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Zombies, Run
I love running. It helps my anxiety and it keeps me in shape. Often, I come up with new blog posts when I run, or at least work through the problems of my day. Did I mention it helps my anxiety? So it may seem strange that I also like to run to this crazy immersive game called Zombies, Run. It’s an app you can download and then listen to while you are running. I use it all the time. I turn on my music, and then at random bursts, zombies run after me and I have to go faster. In addition, I take on the role of “Runner 5”…
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I’m Not Getting a Dog
I was out on my morning run the other day and I saw a woman about my age walking her Golden Retriever. It was a beautiful dog, and the woman, dressed in casual walking shoes and an old t-shirt from a local university, looked content. She sported a large wedding ring and smiled at me as I ran by her. I waved. I don’t know this woman at all, but I know this – she looked happy. And she clearly loved that dog. It reminded me of a conversation I had with Shawn a few years prior. Claire’s recent blood test had shown that the allergy shots were working for…
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Grilling
I’ve never been a particularly accomplished cook, but over the years, I learned enough to make a decent meal or two. As a teacher, I always arrived home in time to make dinner for my family, so usually this task fell to me. Unless it was summer. Because once the warm days arrived, it was time for grilling. And I was definitely not in charge of grilling. That was Shawn’s job. He loved it. When we moved into our current house almost a decade ago, he bought a grill that was way outside of our budget. When I admonished him for it, he said, “Marjorie, we will use this grill…
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My 200th Blog Post
I remember the first blog post I wrote. I was sitting in jury duty, hating life, and thinking: God, I should text Shawn about the ineptitude of the jury system. And then I remembered that I couldn’t text him, because he had died the month prior. I wrote down what was in my head, trying to describe what it felt like to not be able to text the one person who had always had my back for the previous fifteen years. I found it really difficult to do, but somehow, 800 words emerged. At the end of that post, I wrote this: When we said those words, “for better or…
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The Day the Car Didn’t Start
The day the car didn’t start was a day when I really needed the car to start. I guess that’s usually how it goes, right? As usual, I had risen at five in the morning, gone on a run and pulled myself together by the time my kids woke up. “Okay,” I said to the three of them at breakfast, “here’s the plan. Grandpa Tom will take Tommy to his allergy shots. I’ll drop Austin off with the Wilsons and Claire is coming with me to Children’s Hospital to get a blood draw. We’ll all need to go in a few minutes.” I rounded the big kids up and we…
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Waiting for the Future
A few weeks ago, my friend Christine got a crazy idea in her head. “Let’s take a few days off and take the kids to a waterpark,” she said to me. “It will be so much fun for them, and we’ll have each other. Let’s wait to tell them until the day we leave – imagine their faces!” Before Shawn died, I was always up for spontaneous things like this. But I’ve been more cautious in the past year and a half. However, when Christine proposed this idea, I said, “yes, that sounds like a great idea!” Maybe I was ready to be spontaneous again. We reserved a big hotel…
There’s No Handbook for How to Do This
