Good Day, Regular People

Things I'll Miss About My Life When Summer Vacation Begins

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Thu, 23 May 2013 22:21:00 +0000

School will be out within a few weeks. Aaaaaaaaaall the children will be home. Having them with me, around me, walking around in the mornings with their summer pajamas and their bedhead heads just hovering inches away, close enough to smell their night time warmness is a top pleasure in my life.

However, there will be changes, and some of these changes, will be difficult.

In no particular order, the shift from me now being left home alone unsupervised to 24 hour guarded by three pseudo husbands is about to begin, and that means:

1. No more Amy Winehouse at volume 48 pleading Vaaaaaaal, Valerieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee! off of YouTube while I scrub the floors.

2. The 40 minute phone calls to my niece, hosted from the kitchen table, with my feet all barefooty on the edge of the barnwood, pfffffffft. A thing of the past.

3. Someone will be finding my coffee mugs placed all over the house and again with the comments of "Mom, do you really drink this much coffee or do you need to make an early Alzheimer's appointment?"

4. The questions, the hovering questions, of "How much longer are you going to be on the computer??"

5. Bright eyeballs peering over from behind the stove, unhappily commenting on the beginnings of supper. Right now, they come home so hungry from school I could serve up plucked crow and they'd kiss my feet. Also, related: no more being able to lie, "It's not left overs. I just made it."

6. Having to be out of my pajamas and into a bra before the raised eyebrows that judge, "Do you EVEN plan on getting dressed today?"

7. No such thing as running into the grocery store and leaving with only what's on the list, unless the list states 15 containers Pringles, 6 bags Lay's BBQ chips, 2 quarts Mint Chocolate Chip, and half a dozen Ice Cream Sandwiches. Oh. And root beers.

8. Having to take on a third job to pay for the sunscreen and bug spray that three big kids' skin surface area requires. (1500 sq. in. per child x $100.00 per 8 oz of what sunscreen manufacturers think is liquid gold = enough money to make you puke) Especially for someone like me who insists on apply as directed: repeat as necessary.

9. Seek out fourth job (I can work it in between 11 pm and 5 am) to cover costs of filling up gas tank for two teens' worth of summer driving.

10. Did I mention the snacking begins? I should have married a food wholesaler.

* * *

**Seriously, I canNOT wait until I have them back, all three of them, for three months. xo

Zach Sobiech

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Tue, 21 May 2013 17:11:00 +0000

Zach Sobiech passed away yesterday.

The Minnesota teen with terminal cancer, who just turned 18 on May 3, wrote a farewell song to his family and friends, because he wanted them to have something to hold them up when he was gone. His music video, "Clouds" has had over 3 million views, and this young man, Zach, tells us more in 3:14 about living than 20 books ever could.

"Just, try and make people happy, every day. That's it."

Make the time to watch this today, click over, see this with your family. Let them see what it's like to really be remembered and how to make a difference.

Peace to you, beautiful Zach, and to the many that loved you and shared your days with you. Peace.

*To learn more about Zach and his amazing way of living, please watch his story here; 22 minutes of beauty and grace, "My Last Days."

* * *

Chuck That Thesaurus

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Fri, 17 May 2013 16:01:00 +0000

Books sit in piles in front of me, dollars spent on Amazon in hopes of that one right word, reading late into the night to expand my wordstock, following the monthly "It Pays To Increase Your Vocabulary!" with each new Reader's Digest issue.

For what? For naught, that's what.

I just saw a video where Dennis Rodman answers all these world important questions with freakin' made up words! I sat my husband down and made him watch a news interview done after Dennis' trip to Korea -- when it was finished, I rolled my eyes and turned to my husband, asking his feedback on the ridiculousness of the word vomit just witnessed. My intelligent, well employed husband says, "THAT? Was awesome."

There you go. Awesome.

Read about my word snobbery conversion, at Aiming Low. My post today "I'm Going To Make Up My Own Words."

* * *

*Thank you. xo

I Cannot Tell a Lie

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Thu, 16 May 2013 04:25:00 +0000

Folded in haphazard half, was my Mother's Day card from my youngest.

It was printed with pink marker on pink paper, which made the letters look kinda of orange-ish, pale -- but I could still make it out when I stood next to the brightness of the kitchen window to read it.

An acrostic poem, and an ambitious one, too. Not just made up of first letters of my name spelling out only one word vertically. This boy had written me a deluxe model acrostic -- he had penned in a complete sentence for the first letters of my name, which he thinks is MOTHER.

It was a wonderful read, and I had tears from the laughter. He, of course, didn't understand what was so funny, and when I couldn't stop laughing he explained, "What? You know cards are hard for me and it feels funny to not tell the truth."

I'd photocopy it but against the pink paper and pink marker, it looks like a dark blob. Letter for sentence, I've copied it here.

Happy Mother's Day

Many sided sides to her.

Other things I can say about her.

There is a lot of stuff that I like about her but people say is weird.

Hours and hours of fun we have doing her favorite thing of nothing.

Everything she says with the faces that go with it.

Realistic, she tells me exactly what she thinks.

I love you mom.

* * *

*Pretty sure this is a love note, don't you think?

xo (hope you all had a wonderful mother's day)

** BONUS day for me today: besides this wonderful note from my boy, I'm also being featured on mamapedia! Voices! with a post on parenting and teens, "What Happened to the Meat?" THANK YOU mamapedia! Stop over and check them out, you'll find great community voices as well as online resources for all sorts of sharing info. and parenting's nuggets of wisdom.

