As an adult, it is easy to forget the eternity of summer vacation that we’re experienced (if we were so fortunate) when we were children. For me, the weekend is not forever, but the second best thing is working from California while your kid has the forever weekend.

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Big day for weirdness here in the newsroom. Should have you all about up to date by tonight.

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Catching up a bit here again, but the couple of intervening days since we published this issue have seen a steady increase in our very teenage child asking for very extra snuggles, so this is a trend worth noting.

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This was a big year for our publisher. Kudos to her on the completion of a real school year. She wasn’t even in Pre-K when we started this!

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When we asked Kina how she decided that she liked making rubber-band chokers, she said that she had seen “high schoolers” wearing them “and also flare pants”.

Our esteemed publisher looks ahead of the curve for fashion trends.

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The advantage that people born in the city of New York have in the debate about “real New Yorkers” is really unfair, says local dad who has lived in New York for nearly 30 years and was unfortunately not born here.

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Kina really spent a long time on the illustrations for her mini-Olympic gold meal. An artist and an Olympian! We are blessed!

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As a child growing up as part of a military family, I left my school and friends behind every three years or so, setting up shop each time in some new state or country to make an entirely new set of friends. It rarely bothered me much (though the move after fourth grade was incredibly difficult for me), and I learned quickly that homes were temporary and new friends plentiful. I sometimes wonder if that’s shaped my approach to friendships over the years—for better and for worse—to make me more adaptive, in some ways, to loss.

I can remember the people I’ve left behind over the years: the kid with the thick glasses in kindergarten in Rome, NY; Gina, the girl next door when I was in first grade there; Bunty, Teddy, Mike, and Greg from Newark, OH; Wellington Chang(!) and Yusuke from Fairfax, VA; the various Mikes and Jerries from Oklahoma (and a girl whose name I have forgotten who confessed her love for me the day I left, to my dismay); a number of folks from my high school (many of whom were transient themselves); and my many friends (and groups of friends) from college. Their faces are clear to me, even if my youngest friendships feel more abstract than my teenaged ones.

If I were to write a Moving Book, the person moving would be me, over and over again. I’d list the schools and parks and teams and teachers I left behind as I went. I never thought to write it all down; it’s just in my head, my field of view changing gradually, with a few kids holding space in the shadows each time.

The moral here is that any two-bedroom apartment can be the International Space Station if you move languidly enough.

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In my notes document, the words “soft, shark, sandy, rinsin”. It must be summer.

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When Kina saw this posted on the cabinet, she asked, “That’s what I’ll look like when I’m a grown-up? I mean, I would definitely wear flare pants…”

She then spent three straight minutes admiring herself as a grown woman before walking into her bedroom for the night.

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It’s not summer until the publisher goes to Coney Island.

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The injustice of it all.

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It is true, I am back from London and stopped at “Harroods”.

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Another catchup edition?!?! Indeed, because I have been in London speaking at a conference and being weirdly jetlagged. In any case, Mommy did a great job as interim editor and paid a lot of attention to Kina’s hair in the masthead.

Lisa Visits to Read Letters to Kina in Utero From CA & NY Baby Showers in 2016 for HS Graduation Speech Inspo for Her

At Laurea’s baby shower, we invited our guests to fill out these letters to Kina for when she was 10, 18, and 30. We hadn’t pulled them out for seven and a half years, until our friend Lisa suddenly needed to give a graduation speech at the high school she teaches in. No spoilers, but the letters were great.

I love that Kina has celebrated my brief trip to London by getting really into Mr. Bean.

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This may be my favorite headline of all time, because it speaks so directly about the modern condition—truly Kina’s forte.

How do you build a lifestyle that suits a world of lava? Ask a seven year old. She is unbothered and has many ideas.

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As Bart Simpson once said, I’m a little behind on my rounds. It’s been an eventful weekend, what can I say?

“Daddy, What If Your Name Was ‘Déja Boo’?”

I was going to say “drag name”, but that felt a little too appropriative. She has on multiple occasions this weekend called me “Déja Boo Yee”, which really rings nicely.

It is not even close.

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Everybody’s staying anonymous here, but I am proud of Kina and her tough girl classmates for standing up for a boy in her class who got the short end of the bully stick. As angry as it makes me to hear about these things, I have to remind myself that these kids are seven and eight years old, and that their behaviors are just an extension of their own experiences—much like the behaviors and neuroses of their adults. It’s hard to explain that all to Kina, but it’s a lot easier when you know she’s confident enough to protect the people who need protecting. She can spend the rest of her life becoming familiar with the virality of trauma, but she’s kind today.

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