colored people. But I'm familiar with Moms Mabley, one of my grandma's favorite entertainers. Later, Grandma explains that we must be careful to show respect for everyone; that my words, even spoken out of innocence, could offend or hurt someone. I'll bet my grandmother has never hurt anyone's feelings. I don't wish to either.

Grandma rides the bus with a quiet dignity. I chatter away, like my mother and my mother's mother--my other grandmother. Grandma Stanfa smiles down at me. Unlike so many other adults I know, she answers my endless questions not just with patience, but with interest.

I'm one of three children and one of my grandmother's seven grandchildren, but today I feel special. I was allowed to pick out our supper menu, given a whole can of black olives to devour by myself, and even asked to choose today's movie: The Jungle Book. I know my sisters and cousins have had their own days like this with Grandma; we're probably all special to her. Yet that doesn't diminish my feelings.

I hesitate at the concession stand. I've been told Grandma doesn't have much money. I've learned that she's worked for many years at a factory job. She raised three sons without a husband to help her. Her first husband died of pneumonia. He was the father of my Uncle Bob, who still lives with Grandma and was in the Korean War and hears voices. I'm kind of afraid of Uncle Bob, but Grandma makes me feel safe. Her second husband was father to my dad and my Uncle Sonny. I don't know exactly what happened to him. My dad met him once, when he was three. I overheard the story. "You're doing a good job with the boys," he told my grandmother when he visited. Then, he was gone for good.

At the concession stand, Grandma insists I get something. I squint, considering, before ordering a grape drink, served in a plastic, purple fruit-shaped cup.

From my velvet-covered seat in the Pantheon theater, I stare mesmerized at the movie screen. The only sound I make is an occasional slurp through my straw. I look up to see my grandmother gazing down at me with a smile.

When we return to Grandma's house, she pours herself a drink. Whiskey. She lights a cigarette. When she's not looking, I stub it out in the ashtray. When I'm not looking, she lights another.

The next morning, we walk to Mass. I attend a Catholic grade school, but my parents aren't so religious about weekly Sunday services. Grandma's a good Catholic. The kind who goes to Mass every morning, seven days a week. The kind who doesn't remarry after a failed marriage and a long-gone husband, because the Church doesn't believe in divorce.

When my parents pick me up, I casually kiss my grandmother goodbye. I wave at her as I climb into our car. I leave her behind in her tiny two-bedroom house, with her freshly printed church bulletin, her pack of cigarettes and her schizophrenic grown son, for whom she will care until she dies in a hospital bed, seven years later.

Some people leave your life too soon. Often, years pass before you truly know them and can begin to understand them. Before you fully appreciate them for what you didn't know then and what you still remember now.

Sometimes, you wish you'd collected every one of those memories and saved them, perhaps in a purple, grape-shaped plastic cup.

A New Gig

"I think I need a new gig." She fingered the stem of her wineglass, sighed, took a slow sip. "You know? Something different. Something new."

I nodded. "You mean a new job?"

"I don't know. Yes. Maybe. Maybe not. I just need a way to jump-start my life, a way to reinvent myself."

"A new house? A move to a new city?" I squinted, studying her, seeking to comprehend.

"Yeah, all of that. Or none of it. I don't know, really." She sipped more wine and frowned, her eyes focused on the distant horizon, searching for something beyond her vision.

"Yes." I nodded again. I understood.

Nearly all of us understand that, don't we, at some point in our life? Some vague sensation of discomfort and unrest which we wish to overcome and repair. We don't know what we want or need, exactly. And even if we're fortunate enough to figure out that much, something often stands in our way of initiating the means to change it. Uncertainty. Fear. Weakness. Simple inertia.

"So, what do you really want most in your life?" I prodded her. "The comfort of a relationship? The challenge of a new career? The excitement of different surroundings?"

She bit her bottom lip. "Do I have to choose? Can't I have it all?"

I shrugged. "Perhaps. Some people believe they do."

"But how do I get it?"

"Well, I think you first need to decide what you want. And then you need to take the necessary steps toward it."

