Where the Wild Things Are

AA (Appreciate All)

2012-02-07T12:34:00.000-08:00

Last night I went with Rusty to do a show, a free show at a recovery center for it's workers and the folks who are...well, recovering. As usual, it was nothing like I thought and you know what? If I could afford to do that sort of thing (and man, I'm glad Rusty can) I'd do it every single night of the week, free.

Firstly, I didn't expect to walk into a room full of addicts and ex-addicts that look like, um, regular people. I could have been walking into any old room, Cousin Amy's baby shower, a cafe', a PTA meeting, whatever. I saw men in ties, elderly ladies with Scottie dog sweaters, kids (literally KIDS, like 14 years old), cops, farmers, young women, construction workers with mud still on their boots, CEOs. A whole room full of them. If you had just plunked me down in this room and made me guess what these people had in common, I wouldn't figure out their connection. Huh. Dumb of me, but I tend to be slow about things like that. Of course my brain knows perfectly well that drug addicts and alcoholics don't have to look like homeless people, it's that stupid, old, snap judgement rearing it's ugly head. You just assume they'll look a LITTLE different at least. Or if you are as naive as I am, you do.

Anyway, after I got over thinking "Hey hold on, I could be here as a performer, employee OR addict, and nobody'd be able to tell the difference", The second thing I started to wonder was: "What on earth is Rusty - a man who's never been drunk or high in his life, comes from an incredibly supportive, loving family, leads a charmed life, and doesn't even like COFFEE for God's sake - what can he possibly say to these people, people who deal with terrible things he knows nothing of, WHAT is he gonna say to them that could be meaningful?"

Surprise number two. I underestimated compassion. I've never been so proud. Out of his mouth came humor certainly, (he IS a comedian, after all) but also the understanding that we are all 99.9 percent EXACTLY the same. Me...the construction worker in the next seat...the high school English teacher...the millionaire...him. And all we have to do is to believe that. And TREAT ourselves as if we believe that. The roofer is the same as Bill Gates. Rusty is the same as the drug dealer in the back row. It just takes wanting something bad enough, and any one of us can have it. ANY of us. We can make something of our lives.

I helped set up and clean up and mingle afterward to answer questions. One woman quietly thanked me for coming (I don't know why since all I did was carry the guitar and be the butt of several jokes) before she hesitantly asked: "Is....is he for real? Is it an act or is he truly that positive?" I had to laugh as I replied, "Well, he just threw up his hands in a restaurant and yelled "This parsnip puree is GODDAMN FANTASTIC people!!!"

Another man, an ex cop who, at his lowest point, apparently traded valuable pieces of court evidence for drugs, was a guy that Rusty knows from the gym. He spoke to me at length. That's when I got a bit teary eyed, because he said: "You know what your friend does for me? I'll tell you. My wife left, my kids wouldn't speak to me, I've been to jail. When I think about all that I've struggled with, and what I've lost because of it, I get to feelin' pretty low. But THAT man comes up to me while I'm finishing up my squats in the morning and says: "Hey there Bud! Ain't you glad to be alive on a day like this? Jeezum Crow, can you believe we're lucky enough cusses to be walkin' outta here on our own two great-workin' legs, feelin' the sun, and all we got to do is BE?" And then this red-faced muscle man with a military buzz cut shook my hand vigorously between both of his meaty ones for a long time, as if he was somehow grateful for my support as well as Rusty's, and Lordy, I wished I could do this for people.

I understand how he felt because that's what Russ does for me too. I don't know anything about substance abuse, but I do know plenty about feeling sorry for myself lately. He's the kind of friend that WILL NOT allow you to wallow in misery or fall into the darkness. He doesn't know it...(or probably he does, actually)...but dragging me along to AA meetings and nursing homes has reminded me that pitying myself is just as much of a handicap in life as addiction, or dementia and old age. I've got a choice. I've got life ahead of me, beckoning, to waste or live, as I choose. I'm well and alive, I'm LUCKY.

Oh, he's very sly about it. I'll be going on about my week's frustrations or hardships and he'll interrupt me politely with: "No disrespect, I'm listenin' ya know, but quick, look at that before it goes!" and he'll point to the sunset, or the way shadows are stretched out across a field, or a child skipping on the sidewalk, or he'll rush to grab the door for a loaded down UPS man, and that's all it takes. I'll turn back to him sheepishly as he he gestures for me to finish my story, but my tone, my perspective, it will be different when I start again, and he knows it, the sneaky bugger.

And that's the secret. His much sought after Top Secret Meaning Of Life. One of the most valuable things I've ever learned from someone. You want to be happy? Forget YOU. Make other people happy and you're home free. And life IS beautiful, people need to be interrupted and reminded once in a while. Quick! Before it goes!

Move

2012-01-19T08:38:00.001-08:00

Cozy and warm and safe. That's what's important. Just a bit of a big deal change, with no washer/dryer, Internet, phone, dishwasher, all that jazz. No huge problem with most of that.(What kind of spoiled-brat baby would I be, if I was pissed off about not having a dishwasher?! Plus, I was raised without electricity and running water, so I should just be happy I'm not living in a ti pi right now.) Well...I gotta say, a phone or Internet would be nice, because I feel pretty isolated. And the road is not one I want to drive up and down too many times in a day, if I can help it. Last night, I put the kids to bed, then I just kind of wandered around, sat down to read, got back up in five minutes, washed the counter (again), and then it's like seven steps across the whole apartment to my book again...finally decided to watch a video. Felt strange. Quiet and lonely. But I'll get used to it, I guess.

Grampa was completely unresponsive for several days, but then perked up and spoke again yesterday, so that makes me feel better. I'm just having a little slump with all the changes and the move. I feel like I've spent 16 years on nothing, because now I'm in my "first apartment" without a cent to my name, just starting out. And that seems crazy at 34. Even if 34 IS the new 24, let me tell you: poor is NOT the new rich.

Snow Day

2012-01-12T16:17:00.000-08:00

Lots of snow today, school was canceled, Zumba canceled, and the boys spent half the day clearing their little skating rink in the back yard...(which is only about 15 feet wide and unfortunately, from the way the knees of their snow pants smelled, probably a pretty high percent of frozen horse pee.) Anyway, they were happy, and very busy clearing and re clearing as the snow kept falling.

Hanging out at Jen's tonight, she just made awesome General Tso's Chicken, because she's a wicked nerd like that, I mean...she's a wicked good cook. Now the kids are jumping on Avry's Christmas trampoline that takes up the entire living room, and we're praying they don't barf General Tso's Chicken all over the place.

In keeping with my movie commentary: Right now, Jen is watching a movie called 'What Would Jesus Buy?' NOT a religious movie, despite the title, rather a sort of reality show/protest against consumerism. This group dresses up like a choir and plants themselves in malls, Disneyland, etc, and sing about "The Shopocolipse". I gotta say, it's pretty funny. But only if you aren't into buying stuff from China. If you like shopping a whole ton, you'd be seriously offended.

And now it's home and to bed. Tomorrow's another day off, since, snow or not, there's no school on Fridays. Taking the kids to hear an author they like speak at the library, and maybe Eli and I will have a skating date on Saturday, since he's really into that lately. Then there's a fun art opening on Sunday we'll go to. Seems like it'll be a good weekend, lots of time spent with my boys. And snow. There will be snow. Finally.

Movies Move Me.

2012-01-09T05:58:00.000-08:00

My weekend off. (Sorry, this blog post is a few days behind, Internet has been down) Was still not easy to be away from the kids...I'm such a worry wart thinking about them, Gramp, bills, the whole time. Gotta learn to recharge my batteries better, take a rest when I can. Gramp is doing better, by the way. They've moved him out of intensive care and have the bleeding under control. Unfortunately, they don't think he'll regain the full use of his left side and he still can't even swallow on his own, but things are looking up. He was able to open his eyes for a bit the other day for the first time.

Had a couple weird things happen. One: I thought I was about to pass out from hypothermia at one point, outside yesterday. Other people were walking by, hatless and looking comfortable and here I was, barely able to keep moving, thinking it was 20 below zero. Thought I was going crazy. I've been battling anemia all fall and winter due to blood loss which led to an iron deficiency. (I won't go into it because it's gross, but I had a procedure done a while back to deal with the fact that I ALREADY was anemic from having a 14 day long period every 18 days...so I've spent the last four years (since childbirth) almost bleeding more often I'm not. That's not even the gross part, but I don't really feel like discussing my uterine walls here in my blog, much as I love to over share.) Funny thing is, I never really looked up anemia on-line or anything...it was just "Oh, you need more iron." Yesterday after nearly freezing to death, I was curious, and looked it up to find one of the symptoms was a below average body temp on occasion, so I really WAS freezing, not just losing my mind. Other symptoms were fatigue, depression, irritability, all those things that I've been feeling lately and writing off as simply not being able to cope with my situation. Anyhow, that was interesting. I should be at the tail end of it now. Hopefully just knowing that I'm not crazy will help.

So, second topic...I never talk about movies because frankly, I almost never watch them. At least not new ones. I don't have the time or inclination. But since the two people I hang out with the most are in the industry, I've tried to pay more attention to what's supposedly good, who's big right now, etc, etc. (This movie talk will evolve into the other weird thing about the weekend, if you're wondering.)

On Friday night, I saw 'We Bought A Zoo' with Russ. Here's the thing: Movie People everywhere may scoff at this movie, because technically, it's fluff. But you know, it wasn't nearly as silly and fluffy as I would have thought. Sweet and sincere without being TOO too cheesy. And very real, despite having to suspend your belief somewhat to accept that a widowed father and his two kids actually go nuts, buy a decrepit zoo and get it going again successfully. It was based on a true story and I liked it very much. The actors did a great job, I actually cared about them. The whole thing was done well, (if a tad sappy now and again) I'd recommend it. Then, I'm no movie critic, but Rusty liked it too, and he's seen everything there is to see.

Last night, John and I went to see 'Take Shelter', which everyone in the smartypants movie world has been raving about as WONDERFUL. I hated it. Maybe because it played on some of my biggest fears (complete with a middle-of-the-night scene of a wife freaking out over her husband's seizure) Basically, I wanted to run screaming from the theatre. Mix insanity with end-of-the-world-climate-disaster, and you get a movie that I HATE. Does it make you think? Uh huh. Does it drive home pressing environmental issues? For sure. Needless to say, I HATED it. I spent most of the movie with my scarf pulled up over my eyes. I don't find being terrified very fun anymore. Not that I ever did, but I could watch a good thriller with the best of them at one point. Now, having children, I can't handle them at all. I have no idea if John liked it or not because he was just stuck calming me down afterward. I can't deal with certain movies, but I guess he didn't have any idea. Whoops. I had to spring the fact that I have the wild imagination of a seven year old on him, AND the fact that I get totally traumatized by scary movies.

(As an aside, I just looked up both movies on a review board and EVERYONE is of the opposite opinion. Like I said, I'm no movie critic, I just happen to prefer sappy over scary.)

That was weird thing number two about my weekend: I had to talk about how many fears and anxieties I carry. I had to talk about nightmares. I had to describe my bed as being custom built, framed with no airspace underneath because I can't stand having a bed someone could get underneath of. I had to talk about one of my most pressing problems with this divorce is being alone and afraid at night. Yeah. How big and brave am I? As a little girl I was always the one being taunted and bodily dragged onto the roller coaster..."'Fraidy Cat!" I'm still that little girl. Usually, with a good diet and exercise, I have a decent handle on my anxieties, but with low iron, over tiredness, and a scary movie, I wasn't doing so well yesterday.

It's funny, you'd think I'd get this movie-thing from my mom, because she's where my anxiety stems from, but nope, it's 100% from my Dad. He gets completely upset during scary movies, cries if they are even halfway sad, laughs himself silly during funny scenes...we're easily sucked into the emotions of fictional characters, I think. Maybe it's from not having a TV growing up, I didn't get desensitized to all that stuff, but I've always had a hard time walking away from a movie and dismissing it from my head, one of the reasons that I'm not that into movies. Sometimes their lasting damage is too big a price to pay for a some empty entertainment. Basically, I know that, with my personality already leaning towards nervousness, it's better for me to avoid those triggers all together, and embrace the cheerful, not the creepy.

So the moral(s) of the story:

Don't get anemic if you can help it, because you're cold and cranky.

Don't get divorced if you can help it, because you're cold and cranky.

Don't watch 'Take Shelter' if you can help it. Watch 'We Bought A Zoo' instead.

Don't go on dates with the two biggest movie lovers you know if you can help it, especially when you aren't really into movies. Or do, but figure out alternative actions, like lively conversation, cocoa drinking, loud radio sing-alongs, Christmas tree cutting and watching happy little chipmunks scurry around.

Go with warm and fuzzy vs cold and cranky.

There's both my movie review and life lesson for the week. Take it or leave it.

GrampaGrampaGrampaGrampaGrampa

2012-01-03T17:44:00.000-08:00

I've gotten criticism in the past for sharing too much. "Emily, why do you write those things? For anyone to read?" Because I must. It's who I am. Occasionally, my raw feelings poured out in words (that, granted, aren't always very carefully chosen or eloquent) may make people feel uncomfortable. Also, I'm sure I act like I'm self-righteously mouthing off half the time. Sorry. I figure we're all ultimately the same though. Exposing emotions connects me to you, connects me to EVERY person, and when I start feeling isolated, I just need to write. That's that. My post today probably appears to be the provincial topic of a high school essay, I apologize. Not able to be well-spoken right now, just simple and plain, and it will have to do.

If someone asked me to name off my top five favorite people in the whole world...I'd have a pretty difficult time doing it. But one person I wouldn't question would be my Grampa (Yes, I realize normal people spell it 'Grandpa'. I don't.) Avery. And I believe anyone that knows him would say the same. Because there's nothing he wouldn't do for you. Nothing. He'll take you fly fishing on a moment's notice. He'll drop all his plans to watch you dance. He'll show you how to tie knots, dig potatoes, make a kazoo out of a comb and some wax paper. He'll go with you down the Giant Slide at the fair, if you're afraid to go alone. He'll make you popcorn and watch the Disney Sunday Movie with you. He'll teach you to drive. He'll be patient and kind and encouraging. He'll never let you down. I know I've written about him before, how his hugs have always meant the world to me. Today when I hugged him, it still did, it meant the world, only he couldn't hug me back. That was hard.

Stroke...brain bleed...we don't understand exactly what all that means yet, but I'm guessing it's pretty serious since every auntie has flown in. I keep saying "WHY? He's so healthy...compared to most people his age." It's never occurred to me that he's old, not when I watch him playing Lincoln Logs with my boys, not when I see him telling a familiar tale, his hands gesturing wildly, or waltzing with Gram, not when he climbs to the top of the slide with a burlap sack in one hand, and yours in the other.

Maybe it's his time. Maybe it really IS, right out of the blue, like he would have probably wished for. I've got to think about that and figure out if I can be OK with it, but you know, it doesn't matter if I am or not...I don't have a say here, really. The fact that I'm NOT OK with it matters not one iota. So, I WILL be OK. What other choice is there? End of story. I'll be wicked sad. Far sadder than I've ever been before. Or he'll rally, and I won't yet.

At my aunt Deb's the other night, for my cousin Lilly's birthday, he hugged me so tight, he nearly squeezed the air out of me, with his prickly chin roughing up my cheek the way he does. And we love it. He holds on, makes you feel precious, cherished, it's not just a hug-let go thing, it's a hug, hold, hold, hold, "I love you. You know how special you kids are? Gosh, we sure do love you kids. Love those little duffers of yours, look at 'em! Jeezum! Don't they grow though? You're doing such a good job Emmy. Nobody could say you're not. Gramp's real proud of you." It's a whole lotta love, and pride, and a pep talk wrapped up in one massive hug. See, if I turn out alright, THIS will be why I'm a decent human being. With family like that, I can't fail, and I'm glad, glad, glad to have them. I can be brave because I've got them to back me up.

Wish I could have known the other night, if it'd be the last time I snapped his suspenders, as I passed by. Wish I could have recorded his chuckle. Only...I kinda did, I guess, because when I think about it, I can hear him.

When fair time rolls around, I'm going down the Giant Slide. Maybe Gramp will come with me. Maybe he won't. But either way, I'm doing it.

New Year's Resolutions

2011-12-31T05:39:00.000-08:00

I've never made any before. Maybe that sounds snotty of me, but I guess I've always figured; if you have something you want to resolve, why wait until one specific day to do it? It seems like a cop out...as if you're saying "Oh, I'll diet NEXT month"...when you set some projected date to do something, it's almost as if you already know you ain't really gonna do it, you're stalling, putting it off, whatever. New Year's Resolutions have always struck me as fakey fake. Not meaning I'm so perfect I don't have anything to resolve, or I'm above any kind of fakeness, no sir, just that I'm already deep in the muck of LIFE'S resolutions and there I'll stay until I feel I've got it going on. No timeline set. No fateful day it all will start. Nope, it's BEEN happening, and will keep on happening 'til I get it right.

But, you know, of course I DO like the idea of a fresh start, especially lately, when I've seen how much change I need in my life, in my behavior, in my attitude. I recognize that it's a lot. It's quite daunting, but certainly not insurmountable. Fresh starts: Bring 'em on.

To eliminate negativity, would be my number one resolution, if I was to make any. Only that's been the goal all along, and will carry right over into the New Year. To not sigh and think "Geez, I'm depressed"...defining myself AS depressed instead of thinking "Well, this is a depressing SITUATION, but it's not who I AM." Generally, that's what I've tried to do, until some dark moments this year when I simply felt too low and idiotic to attempt skipping along, tossing daisies in the air and singing "Tra la la la...my, isn't this a pickle! But I'm not depressed, oh, no, no, no!" Am I Snow White? Do I feel like whistling while I clean the dwarf's filthy pigsty of a cottage? Have I mastered this whole staying-positive-come-what-may thing yet? Not even close. But I'm getting there.

And is it going to work out for me? You bet it is. Hi ho.

Friday Fun

2011-12-31T05:00:00.000-08:00

On Hold

2011-12-29T13:18:00.000-08:00

Spent ONE HOUR and 15 minutes on hold this afternoon. After spending over a half hour on hold this morning just to be directed to call back in the afternoon. And yesterday, also a half hour on hold, to do a phone interview for our low income benefits. So, what I'm wondering here is: after being baffled by the 18 page accompanying paperwork that makes zero sense, HOW do (and I'm not trying to make any jerky generalizations about the folks that receive these benefits) poor people do this? It's the most confusing process ever, and THEN you have to review all your information every couple months, in case things have changed.

What if I COULDN'T stay on the phone indefinitely? What if I couldn't figure out the information on the World's Most Confusing Application? And again, not trying to say anything degrading about people in this income bracket, (dang, I'M the poorest person I know at the moment, and occasionally feel like the dumbest too) but, statistically, the average education of someone at this level of poverty, well, it's less than mine, if that's possible. And I'M not understanding most of this. Admittedly, I'm a bit of a moron, but in actuality, my IQ is reasonably high, and here I am, ABLE to be on the phone during the day, somewhat, asking questions and trying to sort it out. What about the people that can't figure this out? What about the people that can't stay on hold for hours on end? What about the people who need to be out the door at 6AM to pour concrete? Do they just give up? Do they just starve? Oh, wait, I guess the answer is: if you're pouring concrete, you have an income. At least a small one. But still, what if you've got a bunch of little kids? What if your wife has cancer? What if you have a learning disability? What if you need HELP?

I'm mystified that the system doesn't really seem to understand the situations that would need the assistance the most...the kind of folks, for the most part, that can't deal with the crazy run-around involved in getting it. I'm not saying I have some brilliant idea to do away with poverty and get the welfare system working smoothly, and I'm sure (fibbing a smidge here) they are doing the best they can with what they have, it's simply a smack-in-the-face close-up look at how flawed our Government is. And I GET that there are those who use and abuse these things, and a lot of the run-around is in place to safeguard against that, but...holy, holy. There must be a better way.

You sign up for heat assistance and it somehow cancels out your VHAP health care...then to get it back, you must set up an interview at the Hartford office, after you fax in your most recent pay stubs and tax information FOR THE MILLIONTH TIME, and then, whoops! They signed you up for Reach Up and now you need a different application for heating. And then...call back to the Waterbury office and see about your food assistance because there's a new grant dealing with that and it needs to be filed on it's own. Once you file, you can add fuel help and have to switch it all back. (Don't forget that there's at least a half hour of scratchy saxophone music to sit through before you learn that the ONE person that can talk to you has left for lunch.) Then, "You're separated? Then we need to do all the paperwork over again with YOU being the head of the household, please fax us your own personal tax documents...Oh, it's only been a year and you've never filed separately before? Hmmmm, we don't know what to do about that." After a few days of this, you almost want to just give up and starve/freeze/whatever. Seriously, sitting on the floor, attached to the wall phone because I had been on hold so long that the cordless phone's batteries died, I moaned at one point "Oh my God, would wild dogs just come and eat me now?" And then there was a full ten minutes I believe, where I just sang over and over softly into the phone: "Your muuuuuuuusic sucks and soooooooo do youuuuuuu...."

Obviously, I need to use these programs right now, until I get my feet under me, and THANK GOD they exist. Only, know what? I'm awfully unhappy about using them. I'm unhappy because in our society it's a shameful thing, (I feel like a phony...like "Wait a minute, should I be doing this? This is in place to help the REAL poor people, not me!" But then I realize: "Emily, look at your bank account. Look at your income. Look at your bills. Who the heck do you think you are?! Zsa Zsa freaking Gabor?") AND also I'm unhappy because CRIPES! They've made it so damn hard to use these programs! In a way, I might be glad someday, glad to understand both ends of the income spectrum, (not that I ever was rich, by any means) I'll be glad I learned to swallow my pride, I'll be glad that I have a better understanding of what it's like to live like this. Today I'm just glad that they don't record what people say while on hold.

Favorite Holiday Shots

2011-12-26T06:38:00.001-08:00

Wishes and Fishes

2011-12-24T23:03:00.000-08:00

Have I mentioned that I love Christmas? Yeah, well, I do. This Christmas Eve though, did not top the charts for favorite Christmas Eves. Justin took the kids to do his family's celebration which is how we always spent the night in the past, only for me, pretty weird to not be with them this time. Went to a small dinner party where we were basically served every food I hate worst in the world...shrimp, salmon, fruit cake... (Can't believe how that worked out, I felt like such a picky freak.) Kind of funny really. Anyway, when I got home the kids were already asleep from THEIR drive home. No reading Twas The Night Before Christmas, no putting out the milk and cookies, no tucking in excited little boys, asking when Santa will come. I spent an hour or so bringing down the gifts and filling the stockings. Afterward, I was so frozen I took a hot shower to warm up before climbing into bed around midnight. And then, laying in bed, of course I got to feeling all sorry for myself, fish for dinner, missing our usual Holiday traditions, all alone in my huge bed for the first Christmas Eve in as long as I can remember. I started thinking about whispering "Merry Christmas" or "Happy Birthday" or any of those special things to someone first thing in the morning, and I'd just rolled out the first two, big, fat tears onto my pillow, when I heard coughing and went in the next room to find Ira throwing up. Many hours later, as daylight breaks, I'm still up, having had not one single minute of sleep, really, really tired, and somewhat regret my wish to not be alone in my cold, king sized bed. Now I'm certainly not alone, but the bed is rank smelling and I get to clean up puke every twenty minutes, so be careful what you wish for, you just might get it. Especially on Christmas when wishes magically come true.

And Then There Were Three

2011-12-20T09:22:00.000-08:00

You know, thinking this business out beforehand, wondering what it would feel like to be a single parent, I almost didn't believe that any of "that" would apply to me. All the heartbreaking struggles you hear about. I'd think, "Yeah, I'll be single, but I'll never be one of THOSE parents, those moms going it alone. It won't be like that for ME." I have no idea why I thought that way, it was utterly ridiculous and moronic. Who was I kidding? Sure, Justin is there to help when he needs to, taking the kids when it's his turn to have them, and on the evenings I'm working, but the day-to-day stuff: the midnight-cough-checking, the toast-making, the sock-finding, the constant cleaning, the time-outing, the fight-stopping, the present-wrapping, the gas-pumping, the grocery shopping, the toilet-plunging, the dog-feeding, the puke-washing, the band-aid-applying, the bath-giving, the 2AM furnace-loading...it's all me.

So, I'm NOT the lucky exception of the single mother rule, I guess. Whatever I might have thought, I was dead wrong, it's wicked hard and I'm just the same as all the rest in my place...I can't even imagine being one of the women who did this from the start, although I do wonder if it would almost be easier to never have been spoiled by the luxury of being a two parent team. Because the cold turkey, single mom gig is TOUGH.

I keep thinking that I'm somehow cursed, jinxed...WHY is every single thing breaking? But I realized, after pondering it over, stuff was ALWAYS breaking, all along, only someone else fixed it then. My camera, my computer, the oven, the electricity, the septic, my car, toys, furniture, the dryer... Now I have no means to fix any of these things, and I feel very alone without that built-in help. Sometimes I literally turn in a circle, as if looking for someone to pop out of the woodwork and lend a hand when my hands are full. And sometimes I just drop my armload to the floor and cry. I cry because there's nobody to hug me for a minute and say: "Calm down, I'm here for you. You're doing fine."

