Purple is Depressing for the First Day of School?

This year's first day of school was especially poignant for us because it was one of my Grandma's favorite days. She loved either being here to see them all dressed and ready for school or the phone was ringing while I was walking in the door from the bus stop to hear about who was wearing what and which shoes and how their hair was fixed.

My Grandmother passed away this June and it still is a very tender subject for myself, my children and my extended family, being that she was above and beyond just a Grandma...but alas.

Rose and Max decided to wear purple today to commemorate Grandma because purple was her FAVORITE color. Trust me folks, have you ever seen a deep purple painted bedroom with matching deep purple satin comforter? I read once that purple in a bedroom is depressing and I told my Grandma that. She laughed pretty hard and then said, "I have medication for that."

Olivia didn't have anything purple and said that, "Purple looks better on them anyways, I like pink!" Hot pink it is Olive.



Elijah isn't going to school this year or the next and was pretty sad to see his sisters go. I packed him a lunch last night while I packed the girls' and he's keeping it by his side until lunch time. It's propped up against his bat cave where he is playing as we speak.

Happy First Day of School to anyone out there with children that started today! It will be chaos when they come home and start shoving papers in your face and complaining about how their new shoes hurt their feet. Ah. School.

My Golem

I sat in the dark, late into the evening on our grey porch shaped like my favorite Tetris piece. Atop an uncomfortable green plastic chair, my short legs wrapped under my body slightly numb from the strange position, I stared out into the night. In my right hand was my Kindle, but my thoughts were not on the fantastical words of a strange, fat man in a cap on the digital page. I was instead thinking of my Love, slumbering fitfully one wall and two rooms away from me. I was pondering on his disposition and his variable thoughts and found myself wistfully longing that I could read his mind. Not every moment and never over intrusively, but perhaps for just fleeting seconds so I could feel how he feels, see how he sees.

It was while I was contemplating this sought after supernatural gift that I noticed the creature perched on our porch ledge like a long, lean gargoyle. Like a gargoyle in stance but more like a shadow in form, it sat still as a dark puddle on a black top in an empty parking lot. I thought at first it was there to remind me of something, like the rubber bands my father wears on his left wrist and yet I could not place what it was that I should be remembering. Maybe instead it was a forewarning, but like the lack of epiphany about the remembrance, I couldn’t decide whether it was a ominous warning or a auspicious one. Not wanting it to grow any larger there in front of me, feeding it with my interest or my fear, I stood up and turned my back on it, walked with a steady gait to our front door and let myself into to our bright house. For no reason I can decipher, I held the door open and let it creep in behind me. I set my Kindle down on the front desk, turned off all the lights around our first floor, locked the front door and made my way up the stairs to bed.

I know the golem is here with me somewhere and I know I let it into our home, but I don’t know why.

Sleepless, Restless

12:15 AM
I finished watching Mad Men Season One Episode Nine, put the finishing touches on an order and packaged it, turned out all of the lights, locked all of the windows and doors and made my way up to bed.

I went into each of the kids' rooms and checked that each one of them was sleeping comfortably, brushed my teeth and washed my face. Jeremiah had fallen asleep watching TV in a swath of sheets in our gameroom and I hated to wake him so I had the whole bed to myself. After sharing a bed on and off with various small beast like children I finally have a no kid bed.

12:30 AM
I laid down in bed, set the alarm on my phone and carefully placed it under Jeremiah's pillow and turned on the TV. I tossed and turned, flipping restlessly through the channels. Ancient Aliens? No.

Scarface? Again? Really? How many times can one watch Scarface?

Teen Mom? Fuck you.

1:00 AM
I got out of bed, got a glass of water, turned on the lamp and set my laptop up to watch more Mad Men in bed.

2:00 AM
Maxine Jane starts screaming bloody murder from her room. I run in to find her on the floor, wrapped and writhing in layers of sheets.

"Max! What happened? And why do you have so many sheets?"

"I was cold and I went into Rosey's room and then in the closet and got more sheets."

"Max, there's a whole pile of blankeys next to your bed, within your grasp for that reason!"

Why am I arguing with a six year old at 2:00 AM?

"OK Baby, back in bed."

2:30 AM
After folding the many sheets Max had thieved from various rooms around our house, tucking her in with her own blankeys, getting her a drink and kissing and hugging her goodnight many times, I finally am ready to get back in bed. Put away the laptop and realize my Kindle is downstairs. Go get Kindle, see lights flashing in front of the house. The police are across the street and down three houses where there have been many numerous incidents before. Mostly a couple and their drunken friends fighting over indecipherable topics. I become entranced with the hullabaloo, unable to leave my perch at the front window.

3:00 AM
The police disband and I go back to bed. Forgot my Kindle again, decide to try and force myself to sleep with complete dark. End up getting extra pillows from the linen closet and lining them up all around my body. Fall asleep almost immediately, enclosed in a pillow fence, just like as if I had any of my loved ones in bed with me. So much for loving the freedom of a no kids bed.

7:00 AM
Wake up to Maxine perched beside me on the pillow to my left.

"Momma? Why do you have all these pillows in your bed?"

"I don't know Max, why did you have all the sheets in your bed last night?"