Author: tlee

1. Listen to music
2. Take a lot of walks
3. Take naps
4. Shop
5. Watch TV
6. Have soup.
7. Write about the loss. But don’t cannibalize the experience to turn your pain into an amusing, entertaining anecdotes for others. Or do it, but just be careful.
8. Make jokes.
9. Listen to more music. Really helps soothes those distraught brain waves.
10. Just when you think it’s over, it’s not.
11. Embrace the moments of lightness.
12. Welcome his visits in your dreams.
13. Get massages to unlock the crying trapped in your body.
14. When the guilt and the questioning your past actions comes, it’s okay. Go ahead and work that through.

Excuse me a hot minute as this website no longer permits me to upload pics from the Internet.

For now, just enjoy the words. Ha!

I have long been a Kevin Hart fan (homophobia aside, I do not like homophobia). But before hearing his toxic language, I have called him my boyfriend constantly, to the point where the First Son’s second grade teacher pulled me to ask “Was Kevin Hart really your boyfriend?” No, girl! When I’m grumpy, Husband knows what to do. He finds me a Kevin Hart movie on cable and lets me chill.

Snoop Dog and Kevin Hart are currently in Toykyo commenting on the Olympics, providing much needed joy. Check out this clip, and note the equestrian section in particular. When Snoop Dogg calls a horse trot “gangsta” and exclaims he has to put that horse in a video, and starts dropping a beat beneath the horse trot, I die. Who knew Snoop was so funny and charming? Husband says he knew.

I’m going to have to check out this guy’s TV work. He has a show with Martha Stewart, because I’m happy to add him to my boyfriend list.

There are times that we all doubt my parenting. On the way to ceramics camp, where we were going to pick up the Wonder Twins pots, clay plates, clay animal figures, and clay nubs, Wonder Twin Girl asked if she could ride the granny cart.

Against my better judgment, I plopped her in there and proceeded. We hit a crater in the sidewalk, the cart toppled, I screamed (I always let out a blood-curdling scream when one of my kids is about to get hurt and I can’t stop it), and then fell on top of her in the cart. So smooth, right?

She crawled out after I got up. She had scratches on her forearms. I bloodied my shins. Once we determined we were okay, I said, “I know this is a terrible idea, but I would let you ride again. I think I can avoid the pot holes this time.”

She was not interested, which really, was the wise choice.

This is a breathtaking limited series, reimagined to not just include Black people and characters, but incorporate history and who these people are as an essential part of the plot. I like both. I like when stories highlight portraits where race or identity have nothing to do with the part (or not explicitly, because of course, if you see nontraditional casting, it becomes part of the story telling) and parts where race et al are an explicit part of the story telling.

There is so much to love about Watchmen, I don’t know where to begin. First, it’s produced by Damon Lindeloff, the person behind Lost, one of my favorite TV shows of all time (until the writers’ strike just caused the story line to go AWOL, but the premise was a brilliant love child of reality shows, diversity, and disaster. The cast included Koreans and an actor who plays a bff of Lord of the Ring‘s Frodo. It was the perfect recipe to suck me in). Lindeloff has discussed how Black Lives Matter and the book How to Become an Antiracist by Ibram Xendi influenced his imagination. Watchmen follows a fantastical tale of out-of-this-world super heroes, alternate versions of American history where th U.S. won the Vietnam War, and Vietnam is introduced as the 51st street, where Regina King’s character grew up. Part of this regal Black American’s heritage was Vietnamese!!! How cool is that? She demonstrates how to make traditional Vietnamese pastries for her son’s class.

She’s also a cop, who moonlights as a super hero with excellent eyeliner and killer moves. As the story proceeds, you find her personal connection to the 1921 Tulsa massacre, a three-day takedown of Black Wall Street that really happened and I had never heard of prior to this show. They didn’t teach it public school in NJ when I was growing up.( In 1921, right after World War I, Black soldiers came back to build middle class communities like Greenwood in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Unfortunately, this was threatening to white citizens who also birthed the KKK at this time. Kicked off by a bogus criminal charge, white vigilantes burned down this town of 10,000. We have so many shameful chapter in our country’s story that I’m only now getting educated on.) The real history intertwines with the character’s trajectory, in this mix of alt contemporary, real history, and mystical sci-fi world. It is an utterly wild work of art with a social justice lens that successfully ties together disparate plot lines into one by the end. It is so heartbreaking, I don’t think I can bear to watch it again.

i have no idea what i was thinking here. cancer the crab?

