A coworker lost her mother over the weekend. It wasn’t completely unexpected, but that still has to be one of the heaviest feelings we can feel. It’s got me thinking a lot about my own mom and how I wish I didn’t live so far away from her. Time is precious.
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A coworker lost her mother over the weekend. It wasn’t completely unexpected, but that still has to be one of the heaviest feelings we can feel. It’s got me thinking a lot about my own mom and how I wish I didn’t live so far away from her. Time is precious.
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Went to the post office today to mail a package to my mom. I’m always struck by just how shabby our public institutions have become. Comparing the architecture of train stations and libraries and post offices today to those from 100 years ago really highlights how our priorities have changed.
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We’re training her for the X Games.
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We had our friend Alyssa watch our kids for a few hours today so we could have some time to ourselves, something that is so often in short supply.
Went for a nice bike ride in the rain on the Banks-Vernonia Oregon State Trail and followed it up with a beer and some Texas style BBQ brisket at Hop Cycle.
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Spring is still being moody but the redbuds are in full bloom.
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Four food carts just opened in an underutilized industrial spot within walking distance of my house.
Mexican with excellent birria tacos, Hawaiian-Filipino infusion, Salvadoran, Venezuelan. This is bad. Real bad.
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This month marks 8 years since I moved to Oregon, and the same for my work anniversary. Time flies!
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Just realized I think I put half and half instead of milk in my daughter’s sippy cup for daycare. Mornings can be chaotic sometimes!
Update: Definitely did. it was so thick that her teacher thought we gave her spoiled milk. Whoops.
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I guess our house is the one all the neighborhood kids like to crash.
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Middle Age Experience
My wife and I are watching Fleishman Is in Trouble on Hulu and I’m really impressed by the writing. No real spoilers here, but I do talk about some basic plot info and some experiences of a supporting actor if you want to skip reading this.
The main character of the show is Toby Fleishman, a recently divorced middle aged hematologist. His successful ex-wife, a New York City talent rep for performing artists, just disappears one day and doesn’t come back, leaving him and his preteen kids in the dark about her whereabouts. He and his kids are in shock and struggle to make their way in a new life without her.
Although Fleishman’s experience is the main plot arc, we also learn about the various struggles his friends are experiencing in mid life.
One of his best friends is Libby, and I find her character especially relatable. Her character is about my age in real life, has been married to a lawyer for a long time, and is having a difficult time getting the recognition she deserves as a female writer at a men’s magazine. She watches as male writers get promoted as she’s passed over.
On the episode we watched last night (S1 E6), Libby was out at a once-a-year party with old friends whom she knew from studying abroad in Israel in college. She’s drinking and having a great time, but as the night turns late, her husband begins to get snippy with her about wanting to leave. She insists on staying while the husband storms off.
As she gets more drunk, her feelings about life start to overwhelm her on how dull life becomes in middle age.
She begins to realize how good her life was when she was young, about things she took for granted. In her search for success and carving out an adult life, she somehow missed that she had so much power in her freedom, which she things she let go of too readily in exchange for stability and security. Now the spice of life has left and all she longs for are the unknowns, the freedom of figuring it all out.
Personally I’ve been feeling some similar things, although not as deeply. I love the life I’ve created, but there certainly is some personal growth involved in settling into life while also trying to meet some of those core needs and desires we all tend to put aside when starting a family and getting on with a career.
It’s a struggle to figure out which needs and desires are reasonable when you have to make sacrifices. That can be a tricky negotiation, one that I’m still figuring out and will likely continue to figure out forever. In my heart I know it’s necessary to carve out some life for myself on this never ending path toward self-actualization. It’s the guilt that can come with that negotiation that can be so difficult to get over.
I don’t know what’s in store for Libby’s character, but it’s comforting just seeing characters in my life stage, at this moment in history, working through similar feelings. In a way, it affirms my feelings that I should be giving myself permission to feel what I feel and explore who I am instead of letting guilt force my hand.
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I have this habit of planting too many veggie starts because I think I’m going to kill them all. But as I’ve gotten better at it, I’m thinking I might need to build more beds.
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One of the occupational hazards of being an urban planner is that you’re constantly being critical of the built environment around you.
While out and about, all I think about is access management plans, lack of pedestrian and bicycle facilities, crappy or non-existent transit facilities, single-use buildings in multi-use zones, disappointment in the lack of residential density, Americans’ distaste for residential density, unchecked code violations in wealthy neighborhoods, low quality building materials, huge parking lots, impervious surfaces and flood plains, crappy landscaping, HOAs and restrictive covenants, unsafe routes to school, lack of healthy food options, poor parks and other green spaces, NIMBYs, and on and on.
Sometimes I wish I would’ve gone into something a little more micro, like landscaping or plumbing.
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Went down a rabbit hole tonight reading my first blog on Livejournal, the first entries of which turn 20 this year. Thinking about exporting them to my current blog in spite of my embarrassment.
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Watching the Tigers on TV and it’s cool to see the Hudson’s tower begin to rise over the outfield. It will be something to see once it hits 700 feet and becomes Detroit’s second tallest building.
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Some unusually nice days this week in Portland. Decided to get up early and head over to the Oregon Zoo.
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What’s one thing you used to love that you just don’t anymore?
For me, I used to love staying up late and sleeping in on the weekends. But since having kids, I’m pretty exhausted early on. Anxiety still gives me trouble falling asleep sometimes, but my kids wear me out!
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Have to applaud Cursive for performing their Domestica album two days in a row at one of Portland’s smallest venues instead of just getting a bigger venue.
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90°F in my 2nd level office today. Ashamed to admit I broke down and turned on the air conditioning. A week ago it was ten degrees below average and now it’s like July up in here.
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Had a scammer try to buy $600 in nonsense from a pharmacy 2,000 miles away this morning.
Glad I got the email from Instacart saying my address on file had changed, and that I woke up early today. I was able to chat with the shopper and have the account shut down before anything was delivered or charged.
I use complex passwords and don’t click on strange links, so not sure how this happened. Good reminder to shut down old accounts. Passkeys can’t get here soon enough.
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Getting back into Duolingo lately and thought I was doing so well that I’d try watching foreign shows on Netflix with the Italian subtitles on. Boy, was that ever optimistic.
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As a man of above average height, it will never stop being funny to walk into a restroom and see a short man at the tall urinal when the short one was available.
Whenever I’m forced to take the short urinal in this situation, I have to fight the very intense urge to look the man straight in the eye and shake my head while smiling.
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Not exactly sure why, but I get some sort of strange gratification pulling up next to Teslas and Mercedes at my kids’ preschool in my paid off 12-year-old Subaru with its bumper hanging off.
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Why yes, those are my frozen corn dogs in the office freezer. I am an adult, I swear.
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Overheard my kid today while working from home:
“Mom, I need to see if there are any Weird Al costumes so I can use this accordion for Halloween when I’m 5.”