Ei's Eyes

Oh no he didn't!

2011-12-13T09:58:00.000-06:00

Oh dear, God, it's happened. You know it might someday but nothing ever prepares you for it, even when all the signs are there like flashing neon signs pointing the way to a bathroom in Vegas. (Oh okay, I've never been to Vegas, but that's what I imagine.) And all you can do at this point is hold him up in hope.

Well, okay, I could have screamend and yelled and told him in no uncertain terms that he's too damned young to be asking girls out on dates. Or I could have done that sans the screaming and yelling. Or I could have not given him advice on how to talk to her or what to do on said date. But that really would just tick him off and remove any influence I might have over keeping it simple and innocent. Which when I play confidant mommy as opposed to helicopter mommy , is considerable.

Yes, you are reading that right. My cute little imp who once chased pigeons on the playground yelling "Come back, cickens!" has a date. As in a DATE. With a girl. And she isn't even his favorite babysitter, or the cute music teacher, or, or....just another 7th grader who likes manga too.

Pleh. I'm too young for this crap.

There is rarely evidence of magic.

2009-05-17T16:14:00.012-05:00

I said that to Barb recently. Quite recently actually. I was teasing her about not being able to get the light right to photograph her magical giant tomato...the one she dreamed about last night. Yeah. I really need to learn to shut up.

Maybe you remember my kid got ripped off by a magical creature a few years ago. We've been waiting for that guido to cough up the goods for quite some time now. This morning my kids met me at church (it's their weekend with their dad) and someone was a twitter with the newest spring blossom. We had a few hours together while their dad was in class and I tried with all my might to capture photographic evidence.

Apparently this getting the light right thing is a bigger problem than I anticipated.

At any rate, the news as of today is that this look...

is officially on limited supply. We'll miss it, but we're pretty excited too.

Rules to live by...

2009-04-07T18:40:00.002-05:00

As parents we find ourselves making up rules all the time on the fly. At least I do. And apparently my friend Lisa does too. Check her out, because she's cool.

Rules from the Meanest Mommy

Iowa Rocks

2009-04-03T10:06:00.002-05:00

Seriously.

24 hours deep

2009-04-01T21:36:00.002-05:00

It's really not that bad. Hahaha. Okay I've cried once, but it was more getting teary eyed. I've gotten extremely tense a few times, but honestly, I talked myself through it. It is kind of amazing that something I have struggled with for more than half my lifetime is a simple matter of saying..."Okay, I expected to feel this, I can get through it." And just going through it. Where might I have been if I had mastered this skill at say, 21?

Ah well. I'm here now, that' s what matters.

On another note, the if the intensity about wanting a dog was NOT at a fevered pitch a week ago...boy howdy it is now. We watched "Marley and Me" and my boys are now officially insane about it. And I'm about three steps behind them. We are ready for puppy love.

15 hours

2009-04-01T11:58:00.003-05:00

I am 15 hours in...so far no irrepressible urges to kill have popped up. I've only seen spots once. (I'm so not joking...you know I've been smoking for roughly 24 years, right?)

My friend Shari (who's blog is in my list on the right, but I must have been doing some other drugs that day because I spelled her name wrong) sent me this kick ass beautiful bracelet when I was going through the divorce. I don't wear it often, just on days that I need strength. It's been to a lot of IEP meetings and a few court proceedings. It was on my wrist when I had my first date and I have a feeling it will be there for a few weeks. But mostly it's all good. And I've only eaten a tiny bit of chocolate. :)

Fat Tuesday

2009-03-31T08:39:00.005-05:00

So... I haven't talked about this much because I'm sort of "in the closet" with some of my Internet friends. Which is funny you know, because I'm coming out of the closet about being a smoker so I can tell you I'm quitting. Tomorrow is my official quit date. Not that it's a joke, but what better day to quit smoking than April Fool's Day? Casting off a particularly harsh foolishness and hopefully embracing some of the fun silly kind. I've quit a few times in my past, for over a year at a time, so I know I can do this...but any support and hugs and love you can offer would be appreciated. In the mean time, I'm being extra nice to myself today. I'm enjoying a big fluffy coffee drink and getting my hair done later. I don't think I'll be flashing anyone, but this is really my version of Fat Tuesday. Bidding a bit of gluttony adieu. (I'll probably continue to take care of my hair in the future though...just so you know).

I've been prepping for my quit date for a few weeks now. I've cut down quite a lot and I signed up for the Iowa Quitline program. The counselor there is nice, but really doesn't care too much about knowing the people he talks to, as evidenced by the fact that for two weeks now he's asked me the same questions over and over. And doesn't seem to remember me much at all. But he did give me a bit of good advice that I never would have thought of doing in preparation for quitting. Yes I knew to cleanse my smoking spaces and throw out all my "stuff." I realized that I needed to change my patterns (for me it meant giving up smoking in the car before quitting...since that is pretty much the only place I've been allowed to smoke anyway). But he told me, "Now if you have to take your cigarettes with you, you should probably put them in the trunk of your car, so you can't just grab them." This to me was brilliant. I left them there full time, so that no matter when I decided I wanted a cigarette, it had to be a big process. It really did help me change my patterns.

Happy Tuesday, my friends.

Man, I hate that.

2009-03-30T13:30:00.002-05:00

The hardest thing about my divorce these days is the way it makes me feel about people who have nothing to do with my situation. The word "step-mother" makes me irrationally defensive and angry. Seeing any one's mother referred to as an "egg-donor" makes me want to hurt people. So hard to always know the right thing to do with my own um..."other woman"...when I'm trying to discern between hating the situation and what is really kind of ridiculous behavior from her. Because, you know, one clouds the other.

And can someone please tell me, why are all the blogs about the moms and step-moms. Why is there no responsibility ever put on the shoulders of the men who put themselves in the middle?

Wandering thoughts...just cleansing my palette, so to speak.

Sleeping for spite

2009-03-30T09:11:00.003-05:00

It is always when you least expect it that you get exactly what you want. No, I'm not talking about that BS myth that when you stop looking for true love it finds you. That's mythology promoting mental illness. What I'm talking about is meeting goals of parenting. My example comes from last evening. I'd given Dev the obligatory 15 minutes more than his younger brother at bedtime. This actually is for me more than being a gift of being older. If they go to bed at the same time they keep each other up, but if we allow his brother 15 minutes upstairs alone, he drops off nicely and Dev usually can fall right to sleep too. I know, I'm manipulative.

Last night when his 15 minutes were up, he decided that he WOULD NOT go to bed. He tried to butter me up. "Mom, I want to beeeee with you." When that didn't work he just got mad. He went to his room and kicked the walls, sure to wake his brother so I called him back down. We had a very sincere discussion about why trying to sleep in the living room while mom did her grown up stuff never works. And he protested that I was wrong. "Dev," I said. "What am I supposed to do here? Either you are going to go up there and ruin your brother's sleep so he will have a bad day tomorrow, or you'll stay down here and ruin your own sleep so you will have a bad day tomorrow." At this point honestly, I didn't expect for anything to go well at all. One thing you know about having a child with a mood disorder is that this stuff which is a small hurdle for some families is a major event for you. He looked at me and crossed his arms and harumphed.

"I guess I'll just have to SHOW YOU." And with that, he grabbed a blanket and a pillow, curled up in a ball in his play tent and within 5 minutes was softly snoring...very possibly the first time a child has ever gone to sleep just to spite his mother. Okay, probably not, there are a lot of moms and children out there, but still.

Here, now.

2009-02-21T11:04:00.004-06:00

If you hadn't noticed I'm making an effort to update my blog a little more often. I always wanted to be one of those happy "blog every day" girls but between you and I, even if I had something interesting to say every day, I just can't figure out how to do it when the boys are at home. Between working and parenting it's the best I can do to drop onto the sofa at 9 pm every evening...and while I often am sitting with the box on my lap at that time, actually saying something of value? Not likely. At that point it is really just napping with my eyes open.

Tuesday night was wonderful. Liz Gilbert was every bit as delightful, humorous and thought provoking in person as she is in her writing. I spent the entire speech thinking "Oh I've got to blog this part." But alas...I believe that would be a rip off of the really bad kind, because I would only be regurgitating her speech, and in bad form. But the long and the short of it was...life goes on. Liz, probably to the disappointment of many, didn't become a guru, blissfully in a state of elevated awareness following her journey. She, like all of us, continues her journey every day, good days and bad days, though I think she's probably more aware than she was prior to setting off for Italy. I think what I took away from it more than anything is that old Buddhist saying, one that I shared with my favorite five and six year-old kids in church a few weeks ago..."Be here now." Trying to live in a past no matter how glorious or embattled is fruitless...the past is written and it can not be undone. Trying to live in the future, well, it simply can not be reached. The only thing that can be controlled is now. And it is a pretty glorious thing.

Life around here hobbles on. Money is tight...as it is for most everyone. I'm baking more and going out less. I am spending my entire tax return on making up the difference on my hours that have been cut this quarter. I hope to put a tiny bit of it aside to help pay for tennis lessons for the boys this summer. We are visiting schools this coming week...we aren't entirely happy with the dynamic at the school the boys have been attending. We've narrowed it down to two (but honestly, I think I've already decided upon the school for Elyas). Dev will be attending one of two special ed programs next fall, provided we can get him past the wait lists. It is so sad to me that kids in need of special programming have to jump through these kinds of hoops.

I'm looking forward to spring, and trying to decide if I want to really try some kind of patio gardening this year. It is times like this that I really do wish I had my own home. But I do have a nice little patio out there, which I could just as well cover with plants. I can't spade up part of the yard, but I could, theoretically, do something, right? Anyone got a good book or three to share with me? I have to admit I'm clueless.

I suppose this is hardly a barn burner of an entry...but hey, I'm here!

Ohhh...goody!

2009-02-17T16:25:00.003-06:00

Tonight I'm off to a wonderful event called the Smart Talk Series. I'm not exactly of the tax bracket that would allow me to buy a full season pass for this thing, but I am fortunate that my employer is a sponsor of the series...I was giddy excited when I heard about tonight's speaker, and was ready to go into debt to pay for it. But my boss, (who is beautiful AND smart AND kind) offered to let me use one of the company's passes. The kicker is, I also get a VIP pass so I can MEET her.

Of course the "her" to whom I refer is Elizabeth Gilbert, author of the monumental Best Seller "Eat, Pray, Love." I don't know if I'll have the courage to tell her how it was a bridge of hope to me as I was passing through my divorce. But I know it will be an awesome night for me!

Life lessons with ketchup

2009-02-16T22:05:00.004-06:00

"Anyone want ketchup?" I called to the boys over my shoulder. We rarely eat lunch when we visit our local children's museum, but they were so exceptionally behaved today (and I didn't want to make lunch) I indulged us all.

"Is there barbecue sauce for my chicken fingers?" I glanced around the service station.

"No honey, I don't think so...ketchup, mustard, and..."

"Tartar sauce," he said from my elbow with a scowl. Ah crap. Such a nice afternoon about to go up in flames over barbecue sauce.

"I'm sorry, sweets." He shook my hand from his shoulder and returned to the table with a handful of ketchup packets. I admired his willingness to press on. It isn't so easy, you know. A few minutes later I looked up to a cry of anguish to see that one of the ketchup packets had exploded all over the front of his sweatshirt. I helped him remove the sweat shirt (to reveal the too small shirt of his brother's that he'd put on under) but still he pressed on. Elyas was busy babbling about what was playing at the IMAX, and what does this rating mean and that rating mean. Dev was silent and scowling. Finally I asked what was with the face.

"I'm...concerned...about my run of bad luck."

I smiled at him and assured him I thought it was changing. I went to grab some extra napkins at the other end of the service station, and there it was...the barbecue sauce. I smiled brightly. "Look, Dev!"

He looked down at the fragment of one chicken finger and sighed heavily, tears in his eyes. "At least you can have some with the last of it."

"I want barbecue sauce too!" Elyas squeaked...Dev passed it across the table. "It's not very good barbecue sauce, Elyas...I don't like it you can have it." He went back to his ketchup and brightened for the first time since we'd sat down. "So Mom, do you think my luck has changed enough that we can get ice cream?"

It meant a lot, this afternoon. My kid learning that luck changes because we allow it to change. Maybe I'm learning that too. That's cool.

My wordle

2009-01-03T12:28:00.000-06:00

You'll find me at the door

2008-12-25T20:03:00.004-06:00

I've been told that one of the most pivotal times in a child's life is the day he realizes that his parent, parents, or parental figure is fallible. It is natural that they hold us in such high regard. They come into this world with no reference to it but us. They look to us as the arbiters of their existence, shaping their truths about everything from how to eat and speak and garner attention, to how to function in complex social situations, how to manage their own emotions, how to breech their way into the world, alone. We all probably remember an earth shattering moment when one of those people in our lives disappointed us. And yet even that disappointment instructed us further.

The interesting thing, I think, is that each parent too must go through the realization, on a deep level, that our children too are merely human. It isn't exactly the same sort of revelation. We all know on an intellectual level that they will lie to us, will do stupid things in high school, will make ridiculous choices in love. We joke about it sometimes with each other. But I think that most parents, like myself, hold a tiny infant in our hands on that first birthday awe inspired at its perfection, and make a solemn internal vow to preserve and protect it for all time. As time passes we beat ourselves silly over choices we've made and train ourselves to agonize more and more over each decision. Why wouldn't we, we have the power of a god over something we adore more than our own lives? It's a painful process this parenting. Or maybe that's just me, I suppose I shouldn't impose my baggage upon anyone else.

Sooner or later though in the process of parenting these miraculous gifts we stumble upon the painful shocking realization that they are not perfect, not in the cute "Oh I dread the day she has her first heartbreak" way, but in a real gut wrenching, eye popping way of knowing deep in your soul that this can all go terribly wrong - and there is not a single thing you can do to change it if it does. I think that perhaps parents of special needs kids understand it a lot earlier on. Or maybe not, but we have regular reminders that keep us well grounded in the truth that we are not the gods we are made out to be. We know that each moment is a lifetime in itself. That is where we know the truth about our children, good, bad or indifferent. That is where we know ourselves. That is where we rediscover the perfection of that first birthday again and again.

I find myself realizing more each day that I am not an arbiter of truth. I am merely the woman at each doorway, coaxing my children to pass through them to see another facet of life they haven't seen before. Okay, maybe sometimes yelling at them to come through, sometimes trying to pick them up and carry them through. But always the holder of the door. Door holding certainly isn't as authoritative as a gatekeeper, nor as glamorous as an arbiter. Door holders smile a lot as they watch others pass by on their way to things they themselves may never see. But they are crucial, particularly for people who can't open doors for themselves.

Just the facts, ma'am

2008-12-15T15:17:00.003-06:00

And then there was this time when I stopped having anything to say...

I know. I KNOW. I've neglected both my blog and my blogging friends. I'd like to tell you I'm ashamed, but I'm not. I just kind of lost my wistful desire to be all...introspective, I suppose. Not that I have to be introspective, I could just tell you about life right? But no...too much of what constitutes my life is tangled up in my children's life, who, amongst many other things, deserve some privacy. Needless to say I've been a bit stumped as to what I might say if I opened up my blog, and often, anyone else's.

But I'm here and freezing my butt off in Iowa. In the last month you missed...hum...my furnace breaking down, locking my keys in the house on the way to a holiday party, lots of meetings with lots of people who frustrate me, constant reminders as to why my marriage did. not. work. and of course my 40th birthday. Actually turning 40 was about the best thing. I feared it, but so far, I'm rather liking my new decade, sans the new white hairs sprouting on my head. No worries though, they accept color exceedingly well I'm told and I will probably find out more about that soon.

On Thursday I will take a little trip to the University of Iowa with my son for some more tests. We've had lots of tests lately. He's been a champ about all of them, which means he's the perfect compliment to his neurotic mother.

I've spent more time with my girls, in fact we had a fantastic dinner for my birthday. My friend, Kristin makes beautiful jewelry, and she gifted me with a pair of these and a matching pendant for a gift. She's really a beautiful woman and a great friend. If you are looking for something wonderful for a holiday gift, I'd encourage you to browse her site.

All that being said, I hope you are warm and enjoying your holiday season. Me, I'm just trying to figure out how to talk again (smiles).

Hope

2008-11-05T12:45:00.004-06:00

Last night I participated, as I did four years ago, in a quick paced, heart-pounding Internet chat with some of my fellows who were as excited and nervous about election night returns. Four years ago we cried, and we did last night too, in very different ways. It's no secret I'm a life long democrat, and the race of the candidate really would never have outweighed my vote, but we can all agree that it was a breath-taking moment in our history. For me personally, as a spiritual humanist(and still atheist) mom to two brilliant (and handsome) biracial boys, I feel a special kinship for this President-Elect.

As the hours wore on, I recalled to my friends in chat, that when Barack Obama spoke at the Democratic National Convention in 2004 I had turned to my then husband breathlessly and said "That man is going to be president in 2008!" He had replied that I was a little bit crazy. My friends, they are excellent friends, and they know their job well. "Well Ei, you are brilliant and your ex is an idiot." Yes, they are kind and caring women. But this was an important time to not just accept the ego strokes. "No, I said. I'm a white Midwestern girl. Idealism is easy for me. Being an idealistic black man is much harder." Which, really, is the remarkable thing about all of this. This man, in this time...won on for the biggest part on a platform of HOPE. That says more to me about this nation and who we are than I know how to express.

But you can call me Iggy...

2008-10-15T14:04:00.002-05:00

I thought this one was interestingly on the mark, for a silly little quiz.

Your result for Are You a Jackie or a Marilyn? Or Someone Else? Mad Men-era Female Icon Quiz...

You Are an Ingrid!

You are an Ingrid -- "I am unique"

Ingrids have sensitive feelings and are warm and perceptive.

How to Get Along with Me

* Give me plenty of compliments. They mean a lot to me.

* Be a supportive friend or partner. Help me to learn to love and value myself.

* Respect me for my special gifts of intuition and vision.

* Though I don't always want to be cheered up when I'm feeling melancholy, I sometimes like to have someone lighten me up a little.

* Don't tell me I'm too sensitive or that I'm overreacting!

What I Like About Being an Ingrid

* my ability to find meaning in life and to experience feeling at a deep level

* my ability to establish warm connections with people

* admiring what is noble, truthful, and beautiful in life

* my creativity, intuition, and sense of humor

* being unique and being seen as unique by others

* having aesthetic sensibilities

* being able to easily pick up the feelings of people around me

What's Hard About Being an Ingrid

* experiencing dark moods of emptiness and despair

* feelings of self-hatred and shame; believing I don't deserve to be loved

* feeling guilty when I disappoint people

* feeling hurt or attacked when someone misundertands me

* expecting too much from myself and life

* fearing being abandoned

* obsessing over resentments

* longing for what I don't have

Ingrids as Children Often

* have active imaginations: play creatively alone or organize playmates in original games

* are very sensitive

* feel that they don't fit in

* believe they are missing something that other people have

* attach themselves to idealized teachers, heroes, artists, etc.

* become antiauthoritarian or rebellious when criticized or not understood

* feel lonely or abandoned (perhaps as a result of a death or their parents' divorce)

Ingrids as Parents

* help their children become who they really are

* support their children's creativity and originality

* are good at helping their children get in touch with their feelings

* are sometimes overly critical or overly protective

* are usually very good with children if not too self-absorbed

Take Are You a Jackie or a Marilyn? Or Someone Else? Mad Men-era Female Icon Quiz at HelloQuizzy

2008-10-09T14:56:00.005-05:00

Today, as part of National Mental Illness Awareness Week, is Bipolar Disorder Awareness Day. NAMI (The National Alliance on Mental Illness) encourages people to join the Bipolar Disorder Awareness effort. You can play a part in the event by:

-Learning more about the symptoms of bipolar disorder.
-Participating in a free mental health screening.
-Reaching out to individuals who have bipolar disorder.
-Encouraging individuals with bipolar disorder to seek treatment.

Bipolar disorder has played a larger role in my life than I had ever imagined possible, considering I don't have it myself. But nevertheless it has, and continues to shape, my life. Peace & love all.

Encouragement

2008-10-07T19:00:00.000-05:00

A few nights ago I was sitting around too much food and beer with some of the loveliest women I've ever known. We do this these days, once a month, hovering around an odd assortment of whatever we felt like throwing together (or toting out of the liquor store) and just catching up on life. In college we would have had cookie dough, but you know, it is still good.

We make our way around and share our stories...who was fighting with her husband? Who made up with her girlfriend? Whose kids are struggling at college? Whose preschoolers broke their glasses, again? Who has done something noteworthy this month? Who has done something slightly naughty? It's all out there, and I find I often go home and sleep better than I have for weeks, not because of the wine (Hello! It does help!) but because I feel like I've been emptied out and filled back up. I suppose Keith Richards might know the feeling (or not).

Of course I shared my latest stories of parenting my special needs kiddo, since my life is neither noteworthy or naughty, at least not to a level worth discussing. As this particular group has several remarkable women who work in that industry, they often provide support and brainstorming for me that I might never experience in other circles. But this night they just heard me, there was no advice, no directive, just love and support. And then, simple words that mean so much..."He's lucky to have you as a mom." I managed not to cry, but I've thought about it a lot the last few days.

It was a moment that was instructional to me. Encouragement doesn't always come in the form of cheer leading. It doesn't always come in the form of assistance. Sometimes it comes in the form of a loving mirror, one that shows you that you are capable of so much.

Where I've been...

2008-08-24T11:17:00.002-05:00

Well.

Hi, how are you? Me? I'm struggling still. It took me about a month and a near nervous breakdown to realized that I needed to take the same tact with my own depression issues, that I have with my son's...that medication isn't a sign of weakness, it is simply caring for myself. It was a hard paradigm shift for me, which makes me that much happier that I could make the decision for him at such a young age, rather than leaving it to him to figure out in a hard way like I have. One day my best friend, who also happens to be my sister said "Remember when you told me how you wouldn't hesitate to give him the medication he needed if he was diabetic, so why should this condition be any different? So, tell me why YOU are different?" And you know she's right.

