Nervous Girl

Still Nervous After All These Years

It's been over four years since I typed a word on this blog.

Part of it was that I had started a chronicle of my diagnosis and treatment of ocular melanoma; yes, that's a thing. And having eye cancer seemed like it deserved its own blog. Happily, there's not much to write about on that front these days, though I invite you to read about my experience if you're interested.

You'd think having a rare, potentially life-threatening disease would make a Nervous Girl more nervous, not less, wouldn't you? I would have thought so, too. But a funny thing happened on the way to remission: I realized that a lot of the things that seemed super-scary before cancer seemed like much less of a big deal in its wake. I won't say I was relaxed, but, grading on a curve, I was much more so.

Then the 2016 election cycle happened.

At first I thought Donald Trump was a joke. A lot of people did. Then I started to watch in disbelief as he said offensive things about prisoners of war, women, Mexicans, Muslims, the disabled, and more. As his previous statements about individuals and various groups came out. As he doubled down on hate-filled comments and actions, any ONE of which would have had a previous nominee backpedaling and apologizing, and probably would have tanked their campaign anyway. As he refused to release his taxes. "Surely he won't win the primary," I thought. And then, "Surely he won't win the general election." Even so, I donated to his opponent, registered voters, made phone calls to get out the vote. I didn't think he could win, but I wanted to do everything I could to make sure.

I believed that other Americans would take note of the fact that Hillary Clinton received over 240 endorsements from newspapers and major publications, many of which hadn't endorsed a Democrat in over a half-century or longer. That Trump received only 19, one of which was from the official newspaper of the KKK. For reference, there were nearly as many newspapers, including USA Today, which essentially said, "This guy is unfit. Vote for anybody but him."

And yet here we are.

Yes, Hillary Clinton won the popular vote by a margin that, as of this date, keeps increasing. But that doesn't matter, because it's Donald Trump who will take the oath of office and become the 45th President of the United States on January 20, 2017.

I know that there are obviously many people who voted for Donald Trump. I know a fair number of them. Most of the ones I know are not ignorant;  some are among the most intelligent people I have ever met. Most of the ones I know are not hate-filled; some are among the most humble, generous, and faithful Christians I know. And yet they chose to vote for a clearly unqualified man who repeatedly espoused bigotry and xenophobia. I'm struggling to understand their choice. I hope that someday soon, we'll be able to discuss it. calmly and openly.  I don't think I'm there yet.

Only after the election did I learn of a "time capsule" of Trump's words and actions during the campaign, captured not in retrospect but as they happened. It's what we knew, when we knew it.  I'm hoping this blog will be a similar record for the time afterward. Not as well written, because, hey, I don't work for the Atlantic. Not as comprehensive, because I'm guessing there's going to be more coming down the pike than I'll have time to record.  But when I stand in that voting booth in November 2020, I want to have put, all in one place, the things he did, the things I'm nervous about now. And hopefully, some good things that surprised me.

Here's how it's going to go: I'm going to keep things respectful, in the words of Michelle Obama, to "go high." I'm not going to name-call. I'm not going to insult. I'm going to rely on facts, and, where possible, the man's own words.  But I'm also going to speak up.

I didn't ask for this president, but I'm going to hold him to account. And if you did ask for him, I'm going to document exactly what you signed on for.

Soup on Sundays

So, fall is coming, and I have this tiny idea. Actually, I've had it for a while. I think it's a great idea, but I'm not quite sure how to implement it.

I love soup. I have an almost pathological love for soup. Hot and sour, cream of mushroom,  curried pumpkin, beans and greens, chicken tortilla, avgolemono, lentil and sausage, you name it. I have not yet met a soup I will not eat, although in a cruel twist of fate, my least favorite is turkey-noodle soup, which my husband craves in the days after Thanksgiving like a junkie looking for a fix.

