Finals week, 2015. As Max walked out the door, he yelled at me (as he still does), “MOM! I’m leaving. I LOVE YOU.” I said, “Have a fantabulous day, buddy.” He gave me The Look. “I have to JOG for 30 minutes today.” I said, “Well, at least you don’t have to catch anyone.” “Wow, Mom,” he said. (Door slam.)

I was talking to a friend the other day about how my exercise regime has changed over the past several years. For many, many years, I ran. I ran 10ks.  I ran biathlons and triathlons. I ran half marathons.  I told my friend, “I don’t know what happened. One day I just didn’t feel like running any more. Sort of like Forrest Gump. Just like that. My running days were over.”

And I was okay with it. I filled the space with a different passion. Yoga. I was breathing. I was getting into my groove. I was getting my namaste on. I was trying to control myself to be the perfect mom, lawyer, friend. Well. That’s not the point of yoga. Yoga is, in large part, about letting go of what does not serve you.

Before one of his many concerts, I was tasked with finding Max a white shirt and then picking him and his brother up for the concert – all within one hour. Max called me, “Mom, when are you going to be home, I can’t be late for my concert.”  I said, “Well, first I have to run into the store and get your white shirt then I have to drive there and pick you up.” Max said, “Mom, PLEASE stop being so passive-aggressive. I just want to know when you will be home.” Damn it. My kids and my yoga mat continue to teach me the same lesson. Let go. Let shit go.

I once excitedly told Shane, “John Cusack is twittering me on Facebook.” Shane said, “MOM, John Cusack isn’t twittering you. Stop making up words.” I said, “Yes he is.” Shane said, “Stop. Mom. Please.”  Now that Shane lives on his own, several states away, I try hard to leave him alone to experience his independence. But sometimes my irrational mom fears kick in and I decide he’s been eaten by a bear, so I start to text-stalk him until he responds. “Shane. Shane. Shane.” “Mom.” “Okay. That’s all I needed. Love you.” “Love you too mom.” No twitter, no social media, no made up words, just letting all of that go. My Shane consistently teaches me that the simplest expression is usually the best.

This evening I came home after a long and stressful day, culminating with a few hours spent dealing with doctors and my mother’s cancer treatment. Max had a friend over. I stopped by his room and said, “Hey, how’s it going?” He said, “Pretty good.” I said, “Cool. It was fucking awful getting back here. But good to be home.” I went to my room and realized that I had failed to initiate my mom filter in front of his friend. For me, often, what I let go of comes right out of my mouth before I can catch it.  And my Max didn’t judge me or say anything about  his mom’s language. Because sometimes, often, you can’t judge someone by what they say when they are tired, or in pain, or upset, or stressed out.

A while back, before we knew my mom had cancer, Max told me he was stressed out. I told him, maybe you need to take something off your plate. His response was, “I can’t give up physics or trig because it’s the only thing me and grandma can do together.” So Max kept his full plate. He and his grandma continued to do physics and trig together. These days whenever he leaves the house, I hear him say, “Goodbye, Grandma! I love you!” I am so grateful that he let go of being stressed, that they get to have this time together, that they get to plot their physics and trig takeover of the world. We so need their brilliant, artistic, courageous, quirky, giant brains, and all the other brains like theirs to lead the next rebellion. I’ll supply the snacks.

Tomorrow is Valentine’s Day. While I was waiting for my mother to badass her way through another radiation session at the cancer center I bought myself an unreasonable amount of goodies from Sephora online. And, once we got home, I went to CVS and got myself a large box of chocolates. A good part of the box is now gone. Happy Valentine’s Day to me.

Happy Valentine’s Day to you. May you have peace, breathe deeply, and have no need to run to or away from anything. May you eat all the chocolate you want because love eradicates calories or even caring about damn calories at all. May you have someone in your life who can help you with homework you don’t quite understand.  May you let go of all that does not serve you.

May you love yourself with the huge love you give everyone else in your life.

Namaste.

