another day of distractification

Big A and I spent over five hours on the Pinckney trails hiking and trudging though the snow trying to finish our 16-mile loop before sunset/the end of daylight. Also, I thought it was the full moon tonight and had just seen a trailer for a werewolf movie, so trust me when I say there was speed in my step. (The internet tells me that the full moon is actually tomorrow and it's called the wolf moon!)

It was an exciting, exhausting day. I tired myself out. I laid some fears and sorrows and anxieties to rest (for now). Tomorrow I plan to show up for the people who are counting on me. 

Pic: In the Pinckney Woods. "The woods are lovely, dark, and deep."

scribbling women, dogs walking, dog-writing, and bitches

When I first watched Bridgerton, I was struck by this remarkable line:

LADY WHISTLEDOWN: "According to the much heralded poet Lord Byron: Of all bitches, dead or alive, a scribbling woman is the most canine."

And I meant to use it when I taught Women's Writing again (which is now). It is such a mash-up of Byron's famous misogyny, Hawthorne's hatred of "scribbling women" and Samuel Johnson's screed about women's composition--that it's like a "dog’s walking on his hind legs. It is not done well; but you are surprised to find it done at all.” 

Also, while I was looking for the precise quote, I went down some interesting theory rabbit holes. While I was aware of Animal Studies, I wasn't aware that there was a specialized field of "dog-writing" that studies the intense relationships of women writers with their dogs (Elizabeth Barrett-Browning, Virginia Woolf, and so on). (While I'm no Woolf or Barrett-Browning--in our family, Scout is known as my dissertation wolf and Max is my book puppy. I don't think I could have gone on without their steadfast attention, affection, and presence.) The word "bitch" crops up with increasing frequency in the titles of these works about dog-writing: "Bitch, Bitch, Bitch: Personal Criticism, Feminist Theory, and Dog-writing" or  Writing with the Bitches, etc. 

It feels like I've come full circle with the Bridgerton quote.

Pic: Snow falling in the "portal," which what L and I call this corridor of trees from her house to the street.

heart with the old

I just want to say yes            somewhere, I want 

since we must begin             to watch this again:                            

seeing my problem              through lit windows

and your proof                     where we're made 

                                                                                  without our own consent

                                                                                  like the worst bargain   

__________________________________________________________

Note: I liked writing and reading these couplets in columns, rows, and just mixing it up even diagonally. Somehow it seems to work as long as it ends up where we're born without our consent!

Pics: Last year this calendar lived on my desk at work and brought me joy all year long. Each jar-shaped month was topped by a cheery sprig of flowers and as I shuffled the cards in the bamboo holder from month to month, the composition of the bouquet changed over the year. I was sad about having to throw it out. But I didn't have to throw it out. I cut off the calendar part of the cards and now it lives on as an arrangement of flowers. Perhaps I could add a small picture of Scout to it.

bookends

I woke up to see that a writer friend had tagged me in her exhortation to read more books in 2025 because she'd used a picture of our Little Free Library. And of course the week has been full of various enjoyable year-end roundups of reading lists. Then Lisa wondered about my top books of 2024... The thing is, I don't have a digital record of my reading. Reading is what I've always loved doing but also kind of my work work. So it never made sense (for me) to quantify my reading by hours/pages/titles. When I read for pleasure, like other things I do for pleasure, I tend to do it rather whimsically and for as long--or as little--as I want to. It's not very efficient. But that feels perfect to me.

Lisa's question made me curious, though. So I went to check on my scribbly physical planner, where I usually note what I'm reading "for fun" to compile this top-12. (I think these titles are a mix of 2023 and 2024 and are in no particular order.)

Ta-Nehisi Coates, The Message; Catherine Newman, Sandwich; Paul Murray, The Bee Sting; Percival Everett, James; Kaveh Akbar, Martyr!; Sally Rooney, Intermezzo; Fady Joudah, […]; Tony Tulathimutte, Rejection; Emma Cline, The Guest; Yiyun Li, Wednesday’s Child: Stories; Tania James, Loot; Elliot Page, Pageboy: A Memoir; Teju Cole, Tremor. (Fun fact: Teju Cole used to comment on this blog a very long time ago.)

