Joel & Julia...too close to home

It's been a long time since I've written a "PYHO" post, but this was on my mind and my heart. A good friend and excellent writer recently wrote about good writing being that which scares us the most to write. The two things came together and, well, here I am, pouring my heart out. Please be gentle with it.

Whether it was adrenaline from having watched "Captain Phillips" or it was too many Diet Cokes (yes, I'm off the wagon), I stayed up much too late on Saturday to watch three episodes of the TV show "Parenthood." One continuing storyline is the decaying of the marriage of Joel and Julia. Without going into a lot of detail, I'll bring you up to speed by saying that Joel has decided to move out of the house. That was hard to watch because it hit too close to home.

It was, in the relatively recent past, me and my husband sitting on opposite sides of the room, opening a conversation with our children with the words "First, we want you to know that we both love you very much." Honestly, if you hear those words, brace yourselves. Hard times will follow.

The reasons that Mike and I separated were different that what is being played out on the television show, but I recognized the look that Joel and Julia gave each other as they were wrapping their arms around their children, attempting to make it all better, even momentarily. It's that look that says "What are we doing?" and "This is how it has to be" all at the same time. It's really an awful feeling, one where you want to show a loving, united front to your children when what you feel is torn apart at every point where you used to be connected.

I wish I could tell you if my kids reacted the way the children on the show reacted, but honestly I don't remember. That probably makes me a bad mom, but I was so wrapped up in -- and broken down by -- what seemed like the end of my marriage, I can't tell you what my kids said or did when we delivered the news that we were separating.

Then, there were the days and nights that followed. The ones that were so full of relief it felt as though this must certainly be the first breath I'd taken in months. And the ones that were so empty that no amount of television noise or bowls of ice cream or Facebooking could fill them.The kids would ask "when is Dad coming home" and I wouldn't have an answer that satisfied them, in part because he was away because that's where I'd sent him.

There were moments of uncertainty, when prayers where hastily thrown up with hopes that they would stick. And there were moments of enormous grace, when prayers were answered in ways we least expected.

I don't know what will happen on "Parenthood" with Joel and Julia (and I don't really care). If you'd told me that at this point, my story would have us living again as a family of 5 under one roof when two roofs -- permanently -- seemed like such a certainty not that long ago, I wouldn't have believed you. I can't even tell you what happened to bring our family back together. My only explanation is that same enormous grace...delivered moment by moment in prayers whispered and cried out, by me, by Mike, by plenty of people who love us. Grace that gave us each the courage to trust and to forgive, little bit by little bit.

Yes, it was hard to watch Joel and Julia walking that path, but nowhere near as hard as it was to walk it myself, not knowing where the road would lead. We are not far enough on the other side that I can be grateful for it having happened, for it shaping me as a person. But I'm grateful we are, indeed, on the other side.

To read more PYHO posts, click the graphic at the top of this post.

I feel like dancing

For all that worry, I made it to work just fine! I waited until the end of rush hour before leaving. The side streets were a little like driving on the surface of the moon. The highways were a little slow, but mostly clear. My 40 minute commute took me about an hour, but that's not too bad, considering.

And now? Now I feel like dancing:

Why did the chicken cross the road?

Well, in this case, the chicken would be ME. And the only reason I'm crossing the road tomorrow is that I have to go to work. And to a post-op doctor's appointment. And I'm certainly not chirping about it. In fact, I'm "bawking" at the prospect.

I really don't like to drive -- and that's on a good day. Tomorrow, I'll be setting foot -- more accurately, minivan -- on roads that have been described as bumpy, slick, ice ridden, rutted, dangerous. I wouldn't know myself; I haven't left the house since before noon on Saturday.

"Go slowly," everyone keeps saying. I have a 40-minute commute, so do I plan for 90 minutes tomorrow? I'd rather work from home and save myself an hour and a half on the round trip. But I really need to get back to the office. I haven't been there since December 16, the day before my surgery. There are things I need to check on and people I need to see and a frame of mind I need to get back into. Sigh.

Of course that neck surgery is another thing that is nagging me about the whole driving thing. What if I get into an accident? I envision little titanium nails popping out of my vertebrae and my spine wobbling like a Slinky. Realistically none of that will happen, the accident or a Slinky spine scenario.

