Lynn Rankin-Esquer's Blog
March 16, 2025
Participation IS the trophy
Adult participation trophies are not silly.
Because the win here is that we are participating. We are getting ourselves out there. The medal on the left is an actual winning medal for my pickleball team in our league last summer (we were actually the champions!). Our captain bought these in a very light-hearted fashion but I have kept it around because it signifies way more than beating beginner/intermediate middle aged women at pickleball. It signifies me being willing to look stupid learning a new sport in my late fifties. It represents all the other delightful people I have met learning that sport. It reminds me that I didn’t quit when I realized 99% of the women were former tennis players and I was not. It represents the discovery of a whole new fun community I would not have otherwise met.
It led to trying a hip-hop class and laughing my way through the performance (yes, we performed! It was excruciating and exhilarating and very bonding).
The real ‘trophies’ I have won include a body that is more fit than ever, several new communities of friends (many of whom are also willing to be newbies), and an improved ability to laugh at myself. Like, laugh ’til my stomach hurts fun.
Highly recommend (but no need to hunt down that performance video).
Come visit me at the other places I am finding participation trophies:
Contact me at: lynn@lynnrankinesquer.com
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February 3, 2025
Murder, Mess, and the Tangerine Dress: An Order Out of Chaos Mystery is HERE
A cluttered closet is nothing compared to the mess of murder.
Izzy Bishop’s life is messy. Her house is chaotic, she’s headed for divorce, and she’s almost out of money. So, when Type-A-Sister-Boss Lauren’s organizing company hires her, Izzy vows to purge the past, master organizing, and create a sparkling future…if only she can keep her pesky extrasensory abilities under control.
Not a chance!
When Izzy picks up her client Joanna’s tangerine dress, she receives a message from Joanna’s dead husband that someone is trying to kill his wife. Despite Lauren’s warning to keep her psychic silliness filed away, Izzy has no choice but to investigate.
Izzy soon discovers that everyone around Joanna has secrets, and someone is willing to go to any length to keep their dirty laundry hidden. Faking it as an organizer could get her fired, but faking it as an investigator could get her killed. If Izzy can’t figure it out quickly, she’s likely to be both. Although fired doesn’t really matter if you are dead.
No book is for everyone (for example, I just couldn’t connect with Gone Girl, while seemingly every other person in the world loved it) and so I am not the least bit offended if my book is just not someone’s cup of tea. But if it was …… and it is almost physically painful for me to type these words, could you consider leaving a review on Amazon (link in picture above) and/or Goodreads? https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/223915370-murder-mess-and-the-tangerine-dress
Contact me at: lynn@lynnrankinesquer.com
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January 29, 2025
Um, Cameras Record . . . Everything: How the bird camera got more than it meant to
In the interest of throwing a little humor into a bleak world I am going to tell on myself. I have done a thing that is completely mortifying in its cluelessness and involves birds and squirrels and a camera and …an undressed aging body. Please take a mini break from the horrors of your world and enjoy the horrors of mine.
You are welcome.
As befits my advancing age, I have grown attached to watching birds in my backyard. I hung a bird feeder. The birds found it (how do they do that? It is magical how quickly they discover food!) So pleasing to watch.
And then.
The squirrels quickly broke the code to savaging the feeder (those evil black squirrels, diving off a bush like Tom Cruise doing a Mission Impossible stunt, hitting the feeder enough to spin it around and fling birdseed like a demolished pinata, by which point the squirrels were already on the ground feeding on the largesse).
My daughter, a champion gift buyer, bought me a bird feeder that is supposed to be squirrel proof. AND it has a camera that I connected to my phone, so throughout the day I could delight in seeing all manner of birds pecking at the feed, right up close. And it comes with a solar charger so the camera is always charged and set off by any movement nearby, at which point it records. So even if I miss the live action, I can review the day’s videos and see all kinds of funny and goofy birds.
I decided to attach it to the railing of the balcony off of our second story bedroom, conveniently located next to the little fountain that the birds bathe in.
This worked for three days.
Then the squirrels learned how to scale the screens on the downstairs windows, leap onto the roof overhang and parkour onto the balcony to get the birdseed out.
Foiled again.
I brought the feeder inside until I could figure out where to install it away from squirrels. I set it on my bathroom counter, in part too lazy to take it downstairs but also to keep it away from the dog who rivals the squirrels in his love of birdseed.
