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I thought of you today when I was bringing in the mail. When there was nothing remotely personal to be found in my mailbox, not one thing sent by someone who was actually trying to make a human connection with me, that’s when you crossed my mind. I don’t know much about you, but I believe I can say this: the fact that you’ve paused to read this column shows that, like me, you flip through your mail hoping for something other than bills and solicitations. When our little publication arrives, you pull it out of the stack because it has a neighborly feel, maybe even a personal feel. This is our hope, anyway — that you’ll be glad to see our friendly “face” in the mailbox.

When I was a very little girl, I watched a show called Romper Room. If you did, too, you might remember Miss Nancy looking through her Magic Mirror and calling out the names of children that she “saw.” “I see Timmy and Susie…” she’d say, “And I see Patty and Michael and Joey…” She never got around to saying she saw me, so I remember asking my mom if Miss Nancy could really see me. “No,” said my mother, “but she wishes she could.” (Good answer, Mom!)

That’s how I feel when I write to you. I wish I could see you! For Mark and me, Our Town is more than just a way to make a living. We really do hope to create connections. That’s why I write this monthly column sharing a bit of our personal side. It’s why we love to include support groups and special events and volunteer needs in Community Notes. It’s why we offer ads affordable enough for even the smallest local business. (Did you know that fully half of the 1.9 million businesses in Florida have no employees other than the owner? At Our Town, we love sole proprietors!)

When we talk about the economy with folks who advertise in Our Town, we notice people using the language of hurricane season, phrases like “hunkering down” and “riding out the storm.” And a lot of us are doing what we do during hurricanes—we’re staying close to home. Now, I don’t want to sound like a Pollyanna when times are so lean for many of us. But maybe, just maybe, there is a silver lining to this hunkering down close to home? Maybe we are more likely to support local businesses rather than far-away corporations, to help the local economy. Perhaps when we have less work coming in, and less money to spend, we have more time to make connections…to tutor a new reader at the elementary school, help a refugee practice English, visit a nursing home, or just talk to our neighbors. Maybe we’ll come out of this slowdown with a stronger, more connected community.

Let me know if you have a good way for people to connect, and we’ll publish it in our Community Notes. And as I say goodbye, I’m looking into my Magic Computer, and I see Colleen and Brenda and Eric and George and Judy and Isabel…and all the rest of you, too. Okay, I can’t, but I sure wish I could! As always, thanks so much for reading Our Town.

Our daughter (a recent summa cum laude UCF grad – yay Amy!) and her boyfriend just celebrated a minor milestone: a three-month anniversary. Being a smart fellow, Steve marked the occasion with a little gift. As Amy happily told us about her evening, she realized something.

“Hey, when you guys had been dating for three months, you were already married!”

It’s true. Mark and I celebrated our 20th anniversary this month, which means it’s been 20 years and three months since our first date. And we were engaged for two of those three months! Looking back, I’m surprised that our parents didn’t try to slow us down. If Amy and Steve came to us with talk of marriage right now, we would be hitting the brakes so hard that all central Florida would hear the squeal.

But Mark and I probably wouldn’t have heeded any warnings anyway. After all, we were 30, which seemed old at the time, and we were full of confidence. Reminiscing over our wedding pictures, we have to laugh at those young versions of ourselves, standing at the altar, making pretty serious promises for two people who didn’t know each other very well!

Fortunately, our gamble paid off. As the issues of life arose, large and small, we discovered more about each other, and most of the surprises were good ones. Mark, it turned out, is more consistently kind and supportive than I dared to hope for. And he is willing to cheerfully eat cereal for dinner. He does, however, watch a whole lot more dopey TV than he let on during our brief courtship!

As for me, I’m sure I turned out to be more high maintenance than Mark expected. But I think he got some pleasant surprises, too, like my ability to make a delicious apple pie without needing a recipe, and my willingness to gamble everything we had on starting Our Town, which celebrates its 13th anniversary next month.

