Whenever I pick up a new book about work and moms, I mentally prep myself for a chastising lecture. Could journalist Mika Brzezinski's new book "All Things at Once," be any different? I was pleasantly surprised.

A book demands attention. It requires that you sit down with it, that you feel the weight of it in your lap, or acknowledge its presence in front of you. A book has a way of saying, Slow down and enjoy me. Use me to relax. Breathe me in. Remember. Remember when you knew how to be quiet and alone with yourself.

As any experienced parent will tell you, the longer you can keep your kids watching PBS, the better. Because even though Barney the Dinosaur may fill you with an inexplicable rage not unlike what an African honey badger must feel right before it crushes a puff adder’s head in its jaws, your toddlers love him and his educational friends. But more importantly: no commercials.
 

It wasn’t the lethal use of magic in a PG movie about which I should’ve been concerned. During a 1:10 p.m. showing of a kids’ film on a weekday in July, I didn’t expect that the previews would be, in a word, terrifying, at least from a 10-year-old’s point of view.

Sure, there were superhero costumes for girls too, only they included mini-skirts and go-go boots. Witches looked sexy, not scary in their lipstick, eye makeup and fishnet stockings. None of the get-ups I saw would make a girl feel as though she was going to conquer the world, save anyone or win any athletic contests.
 

Last summer, I acquiesced to my twins’ pleadings to dive into the Rowling series with them. Surprised to find myself so captivated so fast, I plowed through all seven books, which, all told, amounted to more than 4,100 pages. Then I finally understood what all the fuss was about...

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That is a lie.

I started to realize I’d already set foot on Mortification Road when my kids criticized my swimwear for being risqué. “You’ve got to cover that up,” my daughter said. She grabbed the front of the neckline and unsuccessfully tried to pull it up so that the whole chest area was in the location it was, say, when I was 23.

Like so many other aspects of growing older, I figure this must have happened gradually — it’s sort of like becoming a regular Oldies station listener, or reaching the point where you should probably be shaving your ears. But I knew I’d made the transformation when I realized I’d somehow inherited my father’s incredulity at his children’s seemingly complete lack of knowledge about the cost of, well, anything.