After years of reading terrible books like Captain Underpants, Austin finally showed interest in starting the Harry Potter series. A few months ago, we began reading the first book, and we’ve progressively moved through the story. It’s a compelling one, with characters and themes that are far beyond those easily understandable by a 7-year-old. One […]
other people
Lullaby
A few months before my mom died, I broke up with my first boyfriend (who I’ll call Steve in this post.) Steve was good to me, and we were in love – at least in that way that 19-year-olds without a care in the world can be. But I had dated him since high school, […]
Young Love
I was flying to the Cayman Islands to take a break from my life. It was just after Christmas, and the plane was filled with people vacationing. I located my seat, and then I saw the people sitting next to me – a really young couple who were holding hands. I took a deep breath […]
Across the Doctor’s Office
Almost daily, someone asks me why I decided to write this blog. Here’s the response I usually give: In the beginning it was a way for me to connect with my loved ones and get my feelings out into the open. But then the blog (and my motivations behind it) changed a bit. DC Widow […]
Sweet Potato Fries
The morning of Shawn’s funeral, I went to put on the one black skirt I had, and it literally fell off my body. I hadn’t realized until that point how much weight I had lost over the previous six weeks. My sister helped pin the skirt on me, and told me that really, it didn’t […]
Salsa in my Cup
Two years ago, Shawn and I threw a party that was particularly crazy. We didn’t really mean for the party to get so wild. We just wanted to have a few friends over to celebrate the year and toast our successes, failures, and ability to have merely survived. As I remember, we were still reeling […]