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Minor, heavy congestion could add time to the morning commute

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Official: Suspect in attack that left 14 dead identified

<p>Lately, I&#8217;ve been feeling like I&#8217;m the solitary, frozen figure in the center of a snow globe. Everything is swirling around me, chaotic and ever-changing, and I stand here, inert and solitary.</p><p>Obviously, life alters on the daily. Even as we sleep, things are spinning, repositioning and resettling. And yet, I am still predictably consistent.</p><p>Everything in my life is transforming. Some things happy, some sad, but the changes tend to rock my world. I never thought I feared metamorphose, but apparently, I must.</p><p>When we are 12 years old, life appears constant and comfortable. The biggest challenge for me was slathering myself in baby oil and Mercurochrome to ensure a vicious tan/sun poisoning and making sure there was enough Dippity-Do in the bathroom with which to groom my sweet mullet. I remember having the self-awareness to know life was very, very good then and I was thankful. I was hyper-aware that change was coming, and I was a little scared to be a grown-up.</p><p>Our family home has been handed down to a new generation of occupants; ones who I&#8217;m certain will love and tend to it like we did. They will fill it up with their own stories and high-jinks, and the new children will hopefully find all the good hiding places in which to stow away items that every teenager the world over must hide. Or at least I did. Nothing illegal. That you know of.</p><p>My father is in a new home, trying his damnedest to adapt to the ever-changing landscape of his own life. His forks and spoons are in different drawers, his hats and coats in different closets, but his heart? Exactly in the same place it&#8217;s always been. And here I stand. Motionless, emotional and a little scared, still.</p><p>My youngest son will be in college next year. Despite him chanting: &#8220;One more year! One more year!&#8221; every day without regard to my hurt feelings, I understand his need to catch and release. Come September, no one will be at home but Nancy and me, and instead of sharing a can of soup at dinnertime with me, he&#8217;ll be sharing a can of Coors Light at Fox Hill with his golf wife, Joey. I will sit, by myself, eating pickles out of the jar and wondering where the hell everyone has gone.</p><p>My older son will still be in college, although he really has been flying away since he was 18. Even when he&#8217;s here, he soars to a place called Elsewhere. He loves us but he prefers not being stuck in the house playing Scrabble with his mother. I assume it&#8217;s because there&#8217;s no way he can ever win. Stay in school, son, stay in school.</p><p>And as my daughter prepares to be married, I find myself precariously perched on the cusp of the Biggest Change of All. I promised her I wouldn&#8217;t inflict my many pre-marital opinions or suggestions onto her unless she asked. Why doesn&#8217;t she just request I stop breathing for God&#8217;s sake? She is in a constant and perpetual state of planning and motion. And, I stand here, immobile, as I await her permission to suggest. I think I may expire.</p><p>My snow globe gets shaken every hour on the hour, and the shifting in the air around me is astronomical.</p><p>I want to embrace it, rather than fear it.</p><p>There&#8217;s a Chinese proverb that says: &#8220;When the winds of change blows, some people build walls and others build windmills&#8221;. I&#8217;m going to attempt to build a windmill. At least I have enough back-stock of Dippity-Do to keep the wind from ruining my mullet.</p><style>
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<div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta><p>By Maria Jiunta Heck</p><p>Life Deconstructed</p></bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta><p>Maria Jiunta Heck of West Pittston is a mother of three, a librarian and a business owner who lives to dissect the minutiae of life.</p></shirttailMeta></div>

The more things change, the more they change