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Author archive for: Starshine Roshell

Hey! Can I Get an Epidural Over Here?

Published by Starshine Roshell on August 10, 2016

It happened again. I wake with my sheets wound round me, legs akimbo, pulse spazzy. I’m fresh from a fight with something I know I can’t beat. It’s 4 a.m. and everyone else in the family is asleep. Our bedrooms are close and through thin walls, I hear my kids not stirring. Not flopping around on creaky springs. Not doing battle as I am.

Downstairs, our living quarters amble generously through wide-open rooms, but upstairs our three small bedrooms are smooshed side by side by side like hideaway nests. Perched above the bustling world with its snapping predators, careless traffic, and vexing noise, the cozy tree house where we slumber in proximity is quiet and still. Warm and laundry-scented. Closely knit.
For literally thousands of mornings, I’ve opened my eyes to the sunlit, soul-settling certainty that the people who matter most to me are within earshot of a groggy-but-grateful “G’ morney!” Even when I wake from pre-dawn nightmares, their collective presence offers deep and immediate comfort. It’s an absolute: As sure the sun will rise, my boys are near me, curled up, tucked in, at ease and at peace.
But that’s about to change. Continue reading Hey! Can I Get an Epidural Over Here?

Pokémon GO Is the Balm

Published by Starshine Roshell on July 27, 2016

In a world where innocents are mowed down while dancing, and black fathers and sons are senselessly murdered by peace officers, and peace officers are senselessly murdered by military veterans, and voters roiling with toxic resentments threaten to put a hollow shell of a human in charge of the most powerful nation on Earth — well, in that world, sometimes the only thing that makes sense is to wander the streets for hours in search of imaginary cartoon animals. Continue reading Pokémon GO Is the Balm

Globe-Trotting Grade-Schoolers are 'World Schooled'

Published by Starshine Roshell on July 13, 2016

I’m spending the week with three charming gentlemen who regale me with tales of their epic world travels. They describe the sheep on Scotland’s Isle of Skye, the vegetarian sharks in Belize, the sugar in Costa Rica, and the beaches in Cannes.
From grown men, it might be braggy, but because these are my nephews — a 14-year-old and twin 10-year-olds — it’s sort of astonishing. Continue reading Globe-Trotting Grade-Schoolers are 'World Schooled'

Maxed Out: Is System Rigged Against Working Moms?

Published by Starshine Roshell on May 31, 2016

I have an ugly secret: For 18 years, I’ve felt like a fraud both at home and at work.
From the moment I became pregnant with my first child, who graduates high school next week, I’ve had the unshakable sensation that I’m faking big chunks of my life, playing the part of a competent and confident mother and professional — but in fact always shortchanging someone their due: arriving late to work after delivering a forgotten lunchbox to school, darting out of a too-long meeting to arrive at the school awards ceremony 30 seconds after they call my kid’s name, emailing with the college counselor when I’m supposed to be watching that IT training, or grinning robotically through my son’s trumpet-lesson story at the dinner table when my mind is on that proposal I need to finish by morning. Continue reading Maxed Out: Is System Rigged Against Working Moms?

A Shrine to Splitsville: The Flotsam of Ill-Fated Flings

Published by Starshine Roshell on May 17, 2016

White opera gloves. Orange underpants. One pair of crutches.
The objects on display are unrelated in almost every way. The only quality they share is heartbreak.
Lock of hair. Shards of glass. Penguin cuff links.
Some are outright funny, some are gut-stabbingly sad, and some border on heebie-jeebie creepy. But no matter their size, condition, or origin, all are fraught with a feeling that’s familiar to most any adult, in any country: the ache of a fizzled affair.

Fur-lined handcuffs. Mercedes hood ornament. Under-knee prosthesis. Yes. That’s right. Prosthesis. Continue reading A Shrine to Splitsville: The Flotsam of Ill-Fated Flings