Do you remember the last text, email or voicemail you got from someone who’s no longer in your life? Maybe it’s from an ex, a former friend or a loved one who’s died. You might revisit those words more often than you should, wishing things had ended differently, or that you had more time together […]

A few years ago I stopped by my neighbor Mike’s yard to photograph his rhubarb – alas, well past its prime – but my eye was caught by something far more lovely. It was an old apple tree with widespread branches, propped up with cedar posts, secured with leather straps. On its own, an apple […]

The big, red blowsy amaryllis has positioned itself as a holiday bloom, but I’m with Christian Curless, a horticulturist who raises and sells this Samson of flowering bulbs. Dutch-grown bulbs are hard-pressed to flower in time for the holidays because of the way their internal clock has been reworked; amaryllis hails from the Southern Hemisphere. […]

The New England Centenarian Study began studying very old people and their offspring in 1995, setting out to determine – among other things – which characteristics people 100 and older seem to share. They differ in education, socioeconomic status, religion, ethnicity and dietary habits, but they have many things in common: – Few centenarians are […]

When word spread last year that numerous researchers at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden had long been sneaking Bob Dylan lyrics into their work, sometimes unbeknownst to one another, a librarian at the university got to wondering. “I thought, ‘These Swedish guys, they can’t be unique,’” recalled the librarian, Carl Gornitzki, himself a Swedish guy. […]

“When I was a kid,” my mother, Jennie Moglia Carroll, reminisced, “Big Grampa (my great-grandfather) cooked the Feast of the Seven Fishes every Christmas Eve, and Mommy (my Italian grandmother, Agnes, who I lovingly called Nonny) used to help.” The Feast of the Seven Fishes is an American-Italian tradition that may have roots in Christianity […]

Kids tell us their favorite holiday traditions For years, Elf on the Shelf has meant Christmas to Cloe Stickney. Three years to be exact. Almost half her life. In Decembers past, the elf has been found playing in a bowl of marshmallows, eating jelly beans out of a candy cane-shaped container and having tea in […]

BOSTON — When Darren Kisgen decided to make a game, his only goal was to entertain his family. But over the past few months, the finance professor at Boston College has seen his game selling thousands of copies around the world and winning a big prize. “I’m surprised by all of this,” said Kisgen, a […]