Crickets come in bags blown up with air. You get 15 at once, 10 cents a bug. I bring the bag home, get a scissor, the container into which they will be put, and the frog, and go outside. We sit on the front step, all of us. I cut a corner off the blown-up bag and insert it into the peeled-back edge of the container cover. The crickets drop down, with shaking, and fly in obediently. I shake two remaining bugs directly into Skipper’s house. He eats them. The Siamese cat comes around to watch. We go back inside and resume our respective activities. Easy enough.

Today, it will be hard. I will need to figure out how to retrieve one bug from the box without letting his eleven buddies jump out. 

Meantime, Twyla and I go out back. And, lo and behold, the mouse is no more. Eradicated from the spot, without a remnant. Poof. I am feeling good about the cycle of life. Best not to interrupt sometimes, at least when shovels are in the offing. 

So, there we are. A clean slate. 

I did not sign up for “Zookeeper,” on the form. But today, and by 8am, I had the job. I do not like certain animals. Reptiles, mainly, of all varieties. And certain mammals, the mean ones.

I woke up anticipating the morning’s extra chore: the feeding of the crickets. My 6th grader brought home a frog from last week’s Science Fair. It is my office mate. Skipper. He is in a plastic tank which sits in the same spot where the gerbils sat, but that is a long and traumatic story, best for another morning. At least Skip is quiet. The rodents used to interrupt telephone interviews. Anyway, Skipper is to eat six crickets every six days. Today is the day. We retrieved the container of insects only to discover that they had died. Maybe it was a better demise than being chomped by an amphibian. Maybe they were victims of suicide. Who knows. 

I suggested we just feed the six dead crickets to Skipper anyway. My daughter instructed me, though, that he wouldn’t eat dead ones. And, if he doesn’t get the live ones soon, he would expire himself. Okay, I will go to the pet store, because I have a lot of free time, and purchase living bugs for our new pet. And, I will do this every week, because I have a lot of free time every week. End of Skipper story.

So, I let Twyla out back for her morning hygiene…Twyla is our nearly 19 year old bijon-poodle mix, also an exceedingly long story, given the years on the calendar, meant for another time, too…and take the trash out to the alley along the way. I see something dark laying in the grass that has not been cut because I keep neglecting to call Senor Tamez. It has a long thing attached at the end. It is a mouse. I call these creatures mice, not the other more common term, because the word makes the thing so much worse.

This is a moment when I wish there were a boy in the house. Any age would do. There are not many instances when I wish for this, but this morning at 7:45, having handled dead crickets, hosed off my geriatric dog’s privates, for various understandable reasons, and discovered a flopped over rodent that isn’t a guinea pig in the yard…I really wished there was a boy in the house. I thought about borrowing the boy from the next house, but that wouldn’t have been neighborly.

Now, of course, I am left with a dilemma. A personal one, as well as a logistical one. The mouse is still laying in the grass. There is a cat who comes around, a Siamese, who could be helpful with this situation, but I cannot rely on her. There is a shovel in the shed, which the boy would use. I do not know if I can do the shovel. What if I can’t slip the metal under the body? What if it only gets half-way on? What if it falls off on the way to the trash can? An exterminator would pick up the thing in a bag, which, of course, I am not even considering. I could not touch the gerbils, even through a yellow rubber glove. I bet Senor Tamez would pick it up in a bag, if he didn’t mow it into smitherenes by accident.

The mouse thing is the worst part of single motherhood. 

For now, I will do nothing…let the cycle of life take care of itself, let Mommy Nature weave her web. Meanwhile, I better get the crickets.

Did I say between 8 and 10 pm? I apologize. I fell asleep watching Rachel Maddow. It was a few days ago, I know, and I have been up since then, but I had to quiz the Spanish and help with a Language Arts oral presentation (I was the timer) and make dinner and water the lawn and drive 20 miles on a Wednesday evening to a soccer game and write 4,000 words on a local murder of a single mom. Well, think about writing the story because it is hard to sit down and write it. Stalked and bludgeoned with a baseball bat outside the office where she worked. By her ex-husband, who promptly took off and threatened to jump from a highway overpass, but was talked down instead and now sits in prison, having confessed and given up rights to the three beautiful girls who were in school at the time, expecting to see their mom later for dinner. And Language Arts projects. And maybe a soccer game on a Wednesday. 

It is difficult to write the story because Denise could have been anyone, or me, or you, who had done all the right things, taken all the wise precautions, but wound up too broken for her own mother to view. 

As a writer telling the story of this woman, I feel a responsibility to do it justice, and to treat the bigger story in a way that maybe instructs, or warns, or at least, celebrates a mom who did her best to raise her kids, logging work hours, making cupcakes, singing the songs. I met the kids’ grandmother, who is now the mother, by default. Betty. There is a lot to learn from Betty.

