Category Archives: Perspective

Heartwings Love Note 1083: Bigger May Not Be Better

Posted on by

Heartwings says, “Size is not really a good indication of value.”

Have you noticed how big commercial trucks have become? Within the last few years, it seems that most of the trucks that transport much of our nation’s goods have become a third to a half longer and appropriately wider and taller. I remember when I noticed one of my first ones a couple of years ago when they were rarer, and pointed it out to Stephen. He told me no, I was incorrect, it was the same size as always. Then a normal sized truck, the usual ones we saw on the Mass Pike went by and drew up next to the larger one I had pointed out. “I see what you mean,” he said.

Since that day it seems to me that the older, smaller trucks I was used to have greatly diminished and the newer larger sized ones seem to have greatly increased. To be honest, I find these monsters to be somewhat intimidating. They just about dwarf my Toyota sedan, and it’s not a small car. I often wonder what the truck drivers do when they need to navigate narrow, twisted streets in small towns like ours. Surely, the trucks can’t get any larger, yet who knows what the manufacturers will decide to do.

Fruit is another thing that has become larger. Blueberries have become much bigger in size. I don’t think the flavor has increased any, perhaps it has even diminished. Don’t get me talking about strawberries! They’ve been growing bigger for a long time, and it has not contributed to their taste. I wait for the real (to me) strawberries that arrive in farm stands in June and snatch up as many boxes as I can get during their brief season.

I don’t mean to complain, but bigger is not always better. At least the flavor of the peaches and plums that are all swelled up in size taste better if I cook them with a little sugar. I often do the same with the outsized strawberries when I can find organic ones. There are too many pesticides in the inorganic ones. These are said to be one of the highest of the top ten fruits and vegetables in pesticide content. Pesticides and other chemicals are being linked to cancer and other ills, and one is safer buying and eating as much organic food as possible. Besides, it tastes better.

Recently I took out a book by one of my favorite authors, and much to my dismay, I had to return I to the library the next day. It was too heavy to hold to read. One exception is our new library. It has increased in size yet has not diminished in any way, quite the contrary. Growth in size is not necessarily a bad thing, when it is necessary. Necessity seems to be the key. Growth for the sake of making something bigger may not work as well as keeping the size the same. It’s all a matter of what works best.

May you discover what seems to work best for you in terms of size.

Blessings and best regards, Tasha Halpert

P.S. Do you have any thoughts on this or any other subject? Please share the with me, I do so enjoy hearing from my readers. Write to me at tashahal@gmail.com and for more love, notes visit my website at www.heartwingsandfriends.com.

The Fear Factor

Posted on by

Heartwings says, “When our opinions influence us, we may act without thinking.”

What if? When you hear that as the beginning of a sentence, do you anticipate a negative or a positive to follow? It is good to know what passes through one’s mind, i.e. to listen to yourself. Doing so can be very enlightening. What do you focus on? Do you look for optimistic outcomes? These and other rhetorical questions can help you to understand how to be happier, even though circumstances might conspire to make you think otherwise.

There is a story from an anthropologist, as I recall being told, that on a certain island in the tropics the monkeys began to wash their food. They were the first to do so. As time went on, it was observed that other monkeys on other islands, without any contact with the first monkeys, began to do the same. How? Perhaps there is an influence working that is generated without effort but simply by a flow of energy.

Along those lines, I recently heard a remarkable Ted Talk that was entitled, “You are Contagious.” I highly recommend looking it up—probably Google will help. What this essentially boils down to, at least to me, is that if we work at it, and enough of us get going at it, we can begin to change the world for the better. This will take time, but if we start where we are and keep it up, it can spread.

Right now, all too many people are driven by fear. Statistically I am told there are four guns for every person in this country. Many of them are automatic, shooting many bullets quickly. We have a gun lobby so powerful that gun laws designed to help often do not get passed. Sadly too, the laws we do have get broken anyway. In this climate of violence, fear and paranoia flourish.

We hear of these tragedies, and it is more and more frustrating because there is nothing we can do, or so we feel. But wait, there’s more! There is something we can do. We can manifest some positive energy to spread an antidote to the fear factor. I’d suggest beginning with gratitude. When you hear of the next awful sadness, turn your thoughts in another direction. Think how grateful you are for or about something in your life.  Express thanks, either silently or aloud, with your next breath. It is not that we don’t sympathize or feel sad about it, it’s that we don’t need to dwell on that sadness. It does not help.

