“This is the first home game for this football program in thirty-seven years,” Mike told us in the car yesterday. “I don’t think I’ve seen that kind of car in thirty-seven years,” eleven year-old Colin said from the back. “This is the first time I’ve been to Caldwell in thirty-seven years,” Jack said. It was […]
Life Lessons from Little House
The news that Laura Ingalls Wilder’s annotated autobiography Pioneer Girl is scheduled for release in November has me all fired up. I can’t remember when I started reading the Little House on the Prairie series, but it was early. I loved them and reread them often. Laura was my Harry Potter, and she could probably […]
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The menace of ill-mannered motorists
“Mom, is that guy a redneck?” Colin asks me while I’m driving and some jerkwad is following so close I could easily elbow him in the throat from where I’m sitting. I swear to God, I have nothing against rednecks and I don’t believe I’ve ever called someone a redneck. I don’t know where Colin […]
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I don’t really know what anyone is talking about
Last year Jack kept using the phrase going ham, which took a few weeks for me to figure out meant throwing oneself into the task at hand. As in: Lookit that dog, going ham with the Frisbee. Or: I saw this guy in his car at the stoplight, going ham with the music on his radio like no one was […]
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Teenagers might one day be the death of me
Our wedding anniversary was Sunday, and Mike and I slept in separate rooms. It wasn’t like that. He did spend the better part of an hour trying to make a fire for me in a teensy stove, but there wasn’t much for kindling and the wood may have been a little wet. The room would […]
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Stupid mice and their dumb cookies anyway
Colin wouldn’t let me walk him into sixth-grade on Monday, robbing me of the very last time I would get to help anybody unpack a gargantuan backpack on his first day, and then take seven selfies with a scowling child at his new desk. He wouldn’t even let me post the photo on Facebook that […]
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Ode to Autumn: A crappy poem from a happy mom
In mere weeks, we’ll be aghast at Halloween decor Displayed in stores come mid September, Roll our eyes at Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter schwag. Too early, we’ll say. Every year, out early. But oh, Autumn, the newspaper inserts that heralded: Discounts on scissors, white school glue, colored pencils, 3-holed binder paper, spiral notebooks, both college-ruled, Dried my throat, made my fists clench. […]
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Speaking of pot …
So, as I mentioned, last week Jack asked his dad and I for our thoughts about pot. Being the seat-of-our-pants kind of parents we are, it hadn’t occurred to either of us to coordinate what we were going to say when this subject inevitably arose. That was stupid. Both of us at Jack’s age were […]
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Judgmental Jerkwads and conversations about pot
Jack asked Mike and I our thoughts on marijuana this weekend, I had two initial responses: (1) I need to tread carefully here, lest one of us ends up sounding as evasive as Bill Clinton, and (2) Ooh, yay! Another blog topic. Mike thinks a blog on talking to our teenager about pot has the […]
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This is exactly why we can’t have nice things
Mike says he can’t remember his dreams, but when he does, he’s sometimes running from the law. I imagine he’s not remembering why he’s on the lam because his subconscious is taking the fifth. Ironically, those of us around here most likely to have something weighing on our conscience are also the ones with completely […]
