A Mile Wide, An Inch Deep

“In writing this message, Jesse Christopherson displays just the kind of cronyism that has led to the developmental and racial segregation (gentrification) that he is actually promoting. … Perhaps it is his own inferiority or a sense of cronyism that has led him down the destructive and divisive tone that his endorsement of my opponent takes.” -- Charnette Robinson, candidate for Mount Rainier City Council 2015 writing to the Mount Rainier community listserv in response to this (pretty innocuous) endorsement of Tracy Loh, candidate for the same seat A previously-unforeseen downside of having my husband called a promoter of "racial segregation" on the community listserv is that it thoroughly enraged my very petite Indian American neighbor, a woman in her 60s who can nevertheless be absolutely terrifying (per her seasoned career as an educator) and who was extremely passionate this morning in Jesse’s defense.  Very, very early this morning. I shared her disgust and appreci...

James is too sick to go to school, he informs me while jumping on the couch and singing a song. It's a fight to get him into his uniform, into his shoes, into his jacket, so by the time we leave I'm still in my pajamas -- a combination of too-short gym shorts, too-small tank top, old nursing bra, and house slippers. I tell myself it’s a short walk. There are three small African-American boys walking to school ahead of us, a couple of first-graders and a preschooler who’s at least a foot shorter. It’s a reminder that what we call “free range parenting” or “child neglect” -- depending on your viewpoint -- in the rich, white county next door is what we call “Tuesday” in ours. (For better and worse. But that’s a topic for another day.) They’re halfway down the block when they abruptly turn around and head back our way. “If we’re gonna be late,” the oldest says to the others, “we might as well just go home.” Well that is every bit as ridiculous as James being “too sick”...

My youngest is an ardent practitioner of attachment childing. He wants me to "come be my friend"  beside him in the bed while he falls asleep, and I am usually happy to comply. As a working parent I cherish these nighttime moments and the sweet, informative conversations that bubble up out of children trying to procrastinate sleep. Mid-day queries to my oldest of "How was your day?" are typically answered with a curt "nuffink" as though he were a British hooligan trying to avoid interrogation with conversationally-incorrect answers. Bedtime discussions of the same question, however, yield all kinds of enthusiastic answers, usually now about whales and sharks much as it used to be about dinosaurs and trains, but also about his friends and what books he likes to read at school and what he does during "circle time." My youngest likes these conversations too but goes far beyond requiring that I simply exclaim interest in his stories. He demand...

I don't expect any member of the working poor to cry for me. I'm a white collar worker with a job that pays better than minimum wage, with a reliable schedule, with paid sick leave and vacation, with the ability to leave early for school conferences when necessary, with a job that isn't physically demanding and still leaves me some number of evenings and weekends to run a microbusiness. I have parents and family members who can (and do) help me instead of the other way around . In comparison to the millions of people in this country who are being crushed by our Dickensian society, I'm lucky. I'm trying to temper my self-pity today by reminding myself of that. But then I think: that says more about the current state of society than about my sense of claustrophobia.   ++++ I haven't grown up. I don't mean that as some kind of humble brag, the way people do. I mean I feel the deep and burning resentment of youth at not having three months of summer vaca...

As those of you who had to listen to me crying at my desk every day for six months know, 2013 was not a banner year for me, mental health-wise. So in 2014 I was prescribed anti-anxiety medication -- or as Siri just transcribed it, "anti-exciting medication," which is appropriate since it made me less excitable (volatile). It was life-changing. I could function again, I could think rationally (and empathetically) again, I was happy. The only downside is that I gained 30 poun ds in nine months. Having been both skinny/sad and fat/happy, I can say definitively that I would rather be fat/happy. (Also, one of the anxieties that anti-anxiety medication alleviates, I've discovered, is anxiety about being fat.) But when the psych suggested that I might not be anxious, just crazy, she switched me to a different medication that did not have the weight-gain side effect. The jury's still out on how well this new drug is working (I might be both anxious AND crazy, after al...

I don't know what Barack Obama or Harry Reid or Nancy Pelosi are going to do. They've surprised me time and again—for better and worse. But John Boehner? I'm the Michael Jordan and Yo-Yo Ma and Bill Gates of Boehner predictions. If there was a Nobel Prize for Boehner prediction, I'd win it. If there were championship rings for Boehner prediction, I'd have ten. So it's interesting to see Dan Pfeiffer commenting publicly on what I told my boss for years: I’ve always believed that the fundamental, driving strategic ethos of the Republican House leadership has been, What do we do to get through the next caucus or conference without getting yelled at? We should never assume they have a long game. We used to spend a lot of time thinking that maybe Boehner is saying this to get himself some more room. And it’s like, no, that’s not actually the case. Usually he’s just saying it because he just said it or it’s the easiest thing to solve his immediate prob...

My mind is full of projects and new things I want to do, do, do! People tell me: SC, if you're feeling stressed out, cut out all the extraneous projects you take on. Don't they understand, it's the extraneous projects -- the bug bios and home-crafted spinosaurus costume and lava mountain dinosaur cake (for my favorite dinosaur lover) and socio-economic policy Facebook posts and upcycled furniture and small business craft fairs and Art Deco photoshopping and (way) deep(er than necessar y)-dive research into corporate tax policy and home-designed and -sewn mommy-daughter matching swimsuits and homemade Christmas stockings and psychology reading and elaborate, realistic Halloween decorations and... -- that I enjoy ? It's the inescapably necessary things like hair-washing and house-keeping and bread-winning that stress me out. It's the things that can't be cut out, and are never ever finished no matter how hard I work, but just repeat over and over again......