I'm all around stressing out right now. I'm going back to work full time in a week or so and I'm feeling totally unprepared for it. It seemed like a good idea but now all of a sudden I have issues like childcare that I never used to have. There is an afterschool program at school so it's not that big of a deal to leave him there for an extra hour and a half. He says he is looking forward to it, but I'm feeling guilty about it. It's not like he and I do much in that time period anyway- play a little, or watch a little tv, so an hour and a half of games afterschool is probably going to be fun for him. But I completely forgot about June. My mom can watch him in July when she is out of school, but there are 3 weeks in June that I have absolutely no idea what to do with him. I did find a summer camp he can go to, but it is going to cost way more money than I make a week to send him there. I'll make up that money eventually, but it still seems wierd. I hate not being able to be there for him all the time. What do I do if he is sick? My husband is going to have to make some compromises whether he likes it or not. He's used to going to work as he pleases, and staying for as long as he likes because I've been responsible for the childcare. When I told him about the camp, he asked me not, "how are WE going to get him to and from there?" but "How are YOU going to get him to and from there?" I said, "I'm not- YOU're going to have to do it." He had this look of shock on his face. Sorry Charlie but I can't do everything.
This whole job thing has morphed into something more than I meant for it to. I was supposed to just "fill in" for my boss for a few months and now I have to go to a board meeting next week to be approved for what seems like a permanent gig. She says she is coming back in Jan, but I'm not so sure, seeing as they are giving me my own office, making me go to board meetings and the like. I may have bit off more than I can chew. But for now, I'm going to tell myself it's a temporary job- an exciting experience for the short term and try not to stress too much about it. If nothing else, it will be good to have some extra money. And money that I earned rather than a weekly dole from my husband.
Do I sound annoyed? I am, especially at men this week. We had an incident in the playground after school the other day. We often play for a while afterschool with a few classmates- most of them girls. Now, the kids have developed this boy vs. girl thing at school and usually what happens is that all the girls gang up on my son because he is the only boy. It has been mostly good natured puppy style wrestling and chasing up until the other day. Nobody seems to mind if the girls are aggressive toward the my son, but he got yelled at by another dad the other day because he was teasing and mildy pushing one of the girls. I don't approve of him pushing anyone around. But I also don't approve of the girls pushing him around and it doesn't seem quite fair to me for there to be a double standard. He's five years old and certainly can't understand how he can't push and shove but the girls can. I don't know what to do about it without getting into a fight with the other parent. It really pissed me off for the dad to yell at my son. As if he was a teenage molester or something. It was threatening and scary to a little boy to have a man yell at him "get your hands off my daughter!" I didn't interfere because I couldn't process it that quickly and I didn't really want him to be pushing the girl either, and it also sort of seemed like a thing between guys. But I've been stewing over it for a couple of days now, and I'm getting madder and madder. If I had yelled at his daughter, he would have freaked out. And I don't think he would have yelled at one of the other girls. He yelled at my son, because he is a boy and also because he thought he could get away with it because I am well, a girl. I could bet money that he never would have done it with my husband present. And for that matter, I think it was inappropriate for him to have a man to man kind of a conflict with a five year old. Either we just don't play with anyone anymore after school, or I have to tell all the parents that they have to stop all the kids from wrestling with eachother.
It's probably good that he's going into the afterschool program.