Check back in a few to read more…

It feels to me like a prom date. John asked Sarah, I can’t believe it. How could he like her? He doesn’t even know her. How could he pick her, when he could have picked me?

Truly. The more that is revealed about the competency of McCain’s running-mate, the more I know that I would have been a fabulous choice for Vice President. Really, had John and I met, even for oh, fifteen minutes, he would have been swept. Swooned. Sold. I know it. And here’s why.

Mind you, it’s not because I am a female person. Making a case for myself purely on the basis of ovaries and X chromosomes would be insulting to gals across the globe, as everybody knows, even the ones who say they don’t. Girls do that sometimes, something about self-esteem or getting paid as much for the same job or being told to get married when they are seventeen when they probably would rather, well, go to the prom. Wipe drool off your shoulder or compare dyed-to-match pumps with your friends? C’mon.

Anyway, back to me and my candidacy. To begin with, I would have read a speech well, too, especially to a welcoming crowd. It’s easy to read. I was in a few plays, it’s the projection that’s hard for me, which is why I mostly danced. But that is what microphones are for. Most likely, I would have written all of the words in The Big Speech That Would Put Me On The Political Map, but that’s because I’m an Ivy League English major. Uh oh, shhh, don’t tell.

Despite my birth in Manhattan and liberal northeastern upbringing, my life story is pretty compelling. When we moved to the suburbs, Mom taught elementary school for 27 years. Her first day of kindergarten was mine, too. When we were home, she was home. Work, balance and all that. Dad was a surgeon, child of the Depression. He played shortstop. Had immigrant parents. Grandma wrote a column in a local Boston newspaper, about feminism. It was 1940. Papa Louie, Mom’s dad, was a pattern maker, and owned a dress company. Better dresses, they were called, not for every day. Creationism to me means fabrics and shirring and seams. Paint and papier mache.

I grew up with certain expectations, the same ones I now impart to my daughters, who, by the way, are not pregnant. They know, at eleven and just about thirteen, that a body can make babies when it is not married, but that making them before you are married is a bad idea. And they’ve been educated about ways to prevent this bad idea from limiting your future. They think Bristol’s mom should have been aware that she needed help. But that is because of the life they know. When my girls were born, I decided to work from our house. I did not want to hear from a helper person that my fifteen month old walked for the first time. Once, I conducted a telephone interview with a public official, half-naked and on my knees, nursing and writing simultaneously, my infant propped on the bed in front of me. I tried to improve my scheduling after that, but sometimes, you cannot plan.

Everything was easier, of course, when I was married and there was a second income. As a single mother, I face difficult logistical and financial challenges, but I have turned down office jobs and child-watchers to be available to my children, especially now, when pre-teen girls need the security that comes from parental presence and open communication, every time of day. I would have said that in my acceptance speech. I think the crowd would have woo-hooed.

I would have wanted the audience to know, too, that I am an excellent budgeter, which is tough to be with Mr. Bush’s gasoline and food prices. If, for instance, someone gave me money for, say, my girls’ college tuition, or a bridge, maybe, I wouldn’t use it for a spa treatment. And, as much as my ex-husband may be difficult sometimes, I would not try to have him fired. That’s too easy. I beat his attorney in court three times instead, without a lawyer. That was spunky. (Click Here to Read Story) Oh, and I was Founder and President of the Dance Club in high school. The folks would think my executive and entrepreneurial experience was impressive. And now, I write articles for slews of magazines and newspapers and recently, rallied against the building of high-wattage power lines in our neighborhood and helped my kids sell homemade bookmarks to raise money for the abandoned Katrina animals. And what about those books? Love books. And librarians. I do not think that one person should be allowed to decide which books another person can read. I bet John will tell Sarah to get contact lenses because her glasses make her look like a librarian. But maybe they want her to look like a librarian. Librarians get a bad rap.           

Of course, John would have been happy to know, I’ve traveled overseas and across the mainland, and lived in nearly ten U.S. cities. The best part is, my ancestors were Russian, which makes me quite the expert. I’ve had the borscht, with sour cream, yes I have. Borscht, Putin, easy peasy. Lemon squeezy. Finally, I believe that while Americans welcome the notion of God into their lives in all sorts of personal ways, they understand that it is sort of separate from politics in this country. It is hard for Bible-thumpers not to thump, I have learned living in Texas, but it really isn’t a unifying sort of thing. I think most people who don’t thump realize that real live human beings created the disaster in Iraq, and now, are charged with ending it. Best of all, I’m a Democrat, which we know he would have loved to have on the ticket in the first place, just to be able to say he had one on the ticket. Woman, democrat, polar bear. No matter.

It is too bad that I didn’t get to say all of this at the convention. It would have been a kick, not to mention an opportunity to wear stockings and have my hairstyle adjusted. Next time, I will try to introduce myself sooner to the people doing the picking. I will make it happen, yes I will. That is, if I’m not helping my girls get dressed for the prom.