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While My Boyfriend Was Sleeping

What I write after Joe and Henry go to bed

A garden variety valentine from my Oma

February 14, 2011 by heidi 2 Comments

The sweetest Valentine’s Day gift I’ve ever received came today in the form of my Oma, who pulled into my driveway this morning with her Ford Taurus stuffed with two dozen bags of red mulch and her trunk full of plants.

She was a German workhorse on a mission.

Basically, my front yard has looked like hell for a year.

Joe and I have been so busy and broke lately that the last thing on our minds is landscaping, not that we don’t curse our grass-less front yard and dead potted plants every time we walk from our cars to the front door.

The first year we lived in this house I lovingly tended to the plants and shrubs. Two years ago, my mom and I planted fuchsia petunias that flowered so big and brilliant the neighbors stopped to admire them.

Remember last year’s vegetable garden? The thing went bust midway through the spring. We ended up with a handful of cherry tomatoes, two deformed bell peppers and one cucumber. We’ve yet to plant another garden, or even one patch of marigolds (Joe’s favorite flower).

I’ve been slacking in the horticulture department. Big time.

Enter my Oma.

She’s a master gardener with two green thumbs, two green pinkies and two green toes.

She could grow a bed of orchids in a leaky bucket in the corner of a dungeon. That is if she had a dungeon.

The small yard surrounding her park model offers few landscape opportunities, which (I think) has made her stir crazy.

SO … today she arrived at my house with enough mulch to carpet the neighborhood and enough ferns and flowers to manicure a golf course.

I had several appointments and various phone interviews, so I was in and out of the house and otherwise occupied all day.

By the time I returned from my last appointment, she had filled all my empty pots with pansies, planted small sprouts of greenery where dead scraggly bushes once crept, laid more than a dozen bags of mulch and replaced the batteries on all my burned-out garden lights.

The funny thing is, I’m not even sure she knew it was Valentine’s Day.

—

Bleeding heart photo by Simon Whitaker

The pitfalls of downhill roller skating

October 12, 2010 by heidi 13 Comments

The summer I turned 14, I went camping with my mother, my sisters, my friends June and Ann and their mother Wilma.

It was a girls-only kind of weekend. The dads stayed home.

We rented a cabin in the Pennsylvania woods, all of us girls, piled into one two-story bungalow.

Within five minutes of driving into camp I had surveyed the outlying trails for roller skating routes. And yes, I mean roller skate not roller blade. For years I skated on a pair of hand-me-down quads with bright blue wheels. For some reason I never crossed over to inline skates.

June, however, had a slick pair of roller blades — the newest hottest ones on the market.

As we puttered through the campground in Wilma’s minivan, the two of us peered out the windows, our noses pressed to the glass. When we spotted our Everest, we gasped.

It was the granddaddy of all downhill trails. Paved with crumbling black top, riddled with potholes and ending in a sharp plummet, it was the most treacherous trail we’d ever laid eyes on. If it had been any steeper, it would have been a cliff.

As Wilma’s van rounded the corner, June and I implicitly settled on our first skating route. We were fearless.

As soon as the last sleeping bag had been dragged from the van and carried up to our loft, June and I strapped on our skates and announced that we were hitting the trails.

“Don’t go down that hill by the front gate,” my mother said.

June and I exchanged eye rolls.

“I’m serious,” she continued. “DO NOT go down that hill.”

“You’ll kill yourself,” Wilma said.

“Don’t worry,” I lied. “We wont.”

And off we went. June in her roller blades, me in my skates.

Unconcerned for our safety, we blatantly defied our mothers’ warnings to steer clear of the Everest trail. We made a beeline for the summit.

I was leading the way in my clumsy quads, stumbling over potholes, flying through the campground like a jacked up roller derby girl. June was on my heels, gliding in her neon blades.

We rolled to the top of the hill and paused only briefly to take in the free-fall, before howling with glee and pushing ourselves down the incline.

We began hurtling downhill faster than we imagined. Within seconds, the rush turned to terror. We were on a suicide mission.

Using the back brakes on her blades, June managed to stop herself with remarkable ease.

I was not so lucky.

I was flying down a hill on roller skates at 30 mph and unlike June’s brakes, mine were located on the front of my skates. The toe stop.

The longer I thought about braking, the more out of control I became. I was picking up speed faster than Picabo Street, except instead of snow-plowing my way to a halt, I fell knee-first into the pavement and slid for 10 feet, my shin skidding across the concrete.

