James coming out of the school, upper lip red with frosting, face dotted with chocolate crumbs. Adelin’s birthday. They got cupcakes.

We walk past the cars being loaded up for pickup. A dog is in a drivers seat, wagging his body so excitedly as his kids get buckled into the backseat that his tail repeatedly hits the horn.

The more I’m ignored, the more I want to keep shoving myself at things/people who aren’t paying attention. The truth, I know, is that those things are not for me.

There are so few things in my life and I think sometimes little things hold way more weight than they should. I can see or read something sad/gross/upsetting and think about it for days.

( Read more... )

Tony has taken the kids to school. I’m in my robe, on the couch, coffee in hand. The sky is gray and misty. Everything is wet from a night of rain. Birds call from tree to tree, across the neighborhood. The cats sit at the window, watching for them.

There is moss on the trees. Green thrusts of spring bulbs solid amidst the decayed leaves of last ( Read more... )

Another freezing cold day with bursts of slushy snow. Yesterday the flakes came down so sparely, the cats watched them from the window, alert as is they were bugs.

I volunteered in James’s class today. He gets so disruptive with me there. I wonder how much is my presence and feeling that release of a safe place and how much is just him and his ( Read more... )

The kids are super into America’s Funniest Home videos. We sit on the couch as a family and laugh. James claps when the audience claps and it makes my heart swell.

I know women with babies who’ve choked to death on bouncy balls

And babies who’ve suffocated under blankets

All I can do is wash my children’s footie pajamas,

Count the pairs of pants- is this enough for the week?
( Read more... )

His little face in my face- pink cheeked from crying- lighting up under my attention. He says I love you again and again, maybe 8 times. Says that our family is his favorite family in the whole Earth. He brushes my eyebrows with his finger then counts my eyelashes. 21 on one side, 8 on the other, he decides.

Overheard from the kitchen:

Tony: I can’t do that right now- I have a turkey in my hands.

James: You should be nice to me. That turkey is dead and I’m still alive.

Last night, while talking to Emma, she told me what she thinks her grown up life will look like. She’s live alone with her cats and write and read all day. She’ll bake things and invite friends over and make them food. (Sounds like what I dreamed of, too.)

Then she realized she’ll also have to pay bills. And do laundry, fill her gas tank, clean ( Read more... )

“Maybe someday Puff can go outside with Charlee and be a ‘esplorin’ cat.” -James