happy accidents
April 14, 2012 § 2 Comments
Yesterday was scattered with serendipitous moments of friendship and I pause this morning to reflect on the power of a conversation, a genuine moment of stillness that allows us to connect with another soul over a simple greeting. Like an invisible thread fate stitches stories with patchwork personalities; people who share similar journeys, others who inspire action, some who share passion. People pass through my days and I marvel at the blessing of their stories.
In the moments just before school began, watching my daughter walk towards the front doors yesterday, I turned and paused to say hello to a school aide only to find myself quickly wrapped in an intimate conversation centered in the unique challenges we share as mothers of daughters with a common special need that complicates school days. A simple greeting had gifted me a moment of connection to a woman who before that conversation I did not know. Our stories are unique, but the shared spaces inspire an awareness that lends both strength and comfort, hope and celebration.
I was still reflecting on my good fortune when I crossed paths an hour later with a woman I had lost touch with amid the unceremonious busyness of school and home. I met this woman in the chaotic space of preschool activities, sharing conversations on motherhood over park playdates with our children. Between the aisles of our checkout lanes and over her shopping cart we caught up and made new promises to share pieces of our summer vacation at a park. Again, a simple greeting had gifted me the company of a friend; a woman who accompanies me on my journey through motherhood.
These happy accidents of friendship occur with amusing frequency. At the local YMCA on a climbing wall, the outdoor pool under a summer sun, on airplanes, at a local bakery over an order of cookies; in unexpectedly common places I find myself in the company of compassion born of experience. Mothers and children who share a journey similar to my family’s find their way into our lives with a predictability that has not escaped me. Today, I celebrate years of conversations and friendships born of a genuine, unhurried hello.
eeny meeny
February 1, 2012 § Leave a comment
I am compulsively indecisive. Nursery rhymes help, sometimes. I often resort to itemizing Pros and Cons to weigh a big decision. Even then, with facts lined up neatly like statistics, I indubitably rearrange my thoughts, double-check my emotions, look around me at my options. It is a small irritation that I am determined I will not pass to my children, least they run off into the world scattered and indecisive. There are three things I do in an effort to nurture my children’s confidence in their choices.
- Whenever possible I create an opportunity to gift my children a choice. I do this intentionally. From food to clothing, book titles to movie genres I try to foster an anxiety free moment of empowerment with two simple words: you choose. I do not react to their decisions with terms of judgment like: good or bad.
- What do you think? I want my children to feel comfortable giving voice to the quiet instinctive voices that guide them. It gives me an opportunity to learn something new, but more importantly it allows my children to feel comfortable with their opinions. It has also taught them to ask other’s to share different perspectives, modeling a balance between speaking and listening.
- Take your time so that you make a choice you feel good about. Notice I didn’t say happy. There’s a difference to me. I don’t like to be pushed into something uncomfortable and I like to feel I made a good choice for myself. One day my children are going to be asked to do something they may not feel comfortable with and I want them to remember this lesson.
Small acts. Gentle words. Practical practice at thinking for themselves. Little things I hope help them to move confidently along their own paths.
for joy
January 13, 2012 § 2 Comments
I was very young when I declared to my parents and a family friend that I wanted to be a teacher when I grew up. My step mother was an elementary school teacher and this afforded me the gift of visiting a school in the quiet months of summer. I have a deep affinity for the space of classrooms, knowledge resting among the walls and tucked in reference books for the finding. My childhood declaration was met with doubt and adult reminders that prioritized monetary gain over dreams. I did what children do, I hid my wish keeping it safe from judgment until it was forgotten.
By the time I left for college, my future was mapped with others’ shoulds: You should be an attorney. I studied in preparation for law school; choosing classes dense with reading and writing, subjects that were diverse and demanded critical thought. I was hiding among subjects that I loved; my spirit whispering over others’ shouts. I was immersed in books that inspired me, sharing thoughts among peers and professors that lit fires in the quiet corners of my mind.
Then, before committing to a career, I became a mother. Each day I wake to life lessons and opportunities to guide my children. I gather them on adventures into books that push at the boundaries of their world. My tiny students with unique needs perpetually lead me to structure spontaneous lessons to help them understand their world. I am inspired and challenged on a path where I am neither teacher nor lawyer, ironically spending my days teaching and advocating for my children as I navigate school work and legal rights in an effort to provide for my children’s needs. My childhood dream found direction in motherhood.
As my children share their dreams, I try consciously to celebrate their statements of self. I want them to listen carefully to the whispers that come from within and to chart their lives with choices that resonate and bring them joy. I try to do this with words married with action, here. I am teaching my children to make room for joy in their lives, while creating moments of joy for myself.
