clueless but hopeful mama

Three

2012-05-23T21:48:00.000-04:00

She is so big. She jumps at me with abandon and an overabundance of trust. She leaps first, looks second. Or never. She is a menace on her scooter. Her physical fearlessness terrifies me and inspires me equally.

She is little. After dribbling a basketball for the first time, she runs to me in triumph, makes sure I know, I saw. She needs me to hold her - and her accomplishment - for a minute before rushing off to do it again.

She can climb the pulls on her dresser like a ladder and sing her ABCs (with "Elmo" in there instead of "l, m, n, o") and count to twenty (only missing a few numbers!) and hang with the older kids (and try to boss them around) and brush her own teeth (poorly but don't you DARE take that brush) and she's totally definitely THREE.

And wearing the dress I made her for her birthday!

Did you read this post over at Dooce? I laughed out loud and clutched my laptop to my chest in relief. Three is our dreaded year, too. Z completely and totally fell apart when she was three. She was defiant, unreasonable, cranky, whiny, and stubborn and no, I really haven't run out of adjectives but I'll stop there anyway. She was also moving across the country and greeting her new sister all while her mom was slowly but surely falling apart at the usual seams and some she didn't even know existed.

When Z went through three, I didn't know what three was like so I assumed that we had broken our child. We broke her with the move AND the baby sister and she would never be the same.

So it is almost a relief that E is challenging now. There are no baby sisters, no major multiple upheavals in our home and still she is defiant and unreasonable. Whiny and stubborn. Dropping her nap and resisting bedtime. Right on time.

Three. Oh three. It is a very good thing they're still so darn cute.

Snowball

2012-05-17T06:51:00.002-04:00

I had a bad day last week. Nothing special really, could've been any old day but it became a Snowball Day, the kind of day where every issue seems to snowball until my child's minor temper tantrum becomes Further Evidence of My Failure as a Mother and Her Future as a Adult Malcontent.
I realized that I snowball these things, of course. It's not like it happens all on its own. When things are going poorly, I pack and roll and shove that snowball downhill with a running commentary in my head, every word adding more and more snow.

Oooh here we go again. I'm pretty sure the parenting books say I should have nixed this behavior, like, THREE YEARS AGO. How will she survive in the world if she acts like this in front of people who don't love every single hair on her head and even the ones on her back and up her nose? I suck at this mothering gig but also where's my medal for dealing with it EVERY DAY? Oh yes, and here are the complaints about the dinner I so lovingly planned and bought and cooked and she won't eat. She'll get some horrible disease as an adult because she never once knowingly touched a green vegetable to her mouth as a child blah blah blah

And then I feel guilty for feeling so terrible, because I am just so lucky.

Yeah. Sometimes it's not so fun being inside my head.

I've been wrestling with this for so long, this guilt over being fortunate compounded by more guilt when I'm unhappy despite all my good fortune. How ungrateful I am!

Obviously, I get nowhere with these thoughts or, at least, nowhere useful.

Whenever I'm having a hard time in my life, feeling stressed, overwhelmed or sad, I've always tried to shut down the crappy feelings and squeeze gratitude from my pores. When I am at my lowest, I've made myself list how lucky I am, how many reasons I have to be happy. This is supposed to be a gentle reality check and bring fresh perspective on my blessed position in life.

It does not feel like that. It makes me feel worse, each and every time, in a downward spiral of misery and guilt and shame.

Lose LOSE!

Then it dawned on me: when things are hard, I can simply let them be hard - but only factually. I can list them, dispassionately and without editorial comment. I can accept that I am struggling and will just have to muddle through until it gets better. I do not force gratitude, but instead allow myself to simply list the suckitude.

So the former internal commentary now, forcibly, sounds like this: She's still having a hard time with transitions. I will continue to love her through it, as best I can. She's still struggling with disliking most foods. I will continue to love her through it, as best I can.

Also, sadly, I realize I rarely give my positive emotions (I have a few! I do!) a push of their own. When life is okay, I've begun seeking out those tiny moments of joy that can slip by so easily and try to magnify them and give them their own running commentary, a packed snowball PUSH of positivity.

Do you already do this? Why don't I already do this?

When holding E on my lap and reading to her, I make myself notice the scent of her hair and the feel of her soft hand on my forearm. I pause and focus on every positive thing I can think of: I love this moment so much. I love HER. I love reading to her and how close we are and how smooth her skin is and how connected to her I feel. Every book we read deepens our bond and engages her brain. I let every single bodily sense flood with intensity and try to stay with those feelings and that moment as long as possible. My running positive commentary often feels... forced, odd, unusual.

This is sad, yes?

When listening to the girls agree and play together in the backseat of the car, taking turns and helping each other, I actively stop and breathe in and purposely think: They are working together. They love each other. They are learning how to communicate and share and appreciate one another. They have goodness and manners in them. I have taught them good things.

This intentional deep focus and positive extrapolation on the good stuff seems to make the positivity last, it gives the next hour or so a slight glow. If I gather enough of these moments, and try to snowball them, the other times, the times that could add up to despair or madness, seem to happen less frequently, even though, of course, they are probably just as frequent as any other day.

When they do occur, I will continue to love her through it, as best I can.

Mom

2012-05-13T06:00:00.000-04:00

My parents came to visit for Z's sixth birthday blowout. It was lovely having them here, as usual, and my mom was especially helpful to me as she is unparalleled as both a dishwasher and "Let's Play FAMILY!" playmate.

At the end of their time here, my mom joined us for our Sunday afternoon kite-flying. She watched at first, cheering on her granddaughters efforts like the proud grandma she is.

When Z offered her a turn to fly the kite and she demurred, saying "No thanks, I'm too old for that."

And a few seconds later, she muttered, "AHRG, I'm not THAT old,"and took off running with the kite.

I've never been more proud of her.

She continues to inspire me as both a mother and a woman and I am sad that her birthday lands on Mother's Day this year as it makes it harder to celebrate her separately as both.

Oh well, Happy Birthday AND Happy Mother's Day Mom. You are the spriteliest 70 year old I know.

I didn't get a picture of her flying the kite, but man, is the image ever burned into my brain.

Trying

2012-05-06T21:43:00.002-04:00

I've been trying to meditate.

I guess I can drop the "trying", that's implicit isn't it? Meditation is not easy for anyone I know. Maybe once you've been doing it for many many years, maybe then you no longer "try" so much. So actually, leave "trying" in there, it's essential to explaining what it is I'm doing. If I'm doing anything by sitting still and listening to my breath and watching the cloud thoughts come in and out with startling frequency and intensity, it's "trying."

Sometimes I listen to recorded guided meditations but often they just piss me off. This morning's was about how with every breath, you are becoming a better and better version of yourself and you can do anything you put your mind to. I'm not sure why it annoyed me so much, but I guess, at the moment, acceptance is a more enticing concept to me than self-improvement. What I'm looking for when I meditate is that illusive quiet mind. One that doesn't ring with self-judgement. One that doesn't race and pace at times of stillness.

Can this life I'm leading, this moment I am in, this body that I have, this person that I am, be enough? Right now?

I've been trying to lose weight because I no longer comfortably fit in any of my shorts and most of my pants. I have upped my exercising, adjusted my diet, doing all the things that have worked in the past, and still the scale doesn't budge. I know that I can lose those inches, those pounds, but it's looking like it would take sacrifices I'm not willing to make. It would be like a part-time job, a major commitment of time and heart and brain space. Maybe I should accept that my aging body is just a little bigger and go buy myself some bigger pants already? Or is that a slippery slope with no end?