Does anyone see where I’m going with this?
Is anyone, is everyone, smarter than me????
Four days later, four days, it occurs to me that the motion sensor camera is still on. Still recording anything that moves.
In the bathroom.
Where I dress.
And undress.
And shower.
Panicked, I fumble up the Birdty app on my phone and scroll through the recordings.
A veritable slideshow of things I try not to look too closely at in the mirror.
The camera works really well.
I had placed it really well.
The horror.
The praying that no one around us has cracked the password to our wifi.
I flip through one video after another, appalled and hysterical. How did I do this to myself?
“Why are you screaming?” the hubs asks, running in. “Is everyone okay? What is going on?”
I stop hyperventilating enough to tell him. He is amused until I show him his very own hi def videos.
I’ve been feeling pretty full of myself these days. I finished a book that is about to be published. I got rid of not one but two paid storage units. I successfully launched two children out into the world. I’ve gotten decent at pickleball. I can last over three minutes in the cold plunge.
But life is not ready to let me get too big headed. Life was like ‘ah, maybe someone dumb enough to unintentionally install a motion sensor camera in her own bathroom doesn’t get to feel like she’s got a handle on this whole life thing.”
I’m reminded I am still very much a work in progress. And that is is not a bad idea to laugh at myself more. Lots of opportunity for that.
Follow-up: of course I deleted all of the videos. Except for one of my husband, he looks kind of hot.
Contact me at: lynn@lynnrankinesquer.com
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January 23, 2025
Cover Reveal for my new book!
ebook preorder available at: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DTTY3371/
If you want to hear more about upcoming books feel free to sign up for my newsletter on my website at: https://lynnrankin-esquer.com/
January 6, 2025
The Hummingbird Feeder as a Path to the Divine?
This morning I was watching a hummingbird hover near the hummingbird feeder I installed on my back porch. It whirred up, hovered, then perched lightly on the little bar, dipping its beak into the plastic flower filled with nectar. I imagined the hummingbird’s delight to find delicious nectar in a safe spot (hanging, away from squirrels), landing on a bar perfectly designed to fit it’s little talons, the ideal distance from the nectar. It probably wouldn’t know that someone intentionally designed that feeder, that someone else intentionally filled it and hung it. It would probably not be aware that there was a larger consciousness looking out for it. Which made me wonder. What if that is there for me? For all of us? What if there is a larger consciousness (call it God or Source or Love or Grandma) intentionally putting things I would like or need in my path? Is it such a stretch to believe that if I could arrange things for a hummingbird, without its knowledge, that someone might be arranging things for me? What if there is a Divine Design and it is personal?
Contact me at: lynn@lynnrankinesquer.com
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December 30, 2024
Izzy Bishop is at it again
I’m going to repost my fictional character Izzy’s blog here but feel free to head to her site to follow her for more in the future. Back to MY content very soon.
LAUREN WARING LARSENT IS A STAR
So, who knew my mother would read my blog? But she did, and can I say she was not pleased with my … shall we say ‘characterization’ of my sister. I admit, I was a little heavy on the uptight aspects of Lauren (I mean, she’s my boss, that’s not easy) but I like to think of myself as fair so here are a few of her good traits.
Give me a second.
Just kidding. She’s amazing. She’s uber organized (hence, the perfect person to run an organizing company, Order Out of Chaos is fantastic), she’s a great mom, a devoted wife, a loving daughter. She sounds perfect, doesn’t she? Hard to compete with all that, especially as the older sister. But I digress.
Lauren is also a great cook, we share recipes all the time. Of course, she’s more of a from-scratch cook and I don’t mind shortcuts (for example, when bagged salads arrived on the scene I was an immediate adopter and she always makes homemade dressing) but on the whole the Waring sisters (our maiden name) can throw down in the kitchen. The biggest difference is that Lauren’s kitchen will be returned to pristine cleanliness within thirty minutes of dinner ending. In fact, I’ve watched her clean up as she’s cooking, and my kitchen … might have some remnants hanging around the next morning (pots clean better after soaking – I will die on that hill).