The resulting road rash ran from my knee to my ankle.

June started to cry.

I pulled off my skates. Pulled off my socks. As June tiptoed to my side, bawling over my fall, I asked her to give me her socks.

“Wh-wh-why do you need my s-s-s-socks?” She whimpered. “You’re totally b-b-b-bleeding.”

“To stop the bleeding,” I replied.

[Read more…]

When what to my wondering eyes should appear, but a package from Canada Post filled with holiday cheer.

December 26, 2009 by heidi 7 Comments

The man with no hair who you see in the freeze frame of this YouTube video is my sister Heelya’s boyfriend Brian. He buzzed his head last week.  He says it’s his new Chris Daughtry look. Joe filmed this little segment, among others, on Christmas day as we milled about our house cooking dinner and opening presents before Joe’s parents and siblings arrived for what would be a grand feast in the backyard. (To my family and friends back home in New York: yes we ate dinner outside under the carport in our backyard. It was warm and even a bit humid. Yes, I said humid.)

Before I explain the significance of this video, I should first point out the significance of yesterday.

Yesterday was my first Christmas together with Joe. Sure, it was our first Christmas as husband and wife, but it was also our first Christmas together, logistically speaking. I’m always in Western New York with my family and he’s always in Tampa with his, so the fact that we could celebrate under the same roof, much less the same state, was pretty awesome. I was so grateful for that.

It was also the first time in 16 years that my father has spent Christmas with his parents –– my Oma and Opa, who spend their winters in a retirement community about an hour south of me.

Now, add PK, who also lives in St. Pete, and Heelya and Brian, who live in Myrtle Beach, S.C. and you’ve got a whole bunch of Kurps together for Christmas who might otherwise be scattered up and down the east coast. It was wonderful. Our house was loud and crowded. When Joe’s siblings arrived, followed by his parents and grandfather, it got even louder and more crowded in that colorful bustling warm-energy way. I loved it. Ain’t no Christmas without a ruckus. As I shimmied past pairings of people in the hallway and the living room, carrying trays topped with cheese and veggies, guacamole and hummus, I couldn’t help but think of my Nana and Papa’s Christmas Eve gatherings back home in New York.

(I should also mention that this was the first time ever that my mom didn’t spend Christmas with her parents. Nana: I know you’re reading this. I thought of you the entire night, and now that I have one Christmas dinner under my apron I can finally fully appreciate all those years you hosted Christmas Eve at your house.)

Anyway. Joe and I decided to set up a long table Last Supper-style under the carport in our backyard, which turned out to be a genius idea. My dad strung lights and my mom and I crafted pine and berry napkin ring holders out of garland. Joe fired up the deep fryer and from scratch made better mozzarella sticks and chicken wings than any bar and grill I’ve ever been to.

With my mom’s help, we cooked turkey and ham, mashed sweet potato yams and set out a salad bar. Rosey made corn casserole and Joe’s mom made lasagna. Oma supplied her signature chocolate butter cream cake and so many cookies the tray collapsed when we cleared the table. Three pugs attended the celebration: Cubbie of course, Uncle Homer (my parent’s pug) and Owen (Heelya’s pug), who sadly was suffering from a ruptured ear drum and spent the night with his head cocked lamely to one side.

[Read more…]

Yonder mountain wedding snapshots

September 16, 2009 by heidi 10 Comments

 Katebackdrop|Backdrops Sale for Photography

Until I get my photos from kate backdrop Photographer Wendy, these random shots from my dad’s camera will have to do. Here’s me & Joe with my Oma & Opa on the top of HoliMont ski hill in Ellicottville, N.Y. 

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Joe and I with our brilliant officiant Zac Chase – the man who insisted I ask Joe out.

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The wedding party  and the perfect wedding veil– and what a party it was.

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Joe played the guitar when I walked down the aisle. The song was one he had come up with (coincidentally) on the same night we met.

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Papa and Nana with my cousins Reb and Erik. I love this photo. A lot.

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My cousins Krystle and Cory are newlyweds too! They got married in Buffalo a month ago. After the wedding they drove us back to our suite in their yellow Hummer and 15 minutes later brought us back takeout from The Gin Mill. Cory, unable to find salt packets for our french fries, decided to swipe the bar’s glass salt shaker and stick it in the bag with our food. I’m forever grateful for this and thus plan to use the salt shaker forever.

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MEN IN BLACK: Adam (my future brother-in-law), Zipper Boy, Joe’s brother Phil, and of course Joe.

