The backwards spiral of existentialism

It was a wonderful party and I was enjoying myself, celebrating life and joy and marriage. It was then that I was ambushed by despair with a simple passing thought. "In 50 years most every adult in this room will be dead, probably including me."
Moments slip into hours into days into months into years and the wrinkles around my eyes deepen, the skin on my arms looses its elasticity, and my daughters look more like little ladies. Our grandparents were married once too. They too were young and in love. Like my husband and I they had little children and felt all their lives were before them, standing tall and proud, arm-in-arm against the onslaught of time. During their lives they faced wars and economic depression. They were full and busy. They had sadness and joys and they loved; they loved their children with the same fervor with which I love my own, they felt the same passions for their spouse, the same longings for safety and peace, financial strains and maybe even the same fear of death. Did they lay in bed together and discuss the possibility of another baby? Did they argue when what they really just wanted was to be held? Did they cry together over the death of their own loved ones, just as we have cried together over their deaths?
These thoughts are the strong undertow that pulls me down, down, down the backwards spiral of existentialism. At first I am enjoying the swim, immersing myself in the present moment and then I am being pulled under by the strong current of time, awash in the meaninglessness of it all. "Eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow you die." Tomorrow you die. Tomorrow is coming and one of these tomorrows will bring death. Is death a door into eternity or just the infinite blackness of nonexistence?
I don't want to give into the blackness. I am going to fight my way back to the light. Where is the light? I am suddenly so cold inside my core, so full of sadness and sick from fear of the loss to come. I don't want to grow old and have my children take my place as the parents. I want to fight to the end, but why? Does it matter?
That is where despair finds me, my old foe wearing his muddy garb, ready to pull me down into the depths of all that meaninglessness.
"No" I mutter inwardly "No, I will not let this happen. This is precious and I will not surrender this moment."
"Please Lord, help me. Pull me out of this blackness; out of this fear and unknowing. I need your help. Show me your way of looking at my life."
Immediately I feel myself being pulled out of the blackness back to the light. I put my head down against the weight of time and will myself back to life and away from thoughts of death. When I comes I will be ready, but I will not waste what I have been given by falling down the backwards spiral of existentialism.
I am standing upright again, my head above the water, both feet planted firmly on the shifting sands of time that will invariably pull me into the future. I take a breath and fill my lungs with this moment. Only seconds have transpired since my initial thought, the initial shove backwards. Only a few breaths, a few blinks of my eyelashes, that separated for me the light from the dark, life from fear of death, joy from sadness.

On the theme of sickness

We have been having a new round of sickness every other week, with the recovery period stretching into the off week, thus making everyday a sick day with differing levels of severity.
Our normally soda free house has seen many cans, bottles, and boxes of ginger ale come and go this winter. We have also consumed many boxes of ice pops, some the whole fruit type but mostly the cheap artificially colored corn syrup variety. If any of you have recently compared the price of whole fruit ice pops versus the artificially colored crap pops, and if you have a basic understanding of math fundamentals (just figure 3 ice pops consumed by 7 people a day)  you'll get the gist of why we bought the scary, not really food but still soothing to a nauseous stomach, ice pops.

Yesterday however, no one seemed to have any trace of nausea, so instead of ice pops, ginger ale and saltines, we were eating healthy nourishing food. By this I mean homemade hot chocolate. Hey, I made it myself from natural ingredients, that makes it healthy, right?

Well, before I disclosed to the children that I was going to make hot chocolate, I wanted them to help me finish picking up the detritus covering the surface of the floor in their room. My two older girls were at school, but Isabella, my 6 year-old was home along with her two little brothers. Allen is not always very helpful when it comes to cleaning, being only 18 months old. He can pick things up and put them back in boxes, but it takes direction and I was looking for a speedy resolution to the whole floor covered in books, magazines, blankets, pillows, wooden blocks, stacking toys, dirty socks, toy cars, and plastic fishing game pieces situation.

