Image: “Christmas Gifts,” by Kelvin Kay at Wikimedia Commons via a Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 3.0 License. 13 nights,3 states,3 planes,3 cars,5 buses,6 beds,2 cribs,6 Pack ‘n Plays (or is it Packs ‘n Play?),2 nights of Hanukkah,1 birthday,1 Christmas Eve,1 Christmas,and 3 UPS boxes full of presents later,I am home at last, home at [...]
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At my last teaching job, I was also the coach of the varsity girls’ basketball team. I hated every minute of it. I hated the time it took away from my teaching and from Husband. I hated the unreasonable expectations placed on me and my players by their parents. But most of all I hated [...]
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Growing up, my family traveled almost exclusively by train. From our Connecticut home, we made separate cross-country train trips to Los Angeles, Salt Lake City, and Seattle, among other western locations. As a result of our train journeys, accompanying side excursions to national parks, and subsequent trips to Hawaii and Alaska, I have been to [...]
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I was a good basketball player as a kid. This was just before women’s basketball really exploded onto the scene and I managed to play pretty seriously and pretty competitively all the while playing other sports and carrying out the general business of childhood. The peak of my career came toward the end of grade [...]
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Image: “Ear,” courtesy of David Bebbennick at Wikimedia Commons via a Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 3.0 License. My sister-in-law SEL recently pointed out an endearing, if perhaps annoying, habit of mine: I pick up quickly on unusual sayings and phrases and incorporate them readily – occasionally ad nauseum – into my own speech. This has led me [...]
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I can say the alphabet backwards faster than I can say it forwards. For some reason, my beloved but eccentric father thought that it would be fun to have my brothers and me know the alphabet backwards and forwards - literally – before going to kindergarten. And knew it we did. Fun for a laugh to this [...]
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“Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening” Whose woods these are I think I know.His house is in the village though;He will not see me stopping hereTo watch his woods fill up with snow. My little horse must think it queerTo stop without a farmhouse nearBetween the woods and frozen lakeThe darkest evening of the [...]
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I turn 33 today. And that is troubling. Troubling not because I am concerned about getting older. It is troubling because today I turn from Magic Johnson into Larry Bird. Sigh. — Having a birthday on Christmas Eve was a mixed blessing growing up. On the one hand it meant that I could never have [...]
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…and no more Fridays with Judith for that matter. That’s right: Judith Warner announced last week that she is signing off on Domestic Disturbances, her life and culture blog at the New York Times. Thank you, Judith, for four years of wisdom and wit. Domestic Disturbances will be missed.
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Image: Home Sweet Home by John Fekner via Wikimedia Commons under a Creative Commons License. Before I went to college, I had lived in the same house all my life. And, before I moved to the Midwest in the summer of 2007, I had never lived more than two hours away from that house. In [...]
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I have a heart-shaped uterus. A septum divides the two sides of my womb. This so-called “Mullerian anomaly” is a birth defect that affects less than 1% of the female population. I had no idea it “affected” me until I had some complications early in my pregnancy with Big Boy. Having a bicornuate uterus is [...]
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I have an uncanny ability to remember song lyrics. In general, my memory is good, but my ability to recall the words and melodies of songs is formidable. My chops are particurly strong in the genre of 1980s television theme songs. I once found myself stuck in traffic with a car full of people, one [...]
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When I was in second grade, I lobbied my teacher to be the first girl in my school’s history to be the narrator at First Communion. Being the narrator was the plum speaking part and, as I pointed out to Mrs. M., I couldn’t understand why a girl – clearly so fond of her own [...]
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Last week, the witty, wise, and altogether wonderful Big Little Wolf gave me my first holiday gift, the Sugar Doll award. This prize comes with the bloggy equivalent of a required acceptance speech. And so, as part of my Holiday Hiatus, I give you the first installment in this Very Special Ten Part Mostly Silly [...]
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Friends, think of me on an airplane. Think of Big Boy, hopefully docile. Hopefully enraptured by our new portable DVD player. Think of Tiny Baby, hopefully asleep. Hopefully sound asleep. Think of Husband, hopefully multitasking contentedly. Think of the people – hopefully patient, hopefully child-loving – seated in front of us. Think of their kidneys [...]
