“Nothing weighs more than someone else’s belief in you.”

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I retired 22 days ago. Still feels weird to say that. I don’t consider myself technically old enough to be retired. I definitely don’t consider myself “old”, and yet here we are. I am retired. In the months leading up to my last day, it felt I was constantly being asked, “What are you going to do?” How does one justify their existence when the children are done being raised, but you are not being productive in the way the world understands ie a paycheck or something tangible to show you’ve DONE something with your time? I knew I would be busy. I knew I had plans. But even those sounded the tiniest bit lame when I said them out loud, even moreso when I said them out loud to successful businesswomen. Was I doing the right thing, walking away from something I’m good at, leaving behind a ten-year career even if it wasn’t a C-Suite type of career (I left that life behind a very long time ago, when baby 3 arrived in under 4 years)?

What plans do I have to fill my days? First, I plan to slow down. For over 25 years, life has been lived at a pace set by others….career, spouse, home, children and all their various schooling and activities, pets, family responsibilities, volunteer responsibilities I’d signed up for. Mornings were a five-alarm fire drill from the moment the phone starting beeping its wakeup call until the children were dropped off, but only to rush me into getting all the things done in the few hours I had while they were at school, followed by the next fire drill of getting them to and from extracurriculars, feeding, herding through homework and bedtime, taking just enough of a breath to get ready for the next day. I still have an alarm set for weekday mornings, but it’s set back over an hour from those busy school days, and half an hour from the past four years, post having children in compulsory school. I don’t jump right out of bed….I allow myself to slowly wake up, clearing texts and emails that come in over night, checking my sleep app, and the weather for the day before rolling out of bed to brush teeth, put on the exercise clothes, start the coffee, and get the dogs their treats and breakfasts before feeding myself. I take time to journal a few lines in my planner most days, play my New York Times games (Wordle, Strands, Connections and the Mini, in that order), and grab my current non-fiction reading selection for 10-15 minutes. I’ve spent the first few weeks of the new year organizing/reorganizing, getting the donation truck here, putting away holidays, celebrating my retirement over a long weekend visit from my bestie. Now I am just settling in to the plans I had set for myself.

I went to our club yesterday to sign up for golf lessons. Spouse is an avid golfer, and I want to at the very least not embarrass him on the course, and keep up the pace of the game. I’ve had clubs and gone out a few times a year for maybe ten years? But I’ve never had a lesson, sooooooooo…..lessons it is! Just waiting to hear back from the club pro to schedule the first lesson.

I have been journaling more in general. It feels good, centering, cathartic, healthy. The house is less cluttered, more clean, than it’s been in years. I have the time every day to wash those few dishes, actually put the laundry away that no longer languishes in the dryer for days at a time (if it even makes it that far). The new puppy is taken outside frequently in a solid effort to get her potty trained. She’s a teacup Yorkie, so you know that is a huge challenge. Yorkies aren’t known for being easily potty trained. Challenge accepted.

The other thing I am doing….I knew I had to put it out there, verbally and in writing, to hold myself accountable. I am writing a book. I am trying to write a book. I am working on writing a book. I feel like an imposter of the highest order, just saying it out loud. I don’t know it will ever be published, but I promised myself when I was young and writing in my very first journal that someday, I would put my words out into the world. My biggest dream was to be an author, a real one. My daughter has known this wish of mine for years. She knows I had pushed off my dreams for career and motherhood. She knows now is the time. She knows what I’m writing about, and she believes in me. I do feel that as a weight, but not in a bad way. It pushes me…..I want her to see her mom live a lifelong dream, whether or not my words ever see a shelf in a bookstore. I have to try. I have to overcome my own fear and insecurity and at least try. Each day I don’t write, I feel the weight of ignoring my dreams and wishes, of shoving hopes down. It’s not just the weight of her belief in me though, it’s that of friends and family I’ve told of this thing I want to do, to be. They believe in me, in my ability.

I don’t know my thoughts and words will ever be published, out there for the world to see, judge, buy. But I have to try. I have to do this for me, for those who believe in me. That’s what pushes me to my computer, not every day, but right now, at least one day a week, to put those words down and craft them into something like a book that hopefully someday people will hold in their hands.

PS….the quote titling this post is out of my favorite book of 2025 (heck, it’s in my top ten of all time), My Friends by Fredrik Backman.