Reagan however is very helpful for a 3 year-old and usually amazes me with his ability to get things done. Yesterday however was the exception. Instead of just helping picking up, he felt he needed an ice pop and some ginger ale to fortify him for the arduous task ahead. I on the other hand felt he should have taken advantage of this window of opportunity to eat his healthy breakfast before nausea strikes again.
He was clearly feeling fine, but just preferred a straight diet of corn syrup to food that requires chewing.

Amidst his whining, I came across a booklet of collected poetry for children that Isabella had been given by her teacher last year in school (thank you Mrs. Ballenski.) Inspired, I turned my pen to reflect on the events at hand.

"I'm Sick!"

"I just can't help pick up the floor
 I am so tired
I'm sick for sure

 I must lie down, I'm sick I bet
 my tummy hurts
 it feels upset

 Oh, Mommy give me an ice pop PLEASE!"
 he pleads with me
 on bended knees

"I might throw up, I need help now 
Is there ginger ale?
but it's gone anyhow


 I then say out loud for all to hear
"Would you like some hot chocolate
 Izzy dear?"

 The Little Sick One then calls out
"I want some too!"
and begins to pout

Then just as adamantly as before
he claims to be NOT sick
anymore

Another sick day yesterday and the spelling continues...sort of

Madeline is not pictured because she felt much worse yesterday and confined herself to bed exept for an occasional foray into the kitchen to ask if she could confiscate my computer in order to play online math games. I told her to go back to bed and lie down. She was so unwell that she didn't even argue with my decision, usually. However, her persistent nature kept her coming back every hour or so to ask again. I think though, that she was actually relieved by my refusal so she could just lay in bed and rest. 

It was difficult to get a clear picture of Lydia. All this sitting around at home made it hard for her to rest, even though she had still felt sick to her stomach in the morning.
Unfortunately, Isabella doesn't get an alphabet cookie picture of her name. While she was at kindergarten in the afternoon I laid the letters for her name aside on the counter. The "King of the Sneak Attack," Reagan, ambushed the cookies when I wasn't looking however, and unless I can figure out how to spell "Isabella" with the random R's, X's and D's left in the cookie box, her name won't get spelled out till I make it to the grocery store next. That will probably be a while from now considering the rate of sickness per capita in this family and the fact that my husband and I am sharing one vehicle. No complaints however! This is just another chance for me to "make less work!"

Our sick day reading circle. Lydia got out some books and started reading to her siblings. From the picture you can tell that Reagan was obviously feeling much better. Allen's face also shows his mood. He was crabby all day.
It is always so beautiful when the children choose to sit together and enjoy an activity. It is especially lovely when I don't have to orchestrate it. This was a spontaneous moment of cooperation; a much rarer thing then I had imagined before I had children of my own. Although I am not quite sure why because my sister and I fought almost incessantly until I went off to college.

Sick Day Spelling Cookies

She has the cough that will not go. Bryan has been coughing for over 3 weeks now. We thought Maddy wasn't going to get it, because all her siblings got it much earlier then her. Unfortunately she finally succumbed to the cough. Trying to get her to rest however is a very trying task indeed. She seems to think that jumping rope over my exercise bands is a new way to rest. Jumping brings on the coughing however. 

He was having trouble not eating his name. Three-year-olds are not often gifted with a surplus of patience. He too has the unrelenting cough although he insists that "the chine you bought" has made him better. He means "the machine" and by that he means the humidifier he now has in his room. Two weeks of more humid sleeping accommodations has helped, but the cough still persists. 

Poor little guy is still unwell in more then one way, as his frequent coughing fits and diaper changes  attest. I miss the rosy complexions they all had while we lived in Florida. Frequent trips to the beach and daily open air exercise made them all tan and tawny. Six weeks in this frozen winter have drained the color from us all, but spring will come again and it will seem all the more marvelous after these icy grim days. 

My two girls not pictured did not eat any alphabet cookies; too sick to their stomachs for that. Not too sick to fight and complain though, so I guess they will be all right.

