we get by with a little help...

The day spent, we lay in bed, catching up on lost snuggle time—a high priority in our household. Buddy's curls find their way around my nose, tickling me even in their post-shower dampness. I breathe in the smell of shampoo, repositioning my head, and hug him tighter.

"You know what, Buddy?" I say. "I think you're the best boy ever."

He squeezes my arm, wrapped securely around his waist. "And you're the best Momma ever," he replies.

"I mean it, Buddy. I think you are a really neat kid," I tell him, wanting him to get that I'm not just saying this because this is something Momma's say. Wanting him to get that I see him for who he is, and that who he is has value. Wanting him to get that I don't just love him, but I like him, too.

He squeezes again. "I mean it too, Momma," he says. And in a whisper he adds, "You help me when I need help."

You help me when I need help. I am caught off guard by his comment—I smile a "that's an interesting thing to say" smile in the dark. "I'm happy to help you, Buddy. I will always help you when you need help."

It is interesting the things that speak love to a child. So often, they are not the things we think we should be doing. They are the things are children ask for. Snuggling. Praying. Doing something together. Time spent in proximity at the end of a day of separateness. Helping when one needs help. Putting the work aside and playing four square (with two people) when you'd really rather get your work done. I don't do it all perfectly. Some of it I don't even do with mediocrity. But in his world, at the moment, there is a little bit I am doing right.

After my week, I will take it, and rest in that tonight.

on the couch with buddy

Sigh. What is it they say about the best-laid plans?

Today was spent nursing my 8-year-old back to health, rather than taking care of myself. Some days, we just have to do this. God takes our tidy little agenda and tips it upside down like a snow globe, and all the little "appointments" float around like flecks of glitter and fall in entirely different places. My women's group. My quiet time. Blogging. Working on the manuscript. My healing prayer appointment. All up in the air, and then all just gone—buried under a day full of Mike Rowe getting dirty to my son's gleeful delight.

It would be one thing if I did it well—this caretaking thing. I sat on the couch for as long as I could stand it, reading my book in snippets between Mike's bleeps and blunders, and then I was gone. The itch to be productive would not leave me be and I spent the rest of the afternoon at the computer working on blogging issues and research while Buddy sat on the couch watching Mike alone with his fever and his chicken soup.

I wrestle with this parenting thing. With this working full time/writing part time/parenting full time/exercising part time/dieting full time/socializing part time/taxi-driving full time/repeating sixth grade part time schedule I keep. There is not enough time to do it all, let alone do it well. There is fatigue. There is frustration. There is worry. And there is guilt. There is a LOT of guilt. I worry I've not done this mothering thing well. Not really well. And it grieves me. Because I wanted to do it well.

But there is, occasionally, a light that glimmers like a crystal catching the light of the sun at just the right angle. It reflects back to me something of glory. I sit back, my breath caught, and I just look. That glimmer is hope. And the sun is reflecting more and more of it lately. The hope that God will equip. Will restore. Will sustain. Will guide. If only I will listen and follow. If only…

My devotional for today reads:
Trust me one day at a time. This keeps you close to me, responsive to my will. Trust is not a natural response, especially for those who have been deeply wounded. My Spirit within you is your resident tutor, helping you in this supernatural endeavor. Yield to his gentle touch; be sensitive to his prompting. (Jesus Calling, March 18)

Yield to his gentle touch, sensitive to his prompting. I wonder how different today might have looked had I done that. I can't undo it now, so I will not dwell there in regret, but move forward in resolve.

Tomorrow, the snow globe gets re-shaken, and the glitter falls where it may. I can only take it one day at a time. Tomorrow is a new opportunity. To listen. To yield. To follow.

To trust.

To take care.

master orange belt

Scenes from Buddy's Taekwondo belt test tonight.

Sparring with a black belt. Nice shot.

And taking one down to the ground!

Breaking his board on the first try!

Way to go, Buddy!

ode to lysol

Gold colored can of foul floral scent,

blast through the air and make your descent—

on pillows, on blankets, on bears and on beds,

cover them all until all germs are dead.

