The field is near a small forested area on our property. Early in the day it is in complete shade - a blessing since the weather is hot by noon. So I was out there the last few mornings. The air was sweet and cool. I listened to the birds, the flute-like call of a wood thrush and a particularly loud Carolina wren, and felt like I was in Eden.

But harvesting is labor intensive, one reason why Pete made the field a “Pick your own” operation. People can buy the strawberries at a reduced rate, as long as they do the bending and picking on their own.

That’s when I realized that for some, strawberry picking isn’t a mere tradition.

It’s a cult. But a really, really nice one.

Whole families sometimes arrive armed with sun hats and baskets. With laser focus and military precision, they work their way through the rows and finish, content, having guaranteed dessert for days.

And still the fruit proliferates. Which is a good thing. Since Pete doesn’t spray any chemicals on them, we share the fruit with critters once in awhile.

Last year Pete got elaborate towers of pots so we could grow strawberries not just in our fields, but our back deck. The idea was that in the morning we could pick strawberries for our cereal or pancakes, instead of walking through grass and dew 200 feet from the house to grab a few berries.

Ha.

We may have harvested a handful before a chipmunk set up shop nearby.

He got so fat on strawberries I thought he was going to need insulin shots or Chipmunk Weight Watchers. It’s a wonder he could waddle up the stairs to grasp the objects of his desire.

The strawberries are growing in towers again this year. I haven’t seen him, so maybe we’ll have a better chance of grabbing the fruit for our cereal after all.

Meantime, I am content to make my great-grandmother’s strawberry shortcake recipe for dessert, even though if I keep this up I will be as fat as our chipmunk friend.

My great-grandmother, known to all as Nana, was what I think of as a take-no-prisoners woman. Stories about her abound. Although she died in 1952, she is still a legend in our family.

She and her daughter, my grandmother, survived the Titusville (Penn,) Flood of 1892, a terrifying disaster in which hundreds died. She raised her daughter on her own after her husband sought his fortune working on the Panama Canal and soon died there, presumably from disease. Nana was small, blunt, and forthright. And she had a recipe for strawberry shortcake that she stole when a neighbor refused to share it with her, Nana waited until her neighbor left her house, then walked in, helped herself to her recipe box, found the recipe and copied it. Lucky for her that few locked their doors in those days.

Lucky for us, too. All of her descendants have baked it for decades. I published this recipe three years ago, but it’s worth reprinting. Enjoy this product of Nana’s life of crime!

Nana’s Stolen Shortcake 

Grease a square pan, or a muffin tin, and preheat the oven to 375 degrees fahrenheit/190 degrees celsius

Combine in a large bowl: 

2 cups flour 

2 teaspoons baking powder 

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 cup of butter cut in pieces (1/2 stick) 

(either room temp which makes this easy or cut in cold butter with two knives). 

Mix. 

Beat in: 

One egg, slightly beaten 

1/3 cup sugar 

1/2 cup milk

(I often throw in some cinnamon)

One teaspoon vanilla 

Bake, 30-35 minutes. 

The top should be golden brown.

Serve warm, with melted butter. Drench with strawberries, cut up, mashed, with some sugar added. Enjoy!

The bride was not a person, but a bush heavy with white flowers that would appear as the weather warmed in our tiny, urban backyard. Also called the pearl bush, the flowers cluster on branches which bend downward, looking like a bridal veil.

My mother was a skilled gardener, but the location of our house on the west side of Buffalo fought her at every turn. When she and my father bought the Victorian-era structure the yard ended at the red brick wall of a movie theater behind our house. Yet the wall lent the plot of land an intimate feel, like a hidden courtyard. It muffled the constant traffic noise of nearby Elmwood avenue, with its wheezing buses and shrieking ambulances.

Alas, in less than two years the Elmwood Theater was torn down to make way for a bank parking lot. The brick wall was replaced by a chain link fence. The view was unremittingly ugly. In summer the asphalt radiated heat. In winter it was covered in drifts of snow that eventually became black with dirt, salt and sand.

Still my mother tried to wrest some beauty from the yard. She had my two brothers and our father get flagstones from a dilapidated mansion a few blocks away that itself was slated for the wrecking ball. They did, but the flagstones mostly sat in piles at the end of the driveway. None of us made it a priority to help her complete her vision for the yard. But she persisted in her efforts. She planted tulips, lilies of the valley and hyacinth. Together she and I went into the backyards of once-grand homes, now abandoned and falling apart, and dug up bulbs of Stars of Bethlehem, replanting them in the yard. Mom planted two Kwanzan cherry trees. In spring, their branches were covered in double pink blossoms, reaching up like they were glad to see us.

Yet we kids never used the yard much. It was too small for games. The view was grim.

The years passed. So did my mother, then my dad. My sister Ellen insisted on buying the house when Dad died. It was a money pit. Dad never maintained it. That neglect showed. I always thought Ellen bought the place because she wasn’t ready say goodbye to our parents. But in four years she would see them again. When Ellen’s estate sold the house it was slated to be torn down for yes, another parking lot, this time for a nearby bar. I visited the house once again to dig up some bulbs before the entire lot was paved over.

That’s when I could see it, in the spring sunshine, from an upstairs window: The outline of a Japanese rock garden. Mom must have planned it all along and there it was: The Japanese cherry trees, a riot of pink; the bride in full bloom, blossoms cascading and nearby, the stacked-up piles of flagstone. Why hadn’t we made it a priority to take an afternoon, buy some sand, do some digging and imbed the flat stones in the garden? Mom asked nothing for herself and it would have given her so much joy. The thoughts haunted me as I dug up the Stars of Bethlehem. The flowers could not quell regret, but they had become a form of remembrance.

I planted the Stars of Bethlehem around our rural home, but to my disappointment, they never bloomed. A few months later I suffered a miscarriage. It was spring. I bought the biggest bleeding heart bush I could find and planted it to comfort my own bleeding heart. The bush grew bigger every year.

When we sold our house and moved midwinter, I dug up the bush and the soil around it, and replanted it at our new home on a quiet country lane.

As the weather thawed, the bleeding heart branched out and bloomed, content in its new environment. And, somehow, the Stars of Bethlehem appeared, too, as if my mother wanted to send comfort.

Every spring, scattered in the grass, Stars of Bethlehem now bloom in unexpected places. I think of them as my mother waving to me. “Hi, Mom!” I say, as I admire them.

And the bleeding heart? I have split and replanted the original many times now, dividing it in fall and giving some away to friends. This month, all the bushes in front of the house and in our backyard bloomed once again. There are six of them now, 34 years after I brought the mother plant home.

When I see them, I smile, touch the delicate flowers and I whisper, “Hello, love. I haven’t forgotten you.”

My social media feed was replete with pictures of soldiers and everyone’s memories of them, whether or not they died in the middle of a war or warm in their beds decades later. Such attention and gratitude is absolutely right and honorable.

Even I got into the act, posting a picture on Facebook of my mother’s grave with its proud “WWII” etched at the top, indicating that she was a veteran, and its ever-present little American flag in the grass before her tombstone.

But we have gone from pride in the selfless military service of those who agreed to walk through hell for America to canonizing for sainthood absolutely anything to do with the military.

And even my mother, Cpl. Jane Irene Murray, would have said that the government and the country have gone overboard.

Right now, the Trump Administration has proposed a $1.5 trillion budget for the military, an incredible 44 percent increase over an equally jaw-dropping $895 billion that is the current budget, the largest in history. (With supplemental money passed for the Pentagon the true figure is about $965 billion.) The current American budget is more than the combined totals of the next 10 countries which spend the most on the military. The proposed budget would cut programs that help the poor to buy more bombs.

This is utter insanity. It makes the U.S. and the world less safe and vulnerable to presidents with itchy trigger fingers - like the current one. Why negotiate when you can drop a bomb? Why discuss when you can send aircraft carriers to do the talking?

Our military budget is the nation’s biggest jobs program, with projects in virtually every congressional district. So it grows ever-larger and makes it harder to cut.

But the other reason is that we elevate people in the military.

Until Vietnam, it’s safe to say that veterans, most of whom were drafted, were thought simply to have done their duty. Perhaps in retrospect our admiration grew, particularly for those who joined the armed forces during World War II to fight the Nazi menace. No wonder we call them the Greatest Generation. They - my mother among them - helped to save the world.

