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What's it like to live in a small yet sophisticated farm community of 7,000 after decades of living in big cities and upscale suburbs?  Life certainly is simpler when the main "downtown" consists of two major streets and one stoplight, and the busiest gathering spots are a coffee-bread store, public library, and the oldest inn in America. The biggest events in town are an annual Dutchess County Fair, established more than 160 years ago and now filled with rides, farm animals, and food stands, and the newer but equally busy Sheep & Wool festival, which brings scores of knitters to...

From the first frequent query of “How are you?” to the more intimate, “Do you have good chemistry and are you sleeping together?” we’ve found in our single status after 50, nothing seems off-limits. Whether it’s illness—“Is he in pain and suffering?” to financial, “How are you managing and was your settlement good enough?” the questions never seem to stop—like rapid-fire bullets in a war zone. And we’re the target.  We love the concern of acquaintances, good friends, and family…sometimes, depending on our mood, the question asked, tone, and our relationship to the interrogator. However, we wonder if the sharing...

Don’t sweat it, Meg, I think to myself. So you lost your phone. Again. You’ll find it.  Call it. I dial. No ring. I panic. OMG, I turned the ringer off at dinner.  I console myself thinking: I’ll find it but no problem, my information is in the cloud--whatever that means. I can always buy a new phone. Ugh! The expense. And I don’t like change.    I’m frantic. I have to find it. It’s too late to call the restaurant where I dined in case it fell out of my purse.  In the meantime…  I start the hunt.  Step...

When stuck inside in winter because of the cold, ice and snow, it’s an opportune time to chill and do what you normally don’t have time to do.  You can veg out or be really productive—and try new things. You'll be surprised how terrific you will feel after tackling a new recipe for paella or buche de noel, soaking for an hour in a hot tub, cleaning and dusting your bookshelves which you haven’t had time to do in a year, working on that novel which you’ve been writing in fits and starts in your head, or just sitting on...

As the atavistic adage goes: “With age comes wisdom” if you look and listen well. Old age may suck as you watch your parents' friends and family members die and as their own bodies break down if they're lucky enough to reach their Eighties and then Nineties.  I know this firsthand. I have watched my mother hit 80, 85, 90, 95, and soon 97! How remarkable, my friends say. And I know I’m lucky to have her around. However, it's become an increasingly time consuming second job for me to be there emotionally and physically, socially, even if not financially,...