Ten.One Thousand, Eight Hundred & Three

1. The kinds of sounds an empty stomach makes.

2. Confronted with the reality of the passage of time.

3. I do miss doing these kinds of walks on a regular basis. How do I fit more of this into my daily routine?

4. What do I need to work on? Where are the areas that need improving?

5. I tell her that I try to remind myself that the sense of time here is different. It is still taking some time to get used to it.

6. He keeps asking me if he can make me something to eat, and I keep telling him I’m not hungry, while also sticking my hands into the bag of dill pickle chips.

7. I thought he said the new Jurassic Parks are no good.

8. I ask him if it was everything he thought it would be. “More, actually,” he says, before proceeding to tell me about the new dinosaurs he’d forgotten about.

9. Gratitude for what is.

10. Wine on the deck as the evening light fades.

Ten.One Thousand, Eight Hundred & Two

1. Up before the alarm. Bats flitting about.

2. I choose the white dress instead. Why not give it a shot.

3. Leftover baked potato for breakfast. Almost a week with no caffeine. Adjusting.

4. Forgot my charger.

5. At the end of the day, no matter how much we don’t believe we do, we all crave validation.

6. I tell her that my problem is that I don’t have a poker face. I can’t say something if I don’t believe it.

7. Finally a full afternoon with no interruptions to get things done.

8. Back to reading the cookbook to slow down my mind. I give myself a time-out. I’m spending too much time complaining and not enough time being grateful.

9. I text him back to let him know that I am indeed ok. Just busy with life. Just pondering the purpose of life.

10. I start to fall asleep again on the deck.

Ten.One Thousand, Eight Hundred & One

1. Take me back to the dream.

2. “Have you ever had the feeling of wanting to crawl into someone?”

3. We’ll see if it works.

4. I round the curve and he starts to get out and then remembers that he still hasn’t put his contacts in his eyes.

5. I understand. I can’t do anything about it, but I understand.

6. She has good energy. I like her.

7. I listen to her say the very things I say to myself - have been saying to myself for so many years, which is the plight of almost every woman I know. I have no answer for her, and for that, I feel sorry.

8. Overthinking? Always.

9. There is potential here. I can get behind it.

10. I see the bats flitting about. They move so quickly, dashing in and out of view.

Ten.One Thousand, Eight Hundred

1. Can’t sleep. Must mean I’m all caught up.

2. Bats or birds?

3. Volunteer day for Napa Thrives. Another day away from my desk, but for a good cause. And at least I will see some friends.

4. There is still a cool breeze blowing through the building. The question is, how long will it last?

5. Face after familiar face passes in front of me. Long hugs and quick catch-ups. I miss wine. I miss my friends in wine.

6. Soil and Shadow.

7. How do I use the influence I have in order to affect the kind of change that is necessary? How do we rebuild the structure while simultaneously operating within it?

8. It is hot. It is so very hot.

9. She sends me a text asking if I will work with her on basketball because she wants to get better. I tell the other Coach: “Look at what we did!” This moment might be the greatest moment yet.

10. Not a fun way to lose.

11. Pizza and a pitcher of beer to end the night. Joint is full of raucous 14-year-olds. The beginning of the end.

Ten.One Thousand, Seven Hundred & Ninety-Nine

1. Juneteenth.

2. Make the coffee, but don’t drink it. Day four of no caffeine.

3. Make a mental list of everything that must be done today. There is not a lot, but enough.

4. At the very last minute, I decide to take a sick day. A mental health day. I need another day completely disconnected.

5. Morning pages.

6. We drop them off at swim and then take a short drive into town. It is still quiet and traffic moves slow. I add a hibiscus donut.

7. I take the cookbook out to the deck to read but I end up laying down and falling asleep until the sun breaks through the trees and causes me to sweat.

8. But how will I do it differently? What must I be willing to accept?

9. Three-hour nap.

10. We spot him in the grocery store. “The thing about being a small town,” I say, “is that it’s hard to hide.”

11. He says something about sitting on top of a shed, listening to music, and looking at the stars. We are more alike than he realizes.