I also love baking bread. Ever since I discovered how obscenely easy it is to make no-knead bread , and how obscenely good it is, I try to make it at least once a week when the weather cools.  This crusty, delicious bread goes perfectly with soup.

And I love having people over for dinner. Not fancy dinner where I have to time the roasting of the Cornish game hens precisely and make sure the souffle gets to the table before it deflates. Casual dinner where people are talking and laughing and feeling free to help themselves to more if they want it.

I'm well aware that the concept of "helping yourself to more if you want it" is foreign to a lot of families in this country, as is the concept of "enough." That literally makes my heart ache, that almost 50 million people in this country don't have enough to eat, or have to choose between food and other important needs.  Like, say, medicine or rent. 

So here's what I'd like to do:  Every Sunday evening, I'd like to make a big pot of soup and a couple of loaves of bread, and get the word out to friends and neighbors to come on over and enjoy it together. People inevitably say, "What can I bring?" and in this case the answer would be nothing--just make, on your own, a donation to a local food bank or other hunger-fighting organization. No set amount, maybe just what you would have spent making or buying your own dinner that night. Just come on over, enjoy some hot soup, warm bread, and (hopefully) good company.

What do you think? Could it work? Could we even get the idea to spread so that every Sunday, donations are being made to food banks all over the place, and neighbors everywhere are laughing and slurping soup together?

Let me know your thoughts--and if you have a link to a favorite soup recipe, please share that, too.

In Which I Find the House of My Dreams

Last weekend, I trundled the kids into the car and we made the five-hour trek north to see their father and to search for the next place we'll all live together. I prepared them as best I could:  It will be a long day, at times boring. Wear comfortable shoes that slip on and off; we'll be doing both a lot of walking and taking our shoes off as we step inside homes.  Pee before we leave the hotel. Bring a snack, but not a messy one. No whining.

It never occurred to me that we might not find a house, although my husband and kids, I later learned, were less certain. We met the real estate agent in her neighborhood, which also contained some of the homes in which we were interested.  We gamely piled into her car and set off.

The first house, which had looked almost perfect online, was a disappointment in real life. The second house had been added to the lineup by the agent, and showed great promise. The third was equally terrific. We moved on to a couple of less impressive offerings, and then to the one with a neighborhood pool (yay!) and a dripping air conditioner in the attic that leaked into the second floor, saturating the floor (boo!).  My husband explained to the kids what an "automatic DQ" is.

We saw a couple more places that were wrong for various reasons. Just before lunch, we headed to a house I had found online a couple days before, when my husband broadened our search. He'd done a drive-by and was unimpressed, but I was stoked. Among other things, there was a deep Southern front porch with a swing, and a sunroom with skylights. A walled English garden in back. The house had soul, I could just tell from the pictures online.

I was not disappointed.  I wanted a first floor master bedroom, and there was one, painted a pale robin's egg blue, looking out over the beautiful front porch. I had thought from the pictures that there was no hall closet--a big drawback. But it turned out there was, cleverly concealed as one of the wall panels. The kitchen was a little smallish, but beautifully appointed, with a tile backsplash and granite counters.  It also had a pantry with amazing little shelves for spices, canned goods, and bigger items. What looked like a massive antique desk was built into the kitchen wall. Behind the was the sunroom, overlooking the English garden. Off of that was an office, that could be used as such, then converted to a first floor bedroom when my sister comes to live with us in several years. Upstairs, bedrooms for the kids, nearly as large as the master, and a bonus room in back for hanging out with friends. Storage galore. A first floor laundry. Instead of a formal dining room, which we rarely use, a great room with space for a dining table and family room furniture. I could feel my husband getting on board with the idea of this house.

The place looked like a lovingly restored home from 1886, but it was actually built in 1986. Obviously by someone who cared, and who knew what he was doing. It was everything I  had dreamed of.

And it was in the wrong neighborhood.

