When the World Falls Apart… Again
When my children were little, like really little, I would go with them to playdates. The parent (usually a mom) and I would sit on the floor together and pour … Continue reading
My Not-So-Little One Graduates 8th Grade
He’s fifteen now, with his own phone, his own ideas about everything, including how long his hair should be and whether or not his new mismatched sneakers count as dress shoes. He is his own person.
The Choking Silence (Just Breathe)
There’s something about our days now that is familiar. It is heavy in a way and light, too. I know where all the things are but I’m tired of putting … Continue reading
Learning to Lean Your Sequined Heart Against Another Human
I cried this afternoon at my computer. But not for the reasons I should be crying at my computer, like pandemics and people not being able to get their organ … Continue reading
48 Is…
Last night we went out to eat at a favorite restaurant with my in-laws, my hubby, and kids. Which seems more like an expected kind of birthday. But the one … Continue reading
Being Luna Lovegood
I’ve had a bit of a weird jumbly year so far. Not especially bad, but not especially good either. Just last week, one week into the new year, I lost … Continue reading
Preadolescence. It’s a Thing.
Oh my god. Preadolescence. It’s a thing. And I knew this thing was coming. I won’t say this day because it’s more than a day it’s a passage, an … Continue reading
See You In the New Year
It’s not that I haven’t written. I’ve written a lot. In the last few months I’ve reread and rewritten approximately 250 pages. Then I’ve forward written just under 200 more … Continue reading
Goddamn August, I Say a Little Prayer For You
I’ve been reading about writing; Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird, Stephen King’s On Writing, and now Francine Prose’s Reading Like a Writer. It’s a sort of self-imposed syllabus, otherwise called, … Continue reading
He Turns Eleven
He is the best of us and the worst of us and so many things I no longer get to write about because while he is still mine, his stories for the most part are not. But it’s all right there now on his own little world stage, the field, classroom or couch, or stretched across his bed.
Standing at the Edge
We went for a walk today. It had snowed and was cold but my husband had the car and we needed to get out. Like, get out. They’d been ganging … Continue reading
Women’s March 2018/ (Don’t) Take a Drunk Girl Home
Take a drunk girl home. That’s not a sentiment of mine. I don’t think it’s anything I’ve ever said before today. Take a drunk girl home. But it’s a song. … Continue reading
I Ran Over My Daughter’s Boot (Who’s Responsible?)
I ran over my daughter’s boot this morning. Thankfully, her foot was not in it. We were two minutes late for school, two minutes for which my oldest son was … Continue reading
Rabbit, Rabbit, 2018
We got stuck behind the train crossing on the way to school this morning. Of course it happened, because it is the first day back to school for the kids … Continue reading
We’re Gonna Let It Burn
I cried as I drove along, as the principal described how routine lockdown drills are, how well prepared the kids were. I’m not sure why I cried. It just seemed like so much. So much luck? So much good timing? Or so many guns.
I’m Learning to Fly (But I Ain’t Got Wings)
“You know which one was my favorite, don’t you?” I asked my husband as we sat side by side last night catching up on Ray Donovan. We’d paused the episode … Continue reading
An Ode to the Second Day of School
The first day of school is a shitstorm of pain. Is it sunny and hot with a chance of cold rain? Why is it so damn early, every year such … Continue reading
The Playground Disappeared
The playground suddenly disappeared. This both is and is not a metaphor. We were heading to the library, the place I would take the kids for story hours and sing … Continue reading
Manipulated
She manipulates me. I have finished the hour-long process of reading to all four of them together something like Harry Potter or The War That Saved Me and then with … Continue reading
The Art of the Lost Hour
We all grow older, grow up, get stinky, lose track of time. We remember, and then we hold tight suddenly, lamenting. There’s nothing to be done about it at all but this, this one hour outside of time, to celebrate, to mourn, to repurpose into something new that we can hang on a wall to remind us of what was.
We the People…
Midweek last week I had one of those strange moments where two very different things that are deeply related rubbed up against each other. Those are generally my favorite … Continue reading
A Week in Three Parts (You Don’t Stop When the Pom-Pom Drops)
Part I: Fishbone Leaves Last Saturday I was contemplating my role as a woman and a mother. I was deep in thought about who I am, and what I should be … Continue reading
The Morning After the Election, Still I Rise
Last night I stayed up as long as I could watching the television coverage of the election results. And then somewhere close to midnight I finally went upstairs to bed. … Continue reading
On Grief and Farm Stands
I was picking up our share at the local farm today. It’s been a long week with a boil water ban due to a water main break. It was strange … Continue reading
Labor Day Weekend, Where Did it Go?
