rat petunia

Morning addition to my Flickr series, “Floyd Holding...

Sat, 25 May 2013 09:33:50 -0400

Morning addition to my Flickr series, “Floyd Holding Things”.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/62142386@N08/sets/72157632227110508/

This morning, Fudge strolled into the kitchen w/his breakfast dishes just as the NPR reporter began:...

Thu, 23 May 2013 23:30:10 -0400

This morning, Fudge strolled into the kitchen w/his breakfast dishes just as the NPR reporter began: “A British soldier was hacked to death on a London stre—” W/out thinking, I leaned down and screamed “LALALALALA!!!!” directly into his face so he couldn’t hear. Reminded me once again of my favorite mom quote in a movie ever: “He’s gonna find out that the world is a horrible place and that people suck soon enough and without any help from you.” [Laura Linney as Sammy, “You Can Count on Me”]

My poor mom is visiting. She is very, very neat, so I always wind up doing this frantic Hail Mary...

Thu, 23 May 2013 16:54:42 -0400

My poor mom is visiting. She is very, very neat, so I always wind up doing this frantic Hail Mary houseclean the second I realize her plane’s in the air. I was still sweating from the effort when, w/in the first 2 minutes of her arrival, Fudge goes: “Granny, guess what?” Granny: “What?” Fudge: “It was SO funny when we woke up this morning, b/c there was this GIANT pile of dog poop under the breakfast table, right where your feet are!”

I was kinda bummed when Sadie asked to buy a makeup kit w/her...

Fri, 17 May 2013 19:30:22 -0400

I was kinda bummed when Sadie asked to buy a makeup kit w/her own money. How did I not know Sadie would always be Sadie?

Our contractor asked me to meet w/a guy named John Hamm to discuss hardware — knobs and pulls...

Mon, 13 May 2013 19:06:19 -0400

Our contractor asked me to meet w/a guy named John Hamm to discuss hardware — knobs and pulls and the like. I’m working it in.

Found this on my pillow. I wouldn’t want them any...

Sun, 12 May 2013 23:44:18 -0400

Found this on my pillow. I wouldn’t want them any normaler.

Happy Mother’s Day.

Sun, 12 May 2013 09:59:07 -0400

Happy Mother’s Day.

Have you read our new piece by Jon Sands today? If not, you should go read it now. (No pressure.)

Mon, 06 May 2013 22:58:46 -0400

Have you read our new piece by Jon Sands today? If not, you should go read it now. (No pressure.):

holy cow.

Fudge: [appearing downstairs, well past bedtime] Us: “What are you doing down here?...

Mon, 06 May 2013 21:18:05 -0400

Fudge: [appearing downstairs, well past bedtime]

Us: “What are you doing down here? You’re about to get in big trouble!”

Fudge: “No, but wait! I need to tell you something important!”

Me: “It better be good.”

Fudge: “My hand smells like cheese.”

No balled-up wads near the bottom of the trash can, no integrated stacks in the recycling....

Mon, 06 May 2013 14:42:56 -0400

No balled-up wads near the bottom of the trash can, no integrated stacks in the recycling. You’re dealing w/a pro here. Shredding “artwork” while the kids are at school.

Few parenting moments are as rewarding as locking the windows open while driving through a bustling...

Sun, 05 May 2013 16:01:50 -0400

Few parenting moments are as rewarding as locking the windows open while driving through a bustling Little 5 Points, Def Leopard’s “Photograph” cranked at full volume, singing and loudly encouraging your shrunken children to join in.

I’m gonna need some old people backup on Tumblr. It’s lonely out here.

Sat, 04 May 2013 23:25:11 -0400

I’m gonna need some old people backup on Tumblr. It’s lonely out here.

We’re at lunch, telling Sadie the story of Secretariat, and we build up to the last race and...

Sat, 04 May 2013 16:18:26 -0400

We’re at lunch, telling Sadie the story of Secretariat, and we build up to the last race and Sadie squinches up her face and says, “Are you CRYING?!” and I fan my eyes and go, “Yeah,” and she acts like I’m a weirdo and says, “Why?” and I sigh and half-smile and say, “Because that’s the difference b/t kids and adults. You don’t know enough yet to cry when you’re happy.”

Waiting ‘til I have time to sit down and really digest it b/f I read “Story Behind Sally...

Thu, 02 May 2013 09:33:54 -0400

Waiting ‘til I have time to sit down and really digest it b/f I read “Story Behind Sally Jessy Raphael’s Red Glasses” on Yahoo News.

Sometimes something entirely magical just happens. Like you’re waiting in a long line of...