That’s two gambles that have worked out for us, the marriage and the business, and two is enough for me. Or…hmm, maybe it isn’t enough. After all, living life on the safe side wouldn’t have brought us to this wonderful point in our lives. Perhaps Mark and I should take some more chances together. But not now. Now, I just want to sit back and relish the celebration of anniversaries, large and small. Thanks for reading!

Here’s a rerun from the fall of 2004 that seems appropriate as we enter another divisive presidential election season.

In the aftermath of Hurricane Francis, I had a wonderful surprise. Wandering among power-outage refugees lined up for coffee in the free air-conditioning at Borders, I was delighted to spot a friend whom I thought I might never see again after she moved abroad last year.

“We moved back!” she said. “Just in time for the hurricanes!” We hugged, we laughed, we talked about families, health, books. To anyone who saw us, we appeared to have everything in common. But in fact, there’s a big difference, one we usually avoid discussing. Politically, we are opposites, each a supporter of the party that the other one…well, detests.

It doesn’t surprise me that a friendship can survive this difference, because I grew up in a home where a marriage thrived despite opposing political views. I remember my parents joking about cancelling out one another’s votes, back when I was little enough to think Dad went into that little booth after work and actually erased the vote Mom cast that morning! Their good humor about political differences has allowed them to enjoy 56 happy years so far. So I know that opposing viewpoints don’t have to undermine affection and respect.

What mystifies me, though, is how two people with so very much in common — like my friend and me, or my mom and dad — can arrive at opposing conclusions about politics in the first place. How can this be? Curious, I did some reading about the usual roots of political affiliation, and what I found out is this: we’re pretty irrational. We like to believe that we choose a party based on a rational assessment of issues and party stances, but for most of us, that’s pure fiction. Research shows that most of us are drawn, in our formative years, to the party of our parents or another influential person. Once we feel affiliated with a party, we then begin — surprise! — to agree with that party’s positions. Join first, then believe.

What’s next? From then on, most people use party affiliation as a filter, screening out information that conflicts with our positions and exaggerating news that bolsters them. And this is both parties, folks. We affiliate first, then take on the viewpoints, then make sure we don’t hear anything that makes us rethink. Not too flattering a portrait of the voting public, is it?

But it’s not too late to change in time for this big election. I think everyone should draw up issue-based criteria based on the facts, look at each candidate’s positions compared with our criteria, and make a truly rational choice. I’m not going to use this process myself, but I think it should be mandatory for my friend and everyone else who doesn’t agree with me!

Just kidding, of course. Here’s hoping we can all keep a sense of humor this election season and remember that, although we are Republicans and Democrats, we are all in this together, all God’s children, each of us just doing the best we know how.

I’ve heard it said that redheads have fewer sweat glands than other people do. Perhaps that’s why I have never adapted to Florida’s long, hot summers, though I’ve lived here for years. When I get overheated, I can’t seem to cool down like those lucky people whose bodies know how to perspire.

Thus, as our summer months wear on—all six of them!—I go outdoors less and less, my excursions a series of scurries between air-conditioned spaces. In between, I sleep too much, accomplish too little, and ponder too grumpily the meaning of a fully climate-controlled existence. By the end of August, if I’m not careful, I’ll be spending all daylight hours indoors, watching sitcom re-runs while I eat peanut butter out of the jar (which is even less fun than it sounds).

My summer doldrums seem related to the northern malady called SAD, or Seasonal Affective Disorder, which is clinical depression brought on by protracted gloomy winters. I’m not depressed, but I do believe I have something I’ve tagged “Southern Latitudes Underdiagnosed Mood Problem,” or SLUMP. This is linked to the other syndrom I’ve identified: “Weather-Humidity Induced Negativity Experience,” also known as WHINE.

SLUMP and WHINE are problems, for me and for the people I live with. Whenever I have any problem, I turn to books on the topic, but, not surprisingly, there are no books on SLUMP and WHINE. And I have already read, during previous summer doldrums, every generic book ever written about how to kick the blues. Twice.

So, in a change of tactic, I’ve been reading books about happiness. There are a surprising number of them, and they’re not all rah-rah, positive thinking stuff. If you, too, are trying to hang onto your last shred of good humor until cooler weather arrives, you might enjoy the best of the lot, a book that made me laugh out loud and was full of interesting tidbits about happy people and places. It’s The Geography of Bliss: One Grump’s Search for the Happiest Places in the World, by Eric Weiner, whose last name, he points out, is appropriately pronounced “whiner.”

