October 2026

I love you! Happy October!

The month of September was a time of new beginnings and opportunities as we embraced the fall’s change of seasons. Fresh, crisp sweater weather, lower humidity and cool mornings and evenings invigorate our senses.

One of the highlights for me was going to a lecture in Hingham, Massachusetts, featuring a conversation between Jack Smith and Andrew Weissmann. These two government prosecutors I greatly admire spoke on “the rule of law in the United States.”

When Smith entered the Old Ship Meeting House, followed by Weissmann, the eager 300 people spontaneously rose, giving them an extended standing ovation and clapping vigorously in appreciation and gratitude. The positive energy was electric. Many were moved to tears.

We were reassured that there are thousands of good truth seekers who are working night and day, doing their part to keep us safe. When we’re privileged to be able to meet some of these noble souls to express our appreciation, we are freshly inspired to do our part to help find solutions to our country’s pressing problems.

Overall, the entire month of September was inspiring, meaningful, illuminating and a great deal of fun!

My friends and I laughed our hearts out at the 1973 Fellini masterpiece Amarcord that celebrated fanciful Italy in one year’s changing seasons. Another friend and I went to see Sylvia Scarlett, starring Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn, at the Kate.

And oh, the live theater I experienced!

Eileen and Bill, friends from Marblehead, Massachusetts, invited me to join them at the last performance of Come From Away the following week, on September 11. There was something magical about the power of this live theater production that stirred our emotions about the kindness of the people of Canada. The play begins in the hours after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, when planes were diverted to the island of Newfoundland. Seven thousand passengers from all over the world.

The Ivoryton Playhouse in Ivoryton, Connecticut, timed Come From Away beautifully as part of the 2026 celebration of the 250^th anniversary of our country. The entire performance’s story was sung, easing the tragic reality’s pain while the audience’s collective memories and compassion brought us to our knees metaphorically.

There was such an outpouring of kindness, when people opened their homes for total strangers, offered them genuine hospitality, cooked for them, did their laundry. Seatmates from the frightening plane ride to an unknown destination found love and got married.

This last performance was sentimental and emotional, and the audience members were not the only ones shedding tears — a few of the actors were too. In this poignant story of humans’ capacity for loving-kindness and compassion, we know we all can be on the giving side of our human connections.

Thank you, Canada. Your openhearted welcome to help all these stranded, frightened passengers will not be forgotten. Your national character is exemplary. Out of many, you made us all one human family.

The past was once the present. We’re all given the same amount of time each day. When we’re on a path to live the good life, we use our experiences to learn the best ways to use our time. The 5th century BC Greek poet Agathon understood something so profound: “This only is denied to God: the power to undo the past.”

All philosophers teach us that we should concern ourselves only with the things that are in our control. If the gods and God can’t undo the past, then that leg of our earthly journey is a chapter closed. Fortunately, we are in full control of the wise choices we are free to make in this present, living, breathing moment. Right here, right now, we are responsible for our actions. As we inhale deeply, we remind ourselves of the obvious reality: we are alive only when we’re breathing. This truth eliminates the yesterdays and the tomorrows for us to regret or worry about.

The past can never be revisited, except in our dreams, our remembered stories and our illusions. The future will never exist. The clock always goes clockwise, moving the present into the future. We will either be alive to enjoy it or not. No guarantees. It’s common sense to give our complete concentration to focus on our priorities and intentions right now.

I’ve been acutely aware lately of how good it feels when I stay focused in the moment, in my breath. Alan Watts, the wise Zen guru, encouraged us to grasp this keenly perceptive truth: “I have realized that the past and the future are real illusions, that they exist only in the present, which is what there is and all that there is.”

When people talk about their regrets, we all would agree that if we knew what we know now, we would have made some other choices. We can look back, and yet at the time, we weren’t who we are now. We do the best we can as we move forward under the circumstances. Wisdom builds with experience.

We might have taken the road less traveled or said no to decisions that weren’t in our best interest. However, whatever, here we are.

What do you want to do with whatever time you have from this day forward? “According to the Stoics, we humans have a higher obligation, not to the gods but to each other,” wrote the Stoic philosopher and self-help sage, Ryan Holiday, who wants us to remember our humanity. “We are made for cooperation.”