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Another Wednesday, another opportunity to tell you about how Husband and I spend many evenings – side by side on the couch, each with a laptop, paying half-attention to a days old episode of The Daily Show. On the episode we watched last night (and we are quite behind), Stewart was mocking Fox News anchor [...]
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Last week I had lunch with a friend, the mother of three young boys. She passed along to me a number of books that deal with shaping the moral, emotional, and mental lives of boys. She also recommended another book, which addresses, among other things, the phenomenon of the “anomalous male,” one whose interests in [...]
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A friend of mine in California recently decided to move her four year old son to a new preschool. He was being bullied at his former school and the school staff did not intervene in a way that my friend found effective. When she told the preschool director of her decision, the older woman told [...]
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I like to bake. Baking appeals not only to my insatiable appetite for sweets, but also to my love of order, my passion for following directions. (Yes, it is possible to feel passion for following directions.) I like to cook, too, but not in the same way. To cook well, I think, takes improvisation. And, [...]
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Jen and Sarah, the wonderful women of Momalom, are hosting the Half-Drunk Challenge, a blogging event in which they have dared their readers to “put together your most daring, bravest and, if you so choose, most drunken writing experience.” Dozens of writers have responded to the dare with truth. Truth about love, sex, pain, and [...]
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Today I present, in no particular order, the fourth installment of “Six Quick Picks,” a smattering of items on the Interwebs that caught my eye this week: 1. Surely many of you are already familiar with Alice Bradley and Finslippy. This week Alice offered an exquisite post about her decision not to try to get [...]
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Yesterday morning I opened the utensil drawer in our kitchen and a shiver went down my spine. Whisk intertwined with spatula. Cookie cutter collided with slotted spoon. A cacophony of kitchenware. A mess. I extracted the measuring spoon I needed and then closed the drawer quickly, turning my back on the clutter and resolving to [...]
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It’s time for some more Wednesday wisdom with Judith Warner. During our first few installments, we explored balancing our premotherhood and postmotherhood selves; the burden of modern husbandhood and fatherhood; and the “Motherhood Religion.” Today we’ll take a look at the burden of female beauty – attaining it and maintaining it. Over the weekend, Husband [...]
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They say that smell is the sense most connected to memory, but I don’t remember any smells from that day. What I remember most is a sound. The squeaking of their shoes. Close your eyes at a basketball game and you will hear it: a new high top on a smooth parquet floor. The staccato [...]
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Many thanks to BigLittleWolf who bestowed upon me my very first blogging award, the Sugar Doll. Apparently, this honor comes with some saccharine strings attached. So stay tuned for my list of Ten Things We Don’t Know About You, which I will post as part of my upcoming Holiday Hiatus. (I know, the suspense engendered [...]
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I’m thinking this morning about love. I’m thinking of two of my very special friends, two of my Saying friends, who became mothers last week. One of them traveled halfway around the world to meet her two sons. Another welcomed her daughter in the very city where we met and became friends eleven years ago. [...]
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Welcome to Six Quick Picks, a look at a few items on the Internet that caught my eye during the past week. Collectively, you have helped author this week’s edition. On Thursday, I asked you to share the names of some of the blogs you visit to shake up your perspective. I am very grateful [...]
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In yet another selfish act, I went to a movie last night with two friends. The Oscar contenders have yet to arrive, so we chose some feel-good holiday fare: The Blind Side, based on Michael Lewis’s 2006 book of the same name. The movie itself is not great. (I haven’t read the book, although Husband [...]
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Since I wrote two weeks ago about Freudenschade, I have been thinking a lot about Lindsey‘s comment on that post. In her characteristically eloquent way, she wrote: “Most of the things people say to us, most of the criticism, judgment, or, even, approval, is about them and not us. We are mostly screens for other [...]
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It’s time for some more Wednesday wisdom with Judith Warner. During our first two installments, we explored balancing our premotherhood and postmotherhood selves and the burden of modern husbandhood and fatherhood. Uplifting topics indeed. Today we’ll take a look at what Warner calls the “Motherhood Religion.” In Perfect Madness: Motherhood in the Age of Anxiety, [...]
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