I hired Gracie as a House Manager for the summer. I’ve seen these pop up on my Pinterest because she and I had looked a few weeks ago for a “Mother’s Helper” description for her babysitting gigs. Turns out that a House Manager and a Mother’s Helper are very similar and the more I poked around about a House Manager, the more it made sense to offer the job to Gracie.

For $30 a week, I send Gracie a list of tasks that need to be done around the house. For me, the list combines some chores that normally fall outside of Gracie’s normal chores and some small projects or tasks that I would normally do on the weekends. For example, last week, she had to purchase a Target gift card and a hoodie from a specific university as a graduation gift for a neighbor. She had to also buy the gift bag, the card, wrap it all up, and deliver it from us. See? Nothing major, but something that has been on my to do list for a few weeks now.

Here’s how it works in my house:

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I have grieved and I have lost, but I’ve never sat so close with death before. His breathing was labored for hours.

Rise and fall,

rise and fall,

rise and fall,

and then it became calmer. Less difficult, it seemed. But it also because shallower.

I counted in the silence between breaths.

Seven seconds.

Then nine seconds.

And then the pattern disappeared.

I called the name of the family member sitting next to me and we held our breaths as he took a breath in. And he never let it out.

It was so quiet. Deathly quiet, I thought.

There is such a thin veil between life and death, isn’t there? I remember thinking that when my dad passed away. One minute they are living and the next, they are not. It took months for this concept to settle into my heart when Dad died. I remember waking up in the middle of the night for months and whispering out loud in the dark, “He’s just… not here anymore? How is that possible?”

I felt that again today sitting next to the hospital bed. But seeing the rise and fall of his breath made me even more aware of our fragility.

The rise and fall,

the rise and fall,

the rise and fall,

the rise…

And there, at the end of that ellipses, is where science ends and faith begins.

It’s where our world here ends, and heaven opens its arms.

One minute he was sick in that bed and in the very next breath of a heartbeat, he was whole in heaven.

Throughout my life, there have been times when I have doubted the religious semantics of my faith. And I’m sure to anyone who is nonreligious, this must found absurdly childish.

But sitting there in that hospital room, watching that holy breath

rise and fall,

rise and fall,

rise and fall,

rise…

the glorious complexity of faith became startlingly clear to me.

For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son,

that whosoever believes in him shall not perish, but will have life everlasting.

And so, we rise and fall,

rise and fall,

rise and fall,

And then we rise… Rise… RISE.

So imagine my surprise when he sat down with me and Chris at dinner last night and seriously asked if he could go cage diving with shaks for Taylor’s 18th birthday.

(blink, blink)

(blink, blink, blink)

I waited for the punchline, but then i started to get this sinking feeling in my gut that he wasn’t actually kidding.

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This week, the kids had their end of year awards ceremony for their magnet program. Like the good children I have trained them to be (and by trained I mean nagged them until their ears bled), they put the event on our shared family Google calendar. So, I came home from work on Tuesday a little early so that we could make it to the 6:00 start on time.

“Oh, you don’t have to go,” Michael told me, which is what he has said for every school-sponsored event since the beginning of time. I just rolled my eyes and yelled upstairs to ask Gracie because she’ll tell me the truth.

“No, you really don’t go. It’s not for parents.”

Que?

Por que?

What is happening here? I’ve been to every end of year concert/awards/ceremony/banquet/whathaveyou since these children were wearing underwear with their names written on it. What do you mean IT’S NOT FOR PARENTS?! Well then who is it for?!!?

Turns out, only senior parents were attending, which made sense to me. And their magnet program always requires the students to attend and cheer for their classmates all throughout the year at events, so it made sense that the kids had to be there without me.

But as I laid in bed that night trying to fall asleep, I had a thought. A terrible thought. A horrible, terrible, no good thought.

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As I sat in the coffee shop, listening to the person in front of me passionately talk about joining them in one of my favorite career fields, I distinctly thought to myself, “This is amazing. What a fantastic idea. This is going to be so successful.”

And when the actual ask was made, I very confidently responded with exactly what was in my heart. “Actually, I’m really happy where I am and with what I’m doing. Not just professionally, but personally, too. I like the flexibility of my life, and I am perfectly content with just the amount that’s on my plate right now.”

I’ve always been one of those people who has stayed open to opportunities, especially professionally. I’m not afraid to jump to something that ignites me. I’m not afraid to stop out without knowing what exactly I’m putting my foot down on, trusting that the next step will meet me as it should. Nothing has ever felt too big or too uncertain for me. In fact, those things excite me and motivate me.

