Vacation in a Tuberculosis Sanitarium

We love to stay at historic places when we travel, and so I booked a few nights at Birch Lodge during our recent vacation to Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. All I knew was that it was over 100 years old, on the National Registry of Historic Places, and looked beautiful...

Atlanta Writers Club Townsend Prize Awards Dinner

What a glittering event! The ten Townsend Prize finalists, other authors and the want-to-be authors of the Atlanta Writers Club gathered at the beautiful Wimbish House for drinks, dinner, speeches and awards. The Townsend Award is a big deal. Named in memory of Jim...

Medical History Finds Me

I love studying the history of medicine, especially the pre-anesthesia, pre-antibiotic era. Fleming, Osler, Rush, Avicenna, Blackwell, Curie, Pasteur are all familiar friends to me now. So, it’s no surprise to me that nuggets of medical history find me when we are on...

Remembering my Mentor on International Women’s Day

I met Dr. Ruth O’Neal in 1975 when I was applying to medical schools. A gruff, older, white-haired lady, she was one of several doctors who interviewed me at Bowman Gray School of Medicine, now called Wake Forest. I remember it so clearly. I wanted medical school more...

Spending a Weekend with Other Writers

My husband (yes, he writes, too) and I just spent the weekend at a writers’ conference at the Georgia Writers Museum in Eatonton, GA.  (https://www.georgiawritersmuseum.org/2023-writers-retreat/#top) There were 50-60 of us there, all kinds of writers, in all...