It was a tiny, pretty subdivision of fewer than 30 houses, with a larger, soulless subdivision only a few houses away. In the absence of a cohesive neighborhood with planned events, like the one where the real estate agent lived, we might have met nice neighbors and made friends anyway. But we didn't know. And there was another problem--the schools that served this pretty little neighborhood were BAD.  And private school is not in the budget.

Still, the house was so amazing it was in the running for a while. It quickly came down to houses two and three, and my dream house. While we drove around, part of my mind worked on how to convince my kids that having neighborhood friends is overrated, a solid education isn't that important, and that getting mugged in the school hallway is character-building.

I prayed a little for clarity. I grumbled to myself that it wasn't fair that I should have to give up my dream because the kids didn't like the house. It felt too old-fashioned for them. I told myself when they grow up they can pick their own damn dream houses. 

And then, without knowing how it happened or even really meaning to do it, I let the house go. It was out of the running. We were down to the two houses in the agent's neighborhood, which the kids liked a lot and which had better schools.

In the end, the kids preferred House A, which had a flat, fenced backyard and a huge hammock in a stand. My husband and I were inclined toward House B, which had better storage, a first floor master, two-story family room, and hardwood floors. Not to mention a huge bonus room on the second floor where the kids can hang out with the friends I hope they'll make. We went with House B. We made an offer and it was accepted within a few hours. The kids mourned loudly for their lost hammock, and we told them: Tough. We made the best decision for our family.

There's no front porch. No sun porch, and no screened porch. But there's a pretty deck with railings on which I can hang window boxes for an herb garden. It overlooks the sloping lawn, which has a spot in back perfect for a stone fire pit. The kids are big enough to help build it, and hopefully we'll meet neighbors who will sit around it with us. Maybe the friends we've had to say goodbye to in all these moves will visit us and sit there, too.

Maybe the best dream houses are the ones where you build your dreams together.

Approximations

As you probably know, my husband and I are in the market for a new house in our new home state.  Happily, we received an acceptable offer on the house we currently love, and have to be out by October. So the urgency of the house-hunting just got ramped up a degree or two.

I've been spending a metric butt-ton lot of time on real estate websites, and I've noticed an irritating trend: lots of them won't give the square footage of the house.  Well, they'll give it, but they'll give a range. As in, say, 2200-2700 square feet.  I don't know why they do this. The real estate companies know the square footage of the houses. When we listed our house, the realtor knew the square footage when she walked in.  It's not a state secret. Why not just tell me? That way I can avoid wasting the agent's time and mine looking at a house that's too small.

But I shouldn't pick on the poor real estate companies. They're not the only ones approximating. Politicians do it all the time (I've paid income tax at a rate of at least 14%.).

So do my kids (Me: "Honey, are you done with your homework?" Kid: "Just about." Which means, "I have a thirty page research paper due tomorrow, along with forty math problems, a science lab, and two midterms, none of which I have finished preparations for.  But I have completed putting reinforcements on some notebook paper.")

Even my husband, who is perfection itself, is guilty from time to time: "I'm leaving the office in fifteen minutes. Or maybe an hour."

I've been so rule-bound all my life,  I've always felt obligated, when questioned, to give the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. I'm sure that's why nobody ever asks me to knock over a convenience store with them. Because they know I'm a slow runner and I'll get caught and blow them in and testify against them. 

But since all the cool kids are being imprecise, maybe I can, too:

At the DMV: "Weight?"  Me: "Between 110 and 152 pounds."

With employers: "When will you have that article to us?"  Me: "Sometime between Tuesday and 2016."

With my husband: "Damn, honey, I just bought these Oreos yesterday! How many did you EAT?" Me:  Between one and twelve servings."

At confession with my priest: "So, what's burdening you?" "Well, I've committed between two and seven deadly sins, along with between five and seventy-two lesser sins."

With my kids: "Mom, when will dinner be ready?" Me: "Between now and whenever the hell I feel like it. Probably closer to whenever the hell I feel like it."