If you haven't guessed, this is my excuse for being lame and not writing. I've had a hard time forcing myself to do much more than is required but I'm taking quite a few nutritional supplements and have a doctor's appointment scheduled. The supplements seem to be helping quite a bit, as long as I remember to take them. I tank out when I forget. But I've had some interesting experiences, so I'm going to spend some time today telling you about them. Sorry for the hit and miss posting. Maybe one day soon I'll get myself on a nice schedule. :)

Looking forward to:

2008-08-13T12:10:00.003-05:00

Just thought I'd post a quick list. Looking forward is obviously an active dare, so I'll have to keep you posted. (smiles all around)

Seeing my boys tonight. I always miss them while they are at their dad's.
I just signed up to facilitate a small group at my church. Small Group Ministry is one of the coolest things in which I've ever participated, but I've been out of it for two years. Finding a group whose meeting times coincide with my parenting schedule has been challenging. I figured the only way to do it was to facilitate a group on MY schedule.
I'm going to start planning a vacation for fall break with my boys. October is just around the corner.

I dare you to look forward.

2008-08-11T18:38:00.002-05:00

I think we are all on the quest for one thing, the same thing. There are many paths there and many paths that look promising, and how each of us get there, or not, is entirely up to us. Of course I'm talking about happiness. Our constitution in this country promises the right to pursue it, but that is as close as anyone will ever get to handing it to us. The rest, my friends, is up to us.

I've been watching a movie made in the 90'a that features two of my favorite actors, Robert Duvall and James Earl Jones, A Family Thing. They give fantastic performances in a story steeped in old bitter race frustrations and how they played out in one family. The writing is wonderful and it is worth seeing, if you haven't lo these many years later. But one line stuck with me today, and I'm sad that it hasn't stuck in my head like so many other things. Earl tells his nephew a simple story of a simple man who had a hard life and lived for doing something sweet for his family. And when asked about his hard luck he finally told Earl, "Being happy ain't nothin' but havin' something to look forward to." Earl goes on to tell his nephew that looking back at what he's lost will only cause him pain, and that he needs to find something, anything no matter how simple to look forward to, and continues that he has two little girls to whom he owes something to anticipate in life.

Wow. I can wax philosophic about my history with the best of them, but in the end, it is just history. I do know that when I have something, anything to get ready for everything has more depth and color and and meaning. And who wouldn't want to give that to the people you love?

So this week, I dare you to give yourself something to look forward to. Make it small, make it big, but make it matter. Make a date with an old friend who you love and miss. See a movie that you've been wanting to see for ages. Plan a tea party with your kids. Plan a trip to Greece. Plan a trip to your favorite coffee shop. Plan and anticipate. I dare you.

Harder than I thought...

2008-08-10T16:20:00.004-05:00

So did you do it? Did you pick a label or two or a handful to challenge in the last week or so? I had a hard time even facing my labels, and then deciding that I could challenge them. So no one said I was going to be good at this. I just want to keep trying. Well I don't want to be all negative in your face, but what I'm really working on challenging is a phrase that plagues me. Some people who know me might be surprised that this is one that I struggle with, but I have to be honest and say it is the ugliest truth about my self image and the the thing that needs the most challenging.

Hopelessly Disorganized Loser

Sad, isn't it? A three word phrase that encompasses three of the most negative words I can think of. Of course hopeless and loser, well those are pretty self explanatory. Disorganized, sure not perfect, but is that such a sad state of affairs? Well I personally see it as the key to success or failure in life, organizing your thoughts, your affairs, your time and your feelings. And I've just not been terribly successful at managing many of these things. And lets face it, for a person making a living as an accounting professional, it is a downright embarrassing thing to admit that you struggle with it.

But in the last few weeks, I've learned that I am, in fact only those things in my mind. I have taken to reminding myself how successful I have been in navigating the rocky terrain of my life. No, I'm not as skilled as some, but honestly, I wasn't given a lot of these skills as a child, I had to figure them out for myself, which handicapped me. In rethinking how I view myself on this front, it effortlessly flowed into thinking about the fact that a person who has accomplished so much with so little could not possibly be a loser...as a matter of fact quite the opposite was true. But the real key, the one I will have to work on daily, probably for my whole life is in that first little word. Hopeless. On the days I allow myself to be defined by that word, all hope for further success, new accomplishments is stripped from me. On the days that I actively, with love, choose hope, all things are possible. I know that the pragmatist in me holds me back some days. Perhaps another label I need to challenge? Perhaps I need to focus some energy on being a dreamer or an idealist and see where that takes me.

Did you take up arms against some of your negative labels? Did you find some interesting ideas stuck away in your head for safekeeping by the optimist who lives there? Tell me.

What's in a name? Let's find out.

2008-07-28T21:18:00.003-05:00

I looked through the dares one at a time. Some of them scare me senseless, which is probably good. Some of them I think I'm not ready for. Some of them I don't think I really need...which probably means I really do need to look at them harder. This is all to say, I didn't know which dare to pick first. And while a favorite or two stuck out at me, I thought it best to let the fickle finger of fate pick where I would start. So www.random.org helped me pick out this very special dare for our very first one. I think it's a good one. Are you ready?

"Dare To Not Label Yourself"

Now I'm not going to share all the wisdom Natasha Kogan gives us in her book. But the basic idea is right out there...we all label ourselves in ways that are limiting, self-depreciating, or simply not helpful. The fact is, we can choose to shed those labels. My challenge for you, and me too, is to pick three labels you've given yourself and challenge them this week. I'll see you soon. MUAH.

Take a ride with me. I dare you.

2008-07-28T20:28:00.004-05:00

Back in the summer of spending every moment of time I might actually have to face myself trying to make friends with with anyone who would talk to me on the Internets (as long as they were women who had children and didn't have any interest in setting me up with someone) I happened upon a website one day. I wish I could remember how I got there, but somethings are just supposed to happen. This website is a promotional site for author Natasha Kogan's book The Daring Female's Guide to Ecstatic Living. I adored the concept of this book and I wrote to the author right away with the intent of starting an online "Daring Circle" with my Myspace girlfriends and they were eager too. Natasha sent me a free book, and because I wanted her to get something out of it from me, I encouraged all my friends to buy one, and bought one for my first friend who issued me a really good dare. My friend Cyndi won that challenge and I blissfully sent her one in the mail along with a box of goodies for "BARK bags" for her kids. And we really tried, but school started again and everyone kind of floated off in different directions and our circle bottomed out before we really even got started.

This spring, Cyndi's life met some unexpected changes...changes that would have set most of us on our ears. Cyn's bounce back obviously awed not only me, but everyone who knows her. About two weeks later she was telling me on the phone about lunching with a co-worker who has gone through her own messy divorce and she was revelling in Cyn's bounce-back factor. "How do you do that?" she nearly sobbed on Cyn's shoulder. Cyndi told me she went home and pulled this book off the shelf and re-read the note I'd written to her..."Pay it forward, girlfriend." And so she took it to her friend and told her to get daring.

And in doing so, she did the same for me. I went upstairs that night and started digging through my books. I found it fast and I carried it around for a few weeks before I really even looked at it again. But now I know...it's time to get daring. My life is ready for it.

I'm inviting you down this daring road with me, and if you come I'll feel like I'll finally be paying up my promise to Natasha to start a daring circle. But whether you ride along or just spectate, or maybe a little of both, I promise nothing, except maybe something to laugh about or something to cry about, hopefully something that makes us feel alive.

I'll be sharing some of the dares from Kogan's book (which I think you should buy for yourself...you'll love it). And I'll endeavor to dare myself to do them, and report back to you the results. You can share, or not. Send me email's or comments, or blog them yourself.

Dare #1 coming up shortly. See you there.

It's about time

2008-07-27T20:10:00.005-05:00

"Hey Ei, you've been awfully quiet, whatcha been up to?"

I cocked my head and thought about it for a moment. I thought about telling her about how blissfully uneventful my summer had been, how I'd been spending a lot of time reflecting on who I am and what I'm doing with my life, how unhappy I've been with the answers and yet lacking the resolve to change them. I thought about telling her how I'm actually caught up on laundry, but the rest of lives has been slipping away. I considered saying a whole lot more. But the visual of having to call a paramedic to summon her from a coma after bearing my soul to her was pretty painful. So I smiled and shrugged, "Y'know. Kids." Her eyes flicker with recognition. She doesn't have any kids. "Yeah, I guess I do."

Two years ago I found myself wandering familiar terrain, single life, with a whole new set of rules...children, an ex-husband, an aging post childbearing body, and very little curiosity for anything left. At the time a friend told me that the hardest part would be when all the loving kind support I'd received had gone home and tucked in, when the children settled down, and I had to actually look it all in the eye. That took longer than I expected, but that's where I've been. Well, I've been there for awhile. The distractions of life have been plentiful...and my own mad skills at avoidance, well they are pretty amazing.

But more and more lately, I am reminded that I have a long life in front of me, and as much as I love my children, making my life about them would set us all up for frustration...me, them, and certainly their father and the people in his new life. The thing is, my kids are making remarkable progress, growing and stretching in their lives now. They'll always have a hole in their hearts for what they have lost, but now is the time for them both to flex the muscles they've gained from the hard work of recovering. And maybe it is time for me to start too.

Damn it. Didn't want to be sappy. Sorry it is a habit I'll have to work on.

So there is step one of having a weird, quiet, good, moody summer. Admitting you have a problem. Step two is figuring out what to do about it. There isn't a local chapter of "I Got a Divorce and Never Quite Got Around to Getting a Life Anonymous." I don't do bars (thankfully). I don't have all consuming hobbies. I could, I suppose look at all this as a failure. I'm choosing instead to look at it as a blank slate to be filled with beauty and thought. And it's all mine. Let's do this thing.

What Father's Day means to me

2008-06-15T12:32:00.005-05:00

My whole association with the rite of Father's day is a little, um, skewed I suppose. As a child, I purposefully became "ill" so as not to have to attend day camp on the day they made Father's day gifts, I "forgot" announcements about father daughter teas, terrified that my mom would decide she should stand in, or worse yet, that she would send my grandfather. In my married days, I tried to really do something MANLY for my then husband on Father's day...neglecting the fact that I really know nothing about what constitutes acceptably manly versus stereotypically manly and I'm a poor organizer anyway. But hey I tried, and it is the thought that counts, right? Well, mainly it's the thought...for most people, anyway.

Since becoming a single mom, I've been back to rather wanting to hide away from father's day activities. But today I volunteered to help out with children's programming at church. We sat in a circle on the floor and we "lit" our chalice (a lovely little battery operated tea light) and as ever, our children let us glimpse their lives by telling us their joys and concerns. There was the usual assortments of birthdays being celebrated, grandparents coming to visit, doggies who were lost and found, and this week some stories of bailing out the basement. We came to the serious little blond girl sitting in the sitting in the corner. She frowned as she thought about what she wanted to say, "It's Father's Day," she sniffled, "but my daddy is in Iraq so he doesn't get to have a Father's Day." Her daddy, is in fact one of the nicest men I've ever met and it hurt my heart to see his little girl so obviously missing him. How different it made me feel. It made me remember that Father's Day, and Mother's Day too, is really more about the children.

It was brought to my attention some time ago that Mother's Day as it was introduced by Julia Ward Howe in 1870, had little to do with moms sleeping in or getting jewelery, or having a spa day. It had nothing to do with moms being appreciated at all...it was instead a call to action, a call to mothers to use their maternal voices for peace.

Arise then...women of this day!
Arise, all women who have hearts!
Whether your baptism be of water or of tears!
Say firmly:
"We will not have questions answered by irrelevant agencies,
Our husbands will not come to us, reeking with carnage,
For caresses and applause.
Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn
All that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy and patience.
We, the women of one country,
Will be too tender of those of another country
To allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs."

From the voice of a devastated Earth a voice goes up with
Our own.
It says: "Disarm! Disarm!
The sword of murder is not the balance of justice."
Blood does not wipe our dishonor,
Nor violence indicate possession.
As men have often forsaken the plough and the anvil
At the summons of war,
Let women now leave all that may be left of home
For a great and earnest day of counsel.
Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead.
Let them solemnly take counsel with each other as to the means
Whereby the great human family can live in peace...
Each bearing after his own time the sacred impress, not of Caesar,
But of God -
In the name of womanhood and humanity, I earnestly ask
That a general congress of women without limit of nationality,
May be appointed and held at someplace deemed most convenient
And the earliest period consistent with its objects,
To promote the alliance of the different nationalities,
The amicable settlement of international questions,
The great and general interests of peace.

It has occurred to me that Father's Day was really just created as a "Me too" holiday, someone thought that what was good for the goose was good for the gander...and so it all is really just an extension of my UU fore mother's call for peace. The only thing any good mother can do in honor of Father's Day is to be a good mother. Continue to fight for the good of our children, which always includes their fathers...the ones who wake up and honor you on Mother's Day and the ones who don't, the ones who build go-carts, and the ones who build character. Father's day is about making sure that kids have dads to go round with, not about ties or barbecue grills. And also about the sacrifices we all make to make sure that can happen. Father's day isn't about gifting a father with a manly day, it is about gifting a child with a father, for every day. Thank goodness for Father's Day.

Can you feel it?

2008-06-12T21:23:00.003-05:00

Oh yeah...Loving Day. I just love that story. I mean could they have had a better name? Sigh. Well yeah, I know, I'm not the worlds biggest proponent of ANY marriage, but I think it is a personal choice you should be allowed to make (oh STOP it, I'm joking...mostly). But I wanted to take a moment first to say, I tried yesterday to post a few THOUGHTS about Loving Day but Blogger ate my post, so I ended up quickly just posting the nice little blurb my friend Becky gave me. Not even with the way cool picture of Mr. & Mrs. Loving.

The reason I had no time is...well...if you haven't heard, we've had a little rain here in Central Iowa. I was out filling sand bags with my coworkers for fun, just in case we had a repeat of what happened in 1993. Luckily, so far, that has been just busy work. And hey, I have something new to add to my resume (although I don't think my impatient boss will be giving me any recommendations based on my skills in this area.) Anyway, I just wanted to take a minute to remind you that the battle that Mildred and Richard Loving fought in 1967, the year before my birth, made lots of happy couples whom I adore possible today (not to mention, assisted in making possible two little people whom I love desperately). I also wanted to remind you that there are many of our fellow citizens out there who are desperate to marry someone (don't ask me why!) and it is not legal for them to do so. Don't let the battle end with the Lovings.

So that's my soap-box portion of the evening. I would like to tell you that my day was all kinds of Love Thursday magic, but that wasn't in the cards for me, so instead I'll leave you with Elton John...because I've had this song stuck in my head for days.

Tomorrow is Loving Day

2008-06-11T12:39:00.002-05:00

What is Loving Day?Loving Day is an educational community project. The name comes from Loving v. Virginia (1967), the landmark Supreme Court decision that legalized interracial marriage in the United States. Loving Day celebrations commemorate the anniversary of the Loving decision every year on or around June 12th.Learn more about the landmark case and Loving Day here.

Expect...what?

2008-06-09T18:02:00.004-05:00

The interesting thing about having a child with a disability, or probably dealing with any of life's challenges, I suppose, is that it crystallizes your inner struggles or weaknesses and holds them up to the end of your nose so that you can look at them....really see them.

The idea that's been following me around lately is that I have so many problems keeping realistic expectations for my son. I can slide up and down the spectrum from having ridiculous expectations for a kid with his specific issues to having really limiting expectations for a child of his age. The problem isn't recognizing (after the fact of course) that I've had an error in judgement. The problem I have with this is it that I find myself coursing up and down this spectrum in response, trying to dial it in (which is really difficult when "appropriate" expectations can vary from hour to hour with this child) all the while knowing that the one thing I am teaching myself is to doubt my instincts.

As a parent, we are trained to believe that our expectations of our children will set the tone for their entire lives. Expect too much, they will feel set up to fail, unable to ever meet your demands. Expect too little, they will become lazy and complacent and never really know what it takes to reach and try. Ah the pressure! We can make ourselves crazy with our expectations of ourselves regarding the expectations we have of our children. OK, well, maybe that's just me.

The thing is (why is it, I can't type that phrase without thinking I'm ripping off Barb now?) this is just a magnified truth about who I am as a person. I am the woman who agonizes over whether or not I can call a friend at 5:30 because it is too close to dinner time, and again at 8:30 because I don't know when her kids go to bed...and by 3:30 two days later I'm sure she's probably miffed at me for not calling back. (Jotting down my list of psychosis? Gee, blogging is fun.) I struggle with ideas like the Law of Attraction because I consistently monitor how realistic my expectations are, and eventually I end up regulating myself right to the point of envisioning my life just as it is now. I guess I'm trying to say, I'm not an expert at modulating expectations. I'm barely a novice. And I guess I thought I'd be further along by this place in my life. But hey, Steve Pavlina tells me (yes, if you didn't know, all of his blog posts that millions of people read are actually directed at me, everyone else is eavesdropping) that no matter where you think you ought to be, you are where you are, and trying to start somewhere else is just...well...stupid.

So I woke up this morning with the decision to expect nothing, and instead, just follow my gut, with a tender questioning quality at everything I touch. I did some things with my son that some people, maybe even people that have more expertise with children with behavioral disabilities than I might have seen as really lenient. But my son, who is somewhat famous for NOT being a morning person, got out the door with a smile on his face and a soft sweet "I love you, mama." at the door. He also only told his brother to shut up once, which is sort of a miracle. I carried it through later when I dealt with another difficult situation, maybe being more demanding of my other son's day camp director than a lot of parents might have done. But ultimately, she rose to the occasion, and helped me place bigger expectations upon my son, even when she was ready to throw in the towel. But I felt along the way, trying to put my foot in the groove, rather than swinging wildly from one end of the spectrum to another, knowing that the spectrum was doing all the swaying for me.

No, I didn't conquer my expectations in a day...but maybe I did realize that they don't really accomplish as much as I give them credit for anyway. In fact, knowing what they are worth, how much weight to give them, when they come up, that is really the key.

But you probably already knew that. Next I'll be blogging about these crazy kids Dick and Jane and their dog, Spot. He runs you know.

Under my elbow

2008-06-08T15:02:00.002-05:00

I never realized how hard it is to type with someone's head jammed under my elbow. It seems like everytime I sit down to work on the computer there is someone's head rammed right up under my elbow.

You never stop learning as a parent. Seriously.

Last Day of school 2008

2008-05-30T22:36:00.001-05:00

Last Day of school 2008
Originally uploaded by eijax

Today was the last day of the school year. I can't tell you how relieved I am. It's been a really long year. We had a great evening of lounging and pizza eating, and yes, eventually they got to take their jackets off too. I sure hope it warms up soon, swimming in coats could be uncomfortable.

The Elephant in the Room

2008-05-30T14:39:00.004-05:00

There have been a few things that I wanted to blog about lately. Barb wrote a nice piece about being transplanted and how it is hard to grow new roots, which inspired me. But honestly, as eloquent as anything I wrote in my head might have been, I think I've discussed that to death.

Then there was a series of events that inspired me to want to talk about whiny people and wanting what you've got, rather than getting what you want. But I decided I'd probably unintentionally piss off everyone I know because they'd think it was about them. Because we all have a tendency to overlook the big picture when we are hyper-focused on the teeny tiny crap. And maybe complaining about complainers was somehow...wrong.

But more and more I've been wanting to discuss the elephant in the room, not quite knowing how to do it. I tried, badly, not too long ago to blog about what it is like to be the mom of a kid with an undiagnosed Behavioral Disability, or in someone else's terms, a child with Serious Emotional Disturbances. It was written at a stupid time, when I was fragile and frightened and I was angry and upset when people actually tried to HELP me. Well, the thing is, the Internet can not diagnose my son, or I don't think so anyway. We've been seeing professional psychiatrists for a number of years and well...I just trust them more than random posts from well intentioned people who don't know too much about my child. So lesson learned for me. I decided to put that post back under wraps and never ever discuss it again. Ever.

Except...it fills about 90% of my waking thoughts. And it is an elephant that needs to be discussed. This week a little boy with Asperger's made news all over the US, had folks buzzing everywhere when he was voted out of his class with his teacher leading the way. What makes me the saddest about this story is that people seem to think that either the mistreatment of this child can be justified OR that it is somehow an isolated incident. The sad truth is our children, and I'm referring to those of us with kids who have behavioral disabilities, are possibly the only children that it is seen to be normal and needed to punish regularly for their disabilities. What would you think if a child who suffered from epileptic seizures lost all of her playground privileges for weeks at a time after each seizure? What would we think about a child who had cerebral palsy being seated in a corner facing away from the rest of the class, and telling his parents that it is "preferential seating" for his condition? What if our educational system decided that the best way to mitigate a diabetic child going into insulin shock in the classroom was to suspend him each time it happened? This is the kind of thing we as parents of THESE special needs kids deal with on a regular basis. We begin to feel like our lives are being systematically destroyed, but worse yet, we see their future being systematically destroyed. Help is hard to find, hard to navigate and the waiting lists for everything are getting longer.

Parents need to be able to have a voice. We need to not feel like we should be hiding away somewhere, waiting for the next shoe to drop. If my talking out loud about it here will enable even one person somewhere to know that they are not alone and that there is no shame in parenting one of these amazing and exceptional human beings, it is so worth it.

A Lil' Bit O' the Captain

2008-05-28T15:43:00.003-05:00

I think I've mentioned before and in numerous ways how blessed I am in the friends department. Thanks to this glorious box I have that lights up when I touch it, I have friends all over the world. Lots of my friends are friends because they are so LIKE me. We giggle madly over silly things we have in common and lament the not so funny things we have in common. But there are others, some really special people who are my friends because we stand and gawk at how different we are from each other, and how it is kind of amazing how well we get along.

One of my very best friends from my box I have known now for about seven years, since her beautiful daughter was just a tiny baby and my eldest was (sob) just toddling. Back in about 2002 we spent a LOT of time chatting on line. I knew amongst her many incredible talents (she is an amazing photographer, a former teacher, a SUPER-mom) she is a writer. It is more than her grasp for mixing words around and making it into a delightful thing to read, it is her ability to dig to try to understand people. There were days while we were chatting that I felt like the star on a Barbra Walters special...because my life experiences actually seemed interesting when I was talking to my girl. The other thing these conversations revealed was that she and I had QUITE a different life experience. In fact, I began to suspect that my newish online friend was actually Mary Poppins undercover. I mean that in a really loving way, but I have to tell you this girl is "practically perfect in every way." She's gorgeous, she has this lovely husband and a perfect beautiful little girl and she seems like she never has done anything stupid. At all. Unlike...erm...anyone else I know.

