Month: February 2010

  • Sono Così Emozionante

    You are very clever, youse. In our recent guessing game of “Where in the World Will Sabbatical Take Them?,” quite a few commenters came very close, or even rightly named, our family’s likely port of call for our upcoming travels. Here’s the summary of how we got to our current perch: 1)  Jocelyn was born.  […]

  • Deep in the Heart

    Some of y’all might remember that my sister flew me to Denver last October so’s I could help her organize her stuff. Upon my return from that fun weekend, I posted something on Facebook about it…only to have a pal from college reply, “I would totally buy your plane ticket, if you’d come help me […]

  • Doldrums Antidotes

    1) Antidote #1:  Get a good night’s sleep, which is exactly what I did the night of my previous post; when I woke up nine hours later, cobwebs had cleared, and a song–not a dirge–beat in my heart. This, in turn, meant I had to spend a fair amount of time in the kitchen that […]

  • Each Day So Long It Feels Like a Month

    “Is the phrase ‘Slough of Despond’ from Harry Potter or what?” I holler to my husband, who is folding laundry four feet away. We both half-wonder why I’m hollering, what with him standing right there and all.  But, then again, it’s been that kind of day. A hollaback-at-your-knickers-folding-husband kind of day. In that moment, I […]

  • Lots of Landmines; No Metal Detector: Part the Last

    A few years ago, I tuned in to a documentary about life in the Alaskan bush, where there are no roads, no stores, no schools. In particular, I was impressed with a 16-year-old girl who lived in the bush with her parents; in one memorable scene, she loaded up her sled, hitched up her dogs, […]

  • Lots of Landmines, No Metal Detector: Part the Third

      With each successive child, it becomes harder to keep World at bay. The door that cracked open with Child #1 gets shoved even wider with Child #2, Child #3, and so on, until the barrier is blasted off its hinges to expose an entire startled-looking family licking Cheeto gunk off their fingers. The humbling that comes from giving way and giving […]

  • Lots of Landmines, No Metal Detector: Part the Second

    If that bitch, World, isn’t open to negotiating with parents and insists on staring down the well-intentioned sleep deprived, hands on its Costco-shopping, NASCAR-jacket-wearing, Miley-Cyrus-twitching hips, then maybe the compromises have to take place elsewhere.  Like within the well-intentioned sleep deprived. Certainly, new parents have a few blissful months–even years–in which their personal values dominate, in […]