Hi, this is Marilyn. I‘m a nurse and a wellness coach, with a specialty in nutrition.

Today I’d like to talk to you about the “wheel of life” and the “total wellness” team approach to balance your life, between primary foods and the enhancement of secondary foods.

Now, what are the primary foods? The 4 core primary foods are: exercise, spirituality, career and economics, and relationships. When these are not balanced, we are not balanced.

When Bruce and I were first married, we discovered Jones’ Family Farm, and started a tradition.

Each October we’d go to the farm and pick out a huge pumpkin. Then we’d bring it home, and work all weekend to make pies (usually 9) and loaves (usually 6).

Sometimes, we’d make pumpkin cookies or pumpkin pancakes (not a big hit). We’d cook the seeds. Then we’d distribute the pies to my parents and my brother Mike, Bruce’s parents, aunties, neighbors, etc.

I’d always bring some in for the teacher’s lounge at Second Hill Lane School.

Often in life we discover that failure leads to success.

Let’s think about it. Two parents are raising two children: Joey and Johnny.

When Joey’s learning to walk, his mom is holding his hands as walks across the room to his dad. Along the path, walking across the room, Joey is secure, he can’t fall because mom’s holding him, and he feels protected. And everything he does is perfect in the eyes of his parents, because he successfully walked across the room to daddy.

Facts are facts and theories are theories. It's important to understand the difference because many promoters of theories want you to believe that they are fact.

Facts are reality; they are what is, and what happened. They are absolute and the same for everybody. There cannot be more than one correct version of the facts. There are no "alternative facts".

After the storm
The sounds of the dripping ice from the trees
The crunch of the snow being chipped away
The traffic zooming by splashing snow on the pedestrians
Not with a caring thought of who is getting slushed upon
Ah, winter the cold, the brisk, the sun, the light
The weather changing
The weather warming up
The weather warming down
It’s like a tease
Oh, Spring is here
Yet the sun and the birds are chirping
But then Oh old woman winter comes out
It is below zero again
Well that is kind of the way life can go
It can be up

One of my personal gripes nowadays is e-mail. Not, I hasten to add, my own use of it, but other peoples'. Use, or perhaps I should say, misuse.

E-mail today seems to be something that is uniquely capable of laying bare all the personal foibles and failings of the American public. Carelessness, inattention, confusion, disorganization, and inability to follow simple directions; not to mention ignorance of English grammar and spelling.

Did you ever go into some place that had an echo?

It’s so hard not be a kid again. Just to play with it: clap, or say “hello”, or whistle, or stomp your feet.

I am so pleasantly surprised to find places that call you back to being curious, in the moment, childlike, wonder. The New York Botanical Gardens has a fabulous tunnel connecting two buildings that’s just perfect for making echoes. Perhaps it just happened that way. I’m grateful.

You just want to play with the situation. All else stops.

What is it about a rainbow that conjures such positive, joyful thoughts?

It seems that everyone loves a rainbow. Poems are written. Smiles cross faces when the word rainbow is seen. There are so many expressions: catch a rainbow, the other side of a rainbow, ride the rainbow, chase a rainbow, find your rainbow.

Men search for the treasure pot at the end of the rainbow. So I ask you, “Is there a treasure?” Perhaps the treasure in rainbows is “eating a rainbow.” “What,” you may ask, “am I talking about?” I’m talking about starting every day eating the colors of the rainbow.

In our home, whenever someone sits down to eat anything, someone else in the home sits down too, just to keep them company.

Not necessarily to make conversation, or eat something too, but just to be with them.

A long time ago, I worked with someone who came from Taiwan. We were talking about lunch, and he said, “People should not eat alone” – this was a deep and fervent part of his up-bringing.

I am driving to my next destination
As I am on this country road
Looking around
I am thinking wow isn’t it amazing
This car that just transports me
With these wheels that I can go
here and there
To and from
Often I wonder
Do we just forget the attitude of gratitude
Of being able to be so mobile
There are so many people who don’t have a car and need to walk everywhere
Although walking is a really good exercise
Just being able to move in an automobile
Is just really pretty much a gift
I happy to be able to transport myself