Round about 2 p.m. this afternoon, I’m coming back to my real life. For the last two days, I’ve just been pretending. Last June, my choral group sang at the yearly fundraiser for New Music Works, the Avant Garden Party. The AGP started in the yard of my former wonderful neighbor Lou Harrison, a composer…

I finally got around to watching a TED video of a talk by Michael Specter which had been hanging around in my browser for days. Someone, somewhere, recommended the video, and I’m glad I finally got around to watching it. The slogan on TED’s website is this: “Gather the world’s leading thinkers and doers, offer…

It’s the end of an era at our house. This morning I went out for my walk, and didn’t return with a newspaper in my hand. Instead, I came inside, got the Nook, and ordered a subscription. Within seconds, the content of the newspaper, though not the newspaper itself, was in my hand. This is…

I’m often struck at how different our children are when they’re not with me. Actually, I remember that as a child, I enjoyed interacting with other people when my family wasn’t around. I felt like I could actually be myself, because amongst all those people who knew me best, I was stuck in a pre-determined…