on dressing rooms and self-image
May 17, 2016 § 3 Comments
As the days turn warmer, I am left little escape from an unwanted voice; a knowing unkindness that lurks in old insecurities.
Words once used by my father to shape my image of self, have become my own inner monologue. Toxic, unhappy thoughts that leave me curled shamefully away from my image of self.
They are the doubts that tell me to cover-up and hide away, to make myself smaller to become more.
There was a time I fought valiantly against the voice, a tender promise to my young children to model a woman of strength and good health; physically, mentally, and emotionally. I drew boundaries and set rules, established routines and tended to my well-being.
I ate well and rested intentionally, curated time for self and honored a kinder language of care. In time illusions of weakness reshaped themselves into ideals of strength. That version of myself is missing in the mirror, seated moodily alongside the discontent teenage version of herself.
Today, wrestling ill-fitting shorts in an unfavorably lit dressing room, I considered hibernating until the leaves change, sweaters are mandatory, and comfort food might be dismissed as preventative cold therapy.
I wanted to hide from a broken image of self, forgetting that a stronger version of self must first be nurtured with kindness.
I may never again relish swimsuit season, but I still want to savor the sweetness of sunshine. I’m going to think a little less about how I appear in distorted reflections and poor lighting to better bask in those places where I move intentionally with purpose and passion.
I want the image my children use as a gauge for strength and truth to be one of self-care and kindness; a reflection of happiness that can only be mirrored in choices that reflect respect and love.
to my daughter
May 9, 2016 § 8 Comments
This afternoon you came to me in tears, asking for permission to quit band. Your posture was folded over in defeat, your voice resonated with remorse.
I couldn’t rectify the shape of your request with the form of your eagerness this past fall. The way you would lean your torso toward the marching band, rolling down the car window in passing to let the notes drift on cool currents that chased after us as we turned the corner toward school.
You had begun to find a place for your future self in these fleeting glimpses of tall hats and sharp steps.
Looking over my shoulder, I could still see last year’s struggle in this year’s commitment. Weekend practices to supplement lost class time after an extended illness; you had been working to catch up when you fell in love with the rewards of your effort.
Then, this year, band was a familiar family of strangers as you settled into a new school. I was thinking these thoughts quietly as you waited for my answer.
In those short minutes, I wanted to muscle past whatever moment had undone your joy, to order you over the obstacle or help you see your way through. Except, you’ve always been as stubborn as you are sensitive and I was afraid I might chase you further from the truth.
So, I quit – first. I outlined your options and itemized the practicalities. It was only after I mentioned we would need to change your registration paperwork to accommodate choir as the foregone alternative to band that I saw the same fear that had driven you to quit.
Only then did I understand you were terrified of tomorrow’s solo. Standing alone. Judged.
The girl who worked comfortably in the artistic details of her class play wanted no part of center stage.
It was tempting to give you safe harbor, but the truth is our fears have a habit of reappearing in new challenges until we move past that horrible place where our knees knock and our voice wavers. Until we shine a light into the darkest corners of ourself and look lovingly on those imperfect images of self.
You confessed you were afraid you might be awful.
So we joked until you were ready to work. Then, you practiced until giving up something you enjoy to avoid something you fear no longer made sense.
Tonight you are still, palpably terrified. I can sense the closed throat and loose fingers clutching numbly at false bravado even as we set aside your clothes for tomorrow and you settle your clarinet into its case.
Even if you are awful, completely and utterly horrible, this time tomorrow the worst will have come and gone leaving only the joy that was there before fear.
I’ll be waiting on your stories.
Love, Mom
counting down & saving up
May 3, 2016 § 6 Comments
Yesterday my son bemoaned Monday with the comfortable familiarity of routine irritation. I commiserated with an empathetic encouragement: Only three more Mondays to go until summer vacation!
Immediately I reveled in the tiny number that seemingly shrunk the weeks ahead to days until I could almost see past the month ahead. We can endure the necessary demands of the day; an end is in sight. Early mornings of monotonous predictability and days toiled at tasks of someone else’s choosing.
Except, if we’re lucky, there are a lifetime of Mondays to come and that mindset doesn’t account for the sweet spontaneity of pleasure each day offers.
I don’t want to save up my joy, to dwell so completely in something uncertain, that I miss the moment standing before me. If each week is divided by labor and love, then I want to create patterns in my day that inspire pleasure without procrastination. Monday should get to dress up in Friday’s eagerness and borrow a little of Sunday’s grace. I want my children to look for possibility alongside responsibility, play and work in the same day.
For me, part of that joy is counting down tomorrows; childhood paper chains we trim to mark the days and whimsical X’s to strike a path of pleasure across paper squares of time. It is an act of faith in goodness to come that overflows into today; anticipation that creates a spark of delight.
This morning my thoughts and smiles are snagged on how I live anticipation, in the present. Where I save up happiness for another day and where opportunities present occasions to make this moment count.
another me
April 26, 2016 § 6 Comments
I remember the sky seemed to shed her last rays of light just as you lumbered into focus; your silhouette on fire, you plucked me from the shadows of the evening’s heat with curious amusement.
It was an hour of adolescence when time seemed a fabrication of authority and rules were something you leaned against for weight.
We were ghosts of something wanton chasing after stolen moments of spent youth. There was no afterthought in our distraction, only the urgency of fleeting freedom.