Is wearing a bra with giant boobs kosher in a church? And by giant I mean 5 ft long boobs made out of welded steel. And by church I mean Unitarian which I am not but there is a performance art event happening at said chuch which I've been invited to participate in. When I went to the shop the other day to work on an idea for the show this is what came out of my mind and my hands. But I'm not sure this is the appropriate venue for this particular sculptural oddity. Perhaps I should come up with something more family friendly. I was going to have my husband and son participate in the show- come up with something for all of us to do together, but I got carried away with the idea of the giant boob bra and now I am having a hard time wanting to work on something else. I could make us all giant boob bras. Hmm. It could be funny. Not sure if it is funny ha ha or funny wierd...

creatively, i mean. i have a love-hate relationship with people trying to convert me. i am a unitarian, and therefore believe strongly in religious tolerance and everyone has a right to their own beliefs and whatnot. complicated by the fact that i was raised by "recovering" catholic atheists, one of whom is now born-again and really intense/intolerant. and i steward land founded by catholic workers, radical folks who were called by jesus to live in voluntary poverty and serve those in need. rare in these days of megachurches and moneymaking empires built on attractive and wealthy preachers who hawk books, audiotapes, videos, workshops, inspirational calendars, t-shirts, keychains, etc.etc. in jesus' name. throughout my life i have been constantly approached at home and out by people promoting their various religions, and i nearly always take the time to listen, as i am intensely curious about the motivations of people who put themselves out there in that way. we had the mormons over many times in the city, and after awhile they stopped trying to convert us(technically, they say god converts us, they just open the door) and just hung out talking. apparently, they enjoy being around back-to-the-land hippies with lots of kids cause it reminds them of their own community. (though i failed to mention to them that the hottest erotic short story i've ever written involved a mormon "elder".)
in fact, i have more in common with some of those jesus freaks, and use that term affectionately, than i used to think. i am homeschooling, avoiding tv and mass media, i like lambs and i want everyone to love each other in that brotherly/sisterly way. but when they get going on the ol' judgement-armageddon-end-times-hell thing, i just shut down.
today, i was visited-literally, not spiritually, by 2 ladies and holy shit what a difference. the men tend to either talk down to me or stare lecherously at my boobs. ugh, way to bring me over to your side. but the ladies were out promoting an end to war, and the complimented my attractive rooster, we talked about raising kids, planting the garden, and how if women were in charge we could most likely end war. if a feminist, matriarchal, life-affirming, non-judgemental religion came along i'd be all over it. but for now, i'm afraid-just like hillary clinton is putting a feminist face on captialism and the 2-party system, these ladies were trying to pull me in, only to inform me that the male is the true leader, keep my mouth shut, my outfit is a little too boobalicious, and i can tithe on my way out....

Ha- I like reading cookbooks too. My husband gave me a hard time recently when he found me hiding in the bathroom reading Home Cheesemaking. It's not that I was hiding, it was just that I got all caught up in Farmhouse Cheddar. Or maybe it was Gouda, I'm not sure. That and gardening books. Give me a book about gardening AND cooking and I'll really be foaming at the mouth.
Tonight I'm having a go at sweet and sour tofu. And I'll be hiding in the bathroom reading about how to prune tomatoes.

I have an evil habit.

I read recipe books for pleasure.

As you can imagine, Google is an enabler.

Food is very important to me. For starters, if I don't get enough of the right kinds of food (usually greens, sometimes protein) I get restless, agitated, and sometimes depressed. If I don't eat enough, period, I get very hard to live with. Sometimes I will realize that I've forgotten lunch, and that I'm sitting in a puddle of negative energy as a result. Or we'll run short of greens, I'll go two or three days without, and end up in a swivet. I'd rather eat greens than slurp down my emergency meds.

The other issue for me is that if I'm presented with boring food too many times in a row, I stop eating. I'm not all that picky, really. I just like my food to have flavor. Don't feed me ground beef and gravy over buttered noodles with no vegetables and expect me to do more than pick at it. I will do my best to get it down, because any calories are better than no calories, but too much of that is asking for trouble. Feed me vegetables, and use the herbs and spices with a generous hand.

The result is that I do a lot of the cooking around here. it pretty much guarantees I'll have food I like. I would probably do most of the cooking anyway, as B hates cooking and I enjoy it. Actually, we make a good tandem, because he doesn't mind helping out with chopping and stirring. Just so that no one asks him to figure out what to do. He's capable; he just doesn't like to.

