The only soup we had with regularity in my home growing up was matzo ball, and it was never homemade. Why reinvent the wheel when Manichewitz and Streit’s had perfected it and packaged it for ease? As such, I have zero opinion on what makes for a better matzo ball — baking powder, whipped egg whites, or seltzer — for me, I simply have the preference of dense on the inside for a good “bite” and slightly fluffy on the outside.

So while my “family recipe” for our people’s penicillin comes from either a boxed mix or a ready-made in a jar (a game-changer, really), I still have an appreciation for the warm hug that comes from a bowl of soup; its depth of flavor representative of someone who, as younger people may say, understood the assignment.

Soup subculture runs deep, but for me, it’s admittedly more superficial. When temperatures plummeted after weeks of 80-plus-degree days, we entertained whether or not to turn on the heat, pile on blankets, or order soup.

We settled for two of the three. Not cold enough to turn on the heat, we opted for heavier blankets and an Uber Eats delivery of one of my favorite soups: ash-e-reshteh (here’s another from Andy Baraghani).

I’ve made Jake Cohen’s version several times, but even his is a recipe that requires more planning and care than I was willing to apply on a Friday night.

The down-county delivery from Shiraz took nearly two hours to arrive, and yet, ironically, still delivered.

I can now confirm that ash-e-reshteh travels well and satisfies deeply.

The comfort starts with its deep, earthy broth. It reminds me of a soup that my cousin Alice’s mom made for me in Israel. Her soup was Egyptian in origin, I think it was called molokhia, but I remember her referring to it as “grass soup.” And ash reshteh feels similar, if for no other reason than its striking green broth.

More stew than soup, ash reshteh is sturdy by design, with beans, noodles, herbs, and greens. Finished with sour kashk to deliver a memorable bite, once you slurp your last spoonful, you’ll understand and appreciate why it’s served near Nowruz. There’s something almost fortifying and refreshing despite its heartiness.

My craving for ash reshteh might confuse my fellow matzo-ball millennials or members of the tribe, however, for me, there’s meaning in ash rashteh, too.

I don’t have Persian lineage; I remember trying Persian food for the first time in college, including Baghali Polo, a long basmati rice with dill, fava beans, and a richness that comes from butter.

Years later, when my husband I were visiting with family in Los Angeles, we went with our uncle and aunt (technically his, but I claimed them as mine almost immediately) to a Westwood restaurant called Attari Sandwich Shop. Uri, who we lost in 2020, insisted that I order a soup called “ash.” Its appearance is an easy cue to its complex flavor, and it’s a forever reminder of my fondness for my California mishpucha, also complex and curious in its own way.

Food is a great connector, and soup is a great gateway. It brings memories to the forefront through flavor, forcing me to slow down either as I soak beans overnight and bring them to a boil the next day, or as I wait for my out-of-bounds long-distance delivery.

Like most anxious Jewish kids who came of age when it was still socially acceptable to stan the varied creative works of Woody Allen, I was fascinated with the idea of having a therapist in my teens. Showbiz shaped a certain caricature for shrinks — an amalgam of fictional characters from Dr. Jennifer Melfi to Dr. Frasier Crane — that made the idea of having an analyst feel both appealing and overwhelming.

The intent or interest in therapy is only half the battle. An important half, to be fair — getting to the point, probably a proverbial fork in the road, not far from rock-bottom, where you recognize that you need perspective from someone you (or your insurance, if you’re lucky) pay, versus anyone on the inside (I made one reference to Dr. Melfi, and here I am, talking like I’m a bonafide Soprano).

It also doesn’t have to be that deep. I’ve known some people who I would describe as having been “born into” therapy. Their parents had employed scores of head-doctors over the years, with varying degrees of success. Therapy was formative for them, but also, kind of like any other extracurricular activity.

There is something uniquely coastal about the concept of therapy. It wasn’t until I was regularly interacting with people from LA or New York that the phrase “My therapist says…” started to feel almost colloquial.

In addition to the coastal component, there’s something inherently Jewish about being a therapist and seeing a therapist. Maybe we can blame Woody Allen for that, too.

Jewish geography is part ancestral exploration, part gene-pool blame-game. In my family, guilt was a given. You were bred to feel like a scapegoat for the generational trauma of your parents, their parents, and all who came before them.

I was nearly 30 before trying therapy for the first time. I’m not sure that I considered myself mentally well up until that point, but I certainly didn’t think I’d be confronting that I was part of the problem. In fact, I was mostly OK with the stereotype that therapy was just about placing blame on your mother, and was convinced that living with anxiety was healthy as long as you were productive and not a total recluse.

Spoiler alert: it wasn’t like that. Not even a little bit.

My first-ever therapy appointment very much followed the arc of a bad first date. There was planning, scheduling, and lots of discomfort in between.

He was older, which was a choice. In general, I find myself more comfortable with male practitioners, which I think is probably because of unresolved childhood trauma from having a terrible, body-shaming pediatrician that made me skeptical of female physicians.

He also had a dog. That one’s a no-brainer. Dogs are great. I love dogs. That’s it. That’s the logic. That was strategy.

Long-story-boring: it was a colossal failure. He spent the entire time pondering about the scope of my insurance coverage and prodding me for details about how to get published.

I never saw him again, and I don’t remember his name. In fact, when I try to remember what he looked like, my mind goes to a very tall, young-but-still-old version of Dick Van Dyke.

