[UPDATES in Comments!] DS Michael and Amy (not their real names!) are 16yo's in love. Amy's a lovely person, at her core very deserving of the mountains of love heaped upon her by Michael's kind and tender heart. Unfortunately, Amy is being raised in a less-than-blissful home, and from what I can tell, has learned some sadly bizarre coping behaviors. She won't come over to our house because she says we hate her; we don't of course, but I think this is code for "they know things about me that are hateful." I would like to reach out to Amy and soothe her if I can, helping her see that there is serenity somewhere in adulthood and she is not alone in her pain. But I can't do this if I never spend time with her.

A small sweet little black stray cat showed up on our front doorstep the day after Christmas 2006. For two days we mistakenly thought it was our own 6 year-old black cat, who occasionally sits on the front stoop watching the world go by. It was only when we saw the two cats together that we knew we had a stray.
The stray moved to our garage and spent the week hiding under a chair. We put food out there for it, and the kids cooed at it when they were out there playing pool. Eventually, they named it Alvin.

Just like (Vice) President Cheney, who said on Larry King last night, "the reports I’m hearing, FROM PEOPLE WHOSE VIEWS I RESPECT, indicate that the Petraeus plan is in fact producing results", I also only want to hear reports from people whose views I respect.
Unfortunately, the other night I was seated at dinner across from a rather talkative older gentleman with a whole passel of views I don't respect. He droned on about the confiscatory death tax. He criticized public citizens seeking access to 8 miles of beach on a private ranch in Central California. Then he railed against a local traffic plan to divert traffic past his house for a year in order to replace an aging nearby bridge. The combination of right wing talking points, elitist private property beliefs, and NIMBYism just galled me! It troubled me so much, I thought about asking my host why she included me and him in the same dinner party! Luckily, I kept that impolite thought to myself. But that man truly upset me.

After spending 12 years raising kids while sitting out the fast lane of practicing law to raise my kids, I'm afraid I may be someone whose deathbed words will be "I wish I'd spent more time at the office!" And, according to the Pew Research Center survey on working moms, I'm in the majority of full-time moms. 48 percent said they would not want any job, full- or part-time, meaning 52% believe a job would be just great! I wish I had kept my job instead of retiring mid-career back in the 90's.

My 20-year old daughter is studying psychology in college, with no role model for how to 1) work while raising kids and 2) build a marriage of negotiated responsibility sharing, like Linda Hirschman advocates in her manifesto "Get to Work". My teenage sons have no such role model either. Their father and I have divvied up the chores along very traditional gender lines: upside, I don't have to mow the lawn or take out the trash; downside, cooking and cleaning are my middle name.