Maybe about six years ago – Max was working on an argument to get me to buy him an i-Pad. He said, “Mom, at least four kids in my grade have i-Pads or i-Pad minis. I really want one.” I said, “Max, if you want one, you need to earn it yourself. If I buy you an i-Pad now, what will I get you when you’re 21?” He said, “A Lamborghini?” Just then Shane walked in the door from school, ”Shane, how many of YOUR friends have i-Pads?” I asked. “Mom,” he said, “My friends don’t have i-Pads. Max is in a different generation.” And just like that, argument done.

If you asked me for a word to describe my Shane, it would be “steadfast.” I didn’t come up with that defining word for him. At his bar mitzvah, our rabbi did. And he asked me later, “What does that mean?” And I told him, “It means you. It is you. You are absolutely, completely, rock solid, steady, and true.” I never had to wake Shane up for school or work. While I operate on a time space continuum that is mutable and usually involves sliding into courtrooms 10 minutes late (in amazing heels), my Shane has the grace and sense of time. Among his many other gifts: his writing, his films, his photos, his quiet ability to listen and not judge.

When he left for his first job, several years ago, he fortified himself with a large plate of scrambled eggs, two cups of coffee, two large cinnamon rolls, and a vitamin B-12 capsule. “Why are you taking that, Shane,” Max asked. “Because I’m going to have a really long day at work and I need extra energy and this is a natural way to get it,” Shane said. Meanwhile, back at home, Max spent his day eating pickles and Kit Kat bars and learning about the Banach-Tarski paradox on YouTube.

A beloved friend once told me, you should be proud of yourself and know you’re a good mom if your children are different from each other. That means you did your job as a parent – letting them grow up to be their own unique selves. By that measure, I’m a good mom. (Sigh of relief.)

Tonight I went to see Max perform with the Honor Band at the 57th Annual Northern California Band and Choir Directors Association. It was the third time he’s performed as part of the percussion section. He doesn’t care about i-Pads or i-Pad minis anymore. He doesn’t really give a shit about many material things, except sketch pads, perfect pens, and his beloved musical instruments. I can spot my kid onstage in a crowd by the bright red hair in a ponytail. By his intense stare at the conductor. And by the huge, relieved smile at the end of the performance. There is nothing like a Max smile. It could make a chopped up pea reassemble itself into the Sun. (See, Banach-Tarski, above.)

And so, I think my defining word for my Max is, “earnest.” As in, intense, focused (loving). And how ironic. That’s kinda close to “steadfast.” But not exactly. Because my sons, while absolutely brothers, are very different. Max is my heart. Shane is my soul.

January 2019 was fucking hard. There was an inordinate amount of eclipses. There was a lot of heartache and bad news. For those of us who remain single, Valentine’s Day is approaching and that’s a bit traumatic for those of us who had this notion of happily ever after right now. But that doesn’t mean it won’t happen. It will happen.

I’m still believing. So should you. Heart and soul.

About five years ago, Max asked, “Can I order some plutonium on the Internet?” I said,  “I’m pretty sure you can’t order plutonium on the Internet.” Max said, “Yes you can. I found a website.” (Of course he did.) “It comes in a cool container with an awesome label on the side.” I said, “You mean the haz-mat label? The do-not-open-under-any-circumstances-because-its-radioactive-label?” Max said, “Well, yeah, but it’s a really cool container. It would look great in my room.” I said, “Maybe it’s not real plutonium, Max.” Max said, “You’re probably right. It’s only $150.” (Um.)

The next evening, I got a text from Max around 7 p.m.. “I need to buy these things for my science project: a small black poster board I’ll find out the exact dimensions; yellow, red, and orange paper, glue; sticker letters to spell out ‘plutonium’.” I asked, “When do you need these items?” He responded, “ASAP and I need to go with you.”

