I am a googler. I google a lot. At this point, when someone asks my ethnicity, I should say half Italian, half Jewish, and all Google. I will be in a conversation and have a question, or a disagreement, and within seconds, I can have the answer, win the argument, get the facts. I remember, and it wasn’t all that long ago, when you had to call people on the phone to see if they knew the guy that was in the thing with the woman who was a blonde, but had a weird nose, who was the sister-in-law of the kid with the dad who left her mother homeless when she was 2 months old, but was now a major star, JUST TO FIND OUT THE NAME OF SOME ACTOR IN A MOVIE. Or, of course, you had to go to the library and battle with the dewey decimal system to see if you could find the answer to your burning question. Or, (yikes!) the question had to go unanswered. Now, if I am even remotely curious about something, tap, tap, tap, and there it is, exactly what you wanted to know in black and white. I think I might even use it more than my actual brain. My curiosity is insatiable, and I can always quench its thirst by hanging with my friend google. It’s like having an extra room in your house full of answers floating around like bubbles from one of those bubble machines, or a secret annex filled with Rhode Scholar elves, or a satellite office next to the smartest nerd in the world. Obviously, we have managed to live prosperously without google for hundreds of years, but I will be bold and say, I can no longer imagine living without it. Take away my workout clothes. Ban my long down coat in the middle of a New England winter, but don’t make me give up my omniscient, needs no sleep, always delivers, never disappoints go-to, smarter-than-einestein, mensa-IQ, google. Not gonna happen.
*the gratitude-a-thon 
Wasn’t sure what to make for dinner…googled pasta chicken asparagus peppers (what was in the fridge) and found an simple recipe (for which I had all of the ingredients) for an amazing dinner. LOVE GOOGLE! Still remember the first time I used it and where I was. Life has never been the same!
awe, susan. i miss you, too. and those days of little kids (although not the crying ally part)! i remember the dream i had about you with your four kids following you like mother ducks and i was driving and couldn’t get my hands on the steering wheel. hmmmm, let’s give that one to freud! anyway, thanks for your comment. brookline village misses you, too! xo