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Today, May 18, in the commons at Hinsdale Central, the yearbook is coming. The 80th edition, to be precise, of El Diablo. I learned this from a very dramatic video, presumably made for Tik Tok and then re-posted on Facebook with the hope that Central parents and teachers (i.e. people too old for Tik Tok) would see it. Although we did not have Tik Tok when I was in high school (phones were still mounted on the wall and you could only walk as far as the cord attached to the rece...
Each of us had a mother. Whether we knew that woman, loved - or even liked - her, still have her or lost her to death or estrangement, we all are born to a mother. Those of us who are very, very fortunate have multiple women who have offered some kind of mothering to us in our lives. I feel lucky to count myself in this group. First, of course, was my Mom. In a way, she was a study of opposites. She could be very emotional at times, but she also could be unbelievably strong....
One of the things that has always impressed me about Hinsdale is how philanthropic its residents are - and I'm not just talking about adults. Kids at two District 181 schools are in the midst of fundraising drives this month. The Madison School Kids Care Club is holding its third annual summer camp supply drive, looking for markers, paint, paper and more to donate to the summer camp at Anne M. Jeans School in Willowbrook. And at The Lane, a group of fourth-graders is...
I had months to work on my very first column. The Doings had recently been purchased by Pioneer Press and we were reformatting the paper. Editors at other Pioneer titles wrote weekly columns. Jim Slonoff said I should write one, too. Fortunately, a guy named Tom Lauricella gave me all the material I needed when he penned a piece called "Deconstructing Hinsdale" for SmartMoney magazine's July 1999 issue. I still remember the headline, which remains one of my favorites -...
When the District 181 Foundation sets out to celebrate writing, it doesn't cut corners. I was fortunate to be able to play a very small role in the foundation's Young Writers Night at Hinsdale Middle School last week, hosting one of the nine workshops offered. I enjoy my job and enjoy talking about writing, so those two 30-minute sessions were fun for me - and I hope for the students and parents who attended. The highlight of the night, though, was listening to the keynote...
As I have explained before, I am not a fan of the term "meteorological summer." I mean, there's an actual summer - which begins with the solstice on June 21. Changing the start date to June 1 just to make things easy seems lazy to me. But when I look at my calendar, June 1 - the day Ainsley will graduate from eighth grade - does mark the start of my summer. And it will be here before I know it. A quick look at my calendar shows I'll barely have time to breathe over the next...
My senior year in college, as part of a January "short term" group trip to France and England, we traveled by bus to Wales to read William Wordsworth's "Tintern Abbey" at Tintern Abbey. I'm not a huge fan of poetry in general or Wordsworth in particular, but the memory of that day has stayed with me. Last week I had a similar experience - this time, set to catchy tunes. Dan and I took Ainsley to Liverpool and London to see the stomping grounds of her favorite band, The...
I first discovered Charles Mackesy in November 2020 when CBS Sunday Morning was doing a piece on him and his book, "The Boy, The Mole, The Fox and The Horse." We were enjoying our annual Thanksgiving weekend getaway in Saugatuck, so I had time to sit down with my coffee and enjoy the show. "In a quaint barn in the English countryside, there's a man, with a dog, documenting the human condition in its simplest form, through sketches about kindness and empathy, as we all...
Ann Grube didn’t intend to make history when she started volunteering with The Community House in 1983. She and her husband, John, had just moved to Hinsdale from Manhattan. “Someone said, ‘If you really want to meet people, you need to get involved at the Antiques Show at The Community House and you’ll meet hundreds of people,’ and that’s exactly how it began,” Grube recalled. Margaret Guido assigned her the job of public relations for the show, which used to be one of the...
Therese Moraleda of Hinsdale likely will make history as the first girl to achieve the rank of Eagle Scout with Hinsdale's BSA Troop 10. Moraleda, a sophomore at Hinsdale Central, joined the 100-year-old troop in September. A former member of Pathfinders, she was recruited by fellow Troop 10 member and good friend Shreemann Patel. "He told me all about his camping experience and showed me photos," Moraleda said. "I like being outdoors, and I have been camping before, but I...
Every year in grad school when we taught the short story "The Yellow Wall-paper" to our freshman writing classes, my friend David would use the opportunity to include a quick lesson on modern-day feminism. He'd ask his students to raise their hands if they were feminists. Few did. Then he would ask them a series of questions - should women be allowed to hold any job they wanted, should they earn the same pay as men for the same job, etc. - and asked the students to raise...
I spent many years confused by Lent. I’d watch my Catholic friends and acquaintances give up something they either wanted to give up, like chocolate, or thought they needed to give up, like alcohol, only to indulge/over-indulge on Easter Sunday. Or I’d attend a fish fry scheduled on a Friday night during Lent, with platters of food and dessert tables that said anything but “abstinence.” It made no sense to me. I don’t know if I am older and wiser or the thinking around Le...
