I ask you: What’s the difference between “coming home” and “going home?” I’ve been twisting this around in my brain for awhile, the way one braids and re-braids tumbling locks without ever getting it quite right. For more normal people, this is a reason to just brush it out (or off) and go on with real life. But for people like me, it’s a reason to blog. The question in question arose because I realized that when I head to Hawai’i I feel like I am “coming home,” but when I...

I was ready to blog about my car caper on The Big Island when a howling siren woke all sleeping and comatose persons for fifty miles – and scared the living lava out of the rest of us. It was ten o’clock at night. I knew what those sirens meant, but I chose to think that perhaps they were just executing a routine test of the equipment. Perhaps we would be required to perform a kind of “disaster drill” to show that we were in a state of readiness for impending calamity. Or maybe some p...

You know about the TSA 3-1-1 rule right? You can take 3 ounce or smaller containers on board in 1 quart-size bags with a limit of 1 bag per traveler. Me too, I know about that! So WHY did everything shut down in the security lines when my carry on went through? Why did all the security personnel break out into a chorus of “Code 4!” as if they were staging a musical? And why did they then suddenly shout in unison, “All clear!” And most of all, why was it MY SUITCASE that was put back t...

Dear Ann Flanders,
I am leaving for Hawaii in three days on an extended vacation with my best friend, and am feeling quite depressed. I have noticed this pattern over time—that when I am really expanding myself, experiencing something that reflects the life I want, I sabotage myself with depression, “mistakes” or an illness. Have you ever heard of this? Is there hope for me?
Depressed in Portland

P. S. Do you think it could just be the rain?

Dear Depressed,
At the risk of being unprofe...