calm. hope. help.

I ask for more even when I know I don't deserve what I already have. But still, I ask. My expectations are like dreams now. Dreams I only visit in my deepest sleep, just to see them disappear come daybreak. Please send me some relief. A sign of hope for better things to come. Please.

Oh Yes! We sure did!

Hey,

Want a free Obama sticker to celebrate our victory? It's designed by Shepard Fairey, the artist who created the iconic HOPE poster. And MoveOn's giving them away totally free--even the shipping's free.

I just got mine. Click this link to get your free Obama sticker:

http://pol.moveon.org/shepstickers/?id=-9286023-jCrmycx&rc=

Thanks!

President-Elect, Barack Obama!

"Will we unite?
Are we ready to begin a new chapter in America?"














A resounding YES to both questions.

At this moment in the history of our planet, hands are outstretched like never before.

YES WE CAN!

This is a new era. Our elected president will lead us, along side the rest of the world leaders, as ONE for ALL.

This is my belief.

I am filled with pride.

Never have I understood patriotism before this moment. Barack Obama is the American Dream realized and we are fortunate to not only bare witness, not just to reap the benefits, but to taste the sweetness of our hard work realized!

Hope. I have hope for our future.

To be apart of these amazing steps forward for all humanity...my emotion has tempered my words. I am speechless, filled with love and gratitude. I have no language for the depth of feelings swirling in my chest. Joy. I am joy incarnate!

I was born into cynicism, into the post Vietnam mentality, into mistrust, into hatred, into doubt, into America=white men, into the glass ceiling, into the dumbing down, consumer culture, into "1 person doesn't make a difference", into racism and divisive media. I was told I could be anything and then promptly shown the door...barred shut. We have been duped, was the resounding consensus.

My faith in humankind is restored. My parent's faith has been restored. I am rejecting the myth of apathy of the masses! This is our victory. Yes we can.


Change can happen! Brick by brick. Block by block.
http://my.barackobama.com/page/community/post/stateupdates/gGxLhV

last coastal trip, before the snow flies

One of my favorite books from childhood says it best! Thanks to Leo Lionni, Frederick is forever...


"I do work, I gather sun rays for the cold dark winter days."














"I am gathering words for the winter days are long and many,
and we'll run out of things to say."














"'What about your supplies, Frederick?' they ask.....

Close your eyes"

"Now I send you the rays of the sun.....do you feel their golden glow?"

Shop class for moms...

seaside end of summer retreat...ahhh.... and the world shifts.


Nothing like a day at the beach to dust off the cobwebs of monotony. I am utterly at peace. Even the laundry can't get me down. No no. So what, we brought half the beach home with us? Yay sand!

Occasional, you need to leave home, only to come back with a deeper appreciation for all that exists within those walls of your own making. Now and then, you need a sledgehammer to crack a nut : )

Modern Nature

Sometimes I feel the walls closing in...

It's all too much. Keeping up all the appearances, the friendships, the requisite this that & the other thing. I'm in burn out mode.

I'm laying low... again.

Big changes are on the horizon & I am full tilt riddled with anxiety. The intensity of my life is at a fever pitch most days. And my life is as normal as can be. It's not any one thing or any one person that is all too much...I just reach the tipping point, and I need to check out for a while. No phone, no screen, just me.

Is that true?

No.

It's NEVER just me, is it? It's the 4 kids, breakfast, lunch & dinner, laundry, broken cars, the introductory offer on the wireless service about to expire, the relationship, the breaking up of arguments, the cruise directing, the calendar, the dentist, the stupid crab that nobody feeds, the phone that still rings & many unanswered messages mounting up, and then, the inevitable guilt.

Guilt, I hate you.

It always comes. Can we ever truly drop out...even for a little while without that hideous tag along?

Do I really need to check out? Why do I get so overwhelmed with the daily grind? No one else gets the luxury of a vacation from their life, why should I? Why can't I just rise to the occasion...everyday? I'm lucky. Blessed. What the hell is my problem?

