It’s no secret that I love the ocean. I have a board on Pinterest dedicated to ocean pictures and quotes. I have a t-shirt that says “I’d Rather be at the Beach,” and throughout my house there are several jars with shells I’ve collected.
Dear man who offered to help me in the Barnes & Noble parking lot on Saturday, I’m sorry I was kind of bitchy. You were doing this nice thing and I was frustrated and angry and didn’t even turn around to acknowledge your offer.
Rod’s cancer is in his body but it belongs to us both. There is not one second that I am not thinking of it and choking from the fear of it. He takes a pain pill and I take something for stress. We take turns getting up throughout the night…
I don’t know much — OK, anything — about foreign policy. I don’t know why we all just can’t get along, share and play nice like we were taught in kindergarten. I don’t understand why any of us think we own this planet and have any more right to one part of it than anyone else. I also don’t understand why people litter. I’m so silly.
I am truly not hard to please. If you ask my husband I believe he will agree. I am content to eat a salad for dinner and a day out is a trip to Victoria Secret to cash in my coupon for free underwear. Nevertheless, for the past year I have been whining daily about needing a new bed.
Husband and wife, mother and father, and now Buntology film critics? Check out the first installment of Rod and Rochelle’s latest feature, in which they watch and review obscure Netflix movies so you don’t have to.
My husband and I just celebrated our 30th wedding anniversary.
Being married for 30 years is significantly more impressive than 25 years, although the 25th anniversary is typically the one that gets the big party and all the attention.
It’s a whole new decade of marriage. It’s like turning the big 3-0 as compared to 25.
Since I got married at 26, the “married me” years now clearly outnumber the “not married me” years. This is just one more sign of being middle aged that occurs to me at 2 a.m.
I have reached the point of being married where others ask for my advice.
What is the secret to a successful marriage? First of all, just because you are married for a long time does not mean the marriage is successful. It may mean you haven’t figured a way out that doesn’t result in a jail sentence or homelessness. Several times during our 30 years both of these possibilities forced us to suck it up and “work out” our differences.
I believe having a very big house is the key to a happy marriage.
I hate shopping. [editor’s note: no really- she hates it.]
And I especially hate it on a beautiful summer day when I could be doing a whole lot of anything else.
"I wanna destroy the passer-by, 'cause I wanna be anarchy..."
Nevertheless, sometimes you have to go buy a few things, and in North Adams if it isn’t Wal-Mart or The Dollar Tree then it’s a trip to Target.
My husband and I like to call these outings a “date.” This is supposed to make us feel happy and in love instead of miserable and filled with dread as we consider if we have enough gas to drive the 15 miles to the store, or whether we could have postponed buying laundry soap and toilet paper just one more week.
This trip would be brief. Rod would go in his direction and I in mine. Zip, zip, meet at the register and done. And it went just that way.
Once at the register Rod gave me a Visa gift card that he wanted to use toward the purchases. There was $10 left of the original $25. We ran the card and the cashier blandly stated, “It says the card’s no good.”
I can’t remember a time when I didn’t know I wanted to be a “Mommy.” While my sister asked for cowboy hats and toy guns I only wanted to wear my mother’s high heels and play with dolls.
I would not only be a mommy but I would be a perfect mommy. I would do all the right things thereby producing flawless children. I noted every error my own mother made over the years and vowed how I would approach that particular issue differently when it was my turn.
I would always believe my children because they wouldn’t lie thanks to my exceptional maternal gifts. I would trust them and give them reasonable freedom when they were teenagers because, having raised them so perfectly, they would not want to disappoint me and would make the best choices or ask me or their father (whoever he turned out to be) for guidance.
I would love my kids with such intensity that they would never feel insecure, lonely, or sad. I was sure books would be written about my parenting abilities and my amazing children. Oprah would have me on her show and I’d fill the entire hour answering “How to Be a Great Mom” questions from less capable audience members.