Mike offered to drive me to work and if it weren't for the mid-of-the-day post-op appointment, I'd let him. Besides, there are plenty of people who have been out there, driving to and from work and surviving just fine. I know (I think) I can do it. I just don't want to.

I hope by this time tomorrow, I'll be laughing at myself for being so nervous to drive somewhere. Or maybe my nerves will be shot from the experience, which would of course make me a...wait for it...fried chicken.

Oh the pressure of the New Year

The beginning of a new year…oh, the possibility of a blank slate, the potential of dreams yet unfulfilled, the pressure to do it right. When Mike left for college, his very well-meaning grandfather stood in the driveway, waved goodbye and called out, "DO EVERYTHING RIGHT!" That's what the New Year feels like to me.

The New Year kind of stresses me out. Not in the way it stressed out my mother-in-law, who wouldn't go anywhere after 5pm on December 31 because "everyone out there is drunk driving." What stresses me out is the pressure to perform. 

Lose weight.

Spend less.

Save more. 

Have a cleaner house. 

Eat like a caveman. 

Reduce your carbon footprint. 

Pray more. 

None of those things are bad. No one would argue that any of them would lead to bad things. But the bandwagons that are circling for those things make me more nervous than a kid whose needle-wielding doctor just said "this won't hurt...much."

It's not that I don't see areas of my life which could use improvement. It's that I see too many areas that are begging for attention. Lose weight. Spend less. Save more. Be more organized. Be present more. Pray more. Covet less. 

Maybe I need to get more comfortable with the idea of goal-setting. Maybe I need to be better about creating a plan by which to reach a goal. Maybe I need to print signs -- "encouragements" for you Fault in Our Stars fans  -- to hang around the house. Would any of that make me embrace the possibility of the New Year any more than I do?

Last year, I decided that in the New Year I wanted to simply be kind, spread joy. I think I succeeded for the most part, extending kindness outward. 

This year, I'm feeling a pull to turning inward, focusing on our family, our interactions with one another, our stewardship of those things which we've been given. Maybe its the realization that we really only have Annie at home for another 18 months. Maybe its a natural tendency to gather my people in when they are, quite naturally, moving into circles further from our home base. 

I don't have any real resolutions to offer, just an awareness of a direction in which I want to move. No pressure. 

How to survive the last part of Christmas break

Christmas break from school (and work for me) is a wonderful thing. We all look forward to it every year. Days of sleeping in. Nights of watching TV past the usual bedtime. The glitter and color of Christmas celebrations. The laughter (and ok, sometimes, gritted teeth) of time spent with siblings and cousins we don't see all the time. And then.

And then Christmas is over. The celebrations are mere crumbs and crumpled paper in our memories and the kids still have 10 days at home before school starts again. So now what?

Now the "How to Survive the Last Part of Christmas Break" idea list, that's what. Here's what's rolling around in my head...

1. Empty the backpacks. You can skip this if you've already done it, but I can tell you that my kids' backpacks are sitting on their bedroom floors, untouched since they were dumped there the last day of school. Time to drag those things out, toss all the stale and crushed snacks left over from the class Christmas party, smooth out the instructions for the over-the-break project that's probably lurking in there, and for good measure, toss the pack in the washing machine to remove a semester's worth of dirt and germs.
   
2. Edit the toys. In with the new, out with the old. While it would have been a good idea to do this before Santa arrived, doing it with shiny new toys in the picture makes tossing the old ones less of a painful experience.
   
3. Spend those gift cards. I made the mistake letting Robbie spend his Christmas money at Target the day after Christmas. Now that 1,000-piece Lego is built -- yes, it did take him a good 5 or 6 hours to do. I should have waited until next week when the "I'm boreds" have hit.
   
4. Create. Bake or paint or build a snowman if you're lucky enough to have snow. Santa brought us a Rainbow Loom for Christmas. So far, we've made one bracelet. So next week when the kids are whining about wanting something to do, we'll work on a matched set. Provided I get my hind end to the post office today, next week my niece can use her well-honed Rainbow Loom skills to take it to the next level. I was the lucky recipient of a review copy of Loom Magic, a new book filled with 25 loomtastic projects.* There are instructions to make a watchband, a cell phone cover, hair barrettes and even rubber nunchuks. Since we are newbies to the loom, I'm sending my copy to Camryn. I can't wait to see what she whips up.
   