Along the cooking theme – here’s this week’s tip: buy the best cookware you can afford (All-Clad comes to mind) and treat those pots and pans like the goddesses they are (hand wash, towels between stacked pans to prevent scratching). This prevents the buildup of ticky-tacky scratched up cheap Teflon pans. I know how it works, you see a sparkling new twelve dollar sauce pan at Homegoods and just know your omelets will no longer stick if you just had that pan, so you buy it but then fail to throw out the old one. The accumulation seems slow but all of a sudden you are wrestling to get a skillet out of a motley stack that is the kitchen equivalent of ratty underwear. Treat yourself to good pans and you could even look forward to cooking. I might even go so far as to say that my All-Clan pans spark joy (wink wink).
As does Lauren. Sometimes. (I mean, all the time, right mom?)
So, who knew my mother would read my blog? But she did, and can I say she was not pleased with my … shall we say ‘characterization’ of my sister. I admit, I was a little heavy on the uptight aspects of Lauren (I mean, she’s my boss, that’s not easy) but I like to think of myself as fair so here are a few of her good traits.
Give me a second.
Just kidding. She’s amazing. She’s uber organized (hence, the perfect person to run an organizing company, Order Out of Chaos is fantastic), she’s a great mom, a devoted wife, a loving daughter. She sounds perfect, doesn’t she? Hard to compete with all that, especially as the older sister. But I digress.
Lauren is also a great cook, we share recipes all the time. Of course, she’s more of a from-scratch cook and I don’t mind shortcuts (for example, when bagged salads arrived on the scene I was an immediate adopter and she always makes homemade dressing) but on the whole the Waring sisters (our maiden name) can throw down in the kitchen. The biggest difference is that Lauren’s kitchen will be returned to pristine cleanliness within thirty minutes of dinner ending. In fact, I’ve watched her clean up as she’s cooking, and my kitchen … might have some remnants hanging around the next morning (pots clean better after soaking – I will die on that hill).
Along the cooking theme – here’s this week’s tip: buy the best cookware you can afford (All-Clad comes to mind) and treat those pots and pans like the goddesses they are (hand wash, towels between stacked pans to prevent scratching). This prevents the buildup of ticky-tacky scratched up cheap Teflon pans. I know how it works, you see a sparkling new twelve dollar sauce pan at Homegoods and just know your omelets will no longer stick if you just had that pan, so you buy it but then fail to throw out the old one. The accumulation seems slow but all of a sudden you are wrestling to get a skillet out of a motley stack that is the kitchen equivalent of ratty underwear. Treat yourself to good pans and you could even look forward to cooking. I might even go so far as to say that my All-Clan pans spark joy (wink wink).
As does Lauren. Sometimes. (I mean, all the time, right mom?)
So, who knew my mother would read my blog? But she did, and can I say she was not pleased with my … shall we say ‘characterization’ of my sister. I admit, I was a little heavy on the uptight aspects of Lauren (I mean, she’s my boss, that’s not easy) but I like to think of myself as fair so here are a few of her good traits.
Give me a second.
Just kidding. She’s amazing. She’s uber organized (hence, the perfect person to run an organizing company, Order Out of Chaos is fantastic), she’s a great mom, a devoted wife, a loving daughter. She sounds perfect, doesn’t she? Hard to compete with all that, especially as the older sister. But I digress.
Lauren is also a great cook, we share recipes all the time. Of course, she’s more of a from-scratch cook and I don’t mind shortcuts (for example, when bagged salads arrived on the scene I was an immediate adopter and she always makes homemade dressing) but on the whole the Waring sisters (our maiden name) can throw down in the kitchen. The biggest difference is that Lauren’s kitchen will be returned to pristine cleanliness within thirty minutes of dinner ending. In fact, I’ve watched her clean up as she’s cooking, and my kitchen … might have some remnants hanging around the next morning (pots clean better after soaking – I will die on that hill).
Along the cooking theme – here’s this week’s tip: buy the best cookware you can afford (All-Clad comes to mind) and treat those pots and pans like the goddesses they are (hand wash, towels between stacked pans to prevent scratching). This prevents the buildup of ticky-tacky scratched up cheap Teflon pans. I know how it works, you see a sparkling new twelve dollar sauce pan at Homegoods and just know your omelets will no longer stick if you just had that pan, so you buy it but then fail to throw out the old one. The accumulation seems slow but all of a sudden you are wrestling to get a skillet out of a motley stack that is the kitchen equivalent of ratty underwear. Treat yourself to good pans and you could even look forward to cooking. I might even go so far as to say that my All-Clad pans spark joy (wink wink).