My second therapist — because of course, there’s a second, and I’m now on my third — was a metaphor for my introversion.

I was so uncomfortable; each session just felt like I was talking into a void. I think I was her first-ever client. She offered one — literally only one — anecdote which was that some of my control issues and anxieties were rooted in simply wanting to feel heard, which was tied back to being the butt-end of the household birth order.

I didn’t know how to quit our sessions; I was on her schedule for once-weekly visits until finally she went on vacation. And then I ghosted her.

I couldn’t confront that I knew — and had known for a while — that she was not the right therapist for me.

Had this been a work-life scenario, with the therapist being a peer or direct report, I would never have been shy about delivering this feedback.

I wonder what my current therapist would say about that?

Now, here’s a plot-twist. Despite not having found the right fit for a personal therapist, as a couple, we had found our footing with a phenomenal marriage counselor. Our seventh year of marriage was the cliche manifestation of the seven-year itch. Now, three years later and ten years married, we’re in a much healthier place.

It was through our weekly sessions together that I learned more about myself, which in turn inspired me to renew my search for support.

And here’s the insight: the search for a personal therapist is riddled with its own brand of trauma. This isn’t an original thought, by the way. It was a relatable takeaway I had as a first-time listener to a recent episode of The Giggly Squad podcast with Hannah Berner and Paige DeSorbo. I’m not familiar enough with either of them outside of their podcast, but the podcast has quickly made its way into my regular rotation.

When I was single, I never trusted my friends to set me up. Again, control issues.

Matchmaking in therapy is a little more nuanced. You go in knowing that the connection might not be for forever (and in some cases, it shouldn’t be), and it’s not transactional. In fact, it’s almost deceptively consensual in that the therapist has to want to work with you, regardless of how badly you may want to work with them.

I welcomed that challenge during my first appointment with my now-therapist. I went in taking the whole thing for granted, interviewing her, without any expectation that I too, would be subject to review and approval.

I had an out recently.She was switching practices/platforms. I didn’t realize how triggered I’d be by her broaching the topic. I couldn’t fathom having to start over, and honestly, I didn’t want to. Our rapport wasn’t superficial, and it certainly wasn’t transactional. She knows about the highs and lows of my marriage, she knows and has virtually met my kids, and she remembers anecdotes that even my closest of friends have not committed to memory.

I was surprised by how strongly I felt that our work together was not complete. Every week brings a new insight, a new question to explore, and I think what I really have realized is that through therapy with this particular person, I’m starting to feel like I’m in control of myself, without necessarily feeling like I have to control others as a proxy.

I don’t remember my parents expressing even an ounce of shame over screen time when I was a kid, or spending even a second censoring what we could watch. I was a cable kid; I surfed the channels with reckless abandon. It’s possible that as the youngest of four children, the rules bent by the time they were enforced for me. I have more memories of watching movies like Drop Dead Fred, Death Becomes Her, and Jerry Maguire than I do Kidz Bop or whatever the 90s equivalent was. As far as cartoons were concerned, I remember select episodes of Dr. Katz, Daria, and Beavis & Butthead. I much preferred Seinfeld, Friends, Mad About You, and even The Sopranos to classic kid programming.

As a parent, I’m a little more hands-on, but I don’t hover.

My son has never been a screen-demon; as a toddler, he would passively watch a show, but he was more interested in people and toys than TV. What he would end up watching was, for all intents and purposes, in my hands. And frankly, my maternity leave middle-of-the-night feeds involved everything from Bravo to binge-watching The Bureau, so my spectrum of appropriate viewing was slightly skewed.

The consensus seemed to be that Sesame Street was entertaining (Oscar is a vibe, and everyone from Adam Sandler to James Gandolfini has been a guest), Daniel Tiger was tolerable and wholesome, and Caillou was torture.

So when did we decide to turn against Peppa?

The recent — and truly brilliant — marketing campaign around Mummy and Daddy Pig’s new addition, baby Evie, has only renewed my support for the series.

My son discovered Peppa by way of other British kids shows like Fireman Sam and Bob the Builder. He never really took to American programming like Paw Patrol, but for Peppa, he was a captive audience. I welcomed her in as a pink protagonist with some biting British behavior.

Fellow millennial moms who have built careers while clapping back at labels like “abrasive” or “bossy” — or in my case, “domineering” circa 2012 while working in book PR — and who have worked tirelessly to make the world better for women — seem to be the loudest critics of Peppa and her alliterative cast of characters.

With a handful of parenting years under my belt, I’m at a point now where I curate what my kids are allowed to watch on YouTube Kids; only approved shows appear on their profiles. For my rising first-grader, I’m a little lenient. While he’ll still watch Peppa, he’s very super-hero-coded right now, and for better or for worse, he’s discovered a show called Henry Danger that he’s suckered us into approving for him. It has forced us to make distinctions with him about what words and topics are not OK to repeat, even if they seem funny when we hear them on TV.

For both kids, I have most religious programming blocked, especially if it’s outside our faith, allowing only “Shalom Sesame,” Laurie Berkner, and “Sing It! with Ms. Sara” for my daughter. It’s been especially amusing as of late to have her toddling around house demanding to sing about dreidels in May, and Pharaoh in June.

Our rules about screen time may not be overly strict — and as a result, my kids are quick to relinquish a show in favor of a more engaging, unplugged activity — but we do have limits and restrictions.