The Pear Tree (an impression)

It has long outgrown its productive height. Tall it stands in the darkness. Lit only by the reflected light of the house's spotlights shinning up on it from the millions of delicate flakes blanketing everything, coloring the ground white. Shaped by years longer then my own, twisting and turning through space and time, branches reaching out to the sky and then turning inward again, but then once again reaching out to the sun, always straining upward to find the light. Now it is resting, slumbering dormant till the sun awakens it's sap with the lengthening of days, calling it to grow again, to rise further from this earth, to reach up and out and away.
Who planted the seed or when, I will never know. How many children have eaten it's fruit or played beneath it's bows is knowledge known to itself alone.
Tonight it waits for another springtime. A springtime when my own young ones will watch with anticipation for the buds to break forth with new greenness, and for the misshapen pears to ripen out of their reach in hopes that some will drop to the ground in time for them to enjoy the imperfect beauty and sweetness.
A shadow with white frosted brightness. A gnarled, bending and overgrown outline against a frozen white landscape. A time worn beauty. A fruit tree in winter.

My day...today

Before we moved in, my in-laws they were kind enough to install a dishwasher for us. Unfortunately, months later when we loaded dishes into the dishwasher, it didn't actually wash dishes. It was just pretending to do so by making the appropriate noises at the appropriate times. Sorta like when I tell my kids to brush their teeth and they go into the bathroom, run the water, and stand there for a few seconds. Then they run the water over their toothbrush again. It sounds convincing but doesn't accomplish much.
Unfortunately, unlike the kids, we can't just tell the dishwasher to "Get back in there and do it right this time!" I tried it. The dishes still came out dirty, dispite all the swishing noises and mechanical clicking sounds. The lights even switched on and off in concert with the swishing and clicks. Still, the dishes were untouched by water. The remains of food however were baked on by the very effective drying cycle, which managed to melt some of the plastic ware into Salvador Dali-esc shapes.
Today, due to the very cold temperatures outside, Bryan is stuck at home with us. In an effort to keep from going stir crazy due to lack of hard labor, he decided to take apart the dishwasher so we can order the appropriate parts, so it can do more then sound effective.
As evidenced by this picture, he had more help then he knew what to do with.

Am I the Great Weaver

God has a way of weaving together the threads of our lives, weaving intricate patterns, indiscernible as we look up close at the section we can see; the present moment.

I, like Job, am continually asking "Why?" about everything. I desire to see the pattern, to understand how the details of my life, the suffering of others, and the evil in this world are being redeemed, washed clean to make an unstained tapestry. My restless heart chants "Why, why, why?" in rhythm to it's beating, but I am left with the old, old answer. Older then the books of the Old Covenant which record the lives of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, older then the Exodus into the Promised Land, older then all the Law and the Prophets. It is God's first recorded answer to a human question.

Moses wrote the first five books of the Old Testament, and although they record the earliest human history, they are not the first to be written.

Job is the oldest book of the Bible, recording the oldest human question "Why?" 

All Jobs questions add up to this: "I will say unto God, Do not condemn me; shew me wherefore thou contendest with me."

God responds with questions himself, but they all add up to this "Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Tell Me if you have understanding...Shall the one who contends with the Almighty correct Him? He who rebukes God, let him answer it."

When I question God with the "Why?" of ages past, the "Why?” of my own aching heart, am I actually pointing my finger in accusation? I wouldn't do it this way. I wouldn't let people choose evil. I would keep the innocent free from hunger and oppression, safe from famine and torture. I would stop the evil of the world. I would not let things go on like this.

I suppose I am saying that I know better when I entertain theses thoughts. I am questioning God's judgment. Just like my daughters question mine. But my questioning is far more pathetic. My daughters believe they know what is best for them: unsupervised unlimited access to anything they want; TV, video games, movies, candy, junk food, ice cream, the whipped cream in a can. Denying them anything they perceive as good brings forth the question "Why?" 

What is my response? I am the mother and it is my job to decide what is best for them and how much is too much and when unpleasant discipline is required. When they question, they are just questioning me, another mortal. I question the infinite omniscient One with the same audacity of a ten-year-old complaining to her mom.

"Why not unlimited ice pops all day long?"

"Why not an endless string of happy days full of one pleasure following the other?"

Are either of us really asking "Why?" or just complaining? 