We are all contagious. It is as though each of us is an island in an ocean of being, all connected. Perhaps the water the monkeys used to wash their food somehow carried the message to the monkeys on other islands. No one can say. By living with as much optimism and gratitude as we can, who knows how much influence we can manifest? It would be wonderful to try. Nothing is ever accomplished with endless mourning, nor will peace be bought with a sword.

May you find much to be grateful for and stay optimistic.

Blessings and best regards, Tasha Halpert

PS If you have stories, questions, comments, or information for me. Please drop me a note at tashahal@gmail.com. I so like to hear from readers and am enormously grateful.

Heartwings Love Noes 1072: Time to Smell the Roses

Posted on by

Heartwings says, “It’s vital to take time to appreciate the present moment.”

One of my great pleasures in June is driving in the country when the wild roses are in bloom. If I am fortunate, I can have the car windows open and the scent of these small white single petaled blossoms pervades the air and drifts into my car. It’s enough to make me wish to stop, just sit there, and breathe it in.

It’s true that the vines that bear these flowers are invasive. When we owned our home on Sartell, I planted some by the swimming pool enclosure and while to begin with they were lovely to enjoy, they soon began to overpower their space and spread. In the end, the lovely scent was not enough of an inducement to keep them. But where they can grow wild it doesn’t matter.

There are some near my porch here, however last year they did not blossom. I fear they may have been overcome by other wildlings in the vicinity. I hope they have survived to bloom this year. The roses you find in the markets often do not have much scent, though there may be special ones that do. I remember the roses my father and my grandmother grew, they smelled wonderful.

Taking the time to smell the roses has to me become an important part of my life. At eighty-seven how many years do I have to continue to enjoy doing this? As the bottom of the hourglass fills, every grain becomes precious. The pleasure of any moment is to be savored. I thought of this as I opened an envelope of a fragrant loose-leaf tea this morning, inhaling the delightful mixture of spices and herbs it contained.

These small and simple enjoyments of life take on a greater importance as the years dwindle—at least they have for me. The sense of smell is I believe one of our first to develop and the last to go. The infant finds its mother’s breast by the scent. It’s an important aid to survival. So is the smell of something burning. On the other hand, the sense of smell is an important part of the pleasure of eating, as well as other parts of life, such as embracing loved ones or just cooking with favorite foods. I do love to cook, as much for the good smells as anything. I even have a fond memory of someone saying as they came into the room, “This must be Tasha’s kitchen because it smells so good.”

It’s easy to get caught up in one’s busy-ness and forget to stop and smell the roses. It’s important, however, to remember to do that, regardless what else there is to be done. Life has many small and simple pleasures to offer and when we take advantage of them, when we notice them and murmur a small prayer of thanks for them, life is immeasurably improved. Try this for yourself and see if you don’t experience a lift to your spirits and a warmth in your heart.

May you have many pleasant present moments.

Blessings and best regards, Tasha Halpert

P.S. Do you have any stories to share, or comments to make? I so enjoy hearing from readers. Please write to me at Tashahal@gmail.com. My website, for more Love Notes is www.heartwingsandfriends.com

Heartwings Love Notes 1080 : A Spring treat that’s also Medicine

Posted on by

Heartwings says, “It’s true that food can be medicine, and asparagus is.”

My father ate asparagus with his fingers, picking up each stalk up by the end, dipping it in butter and slowly savoring its length. The end was always discarded. At fancy spring dinners my grandmother and my great aunt served asparagus on toast points–crustless toasted bread cut into triangles. There would also be hollandaise sauce or butter poured over the asparagus or served separately by a maid in a shiny black uniform and a starched white apron. This was eaten with a knife and fork.

In those days, coming only in the Spring, fresh asparagus was considered a great treat. My mother disliked canned vegetables and did not serve them, considering canned vegetables to be lacking in vitamins. Today frozen asparagus is easy to find and the fresh stalks can often be bought all the year round. However, it’s the local asparagus that is the real treat. Regardless of its availability, I only really crave it in the spring.

There is a reason it grows and is harvested early in the spring in New England: Asparagus has a wonderful effect on the body, gently cleansing the kidneys as well as the bowels. It serves the helpful purpose of helping us eliminate the leftover winter toxins from our systems. It is an important food that is also a medicine. It is delicious, can be eaten freely and will not cause any untoward symptoms. What a wonderful treat that something that tastes so good is so very good for you.