Happy Mother's Day To Them

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Mon, 13 May 2013 04:55:00 +0000

For the past 18 years, Mother's Day has been a celebration for the three of them, my sons. The ones who made me a mother. I spend the holiday doing for them because they have made me so happy.

I don't ask my three for anything, but they still make me their cards and have their dad take them to buy me my flowers.

I'm happy at home, starting the day with the cinnamon rolls they love so much, and asking them what they'd like for dinner.

Because truthfully, in the life I've had, this holiday has always felt hollow and mandatory to me... until they were born.

Mother's Day is a day spent like any other of my days; in disbelief of the gold I've been given. The diamonds of my every days -- and though I have never not begun or ended a day since they've been born thanking everything under the stars for the jackpot that has rained down on me with them as my life, on this annual celebration, I say to myself over and over, I can't believe I am their mother.

I spent Sunday staring at their faces while they talked, the way their cheeks look so soft when the sun hits them from behind, reveling in the sound of the joy in their laughs, recognizing the uniqueness of each of their smiles and how one's lip curls up only on the right. I know just how one stands with his left leg jutted out, and how the other one always points his left knee out to the side.

Mother's Day is a day of granted requests, and I wait for them to sing to me. It's what I tell them I want when they ask me what I want them to do today. I laugh and order them, "Sing me a made up song!" And they do. Each one out voluming the other in hopes of getting the loudest applause from me, and at the end of it all, with furrowed brows, they scold me and say I can't clap the same way for all of them.

So they decide they have to do it again.

Thank you for today, my children, for giving me a holiday to celebrate. Happy Mother's Day to you.

* * *

We live in an imperfect world, and as well intended of a sentiment as Mother's Day is, for many, it brings on an overload of complexities and life circumstances. If you're someone looking for shared words to help you feel like you're not the only one struggling with this holiday, here's a magnificent post I found: via hopefulworld .org (a great community site) In Case Mother's Day is Hard for You.

The Pinality of it is...

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Sat, 11 May 2013 05:07:00 +0000

Recipes you tell yourself you'll make. Beautiful shoes that will kill your feet, manicured fingertips that look like the ocean at sunset and will last two days tops at your house, arrangements of flea market pictures you'll never find above your kitchen stove -- you'll even stare up at the ceiling at night, wondering how you can ask your husband for a second honeymoon just so you can wear that layered chiffon wedding dress you just saw.

Welcome to the world of Pinterest, where we lose our minds and foolishly tell ourselves we can do things like cut our own bangs or bling our own jeans. Our eyes say me likee, but our effort says not in this lifetime. Pinterest is like a magazine full of only things you like, not a glossy paper one full of occassional seductive items -- nope, pinterest is something you can stay up until l3 o'clock clicking through and seeing what other people find appealing. It's better than going through their real life medicine cabinets because you know in an instant what they're really about.

I tried Pinterest months and months ago, but just as I said above, it became all too quickly obvious that the world would know what I was truly like -- so I got rid of everything I had up there. Because the everything I had up there was all 10 Ways To Beat Depression, and 15 Ways To Cook Chicken in Twenty Minutes. Also lots of shoes that my bunioned feet will say no to and clothes, coats, hairdos, inspirational quotes, crafty things that will never materialize -- all responsible for too many nights of Pinsomnia.

What was I thinking during that Pinterest phase? Pinterest makes me crave bacon wrapped anything in the middle of the night and has me convinced I look good in sleeveless breezy summer dresses that go waaaaaaay above the knee. A soft blue skimmer, really? After a week of 1 a.m. bacon wrapped meatloaf snacking??

It just didn't happen for me and Pinterest, though it isn't totally out of my life, I still haunt the site because it is eye candy, but I now enter that Pinterworld with the appropriate mindset -- that of Pinality.

Pinality -- the true reality of your pinteresting ways, in your world. First of all, you won't do, wear, buy, make any of the things you've pinned on your Pinterest board -- like saving every single paper towel cardboard tube and plastic cups so you can cobble together makeshift iPod docking stations for your kids.

Or spraying brown sugar and water mix in your hair to give yourself caramel highlights.

And second of all, the pinality of it is, it'll just make you wake up with ants in your hair and bacon crumbles in the corners of your mouth.

* * *

photo credit: Bunches and Bits {Karina} via photopin cc

Happy Birthday, Ann Imig!

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Wed, 08 May 2013 18:28:00 +0000

I have always loved other people's birthdays, because you get the chance to use their special day as an excuse to let them know what they mean to you, their place in your life -- no questions asked.

Doing it any other regular day of the year, and depending on the receiving end, but it could make someone uncomfortable. We've all seen that situation set up in cartoons and comedies, "You changed my life! Now I will be your life servant! Your wish is my command!"

So yeah no, can't do that. BUT, today is Ann Imig's birthday, and I am going to take this opportunity of an open window that makes it socially acceptable and not scary in any way, to say Thank you, Ann Imig, you changed my life.

When I found your blog annsrants four years ago under Wisconsin bloggers, I never thought that four years later, we'd be working together -- and that I'd be the one bringing life change to others and into their lives.