The good life is a life well lived, focused on what is true, good and beautiful. When we aspire to become a more evolved human being with a love of wisdom, we will dedicate our lives to the values that foster compassion, empathy, love and harmony. We will do the right thing because we want to. It makes us feel good. Socrates, the teacher of Plato, who taught Aristotle, knew that the higher wisdom exists in distinguishing between good and evil. Seneca, the Roman Stoic, knew that “Every noble deed is voluntary.” Being useful is built into our DNA.

When we reflect on the past and how we spend those fleeting, unrepeatable years, we’re humble. We could have done more good. Now we can soar with the energy of love. The Stoic philosopher Epictetus, a former slave, knew from his painful past, “The struggle is great, the task divine — to gain mastery, freedom, happiness and tranquility.”

My well-read friend Carolyn invited me to a lecture and book event to launch Alexander McCall Smith’s 27^th book in the “No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency” mystery novel series. He’s written more than 50 books and is, by far, Carolyn’s favorite author.

I had never heard of McCall Smith, whose detective series is set in Botswana. Carolyn’s excitement about being able to meet him face-to-face was supercharged electric energy. When she told me about Precious Ramotswe, the sweet lady detective, Carolyn said she was simply adorable. I am going to love reading about her kindness and forgiveness, her sense of humor and appreciation of simple pleasures. Precious Ramotswe started her agency by selling some fat, healthy cattle her father left for her in his will, along with an “unconquerable belief in a kind world.” She’s enthralling, according to those reviews in praise of Precious Ramotswe.

A few days later, another good friend, Alice, called and invited me to join her at the same event: “I bought an extra ticket. A copy of his latest book is included.” She went into the Peace Corps when she was 45 and was sent to Botswana for two years! When I told her I was invited to go with a friend whose favorite author is Alexander McCall Smith, she told me she too has read most of his books because they capture the peaceful, loving spirit of the people from Botswana as no other writer has done so well. Alice is also a big fan.

I had about a month to read some of the “No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency” books in eager anticipation of meeting the great man who created Precious Ramotswe. This brilliant storyteller vividly describes simple, sweet, everyday pleasures: walking in the garden, looking up at the vast open sky, sipping bush tea. McCall Smith’s stories give the reader a gentle assurance about life’s essential goodness and beauty. There seems to always be a rainbow at the end of a storm, but unless you look up at the sky, you don’t see it.

His beguiling characters know the silver lining is something you have to recognize. “There are very few troubles that cannot be solved with kindness, and very few dry seasons that do not end with welcome rain,” he wrote in The Miracle at Speedy Motors.

Alexander McCall Smith is a professor of medical law at the University of Edinburgh. He was born in Zimbabwe and taught law at the University of Botswana for 12 years. He lives in Scotland and goes to Botswana every summer.

His event at the United Theatre in Westerly, Rhode Island, was sold out. Alice picked me up, along with a friend who was joining her who was also a big fan of McCall Smith. There’s something quite magical about being at an event where all the people in attendance are like-spirited and enthusiastic. I was perhaps the newest member of the international fan club of his bestselling books. Several friends I go to movies and plays with, who recommend books to me, were there in the audience. It now seems that I was the only person in the room who hadn’t been reading him for the past 20 years!

Most of the people who attended his talk and book signing were mature in age. During the question period, we learned that many of the women had heard of his work from their mothers.

McCall Smith’s presentation was sheer delight, divine. He was dressed in a Scottish plaid kilt, and when a woman asked him how he could possibly understand life so clearly from the female point of view, he laughed and pointed out that he was wearing a skirt! He answered that his mother and sisters, his doctor wife and their two daughters helped him see the world from their perspective. His wit is obviously a God-given gift. McCall Smith’s ability to perceive, understand and humorously express the relationship between seemingly incongruous things is uncanny. We were eating out of the palm of his hand — he exuded charm, ease, whimsy and contagious warmth. McCall Smith understands the universality of the human condition. Sharing his rich life experiences with us through his imaginative stories is, for him, as natural as breathing and laughing.

I now feel his warmth and playful spirit and his sterling character in Precious Ramotswe’s sweet voice. He is so full of compassion and good, wholesome humor. Reading his work is positively uplifting, soothing and inspirational. McCall Smith is a practical philosopher whose profound knowledge of real life’s possibilities is encouraging as well as infectious.

