Ten.Fifty-Three

1. The gray. I love it. The coming of autumn.  

2. I'm getting faster at making the lunches and snacks.  

3. The deer. She's still here and I feel relieved. 

4. I'm thinking a lot about failure. It's not just the wine exam, but a lifetime of so many other kinds of tests. And yet here I still am. And maybe that is the lesson. Here I am. 

5. I send an invoice. I know it will be my last one. I am sad that this relationship is ending. I am grateful that I've been pushed toward the building of new boundaries.  

6. Back to the library.  

7. I like when he's not home, on the phone, and I can turn the music up real loud. Today it's french cafè music, Katie Perry, Ariana, Elton John, Feist, moody classical.  

8. Chicken tacos.  

9. I think of her saying, "They're a nice family," and how I think to myself, "Of course you think they are a nice family. You are white." And how I say this too about the Midwest—the Midwest is very friendly if you are white. 

10. You cry for your children and then you do this dishes.