ABSTRACT
It is early Friday morning, May 2, 2017. I sit at my dining room table. It is made of pine, thick and sturdy, with beveled circular legs that could have been modeled from those of a linebacker. Spring sunlight squeezes between tree branches outside the window to cut slender yellow ribbons over my notepad. The delicious smells of breakfast—cinnamon toast, bacon, hot chocolate—float to me from the kitchen. Many years have passed since that spring day in 1970 when I clenched my Ph.D. diploma on the turf of Ohio Stadium. Today I look forward to my first appointment at nine o’clock. A few minutes beforehand, I’ll turn on the lamps to their softest wattage so that the lighting will be cozy and inviting. I’ll sit at my desk and glance around, making sure everything is in place—my chair facing the loveseat on which my patients sit, compact boxes of Kleenex waiting to be used, a whiteboard resting on an easel should I find it important to outline the Contextual ABCs.
