Relationships
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Opposites Attract (It’s True!)
I could see my husband was beaming with pride over his innovation of finding a way to stop the vertical blinds hanging in our bedroom from clapping together when the air conditioner came on at night. I cringed and had to cup a hand over my mouth to incarcerate the flood of words ready to pour out. Lined across the bottom of the blinds, like a rigid sentry on serious duty, was a…(give me second, here)…POOL NOODLE! A six-foot, bright royal blue, with a slight kink in the middle…pool noodle! The ceiling fan was on in the bedroom and–as my husband confidently demonstrated–the blinds were pressed snuggly against the window,…
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The Girl in the Third Row
She sat in the middle of the third row back. I was visiting the class for an observation assignment. A substitute teacher was filling in that day and half the class was turned around in their seats chatting with friends, the other half slouched low in their chairs, staring down at forbidden cell phones in their laps. They weren’t fooling me. It’s not hard to notice the flickering glow from the screens reflecting off their oily adolescent faces. The noise level in the room was annoying, so I hunkered in my seat, arms folded across my chest, to watch the show. I wouldn’t get any work done anyway. It would…
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“Dear Mother of a Teenage Daughter…”
Dear Mother of a Teenage Daughter: I know she slammed the door in your face for the third time this week. You stood outside the door for two full minutes, taking deep breaths, trying to decide if you should force your way through the offending door and demand respect or threaten to ship her off to your sister. Your sister wouldn’t put up with these teenage temper tantrums. Or…you could just shuffle down to your own room and cry yourself to sleep. You opt to cry yourself to sleep. Again. Feeling like a miserable excuse for a mother. Again. I’m sorry this is so hard. (Big hug from me…)I know…
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“Sorry, I Can’t Hear You Right Now” (Our Infatuation with Devices)
I’m not sure how long my husband had been rambling on about something happening in the news until I pulled my earbuds out and caught the tail end of “…and if it passes, you know they’ll be rioting in the streets.” Was he talking to me? I’d been sitting nearby listening to a podcast on my iPad. Fortunately, we had discussed the news story he was referring to in social studies class that day, so I caught up real quick. “Well, honey, this world is only going to get worse,” was my lame response. Although I felt guilty for not telling him I’d missed the first part of his diatribe,…
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A Message for a Single Mother
Well into her 80s, Oma shuffled along with her cane everywhere she went. Tap, tap, tap. Everyone heard Oma coming before they saw her. She always carried peppermint candies in the pockets of her cardigan, handing them out to the children at church, in her neighborhood, at the corner grocery store she faithfully visited twice a week — wherever little people crossed her path. She’d reach down to pat their tousled hair and patiently admire their artwork or an interesting rock they’d found in the dirt. It was her custom to walk to the park on Saturday mornings and feed the pigeons. Not because she particularly liked birds, but simply…