But I’m still here–really here, because I haven’t yet moved–essentially just ignoring you.

Okay, that’s not true!  I’m not ignoring you.  But I do have other plans in the works, plans that completely excite me and will likely excite you, too.

But I can’t divulge them  yet.

I know, I know!

But I can’t.

You’ll find out soon enough, though.

So keep tuning in.  You’ll be oh so happy you did.

Copyright © 2011  Jennifer Hritz  hritzontheedge  All Rights Reserved

The Boy was eating watermelon as I read, and just as I got to the story behind the ghost my husband walked into the kitchen.

So he heard the whole sad tale, how nobody liked the Hannigan family because they were from the north, but people couldn’t help but love little Kathleen Hannigan because she was so pretty and sweet and kind. And when Kathleen turned sixteen her family threw a big party to celebrate.

But nobody came.

And Kathleen was so distraught that she ran from the house toward the river and then she slipped on a rock and drowned.  And the worst part was that her older sister Amelia, who wasn’t pretty at all and was terribly jealous of Kathleen, was responsible for sending out the party invitations.  But to spite her sister she didn’t send them.  And so really no one came to Kathleen’s party because no one got an invitation.  And then Kathleen slipped on a rock and smacked her head and drowned.  And so Amelia became a crazy recluse and wouldn’t speak to anyone and she stayed in her family’s mansion and kept her sister’s room exactly as it had been the night she died.  She even kept Kathleen’s party dress on the bed, with the water marks on the pretty pink silk.

Books for children! my husband said in his best radio announcer voice when I finished, Brought to you by Prozac.

Copyright © 2011  Jennifer Hritz  hritzontheedge  All Rights Reserved

And so when I got to Hobby Lobby I reached into my handbag for my extra key

and I shut off the engine and restarted it with my extra key and I made sure the air conditioning was blowing right into the demon’s giant ears.

And then I got out of the car and I used my keyless remote to lock the doors. Except the doors wouldn’t lock, maybe because the engine was running.  I tried, like, ten times before I gave up and just threw a little prayer to the gods that no one would come along and steal the demon because that wouldn’t be any fun to explain to The Boy.  And then I ran into Hobby Lobby and grabbed a plain white tee shirt so The Boy would have one for tie-dying day at his new school and I shifted from one nervous foot to the other while I waited in line to pay and then after I finally paid I ran out to the parking lot where, fortunately, the demon was still in the front seat, barking his little ass off at the passerby.

That night my husband and I were sitting at the bar in the kitchen, trying to have a conversation above the din of the three dogs. I hate those goddamn dogs, my husband muttered.  No, you don’t, I told him.  We both looked at the demon, whose teeth were sunk into the big white dog’s drumstick of a leg.  The big white dog’s trainer says the big white dog is eager to please, I said, I bet he could even be a seeing eye dog.  He’d have to be able to walk past another dog without attacking it, my husband reminded me.

Then he scooped up the demon, who also seems incapable of walking past other dogs without attacking.  Why, just the other night we decided to go on a walk, though we had to leave the big white dog at home because no one can handle him on a leash, even after all those training sessions.  The Boy held the skinny beagle’s leash and my husband held the demon’s leash and we were rounding a corner near our house when up bounded a fluffy, blonde dog.  She ran all friendly-like right up to the skinny beagle, who froze in her tracks because she’s so used to being attacked.  But the demon yanked himself right out of his leash and jumped onto the unsuspecting intruder with his mouth wide open and snarling.  So it appears that we have two testosterone-laden dogs who can’t be left to their own devices around the ladies.

Seeing my husband with the demon reminded me of my excursion to Hobby Lobby.  I left the demon in the car with the air conditioner running, I said, I couldn’t lock the doors but no one stole him after all.  Jennifer, my husband said, Tell me that you didn’t leave the car running with the doors unlocked.

It took me a good five seconds to understand what he meant.  Ohhh, I said, Someone could’ve stolen the car.   I would’ve been too humiliated to report the crime, he said.

I’ve had many of these momentary lapses of reasons lately.  Two hundred twelve days in an eight-year-old’s company will do that to you.  But The Boy has started a new school and after so much time I’m back, baby!  I’m back!

Now if I could just remember how to publish a blog post . . .

