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Today – Saturday, Feb. 16, 2019 – is the day of the second annual black-tie fundraiser gala for the BennettStrong Foundation at Northampton Valley Country Club. Approximately two months ago, I sat down at the Warrington Starbucks – one of them – with foundation co-founder Mary Pellegrino, whose incredible journey with her special needs son, Bennett, and husband Greg (shown together at left) has shaped her new mission in life.

Mary is not just a wife and mother, not just a teacher at Tohickon Middle School in the Central Bucks district and a color guard coach for CB West High School. She is a symbol of almost superhuman strength and an invaluable support system for countless families across the region who are raising medically complex children – kids like Bennett, who was born in June of 2013, four months premature, a “micro-preemie,” and has fought through a real firing squad of medical challenges to grow into the spunky 5-year-old he is today.

“We’re giving voices to families that are similar to ours,” Mary says, describing the foundation she and Greg established in 2017. “The advice comes from us to members of the community in a very private and compassionate way, so families can get the support they need, but they don’t necessarily need to advertise that they’re getting it.”

Mary, a natural extrovert raised in New England (Patriots fan alert!) who copes with heartache through conversation, has been anything but private about her struggles, and she dove into her current role as a NICU heroine without ever really intending to. The BennettStrong Foundation continues to break new ground in the world of the NICU, short for Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, which was the Pellegrino family’s world for nearly Bennett’s entire first year on Earth.

The story behind the foundation will make you reevaluate what “strong” really means. Continue reading “Coffee Convo #5: From NICU ordeal to a life of philanthropy, Mary Pellegrino keeps her family “BennettStrong”” →

On the morning of Jan. 2, 2019, just over 24 hours into my 41st year on Earth, I walked in the door of a third-floor suite in a riverfront office building in Bristol, PA, and I started a new career.

No, the job I’ve now held for one month wasn’t – isn’t – just a job to me. Accepting this position as an entry level content writer at a digital marketing agency marked the end of a gut-wrenching, soul-searching four-month hunt for a post-journalism life path.

I’ve been walking that path in some very different footwear than I walked as a sports journalist for almost 20 years…witness the Sam Edelman pumps from Trunk Club that have left me with blisters on my heels AND toes.

I’m also walking this path in a different “heat” – to borrow a term from the athletic world – from most of my coworkers. I estimate I’m one of the five oldest people in the entire company, and definitely the oldest in my department. Continue reading “Employment Chronicles: Happy Month-i-versary” →

I called it.

My pre-playoff game blog post on Sunday actually said, verbatim: “God help us if this game comes down to Cody Parkey vs. Jake Elliott. (Sound of football hitting upright)”.

No, it wasn’t the most profound prediction, if you’ve followed the Chicago Bears closely this season. You didn’t even need to follow closely to know that our kicker had major “doink”ing issues, or to speculate that his season-long assault on goalposts would play a factor in Sunday’s matchup with the Eagles.

To be accurate, that excruciating Bears loss in the NFL’s Wild Card Round did not come down to Kicker vs. Kicker. It came down to Kicker vs. One of the Worst Cases of the Yips Football Has Ever Seen.

I feel like SuperToe would have been a better option for the Bears with the game on the line.

Now, thanks to Parkey, and NBC color guy Cris Collinsworth, that loss will forever be known as “The Double Doink Game.”

Has a much more amusing ring to it than “The Fog Bowl.” Continue reading “Double Doink!: Finding humor in the Bears’ excruciating playoff exit” →

Fun fact: I was seven years old the last time  – oh yes; the ONLY time – the Chicago Bears won the Super Bowl. My lone memory of that day is standing with my younger sister at the front window of my parents’ house in a northern suburb called Morton Grove and watching in awe as my dad and his drunk friends set off fireworks in the front yard.

My dad doesn’t even really drink. But if there was a time for a lifelong Chicago sports fan to go apesh*t…I mean, other than the 2016 World Series (FLY THE W!!!!)…it was that day.

Fun Fact #2: I have lived in the Philadelphia area almost as long (17 years) as I lived in the Chicago area (21 years), and I married an Eagles fan. There he is in the attached picture, disrespectfully photobombing me as I celebrate the arrival of my amazingly awesome Official Bears Sideline Hat on Saturday afternoon.

In my/his defense, my hubby is also a Cubs fan. That’s how we got together. First date: Cubs-Phillies at The Vet. Wedding: Cubs-themed, in Chicago. They lost that day; LOL. We drove out to Cleveland together for Game 7 of the aforementioned 2016 Series, and we both agree, that was the best night of our lives.

Anyway, I’m writing this blog because the Bears have awakened from a too-long slumber – read: they really sucked for a really long time – and returned to the NFL Playoffs, and today, we have the sh*tty fortune of facing the defending Super Bowl Champion Philadelphia Eagles. Continue reading “It’s all fun and games…until Da Bears face the Eagles in the NFL playoffs” →

A friend from a former lifetime – at 40 years old, in my third city and on my seventh job, I’ve had quite a few of those – added me to a truly fascinating Facebook group called “What’s Your Plan B?” as a way of connecting me to kindred spirits across the country. The group is for journalists grappling with the harsh realities of the modern news industry and striving to map out a blueprint for life after journalism.

