Sisters have ways of socializing brothers into the mysteries of girls. Brothers have ways of socializing sisters into the puzzle that is boys.

There's a deep-freeze of sorts for all good intentions - a place that you store your plans to make changes in your life when you know you're not going to make them at all.

When our culture shifts, it tends to overcorrect, throwing out everything associated with an era we've moved past, rather than saving what was good and combining it with what is new.

Introverts listen better, they assess risks more carefully, they can be wiser managers. It's not for nothing that the Silicon Valley billionaires are so often the retiring types.

Athletes often start life at the opposite end of the wealth and prestige spectrum, but as soon as they exhibit an unusual talent for swinging a bat or sinking a free-throw they may find that the rules have been suspended for them. They are waved through school and into the pros, and incidents of bad behavior are overlooked or covered up.

Credit or debit cards, for starters, are nothing short of shoppers' Novocain. Even in the age of digital purchases and virtual money, we still attach a special value to dirty paper with pictures of presidents on it. Handing some of that to a cashier simply hurts more than handing over a little sliver of plastic.

My family went through divorces and remarriages and the later, blended home - and then watched that home explode, too.