Sometimes food that I've eaten happily for a long time will lose its appeal. For a while I didn't want chicken. Recently (and this is very aggravating, because who cares if I eat chicken, but beans are useful, healthful, and *cheap*) I haven't wanted dry beans. I need to keep an open mind when it comes to planning meals, because otherwise I'll find myself cooking food that I won't eat. That would be too ironic to stand. I'd start throwing pans and we all know where that would go.

Things are mildly complicated by the fact that I don't eat sugar (not all that hard, usually, although if I'm experimenting with some Asian cuisines it sometimes means I have to move away from tradition and alter a recipe) and can't have any kind of refined grain.

Mostly that means that we use brown rice and have had to do some experimenting with whole wheat pasta, but I've found that whole wheat flour substitutes very nicely in practically every recipe I've tried. It's getting easier to find whole grain food -- I discovered the other day that Rice-A-Roni, should I ever be moved to eat it, has put out a line of whole grains.

If I get too bored at home, then I find myself wanting to eat out. Get me out of here. Feed me a meal I don't have to cook, don't have to see the aftermath, don't have to think up. Feed me something different. The trouble is twofold: one, finding food I can eat can be hard, and two, eating out gets expensive in a hurry.

So it's important for me to read new recipes to get new ideas.

But the truth is, I read cookbooks before I became the head cook for a household. B calls it "food porn." (Menus are also food porn.) For one thing, the commentary a lot of cookbooks put with the recipes is interesting. For another, I can imagine, and experiment with, different tastes in my mind, deciding what might or might not be good to eat. I get ideas that I might incorporate into my own cooking, even if I don't choose to reproduce a recipe.

Recently I've been reading bento box sites. It's a good thing the kids aren't in public school, or I would be deeply tempted to assemble bento for them all every night. It would be cheaper than having them buy lunch, and undoubtedly healthier, but I would get all hung up on making everything bento-cute. I'd probably also make all kinds of weird things, and get offended if the kids didn't eat them. (They're adventurous, but if they don't like it, they don't like it, just like everybody else.) I don't mind feeling competitive, but if I'm channeling that into feeling superior because my kid has ghost onigiri for Hallowe'en, that's a little ridiculous.

But there are plenty of recipes that are adaptable, in larger quantities, to the dinner circuit. I saw a good one for a simple way to serve spinach, and an intriguing recipe for baked fish. I bookmark the ones that look really interesting. A recipe has to be very interesting indeed to merit a bookmark. I'm not looking to establish the next Joy of Cooking on my laptop. The rest of the recipes I just read and file away in my head for inspiration.

Once a week, B and I sit down and make menus. Sometimes we invite the kids to come participate, but they rarely have ideas, aside from P's running willingness to make beer can chicken and F's interest in making "casserole" -- a concoction that a friend of mine used to call "Hangover Helper" and which I have run into here in the mid-West as "tuna wiggle." It's good, and it's easy, but it easily becomes boring. Plus, she always wants to cook carrots with it, and the older I get, the more convinced I am that cooked carrots are a waste of kitchen space and effort. I'll eat them if they're mixed in with something else flavored, but straight cooked carrots? Don't bother me with that.

Menu-making is usually when the recipe books come out for real. Most of what I make is the tried-and-true; being original and innovative every night is too much work. I try to pick out a recipe every week or every other week to try out. Usually they're fine with the family, although we've had a couple of strikeouts. (The baked tofu nuggets were icky, although it's possible that's because we weren't able to follow the recipe precisely. But I don't think so.) If everybody likes them, I mark the cookbook (if it's mine) or make a printout of the recipe and add it to the big recipe notebook. I need to organize the big recipe notebook; every time I want a recipe out of there I have to sort through the whole pile.