That’s me, as they say, to a T.

I’m sitting here writing this blog after my first “week” – shortened to three whirlwind days due to the New Year’s holiday – at my first new job in almost two decades.

It’s my first non-journalism job since I graduated from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University (yes, I’m going to thump my chest about that, but mostly because my Wildcats staged an epic comeback against Utah in the Holiday Bowl to cap off an amazing football season in which they also played for a Big Ten championship) way back in 2000.

Now, I’m an entry level content writer at a digital marketing agency, working 8 to 5 in an office full of (so far) strangers, for a $10,000 pay cut, writing website copy, press releases and blog entries for clients in every business from HVAC to Hoagies, with a minimum word count requirement and a focus on Search Engine Optimization.

Hey, it’s writing, and goddammit, I’m a writer! It’s my passion! It’s in my bones!

But this is nothing like anything I’ve had to write before. Continue reading “Employment Chronicles: Welcome to ‘Plan B’” →

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Listening to the recording of the chat I had with Mike Dea and his wife, Lori, which happened (*looks at calendar and shakes head at how much I’ve procrastinated*) more than a month ago at The Stone’s Throw at Shady Brook Farm — when I was still an employee of Shady Brook Farm — I hear the sound not of a reporter conducting an interview, but of a couple buddies reminiscing.

Full disclosure: we were not drinking coffee. It might be more appropriate to call this a “Tequila Convo,” but unlike me, the Deas (pronounced like “idea”) were enjoying some of the pub’s stellar Pennsylvania craft beers.

This was a fitting setting to get to know more about Mike, who, as long as our paths have been crossing in the world of local sports, has never played the role of Head Coach, Manager or Team Spokesperson. I met him when he started serving as an assistant coach in the Falls American Legion program. So, our interactions always have been informal.

Mike prefers that kind of persona. He’s more than happy being “the guy behind the guy,” or, really, “guys,” if you consider all the young men he’s been able to influence in his three-plus decades of coaching baseball in Lower Bucks County.

He loves teaching the game. It’s in his blood. The son of Frank Dea, a veteran youth baseball coach – and we’re talking 50 years and counting — Mike played at Harry S Truman and immediately started coaching with Levittown Babe Ruth after his graduation in 1985. Some district and state titles came with that. But what really got Mike hooked on the coaching “profession” — and we use quotes to reinforce that coaching youth baseball is basically donating time away from your family, when you’re not working your real job — was not winning trophies, but what he calls “the small things.”

“It’s seeing kids be successful — and there’s different definitions of success,” says Mike, a drywall finisher by trade and the father of two college students, Zack and Corey. “Is it someone like [former Holy Ghost Prep star and current Cleveland Indians prospect] Nolan Jones making it to the major leagues, or a kid who was shy when you started coaching him and came out of his shell? Every kid is different. And when you spend enough time with them, every kid is successful in his own way.

“I’m just as proud of the teams I’ve coached that had two wins as teams that had two losses. Maybe it was a kid on the team who never got a hit in three years and got a hit and the kids congratulated him. Just to see a smile from a kid who got his first hit…sometimes just that makes for a successful season.”
Continue reading “Coffee Convo #4: Baseball lifer Mike Dea relishes role as “life coach” for area youth” →

Let’s start with a plug for the West Chester Therapy Group, whose Instagram wisdom (as illustrated here) is the source of at least one daily “F*CK YES!” — and of much-needed reassurance that what I’m going through is normal, maybe even universal, and it’s all gonna work out in the end.

Follow them @wctherapygroup. You won’t be sorry.

So, I chose to attach this particular post because I’m about to enter yet another “level” in my life, and attempt yet another personal re-invention. I just accepted a job as a content writer at a digital marketing agency, and although I don’t start until Jan. 2, it definitely feels like I’ve already begun a completely new phase of existence.

The last phase still looms large in the rearview mirror. It was memorable, to say the least.

I worked as a cashier at Shady Brook Farm for about 35-ish hours per week, from early October until this past Monday, when I cleaned my last toilet and walked out the door with a definite appreciation for everyone working in retail during the holiday season.

You wouldn’t think it, but people are especially surly at Christmastime. I mean, maybe they aren’t too keen on crowded places full of kids and chaos and Mariah Carey on a constant loop, and they’re saving all their holiday spirit for when they get home with their families, in which case, I actually can understand.

I tend to get stressed out in chaotic situations, too. Continue reading “Requiem for a retail career” →

I’m 40 years old, and I just got offered an entry level job that pays almost $10,000 less per year than my previous job, in which I had spent more than 15 years developing skills and talents and establishing myself in the local media community, and I’m sitting here toasting with my husband and celebrating.

We are legit excited that I get to stop sweeping floors at Shady Brook Farm – my in-between job, that pays $9 an hour – and report to a corporate office every day.

That doesn’t really matter, though. There is no, has been no, flow chart for my professional life for a really long time. I spent 16 years at my previous company, treading water, doing what I loved, but in a negative atmosphere that offered no room for growth or advancement. Continue reading “Employment Chronicles: I GOT A JOB!” →