Pic: OM's Facebook Reel of our Little Free Library. I did a quick search, and this is the first picture of it in the snow, I think. I love that our neighborhood keeps it so well stocked. It used to be all my responsibility in the other place where we had it from 2012-2016.

fitness all the goodness

Pic: Weird angle, but that's Engie and me after we finished Day Two of Prana with Adrienne on Julie's invitation. Thanks for introducing me to this yoga series, Julie! 

Yes! Engie visited me on her way to do important stuff and we hung out and it was lovely! It was like a snow globe outside with light, falling snow, and we also took a walk to some of my favorite gardens. They were all empty and wintering, but I did describe how things are in the summer. I'm sure it was just as good as the real thing. 

(Also, this yoga series is clear and easy and I did not realize there was so much available for free on the internet. I have a Mirror, which needs a subscription and hasn't been reliable in a while having been bought out first by Lululemon and then Peloton... now I'm realizing that perhaps I don't even need it?

Day 1, 2025

A quiet and cozy start to the year... 

Nu's guests are still camped out in the rumpus room, their ukuleles and guitars around them.

Back to work for real--but I hang on to emails so as to not be the weirdo who sends out emails when others are still on break. 

I take walks with Max and later with Big A. Everything is grey and leaden. Unrealistically, as soon as Christmas and the NYE have been celebrated, I expect the world to switch into Spring. This despite having lived in the midwest for close to two decades now. Climate change is making this happen sometimes, but that is a different kind of panic. 

I catch up with people on text and WhatsApp and calls. When the kids were younger, it was important to me that we were all in a family group hug at midnight. These days, it's important that I get some quality conversation in with everyone.... Yoga with Julie/Adrienne, some reading, some Arabic practice, some soaking in the tub, some putting Christmas away... I took care of seven (out of my million plants) and experimented with a couple of new thrift-shop projects...

I make lentil soup for dinner; the bakery croissants that people have been ignoring all week went on the dinner table nicely toasted... and thankfully vanished. The round shapes of the lentils are supposed to represent prosperity, and Nu decided to pretend that each circle is a million dollars coming their way. Everyone should start sending their wishlists to Nu. 

Pic: Early in the morning, out with Max.

new year thoughts

I finally finished the paper proposal based on disability in Jhumpa Lahiri's Roman Stories I've been embroidering in my head for a while. It's going to two conferences. I don't know if I can actually travel to both of them--but those are bridges for later.

*

Big A got a holiday bonus and I got to give away lots of it--most of it to PAMA and PCRF. But we dug up some more for Lansing organizations like the Refugee Development Center, our local queer community space--Salus Center,  and Nation Outside a Michigan-based advocacy group led by the formerly incarcerated. 

*

I started a poem (and then ran out of steam): 

accidents constellate our past

hope peoples our future

we need imagination

to survive

*

I survived 2024. I spoke up, and spoke my truth no matter how small my voice started or how repetitive I thought I would sound.

And I'm grateful for everyone who listened even when I didn't say the right thing or say things the right way. I hope 2025 lets me walk gently on this Earth in solidarity with other living beings.

*

And now, as Rilke says, we get to welcome the New Year "Full of things that have never been.” Happy New Year!

Pic: Nu was hosting some friends for NYE, so Big A and I took a walk to the rooftop bar downtown. This party was loud, but the music and drinks were strong. I thought I was getting a photo of the fireworks on the skyline, but I think I got one of the the first emergency vehicle of 2025 instead. It reminded me a bit of NYEs past in NYC and Chennai as we walked past choruses of people wishing us a happy new year on our way home.

What it is/What is it

* At stopped by this morning and helped me address and stamp the remaining holiday cards and I got to hear more about their time in Seattle a couple of weeks back as we worked. I loved the story of how they were going to do a last-minute visit to the Kurt Cobain memorial bench before their 12 am flight back when they met someone interesting... it was such a meet-cute--Cinderella-esque midnight deadline and all!

*  Nu, At, and I took our Flu and Covid shots! (Big A got his at work ages ago.) We got the Novavax, and so far, so good. I've not fallen apart or taken to my bed like a Victorian lady... yet. 

* Hanukkah started last night! This is yet another year I'm using birthday candles for our menorah. I'm good at making them stick with a bit of melty wax, but it's not ideal. Big A's the one with Jewish heritage, so I'm going to put him in charge of getting the Nerot next year. 

*I've jumped back into work via email, phone calls, and light editing again. Is it too early? It feels too early.

