When I was young—maybe nine or ten—there was a house you could see from the freeway that was the weirdest house I had seen up to that point in my life. It had turrets and was painted a mossy shade of green. One day when we drove past it, I decided to use a word I had recently learned; it had given me pause in a book I was reading and I'd had to use some context clues to figure out that it must mean weird.

 "Look at that house, Mom!" I said from the back seat. "It's so queer!"

I still remember the look she gave me, and the harsh way she said "You can't use that word, Amy. Don't ever say it again."

I was totally bewildered. Wasn't it just a sophisticated way of saying "strange"? (And yes: I was a strange child!)

But she wouldn't explain why I couldn't say queer. She just said I couldn't.

Maybe that's such a strong memory for me because I can't remember ever being taught that gay people were weird or morally aberrabt or just downright disgusting. I did learn from my dad, one summer vacation, that they were funny, when he told us the story of how, out on his morning walk (in Vegas on the Strip, and if you know my dad you also know he was wearing tall black church socks and church shoes for walking, in probably shorts but also, quite likely, swimming trunks), a gay man had propositioned him.

But I don't remember being taught to hate gay people.

Maybe because I read a lot. Or maybe it was because of the kinds of music I listened to. (There is no shortage of gay men in New Wave.) Maybe because my parents, while not exactly liberal, never taught us any sort of prejudice. Maybe because I had a gay friend in high school and he was so much fun to go to dance clubs with. I'm not exactly sure, but I never had any anti-gay sentiments. I mean, of course I heard the jokes and I knew it bothered a lot of people, but it never was an issue for me.

I thought about that one day when I was in the middle of reading Carol Rifka Brunt's novel Tell the Wolves I'm Home. I was standing in Target, and there was a guy one aisle over whom I could hear talking—I think on his cell phone, but maybe to a non-responsive (embarrassed?) wife. Talking loudly about how much he hated gay people, and how disgusting they are, and how they were ruining the country.

Where does that malevolence come from?

I'm glad we don't see as much I-hate-gay-people crap anymore. Not like in the eighties, when Brunt's novel is set, when AIDS was just starting to explode, forcing people to decide how they felt about homosexuality. It tells the story of June Elbus, who's one of those young teenage girls who just don't know quite how to navigate the world. She wishes she had been born in medieval times, and goes into the woods sometimes just to pretend the modern world doesn't exist. Her sister, Greta, has always been her closest ally, but now she's turned mean, and her one refuge is her days with her uncle Finn. Finn, who's also her godfather, is a famous painter living in New York, and she takes the train there to visit him. He takes her to the Cloisters, to museums, to odd little restaurants. He gives her a pair of brown leather boots that would fit perfect on a medieval girl. He talks to her and teaches her things and she's really partway in love with him.

He's also dying of AIDS.

Before he dies, he paints a portrait of her and Greta, called "Tell the Wolves I'm Home." They start going into the city every Saturday, to sit for the portrait, and then, when it is finished, he dies. I'm not giving anything away, as this happens near the beginning of the story, and there are so many flashbacks you know from almost the start of the novel that the story is about what happen after Finn dies.

What happens is that Toby, Finn's partner, makes contact with June. June didn't ever know that Finn was in a long-term relationship, but she has heard her parents talking about someone who murdered Finn. At first—since the meetings are clandestine—she isn't sure about Toby. But as she gets to know him, she also starts learning more about Finn, about her mother (Finn's sister), about herself.

I loved this book so much.

Partly it's that books with art are always interesting to me. I wish I could make art, and that I knew more about it, but it isn't one of my strengths. So when I find it in a novel (or a poem or anywhere, really) I am intrigued. The painting in the book plays an integral part in how things are (sort of) resolved.

I loved June, too. Love her attachment to the past and how she wants to escape there, because isn’t that part of being a teenager—feeling like this now is too real, too hard, and wanting some sort of escape? She learns so much over the course of the novel: her parents aren’t perfect, her choices don’t always have to make everyone happy, she is stronger and more capable than she ever knew. Even though the setting and the story are completely different from my own, we have so much in common, June and the teenager I used to be. She is constantly feeling like she doesn’t quite fit, and she’s not certain that is always a bad thing. In fact, maybe it’s a good thing. She has that same knowledge, too. “I thought of that kiss. How I’d blushed after, like it meant something. When I thought of all that, it hit me right in the throat. Nothing had changed. I was the stupid one again. I was the girl who never understood who she was to people.”

I so get that.

But I also loved it for the relationship between Greta and June. Greta is so mean to her little sister—just like I was mean to mine. Sometimes I had to put the book down and walk away, I was squirming so with guilt. Just as Greta has her reasons for being so cruel, I can see my motivations and inspirations for being such a bad sister. In fact, that was another thing I loved about Tell the Wolves I’m Home: how it made me remember so clearly how it felt to be 15 in the 80s, when you could tell the world was changing but you didn’t really know how. There are parts of Greta that I related to, and parts of June, and so much of their sisterhood.

This isn’t a book I read quickly. Partly because it isn’t a thriller. It moves slowly, so if you read it for awhile and then put it down, you can come back to it easily. Partly because it made me intensely sad. Because of all the hard stuff that happens to the characters, and the ominous, inescapable death. But also because it creates the time period of my adolescence so vividly. I found myself missing myself—that person I used to be, when I was June’s age, when I was Greta’s. I was braver then, more willing to risk and thus more rewarded. I was so much more true to who I was inside than I am now.

Of course, you can be a teenager forever. Life makes you grow up, and June does that. She figures out how to handle the awkward situation of her intense friendship with a man her mother thinks killed her brother Finn. I think the work of handling that, of figuring out how to be honest and to say what is real, how to be less influenced by other people’s fears and narrow thoughts and more by what she knows, is the crux of the novel.

I have a theory that if AIDS had never happened, our society would still be closeted. It took a horrible disease for us to do what June does, to look at not what everyone else thinks about homosexuality but what we think, as individuals, because it wasn’t a thing anyone could pretend away anymore. There’s a conversation that June has with Toby, about how calm Finn was as he got closer to dying. Like he didn’t seem to care.

“Don’t you know?” Toby says to June. “That’s the secret. If you always make sure you’re exactly the person you hoped to be, if you always make sure you know only the very best people, then you won’t care if you die tomorrow.”