I have been trying to write fiction, for the first time since college. So far it has resulted only in a few terrible pages and a heaping pile of terror and self-recrimination. Maybe I should give up on the literary dreams I not-so-secretly harbor and find something else, something more reasonable, to focus on? Or am I being too easily defeated?

I've been trying to potty train my almost three year old. After a few initial successes, it's.... not happening. So now I'm trying to figure out where we can fit a cube fridge in the tiny downstairs bathroom where I spend at least half of my daylight hours.

I have been trying to figure out what I want to do with myself once the girls are in school next fall. I feel simultaneously like Everything is possible! And also I'm too old and too set in my ways and my mind is too mushy for me to ever do anything besides laundry and picking up Barbies for the rest of my life! I had a dream last night that one of my favorite mom bloggers and I were hanging out and she asked me if I "really wanted to stay home, like forever? Or did I want to work at some point doing something meaningful?" and I curled up into a fetal position and cried as she walked away from me.

Nice, dream mind. Thanks for that.

I feel like I'm at a crossroads. I am facing a summer with only scattered summer camps and activities for the girls. I need to put on my Julie McCoy, cruise director cap, my best SAHM self. I want to enjoy my girls and create joyful memories for us all. It is up to me to create the space and structures that will allow that. This is partly why I'm home with them, after all. I'm trying to rise to the challenge of an open, minimally-planned summer.

But then, after the summer is over, Z will be in First! Grade! and E will be in morning preschool five mornings a week. I will officially have more "free" time on my hands than I've had in many years.

Five bucks says I will squander that time like a pro.

I have conflicting goals when I imagine having more time on my hands. Part of me immediately focuses on our home, and all the organizing, gardening, decorating, crafting projects that I could devote myself to to make our lives, our little home, richer. The competing desire is to GET OUT. Get out of my house, get out of this little life. Get out into the world. I do have a building, conflicting, desire to work outside the home.

What I know: I want to find some part time employment eventually, once the girls are in school and need me less. I want to serve others. I want to earn some money, engage my brain, connect myself to my community.

I want to just know what the next step will be. I want something to fall into my lap and announce itself: Here I am! Your true calling! You are meant to serve love and goodness in the world by.... ! I fantasize about this because I bravely believe in things happening in their own time and can patiently wait, because I am lazy, because I am scared, because I am unsure where to start so how about I start by waiting and watching and wondering?

I am trying to accept where I am, while pushing myself, ever so gently, toward something more.

And, all the while, I am trying to meditate.

Birthday girl

2012-04-29T20:39:00.001-04:00

We had this huge party for Z yesterday, the day before her birthday. It was going to be a simple backyard birthday party, and she asked to celebrate the obvious theme of "The Wright Brothers and Lil' Orphan Annie save the dinosaurs from extinction."

After some discussion, she agreed to simplify it to "things that fly."

We started inviting people and, in keeping with our It's Just a Low-Key Backyard Birthday Party Philosophy, we didn't really keep track of just how many people would show up. Bring your siblings! we said to her friends. We're CAS-U-AL. We've got a bounce house, an airplane pinata and kites!

We figured the kids would bounce and eat pizza and run around in the April sunshine.

Or, you know, the April SHOWERS.

Yeah, it rained part way through and was freezing cold.

So we had 25 + kids (and most of their parents) in our house for more than half of the party. It was insanity and I went to bed last night exhausted and traumatized, ears ringing and nerves sizzling.

They all brought huge presents! Why didn't we say no presents?? Have I ruined her with this huge party with so many kids and so many presents when what we really want is a simple celebration of her and her special wonderfulness? Will she always require a huge, loud PAR-TY? Why didn't we plan a single inside activity? Why WAS IT RAINING?!?@?!@?!#*!#@%$&$%??

We didn't get to fly the kites, we didn't get to run around the yard. We hopped the kids up on sugar and had them whack the pinata in the garage and it was all sort of insane.

If yesterday was the disease, today was the balm for my recovery.

We woke up slowly to blue skies, ate breakfast, went to church with my parents.

We had a leisurely lunch and received birthday phone calls from family and friends.

We had quiet/nap time followed by a bike ride to the park to fly her new kites.

We had her favorite dinner and ice cream sandwiches for dessert. We toasted her many times over, read to her, indulged her silliness at every turn, told her stories, tucked her in with kisses and hugs.

I gazed at her so many times today with adoration and awe.

My baby.

My fleet-footed, graceful, tender-hearted, curious, wise, 6 year old baby.

This was the way I wanted to celebrate her.

Church

2012-04-23T11:00:00.002-04:00

I parked my car at the end of the gravel parking lot and spent a few calculated minutes playing with my phone. I didn't want to be too early. Alone would be challenging enough, but early? No, thank you.

When I finally got out of my car, I noticed a man walking a few steps in front of me. He turned and smiled in a nervous way I recognized before asking "You know where you're going?"

"No," I chuckled. "I'm following you."

"Perfect," he replied. "Two lost people will follow each other!"

We smiled and walked side by side in silence.

Perfect, lost, together.

-----------------

The wooden chapel was built by the freed slaves of a local plantation. It's tiny, too small for this congregation, but beautiful in the ways that cannot be expanded or rebuilt.

Everyone was friendly, looking happy and open and welcoming. I tried to smile through my new-kid nausea, waiting for the service to begin.

This church is casual, small and intimate with laughing and clapping and singing and big questions and comfort in mystery and I liked it, I liked it all, which is not surprising since it is the denomination of my childhood. The hymn books and chalice and general ideology were instantly familiar and calming.

At this stage of my life with seemingly no spare time, when I am always and forever wishing for fewer commitments, I am choosing to go to church and I'm not exactly sure why.

But I think I may find out.

-----------------

"Mom? Why do people go to church?" asked Z, a child who has never gone to church.

"Mom? If God is supposed to be in heaven, did the rocket ships hit him on their way to the moon?"

"Mom? At school everyone at my lunch table believes in God and Sarah said if I don't believe in God he'll be very, very mad at me and what if I think God is just all of nature and its power? Does that mean nature could hate me?"

She's almost 6. She has a lot of questions, and lately, a lot of specific questions about God and church and death. I'd like her to have a place to explore them.

(Me too.)

---------------

I took Z to her first church service yesterday. When we drove up in the rain, she was bouncing in her seat.

During the service she paid attention and watched and bounced a little more.

When we drove home, she was still bouncing.

And saying, "Can we go back next week Mama? On my birthday? Since it's my birthday I get to decide, right?"

Right, darling. You get to decide.

Downhill

2012-04-16T06:24:00.000-04:00

There are months and weeks where my children seem the same. The same meltdowns, the same silly jokes, the same dance steps, the same quirks, the SAME OLD SAME OLD.

When they are in a bit of a routine, a plateau, I am lulled into smugness, thinking, I know them. I know everything about them.

Then there are other weeks when they seem to change suddenly and completely. Of course, their essential nature is change, as is all of ours. Yet my gaze is so close to them, so close to the tip of my nose, I often don't add up the little steps and spurts that lead to each surprising big development.

I am always, always shocked at their growth. As if they could ever stay the same, even if they wanted to.

Even if I wanted them to.

(Which I don't.)

(Except when they're super cute and snuggly. And then YES PAUSE TIME HERE FOREVER PLEASE AND THANK YOU.)

Last week, both girls went into hyperdrive. It seemed every time I turned around they were doing something new and different.

Z lost her first tooth

and rode her bike on two wheels for the first time (barely stopping except to sleep since then!)

E went from sleeping and napping like a champ to crazy quiet time shenanigans and early morning wakeups. On the plus side, she also suddenly got interested in potty training, having success with both #1 and #2 last week.

Me: "Okay E, put your pull up on." E "OKAY!"

