https://chestertownspy.org Nonpartisan and Education-based News for Chestertown Sun, 04 May 2025 13:22:51 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.7.1 https://chestertownspy.org/2025/05/04/sleepless-in-annapolis-by-laura-j-oliver/ https://chestertownspy.org/2025/05/04/sleepless-in-annapolis-by-laura-j-oliver/#comments Sun, 04 May 2025 12:00:59 +0000 https://chestertownspy.org/2025/05/04/sleepless-in-annapolis-by-laura-j-oliver/ Can you feel me staring at you as you sleep? You are as still as my pink robe tossed at the foot of the bed. You are not even dreaming by the look of it. I’m gazing at you with more intrigue than resentment, although that may be a lie. Not only are you sound […]]]> https://chestertownspy.org/2025/05/04/sleepless-in-annapolis-by-laura-j-oliver/feed/ 4 https://chestertownspy.org/2025/04/27/when-the-thing-that-you-long-for-is-not-what-you-want-by-laura-j-oliver/ https://chestertownspy.org/2025/04/27/when-the-thing-that-you-long-for-is-not-what-you-want-by-laura-j-oliver/#comments Sun, 27 Apr 2025 11:00:54 +0000 https://chestertownspy.org/?p=183870 I leave at 3:20, having not yet taught myself to check the traffic on the Chesapeake Bay Bridge hours before any intention to cross it, and so, already marginally late to my college reunion—and this is a big year for my class—I am stopped bumper to bumper. It takes me an hour to creep along […]]]> https://chestertownspy.org/2025/04/27/when-the-thing-that-you-long-for-is-not-what-you-want-by-laura-j-oliver/feed/ 1 https://chestertownspy.org/2025/04/20/in-the-beginning-was-the-word-by-laura-j-oliver/ https://chestertownspy.org/2025/04/20/in-the-beginning-was-the-word-by-laura-j-oliver/#respond Sun, 20 Apr 2025 12:00:17 +0000 https://chestertownspy.org/?p=183740 Here’s what old people do. They talk about their aches and pains and what they had to eat at their most recent meal. Grilled cheese, and my hip hurts. Ha ha. I know you’re reviewing your last conversation with furrowed brow, so I’m trying to make you feel better. To make myself feel better, I’m […]]]> https://chestertownspy.org/2025/04/20/in-the-beginning-was-the-word-by-laura-j-oliver/feed/ 0 https://chestertownspy.org/2025/04/13/magnified-by-laura-j-oliver/ https://chestertownspy.org/2025/04/13/magnified-by-laura-j-oliver/#respond Sun, 13 Apr 2025 12:00:48 +0000 https://chestertownspy.org/?p=183579   Every morning, when I get ready for my day, I sit at my dressing table, known as a vanity by the judgy, and check out my face in a mirror that lights up and magnifies by a power of 15. “Why do you do that?” my mother asked when she was alive. And “Stop […]]]> https://chestertownspy.org/2025/04/13/magnified-by-laura-j-oliver/feed/ 0 https://chestertownspy.org/2025/04/06/and-then-there-were-three-for-sharon-and-andrea-by-laura-j-oliver/ https://chestertownspy.org/2025/04/06/and-then-there-were-three-for-sharon-and-andrea-by-laura-j-oliver/#comments Sun, 06 Apr 2025 12:00:27 +0000 https://chestertownspy.org/?p=183413 I’m at my sister’s horse farm basking in a late-March, Blue Ridge mountain twilight, enjoying a glass of wine around the firepit with my two older sisters. Golden Mica-dog is on sentry duty gazing out over the fields and lake like the good boy he is—keeping watch for bears, beavers, and falling stars. He will […]]]> https://chestertownspy.org/2025/04/06/and-then-there-were-three-for-sharon-and-andrea-by-laura-j-oliver/feed/ 4 https://chestertownspy.org/2025/03/30/in-terms-of-the-absolute-by-laura-j-oliver/ https://chestertownspy.org/2025/03/30/in-terms-of-the-absolute-by-laura-j-oliver/#respond Sun, 30 Mar 2025 11:46:29 +0000 https://chestertownspy.org/?p=183285 Easter is near, and although I no longer participate in an organized religion with an origin story, we have a brain bias to believe what we have grown up with—a homing instinct, perhaps. So, this is a resurrection story based on my Methodist upbringing —not the resurrection of God Incarnate, but of a family pet […]]]> https://chestertownspy.org/2025/03/30/in-terms-of-the-absolute-by-laura-j-oliver/feed/ 0 https://chestertownspy.org/2025/03/23/meet-me-by-the-swings-by-laura-j-oliver/ https://chestertownspy.org/2025/03/23/meet-me-by-the-swings-by-laura-j-oliver/#respond Sun, 23 Mar 2025 12:00:35 +0000 https://chestertownspy.org/?p=183143 