A Small Thank You to the Tism

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My friends with young adult children and I have been talking lately about the things we don’t miss from our kids being younger. Among the things we miss least (or not at all) is all the driving around – school drop off and pick up, and the hauling around to all the various activites/practices/rehearsals/classes/camps. For. The. Love. The time I am NOT spending in the car anymore is so much better spent these days. I’m still thankful for it, and it has been nearly four years since the last time I had to do a school drop off or pick up, and even longer since the last time I took a child to the dance studio, golf practice, or any kind of meet/rehearsal/game.

From the time they were old enough, we had all three kids in all the activities….dance, little league baseball, soccer, golf camp, Y camp, swim lessons. You name it, we did it, or at least tried for one season. The back of my SUV always had blankets, camp chairs, snacks, various uniform parts, water jugs/bottles, and the wagon to haul it all. We essentially lived in the car on weekdays, starting our days with school drop off at 7:45am, getting home from our last practice often around 8pm or later as they got older. I could never finish any projects at home because as soon as I’d start something, we’d have to leave to take or pick up from one thing or another. I felt like my world was in constant chaos, everything halfway done, if I even started it at all – laundry, dishes, cleaning, grocery shopping.

From the age of five until about eight, we had Z in all the activities as well, painful as it often was, and let me tell you, it was very frequently PAINFUL. As Z got older, we began to realize it just wasn’t worth it. We were torturing them, their teammates, their coaches, ourselves, for very little gain. Their peers were outpacing them in ability and size to the point it was a danger to our child. They just couldn’t keep up, and didn’t care to keep up. When it came time to register them for Minor B baseball (coach pitch at the beginning of the season, and kid-pitch by the end), we knew we were done with baseball. That following summer, we made the decision to pull them from soccer as well. Suddenly, they weren’t doing any extracurriculars.

Z is on the spectrum. They also are ADHD, oppositional/defiant, and have executive function disorder, as well as sensory issues. They are also our youngest – they were going to get slightly different parenting as it was. But add in all those other issues, and everything just looks different.

Why a small thank you the Tism? When I think about Z NOT being all those things, and what life might have looked like if they had been neurotypical, I get even more tired. With just two kids doing all the activities all the way through high school, I was exhausted and often overwhelmed. I can’t even imagine adding all of that for a third, youngest kid. It’s not that we didn’t have things for them….when they were first diagnosed on the spectrum, we had weekly therapy, monthly psychiatrist visits, IEP meetings, med checks, on top of all the “normal” doctor, dentist, parent/teacher conferences and school stuff. We did not have two or three practices a week and games on the weekend to add to the chaos.

So, thank you, Tism, for giving me one small reprieve.

The Great Light Fight

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I grew up in a family that didn’t have much. We kids were hounded to remember to preserve resources – Daddy constantly hollering at us to turn off the lights when we left a room, close the doors to outside to keep heat or cool inside where it belonged, don’t stand there with the fridge door hanging open while we decided upon which snack to choose, don’t leave water running and walk out of the room, etc. Not a day went by one of us wasn’t yelled at for one of the above. We all became super conscious about lights, electricity, heat/cool, water. Add to all of this, we live in California. It’s just part of the CA culture to be aware of resources, and preserving them.

Fast-forward however many years to now. Yeah, Spouse grew up in the same state. I’m sure he got the same presentations at school growing up (although he went to private school so maybe no?). And this isn’t to bash him at all….he does care about the environment. He just has a different perspective. And iso began the “Great Light Fight.”

I am of a mind that if you’re not in a room, you turn off the light. At night, the outdoor lights are off. Doors closed and locked. If I’m not downstairs, why should any lights be on downstairs? When the kids were in high school, I would constantly yell at them to turn off the porch/courtyard lights when they came in or came upstairs. I was forever finding the dang lights back on after I’d turned them off. It came to light (pun intended) recently, with two of the three kids having been out of the house for years, they simply could not be the culprits. Come to find out, it’s been Spouse this entire time, coming along behind me and turning the porch, courtyard, and carriage lights back on after I’d turn them off each night.

