Growing With Our Grandchildren

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Hello, friends, Shirley Showalter here, co-author with Marilyn McEntyre of The Mindful Grandparent: The Art of Loving Our Children's Children, from Broadleaf Books, May, 2022. Having embraced elderhood, we invite you to do the same.

In 2013 I published Blush: A Mennonite Girl Meets a Glittering World. Previously, I was a professor, a college president (Goshen College), and a foundation executive (the Fetzer Institute).

Most recent blog posts

Onward! Through Life and Death

Yesterday Stuart turned 80 years old. Wow. I’ve written about him frequently on this blog. He is the star of our romance and of his recovery from cancer story. When he turned 70, I called him the “linebacker of my life.” In almost everything I do or write he is a quiet, consistent presence. To…

Color Me, Beautiful!

Remember the fashion trends of the 80s? Big hair! Big shoulder pads! Neon colors! Leg warmers! The divas were Princess Di, Madonna, Janet Jackson, Cyndi Lauper, Lisa Bonet, and Whitney Houston. And the book Color Me Beautiful by Carole Jackson spent 3-4 years on the New York Times bestseller list. By 1983 it had sold…

The Handmaid Cometh

  “Margaret Atwood should sue the U. S. for plagiarism.”   When I saw the post above on the social media platform Threads, I recognized a good English major joke. Atwood’s classic novel The Handmaid’s Tale takes place in Gilead, a fictional place that is meant to represent the future United States where life has…