LOST A SOCK

2011 in the rearview

Initially I thought to comment, Well that went fast, when I realized it was time to recap the year that just started five minutes ago.  But then as the past year came into better focus, I knew that the quickness of its passage was less about its days and moments, and more about the fact that the years--they are really moving.  I love growing, I love getting older, I love my grey hairs and tiny little wrinkles left from smiling, I love change.  Bring it, 2012.

But first, for the short and sweet in the record book, allow me to recap 2011.

We began the year as we always do, on a ladder with paint brush in hand.  (Myself, that is. Not my kids.)  My kids were elbow deep in homeschool, and in a bin of dry rice and beans at the time, and we were eight months into our wait for our baby to be referred to us, from Africa.

This was a path that I somehow knew I would walk, at least in the years after I became a mom, though I never could have predicted our story thus far to present as it does in this moment.  While waiting for our referral, we began learning of so much corruption surrounding the situation in that particular country, and eventually we made what felt like the only ethical choice to make, given the circumstances, and we brought our paperwork back home.  I know with certainty that even now, had we stayed the course in spite of our concerns, we still would not have had our baby home today, and if we felt waist-deep in a terrible situation at the beginning of the year, without going into detail, we would have been up to our eyeballs by now.  Even our own agency, who we once had so much faith in, has not emerged with clean hands, and it leaves me feeling just sick for the babies and children who are involuntarily growing up in the center of this cold and dirty hurricane.  In this way the world appears uglier than ever to me, having joined the scene ready to help a child or children as we could, and then having witnessed such an unfolding.  It left me feeling hopeless for the kids at the center, and so very sorry for the well-intentioned adoptive and birth families caught in the swirling periphery. 

I am sorry to say that I came away from this once-exciting time to experience a grief I hadn't known before- a miscarriage of sorts, only for which there are no pre-determined parameters for how one should expect to feel after spending the better part of two years preparing for and dreaming about this very real baby that would join our family, only to walk away with empty arms.  Adoption is not just a thing that people decide to get into, but something we get into with our whole hearts and with our kids and families and friends and finances.  We create space in our homes and excitedly count down until this little person who already feels like one of us, comes along to finally be one of us.  The process, then, of giving away the toys I had saved, the blankets and clothing I had collected and telling each and every person of our turn of events left me mournful and exhausted.  The winter went long, and it felt dark and sometimes lonely.

I journaled a lot through that time, and searched to find the silver lining day after day, because it was the best of my options.  And I opened myself up to the possibility that I could somehow come out of this experience with greater breadth, and build something from all the little pieces.

By the grace of God, I met a friend of a friend very soon after that, who somehow got me instantly, right where I was, and sat with me in the space where I chose to work through our adoption into its roots.  My sadness for everything that had ever failed was palpable, then.  I saw all of that emotion and heartache, some of which I had carried with me since I was my own little kid, and I picked it apart and allowed it to become something new when it was ready.  I had grown into a better mother for all I had learned, and a better self for what I now understood.  The process, the preparation, the loss and the disaster we witnessed was what we simply had to endure for all that could come out of it and still is yet to come.  

And just like that, Spring arrived.

We were okay. We were all okay.  We were built for these sorts of deep life lessons-- a whole Master's Degree, really, on what fear and disappointment and love are all about.  How thankful I am to have come through all of this with a heart open to possibility, though it was no picnic at the time.

It was Mother's Day before I knew it and I was the mom of three amazing little kids, and we spent the morning on a hike, and laying in green grass, absorbing the sunshine.  I will never forget that Sunday morning, because I think it was one of the most perfect, ever, in my book.  I hired our wonderful babysitter for a few hours a week, beginning last Spring, to give me the occasional break that I didn't know I could (should!) grant myself and my kids. I became more familiar with poetry and bounced along on positive, super-fun music.  We had kitchen dance parties in the afternoon and at night, just the kids and I, or the kids and I and Kevin and Sant and Leslie-- all through the house with the music blasting.   

