Eliana Osborn

I wanted to write a book last summer. Then I realized what a terrible goal that was and modified accordingly.

Now that I’m a mother, I’m much more sympathetic to a woman who just couldn’t take it anymore. Not saying I’d leave my kids in a parking lot and hope for the best . . . just saying that I can understand the impulse.

A haircut is a whole lot cheaper than therapy or tattoos or a round-the-world plane ticket.

Really, you should thank me. I’m just protecting your future self.

1. Borrow a child.

Size, like age and salary and whatever else, is just a number. Pretending numbers don’t measure things isn’t helpful. I’m 38 years old: That isn’t good or bad, but it IS different from being 18 or 50.

You know how someone can give you a compliment that you know isn’t true? Like, they tell you a dress looks good when you are absolutely certain that is not the case? But if they keep saying it looks good, you start to think “Yeah... this looks good.”

I, like far too many women in this country and the world, have had a wide variety of experiences involving sexual harassment.

Don’t listen to horror stories about airplane tantrums. Listen to me while I let you in on the secret perks of seeing the world with kiddos.

There are some days of parenting that are magical, full of unicorns and four leaf clovers and lottery winnings. Those are the moments when I catch myself, just for a second, feeling content and happy and looking around trying to freeze things. Out of 7000 days, those maybe make up five a year.