Bread, Thora Birch, and a Book Announcement

After the train wreck that was last week, I was going to sit down just now and write that this week has been better. But then I began to write about my morning and realized that it's just last week all over again. Hold me.

I was baking bread, see, and realized halfway through, right around the crucial no-turning-back point, that I didn't have any yeast in the fridge. I'd been so proud of myself for getting right to it so bright and early - I thought I'd have it finished by nap time - and now I'd have to run to the grocery store and set myself back. Sullivan and I were still in our PJs and hadn't had breakfast yet, so there was a lot of pants-putting-on and missing-other-shoe-locating that isn't usually a part of my bread making routine.

We made it out the door in record time, though, and guess what happened when I got to the cash register with my yeast?

I will tell you; it seems relevant: I opened my wallet and found an empty slot where my debit card should have been. In case you missed my last blog post, let me fill you in on the significance of this: I just got a new debit card last Thursday. I lost my last one last week. Into thin air. Poof. Smoke. Magic. Rabbits.

I stared at the cashier like an idiot for a few moments, and then said, in this really sad, really small voice, "I don't know where my money is."

And she said, "Okay."

And I said, "That's the kind of week it's been." There was a Canadian journalist who used to say that (or something like it) at the end of every news broadcast. I always hear his voice when it comes out of my mouth.

She shrugged at me, and I realized I shouldn't say stuff like this to cashiers. They can't do anything for me, probably just want me to be a grownup and take care of my stuff like grownups [supposedly] do. Probably just want me to pay or get out of the way.

Gasp, I thought. Am I turning into an oversharer? The woman in public who goes up to other women in public and empties her heart out, like a bucket, on the floor in front of them? Who thinks strangers actually want to know how you are when they ask how you are?

So I got out of the way. I offered to put my yeast back and she smiled kindly and said she didn't have much else to do (the store was dead; it was, as previously established, early in the morning). That was nice of her. I picked Sullivan up and made my way back to my car, wondering what to do next.

He was confused. We'd come to the store for yeast, picked out the yeast, brought the yeast to the cash register, and were now leaving without the yeast. "Mom? Where's the yeast?"

I sighed. "I can't find my debit card, so we can't buy anything right now."

He grinned at me. "Debit card." It was not an unknowing grin. He was implicating himself.

I set him down on the ground by the flowers at the store entrance. I held his little hands and studied his little face. "Sully. Do you have my debit card?"

"Yeah. I do."

Sully's little still; when he says, "yeah," it could really mean either yes or no. He doesn't always understand the question. But when he tacks an "I do," on the end, it means he knows what I mean and he means what he said. I searched his person.

Imagine my relief upon discovering my lost debit card in his jacket pocket!
Imagine my distress upon discovering that I'm raising a pickpocket!

I immediately thought of one of my favourite childhood movies, Monkey Trouble, starring Thora Birch. She adopts this monkey who was trained by a con man to pickpocket...anyway. It's not important. It's barely relevant.

Thora Birch was my fave back then though. You should know that about me.

(While I was writing this, I remembered that my bread was in the oven, and that I'd forgotten to set a timer. I'm beginning to suspect that part of my brain has actually shut down.)

This blog post is out of control. I'm just now going to get to the actual point, which has nothing whatsoever to do with bread or Thora Birch.

I wanted to tell you about something that has taken up most of my free time this spring: I've been co-writing a book with my lovely friends over at Coffee+Crumbs! It's all come about pretty fast: last November (I think?), we got an email from Harper Collins wondering if we wanted to write a book, and we said yeah, and they said ok, and so we did. It's a book of essays about motherhood, and it's really quite beautiful (to read but also to look at). Ashlee handed in the manuscript yesterday and it's due in bookstores next April, which feels like a very long time from now.

Ashlee wrote a much better, more thorough, book announcement here.

I may never be 90's-era Thora Birch, but I will be a published writer, and that, I think, is also good and fun.