Swimming for someone else

Remember when I got that Achilles injury and I whined about it so much that a bunch of people blocked me from their Facebook feed and then I did this really philosophical post about a season of healing?

Well I'm still not healed.   The Achilles, I mean.  That thing still swells up like a pregnant woman in a Baltimore summer when I run.

But the good news is that Torbjorn insisted I got to take up swimming again because I was driving him bananas, as a way to keep working out without straining the old ankles.

And, because I can absolutely be peer pressured into anything (um, don't ask, Mom.  Love you!), I agreed to swim a two mile race.  Two miles, you scoff.  Pah.  Well.  Consider that two miles translates into 3218.688 meters.  Which translates into 128.747 lengths of a 25 meter pool.  (Well really you have to make that 129 lengths because honestly - who's the nerd who's going to stop at 128.7 and say Hey that's it, I am D.O.N.E. DONE! ?? )

So.  Two miles.

The race is Purple Swim Baltimore, and is an event to raise awareness and funding for research into pancreatic cancer.  In 2010, over 43000 Americans were diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, and less than 25% will survive the first year.  I signed up with no first hand awareness of life with cancer.  I just thought it would be a great swim, and I could do a little bit of good with it.

I underestimated.  To use words like 'overwhelmed' and 'amazed' when I look at the amount of money donated to the cause by my very own friends and family?  Understatements.  I am nothing less than humbled.  And inspired beyond measure to go out and swim for all of us.

Because life is funny.  In the weeks since I signed up, cancer has come to visit with an uncle I love dearly. Now, in case I needed any more motivation, I have first hand knowledge of the way cancer snakes fingers around hearts and squeezes in dark and scary ways.

I've got exactly twelve hours until I swim.  Two long shark infested ruled by pirates open water miles. I'm excited.  Excited to do just a little thing to make it better, a good and difficult but still a small thing, in a very big world.

Pre-swim Purple

If you would like to contribute, you can click here to support PurpleSwim Baltimore and the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network.  (The page is open for 90 days after the swim, so even if you're slow on the clicker, you've still got time.) (But not that much time.  Get on it!)

Look before you Leap

Fifteen years ago today I made the single best choice of my life. 

We were young - so young.

We had so many big dreams (and so few actual plans).

Yet I knew - we knew - with a certainty of instinct that comes from your deepest gut.

Together we stood at the edge of everything - stood holding hands, me wiping tears and him in a cold sweat of nervousness - and we leapt. 

Yes, we looked before we leapt. We looked out into a future entirely uncertain, found no promises or answers there, and looked at each other.  Here, at the edge of everything there were two people who delighted in each other daily, who laughed together hourly, who told each other outrageous stories and darkest secrets. Here were two newly-minted adults without the wisdom of years or experience, but possessed of the inexplicable confidence that this - this! - was Quality.

Two people leapt that day, out into the unknown.  Through updrafts and downdrafts, through terrifying spins toward the ground and through exhilarating swoops towards the heavens, we live out that leap, every single day.  

There is no other hand I'd rather be holding.

Happy Anniversary, Mr Nilsen. 

eight and three quarters

watching her in motion is like watching two ostriches do cartwheels - all long legs and arms waving around of their own volition.

long long long feet rest on her flip flops, showing me all the growing that is still to come. three sizes, she grew this school year.  three shoe sizes.  

mosquito bites make a point-to-point map up and down her shins, meeting at the matching bandaids on both knees.

the denim miniskirt, so big she had to tie it on in the fall rides high - almost too high - this summer.  A hand-me-down Hollister t-shirt from her cooler, older neighbor friends up the street has been chosen over all the sweet flowered blouses in her drawer. 

the [finally] long hair meets her shoulders, the summer blonde streaks starting to shimmer throughout - it was carefully brushed this morning. i recognize the calculated nonchalance of hair tucked behind ears Just. So.   instantly, i remember those painful early days of knowing you want to look a certain way, but having no idea how to make it happen.

her smooth cheeks slope over razor-like cheekbones she got from her dad.  i watch the dark brown eyes follow everything that goes on around her, exactly as they did when she was six months old.  even now, so serious, she can't help the way they sparkle with curiosity, with challenge, with imagination.

she folds those knobby knees underneath her as she sits, graceful when she's not thinking about it.  she's completely unaware of my gaze - rare for her these days, with a 3rd grader's budding knowledge of the world's perceptions and judgements.  she is wise after a tough year at school, learned some life lessons far more critical than the second grade curriculum of math facts and reading strategies.

my changeling - changing.  in front of me.  so much the same as the day she was born, and yet ever a new creature in our lives.  inexorably, she moves all of us to the next phase: a hazy future involving growth spurts, hormones, algebra. a life away from - outside of - us. 

she'll never know the moments i have taken to study her.  to etch her into my heart, the exact way she looks today.  i haven't had enough moments of absorption, of making sure I know her.  just today, just this split second, i caught my girl in mid flight, even as she begins to soar so far beyond us.

Uh, Dr Schneider? You're the BEST. love, your kid

Did you notice that the Universe tilted just slightly askew last November?