I’m not sure I agree with this completely. I think that if I could make sure I was exactly the person I hoped to be, I would want to live for a long, long time as that person. But I think it is applicable in a wider sense. If we all could figure that out, how to be exactly who we hope to be, there would be so much less anguish and fear. I think we could let people live how they wanted to live—gay or straight—because we would each know ourselves, and that would maybe be enough that no one else would rant in the aisle of Target about how gay (black, Jewish, fat, Hispanic, Mormon, female, Muslim) people are ruining the world.

This past Saturday was the Women’s Conference for the LDS church. And I am one of about thirteen people in the entire church who didn’t go.

Or so it feels.

I joked with Kendell that I didn’t need to go, because not ten minutes after the conference is over the highlights will start showing up on Facebook as inspirational images.

But my reasons for not going run far, far deeper than a silly (but true) joke. They are raw, my reasons for not going, and maybe not wise to share, but it feels important to write about.

Partly I didn’t go because, at the risk of sounding like one of those people who find fault with everything, I am not thrilled about the recent change that makes it so girls eight and older all go to the same conference. Maybe if I had a young daughter I’d feel different. But such a wide range of ages in the audience changes, obviously, the audience. The talks have to be less specific to a time in life and are thus more vague. Plus, I confess, it opens up some of my old wounds, being in a crowd of mothers and daughters spending time together. It reminds me that I wanted to have more daughters. It reminds me that I’m not as close to my mother as I wish I were. Old aches, but persistent.

In the afternoon before the conference, I went to the book festival at the Salt Lake City public library. This was sort of an ordeal to get to, as it meant I had to figure out how to get my shift covered at work and how to get my family to deal with me being gone even though I wasn’t at work. But as soon as I found out that Laini Taylor was speaking, I felt so strongly compelled to go. Not just that I wanted to, but that I needed to. So I went, and then I drove home in the pouring rain in such a conflicted emotional state. On the one hand, inspired. On the other, thoroughly discouraged at the thought of everything I never accomplished.

I kept thinking, over and over, about something she said, about how when she started blogging in 2006, she found her writerly tribe.

Her tribe.

I want a tribe.

That is another reason I didn’t go: I’m not sure that this is my tribe. I have some wonderful friends who I’ve met at church and with whom I’d be friends with even if the church stopped existing tomorrow. But when I go to large church functions, when I am surrounded by so many believers and good people living their faith, I don’t feel like I belong. Not completely. I feel like I’m pretending. Like a tare in a field of wheat, desperately trying to look like the rest of the grain. Like being a Mormon is a coat I have put on—but it isn’t my skin. It isn’t my naked self, as hard as I try to make it be. Partly this is because my reactions to things are quite often so inherently opposite to how everyone else reacts. I question, I doubt, I get hung up on little details that maybe shouldn’t matter. I feel not exactly quite at home. Even this writing is proof: what good Mormon doesn't believe she'll find an answer by listening to conference?

Earlier that day, while I was showering I was thinking about the effects of sin. About how, yes, there is forgiveness. But how forgiveness doesn’t take away the consequences. About knowing how to let go of the burden of very old guilt, worn down to its bones but still a weight I carry around. About not knowing how to let it go, I suppose. I had an imaginary conversation with an unknown church leader who accused me of not understanding the atonement, and how if I understood it I wouldn’t carry the old bones around. But maybe I don’t understand it—because when hard things happen, both new ones and the same old aches, I look at the scapula and clavicle, the femur and the ulna, and I have a different knowledge: they cannot just be put aside because they are the reason. They are always the consequence.

There just…there isn’t a talk specific enough to address all the stuff I am carrying around. If I could go and listen to council that would help me answer my deepest, hardest questions, I would go. But the widely-applicable sentiments aren’t the answers I need.  "He knows you how you really are and he loves you today and always,” for example, from President Uchtdorf. That was the first illustrated quote I saw on Facebook that Saturday night. So many people need to hear that. We all need to hear it. I need to hear it and to understand it. I know it should make me feel better. I know it should make me feel loved. But somehow, when it brushes against all that is real and hard, all the ways I have failed, somehow the thought just becomes someone else’s words.

In the end, I think I didn’t go because I have found myself in a strange place in my life. Where I want things to change. Need them to. Where I am tired of the old skeletons, the old arguments, the old aches, but also all the same old answers, given by Someone In Charge. Where I’ve lost faith that anyone else has any answers for me, or that even I have my own answers. Or that there are answers to be found. I feel thoroughly and completely stuck. I can see what I want, how I want to change, but I don’t know how to do it. And I’m fairly certain that the Women’s Conference won’t show me the way, either.

Eventually, I’m sure, I’ll listen to it. I’ll read the talks and think about them. Maybe I’ll even make an inspirational, illustrated quote of my own. But I couldn't go. I couldn't make myself go, and sit among women, and smile, and talk afterward. Listen to everyone's comments about how uplifted they felt while I still felt low. Felt lost. Leaving without an answer is worse, somehow, than not trying to find one at all. 

Did you go to the Women's Conference? What did you think?

Lately it seems the world is conspiring to make me remember random stuff from high school that I thought I’d forgotten.  Like, a few days ago Jake had to write an essay about Hawthorne’s short story “The Minister’s Black Veil.” I hadn’t read that since high school—it must’ve been in tenth grade, as they hadn’t switched American lit to eleventh then. Talking to him about the story evoked a memory of myself sitting at the computer in our musty basement (our 8088 with, of course, the DOS version of WordPerfect and two 5.25 floppy drives) trying to write about how the veil was a symbol of the minister illustrating Christ’s selfless love. (Maybe my first time with really struggling to write something, and then finally getting it right.) (Also, you have to imagine that I was white-blond and wearing black clothes and an anhk necklace and probably fuming at my mom all through the writing.) 

Earlier discussions with Jake have left me dreaming, literally dreaming, about old boyfriends. I’ve had a long discussion with my sister over this question: Is it harder to be the teenager or the mom to a teenager? (We think it’s just hard in different ways.)

 I got reacquainted with one my gymnastics teammates from my teenage years.

 And I read Megan Abbott’s The Fever.

 I haven’t read any of her noir novels. But I have now read all three of her contemporary novels, which are nothing alike except for this: she does adolescent girls so well.

 The Fever tells the story of the Nash family: Tom, the divorced dad; Eli, the hockey star, and Deenie, the daughter. Mostly this is Deenie’s story, and her friends. Her tribe, really: Lise and Gabby, and the other girls like Kim and Brooke and the white-haired Skye who are on the fringes. Well, Skye is starting to become more central, especially to Gabby. One seemingly-ordinary school day (except for what happened to Deenie the night before, in the car with Sean Lurie), Lise has a seizure, right in the middle of class. This is the start of a sort of contagion rushing through the high school girls, an epidemic of nervous-seeming conditions, fainting and public vomiting and even more seizures.