And this is where it gets blurry. Peppa gets branded as bratty, and so many of my parent-friends feel strongly that they don’t want their kids, particularly their daughters, to emulate this behavior, making Peppa a no-go in their homes. But just like Dr. Becky doing an entire episode on the silver linings of FAFO parenting, I feel strongly that Peppa’s faults are part of her charm.

Peppa is a normal four year old. And while I can’t speak to typical bovine behavior at that age, I can attest to how relatable her parents’ reactions to her schemes and sass have been for me as a parent to similarly aged kids. And if I relate to her parents, I have to believe my son, and now my daughter, relate to her. While the wholesome messaging is perhaps less obvious than anything from Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood, most episodes still bring the plot back to positivity or a lesson learned. Added bonus? My son still refers to his swimsuit as a “costume,” pronounces garage as “gehr-edge,” and until recently called popsicles “ice lollies.”

In the same way that I tell myself that my daughter’s mischief and mayhem are priming her to be a CEO one day, I believe that Peppa’s behavior is age-appropriate and that parents can work with their kids to spin their own narrative.

I would rather my kid watch and learn from someone like Peppa than paint a too-perfect picture of what their childhood should look like. I’m all for a beautiful day in the neighborhood, but I’m also a believer in preparing kids for reality. So while pigs flying is relegated to a figure of speech, I’m fine with my kids watching pigs jumping up and down in muddy puddles (splish, splash, splosh, splish, splash…forgive the earworm).

I still loved it. It was in the same strip mall as a bulk-goods store; I’m not sure I knew the name then because we always just referred to it as “Bulk Food.” My Papa Donnie would let us fill a plastic bag with whatever confections we wanted — I now know it’s because it would still have been cheaper by the pound than individual popcorns and sodas for ten kids. If both grandparents were in tow, my grandmother would fill her purse with ten bags each of tuna sandwiches on challah, grapes, sometimes chips or something else salty. Somehow in addition to that smorgasbord she also managed to fit ten small dixie cups for us to share a Sprite. The only thing that feels crazy to me now is that any of us would have been drinking regular pop.

The whole movie-going experience is something I still sort of romanticize. I prefer the small, shabby theaters of the early 90s to the power-recliners and stadium seating setups we have today.

It’s one of the things I love most about where we live. We have a few theaters that, despite renovations, still feel homely and a little rundown.

I had time to myself tonight, and decided to go to “the show” solo. A small popcorn, large Diet Pepsi (not my preference despite living near its HQ), and I was perfectly primed to watch “The Friend.”

Without spoiling the movie, let me just say that it was perfect for a DIY date-night. No husband scrolling his phone, no kids asking questions in a non-whisper or hushed shout. I felt like I was watching something akin to a Nancy Meyers or Nora Ephron picture. Naomi Watts was outstanding, but Bing, who played Apollo, was also quite the standout star.

Familiar faces like Constance Wu, of course Billy Murray, and Ann Dowd also graced the screen. Watts’ character, Iris, reminded me of myself at times. Sure, I’m married with two kids and a schnauzer, but there’s something to be said for the themes of friendship, strong bonds, and for finding comfort in chaos. The way Iris was forced to navigate her grief with a daily reminder of her loss while she grew into her role as companion to a Great Dane, it was a treat to watch.

Movies like this feel so classically New York to me. As a Michigander-turned-New Yorker, and one who never really liked living in the city besides my short-ish stint in Queens, I swoon for storylines that weave in pieces that feel so city-coded. From characters and plot-lines that are publishing adjacent, a few professorial types, quick-cut glimpses of the subway (despite my distaste for it), the city’s perfect parks. It doesn’t do it justice and yet, it kind of sort of does.

Award season may be behind us, but “The Friend” certainly has my vote for a must-see.

I enjoyed my friends’ parents’ company as much as — and in some cases more than — that of my friends. My taste in entertainment was at least two generations my senior, and for a while, so was my taste in men.

With the exception of grape chewable Tylenol tablets, flavored medicine was rarely something I’d take without a fight. As a 90s kid, I fell victim to pre-Google gullibility. My parents could get me to take medicine with the looming threat of a jab instead of a syrup in suspension. Before the threats, there was often an attempt at mixology. My father, the pharmacist, would mix Dimetapp with Diet Coke (again, 90s kid) or chocolate pudding.

On the whole, my kids are different. For a routine fever-reducer, they toss back the dosing cup like a shot of something more sinister.

Antibiotics are where it gets dicey. Cefdinir, augmentin, amoxicillin, their infamous chalky appearance and near-rancid scents are inherently triggering. Amoxicillin may be bubblegum flavored, but its stronger, less charming cousin augmentin is putrid. The manufactured citrus scent competes with the aroma of chemicals that smell more like a poorly ventilated nail salon than anything remotely medicinal.

And herein lies the issue.

My 23-month-old (she’s just not two yet, OK?) needed a script for augmentin to kick her case of strep. I am unapologetically overbearing when husband volunteers to pick up a prescription. I was a step away from sending a smoke signal to remind him to get it flavored before he snapped that he knew what he was doing.

And yet still, we had a chalky white, citrusy substance to dose up and administer. Not even the faintest whiff of bubblegum, or our second choice, grape.

As we expected, she spit up the suspended dose.

What followed was two calls to the on-call pediatrician to remedy to issue. The first attempt was met with a suggestion to mix the medicine with chocolate syrup.

