The Preteen Years
More birthdays, crazy sandwiches and unexpected guests
I’ll preface by saying that there was nothing extraordinarily exciting about this week except for one fact—I have a 12-year-old now. We celebrated Lily’s birthday on Tuesday with a selection of enormous cupcakes and presents at home. And I will shamelessly say all the cliché things that parents say on their kids’ birthdays: “Where did time go?” “They grow up so fast!” and “Please stay a kid forever.” Of course, all but the last sentiment has happened.
Seriously, where did time go because I’m pretty certain I blinked and she is now almost as tall as me. I remember exactly 12 years ago as if it happened yesterday, the moment after I gave birth, while the nurses were off cleaning her and doing tests on her, tearfully saying to my husband, “This is the greatest thing I’ve ever done” not because I wanted to be self-congratulatory but because wow, I just pushed a little human out of me with no anesthesia (not by choice), something I never thought I could do. At the same time, I thought, “I have no idea what to do with a baby.”
Somehow I figured out what to do with a baby, although I’m not sure if I’ve figured out what to do with a preteen. But while my mom got the moody, temper-tantrum version of me, I lucked out and got the adaptable, friendly, mind-your-manners kid who likes to read and write as much as I do!
Soon, she will be taller than me and I will be relegated to the ‘uncool’ crew and probably will not be welcomed back in again until she’s 26 and she’s just met someone and they want to get married or buy a car together and they need a cosigner. I hope she needs me before that.
Although I didn’t make any New Year’s resolutions in January, I have made a goal to be a more conscious consumer of food. That means using up what we have left before going on big grocery shopping trips. The goal brings with it both a challenge and a delight—a challenge because I have to figure out what I can eat with what we have left and a delight because there was a possibility of putting things together that I normally wouldn’t consider eating.
I always have a loaf of bread in my kitchen, so making a sandwich was a no-brainer. But what to do with a limited selection of proteins, veggies and dairy?
This is what you do when you only have a few things left in your crisper drawer. You make a bacon, lettuce, tomato and egg sandwich, aka BLTE. (You can also turn it into a BLTA if you have an avocado lying around).
Wednesday was my day off work so I took the dogs out to a large, grassy field nearby to throw Chuckit! balls with them. I’d like to thank whoever invented the Chuckit! because it is one of the greatest inventions ever for dog owners. Daisy and Jackie hurled themselves at the balls and ran nonstop for thirty minutes while the sun rose above our heads.
Funny how a month ago, we had not considered getting another dog, at least not until Jackie reached old age. In a way, Daisy chose us instead of the other way around. In the past month, I’ve discovered that she is a couch snob. These days, Daisy luxuriously stretches her paws as far as she can on the couch, as if to say, “I’m relaxing. What are you going to do about it?” She’s like that long lost cousin you haven’t talked to in a while who shows up unexpectedly at your doorstep one day, and he’s so charming that you can’t help but invite him in. But once you do so, he makes himself extremely comfortable to the point where it feels painfully awkward to ask him to leave.
On the way home from the field, I left them in the car for several minutes to go search for missing tennis balls, and during my absence, Daisy plopped herself on the passenger seat (a big no-no) and when she saw me getting in, she went over to the driver’s seat. Still, I can’t be too mad at her because she’s incredibly snuggly and provides all of us with the kind of love we didn’t know we needed.
Delightful Discoveries of the Week
Every post, I’ll share a few delightful things that totally made my week. Here’s a few this week:
I’ve been reading some ‘wisdom’ books to help me write my own wisdom book for my daughter and I have to say, this book isn’t exactly what I thought it would be. Rather than distilling a list of wisdom from one of the oldest living men in America, Von Drehle tells the life story of Charlie White, born before the turn of the 20th century and takes you on a journey through the decades of his extraordinary life, filled with many ups and downs. It’s worth a read, or a listen.
Before I discovered this podcast thanks to Spotify’s algorithms, I could never spend 3-4 hours listening to a podcast. But now I can, because each episode is a deep dive into a specific company, interspersed with analysis about that company in a way that makes me feel like I’m a hundred times smarter because I just attended a very interesting lecture (by choice) at a university put on by a very intelligent professor. Now, this is a rabbit hole that I would gladly go down. Their Costco episode is definitely worth a listen if you’re new to the show.
I loved this post, thank you!