Patricia J. Murphy

Writing Never Eat Soggy Waffles was a most memorable experience. While my memory is like an elephant's and I don't normally use mnemonics, researching and writing this title gave me new ways to remember all sorts of unrelated things without taxing my already busy brain. (more…)

Everywhere you look, you can’t miss the “CONGRATULATION GRADUATES!” and “HAPPY GRADUATION!” signs. And, as I’ve seen each one of them, I got to thinking about the last time I actually “graduated” from somewhere or something.

Sure, thoughts gravitate to my own graduations—junior high, high school, college—and most vividly graduate school. In fact, I can remember the crisp, cloudy, June day that I posed for snapshots in front of the Horizon Center (now, the Allstate Arena) after receiving my masters degree like it happened last week.

But, after picking up the mental confetti and the streamers of this nostalgic parade, my thoughts turned to the other definitions of the verb “graduate” like “to change gradually or by degrees” or “to advance to a new level of skill, achievement, or activity.” I asked myself, “When was the last time you did one of those things?” (more…)