giving up

[image]

I've given up dreams in the past. Sacrificed, compromised. Many times. Especially since getting married. It's a major part of the marriage experience, of life. I realize this. Heck, even my wedding was a compromise; I just wanted to elope. Nobody listened. Sometimes I sensed that by sacrificing something I wanted, I would be getting something better in return. Sometimes I gave up blindly. Some trade-offs I still wonder about but most I've forgotten because in the end they didn't matter so much. The one I've been forced to abandon this time, though, really really hurts. Like a stinging blade, a crushing weight.

This one I fear will haunt me the rest of my days. Will bring a lump to my throat each time I wander through a department store or browse a catalog or attend a party. Will place a wedge of heartbreak between me and everyone else. Will plant seeds of bitterness within me. Will find me weeping quietly and alone and embarrassed, when I wish I could just be heard, when I wish I could just stop thinking. When I wish I could get time handed back to me on a silver platter with a kind note saying "here, it's not your fault, you can have it all back and start all over." When I wonder where the love is hiding because this surely can't be it.  When I belittle myself for not trying harder to make it happen. Then again, what else could I have done? Nothing. All that remains is for the universe to care. Which it doesn't. Time to take one for the team. Again.

Who knew it would be so hard to let go of something I never had? Except that I did have it in my heart, my dreams, my great plan for my life, in my thoughts nearly every day for so many years. And now it's left, an unfinished puzzle cast aside and tumbling among faith and despair.  And conceding is filling me with hate and grief. And it's lonely, all this wandering about looking for impossible right answers while the only answer is the wrong answer: give up. I can't, but I must.

scherenschnitte

I think it is German for "paper cutting," loosely translated. I stumbled upon this site while browsing ideas for an upcoming birthday. Such stunning images here, I couldn't stop looking.                                                                  

  

My biggest little guy and I had a recent, very fun date to the movies to see Tangled, which may be why this image charmed me. How cool that she offers so many free downloads for those brave enough, and steady enough, to try their hand at scherenschnitte. Gezundheit! 

step ball change down memory lane

dancers in pink

degas

I took ballet lessons and tap dance lessons when I was a little girl. I loved them both. Eventually I was forced to choose between dancing and piano, though I  did well at both, and have sometimes regretted my choice [moderately manipulated by my parents] to keep the piano. I still have tap shoes, ballet shoes and my hot pink tu-tu. I can remember my recital, my first sequined white tu-tu, the tedious chore of letting my mother work my long slippery tresses into an immaculate bun, locked down like Fort Knox. I can still hear my teacher: "point. flex! point. flex!" I remember longing to be Clara in the Nutcracker, but never being quite old enough or tall enough.

One of my teachers, Miss Arlene, also owned the Ballet Les Jeunes studio. The basement housed the locker room: rows of slipper-pink cubes for stowing our shoes and leotards, thick lavender paint on the walls. Tap studio in the front, ballet studio at the rear. Miss Arlene seemed old to me then. A trim figure and a swath of short, bushy, pewter colored hair crowning her head. A black leotard and tights. She was brilliant and abrupt. She meant business in her high heeled mary jane tap shoes. And I loved it. And wished I could have high heeled tap shoes, too.

Next to the studio sat a darling, old, grey shake house that had been converted into a boutique. Filled with Nutcrackers, called the Nussnacker Haus. Miss Arlene owned this, too, and had curated a massive collection of all kinds of Nutcrackers into a cozy little shop. Sometimes my mother would take us into the shop to look--but never touch--after our lessons. So many pretty things.

Miss Arlene retired her dance shoes many years ago and moved away. But she took her Nutcracker obsession with her. Tonightt, Conan O'Brien welcomes Miss Arlene and her Nutcrackers to his show. I think it's totally cool, even if it's probably some kind of gimmick. I can say knew the nutcracker lady when...

the help

"I hope she ain't so country she ain't got a Hoover."

I'm the last one to the party on this one, but it really was such a good book. Within the first few pages I found myself nodding in agreement with gospel-choir like "mm-hmms!" and giggling like a little old lady at bingo. Even my thoughts have taken on a southern drawl. I wished I could whip out zinging one liners like Minnie and carry sorrow with such grace as Aibee, and endure condescension with such patience as any of these ladies. I also lost any penchant I might once have had for certain kinds of pie. And I wondered really what it was like to live in that time, in that world, where so few seemed to have a conscience at all, let alone a clear one. Where motherly affection was spared  by mothers but given in abundance by other women, who were often forced away from their own babies. The ties that bind became twisted and confused. And I fantasized over meals like pork chops and corn bread and collard greens, fried chicken and potato salad and caramel cakes. I was hungry through the entire book.