All of these developments had both CG and I grinning like loons (even, especially, the rogue pull-up wearing).

If those moments before, when all I can see are the same old girls I think I know completely, are plateaus, then this is certainly a downhill. Life seems so fast all of a sudden and the rushing of the wind smacks me in the face, each and every time.

I'm holding on, opening my eyes, coasting, adjusting to the new landscape even as it rushes past me.

The Death of the Nap

2012-04-12T10:50:00.002-04:00

As reported last week, when we took away the side of E's crib (because she catapulted herself over it and appeared, weepy and naked, at the bottom of the stairs much to my ever-lasting horror), we also discovered that her last pacifier, the one we were still allowing her to sleep with because the dentist said to wait until she's potty trained to take it away and OH YEAH NOT POTTY TRAINED AT ALL OVER HERE, well that last pacifier had a big rip in it and wasn't safe to use. She told us herself it was time to throw it away.

I mean, when your own kid tells you that it's time for them to throw away their last remaining, much beloved pacifier, it's kind of time, yes? This is, even to those of us who tend toward intuition deafness, what they call a CLEAR SIGN. So we threw it away, even though we thought it was horrible timing.

And LO it was!

Last week was Spring Break and my parents came to visit and I had a week's worth of fun activities planned including going to DC to see art! And animals! And possibly several longish hikes! Which all were now shot to hell since I would be dragging a deranged, sleep-deprived child with me. The absence of the pacifier combined with the thrill of FREEDOM means her nap has rapidly transformed into a pretty unsuccessful "quiet time".

Oh but this wasn't the hardest part for me. Yes, she's been negatively effected by her lack of sleep, vacillating, even more than a normal almost-three year old, between spazzy and weepy and irrational. But even if she wasn't clearly missing the sleep, I'd still be missing her nap.

Because, I'm embarrassed to say, it was often MY NAP.

I've gotten used to having a definite respite in the middle of the day. I could count on a reliable window of at least an hour - often TWO - to clean up, email, blog, read or, yes, SLEEP. Most days, I could chose to do whatever would be most stress relieving to me, and several times a week, my choice was to curl up in bed with a book to read and snooze. This time of rest and restoration was often like pushing a reset button on my mood: after nap time I felt recharged and ready to start again in my best motherhood self.

That I used to nap feels like a dirty little secret, because the stereotype of a SAHM is one of a lazybones with unbrushed hair, clad in pajamas in the middle of the day, popping chocolate and napping at whim.

I'll have you know that I'm often dressed BEFORE noon AND I cannot nap at WHIM. Just at naptime! Which is no longer!

WAHHHH!

(Ironically, I was able to write this because E decided to take a nap today. On the ONE DAY I finally planned for her NOT TO NAP. Jezuz. This is why we moms think our kids plot to make our lives more difficult. BECAUSE THEY DO.)

News from The Clueless But Hopeful Zoo

2012-04-01T06:28:00.000-04:00

Breaking News: The Clueless But Hopeful Zoo announces sweeping changes for its youngest cub.

Do not let that sweet face fool you. This is a wild animal.

After months of ~~avoidance~~ preparation, we are excited to announce her new cage-free, "free range" sleeping quarters.

While she is adjusting to the new sleeping arrangements, we expect this wild cub to range outside of her own habitat regularly. Cub wranglers will be on hand to return the cub to her new habitat as often as necessary.

"Oh yeah, cub wranglers? I'd like to see you try."

(Yes, we are experimenting with the baby gates across her door, however, as some of you may remember, we don't seem to have one that is up to the task.)

We fully expect that as the cub matures, she will settle into her new sleeping quarters and come to understand the expectations and limits of a free-range cub. Until that time, we suggest all guests get a lot of sleep before arriving at our lovely zoo.

Do not feed the animals. Unless it is at the table.

In another, ill-timed change, management has removed the last of the cub's pacifiers. This understandably adds to the volatile nature of this wild animal.

Next up! Getting serious about potty training! (OMG)

We are currently accepting applications for new cub wranglers. ALL APPLICANTS ACCEPTED.

Sincerely,

The Clueless But Hopeful Zoo Management

Mahster Baathroom (after)

2012-03-26T15:57:00.001-04:00

I interrupt my previously scheduled hand-wringing to bring you this breaking bulletin:

Our bathroom remodel is complete!

A shower head that doesn't require my husband to do the limbo!

Cabinets with drawers! Medicine cabinets with many shelves! A toilet that doesn't need to be plunged every day!

A grown up tub, deep enough for a full-sized person (+ a cozy friend)!

(YAY!)

Mixed Media

2012-03-22T13:14:00.002-04:00

Books:

I'm supposed to read "The Shack" for my book group meeting next week and I can't make myself finish it. It feels.... trite and heavy-handed to me. Surely this is further evidence that I'm going to H E Double Toothpicks.

I just finished (when I was supposed to be reading another book, AHEM) What I Thought I Knew by Alice Eve Cohen and I found it very entertaining and thought-provoking in the mommy memoir roller-coaster-of-emotions kind of way.

Weeks after finishing the book, I'm still thinking about some of the characters in The Art of Fielding by Chad Harbach and I don't even like baseball all that much. Whoever you are, you should read it. Unless you hate beautiful writing or are terribly homophobic.

Kids Books:

You know those kids books that you always chose when your kid asks you pick a book to read to them? The ones that give you goosebumps? Here are a few of my current favorites:

Me.... Jane by Patrick McDonnell. There are fabulous illustrations in this story about Jane Goodall as a little girl.

Pretty Penny Sets Up Shop by Devon Kinch. I adore this story because it reminds me so much of Z and her shops last summer.

The Girl Who Loved Wild Horses by Paul Goble, aka "Mom, you ALWAYS chose that one!"

The Red Shoes by Hans Christian Anderson, adapted by Gloria Fowler. The illustrations in this book are so beautifully detailed, Z and I gazed at each page for a long time when she was sick last week.

So, okay, these next few don't exactly give me goosebumps but Z, a new reader, needs books with very simple sentences and I am beyond bored by the ones she chooses from the library (usually based on a TV show or Barbies or some other mindless drivel). However, I can listen to her stumble her way through the Elephant and Piggie books by the incomparable Mo Willems and the Little Bear books by Else Holmelund Minarik for HOURS.

Any other Non-Barbie beginning reader book suggestions would be GREATLY APPRECIATED.

Movies:

1. I walked into town to see the movie last night - and can I just pause to say how much I love saying that? I can WALK into town to see a movie!

Anyway, the movie was a documentary about kids and nature called Mother Nature's Child and while it certainly was preaching to the choir - who else besides nature-loving parents are going to pay to see this movie? - it definitely provided me with some food for thought.

Most of the information I already knew: for younger kids, the sensory input from irregular, impermanent nature is unrivaled by any of the fixed, safety-tested play structures of suburbia.

But the theses about older children really interested me. In middle childhood, when children are building their identities and beginning to separate from their parents, access to nature and, especially unfettered time ALONE in nature, can be profoundly soothing and confidence-building to a child.

If you don't live in the country, how does one allow children to run loose in wild places in this day and age? I love that I can walk to town but that means we have to drive to get to any real wild places. And there are ticks here! And MAJOR Lyme Disease!

(See? Even the nature-loving parents have issues to overcome.)

In the teenage years - the years where children focus on their peers and risk-taking, sometimes in equal measure - outdoor experiences with peer groups (like summer camps) can allow them to build the peer relationships and take the risks they developmentally crave. The documentary hammered home that if we don't give them acceptable risks, they will create their own risks... duhn duhn DUHN!

The upshot: I'd recommend seeing this movie, if it interests you at all.

