State of Obvious

When my daughter was born, a new person was born inside of me.  One that thought a lot more about what it meant to be other, outside, and different.  I had lived my whole life inside the comfortable confines of being a middle class white person.  Sure, my parents struggled and lived on the fringes of consumerism.  We had enough, but only just.  My dad worked hard, my mom worked hard, and we got by with enough.  I never spent a whole lot of time considering what not enough looks like.  I had what I needed, I never went hungry, and my parents provided toys and movies and other entertainments that are the hallmark of what we might consider American life. But, when my daughter came to us with a complicated background, this new person inside me started to wonder.  Why were circumstances for others so different from my own?  How would her life be different with another family? What if her birth mother had decided a different path?   These...

Having an (almost) teenage daughter can be...quite an experience.  "I hope you have a kid just like you," so the saying goes.  Usually, you only hear this if you're a rough kid.  I was a rough kid - in some ways.  I gave my mom a pretty hard time.  And, if she wished for a kid that was 'just like me' to come along as payback - the parent gods smiled on that wish. Today (after a pretty tragical and frustrating encounter) Carly said: I just needed to get mad at somebody.  I don't know why. Well, if that doesn't sum up teenage angst, I don't know what does. It also kind of applies to adult angst.  Some days I just want to be mad at somebody and walk around stomping my feet.  Today I felt like that.  In between good things, though, so at least there's balance. And balance is tricky this days, too. It feels like the house is a wreck (it mostly isn't, but sort of is). It feels like I'm swimming in work and can't catch up (this o...

People move through our lives in often very small and simple ways.  Sometimes we meet for a moment, an hour, a week, a year, a decade.  We make friends, lose friends, remain friends though distance pulls us apart.  We affect others.  That means act upon, cause, change.  The effect is what comes after.  It's the ripples and waves that follow the storm.  Or the warmth that follows the sun rising.  The chill that follows its setting. Here I am at the end of another semester.  Closing things up, putting things aside that never got done.  This time, I have an unsettled feeling, everything in limbo.  I'm not sure what's next and it's very hard to sit back and wait for the future to come.  Every hour, every moment rolling closer like a train on it's track during a midnight ride.  I cannot see the horizon, only these tracks right in front of me as I push on forward. And it's scary. I'm supposed to wait upon the Lord.  I'm ...

The house is still, though it never seems to be exactly silent.  Always there is a buzz, a sigh, a whirl.  Fans spinning or washing machines, dogs snoring or people turning over.  In the night, we are at our most vulnerable.  And yet, we trust. In my heart there is a persistence of hope during these silent hours.  It changes from day to day, that thing I hope for.  Some days it is a small hope for better weather or maybe some rain.  Other days, it is a heavy burden holding me down and I just want it to float away.  I turn this way and that, searching searching, I'm not sure what for.  I keep wondering when I'll find it , that thing that makes the pieces come together in the right order.  I often think that, perhaps, that thing is already here and I've just gotten really good at ignoring it.  Whatever IT is. In these silent hours, mind spinning and thoughts a blur, I let my body slow down into that pattern of just before sleep. ...

Dear me, I'd like to say a few words about what this day means.  This day of birth wherein I (you?) entered the world some thirty seven years ago, asleep.  Yes, asleep.  And still trying to catch up where I left off when so rudely interrupted by a smack on the behind. I'd like to say there is some magic formula or perfect sentence that sums up what it means to advance another year older and wiser, but if anything I've learned that most days (including birthdays) go on basically like the ones before.  Sure, there are the frilly types of days mixed in: celebrations, births, surprises, and the like.  But, really it all mixes together into memory-soup and it's hard to separate the strands. The year of thirty-six was spent largely learning to become a teacher.  Interestingly enough, I learned that I already pretty much am one (a teacher) and that there is a lot more fuss and bother than actual teaching on some days.  (Freshman - need I say more? (Okay...

I, along with much of the world, have been thinking about my goals for the coming year.  I made a list and it was pretty broad, but also pretty do-able.  On purpose.  The one thing that bothers me when these resolutions roll around is just how full of failure they are, often by implication or by comparison to the list from last year.  We (general society we) often laugh because we only made it a few hours, days, weeks, months into our resolutions.  And then we fall back into old habits.  We (that general we again) forget just how hard it is to change ourselves.  Have you ever tried to reshape a rock?  That's us, right there, rocks.  Round and hard and set in stone.  But, changeable over time. This year I made my list AFTER I thought about my successes from last year.  I did not bother recounting my failures, though there were assuredly many.  Instead, I looked back (as objectively as I could) and decided it really wasn't so...