I hardly recognize myself these days. Taking phone calls while on a treadmill, assembling 14 unique community voices into a beautiful ebb and flow of recognition of the art of motherhood as I bring a show celebrating motherhood to Milwaukee. All of this done with the fierce belief that we are all someone.

From the outside, my community may just see a woman driving around in a mini van that needs vacuuming with too many empty bottles of gatorade rolling around inside, but behind the wheel is a woman with a cast book in the passenger seat and a notepad of things to do right next to it, no longer wondering what she can bring to this world -- because I know now.

I can bring opportunity, and all it took is one person to tell me that all of our actions are a leap of faith.

The internet celebrates you today, Ann Imig -- just this year alone, 300 Listen To Your Mother Show voices. Add in the over 100 voices from Listen To Your Mother voices from last year, and 100 more from the year before, and the 100 from the year before that.

All of us shouting, thinking, feeling, brimming with grateful hearts: THANK YOU, Ann, for creating Listen To Your Mother and taking the leap of faith in us.

We don't do anything alone or without the help of others. And you inspire us to do what you've done, create community and spread the power of connection.

You have founded a movement that is generating universal energy and our words have been catapulted out full force with heart and soul, and that makes it impossible for things to ever be the same. How can they be when all of us involved with Listen To Your Mother are saying "I know what I can bring."

Happy Birthday, Ann Imig. THANK YOU for being on this planet.

* * *

photo: Rochelle Fritsch

Thank You, Milwaukee, from Listen To Your Mother

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Mon, 06 May 2013 12:57:00 +0000

There are formal thank yous that will be sent, paperwork to be filed, our homes can now go back to a somewhat balanced state -- but all that can wait.

Our first annual Listen To Your Mother Show took place yesterday at Alverno's Wehr Hall.

And Jen, the co producer, and I, have to thank the city of Milwaukee for coming to celebrate Mother's Day with us. We have to thank the cast for giving our show the magic we knew it would have.

Our guests found their way to our stage after the show to say, "I had no idea!" "Wow. I couldn't picture it, but this was amazing."

There was the wonderful "I'm coming back next year, with my mother!" But best of all, "I think I want to be part of this."

There are so many moments that are gratifying, like the executive director of our local cause thanking us afterward and telling us, "I really, really loved this."

All of this was possible because of the support of family, friends, and our community, through attending and being witness to the power of shared experience.

So powerful because there is energy being exchanged between reader, audience, producers. It's a charge that begins at point A and is received by point B who's been hungry for it, which thrills point A to be able to feed it, and grows into something like a Tesla coil that can't be held in a room anymore! I swear, mid show, I thought we were all going to faint from so many breath-held moments.

More on all that later, the almost fainting and all, but we can't begin today without shouting

Milwaukee, the cast and production crew of Listen To Your Mother Milwaukee, THANKS YOU!!

* * *

photo credit: Tau Zero via photopin cc

Your Self Image Can Be Changed

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Fri, 03 May 2013 14:36:00 +0000

"I don't do anything, really."

"I'm not the type of person to try something new."

"I'm just me, just.me."

"I'd never do anything like that, I could never do that."

Where do we get this idea of ourselves? Who told us way back when, where did we pull messages from, that say, "Nope. You're not the kind of person that does anything that takes planning, work, putting together, asking for favors, approaching strangers, RUNNING THINGS."

But, turns out, I am.

I tell people who ask me what's new, I'm putting on a show! With Jennifer Gaskell; and it's inspirational, emotionally gripping, moving, captivating, and so ass kickin' pura vida.

While the response I'd love to hear is, "Wow! Tell me more! Like where can I buy aaaaaaaaaaaaaall the tickets!, instead I hear, "Oh. I didn't know you did that."

Ha. Can't say I blame them. Because up until this year, I didn't know I did, either.

But with the shoulder to shoulder heave and ho of my co producer and co director, Jenny, and the generous mentorship of selfless women like Ann Imig, Deb Rox, and Stephanie Precourt, along with the community found on the pages of our LTYM Producer/Director Facebook group, We Did It.

The Listen To Your Mother Show Milwaukee is this Sunday, May 5, 3 p.m. at Alverno College's Wehr Hall.

Tickets are available here.

Our cast is made up of some of the most intriguing voices in our area. I love each of these 14 stories, and am so proud for everyone to hear them.

And when the cast members of LTYM 2013 look me in the eye, and say, "I've never done anything like this before."

I say, "I know. Isn't it cool???"

THANK YOU, Ann Imig, [founder and creator of Listen To Your Mother] from the bottom to the top of my ever grateful heart, for shaking my world loose, in the most incredible way.

Damn dust in my eyes, again.

* * *

What The Heck I'm Just Going To Post My Haiku

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Wed, 01 May 2013 03:15:00 +0000

Telling you about
the peace of five seven five
found in lines of three

I have grown and blossomed into my true self since beginning blogging.

I no longer hide who I am in hopes of not offending, being rejected, judged.

Ack, who knows, maybe it's not blogging to thank, but age.

Whatever the route that's led me to myself, I'm here to tell you that I like haiku.

And my kids love haiku because as soon as they could clap out syllables and count to seven, I taught them the fun of laying them out in lines of three. We wait our turn in check out lines or in dentist's waiting rooms, and we haiku our time away.

Haiku 101: so you get what floats my boat: 5-7-5 syllable count on three separate lines.