After I lectured him for a few minutes about doing things at the last minute (which was done in the car on the way to pick up the materials for his science project due the next day so really effective), I asked him, “Okay, tell me something about plutonium.” He said, “Well, its symbol is Pu. Which could be read as either Pee-You or Poo.” “Great intro,” I told him. “Let’s work on some graphics.”

This all became relevant again when I realized that my Max had cleaned his room, about a week ago. He had not just done the typical teen hoarder thing, where they shove everything under the bed or in the closet or into a drawer. Really cleaned it. And – I realized he had moved all of the crap he didn’t want in his room into the “spare” bedroom that we use as an exercise room and guest bedroom.

I once told Max, “There is Max detritus all over this house.” He asked me, “What does that mean?” I said, “It’s little pieces of Max left behind everywhere you go.” I now realize, there’s less and less detritus of Max – and his brother Shane – throughout our home. I took the detritus of Max that he had shuttled from his bedroom to the guest bedroom and bagged it up. And threw it out. Just as I did when his brother moved out. It was pretty damn painful.

When my sons were younger, I couldn’t get rid of anything of theirs. School art, stuffed animals, toys. They would cry and tell me, “No, mom. Please don’t throw that away, it’s mine.” And so I ended up with boxes of papers and drawings and toys. Then one day, they were able to just walk away and let it go.  Of course, they left their crap with me. But to their credit, they learned the lesson – the one that I kept freaking telling them.  Life is not about what you accumulate. It’s about love and action.

Now, I am the one who struggles between keeping four copies of a school photo or just letting it go. Holding onto that camp t-shirt or letting it go. But I have learned, I am learning, as I so often do, from my sons. As we often say in yoga practice, let go of that which does not serve you. As I fill and refill the recycle bin, fill up bags with Goodwill donations, I tell myself, let go, woman. Let that shit go.

Just so you know, Max didn’t order plutonium from the Internet. And every day, we move a little more detritus from our home, and let more love in. Also, plutonium has a half-life of 87.74 years.
And love – it has no half-life.

Choose love.

Both of my sons were at my house for Hanukkah this year so I was looking for something touching and happy that they had said or done in the past to write about them. I came across one of my journal entries from 2003.

“8/12/2003

Tonight, tucking Shane into bed, he asks me why Max is still awake, playing with toys on the floor. I tell him, ‘Because he’s a baby still, and doesn’t know he needs to rest.’ Shane says, ‘I’m a big boy because I know I have to rest.’ I ask, ‘Do you know why?’ He says, ‘You have to rest so you can have dreams to make them come true. And so you can get the mean dreams out of your head.’

And I tell him, ‘I hope you don’t have any mean dreams tonight.’ He tells me, brows furrowed, ‘I hope so but I must still have some because I keep being mean to my little brother Max and I wish I wouldn’t.’

A few minutes later, Max crawls up on the bed with us, and falls asleep with his head burrowed under his big brother’s arms. I look at them for a long time, knowing that tomorrow Max will steal one of Shane’s toys and Shane will whack him. Or Shane will “wrestle” his little brother and lay on top of him on the floor. And somewhere in all the yelling and fighting there is love. They are, after all, brothers.”

I wrote that 15 years ago. My, my, that time really did fly by. So very fast. My Shane turns 20 this week. Max is 17 years old. I’ve broken up a lot of brotherly love fights in 15 years. I’ve hauled my boys out of the grocery store after they got into a wrestling match in the produce section. I’ve stopped the car mid-route to a destination to get out and stand by the side of the road to take some deep breaths while my sons yelled at each other inside the car about which Power Rangers movie to watch on the portable DVD player. It hasn’t been pretty, for sure. But it’s kept them alive.

Shane moved out of state four months ago and it is the first time that my sons have been apart, really apart from each other. Even more than I miss my Shane because, well, I miss my son, I miss him for Max. I miss seeing their daily interactions when they are with me. I miss hearing the inside brother jokes that I don’t understand in substance, but I get in form, because I also have a brother.