As does Lauren. Sometimes. (I mean, all the time, right mom?)
December 18, 2024
My fictional character has taken on a life of her own!
I’m about to release the first book in a mystery series and my character, Izzy Bishop, is just too impatient to wait for all this cover-selection, editing business to conclude. So she convinced me to let her start a blog, she is that eager to talk to the world. You can find her at:
https://izzybishopblog.wordpress.com/
To let me know if you want to be on the notification list for the book, you can either comment here or head over to my contact below.
Coming soon: Murder, Mess, and the Tangerine Dress (An Order Out of Chaos Mystery)
Contact me at: lynn@lynnrankinesquer.com
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September 19, 2024
A Time to be Decorative – on Life, Parenting, and of course, the Ocean
I am walking in Half Moon Bay, California and just ran across these gorgeous boat fenders arranged so pleasingly with the fishing nets. I feel instantly like I’m on a fishing boat, rocking side to side, salty spray on my face. I assume these fenders outlived their use on actual boats and I love that they weren’t thrown away, that someone saw their decorative value. I love that they continued on with a new purpose, having served well in their first purpose of protecting sides of boat from hitting dock or other boats. And now they can rest. And be admired.
I think of all the years when my kids were young, how I put myself between them and the hard edges of the world, how I absorbed so many blows, cushioned their docking and landing. How I was a fender. And now they are old enough that they are finding their own, more advanced, fenders. I am not done as a mother (would not want to be). I will continue to provide lots of things, love, comfort, cheerleading, a companion for a rom-com or concert, a favorite meal when they come home. In a way, decorating their lives. I am kind of looking forward to my decorative stage of life. I’m colorful and a little worn around the edges and would look just right arranged by the ocean.
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August 26, 2024
A Summer Memory – Discovering the Divine in Ocean City, NJ
When I was maybe four I remember my dad coming home with a blue plastic kiddie wading pool that got stuck in the side yard and filled with cold hose water. I can see mom and dad sitting beside it in rickety lawn chairs, the kind with woven thin wide plasticky straps, white with a colorful pattern, stretched over an aluminum frame. It seemed so fun and exotic, being in water outside! In the yard! Now I understand it was the thing a young family on a tight budget would do for fun, but my comparison at that time was not pools or hot tubs or the ocean, it was the bathtub, so this felt like the most delightful turn of events. This kind of beginner’s mind excitement is not to be underestimated, the memory is of pure fun.
And then we went to Ocean City New Jersey and I thought my little brain would explode in joy. Miles of beach, not just a sandbox, and an infinite ocean. Ocean City was a dream for a little kid (the boardwalk! the food! the rides!) but my best memory was jumping in the waves with my parents on either side of me, holding tightly to my hands. I would see a wave come rolling at me, taller than my head, and they would, at the last minute, pull me up into the air so that my head stayed above the water while the wave yanked violently at my body, as if trying to separate me from them. In retrospect, I doubt the waves were past their thighs, but it felt wildly dangerous and thrilling. To simultaneously feel the thrill of danger while safe and protected by their firm grip on either side was the absolute best. I think, without knowing it, they were showing me how God works.
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July 24, 2024
The Tastiest Branzino Ever – On Food and Love
We are standing in the kitchen, it is dinner time and I am snacking on a deconstructed charcuterie board (i.e., I am eating Proscuitto and cheese straight out of their packets) and my daughter has been standing in front of the open refrigerator long enough that it started beeping. She’s been home maybe two weeks, off for the summer between graduating from college and heading to law school. She sighs and closes the refrigerator, empty handed.
“Did you stop cooking?” she asks, with a glance at the clock to suggest there should be dinner preparations going on by now.
It’s a fair question. For her entire life I put dinner on the table every night, provided breakfast and lunch with a regularity that was never in question. My mother was an amazing cook who trained me well and for a long time I really enjoyed cooking. Once I had kids I provided a never ending rotation of meals.
“Yeah, I kind of did,” I said, a bit sheepish. By the end of my kids’ time at home (my son is also in college) cooking had become an unhappy chore. The needs/demands of four different people made it hard to cook something everyone would like (one gluten allergy, one keto, one needing extreme amounts of protein, one anti-inflammatory). Putting in the time only to see a wrinkled face of distaste or be asked to ‘cook with more variety’ wore me down.
