You can tell Roxie feels change coming by the crazy way she's been acting.

It started in Arizona last week, but I just chalked it up to the over-tired, over-stimulated chaos of travel. She started having the kind of meltdowns I haven't seen from her since I Sam and split our household in two.

She bit her cousin in the swimming pool at the end of a long day. Biting was her thing for a while, but it's been a couple years since she last bared her teeth.

Her behavior has reverted, though. She's had a rough week. In school Thursday when I was visiting for family day her best friend looked at me and asked, "Why is Roxie acting that way?"

"That way" being out of control, dumping other kids stuff on the floor and laughing.

None of the 16 kindergarteners have seen this side of my baby.

It's been long gone, packed away when we moved.

Thing is, she's super sensitive, she feels every minor shift — and what I think she felt in Phoenix was Daddy wasn't there. Daddy wasn't there and the energy surrounding his absence had little to do with the high cost of tickets.

This kid, I know she could feel my conflict every time I said Sam and I have been scoping out rentals. Would hear the thoughts under my words saying something else.

Saying I don't think we'll be back together by the end of the summer, I think we'll be all the way apart.

This is dragging on too long. For everyone. I need to be all the out or all the way in by the time she starts first grade. Sam needs a direction. He deserves it.

Sometimes I hate myself for keeping everyone in waiting. Sometimes I wish I could close my eyes and make this all disappear. Wake up two years in the future, lessons learned with out having to live through them.

I don't waste much time feeling sorry for myself anymore. Not usually.

That path goes the wrong direction, a downward spiral. Self-pity is the opposite of gratitude and learning gratitude has been a challenge but I'm there. Most days.

Not today. I'm sitting in a big leather chair in my brother's new house, boxes all around, and I don't want to get on a plane and fly back to my life tomorrow. I've been in Arizona a week, which is usually about four days too long, but I think about going home tomorrow. I'm wiping tears with my sleeves. Rubbing my eyelids dry with my forefingers.

Most days I accept my best for what it is. I believe in self acceptance lies the openness to achieve and grow and cultivate gratitude. Know that I'm good enough.

My brother and his partner have an outdoor fireplace that looks like it should be a fountain. It's a long, narrow basin filled with blue glass chunks. The wall behind it is white tile, so you'd think water should cascade down it into the glass. But under the glass, in a layer of sand you don't see, there's a gas pipe. Turn it on, light and flame burns on the glass.

Their dining room chandelier is from Holland. They saw it in a window last winter and had to have it, Googled compulsively until they found it. The soap dispenser by the kitchen sink is motion activated, put your hand under and the gel drips out.

My brother and his partner have offered to pay for all the vision therapy Roxie needs to "train her eyes to keep up with her brain." So her hands can do what her eyes can see.

I'm grateful. I have a list of learning differences that have never been addressed. I'm hopeful in the long run this means Roxie won't spend her life struggling to survive, as I do, because of challenges no one can see.

My parents were always very affectionate when I was growing up. It was almost embarrassing how much they hugged and smooched each other, but there was something cool about it because it was obvious that they really loved each other and enjoyed being around one another.

My husband and I used to be pretty affectionate — after all, that's what I grew up with so it seemed natural — but the worse the issues in our marriage became, the less affectionate we became. You would be hard pressed to see us holding hands or embracing each other for longer than a standard, "Hi, welcome home from work" hug. We're so distant from each other that showing affection seems weird. Sometimes, I just don't want him to touch me.

What is this conveying to my kids? I know people say that a separation would damage my kids, but what potential damage are we doing by staying together?

We don't scream at each other, but we don't portray a married couple who necessarily enjoys being around each other. I don't want my kids to get the impression that this is what a marriage is supposed to be like. I know that the example my husband and I set right now will have a lasting impression on our kids forever. I'm really trying to not screw this all up.

Those inappropriate things I took out of Roxie and Lila's suitcase last week when we were packing for Phoenix? All the long sleeve dresses and pants they wouldn't need in the desert...

It's a good thing my mom bought each of the girls a new raincoat for next fall; they've gotten great use covering sundresses in the 60-something Arizona rain this week.

