On things I never used to know
Similar Posts
Time for a Jessica story
“Look out for that pole there, darlin’,” I say to Jessica at the grocery store, because she has walked into it before. This is because she is visually impaired, and hates taking her cane when we go places. “You can be sighted guide,” she says to me, which is on its face true; the…
The nature of remembering
I don’t know how my daughter’s memory works. She doesn’t remember much about the winter she was seven, which experience has been scarred into my soul (“How can you not remember that!” is how it feels to me). She doesn’t remember the day camp teacher who saw her every day of every summer for four years,…
One of my favorite things
A few years ago, as I was tucking Jessica into bed, she kissed me on both cheeks and said, “I love you and think you are beautiful.” I have no idea why she thought I needed to hear those two sentiments at once, but I am glad she did, because it has become my favorite…
Travels with Jessica
Jessica is in many ways an amazing child, but her brain does not have an executive function, or if it does, it’s like one of my former bosses, out on a three-martini lunch most days. She cannot intuit or deduct but she can memorize and extrapolate. Which means that I have to do all the…
On how we are free
Years ago, Jessica had a big plastic castle that she got for Christmas, and a number of princess figures that fit inside. One day she came to me and she said, “I let all of the princesses out of the castle and now they are free!” She was beyond excited; she was thrilled. And…
A Halloween Story
It is the time of year when spiders crawl all over my bookshelves. Black spiders, purple ones, pink ones, some with googly eyes, and some with “on” switches that make them glow. “On Halloween, I will dress up like a vampire to hand out candy,” Jessica says, adjusting a madly glittering spider so that it’s…