I threw caution to the wind and painted on all sorts of canvases, and put hardwood floors in our house and painted a few walls more.

We saw art.  We made art.

We plastered art all over our walls, and we didn't apologize for the mess.

We hiked,

and we drove,

and we celebrated.  

I felt that I should meet my inner perfectionist, somewhere in all that, and shake her up a little bit.  The world was not perfect, and I was not perfect.  The world was ugly and messy and dissapointing, and I needed to stare into all of that to understand that it was somehow part of something beautiful.  And so with each opportunity, to this very moment, I am asking myself what I can do with the beautiful messiness, and who will still love and accept me should they walk right into it with me.

And the answer, of course, is this little, solid group of friends and family whom I have intentionally placed around myself, like a group of fluffy pillows to pad my falls.  I am blessed.  Not lucky, as I tossed out there in my last post.  I believe, actually, in neither luck, nor coincidence, nor accidents.  I am here and happy and more whole than ever because I chose to experience awe and gratitude, again and again, for all of the blessings that come my way.  I am following my intuition as best I can, always chasing truth and what is real, and facing the hard work as it shows up, so that I can continue growing into the best version of myself-- all of those failings, and all of that messiness included.  There is more work to be done.

I added to my inky collection last summer, the word that hums through the undertones of my life, and five little birds in flight, for the five of us- Kevin and the kids and I, making this journey together.

We traveled a good deal this year, down to Indianapolis to spend some days with these little buddies of ours while their Mama delivered their new baby, 

and with these buddies of ours (also speaking of new, third babies) to Wisconsin Dells for a fun vacation.

We did the Smoky Mountains in Tennessee this year with family, 

in a mountainside cabin with a view and a settling energy I will never forget,

and we found ourselves floating down a river in bright yellow innertubes.

Kevin and I took a trip to Vegas for our eleventh wedding anniversary, 

and we experienced Utah and Arizona, where we hiked through quiet and still, rocky caverns.

I collected twenty-three pages of favorite quotes this year,

and finally figured out a layout and an atmosphere that is comfortable to me, here.

We saw the Dalai Lama speak in person over the summer, and I attended a fantastic monthly Buddhist meditation class.  Each Kevin and I did something we said we would never do again, and spent the last six months settling into churches we both love, each of us supporting the other with where we need to be.  We've gotten involved with a monthly soup kitchen, and we've met more new friends who have turned out to be icing on the cake.

We've created bonds with our homeschool buddies and taken lots of day-trips.  I bought an iPhone, I conquered every version of Angry Birds, I took the kids to see lots of plays and musicals this year.   

Kevin and I saw U2, which was hands-down, the best concert ever (even if I failed to bring my real camera).

I read this year.  I read and read and read and read, 

and it was one journey inward (and backwards and forwards) after the next.

We said good-bye to friends, both very real friends and quasi-real,

and we watched quietly the sun set,

the silkworm dangle,

and the Autumn breeze blow.

We hosted the holidays again,

and counted ourselves so blessed for full tables and full bellies.

We enjoyed the glow, 

remain present,

and bring nothing but hope, bravery, possibility and love to the year ahead.

Thanksgiving Week, Haphazard Edition

I keep thinking I want to post a spattering of pictures from our last few months of school.  I will get to them, I think, and then the day goes long, long, long, and better luck tomorrow.  

No luck.  

Here's my quick blurb.

We have been spending time at the Indiana Dunes with some of our homeschool buddies, and our kids have taken well to to the art of the camp fire, and roasting hot dogs and marshmallows.  Above, Marin collecting long, thin sticks that can poke through our treats for the fire.  Below, cold, bare grey and brown tree branches.  Lots and lots of branches.  We are again down to the blue sky for color, when we can see it.

We are hosting Thanksgiving at our house this week, with plans for a perfectly set table for twenty.  My sister-in-law's family has flown in from across the country, for the week, and I sometimes marvel about how families are made.  There was mine, and his, and hers, and ours, and some others here and there, and eventually we were planning Thanksgiving together as one big happy, and I love it.  I would love for everyone to bring a friend, and another, and another, until we are all very comfortable and filled with stuffing and pie, and feeling well loved.  I am so thankful for all of these people who walk our journey with us.