Hover and linger, alive in the air,

gobbling it all until nothing is there.

Ridding my home with your magical power

of this plague that makes everyone puke on the hour.

Scour and scourge until all trace is gone,

restoring our health by the breaking of dawn—

Cleanse us of sickness, we humbly pray,

for I MUST be to work on the very next day.

recipe for a snow day

1. Take two of your mother's good spoons, and hide them under your pillow. (Be sure to forget they are there, so your mother goes insane trying to figure out what happened to all of her spoons.) Take care to use REAL spoons, as plastic spoons "are only good for delays."

2. Put your pajamas on. Inside out. And backwards. Wear them to bed this way, with the collar all scruntched up under your chin so that you get drool all over it.

3. Take one ice cube per person and flush them down the toilet. (Be sure to pick small ones, as rumor has it ice cubes can clog toilets which makes fathers very agitated.)

4. Pray. "Dear God. Let's hope we have a snow day tomorrow. Amen."

5. Go to sleep (as if) and let the effects marinate for a full eight hours.

6. Wake up at 1:17, 2:30, 3:46, 4:15, 5:37, and 6:54 to see if it's snowing.

7. Awaken your mother (if she's managed to sleep through all the snow-checking) to see if there is a message from the school.

8. Enjoy the fruits of your labor.

snuggling and sacrifice

It is nearly 11:00 AM on this temperate but grayish and wet New Year's Day, and, oddly enough, I am the only one up. The hubby who stayed up reading after we returned home from our holiday revelry is cozied up in bed next to the seven-year-old, who desperately but unsuccessfully tried to keep up with the almost-twelve-year-olds who intended to stay up ALL night but were found, true to my prediction, sacked out on the couch this morning, unknowingly succumbing to sleep somewhere after movie three. It was a valiant effort, nonetheless.

To say it is unusual that I am the only one up would be a gross understatement. When left to my own devices and not bound by the constrictions of four different calendars, it is quite the norm to find me still in bed while all the rest of my household starves for lack of an ability to get their own bowl out of the cabinet and pour their own milk and cereal. Occasionally the almost-twelve-year-old gives me a run for my money as her body shifts to its adolescent time table, but I can still easily beat her in a sleep-in-off hand's down just about any morning I am given the opportunity.

That is, until Buddy comes and crawls in bed.

Both of my children, I should clarify, are avid snugglers. They love to come into our bedroom after they've awakened and basically make sure that I am awake, too, which is very kind of them, if not entirely misguided. They pull back the covers and burrow through them until they've found my warm body, and then adhere themselves to me in whatever fashion they are able as warranted by my position in the bed. This has been our morning ritual since they were old enough to get out of bed--indeed, Bub even has gone as far as to set her alarm to be sure she gets snuggle time before she has to get ready for school. It is as much of our family's genetic code as ice cream and game nights and hiking adventures and leaving the new toilet paper roll on top of the toilet paper roll holder.

Sometimes, when they've shuffled in with a groggy step and fallen into the bed half-aware, I am blessed with another bit of sleep as their breathing falls mercifully into a deep, deliberate pattern and their bodies are gloriously still. I may not be able to breath or move myself, wedged as I am into the double bed I grew up sleeping in alone and now am forced to share with not one but two to three people and as many cats, but at least they are not moving and if I breathe deeply myself and try to visualize pleasant, spacious places, I can get very close to falling back asleep, myself. Almost.

But I am not always so fortunate. Buddy, who is the true cling-on of the pair, is also a bit, um, shall we say, squirrely, and I know as soon as I hear distinct, rapid footsteps scampering from the bathroom that my evening's repose has expired. No longer drowsy, all hope is gone of his body again becoming static, and I am up for a morning of elbows and knees and whispers and wiggles and sighs and desperate, futile pleas for him to please be still.

They tell me I will miss this.

Truth be told, I tell myself this, as well. It is the only reason I do not lock and bar my bedroom door on a nightly basis. I know I will miss this. Desperately. And so I endure it. And I only groan inwardly as soon as I hear Buster Brown descend from his top bunk across the hall, so that he will not ever know I am not as thrilled as he that he is awake and ready to snuggle. But it is a bittersweet snuggle, as I once again, for the first time of many that day, sacrifice that which I desire for the ever more important desires of my children.

