Live life ✔, Write ✔

I have a unique “memory” (as the term is used to describe the ability to remember things).  You know those kid’s games where the tiles lay face down and you have to collect pairs by remembering where they are in the array?  Yeah, I’m positively terrible at those.  But I can tell you which swimsuit I was wearing, what the sunscreen smelled like, and who was singing on the radio while I was playing at the beach on vacation the summer that I was 9 years old.   Some events - some whole MONTHS even - are lost in a fog.  The first half of a year that we lived in Ohio are completely lost to me, because I was physically displaced and still getting up several times a night with my 6-month-old, and really just “surviving” day-to-day.  I have zero recollection of my oldest nephew’s birthday party, which happened during that time, despite there being photo-graphic evidence of my attendance.  And certain memories that I dislike I have managed to bury deep ...

Dear readers, In order to devote more of my writing time to working on the 3 different books I’m neglecting badly, I’m going to reduce “Live Life, Write” to a twice monthly newsletter that will be released on the first and third Thursdays of each month.  At some point in the future it may go back to a weekly schedule, but in the meantime I have some books to get out (namely, the third installment of the Stanton Sisters Story and the unnamed “spy story” I’ve been picking away at for 2 years now).  Thanks for your support! ~ Lydia ____________________________________________________________________________ My husband and I are about to celebrate our 20th wedding anniversary this week.  I was recently going through old writings and found this piece, from a decade ago when we had just celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary.  With twice the number of married years with my favorite person in the world now recorded, I can honestly say that this needs no amending; it’s as t...

  Dear readers, In order to devote more of my writing time to working on the 3 different books I’m neglecting badly, I’m going to reduce “Live Life, Write” to a twice monthly newsletter that will be released on the first and third Thursdays of each month.  At some point in the future it may go back to a weekly schedule, but in the meantime I have some books to get out (namely, the third installment of the Stanton Sisters Story and the unnamed “spy story” I’ve been picking away at for 2 years now).  Thanks for your support! ~ Lydia ____________________________________________________________________________ When I sat down to write the newsletter for today I promptly had to clear a pile of library books from my desk, and it inspired me to dedicate this week to one of my favorite local haunts. For the last 17 years I have lived - and raised my family - in central Ohio.  Over those years we have found several “favorite” places that we enjoy visiting on repeat.  I’...

When we left off last, I had just filled our previously-goldfish-inhabited aquarium with a colorful assortment of small tropical fish that were supposed to be low-maintenance and easy for “beginners” to keep. I imagine, at this point, that you have at least some idea of what happened next.  However, in order for you to be able to experience the full effect of it, let me remind you that I was already badly juggling four kids and housework, and had switched from goldfish to tropical fish in order to save myself time and effort in the long run.  The goal was less cleaning and scrubbing; just regular water changes and monitoring the temp and the pH of the tank.  After all, reducing the time spent tending my fish meant that I might actually be able to bake cookies and host sleepovers more often, and my kids would feel less skeptical (maybe) about my parenting.  Or, at the very least, I would be able to complete a to-do list for once, or maybe adopt a more reasonable b...

It really is time that I finally tell this story.  I’ve alluded to it before (in the post found her e ), but at that moment I was trying hard not to get side-tracked (trailing off-topic is a real problem for me, and sometimes I get so far down the rabbit-trail that I have trouble making my way back to the point, if I ever even do, and that makes the story confusingly hard to follow…) and in that newsletter the spotlight was on another of our aquarium friends, Phelps, who needed her chance in the spotlight.  Alas, this is a tale that deserves its own feature; it needs to be told in full.  So without further ado: Don’t be like Molly~ It’s no secret that I’ve had a lot of pets in my life.  Or that I take pet-parenting seriously.  (see post linked above)  I think it’s also common knowledge that, save maybe cats, fish are one of the easier pets to care for.  Right? WRONG!  IT’S A LIE!  A TRAP!  DON’T FALL FOR IT!!! I grew up with goldfish (al...