Catherine Newman, my idol. Her past two columns have been so right-on I feel like I’m talking to myself (or to Jess) when I read them.
Read this week’s here and last week’s here.
Seriously, if I could sum up right now, it’s all about the happy-sad season and wrestling with restlessness. This time of year, with its re-beginnings, enforced structure, newly urgent rhythms, and the simultaneously lovely and bittersweet onset of fall really gets to me. I adore the fall; the leaves, the crispness, sweaters, etc, but I hate the very visceral sense of time passing. And the death of summer. Gracie will be four next month. I try to remember back to four years ago, to those dark days that Matt and I slogged through together, and it’s hard. Elizabeth asked me yesterday when the clocks turned back and I told her how I could always remember exactly when because they turned back the very day I brought my newborn daughter home from the hospital. And I’d like to offer that that scenario isn’t very helpful for warding off the old PPD. Suddenly you have a little creature screaming all day, sucking on your body, you have to take sitz baths, and it’s dark at 4:30. Nice!
Well, this is my morning with Whit, so off I go. Lucky little guy is going shoe shopping today – for him, not me. We need to find some kicks for his big appearance in Gloria and Jim’s wedding in a mere 5 weeks!