Like this:

So you want to know
The secret to finding sleep
Go to bed when tired

I fully realize no one may be reading this post at all, and you know what? Writing haiku is so much fun that's okay!

There will come the time
When my house will be so clean
I'll take the kids, thanks

Have I whet your appetite?

Knocking at the door
Me in pj's and slippers
Can you please leave now?

I've been thinking in haiku (shuttup, it can be a language) ever since my third grade teacher, Mrs. Sproul, mapped some examples out on the green blackboard for our class. Smitten, entranced, I couldn't wait to run home and pull my notebook out from under my bed and do some more.

I tried to teach it to my Spanish grandmother and it went over like a lead balloon. Yeah. She'll take the Romeo and Julietness of Pablo Neruda any day.

"Loving is so short, but the forgetting is so long."

She's right, if it's the physical ache that words can bring you seek, then maybe, no, haiku won't cut it.

I like my thoughts like me: simple and easily amused. Pain free. Like haiku.

Thank you so much for reading here today. Stay tuned for more adventures in growth and maturation when next week Ima tell you about my unabashed love for bluegrass music.

So, go on, dig out the Pure Prairie League cassettes and meet me back here.

xo

If you dig haiku like I do, two must follows on FB and twitter are @suburbanhaiku and @haikuvents.

* * *

This Made Me Laugh, And It's Good To Do That

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Sun, 28 Apr 2013 08:22:00 +0000

Popping in quickly to thank everyone for their kindness, as always; the people I've met online never cease to amaze me with how they find the time to send a quick FB message, a tweet, an email, to check on me. Thank you.

This is a busy season in my life, caring for an ailing mother -- duties split between two other siblings, all three of us make up a 24 hour team.

We have moved her out of her apartment, an activity that is like walking through the pages of a book. Everything has to combed through, she has trinkets wrapped in tissues, stuck behind in the back of dresser drawers. There are coins from other countries rolled up into the toes of socks that are part of fifty other socks.

It is like sifting through silt for gold, when you want to rush the job, but you know you can't -- and you know why you can't.

Anyway, that's life for us, at this time.

And this makes the precious moments of laughter so appreciated.

For me this week, it was this: *my boys and I watched 100 times and then 100 more. The lizard. Watch the lizard.

This is 11

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Thu, 25 Apr 2013 04:31:00 +0000

It strikes me so funny that you've turned 11, my dear youngest child, because 11:11 has always been your magic time.

When this grip of 11:11 got a hold on you, I can't remember. But it seems like for always you'd look up at the digital clock, wait for it to flip to 11:11, and then BAM, you'd say "11:11! Mama, time to do something magic!" And somehow, you always would -- just by looking at me with that smile, you would make my heart melt. Magic.

I remember a morning in summer, driving home from the pool, nothing on but our wet swimsuits and you saw the blue numbers on the car's dashboard blink to 11:11. "Mama! It's 11:11! Do something different!"

And so I would. I'd honk the horn, I'd steer with my knees while I clapped, I'd do anything for you to work your magic on me. I'd put my hat on backwards and pretend to drool and you'd laugh that laugh that would make my eyes sting with happy tears. Yes. 11:11. Magic.

You're 11 now.

That magic number 11.

11 is you still holding my hand.
11 is still able to fit together in a movie theatre seat with you.
11 is you, who still calls me mama.

And 11 is the time of magic unseen, but I can feel.

Just like you telling me, "Mama! It's 11:11! Do something different!"

And so you do.

11 is you asking me to pack away the bedspread of dragons that you picked out for your room not so many years ago.
11 is you choosing to go with your oldest brother on rides now, instead of automatically reaching for my hand.
11 is me surprising you with a visit at school lunch time, and you thanking me for coming, then asking if it's all right if you go play with your friends, though.

Of course it's all right that you play with your friends. And that we picked out a solid orange new bedspread for your room. It's also actually good that you want to do things with your big brother now, really. He leaves for school in only a year's time.

You're 11 now. That magic number of 11. And you work that magic every time you sneak downstairs after you've gone to bed, and see me sitting here in the computer's white light. You stand behind me, your arms encircling my neck as you bend over to kiss me, and I feel your hot breath against my ear. I close my eyes and hear you whisper, "Mama, it's 11:11! Do something magic!"

Oh, I wish I could, son, but you've already beat me to it.

**I love you, Auggie. Happy Birthday, my beautiful boy.

* * *

What Happened To The Meat??

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 05:16:00 +0000

I am relieved I figured it out. I was getting scared it was me.

I thought I had it for sure.

I'd get in the car and see the big E for empty, and ask myself, Didn't I just fill the tank?

When I'd open up the pots and pans drawer in the kitchen, I'd see my white measuring cups in there. And not just in there, but DUMPED in there, scattered -- like I had lost consciousness mid-chore.

Hunting around for juice glasses became a daily part of my life; are they here? Did I leave them in the bathroom? I always put them by the larger tumblers, but where are they now? And why aren't they where I remember putting them?

I am losing my mind.

I open drawers and say to my kids, "I put the can opener in with the pot holders?"

And then I remember whose turn it was that day to put away the dishes.

Whose turn it was to fill the gas tank.

Who likes to shove things in drawers then slam it boom shut quick.

My teens.

When my teens empty the dishwasher, it's like watching the loudest silent "I don't give a s**t" in action. They stash things away in places that later make me feel like I'm living with Alzheimer's. They do things that make me question my faculties.