ClassMax broke my heart, though. So much so that I never could really talk about what happened at the end. It was just so raw. Such a sad, slow death of something that I loved with my whole heart. As Covid closed schools all across the country, it became impossible to continue growing, selling, and building a tool that was classroom-specific. It was made for a classroom of students, so when classrooms closed down across the world, we became obsolete.

As with all technology, we could have adapted. We could have kept adjusting to the needs of the market, but we were running out of money. It was costing Chris and I tens of thousands of dollars just to keep an outdated product live. And it was not an easy decision to make about how to pivot. It was hard on my marriage. Chris wanted to keep going, keep building, keep adapting. And I didn’t. I didn’t have the stomach to take on more financial baggage. Everything about that process made me sickeningly anxious, particularly at that time in the markets. The world was panicking and startups were feeling the nerves of investors. I couldn’t sleep at night with all the worry.

Ultimately, we all slowly walked away. First school districts, then schools. Then me, my business partner, and eventually Chris. We were calling it.

Time of death: 2022.

Cause of death: Covid-19

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I love to watch him sleep and dream.

How will we love another as much as him?

We’re having a girl!

I think she’ll have colic until puberty.

How did we ever live without her?

Maybe both of them will nap at the same time today.

Or maybe one of them could nap, like, at all?!

Use gentle hands, please.

Have you brushed your teeth?

Can you share that with your sister?

Is it bedtime yet?

It’s got to bedtime, right?

Oh, thank God it’s bedtime.

I love you.

Is that backpack too heavy?

You were on green all day today?! I’m so proud of you!

No, ma’am.

No, sir.

No, ma’am.

Use your manners.

God is great. God is good.

Did you say thank you?

No ma’am.

GRACIE! I SAID NO MA’AM.

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At certain times of year, Bean is in marching band. In other times of year, it’s in symphonic band. Sometimes, he’s in wind ensemble (which makes no sense to me even after all his explanations).

One time, he texted us at 5:30pm to tell us he had a concert band concert at 6:30 where he was playing the snare drum. This was odd because we didn’t know he was in concert band, nor did we know he knew how to play the snare drum.

Band shit’s a mystery, you guys.

Tonight’s concert was the end of year concert of ALL of those bands, so it was a full two hour program. Bean appeared in places we expected him to play, and then he also showed up in groups we didn’t know anything about. It was like “Where’s Waldo” every time a band took the stage.

We finally made it through the long program and were on the last and biggest band of the evening, Wind Ensemble. I’m watching them load out the other band and load in the symphonic band (each transition between groups takes about 15 minutes) and there was no Michael. He’s usually rolling around percussion equipment, but he wasn’t on the stage.

“I don’t see Michael,” I whispered to Chris and Gracie.

“He’s probably backstage getting his instrument,” said Chris, who was going through emails on his phone in between performances.

5 minutes pass… no Bean.

10 minutes pass… no Bean.

Just as the conductor takes the podium, mine and Chris’s phones go off with a Life360 notification.

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Do I love to work a puzzle? Sure! I love to put a puzzle on my dining room table, put my earbuds in, and listen to my audiobook while I work a puzzle before bed. It’s one of my very favorite of my many, many old lady habits. So, I thought, sure! I’ll join a puzzle team! How fun!

Imaginary friends. Vat der ferk.

Please look up puzzle competitions on YouTube and join me in a collective panic because WHAT THE HELL DID I SIGN UP FOR, Y’ALL?!

Puzzlers - true puzzlers - are serious, you guys. And they are fast. In fact, that’s what the competition is - it’s a race to finish your puzzle.

Did I know that before I agreed? No, no I did not.

On average, it takes me one book and 7-10 business days to finish a puzzle. These puzzle competitions finish in, like, an hour (based on my one Google search I have done).

Here is what I can contribute to my puzzle team:

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They found me.

Any time I am not in the kitchen, in my bed, or in my reading chair, the kids act like I am intentionally hiding from them. And sometimes I am, but not today. Today I was just enjoying some peace and quiet, which I had for approximately 5.6 minutes before the children descended upon me.

“What’re you doing?”

“Where’ve you been?”

“Make Michael take me to this thing tonight."

“I don’t want to take her because she wants me to pick up her friends.”

“What’s for dinner?”

“Where’s dad?”

“Did you feed the dogs?”

“Can we order food?”

They fill the silence with their complaints and questions and arguments and jokes and I don’t even have to say anything. I just sit there, laughing at them, soaking up the joy of being around them.