Which leads me to the reason for this post, one I hope you'll indulge me and her a bit and give us some stories. I like to play online scrabble with this beautiful perfect one. She's a good opponent because she is really smart, and she's also the world's greatest sport, which you know makes playing fun. Anyway, today while playing Scrabble she says to me, "Have you ever been hungover?" She may have heard the snort that came from me, even in the next country to the north, where she lives (that isn't too specific, is it?) She proceeds to tell me that her character in the book she's been working on long and hard is about to wake up with a doozy of hangover wherein some general hilarity can ensue. But there's a little problem...the author hasn't done her research! That's right my Mary Poppins has lived more than 30 some odd years and never ONCE been hung over. She gave me some nonsense about a mortal fear of vomiting, but I know it is because she would never do something that imperfect. I told her I'd share with her some thoughts, but I thought what a good meme idea! Tell Mary Poppins about your worst hangover, send it to me, or link us up in the comments.

I'm buying her a red umbrella as a congratulatory gift when this book hits the shelves.

Crud

2008-05-26T11:58:00.005-05:00

I've waited for a week to see both children healthy. I've waited six months for a holiday with them. It was supposed to be their dad's holiday, but he had to work (retail..neener, neener). I planned (shit, there I go again!) getting up for a long walk around our pretty neighborhood and then off to see the new Indiana Jones flick in the afternoon. But...

It started raining about 6:30 last night and by 9:00 we had something truly ugly. The wind whipped and things dropped from the sky. Not the big twisty things, thankfully, but you know, about half of the massive oak in my back yard. Luckily it landed about six feet from my newish car and not quite that far from the house. My trash can wasn't quite so lucky. Of course the children weren't sleeping...and just as the storm started to calm POP...off went all our electricity. I peered nervously from our doorstep to make sure another tree hadn't taken out our individual lines and Mailman Dave who lives two houses to the north assured me that a transformer was out two blocks away. He handed off an extra hand crank lantern that he had just sitting around and patted my two bouncing bundles of nerves that everything would be just fine. Some time later the boys drifted off while I read to them by flashlight. The electricity came on some three hours later which jolted me awake because I honestly had no idea which lights I'd left on.

Needless to say we didn't wake early to meander through our lovely neighborhood. We awoke late, to the magical sounds of chainsaws all around us. I cried a little knowing that my landlord has full intention of felling the entire tree now (what the hell is it with me and trees?) and I took a vow never to love a tree again. Sniff. Then the ex called and said he'd been cut loose early and he was coming to take my boys. So here I am once more. Dammit.

I will not capitulate

2008-05-24T21:14:00.007-05:00

Have you ever been at that place where the questions that people ask you start to make you want to scream? You know the questions I'm talking about, right?

"Have you declared a major?"
"Have you met his family?"
"You are switching jobs, again?"
"Well it's all fine and good as a hobby, but don't you want something secure?"
"Really, you can't raise a family in this neighborhood, can you?"
"Are you two 'trying' yet?"
"You know every baby needs a brother or sister, right?"
"You aren't going to try for a girl?"
"Are you really going to go back to work? Doesn't that break your heart?"

I'm sure the list could go on and on. You probably have your own personalized list as long as your arm. It is one of the most blatant ways our society inflicts its expectations upon us, in seemingly benign form of polite conversation. Did any of those questions actually end up putting you on a path upon which you couldn't turn back?

I'm embarrassed to say, all of those questions and many more influenced where I ended up today. I don't know if it is normal or if I suffered from an extreme lack of confidence in my youth, but I think I was desperately seeking direction and acceptance. Somewhere in my heart of hearts I thought that there was some wonderful secret to being "normal" and living happily ever after, and that if I could uncover that formula, I would be part of the ones "in the know." It's funny, my girlfriends and I particularly loved a spoof one similarly delusional girl.

Odd how parody is often lost on those who need it most, isn't it?

So I took these questions as sign posts on my path and I followed them straight down a road that had me on antidepressants, living more or less in a catatonic state, not trusting a single instinct of my own. I plodded dutifully down the path, tripping over branches that I couldn't see, expecting at any moment the path would open into the paradise I'd been struggling toward all these many years.

Instead I found myself plopped right down at the starting line again, or at least something that resembles the starting line...excepting of course that my knees are worse, I have stretch marks a c-section scar, a taste for living with furniture and eating something other than ramen noodles and two bright shiny faces looking at me for their own sign posts. And um, I was pretty sure I was screwed.

It turns out that I wasn't as screwed as I thought I was. In fact, a little do over allowed me to step back and do some evaluation and decide that maybe this time, I would pick my own sign posts. So if you hear someone ask me, "Why aren't you dating yet?" and you hear a sound from me that implies something less than a sincere desire to please the speaker, try not to frown at me too hard. I've gone down that path before. This time, I'm blazing my own.

I can't believe I forgot..

2008-05-23T15:19:00.002-05:00

I didn't inform blogland that Emily's arm was saved! She still faces two surgeries on her lungs but she is doing really well. I was thinking about this because my local radio station is doing their annual fundraiser for the Children's Miracle Network and interviewed a local family whose daughter's story was hauntingly familiar, but the little girl lost her arm and ultimately her battle with cancer. It was horrible to hear this mother tenderly recall her daughter's last moments. But I know she hopes like I do that the efforts of fund drives like this will help thousands more kids...kids like Emily. The boys collected coins for the drive this year, we'll be donating them in Em's name.

Yeah, so...

2008-05-20T21:10:00.003-05:00

I had plans today, plans about all the stuff I was going to get done at work, plans about the places I was going to run at lunch, plans for the stacks of laundry in my bedroom. That was at 6:45 a.m. At 7:30 am while I was putting on my 'gonna get stuff done today' eyeliner, the phone rang. You know it is never a good thing when the phone rings at 7:30 a.m.

Elyas, his dad informed me, had been throwing up since 5 a.m., "So, what should I do, because I don't think I have anything I can give him..." These are the moments I'm really glad their father doesn't live in the same house anymore because the me I am today would be thunking him on the forehead rather than rolling my eyes behind his back like I did when we were married. So anyway, I had a retching, clinging, unhappy little person attached to my body by 8:05 and I'd sent my regrets to my day and my boss.

We watched a plethora of shows where young children are entirely too excited about backpacks and cameras, we played some educational programs on the computer, and we snuggled. What we didn't do was eat. I tried, but he refused everything. Finally frustrated I said "Honey, what would you eat for Mommy?" I'm such an idiot, I mean really, who does that?

Of course he wanted ice cream and I didn't have any. And I did have to get to the bank today, which long story short, is how I ended up cleaning, well, you know...yuck with the slightest scent of McDonald's chocolate shake tossed in, out of the back seat of my SUV. And while I did get a good amount of laundry done today, um, the pile still sits in my bedroom.

Some days putting on eyeliner is just a waste, you know?

Just say "Maybe."

2008-05-17T13:00:00.002-05:00

I don't think I'm all that different than most moms I know. Except that my kids are gone from the house three or four nights a week, which allows me some extra cleaning time, some extra talking on the phone uninterrupted time, and some extra time to miss them and remember just how much I really do like them. But you know I pick up toys, I make doctor's appointments, I drive kids to swim class, I cry when someone does his first dive into the deep end (y'all he TOTALLY did it today, it was SO cool!), and I get asked to do a lot of things for school, for book clubs, for parent groups, etc. And like most moms I know I get over extended. I'm really terrible about keeping my calendar in my purse up to date, so sadly, not only do I over book, but sometimes I double book. I usually end up doing this on my weekends when the boys are with their dad. I think this probably goes back to the early days when I desperately tried to fill up those hours so I didn't have to think about missing them or really being angry at their dad. But it also comes from the ability to add an appointment to my Yahoo calendar without actually checking to see what is already on it. So I woke up today with exactly four appointments on my calendar today at 10 a.m. Can anyone spell "Imadork?"

Two of them were walks, fundraisers for charity. I did a pretty good job raising money for both of them and I decided no one would actually care if I was there or not, as long as they got the money. I topped off my contributions with an extra $10 and decided to call that good. Now the other two were my problem. One was the swim class I mentioned earlier. I knew their dad would take them but...I really hate missing classes when it is my turn to take them. I'm lucky to be co-parenting with a man who sees sitting through things like this as a parenting privilege, not some form of drudgery. So we are a little competitive when it comes to who gets to go to what. We have on occasion BOTH gone, but I would feel wrong skipping out on the two walks to share time with him, you know? But the OTHER appointment was to pick up something I wanted to buy on Craigslist, which I've been needing. If I didn't show, I was sure my new kitchen table would go to someone else, someone more deserving because they know how to manage their organizer. I called the girl, sweet little thing who is a college student. Why I'm buying furniture from a college student, I'm not sure. When I was in college my kitchen table was my desk...but...anyway. She was adorably ready to switch times with me and I'm quite sure she's going to provide boys from a frat house to load up the Vue for me. So I got to see the first dive into the deep end. And that makes all the juggling worth it.

The thing that made me happy about all of this is I've finally learned, despite my terrible abilities at keeping a calendar, to never say "YES!" But I never say "No." Either. My annoying and completely honest response to nearly everything these days is "Maybe." Is it evil to do this? Maybe. But it works for me, because honestly? I don't know what I'll be doing 20 minutes from now. Oh wait, yeah, the table. Definitely that.

Ode to Joy

2008-05-15T21:27:00.006-05:00

My girlfriend Barb over at So The Thing Is did this really incredible meme, that she made up her own bad self today, and I think she coined a term in the process, "Joy Rush." She challenged us, her readers, to step up and tell the world what gives them their own special little rushes of joy, those moments that make your skin tingle with happiness, or at a moments notice steal your breath away. So I'm going to start my list with the one thing that makes the most sense in this situation.

1. Barb. (smiles) No, I'm not buttering her up for a copy of her book. I already have one thank you very much, and it's autographed ;). You know I read approximately seven billion blogs regularly, but Barb's is special to me. No, wait, BARB is special to me. One Christmas time I was looking for some thing about motherhood and the spirit of Christmas. I was frustrated because I wasn't finding what I was looking for (and lo these many years later, I'll be danged if I can't remember why I was looking for it) when I stumbled across her website and the columns she was writing about her experiences being a mom, and I read this column. Barb and I connected that day in a very meaningful way and she didn't even know I existed. I was a silent adoring fan of hers until she started blogging, and I started commenting. I learned quickly that Barb and I have amazing and funny things in common that almost make me cry when I see them. Today was just one more day for my darling amazing friend to hold up a mirror to me to remind me what I like not only about her, but about myself. In her own post on joy she posted a Youtube video of one of my all time favorite bands playing one of my all time favorite songs. And it gives me such a Joy Rush to share so much with such an amazing woman.

2. Expanding upon that theme, there is this amazing Joy Rush upon looking into the faces of the people I call friends. Occasionally I have that moment that I feel like I should pinch myself, because honestly, how did I get so lucky? Not only is there assortment of amazing and interesting people, from my talented theatre and music friends to the activists and educators and writers and public servants and healers...not to mention the breath taking mamas, but they are just fine people. They are the people who really understand what we talk about in my church, the spirit of life. And I am eternally awed and grateful to be able to call these amazing souls friends.

3. The humor that boils down deep inside the fresh bright little soul that is, Elyas. Tonight as I washed his hair he turned his head at just the wrong moment and ended up completely doused at my hand. He rose up out of the water like a dunked cat sputtering and I lifted a towel to his face...as he pushed his hair up off his little glistening face he locked eyes with me, shaking his head seriously. "I'm sorry, you're fired, man." Then we both laughed until it hurt. He is a person who just glows with good humor. And lucky me, I get to be his mama. Total Joy Rush.

4. If there is a word that could describe my eldest child, it would be tenacity. There are days when you watch this kid dig his heels in to master a skill, read a book, climb a tree, or catch a bug...well he's going to do it. But do you know what really gives me the big Joy Rush? I learn from that tenacity every single day. It boggles my mind that this living breathing smart-as-all-get-out person who is teaching me came from my body into this world. It gives me goose bumps.

5. Well Barb, as I mentioned, posted a video, so I'm going to as well. I know I've told people I really don't like country music, heck I've even defended it in goofy arguments. But Lyle Lovett simply can't be a country musician because, because, well...he's just too cool. And there's that hair. But you see this song gives me a Joy Rush...

I don't know if you have any bears in your life, I don't know if any one's ever seen the bear in you...but if you smile like I do when Lyle reminds us "they just don't come no better than a bear." You know why this song is a Joy Rush for me. I have some seriously wonderful bears that I like to lunch with, and wow it awes me that someone gets it.

6. Daisies. Planting daisies. Looking at daisies, touching them. They fill up a special little corner of my heart.

7. Sometimes I worry that I talk too much about being divorced, that people think I'm obsessing over something negative, but here is a little special secret, just between me, you and the internets. It isn't an obsession with the death of my marriage...it is an obsession with the person I subsequently discovered in my solitude, the woman I found hiding out waiting to shine. I hope it doesn't sound ego-centric, but she totally gives me a Joy Rush. She makes me cry sometimes because I waited so damn long to find her.

8. The way my Scottish boss says my name, the way it was intended to be pronounced.

9.

This face. How can that not make you happy?

There are maybe a million moments every day that have the potential to be a Joy Rush, if only we choose to open ourselves up to them. Maybe the biggest Joy Rush is just slowing down long enough to just catch them as they fly through our fingers. Thanks for reminding me to open my hands, Barb.

If you'd like to, tell me what kinds of Joy Rushes you've been catching lately. I'm sure it will give me another one...totally contagious, this is.

I'm back

2008-05-15T15:04:00.002-05:00

So I hid my blog away for a little while because I got a call from the ex who made me feel like someone was cyberstalking me. And you know I know this person (who really already doesn't like me) and it felt a little creepy. So I made my blog private for awhile and considered deleting it all together. After awhile though, I realized that I LIKE my little blog and if mean-spirited crazy person wants to read my random thoughts, memes, and funny things that my kids say, well then, welcome to the looney bin.

And the rest of you, I love you. So there.

Sigh

2008-04-29T21:03:00.003-05:00

I need to make this blog private. I know I don't post that much anymore, but if you'd like to still have access to it. Leave me a comment or drop me an email and I'll hook you up.

Update on Emily

2008-04-28T18:25:00.004-05:00

I just wanted to let you all know that Emily will have her surgery on her arm on Wednesday morning. The surgeons need a relatively small amount of bone that can be saved (I believe it was a quarter of an inch on the sides and below her shoulder socket) in order to be able to place pins in her arm to save it. If removing the tumor takes too much of the bone tissue, they will have to amputate. She's had really good progress with the chemotherapy...all but two of the tumors in her lungs are completely gone! This surgery is a big thing for her. Keep her in your thoughts, drop a prayer for her, or eat some sketti on her behalf. She's a livin' doll, really, she is.

Go lightly.

2008-04-21T18:29:00.004-05:00

If one were to read my last post, say, without knowing me, or um...talking to me regularly, you might think that I'm a drama queen. But those people who know me, love me, and talk to me every stinking day will assure you that I am a drama queen. It's all good. I know who I am and I know when to succumb to it and when to ride it lightly. Please know that I'm okay, Dev is okay, and we are riding it lightly 90% of the time. And when we need to be dramatic, we tackle that with panache...and try to step on each other's lines without stumbling over them.

On Sunday I picked up the boys after church. It was their weekend with their dad, but he works with the youth group on Sunday afternoons so they spend a few hours with me. It's generally a nice quiet time to kick back or make a trip to the library. This week Dev produced a CD I'd made for him while the divorce was still fresh, full of tunes to help keep him upbeat, that called upon both my history and his, our shared love of music. We popped it in as we drove home and it ran through a couple of songs as I drove to work today, and it made me smile. I picked Dev up from his second to last day at the hospital partial program and we sang The Bear Necessities together as I drove him to his daycare. And when I hopped in the car to drive home, I turned the key and was greeted with this.

This is the key to our life, to any life really. Go lightly.

Oh and also?

2008-04-19T14:20:00.001-05:00

In case anyone thinks I'm not still grounded to a real life, my darling Foster puked all over the carpet while I was typing all that. He's just keepin' me real and all that.

Bad Date Olympics

2008-03-04T12:43:00.005-06:00

In honor of my "getting back out there" I'd sure love to hear your favorite bad date stories. You know...to keep my expectations in check.

And for my comrade Barb, I'm adding this:

Harry: It was the most uncomfortable night of my life.
Sally: Oh...The first day back is always the toughest Harry.
Harry: We only had one date. How do you know it's not going to get worse?
Sally: How much worse can it get than finishing dinner having him reaching over pull a hair out of my head and starts flossing with it at the table?
Harry: We're talking dream dates compared to my horror. It started out fine, she's a very nice person, and we're sitting and we're talking at this Ethiopian restaurant that she wanted to go to. And I was making jokes, you know like, "Hey I didn't know that they had food in Ethiopia? This will be a quick meal. I'll order two empty plates and we can leave."
[Sally laughs]
Harry: Yeah, nothing from her not even a smile. So I down shift into small talk, and I asked her where she went to school and she said. "Michigan State", and this reminds me of Helen. All of a sudden I'm in the middle of this mess of an anxiety attack, my heart is beating like a wild man and I start sweating like a pig.
Sally: Helen went to Michigan State?
Harry: No she went to Northwestern, but they're both Big-Ten schools. I got so upset I had to leave the restaurant.
Sally: Harry I think this takes a long time. It might be months before we're actually able to enjoy going out with someone new.
Harry: Yah...
Sally: And maybe longer, before we're actually able to go to bed with someone new.
Harry: Oh I went to bed with her.
Sally: You went to bed with her?
Harry: Sure.
Sally: Oh.

My worst date (thus far) was when I was young and impressionable but um...not THAT impressionable. My sister set me up with the son of a friend. He was about my age and he seemed to develop an instant crush on me. So he called me up and invited me out to do "something." This should have been the tip off, but he'd been talked up a lot, so I decided to give it a shot. He picked me up in his pickup truck and off we went to "somewhere" which ended up meaning picking up his best friend (because first dates are always better with extra people) and we went and saw one of the renditions of Lethal Weapon, I don't remember which. While not much of a date movie, I was happy for getting to look at Mel Gibson for a few hours, which ended up being the high point of the evening. After we left the movie he suggested that we "drive around" which is normal young people entertainment for nearly anyone, so it didn't surprise me. What did surprise me was that for these boys, "driving around" included finding car loads of people of other races, yelling racial epithets at them, and throwing things at their cars. He was shocked that I refused to see him after that. Go figure.

So tell me yours. Pulleeese?

Trapped in an alternate universe

2008-02-17T14:01:00.002-06:00

I probably shouldn't complain. I'm spending my afternoon with the five year old...the picky one. About an hour ago we started discussing options for lunch. He didn't want this sandwich or that soup. Nope, no left over spaghetti or chili. He would have settled for some beanie weanie, if I had either the beans or the weanies to make such a thing. So I did the only thing we could do, we went on a tour of the kitchen, me fully expecting to be feeding him cereal with syrup or somthing. You have to understand, this is the child who won't eat green M & M's for fear that they are vegetable like. So you probably can understand why I nearly fainted when after a cursory glance at the fridge, he announced he'd have a salad...no, no meat required.

If he finishes up and goes up to clean his room I'm calling the police.

Emily Rose

2008-02-11T11:02:00.001-06:00

In January, my nine year old niece was diagnosed with osteocarcinoma, a cancer that manifested in the bones of her arm, and subsequently spread into her lungs through the lymphatic system. The cancer was found because a mass in her upper arm grew large enough to break the bone. She has begun chemotherapy treatments, and if they can get the tumor in her arm down to manageable size she will have her arm amputated at the shoulder.

My half-sister, Karla and her husband Dan have no health insurance and have been out of work for several weeks now caring for Emily. Their local women's club (in San Diego) is doing a fundraiser for them. If you have even a couple of dollars to spare to help them out, I know we would all appreciate it. The address to mail donations is:

Checks payable to: GFWC-MIRA MESA WOMEN'S CLUB

Mail to:
Sandra Cabral
10769 Parkdale Avenue
San Diego, Ca. 92126

Edited to add website (paypal button here): www.EmilyRoseBare.com

For anyone who is in the San Diego area and would like details on the event being held at Fudruckers for Emily, please email me and I'll get you the flyer.

Support a candidate this year who wants to do something about the state of health care for everyone in this nation. Emily is a good reminder of why it is so vital that this issue be addressed.

When Carolie Talks, People Listen

2008-01-31T09:48:00.000-06:00

I don't know what it is exactly, but being about the sweetest thing on the planet probably doesn't hurt her at all. The simple fact of the matter is, when Carolie asks you to do a meme, you just can't seem to turn her down. I personally think it is because she is so polite. Lesson for your kids, right there.

So without further ado, here it is.

The Rules:

Link to the person that tagged you and post the rules on your blog.
Share five random and/or weird facts about yourself on your blog. Share the five top places on your “want to see or want to see again” list.

Tag a minimum of five random people at the end of your post and include links to their blogs.

Let each person know that they have been tagged by leaving a comment in their blog.

The Meme:

I was tagged by Carolie.

Five Random/Weird Facts About Me:

My parents names are (were...my father is gone now) Fred and Wilma. My mom remembers when there was a contest going on to name the stone-age family and is pretty sure one of her friends made some money off of that.
I was thirty years old the first time I saw the ocean.
Each of my four siblings and myself were all born in different states...with the exception of T. who was born in another country.
My brother has been in a film with Robert DiNero.
My children were both named after contractors who had touched our lives in one way or another...but really just so named because we liked the names

Top five places I want to visit or visit again:

Dublin
Rome
Vancouver
Africa
Beijing

Tag at least five friends:

Becky at Home Sweet Homeschool
Barb at So The Thing Is
Cyndi at The Rainbow Connection
LaDonna at Notes from Never Never Land
Mandie at Quintessential Quentin
and an extra for good measure (because we accountants have to stick together) Karly at Our Normal Life

Co-Parenting Bloggers? Anyone? Anyone?

2008-01-21T13:07:00.000-06:00

I've been having a hard time with my kids you might say. And when I'm having a hard time there is always one place I know to turn...Doctor Google. Doctor Google always has a plethora of advice, good, bad and ugly. But what Doctor Google lacks in discriminating taste, she (yes, she's a female Doc, deal with it) makes up for in volume and accessibility. But alas, since my divorce she's been failing me more and more often.

