Opinions

You have natural abilities and inclinations. You love doing certain things. That's normal and good. But what you love in life was never intended to be all that is important in your world.

Have you ever walked through the woods and tripped over a thorny vine? Or tried to make your way through a tangle of thorn-covered blackberry bushes? Have you ever attempted to pick a deli- cately, beautiful flower, only to be painfully pricked by thorns that were all over the stem?

DEAR ABBY: My brothers and I loved our father. He was an alcoholic until he was 37. After he stopped drinking, we became the best of friends. He was both mother and father to me, and I was so proud of him. Dad remarried 33 years later to a woman I can only describe as diabolical.

DEAR ABBY: I’m a 60-year-old man. I have a close female friend who is 20 years younger. We see each other just about every day and call each other to talk about our day. We have supper together just about every night. The only thing we don’t have is a romance.

DEAR ABBY: I’m a man younger than my age married to a woman who is older than hers. Ten years ago, we couldn’t get along, so we separated. While separated, I met a wonderful woman, “Cynthia.” We became friends with benefits and fell in love. A year later, my wife got cancer.

TUESDAY, MAY 5, 2026 DEAR ABBY: I have been married to my husband for 10 years. We live in a house he already owned before I moved in with him. He wants to make renovations to the house to increase its value. He says the house will go to his four children (all adults) when he passes.

Bunyan Helen Louise Bunyan, 75, passed away in Oklahoma City on April 22, 2026, after an 11-year battle with cancer. Helen was born July 5, 1950, in Liberal, Kansas, to Lester Fred Bunyan and Opal Pearl (Shedd) Bunyan. She was raised in Hugoton, Kansas, where she lived most of her life.

DEAR ABBY: My daughter, “Aline,” 40, has gone from crisis to crisis since childhood. She can go from kind and generous one minute, to vindictive and mean the next. She’s easily triggered into rants, hurling the most hurtful words she can come up with.

I’m addressing this little message to pre-teens and teenagers because these years are probably the hardest while growing up. (I know. I went thru them.) When you learn of the good and bad forces that are in the earth, you may make choices from both forces at different times in your life.

Evolution is a funny thing. Things always changing, I mean. Not that I believe that human beings evolved from the goo of a warm little pond, rather it is the nature of constant change I find absolutely fascinating. But that really does not nail down what I am talking about, either.