March 25, 2016
I’m having trouble starting this essay. Do I begin with Zoe’s request to “sleep on a train,” or do I talk about my own feelings on this journey, or do I just start with the trip itself? I have started the same sentence over and over. I think because this trip is so big, so grand, that it’s hard to know where exactly to start.
March 9, 2016
Forgive me if this is rambley but my mind is jumping all the over the place and I can’t keep up with the thoughts and they’re starting to pile up and so I just need to get them out before they overflow and I have a big mess to clean up.
February 29, 2016
I’ve seen a lot of posts on social media about Leap Day. My various feeds were flooded today with self-helpy, motivation-laden, carpe diem-filled “go out there and do something great with this Extra Day!” crap. Which is fine, if you have the luxury of actually being able to pull that off.
February 25, 2016
Facebook nudged me and let me know that I haven’t posted in 12 days. Maybe it’s 13 now. Regardless, it’s been awhile and Facebook laid on the guilt and so here I am. Thanks, Facebook, for taking my mother’s place. Are you going to remind me that I should wear more makeup, too?
February 11, 2016
Last week, when I couldn’t stop crying, I texted with a close friend. I had gone round the bend and knew even as I was typing that I was being irrational. Which only makes things worse. She was doing a phenomenal job of cheering me up by making me laugh, as she always does, when out of the blue she typed, “Maybe you’re crying bc you’re scared.” I stopped breathing. She was totally right, and I hadn’t even realized it.
February 8, 2016
Zoe and I ran into Michael’s after school today, because I’m the kind of mom who goes, “Oh, no! Your Valentine’s Day party is Friday and we are completely unprepared!” We were on the hunt for the Valentines themselves and some kind of little trinket to attach, because unlike when I was a kid, you must now also give gifts to the 24 little Valentine banshees in your class. A crappy piece of folded paper printed with Scooby Doo in two colors doesn’t cut it any more. Turns out that Michael’s doesn’t carry Valentines, although we found some cute erasers and washi tape (the washi tape is unrelated to Valentine’s Day but I have a small, unexplainable addiction to washi tape) so it wasn’t a total loss, but that’s not my story. Oh, no, friends. My story is much more nefarious.*
February 4, 2016
Hard week, this week. Mostly because Alzheimer’s sucks.
February 1, 2016
One hundred and two years ago today, my great-grandfather received his union card. John Foley drove a street car, and he was a proud member of the Employes Mutual Benefit Association of the United Railways Company of St. Louis. He was a motorman in the 6th Division. The back of the card says he was 5 feet 10.5 inches tall, and had black hair and blue eyes. The same blue eyes as my grandmother, my father, and my daughter. (I didn’t get so lucky.) (Thanks, Mom.)
January 28, 2016
It appears we have a drinking problem.
January 20, 2016
I’ve read countless articles about how important it is to let your child do projects on her own. It’s also a hot topic among the mothers in my daughter’s class. At the beginning of the school year, her new 4th grade teacher told us parents that it was time to let go, let our children grow and develop on their own, and suffer (or enjoy the rewards of) the consequences of their own actions (or inactions). We’ve been really good with this so far this year. We check her homework only when she asks, or quiz her on spelling words upon request. We’ve been very hands-off, which has given us a lot more free time in the early evening and has made her more responsible. She gets good grades, so there’s little room for worry.