A couple of weeks ago, I’d turned everything off and headed upstairs. He apparently came back downstairs for something, and turned them all back on (outdoor lights, not indoor). I came back down for water later and was like, “WTH?” and turned them all off again. When I got back up to our room, he asked, “Did you just turn off the courtyard lights?” I said yes, to which he asked why. Uhhh…because we’re not using them. Why would I leave them on? He asked if I always turned them off. Uh, yep. Who do you think has been turning them off all these years? He really wanted to know why I turned them off. I then wanted to know why he left them on. We, my friends, appear to have a different philosophy here, and it really doesn’t have much to do with the energy bill. In my mind, yes, I do hear Daddy preaching about saving energy, but also, why would I give any potential thieves or troublemakers extra light to help their endeavors? In his mind, he wants lights so he can see them on the cameras. I had never even thought of that angle.

The great light fight ensues, however. Some nights, he wins and all the outdoor lights are on. Sometimes, I am the last man standing, and all the outdoor lights are off. Do you have a great light fight at your house? What’s your philosophy/reasoning for lights on or lights off?

Are we really talking about this again????

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VACCINES DO NOT CAUSE AUTISM

TYLENOL DOES NOT CAUSE AUTISM

MY CHILD DOES NOT NEED TO BE “CURED” OF HIS AUTISM SPECTRUM DISORDER

I seriously cannot believe these discussions are, well, up for discussion again. It’s frustrating. It’s infuriating. More importantly, it’s dangerous to the mental health of the mothers of autistic people. It’s frightfully dangerous to autistic people. For the love of all that is holy, can we please stop?

When Z was diagnosed in second grade, it was somewhat devastating. At the same time, it was a relief. We finally had the answers to why he struggled so deeply, to why things were so hard. We had the key to getting him the help he needed to learn to function in a world not made for near-diverse people. I never saw it as a death sentence. I never saw it as something to be cured……my child was then, and is still now, perfect and perfectly amazing. I only saw the opportunity to gain tools to put in his toolbox so he could manage life more easily.

Did I question what I may have done to “make” him that way? Yes…..because I think all good mothers question what we may have done wrong. Then again, that’s society’s fault….we’ve been trained since birth that if something goes awry, it’s our fault. There is so much blame placed upon the shoulders of women. But I digress…yes, I did wonder if I’d done something, or not done something that resulted in our child being on the spectrum. Then I took a close look at close family, particularly Spouse. Let me tell you, they are enough proof the autism is genetic in some way. Seriously. They’re all brilliant, but yeah, gatherings are spectrum-y. Spouse is spectrum-y. I looked no further for ways to blame myself. Even if there were a “cause” besides genetics, knowing that cause wouldn’t change anything. He simply is autistic. Knowing a reason wouldn’t change that fact.

In many ways, I feel our family. has been gifted this child. I love the way he sees the world. We did not get the non-verbal type of autism. We got the overly-verbal type of autism (well, he chooses when he wants to converse, but his vocabulary has always been pretty ridiculous, from the moment he started speaking). He has a way of making connections of what he takes in my brain would never even recognize much less verbalize. He notices things we don’t. He is insanely smart, sarcastic, hilarious.

Having an autistic child has taught me patience when I’m out and about in the world. Before autism, I may have been judge-y of other parents. Now, I know that you just never know what’s going on in someone’s life. What may appear bad/questionable parenting when a child is losing their ish may very well be a mother or father just trying their best to manage an autistic meltdown. Kid with an iPad and headphones on all the time may be managing sensory overload or issues rather than parents who are just trying to keep their kid quiet or disengaged. I have more compassion and empathy for having raised an autistic child.

Here’s the thing….He doesn’t “have” autism. He IS autistic. There is a huge difference. Having assumes you could also not have. Being is a whole other story. He is autistic. He will always be autistic. It just is who he is. He will never not be autistic. And I’m fine with that. Yes, getting him through childhood was rough. There were days I didn’t know we were going to get through. It was hard. It was also beautiful at times…understanding the gift of him making progress, of him connecting, of him reaching milestones….I wouldn’t change him. I would just have made things easier than they were, than they can oftentimes still be.

So, say it with me…..Vaccines do not cause autism. Tylenol does not cause autism. Autistic people are not a drain on society. Moms don’t need to be blamed. Autism is not a crisis in American society. We are blessed with their gifts, their brilliance, their being. Now, can we please put this discussion to bed forever?