But Vietnam was so unpopular that vets were shamefully subject to unrelenting insults and vitriol. They were called baby killers, murderers and worse. This, despite the fact that so many who were sent overseas were bewildered boys who were drafted and dropped into a nightmare from which many never emerged. They came home to find peace, and instead were reviled.

That was a disgrace.

But now, Americans have overcompensated. We are told, over and over again, that we owe our freedom to those who serve in the military. That we would not have any rights at all unless people donned a uniform and marched off to battle.

That is a too-narrow viewpoint at best, propaganda at worst, and political opportunism on the part of the government.

I see many people who fought for our rights who have gone unrecognized.

There is little public applause for the aging Freedom Riders who risked their lives to register Black voters in the South in the 1960s, for students vilified for integrating public schools, protesters who marched so that gays not be jailed, injured or fired for their sexual preference, for people attacked for questioning the status quo, for playwrights, journalists and others who shone a light on injustice or lawyers who went to court defending the innocent.

In my view, those people fought for the rights of everyone.

I see zero correlation between fighting for freedom and the Korean War, the Vietnam War (based on a lie), the war in Iraq (based on a lie), the present war in Iran (based on an impulse) and all the military acts that our current commander-in-chief has indulged in: dropping bombs on Venezuela, Yemen, Iraq, Syria, Nigeria and Somalia, among others.

Any see-no-evil attitude towards the military makes a bloated military budget inevitable, and it becomes a vicious circle. The size of our military budget is a clear and present danger.

It’s time for a reset.

In spring of 2025, my book, “Saving Ellen: A Memoir of Hope and Recovery,” was published. Lucky me to be a debut author - not, God knows, to be confused with a debutante - at the youthful age of 67. I planned for post-publication like a military invasion. The days when an author has a fairy godmother to arrange publicity is mostly in the past, if it ever really existed. Marketing would mostly be on me.

Because we are living in a tsunami of books due to the self-publishing revolution, a book is published every seven seconds. Last year, in the United States, 4.6 million books were published, according to Publisher’s Weekly, 15 times the number of books published 20 years before. Publisher’s Weekly is paywalled, so those statistics can be found in this web post from Berrett-Koehler Publishers.

I knew that getting any attention for the book would be a daunting task. All that said, it’s been tougher in some ways and more rewarding in welcome, surprising ways.

Among other occasions, in 13 months, I spoke at or attended:

• Ten libraries

• Four bookstores

• One college

• Three conferences or meetings

• Had a table at two book fairs

• Spoke on eight podcasts

• Signed books and taught writing at the Okoboji Writers’ and Songwriters’ Retreat in Iowa.

• Attended five book clubs (one in person and the others via zoom) where members read the book and were eager to discuss it.

• The book was also the subject of four articles in newspapers, three magazines, and three (blessedly favorable) book reviews.

None of this, you may be unsurprised to hear, resulted in an invitation to a second book deal, a movie, an interview on The Today Show or an appearance on the NY Times bestseller list.

There have been speaking engagements at bookstores and libraries where hardly anyone showed up and one memorable occasion when nobody at all showed. (It was a frigid evening in February; I didn’t take it personally). And there was another occasion, at a local college, where 40 arrived and nearly every seat was filled, proving that you just never know how these things will go.

The book opens up with my childhood habit of stealing from my father while he slept so I could give the money to my mother. Many people remarked on that scene, and it has become a common occurrence for women to whisper to me while handing me a book to sign, “I stole from my father too.” Proving, once again, that none of us outgrows childhood without some pain.

Early on, The Buffalo News did a generous and lengthy article on my roots in the city and the book. But what is, perhaps, a commentary on the decline of newspapers, more people from my past contacted me after an events and arts magazine, Buffalo Spree, published an article in January. Mary, a former roommate, got in touch; so did Carol, a friend from my teenage karate lessons, as did Jim and Kevin, both of whom were ushers at my wedding and an unending source of laughs when I was in college. What gifts, to have these precious people in my life again. Former classmates from graduate school were incredibly kind during an appearance in Washington, D.C. One even wrote about the book in his own Substack (Here’s looking at you, Jim Buie!)

In the year since publication, I’ve been assured sales would increase once I publish another book. Untold numbers of people have asked, what am I working on now and when will it be ready? It’s enough to give me a panic attack. I have only begun to formulate an answer to those questions.

I am in awe of authors and friends such as Luanne Rice, J. Courtney Sullivan, Jeff Benedict and Nicole Baart in this regard. They seem to pop out books every two years or so like they are baking muffins. They make it look easy. I know. Appearances can be deceiving.

Yet I’m a turtle, not a hare.

On August 4th, I’ll be in Wilson, NY at the invitation of the town’s library. My book’s settings are divided between Buffalo, N.Y., the town of Wilson, and nearby Lake Ontario, on which we had a summer cottage. I renamed Wilson in my memoir, but, to my delight, that didn’t fool anyone in town. I am honored by the invitation and the occasion will be a homecoming. Wilson’s library provided endless books all the summers of my childhood. Like all libraries, it is holy ground.

By then, I hope I will be better prepared to answer the question of, “When will you write the next book?” In the meantime, I am beyond grateful I wrote even one.

That’s when I knew it was time.

When my husband began his farm on our land 15 years ago, there was one crop for which I lobbied hard. Despite my white hair, I said, “I’m an Irish girl at heart. Make me happy and plant potatoes.”

So he did. Every year, he waits for dandelions to bloom. Then he plants potatoes.

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If it was an old wives’ tale that potatoes are best planted when the weeds bloom, it is one that is many centuries old. The timing of planting, in fact, is now supported by the science known as phenology. Dandelions, that curse of gardeners everywhere, have maddeningly long roots that burrow deep into the soil. Warmth, soil temperature and the length of day all influence their growth and when they flower, the soil temperature for potatoes is just right when the sunny blooms appear.

Nobody approved of Pete starting his farm more than my cousin Sara Murray, who lived on the family farm outside of Westport, County Mayo. The first topic of our transatlantic phone calls during the warm weather always involved the potato crop. During one summer when we had a particularly robust yield, I said to Sara, half-joking, that I should send her some of our potatoes. There was a silence, and then she said, her voice lilting with hilarity, “A Yank sending an Irishman potatoes? Now THAT would be a news story!”

Indeed.

So with the dandelions in their first bloom, we examined all the seed potatoes we were to plant — five different kinds.

“I ordered too many,” Pete sighed, and I had to agree. We had bags and bags of organic seed potatoes, freshly arrived from the Maine Potato Lady. (That’s a company, not a person.) I wondered where he would put them all. “I’ll plow a new field,” he said. Still, we had plenty of room in the land he had already prepared. So he cut the potatoes up, leaving three eyes in each piece, applied a treatment to the tubers and after a day, we brought them out to the fields to plant. Pete dug the trenches, and I placed the potatoes, eyes up, one after another with room to grow.

Customers at farmers markets go wild for fingerlings, the long, small, slim potatoes.

Their names sound like the nicknames of illegal drugs: Magic Mollies, Blue Ecstasy.

Others are old friends. Pinto Gold is a lovely combination of golden and red potatoes. The purple potatoes have such a vibrant color they look like jewels when they come out of the earth. But that won’t be for another few months.

Pete does nearly all of the farm work himself, but he knows I’m always willing to get my hands in the dirt to plant potatoes. Maybe it’s swirling in my DNA, with ancestral memory of the Irish famine.

In a tragic missed opportunity, in 1845, the first difficult year of the blight that destroyed most of Ireland’s potato crop, there was a letter published that offered a tantalizing clue to a solution. It was a chemical that would have fended off the disease that caused the hunger and deaths of hundreds of thousands and years of suffering. The London-based Gardeners’ Chronicle and Agricultural Gazette published a letter by one Matthew Moggridge, who lived near a smelting factory. The nearer a potato field was to the factory chimney, which belched out copper smoke, the more free of disease were the potatoes. The fields within 200 feet of the chimney were completely untouched, he wrote.

Decades would pass before spreading copper sulfate on leaves was found to prevent the blight that altered Irish history. Such a simple solution, but one that was then unknown.

My satisfaction in planting tubers might have its roots in the echoes of that complicated history, but I think it’s far simpler than that.

The work of writing, unlike my husband’s work of farming, is not physical at all. It mostly resides between my ears. There is a real satisfaction in engaging in activities that get me out of my own head. I plant, something grows, I can feed it to my family. I can measure it. There’s nothing for me to intellectualize, thank goodness.

