Come under my umbrella

I spent part of Sunday with an old friend. A friend who could remember that breastfeeding was not fun sometimes, kids are not perfect sometimes, and relationships, especially when there are kids involved, take work. I was grateful for her presence and her insight, and her honesty. I had missed her.

We talked a lot about how we both got to where we are. Family of origin, moving, school. We talked about the words our families used about and to us, and how we both struggle, even now, to acknowledge our childhood as less-than-ideal, while moving on to not become our parents. It is hard, we both knew, and had the sand not been blowing around so much, I for one would have cried a few times. It has been hard, we could both see that clearly.

We talked about our relationships, choices we made about sex and love and family. We both had roads where we are trying to forgive our respective partners (and ex-partners) for being human, at the same time expecting them to man-up and take some responsibility for their own happiness, without masking the problem or running away and ignoring it completely. We both knew we were working on the same things for ourselves.

We talked about kids, and just how it is to parent children in the real world we have created for them. We both try to balance being involved with our children’s schools, while trying to let administrators do their job, and trusting them to it. We both have successes and failures when it comes to how we educate our children.

We both know our children struggle with things that are different than what we would hope for them. My son struggles with not remembering a time when he lived with both of his parents in the same home, working as daily partners, and feels he missed out. My daughter remembers the “bad stuff” that happened before her father and I split, but misses the good stuff of being a mom and dad family. My friend talked about how even with two parents in a home, the styles and needs sometimes overwhelm her, and she knows it affects her kids. Each of us had different strengths and different challenges we live with daily, based almost solely on our own individual choices. We each have different regrets.

We also laughed completely as the kids ate berries (covered with sand), and jumped off beach cliffs (about 18 inches high) and let the wind carry away a beach umbrella (they were using as a hut). We moved our own blanket a couple times to avoid the sand kicked up by running and jumping feet, yet somehow, wherever we moved, that is where the kids needed to be. It was funny, and in a way sweet, that in the middle of that annoyance, what the kids really wanted was to homestead and stay near.

The whole dance, in an out of our own past, present, and future, lasted about three hours. The time was sweet and happy and melancholy and joyous all at once. I can’t wait to do it again. The next time, my kids will come, too.

On Wednesday, she and I will have lunch together. We will have no kids with us. We will eat cheeseburgers because we won’t have kids around watching us eat such junk. I hope we will talk about movies and celebrities and music. I hope we talk about paint colors in our respective new houses, and how we keep bathrooms clean with two kids in the house. I hope we talk about shoes. I also hope we get to know each other better as real women, because you can never have too many friends who know your story and want to hang out with you anyway. I am already excited about it.

...I have a few...

It was Memorial Day 2009 that I moved out of my home of 10 years in Monterey. It took all my strength, all my will power to make that change, and I am learning much more about myself from that decision that any other choice I have ever made. I don't regret it.

I have been on a few dates, though the last one was in February and while "nice", did nothing for my ego, my self esteem, or my sense of something good being just around the corner. It was flat. It was boring. It was average. I have not seen the man again. I don't regret it.

I just finished helping my kids with baseball season. It was an action packed season, running around everywhere. We traveled to Salinas, and Pacific Grove. We had dinner in the car, often junk food or sandwiches. I watched every game, yelled and cheered. I was cold. I got sunburned. I was anxious and disappointed. I don't regret it.

In 2009, when I was first a "new" single mom, I thought the way to fulfill my happiness needs was to date. A lot. I actually was "dating" three guys with the same name at one point, and that was very confusing. I fell in love, or at least lust, a couple times during that time, and confused the two a couple times, too. I was never without a boy to occupy my thoughts for long in between, and have some stories to write about later. I don't regret it.

In 2010 I began searching for a house to buy. I did hours of research, combing every website, every newspaper, every trade magazine to find out what I needed to do, and where I needed to look. I looked at 60 or 70 houses (compared to the national average of 4-5) before making my first bid. That was June. It took until October to work it all out and get to a closing. It took every minute of my time and energy. I do not regret it.

After I purchased the house, it needed painting and repairs. I put in a new furnace, reconfigured the kitchen and one of the bathrooms. I helped the kids paint their rooms, and put up curtains, and pick new throw rugs. I put in new doors and windows. I moved in, and unpacked. I threw a house-warming party and a birthday party within 6 weeks of getting the keys. I got lots of help. I do not regret it.