“It doesn’t take any talent…”

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There was an interview the other day of a certain pastor of a Christian Nationalist church that’s getting a lot of attention. There are a ton of sound bites. I won’t give him a name or credit here. I refuse. I was infuriated on so many levels watching the interview/piece on this church and its growing following/community. To be honest, I was completely disgusted by essentially everything the lead pastor and his associates – all middle-aged white men, for the record – had to say.

I was born in 1969. In my lifetime, women have gained the ability to have their own checking account, their own credit card account, buy a home in their own name, open a business themselves and own it. Those are just a few things, a few rights we have been granted since my birth. Do I think we’re still figuring our way to really defining feminism and feminist rights, what it means to be a woman in the world in the 21st century? Yes, I do. Our roles and outlooks are evolving. I do not, however, believe that women are and should be “just vessels” nor do I agree with the whole “submitting to your husband” the way this church is currently defining submittance. But that’s not what I’m here to write/talk about today.

This man said, “It doesn’t take any talent to biologically reproduce.” Sir, with (ahem) respect, you’re a fucking moron. I’m going to take it to understand you have zero clues what women go through from the moment their periods first start when they’re teenagers, what happens when we’re trying NOT to get pregnant, when we’re trying TO get pregnant, what happens to our bodies and how we care for them while we’re pregnant, what childbirth is actually like (even when everything goes 100% right, which, to be honest, is rare), much less post-partem and then just being a mom in general. It indeed takes a ton more than biological talent. It takes a strength you’d never have the depth of understanding. It takes a will, it takes tolerance, it takes mental, physical and emotional skills you couldn’t hope to achieve in your lifetime.

But let’s back up a minute…..no biological talent….really? Has anyone you’ve ever known suffered through infertility? A premature birth? A still birth? Do you know what a miracle any pregnancy is, how many gajillion things have to go absolutely right to result in a viable fetus? Seriously dude……We endured 18 months of fertility treatments, granted that’s a pretty short stint in that world. I did EVERYTHING I was supposed to do, endured so many tests and procedures, most of which were painful and invasive. I took fertility drugs that caused all kinds of fun side effects. Then we gave birth 14 weeks early and spent three months in the NICU with our son fighting for his life. But sure, no biological talent.

Do you really think all women are complete idiots who are only capable of reproducing and offer no other skills to society? That is offensive, ignorant, and 1000% wrong. Do you know where you’d be, where we’d be as a modern society without the gifts and contributions of women?

In all honesty, I am a woman who chose to leave her career when our third child was born, to stay home and be a mom/homemaker. It was the best choice for our family, especially given the different needs of a preemie and then an autistic child. But I am still offended, and am allowed to be offended by anyone who says that’s all I was meant to do and be. I worked my way through college, and then twelve years of a career before I became a stay at home mom. Even during the years I was at home, I was much more than a submissive, passive, non-contributing, unworldly woman. I would say that of nearly all women who make the same choices I did, with the only exclusions being the women in this man’s church who believe the BS he’s feeding them.

As a woman, even one whose children are grown, I see this movement as dangerous to everyone BUT white males. The witch hunts of hundreds of years ago….those had nothing to do with real witches or religion, but rather fear of women who refused to dumb themselves down, who would not stay “in their place”, refused to hide their skills, talents, minds. They had everything to do with men who were afraid of those women, and their potential to bring the idea of an equal presence in the world to other women.

Now if you’re a woman who chooses the lifestyle this “pastor” is presenting as viable, go you. That’s your choice. But I will fight with all I have to keep this from becoming the norm for all women. In the words of another recent in-the-news person, “We are not going back.”

Slide Through Summer

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We’ve had the Princess home this entire summer, minus a weekend here or there. She got home mid-May ish to work her legal internship and pour wine at a winery (strangely a life goal she’s had for awhile haha). We have loved every minute of having her home, especially knowing we’re unlikely to ever get time like this with her again. Spouse and I haven’t done any big trips this summer either so we’ve just been home.

It’s been a lot of nights on the back patio, watching baseball, drinking wine, and talking. It’s been evenings of movies, binging tv shows, or just quietly reading side-by-side. We have laughed, and, as per usual for when the Princess and I are together, we have sometimes cried. We’ve talked relationships, old and new, marriage, life, career, the past. We’ve hashed out political topics and world issues. We’ve discussed so many theories around our two favorite fantasy book series/universes (trust me when I say the Empyrean Series and anything Sarah J Maas are our entire personalities…..we can talk for DAYS about them).

