Eliana Osborn

1. Borrow a child.

If you kill a tortoise, even on accident, you probably shouldn’t have children.

The most important things my mother taught me included work from Neil Diamond, Billy Joel, Wham! and Whitney Houston.

Now that I’m a mother, I’m much more sympathetic to a woman who just couldn’t take it anymore. Not saying I’d leave my kids in a parking lot and hope for the best . . . just saying that I can understand the impulse.

My sister Liz is full of wisdom, like my favorite quote I’ve shared with practically everyone I know: “Every pair of underwear has two good sides.”

If he were an a--hole to my kids, things would be easier. But he’s not. He’s good with them. He’s his best self. It makes me alternately happy and heartbroken.

Help.

I wanted to write a book last summer. Then I realized what a terrible goal that was and modified accordingly.

I’m not there yet. But I need to be honest—I’m closer to 40 than any other multiple of five.

Size, like age and salary and whatever else, is just a number. Pretending numbers don’t measure things isn’t helpful. I’m 38 years old: That isn’t good or bad, but it IS different from being 18 or 50.