omg

​John and I hosted cookouts for the five of us in our immediate family, plus a boyfriend or girlfriend. Sometimes, Scrabble games followed that Ben almost always won. We teased Beth about choosing a law school in California, as far across the country as she could get from us in Boston! Especially since she influenced most of our migrations from Ohio. 
 
Beth reassured us, laughing, that she’d be back on the East Coast after graduating from Stanford.
            
I cooked my first big turkey dinner after 50 years of traveling to Thanksgiving feasts in Ohio. My mom and grandma had cooked for crowds and timed everything perfectly, with the turkey carved and the potatoes mashed just minutes before we ate. I had roasted a turkey before but not with all the extra side dishes. My first attempt resulted in dry turkey and lumpy gravy. 
 
The pumpkin pies I made from my great-grandma’s recipe didn’t last long.  
            
In December, Beth’s boss asked her to attend Harvard's Health System Research Agenda Workshop with him in Cambridge. Late in the evening of the third, Beth sent me an email:
            
OMG. Bill Gates was at my meeting. Then at dinner, I sat by a lovely French man who is the head of the World Economic Fund. He asked ME about my research and said I was helpful! So I’m having an existential night. 
 
I need to figure out what I want to do with my life because anything is possible. 
 
Love from your daughter, who has a big head tonight and danced alone on the T with her iPod. 

Next: November's Serendipity Newsletter!