I’m not retiring. I’m just getting started.

How I'm redefining midlife success. Plus: Summer dinners and new specs.

Jul 27, 2025

Hi Midlifers!

How is your weekend? So far, mine has been delightful — full of early walks to the beach with the dog, grilled kabobs and a fresh veggie orzo salad for dinner on the deck and the house bursting with the scent of basil from the giant bouquet we picked up at the local farm stand. My daughter Ubered here from Philly on Saturday morning and we’ve squeezed a lot in, including a quick dip in the rough ocean before dinner and working all afternoon on a fun brand refresh for The Midlife Diaries from the comfort of our shady porch (stay tuned).

Today, I’m driving my girl back to Philly. We’ll pick up my sister and our old Ektorp chair that’s been living with her for the last few years. We’re reuniting the chair with the old Ektorp couch that’s been having a renaissance in the City of Brotherly Love and then grabbing brunch at Sabrina’s around the corner from my girl’s apartment. Totally worth the 2.5 hours of driving.

I foresee spending the rest of my Sunday savoring the last of the quiet — maybe reading on the porch or walking the dog — before reentering the madness of work on Monday morning.

My adorable boss/daughter finally signed off to start her maternity leave, which runs through the end of the year. In the meantime, I now have three teammates reporting through me and bringing new priorities and focuses to my already pretty full work plate.

It will be, as they say in the business world, a lot.

When I indicated I’d like to step in as interim people manager, she was like, “Really? It’s a lot of work. Are you sure?” And maybe it’s like having that first baby — you have no idea the amount of work involved until you dive in and see for yourself. Right now, I’m still in the “How hard can it be?” mode.

At a time when many of my peers are slowing down, retiring to second homes or taking bike tours through the Loire Valley, my professional ambition has ramped up.

When I was in my early 20s and working at a high-end women’s magazine (Mirabella, for those of you who remember), my ambition looked a lot different. Back then, it looked like wanting my boyfriend to marry me and play house. I wanted to ditch work and stay home with a passel of kids and create the family I longed for but didn’t grow up with. How hard could that be? (LOL generational trauma.)

Before the pandemic, I visited my Mirabella work wife and we spent the night chatting about who we were almost 30 years earlier. I told her how my dream back then was to get married and have a big family, and she said — with what felt like sincerity —
“Congratulations. You achieved your life’s goal.”

And while it may have been a messed up, antiquated goal, that’s where I was back then — trying to build a system in which I felt like I belonged. To achieve that, I was more than willing to push all career ambition aside. The things I secretly dreamed about — following in the path of writers I admired like Anna Quindlen and Nora Ephron — got smothered by endless chicken nuggets, blurry nights breastfeeding and a crippling lack of self confidence.

Looking back, I realize: It’s not that I didn’t have drive when I was younger — it’s that my ambition was pointed inward. Toward safety. Belonging. Stability.

Many years later, when I found myself teetering on the edge of financial insecurity, I had no choice but to throw my hat into corporate America’s ring. And since then — almost 4.5 years later — opportunities have continued to unfold.

On one hand, I feel lucky. On the other, I’ve worked hard to open those doors.

Timing has had a lot to do with it. Back when I was an editor for an online local news site (shout out to all the Patch survivors), I still had four kids living at home — and at one point, they were all in different schools.

People were coming home with staples in their heads. They were struggling with mental health. My youngest still needed to learn how to ride a bike. Or help making a hat covered in pennies for the 100th day of school.

In other words: I was distracted. While fellow editors were being promoted, I got laid off in one of the earlier rounds.

When I started at my current company, I still had a lot swirling around me: My youngest finishing high school. My dad in and out of the hospital. Selling my house just to make ends meet.

Now that the house is (mostly) quiet — my ambition has grown louder. It’s like a fire that had to stay small to keep everything else warm is now roaring, now that I’ve been able to give it some oxygen.

If you had told my 25-year-old self this is where I’d end up, she wouldn’t have believed you. But here we are. I’m aligning hard with stakeholders all week and trying to get ahead at work — but also enjoying the fruit of those earlier ambitions.

I’m cooking dinner alongside my daughter. Diving into the ocean with her and her brother. And she’s helping me make my Substack look pretty.I want to spend every Saturday night tucked on the porch holding bowls of warm berry cobbler, our dog draped across us, his tail wagging as we take turns scratching his head.

Isn’t life weird? And wonderful?

What I’m cooking

I always love to have a salad dressing in the frig to bring for lunch on work days or throw a quick dinner together at night. While I wanted to make was this dressing from Samin Nosrat but, lacking a shallot and sherry vinegar, pretty much made a balsamic number (which we also used on the orzo salad we had for dinner Saturday night with a splash of champagne vinegar). I love the video I shared above with its Salad Dressings 101 premise.

Barefoot Contessa peach and berry cobbler (minus the peach).

I’ve made this berry cobbler recipe from Ina Garten countless times. It was close to 6:00 by the time we got home from our ocean dip on Saturday and really had to kick into high gear to turn dinner around, so its simplicity was appreciated. I used my hands to make the topping instead of dragging the standing mixer out, and it was super easy and delish topped with some Jenni’s sweet cream ice cream tucked onto a couch on the porch.

What I’m wearing

You can see how my glasses look inside vs. outside.

Gang, I am the worst selfie taker. Like, please ignore and focus on my new Warby Parker glasses, which arrived right before I headed to Maine for vacation. They are transition progressives, which means I never have to take them off, like when I was in Europe and had to constantly dig sunglasses out of my pocketbook to swap with the progressive readers. Instead, I move throughout the day, inside and outside, and never have to take them off.

It was a godsend at work this week when my colleague suggested we eat outside after we’d left the office. In the past, if I didn’t have my sunglasses, I’d have to squint through lunch. The downside: a slower transition back to regular glasses when you come inside so you look like you’ve had a rough night out on early afternoon Zoom calls. I ended up getting some money through my vision plan at work so reallly consider them a raging success and great investment.

Also, I’m really into my Gold Coast straw hat I picked up at a sidewalk sale at the end of last summer.