2. We are supposed to go to the movies this weekend. Anyone seen anything good lately? Bonus points for good kissing scenes (me) and loud car chases (my husband).

The Golden Pop-up Tent

2012-03-16T06:38:00.001-04:00

In my sophomore year of college, I volunteered as a legal advocate for battered women. This challenging work introduced me to a whole new world; I had never been beaten, had never been involved in the legal system, had never experienced much outside of my suburban upper middle class reality. I had little to offer these women, many of whom had lived lives defined by trauma and deprivation.

I saw first-hand how the cycle of abuse drew its tentacles across generations.

I wound up very attached to some of my clients, and very protective of them. When I started dreaming about them and, worse yet, lying awake night after night wondering if they were okay, I knew I needed help.

My new therapist, a college counselor not much older than me, told me to create an invisible golden pyramid around my body, to protect my fragile self from seeing broken eye sockets while hearing "But I LOVE him!". Every time I walked in to greet a client, I was to build my golden pyramid, through which I could see and reach out, but nothing could truly penetrate.

He knew from our very first session that I had little internal defense against outside influences. I was then, as I am now, highly sensitive - an easy cry, an easy mark, a hair-trigger sensor of neighboring emotions. I wear my heart on my sleeve, and then I place that sleeve directly into the palm of pretty much anyone I interact with, saying "Here you go! Do with it what you will!"

I gamely tried building this pyramid when interacting with my clients and my lack of success surprised no one. I would spend copious amounts of time visualizing a shining pyramid, only to find it vaporize the moment a client began to cry.

I always cried too, which was not terribly helpful.

After similar experiences in a special education classroom, a teen alcohol and drug inpatient unit and a suicide hotline, I decided I wasn't cut out for pyramid building and so gave up on the notion of pursing social work as a career.

Someone else, someone a lot tougher than me, would have to save the world.

----------------------

Years later, I was running a private massage therapy practice as a way to support my dance "career". I loved the work; it was quiet, one-on-one, tangible. Seeing and feeling the difference I made in someone's body was deeply satisfying and when people left my table happier, more relaxed and grateful .... well, it was a heckuva lot better than waiting tables.

Somewhere along the line, while working with dancers, athletes and desk jockeys in equal measure, I began to attract a new type of client: the chronic pain sufferer. These women - for they were all women - were sweet and vulnerable and deeply, deeply suffering. I think they mostly liked me because I listened to them, as they often wanted to talk just as much as they wanted to be massaged.

Before massaging any client, I always grounded myself first, a hippie massage school version of building a golden pyramid. I had worked on this version of pyramid building since college and with most of my clients it served me well. But I soon found it wasn't enough when I worked on those with chronic pain.

One would come in with an unrelenting headache and leave feeling relief, but I would have a headache. Another suffered from general stiffness and depression and I'll be damned if I didn't feel stiff and depressed every time I finished working on her.

It was like their misery seeped into my body. Their pain became my pain.

I tried to visualize their tension flowing through me. Or reversing the flow and sending good energy into their body. Or letting it bounce off of me and disperse into the air.

None of it worked.

Eventually, I wound up with Thoracic Outlet Syndrome, my arms so weak I couldn't work, drive, type, brush my hair. I finally found relief through studying Pilates and closed my most of my massage practice to become a Pilates trainer.

It was clear to me I needed more distance from my clients, that physically touching suffering people was too draining on someone as sensitive as myself. I just didn't have what it took.

Someone much tougher than me would have to heal these people.

----------------

In the years before I became a mother, I worked in therapy on setting boundaries in every relationship I had. After years of trying to guess what people wanted from me, the thought that relationships can be an open, equal give-and-take was new. I slowly learned how to turn my antennae inward to sense what I felt and what I wanted and then give those needs tentative expression.

I gave birth to Z at the age of 34. I had done over a decade of weekly work in therapy and was finally in a equal partnership with someone who knew me and supported me in all my imperfection.

I felt I was as evolved as I was going to get.

When you've worked on setting boundaries in psychotherapy for many years, having a child is an especially humbling experience. When she opened her mouth for her very first cry, I could almost hear the universe saying Those are some shiny new boundaries you got there, GOOD LUCK WITH THAT.

From the moment of her birth, she and I were tethered in a way I had never been with another person (other than my own mother, perhaps) and I had absolutely NO barrier between her emotions and my own. When she smiled, I grinned like a loon. When she despaired, I would tear my hair out trying to calm her, to soothe her, to make it right. I could see my needs, but they were far away and her needs were always front and center. Of course, this is mostly the way it should be with infants; they cannot fill any of their own needs at first and we must attend to them as best we can. But somewhere along the line, my needs, newly understood and wanting to be filled, had to fit in too.

It didn't take me too long to decide that someone much tougher than me was needed to do this mothering thing.

But, of course, while there are many, many people tougher than me, there is no one else to do this job of mothering my girls.

Motherhood is not an internship I can quit. I have to muddle my way through every moment with my girls and hope that the benefits of being raised by this deeply sensitive, deeply imperfect mother outweigh the negatives. I am learning, in my typical two-steps-forward-one-step-back approach, to set and enforce boundaries with the biggest boundary pushers I've ever met.

I think about my college therapist's golden pyramid often these days, as my girls give me nearly constant lessons in boundary setting.

"This is my notebook, but I can get you one of your own." "I'll be available to help you when I'm finished with this phone call." "You may get angry with me but you may NOT hit me."

I still struggle to not be affected by their every mood; despite all my efforts my skin is still paper thin, my inner defenses against the emotions of others, especially those I love, are still weak. But I don't build a pyramid to protect myself anymore; it takes too long and it lacks flexibility.

Instead, I imagine a pop-up tent. It is pressed down to the floor most of the time as I let my girls in close to me to be seen and heard and loved. At other times, when they are being too loud, too close, too needy and I can feel their emotions flood into mine, I let the tent pop up around me. I am there with them, but on the other side of a whimsical piece of fabric, a thin flexible boundary between us.

Use Your Words

2012-03-11T21:18:00.002-04:00

"I feel MAD. And SAD. And a little.... FRUSTRATED that this is so hard," Z said yesterday while trying to put her puzzle together.

We're working on her owning her feelings, and finding appropriate ways to express them. This begins with recognizing and naming her feelings, since so often she is upset and doesn't really know why.

The unintended result of this latest effort? We now have a running commentary of her day's emotions.

"I feel PAIN. And a little MAD at you, and I just want to GRRRRRR" she says, gritting her teeth when I brush her hair every morning. And then "I'm MUCH happier now" as soon as the brush is set back down.

"I DON'T LIKE THAT. I'm starting to feel VERY MAD and like I WANT TO HIT YOU because you aren't listening to me," she tells her sister who, in the time honored tradition of younger siblings everywhere, has discovered juuuust how to push her sister's many buttons.

Perhaps the biggest surprise for me about this recent State of the Emotion, is how unsettling it is for me to hear her declare her emotional state. Now, I didn't grow up in an emotionally repressed household; if anything, I tend to be a little TOO loose and comfortable with displays of emotion. I think my discomfort stems from being an adult long enough to be shocked when someone comes right out and says bluntly how they're feeling and why.

Adults don't do this. At least, the ones I know.

Often I find myself cringing and wondering Should I tell her to keep that feeling to herself? At some point, I know we will need to tell her to do just that, to help smooth her school social life, if nothing else. Her friends and teachers are not going to be interested in knowing the constant fluctuations in her mood throughout the day.

Put on a smile! Turn that frown upside down!

At first I was a little concerned about encouraging her to announce the shifting tides of her emotions. By declaring the dark feelings, are they are deepened rather than released? Surely she can just say them in her head rather than needing to announce them to the world?