Copyright © 2011  Jennifer Hritz  hritzontheedge  All Rights Reserved

The Boy actually seems to be quite excited.  My husband and I are riding his wave of enthusiasm, figuring that we have approximately three days where The Boy will willingly go to school before he realizes that having to be somewhere all day every day isn’t as much fun as he anticipated and he refuses to get out of the car.

Even that sounds better than the past seven months.

Not that there haven’t been memorable moments.  Why, just the other day when we were flying back from our “vacation” we were upgraded to first-class.  The Boy, who loves flying first-class (but who RARELY has the option, mind you), taunted the other passengers as they lumbered past us to the economy seats. How I love flying first-class! he crooned, opening up his blanket and spreading it across his knees as he sipped from a glass of apple juice.  Boy! I hissed, noting the black stares of the other passengers, Do not anger the masses!

I’m totally kidding.  I didn’t really say that.  But I did turn a withering look in The Boy’s direction and remind him where we usually sit.  And anyway, karma showed him who was who thirty minutes later when the flight attendant came by with a plate full of tightly wrapped, steaming, white cloths. Taking one from the tray with his silver tongs, he offered it to The Boy, who, limited in his knowledge of cleanliness, contemplated it for a moment and then, deciding that it was clearly the course that followed his glass of apple juice and ceramic ramekin of mixed nuts, tried to take a bite.

In the spirit of keeping things first class, I finally tried the Violet Crown movie theater.  I love the lounge, in part because they offer Antonelli’s cheese plates and cake balls from Doris and Dixie (it’s my book launch party all over again!) and they have killer cucumber martinis.  Once I got in the theater, though, I was kind of disappointed.  Sure, the leather barcaloungers are comfortable. But when I decided I wanted a cake ball, I had to get out of my seat and slink past other moviegoers and head to the snack bar. Frankly, I prefer to be served.  And when I’m finished with my hummus plate, I’d kind of like someone to clear it away.  I really don’t want it sitting in front of me for the next ninety minutes.

When I got home from the movie I sat down across from my husband and put my head in my hands.  I’m tired, I said, I don’t like Austin anymore because it’s too hot and I don’t like being hot and I want to move.  And my husband nodded and said, Jennifer, do you know how sometimes you get crazy?

I did not acknowledge the question.

Right now you’re crazy, he informed me, And you need to write and do yoga and then you’ll feel better again.

But I didn’t write and do yoga the next day.  Instead I went to a friend’s house because she was having a few people over for brunch and she catered everything from The Steeping Room and some cute little cupcake shop.

Also, she has a new light in her kitchen that makes me giddy.

And all of my friends seemed as haggard as I’ve been feeling lately because even though their third- and fourth-graders were back at school, they all have preschoolers who start school the same week as The Boy, except for our lovely hostess, who has a ten-month-old and gets even less space than any of the rest of us.  And we all sat around the table and ate sun-dried tomato and feta strata, and scones and clotted cream, and talked about how maybe we should move to Colorado to start a commune.

If I move to Colorado, I’ll be closer to the wedding site of my Colombian Princess, who claims she’ll be getting married next summer in Tahoe, but hasn’t done anything yet to make that happen.  Actually, I’m a tiny bit worried that I’m the one responsible for nothing happening because I’m the matron of honor and I’m thinking I should be planning something.

But I’m too stuck on the word matron.  Can’t I be the best woman instead?

Also, I do not want to wear a bridesmaid dress, mostly because I’m forty thirty. Don’t worry, said my Colombian Princess when I voiced my concerns, I’m thinking my bridesmaids will wear dresses of their choosing, just in the same color. Oh, I said, What color is that?  I’m thinking champagne, she confided.

Champagne?

What do you think? she asked.  I think, I said, That you’d look fabulous in champagne because you have dark skin and black hair and smoldering eyes.  But I have white skin and blondish hair and I look good in scarlet and navy and turquoise. In champagne I look dead.

She’s taking that under advisement.

Just wait until I lobby for bare feet.

In the meantime, my house is for sale and I’m supposed to be moving to the haunted house near The Boy’s school.  So I don’t know if Colorado is going to work out.  Actually, I don’t know much of anything right now because I’m hot and tired and every day brush fires break out along the highway because of this crazy drought and my brain is nothing but shot from hearing the constant sputter of an almost-nine-year-old Boy pretending to fire a machine gun at his dogs.

And that’s why I wrote this post last Friday.  Because while you’re reading this, The Boy is enjoying his first day of school and I’m spending the day like my friend Lisa.