What I regret is that in all of that, I did zip to take care of myself. Those men, well, they could have anything they wanted without giving back, and I was fine with that. Baseball season was just plain exhausting. House hunting was a great distraction, as was moving, painting, repairing, blah blah blah. The relationship I had left, and the childhood I had long ago moved away from, had given me no skills to understand how to stand on my own. I am very good at the "strength" portion of my life, doing the things that are necessary to make a life work (like fixing the plumbing, or putting in the new tile, or going on dates with random guys who are bad for me) but I am not very good at the "weakness" portion of my life. The part that lets me cry, the part that lets me laugh at my own silliness, the part that is quiet, the part that is alone.

I have not been on a date since February. I have not painted a wall or fixed a thing in quite a while. I have not signed the kids up for another sport. I am feeling everything with great intensity these days, and trying not to distract myself with all the other things I tend to fill my life with. It is tough. I am lonely. I backslide, a lot. I am concentrating on myself, and scared every minute. I am likely to need some help, and have already been getting some. It feels weird, but the most important part is that it feels. I do not regret it.

Housekeeping Fairies

Spotless houses are not something I strive for. Don't get me wrong, I like a clean house as much as the next person, it just has (as an adult) never been near the top of my list of things to care about. Yep, I had to start figuring out why.

It's not like I don't know how to load a dishwasher, I do. It's not like I don't know how to fold towels and get them to the closet, I do. It's not like I don't know how to identify limes that used to be heads of lettuce in the back of my fridge, I do. What I don't know how to do is stop hearing my mom's voice (and sometimes my ex-husband's voice) in the back of my head (and sometimes on my phone) that it is not done correctly, timely, and with ease. Growing up, everything was "easy" yet some how (I was told often) I just was not capable of mastering it.

A week or two ago, I needed someone to come unlock my door so that the city inspector could come check if the grommets on my heater were properly plasticised (or some such bullshit), in the middle of the workday (the joys of home ownership!). Why the voice in my head that said "Don't call your mom!" was not heeded, I don't know. Before I could have even changed my mind about asking her to come over and let the guy in, I heard her say it: "I hope your house is clean enough for me to step into, I don't want to be embarrassed."

Yep, opening the garage door to a guy she had never met, who she will never see again, so he could spend 60 seconds looking at a piece of sheet metal, would devastate her if there was laundry on the floor or a pile of dirty dishes.

I changed the appointment. I asked the guy to come later in the day, and I came home. My mother did not have to come into my house. I told her never mind, that I made other plans, and she would not have to worry about any embarrassment I might have caused her.

You would think this would not have made me shaky at all, but not a chance. I had just taken away my mother's right to judge me, or my living conditions. I had just found out that I could do this for myself. Imagine that.

So why do I mention this now? Because I cleaned my house to the nines this weekend. All the laundry, all the dishes, all the vacuuming. I cleaned every surface, every mirror, both bathrooms, and the kitchen floor. It did not take long (about 90 minutes total over 2 days, plus laundry time). Because honestly, my house is usually messy but not dirty, if you know what I mean. I did not do it with any voices in my head telling me it should be done. I did not do it with any provocation of impending visitors or parties. I did not do it and then expect it to stay clean. On the contrary, I did it because I liked it. I did it for me, and my kids helped. This is new, like maybe somehow my house had been a mess out of control, because I could, as an adult, have my house any way I wanted. I have recently decided to have it be a little cleaner just because I could. I think it is just because I am starting to feel better, because I am starting to take care of myself without judgement. What a shocking revelation, who knew?

Now, what I need to do is get my house key back.

happy butterflies, and all that fluff

Positive Affirmations, here I come.

I don't know what to think about positive affirmations. They sound a little too hokey-Hallmark-O Network-feel good-blah blah for my tastes. I mean, it sure is nice to hear the you are pretty, or you are energized, or you are successful. But what if you don't feel that way, will hearing it from yourself really help? What if all that happens when you look in the mirror, say the positive words, and smile, is that the person looks back and say "liar!"?

I know that sounded funny, and a little pathetic, but that is actually how I see it right now. Giving myself praise feels weird. More than weird, it feels wrong some how. I am not getting that kind of verbal loving praise from anyone else, and can't even remember a time when I did.

