"When it’s over, I want to say: all my life, I was a bride married to amazement. I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms."

– MARY OLIVER

Merrill has been a successful businesswoman, a stay-at-home mother, and an urban farmer. Her most recent project is ‘An Apple a Day’, a virtual showcase and sale of 365 handmade ceramic apples she created to fund the Amy Krouse Rosenthal Foundation. The Foundation, formed in honor of her late dear friend, Amy Krouse Rosenthal, focuses attention on the early detection of ovarian cancer. The outcome for patients whose cancer is detected early is vastly improved, and to that end, The AKR Foundation has funded grants to researchers at The Dana Farber Cancer Institution, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, and the University of Southern California.

As a second generation board member of Planned Parenthood, Merrill sat on the board of Planned Parenthood, Chicago. Her mother served on the board in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Merrill is one of seven siblings, and her mother was once asked if she'd had so many children because she was Catholic. "No," she replied, "We just got carried away."

Merrill currently sits on the board of Chicago Public Media, WBEZ, and is one of the original funders of the show This American Life.

For her, living a life in full means always embracing learning and experience. She subscribes to the firm belief that life is to be lived, not endured. She strives to pass this philosophy on to her son and daughter, advising them, “Be willing to jump, and hope for net.”