Weiner starts his journey in the Netherlands at the World Database of Happiness, then globetrots to places that rank particularly high or low on that institute’s happiness scale. My favorite chapter was about happy Iceland, where there is no one with SAD because, scientists theorize, that genetic strain could not survive at all in a land where it’s pitch black all day long for months at a time. The coziness and camaraderie of that dark, chilly place sound perfect to me right about now.  And no hurricanes!

Weiner includes a quote from Benjamin Franklin that I had never heard before. “The Constitution only gives people the right to pursue happiness,” said old Ben. “You have to catch it yourself.” I do believe this is true, and I will be working on that, just as soon as it’s cool enough to chase after anything at all. Stay cool, sweat if you can, and thanks for reading Our Town!

By Sandy Bailey Lipten, July 2008

Poor Sam. The wallpaper in his bedroom was really too juvenile for him when we moved into this house six years ago, back when he was 12. We told him that it would go, just as soon as we finished stripping the walls in his sister’s room.

But it was Sam’s misfortune to be second in line after a project that proved unexpectedly grueling. The four of us worked for a week on Amy’s room, spraying, steaming, peeling inch by inch, to reveal the plaster behind the layers of paper. It was truly hellish. Years went by before we were ready to even consider tackling Sam’s walls, which, now that he’s 18 and in college, had begun to seem not merely juvenile but downright insulting. I started to worry that he’d move everything out, go live in an apartment out by UCF, and never come home! But how to get ourselves going on this project that we knew would be so awful?

Enter now another character in this story, and I when I say character, I mean a real character! It’s my older brother, Mike, who just moved back after seven years in Kansas City. Yes, it’s Mike—and the cadence of that sentence, as I write it, reminds me of the intro to the black-and-white Superman reruns the two of us watched as kids:

Yes, it’s Superman…strange visitor from another planet, who came to earth with powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal man! Superman…who can change the course of mighty rivers…bend steel in his bare hands…and who, disguised as Clark Kent, mild-mannered reporter…

Yes, it’s Mike, strangely youthful refugee from tornado alley, who came to Florida with powers and abilities far beyond those of a typical 52-year-old man! Mike…who is always in a good mood…believes that no task is too daunting…and who, disguised as a mild-mannered Embarq employee, still has energy after work to peel wallpaper all evening in his nephew’s bedroom!

It is such a gift to have my childhood companion around­ again. Mike and I both avoid flying, so we had hardly seen each other the years he lived far away. I had thought we were keeping in touch pretty well, but now that he’s back, I realize there had been a huge, brother-shaped void in my life.

The impact of my only sibling’s presence goes far beyond the spanking white plaster walls that, thanks to Mike’s enthusiasm, are emerging from under the wallpaper in Sam’s room. It’s as if an area in my brain—and in my heart—had been wallpapered over for a few years, but now it’s been revealed again, a beautiful sibling relationship in all its shining glory. I already had an embarrassment of riches, what with my wonderful husband, kids, parents, in-laws, and friends. Now, I’m a full-time, in-person sister again, and I’m loving it, even more than Sam is loving his walls without baby blue stars and moons.

Here’s hoping all your wallpaper comes off easily and all your family members bring you as much joy as mine do. Thanks for reading Our Town!

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By Mark Lipten, May 2008

Last month, my wife wrote about my recent visit to the emergency room. In case you’ve forgotten or didn’t read last month’s column, here’s what happened: I laughed so hard at a joke my son told that I passed out at the dinner table and was taken by ambulance to Florida Hospital.

After a night of tests and a follow-up with my family doctor and cardiologist, I’m happy to say that all is well. For good measure, I also had a full annual physical and a dermatological exam. Still doing fine for a 50 year old — and that’s inside and out, which I verified when I also had my first colonoscopy, which was a breeze (and I don’t just mean the breezy back of the hospital gown!). The prep the day before wasn’t even that bad. Of the procedure itself and its aftermath, I remember nothing, not even the mega-snacks my wife says I devoured on the way home. That afternoon I took the longest nap of my life. Now I just have to remember to schedule another scope when I’m 60.

