The twins are taking exams from our basement, which is a sentence I never thought I’d write. They had to clear the room of any and all notes. Pop in earphones to create quiet, and start an app that freezes their computer on the exam. This is their 15th month of school from home, which I know is totally normal if you’re homeschooled. But the twins aren’t homeschooled. They are just home and schooled.

This has been a very weird year.

But it now feels more normal to have them doing school from home than thinking about having them go to school in a classroom again. Next year is currently set to be in-person. I know I will once again grow accustomed to having everyone out of the house, but I sense that it will take me months to go back to feeling like it is “normal” in the same way that it took me months to come to a place where everyone at home felt “normal.”

I’m in a liminal space, trying to figure out how I feel about everything.

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Stop procrastinating. Go make your backups. Don’t have regrets.

Seriously. Stop what you’re doing for a moment. It will take you fifteen minutes, tops. But you will have peace of mind for days and days. It’s the gift to yourself that keeps on giving.

As always, add any new thoughts to the Friday Backup post and peruse new comments in order to find out about methods, plug-ins, and devices that help you quickly back up your data and accounts.

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And now the blogs…

But first, second helpings of the posts that appeared in the open comment thread last week. In order to read the description before clicking over, please return to the open thread:

• “Between the Lilac and the Birch” (Mrs. Spit… Still Spouting Off)
• “Parenthood and Grandparenthood in the Pandemic” (InfertilityHonesty)

Okay, now my choices this week.

Jewish IVF asks when those twinges of jealousy will ever go away. She writes: “For me it’s more like a tug in my heart, the sting in my eyes, the pull in my gut. Then guilt that I feel it at all instead of just being happy for someone when they share their news.” For her, it’s pregnancy-related more than baby-related, but this idea hit home for me, too. I still feel those twinges sometimes.

The Uterus Monologues was asked when they’re planning to have another child. She explains: “I think the single most surprising thing for me about having a baby has been how quickly people ask when you’re going to do it all over again.” She does the mental math of what it will take to go through pregnancy again after loss. It’s a fascinating post on where the brain goes when you have so much more to consider.

Lastly, Infertile Phoenix goes through what may be the most awkward and inappropriate icebreaker situation ever when someone decides it will be a fantastic idea to ask all of the people at a new place about whether they have children. Though I love this line: “I didn’t say anything else. No explanation. No elaboration.”

The roundup to the Roundup: The end of the school year at home. Your weekly backup nudge. And lots of great posts to read. So what did you find this week? Please use a permalink to the blog post (written between May 14 – May 21) and not the blog’s main url. Not understanding why I’m asking you what you found this week? Read the original open thread post here.

My Sweet Dumb Brain had a beautiful essay unpacking an idea from Glennon Doyle’s book about life as a game of chutes and ladders, and how social media amplifies the squares we’re all on.

She was on a figurative high square moving towards the next milestone when her husband died suddenly, sending her down a chute that changed her relationship status, friendships, career, and adoption application. And then there were all the “ladders” that friends were posting on social media:

While I was coming to terms with the fact that my husband was dead, everyone else seemed to be living their best lives—and making sure the world knew about it … all of these posts made me feel woefully alone. While I had fallen down a never-ending chute, it seemed it was all ladders for everyone else I followed.

The point, she explains, is that “I usually focus on the chute part. I forget to look for the ladders.” Because it’s easy to feel the impact of a chute. Your stomach is plummeting. Your heart is in your throat. You are upset, and it blots out everything else. It is much harder to feel the elation of a ladder. We climb them, enjoying the fact that we’re going up while simultaneously looking for the next ladder. Climbs don’t have the same physical response.

Anyway, I love her essay. Give it a read.

I sent the ChickieNob outside last week to meet up with a friend. There is a clearing between our houses, and they can remain 12 feet apart on picnic blankets. An hour or so later, she came back into the house. “They are here. They are here. They are everywhere.”

The cicadas.

I had been looking in our yard, assuming that if they weren’t in our yard, they weren’t in our neighbourhood. Not quite. It turns out that they were just a few streets away. Some of my friends’ yards are swarming with them.