For as long as I can remember I have written letters. Quick notes passed in classrooms, summer letters to school friends, love letters tied with heartstrings, and dreams scribbled in the margins of my days. I write for clarity and for joy. My children know that I do this and that writing is an expression that brings me happiness and comfort in the way building with LEGOs and creating artwork bring them pleasure and peace.
Slowly, I have invited my words to become a larger piece of my life. I do this cautiously, carrying with me an uncertainty born of those early statements of self among family and friends. I began here, where few could connect my words to myself, sheltering my feelings of joy from judgment. I still hear others’ shoulds. Throughout my life others have said: You should write. Should seems to shadow my joy, expectations suffocating pleasure. I have begun to internalize others’ opinions of how, what, when, why I write as measurements against which I gauge my ability and validate my efforts.
Then something special happened. My husband discovered pieces of me he didn’t know between the lines of my posts. My son serendipitously discovered a post and kept reading, celebrating my words with a hug. My daughter exclaimed proudly to a friend, my mother writes. People I love began to identify me by something I love to do.
I know my husband wishes this act of writing could evolve into a larger piece of our life, that someone would happily stumble into my words and open a door to something else. I know these are logical wishes and that his faith in me is a source of love. I am still growing, learning and dreaming; uncertain how to define why, how, when, and what. I am happy for a place to store my thoughts, for my children, for some day, for me. I write to invite joy and dreams into my day.
comfortably unsettled
September 20, 2011 § Leave a comment
Sometimes a little discomfort creates moments of greatness. Sitting among parents and educators gathered together to listen to a speaker on the subject of resilience, I quietly encountered emotions unexpressed that had lain dormant without a voice and hidden behind good intentions. Fear, doubt, uncertainty, hope. Am I parenting properly? In teaching resilience, mistakes are mandatory.
Education is a subject of importance to each parent invested in their child’s future. I have found myself frequently looking outside the box for ways to facilitate my children’s educational experience in the hope that they will gather the tools and life skills to create their own future. The greater lessons are taught outside of class, unprinted in text books.
I could outline for you the schools we have chosen and the teaching styles we have explored but I think there is something to be said for my children’s raw materials. Bottom line: I am blessed with two curious children that love to explore their world, have faith that they can approach new experiences with ability, and a willingness to create with spare parts.
My children’s greatest challenge was me. I am a grown-up stereotypical “good girl” with an eagerness to please and a need to be accepted. Luckily my spunky children are comfortable with an uncomfortable mother. They are secure in their imperfections and aware of their needs and limits. I have become comfortable with imperfect grades, unfinished homework, and simpler schedules; putting my children’s needs before other people’s standards of excellence.
In our house we do our best, work hard, sleep well, relax, play and have family time. We also argue, fighting for what we believe in. We apologize for causing hurt and do not apologize for our differences.
Today I listened to someone tell me we will be okay and I felt immeasurable relief. I hadn’t realized I was holding my breath. This job of parenting is impossibly imperfect and perfectly rewarding. We do our best and fight for what we believe in. We make mistakes and carry on.
parenting in progress
September 12, 2011 § Leave a comment
I am an amateur. I have lofty dreams of parenting from a serene source of strength, but sometimes I struggle to be the mother I strive to be.
I never intend to raise my voice to my children and still I have. The sharp sound of my voice tinged with anger makes me feel horrible and has yet to fix poor behavior, but in moments of extreme frustration I sometimes lose sight of intentions and ideologies grasping desperately for order and authority. Shame for my own impatience guides me to apologize. In our house we have expanded sorry to encompass a promise, we say: Sorry means I will try to do better.
My kids know I am fallible, it would seem silly to hide this. I cannot imagine the standard of perfection that would cast judgment on their own mistakes without the balance of my errors. I hope my children are comfortable with both making mistakes and striving to learn from them. I often think of my children as consultants in parenting; sometimes they teach me, often times they forgive me, but mostly they hold me accountable to do my best.
On Saturday, my son snapped at my daughter and my daughter threw a noisy, public temper tantrum. I was horrified and snapped back. Maybe they were tired, hungry, overheated, or under the weather. Regardless of why, they were unhappy and ugliness seemed to puddle around us drawing each of us further into a muck of misery. Underneath the unpleasantness were these amazing little souls that provide me with moments of joy, humor, compassion, and wisdom.
I sat both children down and held for them the mirror of accountability that they hold for me. We talked our way through the problems and I asked them who they want to be; if their behavior best represented the person they are on the inside. They are no more bad kids, than I am a bad mom. They are little people still making sense of their world just as I am finding my way through motherhood. Forgiveness and understanding, acceptance for our imperfections and opportunities to do better are all any of us can hope for.