When he was signing books and saw on the Post-it note that my name is Alexandra, there was an invisible feeling of connection that I was a female cousin. The internationally famous fiction self-help mystery author signing a copy of his latest book, The Big Cats Dance Party, to a nonfiction self-help writer with the female version of his name: Alexandra. “Fiction is more fun,” he said with a jolly chuckle! His characters just come to him after he sits down to write his 2,000 words in two hours, seven days a week. Apparently, they just open doors, he said, and leap into his imagination.

He wrote in his newest book, “When Lion and Leopard were leaping about playing what would be the last number, everybody suddenly began to dance.” Alexander McCall Smith reminds us to celebrate (yes, dance!) the joy of being alive and loving those you’ve loved and still love with every “fiber of your being.” I feel we share a message: “Love & Live Happy.”

I’ve gushed enough about Alexander McCall Smith for now. I’m going to begin to read another one of his books in the “No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency” series!

When an actress friend of mine told me about Almost Maine, a theater production about love and loss, I was intrigued. On the last performance on a rainy Sunday matinee, a friend and I were amused, moved and entertained as we sat back to become part of a dream sequence.

Laura Thompson, the interim president of the Board of Directors of the Granite Theatre in Westerly, Rhode Island, wrote that the short skits that make up the play Almost Maine “explore those moments in relationships that provide meaning, hope and growth in its characters' lives. With a little bit of humor, magic and whimsy it shows us the importance of human connection in our communities.”

The brilliant stage setting consisted of washes of pastel colors and silver swirling tissue-like paper in the ceiling. There was a red door and a green door that remained stationary. Everything else moved in and out, involving us in the character’s dream.

John Cariani, the playwright, “wanted the script to feel real,” according to the interim artistic director, Addison Roush.

Apparently, Roush had never liked this play, and he felt the same way about Oklahoma, so he decided to put on these two productions to show us in the audience how they were supposed to be done. As I wrote about in August, with Oklahoma, and now with Almost Maine, he has succeeded.

The characters are ordinary, real people from Maine who experience real problems, but we are experiencing them through their dreams and fantasies. All these residents of Maine are asleep. The eight cast members played in several different scenes — 20 in all. At the end of each dream about love, loss, longing and hope, the characters awaken to a digital clock. We can relate. The huge screen shows romantic, breathtakingly beautiful scenes of gardens, lovers kissing, hands about to touch.

All these skits portray situations we all have experienced — a lack of communication, a lack of listening, a fear of intimacy and expressing our love — and they are beautifully expressed on the stage. These fantasies, magical moments, real and unreal, all make sense when we view this play through the lens of a series of colorful images, ideas, emotions and sensations that occur during sleep.

Happy and sweet dreams. The Almost Maine play we enjoyed was truly sweet!

Ever since my trip around the world in 1960, I’ve valued travel as a high form of education and enlightenment. While on this life-changing trip with my aunt, we were given gracious hospitality everywhere because of her international work as a social worker. Being guests in her friends’ homes gave us a taste of their culture and country’s ways of living. This intimate view of different nations from the citizens who showed us around their villages, towns and cities was a history lesson told through our experiences.

The demographics of the character of the human population is forever fascinating. Once I was able to write books for publication, my literary agent was most excited whenever a foreign country would publish one of my books.

With a heart full of gratitude and humility, I am so pleased to know that 95 different countries have readers who are currently reading my website as well as some of my books. 

I’m so touched that Singapore is number two! I worked for Singapore’s government in the 1980s, decorating a permanent residence in New York. This assignment required me to travel throughout Southeast Asia to gather the textiles and furnishings for this most exciting project. My client was the ambassador to the United Nations from Singapore.

Friends from Singapore, thank you for keeping our connection alive. I’d love to hear from you to learn your stories.

Friends from Ukraine, I’m moved by your country’s courage and determination throughout this unspeakably tragic war. Thank you for your strength and love of country. Please know that you have so many Americans who love you and are supporting you in big and small ways.

I’m so fortunate to feel that there are friends in the far reaches of the globe who read my monthly newsletter. Just the mere thought that human hearts can beat in unison in friendship and spirit, with warm wishes, inspires us all to reflect on all our good in the world.

Love will continue to unite us through our human hearts.

Happy October. Enjoy the magical beauty of the colorful fall foliage.

Love & Live Happy,