February 17, 2017 Columns by Jamie Hughes Conference Was a Reminder of Why We Must Continue to Create Own Stories Last week, I attended the Association of Writers & Writing Programs (AWP) conference in Washington, D.C. I had the opportunity to meet many fine folks who are hard at work creating everything from alphabet books for children to poetry protesting xenophobia. I attended panels on editing, writing…
February 3, 2017 Columns by Jamie Hughes Correlation Between MS and Harry Potter Characters is Pure Magic Perhaps the most famous MS advocate today isn’t a patient, but the daughter of one. Author J.K. Rowling lost her mother to multiple sclerosis in 1990, something she describes as “an enormous shock.” In order to help fight and defeat this disease, she donated £10m to found…
January 20, 2017 Columns by Jamie Hughes Fighting MS on Our Own Terms: Vive La Resistance! There’s one thing you need to know about my family — we’re weird. We laugh at inopportune times. We can go entire days just speaking to one another in movie quotes. Sarcasm is a love language to my clan. And we can make just about anything — and I…
January 6, 2017 Columns by Jamie Hughes Planning to Succeed in the New Year Now that 2016 is thankfully behind us, it’s time to start a new year — fresh, rested, and ready to kick butt and chew bubble gum. That being said, rest in peace David Bowie, Alan Rickman, Glen Frey, Prince, Nancy Reagan, George Kennedy, Gary Shandling, Anton Yelchin, Gene…
December 16, 2016 Columns by Jamie Hughes Hope Lights the Way to a Cure for MS “This first candle in the advent wreath,” I told my kids as I clicked the lighter and set its flame atop the wick, “represents hope. What does that word mean to you guys?” In the warm glow of the purple taper, we talked about everything from wishes and…
December 2, 2016 Columns by Jamie Hughes Life is a Symphony of Challenges – Play On! In Cold Sassy Tree, the classic novel by Olive Ann Burns, Grandpa Blakeslee tells his grandson Will Tweedy that, “Livin’ is like pourin’ water out of a tumbler into a dang Coca-Cola bottle. If’n you skeered you cain’t do it.” If you don’t speak fluent hick, as I do,…
November 18, 2016 Columns by Jamie Hughes ‘Courage, Dear Heart’* You’ve gotta dance like there’s nobody watching, Love like you’ll never be hurt, Sing like there’s nobody listening, And live like it’s heaven on earth. Those lines from William W. Purkey, a professor, author and motivational speaker, have been blazoned on countless greeting cards and posters…
November 4, 2016 Columns by Jamie Hughes Finding Power in Knowledge and Numbers When you have a chronic illness, learning everything you can about it is both a blessing and curse. The part of me that’s a researcher and a digger at heart, the one who simply can’t get enough information, gathers it nonstop from a variety of sources; after all, knowledge is…
October 20, 2016 Columns by Jamie Hughes Lego and MS: Lessons from Things That Rip Apart and Reassemble As a mother of two boys, I’m blessed with an abundance of dirty socks, Nerf darts, and Legos — all of which end up in the laundry (more or less) each week. And of those three kinds of detritus, I must say that the Legos vex me the most. If…
October 5, 2016 Columns by Jamie Hughes Vitamin D: You Are What You Eat A few weeks ago, I visited my general practitioner for a yearly physical. I was expecting him to harp on my weight, cholesterol, blood pressure — any of the other myriad issues that crop up as we age. But surprisingly, I left the office with my self-esteem firmly intact. (In…
September 30, 2016 Columns by Jamie Hughes Happy is the Woman And do you feel scared? I do, but I won’t stop and falter. And if we threw it all away, things can only get better – Howard Jones, “Things Can Only Get Better” Things I’m good at include (but are not limited…