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I listen to a lot of podcasts. While doing the dishes, folding the laundry, mowing the lawn, walking or driving, podcasts are my go-to for education, entertainment, and connection when I’m alone.
I also read books, watch videos, and take courses. I enjoy these experiences until, just like the tail end of a meal, I am done. I don’t want any more.
Read MoreA friend of mine, a stay-at-home mom, is locked into a perpetual battle with her career-oriented sister-in-law.
“You’re so lucky that you were able to stay home,” says the sister-in-law. “We never could have afforded it.”
My friend seethed. “It wasn’t luck!” she told me. “We sacrificed. She could have, too.”
She wants her sister-in-law to acknowledge the nobility of her choice to stay home with her kids. The rightness of it.
Read MoreAwhile back, the parent of a student at my school learned some concerning information about another student.
She had this information because her daughter had shared it with her. She sat on it for weeks, hoping that another parent would come forward with it so that she wouldn’t have to.
Eventually, this parent, Amy, got in touch to pass this information along to me. But why was Amy contacting me and not the parent of the other student?
Read MoreThe other night, I took the draconian step of moving my phone and its charger down to the kitchen.
If I want to know what happened in the world (and with my friends and family) while I was asleep, I now have to go all the way downstairs to find out.
The desired outcome, of course, is that I go to bed and get up on time. Both of these things do indeed happen more easily as a result of this change.
Read MoreAs a teenager, Claire Danes starred as Angela Chase in the short-lived American TV series My So-Called Life. She lives with her attentive parents and her sister in a nice house in a nice neighborhood; naturally, she eschews them and is drawn to the miserable kids with miserable family lives.
In one episode, Angela’s best friend, Rayanne Graff, gets dangerously intoxicated. Rayanne’s mother, previously established as cool and laid back compared to Angela’s very square, anxious mother, is dismissive: “You are too drunk, young lady. Way too drunk.”
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