Author Archives: jennifer-jenny-jen

After volleying the idea of having a wedding back and forth for the last couple of years, my partner and I eventually agreed that it was an important symbol of the life and home and family we had spent the last five years creating. At first, I didn’t think it was right to have aContinue reading “choosing partnership over marriage.”

After 16 months of social distancing, masking, quarantining, missed parenting time, make-up parenting time, mental fog, exhaustion, anxiety, and–finally–the relief that vaccinations promised, we’re still not done with this pandemic. I’ve worked hard for the last year and a half to cultivate gratitude for so many things, to let go of anger and resentment, toContinue reading “catching covid.”

As Juliet famously opined in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, “O! be some other name: / What’s in a name? that which we call a rose / By any other name would smell as sweet.” So, it seems, many women feel when they marry and take their spouse’s last name. The taking on and leaving behindContinue reading “the evolution of a name.”

Let me start with this caveat: I mean no disrespect to the impossible work the mothers of black sons and daughters must do in order to raise their children safely and happily in today’s world. I can’t imagine how I would explain to my son that the world will look at him with suspicion forContinue reading “entitlement.”

Following the news since March 13, 2020 has been quite a rollercoaster of emotions: virus, pandemic, shutdowns, lockdowns, quarantines, isolation, remote everything, social distancing, travel bans, testing, reopening, vaccine development, vaccine distribution, phase 1a, phase 1b, slow rollout, shortages, phase 1b rollback. I cried when I heard the news of the first shipment of theContinue reading “achieving victory without compunction.”

I’ve read a lot about gratitude in the 40-something years I’ve been a reader. As a hopelessly optimistic upbeat cynic, I tend to see the glass as half empty; the cake I can’t have and eat; the worst case scenario. I’ve spent a lot of my life wanting to feel grateful but not having aContinue reading “cultivating gratitude.”

“Are there things about your life you wish you could change?” my 13-year-old asked me in that innocent wondering way that kids do. Misunderstanding the question, I answered, “I choose not to live with regrets.”  “Well, sure, but I mean, are there things you would change if you could?” she pressed. I thought about theContinue reading “apologies.”

October 20, 2019 was the National Day on Writing (#NDOW)(#WhyIWrite), and because Bryan Ridley Crandall asked me to, I asked my students to respond to the following questions: Why Write? What is writing? Who writes? Why should you? And—new this year—Where should we write? Because fall in New England is not always beautiful but has beenContinue reading “why I write.”

I first dipped my toe in the blogosphere when my daughter was born, launching a blog that featured all of the things she was doing that her father and I found fascinating and that we wanted to share with friends and family who were living too far away to catch all the firsts in person.Continue reading “mothering a toddler redux.”