Like tonight when I made meatloaf. They love my meatloaf, that's why I make it. Let me give you this freebie -- I use apricot jam, it holds the ground meat together nicely and gives the baked loaf a sweet irresistable aftertaste. Try it.

I make this requested by them double batch of meatloaf early in the afternoon because I know they both come home crazed with hunger after their two hour swim practice. At 3:00 pm I pop the meatloaf in for an hour. Set the timer, run and get my one non-teenager to bring home from school, pull out the meatloaf at 4:00 pm and set it atop the stove to let the apricot jam juices circulate and render the meat juicy sweet, then by 5:00, when the teens are home, we'll have a complete meal -- mashed potatotes, salad, and all. Mmmm.Mm.

Only thing left to do is let the barbeque sauce simmer on the stove while I start some laundry and wait for everyone to be home. But when I walk back into the kitchen, there is no meatloaf in my pyrex loaf pan.

And then it begins. My line of confused self questioning, Did I make a double batch of meatloaf? I know I made a double batch of meatloaf. Could have sworn I did the recipe x two. What happened to the meatloaf???

My boys had come home early while I was sorting and folding, the washer and dryer noisily running, and the both of them had helped themselves to one-half each of the browned brick slab.

Never mind the butter and garlic smothered potatoes, mom. Forget the crisp green salad with cherry tomatoes. Just a fistful of meat is all us boys need.

Have I lost my mind? Do I have early Alzheimer's? Didn't I make meat for tonight?

Where is the meat???

Before you begin your own down on your hands and knees APB alert for missing items and misplaced coffee mugs, ask yourself: Are there teenagers in your house?

I hope, for your sake, the answer to all your mystically placed and combobulated items, is a much relief filled sigh of *yes.*

And if you need me to commiserate, I'll be here, down on the kitchen floor, wondering why in Sam Hill I would jam the knives and forks in between the cutting boards rack.

* * *

First Annual Listen To Your Mother Milwaukee Show

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Sat, 20 Apr 2013 19:58:00 +0000

WELCOME TO THE FIRST ANNUAL LISTEN TO YOUR MOTHER MILWAUKEE SHOW!

Join us for live readings by local writers as we celebrate the beauty and the beast of motherhood. In celebration of Mother's Day, fourteen women and one young man will read their personal stories about the humor, the hope and the heartbreak of motherhood.

A portion of ticket proceeds will benefit Sojourner Family Peace Center (http://www.familypeacecenter.org/), an organization dedicated to providing education, advocacy, and resources to keep people safe. Sojourner Family Peace Center is committed to creating communities where people live peacefully.

LTYM Milwaukee will be at the Wehr Hall on the Alverno College campus.

Produced and directed by Alexandra Rosas and Jen Gaskell, the cast includes:

Lindsay Atkinson

Liysa Callsen

Rebecca Christman

Julie Davidson

Rochelle Fritsch

Kathryn Gahl

Jen Gaskell

Lisa Gooseberry

Nikki Janzen

Bonnie Johnson

Amie Kapusta

Tara Pohlkotte

Rachel Schickowski

Alec Schultze

Pamela Stein

**Only cash sales will be taken the day of the show.**

***We are honored to announce that this show will be ASL interpreted thanks to the generosity of two sponsors who are donating their time and talent.***

CLICK HERE to purchase tickets.

* * *

Son, Now That You're 18, There Are Things You Should Know

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 06:06:00 +0000

Dear beautiful firstborn child,

Happy birthday!

Today you turn 18. As the dedicated parents we are, we know that to serve you well, there are some things that we need to tell you. The most important being that your father and I truly adore you. You make us beam with pride and we are beyond fortunate to be your parents.

When you walk into a room, it's hard for me to not stand up shouting "It's him!" and start clapping -- so I've quit trying to stop myself. Your father's punch to your arm is his way of saying he loves his world because you're in it.

And today you turn 18.

As of 1:39 pm today, I will be living with two men.

You'll be leaving for college much too soon and I'm going to stick my head in the sand about that for awhile longer, but in the meantime, your father and I would be doing you a great injustice if we did not tell you the things you need to know now that you're an adult.

Please keep this information from your younger brothers awhile longer, won't you? Here we go:

The Truth You Need To Know Now That You're 18:

When we ask you "Were you born in a barn?," we really don't care what you answer. We only care that you close the doors because the cold air gets in and we pay for heat. That's all. I'm not even really sure about the paying for heat part, but your dad says it because his dad said it. One day, you'll say it too.

No one has a money tree. I know we ask you to "look outside, you see a money tree out there?" like some people have them and some people don't. We are sorry if we ever made you hope that maybe someday we'd be a family that had one.

I know we've told you "the trouble with trouble is that it starts out as fun." Not true. When you get to college you'll realize much too soon, trouble usually starts out as trouble right off the bat.

You really won't fry your eyes out and need new eyeballs put in if you sit too close to the TV. It may affect your vision if you spend megahours doing it and you're superyoung. But for the most part, you don't need to go out and buy that eyeball surgery insurance.

Wet socks will give you Vietnam rot. Lord help me I don't know why we'd say that to you when you'd walk in soaking wet after a soccer game. Seriously. All we had to do was say "take off your wet socks." And also, as if you wouldn't??