I can remember for a very long time being told exactly the opposite. I was not worthy of anything because I was nothing. I was too fat to be sexy, though there were no complaints about the amount of sex. I was too stupid to be able to do anything right, though there were no complaints about the bills being done on time. I was too ugly to be seen with, though there were serious complaints if I cut my hair in a style I liked, or wore make-up or jewelry, or clothes that fit. I did not know how to load the dish washer correctly, the kids were too whiny, and the car was never clean. I could not be kissed if I had not just brushed my teeth, though if I was put off by the smell of brandy, my refusal to do the same was punished with remarks about how much of a cold bitch I was.

I can say it loudly that I am proud that I have never cheated on any of my relationships. It was not for lack of desire or opportunity, it was just not who I am. I did tell my ex one time that I was attracted to someone at work who was paying a lot of attention to me. It was right after Haysten was born, and given all that happened during that pregnancy, and how I felt about my body, I was pretty shocked anyone noticed me at all. When I confessed this feeling, the words I got back were "Liar, no one will ever be attracted to you." Instead of doing what normal women would do, and smack the bastard upside the head for being, well, a bastard, I said to myself (in my messed up head, of course) "Wow, I really must be lying (read that as delusional) since no one who loves me would say something that mean and not have it be true." I changed work shifts and never talked to the other man again, just in case.

I am learning that there have been a bunch of times in my life, even recently, where I accepted that kind of put down with out any doubt whatsoever that the person saying it was completely right. When I was sure I wanted to be a lawyer and a writer, I was told that that was not a skill for a woman and I should be sure to get my typing skills and teaching knowledge in hand so I would have something to fall back on in case writing and law school didn't work out. I never bothered to apply to law school. I took six zillion English classes but ended up teach pre-school. I never bothered to submit my work. Why would I? I was not a writer, and definitely not one with any talent.

(Okay, I will post links to stories I did write that got published, but want you to know that it scares the hell out of me to both admit that I wrote something, and that it was good enough to get printed).

So back to positive affirmations. Today I will look in the mirror and say out loud "You are an honest and trustworthy person". I will say it again tomorrow. Maybe if I say it everyday for the next few decades I might be able to move on to some other saying. I am voting for beautiful and talented next.




Here are the links BTW: (scroll down and find my name, then come back and read them all, they are good)

Three in this posting:
http://www.montereycountyweekly.com/news/2009/dec/23/the-short-of-it/


One here:
http://www.montereycountyweekly.com/news/2006/jan/05/fast-reads/

I WON in 1999, but they have taken down the link. I will find it and scan it.

27 words

I got the results back from the scantron test my counselor gave me a couple weeks ago. I have been avoiding writing about it. It has just been spinning in my brain, keeping all the other stuff from flowing out. I wanted to write about the end of baseball season. I wanted to write about train trips. I wanted to write about phone messages. I wanted to avoid the obvious, that I could not write about anything else until the feelings about the scantron test were out. Damn.

On a 8.5 x 11 piece of paper there is a graph. It is really more of a line, with dots, on a a scale, with little letters by it representing things. Things like Self Esteem and Anger. There is a truthfulness scale, a depression scale, and a masculine/feminine scale. It has a way of detecting if you are being too fakey-good, or too fakey-bad.

I told the truth, did not exaggerate my goodness, took responsibility for my badness, and answered appropriately for my gender identity. I am not a hypochondriac, a loner, or in any kind of denial. It told me I am angry and depressed, have low self esteem, and tend to need validation from others. It says I have a tendency towards substance abuse (including food) and might be suicidal. Except for the suicidal part (I am not so don't worry), tell me something I didn't know. Most of it fell in the "yeah, duh" category.

The depression diagnosis did not surprise me. It is, in fact, the reason I started counseling to begin with. I knew it. I had gained weight (not a good thing in the best of circumstances). Food tasted bland. My favorite movie irritated me. That was early January, and I had no energy, seasonal blues that meant my Christmas tree was still up, but I hadn't finished decorating it yet. My favorite person had moved away, and I didn't like even the smell of coffee anymore (and I love coffee). I wasn't talking to my best friend, for whatever circumstances were causing the courses of our respective lives to never coincide.

I had also just contacted my attorney about wanting to clarify an agreement regarding custody and visitation. All in all, things were going smoothly. We had survived the Winter school break with no major issues, my children's father picking the kids up for visitation at the appointed/ordered times and places, and not whining too much.

