October 22, 2023
Would you eat this?
The answer is no. Trust me.
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September 25, 2023
The Call of the Commode
There comes a time in every runner’s life (well, walker, in my case), where you are convinced you will crap your pants or be forced to leave a deposit on a neighbor’s lawn, because your bowels simply do not have the fortitude to make it back home in time to use your own toilet.
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July 12, 2023
A moment of music
Our Middle School choir teacher, affectionately called “JRob” by students, faculty, and staff, stopped by the MarComm offices today, answering questions we had about a new, additional role he is taking on this school year. Because I love JRob—have for years ever since he was Zoe’s advisor and I realized during a conference that he had taken the time and the care to truly know my child—I ensnared him into some chit chat before letting him leave. He’s one of those people who is fun to talk to, regardless of the context. In the course of conversation, we spoke about the ongoing renovations of the space behind the stage in Eliot Chapel, a large auditorium next to our offices. It’s being turned into a new classroom. Someone told me this morning that the main renovations were finished, so he and I, along with another colleague in my office, decided to pop back there and see how it looks.
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June 25, 2023
Summer, summer, summertime
I haven’t been writing a lot lately, or rather, I haven’t been writing at all, really, but it’s ok. May is hell at work, absolute hell, for both me and my team and most everybody else who works at a school where children from ages four through 18 are cherished and celebrated. It’s all good stuff, but there’s an absolute fuckton of it and at the end, most of us are damn near comatose with exhaustion. By the time I left on vacation, I could hardly think straight and my motivation was subterranean. At the last moment, I remembered that I hadn’t fulfilled my goal of writing in a different library every month and I was nearly out of time. On the last day of May, I spent my lunch hour in the Upper School library, writing frantically for myself, which I hadn’t done all month. I had written so very much in May but it was all for work, which is fine, ‘tis the season and all that, but I was happy to squeak in that checkmark and not completely hose that particular 2023 goal in the fifth month.
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March 14, 2023
Dispatch From the Caribbean
I kind of wondered how I was going to meet my goal of writing in a new library every month this year, in March. It’s not great to feel as though I’m already teetering on the brink of goal collapse a mere three months in, but March is a bit crazy. I had a work trip to Kansas City that took a weekend, and a cruise in the Caribbean that is taking two. I don’t like waiting until the end of the month to try to reach a goal because then the odds are stacked against me to actually make it happen. I could get a flat tire on the way to the library. I could run into a friend in the grocery store and spend an hour catching up in the produce section, cutting into what would otherwise be writing time. No, I like to bang out that monthly goal early and then sit back in comfort knowing that I could at least check one thing off that 23 in 23 list.
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February 25, 2023
Hey, How Ya Doin’?
I absolutely hate this statement. I despise it. I abhor it, because it has lost all meaning.
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February 12, 2023
The Power of Music
Zoe and I had a great conversation about music in the car the other day. We were listening to a playlist I had put together for all-school assemblies, which is harder than it sounds because you have to find music that appeals to all ages of kids from four to eighteen. It’s a great playlist, though, and it’s Zoe’s default go-to when I make her choose (if she doesn’t feel like playing Taylor Swift, Tom Petty, or Joy Oladokun).
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February 7, 2023
State of the (Marital) Union
Members of the Family, Ladies and Gentlemen of the Press, Friends, Fellow Citizens, I come before you today to report on the state of our union. Thank you for this opportunity.
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January 29, 2023
An Update. And a Story.
Mostly because the outpouring of support from friends and family after my last post was overwhelming and lovely, so I want to be sure y’all know that I’m doing better. (And give you all credit, because all of your support has helped me in so many ways.)
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January 19, 2023
Climbing Back Out
I hit bottom, y’all. I sank down and settled into the muck and just stayed there. It was comfortable…for about five minutes. Then I got stuck.
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