Happy New Year
Ellie — I hear you didn’t make it to midnight on this December 31st — but then, neither did your grandfather. 2017! People my age marvel at what a high number that is, at how quickly the years pass as we grow older. By the…
The Final Flight
Dear Ellie — It’s been a tumultuous fall. Aside from the November presidential election, your great-grandfather died that same month. He was your mother’s father’s father and his name was William Fendall Pennebaker. He would have been 99 on December 3. Everyone called him Bill,…
A Few Rules for Survival
Dear Ellie — Well, you know how it went down. We didn’t elect the first woman president this week. We elected a man who sees women as objects, who’s volatile and bigoted, who wears his inexperience and lack of knowledge as proudly as he would…
A Woman President. It’s About Time.
Ellie — I kept another blog for several years. Looking back over the hundreds of posts I wrote, I noticed the ones about politics didn’t age well. They were too tied to long-gone current events and seemed tired after a few years. So, with my…
Joining Hands
Dear Ellie — For the past five years, your grandfather and I have lived in a downtown highrise condo in Austin. It’s a lovely place, where we’re treated very well. It’s also been a good place for us to be at this time in our…
Roaming With a Passport
Ellie — Well, you just had your first international trip. You even have a passport, with a photo that shows you glaring at the camera. (Passport photos are never good, even when you’re an attractive baby.) You and your parents met Uncle Nick, his girlfriend…
Singing Like No One Can Hear
Dear Ellie — Today’s your first day in daycare. Not ones to let anything in your life go undocumented, your parents have snapped your first day below. You’re in a Spanish immersion daycare, which means you’ll soon be running circles around us in two languages,…
To Quote a Band, I’m a Believer
Ellie — Almost a year ago, your grandfather and I went to see an off-Broadway play called “The Christians.” It told the story of a minister who’s begun to doubt some of his church’s primary tenets, such as the belief in hell as a place of…
One Year Old
Ellie — You’re almost a year old now, and your grandfather and I will be coming to help you celebrate. If you’re anything like your mother at the same age, you’ll smear icing all over your face and fall asleep with your head in the…
Shades of History
Ellie — Right now, there’s a controversy going on: Should the professional football team, the Washington Redskins, change its name since “redskin” is a derogatory term for American Indians? Once you read this, it probably won’t still be a controversy, having been long resolved one…