menus & mealtime
February 11, 2015 § 4 Comments
Recently my husband acknowledged a desire to cook that spoke to a richer passion; restless and playful he was looking for a creative outlet outside the normal pieces of his day. This expression of want was a demonstration of need; an interest that extended beyond caring for our nutrition or assuming a new responsibility, this was a request to interrupt the expectation of sameness with something unknown.
I welcomed his enthusiasm with gratitude for a reprieve. The endless monotony of what to make and who to please, what to buy and the practicality of small details weighed on my mind weekly. The joy of creating meals that cared for my family had become overshadowed by an empty appreciation for a thankless task. There was no stubborn pride or sense of fulfillment to defend against sharing this responsibility; it was with relief that I differed our dinnertime quandary into his able hands.
It has been inspiring watching my husband search for meal ideas and gather recipes into a grocery list; endearing to watch his large frame fill the familiar corner of my space with clumsily careful attention to detail. I have done my best to refrain from interfering by projecting my experiences onto his discovering, resisting the temptation to commandeer his efforts with hijacked enthusiasm. Instead I keep to my perch on the periphery of his play, reminded how often we need to push against routine with reckless curiosity to broaden our expectations.
I have rediscovered an appreciation for a previously dreaded hour and gained a new experience of our time gathered over a meal. I am falling in love with my husband’s open-minded perspective and my children’s generous encouragement. We are dwelling longer at the table and embracing the mystery of unfamiliar foods with a sense of adventure and appreciation for the care it takes to create something new.
Dinner has once more become a service of love, an act of play, and cause for joy.
to my children
February 10, 2015 § Leave a comment
I wish you knew the fullness of the little moments when you are greater siblings for the friendship between you. Last night you tossed yourselves attentively into one another’s company; one needing guidance and the other basking in a sense of purpose. Asking for help and offering assistance, teaching and learning, you were navigating a language of appreciation.
To my son, Your little sister so often bulldozes you with a bossiness you mostly tolerate good-naturedly. She is quieter in her praise, quick in her frustration, but ever thoughtful in her admiration. Yesterday she leapt at the opportunity to study your favorite subject, eager to speak as your equal. Despite the ease of your mastery you were mindful in your manners, patient and respectful as you tempered your knowledge without undermining her ability. For a moment I imagined the father you may one day become in the brother you already are; kind and wise, patient and enthusiastic.
To my daughter, One of the greatest lessons we can offer as a family, is an ability to sound out our uncertainties and accept another’s help. Watching you delight in an opportunity to learn, framing your questions into an eagerness to grow, was a lovely demonstration of trust and respect, vulnerability and honesty. You might have struggled though your answers in a more solitary endeavor and gathered the same information independently, but inviting your brother to share a source of joy was a gift of appreciation that spoke of a gentler personal wisdom. There is no academic standard for character, it is a success measured by the health of our most valuable relationships.
To you both, There will come a time your lives will diverge as your choices lead you to new places and partnerships, may you always look to one another as sounding boards of wisdom and friendship.
Love, Mom
february
February 9, 2015 § Leave a comment
It is the shortest month, one so often swept under the exhaustive anticipation of romance. To my little family, it is the month my husband and I celebrate our anniversary with unexceptional attention and thoughtful recognition. Marriage, unlike the luster of romance, is a labor of love; the daily tending to of dreams we craft with another’s joy in mind greater than a confetti of acknowledgment that clutter a more genuine humility with colorful demonstrations of elaborate excess.
Children and pets, home and work pull at our attention with a necessity of care; a misconception of ease that undermines the value of holding hands and stealing smiles in the fervent busyness of the world’s demands. It is not the day to come that weighs us in recognition of togetherness, but all the days we chose one another in simpler acts of love; unglamorous demonstrations of friendship and passion, kindness and patience that weigh the brevity of February with the fortitude of every yesterday between us.
beloved
February 8, 2015 § 2 Comments
I write you in the space between my dreams and consciousness, just as the light crests the darkness I press my mind against memories and fight the clarity of your absence. For just a moment, I am less myself and more my own.
writing out loud
February 6, 2015 § 2 Comments
Lately I am lost between the narrative of my days and the story in my mind; words pressing against my thoughts as I work with a frantic serenity to gather them quickly into print.
All or nothing, it is a terrifying need that consumes and ignites sleepy places in my soul. I have never felt more still while the wheels of my distraction spin with reckless disregard for time.
I am both hungry and sated in my pleasure, terrified that this moment might pass and leave me in want of something I cannot fathom loosing.
Every moment is a contradiction as I disappear from familiar places in my day, more present in my own skin as my fingers transpire the secrets of my dreams.
self & sight
February 4, 2015 § 2 Comments
I have spent a lifetime navigating invisibility in plain sight; hiding behind the boisterousness of a louder companion or the deception of disinterest, the fullness of my doubts and dreams more easily masked by assigned roles tangent to more colorful personalities. I learned this first as a child shuffled between new schools in my parents’ divorce. Uncomfortable in a space of extended uncertainty, I began to lean against other’s for direction; moving through days in borrowed shadows.
There is a magic to disappearing; watching the world unfold like actors on a stage. Expectations are safely impersonal, opinions ignored as irrelevant; failure and loss are guarded from the fragility of exposing the intimacy of hidden vulnerabilities. This too is a trick of perception. Just as I have escaped the criticism of others in consciously crafted illusions of confidence, echos of unrest reverberate in the silencing of self.