We are nearing 11:30 and there is still no sound from upstairs. Apparently starting a movie at 2:00 AM was enough to keep Buddy quiet for his father this morning, and they are still warm and cozy in MY bed that I could no longer lay still in for lack of space and breathing room. (Literally.) Rather than fight for cramped, sweaty, broken sleep this morning, I have done a new thing in this new year. I have arisen before my entire family and come down to the kitchen and sat my butt in front of the computer and I've done something I WANTED TO DO. For once. Perhaps this bodes well for the new year. Perhaps this is an omen. Or perhaps this is just a fluke. After all, it is much easier to rise before everyone else when I am rising at 10:00 in the morning. Which is just about right for me...

Parenting and writing do not flow easily for me out of the same space. Somewhere between all the work of taking care of people, which is done both professionally and personally, I fear I have lost my creative self. The writer. The musician. The artist. I know intellectually they are truly not lost--just hibernating, perhaps, not enjoying the cold, gray winters of Ohio any more than I do. But I miss them. Desperately. And I feel incomplete without them. And I've still, after almost twelve years, not yet determined how to balance that which I need with the needs of my children. And I've yet to comprehend, in my own life and beyond, where the mystery of death to self and the reality of taking care of one's self intersect.

For a fleeting moment I hear a bird singing outside my window, and just as quickly as it came, it is gone. Thank God for temperate, unseasonable days that bring us out of hibernation and restore to us that which we were created to do. Even if only for one, quiet, up-before-everyone-else morning.

what remains

The day began innocently enough as far as epiphanies go. After a slow start due to a late night the evening before, we were finally all up and moving—moving tubs and bags and boxes up from the basement to be dug through and sorted and stored or gotten rid of. I was nearly jubilant as I plowed through the last ten years worth of stuff (which had heretofore been accumulating en masse all over my basement, already a pit to begin with) trying to determine what were keepsakes and what was simply not worth keeping. Baby clothes, teething rings, books, baskets, tennis shoes, clothes out of date, out of style, out of size. Three carloads to Goodwill later, I was nearly finished.

Laid out before me were the remnants of babyhood to be sorted and stored, and then my work would be finished. I perused the items carefully—which child did they belong to? Was this handmade? By whom? Would they want this for their own children? I tried to identify all the important information one would want to remember but would never be able to in twenty-some years. It was at this point I picked up the dog.

He was cute—a soft, shaggy brown mutt about the size of a webkinz. I couldn't remember for the life of me to which child he belonged. I noticed he had stitching on each ear—one ear read "record," the other, "play." Easy enough, I figured. I'll press play and see if it gives me any clues.

I pressed play and out came my own voice. "Hi Buddy! I love you!" I crooned. Problem solved. It was my son's. I was not prepared for what happened next.

The recording wasn't over. After my own "I love you," there was a second's pause, and then an 18-month old voice echoed back, "I yuv you!!!"

If this afternoon in my life were a scene from a movie, that moment would look like the scene in Ratatouille when Anton Ego, the food critic, takes his first bite of Remy's ratatouille and is sucked back through a wooshing vortex of memory to his mother's kitchen some thirty or forty years earlier. I could almost feel my hair swoosh around my ears as I was transported instantly back to chubby cheeks and cherubic faces and wet kisses and infectious laughter. I lost it.

I sat there in the middle of what will never be again, and I couldn't pull myself back together. And that's when it all finally came clear in one heartbreakingly obvious moment. It was more than just mourning the passing of these stages in my children's lives, though I am wont to do that ad nauseum. No—it was something more, something deeper, something I've never spoken. Something I've ignored and stifled and stuffed and shrugged off but could never quite get rid of. And there it was, all messy and snotty and out in the open. I. Want. Another. Baby.

There. Will. Be. No. More. Babies.