We are finishing up our unit on the Human Body in Science.  Nerves, followed by muscles.  Next we will delve into heat and its properties and producers and the way it travels.  Conduction, convection, radiation.  I need to order all those books from the library.  

My kindergartner has become the king decoder of words that end in "silent e."  One moment he was slowly decoding every letter of every word, and the next moment, it seems, he had turned the lock with a key, and got it.  Magic.   

He has also discovered the fine art of end punctuation.  It lives everywhere.

The kids needed haircuts, so I plopped each one up on the bathroom counter tonight, and trimmed away before baths.  Then I cleaned their ears and trimmed their nails and smelled their fresh little heads.  I love it when everyone is all squeaky clean at once.

My oldest guy and I (much too old to have his nails trimmed and his hair washed by mom) sit on the couch for a small, quiet fraction of most afternoons and read US History together.  We read from our Smithsonian History Encyclopedia, digging up the details on Anne Hutchinson and the Puritans and William Penn and his Pennsylvania colony, and all the others who braved their way over here for something so important as freedom to worship in whatever way they preferred.  Sometimes when I think we have read enough for the day, I suggest we bookmark here, and then he asks for just a little more.  This, too, feels magical to me.  

The last time I steam cleaned our carpets, late at night, I woke up in the morning to find dog vomit right in the center of the hall floor.  I cleaned them again last night, and would appreciate if they could remain clean for at least a few days.  It's a shame that more of the various liquid-spilling individuals in this house cannot read.  I might post an effective note. 

I have cleared our calendar from this morning until Wednesday night, so that I can focus on school, and Thanksgiving, and a website project for a friend.  This is equal parts exciting and red, bumpy hive inducing.

The kids are all sleeping, and Kevin just arrived home.  He offered me his peanut butter and apricot jelly sandwich special, and now we commence watching The Fabric of the Cosmos.  After that I will take out half of my new pile of reading material.  Or at least, drift off to sleep trying.

Happy Monday, friends.

Navigating the Path Unknown

I wondered what it would be like to quickly jump in here, when inspiration hit me late some random Saturday evening, and write.  Without concerns for sentence structure or complete thoughts, without giving pause for who’s reading and what I am sharing, and just go.  When I paint, I apply enormous, free range strokes or tiny, delicate ones- whatever moves me.  When I take pictures I shoot what I experience and what I love, and don't give a second thought to who will critique...I just go from where I feel.  But I have been stuck with blogging for a while, holding a nonsensical standard for how I come across and what my content should look like.  And I have realized it is killing my creative process.  

So this place becomes something new again.  For just a while I am going to let myself off the hook, and write two lines on a Tuesday, and publish.  And then post something that really inspired me on Wednesday.  And a handful of shots from our adventure on Friday.  Then I would be back to regular blogging.  

This is that.  Clicking refresh.  Slightly redesigned, permission to just GO.

The archives of this website contain the story of transformation, documented moment by moment or week by week, depending, of course, on how busy these days get.  Documentation of the world, on being a mom, on looking at one’s own life and choosing to see it for all of its beauty, and run with inspiration. Sometimes the stories complete themselves—there was a positive pregnancy test, and a beautiful baby girl nine months later. Sometimes they go on and on and on.  There was a house.  We just wanted to move. It failed to sell.  We rented it.  We saved it.  We saved us.  We sold it.  Years, this one unfolded.  And I know there are other story lines that are left dangling in the breeze, because I don’t know what to say publicly at the moment, or for a long time. Adoption, and deeply felt, unexplainable love for a far away place and its beautiful people.  A treacherous, magnificent path to experience- to learn things one could never learn in any other way.  