Making menus helps out with my only serious kitchen problem: by five o'clock, I don't have any inspiration left. If I leave the planning until late, I can't think of anything to cook. I let everybody fend for themselves. If we make menus, all I have to do is look at the cork board and start chopping. Besides, if I need to thaw something, or cook something all day in the slow-cooker, having the menu there means I remember, rather than coming up on five o'clock and realizing that there is no time to cook the barley, or that I'm going to have to thaw meat in the microwave, which I hate.

It does wonders for shopping, too. Once we have menus, it's a snap to make a shopping list. Recently I've taken to putting the list in the order we'll pass stuff in the supermarket. B and I go together (it's as good as a date) and whisk in and out. Most of the time we buy only what is on the list, which means we spend less money and are less likely to have vegetables rotting in the refrigerator.

I have a little pain. It comes and goes, mostly goes, and it's not too bad. Very low in the abdomen, almost down in my pelvis on the right. Last time I had a pain there, it turned out that there was a problem, so I hied myself off to the gyn. She's one of those doctors who remembers all her patients, and I'd just been there for my regular visit a month before. I claimed that I'd been thinking of inviting her over for dinner, but had decided that an office visit would be cheaper, since insurance pays for it. She laughed.

Then she asked about four zillion questions, poked around, and told me that she thinks I have a hernia.

What a remarkably unromantic problem.

And she gave me a handful of business cards for general surgeons she trusts.

It doesn't hurt that much. B could be out of a job in less than a week. I'm not calling any surgeons until he's safely insured again.

I hope that's soon.

Meanwhile, I am so distracted that I am rivaling P, whom we jokingly refer to as "the super-hero, Distracto Boy." I'm not worrying, exactly; I just want to know, one way or another, what's going on. Worrying will start if B gets downsized.

I hate rumors about important things. Last word from someone in management, in mid-March, was that layoffs wouldn't take place for 30-60 days. Friday, rumor came from someone in HR that layoffs will be next Monday, and that B's department is laying a lot of heads on the block.

I hate corporate America. But that's where B works, and it will probably always be where B works -- his choice. Meanwhile, I am white-knuckling it, waiting for the axe to fall. B will almost certainly lose his job; I would be extremely surprised if he didn't. A small part of me is desperately clinging to the idea that he'll still be employed after the RIF, but that's wishful thinking.

He's waiting for word back from a company where he had what he is pretty sure was a very successful first interview. But he was warned by the HR people that pulling the necessary management heads together for second interviews is going to be hard. Bloody disorganized, in my snotty opinion. So it's anybody's guess when we'll find out one way or another whether he made the first cut.

He has applications in to several dozen other companies, but the process of screening and interviews is slow even in efficient companies. I've been crossing my fingers that he'd have something new on-line before the chop, but that's looking less and less likely.

I am trying to be calm about this.

He's willing to get an hourly job of some kind, which he should be able to find around here without too much trouble. That won't be enough money without me working a substantial number of hours, though, and while I'm getting ready to apply for a job in a bookstore, the fact of the matter is that between homeschooling and outside activities, it will be hard for me to put in many hours. Actually, though, I'm thinking that in terms of B's current schedule, which won't matter a bit if he's fired and working an hourly job instead. We'll just coordinate schedules somehow.

I just wish I knew what was going to happen. Not knowing for sure whether he's going down, and not knowing when it's going to happen, and especially not knowing how long it will take him to get another job in his field, is hard.

Meanwhile, I have a short, cheap trip scheduled to see a friend. I don't know whether to cancel it or not. If B is out of work, or soon to be out of work, then I probably shouldn't go. I've saved the money for it, but that little bit of money could mean a lot if things get tight. If he has a new job, I'm out of here. It's been too long since I took time overnight, away from the family.

I've always looked for certainty and security in life, because I tend to be scared of change. I've always known that certainty and security are an illusion, because things happen, but I've done my best not to pay any attention to that knowledge. I'm going to have to deal this time around, though.