I’m not ready to give up my pen for a shovel anytime soon, but let the potatoes grow. And dandelions? They have served their one positive purpose, so from here on out, I wish them only limited success.

One involved the king of Great Britain, Charles III.

The other came from my beloved hometown of Buffalo.

Both combined to show that there is a glimpse of a kinder, stronger, even wiser United States than anything the Trump administration has shown to the world in 15 months.

First: Who’d have thought years ago that it would take a king, addressing (transcript) a joint session of Congress, to remind America what democracy is all about? (video link)

To help the 535 members of Congress that they are more, should be greater, than the bullied, servile lapdogs too many have become since Donald Trump took office? That the America that has stood up for NATO, that came to the defense of Ukraine, is worthy of rising again?

The king is far too polite to say, “Exactly what have you people been THINKING since January of last year?” But he got his message across nonetheless, with tact, clarity and wry humor.

He reminded Congress of how they are supposed to act, and of our shared roots. “The U.S. Supreme Court Historical Society has calculated that Magna Carta is cited in at least 160 Supreme Court cases since 1789, not least as the foundation of the principle that executive power is subject to checks and balances.” (Emphasis mine)

He also said, “…it is here in these very halls that this spirit of liberty and the promise of America’s founders is present in every session and every vote cast. Not by the will of one, but by the deliberation of many.” (Emphasis mine) Congress loudly applauded.

He reminded Congress that Great Britain has stood with America in conflicts for the last 100 years and NATO came to the aid of America after 9/11, the only time that Article Five of the organization’s mutual aid agreement was ever invoked.

And he added, “Today, Mr. Speaker, that same, unyielding resolve is needed for the defense of Ukraine and her most courageous people.”

Congress roared its approval. Members leaped to their feet.

What King Charles staged was less a speech and more an intervention. He reminded members of Congress of their higher calling; that they are capable of much more than they have shown lately.

Of course, the only true intervention can come from American voters, whose biggest mistake is sitting in the Oval Office right now, wreaking havoc. And interventions are powerful, but are, by nature, temporary. Still, the messenger and the message made a welcome impact.

The second sign of hope came from my hometown of Buffalo.

The city has had a tradition for decades: When the Buffalo Sabres hockey team plays at home, both the Canadian and American anthems are sung. It doesn’t matter if the Sabres are playing another American team; the words of “O, Canada” echo to the rafters.

The only other American city that follows this tradition is Detroit which, like Buffalo, is a city on the Canadian border. Everyone in Buffalo grows up knowing the words to the Canadian anthem; as a vestige of our childhoods, I do and my husband does, too, even though we haven’t lived in Buffalo for 40-plus years.

This affection we feel toward our northern neighbor has made it all more heartbreaking for us to watch as Trump has been vicious, belittling, and rude to Canada, outrageously saying it should become America’s 51st state and insulting beyond all reason.

So what happened in Buffalo? As usual, before the Sabres took to the ice against the Boston Bruins, a woman began to sing the Canadian national anthem. Unfortunately, the microphone malfunctioned. Her voice could not be heard after the first few words.

It didn’t matter.

After a moment’s hesitation, the crowd, dominated by people from Buffalo and at least some Canadians who drove across the Peace Bridge to attend, took up the words and began to sing those beautiful verses without a missing a beat, their voices getting clearer and stronger, together:

O, Canada, our home and native land

True patriot love, in all of us command,

With glowing hearts we see thee rise,

The true North strong and free.

From far and wide, O Canada,

We stand on guard for thee…

By the end, most of the 19,000, American-majority crowd were singing the Canadian national anthem, showing the traditional respect and affection we have always had for that wise and good country.

And together, the crowd roared their approval when they finished.

The moment has gone viral. I am profoundly moved whenever I see the video, not just because of the grace of the act, but because it symbolizes the promise of a return to decency. I also know, no matter what spews out of this administration, that given the chance, Americans would stand on guard for Canada. And despite everything, I believe Canada would stand on guard for us, too.

But which one?

Google alerts have made me meet, virtually, my doppelgängers from all over the country.

“Doppelgänger “ is an imprecise term in this context. It implies that we look alike, and of course, we don’t. Our ages are all over the place. The name Maura Casey may not be Jane Doe, but it is remarkably common.

Casey is among the most ordinary Irish names, behind the likes of Murphy, Sullivan and Kelly. So this was not unexpected. But the combination of my first and last names occurs far more often than I once thought.

There’s the Maura Casey who is a National Weather Service meteorologist. She keeps an eye on conditions out west. With my google alerts, I can tell you all about the snowpack in the mountains of Montana, the danger of wildfires, and high winds. Better yet, her title reveals that she is a “warning coordinator.” We all need a warning coordinator in our lives, and I’m delighted to hear that Maura Casey is vigilant.

There’s more, of course. One Maura Casey is a physical therapist in New York City. Another Maura Casey is a pharmacist in Pennsylvania. Maura Casey also competes in canoe races in Ireland - who knew?

Another Maura Casey is a sommelier - a wine expert. From her website: “About a decade ago I found myself in wine and spirits and haven’t looked back.” Yup, that happened to me, once. Speaking from the vantage of four decades of sobriety, I hope that her journey is smoother than my own. I was a whiskey woman, though. Maybe I would have had better luck sticking to wine.

There’s also a Maura Casey who is a realtor in Scottsdale, Ariz. I’ve known about her ever since I tried to buy the domain name of mauracasey.com and discovered she grabbed it first. She also got mauracasey@gmail.com. She used to be a marathon runner, too, putting my little 5K races to shame. Clearly, Maura Casey is quicker on her feet and on the uptake than I am, or at least more internet-savvy.

This array of people with whom I share my name isn’t entirely a surprise. When my husband and I lived in Somerville, Mass., and were in the process of buying our first house in the 1980s, my financial records got mixed up with a Maura Casey who either worked for or was on the Boston City Council. Then and now, Boston is the city with the highest percentage of people of Irish descent in America, so at the time I was more amused than startled. I was also grateful that she wasn’t a bank robber.

I get a kick out of knowing there are versions of me out there, and here’s hoping they are better humans than I am. Even knowing someone with my first name is rare enough that it amuses me. For example, the office manager of my dentist calls me for appointment reminders. She is a lovely woman, originally from Ireland, and when she calls me in her lilting voice, she always begins the same way: “Maura, hi, it’s Maura.” “Hi, Maura!” I respond. We both laugh. Perhaps we are easily amused.

I suppose we could all make things less confusing for each other if we used our middle initials. My middle initial is J, for Joanna, but I grew up with mixed feelings about my middle name. I was named for an aunt who was a virtual stranger to me. But later, I became friends with a Miami Herald editor whom I loved and admired, Joanna Wragg, who by her example helped me get sober. So for a time I used my middle initial more as a sign of gratitude for my friendship with her, rather than its familial ties.

Most of the time, though, I’ve been just plain Maura Casey, like the rest of the Caseys canoeing, sniffing and sipping wine, selling houses, measuring wind speed and serving in government. Who knows how many of us there are. Godspeed, everyone. Please don’t get arrested and pay your bills on time, for the sake of us all.

Just two years after my first trip to the city, the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum opened, in 1976. It is one of the few museums I have visited regularly over 50 years. I have gone there alone, with my kids, with my daughter Anna’s eighth grade class and last week, when I went with Anna and her daughter, Ellie. The place was mobbed. The gift shop cashier mentioned that he had just waited on a couple from New Zealand. The people in line behind us were from Japan.

Despite the crowds, in the most important ways the visit was exhilarating. The museum has evolved. Planes still hang from the ceiling. But the exhibits are now so different from decades ago, when I first attended as a teenager with long, black hair, up to this past week, when, as a white-haired grandmother, I panted hard to keep up with Ellie.

Early on, the museum was a paean to human creativity and male testosterone with just one exception: Amelia Earhart, the world-famous, courageous pilot and feminist who was the second person to fly across the Atlantic nonstop. Otherwise, the contributions of women were scarcely represented. The same could be said of Black pilots. That changed in 1982, with the exhibit “Black Wings,” which showcased the barriers and struggles African Americans faced who wanted to fly.

That early exhibit was a step forward, but still separate. The achievements of Blacks were not showcased as part of the main museum. They were still Other. The same could be said of women. The treatment of the exhibits spoke volumes.

Every museum conveys what is, or is not, important to a society.

