Breaking Bad

Bobbing for Apples on Halloween

         I remember growing up in Maplewood, New Jersey and going to a Halloween party at my good friend's, Gibert. With the lights turned off and our imaginations turned wild, we stuck our hands in bowls of brains (wet spaghetti) and eyeballs (wet grapes). 
        Afterwards, we headed to the front porch of Frog Hall (the name of her house), and bobbed for apples ... hoping the cold water would quell our brains from the ickiness of the past hour.
       The gaggle of girls dressed as Charlie Chaplin, Dorothy in the 'Wizard of Oz," Buckwheat in "The Little Rascals," a Hobo and a pumpkin. Others wore long straight bangs, and it was questionable as to whether they were supposed to Twiggy, Davey from The Monkees, Paul from The Beatles or Mick from The Rolling Stones. From a certain angle, they could have also been Florence Henderson.
        My friends and I sipped cold apple cider, ate oven-hot ginger cookies ... and wondered whether any of the cute boys from Jefferson School would crash the party.         

        Halloween is a lot more fun when you're in 6th grade than it is now.

How the #Hashtag is Ruining the English Language

This is #hilllllarioussss.  (Click here, #play, #laugh, #think.)

America's Cup Victory!

Go TEAM ORACLE USA!!  The America's Cup stays in America!

Smile and Wave

Feeling land-bound?  Turn up the volume and close your eyes.

FINANCIAL TIMES from a 2-Foot Perspective

                                                                                                      Photo: Bonni Brodnick

At Home with Chubby

     There is something wonderful about town hardware stores. This is the one in Pound Ridge. It has a funny name, but I'll tell you one thing ... if Chubbby's doesn't have it, you don't need it.

An amazing thing ...

A dear friend, as well as his amazing wife, show great dignity and grace as he lives his last days. Miraculously -- and out of nowhere -- a beautiful peacock has wandered onto their property. They have no idea from whence it came.

A peacock is the symbol of ever-lasting life. Early belief holds that the Gates of Paradise are guarded by a pair of peacocks.

There is something allegorical, metaphysical, magical and incredible about the peacock appearing on their property at this time and place.

9/11 -- 12th Anniversary

Remembering our fellow Americans on the 12th anniversary of the September 11 attacks.

Ferry On Back to the Mainland

Summer's Fall

The summer wardrobe packed for this late-August vacation is now out of season. Blaring orange, pink and green patterns on my Lily Pulitzer shifts, once so light and bright on a hot summer evening, are now garish on a cool September night.

The ocean temperature is down 10-degrees from two weeks ago. On land, shrub oaks burst with baby acorns and purple asters are in post-August bloom.

Sunflowers reach as high as they will this growing season and the spring wheat planted in May bends gently with the wind. Clouds are brilliant white in the clear cerulean sky and, oh, the Golden Rods, so pointed in their gesture as they extend their flowered limbs.

It's an early-fall day on Martha's Vineyard. Glorious September on an island now quieted from the summer crowds.

Sunset on Martha's Vineyard

At a film society benefit in Vineyard Haven. The showers finally broke and a rainbow cast its arc over the harbor. Gorgeous and splendid. (Everyone lined up with their iPhones to take photos. I decided to buck the tide and experience the moment first-hand without technology blocking the moment.)

My New HUFFINGTON POST: "Empty Nest, New Beginnings"

" ... It was bad enough emptying the drawers of his antique bureau when he went off to college ... never-used heat bulbs from our long-deceased Bearded Dragon Lizard; and a T-shirt with the date of a spring concert in middle school ... "

With the end of summer, comes fall and new beginnings. Click here for my new Huffington Post.



~~ It's all about ... Bearded Dragon, Cub Scouts, Corgi, Empty Nest, First Apartment, Kids Growing Up, Leaving Home, Leaving-College, Little Boys, Moving ~~