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One Thing Or Another Column: The Big Six-Seven
By Mark McNease
Previously titled ‘The Big Six-Oh,’ I first wrote this one when I’d just turned sixty. What a difference seven years makes! Two presidential administrations (one of them in two parts), Social Security, Medicare, trading an hourly job for a career conducting writing and journaling workshops. So much is the same, while so much has changed. I’m still enjoying my sixties to the fullest, but I can’t say I’m in a hurry for the next big decade.
IT’S BEEN ALMOST A MONTH since I turned the corner into another decade. I remember thinking once how old forty seemed, back when I was filled with twenty-something angst. As happens, forty came and went. Then fifty arrived with a cruise and a presidential election while we were somewhere in the Atlantic ocean. Now I’m officially in my sixties, celebrated once again with a cruise, this time for two weeks. They seem to get longer as I get older. Maybe we’ll do a cruise around the world for my seventieth, although that might feel too much like a farewell tour.
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On the Map: Getting the Royal Treatment on Royal Caribbean’s Odyssey of the Seas
Sailing the Atlantic in Style
There’s something magical about waking up to nothing but ocean on the horizon — a vast expanse of blue stretching endlessly in every direction. That’s exactly what I experienced aboard Royal Caribbean’s Odyssey of the Seas, one of the line’s most innovative and dazzling ships. This wasn’t just any cruise — it was a transatlantic journey, a voyage that invited both adventure and reflection as we crossed from Europe to the Americas.
A Floating World of Wonder
From the moment we stepped on board in Civitavecchia, the port for Rome, we knew this would be among our favorite cruises. Odyssey of the Seas is a marvel — sleek, modern, and full of energy, from the ship sailing through the Atlantic waves to the ever–pleasant presnce of the crew. Its open spaces gleam with glass and light, while its art installations and design details remind you that this is as much a journey of the senses as it is a voyage across the sea.
We quickly discovered that this ship offers everything you could dream of and more: multiple pools (including the adults-only Solarium), high-tech entertainment (my personal favorite was the Nashvill Tenors), and dining options that often rival any fine restaurant. Whether you’re in the mood for fine dining at Giovanni’s Italian Kitchen & Wine Bar or a quick bite from El Loco Fresh by the pool, the culinary experiences were plentiful and pleasing.
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Book Your Holidays Now: The Bookworm’s Reading Gift Guide Part I (Fiction, Mysteries, Memoirs)
By Terri Schlichenmeyer
The Bookworm SezSanta will be very relieved.
You’ve taken most of the burden off him by making a list and checking it twice on his behalf. The gift-buying in your house is almost done – except for those few people who are just so darn hard to buy for. So what do you give to the person who has (almost) everything? You give them a good book, like maybe one of these….
GENERAL FICTION
The giftee who loves multigenerational plots, “Kaplan’s Plot” by Jason Diamond (Flatiron Books) might be their favorite gift this year. It’s the story of a man who returns home to care for his dying mother, but mother and son have kept secrets for far too long. When the man learns a few surprising truths about his ancestry, it could change the relationship he has with his mother forever.
For the person on your list who loves a charming little novel, wrap up “The Peculiar Gift of July” by Ashley Ream (Dutton). It’s the story of an orphan who goes to live with a cousin who barely knows the girl and doesn’t really want her. But July, the child, has a little magic up her sleeve, and what happens will dazzle your giftee. Wrap it up with “The Irish Goodbye” by Heather Aimee O’Neill (Henry Holt & Company), the story of three sisters, a long holiday weekend, and secrets that need tending.
Here’s something for the historical novel lover you know: “This Here is Love” by Princess Joy L. Perry (W.W. Norton) is set in 1690 in Virginia. One of the characters is a slave. One is the child of a freeman. One is an indentured slave, and all somehow find love despite their bondage. How can anyone resist a tale like that?
The new mother on your gift list – the one who loves thrillers – will be so happy to unwrap “Her One Regret” by Donna Freitas (Soho Crime). It’s the story of a disappearance that may or may not have been criminal. Did Lucy Mendoza do the unthinkable?
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On the Map: Rome If You Want To
We’re almost back to New Jersey aboard the Royal Caribbean Odyssey of the Seas, following a 14-night cruise with ports, and storms, and detours, and six nights across the Atlantic. But first, let’s take a look at our Rome trip. We flew there for a three-night stay before heading to the cruise terminal and sailing off. It wasn’t a lot of time, but we saw plenty. Check out my travelogue below with some photos.