Time to change the subject. Except to say again that I hate corporate America and its damn obsession with the bottom line. If you can believe it, the announcement that there would be layoffs was preceeded *by minutes* by an announcement that the company had exceeded its financial goals for the previous year. That's right, folks. The ship is perfectly safe, sailing swiftly through calm waters, ahead of time to reach its destination. But just in case, we're going to lighten the load by throwing passengers and crew overboard.

Yeah, I'm bitter.

P is in Texas; my younger brother invited him along on his annual week of vacation. My brother bought his plane ticket and everything, so it was possible for us to let him go. The last time we talked to him, it sounded as though he was having fun. I hope so.

The rest of us went to the planetarium yesterday. Also fun. I have to admit, knowing most of the answers to the questions asked in star show was a nice ego boost. I didn't actually answer most of the questions -- no need to be a know-it-all -- and it will never get me a job, but I knew more than I expected.

Today, the girls and I are supposed to go to the library, but we've been waiting forever for F to finish up the various things she's doing. I'm not coordinated enough in my head to be really paying attention, so it's lunchtime and we still haven't gone. I really, really want to throw school over and stay home and sulk about how awful the world is, but for one, we need to do school. For two, staying home to sulk is bad for me, and I know it.

B and I were in the bookstore on Saturday, and I was looking through the women's studies stuff. I saw easily half-a-dozen books I'd like to read, but they're all classic, main-stream feminism. I can get them out of the library. So I'll see if some of them are available. I bet I have to reserve them, either to get them out of storage or to get them from other libraries. They're read continuously, though, so maybe I'll find them on the shelves after all.

Time to go eat some lunch and pull myself together. B commented today that he wasn't sure he should keep me up to date on the rumors at work; I'd probably be calmer. He's right that I would be calmer. But I don't think I want to be protected like that. I think I want to deal with what's going on, even if it's all eggs and moonshine so far. Grownup-ness. Facing reality. Dealing. I know I can do this, but I have to admit that head-in-the-sand is seductively attractive.

I've been trying to makeover our lives in a more sustainable way- setting up a garden to grow as many vegetables as possible, not buying processed food, making our own bread, cheese, even breakfast cereals. Which has been fun, but some work. I won't buy CAFO meat anymore, so we are mostly not eating meat (much to everyone's chagrin) and I'm trying my best to improve my vegetarian cooking vocabulary. I just got promoted at work from a part time teacher to the Director of Education (?!) which is sort of exciting although I'm not entirely certain I'm ready to be Director of Anything. It's not a permanent job- I'm taking over the position until next Jan so that my boss can take an extended maternity leave. It will be good experience, but my farming may suffer. It will be challenging to see if I can work full time and still maintain the garden. It will be especially challenging to see if I can work full time and not give in to mac and cheese.
Speaking of mac and cheese, my eleven year old niece is visiting for the week. As far as I can tell, she has made it to eleven without ever having any protein. As long as I have known her, she refuses to eat anything but plain, buttered spaghetti, french fries or candy and her parents apparently accommodate her. It is extremely maddening. I did manage to get a few beans in her last night on some nachos. I hate to judge other parents, but jeez- my son will try practically anything. And it's not necessarily because he wants to all the time.
So, rather than make myself crazy, yesterday I decided to let it go and join the party. I took the kids to FAO Shwartz and then we had a lunch of french fries and milkshakes. Then we went to Times Square where we rode the ferris wheel in the giant Toys R Us. We desserted on M&Ms at the M&M store and walked around the Hershey's store across the street. It was definitely a Willy Wonka Day. So much for sustainability. It's her first visit to nyc all by herself. We'll go back to whole grains next week.

Last weekend was F's ninth birthday. Today is the party. The party will be a snap -- it's laser tag. Even if we were having it here, no problem. Don't overdo, and the parties are easy. It helps that we don't feel any obligation to give our children The Best Birthday Party Ever(tm).

But I'm worried. Not over the party, but over the kid who isn't coming.