I can't help feeling guilty for wanting a partner to make life easier and nicer, that shouldn't be the purpose of a relationship, I know. Apparently you're SUPPOSED to be able to stand alone, be strong, be a complete person, and all that jazz BEFORE you get into a relationship. It feels callous to NEED a partner...isn't that the wrong reason to be with someone? Even if I do sigh with relief when somebody else helps buckle the car seats, when somebody else cooks dinner, when somebody else makes a decision on our driving route. (Feminists everywhere would be cringing with horror at my words...actually I am too...) I hate to ask for help from people I date, I hate that I asked that from Justin. I hate that, with the way I am these days, I can bring nothing to relationships but work and worry. I hate being the damsel in distress. And I can't quite trust that someone won't feel bitter towards me after they get sucked into the madness of Life With Children That Aren't Even Their Children.

I've been talking to a counselor on occasion, because I have a day or two, probably about biweekly, when I just crash down into depression so deep, I need someone to pull me out. (This is one of those days...obviously, just look at this depressing post.) Other than that, I think I'm doing a pretty decent job of being by myself and raising the boys. We DO have bad days, oh for sure, but I was dumbfounded when Justin suggested yesterday that he take full custody of the kids and give me the house instead, claiming that he doesn't think I can cope with them. Those babies were born from my screaming body after hours of agony, I've cuddled them close every day of their lives, I love them more than I love ANYTHING, they ALWAYS come first, no matter what, and they'll never, never, never be taken from me as long as I'm breathing. Times are hard right now, I'm trying to find my path, but I don't think that's a proper basis for saying I can't cope. I ought to be allowed a grace period to figure out everything I don't have a clue about, oughtn't I? It's like dumping someone who can't swim overboard and expecting them to do the butterfly stroke. No, I can't fix cars. No, I don't know how to rewire the stove. Nope, I have no idea where the water pipes go to, life is indeed a frustrating struggle for a single women who is unfortunately not very handy...nobody's showing me how to do these things, it's just trial and error, A LOT of error, true, but does that mean I'm a the terrible parent, and he's the capable one? Do I really seem that incompetent?Golly, I didn't think I was a COMPLETE mess, just lousy at all the technical aspects of things I never understood. (I actually got my key stuck in the ignition the other day and freaked out for about ten minutes, doing everything I could think of to get it out until Justin pulled in behind me and immediately said "You're probably not shifted into park all the way." Sure enough, a granola bar was jammed behind the lever. Embarrassing.)

All I can do is wake up in the morning, kiss my kids, and say "Hello World. Go easy on me today, will you?" Spend the day being as good of a person as I know how. Cry a little on occasion, but count my blessings too... try to remember to laugh at myself more, and hope for the best, sputtering my way through the butterfly stroke.

Celebration #1

2011-12-19T06:41:00.000-08:00

Love Christmas

2011-12-15T06:58:00.001-08:00

Having no Zumba yesterday, due to a meeting held at the school, I had a nice mid-week night off. My friend Russ had tickets to a Darlene Love concert at The Flynn and thanks to my sister's babysitting generosity, we spent part of the afternoon beforehand doing Christmasy things, and I feel far less bah-humbug than I did a few days ago. Strange that a weekend away from my kids feels like way too long, but an evening out feels just right, now and then.

Anyway, we went to Paine's Tree Farm where Russ had tagged FOUR different trees, weeks ago, and wanted a second opinion. An hour, and a bunch of chainsaw smoke later, (You know it's Vermont when the guys at the tree farm just hand you a chainsaw and the keys to a tractor, and tell you to knock yourself out) we had the wagon filled with a magnificent fifteen footer for the lucky duck who has high ceilings, and a sweet, little tree for his mom's apartment.

After some death defying antics involving ladders and hammers and Christmas lights (seriously, I could hardly watch, good Lord) we headed to the concert, which was phenomenal. Darlene Love. Wow. That lady is all sorts of joy and happiness and holiday goodness rolled into one powerful voice. Odd that I didn't really know who she was exactly, had only vaguely heard of her, but then, when she started to sing, I knew every one of her songs by heart, and so would you.

After a festive night out, (AND I got to wear my awful, bright red, patent boots and snowflake earrings. What? People are ALLOWED to dress tacky during the holiday season.) I'm back in the Christmas Spirit. Helps that my cold has flown the coop, even though Eli seems to have woken up with it now. Attempting to address a stack of cards today, but my address book has gone missing...filling them out anyway. They'll be late...you can count on it. (Just sayin'.) And doing some wrapping. Of course I'm only half done shopping, which may become a problem before too long, since there are mere days left. And the kids are on vacation as of today. Egads. Time is running out! Harried or not, I love Christmas. Sometimes I just forget it for a minute.

Christmas Countdown

2011-12-13T06:24:00.000-08:00

Having a rough week so far. Christmas Panic setting in. Still trying to keep up with all the proper traditions but it's hard to feel super excited this year. It would be a good winter to experiment with human hibernation...wouldn't mind sleeping through the whole shebang, and thawing back out in May. No, I'm just in a slump today. I've always been really into Christmas. I love Vermont and how beautiful and stark this season is. Simply hard to remember all that when my bare feet hit the icy floor at 6AM in a house that's 52 degrees, and I've got to somehow entice two little boys out from under their covers in time for school. It was Justin's weekend with the kids and it was the longest I've ever been away from them in my life. Even though I went with them to visit Santa on Saturday, which broke it up some, I still felt restless and worried the rest of the weekend, missing my bubs. Funny in a way, because I looked so forward to a break all week, and then I was homesick for them the whole time. Went to a wonderful dinner party and saw some lovely art, met interesting people, but...my mind was on my babies, not Napoleonic upholstery, or goat cheese and pomegranates, or debating what the Mandarin word for school bus translates as. That sounds totally snobby of me....or ANTI-snobby, which, really, is just as bad, sorry. I was in a pretty intolerant mood already, and then I also had a cold, which made me feel like a sniffling, snot-dripping piece of white trash...not a great combo, in Emily Land. When gushing women in Jimmy Choos say "And what do YOU do?" I want to say "Oh, I teach Zumba and spread pestilence." If only I was missing a front tooth, I could pull it off no problem. Well, anyway, I've got the carols blaring today, I'll feel better in no time. Just a few Rum Pa Pums later and I'm a new person already.

Rue The Day

2011-12-08T10:16:00.000-08:00

Ira, Ira, Ira. My posts include a lot of that kid. "Where was I?" Poor Eli will someday ask when the stories are recalled. "At school" or "Behaving yourself" will be my reply.

A conflict in babysitting left me taking the kids to work with me a couple of nights ago. Eli angelically sat down with some books and a sketch pad and a sandwich. Ira looked at a book for 30 seconds before flinging it aside in disgust, and moving on to other mischief, the devilish gleam in his eye bright enough that even my back row Zumba ladies probably feared for their lives. Rightly so.

First he tried to muffle the speakers by covering them with coats. Next he pressed his ear against them, giving himself some big-time hearing damage, I'm sure. I lugged him away by pulling on his ankles, mid-step in my booty shakin', and sliding him across the floor on his belly back to his little nest of books and snacks.... but, of course, the laughter from the audience egged him into repeating this performance as many times as he could, until I gave up on his hearing all together.

Next came the inevitable every-four-minute bathroom trips, on which Eli patiently accompanied him and zipped his pants back up, until eventually Eli came racing back with a well-known harried look on his face, and the news that Ira had locked all the stall doors and crawled out underneath. Whoops. Sorry janitors.

And THEN, the Bouncy Ball Incident. From the bottom of the snack bag appeared two miserable bouncy balls that found their way under the feet of my dancers time and time again. Not to mention the fact that Mary fell to the floor in a heap at one point because she rolled her ankle stepping on a miniature pretzel rod.

We finally left the gym with the alarm on the soda machine beeping, unidentified red goo all over our pants, and my water bottle still full to the brim, because normally between songs, I gulp it down instead of dragging children back from climbing inside lockers, stopping them from putting their thumbs over the drinking fountain stream, or chasing wayward bouncy balls.

Yesterday, thinking I had recovered, I decided Ira and I would do some Christmas shopping. Ira gets carsick, but usually only on long rides, one would think we could make it seven measly miles. We had just walked into Welch's Hardware Store when he threw up all over the Christmas aisle. Twice. Ira, myself, the floor, several velvet tree skirts, and one unfortunate saleslady will never be the same again.

Oh Lordy. Was I just saying what an awesome mother I am? I don't take that back exactly, just let me rephrase it...I'm a utter wreck, but if there's anyone out there with a four year old, they understand what I'm saying, and they're a wreck too. You can recognize mothers of four year boys by their familiar hunted expressions, their uncombed hair, sticky substances smeared on their clothes, pockets filled with repossessed sticks, rocks, clothespins, rubber bands, and really, really loud, annoying whistles. The Terrible Twos are a myth. A MYTH, I tell you. With Eli, it was the Frightful Fours, and hopefully I can live through it one more time. Fingers crossed. Keeping a sharp look out for pretzels and other hazards along the way.

The Eye of the Beholder

2011-11-21T11:16:00.000-08:00

Driving through Bethel a couple days ago, on the way back from getting groceries, Ira was chatting away as usual. He was oddly quiet for a minute before asking, out of the blue, "Mom, are you beautiful?" Without thinking, I snorted and said "Nope, definitely not." Then I felt bad because, well, why DON'T I think I'm pretty? Because my nose is big and my breasts are small? Because my hair doesn't match my eyebrows? Because I had two babies and show it? Because I don't look like those glamorous women that I'm told are gorgeous by magazines and movies? I guess so. But do I like that weird idea? No, of course not, it's sick...but here I am, accidentally passing it on to the next generation.

Damage control time. "Actually Ira, everybody's beautiful. Momma's just grouchy lately. You are very, very beautiful and you came from me and Daddy, so we must be beautiful too." (Best I could do on short notice. In Bethel.)

Made me think about it though, the reason the whole wide world goes along with this dumb theory of what is and isn't beautiful, is because... we JUST GO ALONG WITH IT. Duh. Let's not. It's quite simple. But apparently, with the way I feel about myself, I'm sadly one of the worst offenders.

See, I have a hideous self-esteem problem. Always have. Don't really know why, and lately, with the pressure NOT TO FAIL coming from so many angles, this problem has manifested into something very tricky. (And no, this isn't a passive aggressive way to get people to tell me how great I am. Of course I'm great, and blah, blah, blah, we're ALL great, that's not the point. The point is: I need NOT to need other people thinking that, I need to think I'm great all by myself.) For some reason, I have forever felt inferior in looks, talents and intelligence to everyone else...not sure if it's because I'm ultra sensitive to the fact that I didn't go to traditional college, that I don't have a successful career, that I grew up too poor to have the glossy hair, perfect teeth and trendy clothes others had, that I got picked on a lot when I first started public school in those crucial teenage years, maybe the fact that Justin was always the genius and I was always the idiot, or maybe because pride in one's self is sometimes treated as acting "too big fer yer britches" around here...whatever it was, I don't want my kids growing up crippled in the same way, always needing someone ELSE to tell them they're worth it. I'm working on my self confidence, trying to move away from that ridiculous need for pre-approval from others before I believe in myself. Because if I hang around waiting for it forever, well, maybe it ain't ever coming.

Example: when somebody disapproves of something I do, something I wear, something I say,(which is often, given we are talking about ME here) my first reaction is that they are right and I am wrong. I don't trust my own instincts about a situation. If a person is upset with me, I am instantly crushed and wonder what I did wrong...it would never have occurred to me in the past to say "Screw you". Or to not exactly say "screw you", but be confident enough in myself to know that it's not ALWAYS my fault. Stick to my guns, so to speak. Instead of letting the world know I'm an easy target because I'll back down apologetically in any case.

Jen and I used to pick on Myra for catching her as a very little girl, looking in the steamy mirror after a bath, batting her cute eyelashes at herself, and quoting a cosmetics commercial from the time..."Don't hate me because I'm beautiful." Well, she was. And I was always rather jealous of both her beauty and her confidence to know it. I mean, it sure didn't hurt her to hear people say how adorable she was every minute, and perhaps it DID hurt me to hear boys say in high school that I wasn't pretty like my sister. But knowing is half the battle. She KNEW she was pretty, therefore, she WAS pretty. Lesson to be learned, right there.

Going through this split, and the anger-talk that goes with it, has been one of the biggest blows ever to my shaky self-esteem. To hear people on the "other side" are criticizing my choices, and me in general, is a rotten feeling, especially to someone who's always felt rather swayed by other's opinions. Constantly made me second guess myself. I hope that I'm finally becoming smart enough to know that no matter how bullied I may feel, I'm not doing anything wrong. I'm NOT crazy/stupid/morally unsound. I've got bigger things to worry about than opinions fueled by anger, not fact. Public opinion can go hang for once. I'm in a tough situation, doing the best I can. Look at my beautiful boys, I must be doing something right. And for the record, I'm a damn AWESOME mother, even if I'm not pretty. So there.

Portraits

2011-11-16T13:39:00.000-08:00

Working a lot in the last few days, it's the Christmas season portrait rush...just thought I'd post a few shots.

Shearing

2011-11-11T16:30:00.000-08:00

Went up to Unadilla on Friday to watch sheep shearing...they shear late in the fall to make lambing season easier. Apparently the lambs can nurse better if the wool isn't so thick by spring. Poor, little, bald sheep were wandering around in snowflakes by the time afternoon rolled around, but they have a cozy barn to get out of the weather, so they'll be fine. The boys were fascinated, Eli especially, with the process. The machines and tools and technique, the funny, elfin, wool booties the professional shearers wear. Ira, in true Ira fashion, was just into the sheep. I've never really seen it done before, which struck me as strange...you'd have thought I'd have seen it at the Barreda's or someplace else, we know so many people with sheep, but nope, I haven't. Such an art to it. I found it lovely to watch, the way the wool peeled back perfectly, stroke after stroke, leaving shimmering, uniform stripes on the sheep's bodies. Reminded me of some graceful dance...the shearers even stretched and did yoga poses beforehand. In filthy work clothes. Very interesting, all of it. Would love to try it sometime.

Anyhow, today's a busy one. Sunday is obviously NOT the day of rest at my house, darn it. I wish. I'm writing in between four portrait sessions, and after they finish, I'm watching Av in exchange for Jen watching the boys right now, so she can do a massage, then scheduled to clean the school this evening, so it's a long day, work-wise. Helped John with a dinner party last night that went super late, all neat, fun people and I enjoyed it very much, but I'm feeling pretty exhausted at the moment. Wondering when I'm going to find my groove. Will I ever? IS there even a groove to find for someone in my situation? My brain repeats "WhatamIforgetting?WhatamIforgetting?WhatamIforgetting?" all day long, every day. Starting to get rather nerveracking. I keep telling myself: "Let it go." "One day at a time." "Breathe." and "You're going to be OK." My calming mantras. Hoping that helps a tiny bit at least. One of the women at dinner last night, Sidney, talked to me at length about her divorce and it was one of the hardest talks I've had yet, somehow. I've only meet her once or twice before, and here she was, crying, and so was I, and it was just sad and awkward and nice and awful. It was uncomfortable since she was a virtual stranger, and oddly comfortable for that very same reason. She had no judgements about us already. Huh. I don't know why I wrote about that. Just kinda tired and writing whatever pops into my head, I guess.

Well, that's all folks. Off I go to grin and shout "Say cheese!" for another hour. Over and out.

Beautiful Day

2011-11-07T07:44:00.001-08:00

It's been a couple week's worth of awful. Seriously, I don't know why things always seem to happen at once, but anything that could break, go wrong, or turn up missing around here did. I won't even attempt to list all the random are-you-KIDDING-me? stuff that happened, but yesterday I decided to try and take some nice Christmas pictures of the boys and it was actually a lovely day for once. We went up to Landgoes for lunch, because it's so pretty for photos, had a delicious dinner at Myra and Jim's, and then saw a funny, old, Buster Keaton silent movie at The Hop. A good day. I hope good days start to be the rule rather than the exception.

Trick or Treat

2011-11-01T09:06:00.001-07:00

Eli insisted on cramming himself into his robot costume from a couple years ago, and Ira changed his mind ten minutes before we left the house, from turtle to pirate.

Poverty + Divorce = An Ugly Halloween Tale.

2011-10-24T08:29:00.000-07:00

That's what it feels like most of the time. Here's what I've got to do today for my sanity: write about the nitty-gritty hell that accompanies a split after 16 years. Especially if the people involved are poor. This entry goes against my general rule about not saying anything unless it's nice, this entry goes against my Don't-Sink-Down-Into-Misery policy, but I find lately, I'm only writing after a rare day off, when I feel halfway refreshed and hopeful, so...I'm giving you an incorrect representation of myself. I'm sorta disgusted that my most recent posts are about cute farms, fuzzy sheep, and blissful road trips, and, you know, chirpy little la-la-la entries. Out and about! Look at me!...Moving on! And that's not really the case. Makes me sound like I'm super excited to be headed forward into a fresh start...but I'm not. Things ain't peachy. I'm sad about what happened here, and I'm afraid. Afraid, afraid.

Understand though, I can't, in good conscience, ALWAYS be writing just of the stuff that goes on between those once-in-a-while great moments because the words would be UGLY. I don't want to write them often, I don't want you to have to read them often. I'm ashamed to let people know what happens on a day-to-day basis. Because I'll tell you what it is: it's fights, it's purposeful hurting, it's money and responsibility and the arguments concerning selling off our life, basically. Goodbye beach cabin, goodbye house, goodbye ponies, goodbye boat, goodbye painting over our bed, goodbye everything nice in the life we made together. Start over from scratch. The most horrible thing about the "fresh start" is the fact that I'll actually start from nothing. Truly from scratch. Half of everything is not very much. Especially after what we owe is paid off. And Lord, I'm exhausted just thinking about starting over, since I haven't got the skills to do anything with my "half" anyway. I can't buy a hunk of land and build a house, I could only buy one...only there's not NEARLY enough money for that. I can't even get a loan because our credit is completely shot.

Am I doomed to tuck my tail between my legs and run back to my parents, babies in tow, at 34 freaking years old? Pride is a hard thing to reckon with. It frustrates me to know that I'm not able to stand on my own two feet when I want to SO badly. I need my boys to see me as strong, I need them to know for sure they can count on ME, always to take good care of them. I don't want them to have to worry...not about themselves and certainly not about their mother. I desperately wish they could someday be able look back and say, "Wow, our mom was one tough cookie through all that." It comes back around to pride, again.

We had a horrendous fight last night, Justin and I. Over honesty. Over debt. Over the fact that we agreed he keep paying the bills and I keep raising the kids...as our full-time contributions to the situation, except for the fact that the bills are going unpaid. A man came yesterday, knocking on the door, to inform me, very rudely, that the mortgage was so far behind he needed to take photos of our house for foreclosure purposes. And I know that these people usually deal with nasty confrontations, but when I told him, with my mouth hanging open like an idiot, that I had no idea things had gotten this bad, he smirked disbelievingly and said "Yeah, that's what they ALL say, lady." I've never been so humiliated. And then, the same afternoon, I received a final shut-off notice for our electric service, gone unpaid for months, unbeknown to me. Compounded by the fact that there's no heat in the house yet, despite everyone else being toasty warm for a month already, at least, and school tuition is also unpaid...well, melt-down city for Emily.

In a way, I'm kicking myself for not working all these years instead of raising kids, since that's what people seem to think I ought to have done. But I can't really agree, because I KNOW my kids were better off this way. Daycare costs more than any income I could have gotten, it didn't make the least bit of sense for us to pay some stranger MORE than I could make, to watch our children. And I've always worked part-time doing dance, photography, writing for the paper...whatever, for extra money. Dang it, I TRIED to do my part. I thought I was. We just couldn't make ends meet.

I'm having a hard time being alone. I never was before, not ever. I watched a short film on-line yesterday called "How to be alone" Here, I'll try and paste the address in:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k7X7sZzSXYs

I'm having a doozy of a time with it. Doing all the household chores that used to be shared is huge too. I don't ever sleep until after midnight. I find myself on the phone a lot after the kids are in bed, just because I can't handle the quiet when I'm doing the dishes or laundry. The house seems too still, and like a museum to my old life. I feel uncomfortable facing it by myself, and saying, "Yup, it's just little ol' me now. I'M the one gonna be filling your furnace. I'm the one taking your trash to the dump. Problem is: I don't know really how to do all these things yet, so we're going to have a rocky ride, House, you and I." It's daunting, feeling scared of being alone. I'm also upset beyond words that I'm working crazy-hard here, doing much more than I ever did in the past, and yet, I'm going to lose it all anyway? How can that be?

Not to mention we live in a tiny town, what do you think the hot topic around the General Store's coffee machine is? When I shake it, leading a Zumba class, what do you suppose people are thinking? Are they judging? Why do I even care? Who the hell knows. I guess I care because this is MY town. And I'm stupidly sensitive about what people think. This is the same place where I've been on/in every committee/group there is. I've baked pies for town meeting, I've helped out with the summer reading program, I've donated all the proceeds of my dance shows to the food shelf, I've made cookies for art openings, volunteered for the after-school program, sang Christmas carols to shut-in, been the local correspondent for our paper, taught a zillion dance classes to kids for peanuts, been in the Historical Society as long as I can remember, raised money for the Grange. And I'm not saying any of this because I feel entitled to respect from my neighbors. I did these things because this town is important to me, I love this place, it's special, and I'm proud to be accepted here. But some people are still going to disapprove, and I'm just an ordinary floozy after all.

And let's add the money issue to things: I always knew, of course, that poor people had the shitty end of the stick, we've been basically poor all along anyway, but I never realized the true scorn and humiliation that comes along with ABSOLUTE poverty. I spent over three and a half hours, day before yesterday, on the phone with our insurance company trying to work out a tangle, and being made to feel like DIRT. We get Government funded health care now, and here's what I learned from them over the course of the afternoon: I am obviously an ignorant, uneducated, lazy person. I am without human feelings, I am a mooch on society. My own bad choices are to blame. (And boy-oh-boy, was I reminded of that to an extreme extent.) I got the impression over and over again that I ought to count myself lucky that anyone even cared about people like me, (They actually used the phrase "people like you" repeatedly) and how dare I complain or question what kind of service I deserved? Because as a lower class citizen, I deserved nothing, really.

Maybe I HAVE made some bad choices. Haven't we all? Maybe buying the boys ponies was a bad idea, I just so much wanted their lives to be happy. I didn't want them to feel like they were always wishing for what they could never have. Maybe I shouldn't have done a lot of things. Maybe I am uneducated. But I'm not lazy. Worn out, more like. Plus, I'm full to the brim with normal, human emotion, and my pride is smarting horribly through all this. I cringe every time I have to ask for help. If it was just me, I never would. I'd live under a bridge first. But my kids aren't. No way.

There. I just spent forever on the phone with Myra, sobbing about how tired and sad I am. Even if she is all: "Power through this! Don't waste time feeling sorry for yourself! Who cares what people think?!" I end up feeling like a pathetic scab just wallowing in self-pity, but it still helps to know that my family loves me and won't let me live under a bridge. It also helps to eat a half pan of brownies apparently. My Halloween costume this year? Still undecided between Corpse Bride, Streetwalker, Homeless Bum or White Trash Momma.

Unadilla Afternoon

2011-10-17T09:22:00.001-07:00

This week's day off spent at Ann and Bill's beautiful farm and community theatre. Trying to capture the very last of the color before the world goes black and white!

Indian Summer

2011-10-10T07:54:00.000-07:00

Glorious weekend. Warm and colorful. Since it was Justin's day with the boys on Sunday, John and I decided to take a tiny road trip and made up a ridiculous scavenger hunt to enjoy a day out. Our partial list (I forget some), from random, goofy suggestions:

1. Get a stranger to tell us a story.
2. Find our names on old gravestones.
3. Read three historic markers.
4. Pet a puppy.
5. Eat a Charleston Chew.
6. Buy a Christmas gift for someone.
7. Cross the Connecticut River
8. See a movie
9. Go to a used bookstore.
10. Hijack a plane. (Optional)

We ended up adding a few other things along the way...took a detour to Lake Groton and had lunch with Matty, climbed Owl's Head with a bizarre assortment of tourists, and had an accidental three hour dinner at a crazy Italian restaurant, where we almost started waiting on tables ourselves, so harried were the waitstaff. It was a much needed and fun break from a stressful week, I laughed a lot and almost felt human again by the end. Thank God for friends.

Life, As We Know It.

2011-10-10T06:14:00.000-07:00

I'm frazzled. So frazzled that a perfect stranger took one look at me a couple days ago and said "You OK, Hon?" I guess spending every day being worried about the kids and our future, shows on my face, plain as day. I'm trying to walk a fine line between obsessively monitoring their behavior, and letting them work things out as they need to. And either way is wrong...being in the middle is wrong too. Apparently, there is no magic way to bring them, and myself, through this, unscathed.

At the Shelburne museum last weekend, Myra and Jana remarked, "Geez, if we ever get separated from you guys, we'll be able to track you down by just listening for Emily calling: "Come here!" "Don't touch that!" "Hold my hand! "Don't run!".....Relax, Emily." Basically saying I should lay off. But when I tried to loosen up a little, we had several incidents, including one where Eli grabbed a handful of a valuable costume's skirt with a muddy hand, making an armed guard very unhappy, and Ira tried to slide down a mahogany spiral staircase, three stories up.