There will be no more babies. After two difficult pregnancies, one of them with multiples, I couldn't have dreamed of putting my 34 year old body through that, let alone my nearly-40 body. I knew, when my son was born, we were done. I simply couldn't do that again. The nine months of terrible pain, the destruction of my body, the disruption to our lives, the months upon months upon MONTHS of screaming, diaper changing, screaming, sleepless nights, and did I mention the screaming? No. There will be no more babies. I knew this six and a half years ago. I know it still.

But there is a difference between knowing and knowing, and my heart began to understand that difference this Saturday knee-deep in blankets and bears and binkies and baby books. I grieved on and off all afternoon. I grieved lying awake in bed, unable to sleep with pre-meet nerves. And I grieve it now, wiping tears between paragraphs, putting it all into words for the first time and perhaps the last.

There will be no more babies. Surrounded with what remains, I closed that chapter yet again this weekend, flipping forward once again to the school-aged years where I will continue to suck every bit I can out of each and every moment available to me. As Buddy listened with curiosity to his younger self, he crawled in my lap, wrapping his slender arms around my neck. "I still love you, Momma," he reminded me. I held him too tight for a little too long, and I told him I loved him, too.

And then, yet again, I let him go.

airborn

Buster Brown raking with Poppa this weekend!

a taste of freedom

It is 11:30, and my house is eerily empty. I have both anticipated and dreaded this moment for months, if not years. After ten years of child-filled days, I now have three days a week to myself. Having already had breakfast with one of my best friends, now also child-less, I'm not quite sure what to do with my afternoon.

Today will be filled with getting done all that has not gotten done this summer. Paying bills, updating accounts, catching up on emails--all sorts of fun awaits me at my computer. I might even unpack from our weekend. Maybe.

Buddy is now at lunch--I try not to picture possible scenarios, as they all, currently, in my own fearful mind, involve him ending up in tears. It's just best that I not go there. Not today. Not any day. He will be fine. He will be fine. He will be fine.

I will try to turn my thoughts to balances and budgets and bookkeeping. I will try to not watch the clock. I will try to work first, and will try to play later, as well. I will try to not call out to an empty room, "Listen, Buddy! There's an airplane!" I will try to reserve this time for myself, and fill it only with what I want to do. I will try to not miss my Buddy, and wonder what he's doing every moment. I will try to focus on being an adult without children, if only for a few hours. I will try.

Then, once they are home and tired and whiney and bickering, I will remember why I couldn't wait for today to come. And I will sigh a sigh of both contentment and frustration, and I will both look forward to and dread Friday, when I will do it all again.

the big day

I really have actually done a little writing, but have been on the road and getting these kiddos set for school. Hope to post some of it tomorrow, perhaps!

My baby, first day of first grade. Where has the time gone? (Where have his CHEEKS gone? Not to mention his TEETH?!?!)

My FIFTH GRADER. Ugh. I am getting OLD. (Isn't she pretty?)

Two peas in a pod...


...all the way down to their toes!

my baby starts first grade tomorrow morning. which of us do you think will get the least amount of sleep?

our last days of summer vacation

If my dear friend Bob thought it strange that we spent part of our last spring break in Indianapolis, he will be completely flumoxed by the fact that our summer "vacation" was spent in Springfield, Illinois.

The kiddos in front of the state capitol building. (Should that be capitalized? I'm too tired to care...) It was one of the most beautiful domes (from the inside, of course) that I've ever seen.

Hangin' with the Lincoln Family at the White House. I HIGHLY recommend the Lincoln Presidential Museum. Very, VERY well done.

Yep, that's corn. Right next to our camp site. BUT it's the BIGGEST darn corn I've even seen--which says a lot for a girl who grew up next to a corn field. (To give perspective, I am 5'3" in shoes. That is BIG corn!)


Was thrilled to find out my good buddy, James (we've been friends since kindergarten), got back into the country the week before we drove right smack dab through the town where he's doing his Ph.D. Stopped and had lunch, then made him late to go sell his textbooks. Oops.

