Top of the World...

"Feeling my way through the darkness
Guided by a beating heart
I can't tell where the journey will end
But I know where to start."
-Aloe Blacc


I’m working on a better answer for people when they ask if I’m dating.

When a completely well-meaning person asks me that, my instinct is to worry that they are about to suggest a date. Or a dating app. Or what have you.

Then, of course, I usually stumble all over the actual answer, which is a simple no, and say things like, it’s not like I haven’t dated at all in the past four years (lest they think there is something wrong with me), and then stumble into how I’m really not looking to date right now.

All of that is true. But I say it all slanted and weird, and usually the person ends up assuring me that someday I will meet someone.

I then smile politely and often say something equally awkward and eventually, praise hands to God, the conversation ends.

The truth about me and dating and love and all the things is just a bit more complicated that I can go into in a simple conversation.

I’m not sure that the true answer is incredibly complicated, but my answer to this question never seems to be what people are searching for.

The hand-on-my-heart, true answer to this question is that I enjoy spending my free time with my girls. My life when the girls are home is filled with old television shows and books and Barbie dolls. It’s my preferred way to spend an evening.

The second truth to why I’m not all that interested in dating is a bit more complicated. I truly believe with all of my heart that I am going to meet this person who I will magically know is the perfect person for me. (I really do have a physical checklist for this purpose.)

Then, of course, you have to take a step back from that and say, in all seriousness, “but, Joy, you already thought that.” And you are correct. In my lifetime, I have loved one boy ever, and he checked all of those boxes, and all of life was exactly what I wanted for fifteen years, and then it was all a lie.

It’s a hard, hard reality to live with- the notion that I believe to the depth of my soul in true love and soulmates and Nora Ephron movies, and then to juxtapose my divorce and my complete and total belief that it was necessary and correct and the best thing for both of us.

The most truthful answer to this question is simply, I am waiting for the guy that checks all of the boxes for me and the girls, the guy who meets all of my romantic comedy wish list needs, and who understands that I have scars that are still healing.

I quite likely set the bar too high for anyone to reach for a reason. I’m well aware of that. But, for now and likely the near future, that is my truth. Even if it takes too many awkward words for me to say.

"So wake me up when it's all over
When I'm wiser and I'm older
All this time I was finding myself
And I didn't know I was lost"
-Aloe Blacc

Contradictions and Complexities...

Late fall is full of contradictions-the weather can’t quite make up its mind, the threat of icy roads is dangled as a possibility more than I would like, the trees are barren branches but it is still quite warm on my walks at night, the dark confuses all of my sense of time and I mostly want to curl up in bed with a book by 6 o’clock every night.

Late fall still brings to the surface mostly lovely memories-memories of falling in love for the first time, and memories of becoming a mother (which for me was the culmination of a million dreams come true), memories always of the lead up to Christmas, which is of course also my birthday, so it is indeed my most favorite day of the entire year.

Four years on, those memories are all mostly just truly lovely. That’s one of those truths that I wish I had understood in the beginning. That eventually you are able to remember mostly the good, mostly the magic, mostly the fun parts. It’s not that I have forgotten the painful parts. But four years ago, remembering the good just brought to the surface so much that I didn’t want to deal with-was it always a lie? Was I remembering everything wrong? When did it shift?

I don’t have the answers to those questions, and I’ve come to the conclusion that I likely never will. But I have learned, in my slow as a snail way, that it doesn’t truly matter.

Things I Have Loved Lately:

The Lazy Genius Podcast Episode 131: The Perfect Thanksgiving Turkey

I. CANNOT. RECOMMEND. THIS. HIGHLY. ENOUGH.

Nick’s leaving created all sorts of holes in our lives. One of those was that Nick always made the turkey for Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving was always a joint effort on our part, Nick and I together made most of the food that my family then shared at our Thanksgiving meal. (My mom makes the pumpkin pie, my Grandma makes Betsy’s most favorite Cherry Jello, and my sister, bless her heart, makes the crescent rolls.)