I'm not sure I remember any natural disasters that happened then, or any particular blip in the stock market, but I can say without question that the world hasn't been quite the same since November 2010, because that's when my dad retired.

Ah big deal, you say.  He's a baby boomer - those guys are dropping out of the work world like dozy August flies.

But my dad, every day of his working life, changed someone's life for the better.  Every single day.

My dad was - is - a pediatrician.  For forty years he prodded small baby bellies, palpated big kid sprained ankles,  took countless histories from overwrought and sleepless new parents, and gently broke bad news to families.  He worked in hospitals, as the single pediatrician in a town way out in the country, as a family practitioner in a busy Maryland suburb.

He was that amazing doctor who chatted with siblings in the examining room, took the time to find out family stories, who had boundless patience with the parent who had endless questions.   He encouraged moms to listen to their gut instincts, and he thoroughly enjoyed dads who wanted to be part of the parenting journey.

Most of all, he loved - loves - children:  all sizes, all ages, all stages.  When he left his practice, the parents in our part of the world lost one of those doctors who would value your family to his core, and do everything in his power to make your child well.

When he retired, I think I couldn't quite believe it.  He'd made the decision 6 months earlier, and none of it came as a surprise.  So I missed my chance to tell you this story back in November, because I was still getting used to the idea.

But I realized I don't share much about my dad here, in these stories I tell.  I'll often see him three times a week, and yet I don't often include tales of this person who has been such a huge part of my life, and so incredibly formative in my growth as a parent.

My sweet mom & dad.  Aren't they cute?

But this week, this week.  I decided I had to tell you what a gift my dad has been to me this week.

In the midst of CT scans and blood tests and a spinal tap (all for The Boy, not me), my dad has been my ally, my advisor, and my motivator to go out and advocate for my child.  To make sure that I had the information I needed, and had the confidence to fight to say you will figure out what's wrong with my kid.  Who has called every single morning to check on his little patient. Who has remained calm even though I knew with certainty he was as wild with worry as I was.

I can tell you many stories about a childhood filled with adventure, with endless activity, with sledding and hiking and canoeing and football and ... all of it.  I can tell you about a dad who was wrapped around his only girl's finger on a pretty consistent basis (barring that tricky 13-17 era. Oh, and the time I crashed his truck.)  I can tell you all about how he taught me how to change the horn (in self-same truck), check the oil (only one time I forgot. in a big style black-clouds-of-smoke on the PA Turnpike way), and to throw a baseball the right way.

The stories about what a loving grandfather he is?  A whole 'nother book's worth of words.

But today I wanted to celebrate my dad not for the man he has been in my life, but for the man he has been in other's lives.  Because this week I lived with that man, and I was so blessed.  Am blessed.

House. And Home.

Sunday night found us pulling up to the Yellow House after the third party in as many days.  Kids were tired, hot, and weepy.

I squinted critically at the Great Prepare The House for Painting Project - whole swathes of cedar shingles in various stages of scraped or painted, giving passers-by the distinct impression of a bad case of mange.

On the way inside I kicked the kids' buckets, scooters and bike helmets out of the way disgustedly.  A pigsty, I muttered darkly to myself.  This place is a total pigsty. [A brief reality check here: who says pigs are so filthy?  I mean, did you ever see a pig with a million dusty tchochkes on the shelves, or hear a pig complain about paying too much at the Container Store for organizing products?]

I heard the tap dripping upstairs, all the way from the front hallway, and set my purse down amongst the pool totes, reusable shopping bags, and backpacks cluttering the rug. Sure would be nice to have a hall closet for the kids to ignore, I groused.

Stupid house.  Stupid old time-sucking money-hemorrhaging house.

And then.

Monday morning found me with a listless and crying six year old on my lap, pressing the sides of his throbbing head to somehow lessen the pain.  Monday afternoon found me in the pediatrician's office, the lab to offer blood samples, and, by evening, a radiology center for further tests.

Honestly I didn't think much about my house, or the junk inside or the case of mange outside, this Monday morning.  Didn't think at all about it, in fact, until I heard a wavery plea from the face buried in my neck: please take me home, Mommy.  I just want to go home.

This was the refrain I heard all day, as we waited the long minutes for our name to be called.  Please take me home, Mommy.  I just want to go home.

To him it was not the stupid old time-sucking money-hemorrhaging house.  To him it was rest, it was reassurance, it was cool darkness and sheets that smell like 'our' laundry detergent.  Home had not the first thing to do with peeling paint or dripping taps.

Etsy.com

That's how this house works.  Because this house is, to us, home.

************

This post is submitted as part of Peter Pollock's One Word at a Time Blog Carnival.  The theme is 'Home', and although I've been pretty clear with all of you that my true home will always be England, there is a pretty charming little spot right here near Baltimore that's got a tight hold on my heart. 

Pardon me, Madam, your neuroses are showing

Ah yes.  There's a title to pull 'em in.

This spring was a strange ol' season.  There was a fair bit of 'putting myself out there' - a big writing project for church, a reunion, a 10-week fiction workshop.  Some of these went a little more successfully than others: the church thing went well.  The reunion, super happy. The writing class, tragical crash n' burn.