*Pic: The whatsit I got at the thrift store when I took Nu to shop on Monday... I love birds and found this lidded container irresistible especially because it cost all of 6.06 and was also "on sale" so I paid less than 4.00 $. It says "Made in Italy" on the bottom and is so intricate... and impractical. Like what would one put in it?! (Nu's tongue-in-cheek suggestion was soup.) A reverse Google image search suggests it's a "trinket dish." I might use the bottom as a cache pot for a plant and the top as a frame for mint, moss, or a succulent that could grow out of the openings? Ideas?

from the other side of Christmas

I'm not sure how it happened, but when Nu came down for Christmas--and while I was still listening to carols and checking on the Christmas breakfast pudding--Big A decided to tell them how much baking soda you'd need to mix with cocaine to make crack. 

But the rest of Christmas was more traditional (for us, anyway). Big A was off Thanksgiving this year, so he's working over Christmas--this is the standard E.R. scheduling tradeoff. But the kids have learned to accommodate celebrations around his schedule over the years. I started to wake the kids up when A was on his way home from work after his night shift so when he got home and decompressed for a bit, we could go to cider, stockings, presents, and then Christmas pudding brunch, lazing around, snuggles, napping, movies, biriyani, and so on.

It kind of felt like the nicest Christmas in a few years. The kids have had a couple of rocky years recently, but we're on the other side of that now one way or the other. It's also our second year of Christmas without Scout--no one approaches his level of enthusiasm for Christmas, which will always be bittersweet. 

I put LifeStraws in everyone's stockings including my own (during an anxiety-prone week is my guess). I'd wrapped everyone's presents long before I left for Greece. That was a while ago and I lowkey forgot some of the details, so I was nicely surprised as people opened their presents too. Ha. As for myself, my massage budget has been replenished, and I've been promised a trip to the Grand Canyon in October! I'd mentioned to Big A that I had poetry accepted to three anthologies this year and that I'd like to maybe get a book of poetry out into the world in the coming year--and I got a stack of autographed books of poetry including Mosab Abu Toha's for inspiration. That was the sweetest present.

Pic: Nu being a silly Christmas elf, and all of their siblings--Max, Huck, At--looking at them adoringly. There's a sliver of Big A still in scrubs in the corner and the clutter of opened and unopened presents all around them. 

P.S. In the comments to yesterday's post, Nance used the term "sanitation worker." I'm not sure if it was intended as a gentle correction, but it worked as one. It immediately sounded like a more courteous term, and when I looked up how the relevant union refered to themselves, it seemed the term of choice. So it will be what I will use going forward. As the better Maya said, "Now that I know better, I [can] do better."

Christmas bonuses

Christmas is extra special because At spends Christmas Eve here. The kids didn't want to go to the candlelight service at the UU (I guess that was always me), but they still enjoy getting their Christmas Eve pajamas, fuzzy socks, and ALL THE books.

Speaking of bonuses, I set out the gifts and cash bonuses for the trash collectors and mail deliverers this morning. In the past, our trash was collected by a team of two so I set out two of everything for them. But I guess the team has been reduced to just one person because only half the things had been taken when I went out later. I'm blown away by the uprightness of this! I would not have known or cared if the one person had taken it all. People are just so amazing. (This person is doing all the work and they deserve all of the cash bonus; I plan to get the remainder to them next week.) 

Pic: Nu and At in their fuzzy pajamas. I'm proud of the old copy of Susan Faludi's Backlash I found for At and the copy of Michael Kimmel's Guyland I found for Nu. Classics both. 

colorful leftovers

Tomorrow is Christmas Eve! Today was just making sure everything was ready for tomorrow. Nu didn't have presents for everyone, so we went thrifting as we had missed all the craft bazaars and Nu doesn't like big box stores. 

I've gotten really tight-fisted about spending money on things, as extra money goes to GoFundMes and E-Sim top-ups. But spending money on celebrating community is a joyous loophole. Planning and coordinating an event is also a welcome distraction when I'm trying to fall asleep. Guests from Saturday's party shared pictures with me and it got me thinking back, and I thought I'd record my favorite parts for next time. 

Of course, it was because of all the people who came that it was a lovely afternoon. It was so great to see faraway friends from Grand Rapids, Midland, Alma, Manistee, Mt. Pleasant, Ann Arbor, Detroit, Flint, and more. By far, the best thing I did was use my quarterly massage budget to ask my therapist if she could be at the party to give guests mini massages. She was amazing and people loved it. (It sounds like I made a big sacrifice, but it's Christmas now and my birthday soon, and don't cry for me, Internet--I will probably have a massage budget again when my fam finds out.)

