This is not a political blog, so I will not make it into one now but it is nearly impossible to continue on with no mention of the events that caught America by surprise last week in the election of our next president.

Although I am slowly (ok, very slowly) uncurling from my fetal position, I am still struggling to come to terms with the potential loss of the rights that women of my age (I’m suddenly very proud to be 58 years old!) have fought for and advanced in the last 40 years or so. There are too many to list here but for me it started with  Title IX and I never looked back. The list of other potential setbacks on advances such as climate change goes on and on but this is not the place for them, in part because the list is TOO LONG!

So here is the thing. Despite the popular vote in favor of one candidate and the democratic process electing another, the American people had their chance to speak with their vote. So now we need to calmly and patiently listen and find out why this happened and figure out a common ground and work together.

So it was today when I was on my morning walk that I bumped into this little guy, Willie, who was on a walk in the Ward’s neighborhood. I smiled and laughed and enjoyed this little potbellied pig on a leash and I felt room in my heart for a whole other interpretation of When Pigs Fly…  The phrase used to have an implied threat of impossibility that no longer exists after last week’s turn of events. Now we need to understand what Willie is doing on a leash in Kirkwood, Missouri and not question why he isn’t a puppy.