I feel...hypersensitive to everything. I feel like people are judging me, and judging my kids. And judging me BY my kids. If ever was the time to be a perfect parent, it's now, when they are going through such changes. And yet I feel like I'm failing them. I'm making mistakes left and right. I'm not used to dealing with things alone, I get so tired and feel like I'm being a terrible nag. But since THEY are feeling pretty emotionally unstable too, when I don't carefully watch and react every second, they do things that are unacceptable or unsafe, because of course they're testing these new boundaries and trying to understand things.

I'm trying to do special things all the time with them, letting them know I love them and that Dad loves them, everybody loves them...but still, I understand they are angry and scared. The tricky part is: I'm angry and scared too. I'm setting up counseling for the kids and I, which I hope will help us deal with each other the right way. I can't figure out if I should be a little more lenient of Eli's wild fits of defiance, or be as consistent as possible through this. Either way, I'm exhausted.

John has been an amazing help. I'm very thankful to have him in our life, although it's a complication that obviously adds more anger and awkwardness in certain areas. Sometimes I feel like Justin and I could be in better agreement with our parenting if there were no other people in our lives, because we tend to feel so hurt by each other, it's hard to think straight. Needless to say, Justin does not approve of John, and the more John helps me with the kids, the more Justin disapproves. But as I said before, I'm not used to dealing with things alone, I get completely flustered in public, there's two very confused little boys, testing me every moment. John has been there for us, helping me take the them places, watching one, while I take the other one to the bathroom, keeping one from breaking something while I chase the other, holding ladders while we pick apples, helping impatient seven year olds set up tents, and sharing the occasional cup of tea with me in the evening, while I cry about what a lousy job I'm doing. It can't be fun for him. I honestly don't think I'd be a good enough person to date somebody with kids if I didn't have any myself. It's a pretty unfair deal, because you never get to come first. Never get somebody's full attention, and are forced in the position of having to take on loads of parenting responsibilities, but always required to yield completely to the actual parent's opinions/rules/rights. I know it's selfish of me to think that way, but God, it must be hard. You'd have to have the patience of a Saint. Plus, in that situation, you've got potentially upset children, not to mention their upset, newly single parent, all damaged and gun-shy about relationships.

So, that's where I am at the moment. Happy and sad. Thankful and guilty. Tired and confused. Optimistic, yet battling depression. Overwhelmed. A fresh page in a brand new, blank book, without an idea in my head of where to start writing, but somehow it must be a sequel to the last book...I need to include all the characters I love, but continue their stories in a whole, new way. And add things that I know nothing of yet. It's scary, but I'll try my best. I just hope it's worth reading.

Once Upon A Time

2011-09-24T18:56:00.000-07:00

Working on Antique Hill at the Tunbridge Fair last week was enlightening in ways it hasn't been before. I haven't heard what the official numbers were yet, but it doesn't take a mathematician to know that it was a slow year. What with rainy, cold weather dampening a couple of the fair days, and the recent flooding and all, not that many folks were in a fair mood, I guess. I was only asked, by a chuckling tourist, if I "was the real Schoolmarm in 1905" a small handful of times. That's my scientific calculation on the number of fair goers right there.

On account of an attack a few years ago, we're required to work the schoolhouse in pairs now, especially at night. The buddy system seems like a good idea, both because the building is set apart from the rest of the museum and because, when it's not busy, you get pretty lonely. I was fortunate to be scheduled with four dear friends over the course of the fair, and I had the absolute best time with each of them in different ways.

In between visitors, we all had these amazing heart-to-heart talks, leaving me feeling like a blessed person to have the people in my life that I have. Something about that little, red schoolhouse invites openness and honesty, it's such a cheerful, serene, no frills place. Very special. It could double as a therapist's office if you ask me. Had I more time tonight, I'd tell you all the stories and love that came pouring out of my wonderful friends in this place last week, but for now, I'll just settle for telling you about my pow wow with Euclid.

Euclid Farnham is our town historian, a handsome, mustached, elegant farmer in his late 70's that embodies all the common sense and class a true Vermonter should. He moderates our town meetings, plays Santa Claus every December, gives slide shows at the local schools, heads up church events, library events, town-wide events, he was the president of the fair for 31 years, a retired dairy farmer, brilliant speaker, writer, just an all-around first class human being. Talking to him is a joy and I'm proud to count him among my good friends.

While Marsha, Louise, and my conversations ran more along the lines of sniffy, tear-filled purging on the subjects of love, life, divorce, children, friendships, relationships, and uh, clothes, (What? We all like them!) and Ben's was four hours of a welcome, lighthearted, clowning distraction, a never ending continual joke and fun time, Euclid's stint in the schoolhouse, Sunday afternoon, left me with a lot of thoughts on how people have changed throughout history. We spoke in depth on the topic of "The more things change, the more they stay the same" and if we believe that or not, in the course of human emotional evolution.

Long ago, when people married, maybe it was for love, maybe it wasn't. Either way, people didn't seem to feel the same entitlement to happiness and success. Now, we come into this modern life thinking "I deserve to be happy. I deserve this and this and this..." According to old journals, people didn't actually seem all that miserable with their difficult lives, their loveless marriages, their hardships and grief. It was just a matter of fact. You get up and get on with your day. There WAS joy, equal to our own. Euclid told me a story about a young woman who died in her mid-forties, and on her gravestone, her face was crudely etched, surrounded by the faces of THIRTEEN children she had born and lost. THIRTEEN. Dead. Either at birth or in early childhood. And yet she somehow kept going, her farm, her life, she JUST KEPT GOING. Were people stuffing their emotions way down deep and suffering in silence, or was it just a fact of life, so completely accepted as the way it was? Did these mothers feel too depressed to function? Apparently not. But WHY not? Can we have evolved that much over the course of a hundred years? Has our idea of happiness changed so drastically? Happiness used to be a hot meal, a warm bed, a cow in the barn, living children. Now it's this idea of getting what we want, not just what we need, but what we WANT as well. And we want the moon.

I'm not joking. We want the damn MOON. Think about it, materialistically and emotionally, we want it all...the perfect home and impressive cars and STUFF galore, health and wealth, satisfying jobs, stimulating travel, well rounded children, intelligent friends, Martha Stewart Christmas's, and a partner who loves us, respects us, reads our minds, is attractive, babies us (not too much, just enough) takes care of us (while admitting that we are perfectly capable of taking care of ourselves and everybody else) is 100 percent sexually compatible, loyal, says all the right things, is a certain height, weight, makes grand romantic gestures, likes the same movies and so forth. Just when did this happen? Not that I think it's bad or anything...I'm certainly not saying we should go back to a time when women were possessions, and happiness was not even a consideration when choosing a mate, but it's just interesting is all. And interesting to think that when hardship befalls us, we don't instantly pick up the pieces and keep on, but instead we stop our whole lives to grieve, to work through it, to get help, to talk, to feel, to purge.

At what point did feelings outweigh practicality? When did they take the top billing in our lives? Are we handicapped by the massive myriad of choices available to us, or are we lucky? Reviewing my own sadly failed marriage, dissolved from nothing else but feelings, I know without a question that one hundred years ago, I would be still be certainly happily married, And I'm not even kidding about the happy part. Because back then, 'happy enough' was all the happy you were gonna get. And you accepted it.

Is that terrible? Euclid and I discussed the horror of being one of those 1880's, poor, farm women, burdened by toil and baby after baby, but literature tells us that they, for the most part, were "happy" people, or at least as happy as we consider ourselves to be. Now, we've invented new unhappiness to take the place of the old. It's such a mysterious thing...on one hand, we should be counting our lucky stars that we have the freedoms and options we have, and yet we never stop wanting more. (Sorry Feminists, I'm on your side, but I'm just playing devil's advocate for the sake of this blog and my curiosity at the moment. And anyway, I'm not meaning to slant this towards women, ALL people were in a similar position, happiness wise. Men were just as trapped in many ways.)

Neither Euclid or I could make out which idea was better, maybe it seems obvious to others, but honestly, I can't say for sure. It's difficult and heartbreaking to make decisions, I, personally, never know if I'm making the right one...is it better to have the decision made for you? Or is it unacceptable to be stuck in a just-make-the-best-of-it situation..."Life's hard, and then you die?" Is that how it should be? Now or then? It's all hypothetical anyway, we ARE living in the now. But I just spent several days imagining myself living back then, and let me tell you, it makes for some deep, dark questions on who I am, and how I really would have been, once upon a time...

It's a different world, that's for sure. For better or worse, they don't make 'em like they used to.

Avry-isms

2011-09-20T12:47:00.000-07:00

Doing the straps on their car seats this afternoon, Ira asked Avry, "Do you still have to be buckled up too?" Avry said, disgusted, "Of course. EVERYBODY has to be buckled, 'cept for people who are dogs, 'cause nobody cares if dogs go dead."

And on the way home I decided to stop and get the kids an ice cream since they'll pull the plug on the creamee machine any day now, and Avry rapturously announced, "I LOVE the cone SO much, I wish I could have it without any ice cream in it, but I want the ice cream because that's my favorite part!" Well, OK then.

Falling

2011-09-20T09:15:00.000-07:00

Ira put his hands on his hips this morning and, looking up at the sky, shouted: "God, throw down some snow! I wanna roller skate." I'd like to retract his plea, if it's all the same to you, God. You can hold off on the snow for a good, long time still.

The Fair's over, which means it's officially Fall...leaves are turning, air's crisp...I like Fall, like the way it smells and feels. Wouldn't mind it lasting well into rollerskating season.

Here are a few shots from this year's fair...I didn't feel much like taking a zillion pictures, it was a looooooooong four days. Mostly wonderful, as always, just tiring.

My dance group's performance was a bust, not my dancer's fault, the sound system crapped out, but luckily it was a wet, cold night and only a small handful of folks had to watch the disaster that was our show. We did the best we could, and I'm proud of everybody for pulling it off when we couldn't tell what the heck song was coming out of the speakers. Ah well, better luck next time.

Antique Hill was fun and amusing, the way I expected it to be, heard lots of stories from old-timers, plenty of "I think children should still recite the Pledge Of Allegiance" and "It was better when kids got smacked for giving the teacher any lip" and "We said the 23rd Psalm every morning."

The boys got pretty exhausted this weekend, so very grateful to our super nannies for their patience. And now here we are: Fall. Extra quilts coming out, no heat yet and it's already frigid in here most mornings. Gotta get cracking. I thought we could hold out until October before needing the furnace, but maybe not. Hey God? Instead of answering Ira's prayer for snow, can you just throw down a few cords of wood? Please and thank you and Amen.

9-11

2011-09-13T07:47:00.000-07:00

I was eating dinner with my friend Rusty the other night when he said, "I know it's a cliche' today and all, but DO you remember where you where when you heard the World Trade Center was hit?" I do, and it was the day my photo studio officially opened for business. Written right on all my tax info and all. I had a full eight hours of portraits booked, and the first one had just arrived. The radio was set to some classical station, I'd just placed two toddler sisters, in their matching vintage dresses, on a miniature park bench, and their mother was waving and hopping and whistling behind me. A symphony cut out to an announcement that was already half over, but we got the drift. A plane had just hit the first tower, something was happening to the Pentagon, then another plane...mass confusion, bedlam... The girl's mother just walked out my door and got in her car, either to listen to her own radio, use her phone, or just be alone a moment, I'm not sure. I was stuck inside with two kids who were happily hitting each other with a sock monkey and giggling, spilling a bottle of bubbles kept on hand for catching their attention. I have no idea what I was feeling. Isn't that crazy? No idea. The rest of the day's customers were no-shows. I remember my parents saying something along the lines of "We should all go hole up at camp until the world ends". And arguing about whether or not to pick up Myra from college.

But you know what? The birds were still singing. Those small sisters were still blowing bubbles and laughing. And all around us the world was falling. ENDING. Some people go around thinking that every day of their lives. Not everyone though. Is it wrong to blow bubbles and sing? I don't think so. See, I decided perhaps the birds and kids have the right idea. Of course, I feel horrified, absolutely horrified, about what happened. The pictures of people jumping from windows, and falling to a more preferable death than what awaited inside, make me sick. I can hardly type those words, in fact. But still...

Since I'm on an anti-political kick at the moment...I won't say what I think about the whole deal. I know that sounds shitty, but I'm tired of being angry or scared or helpless/hopeless feeling. Politics may be the single biggest factor in some people's depression issues. I'm needing to focus on up-close things right now. I'm needing to focus on the good, amazing, beautiful things in every single day. My children, my home, my friends and family, the sunset, jokes, happiness. Politics don't exactly lend themselves to positive thinking. So, I'm ignoring most of it. I know that ignorance is NOT bliss, I've said that before, but give me a break Tax Cuts, Budget Deficit and Oil Crisis. I'm just going to try to be a decent human being for a bit, keep on keeping on, and pretend I've never heard of you. My recycling will still get sorted, my groceries still organic, I will still disapprove of war, but for God's sake, turn on the angry political ranting, the conspiracy theories, the debate about which president sucked more...and I'll politely tune you out. It's not because I don't care, or don't have an opinion, it's because I need to. No offense to those of you that sink your energy into making changes and do so much, I'm proud of you. I understand your drive and anger perfectly. It's just my time to step back...if I dwell any longer, well, it won't be pretty.

That being said, I'm wondering how on earth I'm going to pay for my recent trip to the ER with a simple sprained ankle, and where the money for this winter's heat is coming from. I could get super furious at a system that's made to eliminate the lower class, but life is hard enough without being ticked off at the Whys and Whats of the situation. Not to mention short. Life is dang SHORT. (That tiny girl, up above? She's a teenager now, nearly six feet tall. All grown up. Only yesterday she was smacking her hysterical, chuckling baby sister with a sock monkey while the Twin Towers collapsed.) So, that's the scoop. I'm sorry if I sound like a bimbo, or irreverent about sensitive subjects, but it's the only way my head can rest. If I get back on the political bandwagon, you'll be the first to hear it. For now, please pass the bubbles.

It's A Small World After All

2011-09-13T07:15:00.001-07:00

So, you know when you just learn something and then it coincidentally pops up immediately? Like people tell you a fascinating new fact about gorillas and then boom! ...You drive right by Gorilla Street the very next moment. (OK, that made no sense, but you get what I mean, right?)...Is there a word for this phenomenon? Knowledge + Coincidence = What? This has been happening daily to me lately, and it's awfully strange. But fun.

I've started dating John. You might know him. You might not. Anyway, he seems to be the king of this weird phenomenon. A magnet for it. One example: My sis-in-law Tamera, and her husband Sean, just moved into this darling house in Plainfield VT, (making the long trek from San Fransisco in a cramped uhaul with two cats running wild in the cab with them) which is awesome, very glad to have them less than an hour away, the kids are in ecstasies. Anyway, I was describing their cute, brick house to John...then the next day, he tells his mother about it (she lives one town over, in Marshfield) and it turns out that her partner used to own it, and once threw a naked man who was sleeping with his ex-wife down the stairs in that very house...some coincidence, huh? And also it turns out John's mom's next door neighbor is my cousin Tim, who was at their place the other night when they happened to mention their son was dating me...apparently THAT was a funny scene. If you want to use the word 'funny' to encompass all manners of awkwardness.

Another goofy coincidence happened this week, I was in the Hanover Co-Op, when I noticed all these mylar baloons on the floor in the corner. Upon closer inspection, I saw they were shaped like animals with dangling cardboard feet and leashes, and were miraculously floating just a few inches off the floor. Some brilliant mastermind figured out all the details so you can actually walk an inflatable pug dog and have it follow right behind you, bobbing along completely realistically. (I was really into these, as you can probably tell.) I led one up and down a few aisles, other shoppers giving me the wow-now-she's-a-piece-of-work-whatta-freak eyeball before I decided I had no real need for an eleven dollar balloon shaped like a pug dog. Next day, a friend shows me a video saved on his phone of his son trying to pop an INFLATABLE MYLAR PUG DOG.

Is any of this important or meaningful? No. Just curious. And I like silly parallel occurences.

Yeah, my life, which is on an uncharted course at the moment, unsure and all very new and foreign, is suddenly filled with many, many chance happenings, deja vu, coincidence after coincidence, seemimgly random encounters with the very same person you were just speaking of, odd moments of supernatural connections...rather interesting, to say the least. Such a small world. Once you actually pick your head up and look around anyway. Maybe I haven't done that for a while.

What's that game? Five Degrees Of Separation? Where you can connect any two people in no more than five steps? Here in Vt, I feel like you can cut it down to TWO degrees of separation. And throw in a few gorillas, naked men, shocked cousins, and helium-bloated pug dogs for good measure.

Some Pics From The Last Couple Weeks...My Studio & The Birthday Boys

2011-09-01T12:24:00.000-07:00

Fair

2011-08-30T04:48:00.001-07:00

Things are pretty sad at our house at the moment...unstable, ugly, hard. Not referring to the recent Hurricane Irene, but a personal storm, also of epic proportions. Justin and I wrote a blog post explaining all this separation business months ago, but then I was shamed into not posting it because it was "too private"...I still feel like I want to tell you the whole story because it is so unlike me to NOT, only it'll have to be much later, after some more of the rawness wears off, I guess. I'm sorry. And I'm sorry for hiding it for so long. What seemed like a good idea once does not seem terribly smart now. Everyone is freshly shocked even though it's old news to us. People are offering sympathy, lectures, advice... which makes it feel like it just happened all over again. Reopens the sore spots that might have healed. But then, hindsight is 20/20 and all. Yeah, I'll say.

Tunbridge has also been battered severely by the actual hurricane, giving me even more of a sense of disbelief and a surreal outlook on everything today. I have a hard time wrapping my head around change. Yet change has happened so drastically since early winter that I feel nearly autistic in my emotional blankness some days. Almost like stone inside, and immune to it all. Defense mechanism, I guess. But other times, I can barely breathe. I cry about the stupidest things. For now, I'll push that down deep again, because that's how I cope. I can't walk around being a basket case in front of my kids. Smile and dance, that's what I'll keep doing. It feels fake plenty of the time, but it has to happen. Fake it 'til you make it, baby. Yes, I know it's not healthy to repress, and I need to talk. I am. But I can't do that every minute or I'll go insane. Sometimes I have to pretend it's all normal. Writing helps the most, and I've done plenty of that. Don't worry, I'm OK. Seriously. I'm not the first person this has happened to. I'll live. For now, let me write of something lighter, something happy. My home life weighs in at 'Fair'...... not 'Good', certainly not 'Excellent' but also not 'Poor', so have no fear. We'll weather this storm, and be better people for it someday. Well, here you go...on the topic of 'Fair', my thoughts on the upcoming annual event I enjoy so much:

When Fall rolls around, I do what I've done every year for the last 16? 17? years, (I need to figure that out at some point)...I work in the antique museum featured at the Tunbridge Fair. Our Fair is really quite famous actually, known as "The World's Fair" after a well-known politician likened it to the one in Chicago, probably as a joke? But anyhow, the name stuck. It's a delightful mix of modern day carnival and traditional county fair. Award winning cattle, needle point, pies, giant, creepy, misshapen veggies on display after you walk through the brightly lit midway hawking Justin Bieber posters. Sometimes I find the contrast sort of jarring, mostly I like it. It's unique, that's for sure. Maple milkshakes and electric blue sno-cones go hand in hand.

Some years though, I never even leave Antique Hill, because to me, that IS the fair. What I think of as the best part anyway. A whole, tiny village perched on the knoll above the grandstand and the tilt-a-whirl. A turn-of-the-century one-room schoolhouse, blacksmith's shop, printing press, post office, general store, colonial kitchen, Civil War encampment, cider mill. Weavers, rug hookers, old-time fiddlers spread across the yards between buildings and barns. The smells up there evoke primitive pictures...black powder, roast chicken, apples, musty books, woodsmoke... HISTORY, man, that's what it's all about. And History is my drug of choice. I'd snort it if I could.

I've held all sorts of positions over the years, sometimes changing costumes several times a day, moving from one time period to another. Dipping candles for hours on end in a sack dress and mob cap until I could see bubbling wax in my sleep for nights afterwards. Basting a chicken over an open fire while I kneel, bare foot on the warm, cinder-spotted, stone hearth. Wrestling myself into a corset and huge, feathered hat to tend the Post Office, counting change and stamping cards, (occasionally whacking my head on the antique telephone because my hat creates so many blind spots) All prim, and proper, and dainty, speaking of the three R's as the 1900's schoolmarm. Encased in a large white apron, stabbing at pickles floating in a giant, murky jar in the general store.

Can't decide which is my favorite. The school or store. Both feel right. Not only do I love dressing up and smiling at slightly frightened small children for 12 hours a day, but I've learned so much after all this time, not only about history, but about human nature in general. I've learned how to read people, body language, all of that. I'm not a terribly talented person in a lot of ways, but I've got this going for me. I can size up a person (MOST of the time...I've certainly been surprised a time or two) in an instant, owning, I believe to this particular job.

People are ultimately the same. There are several categories in this "sameness" but still, same they are. I can predict, often word for word, what certain types of folks will ask or comment about. And this skill has slowly grown to expand my awareness of people year round, not just during the Fair. It's handy. Handeeeeeee.

When I work in the kitchen, the questions and comments are the most predictable. You're middle aged men in loud Hawaiian shirts like to learn over the railing and say either "What's for dinner?" (To which I like to reply, "Whatever you kill and bring back to me.") or "When's dinner?" Other questions include: "Is that a real chicken/baby/potato?" "How long does it take that chicken/potato/baby (kidding on the baby part) to cook?" "Bet you girls are hot in here." "Bet you girls wish you had a microwave." (And I like to answer that one with, "What's a microwave?")

In the Schoolhouse every person over the age of say, forty, likes to remark, in a smug tone tone, "My grandmother went to a one-room schoolhouse." As I grin and affect an attitude of amazement, I wonder if it has ever occurred to them that nearly EVERYBODY'S grandmother went to a one room schoolhouse. Sweet elderly gentlemen will sit down at the scarred desks and look around for a moment before saying "If my teacher had been as gosh-durn purty as you, I'd never a graduated!" And I, of course, always feel flattered by this adorable geriatric flirting, and coyly threaten to get the paddle out of my desk if they don't behave. They usually shuffle out, still chuckling, while I pray the next batch of visitors didn't overhear our banter, so I can do it all over again in five minutes. "Where's the dunce cap?" they'll ask. "Bet you girls are cold in here."

These repetitious questions are both exhausting and comforting. Tiresome when I'm cranky because nobody has any idea that they aren't the only ones to ask them and you literally have to act like it's the wittiest, most original thing you've ever heard...a million times in a row. But also nice that all you need are a dozen stock answers and there's no need to really think, you can just lose yourself in the time period. And I do.

Why do I do it? Because I feel at home. In those places, in those clothes. Sometimes I feel a bit like the tourists are intruding into my world. My time. Of course I'm glad they are interested, and I'm quite willing to tell them anything they'd like to know, I WANT them to love history! But really, I mostly do it because it's where I belong. I'm homesick for 1900 all year long until that September week when I don my real clothes and lift my skirts clear of puddles while soldiers tip their caps to me.

Having my kids similarly able to ease into a bygone era, as if they were meant to be there, is wonderful too. Seeing other children in the historical setting really makes it seem REAL to the busloads of 2nd graders on field trips to the fair. History is no longer dry and uninteresting when real, live, little boys are gathering firewood for the evening meal and helping the blacksmith. Real, live, little girls are peeling potatoes and practicing sums on the chalkboard. Just as real as any today. All fighting or laughing, simply being kids. Having my family go back in time means more to me than I can say. To understand, appreciate and transition between centuries is an amazing gift. Switching gears and stepping into long ago comes as easy as a trip across the hall for us. History repeats itself, they say. So, we should be all set, whenever. And people are all the same, now, then, here, there.

September approaches, Fair time growing closer, (which really rates up there in the Excellent category) and we look forward to the past.

Block Of Ages, Cleft For Me

2011-07-13T19:36:00.000-07:00

We had lunch on the outdoor patio at Lui Lui's today, and the kid's were throwing bits of bread to these adorable, (fat) little birds that would come within inches of them. Ira said "Oh, maybe they're thirsty now..." Before I knew what he was doing, he'd sucked up a mouthful of water and spit it out all over the place. I had no idea he had such impressive spitting range, nor did I realize the sheer AMOUNT of water he could hold in those cheeks, but I got the distinct impression we were not very popular after that. The people closest to us...I think they thought he had projectile vomited and left swiftly. Other people just looked disturbed or disgusted, depending on whether or not they themselves had small children.

(I cut and pasted that last paragraph out of an e-mail to a friend, so excuse if you read this twice, friend...since I'm too lazy and writer-blocked to think up anything else at the moment. I'm having this issue where I can't think of what to write unless I'm writing it TO someone. Ya'll, in general don't count.)

Anyway, I keep just writing about the kids because A.) Um, they're my kids. B.) There's nothing else to write about. C.) Correction: there's SO much to write about, but everything in my head is about somebody or something that I shouldn't be sharing, I guess. Therefore, no writing fodder available at present. Dang, dang, double dang! I haven't the imagination lately to work around that stuff. So, blocked I am.

Summer, So Far.

