The Late Arrival

My gut is all I have. This doesn’t discount my family, friends or my faith, because my gut instinct is tied inextricably to all of the above. It’s the second voice that whispers a welcome or a warning in the interest of keeping family, friends and faith intact. Teaching my daughter to trust her own gut is critical. I won’t always be here to give her the answers she needs. It’s gut-wrenching because I want to give her the right answers, but I know if I do that, she’ll never learn to trust her gut, or make decisions that grow into convictions. Most of the time, I end up sprawling myself strategically along the sidelines, allowing a toe or a foot or a half-shin to cross over into her decision-making territory while I pray she hears her gut and God’s voice and listens to them both. You’d think I was an expert at gut-listening-gut-heeding. You’d be wrong. Let the record reflect that I turned a blind eye, deaf ear and mute tongue during the relationship that was anything but ...

Now look right here, I said, touching the space between my brows. Picking up the t-shaped millimeter ruler, I looked directly into the eyes of my patient and measured. The t-shaped millimeter ruler had a name, but I still don't know the technical name for it even twenty-some-odd years later. It was a tool used by opticians like me way back in the day who worked at optical stores. The place I worked was a franchised shop in the neighborhood mall. Optician training was trial by fire, but within three years, I learned the difference between progressive lenses and bi-focals; the difference between base curves and diameters; I knew how to UV coat an unfinished lens, set it into the chuck, run the edger and rotate the lenses into the frame according to an axis dependent upon the patient's astigmatism. Impressed yet? Of course, there were other things I learned too, unrelated to the fine art of Opticianing. (And no, that is not a technical term. I ju...

After leaving my job back in June, my bank account has now gone Ryan Gosling on me. Like any red-blooded American woman, I can't resist Ryan Gosling, so I dove in. Understand, the last time I applied for a job was fifteen years ago. FIFTEEN. It was simple back then. I'd show up with a resume and a starchy blue suit, scribble in forms with a fancy pen, sign the application and leave. There'd either be an interview call a couple days later or a thanks-but-no-thanks letter in the mail. It was simple. But online applications are icy cold as a Wisconsin winter and as frustrating as driving through a snowstorm in rush hour. First, I searched. Then I refined the search by city, then I further refined by miles away from the city that I just refined. Then, I searched by industry and then refined the industry by sub-industry. How refined of me. After an hour, I finally found the position and description. Press Here to Apply! Yay! I thought, Techn...

Hey, you didn't go anywhere today, my husband said. Any day I don't have to go anywhere is good day, dude. The answer tumbled from my lips before I had a chance to edit it. He looked worried and I swear he started dialing 911 to get me the emergency help I obviously needed. He might've even Googled Involuntary Commitment on his phone. Maybe I should've answered better. Maybe I should've said Why is staying home not good? We call it home, we dust, vacuum, scrub floors and baseboards and Febreeze it to make it feel homey, and yet people think we're crazy if we want to stay inside and enjoy it. Although I meant -- and mean -- every word of that, I didn't say it. Maybe I didn't say that because deep down in my bones, I know the greater joy in not leaving the sacred doors of home is in the not-having-to-make-yourself-presentable to people who live outside of your home. Understand, I've been willingly unemployed since June of this year;...

This is ridiculously adorable. And funny.  Go ahead and watch; it'll only take a minute. I cried laughing the first time I saw that little fluffy dog refusing to enter the house because he needed someone to open a door that only he could see. I watched it again and laughed just as hard. Then I looped it a third time for good measure, but that's when something eerily familiar resonated with me. Doggone if that little dog and his invisible closed door didn't remind me of me.  I think we've all stood on the outside, looking in and waiting for someone to open doors that existed only in our minds. For me, the 'right time' was my door. I kept waiting for the time when we'd be more financially stable, or for the time when stress would resolve itself and then -- then I could get out of a miserable job situation and into peace of mind.  I waited outside of that closed door only to finally realize the right time wasn't even a real obst...

"What'll you have?" "Beer's good." The fizz tickled. An hours-old "It's definitely you , not me " declaration and a final exit's relief echoes in my head. A job is life's filler. Not the other way 'round. Fizzes, tickles...taste like freedom.