What, you say?  You crashed and burned at writing??  Why yes, yes I did. Somehow I might have convinced all of you that the words come burbling from me like a mountain stream straight out of Heidi, and that I am, in general, a wildly confident person cruising around town in my Swagger Wagon.  If so, well, high fives.  I didn't mean to trick you.

Actually, there are a fair few games that my head plays with me.  And let me just say, my head does not play fair.  In fact using the word 'games' seems to give it a little frisson of fun, which is misleading because my head's not such a fun playmate these days.

There's the sneaky procrastination game, where my head convinces me that absolutely, tonight after the kids are in bed I mean early tomorrow morning okay so maybe during naptime if you can distract Lars with your iPhone things will get written/researched/dealt with.

Then my head starts up with the you can'ts and you'll nevers and the what is your frakking point??s.  Oh, and the constant sarcastic background noise of Awesome parenting, there, girlfriend. Keep it coming!

Add to this the standard (but usually quashed under layers of denial and willful ignorance) freakouts over  finances (oh, a stay at home mom?  hm.  yes, the finances are always a source of freakout), over What Will I BE When I Grow Up, over ack, you know.  Lots of things.  I'm kind of a professional freaker-outer.

In a totally polished and cheerful and zen sort of way, of course.

Why do I share this with you?  (See there? The what is your frakking point?? just popped up again.)

Well.  There is a lot out there on the interwebs about how we only present our very bestest most perfect selves on our blogs, on Facebook, on Twitter.  And this makes all the other people on the interwebs feel bad/anxious/depressed, imagining all of these perfect lives and being confronted with charming snapped-on-the-iPhone evidence of the perfection.  (I am guilty of the iPhone snapping. Sorry.)

But for all of that perceived perfection, I'd hazard a guess that most of us are just people trying to get by.  People doing the best they can, trying to ignore all the crazy in their head, one day at a time.

Maybe, just maybe, the sharing of small moments of joy has much less to do with lording my "perfect life" over yours, and more to do with trying to find whatever magic there is in my day.  Maybe it is a reminder to myself that amidst the yelling and the eye rolling and the peanut butter sandwiches there are tiny little shards of brilliance:  shards that, combined, make a gem of a life.

I'm thinking there must be those shards for all of us to gather.

I was not a Senior Hottie. I don't think.

There's been this meme going around the interwebs this weekend called I Was Senior Hottie, and it's pretty funny - all these bloggers posting pictures from their high school graduations.  There's a lot of late 80s and early 90s fashion going on in there: hair spray, standing-up-straight-bangs, and pouffy taffeta.  My absolute favorite of the series is my pal Varda at The Squashed Bologna - not class of '97, not class of '87:  try class of '77, baby.  Aw yeah.

I'd pretty much decided against posting (just because most days I decide against posting. Sigh. Sorry, readers.)  Then an old friend emailed this, late last night:

Yep that's me, sporting the lifeguard's usually-wears-sensible-one-piece tan.  Mmmhmm.  This was our senior class trip, to Florida. (You can tell it's me there in the middle, because I am twice as long as the other two. Why are the women in my life so petite?)

So fine then, let's go ahead and post a graduation picture, complete with hairsprayed bangs and white pantyhose:

Class of '91 represents, with my sweet grandma

What's the point of all this nonsense? you're wondering.  So what about your high school grad photos? Even if you did post a half-nekked beach one?

Here's the thing, peeps.

Never told you much about my reunion weekend, did I? It was great - a good time had by all (I think). It was silly and brief and all the things you want reunions to be. There was a monsoon and my hair looked like hell all weekend, but whatevs. 

There was one flash of insight, twenty years later.  Over the weekend I remembered just how incredibly multicultural my class was:  Indian, African-American, African, Korean, West Indian, and yeah, Caucasian.  My group of friends mirrored this mix, and we had a good time.  The differences in our skin color never seemed to matter very much.

My flash of insight was this:  in the midst of all this gorgeous ethnicity, there wasn't a huge demand for oversized preppy white girls.  Just wasn't the going currency, if you see what I mean.  So I managed to get through most of those horrible high school years not thinking I was any kind of 'high school hottie.' Far from it. 

And here's the best part of that - when you go through high school without being particularly worried about this, it frees up a huge amount of psychic space for sports, for student government, and yeah, for um...school.  

Now - before I get away from this post scot-free, claiming I trod the vanity-free high road, I will absolutely hold up my hand and affirm that 14-18 year olds are notoriously narcissistic, and therefore of course I worried about my looks. Of course I spent way too long peering into the mirror.  But somehow all those hours with my Paul Mitchell Awapuhi hair spray seemed not to result in a very positive takeaway image. 

And that's ok. 

Yep. By the look of these photos, if big blondes are your thing then maybe I was a High School Hottie.  But, quite simply, I'm just happy that it was something I didn't believe back then.

Comfort Food

A fraught grumpy evening, a stormy exchange.  An irrational, angry response that prompts sudden, heartbroken sobs - the kind that require flinging one's eight year old body onto the bed full length and letting shoulders heave.

I can only apologize.  And I do.

I hold my girl on my lap and say I'm so sorry I acted that way.