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MY GIRLS: Leilani, Rosey & Ro.

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MY GIRLS, TAKE TWO: Yuuki, Heelya & PK.

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This was the view coming up the hill.

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This was the view coming down the hill.

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And this was the view on the top of the hill: me, Joe, Grandpa Ra and Joe’s mom, MaryAnn.

—–

The tent diaries 2

May 30, 2009 by heidi 6 Comments

Part two of this adventure revolved around staying with friends and friends’ families.
For two weeks I traveled the Midwest, sometimes camping, sometimes staying with people I knew (or people of people I knew.) It turns out I know a lot of Midwesterners, and their company was a nice reprieve from solitude.
In Macomb, Illinois I stayed with my girl Ricci’s mom, Beth.  In Chicago I stayed with my old coworker Kevin. In Athens, Illinois (a charming little town outside of Springfield) I stayed with my old roommate Zac’s family. Zac, in case you didn’t read this post, is one of several reasons why I asked Joe out. He also threw me a sweet bon voyage dinner party the night before I left town, at which he cooked my favorite authors’ favorite foods. (Hemingway’s gazpacho was delish.) Zac’s marrying us in September. I’ve also convinced him to MC the event.
Without further ado, here’s part two of my road trip, in which accommodating Midwesterners welcome the pug and I with open arms, scrambled eggs and bags of radishes:
—
[Read more…]

Bite me, slice me, dice me

May 19, 2009 by heidi 6 Comments

I‘m suffering from a supreme case of writer’s block. 

So what do I do? Well. As always, there’s Lance. 
I come here more than I should whenever I’m stuck on a story; a paying story. It helps me get over uninspired humps. 
Sometimes.
Today I spotted my first big, red tomato hanging off one of two tomato plants I planted three months ago in the front yard.
If anything should inspire me, it should be this. I’ve never grown an edible thing in my life. Well, basil. But that doesn’t count. The pug could grow basil in his food bowl if he slobbered on it every day. 
The tomato plants were my mom and Joe’s idea. There were four big pots in our front yard when we moved into this house, in which the previous owner had planted squatty palms and purple ferns. When we closed on the property, the squatty palms and purple ferns were scorched from too much sun and wilting from too little water, so I pulled them out of the pots and stuck them in the ground, where they are much happier and healthier.
In two pots I planted tomatoes and oregano. In the other two, I planted marigolds and bushy pink flowers. Within a month my bushy pink flowers had tripled in size. And my tomato vines! Ah! I had so many little green buds I felt like Fannie Flagg. The front of my house had suddenly taken on a Better Homes and Gardens look. 
When a storm whipped through the neighborhood last week, I ran out the front door to stake my bent tomato vines to sturdy twigs. After much nurturing, whispering and watering, I couldn’t bear the thought of losing my tomatoes. They looked so pathetic in the wind and rain, bent over like a child with a stomachache. I never felt so much like my Oma than when I called for Joe in a panicked yelp, to bring me scissors and string so I could tie my vines.
Now that I’ve got this big red one sort of poking out at me, willing me to pick it, slice it and serve it over mozzarella and balsamic, I’m freaking out. What if it’s too soon? What if it’s too late?
If you know anything about tomatoes, please share your wisdom. I’m a novice vegetable grower, whose new hero is this guy: former Baltimore Orioles manager Earl Weaver. 
Weaver, the 5-foot-7 short-tempered, smack-talking “Earl of Baltimore,” used to grow tomato plants down the left field line in Baltimore’s old Memorial Stadium. He and head groundskeeper Pat Santarone had a contest every summer to see who could grow the biggest, juiciest crop. Rumor has it Santarone once grew a tomato so big it wouldn’t fit in his ball cap. 
According to former first basemen Boog Powell, the mens’ tomatoes were so large, “one slice would way overlap the bread.” And according to Cal Ripken Jr., whose father worked for the Orioles in the 1960s and 1970s, Weaver used to fertilize his giant tomatoes in the Orioles bullpen using horse manure lifted from the Preakness Stakes. 
I wonder if pug manure would have the same effect. 
—
PS. To everyone who donated to my Ride for Roswell: THANK YOU! THANK YOU! In two weeks I raised $675 for the Roswell Park Cancer Institute – $175 OVER my initial fundraising goal. 
PPS. About Saturday’s hair post: the top photo was the $50 haircut. In these trying economic times I suggest patronizing beauty schools. No one will ever know your ‘do cost five bucks. Unless of course you blog about it.