Parenting is an ongoing effort full of adjustments, lessons, apologies, and hope; a work in progress. Each day is a new beginning, an opportunity to do better.
playing house
August 27, 2011 § Leave a comment
There are friends that tie us to a younger self; the girls we women once were. In their company time stands still and the reality of marriage and motherhood feel like a grand game of make-believe. Discussing our lives after childhood, I feel like a little girl playing house.
I never envisioned this part of my life, it has been an experience of improvisation. My parents were divorced with widely differing personalities and parenting styles; they lived in different communities and without the predictable social rhythms of my close-knit neighborhood. I sometimes feel like a child’s toy misplaced; a round peg stuffed into a square space.
I am comfortable in the company of my family, but sometimes lost in the space of expectations. A little voice seems to whisper, I don’t know how to do this. I have learned to follow my gut and lead with my heart. Asking for directions and watching for answers. Still I marvel at those that seem to know with a quiet confidence, what comes next at each turn.
It is with great joy and reassurance that I perpetually find myself in the company of wise souls that share with me a vision of Happily Ever After in the space of everyday life.
growing pains
July 29, 2011 § 2 Comments
As my children stretch their independence and their abilities extend toward self-reliance I find myself stuck in a place of transition; caught between the experiences we have outgrown and the unmarked space of our futures. When my daughter’s language skills first formed concise thoughts, she inquired: Mommy, what do you want to be when I grow up? My heart and head stumbled over the answer. In truth, I was so busy being my children’s mother I couldn’t imagine what else to be. Her question, formed in innocence and curiosity has followed me, tucked between my conscious and subconscious thoughts like an item on my to-do list: buy groceries, choose future career, finish the laundry.
I try to recall my childhood fantasies, but I have outgrown tiny tutus and tap shoes. I still hear the echo of teachers’ and my parents’ voices projecting me on various academic paths; titles I wish would resonate if only to know my place. Motherhood was a happy reprieve from committing to a career. With my daughter’s prompting and no clear answer, I find myself window shopping for the future.
Where others create careers, I found only interests. In college, my favorite space was a classroom; unique personalities and opinions challenging old theories and projecting new possibilities. Subject matter was secondary to the experience, but my favorite teachers pushed boundaries in conversations centered in English, Psychology, Sociology, and Philosophy. I wonder now if my liberal arts education could still hold the key to doors of opportunity promised over years of academic guidance.
I am happy here, in this moment as a mother. Still, I sometimes look ahead and feel the familiar panic of my youth as old questions revisit bearing uncertainty and insecurity. Shouldn’t I know what I want to be? I envy the uncluttered wisdom of youth; tiny people dressed in costumes clearly marking their future with dreams. Firefighters, teachers, doctors, scientists, and dancers confident in their childhood career placement. I wish for a simple answer and the ability to demonstrate the passion and conviction of owning a dream. To model for my children the drive and ambition, hard work and stamina of working tirelessly towards a gratifying sense of self outside our home. To know myself more completely, and for my children to see, the woman in the footsteps of their mother.
between the lines
July 5, 2011 § Leave a comment
I set the book aside, knowingly. Days passed and I would greet the title with each dawn, waiting for the right moment to begin. On a cloudless day, beneath a brilliant blue sky, I sat in the shade of my backyard and slowly welcomed old memories between the lines of another’s words. With a lump in my throat and a full heart, I read The Anti-Romantic Child: A Story of Unexpected Joy by Priscilla Gilman.
Our lives have different beginnings, but our stories are hauntingly familiar. We meet in a place of beauty; kindred spirits bound by grace born of love for our children. Two mothers searching for and finding joy in our children’s extraordinary gifts and challenges.
My son, my first-born, was my homecoming. The first time our eyes met my speech failed, but my heart opened in an awakening. Large brown eyes, sage and serene, mirrored my own. Long, thin fingers wrapped around mine and centered me in a place of peace. I fell into contentment.
There were no other children to contrast my son’s development and I was blissfully unaware of heartaches and struggles looming in the shadows of our future. We toiled away hours, days, months, and years oblivious to red flags that would later signal an otherness. Endearing traits would later become cause for concern.
One doctor, with little more than an unsettled feeling, refered us to a child psychiatrist that would see what we had not. Diagnoses and abstract initials hovered heavy, stealing the air from the room as we began to understand our son in a new language. With love and hope we have found our way amidst the endless unknown determined to embrace our son for the special soul that he is.
Between the lines of a stranger’s story I have found strength and inspiration; a celebration for the unique spirits that accompany us on our journey through motherhood.
Please note: This post is my effort to capture my initial feelings as I read this very special book. I consciously did not reference the author’s words but rather my emotional connection to the experience of reading them.
scribblechic 