a good friend called and said, “read the wednesday wars. it is everything you want a book to be.”

i didn’t ask for clarification at the time, instead dutifully read the book, and am here to report that it is everything you want a book to be: funny, sad, intelligent, a tad ignorant, full of shakespeare.

in short, i loved it. and you will too. unless you’re like all those dopes on goodreads who didn’t like it.

in other book news, i’m listening to the alchemyst on audible. (not to be confused with the alchemist which i hated worse than junior high.) i love this book. if i used the word “freakin” i might use it here. because i love it. in fact, stephenie meyer should eat this book because it’s werewolves done right, if you ask me.

anybody else reading anything good i should add to my list?

i had one of those weeks. husband’s car went kaput. i did dinner and bedtime by myself every night. i spent a lot of time watching screaming children. a lot of the children screaming were mine. by the weekend, i had effectively disintegrated.

and then i overheard this lovely little game from my children.

h says to v: “let’s play government.”

v: “okay! that will be fun!”

h: “you push your lawnmower to me and then i will give you money to buy the lawnmower.”

v: “okay!”

v pushes imaginary lawnmower to h. h gives v imaginary money. v gives money back to h.

h says: “now let’s switch.”

v: “now i’m the government!”

[and the game goes back and forth like this for twenty minutes.]

which teaches me that at least somebody understands what’s going on, even if it isn’t me.

henry was riding his bike to school today. through the field. you know, like we do.

he sort of slowed down. “what is this stuff, mom?”

i wasn’t sure what he was talking about. i told him that. [answers like this do not deter him. it is inconceivable to him that i might not be able to answer him down to the atom.]

“but. what. is. it?!” he yelled.

oh. i thought. i get it. “it’s mud,” i said.

“what is mud for?” he asked. but then took off on his bike again. and i was left with violet in her fleece wintry heart pajamas eating cereal out of a bag repeating over and over, “what is mud for, mama?”

i’m living in a place without vegetation. without weather. without rain. without mud.

can we say arrakis?

it’s about the time of year when i start feeling homesick. (i also feel homesick during all the major holidays, the heat of the summer, the tinglings of spring — pretty much i’m a big baby.)

and because i’m a hopeless humanities sort, this is a moment for much too intense self reflection. what is homesickness, really?

when i was a kid, homesick=wanting to go home. this equation doesn’t exactly hold up for my adult self. “home” isn’t quite as location specific as it used to be. we’ve lived so many places, we will live so many places — place isn’t home any more.

but you’re shaking your head. and i think you’re right. it does have to do with place too. i get homesick for holden arboretum in ohio. i get homesick for london in april. i get homesick for provo in the fall. i get homesick for orchards and mountains and the sound of wind in firs.

the english geek in me pulled out the OED. home, traditionally, is the place of one’s nurturing.

so many places and people have nurtured me that i suppose that’s why i can’t ever satiate this feeling inside me. [now i have to laugh at myself, i sound so dramatic. imagine me fainting onto a settee and wearing a corset.]

here’s the gosh darn truth. i want my mom. i want my dad. i want to be in the mountains. i want fall. and red leaves. and cider. and to be cold. that’s pretty much it.

are you homesick too?

i never know what to say on 9/11.

but my heart beats for the people then and the people between and the people now who live on my street, who stop with me at the mailbox, and are missing someone, or something: arms, legs, eyes.

my heart beats with hope and love. and, as always, there is reason to faith.