I want this world to be perfect. I want to never grow old. I want my children to live in peace and harmony with no pain, no suffering, no death. I never want to feel the undying ache of loosing my husband, watching a loved one waste away from cancer, or experience the body breaking torture of persecution. I don't want anyone to suffer. Yet that is the state of the world. Do I really think I know better then God how this world should be? 

The ache in my chest that never really goes away, the one that gnaws at me and tells me that something is wrong says, something is always wrong: time is passing and the specter of death hangs over every one of us like Damocles’ sword, waiting to cut us asunder from life, that ache says "Yes, this is all wrong. We were never meant for this. We were created in the image of God, perfect. How could He let this happen? Why?"

I am just like my ten-year-old daughter. I am always asking why and never satisfied with the answer no matter how true, because I want my own way. I want the easy way, the path without pain. 

Home in NJ

Well we now call NJ our home again, after 12 years away (almost). Looking for work for Bryan is our main occupation right now. Oh and changing poopy diapers...
It has been a bit of weather shock for me and the children. Seven months of perpetual summer in SW Florida weakened our resistance to coldness and all these cloudy days and precipitation have been a difficult adjustment. Being with Bryan makes it all OK though. We just pile on more clothing and have to cuddle up under more blankets. If we must go outside full snow gear is in order. I used to love the cold and snow and rain and sleet and overcast days that are wintertime in NJ, but my constitution had adjusted to high humidity and heat of Fort Myers Beach, so I am relying on my attitude (mind over matter) to overcome my icy fingers and frigid toes. I have been considering wearing fingerless gloves in the house but I wash too many dishes for that to be practical.
I finally have a computer for blogging again (thank you dear sister and brother-in-law)and once Bryan finds regular employment I will start writing more regularly again as well as looking for a paper that might publish my work. I was so blessed to have The Berthoud Surveyor in Colorado and The Island Sandpaper in Florida. The awesome editors at those papers gave me a place on their staff. Seeing my work in print is a thrill every time and I hope to find a new outlet for my writing. In the meantime I hope to turn my efforts back to blogging again, now that we are settled into our new apartment at Bryan's parents home.
We have been the recipient of so much charity in the past few months. It is a very humbling experience.
Lots to write about but no time right now. I need to get Izzy ready for half day kindergartenand feed her and the boys some lunch all while avoiding eating too much myself. Here's to trying!
Home in NJ, it still sounds wierd to me.

Control

We all like to have the illusion that we have some control over our lives. Children constantly struggle with their inability to control what is happening around them. Even my little 16-month-old son is learning to want to be in control. I struggle with my need to put constraints on him, to help him to trust me to be in control of the things he is not yet old enough to decide for himself.
All parents can identify with the struggle that we call bedtime. We know that children NEED to go to sleep yet they think we are just spoiling their fun. So they fight us. They roll around in bed, talk to their siblings, or remember something sooo important that it just can't wait until morning. Sometimes they make excuses or try to reason with us. Other times they simply whine. They may cry and call us mean. My 16-month-old has no words to plead with. He simply keeps himself awake. He rubs his eyes and reaches out his arms to me. If I put him in his bed he will stand there and cry. He wants me to hold him, to rescue him from his own sleepiness. So I pick him up and comfort him and try to calm him. I want him to sleep because I know he needs to, because it is best for him. I may feel impatient and tired myself but I do my best to make bedtime pleasant for him.
Tonight it took hours of nursing him and cuddling him, rocking him and soothing him before he finally let himself drift into dreamland. Now he is cuddled up peacefully in bed. Why did he fight it so?
Why do I fight it so when God is parenting me? He certainly knows what is best, but so often I don't want what he has for me. I want to decide, to choose for myself. The illusion of control is comforting, but it is not safe. Why would I rather be angry then rest in His peace? All I gain is hours of wasted time, wanting my own way, feeling I deserve this or that, that I NEED it to be a certain way.
Why not just close my eyes and rest in his arms?
Just this thought helps me to view my own children differently. Bedtime may be frustrating, but I am just like them. I reason and complain. I whine and make excuses, hoping to get my own way. I may even cry. In the end I always end up in my Heavenly Father's arms, as he rocks me to sleep.
"O rest in The Lord, wait patiently for him and he shall give thee thy hearts desires."
Thank you Lord that I am not in control. Give me the patience with my children that you extend to your own. Amen

