The Case for Hogwarts (Raising a Wizard in this Muggle World)

My son is brilliant. I know most people believe their children are brilliant and bombard complete strangers with pictures and statuses about how their children’s brilliance outshines the brilliance of the average star…but my kid actually is. Trust me on this, I’m a professional. I know kids. They’re my genius. So with my genius kid…

Working From the Heart (A Lesson in Keeping It Real)

  When I was in college I was a part of this big time summer research project. I was triple excited about it because UM basically paid me to read books and write about them. I was like, “Read. Write. Money. Sign me up.” There was only 1 professor on campus at the time who…

Mama in the Hood or The Greatest Show On Earth

Today I told him, “There ain’t one dummy in this family! You Will NOT BE THE FIRST!” Mamahood is hard. It’s an ever vigilant watch over every detail of someone else’s life. Somedays I feel like a CEO in full possession of my team and lair. I delegate and shit gets done. On time. The…

Advice to a Young Miss On the Occasion of her Coming of Age

Today, I was speaking with one of my students about a ‘first’ she will experience this week after a traumatic loss. She responded to me, “I’m just trying to be strong.” I started a conversation with her with, “What If I told you I don’t want you to be strong?” As I went for my…

39,653 Hours Till I Retire, So Today I Walk

Today I met with a financial advisor. He was a nice man. He used all kinds of big financial words, threw around the term ‘economic forecast’ and even ventured a conversation about ‘mutual funds.’ Having been a working woman for 23 years, I’ve had a dance or two with financial advisors so today I just…

Big Hairy Goal Meets Blog: Love or Nah?

On October 16th, I will walk a half marathon. This is either the bravest or the dumbest idea I have ever had in my whole entire life (and I’ve had some pretty harebrained ideas). A half marathon is 13.1 miles of nonstop movement. In addition to committing myself to endure 13.1 miles of nonstop movement,…

a blizzard, an er, and a praying 4 year old

when my son was 4 years old he had a very bad asthma episode. for a couple of days i had been working with him to get him breathing with regular breathing treatments to no avail. finally, late one night he was wheezing and just so uncomfortable, i told him, “we have to go to…

single parent fantasy no. 5

  at some point in your life as a divorcee you come to the daunting realization that you are in fact doing too much. nature, God, or the minions of Mary Poppins all intended parenting to be a two person task. one person is suppose to be tending the domicile and the tiny humans while…

if nothing else, you gotta respect the hood (the motherhood that is)

everyday i stand in complete awe of my position as a mother. and by awe i mean i’m generally scarred shitless about the wellspring of responsibility that is mine to navigate. and for those holier than thou types, take a moment and think about it…as a mom you hold the key to your child’s soon-to-be-adult…

Grown Up, Gifted and Working to Make a Difference

I grew up gifted. One day I was a snotty nosed 4th grader with double plaits, a champion Chinese jax competitor and neighborhood double dutch Jedi. The next I was given a test, put on a yellow bus and shipped off to a school for ‘special’ kids. To say it pissed me off would be an…