The reason I bring up colonoscopies is that it’s so important that adults who are 50 (or even younger, depending on risk factors) have this or one of the other screening procedures. There’s nothing funny about colon cancer. This year more than 140,000 people will be diagnosed with colorectal cancer and over 50,000 will die from the disease, despite the fact that colorectal cancer is one of the most detectable and treatable forms of cancer when people get screened. I had to laugh (don’t worry, not hard enough to pass out!) when I read a report on the top reasons why people don’t get screened. Of course people cite a lack of awareness or confusion about insurance benefits or a lack of insurance coverage. But the one that jumped out at me was this: the absence of social support for openly discussing and doing something about “the disease down there.”

Yes, people don’t want to talk about or think about the screening. Unfortunately, the åtopic of talking about and then having a colonoscopy is lumped in with our other conversational taboos: Income, Intimacy and, as the report said, “the disease down there.” I can sort of see the first two, but that third avoided topic kills over 50,000 people a year. So, I’m talking about it.

I’m lucky for a lot of reasons. I’ve celebrated my 50th year with a full menu of planned and unplanned medical procedures, and all the results have been good. I have excellent doctors and health insurance. But the best thing I have is a wife (Sandy, who usually writes this column) who nudges me just enough to do the right thing. Nudge the ones you love. And consider this your nudge.

Thanks for reading!

June 2008

Whenever I happen to mention to my folks that I’m trying to come up with a column for Our Town, my mom always tosses out a couple of ideas. Unfortunately, I usually toss them right back. It’s not that they aren’t good; it’s just that I find it hard to write “to a prompt,” as they call it in FCAT testing. Seems to me that you’ve got to have already some thoughts percolating on a topic in order to turn out a decent composition.

But this month, Mom had an idea that struck a chord with me. “Why don’t write about how “Computer” has changed your life?” she asked. (This is how my mother refers to technology. It’s not “the computer” or “computers” — it’s “Computer” with a capital C. “Computer” is her enemy, though she puts hers to good use in spite of her distaste. I admire this…but I digress.)

I started to reject her idea, thinking that I didn’t have any new angle on how computers have changed the way we all do so many things: shopping, banking, travel planning, news-reading, etc. But then I realized that “Computer” has affected me, Sandy Bailey Lipten, in a particular and personal way. The personal computer — specifically, its e-mail function — has allowed me to have friends.

It’s not that I ever had trouble making friends. But keeping them, well, that’s been really, really hard for me since I got married and had kids. During the years when we ran a home-based business, home-schooled our two kids, and lived next door to my brother and to my parents, I was almost never alone. This was a taxing situation for a person who needs much solitude. Interpersonally maxed out, I started to shrink from visits, parties, even telephone conversations. The phone would ring and I would cringe. Friendships foundered and fizzled.

But e-mail saved me! Because e-mail causes no stress. It doesn’t drain your energy. E-mail waits for you, and it’s there when you need it. And so, over the last few years, I have been able to stay close to a small circle of friends whom I rarely see or talk to on the phone. In fact, I have a couple of friends from my yearly writing retreats with whom I have never talked on the phone! In-person socializing may happen only monthly, quarterly or even annually, but our connection doesn’t falter. And thanks to unlimited storage at yahoo.com, I have a written archive of these years of our lives, the often-lost details of everyday events and emotions.

Some may say that this reliance on online contact is an unhealthy sign, an unraveling of our social fabric. They may be right. I can’t say for sure that e-mail friendships are a good thing for society. But they’ve certainly been good for me during this family-intensive years. And as things become quieter around the house (which is already happening as our kids become young adults), my friendships will be fit to withstand a shift back to what the text-messaging generation calls F2F — face to face. And I will welcome that time, because in spite of all its benefits, “Computer” is just no darned good at hugs.

As always, thanks for reading Our Town — and drop us an e-mail anytime!

By Sandy Bailey Lipten