You know the hey dey of podcasts are past, because my mom and I now listen to them regularly. We don’t listen to the same ones of course. During the pandemic, I mostly look for funny ones or ones with long stories that can help me transcend the fact that I’m washing dishes yet again or fixing a bagel for a child every goddamn ten minutes. Right now, I sometimes listen to “Smartless podcast” with Jason Bateman, Will Arnett and Sean Hayes. I found it because I am obsessed with “Ozarks,” starring and directed by Jason Bateman. Initially, the podcast was a delight. I laughed, laughed, laughed. It has the laziest premise. One of them chooses a guest to interview and preps, while the other two get to be surprised. The guests they interview are mostly A-list Hollywood celebrities, and it gets tired. I’m now more curious about regular people. There are so many regular people in this country I know nothing about who are still interesting and talented. They interview Adam Sandler and Jennifer Aniston, among others, and with each guest, it’s “what’s so amazing about you is that you’re so successful and talented and beautiful, but you’re so nice too.” Really? All of them? They’re all nice? Did you know if Jennifer Aniston wasn’t a movie start, she would be an interior decorator? I mean, god, that’s boring. I’d rather pay attention to washing the dishes. And of course, this is also three white rich successful men. When they interview Bryan Cranston and ask how he turned out so well, when he had such a rough childhood, they give all kinds of answers, but they never say “It’s cuz I’m white.”

Of course, I could stop kvetching and start diversifying my podcasts and sprinkle some people of color, which I obviously need to because this self-absorption makes me eyeroll.

I tried to pitch this documentary to my mom. I said, “It’s about a guy with Alzheimer’s, and his daughter stages his death over and over again. It’s great, I love it.” Mom just eyerolled and said, “No way. Too weird.” It is truly weird and funny and dark and so wildly creative! Whatever my video watching algorithm says about me, Netflix completely has my number!!!! This is exactly the kind of work I’d love to produce. I’ve always wanted to produce a film where I write parts for me, Husband, and my parents. God, that sounds so mega fun. In “Dick Johnson Is Dead!”, the dad is so very sweet and supportive. He may not have a full grasp of what the film is about all the time, but he supports it because he wholeheartedly loves his daughter. He’s incredibly patient with himself most of all. In the end, Mom did check it out because it was making the rounds in her high school alumni What’s Up app, and she thought it was “Good.”

Before I had a clue what was happening, I have become a Pushover Parent. I am constantly trying to make my kids’ lives easier and then it’s like I forget I’m an adult with actual responsibility and authority. I forget that I can say no! It’s so stupid, but it’s like when Wonder Twin Boy asks for candy. “Can I have candy?” is what he typically says when I finally get him outside for playground time. Then he will ask “Can I have candy?” two more times on the way. By the fourth “Can I have candy?” happens, I GIVE HIM CANDY! It’s like just automatic reaction.

It reminds me of this story my mom made fun of me for. Back in the day, before subways had Metrocards, you bought tokens to ride the subway, and this white teen boy just came up to me and said “Can I have a token?” I didn’t know him. I wasn’t in danger. He wasn’t threatening me. I gave him one. “Can I have another one?” And I GAVE IT TO HIM! When my mom heard this, she was so mad at me she employed sarcasm, which she rarely uses. “What is wrong with you? IF someone asks you for money, you just give them money? Oh yeah, sure we should put you in Port Authority and just yell ‘Hey everybody! This woman just gives out tokens!”

I mean, if I’m being truthful, it’s not merely because I am passive that I give these things away. I am also not that attached to those items or rules or norms. I think when I am just bopping along and someone wants something I have, I figure, they must really want it, so I share.

But now that I’m a parent, I have to admit, that’s weird.

In a time where we all hitting a wall, I have to say watching “The Mandalorian” as a family gave my spirits a lift. Baby Yoda! Who knew! I have seen the memes and Buzzfeed articles devoted to this little guy before watching this show, and thought, no big deal. But when I saw him using his paws to channel the Force and fall on his bum from the effort, or call out in a baby gurgle, forget it. I had no idea Baby Yoda was so utterly beguiling.

Also, in this era of seriousness, watching “Pretend It’s a City” starring Fran Leibowitz has been cracking me up. She described almost getting hit by a young man on a bike holding a pizza in one hand, texting with a phone in the other. He drove his bike with elbows. Ahh youth!

Here’s a job I never applied for: Homework Doula! Oh, it’s thankless, uphill-battle kind of work. It involves crying, yelling, throwing one’s body on the bed, denying, lying, resigning oneself to one’s fate. I think also candy and wine are also part of the deal. I’d rather not be involved with the kids’ homework, since I listen to one childhood podcast that recommends to keep school work between the student and the teacher, that it’s important to show mistakes so the teacher can identify areas for improvement. This jibes with like my goal to be more hands-off when it comes to academics, which is the opposite of my mom’s approach.

As much as I like to play the role of an extra in this pandemic, when we discovered Wonder Twin Boy has 39 missing assignments, we have no choice but to get involved, and it’s a two-person-team effort! Husband is creating Boy’s state project on Hawaii and I’m practically ghostwriting a feature article on Minecraft.

It reminds me of my third grade project on South Korea that must have slipped my mind, because over the weekend, my parents got to work. Mom wrote out paragraphs on Korea that I rewrote in my own handwriting and Dad cut out pictures from a South Korea tourism book to glue to my poster board. That pretty much meant they did my homework, and I turned out okay. There’s hope for all of us yet.