The National MS Society has named Gail Blanke’s wonderful book Throw Out Fifty Things as a finalist for their books-for-a-better-life award!

But, it is funny how difficult it is to let go of the daily news blasts from your children, or the knowledge of who they’re with and what they’re doing.  I find that as long as I know where he is (or should be), like a class or crew practice, I can have a visual in my head of how he’s doing.  It’s the other times–the weekends and evenings–where I really feel the need to find out where he is so I can imagine his comings and goings.

 I think these obsessions/neuroses I have are just an outgrowth of survival of the species.  I think that they are hardwired into mothers as a way to protect their young.  So I’m not embarrassed by them.  But I do need to figure out how to control them, especially because my kids are pretty darn safe (I hope), at a good college, and don’t need me to worry about them every day.  In fact, I think they’d be horrified if they knew I did so!

One way I know I can calm myself down is by reading Katrina Kenison’s words in THE GIFT OF AN ORDINARY DAY.  I’ve been working with Katrina for the last couple of years on this book and I have to say her emails with draft chapters got me through two kids’  college applications processes.  She reminds us that our children do not need our hovering or our controlling them when they’re teens. What they need is for us to have confidence in them, knowing they may fail, but that they’ll be okay.  And, ultimately they’ll succeed on their own and that will give them the confidence they need.  They’ll figure it out.  In fact, a beautiful essay from the book will be excerpted in the October issue of Family Circle. It is about her 9th grade son trying out for the basketball team and the heartbreak, but ultimately success and self-knowledge he earned from that challenge.

I will reread another chapter tonight and take strength from Katrina’ insights about letting go, and about finding beauty, grace and transformation in the ordinary days of our life…and maybe on Saturday I’ll call my sons!

No fear, though! You can re-vamp your energy level by eating a few key things at the right time!

There is a lot of advice out there about what to eat, but luckily I have weeded through the complicated and long-winded stuff, and found a great little blog post that offers simple advice.  

 Check it out here: http://blog.fitnesstown.ca/2009/08/30/your-secret-power-foods/

p.s. notice the post references our very own book The Good Mood Diet by expert Susan Kleiner!

…Enter science!                                                    

In today’s New York Times Nicholas Wade wrote about how scientists have now found a way to eat less without really eating less. In other words, scientists are now testing a drug that allows people to eat their normal amount, but only absorb 70% of the calories. One of the drugs currently being explored is called Resveratrol. Discovered in 2003, Resveratrol can be found in grape skins and red wine. It is one kind of sirtuin activator, an artificial calorie restrictor. Laboratory tests on mice placed under this drug have been found to live 30% and 40% longer than their counterparts.

Tests on Resveratrol are ongoing, but many scientists are already optimistic. Among them is Dr. David Sinclair of Harvard Medical School, who believes that sirtuin activating drugs would postpone diseases that come with aging, such as Parkinson’s, leading to healthier years down the road, and the possibility of a longer life.

If these developments continue to be successful, the results could be astronomical for baby boomers. Who knows—in twenty years’ time it might be possible for seniors to be leading life to the very fullest!

What will you do when you get the call that a loved one has had a heart attack or a stroke?  Or when you realize that a family member is too frail to live alone, but too healthy for a nursing home?

Journalist Paula Span shares the resonant narratives of several families who faced these questions.  Each family contemplates the alternatives in elder care (from assisted living to multigenerational living to home care, nursing care, and at the end, hospice care) and chooses the right path for its needs.  Span writes about the families’ emotional challenges, their practical discoveries, and the good news that some of them find a situation that has worked for them and their loved ones.  And many find joy in the duty of caring for an older loved one.

There are 45 million Americans caring for family members currently, and as the    77 million boomers continue to age, this number will only go up.  Paula Span’s stories are revealing and informative.  They give a sense of all the emotional and practical factors that go into the major decisions about caregiving, so that readers will be better able to figure out what to do when the time comes for them and their loved ones.

Here are some great online resources (all free) that we recommend for exercising your brain:

Weekly puzzles from the NY Times Crossword’s archives

Online Sudoku puzzles (also from the NY Times)

MSN games online: Bridge, Hearts, Texas Hold’Em, TextTwist

Facebook’s Scrabble and Chess Applications

Orisinal’s series of beautifully animated online games

Starting a blog through LiveJournal, WordPress, or Blogger

Participating in National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo)

Checking out a book from the NEA’s The Big Read list

Reading the poem of the day at Poetry Daily

Following The Two-Way, NPR’s news blog

Reading about, or creating articles for, unusual locations at Atlas Obscura

Solving a Virtual Rubik’s Cube. (Need help? Check out this tutorial by one-time world record holder Leyan Lo)

Learning to play a new instrument by searching for video tutorials on YouTube

It’s here! The 40^th Anniversary of what some of us would consider our most memorable summer. Whether you were there to slog through the muddy fields yourself, or you heard about it from friends, it’s hard to forget Woodstock and August of 1969.