The shuddering sighs come that signal the end of the weeping, and still we sit, rocking together on the bed. And then:  Mommy, I'm hungry.

Well sweetie then you should have eaten more at supper.  We're done eating today.

No, I did eat enough supper.  I'm just hungry for....something.

Oh sweet girl.  I can tell you what you are hungry for:  you are hungry for security, for feeling loved, for feeling happy with your place in the world, for feeling content, for feeling accepted.

Instead, your body says that it is hungry for Ben & Jerry's, for BBQ Pringles, for Twizzlers, for Froot Loops.  Maybe for hunks of salami hacked off, pinched together with thick slices of cheddar.  Maybe dark chocolate truffles dusted in cocoa. Maybe a whole pan of Rice Krispie Treats.

So at 8, I get to teach you about the concept of comfort eating.  The mother who swore not to bring her own food issues, her own body image issues into our relationship?  Yep.  That mom gets to explain that your body swears it is hungry, but hungry for the things you won't find in the fridge.  That you can eat all evening long and still not fill that hole.

Will you remember learning this?  When you are far away in a college dorm someday and reeling from a broken heart or a horrible job interview, will you remember that the hunger isn't going to be fed at the drive-thru?

I wonder about this, later, sitting on the couch licking raw cookie dough off my spoon.

Ready?

Every new parent's heard it:  don't compare your baby with others.  Every child reaches milestones in their own timeframe.  Different kids will achieve at different times.

Easy enough for your pediatrician to say.  Easy enough for those crazy authors of What to Expect From The First Year.  Living bloody hell for the poor parent sitting on the floor at the weekly playgroup wondering why the hell Baby Quinn is walking!! in her RileyRoos while your kid is sitting happily in front of you, clapping his heart out but headed nowhere.

And so it goes.  Eventually you might have another kid or two that distracts you from obsessing about those ages & stages.  Maybe you don't have any more, but you still might just get over yourself and decide to smugly leave the front door wide open, safe in the knowledge that Little Ozzy won't crawl out on your watch.

And then.... then they get to preschool.  Maybe you've been lucky enough to land at a preschool where they encourage play, and keep up the messages that you're doing fine by letting your kid splash in soapsuds all morning and dig in dirt in the afternoon.  Maybe you've landed at one of these schools where the teachers worriedly lean into the minivan at pick up and ask if there is maybe a chance you could be practicing more of the letter sounds at home?  Maybe that makes you more comfortable, to hear these oblique queries - makes you feel your 4 year old is actually getting a jump on education.

Ok, so now, fast forward to that summer before kindergarten.    You mention to an acquaintance or two that you're a little worried about readiness.  That maybe this modern world of all day kindergarten might be a bit much for your sweet Ebenezer.  I would put money on the next question:  but when is his birthday?

As in, surely the information about where in the calendar year his birthday falls will be the final say on his readiness for the world of formal schooling.

Where, all of the sudden, has the gentle talk of 'ages and stages' gone?  Is this something we grow out of - getting the benefit of the doubt?  Of being given the gift of time to mature and grow on our own little timeframe, different though it may be?

All of the sudden I find myself deep in the mire of a pedagogical debate, all about whether readiness for kindergarten is such a big deal.  About what actually happens in that mystical magical kindergarten classroom, which is often billed as the great equalizer for 5 and 6 year olds across the land.

This I believe:   kids are different - at all ages, at all stages.  There is simply no way a school system or a tutoring business can address this and get everyone to the same starting line.

I am just a parent and a blogger, listening to that small voice inside that says 'maybe The School isn't always 100% right'.  But I'll tell you:  I've got some heavy hitters doing research that supports me in this apparent lunatic idea.  First, I've got Sir Ken Robinson himself, diagramming all the holes in the current education system.

Then, today, one of our favorite advocates for childhood, Classic Play, wrote all about why your 3-year old doesn't actually have to learn how to read this year.  (There are some excellent links in this article to current early childhood education research.)

So. I don't have a heavy message for you to take away tonight.  Just a gentle reminder, a crazy old idea, that regardless of their age, maybe giving your kid a year to play may be the very most powerful tool for success at school.

She's EIGHT. But she can't go to school naked.

So I dithered on posting about this.

As she gets older, I want to respect her privacy - recognize that she won't want all her business out there for the blog world to read. (Already getting the wary "are you going to blog about this?" or the cheesy poses, as she yells "put this picture on Facebook!" Yikes.)

Anyway.

It's spring.  She grew.  Not like, 'oooh those pants are getting a tad short' grew - more like, 'honey are those shorts a little long or are the they pants I JUST BOUGHT YOU IN JANUARY?'

So she needs new clothes.  Ok, not 'needs' like she needs a new toothbrush, but hey - I'm a tall girl and a little sensitive about making tall kids wear too-short trousers.

So I spend two hours of MY FREE TIME, and I buy her new clothes.  Not cheap clothes, because I'm a little old fashioned in this way, and I hate when t-shirts fall apart in the washer after wearing them twice. But, we're not talking Gucci or Ralph Lauren stuff here either.

I give her the bag.  She makes the snottiest face.  She says "ugh.  I guess I'd wear that.  Maybe like... once a month."

