The dog licked me awake early this morning. Well, early for my slumbering house of teenagers house. And I stayed awake for the quiet.
As I type to you, snow layers the landscape out my window like fondant. I love its muting effect–on schedules, on sound. My life craves more quiet, for the love of Mike. And the end of the year always seems to hush my own soul into a more contemplative place.
I paused on the stairs today, peering at this photo of my sons eating hot dogs in Halloween costumes at a Trunk or Treat.
The one on the left, in the fireman costume, is now a Marine in infantry training, rucking five kilometers this week with about forty pounds on his back.
Me with my dad–who’s had my back for a long time.
When I was a junior in high school, a good friend of mine asked me to prom. I was elated. Yet as per our family’s policy, my dad asked to meet him for coffee and bagels. It was his “interview” of sorts before all my dates.
“How will I know which one he is?” Dad asked me.
So there’s this chance raising teenagers could kill me.
I’m (again) in one of these parenting seasons where hope feels like a mind game. There is indeed a battlefield in my brain, in my soul.
So maybe like me, you got the automated notice from the school yesterday that your kids–surprise!–have an extra week of spring break next week, because #coronavirus.
And maybe like me, a member of your family braved Costco this week. Or maybe you now possess a weird amount of toilet paper–which according to a meme I saw yesterday, is now the bottom rung of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.
Stress is like wearing a flannel shirt when you’re washing dishes, you know?
One minute, you’ve got your hands in the water, scrubbing, the edge of your cuffs kissing the water. Next minute, the water’s bled up to your armpits. (For this reason, my husband’s told me that in Boy Scouts, they always said “Cotton is death”: If you’re wearing cotton when you’re active in the cold, it absorbs your perspiration, and can quickly bring you to hypothermia in bad weather.)
![Now You're Speaking My [Love] Language](https://www.janelbreitenstein.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/love-languages-text-1.jpg "Now You're Speaking My [Love] Language")
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