Julia Park Tracey

No dogs allowed (sorry, dog lovers). The only dogs here are my feet, and they’re barking. “Dog days” refers to the Dog Star, Sirius, which rises and sets prominently in August, which of course you already knew, being learned folk… Busy days: I’ve been moving, sick as a dog (heh), exhausted and not writing anything “good” at all — but busy as can be. In submitting a short essay to a call for entries for an anthology about mothers/daughters and shopping, I inadvertently stumbled across an agent in NY who loves my work. She’s reading my ms now. She said she was very excited. But then the dead silence follows…so…

I have a secret. An obsession. I’m in love. Tra la! We’ve been moving, he from his house and I from mine, into one happy, united abode. And when two adults are moving into a house that will also teem with not two but five children of various ages, it soon becomes apparent that there is going to be trouble — with the laundry. In my apartment, I didn’t have a washer and dryer — I’d sacrificed them to the greedy gods at Craigslist and bid them adieu after my man got a bit of a hernia hoisting them up the back stairs (naturally, I lived on the second floor).…

When Mia was in Budapest, she stayed with my former neighbor Kathy, who is grown and married and has two children. Our parents are still close friends, and Kathy’s mother recently wrote to my mother with this to say about Mia’s visit: Dear Liz and Bill, Thank you for your nice letter; it was so good to hear from you. Well, Mia “did” Budapest, and Kathy and family enjoyed having her. Kathy was very proud of her – Mia went sightseeing on her own and in spite of all the construction going on all over the place (they are renovating some of the subway lines), she managed very well. She…

At long last, a new post from me. Mia’s adventures are much more exciting that what I’ve been up to, which is moving, packing, cleaning, unpacking, falling down with exhaustion. Getting back up again. A routine, you might say. Mia will be home Tuesday, anyway, and then maybe she’ll guest post a decompression version. I will ask her when she gets home and has a hot bath, dabs some goo on her festering mosquito bites, has a real Mexican meal after all these months, and catches up on her zzz’s. As for me: The PR biz is actually going into hiatus; I still have a number of clients but have…

From Mia:dear mama, today things are much better! i am not going to Portugal but staying in Italy. i haven’t seen nearly enough of this place and i am scared of trains now! so scared that i am starting my journey to london on sunday… flight is on tuesday morning! i just can’t risk it, ya know? i am so excited to come home, though. especially because i found the most awesome ITALIAN gift for you today. if you hate it, i will TOTALLY take it. but methinks you won’t. i have 30++ mosquito bites (my ankles are swollen with them.. yikes.. and i even have the bindi dot mosquito…