Euell Gibbon’s book Stalking the Wild Asparagus is a classic on foraging and eating wild vegetables. His description of how at the age of twelve he discovered the wild asparagus is quite enchanting. He admits that wild or tame, they taste the same, except for the thrill of finding your own wild harvest. Actually, this perennial plant, with the help of the birds who ate its seeds, originally escaped from the gardens where it was cultivated and proceeded to grow enthusiastically wherever it could. The wild stalks can be located by searching out the dried seed stalks. These look like feathery miniature trees that have dried up and turned to straw.

According to Mysterious Herbs and Roots, Mitzie Stuart Keller, Peace Press 1978, asparagus was once a royal food reserved for rulers and kings. A member of the lily family, it is related to chives, leeks, garlic, and onions. Wild asparagus, one of the oldest known plants, was believed to have grown in the salt marshes of Asia Minor thousands of years before the earliest recorded history and was unknown in Europe prior to 4 BC. Alexander the Great discovered it when he went searching in the land of Medea, where legend had it that she gave Jason of Argonaut fame the secret of eternal youth. High in vitamin E, it has been for centuries reputed to be an aphrodisiac and was treasured by rulers of many nations. The Romans maintained armed guards to protect their beds from thieves, while royal gardeners made money on the side from selling the seeds.

May you enjoy your medicine as food, and relish this spring treat.

Blessings and best regards, Tasha Halpert

PS Tales to tell or hints to share? Please write to me at tashahal@gmail.com It’s a great treat for me to hear from readers.

Heartwings Love Notes 1079 Easter Customs Make the Celebration

Posted on by

Heartwings says, ” Colorful Easter echoes with spring.”

Like Christmas, Easter has accumulated a number of customs, and it has its roots in a more diverse past than that embraced by religious Christians. The first official celebrations by Christians began with the Council of Nicaea, in 325 when the date of Easter was established as being set for the first Sunday after the first Full Moon after the Equinox. It is called a “moveable feast,” as opposed to Christmas or Halloween that are fixed, on the same day every year.

Many of our Easter customs, like many of our Christmas ones, come from the people of Germany and their traditions. Colored Easter eggs, for instance have been found in burial sites there that date back to the bronze age. The Germans who settled in Pennsylvania brought their Easter and Spring customs with them to this country and they spread from there. One of these was that the Easter Hare (aka for us rabbit) both laid and hid the colored eggs that the children hunted for on Easter morning or found in the nests they made for them in their hats and bonnets.

The Easter bunny, originally a hare, is an integral part of the holiday. Chocolate bunnies begin to appear right after Valentine’s Day, both in food markets and drugstores. The fertile rabbit is a fitting symbol for a springtime celebration. Easter named for the Saxon goddess of spring and fertility, Eostre, is part of the collection of lore around the season. Like winter, the solstice and Christmas, Easter, Spring, and the Vernal Equinox associated with it, have been celebrated long before the advent of Christianity. Our bunny rabbit has a similar association.

The hare, a cousin of the bunny rabbit, is the original animal associated with spring.  It is associated with and sacred to the moon. Hares are larger than rabbits and fiercer, known for engaging in fights and, unlike rabbits, who live and give birth in underground burrows, are born in nests above the ground. Born in the spring, they emerge with their eyes open, able to fend for themselves very soon. The gentle rabbit is far more appropriate as a pet, because the hare is not easily domesticated. They are a food source as well and are often hunted or trapped for that purpose.

The wearing of new clothes for Easter is another symbolic act. It speaks to the custom of seeing spring as a new beginning; new clothes are a part of that. There is a superstition that it is good luck to have at least three new items to be worn for the celebration of Easter. The Easter parade of song and story, is still a tradition as well. Best clothes are worn and animals are even dressed up and wheeled or walked in New York City and other places that hold an Easter parade.

Easter is a delightful time to enjoy and affirm the advent of spring, a fine opportunity for all to gather in celebration.

“May your celebrations be joyous no matter when they are held.”

Blessings and Best Regards, Tasha Halpert

P.S. Do you have any Easter memories to share? I so enjoy your emails and comments. Please write to me at tashahal@gmail.com with any thoughts, stories or suggestions.

Heartwings Love Notes 1078 Food for the Body, Food for the Soul

Posted on by

Heartwings says, “Taking care of ourselves is very important, and dandelions can help.”