We had our first on the front step this weekend—both the actual cicada (which I mostly missed as Josh nudged it away with his foot) and its shell (which I jumped over, shrieking). And I saw them on some of the trees while we were driving.

Since then, I’ve been standing by the window with my birding binoculars, searching the trees like a curtain twitcher (a term I learned from fellow former blogger, MsPrufrock, aka BarrenAlbion, that I think of any time I stand by the window). The twins tell me that I’m creepy, and if anyone looked at me while I was standing at my bedroom window, binoculars glued to my face, they would think I’m weird. Think I’m weird? Is that the worst that would happen? Because do you know that the alternative is that I will not know when the cicadas come to our actual yard?

I forgot that they emerge slowly at first and then pick up steam.

I took a few minutes to sit outside yesterday. It may be the last time for awhile.

Not sure what #MicroblogMondays is? Read the inaugural post which explains the idea and how you can participate too.

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I recently learned that in the US, Sunday is considered the first day of the week. Which is funny because the days of the week in Hebrew are literally “first day,” “second day,” “third day,” etc. And Sunday is Yom Rishon or “first day.” But even with that linguistic fact, I’ve always thought of Monday as the first day.

I purposefully chose a calendar that has the week set up as Monday to Sunday so it fit my mental counting of the first day of the week.

What do you consider the first day of the week, and do you match up with your country??

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Are you also doing #MicroblogMondays? Add your link below. The list will be open until Tuesday morning. Link to the post itself, not your blog URL. (Don’t know what that means? Please read the three rules on this post to understand the difference between a permalink to a post and a blog’s main URL.) Only personal blogs can be added to the list. I will remove any posts that are connected to businesses or are sponsored post.

As I say every month, I’m shamelessly stealing this idea from Jessica Lahey. She has a recurring monthly date where she reviews all the books she read that month. Book reviews are important for authors, and I want to get better about doing this.

So. I’m going to review them here and also online, but I’m going to do it a little differently. I’m only going to review the stuff I really liked. I don’t see a reason to spend my time writing about something I didn’t love; it’s just using up more of my energy. So only positive reviews.

These are the books I liked (or mostly liked) from April.

The Magicians (Lev Grossman): ChickieNob and I listened to the audio while we did our daily indoor walk. This is one of my favourite books, so it made it easier to carve time into every afternoon to exercise because I knew I was going to be spending time listening to the adventures of my book friends.

A Game of Cones (Abby Collette): This is the second book I’ve read in her Ice Cream Parlour Mystery series. I adore this series. I like every character. I like that she throws in a Hebrew or Yiddish word here and there. Is the plot believable? Of course not—it’s a cozy mystery. But reading it was a true pleasure. I liked every minute I was with this book.

Her Dark Lies (J.T. Ellison): I didn’t rate this book on GoodReads because I didn’t know how I felt about it. It had zero plot twists. Everything you think will happen, happens. I didn’t understand what she was doing with this. It was like the romance equivalent of a mystery in the sense that you knew everything that would happen, and there were no surprises. But, at the same time, I devoured the book. It was like… a paper soap opera.

Murder in G Major (Alexia Gordon): Another cozy mystery—this one set in Ireland with paranormal elements. If you like cozy mysteries, this is a perfect cozy mystery. Loved the characters, the town, and the plot. I plan to read the whole series because the first book ends of a cliffhanger.

The Two Towers (J.R.R. Tolkien): I’m still rereading Lord of the Rings every morning in 15 minute increments. And I love it. Of course.

Good Girl, Bad Blood (Holly Jackson): This is a sequel that may be even better than the original book. A warning: it has a really dark twist at the end. But the only thing I would change about this book is the title. It’s a terrible title, right? For a really amazing book. I cannot wait for the third book in this series.

The Good Sister (Sally Hepworth): This is another book that I didn’t rate on GoodReads because I didn’t know how I felt about it. Once again, infertility plays a role in the plot in Hepworth’s book. It’s super read-able in the sense that you’ll race through it. But a bunch of pieces of the book made me feel squicky. I’d be curious how other people felt about the book.

What did you read last month?