Not Everything Has To Be A Teachable Moment

Last week was a hard week to be a parent, especially to two little boys who love to watch football.

Everywhere you turned, someone was talking about the massive scandals involving several NFL players and their deplorable conduct.  On television.  In the newspapers.  In line at the grocery store.  I did everything in my power to shield them from all of it.  I didn’t even let them watch the NFL halftime shows on Sunday because I knew what the topic of discussion would be.

I suppose I could have told them a watered down version of events.  It is, after all, in vogue in the parenting world to turn every moment into a “teachable moment.”  I suppose we could have had a didactic discussion about whether employers should be able to fire you for your off-the-job conduct.  Or whether when you hold yourself out as a role model, you accept that you should be held to a higher standard. Read more...

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Make a Wish

I got home from the Virginia game late on Saturday night and this was waiting for me:

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A container of personalized New York Football Giants M&Ms – a present from my college roommate who had to suffer through years of my football obsession while she was trying to get her molecular biology homework done.

As I was standing in the kitchen eating them (I hadn’t had dinner after all), the words jumped out at me.

Make a wish.

That is the essence of loving any sports team, isn’t it? Read more...

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Are You Ready for Some Football Part II: How Football Finally Made Me Cry

You can read Part I of the story here.

I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve cried this summer.  I’m fine, remember?

I didn’t cry at my dad’s memorial service.  In fact, I reveled in the celebration of his life and took odd comfort in consoling the people who came and cried on my shoulder.

I didn’t cry as I spent 8 weeks living in my parents’ house, the house I grew up in, surrounded by his things. I looked at his clothes hanging in the closet, at his briefcase filled with law review articles, at the pictures of him scattered on tabletops and bookcases. I liked seeing those traces of him everywhere, as if he was about to bound through the doorway at any moment, ready to kiss my mom on the forehead and tell the boys a silly joke. Read more...

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Are You Ready for Some Football?: Love, loss, and America’s Game

After months of despondently pretending to care about tennis and golf and baseball while secretly watching reruns of the 1982 Peach Bowl on ESPN Classic, the drought is finally over.  With August comes a return to all that is good with the world.

Football.

I love everything about football.  College or NFL. Televised or live.  I love the play calls, the pageantry, the speculation over coaching hires and recruiting.  Most of all, I love being a fan. Since I was a little girl, I have loved my Giants and my Wahoos. But truthfully I will watch any game, any time, anywhere. Read more...

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‘Twas the night before school

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Today is my least favorite day of the year.  The day before school starts.  The end of summer.  The beginning of homework and drudgery.

The end of fun.

Jack has been dreading this day for weeks.  He angsts. He frets. He worries about things to come instead of basking in the remaining moments of his freedom.  He is, after all, his mother’s child.  I do my best to distract him, to cheer him up, to reassure him he will love it once he gets there.  But I am pretty sure he can see right through me. Read more...

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Summer Crushes

07 16 14_0001Oh the summer crush.  There is nothing like it.   I don’t know whether it’s the potentially fleeting nature of the relationship that makes it so intense.    Perhaps a summer crush is special because it is accompanied by the exhilaration of seasonal freedom.  Unlike the other nine months of the year, reason and obligation take a backseat to the vagaries of the heart in the summer.  Maybe everything is amplified by warmer temperatures and the heady smells of suntan lotion, chlorine, and french fries from the snack bar.  Whatever the reason, in the summer you sit a little closer, gaze a little longer, giggle a little louder, and love a little harder. Read more...

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The Family We Choose

08 12 14_0001This is what 38 years of friendship look like.  Easy.  Real.  True.

38 years ago, our mothers asked each other to be godmothers to their new daughters.  27 years after that, we were each other’s maids of honor.  Fast forward another 3 and we are godmothers to each other’s babies.  And all the moments of all the years in between are just too good to reduce to words.

When we were younger, I idolized her incredible spirit of adventure, her fearlessness, her inimitable ability to make everyone laugh, her giant heart that embraced everything and everyone.  I still do.  But now I admire how she didn’t sacrifice those qualities on the altar of adulthood.  Instead, she effortlessly parlayed all of them into her marriage, her children and her work. Read more...