A clothesline for my mothership

May 11, 2009 by heidi 8 Comments

I aim to pay homage to my mother(a day late) with this post.

I went to Ace Hardware over the weekend and purchased among many things, a clothesline.

Nothing major. Just a piece of white nylon rope that I stretched between two trees behind my house, a span that runs the width of my tiny backyard.

I did this because I’m green-washed and cheap. Since I live in Florida, where every day the sun shines, the birds chirp and Snow White kneels in my parched grass and summons Jay birds to her fingertips, I see no reason why I can’t save some money (and the environment) by running my dryer a little less. Not to mention the fact that I love clotheslines, which is where my mom comes into play.

My mom can work a clothesline like nobody’s business.

Growing up I used to stand beside her and hand her wooden clothespins as she pinched sheets on our clothesline, or draped my father’s heavy jeans over two lines at once so they wouldn’t sag to the ground.

My mom’s clothesline is enormous; an almost Amish clothesline that my father cemented to the ground beside a corn field, that in the summer gets spread with liquid manure so pungent my mother used to run like a gazelle out the back door to rip the clothes down whenever the spreader ran its course.

“C’mon girls! Richmonds are spreading shit. Help me get the clothes off the line.”

Anyone who grew up in the country with a clothesline knows this routine. I had friends whose mothers responded the same way, and some friends whose mothers did not. Hence some kid went to school with their Wranglers smelling like a barn.

Clotheslines also make me think of my Oma and my Nana. On summer evenings, I’ve stood beside either one of these women helping un-pinch my Papa’s white T-shirts or my Opa’s black socks.

There’s a therapeutic monotony to hanging clothes on a line. The act of pulling pins out of a bucket is repetitive. Utilitarian. Time consuming. Lending itself to the act of daydreaming. Even better, saving money.

My mother loves the way sheets smell after they’ve hung out to dry on her clothesline. (This is on non-manure days.) When my sisters and I were little, she used to pull our sheets off the line and sniff them as we ran around her legs, clamping our lips with the pins to see how much pain we could withstand, charging through bath towels like Pamplona bulls.

There’s a Zen-like serenity in the folds of sheets.  When they were hanging out to dry, I used to walk between my parent’s queen-sized sheets and try to make out silos in the distance. Through the thread-bare flapping of off-white cotton the world looked hazier, safer, lovelier, softer.

When a thunderstorm would roll in, we’d all help her pull clothes off the line. My dad too. Galloping out the back door, our black cocker spaniel following us like a shadow as we traipsed with armfuls of wet laundry into the house and down the stairs into the basement, where we had a second clothesline for winter drying, manure days and rain events.

As with any family whose clothes dry outside, there are were those embarrassingly awkward (or just plain uncomfortable) mornings when we’d pluck June bugs out of our underwear. Or days when our jeans were so stiff from line drying they’d stand up like confederate soldiers and we’d have to pole vault our way in.

When my sisters and I were teenagers, we’d plead with our mother to tumble our jeans in the dryer.

“It’s like you STARCHED ’em,” we’d piss and moan.

When we had boys over, I remember running to the clothesline to pull my ratty Hanes off the line before anyone arrived. Clotheslines are quaint when all that’s drying on them are T-shirts, socks and sheets, but nothing is more mortifying than watching your pair of flowery high-waisted briefs flap like a faded circus parachute while you and your 16-year-old girlfriends chicken fight with boys in the pool.

So, here’s to you Mothership: a late Mother’s Day post, as I sit on my back deck, waiting for the washer to buzz, contemplating whether or not I should hang my baggy bloomers on the line, I am of course smiling and thinking of you.

—–

PS. AND to both my parents: Happy 30th wedding anniversary. Do something sappy tonight, will ya? Dad: don’t work on the roof. Mom: don’t do laundry. You guys should rent two-for-one romantic comedies at Shurfine and cuddle with Uncle Homer The Pug.

Hello, romantics. This one’s for you.

May 7, 2009 by heidi 12 Comments

IF YOU’VE BEEN FEELING SURLY LATELY…

HERE ARE SOME PHOTOS…

FROM A WEDDING I PHOTOGRAPHED LAST MONTH…

ON CASEY KEY BEACH.

THESE FOUR ARE SISTERS.

SUSANNE (2ND FROM RIGHT) GOT MARRIED AT PAULINE’S (FAR RIGHT) BEACH ESTATE…

NEXT DOOR TO HORROR NOVELIST STEPHEN KING’S HOUSE.