I celebrate those who walk uncomfortably into unforgiving spotlights, dropping the veneer of security for a moment of brave authenticity. I champion the stranger who falls dangerously along a path of their own design, bolstered by the boldness of their courage. Each imperfect articulation of someone else’s sense of self whispers to my soul the warmth of knowing and being known.
Today I am looking inward for direction, setting my compass to new intentions and old dreams.
stations of living
February 2, 2015 § 2 Comments
My experience of death has been largely abstract; loved ones who disappeared outside the routine or physical space of my days. My world was small enough that I escaped the nearness of loss; my grief lonely and private.
This year I have watched acquaintances and friends mourn illness and loss in contrasting shades of peace and sorrow. A young mother taken inexplicably early; parents and grandparents lost unexpectedly. In each passing the grief was as tangible as the life within the loss.
As a witness to another’s memories, I am humbled by the fullness of lives that intersect our own. Like passengers on a train to nowhere in particular the details of old joy and passion remind us of our own years, lost enthusiasm and hard-earned personal accomplishments.
I am left wondering which platforms we might revisit and what journeys linger in want of a beginning.
to my daughter
January 29, 2015 § Leave a comment
I have this moment pinned to my thoughts, a smile just askew of my attention. This week you threw a quiet temper tantrum, a storm of self-righteous indignation that simmered beneath deceptively calm waters. At the time I was so very frustrated by a casual detachment from your studies that I contrived to withhold every possible outlet of entertainment, not expecting to uncover a smile. You shook off each consequence with a stoic disregard; boldly you crossed your arms, straightened your posture, and stared me down. Each posture was an exercise in independence, but the cockeyed arch to your eyebrow and determined pucker to your lips betrayed your rage and unraveled my mask of seriousness. I could push no further and so I relaxed into a genuine appreciation for the passion behind your certainty. I did something I rarely managed when you were little, I laughed openly at the ridiculousness of the power struggle between us.
Sweet girl, I hope you choose your battles wisely and find your footing carefully. Know when your cause is lost and be thoughtful in your conviction. Don’t be afraid to look silly, but don’t mock those who guide your choices with love. Never apologize for your strength, but be mindful of your power. Love, Mom
this & that
January 25, 2015 § 2 Comments
This month has been a study in contrasts; less of this and more of that.
Change and conflict were tempermental companions this past year as my husband and I navigated uncertainty with a forced conviction and false confidence. Work worries and family tensions frayed the tender strings of patience as we trudged through the unfamiliarity of old routines mourning the comforts of hope in the company of fear.
At the least convenient opportunity we leapt into a messy, full-hearted commitment to a sweet pup; abruptly interrupting our expectations with an assumption of change. It was a pinch on the arm, a foot thrust forcefully into a doorway; calling us to attention and creating space for light.
This year we have become still where we were once frantically busy with empty endeavors; attentive where we had become unconsciously paralyzed. Our routines had been reshaped by doubts and our hope informed by a stubborn complacency, hollow gestures of living shaded by misfortune.
None of this is to say happiness swings to the joy of a puppy’s love. It doesn’t.
At the core of discovery and recognition there was a discomfort that alerted our consciousness to greater contentment just askew of our perspective. In tending to another’s happiness we looked further outside our discontent.
Rather than tallying what we might lose we have been inventorying what we have; unsettled by comfort we have created sources of rejuvenation. We are trying new things, planning for change and playing at forgotten interests. More of that which was ever-present and overlooked; less of what we do not need and cannot control.
growing up
January 22, 2015 § 6 Comments
Perhaps it is because my children are of an age where I find myself unintentionally referencing outside expectations and their growing independence with an insincere acquiescence of external values, but lately I am unimpressed with the accomplishment of maturity. I hear my voice contorted into hollow directives as I play at my role of adult, chagrined by the unoriginality of my dialogue and lonely for the magic of my children’s childhood expressions.
There are few lingering exclamations of exaggerated mastery, those treasures of language that once speckled conversations with endearingly irrelevant statements of fact and whimsical brushstrokes of self. Pronunciation and tense were a chaos of communication that drew me into a Seussical world of impossible realities that I became adept at translating into the gray language of the world around me. Some days the gray seems to suffocate the prisms of possibility from our speech.
There are fewer pockets of clutter as play seems relegated to more private spaces. I give thanks every day for the carnival of colorful figurines that circle the perimeter of the bathtub, poised in a silent story line, for interrupting the monotony of my routine with an act of imagination. I tenderly note the direction of the characters, wondering at the changes in their stance and marveling at the endless performance of which I am a second-hand witness.
Most worrisome is the absence of Why, a word that so often announced the beginning of a new adventure with enthusiastic curiosity. The school years have directed our attention to a more singular expectation of mastery and I miss unraveling all the possibilities of the unknown.
To my children,
Growing up is about balancing responsibilities; we are all committed to basic burdens that exist to inform care for self, home, and our world. Do not let your success in these areas define the measure of your maturity. I hope you will continue to color outside the lines and speak in passionate uncertainties. Think less of the answers and more of the journey to knowing. We are never too old to play and always old enough to dream. Don’t ever misconstrue growing-up with outgrowing the child within.
Love, Mom
