Lisa Zahn

I went to the gym this afternoon (feeling better enough, after work). I stepped on the scale "just to see" and discovered that even with my shoes on I was down two pounds! So I took my shoes off. Down another pound! Three pounds in all. Ah, the one benefit of being sick for a week...I'd tried for two months to lose those few pounds (well, half-heartedly as far as the eating part of the equation--it was the holiday season after all). I got sick without even trying, and that did it. One time I had the flu or something really bad for a week. Elijah was one so this was 9 years ago. I literally slept that whole week and ate nothing. I lost at least 10 pounds. The last 10 of the 50 I'd gained as "baby weight". I thought it was pretty great back then too. The losing the weight part, that is. Not the flu part. It's a pretty sad state of affairs when losing a few pounds makes me so happy. I saw my trainer at the gym and she said, "well, that's not the wa...

Continuing on my quiet time theme from yesterday, today I present two beautiful photos taken by my sister-in-law Martha Goodman. They are from the beach at my mother and father-in-law's home in Gloucester, Virginia, looking out at their pier. Visiting my in-laws is like visiting a beautiful bed and breakfast (well, except your whole in-law family is there, no offense). They do treat us so well, and the scenery is awesome. And this is good, because it's generally our only vacation time each year. We missed them this Christmas but will be there in the summer. Speaking of Christmas, this past Solstice I attended a drumming ceremony with a group of my dearest friends, my W.E.T. Sisters (Women's Enrichment Time, story for another day). The drumming ceremony was at the Carondelet Center next to the College of St. Catherine's in St. Paul. The Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet invited actor, drummer and frequent ceremony leader Jaime Meyer to lead us in the ceremony. The cere...

Often I get discouraged by all the noise our society makes. I too often invite it into my house, watching TV, listening to the radio, etc. Today I turned on the morning news to hear who won in New Hampshire. I got the highlights, and then I remembered the off button. Sometimes that's hard to do, all those fascinating teasers just suck you in and suddenly you've wasted an hour just sitting in front of the "news". I was glad I turned it off this morning. It gave me 1/2 an hour to sit in the quiet (well, I did turn on a relaxing CD, to tell the truth. That was even better today, for some reason.) I lit a candle, drank my tea and ate my oatmeal in peace. I decided to play around with my camera and take a photo of the scene. I just pushed a few of the buttons on my Nikon Coolpix and found out I could get the candle to glow somehow. Unfortunately, I can't read the directions to see what I'm really doing (not that I'd do that anyway) because I can only find the c...

I'm on the upswing now but have been sick since Saturday. I did get to Barnes and Noble to skim through most of In Defense Of Food by Michael Pollan on Saturday morning, but that's about the last thing I did before taking to my bed for three days. It was the worst sore throat I can remember! And fever, aches, pains, stomach nausea, the whole deal. Well, it could've been worse I'm sure. I went to my chiropractor, Dr. Mike Svensson, yesterday for an adjustment. That really helped me turn the corner on this thing. I decided I should do an ad campaign for him: "Dr. Mike always makes me feel worse. But that's okay, because then I feel better." It's true! Immediately after seeing him, getting all straightened out (and he does this very gently, mind you) and having my sinuses massaged and re-pressurized or whatever it is he does, I do feel worse. This is because, as he says, my body can mount an even bigger immune response when it's all in ord...