We almost missed it driving in.

Tucked into the bluff, the peak of the slate roof is just above road level and was barely visible through the thick summer foliage.

We pulled onto the side of Skyline Drive to park. The air was still damp from the afternoon thunderstorm as we climbed down the stone steps to the access road.

My Sicilian grandmother was just over five feet tall, like me. She had thick brown hair and olive skin, like me, and she wore a ring on almost every finger.

"Mangia! Buon appetito!" she'd say, setting down an antipasto platter, a plate of warm arancini, or a slice of spaghetti pie made from leftovers.

Last week, a neighbor three doors down invited our dog, Rory over for a dog play date. While Rory and Red chased each other in a loop around the backyard, we admired the garden—azaleas, forsythias, pink flowering almond, and blue phlox. Hasta, wild violets, Japanese water iris, an old dogwood tree, and a large weeping willow in the middle of the backyard.

I'm standing in the middle of the music classroom. Two brothers sit side by side on the piano bench, rehearsing the duet they're preparing for our Spring recital. It's our first coaching session together.

I've been reading The Next Right Thing by Emily P. Freeman. The book is about making decisions and creating space for your soul to breathe and I don't know about you, but I can always use the reminder that my soul needs to breathe.

For those of you who like to plan ahead, feel in control, and know what's coming, living through another pandemic winter is likely wearing you out.

It's that time of year—the last month of the calendar year and the first of a new liturgical year. The old and the new. An ending and a beginning.

Here's something you may not know about me: time is my biggest motivator.

I realized a few months into the pandemic that I was deeply missing the connection to music-making – singing and playing on occasion, attending concerts, and playing duets with my students. I needed another creative outlet, something to do with my hands.

So I started painting again.