the last mile is the longest

Now that we have a date set to move to New Jersey, my mind is reeling with things to get done. Yet I wish I was leaving tomorrow. I want to throw everyone in the car and just drive, just get there. I want to be done with waiting. It would be pointless though because I am not waiting to get back to NJ, or waiting to settle into my new home or even waiting to see my extended family whom I miss so much. I want to be driving to Bryan, my husband, the man I married, who I pledged my life to for better or for worse, for all of it, for as long as we both have breath.
"For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife and the two shall become one flesh."
One person can't be in two places at once unless he is is severed from his other part. With this process death would ensue. For the past 7 months some part of me has been dead. Some part of my heart has been so hard in order to bear the separation. Otherwise it would have been too heavy with the weight of all that missing to carry on.
But now the ice is melting away. My protection is weak and I have to muster up my happy face for today. Why now when it is so close to being over does the heaviness of all those days press like an iron fist around my heart?
Is it the realization of all that water under the bridge; all those moments lived apart, only partly alive?
Could I have lived those months more fully, if I had not hidden my soul like a turtle in its shell? Or would every moment have been sheer frustration, full of loneliness.
Pain is a refining fire that molds our hearts into the image of Christ. Did I, in my desire to protect my heart and to "just get through this," stunt my own growth?
I don't know. I have these last days to get though still. Days of anticipation and worry. What if he doesn't leave early enough, and I arrive there before him and am still stuck, still waiting.
I want to be driving to my husband, nothing else. But there may be more lessons ahead that I wish I did not have to learn.

Around Town Continues Update

I am having some trouble editing the Around Town page on my mom's Ipad. I just added a new post but for some reason it re-posted the entire page again at the bottom. SO, you didn't miss out on 3 prior posts, it is just a glitch and I hope to have it fixed soon. I will try editing it on a PC. Anyway, I hope you will read about my continuing struggle with CLS on the "Around Town Continues" page. I love having problems like this. It feels so good to laugh at myself and I hope you will too! (I don't mean that the way it sounds. I don't mean that you should laugh at yourself. I am sure that you have it all together and that there is nothing funny about you. Other then when you are telling a joke of course. I on the other hand am a terrible joke teller but a hysterical homemaker.)
Before I dig myself another hole, go ahead and click on the "Around Town Continues" page. Enjoy!

My daily miracles

Every day I am witness to miracles. It is the same miracle over and over again but it never fails to fill me with wonder. Those moments between waking and sleep that pass over the faces of my boys as I cradle them in my arms or simply lie next to them; to help them calm down, surrender to rest. These spaces in the day are wondrous and peaceful, rich with the fullness of time. Each moment is stretching, each second overflowing with gentle beauty as my little three-year-old presses his head into my shoulder, pulls my arm to his chest and whispers "Oh my little mommy, you so soft my little mommy." His black lashed eyes lazily open and close beneath his nodding head of golden hair.
There are times when I am nursing the baby while he fights sleep, trying to turn his head, rubbing his dark round eyes, trying to push me away, but hungry enough to keep eating despite the sleep tugging at him, finally pulling him out of consciousness to slumber.
His big brother cuddles next to him, snuggling in closer "Oh Allen so cozy, so cozy" as he too drifts out of ceaseless motion into the world of dreams.