The point is, the amount of resources out there as help for people in co-parenting situations is miserable. Most of it comes in the form of lectures about how to handle the co-parenting plan when the divorce is going on, and step-parents patting themselves on the back for putting up with the biological parent not living in their home. There is nothing that I can find that offers any kind of support forum for people who are co-parenting. There is nothing that I can find about learning how to be an effective disciplinarian in a situation where you are desperately missing your child half the time, and dealing with an entitled brat the other half of the time. Nothing that I can find about maintaining your sanity when your ex makes your children start calling his girlfriend their step mother. Not much out there to support those of us doing this strange and very difficult work "for the kids."

Well, I'm sitting here looking at Doctor Google saying, "You know, somebody should do something about that." It wasn't Doctor Google at all, but some ghost from the past who sounded like a housewife said, "Um, you know you ARE somebody, right?"

So right now, as of this moment, I'm looking for bloggers who are also co-parents. I'm looking for people just starting off in the co-parent adventure, and people who have done it for years, moms or dads although I'd rather not it be "steps." And even though I respect them greatly, this really isn't about the parents doing it largely on their own. I'm looking very specifically at dealing with the issues of sharing parenting responsibilities with someone else. I suppose co-parents who were never married or significantly involved too, even though I don't have a lot of experience where the "other" parent is significantly involved in the child's life in those. And while we all know the children are of the utmost importance (that is why we make these choices, isn't it?) I want this blog to be about parents caring for themselves too.

What blog? Oh that's why I'm looking. I want to make a resource for co-parents. I like the blog format because it is personal and inviting, but I think it will need various contributors because a) I couldn't find enough fodder for a useful blog all myself, and b) I won't learn anything if I'm only blathering on about my own experiences and c) there is power in numbers.

So if you know a co-parenting blogger, are a co-parenting blogger, know of anyone who might know a co-parenting blogger, tell them to drop me a line here in my comments. I will email them back ASAP.

What comes around goes around.

2008-01-18T11:42:00.000-06:00

Maybe you've noticed how I often blog conversations between my kids and myself. Part of the reason for this is I'm kind of pathetic and they are the centers of my little teeny tiny universe. So I'm trying to talk about it right now while it is still cute, not a symptom of an over attached mother who doesn't have a life.

The other reason I do it is that they are really much funnier and more interesting than I am. They just lack the mad typing skills I have (heh, heh...please don't find my ninth grade typing teacher and ask her though because that would be awkward...yeah). But mostly its just that old silly motherly pride and all of that.

Yesterday I was driving with my eight year old through some fairly icy streets. It was just the two of us (please don't ask me why he was not in school like his brother...the hemmorage is just starting to heal). He was goofing around with one of his little brother's motorized trains in the back seat when he "accidentally" launched it across the car and it banged on the door opposite his with a loud thud.

"Reer! Reer! Reer! Reer!-Thump!" went Thomas as he bravely tried to climb the door behind me. "Reer! Reer! Reer! Reer!-Thump!"

"Mom, can you reach that?"

I was in a small skid on the ice. "Um, no, I can't take my hands off the wheel."

"Well then I'm going to!"

"You, young man, will NOT take your seat belt off until the car is stopped, do you understand me?"

"Reer! Reer! Reer! Reer!-Thump!"

"Mom, that noise is making me crazy, crazy I tell you!"

"Reer! Reer! Reer! Reer!-Thump!"

"You WILL HAVE TO WAIT."

"Reer! Reer! Reer! Reer!-Thump!"

At this point the sound that came from my son was somewhere between the hacking noise my cat makes when there is a hairball issue and the unmistakeable sound of a walrus dying.

"THAT sound was much better, thanks."

"Reer! Reer! Reer! Reer!-Thump!"

"Mommy! I threw up!"

"Uh. OK. Well I don't smell anything, goober."

"I was just kidding, Mom. Playing a joke on you."

"Reer! Reer! Reer! Reer!-Thump!"

"So you've got yourself a sense of humor, do you? Who said you could have one of those?"

"Hey don't look at me, lady. I came from you, what do you expect?"

Oh gad. I'm in so much trouble.

Who says customer service is dead?

2008-01-15T22:00:00.000-06:00

As you all know, I turned 39 in November (Ooops! Almost typed "30" - that would have been an unfortunate error, huh?) What this meant, among many other things, is that I had been a citizen of Iowa for FIVE years. FIVE. For my friends who "went through" the move from Colorado with me, I know they are probably as in shock about that as I am. Time really does fly when you are having fun...or whatever the hell it is I've been doing. Ok, ok...time flies when you are getting divorced too. That's really true, in a sad way. ANYWAY. Five years. I didn't really stop and think about all that signified at the time. A benchmark perhaps, but I'd have to consider that later because there were Christmas gifts to postpone buying, boxes that I'd postponed unpacking long enough, and of course the usual every day drama to deal with. I'd reminisce about my five years of being an Iowanian later.

Funny, the Department of Transportation really doesn't like you to put off some things. Yeah. I had totally forgotten that this was my year to renew my driver's license until some clerk carded me for a bottle of sparkling grape juice on Christmas eve and said "Oh hey, you know your license is expired?"

D'oh!

So at that point I figure I'm already 30 days behind...what the hell is the rush now? I planned a day off to go to the DOT around a day that I already had numerous other reasons to be off work (yes, I spent half my day at the school...if you were wondering). I hopped on the DOT site last night to see how much money and how many hoops I'd have to jump through. I'd already cleaned out my car in anticipation of having have a driving test. There are several reasons I'm glad I did this. For starters, I found out that the DOT station I've gone to for everything since I moved here, just a few blocks from where I used to live...has been permanently closed. I had to drive to Ankeny, which isn't that far, but honestly? Isn't that close either. You'd think that the freaking state capital would have at least ONE operating DOT station, but noooo. Anyway. (I'm saying that a lot, huh?)

The other thing I learned pissed me off (at myself) to no end. I had assumed, for no reason what so ever other than it made sense to me, that there was a thirty day grace period for getting your driver's license renewed. Nope! The state of Iowa is generous and gives you a sixty day grace period. Being a collections professional it is very easy for me to calculate days quickly. Today was, you got it SIXTY-TWO days after my 39th birthday, the day my driver's license expired. So, it seemed I would have to take a written test (they only require the driving test if you've let it lapse for over a year...I should really do more research earlier, shouldn't I?) So I spent about three hours last night cramming like a teenager for my stupid driving test.

I stood in line and my strange stress thinking had me conversely panicking and laughing like hell at myself. What if they arrest me for driving up here without a valid license? What if they fine me? Then I'd laugh at myself. I got up to the counter. The lady was not as good at figuring out the past due days as I am (I'm telling you it, truly it is a MUST in my industry) and she got out her little cheat sheet..."so it would have been sixty days on...."

"Sunday." I assured her.

"When we wouldn't have been open, so if you would have been here yesterday you would have been ok." She gave me a sad little smile.

I nodded sheepishly, probably looking much like my children do when caught with their fingers in the proverbial cookie jar. "I don't suppose the fact that the Department of Transportation cares much about it being the holidays and that I moved, and that my kid was having trouble in school during this time."

She smiled wryly. "Not really. But I don't think they really care very much about 24 hours either. We'll just let it go. Go get your vision test and your license and go home."

One of the nicest thing anyone has ever done for me. But I wish I would have known that before studying for three hours. Seriously.

Politics as usual?

2008-01-10T21:22:00.000-06:00

Earnest and sincere my youngest looked at me, clearly wishing to communicate that he had learned something important.

"Mommy, did you know that Mr. Obama and Mr. Huckleberry won the cacsukahs?"

My nose wrinkled. My eyes watered. I pinched my lips together hard. Must not laugh. The eyes watered some more.

"Caucuses. Um. Yes do you know what the caucuses are for?"

My oldest chimed in, eager to show that he was better than his brother at yet one more thing..."To choose the president!"

"Well sort of, to choose our presidential candidates for the two major political parties in the country, the Democrats and the Republicans."

"But we're Democrats, right Mom?" That older boy. Pretty darn sure of himself.

"Well, I'M a Democrat. Your father is too. You don't belong to any party right now. Why is that?"

"You have to be eighteen to vote. But I'm going to be a Democrat because I think war is stupid. People should use their words, not fight in wars."

"Hmm...well I don't know if it is quite that simple, but yes, it would be nice if everyone would just use their words to work out their differences. So you aren't old enough to vote, but do you know how old you have to be in order to be the President of the United States?"

"Eleven or twelve?" offered the young one helpfully.

"No, actually you have to be at least 35 years old!"

"Wow! Really, that's old."

"So do you think anyone you know could be president?"

"Well, I don't know..."

"Could Miss R from church be the President?"

"Yes, yes, she'd be a good president, she's good at using her words!"

"Nope, sorry boys she's only 22, too young to be president."

"Daddy could be president!"

"Well sure. What about me, do you think I could be president?"

The gurgling noise coming from my youngest was unmistakable. He was drowning in his own laughter.

"Hey! What's that for, why couldn't I be president?!?"

"You're a MOMMY, Mommy. You've got IMPORTANT stuff to do."

Well then. Okay.

8 days and no food in the house

2007-12-27T21:49:00.000-06:00

Whew. Its been a week! Last Wednesday I picked up the boys from daycare and came home to find the police parked in my driveway...they ended up cluttering my lawn for several hours, as my neighbor's 12 year old daughter was missing. In the end, we found out that Little Miss M. was holed up at a friend's house, and she was in trouble, BIG TIME. In the mean time we joined our new friends across the street for their regular potluck. Of course the weekend was full of last minute holiday preparations and of course...more snow. We bagged on church on Sunday as the boys were both a little under the weather. A big surprise to me on Monday was that Elyas didn't have daycare available (note to self: read the small print on the signs at daycare) so he went to work with Mom for the morning and charmed himself into the hearts of several. Christmas was magical and wonderful and surprisingly peaceful and calm. Wednesday night I was too beat to cook, so we ate out - forgetting that I had scheduled us to be at the first Single Parents Meetup at Chuck E. Cheese's tonight. So needless to say, despite the holiday, I haven't been on my schedule too much. I've had to stop at (blushing madly) the convenience store the last two days to have a lunch to send with Elyas to daycare, and sadly will have to do the same tomorrow because I haven't carved out an extra 20 minutes to go buy those crazy items you need to pack lunch - things like bread.

I've kept busier than ever in the last week plus a day, but I'm thinking there are a few things I need to do if I'm going to continue on this path.

a) Um...buy groceries. Hello unprepared girl!

b) Buy more socks for the boys. If I'm not going to get laundry done during the week, I need spare sets because those crazy things seem to slink off and hide in places that I haven't discovered as of this point in the new house.

c) Ask for more. It is interesting how much you get when you ask for it. My life has been blossoming since I just decided to find people to spend time with!

Peace and love to you my friends!

Road signs?

2007-12-18T12:42:00.000-06:00

Life is a strange journey. I've often told people that I really don't believe in fate, but do kind of think that there is a "preferred path" and that life throws you road signs sometimes. I often find myself whizzing down my own personal interstate yelling "Hey did anyone see what that sign said? That semi was blocking my view and..." Well, I don't know maybe I need to slow down, or get on a quieter path, or stop talking to imaginary backseat passengers. Because it is a pain in the ass to have to get off at the next intersection, turn all the way around and drive back to find out the sign said the next exit was your junction. Humph.

About two weeks ago I got an email from our DRE at church asking me to sub for the Kindergarten class at church. I was happy to oblige, the kindergarten class has one of my favorite offspring in it not to mention a bunch of other Happy Shiny People. What could be more fun than an hour and a half with a bunch of five year old kids?
Well, it wasn't quite the picnic I'd dreamt up, my own child was goofy and out of control, which was an interesting combination with being glued to my body. The three stooges, as I've come to think of them, are three little boys a bit younger than my Elyas who all entered the church at about the same time, who all attended the same preschool and whose mothers all hang out together. They used to be ever so sweet as a little gang. These days they are just ever so loud, and raucous. And did I mention loud? There are some very charming little girls in the class who seemed to have a bad case of being bulldozed by the one regular teacher's daughter. And they all cried at the drop of a hat. Except for one little girl who was dressed in a lovely christmasy red dress with velvet sleeves and a satin skirt and all kinds of sparkles. She took one look at Elyas perched on my lap and decided that perhaps that is where she needed to be as well. So they squirmed happily next to each other through the story and discussion, and if Elyas whispered a comment in one ear, she was sure to come up with another. And then, something kind of surprising happened. Like I said, I decided to make my teaching commitment as a substitute this year, making sure that there is coverage when other teachers want to have a life or something. So I don't know all the kids names. As it happened when this little princess decided she needed to do a dance recital for me rather than do the craft project I still didn't know her name. I was really surprised when the other teacher said, "That was really very nice, Aria, lets sit down at the table now." If I'd been drinking something I might have done a spit take. I've only heard the name Aria once (actually spelled differently) in my life and it belongs to another amazing person who happens to be a very close friend and neighbor of my friend Cyndi. I met her when I visited Arizona in February. I found it kind of amazing because despite the geographic, age, and yes even racial differences between the two, there are some specific personality similarities. The phrase "spitfire" comes to mind. I had a moment of thinking maybe this was a sign, but I passed it off as interesting coincidence. Aria's mom picked her up after class and I congratulated her on raising such an affectionate kid and awe inspiring dancer, and that, was that.

Or.

So that leads us to this weekend. I did my normal weekend without the kids stuff, shopping (note to self, when your kid wants one of the most popular toys on the market for Christmas, waiting until the last minute is really stupid...really...), cleaning, web surfing, church, crafting. etc. But it is really getting hard sometimes - the solitude of it all. I spent a lot of time thinking how much I'd like to have some more friends. I even looked at some dating sites again, which made me throw up in my mouth a little bit. But the truth of the matter is I've been on my own for about 20 months and my circle hasn't really grown. I've recently joined a single parents meetup, but nothing has really happened with that yet. And I'm feeling pretty isolated.
That's really where I've been for several days. I woke up feeling kind of blah, but decided to start my day with a flourish and try to shake off the sad feelings. My car had become a pit of crap the kids had drug into it, so I decided to clean it out before heading out to work early. I grabbed a trash bag and opened up the car from the passenger side and began shoveling crap out. It was cold...I don't know the exact temperature, so let's just call it STINKIN' cold. And when it is STINKIN' cold, you know it takes a few minutes for your car to warm up, so I decided to start the car while I finished this job up, I put my purse and stuff down in the driver seat and put the key in the ignition and started it up. I filled up the bag and turned to take it to the garbage can. As the door swung shut behind me I remembered that my car automatically locks the doors when the ignition is engaged. I was locked out - of my car - of my house. My cell phone was in the car. And remember, it was STINKIN' cold. I tried to figure out how to break in...to the car or the house for about ten minutes. Then I tried knocking on the landlord's door. I think, I'm not sure, that they might have moved into one of the other rentals across town. At any rate they weren't answering the door at 7:15 am. Nor were the neighbors on the south of the house. My neighbors in the duplex were home, but their phones (a cell only family) were not. I looked starkly up and down the block. I really know no one around here. How horrifying to have to walk up to a stranger's house and beg for help. And yet, what else was I going to do?

I remembered our first weekend here, the neighbor across the street had come up to express his concern about the boys playing too close to the street, he'd seemed nice, so I decided, well, I'd start there. I took a deep breath and rang the bell. At first I thought they were not home...quiet then a dog, not really barking but kind of grumbling. Footsteps and the door swung open, I started delivering the speech to a pair of bare feet and the bottom of a grey terry bathrobe.

"I'm so sorry to bother you so early, I'm your neighbor across the street and..." as my eyes traveled up I saw the beagle pacing behind her and I met her eyes. It was Aria's mother! I nearly fainted. We had a big "it's a small, small world" moment and then she slipped on a pair of uggs and grabbed a wire coat hanger. She stood out in the STINKIN' cold for about 20 minutes trying to work her magic on my car (she is no stranger to locking her keys in the car she assures me) and when she couldn't she invited me in to call a locksmith. We chatted for nearly 45 minutes while she puttered around in varying stages of getting ready for her own day. She invited me to dinner on Wednesday. "We do a potluck with friends every Wednesday. I tend to tell people when we aren't going to do it rather than when we are, it's just easier." I confided in her that Elyas is rather partial to tea parties which she was thrilled about. "Aria needs a tea party partner!" And as it happens, Aria is rather partial to trains, so that's kind of nice too.

Maybe I didn't miss the exit after all, but I needed a big flashing neon sign to get to it. Maybe.

Or maybe it just really is a small small world. Whatever. Kind of a good story, I thought.

Things that confuse me

2007-12-16T18:40:00.000-06:00

I get those moments once in awhile when I find myself obsessing over something that just makes me batty. I don't want to do this, necessarily (although, maybe I do and I just don't know it) so I think maybe writing these "Things that make you go 'Hmmm?'" things out would help me get them out of my head and maybe you'd have ideas about them...or even just find them entertaining.

Here lately, it's home decor choices. Now I'm all for freedom of expression...or even lack of desire to express anything at all, but sometimes you just have to wonder WHY people do what they do. I'm very able to freely admit that my family had basically nothing while I was growing up...we spent a good part of my youth in a 10 x 60 trailer house (you do the math on that...it had two bedrooms the size of postage stamps), so I spent my youth dreaming of getting OUT of rooms covered in horrible pressed wood paneling covered in what would have been photocopy wood, had there been color photocopiers back then. I see the stuff now and I have a visceral reaction...it makes me want to run away screaming and play Barbies all at the same time. But I've always kind of thought, oh well, it was a stamp of our poverty, that's all. No one really chooses to live in that.

But you know, I'm either a very bad judge of about the amount of money some people make or there are some crazy people out there. I'm not saying that I know lots of people who have the exact stuff that was on the walls of our trailer. But my friend Barb recently posted pictures of a house she's buying soon, with strong disclaimers that she's REMOVING the wallpaper, so try to have some imagination! I look at these pictures and I keep thinking about who in the world chooses to take the same ugly little reprinted picture and cover an entire room in it? The house she is buying is neither old (although I'm not sure I give any more credit to someone who did it thirty years ago than I would to someone who did it last summer), nor is it a cheapie one size fits all kind of house, slapped together by someone who didn't give a rat's pa-toot about who might actually have to look at this stuff daily. In fact, as much wallpaper as there is in this joint, it would appear to be a personal preference! Color me...dismayed. Really? This little man chopping wood with his blotchy handlebar moustache is an image you want to look at not only on a daily basis, but in kaleidoscope effect while you are curling your hair and brushing your teeth?

Really. Wow.

Maybe I'm just a bitch, or completely uninformed about the joys of wallpaper, but I really don't understand what would drive a perfectly logical person to go out and spend perfectly good money, time, energy and effort on such a thing. Particularly when Debbie Travis is out there leading the crusade for paint. Listen to Debbie my friends. She knows her stuff.

Love Saturday

2007-12-15T12:38:00.000-06:00

Ah screw the rules. Today made me all warm and fuzzy in the middle of yet another snow storm, so I'd better share. It isn't Thursday, so I'm sure the earth is going to spin off it's axis. The sacrifices I'm willing to make for my kids!

Today was Elyas's first basket ball game. Can I just share a secret with you? If you are sad, bored, depressed, angry, lonely or questioning if there is a reason to go on, find out where the four and five year old kids in your town are playing basket ball, or hockey, or soccer, or whatever and get yourself there. Go particularly if it is the first time they've ever played. My son, in particular took the cry of "DEFENSE!" so seriously, hands up, dancing around like he was doing drills for a football practice. The problem of course is he had no idea why he was doing this and would watch his opponents run right by him with the ball and shoot. He never stopped dancing. LOL. One little boy (actually the littlest boy, so cute!) was told at one point to guard the basket, the coach positioned him right under the basket, and he refused to move for the rest of the game. His coach had to pick him up and carry him to the huddle after they finished. Players routinely left the court in the middle of the game to hug their mommies, or even better their preschool teachers that they haven't seen for four or five months. The lone little girl on the league was sure to cry foul when she got benched, stomping her feet and telling her mother it was sexism (totally not making that up!)

On the last play of the game Elyas got the ball and he was running with it (apparently traveling is not a problem in the under six version of basketball). The three other times he'd had the ball during the game another member of his own team had stolen it from him while he was TRYING to dribble and so this time he wrapped his arms around it and barrelled into the crowd and ran straight for the little boy anchored under the basket. As the buzzer sounded his dad shouted "Shoot Elyas!" And wouldn't you know it, he tossed it and it landed - somewhere near the locker room.

As I was walking to my car I heard one little boy explaining to his mom why he thought maybe it would be more fun to play basket ball with knee pads and a helmet. I wondered if Elyas had anything to do with that request.

I haven't laughed so much in months.

My first theological discussion with Elyas

2007-12-13T20:30:00.000-06:00

It also happens to be the most convoluted theological discussion I've ever had. Follow me inside the mind of Elyas, but stay close we wouldn't want to get separated...

"Mom, why do people say grace?"

"Well some people say grace because they believe in God and they think -"

"YOU BELIEVE IN GOD?"

"Well no, not really, but some people do and they think it is important to thank him for the good things they have in life. The reason WE say grace is -"

"Does Dad believe in God?"

"Maybe you should ask him about that."

"But black people don't believe in God!"

"Really, that's what you think?"

"Yeah."

"Why?"

"Black people just don't. Only white people."

"Hum...no honey I think that all kinds of people black or white or whatever believe - "

"And tan people? Like me and Devereaux?"

"Yes, and tan people too...believe in God and all kinds of people also don't believe in God or believe in other kinds of things."

"But do they wear underwear?"

"Huh? Yeah. What?"

"Why do we have to wear underwear anyway? It's just stupid. And socks! Why do we have to wear socks? Mom, where are you going?"

Where ever you go, there you are.

2007-12-07T19:06:00.000-06:00

Not too long ago, I started entertaining the notion of taking up the fight with the ex-husband that would undoubtedly ensue by moving my little family away from here, away from him and the pain of our divorce and into the loving arms of my family and/or friends in other states. I had conjured up images of long sunny days frolicking in the yard with cousins and kinda-cousins, sharing drinks with my sisters or my girls and giggling. Maybe I'd even find myself a nice man who lived in my circles and settle down again. My mama and I could bond, my kids would know my family and community values.