Fast forward to this year. When the visitor enters the main hall, a banner with the image of Katherine Johnson hangs from the ceiling. She was the NASA mathematician showcased in the movie “Hidden Figures,” so flawless in her calculations that astronaut John Glenn wouldn’t fly unless she approved his flight trajectory. She and other female, Black “computers” – so called because they were experts in math – made space flight possible. There are also exhibits throughout the museum of women astronauts, astronomers, and aviators like Bessie Coleman, the first Black woman to get a pilot’s license. They are no longer separate.

Times have indeed changed. On April 1, while watching the countdown to the launch of Artemis II in its journey to the dark side of the moon, I noticed a woman, Emily Nelson, directing the final preparations of the flight from NASA headquarters. It matters, just as it matters that this museum now gives everyone a seat at the table.

Now the question haunts me: Will that last?

In the name of purging any and all efforts at DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion), the Trump administration has gleefully fired women and Blacks. Pete Hegseth, that superbly unqualified secretary of defense, has implemented such efforts in the military with enthusiasm, best described by Lucian Truscott, whose Substack I follow. Hegseth intervened less than three weeks ago to remove two Blacks and two female officers in a committee-approved promotions list to brigadier general. Hegseth apparently believes that if women or minorities hold high office, it is proof they did not merit promotion. Yet he is proof that this administration promotes incompetent white men based on their loyalty, race and gender. The qualified need not apply.

For example, last year Hegseth fired Chief of Naval Operations, Adm. Lisa Franchetti, the first woman to be named the Navy’s highest ranking officer. Before becoming CNO, she had led the U.S. Sixth Fleet in the Mediterranean Sea, headed U.S. Naval Operations Korea, commanded a naval destroyer, led a destroyer squadron and twice commanded aircraft carrier strike groups. But her ample qualifications didn’t matter.

The bigotry of the Trump Administration is bound to affect even cultural icons like the Smithsonian, and indeed, the Administration is acting like the politburo of the former Soviet Union. It has aimed its racist and sexist efforts squarely at the Smithsonian Museums to censor and alter exhibits, insisting that they “remove divisive narratives.” Happily, the Resistance has emerged in an army of volunteer citizen historians who are documenting any changes for the blessed day when this administration ends.

For now, my excited granddaughter and her completely exhausted grandmother absorbed the museum’s core message, the only acceptable one in a decent society: That for every child, the sky is the limit.

I knew how bad this could get for America and the world. Over the previous summer I had forced myself to read half of the 900-page tome outlining the far-right “2025 Project” and from its deeply depressing pages I knew that a cultural war against women’s equality, minorities and LGBTQ people was about to commence. It outlined huge cuts to the federal government. It was clear that the international order was about to be upended the way little Donnie Trump allegedly used to throw around chunks of birthday cake at children’s parties. (Tells you something, doesn’t it?).

Yet, as is my nature, I reached for something, anything, to feel a glimmering of hope, even as my stomach churned. And so I said:

“Well, at least he won’t get us in a war.”

Ha.

Trump had for years railed against the wars that America pursued since the turn of the 21st century, but since Trump lies about absolutely everything, there was no logical reason on my part to believe he hadn’t fibbed about this, too. I was suckered.

The prime-time, nationwide speech he made last night, appropriately on April Fools Day, was a 19-minute word salad of bluster, lies, shifting arguments, empty promises, dissing former presidents and general grandiosity. He even used the phrase, “bomb them back to the Stone Ages where they belong.”

Trump sounded like an aging barfly watching Fox News while swilling a beer and mouthing off at the neighborhood ginmill.

He - and his moronic, bigoted, ideological twin, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth - are treating the war against Iran like a video game. Even as American bombs blew up a girls school, and recently, dropped a bomb in the middle of a girls volleyball game.

Trump started war against Iran on a whim, and its admittedly loathsome government immediately moved to lob missiles at its neighbors as well as U.S. servicemen and women, bottle up 20 percent of oil traffic in the world and vow it would never, ever stop fighting. Given Iran’s thousands of years of history and deeply ingrained sense of honor, it probably won’t.

These are the repercussions America faces from being vacuous enough to elect Trump not just once, but twice.

The Founders of the United States created a government of checks and balances. On paper, it is brilliant. Congress would be a check on the president; the Supreme Court would restrain both. Under some narrow circumstances, Congress can also modify Supreme Court decisions.

But the Founders never predicted a supine Congress of the president’s party held hostage by the power of money and threats, Nor did they foresee a Supreme Court willing to grant sweeping powers to the presidency that they had never envisioned.

Yet there are signs of hope.

Republicans in Congress may be groveling, but millions of Americans are not. Consider:

• The “No Kings” protests of 8 million people that took place last weekend no longer look like a Woodstock reunion of aging hippies; this new war - and the prospect of yet another Mideast quagmire - attracted noticeably younger people. Thank God for that, because my generation has messed things up so badly we could never apologize enough. We need the voices, energy and activism of the young to begin to make things right.

• Europe and other allies are standing up to Trump. They aren’t racing to open the Strait of Hormuz, or offer their bases in support of a war they were never consulted on by a man who has done nothing but lob threats and insults toward them.

• American courts are handing the administration one defeat after another. They have taken awhile to get going - the wheels of justice move with agonizing slowness - but in the last two months courts have slapped down Trump’s tariffs, his shuttering Voice of America, yanking federal funds from National Public Radio and the Public Broadcasting System, imposing Orwellian requirements on defense reporters and halted the building of his mega-ballroom attached to the White House,

It isn’t enough, of course. We need not just regime change in the United States, but also a change of heart, which is infinitely more difficult. American voters elected Trump and Republicans in Congress. Will they change?

We have seven months before election day, when one-third of the U.S. Senate and all of the House of Representatives, both now controlled by Republicans and the White House, face the voters. That day of reckoning can’t come soon enough. Trump is proving once again that he is the king of chaos, and he didn’t launch America into a war with a plan.

He’s just throwing around chunks of birthday cake.

Sailing is like getting high without the hangover. I fell in love with it at 12, when I first sailed in a 19-foot Lightning on Lake Ontario with my sister Ellen, my neighbor Tony and his wife Linda. We got caught in a brewing storm. Then the mainsail got stuck and for tense moments could not be wrangled down in the rising wind. While the adults white-knuckled the boat into safety at last, I loved every minute.

I stayed hooked into adulthood. I owned a 26-foot Columbia until it was clear that my husband would rather farm than sail. It was too big for me to handle alone. I sold it, then spent a few years pining to sail. When my friend David and I decided to purchase a sailboat together, it seemed to be a perfect solution. He was the husband of my beloved friend Dorothy and was a far better sailor than me. In fact, David did nearly everything well. He was one of the best men I ever knew.

Owning a boat together was seamless. We named the 17-foot pocket cruiser, Second Wind and agreed on everything, except one: How long we would own the boat together. Sadly, David died suddenly after 15 months. I became a solo sailor.

I financed repairs to a crack in the boat’s hull that had not been repaired correctly by the previous owner; a less stubborn person would have seen it as a sign to get rid of the boat altogether and find another.

I added mechanisms to make the boat easier to sail single-handedly. And I learned, through a lot of mistakes and small adventures, how to be a better sailor, although I am still not the sailor that David was.

But last year, my beloved, down-at-heels marina where I happily kept the boat was sold to a businessman who immediately raised rates by 50 percent all the while bragging about the improvements he was going to make. I didn’t want the improvements. I wanted the same scruffy atmosphere, affordable docks and camaraderie. But, in truth, I knew I wouldn’t have time to sail the boat that summer. I was going to be traveling to sell my first book, “Saving Ellen: A Memoir of Hope and Recovery,” and time was at a premium.

This year, when the moment came to figure out where to put the boat for the season, it felt like homework instead of the beginning of new adventures. I knew it was time to sell. It took me 10 minutes to advertise the boat online and within two days I had six people who wanted to buy it.

But my lack of regret puzzled me. Why was this so easy? Was sailing just a phase of my life that was now over? I still look forward to the incomparable thrill of the hull pounding, the sails billowing, the sun dancing on whitecaps.

My love of sailing has not changed. I have.

It may also be that I was finally able, after all these years, to let go of my friend David.

There are aspects of life that I will never understand if I live to be 110. One it this: How a compassionate and brilliant physician, who could write poetry, cook a gourmet meal, paint lovely pictures and sing beautifully could be here one day and gone the next, stolen away by pancreatic cancer. I will never accept the cruelty of that.

But I can be grateful, and I’ll hang onto that, as well as the memories of all the sweet afternoons I spent on Second Wind that David wasn’t able to experience. Now someone else can enjoy our boat. My friend Joanne has assured me I’m welcome to sail on her much larger vessel in the coming months.