I’m sleeping and crying.

Copyright © 2011  Jennifer Hritz  hritzontheedge  All Rights Reserved

Looks a lot like the one Joel buys in my third novel.  That lifeguard at the neighborhood pool who never takes his whistle out of his mouth?

Reminds me a lot of James, circa 1991.  The labyrinth I walked last week at a bed and breakfast?

I know that’s going to end up somewhere.

Everywhere I go, everything I do, comes back to the stories I write.  I can’t imagine my life without them.  I’m always writing stories, even if they’re only in my head, even if they’ll never be something you’ll see on Amazon.  I can’t help but think of the story behind every person I see:  the guy beside me right now at Pacha, jiggling his shiny-belted shoe and typing away on his Mac; the guy on the other side of the partition, breathing open-mouthed and wiping his glasses with his thumb; the obnoxious guy who’s taking business calls and scarfing down oatmeal, an inexplicable choice given that it’s already 87 degrees at 10:30 in the morning. They all have stories, and what I don’t know as fact I’ll make up.

That’s just what I do.

The night before last I was driving home with The Boy, returning from a visit to my mother’s.  As we exited from 183 to Mopac I groaned:  backed up traffic and emergency vehicles, which meant The Boy would be late getting in the bath or–knowing him–he’d be skipping a bath altogether.  I’ll exit Steck, I thought, and just take Shoal Creek all the way south.  Easy enough, and as I crept toward the exit The Boy, who’s fascinated by destruction in all its forms, chattered away about what might have happened.  Then in my rearview mirror I saw a fire truck approach.  But I didn’t hear a siren, and when I looked ahead I could see that the wreck in front of me wasn’t a fender bender.  I was looking at a flipped SUV, its front end smashed flat.

The window was covered with a sheet.

The rest of the way home I tried to listen as The Boy, oblivious to the meaning of that sheet, talked about wrecked cars and how cool it was to see a car flipped on its top.  Boy, I finally said, We don’t know exactly what happened back there, but I bet it was awfully scary for whoever was in that car.  Oh, I don’t like when people get hurt, he informed me, I just like to see the damage.  He’s literal, matter-of-fact, a scientist.  When he was five we went on a hike in western Pennsylvania and he took over one hundred photographs of the damage to the forest from a lightning storm.  Take him to a beach and he’ll stand on the bank, pretending to be a forecaster announcing the arrival of a category five hurricane.

Oh, but I’m not the same.  I think about the story of those people.  Of the driver of that SUV, of the person who witnessed the accident, of the police officer who had to deliver the shitty news.

Every day I receive emails from Scott Noelle, progressive parenting guru.  My reaction to his gentle reminders of alignment or appreciation lists depend on my mood; sometimes they inform my entire day and sometimes–like on the days The Boy awakens me with a shriek because the demon has devoured his favorite football–I find myself muttering, Dude, fuck off.

A few weeks ago, Scott Noelle’s email reminded me that every time I speak I’m telling a story.  In his words:

You tell a story when someone asks you, ”How’ve you been?”

 You tell a story whenever you chat with your friends about how difficult or easy it is to parent your child.

 You tell yourself stories when you recall good or bad memories, worry about tomorrow, anticipate fun, etc. 

I just returned from vacation, the one I concocted a few months back when I decided that flying to Southampton to see my brother and Nancy Goat and then renting a car and driving a good eight hours west to see my father in Pennsylvania–this after the whole Second Grade Dropout/Orthopedic Nightmare Spinal Fusion Surprise/Let’s Sell Our House and Move into a Haunted Mansion–sounded like a good way to wrap up the summer.  The trip wasn’t easy.  In fact, I’m more than a little worn out.  But on the flight home I decided to make a mental list of everything that had gone right, instead of cataloging everything that had gone wrong.

The Boy got to hang out in the cockpit of the airplane while everyone was boarding, and mess around with the brake.

The pool in Southampton was beautiful and cool.

We ate fabulous lobster here.

We celebrated Nancy Goat’s birthday with a delicious, if deceitful, cake.

We stayed at a beautiful bed and breakfast in Pennsylvania, built in 1856.

The grounds of the bed and breakfast were picturesque.  There was a swing

overlooking rolling hills and a farm.

And in the room at the top of the house I jumped up and down a bit when I discovered this door separating the bedroom from the bathroom.

