My Jenn-eration

To be honest, nowadays I find myself writing less and less. Maybe it’s because the kids are getting older and it’s complicated. Or maybe it’s because I’m getting older, and it’s complicated. But there is something about the close of one year and the beginning of a new one that almost always compels me to say something, to have some sort of written reflection of my place in this world. Something that forces me to pause when every part of me, if only for self-preservation, just wants to keep plowing through the next few days. To keep getting on and getting through as all of us must and will do. I want to write something to you about what this year has meant to me, to each of you - and the only word that I keep coming back to again and again is grief. 2019 for so very many people I know and love was a year of grief. I can’t tell you that’s all there was. Honestly of course there was more. Beautiful wonderful moments! But oh the sweet and utterly brutal grief of saying goodbye to who...

Join me over at The Washington Post where I'm talking about navigating the new frontier of my children being old enough to Google me. Embracing my own digital footprint is an uncomfortable but necessary process. Sharing it with my son as he carves out his own digital future, is a moment of personal growth for both of us.

We are fresh back from a few days away together as a family. I often think that if you could perfectly summarize what it is like to build and grow and love and live within a family, vacation is in and of itself the perfect encapsulation of all the things. There are so many special moments together. There are SO MANY MOMENTS TOGETHER. We were fortunate to travel to an extremely lovely spot and I can’t underscore that enough. But it was so lovely that for the first time ever my husband and I experienced the very odd sensation of feeling that so many of our fellow travelers were nearly all the time Instagramming all the things. In fact my children and I stumbled upon an actual photo shoot as we wandered into the pool early one morning. The woman was wearing a bikini that was not particularly G rated and arching her back in the waterfall next to the tank where my kids were gawking at sea turtles and sharks. I felt like I was imposing on her photo shoot. I genuinely needed to re...

For reasons still unclear to me, I stayed up way too late last night waxing overly philosophical about 1994. Inspired by that Gen X piece in the New York Times, I hope you'll give it a read.  Click here for time travel. 

This morning I was gifted with a rock, some seeds, and chocolate. Also this card which, both its words and the image completely leveled me. A circle, a wave.  My god look at what all of you have done. Isn’t it simply amazing?  The way you work, or the way you stay home with them, the way you rock them all night or sit by the phone waiting for them to call, the way you do it all on your own or are humble enough to ask for help, the way you cook them all that nutritious food an d the way you lovingly work to pay for the takeout pizza, the way you bottle feed and breast feed them, the way you plan for every IEP meeting, and every college application, the way you hold their hands and hearts every damn day and promise them it will all work out when you are never really sure. The way you love them when it’s good and bad and everything in between. Just the way you love them.  I was super weepy this morning as I looked around the table at my family. I’m not even sur...

Your transition to the middle of parenting happens swiftly and silently like most other phases. You don’t remember when the baby starts sleeping through the night, or when they started talking in full sentences. Or when one day that stroller, the one you fretted so deeply about which one to buy - well one day cobwebs spring up around it in the garage where it lies, unused and untouched. You aren’t a mom pushing your babies in the stroller anymore. You’re not that mom anymore. The thing about parenthood is that just when you gain your footing in whatever moment your kids are in, they change and so the whole experience sort of feels like you are perpetually bracing yourself, constantly searching for some sort of solid ground. There are these brief moments where the water seems foolishly calm and free of ripples. But even then you know that’s not how all of this works. The stillness is the exception. Parenthood is entirely about riding the waves. Here now in the middle I’ve got twe...