...has been a hard one for me.  For a lot of reasons, some of which I'll list (school, teaching, school, busy-ness, school...) and some of which I won't (........).  I'm tired.  To a degree that I have not experienced before.  They told me going in (to the first semester of a Master's Degree and Teacher Certification combined) that this one would be the hardest.  And it has been.  Not because of the classes - those haven't been that bad, actually.  But because of the amount of running around, planning, revising, running around some more, and missing my family that comes with those classes.  I just keep telling myself to hang in there, it's almost done, only a little longer, and so on.  And here I am at the end, still mostly in once piece. ...has been a season of grief.  Everywhere I look, I see people and things that I've lost.  Eric's mom, Ann, seems to be whispering in my ear.  I even dream about her on a regular basis. ...

There is this moment when the thing we fear becomes like an animal in a cage.  We feed it, give it treats, reach into to steal a stroke, tease it, name it, watch it pace in front of the bars.  We get comfortable with it and begin to lose the tightness in our belly.  We begin to believe our feelings were not justified, that we were just being silly.  We begin to make friends with that animal in the cage and we decide to let it out, to see if it has suddenly become civilized.  Inevitably, it has not and then comes the bloody, broken mess on the floor that we have to clean up even as we know we created the mess and we don't want to see that thing we've let loose.  And we have to put it back in the cage, the struggle ensues, and we are irrevocably scarred by the experience only to begin the process again. Lately I seem to be reading, talking, thinking, talking, watching, talking about inclusion and diversity.  As if one of those things is somehow more va...

Call it a product of lots of work and little time, or maybe classes which all seem to share threads despite being almost wholly unrelated, but lately I've been thinking a lot about how powerless I am in my own skin. I talk too much. Or maybe it's powerful .  I am powerful in my own skin .  I can do things, be things, try things.  I don't have to do it for anyone but me.  I don't have to do it unless I want to.  I can look at the map and choose the road and see where it goes.  And be okay even if I get turned around. I am a bonafied know-it-all. It's funny.  I haven't noticed myself getting older.  It just sort of happened.  Snuck up while I was napping.  Little spots on the back of my hands, wrinkles around my mouth, gray hair.  I've settled into my thirties, somehow, just in time to get ready to leave them.  Mid-way, mid-life, mid-me.  I'm not excited about forty in four years, but it's coming anyhow.  C...

Once, when Josh was still very small, my mother-in-law turned to me and said: "You know, it's like he's always been here." And right there, in those eight words, she perfectly captured my faith in God. There are days, like today, when I look at my child and I can almost see eternity stretching backward like a long unfurling satin wing.  We've been on this path together for a while now, though we've forgotten the greater part.  But it was only just tonight, while I had my hands in a bubbly sink full of dishes, that I came to understand the significance of that. I often think to myself: I am failing my child . or I am a terrible mother . or I can't believe I just did that, again! or What is wrong with me? These kids are making me crazy and they're not even doing anything wrong! or I should not be his/her mother.   or It's no wonder we don't have any more kids.  I don't deserve them. or Well, you get the idea...

on days like this we try to explain things the truth is there are no explanations some things are just senseless we look at the shattered pieces dazzling shards and try to arrange them into what-might-have-beens none of the arrangements are satisfying so we begin again slicing open our hands on the sharp edges we say somewhere buried in the ashes there must be meaning there must be lessons but perhaps that is the lesson: that there isn't one that every day is a random gift to unwrap or throw away

I was in seventh grade the first time I felt like maybe I was a writer. My language arts teacher coaxed it out of me. She was a young, pretty, newly-minted college graduate with blonde hair that fell softly to her shoulders. Funnily enough, I can’t remember her name or another other features, but I do remember that she would read to us from chapter books almost every day. At the time, I kind of felt like I was too old for story hour – but, our whole class would sit transfixed while she read books like Matilda , and The Witch of Blackbird Pond . Somehow, those stories would transport me from the classroom into a wide world completely constructed from words. It had never happened before. My teacher also read some of her own creative works. The one I remember best concerned the despondent life of a house fly. So convincing was her portrait of the measly, black fly that I spent years believing flies really did want to be swatted so they could end their miserable existence as quickly as pos...

The world is hard. Hard days, hard times, hard faces. Uphill. Sometimes I want to just stop the spinning. Stop the whirling, flying, crashing motion. I want to be still. I can feel the breathing, beating rhythm of change. Every moment advancing. An endless march of moments. Everything morphing into something new. Most of the time not even realizing it. Most of the time feeling like we are standing still, aren't we? Outside the sun sinks low. Dropping into tomorrow without even a sound. Just light. The world is hard. Hard faces, hard times, hard days. Downhill.

The answer to every question, every hope, every fear.  All wrapped up in two very different children.  And a spotted dog's backside.