2011-07-06T19:27:00.000-07:00

Trying to figure out what the heck we've been doing...a million things...busy every minute. I can't quite gather my thoughts to write anything interesting today. Life runs the gauntlet between good and bad. So, I'll give you pictures instead! Hope everyone is having an amazing summer so far!

Basement

2011-06-29T19:58:00.000-07:00

My Grampa Avery's birthday tonight. He's the best, my Gramps. I've never, in my whole life, walked out of his arms without him telling me he loved me. Sometimes even two or three times. In a word of arguments, grudges and misunderstandings, it's always been a loving, unconditional constant for me. I felt, growing up, and still, that in my grandparent's eyes, I could do no wrong. Not that they didn't scold or discipline us as children, but always, they loved us harder than one would think is even possible.

At Gram & Gramp's, I went downstairs at some point this evening, half to get a drink out of the 'fridge in the cellar, half to escape my mom...who chooses to believe that when dogs tussle under people's feet annoyingly, it's my fault, and snapped that I put them outside. (My own dog was at home, mind-you, but apparently since I own a dratted dog, I am responsible for all dog's displeasing behavior, world-wide. Or it was my fault because obviously my own dog taught these other dogs to be jerks in his long career of being a trainer of jerky dogs. Duh. For whatever reason, if it's dog-related, I usually get yelled at.) Anyhow, that wasn't the point...my being cranky. The point was the basement.

Ah, The Basement. Maybe this sound silly, but their basement is my favorite smell in the universe. I nearly hyperventilate when I'm down there because I'm trying to breathe as much of it in as possible. I've heard your sense of smell is the strongest sense, evoking forgotten memories, swaying your emotions powerfully, and I believe it. There are a lot of smells I love...Lilacs, hay fields, clean sheets, peaches, vanilla, fresh turned dirt, campfire smoke, Fall, but truly, nothing comes close to The Basement.

What makes this smell? If I could somehow recreate it, I would...let's see...it's a mix of perpetually damp floor, fresh wood-working projects, and potatoes in the root cellar. Aged canvas life jackets, turpentine, the wall of canned pickles. Laundry hanging over the washer, a huge chest freezer from 1960, home-made lawn chairs and a canoe. It's sixty years of kid's skis and bikes and sleds up on the ceiling. It's love.

The stairs leading down are so rickety, they rock back and forth like a suspension bridge when you descend, but I've never worried they will fall. I don't really think of them at all, because as soon as I start down, the smell overpowers me and I'm happy and safe.

The basement is about Popsicles and beloved antique tools, it's about learning to drive the ancient Cub Cadet lawn tractor when I was ten. It's about the black rotary dial telephone in the corner, and the wooden toboggan. It's about hidden Christmas gifts, and storing extra holiday platters of food. It's about making the bouquets for my sister's wedding, hauling out the sprinkler, and Gramp in coveralls, oil-undercoating his car. It's a little bit of everything. Half the memories I hold dear, brought to life in a single whiff.

The dogs can wrestle, folks can bicker, children can run amuck, I'll just take in few more wonderful breaths and then, when I head back on up, I'll get another hug to top it off.

Award Wining Weekend!

2011-06-21T19:40:00.000-07:00

A very exciting weekend...the boys were in their first horse show, such fun! The fancy-schmancy Icelandic judge was impressed with, and had wonderful things to say about both my tiny riders, so of course, I loved her. And a beautiful couple of days to boot. Who could ask for anything more?

Lambs, and Toddlers and Ticks, Oh My!

2011-06-12T17:10:00.000-07:00

And so summer starts. A weirdly jinxed week/weekend. Fights abound, zero creative juices flowing (as evidence: this lame post), end of school closing-circle was punctuated by cloud-to-ground lightning, and sheets of freezing downpour, a cold, drizzly rain most days since, and an emergency room visit. I had...ummm...yeah, it's always something embarrassing with me...a teensy-weensy tick in my...oh geez...I'm just gonna say it...in the underside of my damn nipple. I've religiously checked us all out every evening, and I thought I had been especially vigilant since we had gone on an after-dinner hike in tall grass, but the darn thing found the perfect hiding place and stayed overnight. Not that my breasts are big enough to hide much, 'cause we all know they ain't, but...that was probably the only spot I couldn't see. Cripes. Yuck. Seriously grossed out. I started sobbing in the bathroom at one point, after I'd pinched myself silly with the tweezers to no avail. Anyway, I couldn't get it out, and the surgeon on call had a tough time of it too. Now I get to wait two weeks and see if I've got Lyme Disease. Yippie. The kids, and Justin and I have been doing nothing but crabbing at each other for days. Nobody's sleeping well...Ira says that ghosts are scratching him in the night, and Eli says he can't stop thinking. Excuse my whining. I usually make it a policy to try not write when I'm grouchy or negative. Because I went through a period, (or many periods) with this blog where I did nothing but complain, and I HATE that, looking back, but whatever...we all get to be in a bad mood sometimes, I guess.

We DID have a great evening at Myra and Jim's this weekend, another gorgeous storm while we were there. It's so lovely up on that hill, their flowers were amazing, even more so when rain-soaked, and Oliver's a funny little midget, zooming around on his bike with a Viking helmet on his head. I'm just putting my kiddos to bed, they are tired wrecks. I had a decent night at Zumba, the crowd was huge, which is always awesome...so at least that angle is terrific! Fed Bumble, who has started chasing the dog and head butting him in the side today, he now stays up on the picnic table to escape her. She also likes to give her bottle a good head-butt, right as she starts to drink, just to make sure her feeder is sufficiently sprayed with hot, smelly, lamb formula. It's an early night for all. Ira seems to be running a bit of a fever. Hopefully, we'll sleep away our blues, things will turn around, and the sunshine comes back tomorrow!

Memorial Day

2011-05-31T07:27:00.000-07:00

Not much for pictures from this weekend, which is a shame since everybody looked sweet. But with horses, lamb and kids to deal with during the parade, I just didn't have a free hand left for my camera. Eli and Rose rode with the Icelandic Horse farm, so big and proud looking, I could have cried seeing how grown up and capable they seemed, up high on those giant beasties. Justin and I walked the minis, and Ira led the lamb up front for a ways, but then she laid down mid-parade route and wouldn't budge. Ira shrilled "We are the LEADERS!!!" at her, but nope, nothin' doing...had to pass her off to people on the sidelines. Next a picnic on the fairgrounds while Jelly very accommodatingly gave pony rides, followed by heading to Will's for ice cream, and lastly: the summer's first swim in a friend's pond. Exhausting but fabulous day.

Honey...I'm home!

2011-05-29T06:02:00.000-07:00

Just returning from a trip to Prince Edward Island! And yes, I'm one of those irritating people who reads every sign out loud in a singsong voice on road trips. I think it's a recent thing actually, something that happened as we started making these sixteen hour drives a half dozen times a summer. Saw some signs I just didn't GET, no matter how I read them. One sign in Canada somewhere, outside a grocery store said: 'SAVE $10 ON FROZEN UTILITY TURKEY!' At least we passed several miles laughing outrageously about it. Once you are crazy-hysterical-tired, and sick to death of being in the car, really strange things seem funny. Stopping for a late breakfast in a diner, the kids were beyond excited, inexplicably, about those dinky, little packets of butter they give you with your meal, only the waitress didn't bring nearly enough to cover their enormous pancakes... When packing up the 'fridge in the cabin before hitting the road, we put a giant block of leftover butter in our cooler. Example of over-tired hysteria: Justin suggested we go out to the car and get OUR butter for the pancakes...and I said it was a BYOB restaurant, (Bring Your Own Butter, obviously)...and then I cracked up, and spit my orange juice everywhere. Christ. Get me home. Where signs make sense, and the butter isn't funny.

Ira must have remembered that he used to get horribly carsick, so there were quite a few fun/vomit-filled stops on the drive, using up entire containers of baby wipes and all of our towels. We almost turned back at one point, but he wouldn't let us.

The vacation week was lovely otherwise. Still cool on The Island, but there was sun, and mostly nice, mild days, unlike back here in Vermont where Mother Nature gave you the smack down, so we heard. We did plenty of beach walks, the boys donned wetsuits and went in the water some. Lots of sponges washed up, and the wind was salty and brisk. I found a smooth, bleached, driftwood rootball that Justin created a chandelier out of. The coastline seems so rugged with the big red rocks, but it was ravaged by the winter, so much erosion this spring, with trees tipping out of the cliffs. We filled our pockets with treasures, as usual. Stones that are prettier when they are wet, shells with rainbows glossed over their interior, foggy bits of beach glass. Young seals kept popping up, curious as to what the boys were doing. Scuffed our toes in sand that sings as you walk.

Drove up to East Point and explored. Justin wanted to tour a new distillery up that way. So bizarre, how tiny and rural everything is when you get away from the touristy sections, we drove through one village that was named, no joke, "Five Houses". Can you imagine living in a town actually called Five Houses? Our neighbors have said, in the winter months, only a few cars drive by all day long, and they can tell, just by the sound of them, who it is. Very neat. Passed a field of windmills built up over several abandoned, decrepit farmhouses, interesting...the mix of yesterday and tomorrow. The Island is almost entirely powered by wind which is amazing.

In some ways, the place appears behind the times. Through the Acadian areas, women still wear skirts and nobody has ever left home. Islandwide, everyone goes to church on Sunday, (all stores close even) they farm/fish for a living, fashion is unheard of, no high speed Internet, teeny schools, etc, but it's like they've picked and chosen the areas of life that really MATTER and moved out to the front of the pack there. They are light years ahead of us when it comes to the environment. Mandatory composting, they recycle EVERYTHING and make almost no waste. Every community has shared farm equipment, they rotate crops by law to protect the soil. People drive fuel efficient cars. The Island prides itself on being self sufficient, they raise their own food and are so close to being entirely independent power-wise. Also it's CLEAN and pretty. They award money to people who have the nicest yard/flowers/gardens yearly...I suppose that's because of the whole tourism thing, but it's admirable to see such a tidy, picturesque place. People are all (well, the ones we've met anyhow) incredibly welcoming, and such characters! I love it.

Our friends and neighbors, Ethan and Lila have become surrogate parents/grandparents when we visit. I can't think of anything they haven't offered us...extra beds, huge, homecooked meals, showers, allergy meds...sweetest folks on the planet. They watch out for our cabin all year. Ethan even mows our lawn, not that we asked him to...he just does it. They have four children around our age, spread across the globe...China, Cuba, Toronto and...I forget where the other one is right now. Good people. We're lucky to know them.

Let's see...what else did we do...? Built a new bed with a trundle beneath for the boys. Our cabin is adorable, but when it rains, the kiddos seem like huge, noisy beasts, far too big to contain in such a wee house. Hopefully expansion coming in the future. It feels necessary to spread out a bit more. It IS such a cozy cottage now though. We had the potbelly wood stove humming in the evenings, with cocoa heating on top, of course. Lots of simple things, that are beautiful to me there. I love laying in bed and watching geese and gulls shadow the curtains in early morning light, and seeing the sun set over swayback ridge-poles of sagging, shingled barns. The way the fog rolls in and hides the sea out the front window. The ferry horn, long and low, right as we fall asleep. I needle-felted gnomes in candle glow, and whenever the weather was iffy.

And here we are, home, with birthday parties, barn chores, bills, laundry and the Memorial Day parade to be reckoned with. Part of the Island charm may be the fact that those things don't really exist to us there! But...Cest la vie. A busy summer ahead, and hopefully another trip in our near future. As we came down the hill in Chelsea, after sitting in the car for a zillion loooonnnnnng hours, I was thrilled to sing out, in obnoxious opera style..."Tunbridge...6 miles!!!!" after spotting the beloved road sign. Home again, home again, jig, jig, jog.

Welcome Bumble

2011-05-19T07:59:00.000-07:00

Well, our little "farm" which thus far has included one dog, two horses, nine chickens, an evil rooster, and a big batch of new chicks, expanded yesterday to include a lamb. A bottle-baby, gift from our friend John, to be a gas-free lawn mower this summer. My favorite joke of the week: when we went to pick up the lamb, waaaay up on the hill, in the middle of Tunbridge-nowhere, we pulled our rusty Honda into the driveway, right next to John's Honda, and he remarked "Ah, good, a Honda Accord is THE prefered truck of Vermont sheep farmers". So, I guess we're sheep farmers now. Kids are excited and in love with her. She's a very pretty Romney, the kind with spiraled wool locks and pretty eyelashes.. The original deal was: how about she goes away in the Fall?...but, you know, maybe not...Bumble could be the start of something. Yesterday was also Justin's birthday, so in between bottle feedings, we made a cake and apple pie... and only a LITTLE of the lamb's milk formula splashed in while I was baking. Whatever, it's not like we'll grow woolly ears or anything. It's been a rainy week, the plum trees are spectacular but the bees are no where to be seen as of yet. Feeling giddy about Spring and Life and Lambs and Blossoms.

Summer Lovin'

2011-05-14T18:17:00.000-07:00

You people who know us well enough to know our dirty, little secrets, know this about our family: fitness freak that I've turned into, we still go to Will's Store EVERY NIGHT in the summer for Creamees. I don't mean we go sometimes, or a lot, or often...I mean EVERY NIGHT. Unless there's an act of God preventing us, the woman who runs the register expects us to walk in around quarter to eight, the rusty cowbell over the door jangling as we enter, and order two baby sized cones, one small, and one medium.

The Creamees aren't the only thing I love about Will's. The place is like something out of a movie...but one that hasn't been made yet. An old brick store where the fishing bait sits next to the Yankee Candle selection, ammo next to the aspirin, along with incredibly bad wine, toys that have been on the same shelves since 1979, movie rentals, yellowed postcards, beef jerky, knick-knacks, a surprising variety of great books. They also make their own terrific hard ice cream, a fact that few people care about because the Creamee machine reigns supreme, commanding the front of the store, most folks don't even venture further in than that, never wander to the back where you can find paperclips and glittery resin figurines of wolves and bald eagles. Their loss. But on rainy days we roam around back there with our creamees, finding odd merchandise, stuff we've never seen before, every time. If we're lucky, the side door will be open and the Chelsea Town Marching Band (which is really just five people, one of them Will himself, wheelchair bound, but who says marching has to mean MARCHING?) will be practicing on the covered ramp.

There are a couple women who alternate nights working at Will's, we call them "Good Jimmie Lady" and "Bad Jimmie Lady". (Not to their faces, obviously, although the kids have let it slip a couple times and we've had to fake a coughing fit.) Good Jimmie Lady takes your ice cream and boldly plops it down in the container of sprinkles, rolling it around and COATING it with either chocolate or rainbow. Right on! Bad Jimmie Lady holds the cone over the sink, and kind of gingerly flicks some sprinkles at it with a spoon, while she gives you the evil eye for ordering sprinkles in the first place. The result is: a sink full of delicious, wasted jimmies, and an ice cream with seven actually stuck to it.

This has been going on for a few years now, with the entire universe afraid to speak up to Bad Jimmie Lady.

The most awesome, miraculous thing happened as this summer's creamee season began...Good Jimmie Lady gave Bad Jimmie Lady a crash course in proper jimmie application! No more wondering if we'll have to pay that extra 15 cents for a whole lotta nothin'. No more agonizing on the way over to recall whose night it is behind the counter. It doesn't even matter. Now that they're BOTH Good Jimmie Ladies, I think we'll ask them their real names. Summer's here, the marching band is tuning up, and all is right in the world.

To Eat, Or Not To Eat...

2011-05-14T17:21:00.000-07:00

The circle of life...it seems pretty sad this weekend. A carton full of chicks arrived a few days ago, all sweet and fluffy and peeping. (Yes, they're meat birds, but I still think they are darling...for now... is that warped?) Anyway, Eli is totally a red-blooded meat eater, as is Justin, both very matter-of-fact about it all. I've always felt a little bad, but you know, if I feel like it lived a good life, died humanly, and isn't pumped full of chemicals, I'm OK with meat. But Ira, at three, is a vegetarian through and through. He randomly burst into tears in the car yesterday, and said: "I'll never eat the chicks! No! Not in FOREVER!" It's such a delicate subject, telling him he doesn't have to eat them, of course, if he feels that way, but gently letting him know that somebody else certainly will.

Apparently, when you order day-old chicks in bulk, you tend to get a few defective ones, which has shockingly never happened to us before this batch. We've had an adult chicken break a leg once, and she still lived happily in the coop, with room service delivering her meals daily, but never had to deal with something happening to a cute, baby chick. One with a neck deformity died this afternoon, and another really, really, small, weak one is still breathing, but won't possibly last the night. I keep wondering if I should put it out of it's misery, but I just can't do it.

I feel awful for Ira...home and the things that go on here are his whole world. Eli has friends, school, lessons, hobbies and big kid things that occupy a lot of his brain, but Ira's EVERYTHING centers around his house and pets. He's sat and watched those chicks non-stop since they got here. And now tomorrow we'll shed some more tears as we bury a couple of them, nestled in the toy pirate chest he picked out this evening...and eat the rest with stuffing in twelve weeks.

Fiddlehead Tanning Booth

2011-05-02T09:07:00.000-07:00

(This will be one of those jump-around, what-the-hell-is-she-talking-about posts. Warning you ahead of time.) Just getting in from a nice hike and Fiddlehead hunt. Those things just TASTE like spring to me, strong and musky and fresh, sauteed in butter, melting in your mouth. Yum! Can't wait! We got a basketful, and wham, we got all tan too. I'm not a fan of tanning just to tan, I think that's gross. But I'm not into keeping out of the sun either. I love the sun. I wear a hat, but the rest of my body doesn't seem to care either way...I've only gotten a sunburn a very few times in my whole life, so I don't feel like it's a huge deal. I just brown up instantly in the spring, and then nothing else happens. Must be genetics. (Although genetics have dealt me a weird hand, what with the yeller hair I've got going on...Summer finds me looking like some creepy, tropical Barbie doll, minus the boobs and permanent high-heel-shaped-foot. Whatever.) Mom and Dad spent part of the weekend visiting cemeteries because Mom was looking to fill in the blanks of some genealogy research. They went up North somewhere to find the grave of her Indian Great Grandmother, who was a chief's daughter from Canada, married off to a Quaker. Growing up, I always envisioned her as some sort of Pocahontas-glamorous-princess type. Finally seeing photos, and finding out she was short and squat, (nearly as wide as she was tall, really) was a bit of a letdown. Of course, there's other Native American heritage in the mix, and I'm sure some of them may, more or less, fit my romantic childhood ideals, but that one was, you know, ROYALTY, sort of. Oh well. At least her tan was pretty sweet. Anyway, there was some sort of mystery about her death that Mom wanted to clear up...so she turned Nancy Drew for a day and made all these little hand-drawn maps for Dad to follow, I saw them, and they were literally two squiggly lines across a piece of paper...and a star. That's all. Which, apparently, she would study intently and then turn upside down and study some more, while directing Dad where to drive. Native American navigation skills? She also got Poison Ivy on her knuckles from somewhere in their travels, rooting around in old graveyards. Native American oneness with the earth? It's cute, my Mom's occasional, adorable cluelessness. (My recent favorite example was when she and I were on the computer, zooming in on everyone's houses with Google Earth...It was a few months ago, and we were looking at my aunt's home, also in New England. The Google Earth shots were from summer, everything was sunny, green, lush and blooming. Mom, always astounded by technology, said: "Wow! That's amazing! I can see my sister's house, RIGHT THIS MINUTE?! Her garden looks amazing!" It didn't occur to her that there was three feet of snow outside. Sometimes....you just wonder, is all. "Mom? It's February".) Anyway, of course the 'rents eventually found what they were looking for, they always do, it just takes twenty times longer than it ought, but that's half the fun, I suspect. They like to go for drives to "find things"...usually they come home with lots of stories about meeting strange folks, and a digital camera full of shots of I-never-can-tell-what-it-is: headless people, blurry trees, sideways barns. (The photography gene skips a generation.) So, that's what they did for weekend fun. And what a beautiful weekend it was. Sun galore. Flowers. Peepers singing in the pools at dusk. Ferns, starting to poke up. Just perfect. Spring, spring, SPRING! Hope everyone got some sun on their shoulders this weekend, not by tanning, but just by LIVING. Finding Fiddleheads, ancient cemeteries, talking a walk, raking up all those pesky leaves from last fall, getting ice cream, whatever floats your boat. It's SPRING. Live it up.

Story Of My Life

2011-04-26T16:20:00.000-07:00

Stories...I know so many. And they are all good. Gooooooooooood. Bite-your-teeth-in, juicy-good. Full of flavor. Proof that truth IS stranger than fiction, and a dang sight more amusing too. That's the most wonderful thing about living in a small town, you have easy access to the BEST tales. Everybody has a quirk, everybody has a story. Stories are so thick, it's a writer's paradise. I can't think of a person I know, that I couldn't tell you a hilarious story about. I love that. I love that, and I hate that, 'cause I won't. Won't tell you, I mean. That's the worst thing about living in a small town...it'll only take an hour before everybody's talking about it, things spread like wildfire if I say one word. And no matter how my fingers itch to write them down, to share these things with you, I wouldn't hurt my friend's or neighbor's feelings for the world. And maybe it's the reason why life in this precious place works...because there is a mutual trust not to exploit or betray each other, to band together, look out for one another, even the man with the porta-potty business next door. So, safe in my head, I think them all out, useless little stories and anecdotes that could make me a nice living somewhere else, but not here...here they'll just get me dirty looks at the post office. And here is where I want to be.

Eatster

2011-04-25T09:31:00.000-07:00

Here's a big, big, bummer: I have a cold. Not SUCH a huge deal really, I've been healthy all winter, we all have, it's been great! But...yesterday was Eat-ster and I tasted nothing. Zip. Nadda. The congestion has knocked out my sense of taste completely, like never before. Even a jalapeno did nothing. The stupid part was, I KEPT EATING ANYWAY. I literally felt like I was chewing cardboard all day, and I still didn't stop. I won't even torture myself by giving you the details of Jana & RJ's amazing German brunch, and of course, my mother-in-law's always fantastic dinner. It all LOOKED beyond delicious. And from the way everyone else was putting it away, I can only assume it WAS delicious. I think we should have a do-over next week.

Hams

2011-04-22T10:48:00.000-07:00

Two days before Easter. On a web site side-bar this morning, I spotted an add: "The Only Guide To Ham You'll Ever Need" Hell, how many guides to ham can there be? Slap some honey, brown sugar, or maple syrup on the sucker, stick it in the oven until the little doo-hickey pops up, and there. Ham. (Whoops, saying "Hell" isn't very Eastery of me. What would the Easter Bunny say?)

Speaking of hams...here's a shot from Easter Morning...1982 or so. People don't still do this to their kids, do they? Somehow, I don't think we loved the whole Easter-bonnet-tradition very much, although, hey, what's not to love? Piles of cheap, starchy, K-Mart lace, stacked around your head, and held on by a little elastic band that cuts into your chin. Yay! Let's go to church!

Green Up

2011-04-19T08:11:00.000-07:00

Really, being titled "Green Up" these shots should be of green things, but sorry, they're not. Just a quick photo recap of the last few days. We danced during the Mud Season Variety Shows over the weekend, I worked every night, got our taxes in, riding lessons, kids are on break now... so many things going on that my head is a'whirl with it all, but I see the fields misted over with that pale emerald haze and the hills turning a faint purply-brown with buds swelling, and the anticipation is out of this world! Thrilling to think that summer is around the corner. Love watching the green-up...the green getting so bright and intense you almost can't believe it, yet the next day, it's even GREENER. Incredibly welcome after a long winter of black and white. I've been so thirsty for color, and finally, the April rains are washing it back into the landscape this week.

Today

2011-04-18T08:58:00.000-07:00

Ira was holding the refrigerator door open this morning while I was making his toast..."Can I have yogurt?" he asks me. "After breakfast" I said. "Can I have a cookie?" he asks next. "After breakfast" I reply. "Can I have beer?" he asks. And Eli shouts, exasperated, from the next room "Geez, Ira...AFTER BREAKFAST!"

Then: Ira notices what I'm doing and, "NOoooooooo! I don't want jelly! I want that stuff that comes outta bee's butts!"

So..."Will you put the jelly back for me?" I ask Ira. He throws himself down flat on the floor and groans deeply, "I'm tired of being your helper."

Muscle Memory

2011-04-13T09:53:00.000-07:00

This morning, I had a craving for doughnuts...I haven't had one in....who knows?...a long, long time. Justin grabbed a bag at the general store, and the first bite sent me on a tailspin to Instant Nostalgia Land. Gram and Gramp Shepard's house. Where there was always one of those big, thick, glass jars on the kitchen counter, full of home-made doughnuts...even after Gram's mind started slipping and she was eating flour by the handful, not to mention cat food, on occasion...the doughnut jar remained full, at all times. I wonder sometimes, how she managed to make them still, without hurting herself, or having them taste awful, in the very least, but I suppose it was simply muscle memory. She had ALWAYS made us those doughnuts, and BY-GOD, she always would.

It's funny, I can go quite a while without thinking a lot about, or missing terribly, some of my departed loved ones. Gram and Gramp Shepard, I am reminded of every time we drive by their place, which is pretty much daily. When we pass that big, old, peeling Catholic church, my eyes are automatically drawn up the bank to the black and white house with the Adirondack chairs out front. In my mind, I can still see the blue canvas hammock, fringed and faded, on the lawn, Gramp smoking his pipe near the lamp post, humming tunelessly to himself, Gram in her cat-eye glasses, one of those thin, cotton, flowered dresses with the big pockets and her hair curled impeccably.

