Someday you will drop your boys off at the ball field for practice. And your daughter will get on her bike and ride the surrounding quarter-mile paved loop over and over. And you might walk the same paved loop, untethered. Or read The New Yorker. Or simply sit on the bench with your eyes closed […]
I recently bought sidewalk chalk and Sophie recently drew a rainbow, highly pigmented (pink, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, pink) with white puffy clouds on each end, which is not a true meteorological phenomenon but one that has lived on children’s papers (or, at least, strangely on my papers as a child and Sophie’s as […]
Two things happened yesterday that helped clarify an uneasiness I’ve felt all summer. • I took the kids to the zoo with only a small backpack filled with three water bottles and a few essentials. We’ve been handling zoo trips this way for quite some time. But this visit, zipping around strollers filled with children […]
A couple years ago, as I was loading Sophie into the van after a morning of half-day kindergarten, two men approached me. Their car had run out of gas on 27 and they wondered if I would give them a ride to a gas station. I believe most people are good and kind. I give […]
It’s difficult to tell the story of Mia without telling the story of us. Her years marked so many of our big moments, which, I guess, any 14-year chunk of time will do. Mia came into our lives in 2001. Andy was taking classes at OSU and living with friends. I had just started a […]
I love this season of innocence. Even when it’s not so jolly. This weekend we cut down our Christmas tree and I was reminded of the look on Owen’s face in a picture I took last December, a picture I now love. I was reminded of how hard things were mid-December, last year. How un-jolly […]
Although Kentucky’s election results aren’t proving promising, we were gifted today with the most lovely November weather—75° and sunny. And so, after voting, we did what we love to do but don’t do nearly enough—we hiked. (This time, the Fort Thomas Landmark Tree Trail.) We slid on leaves, observed moss and mushrooms, and stood still […]
Today is Dia de los Muertos, Day of the Dead. It’s a tradition I’ve long been aware of, but only halfheartedly. Recently the children and I have been attending First Unitarian Church of Cincinnati. It’s a good solution for our family. Andy is an atheist. I’m agnostic. I wanted something that exposed my children to […]
Sophie is 7 now, and in the fall she will start second grade. We don’t really talk about Facebook at home but somehow she knows about it (school, friends, the life she’s now living for 6+ hours on her own Monday through Friday) and lately, when something funny or charming or sad or uplifting happens […]
• He discovered he had hair on his arms (Owen). • The framed picture on his bedside table shows him wearing long sleeves and long pants, but he wants to be wearing short sleeves and shorts—in the picture (James). • Snow got into his mitten (Owen). • Only half the puppy tattoo stuck to her hand […]
