You know that feeling you had in college, when you had a big paper due? You’d thread through cycles of procrastination and intense effort, finding your rhythm on it at last. But you couldn’t work on the paper every minute of every day: you had to go about the tasks of life and pretend to enjoy them, even as this undone business of the paper cast a grouchy pall on every meal, every chore, every moment.

Or maybe you didn’t have that feeling because you are a much less anxious person than I am. Good for you.

Me, the last two weeks of my life have occurred in the fog of this worry. And yesterday, at 5:33, we FINISHED the paper. Which is not to say we are done with this long-term, intricate project by any means, but the single largest discrete piece of it is done. Oh, and it’s pretty damn good. Here’s hoping we get an A.

Meanwhile, I can carry on with the rest of my life. And file this experience under “Reasons I Will Never Be Pursuing a PhD.”

Yesterday, Lucy brought home a paper from school that outlines an approach to Stranger Danger, which reinforces my concern that we’ve been poorly handling this part of her upbringing. I am pretty sure that before yesterday, if you’d asked her what she should do if she met a stranger, she’d have said, “Introduce myself!” This is probably something we should work on…

Lucy turned seven on March 12. I can hardly stand to think about it. In this photo, I can see what she will look like when she is 13. And, lately, I am getting a glimpse of how she will act when she is 13. She questions everything. “There has to be a REASON,” insists. When I am not caught in the petty trap of because-I-am-your-mother-and-I-said-so, I have to stand back and admire her mind, her tenacity, her emotional intelligence. She both exhausts and amazes me, and she has since the moment she was born.

Setting aside the issue of whether  to lie about one’s own age, when is it okay to lie about your son’s age?

I only ask because I’ve found myself doing it these past few months. People ask how old he is and, too often, I glibly say, “One.” He’s small. He can pass. What’s the rush?

And yet, there’s no slowing down the tiny bullet train named Milo. The kid is crossing the year-and-a-half mark at a full (if slightly wobbly) gallop. He’s added a few key words to his vocabulary (“mine,” “Elmo” and “TV ” — so proud), and he chatters constantly. He even pauses appropriately in his nonsensical conversation with you as though to say, “I know, right?”

He mimics singing and reading. He dances (sort of). He will take your hand and lead you to something he wants to show you. He will throw his arms around you and squeeze when you ask for a hug.

Sigh. He is one and a half. I have about three months to gracefully stop calling him “baby.” After which point, we may just have to be weird.

I’m never sarcastic. Ever.

What I have come to realize, hearing sarcasm from the mouth of my almost seven-year-old, is that it’s not warm or loving. While sarcasm can be used in a teasing, occasionally sweet way, it’s mostly a default for nasty. Which was recently made very clear to me…

Lu: [SOME NOW FORGOTTEN DRAMATIC, SWEEPING STATEMENT USING WORDS "NEVER" OR "EVER."]

Me: Uh huh.

Lu: Mom, I HATE when you say, “Uh huh” like that. It’s so MEAN. It’s like you don’t like me or you’re not listening to me.

Me: [BLINK. BLINK. PAUSE.] It doesn’t mean I don’t like you, it just means I am trying not to react when you’re being melodramatic.

Lu: Well, you are, and it’s mean.

Sometimes, even when I am trying to respond to her overblown responses with a flat affect, thereby diffusing her intense emotions, I am snide. And it is mean. Despite the points I give myself for saying “Uh huh” instead of “Are you seriously throwing a fit about where a certain shirt was put away when I do all the laundry, and how about you do you own damn laundry while you’re at it?”

I am going to be better about being sarcastic/snide with her (and everyone).

Oh, I heard that “Uh huh” you just uttered. Rude.