Anxiety begets anxiety.

I am trying to hide. Escape. From what?
People. Obligations. Friends.
But while I'm in hiding, there is no real recharging of sorts. No relaxation. Just guilt & paranoia, and the thumbing through my mental rolodex of excuses for all those unanswered messages.

What is my excuse?

Why do I keep putting myself in this position? This happens 3 or 4 times-ish a year. Leading up to my self imposed seclusion, I can feel the walls closing in. The mounting pressure. Will it ever be possible for me to accept this cycle & just be in it?

Will I keep up the excuses?
What does that mean? It means that I have people in my life who expect things of me that I can't always deliver. The intensity is overwhelming. I then feel compelled to make it OK. Enter the excuses:

Things have been so crazy!
I've been so tired.
The kids...
The baby...
So much to do...
Days turn into weeks...
I miss you! Lets get together...wah wah wah wah (although this is sincere, I feel like it sounds like a Charlie Brown episode!)

Who wants a friend that checks out on them? Wouldn't you think it's personal? Isn't it personal? And then I feel bad because I then begin feel isolated when no one returns my calls. No friends. Duh!

This is beginning to have a little passive aggressive wash to it...but is it?

What a world.




The time is here for being straight
It's not too early and never too late
People say I should watch my pace (What do they know?)
Think how you spend all your days (They all say so)
They'll just have to wait and see (Wait and see)
If things go right they'll have to agree

Oh, what a world this life would be
Forget all your technicolour dreams
Forget modern nature
This is how it's meant to be

Du-dam-dam-duru-dam..

today

today I am small.
inconsequential.
and yet
everything to some.
including
a source of great frustration.

why
can't you do it right now?
why
beans AGAIN?
why
are you yelling at me?

no.
I did not hear you the first 5 times.

I'm breathing.
and clenching
my jaw
that hurts
again.

the kitchen
is a revolving door of
never enough.

the bathroom.
seriously taboo.

and me?
neglected.
again.
by no one other than
myself.

I'll get to it.
one of these days.

Dream a little dream...

I had the MOST disturbing dream last night. Yuck! It felt so real. I couldn't shake it- all night I would wake up & then go right back into it. I dreamed that my husband left me for this skinny, perky blond with no kids. I would watch them run together (he doesn't run) and laugh and carry on like life is GOOD! He was all fit & muscley-like & thrilled about her cooking. He went on & on about her home made waffles. Home made fucking waffles? I cook for him EVERY SINGLE DAY! In the dream, he claimed HER waffles were the reason he became so fit. Waffles as diet plan? OK.

kill kill.

Several times I found myself screaming at him (I've NEVER screamed at him in life) that we are broken! BROKEN! And HE broke us! It was always in odd places from my past and their were people from all parts of my life-- past & present all grouped together in these odd locations that they would never be ordinarily. For example, a bunch of parents & teachers from my children's former school were gathered in MY old high school gym...like at the eighth grade dance (?) while this hideous scene between my husband & I played out. I remember screaming while catching a glimpse of my son's former 3rd grade teacher. It was shortly after that I met up with HIM.

What the hell is going on in my head?

I actually ended up starting a relationship during this disaster that was the end of my marriage. What? It was a boy, now a man, from high school that I had a closeted crush on for years. We got it on at my Dad's house (eeew!!) in my former bedroom & then I found myself pregnant. Yeah. So, I'm pregnant with my 5th child and living with my father while my husband has left me for the blond waffle maker & my kids are displaced from their home that my husband has claimed for himself & miss waffle, the home that doesn't exist in life mind you, and my poor children are waking up every morning soaked from wetting their beds b/c their mother is too preoccupied with her pregnancy & heart ache to remember to take them to the bathroom!!