I think one of my favorite things of having her home is our morning walks on her days off or when she doesn’t start at the winery until early afternoon. We have a loop that goes all around the outside of our neighborhood, three miles door-to-door, complete with our walking friends (dogs) we see most days. The best days are when we see our favorite route dogs and get all the scritches and snoodles.

When she was a teenager, and we were struggling immensely with her for a couple of years, I couldn’t begin to imagine having a relationship like this with her. People, other moms, told me she would come back and we would end up being close once again. I didn’t believe them for one second. But they were right. They were so right.

She leaves Tuesday to go spend time first with her partner for a few days, and then with her cousin for a weekend before she and the bf start the two-day drive up to Oregon. She will move into her new apartment in Eugene, and then dive into her 2L year. We probably won’t get to see her until Thanksgiving. Sigh…..I know I will spend a lot of time this fall thinking back on these few months, and being so grateful for them.

Who was I before?

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Do you ever read a book and a line/paragraph will just smack you upside the head, make you inhale sharply in understanding or connection? I recently read “My Friends” by Fredrik Backman and this happened so many times during this particular reading experience. I have probably thirty page flags marking such lines….the book is 434 pages long. I literally hugged this book when I finished reading, it is just that good. Sigh….You’re probably going to get at least a few posts from me on some of those more-thought-provoking lines. For the record, I read everything Backman writes. I’ve liked some more than others. This may be his best work yet, and that’s saying something. He is an incredible writer.

One paragraph in particular grabbed me, about becoming a parent and how it is a “love so immense that it squeezes the air out of your lungs” and that “there’s such a clear before and after. A completely new you.”

I have been a parent nearly twenty five years. Seems insane to consider. I don’t really remember who I was before becoming a mother. What did I do with my time? What did I think about? What did I consider important? Who was I? I can hardly recall that woman, other than to recall she was insecure, shy, introverted, and definitely allowed people to walk all over me. I rarely spoke up for myself, much less anyone else. It wasn’t in my nature. What did Spouse and I do with our time? How did we even spend our evenings and weekends before we became parents? What did we talk about? What did we focus our energy on? And what the hell did we spend our money on before kids?

Who was that person? I am so different than she was. When you have children, you have to learn how to advocate for them. No one else is really going to do it. I had a trial by fire in this arena when Big Man was born so early and we spent three months with him in the NICU. As he was fighting to live, we were fighting to give him everything he needed to do so. We had to learn to navigate the health insurance nightmare of having a micro-preemie, and hospital life, followed by life with a medically fragile child who required all kinds of therapies, follow up, medications, and so on. As we moved through the educational system, we had to manage IEP’s, special education, different needs of different children. All of this stripped that ability to be walked all over by other people. Nope – I HAD to fight for my children. It changed me. I didn’t have the luxury to stay in my own little world, running from conflict.

I have also never loved anyone the way I love my three babies…..not one single person. Sometimes I look at them now and am in awe they came from us. I carried them, held their tiny hands, watched their miniature eyelashes flutter, their pulses beating in that precious soft spot in the middle of their skulls. I traced their tiny lips with my fingertips, ran my fingers through their baby hair on their baby heads, utterly enthralled. I watched them move into the world in wonder, every single thing new to them. We saw them find their interests, their personalities, their faults and curiosities, discovered their dreams and hopes. We’ve held our breath as adult decisions have been made as they become who they were meant to be, out in the world on their own. Two don’t live at home, so my heart exists in two other cities besides this one.

Who was I before? I am not she. I changed the moment Big Man took his first breath. There is a clear before and after.

Not all at once, please

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I have a complaint to file with the parenting public in general…..well, the parenting public a generation or two older than me and Spouse. Now, we have three adult children now. But my first complaint was this – no one told us how extremely difficult parenting teenagers is. Whew! We survived parenting teens by the skin of our teeth. It. Was. Rough. We made it. But then right on the heels of that, we entered the phase of parenting what we’ve come to lovingly call “baby adults.” If you’ve had a baby adult, you know exactly what I’m talking about….they’re adults, but still figuring the world out, as well as discovering how not fun it is to be an adult. Yes, I get *those* phone calls…..where does a stamp go on an envelope? Where can I find XYZ in the grocery store? How do I deposit a check without my banking app, and what is “endorsing a check” mean? How do I make a doctor’s appointment/dentist appointment? How do I get my prescription here where I’m at school rather than our pharmacy at home? All of the things….I get those questions regularly. What do I? How do I? Where do I? And then, the question all parents love the most, “Can I please get more money for…….?” My complaint is, NO ONE TOLD US HOW DIFFICULT IT IS TO PARENT BABY ADULTS!!! Jeeez….can a person get a heads up?

