There is an ornament that hangs on my mother’s tree that is little more than yarn and popsicle sticks.  There may be a small strand of silver garland attached to it, although I’d be surprised if that part has survived the years of holiday packing and unpacking.
I made it when I was about Devin’s age, [...]

When we say we want to be “writers” when we grow up, we imagine ourselves as a slightly shorter version of Carrie Bradshaw.
Or, at least, I do.  I mean, the woman had an insane shoe collection and lived in my favorite city in the entire world.  What’s not to emulate?
If not Carrie Bradshaw, then maybe [...]

I’m not perfect.
None of you are surprised to hear that, I know.  But my point is that not only am I not perfect, but I have no desire to appear perfect.  Not to you or anyone.
There’s too much pressure in perfection.  Besides, most people know it’s a lie, don’t they?  I know I have, at [...]

Sent at 10:16 AM on Friday
Jared: Hey miss writer
brittmariereints: miss writer?
wha?
are you mocking me?
Jared: Don’t think to0 hard but
no
asking for help
brittmariereints: oh
ok
Jared: tamieka is trying to write something for her grandfather that passed yesterday
she is writing a poem or whatever you call
it when you
Say like
G – is for giving
R is for
brittmariereints: oh jesus god
corny is [...]

I spent my weekend at a conference about making money online.
Correction.
I spent half my weekend sitting in a conference about making money online thinking, what the hell am I doing here?, and sending an incessant amount of snarky, bitchy, annoying tweets.
I spent the other half of my weekend holed up in my hotel room with [...]

I’m sitting on a fourth floor balcony overlooking the Atlantic Ocean.  I’m looking at the beach, listening to the waves, but I haven’t stepped foot on it yet.
I haven’t stepped foot much of anywhere this weekend.  It’s after 3:00 on Saturday afternoon and I’ve left my hotel room exactly once to steal coffee from the [...]

Sarah pointed me to an article in Wired that pretty much sums up my philosophy on life.
Or, at the very least, the point I’ve been trying to make in an ongoing argument with Avitable recently.*
The entire article is a long list of new rules of behavior for “highly evolved humans” – aka, people living in [...]

I’ve written a lot of really personal stuff here.
I’ve talked about my marriage – the good and the bad.  I’ve documented my depression as it was happening.  I’ve used this blog to communicate with my husband via “open letters“, often revealing on the blog things I couldn’t say face to face.
And yet, yesterday, I wrote [...]

“Alright, Mom.  I have to go.”
Our morning conversation was beginning to bleed into my working hours and I could no longer ignore the screams from my inbox.
“OK, baby.  I love you.”
“I love you, too.  Thanks for listening to me be a raging whore all morning.”
“Mmm… I’d say raging bitch.”
“Oh.  Right.”
“Technically I don’t think I can [...]

I used to be funny.
Ask anyone who knows me and they’ll tell you.  I was funny.  I may have been crude and abrasive, but damn it, I was funny.
I hate coming to this blog right now because the last post is always “OH! HI!  Let me tell you about my health!” and I think “you [...]

I’ve been writing on this blog for almost three years.  It has always been a personal blog – more personal than most, I’ve been told.  But it wasn’t until recently that I understood why so many people were baffled by my openness here.
Tuesday night, Adam and I arranged to have dinner with a blogger who [...]

On Sunday I was going to write a funny post about how Hilly and I spent Saturday pretending to be supermodels.
I was going to show you pictures of our light guy and write funny things on the pictures like “see how we is sexy!” with an arrow pointing to my boob inexplicably hanging out of [...]

Let me tell you now that some of you will hate this post. I’m not entirely comfortable with that right now, but I’m going write it anyway because… well, it’s what I do.
I’m using that disclaimer, in part, to avoid starting.
I’m never sure where to begin when I’m unraveling my fears.
The short version of [...]

“Every eye fixed itself upon him
with parted lips and bated breath
the audience hung upon his words
taking no note of time
rapt in the ghastly fascinations of the tale”
-Mark Twain, Tom Sawyer

And now we wait.
All of them, all of us,
to see if it is possible.
To see the dream realized,
or the believers made fools of.
For the celebration,
the disappointment,
the [...]

I notice it most when my polish is chipped off my toes.
And when I’m sitting at home flipping through HGTV reruns.
And when it’s a Tuesday night and the kids are in bed, Jared’s asleep on the couch, and I’m too restless to get lost in a book or a blog.
That’s when I notice the big [...]