Not the most exciting vacation, 'tis true. But when you spend over $3000 on a broken arm, you make do! We had a great time with my folks, and it was great to see all the Lincoln sites during his bicentennial year. Now, to prepare for school!

another go ‘round

I was kinda sorta almost doing okay-ish with the thought of my baby starting first grade a week from tomorrow. That is, of course, until I looked at this.

I had all sorts of fears for my daughter's first year of school—fear, of course, being what I do. In the end, it was all good, as everyone assured me it would be. The role my daughter was cast in has fit her well, and I am eagerly anticipating the playing out of her fifth grade run, though I wish I knew where those adorable cheeks went.

My son, on the other hand, is causing me great concern and distress as we gear up for his elementary school debut. Not nearly as gregarious as his sister (read: at all), my fears for my son include sitting alone at lunchtime and prowling the playground by himself at recess at best, and being teased or bullied over his slight frame and sensitive spirit at worst. My stomach gets all knotty when I think of it—when I picture his sad little face, unable to hold in all that sad and having it spill down all over his cheeks. I just can't bear it. Tell me I'm being unrealistic. Tell me I'm being overly concerned. Please, someone tell me it is going to all be okay.

At day camp this summer, my Buddy never made a buddy. This is not unusual—in all his time at school and church, he has only made one good buddy, and that friend chose him two years ago and latched on to him like stink on a dog and has not yet let go. So after two days of camp, curious if the social situation had improved any, I asked him who he played with at free time. "Nobody," he responded. "The other boys don't want to play with me."

"How do you know that," I responded. "Did they tell you that?"

"No, I just know 'cause they ignore me when I try to play with them."

He delivered the line matter-of-factly, and I responded in-kind, but inside both the fear in my spirit and the lump in my throat grew.

In a two or three weeks, God-willing, this will all be behind us and Buddy will be settled in both scholastically and socially. There will be a lot more prayer between now and then, as prayer is the only thing I can do in this situation. It will be a long two or three weeks, as we wait for the dust to settle and the cast list to be posted.

Then, once that is behind us, I will be free to obsess about how impossible it is that my BABY is in first grade. If I can contain myself that long…

the state fair: a photo essay

top ten things i love about the fair:

1. for one whole day, i don't feel fat, frumpy, out of style, or underdressed.

2. i leave with a newfound appreciation for my own children. i get to watch my daughter be my daughter...

...and my son be my son.

3. the sky lift. the best three bucks ever spent after ten hours on your feet. (with the exception of the 25 cent massage chair...)

4. fried dough with sugar on it. 'nuff said.



5. the ferris wheel. what's not to love?

6. more food on a stick than you can shake a stick at.



7. the state fair youth choir. summer of 1986. ah, the memories...

8. baby cows. can you get any cuter?

9. bright, colored, twinkly lights. lots of 'em.

10. cows made out of butter. only in america.

hope you enjoyed! we sure did!

parenting pop quiz

When your six-year-old falls into the fountain at Whetstone, completely submerged, which is the appropriate response?

A. Give him a stern lecture on not running off and climbing on things. Oh, wait, you've done that already. Twice. Just tonight.

B. Roll on the grass laughing at him as he stands there with his hair plastered to his head and water running down his legs. Try to pretend to be upset with him when you walk past the parents that saw him fall in. Ignore the fact they thought HE was a SHE.

C. Make him sit in the shade. In the breeze.

D. Your response?

sad and sadder

The door clicks, followed by the soft footfalls of six-year-old bare feet on the hardwood floor in the hall. There is a pause, then more shuffling. Another click. The quiet clamor back up the ladder to the top bunk. All is quiet. I can return to my book in peace.

I no sooner reconnect with the words on the page when a soft wail rises from my son's room. As my niece and nephew are spending the might, I get up immediately to both see who it is and to keep that one from waking the other. Another wail rises as I make my way into the darkness, trusting my ears, not my eyes, to lead me. They lead me to the top bunk.