People?  I had to walk out of the room.  I WAS THAT MAD.

Where do I go from here?  Seriously - looking for advice on this one.  Do I just let her pick out what she wants (glitter, sparkles, the Shar-Pei line) at Target?  Do I give a big speech about looking for well-made seams and lining in dresses?   How do I deliver the message that it is not ok to be snotty (and/or snobby?!?! about your clothes) at THE TENDER AGE OF EIGHT??

Coming up hard against the perplexities of raising girls these days, and coming up short of answers.

*******
This confused little rant is part of the Stream of Consciousness Sunday posts over at All Things Fadra.  Bunch of posts this week, on all sorts of stuff.  Check it out!

Humble

Someone forgot to brief the stupid cat that it's National Sleeping In Day Mother's Day.

Since I'm up, I thought I'd go ahead & do my Stream of Consciousness Sunday post.

*********

I want to write a Mother's Day post. I do. I sat down 67 times yesterday to write a Mother's Day post to all my lovely friends who do that mothering thing, and each time I sat, I wondered - what do I say to them that we haven't all heard thousands of times before?  That we don't know already?

Yes, mothering is the toughest job there is.  Yes, it changes everything. (Thank you Johnson & Johnson for that deep little insight into our existence).  Yes it does 'go so fast.'

But what I am only starting to grasp about mothering - although the lessons started the day that little changeling was born - is how profoundly humbling the task is.

Humbling.

Find me any mother out there who thinks she has done it perfectly.  Find me the very most confident, naturally-gifted mama, and in promise you that in the late night hours, the hours when we are most alone with our bare thoughts she will admit that she's afraid she messed up big.  Could have done it better.

I can't think of a single life experience that makes you question, on every level, almost daily, if you are doing the right thing.  Wondering if, in ten years, fifteen years, twenty years, you will be able to look at your child and say - I did it right.

But here's what I want to tell you, all of you gorgeous mother's out there on Mother's Day:  I guarantee you did it with love.  Whether you are finished, whether you are just starting out, whether you're right in the thick of potty training or pubescent angst, whether you're kissing your child on graduation weekend, whether you're wondering if your grandchildren will call:

You did it - do it - with love.  This I know for sure.

And surely, this is all that can be asked of a human, caring for another human:  I did it with love.

*********

Happy Mother's Day - to my own beautiful mother who shows superhuman amounts of love, always; to my mom friends who get me through this adventure with, yep, love (and um, snarking and wine); to all the moms out there on the interwebs who may come across this today.

My Mother's Day flowers: peonies make me smile like nothing else.

Back to the Water

I've talked to you about water before.  Talked to you about swimming. Talked to you about the pool, about the pond, about the lake.

For about a year now, I've been thinking a lot about water.  About the chaos the ocean represented to ancient peoples, the total absence of control.  About suspension within the depths, both literally and figuratively.  I hinted at it in this post:  hinted at what it means to go deep, below the surface, simultaneously floating but also deliberately diving down.

Somewhere in there is a big story - deep in my writer's heart it seems clear that I'll find my story in the water.

In the meantime, I found a more prosaic way to go meet the water.  I finally sucked it up and re-joined my local Y.  What took me so long? I wondered this morning.  Swimming is an action that lives deep in my DNA, and my body does it without thinking. I sliced my arms into the water, over and over, feeling the familiar burn in my triceps, feeling an unfamiliar burn in my lungs from weeks of inactivity.  What took me so long to come back to the water? 

“Artists and athletes speak of something called “flow.” When they are deeply involved in what they are doing, time ceases to exist. So does their sense of themselves as separate from what they are doing……..Awareness blooms, as the individual self escapes its confines to become part of something bigger than the self.” – Barbara Brown Taylor – An Altar in the World

This morning, I didn't miss pounding the pavement in my Nikes. Didn't miss the iPod or my playlists.  Didn't miss the sweat streaming down my face.  I do miss running.  I may get back on the road someday, after a long season of healing.  But the silver lining has been re-discovering the place where I flow.

The water welcomed me back.  Here, it whispered.  Here is where you will find your own depths.

Diving in: Summer 2010

Church & Chocolate: The Easter Recap

So totally missed the Stream of Consciousness Sunday post last week when all y'all were seriously on the edge of your seats waiting to hear about the reunion.  But I was still reunionioning, people!  The ladies had one last night of antipasto and drinks before everyone returned to real life.

Determined to avoid that whole strike-while-the-iron-is-cold phenomenon this week, I'm going to go ahead and give you an Easter recap so that your teeth can ache too when you see all the sugar involved in the celebrating.

Ready?  Here goes.

*********

Top Ten Observations about Easter 2011

10) Yet again I did not get my act together:  did not produce handmade & hand-decorated sugar cookies, origami paper carrots, or homemade hot cross buns. Til next year, then.

9)  No one likes hot cross buns.  Scratch last item off list.

8)  Filling Easter baskets without buying big-ticket items like a Wii console or a pony means either 1) small pieces of plastic junk they do NOT need but are wildly attracted to for 5 minutes or 2) going with the 99% sugar, 1% high fructose corn syrup solution.  We went with option 2 this year. Oh, and pencils.  Easter-themed pencils.