 Some of the early reviews compared this to The Crucible. (Another book I read in tenth grade!) As one of the topics that fascinated me in high school was the witch trials in Puritan America, this seemed like a perfect mix for me. And it gave me exactly what it promised: a moody, atmospheric story with a mystery at its heart, but not its soul. Its soul is the way that girls find their tribe, and the way the tribe refuses to stay together. The process of just beginning to figure out what it means to be yourself, but at this time when your body and your mind are feverish with everything that makes up adolescence. Also secrets, and envy, and a little bit of obsession.

 I loved it.

 But, I confess: I didn’t love it as much as Dare Me. 

 I can’t really pin down why, exactly. I just didn’t care as much about the characters. And I think I was hoping for more witchy behavior, which didn’t happen until near the end.

 But that’s OK because The Fever didn’t promise me it would be better than Dare Me. And it fit so squarely into my life right now, as one of the characters whose point of view we see the story through is Tom Nash, Deenie’s father, and I so related to his struggles. Sometimes, when you are the parent of a teenager—quite often, in fact—there just isn’t an answer. There’s not a book or a magazine article or an expert on adolescents to give you advice. It’s just you, trying to know what to do when you don’t know what to do. Tom is in that position nearly the entire novel, and his responses aren’t always perfect, but he manages, and it gave me a little bit of hope that I will manage too.

 Near the end, Tom is talking to another teacher at the high school. She’s telling him a story about a girl she knew in high school, the coolest girl, and the tattoo she had. Then she shows Tom a little part of her own tattoo. “And so,” Tom said. “Marked for life.”

 “That’s what high school does,” the teacher responds.

 I don’t know if that’s true for everyone, but it holds true for me. How it marks us, in ways both extraordinary and common, is what Abbott is so good at writing and why I will always read her. 

Back at the beginning of September, my friend Marnie wrote a WCS post about finding an image that captures what the end of summer looks like to you. (Go read it HERE!) I’ve been thinking and looking for my image ever since. I’m not sure I didn’t start too late! For me, summer doesn’t end when the kids start back to school, because they start so early here in Utah (August 19 this year) and because it takes awhile, quite often, for summer to wind down. I don’t know, is it like that everywhere? Look up at the mountains and it’s fall, but here in the valley the grass is still green and the days still hot.

For me, it really feels like fall has started once I am tempted to wear a long-sleeved running shirt!

The end-of-summer image is almost one I haven’t even taken, but probably you can imagine: a bowl of peaches in morning sunlight. This is because, on the day that Kaleb started first grade and I realized what it truly means to have all of your kids at school  all day(a certain sadness), I went running and then I made a peach smoothie with peaches from my niece’s in-law’s peach orchard. The most delicious, perfectly ripe peaches I’ve ever eaten. The peaches I buy every summer now, and every time I taste one I remember that smoothie and that feeling. That sadness/freedom mix that the end of summer brings.

It’s almost that image.

But the end-of-summer feeling is also so tied to being outside that it is an outdoor image. Not the mountains, where it already is fall, but my very own yard, where summer is lingering. Where, at the end of August and into the end of September (if we don’t get a cold snap), these flowers bloom:

 
I fight them all summer because they try so hard to overtake one of my iris patches. They are very nearly flower bullies. But then they bloom and I remember why I put up with them, these flowers I don’t have a name for. They are the last bit of bright, cool color I’ll find in my yard until spring brings the crocus back. They are like all the bright light of summer turned into petals.

A metaphor for the end of summer.

Today, when there are only a few true days of summer left, a look back at some of my favorite summer 2014 memories, the ones I either didn’t or couldn’t photograph:

Doing yoga on the beach with Haley. This was when we were in Cabo in June. The resort where we stayed had yoga every morning, but we only made it once. Right in front of the beach they have a patch of springy grass, and a pile of towels, and an energetic yoga instructor counting in English with her soft Spanish accent. Green grass, turquoise water, bright blue sky, waves crashing on the sand and that deep, relaxing stretch that only yoga brings. All with my favorite daughter! After, we stood and watched a school of manta rays flipping in the surf.

Hiking with Jake. It might be obvious (or not) that this hasn’t been the easiest teen/mom summer. There has been a lot of frustration and plenty of misunderstandings. In July I made him go hiking with me, partly because he was boasting about being faster than me! Faster maybe…but he’d apparently forgotten my endurance. So we started out on a steep trail with a friendly, competitive spirit. He coaxed me up the slippery spots. We talked and laughed. My endurance beat his speed. We took a wrong turn but navigated back so we weren’t lost for too long, and in the way that exercise has of wearing down all the negative feelings, for that morning we were our old, comfortable-with-each-other selves.

Shopping at Old Navy with Nathan. I tell you…I had a hard time getting motivated to go back-to-school clothes shopping this year. Kaleb wears a uniform and I had to buy him a whole new batch of shirts last spring when he hit a growth spurt, so he didn’t need anything much. Jake is always “ehhh” about shopping for clothes, so I usually just pick out some stuff I think he’ll like and he usually likes it. Nathan though—he’s particular. He likes to look nice and he has a specific “look” he is aiming for. He really, desperately needs some new jeans, but he is growing so fast that I asked him to please wait until it cooled off. I’ll take him to American Eagle in October. (He wears a 28/32 jean. Do you know how hard it is to find that size?) So we went to Old Navy to look for shirts. Just me and him. We talked, we laughed, we found some shirts he loved. He’s a good companion…easy to spend time with, even when haggling for more clothes. (And of course a belt!)

Running with Kaleb. This is probably silly. It’s a tiny moment. But I loved it. In August, Kaleb’s cub scout troop had a pack meeting at the park, with obstacle courses and outdoor games. One of the stations was just a simple race between two cones. I took off my shoes and I race him, barefoot in the grass. I ran as fast as I could (or, I guess, as fast as I could trust my ankle) and laughed while we ran. He was happy and I was happy and I’ll let you guess if he won fair and square or I let him win.