For the most part, our kids do great. Things have been pretty level with all of them for awhile. We’ve been enjoying them being at this stage, the shift in the conversations we have with them, etc. Here’s the deal though. When kids are little, their problems are usually pretty little, easily managed and dealt with problems. The older they get, the bigger the potential for real life, difficult, impactful, life-altering problems. We’ve helped the Herd through some of these bigger, baby adult problems. But let me tell you, when more than one of them has one of the bigger problems going on, it is exhausting.

Not gonna talk about what the problems are, but we currently have two of the three dealing with some things. Sleep has become a serious commodity the last week or so. Every time the phone rings, or FaceTime pings, I hold my breath. My mom worry monitor has been at level orange. I am mentally and emotionally pulled in different directions. I am mentally and emotionally drained. When more than one child is going through something at a time, it is overwhelming. Please, my lovely children, get in line. Take your turn. Not more than one of you may have a problem at any given time, for the love of all that is holy. This momma can’t take it!

I’m being facetious of course. We do what we must. We don’t get to control when life comes at us, comes at our kids. If I could control it, then not one of my kids at any time would ever face big, hard life stuff. Since I can’t control that, I would really love to at least be able to control WHEN they are facing stuff so I can focus on one kid at a time, when they each need us most. Since I can’t control that, I will just take a freaking big breath, make sure I’m taking care of me, dig in, and help my babies through.

Humanizing the dehumanized

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I grew up in the Central Valley….a tiny town in the northern end of the San Joaquin Valley. We moved there when I was ten years old, going from a big city to this very small, very rural, barely-a-blip-on-the-map town. We had four elementary schools, two middle schools, and one high school (plus the two rural K-8’s and one Catholic K-8). Fifteen thousand residents….that was it. My siblings and I could bike the entire town in one afternoon. My parents were able to trust us to do that, even at ages 14, 10, and 8. It was that small of a town.

Many of the residents of that town owned or worked on farms. A lot of the kids I went to school with were from families of migrant workers, their parents in the fields or processing plants, often working two or three jobs to pay for housing, food, and clothing for their families. Most of those children worked extremely hard in school so they could better their lives even further, knowing how hard their parents worked to give them the opportunity. I never really thought much about the legality of their presence. The children who were my classmates were usually born here in the US, or brought over by their parents at very young ages. We all knew the farms in our town needed them, needed those workers. They would not be productive without them. No one else wanted to do that work….hours in the field, in the 100+ degree heat, or the dripping, windy rains and fog. Those families were part of life, part of our community. They were human beings whose presence and existence were, well, normal. I didn’t question their right to try to have a better life, a safer life than they’d have back in Mexico or any of the other South American countries they came from. I didn’t get all the politics or political opinions surrounding their presence. It just was.

We moved our young family to San Diego over twenty years ago. Our town is relatively small, and about an hour from the border. It is more of a city than where I grew up, but agriculture surrounds us. As we are relatively close to the border, there is a large population of immigrants, legal and not quite legal. My children went through school with many “dreamer” classmates who again were either born here or brought over very young, their parents seeking better, safer lives, some seeking asylum from very dangerous and persistent violence in their home countries.

When a certain president was elected in 2016, my children – the older two in high school – became aware the pervasive fear among those dreamer classmates. Those kids didn’t know if their parents would come home at night, or whether they’d be rounded up and deported while the kids were at school. They lived in constant fear of separation. It was the first time my kids understood differences between their lives and those of many of their friends. They couldn’t understand the way many people were talking about other people, labeling as the “worst of the worst”, rapists, murderers, gang members. All they knew were good people working extremely hard to just live and provide. But we watched and listened as every day this group of people was dehumanized in every way possible, families separated, people put in overcrowded cages while they waited for their cases to be heard, to be sent “back”. They heard people screaming about building a wall, about “illegals” taking “American jobs”, “stealing” our resources, free-loading, etc. They didn’t understand the ugliness about the people they only knew to work hard at jobs no one else would do. Their fears for their friends, for their friends’ families was very real.