"So I need to figure out what I want?"

"Yes."

"OK. That's easy."

"And?"

She sighed again. "I want a new gig."

The questions are simple, for all of us. For most, the answers don't come so easily.

Contemplating Happiness

We hadn't talked--not really talked--in a long while.

Much had transpired in both our lives.

We relay our stories, in between drinks and admiring glances at family photos pulled from our purses. As we each listen to the other's tales, we nod. Some stories elicit grins. Others cause one to draw in a breath and grasp the other's hand.

Life elicits a myriad of responses. Years condensed into one dinner outing encompass them all.

"So, are you happy?" one finally asks the other.

"Happy? I don't know." A pause. "Are you?"

The one simple question grows into an hour of contemplation. Because what is happiness?

Does happiness mean we wake each morning, eagerly anticipating both the expectations and the uncertainties of the day?

Does happiness mean our everyday activities provide us satisfaction?

Does happiness mean our loved ones bring us joy?

Does happiness mean we bring joy to others?

Does happiness mean we feel productive and somehow valuable?

Does happiness mean we can manage to laugh?

Does happiness mean that, amidst anything else, we retain hope? Or faith?

It's a broad and vague term, this idea of happiness. Meaning such different things to different people. Its connotations change even for ourselves, at varying times in our life. Something we once thought would ensure our happiness isn't, one day, enough. Something we never before dreamed might bring us contentment can unexpectedly make us sigh, and say, "Yes. This is good."

"Are you happy?" Neither of us truly answers the question tonight.

But before we leave, heading back to the comforts and the challenges of each of our lives, we smile and embrace each other. It is good.

And we realize that, maybe, happiness should be measured by an accumulation of single moments like this.

Stories You Keep from Your Children

We don't blame them. Can our parents be faulted just because they took such horrific risks with their children's very lives? (Although clearly we should find ample opportunities to blame our parents for many things.)

It was a different era, raising children in the sixties and seventies. It was a time of innocence. And a time of ignorance.

Our parents didn't know better when they allowed us to run, shrieking and giggling, through the chemical fog spewing from the mosquito trucks that patrolled our neighborhood.

No seatbelt laws were in effect when they piled ten kids into a five-seater car, to haul us all to the county recreation center for a day of swimming.

They saw no need to stick around at the pool to supervise us. Nor did they accompany their children on our two-mile walk there for swim lessons, when the oldest was only ten and the youngest just seven. The news then didn't broadcast a stream of announcements about nationwide child abductions. No one could yet conceive of the necessity of something called an Amber Alert.

We roamed the neighborhood for hours with no declared destination and no cellphone for parental communication. We played in parks and in the middle of streets several blocks away until the streetlights came on. Or well after.

Not only did our parents trust society, they trusted us--even when we became teenagers. They never imagined what might transpire if we had friends over while they were gone. Likewise, they never thought to call and confirm that the party we were attending would be chaperoned. In many cases, they never knew at all where we were going when we headed out the door on Saturday night.

High school "After Prom" parties weren't school-sanctioned, lock-in events. They were hotel room keggers.

Some of us went on unchaperoned spring breaks our senior year in high school. We ventured to Fort Lauderdale or Daytona Beach, driving twenty-hour trips in our parents' own car. Only half of us were even eighteen, but our parents figured all of us were nearly adults. Legalities were only technicalities then.

Amidst all this reckless behavior, most of us managed to survive our youth.

But once we became parents ourselves? Oh, the difference a few decades make.

It's not that we're a generation of better parents. Perhaps, however, we're better informed, thanks to health and safety laws and the ubiquitous media. Maybe we're wiser, too, due to our recollection of what we did--and shouldn't have done.

With all that we 21st-century parents now know, we can hope our own children reach adulthood safely, and cause us no undue worries.

Just as long as they do as we say, and not as we did.

And we keep a few stories to ourselves.

When Understanding Eludes Us

When understanding eludes us, we struggle to accept.

When mere acceptance seems unacceptable, we seek change.

When change appears formidable, we strive for strength.

When our strength is insufficient, we turn to others.

