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<p>Yesterday, I passed my taekwondo midterm, which means in ten weeks — barring catastrophe or tragedy or some other evil — I will be able to test for my black belt. But it is 2020 and just because the timeline says I should be able to test, I’m not banking on or counting on anything. [&hellip;]</p>

<p>When my alarm went off this morning, my dream left me feeling disoriented, confused, and angry. At the start of the dream, Mom and I were at church. In my head, it was supposed to be Sacred Heart, the church I grew up in, the one my mom still goes to, but I could tell [&hellip;]</p>

<p>I miss Dad badgering me about what he could give my son for Christmas. This is the time of year he’d start calling me and asking me to give him some gift ideas. My son has never been easy to shop for.&nbsp; Books and Legos and “fancy clothes” — and that one year he wanted [&hellip;]</p>

<p>I am proud of my son. The boy who hates all things Zoom, wanted to compete in a virtual taekwondo tournament yesterday. He did well, considering for months he refused to take virtual classes and he was more nervous than ever. He wasn’t nearly as crisp as he had been back in February — at [&hellip;]</p>

<p>I have sunk to a new low — using Facebook posts to influence my lesson plans. Or maybe, the fact that I get inspiration from social media is a testament to the sort of friends I keep. Intelligent literary minds think alike.&nbsp; Last month, Trump announced his Supreme Court nomination in the Rose Garden. Days [&hellip;]</p>

<p>Pennsylvania declared Biden the winner today which gives him the 270 electoral votes he needs. When I read online that Biden was the President-Elect, I didn’t cheer. I didn’t even smile. I sat down on the kitchen floor and I cried. Because all I wanted to do was pick up the phone and call Dad. [&hellip;]</p>

<p>It boggles my mind that the same people who think my marriage is immoral voted for a man who has had multiple wives and raped women. It’s disconcerting that the same people who cry about abortion and argue that no child should be harmed have no problem with a President who ripped kids away from [&hellip;]</p>

<p>Last fall, G3 wanted to read The Hobbit, but he has a remarkable ability for starting books and not finishing them. I also wasn’t sure — having read it at least a decade ago and not remembering it at all — he’d understand it well enough if he read it on his own. Therefore, I [&hellip;]</p>

<p>Mom was up before dawn today so that she could vote. She was concerned that the line might be terrible. Her legs and feet are not great so she was concerned about a long wait. I suggested she go early, arrive when they open. I also said I’d call her when I went out for [&hellip;]</p>

<p>Daddy cleaned up the leaves. In one windy day, he blew them off the lawn, away from the house, and into the woods. Lately, I had been sad simply looking out the window and seeing all the leaves falling on the ground. The fallen leaves — like so much else out here — remind me [&hellip;]</p>

<p>Halloween has always been one of my son’s favorite holidays. He loves dressing up and becoming his favorite literary, historical, and movie characters — Beowulf, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Abe Lincoln, Dumbledore, Mad-Eye Moody, Huck Finn. This year, he planned to be Lupin — a werewolf — because the full moon fell on Halloween. For years, he [&hellip;]</p>

<p>Our memories are fragmented. Yet stories are expected to be rounded out with clear beginnings, middles, and ends. This may work beautifully for fiction, considering the author gets to make everything up. But when it comes to essays and personal narratives, well, we tend to fill in the gaps here and there because it’s what’s [&hellip;]</p>

<p>My dream last night left me feeling empty and sad. Before I can tell you about my dream, I’ll give you the background to it. Living at my mom’s house in Mattituck means I don’t have a dryer. When it comes to doing laundry, I am at the mercy of the weather. Lately, it feels [&hellip;]</p>

<p>One evening at dinner, my son argued that even though he is only ten years old, he should be allowed to vote. He presented some valid points, including the fact that the President affects his life as much as he affects mine, therefore, he too should have a say in who lives in the White [&hellip;]</p>

<p>I am too old to be sitting in my room crying this much. My anger is uncontrollable. My pain is unlike anything I have ever experienced. I was listening to the news and Donal Trump had the audacity to say that getting Covid was a gift from God. I have no words to express my [&hellip;]</p>

<p>I’ve lost count of how many breakdowns my son has had in anger over everything he has lost in Trump’s America. For months, despite his love of taekwondo, he refused to take classes because he despises doing things via Zoom. He hates all things virtual. So when we moved temporarily to New York, I found [&hellip;]</p>

<p>Daddy may not have been famous or well-known, but the children’s librarians at the local Mattituck-Laurel Library knew him. Every year, at the start of summer, he and Mom used to stand on line to enroll my son in the summer reading programs. They also signed him up for whatever programs he’d enjoy when he [&hellip;]</p>

<p>The virus finally caught up to the bastard in the White House. It infected him. But will it kill him? Let me be clear. I don’t want the bastard to die. I want him to suffer. I want the virus to destroy his body and mind enough so that he is in pain and miserable [&hellip;]</p>

<p>Last year I taught college writing. For my level two classes, I focused on politics. Too many college students I realized didn’t take an interest in government, in the decisions being made that would eventually affect them. Some knew who their government officials were, some didn’t. Many voted, if it was convenient. Others didn’t because [&hellip;]</p>

<p>In having opted to homeschool my son, I’ve pretty much eliminated all the free time I used to have to write. I am glad — considering the state of education in relation to the virus at the moment — that I have the skills and ability to homeschool him. However, there are moments that I [&hellip;]</p>