It recently became fashionable to celebrate our obsession with list taking. You know the books: 1000 Places to Visit Before You Die, 1000 Things To Do and even the movie, The Bucket List, a melodramatic journey of Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson as two old men revisiting dreams and rekindling failed relationships. Even Oprah Winfrey’s O List has a way of magically transforming the item mentioned into an instant best seller, whether it is a book, a product, or a personality like Dr. Phil or Dr. Oz. We are a culture obsessed with lists: little items, thoughts, or deeds we must write down to check off and feel a sense of accomplishment. I’m not knocking it; I am a list queen myself. If I don’t write it down (to then check it off), it doesn’t get done. …Read on

Twenty years ago I was a daredevil. Today I am chic. I am poised upon the fresh powder (that’s Colorado snow, for those of you not in the know), garbed up in my razor sharp ski outfit (Spyder jacket ice white with aqua and midnight trim, white gloves, sexy black pants) helmet, goggles, boots, skis. Ready for the slopes. On top of the world.

I had made it on the lifts, a contraption I gave no thought to mount from age 6 to 19, but now, at 39, approached apprehensively. All right, approached in a panic. I haven’t lived in Manhattan in over 14 years but it’s as if Woody Allen and all his neurosis had infiltrated me steadily through the years:

“Get on this thing? It’s not safe? A dangling chair in subzero weather climbing precariously …Read on

Oh I thought of all of you last night, my friends, as I used Larry for the first time (no, Larry isn’t my vibrator, if you recall from a former post, he’s my meat grinder…)  My husband was helping me shove in chunks of top round as it was all spewing out of the tiny little drain-looking contraption and meat and blood was flying EVERYWHERE splattering my seven-year old son and I in the face like an edited-out scene of Carrie.

I assume most normal folk would run in horror, scream, or, quite logically, TURN THE KITCHENAID MIXER OFF, but I fell straight into the role of the demented killer as a smile the size of a quarter watermelon slid on my face and a curling, and pardon the pun, bloodthirsty laughter escaped from the deepest and most carnivorous corner of …Read on

I’d imagine most mothers celebrate the moment their preteen daughters set off for camp. It can be viewed as a time for growth, self-awareness, peace, and calm.

I bought myself a meat grinder instead.

You see, I know I am supposed to feel happy. I know it is good for her. Good for me. Good for everyone. But still, that mother identity has steadily coated its glaze on me over the years of driving the child to karate class, driving the child to piano lessons, driving the child to physical therapy, driving the child to play dates and on and on and on is suddenly hitting me dead on. She’s gone, now what the hell do I do? Who the hell am I? And that’s when I am not done. I still have a seven-year old son left …Read on

This past Tuesday was Election Day, and while I was particularly excited to live through such a history-making election, I was also glad the kids did not have school and I would not have to get up at the crack of dawn to tackle lunches, snacks, breakfast, shoe searches, hair untangling etc. etc. etc.
Little did I count on my wake-up call from my six-year old son, Jonathan.
TAP TAP TAP, a determined finger knocked through my comforter solidly on my forehead.
“Mom…” he insisted, mid-whine, as if we’d been engrossed in this conversation a good half hour or so.
“MOM!!!” more forcefully now (he’d definitely found me and wasn’t going away).
I peeked one bloodshot eye out into the dark world and was met by an inquisitive stare framed by ridiculously long, thick eyelashes.
Standing by my bedside in his favorite tin soldier pajamas was …Read on