When others can't aid or comfort us, we lean on faith.

When we question faith, we're compelled to search for more.

When we truly search, within and without, we discover hope.

Because sometimes hope is all that remains.

And when we find hope, perhaps, we finally possess all we ever needed.

Ghosts of Vacations Past and Future

We leave for our extended family vacation in a few weeks. It's become an every-three-years tradition for my two sisters and me, our families and our mother. Every three years works well for the Stanfa clan. It's frequent enough to maintain those warm and fuzzy family ties, yet far enough distanced to forget how close we came the last time to committing family genocide.

In families like ours, the key to vacationing together is learning survival tactics. I don't mean knowing how to make a shelter, how to signal for help or how to ration a water supply. In our extended family, roughing-it survival means knowing ahead to rent three separate cottages with multiple bedrooms, ensuring we find week-long entertainment suitable for replacing Facebook and reliable cellphone coverage, and having access to plenty of liquor.

We were not, clearly, destined to stay with John Boy and Grandma on Walton's Mountain.

Stanfa Family Vacations weren't always this way. For the first 14 years of my life, our yearly family vacation consisted of spending not one but two weeks every summer in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. No bathtub or shower. No hot water. No TV. No playground or organized activities for the kids.

We bathed in the frigid lake. Our primary entertainment was playing pinochle or fishing from a rented rowboat. We slept--all six in our extended family--in a tiny two-bedroom cabin.

Yet somehow, for all of us, this cramped, self-entertaining trip was the highlight of the summer.

So what's changed? Why do we require so much more from a family getaway now than we did then?

Could it be that we're all more tightly wound than we were a few decades ago? That we've all become accustomed to living in 2,500-foot homes and staying in four-star hotels? That the entertainment value of card games and casting for perch have made way for wireless internet and weekend parties with everyone but our own families?

Maybe those of us old enough to remember the Ghosts of Vacations Past have simply forgotten their magic. And those too young to have experienced them simply need an introduction.

I started packing this week. I gathered together a deck of cards and a couple board games. A bag of marshmallows and some Jiffy-Pop to burn over the bonfire. A couple of dusty fishing poles.

I decided, with a lingering and forlorn glance, to leave my laptop behind.

But I am sure as hell not giving up having a bed to myself. Or a bathtub, with running hot water. And while I will gladly partake of a fresh lake perch dinner, there will be no cleaning of fish guts in my future.

Nostalgic memories aside, some ghosts just make you shiver.

First Yet Not Last

Son #2 turned 19 today; Son #1 hit 21 last week. Hard to believe, since I'm barely 20 myself.

This particular year, my two sons' birthdays bring them each a milestone, a First and a Last. The older one can drink his first (legal) beer. The younger one has entered his last teenage year.

We tend to track our lives through a list of Firsts and Lasts. Once we become parents, however, we often stop marking our own and begin noting our children's.

The baby years bring a flurry of Firsts: first tooth, first word, first steps, first wailing trip to the ER.

These make way for the noteworthy moments of young childhood: first spin on a two-wheeler, first day of kindergarten, first dance recital or soccer game.

At some point, the momentum slows. As our children grow, the Firsts become not only more infrequent but also infused with some parental apprehension: the first evening alone without a sitter, the first date (which he will never acknowledge as such), the first moment behind the steering wheel, the first unchaperoned party.

And by the time our kids reach the end of high school, we realize we've stopped tracking the Firsts altogether and have started noting the Lasts.

As both of the young men I've raised head into their twenties, I look back on their years of milestones with a combination of joy, pride, disappointment and simple relief.

Yet I realize the cycle of moments-to-remember hasn't ended at all. It's simply started all over again.

I know I won't be there for every monumental moment of my sons' adult lives, but I look forward to taking pleasure in many: their first "real" job after college, their first dance with their new wife at their wedding reception, their first child. They'll learn then a bit more, themselves, about the significance of Firsts and Lasts.

And I hope they learn, early on, that "Lasts" are not to be lamented, but to be acknowledged for what they truly are: the transitions to new and rewarding "Firsts."