Why would I run to someone else instead of taking care of my children? I jumped into this new situation while completely disregarding the reality of the disaster in front of me...And then I went & made it worse, MUCH worse. So, here I am, knocked up with some guys kid and I'm trying to figure out how the hell it all happened. Some guy that I could give a flying flip about & now I'm panicking & thinking the A word (which I would Never consider in life- No judgment). I remember feeling the shame of the world. I had tremendous guilt for my awful choices and all the time feeling also like a victim. Like, how could this happen to me? How could this be MY life? What did I do to deserve this? Yet, much of it was my fault.

At one point my grandparents, who I adore, looked at me with such pity. I wanted to die. I just felt so trapped. How could I be here? It was then that I identified with other people going through a divorce or split of sorts. My husband would try to reconcile here and there, and I would just unleash this ANGER from deep inside me. It was frightening...how much was there that I couldn't harness. I recognized that once you say or do that ONE thing, that's it. It's the tipping point and you can't EVER go back. Your life as you once knew it is over. Expectations gone. Memories scarred.

And then you are pregnant, living with your douche bag absent parent from your childhood that is now influencing YOUR children, with no money, no partner, and the cherry on the sundae is that your husband looks and feels better than ever...with someone else.

I woke up.

I was laying in between my 13 month old & 4 year old. My husband came in to kiss me goodbye, like he does every morning. I almost puked. Part of me wanted to jump up and hold him until all of the dread from the previous nights unrest left my body. The other part of me wanted to sock him...again and again. I managed to ask him about his little blond chippy & the magic diet waffles as he edged closer to my bedside.

He grinned a queer grin and whispered smugly into my ear,

"You've got it ALL wrong. She would have been a red head."

the daily catch...

I've been OUTED...by myself!

SPOILER ALERT: ROOKIE ERROR AHEAD

My advice for the "secret bloggers"out there...

Sign out of your "secret" account before you post to your public account. I am an utter ding bat! Just one little comment. Jut one. And it's over. Like that.

Seriously?
A slip THAT big?
AND it happened on the very day that my co-blogger decided to turn on the "moderate comments". Not ONLY that! Oh no. It was just after I published my very first "secret"post. So I leave my comment, and since it didn't just appear (poof), I didn't happen to recognize I was signed in under my new identity.

Perfect.

So we're moderating comments now. Harmless right? HA!

I've been had! I'm a rider.
My secrets out. Does everything happen for a reason? Is it Karma? Was it just one of those things? What is it?

After taking stock of my need to please and serious inability to tune out my audience in the real world, I've decided to take my lumps. I am continuing on with blind ignorance (kind of) to the fact that my private words are exposed to those I know (friends, family). That said, I'm staying the course. This is important to me and I want to finish it.

Inner dialog:

{{{Does that sound strong? Courageous even? I wonder if they'll see right through it? "Important" my ass! Sure, when I'm the ranter! NOT ME!}}}

What am I asking myself now?

I wonder about the nature of accidents. I struggle with going back & forth between believing in fate (and signs and everything that comes with it) and giving into the old adage:

Shit Happens.

With no fault to anyone, we have natural disasters, we lose jobs, people die. I don't believe success is measured by how seemingly easy or without trial your life is, just as I do not I believe God has a hand in everything we do. We have free will. All of us. Following that logic, God couldn't possibly know everything that will ever happen. I believe God is here and with us always. But as a support. A sounding board. The barometer. The guide.

Always?

It's scary to me to even right that word with a question mark. The truth is, I DO believe, but I don't always FEEL it. Does that make sense? Sometimes I really feel like a big fat failure in this messed up world...with no one to count on, no relief, no manual. I just want to know that it all works out...and I can't. I love information. I revel in the details. Do you see my conundrum. I want to know the unknowable. And I wonder why I feel unsatisfied?

That's a bit simplistic, I know, but we'll visit that another day.