Nightmares

Bad dreams have a way of haunting you in the daytime. They are not unlike that scary movie you watch. You put off bedtime, hoping you'll be tired enough, sleep soundly enough that nightmares
wont wake you from your slumber.
I think the thing I hate worst about them is that moment in the night when you awake and there they are, fresh in your mind. Every sound in the house seems suspicious. The noise of the cat walking down the hall frightens you into alertness. You know you are tired but the adrenaline pumping in your veins keeps you from settling and your mind races.
That is why I am sitting up tonight, typing away, putting off my much needed sleep. I wanted to take a nice long peaceful nap today, but my boys napped at different times, leaving me without a respite for my own nap time.
The nightmares are still vivid in my memory. More vivid then the things I actually did the past few days, my nightmares are there, those startling and unsettling memories. At least when I watch a frightening movie I am not one of the actors, but my nightmares are movies in which I was an actor, playing a part in terrible scenarios that leave my heart racing.
When I awoke the past few nights in my bed, hearing the breathing of my little ones, I was so thankful that those dreams were only the imaginings of my mind. Each time I was relieved to be able to hear my children around me sleeping safely. My heart cried out to The Lord in thankfulness that all was well in our home.
In a way these night terrors awaken me to thankfulness. Thankfulness for another ordinary day with ordinary stressors and frustrations. I love our ordinary days with the rhythm of preparing meals, cleaning house, resolving arguments between bickering children, and soothing bumps and bruises.
They are such a gift.
Before I go to bed tonight I will beg The Lord for restful sleep. I will also remember to thank him for this ordinary day, free from the horrors of my night visions. Today was just an ordinary day. How wonderful and beautiful is was.

Struggling to remember

Living here in a place that I only vacationed before, all of a sudden I will have a memory surface. It greets me like a movie scene, full of depth and color. Then as quick as it came, it is gone.
I am left wondering what value they have. When a vivid memory stirs my present reality there is a sense of loss that comes as well. Time is moving on and taking me with it. I am not the person that I was when I first experienced that which is now my memory. But even more then that I feel a loss for all the things I can no longer remember, all those yesterdays for which I have no recollection. I have 36 years full of days behind me but only a few minutes here and there are memorable to me. The rest of my life is more of an impression. There were the college years, my trip to Italy, my early childhood when my parents were still married and we lived on a farm, the years my Mom was living with her third husband, the year when we moved to Florida and my mother didn't tell anyone. That was the lost year. Each of these phases leaves an impression on my mind and I can pick out a few memories from each, but there is so much I can't bring to mind, both pleasant and unpleasant.
My oldest daughter can remember what she was wearing the day her first sister was born; the details of the place where she stayed overnight with my mother. My daughter was 18 months old. There are no pictures to tell the tale. Those are real memories. My memories are so fractured. I often wonder if it is my mind's way of dealing with the bad things, the abuse, the things I wanted to forget. So that now, when I want to remember every single detail of every moment with my children, my mind has trained itself to forget. It has learned to file my memories away where they can't  sneak up on me again later. Where they can't stab me in the back when I let down my guard. If my memories can't find me, they can't hurt me.
I struggle to make memories that stick. I look at the face of my one year old. I look and I look. I say to myself, "I will remember this moment. I will not forget."
Yet later, although I can remember my mantra and the intention behind it, I cannot conjure up the memory. I can remember my longing to preserve the moment forever but not the image I tried so hard to burn into my conciseness. I am left with the longing, with the loss. I am left with my struggle to remember.

When I have my own place again

When I have my own place again I want to remember...
 1. to not use my oven for storage. It is a pain to have to empty the oven of pans and baking sheets every time I want to use it. If it doesn't fit in a cupboard then I shouldn't have it.
2. to be thankful for cupboards.
3. to have a designated place for laundry sorting and folding, and I don't mean the sofa or the dining table. It drives me insane to have the living room turned into a laundromat, the sofa and chairs covered in mountains of laundry, leaving me no place to sit.
4. to make an ingoing and outgoing station with trays that hang on the walls marked "things to be signed", "bills to be payed", and incoming boxes for each of the kids homework and pictures. Also trays for "things to be mailed" and "letters in progress." My table is too often cluttered with this stuff because it has no where else to go.
5. to write letters to my mom and grandma and actually mail them.
6. to never use my bedroom as a staging area. I want my bedroom to be neat, clean and nearly empty. NO CLUTTER and NO STORING OF EXTRA STUFF IS ALLOWED! It should be a place to rest and be alone with my husband. Not a garbage dump.
7. to be alone with my husband in our room every day.
8. to have a small desk for writing that faces out a window. That way I can't get distracted by housework. When I am writing I want to be writing. When I am cleaning, I want to be cleaning. Doing both at the same time is incredibly ineffective.

I will remember. I will remember. I will remember.