Of them wanting to be around me. Hallalujah, as the kids are saying this week.

Gracie convinced me to put my book down and take her driving for a while. So, we drove to this shopping area where we practice because there aren’t many cars, but there are about five different parking lots that are connected together. It’s the perfect place to learn to drive. Also, my Panera happens to be in one of the parking lots, so Gracie took me through the drive thru to get me a fresh iced tea. Hallalujah.

Gracie calls driving skrt, skrt (which you will know how to pronounce if you have teenagers). As in, “Come on, Mom. Skrt, skrt.” And as she turns the car while she drives, she says loudly, “Skrrrrrrrrtttttt, skrrrrrrrrtttttt…” And when we park the car, she says things like, “That was some good skrrrting.”

What is wrong with children today? Honestly.

Hallalujah.

Today, we practiced parking. So, she pulls into a parking spot (skrt, skrt) and then we always open our doors to see how straight she is in the spot. This time, she was almost perfectly straight, so she yells out, with her arms above her head, “SKRRRRT SKRRRRRT!” But she forgot to put the car in park, so as she’s saying this we are slowly rolling forward into a shrub.

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Nothing sent me into a spiral faster than watching someone do something “wrong” when I had already provided what I believed was the obvious right answer. And if you’re a high performer, you probably understand this feeling.

When you’re the person who naturally plans ahead, solves problems quickly, and anticipates issues before they happen, people tend to reward you for that. At work, it gets called strategic thinking. Leadership potential. Strong execution.

At home, it often looks like being the person who remembers the dentist appointment, signs the field trip form, orders the birthday gift, schedules the oil change, and notices that your child has somehow outgrown every pair of pants they own overnight.

You become very good at managing things. And if you’re not careful, you can start believing that your ability to manage things is what keeps your world together.

I definitely believed that. And then I had a pesky stroke.

That stroke, and the mental health struggles that followed it, changed me in ways I didn’t expect. It forced me to confront a reality I had spent years avoiding:

Control is mostly an illusion.

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This was odd for a lot of reasons, not the least of which was that I hadn’t told anyone that my arm has been hurting. And I definitely hadn’t told this coworker.

“How in the world did you know about my arm?” I asked.

“It’s on your Outlook calendar.”

Sure enough, I opened my Outlook calendar for the first time that morning and there was a 9am appointment hold that said, “MAKE A DOCTORS APPOINTMENT SO MY ARM DOESN’T FALL OFF.”

Again, this was odd. I definitely had not put that on my calendar, but who would have had access to my work calendar to add something like that?

Gracie.

Gracie would.

Turns out, Gracie poked around on my calendar app and added the appointment, but she accidentally added it to my work calendar instead of my home calendar.

Later that day, I ran into my boss in the lobby and as he ran out the door, he turned back around and shouted, “Did you make that doctors appointment for your arm yet???”

The short answer was no. No, I had not made the doctors appointment for my arm yet. For one thing, I don’t have time to go to the doctor because I know what they will tell me. They’ll tell me it’s something in my rotator cuff and then they’ll want me to go to physical therapy and I REALLY don’t have time for that. So, no. I had not made the doctors appointment yet.

If you aren’t working from your car while your teenager practices driving around a parking lot, are you even a working mom????

In truth, I hadn’t made the doctors appointment in the four months my shoulder has been bothering me because there is just never enough time. I’m rolling out a huge program at work to over 1,000 people and it is taking up every breathable moment in my work days. At home, we’re in that end of year spiral with the kids where everyone has some kind of massive test that will determine the fate of their entire lives every day and at night we’re in banquets and concerts and award ceremonies because THIS IS SPRING IN HIGH SCHOOL.

You all know this grind. It’s the full calendars, yes, but it’s also the constant mental gymnastics of logistics. “Chris can pick up Gracie and meet us at the school, Bean will be coming from band rehearsals, so he’ll already be there, I’ll leave work 20 minutes early and can make it in ti… DAMMIT! No, I can’t. I have that meeting with so-and-so that I can’t move again…” and on and on and on.

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This weekend was Gracie’s birthday party. T’was longer than Hanukah, friends. My goodness. We spent all day Saturday cleaning the house because if I haven’t had a chance to write lately, I definitely haven’t been keeping up with my chores. It was one of those mornings where I loaded up our family Skylight in the kitchen with chore lists well before the sun came up. Everyone had a list. And, miraculously, when Gracie’s friends started showing up at 4:00, we were all clean and on our best behaviors.