Both sides have value- right? But, in my experience, subscribing to either one is a slippery slope. I'm the type of person who seeks out order and looks for patterns in everything. I want ot make sense of things. I like answers. I also happen to ask a shit ton of questions. Yeah. I said shit ton. I'm from a hick town, originally, and some of my inner hickness comes out now & then. I'm bringing shit ton back. Try it. It's way liberating, & trust me, you'll get some serious laughs. At least a reaction any way : )

So, back to the free will vs. shit happens debate. I'm kind of a tandem believer, and currently, it's working better than the alternative. I'm the first to scoff at these modern folks with all their take a little from here, a little over there & lets dream up a religion (philosophy, etc.) that works out best for me. I don't lump myself in with that lot, but I do see the inclination. But you must also know that I am open. I am open to new ways of looking at the world...myself included. New ways of learning and thinking. I push myself whenever possible to try on different ways of being to see what I can see.

I believe we are here as many (not 1) to build community. It is in the essence of building community that we are forced to look at ourselves. All of it. We are confronted face to face with our flaws,our humility, our limitations, our gifts, our strengths, our egos. We need each other in order to be the best version of ourselves and to continually do that inner work that keeps us humble, fresh, and always learning. I see God in my life. I see glimpses, in the moments that are timeless, of what god wants for us. I also see how the suffering, longing, and poverty are completely unrelated to the will of god. There's this deep inequality on so many sick levels in this world, and no one did anything special to deserve that place. Just because you pray diligently & go to church regularly, that's not the reason you have a huge house & kick ass trust fund to boot. Ya dig?

This is my dime store guide to the cosmos, I know. But this is how it works for me- and I struggle. Struggle with feeling isolated, feeling alone, and just left...left by all my elders.

I'm an amateur. Just a girl really.
In the words of Juno, "I am ill equipped."

I have this creeping feeling that I am doing it all wrong. Nothing is really going to work out the way I want it to. I'm scared to death that I will spend the rest of my life waiting for the day when...and all the while trying so hard to be grateful for what I do have. I often say to myself, "How do you want to remember this moment?", and sometimes it helps me to rise above.

I'm gonna say it.

Do you ever feel like you've been dealt a bad hand?

There. I said it. God, it looks so pathetic in print.
Here's my unrealistic fear, yet, I feel like it's actually real...some of the time. The people in my life that have gargantuan sums of money seem to have the air about them that it all happened as a result of their positive thinking and openness to it. OK. I'm trying to wrap my head around that one. I even practice it. But what then do you do if it doesn't happen? If in fact you work your ass off for very little money and don't have the financial mobility to change your circumstances in a big way? Does that mean if I only willed it stronger, tried harder...I'd be in your shoes now?

Hell NO!

Inner voice:

{{{God I hope not? Is it me? Am I closed off? NO!! Well, am I? NO!! Could it really be me?}}}

I feel compelled to soften my earlier remark. I am pretty lucky to have the things in my life that matter. The things that you cannot buy or create by having all the things around you that look the way they should that make up the recipe for a perfect life. But a little farm- a house even for my kids to grow up in, sure would be sweet : )

I hope to have a little piece of land to call my own one day. A garden, a hobby farm in the country, and a place for the kids to play. Will I get there? And who can tell me where I am now? Trick question? Yeah yeah. I guess I'll have to get to work on that one. Seriously, where are all the mentors with the sage ass advice?

Birthday Hell

Quick background before you read today's post:

My family (husband & children) moved to this are 5 years ago in search of a better education. I had my kids at a Waldorf School. That sucked big time. Love the education, hated my kids teacher for shaming him daily.

That was a pickle.

So, now we're nearing the end of 2 years of homeschooling and we have decided to enroll them in a public school. I have 4 children, two of which are school-aged. I had a birthday this week, 33. People see me as kind, patient, fun, loving & easy going- always positive, forever the optimist. Oh what they don't see...