In celebration of the good times that summer and all those that have followed, we present to you a small collection of sites and events that might help you to revisit that weekend:

The original Woodstock documentary was released in 1970, and was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry in 1996.

A new film called “TAKING WOODSTOCK” is set for release in late August. Visit the IMDB website for more information and to view trailers for the film.

NEWSEUM WOODSTOCK EXHIBIT:

If you happen to be near DC on Saturday Aug. 15, join former New York Times journalist Bernard Collier, as he talks about what made Woodstock newsworthy.

Share your own memories of Woodstock with us! What do you think was so unique about the event? Were you forced to stay at home or did you head off with some friends to camp out in the fields? Have you been to anything like it since?

In fact,  Baby Boomers currently have the highest rate of starting a new business of any age group in the U.S.

U.S. News and World Report published an article the 0ther day stating that “over the past decade, the highest rate of entrepreneurial activity was among people between the ages of 55 and 64,” and that “about 21 percent of all workers who change careers after age 51 are self-employed at their new jobs.”  It goes on to say that after making the decision to start a business, “entrepreneurial baby boomers need to pick a place to set up shop.”  Here at Springboard we took particular interest because, frankly, we couldn’t agree more!

(http://www.usnews.com/articles/business/retirement/2009/06/29/10-great-places-for-entrepreneurs-to-retire.html)

While the article focusses on great places for entrepreneurial boomers to retire, we feel that the real expert on the subject is our author Barbara Corcoran, real estate guru, who wrote an entire book devoted to the subject of where to “live your life” called Nextville. Not only does Corcoran’s book include a quiz to help you figure out where and how you want to live, but it breaks each location down by cost, weather, median age, and local activities. Nextville is actually about to come out in paperback, and includes a new forward by Corcoran about how to survive the current (read: tough!) real estate market.

For more info, check out Barbara Corcoran’s website directly:

http://barbaracorcoran.com/

In his poem, “Facing It,” celebrated writer and Vietnam veteran Yusef Komunyakaa recalls a visit to the Vietnam War Memorial in Washington, D.C.  His language paints a powerful picture of a man whose memories of war have been engraved onto him as permanently as the names carved on the wall.

Facing It
by Yusef Komunyakaa

My black face fades,
hiding inside the black granite.
I said I wouldn’t,
dammit: No tears.
I’m stone. I’m flesh.
My clouded reflection eyes me
like a bird of prey, the profile of night
slanted against morning. I turn
this way–the stone lets me go.
I turn that way–I’m inside
the Vietnam Veterans Memorial
again, depending on the light
to make a difference.
I go down the 58,022 names,
half-expecting to find
my own in letters like smoke.
I touch the name Andrew Johnson;
I see the booby trap’s white flash.
Names shimmer on a woman’s blouse
but when she walks away
the names stay on the wall.
Brushstrokes flash, a red bird’s
wings cutting across my stare.
The sky. A plane in the sky.
A white vet’s image floats
closer to me, then his pale eyes
look through mine. I’m a window.
He’s lost his right arm
inside the stone. In the black mirror
a woman’s trying to erase names:
No, she’s brushing a boy’s hair.

(source: The Academy of American Poets Website)

* * *

More Poems About the Vietnam War:

• “At the Vietnam Memorial” by George Bilgere
• “Advent 1966″ by Denise Levertov
• “Vietnam” by Michael Collier
• “Driving through Minnesota During the Hanoi Bombings” by Robert Bly
• “The Asians Dying” by W.S. Merwin
• “Song of Napalm” by Bruce Weigl

Famous Poems About Other Wars, Past and Present:

• “Here, Bullet” by Brian Turner [Iraq War]
• “The Death of the Ball Turrett Gunner” by Randall Jarrell [WWII]
• “Dulce et Decorum Est” by Wilfred Owen [WWI]
• “The Blue and the Gray” by Francis Miles Finch [Civil War]
• “The Charge of the Light Brigade” by Alfred Lord Tennyson [Crimean War]
• “Paul Revere’s Ride” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow [Revolutionary War]