I sometimes call M "the most anxious child in the world." Recently, his mother has been talking to me, looking for help. He's not just anxious; he's a mess. Recently, he's been experiencing really rocky depressions. Frankly, he's scaring the hell out of his parents, because at his worst, he talks about wanting to die. They take this very seriously. He's in therapy and under a psychiatrist's care, but so far they haven't cracked the wall.

M loves laser tag. And he used to be up for any chance to spend time with P. Today, his mother called up; his dad and sister are still coming to the party, but he's having "one of those days." "One of those days" means that he's so acutely depressed that he doesn't want to do anything. That is bad. Really, really bad. It's the second time in about two weeks, too.

I know a bit about how he feels. Wanting never to do anything again. Wanting to die so that I won't have to feel anything any more. Thinking that I can't possibly stand one second more without mentally exploding, but being unable to explode and just being stuck under that tremendous pressure.

I have the whole day free tomorrow. I was thinking that I might invite M's mom out for coffee. We haven't sat and talked in a while, and she's been stuck in the house after surgery. But I was thinking today that, if he's willing, I might take M out for a walk, and stop for coffee or ice cream after. He probably won't want to, but getting out from inside the same four walls and getting into some sunshine might take the edge off, if I can talk him into it. It won't cure him by any means -- what he's experiencing is far too severe for the sunlight-and-exercise cure -- but any little bit that helps is important.

It's hard to watch him and know that he's probably going to go through the same kind of extended hell that I went through trying to find a combination of meds and therapy that will stabilize him. I'm hoping ... I am hoping for a miracle, and I am hoping for a fast miracle. Or, since I have never believed in true miracles, I'm hoping for a small concentration of sheer dumb luck on his behalf.

I have to go comb out my tangled locks and get ready to go. It will distract me from M's troubles. It sounds a little cold, but I do have to be careful not to let his situation bring me down. Among other things, it would be completely unproductive in terms of being able to give him any support if I start to spiral. So some distraction is in order.

I have a new blog.It's kind of self indulgent, but I am enjoying it. I do like to write and it gives me an outlet, even if nobody reads it except for me. Also, it makes all the work around here a little more fun- instead of griping about not wanting to strip paint off the walls, I can photograph and document the process and instantly publish it. So I'm a blogger. It is fun, instant gratification.
Other news- I am a finalist for a commission in South Korea. I may have to install a huge art installation on the other side of the world which is completely daunting and exciting. It happens this summer, which will interfere somewhat with work- I am filling in for the director of education at my job while she is on maternity leave. Hopefully they won't mind if I have to be gone for a week or so.
Our charter school is coming along. I am helping with the curriculum portion. It is exciting to see some of my words being incorporated into the school philosophy. It will be really great when the school actually opens. I will feel proud of being a part of it.
Hmm. Lots of stuff going on. It'd be great if I could squeeze in some time and energy to make some sculpture. Maybe I should make a blog about it. It would force me to produce. Not a bad idea...

Ugh. I am not entirely well. I get so confused when I get sick. I'm just don't know how to deal with it. I feel okish, except for this cold has settled in my throat & upper chest like nothing I've ever experienced. P says I look really good for being sick... but I feel like I've been pounded about three inches above my sternum, unless it just feels peculiarly numb -- awesome -- bronchitis! My throat is just raw & angry. But not in that streppy kind of way, just in the annoying winter sore throat kind of way.

Bleah. And the lack of energy. I have just enough energy to muddle through what needs done, and then I don't even have enough energy to go to bed. BUT -- with the recognition of that fact, I am, in fact, going to go do that because I was up with croupy girl last night, and the night before I only got five hours of sleep, and I haven't been napping while I've been working from home sooooo I think I'm probably exhausted. Right. Off I go then.