If I CLOSE my eyes, I can smell them, smoke and cinnamon and furniture polish, musty collector's editions of Reader's Digest. Hear the clocks chiming, so many, all at once, hour on the hour, a heady, confusing medley. I can imagine myself small again, snooping through Gramp's workshop, full of gears, and brass pendulums, and fancy clock hands. We would drag out the giant sack of blocks, smoothed to a satin finish by years of grand children's playtime, and spend hours riding the perpetually squeaky bouncy-horse. I remember peering into the mysterious upper bedrooms with chenille bedspreads, using the tiny half-bath up in the hall...the one papered in newsprint, those longhorns hanging in the living room, the curio cabinet full of Currier and Ives dishware, the slanting screen-porch off the kitchen, it's steps leading down into what I thought was the real and true 'Secret Garden' all tucked and hidden in a nook on the steep hillside. I recall how I loved curling up next to the fireplace with that big book of Norman Rockwell prints. Gram served us juice out of cups that Welch's Jelly used to come in, the ones with Tom and Jerry printed on the sides, and every dinner included a side of instant mashed potatoes. Every single one. Gram's voice scolding, "EARL!" rings clear, as if she's right here next to me, and Gramp's pleasant, garbled grumble as we tickled his ears while he dozed in his chair, or after he teasingly prodded us with his cane, "Get along, you Scallywags."

I have never yet, all these years later, gone by their house without my head turning, and involuntarily lapsing into a quick trip to the past. Gramp's out there, feeding chipmunks from his hand, or calling to Joe, his mangy mutt, he must be. I have to stop myself from pulling in, just so I can sit on the front step for a minute. Muscle memory. I sigh and drive on.

Spring, not quite

2011-04-11T06:39:00.000-07:00

Sitting here, sipping cocoa
From a cup that says:
'My friends went to VIRGINIA
And all they brought me
Was this lousy MUG'.
Eaves are dripping,
Dog licking
Registers ticking.
Rhythms of my life today.
Clocking time.
Cold, clammy, ugly and dark.
Chilled directly through my heart.

Last night it fogged
So hard, you could have missed
Your own house.
Crept right past before you knew,
Eyes only for the white line.
Swerving sharp around
The first frogs of the year,
Those tiny, sad-looking lumps
Looming up on the road,
Shoulders hunched,
Waiting for the sun.
Fifty deer, wet and hungry,
Ears pricking up out of low, grey clouds,
Spread across
A matted field,
Nibbling like a Serengeti herd.

I just deleted the last three stanzas of
This poem.
All mopey and melancholy and morose.
Feel much better now.
If only this pre-season
Of dank and brown and damp
Could be
Abbreviated so easily.
Waiting,
With my shoulders hunched,
For the sun.
Drip, drip.
Lick, lick.
Tick, tick, ping.

What's in a name?

2011-04-07T13:18:00.001-07:00

I'm awfully excited that a bunch of my nearest and dearest are having babies! Babies are cool. I like 'em. They wiggle and squeak and wave their fists around and drool, and we think it's just the last word in cute. And since I'm not having any more, no way, no how...unless somebody else makes one for me, I see them as especially precious commodities. Maybe I'll find another to be mine at some point... who knows. Whenever. I'm patient. Nice to be away from diapers for a while anyway. For now, I'm thrilled enough to pat my friend's bellies and buy teeny-weeny little overalls for other people.

I've spent lots of time sharing birth stories and recounting pregnancy woes, I did not do knocked-up gracefully, the way my friends do. They all seem so serene and lovely and Madonnaesque. The cliche' of GLOWING even. Not me. I was cranky and ugly. You know I was. I did not glow, I glowered.

And I've been very, very helpful, suggesting bizarre names, straight-faced, just to see reactions from parents-to-be. People have such shockingly different tastes when it comes to baby names. Myra goes for the ugliest names imaginable: Mabel, Fanny, Bertha and Gertrude, (No offense Mabel, Fanny, Bertha and Gertrude, you know your names are dopey, just as I know my name is boring as shit.) Jana is loving the names that are very American or Irish sounding, probably because she's German. (I don't know what that has to do with it, actually, just my random commentary.) Meg seems to have a wide range going on. Melody and some others are not sayin' much about what their picks are because they know everyone will probably make fun of them. Smart move, there. I'm not meaning to discount the father's choices or opinions, only it tends to be more of a woman's driving force that gets a baby named. As it just came barrelling out of HER womb, she can usually name it anything she wants. Not many will argue with that.

IF I ever had another baby, girl names that top my list are: Trixie, Sylvia, Una or Ilsa. Boy names that strike my fancy are Wyll, Ansel and Saul. Poor, poor things. Good thing I'm not naming my friend's little ones, eh?

Other than my irritating onslaught of "you should name the baby ---------", it's nice to be the Wise-Woman...to be asked for advice. I don't think I had my kids early or anything, just happened to be earlier than most of my friends. Been there, done that. You want to know why your butt hurts? Gotcha covered.

me

2011-04-07T11:12:00.000-07:00

(One of those blog post written while not ACTUALLY high, but late enough at night that you might as well be.)

Isn't it weird to be inside your own head? I spend too much time wondering if everyone else really DOES think and feel the same things I do...I'm not sure I can make you understand what I mean here, exactly...not just the whole are-we-are-all-the same? thing, but deeper than that, what does it feel like to be stuck in YOUR head? I'm wondering if this question is along the same lines as trying to describe the color red to someone who's born blind, there's just no way to make them understand. Since I'm the only one in here, it feels to me like I'M the center of the universe. The world revolves around me, from where I stand. But you must feel that way too, don't you? See, I'm in here, looking out of MY eyes, feeling the sun on MY skin, smelling mud with MY nose...it's a little me-orientated. Sometimes it's lonely and scary, not knowing if I'm going it alone, not knowing if it's the same for you, no matter how similar we humans are supposed to be. Are we all in the same boat? If we ARE in different boats, I wish they were the glass-bottomed kind, so we we could get a glimpse in.

They say dogs always jump up to try to lick a person's face because they sense that's the most important part, the part that matters, your head houses YOU, all your senses originate there, the rest of your body just supports your brain, kinda like a tree holding a tree house. Does this make any sense? I'm in total agreement with the dogs, which maybe means I'm not in touch with my body enough, and that I'm too isolated, up in my own head. It's just crazy, because there's no way anybody else can come in here with me, and I adore company. Occasionally people I love get close, almost as if I can hear knocking outside the tree house, but the trap door doesn't open. Kindred spirits can play on the tire swing, but this tower room holds me, and only me. (Sorry, I'm going nuts with the bad similes today.) Is this normal? Do you feel completely alone in your thoughts and feelings? Do you think most people do?

The only time I really mind feeling like a warped version of Rapunzel is when I'm afraid of something. You know, when that wave of cold-heat washes over you, that heart pounding, chilly, sweat of terror. When words others say don't even pierce your fear. Hearing someone tell you "everything will be fine" simply doesn't cut the mustard, comforting words bounce off your ears, locked out, because you are ALONE. The only one scared, or sad, or whatever. The only one in your head to face whatever demon you're facing. Being alone is overwhelming then. Hello panic attack.

(There's nothing up with me, by the way, even though I sound looney tunes at the moment. Rap on [tree house] wood. Loving this glorious day, loving my life, happy, content, busy, all well. I need no psychiatric evaluation. Just one of those things I was thinking about. And thinking = typing, for me.)

Anyway, it's strange that I'm writing this, because I'm a pretty laid back person these days. I've convinced myself that I'm just along for the ride, and what ever happens, was supposed to happen. Made my peace with the fates. Though you can't control the situation, YOU are in charge of how a situation effects you. Mostly, that's what I believe, and how I live. But it's still hard to over-ride the yucky stuff life has to offer. And hard to over-ride pre-programmed-before-birth tendencies to hang out in my tree house and worry. Paranoia runs deep. Starts in my roots and travels up every branch.

go snow go

2011-04-05T18:32:00.000-07:00

The snow will go when it goes folks. That's the deal. Yesterday I saw a elderly woman on the side of the road, a scarf covering her curlers and wearing A BATHROBE, no joke, whacking at a snow pile at the end of her driveway with a pick-ax. An honest to goodness pick-ax. We don't even own a pick-ax, where does an old lady get one? (I think at ninety, they should take away your driver's licence AND your pick-ax.) Anyway, as I was saying, leave the stuff alone! It'll melt at some point, I promise. Everywhere I went this week, I spotted people shoveling piles of ice out onto bare spots, hoping to speed up the process. I admit to giving it a kick now and then, myself. Sure, it's a somewhat satisfying thing to do, like the way you breathe on snowflakes that gather in a crease of your jacket sleeve, just to watch them shrivel and melt right before your eyes...it's like that, only on a larger scale, I guess. But the truth is: we don't need to bother, OK? It's on the way out and spring is on the way in. With or without our help.

Rude

2011-04-05T13:39:00.000-07:00

Am I rude? Today, when I was running errands in South Royalton, I was about to go into the diner when a friend called to me from the sidewalk. One foot in the door, Ira had already rushed on in ahead of me, I paused, maybe twenty seconds, to answer her question, but it was twenty seconds too long for the cranky lady who stalked over and told me I was a rude and inconsiderate person for holding a door open to talk to someone while it was FREEZING outside. (I, myself, was only wearing a thin raincoat because it's somewhere around 42 degrees.) Anyhow, I felt really bad, like I was the biggest jerk in the world. Especially when I heard the woman complaining, loudly to her companion about how thoughtless people are these days. Was I? Was I just being dumb and careless? Should I already know the answer to this?

The other night at Zumba, I had another "rude" moment when halfway through the class, I took a quick break to swig some water and looked around the room to see who was there (My back is usually to everyone while we dance). The town pastor caught my eye, granted, she's a doll, very kind and fun, but still I frantically sorted through my memory to recall what music I'd been playing all evening, and blushed deeply knowing it was the raunchiest of the raunchy. There's a reason the class is labeled PG-13. I know it wasn't a true issue to worry about, after all, she's a grown woman, married, probably heard everything, and she's choosing to attend my class, but still, it felt a little rude of me to be grinding my hips with a minister right behind me, you know?

Sometimes I catch myself staring into space when people talk to me, and then wandering away before they've finished saying whatever it is they were saying. How rude. Sometimes, I forget to return phone calls and e-mails, I don't mean to, it just happens. How rude. Sometimes I tell people we'll hang out soon, and then I never make an effort to make it happen. How totally rude. Sometimes I watch something lame on the computer and don't bother to do the dishes, and then I complain the house is a mess when Justin gets home. Utterly rude. I always stick my tounge out when someone tries to take my picture. Rude. I tell people when I hate their shirt. OK, only my sisters, but still...it's rude.

So, fact is, it seems I'm a little rude, or maybe a lot...depending on if a draft from an open door went up your house-dress and got your panties in a twist.

Pink

2011-04-01T11:25:00.000-07:00

Teenage injustices, I once could name a zillion, now they elude me, all but one...The Injustice Of The Pink Prom Dress.

Our high school Junior Prom wasn't just limited to Juniors the way it is other places. See, our school was so tiny, you had to open prom up to all grades because otherwise, there wouldn't be enough people to make up a party. Get it? So, I was a Freshman, or a Sophomore maybe, technically dateless, attending with a group, when this particular injustice occurred.

I went shopping with friends for a prom dress. It was a lush, simple, black velvet sheath. Fitted like it was poured over me. It was perfect. I had never looked sexy before. With one day until the prom, I tried it on at home and walked into the kitchen...Mom took one look, and I ended up in a borrowed bridesmaid gown. Baby pink, tea length, padded shoulders with bows and nasty, fake satin roses attached to trailing ribbons down the back. Yeah, WEIRD. I wasn't exactly the girly, prommy-prom type anyway, and hooooooooooly cow, was I mad.

At the dance, the boy I liked, well, HIS date was wearing black velvet, tempting midnight velvet that sucked up the light and hugged snug around her ample curves. I went into the bathroom and tore a satin rose off the back of the tacky bodice and threw it in the sink, after I spotted them dancing, her cheek on his shoulder. Uuugghh. Gag me. (Or, I would have liked to gag HER with one of those stupid bows, rather.)

(FYI, Nearly eighteen years later, my black prom dress is now a seat cushion on an antique straight-backed chair in our spare bedroom, I don't recall exactly how that came about, but I remember The Injustice whenever I see it. The pink one got returned to it's unfortunate original owner, and I doubt anyone would even upholster a toilet seat with it.)

But that's not the end of the story, oh, no...the REAL injustice is yet to come.

Imagine my chagrin when my baby sister sauntered down the stairs, stilettos clicking, to depart for her prom, several years later, in what I can only describe as a slightly (and I do mean SLIGHTLY) longer than average tube top. Skin-tight, shiny, black spandex, ending right below her ass. Mom and Dad waved her and her date out the door, without even attempting to smoother her in twenty yards of bubble-gum colored taffeta. Nary a bow or rose in sight.

The unfairness of being the oldest daughter and breaking in the parents. By the time the youngest kid's turn rolls around, they JUST DON'T GIVE A CRAP anymore. So if anyone in my dance classes ever wonders why my shorts are so damn short, that's why. Blame it on teenage trauma.

Facebook

2011-04-01T09:47:00.000-07:00

(That's my profile picture at the moment)

Because sometimes I get on a roll with posting here, and sometimes I ignore this blog in favor of Facebook (or Wastebook, as many people say), I thought I'd paste a bunch of my status updates here for all ya'll that aren't lucky enough (ha ha) to waste hours of your life reading people's random staus updates. Gathering these together like this, I see I've turned into one of those irritating people who respond to anything anyone else says with: "Well, do you know what MY kid said?" Sorry. That's just the way it is. Kids, kids, kids. OK, here you go.

-As a reply to my petulant "Ira, you PROMISED you would pick all those LEGOs up when you were done playing with them." "Well, I won't promise next time, Mommy...Anyway, I'm a BOY, so I'M the boss." No way Jose. Afraid that one doesn't fly around here.

-Eli & Ira are playing with LEGOS. Eli says, "Look Mom!" and holds up an intricate helicopter, complete with spinning propeller, landing gear, and working doors. Ira holds up a colorful clump and cheerfully says, "Mine's a porch that can't stand up!" So, I guess I've got one engineer and one Frank Lloyd Wright.

-Happiness is eating contraband Fruit Loops while you win some sweet booty shorts on Ebay. I'm living the life, folks.

-Justin laminated a fortune cookie fortune that he got years ago, and keeps it in his wallet. It reads: "You're the greatest person in the world." He whips it out whenever we argue about anything.

-Ira wandered in while I was showering and said, "Mom, if you're gonna pee in the tub, pee near the drain." (Sage advice from his father.)

-Hey, Dead River Oil Company? Your name SUCKS. Seriously. Who thunk up that one?

-The kids were fighting something fierce, and when I told them to go into different rooms, Ira shrieked at me, "We are BRUDDERS, why we have to be away from each udder?!"

-There's a dead rat somewhere in the wall. What to do? OK, it might just be a dead mouse, but it SMELLS like a fifty pound dead rat.

-The kids were so bored they ASKED for haircuts.

-Ira has been staring at my backside, through binoculars, from his playhouse window for a while. "I'm SPYIN' on you Mommy, and you are HUGE Mommy." Great.

-Why over-sharers shouldn't use facebook: My kids have the most ferocious gas today. Holy, holy.

-Town Meetin'! Wringing my hands in glee thinking about all the awesome arguments involving firetrucks and zoning I'll get to hear tomorrow. And pie, I'm thinking about pie of course.

-When Ira had the pukes the other day, I let the kids watch endless movies, something we NEVER do. So, yesterday Eli was going on and on about why the road buckles and heaves in the winter and what the road crew could do about it. Then he said, very scornfully and bitingly, "Know where I learned that? From TV. And YOU guys say TV isn't good for me." Such sarcasm at six does not bode well for sixteen.

-Freakishly ALL ALONE in my house at the moment, which means, yeah, I totally just had ice cream for dinner.

-I'm kinda embarrassed to say that I can no longer tell the difference between the high school students, and the law school's grad students walking the streets in South Royalton. They just all look equally...young.

-Is it just me, or does anyone else think that brand spankin' new socks are the best things on earth? Hey, guess what? I just ate an 85% cacao chocolate bar and I AM NEVER GOING TO SLEEP!!!! Zowie! Oh my Lord. My brain may actually be buzzing.

-Best day ever. And the smell of mud to boot!

-Whoops, just accidentally left the back door open a crack when I popped out to chase the dog, and one of the ponies got into the house...I mean, he is only 36 inches high, but still, a horse in the house is pretty weird. Ira was yelling, "Maaaaaaammmmma...Dexter trying ta take my sammich!"

-I just had to order part of our clogging costumes from an online sex fetish shop...because they had the cheapest, quality petticoats around. A girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do.

-So, if you sit still for too long while balancing your laptop on your knees, and you don't really notice that your left butt cheek (and then some) has fallen asleep, when you jump up, real quick-like, to answer the phone...you WILL most certainly fall in an undignified heap on the floor.

-Just when I was sayin', "Oh, dearie me, what EVER will I wear to the Valentine's Cabaret this weekend?", Grammy Sammy left two boxes of her 1940's-1970's hand-me-downs on my porch. Check it. Most perfect dress of all time! I love my gram. And this twirly skirt. Helloooooo panties!

-Ignored the Superbowl and went out to eat with friends. But I'm glad to see that Scott wasn't wearing that cheese head for nothing all day.

-Is it inappropriate to wear my tie die union suit with the flap seat out in public? Oh well. Eat your heart out Tunbridge. You all wish you had one of these.

-"Nation Paralyzed By Storm!" I don't know...I don't feel too paralyzed, how 'bout ya'll? Hey fellow facebonkers, look outside! Ain't it purty!?!

-Sorry peeps....I've been so busy, my facebook page is like a ghost town. But fear not. I'm sure things will slow down soon, and I will once again obnoxiously post several times a day.

-Off to sub for the Nursery class. Need to rally my energy.

-Should I buy my father-in-law a puppy while my mother-in-law is out of town? Magic 8- Ball says: "Without a doubt." Should I rely on the Magic 8-ball for decisions of this nature? Magic 8-ball: "As I see it, Yes."

-Eli complained this morning, "My school has those cheap bandaids that don't even stick to you."

-Made phenomenal gingerbread cookies and managed to stick my hand into the potted cactus on the counter. You take the good with the bad.

"A horse, a horse! My kingdom for a horse!"

2011-03-21T13:42:00.001-07:00

Just a few shots from the last month.

When I grow up...

2011-03-21T11:42:00.000-07:00

I want to be...what? Too many choices. I thought things would maybe narrow down as I got older, but instead. more and more has opened up to me, which is like a dream come true, of course, but also makes for many hard decisions. I can't do everything. Time's a'passing at breakneck speed all of a sudden and I could never fit it all in.

What do I love to do, best in all the world? I love to dance, write, take pictures, read, talk to people, be a mother, design things, teach things, organize things, study history...If I had to pick just one or two to do forever, what would win?

Dancing makes me happy. Turning around and seeing people literally wringing sweat out of their shirts, but still grinning at me, is the best feeling of all time. I love having my body suddenly find that perfect groove. I love the music turned up LOUD enough to feel it hammering in my chest. I love my dancers. Love my job. But it's my job for how long? Dance teachers need to be young, need to be lively, sexy, tight. Can I really see my body cooperating for even ten more years? Not sure.

Writing is something that I can't stop doing...I'll wake up at two in the morning and grope around in the dark for the stubby pencil on the bedside table to jot down some thought.... if I don't, I can't fall back asleep. I have no idea if I'm any good at it, but fact is, I can't stop, so I'd better GET good, huh? Otherwise, what can I do with it? Dime a dozen. I personally know a handful of amazing writers, just off the top of my head, and yeah, their scribblings leave mine in the dust.

Photography - Everything enchants me through my camera lens. I never see ANYTHING without thinking "click". When I'm without a camera, I feel like I'm forgetting something, lost. I'm not great at this, no matter how much I love it. I'm decent with composition, portraits, and catching a moment, but I have never buckled down and memorized all the technical aspects that I should have long ago, it never interested me. A hefty portion of my shots rely on luck, not actual skill. I'm not too shabby with Photoshop, but unfortunately, it's out of necessity. Thank God for the digital era!

I want to help and be The Nice One. Everywhere, anyhow I can. And it's true, I AM good at being the behind-the-scenes person that gets the dirty work done when nobody else can, but I'm a snob about it. I push my way in any place that looks like I can be of use...it's a little obnoxious. Stems from being the oldest child, perhaps? Oh, I can to tell people how to fix their problems, how to be happy, how to heal, how to keep roast chicken moist. I come across as a know-it-all and I don't mean to be. I know nothing, really. Or worse, I know a little bit about everything, not enough to give an expert opinion, just enough to be a pain is the ass. But I like to brainstorm and try to help. Little Miss Helpful. Run when you see me coming. I'm working on it.

If I was rich, maybe I'd just stay home and stare in wonder at my kids all day long. They are hysterical and smart and beautiful and darling. I love them beyond anything else I could ever say. I think I'm a pretty good mom. But admittedly, if I spend too much time doing nothing else but mothering, I get rather testy. Mothering comes first, but something else has to be there too.

I have spent days making mock-ups of posters, websites and brochures I knew I would never use. Fascinating to lay out a page of images and text and make it catch the eye, you know? Not a terribly useful skill in little Vermont. We only need maybe two graphic artists for the entire state and we already have hundreds more than that.

Teaching skating, snowboarding, water skiing (I was a last choice for that one, don't ask!) dance, photography, all those things feels GOOD. I get frustrated with the politics involved, trying to please everybody, but the nitty-gritty teaching...that I love. Teaching people that actually want to learn = especially gratifying. Passing the torch and all that. I also love being taught things. Somebody sit me down and finally show me how to fold an oragami crane!

When I get immersed in planning something, it's all-consuming and delightful to watch come to fruition. I'm totally anal about details, details, details, evn if they don't turn out exactly that way in the end. A party, event, wedding, trip, all those kinds of things. I'm the dorky one that makes an itinerary and passes out photocopies...I'm the one that has a Plan B. Also a snob here. "You forgot your sunscreen/safety pins/vitamins/plastic forks? Don't worry, I brought extra."

History, particulary local history, I am a total sucker it. I didn't find it all that absorbing when it was handed to me, easy as pie, back during history classes, but now? Love it. Dusty old photos. Houses. Stories. Letters. Journals. Clothes. I could give you a two hour lecture on the Tunbridge Fair, or the 1927 Gaysville Flood, and you'd be the only one of us that was bored. Too bad for you.

So there you have it, Jack of all trades, master of none, that's me. Lately feeling like I need to choose, to make some sort of decision so I can master something and grow up. And stop feeling smug that I remembered the safety pins and you didn't.

Please Come!

2011-03-10T11:03:00.001-08:00

Tricky Business

2011-03-02T19:03:00.000-08:00

People who play pranks are really sort of cool. Take my brother-in-law Matt, for example. He LIVES for pranking people. My mom falls for every one of his gag phone calls. Among other things, he can pull off the old "Is your refrigerator running?" like nobody else. You think you couldn't possibly fall for that one? Think again. If you stayed late after school to finish up a project, who would have the uncanny ability to know what darkened hallway you'd be walking down, and could jump out at you, nearly causing your heart to stop beating? That's right, Matt. Who hides in the back of your pick-up truck on a summer night, so they can reach around through the window and grab you by the neck as you start to pull out of your driveway? (Ummm...holy crap.) That would be Matt. It's really quite impressive. I can't ever trick anyone, I'm lame like that. Plus, with my luck, the person driving the truck would have a stroke and drive us off a bank. Matt has good timing and crazy luck. Tricky, tricky guy.

Totally off the subject, but the word 'trick' reminds me of Pete. When I was a little, we had a pony, a mostly nice pony. Pigweed Pete. He had 50 tricks, my parents like to say. He ate a hole in the side of the barn big enough to walk out of so, yeah, I guess he had some stuff up his sleeve alright.

Once my sisters and I tried to booby trap the neighbor's swing set as kids, but all we got out of it was the girl's mother calling, all pissed off, telling us to take our prank down. Similar reaction for toilet papering some trees on Halloween. Ticked off people, immediately knowing it was me. Matt needs to pass on his secrets. How he gets away with trick after trick. And making people laugh all the while. We should all be so lucky.

Gnomeo & Juliet

2011-02-21T19:23:00.001-08:00

Howdy all. I am no longer pink-eyed and bushy-tailed. Everything's grand. It was a fantastic, busy weekend. Did lots of stuff, mostly terrific stuff, but it would bore you if I wrote it all here. One thing (that may also bore you, but it's my blog, so I'm actually ALLOWED to bore anyone I want) was that I became obsessed with needle-felting. Fell in love with it. I feel a teensy bit goofy because...normally I sort of hate crafty things. I sew, yes, but I don't muck about with yarn. I don't furiously knit during Town Meeting like all those new-agey homestead women do, comparing their unique stitches during lulls. Needle-felting is awesome for non-crafty people like myself. It basically entails stabbing some fluffy, raw wool with a special barbed needle a million times until it almost dreadlocks itself, and takes the shape of whatever you're trying to create. Personally, I'd say a craft project that allows someone to repeatedly jab something with a needle is right up my alley. Therapeutic and addictive. I was cranking out the needle felted gnomes left and right. And Eli has been helping me. I made myself carsick on the way to Lebanon today just so I could keep on poking at a pointy, red gnome hat. Try it. Not the carsick part, the needle felting part. And if you have some secret Voodoo Doll fantasy, you can kill two birds with one stone. How cool is that?

