a list after the birthday weekend

1. new Wild Blueberry Twist Trident--it'll knock your socks off.

2. 2 new Cubbies t-shirts from my honey. I almost have one for each day of the week.

3. Pumpkin cheesecake.

4. Banana cream cheesecake.

5. Learning how to spend time with family and enjoy it for what it is. Okay, so it's taken me 35 years to see the value in this. As I said to Hillary on the phone this morning, this weekend we went up to Chicago to visit S.'s cousins--on purpose. Not because we needed something but because we enjoy spending time with them.

6. Smiling happy when a student comes to my office (not five minutes ago) to thank me for assigning Cheryl Strayed's essay "The Love of My Life." She can't wait to go home and write her reading response about it. "How could I have never found this essay?" she asked me. That's what I'm here for.