So the only thing I wanted was to have my kids on their brother Seth's birthday every year, as if it was a Holiday (and honestly, this did not effect the schedule AT ALL until 2015). I thought it was no big deal since it was in the original negotiations and co-parenting discussions, and had inadvertently been left off the final orders. This is how my attorney had phrased it to his attorney "Lastly, and this is something you and I touched on very briefly long ago, Elise wishes to have the children with her each year on the birthday of the parties' other son, Seth, who passed away. His birthday was Feb 8."

What I got back in an email was this: "RE: our first "child" Seth. He was stillborn before even being a viable person. This was before Mariah and Haysten were born. I don't agree with her request."

Those 27 words wrecked me. Seth and Mariah and Haysten's father was the only other person in the world who knew Seth lived. And in 27 words he dismissed him. He was a so-called "child" only in my eyes. In my eyes the three of them are a package, the three children I carried, the three children I gave birth to, the three children I love with every fiber of my being. Their father, it seems, only had two children.

So what does this have to do with my scantron? Well, I am pissed and sad. DUH! And 27 words sent a whole flood of other things into my reality. My own childhood. The balance between letting go of hurtful things and still allowing myself to retain the good things. The acceptance that the man I loved and created children with was abusive and cruel, and still is. 27 words that cost him nothing, and has been a catalyst for coming to terms with my entire life.

I am actually a bit surprised that I wasn't worse off. Maybe I can write about something else now. Not like I actually wrote about the scantron test anyway.

Dr Rick

Annual exams are a time that I look forward to for one reason, and one reason only. Let's call him Dr Rick.

I was 24. I was using condoms as my primary birth control method, but needed something better in addition. I was with a boyfriend who I affectionately call my "drama" relationship. We fought, loudly, in parking lots and bars. We threw things at each other, often clothes, out windows, since we lived together (unbeknown to my parents) for much of that time. We danced all night to very loud music, and experimented in the sexual underground of mid-town Sacramento and down-town San Francisco. We were always safe, in that way you had to be in the late 80's AIDS scare, and no actual infidelity occurred, but we were definitely a little further on the edge than I am comfortable admitting. I had met him while drinking at a club just blocks from my midtown apartment, taken him home on the first night, and spent the next couple of years just feeling all the energy that comes with youth and large amounts of sex.

But I digress, this is not a story about that boy.

I had come home to Monterey for a week (a break from the above mentioned boyfriend) and called the first ob/gyn in the phone book my finger came to. His office scheduled me for an appointment that same day. I walk in, scared a bit, but instantly intrigued. I was charmed by the whitewashed carved wood seats and mauve walls. I loved that my pen was a flower, and that there was soft music in the background. I was comforted by the lack of reception area marketing clutter, but instead had several current magazines, a couple romance novels, and a coffee pot with china cups sitting next to it. A little sign in pretty calligraphy said "Help yourself, but it is decaf " and there was a smiley face with little hearts right next to it. The whole place smelled a little like a lavender sachet. Basically, the exact opposite of the life I was leading.

I undressed, put on a pink paper gown, and prepared to have my annual exam by some older, doctory-looking guy, and his sweet little nurse. I had planned to not tell him a word about my sexual history, just that I would need birth control for my committed relationship. I had planned to be shy and demure, and quiet. I had planned to get it done, and get out.

What I got was Dr Rick. He was 34. He had delivered something like 4 babies all by himself at that point, and was still getting established. I think I was actual patient number 37 or something ridiculous. He had been doing this for all of about 5 minutes. His wife of 2 years had just given birth to a daughter (his first) three weeks before. He had not done a c-section yet in his private practice. He ran marathons and planned to do a triathlon in the summer. He had little tiny baby feet on his white lab coat. He had pretty eyes. I was in love.

I spent more that 30 minutes with him talking about sex and choices, babies and safety, and about relationships and love. I learned that he liked angel hair pasta. He learned that I never cheated on any of the boyfriends I had. I learned that he loved woman because his mother was a neurotic basket case. He learned that I loved men because I was terrified of missing something. He called me Elisabeth, I called him Rick. We became friends in that small space of time between 1:15 and 1:45.

In the last 21 years, Dr Rick has been a place of solace and a place of joy. He is the one that confirmed the poly cystic ovaries diagnosis when my first ex-husband and I were trying to get pregnant. I cried in his office and took the referral to the fertility specialist. He is the one that ordered all the STD tests when I learned that the same ex-husband had been cheating, obviously unprotected because the woman was pregnant, and now I could not trust if I was safe or not. I had $12,000 dollars worth of fertility medication on my kitchen counter next to my divorce papers. I cried in his office and took the name of someone who would help me sell the unneeded fertility drugs.