I know there are more sun-dappled days in my future. And gratitude will remain, always.

I was appropriately green with jealousy after reading Rini Jeffers’ eloquent take on St. Patrick’s Day, March 17. Her words had the ring of truth - the best of all reasons to mull over a piece of writing.

Jeffers is the talented columnist for the Chronicle-Telegram of Elyria, Ohio. In her column, titled, “The Irish never forget a kindness,” she wrote about the Great Hunger, commonly known as the Irish potato famine.

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Ireland was a nation of mostly poor tenant farmers, all scratching out a living for English landowners, as the island was a British colony. From 1845 to 1852 a fungal disease destroyed the potato crop that was a mainstay of the Irish diet; as a result, 1 million died from starvation and disease and another 2 million fled.

It was, “the greatest social disaster of 19th century Europe — an event with something of the characteristics of a low-level nuclear attack,” according to former Oxford University professor Terry Eagleton. British policies made the Great Hunger far worse, exporting crops that could have fed the starving, and compelling others to labor on public works projects, building roads to nowhere in return for thin soup. To qualify for relief, during the later famine years tenant farmers had to give up their two- or three-acre plots. If that wasn’t enough, Parliament passed laws that unwittingly gave landowners incentives to evict their tenants off the land entirely.

I grew up knowing some of this, and had heard of the generosity of Native Americans who themselves had been cruelly evicted from their land and forced to relocate to Oklahoma. They were desperately poor, and yet they sent donations to help the Irish in 1847.

But I was transfixed by the rich details Jeffers included in her column: The Choctaws of Skullville, Oklahoma, sent $170, nearly $7,000 today; the Choctaws of Doaksville, Oklahoma, sent $150; the Cherokees, who had also been forced out of their tribal lands, sent $200. Slaves from the Caribbean sent donations. Children in a pauper orphanage in New York pooled their pennies to send $2. Inmates of Sing Sing prison in New York sent what little money they had.

The poor, the ravaged and those with almost nothing gave what they had while the well-off and well-fed made speeches about the flawed character of the Irish poor and their shameful dependence on government help.

Yet the same phenomenon happens today. Even in our more affluent era, the poor generally give a higher percentage of their income than the wealthy, although their smaller contributions don’t equal those of the rich. And I can’t count the number of times right-wing lawmakers have voted to cut school lunches or health care subsidies, while enthusiastically lowering taxes for the wealthy.

The stories of how the ragged poor helped those even more desperate so many years ago made me realize once again that the world will never have enough empathy and kindness, two qualities that seem increasingly removed from our national discourse. For decades, the poor have been seen as losers, more or less, and programs to help are denounced, disparaged, and seen by too many, mostly on the right, as a waste of money. They would have been squarely in the camp of those who imposed ridiculous conditions to help the starving Irish.

The impulse of the haves to view the have-nots as morally deficient is plenty common in the here and now, let alone the 19th century.

The Irish never forgot. In 1995, Irish President Mary Robinson formally thanked the Choctaw tribe for help during the famine. And this: When the Covid-19 epidemic ravaged the Hopi and Navaho tribes, the tribes had the indignity of starting GoFundMe efforts to raise money because our own government’s help was so inadequate. When the people of Ireland heard about it, they donated millions of dollars. Today, Ireland offers scholarships to enable members of the Choctaw tribe to study at Irish universities.

My ancestors’ experience of the famine has drifted down in the form of vague family stories of uncertain veracity. Still it lingers. In a cemetery near my late cousin’s County Mayo farm there is a marked, mass grave from the famine years, a grassy mound that remains a silent witness to the suffering of years ago, but whose remnants still swirl in our DNA.

If that long-ago experience makes us somehow more generous, more compassionate, it will be a small compensation for the heartache that still lives in haunted memory.

Several of the historical facts in this column come from the book, “The Graves are Walking,” by John Kelly, an excellent account of the Great Hunger.

Most of the people buried in the cemetery were among the hundreds of thousands killed in what we call the Iran-Iraq war, which lasted eight long years. But Iranians call that conflict the “War of Holy Defense.”

Think about that name for a minute as we watch our latest reality TV show from the comfort of our homes: American and Israeli forces dropping bombs on Iran.

President Donald Trump repeatedly calls himself a peacemaker, but in the first 14 months of his administration he has bombed a half-dozen countries and now has launched an optional Mideast war. The United States and Israel began bombing Iran early Saturday morning. By evening, Israel had killed the supreme leader and brutal dictator, 86-year-old Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, along with more than 40 top government officials.

At least six American soldiers have died. But so did more than 100 Iranian girls after bombs destroyed a girls’ elementary school.

Dropping bombs is far too easy for American presidents. In this case, lasting regime change can only come from the Iranian people. It cannot be imposed by an American government that most Iranians detest. Yes, many also hate their government, which slaughtered at least 6,000 protesters in January and February. But the Islamic government that keeps its boots on the necks of Iranians possesses the structure and defenses to hang on to power.

If the American government truly wanted to help Iranians resist oppression, it would have overridden Iran’s blockade of the internet that leaders imposed during protests in January. In addition, Trump never would have mindlessly sanctioned dismantling the Voice of America last year. He never would have disregarded America’s “soft power” - ways of achieving diplomatic goals without bombs and bullets.

All wars have unintended consequences. But through the breaking news reports, I kept thinking about my own time in Iran in 1998.

I traveled to the Islamic Republic during a short a period of moderation when, behind the scenes, both the United States and Iran wanted to explore closer ties. Both sides saw cultural exchanges as a good first step. That’s why I ended up in Tehran with my adventurous friend Cynthia Dickstein, an expert in international exchanges. We were there to set up an exchange of journalists between Iranian and New England newspapers.

In between meetings with editors, we had plenty of time to interview Iranians of all different backgrounds. They varied widely, from the family of Iran’s former oil minister Mohammad Javad Tondguyan, who was captured, tortured and killed during the Iran-Iraq war and revered as a martyr; Shirin Ebadi, then a human rights lawyer and activist, who five years later would become a Nobel Peace Prize winner; Iran’s first female vice president, Massumeh Ebtekar, but most important, ordinary people - shopkeepers, waiters and journalists.

Many blamed America for a litany of trouble, starting with the 1953 American-backed coup that overthrew their revered, democratically elected leader Mohammad Mossaddegh, whom Iranians described as “their JFK.” The coup ushered in 25 more years of the shah’s authoritarian rule. Others blamed America for the bloody Iran-Iraq war (1980-1988) because our country backed Iraq. Yet to a person, Iranians made a careful distinction between our government, which they openly loathed, and the American people, against whom most harbored no ill will. A few even bragged about having cousins in “Tehrangeles,” their name for Los Angeles, which still has the largest population of Iranians in the country.

But even then, the power of conservative Islamic hard-liners became brutally apparent. Conservative courts began shutting down dozens of newspapers. They snuffed out any fragile overtures to the West. Our exchange took place just once and never happened again.

It’s naive to think that dropping bombs will make the flowers of democracy bloom.

The Iranian opposition has no clear leadership or structure. They have justice on their side. But that’s not enough.

It is not clear why Trump has chosen this moment to go to war, but it isn’t to liberate the Iranian people. A president who tears down democracy at home will not lose sleep over the rights of ordinary people overseas.

Before approving military attacks, Trump consulted with Saudi Arabia and Israel while ignoring most of Congress, our allies and the American people. His family has been the personal beneficiary of business and billions of dollars from Saudi Arabia. (Gift link). Qatar is giving Trump a $400 million plane to use as Air Force One and has suggested that he take it with him as a bauble after his time in the Oval Office is thankfully over. His business also has numerous projects in the United Arab Emirates.

Former Secretary of State Colin Powell was famous for his “Pottery Barn” rule about military action in another country: You break it, you own it. But Trump has never hewed to that rule. In his business, politics and personal life, he breaks things constantly and simply walks away.

No doubt, walking away will be harder after beginning a Mideast war. I only hope this does not become, in Iran, another years-long “War of Holy Defense.”

For those interested, here is an hour-long video with journalist Max Blumenthal in discussion with American-born Iranian professor Mohammad Marandi, walking through Berhesht-e Zahra cemetery. Taken in May of last year, it gives an interesting perspective on U.S.-Iran relations and Mideast politics. At around minute 48, Marandi says, “I think Americans are miscalculating, and they are overestimating their capabilities and underestimating Iran’s capabilities.”