Sitting on the side of Tioga Road in Yosemite with Kendell. After we hiked Lembert Dome, we started driving for a bit, but pretty soon we both realized how thirsty we were. So we pulled over at a tiny little gravel patch and then pulled the bowl of watermelon out of the cooler in the back of the van. We sat in the van and ate the watermelon and it was the coolest, most refreshing thing ever. He was happy, I was happy, and we had cold melon. So sweet.

Doing water aerobics with my mom. Again at Cabo. Same resort, same soft-voiced instructor. When we finished working out, she had the whole group make a circle in the middle of the pool. We held each other’s wrists, and then every other person lifted up their feet and started floating, and the others started walking in a circle, so the floating people spun in a widening gyre. First my mom floated, and as I held her wrist I could feel how delicate it is, and the strain in her shoulders, the age in her bones, which should terrify me but it didn’t. It just felt like her, right now, in my hands. Then I floated and she held part of me up (a stranger was holding my other hand), helping me balance, and I just loved her so much right in that moment.

Swimming in Chileno Bay with Suzette. Can you stand one more Cabo story? Most of the beaches there aren’t safe for swimming, so one day we drove to Chileno Bay. Haley and I swam out to the roped-off edge of the bay and then back, and then Suzette and I hung out together in the water. She’d had a hard time getting past where the waves crashed, and had a scary moment when they tumbled her around. But with the help of her daughter Madi (who came racing into the water with a lifeguard kick, because she is an actual lifeguard) and a trio of kind Mexican men, she made it into the deep water. So we floated out there in the salty water, which was so cold, but the day was so hot it didn’t matter. We laughed at her near-drowning because it really wasn’t that she almost drowned. We laughed at our beautiful daughters and our mother sunning herself on the sand and our soft, wrinkled, middle-aged selves. It was perfect.

Driving with Becky. At this year’s Ragnar, I was sort of lame. I fell asleep in the van at the second major exchange (when it was starting to get dark), and then I was completely out of it. I’d wake up just the smallest bit when our team’s runners were coming in and out of the van, but I was mostly dead-cold asleep. (This felt lame because I did virtually zero cheering for my teammates, during the roughest legs. On the other hand, it didn’t even feel like a choice. I was just…asleep.) This meant, though, that after my night leg (which happened “late” enough that it was really a very-early morning leg, in the light!), I wasn’t so thoroughly exhausted. In Ragnars past, I’ve had that out-cold moment after my second run, so I’ve never been awake for the drive to the last major exchange. But this year, I was! Everyone else was asleep except for me and Becky (who was driving). We talked a little bit, and I admired the scenery, and I was at that point of tiredness when you’re full of energy and happiness, and the sun was up with that early-morning color of summer light, and I was just so happy to be there with my sweet, fantastic sister.

Running in Yosemite with just myself. We had two mornings in Yosemite, the one when we hiked and then the next day. I was so determined to get up early on the second morning and go running on the bike trails in Yosemite Valley. But I came down with an ugly cold (it hit me when we had three miles of hiking left) and that morning? There was no early waking up. I had an actual fever. So no running, either. But, I did have my running moment the day before. This happened in the Little Yosemite Valley, which is a mostly-flat section of the trail. I stopped to take some pictures of the river, and when I turned around, I couldn’t see Kendell, Jeff, or Lenna. I couldn’t see anyone, in fact. So I stood in the quiet, savoring the very-rare experience of a moment of solitude in Yosemite. Then I adjusted all my straps—and I ran. It was only for roughly four and a half minutes, and it was the awkward run you can only do when you’ve got a pack on your back and a big camera on your chest and you’re running in hiking boots. But, running nonetheless. In Yosemite, by myself. It was blissful.

What image sums up the end of summer for you? What were your favorite summer moments?

It's starting to feel like fall here---despite the fact that it was 90 degrees yesterday. My autumn decorations are slowly making their way onto the different flat surfaces in my house. The mountains are ablaze with color, the mornings are just the right amount of cool (perfect running weather!), and the light has changed to that glimmery shade it will have for the next few months.

On Monday I made these cookies, and Nathan walked into the kitchen. "Yes!" he said. "I know fall is here, because Mom's baking with pumpkin!"

So there's that, too.

This was a new recipe I tried. I altered it a little bit, but I started with this as the base. They are delicious!

Pumpkin Spice Frosted Cookies

cookies:

2 sticks butter, softened
2 eggs
2 cups white sugar
1 cup brown sugar, packed
2 cups canned pumpkin
2 tsp vanilla
2 tsp baking soda
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt

3 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp nutmeg
3/4 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp ground cloves
1 cup whole wheat flour
4 cups white flour
1 recipe frosting (on back)
1 cup white chocolate chips
2 cups dark chocolate chips

Cream the butter and sugars until pale and fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, scraping between each. Beat in the vanilla and pumpkin. Combine remaining dry ingredients, then slowly beat in. Add the chocolate chips last. Drop onto a greased cookie sheet. Bake at 350 for 13-16 minutes, checking at 12.

frosting: 

2 sticks butter, separated
3 T brown sugar, packed
½ cup canned pumpkin
1 tsp cinnamon
½ tsp nutmeg
½ tsp ginger
1/4 tsp cloves
dash salt
1 t vanilla
1 ½ lbs powdered sugar (about)

Brown one stick of butter by melting it over medium heat. Then turn the heat to medium low and let it cook, swirling occasionally, until it is browned. Let cool to room temperature. Cream remaining stick (softened) with the brown sugar, pumpkin, and spices. Pour in the browned butter and cream again. Start adding the powdered sugar one cup at a time, creaming as you go, until the frosting is as thick as you like it. Spread on the cooled cookies.

Here's a PDF with the recipe:
Download Cookies pumpkin spice frosted

What's your favorite pumpkin recipe?

Last October, I went to Italy on a guided tour. This was one of my mom’s dreams, to go to Italy together with her daughters, and she got it all organized for us. I’ve never traveled like this before—the itinerary, transportation, and accommodations all planned by someone else, and everyone in the larger group a complete stranger. I think I’d do it again, but there are a few things I wish I would’ve known from the very first day of the trip. Here are my tips for traveling with a group on a guided tour (along with some of my favorite photos from Italy):

1. Get a travel guidebook of your own. That sort of sounds counterintuitive…why would you need to read and learn about a place where you’ll have someone guiding and teaching you? We had some really excellent tour guides on my trip. (I can’t think about Rome without hearing our Rome guide’s beautiful voice saying “Roma” and “andiamo!”) But when you already know some of the history,
geography, politics, art, and architecture of the places you’re going, your response to the area will be so much more complex and complete. In the places I hadn’t read about (namely, Orvietto and San Gimgiano) I felt like I didn’t know what to focus on because I didn’t know what I could do there. My experience was much richer in, say, Florence and Siena, where I’d read about the basilicas, towers, history, and famous people. Sometimes the tour guide will repeat something you’ve learned, but then you can just nod your head in your shared wisdom. Plus, a guidebook will give you some ideas for where to eat, which is handy when you don’t have an international data plan on your smart phone.