Coincidentally, collard greens were included in this week's co-op basket. I consulted one of my favorite southern women on proper preparation and now have a pot of southern life simmering away on my stove.

insomnia

it's a bummer, but here I sit alone with my random sleepless stream of consciousness and a keyboard. insomnia means watching Jimmy Fallon who I've decided is funny and kind of adorable. and the trailer for the new harry potter movie reminds me that I sorta really want to go to Universal Studios Orlando and I feel a bit geekish about it. and the movie trailer reminds me that I saw "RED" over the weekend and really liked it and Bruce Willis is hot awesome and Helen Mirren is fabulous.
And that was our fourth date of 2010. I think that's one more than last year. And it only happened because the in-laws were in town and (I'm sure to their regret) volunteered to tend the little ones. So Mr. J doesn't get credit for it. Our last date was for his birthday in August, and the last one before that was a work-function that he was required to attend so it sorta doesn't even count as a date.
What a fine testament of his love for me, this zero motivation to go out. Some couples/parents of small children who go out every week or take weekend getaways or lengthy over-seas vacations and it boggles my mind. It's like an alternate universe. Seriously.
Then I wonder if I could bring myself to leave my babes for a few days if the opportunity presented itself. Don't know.
And right this minute I'd really love to turn my brain off and stop ruminating on the massive organize-the-office project that is never ever done but it's overwhelming and I'd love to stop wondering if I'll have time to sweep, vacuum and mop tomorrow and if Piglet will be agreeable in the morning and why oh why doesn't he obey? and how much food will Nanuk toss across the kitchen and did I buy enough treats and why do I have to dust my furniture every single day and where did all this laundry come from and I wonder if I'd look good in skinny jeans but when would I be able to go jeans-shopping anyway? Stop, brain, stop!
Sleep, where are you? The children will be making their boisterous demands on me in 6.5 hours. If I could fall asleep right now I might get just enough shut-eye to function.
This bright glowing monitor probably isn't helping matters. Time to try something else.

gut feeling

Prompting. Impression. Premonition. Instinct. What do you call it? that sense or that voice that tells you in your heart of hearts what to do. Funny how it never tells you why, it just says do or do not.

An exciting opportunity recently landed in my lap. a chance to use and stretch my abilities, gain some new skills, absorb new ideas, work with interesting people, put a little cash in my pocket. I wanted the adventure. I wanted the project. Of course I did, I love projects. I wanted the challenge. I wanted the diversion. I had the abilities and confidence to do it all; my fingers tingled at the prospect, my mind raced with possibility. Go for it I told myself.

But I turned it down. And I don't know why, other than I felt strongly that I should. That I must turn it down. As I tried to shake that feeling or talk myself out of it, it became stronger. Curse that gut feeling, I didn't want to pass up this chance, new and creative. Which is why I knew that I must. And now that it's passed, I feel better. Not happy, but better. Yet still there is no explanation.

So I'm left to wonder if the heavens, the Universe, have another path for me right now. Maybe a sudden illness. Perhaps an unexpected need within my family  will require all my energy and attention. Perhaps something more thrilling and big is down the road. It may have been that the project would have consumed my life and impacted my family negatively. Maybe the caldera that is Yellowstone National Park is going to erupt and vaporize me. Maybe my fairy god mother is going to show up next week to whisk me off to a castle in Italy.  Would hate to leave any loose ends, you know me. I wonder and what-if but just for a little while because it's pointless. I'll never know why until after the why has come to pass, and maybe not even then. The universe knows all and has made it clear to me the choice I should make. I have to respect it and stand by it. Come what may. I may have some regrets now, but in the end I trust that all will be as it should.  It's what we call faith, where I come from.

[photo credit]

what I know about me

i need to feel heard and understood
i hate to inconvenience other people
a clean, tidy home is more exciting to me than presents
wasted time is a major peeve
carbs are a good thing
i assume we are friends unless told otherwise
good books, good music, good food and good shoes matter
three is my number, but i can be ok if it's two
i believe wisdom is more important than popularity
and laughter is way way better than therapy

***photo taken from my front porch last week.  just after one of those brief whoppers of a south-eastern idaho evening storm. i love that smell.

I must be a grown up if...

 the sight of this in my yard puts a smile on my face and makes me want to do a happy dance:

so happy to be fenced in.

note to self:

trying on swim suits while you've got the blues is not a good idea. ever. 

nor is eating the last of the ben and jerry's in retaliation to the swim suit incident. 