I'm sure I could come up with more examples, but I've got to clean my house.  Sometime between now and when I move out.

There Is No Heaven Like a Good Marriage...

...and no hell like a bad one.

Once upon a time, my occupation was  "family law attorney." That means I have seen many, many bad marriages. I must say that it made me appreciate my own wonderful husband more, but the work I did often left me wondering if we were the only happy couple left in America.  Some days it seemed like I was drowning in a sea of other people's lies, infidelity and hostility.

Lately, though, I've noticed an opposite trend on Facebook. A number of friends and family members have been posting about their happy marriages. Not in a braggy way, or a grandiose, he-swept-me-off-to-Paris-for-the-weekend way. More like a vacation picture where the wife is smiling at her photographer husband with a look of pure abiding affection.  A happy status update from a friend whose husband snapped and sent her pictures as he drove through Chicago because he knows she loves road trip pictures. Today is my cousin's eighteenth wedding anniversary, and he and his wife posted such sweet thoughts about it that you could just feel how connected they are, and know that eighteen years is just a warm-up for them. They are in it for the long haul, and they are feeling really good about it.

I'm feeling really good about it, too. I love having a marriage in which my husband and I complete each other's sentences and quote our favorite TV show (The West Wing) and movies (The Incredibles, The Shawshank Redemption) to each other.  I love it that when he's getting us coffee, he pours mine first. I love being able to make lunch for him when he's running late in the morning so that he won't have to buy one.

I wish marriages like these for all my unmarried friends and family members. The movies are full of grand romantic gestures. Grand romantic gestures are wonderful, as long as they're not intended to distract from the fact that, day-to-day, things aren't all that great. Never marry someone who makes you feel bad about yourself. Never marry someone who says snarky things about you, and then says, "I was only joking," when you call them on it.  Never, EVER marry someone who tells you how lucky you are to have them or that if they left you you no one else would want you. I don't care how spectacular the sex is or how much money they make.

I once had a boyfriend who, early in our relationship, brought me wonton soup when I had a cold. Nice enough. He brought it in an ambulance (he was a paramedic), lights and sirens blaring as he drove down my street. Grand gesture.

I let the big showy gesture blind me to other things. Like that he still shared an apartment with his ex-girlfriend. Who didn't like me spending the night because it made her uncomfortable walking around in her underwear. And the fact that my boyfriend's response to that was to walk me to my car before I left for the evening from then on. Most of the time.

Uh-huh. Would you believe that that relationship didn't end until he ended it? Not one of my prouder moments.

Marry someone that you put first because you want to, because he always puts you first.  Marry someone who brings you soup when you're sick and doesn't make a big deal about it. Marry someone who looks at poor pitiful sick you, with your raw nose and your greasy hair and your ratty sweatshirt, and gets a moony look all over his face. Marry someone who makes you feel so beloved every day that when Valentine's Day rolls around, it doesn't really matter if you celebrate it or not. Marry someone who would pick up tampons or Preparation H for you without flinching.

Don't marry someone that you think you could live with for the rest of your life.  Marry someone you can't imagine living without.

Why I Love Me Some Republicans. Seriously.

If you've been a careful student of   been a regular reader of  been an occasionally reader of  ever read a post  sentence word on this blog, you may have correctly inferred that I tend to be a little liberal in my leanings.  It's an election year, and things are hard for me, because there are things that I feel very strongly about. So strongly, sometimes, that it feels to me that no sane person could possibly disagree. And because the older I get, the less willing I am to remain quiet about things, I occasionally  frequently damn near always give voice to those feelings.

Invariably, some people disagree. The sanity of some of them might reasonably be questioned, and not just because of their intentional association with me.

The rest of them, though...that's another story. They can't be written off so easily. Nor, to be perfectly honest, do I want to.

Let me be perfectly frank here:  I love me some Republicans. And to be grammatically correct, I must say that I love me (some) Republicans. I know Jesus wants me to love ALL my brothers and sisters and we are working on that, but it is not going so well some days. But I do, I love an awful lot of Republicans.