THERE WERE ONLY 25 PEOPLE THERE.

IT WAS SIMPLE & BEAUTIFUL & QUITE LITERALLY…

TOOK MY BREATH AWAY.

EVERYONE WAS SO CHARMING & PHOTOGENIC…

I FELT LIKE I WAS IN A SCENE TORN FROM THE GREAT GATSBY.

I HAVEN’T PHOTOGRAPHED MANY WEDDINGS…

BUT IF I DO, I’M CERTAIN THIS ONE WILL BE MY FAVORITE.

EVERYONE WORE PAISLEY PRINTS AND BRIGHT COLORS.
IT WAS ALMOST A SHAME TO EDIT THEM INTO BLACK & WHITE.
THEY CALL THEIR HOUSE “THE TREE HOUSE…”
BECAUSE IT’S LITERALLY BUILT UP INTO THE TREES…
LIKE TOWN & COUNTRY’S VERSION OF THE SWISS FAMILY ROBINSON…
TREE HOUSE.
I BARELY POSED ANYONE.
EVERYTHING FELT SO NATURAL…
TO ME. 
SUSANNE & PAUL ARE FROM MUNICH, GERMANY.
SO I ASKED SUSANNE’S FATHER (BELOW & ON THE LEFT) IF HE HAD HEARD OF THE TINY TOWN…
WHERE MY OMA IS FROM.
AND HE KEPT SAYING, “VHERE IS DEES PLACE?”AND I KEPT SAYING, “BAD SOODEN-ALLENDORF…IT’S A SPA TOWN SMACK DAB IN THE MIDDLE OF GERMANY.”
A ROMANTIC POET NAMED WILHELM MULLER ONCE LIVED THERE.
IT’S A PLACE RIPE WITH MINERAL SPRINGS AND SHOEMAKERS’ KIN… LIKE MY OMA’S SIBLINGS & THEIR CHILDREN & THEIR CHILDREN’S CHILDREN.
BUT SINCE I DON’T SPEAK GERMAN…I DIDN’T EXPLAIN THIS TO SUSANNE’S FATHER…WHO WAS WEARING THE MOST AMAZING SUIT COAT I’VE EVER SEEN.
INSTEAD I THOUGHT…
AS THE SUN SET ON THIS AFFAIR…I HOPE MY WEDDING IS AS AWESOME AS THIS ONE…
OR MORE SO.

Roaming minutes

March 15, 2009 by heidi 10 Comments


Just called my father, expecting it to be my mother. Since I’m all lazy and easy-like-Sunday morning, I figured I’d sort out this Popple tail thing over the phone.

“Hello Mothership.”
“(Snort sound) This is your Fathership.”
“Oh, Fathership. What’s up with you?”
“I’m at 2,000 feet.”
“In the plane?”
“Yup. Flying over Lake Erie right now. It’s frozen from shore to shore.”
“I think you get better reception over Lake Erie than you do on Jennings Road.”
“(Snort sound.) Yeah, I know.”
My father has a two-seater Cessna named Isabella that he and my Opa bought when I was about 11 years old. He got it shortly after he got his pilot’s license – the culmination of months of night school, instrument training, a bevy of other FAA-regulated requirements and a medical exam.
Opa doesn’t have his license. 
When my dad flies, Opa sits next to him, living vicariously through the plane’s passenger seat controls. 
Oma wasn’t too thrilled about Isabella. Neither was my mother. Night school was expensive and logging miles with a flight instructor cost even more. 
The airplane however, when compared to what other men spend on less impressive toys, was cheap – relatively speaking. My dad had to entirely rebuild the engine. The labor cost nothing. He did it himself. 
My mother calls Isabella, “The Other Woman.” In fact, she’s the one who named the plane Isabella. I think it made the hobby easier to digest – my father nurturing something human instead of machine. We women personalize everything. I think I Lanced about this already. Oh yeah. Briefly, here. 
Anyway, my dad answered the phone. 2,000 feet in the air. Buzzing Lake Erie. 
“Whatcha up to kiddo?”
“Joe’s got a cold and I’m lounging around, eating pizza. A photographer friend is taking engagement pictures of us and the pug tonight.”
“Engagement pictures?”
“Yeah. I wasn’t going to do ’em, but he offered to take them for a case of beer. I think he wants glamour shots of the pug for his portfolio.” 
“What do people do with engagement pictures?”
“I don’t know. Put them in a giant frame for people to sign at their wedding, I suppose.”
“Hmm. Well that’s pretty nice of him, to take them for free.”
(Yeah. Too bad Joe is sick and the pug has eczema in his facial folds.)

