October 1st: A Recap

October 1st. It’s 61 degrees. The moon is full.

We have been slowly shifting from a performance focused school mindset to a love of learning school mindset.

The oldest child is nearly 12. We are fully into the moody, blessed years of pushing against the constraints of childhood and getting ready to grow up in mind, not just in body. She’s too dang smart for her own good with her newfound access to technology, and this very afternoon I was googling how to foster self control in children, since that isn’t my strong suit either. It’s beautiful and terrifying to behold. The angsty pixie haircut, the love all things black. The hours spent in her self-made cocoon of sheets and Christmas lights, drawing and listening to music on her headphones. But she still has that cute little upturned nose she got from her Grandma Jackie and sleeps with her ragged stuffed bunny. I coax her out into the sunlight by making her walk her dog and sometimes make her forget her angst by dancing with her in the kitchen until she giggles. She’s smart enough to see how ridiculous the mood swings are and has the grace to (sometimes resentfully) laugh at herself. If I get her alone and out of her room, she tells me all the crazy fun things that are bouncing around in her beautiful brain.

The middle child is in the waning part of his 9th year, set free from the bounds of public school and set loose on the world (neighborhood) to test his mettle. He is a dreamer, a thinker, a builder of epic lego concoctions, a consumer of books, and a distract-o-bot who loves making art and comics with his trusty BFF (the middle F fluctuating between the two parts of Frenemy) /youngest brother at his side. I see him out in the sun on the sidewalk, or catch a bare foot dangling from his hammock and I ask what he is doing. “Just thinking”, he replies. He’s all war and knights and battles and pirates, troll hunters and epic beasts, his eyes lightly skimming over the gore and horror of the topic and landing on the feats of bravery, band of brothers camaraderie, cool weaponry and armor. He’s the one who seeks out new music and chases down rabbit trails of snippets of songs he hears until he says, “Mama. You gotta hear this music.” And I find myself listening to D.J. Marshmallow without knowing how this happened. He’s the one who is never in his body, but somewhere in his head. The scars on his knees and elbows (and this week his mouth) are evidence. He keeps my first aid skills fresh. This week he had me googling “wound care in the mouth.” Good times. He’s still my sensitive soul. The one who passes through logic to the heart of the matter and no amount of words will explain it all. I just hold him while his big grey-green eyes look up at me, as if I have the answers.

The youngest child is my live wire. My prankster, my jokester. My Loki. Still mercurial in his moods, still my early morning riser who greets me (and the dog) at the dawn with the grin only a 7 and a half year old sports, all teeth too big for his face and gaps between them big enough to squish through a considerable amount of jell-o. He’s all muscle and scrappy quickness. He climbs and jumps and leaps where angels dare to tread. He’s the kid who told me days after it happened that he had gone for a walk alone around the block. I never even knew he was gone. I thought he was outside playing in the yard while I made dinner. He follows wherever his big brother leads, but will straight up cut you if you don’t also listen to his opinion. He holds himself to a high standard and when he doesn’t understand or get it perfect the first time, is so hard on himself that I have to tell him that I don’t let anyone talk to my kid that way. Not even him. His mind is quick and logical, cunning and silly. He doesn’t let anything slip past him. Cookies in the house? He knows how many are in the box and how many everyone else has already had. He’s gonna get his fair share. He’s desperate to be big, but is still the one who comes in for a morning snuggle.

Charlie is 9 months old and has a nose for legos. I wish I had started an art piece called “Things I fished from my puppy’s mouth” the day he came to be with us. It would be disgusting and epic. He chews things he shouldn’t but brings them to me as if to say “Please take this away from me.” He’s the best soccer goalie in the family and makes epic stops, leaps and catches mid air, as long as the ball is kinda flat. He’s a great addition to the family and we are finally coming out of that phase where I feel like I have a hairy baby to take care of, but who I occasionally put in a big metal crate to sleep and if he were a human, that would be totally wrong.

I’m 43 and 11 months and I’ve had a grown up job for most of this year where I get paid and everything! And no, I don’t mean homeschooling 3 kids. That’s my other job, which is awesome and I am loving but am not confident in yet. I’m a freelance project manager for a marketing firm and who woulda thought after managing a house, 3 kids, a rental, childcare, finances and everything in between that I’d be good at holding all the strings of a project in my hand and making sure everything gets done. Matt says I’m the best he’s ever worked near. High praise! I got a bit closer to finishing that album I’ve been working on forever and amidst love and loss and Covid, I found that I do survival really well. It’s looking forward and making plans for 5-10 years out that is harder to keep my mind on. We are renovating the house after nearly 14 years of just living with things exactly as they were the day we moved in and this week after working with the guys who were setting the countertops, one joked that they should hire me and the other asked me when I was going to get my General Contractor license. I talk the talk but am still fumbling my way through this process. Hard and costly lessons are good teachers but hard masters. I try to keep my eyes on the good things most of the time. I look for good and glory and grace. It’s hard in the midst of all of this to not get swamped by the weight of it all. I fight the good fight, rest and then wade back into the fray. 

Homeschool - Day 20?

 We are just trying to figure this all out.