Now I'm convinced it's a good thing; the feelings would be there no matter what and even if she was capable of keeping them in (hahaHAHAHA!) I think it's safe to say that's a pretty destructive habit. At least this way, there are fewer unexplained volcanic eruptions. Since she's able to keep it together at school most of the time, for now, we experiment with this at home.

For her.

And for ourselves.

You see, we quickly discovered we would need to model this behavior for her, in real situations. We wanted her to know that we all struggle with difficult emotions and how to deal with them.

So when I burnt my toast and my fingers the other day, I started to feel my own - very real - frustration and, realizing that Z was drawing at the table steps away, swallowed my preferred muttered expletives and loudly said "I can't believe the toast got burned! And my fingers hurt! I'm feeling so mad right now, I want to lash out. But I'm going to walk away and think about something else for a minute to calm down."

This feels about as silly as it sounds, to give detailed external words to my internal feelings, in real time.

But it's getting more natural as the weeks go by. Of course I clean up the language I use, and sometimes I'll over embellish when I'm really not having THAT hard a time controlling my anger just to show her how it's done. But more often than not, when I'm really, actually struggling with frustration around my girls, I will now stop and try to put clear external words to my anger.

It is surprisingly difficult, this Use Your Words business. It strengthens my empathy for my girls - especially Z - for I ask it of them all the time.

Luckily, Z has started labeling my emotions for me. "Mommy? Are you feeling angry? Do you want to own it and take a few deep breaths?" Z said sweetly from the back seat of the car last week after a driver flipped me off for no apparent reason.

I didn't at first, so caught up in the peak of annoyance was I.

And then I made myself let go and I said I was and I did.

I'm still caught by surprise how much of parenting is learning lessons right alongside my children. I had this idea that I would be - or should be - sending wisdom down from on high to my grub-like children below.

Instead, here I am, no pedestal to be seen, standing right beside them, hoping to keep one step ahead.

Or at least to stay by their side.

There's TWO OF THEM

2012-03-06T21:30:00.001-05:00

I was shoveling my dear friends' driveway in Western Massachusetts on Sunday morning and the combination of the rising sun and my working muscles was enough to bring me to an honest to goodness sweat. I felt a little silly as I shoveled: clearly if I just gave it enough time, the driveway would be clear soon enough. It would be fine all on its own.

But I wanted to DO something. Many somethings. Shoveling was but one something. I baked, laundered, cooked, vacuumed, rubbed, swept, and washed since arriving in Massachusetts.

I'm not sure who actually needed me to do these things, them or me.

I'm pretty sure it was mostly me.

I needed to help. I knew that my friends' lives since their twin baby boys were born have been an whirlwind of breath-taking love and mind-numbing exhaustion. I remember that newborn time, that blur of feedings that run into one another, the nights that contain maybe just a little more sleep than the days, the ache of your eyelids because they haven't closed long enough in days and days.

Well, she's had DOUBLE all that. DOUBLE. Because there's TWO OF THEM.

All weekend long I kept exclaiming "THERE'S TWO OF THEM!" Classy, eh?

I remember what those early days are like and I double it in my head in a feeble attempt at empathy. And I feel desperate to lighten her load.

I've listened to her struggle from far away, too far away to do anything but listen.

But as I shoveled this melting driveway, and throughout the whole rest of the weekend, I felt so very present. And I finally understood just how fine they are and will be. They are figuring it out, like all parents have to, one day, one nap at a time. I cannot do any of it for them.

And given time, they would be just fine all on their own, much like their driveway.

-----------------

Oh my goodness, you guys, I MADE IT. I made it to Massachusetts to see my college roommate and her adorable twin baby boys and I didn't whisper anything about it EVEN INSIDE MY OWN HEAD before I left because I was so nervous that something would go wrong, like it did last time.

I didn't pack until the very last minute because the gods of viruses and freak snow storms were watching, YOU KNOW THEY WERE.

But I made it and the whole time, from the start of the trip in the airport and throughout the whole weekend, I tried so very hard to just enjoy myself including the delicious moment when you realize I had a book and a pack of M&Ms and a whole plane ride to enjoy them ALL BY MYSELF.

Then, of course, there were the BABIES.

Have I mentioned this? THERE ARE TWO OF THEM.

I basked in the glow of baby feet.

And baby head sniffs.

Even folding baby clothes. Man, that task was SO NOT a chore.

I coochie-cooed and beamed like a loon the whole time, because you guys, I MADE IT. I was THERE.

FINALLY.

My notebook

2012-02-27T14:21:00.003-05:00

I like to keep a notebook and pen beside my bed. I don't mind writing on the computer, and lord knows spellcheck greatly improves my spelling, but I've always liked writing free hand, especially late at night or early in the morning.

That is, after all, when most of the ideas come. They're little and quiet and always come when my brain is a mumble jumble and I'm not sure I remember how to walk and wasn't I just in Paris pulling a tuxedoed Ewan McGregor into an embrace?

I try to leave a notebook next to my bed to catch those fleeting ideas. The notebook lasts there for a week, maybe two.

Before the girls get to it.

It's usually on a weekend, when we sleepily pull them into bed with us, released from our weekday fear of messing with the sacred cow of our morning routine. We, the adults, envision an hour or two of quiet cuddling with our adorable soap-scented brood. The children apparently see an excellent trampoline and two semi-comatose punching bags.

We never learn.

They last for maybe 4 minutes of lying beside us before looking for entertainment. Singing songs at a later-in-the-day-please volume, pulling bookmarks out of books, debating the relative merits of Sprout TV shows are just the beginning.

Drawing with a nearby notebook and pen eventually enters their minds.

Sometimes, I give up my notebook willingly, giving them just a page at first, and please not any of the ones I've already written on. Other times, I tell them the notebook's mine, for grownup writing, and they're welcome to get their own paper and crayons from downstairs.

Which they won't do unless I accompany them, thereby completely ruining the whole stay in bed scenario. The sad truth is, I usually just give up and let them co-opt my notebooks.

It suddenly occurs to me that I have other options. Like leaving a notebook and pencil that's just for them on my side table.

(AHA! And see also: DUH!)

Next time I go shopping, I'll pick up a notebook for them and put it by my bed, right beside this new one that welcomed me home this weekend as part of a fantastic Crappy Day Package from Di over at Motherhood Is Painless.

This one is mine, all mine.

The Whispering Mama

2012-02-23T17:17:00.001-05:00

I lost my voice here in Arizona. I must have picked up a virus on one of our flights; by Tuesday my throat was scratchy, my voice fading. By Wednesday morning I could only muster a whisper.

(Oh, and I also picked up viral pinkeye and several volcanic zits. I'm quite a sight right now, I assure you.)

I thought the laryngitis would remedy itself quickly, as it usually does. But here it is Thursday afternoon and I still have only the softest whisper of a voice.

It's made me realize that, as a mother, I sure do an awful lot of talking. And I'm tempted to put the emphasis on the awful.

Imagine this scene: you are the lone adult in a car, driving your two children home from a rodeo parade. The children are hot, dusty, overtired, oversugared, OVER. They begin to bicker in the back seat and someone takes someone else's prized whosewhatsit and soon there is screaming and crying that seems like it will go on forever.

Now, normally, I would raise my voice at a moment like this, uttering some calm, wise chestnut like "I DON'T CARE WHO STARTED IT, CAN'T YOU SEE I'M DRIVING HERE?"

I might even yell.

But I couldn't do that, you see. I couldn't even speak loudly enough to be heard over the din. So, for once in my mothering life, I did nothing in the face of loud bickering. Absolutely nothing.

I was silent.

I drove the car.