Turns out my niece's outdoor graduation ceremony was a high school football packed with families huddles close under blankets, tilting umbrellas to block the sideways rain. There was more hot chocolate than cold water.

Turns out we could have used the long sleeves and then some.

Turns out, as usual, kids know a lot more about what they are doing than we think.

They always know, the little psychics. My girls mirror back feelings before I'm even aware I'm having them.

It's amazing what people can tune in to before their brains are cluttered with the day to day static of grocery lists, work projects, and endless to-do lists.

I'm not saying the random winter clothes my 3-year-old packed was fortune telling; I chalk that up to coincidence.

But other things, like the state of their families — our small kids know way more than we think.

Doesn't matter what you say or don't say, how carefully you chose words when talking to your husband, or how you try to stage the state of your marriage.

They pick-up the truth beneath the veneer. Might as well be a picture window.

They see everything. And, for all the time I spent trying to hide the problems in my marriage, my kids have been much happier and visibly better adjusted since I left.

Now that I know they see, I'm not trying to hide anything. 


My husband is thinking about taking a job overseas for a year. His boss wants to send him to a place that would not be feasible for the family to follow and besides that, anyone who has been paying attention to the news lately knows that it's really not the best time to try to sell a house.

If he gets this position then he'll move overseas temporarily, with a vacation sometime in the middle to come back and spend about a month at home.

The kids will miss him like crazy if he goes, but in my husband's line of work if he doesn't go now he'll have to go eventually.

We both figure that if he goes while the kids are as young as they are now then it won't be as traumatic. We figure our son may not even remember him ever being gone when he gets older.

What a pickle. We've both been trying to work on our marriage, but if he goes away then everything will go on pause. We won't have anything figured out, and it will be a weird sort of pseudo-separation where we're still married but we're not living together.

I can't decide whether that will be a good thing or a bad thing. I'll admit that the thought of living without him for a year is pretty appealing, just because I won't have to deal with him. On the other hand, if he isn't here and present then how can we ever get everything figured out one way or another?

Maybe the time away will reveal that we're better off apart than we are together, or maybe we'll pine over each other like mad and decide that the marriage is worth saving. I don't know. Either way, if he gets this position things are bound to get interesting.

Roxie, Lila and I flew to Arizona last week for my niece's high school graduation. Most of my family is down there in the desert.

My parents live in a cookie-cutter neighborhood. They've been living in the same house for 10 years, and at night, I'm still not sure which on is theirs.

Every house is that suburban-Scottsdale tan adobe with a terra-cotta roof.

In May the weather is uniform like the architecture. Everyday is hot and sunny.

Our visits are always pretty scripted. They kids stay with my parents, I stay a couple nights there and a couple nights at my brother's, or my sister's.

And it's hot.

Last graduation here, my other niece's, I was pregnant with Lila. It was 100 plus degrees, my shear tank-dress was one layer too thick and no amount of bottled water could quench my desert thirst.

What I love about travel is the unexpected. Visiting family isn't exactly "travel," but it's a break from routine.

And this trip we got a great dose of the surprise. The temperature dropped 50 degrees from 108 on Tuesday to 57 on Thursday.

It was cold and rainy and nothing like late-May is supposed to be here.

The wind blew graduation caps across the fields, and while people huddled under blankets and umbrellas they laughed though the complaints.

And loved it for the great stories that come out of disaster even as it's happening.

For me, that's key to surviving these hard times. Loving them for the stories they will become and laughing a little right now, too.

Yay! Vacation. Bring it on!

Well, not vacation, exactly. But as close as I'm getting anytime soon.

We're headed to Arizona for some quality family time and my niece's high school graduation.

My girls and I have been packing this week. OK, technically, Roxie and Lila have been packing and I have been unpacking the inappropriate things they've chosen for the trip.

Replacing long-sleeve dresses and heavy jeans with tank tops, skorts, and cotton capris.

