David Minerva Clover

My kid, who turned three the day after Mary the duckling died, wasn’t old enough to get any of it. Yet talking to toddlers about death is part of life.

I am not middle class. Tiny houses are touted as an affordable solution, but they’re still more house than I can afford.

Back when we decided to have a baby together, we had a plan. She was never, ever going to have to work full-time. She was going to work part-time, and I was going to work part-time, selling dog food at that cute little store I used to work at. We would have one day off a week in common, and we would be broke, but we would get by. We would be tired, but we would be happy.

After the solstice, the light very slowly begins to return, and every day is a little longer. Yule is a promise: winter sucks, but spring will come again.

I don’t want to deprive my child of these magical Halloween memories, I just also want to light candles and talk about our ancestors.

A human being does not go through an experience like that without getting to know themselves really, really, well. I learned more about myself than I could have ever imagined. Today, I am going to share some of those lessons with you.

I am at the bar, working on a piece about kids’ books, while my wife stays home to mind the baby. The lady next to me strikes up a conversation about this and that. Then she notices that I’m still casually clutching a copy of Guess How Much I Love You?

Get creative! There's a wide range of passive-aggressive, and aggressive-aggressive, comments you can make as you hand over the dough. Whatever you choose, remember that your goal is make them wonder if having their electricity shut off is actually any worse than having this conversation with you.

I believe in reproductive justice. I believe everyone deserves a say in how, when, and if, they choose to reproduce. I believe comprehensive sex education and access to safe and legal abortion are important parts of giving women, girls, and other people with uteruses full agency over their reproductive lives. Could we extend this to cats, too?

I mess up and do things very differently than I want to sometimes. When that happens, I have one rule for myself: I stop and apologize to my kid.