He is the one that confirmed my pregnancy with Seth. He is the one that told me he could not hear the baby's heartbeat on the ultra sound. He is the one that told me I needed to go to the hospital immediately, and he would meet me there. I cried in his office and let him dial the phone for me so I could tell my husband that our baby had died.

Since then, Dr Rick has delivered my other children. He cried with me in the operating room when my daughter came. He laughed with me when my son, seconds old, peed on his pediatrician. He held my children for pictures and showed me pictures of his girls along the way. He is the one I confessed to when I was so tired as a new mom that I understood why new mothers feel like putting their children in dumpsters. He helped me understand that I was normal, and how to take care of myself. He laughed and told me he had had almost the exact conversation with his wife, except hers was plastic bags instead of dumpsters. He said we are both good moms.

When my children's father and I split up, Dr Rick is one of the people I cried with. And he said just the right thing, saying men who are mean and cruel to their wives are sociopaths who don't deserve their families, and I would be better off without him. By now, he is 2 decades into a practice, delivered thousands of babies, and is actually the go-to surgeon for high-risk obstetric and gynecologic procedures on the Peninsula.

Yesterday, I had my annual exam. Dr. Rick joked with me about how the PAP police would be sent the next time I waited 18 months instead of 12 between appointments. We talked about sex and choices, babies and safety, relationships and love. When I said that my 45 year old body just was not gonna have any more babies, he said he thought that meant I was not insane. And then I cried in his office as the weight of all that hit me. No more pregnancies, no more children to birth, no more babies to hold, no more breastfeeding. He got it, and sat next to me, just quiet and still.

He still calls me Elisabeth. I still call him Rick. I will see him again next year.

oh, um... nothing

Let me tell you about my weekend.

On Friday night we did nothing. It was an awesome kind of nothing that involved PB & Js for dinner. We did not bring in the trashcans that were sitting by the curb. We did not pick up the legos that were all over Haysten's floor (though, we would come to regret that in the middle of the night). We did not do dishes, or laundry, or vacuum. We did not take baths. We wrapped ourselves up in underwear and socks (that we had been wearing all day, thanks) and blankets, and watched the last Harry Potter movie on DVD. We ate popsicles, and licked our hands. It was divine.

On Saturday we did nothing. It was an awesome kind of nothing that involved baseball and the National Anthem. We did not make our beds. The trashcans still sat by the curb. We only did laundry enough to have decently clean uniforms. We ate hot dogs from the snack bar and drank Gatorade. We danced in the aisle at the commissary, and cried with both excitement and stress. We sat in the cold and watched Mariah make the only run. Haysten did not see it as he was busy doing nothing in a tree near the edge of the park. When we had dinner, we had a contest to see who could peel their cutie tangerine in one piece. We watched a movie, again in our underwear and socks. We read a bedtime story.

On Sunday we did nothing. It was an awesome kind of nothing that involved sand toys and kite strings. We ate waffles with peanut butter and applesauce in bed. We only got dressed because we wanted to go play in a bounce house, and naked in a bounce house leaves red rub marks (yes, we know this from experience) that sting. We read the poems that were laminated with pink borders and pretty hand drawn leaves. We drank tea with milk and honey. We tried to visit my mom, but after waiting an hour and a half, we ate the KFC and drank the iced tea, and decided to go fly kites at the beach. We buried Haysten up to the neck in the sand, and got completely soaked by a rogue wave. We tied colored strings to our toes and wrote wishes in the sand with and old piece of driftwood. We drove home naked and cold, and laughed until we could not breath. We took warm baths and put on clean pajamas and ate ham sandwiches with tomatoes. We watched another movie, and read another book and cuddled up on the bed until we all drifted into a contented sleep.

This is exactly the kind of weekend I dream about. No schedule, but for a few minor details. No pressure, but for doing something you love for the enjoyment of it in front of friends. No demands, except for having to wind in 300 feet of line and get the sand banged out of the bottom of buckets. No arguing. No crankiness. No rules. No have-tos. No should-ofs.

In the history of Mother's days I will be asked about in the future, wondering what I got as a gift, or how I spent the day, I will wistfully say "nothing" and smile and be happy in the secret of the memory.

It's warm by the stove.

