Exhibit A: Wearing a construction paper birthday crown, Girl asks to sit in the big chair at the head of the table at supper.

“You mean in Dad’s chair?” I ask.

“Yes. It is my birthday, you know,” she says.

I think about it for a split second, then realize what that chair represents to a 6-year-old. Raw power.

“Nope,” I say. “That’s not the way we roll. Go sit in your own chair, please.”

Exhibit B: The unthinkable has happened. Girl was on blue, a less than perfect conduct grade. I heard about this second hand — she’s not talking about it — but allegedly, the teacher did not pass out some papers that Girl insisted needed to be passed out. The teacher must have reminded Girl that she was, in fact, not in charge of the classroom. To which Girl burst into tears and earned herself a blue grade for the day.

Exhibit C: A flyer comes home in Girl’s backpack advertising classes for cheerleading and karate. She informs Bob that she wants to take karate because she’s already done cheerleading. HI-YAH!

Where did this child come from?? Her light brown hair is the result of my dark brown and Bob’s formerly reddish-brown hair. Her eyes are a blend of my chocolate brown and Bob’s sky blue. But her personality — Good Lord! Where did this fierceness come from? It’s like the genes of all the angry Scotsmen and the genes of all the crazy Sicilians have been crammed into one small package. No wonder she explodes at the slightest provocation.

Of course, it could be more than genetics. She’s an Aquarius. And if you Google Aquarius, here’s what you find: “Of all the signs in the zodiac, Aquarians have perhaps the biggest ego of all. Their interest in intellectual pursuits and their unique viewpoints on life makes Aquarians think that they are the most special people on Earth. Coupled with their creativity, Aquarians can sometimes think that they are God’s gift to the universe.”

True. So true. She’s also God’s gift to me.

We’re arguing about who will drive the Camry. I want to, not because I really want to, I don’t like that car. It’s gutless and boring — it looks like a member of some nameless corporate fleet. But I want to drive it because I don’t want to worry about other people being inside the car if the accelerator sticks. At least I drive alone most of the time.

Not that I would know what to do if an accelerator stuck. I wouldn’t even realize the point at which, yes, I should go ahead and panic, because even before that point, my brain would be so preoccupied with worrying about the possibility of the accelerator sticking that it would take a while for it to shift gears into a full blown panic. Is it sticking? No, it’s okay. No, no, that feels like it’s sticking, am I slowing down? Ah, okay, the brake’s working, but better be safe and stay under 50 miles an hour just in case. Oh shit! It’s sticking! No, that’s just my foot. Just like that all the way to work.

The whole reason we bought a Camry — the whole reason anybody buys a Camry — is for safety and reliability. I wish I could trade it in right now, today. Drive it to a Ford dealer and exchange it for an F-150. The kind that tows boulders in the commercial during the football playoffs. That one there. The one that promises invincibility. I’ll take some of that, thank you very much.

Toyota, you’re going to have to do a lot to win back the hearts and minds of American moms. We hate being more scared and worried than we already are, especially when it comes to the safety of our families. You just mashed the hottest hot button we have. In fact, I would say that button is permanently stuck.

Shatter your self-imposed limits!!! The process of change touches almost every area of your life and paradoxically challenges you to establish a long-term plan.

This is my horoscope for 2010. I’m a Capricorn, which means I’m not used to seeing horoscopes like that one. Capricorns are the Poindexters of the Zodiac. We’re practical, predictable. In fact, we goatheads are downright boring, astrologically speaking.

So, true to my Capricornian nature, I have no intentions of shattering anything in 2010. Baby steps, small improvements are my plans for this year. New carpet instead of a new house. Call people more, Facebook less. More yoga, less working through lunch. More vegetables, less red meat. Love more, complain less.

I am also completely ignoring a book I received for my birthday: “Skinny Bitchin’ – A Get Off Your Ass Journal to Help You Change Your Life, Achieve Your Goals and Rock Your World!”

I don’t want my world to be rocked. I like my world as it is. I also don’t want my ass kicked by a skinny bitch. FYI, the Skinny Bitches are two writers who look like Barbie dolls. Their claim to fame is a tough-love diet book. Here’s a pearly nugget from their latest tome: “Whatever you’ve been dying to do or try but have been too scared, today is the day! Carpe diem, bitch!”

Sooooo happy not to be sitting a cubicle away from this person. I’d be dying to kill her.

Corpus delicti, bitch!

Ten years ago on New Year’s Eve, I wasn’t partying like it was 1999. I was hunkered down expecting the lights to go out and mass chaos to ensue. I had been suckered in by the Y2K scare — remember that one? I spent most of 1998 covering the high tech industry for an Arizona newspaper, and Y2K was THE story. It was supposed to be the end of the world as we know it.

That night we stayed home with Bob’s young kids who had come for their holiday visit. Most of the night we sat on our big leather couch, waiting to see what midnight would bring.

As everyone knows, real disaster came, but it wasn’t on New Year’s Day 2000. It happened a little more than a year later on a bright blue September day. And there’s no way that any of us could have been ready for it.

Fast forward to tonight — I’m still staying in, still sitting on the same, now dumpy, couch with a couple of young kids on New Year’s Eve. But I’m grayer, fatter and maybe a bit wiser. Much has happened to me over the past decade, most importantly Boy and Girl. If motherhood has taught me anything it’s this: It’s never the terror of the night that gets you — it’s the arrow that flies by day. The expected horror almost never happens, but the unexpected catastrophe sometimes does, and there’s no way to be ready for it. So there’s no point to live in fear, is there?

I’m not afraid of what 2010 will bring. This is not a night for hunkering down. It’s a time for looking up.