Or.

As I reflected it became apparent to me that I was perpetuating a tradition of idealizing the dead. It is, I suppose a coping mechanism that we humans have to remember the dead fondly, we tend to blot out their very human traits that irritated or even harmed us. It hurts us to know that someone will remember our own transgressions, so I suppose in forgiving theirs, we forgive our own. Nevertheless...sooner or later I had to recognize that not only was my own very dead past just as buried in the dust as any saintly gone-by relative, but that it had just as many of its own ugly tales buried under the rosy glow of my wishful memories. What would small town Nebraska have to offer me in the way of support or even after-school care for my behaviorally challenged special needs kid? How about my family? How would they deal with his condition when faced with the sometimes hard realities of it? How about my hippy dippy approach to spirituality? I actually spent sometime thinking about all the reasons I've left all the places that I've left. And I became pretty despondent.

Why do I not find the peace I'm looking for? What is missing? I wrote a blog, when I first started blogging about the old Marcel Proust quote, "The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes." I've tried to have new eyes, but the same old ones seem to be there every day when I wake up. I find myself more recently remembering another quote, that I can't quite recall verbatim and can't seem to even google up, but it was from a recovering alcoholic (is that the proper term these days?) who laments that the problem with getting sober is that you have to deal with the person that started drinking in the first place. That strikes some serious chords in this whole battle about where to call home. I think I've been running from place to place, and dragging the problems right along with me, because I never stuck around long enough to quite get "sober." These days I'm sober. I'm not running. I'm dealing. But facing the person who started running in the first place, it isn't easy.

Taking it slow. Practicing forgiveness. Have you been there?

True Believer

2007-12-07T17:03:00.000-06:00

Until I became a Unitarian Universalist, I thought I was a pretty weird duck. Well, if we are being honest, I am a pretty weird duck, but you know, I've found out there are others. It seems less weird when you have company.

A big "for instance" always comes up this time of year when moms and dads, grandmas and grandpas and various and sundry others who think they need to weigh in on our parenting choices all begin the debate about,"Is Santa a cherished holiday rite of childhood, or a ridiculous lie that destroys children's trust in their parents?" And I struggle with not getting snarky, because, while I'm pretty much an atheist (humanist, I suppose, but I see that title as issue avoidance) I firmly believe in Santa Claus. Confused? But SANTA CLAUS, you must be thinking, "C'mon Ei that one is easy to prove. There is a paper trail that leads directly back to your parents, right?" But you are wrong.

I was really late in figuring it out as a kid, I think maybe 12. I like to think that this was not because I was stupid so much as hopeful. And my discovery was rather hurtful because I was a temperamental kid (much like an eight year old who sleeps at my house) and my mom was rather blunt in her delivery...and it all kind of sucked. The end result was, "Hey kid, Christmas magic is over. Welcome to adulthood." It ruined my holidays for several years to come. Everything about the holiday took on a hollowness. Decorating the tree wasn't as much fun, baking cookies, buying gifts - it was like someone took a vacuum to the season and sucked all the color out of it. My favorite holiday in my teens was sitting with my grandmother in the nursing home, listening to her and my mom tell stories about days when I didn't even exist.

Not blaming the event in question, perhaps it was just a theme in my life, but life in general seemed to go that direction in my teens and early adulthood. By the time I was 20 it was pretty much at critical mass. I don't remember anyone talking much about clinical depression at that time, but I know I had it (still do) and this added with the daily trials and trauma of being 20 and being a college student with poor social skills were taking its toll. The many friends I'd made my freshman year were all busy with new mini-soap operas and I was just too sad to get involved. I couldn't make ends meet and I was lonely. I lived in a trailer by myself surrounded by other college students whose lives seemed to be non-stop dating and parties. I became addicted to MTV and skipping class. I took very poor care of myself (I won't even go into the food that I ate at this time...if you've lived through college, you probably have a story or two yourself). I had an old boyfriend show up at my doorstep one evening and he spent the night...just long enough to give me and STD and to crush my self esteem into the ugly shag carpet.

As we rolled around to finals in December, I was hanging by a thread. I woke up the morning before my final in history (that I knew I would fail) and tried to decide if I would go in and face the music or kill myself. Honestly. I laid there trying to decide which would be the most painful, and which embarrassment would be worse for my family, the high school honor student, Board of Trustees Scholarship recipient flunking out of college, or just killing herself because she was so pathetic?

I don't know why exactly but I decided to take the test. Maybe to give myself proof that the other option was the best choice. Maybe because I was afraid that if there WAS an afterlife, I'd have to witness how little anyone cared about my life. But I got dressed, put my hair in a ponytail and went out to start my car. I remember it was really snowy and I was afraid it wouldn't start. But it did. Once it did start I reached for my cigarettes and realized I'd left them in the house, so I quickly pulled the keys out of the ignition and ran inside to get them.

When I climbed back into the car I reached to push the lighter in as I started the car and knocked something to the floor, I peered at it. It was a little blue foil wrapped Christmas candy, with a picture of Santa stamped on the front. Someone had slipped in my car and set it there where I would find it when I'd run in the house. It wasn't frozen, so I knew it had only been there moments. I looked all around but could see no one. My neighbors all seemed to be gone. I couldn't even think of a person in the world who might have wanted to do something nice for me, much less have done it in secret.

I didn't take my history exam that day, nor did I kill myself (well, okay, duh). I did sit holding that little piece of chocolate for about three hours, crying. It became the day I call upon when I think about Christmas, and very much so Santa, who undoubtedly delivered that chocolate to me, via traditional Santa magic, which is moving hearts with kindness and love. Santa saved my life that day, probably. And if he didn't, he certainly saved my faith in mankind.

My kids know Santa much the way I knew him. And one day I hope I can help them find the colors of the TRUE Santa story in a much gentler way than I found them. But I'm so glad he's there and I'm so glad to share him with my children.

So do I need to talk about S-E-X more?

2007-11-15T16:28:00.000-06:00

Or do I need to talk about the D-I-V-O-R-C-E less?

Oh come on, I've been wanting to reference that song for a year and a half.

Go me!

2007-11-14T20:59:00.000-06:00

So as I mentioned, today is my birthday. I guess my boys have really been saving their pennies because after a rotten day at work I picked them up and took us out to dinner. Our usual diner is being remodeled, so we took ourselves to Perkins. And the boys gave me a great little table lamp and a DVD player. Our old DVD player died in January. In May I bought a portable DVD player that I could attach to the TV for our vacation. The boys broke it two days after the 30 day warranty was up...so I wasn't in a rush to replace it. So I guess they decided they want their movies back. Ha! Well...honestly I really don't like that the ex-husband spent that kind of money on me for them, but I can't exactly say that. I just makes me feel like I owe him something, and if there is anyone I don't want to owe anything to...well. Anyway.

Guess what I did! Oh just guess! I just programmed my very own universal remote! Don't LAUGH! I've installed toilets, repaired lawn mowers, and loaded concrete at a lumber yard, but that damn universal remote scares me. I can't believe I conquered it! I feel like such a WO-man! Go me!

Who needs Santa when you have dimples?

2007-11-11T19:03:00.000-06:00

So do you think there is some subliminal messaging going on in the random play with the fridge magnets?

This, if no one has noticed, is my magic child. No seriously, great mind bending magic flies out of him when you least expect it. Remember when Harry accidentally set the snake on Dudley? It is totally like that. Like on Thursday I picked him up from daycare and we were dangerously close to being late for picking up his brother and traffic was horrible. I was at that place where every ounce of my being was being devoted to holding on to a long blue stream of obscenities. He was smiling and happy when I picked him up, as he usually is, and he was having a conversation with a train in the back seat. Suddenly he said "Mama!"

"Yeah, babe."

"Deedee is swinging from vines!"

Deedee is the name we've given the car.

"Huh?"

"See those black lines? They are vines, mom!"

I can't see any black lines. I look around thinking maybe he's seeing shadows of light posts or electrical wires or something.

"Elyas, I can't see any black lines."

"Oh, that's because this is my world mom."

See? Magic.

A new perspective

2007-10-15T21:07:00.000-05:00

So there is this interesting phenomena that takes place when you are one of two parents, doing their thing separately, instead of as a unit. The thing to which I refer is is the, well, the...oh darn, I hate to say it, because it is actually a really good thing...but it's the "Tattle syndrome." Oh I know you marrieds, your kids still tell each of you things that the other does. But when they know dad and mom aren't snuggling up at the end of the evening, I think they feel safer saying some basic truths that you might not hear otherwise. I'm in the car with the boys the other day and Elyas says something about the dog biting at them. Cranky mom, ever on the alert for something that "damn man" is doing wrong jumps on it. "He bites at you? Has he ever bit you? Does he bite at everyone?" Well, turns out it is mostly play and the dog getting over excited (still worries me) but the conversation leads to "and he jumped up on the baby and made her fall down and cry."

This was all Elyas. Dev, deep in thought murmurs, "Sometimes I dance to make her stop crying." As much as it annoys me that woman is in the house with my kids, I'm charmed by this. "That's nice babe."

"Her mom says when I'm sixteen and bring my girlfriend home she's gonna tell her all about my chicken dance."

It's really a normal tease, from adults to children, almost a right of passage. But anyone who really understands my kid knows better. You don't tease, Dev. Even when he takes it (which often he doesn't), it bruises him deeply. I could tell that this worried Dev.

"I guess adults don't always understand that stuff like that is what makes kids not want to bring their boyfriends and girlfriends home."

"Yeah, mom. I'm glad you don't say things like that."

I'm glad you are teaching me kiddo.

Who Am I?

2007-10-09T19:34:00.000-05:00

A little over a year ago, my friends and I were obsessing about a book called The Daring Female's Guide to Ecstatic Living. At the time, my separation was very fresh and new and I was ready to do a little bit of something to be ecstatic about. Anything, honestly. I was taking a great amount of solace in pouring all my thoughts out into a private blog with my close friends and it was not only a bit of good therapy, but I discovered something important. Or rather rediscovered...that I love writing. So I started this blog and posted a few of my better (and not intensely personal) blogs here and started writing...but not terribly regularly. I was still much more comfortable going to my little circle of girls and spouting off about my daily stuff.

In the process of all that, my friend Cyndi issued me a Daring Female dare. Her dare was to begin a Who Am I Journal. I in fact did this and it began an amazing journey of self discovery...some parts of which I absolutely relished, some that were quite simply painful to endure. But it made me a stronger and I think happier person. Though, there are some days I'd have to say I was wrong about that. But we all have those days, eh?

Now rather than taking you on the long winding road I've been on in the last year and a half, I'm thinking maybe I'll just tell you, this time, about where I've ended up. At first blush, I probably don't look too different than I did at that time. My job is the same, my devotion to my kids, my faith (or lack thereof, depending upon whose viewpoint you are referencing), and my friends...all the same. Even my sad dependence upon numerous ellipses remains, as you might have noticed. I still read a lot and I'm still not in a rush to find another man (I must admit I look more than I used to...still won't act on it though.) Actually, with the exception of my address, looking at my life you probably wouldn't see much of a difference at all. Did I do all that work to end up in the same place I've always been? In short, no.

When I started writing about "Who Am I" I was a woman crushed by a life, not living one. All of my expectations had been met, and that really wasn't a good thing. So I spent a lot of time dealing with the things I didn't like...and I may have done myself a disservice by spending a lot of time trying to figure out how to fix them, rather than doing what ultimately I needed to do, which is come to terms with them. So where I am now, is an awful lot like where I was then, with a gigantic difference. I like me. I may be so bold as to say, I love me. Warts and all. And that, my friends, makes all the difference in the world.

So now I have a guide to changing my life. I'm following that happy girl's lead. And I've learned two things that makes me happy are reading real "slice of life" blogs, and writing. So, I'm going to commit to writing regularly, even when I don't think anyone wants to hear it. Because this isn't about them. Sorry DaMomma, but this one really is about me. But I hope I can find some things to say that will do a little something for you too.

Nice Matters

2007-09-26T11:06:00.000-05:00

My friend Becky awarded me a kind of cool little "pay it forward" award titled the "Nice Matters Award." Since my blog has never won an award before (I wasn't even sure anyone read it at all), it thrills me that Becky saw fit to give me this award. But I have to tell you I wish I could give this award to so many people...who don't blog but live it.

First and foremost, I wish I could give it to my church. You know this week I was forced to swallow a bitter little pill for myself and ask for some help moving. That email somehow got passed on to the Care Committee at my church. And that little bird is going to make my life so much more comfortable.

My friend Twila is going through some serious stuff. I'm trying to help her. I fall down at that a lot. She still loves me. She deserves a nice award.

My kids...wow, they are some seriously nice people. You should see the picture the little one drew for me this weekend.

My boss...you remember him, the gruff Scot? Oh he's a peach. May be the nicest man I've ever known.

My SISTER. You know how nice she is? She hardly ever mentions that I'm not a Baptist. Do you know how hard that is? And she loves me anyway!

My friends who call me and forgive me for hanging up on them because I'm a big ol' butterfingers who can't manage my cell phone properly...they are NICE.

I guess I'm just saying, nice really, REALLY doesn't happen in a vacuum. And I'm so blessed that someone noticed. But I'm even more blessed for the people who teach me nice every single day.

Here are some of the bloggers who teach me nice too. They are getting the award from me.

Barb - http://www.sothethingisblog.blogspot.com/

Damomma - http://www.damomma.com/

Dale - www.parentingbeyondbelief.com/blog

First you find the pool

2007-09-24T14:40:00.001-05:00

Saturday was the official commencement of the boys swimming education. Perhaps late for Dev...perhaps a lifetime too early for Ly, but nevertheless, we were there. You may remember when I signed up it was slated to be an 8 a.m. class. So NOT cool. 8 a.m. on Saturday? That's like asking me to eat lima beans for dessert. Or beets. But then the instructor called on Monday night last week to inform me that the class had so many people sign up that they were creating a second class, and since we signed up early would we rather come to the 10 o'clock class? Well. Duh. So it became more of a fruit and yogurt parfait. Right on.

So of course, the boys were up at 5:45 on Saturday morning. Lazy things. Nevertheless, we weaved between boxes and garbage bags, evidence of our upcoming move to a duplex (a yard! bedrooms for all! an entire basement for the damn cat box!) and had a leisurely morning of cartoons and mama's French toast and fruit smoothies. And then there was this sound. The electric grinding whirring sound that does to my stomach the exact same thing that the sound of a dentist's drill does to it. It was a chainsaw...and it was close, way too close.

Dev beat me to the window. "Mom, they are cutting up our tree. Why are they cutting up our tree?" I gasped a little to see the men hanging from the tree just outside my window. "My" beautiful cherry tree was coming down in large chunks. Quickly. I gulped. "Maybe he was just getting too close to the power lines, honey." It was hopeful. But somewhere inside of me I knew it was a lie. We loaded into the car and the three of us sat there mesmerized by the sight of branches dropping, like the sick sight of hair dropping to the floor in preparation for some horrendous brain surgery. Dev started to whimper. I started the car. "Mommy, please, we can't leave our tree!" I knew there was nothing to be done. The tree belonged to the realty company, not us. I knew there had been some plumbing issues for the lower floors, and in all likelihood the trees roots were wreaking havoc with the building's plumbing. "We are going to be late if we don't go now." I lied. Class didn't start for another 45 minutes. "I'll tell you what happened when you call me from Daddy's house tonight." We paused at the drive and we all took one long last look over our shoulders and then I forcefully shook off the sad feeling washing over my body. "Swim Class!"

We soon found ourselves marching up the rather intimidating front walk of the high school where the classes are held. The building loomed large in front of us and as we entered the building I couldn't help but think of a prison movie with the architecture of the interior. "I'm sure it is better when it is full of kids." I said to no one in particular.

The boys both pressed close to me. "I don't think I'm ready for high school, Mommy." said Dev.

"Yeah, me too."

A lovely woman paused long enough to tell me that the pool was up the stairs and off to the left. We passed through the cafeteria to the stairwell she seemed to have indicated and began wandering to the left. "Mommy, aren't we going to swim?" Elyas murmured. "Yes, m'love. First we need to find the pool." We wandered for a good five minutes before I saw a light in an office. The custodian. He was very friendly and showed me where we had gone wrong. There had been a set of stairs in the cafeteria we had passed on our way to the second set. We back tracked, finally on the right track. Class commenced and they began dividing the children into groups, first by their level of fear of the water then by what they actually knew what to do. It didn't surprise me on the first pass to see my children at opposite ends of the pool...Dev on the "A little fear is a good thing, kiddo" end and Elyas on the "Water doesn't bite, sweetheart" end. About halfway through the class Elyas started wailing that he wanted his mommy. Mommy bravely sat on the bleachers and cried silently.

After drying off and warming up, I gave them both giant hugs and told them how proud I was of them for listening to their teachers, doing their best, and finishing what they started. I broke one of my own rules and carried Elyas to the car while he hugged my neck tight and kissed my cheek, repeatedly. I dropped them off at their dad's house and returned home to my monumental task of readying my home for the move the next weekend.

The tree was indeed completely gone. I ran my hand over the rugged stump and sobbed a little. Very few people know the comfort that tree had given me through the hardest time of my life, how I had laid on my bed and talked to it when there was no one else to talk to and how I felt like it heard me too. How just days before I'd told it as I drifted off to sleep that I was sorry to be moving, that I would miss it terribly and that I hoped the cherries would come in better next year. No more cherries, for me or anyone. Not from that tree.

I worked hard all day. I packed up and intensely cleaned two rooms. I broke the news to Dev that the tree was gone on the phone that night. Elyas got on the phone finally and said

"Mommy, why did they cut down the tree?"

"I don't know honey. I guess there was a reason. It makes me sad though."

"Why?"

"Why? It was a nice tree. Don't you think it was a nice tree?"

"No, Mommy...I mean why? What did the tree do?"

My baby thought it was retribution for some rotten act. For my child obsessed with death as it is, I was dumbfounded as to what to say.

"Nothing baby. I...sometimes things just happen, I guess."

He gulped a little and I wanted so desperately to hug him. "I love you mommy. Will you sing to me?"

A year and a half ago, our family, as it was, as they had always known it, died a sudden and painful death...and since then every loss however seemingly insignificant hits hard and painfully. I sat at the window and stared down at a stump in the yard. It seemed almost cosmic that they had done this as I packed up our life to move on from this first place of life lessons after that death, this place where our love and skills grew as a new and different kind of family. I thought about telling Elyas that before we swam we had to find the pool. Indeed, that is what we had done here. We spent some time finding the pool, testing our skills to see which end of the pool we belonged in, and crying a little bit when it was uncomfortable and scary. I threw a few more things in a box as I said goodbye to the tree that had sheltered me and marked the spot. I guess it is time for lesson #2.

The Big Game

2007-09-14T09:14:00.000-05:00

You probably have one going on somewhere too. Here and now it is the Big Iowa vs. Iowa State Team. I'm cheering for football widow sales. Please, PLEASE let us win big this weekend!

Just for clarification...

2007-09-09T20:30:00.000-05:00

Sitting on the sofa, some time after bed time...

"Well hello."

"Hi Mommy."

"Um, Elyas?"

"Yeah, Mom?"

"Goodnight."

Not moving. "Goodnight, Mom."

"GOODNIGHT, ELYAS."

Smiling, but still not leaving "Goodnight mom."

Whispering "That's your cue to leave."

"Mom, how do you spell Eileen?"

Exasperated sigh. "E-I-L-E-E-N"

"Oh ok. And then, ok, how do you spell alien???"

You can see why he was confused.

Ma and God

2007-09-05T22:05:00.000-05:00

God gave us fingers-Ma says, “Use your fork.”
God gave us voices- Ma says, “Don’t scream.”
Ma says eat broccoli, cereal and carrots. But God gave us tastes for
maple ice cream.
God gave us fingers- Ma says, “ Use your hanky.”
God gave us puddles- Ma says, “Don’t splash.”
Ma says, “Be quiet, you father is sleeping.” But God gave us garbage can
covers to crash.
God gave us fingers- Ma says, “Put your gloves on.”
God gave us raindrops- Ma says, “Don’t get wet.”
Ma says be careful, and don’t get too near to those strange lovely dogs
that God gave us to pet.
God gave us fingers- Ma says, “Go wash ‘em.”But God gave us coal bins and
nice dirty bodies.
And I ain’t too smart, but there’s one thing for certain ~ Either Ma’s
wrong or else God is.
-Shel Silverstein

Shel and I go way back to fourth grade. He helped me figure out a lot of things about myself that I didn't have words for...I wish I'd paid more attention to "The Bagpipe Didn't Say No." But beyond that, I think I got a pretty firm grasp of having fun while challenging boundries when I learned me some poetry. Oddly, Ma and God only recently became one of my favorites. Mostly because I'm Ma and I don't believe in God...which is ironic in and of itself. I think Shel might have enjoyed that one quite a bit.

But in the deepest parts of my heart I do believe in something. It is just not anything that I can call God because...well I suppose that is a whole lot of baggage I don't need to go into. It's a language thing that "my people" (UU's to be precise) seem to struggle with. At any rate, I don't call it God. I usually don't know what to call it, which is probably appropriate since we really can't know what it is. I like to think of it as a universal energy. Sounds pretty new agey, doesn't it? Well I suppose I'm nothing if not a super geek, so I'll cleve to my predetermined role in life...roll with it as it were. On other days, particularly days I've been reading Harry Potter, I like to think of it as magic. (Really Jo, no more? Say it isn't so, Jo. Maybe one more...about Harry's third cousin twice removed who lives in Phoenix? No? Oh ok...I'll go sulk a little more then.)

But this poem, it encapsulates exactly my frustration with the God with whom I became aquainted as a child. Either Ma is wrong, or God is. Black and white, right and wrong...

I'm still trying to figure out what I really want my kids to know about God...or the lack thereof. But I definitely know I want them to know about Shel. And the bagpipe...let's not forget the bagpipe this time.

Why my children hate me

2007-08-29T19:00:00.000-05:00

"Mom, is that wrapping paper I see?"

"Hum...yes."

"And what is THAT for?"

"Oh someone I know is having a birthday."

"It's me!!!"

"Oh yeah, you are having a birthday, right? You'll be what, fourteen?"

Giggling "Noooo..."

"Three?"

"Mommy..."

"Thirty-seven?"

"I'm going to be eight!"