My mom is part of the generation of non-complainers. European war-children, having seen and heard more terrible things before the age of 10 than the rest of us might ever see. She has told me stories of how she, as the oldest of 7 living children, was basically in charge. She cooked. She cleaned. She stole coal off the back of the train while her younger siblings ran behind the railcar and gathered it up in messenger bags and aprons. She read to her charges, changed their diapers, and still fulfilled her duty by belonged to the Hitler Youth, all as was required. There was no complaining. Complaining meant death. Simple.

She grew up the daughter of an Austrian father and a Hungarian mother in Vienna. Hungary had already allied itself with the Axis powers and relied heavily on Italy for it's commerce. Austria was not supposed to be allowed to join forces with Germany because of treaties during WWI, but with Italy and Germany in alliance under Hitler and Mussolini, this was and easy dilemma for Germany. This was 1938. My mom was 5. My mom's status quo was one of soldiers and rallies, silence and food rationing, school and Nazi youth programs. No one loved Hitler, but no one had any power to stop him.

When the end of WWII came, and Vienna was liberated, it was a city divided, literally into 4 areas, by the winners. Russia, the US, and the Brits all took a chunk of the city, and gave a piece to France to show some good will, and have a continental Europe foot hold (and expense sharer). This was in the name of "rebuilding" and "de-nazifying". According to my mother this really meant a bunch of uneducated police "peace-keepers" could do anything they damn-well wanted to you or your house. I heard the stories of the hidden jewelry, and the stolen alcohol, and the uniformed men sleeping in the living room and bedrooms while my mother and her siblings squished into the kitchen.

Maybe I should have recognized in that story when my mom said "at least the kitchen had the stove for heat" that she had no choice but to suffer in silence. What else could she do? Had she said something, she could have been beaten, or killed, and the people left behind would have been punished as severely. For my mother, it was how you lived, you didn't know anything else.

I think of Maya Angelou though as I say that. Her quote “You did then what you knew how to do, And when you knew better, You did better.” doesn't seem to apply to my mom. Somehow in the midst of all those trials, and then having survived, my mother didn't leave. Yes, she married and moved to the US, and bought a house, and had a job, but she never thought about what she could have, just what she didn't have. She forgot that her children were going to have it better than her, and we lived in a state of deprivation. Deprivation of some things, like fast food and sleepovers and store bought birthday cakes. Trivial stuff.

But the big deprivation, the big starvation, was that there was not any affection in the things we did have. Yes, I played baseball and had a bicycle. Yes, I had a television and new shoes every year before school started. Yes, we went fishing and I got all my shots. What I didn't get was the right to cry, or yell, or feel sad, or love, or anger. After all, what did I ever have to feel hurt about compared to being beat and silenced by the Russian Army? It was that simple. I did not need anything more than what I had because she had already survived so much more. I knew it from very very young, and never could I ever ask for anything, because asking for anything that wasn't already given was selfish and unnecessary.

There is so much more, but the timing seems harsh, with Mother's Day on Sunday. Maybe it is a present I can give both of us, her and I. Maybe I can work my way though more of this. Tell her story for her, let her grieve for the childhood she didn't have. Maybe I can grieve for the childhood I didn't have, letting her know in a way that is not one more slap to her face, that she forgot to be happy and she passed that on. Maybe I can learn to be happy myself, and not pass any of this legacy on to my children. Maybe this 80 year long journey gets a little hiatus, a little oasis for the weekend. Maybe I will go sit by the stove where it is warm, or maybe I won't, and I will go sit in the sun instead.

Refrigerator magnets

A new picture showed up on my refrigerator this morning. It was a drawing of a girl, in a two-piece swim suit, floating above the water, graceful with her legs and hands crossed, and a sword through her head with blood dripping in the water.

A sword. Blood. Big smile. Happy fish in the water under her feet. I knew it was my daughter's, I know her style. It is beautiful, colorful, proportionally correct, hanging at eye level where she knew there was not a chance I would miss it. I have not said a word. Not yet.

I have been contemplating what to say. Is this a cry for help? Is this a deep seeded need to act out her frustrations on paper? Is she just copying her brother's style, who often adds warriors fallen in battle to his maps and architectural sketches? Is she just trying her hand at something new?

