There is always tension in women's gymnastics between athleticism, grace, performance, and eros.

It's all too easy when talking about female gymnasts to fall into the trap of infantilizing them, spending more time worrying more about female vulnerability than we do celebrating female strength.

I think about my mother every day. But usually the thoughts are fleeting - she crosses my mind like a spring cardinal that flies past the edge of your eye: startling, luminous, lovely... gone.

My whole life, I had been taught to read and study, to seek understanding in knowledge of history, of cultures.

It's kind of like family. I can't say that we go out to lunch and to the movies every day with each other. Everyone's fully grown adult women with lives.

As it seems, Spa is a good venue for the Schumacher family.

It has been tough being a mother of two daughters without a co-parent because I think I was a child myself, as my mother was.

If the nose has become a deeply disillusioned and grief-stricken organ in the modern world, then what of the ear? The poor little ear - such an innocent, intelligent and sensitive creature; in these times of such flagrant sonic brutality, the sense within the ear has much to contend with.