My husband works a very erratic schedule and is only too happy to cook for himself (he is a keto chef master) so once both kids were in college I drifted away from cooking. I enjoy my big meal at lunch and a light meal or snacking at dinner and it doesn’t bother my husband so that was the new normal. Recently I’ve gone back to making meals I like, just for myself. Not often, but on occasion. Like pasta with lemon marinated tuna and kalamata olives and capers and homemade croutons and parmesan. My favorite. I’m the only one who ever liked it. I don’t mind cooking this one at all.
My daughter made a face. “I like your food. I like having dinner cooked every night.”
“You cooked for yourself for four years,” I pointed out.
“Exactly, that’s why it is so nice to come home to someone else doing it.”
In large part it was the decision making that got so taxing. Every night deciding what to make. Keeping a grocery list and lots of ingredients around. Every. Single. Night. I don’t want to go back. I’m amazed I did it for so many years. I am amazed at all my friends who have done it for so many years.
How did we do that?
The why we did it is easier to understand.
Providing food is such a basic way to show love. When you love your child you show them in so many ways, but keeping them fed is one of the most crucial ways. I liked experimenting to find things they would enjoy eating. I liked feeling like I had provided something for them. I liked the ritual of sitting together eating. I liked feeling that I was keeping them alive and basically healthy (I can’t say all my dishes were particularly healthy, but I was in the ballpark). Keeping them safe and fed and healthy and attended to, all part of showing love.
So when my daughter asks if I stopped cooking I had a moment of feeling like she was asking if I stopped loving her. A flash of panic, did I need to start cooking again for her to know I loved her? I didn’t want to cook every night but I for sure didn’t want her to feel unloved.
But then I remembered, another way we show love to our children is helping them become independent. At age 22, as a college graduate, she is perfectly capable of cooking for herself, or even for the family. And I’m proud of her for that. And I’m proud of me for helping her get to that point.
So I’d like to argue that going back to cooking for her every night would be backsliding.
Just saying.
We agree that I will cook sometimes (I would like to) and that she can request favorites and maybe she can even shop for the ingredients and I’ll cook sometimes and she can cook other times.
It feels like a parenting win. Dependence giving way to a cooperative independence.
Then she invites my husband and I out to a fancy dinner to thank us for providing her with a college education and a nice place to live while in college. She emphasizes that she wants to pay for it.
My daughter is not a spender. Every bit of her summer job and birthday money has gone into a savings account that is surrounded by one-way metal spikes – money goes in but it cannot come out without suffering. So the offer to buy us dinner has a lot of meaning.
She picks Café Pro Bono, a local favorite Italian restaurant.
We walk in to the always busy restaurant, greeted by the friendly Italian accented staff who always act like we are their best friends, so happy to see us (I suspect they might not remember but they are very good at making us feel welcome) . A lovely white linen topped table, surrounded by people at other tables happily drinking wine and eating polenta and piled high salads and veal Picatta and stuffed ravioli.
We open the heavy leather menus and I watch her face as she really looks at the prices. She has always appreciated us for things like dinners out, she never acted entitled to it but this is different. This is her money.
“Sixteen dollars for a salad?” she laughs. She looks at her dad. “Are you getting an appetizer?”
She knows he loves the sauteed prawns. They are seventeen ninety-five.
He looks at me.
The first impulse is to take it easy on her. Not order the way we normally would (appetizer, entrée, dessert, maybe a glass of wine). But I see this moment for what it is. She is so proud to offer this to us. She can afford this.
I nod at him, he says yes.
In this moment, the way to show her love is to eat the food she is offering.
Tonight we are showing her love by ordering it all. By allowing her to fully give, after twenty-two years of receiving.
There is Branzino and pork chops and prawns and dessert and several drinks and we have a great time even as I can see her counting up as we go.
The bill comes and she proudly pulls out her credit card. As she looks at the bill her eyebrows shoot up. “I forgot I have to tip too! Do I really have to give twenty percent?”
I nod yes, she shrugs and we all laugh. It’s so fun sharing this kind of ‘welcome to adulthood’ moment with her. Branzino has never tasted so good.
Contact me at: https://lynnrankin-esquer.com/
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