It was everything I expected it to be, and more – which I also expected. I wrote last week about the Toastmasters District Conference I would be attending over the weekend – my first in Georgia, although I attended many when I lived in Minnesota. I expected to see a few people there whom I already knew, as well as to meet and get to know many others – and I did. I expected the educational sessions to be not only educational, but inspiring and [...]
“Everything old is new again.” I’m not sure where or when that saying originated, but it’s what I’m feeling right now. I’ll be spending this weekend in Atlanta at the Toastmasters District 14 Conference. This isn’t my first Toastmasters conference. I’ve attended a number of district conferences and conventions, and several regional and international conventions since I first joined Toastmasters in 2005. But that was when I lived in Minnesota. This is my first district conference since moving to Georgia two years ago, and I’m [...]
My first-ever trip abroad was with a tour group to Paris in 2005. We had a full and glorious itinerary, visiting the Louvre, the Eiffel Tower, Versailles, Monet’s Garden, Sacre Coeur, and other famous and not-so-famous-but-still-wonderful sites. Sadly, Notre Dame was not among them. It was on our original itinerary, but the day we left the States for Paris was the day Pope John Paul II died. In the following days and weeks, Catholic churches around the world – including Notre Dame, of course – [...]
I just bought a guitar. The decision wasn’t totally out of the blue, although it wasn’t exactly on my bucket list, either. I’ve always enjoyed music. I took piano lessons when I was in grade school, and I played French horn in the band from sixth grade through high school. I bought a guitar during my freshman year in college – inspired by a girl in my dorm who played the guitar and offered to teach me a few chords, and the fact that there [...]
I was surprised – honored, but surprised – when a friend and former coaching client contacted me recently and asked if she could interview me for her podcast. I felt honored, because my friend is amazingly accomplished. She has a PhD and is an ordained minister. She is certified in several areas of healing arts, and has a thriving business helping and teaching others to live an authentic, happy, purposeful life. She has published a book, developed a spiritual growth app, and produced dozens of [...]
It was just starting to drizzle as I got to my car after a meeting of my church group. I wasn’t carrying an umbrella, because it had been sunny and clear when the meeting started – although, to be honest, I rarely carry an umbrella anyway. If it looks like it’s going to rain, I usually just wear a jacket with a hood. As I got in my car, I could see dark, angry-looking clouds racing across the sky. There’s a nasty storm coming, I [...]
A friend of mine told me a story the other day that she warned me was going to be sad, but uplifting at the same time. She had been working on a craft project, and had that on her mind as she was going up and down the stairs retrieving supplies from different areas of the house. Because she was concentrating on that, she almost didn’t hear the quiet voice that whispered something inside her head. It was her mother’s voice – her mother who [...]
Note from Betty: Sometimes, as I'm writing my blog, I know what I want to say but the words just won't cooperate. That's what happened last week, and by the time I got the words right it was almost time for this week's blog, so I just waited till today to post it. My apologies to those who were wondering why there was no blog post last week! “Gee, but it’s great to be back home.” That’s the opening line of a Simon and Garfunkel song [...]
I rarely catch colds – maybe once every few years or so. So naturally, I came down with one a week before we were scheduled go visit our new granddaughter. I blame my son for jinxing me. "Be sure you're getting enough Vitamin C," he said in a phone conversation a few weeks earlier. "You don't want to get sick right before you come to see the baby." What made him even think of this was the fact that his brother-in-law had been planning to visit [...]
When my husband retired and we moved to Georgia – after 40 years in the Chicago area and 18 years in Minnesota, with a few other locations in between – we often said that we’d go back to visit family and friends up north, but never in the winter. That was before our son and daughter-in-law had a baby – our first grandchild – in the middle of January, in Minnesota. We were only joking, of course – well, half-joking – when we talked about [...]