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Look at me, look at me!

06 16 14_0001Nearly every afternoon in the summer, you can find me in the pool.  Not at the pool.  In the pool.   With 8 kids lined up waiting patiently to jump to me.  Or 5 boys practicing the sweep the leg move from Karate Kid as they try to dunk me.  These kids range in age from 3 to 8 and sometimes I don’t know half of them.  I’m “the pool lady.”

Last year, there was a woman stretched out languidly on her chaise lounge, flipping through a magazine, in the area I affectionately call the “adult” section.  You know – the place where people go to relax and read and get a suntan.  The place you go when your kids start insisting on sitting at their own table.  Far away.  The place where dreams go to die as far as I’m concerned.  She looked up at me as one of the boys tackled me in the water, smiled a bless-your-heart kind of smile, and said “don’t worry, you’ll be over here with us soon enough.” Read more...

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Passion

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In the course of your life, there are certain moments that you remember as clearly as if they happened yesterday. Some are big moments, but most of them are small.  And this weekend, at Tony Bennett Basketball Camp, was one of those moments for Jack.  And for me.

But not for the reason you think.

Despite his most fervent desire, the idea that Jack would even be able to attend a college basketball camp was a stretch at best because of a rare disease no one has heard of (for more read here).  But this one – 2 half days with parents in attendance – seemed like the best shot we’d ever have to give him this dream.  Way too often in my younger life, I preemptively said no to things that I suspected I couldn’t do.  And that was the safe thing to be sure.  But I also regret that I didn’t just try some things, even if they would have ended up with me unable to walk for days. Read more...

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Cheers

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When I was a kid, the end of the school year was brutal. I was ready for a languid, lazy summer by mid-April.  My brain, which generally fired on all 4 cylinders, was limping toward the finish line on a flat tire and a crappy suspension. The days were warm and my feet were sore.  The idea of finishing my diorama on Jamestown was more torturous than being trapped in a pit of snakes.

Turns out I still feel that way.

The moms who drove our carpool back then must have sensed this fatigue because at least once a week that last month of school, one of them would stop on the way home and get us Slurpees. Everyone had a favorite concoction. Mine was a Coke Slurpee with a thin layer of cherry in the middle. Read more...

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It’s not the size of the dog in the fight, it’s the size of the fight in the dog

It’s that time of year. The warm weather spells a deathknell for all sorts of fun for our family. Warm weather means blisters. Lots of them. Warm weather means the carefree running around that the boys and I enjoy in the cold must be once again shelved until the winter months return. When it’s 90 degrees, even walking through the parking lot causes blisters.

I can handle it. I know my limitations. I know when to say “no I can’t do that” – even if I really want to. I know how to be okay with being different. I know that it made me stronger – even if it hurt in the process.  I know how to compartmentalize disappointment and pain.  I’ll survive. Read more...

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Ten Things No One Told You About Motherhood

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10. You know how you were able to sleep through fire alarms at 11am in college? Forget it sister. You will now bolt straight out of bed if you hear a sigh. That’s right, a sigh. Because apparently one of the side effects of labor is developing supersonic hearing.

9. Laundry will be the bane of your existence. You will empty all the hampers, do 5 loads of laundry – none of which is yours of course because you would rather re-wear white pants covered in coffee, chocolate, and ketchup than wash One. More. F*&%ing. Thing.  As you fold and put away that 5th load, you think you’ve won. And then you realize that in the span of 3 hours, all the hampers are FULL again. Read more...

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Wolfman Jack

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Sometimes Jack gets blue that his blisters will prevent him from even getting the chance to score the go-ahead touchdown or winning basket. As a parent, it is heartbreaking to see your child limited not by his talent, but by some genetic flaw that you passed down to him.

So it’s crazy cool to have moments like this . . . when he finds his groove in a different arena. It’s doubly cool for me since that arena is the same stage on which I performed 20 years ago.

#watchouthollywood

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