parenting

Coming to terms with the big changes ahead.

Somehow the college application process changed my daughter, charmed her really.

The kids, even in their terrible teens, so strongly want to revisit places that were “ours.”

Finding one’s place is an ongoing job.

Why do we pay taxes? What’s interest? Do you really need insurance to drive a car?

I’ve never been one to let a loose thread be.

Teleporting with the Hamilton Beach Model 10 “Malt Mixer.”

Why didn’t anyone warn me how brief the small kid phase is?

Or, why let a few incompetencies get in the way of the end of summer.

Thankfully we’ve got to quit and go to sleep once a day, with the chance to start again.

My 2nd Grader has been eager to walk to school alone. Like many things he wants to do by himself, he’s ready, but not fully able. So in a compromise I get him to within squinting distance of the intersection where his school is, and he goes alone from there.  This morning I was waving…

One of the joys and tragedies of siblings is how much the little one picks up. When my daughter was in first grade, I was welcome in the classroom, on field trips, anywhere. She was glad to see me until at least fourth grade, when she started setting limits of how much (or if) I…

Sometimes the raw honesty and directness of childhood takes my breath away. When I think about death, there is a brooding quality, a familiar one yet muted. Adults learn to push it to the back of the shelf. And there’s a bittersweetness; I think fondly about those I’ve lost and miss. None of this is…

It’s tiresome, how unprepared I am for the things that inevitably happen. Jaden was running a fever of 102, 104, even briefly 105 over the weekend, and was snuggling with me, and coughing in my face, during the night. The advice nurse said we were doing the right things: fluids, rest, ibuprofen or acetaminophen. Compared…