Ten.One Thousand, Seven Hundred & Ninety-Eight

1. Cramps. Still.

2. I could lay here and look at the sunlight coming through the trees, but there are things to do.

3. Just can’t seem to nail pancakes.

4. I leave in the middle of the second inning. I managed to overdress and now I am sweating while I sit here at the top of the bleachers.

5. 4-2. Championship game on Tuesday.

6. Margaritas. Sunshine. Warm breezes. The sound of kids splashing in the pool. I can barely keep my eyes open.

7. Sometimes a fried chicken cutlet hits the spot.

8. Still, so much laundry to be done.

9. Will there ever be a day again when I don’t feel this kind of tired?

10. Don’t forget.

Ten.One Thousand, Seven Hundred & Ninety-Seven

1. Gold morning light.

2. Opt for no coffee. Juice and water instead.

3. Washing the dishes by hand.

4. The woman in the chair next to me gets the same color for her toes. We talk about kids and town and our work; circles overlap, of course. I ask her the name of her huband’’s winery. She tells me what it is. “Have you ever heard of it?” “Of course!”

5. I circle back to the estate sale to see what this house is that will soon be for sale and to find something special. I leave with two teapots, two sets of bangles, a wooden salad bowl, and verification that it wouldn’t be the right kind of house for us.

6. Just couldn’t help themself from doing it.

7. She asks me if there are consequences.

8. Nap.

9. I take the cookbook out to the back deck. Next door is blasting a familiar playlist: Billy Joel, Prince, Journey.

10. Next house will have a sleeping porch.

Ten.One Thousand, Seven Hundred & Ninety-Six

1. I like this waking up with the natural light thing.

2. Curled up on the chair, sitting in the sunlight, sorting emails.

3. What is at the root of all of these feelings?

4. Trying to fake it as best as I can.

5. I can’t.

6. I stand there in the room with the camera in my hand. I can’t remember where my bag is. I keep looking and looking. He asks me if I’m okay. I tell him there is just too much going on in my head, but now I remember where I left it.

7. I wander through the parking lot. I cannot remember where I parked today. I cut across, stepping over rocks and walking through the mulch. He sees me again. “First I couldn’t find the bag. Now I cannot find the car! Just one of those days,” I tell him. He laughs with me.

8. I remove it from the rack and hold it out in front of me. The Kimono is long and structured. I call it a piece of art. I slip it on. They tell me it looks perfect. It feels right. It feels like home.

9. I take a moment and stare out over the deck railing. A small fox is out by the willow tree. I wonder if it is our friend from earlier this summer.

10. But wouldn’t it be nice to get back to a place where I did want to be with people more?

Ten.One Thousand, Seven Hundred & Ninety-Five

1. Finally a little relief.

2. This will be a long one.

3. The thing is that I don’t have very much of a poker face.

4. I just need there to be more order.

5. I told myself I would skip the gluten today, but this scone is perfection.

6. I make a joke about my daughter being twelve years old and making a drop-in daycare center in our office.

7. I tell him that it was another one of those days with people telling me lots of everything and feeling like I have no way of helping.

8. I get a glass of rosé and sit down with the notebook and the printouts. Our table slowly starts to fill. Strategy session. The last one for the year.

9. We say what needs to be said. And there were times when we thought we should have said the hard things sooner. But honestly, the timing was just right.

10. But now I really feel like I need a vacation.

Ten.One Thousand, Seven Hundred & Ninety-Four

1. Dog. Again.

2. The in-between.

3. Too many mistakes. Too late.

4. The moment of silence feels particularly long. I am okay with it.

5. I really did try to keep this from happening. As the words are coming from my lips, I know I should not be saying this. But still, it is an apology and also a vent.

6. How long does one get to escape the consequences of their duplicities? To shove the blame of the chaos onto someone else?