Getting a cavity hurts worse than I can ever tell you. Well, it hurts a little. We just wanted you to brush your teeth. Sure, if you let it go long enough it will, but you guys just keep brushing and flossing twice a day and seeing the dentist every six months and you're good to go.

Monkey see. Monkey do. Have you ever seen this at a zoo? No. Not too much imitating. Mostly just ignoring us and random screeching once in awhile. We'd say that when we didn't want you to be a sheep following the pack. Just be yourself, never mind the monkeys.

Don't read on your back with your book held up in front of you. I don't why the hell not. Ignore this from the past 18 years.

If you ever decide to smoke a cigarette be sure to have a cellphone in one hand ready to dial 911 and a cigarette in the other because you'll hear your lungs crackle as they burn up. YES. I KNOW WE SAID THIS. Please try to forget the visual we've scarred you with for life and just know this: cigarettes are bad for your health, not overnight, but cumulatively. And you can spend your money on organic broccoli and pesto instead. Better choices, see?

And how many times have you heard this one? You are the most wonderful beautiful smartest boy in the world. Well, maybe not to other parents, but to us, YOU ARE.

Happy birthday, wonderful child, we are proud to say that you are our son (this one? so true).

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Want to read more on teen parenting?
--You can catch me here this week on mommy. com talking about Society and Raising Boys.
--And here on Care. com where they interview me and ask about our house rules for teens and cell phones.

When Your Heart Tells You To Stop

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Tue, 16 Apr 2013 17:14:00 +0000

My youngest woke up hungry and asked for a chicken sandwich for breakfast this morning, so I preheated the oven because he likes his patties 20 minute oven crunchy and not 3 minute microwave soggy. While I took care of his breakfast, he dressed and washed up, packing his books for school. It wasn't until 7 minutes before we had to leave when he sat down to eat that I realized I had forgotten to put his sandwich in the oven.

The cashier at the QuikMart who rang me up today had to call out after me, "You forgot your salad!" At the end of the conveyor belt, I had left the only thing I had gone in for, a fast lunch -- distracted by the Wall Street Journal's front page and the picture there, of Boston yesterday.

This morning I had an appointment for our minivan that needed new brakepads, not an inexpensive way to spend an hour and a half. The service tech popped his head into the waiting room to tell me my car was ready and I could check out anytime. Thanking him quickly, I looked up briefly from the television and its scenes from Boston, then got up and walked through their garage, getting in my car. I barely drove out of their lot when I realized I had never paid for the work.

It was on twitter yesterday afternoon that I heard of the bombings in Boston. Clicking over to Facebook for news snippets, I saw that it was real. And worse than the tweet had shouted. Leaving to pick up my children from school and then drive them to all they needed to do, we came home and I slammed a dinner together of sauteed chicken breasts with rice made in 20 minutes. The pan that sits still dirty in the sink this morning shows that I couldn't do more than that.

I can't focus today.

I feel unsettled, without seeking out more news on twitter or Facebook, I am saddened, shocked, heart broken. My day needs me to keep doing, though it feels like moving through mud: cleaning, doing, driving, running. But everything I do since yesterday keeps coming out with a part missing, something forgotten, things left behind, just unable to do it right.

I can't pull it together. Tears are half a second away, the lump in my throat is almost to an ache.

Sometimes you have to stop moving and take the time to honor and bless, acknowledge and bow your head. Take yourself away from everything, and find that corner, that space, wherever it is, and let the silent tears slip and release the tug in your throat.

I made myself still today, each tear sending out love and fellow humanness for all of us on this planet together. Praying so hard for the pain of loss and the sting of shock and disbelief for so many. I paused and meditated with a heart pulsing with shared sorrow, because there is something inside that won't let me go on as if there wasn't a rip in so many lives yesterday. I think of what I saw and read about what happened in Boston and it's no wonder that I can't concentrate on anything else and that everything takes twice as long to figure out and do today, I mean, Look at our fellow man.

Think on him.

Thinking on you today, Boston, with a full, still heart.

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Soap Box Time

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Sat, 13 Apr 2013 04:33:00 +0000

It's been awhile since I stood up here and wagged my finger. God I hate that finger thing about myself. Trying to stop that habit, but anyway, with my hands folded behind my back I need to talk to some of you about something called, "I'm not good enough."

As in what I read on twitter this week, used in this way, "I won't nominate myself for BlogHer Voice of The Year because I'm not good enough."

Would you tell a friend they're not good enough? Would you discourage a friend from trying to go for something? Then why would you talk to yourself that way?

Tell yourself you are that good, submit that post of yours that you are so proud of, and the one where your own words make you cry, and the one that makes you laugh every time you read it. Send that baby in here.

How can you tell your kids to go for it and reach for their dreams if you don't do it yourself?

Go. Now.

Dang. The finger came out again, didn't it?

*submit, encourage, cheer and VOTE*

I love you guys.

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Announcing Room of Your Own BlogHer Sessions for 2013

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Thu, 11 Apr 2013 05:11:00 +0000

I'm thrilled and excited to share the news that Erin Margolin of The Road To My Writer Roots and I will be part of a panel presenting a Room of Your Own roundtable at this year's BlogHer 2013, being held in Chicago July 25 through 27.