An update

Somehow I managed to remove my "Around Town" page from the blog, but it is back up now. I am having technical issues learning to write and edit my blog on the iPad. My computer is SSSOOOOO slow, so I am using my moms iPad while I am here.
I will be having a bi-weekly column in a local paper here on Fort Myers Beach that will start this week! I am exited to be able to continue being a published writer. This paper has a significant circulation as this is a densely populated area with a lot of tourists coming through as well. I am so thankful  this opportunity.
You can check the paper out online at www.islandsandpaper.com
I will continue to blog but it will be biweekly on the opposite week as my article in the Island Sandpaper.
I know, I know, I haven't had a blog entry in 2 weeks now. Well I wrote one, but I couldn't edit it and spell check it for some reason on the iPad. With my crazy brood of kiddos I only have so much time for writing, and usually that is when I should be asleep.
Thank you for your patience and encouragement. Keep checking back, take a look at the Sandpaper's website and comment!
Time for my newest invention, Pine Nut Biscotti to come out of the oven. It smells heavenly but "I will resist, I will resist, I will resist..."

A tomorrow that never comes

I intended to get into a regular routine of writing. I had so many plans. I am so good at making plans, setting goals, imagining what it will be like, where it all might lead.
I am slightly less accomplished at achieving these goals. If things work out, fall into place, I think my idea is good. If I encounter significant roadblocks, I start to question the validity of my plans.
Almost every evening while I stand in the shower, reviewing the events of my day, turning them over in my mind, I renew afresh my resolve to adhere to my most recent proposed eating plan. While I review my plans for the next day I feel a surge of optimism and resolve. Tomorrow I will start afresh. It will be the day I overcome. I will eat the foods on my eating plan and I will not eat anything else. Simple enough. But somehow on the next day by three o'clock in the afternoon, I find a box of crackers or a dish of ice cream in my hand. By dinner time I am munching away on this and that as I prepare the evening meal for my family.
Plans derailed, I revert to my default eating pattern which is mindless eating and too much of it. But by the time the day is done and I am in the shower again, I am starting all over, making plans for tomorrow, a tomorrow that never comes.
Writing isn't that different from dieting. It requires a commitment of time and choosing to stick to it even when it is easier to return to the default activity, usually cleaning. Sure cleaning is good but it won't help me a become a better writer. For that matter, my homemade chocolate biscotti is pretty good but it won't help me become a thinner women.
That is why on this weekend that traditionally marks the end of summer I have only blogged twice and I haven't lost an ounce of weight since I arrived in Florida over three months ago.
Thankfully I will probably have the chance to try again tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow until I have no more tomorrows. Another chance to do it better. Another day to spend on the things that really matter....like chocolate biscotti.

Around Town Continues

For those of you who have followed our family adventures in The Berthoud Weekly Surveyor, I have added a page to my blog focusing on our continuing adventures out of town. I have temporarily relocated with our children to sunny, humid south Florida while my husband slaves away in sunny, arid Colorado trying to get our house ready for sale. The inspiration for having a blog to begin with came from my constant struggle to keep our small two bedroom house clean and organized while our family continued to grow. Now I have an added incentive to blog as I will no longer be writing for The Surveyor. They focus on using local writers, which I no longer am. We loved living in Berthoud and have spent nearly ten years walking to Hays Market, drinking coffee at Da Bean, getting lots of help at Ace Hardware, borrowing books at the library, frequenting local businesses, and enjoying the small town charm of Berthoud.

During this period of crazy change, we have continued to get involved in the community where we are living; supporting local businesses, getting to know the people who work and volunteer in the community while enjoying the beauty and uniqueness of the place we are living now. The climate in Florida is drastically different from Colorado but people are people everywhere and we have been blessed to meet a lot of wonderful ones.
So if you were a fan of my "Around Town" columns for The Berthoud Weekly Surveyor, I will continue to supply you with a weekly dose of humor and family misadventures via my "Around Town Continued"  page on my blog. There will be a new post every Wednesday and you can expect the same fare as my column only they sadly will not be set in Berthoud anymore.
Just go to my blog and click on the tab that says "Around Town Continued." You can also sign up to follow my blog and receive email notifications when I have posted a new article. Or just check on Wednesdays. I look forward to continuing my journey as a writer as I journey around the country and hope that you will gets some laughs out of it along the way.

