I first met Casey at a meetup in Indianapolis, in 2008.  It was April 24, 2008…almost exactly three years ago.  Funny, but it feels like I’ve known her my entire life.

She was just how I had pictured her; kind, intelligent, funny, red-headed and adorable.  She, however, was shocked that the Momo Fali she met that night wasn’t a 300 lb. Samoan.

That trip to Indianapolis turned out to be one I will never forget.  And, not in a good way.  I spent most of the evening in tears, worried sick about my son.  I will never forget getting off the phone with my husband and falling against the wall in a sloppy, sobbing heap then looking up to see Casey standing there.  The hug that she gave me, from one stranger to another, got me through the night.

I came to find out that the hug was indicative of how much Casey gives of herself.  She embodies strength, honesty and friendship and since that first meeting, I have hugged her when she cried, she hugged me when I cried AGAIN, she has seen me in my bathing suit and I have arranged the marriage of my son and her first-born child.  For real.

She has openly shared her battle with depression and has probably saved some people in the process.  I respect Casey for that and for so much more.

As she prepares for the birth of her second child, I want her to know that I’m thinking of her, I’m proud of her and I’m so glad that she’s my friend.  Pregnancy has not been easy for Casey, but she has managed to endure.

But, still…I hate her a little because next to her, I really do look like a 300 lb. Samoan.

Follow

Email

Yesterday my daughter performed in her school musical.  There were three performances at 10am, 1pm and 7pm.  I attended all three.

She didn’t have a lot of lines and she didn’t sing any solos, but she was in full costume and makeup, on a stage, in front of an audience and she was having a really bad day in the scheme of all things sixth grade.  I wanted to be there to applaud her.

After last night’s performance she asked, “Mom, you do realize that you sat through three hours of the same play just to watch me say a total of 27 lines, right?”

I replied, “Yes, I know.”  Then I asked,  “Didn’t you want me to be there?”

And, as well as any twelve year old can say that they are thankful for their mom, she smiled and replied, “Yeah.  I guess.”

Follow

Email

You know how you don’t get any sleep, and then your cold turns into a sinus infection/bronchitis mixture, and you spend your Saturday afternoon sitting in the cold watching an endless, sixth grade, softball game, which really wasn’t endless, but it WAS three hours, which is the same as endless, and the girls on the opposing team scream and chant the entire time, “We’re going to rally, rally, rally!  We’re going to rally, rally!” and you feel like you should go to confession because you wished they would lose their voices, then you take your obsessive and compulsive son to a monster truck show, and his latest tic is to sniff, sniff, sniff, SNIFF, SNIFF, and you take his noise-reducing earphones off to adjust them and he starts sniffing harder and completely freaking out that you are GOING TO MAKE HIM DEAF, and then he starts gagging, but you can’t go anywhere because you’re smack-dab in the middle of the row of seats and there is a wall behind you, so you do what any mother of an almost-nine-year-old would do, which is to put your hand under his chin and catch his vomit in your bare hand, but that’s okay because you have TISSUES and your friend has hand sanitizer, and then the young child in front of you stands up and yells, “Screw you!” to the announcer, and his parents LAUGH, and then you spend all day Sunday coughing up a lung because after you caught vomit in your hand, you sat in that closed arena and inhaled exhaust fumes all night and that goes really great with your asthma/bronchitis, sinus infection?

Yeah,  me too.

Follow

Email

After a long, cross-country trip in an airplane seat so cramped that I couldn’t, simultaneously, have a drink on the tray table and complete a crossword puzzle, I arrived home late last night to some excited children. It was a welcome sight to my sore eyes.

My son was extra eager to see me. As he rifled through my backpack I asked, “Wait a minute. Are you happy because I’m home or because I brought you a new toy?”

He gave it some thought and replied, “Both…well, actually I’m happy about the toy because it’s new and you’re old.”

I laughed and jokingly said, “Oh, thanks a lot!”

And when he sensed that he might have offended me he said, “But, you’re not old like a grandma! You’re old like a shoe.”

Follow

Email