2. Take advantage of having a guide. Stick close to him/her and listen. Ask questions too. These are people who thoroughly and intimately know the cities you’re only visiting. The knowledge and details they share with you are, quite frankly, part of what you paid for. Wandering through an unknown city is much more fun when you learn about what you’re looking at, rather than only looking at it. Plus you’ll have more little tidbits to share when you get home. (And, speaking of paying for the guides…remember that you’ll need to tip them when they’re finished. I didn’t know this and I would’ve got more cash if I had.)

3. Make friends! This is the best thing about traveling with people you don’t know: you get to meet other people. I loved talking to and getting to know other people in our group. We were all pretty different in lifestyles, careers, families, and time of life. It didn’t matter because we found different things in common. If you are traveling with people you know (like I was with my mom and two sisters), it’s easy to be sort of clique-y and stick just to that group. But your experience will be much more fun if you try to make friends with everyone. Go to all of the group activities, especially the meals. Sit by someone new every time you eat as a
 group, or in the bus. Ask people what they are reading or listening to. Ask to look at their pictures or what they thought about a place. I enjoyed this so much that I found myself striking up conversations with other strangers as well, like the father and daughter from Ireland who we chatted with at a restaurant in Rome. (This isn’t normally a strength of my introverted personality.) Talking to them (and listening to their accent) was one of my favorite moments.

4. Be patient with people. Everyone has different travel styles and expectations. This is not a bad thing, but sometimes it can be a challenge. Maybe you’re expecting lots of time to linger in gift stores because that’s your thing. But someone else’s thing is more time in the actual museum (or whatever). You can work around this by talking to people, letting them know what you are hoping to do, and perhaps most importantly, remembering you’re not the only one on the trip. Also remember that you can only move as quickly as the slowest person in your group. If you are a fast walker, use your extra time for lingering in the doorways of shops, admiring perspectives you’d otherwise miss, or taking pictures. If you are a slow walker, don’t feel guilty or worried about it. You’re just giving the faster people chances to get more intimate with the place you’re in.

5. Expect that you'll start to rub on each other. If you were traveling with twenty or 25 people you knew and loved, this would still be true, so when it’s people you don’t know very well? It happens. There will be someone who bugs you. That's OK, because you're likely bugging someone else. Decide not to be a victim of annoyance by doing your best to overlook the actions of someone else who is rubbing you the wrong way; assume the best about everyone. By the third day, I was acutely and painfully aware of which person I was bugging. By the fifth day I decided I didn’t care if I was bugging him because I had paid for my trip, too, and I wasn’t going to let his annoyance ruin it. The best way to deal with someone who’s bothering you? Take advantage of any and all free time. Which brings us to tip number 6.

6. Take advantage of any and all free time. This is another reason for the first tip. If you have some basic knowledge of the city, a map (already in the guidebook!), and an idea of what you want to see, you’ll be much more productive with your free time. I, for example, did not read up on Bologna before we got there, so with the free time we had, we saw the main basilica and not much else. But when we were in Rome and had an entire afternoon to ourselves, my sister Becky and I saw the Castel Sant’Angelo, the Spanish Steps, and several other landmarks. We walked next to the Tiber river; we revisited the places we’d felt rushed in before, like the Pantheon and Trevi Fountain; we found
the metro and figured out how to ride it back to our hotel. (That was one of my favorite afternoons.) We knew we wanted to do all of those things because we’d both read a guidebook or two. Don’t be afraid to let yourself get a little bit lost. You’ll discover things you love that you couldn’t find any other way, and people are friendly in Italy. Even if you’re really lost, someone will help you find your way back. (Just keep watching your watch if you have to be back at a certain time!)

7. Thoroughly understand what is happening each day. Don't assume anything! Ever since I first saw the itinerary for our trip, I was anticipating the moment we would walk through the duomo in Siena. One of my friends had told me how much she loved it, especially the interior, and I couldn’t wait to see and feel what she told me about. While we were in Siena, however, we toured the Basilica of San Domenico instead. This was a beautiful, simple church, with the head (literally) of St. Catherine enshrined in one of its naves. I enjoyed learning about it. But then we just walked right past the Siena duomo! We saw the outside but it wasn’t in the plan to go inside of it.
If I had understood the plan for the rest of the day, I would have known that I did have enough time to see the cathedral on my own if I skipped out on part of the tour. (There is no rule that says you have to stay with the group the entire time.) Sticking with the tour most of the time is probably the best idea, but if there is something you must absolutely see, and it’s not on the itinerary but there is time for you to see it on your own, I say be brave and go for it. But this can only happen if you understand what is happening each day. Ask questions! 

8. Be on time. Nothing annoys group members as much as having to wait for someone. I know this for two reasons—I waited for late people, and I was late myself. Twice, in fact. The first time happened when we were walking back to the bus, but as I was with more members of the group than just myself, I wasn’t worried. (People still thought I was late.) The second time I was late really was unforgiveable. It happened when we were leaving in the morning, on one of the days we were changing hotels, and it took Becky and I longer to pack than we thought. I’m still embarrassed that it happened. Especially pay attention to the meeting time when you have free time or if you are breaking away from the group. It helps everything run more smoothly and it’s probably nice not to embarrass yourself.

9. Be open to unexpected and spontaneous experiences. One of my favorite moments happened in Rome. Becky and I were in the lobby one night, sort of late, and we noticed there was a bunch of people from our tour group hanging out in the bar. So we joined them. Again: introvert here. My heart was pounding at first, and I didn’t do an excellent job at mingling. But I managed it. And actually had fun! Another spontaneous moment happened in our hotel near Venice. A few minutes before we were supposed to meet at the bus in the morning, some of the group members ended up in the lobby together. There was a piano, and one of the members (a skilled, professional pianist) played a song for us. It was amazing and beautiful and wonderful. I have a theory that if your heart and mind are open—not too devoted to schedules or personal fears or anything else—then life will bring you these unexpected moments. Watch out for them, and then grab them when you have the chance!