6th grade - Khan academy math, research Mesopotamian Art project, Poem memorization

4th grade - Colonial America - model of a colonial village, discuss battle of Lexington and Concord

2nd grade Khan acadmey math, poem memorization and writing, copywork

Building Your Own Pandemic Virtual School Desks - A Tutorial...of sorts

How to make desks for homeschool.

Step 1. (Not pictured) Go to the local big box construction store with 3 kids in masks plus a dog because WHY NOT make it a circus. Choose laminated lumber slabs that are 24" x 48" x .75". Lose one child who keeps running off to find a lumber cart, tell the children to put their masks on 15,000 times, and, for the love, please give other people some space because social distancing. Break up about 14 arguments about who gets to push the cart.

Step 2. (not pictured) Let the kids pick a quart of trim paint in whatever garish shade they want. Do not comment. Ask the youngest 20 times to stop treating the lumber cart like a sled and ooching it all over the paint department. Make your daughter put back her fan of color swatches. Let about 10 people ooo and aaahh over the dog who is in the store and who brings their dogs into stores!!!!????

Step 3. (also not pictured but hubs DID try. I was too focused) Don eye and ear protection and cut those boards to size with the skill saw that you are terrified of because John Hardy lost 3 fingers to one when you were a kid. Insist that hubs supervise just in case you need someone to ice your severed fingers on the way to the hospital. Feel super empowered. Also feel like vomiting a little.

Step 4. (pictured here) Have your surly kids, who think it's too hot and this is too hard, sand the edges off of the desks because of sharp edges and their being prone to needing stitches. Attach the 4 blocks you cut off each board with wood glue and a center screw as a clamp to create corners for the legs to attach. 

This is what the top of the desk will look like after sanding and attaching blocks.

This is what the bottom of the desk will look like after sanding and attaching blocks.

Step 5. Have your kids complain loudly about hard it is to be perfect with power tools that they have maybe used twice in their lifetimes. This will make the process so much more enjoyable. Drink coffee to sustain yourself and maybe sneak off to stress eat a few cookies. Whatever works best for you.

Step 6. Spill an entire can of Kilz 2 on the porch when a kid kicks it over. This is an important step.

Step 7. Prime the desks alone on the front porch while listening to an audio book because the only primer you have now is Kilz (original) and can only be cleaned up with mineral spirits. Get light headed cleaning the brush outside with mineral spirits and google frantically because you don't remember how to dispose of it. Leave it out to evaporate, but where the dog and kids can't get it.

Step 8. Spread out that giant tarp that you are definitely not going to roll dead bodies in and head for the lake if the bickering doesn't stop around here, and let the kids paint their desktops. Clothes will be ruined. They will mysteriously get paint on their faces. Are we eating paint now?!

The dog will get in the mix.  

He will totally get painted. The kids will be filled with self confidence. You will feel like you are killing it at this parenting thing.

Step 9. While the kids are watching The Dragon Prince on Netflix, sneak outside and paint a 2nd coat to make the desktops look like they weren't painted by 7 and 9 year olds. The 11 year old's looks amazing. She's doing a great job so just touch it up a tiny bit on the edge were you can still see primer, but for the love, don't tell her or you will wound her tweenage soul. The desktops will look amazing. Almost as if you had some clue as to what you were doing and TOTALLY not winging the whole thing from beginning to end.

Step 10.  Order 5 different sets of hair pin table legs from Amazon at the appropriate height for your kid and have only one set show up and the others be mysteriously "undeliverable". You will need to order more. Actually this would have been step 1, but then the shipping debacle will happen so here we are. Desktops build and still no legs. 

Step 11. When they finally arrive (2 days AFTER school begins - because pandemic), attach the hairpin legs to the blocks under the desktop and hope and pray that these small children won't actually test the 500 lb weight rating these table legs have. In fact, don't mention it at all, in case they get ideas. Be sure to use screws that are just a hair too long and then do some patching and painting to the top to make it smooth where the wood splintered. Or don't. You can just leave it. At this point, who cares. We are almost to the finish line. It will bother your soul though. Because these kids didn't come by their perfectionistic tendencies by change.

Step 12. Set up the desk in the room that is about to have to have the ceiling ripped out where the 100 year old plumbing pipes failed because could life BE any more insane right now. Step back and marvel at your the children's handiwork and tell them what a great job they did. Just in time for the start of the pandemic school year where you and your progeny will be flung to the wolves of unexpected virtual schooling.

Happy Building!

Quarantine Goes On

It has been months. And months. And months. So much togetherness. No end in sight.

Love in the time of Covid19

We have been on lockdown in Nashville for more days than I can count.  March 2nd was the tornado that closed all the schools for a week. Then the kids went back for tree days and then school has been closed ever since. We don't leave the house much beyond taking the new dog for a walk. Our 16th anniversary came and neither of us remembered until halfway through the day and Facebook reminded me.

All activities are cancelled. Parks are closed. I am attempting to homeschool the children but it often goes south before too much gets done. We watch movies. We write and draw and play outside. The kids run loose like I used to in the woods on Hamby Road.