Table: I used a fuzzy green blanket someone had given me as a tablecloth (lol) and had to move some of the decorative elements off the table as people brought in so many cookies. I made the Christmas Toffee that Nance recommended. (Also, I can't say how much I respect and love Nance for not using the more common name for that snack.) By far, the prettiest thing I made was a similar hummus Christmas Wreath and it took all of five minutes (you can kind of see it at the far end of the table). I spent a good part of Friday bugging Big A and LB if my Christmas Tree goat cheese actually looked like a Christmas Tree (Big A: Kind of?" LB: "Sure, Maya"), so it was a relief the wreath immediately turned out like a wreath and I didn't have to bug anyone for validation.

Playlist: New this year was Finneas "Another Year" ("I don't believe that Jesus Christ was born to save me/That's an awful lot of pressure for a baby"), Charlie Puth "December 25th" (the beginning sounds so much like "Last Christmas!!"), and RuPaul "Hey Sis, It's Christmas" (If you want nontraditional interpretations of "gay" and "ho"). Not really Christmassy but wintery songs like Fleet Foxes "White Winter Hymnal" and my favorite British-American bands--Slade "Merry Xmas Everbody," The Pretenders "2000 Miles," John Lennon and Yoko Ono "Happy Xmas (War is Over)," and Lindsay Buckingham "Holiday Road'. Plus a bunch of Diana Ross, Aretha Franklin, Cher, Norah Jones, and Linus and Lucy suites from A Charlie Brown Christmas to round things off sweetly.

Pic: AS's photo.

roUGH and toUGH

Discussions from the annals of today's family chat:

Don't cross the picket line. Starbucks Union baristas are calling for customers to boycott Starbucks through the 24th as they strike for respectful negotiations and fair wages. (This is easy for me since I don't drink coffee and am notoriously [hilariously] intimidated by situations where I have to order in a line when people are waiting behind me.)

Social media realities. This was a shoddy book (I flipped through it) and a shoddier movie (probably). Still, now I have to pay attention to this million-dollar misogyny machine nonsense to review how P.R. can distort social reality. The guy developed a feminist reputation, despite being a predatory harasser and retaliatory creep and then hired a P.R. firm to flip the script on his co-star Blake Lively. The alarming part here is that she's more famous than he is, but he thought he could get away with it because... he's a guy? 

Pic: A really leaden day: gray skies, gray water, chilly temps. 

getting brighter

Some people might have thought the party was taking place around the cookies, the laughter and conversations, or the lovely massage therapist giving mini massages...  but the real action was on the floor where the babies and the puppies were finding each other and having conversations: "Doggie!" Ruff-ruff!" "Touch Doggie?" "puppy-kisses, puppy-kisses, tail-wags."

We didn't get to singing carols until really late into the evening, and I was quite taken aback by how easy it was to sing along to The Dysfunctional Family Christmas Songbook that JN brought. 

OM came in from Grand Rapids for the evening, and I showed her book to everyone so lots of people put it on their TBRs. Her rum balls were really boozy, and after everyone left, we could barely move and curled up with hot cocoa for a long, no-holds-barred chat.

I'm looking forward to the extra minutes of light and brightness as the earth hinges into solstice...

Pic: Max, Huckie, + toddler and baby feet... Perhaps Max and Huck have found some cookie crumbs from the Cookies and Cocktails party? (I hope it's not cocktails they're after!)

between the glass of dreams

they say every poem is a ghost story

keeping its secrets, still looking on in 

what I remember is opening the door

knowing this made surprise and sense 

the curious ritual of intuition and touch--

feeling one's way as though blindfolded

seeing everything entire as a visionary

I stay the same; I've never felt this way 

________________________________

Pic: Christmas coziness--our tree has every ornament (that survived our many moves) from the kids' kindergarten ouevre upwards. 

I told Engie we don't do advent calendars. And that was true, but this is Nu's last year at home and I thought I should at least try it? Big A and Nu like jam, so I got the (what I like to think of as the anti-Nazi jam) Bonne Maman calendar, and... they rarely barely remember to open it. I keep reminding them though, because I love those darling little jars when they're empty. And oh, what a sweet Bonne Maman advent calendar proposal story!

interior monologue randomness

*Thank you, America for welcoming me back with a school shooting. I've been thinking of Madison, WI friends all day. I know Sarah's kids are in public school (the shooting was at a private Christian school), but it's got to be scary having something like that happen in your city. (It's also the second or third time the media have tried to wrongly blame a trans kid for the shooting. WTH?)