Is a simple life one to be remembered?

I have often seen the bumper sticker "Well Behaved Women Rarely Make History." I guess that is true, but what impression do "badly" behaved women leave behind them? Think of memorable women that people everyone would recognize, Marilyn Monroe is a perfect example. She is iconic, her image is everywhere years after her death, men still lust after her and women still wish they could look like her but for what good? She is dead, her life spent out at a young age and cut short by her own hand and a string of broken and disfunctional relationships ttmarked her personal life. The most desirable women in the world went into eternity lonely and alone.
My grandma has a book featuring the 50 most memorable actresses of Hollywood's studio era. The lives of most of these women were unconventional and daring. They had multiple husbands and lovers. They signified what it ment to be alluring and successful to generations of women. Yet the depth of fulfillment in the relationships of their personal life seems abysmal. Is making history really success?
One of my favorite novels is Middlemarch by George Elliot. George Elliot was an unconventional women who scoffed social norms by living with a married man and later in life marrying a man much her junior. She denied the Christian faith but continued to write novels reinforcing the morals taught by Christ and espoused (though not lived out) by her hypocritical Victoian society. She was a misbehaving women who left an indelible mark on history. Yet her own words speak of something else as the measure of success.
As Dorothea's epitath in Middlemarch, George Elliot says this...
"Her finely touched spirit had its fine issues, though they were not widely visible. Her full nature, like the river of which Cyrus broke the strength, spent itself in channels which had no great name on the earth. But the effect of her being on those around her was incalculably diffusive: for the growing good of the world is partly dependant on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs."

This is my job

Like every mother I know, I've looked into those  "work from home and make a million dollars a week" scams. I've often tried to find some way to make money while also caring for my children. The problem with that has been that my children are a full time job, requiring constant supervision and care. If I get on the phone, start vacuuming, or try to write (this is happening right now) my children will suddenly become discontent, sullen, hurt themselves or start fighting (right now all of the above are happening). Starting with the birth of my oldest daughter I have felt that task of motherhood is stretching me. With the birth of each child I have realized that I am just a little more flexible then I was before. Having five children all at once would have been a disaster but with each child I have grown.
I always considered mothering a full time job, requiring that I be present most all the time, ready to deal with all the complicated relationships of family life. Then our life situations changed and I started to doubt myself, started to listen to the voices all around me, started to compare myself with others, started to listen to the "man at the back door."
Maybe I should get a job and find daycare of some sort. I mean desperate times call for desperate measures. For many of you reading this you may feel that you need to work, for many different reasons, and I am in no way suggesting that working is wrong...but I was afraid; not choosing but reacting, not trusting but looking for a way to work things out myself. Fear gets me caught up in all the things that drag me down, pulls me away from the light, keeps me from hearing the one who calls to me from the front door. God doesn't need to sneak around. He comes right up to the door and knocks. Satan whispers through the back screen, whispers my name, whispers my fears, whispers how I'm not good enough, aren't doing enough. Before I knew it I was trapped in my own mind, doubting all my choices, about everything.
When I was sharing with my sister on the phone about all my fears and worries and doubts, especially about working outside of the home, she simply said " Have you asked God what he thinks about that?" In that moment I realized I was looking for affirmation and approval in the wrong way. I wanted to answer my own questions. So I simply went to the front door and asked him "Dear Lord, do you want me to get a job?"
And that still small voice that answers our heart's call, answered me in his gentle way. " Why did you wait so long to ask me? You already have a job, the one I appointed for you since the foundations of the earth. I want to help you to do that one well. Don't get distracted by the whispers of the deceiver."
So now I don't have to justify myself or my choices or to look for approval from others. I just have to open the front door and keep asking God "what he thinks about that ."

My thanks to Serena Ontiveros for her kind encouragement and also to Dr. Kimberly Schmidt. The analogy about the man at the back door and God at the front one is hers. It was passed onto me by my sister and has been a valuable tool in discerning the voice of The Lord. My Thanks to you both.