Sloane is too clever. She fed her doctored syrup to a Peppa Pig figurine. Unsurprisingly, it didn’t pass the sniff test.

And so we did the whole on-call song and dance once more.

By we, I mean me.

I finally identified the issue, which was that the lovely on-call pediatrician thought when we referenced “bubble gum” flavor, we were asking to prescribe amoxicillin in place of augmentin. After some well-intentioned restating of the request we landed on the same page: we needed a new script of augmentin and for the pharmacy to add additional flavor for a bubblegum disguise.

At long last, we were successful, Sloane was medicated, and as millennial parents, we breathed a sigh of relief instead of spiraling our ways to a solution.

Bubblegum can be used as an old-school zing, akin to modern day “basic,” and yet for the next ten days, I will lean into its elasticity more than its color, as I stretch the implication to something healing and restorative. May its textbook stickiness take with it every last trace of streptococcus.

I started my career agency-side, where layoffs tapered off after the 2008 financial crisis. The company endured a very public, unrelated split, and yet the conditions felt stable even if the culture seemed chaotic as the new organization found its footing.

The decision to leave an agency role that was, for all intents and purposes, the picture of comfort and growth wasn’t easy. I was motivated by work-life balance (a thing I’d later rebrand as work-life coexistence), which felt like a a contrived construct when my days were consumed with billability, team leadership, and business development.

Layoffs were never previously top-of-mind when taking interviews. As a woman, I felt conditioned to parse through corporate word salad in search for things like policies for family leave, equity programs for women in leadership, etc. more than any other type of “protection.”

My experience taking maternity leave twice was enough to put me off ever further expanding my family. The process was painful, with a paltry policy nested under short-term disability. I navigated two high risk pregnancies without support from human resources to guide me through taking the leave; the standard was poorly understood because it didn’t really exist.

Over the past couple of years, a new normal has emerged. RIFs have been happening en-masse, especially post-pandemic, with few industries spared. In the beginning, questions from connections flooded my LinkedIn feed, with concerned people, particularly women on maternity leave, asking about the legality of layoffs while on FMLA. They would soon learn that they were likely not protected, because even FMLA has fine print.

What followed were stories from parents who were on leave for births, adoptions, etc., fully intending to return to their roles once their time away was up. Instead, they received ominous requests for remote meetings, templated emails with links to separation agreements, or even worse, they went to log into their work emails only to find that their access had been restricted or revoked, learning later that their employment had been terminated.

Now that we’re past the pandemic, it’s important to put this all in perspective.

The recruitment and retention processes is flawed. Employers barely comply with salary-band transparency; entire departments exist to shield them from liability. Long-story-boring: the employer is protected. They’re boxed in by labor laws and then some, and kept enough above board to get by.

The employee(s)? The savvy ones who know what to ask might be OK. Decoding the dribble in a disability policy to understand pregnancy protections, and committing the company handbook to memory to comply with the rules out of an abundance of caution are only part of the equation. Severance and separation agreements should fall somewhere in between.

Many companies have this language drowning in legalese. Stipulations exist for years of service and/or experience, seniority, even job function.

RIFs are the new normal; they’ve become routine headlines while the policies for severance remains hidden. Employees (including prospective hires) should be given the benefit of reviewing the policies before signing an offer to understand and potentially negotiate their eventual exit, should it be untimely.

The idea of one week per year, benefits until the end of the month, or a final paycheck inclusive of unused PTO is unacceptable and void of accountability. I don’t expect “humanity” when speaking “corporate” — I do, however, expect that a company should have to put its values in plain text.

Treating severance as part of a benefits package places a silver lining on the rise in RIFs; you can negotiate your worth in a way that reflects a value that is complementary to your base compensation.

In the same commonplace coordination of benefits that happens between setting up or transitioning 401Ks and signing up for medical coverage, clearly disclosing RIF protocols and severance policies sets a precedent for big-picture planning; it’s prophylactic in nature.

In the spirit of the beloved Kit-Kat jingle, I think it’s time for corporations to give us all one big break.

Only one part of it stung. The time management. I’ve always had a funny relationship with time — probably a combination of general anxiety and chronic imposter syndrome. I’m not religious, but if work were my religion, my calendar would be my bible. And, like most congregants, I sometimes treat the Bible as a framework within which I need a little freedom.

When I was agency-side, I tried certain techniques to keep me profitable and timely. I blocked my calendar to track my hours (time is money, honey), I consolidated meetings to specific days of the week to offer me windows of work that felt productive.

We’ve become an over-scheduled workforce. Meetings upon meetings upon requests for new meetings upon holds for hypothetical meetings without requests or agendas. If I didn’t employ some sort of strategy to my “book” (the quotes are a function of my imposter syndrome re: coolness, because saying “book” for calendar feels akin to saying “dough” for money), I’d never get anything done.

The agency grind of striking a balance between billability and business growth wasn’t my only time-bound struggle. The shift to client-side work removed the onus of billable hours and replaced it with infamous boardroom “brainstorms” — the bane of my productivity. Fun, creative, and good for morale — all true until the evening exodus would begin with no work-product to round out the day.

I’m in the second-wind of my client-side era (at this point, a Taylor Swift reference feels like I am officially trying too hard…) and at perhaps my peak of self-awareness, confronting again that time management is perhaps going to plague me forever.