I was thinking about this path.  I was thinking about all of these things documented here over nearly six years here, and I talked to a friend about the holes and the untold stories.  I have been thinking for months now about my direction here and whether there even should be one, or if I continue on documenting here or elsewhere, or where I put my energy.

Do you overthink sometimes, too?

I don’t have a specific goal for this space right now, in spite of being such the goal-oriented person.  I have dedicated years, now, to unearthing authenticity, and probably more in the last year than ever.  I’ve been unsure as to whether this exists as the appropriate forum for sharing all of that or not, but at least for now, I am deciding that this space is going to contain anything I can give it.  

I still want to write a book.  I still want to homeschool three or four days each week, with those remaining one or two being the difficult ones, with three kids at home all day, every day, their educations and their upbringings (not to mention their meals and their playdates) completely my responsibility.  I want to write openly again about food and struggle and creativity and home décor.  I want to unapologetically contemplate the hell out of every good book, and all the trees and leaves on every hike, and share that here, even if clumsily and hurriedly some days, because that is just where I am.  I am just going to show up more often, with whatever comes.  And then one day again, I will bind it all into a book and keep it for myself and my growing family, knowing I once took an opportunity to throw perfection's silly constraints to the wind, and this is what it looked like.

Thanks for coming along.

2010 in review. This time with words!

In the eleventh hour I am borrowing this Q & A format from Amanda, for reflecting on the year past.  I have read so many of these question and answer posts this week, and have always wanted to try one out.

1. What did you do that you have never done before?  Assembled a dossier to adopt a child from the other side of the planet.  Sold a house.  Owned my writing and my photography, by slapping my name across the top of my blog.  It only took me five years.  Also, I embraced the unknown.

2. Did you keep your 2010 New Year's Resolutions?  Is weight loss always going to show up on them?  Other than that, mostly.  Yes.  Will you make more?  Does the pope wear a funny hat?

3. Did anyone near you give birth?  Kevin's brother's wife had their first baby just a couple days ago.

4. Did anyone close to you die?  Papa Tipping, Granny Ray and my old friend Tina, who I was once very close to.  

5. What countries did you visit?  No countries, but we've made it up to thirty-seven states now!

6. What would you like to have in 2011 that you didn't have in 2010?  Feet that move quicker than my mouth.  Better endurance.

7. What dates in 2010 will remain in your memory?  September 24th, as Sant & Leslie's beautiful wedding.

8. What was your biggest achievement in 2010?  I cannot figure out any other way to convey this, without sounding like a total lame-ass, but my biggest achievement in 2010 was without a doubt the peace I've found through so much meditation.

9. What was your biggest failure?  My inability to better structure our days at home, for the sake of the kids and I and school.  I am far too lax in sticking to any sort of regimented schedule, even though I know we would all be better for it.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?  Ha!  I broke my foot just as we started painting the old house!  I still can't believe that.

11. What was the best thing you bought?  My laptop.  Welcome to the millenium, right?

12. Who's behavior merited celebration?  Elizabeth Edwards, who lived and died a beacon of strength and repose.

13. Who's behavior made you appalled?  Those who rejected us after we shared the news of our adoption.  Not for the sake of us, but for the sake of orphaned children in need of love and family, all over the world.

14. Where did most of your money go?  Dare I say that we dumped more money into that house than we did into our notoriously expensive international adoption?  Yes, the house.  Then the new baby.  

15. What did you get really, really excited about?  Our baby.  Girls' weekend in Michigan.  Seeing our East Coast trip become a reality.  Seeing the East Coast.  Closing on the old house.  Making a new friend.  The Christmas donation that was made in our name to the school and orphanage in Ethiopia, run by our adoption agency.

16. What song will always remind you of 2010?  Awake My Soul by Mumford and Sons

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:

Happier or Sadder?  Happier.

Thinner or Larger?  Larger, baby.

Richer or Poorer?  Richer, on so many levels.

