My mom WALKED a MARATHON today, but I already knew that lady had patience. Did you know me at 14? Let's just say doors were slammed.

She said she was passing time in her hotel room last night, and was getting through some pages of What is the What by Dave Eggers. There she was, "relaxing" before her seven hour walk the next morning, and she gets to the part where the Sudanese refugees are trekking hopelessly by foot across the desert for months, many dying of starvation and illness along the way. "Suddenly I was thinking, maybe I should just see if Law & Order is on," she said.

I joined her for the last six miles. I'm embarrassed to say that I was hurting by the end.

Happy birthday, Danny.

Here's a picture taken of my brother this summer in a temple in Thailand. I've seen this exact expression a million times. He appears to be doing what the middle child between two loudmouth sisters does best: quietly tolerating.

My room has a big old-timey heating register. A metal shelf has been built encasing it, either to protect people from idly resting things on the white-hot coils or to create a functional surface out of an oversized bothersome structure or both. I hung a mirror above mine and used the shelf surface for makeup and jewelry, creating a sort of vanity table. It works.

When my mom was helping me move in, she was worked up over my choice to set THINGS PRECIOUS THINGS on top of the shelf and immediately pulled a tape measure out of her purse (cause you never know) and started making quick measurements and pensively biting her nails. I chalked it up to faulty circuitry from popping out three kids in three years and ignored it. But today in the mail, I got a package from her enclosing a beautiful quilted runner for the shelf in my three favorite colors. My mom has handmade me so many things over the years, from gluegunned hairbows to abstract Halloween costumes to my high school graduation quilt. As it turns out, motherhood doesn't expire.

Thanks, Mom. 'Cause when I said at 8 that I had to be The Blob from that '50s B-movie for Halloween, you could have said, "Are you sure you don't want to be a cat?"