7)  They can spend the morning eating sugary items.  They can be offered cookies with brunch,  and chocolate rabbits until they bleed brown, and still at the end of Easter dinner one of them is guaranteed to ask me in a stage whisper "is there going to be any dessert?"

6)  You know an Easter sermon will stay with you all year long when it includes a Wittgenstein quote that moves you to tears.

5)  Six year old boys will still wear what their mother says, bless their cotton socks. Even if it means [gasp!] a sweater vest.  [what? pictures, you say?  well that would assume that the Nilsens could keep their act together from one Major Event to another & keep track of the cable to transfer pictures.  But I'm really not annoyed about it.  Not at all.]

4)  Matching Easter dresses makes the daunting task of raising girls pretty much worth it. [picture, you say?  see above.]

3)  Girls matching? Intentional.  That the entire family wore light blue? Vaguely silly and totally unplanned. But kinda cute.  [Really.  stop asking about the pictures.  It's becoming a sore point around here.]

*********




Gah! Just like that, we are finished our five minutes, people, and me only at Number Three.  Sorry 'bout that.  I'll just let you get back to finishing your own Easter celebrations (or not).  I myself am heading to finish off those Malted Milk Robins Eggs.  Arguably the best Low Quality High Chemical Candy Product on the market.

Oh the places you'll go!

aha... see there?  I tricked you.  You clicked over thinking you'd get a sweet post-reunion recap, didn't you?  Well that's coming friends, but tonight I'm trying desperately to write something for my fiction class, and that's not going quite as smoothly as I was pretending it would.  


There's a blog carnival going on, all about Adventure, at Peter Pollock's site, and I would highly recommend you go over there and be an armchair traveller for a few minutes.  As for me, I'm giving y'all a repost, but until I can pick just which of the many adventures Mr Nilsen's dragged me along on, this just about says it all:

ADVENTURE

Say you're a girl who likes a routine.  Say you're the kinda gal who might run the same route every day for 2 years, just because you love knowing exactly how many miles you've run, how fast you've run it, and knowing right when the hills can be expected.

Say you're the kind of person who loves to know what's happening today, tomorrow, and the next day.  The kind of person who tries not to cringe when an acquaintance casually says, "Oh, we'll just figure it out when we get there."  What? No plan? Ack ack ack ack ack.

You may be the kind of person who is mortified by these tendencies.  You may wish daily that you were a fly-by-the-seat-of-yer-pants kinda gal.  You may wish that it didn't give you an ulcer to be lost in a strange city, or to rushing for a flight, unsure if you'll make it in time.    You may watch people who operate without a wristwatch with envy, wondering if it EVER bothers them not to know what time it is, or if they're late, or how many minutes it is until their next appointment.

It's funny how life works.  Because say you're that kind of person, and you fall in love with a person who approaches life in exactly the opposite way:  someone who always flies by the seat of their pants, someone who never knows where their watch/wallet/keys are, but lives in faith that these items will turn up eventually.  Someone who hates to brush their teeth the same way twice, much less drive the same road, run the same course, or wear the same shoes two days in a row.

These two opposites might get married, might delight in this particular element of opposite-ness, and might make a darn good life from it.

And then might come a cosmic event where the kids had a day off from school, the Farmor would be in town from Norway, and the forecast for the beach would be sunny sunny sunny. 

Then the Seat of Pants Man may come up with the bright idea of taking off for the ocean - driving into the night, and then spending tomorrow at the beach.  Mrs OCD might struggle mightily with ditching her schedule, with leaving all of her routines at home, with just "throwing sleeping bags into the car" and driving off towards the coast. 

But she will do it. 

Because man oh man does she love the adventures that Mr Seat of the Pants comes up with.  She loves that he has passion for possibilities as-yet-undiscovered, and loves that he ignores (in the nicest way possible) her protestations of practicality. 

So we're off, dear readers.  Off on our next adventure.  Look for photos of the Not-Plan soon.

Reunions: A Spanx-free post

With the whole boot thing, and a handy little running hiatus along with it, I've been joking with people at church that I gave up vanity for Lent.  (This is screamingly funny to a Presbyterian, maybe a Catholic; the rest of you can just nod and smile politely until I get to the real post.)

Here's the thing. I have my 20th High School Reunion this weekend.  And instead of heading into the weekend in the best shape of my life with a big half-marathon race a mere 3 weeks away, I'll be limping into the festivities with my fancy cast and sucking in my gut along with the best of 'em.

I totally forgot to crash diet or to get a boob job before this reunion thing.  I even bailed on buying a new outfit.  How's this for profound insight:  I haven't seen most of these people since the Ten Year event.  They won't know whether or not I wore this outfit 6 days in a row last week!  Pure genius.

I did buy new shoes:  the timeless and go-to salve for the pride of anyone who may or may not have gained a pound a week in the time she wasn't running and ate a lot of Easter candy instead who needs a little boost.

