S. and I sat at an outdoor table at a restaurant narrating our imagined lives with the assorted guys walking down the street. She wanted the guy with the Hummer and I chose the Starbucks guy. That pretty much sums up our tastes.
continue...

Any self-respecting fashionista in the dating world knows there's a difference between Louis Vuitton and baggage. I recently signed up for a friendship networking service that introduced me to two guys. Bachelor Number One couldn't tell a Louis Vuitton from a fake. That is, he had baggage that was best left at the door.
continue...

On the last Thursday of the month, I take off from work so I can see Dr. Altman in the city. I arrive a half hour early and pop into Sephora before walking around the block to his office. The pull to browse this cosmetics emporium is too strong to resist, and so even though I can’t afford much, I buy one of the cheaper lipsticks.
continue...

Journalist Linda Ellerbee got it right: “Change is one form of hope. To risk change is to believe in tomorrow.” As a new year begins, I reflect on one life-changing decision I’ve made: to institute a cross titer from my old medication to a newer atypical. Last spring, the drug I was on for 20 years stopped working. My psychiatrist executed the switch with a sure hand. It has been like a miracle: the paranoia lifted.
continue...

My goal is to be the Rachael Ray of the recovery movement. Have you ever seen this chatty, gregarious cooking expert and lifestyle show host? One day I watched her on TV while I waited in the doctor’s office. Her infectious good humor cheered me so much that I wanted to tape her shows and replay them at night when I got home from work.
continue...

It was my mother's birthday, and we sat at a table in Luigi's, in my neighborhood, eating dinner. It was just the two of us. She'd taken the bus over the bridge, and we met on this rainy night inside the restaurant.
continue...

It's 3 p.m. on a Sunday at the coffeehouse. I'm here with friends who've all been down the rocky road I traveled. I'm sunk in the comfort of a marigold chair.
continue...