It is a good deal different than how I interacted with my mom, that is for sure. I hid my drawings and writings from her after the first time. My mother likes happy stories where everything falls into place. Predictable plot lines, familiar places, perfect people. If it has a religious slant and a morality lesson built in, so much the better. Poetry? Not a chance. Dark and sinister, where the bad guys might win, even worse. Moody, or sexy, or outspoken, and it was condemned.

There was a bible in her house, and some Grollier yearbooks. There where Caldacott Medal and Newberry Award winning children's books, signed by the author, but only the ones that would fit on the short shelves. Yep, that was the basic criteria; pretty, pleasant, and no more than 8 inches tall. Sadly, I don't remember my mom ever reading to us past about early pre-school. I could read before kindergarten, and books were my world along with little drawings, so I guess she thought I was good to go. I never hung a picture on her fridge. I never hung one on my bedroom wall for that matter.

So what do I say to my daughter? I don't want her to ever shut down and hide her drawings and writings away like I did. I don't want her to think there isn't any avenue she can't explore, even get help exploring. I want her to know that I love her desire to express herself even if the images are hard to see, or comprehend, coming from her especially. This is new, and I wonder if I am ready to dive in. Also want to make sure I am not missing something if what I say is "Wow, that fish is gonna have a stomach ache if he drinks all that blood." or "Vampire fish should have longer fangs." or "Do you really think the belly button would be that high above the bikini bottom?". I just don't know. That's what has me worried. It is why I did not say anything yet.

I know my girl already writes in her little diary. She shows me sometimes, and we talk about the who? or the what? it says. She asks for colored pens, and I go get them from my art box. Sometimes, she hides the notebook under the covers if I walk by. I respect that. I'm good with that.

I think I might leave the picture on the fridge even after I say something. It is actually kinda good. It looks great with the picture of a drowning cyclops my son drew last week, and the magnet made of gingerbread, and the baseball order forms that never made it to the team mom. Maybe this is just life, and expression, and normal for our new family world. Maybe there is nothing to say.

Softer than a whisper...

This morning, while driving my kids to the youth center they go to before school, my daughter hands me a stack of CDs she pulled out of the cabinet. She tells me that she wants to start listening to music in the car again. It had not even occurred to me that we weren't listening to music. Where had I been? Didn't I even notice how silent the car was most mornings? If you had asked me, I would have thought we were talking the entire time, but I guess not enough for my daughter.

I don't think she actually looked at the CDs. They are definitely not anything she would have been listening to, and nothing you would hear on the local pop radio station. Yet here it was, 4 CDs of my music, waiting to be slid into a CD player in my car, and anything I was listening to would be fine by her, I was assured.

So I open the first jewel case, and pop it in, not even looking at the cover, and turn it up. I can go with the flow, loud music at 7 am is just what I was craving (not!). It turned out to be an old country CD. Hal Ketchum, 1992.

Now, the music is some of my favorite. Ask anyone about my taste in "celebrity" men, and it is either Pierce Brosnan or Hal Ketcham that I would run away with if he came begging at my door. I was not prepared for the impact this particular CD would have on me, at least not today I wasn't. It was the "Sure Love" album, given to me as part of a wedding gift from my first ex-husband. I had popped the CD in, hit shuffle, and listened as this sweet warbly ballad called "Softer than a Whisper" came out. I didn't stand a chance. The universe is out to get me. My daughter is a secret collaborator.

Before I could have hit next, or pulled over and throw the CD out the window, I was sobbing. Big fat tears pouring out of my eyes and leaving dark blood colored spots on my red shirt. I was happy the music was loud, and that right then, my children did not notice their mom blubbering. I could not have explained it to them, how a memory from 17 years ago just hit me up-side the head and knocked me down.

In the truest sense of the word, I am "over" my first ex-husband. We were married for 7 years, and the breakup was quick, involving infidelity, mental illness, and the impending birth of a child who was not mine. It had shocked me to find that I would not be with him forever, but having lived the last 12 years, and having talked with him about the choices and the pain it caused several times in the last decade, I know that we made the right decision. If we had not split, right at that time, we would have ended up hating each other, instead of being okay with each other, like we are now. I don't miss him.

So I tried to figure out why the song made me cry instead of smile today. I have heard it enough times, even in more recent years, that it was not a shocking event. I have played the CD all the way through several times, and even have it on my MP3 player. I know I have heard it on the radio, and even in a movie. So it wasn't the song, per se, and truth, it wasn't my ex-husband either.