"What?!?"

"Mommy, I'm going to be eight!"

"YOU ARE GOING TO BE ATE??? Who on earth would eat a little boy???"

"No Mommy, I'm going to be EIGHT!"

"So you say! How can I protect you if you won't tell me who is going to eat you?"

"EIGHT - like the NUMBER EIGHT!"

"Oh you mean like 'Eight Lords-A-Leaping?'"

Relief. "Yeah, like that."

"Cool! How did you get that gig? I didn't even know you knew how to leap."

"No mommy EIGHT YEARS OLD."

"I've heard that song a number of times and I'm pretty sure it is eight lords-a-leaping."

"MOM, I AM GOING TO BE EIGHT YEARS OLD TOMORROW."

"Oh. I see. I should probably wrap a present up for you then, huh?"

"You are so weird, Mom."

"Just doing my job, kid. Just doing my job."

By George...just maybe...shes got it...?

2007-07-23T12:02:00.000-05:00

You'll remember last year, I blogged about forgiveness...and I blogged about it some more....and some more...you know it shouldn't be surprising that a woman who has seen as much rejection as I has an ongoing issue with forgiveness. But you know, it gets tiresome for me too, dear reader, so don't feel guilty. But with this post, I knew I was getting close. I readily admitted I didn't have it all figured out, but maybe what I uncovered would point me in the right direction, right?

But still I struggled. And that load of baggage was getting heavier and heavier. I knew I needed to set it down, but I didn't know how. Like Kim Possible's arch enemy threw a bondo ball at me and my baggage.

Something occurred to me today, that may well be the piece of the puzzle I've been missing. Did you have this piece? When the need to forgive is hurting you the most, often we thing that the kindness and love of the forgiving act needs to be pointed at the person we know we need to forgive. But we are wrong. Lack of forgiveness is an act of carrying a wrong doing around like it belongs to you, when it actually doesn't. Yep I got that part right. But what I missed was this. When you carry that hurt around, you actually continue to hurt yourself with that same act over and over again. You might recognize this process. It's the one used by all the bad guys trying to torture information out of some brave secret agent. Mel Gibson getting shocked over and over and again...they hit him over and over in the exact same spot and he screams in agony. That is what we do to ourselves when we carry around a slight. We hit ourselves with it over, and over....and over. And finally it is time to answer your interrogator's question, the question that it has been whispering in your ear for days, weeks, months.

"You deserved it, didn't you? You did something wrong, you weren't good enough, you are lacking as a human? Too fat? Too skinny? Not smart enough? You know it is your fault...admit it...it is your fault."

When you can look it straight in the eye and simply say, "No." It is over.

No.

No.

NO!

Saying no is an act of setting the baggage down, leaving it in the road for it's proper owner. It's freedom.

OPM Anonymous

2007-05-18T11:10:00.000-05:00

Hi. My name is Eileen and I'm an Over Protective Mom.

~Hi Eileen!~ (That's your line, speak clearly, reach for the back row.)

I'd like to tell you there is a day that it started. Maybe the day I got that horrible email about the three year old who was abducted in England. Maybe the day someone I "knew" from the Internet had a child killed in an unfortunate driveway accident. Maybe...but probably I was born this way. I'm not a risk taker. I was the sit and read books kid. I had a fear of things like bleeding. I avoided it at all costs. Which might have been nice for MY mother. Maybe. But it really doesn't do my two boys any good. Two boys.

You know I have heard people say things like "How can you look at a sunset, or a flower, or a new born baby, and not know that there is a God?" I dunno. I look at that as astounding circumstance, the brilliance of cause and effect and chance. But if there ever were an argument for the existence of the almighty, I believe it would be the fact that this wall flower, book reading, liberal, pacifist, candle meditation loving round girl somehow birthed the modern day version of Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn (I'll let you decide who is who...) That, to me is evidence of not only a higher power, but one with a sense of humor, (and may also support evidence that this higher power is kind of mean).

So last night after a good couple of hours of, "Please don't touch that. Hey we don't throw rocks at cats! Why are we pouring water into a cardboard box? Where is the hamster now? Oh, no, please not in your ear...or no...not there either...Are you licking me? Why are you licking me?" I was laying on my bed blinking. I wish I could tell you some grand epiphany came to me but my brain had stopped working. The realization was old and new and old and new. They aren't going to change. You have to adapt.

And I do, not just for my own sanity, but for theirs. They are boys. Boys experiment. They bleed. And they like it. And sooner or later they'll be better men for it. And I might survive too. But I have doubts about the hamster.

Ironically enough, I got a book recommendation today. I ordered it for the boys, hopefully it will be here just in time to take on our vacation next week. Read the interview with the author at Amazon. Written by brothers dontcha know. Anyway, I guess summer is as good a time as any to begin living a dangerous life. I'll bring the band-aids.

The Dangerous Book for Boys
By Conn Iggulden
Release date: By 01 May, 2007

Home

2007-05-12T13:31:00.000-05:00

It was tentative and uneasy, but I slipped my shoes off and slid my toes into the grass. I remember suddenly that no matter how lush and lovely it seems, that it will always surprise you with sharp angles of thick cut stalks and the coolness of it. I'd told someone recently that putting my bare feet in grass always made me remember my grandmother's laugh. That only made me realize how long it had been since I'd done it. I couldn't force myself to stay long. The rush of memories was so strong, so pleasant, so...uncomfortable. I'm not sure why uncomfortable.

The best days of my life were spent in the company of my grandparents. I wanted to say "in the company of my grandmother" but I know in truth, as hard as my relationship with him was, my grandfather contributed a great deal to that bliss. I remember waking in the attic bedroom, crammed full with artifacts of several lives...theirs, their parents', my mother's, even mine. There was never enough room to do much more than walk around the bed, but it was my favorite room in the house. I dug through boxes, imagining my grandmother in this dress, my grandfather smoking that pipe, or marveling at strange things that seemed to have no logical purpose. There were books and fountain pens, hats and dime store jewelery. It was a treasure trove.

But what I remember most of all is waking up, bright light, a fresh breeze and the lilting sounds of a tiny town waking up wafting through the windows, lifting the curtains in a lazy dance. There was the familar smell of eggs frying in my grandmother's cast iron skillet and the unmistakable sounds of dishes clattering and my grandfather coughing himself awake in the bathroom. I would hear my mother and grandmother talking, and Paul Harvey or the local weather on the radio. And bad country music. I'd do the obligatory dance outside the bathroom door as I waited for my grandfather's endless morning preparation to cease and then would sit sleepily down to my glass of Tang and whatever cereal I'd talked my grandmother into that week.

The summer days we spent there were endless chores that seemed like vacation to me...painting the screens, hanging laundry on the line, peeling potatos for dinner. I built sand castles in the street (it was the sandhills after all and the "street" was indeed sand!) and hiked up the road to look at the neighbor's great nasty Thanksgiving turkey, strutting around the yard and scaring the chickens. I snooped through my grandfather's shop and wondered about how many ways there was to put all these things together and the marvelous things I could build. Grandma and I would play Kings on the Corners, and she didn't let me win because I was a kid. In fact, she didn't let me win because she was a kid herself at heart. At night, after the dishes were washed and put away the grown ups would sit in lawn chairs and I would sit in the grass looking for four leaf clovers. While the clover was the bane of my grandfather's gardening experience, for me, it was the best thing his lawn could offer. I would lay there for hours examining each individual clover, excitedly plucking some out, only to realize that I had been deceived. I would pull up a healthy three leaf clover once in a great while and tear a leaf down the middle, trying to convince myself that I'd found one, but it was just a game I played to keep my spirits up.

My grandmother was diagnosed with lymphoma in 1982, the summer I was 13. While she lived for another four years, she never came home again and it was never the same without her.
I did eventually find a four leaf clover though. She was gone by then and I was 22 years old. I put it in her jewelery box. It was gone the next time I came home. I suppose my mother might have found it and thrown it out. But I like to think Grandma found it and knew it was something I wanted to share with her.

I had a friend recently ask me to think about what home feels like. Home feels like bare feet in the grass. Home feels like a treasure trove waiting to be discovered. Home feels like people you know and you trust waiting for you with a glass of Tang while the wind blows the curtains beside your bed.

Happy Mother's Day, Grandma, wherever you are.

Happy Mother's Day to you too.

STOP

2007-04-22T22:17:00.000-05:00

Elyas fell off the new scooter for the third time and I went to pull him to his feet. He smiled his brilliant little smile and leaned in to hug me. "Mommy," he murmured, "you are the nicest, sweetest, funnest mommy there is." He pressed his face up against my neck. "And you smell..." He was searching for just the right sweet nothing..."You smell just like...a cow..." Big sigh, bright dancing eyes. You can tell he thinks he's the smoothest guy in town.

I stifle a giggle. If my son knew for a second what actual livestock smelled like I would have been mortified. But that's just my kid - amazing, crazy, fun. I set him back on the scooter and gave him a push off in the direction of his brother. I ambled along behind them racing along in their red and blue helmets, bobbing and weaving along the long straight walkway leading across the campus with its impeccably manicured lawns. It was such a vision, these perfect little people who some how came from my body, scooting their way toward the sunset, occasionally pausing to lean in and share with each other some mystery of the universe that they'd unravelled in their journey across the lawn. And a voice deep within me called out "STOP!"

It all goes too fast. You hold those new born babies with their intoxicating smells and gurgling smiles for a moment and they are toddlers wiggling and stretching for the nearest thing they can dump on the newly vacuumed floor. You scoop the toddler up into your arms and suddenly he's a preschooler reading you a book and explaining the lyrics to a favorite song to you. Turn your face from the preschooler for a moment and you look back to find the confident school boy kicking a soccer ball across the lawn with the precision of Pele. And sometimes you just have to beg the universe to give you a moment more...one more second of perfection before those young men are slipping out the door on the way to college, or back to work, or off to pick up their own kids from daycare. Some days you just have to beg the universe to stop. And even though it doesn't, it will give you something to hold on to. One of the things I will hold forever is the vision of my children bobbing down an endless walkway that cuts through a sea of green grass and laughing because I smell like a cow.

Rome was not built in a day.

2007-04-19T16:00:00.000-05:00

I've been teaching myself about small steps these last few weeks without realizing it. Planting one foot in front of the other rhythmically, and deliberately, all the while trying to keep my eye on the destination. Sometimes it falls behind a tree that blocks my view...other times it falls behind a mountain, but still I look toward it, knowing that it will reappear on the horizon soon enough.

Two weeks ago - almost, I was sitting in the reinstatement meeting for my son's last in-school suspension and his father was trying hard to press the point that he has in fact made tremendous progress since the beginning of the school year. The educators all shuffled in their seats and hummed about it, "Yes, but we need to deal with what is happening now." His father and I are not fools, we know this. We discussed some strategies for helping the boy calm down in situations of stress, at least when the staff could see it coming. As we left the meeting, only the teacher, a counselor, the father and I remained in the room. The teacher expressed concern about this business of setting up special procedures to help my son cope in situations that are difficult for him. "I am not a parent," he said with a certain tone that annoyed me, actually, "but from an educator's point of view I'm very concerned about him learning life skills. As an adult, if my boss tells me something I do not like, I do not have the option of getting time and space to calm myself down or special tools to do it."

"And I am concerned about the idea that it is reasonable to have adult expectations of a seven-year-old child." I locked his eyes and continued. "Most certainly he will need those skills as an adult...he also has quite some distance to go before he is an adult. Perhaps we should be focused on helping him grow into an adult, not become one overnight."

A few weeks later in my weight loss quest, I read something that tells me that one of the biggest problems people face in "diets" is that they look at them as temporary confinements while they reach for a goal. Once they reach the goal, they go right back to their old behavior. You should never continue on a diet plan that you can not envision yourself keeping up, once you meet your goal, the article said. It made me think about the goal oriented approach I've always used in such endeavors. After I went and got a snack of trail mix I'd been denying myself, I reflected upon how many times I started off an exercise program trying to walk four miles in 45 minutes every single day, or push my way through an advanced aerobic workout despite my lack of grace and health because "By God I was going to do it this time!" I've repeatedly ignored the warnings to start slowly and to be gentle on myself. And then because I couldn't fulfill these lofty goals, I gave up and labeled myself unworthy. So on Tuesday morning when I really didn't want to walk, I thought "Eh, well then I'll just go out and stroll around the neighborhood a little, just to wake up." Of course I ended up walking two and a half miles and feeling exceptional about my day.

Two nights ago the ex-husband and I had an actual civil conversation about the boy's latest suspension and both of our frustrations about them not giving the boy credit for his progress, even though it is visible and steady. Not to worry, by the next night I made an innocent remark on the phone that sent the ex into a characteristic rage, yelling loudly at me and trying hard to insult me. I simply hung up, but it bothered me a lot. I worried about how my boys can cope with such a personality. Granted, I don't think I bring out the best in the man anymore. But I tried to just close my eyes and focus on my destination, happy well-adjusted young men bringing me degrees, awards, life lessons, and of course grandchildren. This morning when I sat down at the computer, there was an email from the father titled "Apology." And indeed, that is exactly what it was.

Rome was not built in a day, it was built in a moment.

In fact, millions of them.

Days Like That

2007-03-19T19:02:00.000-05:00

As I was leaving to walk at lunch today, my coworker came in overwhelmed and tired cursing mistakes made by others and how crummy she felt. I smiled and offered to help. She shifted in her shoes. I don’t think she wanted me to show her up. I don't think she heard me saying "I've had days like that."

Walking at lunch today, I watched cars passing by on a street that used to be a one way street, but isn't any more, I watched the driver of an SUV slam on his breaks as he narrowly avoided a head on collision with another vehicle who was actually in the right. His face turned red with anger as he leaned on his horn. I watched it dissipate into shame as he saw the freshly painted double yellow line on the right of his car. He looked up at me at that moment and I smiled at him. He flipped me off as he drove away. I don't think he heard me saying, "I've had days like that."

Walking at lunch today, I passed by the building where I went to marriage counseling not quite a year ago. There was a woman coming out of the door. She had a cell phone pressed to her ear and she tried hard not to meet my gaze. Her eyes were watery and ringed in red, her face was sallow and there were dark circles telling the tale that she'd either been crying a lot or sleeping very little, or, probably both. I smiled at her and she turned away. I don't think she heard me saying, "I've had days like that."

Walking at lunch today, I gazed up at a cool spring sky, and took in its lovely color, breathing it deep into my soul. I spun around a bit and was grateful for the day I was having, for the life I am having, for my own special story to tell. I stopped to see an old man in a funny hat across the street gazing at me with a smile on his face. "It's a good day for a walk!" he called across four lanes of traffic. I smiled and nodded, "It is indeed!" I shouted back. We stood and regarded each other for a moment. Finally we both turned in opposite directions and went on about our days. But I heard him loud and clear. He's had days like that.

A Dummy's Guide to Fasting...

2007-03-18T16:11:00.000-05:00

Occasionally, those of us with very loose religioius ties try things that many other faiths do on a regular a basis, because it seems like a pretty sound spiritual practice. It's been awhile since I've done anything of the sort, but I decided to do a small fast this weekend, for both health and spiritual reasons...clearing out my system from a few different angles. I used to do this back in the day...an annual spring cleaning and I figured if there were ever a time to get back to it, this would be it. The boys were with their dad, and I loaded up on juice and tea and a couple of good books, I parked the television on HGTV and I was on my way. I did some reading, and some discussing, and I want to share some very basic things I taught myself this weekend.

1. Mega Green juice is chock full of all kinds of good things for you to be taking in to your body. But don't put it in a glass that you can see through. There is something about drinking something that tastes like yummy papaya juice but looks like water from the haunted lagoon that may be good for fasting, but really bad for finishing the juice. Don't look. Just drink.

2. Health food stores have a way of dashing any hopes that a fasting weekend will somehow be cheaper than a regular weekend.

3. While walking sounds like a wonderful thing to do when you are taking care of your body for the weekend, you should probably either do it on a treadmill or walk in circles around your house. Only an idiot decides a four mile hike is a good idea when they've done nothing but drink water and juice and tea for 12 hours.

4. Even if you don't like V-8 juice, it becomes delicacy after 16 hours of fasting.

5. If you go into a fasting weekend with fantasies that you may one day find yourself able to take on a healthy vegan type of lifestyle, dreaming about pork chops dashes those plans fairly quickly.

6. The quickest way to sabotage yourself on a fasting weekend is to decide you MUST go buy cupcakes for your child to take to school for his birthday. And buy them somewhere that Girl Scout Cookies are being sold. And where crab meat wontons are on special. But 38 hours is pretty good, for someone who is rusty, right?

Anyone want a wonton?

Life as you know it is about to change...in five...

2007-03-17T14:58:00.000-05:00

...four, three, two...there! Do you feel it? No? Ok go back and try it again. I'm sure you'll feel it this time.

Life is a constant tumble of change. You breathe in, breathe out and somewhere in that breath, life has changed irrevocably for someone, probably you. Maybe you sucked in some germ, maybe in a zen moment you reached a higher consciousness, maybe you decided to buy those damn cute shoes even though you shouldn't. Maybe somewhere someone decided that you are the person they'll love 'til the end of times, or maybe they decided to sue you. Maybe your kid discovered his passion, or maybe she discovered where you hide your secret chocolate stash. Maybe someone you love just was born, or born-again, or breathed her last breath. Maybe that damn butterfly is flapping his wings again wreaking havok on your weekend with a resultant late spring snowfall in Iowa. But it has been said in simpler terms...the only thing you can depend upon is change.

Change is frightening...and exciting...and chaotic...and refreshing...and exhausting. How ever you choose to look at it, change is a fixed aspect of our lives. We grow, experience, age and falter, and move ever closer to our final change from this life to whatever moves beyond. Human beings try to outsmart the "butterfly effect" by being prepared for anything. But it has occured to me lately that this is a frivilous waste of time. We can't predict what is next any more than we can predict which leaf might fall from the mighty oak first. We might ultimately be able to get even that to a really terrific educated guess, but to what end? Once it falls, we then look at each other and say, "Ok...we got that one. Now what do we do?"

A year ago I wouldn't have thought about life like this. I was managing everything and enjoying nothing. I was on a schedule, on time and in a groove...a groove that resembled a rut in retrospect. And then, the earth moved and my rut was gone and all that was holy in the world of order abandoned me. I found myself crying a river of tears one night and giggling madly with the girls the next. My once predictable role of mother to my children became as complex as navigating a mine field. My own personhood was a strange new land of discovery. And the bizzare thing is, I loved every minute of it. The hurt, the anger, being oddly self-possessed in some places and completely unable to mask my emotion at others. I've climbed through my own hang ups and examined them like my son examines the bark on trees. And it all felt like living...not existing, but really living. This change, this is the stuff that makes a life a story worth telling. Living through challenges helps us measure who we are, both to ourselves and to others. Possessing joy with willful abandon gives the world the gift of our presence.

My advice to you today is don't wait for a rift in your own time space continuim. Get out there and embrace the changes being tossed your way today...experience them, love them, hate them, mourn them or celebrate them. But let them surprise you...you have a gift in that.

How long?

2007-03-14T20:42:00.000-05:00

"So how long does it take, this process?" asks my gruff, but good-guy Scottish boss. It is a question that has been asked of me about 300 or so times since my marriage fell apart last spring. It's funny how being in the process of getting a divorce is supposed to make you some kind of expert on the subject. Funnier yet, is how many women come to me for advice when they are having trouble in their marriage. I rarely say it but I can't help but think, "Um, you are the one that still has her husband in her bed, why are you asking me?" But I don't. I guess they think that misery loves company. Or maybe, they've noticed I'm not that miserable, and they are intrigued by that...I don't know. But I get questions all the time about how much lawyers charge, how often you have to go to court, etc. And the truth be told, I'm almost done and I still don't really know. I've gone through it all, but it has really been a blur of bad timing and strange innuendo. And even if I could make sense of it, it doesn't seem possible that what I've been through has been a normal process. Nothing about this is normal.

But I do think I've come up with an answer, or maybe more appropriately several answers, to this "How long?" question. Since the decree should be going before a judge very soon, I thought I'd take a moment to write it down. How long does it take to get a divorce? Well, this is just my experience, but:

from the 11:30 p.m. revelation from your husband that he loves you too, "I guess" to signing your final decree of divorce, it takes 50 weeks, five days, and eleven hours
it also takes seven years of trying and not really knowing why nothing seems to work
it takes .5 seconds to say "Yes." instead of "Can we make this decision after the baby is born?"
it takes 30 + years of carrying your self esteem around at the bottom of your purse, and pulling it out, in shock that it is tangled up in teeny tiny knots that you will need tweezers to work out
it takes twenty-three hour long visits to your own therapist, countless hours with your children's therapists, and monthly visits to the pharmaceutical counter at Walgreen’s
it takes many sleepless nights, staring out the window, with rocks in your stomach
it takes as many hours of free long distance as you can rack up - and several hours that aren't free
it takes hundreds of hours of dealing with the angst and anger of your children, answering questions to which you don't really know the answers
it takes five hours to take a parenting course that teaches you not to call your ex bad names in front of the kids
it takes too many billable hours with the cheapest lawyer you could find
it takes 37 years to start it, I haven't quite figured out how many it will take to tie it up

I always used to get a bad taste in my mouth when I heard stories of women who party it up right when their divorces were finalized. But I understand now, it isn't celebrating an end, it is celebrating a commencement. I will officially move into a new phase of my life this week. It is my pinning ceremony, the turning of a tassel, the signature on my diploma. I've passed this test. Now I get to take on some new life. Somebody, please, buy me a drink already.

The Buzz About Maddy

2007-03-12T19:50:00.000-05:00

I read an angry mom blog today about the newest Disney Princess, slated to hit theaters in 2009. I'm accustomed to parents who are angry about Disney Princesses. Lets face it they are riddled with problems for parents of someday women. The characters are entirely too focused on getting their men and the industry focuses too much on sexual stereotypes that are, if not harmful, completely one-dimensional.

Princess Maddy, who will star in Disney's "The Frog Princess", will take on an entirely new set of problems as well as a lofty goal. Maddy will be the first ever black Disney Princess. Here is Princess Maddy, sassy girl from New Orleans! A princess in New Orleans? Ok...I'll bite.

