by Jennifer | Jan 15, 2016 | 31 days of creativity, a mom's life, books
…or How I Fell off the Wagon. A hermit, of the basement-dwelling sort that I am, rather than the kind fighting daily for survival, faces a question each morning: what shall I do with this long, empty day stretching in front of me? Because my days of freedom are...
by Jennifer | Jan 14, 2016 | a mom's life, hospital
A little background: In November 2015, I was diagnosed with thyroid cancer. Mine was treated as most thyroid cancer is, with surgery, followed by radioactive iodine therapy. ❖ ❖ ❖ Yesterday I drove to the hospital, entered a special lot I’ve never parked in...
by Jennifer | Jun 1, 2015 | poems
“Chink!” She tossed the word with careless scorn, darted back into her first-grade classroom. And I, just passing in the hallway, caught it up and held it, turning it over in my hands. Like night slowly creeping in the knowledge that it was thrown with...
by Jennifer | May 22, 2015 | a mom's life, marriage
I have a Briggs & Riley suitcase I bought before Ken and I met, 20 years ago. It’s a very good suitcase. At the time, it was the most expensive thing I owned, next to my 1990 Honda Civic. I traveled for work, and it took a beating. We’ve taken it on...
by Jennifer | Mar 15, 2015 | a mom's life, poems
If I had only known Three days was nothing Four weeks now notched on my belt of motherhood Four weeks with a sick child, one at a time, usually on Thursdays Falling not like dominoes but like patient drops from the tip of a stalactite J.D. Fitzgerald’s mother...
by Jennifer | Feb 11, 2015 | a mom's life, poems
For Tennyson, who says it isn’t a real poem unless it rhymes. There was one a 9-year-old kid Whose stomach decided to rid Itself of its contents Under the pretense Of denying itself, so it did. There once was a boy fair and jolly Who snuck a lick of his...
by Jennifer | Feb 7, 2015 | a mom's life, poems
Three days in to the stomach virus in our house And I am checking every twinge Was that nausea I feel? What was that gurgling in my intestines? Something sinister? Heaven help the child who complains of anything abdominal; It means quarantine for sure. And constant...
by Jennifer | Jan 17, 2015 | 31 days of creativity, the girl
This is an old unpublished post that I began writing back in 2011, part of a series of interviews with Gigi (with a grand total of two posts). But now Gigi can speak for herself, so any future interviews will be her actual words, probably lots of them. Geneva, now 2,...
by Jennifer | Jan 16, 2015 | 31 days of creativity
My Day 16 writing was the About Us page for our long-neglected blog… http://www.busyboys.info/about/
by Jennifer | Jan 15, 2015 | 31 days of creativity, poems
I used to dream that I showed up at school wearing only my underwear. That I missed the bus and couldn’t find the school. That I never began the research paper we were supposed to be writing all semester. Now I dream that I’ve forgotten my son’s camp...