"Do not forget. Remember and warn."
-- Plaque fixed to the hollow shell of Sarajevo's National Library

This week is so going to be a write-off for school. I have an appointment every morning Monday through Wednesday, and we never do school on Thursday and Friday because we have other commitments. Morning appointments screw us up completely, because they're almost always right in the middle of the morning. We don't have time to get anything done before, and by the time we come back, everybody is getting into lunch mode, and it's hard to sit everybody down and get them to concentrate.

It's hard to believe that after nine years at this gig, I am a senior homeschooler. People ask me questions about what I do, looking for inspiration and direction. The fact that I've gotten this far encourages them to think that they can do it, too.

There are two things that can make a homeschooler look radical to other homeschoolers (we all look radical to the public schoolers). One is to unschool. I think unschooling is a great idea, and I've incorporated some unschooling ideas into our schooling. Looking at the total picture, however, I'm not calm enough, or I'm too much of a control freak, take your pick, to totally unschool. And as I've had kids get older and need more advanced work, and as I've gone from one kid to three, I've gotten more structured.

The other thing you can do is to homeschool your kid in high school. A lot of parents call a halt at the end of eighth grade. It makes a certain amount of sense. High school involves some relatively specialized stuff, like advanced math and lab sciences, and a lot of people feel they should get into what I think of as "Final Four" literature -- reading the classics, analyzing the classics, discussing the classics, and writing papers about the classics.

We're nicely placed to homeschool through high school, and whether it's from mad self-confidence or cheerful ignorance, I've always just assumed we would homeschool right through. Math is no problem. I can easily handle math through algebra and geometry, and if one of the kids wants trig or calculus and I find I can't remember enough, there's a good community college nearby that is used to working with homeschoolers. We'll probably deal with lab sciences that way, since I'm not much into dissecting frogs on the dining room table. And I'm really not worried about whether my kids read Melville and Coleridge.

Plus, I have an evil part of me that is in revolt against my middle-class upbringing, a part that whispers, College isn't the only option, you know. That part of me is backed up by the knowledge that if the kids choose to go to college later, they can do whatever it takes to prepare themselves. Financially, we're not going to be able to help them much, but we have enough money to screw up financial aid. They might very well do better to wait until they're old enough to be considered "independent," and go as non-trads.

Besides, my future was so totally laid out for me -- do well in high school, go to an exclusive college, do grad work -- that when I found myself uninterested in grad work I had absolutely no idea what to do with myself. In a way, I'm still looking, since my current gig as a full-time mother and homeschooler is a timed contract. I want my kids to consider their lives in a wider way. Maybe they want to do internships. Maybe they want to spend a year working in the inner city (I could see P doing that; a couple of days there left him curious and feeling as though he could do more).

There is more to life than advanced degrees. Heck, even if I had gotten an advanced degree, I still wouldn't have known what to do with it. Don't get me wrong, they're useful, and critical if you want to get into certain areas, but there are plenty of things you can do, and do well, without ever setting foot on a college campus.

If you go digging really deep down, though, I worry. I worry about whether they'll be able to get the jobs they want. I worry that they'll end up with corporate drone jobs. B has a corporate drone job, but it's doing something he's good at and happy to be doing, but what if that's not true for the kids? I worry that at the end of their lives, they'll look back and wish they'd done something significant with themselves. And I worry that I won't prepare them well enough.

In so many ways, I felt ill-prepared for grownup life. Some of that was my parents failing to teach me, some of it was them failing to push me to stand on my own. Some of it was me, responding to the fear that I had even then. And some of it was just that no one is prepared for grownup life, and even if we were, grownup life is irregular, unpredictable, and full of pitfalls. Parents can only do so much.