    I have always loved dandelions. My memory holds an image of my four-year-old self making a crown for my mother–picking the dandelions, carefully slitting each stem and then poking the heads through to make a bright golden circle. I also remember picking great bunches of them to give her and being disappointed when they closed up, never to reopen. I love to spot them flowering in vacant lots or beside city buildings; their cheerful brightness refreshes my soul. These little golden suns are starting to show up everywhere these days.

    Some will groan and go out to buy weed killer. Big mistake! In addition to the damage most weed killers will do to the surrounding denizens of the year with paws or wings, not to mention humans, when you know how to use them, the greens are good food. You can use them in salad as well as cook them. Somewhat bitter, dandelions are nutritious food. In addition, you can add the steamed greens to steamed kale, collards, spinach or asparagus and whirl them together with garlic and olive oil in a food processor. Promise you won’t experience the bitter at all.

Dandelions contain a whole pharmacy of healthy ingredients. According to Susan Tyler Hitchcock, writing in Gather Ye Wild things, one half cup fresh dandelion greens provides 14,000 milligrams of Vitamin A, as well as half our daily requirement of vitamin C, plus minerals–most especially potassium, calcium and others.

Still want to poison them? Consider that every part of the plant is edible, that the early settlers who brought the seeds here from England used to make coffee from the roasted roots, and that your liver as well as your kidneys will greatly benefit from eating the fresh or sautéed plant. Anyone who wishes to diet will do well to eat dandelions as well as drink dandelion tea, available in health food stores in tea bag form. It is a healthy, inexpensive diuretic. It makes a great wine. It’s easy, tasty, and fun to share.

Ingredients: three lemons, three oranges, six cups of sugar, one package of dry yeast, a quart of dandelion blossoms and a gallon of boiling water. Method: Slice the lemons and oranges into a bowl. Pour the sugar into the bowl and stir to blend. Leave over night. At the same time, pour the boiling water over the freshly picked blossoms in a large crock, or enamel or stainless-steel pot and leave overnight. Never use an aluminum vessel.

The next day, combine all in the large crock or pot, sprinkle with yeast, cover with a cheesecloth or netting and leave for five days. On the sixth day, strain out the fruit and blossoms, bottle the liquid, and cap with a balloon. Set aside to ferment. When balloons hang limply, fermentation is done. Cork tightly and store at least six months, the longer the better. This recipe makes about five bottles of a slightly sweet, mellow, green/golden wine. It is best served after dinner or as a special treat. To me it tastes like a Spring Day.

May your dandelions nourish you in whatever form you have them.”

Blessings and best regards, Tasha Halpert

PS Please write to me with your thoughts, messages and suggestions. I so enjoy your dear letters and will always answer you sooner or later; that’s a promise. My email is tashahal@gmail.com and my website is www.heartwingsandfriends.com .

Heartwings Love Notes 1077: Duty, Obligation, and Love

Posted on by

Heartwings says, “Small acts of love sustain a relationship over time.”

Stephen and I have been together for more than 45 years and this year in July we will have been married for 43. If you were to ask me what keeps us together, I could give you several answers, and they would all be correct. However, in my opinion there is one that stands out above any other: we do our best to be kind to each other. Of course, there are times when one or the other of us, in an attempt to be kind, metaphorically steps on the other’s toes. However, all is quickly forgiven when the one with the stepped-on toes informs the stepper of the error and a discussion ensues.

The codicil of this kindness is a dedication to honesty and truthfulness about feelings. We’ve learned it’s all right to say “ouch” when necessary, and usually to do it tactfully. “You made me…” is not a good way to begin any kind of conversation featuring a complaint. Neither is “Why did you do that to me?” Owning up to one’s feelings is vital. To say “You made me angry when you…” is not helpful. What is, is rather, “I felt angry when you…”.  This is fair and honest. It is important to allow oneself the luxury of being vulnerable enough to admit to being hurt, while not being accusatory and making the other feel uncomfortable.

Kindness in small ways is important. Stephen washes the dishes as a gift to me for doing the cooking. I appreciate this, especially since I know he doesn’t really like doing it. Sometimes I ask him if he would mind if I did them, and he may say yes, or no depending upon how he is feeling. I actually don’t mind doing them, and I even find it soothing to have my hands in warm, running water, however I appreciate his doing them as a loving gift. When I tidy the bed in the morning, opening the covers I’ve straightened to air the bed, I make it easier to make later. This is a gift of love I give Stephen because he makes the bed.