We stayed at the Mascagni Hotel, a boutique hotel near the busy central city. I’m not giving it a thumbs up or down. I knew from past experience that European hotels in general are smaller, and that was the case here. But the decor is lovely, the staff was (mostly) friendly and helpful, and it was easy to get everywhere … until you started walking to your destination! Rome’s streets are very pre-grid, and even using Apple Map we got lost. The pathways are winding, in comes cases even seeming tortured, and if you take a wrong turn the map just reorients and takes you another route. Maddening, especially when your walking tour leaves at 10:30 a.m. and you’re sure you won’t make it. But we did! And here’s what we saw …
Say hello to Genny and Paul, the lovely couple from Canada who were among the travel friends we made, and these folks are keepers!
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Online Workshops in December: Fiction Writing, Self-Publishing, and Autobiographical Journaling
I’m excied to announce three online workshops coming up in December, with more online and in-person workshops planned for the new year. These will be held via Zoom from 2:00 – 4:00 pm eastern to accomodate participants in multiple time zones. (Workshops are limited to 8 participants each.) Just click on the links below to register. And now you can also purchase gift certificates for the writer in your life!
Gift certificates are good for any workshop or project.
Fiction Writing Essentials: 2 Hour Online WorkshopJoin us on December 03 via Zoom – 2:00 – 4:00 PM easternIn these writing classes and workshops you’ll explore your own creativity as writers, learning what makes good characters, page-turning plots, and the illusion of conversation we call dialogue.
Have you wondered where story ideas come from? Or how to take an idea and turn it into fiction? What do you do when you get stuck? How are some of the ways we can keep ourselves going from the whisper of an idea to a full-fledged short story or novel? Learn structure, outlining, narrative, point of view, and more, as you become what you want to be, or what you already are: a writer. Yes, you can!
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Book Review: A True Crime Roundup
By Terri Schlichemeyer
The Bookworm SezTrue Crime Books by various authors
c.2025, various publishers
$28.00 – $32.00 various page countsWhodunit?
Sometimes, the answer is known before you even have a chance to hear the whole story. Other times, the story of a crime is more than just a murder or a B&E. Either way, most definitely, you need a good true-crime book, like maybe one of these…
What you’ll read inside “Shadow of the Bridge” by Aine Cain and Kevin Greenlee (Pegasus, $29.95) will chill you to your toenails, especially if you’re a parent. It’s the story of two teenage girls out on a hike, the man they accidentally met along a bridge in Indiana, and the crime that shocked a nation. Yes, you saw the search for the girls and the reports on the news; this book takes things further with excellent journalism. You’ll be riveted.
A true-crime book doesn’t have to be set in recent years; the crime can be decades old and still be of interest, as you’ll see in “Sisters in Death: The Black Dahlia, The Prairie Heiress, and Their Hunter” by Eli Frankel (Citadel Press, $28). Ever since Elizabeth Short was discovered nude and surgically bisected in an empty Los Angeles lot in 1947, sleuths both professional and amateur have tried to figure out who killed her. Here, Frankel offers another possibility to the solution, and it may reach farther back – more than eight decades ago, in fact. If the Black Dahlia death still confounds you, here’s your book.
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The Weekly Readlines October 31
From the editor’s desk: This is a new way of offering The Weekly Readlines. It’s a work-in-progess, kind of like most things in our lives. Now I just need to keep refining it. Until then …
BIG CUP: THE WEEK’S TOP STORIES
House Speaker Mike Johnson keeps House out of session for 6th week
One big house and nobody’s homeTrump calls for endig the filibuster
It’s about time. Make senatorial elections matter again!Texas Supreme Court rules judges may refuse to officiate same-sex marriages based on religion
San Antonio Express-News+1Crisis calls among LGBTQ+ youth in Oklahoma drop after the state’s schools chief resigned
Advocate.com+1Global monitoring: Anti-LGBTQ+ sentiment and rights rollback
theguardian.com+1 -
Upcoming Holiday Ad in the Bucks County Herald (Now With Gift Certificates!)
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On the Map: What’s A Repositioning Cruise?
By Mark McNease
We’re leaving later this week for one of the longest vacations we’ve taken – almost three weeks! It begins with three nights in Rome, where we’ve book walking tours of the Vatican and the Colosseum. I’ve had a fascination with gladiators since I was a child. I can’t imagine why …
After our Rome visit, our first to Italy, we board a Royal Caribbean ship that cruises the Mediteranean and ends with a 5 night return sail across the Atlantic. It’s a repositioning cruise, bringing the ship from its season there to its next one home-ported here. The best part? It docks in Bayonne, New Jersey, about 90 minutes from where we live. Given my loathing of all things airports, it’s a real treat to fly only one way. So what’s a repositioning cruise? Keep reading!