Jump in, honey! I’m right here. Jamie’s voice echoed above the splashes in the indoor public pool where 3 year-old Georgia was taking swimming lessons. Pigtails on either side of her head created alien like bulges through her orange swim cap. She stood at the pool’s edge, stooped over...thinking, weighing the options...and not jumping. Can’t say I blame her. Ground is solid, secure; while water, no matter who’s standing in it waiting to catch you, isn’t. But solid isn’t truly solid if you think about it. Earthquakes happen and whole buildings tumble. Floods sweep villages away; and tornadoes and avalanches even use what’s solid to ground themselves and wreak havoc. Clinging to what’s solid can be a dangerous proposition - in nature and in your career. I imagine my daughter, stooped, overthinking, weighing her options, missing out on the fun she could’ve had, had she just jumped into her daddy’s waiting arms. The scene was my mirror. What I saw was myself clinging onto a ...

Hey, I know it’s summer and everything, but it’s getting late. Bedtime, kiddo. Georgia and I were watching Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs . She had seen it before, so it wasn’t like she was missing out. We said bedtime prayers, and I kissed her goodnight. The movie had sucked me in by that time and I wanted to know how everything would get sewed up in a tidy bow, so I went back to watching. It didn’t disappoint. I was entertained and nearly clapped as the credits rolled. The next morning, I told Georgia what a clever movie it was. You watched the rest of it? Seriously, mom? Now I felt stupid. Well, yeah. I got hooked and wanted to see how it ended. She and Jamie exchanged looks. Um, mom...you saw that movie already. At the movie theater. Don’t you remember? Listen, my brain’s memory chip has been deleting a ton of low-priority information lately. But an entire movie? Like, a swath of time and place that I completely blanked out on? Between you and me, I still contend ...

What did he say he wanted to do on Saturday again? Jamie's list of to-do's scrolled through my mind as I drove to work: a trip to the store here, an errand there, another errand across town, maybe sledding, maybe work on the basement redo. Next thing I know, it'll be Sunday which means church, errands after church, maybe a nap. Then dinner. Then Monday. Again. My rant was interrupted by the slippery road indicator light blinking at me as my tires spun a through a four-inch snow "drift." Overtired, I giggled at the thought of a four-inch snow drift and remembered the time I got caught in a real blizzard. In 1996, I was a faithful bus rider (faithful because I had no car, but that's another story). From our bachelorette apartment, it took a forty-five minute ride east on the Route 57 downtown, then another twenty-minute stretch northward on the Route 30 to my job at St. Mary's Hospital. At the end of the day, the rides were reversed. This particul...

Ahh, the flu season. When adults are reduced to crying out for their mommas and sales of hand sanitizer skyrocket. There’s nothing like it; and there are definitely distinct types of flu sufferers. Recognize any of these? The Wounded Animal In the opening scene of “To Kill A Mockingbird,” Atticus Finch shoots a rabid dog. The dog was perfectly fine before the disease, but once he contracted it, he went mad and terrorized the town, attacking people at will – even those who might have offered help. The Wounded Animal sick person is kind of like this. He/she is a normally upbeat, go-getter puppy-like being. But when sickness hits, look out. The flu won’t make them go mad. It makes them go crabby; and The Wounded Animal snaps, bites and growls at everyone around them. Recognizing The Wounded Animal : They respond to “How are you” with guttural noises, grunts. The asker is often heard saying with a puzzled look “All I did was ask how he/she was doing.” Handling The Wounded An...

We made it through the Christmas weekend, enjoyed family, unpeeled a few presents and ate.  And ate. And ate. Now it's back-to-work and back to some sense of schedule.  Truthfully, there's a part of me that hates to see it go.  I mean, it's kind of ironic that we get thrown back into the fray just as soon as we've unfrayed from the seasonal fray. But that's the way real life is...and I guess I'm just realizing that the seasonal fray of obligations, overpacked schedules and general racing around isn't real life after all. And I'll be okay with that...until about 364 days from now.