I'm having an incommunicado week- not on purpose, just trying to stitch together a sentence or two without weeping. It's so stupid. I have a great life. What's my problem? I'm trying to focus so hard on all that I have. I really am grateful! I do so appreciate all the beautiful gifts I have in my life. So why the tears? Why am I in this place? Why can't I shift my focus? my perspective? my story?

I have everything I need and more.

I spent my entire birthday crying. Sobbing. Weeping like I was trying to save the freaking whales with my blubbering. I'm in such a funk- so much emotion is rising to the surface as I reflect on my life. It started the night before my birthday & it's beginning to clear a bit (fake it till you make it, right?). Birthdays have been tough for me b/c they bring up childhood birthdays, which historically, not so stellar. My father forgot year after year & my mom, well, she was more the child than I was. She had an aneurysm just prior to my 5th birthday. She's living in a group home and I am her guardian. The honest truth is, my mother died when I was 4 and now, I could really use a mom. I have now connected with the orphaned child in me that feels like they have no mentor, no protector. But, on the outside (when I was growing up) I looked the part of a kid who had everything they needed.

This is all hitting a bit too close to home at the moment.

So, this year I'm sitting with letting go of some that stuff. My father & "mother" forgetting my birthday (again) didn't help. I'm certainly not dependent on their approval, it just set the wheels turning down this shit bag of a road. It feels good to swear. Also, this sending my kids to school makes me feel like a failure...to them and myself. A big fat lazy failure with an embarrassing lack of patience. The real kicker is I really like this (public) school. I didn't have any of these feelings until now. This is exactly how I felt when we left the Waldorf school. Well- there's a lot more in both cases, but I'm distilling it down. I feel like my kids will not get the education I want for them b/c of me. I've done something wrong. I don't deserve to have fill in the blank.

How do I underscore the level at which I feel a failure?

Let's see. The state of our home life is so far out of my control- it's chaos 24 + 7. At the end of each day I recount all the moments where I've been ignored, yelled at, called every name you can think of...and then I go over how my kids interact, their lack of boundaries, their work ethic. Then I tally how much we accomplished- rather, how much we have yet to do. It's a sad state of affairs.

Then I go to, "WHAT'S WRONG WITH ME!!??"

So, I'm letting things go.Flipping the script- been reading Byron Katie. I'm not reacting. I'm doing everything I want them to do but won't. Guess how that's turned out? FYI, I started this on my birthday- retarded, hello? I am no longer the chore minder, the referee, the "mean teacher". Great right? I'm taking the charge out of it (also been reading a lot of Pema Chodron). I'm rising above the feeling to react to that voice. I am not reacting to my fears of them attending community college-- or worse-- community service.

Oh no. Nope. Not at all.

I am now their servant, their maid, their chauffeur, their personal chef & audience to their many & frequent fisticuffs as I bare witness to the piles & stacks of unattended school work.

The inmates are running the asylum!


***********************************************************************************
Please god. Give me a fucking manual! Even just a tiny glimpse into the future will do...just to see how it turns out? A tiny glimpse? OK. I'll settle for the manual.

god? <>

uh...god? you there?

Byron Katie? Pema? Super Nanny? Anybody?
************************************************************************************

I am so far gone into the land of ill equipped- these are desperate times. Where's the grandmother with all the sage advice? And why now, that I'm cashing in the homeschooling chips do I have this new (but familiar) flutter of anxiety over what I'm gonna be when I grow up? I was still, settled even when I identified as a homeschooling mom. Now there's all these questions. Questions like, "What am I going to do now that the kids are all set up?"

Ggood fucking question.

Better yet, what do I want to do? AND, why exactly did I feel more settled as a homeschooler? It certainly wasn't a place where I felt confident in what I was doing. So then, what the hell is it? And why can't I just be their mom? Why do I feel like I am a big fat loser if I don't have another identity? And, how exactly am I going to get through the rest of the school year and summer when I don't know how I'm going to get through lunch?

Wow. There it is. Thanks for listening.