I'm sure you can guess what happened next: they stopped bickering and before I knew it, their voices turned to laughter.

What. The. HELL.

This laryngitis has shown me how much I normally talk to - and AT - my children. Many times over the last few days, I've thought about saying something to one or both of my girls, to guide their choices, to remind or cajole or insist on behavior that feels vitally important. But I can't. So I sit and watch. Or, if it's really serious, I put a hand on a shoulder, get their attention and shake my head gravely.

They always understand what I mean.

I am astonished to learn that I really don't NEED to talk to them so much; in fact, the last two days have shown me it's often better if I don't say a thing. My not talking has given them space to figure things out on their own. The resolution is slower, louder, and, of course, messier when they figure things out for themselves with little to no intervention from me. But it is all theirs.

Once my voice returns, ANY DAY NOW, I hope this lesson stays with me: silence is a reasonable - even powerful and empowering - mothering choice.

To the cacti

2012-02-17T14:21:00.002-05:00

Tomorrow we'll get on a plane - well, two planes - and make our way across the country to Arizona, where CG was born and raised.

When we moved here to Virginia two and a half years ago, we decided the only way our California-wimpy selves could survive winter would be to head to his parents' place in Arizona - or some other warm place - every February, when the snow had just started to outstay its welcome.

(Now, of course, we are afraid we might actually miss the only real snow of the whole winter.)

Last year we went to Jamaica for a week in February, courtesy of my parents. This year we will spend a week with my mother-in-law in Tucson, going to the rodeo, the playground, the desert museum, all the while reaching our faces to the sun like a couple of lizards.

It feels important to us both to take the girls there, not during a busy holiday but during a time when you can focus on the landscape, a time when you can spend days just puttering around the yard looking at the cacti. If nothing else, CG hopes the girls will know that a saguaro isn't just a picture on the wall.

I thought we'd do this every year, assuming we could afford it. But planning this trip has brought a sad realization: this may be our last year of February trips. Next year, when Z is in public school for first grade, there will be a lot of pressure to keep her in school, with no absences for family vacations. I don't know why this surprises me but it does. Didn't I take trips during the school year that weren't an official school break? Aren't trips to see family, not around a school break but when we really, actually, want to travel, an important part of childhood?

As it is, Z's kindergarten will roll along without her; they're taking their first field-trip, to see a play, while we are gone and she is heartbroken about missing it. Yesterday she loudly lamented her unfinished art project that will languish and "be lonely" next week when the other kids finish theirs. She worries that she'll miss the rest of the lesson on the heart, "a very important organ, Mommy," she informed me indignantly.

Yes, she is excited to go to Arizona, but she is also suddenly aware of life going on here without her and she doesn't like it.

I have a sense that this trip is an end of an era, the era when our family made vacation choices based almost solely on what worked best for the grownups.

Though I am excited for Z to start public school next year, I feel like we are in a raft the top of a churning rapid. The school system will have its way with us and we will do our best to navigate the waters, keeping our little raft, our little family, intact along the way.

School means we most likely will not be taking week-long trips in February any more.

Here's hoping this one is a last great hurrah.

Love

2012-02-13T22:36:00.001-05:00

"Mommy? If you're not sure you believe in God, what do you believe in?"

"I believe in love, Z, that much I know for sure. Love. And, you know, for a lot of people, God is love."

"....Huh? I thought he was a man!"

---------------------------------

I have friends who hate Valentine's Day. They think it's a fake holiday, manufactured by corporations interested only in giving you another reason to part with your hard earned dollars.

I understand this inclination; I do. I resist the commercialization of most holidays and am forever striving to celebrate them in ways that are meaningful to - and representative of - our family.

Which is why Valentine's Day in our home is all about homemade treats. And love.

I believe in love. I believe that love is a more powerful force than hate or fear. I believe that all that is lost, can be found through love.

And I believe that love, in all its forms, must be celebrated.

----------------------------------

I was sitting on the couch with my husband one night last week, sewing some felt valentine hearts for the girls to search the house for on Valentine's day morning.

"Hey, you gonna make anything for me?" he says lightly, a twinkle in his eye.

"Yee-s," I say indignantly, making a mental note to think of something, anything, to make for him, too.

There may or may not be naughty fortunes in a few of these.

----------------------------------

"I got VALENTIMES!" E shrieks, raising her paper bag from preschool. "From my FRIENDS!"

She couldn't be more proud and shows them to her sister before clutching them to her chest.

"They're MINE. I love them," she says before giving each and every one a gentle kiss as her sister puts the finishing touches on her handmade valentines.

-----------------------------------

We are baking heart shaped cookies in the afternoon sunlight and listening to "All You Need is Love" and laughing and I think I am the luckiest person in the whole world.

And then there are tears and struggles over who gets which stool and whether someone dropped flour on purpose or accident and in the mayhem I forget to set the timer so this batch is overdone and . . .

I sing "All You Need is Love" a little bit louder.

--------------------------------------

Happy Valentine's Day, my friends. I hope you are celebrating in whatever ways stoke the love in your heart.

Tears

2012-02-09T14:08:00.001-05:00

Her tears come quickly. Out of nowhere. They usually burst forth right alongside loud words and a spastic body and a twisted up face. For her, frustration must take many, many exits in its release.

They come every day, I think. Though there's probably been a tear-free day or two here and there, I honestly can't remember a day that didn't include them. Every frustration, every banged knee, every thwarted ambition has the potential to bring them out. Sometimes they are gone just as quickly as they appeared. Sometimes they linger like an oblivious, unwanted house guest.

And I am, as ever, caught between parenting ideals. I want her to be tough. To muster a steely strength that can keep her focused and calm as life throws her the inevitable speed bumps and road blocks. At the same time, I also want her to love and accept who she is, every single part of her, including her own darkness. I want her to feel safe and understood and deeply, deeply okay being just as she is.

Even - especially - when "as she is" is extremely sensitive.

In pursuit of resiliency, I am sometimes heartless, answering a BANG! OW! WAHHHHHHHH! with nothing more than a raised eyebrow and a wordless pat on the head. I have been known to look down at her tearful face with weary resignation, as if to say: What is it this time? I have, on occasion, reminded her that when she screams and cries so often, over relatively tiny events, she is training me to ignore her yells. Which means if something truly awful were to happen someday, much like the townspeople and the boy who cried wolf, I may not heed her call.

I'm okay with this approach most of the time. I like to imagine that my calm, impassive reaction reflects back to her that minor bumps and bruises are all in a day's work and not such a big deal after all. I don't know if it really does. I can only hope so.

But sometimes, when I look at her tear-streaked face - really look - I remember. I remember crying over anything and everything. I remember tears that came from nowhere and everywhere all at once. I remember physical discomfort as being impossible to bear, emotional discomfort as nothing short of torture.

I remember being five and being completely and totally at the mercy of my own tear ducts.

Those are the times that I engage with her, probably more than I should. I can't will myself to turn away from her pain. I can't help but reach out to her.

To say: I know. Let it out.

And: It's really, really okay.

Plan B

2012-01-27T14:24:00.002-05:00

Z is one of those kids who has always needed to know what's going to happen and when and how and why. She likes things to be predictable and structured and doesn't manage well when plans change suddenly.

Of course, life is all about plans changing suddenly.

When she was younger, we bent over backwards to not rock her world too often, for her - and our own - sanity. Now we realize that we cannot structure her whole life; she's going to need to learn how to roll with it when plans change. Our new goal is to maximize her resilience and give her confidence in her own flexibility.

So we work with her, as best we can. We point out and applaud any examples of her mental flexibility. We try to model our own. When planning the following day, we now talk about "Plan A" with either a direct mention or the understood implication that we might need to make up and accept a "Plan B" or even a "Plan C".

