The Burglar On Our Front Porch

Newsletter 2020-04-20

The burglar rattled the front door. My nine-year-old, Betsy, sprinted upstairs in tears to wake me. I barrel rolled out of bed and reached for a softball bat. I was the last line of defense since my dog is useless and my pigs can’t be counted on in a crisis. Then my brain had enough time to wake up all the way and fully understand what was going on.

My kids have been sleeping on the first floor of our house off and on for the last few weeks. At first, they were in the blanket fort that had become a permanent fixture of our lower story. But it turns out blankets aren’t the most durable construction material, and also we might have cut a few corners when it came to building codes. It’s hard to find top tier blanket fort contractors in the middle of a pandemic. Disaster was inevitable. This week, one of the kids accidentally broke through the blanket ceiling, and everyone else gave up on rebuilding and left the place as a pile of rubble. So it looked just like the rest of our house right …