Sabbatical!

Since I worry about the pitfalls Andrei Codrescu apparently fell victim to (see Nov. 19 post), I liked the idea expressed by my long-ago bridesmaid, now a grandmother happily retired on the West Coast. "It's nice to have a new start in life's next chapter and take your time filling in the pages," she wrote on my Facebook page. "I said 'no' to anything new for six months and called it my sabbatical."

That sounded like a great idea so I wrote her back for more thoughts. Now that she's been retired almost two years, she says, "I do get more ideas than I would have time to do so I think on most for awhile and if still sounds like fun, move ahead. If it stops being fun, I try something else. The main thing I have to watch out for is not adding too many 'little' things as they add up. If I start something new, what goes on the back burner? And some days it's nice to be just free to take a walk, read, whatever. Enjoy the new experiences."

Old friends really are gold, aren't they!