The Little Limes were beautiful. In early summer, the so-called-petite hydrangeas sprouted thick green leaves and a profusion of pale green blossoms that faded to white then pink. Their light scent drifted around the patio attracting winged things.  After winter set in for good, the leaves broke off but the blooms dried into shades of caramel, sand, and chestnut that lingered on the stalks. Then the brittle blossoms swayed against the white snow. Yes, they were beautiful. For another time, another garden, a life where no one perpetually needed to pass through. Here, now, they were flower-heavy and weight-bent and wild-grown. I tried to tame them, really I did. Every spring I trimmed the shrubs down to a diameter of less than two feet. I wound a circular tomato plant trellis around each bush to coax it to carry its own weight. And I spoke sweetly to them, asking them to please bloom upright like their rosebush neighbors and not crowd the patio stepping stones. Please - be polite, be...

Sit down, we need to talk.  I've got something to tell you that I've been keeping to myself like a shameful secret for a while now. It's grown so heavy and thick, I need to get it off my conscience so I can sleep better.  Deep breaths. It's not about the children; they're fine. This is about me.  Over the last year or so, I've developed an addiction.  Every single day I crave this thing so deep within my bones that I have to have it, or I can't function. Without it, my body starts to break down and my brain begins to melt to uselessness. I can survive from dawn until lunchtime, but then I start plotting and planning and counting the hours. What errand can I skip, what chore can I put off so I can get my fix? What is drop-dead necessary, and what can wait until I fulfill that indecent need burrowing inside my head?  My friend, I'm profoundly addicted. To naps.  It started innocently enough, just a recreational resting-my-eyes. I could get up anytime I wan...

At the first Thanksgiving I celebrated with my future husband-to-be, my future in-laws whom I love dearly served turkey, mashed potatoes, and corn. And maybe rolls. That's it. And I said, "That's not Thanksgiving. That's just Thursday." Where were the exotic, calorie-laden dishes that only appear once a year? The puzzling mincemeat pie, the savory dressing, the sweets like cookies and chocolates and pastries? That's more like it. Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. Perhaps it's an unconventional choice, but one that makes sense given that I grew up playing jump-rope with the poverty line . My family didn't host or attend cook-outs on Labor Day or Memorial Day, and never bought fireworks on Fourth of July. Christmastime was often excitement tinged with disappointment and forced merriment I didn't enjoy. But Thanksgiving Days were full of delicious once-a-year foods, thanks to community pantry donations that made our food stamps go farther .  Leadi...

  Don't. I really mean it. You think it will be fun, but it won't. You think it will be all family bonding, laughing while inexplicably wading through a vat of uncooked corn kernels, sipping cider on an outlandishly oversized, rough-hewn wooden swing while gazing at one another lovingly. It will not be like that. It will be hell on a farm, which is already a kind of hell, with goats scream-bleating at you and children getting rub-burns on snot-slick plastic slides after losing their squares of scratchy carpet and expensive small-batch caramel corn flying everywhere and $50 for a lumpy pumpkin you have to hack off the prickly vine yourself and someone will cry. Someone is always crying. Sometimes that someone is you. And there is no alcohol for purchase at this farm. Stay home and stream a movie instead. Microwave popcorn is fine.

Almost five years ago, I gifted the world a list of Things I Never Thought I'd Have to Say , an ongoing collection of utterances that made me pause and think, "WTF did I just say to my child?"  Gems included please don't lick the dog , we don't cook our friends , and  don't high-five him in the face. Since 2020, I have said dozens more of these bizarre sentences to the two small humans who live in my house and follow me around, asking for snacks and screen time.  Because parenting is weird. Any time you try to teach another person what shouldn't be eaten, how to be kind to others, and also how to act in public, things are bound to get muddled. It's time for an update of what I've said.  Strange sentences about food Please don't put Goldfish in your ears Don't hit yourself in the face with carrots. You have cranberry sauce on your glasses. Please don't put hot dogs inside your pockets. There's no reason to ever take syrup into the ba...

I carried a pink lunchbox every day.  Bumpy and thick, the molded plastic was designed to keep the contents cold during sweltering Texas school days. The outside had horizontal furrows, too narrow to stick my finger inside, but I traced them anyway like they were Braille and I was trying to understand life. The inside of the lunchbox featured separate compartments for a sandwich and chips, plus a Thermos or can of Coke (it's all called Coke in Texas).  Actual lunchbox, photo courtesy of eBay But on this day there was no drink, and the lunchbox was considerably lighter at the loss.  It must have been the end of the month, because at home we had run out of whatever I usually brought to drink in the school cafeteria. There would be no trips to the grocery store until my dad got paid, our next booklet of paper food stamp coupons arrived, or we found time and gas money to visit the SoS Spirit of Sharing pantry in the next town over. It was the late '80s, either 3rd or 5th grad...