My Substack Subscriptions
... At the moment, here’s what’s speaking to me on Substack. I subscribe to each of these for $5/month. I love what each of these women bring to their spaces, from the profoundly personal to the thoroughly researched; often, the deep anthropological dives are inspired by their own struggles. I highly recommend all of them!
Our Weekday Default
The other week, I mentioned that having a “default” routine helps me avoid burnout. We often have to make small tweaks to that routine - and sometimes, like next week when Jon will be out of town and I’ll have to stay in the office late at least a few nights, big ones - but it means we’re not starting from scratch with the logistics every time we plan our steps for the day ahead.
So let’s look at the morning and evening defaults through the week:
Instituting Shabbat
When Jon and I sat down at the end of the summer to sketch out the academic year ahead in broad strokes, I told him I wanted to prioritize Friday evening Shabbat dinners.
We’ve done Shabbat - saying the prayers, at least - most weeks over the last few years, but I want to make it part of our default. More, actually: I want to keep Friday evening sacred as family time. Part of that means committing to being at home for Shabbat and scheduling activities on other nights. But the other part, even if we just throw a frozen pizza in the oven and say the hagafen over a beer (despite the blessing literally meaning “who created the fruit of the vine”), means recognizing it as an experience outside of our normal routine.
How I (Try To) Avoid Burnout
Earlier this week, I mentioned on Instagram that I had about a dozen half-drafted posts (or titles for posts, at least) on working motherhood saved for this blog. I asked if there was anything in particular you wanted to read from me, and someone replied, “You somehow do not seem burnt out. How?”
A Thank-You To Daycare
Tomorrow is Claire’s last day at daycare. We’ve been with this daycare for almost six years; Robbie started when he was nine months old, in September 2018, and he and Claire overlapped for a few months before he moved on to preK-3.
I’m not going to delve into the bowels of Reddit or conservative parenting blogs to find exact quotes from people who think that sending a child to daycare is tantamount to abuse, but one I remember seeing repeatedly over the years is “Well, I could never let someone else raise my child.”