18. What do you wish you had done more of?  Exercise.  Sleep.  Play board games with my kids.

19. What do you wish you had done less of?  Speaking to fill space.

20. How did you spend Christmas?  Surrounded by family, at our house.  Fantastic.

21. Did you fall in love in 2010?  Wow.  Yes I did.

22. What was your favorite TV program?  Listing Oprah as my favorite tv show is like listing "swimming" as a hobby for fish.  So let's go one beyond and say Modern Family.  Love it!

23.  Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate last year?  I do not hate a single soul.  I am so blessed for that.

24. What was the best book you read?  There is No Me Without You by Melissa Fay Greene

25. What was your best musical discovery?  Mumford and Sons.  I have a bit of an obsession.  Also, Ryan Adams.

26. What did you want and get?  Our completed dossier to Ethiopia.  When I re-read my goals for 2010, written at this time last year, I was at that time on pins and needles about our adoption.  We didn't have an agency, a homestudy, a support group, enough money...  I wasn't sure how fast we would take it or if we could even dive in one hundred percent.  And here we are awaiting our referral, one hundred fifty percent.  Smiling.

27. What did you want and not get?  A profit upon selling the old house. Though not to say I am not most grateful for the sale, because that is what I wanted more than anything.  I had to answer the question, though.  

28. What was your favorite film of this year?  I thought for sure it would be Eat Pray Love since I adored the book, and the experience of going to see it with some of my best girlfriends was certainly wonderful, but the film itself left much to be desired.  My favorite movie this year, I think, was the HBO Miniseries John Adams.  (What?  It's on DVD.)

29. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?  I was thirty-two, and Kevin and I and the kids spent the day at the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago.

30. What one thing would have made the year immeasurably more satisfying?  A babysitter.  I mean that.  The kids and I never, ever get a break from each other and I think we all suffer because of it, in our own ways.  I think I could be a better mom if I could find a babysitter for just an hour or two or three.  

31. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2010?  How would you describe solid color t-shirts, jeans and Converse gym shoes?  Sorry, toss in a few of my hand-made bracelets and a spritz on the neck of Ralph Lauren Romance.  Trade up the jeans for black yoga capris, if I am home. That's my style, whatever it is.

32. What kept you sane?  Meditation.  An empathetic husband.  Going on dates with my girlfriends.

33. Which public figure/celebrity did you fancy the most?  Oprah Winfrey wins this one, hands down.  I also love George Clooney for his work in Darfur, Sudan.

34. What political issue stirred you the most?  Gay Marriage.  I felt it to my core this year.

35. Who do you miss?  My closest friends when I cannot be with them. Especially those who live farthest away.  I have found an entirely new adoration this year for the amazing women in my life.  

36. Who was the best new person you met?  Does seeing someone in an entirely new light count?

37. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2010.  Follow your heart, as fearlessly as you can muster, in love.  If following your heart pisses people off, the world will not end.  

38.  Quote a song lyric that sums up 2010.

So tie me to a post and block my ears

I can see widows and orphans through my tears

I know my call despite my faults

And despite my growing fears.

But I will hold on hope

And I won't let you choke

On the noose around your neck.

And I'll find strength in pain

And I will change my ways

I'll know my name as it's called again...

(Mumford and Sons, The Cave)

39. Quote a line from a book that sums up 2010.  Be responsible for the energy you bring to people.  --Jill Bolte Taylor, A Stroke of Insight

40. Favorite shot of the year?

I was so humbled to be here. 

***

Happy New Year, friends.

There were two in a bed and the little one said...

2008

My girlfriend Jenny buys a new mattress which is non-refundable and on which she is uncomfortable.  We need a new bed.  We buy hers.  All are happy.

6.2010

Our relatively new mattress is sinking.  How is this possible?  All are no longer happy.

11.2010

I can no longer sleep on said mattress.  The middle of the bed has sunken a full six inches lower than the head and foot.  My back is aching and I am pretty ticked off that a two year old mattress could possibly break down so quickly.  I spend a few weeks (hardly) sleeping on the couch.

