Just got interrupted by the Fed Ex man, who delivered your birthday present from your Uncle Jeff. I had to stop whatever I was doing and assemble it, I was so excited. That’s an unexpected part of parenthood, how it makes you much more excited about something for someone else than something for yourself. It’s an awesome 3-in-1 push trike thing, and I am not waiting until your birthday. The weather is beautiful, sunny, a little chilly but nothing a coat can’t help. And when you get up from your nap, I’m going to feed you some lunch and then load you up and we’re going for a walk/ride! I know, I am really excited. I’ve already pushed you around the house in it. You also love it. I think we’re going to get a lot of use out of it.

The pug also tried to bite the Fed Ex man, but he’s got this jowly lips that kind of get in the way, so it’s more like being mouthed at. Plus, he’s kind of a big chicken dog, so he doesn’t actually get close enough to actually bite. The Fed Ex guy and I had a good laugh about that.

First excerpt . . .

My first excerpt from my "novel" (ha ha ha) outlines my drug use policy, which is modeledon the policy of a parent of a former student (he sampled and got caught):

So we will visit some military schools, and you’ll get a sense of the complete lack of freedom that awaits you. The choice will be yours.

And because I cannot trust you, you will submit to drug testing! Imagine the humiliation of peeing into a cup in front of your mother! (If you’d like any deterrent to teenaged pregnancy, ask me about the humiliations of giving birth . . . )

After your first offense, a failed drug test is a ticket to military school.

If you’re thinking, oh, mother, we’re not wealthy, how are you going to send me to military school???? Well, Ava, know this. You aren’t yet a year old, but I’ve started your college fund. I am absolutely committed to providing you with a quality education. I will drain your college fund to send you to military school. If I had to, I would sell our house to get the money. That’s how seriously I take this. I would rent a room in a boarding house and work night and day if that’s what it meant.

If you really insist on being a little crackhead, I read that the best course of action is to help you hit rock bottom. To that end, I will always assist law enforcement. I will load your car or bedroom up with whatever your drug of choice might be, and call the cops. If you get to jail all on your own, you’re on your own. I am not a source of bail money. Ever. Also, I will not drain your college fund for rehab. I will retain the money for a period of time in the hopes that you get the monkey off your back, and if it doesn’t look like you’re going to shape up and get smart, I will take the money and fund some other kid’s college education.
Just some stuff to think about.

TRIUMPH!

I've been wrestling with my work website on Wordpress, and I conquered a problem I've been trying to figure out for days.

And I conquered it by reading the help section! Ha! Lesson learned. Look at the help topics. They're helpful.

I still feel a sense of triumph, even though it's like feeling brilliant for stopping to ask directions.

I'm pumped!

I have a lousy perception of the passage of time. I also don't have a sense of direction, but that isn't germane to this post. I will say that I am completely without an intuitive sense of time or place. So, of course, it is a little surprising to me that Sunday is November 1st! But I'm excited. I've been jotting down potential writing prompts with the goal of having at least one per day. My goal for this "book" isn't publication, but I would like to print it out for Ava, for when she's older. I'm hopeful that readers will post comments that I'd also like to include.

See you in November!

Sorry to have gone AWOL--many projects demanded my attention, including an eminent and desperately needed basement renovation.

However, in November, I'm going to try National Novel Writing Month again, and I'm going to post excerpts here. I doubt anyone wants to read the whole thing, because it's NOT National GOOD Novel Writing Month. If you enjoy writing, it's an excellent exercise in just getting words onto paper, which is often the hardest part of writing anything. My month is really more, Typing Towards a Goal of 50,000 Words.

My topic is schmaltzy: Letters to My Daughter: Stuff I Want to Tell You Just In Case I Die.

A little morbid, perhaps, or overly dramatic, but as her first birthday approaches, there are just so many things, so many memories I want to get down on paper just in case . . . and honestly, the more likely scenario is that when she's entering adolescence, she will be busy and on the surface, dismissive of whatever I have to say. But if I write some stuff down, she can access it when I'm not looking. It's a chance to speak to her when she's interested in hearing what I have to say.

Facebook offers the opportunity to revisit the past, to see and catch up with people that have gone missing from your life for 10-20 years, if you're of a certain age. When I went to college, we relied on snail mail to sustain friendships, and unfortunately, the effort was tough for a lot of people to sustain.

So there are some people who I've really been thankful to reconnect with, people who I regret ever having lost.

Yesterday, I got to revisit some people I worked with about 15 years ago, one of my first "real" jobs in Chicago, and it was a little weird for me. "Seeing" these people brought back these feelings, not about them, but the way I felt about myself at the time. I was working a job I didn't like, but feeling compelled to try and excel at it (impossible). It was a time of my life where I felt out of sorts, but instead of acknowledging it, I tried to push it aside, and looking at these people brought it all back. There's a specific experience that encapsulates the whole thing. One day, I left work, and fell while crossing LaSalle. If you're not fluent in Chicago, it's a really, really busy street. And they were repaving it, so the surface was grooved, and so when I fell, I shredded my pantyhose and my knees. I'm all bloody and yucky, and I just fell in front of probably hundreds of people, and one person asked me if I was ok. I said I was, aside from my pride, and I had to ride home, hurting, hot and uncomfortable (it was summertime), on a packed bus where everyone ignores you, but more than anything, pretty embarrassed.

It's August, and although not warm-warm, it is still clearly a summery day, but I bought the kid a sled today. It was super cheap, at a resale shop, so I snapped it up. I put her in it when I came home, and pulled her around the yard. She made a new sound, really loud. I can't wait til it actually snows. I like hauling around in the snow.