When you list “time management” as a development area, there may be internal hesitation because of what you fear it may communicate. But I’m here to be you inner millennial-manager monologue, reminding you that time management is all relative. Sure, it could be that you’re a procrastinator or that you spend too much time schmoozing. It could also mean you’re inherently over-extended and poorly resourced. Or that you could use some support in prioritizing and delegating. Acknowledging the issue is actually a great representation of business maturity; you’ve moved it out from being a blindspot and have it squarely in focus.

But can you conquer it? I read an article on HBR today that caught my attention with a super click-baity title around time management and leadership. There were some strong nuggets throughout the piece, but for the most part, I felt it was casting blame and shame in all the wrong ways. Time management is as much on the manager as it is on the organization, and to some extent, even direct reports.

Here’s my logic.

When you take responsibility and start to implement techniques and tools to better allocate and share your time (because that’s really part of management, it’s like the recruitment process is akin to those cheesy, cliche time-share sales pitches, and then your actual work life becomes bookable by anyone who needs you) you’re communicating that you’re invested, you recognize the trend, and you’re committed to continuously improving your way of working.

So, where do the others come into play?

The organization is as responsible for the setting of expectations and boundaries as the individual. If you’re lucky — and I consider myself almost as lucky as a four leaf clover with my current N+1 — you have an organization that recognizes that they’re part of the problem. They want to hear and help and give you the right resources, tools, etc.

The hardest part of this 3-way coexistence and its impact on time management is the direct reports. If you take the step toward self-awareness of your deficits, you also need to embrace transparency and put your proverbial cards on the table. I always volunteer things like, “I know my calendar may look cluttered and time with me may appear hard to book but…” followed by the ways to reach me. I know people value my approval on creative and copy, but I also clearly disclose that I refuse to be a bottleneck. I do my best to document my approach to review so that when time is scarce, the steps are clear to reach a close-to-Kirsch conclusion on copy. (Forgive me, again, trying too hard.)

That’s where the onus is shared; I’ve self-identified my development area and where I am always look to improve and grow. I expect, in return, the same growth in empowerment and entrepreneurial drive from my directs.

When they request my time, it’s a flag to me that I’m needed, because otherwise, my goal is to delegate and empower, with 1:1s keeping me in the loop before a problem pops up or a milestone is marked. It’s a partnership. And that’s where I feel like this article got it at least kind of wrong.

Each of its 5 list items were valid, but not quite functions of poor time management. In fact, maybe that’s the issue I take with it; I feel like I came to the article thinking there would be a nugget of time-related intel that I could apply to my forever quest to improve and grow. Instead, it pointed out bigger leadership flaws; it connected obvious dots between workload/bandwidth and respect for your team, but not necessarily personal time management outside of “Flaw #4: Never Being Available,” which even still was misleading because it was more about communication than time management.

It’s not my job (or maybe it is, for what I pay for my annual subscription!) to give the writer notes or feedback (but it’s a gift!), but if there’s one thing I wish she would have emphasized in her article, it’s that time management is a shared responsibility with strong ties to communication and leadership. I think it’s a stretch to say that time management on its own can be the litmus test through which you evaluate leadership strength. Blind spots and areas of development are things that can follow someone all the way up to the C-Suite. It’s how you disclose, focus, and manage them that differentiates your potential.

If this were a long-story-boring situation (because again, time management), I suppose the TL;DR is that I identified more with a generational meme than an HBR article. Go figure.

It’s rare for me to feel like the outcast of a group. I can typically flex my social skills and topics of conversation to something that — following a sound reading of the room — would be of universal interest.

I’m usually pretty good at weeding out topics and people. It’s a skill I picked up from my mom, no doubt. She can see through people, but that’s only a flex for the ones who are good at hiding their true colors.

This guy wasn’t.

He wore a MAGA hat to our son’s third birthday party; a head-covering so red it felt like we were part of a preschool running of the bulls and he was the target.

It was the first time my antennas were up. I wondered if it could have been ironic, like in that one Curb Your Enthusiasm episode. Did he just not want friends? Was he hoping to be seen as a social assassin?

I wondered if maybe he was just bolder than my husband, but still harmless. I reasoned that he appeared to be a loving father and husband.

But appearances are all relative.

His hat was a way of peacocking; a precursor to his proclivity for polarizing swarms of preschool parents. The hat made its way to school grounds, flanked by similarly positioned bumper stickers. Summers at the pool felt soured by his tone-deaf way of dress. It was almost impossible to take him seriously.

And it wasn’t all politics.

I oscillated between reason and logic, wondering if I’d have similar doubts and concerns about a person’s character if they paraded around in a “Biden-Harris” shirt or cap. I knew that I wouldn’t.

This entire conflict was self-contained because it was inherently all me. He knew of no issue between us.

It wasn’t fair.

His toxic friendliness started to overpower his politics.

I don’t love hugging; I’m a control freak and don’t find comfort in getting lost in a person’s embrace. My kids are the exception. Their hugs, their snuggles, their laughter. It’s the best.

This man is a hugger. A hugger who hugs tight, kisses cheeks, and tells people he barely knows, and their kids, that he loves them. Love is a big word.

My husband and I are both highly therapized individuals. We may not always be great at how we communicate with each other, but when our kids are part of the equation, their safety and wellbeing is top-priority.