We'll be hosting "Shedding the Façade and Writing our Vulnerable Truth," on Friday, July 25. A Room of Your Own is a 45 minute dialogue between a panel of four bloggers and the audience. BlogHer promises to assemble a diverse group of bloggers who will discuss what it's like to put our lives out for public viewing, and what, if any, restrictions we follow.

Come share, come talk; this promises to be a gathering of lessons learned, wisdom gained, and bonding through shared ideals.

We can't wait to see you!

BlogHer '13: Room of Your Own Roundtable: Shedding the Façade and Writing our Vulnerable Truth

Friday, July 25, 10:30-11:15 | Shedding the Façade and Writing our Vulnerable Truth
In a world where judgment is rapid fire, the survival instinct we're born with is to not appear weak. Join bloggers who have shed the façade. Rather than private struggles and only working through life's questions within an inner circle, they have created strong, supportive communities. By bringing their truth -- sharing 100 percent of themselves, through working out depression and mental health histories, the challenges of finding a community, deciding what is right and what is wrong, by taking on less than popular stances, these bloggers have found strength where most expect the fear of appearing less than perfect. We hunger for connection, and connection comes from sharing our honest, real, and vulnerable selves.

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I Wish You Could Have Known Her

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Tue, 09 Apr 2013 05:34:00 +0000

I stand in the large, stark bathroom, watching the skilled nurses taking care of my mother in hospice. Their deft, practiced movements with daily personal maintenance; all performed with gloved hands. A quick swipe here, maybe a second one -- or more -- there, and then returning her quickly to bed, without words or eye contact exchanged during this assembly line process.

They do an exemplary job, beyond adequate. Doling out a required service with a level of aptitude that they quickly move on and follow the same steps for the next four rooms in my mother's unit, filled with patients still awaiting a nurse's care. This team of two manage in ten minutes what would take me at least half an hour on my own.

With the two of them together, both leaning in to assist my mother with her undergarments, they pull up what needs to be pulled up, and I watch. All the while biting my top lip, wanting to say something to them. Beginning to speak, my eyes fill with tears and my voice begins to swell, and I stop. Embarrassing myself, fearing I'll move my mother to even more emotion than what I already see there on her face, during what is now surely a humbling season of life for her.

As the three of us stand over my mother in the open bathroom, I feel pressed to tell them that who they see before them today is not an elderly woman no longer able to be on her own, but someone else. I want them to know, I want to say, I wish you could have known her when she was 30.

I wish you could have known her when she was 30. She was beautiful. She wrote poetry for the newspaper of her country's capital, Bogota, Colombia, a city even then of over 500,000. Her columns penned anonymously, all beginning with the same three words, A Mi Amante. To My Lover.

She walked through Colombia's crowded streets, amid the honking and the whiz of electric railcars, the men looking up to see a woman in the business district, working in a place and in a time when women didn't. With her strong straight as an arrow spine and her eyes set ahead, she maneuvered through the busy avenues, always intent on her destination. Tugging at the hem of her custom made suits, her polished nails smoothed the placket of buttons in the back. Her platform heeled shoes made specially of stiffened leather for her by the town's cobbler clicking along the brick walkways. She didn't have to state her independence, you could read it in her deliberate stride as she wove her way somewhere, to meet with the town's mayor, an appointment for dinner with one of many friends. Anyone hoping to keep up with her would have been long ago lost in the bustling city.

She was like Moses parting the red sea, traffic stopping on the power of her perfect face alone. The vision she was, her rich, dark curls that played on her shoulders. There was her cinched waist in her smooth tailored jackets, her shoes in the latest style with the cherry red tips of manicured toes peeking out, her youthful lips that needed no rouge. There were all these things. But they disappeared from sight the moment she caught your breath with a fiery flash of her coal eyes. Eyes that could light a cigarette.

I want to tell them all these things, but instead hot tears spill off my cheeks and onto my mother's bent gowned shoulder, and the only thing the nurses hear me say before my voice breaks is, "I wish you could have known her..."

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Maybe Someday They'll Tell Me

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Sat, 06 Apr 2013 06:05:00 +0000

*with special thanks to my ever musing muse, Taming Insanity.

Questions I Want To Ask My Children:

1.)   Do you walk around then stop mid pace to fart, just for my benefit? Or are your friends at school treated to this special delight, also?

2.)   During lunch at school, does the conversation also begin with your favorite blood letting scene in a movie and then end with how you'd perform brain surgery on yourself via your nostrils, or, again -- am I just the lucky one?

3.) Are screaming goat imitation competitions held elsewhere other than this house? Or do you feel it can only be done at home, because the acoustics are best when they bounce off the back of my head like that?

4.)   I have a feeling you place bets with your friends on whether or not I will bring your lunch to you at school if you forget it at home, don't you? You know what? I don't care. The thought of you with no food just dissolves me.

5.)   I won't ever get an answer to "who left their socks on the coffee table?!," "who left the empty pitcher of kool-aid in the fridge?!," and "who left the van door open all night?!," will I?

6.)   Why do you think I can get you to school in negative ten minutes and reverse time when the rest of the world would take twenty minutes to travel the same distance?

7.)   Please explain to me, so that I can help myself understand, why I go through the work of setting the table with silverware when you each grab the meat off the platter like cavemen after a shared mastodon kill.

8.)   Do you boys know I have no special skill in finding things? When something is lost, I have to look for it in the same way as any other human being does -- search and locate, boys, just like everyone else.

