Twilight Time

Twilight Time: Aging in Amazement is a reflection on memory, aging, and mortality in the form of a collection of short essays that travels back and forth in time. Kaufman invites the reader to accompany her on a journey of inquiry, from a childhood in Jewish New York in the fifties to an unknown future and back again, always returning to the present moment--its colors, its sounds. Twilight Time avoids any sentimentality or nostalgia about the past, as well as any false certainty about the future.
Kaufman, a retired hospice chaplain, suggests that not knowing is the final frontier. She watches reverentially as her older sister ages and her mother's dying unfolds. She entertains the possibility of other life narratives, but recognizes finally that she has been imprinted by her own past in all its singularity, all its wounds. In Twilight Time, Kaufman shares a glimpse of the crowded canvas of who she has been as she prepares to enter the unknown, letting go of it all. Susie Kaufman practices mindfulness in the Plum Village tradition of Thich Nhat Hahn.


""In a series of short but powerful meditations, Kaufman takes us along on her spiritual journey of aging. . . . She seems to have the language and fortitude to put into words so many of our longings, anxieties, and joys.""
--Sonia Pilcer, author of The Holocaust Kid

"". . . a delicious meal . . . true 'Kaufman': Jewish, sexy, emotional, word-wise, grandmotherly . . . Kaufman says she has always yearned to be openhearted, expansive, and curious. Clearly, she has more than yearned; she has beautifully learned.""
--Theodore K. Phelps, author A Course in Meditation

""It's a rare delight to read the wise reflections of an older woman who has lived so richly and has so much to give.""
--Jennifer Browdy, author of What I Forgot . . . And Why I Remembered; Professor, Bard College at Simon's Rock

""Transporting readers through family, travel, politics, and wonder, Kaufman's book is a balm to the soul.""
--Frances Bartkowski, author of An Afterlife, Professor, Rutgers University-Newark

""Life today is a living paradox, and these short essays interweave past and present, joys and struggles, the perplexing and the dear. Susie Kaufman is a discerning witness of the world around and within her. . . . Her language is rich, warm, and inviting; we listen with her as she leans toward life's whispers of meaning.""
-- Signe Eklund Schaefer, author of Why on Earth? and I Give You My Word


Susie Kaufman is a retired hospice chaplain and spiritual director. Her writing has appeared in the journal Presence as well as in Lilith and America magazines and the anthology Writing Fire (2017). Kaufman's blog seventysomething (susiekaufman.blogspot.com) appeared biweekly from 2015-2017. She can be contacted at seventysomething9@gmail.com.