Parenting is hard. I find humor in the chaos and dysfunction that comes with raising kids. I’m careful not to offer advice when it’s not solicited, and to keep my mom-hacks transparent. There’s nothing worse than turning to a person for perspective and leaving the conversation feeling more alone and helpless because they kept their cards so close to their chest. Some people don’t want to share their struggles. Others keep their guards high because to lower them is to reveal their true colors.

And that’s when I realized my instincts were right.

It wasn’t just his friendliness that was toxic. It was his whole performance as a parent.

My everyday reality is that my kids are polar opposites; they’re both great and I wouldn’t trade them for the world, but I’m candid about the struggles because the struggles are real.

Everything came to a head at graduation.

The ceremony was adorable and emotions were high. I could never have guessed that I’d be bawling like a baby while my first-born sang “Unwritten” with his classmates, all wearing mini, fully-decorated graduation caps.

My son made me a mom. He teaches me about myself daily. It’s unlikely that he’ll ever know just how much he means to me, and how much I love the moments where it’s just the two of us. He is the most fun; a heart of gold, an unparalleled imagination, and a never-ending thirst for knowledge.

Any criticism of my son outside of our circle — my husband and me — is met with my Mama Bear alter ego; my mind starts to run in a way that is like it’s running away. Words prepare to hurt.

Months ago, there was an incident at the park. His son and my son were playing. There was an innocent push in a physical exchange that ended with his son falling from a table, thankfully uninjured. He hurled comments at my husband, both of them being wrong for not closely watching the kids.

It didn’t stop there. My son was removed from the situation and scolded, whereas he and his son continued on, reengaging in the dangerous behavior with other kids, the father working on a narrative about my son and his behavior.

A grown man, finding his emotional equal in a toddler. Charming.

I let it blow over, but put barriers in place so as to not have to engage with someone who had established himself as a man-child in my eyes.

And so, at graduation, when all was said and done and families gathered for an after-party, things boiled up and over.

I had had enough.

After a few calculated comments about my son, my upbringing — all while telling my son he loves him. Hugging him.

Love is a big word, and so is hate.

I don’t really hate anyone. If and when I use the word, it’s either colloquial in nature, or in quoting someone else. Hating takes a lot of energy.

I’ve talked before with my husband about how uncomfortable it makes me that this person would tell my kid he loves him. He doesn’t know him. He doesn’t know us.

I shared this with my son, too, in words that I felt a five-year-old would understand. I explained to him that he doesn’t have to hug anyone he doesn’t want to, that he can set boundaries, and that love is a big feeling and should be taken seriously when shared with someone. There’s nothing light about love.

My son didn’t totally follow my logic. He’s smart, though, and could tell I didn’t really like this person, because he was at the center of the story with themes of consent and boundaries.

And so at school, he declined to reciprocate a high-five because “my mommy doesn’t like that man.”

News of the exchange made its way to me, and I owned up to what I said. As my son loves to say, “I said what I said, and I meant what I said.”

My ownership didn’t land the way I had hoped it would; it was a real-life case of “he said, she said” — where it was suggested my kid said that I hated him.

I believe that hate starts at home, and as such, am very careful about that word and those feelings in front of my kids. I’m a big believer in protecting my kids’ innocence. The same guy who dresses his kid in Trump t-shirts and enables his kid to breach boundaries was the one telling me he was concerned for my kid’s trajectory.

It was a real-life tragic comedy. If his opinion mattered, I’d be crushed. Instead, I was amused. Aren’t kids supposed to say the darnedest things?

I think that there’s a certain level of irony — and maybe even destiny — in my penchant for prose. I didn’t always have a strong vocabulary; “potty words” came easier to me than anything else. They felt powerful, even when they were very much the opposite. The word “fuck” was an easier space-filler, and commanded the attention I craved from the grown folks around me. Naturally, profanity came with punishment. And yet, I still didn’t learn.

Consequences — some stronger than others — didn’t curb my curse words. In fact, they made it worse. Again, it was a misguided power play.

When a kid swears, the awe-struck audience asks, “well, where did they hear it?”

Like I said, I heard it from my dad. You could say, based on his volatility, swearing was akin to his love language. Great material for therapy, and saying just that says just enough.

I’ve grown, followed a path paved by stronger words, all the while understanding how void of power so-called four-letter words really are.

I went through a phase on social media in my early 20s where I never used profanity. To be fair, I mostly posted quippy one-liners from Curb Your Enthusiasm, but still, out of all of Larry David’s fuck-filled funnies, I kept it clean.

Like the general rules of grammar, I think at a certain point you earn the credibility as an adult to linger in loopholes. So, sometimes you’ll find me swearing online. Even on LinkedIn. In a “grown-up” conversation, or a retelling of a story for broad reflection, I may pepper in some profanity for emphasis or oomph. Sometimes even for comic relief. But in a real exchange, where I’m looking to build credibility, or in an argument where real power is up for grabs, I keep it PG.

With peers and at work, this comes easily. I take more time to communicate with intention. I think, even if on my toes, about the words I’m using and my tone.

At home is where I struggle.

Stepping on a Lego or other infamously easy-to-miss floor toy gets a knee-jerk “dammit!” Spilling freshly-pumped breastmilk when prepping bottles for daycare summons a “shit!” And at home, my audience is one most eager for a power-play: my toddler.

Is a 4 year old even a toddler? A little kid? Who knows.