Pinkeye

2011-02-17T08:17:00.000-08:00

Came down with some gunky eye infection yesterday. Not sure if it's Pinkeye or something I picked up from the aged make-up that I wore the other night. I wear it so rarely, I should just buy new when I do. Either way, it's gross in the extreme. Waiting for my doctor to call me back. I was just saying to someone how it kind of creeps me out that she's younger than me. That sort of thing has been happening more and more often lately. Sometimes I want to say, "Hey! Why should I listen to you? You were still in diapers while I was off riding my bike!" But then, I suppose she could say, "You were still a ski bum while I was off in medical school!" It's all relative.

I don't have any pictures to show you today, because trust me, you don't want to see this. My left eye is all swollen shut and puss filled. There, that graphic enough? I feel...really sickened looking at it. Otherwise, I feel peachy. I guess I'm vainer than I thought, because no way am I stepping a foot out of this house until I look human again. Not complaining though, we haven't been sick once this winter, really. I can put up with a little Bride-Of-Frankenstein squint-eye, if it means nothing else. The real reason I'm bummed is, last night I ordered Justin to hide the monster bag of Hershey's Kisses from me AND HE DID IT. Jerk. I can't find them anywhere. But I can still see the sun shining! Spring's coming! Chickadees have been all in a tizzy the last few days. They are so adorable and chubby and full of personality. So happy looking.

Anyway, off now, hope everyone's enjoying the last of the winter before the sap and mud start flowing. I am so looking forward to both those things. And looking forward to my tear ducts drying up at the same time.

Valentine's Day

2011-02-14T09:00:00.000-08:00

I stole this pic from my friend Sarah. Awesome and slightly offensive. The way a valentine shoud be. Valentine's Day. Didn't really get much play this year. I snagged some candy for the kids as an afterthought yesterday. It was a busy weekend and Justin has a beard so...

The Internet all morning has been peppered with stories of people that fell in love at Home Depot and what-not. And that crazy story about the twelve year old girl who was eating those candy hearts made of chalk, with the cutesy little messages on them, and you know how there's an 'adult' version of those things? The factory must have mixed up, because she got one that said "Nice tits" so her mother is suing. I mean, come on, she's twelve, she's heard worse. It's not super great or anything, but I'm willing to bet she isn't actually scarred for life. Gotta love America, huh? I should sue because there was no warning on reading the story. Now the word 'tits' is burned into my brain and I require immediate therapy. Cripes. And YOU can sue ME because I didn't warn you, etc, etc, etc.

Anyhow, a busy day...teaching a Swing class at school, then we head to riding lessons, then I teach Zumba this evening, for ladies whose husbands also have beards and aren't staying home instead. Hope everyone has a lovely day. Warm and windy here. Sap should be thinking about thawing in a couple weeks, can't wait! Later all!

Dresses.

2011-02-09T17:52:00.000-08:00

Grammy Sammy just called me, to make sure I got the boxes she left on my porch a couple days ago. It's she and Grampa's wedding anniversary today, awwwww. I did indeed get the boxes, with 70's fabric scraps peeking out of the dog-eared cardboard flaps, getting me rather excited as I lugged them into the dining room and dove in. Hellooooooo orange polyester! A time capsule! The dress Gram wore to MY parent's wedding, flowered in blue, yellow and white...I've seen it in pictures a thousand times. A black and blue, off the shoulder, puffed sleeved, full skirted gypsy frock, far older than I am. An eyelet dream in white, to the floor, empire waisted. An emerald green silk that wears like a second skin. And my favorite, a sheer white swing dress with pink flowers that twirls up in a perfect circle when I spin, that I plan on wearing to the Valentine's Cabaret this weekend. It's so 50's and classic, I feel lovely wearing it, and I love that Gram wore it too. I'm sure she danced in it, who could not?

When I think about my clothes, I'd say my relatives played the biggest role in any sense of style I might have, what I think is fashionable and what isn't...Both my parents have sisters, sisters up the wazoo actually. My Aunties were my idols growing up, they were all so pretty, with long straight hair, parted in the middle, big sunglasses, and they dressed like nobody's business. I'd say that every one of them was almost exactly the same size as me from the 1960's through the 1980's and some of them were serious pack rats. YES! And they really were pretty snazzy dressers. Still are. That makes for heavenly hand-me-downs, in my eyes. My favorite jeans were Aunt Dorie's when she was in high school, I could stare at my own butt in them all day long...why don't they make those anymore?! Dozens of my long, cotton summer dresses went to some groovy dance before they became mine, I had my wedding gown made from Aunt Deb's prom dress pattern, and when she sold her motorcycle, I got some kick-ass leather pants out of the deal. Their taste became my taste, no matter what year it is NOW, that's the stuff that I want to wear. Fits me, costs zip, most of it was made by someone I love, and if I can look half as good as they did...well, that's like, groovy man.

Cups

2011-02-08T10:05:00.000-08:00

When you're just plain pissed off, and you slam the dishwasher door real hard to hear the satisfying sound of a glass breaking...you still have to clean it up in the end. Moral of the story: Don't get mad. And if you do, don't break something that makes a mess. Break something like a cookie, so the dog will just come along and eat it later.

Not meaning to write about my dad, yet again, but I think I'm turning into him. The cup thing. That was always Dad's anger release when I was a kid. He'd bang his coffee cup down on the table, and the handle would bust. We had many handle-less mugs in our house. I don't drink coffee, good thing, huh? Tea, yes, but not to the point where there's a cup in my hand all the time, ready to slam at a moment's notice.

Maybe, in China, the people are so grouchy, they leave off the handles in the first place?

The Reason Why

2011-02-03T06:20:00.000-08:00

When my son canters on a horse, I bite my nails. When the kids dig an igloo in the snow, I worry it will collapse. When I'm in a crowded room, I unconsciously look for the closest escape route. I hate flying. There's a reason why I'm a bit of a paranoid person. And I know the exact moment it happened. Didn't take any therapy to figure out that a combo of my mother's continual anxiety and one particular incident have made me the way I am. If it hadn't happened, and I had half of each my parent's temperaments, I might be a well rounded person, because Dad is just the opposite of Mom. He doesn't worry. At all. "You guys want to slide off the barn roof? Go for it! It'll join you after I finish melting scrap lead into bullets on the kitchen stove." This is a sad story, or maybe a funny story, depending on how you look at it. Funny in that, one tiny thing can screw you up good. All it takes is a few minutes and life will be different.

I went to first grade. Home schooled ever after that, but in the beginning, I went to first grade. I was the youngest in the class, with my birthday falling on September first. All was well, I made friends, loved writing in my little wallpaper-bound journal, loved putting on class plays, loved to draw. A few weeks went by happily.

There was a boy in my class, Michael Hawthorne...I still despise the name Michael, it took years to call my father-in-law by it without a shudder. (And probably Michael is a delightful person these days, with kids of his own even. Michael, if you are somehow reading this, I forgive you, you were six, but man, you messed me up bigtime.)

Anyway, Michael was the class bully, and I was the smallest, making me an easy target. Mostly it was normal bullying stuff, shoving me in the lunch line, chasing me on the playground, the usual...Cooties and what-not. My girlfriends and I would plot against him in secret under the slide, it was almost fun, in that nah, nah, nah-nah nah, boys-against-girls way that kids seem to enjoy so much.

One day, I had gone into the bathroom which doubled as a storage closet for the painting supplies. The bathroom door had a hook and eye latch on the OUTSIDE as well as on the inside, for whatever reason. I think I remember the door would swing wide open if it was unlatched, out into the reading corner. Plus a first grader's bathroom usually smells like pee. Anyway, point is, I was in the bathroom, and it had a latch on the outside. I had been balancing precariously on the giant toilet with my toes dangling many inches off the linoleum, when a loud alarm started blaring. I heard yells of "Fire drill!" Didn't know really what that meant, only that I'd better get the heck out of there. I hopped off and was hustling my Strawberry Shortcake panties back up when I heard, faintly, over the clanging, the metal snitch of the hook and eye (Michael's doing, I found out later) as the class exited the room. I banged on the door and screamed, but there was too much noise and excitement, they were soon gone, and I was locked in.

In my mind, I was trapped in a burning building. I pounded and clawed at the crack in the door door until my fingers bled, trying to wiggle loose the latch. Heart racing, cold all over. Sure I could smell the smoke, feel the flames reaching for me. Crying so hard. I wanted my parent's to magically appear and scoop me out of there forever. Finally became strangely calm. Or maybe it was some form of shock. I curled up in the corner, on those speckled orange and avocado tiles, arms wrapped tight around my shaking, skinny knees, and waited. Wondering what it would feel like, that last hot breath. Maybe this sounds too dramatic, but I honestly didn't know about fire drills, only fires, I was just a baby with a fertile imagination and this scared the life out of me.

When they found me, they laughed at me and I was scolded about the scarred door and the blood on my dress. What a silly little girl. Why didn't I hurry and get in line with the other children? And it was only 15 minutes. (Why hadn't the, excuse my french, FUCKING teacher counted us? Is what I wonder.) These days she'd have a dandy lawsuit on her hands, but back then, I got in trouble. Not her. Dear Michael had to give me a phony apology which included sticking his tongue out at me as soon as Mrs. Hatch turned away, which was instantly. I'm sure she never thought of it again.

So, that's that. I feel like I was never a real child after, never trusting. Always afraid of something. My mother would get so frustrated with me, after being potty trained for years, when the school bus would drop me off at the bottom of our long, steep, icy driveway, in the dead of winter, I'd slip and fall halfway up, and wet my pants, sliding back down to the bottom in a soggy, teary heap with my lunchbox and backpack crumpled under me. Nearly every day. I never went in the school bathroom again. And I stopped sleeping with my favorite stuffed animals, stopped reading my favorite books, but kept them packed in a bag hanging off my bed so I could it grab quick, in the night, in case of fire. Never told anybody about any of this. The way that woman had been half angry, half scornful, made me think I was stupid. I've been working my whole life to erase the crazy, unreasonable fear...of everything.

Something I miss.

2011-01-28T08:09:00.000-08:00

Before kids, (and I'm not in any way saying that before kids was better, OK? Just 'before') we used to have time to do stuff that we wanted. Stuff that we had no reason to do, other than we just wanted to. Unheard of now. One of the things I miss the most was being at the lake on the weekends. I miss taking a long, sunset, cocktail cruise with Matty around Lake Groton, Patsy Cline playing on the ski boat stereo. Miss it a lot. What a way to wrap up a perfect summer's day of grilling sausage, laughing, with our feet propped up on the porch railing, and floating lazily in tubes, my fingers trailing in the water. Every weekend, before kids, if there wasn't a wedding or something else taking up our time, that's where we were. I miss life being slow. I miss decorating a boat for the 4th of July parade. I miss the rocking chairs and the loons. I miss being the spotter when somebody skied, getting my hair whipped all over the place. I miss watching people fishing from the dock, and playing croquet on the lawn. I miss the rattle of ice in Matt's Jack & Coke. I miss Alan, the jovial neighbor from the camp next door, always ready to lend a kayak, sometimes he mowed his own lawn, and then he'd come over and keep right on mowing. He's gone now. Took his own life. Don't understand it. I miss a million things. The battered tin coffee pot in the front garden with geraniums planted in it, the outhouse with the rubber rat perched next to the toilet seat, the smell of campfires, the way sound travels over water. It's silly, February right now and I've got a list as long as your arm to get done today, but this blue, blue sky is taking me somewhere else.

Fractions

2011-01-26T12:34:00.001-08:00

Back when I was Christmas shopping, and I don't do a lot of Christmas shopping right before Christmas, I like to get it done by September if I can help it, but none the less, it was a couple weeks before Christmas and I was waiting on line somewhere, in front of a lady who was holding the same size socks as I was. And as ladies who notice they both are holding kid's socks in the same sizes often do, we started chatting about our children. She told me that her little girl, who was the same age as Eli, was doing fractions already and "She just loves them!" Now you tell me, what six year old "just loves" fractions? That's plain weird.

I didn't say it to her, of course, but in this case, I really I think I've got bragging rights. My kids know about the important things in life, like clinking your boots together before you swing your feet into a car, and what it means when the cows are lying down, and all the words to "Over The River And Through The Woods." They know if they want a half an apple or the entire thing. (There's fractions right there.) They can put on their own snowshoes, and they take turns feeding the dog. They know about jump starting the lawn tractor. They can name trees and tracks and birds when we walk. They give really, really great hugs. They want to see everything, do everything, ask a million questions about anything they overhear. I'm not worried that they don't "simply adore" math, or aren't pushing to read faster. They love life, the whole darn thing, not just a fraction.

Kitten Day

2011-01-26T06:24:00.000-08:00

Everybody always asks what your first memory is. Like it means everything in the world.. Maybe it does, I don't know. I've got snippets, bits and pieces I can remember, almost like pictures, could be I AM just remembering a picture, not the memory, who's to say? But my first whole, real memory, one where we don't have any photos, so I know I'm not cheating, was the Kitten Day.

The neighbor's place was big and expensive. One of those rich, fake farms. Despite the drastic difference in our family's incomes, I was best friends with their youngest daughter Allie. Anyway, their rich, albeit unspayed, cat had a litter of free kittens, hence my memory.

Dad had just gotten up, he worked nights at a machine shop, and even though he must have been tired, he usually woke up in the mornings with the rest of us, and pretty much worked all day too. It was a beautiful, warm day. Dad and I walked down the road, hand in hand...I remember how big his hands were, even though mine could wrap around one of his fingers, he held my hand carefully, the real hand-holding way, not the baby way. I was thinking that I was a big kid, going for a walk with my dad and I didn't have to hold his hand the baby way anymore. At the neighbor's barn he let me climb up a ladder to a small hay mow, when my head could look over the edge, I stopped, and he stood on the ladder in back of me with his arms on either side so I couldn't fall. There was bright, loose hay scattered on the floor, right at the level of my nose and it tickled and got in my hair. Just the same color. Morning sunlight streamed through cracks in the walls and everything was golden and glowing. A mama cat came over, purring, and pushed her cheek hard against my cheek, almost knocking me over. I laughed, but didn't dare let go of the ladder rungs. Dad reached around me, and out of the hay, he lifted up a tiny, yellow kitten, with darker yellow stripes and a white bib, it's eyes still closed tight. He set it in front of me, and the mama cat briskly tumbled it over on it's side and started to wash it. Dad lifted up another yellow kitten, lighter than the first, and then a grey one, maybe two gray ones? And a black? I can't quite recall. "Pick two" he said. "They can't come home yet, they need to stay with their mama some longer, but let's pick one for you, and one for your sister." I picked the two that were like that day. All gold, and soft and sweet smelling.

White Trash

2011-01-26T05:31:00.000-08:00

Dropping off a bag of clothes at a Salvation Army, I noticed a pair of white, spikey heels, rather 50's styled...or maybe 80's...cute anyway, and size six. So I scooped them up and headed for the counter. While I was fishing out my $2.25, the lady behind the register said, very conversationally and nodding her head in a friendly way, "Yeah, the white trash look is really in right now." I wasn't sure if she was referring to my purchase, whatever I happened to be wearing that day, or just making a general observation. My intelligent reply was "Huh." I paid her and left, not knowing if I should have laughed, or given her the finger, not that I'm a giving-the-finger kind of girl. Normally I would come up with some sass-mouth comment, but I just couldn't figure out her angle. I still wonder what she meant.

Sometimes I think about what being White Trash is. It's obviously about being white, and for the most part, I am that. But the rest? Is it about being poor? Being stupid? Swearing a lot? Eating a bag of pork rinds for breakfast? What's the criteria? At my Gram's recently for a family dinner, she slapped a paper plate of rolls in my hand and told me to "Pop those in the Nuke Box for a coupler minutes" and I guess I never paid much attention to it before, but her microwave has got to be one of the first microwaves ever made, taking up four square feet of space and had a bag of Wonder Bread stuffed on top. I could curl up in that sucker. As I yanked it open by it's big ol' handle, I knew that there was a log of bologna, an actual LOG, and a big jar of mayo in the 'frige right next to me. The Wonder bread was in good company. I got a sneaky suspicion, then and there, that I truly was White Trash. So I guess it's different for everybody. For some people it's about your grandmother's kitchen and how she adds random r's to words and you understand perfectly what she means, for other's it's about how old you are when you have your first kid multiplied by how many wheels are under your house, and for some it's about playing pool in a bar with a Dale Earnhardt shrine in the corner. If you are going to label me just because I like to make out listening to Willie Nelson, I might as well throw in the towel and admit it. It seems White Trash is defined either by what you say, where you live, how you look, what you do for fun, or what you eat. I, myself, don't like pork rinds, but once in a great while, standing next to one hell of a giant-ass nuke box, get a craving for a bologna sandwich, with mayo, on Wonder bread, with one of those little, peel back, prepackaged, cheese slices, the kind my kids have never even seen before. If you know that about me, you know who I really am. And I'd be wearing those shoes when I ate it.

(unimportant pet peeve)

2010-12-31T09:16:00.001-08:00

I don't know why this annoys me, it just does....everyday at noon, a lady jogs by soooooo slowly that I want to pop out of the house in a gorilla suit and chase her so she'll go faster. I mean, whatever, she's moving, that's great and all, I should be happy, but every time I see her, that's what I think. Gorilla suit, pronto.

Shit MY Dad Says, Decoded.

2010-12-30T17:53:00.000-08:00

I occasionally check out this website called "Shit My Dad Says"...it's by this guy who lives with his elderly father and writes down one thing his dad says every day. It makes me laugh, although in all honesty, some of it is far less entertaining than shit my dad says. It's more the WAY he say things rather than what, and I suppose most of what my father says isn't terribly original, but it got me thinking about all the sayings I've heard from him my whole life...and how many I could pull up on the spur of the moment. I thought I'd test myself and see. Here goes:

1.) "Get your head out of your ass" (This one's pretty self explanatory I would say.)

2.) "She fell ass over teakettle" (Meaning someone, usually a "She", took an ungraceful spill to the amusement of all.)

3.) "They don't know their ass from their elbow" (Or armpit, or hole in the ground, I've heard all three equally, meaning that somebody doesn't know what they are doing/talking about. Duh.)

4.) "More (insert any noun here) than you can shake a stick at." (A lot of something.)

5.) "Howdy-Ho!" (Hello.)

6.) "B'God!" (An expression similar to "Darn tootin'!", usually used to drive some point home.)

7.) "Jesus H Christ!" (Wonderment or anger depending on the tone. I have no idea what the H stands for.)

8.) "Shit on a shingle." (Poor quality.)

9.) (Winking while my mother takes one tiny swig of beer) "Hey, maybe I'll get lucky tonight!?" To which Mom rolls her eyes and says "You got lucky LAST night." (Dear God! We children run screaming from the room covering our ears.)

10.) "Didn't he marry so-in-so's father-in-law's sister? The one with the nasty teeth?" (Genealogy research.)

11.) "Atta boy!" (Whether or not you are actually a boy, expression of praise.)

12.) "Gotta love it." (More happiness talk.)

13.) "Hold my beer and watch this." (Stolen from some comedian, meaning he's about to do something dumb, on purpose.)

14.) "Shitabitch!" (Stolen from my mom...we all say this actually, it's a proud, original, family curse.)

15.) "More power to ya." (You go right ahead, good luck with that, heh heh.)

16.) "Up Shit Creek without a paddle." (No chance in hell.)

17.) "Smarten up." (More polite version of "Get your head out of your ass.")

18.) "He/she can't find their way out of a wet paper bag." (Bad at directions and plain stupid in general.)

19.) "Pull my finger." (Don't.)

20.) "Pass the salt." (Immediately followed by his own response to himself...) "You want salt? I'll give you salt!" (A dinner tradition.)

21.) "Shit or get off the pot." (I think everyone's dad says this.)

22.) "A real corker." (Unique/great.)

23.) "Don'tcha know." (Got it?)

24.) "Yer slayin' me." (While laughing very hard.)

25.) "Frickin' cats." (Not a fan.)

Just a brief vocab lesson for you, I won't even try to decipher his jokes.

Jelly & Dexter

2010-12-17T19:53:00.000-08:00

We've thought about getting horses for years, it just never seemed that feasible, what with our 1.3 acres or whatever it is. But the boys were getting very interested in riding/cowboys/animals in general so we rethought the idea and came up with a solution. MINIS! Mini horses for our mini back 40. Wanted to find something that the kids could ride (for a year or so anyway) that was also a pet, something that could help all get us used to the daily routines that come with owning a high maintenance critter, but that involved little or no danger. In a year, after we're accustomed to the workload, maybe we'll get a regular sized horse, since I like to ride too and Eli's legs get longer every night. We shopped around a lot in the last couple of months, and in the end, lucked into our two tiny friends. Jelly is an 11 year old ex-petting zoo/pony ride pony that is very gentle and extremely fat...she goes on a diet immediately. Comes from being fed handfuls of grain by adoring children for years. Seriously, she's so fat that, even though she's nobody's mama, we started telling 'Your Mama's So Fat' jokes about her. Dexter's 4, originally belonged to one of the kid's teachers. Her girls got too big for him and she sold him to my Uncle Roger to be a companion for his old draft horse. Rog only had him a couple of months before, sadly, they had to have their draft put down. Knowing we were looking for a second pony, they gave him to us. Justin built two scaled-down box stalls in the barn, and the ponies seem to be getting along. Dexter is definitely more of a puppy dog, comes running whenever anyone goes outside, follows us everywhere, plays with Captain... and Jelly is more of a horsey horse, wily about being caught unless it involves treats and kicks the dog if he's a pest. The kids have ridden them around bareback a bit, we haven't worked with them too much yet, I think we'll just give them some time to get settled first. Justin is hoping to break them to drive in the spring so that we won't actually "outgrow" them. Our place is sort of feeling more like a farm now. Next up: an ostrich. Just kidding mom. Maybe they make mini ostriches.

Good Things

2010-12-15T06:21:00.001-08:00

Yup, we got the boys ponies for Christmas (we must be insane) but only one is here so far...I'll do a post about that later on, but for now, I thought I'd try to head off any seasonal depression (which hasn't been nearly as bad in recent years due to dance and changing my way of thinking) with a list of all the things that I'm looking forward to this winter! Corny, but it works for me.

-Holiday time! Adore Christmas. Love the smells, love my family...really looking forward to hugging everyone and eating the crazy, random things that Grammy Sammy dips in chocolate.

-Dance class in the nice, big, warm gym. So thankful the school is letting me use it.

-My good friend Jana (and E's riding trainer) will be back from Germany where she's been visiting her family for the last month. We've missed her so much!

-Other friends will be home for the holidays.

-Skiing! It's been a long time since one of us didn't have to pull a baby around in a sled while the other one made a run...ALL of us will be on the hill this year, I hope!

-Skating! I wish we had our our pond, but the Tunbridge rink is amazing, with daily smoothed ice and lights. Yay rink gnomes!

-Oliver's Birthday, Jen's Birthday, lots of get-togethers in our little clan.

-White, fluffy snow with two ponies & a pup to frolic with in the backyard. Boys were sledding last night and Dexter was already loving it...he'd climb to the top of their hill and sniff the sled, then he'd race the kids down on the other side.

-Cozy times in by the woodstove with books and tea.

-Snowshoing with my parents over at camp.

-Projects. Can't wait to get some work done on our house.

-Valentine's Day and all those other pointless excuses to have tiny parties for no reason.

-Sugaring Season, I love the work, I love the steamy, late nights, I love the whole time....even though I'll never love Maple Syrup.

-Rosy cheeks on my babies.

-Never having to worry about what to wear...wool socks, long johns, jeans, turtleneck, sweater, boots. Done. No thinking or fashion required.

-The sounds the river makes when it's chortling along under the ice.

-Soup and stew and chili.

-The feeling, more than ever, of being isolated from the rest of the world. Some people don't like that feeling but I, even though I don't use my blog as a place to express it, get entirely fed up and angry and scared about the way things are going and sometimes it's nice to forget about it for a while, to feel cocooned in Vermont by blizzards and no TV reception. Ignorance is not bliss, no, but a break from political rubbish saves my sanity.

-Extra quilts on the beds.

-Glorious frost patterns on the windows every morning.

-The boys go to sleep earlier.

-I don't really have to bother with shaving my legs.

-Avocados and oranges are on sale!

-I have more time to write.

-People look super adorable when their noses are red.

-Since I'm stuck inside more often, there's no excuse for not keeping the house tidy...a good thing because I hate it messy, but in summer I'm too lazy/busy to bother.

-We are more likely to use candles at dinner.

-Time seems to move slower, a blessing these days when I'm sad about how fast my kids are growing.

-My children can both dress themselves now...no more hour long wrestle to get them into snowsuits, only to hear, five minutes after they go out, "I'm cold!"..."I have to pee!"

