As we headed back for my test, my heart racing, my stomach turning, I admitted to the bubbly, kind tech that I am a bad combination: I am claustrophobic and a hypochondriac. She laughed, in a warm and kind way, and assured me that there was nothing to worry about. “I just have bad anxiety,” I told her, as I was putting my belongings into a locker by the MRI room.

We got into the room, she put a fresh sheet of tissue on the table and then she said, “Before you go in, I just have to tell you a story. Long story short…” and then went on, and I am not exaggerating, to tell me a ten minute story about how her son started to get weird neurological symptoms, including screaming fits, twitching, the inability to balance, sleep or brush his teeth and she was sure he had a brain tumor, being an MRI tech and all. AND, he also had anxiety. They took him to many hospitals and finally, through a special program, he was diagnosed with Encephalitis, the source of all of his symptoms. Including the anxiety. So basically, she spent ten minutes telling me why I should be more worried. I actually got a bit woozy at one point and sat down (there is only so much you can hear about the blood and brain) but when I finally got in the MRI machine I actually started to laugh. It was so ridiculous that I just had to laugh.

2. Speaking of my MRI, I had to take out my new ear piercing, just two days after I had it done, as there is no metal allowed. I tried to put it back in last night and it didn’t work well. So my husband re-pierced my ear. I feel like this might not have been a great idea.

3. Today, someone pointed to my son and asked, “Oh, so you’re the babysitter?” (Score!)

4. This week, I received the most incredible support from the most incredible friends, near and far. I felt very loved and for that I feel very blessed. I was able to ask questions, ask for help, tell seemingly endless and boring stories at times, and other times, I did not have to say anything at all.  #friendshipisthickerthanblood

Speaking of friends, this, the whole dress debacle that seemed to dominate the internet last night, caused me great anxiety. I asked my one bestie, the neuropsychologist, why our brains would make us see things so differently (she saw gold and white; her husband, my husband and I all saw blue and black). I tried to explain to her what white looks like to me: I said it is a light color, whereas black is a dark color, like the sky outside at nighttime. She asked me if I saw marshmallows as black; I asked my other bestie if this was a sign of the apocalypse. I was seriously scared. Thank gd she has a survival kit.

5. This morning felt like a mom-win.

I made three different breakfasts for three different dependents, because my one child does not eat strawberries or muffins and the other won’t eat blueberries or eggs.

and then there was this one. Have I mentioned that we hand make all of her meals?

Then, I packed a lunch and decided to write a note for my daughter that she could read by herself (because she’s really taking off in her reading and it is so cool!) So I tried to make it easy, and use a picture like they do in the BOB books.

Except, I can’t draw. My husband makes the most amazing lunch notes, but this morning it was on me.

Let me see if you can figure out what I was trying to convey with this masterpiece here:

Finally, my last moment of heart-exploding pride came when it came time for my daughter to leave for school.

I mean, the newsboy cap; the kiss; the chunky thighs; the love.

And those are a handful of things that are on my mind.

So, what color did you see?

(Just kidding. I do NOT want to know.)

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And I can’t believe how different things are now.

She is no longer in college.

She is no longer a White House Intern; (Though we now stay in touch with her former boss from that summer, as he has become a dear family friend.)

She is no longer traveling abroad on the reg.

But, some things never change.

***

Today, I introduced my kids to Grease for the first time.

I am lucky enough that my daughter is just young enough that anything inappropriate goes over her head (she was completely oblivious to the cigarette smoking, shockingly, and does not even come close to getting any references to drugs or sex).

I did, however, have to explain the premise to her; I said, “Imagine that we were away in St. John and you made a best friend and you were sooooo sad when we had to leave because you thought you would never see your friend again…and then you ended up both going to the same school, and you didn’t even realize it.”

She was a bit hesitant. Her loyalties are to Into the Woods and Rent and I respect that, because, come on, they are genius in completely different ways, but Grease…it’s Grease!

I told her to wait for the first song; I told her that I thought she would like it.