The girls spend the night on Saturday. They painted flower pots (my idea) and hairbrushes (Gracie’s idea), enjoyed the lemonade bar, and ended up going to bed at some ungodly hour.

Don’t you love this lemonade bar?! A friend at work told me about one she did for her daughter’s high school graduation, and I thought it was such a cute idea! A few minutes scrolling Pinterest and a ChatGPT search later, we had a full Amazon cart of supplies and even a custom drinks menu.

I don’t know who loved this more - Gracie, me, or my mom! She and David came down Saturday night to hang out with Chris and me while the party raged. And by raged, I mean while they did their arts and crafts. Girls after my own heart.

Sunday morning, we loaded up two cars and took the crew to the beach for the day. It was beautiful weather until it wasn’t, but we still managed to get a few fun hours of sunshine.

I saw something on the beach today that I’ve never seen in my entire life of being a beach girl… monkeys! This woman next to us on the beach had two small monkeys! Of course, I had to go over and meet them. Turns out, she is a vet and so she has an exotic pet license. She takes them everywhere with her. So, now I need a monkey. Someone tell Chris, please.

We headed home in the middle of the afternoon once the rain showers started and you’ll never believe what happened on the way home.

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Same rules. Same meals. Same carpool line. Same genetics. Wildly different outcomes.

Take Michael, for example. Michael is the most low-maintenance person I’ve ever met. Not just “easygoing,” but actively resistant to needing anything. I have spent an entire lacrosse season begging - BEGGING - this child to pick out a new stick. His current one looks like it’s survived multiple wars.

“Why?” he asks, genuinely confused. “I can fix this one.”

And then he does. He orders parts. He researches. He performs what I can only assume is lacrosse stick surgery. Meanwhile, I’m standing there like, we have the money, Michael. You don’t have to live like this.

But he does. By choice.

Now enter Gracie.

Gracie needs something every single day.

“Mom, can we go to Starbucks?”
“Mom, I need to run to Target.”
“Mom, I think I need new shoes.”
“Mom, I definitely need new eyeliner.”
“Mom, there’s this concert…”

There is always a need. An urgent one. A deeply important one that absolutely cannot wait.

If Michael is “Why would I spend money?” then Gracie is “Why would I not?”

Michael is a homebody. If left to his own devices, he would happily exist within a five-mile radius of our house indefinitely. The only exception is his girlfriend, Taylor, who he will follow anywhere… albeit with the energy of someone being mildly inconvenienced… but still. He goes where she takes him.

Gracie, on the other hand, has to be told she is staying home. Against her will. For her own survival. If we didn’t make her stay home sometimes, she’d never sleep again.

She will be in the middle of hanging out with one friend while actively planning who she’s seeing next! It is my worst nightmare, you guys. How does she live like this?!

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It’s hot without being humid. The daily afternoon thunderstorms of summer haven’t started yet. The flowers haven’t been burned in the summer heat. It’s just beautiful.

Which is why I am completely useless right now.

Every night as I lay in bed trying to drift off to sleep, I make ridiculous promises to my tomorrow self.

Tomorrow, I will wake up early and write.

Tomorrow, I will pack a healthy lunch and actually eat it this time.

Tomorrow, I will finish that one project at work that has been hanging over my head.

Tomorrow, I will make that doctors appointment I’ve been meaning to make.

Tomorrow, I will go for a walk when I get home from work.

Tomorrow, I will fold that basket of laundry that’s been in my room for a week.

And then tomorrow comes and the sun shines and the birds sing and the flowers bloom and I think to myself, “I’ll do it tomorrow.”

GOSH DARN IT, YESTERDAY KATIE! GET YOUR SHIT TOGETHER, WOMAN!

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Not, like, one or two gnats. Not a “did something just fly by my face?” situation.

We have gnats.

They came in on a plant. A sweet, innocent, “this will bring life to my kitchen” plant. And now that plant has brought death. To my sanity, my peace, and honestly, the overall vibe of my home, which is the true crime here.

At any given moment, there are at least 7–12 gnats hovering in a loose formation like they’re planning something.

I have escalated appropriately.

• I bought the Zevo traps.

• I made DIY traps (water, vinegar, sugar, dish soap - basically a gnat cocktail bar).

• I have cups of this concoction scattered around my house like I’m hosting a very specific, very weird dinner party.

There is currently one sitting in the center of my kitchen table. As a centerpiece. Martha Stewart would be devastated.

And here’s the thing: they’re working.