I visited the book store my aunt runs

and found to my delight a brisk business for such a small town.

And most importantly, the weather was blissfully cool, no small treat given that Austin has seen almost seventy consecutive days of temperatures over one hundred.  Going to be a hot one, said the woman checking us out at the grocery store in Pennsylvania as we loaded up on supplies for a cook out in the forest, Eighty degrees today.  Lady, that’s the temperature in Austin, I told her, At five o’clock in the morning.

Lately when I’ve been asked how I’m doing I’ve said something along the lines of I need extensive therapy or I’m just about ready to be committed.  But now I’m thinking that maybe it’s time for me to tell a different story.  So the next time someone asks about my well-being I’m going to say, Who, me?  Why, I’m fabulous.

Disclaimer:  Response does not apply to Hritz on the Edge content.

And if this weather doesn’t fucking change I’m taking my story to Denver.

Copyright © 2011  Jennifer Hritz  hritzontheedge  All Rights Reserved

Of course, I give away our family secrets all the time, right here on this blog.  And I know you read them, because I have the statistics to prove it.  Even when I miss updating you almost two weeks in a row, I can tell you’re checking in.  Part of me feels kind of thrilled.  Part of me feels like I really can’t handle the pressure. Because 2011 has kind of kicked my ass, what with the Second Grade Dropout and the Orthopedic Nightmare’s fourth surgery in three years and the demon and the sudden, inexplicable decision to sell our house in Austin and buy a hundred year old project fifteen miles north.

Also, I just received notification yesterday that The Boy’s new school is working out septic tank issues and will likely be pushing back the first day of school–a day I’ve circled on my calendar, along with stars and exclamation points–by two weeks.  Two weeks!

My friend Wendy says the kids should just shit in the woods.  They have enough acreage.

By the time I broke the news about the school’s delayed opening to my husband–my husband, who’s “on business” at a resort near Spokane, where the temperature is seventy degrees, while I encounter an inferno every time I open my front door–I was hyperventilating.  My husband told me to hire a sitter.

But I’m not sure I have the time.  And that seems to be the theme for the year, I’M NOT SURE I HAVE THE TIME and CANCELLATION OF ALL THINGS FUN, which so far has included my trip to Connecticut in May and my friend Lisa’s trip to Austin.  And even though my Colombian Princess came up last week for one night I totally had to share her with The Boy.  Oh, and forty-eight hours before her arrival my husband called to tell me he had to go out of town and so I had to scramble to find childcare, which believe me I did because I’ve been telling my Colombian Princess for months that I would take her to Uchiko.  And we decimated entire populations of fish and drank sake and laughed and closed down the restaurant.

Okay, so maybe not all fun was canceled.  But at the very least FUN seems to be intertwined with a little bit of stress.

This does not bode well for our upcoming vacation to Southampton to visit my brother and Nancy Goat, or our jaunt from Southampton to Pennsylvania to see my father.  Flights.  A seven-hour drive.  A bed and breakfast in the little town where my father lives, one which allows children but has never encountered The Boy or his “library” voice.

Of course, as a result of my trip you’ll inevitably hear more family secrets, potentially sordid ones.

Assuming I have the time to write about them.

Copyright © 2011  Jennifer Hritz  hritzontheedge  All Rights Reserved

Actually, I’m buying a really old house assuming I can sell my current house.  And I’m very excited but I’m also thoroughly exhausted because in addition to dealing with The Orthopedic Nightmare’s fourth surgery in three years and twenty-five weeks with a constant shadow in the form of a Second Grade Dropout I’ve been painting miles and miles of baseboards.  Do you know how many miles and miles of baseboards you have in your house?  I know how many I have in mine, because for two weeks I’ve been crawling around on my hands and knees and wiping my paint-stained fingers on my favorite yoga pants.

I’ve also painted The Boy’s room

and packed all kinds of shit

and planted some new shrubs in the flower bed

and touched up the hardwood floors

and arranged to have the ceramic tile cleaned.

I have also shopped.

I don’t like to shop.  You know that I don’t like to shop because you’ve seen my closet.