But in the loneliness is a quiet and a contentment that I have not felt in awhile. It feels good to be still. It feels good to be quiet. The dishwasher hums, the dryer spins, the boys write poems with sticky letters while my girl reads yet another novel on her Kindle. Hubs retreats to his man-cave to play games. It's a good life. We are lucky. And I am happy today.

Love (and Parenting) in the Time of Covid19

My darling I love you
But don't cough on me
We have been here for weeks
In this wretched quarantine

The groceries are scarce
The toilet paper runs low
We are stuck in this house
But there's nowhere to go.

The parks are all closed
The stores are all shuttered
We are shut in with these children
And the house is getting cluttered

With Legos and books
And homeschool papers
We Facetime and Zoom while the
Kinder cut capers.

We attempt to do work
But get nothing done
We send out the kinder
Out into the sun

They explore and they argue
They create and they wander
They ride down the hill on their bikes
And they ponder

What does this dead snake
That I found feel like?
Can I run over this roadkill
With the wheels of my bike?

Can I have another snack?
Can I dig a big hole?
Can I paw through the fire pit
And paint my face with charcoal?

Do I HAVE TO do Math?
Do I HAVE TO write cursive?
They are making me use my mom voice
In threats most coercive.

Wash your hands, wear your mask
Please don't ask again why
If we follow all the rules
We might be free by July

The Homecoming Mum

A short story of a memory.

I guess I should begin by telling you what a Homecoming Mum is.  It seems to be exclusively a Texas thing and is a big fake chrysanthemum flower, usually in the wearer’s school colors, surrounded by and trailing ribbons, bells, braided ribbon, curled ribbon and every plastic dangly item that can be bought at a local Hobby Lobby and may best describe the wearer.  For example, cheerleader megaphone, teddy bear, princess crown...you get the idea.  These mums are worn on homecoming day and gifted to the wearer by a boyfriend, a grandparent, a parent, auntie, uncle, a secret admirer etc. The boys also wear something similar in terms of ribbons and dangles, but it is attached to a garter on their arm and out of necessity, much smaller. That elastic band can only hold so much weight.  Mums, however, have no limit as to how big and elaborate and weighty they can be.  

In the 90’s, things had gotten only a bit out of hand and while the mums were large, they were still mostly wearable.  They could not be pinned to the shirt because it would rip a hole in the fabric. Often they were pinned (if the mum was smaller) to a bra strap for support. Or to the heavy wool fabric of the letter jacket the wearer was sporting and if it was your sweethearts jacket, all the better.  It was all about structure and support. An interesting fact was that these mums were often a measure of popularity.  To be seen on Homecoming day, with a LL Bean backpack and Dooney & Bourke purse, struggling down the hallways, clothes obscured by the mass of jingling and fluttering doodads was the height, THE LIMIT, of cool. The coolest girls got a mum not only from their parents and/or grandparents, but from their boyfriend and bffs. 

In 1994, I was a senior.  And let me be clear, I was, how can I put it best...queen of the nerds.  Well.  Not that nerds had queens then.  That would imply that I had some sort of notoriety as a nerd, but really I was just a plain old nerd and I had a small group of nerd friends, but I was not the queen of them. Chubby, glasses, nose in a book, in the most uncool extra curricular activities.  Academic Decathlon, for example.  We studied and took tests.  For fun.  For FUN! What?  In addition to that coolest of the cool activity, I was also on the swim team and sang in the choir.  These may be pretty cool in some places but in the 90s, these were the backwater of sports and activities compared to the behemoth that is football (and its cute perky girlfriend, cheerleading) in Texas.

I could feel the longing to belong, to have a mum, to be popular, but I didn’t have those skills, or that kind of money.  My large family had enough for necessary and sometimes a bit for what was fun, but shelling out 50 bucks for something I would wear for one day was out of the question. I had reconciled myself to that fact in my Freshman year when I realized what a big deal this Homecoming thing was.  And now my budding rebellious mind had done a 180 and if I could have uttered these words whithout dying of religious guilt and perhaps being struck down in blasphemy at the time, I would have said “F that”. I knew, even in my longing, that it was a ridiculous, extravagant thing and not necessary for the wellbeing of my soul.  At least that is what I told my 17 year old self.

Instead, I decided to go classy.  I was, due to perhaps a glut of reading all things L.M. Montgomery at the time, a bit of a romantic.  Not in the relationship sense, but in the Anne of Green Gables putting herself in a leaky old boat to float out into the water, a pale “dead” maiden while her friend read “The Lady of Shalott” upon the shore and shedding a tear because she looked so dead in that boat, kind of way.  She nearly sank by the way. That’s what being “romantical” got you, even in Anne’s day.  This is the kind of gal I was.  I was very Anne. So I bought a real chrysanthemum and with my best craft store supplies and questionable hot glue gun skills, I made my own corsage.  That was, in fact, where the tradition had come from.  You got your gal a corsage for Homecoming.  It was just a testament to how all things are bigger in Texas that it had gone from that, to the shirt ripping monstrosity it had become.  I pinned it to my own letter jacket (because I had no boyfriend’s jacket to wear) and off I went to school.  