This is helpful, but only to a point. Because, you see, she's also a worrier. Sometimes when we lay out what we hope will happen, she'll mentally reach into the "Plan B" realm and not be able to come back out, worrying endlessly about all the things that could keep her beloved Plan A from happening.

Which brings us back to why we originally structured our lives for her benefit: it reduces every one's stress.

It's a one step forward, two steps back sort of process. Some days, she'll rally when disappointed and say "Well, we just need to figure out a Plan B, right?" Other days, she'll act as if the world is ending and no "Plan B" will do.

Today especially, I know how she feels.

I am supposed to be arriving in Connecticut right about now. Then I'm supposed to pick up my rental car and drive to Massachusetts to see my college roommate and meet her twin baby boys. In a few short hours, I should be sitting on her couch, holding one or both babies, sniffing their sweet heads.

Instead I'm sitting here choking down crackers after being felled by a stomach bug.

We've been planning this trip for months, since before the boys were even born back in November. I've been itching to be there - to help out, to hold babies, to hold her hand - for months now. CG and I found a good weekend, bought an airline ticket (with trip insurance THANK GOODNESS) and I waited with bated breath, counting down the days.

Then, last weekend, E threw up in her sleep. So began my countdown.

I was anxious about catching it, even more than usual. I washed my hands incessantly. I pushed her away when she tried to touch my face or kiss my lips. Any rumble in my belly brought on a new wave of anxiety.

All of that was for naught, as I found out around 2 am Thursday morning.

The timing of it couldn't be much worse. It just really sucks.

I don't want a "Plan B". I wanted my "Plan A".

Intwerupon!

2012-01-23T17:32:00.001-05:00

I don't know when exactly but sometime in the past year, it slowly dawned on us that we have TWO actual child people in our house. It sure was a calmer, quieter household when we had one child and one baby/toddler we sort of - not really, but kind of - ignored.

Z has always controlled the airways. She was an only child for the first three years of her life and I spent all day in one-way and, eventually, real, honest-to-goodness, two-way conversations with her. By the time she was a toddler and talking in earnest, our dinner table conversations were pretty much dominated by whatever bizarre-o thing was running through her head.

As Z got older, the conversations in the car, on a walk, at the table became a place to chat about our days, to ask burning questions about dinosaurs, to test out nonsense jokes that made us roll our eyes. She's always been a part of the conversation because, of course she was. Slowly, falteringly, we taught her about taking turns in a conversation, not interrupting, listening patiently for the whole question before answering.

Then E started talking. And she wanted her fair share of the airwaves. At first it was loud babbling, with shrieking sprinkled in for punctuation, any sounds she could muster just to contribute and be part of the family. Now it is full sentences or, her current favorite, Christmas carols sung at top volume. All while someone else is trying to talk about their day.

Momentarily resting her sledding muscles, and her vocal cords.

Logically one would think that this would cause Z to calmly sigh and resolve to be an excellent example of polite conversational skills.

What? That's not logical? NO WONDER.

Now our house during daylight hours is a swirl of little people talking over one another. I am constantly one "conversation" away from a headache. We are working on remedial conversational skills with Z and basic NO SCREAMING PLEASE instructions with E. I bark endlessly: "Just a minute! I can't hear you until I finish hearing your sister!" "Inside voices!" "One at a time!" and "No interruptions, please!"

So, of course, E has taken to yelling, when I'm in conversation with someone else: "INTWERUPON!!! INTWERUPON!"

At least she's aware of what she's doing? It's a start?

Where's my Advil.....

My mahster baathroom

2012-01-18T14:10:00.000-05:00

When we bought our first house in Pasadena, one of my massage clients at the time said "Congratulations!" and then, without missing a beat, "Tell me all about the master bathroom!" Actually what she said was "mahster baathroom" with a slight British accent which was totally ridiculous as she had never traveled outside of California. (Say what you want about Madonna and her accent but at least she actually lives in England.) While I was used to my client's fake accent and her chummy way of asking about my life, I was stunned by her basic assumption. For, you see, our new house was quirky and lovely and sunny and perfect and.... TINY, with one weensy bathroom that could not rightly be called the master anything.

We loved that house, including its tiny bathroom. But when we later planned to move here to Virginia, with two children and a dog, we had lived through several rounds of houseguests - and stomach bugs - so knew we wanted at least two bathrooms. Buying our current house from far away was challenging; I spent many, many hours squinting at real estate photos on my computer screen trying to figure out how a certain room really looked, how it would feel to walk through the space and make it our own.

Our new home was clearly right for us from the beginning. We were looking for something bigger than our old house but not too big, close enough to town to walk easily but on a quiet street, preferably a cul de sac. We found it and snatched it up and didn't really think too much about why the seller didn't post photos of the master bathroom. We knew it existed, we just didn't have photos of it.

I was tempted to call my old client and crow, "I have a mahster baathroom now!" But then I would have had to actually pick up a telephone and we all know that's just a crazy thing to do unless a gun is pointed to your head.

What we discovered was that our new mahster baathroom hadn't been touched in the 30+ years since the house was built. Luckily, it was built with the cheapest contractor grade materials which were starting to disintegrate! The toilet rarely flushed properly, the tiles were crumbling in spots, the sinks and shower head and tub were all bizarrely - uncomfortably - low to the ground as if they knew we would be bringing in two little ankle-biters who would rule our lives.

We began fantasizing about remodeling the bathroom from the moment we moved in.

We started the actual process a year later with budgets and savings accounts and architect-designer friends and many, many bathroom magazines. The actual, honest-to-goodness remodeling began last week.

Here is our bathroom a week ago, Monday 8 am, right before a sledgehammer smashed its beige blahness to smithereens.

And here's where this post starts to go off the rails. Because, you see, when I look at these photos, I see a perfectly functional bathroom. Boring and blah but basically functional (mostly) and all the little crumbly issues could be dealt with in spots and we had gotten used to stooping over the sinks and under the shower head and not bothering ever to take a bath because the water only covered the back 1/4 of our bodies.

If we had just accepted it as it was, then all this money we are spending to make it nice and modern and fulfilling of every capitalist middle class fantasy would be free to donate to someone without a job and a comfortable house, someone without any bathroom, master or not.

I have been haunted by this post by Catherine Newman which I read right after the new year, ie. right after we had signed the contract to actually start remodeling our bathroom.

"We stretch to give, and I hope you do too. There are some good resources at the end of that piece about how to find organizations to give to, although we give everything we give to Partners in Health, and I feel good about that choice. And every year, it comes down to the same question: build a mud room, or give it away. And every year I think that people need to not be holding dying children in their arms more than we need a better place to keep our boots.
I'm all about "tax the rich," "eat the rich," and occupy everything. You know my politics. But with respect to the developing world, upon whose backs we have amassed much of our nation's wealth, we are the 1%. Even if, yes, you trip over a lot of shoes and coats and backpacks when you walk directly into our dirty kitchen from the muddy outdoors."

After I read that post, I couldn't get it out of my mind: People need to not be holding dying children in their arms more than we need - a new master bathroom. When it's stated like that, how can you ever purchase anything "extra" for yourself ever again?

I can't help it, I am trembling with guilt over our master bath remodel. Which is ridiculous, I know. Is there anything less tragic than middle class, liberal, privileged guilt over their freaking bathroom remodel? Perhaps a long winded blog post about a master bath remodel? Jeezus.

I really have one of two options as a reasonable adult: I can insist we forgo the new modern bathroom and give the money to reputable charities or I can enjoy the remodel, grateful for my good fortune, and accept the reality that I am enjoying a luxury that few in the world can afford.