And here we are again. Look, our immigration system is complicated, and pretty broken. It is very imperfect. It desperately needs reform, better funding, more staffing. The route to citizenship needs to clearer and faster. Immigration itself is a very complicated, nuanced topic with a lot of gray area. Do some “bad” people come over? Yes! Bad people are always going to take advantage where they can. That’s in the definition. But most people who cross that border are coming here to escape horrific violence, constant threats of death, or very impoverished lives. They are seeking safety and better lives for themselves, their children. I can only imagine the lengths I would go to in order to give my children safe, better lives if I believed their existence were threatened. Do you think the people who come across our borders just left their homes, their countries willy-nilly, on a whim, or just to try to take something from you? No……they don’t want to leave their homes and all they know. Would you? Unless you absolutely had to, would you up and leave your home and take an extremely dangerous journey across hundreds or even thousands of miles?

These are not “aliens”. They are not “scum”. They are not “the worst of the worst”. They are human beings. They deserve to be treated as such, with respect and care. They are your neighbor. They could be you. The rounding up, the terror that is being inflicted lately is disgusting, awful, horrific, beyond imagination. The people cheering it on…..I have no words. The people in the red hats buying Alligator Alcatraz merch like this is a big comedy designed specifically for their enjoyment….I can’t even. You’re laughing at the severe violation of the rights of very-real humans. But then, they (the administration) don’t want you to see them as human. As long as you’re distracted by the handling of “others”, those they want you to believe are threatening your rights, your resources, you’re not paying attention to what they’re doing (or, rather, not doing). It’s a game that’s been played for hundreds of years. It’s a strategy to keep you focused on anything other than why they’re not working to make YOUR life better, why they aren’t doing the very things that would make the economy better, housing/food/fuel, taxes more affordable.

Look, this a huge topic that isn’t going to be resolved in one blog post. My whole point, my whole thought process is that these people are human beings. Same as you and me. They deserve to be treated as human beings, not terrorized, rounded up, put in cages and made the butt of crass jokes.

Why would anyone care?

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I started blogging in the fall of 2005. The Herd were very little and we were in the thick of all things young children. At the time, I was very involved in an online community for NICU parents. Blogging was a forum in the community. It gave me an outlet, a sounding board, a way to process all we’d been through in creating our little family, as well as gave me resources for all that would come throughout their growing up. I moved my blog here in 2009. It still remained mostly a “Mommy Blog”. By then we were dealing with various diagnosis, along with the usual growing up stuff. As they moved into teenage years, I struggled with writing so I could process, and giving them their privacy.

They’re all three grown now. While the parenting never ends, their stories are their stories, not mine. The writing has evolved. In the last few years, I’ve gone rounds with myself over continuing on with writing. Really, are blogs still relevant? I won’t do Vlogs or TikTok’s or any of that. I’m fine with a keyboard. I’m horrible trying to actually talk, much less talk on camera. I’ve gone through entire seasons without writing anything at all besides emails. I wonder if I should even bother anymore

There is a lot going on in our world…most of which I have feelings and opinions on, especially lately. But why would anyone care to read what I might have to say? I write from a place of privilege. I am an upper-middle class, middle-aged, suburban, white female. Why would my words have any impact? Why would anyone find merit in anything I have to add to the conversation?

This is where I’ve been sitting the last year or two. And then when the discussion began on the government starting a national autism registry, I shut it down. My writing has been used against us before. I won’t let it happen again. I will protect my child at all costs. However, I refuse to stay quiet about all the horrible things that are happening in our country now. When this is over, when we are on the other side, I want to know that I stood, loudly and proudly, on the side of human compassion. I need to know that I stood for something, stood up for those who don’t live in my world of privilege.

I guess my point is this…..I suppose I will keep writing. It’s no longer a mommy blog. You may not hear much about my adult children, unless they give me permission to share something. You may get quite a bit more political and social stuff than you’d like or that you’re used to seeing from me. There may be more bookish content. There may be more middle-age, sandwich generation talk. But I’m here, whether anyone reads or not. We’ll see how it goes.