My nerd friends tentatively admired it.  They knew what it was to buck the system and to be seen as enjoying a departure from the status quo, so they kept their praise on the down low. A chrysanthemum is a sturdy flower and needs a lot of water to not go wilty, so I had to keep refilling that green tube of water with a rubber top in which my flower was stuck. It involved a lot of unpinning and getting my jacket wet to maintain this flower, but I did it.  For a full school day.  

That night was the “big game” and I put this in quotes because while I understand football and grew up near football, I literally could not care less about it. Scandalous. I know.  I’m sure I’ll hear about this later.  Especially from my Grandpa who insisted we spend Thanksgiving with the TV blaring the Dallas Cowboys game while my Grandma marshaled the troops and cooked for an army of adult kids and grandkids.  She’s not here to tell me if she would mind my indifference to football but I remember her crinkled bead brown eyes peeking around the corner of the kitchen door for the score every so often.  I stood in the stands, with my back to the game, plastic Longview Lobo cup in hand, drinking my soda and talking and laughing, proud of the corsage on my lapel. When the band would play or the crowd would roar, or people around me would lean forward, sucking in their breath, eyes popping as some play was made for the endzone, I would turn around and watch and collectively chear or “awwwww man!!” with the best of them. A nerd in a Texas Football world has to learn to assimilate, right?

Now the worst thing a nerd could do in public at the time, was appear to not care what other people thought about him or her.  One had to be properly aware of how uncool one was and pay proper deference to the hierarchy. To fail to do so was to risk wrath.  I should have learned that lesson at the Sadie Hawkins dance when I was laughing at a joke with my date, a boy called Russell Hurst who was sweet and very very pale, when a football jock recoiled at the audacity of my happiness and reached over a burned my leg with his cigarette.  But I was hard headed and more than a little ADHD and so I had forgotten to be properly cowed in the presence of cool. I was having a good time and was proud as punch of my little corsage.

A few of the cool boys noticed my forgetfulness and began a plan to put me back in my place.  The uncool are never deserving of happiness, after all.  Whenever I turned my head to look at the game or to look at a friend, this group of boys began plucking out flower petals of my corsage.  Like a snake strike.  Just go for one petal.  Quick as a flash.  I would cover my corsage and shout at them to stop. Then after a few minutes, I would forget to be on guard (ADHD, remember?) and they would do it again.

Now in my head, the adult me replays this sequence of events and imagines I give those boys a massive shove backward off the bleachers where they would lie bleeding and contrite that they had been such jerks. I would flip my hair and coolly sip my coke (which was a Dr. Pepper but in Texas a coke is what we called every soda). Then I would flay them with my eloquent words as I dressed them down for all to hear and my friends and fellow nerds would cheer and say “Serves you right, assholes!” That is not what happened. I was not self aware enough to move to a different spot. I did not have enough self respect to not be a tiny bit pleased with this attention, awful as it was. To be seen and paid attention to, even negative attention, felt better than being invisible to my warped high school mind. So it went on, for the better part of the game until my flower was just a stem and I was mad and close to tears.  

The game ended and we did not win. The 1994 season had not been a good one for the Longview Lobos. The crush of bodies pressed out of the fences and I wandered to find my grandpa, who had season passes and therefore sat in the “good seats” on the other side of the stadium and didn’t have to endure the rabble of the bleachers. I threw away the sad remains of my corsage in the barrel full of discarded Lobo cups and we walked together down the long row of cars parked along the street to his old Ford pickup truck. We didn’t talk much and that was normal. Grandpa was my ride to the game, but not really my companion, nor had he ever been back then. That had been my grandma’s job. Both of us were still reeling from the sudden loss of her earlier that year in April and it was all too fresh. Too real. Too lonely. Being with the person who reminded me most of her and yet was the opposite in terms of comfort and understanding was like holding a coal to remember the warmth of the fire. The pleather bench seat of the truck was cold underneath me and neither of us spoke as he drove. I figured he was mad we had lost the game, and he was a man of few words anyway back then. My chrysanthemum and dignity were a mess and I didn’t have much to say either. 

I looked out the window as that old truck lurched and squeaked and jostled down the road.  It was dark as only rural roads can be dark. The light of the crescent moon was faint and thin and cold. 

 

October 1st: A Recap

 October 1st. It's 97 degrees.

My oldest will be 11 this month and is all legs, opinions, fairies, dragons and ideas and angst. Art and reading abound, as well as deep conversations with me and friends about the state of the world. Time management and deodorant are still a daily struggle.

My middlest is 8 and a half and can't wait for the next time he might receive presents. "How far away is my birthday?" He is also in a particularly painful period of perpetual pestering but is beautiful in his mischief, physical strength, love of reading, tender heart, growing love of art and pushing me to find ways to engage his energy. Running, biking, climbing, wrestling. He seeks to test his mind and body in all ways. He is also training from the Dad Joke Master (Matt) and is growing in skills daily.

My youngest, age 6 and a half is all raw emotion. Whatever it is, joy, sadness, anger, he is ALL IN. The storm rages for a minute or two and then passes. Then it's all jokes and giggles and opinions. I am still the most beautiful im his eyes and when asked what his favorite subject is, he replies, "Math." Because reading is still hard. He still loves whatever his brother loves but I see signs that he is thinking of striking out on his own.