5. Phone a friend. A little too much family togetherness can spoil the soup (or something like that). ( call it "family fatigue syndrome." Now that all the planning and prepping for Christmas is behind us, this last week of vacation is the perfect time for the kids to hang out with friends. Bonus points if they go to the friend's house.
   
6. Clean out the cabinets and closets. Much to my children's unknowing chagrin, this is indeed on our list of things to do this coming week. I have 2, maybe 3, closets in mind. They won't love the task, but a little character-building decluttering never hurt anyone.
   
7. Enjoy! As much as my kids might argue differently, I am not all about cracking the whip. I do want to enjoy this unencumbered time. We will take in a movie or two (matinees on the cheap, of course). We will sleep in. We'll watch the Rose Parade and a bowl game or two.

What will you do to thrive and survive this last week of Christmas break? I'd love to have a few more ideas to add to my list.

*Loom Magic is published by Sky Pony Press, the company that provided me with my free copy. If you click the link in this post, it will take you to Amazon.com. If you buy the book from Amazon following my link, I will get a few pennies as a thanks for directing you there.

The love child with the funny name

Sing with me...

"On the 2nd day of Christmas, my true love gave to me..."

A vintage-real-life-never-out-of-the-box-signature-on-her-bum-birth-certificate-included-Cabbage-Patch-Kid!

She was a little delayed on arrival, but given that she's been in a box since 1985, I'll cut her a break for not knowing about GPS.

The box came just as we were leaving for Charlie's basketball game. It was big, but light. I didn't have a sense of what was in it, but Mike was happy it had made it. So when we came home from the basketball game, we all sat in the family room as I opened the box. I'll admit to getting a little teary when I saw the yellow cardboard packaging with the chubby leafy baby logo.

Mike said he had tried to buy a doll with red pigtails, like the one my sister had, but I'm glad he didn't get that one. All those years ago, in the year without a Cabbage Patch Kid, I didn't want my sister's doll. I wanted my own. And now I have her.

She came, still affixed to the packaging with twisty wire, her birth certificate still glued to the cardboard next to her.

Her name: Elna Fanny.

Elna, which means "sun ray."

Fanny, which means, well, duh. Fanny, bum, bucket, buttocks.

My very own Cabbage Patch Kid and her name means, loosely translated of course, "sun shines out her arse!"

I wasted no time in opening the box. This is no collector's item doll. This is my doll. And I will love her and hug her and squeeze her...sorry to go John Steinbeck for a moment.

Anyway, it is pretty funny how maternal I felt toward Elna Fanny as soon as I freed her from her box. Even after 28 years encased in cardboard and cellophane (imagine the bedhead!), she has that baby powdery smell that I remember Cabbage Patch Kids having. Her birth certificate came with a form to fill out so I can send away for an official certificate suitable for framing, though I have a feeling that's a piece of mail that would go unanswered these days.

I sat on the couch with her and smelled her chubby cheeks, finding myself talking in baby talk and allowing my mind to wander a bit about how it might be to have a REAL baby in the house again. Then I remembered real babies don't always smell like powder and they are not often content to sit in one place for 28 minutes, let alone years.

So, I thanked Mike with a kiss, and took Elna Fanny -- it's a must to use both names -- upstairs to bed with me. Oh, no worries. No co-sleeping here. She is tucked into her own call-it-a-bassinet-but-its-really-a-laundry-basket next to my bed, that just happened to be there in a handy spot.

She'll probably hang out in my room most of the time. Some days, maybe I'll pick her up just to smell her powdery sweetness. I might peek at her bum just to see the "real" Xavier Roberts signature again. And sometimes I'll just smile at the thought that Elna Fanny is the love child of my childhood dreams and my husband's desire to make them to come true.

10 things you think to yourself when you're about to go under the knife

1. Wait! I changed my mind.
2. I hope the surgeon doesn't sneeze while he's cutting on my neck.
3. Which will be better…sleeping a long time or watching movies for days on end?
4. They really ought to re-think what qualifies as outpatient surgery.
5. I wonder if the titanium in my neck will set off the metal detector at the airport?
6. I hope the kids pick up the house a bit before my parents get here.
7. Is it inappropriate to wear jammies to the surgery center? 
8. I sure hope this works.
9. I wish the kids were awake right now so I could give them one last squeeze.
10. Wow. I could use a Diet Coke.

BONUS: This is going to be one epic game of Mommy's legs are broken.

See you on the flip side.