12.12.2010

We suck it up, spend the money and buy a new bed.  A set, with box springs and headboard and footboard.  We are grown-ups!  The salesman at the furniture store warns us that if we get blood on the mattress, like he once did while clipping his toenails, we will void our warranty.  Freaking Gross, sir.

12.18.2010   8am

We empty out our bedroom in preparation for delivery of our new bed.  I list the old bed on freecycle, and we drag the old(ish) mattress to the living room floor while it waits to be spoken for by new owners.

12.18.2010   8:17am

Watching the children roll around on the mattress on the living room floor, I observe something peculiar: this two year old mattress, which upstairs could have functioned as a skate board park as it were, now appears flat.  

12.18.2010   8:18am

I lay down on the mattress.  Solid and comfortable.

8:19am

Kevin and I rush upstairs to inspect our box springs, which is original to us from my college days.  Sunken.  Cracked.  Garbage.

8:20am

DOH!

9:02am

Our new, non-refundable bed is delivered.  

We sit on the hall floor, half way between the new bed in our bedroom and the new-ish bed in the living room. We debate a solution.  Leave it on freecycle? Swap our boys' twin beds out for this queen size? They sleep together half the time anyway.  Give it to-- GASP!  Marin?  She's been climbing out of her crib for months, and soon we will be shelling out money for another twin mattress or a trip to the Emergency Room anyway.

9:47am

Kevin begins dismantling the crib in Marin's room.  I sit a few feet away and cry about my babies and all of the growing up they keep doing.

10:32am

We bid farewell to the crib that our three babies slept in.  Kevin's dad purchased this crib for KJ before he was born, and then he passed away in 2005, while I was pregnant with Jack.  He never got to hold Jack or Marin, but there was always something nice about the idea that they slept in the bed their grandpa bought.  

Since then the crib has been broken and repaired, jumped in, chewed on, climbed in and out of, and recalled.  After three babies it has seen too much wear and we must have a new crib before the arrival of our next baby, for safety.  This was the end of something.

11:14am

A very small princess (dressed in a flower girl dress) in a very large bed.  With the most child-friendly sheets we could dig out of the linen closet-- flannel snowmen.  Does princess bedding even come in Queen Size, Extra Deep Pocket, I wonder?

11:17am

Antics.

1:25pm

Naptime is shaky as expected.  The security of her little crib is gone and she needs me to lay down with her, rub her back, rock her, stay with her.  She eventually dozes off for a little while.  

9:35pm

Pleased with my brilliant plan to keep her up past her bedtime, in order to create a tired, sleep-ready toddler who will stay in her new bed, I rock her, lay with her, read her stories and rub her back before I kiss her goodnight.

9:37pm

She joins me in the living room.  I put her back.

9:42pm

She climbs into her brother's bed.  She pokes his cheek hastily, attempting to wake him before I can reach her.  I put her back.

9:43pm

She follows me out.  I put her back.

9:52pm

She has emptied her toy box onto the floor and requests that I play with her.  I decline, politely.

9:54pm

She joins me in the kitchen.  I put her back.

9:55pm

She emerges.  I put her back.

9:56pm

She emerges.  I put her back.

9:57pm

She emerges.  I put her back.

10pm

As a necessary next step, I put up a baby gate in her doorway.  She cries for a minute or two and falls asleep.

10:22pm

She is at her gate again.  She requests that I sleep with her.

11:34pm

I am still in her room (less) patiently giving back rubs and coercing an unwilling toddler to sleep.  A first-night peaceful transition is what I am holding out hope for.

12:07am

I kiss her and head downstairs to turn off lights for the night.  It could be a long(er) one, I fear.  Then I crawl into my own bed.

12:42am

Just as we drift off to sleep I hear Marin toss a book into the hall, over the baby gate.  Then another.  Another another another another another.  Kevin reminds me that books can be easily cleaned up in the morning.  Maybe she will sleep soon, he suggests.

12:53am

She has emptied her entire bookshelf into the hallway, easily more than two hundred books.  Then she tosses her beloved pink blankie, sippy cup of water and Pegasus stuffed animal atop the pile.  And cries.