I, age 42 (and 11 months), am still wondering what I am going to be when I grow up, (Ha!), actively fighting off the mental hibernation and sadness that come with the increasing seasonal darkness. Recording my podcast, songwriting, leading a middle school choir and a girl scout troop, volunteering at school or church or in the neighborhood, making things and housework fill my time. Study, learning, philosophy, theology and deep conversations fill my mind.

It's a beautiful life, even when I lose sight of that or wish for grander things.

I am

I am my mother's feet and hands, her talking a hind leg off of a donkey and her love of relationships
My fathers musical mind, dark hair, heavy lidded eyes, and thirst for knowing and understanding
I am my grandmother's creativity and her crappy thyroid gland
I am my grandfather's campiness, his love of poetry and his temper
I am my sisters voices, that can't be told apart when we spend long stretches together and our laughter that is like
I am my brothers traipsing through the woods, swimming and longing for wild places
I am

When the old ways don't work anymore

When the old ways don't work anymore
How do we change course?
It's like digging up the dead
and dragging them to a new cemetery
it's messy and hard 
and leaves a trail
unmistakable and ugly
But the rot dries out
and the shame has
sunlight shone
in the darkest corners
We bury the things anew
yes, with grief
and ceremony
but also with understanding
and healing
and finality
rather than a hasty
shoving under the earth
to hide the bitter
the hurt and the humiliation
and in the end
there is no longer a well groomed
field of beautiful death
but a lumpy and lovely
and untidy home
for the heart that is whole again

Thoughts on Funerals: : Why it's important to go to them

It has been a year since I wrote here last.  Nearly to the day.  In one month, it will be a year since my baby brother, just shy of 33, took his own life.  That is a whole other blog post, a long long way off, but after his death,  I retreated into myself, filling journals, but everything was too raw and too private to share with many others.  Even my sweet and beloved family.  We were all suffering in our individual ways and to share my burden with them felt like piling extra weight on them.  I just couldn't do that.  I had my safe people.  My therapist.  My journal.  They got the bulk of my grief.  (They still do.  It has not all gone away.)

Just after my brother died, the last of my grandmother's cousins died and then a friend's husband.  As I got dressed and was driving to my friend's visitation, I realized that I now have my "funeral clothes."  Dark, comfortable, appropriate and I chose them without thought.

I also realized that I have let go of this notion that it is not appropriate or distasteful for me to go to a funeral or visitation.  My friend and I haven't really had much contact beyond Facebook for nearly 10 years. We were co-workers at the job I had before coming home full time with my first child.  And my grandmother's cousin?  The last time we spoke was at my Grandmother's funeral when I was 17.  I thought of her fondly, but we didn't keep up much.  Her funeral was about her friends and her life and I was glad to meet them and know them.

If it were a year ago, I would not have attended either function.  It would have felt awkward and uncomfortable.  I would have been thinking about myself and my little bits of shame that I had not been a better friend or cousin, worried if people thought my blue tunic was too happy a color for funerals and did I look nice enough.  But as I was driving to the visitation I realized more deeply that funerals are about none of that. 

When we had the service for my brother, the church was filled to bursting.  Standing room only.  Aisles filled with fellow police officers, friends of ours from childhood, friends of my parents, other men and women who were officers from other counties who didn't necessarily know my brother that well but stood in solidarity for a fallen brother, and Marine brothers, from his time in the service, who stood stoically in the back.  I never once looked at those faces and thought "They don't deserve to be here."  I thought, "My brother was loved and thought well of.  If only he could see this now.  If only he could know how much he was loved and respected." and also "My family is so well loved."  The faces of the people who came and hugged my neck are a dark blur of tears.  But I look over the register they signed and remember that they were there.  That they cared. 

And it matters that they were there.  It matters.  My friend V looked out over the people in the visitation and saw my face and smiled.  I hugged her neck and she began to comfort ME over my brother.  I accepted her comfort and she accepted mine.  We talked, quietly smiled and she gently, with one finger, caressed the face of the body her husband, smoothing his breast pocket as he lay there.  I wasn't repelled. I was...not glad...that's not exactly the right word, but in some way it was the right word.  Glad that she had this moment with his body, with friends, with remembering him and celebrating him.  And knowing she didn't care that we hadn't kept up for 10 years, but that she was glad I had come.

I was glad to drive 30 minutes for 10 minutes with her.  Glad it brought a smile to her face that we could talk in her time of grief.  Glad that in some way, it uncovered a bit more grief for me so I could tend to that part of me that is still broken and healing.  It was important to go.  And so I will continue to.

Poem : : First day of School Vacation

These little people
who have been
like the walking dead
for months on end
as the school days
droned on and on
Barely able to put
feet on floor
Groaning
in the glare
of the light
when Mama comes
to wake them up,
Are squealing
and bumping
and giggling
and building
and whumping
in the pre-dawn
hours of
the first day
of school vacation.