9.)   Please tell me when you'd like a class on toilet paper roll replenishing. I'm pretty much home all the time.

10.) You do know I'm on to you, right, when you tell me that no one butters toast all the way to the edges like I do, just so that you get me to do it for you? Again, I don't care, the thought of you no longer being here for me to do this for, dissolves me.

xo

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Three Minutes of Reasons on Why I Love Ann Imig and The LTYM Movement

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Thu, 04 Apr 2013 05:16:00 +0000

The Listen To Your Mother shows. Happening across 24 cities this May.

If you're on Facebook or twitter, you've heard about them. Those of us involved with them or in love with them, try to explain what an LTYM show is, but it takes us 15,000 words. Founder and National Director, Ann Imig, does it here in three minutes.

Click play and watch, if only for her luminescent skin.

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This Trail's Been Blazed

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Wed, 03 Apr 2013 03:15:00 +0000

Truly, I think that among the last words I'll whisper through parched lips on my death bed, you'll hear "I love the internet."

The awesome internet. How in the world else could I have met someone like Daphne Brogdon, of coolmom. com? Snowball's chance in hell of ever meeting someone in real life who made me laugh out loud, kept me company, and encouraged me to start a blog, the way that she did. I followed Daphne home to her website after seeing her on an Oprah segment about mommy bloggers. I'm drawn to funny people like my ten year old is drawn to the Costco size drums of Swedish Fish. And Daphne was the perfect mix of irreverent, intelligent, and fast on her feet.

And here's the amazing part of my internet life: four years after meeting her online, then meeting her in person at BlogHer three years ago, we're friends. Emailing, tweeting, people who like each other, friends.

Daphne is on vacation with her children this week and asked me to guest on her blog. I'm joyfully there, hosting "Teen Week." Since she is the mother of two children under the age of six, I feel it's only fair to pay back her kind deed of making me smile through some grim winter months -- by giving her a peek of the fun times that will be here sooner than she knows.

I'd love for you to stop by and meet Daphne. She's a beautiful down to earth woman, who does some knock out funny videos and blogs about current issues and pop culture with a quick as a whip brain. So, click over and get smart and laugh at the same time.

Daphne Brogdon, TV host and standup comic, has appeared on numerous television series, she has hosted “The X show” on FX, “Perfect Partner” on Discovery and “The Fashion Team” on TV Guide and various other basic cable shows. Since creating coolmom.com she has been on Dr. Phil, The Oprah Winfrey Show, CNN Headline, MSNBC, and the Ricki Lake show.

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Enjoy Yourselves, Still

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Fri, 29 Mar 2013 11:58:00 +0000

This week is Semana Santa in our house.

Holy week.

Bigger, brighter, more talk, more reading, more about our faith, the things we believe in, than the average household.

More jelly beans, more hidden Peeps, more Cadbury eggs. Larger baskets, more cleverly hidden (we use clues leading them to the baskets and so what if they're teenagers).

How Colombians do Easter. Now with more mandatory Easter viewing of Jesus Christ Superstar.

Yes, children do have to listen while mom sings along. And later in the week, I'll smile through proud tears as I overhear all three boys at one time or another singing to themselves, "I don't know how to love Him."

Happy Easter, a Blessed Passover, so many good wishes to you all for peace, love, rest, centering.

'Till next week.

xo

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Of Love and Castro. WTH, Throw in a Big Diamond Too

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Tue, 26 Mar 2013 23:34:00 +0000

A long line of story tellers. That's where I come from.

My mother spends the day with us on Sundays, and shares tales of her life while she's here. Her memories are true things of delight, and time has been so much more than kind in how she remembers her days. You can say that time has been ass kickin' kind in the boss memories it's given her. Like the one she tells us about here, my monthly column at FunnynotSlutty.

Know what we say in our family? It's your life, you can remember it any way you want to. *this means you, mama

We love you.

xo

FunnynotSlutty. The Funniest Women on The Planet

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We Dance For Those That Can't Dance For Themselves

noreply@blogger.com (The Empress) — Sun, 24 Mar 2013 04:20:00 +0000

Monday will be my nephew's birthday, our first without him. And it's hard.

Today, I will be at a Native American Honor Dance with my family, celebrating his much too short life.

His younger brother will hit the drum as he sits in the drum circle. He will sing and proclaim, "We dance for those that can't dance. We sing for those who no longer sing." Singing loud, dancing hard, doing this with the healing thought of being the feet and voice for her son, will be what provides my sister respite from her pain today. If only for the moments of the ceremony.

She'll dance, arms up and feet hitting the ground hard. She'll raise her head and lift her voice and sing for her boy. And in that sacred time, nothing else will exist for her, except the communion between a mother and her child. Private, holy.

Hold us in your thoughts today. Keep us close in your hearts.

Wish us peace.

In Powwow Trail, Dylan Jennings shares a weekend of singing with Midnite Express and dancing at the Oneida Powwow. This video is part of The Ways, an ongoing series of stories on culture and language from Native communities around the central Great Lakes.

More at theways.org
Follow us:
facebook.com/thewaysorg
twitter.com/thewaysorg
Finn Ryan - Producer, Director, Video
David Nevala - Video, Editing, Photography
A Tribe Called Red - "Electric Pow Wow Drum"
Midnite Express - "Randy's Song"
A Production of Wisconsin Media Lab

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