What was it? It was hope, and desire, and possibilities. It was the future and the past and the longing. It was that things change and life moves on and you survive and thrive and fail. All of that, all at once, in one fell shot, taking no prisoners, and unwritten permission to feel it all right then and there.

I like that. No prisoners. Crying would be okay. Songs could devastate me for three and a half minutes, and I would make it out the other side. I was feeling something for myself, in my heart, and I could hold it and be in it, and allow it, without losing anything in the process, or being trapped by it in a personal sentencing to life devoid of emotion.

I will make it a point to listen to the song again on my drive home. Conjure for myself the happy image that love was there. I will wrap myself up in the memory and let it make me warm. It is just a part of allowing myself to get to keep the good stuff, own it, enjoy it, even when bad stuff happened after. That way, maybe I will remember that in the middle of feeling all the bad stuff, like right now, there will be good stuff left. I will accept love when it comes, and do my best to recognize it. This time, love found me in an old CD, and I am grateful for the memory.

And just for my own heart, here are the lyrics:


It was softer than a whisper
Quiet as the moon
But I could hear it loud as laughter
Across a crowded room
It was gentle as a baby's hand
But it held me like a chain
It was softer than a whisper
When love called out my name

Time's up. Pencils down.

I have been given two separate assignments by my counselor this week.

The first, though only marginally scary, is done. It involved a number 2 pencil, a scantron, and a test book. It took two hours. It was not difficult, as long as I just answered the question and did not spend too much time inside my head. I mean, how hard is it to answer yes or no to questions like "You would like to be a florist." and "You have headaches often."? They were redundant, sometimes seemingly superficial, and will, in a week's time, tell me just how fucked in the head I am. I don't really mind.

The second is the one that is killing me. I almost decided I was going to fire my counselor. I almost decided I was going to burn down his office building for good measure. I almost decided to stop writing again. Yep, two weeks into my new (re) found online journalling, and I was calling it quits. How dare he give me a writing assignment. How dare he give me a writing assignment that would involve my feelings. How dare he make me want to hide just because I let him inside my head.

The assignment was to write down all the reasons I could think of for why I feel invisible, and have since I was a kid. It was to be first a "head" exercise; just a list of possible reasons why my mother ignored me or kept me at a distance. On the list would be my father's reason for being angry if I cried. I would write down why my brother could get Cs and I needed to get As for the exact same type of notice.

I was then supposed to write down, once again in list form, the other people who made judgments against me that do not seem fair on the surface, and what their reasons might be. I was to list things like why my first ex husband walked off 13 different jobs in 7 years and we never had any money . I would include that my children's father had an affair with my sister when I was pregnant with my son, and how he told me it was my fault because I was too fat. I would list the story about a boyfriend who left in the middle of the night because the police showed up to arrest his daughter's mother. And the girlfriend who broke up with me because she could not biologically father my children.

Writing all that down was the easy part. I did it, just like I was supposed to. It is the part in my head, the part that starts to sound like a laundry list. It is a bibliography of stories that make up the timeline that got me from there to here. I didn't forget any of it. I could probably tell you what I was wearing.

Part two caused me to shake. Part two made me write how each of those events made me feel. Really? Fuck that. I don't want to fucking tell my god-damned counselor how the fuck I feel. I didn't want to remember feeling isolated and scared when I was sent off to softball practice alone. I didn't want to remember feeling jealous and angry when my brother got a dollar per C and I had to explain the A- in handwriting before my mom would sign the report card. I did not want to remember feeling worthless and ugly and abandoned when my husband wrote love letters to other women, often in front of me. I didn't want to remember feeling lonely and overwhelmed with grief when my milk came in after my son died, and being told at least he didn't suffer. Fuck all of that, I was a mess.

So I did not burn down my counselor's office. I wrote with a pen and paper a list, with words and pictures and colored pens. I used a bunch of tissues and toilet paper, and I slept. I hate that I cried to the point of sobbing and having a runny nose and red splotches on my face and neck. I hate that I almost stopped writing at all, because then I would go all invisible again. I hate that my life is still feeling like a tailspin and I have not mastered it yet. I hate that in that laundry list, there are sure to be things I have not even begun to uncover because I just haven't faced them yet. Damn, I feel more assignments in my future.

I wonder if I should be worried about the scantron test. I guess I would be if I had even the slightest bit of energy left. Maybe that was why I got the two assignments at once. Maybe my counselor knew I would have to let one go.