Surreal Morning Conversation

Lily: "Omigosh I really love this lint brush! It's so fun to clean the house!"

Sam: "I know, right?! I keep folding these towels and it's SO FUN. I just want to do more and more of it."

Lily: "I got to fold two baskets of towels."

Sam: "Lucky. But I am luckier because I scrubbed the bathtub."

Lily: "No fair!"

Sam: "Tomorrow, I am going to start doing ten chores EVERY DAY."

Lily: "I'm going to do TWELVE!"

Miss Provo Wrote an Article about herself.

And also about herself.

Lily: On Cleaning the Bathroom

Lily: "When you clean the toilet, you've got to really scrub, you know? You've got to get in there. Get it so clean that it looks like a GIRL's bathroom."

Last night this not-so-little fellow ran across Steve's chest

There was only a little screaming.

Copious Google searching leads us to believe that he's a "Wolf Spider." He certainly is wolfish.

Turns out he was living in the window air conditioning unit we just brought in from the garage. Note to self: next time, do not ignore the spider webs you saw on the filter. Where there are webs, there might be wolves.

It figures.

Sam and Lily made "found items" sculptures for their art class. (Sculptures out of trash.)

Sam made a gun. Lily made something to wear.

You know you've been watching too many 80's movies when...

[we're swimming]

Lily: "Let's play Marco Polo!"

Sam: "Naw. I don't want to play that. Let's play Global Thermonuclear War."

me: "How on earth do you play *that* in a pool?"

Sam: "Well, you find the Russians and you SPLASH them."

me: "Okay, you find the Russians and splash them. But how do you *win*?

Sam: "Mommy, nobody wins a nuclear war."

Pool Entry: $10; Mommy's time: priceless

[We're swimming. Lily gets herself in just a little too deep and starts to struggle, panicking as she sucks in a little water before I can snatch her up.]

"Oh, Lily!" I say, balancing her on my hip. "Was that scary? Are you OK?"

Lily: [coughs up some air and water as she nods her head yes.]

me: "Are you sure? That was quite a dunk."

Lily: [looks at me incredulously] "Of *course* I'm OK. I am spending time with my Mommy."

Afternoon conversation: Sam on Self Esteem

Sam: [Artfully wrapping a towel around himself after swimming.]

Lily: "Sam. What are you doing. You totally look like a girl."

Sam: "No, Lily." [Pause so he can look at himself in the mirror.] "What I look like is a GOD."

Freud: 1, Margaret Mead: 0

Hey look! My chair!

I had some slipcovers made. You can see one of them here.

I heart slipcovers. And also, I heart the girl who makes them for me.

Lily: On the Royal Wedding

me: [pausing the reaaaaaallly old DVR tape of the Royal Wedding I finally decided to watch] "Lily! Do you want to come watch a prince marry a princess?"

Lily: "You mean that bald guy? No thanks."

People! End of the World Party at my house on May 21st! (if we survive...)

I saw a big RV drive by today with lots of pronouncements about the end of the world and how it's in a few days.

Awesome.

this was the best picture I could get (I was at a stoplight):

That about sums up the experience of my class I think.

One of my students just sent me this little poem. I'm a fan.

No words can describe
How much I have learned to plan
From so few deadlines

Things students will do for paper extensions:

just watch this one.



isn't the library scene the BEST?

In which we discover that Lily really does care about the emotional life... of her food

Lily: are you having dinner without me?

Dad: I thought you already had a peanut butter sandwich.

Kristin: yeah it's all over her face.

Dad: where's the rest of it? On what part of the floor?

Lily: no!

Dad: you finished it? And you're still hungry? You're never hungry!

Lily: yeah, but I just have the one sandwich in my belly, so I need to have another one. otherwise it'll be so lonely in there!

Dad: [pause] Okay then. I'll make one.

This is a video based on part of my friend Rick Walton's book. It sort of rocks.

Anyone who reads this a writer?

I need someone out there to bug me so I'll work on my manuscript. My self-discipline has been sucked away in equal proportion to the volume of beta blockers I suck in.

Here's what I want:

I'm making a writing goal. If you want to make a goal too, leave a comment and let us all know what it is. And then use the comment section to report yourself every time you *miss* your goal.

See, I've done the positive reinforcement thing where you celebrate every day that you do your goal. And that way is nice and makes you happy and not filled with self-loathing (the natural state of writers). But that way doesn't work for me at the moment. Hence the new method:

Shame.

So. My goal: Every day (except Sunday) I'm going to write at least two words in my WIP. (This goal gets more done than you'd think. Also, it's about all I can handle with my heart acting like a teenager and throwing fits unpredictably.) Every time I fail to write two words, I will tell you in the comment thread here. And when my WIP is finished, I'll announce it and THEN we can all brag about how awesome we did with our goals. k?

so leave your goals below. and you know what? you don't even have to be a writer. just make a goal and then leave a comment back here every day you fail. the challenge will last from now until my manuscript is finished. (I only have about 60 pages to go; before the skin-graft turned heart-problem, I could do that in a week.)

Best of luck people.

That's right, Buddy.

Sam's friend: "I have so many girlfriends. I have, like, twelve girlfriends."

Sam: "But, dude. That is just... wrong."

Sam's friend: "You're right. Maybe it was thirteen girlfriends..."

Sam: "No, no. You're not supposed to have twelve OR thirteen girlfriends. It's just wrong. It's mean. And bad. You're only supposed to have ON... [furtive glance at me as he realizes I'm listening] I mean, ZERO. ZERO girlfriends. None at all. We are WAY too young to even be thinking about having girlfriends."

In which we discover that I am imaginary

Steve: "Your Mommy is a doctor, Lily. Did you know that?"

Lily: "Huh? But Mommy, [turns to me] you don't see any patients."

me: "Well, no. I see students."

Lily: "So you're not a real doctor."

me: "No, I am. I'm just a doctor of philosophy, not of medicine."

Lily: "Like I said. You're not a real doctor."

Steve: "Aw. She sounds like a surgeon alREAdy!"

For an adorable iPad storybook

click here.

OMG, people. This is PROGRESS.

I just wrote a full scene. 

I haven't done that since before my surgery.

The surgery that made me stupid. And also not able to do anything.

It's been almost seven months since that *&^%$ surgery. They say the pain from the damaged nerves might go away in one to two years. Maybe never.

Have you tried to be creative when you're in pain?

And not just normal pain. Not even "OMG I broke my back!" pain.

Pain like fingers on a chalkboard times a million. Pain so intense that you didn't know there was pain like that. Pain that tears away your anchor. Rips that sacral foundation out from under you and takes away who you were. Pain that over-stresses your heart and literally almost kills you. My mom knows that kind of pain. So do I now.

But today I wrote a scene. Just a half a page. But a whole scene.

It makes me think that maybe I'll come back out of this. Maybe I won't be gone anymore. Maybe there's a teenie tiny light at the end of the tunnel.

I don't want to get my hopes up or anything.

But, people.

I wrote a scene.

And also she says that I'll miss her little hands when she's a teenager and does crazy things like ride her bike in the snow.

me: "What's this on the wall?" [point to Lily's latest artwork.]

Lily: [Shrugs.] "It's signed 'Sam.'"

me: "I know. But it's in your handwriting."

Lily: [Stares at me in a loaded silence.]

me: "Do you have anything to say?"

Lily: "My handwriting is on the fridge, too." [Pause.] "I could take you to see it." [Pause.] "It's there in the note I wrote you so you could remember what I was like when I was little. Where I put a picture of my hands." [Pause and plaintive look.] "My little, little, hands."