But I still feel responsible, and doubtless I'll feel responsible if things don't work out for the kids.

we have made syrup. it sounds like a weird thing to do, though it was a major staple food for those who lived on this northeastern land basically up until the landrape of big box stores and the horrors of corn syrup arrived. first, we dreamed about it. then, we drilled little holes into the sugar maples. it was cold and snowy, and we put the taps in, all bundled up, attatching blue tubes to 5 gallon buckets. then, waiting. and dreaming. dreaming about syrup. all of a sudden, it's running and we're down there all day emptying bucket after bucket into huge drums, in the rain, wet from the top down and the bottom up sappy and trying not to spill the precious goo. slippery in the ice and mud and wet maple leaves. every time someone comes over we're like hey, let's go empty buckets! nothing like punks in the woods. i let the kids play in mud and muck just to get a few minutes in of emptying. we're sore and hungry and soup is ready. suddenly, every bucket and barrel is overflowing. we're scooping drinks of sap straight out of the barrel, it sloshes, we're cocky cause-what the hell-we've got a few hundred gallons! (which makes, maybe 5 or 6 gallons of syrup.) then...the cooking. all day tending the huge fire mapley steam and wet-wood smoke in your hair and clothes, talking or reading or smoking, a nip of whiskey and a piece of pie, just watching the sap bubble and reduce, adding more and more wood, more and more sap, hours and hours in the sugar shack. then we bring it up the hill for finishing, cleaning, and maybe a few maple candies. i will never, never eat crappy syrup again.

One of the ways I do togetherness with my family is to sit and read a book or work on the computer while they're watching a movie.

I know it sounds detached, and sort of terribly everything-that-is-wrong-with-the-modern-era, but it's what I do. The family watches basically no television except for six or seven movies a month. (That amazes me. When I was a kid, it was a treat if I saw one movie a year.) Some of the movies I like, and I watch, and we talk and point things out and stop the movie to discuss. Or sometimes for me to rant about a particular ism.

Some of them I either don't like or have seen before and don't much care about seeing again. For those ones, I put together something I'd really rather do, like work on the computer or read a book. I can't truly multi-task; I have to concentrate on one thing at a time. But changing focus from one locus to another doesn't disorient me. I can keep track of what is going on in two different sequences, as long as I don't have to do it simultaneously. So I give most of my attention to what is in my lap, and some of my attention to what is being watched, and sometimes comment, and sometimes we discuss. Sometimes whoever is ruling the remote calls my attention to something and replays it for me.

So it does what I want it to do, which is to keep me in the same general space as my family without making my personal headspace crazy.

Today's feature is "The Day After Tomorrow." For some reason we own it. Possibly someone gave it to us as a gift; we own very few movies. There is a friend here for an overnight and they rooted around amongst what we own, and that's what they came up with.

At least, if it must be dramatic, it's dramatic about a topic that needs to be taken seriously. Other than that, I don't want to bend my attention to seeing it again. I disappeared into the kitchen to make a pot of tea when they hit the wolf sequence. I don't know why, but I don't have a huge tolerance for suspense. It's worse when I know what is coming. Backwards, I know, but there it is.

Ah, well. The computer is running out of charge and the movie is almost over. Not to mention the fact that it's almost midnight. Time to shut down. And have that cup of tea.

at least of the first draft. Who knows what will happen when the editor returns it all marked up for revision?

I am comparing the manuscript I had asked two librarian friends to look over 2 years ago with what I have now. The last chapter was 2732 words when I gave it to her; now it's almost 5000. and it's much more fleshed out. (and thought out)

I was hoping to have all 133 pages in my hands tonight, go through, make a list of questions of what still needs to be answered, what questions I need to ask whom, and then get on it.

But now, after having worked, on and off (mostly on) this damn monster for 11 hours, I am sleepy and everything seems not-that important and so I should do the responsible thing and stop trying to read prison stuff, do my dishes, shower (which will hopefully stop my toes from feeling frozen inside my boots)and curl up with the zines that ms ladybug mama brought when she came to visit last week. I should *not* look at the folder of miscellaneous information I just pulled out. Really, I shouldn't...

Sometimes paper is the only thing that will listen to you.