Have you ever had a hard time convincing someone that something is wrong with your car, your house, or your computer and they really do need to fix it? Of course you have. I can't help you fix whatever needs fixing, but I invite you to compare your frustrations with mine.

Believe it or not, I've been told I had cancer SIX TIMES. Luckily, five of those diagnoses were wrong. But why were so many doctors so eager to tell me that I had a fatal disease? Is that any better than the way it used to be, when everyone--including doctors--were afraid to so much as utter the word?

Did you play a musical instrument in elementary school? Did you give it up? Why? Do you wish you had continued taking lessons? Is it ever too late to try again?

Are you--or someone you love--in denial about how much you're missing because you can't hear most of what other people are saying? Why are you so reluctant to make a trip to Costco and buy a pair of hearing aids? Why was I?

What's it like dating the star of a reality TV show like The Golden Bachelor? Is there any hope for a woman in her sixties or seventies who still wants to find love before she dies?

Did you know that bridge was once the most popular game in America? EVERYBODY played. And now? Hardly anyone. So, why did I become obsessed with playing bridge? Why do any of us pursue the hobbies we pursue? Or do our hobbies pursue us? Why are we so afraid to admit we are who we really are? Why are some of us so afraid to admit we're average?

Why on earth would anyone miss the funky Catskills hotels and bungalow colonies where Jews vacationed for most of the 20th century because they weren't allowed to check into most gentile-owned resorts and didn't have the money to travel anywhere else? What do movies and TV shows like Dirty Dancing and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel get wrong? As someone who grew up there, don't get me started!

Are you spending a ridiculous proportion of your time in doctors' offices, at the gym, or in various beauty and wellness establishments? If we devote sall our time and energy to trying to stay healthy and youthful-looking, what is the purpose of being alive? Is there an age when you should just give up?

I signed up for what I assumed would be a very basic art class, strictly for beginners, but there on the stage stood a very handsome, entirely nude man I was expected to draw. What happens when we finally get up the courage to try to do something for which we've been told we have absolutely no talent? (Warning: this episode contains several instances of the anatomically correct word for what was hanging between that man's legs!)

My mother saw disaster lurking everywhere. Why did I take so many decades to believe she--and so many women like her--had a lot of reasons to be afraid, not only for herself but for all of us?