12:59am

I retrieve her blankie and pony, damn near kill myself sliding atop the large pile of books and climb over the baby gate, giving up all hope of sleeping in my own new bed, just hoping for any sleep at all, in hers.

1:12am

I realize that I need a decent pillow and maneuver my body half-way over the gate, over the pile of books and crane my neck around the corner to wake the blissfully sleeping father of this beautiful, insane child in order that he could deliver my pillow.  Then we will all sleep.

1:13am

In his sleep, he grabs my pillow and makes his way around our new bed, forgetting that we are now the proud owners of a footboard.  He slams his knee into the pointy wooden corner of the footboard, letting out a painful scream, and goes running down the hall.  (Then we will all not sleep.)

1:14am

I leap over the gate, over the books, and follow him downstairs to the kitchen, seeing a bright red trail of blood seeping into the carpeting down the hall and the stairs.  People do not think to dart into the nearby bathroom WITH THE TILED FLOOR, in their sleep.

1:15am

I direct my husband to sit in the kitchen and elevate his leg, applying pressure with a washcloth to the two inch gash on his knee.  I take a look to see whether I should wake the (two) sleeping children in order to drive their father to the hospital for stitches.  Surely Marin will sleep in the car.  The gash cannot be fixed by stitches.

1:21am

I begin scrubbing the carpet, from our bedroom all the way down the hall past the bathroom and down the stairs.  There is a large drip of blood every ten inches or foot, at least.  And none of it is coming out.  We joke about homeowners insurance.  Kevin utilizes lamaze breathing techniques.

1:43am

I return to the kitchen with a bottle of peroxide, large padded bandages and surgical tape.  I clean my husband's still-bleeding knee.  He refrains from punching me.  I bandage his leg.  I point him towards the dark brown, family room couch.  He will not be voiding our warranty on the very first night of owning our bed before we've even slept in it, as per Mr. Bloody Toenail Salesman.

1:52am

I begin scrubbing the bloody kitchen floor.  Our house, it appears, has been the setting for a massacre.

2:13am

Exhausted, I drag myself back upstairs, peeking in on our baby daughter, who I am positive is sleeping by now, since she has been so quiet.  And because it's after two o'clock in the freaking morning.  Our eyes meet and she greets me-- Hi Mom!  I lecture her, offering approximately eight million, nine hundred thousand and forty-six more words than she even understands in the English language, and I am sure that I sound exactly like Charlie Brown's teacher, but I don't even care.  

Wah wahwahwah wah wah, Wah wah wah wah stay in your damn bed wah wah.

2:18am

I flop into my new bed.  Marin stays in hers for the night.

7:04am

Marin is awake, already.  I snap photographic evidence, so that you may believe.

...And also so that I may have something to show her thirty years from now, when she is exhausted and would like me to babysit her own spirited toddler child.

Most thankfully, these are the stories we can shake our heads at and laugh about twenty-four hours later.  Just, er, not quite, while deep in the tiresome trenches.

Use the force, Luke

It's summertime, which means there have been infinitely more activities available to our little crew lately.  We've visited our favorite part of Michigan, taken long walks all over town & fed the ducks at the lakefront, and spent days at the Museum of Science and Industry and the zoo.  Last weekend my girlfriend Jenny was installed as the Pastoral Associate of a parish in Chicago, so the boys and I attended her Sunday afternoon ceremony.

It was at A Church, which Kevin and I don't really cling to the concept of, so I found myself pointing out lots of unknown people and ideas to the boys during the ceremony.  That is, just after we snuck in late and Jackson threw up his hands and proclaimed in a thundering three-year-old voice, GOD IS HERE.  Thank you, son, for that.  (Stop the ceremony folks, we have arrived.)

Forty-five minutes later when Auntie Jenny was official and it was clear that my young son might never grasp the concept of a whisper, it was off to locate the hors d'oeuvres.  But not, of course, before we allowed her a few prized photo opportunities.  One of which was with Cardinal George, who is the head of the Chicago Catholic Church and President of the US Bishops. 