But right now I HAVE to shop because I have to stage my house to sell and so I go into Pier One Imports, for example, where I never, ever shop, but I’ve been asked to put a couple of cute chairs on the front porch and I’m in a hurry and so I find two cute chairs that perfectly match my new red door

and I pay for them and then I ask the guy to help me stick them in my shiny red convertible, which just the day before closed its top with such animosity that it ate a piece of its own self

and now I’m going to have to take my car to the shop in my spare time.  And the guy gets two chairs and when he brings them to the car I see that they’re damaged.  And so I say, Do you have any more in the back?  And he checks and says no, but he’ll have 1200 more in two weeks.  And I can feel the blood rising in my face and I say, Well, that doesn’t do me a lot of fucking good now, does it?

And then I come home where my friend Michael

who built his own house when he wasn’t fighting fires and who’s now making my house so beautiful that I’m starting to question why I’m moving, informs me that I’m going to have to paint all twelve interior doors

on my own because he’s busy obsessing over the French doors.

 And then when I do break down and paint the interior doors on my own he tells me they’re too streaky.

Also, all of this cleaning and clearing has made the dogs absolutely spastic. Yesterday the demon darted past me with something shiny in his mouth and then he squirmed under the bed and when I dropped to my knees and peered in at him I saw that he was holding this

between his teeth.

I never said he was smart.

This morning he demolished a roll of toilet paper and ate my favorite purple bra.

Also, I think we have a ghost.  I think we have a ghost because yesterday afternoon The Boy actually left the house for three hours to play with a friend and I was in my house alone alone alone and I talked to my coach and then I went into my bathroom and I sat on the edge of my tub and I shaved my legs because it had been a really long while and then I did some more work on the hardwood floors and then I crashed out with my laptop and a Topo Chico.  And I had Soulhat playing really really loud and so at first I didn’t hear the whimpering. And when I finally tracked the skinny beagle down she was in the Jacuzzi tub.

I don’t know how she got in there because she’s short and the sides of the tub are tall.  Also, the skinny beagle quivers at even the mere mention of “bath.”  So I don’t know.  The best I can figure out is that something put her there.  Something ghost-like that has taken my request for a haunted house a bit too seriously.

I’m so tired.

Yesterday I was hanging out with Jennifer Elsner and we chatted for a while sitting at her kitchen table and then we wanted to look something up in one of her books and she said the book was in her bedroom and when we went in her bedroom we took one look at her inviting bed and then we collapsed right on top of the covers.  And we started talking and we had a really good conversation and I finally turned to her and said, Why does this feel so right?  And then I realized it was because when we went to Mexico we spent most of our time on this.

I want to go back.  But instead I’m using my time energy money all of the above to move.

That’s okay, though.  Because when it’s all said and done I’m going to be looking at this, baby.  THIS.

Copyright © 2011  Jennifer Hritz  hritzontheedge  All Rights Reserved

and I flew backwards?  Twice?

Well, the second time that happened I was in the middle of writing my blog post about flying backwards in my desk chair and I didn’t want to stop long enough to haul my broken, cheap-ass desk chair into the garage.  And so I kicked the leg of the desk chair out of the way

and I set the desk chair up again, right behind my desk.  So my office still looked nice and inviting.

And then I went to BookPeople for Sarah Bird‘s reading and I completely forgot about the fact that I’d left a broken desk chair posing as a safe desk chair behind my desk.  I didn’t even tell The Orthopedic Nightmare, who’s just three weeks past spinal fusion, or The Boy, who often sits at my desk, staring with a rabid expression at Lego.com.

The next morning, which was yesterday morning, I woke up and I stretched and I thought, I must remember to haul that broken desk chair out to the garage.

And then I forgot.

And so when I went into my office and sat down I flew backwards.

And this time I whacked my head really hard.  And The Boy came running and I sat up and I held my hand to my head and I thought, damn, I cut myself.  And then I touched my hand to my head again and this time there was even more blood. And The Boy said, Whoa.  And I told him I needed a little towel or something and he ran off and by the time he came back my hair was saturated and the back of the giant purple tee shirt I’d worn to bed was soaked through.  And so I reached for the phone on my desk and I called my husband and I told him I’d whacked my head and now I was all bloody and I needed him to come home.  But he works, like, fifteen minutes from our house and so when the giant towel I was holding against the back of my head started leaking I called 911.

During this time there was much screaming and sobbing and wailing, none of which emanated from The Boy, who busied himself corralling the dogs and tricking them into going outside.