I know this is part of the journey that my sons have been preparing for ever since they were old enough to crawl away from me. I remember once that Shane told us not to worry when he went to college because if he started to party, “I’ll just stock up on the morning after pill so I don’t have hangovers.” Obviously, that was when he was still in need of a few facts of life talks. In my oldest son’s defense, that was a long time ago. I am pretty sure he’s got that figured out now.

About seven years ago, Max and I were talking about how long it was going to be before he was able to drive. He said, “Anyway Mom, I’ll be driving in about 10 years. And I want a really cool car.” I said, “Max, you are 10. You’ll be driving in 6 years.”

“You see,” he said. “Time just flies by. First it’s 1-2-3 A-B-C. Then it’s 4×2 is 8. Then it’s ‘oh my gosh I have to get these papers done and turned into my boss.’ The next thing you know, you’re thinking, “Here I am at the retirement home.” Then you’re saying, ‘Wow, that went really fast. Was that really my life?’ I tell you, you just don’t realize how fast life can just get away from you.”

Well, my Shane is at college. And Max is driving. And we have all survived. Life does get away from you, those years do slip by mighty fast. But it is also damn amazing. It’s pretty awesome to see my little boys as young men.

I have a lot of formal education. I know this because I’m still paying off the school loans. But not once, in all those years of classes and tests did anyone ever teach me how to be a mother.

My sons – and a badass tribe of other mothers – taught me that. There are a lot of terms for moms today: helicopter, tiger, over-parenting. Well, I’m not gonna judge. I’ve done all of it. I’ve been the mom who put fruit rollups and cold chicken nuggets in a Power Rangers lunch box for her kid so I could make it to work on time. I’ve been the mom who emails every teacher and the principal about a (deserved) grade. None of us do this perfectly. Because there’s no such thing as perfect.

Our kids survive. And thrive. Because of us – or despite us. Tonight, both of my sons texted me, ‘I love you, Mom.” That alone is worth the years of being a brotherly-love-fight referee and judging myself as a parent.
And I won’t have any mean dreams tonight.

A few years ago, I got upset with Max for something he’d said, and he told me, “It’s like there is a conveyor belt running from the back of my mind and it exits through my mouth. And there’s all kinds of stuff on it and it’s always going. So sometimes the stuff goes straight through my brain and out of my mouth. There are these little workers that are at the exit near my mouth and their job is to stop some of the things before they come out but a lot of the time they just go, ‘Oh darn, we should have caught that one before it went out!'” And after that complex anatomical explanation I couldn’t even remember what he’d said that I was mad at him about.

Today is Thanksgiving. Max and I are in the living room; he’s working on a paper for school next week. I’ve been alternating between cooking and reading. Max asked me, “Mom, what’s another word for corrupt?” I said, “Perverted. Shady. Crooked. Tainted.” A while later he asked me, “Mom, what are the names of the five books of the Torah?”  I thought to myself, “What kind of writing assignment is this?” But I helped him look it up.

This Thanksgiving, it was me and Max and my mom. I asked them, “What’s something you are grateful for this year?” My mom said, “I’m so grateful to be here, so I can watch Max grow up and be the amazing person he is meant to be.” Max said, “I’m grateful that I get to spend time with my grandmother and get to know her.” And I said, “I’m grateful that I can, I hope, make a difference, even if it’s a small difference, to make the world a better place.” And, I gotta say this. I’m grateful that I am learning to let sh*t go. It’s a process. I’ll keep working on it.

We all say stuff before the little workers stop things from coming out of our mouths. What’s more important is to spend time with the people in our lives. As they are. Not as we want them to be.  So today, I thank you, for spending time with me, for teaching me, for accepting me.  Happy Thanksgiving. Namaste. I honor the light, love, truth, beauty, and peace within you because it is also within me. In sharing these things, we are united. We are the same. We are one.

Kimba, our 130 pound mutt, and I used to have a morning ritual – we would go in to wake up Max for school. Then we would head downstairs to check on Shane. I noticed that Kimba was getting a little white around the snout, like me. I said to Max, “When I get old, can I come and live with you?” He said, “Mom, I think that is going to completely ruin my chances at ever getting a girlfriend.” (It didn’t.)

