MeSoFun Blog

I have access to stock photos. That's what this picture proves. An email arrived last week that took me back. This wasn't a pleasant reminiscence. I wrote a blog a few years ago for spouses of PA school students, trying to help them through and let them know they're not alone. More than a few people have commented or emailed me to check in. What you say on the Internet lives on forever, they say, so here was the start of an email I received from a PA spouse whose husband had just started rotations. "My husband just started his clinical rotations away from home and I thought I had a handle on it, but I don't," it started. Immediately, my heart breaks. I know that feeling, except I never had the illusion that I had a handle on it. I definitely lost all my handles as the spouse of a PA student. That's just what it is. I know of not one single spouse that spent two years with a self-absorbed PA student and thought, "That really wasn't so bad." I...

Daisy later sprinted up one of the rows, ruining the scene. Sorry, perfect scene. As much as anything, this is a note to myself in August of next year. I love that somebody did this. Future self: Here's hoping you finally lost that 10 pounds you keep talking about losing, you handsome devil! I know you're dreading winter because it's August, and that's when you start spotting the premature changing of leaves. I'm here to remind you how good it can be. Christmas is Christmas. You don't love it, but people seem to be in good spirits. Don't forget to enjoy seeing other people be happy. The real fun comes in January. I know that sounds crazy, but really, we're in the worst stretch of winter and it's not bad at all. In fact, today was one of those days that you end every sentence with an exclamation point. You know what I mean! It was glorious! OK, enough of that. But seriously. The average high from Jan. 7 to Jan. 29 in Portland is 31 degrees. The averag...

Standard morning pose. Also, the chalk makes it look like I have hair. Sorta. People make New Year's resolutions. Or so I'm told. Gyms make a killing off the short-lived idea that "this will be the year that I get healthy," and so forth. Another girl in our lives, much to Daisy Duke's chagrin. Being a contrarian, I of course hate everything about this resolution business. But I don't think I'm perfect. Far from it. It's the Jan. 1 change that I object to. You can make a positive change any time. For instance, I wasn't happy with my 401(k) savings, so I gave the savings rate a significant boost. That was July 1. Or I wasn't happy with what I was doing at work, so I did something about it. I wrote a story for our newspaper. That was in September and October. And for the last six months of 2014, I did something more than a little obsessive. I got a phone with a pedometer in it and I averaged 15,000 steps a day. Every day. For six months. I'm c...

The "Nose Lecord," as I famously called it. My Dad has a song. He is unaware of this fact. But it's a fact. Like a sappy, puppy-dog-in-love teenage boy, I have a song that is my Dad's song. Don't worry. It's a manly song, full of guitar solos and stuff that makes The Wife turn the volume down. But TW wasn't home yesterday, which meant I had free reign over house cleaning, which I take to with aplomb. Yesterday was for toilet scrubbing, bathtub scouring and mopping the floor. It's amazing how much work that can feel like. Pandora helps me get through, so I put on the Zeppelin station. It's not very good, Pandora, but I was too lazy to find a decent local station to stream. About halfway through the work, Dad's song started. All bass strings, maybe a guitar playing a harmony. No drums. You probably know the California Raisins' version or Marvin Gaye's version, but in our house, Credence Clearwater Revival was and remains the only proper v...

That's my house, on the left. Everybody takes the place they live for granted. Maybe it's the amazing pizza place down the street, the sunsets on clear nights or the mountain vistas. Everyone, everywhere, falls into the trap of not noticing. The Portland Art Museum. Still have never been inside. Guilty as charged. There is a house – a mansion, open to tourists – about 200 yards from my house. The mansion was built in 1860. In the fall, when our stock of senior citizen tourists is particularly lush, tour buses pull up to the curb in front of the mansion and gray-haired leaf-peepers take stock of, essentially, a house that's a half a block from my bedroom. I've never bothered to even take a picture of the exterior. Then Flat Stella came in the mail. Stella was visiting us from Minnesota. Born of our lovely niece Holly, who I spend far too little time with in person, Stella came to take in the sights of Portland. I'm always a sucker for a photo assignment. We had just ...

Hopefully this isn't an annual rite of passage into fall. Cold fronts are usually windy. Minnesota farmers know that. Sailers know that. People with giant umbrellas attached to their patio furniture should know that. I saw the thing wiggling around. But really, what's the worst that could happen? It turns out patio umbrellas can lift up into the air above the glass and then crash back down on the table when the wind dies. That can happen. We won't be playing pegs on the porch or doing any more dump dinners this year. That's OK. The wind from the cold front was bringing chilly air. It was 58 degrees and windy on my walk to work. Oh well. That's a revelatory statement for me. I'm that guy. I'm the guy with Rayndaud's Syndrome, which means cold hands and feet for six months a year. I'm the guy that doesn't like Christmas so I spend a couple of months being annoyed by decorations and sales and hubub. But life's too short to get wrapped up in the ...

I am incapable of a normal smile. I did my dishes today. "Whoop-de-doo," you're thinking. Weird that my Dad never poses when it's picture time. Clearly my mother hasn't been visiting your place if you don't understand the novelty of doing your own dishes. Mom is a cleaner. It's her zen. She might even admit to that. Dishes don't hit the bottom of the sink with mom around. It's an adorable bonus to her visits. Mom likes to be useful. If all our guests did that, we'd be golden. I've lost the official count of how many visitors we've had since we moved into our house a year and a half ago. I'm confident we're in the 20s; we had 17 overnight groups in the first  year alone. This is the best possible time of year in Maine. The temperatures are in the 60s every day. The skies are blinding blue on a regular basis. And the tourists are mostly gone, except for the occasional gigantic cruise ship. There's parking on the street next to...