This year, for the first time since my kids were born, I am going to lose Halloween. Not lose it as in it won’t happen. Of course it will happen. I’m not actually a witch; I can’t just make it disappear. Lose it as in my kids aren’t going to dress up. They might throw on a mask or some benign accessory, knowing that if they don’t, I won’t let them trick-or-treat with their friends. The idea of ...
Hakuna Matata??? I Wish!
I'm going to let you in on a little-known fact: I don’t transition well. I was at a preschool parent-teacher conference the first time I heard that phrase. The teacher wasn’t referring to me… she was referring to a much smaller, far cuter, male version of me… but I internalized her words nonetheless. As she explained how my son had a hard time moving on from the things he loved, I thought to ...
What’s So Good About Good-Bye?
A few weeks ago, I stood on the front lawn at my son's school for their Memorial Day celebration, listening to the principal play guitar and lead the students in the sweetest rendition of “This Land Is Your Land,” the flag flapping gently in the breeze. If you close your eyes and imagine a fairytale that takes place at a school, this is what it would look like. And like most fairytales, I didn’t ...
What Happens On the Hillside… Is Pretty Awesome.
One Sunday a few weeks ago, I looked out my bedroom window to a perfect sunny day. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky. I threw on a pair of capris and my silver Sperrys (the kind you wear with no socks) and headed to Max’s lacrosse game. Minutes after my arrival, the skies darkened to the point where I fully expected to hear a loud, booming voice, the temperature dropped 15 degrees, and we were in ...
Walking In A Winter Smotherland
It’s a funny thing, being Jewish in December. Chanukah came early this year. Not Thanksgivikah early, but early enough that it still caught me off-guard. Whenever there’s more than a week between the last night of Chanukah and winter break, I get cocky. I feel like I’ve been given the gift of time. But that feeling is very short-lived, because in reality, there’s only one thing that happens when ...
Camp Crazy
Every summer, there’s a catch phrase that’s blurted out so frequently during my interactions with parents that I often wonder if they secretly believe it’s the key to unlock the holy grail of childrearing: I’m not THAT parent. It’s never followed by any type of explanation of who THAT parent is. In my line of work, it’s assumed that I know. Spoiler alert: I KNOW. There’s another phrase ...