I’m singing along with a song on the radio as I am inclined to do no matter how much Jessica asks me not to. “That is a song about the moon,” she says suddenly. She has always had a particular fascination with the moon. I don’t know why. It has always been like an old…
Category: Conversations with Jessica
On the need for cocktails at IEP meetings
I am sitting in Jessica’s IEP meeting thinking there is not enough strong drink available. There is none at all, in fact, though my position has always been that serving alcohol would make these sessions easier to get through. I don’t mean to imply that there is anything difficult about the other people seated around…
On how the weather is
“It’s going to rain today,” Jessica says. “Yes, it sure looks like it,” I agree. “I just wanted to make sure you know.” “Um, okay,” I say. I am fully capable of reading a weather forecast or looking up at the iron-gray sky and reaching the appropriate conclusion, but whatever. An hour later, I’m in…
On the trouble with the truth, part 2
Jessica and I are eating at the Mad Greek, our favorite place to go when she comes home from her father’s house. The evening sun is low in the sky and the mellow light glows through the window, glancing off her round cheeks, illuminating her intense focus as she tries not to drop the glass…
On how I really do like people
“So,” Jessica’s dad says as I pick up her meds and medical equipment from him. “How was the conference?” I’ve been out of town for a business meeting and he is being his usual polite self. Even at the height of our discord, when I had the butcher knife in my hand and insanity in…
On the pros and cons of jousting
Jess and I are at the Renaissance Festival, watching the troubadours and the fire jugglers and eating cinnamon almonds and discussing if the jousting is actually real. “Well,” I say, “they are falling off the horses. And that’s gotta hurt.” She considers this. “But do they know they are going to? Do they decide the…