And oh, she suddenly transformed, in an instant, from The Baker’s Wife into Sandy.

It didn’t matter that we had spent this entire snow day acting out Into the Woods 172 times, or that she stood at the sink for a half an hour “preparing things to bake”, or that she told me, at one point, that she was pregnant.

She was now Sandy!

And I don’t blame her, because

It may be four and a half years later,

so much may have changed,

but,

still,

Grease is the word.

#pinkladiesforever

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Several years ago, I wrote a post specifically about my love of and history with music; But, in truth, music has infiltrated almost every space of this site. I write about our daily dance parties, my deep love for the music of Brett Dennen, my rich history with musical theatre and the soundtrack that makes up my life.

This past year, through all of the darkness, I have had one unexpected and unparalleled bright spot. I have been able to make music.

First, as a teacher. This past summer, I was the performing arts director for a most wonderful program and got to teach classes in musical theatre. The middle and high school students whom I taught were incredible; so open, so brave, so talented. I got to teach and stage and choreograph numbers from Rent and Wicked and Newsies and I got to give young people the confidence to share their voices with the world. I have been teaching musical theatre professionally in some capacity for nearly 10 years, but really, since I was 14 and came back to my middle school to be assistant vocal director for their musicals. I am passionate about music and about instilling a feeling of self assurance in young people, and so this summer was a, pardon me for this, season of love.

But nothing, nothing can compare to the band. I am the lead singer of a rock band called Fox & the Hounds. I am lucky enough to have my next door neighbor serve double duty, as he is my bandmate and our alpha. I started playing with him and another supremely talented guitarist in June of 2013, singing cover songs, messing around on Spotify and watching my belly grow by the minute.

Last winter, despite all of the bad going on in my life, we managed to keep the band alive. And not only did we keep it going, but we added to it, so that by the Spring, we had a bassist, a drummer and had gone electric. My summer was spent in the basement of our guitarist’s home, sharing beers and stories and rocking out as hard as we possibly could to every single song we each wanted to play.

(Except for “Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow”. I could not get them to play “Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow.” To be fair, they could not get me to sing “Living on a Prayer”.)

Each member of the band brought something different in talent and personality and practice was something that I looked forward to, almost craved, each Wednesday night. It fed my soul.

Towards the end of the summer, the guitarist and I even started to write some of our own material, as he came up with a blues jam to which I put words and a melody.

Bands evolve and morph and at this time we spend most of our practicing playing acoustic, back to our roots, hibernating for the winter, as I say.

I try to tell my bandmates how much they mean to me. I write them nice emails thanking them for being the best parts of my otherwise bleak year. But they are dudes. They are good to me and ever so kind and compassionate, but they are still dudes, and I will never get a “You mean so much to me, too!!!!” in return, but I’m OK with that, because they give me that by continuing to play with me whenever possible.

Because of Fox & the Hounds I have grown tremendously as a musician. I have learned to perform in a whole new way and have tackled musical obstacles that I once thought impossible. And I have my guys to thank for that.

I don’t want to continue to embarrass them (in fact, I am positive that being publicly praised on Facebook is about the last thing that certain band members want, but…tough). I just want to say thank you.

***

Out of all of the things that defined this past year, I feel so blessed that music has been one of my greatest supports. The gratitude I have for the music in my life is hard for me to describe in plain words.

I got an incredible gift from my favorite singer, got to see a ton of live shows, and, had quite possibly the coolest experience of my life when I saw Brett Dennen play an acoustic show in Wilmington, Delaware, as I was leaning on the stage (I was that close), and he asked the audience to sing along, and then he called me out for having a “beautiful voice”, engaging in an entire conversation about my singing and my band with me in front of the packed audience.

But when it comes to music, there is only so much you can say; sometimes you just have to hear. So, I have made a small compilation of my year in music. The gigs, the dance parties, the bloopers and the craziness. It has been the best ride of my life.

*Note: at the end credits, Oasis was left out mistakenly from our list of brilliant musicians. So Oasis, if you are reading this, please don’t look back in anger.

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