Today is the anniversary of my mom’s passing nine years ago. She came down with the flu on March 29th, 2000 and quickly without warning or anyone knowing, went into congestive heart failure twenty-four hours later and was gone. She was 59. She…

I grew up in an overachiever family. And, as the oldest of seven kids, it was not easy to refuse the Kool-Aid. As my husband, son and I were out bike riding around the beautiful lake in the center of our city Saturday morning, we stumbled…