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Were gonna need more bacon.

Hi there!

Its been some four months since we closed ChairmanMe. And while it was a hard decision, I havent once regretted it.

There is no favor I could have called in that I didnt. Certainly the startup carnage (and corporate backlash to DEI) has only gotten worse since.

You know what else??? Amid all the response to us closing, all the hundreds (maybe thousands) of kind emails and notes and texts telling us how much CM changed their lives, we noticed that almost all of it was past tense.

I couldnt have gotten through the pandemic without you.

This helped me at a crucial moment.

I was able to quit my job because of what I learned in the side hustle course.

I wouldnt have gotten my book deal without Pauls course.

That kind of thing. (By the way we are doing those last two courses one last time if you are interested go here for Open Book and here for Six Figure Side Hustles. I think there are a few more slots in each.)

Maybe founders arent supposed to say this because it sounds like giving up. But our core customer went through A LOT in the seven years we were in business, between Dobbs, Trump, George Floyd, Jan 6, the pandemic and on and on. Maybe we did what we were supposed to do during those pivotal moments and served our purpose.

Anyway, you are on this list because you took a CM course, you were an avid reader of the Mama Bear/Daily Dose or you asked to stay on my email list after CM closed last fall. And aside from some one-off announcements on bonus courses, youve mostly just been sitting in MailChimp.

So I thought Id say hi. This isnt really a newsletter, because a newsletter has more of a PURPOSE. I just want to tell you what Ive been up to, and see what youve been up to. Ask if theres anything I can do to help you because all of you did a lot for me at various points. Just pull up a chair in your virtual kitchen and chat for a bit. (I might say hi once a month or so. PLEASE feel free to unsubscribe if you dont want to be on this list! I know your inbox is precious!)

Heres what I want to write about today: My subconscious. My subconscious (and no doubt yours too!) is so much smarter than I am. I feel like my subconscious is Yoda and my conscious mind is Jimmy Stewart in the scene in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington where he cant stop fumbling with his hat.

My subconscious mind is constantly coming up with THE ANSWER and then my conscious brain comes in and well, actuallys all over the place screwing it up.

My best decisions go around my conscious brain, whether its going with my gut or the result of hypnotherapy sessions. Seriously: My future self has appeared to me as a giant hawk and given me ALL THE ANSWERS in hypnotherapy sessions.

One of my favorite ways to listen to my subconscious without Jimmy Stewart getting in the way is my dreams. I have extraordinarily vivid dreams and when something comes to me in a dream, I dont question it.

See Radish, above. I never thought Id have a dog. Came to me in a dream, with the name. And wow is he the best dog on Earth who has completed our family just perfectly. In that picture above he was diligently protecting me from a mouse that moved into our mountain cabin. (Evie named the mouse Tony and fortunately he never came back after Radish stood guard so earnestly, because we couldnt possibly have killed him after her pointed Wanted: ALIVE poster she made for him.)

The other night, I had a dream that involved all sorts of madcap things going on, as dreams do. But one thing stood out: I was writing a book about parenting queer tween wolves. And it was titled: The Agony and the Bacon

How brilliant is that??? I havent been able to get it out of my head. I wasnt goign to write that book, but maybe I will. Or maybe Ill name this once in a blue moon newsletter the Agony and the Bacon. Youd open that right? A reminder to listen to your subconscious if nothing else.

Heres what I love about it: Its grand and mundane. Its specific. You kinda dont really get it but also get it, right?

Heres the context my subconscious perfectly processed: My kids insist that I make the best bacon on Earth.

They are right, by the way. I weirdly take pride in how I cook bacon, because I hate when theres any un-rendered bacon fat. It takes forever, and I cannot multi-task when Im making it. Truly: Chef friends of mine have remarked on how perfect my bacon is.

Eli and Evies favorite meal I make is Mommy Pasta which is buttered shell pasta, with barely steamed broccoli florets, flakey salt, and this perfect bacon. (I also stir in a tablespoon or so of bacon fat.) I arrange it all kind of like a bowl of ramen.

When Eli was in second grade, her school did a Great Feast where you had to bring a dish to feed everyone that reflected your heritage. Ours was mommy pasta. I made so much of it. And everyone (including the adults) were like You get this once a week, Eli??? This is delicious!

I make extra bacon, because it takes so long, I might as well. Also, the only thing that Eli will eat in her lunch other than a PB&J is a BBT. Thats a bacon, butter and toast sandwich. I pack Evie a Ziploc bag of extra bacon in her lunch on these days, because her best friend also believes I make the best bacon and has now told everyone else this. So she doles out my bacon like cigarettes in prison. She doesnt wait until lunch: She sneaks the bag from her lunch box into her hoodie pocket, thinking no one sees it.

When we have slumber parties, Eli and I make fantasy pancakes in the morning where kids can pick from white chocolate chips, chocolate chips or bacon to be cooked inside their pancakes. (Eli picks all three; Evie omits the white chocolate; Paul does just white chocolate, and I just do the bacon.)

I had not really thought about it until my subconscious gave me the title, but bacon is like our ice cream. It will always be a bite of home. Its also irritatingly time and attention consuming to make. And I cannot outsource it to anyone. Its that thing YOU need to do for your kids, which is all about parenting Tween wolves. Its so much more emotionally demanding than any stage Ive hit thus far.

Its the bandaid that I can bring out when theyve got emotional scrapes. The kiss on the boo-boo when thats a broken heart. Its my momming in one tangible thing: The thing their mom does better than anyone else, that theyll always remember.

And that happens a lot now that were in the Tween Wolf years.

Emotions are all over the place and no one has even fallen in love yet.

I have no idea what is coming next but I know one thing: Were gonna need more bacon.