The Resolute Woman

Category: families

  • People who matter stay with us

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    resolutewoman
    in ,

    Vivian’s “losses have piled one on another like layers of shale. Even if her mother lived, she would be dead now, the people who adopted her are dead. Her husband is dead. She has no children,” writes Christina Baker Kline in the book The Orphan Train. But Vivian knows “the people who matter in our…

  • Keep learning

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    resolutewoman
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    Tess is forced to analyze what has happened to her relationship with her husband in Liane Moriarity’s book The Husband’s Secret. “It seemed to her everyone had too much self-protective pride to truly strip down to their souls in front of their long-term partners,” Tess thinks to herself. “It was easier to pretend that there…

  • Endless forgiveness

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    resolutewoman
    in ,

    I read Boris Pasternak’s Dr. Zhivago, all about the horrors of World War I, the Russian Revolution and the Russian Civil War. By the time I finished the book, I was feeling a little down, but I found a good remedy to cheer me up. I spent a few days in Mitford with Father Tim…

  • Everything you need to know about love

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    resolutewoman
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    I found the book called Everything I Need to Know about Love I Learned from a Little Golden Book by Diane Muldrow on a table with other books for Valentine’s gifts at Barnes & Nobles. One page featured an illustration of Little Red Riding Hood. “Of course, there are a lot of wolves out there,”…

  • Like a wall?

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    resolutewoman
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    Harold misses his wife, Maureen, even though they had lived together for years in silence, never talking, never relating. “He and Maureen could pass hours without saying a word, but her presence was like a wall that you expected to be there, even if you didn’t often look at it,” writes Rachel Joyce in her…

  • Merry Christmas, Scrooge!

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    resolutewoman
    in ,

    My family has gone every year—or almost every year—to see the Dallas Theater Center’s performance of “A Christmas Carol.” I remember fondly performances when my children, now adults, couldn’t sit still and were frightened by Charles Dickens’ ghosts. This year, however, I bought tickets for my husband, Jerry, and my daughter, Mary Elizabeth, but not…

  • A lesson relearned—my interesting family

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    resolutewoman
    in ,

    I recently had dinner with a good friend, and she spent a long time complaining about the relatives she planned to entertain during the holidays. I don’t know about you, but I could complain a bit about a relative or two. My family is not perfect, but it is the only family that I have.…

  • We’re thankful for family

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    resolutewoman
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    Ranna, Fayteen’s daughter, has been in the hospital. We are thankful that she is home from the hospital and growing stronger. My son, Jay, was sure that he could come home for Christmas, but he wasn’t sure if he would be able to come home for Thanksgiving. “He has to come home for Thanksgiving,” his…

  • We’re thankful for friends

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    resolutewoman
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    I’ve known Fayteen for 25 years—and I’ve known her daughter, Ranna, for almost as long. Once, earlier this year, Ranna thanked me for visiting her when she was ill. “Ranna,” I told her, “I consider you to be a good friend—a good friend who has become part of my family.” This Thanksgiving, I am thankful…

  • Finding and giving kindness

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    resolutewoman
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    Boris says: “None of us ever finds enough kindness in the world, do we?” And, Theo finally realizes: “It didn’t occur to me then, though it certainly does now, that it was years since I’d roused myself from my stupor of misery and self-absorption, (that) there were a lot of small, easy, everyday kindnesses I’d…