How could anyone who loved school as much as I did hate the idea that life itself is a school? And how can someone who was a Safety, for goodness’ sake, be such a bad student? Shouldn’t I be thriving on learning new things in a giant earth classroom with you, my teachers, and classmates? […]]]> https://chestertownspy.org/2025/03/23/meet-me-by-the-swings-by-laura-j-oliver/feed/ 0 https://chestertownspy.org/2025/03/09/the-inside-story-by-laura-j-oliver/ https://chestertownspy.org/2025/03/09/the-inside-story-by-laura-j-oliver/#comments Sun, 09 Mar 2025 12:00:54 +0000 https://chestertownspy.org/?p=182889 The first time my mother brought my father home to the farm, my grandmother said of this charming college classmate in the yellow sportscar, “He’s either the worst thing that ever happened to you or the best.” “He was both,” my mother confided from the far side of that marriage. Here’s what I learned from […]]]> https://chestertownspy.org/2025/03/09/the-inside-story-by-laura-j-oliver/feed/ 4 https://chestertownspy.org/2025/03/02/if-a-little-is-good-more-is-better-meditating-on-a-bed-of-nails-by-laura-j-oliver/ https://chestertownspy.org/2025/03/02/if-a-little-is-good-more-is-better-meditating-on-a-bed-of-nails-by-laura-j-oliver/#respond Sun, 02 Mar 2025 13:00:42 +0000 https://chestertownspy.org/?p=182745 My friend Brian meditates five hours a day while running a successful multi-state business. We started as editor /writer and are now Zoom friends. We’ve never met. Brian texts me that there is only one guaranteed path to self-love, the basis of all spiritual growth, and it is not relationship. (My theory.) Which you do […]]]> https://chestertownspy.org/2025/03/02/if-a-little-is-good-more-is-better-meditating-on-a-bed-of-nails-by-laura-j-oliver/feed/ 0 https://chestertownspy.org/2025/02/16/rescue-them-by-laura-j-oliver/ https://chestertownspy.org/2025/02/16/rescue-them-by-laura-j-oliver/#comments Sun, 16 Feb 2025 12:00:30 +0000 https://chestertownspy.org/?p=182515 A quick review before we get to why I am telling you this story. I worked for five years as a volunteer dog walker at the SPCA before I met Leah. She was a grossly neglected, 17-pound, black-and-white terrier mix. Her original owner, overwhelmed by the needs of three kids under the age of seven, […]]]> https://chestertownspy.org/2025/02/16/rescue-them-by-laura-j-oliver/feed/ 2 https://chestertownspy.org/2025/02/09/the-reformer-by-laura-j-oliver/ https://chestertownspy.org/2025/02/09/the-reformer-by-laura-j-oliver/#comments Sun, 09 Feb 2025 12:37:20 +0000 https://chestertownspy.org/2025/02/09/the-reformer-by-laura-j-oliver/ My smart older sisters have blazed a trail through life for me by example. If I hadn’t received my driver’s license on my first try, for instance, I’d have failed tradition. So, having recently discovered that they both love Pilates, I tried it, too. Things went well until they went horribly wrong. The trial class […]]]> https://chestertownspy.org/2025/02/09/the-reformer-by-laura-j-oliver/feed/ 3 https://chestertownspy.org/2025/02/02/book-ends-by-laura-j-oliver/ https://chestertownspy.org/2025/02/02/book-ends-by-laura-j-oliver/#comments Sun, 02 Feb 2025 12:26:50 +0000 https://chestertownspy.org/2025/02/02/book-ends-by-laura-j-oliver/ `You’re not going to believe this because I couldn’t, but then there are so many facts coming to light nowadays that are, at best, counterintuitive—my two favorites? That light is both a wave and a particle (whaaat?) and entanglement–the concept that two subatomic particles, once in contact, remain inexplicably connected across spacetime so that what […]]]> https://chestertownspy.org/2025/02/02/book-ends-by-laura-j-oliver/feed/ 2 https://chestertownspy.org/2025/01/26/catfished-by-laura-j-oliver/ https://chestertownspy.org/2025/01/26/catfished-by-laura-j-oliver/#comments Sun, 26 Jan 2025 13:00:44 +0000 https://chestertownspy.org/?p=182077 This is a story of being catfished—you know, when you think you’re getting to know an attractive person online with a successful career, who may even have their family name on a wing at the hospital, only you’re actually corresponding with a troll in a third world country emptying your bank account. And although this […]]]> https://chestertownspy.org/2025/01/26/catfished-by-laura-j-oliver/feed/ 