Today was the last day of summer, Labor Day weekend, two days away from the start of school. In the morning I headed out alone to the beach with … Continue reading
The In-Between
I stepped outside today and it was what we call nether weather. It was neither cool nor warm, windy or calm. It felt like there was no temperature, no sun, the … Continue reading
The Weightlessness of Water
I could sit underwater and watch my children swim for hours. Well, not hours. I’m no David Blaine. I can only hold my breath for about four times as long … Continue reading
Last Week of School
It is their last week of school. And when I’m not feeling overwhelmed at the thought of a recent birthday just passed, or one looming ahead in two weeks, … Continue reading
Turning Six, Not To Be Missed
My baby is turning six. I know I always say this. My baby is turning four. My baby is turning five. But this time I mean it. My baby is … Continue reading
Turning Nine and the Football Cake
My son turned nine this weekend and I have absolutely nothing to say about it. I should. I want to say something. But I am in turns fake-preoccupied with something … Continue reading
We Went to the Ocean
We went to the ocean this weekend. I was resistant. “But we’ll miss three lacrosse games and two birthday parties and a lacrosse practice and an invitation to go to … Continue reading
Happy Jazz Handsy Valentine’s Day
My kids were talking about Valentine’s Day in the back row of the minivan. My five-year-old was beyond excited about the day. They had all been told to wear red, … Continue reading
What I Remember, There You Are
It begins like this. My alarm goes off and I get out of bed. My husband is already awake, because he is an early bird. I get out of bed, … Continue reading
Elf on the Shelf Gets the Last Word
Something you might not know about me is that I’m not so into magical creatures. I mean, the Tooth Fairy forgot my kid last year (what a jerk, right?) and … Continue reading
The Big, Stupid Stuffed Panda
My seven-year-old daughter wants a stupid, stuffed panda for Christmas. Not just a stupid, stuffed panda, but a big, stupid stuffed panda, big enough to be bigger than her, for … Continue reading
Getting My NaNoWriMo On, One Bird At a Time
“Thirty years ago my older brother, who was ten years old at the time, was trying to get a report written on birds that he’d had three months to write, … Continue reading
Just Five Things
Lately I’ve been remembering the words of a woman I used to work with. She’d been diagnosed with one of those illnesses that takes away your ability to do what … Continue reading
Twin Posts: Mirror in the Sky
I spent the morning at my daughter’s school celebrating her seventh birthday. We had planned for me to make crafts with her class, a collaged ocean seascape and some hot … Continue reading
Learning to Go It Alone
I just realized that I hate to be alone. I was standing and wiping the counter, putting dishes in the dishwasher, mindlessly eating granola off the kids’ plates, and I … Continue reading
Last First Day of School
I began to see my day and the things I would do. Then my week and the things I hoped to accomplish, then my month, and so on. As I told my son, I guess you need new beginnings for sentimental endings and sentimental endings for new beginnings. And now it’s time for the next new beginning.
The Last Last Time
I was wringing out wet bathing suits and hanging them over the deck railing. Our front porch is about fifteen feet from the road with a lively view of the … Continue reading
The Summer of Enough
Last week my email account resent a bunch of emails with photo attachments, emails I’d sent a year ago. And my sister replied to a very back-to-school looking picture as … Continue reading
August is the Cruelest Month
This morning, as my husband walked out the front door, he reminded me that the painters were coming tomorrow and that we needed to vacate the house. They would come … Continue reading
I Don’t Like Eight-Year-Old Boys, the Never Ending Sequel
I don’t like eight-year-old boys.You might remember that I didn’t like seven-year-old boys much either. It’s hard to describe what the actual thing is that he does that drives me … Continue reading
How You Measure Half a Life
It happened. The kind people at Mamalode published my essay on their August theme Optimism, How You Measure Half a Life. And ironically, it’s a meditation on whether there is … Continue reading
100 Rejections
My sister had a brilliant idea for my nieces’ thirteenth birthdays. What do you give young women who have pretty much everything they need? Words of wisdom. My sister asked … Continue reading
Summer Camp, All Alone
This week is camp week. You know the kind I mean. You slather four children in sunscreen, pack four bags with yesterday’s damp swimsuits and towels, and then send them … Continue reading
U2 Can Have Your Cake and Eat It… Too
In six degrees of separation how would we get from U2 to a Doc McStuffins cake? Doc McStuffins cake, inspired by the Doc McStuffins cartoon, for which China Anne McClain … Continue reading
The Tooth Fairy Forgot to Come Last Night
The tooth fairy forgot to come last night. Mica walked into my bedroom this morning, waking me with his sad, sweet little face and shuffling footy pajama’ed feet. He said with the … Continue reading
Little League, It Ain’t No Big Thing
I admit it. I was equipment-shamed by the guy at Modell’s. And Modell’s by the way? It sort of sucks. I’d much rather go to Dick’s. Especially with my mother … Continue reading
jen groeber: mama art 