Shane never had to be woken up for school; he would be up and making coffee before Max and I grumbled down the stairs. Max is like me. We are not very good at mornings. Max and I butted heads frequently around that time, when both he and Shane were in high school. Once, after a particularly rough morning fight, I said to him, “Max, what do you think is the most important thing in life?” I was hoping he would say something like getting along or seeing the other person’s point of view. Instead, he said, “The most important thing in life is getting a wife.” I said, “Why?” He said, “So she can make me a sandwich when I am too tired to get off the couch after a fight with my mom.”

It’s  been a few years since what I call the sandwich-feminist debacle. Max and Shane’s dad and I have been divorced for a while. Kimba has been gone for a while as well. There are still (several) dogs in my house, and we wake up Max for school on the mornings he is at my house. And Max and I still grumble at each other as we muddle through our mornings.

And Shane – Shane moved to Oregon to go to school; it feels like an eternity away from me. He has been applying for jobs and after a few months, my usually optimistic son was a bit discouraged. “Mom, I didn’t think it would be this hard. I’m okay, I just didn’t think it would take this long.” He sent me his most recent cover letter to edit and I may be biased, but I would hire my son. “Now I am a college student, I have grown up a little bit and moved away from home. I am now seeking employment…. Beyond being steadfast, punctual, and detail driven, I would be a solid employee because I am eager to jump in. I want to learn and meet people and improve myself along with where I am in life. I look forward to your call.”

Dear Future Employer of My Son: You were once a young person trying to make your way in this world. It was freaking hard, remember? But someone gave you a chance and look at you now. Life is about chances. Chances at falling in love. Second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, hundredth chances. I am just asking for you to give my son a chance.

Maybe all we have are chances. To get up in the morning, even if you’re pissed off about it. To work. To get a girl(boy)friend. To fall in love. To fall in love again. To grow old. To be with kids and grandkids. To be happy. To have a sandwich made by someone who loves you when you’re too tired to get off the couch. To have someone who loves you wake you up in the morning. To live happily ever after.

Do it. Take a chance.

Several years back, Max brought home his homework report with three signature lines. Under one he wrote, “Anishals here.” Under the second he wrote, “Your dog’s name.” Under the third he wrote, “Your maiden name here.”

The other night my Max texted me. “I’m really stressed out.” I asked him, “Why honey? What’s going on?” He said, “I have too many things to do… I don’t have time for anything I like and I’m stressed out.” Dammit.

My kid is a junior in high school, with a ridiculously good GPA. He started a jazz band when he was 14 years old.  He plays several instruments. He is an artist. He is in honors classes. He works. He never. Freaking. Stops. And I owe him the biggest damn apology. I am so, so very sorry. I did that in high school, too. I still do that, now.

I am an overachiever, for sure. But I do not expect my children, or anyone else in my life to do what I do or be who I am. I am well aware that I constantly walk the balance beam between fucking falling into the stress-ball abyss and namaste.

People sometimes say to me, “I don’t know how you do it all.” The answer is, I don’t. I don’t do it all. Or even half of it all.

Maybe it looks like I do. But trust me. There are many unanswered emails and texts. There are many books unread. There are bags of dry cleaning to be done in the trunk of my car. There is laundry on my floor. I never finished my wedding album. I never will, because 20 years later, I got divorced.  That’s sort of how this overachiever does it all.

But that’s okay. What I try to do, every day, is put my anishals where they are supposed to go. I know every dog’s name that I have ever had the privilege to live with. As for maiden names? There are no maidens living here. My home, probably a lot like yours, has an overachiever-stressed-out-divorced mom raising a couple of sons, trying to make this world a little better. That’s not a job for a maiden. That’s a job for a g*damn tired Type A mama warrior and some strong coffee. Like me. Like you.