I had absolutely no idea how to make the turkey. And then I found this recipe. Kendra (aka The Lazy Genius) is indeed a genius about the things that matter, and lazy about the things that don’t. This recipe makes a delicious turkey with an absolute minimum of fuss. IT. IS. THE. BOMB.


Dolly Parton’s America

The girls and I adore Dolly so much. This podcast is a bit different, and it took me a minute to grasp the point, but ultimately I’m really enjoying it. I will admit that when the girls and I went to Dollywood a couple of years ago, the irony was not lost on me that I was spending over $200 for the three of us to enjoy a theme park that is built on the idea that Dolly grew up with a coat of rags and nearly starved to death one winter. But at the same time, I see what she has done for the area that she grew up in, how she has lifted them up- it is, of course, the dream that I hope that everyone would have, the ability to provide a life for those around them. To encourage literacy and development and all the things. I will always love Miss Dolly.


Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy: The Story of Little Women and Why It Still Matters

This was an interesting read for a bit of a Little Women superfan, which indeed I am. This book explores not only the well known biographical trope of Louisa’s use of her own family as the model of the four girls, but also explores adaptations of Little Women and its place in the literary cannon. I could quibble with a few of her own personal opinions, but mostly it all holds together nicely. She picks apart different characterizations, spends a good deal of time on the idea that it is Katharine Hepburn’s Jo who we all remember, as opposed to some of Jo’s actual character-after all, she does ultimately marry. And so what does it say that that was the ultimate goal, even for headstrong Jo?

(My own personal favorite of the Little Women is Beth, who is contented and happy at home with her sisters.)

The girls and I are anxiously awaiting the new movie, along with a million other movies that seem to be about to drop. Betsy is in complete love with the new Disney+ streaming service. We have been watching Christmas movies and reading all the books (we have well over 100 Christmas books). Enjoying so much our evenings in.

“If it’s dark, put it in park.” That’s our motto for this late fall. So far, it’s been fairly glorious.

The Road to Xanadu...

“In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure-dome decree:
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.”
-Samuel Taylor Coleridge


On Wednesday, Felicity came home from school sick. Thus, I became that stay-at-home mom that I used to be for a day (which I do miss from time to time, back when my babies were babies and my life was just wholly centered on them- life has moved so far from that now, and it’s as it should be, but it is nice to go back sometimes).


Felicity slept and played with Barbies, while I did laundry and read my book. And then she declared that we needed to watch something. Which was a tricky proposition, because Betsy hates to be left out, and so we had to chose something that she wouldn’t care that we watched without her.

And so we landed on my most beloved Xanadu.

Here is the thing about Xanadu: I am super well aware that it is a mucked up mess of a movie. The actual storyline is terrible and mostly boring. When we start watching I always start to question why exactly I love this movie, because it starts slow and Michael Beck is woefully miscast as the lead.

But by the end I’m always so charmed that I want to start watching it all over again (I did make poor Debbie listen to the soundtrack 3 times the next day).

There’s just something magical about what is basically a 1940s musical updated to a late 1970s roller skating, glittery disco. Gene Kelly is in roller skates! Olivia Newton-John is at her most fabulous, singing songs that would go on to become some of her biggest hits. There is a Don Bluth animated short in the middle of the movie!

It all makes up for the complete and total lack of a coherent script, and the lack of any kind of chemistry between Michael Beck and Olivia. If only John Travolta were opposite the love story would at least seem believable. I read that Olivia had tried to get Mel Gibson for the role, which would have been just amazing, but alas, this is what we have.


I'm not one hundred percent sure why Felicity always loves the movies that truly tend to make the least sense that I love (she adores Return to Oz, which is genuinely one of my most bizarre favorite films). But I'm so grateful that she enjoyed spending her afternoon with her mother watching a movie that was dated and old even when I watched it for the first time.

I'll take all of the sick day, magical disco roller skating moments that are still left with my girls.