Some of the Republicans that make the news say verifiably false, sometimes crazy, things.  They make the news disproportionately, and you can argue about why, but it's a settled fact that crazy talk makes good TV and headlines.  The problem with this is that if you watch and read enough of it, you start to believe that the speakers/writers and all of their kind are crazy and callous and evil and that they are launching a war on all that is good and holy. Once you get to that stage you don't have to listen to them anymore, any of them, because the name of their party has become synonymous with "totally batshit nuts."

Unless... you actually know some of them. Like my old neighbor, who is a great, principled guy and a mile smarter than I. (Although I am smart enough to know I should say "smarter than I.") Or one of my best friends, who is kind, loving and compassionate, possibly because she's been through things in her life you wouldn't wish on your worst enemy.  One of the funniest bloggers I know. A fairly large handful of my cousins.  Many of my dear friends from church. My brother. My husband, for Pete's sake. 

I know these people. I know they love this country, and for the religious ones, that their religious faith is based in love, not hate and persecution. And they're Republicans.

So if I say all Republicans are crazy, or hate-filled, or greedy, or idiots, I'm saying it of them. Of my family and my friends. And I know it's not true of them. So I have to believe it's not true of a lot of other Republicans, either. Maybe most. Maybe, like the Republicans I love, they love this country and want what's best for it. We disagree about how to get there an awful lot. It's hard for me to remember sometimes that the people who disagree with me aren't doing it because they're evil. They're doing it because they're wrong. (Kidding there, folks!) They're doing it because these are complex issues and there are rarely simple answers. Where there are, they're usually wrong.

This blog post isn't going to make anyone change their vote, and it might make some people feel angry and betrayed. I'm sorry about that.  But stereotyping is lazy,  and name-calling shuts down discourse. I will continue to become frustrated when what seems obvious to me is perceived so differently by others.  I will howl with that frustration sometimes. But I will never assume that you're evil just because you disagree with me, and I will always try to understand where you're coming from.

Please do the same for me.

Criteria

When I was a mere slip of a girl, I had some ideas about the man with whom I was going to spend my life. Nothing too specific, more of a vision of how things were going to pan out. He was going to be a writer--we both were--and we would spend our days at our word processors (it's been a while since I was a mere slip of a girl) churning out brilliance, and our evenings on the deck of our lakefront house sipping wine with each other and our witty friends. This mystery man would be tall and bookish, with round wire-rimmed glasses and wavy fair hair. That was my idea of paradise.

When paradise actually walked in the door, all that remained of the vision was the tall part and the glasses (which were not quite round, now that I think of it). Paradise turned out to be a tall, balding bald engineer with no literary pretensions whatsoever, and more interest in educating himself than in sounding clever to others. He's happy to drink wine with me on the patio, but you're more likely to find us drinking coffee on the front porch and waving to the neighbors.

And that's more than fine with me. The lesson: it's great to have an idea of what you want, as long as it doesn't keep you from recognizing true love when you actually see it.

I started thinking about all of this because my dream date and I are looking for a house. And there are some similarities between looking for love and looking for a home. You can go in with your list of criteria clenched in your sweaty little fist, look at a house that meets every one of them, but it leaves you cold. And then on a whim, you can duck into an open house for a place that's all wrong on paper, and fall in love.

When you fall in love with a person, things aren't going to work out unless the other person feels the same way.  When you're in love with a person and fall in love with a house, things aren't going to work out unless the other person feels the same way. My husband and I have bought two houses together so far. The first time, it was love at first sight for both of us. This last time around we were vacillating between two houses we liked. I preferred one, he preferred the other. We talked. We reasoned and considered. We reached agreement. We fist-bumped, because we are dorks. Less than ten hours after we saw the house, our offer was accepted.  We fist-bumped again. Easy-peasy, mac-and-cheesy. I know that's a dorky thing to say, but, um, hello? See above.