My Shane was called for jury duty in June of 2018. I read him the summons and told him to call and find out when he had to appear. He texted me, “”How long do you think the jury summons will last tomorrow?” when his jury number was called to appear. I told him to take a book and he showed up. My Shane always shows up. He is my steadfast hero.

I asked him, “Did you get picked?” He said, “No, they haven’t even gotten through the first round of potential jurors yet.” I said, “You know, you can always tell them that your mom is a plaintiff’s attorney and your dad was a cop, that might get you excused.”  Later, he told me, “I would have but it was kinda cool to watch.” And all he told them was that he was a 19 year old student. Oh yes, my heart was full, thank you. My 19 year old son understood the importance of jury duty. That was worth every freaking penny of my law school tuition, right there.

Shane sat through three days of jury selection. He didn’t get picked. He did get a witness fee and mileage fee. I think it was $11 or less. I asked him, “What was the case?” He said, “I don’t think I can discuss it with you, Mom. We were told we can’t discuss it. I’ll just say that it was a criminal assault case.” Oh hell yeah, for my honest, steadfast son.

When someone posts something on social media about how young kids wear baggy pants  or “man buns” and were spared being hit with a belt and somehow that is not okay, I just have to say this. I don’t get it. My mom always told me she wanted my life to be better than hers. I so appreciate that, and now I have the chance to pay it back to her. I want my sons’ lives to be better than mine. I don’t give a sh*t about their pants, as long as their hearts are big and they do the right thing. Shane’s pants sag because he is skinny, and because he chooses to shop at a thrift store to save money and because he has a unique style. His priorities are about making the world a better place. Not making sure his pants fit to make other people happy.  My son Max’s hair is long and he puts it up in a really cool ponytail/bun when he plays his jazz. He doesn’t have the time or inclination to cut his hair to make anyone else happy. And he really does have great hair.

It may help to remember that we, too, had our way of rebelling. Maybe it was pants. Maybe it was hair. Maybe it was shoes. I was a punk rocker with purple hair and tattoos. I don’t have purple hair anymore. But I will always, always, have the soul of a punk rocker. It’s what made me who I am today, for sure. I encourage my sons to be their authentic, creative, badass selves. And I am so proud that they are. They are definitely not molded versions of anyone else’s expectations. And by the way, you should remember, too. Your bad ass, rebellious self made you who you are today. Not your complicit acceptance of what someone else thought you should be.

If you are ever the subject of a jury trial, I hope one of my sons is on your jury. You couldn’t do better than having one of my beautiful, fair minded, open hearted sons on your jury. I know I am judgmental AF sometimes and I work on that every day. My Max asked me once, “If I judge someone for being judgmental, does that make me a judging judger?” He had a point. By asking, we can become aware. And awareness gets us halfway there. We should always keep asking.

None of us are perfect. None of us know what perfect looks like. Sometimes, we are cruel to each other and often, we say things to each other we shouldn’t. I hope if you sit in judgment on anyone else, you stay fair. And if you sit in judgment on yourself, you give yourself some grace. You deserve that. You’re badass. Keep asking. Keep going.

When Max was much younger, he asked me if he should go for it and let the girl he had a crush on know how he felt about her. I told him, yes, do it. Be bold. Tell her how you feel. He did.

After he had spilled his heart out to her and she had rejected him, he said to me, “Mom, I can never trust you again about relationships. You gave me bad advice. I have to be sure that someone loves me before I say that I love her.” Oh, if only. If only we didn’t have to shipwreck our hearts to get the answer to love me, love me not.

Not too long ago, my uncle called me from Hawaii. He lives alone and waits for his home health worker to show up so he has someone to talk to. He said to me, “I am thinking about getting a cat. But I want something that won’t die before I do.” I said to him, “Uncle, maybe you should get a bird. They live a long time and they will talk to you.” He said, “I will think about this. But maybe a dog.” I get it. We all want someone we can share our time with – who loves us unconditionally, who is always happy to see us.

