One of the first things I do each day is make note of what happened the day before.

Each year, there are always a few stand-out days. This year that day was May 4th, 2021. Here is my daily re-cap from that day.

• this was anthony's first day back to school in over a year. he has to go in for end-of-term testing and they won't/can't let kids do that from home. i could tell anthony was more than a little nervous about having to leave the house (and sit in a room with a bunch of humans). he has for sure been the most careful member of our family through the covid-crisis.
• since marty, alex and bella have all returned to school and it is just anfer and i at home, this means this would be my first day alone in the house in over a year. imagine!!!
• marty woke up and could not put any weight on her ankle, like at all. she used her first full sick day in more than 3 years (or since returning to work) because of it.
• she was able to get an appointment scheduled at washU orthopedics and we headed over within the hour.
• meanwhile, alex announced he was turning in one of his mental health days and would not be going to school.
• and like that, my first home-alone day got dashed before i even got to sniff a minute alone.
• a positive for me is marty had to get fitted for a boot. that happened at the same place i got my knee brace so i asked them about a replacement as my existing brace was about eight years old and pretty foul (given all the summer tennis matches in the august heat). they said I should just call into my doc and ask for a replacement. they also offered to take my measurements while i was there. so that is exciting.
• and it is worth noting that it is pretty cool that within hours of waking up with a busted ankle (or strained ligament in this case) marty was diagnosed and fitted with a corrective boot which immediately lessened her discomfort.
• at times in this day i felt like i was getting a mild glimpse of my future.
• all of the above happened before 11am.
• the day was reasonably scuttled after that, in my eyes at least. i got a little bit of dev work in but pretty much pissed the rest of the day away.
• did start watching a time to kill. i thought i would be re-watching it but it turns out i only read the book and had never seen the movie. the movie is super great. what a cast!
• remembered to go get anfer after a VERY long day of testing for him. he was in good spirits and got some solid stories from the day.
• obviously made dinner given marty's state. improvised to burnt butter pasta and steak. also did dishes.
• bella swung through with saba and her cousin (can't remember the cousin's name).
• watched some television with anfer. magicians and tosh.
• A few family catchphrases that got some play today:
  • getting big-timed (via tom brady interview)
  • you've never looked older (which I first used on marty over the weekend and people kinda latched onto and definitely threw at a boot-laden marta).
• and dinner table conversation was dominated with talk about the existence of a digitally printable card which supports a long held theory of mine that such a thing as a bendable screen exists. a recent video of a magic trick being played on harrison ford revived this theory. after positing a story about replacing palm pilot screens in the nineties and describing how they worked, I swung anthony a bit to my side.
• full and memorable day.
• Love it.

I assure you most days do not look like that. Most of my days, most people would find to be a comparative borefest, but not May 24th. And I would like to add that it would be another 111 days, or 3 months and 19 days, before I scored that alone day. If I have a point of pride of over these last two years, it is how well I shouldered zero alone time from March of 2019 to August of 2021. And that is with no notice. Of course my saving grace is my family is seventeen kinds of awesome. If they were anything less, it likely would have been a choppy affair.