For my friends who have little dark skinned girls with tight dark curls, I know Maddy might be a welcome sight. One such mama has told me how she worries for her daughter's self-esteem when she tells her mother she wishes she could have straight blonde hair and blue eyes, because then she would be beautiful. We know these little girls need to see their own images of beauty. Disney, long suffering for its lack-luster performance in the realm of diversity, is trying. And it can't hurt to have those little girls who have the straight blonde hair and blue eyes completely revel in the loveliness of a woman of color as well, right? Oh my, but she is the picture of loveliness too, isn't she? But then again, if Disney thought it suffered at the hands of irate Muslims when the presentation of Middle Eastern culture in Aladdin was perceived to be stereotypically violent and blood thirsty they might be in for a surprise here. If they screw up presenting New Orleanian African Americans...well...I'm sure there's enough fodder there for the next fifteen Shrek movies. Word is that the plot line includes some voodoo, so it sounds like they've got a leg up on that! Whew!

I started to wonder why this mattered to me at all. While my children are biracial, they are boys and the chances of them being significantly impacted are relatively low. I'm all about women empowering themselves and each other, but I can honestly say, it wasn't a feminazi rage boiling in my blood when I started reading about Princess Maddy...nor was it a white privilege shame.

When I was in college, I was lucky enough to do a show called "Talking With..." It consists of eleven monologues from eleven different and incredibly interesting women. My favorite still is a barrel-racer named "Big Eight." She'd been in the rodeo since she was a child, and she loved it with everything that she was. After years of living her simple life, the rodeo was "bought" by a company that decided it needed to be packaged differently. She tells some seriously funny stories about rodeo clowns dressed up like astronauts and the choreographer that used to work for the "Ice-damn-Capades" and about how they asked her to "haul her ass through the barrel races done up like Minnie-damn-Mouse in a tutu!" But the end of the monologue, it sticks with me. I think of it often even 15 years later, even though the role wasn't mine.

"Someday, somebody is gonna take what you love. Buy your rodeo. Turn your pleasure into the Ice-damn-Capades. Do you hear what I'm saying to you? Yer just merchandise to them. Yer just merchandise..."

In the end, that's my problem with Disney. Women are just merchandise. Ethnicity is just merchandise. New Orleans is just merchandise. Welcome to the main stream, Princess Maddy. You've come a long way, baby. Now please bend over.

What Eleanor didn't tell us...

2007-03-12T17:47:00.000-05:00

"No one can make you feel inferior without your permission."
Eleanor Roosevelt

I love a good quote, don't you? When such a powerful thought can be boiled down to one simple statement, it is rather awe-inspiring. It is such a popular craft that almost anywhere you create an account for personal purposes online, you are encouraged to share your favorite quote. The problem, I'm finding, with quotes is that they are too simple. We read a quote like the one above, and I'm sure you've all read it before, and we think "Yep, that sounds about right." Some of us might even say a little, "Amen, sister!" And often we think to ourselves, that is one we need to remember, because "that one is one I need to focus on!" And then two or three months or even a couple of years go by, and you read the quote again...and this time maybe you are thinking, "Oh yeah! I KNOW this. I've GOT to remember it." If you are like me, about the 784th time you run across this quote you are smacking yourself on the forehead and saying, "Why the hell can't I get this? What is wrong with me?" And look at that, Eleanor Roosevelt just made you feel inferior...you didn't give her permission did you? Or did you? Hell you can't even remember a stupid quote, how the hell are you supposed to remember if you gave someone permission to make you feel inferior? The problem is not really the idea behind the quote; the problem is it doesn't make the reader go through the work of getting to that idea that the writer (or speaker) had to go through. So while you might think you've got it, you've only got its essence.

This occurred to me tonight as I drove home from work. I was humming along, windows down fresh, cool spring air blowing on my face and I was thinking about maybe writing a blog about Maddy, the newest Disney Princess to be launched in 2009. And I was smoking a cigarette. And I drove past a very put together looking woman on the street walking and pushing a toddler in a stroller. She gave me a look...a look I could only interpret as disdain, but I'm fessing up that it was only my interpretation. And I began making excuses to myself about my smoking and getting annoyed about presumptuous people judging me. "She's never waked in my shoes!" I lamented. And then someone pushed the pause button and I really stopped and thought about my own internal dialogue. Truth is, I had no idea why that woman shot me that look. Maybe she thought I was judging her for having her obviously mobile toddler in a stroller. Maybe she just remembered a bill she forgot to pay. Maybe a bug flew up her nose. And yes, maybe she was judging my smoking. But the truth is, all of that is irrelevant, because all the negativity that was affecting me was coming from ME. Wow.

I finished my business at the bank, already knowing my blogging subject matter had changed, when I came to a two way stop...you know one of those places where the sign is posted "Through traffic DOES NOT STOP." And there was someone else across the way, coming from the opposite direction. This stop is just beyond the rise of a little hill, so sometimes it is a little hard to see the "through traffic." The woman across the way thought she saw an opening and started across and I tapped on the gas, but slammed on my breaks quickly when I saw an oncoming car. The person in that car also slammed on the breaks, tires squealing, horn blasting. As my "other side of the road" counter part whizzed by me, the driver of the car that had stopped was waving her hands and yelling, though I don't know what. And my internal dialogue took off again with excuses that it is really hard to see and "Gee, you don't have to be a bitch!" I only realized a few minutes later that I was in fact feeling guilty for my moment of having stepped on the gas, even though I had stopped in plenty of time. This problem, I surmised, runs deep in me.

I've actually been working a lot on my internal dialogue, and the fact that I'm seeing this behavior in myself says a lot to that. It is easy for us to get angry with ourselves for all kinds of things and project it out on other people. This is what happens to me when I find myself brooding over slights, real or imagined...the person I'm usually getting unreasonable flack from is myself. I don't know that I've found the cure, but I'm really working on being gentler in the way I talk to myself. The funny thing is, it results in me being gentler with the people around me. I stopped being mad at both these ladies almost instantly, in fact, I found myself laughing and hoping that their evenings got better, and I allowed myself to go on and have a better evening too. What a cool gift.

Just wanted to tell you that.

There oughta be a place...

2007-02-14T15:08:00.000-06:00

I can't remember, it seems like it was a year ago that I blogged about visiting the courthouse on Valentine's Day and how delighted I was at all the fresh newlyweds clogging the hallways, taking photos on the front steps, and generally being gooey-eyed over each other. It might have been an email though, because I can't find the blog. Well, here I am a year later and I found myself once more needing to make deliveries to the court house for work. Only I couldn't do it. I just couldn't face the gooey eyed idiots. I've shuffled through the office with my eyes down kind of holding my breath so I don't even have to smell the roses other women here have gotten. Luckily, something melted on the vaccuum cleaner belt so the smell is not so much an issue. And then to top it off, I got my copy of "The Year of Magical Thinking" by Joan Didion in the mail today. I flipped it open to the first page, to the first words on the page, "Life changes fast. Life changes in the instant. You sit down to dinner and life as you know it changes." And I started crying.

My lack of enthusiasm about Valentine's Day, or rather spending lots of money that we didn't have on Valentine's Day, was an argument used in supporting the need for my divorce. I wish I could tell him today that if he thought I wasn't enthusiastic before, I'm very close to being dead around the heart regarding this holiday now. Life hurts too much. My friend Shari reminds us that St. Valentine is the patron saint of epileptics. I think that's a better thing to reflect upon today, don't you? Love is a really sucky thing to focus on for an entire, entirely too public day. Love is personal and painful and raw. It isn't really a Hallmark emotion, is it really?

I read an article today by a woman who escaped to a Dominican Republic beach resort with her two chilren on the first Valentine's Day after her husband was killed in the twin towers. It was an outstanding piece, very uplifting, all about how we can find new meaning despite ourselves. Despite the ringing endorsement for embracing the new love, the new traditions, I have to admit that in my heart of heart what I really got out of it was..."that's a hell of an idea." Her idea was perfect, an escape for those of who are wounded by this painful holiday, though her execution, we find out, was not terribly successful. I'm thinking though, that there are establishments who could make a fortune for Valentine's Day Protesters. They have Football Widows sales on Super Bowl Sunday, wouldn't it be a brilliant choice for someone to dish up some forgetfulness for "the rest of us" on this puffy pink nightmare of a day?

I'm just sayin' - there oughta be a place for people like us.

Intensive Care for the Nurturer's Soul: The World's Most Unusual Therapist

2007-01-28T22:06:00.000-06:00

Intensive Care for the Nurturer's Soul: The World's Most Unusual Therapist

I just really wanted to share this blog with you, my friends. It kind of took my breath away.

Love wrapped in peanut butter

2007-01-22T21:48:00.000-06:00

I've been on a three day marathon of tending two small children who sound rather like the love children of Marlon Brando and an irate Harbor Seal. That, of course is because of the cold...not because of me so sheddup anyone who wants to rag on my bowling alley waitress contralto. On the other hand, they behaved more like chimpanzees on crack. But of course, when Mother Nature blankets the earth in the softest prettiest six or so inches of fluffy beautiful snow, and the air is cool enough to sustain it, and warm enough to make it sticky enough for the first perfect snowball of the year, there is nothing a little boy wants to hear more than, "I'm sorry baby, you're sick, you have to stay inside." It is a hideous guilt wracking experience for a mother to utter those words, and guilt, most of you know, causes a mother to lose her stinkin' mind.
Thomas' Halloween Adventures Marathon - Round Number 1:
Mom, Mom! (cough, cough) Look there's Terrence!
Who?
Terrance, the tractor! Oh you missed it, back it up.
__________________________________________________________________
Who wants muffins? Mommy made banana nut muffins!
I hate banana nut muffins. Can I have a peanut butter sandwich?
For breakfast?
(cough, cough) Yeah, can we go outside and build a snowman today?
OK, PBJ, on toast, maybe?
___________________________________________________________________
Mom? Can I make a mailbox?
For what?
Uh...so you can write me letters when I'm at Dad's house?
Mommy? It's TERRENCE! LOOK NOW!
Uh...yeah OK...uh what do you want to use for this mailbox?
Mommy...LOOOK NOW.
I was thinking we could cut a hole in that laundry basket and...
WHAT?
You missed it AGAIN! Back it up, PLEASE!
____________________________________________________________________
(Out of tape out of glue, have made two cardboard mailboxes, covered them in construction paper and stickers and hung them carefully on the wall, written several thousand love notes with and for each of the boys and stuffed them full several times. We've made penguins out of their traced hand prints. There are scraps of paper on every square inch of my living room, and sippy cups stashed in places I'd never think of. One is snoring softly on my lap the other emerges from the bedroom in a television induced trance like state.)
Mom...
Yes dear? You OK?
Yeah.
Mom?
Yes, honey?
This place is a mess. You should pick up.
_____________________________________________________________________
Thomas' Halloween Adventures Marathon - a reprieve after round number 23: Instead? Wonder Pets....
Trilling gerbil: We must save de dowfinn!
Trilling duck: Yes! We must save de dowfinnnnnnn!
Dev: Cut the karaoke and save the stupid dolphin, already!
My son, ladies and gentlemen. MY son!
_____________________________________________________________________
Mommy, I've got mail!
Huh, yeah, cool baby.
Dear Elyas, Leave me alone. Your brother.
That wasn't very nice was it?
(Lip trembling) No.
I'm sorry.
Mommy? How do you spell stupidhead?
______________________________________________________________________
Can I have another peanut butter jelly?
We're out of bread.
Oh. Can I have a granola bar?
They're gone too.
I'm STARVING!
You still have soup left from lunch.
Oh. Can we build a snowman today?
I could make pancakes, I guess...
______________________________________________________________________
Thomas' Halloween (WHY HALLOWEEN? It's JANUARY) Adventures Marathon round 483:
Look Ly! It's Terrence!
Duh mom.
______________________________________________________________________
Hey Mommy. We had a nice time at your house this weekend. Daddy says we have to go to bed now. Hey mommy, maybe tomorrow you can go to the grocery store? You know, get some more bread and granola bars? Mommy? Mommy?

Reading material for the brain damaged (aka...mommies)

2006-12-07T15:58:00.000-06:00

So I should tell you right now that the amazing DaMomma is now published. And you should flock to amazon and read her book, because she's a little bit rock and roll. (I have no idea what I'm saying. But I love her writing and you should read it.)

Winter

2006-12-07T14:13:00.000-06:00

My life seems to appropriately be reflecting the seasons this year. My vision has gotten tired and blurred and my soul is cold, possibly even frozen...the thaw of spring seems eons away. I could see it coming, this blank, stark time. I tried to prepare myself. Hell, I TRIED to make myself excited for it. But winter is neccessary, but not something you can really get excited about, is it?

An excerpt from My Garden Book by Jamaica Kincaid

People will go on and on about the beauty of the garden in winter, they will point out scarlet berries in clusters hanging on stark brown brittle branches, they will insist that this beauty is deep and unique; people try to tell me about things like “The Christmas rose…in bloom in December is really very beautiful,” but only in the way of a single clean plate found on a table many months after a large number of people had eaten dinner there; or again they tell me of the barks of trees, in varying stages of peeling, and the moss of lichen growing on the barks of other trees and the precious jewel-like sparkle of lichen at certain times of day, in certain kinds of light; and, you know, I like lichen and I like moss, but really to be reduced to admiring it because nothing else is there but brown bramble and some red stems and mist… It is so willful, this admiration of the garden in winter, this assertion that the garden is a beautiful place then…

But this is not true at all…I want to say to…[these people]. This is just something you are saying; this is just something you are making up. I want to say that at this very moment I am looking out my window and the garden does not exist, it is lying underneath an expanse of snow, and there is a deep, thick mist, slowly seeping out of the woods, and as I see this I do not feel enraptured by it. But you know, white is not a color at all…white only makes you feel the absence of color, and white only makes you long for color and only makes you understand that the space is blank and waiting to be filled up—with color.

My minister read this in a sermon about a year ago. That's really what I feel right about now. I'm tired of straining myself to admire lichen. So I guess I'm kind of hibernating right now. I hope that's ok.

Thanksgiving Grats

2006-11-22T13:24:00.000-06:00

Here is a story from our service at church on Sunday. There was a Zen master upon whom many people called for help over the years. People came to her with heart break and strife of all manner, from the seemingly mundane to extraordinary greif. Each person who called upon her undoubtedly recieved her full attention, but she encouraged all of them to practice a mantra of sorts throughout their day, every day. That mantra was this, "Thank you for everything, I have no complaints whatsoever." It didn't make much sense to one man in particular. After a year of trying this meditation he returned to her.

"I've been saying this mantra for a year and I'm still selfish and angry and bitter. Please help me!

"Thank you for everything, I have no complaints whatsoever." Responded the Zen master. And the man arose with a new understanding and returned to his life able to embrace it more fully.

Our minister Mark remarked how people in Zen fables always seem to just "get it" with the snap of the fingers, and how crazy that made him. But in truth, the Zen master was telling us, that we must be grateful for everything...even the things that drive us nuts are gifts. So with that in mind.

I am grateful for anger, for it reminds me that I love myself.
I am grateful for loss, for it teaches me to appreciate and also gives me room for new joy in my life.
I am grateful for my life's challenges, for they teach me that my love is strong and unbending.
I am grateful for being disorganized, for it teaches me that I am resourceful as well.
I am grateful for adversaries, for they teach me that there is another vantage point.
I am grateful for tears for they cleanse my pallet, making it a welcoming place for the next round of joy.
I am grateful for my solitude, for it teaches me to appreciate my own company.
- And on another note-
I am grateful for my children...in guiding them, they guide me.
I am grateful for my friends who ground me and remind me that we are all in this together.
I am grateful for my family who remind me that my past, present and future are all tied together.
Thank you all. I have no complaints, whatstoever.

The Days Are Just Packed

2006-11-10T09:18:00.000-06:00

Elyas: "Mommy, is your car a bug?"

Mommy: "No bug, my car is not a bug."

Elyas: "What is your car?"

Mommy: "It's a Taurus."

Dev: "Taurus? Like people who visit museums?"

Mommy: (Laughing) "Taurus, not tourist."

Dev (DEVilish smile on his face): "Oh you mean a large slow turtle!"

Mommy snorts: "Well that fits, huh?"

Dev: "Or maybe it's more of a dinosaur. A Torosuarus!"

Mommy has tears running down her face from laughter: "You've captured the essence of my car darling."

Dev: "So what does Taurus mean?"

Mommy: "It's a bull."

Dev sits and blinks. He is much better at naming cars than Ford Motor Company.

Honor Your Children

2006-10-27T22:54:00.000-05:00

My friend Cyndi has a favorite quote that has touched me over the years of knowing her, the funny thing is it becomes more profound to me the longer it sits in my memory banks.

The moment a child is born, the mother is also born. She never existed before. The woman existed, but the mother, never. A mother is something absolutely new.
~Rajneesh

I know I’ve told it over and over again, but on the day Devereaux was born, after fidgeting my way through recovery and chasing the loving devotees away from my bedside, I sat with my beautiful infant son in my lap staring long and hard into his beautiful chocolate brown eyes and wondering how on earth anything so perfect ever could have come from me. These first awe struck moments are the stuff that makes magic in ordinary lives, that give us meaning. These moments are the holiest of holy, because we are connected with the sheer tenacity of life and staring into the depths of true beauty. There is no more perfect moment.

But we must leave Eden, and start our lives outside the garden. There is spit up, and teething, first shots, and eventually temper tantrums, eating dirt, throwing up in the middle of the night, homework battles, undesirable friends…mountains of obstacles. And that is not all…

Nobody tells you about all of them. You start to get an idea, but just the slightest hint in about the sixth month of pregnancy, when people start telling you horror stories about their deliveries, or about why you MUST breastfeed, or why you simply MUST let your child cry it out, or why a certain kind of sheet is as good as putting your child to sleep on gasoline soaked rag. But even then, you have no idea how vicious the judgment of the parenting community will be.

I’m not really sure when it went into overdrive for me. It may have been when I noticed how the other mothers looked at me at playgroup when Devereaux was the only child who had to be chased all over the playground because he was rather like a balloon the air had just been let out of, whizzing around bumping into things and making obnoxious noises on the way. It might have been when I read on a birth board that other children just my son’s age were counting to 20, when we hadn’t even started working on it. Maybe it was just before his second birthday when a certain person informed me with haughty superiority that her son (I’m sorry, I can’t resist, who happened to be my husband) was potty trained at 13 months old! Maybe it was the first time I realized that other mothers actually had complexes about having had caesarian sections. Maybe it was the first time we were recommended to therapy, or for ADHD evaluations, or maybe it was just a culmination of all of the above and a little bit more. But there undoubtedly came a time that I began to worry, seriously, that I was not much of a mother. And more pointedly, that all of my imperfections were being passed on to my beautiful soft cheeked, brown eyed boys.

And this all sucks.

Now add to this anxiety a divorce, that really makes you question yourself and how good a person you really are, and all the nasty things that can be said in a divorce that makes you worry even more about your parenting skills, and some serious anxiety and temperament in a very sensitive child, and you have the recipe for a big bad case of Bad Mother Blues. And I’ve been suffering it for awhile, constantly second guessing my own choices, in fear of screwing them up and making them hate me, terrified of hearing the words that will always come in situations like this but make you bleed nevertheless “I don’t love you anymore, I only love my daddy!” Even writing that sucks the air out of my lungs, and it has been months since I’ve actually heard it.

So earlier today I found myself writing an email to my son’s therapist in essence asking for validation for going against the parenting peanut gallery out there telling me that the family bed is a horrible no-no. And then a few hours later I found myself discussing whether or not supporting a child’s choice of Halloween costume, even a costume that society at large might find strange, is good for a kid or not. A few hours after that I found myself reading a blog at Daddy Daze about how he worries constantly about passing his own baggage on to his kids. And it was at this point I stopped and said “WHOAH!”

And for one crystal clear moment I was back in that hospital room holding that perfect baby in my arms, and I knew…that day, a mother, just as perfect as that baby was born. And I need to trust her, because the best thing she ever did was to honor that child’s perfection.

In the middle of all this discussion and thought I spent some time with my eldest. I’d gotten off work early for an appointment with my lawyer then I picked him up from school and we came home for a decadent few hours of Lays potato chips, chocolate milk, and Shark Boy and Lava Girl. And while Max dreamed a better dream, Dev and I did too. He dug out a box of pipe cleaners that he had mangles in a bad transaction at day camp this summer and we quietly untangled and straightened them while watching the movie, and we each began to make little creations of our own. In the end, Dev carefully wound them all together in a creation he aptly dubbed “Love Man”

And also…”Love Man Gets a Great Idea”

And what have I learned from all of this? That Love Man will always have the best ideas and perhaps the ideas of the peanut gallery, pun entirely intended, be taken with a grain of salt. I know it because if you look at their faces, and into their hearts, they will lead you. Maybe the Ten Commandments didn’t get it wrong when “honor thy father and mother” was written but I think it was also only half right. Because honoring your children is to honor all that is holy in you.

You say goodbye, I say hello

2006-10-17T13:05:00.000-05:00

When I signed up for small group ministry about a year ago, I was nervous. I really didn't know at all what to expect. Sitting down having relatively intimate discussions about life and spirituality with ten relative strangers seemed dangerous. But I wanted to make friends in my church community. I really hoped that there would be another mother of young children with whom I might connect in my group. On my first day I sidled in to the room and sat down. Face after face appeared in the doorway, none of them the young moms from the toddler room I hoped to see. In fact, I was worried. Most of the group was considerably older than I. How could I connect meaningfully with people my mother's age or older? Ah yes, agism alive and well in my UU body. Then she rushed in, rustling around creating a stir...a typical Mary Ellen entrance. She beamed her "I'm a sweet old lady" apple cheeked smile at us and told us not to mind her. But no one could be in the same room with Mary Ellen and not take notice. She is that woman, you'll notice her because regardless of what she says, she wouldn't have it any other way.

You have to get a mental picture of Mary Ellen. Mary Ellen has the picturesque charm of every sweet grandmother, school librarian, neat, tidy, and practically perfect in every way Mary Poppins you've ever met or conjured in your imagination. But let me tell you a small secret. Mary Ellen is no Mary Poppins. Mary Ellen is a mensch. The first time I ever heard Mary Ellen speak it was at our church's annual member meeting. We were voting on important matters of budget and conscience. But Mary Ellen defined the UU experience for me by rising and sweetly chastising the congregation for holding our annual meeting while the gay pride parade was preparing to begin. What kind of Unitarians do that? That, my friends is my friend Mary Ellen.