-Stirring hot chocolate with leftover candy canes.

-We have a new furnace.

-Most of the pipes in the house that could burst already did last year, so we should be set with that.

-Shoveling makes my tummy tight.

-No lawn to mow.

-I sorted out a year's worth of unmatched socks recently, including all the really warm ones.

-I own four pairs of fur boots. Maybe that sounds like a lot to some people, maybe not enough to others. But four pairs of fur boots are the exact right amount of fur boots for me to own.

So, that's that. Sappy but necessary list of winter good things. I'll remind myself to look at it when the roads are icy and the kids have their seventh cold.

Because November Always Feels Sad To Me.

2010-12-06T13:10:00.000-08:00

Every few days, when I drive South down RT 110, I pass this little farm, close to the road, nothing fancy. Very plain and UN-fancy in fact. What appears to be vague untidiness to the untrained eye is, in actuality, simply many years worth of I-Just-Might-Need-That-Someday. Cats lounge on the crooked stoop, and bask all over the dooryard. An old farmer lives there, I forget his name now. In December, balsam trees for sale line his porch railing, occasionally we've bought a Christmas wreath from him. Locals will know who I mean. He has a certain look about him...slight but strong, gaunt cheeks, lined face on which perches thick, horn-rimmed glasses. (Are they actually left over from the 40's? Where does one even buy such things nowadays?!?) In winter he wears a wool flap hat with grey hair bristling out underneath, and a checkered, moth-eaten, Johnson Woolen Mills coat. Summer, even the hottest August days, will find him in a long sleeved, flannel shirt. Tilling his huge garden, working outside every minute, no matter the weather, he is more Vermont than Vermont is. When I picture him in my mind, I always see him in black and white just because he seems so timeless. Daily, as I'd pass, I'd look for him driving his tractor, so ancient that it's unbelievable that he even uses it for work when the only others of it's kind are paraded down the middle of town by collectors on Memorial Day, or chopping firewood, or letting his tiny herd of bony cows out to pasture. I'd think, "When I have more time, I need to stop and photograph this man." The way he moves, slow, but with purpose, the way he runs his gnarled hands lovingly over machinery, swings an ax through cord after cord even though it seems a light breeze could blow him over, strokes the spine of an elderly Jersey...he reminds me of my Great Grampa Gray and every old Vermonter rolled into one stubborn, whithered body. For ages, I've been reminding myself to try and capture this fleeting New England strength on film, never was there a more perfect subject, classic and strangely beautiful...iconic. As the months rolled by and other things took priority, years slipped away while I always put it off as a thing to do "some other time". And then, a while back, as I drove by, I saw the farmer, standing in the spot his tractor was usually parked. A shiny, out of state truck with a flatbed trailer behind it was pulling out, with the antique secured carefully on board. The way the man's hands were stuffed, too deep in his pockets and the slump of his shoulders that, despite his years, had never been there before, told the whole story. I felt like stopping on the side of the road, and sobbing, so tangible was his loss. Maybe it's silly to think a man's heart and soul could be broken this way, but it seems it wasn't the only change. At night, there used to be a warm, yellow glow spilling from the cracked windows of his ramshackle barn where he'd be busy with the evening milking. People would come, and he'd fill whatever bottle they'd bring with fresh, raw milk for a couple of bucks. Although I can't imagine there was ever very much, the rest would be picked up by the regular milk truck. These days, the barn sits cold and dark, and for the first time ever, in my memory, a blue, flickering flash from a television set can be seen in the farmhouse window. It feels like defeat, like age, like grief. A man, I'd only spoke to a couple times really, letting go of all he's ever known or probably wanted. I like to think he was happy in his simple life, happy to serve his purpose, and I mistakenly assumed he would go on forever. Picturing him, sitting in the half-light with his tired, work-worn hands folded on his lap, staring blankly at reality TV and other things he can't possibly care about, so great is his love for his farm, always gets inside of me, aching deep down, right to the very core where my real Vermont self is hiding. The unfairness of aging, rural destruction and poverty combined. A helpless, hopeless sadness of losing a way of life. And perhaps I am sentimentally projecting feelings on him that weren't there...maybe this man who once drove his cows down the springtime river valley in the dusk, when the lilacs scented the banks, and the whippoorwill was calling goodnight, maybe he truly DOES want to sit inside with his re-runs. I'll never have those photographs to match this blog post, I wish, more than ever, my camera had recorded the way it was. What is a picture worth again? Is this anywhere near a thousand words yet? Because, in my regret, those pictures would have been worth far more.

October

2010-11-13T15:58:00.001-08:00

Hmmmm... it's already November, but I thought I do a quick post on last month. The Fall flew by so fast, I can barely believe it. Tamera's wedding, school events, getting in firewood, dance classes, etc, etc, etc. I stalled about dealing with my pinched nerve for three months and it actually finally seems a bit better...not all the way, but I have some feeling back in my arm and hand again. We never ended up going to the Island one last time so I guess we'll just keep our fingers crossed that the cabin will be OK until Spring. Sad, but there just wasn't time. I don't even remember all that went on last month. Stuff. Lots of stuff. And November has brought even more. Yawn. To bed.

Horse, horses, horses.

2010-10-15T06:25:00.000-07:00

Having a bit of a re-occurrence of that horse craze from childhood. Lucky for me, Eli is more than obsessed as well. He and I have even walked around our own barn lately, dreaming of remodeling to fit some box stalls. E is loving his riding lessons...he's so cute and serious when he's listening to his trainer. These Icelandic horses are the perfect match for him, small, strong, and mellow. They are bombproof and affectionate to the tiny kidlets, and full of spirit in the show ring. In fact, they are so mellow and understanding as a breed, I feel no fear around them. This is awesome as I've been attempting to get over my intimidation for about 12 years now, since we worked on that dude ranch the year before we got married. I went from riding every single day, for six months, in all weather, to a very fearful rider.

I can't say exactly where things went sour in that time, only it was the rule to give the paying guests the well behaved horses and ride the rotten ones ourselves. The rotten ones were usually horses we had no idea where they came from, probably abused, only half broke...cheap. It was tricky, getting trailer loads of horses, with no background information, to try and figure our their stories. NOBODY wanted to be the first to test drive the monthly newcomers. And our boss really didn't treat them very well either, so it wasn't their fault, a lot of unfortunate events led to some of them being nasty but you can only get bit, kicked, bucked and thrown so many times before the whole thing just isn't so fun anymore. I guess I started to expect that the horse would hurt me and I was always tense, waiting for some mean trick. Obviously there were some wonderful horses too, but I only got to ride those in a slow week when they needed exercise which wasn't all that often. And usually when we rode one for exercise alone, we'd have to lead another, possibly a naughty one, who would nip at the one you were riding the entire time and wreck any enjoyment that might have been had otherwise.

I remember one sweet mare named Ruth that was so gentle and careful with her riders. We always put little girls on her because she seemed so motherly to them in a weird way that I can't really explain. She never buddied up with any other horse in the pasture, only grazed quietly or dozed alone in the sun. But when a family with kids signed up for a trail ride, she would come alive and nuzzle the children when they pet her and, I swear, her big horsey eyes would just shine. We always thought that maybe she had come from a home with a little girl and really missed her. She was older, not OLD, but older. The deal at the ranch was, if the boss could get a good profit on a horse (which was pretty easy since they were bought for nearly nothing, hence the many bad eggs) he would sell it if someone was interested. A family with a nine year old girl came and rode one day, naturally we paired the girl up with Ruth and they fell in love. The parents came back the next day to ask about buying her. Our boss (the jerk, I'll never forgive him for all this) was bragging about how wonderful and safe Ruth was, and talking about how he trained her himself (which was a crock, he never saw her before that summer) and telling them that her asking price was...I don't remember, but it was an insanely high amount for a grade horse that he paid seriously less than $100 for. Ruth had been standing in the corral, half asleep with her back to us this whole conversation. I guess to prove how sweet she was, our boss ran full tilt at her and vaulted onto her back. (He always acted like he was the swaggering star in some cheesy Western. He taught us all to rope things from horseback to impress the guests...he had issues. His dog, Colorado, peed on, or humped everyone's legs. I consider that a direct result of his owner's gross personality.) Anyway, of course Ruth bolted and tossed him off. She was basically just attacked from behind while asleep in the warm sun, what horse wouldn't react the same way?! The people who were looking at her were either scared away because they truly didn't know that much about horses, or disturbed by Boss/Jerk's attitude so Ruth's chance at a loving home was ruined. All the horses got shipped back to auction yards at the end of the summer, and who knows if they fared better at their next ranch/camp/farm. I've often thought of her and wondered what happened to her, along with a few other of my favorites.

We wished we had the money and space to save Spanky (clownish, white, smaller horse who was always my pick, if the choice was mine, probably a cow pony, lots of tricks but more goofy than bad...we got along well), Ruth (the aforementioned big, brown who-knows-what with a heart of gold), King (very young, darling Paint, who would let you sit on him while laying down in the field, had poor or no eyesight in one eye but was still 100% trustworthy), Montana (Huge, gorgeous,glossy long-legged TB that must have been bought by mistake, never put a foot wrong, tricked the guests into thinking we were high class), Johnny-Bravo (Justin loved him, also expensive looking to the untrained eye), Kate (dainty maybe-Morgan mare that seemed to be perpetually in heat, but mostly lovely just the same), Franklin (ex circus pony that loved to jump), and Harley (Half Belgian, half Cobb?, his back was like a sofa). But there are several that I hope were made into dog food. No, I don't mean that, though I do remember curling up, sobbing, in the tack room because I got bucked onto the saddle horn by a Draft cross that was only broke to pull a plow, one too many times, and another group of dudes arriving when I was thinking I NEVER, NEVER wanted to see another horse as long as I lived.

So...after all that, it's nice to be around horses that have been raised lovingly by people that know what they are doing. Not to mention the entire stable is simply beautiful...far nicer than my house actually. The horses have a SAUNA for goodness sake. Kind of strange seeing the other side of the horse world. A far cry from my last horse experience. I feel like watching the kids ride, and having velvet muzzles carefully eat an apple slice out of my hand is a good place to start over, for now. I have a sneaking suspicion that a few weeks time may find me back in the saddle again. Ti Yi Yippie Yo.

Fair

2010-10-15T06:13:00.000-07:00

There are a million photos, as usual, on Flickr!

The Jumble In My House vs The Jumble In My Head

2010-09-28T12:52:00.001-07:00

Wow, July since I last posted! I'll try to put up Fair pictures and Fall pictures soon, but I thought I'd just drop in quickly and let everyone know that I haven't exactly forgotten about this blog, it's just so incredibly busy, I can't really find the time for it lately. School started smoothly, with me bringing the boys and Av to and from everyday, but just last week, the littlest started to panic about being left and finally, today, we decided he was just too young for the class quite yet. A bit of a drag because I was about to commit to some dance blocks at a couple local schools and now my plans have switched back to "Stay At Home Mom". Ah well. C'est La Vie.

Awesomely, the kids somehow have escaped every cold and bug that got passed around as the school year began. I, on the other hand, have had a pinched nerve in my neck or shoulder that renders my right arm nearly useless for the last two months. Waiting for our insurance to OK the MRI and other testing before some sort of action can be taken. A real drag since I have had no feeling in my thumb and can hardly sign my name. Makes daily wrestling with the three kiddos rather tricky. And all those car seat buckles almost impossible! And even more fun, I have a Bartholin Cyst. I won't even explain this one, trust me, you don't want to know. It gives me the heebie jeebies just thinking about it. A really, really painful, gross, girl thing and I'm having surgery on it tomorrow. Dancing has aggravated it horribly...just UUUUGGGHHHH. I'm going to barf if I talk about it anymore. And so will you.

Tamera's wedding looms closer and the need to finish cutting and stacking firewood is getting more desperate, not to mention all the winterizing that still needs to happen on our house. To the chagrin of many of my dancers, I've taken Tuesday and Friday evenings off for a while so we can get something done before snow falls. I hate to disappoint people but we HAVE to have some free time for us or else we'll be in real trouble soon! I organized an Art In The Park fundraiser for the kid's school a few weeks back that was a success so I am feeling pretty good about that, but now it's the big push to scavenge donations for their biggest yearly fundraiser, a holiday themed silent auction and being on yet another committee is making me stressed out at the moment. Plus we clean the school once a month which somehow always seems to fall on a weekend that's already overbooked... And now, suddenly, my phone is ringing off the hook for Senior Portraits to be done. I don't want to turn away business, especially when we need the money, but WHEN?! There is no time left in the day!

OK, sorry! I'm not meaning to go off on a cranky rants. Myra says I'm a negative person lately, and I can't say no to anyone and that's why I'm unhappy. But I'm NOT unhappy, only overbooked and telling it like it is. And I'm not meaning to single out the negative in the last couple of weeks, it just takes center stage sometimes. I DO have a problem saying no, but it seems like it's always a situation where if you said no, you'd have to be the World's Biggest Ass. Like a teacher/friend called asking me to substitute for her art class because her mother DIED and she's going to her family. Do I say "Hell no!"? No way, I don't have it in me. I felt like a jerk canceling my Hip Hop classes. There are a few kids who love it beyond ANYTHING and they were heartbroken. My normal rule of thumb is: I try to not say no when other people's uncomfort or needs outweigh my own, but I'm at a point where I would be sacrificing too much to keep those extra dance days going right now. Still, the guilt remains, and the pressure from dancer's parents.

I've always been proud of rarely letting people down...it's a foolish pride in always being The One To Pull Through, and I feel like a schmuck when I fail. It's idiotic of me, but often I wonder who I am and if it's the same as who I appear to be. And I see that I'm perceived as helpful, dependable and softhearted. And I worry that that's IT. If I fail, I'm nothing, nobody. I'll wake up in the middle of the night, remembering something I said I'd do, somebody I said I'd call, and I AGONIZE over it. An easy fix would be to simply never do anything for anybody but myself, for us... my family tells me to be more selfish, which truthfully, I guess, is a practical solution. Only I already feel selfish by refusing to give up who I think I am, and I just don't know how to stop. I'd fade away into that flaky person that I've always feared becoming.

In some areas, things are out of hand, like the fact that, depending on the situation, I always keep extra socks, hair ties, drinks, sports equipment, you name it, on hand for people that have forgotten theirs, I buy things based on who might need to borrow it at some point. When I thrift shop, I have seventeen different people in mind "Hmmmm, So-In-So could use this..."...Figure skates, snowboards, costumes, mittens, cake pans, tents, etc, etc, etc...we own these sorts of things in mass amounts of random sizes simply to lend. People have come to expect that if they need something, ANYTHING, that we will have it. My house is a disaster because of it, and yet I feel the overpowering need to turn no one away, disgruntled that Emily couldn't help them. When I photograph a stranger's wedding, I have an entire emergency kit of safety pins, hair clips, scissors, needle & thread, super glue, emery board, nail polish and breath mints in my camera bag for the bride WHO IS NOT MY RESPONSIBILITY, but I haven't yet met a pre-wedding-hysterical-bride (in the 60 something weddings I've done in the last few years) who hasn't needed something from me.

Deep down, I could never sit there and not help. On the other hand, I need to simplify and I suppose I need therapy. Trouble is: I KNOW what my problem is, and the way out, but haven't the energy to put the plan in action. After reading this post, I wonder if my accidental, passive-aggressive writing of this post will make people steer clear of favors from me. Not my intention, but why else would I write such a thing? Perhaps because our life has become too hectic to accommodate even our own basic needs? Perhaps because my journal sits buried under my underwear in a dresser drawer and my only outlet is this keyboard? Perhaps because if I write enough of my inner thoughts in a public forum, I'll become more than just a "dependable" person? Perhaps I'm just tired and wanting sympathy? Whatever reason, yes, I realize that I have self-esteem issues lurking under the be-everywhere-do-everything-keep-on-trucking-make-the-cut-let-no-one-down facade. So maybe, in the tradition not offering alcohol to an alcoholic, if you have something you need for a while, ask my sister.

home again, home again, jig, jig, jog

2010-07-30T08:02:00.000-07:00

Last week's trip to the Island was a little more eventful than usual, with Justin cutting off a foot and a half of hair, visiting friends, car dying, kids with colds, all the land around our cabin bought up by Buddhist Monks (except for the brand new biker campground, catering to Hell's Angels), mostly great weather, but some intense storms thrown in there, my near concussion by somehow slamming my head in a door, an exploding dryer in the coin laundry, etc, etc, etc. All in all, an awesome week...if you overlook the random not-so-awesome adventures. The car was the biggest issue, and the most icky, although everything turned out just fine.

It was late evening, after dinner, and we decided to drive to one of our favorite isolated beaches for a dusk walk before bed. Probably about 15 miles away. So we are in the middle of nowhere, near dark, and the car just stops. No cell service, nothing around except one long driveway, back a way, in the bushes. Justin leaves us in the car and hikes down to check it out. After nearly forty minutes, I panic a bit... The kids are starting to run fevers, it's crazily buggy out, plus my door doesn't lock and I don't want to leave the car that just happened to have both our laptops in it, not to mention cameras, passports, purse... No other cars pass this whole time. High tourist season my ass.

Anyway, Justin eventually returns with an elderly man named Ken, and a gas can. (Justin tells me later that after Ken and his wife opened the door, before he even said a word, they ask him if he had knocked for long because they were both deaf in one ear, and their cat was too. Since none of them can tell where a sound comes from, they all went to the wrong door first...they next proceeded to tell him that all white cats with blue eyes are deaf, but as Cookie has one blue eye, AND one green, he's only deaf on the one side. They open up the door and usher Justin [who still hasn't explained what he's doing there] inside and Ken asks him if he plays the fiddle. Fumbling around under the sofa, he draws out a violin case and shows Justin a fiddle he's made himself. Next comes the photo album of fishing boats he's built, and various woodworking projects over the years. Not that Justin didn't appreciate any of these things...in another situation he would have been delighted to talk shop with the guy but....)

Back at the car the gas does nothing. Justin and Ken head to the house to call a tow truck. We wait again before Justin, Ken and his wife, Rena return. The tow truck will be an hour at least so the couple invite us all up to the house. Once there, Rena beckons to me, "I have something to show you." Leaving the boys and comparative safety of the front yard behind, I follow her down a long, dark, twisting hallway. Before she turns the knob on what appears to be a bedroom door, she peers at me with a weird smile and says "What do you think of THIS?!" My heart is racing as she opens the door with a proud flourish. Dolls. THOUSANDS of them on every surface fill the entire room from floor to ceiling. There is a tiny path around the bed, but other than that, the dressers, bed, floor, shelves are piled with DOLLS. She starts to wander around saying hello to them...every one has a name and a story, and I hear quite a few... Some are wearing handmade cardboard and colored plastic sunglasses. She says that the light destroys the eyes on the vintage dolls, so she made most of the older ones special glasses, and keeps the shades drawn. At one point she picks up a doll dressed in a nun's habit and asks me if I'm Catholic. "Nooooooo" I say slowly, hoping not to offend her. "But of course you've heard of the Order Of St. Crisco?" she presses. I wanted to say "Oh sure." But luck was with me and my honestly won out. "No, I guess I haven't." She seems a bit shocked for a moment before breaking into a cackling laugh and flipping the doll upside down, revealing a can of cooking grease. "I BUILT HER ON AN EMPTY CRISCO TUB!" Whew! Starting to sweat now and praying to St. Crisco that the tow truck hurries the hell up. But you know what? A few more minutes, a few more stories, and I decide that I really like this crazy doll lady, and am rather disappointed when we hear the truck rumble in.

Since the kids and I don't fit into the tow truck, Ken and Rena offer to drive us home. Rena forces her husband to slow to a crawl in front of every house we pass, while she tells me who lives there, what they do and how they are related to her. Quite late, when we finally get back to our cabin, I light some candles and we exchange contact info. Rena's last name is HOWE! Totally strange! There are no Howe's anywhere on the Island, it's all McSomething or MacSomething. I fully intend to send them a doll or two for their kindness.

The car saga continues the next day when Justin and our friend John (who was luckily honeymooning nearby and came to our rescue) head over to the garage to figure out the problem. The little old man at the garage identifies the broken part in a heatbeat, and our luck continues when, out of the five cars rusting in the underbrush behind the shop, one happens to be the same as our car. The mechanic explains that somebody just left it there a couple years ago..."Dunno who, dunno why." Justin is welcome to take parts off it, free of charge, as long as he replaces them from a junkyard before we leave, in case the mysterious car owner ever returns. The man also hangs over Justin and John as they work, telling them story after story, and seeming terribly amused by their plight. So the car got fixed, John and Kate head home on the ferry, we got replacement parts the next day and put them back in the junker, while the 87 year old Panting Shore Garage mechanic tried to sell us a case of canned beef to bring home to Vermont, and that was the end of the car adventure.

Seriously, the locals there are so insane that it feels just like home. My other favorite Local encounter was when we were in the barber shop and Justin sat down in a chair between two burly fisherman (with buzz cuts, getting their hair cut even shorter) and took off his baseball cap, letting his Rapunzel mane tumble down his back. One fisherman started taking pictures with his cellphone, while the other one asked us if it wasn't scary "living in Vermont with all them poisonous snakes you got down there."

It was an amusing, mostly nice week. We had some other friends, with three kiddies, who were vacationing in Summerside, come spend the day with us and all the kids had a blast. We ate lots of good Island food...the new potatoes were incredible. We had dinner with our neighbors Ethan and Lila who informed us that Rena-Doll-Lady was their children's elementary teacher growing up. We took in a museum or two, did a whole lot of beach, mowed our lawn a couple of times, did the moonlight lighthouse tour (E's favorite), relaxed during the day, kids coughed during the night. I shut my head in the cabin door trying to get in before mosquitoes did, and had a monster headache for awhile...it's still sore. A wacky week. Missing the sound of the sea at night, but glad to be home. Every place gets compared to home, not really fair, I know, because no other place will ever win. Even our home away from home. How lucky I am. Poisonous snakes and all.

My computer is being slow so pics are all on my flickr page. http://www.flickr.com/photos/48439883@N00/

Daisies

2010-07-09T08:25:00.000-07:00

When the garbage truck swerved
Into my lane,
I was thinking of daisies,
And how they lay thick
In the ditches.
Dainty swath of white,
As if someone drew a finger
Down through a puddle of lace.
I hadn't a thought of how Life depends
On the carelessness of a CD change,
Or the lighting of a cigarette.
The balance hanging, every second,
In the hands of strangers.
To save myself,
I yanked the wheel to the right, and mowed
Down several feet of daisies
Nodding their heads cheerfully
By the wayside.
Those innocents
Crushed into the dirty shoulder.
Broken.
And really, what's the difference
Between us?

CRAIG

2010-06-30T13:36:00.001-07:00

So, this morning, we lost Craig Byrne. Last time I saw him, a couple of weeks ago at Wellspring's Graduation, we joked about his sharing oxygen with me from his recently attached oxygen tank, and he gave me one of those famous Craig-winks and said "Catch ya later, Em." Tears welled up in my eyes as he walked away because oddly enough, I got the feeling he meant LATER, as in WAY later. And he did. Craig has been an amazing friend, one of my most devoted dancers, the dad of Eli's best buddy, and the strongest, most positive fighter of cancer I've ever seen. You know how, after someone dies, everyone acts like they were just THE most wonderful person, no matter what? Well, he pretty much was, for real. And he made everybody feel OK about this.. it's sad and unfair and I've cried all day, but if he was OK with this, then we've gotta be too. Somehow. Rock on, Craig. Catch ya later.

Sawmill.

2010-06-23T13:17:00.000-07:00

Heat.
Waves off the roof.
Ripples above warped metal.
Out behind the sawmill.
Chewed pine aroma tangled with
The over sweet scent of wild strawberries,
Crushed underfoot.
The blade whines,
The great, green trees sway
In sympathy as
A brief breeze,
Carries a pitchy tang.

Inside, my father pulls the levers,
Rusty fingers poking through worn gloves,
He sings over the ancient, sputtering motor.
Smoking and belching, it will never quit.
Forever sparking to brutal life
When he turns the oily key.

And back here, I hold a patched shovel,
Because I come from a people,
That patch shovels,
Pulling the ever growing dust mound
Back away from the pipe that spews it.
The remains of log and steel encounter.
My job for the morning.
No hurry.
A wet circle rings the pile,
As finally, in June, the inner ice thaws,
The deep glassy heart, melting at last.
Never a hurry.

It is enough, right now,
To simply exist.
To look at my shovel and it's
Riveted tin patch,
The moisture seeping
From the crumbling, yellow hill at my feet,
The berry stains edging my boot soles.
To think of the trees,
And my father, and his gloves,
And his voice,
Raised in a pure baritone
Over everything else.
To be someplace
Because you were put there.
Because you belong.

Yes, back here,
Amidst, sound and smell,
Sun, and coarse, golden chaff,
An itching cling on my damp skin,
I am alone, and never alone.
Questions, questions, questions dissolve,
Surrounded by what and where and when.
Happy.
I know who I am.
Oddly satisfied.
A strange peace, raw and loud,
Keeps me.
Fills me with home.
Home.