10. Get the email addresses of the people in your tour group. Especially the ones you'd like to swap pictures with. I still would like to do this! If you are taking pictures, you’re far less likely to be in your pictures. But you’re probably in other people’s pictures (just like you’ll have some great photos of the other tour group members). Figure out a way to share them. The group I traveled with did not do this, but I still would like to see some of their pictures.

And, I know I wrote that this is a top ten list, but here’s a very important bonus tip:

Go to the bathroom every chance you get. Seriously. Italians must have the world's largest bladders, I don't know. But there are very few bathrooms. So prepare yourself. Keep a Euro or two in your pocket (yes, you have to pay for many of them) and whenever anyone finds a bathroom, use it. If you find a bathroom, tell everyone else about it. This doesn't seem like a tip that fits with traveling with a group, but I promise: you'll annoy people if all you talk about is how badly you have to pee. And it's hard to be social and outgoing when you’re uncomfortable like that. 

Have you ever traveled with a group? What suggestions do you have?

(Read more about my moments in Italy:

First church in Rome

In the Accademia

Florence)

One of my goals for the rest of the year:

Scrapbook less.

OK, that sounds like a fairly crazy goal, right? It’s my favorite hobby. I have a whole room dedicated to scrapbooking. I’ve taught classes and written articles and blog posts about it. It’s been my place for the past almost-twenty years.

But I’m also realizing that it’s my comfort zone. When I’m making a layout, I’m happy. I cheerfully cut paper and flip through my pretty supplies. I feel all pat-myself-on-the-shoulder-y, because it’s a good thing, yes? Keeping the details of your family history.

And even though I have a growing disconnect between myself and the Scrapbooking Industry, I don’t know that it will ever not be my thing. It makes me happy in many ways.

But it doesn’t challenge me.

I've been re-reading The War of Art, a book that focuses on resistance and how it keeps us from doing what we want to be doing, and I keep thinking about this idea:

Resistance will tell you anything to keep you from doing your work. It will perjure, fabricate, falsify; seduce, bully, cajole.

And also this one:

Resistance obstructs movement only from a lower sphere to a higher. 

And this one:

Like a magnetized needle floating on a surface of oil, Resistance will unfailingly point to true North—meaning that calling or action it most wants to stop us from doing. ... The more important a call or action is to our soul's evolution, the more Resistance we will feel toward pursuing it.

Right now, scrapbooking is the form my Resistance takes. It seduces me away from writing. And without writing (writing for real, writing that other people can see and respond to) I don’t feel fulfilled with my life.

I feel like I have missed a turn I was supposed to take, and the road I am on is in the same location I was meant to be in…but not exactly the right place. I know where I want to be (in the country of the writers, to continue my metaphor), but I haven’t pushed myself to find the way. I’ve just continued on with my happy little wandering journey, with my bits of scrapbooking creativity, gaining miniscule amounts of success in an industry where I don’t really fit (having words, yes, but not the skill of graphicality—not the ability to use design like others do), and feeling sort of hollow.

So here’s my current mantra: less scrapbooking, more writing!

And when I am scrapbooking (because really, I can’t imagine life without it), I want more authenticity. More meaningful details. More stuff I’ll be glad I spent the time on. (Not more intricate decoration.) I want to make layouts that make me happy, even if they don’t necessarily jive with the current scrapbooking aesthetic. I want to share more layouts on my blog, not because I think one of them will finally be my way of being noticed but because I just like sharing what I’ve made.

And I want to be able to accomplish more in less time.

One of the ways I’ve found to scrapbook faster is by using sketches. I don’t do it very often because that would require me to find sketches and then organize them. (Which takes more time!) But this summer at Write. Click. Scrapbook. we’ve been having Saturday Sketches. I haven’t played along with all of them, but the ones I have have consistently taught me: a sketch makes it go faster. Especially for me, where all my energy goes into the words, and where my strength is writing the story, not arranging the pretties.

I see more sketches in my future.

And in the spirit of sharing, here’s a layout I made using last week’s Saturday Sketch:

(Fairly grainy photo-of-layout because it's been grey and rainy here all week!)

I started it when I was home on the weekend for my lunch hour, and then I finished it later that day…so I spent maybe an hour, total, on this. Which for me is like Ethopian-marathoner fast. In the end, it looks almost nothing like the original sketch (click HERE to see it and some other layouts made with it). I turned it sideways but the journaling strips are still horizontal, and I used one photo instead of two. Copying exactly, however, is not ever my goal when I use a sketch. Instead, I like how it got me started and gave me enough of a structure that I could put everything together quickly. I love how it turned out!

If you are a scrapbooker, do you use sketches? How do you organize them? 

When you go to Rome, you are supposed to throw a coin with your right hand over your left shoulder into the Trevi fountain if you want to return to Rome.
 I tossed a Euro and made the wish, and while I loved Rome and hope to go back there again, the city I most want to revisit is Florence.

Since we went to Italy on a guide tour, the itinerary was already planned. We didn't stay in Florence, but drove there from Montecatini. Once we arrived, we met up with a tour guide who walked us through the city.

Everywhere you look in Florence, there is a small,beautiful detail

The famous Odeon theater. We didn't catch a flick.

Even the doors are beautiful!

We stopped at the Florence Cathedral (the Basilica di Santa Maria del Fiori) and the Baptistery,

(I found this image of Santa Maria by doing a Google image search! Alas, not mine!)

but since we were there on a Sunday we couldn't actually go inside the buildings. (People were going to church there.) After taking some photos and getting us each a copy of a city map, the tour guide showed us more of Florence. She pointed out monuments, buildings, museums, and bridges with historical importance, giving us an idea of the city's layout, and then led us to the Accademia, where I had my moment with the slaves. 

Then we had some free time.

Most of the people in the group decided to go to the leather market. I was sorely tempted to join them, as I had visions of finding a belt for Nathan (belts being one of his favorite things, ever since he was little) and a gorgeous Italian leather backpack for myself. But Becky and I had other ideas. We had someone show us where we would all meet up (as well as the location of the leather market, just in case we had time), the San Lorenzo basilica, and then we were off on our own adventure.

We wanted to climb the 414 stairs in Giotto's Campanile.