Every time I check, those traps are full of tiny floating bodies. It’s both satisfying and deeply disgusting. Like, I am winning… but at what cost?

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But we’re doing it, guys! We’re doing all the things and loving on our people and showing up when it counts and tap dancing through our workdays and life is good, isn’t it?!

Today is Easter Sunday. My favorite holy day of the year. Because we’ve been so busy, though, I didn’t have a chance to really walk through Holy Week like I normally do. I didn’t attend any Holy Week services. I didn’t crack open my Bible. For the first time in probably ten years, I didn’t even make it up to our church’s prayer labyrinth.

So as we walked into the sanctuary this morning, I kind of felt like a kid who walks into the classroom and realizes that there’s a test today they forgot about. I mean, I stuffed all the Easter baskets and bought the Easter dress and fixed the Easter lunch… but I kind of forgot to prepare for the actual RESURRECTION.

We got to church late and ended up standing the whole service because it was so packed. And I realized as I stood there that I had taken this test before. I knew this story. I knew the characters and the plot and the setting. I knew the costumes and the set. I knew Mary would walk into an opened tomb and find it empty. I knew that Jesus would appear behind her and ask who she was looking for. I knew that she would think he was the gardener and that he would stop her panic by calling her by name.

I wasn’t unprepared.

I knew this by heart.

That’s why my lifelong faith is the most important thing in my life. It is the foundation for everything else I stand for. Everything else I am begins with my faith in that tomb.

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1. Driving around doing my silly little errands with my sunroof open while I listen to Tom Hanks read Ann Patchett’s The Dutch House.

2. Sleeping in without setting an alarm since I’m on spring break with the kids.

3. Sitting in my favorite chair under my favorite blanket reading while Bean recovers from his wisdom teeth removal on the couch next to me.

   

4. Getting dressed at a leisurely pace midmorning.

5. Gas station snack stops on family road trips.

6. Weather that’s cool enough to leave the windows open during the day.

7. Laying in bed next to Gracie at night, reading our books.

8. Drinking a Zero Sugar A&W Root Beer in a can. (Thank you to my sister for introducing me)

9. Watching Bean experience “Ted Lasso” for the first time.

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On Sunday, we drove the seven hours to our hometown of Pensacola. We spent some time catching up with Chris’s Grandma and then barely laid our heads on pillows at my MIL’s house before we were driving out to the University of West Florida’s campus to a tour. We had the most scrumptious little tour guide. He was a junior and Brazilian and a tennis player and I kept shoving Gracie out in front as an offering to him. Shameful, I know. But he was adorable.

The UWF campus was a lot like the UNF campus. They are comparable in size, but UWF was a little more spread out, which Michael liked. I like it because he’s close to family if he needs them. I do not like it because it is seven hours aways and I’m really going to hate making that drive every three days for the next four years of my life because HOW CAN I LIVE WITHOUT SEEING HIM FOR MORE THAN THREE DAYS AT A TIME?

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LOOK AWAY, CHRIS! LOOK AWAY!

While we tooted around (as my mom says), I picked up a few things for myself to try on, too. Why not? The sun was shining, the day was happy, and I did need a new pair of shorts, come to think of it.

In my fitting room, there were more mirrors than should ever be in a confined space. I couldn’t get away from myself. Everywhere I looked, there I was in all my pale, cellulite glory.

It had been a long time since I’d seen myself in the round and I paused for a second.

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The biggest one is our shared family calendar. We use a Google family calendar to keep track of everyone’s schedules. When the kids were younger, I entered everything myself - school events, sports practices, birthday parties, field trips. But somewhere around the time they got to high school, we made a shift.

The kids now manage their own entries. If they have a test coming up, it goes on the calendar. If there’s a project deadline, it goes on the calendar. Lacrosse practices and games, band rehearsals, theater performances, events for their magnet programs… If it matters, they add it.

It’s been one of the most helpful parenting transitions we’ve made. It teaches them to manage their own time while still giving the whole family visibility into what’s coming. No one can say they didn’t know something was happening.

The calendar is so central to how we operate that it actually lives in two places. Last December my mother-in-law gave me a Skylight calendar for my birthday, and it now sits on the side of our fridge where everyone can see it. It syncs with our Google calendar, so anytime someone walks through the kitchen they can see what the week looks like. It’s one of those things I didn’t know I needed until we had it. Instead of asking what’s going on that day, people just glance at the screen.

The Skylight app also lets me assign chores that show up right on the daily calendar. I’ve started using that more recently, although my main chore system is still pretty simple.

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