These little daily acts of love between us are not extraordinary or big hearted, but they are part of how we express our love for one another. Small gifts he finds here and there from his forays into thrift shops, thoughtful gestures like holding the door for me, or handing me my cane, are other simple offerings of love and caring that keep love in the forefront of our relationship. Asking each other if one or the other is happy several times a day demonstrates this as well. We live in close proximity, in a small apartment, and it would be easy to get irritated with each other, however we don’t because we are tender with one another, as well as honest. I am grateful to him for his caring, as he is grateful to me. We express this often. It also helps keep us both in love.

May you find happy ways to express your love to your dear ones.

Blessings and best regards, Tasha Halpert

P. S. Your comments, dear reader, are always welcome, as well as any tidbits from your own experiences. Your correspondence makes me so happy, so please, do write when you can.

A Report on a Very Special Book

Posted on by

Heartwings says, “Reading a good book is a pleasure and a joy.”.

When I was in school, I always enjoyed writing book reports. Ever since I learned to do it, reading has always been especially enjoyable for me. Book reports were never a chore because I liked to share stories or information that pleased me. To this day I often recommend what I am reading to a friend who I think might also enjoy it.

Recently, I joined a library book club and the chosen book for the past month was one called Wintering, by Katherine May. Once I began to read it, I was hooked. Now, having finished it I feel so enthusiastic about this book, I am recommending it not just to my friends and family but also to my readers. Perhaps this “book report” will encourage some of them to at least get Wintering from the library, if not buy a copy.

Because the amount of time I have to read has for several reasons diminished, I normally read for entertainment only. My genre of choice is urban fantasy fiction. Wintering is neither fantasy nor fiction, it is a thoughtful, beautifully written book about the times in one’s life that resemble winter: dark, difficult cold, difficult, even painful.

Writing from her own ordinary experiences, May has brought to light what we all have to live through at times. The periods she terms winter are those bleak weeks or months or more when nothing seems to be working, when we feel sad, lonely, incompetent, perhaps even depressed, and more.

That may not sound like an enticing theme. However, it might surprise you. May shares the way she has learned to move through these times with grit and grace. She speaks with frank truthfulness about her feelings and how she deals with her ups and downs, her triumphs, and tragedies. The reader is carried along with May in this compelling book about how she copes and also even how she can’t.

The author is British, and the places she speaks of have unfamiliar names, but the circumstances she has to deal with do not. Illness, dismay, disappointment, and failure fill these pages, and then they are overcome by fortitude, energetic coping, and the author’s special, ultimate courage–whether she succeeds or fails in whatever life has handed her. Sometimes overcoming one’s feelings of inadequacy after a failure, provides a different kind of success.

Along the way she also shares stories of others, and there is interesting information as well, tucked in here and there. Most importantly, this book is not preachy or “New Age” in its philosophy. May is a serious professional whose writing has been widely published. She doesn’t offer anything trite or shallow by way of solutions to difficulties. Instead, she shows us by example how she dealt with her issues, and what that was like for her. This is an inspiring, authentic book written from the heart, presented in beautiful, clear, sometimes poetic prose.

May you enjoy learning both from books and from experience.

Blessings and best regards, Tasha Halpert

PS If you do acquire this book, please tell me how you enjoyed it, I always treasure your responses and will always write you back.

Heartwings Love Notes 1074 A Little Rain is Good for the Garden

Posted on by

Heartwings says, “The acronym for fear spells false evidence appearing real.”

Recently I had a small series of bumps in the road of life. Taken individually, none was particularly serious. Taken as a whole they were a reminder to me to be grateful for what I ordinarily might take for granted. For instance, when I run the water in the sink I expect it to go down the drain, don’t you? Yet when it is reluctant to do so, something must be done. And I did all the things I could think of to do: plunging, pipe clearing liquid, more plunging, hot water, waiting patiently, more pipe clearing liquid, etc. When nothing did any good I opted for the plumber. He took care of it nicely and that was that–until the refrigerator refused to be cold.

