A friend tells you what you want to hear, a kick-ass friend tells you what you need to hear.
It takes an incredible amount of trust and vulnerability to let people see our personal warts—the blemishes we develop over a lifetime as a result of bad choices, actions that are inconsistent with our value systems, embarrassments, [...]

I tell my son I love him so many times each day the words simply whisper across his ears without regard, but in the quiet moments before he falls asleep is when the emotion seems to resonate.  I’ll breath, “Mommy loves you more than the moon and all the stars in the sky,” and in [...]

Do you ever have this overwhelming need to do something crazy?
Every now and then I go through periods of time where I’m discontent, incredibly hyper, and I start to drive myself a little more insane. I love my life and family but let’s admit it — Suburbia can become a tad monotonous. For someone who [...]

Words strung together become clichés for a reason; they’re repeated and digested and generalized as stones of truth. They hurt or caress when the intent for either is nonexistent. We’re all simply trying to communicate, to tell our own truth, but for good or bad there’s nothing more powerful than our words.
I just started reading, [...]

I’ve spent considerable time over the last six months thinking about purpose. My purpose. Trying to define it.
My husband, being the retired corporate executive that he is, and whose mind is trained to create strategy, keeps prompting me to stop spending time in the how and to give myself up to the what…traveling without a [...]

“Do you think healthcare is a right?” I asked my husband while sitting with him at the dinner table.
He took the bait but not three minutes into the conversation he was already frustrated with my position and was about to end his opposition by ending the conversation.
“Listen,” I said. “I really need to have brain [...]

Since Aaron’s birth five years ago, I’ve had a plethora of experiences related to the mommy wars…the feud in which working moms and stay-at-home moms underhandedly engage. I’ve turned the other cheek as moms disparaged my choice to work and clucked their tongues. I’ve listened to women make comments, Why bother to have children if [...]

My hair is longer than it has been in at least a decade. After cheating on my stylist the last time I ventured out for a shearing, I haven’t had the desire to walk into a salon. I’ve been fooling myself (an easy task) by having a little internal discussion proclaiming longer hair in the [...]

It’s difficult to watch the people we love age. I’m 37 and in a few short weeks my husband will be 64-years-old. I’ve felt the years change him, seen how time has frustrated his joints and caressed away his hair, but I’ve never really cared; the intelligence lapping through his mind is my quintessential eros. [...]

I started blogging because I needed some place to release a creative muse, and I was trying to avoid a late-night chocolate binge. I know Shout isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, or coffee, or wine. Hell, it’s certainly not everyone’s idea of a good, stiff drink. I’ve gone back and forth with myself to create [...]