Alas, I’ve spawned a pre-schooler with a potty mouth. Truly in his parents’ image. We scold him and redirect him, and still, he conjures a curse word with appropriate application — in the most inappropriate settings. Daycare. The doctor’s office. You name it, it’s been defiled by his words.

He chuckles when caught, saying, “Sorry, I know, I know. Bad language.” I can’t tell if he really gets it. I know he’ll grow out of it. Even still, I don’t think you ever really recover from the little loss of innocence when you hear your young child use a “bad word.” Especially when delivered with conviction.

I don’t know that I feel shame; my inner reactions oscillate largely between shock, disbelief, and disappointment. Would it be better if he did it at home, but not in public? No, probably not.

I can say with certainty I’m not angry. Like most questionable toddler behavior, the root cause can be traced back to the parents. I know, I know, it’s so cliche.

My preschooler, with his premature potty mouth, gives me pause as a parent. One day, my own missteps as a parent will be fodder for his therapy sessions (you’re welcome, Harrison!).

Until then, I suppose I’ll look forward to him expanding his horizons with words that command power more appropriately.

Confidence is good. Pair confidence with self-awareness? Even better. So then, how could ego possibly be bad?

We need to be more thoughtful about defining "ego" and distinguishing it from confidence. Confidence is fluid, and doesn't depend on "right" vs. "wrong" -- it's a matter of belief and passion. I tend to believe that someone can more quickly recover from a knock to their confidence than they can to a bruising of their ego. Confident people make room for feedback, and are more willing to implement change. Confidence also supports failure. Failure is part of growth and learning. I'd argue that to fail actually takes a tremendous amount of confidence. Graceful failure can rebound into ultimate success.

Ego, on the other hand, operates on a lack of self-esteem and a lack of self-awareness. It's a masquerade of confidence. Someone who operates on ego is focused on form over substance. In business, and especially in leadership, this is a recipe for disaster. Ego breeds isolation. Egos offer insulation from reality while isolating people and eliminating the potential for two critical business tenets: feedback and collaboration. Ego may empower those on a leadership track to believe they're in control of their narrative, but it's a glaring false positive.

I like to joke about ego because it's easy -- it's a low-hanging fruit punchline because it's almost always obvious when ego is clouding someone's judgment. Confidence is another creature altogether. It is fluid because it requires introspection, which is most successful when fueled by feedback from peers. A world without that -- without the willingness to hear and grow, to change and learn -- is a lonely one.

The bulk of my career was spent agency-side. I dedicated the better part of a decade serving at the pleasure of clients with a plethora of personalities and managing tens of direct reports from different specialties. Agency life demands a certain entrepreneurial spirit -- chasing pitch opportunities and choreographing campaigns, because time is money, honey -- and rarely do you ever see an entrepreneurial endeavor succeed with a team of one. Sure, there may be a single brainchild behind the concept, but to go from concept to reality takes manpower in many forms. And ego isn't one of them. Ego is a toxic distraction.

Identifying and reframing experiences to minimize opportunities for ego to interfere is critical. This doesn't mean every organization or team should be "flat" and without hierarchy. I think it's perfectly OK to have reporting structures and layers of authority. I don't think titles are responsible for breeding egos, but I think there needs to be better accountability by employers and hiring leadership to align on the remit of each role and title, so the chase becomes about the potential to contribute as part of a team versus the potential to grow in isolation on your resume.

I love the grit of New York City, but not the grime. So I moved to Westchester, but held onto my dream, or at least the parts that have survived reality.

I'm happy with the career I've built; I sometimes experience a wave of gratitude and pride when I pencil in the time to reflect. But we all have ebbs and flows to career fulfillment and happiness. It's natural. You can love what you do, where you do it, and the team that supports you, and still have moments where you question the very course you've charted. And that's ok.

Yesterday was a tough day. A full workload and other real-life needs have been competing for my attention. On my commute into the city, I came across an article titled "The Ambition Collision." The title resonated with me, but I didn't have time to give it a read.

It crept up again on my late-night commute home. As if reading my mind, a friend and colleague texted it to me, bringing it above the fold. Somewhere between White Plains and Chappaqua, I confronted my curiosity.

Wildly relatable and so very important, Lisa Miller beautifully pieces apart the segment of working women in their 30s who shelter themselves in what she calls "professional bubbles." She paints a picture of women who have it all, but who still feel short-changed. Her article tries to solve for "why?" with just enough tongue-in-cheek witticisms to keep readers engaged.

The female dissatisfaction chronicled by Betty Friedan in The Feminine Mystique was prompted by a widespread awakening to the bullshit promises of domestic happiness, manufactured by culture to make female containment look good. Now another bullshit promise has taken its place, and another generation is waking up. The men in charge are still in charge. It is impossible for women to continue to have faith in a vision of their own empowerment, when that empowerment is, in fact, a pose. It is not true that a gleaming kitchen floor is the key to female satisfaction. And “Bow down, bitches” is a lie.

Have millennial women, as Miller writes, "presumed their power?" I'm not so sure. We focus so much on the wage gap - which, as she points out, has not budged in a decade -- but the pause in progress is more troubling than dollars and cents. We're spending more time than ever at work -- even if doing so remotely -- and as Miller points out, we're focusing on the wrong things. She's not suggesting we settle. But she's encouraging us -- the working women who sometimes struggle in balancing work with life -- to press the proverbial "reset" button on perspective and find comfort -- or as Miller puts it "appreciation" -- in the imperfections.

