1. My household is a Momocracy. I don’t negotiate with terrorists. Of course, I have the burden of making sure my terrorists are actually terrorists. So, I’m faced with the burden of proof, truth, and evidence…ok, so maybe I didn’t learn that from him.
1. Each night I check to make sure they are breathing.
2. I am capable of doing unspeakable things to people who hurt my children.
3. I am not as nice as they think I am.
4. Dating wise, I’m far more shallow than they give me credit for. So, while my daughter worries that I don’t take an interest in the men we encounter at the market, the mall, the local McDonald’s—I have seen them (often before she has) and dismissed them.
5. The rest of the things that I don’t want them to learn by reading this, smiles.
1. I love them more than I can say.
2. I am so proud of them.
3. It’s a pleasure watching them grow as individuals–even though it means I will no longer be the center of their lives (and, yes, I am oblivious enough to believe I am now the center of their lives).
4. I enjoy engaging in conversations with them (which is not the same as arguing with them, see things I learned from George Bush).
5. They are talented, beautiful, wonderful children who will grow in to talented, beautiful, wonderful adults who will never try to force me in to a nursing home (unless it’s a really nice one where I can write for hours on end while watching the ocean from my ocean-view apartment).
6. They are destined for success.
7. They can tell me anything.
8. I will always love them.
9. I will not always be right, but that won’t always stop me from offering my opinion.
10. Never stop learning.
11. Make new mistakes, there’s no sense remaking the ones I have already made (and, made quite well thank you).
12. Don’t let any one decide your dreams (not even me).
13. No one has the power to make you fail.
14. Make the decisions that will make you proud, not popular
If you’ve been within a mile of Mount Vernon Place this week; if you’ve visited the library, a book store, a friend with a book; or if you’ve perused the Sun, the City Paper or b, chances are you already know The Baltimore Book Festival is this Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
I’m honored to be reading with Joanne Cavanaugh Simpson, writer, editor, Hopkins professor and advisor. We’ll be at the CityLit Tent from 1:45 to 2:15 as part of their School of Lit .
School of Lit features faculty and students from some of the area’s finest writing programs. Joanne and I will be reading nonfiction essays, short stories and talking about Johns Hopkins University Advanced Academic Programs MA in Writing.
I hope to see you there.
We had been married six years, nine months, three weeks, and four days—no five—and only once have I pictured him dead.
I blame Wal-Mart.
Half way between a tube of Burnt Coffee lip-gloss and a 4-pack roll of single-ply bath tissue, there dangled rows of thick, braided rope. I fingered them, attempting to touch them all, lingering on the thickest braids. The knots were strong against my skin; the frays tickling the flesh between my fingers. One hundred feet for $9.99—One hundred feet.
It was the perfect length for tying a King-sized mattress securely to the roof of a car; or for my nine-year old son to practice tying knots to gain his merit badge; or for securing Justin to his office chair before sending the chair bounding down the 28 stone steps leading from our house to the street.
I slipped two coils into my cart.
“How much was that?” I asked.
Poking the corner of her mouth with her stubby, pink tongue in an act I’m certain someone told her resembled concentration, the cashier focused on the numbers on the screen, hoping I would do the same.
I peered at the slender plastic bag of my purchases: toilet paper, lip gloss, rope. My items implied I was the type of woman to buy on-sale toilet paper for the guest bathroom while buying Charmin for my own; who would apply lip gloss to her full lips to avoid leaving unappealing crescent shaped kisses on coffee cups; and who would haul a king-sized mattress in an elongated shopping cart, hoist it over the hood of a fairly new car and drive 45 mph down 695 to avoid losing said mattress.
In particular, the rope implied I was the type of mother who would stay up nights teaching her 9 year old son to tie wild animals with rope should he be confronted with a wild animal before attempting his merit badge. Or, the type of wife who pictured tying her husband to his leather, office chair, his sailing before gravity propelled him toward the parking pad where her car was conveniently not. A woman who pictured not blood and bone scattered in said parking spot, not his dying, but his death. Death presented neatly, like a gift, a tiny wooden cross where the bow would be.
My mattresses are delivered by people who endeavor to do such things; I do not have a son, and I don’t like the sight of blood.
“Take the rope off, I don’t need it.” I say.
There are at least one hundred ways to end a marriage–make that 99.