Poem : : My Feet Use to Be

My Feet Used to Be

My feet used to be
Bare and free
Calloused and agile
Gauging the bark
and strength of the branches
as I climbed.
Sinking into the soft red clay
of the well-worn path around the lake,
in spite of the carpet of pine needles,
gallantly thrown
like a cloak over a puddle.
Expertly avoiding the crabby crawdad
under the rock
who did not appreciate two giant invaders
into his watery domain
Quick stepping
on the hot black tar-top road,
softened by the sun
so my indented footprints
were left behind.
An advance scout
Sent out
test the strength
of some cobbled together invention
made by kids with too much time
and too little building experience
on their hands
Now they are prisoners
of age, injury, fitness goals, work, and propriety
Swathed and suffocating in cotton socks
and always shoes
My feet remember
how it used to be
to breathe

On the Loneliness of Marriage

I have lived for over 13 years with someone who is very unlike me.  He is an introvert in the extreme.  And sometimes his hobbies and job make it exponentially more intense.  But this is not a blog about him or why I think he is the way he is.  It is about me and the loneliness of being married to someone like him.  Let me be clear, I love my husband very much and I work very hard to accept him the way he is, in the place he is, and still gently ask for my needs as a partner in marriage to be met.  But sometimes they just can't be met.  He can't give what he hasn't got.  You can't get oranges from a hardware store.

Most nights I put the kids to bed and then he retreats to his man cave and I putter around.  Alone.  In fact, for one reason or another, I do most things alone, or with just me and the kids who are still young enough that I am constantly parenting and not always just enjoying their company.  Trips, church, chores, most meals, holiday preparation, parties, cookouts, camping, hiking, concerts, household projects and repairs, shopping of any kind (and lots more) are, for the most part, done solo or sometimes I can recruit a friend.

You would think I'd enjoy it after a full day of being with three rambunctious, hyper kids.  But I don't.  I recharge by being around people.  Grown people.  My brain wakes up and thinks and connects thought to thought and laughter with laughter.  I enjoy being around people.

The other day as I was driving to a class alone, I began to cry and pray.  "Lord, this feels like the same crushing loneliness I felt as a single person.  The loneliness I cried out to be released from by joining with a spouse.  I really thought that marriage was the answer (even though everyone said it wasn't.  I didn't believe them).  If I could just find a partner to share life with.  If I just had someone beside me to see what I am seeing and enjoy it."

But here I am, the other side of it, and I am just as lonely.  Some days it feels like I might not be ok, because I am so lonely and in that loneliness, feel intensely unloved.  And then I get angry.  I AM OWED COMPANIONSHIP, right?  I AM OWED A PRESENT PARTNER, right?  Usually this ends with me yelling at my hubs and telling him all the things he is doing wrong.  Perfect for making someone want to spend time with me, no?

As I cried and prayed, the thought came to me, if I am the same kind of lonely inside or outside of a marriage, maybe the answer was never marriage.  No brainer, for anyone with therapy experience, but knowing something and KNOWING something are different.  Know what I mean?

I drove to my class and on the way back home, I took a "vitamin" from the Y.  (It is a little slip of paper you can grab on the way out of the door and it has a scripture on it.)  It said ""As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. John 15:9"

Remain in my love.  Remain.  I am already there.  I just can't see it.  Or feel it.  Because I am focused on what my flawed (and we all are) husband can or can't give me in relationship.

It's not all peaches and roses from here on out.  I know that.  A bible verse doesn't fix me.  Self knowledge doesn't fix me.  I need to be reminded multiple times to remain.  Just stay here.  Present.  And be loved.

As the Day Ends

In the click of the lock as the day ends
In the hum of the a.c. outside
In the thrum of the mower that the neighbor uses at 9pm as if that is the perfect time for firefly lit yardwork
In the woosh and spin and click of the hookup of the dishwasher that is
An anachronism in this kitchen made for the 50's
In this house made for the 20's
In the stones that hold 100 years of time in the history
of earth and death and grass and Hackberry star seeds
To the rhythm of the breath of sleeping babes
Who dream and become old men and old mothers
In the passing of the sun and the moon as it grows fat and lean
In the seasons and the years and the lifetimes that this place
Held and lost and held and lost until this moment.
My bare feet on these creaking boards, once trees, once seedlings, once acorns,
Once one hundred feet high on the limbs of their mother
Carried here.  To now. Where the mint takes root in the glass on the sill
And the van beeps as I double check
And the lock clicks as the day ends.

An Invitation to Beckon the Lovely - the passing of Amy Krouse Rosenthol

I am typically not a fangirl, but I was and will always be a fan of Amy Krouse Rosenthal. She died today. Amy was a writer, an essayist, a film maker, a mother, a wife, a finder of magical and beautiful things, an encourager of others to find their magic and beauty. I watched her film, read her books and like a total nerd, wrote her a letter. 

She wrote me back. We didn't agree on where bowls should be racked up in the dishwasher, but in all things serendipitous, beautiful, and so unexpected they seemed magical, we each found joy. Me, because she pointed it out for me (and many others) and got my head out of my own crazy, lost in baby-land, navel gazing and her because she was a perpetual optimist who had her eyes wide open and searching for it. I strive to be like that. She made things. She did things. She gathered other makers and doers to her side without fear or comparison (or the paralyzing self doubt I am plagued with) and I watched her in wonder. They made things together. 