Work can't be your everything. You need a life outside of the office to help you recalibrate. Setting boundaries is just one way to get there -- they shape expectations and curb judgments from people who haven't yet been caught in the collision between career ambition and reality.

Ever the non-athlete, I've somehow lucked into a love for circuit training and pilates. They keep me as zen as I've ever known myself to be. Challenging myself physically has helped me continue to challenge myself professionally. It's also made me more thoughtful as a manager, and more conscious of how I invest my time.

Work might not always be perfect, but if you can get behind the notion that visions change, career paths take detours, and that there's promise in your passion, you'll net out somewhere between myth and reality, and you'll be alright because you were part of the fight.

The communications industry has, over the years, contributed to a broader culture of people pleasers. As a perfectionist and overachiever, you'd think this would be a natural fit. Disappointing someone, or falling short in any which way, even if only by my own perception, can sometimes feel like getting that one B+ amongst an otherwise suite of straight As.

The reality is, though, when you're your own worst critic, it's easy to get lost in someone else's reaction, feedback, or otherwise unfavorable opinion. Reading between the lines of an e-mail, a phone call, or worse yet a text, can set off a destructive spiral of self-deprecation.

I sometimes wonder if the solution is really about work-life balance more than anything. If we powered down, would we think a little more about what we say, how we say it? Would we be more enthusiastic if we unplugged after hours? Setting boundaries is definitely part of it -- how people should speak to you, when they can reach you, what you're actually able to do and responsible for -- all of these elements contribute to a transparent -- and most importantly respectful -- working relationship.

Instead of devaluing the work that we do, it's important that we remember to instead find ways to move on and move forward. After all, we're all human, right?

Public relations may have deep roots, but as far as industries go, social media is a relatively new speciality area, and when it emerged, so too, did a smattering of descriptors for its target demographic.

Calling me a “millennial” — and worse yet, an “older millennial” — will summon the most cold-stone serious of stink-eye stares from my otherwise shayna punim.

The phrase millennial casts a wide net — it technically accounts for some 75 million people born between 1980 and 2000. Farhad Manjoo put it best when he said:

Although millennials are now the largest demographic group in the country (sorry, boomers), and though they are more racially diverse than any other generation in American history, they are often depicted on TV, in movies and music, and in the news (including The New York Times) as a collectively homogeneous cliché.

Nowhere is this more apparent than in corporate America, especially in the technology industry, which has long been obsessed with the dubious idea that young people are in the cultural vanguard.

Don’t get me wrong, I think I’m pretty fabulous, but I would never dub myself a cultural vanguard. Not even close.

I wince at the thought of being part of a generalized cultural clump that discounts the diversity of my generation. And, as Manjoo goes on to explain, “there’s a glaring problem with these and other efforts to go after the younger among us: Millennials aren’t real.”

I couldn’t agree more. My passionate disdain isn’t just in reaction to a perceived misnomer, but more so because of my larger beef (or tofu) with the closed-mindedness of generational marketing.

I lead a team of social strategists, and while the clue may be in their title, everything they (really “we”) do is rooted in strategy — a practice that’s very foundation is dependent on understanding the target audience.

Caging an entire segment within the confines of broad generational rhetoric is lazy, and it’s high-time to un-teach it. We live in an age where mapping out a sophisticated set of personas — or personality types that your content should speak to — is conveniently at our fingertips, just a few taps away. Alongside the rise of the social strategist has been the role of digital analyst, a function that every digital team should have. These are the people that offer credibility to what would otherwise be healthy hunches with strong strategic intent.

With the data available, it’s downright irresponsible to rely on generational marketing to guide any sort of smart thinking and most importantly: authentic, relatable stories.

I guess my problem is that I expect more — from myself, my industry and even consumers. I expect us to think of ourselves as deeper than “boomers” or “millennials.” I’ve been called a lot of things — and yet somehow, millennial irks me most. I’m a communicator, a wife, a dog-owner, a pescatarian, a Michigander and more; my age doesn’t define me, and yet because I’m young and grew up in tandem with the booming tech industry, I get stripped of what makes me standout.

My industry has been going through an identity crisis since its inception. There's little consistency across agencies and clients on how to best describe the depth of each social channel, let alone how we title the people who manage them.

Social media will always be evolving -- much like how the universe is expanding. My experience is rooted in the agency world, and in under a decade, my title has morphed from PR hierarchical nomenclature to newer, looser titles with overt ties to digital.

My current title reads something like, "Vice President, Social Strategy and Content Marketing," and the clarification after the formal title was my attempt at claiming stake to the area of social media about which I'm most passionate. I see social strategy as level agnostic. Even as a Vice President, I wouldn't scoff at being referred to more generally as a social media strategist to someone who doesn't know or care about agency hierarchy (read: most people).

At my core, I identify as a writer, and over time, that identity has expanded. Aligning myself with the strategist moniker embraces and encompasses my passion for writing, while also compensating for my consumer curiosity, analytical drive, and overall thirst to communicate creatively.

I could easily whittle off a top-10 list of qualities that negate a person's claims to social media czardom (a phrase that truly makes me wince whenever I see it), but I'd rather make the case that we shift how we think about job titles. Roles should be shaped by an agile vision of how a person or particular area can grow --- no limits to inflate impact or truncate potential. Digital teams should be built to flourish in tandem with an always-changing industry.