I'm sure there are people who can toggle quickly from all-in caregiving to structured socializing, but I can't think of any offhand.

For me, the greatest source of frustration was trying to work with a willful child when there was something else I wanted - say, to get the child to go to bed so I could have my own time. Just the promise of the time, and feeling that promise slip away, was enough to introduce a whole other element of stress into the encounter.

One way to make tough decisions is to take incremental steps that don't commit you to anything yet.

Live in the moment, this moment, your moment. That is by far and without meaningful rival The Best Position to put yourself in to discover and delight in who your children turn out to be, whoever they turn out to be.

Moving is hard. Staying is easy. Logistically speaking, at least. And this is true whether you're doing or undoing something.

The topic of sexual education makes me nuts, because kids are certainly not now and have rarely ever been "clueless" about what adults do and delude themselves about keeping from their kids. Especially now that so many of them are carrying the entire internet around in their pockets.

I do crosswords when I have time to kill somewhere, and am 100 percent successful on filling in the spots I get stuck on - after I close up, do something else, and then go back to it.