A series of attempts to make it run properly failed and another repair person was summoned. Now I have a guarantee I have paid for that lasts a full year, and although I hope the refrigerator will continue to provide cold, at least I feel secure about further repairs should they be needed. It is so easy to take things like the refrigerator for granted. Naturally I expect the washing machine, the dryer, and the vacuum to function efficiently and when needed. However, these little glitches in my everyday life have alerted me to the fact that I do need to remember to be thankful for what I might otherwise take for granted.

Then there was the little popup that kept appearing on my computer screen. It reminded me that I needed to renew my virus protection. “Your computer may be at risk,” it proclaimed. Ought I to tremble in my shoes? I reminded myself to be careful not to download anything potentially hazardous and waited patiently until my computer friend was able to remedy that difficulty. The popup too reminded me to be grateful for my remarkable computer and its gifts to me.

When I was growing up, I would read stories about robots and the marvels they could perform. Somehow, they always walked on two legs and had arms and fingers. Mostly made of metal, like the tin man they had a kind of brain and could speak. Unlike the tin man they performed a multitude of tasks and cared for their owners. Today I am surrounded by “robots.” They don’t walk around or have conversations with me yet they can be programmed to do what I want them to do when I want them to do it and indeed, they do take care of me. They may not physically resemble the robots of the science fiction I once read, yet they fulfill many of the same functions.

I am grateful for my mechanical servants. I appreciate the stove, the washer, the dryer and the vacuum. Having read once in an article on the Feng Shui of India that suggested it, I have even given them all names. I praise them when they do my laundry and cook my food. Most of all I am grateful to them for the hard work they save me from. Truly I am grateful for the little bit of “rain” that fell on the garden of my daily life, it has been good for the garden and even better for the gardener.

May you handle your rain with grace and strength.

Blessings and best regards, Tasha Halpert

How do you handle your rain? Can you avoid getting wet or find good ways to stay dry? I do love it when readers share their stories. Write to me at Tashahal@gmail.com and make my day.

Heartwings Love Notes 1073 Small Economies for Big Savings

Posted on by

Heartwings says, “Paying attention to the truth behind advertising really helps.”

Newenglanders have a reputation for thrift.  “Use it up, make do, or do without” is one example of the thrifty frame of mind. Prices for everyday items like food, gas, and medicine rise every time payment comes due—or so it seems. These days thrifty habits are a necessity. A mindset that puts thrift at the forefront is extremely helpful to the budget.

I can remember my grandmother taking her foot off the gas to coast down hills. My mother found a way to use up every scrap of leftover food. I employed my old-fashioned meat grinder to grind up leftover lamb or beef for pot pies or casseroles. I have always made my own applesauce. Not only is it cheaper, it is more nutritious because I do not peel the apples before I cook them—putting them through a food mill once they have been the slow cooker overnight. I also use half cider, half water to simmer them but never any sugar.

Soup does come in cans, but the only kind I buy are the clam chowder we like. While I am reluctant to cook anything too labor intensive these days, I am happy to make my own soups with lentils or split peas. Leftovers, often combined in good ways, are used up creatively.

 Normally nothing in my kitchen goes to waste. I’ve even discovered that fruit that seems overripe or to be going bad can be cooked up instead, sweetened, and used as syrup for pancakes, waffles, or plain cake. See if you can find a recipe for Cottage Pudding and bake up this inexpensive plain muffin style cake to serve with any sauce for an economical dessert. Email me if you can’t find one and I will give you my recipe from Fanny Farmer’s. That has many good, inexpensive, and helpful recipes and ways to sav

I get annoyed by the advertisements that want you to save money by spending it. It’s false economy to buy something on sale unless you really do need it. No matter how tempting the “sale” may be, if you don’t need it or are tempted to use it to replace something adequate that you already have, it’s no bargain. Spending to save is ridiculous. So is getting something “free” that will get more expensive later. Reading the small print is very important.

Once it was fashionable to be chubby. It meant you had plenty of money for food. Now it is fashionable to drive expensive cars, carry a trendy pocketbook or wear certain name brands of shoes. This is how people get corralled into running up credit cards that have exorbitant interest. I can say I get tempted too, yet I know how to resist. Being grateful for what I already have is my secret to keeping myself free of the urge to buy more. Of course, thrift stores are another way go, Think thrifty and save.

May you discover wonderful ways to economize that cause you no pain.

Blessings and best regards, Tasha Halpert

P.S. What’s your secret to saving? Write to me at reply on WordPress or at tashahal@gmail.com It’s a real treat to hear from readers, and I always answer.