Having already earned our title as the "straggler sisters" (a story in its own right), we didn't want to be late to the meeting place. So we hustled. We stopped at a little restaurant on a side street, where we scarfed a delicious pizza and a thoroughly disappointing cannola. (One of my wishes for my trip to Italy that wasn't realized: eating some delicious and amazing cannoli.) Then, as we walked to the Campanile following our handy map, one of the street vendors stopped Becky to tell her she'd dropped something. When we looked behind us and saw nothing he said, "You dropped my heart, beautiful lady." This was her third Italian admirer, but alas, we did not have time for her to be wooed.

But it did make us laugh all the way to the Piazza del Duomo.

Giotto's Campanile is the free-standing bell tower of Florence Cathedral. It is absolutely breathtaking even before you start climbing the stairs. (I cannot believe I didn’t take one photo of the tower itself.) Dark pink, white, and green marble in geometric patterns, hexagonal relief panels depicting biblical scenes and scholarly ideas, rows of lozenges, niches, and statues. Like the cathedral, it was designed to look like a painting. Very ornate, of course, but so beautiful. The top three levels are each built larger than the lower one, so that when you look up at the tower, the effects of perspective cannot be seen. It took 25 years to build the tower; during part of that time no work was completed because of the Black Plague.

Oh how I wish I could hear the history stories those old stones could tell!

Becky and I laughed, talked, and breathed fairly heavily going up those stairs. It's a sort of a spiral staircase, sometimes curving but mostly turning sharply, very narrow and steep, with a low ceiling.

When I took this photo from one of the stair landings I thought I was being creative. I've since seen about a million interpretations of it.

As we climbed, I thought about the people in the past who would've done this as part of their lives. The people who rang the bells, or priests I suppose. The stairs are worn smooth from people's feet, but the high reaches of the walls are dusty. It is like breathing in history.

 At the top, we wandered around.

(The tiles on top of the tower. I prefer to think that white stuff is patina, not bird poop. Please do not disabuse me of this notion. Thank you.)

There was a procession of some sort, winding its way through the narrow streets.

The view is fairly amazing, all of those Tuscan rooftops and narrow streets, the birthplace of the Renaissance spread out below you.  

I really, really wish I would've taken more pictures. I wish I would've handed my camera over to a stranger for a photo of me and Becky on top of the tower. I wish I would've crouched down at the bottom of the tower and photographed it that way. I wish I would've taken more pictures on top. I have some pictures—but not enough, and that is an exact reflection of my frustrated feeling that day. I tend to get impatient with photography when I am in a bad mood. 

I was in Florence...and I was in a bad mood. How dumb of me. But it felt like being given an entire box of chocolates and then having time to eat half of one. I wanted the whole box! I wanted to have time to see all of Florence. So it's not that I was grumpy. Just highly frustrated.

Once we stood on the top of the tower, and admired the view, we climbed back down, and set off to find the Ponte Vecchio.
This is a bridge that crosses the Arno River, and was the only bridge not destroyed by the Germans when they retreated from Florence during World War II. Florentine bridges used to all have those buildings on top—they were places for shopping and gathering. Only the Ponte Vecchio still has them. They used to be butcher shops, but now they are little shops where you can buy jewelry and souvenirs. 

By this time,  we were seriously racing to beat the clock. We crossed the Arno on the Santa Trinita bridge.

This is a bridge that was destroyed during the war. On each of its entrances, it has two statues, and they were destroyed as well. Each of the four statues depicts one of the seasons. After the war, the bridge was rebuilt and the statues pieced back together (their parts mostly lying in the river until they were restored). I wanted to stop and admire each statue, but since we didn’t have much time, I settled for photographing each of them. The light was bad and I was hurrying so even that “settling” was disappointing as the pictures aren’t great.
(I had to convert them all to black and white. Otherwise they were too awful to look at.)

The best photo I took of the statues was this one, which is the back of the summer statue:

It is so moving to me—the clear lines of where it was pieced back together are evocative of my Mary figurine and what it still means to me. 

After crossing the bridge, we speed-walked down a small side street to get to the Ponte Vecchio. This is one of my most vivid memories of Florence, for some reason, the small shops with their lighted windows and food, the heavy grey skies, the hustle of the crowds, the slight scent of the river. We turned a corner and there it was, the Ponte Vecchio. I wanted to stop and linger but we had like eight minutes to get to San Lorenzo. I crossed the Ponte Vecchio—but I didn't get to linger or really experience it.

We started to sprint. And then the weirdest thing happened—I slowed down. You have to know this about me: I am seriously a fast walker. But for some reason, I just could not walk fast. Or at least not as fast as Becky was walking. My feet were hot and my ankle was throbbing (I had my brace on) and I felt like I was walking through mud.
As I got slower I got more and more frustrated. What was wrong with me?

We passed the leather market and I looked at my watch, but there was definitely no time to shop, so my perfect Italian leather backpack and Nathan’s favorite belt stayed in Italy. We kept walking and we made it to San Lorenzo with three minutes to spare—and no one was there to see the Straggler Sisters' early arrival! Or, at least, no one from our group. All that hurried rushing only to discover we could have lingered for just a bit.

San Lorenzo is one of the oldest churches in Florence. It’s surrounded by an enormous square of crumbling stone steps. I sat down on the stairs of the church and I took off my boots so I could get rid of my ankle brace. I actively did not take any photos. Even though I want one now, so much, even just of my boots on the steps. Of that ancient church and my Eeyore self. I'm pretty sure Becky sat ten feet away from me, because she didn't want to be inundated by the waves of frustration rolling off of me. There we were in Florence, with a ridiciulously small amount of time to actually see much, and I finally realized why I had been walking so slow: I needed to pee. SO BADLY.

One thing about Italy: they don't really do bathrooms. Probably if you know all of the secrets, you know where the bathrooms are. But in that square, I couldn't find one. And I was in serious pain. I walked (slowly) around the square, hoping to find a bathroom. I didn't dare ask anyone "dove e il bagno?" because there was no way I could understand their quick responses. So I looked (in vain) through the belts a small merchant was selling. I saw no leather backpacks. Becky stood watch for me as the tour group members started trickling back, and then I just gave up. I sat down right there, on the steps of a church that seemed beautiful in such a simple, striking way, in a remarkable city full of history, architecture, art, and beauty, and I felt such a combination of annoyance, frustration, and desire for more that it was like I was sitting in a black puddle.

I might as well have just gone ahead and peed my pants.

And then I had my Florence Moment.

A nun, walking toward the church but from a different angle from where I was sitting, changed directions. She walked right over to me, patted my shoulder, and touched my forehead with the thumb of her other hand. She said something in Italian, squeezed my shoulder, and walked into the church.

