Excellent advice, Lindsay. The story about your friend asking you to describe what happened to you in Africa in one sentence reminded me of a prompt I came across years ago. I think it may have been through Oprah or her magazine, but I have what I believe is the original prompt here:

Describe your life in 7 words. I was inspired and wrote this in a blog I was keeping at the time:

Learning to live my life in reverse.

You see, I chose not to have children — never had the desire, my biological clock didn’t tick or tock. When I was 49, I helped a runaway teenage girl, originally from Honduras, and soon adopted her. I started my family at 49 years of age.

My daughter would marry, produce a son and a daughter, get divorced, and return home. In my mid-50’s, I started raising my grandchildren. The raising of children is an activity most people do in their 20’s and 30’s but I started parenting a baby and a toddler when I was 56.

As my friends were experiencing empty nests, I was experiencing a very crowded and bustling nest.

See, I was learning to live life in reverse!