My food store in Maine is overflowing with locally raised vegetables, but the small half bushels of yellow bean always stops me right in my tracks. The sight of freshly picked, ultra-thin, bright yellow beans always brings to mind memories of my dear sweet Mother. When we were kids we visited a farm market on the way home every day to get vegetables for dinner and fruit for the 3 mile ride home. Our parents loved fresh vegetables, but my Mother's face would light up at the first appearance of yellow beans and we ate them every day until the last bean was picked for the season.
Yellow beans make me sad, make me happy and make me miss her again and again, year after year. The first thing that she would cook was yellow beans with pork chops, small white potatoes, oregano and tomatoes. The whole house was filled with the smell of garlic and oregano, filling us with anticipation. We stayed close to the stove talking about our day and snipping the beans. Sneaking small spoonfuls of juice out of the simmer pot to taste without ever being scolded because she always made extra. Being her daughter was as sweet as it gets.
I am addicted to chocolate. I don't mean that I just like to eat
chocolate, I have to eat chocolate. There is no twelve step program,
there are no support groups but I know it is genetic. My mother is also
addicted to chocolate as are two of my six little nieces. Sometimes the
four of us sit around the kitchen table in silence eating chocolate. I
am the enabler. I buy chocolate every time I pass through a duty free
store in an airport. I stop in every bakery I see to buy anything
chocolate they have. I know exactly where all the nice chocolate shops
are in New York City. You get my point?
My mother had a way of inventing traditions. “It’s Lizzie’s birthday!” she’d proclaim periodically and everyone in the family would don a party hat and sing happy birthday to one of our English Springer Spaniels. The announcement of the dog’s birth and subsequent celebration of it could occur at any time – on April 5, say, or December 12. It could happen twice a year or once every few years. But however haphazard, it became a tradition. 
Take a lesson from Cayenne; even though she's a bit of a bitch sometimes, she always knows how to kick it up a notch. I often tell students at my seminars that if we let our relationships go bland, it's
hard to go back cold turkey.
I always know the exact moment love officially strikes me clear and hard. The world actually goes silent. I can’t help but smile. My eyes light up. And most importantly, I shut up. Because in that very moment, no matter how ridiculous it sounds, I’m rendered speechless since there’s only one truth: I’m alive and I love you and I know it and that’s all there is to it.