The story of Darren and “Dan”.
When Darren was growing up as the youngest of 4 fairly competitive siblings, he decided to pour a lot of his effort and teenage energy into practicing racquet sports. If a sport used a racquet, he would play, and he particularly loved tennis and racquetball. Through some connections of his dad’s he gained access […]
A large ladybug and having a say.
When my dad was being recruited to the University of Utah from the University of Minnesota, I was 7½ years old. There are a plethora of reasons why he decided to accept the offer, not the least of which was the closer proximity to both his and mom’s families in California. At that time I […]
Fear. And a really great purse.
One of the things that the people in my life – and probably the 12 of you reading this – used to tease me about is my purse. My particular brand of OCD + my Enneagram 6 phobic personality = an INORDINATE amount of time spent thinking about my purse. Condition #1 – It […]
My version of the story.
One of the first things I bought with my very own big-kid-job money was a 1992 green manual transmission Jeep Cherokee Sport. It was way out of my price range and for sure not a smart purchase for a first year teacher, but it helped me feel more like ME, and gosh, I loved that […]
Old Lady Candy.
I like ‘old lady’ candy. I’ve liked it since I was a young lady. One of my college besties introduced me to Bridge Mix wayyyyyy back when we were freshman. We would walk from our dorm through the bookstore and stop at the candy counter and purchase ¼ lb. of Bridge Mix to share on […]
Order of Operations.
One of my sisters texted me the other night and said “I need you to do this math problem and tell me the answer. I’ll explain later.” She attached a picture of a scrap of paper with this handwritten on it: 3 (5+3+45) – 12 – 16 ÷ 8 x 3.14 I did the […]
Madame Zeroni and the mountain.
I used to make my high school students watch the movie “Holes” in class each year. It was one of the only ‘legal’ PG movies we could show back then that didn’t require a permission slip. But that’s not why I had them watch it. It starred a high-school-aged up-and-comer named Shia LaBeouf and […]
Risk Management.
Early in the morning in early January of this year, my mom and all my siblings received a text from one of my older sisters telling us her oldest son had crash landed a small airplane he was piloting. Realizing some of us are worriers (ok, one of us) she started the text with “J.R. […]
Unmoored – and embracing it.
Recently I have become fascinated with the term “unmoored.” If you’ve been around me lately, you’ve probably heard me say it more than once. The fascination is because that word can mean two completely different things – depending on your thoughts. Unmoored can mean freed, liberated, unshackled, released, and unlocked. Yea! And unmoored can […]
5 Lessons from My Final Year.
Most of you know that I walked into a public school building as an employee for the last time this week – after doing so for 31 years. I walked out with tears. Lots of tears. Here are five lessons five of my students taught me in this, my final year. I’ve shortened their […]