But here's another stunning revelation:  the people I will see this weekend are not attending because they've heard rumors that Kirsten Nilsen nee Schneider bought new shoes.  It's true.  In fact, to preserve what little shred of self-dignity I've got left after this boot wearing incident, let's not even reflect on the percentage of people who are [gasp!] turning up to the reunion not even remembering that Kirsten Nilsen nee Schneider was in their class.

A classic yearbook shot, c1990:  Yours Truly is bottom right with my ladies Clare & Andrea.

Which is all to say this:  reunions are so not about me, or about you.  Pride schmide, vanity schmanity.  We are all going to look twenty years older.  Those of us who spent our high school years lifeguarding are probably going to look twenty four years older.  Lisa Lang will probably look as stunning this weekend as she did the day we graduated.  Some people are just like that.

What this reunion will be is about connecting:  revisiting those small moments in high school when you shared a joke with someone in Chem Lab, when you felt profound empathy for someone's embarrassment, when you watched someone navigate a crowded hallway with an inner grace that had nothing to do with their grades or popularity.  Checking in with people who have lived unusual, adventurous and brave lives and admiring their moxie.  Checking in with people like yourself who have lived entirely regular lives, the lives that probably could have been predicted in June 1991, but have made that their richly embroidered story nonetheless.

So remember this, all of you who feel that you don't want to go unless you're 20 lbs thinner, one marriage happier,  2 gorgeous kids richer.  It's not about you, not really.  It's about connecting as human beings - humans who knew each other at our most-raw, least-evolved time of life.  There's gotta be something said for that kind of knowledge.

I think they call this 'Adventure'

Sucking my teeth, I look down at the brown mosaic tile.

Mommy!!!!!  I is STUCK! A three year old face peers out at me in the crack between door & stall frame.

Really sweetie?  No.  Just turn the handle.  Yep, just turn that silver circle, right there.

No I can't, I STUCK!

I walk away to set down the handsful of stuff I'm holding for her.  Cue panicky small voice:  MOMMEEEEEE!!  Where IS you?  Note to self:  will not be walking out of here to find a small-scale sibling to help.

I go back to the door, and to surveying the industrial brown tile.  Considering the elementary school bathroom stall, scaled down to accommodate even the smallest of kindergarteners.  Eyeing the 9 yards of fabric in the skirt of my Norwegian folk costume, worn for World Fair Day and our 'Norway' table.  Fully conscious of the walking cast on my right foot.

Sigh.

I drop all 6 feet of me onto that elementary school bathroom floor. grab the door frame and slide myself underneath that small-scale stall.  Good news:  door so low that I can reach up and unlock it - easily.  Bad news:  door does not open out.  Instead it swings in and cracks me on the noggin.  Must slide myself back out.  And promptly slam my cast against the opposite bathroom wall.  Ow.

Ms. Three is unscathed, and giggly:  I not need to pee, mama.  I change my mind.

*******

Fifteen years married to Nilsen, and 8+ years of mothering: here's me thinking that climbing on my roof to break into my own house, flying to England with 2 kids under four, and breastfeeding on a speedboat in the rain might have filled my quota of mothering adventures. How foolish of me.

Anyway.  Here we have my favorite part of the week these days:  Stream of Consciousness Sundays.  A 5-minute brain dump is right about my speed.  Y'all should totally do it.

TV? We Don't need no Stinkin' TV!

Alternative post title:  Oops I Did it Again.  You can read about my previous experimentation with this here.

*****

One request.  There's only been one request in 48 hours.

This from the three kids who start every day with GoodMorningMomCanIwatchashow?  The kids who happily could spend 3 hours in front of the tv.  The kids who pick fights with each other all day long, but manage to compromise over what tv show and when because they know it'll get switched off in a hot minute if they fight about it.

Things generally get out of control around Christmas - extra vacation time, movie classics on TV, slow mornings, lazy (or burned out) parents.   By February, after all the snow?  We are at all time highs for viewing hours.

And I've had enough.

April is Turn Off The TV Month, I told 'em.  Didn't even try to sell it as a science experiment this time.  Just told 'em - the good weather's coming, and I'm sick of hearing about tv.  Don't ask.

It's been 48 hours.  They aren't crawling up the walls, they aren't locking themselves to my kitchen island in protest, they aren't even fighting with each other more.

We did it last year, in the middle of Snowmageddon - 28 days of no tv, no computer games, no sneaky time on Mommy's iPhone.  Spending April the same way? Total cake walk.

She says.

*******

This is posted for Stream of Consciousness Sunday on all.things.fadra   Just the trick to knock out the Sunday Night [With No TV] Blues.

Seriously, April? It's been too long.

and, hey there, March?  Um, don't let the door hit you on the backside on your way out.

Have never been so happy to see the beginning of April.

March.... well.  March is just about the worst month on the calendar.  It is the monthly equivalent of Tuesday in the work week.  (My antipathy for Tuesday - every single blessed Tuesday - is a whole other post.)

I tried to work it, really I did.  We did 'in like a lion, out like a lamb' weather experiments, coloring pages, and data graphing. I enthusiastically cooked up some corned beef & cabbage and made rainbow with a pot of gold fruit salad for St Patrick's Day.  (I drew the line at green milk, however. I wave the Not-Irish AT ALL flag here.)  We learned about kites, and wind, and planting seeds, and everything early-spring I could come up with.  We even threw in a Star Wars birthday party in there!

