New for Fall

The HHDs are upon us now. I'm going to my final writing class for the quarter this Wednesday, and then downtown to deliver Erev Rosh Hashana. Dad will be taking G with Cathy, and it will be nice to have them in the congregation. Thursday I'm at the Wiltern with a lot of kids in the Youth Choir whom I don't know, with choral books that no longer match the books the congregation has. Problem! I need to update my book now. Alas...

G had her first LACC rehearsal today, and she looks kicky and mod with her new, cool haircut. She seems quite confident to me.

Our new kitchen stuff is starting to come in - new dishes, pots and pans, etc. It's like being a newlywed. Hey, come to think of it, it all is feeling like being a newlywed.

As soon as September is over, I start my new quarter at school, and my new life. It's strange to be so thoroughly turning the page. There is nothing gradual about any of this.

I miss Jeanne. I always think we're not speaking, somehow, and it never ends up being so. Maybe this is still one of those occasions. I have been friends with her for over twenty years, and we have had words exactly twice, both over the phone, and both over Don Henley. How many people can claim him as the central topic of debate in their decades-long friendship?

My mother has recently returned from Anderson Cancer Center with a literal new lease on life. We all have some real hope now. All is well.

JW heads off on tour for the rest of this month in a couple of days. Back to single-parenting...

Home

This is where I will be spending most of the foreseeable future. I am now homeschooling my 10-year-old, and have resigned my job. I will be teaching (aforementioned progeny), studying (still trying to be Cantor Shapiro for reals), and traveling (with one husband by the name of Jack Wall).

I think I'm happy, although some days it's still a little hard to tell. We have chosen Oak Meadow as our home school school and curriculum. So far, we love it. Plus I have G doing Rosetta Stone French, Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain art, piano at NoHo Piano Academy, singing at Los Angeles Children's Chorus, and she is also a member of two home school groups. She has a new best friend and seems happy to me. My little A+ girl. She was always A+ to me.

No more schlepping on the 405 several times a week, sweating bullets, wondering if I will make it on time, no matter how much time I've given myself. I have one more High Holy Days cycle to go through, a few more Shabbatot, a couple of girls to nurture through their Bat Mitzvahs, and then, it's blond and pink hair for me in a symbolic casting off of the veneer I've had to don in order to pass muster these last few years.

Freedom beckons...