I have a great brother. When I told him I was planning to retire he gave me the surprise of a lifetime. He let me use his miles to go on a trip of my dreams. I had to choose between Madrid, Barcelona, Lisbon, London or Panama. I chose Panama, why? It is close to New...
Ouch, I walked into the open closet door. The green and yellow Sprite bottle was sticking out of the bulging recycling bag. How many times must I ask my children to return the bottles? It’s summer, it’s raining, and the pool is closed. My three children are looking at...
Decluttering: for some the word conjures up death. Black garbage bags piled on the sidewalk in front of a house. How quickly a house turns over after the occupants die. The house is emptied and then taken over by the next owner.My parents died many years ago and some...
The frozen squash is in the oven. Put up the fish, 350 degrees for thirty minutes. I found the supper on the table, note attached. This was my life when I was in middle school. My mom, Gladys Reznik Frank, was going back to school. After raising children, being a...
Shoshanna Keats Jaskoll marched into the meeting like a woman on a mission. It was a Saturday night, and we were here to sign postnuptial agreements. Shoshanna was on her way to Lakewood. She was leaving back to Israel in two days, but she stopped off in Cedarhurst...
“Help,” I say to myself, “Everyone is coming for Shabbat this weekend and I have to prepare twenty different main dishes!” Or do I? It can be daunting when you have a bunch of different guests coming, each with very different dietary needs. This one is a vegetarian,...
Maybe you received a large scholarship from a school that you couldn’t turn down. Maybe you didn’t get accepted at your “dream school”, but you did get accepted to another school that was close by or had other things going for it. There are many reasons that a person...
My father, Leon Frank, survived the Nazis by hiding in the forests of Poland and living on potato peels, wild mushrooms, berries and beans. He never imagined the food scraps he ate would save his life. In today’s world, we are literally throwing away the best parts of...
When your daughter comes home from a school trip and tells you to stop using single-use plastic water bottles, it gets your attention. When the sanitation people tell you after a big holiday that you are the garbage queen of the block, it is time to take notice. As a...
When you are the parent of a child who doesn’t fit the mold – who is non-religious or who identifies as lesbian, gay, trans, bi, or queer – you often find yourself between a rock and a hard place, and your first inclination is to hide. In fact, it quickly becomes very...