I thought about my friend Mary Ellen two days ago when I read Damomma's account of a scary incident. I thought about her for a lot of reasons. Small group ministry is supposed to be rather like Vegas...without the slot machines, stage shows or alcohol...but what happens in small group is supposed to stay in small group. I hope the laws of Vegas, small group and the divine Mary Ellen will forgive me for sharing this. Mary Ellen is the most committed atheist I've ever known, a strong, willful humanist woman. On this day we were discussing prayer, and she told us the only time she'd ever truly prayed was on the day that she rode in an ambulence with her son who had been hit by a car while riding his bike. Her prayer was not a request, it was a demand, "God!" she yelled out loud in the audience of a stunned paramedic, "Don't you hold this child responsible for my non-belief!" That's my Mary Ellen.

Mary Ellen has had a hard year too, much harder by far than mine. Always busy with her work for hospice, caring for her aging and sick husband, she missed our last few sessions of small group last spring. "Under the weather," she reported simply via email. I learned during the summer that she had been diagnosed with cancer. It spread quickly and her doctors have spent the summer trying to keep up with it. As it goes with things like this, one week we would get an email telling us that she was doing better, the next week there would be some new challenge. But always the emails ended with a reminder that Mary Ellen needs her rest to fight this thing, so while cards and letters were very welcome, please don't plan to visit. But today the email was different. Today the email was simply it is time to say goodbye, here is her room number, if you have something to say, you'd better say it now.

~~~

Mary Ellen also told us that in her work at hospice, she often became very close to people and their families at the end of their days. It was not uncommon for families to ask her to pray at their bedsides or funerals. She said she didn't feel comfortable with this, as she was indeed an atheist, but a Unitarian as well, and she encompassed well our fourth principle, the right to free and responsible search for truth and meaning. So she would generally suggest that a family member or close friend might be better suited for the task. But occasionally, she said, she couldn't get around it. So when she prayed for these people, she tried to pray as she thought they would have prayed themselves. I am trying, and will continue to try to pray for Mary Ellen as she would do. By standing up and speaking out for what is right, by taking up the cause of the defenseless, by nurturing humor and compassion with a strong voice and a steady hand. And I hope you will too.

It's been a long time now since I've seen my friend, and I'm a bit afraid of what I'll find when I do go to see her. I'm so angry that she's saying goodbye, just as I was learning to say hello. But this is what life give us. I'm thankful I got any of it at all.

Where we are going is someplace we've been...

2006-10-16T21:15:00.000-05:00

Here's a great poem from Jean Wyrick "Poem for an Inked Daughter."

I wanted to share this with you because...it resonated in me. Not that I have a teenaged daughter showing up to dinner with dragons inked on her shoulder...nor did my mother care about my outrageous (and ugly) earrings when I was a kid. But we've all done it, looked into the eyes of these children and seen our own peering back at us with the same fears, defiance, frustration, and oh, yes...our very own humor staring us down and challenging us.

Remember that when you respond my friends. The best parenting advice I've ever read was "be the kind of parent you wished you had." If you take that on the surface, well that could be dangerous, I suppose, because we all probably wanted rich, famous and very lenient parents. But deeply...what did you want your mom to say when you were hurt? What might dad have missed that he shouldn't have missed? In the stillness of your heart, the answer to the kind of parent you want to be is the kind of parent you wished you'd had. And if you had that kind of parent...your kids are doubly blessed, because you got a mentorship.

Peace.
Ei

What are you made of?

2006-10-12T21:30:00.000-05:00

"Sugar and Spice and Everything Nice, that's What Little Girls are made of..."

I've been a big talker lately, haven't I? I can sit here smugly and write about seeking joy and forgiving and taking on new chanllenges...and yet I find myself frozen in fear, for reasons I can't quite grasp, at the prospect of walking into a courtroom, for a proceeding that has an obvious and expected conclusion, expecting no surprises. But still crazy afraid.

I came home tonight and consumed my new favorite comfort food, a chicken taco salad, heavy on the sour cream, and fitfully watched the episode of Project Runway that I missed last night. I respectfully got sucked in, but each time they went to commercial, I found myself up and pacing like a caged animal. Peaceful was not my name.

I climbed into the bathtub with the thought that my brain may slow down if I boiled it in lightly scented bathwater. But instead in boiled over...I suddenly remembered an article I read a few days ago and this voice, actually That voice, came thundering into my head, "Eileen, what are you made of? That's the problem, that's the question." And I have to tell you that my sweat shirt is still sticking to my body because I didn't dry off well enough because I needed to start writing this before it went away.

So the article I read was an interview with Elizabeth Gilbert, the author of the much blogged about book "Eat Pray Love." She was infact talking to a reporter about her adventure which is chronicled in that book. And she said this,

"What has changed about the world, I think, is that women can now take those epic journeys, too. Joseph Campbell (whom I do love, by the way) always said that there was no such thing as the feminine heroic quest; that women have, mythologically speaking, never needed to go out there in the world and "find themselves" because, as life-bearers, as the living goddesses of fertility, we are already perfect and whole. Now, while it certainly is flattering to be deemed a perfected life-goddess, I for one don't personally relate to that icon at all."

It is really so true. I love Joseph Campbell, but this same statement has always bothered me, as does "sugar and spice and everything nice." And it continues in current popular music, when in his song, "Daughters" John Mayer tells us:

"Boys, you can break
You'll find out how much they can take
Boys will be strong
And boys soldier on
But boys would be gone without the warmth from
A womans good, good heart"

But girls we have our own quests to make...sometimes instead of away from tending the fire, we must quest instead to go through it. And to hell with them if they don't get it.

And I was sitting in that bathtub and it all fell down on my head. I'm not sugar and spice and everything nice. I'm not perfect or a living goddess. I'm on my own heroic journey. I am woman...and I'm learning...and I'm growing...and you can't stop me.

What I'm afraid of, I think, is walking into that courtroom, knowing that it's the biggest test of my life. I have to walk in there and find out what I'm made of...am I a blow hard sitting behind a computer or am I a person on a quest? Am I sugar and spice and everything nice or am I real and confident and flowing? Will I be who I am, or will I be wearing a hockey mask?

My husband has a favorite phrase about getting ready for something big, "putting your game face on." But for me, this time, it's about taking my game face off, and seeing what is underneath. And I think he'll be surprised, at least I hope so. Because if it is what I think it is, it is nothing he's ever seen before.

It is nothing I've ever seen before. And it is amazing.

You are what you are...so dig deep, right Neicey?

Forgive and Forget

2006-10-10T09:22:00.000-05:00

Humans are hard wired for learning. Who knows why, but we've made it to this place in our development because we learn from our mistakes. As little children we touch something we aren't supposed to teach and some thundering voice from above tells us "No!" (And I'm talking about your caregiver's voice, not God's, but when you are less than two feet tall, there isn't much difference.) And we look at that object, not making a conscience choice to learn, but we memorize it, and we see it as a "No!"

"NO!" is the first word I ever wrote. I was four, and I had a felt tip marker and was starting toward my mother's ironing board with it. My older sister shouted "Eileen, NO!" and stormed away to get mom. So that is what I wrote on the ironing board cover. My mother didn't see the humor in it that I do know. That ironing board, the last time I saw it when I was about sixteen, still had the faded out "NO" written very clearly on the edge reminding me that this object was a big "NO!" Throughout my childhood, each time that thing was hauled out from the shadows; I felt varying degrees of guilt, frustration, and impudence in looking at it. What I never felt was forgiveness. I'm not saying that my mother never forgave me, although I can't say for certain that she did because we never talked about it. But the person who most needed to forgive me got taught the lesson of "No!" that day, but never got taught how to forgive herself. That, if you are as slow as she is, was me.

For all our abilities to learn from all sorts of mistakes, the biggest mistake we make in life is often one that we don't know how to recognize as such. The mistake of harboring anger, towards ourselves and others. Anger is a heavy ugly load to carry, particularly anger toward ourselves. And anger toward others, only inspires anger toward ourselves, because we are carrying around the weight of the mistakes of others with no lesson to learn from it other than "NO!" a lesson we all learned when we were under two feet tall. And so, we suffer.

How does one learn to forgive? I'll be honest and tell you I haven't figured it all out yet. But there is some wisdom in the old idiom "forgiving and forgetting." The idea was presented to me over fifteen years ago when I first read Life 101. When you break down these two words you get something very interesting, a concept that has helped me learn to embrace forgiving and forgetting. "For Giving" If you are "For Giving" well, that's a great thing, isn't it? In this case you want to be all for giving the weight of the problem up. Be for giving yourself credit for having made a mistake, and knowing that you won't make it again. Be for giving the person who hurt you the weight of the misdeed back, so that they too can learn from it. If you are carrying around for them, they will only learn that you are an emotional pack mule. "For getting" Usually when you hear the word forget it sounds like you are going to give up the lesson you learned, but that isn't what the word says, is it? It says you are "For Getting." But what are you for getting? I'm willing to believe that by being For Giving, you make room on your emotional plate "For Getting." Forgetting is making room for joy, for new experiences, for better than the injury you've been nursing.

I'm giving up some baggage I've been hauling short term and long term, because I'm all for getting some new beauty in my life. How about you?

Grapes and Wine

2006-10-07T09:20:00.000-05:00

I'm an eater. Ask anyone who's seen me from the neck down, they'll tell you, yup, Ei's an eater. Now this is not to say I have an astounding sense of what is fabulous in cuisine, nor is it to say I even know what I like, but I eat really well. I eat when I'm sad, when I'm bored, when I'm happy...you get the picture. The one time in my life that you can tell that something is really wrong is when I'm not eating much of anything for an extended period of time. That is indeed a really serious sign. Other than physical ailments, it has happened three times in my lifetime - once was this spring.

But this tendency to want to just chew up life, gulping it down in large chewy bites is not limited to food. It is the way I consume information, relationships, even my relationship with the divine. I don't want to sample it, to savor the aromas, to feel the texture on my lips or to even admire it sitting on a plate. I want to ingest my life...infuse it into my very being. And I've realized that this has become a problem.

My weight is only a small indicator of how ineffective my approach to life has been, but certainly the most readily apparent, nagging reminder of how much I've sucked into myself without thinking, without feeling, without even enjoying. And how little I've passed up. How little I've let go. It is the ever present symbol of the baggage I tote from even my youngest days in life...dragging around thirty some odd years of impulsive cramming myself full of life, regardless of it's nutrient level or taste.

So here I am at 37 a few short weeks from 38 and finally saying "I'm stuffed...I couldn't eat another bite." In other words, to quote an old old commercial, "I can't believe I ate the whole thing."

I've never been to a vineyard. I can't say that it has ever interested me. As a whole I'm not really about drinking too much. This is not to say that I didn't go through my period of stuffing myself on the experience of drunkenness and released inhibitions and wild parties that left me feeling broken and restless. But I've never been one to really enjoy a glass of wine, a special cocktail, the best stout beer. I really didn't get it. I had a friend in Denver who had wine parties the way some people have Tupperware parties (and yes there really is a company out there that does this with fine German wines). I went to her parties, but I really didn't get it. I got myself their wonderful dessert wine and promptly drank the entire bottle by myself. If I had visited a vineyard though I quite imagine I would have stuffed myself indiscriminately on grapes while tromping through the vineyard, rather than saving myself for the wine once we entered the cellar. By the time we'd gotten to the wine, my stomach would have been protesting, telling me that wine was out of the question...it already wanted to throw up.

I really admire people who know themselves. That know their wine. I've not really been that person in my life, as much as that is something that I've wanted to consume, it was just too much waiting for an eater. Wine isn't a pluck it off the vine, or shelf, or drive through window interest. Wine takes patience and education, and a very clear sense of self, meaning, knowing the difference between what makes a wine good to the world and what makes a wine your own special taste. I haven't had that kind of time to invest in wine. I haven't made that kind of time.

Now before Christie gets on my tail about aspiring to be a lush, let's be clear that this is my metaphor for the day. I've decided that I need to slow down and witness more and ingest less. That I need to smell some fruit that I will never taste, and marvel at the artistry of a cream puff that will never end up in the seat of my jeans. I need to pluck some grapes and make some wine. And when the wine is finally ready, I will savor it...because it is mine and it belongs completely to me. And hopefully, by the time it is complete, I will have plenty of room in the seat of my jeans for it too. Because I'm tired of hauling around an entire lifetime of impulsiveness like Marley hauled the chains of his life. It's heavy, and burdensome and unattractive.

I've decided that I'm not looking for another love to consume (or who will consume me). If I ever love again it will be because the perfect blend of fruit is delivered, by happenstance, into my open hands. It will be because that fruit ferments perfectly and is tended with caring skilled hands. And when it is consumed, I will experience it with every sense I have available to me. And if I never have the chance to make that perfect bottle of wine, I will die happy at spending the rest of my life cultivating the skills to do it anyway, rather than gorging myself on grapes.

However...I may still indulge in a handful of grapes now and then. Man cannot live on wine alone.

Peace.

Warning...mind bending statement coming...

2006-10-03T09:17:00.000-05:00

That's what I hear when there is a certain tone and frequency to the way my son says "Hey, Mom...."

"Hey, Mom?"

"Hmmm?" Pulling nose out of book..."Yes darling, what is it?"

"Do you think that God stays in heaven because he's afraid of what he's created?"

(Insert the sound of crickets chirping here....)

Well, what would you say if your seven year-old asked you?

Actually, it's half full...

2006-09-24T09:13:00.000-05:00

There's been a whole lotta blogging going on in reference to Natasha Bedingfield's song Unwritten. There's a reason for that, you know.

It's my youngest son's favorite song. There is something so endearing about his sweet toothless lisp crooning out "Feel the rain on your skin, No one else can feel it for you, Only you can let it in, No one else, no one else, Can speak the words on your lips."

It matters it matters that it speaks to him, that it speaks to you, that it speaks to us. We're all unwritten. We all have empty pages in the journal, admittedly some of us have fewer pages left than sweet Elyas.

Which brings me to the real topic on my mind...all those pages we've already written upon. We all seem so focused on what we will write, might write, want to write, that we sometimes do not give enough props to those pages we've agonized over, poured ourselves into, or even the stuff we've jotted down on the fly, never knowing until years later how much it really meant.

I have pages, volumes of pages, and you do too. I may be unfinished, but I'm not unwritten. And I'm learning to live and love it. I hope you are too.

It's not enough to know where you are going, you have to know where you've been. And love it. And I do.

In the middle of nowhere

2006-09-23T21:06:00.000-05:00

I was driving down the interstate today, thinking. What else do you do when you are driving down an interstate? Like always I'm thinking about where I'm at in my life...thinking about how I got here, thinking about where I might be going. I-80 isn't a very interesting route. Not much to look at, lots of pretty fluffy clouds, dead racoons on the side of the road, lots of trucks.

Like I often do, I notice the cars driving around me, how there is a pattern to the craziness. How you end up kind of traveling "with" someone for awhile, because they are driving about the same speed, in the same direction, and you kind of feel like you have a traveling partner, even when you know you don't. But then they get pissy about a slow driver, or take off on some exit to get gas or food, or slow down because they are nervous about a cop you've passed, and *poof!* traveling partner is gone. And suddenly you are in the middle of nowhere without your partner. Your partner that you never really had. But it was comforting for a moment, wasn't it?

I grew up in a little town that has an event every year called "The Middle of Nowhere Festival." When I was about 11, in fact I know I was 11 because it was the year my sister got married, the year my dad died, Ainsworth hosted the National Horseshoe Championship. Who knew such an event even existed? I didn't, but there we were hosting it. And there was this guy, a professional bowler, who was on Johnny Carson one night telling Johnny that he was on the way to the middle of nowhere to participate in this event. So when he rolled into town he was greeted with a huge vinyl banner that said, "Welcome to the Middle of Nowhere." I guess someone needed to depreciate the expense of that vinyl banner, because it became an annual thing every year thereafter. It's been 25 years, and I wonder how many people in that town even remember why they do this? Anyway, I couldn't help but agree with the bowler. I hated the town where I grew up. It was bland and boring and mean and I couldn't wait to find the world, get lost in a city, own some notariaty. I couldn't wait to get somewhere.

I grew up, I went to cities, I slept with artists, I read great books, explored the dives, and drank up the theatre. I gave birth to beautiful children, and I drank in the texture of the world.

And still I wake up again and again in the middle of nowhere.

What did I miss?

I got home and read some blogs. I talked to my friend. I tried to sleep. I filled out paperwork for my divorce. Finally I plugged in one of my favorite movies, even though I knew it was a dangerous choice, American Beauty. It's a weird movie, because everytime I watch it, I identify with all of the characters, some more than others at different times. I thought tonight that I'm somewhere in the middle of all of them. And I laughed. And then I cried.

Lester
Both my wife and daughter think I'm this gigantic loser, and...they're right. I have lost something. I'm not exactly sure what it is, but I know I didn't always feel this..sedated. But you know what? It's never too late to get it back.

Lester
It's a great thing when you realize you still have the ability to surprise yourself. Makes you wonder what else you can do that you've forgotten about.

Ricky to Angela
She's not your friend. She's someone you use to feel better about yourself.

Angela to Jane
At least I'm not ugly!

Ricky
Yes you are. And you're boring. And you're totally ordinary. And you know it.

Lester
Our marriage is just for show, a commercial to show how normal we are, when we are anything but.

Angela to Lester
Do you think I'm ordinary?

Lester
You couldn't be ordinary if you tried.

Angela
I can't think of anything worse than being ordinary.

Lester, closing speech
I'd always heard your entire life flashes before your eyes a second before you die. First of all, that one second isn't a second at all. It stretches on forever, like an ocean of time. For me, it was lying on my back at Boy Scout camp, watching falling stars. And yellow leaves from the maple trees that lined our street. Or my grandmother's hands, and the way her skin seemed like paper. And the first time I saw my cousin Tony's brand-new Firebird. And Janie. And Janie.
...
And ... Carolyn. I guess I could be pretty pissed off about what happened to me, but its hard to stay mad when there's so much beauty in the world. Sometimes I feel like I'm seeing it all at once, and it's too much. My heart fills up like a balloon that's about to burst. Then I remember to relax, and stop trying to hold on to it, and then it flows through me like rain, and I can't feel anything but gratitude for every single moment of my stupid little life.

I don't know where I went wrong, or if I went wrong. Maybe I'm supposed to be in the middle of nowhere. Maybe that's where it's all at. Look at the miles of puffy white clouds...the semi-trucks racing by. Look at the road kill and all the people racing to get somewhere. Look at the cornstalks whipping in the wind. Maybe there's something here I missed.

Lester
You have no idea what I'm talking about, I'm sure. But don't worry. You will someday.

Poor Katy didn't

2006-09-05T08:57:00.000-05:00

A real conversation from my life.

D: Mom, remember that Katydid that we caught in Mr. Cute Teacher's room?

M: Sure, very cool.

D: Did I tell you that Matthew caught a Praying Mantis?

M: Yes, I saw him at conferences, remember?

D: Mr. Cute Teacher put Matthew's Praying Mantis in with the Katydid today. And the Praying Mantis ATE him!

M: (Stunned silence)

D: School is just so cool!

The Theatre of Life

2006-09-05T08:55:00.000-05:00

My love affair with theatre (and yes, I'm enough of a theatre geek that I spell it that way, not "theater") began as most do I imagine, in a darkened auditorium, swept away in the wonder and majesty of a beautiful story close enough to touch. A story you feel like you are part of, not witnessing. I was four years old and my mother took me to a production of Camelot at the college she attended. Had it been any other production, I can honestly tell you the course of my life might have been altered. This one evening in my life at such a tender age defined me in ways that I'm only begining to understand.

Of course, what four year old girl isn't rapt with the idea of Kings and Queens and dashing knights in armor, and lovely wicked bastard sons working their evil in dastardly ways? That's what hooked me, I loved sweet selfish Guenivere and doddering and loving Arthur. I was enamored with the narcissistic (go figure) Lancelot and squealed with delight at Mordred's charming flavor of nastiness. But the thing that stuck with me from day one to whatever day I'm on today was the scene where the round table was conceived.

Arthur was a well meaning screw up. He had accidentally become king, it had never been his intention to be king, and he wore the title uncomfortably. Finally in a place with the love of a woman that he adores, he wants desperately to be more than king...he wants to be a GOOD king. He races through their chambers as he dresses pontificating about what it is that his kingdom needs. He knows more than anything that it needs peace. As he wraps himself around the idea that the noblemen, the knights of his kingdom, must personify something new, he thinks about who they are. They are the strongest, both physically and economically, of the land. And with their power, they determine how life is for all others. Their might determines what is right. "Might is right," he disconcertedly mutters to himself. Finally with the help of Guenivere, he begins to realize that as king, he can mold a new heirarchy, where all nobles are equal and given equal consideration. Guenivere offers the use of a huge round table that they were gifted for their wedding so that no one would have the honor of sitting at the head, all people would be equal. And as the idea springs to life, Arthur dashes around the room shouting about his ideal kingdom, ending triumphantly with "Not might is right...might FOR right!"
I was caught and my fate as an idealist, bleeding heart, liberal theatre geek was sealed. Might for right. Might FOR right. It resonates at the very core of my being. It is in everything I feel and I do. I'm a little girl caught in my own fantasy kingdom that didn't quite grow up.

But it isn't such a bad thing.

We all know where that story went. Arthur built his beautiful Camelot into a place more magical than he could have imagined. It attracted people from far and wide, including the man who would be his best friend and who would also destroy it all, Lancelot. And it attracted the attention of a bitter son who would have them all die in bitter dissapointment for the sins of his father.
"Don't let it be forgot, that once there was a spot, for one brief shining moment, that was known as Camelot."

Ok, so if you aren't a theatre person, or don't know the show, I'm probably taking lots for granted. But in the final scene as Camelot crumbles, Arthur sends a young boy out into the world, comanding him to hide and be safe, to live a long and fruitful life, and to tell anyone who would listen about the beauty and the joy that Camelot had brought.

"Run boy, RUN!"

And I was that boy. I'm still fighting the fight, dreaming the dream. And I'm enamored by the fact that my own Lancelot didn't destroy the dream. And I'm wondering if maybe there's a round table hidden in a dungeon somewhere in the depths of my soul that I need to drag out, clean up, and put to use.