“Dad, you’re talking to me in the airplane, but I can barely hear the engine.”
“You know it’s great! I’ve got the cell phone stuck under my headset with both hands free and I can still hear the radio controls.”
(And to think, he lectures me whenever I drive and talk on the phone.)
“Yesterday I was machining a part for your cousin Cory’s truck and I figured I’d fly over his house to see if he was working on it today. Sure enough, saw him in the driveway, puttin’ the alternator in.”
“You were spying on him from the air?”
“Sure. I called him up too. Told him I was watching him from the sky. He looked up and started laughing.”
—
PS. I took the first two photos about three years ago while flying one summer with my dad over North Collins, N.Y. (my hometown.) If you squint, in that first one you can see our house. 
PPS. The third photo is him and Isabella, sharing a private moment. 
PPPS. The video below is Joe’s first date with Isabella. 

While my Opa was sleeping

March 6, 2009 by heidi 9 Comments

Joe’s in Hampton, Va. for Phish’s first reunion concerts.

Me and the pug? We’re at my Oma and Opa’s place, enjoying an alternate weekend in Nokomis, Fla.
(Oma and Opa = German for Grandma and Grandpa.)
They live about an hour from me in a wooded mobile home park called The Royal Coachman – the quaintest retirement community on the Gulf Coast. And in my journalistic opinion, the best retirement community on the Gulf Coast.
PK will join me tomorrow for sun tannin’ by the Royal Coachman pool and home cooked German meals in Oma’s lanai. Until then, it’s just me and the pug sleeping on a pullout sofa, listening to the sound of clocks tick and motorcycles rev muffler-lessly into the night.
Oma told me a story tonight that I’ll share with you briefly before I fall asleep under these downy blankets.
It started first with Opa pinching his gray hair, which hangs in a kind of sparse dutch boy when it’s freshly cut.
“Gerhard,” Oma said. “The barber tuk a lot off dis time.”
“Ja. That is because I told him to,” said Opa. “Every time I go to him he schnibbles only a little around mein ears, so I have to come back two, tree veeks later. I told him to take it all off at vonce. I pay to get mein hair cut, so cut it mensch!”
Smiling, Oma reached around Opa’s head and touched the bristled ends of his hair. She asked if I remembered tiptoeing up to him as a little girl – my sisters and I – clipping plastic barrettes in his hair while he was sleeping.
I remembered it vaguely.
Opa, who has a hard time remembering most things, remembered it like it happened yesterday.
—
PS. Photo by R., a 23-year-old aspiring writer and “general bohemian gadabout” living in Sydney, Australia. For her flickr photostream click here.
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Why do I even blogger?

If you really want to know why I continue to write here, read this post.

Lance lately

  • Old School Values
  • Land of Hives and Honey
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  • Truth Bombs with Henry [No. 2]
  • Truth Bombs with Henry [No. 1]
  • By now I’d have two kids

Social commentary

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Oddities

Reading material

Wild by Cheryl Strayed Travels with Charley Home Game bossypants just kids the time travelers wife Boys Life The-Liars-Club My Uncle Oswald Stephen King On Writing

Me.

Heidi K

Joe.

Joe on guitar

Henry.

henry as werewolf

Chip.

Chippy in a cupboard

Buzzy.

Buzzy

Why Lance?

This blog is named after my old friend Sarah's manifestation of a dreamy Wyoming cowboy named Lance, because the word blog sounds like something that comes out of a person's nose.

About me

I'm a journalist who spends my Mondays through Fridays writing other people's stories, a chronic procrastinator who needs structure. I once quit my job to write a book and like most writers, I made up excuses why I couldn't keep at it.

My boyfriend fiancé husband Joe likes to sleep in late on the weekends, but since we have a kid now that happens less than he'd like.

Before Henry and Chip, I used to spend my mornings browsing celebrity tabloid websites while our dog snored under the covers. Now I hide my computer in spots my feral children can't reach because everything I own is now broken, stained or peed on.

I created Lance in an attempt to better spend my free time. I thought it might jump start a second attempt at writing a novel.

It hasn't. And my free time is gone.

But I'm still here writing.

I'm 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 and I've yet to get caught up in something else, which is kind of a big deal for a chronic procrastinator.

How I met Joe

If you're new here and looking for nirvana, read this post.

And if that’s not enough…

heidikurpiela.com

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