On Men

Filed Under All Posts, Connie Stetson, Family, Group Posts | 9 Comments

“On Men.” Quite a title, yes? I’ve spent way too much psychic energy “on men”, literally and figuratively. The darlings.

My father and mother divorced when I was six, my sister was four. When he left us, he promised he was just leaving mom, not us. He lied. He was so handsome, funny and charming; a musician, and we loved him wildly. I learned from him, that part of love was expecting a broken heart. He disappointed me one time too many and I didn’t speak to him for 15 years. Read more

Daddy’s Girl

Filed Under All Posts, Cathy Fischer, Family, Group Posts | 5 Comments

I don’t’ really see myself as a “daddy’s girl” but I sure do love my dad, and yes, he spoils me.

In some ways he’s typical of his generation, distant but close. Born in Poland in 1922, he lived through the horrors of WWII, lost his entire family and amazingly rebuilt a life in France, then the U.S. Both he and my mother worked in garment factories in New Jersey, then their own lumber and hardware store in South Central, L.A.; immigrants dedicated to giving their children everything they didn’t have. Read more

Stepping Off Cliffs and Other Acts of Midlife

Filed Under All Posts, Family, Group Posts, Prudence Baird, Reinvention | 4 Comments

I didn’t even tell my closest friends until I was absolutely sure. After all, there is no turning back from a decision of this magnitude. Either you’re on the bus or not.

The first person I confide in is my hair stylist.

“I’m moving to Vermont!” I holler over the cacophony of blow-dryers and snarky conversations.

“Are you gonna open a bed and breakfast?”

Okay, cliché, but a fair assumption.

Vermont at my age—okay, fifty and change—must mean I feel a need to reinvent myself, right? Leave behind the expensive highlights, the freeway traffic and slip into a more relaxed lifestyle. Read more

The Good Life!

Filed Under All Posts, Family, Melissa Howden, Politics | 6 Comments

There are some times in the year, which are emotional hotspots. Currently I am sitting at the center of one of those places. Not long ago would’ve been my mother’s 74th birthday had she not died of emphysema. Shortly after that was the anniversary of her mother’s suicide just shy of 93 years old. However, I also just celebrated (and attended) the birth of my nephew. I am childless by a combination of choice and timing. My brother is stepfather to my most favored niece Emily who has been my one and only since she was two years old. But this is the first (& no doubt last) newborn child in this part of the Howden line. Read more

My Mother, My Shelf—Thoughts on My Boobs

Filed Under All Posts, Beauty, Connie Stetson, Family, Humor | 8 Comments

“Giant boobies, on my chest.
One points east, the other points west.”

(Sung to the tune of Don Ho’s “Tiny Bubbles”… and if you’re around my age, you know who he was.)

Sadly, the words to this little titty ditty are prophetic.

I have large breasts. Not a complaint, mind you. I have always enjoyed a very good relationship with my bodacious tata’s. They are quite nice and symmetrical; my husband describes them as soft, comfy and compelling. Everyone seems to enjoy a hug from me. Sweaters have followed me home, and, yes, men have bypassed eye contact with me all together to carry on deep conversations with them. They’ve been called fabulous. My sister says that no one has enjoyed my breasts more than I have. My sister’s breasts are those charming “champagne glass” types. (Though, they say to never drink champagne from those little bowls, flutes are better. Frankly, I’d drink champagne from a jock strap. I love the stuff). Read more

Politics: Breakfast of Champions

Filed Under All Posts, Family, Melissa Howden, Politics | 8 Comments

In my Father’s house, politics has always been the breakfast of champions: coffee, oatmeal, two newspapers and commentary. Skipping the oatmeal, my own routine follows what I learned as a child—only I read my papers online.

My father was the youngest Mayor of the small town we lived in for the first six years of my life. From the time I could talk, when I went anywhere with my father I said, “We’re going “politicking,” which usually meant coffee and pie with the local movers and shakers at the Royal Café.

As a four-year-old I learned “the wave” while riding with Santa Claus and my father, the Mayor, in the Christmas parade down the main street of our town. Read more

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