Forget not that the Lord loves you I dream about things sometimes, you know?  Build big castles in the air, floating on clouds, sailing through the blue.  I wonder, what would I do?  With a million dollars - a thousand dollars sometimes.  If I was famous.  If I finally did write that book.  Happy, good, childish dreams.  Nightmares, too, but we won't talk about those. Have you ever sat and listened, just listened, to the in-out-in of breathing?  To the delicate way air flows in and sighs back out?  Have you ever felt the heaving in-out-in of a child's chest as they slept?  Right next to your thrumming heart, their warmth making you sweat.  Have you traced the gentle curve of their chubby cheek, moving so softly they twitch from the finger's kiss?  You should try it. I often get distracted.  Building those castles can be very time consuming, filling me up.  Eventually, I realize those fluffy dreams are not...

Be You. No one else can live your life. No one else can do it just the way you do it. Happiness won't come from following me, it will come from walking your own bramble covered, lumpy, bumpy, underwater, smooth sailing, sharp turning road. Be Authentic. No one else can make your choices. No one else will choose the same things you do. Happiness will come from choosing right, and it will come from following your gut, even when it's wrong. Be Honest. No one else can tell you your own truth. No one else will see things just they way you do. Happiness won't come from what I say about you, it will come from what you say to yourself, so choose kind, gentle, loving, honest words to build you up. Be Kind No one else can fix the bruises you inflict with your words. No one else can undo the love you've shared with joy. Happiness will come from the soft moments, it will come in the stillness that follows a humble heart, so be ready to bend a little. Be ...

I took a stroll down memory lane tonight, sampling the bitter and sweet that is all tied up in pictures.  Along the way I stumbled across what might be one of the last pictures of Carly with her Grandma Annie.  It made me sad and happy all at once, like eating the last chocolate in a box. I also found some silly moments I had forgotten and wondered how I let that happen.  I always think I will remember each golden moment forever, but it slips away.  And I scolded myself for being such a poor steward of time. I have watched my children grow into these little (and not so little anymore) people, but I have been so close to the phenomenon that I almost didn't see it happen.  Like magic, suddenly they are new creatures, wholly formed and beautiful in a new way. I sometimes wonder what my story is, when it will happen.  That dramatic, defining moment that you either get through, or fall through, or check out of.  Maybe it's already happened....

This was one of those years that sort of just flew by.  It was January - and then it was January again.  That is not to say we didn't have experiences.  Good and bad.  They just seemed to come and go so quickly. A glimpse at 2011 in words: January - On a High Stool   February - Served March - College is April - What it means to me May - In Profile June - Jotting it down July - In Memory: The Water of Life August - Birth Days: Part Two September - Dear Josh, November - Tilt Oh Whirl December - Dear Carly, (My personal favorites were January, May, July and August.) My hopes for 2012 are simple: I hope to be more fiscally reasonable. I hope to yell less. I hope to do well in school. I hope to be happy. And, of course, I hope to win million dollars.  (But if not me, maybe you!) Happy New Year!

I figured out what it is, that thing that has me yo-yo-ing between ok-happy-sad-sadder-ok-sad-happy...people keep having babies! They're everywhere!  Little pregnant women with popped out bellies.  Big pregnant women looking glow-y.  Celebrity pregnant women.  Mean pregnant women.  Ok, so not really any mean pregnant women.  But I wish they would be mean just so I could justify these feelings. Don't get me wrong.  I love that people are having babies.   (I am pretty sure I've typed that before.  Probably more than once.)  I mean, someone has to keep things running in the future when I am too busy mashing up my food before I eat it.  Plus, babies are cute.  Ridiculously so.  Chubby cheeks and soft hair and little button noses.  That's the reason people keep having babies, really.  The cuteness.  (If a three year old popped out, people would definitely have fewer kids.  If any at all.)  I'm ha...

I'm not sure which is worse. On one hand, hopeful is so enticing.  It's that bubbly feeling in the hollows of your chest, eager to get out.  A spring in your step.  A smile that won't fade.  It's a glass half full and a sunrise in all its glory.  It's strawberry shortcake with extra whipped cream, but it doesn't have any calories.  It's wonderful. Until you crash. And oh, the crash.  The waves.  The internal beating of a saddened heart.  The sunset and clouds and rain.  The beautiful misery.  But hopeless - that's another story.  It's never expecting, from the start.  It's convincing and being convinced that dreams are only pictures.  It's empty sounds and endless nights and sheets that feel too cold no matter how long you've been in them.  It's the long, dark corridor of night. With hopeless there is always the small, sad possibility that you might just be surprised.  It tickles the back of your m...