So, because we're so good at this, we're doing it again. Challenges this time include a more expensive housing market and some very spotty school systems. Not to mention the fact that this time we are giving our children a voice in the process, which they have mistakenly interpreted as having been given a vote.  But thirteen year old boys and ten year old girls are notoriously tractable, so I can't imagine that will be a problem.

And yes, I've got my list of things that are important to me in a house.  I want a nice kitchen, and a screened porch, and dedicated space for the kids to hang out with the friends I hope they'll make. But I know as long as I have those kids, and one bald engineer with glasses, we'll be okay wherever we land.

Can I get a fist-bump?

 

So much has happened...

...and most of it is good.  If there is anyone out there who remembers I have a blog and actually wishes I wrote to it, I apologize. I tend to blog as I exercise: with great enthusiasm for a couple of weeks, and then not at all for a few months.

But as I mentioned, good things are afoot. My husband has a job! A good one, in North Carolina, where we were hoping to relocate.  So he's there now, and I'm here with the kids. I'm so grateful that he found a job reasonably quickly. I'm thrilled that I'll be establishing a permanent address in the state where I've wanted to live since I was nine. I'm giddy that, assuming we stay there, my children will be eligible for in-state tuition at North Carolina's great public universities. And I'm over the moon that I'll be close to family and friends I haven't seen much (or at all) since I graduated from law school.

Now all we have to do is sell our dream house and find (or build) a new one. And that, my friends, is a post for another day.

 

Of Crazy Russian Saints, Kitchen Appliances, Lunchbags and Really Good Friends

On Wednesday, I was writing the last few lines of my last blog post, trying to figure out how to wrap it all up, when the doorbell rang. It was about four in the afternoon, and I assumed it was my daughter, not bothering to try the door (which was unlocked) before ringing the bell. When I got up, irritation written all over my face, to let her in and chastise her, I saw I'd been wrong. Yes, my adored one was at the door. But it wasn't my daughter.

It was this.

I stared in shock at the UPS man as he hopped in his truck and drove away. Then I burst into tears, (which is when my daughter arrived on the scene).

It turns out that several of my friends, having read my saga of kitchen appliance longing, thought it would be a hoot to chip in and cause one to arrive at my door. So they did. They would have been gratified if they had seen my flabbergasted response. A hoot, indeed. If you have any idea how it feels to know that many people came together on your behalf, just to make you smile (and cry) you're a lucky person. It may be the single nicest thing anyone's ever done for me in 44 1/2 years.

On that same day, another friend messaged me just to see how things were going. I responded, including an update on my husband's job search. The friend was unaware he'd been liberated from his employment, and suggested I pray for St. Xenia's intercession, as she's been known to help those seeking employment.  So of course I had to find out about St. Xenia.

She was a devout Russian woman who was widowed young. After her husband's sudden death, she gave all her belongings--ALL, including her house--to the poor and wandered about, homeless. People thought she was crazy, not only for that act but because she wandered around saying crazy-sounding things. Somebody figured out that "crazy" meant prophetic; her visions were from God.  And it turned out that everybody who helped her--merchants who gave her food, cab drivers who gave her rides--was blessed with increased business. People started competing to help her, but she took only what she needed.

I've been praying, and will continue to pray, for St. Xenia's intercession for my husband. And while I realize that saints aren't vending machines--you don't just press the right buttons and get the thing you ordered--it occurs to me that it might be pleasing to this saint if I gave some of my possessions to the poor.

I could sell my shiny new mixer and donate the proceeds to charity. But that would be an insult to the dear friends who conspired to make me so happy. A slap in the face, and I could never do that to these wonderful women. Who may possibly be expecting homemade pastries.

Then, like a slap in the face (the helpful, wake-up kind) it hit me: A way to honor St. Xenia and these friends who are clearly concerned about making sure others have good food to eat.