When I read her post in the NYTimes about her husband (a dating profile of sorts in hopes that he'd find love after she was gone), that was when I realized she was passing out of this world and I sobbed like it was news of my best friend dying. I had to go to bed early. I was a wreck. For a virtual stranger. But that was the way she invited people in. To know her through her writing. To make them laugh, and think, and wonder. I am grateful that she was here as long as she was. I am grateful that she shared so much of herself and encouraged others to beckon lovely. 

In honor of her, I will do as she asked and beckon the lovely into my life.  To look for the magical, romantic, serendipitous, silly and beautiful.  To open my eyes and live more deeply in gratitude.  And when I forget, as inevitably I will, I hope that you, my community of lovelies, will walk beside me and lift my head up to see the sun rise.  I will do the same thing when it is you who cannot look up from putting one foot in front of the other.

Thank you, Amy, for all that you brought to this world.  You will be sorely missed.








Her movie
Her Books
thebeckoningoflovely website has been taken over by some insanity.  Don't go there. 
whoisamy.com is much better.

Lack

I didn't know we were poor until it was pointed out to me, with sneer and disdainfully curled lip, topped with perfect blond curls and giant grosgrain bow, that I always wore the same dress to church. 

I didn't know we didn't have what others thought we needed because I had the wild woods, the endless Texas sky, a creek to dig toes in mud, and a library so full of everything I could ever want to read, (I wanted to make it so no one else could check out books and I would go A to Z and read them all.  If others checked out books, how would I know what I missed?), 6 playmates, logs and leaves and forts and trees, a lake and a flat bottom skiff and shiny brass hooks to catch those 'sucker fish' with, with the night crawlers dug from the leaf beds, where the long, tar-top driveway curved and ran to grandma's house.

I learned while my sister worked her first job to buy nicer things than my parents could afford so she would feel like she fit in.  And she permed her hair and her eye lids turned a shimmery blue to be like those other 90's teenagers.  I learned when the kids around me asked if I had worn those jeans yesterday.  I had.

I learned when I saw your house and realized that mine was different.  That there was a hole in the floor, where the only thing between me and the chickens underneath the trailer was a green shag carpet.  It bowed there and we jumped over that spot between the living room and the kitchen.  And the thought of you coming over and knowing that about me, made my insides roil like a nest of rattlesnakes. 
 
My three haven't learned.  And we haven't lacked.  Until now.  When the job goes and the money dwindles and the roil comes back.
.
I am gloriously grateful today that a trip to buy new Storm Trooper shoes for a gift is all the birthday he needs.  He hasn't discovered it yet.  The Lack.

And this I know to be true, even if I don't manage to live there, The Lack, no matter how much we have or buy or give or fill up with 'things' and people, it will never go away.  There will always be someone with more and will I compare or will I be content?  Will I envy Disney and nicer, bigger houses and vacations and fancy mini-vans?  Have I given the illusion that I have transcended the envy of 'stuff' but still envy bodies, and beauty and youth, and relationships and compare my inside to your outsides (and Facebook feed)?
Or will I close my eyes and find quiet in the lack?
Can I find quiet in the din of this noise in my head and this twisting roil of rattlesnakes, that's true name is Fear of being known and rejected?
Can I get by with filling my eyes with envy instead of the peace brought by the lack thereof?
Or can I live here? In the Lack?  And hand over my worries and fear and just be content?
Sweet Lord, I hope I can.

Dust if you Must - Poetry I like today

Dust If You Must

by Rose Milligan

Dust if you must, but wouldn't it be better To paint a picture, or write a letter, Bake a cake, or plant a seed; Ponder the difference between want and need? Dust if you must, but there's not much time, With rivers to swim, and mountains to climb; Music to hear, and books to read; Friends to cherish, and life to lead. Dust if you must, but the world's out there With the sun in your eyes, and the wind in your hair; A flutter of snow, a shower of rain, This day will not come around again. Dust if you must, but bear in mind, Old age will come and it's not kind. And when you go (and go you must) You, yourself, will make more dust.

Text Source

Poems I like today

I am grateful for the internet.  The eternal source of poems that may have been forgotten, lost in obscure books long out of print.  Instead they are fresh and real as the day they were written, there in front of me.  I may need to look up the obscure verbiage or antiquated language, but I CAN do that.  So here are a few.  Found (in part) in the introduction of The Inquisitor's Tale Or, The Three Magical Children and their Holy Dog by Adam Gidwitz (Illuminated by Hatem Aly)

Pied Beauty

By Gerard Manley Hopkins

Glory be to God for dappled things –

   For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;

      For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;

Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches’ wings;

   Landscape plotted and pieced – fold, fallow, and plough;

      And áll trádes, their gear and tackle and trim.

All things counter, original, spare, strange;

   Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?)

      With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;

He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:

                                Praise him.

 Text Source and to hear it read aloud

 

As I Walked Out One Evening

W. H. Auden, 1907 - 1973

As I walked out one evening,
   Walking down Bristol Street,
The crowds upon the pavement
   Were fields of harvest wheat.

