Fiction Friday: Knock at the Door

Clare Boothe Luce

Previously, in The Walker:

Carla, who lives alone in Toronto, sees a woman and a young boy walking along the side of a highway in rural Ontario. She stops to pick them up and ends up bringing them home to live with her temporarily, to rescue them from a violent home situation. The woman, Bettany, turns out to have a volatile temper and little motivation to get on with life. The boy, Michael, is worried that they'll be kicked out. Carla is torn with wanting them to stay (she has really connected with Michael) and wanting them out of her house (Bettany is clearly a freeloader). Bettany recently told Carla that she is moving out to share a house with Ben, a man she met in the park.

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The following Friday, Bettany loaded her few things into Ben's car, buckled Michael into the back seat and left.

Baby's First Haircut

Kane in all his wet, furry glory, about to dive into the pool. (The sunset light is what's making him look so brown here.)

Don't you hate those baby books? You know -- the ones where the exhausted new mother is supposed to remember the date that her third child said its first words? Those books were a constant accusation to me, a guilt trip about what an incompetent mother I was.

Meandering Thoughts on Depression and Suicide

Suicide is not chosen; it happens when pain exceeds resources for coping with pain.
From metanoia.org

"I wonder why this is hitting you so hard," Stephen mused yesterday, more than 24 hours after I heard about Robin Williams's suicide. It was a question I asked myself.

The moment I saw the word "suicide" in connection with the news, I started crying and have had fits of tears on and off since then.

Why?

You are not alone.

RE-POST: In response to the news of Robin Williams' suicide, I am re-sharing this post from 2011 in the hopes that it will help someone. Depression can be fatal. Depression lies.

You are not alone.

I have had the incredibly unfortunate experience of assuring someone that she was stronger than she realized, only to have that person attempt suicide the following week.

A Tale of Two Weddings

After signing the wedding registry, April 28, 1984

As many military couples have done before, we had two weddings; one for expediency, and one for broader celebration. Here's the tale.