Since misery loves company, we spent our enforced isolation doing our taxes. Except, surprise: We experienced no misery at all. This year, we made out like bandits, with a healthy refund, the first we have gotten in years.

That’s good for us and bad for the country. It reflects a skewed national priority to give ever more tax breaks, credits and benefits to the over-65 population while making it harder and harder for younger people to keep their financial heads above water.

Our windfall this year is due in part to the unwise over-65 tax deduction of $6,000 for each elderly person passed in the Republican tax bill last year. The so-called “Big Beautiful Bill” that gave tens of billions to finance the spread of masked, anonymous immigration enforcement officers swarming our streets, inflated the bloated military budget even more and, yep, shoveled even more cash toward the elderly.

This is stupid and shortsighted. The U.S. gives younger generations very little help compared with oldsters. And the very youngest children get even less of the national largesse.

One study clearly illustrates the government’s skewed priorities: In 2019, the U.S. government spent $5,595 on programs benefiting children, but a little over $29,000 on federal entitlement programs alone for the elderly. That means for every $5 spent on retirees, $1 went to the kids.

Meantime, struggling 30- and 40-somethings are stuck with day care costs rivaling that of in-state college tuitions, student loans that rise upward with interest rates, starter homes that are unaffordable and rents that eat up half their incomes, not to mention a looming Artificial Intelligence revolution that could threaten their jobs. All with little to no help from Uncle Sugar.

Contrast it with the situation of many of my fellow geezers, as outlined in an excellent Wall Street Journal article headlined:

“Over 65? Congratulations, you own the economy.”

Americans 65 to 74 had average net worth of $1.8 million in 2022. This is a hike of 178 percent from the same age group in 1989, adjusted for inflation.

Of course, this doesn’t mean all elderly people need wheelbarrows to take their money to the bank. Plenty struggle. This is especially true of the unlucky younger Baby Boomers (the generation born between 1946 and 1964) who are just approaching retirement. Many are considerably less well off than older members of the generation who had the accident of better timing for jobs, recessions and cheap college educations. One third of younger baby boomers are facing retirement with no retirement savings, depending on Social Security alone to support them. It won’t be enough unless they have pensions to supplement their incomes – something that is increasingly rare

My biggest hope is that ever-younger voters will begin to have the last word. It used to be a snarky saying among election workers that 80 percent of 80-year-olds vote while only 20 percent of 20-year-olds did, but the younger generations may be waking up to what’s at stake.

In 2024, nearly half of 18-to-29 year-olds voted, a sign of progress, but still not enough to offset the elderly, who make up nearly one-third of all voters because their participation is so high. If that changes, look out. In the meantime, Americans will continue to have a government acting like the mythical god Saturn, eating its young.

“Every Olympian’s childhood dream was standing up there and getting a medal hung around their necks,” said Chris Fogt, who won a silver medal in bobsledding at the 2014 Games. “But after you get it, and you get a little older, it’s almost like the journey was more important.”

Yup. It’s really all about the journey.

I wonder if having a destination, of migration from one place to another, isn’t in our DNA. If our destinations are not found on a map they are, instead, found in the quiet ambitions of our own hearts.

Perhaps we all need journeys of some kind.

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In my teens I took lessons in Isshin Ryu karate, an Okinawan style, after I had been the victim of one sexual assault and two attempted muggings. I wanted, desperately, to be free of fear. Karate did that for me. But it held other, unexpected lessons.

It taught me why the word “karate” is translated from Japanese as “empty hand.” It isn’t about striking first, or victory over others. Instead, it is about inner peace, and victory over self.

I took classes once a week. There were only two belts - green and brown - before black belt, which would take years to achieve. My sister Ellen eventually took classes with me, and my brother Seamus took some lessons, too.

But karate was always my individual journey. It took several years for me to get a green belt before moving away took me far from the nearest school in this particular style of karate. I stopped taking classes. I kept the belt, though.

Decades later, in October of 2016, Seamus called. He told me that the worrisome symptoms he had for many months finally had a diagnosis: ALS, commonly known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. My brother was matter-of-fact, even dryly humorous. I was heartbroken.

Later, I wondered what I would regret if I faced a terminal disease that would threaten my mobility.

It was then that I realized I would regret not continuing to take karate lessons. The very next day I signed up for classes again, not in Isshin Ryu, but in a Chinese style, Shaolin Kempo. When I visited Seamus, I would show him what I was learning. He would always smile. A few months before he died, he said, his voice slurred from the disease, “You know, I never really cared about karate. I just wanted to hang out with you and Ellie.”

I wish he had lived to see me get my brown belt.

And yet, my journey was interrupted again, by the COVID lockdown, by a painful shoulder injury that took months to heal, and then by the realization that I had forgotten enough that I would have to start over. For awhile, I railed against that reality. But eventually, I started over, on this, my third karate journey.

Two years ago, I began again with the help of my friend, second degree black belt and superb teacher, David Belles. Even better, he started his own dojo, Crane’s Wing Martial Arts, a year ago.

Now I take two classes a week. I am one of two female adults in classes of men. I don’t care. I am older than every other student by decades. Smaller, too. I don’t care about any of that.

My journey is different now. My knees bother me; they never used to. Thankfully, an orthopedist told me I just have some arthritis. He gave me a list of exercises to strengthen muscles supporting the knees and encouraged me to keep taking my classes. There’s a lot of memorization in karate, and the tricks of recall that worked at 18 do not work at 68. I have made adjustments, not for the last time.

We are all on journeys. I have a writing journey; I wrote one book and am casting about for another. I am still learning how to be a grandmother, which my granddaughter Ellie assures me that she is happy to teach. (Riley, almost 3, has not yet expressed an opinion.) Bread baking is endlessly intriguing; that’s another journey.

But karate, along with writing, has spanned most of my life. Maybe, sometime in my 70s, I will have earned a black belt. Maybe not. I’m not sure it matters. The journey is its own reward, always.

I would love to hear about your individual journeys in the comments!

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I have slightly more tolerance with the freezing weather because of my Buffalo childhood, but the keening and complaints coming from New York City as residents wait for at least a little melt have been nonstop. I do adore New Yorkers, but they are not known for patience. The city-wide frayed nerves was the subject of a recent New York Times article, (gift link) which ended by quoting comedian Chris Coro, who wrote, “This is no longer winter. It is harassment.”

The anguished public handwringing would be greeted with snorting laughter from states like North Dakota or Montana. Not to mention frustrated envy from battered Ukraine, where Russia’s Putin seems determined to freeze the entire population to death by bombing any source of heat, including lit matches if he can find them. In contrast, what many of us are going through is an inconvenience.

Anything is more bearable if greeted with a generous serving of gratitude. But this winter, my long love affair with country living is wearing just a wee bit thin.

It could be my age. The fact that we have been below freezing nearly every day for weeks would not have bothered me too much even five years ago. This year, my internal whining goes something like this:

I am tired…

…Of having to dress like an astronaut just to walk the dogs.

…Of walking the dogs at all. Although their differing reactions to the snow are endlessly amusing and it’s hard to believe they are sisters. Bella, smaller and thinner than Zoey, just wants to run and play in the white stuff. Zoey is beginning to come around to snow, but she will sometimes sit in the street and hold up a snow-encrusted paw in disgust. You can almost hear her say, “Ewwwww!”

“This is no longer winter. It is harassment.” - Chris Coro

I’m also tired of having to think about where I put my feet when I walk. Last year, I slipped and fell twice on the ice, but fortunately, I had a winter coat on so puffy that it is like wearing a sleeping bag. It was akin to falling on a feather bed - no harm done. Still. One fact of aging is that falling can have some dire consequences. So I have learned to be careful.

And yet, this winter, like all winters, will pass.

In the country, the signs of the turning of the seasons are subtle, but more noticeable than they are in the city.

For example, more birds are beginning to hang around despite the cold. When I walk out in the morning I can hear more birds singing, when a few weeks ago there was near silence.

Because our pond is only partially frozen, our friends the ducks come and swim around every day. They think it is a heated pool just for them. There is no open water left anywhere, but the many springs in our pond keep at least part of it free of ice.

The days are lengthening. Already, daylight lasts more than 40 minutes longer than it did on Dec. 21, the winter solstice. By the end of February, we will gain nearly three minutes a day of sunlight.

The rays of the sun are warmer, too, even on cold days.

