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Have you ever longed for a flavor? A favorite food you remember from childhood or a particular dish? A little over three years ago, my family made an unexpected cross-country move from Texas to Chicago. After years of training, my husband was offered a job as a cardiologist and medical professor at UIC. It was a great position but it meant moving nearly 1,000 miles away from our friends and family. Suddenly my familiar life changed. Our old home sold in days. I left my job as...
“Wow, you look warm,” someone comments. This is a frequent occurrence for me. Neither dewy nor glowing, I simply appear uncomfortably hot. Which, in fact, I am. But there’s a lot more than sweat going on; allow me to discuss it. Menopause is, of course, a natural phenomenon, and it’s hardly life-threatening. It can be awful, though, and frankly becomes worse because no one wants to talk about it. We often perceive menopause as embarrassing, a painful acknowledgment of aging,...
My teenage son, who runs cross country, shrugs and cringes slightly when I invite him to run with me these days. Once a junior Olympian and collegiate runner myself, I'm no slouch, but there's no denying that my speed and my cool-ness have faded with time. When I look in the mirror, I sometimes see my 18-year-old self with endless energy and a mischievous grin, but sometimes, I imagine I see one of my grandmas - shrunken, crotchety and glowering back at me. It's hard to see my...
Vacation. It is a time of rest, relaxation and recuperation. It is a time when families can get away and re-strengthen their bonds. It is a time when the rat race of the American lifestyle can be safely left behind and the relaxed lifestyle of other countries and cultures can be embraced. Yeah, right. We are Americans, and we can leave America behind, but the American in us is always strong and manages to shine brightly, even during our vacations. Take my trip to Paris last su...
My baby just turned 10 and, even setting aside my emotional baggage over that, it is a momentous birthday. This milestone involves special traditions in our home, the most sentimental of which is a letter from me entitled "10 Wishes." I outline 10 things about my child right now that make me proud and 10 wishes I have for their future selves. As I worked on this last letter, I realized it is a list that we could all use right now. So I humbly offer up an abbreviated version...
I knew this column would be written one day - I just wasn't sure when. After 12 years in Hinsdale, the Neiman family is packing up and heading back to the West Coast. When I dragged my family here from California, I made my wife, Nancy, a deal. Once our daughter Madison graduated from high school, we could move back if my job allowed it. Madison graduated from Central in May and Nancy called in the contract. But where to go? Back to California? Nope, to the surprise of many....
On Thursday morning, the alarms went off. All of them. Every cell phone. Every egg timer. Every theft alert in every Walgreens, Walmart, Best Buy and bank. In an instant, every man, woman and child was awash in the clanging, clicking, beeping, buzzing, trilling, chiming, whooping, squealing cacophony that blanketed the Earth. Sump pump alarms sent homeowners scrambling to the basement and crashing through dusty cardboard boxes, wondering if maybe it wasn't time to start Marie...
I recently read about a study that investigated the relationship of human happiness to random social contact. Scientists found that even momentary social interaction with a stranger increases our well-being. As simple as making eye contact or smiling and nodding - whatever the interaction was - it apparently makes an actual, chemical difference in our brains. This story seems similar to a refrain we've been hearing for a while now: the idea that, for all the technological...
I have long dreamed about backpacking the Appalachian Trail and in July, that dream became reality. I've gone on organized hiking trips in the past, but this adventure would be different. No guide or timeline - just fly in, strap on my pack and head north. I found a hiking partner, bought a one-way ticket to Dulles, took an Uber to Harper's Ferry, W.V., and started walking. Our daily routine consisted of hiking, eating and sleeping. The distance we hiked depended on the sorene...
The classic film "Gaslight" (1944), starring Charles Boyer and Ingrid Bergman, has been a favorite of mine for years. (Spoiler alert: Set in Victorian London, the dashing, dastardly Boyer manipulates his wife, Bergman, into believing she's going mad. Meanwhile, he surreptitiously searches for her jewels.) I first watched this movie on TV while home sick from school. The plot was irresistible, as was the Beethoven sonata prominently featured in the soundtrack - a piece I was...
Sometimes in life you just have to move on. For me, this time, it happened suddenly. In fact, if you had asked me just a month ago if I was excited to go to college, I'd have said something like, "No, it's still only summer. I have all of senior year left. I just am not ready." The idea of college is a scary thing to a 17-year-old girl whose heart is still set on being a 17-year-old girl and whose mind has told her she still has lots of time to be one. But recently it feels...