The weather remained resolutely cold, wet and miserable.  All. Month. Long.

So here's a recipe for great mental health:  take one person with Season Affective Disorder, who just barely makes it through winter on the best of years, and give her an Achilles injury that equals zero physical activity all month.  Then have her start a writing class that is truly exciting, but oh-so stress inducing. (Me:  I am having a little performance anxiety about all this.  Husband:  Is this the part where I say 'no kidding'?)  Add in a little crisis at school requiring some principal-meeting and parent-teacher conferencing,  and coat it all with a thick crust of mud.

Mud everywhere.  Glommed onto shoes, coats, gloves (because oh yes, we still need our gloves!) - in people's toes, in their hair, in their ears.

So yeah.  I greet April with open arms, screaming and running headlong into it like a teenage girl reunited with her boyfriend who was like, totally away for like, a whole week.

I've got, what, eleven months to ignore March, right?

Lentils. Yes, Lentils.

Hands up people:  who plans their meals a whole day in advance?  So as not to repeat a certain foodstuff, or to overload on another? Oh yeah.  Me neither.

Yesterday morning I had steel cut oats for breakfast - the kids had already eaten & gone by the time they were cooked, so I could've had a portion for four if I wanted.  For lunch I made lentil salad for a friend of mine, to balance out the crusts of grilled cheese that we were 'cleaning up' after the kids. For dinner my mother in law cooked a dish that was Torbjorn's childhood favorite - lentil stew on brown rice, topped with peanuts and raisins.  (What this says about my husband?  Whole 'nother post.)

Let's just say my system is feeling remarkably.... clean today.  But the point of this long and detailed report of my overly-fibrous diet is to say I'd do it all over again, I love the lentil so much. The salad yesterday was made with the tiny pitch-black "caviar lentils" I'd found at Trader Joes,  and their texture was perfect alongside exquisitely ripe avocado slices, some arugula leaves, and a sprinkling of goats cheese on top.

A salad - why not.  Let's pretend that snow isn't on the forecast for Friday.  Let's pretend that the freezing  rain that'll probably arrive instead won't knock all the beautiful cherry blossoms off the tree, and let's imagine the spring really is on its way and the days of huge salads in plain white bowls, eaten while bathing in the afternoon sun on your front porch are right around the corner.

Let's pretend I didn't just cross a new threshold into middle age by telling you about the fiber in my diet.


Crunchy Lentil Salad
from Jeanne Lemlin's Quick Vegetarian Pleasures

1 C lentils, picked over and rinsed (do not use mushy red lentils or big green ones. Use Puy lentils, or those caviar ones I mentioned.)
5 C water
1 bay leaf
1 celery rib, finely diced
1 carrot, minced
1/4 C finely diced red onion
2 T minced fresh parsley
1/4 C fruity olive oil
2 T fresh lemon juice
1 garlic clove (pressed or minced)
1/4 t dried thyme (or 1 tsp fresh minced, my preference)
1/4 tsp ground cumin
salt & pepper to taste.

In medium saucepan, combine lentils, water, and bay leaf.  Bring to a boil and cook, uncovered, 15 minutes, or until the lentils are tender but still crunchy.  Stir occasionally.  Pour into a colander and discard the bay leaf.  Drain the lentils very well, and let them sit 5 minutes or so to be certain all teh water has drained out.

Place lentils in serving bowl and gently stir in the celery, carrot, onion and parsley.

Mix together the olive oil lemon juice garlic, thyme cumin salt and pepper.  Pour onto the lentil mixture, and carefully toss.  Serve at room temperature.

How Simple is Simple?

This weekend I got my chops busted on Facebook for the following phrase:  "So often, simple is the very best answer.  Simple."

I had no great agenda behind my statement - it was actually prompted by the joy of a quiet Friday night, instead of the hectic one I'd had planned.

But a friend chose to see this as a political statement - or at least to respond to it that way.  He posted a link that suggested that choosing to live simply implies a willful ignorance of the inequities and injustices of the world.   (The actual specific politics of the link he posted can be tracked down on my Facebook page if you're really interested.  But that tangent is beside the point.)

Here's the thing.  The conscious pursuit of simplicity in one's life has nothing at all to do with ignoring all that is seriously screwed up in the world.

On the contrary.  The pursuit of simplicity - living with intentionality, with a focused discipline on reducing distractions - is surely the only way we can consider the situation of those less fortunate with any meaning, any consequence.

By choosing to live simply, I choose not to purchase, acquire, and consume in the manner that my culture seems to think I should.  By choosing to live simply I spend less time focused on the lifestyles of those who contribute [not much] to society and spend more time focused on the lives of those who bring Quality to mine.

I don't mean to preach.  I didn't mean to preach when I posted the simple statement on Facebook.  But neither do I like to be misunderstood on a matter that is a core belief.

Intentionality. Conscious existence.  Stillness.  These are the things that allow me to live meaningfully.

Simply.

**************

This little rant was written for Stream of Consciousness Sunday, which I stream-of-consciousnessed about last week.