My puddle evaporated.

I don't know what she said. Maybe it was "you're acting like a giant baby right now." Maybe it was “Yes, you didn’t get to see everything you wanted, but you are here, right now, in Italy. Cheer up.” Maybe it was “there’s a bathroom around that corner.”

But to me it was a blessing. A benediction of sorts. I thought about the feeling I had had while in St. Peter’s Cathedral, standing in front of the statue of St. Peter, which has a foot that, if you touch it, is supposed to give you a blessing. The foot is worn thin from so many centuries of touch, and it made me think about how powerful touch is, how it connects us and yes, blesses us. How we give a small portion of ourself in that touch, too. Being touched on the shoulder by the nun was the same feeling, only better because this was real.

My frustration drained away.

Eventually, everyone from the tour group arrived. In fact, I think they all thought I was the late one holding everyone up. I wasn’t late though. I was sitting on the ancient steps in front of an ancient church, thinking about how moments with God are not limited to time in churches or temples. They are not narrowed by religious denomination or gender or nationality. They are a thing you can find anywhere, even when you have blocked yourself into a black emotional corner.

The spirit is everywhere if you watch for it. Or maybe you sometimes have to sit still enough in your darkness for the light to find you, but it will.

I won’t say everything was magically better. I still had tons of walking left with my stupid aching bladder holding me back. (Our tour guide finally stopped at a bathroom in a tiny alleyway and I have never been so grateful to hand over money to pee.)
I still wanted to shop and explore. Not getting to examine statues in the Loggia di Lanzia in the Piazza della Signoria (Perseus with the Head of Medusa, The Rape of the Sabine Women, the Medici lions…) felt like ripping my heart out.
Walking past the Uffizi without going in—the Uffizi where Bottecelli’s “Birth of Venus” is hanging?—was physically painful.

But I had more of a peaceful heart (even if it was ripped out of my chest) and a lift to my feet. I tried to savor whatever I had left of Florence—walking past the city hall,
at least seeing those statues, listening to the tour guide talk about Santa Croce, a Christian church designed by a Jewish architect who included a Star of David. (This is where Michelangelo, Galileo, and Machiavelli are buried.)

I don’t know if I’ll ever get back to Florence. There wasn’t a fountain to throw a coin into along with a wish. But it’s there, on the top of my list: revisit Florence. See all the churches. Go to the Uffizi. See more of the Accademia than just the Slaves and David. Walk slowly along the Arno, cross all the bridges, shop at the leather market.

Find my Italian leather backpack.

But even if I don’t ever go back, the nun’s blessing (for that is how I will think of it) centered me enough that I could remember how lucky I was to be in Italy.

I just wanted to go to church on time.

Or at all, because the past three weeks I haven’t made it (due to adolescent angst). (Not mine.)

So I made to get up and get going with plenty of time to get to church by 11:00. I put the pork roast in the microwave to defrost, and then I made French toast and got everyone started on getting ready for church. Then I printed out the announcements for relief society and started to get myself ready.

Then I remembered I hadn’t put the pork in the crock pot.

So I hurried to dry off and get dressed. I gave Kendell his marching orders: he needed to take the boys to church, I’d put the pork together and then meet them over there.

I’d be a few minutes late, true. But better than not going, right?

So I start the sauce (toss the Rotel tomatoes in the blender, then mix with some brown sugar and Dr. Pepper) and open the microwave, and yes: the microwave has done its special thing, which is stop half way through the defrost time so you can turn the meat. Only I didn’t notice it had stopped because I was in the bath.

Which means it’s only partly defrosted.

And this is a big pork roast (I’m feeding three growing boys here). Too big to fit into the crock pot unless I cut it in half.

So I set it on the cutting board and find my biggest knife.

Meanwhile, Nathan is already at church waiting for us and Kaleb can’t find his tie and Jake is dragging his heels and Kendell is all “let’s leave NOW so we can walk” and Jake’s like “I’ll just stay here then and come late with mom because I am not walking” and I’m being perfectly quiet but inside my head I’m fuming at myself because I had more than two hours to get ready and yet I’m late again, and I’m fuming at Kendell because can’t he just load them up into the *&$*#ing van and take them, and I’m fuming at Jake for being such a teenager, and I’m sawing silently away at the half-thawed raw pork, and the blade gets stuck.

And instead of calmly wiggling it out like a non-silently-fuming person would do, I yank on the knife as hard as I can, with all the fuel of my fumingness behind the yank.

And it slides right out of the pork.

And slices right into my forehead.

So then I threw the knife down and I screamed every. single. swear word that was fuming around inside my head, and I clamp my hand across my forehead (immediately wondering if you can only catch trichinosis by eating raw pork? Or can it get in through a wound?). Jake and Kendell rushed over and Jake was perfectly calm. He offered to cut the pork for me and Kendell hustled me to the bathroom where I looked in the mirror at a long, narrow cut, and I’m sobbing and shaking and bleeding and my heart is pounding and I wailed but I don’t want an ugly scar! And then he put a big clump of toilet paper on it, which distracted me enough from my worries about scars because, ewww. THAT IS WHAT GAUZE IS FOR.

So I stopped shaking and crying and my heart stopped pounding because Kaleb (who had meanwhile found his tie) started telling me it could be worse, at least it didn’t cut my brain open, and you can’t shake, cry, and panic when you’re laughing.

Because really: how embarrassing is it to head to the ER (wounds requiring medical attention never happen when the doctor’s office is open, ever) to tell this story:

So, I was cutting some pork, and the knife got stuck so I yanked it out and yeah, I cut my forehead open with the back of a knife.

It’s a very common kitchen injury, the head wound.

What’s worse?

It was just shallow enough not to stitch. So I had to go to the ER, and listen to Kendell complain about how much the bill will be, and tell that story to the guy checking me in, and to the nurse who cleaned it off, and to the doctor and his two medical-student assistants.

And then they glued the stupid cut closed.

I would way rather have stitches than glue. Stitches at least look serious. (Stitches can at least be covered with a bandaid.) The glue shouldn't be covered because then forehead sweat will gather and dissolve the glue too quickly. The glue looks like I have a big, shiny glob of spit stuck to my forehead, with the cut, which turned purple, underneath.

But he promised me the scar will be smaller this way.

He better be right.

On the bright side, the pork is in the crock pot, and we’ll be having sweet pork burritos for dinner.

I was very careful not to bleed on it, I promise.