Burnt Chocolate Stories

 A few months ago, there was a young man here, a cellist student, who performed for the residents at Saint John's. He had studied abroad, Spain I think. Some of his family and friends were in the audience. Saint John's often gives young musicians an opportunity to perform in front of an audience, a great use of our auditorium space.    Our cellist began with a very difficult piece and, unfortunately, lost his way towards the end and abruptly stopped. He could have pretended he'd reached the end with a fake flurry. Instead of being embarrassed, he laughed and said, "Well, I knew that might happen and I'm glad I got my most difficult piece out of the way first. Now I can relax." Impressive. I can offer the flip side of that. When I was a little girl, I started taking piano lessons when I was about ten years old, something I had been begging my mother to allow me to do for nearly a year. She was reluctant to give me lessons because my older sister had quit after ...

If you haven't seen the movie Joy , it's worth your time. It's the true story of the world's first in vitro fertilization baby in 1978. Robert Edwards, Patrick Steptoe and Jean Purdy were a devoted team that worked tirelessly for ten years to help infertile women conceive. At the very end, the commentary said that while the men received recognition and awards for their efforts, Jean Purdy was excluded and did not receive any acknowledgement until 2015, many years after her death. Seeing that sent me down that rabbit hole where I have been before, reading and learning about the many dozens of disregarded women who have given us great literature, scientific discoveries, art and research. Why were they excluded from recognition, rewards, history books and college courses? Is it fear or jealousy or both? Is that exclusion still going on or has it stopped? I've actually no idea. But I do think that it may very well be continuing, but, hopefully, to a lesser extent. In Ch...

We have John Calvin to thank for the work ethic that permeates our culture.  Wasting time sleeping too much or relaxing were literally considered sins. His belief system seeped into most American's bones and became the reason we struggle with so much angst during our retirement years. We fight against taking a nap, continually search for purpose and productivity during our waking hours, and feel we are taking up space that could be occupied by someone more worthy. It's as if there is someone out there taking measurements of our efforts and putting in a red check mark for any failures. Europe operates on a whole different plane. Especially southern Europe. Italians, Greeks, Spaniards never swallowed this line of thinking. They nap in the afternoons, eat a leisurely dinner, open their shops when the mood strikes them. I suspect their retirement years look pretty much the same as it has for most of their lives although I've no proof of that. So here we are, struggling to make ...