When You Fall for No Reason
I was walking down from the elevated train platform yesterday after work, on perfectly normal stairs, wearing perfectly flat sandals. I was taking my time and not rushing. Close to the bottom, my left ankle rolled - I don't know why. As I fell, I dropped my book and...
Taking Risks Is Just Fine
In the fall of 2007 I decided I'd had it with my job. I didn't feel like waiting tables anymore and wanted to return to sitting at a desk all day. People (including my husband) tried to dissuade me from trying to make a change just then. They said, "The job market's...
Back to the Dog Ebook
Last spring I created a first draft of my memoir with the working title "I Never Wanted a Dog." I found some readers to give me feedback on it, thinking I'd start revising at the end of June. Then I found myself facing divorce, my mother reached the final weeks of her...
Divorce Feels Pretty Good Right Now
My brand new love seat and ottoman! I love ottomans. I am totally enjoying furnishing my new apartment! I'm getting as much stuff as possible in my favorite color: pink (rugs, cups, kitchen towels, etc). If an item doesn't come in pink, then red is my second...
New Home, July 2013
One-bedroom apartment in the Rogers Park neighborhood of Chicago, IL, USA My new apartment has the light I've been craving ever since I moved out of my spinster pad in 2007. The apartment I shared as a wife was perfect in many ways, but it didn't have a lot of natural...
Snapshot of Divorce
Today is my last day as a live-in wife. I'm wandering among my labeled boxes, gazing at the last things that need to be packed. Twenty-four hours from now I'll be taping and sealing the boxes and getting ready for the movers to arrive. Once I'm in my new apartment, I...
How to Talk to Little Girls
THIS is an excellent post that appeared on www.latinafatale.com in 2011, but it will be advanced thinking for decades yet. What's wrong with greeting a little girl by telling her how cute or pretty she is? I quote from the article, "Teaching girls that...
This Feminist Is Keeping Her Married Name
Back when Bob and I were first married, I told him (and he remembers this), "No matter what happens -- if we end up divorced or you die -- I'm keeping the Martin. Okay? Just so you know. I'm not going back to Regina Rodríguez." He said that was fine. Reason: the...
Regina Divorcing
Tuesday, 2 July 2013 So my husband and I are divorcing. It happens. I realized my marriage was over right around the time I found out my mother was getting hospice care. This spring/summer has been quite a ride. I'm packing this week because I move into my new...
World War Z Is Not World War Z
Max Brooks' World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War is one of my favorite books. I've read it three times and I'm sure I'll read it three more times. It chronicles the global invasion of zombies and how each country responds to the crisis. Each of the book's...
The Big Secret
The big secret I referred to on my blog last month was that my mother was in hospice care. That's why so many of my June posts were about death. My mother and I had been estranged for years, but we managed to say a loving good-bye when I flew out to California during...
Avoiding One’s Home Town
Is there anyone else out there who avoids their home town because going there doesn't evoke good memories? Today I head out there one more time. It seems many people enjoy visiting the place they grew up because there are still people there who they enjoy seeing:...