*It's Dec 16th and I did not get an email from our Provost, so it's ok to assume I still have a job.

*I've landed very firmly back into Christmas prep territory. I did a ton before I left, so there's just stuff I'd be doing around this time anyway (cookies, last-minute wrapping, panic gift sourcing). I'm writing this relaxing by the glow of our Christmas tree.

*Our holiday cards are delayed, but that's because I wanted to include a pic of our sisters' Greece trip. I enjoyed wearing matching things every day with my sister and being a dork.

* Speaking of dorks, our partners have made miraculous recoveries. 

* Also, Big A drove an hour+ to pick me up at the airport with a drink and snacks and I had flowers and chocolate waiting for me at home. True Love! I'd stopped eating chocolate a few years ago, but I never waste anything, so loved ones have figured out that I'll eat it if someone else buys it for me--this is a cheat, right? 

*In the same vein, I've been sending all my discretionary cash to people's GoFundMes in the past year, so having to spend money on myself on the trip was a bit jarring. But it was for my sister's big birthday, and I don't get to decide how she spends her corporate salary. Nevertheless, I had to spend a lot of time talking myself through these rationalizations before I could fall asleep at night. 

*I avoided the news this last week, but I learned today that Reem's grandfather died in an Israeli shelling. I'm not a "I'm glad they get to be together now in heaven" type of person; I'm a "they should both be alive together on earth kind of person." So I'm both sad and mad. 

*Lisa asked if my sister and I had done a trip like this before--we haven't! My kids are finally at a point where I can take off for something like this without much prep. Ironically, although my sister doesn't have kids, our elderly parents live with her, and it requires a lot more planning on her end now. 

*Nance and Lisa also picked up on my mention of a squabble. This was despite both of us being on our best behavior. We haven't lived together in thirty+ years and are very different. For instance, we have diametrically opposed views on this year's revolution in Bangladesh. But at the same time, we want similar things like the secular India of our childhood that was a shelter and leader to third-world causes. So we can make it work. We plan to go to Egypt for my 60th! 

 

Pic: Friday's Cape Sounio sunset.

getting there

Our tree is up, and here we are trying to take a picture for our holiday card. This year's "theme" is Indian scarves from my closet, and although I just tied Huck's on as a bandanna, it's already unravelling...

Somehow I'm the shortest human in the frame, 3/6 are smiling, and 4/6 are looking toward the camera... Perhaps it can't get better than this? I kind of like the excited and slightly wild vibe.

Offices seem deserted at work, but it's SO BUSY! My online Gaza course is winding down too. The big challenge here is to pare down my lecture slides as students are accessing materials from internet cafes, so big files are a challenge to download. Also, it's grad school application deadline time, so recommendation letters are due everywhere. Over at my regular job, it's finals week, and grading is piling up. It's a breathless kind of busy. It will get better this weekend.

Also, Nance commented that I must be proud of At, and--omigosh--I so am. In 2022, it was pretty heady and I wrote, "We’re so very proud of At, our labor organizer extraordinaire, who made national news for leading the first Chipotle in the country to unionization. I like these articles featuring At and coworkers:

Slate "Two mad-online leftists. The Starbucks-worker playbook. And an accordion."

Labor Notes "How Zoomers Organized the First Chipotle Union"

Jacobin "Chipotle Workers on How They Won the First Chipotle Union in the United States"

Washington Post "Michigan Chipotle outlet the chain’s first to unionize"

Related story in the Washington Post "The labor market is still red-hot — and it’s helping union organizers"

NPR "Chipotle in Michigan first to unionize for the fast-food chain nationwide"

slide to the left

FB memories brought up this old poster from December 2011...

The Occupy Wall Street movement had spread to university campuses by November 2011 and students had begun organizing. There was a viral video of a policeman casually pepper-spraying students seated on the ground (it later became a meme too).

It started out as a conversation with GG about basics: Pepper-spraying students is wrong. Before long, we were organizing a teach-in with Nathan Brown from UC Davis, Pranav Jani and Steve Conn from OSU, and various Yellow Springers. 