Wed, 01 May 2013 20:56:00 -0400

Sometimes something entirely magical just happens. Like you’re waiting in a long line of traffic, and this vaguely John Cusack-ish guy 2 cars in front of you opens his door and climbs out of the driver’s seat into the street and just stands there for a second, and your internal alarms start buzzing and you eye your surroundings for possible escape routes, but then he throws his head back, feet spread wide, arches his back, and triumphantly fist-pumps the sky. Then he jumps back in his car right as the light changes, and we all inch forward laughing, glad he got the girl or the job or the part, tickled to’ve been extras in his own personal “Say Anything”.

I Run On Laser Beans

Fri, 26 Apr 2013 18:03:00 -0400

Every once in a while you get this tiny little memory-shake of what it’s like to be a kid, imagining everything as something else. We have one of those coffee grinders where you pour the beans in the top, set the number of cups you want, and the right amount of beans passes down through the blade to the bottom canister. I wasn’t sure if there were enough beans to make the 8-cup pot I wanted, so I stood there mesmerized as the grinder went about its grisly work, pulverizing beans into a granulatory mass. Staring at the slowly diminishing bean level, I started imagining them as little individuals, trapped in a Star Wars-type situation, like when the walls of that trash-compacter thing are closing in on Leia and Luke and Han Solo and you’re waiting breathless, wondering how they can possibly avoid being smushed, but then at the last possible second they frantically work together to induce some sort of mechanical failure, and the walls stop and they slide relieved down to sitting, blowing hair out of eyes and shaking heads in disbelief, silently exhilarated by the near-catastrophe, more alive for being nearly dead.

So then I start rooting for the beans, willing the whirring blades to stop before the last few trickle into the conical opening to face their gruesome end. To my delight, on cue, the grinder halts, the last 3 beans trembling then settling untouched in its base. I let out a little snort-shrug of amusement, dumping the less fortunate grounds into a filter, the nameless, disposable Rebel Alliance extras. The coffee maker glurps and steams to life as I putter around the kitchen, imagination receding into routine, a bean is a bean is a bean.

I’m sensing we could all use a little “Floyd Holding...

Sun, 21 Apr 2013 18:39:46 -0400

I’m sensing we could all use a little “Floyd Holding Things” about now. Today’s addition, w/complimentary kid-braided faux hawk.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/62142386@N08/sets/72157632227110508/

Nineteen

Fri, 19 Apr 2013 16:25:00 -0400

I can’t escape it. Maybe my moral compass has gone haywire, but still, there it is, gnawing at my insides. I feel depressed, exhausted by the weight of mourning another young person, sorry for a kid cheated out of a future. Only this time he cheated himself, and his name is Dzhokhar Tsarnaev.

I don’t know if it’s wrong to feel sad for him. I can only offer that it doesn’t diminish the heartache I feel for the multitude of victims left in his wake. What he did is terrible. But I don’t believe in distinct concepts of good and evil, and I can’t make myself accept that this teenager fully understood, even as it unfolded, the magnitude of his actions.

Having once been 19, I flush with shame at the times I allowed myself to be swept along in questionable endeavors, under the influence of older, “wiser” people, participating even while understanding my actions were wrong, never quite grasping these same actions had repercussions. I know nothing about Dzhokhar, but it’s all too easy for me to imagine a floundering young person, convinced he’d been handed a cause, trying on a personality like so many teenagers. It was probably a huge rush for a hormonal young man, the mission: the secrecy, the planning, the sense of purpose, the pride of an older brother’s respect. I wonder if it even seemed real as he slipped the backpack off his shoulders. But of course it was real, and the horror it set in motion ensured that this was no stage a kid could grow out of.

When I was 19, I didn’t make bombs. I never killed anyone. But I drove drunk, I routinely behaved selfishly, I hurt people without thinking, and I was generally callous with life. I was half-formed in the way of many teenagers, susceptible to magical thinking, vain and impressionable and naive in ways my adult self finds incomprehensible.

I’ve no interest in defending Tsarnaev’s actions. I’ve every interest in understanding his motives. Otherwise, we can count on having this conversation again.

Earlier, in an effort to distract myself with something mindless, I idly clicked on a celebrity gossip link, a piece detailing Justin Bieber’s love life and career. And there, in the words of a spoiled pop star, was the reason for my melancholy, the answer I’d been searching for all day. What, the interviewer asked, were his plans for the future? “I’m figuring it out,” Bieber replied. ” Isn’t that what you’re supposed to do at 19?”

My daughter’s going to the Taylor Swift concert tonight....

Thu, 18 Apr 2013 09:41:04 -0400

My daughter’s going to the Taylor Swift concert tonight. Time to pull out my old Prince concert pics and show her how it’s done.

Fudge: “Mommy, can we have popcorn tonight?” [answer always no} Me:...

Mon, 15 Apr 2013 21:09:00 -0400

Fudge: “Mommy, can we have popcorn tonight?” [answer always no}

Me: “Yes.”

Fudge: “Really? YAY!”

Rick: “Why?”

Me: “Because an 8-yr-old died today. And fuck it.”

Rick: [nodding assent]

Heartfelt to Boston. Love to all.