When my dad died almost 21 years ago, I had only a handful of friends who had lost a parent. My husband joined what I've heard described as "the club no one wants to be in" when his mom died in February 2017. We lost my mom in November 2020. And last week we said goodbye to my father-in-law, John. At 93, he outlived his wife and my parents by decades (my dad died at 67 and my mom and mother-in-law each lived to 79). We credit John's longevity to all the walking he did during...
I've been thinking a lot about love lately - and not because Valentine's Day is only a few days away. I've been thinking about love because Dan Harris keeps bringing it up on 10 Percent Happier, one of my favorite apps. He's not a mushy guy, and he's not talking about sappy romantic love - or even sappy self-love, although self-love is an important part of his message. Here's what he has to say about it: "Self-love, properly understood, not as narcissism, but as having your ow...
Next week we will begin our coverage of the Tuesday, April 4, election. Unlike most years, we have a single contested race to cover — the Hinsdale High School District 86 board, in which five candidates are running for three open seats. Election season is one of my favorite times of the year. I firmly believe that helping readers learn more about the individuals who want to represent them in local government is one of the most important things community newspapers can do. Y...
I had every intention of getting my COVID booster. Really, I did. But I couldn't seem to find space in my schedule for a day-long recovery period - as I needed after my previous inoculations. Plus, COVID now is just a mild cold, right? And so I never scheduled the appointment. Ahhh, hindsight. I felt some very minor cold symptoms Jan. 15 and thought I should take a home test just to be on the safe side. Within three minutes, I could see a clearly defined positive line. An...
Ham and cheddar scones. Egg and watercress sandwiches. Salmon spread on pumpernickel. Sticky toffee pudding. That's the menu for tonight's book club meeting, a perfect compliment to our discussion of Jane Austen's "Emma," led by yours truly. To be honest, we probably won't discuss the book that much because we'll be watching the 1996 film version starring Gwyneth Paltrow as we sip on Earl Grey and English breakfast tea. (I imagine some other beverages will find their way into...
The doorbell rang shortly after dinner Tuesday night. As I flipped the deadbolt and opened the door, I expected to find someone trying to sell me more popcorn or more cookies (both of which I'm currently trying to avoid!). Instead I saw a woman and her young son, who was holding a package, standing on my front stoop. "Does Ainsley live here?" the woman asked. "She does," I answered, and they explained that a package for her had been delivered to their house, which has the...
I was excited to learn, while working on the Pulse feature this week, that I am not the only one who struggles with New Year’s resolutions. I found all sorts of encouraging statistics. Twenty-five percent give up their resolutions after a week, 64 percent after the first month. Only 9 percent of resolvers are successful — and only 41 percent bother to make them in the first place. After decades of failure making resolutions, I tried a new strategy two years ago. I made a “21 for 21” list of nonresolutions, following a sugge...
I've learned over the past three years that change is inevitable - even when it comes to cherished holiday traditions. But there's one I plan to continue as long as I can. The final issue of the year also happens to be the issue before Ainsley's birthday, and I've used this space for more than a decade to pen her an annual letter. I typically make the same two points in my introduction each year and will do so again. I am grateful she has yet to object to the very public...
More than a decade ago associate editor Ken Knutson and I covered one of my favorite Christmas stories of all time. Hinsdale's Wes Gibson and his elves - or rather, employees - from Gibson Consulting Inc. visited homes in this village, Burr Ridge and Willowbrook to bring Christmas to six families who were clients of HCS Family Services. They baked cookies, brought and decorated trees and left a host of gifts to be opened Christmas morning. One family received a new car,...
I feel like Sally Field at the 1985 Oscars. You like us. You really like us. Field unfortunately was misquoted and that's not exactly what she said (read more about it online, if you wish). And we didn't just win an Oscar - or even a newspaper award. But we have been looking through responses to our request for voluntary contributions to the paper, which we solicited in a recent letter to all Hinsdaleans and in ads in the paper (one appears today on Page 15). And they are...
Ainsley enjoyed a piece of chocolate with her breakfast this morning. Chocolate (unless it's in the Nutella on her waffles) typically isn't on the morning menu at our house, but it will be for the next 24 days as Ainsley opens the numbered squares on her Advent calendar. She'll also take one of the characters from a numbered pocket and Velcro it in the manger scene on a large fabric Advent calendar hanging on the fridge. It was a gift her first Christmas from my friend (and...
My cell phone rang at 4:50 p.m. Saturday. It was Slonoff. “It’s a little early,” I thought to myself. “But this has gotta be a call about Thanksgiving.” I was right. Jim was searching for frozen cranberry juice cocktail to make his cranberry sauce — which is actually my cranberry sauce — for Thanksgiving dinner. Then on Monday I heard this snippet of conversation: “I make a sauce of brown sugar, vanilla and butter and then I pour that over the sweet potatoes,” Jim...
Monday mornings can be tough. This past one, I lost my credit card before I even got in the shower. I had planned to combine my morning walk with a quick errand to pick up some cold medicine for my daughter. So I put my credit card in my pocket with my earbuds and headed out. To get a full 2 miles in, I headed in the opposite direction of the store for the first half of my walk. By the time I had circled back to my house, I decided to give up on the rest of my walk and just dr...