Orion, my favorite winter constellation, and his faithful dog, Sirius, are both high in the sky after sunset and are swinging towards the west by 10 o’clock at night. I know they will begin their descent soon. By the time spring begins in earnest, they will begin slipping farther down towards the horizon until they won’t be seen again until the fall.

Then, there are my household’s measures of spring.

My husband always begins to plant seeds in trays inside the house by the beginning of February for the season to come. He used to plant them all over the house, each with its own lights, leading me to wonder if the neighbors think we have started a marijuana farm in winter.

But this year, he got a commercial seed germination chamber to help with the process. It looks like a big, boxy oven, but in fact, it sets temperature and humidly at the perfect setting for whatever vegetables he is planting.

“Look,” Pete said to me yesterday. He removed a tray from the chamber and held it up in triumph. “The onions are growing!” The tray was covered in what looked like little green hairs, far from the gorgeous globes I will pull out of the earth in four or five months. But they are good omens all the same.

We need these signs. We’ll be back to the deep freeze this weekend, with temperatures plunging to 0 degrees Fahrenheit, snow and high winds. Once again, spring will feel distant. But I’m hanging on to optimism. Warmer days, longer days, are coming.

The storm was a monster -- 2,300 miles long, with snow and cold affecting dozens of states. Single-digit temperatures and 16 inches of snow later, even winter warriors like my husband and myself were impressed.

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And yet, as we dug out, all I could think about concerned events in Minneapolis, Minnesota, 1,100 miles to the west and colder than anything we faced. More dangerous, too, and I’m not just referring to the winter weather. The Fahrenheit temperatures in single digits and below zero didn’t dissuade thousands who protested what the sweeping raids by Immigration and Customs Enforcement stormtroopers were doing to their city. And that large demonstration was one of many smaller ones, protesting the shooting of a mother in her car clearly trying to drive away from ICE officers and the execution of a nurse, followed by a stream of hideous, slanderous lies about both from federal government officials.

America is a country born out of protest. That fact of history should enable more people to respect the acts of collective disagreement and what they have done to shape the country for the better. But that rarely occurs.

In real time, demonstration participants are usually denounced and demonized. During the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s, when protesters were shot, killed, beaten with batons and set upon by snarling dogs, government officials — particularly in the South — blamed the protests on “outside agitators.” That lie is eerily echoed today, 60 years later, by President Trump in disparaging the Minneapolis demonstrations. He’s just as wrong now as the Southern politicians were then. And so are his violent, abhorrent policies that are spurring outrage across the country.

Yet there is hope. When none other than conservative columnist George Will compares Minneapolis to Birmingham, Alabama, where four little Black girls lost their lives in a 1963 church bombing, you know that the truth is beginning to peek through.

Pushback cannot come quickly enough.

As a child I watched the protests for civil rights and witnessed my entire generation demonstrate against American involvement in the Vietnam War. As a pre-teen I listened to adults in my life heatedly discuss the issue of protest when National Guard troops gunned down four college students and injured nine others at Kent State in Ohio. Peaceful protesters have sacrificed their lives over and over again to make the country a better place. That doesn’t make it any less painful to watch what has been going on recently.

During patriotic holidays we are always exhorted to remember the sacrifice of our military. Hey, I get it; my mother was in the Army, my brother spent 26 years in the Navy Reserve and my sister was in both the Marine Corps and the Army. I am well aware of what people give up to serve in the military. Sometimes, that service comes at an awful price.

But the awful price was also paid by the students at Kent State; by civil rights leader Medgar Evers, shot in his own driveway; by three in Mississippi murdered 1964 trying to register voters; by Viola Gregg Liuzzo of Detroit, who in 1965 drove to Alabama to help the protests and who was murdered by the Ku Klux Klan. And now, shamefully, add new names to the fallen: mother and poet Renee Good and intensive care nurse Alex Pretti. Those who died were all defamed by government officials, but at least, in this age when everyone has a video camera in their pocket, the lies can be exposed sooner.

Peaceful protest is a tradition here. Nobody deserves to be shot for exercising that most American of rights. It is in the tradition of the great Civil Rights icon and Congressman John Lewis, who said, “Get in good trouble, necessary trouble, and redeem the soul of America.”

The sliver of good news is that outrage is growing. The first “No Kings” protest in April of 2025 attracted 3 million; the next, in June of last year, 5 million; the last, in October 2025, 7 million. The next “No Kings” protest will be held nationwide March 28. Organizers hope for 9 million to gather then. I hope they get more. We have so very much, to redeem.

That happened to me one week when I was working as an editor in New London, Connecticut, around 20 years ago. Much of my job at The Day, the midsized daily newspaper where I worked, involved putting together a four-page section of different viewpoints that appeared every Sunday. During slow weeks the task was challenging. I was not above sifting through the mail to see if reader contributions too lengthy to publish as letters were worth running as columns instead.

That was the case with one wordy letter, although my first, emotional impulse was to toss it in the trash. The letter went on a harangue against a fixture in the region: Cal Robertson.

Cal by then had stood for 20 years on the steps of a monument dedicated to soldiers and sailors while holding up signs. “Will Children Have a Future?” was one. Another: “No more war.” Six days a week, in brutal cold and shimmering heat, he would stand as a silent witness as cars and people passed by. Sometimes he would stand at other locations, such as the Naval Submarine Base several miles away. But he could almost always be seen near the monument dedicated to members of the military.

Cal’s quiet activism outraged the letter writer, who questioned, in a sneering way, why he didn’t find something more constructive to do.

I knew immediately that the paper should run the letter, but not without giving Cal equal time. So I walked the block or so to the monument to ask him to come to my office, when he was done with that day’s vigil, and dictate a rebuttal. It would take time. He had lingering brain damage from a blood clot and spoke very slowly.

When he came upstairs to my office, he read the letter from the irate reader, carefully set aside his signs, sat down and began, haltingly, to explain his life’s work.

Cal had been a medical corpsman in Vietnam during two deployments in the 1960s. The experiences haunted him and he regretted his youthful decision to join the military for the rest of his life. When he came home, he said, he drank for years and was hospitalized in the 1970s with the blood clot that would forever after keep him from speaking normally. After that, he got sober, and began his quiet demonstrations.

He had no animosity toward the letter writer and meant no disrespect to anyone. But his silent witness - his signs against war, against violence - was his job, he said. He lived with his parents. His disability benefits paid for his few needs. The vigils were his life’s work.

After we published both letters on the same page, there was an outpouring of support for Cal and no obvious support for the man who criticized him. People had the deepest respect for Cal, for his message and his dedication. Not everyone was a fan, of course. But whenever I saw him at his post, the thumbs-up signs and honks of support from drivers seemed to far outnumber those who didn’t like what he was doing.

Cal died Jan. 3 at the age of 80, and now there is another outpouring of support and memories from the public. One Navy veteran recalled that Cal was standing with his signs in the mid-1980s outside the submarine base when he joined the submarine force, and 26 years later when he retired, Cal was still at his post.

It has been a while since Cal was well enough to stand vigil six days a week, but he still attended the occasional demonstration for peace. At one, a woman recalled, police parked and approached the gathering. She became apprehensive. But the cops just wanted to say hello to him.

The power of example is the most underrated of all influences. Cal didn’t make moving speeches. He never ran for office. He wasn’t well known beyond a little corner of New England. But many years before “social influencer” was even a thing, he influenced others by his singular dedication to a better world. His vigils made people think. They were silent reminders that we could be better, do better. That matters. So did he.

In the early 1990s when America’s Cold War battle with the Soviet Union was clearly over, many in the area credited - you guessed it - submarines. Submarines, bristling with nuclear weapons, stealthy and hard to detect, proved so formidable that the former USSR had no choice but to submit. I heard this from workers, journalists and Navy officers alike.

My brilliant Jesuit friend, Bernard Bush, found this to be a too-convenient rationalization of a bloated military budget. What did he think ended the Cold War? “Prayer,” he said simply. If he was going to speculate on something nobody could prove, he preferred to believe that prayers for peace had a powerful role.

I, too, believe in the power of prayer, so I would like to think that Bernie was right. We could use prayer right about now.

This has been an awful week with a Minneapolis woman, Renee Good, gunned down by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent who stepped out of the way as she turned her extremely slow-moving car away from him. He shot her three times, killing her instantly. That’s bad enough, but what followed was, in its way, just as brutal. Government officials, from the President on down, spouted personal attacks and lies, saying Good was running over agents and was a “domestic terrorist.” Their conclusion? The killing was HER fault. And the answer: To send hundreds MORE agents to swarm Minneapolis.

