Hope you're enjoying a great weekend and not spending too much time on the computer - go hug your kids! My wife is giving me that look that says "uh, practice what you preach..."

Okay, right away. Just wanted to take a moment to point you to two posts from other blogs that we like today.

The first comes from Motherlode, one of our favorites. Lisa Belkin of the New York Times writes today:

The rejection season has begun. The time of year when it can hurt more than usual to be a parent and watch your child lose what they desperately want.

That pain is there all year and at all ages — rejection by friends, by lovers and employers. Back when I was a preteen I thought there couldn’t be anything worse than the patches where your friends found new friends and didn’t want you anymore; as an adult I learned there is something far worse — watching that happen to your child.

For those of us with children at the start and the finish of the K-12 arc, there is an extra dose of that doubled pain at this time of year, when the rejection is typed onto school letterhead and sent to your home.
Read the rest of her post here.

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Then we have this item, submitted by Mommy Melee, a St. Petersburg, Fla., mom who started following us this week on Twitter. You ARE following us on Twitter, aren't you? In this entry, Mommy Melee writes a poignant tribute to a school being demolished. It's long compared to what we write here, but worth the read. Here's the top:

It’s a little after 5:30 and the sun is starting to give everything a rusty, magic glow. Green is greener. Blue is bluer. And half of Riviera Middle School is in ruins.

I knew about it, of course—racing the sun to get the light, to document the destruction before I forget, before it’s gone gone gone. I have my camera in the passenger seat. I pull up against the fence, crack the windows for my sons in the backseat, and step out onto the pavement.

Monsters in the parking lot. Two giant diggers. (The dinosaurs are eating the school, my son whispers.) The sun glints just right, a little flare of personality. A wink. I shiver and start taking pictures.

Gum on the seat, then my jeans, a jacket tied around my waist. Crying on the phone, please come and let me go home, the girls are so mean. I write a report on dachshunds. A boy in gifted class writes a song about the way I pick my nose. I know I’m not the only one who thinks about last year’s rape incident every time I march up the dingy stairwells. I have a boyfriend for three days in the hall. A high school student volunteers with the after school chorus program. Why don’t blondes use vibrators, he asks me. Because they chip their teeth. I don’t get the joke.

When I hear tires crunching on gravel, I turn, jittery. But it’s not the cops, it’s a woman in an old Neon. She climbs out of the car as if exhausted by the movement, exhales heavily and tells me, “I’ve been waiting for this day.”

“Oh.” It’s awkward. “I went to school here. In 1992.” I take another photo, trying to give her space.

“I taught here for twenty years. Do you remember me?”

I don’t. But her face is familiar. Tired. I shake my head apologetically.

She explains where her classroom is, hopeful, reaching for a connection, so I smile and nod. “Yes, I remember that.” But there’s nothing else to say. I’m glad to see the beast go. But I’m not celebrating. This is a funeral.

After a while, she walks back to her car. “Thank you for sharing this moment with me.”

When she leaves, it’s just me and the diggers. They linger in the parking lot, ominous and hungry. I keep my body between them and my boys in the car. As the traffic whisks by behind us, I take a few more pictures. Someone honks.

Focus. Unfocus. The fence. The ruins. The fence. The steps.

I trip on my backpack and fall on the sidewalk. It bleeds so much my mom thinks I have a gunshot wound. It leaves a perfectly round scar. I ride my bike to school, singing into the wind, licking my braces. I get my period during lunch break. Two girls push me in the bathroom, steal my jacket, and a few dollars from my pocket. My science teacher, handsome, says, “smile—you look like your dog just died.” I smile.

Read the rest of her post here.

Okay, I'm shutting down my computer now. And hugging my kids. All day.

Have a nice weekend.