Long Overdue Post

2010-06-17T18:28:00.000-07:00

Yes, I'm a bad, bad blogger these days...This place feels like a ghost town! Well, better late than never, right? The boys are OBSESSED with cowboys lately. No more pirates, no more knights, just COWBOYS. They have their own playlist of favorites on my itunes...if I have to hear the Bonanza theme song one more time... Anyhow, exciting news: E lost his first tooth day before yesterday, the bottom right, which, I think was the first tooth he ever got too. He'll start first grade this fall and the Little Bub & Av will start in the Butterfly Garden (Nursery/Kindergarten). It feels sad to me in a way. I wish they could stay little and snuggly and lispy and silly forever. E already acts like I'm the embarrassing Dork-Mom, cramping his style when he's hanging with his gang of cool dudes. At his end of school picnic they were like miniature 13 year olds, tormenting the girls, getting into trouble, and steering clear of the moms. I want my babies back! Sniff. The boys fight like nobody's business lately too. Holy, holy. Makes me insane. And when Av comes over...watch out! Otherwise, we are all busy, busy, busy. Dance classes are going well, some nights way busier than others. Zumba is filled to the max, but clogging is down to a half dozen students. Hip Hop depends, some weeks it's full and sometimes only a handful of dancers. The kiddie Ballet and Creative Movement is swamped for the tiny tot's class, but only a small group in the older kid's class. And Swing this session has just two-four couples. All in all, it's working out for me, and I like what I'm doing, how many people can say that?! We have 567542657087255 projects we should be getting done around here this summer, but as usual, we are procrastinating...plus as soon as Justin gets home from work, I GO to work, so finding time for anything else has been tricky. I feel a bit overwhelmed sometimes, the responsibility of having everything organized, with lesson plans, and new choreography - it takes away all my free time, not that I had that much to begin with. Always a few cons to go along with the pros, I guess! I just feel bad because the kids aren't getting the attention they used to, and now everything's going so fast, I don't want to miss out, you know? Not to mention the fact that I'm just plain BEAT at the end of the day. Speaking of which, I think I'm headed to bed now all. Perhaps I'll be on top of my game and post again in the near future? We shall see! XX00 -Em

SUMMER!!!!

2010-06-01T08:46:00.000-07:00

I know, I know, I've neglected this blog terribly lately...SO much going on around here! We got back from an awesome vacation at the beach cabin last week, had a million projects going on around here, etc, etc, etc. I tend to leave my laptop (which is newer and faster than Justin's, and has all my photos stored on it) upstairs to use when I put the boys to bed, so whenever I'm downstairs poking around on the computer, I don't have access to my photos and stuff....a testimony to how lazy I really am, I guess. I can't even drag my sorry butt upstairs and get my laptop. ANYWAY, a beautiful Memorial day weekend. We spent it relaxing for once. No frantic last minute parade float to put together, no potlucks to cook for, no running late for any place...nice. We just wandered around town, watched the parade, enjoyed the festivities, ate bbq chicken, sat in the river... I'd better be careful, I could get used to this! No, this week it's back to normal life again, kicking it off with a rather late and harried arrival at school this morning, with a still half-asleep kid in tow. OK, heading out in the rain into town for groceries, since there is nothing to eat in the house. I'll possibly upload some recent pictures later this evening if I have time. Just wanted to let everyone know that all is well, life is good, summer is here and I'm a happy camper.

Northern New England Journey Cover

2010-04-22T18:38:00.000-07:00

Check it! We're famous! Sort of.

Journaling

2010-03-31T09:40:00.000-07:00

In my closet, a sizable Tupperware tote, crammed packed with little books...some cloth-bound with hot pink flowers, some striped, some rather plain and dignified. I started keeping a diary when I was seven, filling several a year until I hit my late-twenties and things started getting too busy to sit down with a pen...instead, my blog sort of turned into my journal. (At some point, I'll have to print out all these entries and stick them together to add to my collection.) From ages 8-10, approximately, I was obsessed with drawing maps in them, little diagrams of our property, marking out where the tree house, woodshed, cat's grave, well and swing set were located. And of course maps of everyone else's houses as well...I loved drawing my grandparent's house because I could map out the hidden passageway in their playroom. Ages 10-12 held mostly angry outbursts at my parents for making us move/live like pioneers/eventually start public school at age 13. 12-15 was full of lovestruck doodles and scotch-taped in memorabilia. 15-18 covered my trying to get out of one mess after an other. 18-20 weirdly half adult, half child, changes, impulsive behaviors, growing up. 20-22 included young married life, job complaints, badly written and incredibly boring. 22-26 The Search for who I am/where I belong. 27-32 Children...and I rarely write, although Eli has many, many sheets of paper with his important maps covering them...I suppose it's time for his own journal. I noticed that I used to start every blank book with a little synopsis of my life at that time, in list form, since I have always been a list-making freak. Name: Emily. Age: 13. Best friends, pets, favorite color, food, school subject, romantic interest, books, movies, songs, likes, dislikes, height, weight, greatest wish, biggest fear, etc, etc, etc. I kept this up through almost all my journals into adulthood, although the answers to my own created-at-nine-years-old, goofy questions got increasingly sarcastic as time passed. As it's been many years since my personal questionnaire has been filled in, I thought I would recreate the Life List, in it's original form, with today's answers.

Name: Emily

Age: (Must I?!?) 1977, you do the math

Best Friend: I would have to say Kendra, as I have for the last 20 years at least. (Although, once, I think she showed up in a brand new category called "People Who Are Jerks" Ha. Sorry Kay!)

Pets: Captain Burdock, the crazed Aussie/"Chug" that makes me want to eat my own brain once a day, and close to a dozen Aracauna chickens, depending on what the dog is doing right now...

Favorite Color: I love red.

Favorite Food: Strawberries, cheese, spinach salad, cheese, peppers, cheese...

Favorite School Subject: Well now, that one's a bit tricky... IF I was in school still, It might STILL be art or maybe History these days. I might even like GYM CLASS now. Shocker.

Boyfriend (Yes, even at 9): Ha. No comment. Kidding Dear.

Favorite Book: There are so many! Just reread Solar Storms, an old fav, but really I could never pick.

Favorite Movie: Hard to say, I'm terrible at picking, it changes so often, and my taste runs the gantlet. Anne Of Green Gables still tops my chart, nothing deep, but comforting and sweet. And you know...any cheesy dance flick...

Favorite Song: This is sort of like the book question. I can't even make a guess, Too wishy-washy and I love so many songs.

Likes: Summer, boats, dance, cameras, animals, clothes (sigh. I know, I KNOW.), skating, snowboarding, music, monotonous craft projects like quilting, avocados, satire, writing, beaches, road trips, oranges, checking out different people's toes, gnomes, Snickers, worthless knick-knacks, horrible jokes, curly hair, costumes, musty smelling basements, spicy food, kissing, (those last two, not in that exact order) salamanders, making lists, hiking, lemonade, babies, Reese's Pieces, absolutely any type of museum, stone walls, cowboy boots, holidays, tea, exploring, soccer, poetry, dark chocolate, red wine, lilacs, eggplant, the smell of hay, rocks, watching fire, boardwalks, hats, waterfalls, eye contact, very, very hot showers, peaches, asparagus, tire swings, pearls, stacking wood, piglets, wind-up toys, having my hair brushed, fly fishing without a hook, stained glass, Barbara Kingsolver, mis-matched socks, nostalgia, barns that have been turned into houses, trampolines, running, archery, beeswax, wool, air hockey, real hugs, ceilidhs, stilettos, crank powered flashlights, hot cereal, mysteries, wainscoting, old theatres, NPR, giant sunglasses, tequila, yard sales, cheesecake, family...

Dislikes: vomit, spiders, zits, talking on the phone (I have a wee phobia occasionally...possibly since I can't HEAR anything after the onslaught of children),fish, raw tomatoes, idiots, mushrooms, hospitals, fevers, being broke, more than three lanes on a highway, watching baseball (just kill me now), roller coasters, wasps, sushi, cookie dough, flying, heights, elevators, lap dogs with no personality, those hand-knit dolls that cover toilet paper, television, maple syrup, explosive substances, electric fences (terrified of these), ferrets, snobs, nettles, early mornings, plastic, Disney crap, washing dishes, clowns or mimes, Yatzee, granny panties, SUVs, whining, horoscopes, and....that's about it.

Height: Five foot two...been that way for awhile now

Weight: 105 (I only listed bra size once and then gave that up when it became obvious it wasn't ever changing.)

Biggest Wish: Do I go all World Peace here, or for myself? (In the past, this one fluctuated from general good wishes for all, to the selfish extreme of wishing for three more wishes, or having Someone fall in love with me.) I want my loved ones & myself to be healthy and happy.

Biggest Fear: I'm afraid of losing people...I hate to even write it.

So, there's the list. Of course other fabulous categories were added over time, here and there: Bra Size, People Who Are Jerks, Favorite Number(?), Favorite Place, Sports and People, but you get the gist of it. I love that I accidentally made these clear cut memories for myself, they are funny, yes, but also spot on. I can see a whole snapshot of Emily at 10 or 15, just by glancing over a page penned in fluorescent green ink, the I's dotted with little hearts.

Size Matters

2010-03-26T16:20:00.000-07:00

After being reasonably active this winter, I thought I'd try on an old swimsuit or two, out of curiosity, before I sat down at the computer to start the grueling process of finding and ordering something that covered/smoothed all my jiggly-I've-had-babies bits. Pleasantly surprised, I'd like to say a big "SO THERE" to mother nature after cheating me out of a bikini for the last six years. Still have some serious stretch marks and a quite a few pounds left to drop if I wanted to get back to pre-baby shape, but I feel pretty darn good about myself at the moment. My legs ended up super strong & stocky from teaching dance, but I guess I just don't care anymore. I used to long for my willowy, dainty figure back, now I think I'm OK with this. There are many tween/teen girls taking my dance classes. If I obsessed about my weight, what kind of message would that send them? I want them to be fit, not sick. Normal bodies, in good health, are the perfect size, no matter what size that happens to be. I hate hearing twelve year old girls look in the studio mirrors and say, "Oh my God, my butt is HUGE!" If your butt is actually huge, like you pant when you walk, well, OK then, you need to get yourself healthy, but even if you are sizes bigger than the magazines suggest you ought to be, who cares? Those magazines take advantage of how insecure we all feel sometimes about our bodies...they are trying to sell clothing, and they make us think that if we buy a certain thing, it will transform us into a mysterious, bony siren who lounges around with dewy skin and smokey bedroom eyes. When I first looked in the mirror today, I was reminded of the Laura Ingalls Wilder books that I've been reading to the boys lately...Pa calls Laura a "little French horse". (For those not familiar with equine conformation, they are particularly small, stocky and powerful beasties.) That's okeydokey. I can do more with strength than I can with a so-called "perfect" body. The only thing being skinny-skinny is good for is creepy fashion trends. Dudes, you might as well walk a coat hanger down the runway, it's practically the same effect. Sorry to sound preachy, it's just really out-of control, people literally killing themselves because they feel they don't look "right". We all need to stop wasting precious time worrying about our body, one shot at living folks, and in the end, inches on your waist and thighs mean nothing. I don't know anyone who would stop loving me if I wasn't thin, and I don't want to. Those two enormous, darling kidlets came from this body... what a totally amazing, freakish, and beautiful concept life is.

DANCE

2010-03-24T06:41:00.000-07:00

I'm about to start dancing five days a week, which is a big change around here...no longer can I say it's "just something I do on the side", it'll be the real deal. I couldn't sleep last night and I was thinking about what started all this. I was eight or nine, I guess, and my parents had taken us to a regional home-schooler's meeting. These were usually held in the dingy basement of a local Legion Hall. Families came from all over the area to talk about the ups and downs of schooling children at home, trade books, swap teaching tactics, and get some social time for their somewhat socially inept (yes, me) children. Also during these meetings, kids could casually perform on the tiny stage with it's sagging plywood wheelchair ramp. In between parental discussion, there was a never-ending stream of singing, piano playing and poetry recitation. I remember (now famous author) Frank Asch and his son, Devin, demonstrating the colorful kites they had built, flying high in the strong spring wind. Mostly, as the children warbled folk songs, the adults would continue to sip their coffee and chat, feigning interest, and clapping blandly at the end. When it was my turn to dance, I recall feeling completely disgruntled that my mother insisted my two, small, bumbling sisters would join me on stage. But as soon as she set the needle down on that scratchy Tchaikovsky record, one that I'd played a thousand times before, I forgot everything else. Nothing choreographed, I just danced. Ignoring the Ballet lessons and recitals, where I always got cast as the rag doll or the teddy bear, I think my eyes were closed for most of it. How I managed to stay on that tiny stage and avoid my sisters, I'll never know. I felt something else coming through me. The music slipping inside me and moving my limbs the way it wanted. In the tutu my grandmother made me, so faded, it's once blue tulle now a grubby grey, I was wonderful. I knew it. I tried things I'd never tried before, and they blessedly happened. At the end, I pirouetted perfectly and slid into a graceful split (which I normally couldn't do, I forced myself, and it hurt, but it didn't matter in the least, because that's what the music asked for). There was the cliched moment of dead silence before true applause. I don't know if they really thought I was good, or if they just recognized that I loved what I was doing. Perhaps it was my wee, adorable sisters who captivated them, or simply politeness towards my parents who hosted the event, or maybe my dad, clapping six times harder than is possible, but for whatever reason, the clapping was long and loud. I slowly came back to myself, disappointed that it was over and I had returned to being me. It's funny, I've never felt exactly that way since. Never quite wholly lost myself in the dance again, but the sensation was so strong, I've danced my whole life searching for it. To make my body as much a part of the music as one of the instruments themselves. Even being close, just for a moment, is enough for me. There must have been magic in the dim light from pea-green curtained windows, the stale smell of dust, and a hundred corned-beef and cabbage community suppers. I love to dance. I am not a great dancer, no, and I never will be. But I am GOOD, and I love it. More than that, I love to make other people love it, people who could be GREAT. And I get to eat whatever I want, a perk not usually afforded a mother of two nearing her mid 30's! Yee haw! It's an easy job, but somebody's got to do it.

Please, Please Come If You Can!!!!

2010-02-10T07:59:00.000-08:00

All Well

2010-02-10T07:52:00.001-08:00

I'm still a bit stuffy, and Justin turned his ankle pretty badly stacking wood two nights ago, but for the most part, we are healthy again! Finally!!! Now if winter would just bugger off, everything would be keen!

popsicles

2010-01-28T11:47:00.000-08:00

After yet another doctor visit this morning, we learn that the littlest one now has pneumonia as well. I'm in awe that this is even possible, this much sickness. I wish I could pinpoint what I am doing wrong here. All organic food: check. Plenty of rest (for the kids anyway): check. Exercise & fresh air: check. Frequent hand washing: check. Humidifier/air purifier in our room: check. Not going out and about all winter: check. The only thing I can think of is the fact that we have gone to the doctor's so often, maybe they pick up things there? But I always just hold them in the waiting room and we don't touch any of the toys or anything. I feel like I'm just on autopilot, stumbling though the days, measuring medication, putting another video on the tv (something that is virtually unheard of in this house), pouring drinks, wiping noses/puke, cleaning things, getting popsicles, calling pediatricians in the middle of the night, never sleeping. My mind is blank... and I don't seem capable of deeper thoughts than popsicle flavors and tylenol doses. It seems with extreme tiredness, you get sort of a second wind, but you function more like a zombie instead of a human being. So anyway, sorry there have been no pictures on here in ages...there isn't a thing to take pictures of lately, other than pale babies and eye bags.

January Thaw

2010-01-21T12:41:00.000-08:00

Nice sunny day, everything is drippy and melty! I went to the ER a few days ago with what I thought was a broken rib, but luckily, it was just cracked cartilage between my ribs. Feels much better now. Just sore. Who would have thought coughing could do that?! I'm nearly done with this cough now. And The Baby dislocated his elbow last weekend playing in the back yard. That gave us a pretty stressful night, but all is well now. It's funny, I would say all in all, that this winter has been far trickier than last winter and I'm doing OK with it. Maybe I just had a chemical imbalance last year, or I'm way to busy to dwell on it this time around. Because last winter, I think I was a mess nearly every day. And of course, I still have those days, when I'm a wreck, but they certainly aren't the rule. Even though I've overbooked Saturday, I'm not freaking out. (yet!) I have a senior portrait session in the morning, a swing class to teach immediately afterward, and then a wedding to photograph the instant my class is over. Oh dear. Oh well. I think a lot of credit goes to the dance classes. I'm really loving teaching them, and who knows? Perhaps I sweat out all my problems? Makes me a firm believer in the exercise is better than antidepressants theory. It's been amazing and gratifying to watch the classes grow to almost bursting out of my studio. Also awesome to watch everyone get GOOD. Like super good. I feel so proud. I'm not the greatest dancer...but I think I'm a decent teacher, and it makes me thrilled to step back and watch them all and think: I DID THAT. So, yeah, it's not some big, earth changing accomplishment, but it makes me happy anyway. Plus, it makes me feel young again...loud music, laughing, leotards... Strange that when I stopped feeling depressed that my "calling" was getting me nowhere, a new calling found me. Not at all what I expected to be doing, but I think I've given up guessing where life will lead. I'm just along for the ride.

the latest

2010-01-06T09:06:00.000-08:00

NOT complaining, just telling you what's up. We had the flu a couple weeks back, mostly me...high fevers, cough, sore throat, body aches... although the kids had their usual horredous coughs all through Christmas. Then we all got some stomach bug which was one of the worst things I've had to deal with yet, three guys throwing up every twenty minutes each for 24 hours or so. No clean towels/sheets/clothing left by the end of it. I, luckily only felt super queasy the whole time. At first we thought we all must have eaten something bad, because Jen & Matt & Mom & Dad had it too, but I guess there WAS some nasty virus going around. Poor Justin came down with it in the middle of an all-night emergency at the South Royalton House. The water main broke and the pub filled chest deep in water, flooding the furnaces, etc. Pretty stressful to be out bailing water until three in the morning when you have to vomit every few minutes...Anyway, after we finished that, I came down with insane hives all over my body, something I've never experienced before. I went to the doctor because I'm still coughing pretty hard from that flu and she checked out my hives as well. Probably just a side effect from the tummy bug and they should go away in around ten days. I've never seen anything like them...Looking in the mirror this morning shocked the heck out of me. I can't even fit my wedding ring on my pinky! And I want to roll naked in a snowbank to stop the itching for a second! Whew! It seems like we get more unhealthy every winter. Actually, it's mainly ME with the problems this year, which is unusual. I'm usually healthy as a horse. Oddly enough, even with all this stuff going on, I don't feel as stressed as I did last winter. It's all a mess, but somehow I'm not freaking out too badly for once. Or maybe the Benedryl is making me too woozy to care! E went to back to school this morning, he was getting so bored doing nothing here at home. I do feel pretty lame though, like people must think I'm just making this stuff up....I mean, WHO is sick this much? Mom thinks our house is poison. She brought over lots of clorox yesterday. I know I'm not the World's Best Housekeeper, and the house IS ancient, but I really DON'T think the mildew on the bathroom ceiling is the problem. There's only so much I can do while raising children, and half the people I know live in houses just as old and grubby as ours. Who knows. Maybe I'm simply allergic to winter. Anyway, things could be a lot worse, and I'm thankful that our health is as good as it is. My dear friend Amelia started chemo treatments yesterday. She's one of the healthiest people I know. I'm sure she's going to beat it, but it's still scary. Also, there is no mildew on her bathroom ceiling. Sometimes health is just the luck of the draw, I guess. Of course it doesn't mean people should feel free to make bad choices, good choices certainly help, but there's never a guarentee. OK, feeling drunk and falling asleep over my keyboard, so I'll stop now. Peace.

Busy, busy, busy...

2009-12-29T08:04:00.000-08:00

It's been a crazy few weeks. I'm sick (What?) at the moment so my brain is a little fuzzy, but I'll try to fill you in. Justin's Grandma passed away, which I think I already said, and I posted a picture of little Oliver in the last entry, add several family Christmas celebrations/dramas, a handful of doctor visits for me and the kids, our basement flooded with every drop of water from our well by freak chance, van windshield got smashed, dog chewed all the hair off his paw for some reason, studio track lighting mysteriously went on fire, business meetings to finalize our hostile takeover of the South Royalton House. Just kidding about the hostile part. It's hopefully going to be a wonderful thing for us. But speaking of hostile, I was terrified to learn that Marc was on that plane back from Amsterdam last week. Thank goodness he's safe. We DID have a great Christmas though. I was all upset for a bit because the thing the boys wanted the most, a huge wooden castle with drawbridges, dungeons, knights and dragons, etc, arrived from the company two days before Christmas and when I opened it, it was the wrong one. A hot pink, princess castle, with unicorns and canopy beds. Not that we have anything against hot pink or unicorns around here, but still... So I was grumped out that I couldn't return it and get a replacement in time, AND it was insanely expensive. Later that afternoon, I popped into a thrift store to see if they had any kids snow boots (after I ditched the last pair we bought for Eli because they had a dead rat inside.) and I literally stumbled over the same wooden castle that I ordered, in perfect condition for FIVE BUCKS! So see, sometimes I am pretty lucky! The other awesome thing is: we ran out of wood COMPLETELY yesterday, like Justin had started chopping up random woodworking projects in the basement to burn, and the Wood Guy, who is totally unreliable and never even delivered the wood we ordered LAST winter, pulled in with a load of wood and dumped it in our yard. Also, I went to the hospital yesterday for surgery to remove a cyst that has kept me on antibiotics for a few weeks. (That's right, I talk about icky things you don't need to hear. Over-sharers Anonymous, here I come.) When I got there, the doctor said it looked like it had shrunk and surgery was no longer necessary. She'll check again in a week, but yay! Anyhow, so that's the good and the bad from the last couple weeks. Looking forward to one more family gathering in Amherst this weekend. Hope everyone else had a fabulous holiday! Love, me

Welcome Baby Hudson!

2009-12-16T18:12:00.000-08:00

Oliver Hudson was born this afternoon at around 2:45, weighing 5 pounds, 15 ounces, and measuring 20 inches long. It was a pretty smooth delivery and he is healthy and beautiful! (More pictures on flickr.)

Some Pictures

2009-12-11T19:14:00.000-08:00

I'm NOT superstitious, but this was just a wee bit...odd.

2009-12-10T09:33:00.000-08:00

OK, I'm completely tired, and rather out of it, but here's something really weird: (I just cut & pasted this story from an e-mail I sent Tamera because I'm too sleepy to rewrite it.) Justin and I decided to watch a movie last night after we got the kids to bed since it wasn't too late. Eli woke up as the movie was ending and couldn't get back to sleep until around five in the morning, which was right about when Ira was waking up. (So, there was no sleep for me until Justin took Ira downstairs and I got a couple of hours this morning.) Anyway, I thought maybe Eli had a nightmare, because all last night he kept talking about ships and "What happens to the people if boats break into pieces?" I tried to reassure him about lifeboats/life vests/radios/etc, but it didn't seem to help. He obsessed and asked about it the entire night. As far as I know, he's never really seen or heard anything too awful in the way of shipwrecks and I sort of chalked it up to his whole pirate thing. The only thing he's seen, I think, was a photo of a sunken submarine in the National Geographics he pours over, but I felt like he was describing the Titanic, and children drowning or something. He was really upset wanting to know that people were safe. So, then this morning, I turn on the computer, and the headline is a story about a family with two little kids that were sailing around the world, when their sailboat was rammed by a South Korean Cargo ship, smashed into pieces and they all drowned, except the mother. The little boy, right away, but then a wave took the little girl, while they were clinging to debris, and the father drowned too, going after her. The mother had broken her back and fractured her skull and had to just lay, paralyzed, watching it all happen. (Sorry it was a very graphic story.) The Cargo ship left them for dead even though they could hear the family screaming for help. (They aren't being prosecuted because of some obscure law about international waters.) The mother spent days floating on a partially inflated raft and was so grief stricken that she actually tried to drown herself several times, but wasn't able to because she couldn't move. She eventually washed up on shore somewhere in Australia and was spotted by a plane. It happened 14 or 15 years ago at this time of year, and she is finally able to talk about it. The story, by itself was unbelievably horrific, and so incredibly sad that I would have been crying anyway, but the fact that Eli spent all night thinking about the exact same thing really freaked me out. I'm sure it's just one of those things, and simply coincidental, but still, how very strange.

In other strange news, Facebook sent me a message today saying that "abusive behavior" had been coming from my IP address, at the risk of my mom saying "I told you so", I'm worried that someone hacked into my account. I mean, it's not really that dangerous for me, since there is no money involved or much personal info, but I, obviously, don't want someone making it look like I've done something wrong. It may be a fluke since they are updating all their security systems. I certainly hope so! They are looking into it. Anyway, excuse this creepy blog entry...We got a foot of snow yesterday. The boys went sledding and got delightfully rosy cheeked. We got our Christmas tree last weekend and will visit Santa at the library on Saturday. I'd upload pictures but I'm on the wrong computer, so later! Hope everyone is well! -Emily

(About two hours later) I just got a call that Justin's Grandma has passed away. Heart attack in her sleep. We will miss her so very much. She was a prickly, sarcastic, funny, sweet, sweet lady, if that makes sense. I think she was 93. Her life was not easy, and life will not be easy without her. She had a very strong connection to the sea. Her ashes will be spread there. Again, I am NOT superstitious, but Eli's sleepless night seems rather well timed.