Rx: treadmill  and sunshine

love me some

crab cakes
fresh air
slobbery baby kisses
"mommy! you're home!"
doris day movies
jack johnson on a road trip
spring cleaning
stacks of folded laundry
luxury shampoo on sale for $5
bright linen scarves
lip gloss
new-sandal-shopping
piglet, playing air-drums along with the music in the car
Easter
tulips pushing through the earth
rainy nights

vice

I love my little blog. I love how it has connected me with long lost friends, far away friends and friends I've yet to meet. I love how it serves to document and preserve, how with it I can put my thoughts down and be mindful of what kind of energy I'm sending out into the universe. I love how the land of blog is an endless source of inspiration, insight, humor, and tenderness. A place to rally the troops or be a shoulder for someone else's tears. I love that I can tune in our out as I choose, and participate in bloggishness when my real life permits.  The blog is free. And doesn't require hiring a babysitter.

Marta  formulated and presented a blogger's workshop of sorts recently with a few precious pearls of wisdom in regards to this thing we call the blog. It's true that many argue the internet is wasteful, that blogging is frivolous, that it's just a vice. Ooh. That stings a little. But I think it's only true if one wants it to be.  Via blogging I have found kindred spirits that have enriched my life. I have found a creative outlet. I found a cure for the loneliness I felt after I had my first baby and then moved to a small town in which I didn't know a single soul.  I have found a sounding board. I have found company in heartbreak, kinship clever words, and a place to show a little love imperfect as it might be. Sure beats watching reality TV.

A few clicks of the mouse give me something all to myself. A novelty in motherhood, where my home is not my own. My lunch is not my own. My sleep is not my own. My time is not my own. Even my shower is oft derailed by the needs of my family and ceases to be my own. But nobody ever messes with the blog.  It alone is my own. A vice it most definitely is not. An opportunity, a blessing, it most definitely is.

[photo credit]

freckles, lost and found

I found my freckle. I don't know exactly when it left, but I know where it went.

It split in two. One half landed on piglet's leg, in a position slightly awkward to photograph.

The other tiny half landed on nanuk's cheek, just below the corner of his right eye. See here? It's like still having it, only better. Assuming I don't kiss it right off.

antiques

When my parents came to visit for Nanuk's birthday last week they brought piles of candy, toys and clothes for my boys (too much, of course), and this:

It's a secretary, and it's probably 100 years old. my mother's grandparents purchased it at a garage sale and eventually passed it along to her. It stood in the entry way of my parent's colonial for over 20 years.  Then they moved and no longer had a suitable "wall" for it. My mother has boo-hoo-ed for months on end about how it must stay in the family and we must cherish it, but nobody else would take it. Now it's mine. More ornate than my preferences, but I like to mix things up a little bit so I think I can make it work eventually.

My issues are thus: I don't care for the finish (why does it still smell like varnish?) and I'm not thrilled with it's current placement in the corner of my front room. Mr. J insists he likes it where it is, but I'm fairly certain that's because he doesn't want to move it downstairs to an alternate location in the guest room.

Do I dare paint it? white? yellow? A major undertaking for sure, but maybe worth it in the end...

streaming

...I enjoy preparing a traditional Sunday dinner. I enjoy eating it, too.

...have you ever really wanted to just say "get over yourself already" to someone? but, attempting graciousness, resisted the urge? My tongue is sore from biting.

...oh how I wish the sabbath really were a day of actual rest.

...to seam-rip or not to seam-rip? the seam in question has a slight pucker that went unnoticed until completely finished. it's bothering me, but that's really a lot of seam-ripping. quandary, quandary.

...is it prideful to believe I work at, and succeed at, feeding family wholesome, well-balanced meals? and sometimes sweets?

...I feel compelled to paint the interior of my house. Basement. Bedrooms. Bathroom. I also feel compelled to rid myself of everything in my bedroom. But this is ridiculous.

...wondering if it's possible to be both enabled and crippled by our family ties?

...was surprised at the collections of great paper and cute fabrics at the local craft store

...itching to get the Spring Cleaning underway. It's one of my neuroses. And it makes me happy.

...desiring, from the bottom of my heart, built-in shelving in my office nook.

...is there some sort of intensive clean & tidy training for husbands? I keep thinking that his love for me is sufficient to motivate him in the ways of organized and spic-n-span (at least to some degree). I refuse to believe I'm fantasizing the impossible.

..it feels like a Jane Austen day. Maybe Mastepiece Theatre...

hiatus

I'm on a spending hiatus. Not because I'm a compulsive spender, but because the winter blahs make retail-therapy all too easy to justify. And because there are lots of expensive projects on my to-do list. And because I just don't want more stuff. Months of hibernation, surrounded by all of my current stuff, has me feeling a little suffocated. Less stuff must equal more air, more peace. More zen. Or something.

A vacation is so much more appealing to me than more stuff. A fence is more necessary to me than more stuff. A pretty bedroom is more important to me than eating out or that thing from Old Navy that I just had to buy because it was so cheap and I would never have bought it except that it was on clearance and I'll probably hate it in 3 weeks because it will prove to be so cheap.  So, spending hiatus it is.

