Sharon Kapnick

Rose Madeline Mula: If You Can’t Stand the Heat

Rose Madeline Mula Writes: “It was with considerable trepidation, therefore, that I entered the kitchen of my hostess, the legendary actress, Joan Fontaine, one long-ago Thanksgiving morning, to offer my assistance. Acting was not Miss Fontaine’s only talent. Not by a long shot. She was also a hole-in-one golfer, a prize-winning fisherwoman, a hot air…
An Undocumented Childhood by Rose Madeline Mula

Rose Mula Writes: Some people never leave home without their American Express card; I never leave home without a camera. Digitized pictures of the twenty-five countries and forty-plus states of America that I’ve visited since my first tour of exotic New Hampshire constantly flash on my computer monitors and digital frames throughout my home, helping…
Julia Sneden Wrote: Love Your Library

Julia Sneden Wrote: My mind’s eye can still see the face of the Children’s Librarian, although I have long since forgotten her name. We will be wise to continue to back up our knowledge of history and literature and art and science with hard copy. She kept up with my reading level, suggesting writers and…
Julia Sneden Wrote: If The Shoe Fits … You Can Bet It’s Not Fashionable

Julia Sneden Wrote: My mother was a mini Imelda Marcos. She kept upwards of 40 pairs of shoes well into her 80’s, and was crushed when she had to give up high heels following a heart attack at the age of 89. Her sole criterion in buying shoes was style, not comfort, and she was…
Joan L.Cannon Wrote: A Family Inheritance: More Than ‘Things’ … Emblems of Our Lives

Joan Cannon wrote: As one advances in years, one accumulates possessions the way a caddis fly larva accumulates grit. The glue that makes us carry it all along with us is in a way self-secreted as well. However, it’s psychic rather than physical — emotional rather than material. Perhaps the most obvious example is a…
Julia Sneden Wrote: Old Dogs, New Tricks

Julia Sneden wrote: At the age of 37, I started a new career as a kindergarten teacher. My first day on the job, the lead teacher, who was in her 70’s and scared me every bit as much as she scared the children, watched me writing a note. “You’ll have to change the way you…
Joan Cannon Writes: Finding the Right Excuse; Committing Words to Paper Because …

Joan Cannon Writes: Think of the poets and novelists and playwrights whose words sink into the consciousness of thousands and even millions and remain there, as emblems, guides, beacons of hope or warnings of disasters, and the excuse (as if one is needed) presents itself. Maybe there’s information or a revelation for some unknown viewer…
Joan Cannon Asked: What is a Book Club? An Old-Fashioned Book Report? A Program Given By an Author? What Is the Accepted Practice?

Joan L. Cannnon wrote: A year or so ago, I was invited to attend a tea given by the combined membership of all the book clubs in the town where I now live. A presentation was scheduled for the proprietor of the much-loved local independent book store cum gift shop. She is a legend in…
Moving … Forward? Highlights From a Fairly Long-Running Sitcom

Joan L. Cannon writes: Several hundred pounds of bookshelves that were to be left behind for Habitat, and one for a friend, arrived here where I have no place to put them. Such treasures as all my baking pans, including the ones that fit my toaster oven, are somewhere between here and North Carolina. How…
A Trip to New York City: The ABC of It; Why Children’s Books Matter

Adventurous avant-garde picture books from Bolshevik Russia; a Civil War-era patriotic reader published for children of the Confederate States; a Noah Webster speller aimed at teaching a uniquely American English to the schoolchildren of the newly formed US; the manuscript of James Stephens’s Irish Fairy Tales to help preserve Irish tradition in a time of…
Elaine Soloway’s Caregiving Series: Crime Scene Investigation Chicago

My husband and I had already yanked inside-out all the pockets of his clothing. Had already peered under the bed, under the nightstand, under the couch cushions, under the couch. When all of these turned up empty, a dark thought entered my head: Tommy must have left them in the front door and some miscreant…
Don’t Look Away: Elder Justice — More Federal Coordination and Public Awareness Needed

Officials also cited the need for greater awareness of elder abuse by the public and training of direct service providers who interact with older adults on a regular basis, to help prevent elder abuse or recognize its symptoms. Five of the nine regional agency officials GAO spoke with said elder justice issues need to be…
First Flight: The Tradition of Airplanes Communicating With the Earthbound Goes On

Margaret Cullison writes: Flush from the post-war economic boom, Dad bought his first airplane, a 1946 cream and red Taylorcraft BC-12D. I recall the anticipation stirring in the pit of my stomach as we waited for someone to prime the propeller and yell out above the noise of the wind and the engine, “all clear”,…
Internet Pharmacies: Federal Agencies and States Face Challenges Combating Rogue Sites, Particularly Those Abroad

Don’t buy from sites that offer to prescribe a prescription drug for the first time without a physical exam, sell a prescription drug without a prescription, or sell drugs not approved by the FDA. Use sites that provide convenient access to a licensed pharmacist who can answer your questions. Avoid sites that do not identify…
Women of Note: Deborah Hersman, NTSB Chairman

“Our mission is to understand not only what happened but why and how it happened, … We want to make sure we do not have events where interstate bridges drop into the waterway below them. That is not what we expect.” “I think too many parents — we’re all guilty of doing as I say…
Swinging From the Branches of My Family Tree

Roberta McReynolds writes: The genealogy bug bit me when I was exposed to this ‘illness’ through my Aunt Bessie. She would spread out her albums of family research at annual family reunions, hoping to deliberately infect the younger generations. I honestly don’t know if my elders would be more pleased or horrified at the results;…
CDC: Overdoses of Prescription Opioid Pain Relievers and Other Drugs Among Women

Since 2007, more women have died from drug overdoses than from motor vehicle traffic injuries, and in 2010, four times as many died as a result of drug overdose as were victims of homicide. Men are more likely than women to die from drug overdose; however, between 1999 and 2010, the percentage increase in the…
Clarifying Patients’ Wishes: New End-of-Life Measure Quietly Sweeps the US

“We needed a portable system of actionable medical orders that would follow the patient and be consistently respected across settings of care, whether that was in a long-term nursing care facility, home, hospice, the ambulance or an acute care hospital,” Dr. Susan Tolle has said. POLSTs are often confused with advanced directives, but they differ…