This came after a three-week period in which Trump ordered bombing raids in rural Nigeria, in Somalia, and captured the leader of Venezuela and his wife while declaring that the country is now ours, after which he threatened military action against Greenland, Columbia, Mexico, Iran and Cuba.

I am left with the overwhelming urge to hide under my bed.

I have never felt more sheltered, here on our farm, far from agents dressed in black searching any neighborhoods near us. I have felt the sweet peace in this rural corner, where nothing is heard when I walk the dogs before going to bed but owls hooting at one another in nocturnal dialogue.

However, reading multiple newspapers a day - a habit ever since my first reporting job more than 40 years ago - keeps me tethered to the outside world. My worry about the country’s direction abates temporarily during long walks.

“Solvitur Ambulando” says a sign above my desk; Latin for “it is solved by walking.”

During walks these are the few answers that come to me: Help your neighbors. Give to the right causes. Write letters in protest. Show up to marches. Do everything you can think of to throw sand in the gears of the churning machine of injustice currently operating out of the federal government.

Pundits say that real change may come in the midterm elections, but those are in November, 10 months away, and a lot of damage will be done in the meantime.

I can attend all the “No Kings” protests possible, but what really needs to happen is this: The 535 members of Congress need to stand up. The vast majority of Democratic members are making themselves heard; a tiny fraction of the Republicans who control Congress have as well. But most of these sidestep questions, duck reporters, equivocate, avoid, evade or loudly support the president and his minions. They need to find a conscience, if they have one.

If my friend Bernie was right and prayer is more powerful than humanity’s bristling weapons, if prayer can change the trajectory of history, then my prayer is this: May we all fight against injustice, but most of all, may the limpid majority in government find their spines.

I am told that if you live with two golden retrievers, this is probably your situation:

One dog will be an old soul. The other dog will act like a crack addict.

Seems about right.

We have two golden retrievers (my husband’s idea). Zoey is the old soul. She is calm, and has an instinctive obedience that her sister, alas, does not share. Not now. Not ever.

Her sister is Bella. She leans towards hysteria. If I go out to the mailbox, she will greet me when I walk back into the house as if I just returned from military service overseas. Zoey may open one eye as she naps.

It’s hard to believe they come from the same litter.

If you inadvertently drop Bella’s leash, she will bolt, rejoicing in her freedom. Good luck in catching her and hauling her back. Yesterday, Zoey’s collar dropped off by accident, leaving her free as a bird. She tilted her head, confused, and sat down as if to say, “I will just sit here until you pull yourself together and reattach my collar.”

Bella will try to knock down anyone who comes into the house. Upon meeting someone new, Zoey will sit and gravely offer a paw - which we never taught her,

But what really sets Bella apart is the tendency that she has exhibited for years and yes, through the holidays. She. Eats. Everything.

Seriously.

The grandkids know if they want to run around without their shoes in my house it has to be in bare feet, because Bella will take the socks off their feet and eat them. Ask me how I know. Granddaughter Elle has learned to put her beloved stuffed elephant, Anya, up high where Bella can’t reach, lest it become a snack.

Bella has, in no particular order, eaten used teabags (can cause a stomach obstruction), a large flower from a rhododendron bush (poisonous to dogs), and, basically, anything she could think of. I haven’t had gum in years because it has ingredients poisonous to dogs. Ditto, raisins and grapes. All deadly, apparently. Anything to avoid another vet bill.

So Bella has a rap sheet. But in the days before Christmas, she outdid herself.

Pete decided that the pooches needed toys for Christmas. He got a long toy that the dogs could chew, and maybe use to play tug-of-war. What could go wrong? He gave the foot-long toy to Bella, who did a zoomie in triumph, and promptly ATE IT. The entire thing. Without so much as a burp. Zoey didn’t even have a chance to give the toy a lick. Doggie Dad raced Bella to our vet. Two hours and $500 later, Bella expelled the toy.

But she wasn’t done. The very next day, Christmas Eve, while Pete walked her, Bella spied a dead mouse, snapping it up and swallowing it before Pete could say, “I am tired of paying my vet’s mortgage.”

If we knew how the mouse died, we wouldn’t have worried. Say, if the mouse saw Bella and committed suicide, well then, fine. But we have traps outside the house, with poison. A poisoned mouse could hurt Bella, or even kill her, we thought. We made her drink a small amount of hydrogen peroxide, which normally makes dogs vomit within about 20 minutes. But Bella just smiled.

Our regular vet had closed by this time, so we began to drive to the emergency animal hospital an hour away. When we called ahead, the vets told us to call a special animal poison control number first.

We pulled over, and after being on hold, talked to a vet (for a $100 donation to an animal shelter). She told us not to worry. The mouse wasn’t big enough to kill Bella, although it could give her a tummy ache.

We drove home. Bella, cheerful as ever, didn’t lift an eyebrow.

I could be annoyed. But I am resigned. We’ve had both dogs for four years now, and no matter what stupid thing Bella does, I cannot help but appreciate how she openly adores our granddaughters and manages to get a grip on her excitement to avoid jostling them.

And both pets become my therapy dogs whenever I turn on CNN to see what fresh hell President Donald Trump is inflicting on our country and the world. In those moments I have been known to bury my head in their fur.

Zoey lifts a paw and places it reassuringly on my arm. Bella leans into me and puts her head on my shoulder. During those few moments, I close my eyes, sigh and think, I guess I don’t mind the vet bills after all.

I was going to write a Substack post a few days ago when I was engulfed by a tsunami of news. The violence of the world seemed to overshadow the season. Jews attacked and murdered on Bondi Beach, Rob Reiner and his wife stabbed to death, allegedly by their son, and a murderer, still at large after killing students at Brown University in Providence, R.I. Then a beloved Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor gunned down in his apartment entry.

It’s been a really dark week.

Providence is an hour’s drive away from my house. An elderly retired couple I know has a house very close to campus. After the shooting they locked all their doors and ate their dinner in near-darkness, worried that the bay windows in their kitchen would give an assailant a clear shot.

It’s really hard to believe in the goodness of most of humanity when the evil few can create such chaos and terror.

My Christmas tree, which should have cheered me, seemed to be a mere gesture of light that amounted to little comfort as I absorbed the news.

Then I realized I had forgotten something.

My mother’s ornaments. Not all of them; the delicate, intricate gold balls and stars danced on the branches of the tree.

But her marble angels, the expensive ones, the ones for which she saved her pennies. I had somehow forgotten them.

I was 20 when my mother died, When her end came from congestive heart failure, the only money she had came from alimony and her precious veteran’s disability pension, which she earned due to her worsening health and her Army service during World War II. Her income did not amount to much. She died with $87 in the bank. Yet she also never spent money she didn’t have.

Every year, Mom saved a little bit of money to spend after Christmas.

There was a store in our neighborhood that sold beautiful ornaments. My mother could never afford to buy before Christmas. She would wait until after Christmas when they were half price.

That’s how she acquired marble angels to clip onto sturdy boughs of our Christmas tree, symbols of the cherubim welcoming the Christ child as his bewildered parents huddled together during that long-ago night. My mother’s eyes shone as she clipped them, one by one, into the tree.

Mom must have known when she bought them that she didn’t have long to live. I had to write my book, “Saving Ellen: A Memoir of Hope and Recovery,” to figure out exactly what Mom knew and when she knew it. Several Christmases before she died, doctors told her that her flagging heart would never allow her to live to see me or my sister Ellen graduate from college. She kept the news to herself and told only her best friend.

Yet knowing her time was short, Mom still bought the ornaments. She still delighted in their beauty. She still reveled in hope, in its mystery and eternal message.

So I went to the attic, found the box and put up the angels. Tucking the ornaments in our tree, I also thought of my mother. She had so little money. But she had assets that no money could buy: a relentless optimism and an insistence on believing in goodness despite everything, that better times would come someday. For me, these angels are symbols of those qualities.

Mom knew that she wouldn’t have these ornaments for long, but she bought them anyway. Now her children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren admire them and think of the tiny but courageous woman whose hands caressed the angels that still rest on the boughs of a Christmas tree.

Some weeks, the news is just awful. We cannot deny reality. But we can leave room for a sliver of light, a sign that the world hasn’t been completely enveloped in darkness. We can believe in the message of the angels, and choose hope.

Happy holidays to all who celebrate.