7. More and more and more meetings. Very little work.

8. Of course, as soon as I cancel, they want to come. It is human nature to want what you can’t have.

9. More cookbooks.

10. It isn’t perfect. Nothing is.

Ten.One Thousand, Seven Hundred & Ninety-Three

1. The dog. What is it barking at?

2. Is this worth the fight?

3. I reckon the idea of quitting in person is way scarier than actually committing to the practice.

4. I stand up to leave and then mention something about it being nice to know you’re not alone.

5. I really need to buy some more summer clothes. And shoes. And, and, and, and.

6. Maybe everyone thinks I have more influence than I actually do.

7. I sit in the back seat and watch the minutes creep up and up and up. We crawl south through the valley. Just need to get through Napa.

8. Though the sun is bright, there is a cool breeze blowing in off the bay. This city has so much potential. Or, maybe it has reached its potential. Or maybe I need to rethink “potential.”

9. An easy win.

10. Better than expected.

Ten.One Thousand, Seven Hundred & Ninety-Two

1. I like this no alarm thing.

2. I forgot about the 8:30 football and 9:00 basketball camps. So, it looks like we’re still having those kinds of mornings.

3. Finally coffee. I eat the extra breakfast sausage left on their plates.

4. Move slowly through the list.

5. I remind myself that I get to set the tone for the day.

6. It wasn’t meant to be for this year. Maybe next year. After they’ve tasted more success.

7. Change takes time.

8. But sometimes frozen lasagna just hits.

9. None of them show up. But at least there are these three. We run them through some exercises, foot work, 1 versus 1 and 3 versus 2. There is promise here. We made the best of it.

10. Ha. A recommendation that we disband. She just wants us off her back. She hasn’t figured out that we’re never going away? Not until she’s gone?

11. Change takes time. And stamina. We’ve got stamina.

Ten.One Thousand, Seven Hundred & Ninety-One

1. A little bit of bah-ing from the goats.

2. Slept in so long didn’t even get a chance to do my hair before she arrives. But, neither here nor there.

3. Today, I feel strong and balanced, even though my mind is thinking of a thousand other things.

4. The coolness of the caves. Placing bottles into the shipper, adding an extra as a gift. I do miss wine.

5. Squeezing in time to daydream.

6. I need to block this from my phone.

7. Always a few laughs during family call. Not much drama these days, and that’s really a good thing.

8. A French Dip without the French bread. An odd choice.

9. I stick her bottles into the rack. Time to place another order.

10. What systems am I building to support the life I want to live?

Ten.One Thousand, Seven Hundred & Ninety

1. Not sure when I became the kind of person that turns off alarms.

2. Just basketball.

3. Clean rugs in the car.

4. It is already so warm. I am only sitting in the shade and reading and I can feel a thin line of perspiration forming along my hairline.

5. The things you hear with four teenage boys in the car.

6. I tell them that some of them have the right idea. The sooner they start dating and breaking up, the sooner they run out of girls to choose from. It’s a small pool.

7. We sit in the car between each game for the air conditioning.

8. What’s admirable is that the boys never give up.

9. But when the season starts, it’s going to feel so easy compared to what they experienced in this summer league.

10. I delete Instagram from my phone and think again about what I really want this life to feel and look like. What would be a better use of my time?

Ten.One Thousand, Seven Hundred & Eighty-Nine

1. First day.

2. Last glass of orange juice. Really need to figure out my breakfast situation.

3. Coffee in the tall tumbler while sorting through emails.

4. I cannot hear every word, but something is happening and it’s not a good thing. And there’s nothing I can do at the moment to fix it.

5. Can’t stop sweating.

6. Noticing a theme.

7. Solution-oriented.

8. Too full from lunch to eat dinner. Over-stuffed. I blame emotions.

9. The Bald and the Beautiful.

10. I so badly want to sit outside and read in the glow of evening light. But it is too hot and I can not find the right extension cord to blow the leaves off the deck and furniture. But there will be other days for it. Just not today.

Ten.One Thousand, Seven Hundred & Eighty-Eight

1. Today is the day.

2. The early heat is a reminder that it is indeed officially summer - it’s the last day of school.

3. He needs “nice” clothes for the day. I take his measurements and try not to talk about his height again, but he is getting so tall.