It is, as I expected, my son who is quietly sobbing atop his loft. "Whatsa matter, Buddy?" I ask. "I don't know, I'm just sad," he sobs. I sweep him down out of his bunk so as to not awaken the one I know I will be less easily able to comfort, and I take him out into the hallway. We sit, his head in my neck, and I ask him why he's sad. He sniffles, wiping tears from his big, brown eyes. "I dunno," he chokes out. "I'm just sad. I'm really sad."

This is what I'm talking about.

So, why does this innocent, cheerful, albeit slightly sensitive child's tiny bright red apple fall so close to his mother's tree? Is it genetics? Learned behavior? Generational cursing? Self-pity? Lack of contentment? Poor nutrition?

I don't know, but I sure wish I did. For him. For me. For others.

What causes a child who has everything—loving (albeit imperfect) parents, a room full of toys, food in his belly, friends who seek him out, a roof over his head, a knowledge and certainty that he is loved—to go to bed, night after night, feeling sad to the point of tears?

What causes his mother to do the same?

quote of the day, take two

From my son, in exasperation, as he explains to me the necessity of sleeping in the basement tonight because Hope, a six-year-old meteorological expert, informed him there will be tornadoes tonight:

"Momma, you don't know everything."

quote of the day

"Momma, Miracle Whip is not really a miracle."

Buddy

excuthe me, you theem to be mithing thomething...

Buddy, after Poppa knocked out his two front teeth last night! (In his defense, they were hanging by a thread anyway...)

pass the tissues, please

I'm convinced his entire goal is to make us cry. He always succeeds. Were it not for the fact that he is so likeable, I would really hate that about him.

He greeted us all with high fives as my kindergartener stepped off the bus this morning with 14 other similarly nervous-looking six-year-olds and quickly came and grabbed my hand. Despite the fact we've been in the elementary school every day of the last four school years, Buddy was now suddenly nervous. What seemed downright blasé this morning was now unnerving him in his quiet little way, and I allowed him to cling for a moment as we were ushered into our classroom.

The visit to first grade is an important rite of passage at our school, for both children and parents alike. Because the kindergarten is housed separately from the elementary school, the visit is intended to calm any fears that may arise as fall approaches by making known the big unknown, both for the little and the big in attendance. Introductions were made, buddies were assigned, and the exploration began as the parents were whisked off to meet with the principal in order to allow the children time to spread their wings and move toward the edge of their safe little kindergarten nests. Or at least that's what they'd have you believe. But I know better.

Because this is the point at which he always makes us cry.

Get the emotion out of the way now, and next fall won't be so hard. Perhaps that is his philosophy. But I know enough from the tears in his own eyes as he talks about his oldest son to know that he knows better. There will be tears now, and there will be tears later, and that's okay. But it's still not nice to deliberately make us cry.

He begins, as he always does, by cutting right to the truest, deepest question within our hearts. "Your child will be cared for here," he tells us. Four years ago, it was these words that dissolved me, as that was, indeed, my greatest fear. Would my quirky little bundle of energy and excitement be received and appreciated for the joy she could be, or would that spirit within her be squelched and drained? The answer, I learned very quickly, was the prior. So now, four years later, these questions are a moot point for this mother. I know my son will be cared for here. I don't worry about that at all. I'm just not ready for him to BE here yet.

"The umbilical cord was cut six years ago," he reminds us. This is the line that kills me this year. "They're not ours—they're merely entrusted to us for just a short time." I know this. I KNOW this. But that doesn't mean I LIKE it.

My baby is not a baby any longer, and despite my desperate longing for full days of being BY MY SELF, I am just not yet ready to let go. I don't want the years to keep moving on. I don't want to think about my baby going to school all day. I don't want to think about approaching Bub's last year in this building, about middle school, about being home alone, about outgrowing the sweet one on one hand-holding dates to the zoo, the conservatory, to COSI that I have loved for the last ten years. I know the next stage will be good and will have its own unique joys. I know this. But I liked THIS stage. And this stage is almost over.

He knows this. And rather than dance around it and pretend it doesn't exist, he brings it right out in the open for us to acknowledge and even bond over, knowing that it may mean tears for some. For many, even. I suppose that is a good thing. I suppose. But I sure am glad I won't have to do it again…

Not until fall, at least.