I love traveling alone with my girls. The adventure. Three girls alone on the road, or in the air, as it were. It's empowering to know we can do it ourselves. Even if, technically, I'm going to my family where my kids stay with the grandparents, I stay with my brother or sister and I have way more help than I do at home as the only adult.

Still, even on these totally scripted trips, where little room is left for spontaneous activity, travel feels like possibility.

Even on the "easy" trips, you can't leave home without learning more about yourself. Travel is the ultimate crash course in self discovery.

And there a few things I already know.

We can go anywhere. Do anything we want. Don't need anyone else.

A few months ago I read a Newsweek article written by a woman who was in the middle of a divorce. She and her husband had both come to the realization that the marriage wasn't going to work, so while they still remained friends they knew that divorce was inevitable.

Instead of splitting up the household goods, working out a custody arrangement for the kids, and then going their separate ways, they still lived together in the same house they bought as a married couple. They had separate bedrooms, but they still maintained the home concurrently. The kids knew the parents were divorcing at that eventually they would be split up into two households, but until the house sells they'll all stay together under one roof.

I remember thinking to myself as I read the article, "Is this feasible? Can two people who are divorcing share a house and not be freaked out the whole time?" I figured it must be an exceptional situation, and didn't give it much more thought until a friend recently told me about her neighbor who is doing the exact same thing. Apparently they're afraid to put the house on the market because of the current real estate environment, so they've set up separate bedrooms and they've already filed the divorce paperwork.

Does anyone else think this is weird?

If I filed for divorce I would not want to live in the same house as my husband. Maybe it's different for me because my husband absolutely does not want a divorce, so it would be weird to live with him and deal with the whole, "Are you sure you want to do this? Can't we work it out? How could you do this to me?" thing that I would probably get from him every single day. Not being able to be physically away from him would be bizarre, considering the circumstances.

How to say this without it coming out wrong.... Aside from the emotional chaos and inability to move forward, the hardest part of this limbo land I've created is single parenting with no break from my kids on their daddy days.

I know, plenty of you out there are true single moms. Full time, full on. I bow to you. I have no idea how you do it. It feels lame to whine here when Sam has them three to four nights a week.

But, obviously, I've come to whine, or I wouldn't have started this post.

I balance parenting and working (or, at least, attempting to work) five days a week. Because my work schedule is "flexible" and Sam's is not, Roxie and Lila are with me from Sunday night or Monday morning until Thursday evening. Sam has them Thursday night, but brings them back to me Friday morning before work and I take them to school. I get a few work hours Friday morning, and they're back with me all afternoon.

I know, many people have it harder. Many people can parent all day and pump out the work into the wee hours. Not me.

I require down time. Period. Lots of downtime. Without it, I can't function, and everything tumbles like dominoes.

I need balance. If I have my kids all the time half the week, I need a couple solid days of not being Mom. Not doing the bedtime routine, or waking to cries, coughs, and nightmares every other hour.

The half-in, half-out thing is not sustainable.

Here's my revelation of the week: We need to fully sever or move back into one place soon. Because until we do I'll be here, exhausted, in my tiny apartment trying simultaneously to work on my own goals and work as a family, and not doing either very well.

I went ahead and answered the question as best as I could. I told her that sometimes parents don't stay together, and if they marry someone else then the new person becomes a step parent to the kids. She didn't quite get what I was saying — probably because all she has ever known are two parents who stay together and never speak about separation in front of the kids — so I approached it from a different angle. 

I told her this: "If mommy and daddy decided they didn't want to be married anymore, and then mommy eventually married another man, that man would be your stepdad." This seemed to clear it up for her, but I looked over at my husband and realized that I had just painted a picture of one of his biggest fears. Before I could say anything else, my horrified husband said to my daughter loudly, "...but that's not going to ever happen, sweetie, so don't you worry about it."  

I think this wins for most awkward conversation I've had in a while. 

The thing that really amazed me was that my daughter didn't seem particularly alarmed by the whole concept. I'm not naive enough to think that she could care less if we stay together or not, but it was certainly a surprise that she was so easily able to accept the fact that sometimes parents just don't stay together. I guess that sometimes I don't give my daughter enough credit for how smart she is.