4. I ask them to hurry so that I can take the picture before it’s time to get in the car. The littlest one is still getting his shoes on. The big one kneels down and ties the shoe for him and reminds him that he’s going to be in middle school next year so he needs to get faster. But he says it so nicely, so kindly. I am doing something right.

5. Loveski bagels and talks about sweaters and should we start a little free library in the cafeteria?

6. Never enough time.

7. Maybe, one day, I will stop having three jobs.

8. She tells him that he looks like but he can’t hear her through the ear pods.

9. He did it. We made it through. And I think things are looking up.

10. Fried olives and meatballs and Brussel sprouts and burrata toast and halibut over risotto. Good conversation.

Ten.One Thousand, Seven Hundred & Eighty-Seven

1. Birds, birds, birds.

2. I remember that she needs things in order to bake the treats for her class.

3. I get back home and unload the milk, the boxes of brownie mix, the orange juice. No eggs.

4. I make my way down the stairs and see a carton on the ground. We talk through the window. He is in quarantine like almost everyone I know.

5. Stress sweat from pivoting on the fly. Frustrated because maybe it shouldn’t have been this hard but all of this is just a learning moment. What will I do differently next time?

6. Shoot snacks down to the gate house.

7. Thankfully, we are in the shade. The ceremony is quick - the benefit of being in such a small school They call the names in his class first. No blazer because they were supposed to be in their tye-dye. No more elementary school.

8. I can barely keep my eyes open.

9. No air in the office.

10. The first time in a long time that all five of us are sitting down together for dinner - and talking. So ready for summer.

Ten.One Thousand, Seven Hundred & Eighty-Six

1. The loud hum of some machine.

2. Emotional hangover.

3. The only way to work it out is to write it over and over and over again.

4. I think of how she said to not be attached to the outcome. Do what you know needs to be done, but be prepared for the undesired outcome.

5. Relieved.

6. The problem is that it never seems like the right time to ask.

7. I am unsure of what to do with the request. I suppose I just help, even though I know there is probably no way of shifting the outcome. Even though I know they are probably already tired of seeing my name in their inboxes.

8. I hear the sound of tears in his voice and know immediately what has happened: his fresh french fries are on the floor of the car.

9. 4-1 Rangers. 4-3 Rangers. 5-4 Napa. 7-5 Rangers.

10. It is after 8 o’clock and the sky is now a deep and dusty blue. The silhouettes of the mountain ranges loom high above. I think of how lucky we are, even with all of this.

Ten.One Thousand, Seven Hundred & Eighty-Five

1. In the dream, we are arguing with one another, first in front of a classroom of high schoolers, then in front of the principal. Really need to not dream about this ever again.

2. Later than usual but necessary.

3. Fuel gauge low. Living on the edge. How much of this is due to the incline of the car? Can I make it to and from school? The car tells me I still have 42 miles until empty. Do I trust it?

4. Long, long list and three very large cups of coffee.

5. Humor.

6. It’s this thing but also other things and that’s why I am crying.

7. Lunch outside.

8. Three COVID messages in one day is three too many. Can we just get through school?

9. He shows us all of the Zoom backgrounds his school district created for each month: Pride, AAPI, Women’s History Month, Black History Month. He also has his pronouns. No one is perfect, but I am ready for this change.

10. Words of encouragement plus a few laughs.

Ten.One Thousand, Seven Hundred & Eighty-Four

1. Is that the sound of rain?

2. I float in and out of consciousness. There is nowhere for me to be but right here. This is what I love about a metal roof.

3. Still listening to the water drip drop through the trees.

4. Finally together again. Doesn’t matter that it is virtual. Soul fed.

5. No one has eaten lunch yet and it’s almost time to go. Uniform has not been washed. He asks me if he knows where his shirt is.

6. I stare out the window while I eat popcorn. The vineyards are green and lush. The clouds are still low, hugging the tops of the mountains.

7. And no cleats.

8. Surprisingly warm and humid. Bad plays. No energy. It’s like they don’t even want to be there.

9. Everyone needs boundaries.

10. We all know the reason why it looks like this.