How to Practice Radical Self Care in 26 Easy Steps

1. Spend 214 days with offspring in some version of quarantine.

2. Do all the emotional labor of parenting. Every time the emotional labor cart wheels by, look at the emotional labor offerings like they are chocolate mousse or key lime pie and point to them and say, Yes, that. I’ll have a big slice of that emotional labor. Please just make sure my co-parent/spouse gets none, as that would mean he knows what I’m dealing with and we cannot possibly have that.

3. Engage not with rando hate soldiers on social media, but by all means, do get into a verbal tussle on Twitter with that dude you met eleven years ago and go deep into the stacks of his thinly veiled Tweets about white supremacy because this is what will serve all mankind in this present age.

4. Sleep not.

5. Eat all Halloween candy in freezer and purse and all secret hiding places by October 2nd.

6. Become so haggard that when you go to get your highlights updated, your hairstylist says, “Okay, so just so you know, highlights won’t cover all this gray. Like that’s not what highlights are able to do.”

7. Teach and write and walk the dog as these things are your actual jobs.

8. Clean the bathroom but only whilst listening to the most sad-ass podcasts where the endings are all an ambiguous muddle or unimaginable tragedy. Bathrooms are only at their cleanest when you have cried human tears into the sink over a stranger’s story.

9. Now this part is really critical so don’t mess it up: Lose all contact with your therapist. Don’t you dare think your problems in the midst of a global pandemic are worth talking about because we are ALL IN THIS TOGETHER.

10. Exercise only if it’s useful to someone. Like oh, you want to mail that package? Let me just walk it to the post office and stand in line like I’m in a socially distanced meet and greet at ComiCon.

11. Order some more stocking stuffers for the kiddies on Poshmark because retail therapy.

12. Look at husband, open mouth and say, I think I need to actually run away from home?

13. Hear Husband say, Yeah. Why don’t you do that.

14. Believe what Husband actually says was, Oh, are you sure you need to do that now? Because we might all perish like a bunch of trampled dandelions the second you leave us.

15. Double check that it’s okay to leave for the weekend.

16. Secure room in most amazing AirBnB in Western MA.

17. Secure rental car for getaway.

18. When asked if you mind what kind of car you’re given by Enterprise, say, Oh heavens no, and when given the keys to a white minivan, take that hot rod and get the hell out of Dodge.

19. Secure appointment for hot tub + massage (wearing mask, obv). Luxuriate like you are posing for the front of said spa’s brochure.

20. Watch a gazillion hours of “Gilmore Girls” as if you don’t know what all shakes out with Luke/Lorelei/Rory/Logan.

21. Take a hot shower and another and another.

22. Download book on Codependency. Expect to see picture of self as you turn every page. Highlight some things. Ponder codependency.

23. Eat vegetables cooked by another human. Eat more! Drink them even, you crazy veggie crazed rascal!

24. Frolic in leaves and among them, swirl in all their splendor like you are Fraulein Actual Maria.

25. Momdance in minivan while driving home.

26. Return home so happy they barely recognize you.

Alanis has made amends with us about "Ironic"

My manlove and I got to see “Jagged Little Pill” last weekend on Broadway. Shoutiest of shout-outs to Nana Red for watching the offspring over the weekend that we ran away from home.

Microreview: the show is very, very good. The talent on stage overfloweth, from choreography to song arrangement to the book, which was written by Diablo Cody. I wouldn’t say the musical is a timeless work of unparalleled brilliance, but the songs and dialogue hang together pretty seamlessly, the character portraits are interesting, and you leave feeling hopeful, with a whole new appreciation for the Alanis Morissette canon.

Oh, Alanis. You really cannot say the name “Alanis,” even 25 years after “Jagged Little Pill” dropped, without asking the rhetorical, “Isn’t it ironic?” And you would not be the first to crucify Canada’s songstress for what amounts to a variety of cliched couplets that completely misunderstand the very concept of irony, conflating these supposedly inconvenient and upsetting things that happen with something that is so tragically coordinated it, well, figurrrrrres.

The song was an instant banger when I was in high school in Ohio where on any given Friday night, my friends and I would be doing our very best white girl howls along to “Ironic” and “You Oughta Know” as if we had any kind of romantic history that even came close to meriting that brand of bitterness. It was such a big moment to own CDs that you played nonstop and shared and left in other people’s cars by accident because they had jimmied their portable CD player to their car stereo and weren’t we all just living that high tech lifestyle on wheels?

Since that time, CD players are practically obsolete in cars, and I no longer think LLBean barn coats are the height of fashion per the contract of every Catholic high schoolie in 1996. But I still think “ironic” is a banger even if the irony is ill-conceived.

And I think we should all treat it as “Jagged Little Pill” the musical does: as a miscalculation by a young writer. Just like people should stop asking Ali MacGraw what she meant when she said “Love means never having to say you’re sorry.“ She’s sorry, all right? And Rebecca Black would like to forget she knows anything about any day of the week.

Perhaps I’ve become some kind of apologist for white women who make regrettable art in their youth. Maybe I need to examine deeper the implications of that. But I’m here as a writer showing up to do my utmost to synthesize my best ideas with my best dedication to the page. Just don’t show me the unadulterated copy from ten years ago. Or five months ago. Or last week. We’re all works in progress but our art evolves. I’d like to think I give as much passage and permission for other women to groove on with their bad, evolving, artistic selves—as much as I would hope the same is granted for myself.