2 https://chestertownspy.org/2025/01/12/unbroken-by-laura-j-oliver/ https://chestertownspy.org/2025/01/12/unbroken-by-laura-j-oliver/#respond Sun, 12 Jan 2025 15:45:32 +0000 https://chestertownspy.org/?p=181799 Leah is on the rug in the foyer, licking her paws nonstop. The terrier mix is hard at work giving herself a…  mani? pedi? Your guess is as good as mine, but she draws my attention to something on the floor next to the door, near the crack that lets the cold air in. I […]]]> https://chestertownspy.org/2025/01/12/unbroken-by-laura-j-oliver/feed/ 0 https://chestertownspy.org/2025/01/05/indicators-by-laura-j-oliver/ https://chestertownspy.org/2025/01/05/indicators-by-laura-j-oliver/#comments Sun, 05 Jan 2025 13:00:46 +0000 https://chestertownspy.org/?p=181699 “I have a story to tell you,” I text my friend David as I pull up in front of my house after the Washington College Lifelong Learners pitch session. We’d both just promoted classes we are teaching in January, but I don’t elaborate—I just hit “send,” then wonder if he will believe this story. David […]]]> https://chestertownspy.org/2025/01/05/indicators-by-laura-j-oliver/feed/ 10 https://chestertownspy.org/2024/12/29/forecast-happiness-laura-j-oliver/ https://chestertownspy.org/2024/12/29/forecast-happiness-laura-j-oliver/#respond Sun, 29 Dec 2024 16:28:47 +0000 https://chestertownspy.org/2024/12/29/forecast-happiness-laura-j-oliver/ Clustered around two tables at a Chinese restaurant, I am one of 12 women ostensibly here to have lunch and to learn more about feng shui, the Chinese art of rearranging your possessions to change your life. In reality, it is the promise of a personalized forecast for the Chinese New Year that inspired most […]]]> https://chestertownspy.org/2024/12/29/forecast-happiness-laura-j-oliver/feed/ 0 https://chestertownspy.org/2024/12/22/do-you-hear-what-i-hear-by-laura-oliver/ https://chestertownspy.org/2024/12/22/do-you-hear-what-i-hear-by-laura-oliver/#comments Sun, 22 Dec 2024 12:00:30 +0000 https://chestertownspy.org/?p=181554 I ran into Stacey at Whole Foods this week. She is my neighbor who became a massage therapist, and I am the idiot who had to learn to stop referring to her as a masseuse. It means the same thing, but for some reason, masseuse sounds creepy nowadays. Stacey is beautiful and sweet, and we […]]]> https://chestertownspy.org/2024/12/22/do-you-hear-what-i-hear-by-laura-oliver/feed/ 2 https://chestertownspy.org/2024/12/15/conceal-carry-by-laura-j-oliver/ https://chestertownspy.org/2024/12/15/conceal-carry-by-laura-j-oliver/#comments Sun, 15 Dec 2024 12:00:10 +0000 https://chestertownspy.org/?p=181411 I was in the wine store the other day not asking for help because I already know that all the least expensive wines are displayed on the lowest shelves so that you have to crouch down near the floor to read those descriptions and prices, which means you are in the way of customers who […]]]> https://chestertownspy.org/2024/12/15/conceal-carry-by-laura-j-oliver/feed/ 2 https://chestertownspy.org/2024/12/08/fire-talkers-by-laura-j-oliver/ https://chestertownspy.org/2024/12/08/fire-talkers-by-laura-j-oliver/#comments Sun, 08 Dec 2024 13:00:04 +0000 https://chestertownspy.org/?p=181259 My Great-Grandfather Anderson was chopping milkweed one day, got the juice on his arms, and broke out in a rash that eventually extended all the way over his head. His fever soared, he lost all his hair and then lost his mind. He had developed Aerophilous Erysipelas, or St. Anthony’s Fire, which causes sores, intense […]]]> https://chestertownspy.org/2024/12/08/fire-talkers-by-laura-j-oliver/feed/ 2 https://chestertownspy.org/2024/12/01/my-inspiration-now-and-always-by-laura-j-oliver/ https://chestertownspy.org/2024/12/01/my-inspiration-now-and-always-by-laura-j-oliver/#comments Sun, 01 Dec 2024 12:00:35 +0000 https://chestertownspy.org/?p=181141 My eldest, ever-practical daughter, who has made England her home, where she and her husband are raising their two boys, 6 and 7, wants to know what I want for Christmas. She is organized and dutiful. She will have all her gifts ordered and delivered to every family member in North America weeks before December […]]]> https://chestertownspy.org/2024/12/01/my-inspiration-now-and-always-by-laura-j-oliver/feed/ 6