“In these next months, I’m determined to pay attention—to breathe in the present and not to skate over it. I am not a saint or a poet, but I am a headmistress and a writer and a mom and a wife and a friend.  I’m carrying a miniature version of Emily Webb in my heart, reminding myself that letting everything go by unremarked to save myself the pain of what I might miss is folly. The mess of it all. To love the every day, to hug the whole experience, to notice life as I am living it is the intention I’m setting for myself.”