There's this tiny little grassroots organization that sprang into being last year with the sole purpose of providing brown bag lunches to the homeless. It's a small, but growing, group of caring people who want to show love in the most practical and essential of ways. They're feeding a lot of people and inspiring plenty more. They're not preaching. They're just taking care of people. I think if St. Xenia lived in modern-day Florida, she'd be slapping together sandwiches and handing out sack lunches right along with them.

So I am going to make a small donation (I haven't evolved quite to the place where I'm willing to liquidate all my possessions) to Brown Bag Lunches of Pinellas* in honor of St. Xenia and my sweet, sneaky, generous friends. As soon as I have a chance I will make them all some cookies with that shiny mixer.  And because of my deep commitment to helping others, I will eat St. Xenia's share.

*If you'd like to donate to this very worthy group, you can easily send them a donation via PayPal at [email protected] .  Even a few dollars will really make a difference for someone.

What are you waiting for? Something amazing, I guess.

"The Incredibles" is one of my family's favorite movies.  It's got a great story, terrific visuals, funny lines. It's also got three awesome messages  subtly woven throughout, rather than being preached at you: 1) Not only is it okay to be different, but your differences are what make  you valuable;  2) No matter how strong you are in one area, sometimes you're going to need someone else's strength; and 3)When we work together, we can do anything.

One of my favorite characters in the movie gets two short scenes, about thirty total seconds of screen time. It's the little boy who lives across the street from the Parrs (the Incredibles' secret suburban identity, in case you've never seen the movie).  The Parrs and all their other super counterparts are in hiding after the tide of public opinion has turned against superheroes. They're supposed to be acting just like regular people. Having to hide who they are is taking a toll, especially on Mr. Incredible, who misses hero work so much he sneaks out to do it under the guise of going bowling.

This little kid is on to Bob Parr/Mr. Incredible, though. He knows there's something different about him, even if he doesn't know exactly what, and he's keeping an eye peeled. One day Bob catches him watching and almost snarls at the kid, "What are you waiting for?" The kid looks back, all innocence, and says, " Something amazing, I guess." Bob, fresh from his dreary job at a monolithic insurance agency says,  "Me too, kid," before turning, deflated, to go in the house.

That's a little bit how it is around here these days.  I blog and write on the downstairs computer. My husband networks and applies for jobs on the upstairs one. We have lunch together and go for a walk. We go back to our screens. The kids come home, we listen to their daily adventures and woes. We make dinner and do homework. We might watch a little TV. We go to sleep. The next day we do it again.

We hope and believe that something good is coming, but we don't know exactly what, or when. Occasionally it occurs to me that maybe something good won't come, that we'll chug along, depleting our resources, until something really bad happens. Most of the time I don't feel that way. But sometimes I do, and I understand how Bob Parr feels.  He has something special, but he thinks nobody wants it. He's starting to question whether it even is special. Whether he is. He's slogging through the days, wondering if anything will ever change, with increasing doubt that it will.

Then, an opportunity comes. It looks too good to be true, a chance to resume his hero work, to be appreciated and rewarded for his true self. Of course, it is too good to be true. It's a trap laid by an enemy, and he wouldn't have survived it without his quirky family's help. They manage to escape, but Syndrome, the bad guy, pursues them. When they finally vanquish him, they're outside in their driveway. A huge fireball of an  explosion overhead signals Syndrome's destruction. It's silent for a moment. And then, from the driveway across the street, a triumphant shout.

The little kid across the street has finally gotten his payoff. Bob may have been on the verge of giving up, but the kid didn't. He knew if he kept watching, and waiting, he was going to get his something amazing.

That's why we keep doing what we're doing, even on the days it feels like hell, like it will always feel like hell. So that when a job offer comes, or a book gets published, we can stare at each other,  dumbfounded for a moment. Then we'll shout, like the little kid who never gave up hope, "That was totally wicked!"