It's Friday, Issue #126
good things
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My holiday was a letdown. We didn’t travel anywhere for the three weeks the kids were off school, it rained nearly every day, and on Christmas Eve and Day, I was horribly sick. The world was bleak. On top of all that, Bean went nocturnal, sleeping from 3 am to 3 pm, and he often woke me up in the middle night with his new habit of…wait for it…whistling. As if that weren’t bad enough, he and I got into an enormous fight—an absolute brawl—over screen time. The lack of routine heralded the return of Ginger’s insomnia. I spent most of my time preventing Mickey from eating yet another banana or tangerine.
During our last week together, after Patrick had returned to work, I dragged Ginger and Mickey to the Science Center (Bean: asleep, unwhistling). The museum was packed because, well, the Science Center is free and there was nothing else for anyone to do, considering the weather.
It wasn’t until we were squeezed into a crowded exhibit that I realized I hate the Science Center, especially the nature exhibits. Here, kids! Watch this video and tap these buttons to learn about the outdoors…instead of, you know, actually going out into nature! As we waited for a rush of water to come pouring out of concrete rocks (a desert flood exhibit), a hopelessness overtook me. I felt vaguely, sullenly suicidal. Don’t worry, it was more of a leisurely, existential feeling like, Dying would be better than standing here waiting for this reticulated water.
After that, I said something deranged like, “In exactly seventeen minutes we are leaving,” thus upsetting my children.
The night before the kids went back to school, Ginger remarked, “Nothing fun happened over break.” I didn’t disagree.
After her first day, though, she told me she’d been tasked to brainstorm for an essay about her holiday.
“Once I wrote everything out,” she said, “it wasn’t all bad. There was good stuff too.”
I was struck by how true and wise that is. In that spirit, I wanted to write about a few good things from my time off:
Art
I drove to see my dear friend Christine Frerichs’ paintings at the Billis / Williams Gallery in Culver City. These are still life oil paintings made in her home and studio, and in person they are so layered and detailed, and the paint is textured, tactile. I snapped a couple of photos for you:
(PS you can BUY these beauties!)
Movies
Patrick and I prioritized getting to the theatre to see the big movies of the season, usually trading off nights. My favorite of these was definitely….