Sometimes, we get lonely and stuck. There are so many reasons we can give to stay hurt or depressed. There are so many reasons we can give to be angry at someone or something else. There are so many reasons to stand behind fear and pain. But there are so many reasons not to.

Maybe we are all just pilgrims here, on a path none of us have the final compass points for, walking together in the hope of finding our happily ever afters. Maybe once we could have settled for being perceptively fragile and fucked and fermented in a vat of “I told you so’s” and regret. We are better than this, I think. We all have the capacity to be strong and kind and good. To do otherwise is to give up. I don’t think we are built to give up, and especially not to give up on love. I think we are made for love. After all, we are all in this together.

There are two words I am working to integrate into my vocabulary more. They are not common words in my line of work. But what the hell. I’m going to try. They are “I believe.” I believe. I believe in love. I believe that even a shipwrecked heart can make its way back home. I believe that the best hearts are those that have been wrecked and yet remain open to make their way back out to sea again, to try again. And again. And again.

Don’t give up. Don’t give up, uncle. Don’t give up, Max. Don’t give up, you. Take the chance. Put your heart out to sea again. And don’t ever, give up on love.

I took the California bar exam two times. Not unusual. It is a mother f*cker of a test. In 2012, when I took it the first time, Max was 10 years old. During that time, I downloaded some free self-hypnosis podcasts from i-Tunes to see if any of them could talk me down after my days of studying for the bar exam (versus drinking an entire bottle of wine and crying). I found 3 minute self-hypnosis podcasts (who has time for more than that?) and Max checked it out, too. His favorite was one called “Wash Away Stress.” He would borrow my i-Pod and lie on his bed with my little pink earbuds in and zone out. He told me he liked to “get hypnotized and de-stress at the end of a long, very stressful day.”

When I failed the bar exam the first time, no one was more despondent than Max. He spent hours with me during the summer of 2012, lying on the floor next to our big dog Kimba, while I studied. I would tell him, “Max, go outside and play.” He refused, preferring to sort through my flashcards and read them out loud to me. Burglary. Robbery. Larceny. Rule Against Perpetuities. Strong stuff for a kid who had barely started middle school.

The evening I found out I had not passed, we had an event at our synagogue. It was probably the best place for me to be. I am not what you would call a religious person. But our synagogue is a welcoming place and probably the closest thing my hippie soul can stand in and be comfortable in for purposes of any kind of connecting to the Big Everything. I needed to connect.

I was tired and overwhelmed and too self-conscious to cry. But Max cried. He clung to me like a suckerfish to the side of a fishbowl and he cried. He kept telling me, “Go back and check again, Mom. It has to be wrong.” I told him, “No, baby, it is right. I know it. I did not pass this time. But I promise you I will try again.” I did try again. And damn it. I passed. My Max was with me the entire way. No one was prouder than my youngest son the day I was sworn in as an attorney.

Flash forward six years, Max and I are sitting in his room. Max is writing an essay about his struggles with ADD and getting his homework done on time and getting to school on time. This is a struggle I know very well. I struggled with ADD while I was taking the bar exam. Fuck, I struggle with it every damn day. I always joke that the name of my band should be “Late For Court.” We all need a little grace in our lives; the grace I ask for, every day, is that those in my world understand my struggle with the time-space continuum. And I have been given that grace, for which I am so grateful.

So far, life hasn’t been as forgiving for my son, we have been fighting to get him a little grace in his world. We will get there. But sitting in Max’s room that night, he was doing what Max does and addressing how ADD is actually a gift and has helped make him the successful person that he is today. I said to him, “Let’s do a paradigm shift. How many really successful people have ADD? Tell me someone you admire, who is your hero, who has ADD.” And he said, “It’s you, Mom. You are my hero.” And I couldn’t say anything because my whole heart was just….

We all have bad days, for sure. We all fail. You cannot truly succeed unless you do. Max reminds me that I should take time at the end of the day to wash stress away. Max gives and teaches me more grace than I ever give myself. And for that, my Max will always be my hero.