Whatever you do, don't congratulate yourself too much, or berate yourself either. Your choices are half chance. So are everybody else's.

In twenty years you'll look back at photos of yourself and recall in a way you can't grasp now how much possibility lay before you and how fabulous you really looked.

Don't waste your time on jealousy.

Maybe you’ll marry, maybe you won’t, maybe you’ll have children, maybe you won’t, maybe you’ll divorce at 40, maybe you’ll dance the funky chicken on your 75th wedding anniversary…what ever you do, don’t congratulate yourself too much or berate yourself either – your choices are half chance, so are everybody else’s.

Families are ecosystems. Each life grows in response to the lives around it

The Thanksgiving meal should not be treated as a grad school exam or an Olympic dive. Whatever you cook will be good enough - unless you make that Twinkie turkey stuffing we're suddenly hearing too much about.

For some Chicago expats, food is the medicine that blunts the pain of separation.