I seem unable to choose either of these options.

I'm remembering this post too, which I found last year on (in)significant detail, by mimismartypants.

"My brain does a serious push-pull when it comes to larger questions of how to be in the world. Specifically, stuff. There are things I want. I want a remodeled kitchen, with an extremely kick-ass stove. I want to put a skylight in our stairway. I want to make over the upstairs bathroom with an extremely expensive shower. I want lots of new shoes, an upgraded iPhone, new pots and pans, an Xbox with Kinect (embarrassing, but true), a few sessions of personal training. I want a long interesting vacation to a foreign country.

Then I start to freak out about the cost. And not just the cost as in our personal budget, but about whether remodeling the bathroom or buying an Xbox is more or less the same as kicking a poor person in the face. There are people in the world who will watch their children die of hunger, and I am thinking about dropping fifty bucks on an All-Clad saucepan? Really?

And sure, I could send fifty bucks to a hunger relief agency, and I do that periodically, although the charity budget has to be split several ways because everything matters!

It does not change the fact that I still want the saucepan."

This is the rub: I could have insisted we not remodel, given the money to charity. But it would not have changed the fact that I still want the saucepan.

What do you all do, if and when you have extra money? Does it go into home improvements of the practical or enjoyable kind? Does it go into long term saving? Does it go to help people who have so much less than we do?

Sisters

2012-01-15T21:50:00.003-05:00

They are so close; they really have no choice. They can't get away; they are almost always there. One does something, the other tries it out. One laughs, the other laughs.

One cries, the other cries.

I took a photography class today called Mothers Who Click (Cross one off of my 40 for 40 list! Yay!). In it, we were asked to pay attention to what shots we are always trying to capture: a real smile out of a non-smiler, a perfectly posed portrait, a peewee football action shot. There was no question for me: I am always trying to capture my girls together in a candid moment that perfectly represents them at this exact moment in time.

I hope that one day, when they have the choice, repeatedly, to be together or be apart, they will chose to be together. And that I am there to take their picture.

Sisters from Clueless But Hopeful on Vimeo.

Music: "Sisters" by Sarah Battens

I (don't) know you

2012-01-10T14:31:00.002-05:00

Dear Z,

I like to think I know you.

You are so like me, I say sometimes. We are so alike. Later, you repeat it back to me, especially when you're feeling scared or sensitive about something. I'm sensitive like you, right Mama? That's why I'm scared of monsters?

Yes, I say. We are a couple of sensitive flowers.

I understand when you desperately want to play with other kids but don't know how to approach them. I wince in recognition when you cover your ears and cower in loud places. I know immediately when you are grouchy and unreasonable due to hunger and hand you a packet of almonds I keep in my purse for me - and now, for you.

I think these similarities are a gift to us both. They bring to our relationship a recognition, a mirroring of experience. They help me feel close to you, even during your most exasperating behavior. I think they alleviate some of your loneliness and pain when you are scared or hurting, because you know I understand, even if my response to you is not always as sympathetic or calm as we both would like.

Sometimes this knowing you through my own experience gets in the way of really seeing you, though. I have to remind myself that you are not scared of heights or high speed or being upside down; that was - IS - me. I have to remind myself that while you worry when approaching new kids, you still do it, rather than hiding behind your mother sucking your thumb like *ahem* someone you know.

That elusive thing we call balance is what I'm looking for, of course. I want to let our similarities be a comfort and a way to connect, not a constraint or a prophecy. I want you to understand and love the parts of you that are like me, the parts of you that are like your father and the parts of you that are unlike anyone else in the history of time.

Love,

Your Clueless But Hopeful Mama

----------------

Dear E,

I sometimes think I don't know you.

Where did you come from? I think and, sometimes say, gazing at you in bafflement.

You are the little sister in our household equation and as a fellow little sister I understand the feeling of looking up to a sibling, the constant desire to run with the big kids.

But that is where my easy recognition ends.

You are slippery, stubborn, resilient, and not terribly interested in rules. I am surprised time and again that you wake so slowly, completely uninterested in food, while your sister and I are wide awake in seconds, demanding food before anything else and lots of it, please.

I don't want to simplify your complexities by saying that Z is like me and you are like your father but, of course, I think those things from time to time. I don't want to be so determinate about it, to divide you two and act as if each one of you belongs to one of us, when of course, we all belong to each other and to ourselves and to the universe in equal measure.

I think our differences are a gift to us both. You are not a mirror for my own reactions, my swirling, volatile moods. I see you as a separate person so much more easily than your sister, either because you are my second child or because you are so seemingly different from me or both.

I don't want to divide up personality traits and assign them like a warden: You are the sensitive one and you are the confident one. I want you to know that, in this life, you get to try on all the adjectives you like, my dear, including the ones you think your older sister has already taken.

The truth is: you have parts of me and parts of your father and parts that are uniquely, spectacularly you.

Love,

Your Clueless But Hopeful Mama

40 for 40

2012-01-04T17:27:00.000-05:00

When I turn 40 this year, I would like to feel ... triumphant. So on November 28th of this year, this whole resolution/goal/to-do list thing will either make me feel terribly accomplished or terribly DEPRESSED. Whee!

I got this idea from Greenstyle Mom: 40 things to do in the year I turn 40. If you click over to her blog, you'll notice that she's going to do a back flip off a diving board and complete a marathon AND a triathalon. Mine are decidedly less impressive.

A lot of the things listed below either scare me, overwhelm me or just get lost in the shuffle. But they're all doable. Hopefully I'll find the impetus to get off my duff and just do them already!

1. Take a hike on the Appalachian Trail. It's close by! I've driven by it! And waved!
2. Submit writing to three different places, web or print.
3. Go out dancing (any kind!) with my husband.
4. Visit an art museum in DC with the girls (I'll be sure to warn all you local folks so you can steer clear).
5. Take the girls on a new hike.
6. Take a new exercise class.
7. Hold a freestanding headstand.
8. Hold a family fire drill.
9. Volunteer my time. Somewhere.
10. Go waterskiing again.
11. Take the girls on a hike to see my favorite waterfalls this summer in Vermont.
12. Start a baby clothes quilt (or just donate the freaking baby clothes already.)
13. Drive to West Virginia. It's so close! I've never been!
14. Show our girls the Atlantic Ocean. They've never seen it from this coast (Jamaica doesn't count in my book!) and that just feels wrong.
15. Take the dog for a hike, just the two of us.
16. Meditate. At least once.
17. Lie in bed until 8 am at least once. Just because.
18. Paint our living room.
19. Learn to love the old rug and curtains in our living room or get new ones.
20. Hang pictures on the walls in the basement.
21. Part my hair on the other side for a day. Just to see.
22. Wear earrings at least once a week.
23. Take a full day media/web fast.
24. Plant a new vegetable in our garden bed.
25. Take out all my camera lenses and remember what they're for.
26. Take at least one decent picture of the girls every week.
27. Tackle our filing cabinet.
28. Get our taxes done without needing an extension. *ahem* CG *ahem*
29. Sit down with CG and take a good, brave, come-to-Jesus look at our finances.
30. Check out the local Unitarian Church. IN PERSON.
31. Pick and freeze blueberries.
32. Make tiramisu, CG's favorite dessert, from scratch.
33. Visit the National Zoo with the girls.
34. Celebrate my tenth wedding anniversary in some exciting way.
35. Take my husband on a surprise date.
36. Take a creative workshop of any kind. Yoga. Writing. Sewing. Photography.
37. Write a 'just because' letter and mail it.
38. Host a Scrabble party, since my husband refuses to play with me.
39. Go on a family bike ride that finishes in a picnic.
40. Post here about these as I accomplish them!