The Unabridged FamiLee Holiday Letter

Dear Fam, We cheaped out on the Christmas holiday letter, reserving only a few lines on the glamour card for an update, so I thought I would harness the economy of this world wide interweb for the purpose of updating you on the FamiLee goings-on here at fiscal year-end. Do you like how I just referred to our family unit like it's a limited liability corporation? Do you think we should probably get a tax cut? Do you think I can write off my blog for these purposes? I have questions.

But before Kanye grabs the mic from me, I want to first say very emphatically that the best album of the year was Lady Gaga's Joanne (Deluxe)" Buy. Listen. Love. For best books, I'm putting Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body and We Were Eight Years in Power: An American Tragedy as my favorites. The latter I have not yet read but I ninja-dropped it into my dad's basket when he was buying Christmas gifts, so I'm sure I'll love it. For movies, pssh. I paid to see "The Emoji Movie" so you should for no reason be taking film notes from me.

Now that we've got that out of the way, the news.

In the early part of the summer, we joined John's family in Vancouver to see his grandma who is 90 years young. If you want the curated version, see my Instagram feed. If you want what really happened, you can consult my Google searches during that time. They include:

"MY+KOREAN+IN-LAWS+ARE+DISAPPOINTED+MY+KID+WON'T+EAT+RICE+AND+WHAT+TO+DO+ABOUT+IT."

"I+JUST+REALIZED+I'M+A+DIVA+IN+CANADA+I'M+SAD+NEAREST+SUPPORT+GROUP."

"DIRECT+FLIGHTS+VANCOUVER+TO+CHATTANOOGA+THIS+AFTERNOON."

After we returned to Tennessee from the trip, the kids spent two weeks at their grandparents' homes in Ohio. It was epic! We missed them terribly but are so grateful for Grandparents Camp because it allowed John and me to pack up our earthly possessions for the big move.

That is probably the biggest news bulletin--not in the world obviously because North Korea is up to somethin' and obviously Chip and Joanna Gaines are in their last season so the world might actually end any second now--but in our world, moving back to Boston has been the biggest news.

Especially since it doesn't make a whole bunch of sense. Why would we leave Tennessee where we both had great jobs that we loved, where the kids were in a great school, and where we didn't even need to own a snow shovel? Well, my friends. Like Al Gore gesticulating the ebbing of global climate change, the Lord moves in mysterious ways. We moved back to the same street we used to live on, not far from the house we had to short-sell because we thought we were going to be in Tennessee until the Lord returned or until "Fixer Upper" stopped releasing new episodes. So here we are back in a city that we adore, where we get to show the kids things we've already done with them, of which they have no memory of doing the first time. It's like that part in "National Lampoon's European Vacation" where they keep circling Big Ben except our kids are legitimately impressed to see Big Ben again. We found an apartment in the Athleisure Capital of the World. Even the yoga pants are fancy here. It is exciting to go from renting in ruralburbia to renting an apartment just steps away from Dunkin' Donuts. John's working as a counselor at a boarding academy for which people seem really interested to know the tuition. I guess that is more important than whether or not he's happy. Ohh! Burrrrn! The answer to tuition and happiness, though, is the same. A Lot. I'm doing the freelance thing. Mostly putting the "free" into freelance but having fun as I write with my calligraphy pens or this here laptop.

As for the kids, they are mostly amazing and teaching us about resilience through this transition. We lost a hamster just as school started, and the kids showed us that we had not failed entirely as parents, so we were grateful for that outcome even if we the kids miss Doris something fierce. RIP Dodo.

Madigan, 9, is still the delightful optimist you remember, now with tween mood swings! She has not had an easy adjustment to school. Going from a small Christian school where she knew everyone to a much larger public school has been overwhelming at times. We think this to be true, but obviously, she is a tween so she only answers in one-word answers like "cool"and "good" and "maybe." We are proud of the way she is staying on top of her studies and making kind friends, too. She started guitar lessons this past fall and she has better musical timing than I could hope to have. Again, I paid to see "The Emoji Movie" so my artistic opinion is null and void but really, she is good.

Tatum, 7, is still the goofball you recall, now with a whole suite of fresh dance moves. He is crushing the first grade and is taking karate. He has a vast knowledge of YouTube Gamers, so if you were ever wondering what kind of hypothetical Minecraft moves you could make over the course of the next seven lifetimes, just give our boy a call.

As we settle in to Boston Life the Remix, we miss our Tennessee church most of all. We are a part of a body here in Boston and we are trying to find on-ramps for involvement, but it is not the same. We are grateful for the experience we had as part of a healthy church family and are using that experience to help us believe better things are to come. I think this is a sound reminder of the way our Savior came to earth: vulnerable and with parents in transition, cloaked in beauty and filling us with hope. We remember Jesus who came and saw and loved and conquered and we are encouraged to do the same.

Wherever this holiday finds you, in a place of landing or a season of transition, we pray that peace will reside within you, and wish an abundance cookies, covfefe and good cheer to you and yours.

Love, Kendra...and John, Madigan, and Tatum