          

Instead of buying special Valentine packaging and ribbons and sprinkles and special treats and what not, I made do with the odds and ends on my craft shelf and in my pantry. Instead of throwing a big shindig for Nanuk's 1st birthday, we are keeping things small, sweet and simple. Instead of buying the beautiful lamps that would look really great in my light-and-style deprived living room, I'm tolerating the el-cheapo random light fixtures I currently have even though I think my living room looks like it belongs to college students. Maybe the lamps will get marked-down before they are sold out? Instead of fun high-maintenance treatments at the salon, I'll go the close-to-natural route (what grey hairs?). Instead of eating out once per week (even on the cheap), it's once or twice a month. Still on the cheap. Sticking to essential purchases only. Little things, all of these minor sacrifices for the greater good, but together perhaps they will equal the greater good. And a handsome fence to keep my wee babes corralled.

saturday is a special day

it's the day we

feed the children
dress the children
make the beds
wash the clothes
dry the clothes
send the emails
knead the dough
bake the cookies
sing the songs
race the little cars
clean the counters
clean the stove
unload the dishwasher
load the dishwasher
feed the children
clean the children
wash the clothes
dry the clothes
scrub the bathroom
wash the car
run the errands
fly the paper airplanes
slice the veggies
bake the pizza
feed the children
bathe the children
wash the clothes
dry the clothes
read the stories
snuggle the children
cut the fabric
make the phone calls
...and so on until tucking my self into bed.

On paper it looks like I accomplished a lot. So why does it feel like I didn't accomplish anything?

identity crisis

For many years I often joked that my best feature was my left ear lobe with it's tiny brown freckle. I suppose I was too embarrassed to give a real answer to that question "what's your best feature?" or "what do you like about your appearance?" or other such silliness. I was riddled with insecurities so I answered with the ear lobe. Which I suppose is a very fine looking ear lobe, especially with a charming little freckle.

Today as I was drying my hair I caught a glimpse of my ear and had this thought: "I wonder how that little freckle is..."

So I got closer to the mirror.

And I looked and I looked. I asked Mr. J to look.

No little freckle.

None. It hasn't wandered to the back side of the lobe or onto my face, it hasn't wandered over to the right ear. It's just. Gone. My best feature. Vanished into thin air? Washed away in the shower? Nibbled off by Mr. J  a rodent in my sleep? Snagged by a baby?

It's very troubling.  Here I was all worried about getting extra freckles and the one I wanted has disappeared. Life is cruel. I didn't know freckles could do such a thing.

brrrrrr

It never occurred to me that I would ever live in a place where school gets cancelled because it's too cold outside.  I'm beginning to wonder exactly how it happened that I landed in Idaho, where one can actually be too cool for school.

When I married Mr. J, I naively and stubbornly stated that I would follow him anywhere but the mid-west because it's just too flippity flippin cold out there.  I know Idaho isn't the mid-west geographically speaking, yet, here I am, anticipating that in the morning, it will be too cold outside for kids to go to school. Which makes the fourth rule-of-my-life I've broken since meeting Mr. J: Never live in the midwest (or anything like unto it). Ugh.

On the bright side, if the kids don't have school tomorrow, neither does he! Hooray!

unmentionable cupcakes

cupcakes cupcakes everywhere. their charm knows no bounds, it seems. I recently ventured into the local victoria's secret to make a rather mundane purchase. lucky me, the store was offering a complimentary gift with purchase: a lacy cupcake. not a cupcake decorated in lace, but something lacy packaged to look like a cupcake, a lacie cupcake to be exact. I even got to choose a flavor color: cocoa cream or vanilla. really. and the clerk assured me that one size fits all. really. really?

seems a bit silly to be purchasing foundation garments at a store that thinks lace thong panties can be a) universally appealing,  b) one size fits all  and c) labeled as cupcake flavors.

the clerk also mentioned that if I didn't want to keep the free lacy cupcake for myself, I could just give it away to someone else. needless to say I've been thinking long and hard about to whom I could bequeath such a gift. so, if you discover a lacy cupcake in your stocking on Christmas morning, it probably didn't come from Santa. But, hey, if you really really want one of your very own (in pink!), you can get one here.  Enter code cupcake at checkout 'til november 25th.

it's my mother's fault

I recently engaged in some back-seat psychoanalysis of my mother, with my cousin the therapist who knows a thing or two about such matters. She mentioned she has some books she shares with her clients with mothers like mine.

I said: "it's amazing I'm not more messed up, right? Oh. Wait. [a pause while I realize that she is professionally treating & counseling people who are messed up because they had mothers like mine and I add it all up] Am I messed up?"

which was followed by a long awkward pause.

which was followed by a giggle.

which was followed by her insistence that she needed to go to bed and that I should call her another time  to talk. when we have more time.

I guess I really can blame my mother...