The 43

Memories aren't just about the places you were or the experiences you experienced. They are also about the way you felt. I'm 20 years removed from the feelings I was struggling with during two trips, but today, the rawness of my anxiety then surprises me because it seems so recent. Summer 2006. Ben was just born, and I had returned from family leave and wanted to take more but was pressured not to, even though company policy allowed me to use accrued sick time to do so ... and I had a lot banked up mostly because working for a daily newspaper, I resisted calling in sick unless I was dying. I also had plenty of vacation built up and was good about using it efficiently. I would need it because we were traveling to Chicago for Ben's christening, going to Minnesota for a friend's wedding in September, and then returning to Chicago later in September for another good friend's wedding. Oh, I was also absolutely fried at work. Not just fried, but paranoid and really bitter...

My annual summer solstice post is being written days after the solstice. A wildfire broke out near the hill I write from, and the sky was too smoky and cloudy for an effective sunset to provide inspiration. Then, Lori and I were in Colorado for five days for my niece's wedding. We got back but I was slammed with work that invaded my evenings. I finally moderately caught up to come out to my hillside tonight, but another problem awaited — I have no idea what to write about. The last year has been good and bad. Freelance work has been hit or miss — enough to sustain (helped by my severance and unemployment insurance) but not as full as I hoped. I applied for more than 100 jobs in the last year and got three total interviews. Most of the jobs I didn't want anyway because I want to make the freelance thing thrive, but it was nonetheless not encouraging. That said, I haven't been unhappy or stressed out. I'm sleeping at night. I've lost a nice chunk of weight (after bein...

Saturday nights, 1979-81 My father worked most Saturday nights during this time, and I'm frankly at a loss at what I did to pass the time when I was a kid during these years. In the summer, I'm sure I was playing outside until it got dark (and sometimes past dark, my mother didn't like when we'd play Jailbreak -- think Kick the Can without a can -- and run through alleys). but the rest of the year, if I wasn't by a friend's house, Saturday nights were, maybe, bleak, especially during the winter. This was before cable, so our TV options were limited: "The Love Boat" and "Fantasy Island," but sometimes I wouldn't be in the mood. Perhaps I'd watch "Wild Kingdom" or a basketball game. Or, maybe I put on a movie on our Betamax. We owned only one car, so Mom didn't take us out on Saturday nights. We wouldn't have an Atari until November 1981, so that wasn't an issue, and I'd be lucky if I could get my sister to pla...