We waited in a good line for her turn to come, and then it did, and as her photo-op ended my child also took the opportunity to meet the Cardinal.  Jack introduced himself very matter-of-factly and shook the Cardinal's hand, and then he did the only logical thing for a person who meets the Holy Hierarcy to do.  He wove a little tale for the Cardinal, saying it was his birthday, and the Cardinal wished him a happy day.  Fantastic.

An interesting pair, indeed.

Now, this weekend was a little different, though we somehow still ended up in a traditionally quiet place with a three year old and the whole whisper thing wait your turn no wait stay here let's not clobber anyone, m'kay?

At the library in the next town over from us today, there was an afternoon event with many of the Star Wars characters.  And being as how just in the last several weeks Kevin and I have begun exposing our of-age children to the Jedi Saga of six Lucas films, we thought it a great opportunity to meet the real life Darth Vader.  Or a guy dressed up just like him, whatever people.   

And I realized as we moved from character line to character line, that Jack introduces himself to The Sith exactly as he does The Archbishop.  Except for the part where he told Boba Fett he would kick his butt.  That, thankfully, he reserved from church, miracle of all miracles. 

As we pulled up to the library event early this afternoon, we noticed that the parking lot was extremely full and people had even resorted to parking on the lawn.  Too bad this is what it takes to get people to a library, we mumbled as we pulled in.  And as we walked around I wondered briefly how many of the attendees ever bring their children to borrow books, or even read to them at all, because in my experience as an at-risk preschool teacher, it is far less parents reading to children than one would assume.

I stopped all the back patting quite abruptly, however, when it was time for us to leave the event.  Jack began insisting that we check out books and I explained that we currently have books checked out, at home, that are due on Tuesday.  No more than three books out at a time for you, three-year-old son.  We will be back on Tuesday!  And again after that!  And after that!  No books on Saturday when the place is packed and the lines are long and there are BOOKS at HOOOOOME!  

But his wails only grew louder, somehow echoing through the packed building with its cathedral ceilings and cold tile floors.  

"I WANT BOOKS!" my child screamed.  

I moved from kind reminders to pulling out all of the emergency parenting tricks I'd ever called my own, speaking through gritted teeth with promises of time-out and early bedtime and no dinner ever again and triple rent after college to just make the screaming stop until we would reach the safety of our vehicle. 

It didn't work, of course, any of it.  My son continued, over and over, screaming and crying louder and louder, "I WANT TO TAKE BOOKS OUT!  I WANT TO TAKE BOOKS OUT!"

Mobs of Star Wars fans turned around to look at the parents who no doubt never read to their children or took them to a library other than on Star Wars day, and now weren't even willing to get a book out for the poor neglected screaming child.  We were probably headed out of there to drop him off at his under-age full-time job from here for a little Saturday overtime, they thought, and his hard hat and steel toed boots were back in our car.

He melted to the floor screaming the same thing again and again at the tops of his lungs, and began kicking his feet as even KJ attempted to cover his mouth and save us all from sure embarrassment.  "I WANT TO TAKE BOOKS OUT!" he continued on and on.  Where the hell was Obi Wan when we needed him?

From off the floor Kevin picked up our stiff, reddened, screaming offspring and carried him towards the door as quickly as possible, though not before every parent in the place began whispering about someday failing the standardized tests, and tiny work boots. 

All the way through the spilled-over parking lot and to our car my son continued with an anger meant for armies of grown men, "I! WANT! BOOOOOOKS!" and there was nothing that could bring him back down from it. 

Across the way I locked eyes with a mother who laughed, and I knew for sure, so thankfully, that she had been there too. 

I've decided that next time I shall carry a sign that exclaims, AVID READER, CRAZY CHILD.  I'll carry it folded up in my pocket right next to the note that reads, PLEASE FORGIVE HIM, NOT REALLY HIS BIRTHDAY.  AND DO PRAY FOR ME.