Commentary

Pass That Tuna Casserole, Please

Kathy StevensonLeave a comment

(Unearthed from my archives – this essay was published in the Chicago Tribune on 11/29/94.)

Every now and then a journalist comes up with an idea for a newspaper column that makes other journalists straighten up, push back their rusty, squeaky chairs from their blank computers and say, “Now why didn’t I come up with that?”

That’s not the way I felt when I read about a new syndicated column to be penned by news personality Cokie Roberts and her husband Steve, a senior staff writer for U. S. News and World Report.

Their idea is to write a column together that will give readers an idea what it would be like to eavesdrop on a typical conversation at the Roberts’ dinner table. Topics might include the balanced budget amendment, health care, behind-the-scenes wheeling and dealings of Congress and presumably other timely national and world events. You know, stuff you talk about at dinner all the time.

I had the idea for a similar column years ago, but after recording several conversations at our dinner table, I decided the world would be a better place if those conversations remained private. Continue reading →

Garage Sale Treasures

Kathy StevensonLeave a comment

(This was originally one of my weekly columns in The Beach Reporter newspaper in Manhattan Beach, CA.)

Having a garage sale every five years or so should be a requirement for every family. Not only do you get rid of things hanging precariously in the rafters of your garage and threatening lives, but you also get to know the true feelings of other family members. It’s better than therapy.

Take the following conversation (which may or may not have happened, I’ll never tell).

Wife: “I really think we should sell your surfboard. The last time you surfed the Beach Boys still had hair, and you didn’t get winded carrying the ice chest down to the beach.”

Husband: “I’m not selling my surfboard! Why, just the other day I was sitting in my office thinking maybe I’d take it up again.”

Wife: “That’s called fantasizing. What do you think we could get for it?” Continue reading →

A Summer Fantasy Becomes Reality

Kathy StevensonLeave a comment

(This essay was originally published in The Christian Science Monitor.)

It was one of those rare days at the beach. The humidity was low, the temperature hovered right around 80 degrees, the sky was washed with watercolor blues and the flags snapped briskly over the boat harbor. Lake Michigan was quiet and waveless and even the water temperature had risen above the frigid level to merely bone-chilling.

So what was wrong with this picture?

Actually, everything was right. I had finally reached that nirvana of motherhood – that fantasyland that mothers of young children only dream of. My adolescent children, who had accompanied me to the beach, had run off with their friends as soon as we’d arrived. I was alone.
I could reach into my canvas beach bag and read a book or magazine uninterrupted. I could roll over and nap. I could buy myself an ice cream and not have to share it. I could float lazily on a raft, write a short story, re-invent my life. Continue reading →

Bittersweet Summer

Kathy StevensonLeave a comment

(This essay originally appeared in Main Line Today magazine.)

There comes a time every summer when you finally get your well-deserved week at the Jersey shore. You’ve managed to squeeze a week in between sports, dance, sleep-away, and tennis camps and the beginning of school. Your packed and overloaded family car resembles a suburban version of the Beverly Hillbillies as you careen joyously into Avalon or Stone Harbor or Ocean City, the entire family singing along to the soundtrack of The Sound of Music. Summer vacation is here at last – the kids have no scheduled activities, you and your husband have coordinated a week off, and the sun is shimmering benevolently over the Boardwalk. Aahh, the dog days of summer…

Fast forward one week. You never noticed it before but it is quite possible that you are the only truly sane, normal person in your family. How this fact has eluded you when you have lived with these people for decades is a mystery. You start thinking that maybe, just maybe, it is time to go home. If you have experienced any of the following phenomena, then perhaps you truly have been at the Jersey shore too long. Continue reading →