When the ambulance came The Boy let them in and two super cute EMS guys told me that I’d hit the floor hard enough to open the skin in three places. Also, I had a huge knot on my head.  And I was quite traumatized and not simply because I was still wearing the giant purple tee shirt I’d slept in, along with my husband’s ten-year-old flannel pajama bottoms

which I appropriated some time ago.

I didn’t need stitches but I bled all over the place anyway.  Should I not have called you? I asked the EMS guys, and they said, Uh, no, you did the right thing because that was a lot of blood.  And they smiled at The Boy and asked if he was okay. Honestly, The Boy said, This is pretty interesting.

My husband made me throw my giant purple tee shirt away.  Thank god the blood didn’t get on those pajama bottoms because I might have dug them out of the trash when he wasn’t looking.  And he carted off my old desk chair and The Boy brought one of the dining room chairs into my office and then he told his father he didn’t feel comfortable being alone with me.  But my husband wasn’t going to go back to the office anyway because the EMS guys had told him to watch me for a while and make sure I didn’t forget my name or something.  And so for most of the rest of the day my husband stalked me, asking questions like whether or not I was going to blog about what happened.  And he told me I made a mistake not getting a photo of the EMS guys, who really were super cute.

Silence. Darkness. Cold.

But HELLO?  Not the tomb!

Copyright © 2011  Jennifer Hritz  hritzontheedge  All Rights Reserved

and I fell to the floor and whacked my head.  You might think the chair couldn’t handle my frequent trips to Sugar Mama’s, but actually I just have a really cheap chair.  Also, this morning I was talking on the phone to McGinn, and right in the middle of a litany of complaints I tilted way back and tossed my legs up on my desk and then I fell over backwards.

I’ve fallen twice today, and it’s not even time for dinner yet.

There’s an unauthorized hardcover version of my novel for sale on Amazon.  You can buy it for $167.65, but I can’t guarantee what you’ll find inside.

The Boy has reached new levels of boredom.  What’s the next fun thing we’re doing today? he asks when the door shuts behind his most recent playdate, and when I tell him nothing, that FUN hasn’t made the afternoon agenda, his wails echo in our now-empty-of-all-rugs-house-because-the-dogs-have-eaten-all-three.

I was just telling friends on Saturday night that I’ve been very lucky that my husband hasn’t traveled very much this year.  Instead he had surgery and I’ve taken to calling our bedroom “the sick room.”  And then this morning I opened my email and found two notifications of heretofore unannounced trips, one of which my husband will be taking the day The Boy returns to school after his six and a half month hiatus.  Because this is what I need.  To handle on my own the possibility that The Boy might balk at even this amazing school.

Also, my husband and I made plans over the weekend to take a little vacation next month, to see my brother and his goat in Southampton, and my father in Pennsylvania.  And today I called to make arrangements to board the beasts while we’re gone.  Guess how much the vet wants to board the dogs for ten days?

$660.  To board the dogs.  Because we have so many.  Because I keep adopting them.

I haven’t told my husband yet, but I think he might suggest drowning them all in the jacuzzi tub instead.

I keep getting requests to meet my friends for wine and coffee and I mostly have to tell everyone no.  Or worse, I say sure, and then I cancel on them at the last minute.  Because apparently spinal fusion is a more serious surgery than I thought and my husband isn’t ready to handle The Boy on a daily basis, not after working a full day or even a half day at the office.  And The Boy has become very cranky indeed and has taken to talking aloud to his stuffed animals when he thinks I’m not watching.

Last week The Boy and his playdate were hanging out in the living room and chatting while I was in the kitchen and they seemed to be under the impression that I couldn’t hear them even though I was, like, five feet away.  All my mom does, The Boy told his friend, Is stare at her laptop.  Yeah, the playdate said, commiserating.  Sometimes I have to say her name two or three times before she even looks up, The Boy continued.  Uh-huh, said the playdate.  And half the time, The Boy confided, She’s on Facebook.

Not true!  I swear.

My people were not meant to live in this climate.  I’m quite certain.  And yet here I live, in Austin, Texas, where the temperature is currently 100 degrees and there’s not a cloud in the goddamn sky.  I walk outside and my eyes narrow like I’m staring into a spotlight.  All the back and forth and back and forth between the 100 degree heat and the cool cool cool temperature of my house makes me feel kind of like I want to throw up.  And every afternoon I have a headache.  At night I picture the earth turning away from the sun and I think, can’t we just face this way for a little while longer?

