My Son Announced on Facebook that His Family Hates Him
Like all good parents, I have done nothing but love my son. His grandparents, aunts, and uncles love him too and have gone above and beyond to always show him. First class tickets to Manchester, England to watch Manchester United play? No problem. Hours and hours on...
500 words a day
496 to go! How do you folks do it? How do you write 500 words in one day, get them cleaned up, comprehensible, sometimes very funny, and post the whole shebang online? I am terrible at this. I fight with every thought, with the words to express those thoughts, with...
When your dead husband sticks a small sasquatch in your face and your alive husband sings in his sleep
Frightening doesn't begin to describe it. I have some really weird habits. For instance, I pick at scabs, pull my hair out along my temples, and attack my toenails. (Seriously. I have like four left. My pedicurist never remembers my face, but as soon as she sees my...
The Bloody Truth
Since I was about five, I’ve been prone to hives. Since high school, I’ve been prone to tearing out my eyelashes (but not eating them, though I’ve heard that’s a thing). And since becoming a mom nearly thirty years ago, I’ve been prone to breaking out in little red...
How to keep moving forward when you simply want to quit
As a writer, I’m one of the lucky ones. The two books I’ve written were published by a huge publishing house. They did pretty well, too. Nice reviews, decent sales. But that was then. 2008 and 2011 to be exact. It was a time when, if you rolled memoir, humor, and...
How we found our realtors (because I know you want to know!)
Yesterday the sign went up and the lockbox went on. That's when things got real. It's also when I realized my two dozen or so realtor friends might be hurt because the sign and the lockbox aren't their sign and lockbox. Since my realtor friends are also readers and no...
I hope the house didn’t forget to floss
Our sweet little bungalow had its photos taken on Friday and I can only hope it remembered to brush and floss. We've done everything else. We've painted, depersonalized, and filled the place with flowers. We cleared off the countertops, hid the work shoes Rob keeps in...
In other news
As you may recall, this happened in February. Upon our return from Florida, where that happened and where we also bought this, we decided to host a celebration in June with family and friends and then crossed our fingers folks would be able to come because, you know,...
Distractions’ll Do You Good
The word distraction has a bad rap and rightly so. When we get distracted by something, it usually results in our not doing something else. Like the laundry. Or watching the kids at the mall. Or even, but not often (I swear!) going to work. That last one worries me...
Addictions That’ll Put You in the Poorhouse
Are you "addicted" to something because - rumor is - it will improve your health or memory or the little patch of athlete's foot that pops up between your toes during sandal season (of course it does!) and yet no matter how long you use, eat, drink, or do that...
Flawed Hobbies Are My Favorite
You can't work 24/7, right? I mean, at some point you need to refuel. So how do you do that? Do you have a hobby that recharges you? Gardening. Cooking. Bird watching. These are the things I think of when I think of hobbies and, frankly, how I don’t have any. My...
Inflexibility. It’s a flaw.
When you're so busy being flexible, do you ever think, "For Pete's sake, just do it my way already!"? I do. It's a flaw. I find it raises its ugly head when I'm confronted with certain situations that make me recall certain expressions. Like, "When one door closes,...
A career change at 59. A flawed decision?
Are we ever too old to change careers? Start something totally new? I've been thinking about it. A lot. Pondering a professional reinvention. Change is good, right? I've got some excellent skills, transferrable skills that could really work in a new work environment....
On Target
I have a confession to make. Even though it’s nice and quiet and because it’s such I should stay here, at my desk, writing, I really want to go to Target. I haven’t been there, for a leisurely stroll through the makeup department or an unhurried oohing and aahing over...
Everyone needs that friend who always says the right thing
Years ago, when I’d once again waited until the absolute last minute to decide what to wear to an event, I stood in my bedroom ripping through my closet. As I threw dresses and slacks and skirts onto the bed, I spied the periwinkle Norma Kamali sleeveless sheath dress...
Barbarians at the Gate
When I find myself not writing, I need to ask myself, what is it that I don’t want to write about? Because it’s not like me not to be writing. So if I’m not, and I haven’t been, I need to stop telling myself I just don’t feel like it and I have nothing to say. Oh no....
2 Minutes with Jenn (and Joe)
Recently, my exceptionally talented and successful friend, Jennifer E. Goldman, launched a video series on LinkedIn called "2 Minutes with Joe." For 120 seconds (give or take) every day, Jenn sips her coffee (the Joe in the title) and talks about an issue that's on...
Beach Dreams
I've had beach dreams - dreams of moving to the beach - for forever. As a kid, I cried when we came home from our vacations in Chadwick Beach, New Jersey. When Stu and I were dating and hitting Jenkinson's Pavilion in Point Pleasant every weekend, I used to beg him to...