A Note of Thanks to Those Who Make This Blog Possible — Above All, My Husband Steve

As a new year gets underway, I feel moved to make a statement of heartfelt thanks here — thanks to my husband Steve, who makes it possible for me to blog (and read and write) by assuming the responsibility of being the primary breadwinner of our household. As some of you know (but you may not all know this), I don't have a full-time job, while Steve does. 

A Footnote to Previous Posting: Thank You for Your Comments and Support

It also goes without saying (I'm tagging this comment to what I just posted) that I am deeply grateful to all of you for your comments here this past week, for your emails, and your generous expressions of support and encouragement. I am probably not going to be able to respond to each comment left here following my two postings early in the week. 

Gratitude: A Story from Our Recent Trip

Gratitude is the highest form of acceptance. Like patience, it is one of the catalytic agents, one of the alchemist's secrets, for turning dross to gold, hell to heaven, death to life (Stephen Levine, A Year to Live: How to Live This Year As If It Were Your Last [NY: Bell Tower, 1997).

A Bit of Good News: Paperblog Chooses Me as Blogger of the Day

Sharing a bit of good news with you all: Paperblog chose me as its blogger of the day this past Tuesday (and see also here). I'm very grateful to that site and its readers for this vote of confidence in the work I do here--and to all of you readers for your interest in what I write. I'm particularly grateful to a number of readers of this blog who have contributed support in various ways, including one reader who has sent astonishingly generous gifts over the course of several years, and again recently. Too kind . . . .