Sometimes people belittle Occupy, but it held the seeds to the popularity of Bernie, the resurgence of the youth labor movement, and current university protests... People supposedly get conservative as they age, but in my case, I think I get more radical and angrier as I get older and learn more.

I'm thinking about these things because I'm proud of At, who is off to Seattle today as an invited speaker to the UFCW about democratically organizing a union. One of our dinner table jokes is that Pete Buttigieg's and Kamala Harris's parents must be disappointed in them--both of them had professor parents whose Marxist politics were probably more radical than that of their kids. We're definitely on more equal footing over at our place.

other things I was told this week

You told me I had two very different reactions to the separations of two people I was close to. That's so true! I guess I was basing my own response on how the person I was close to was responding to the event. 

The produce person told me by the banana stand that I should "mix and match" bananas from different bunches--some for now, and some for later. I don't know why I've never thought to do that before. I always thought of the bunches as an inviolate collective entity. 

Big A and my massage therapist told me I've been losing weight. I feel like I look the same, but my appetite has been off. Whether it's because of new anti-anxiety meds or because I'm listening to the news, I don't know. 

Pic: Hartrick Trail Wetlands. New to me. Nu's driving instructor told me to check it out when I said I was going to walk in the school parking lot to kill time. It's adjacent to the school grounds and I can kind of see the school buildings in the distance. The high school in 10 Things I Hate About You still rates as the best school building with the best view of all time (Stadium High School, Tacoma, WA; it looks out over the waters of the bay--swoon.).

let's talk about sex and sex ed, baby

For months now, I have thought the name of the new host of our local station's Morning Edition was Malorie DeGay, and I thought it was thoroughly charming. I just learned it's actually BE GAY, and I couldn't love it more. 

Speaking of gay icons, I'm really loving Chappell Roan's music right now. There's something so retro, fun, and transgressive about her music, especially the choral work. If you've listened to "Pink Pony Club," tell me it doesn't remind you of the 80s... of Cyndi Lauper. My favorite song is actually "Good Luck, Babe." It's super catchy and it wasn't until four or five listens in that I figured out that it's not just about an ex (You can kiss a hundred boys in bars/shoot another shot, try to stop the feeling") but also someone who has shoehorned themselves into a heteronormative relationship ("when you wake up next to him in the middle of the night/with your head in your hands, you're nothing more than his wife). Nu thinks it's hilarious that I like this song and has been declaring at the dinner table that "mama is going to go pure lez now" while looking pointedly at their dad. I think it's safe to say the pneumonia is in check and they're back to being their regular cheeky self. 

In regular old sex ed., today I learned that my first-year composition class did not know there were free condoms at the Health Center--how?!?!

And finally, today a student who took a hard stance in their research on porn stating that there is absolutely No Ethical Consumption of Porn gave a presentation that had everyone in class riveted. And as if that wasn't enough, they were inspired to create a piece of art--it's a woman's torso inscribed with porn search terms and "the erogenous zones have objects stuck on them to symbolize objectification." I was marveling at the abundance of thought, time, and effort they had put into this work when they held it out to me and said they wanted me to have it. I don't think I'll ever get over the sheer generosity of this. 

Pic: The new piece of art entrusted to me is now in my office.

Out in the world

Grandbaby is out of the NICU and headed home! The parents are keeping photos off social media, so no pics here, but she is so, so adorable.

My Nu went out into the world for the first time in four days… to Urgent Care with Big A where they spent hours waiting to be seen and then fell asleep in the triage room. They have pneumonia and now have antibiotics to help them get better. Fingers crossed. 

 

Also, my cousin/aunt (depending on which branch of the family tree you follow) just published her novel--the first in a series of Neena Sundar mysteries titled A Pre-Med(itated) Murder. There's more on her homepage.  I love how people I love are just going ahead and making their writing dreams come true.

 

I had a meeting with my publishers today and they talked me out of my post-election-panic-induced decision to write a new foreword to my book on trans rhetorics. They think it's time for this book to go out into the world. I don’t know… It feels like a very small hand raised against the coming deluge.

Pic: Baby Nu asleep at Urgent Care. This is somehow so characteristically our plucky Nu and yet so small, lonely, vulnerable... and now sickly—it made me sad. I’m so worried for the kids. StephLove mentioned her nightmares about having to shelter and save kids—that’s where I am too.