“That night, I take Wallerstein's book from my bedside table and re-read something she mentioned only in passing: the ambivalence that many adult children of divorce feel about their obligation to their aging parents. So lasting are the effects of… — Katie Hafner Copy Share Image
“Doing a geographic” is a term alcoholics often use for acting on the impulse to start over by moving to a new town, or… — Katie Hafner Copy Share Image
“My mother has always loved piano music and hungered to play. When she was in her early sixties, she retired from her job as a computer programmer so that she could devote herself more fully to the piano. As she had done with her dog obsession, she took her piano education to an extreme. She bought not one, not two,… — Katie Hafner Copy Share
“Suddenly life was good, even glamorous. We were poor but didn’t know it, or maybe we did know, but we didn’t care, because my mother had stopped disappearing into her bedroom. Our apartment building was surrounded by empty lots, which were all that separated us from the ocean. Within a couple of decades, those stretches of undeveloped land – prime… — Katie Hafner Copy Share
“Stately and commanding, the house I found on Sacramento Street, in Lower Pacific Heights, was an architectural jewel; tour buses drove down the street several times a day and the guides pointed out our Victorian “painted lady” not just for its curb appeal but also for its lucky survival of the earthquake. Meticulously renovated, the house had a layout that… — Katie Hafner Copy Share
“But today I'm indifferent. And with this comes a glimmer of understanding: I can pick and choose what I absorb and what I deflect. This is how the color spectrum works: Some colors absorb light, while others deflect it, depending on where they are on the spectrum. Earlier in my life, when it came to hurtful words from my mother,… — Katie Hafner Copy Share
“When I was five and Sarah seven, my mother went on a trip. She was gone from our home in Rochester, New York, for several days. But she was often gone — not always from the house but missing from our lives nonetheless. Then one day Sarah and I returned from school to find her standing at the door, a… — Katie Hafner Copy Share
“I usually enjoy setting up a new kitchen, but this has become a joyless and highly charged task. My mother and I each have our own set of kitchen boxes, which means that if there are two cheese graters between us, only one will make it into a cupboard. The other will be put back in a box or given… — Katie Hafner Copy Share
“That night, I take Wallerstein's book from my bedside table and re-read something she mentioned only in passing: the ambivalence that many adult children… — Katie Hafner Copy Share Image
“It’s one thing when you plug into a socket in the wall and electrons flow,” said Bob Kahn. “It’s another thing when you have… — Katie Hafner Copy Share Image
“For years, whenever I told people about my childhood but assured them that my mother and I were now close, that I held no… — Katie Hafner Copy Share Image