And down by the brimming river
   I heard a lover sing
Under an arch of the railway:
   ‘Love has no ending.

‘I’ll love you, dear, I’ll love you
   Till China and Africa meet,
And the river jumps over the mountain
   And the salmon sing in the street,

‘I’ll love you till the ocean
   Is folded and hung up to dry
And the seven stars go squawking
   Like geese about the sky.

‘The years shall run like rabbits,
   For in my arms I hold
The Flower of the Ages,
   And the first love of the world.'

But all the clocks in the city
   Began to whirr and chime:
‘O let not Time deceive you,
   You cannot conquer Time.

‘In the burrows of the Nightmare
   Where Justice naked is,
Time watches from the shadow
   And coughs when you would kiss.

‘In headaches and in worry
   Vaguely life leaks away,
And Time will have his fancy
   To-morrow or to-day.

‘Into many a green valley
   Drifts the appalling snow;
Time breaks the threaded dances
   And the diver’s brilliant bow.

‘O plunge your hands in water,
   Plunge them in up to the wrist;
Stare, stare in the basin
   And wonder what you’ve missed.

‘The glacier knocks in the cupboard,
   The desert sighs in the bed,
And the crack in the tea-cup opens
   A lane to the land of the dead.

‘Where the beggars raffle the banknotes
   And the Giant is enchanting to Jack,
And the Lily-white Boy is a Roarer,
   And Jill goes down on her back.

‘O look, look in the mirror,
   O look in your distress:
Life remains a blessing
   Although you cannot bless.

‘O stand, stand at the window
   As the tears scald and start;
You shall love your crooked neighbour - (Love this line!)
   With your crooked heart.'

It was late, late in the evening,
   The lovers they were gone;
The clocks had ceased their chiming,
   And the deep river ran on. 

Text Source

Breakfast Adventures: Poached Egg on Toast with Mushrooms in Garlic and Butter Sauce (aka , how to gross out almost all your kids)

It's summer.  Glorious summer.  When time is loose and the world doesn't end if I don't get breakfast made and everyone out of the door by 7:30am.  Heck, it is currently 7:21am and only one kid is even awake!  Now if only I could sleep in, I would.

Recently I took advantage of this extra time to return to making different things for breakfast besides the same old same old eggs, toast and fruit that has been our school day staple.  And by that I at least I mean cooking the eggs in a different way, right?  Right.

I had leftover baby Portabella mushrooms I needed to use up and some garlic and butter, so I sauteed the mushrooms and garlic in butter, poached some eggs, toasted some toast and there I had it!  A delicious breakfast.  I even went so far as to serve in season, deliciously ripe, in season strawberries with freshly whipped cream. (As kids we called it "whup cream".  I did grow up in Texas, after all!)

The butter has all run off and soaked into the toast.  Mmmm.

Matt's comments were, "Man this is good!"  and "I feel like I am dining at a cafe in Paris." (where he has never been and wouldn't know that breakfast in Paris mostly consists of cafe au lait and a croissant) but I know what he meant and I liked the compliment.

Cora gave it a big thumbs up and ate every scrap.

The youngest two gave me these faces and these tears.

Guess what kids?  Mama is never gonna stop making weird food for you to cry about!  Ha!  We folks with a more sophisticated fake French palate are going to continue to eat this stuff from time to time and I know you think you don't like it, but your mouth is going to catch up with the rest of us some day.  Until then cry on, my loves, cry on.

Happy Summer!

The Deep Places

I notice in my life there are seasons when I fall silent.  As a lifelong journaler, this is strange to look back on. I used to wonder why and try to remember what was going on in my life then.  Now, as an adult, I have figured it out.  These are the times when the things that are going on inside me become too complex, too deep, too painful or angry for me to figure it all out, much less write about it.  I fell silent here too.  Life still went on.  The kids did funny things, we celebrated birthdays and holidays. I laughed and took photos, traveled with my family and wrote funny blurbs on facebook, where my life looks shiny and mostly happy.

But here I have to get still.  I have to get quiet.  And here is where I find what is underneath all of that surface life.  And I have been trying to ignore it.

In the deep places, I don't find rest, or contentment, understanding or faith.  Right now, in the deep places, I find longing like a deep dark well.  I find anger so strong that it threatens like a wildfire to consume the rest of my life.  I find sadness like an endless grey sea and lack of faith.  These things disturb me and I don't understand them, so I don't visit the deep places for very long.

Thankfully there are those around me who help me walk through the deep places, help me talk about these things.  To help me be present in my life instead of wander through my life as a documentary journalist, taking photos of life around me and never being in the photos.

Now, family members and friends who like to worry about me/love me, this is not an invitation to fix me.  That's not your job.  Thanks for the love you give and I understand that you want me to not hurt or be angry, but no one can take that away.  It is only God who can heal us in the deep places and I am seriously considering letting Him.  I've held Him at arm's length for a long time about this place, dancing around faith and surrender like a child throwing a tantrum at the end of his mother's arm, taking back the steering wheel of the ambulance when I need to be in the back on life support.  Don't worry.  He's got me.  He is never going to let me go.  Even when I go to the deep places.