The heat stress face-time nurse-time lack of space is getting to me.  Just last week I told my friend April that we should meet at Alamo Drafthouse and we bought tickets ahead of time and I drove all the way across the river during rush hour traffic and then when I got to the ticket counter I discovered that I’d gone to the wrong theater.  And the previous week I told April I’d watch her daughter one morning and then I double-booked and I didn’t even discover my error until April texted me the night before to ask if we were still on. And we weren’t, because I’d double-booked.

I used to alphabetize my spices, people.  I used to have my shit together.  I was in control.

Maybe this is the new me.

Silence.  Darkness.  Cold.  This is what I’m craving.  But I’m trying to be super specific because I don’t want the universe to get confused and think I’m talking about a tomb.

That’s all I’m going to write for now.  Partly because I have to go pick up The Boy from his playdate and I totally forgot to chop the stupid potatoes for dinner and I don’t have time to make them now because I’m heading to BookPeople to see Sarah Bird read from her new novel, The Gap Year

but also because I’ve been writing my blog post in this chair because my other chair broke

and now my lap is really fucking hot.

Copyright 2011  Jennifer Hritz  hritzontheedge  All Rights Reserved

That’s due in part to the Orthopedic Nightmare’s surgery–which went just fine, by the way, save for that zombie-like scar on his throat–and in part to the fact that The Boy has now been out of school for TWENTY weeks.  Yeah, well, it’s summer, you’re thinking.  He’s supposed to have off.  Well, guess what?  You didn’t spend sixteen weeks hanging out with your kid before summer started. Also, your kid is likely in camp at least some of the time because that’s what kids do in the summer.  They go to camp.  But The Boy has refused all group interaction and so almost every day I entertain his little friends.  Between pharmacy runs and playdate negotiations, this little Sugar Whore doesn’t have time to eat a cupcake, let alone update you.

Also, I’m moving.

Say what????

Remember that house outside the city?  The one with the pool and the L-shaped front porch where I can sip mint juleps?

The one that’s fifteen miles outside the urban core?

Over the past two weeks my husband and I have been discussing whether or not buying this historic home with the pool and the cabana and the music studio for all those guitars outweighs the benefits of living right down the street from Apothecary.

Very quickly my husband came to the conclusion that it does.

But I’m not so sure.

I mean, yes, I’d love to put those guitars somewhere far away from my line of vision. I’d love to send The Boy upstairs to his suite and then shut the door at the bottom of the stairs behind him.  I’d love to do yoga by the pool and traipse across the creaky old hardwoods on my way to the butler’s pantry.

But how long is it going to take me to get to Justine’s?

Also, my community is here in Austin, just like The Boy’s friends are here in Austin, just like everything funky and hot and fun is here in Austin.  And so it scares the shit out of me to leave all of that behind, especially since once you leave the city’s limits everything gets less . . . progressive.  I don’t want to tell my neighbors that I write fiction from a gay male perspective and watch them grimace.  I want them to be gay.

When I told my husband how I was feeling he tried to tell me I was making assumptions.  Maybe, I muttered, though everyone knows that Austin is an oasis in Perry-land.  Because I didn’t look convinced he brought out the big guns.  You know, it’s all well and good to say you’re subversive when you surround yourself with people exactly like you, he said, But moving somewhere and being the stand out?  Now that’s subversive.

Goddamn.

So I went to see Jennifer Elsner, who I can count on to think with the heart and not just the head.  After all, when I sent her a link to that shiny red convertible I was thinking of buying,

instead of saying, Well, that’s not very practical for carting around a kid, Jennifer, she said, “Oh my fucking god.  This is totally a guy’s car.”  And I was like, well, how can I not buy the car now?  And when I told her all of my concerns about moving so far from everything she said that buying a house far, far away sounded like an adventure.  And that I had a super fun car for my trips back to the city.  And she told me that whenever she’s afraid of doing something, that’s when she knows she has to do it.

So I thought back over some of my decisions–like sending The Boy to the best school in all the land, or pulling him out of school when he’d had enough, or self-publishing my novel–and I realized that those moments of intense fear were really best faced by forward movement.

I’m always happier in the long run if I’m challenged.

So I’m in.

Or out, actually, by fifteen miles.  Assuming my house sells.

Just think of the adventures you’ll get to read.

Copyright ©  2011  Jennifer Hritz  hritzontheedge  All Rights Reserved