Repositioning cruises are unique voyages offered by cruise lines when a ship needs to relocate from one region of the world to another. Unlike traditional cruises that circle back to their original departure port, repositioning cruises begin in one location and end in another, following the movement of cruise ships between seasonal home ports. For example, a ship might travel from the Caribbean to Europe in spring or from Alaska to the Mexican Riviera in the fall. Or in our case from the Mediterranean back to New Jersey!
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‘Pine Melody: A Memoir’ by Stacey Meadows Now Available
I knew when I first started helping Stacey Meadows publish her memoir about her son’s death in a car accident that this was something special. The writing is superb, and the emotions are as raw as they could possibly be. It’s both beautiful and devastating, with the promise of acceptance and healing as Stacey recounts her journey with grief. I’ll be giving this to my workshop participants as an example of an outstanding and well-written memoir.
Swerving to avoid a deer on a dark Wisconsin highway in early summer, 22-year old Gabe lost control of the car. His 29 year- old brother, Jonah, singing along with him as he drove, absorbed the full force of the impact with an oncoming pick-up truck driven by the Chief of a First Nation. The crash left Jonah with severe traumatic brain injury, Gabe with a broken femur, and soil samples, meticulously gathered for Jonah’s graduate research project on agroforestry, strewn across the highway.
As general counsel for a Philadelphia medical center, I was competent enough to interact with my sons’ care teams, but lost all semblance of professionalism when neither my legal expertise, search for a medical miracle, nor tenacity of my love was able to bring benefit to Jonah, who lingered in a coma for three months, before dying in hospice. I was left to find a way to carry on for the sake of Jonah’s brothers while handling my own grief and helplessness.
Immersing myself in Jonah’s journals, and memories of his extraordinary, spirit-filled life, my pillars materialized—meditation, yoga, prayer and sailing. With Jonah as my spirit guide, in the bardo and beyond, I navigated pathways between terror and beauty that Jonah had spent his life seeking. Pine Melody is the result of my journey.
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‘Pine Melody – A Memoir’ by Stacey Meadows Now Available!
I’m very pleased to have had the opportunity to help Stacey Meadows publish her memoir ‘Pine Melody.’ It’s about the death of her son Jonah, and her journey through grief. It’s an extraordinary book, and Stacey is an extraordinary person. The Kindle version is out now, with the paperback and hardback coming soon.
Swerving to avoid a deer on a dark Wisconsin highway in summer, 22-year old Gabe lost control of the car. His 29 year- old brother, Jonah, singing along with him as he drove, absorbed the full force of the impact with an oncoming pick-up truck driven by the Chief of a First Nation. The crash left Jonah with severe traumatic brain injury, Gabe with a broken femur, and soil samples, meticulously gathered for Jonah’s graduate research project on agroforestry, strewn across the highway.
As general counsel for a Philadelphia medical center, I was competent enough to interact with my sons’ care teams, but lost all semblance of professionalism when neither my legal expertise, search for a medical miracle, nor tenacity of my love was able to bring benefit to Jonah, who lingered in a coma for three months, before dying in hospice. I was left to find a way to carry on for the sake of Jonah’s brothers while handling my own grief and helplessness.
Immersing myself in Jonah’s journals, and memories of his extraordinary, spirit-filled life, my pillars materialized—meditation, yoga, prayer and sailing. With Jonah as my spirit guide, in the bardo and beyond, I navigated pathways between terror and beauty that Jonah had spent his life seeking. Pine Melody is the result of my journey.
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Savvy Senior: What Seniors Need to Know About This Fall’s Vaccines
By Jim Miller
Dear Savvy Senior,
With a longtime vaccine critic leading the nation’s health departments, can you give me updated information on which vaccines are recommended for Medicare seniors this fall?
Medicare Mary
Dear Mary,
Even though the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is undergoing major cultural changes and upheaval, the overall fall vaccine recommendations for “older adults” resembles last year, with exception of the Covid shot. Here’s what you should know.
Flu Shots for Seniors
Just as they normally do, the CDC recommends a seasonal flu shot to everyone 6 months of age and older, but it’s especially important for older adults who have weaker immune defenses and have a greater risk of developing dangerous flu complications compared with younger, healthy adults.
For people age 65 and older, there are three different FDA approved flu vaccines (you only need one) that are recommended over traditional flu shots. These include: the Fluzone High-Dose Quadrivalent, Flublok Quadrivalent (recombinant, egg free vaccine), and Fluad Quadrivalent.