You chose me and I marveled at my good fortune. Moving recklessly against whim I let your contentment fill the vacancy of my certainty as I quickly disappeared into an extension of your pleasure.
There was no one to hear the quiet panic in my acquiescence, the silent loss of time squandered in determined hopefulness. I was less myself after you left, hollowed out and angry; unraveled and awake.
And so we became strangers long after we first met, speaking in a muddled language of shared memories and complicit ignorance.
A snapshot of self forgotten except in the light of summer’s first arrogance when I miss the girl who held her breath for magic. The girl I knew before you.
to my daughter
April 23, 2016 § 4 Comments
If your big brother kept falling in love a secret, you are wearing your first crush with the sweet enthusiasm of bubble gum blushes. Your cheeks are the most endearing shades of happy and your smile sticks to your words with a crooked permanence.
At first this boy was just another story. Someone from school who did something that made you laugh. Then, suddenly, every story was wrapped in his name; an excuse to sound out new feelings.
This week you offered clues to your crush in confidence to classmates turned confidants. Each day has brought a new telling of the mock horror of their playful taunts over the inevitable disclosure of your affection. You’re too young to date and quick to qualify the fascination for what it is, so we’re just talking our way through the newness of this moment.
I’m letting you enjoy those effervescent butterflies behind your blush while listening carefully for opportunities to learn more about the values you hold dear in others and yourself.
I like that you admire people first for character over image and that you aren’t intimidated by popularity or pressured by peers to pretend a persona that isn’t true. Like your brother you’ve allowed yourself to be vulnerable without losing the backbone of authenticity. We’re having real conversations about issues that are tangent to your emotions and I’m learning more about how you perceive yourself and the world around you throughout this new experience.
When a peer said your crush had a boyfriend, you respected he may be gay and were just as comfortable imagining friendship as you were when another friend said he had a girlfriend. As your well-meaning friends line up reasons for doubt, cautioning you from disappointment, you’ve stayed true to your gut. Through out all the inferences of differences between you, I like that the only change in you has been the flush on emotion that colors your speech.
Most important, you still tend to your friendships and family. You haven’t lost your sense of self even as you fall.
Love, Mom
living small
March 13, 2016 § 5 Comments
I remember a time before googling was a verb that accounted for answers to last-minute homework assignments, housecleaning foibles, and comparison shopping. The early hours of an online environment of conversations folded into letters.
A time before friends were chosen like teams in gym class; waiting to be accepted and liked then placed in a hierarchy of belonging and popularity among a virtual clique.
There was the briefest moment when most of my online wonderings were messages given to friends, farther reaching than the span of my days.
Over the years, it has become a rabbit hole of squandered minutes and lost hours for which there is not time enough to gamble such loss.
My children are growing too quickly, my dreams demand more of my attention. I have come to a place where I must make my life smaller to live beyond the confines of my habits.
As the ground softens with spring and the trees blossom into a new season of life, I am promising myself a simpler schedule of play; a truer practice of mindfulness.
I’m whittling my online distractions to a more genuine opportunity for connection.
As so many stumble upon the wisdom of Marie Kondo’s elegant system of tidying, I’m considering a similar necessity for organizing my space online to nurture greater joy and purpose.
At present, I have put pen to paper, naming my virtual distractions; the places I log on and the people I follow to better identify my personal investment. The value of beauty and inspiration, insight and education beside emotional outlets of social opportunities.
It would seem simple, but I have found more complicated personal truths. Disingenuous relationships and excessive ideas too vast to be accessible.
They are the places I am passively present and absently inspired.
I have begun to save lost relationships in the same way others cling to old clothing with scraps of sentiment. I have hoarded creativity by neatly naming it into a system of possibility.
This week, in quieter minutes of intentional care and unhurried effort, I am tidying up my online spaces for a new intention of presence and authenticity.
to my daughter
March 10, 2016 § 2 Comments
On your eleventh birthday, you proudly proclaimed yourself eleventeen. Younger sister to a teenage brother, it sometimes seems you were born assuming an equality of age while simultaneously performing a playful demonstration of the very youth you feigned ignorance of experience.
I can remember elementary days, picking up your brother from school while you chased ahead of me in full costume. Parading after the older children with a single-minded purpose of falling into line and assuming a place in their day.
You were fearlessly bold before you were old enough to understand unkindness, to feel different or doubtful. Over the past few years you’ve sometimes struggled to be seen authentically amid the familiarity of sameness.
This year, as you introduced yourself to strangers and set about the task of self in a new setting, I marveled at confident expressions that hinted at your playful nature and creative spirit. When others might have sought the invisibility of a crowd, you moved comfortably in your costume of self.
Bulky orange headphones, outdated for their size, draped at your neck or a borrowed baseball cap worn backwards; torn jeans and weathered boots; sentimental accessories and clothes that are a hodgepodge of comfort and convenience. Just this side of pretty with a carefully casual disinterest in compliments.
I have a sneaking suspicion you will soon outgrow this phase in much the same way you ceased to chase neighborhood sidewalks in stained princess gowns brandishing your brother’s forgotten sword in trade for an astronaut costume with pearls.
Even as I cautiously redirect your attention from a new question of feathers and hair color, I’m secretly smitten by the riddle of style that has become reassuringly familiar for its predictable chaos that is your own.
Love, Mom
the condition of loving
February 8, 2016 § 7 Comments
This summer, in anticipation of our move, I sorted the long procrastinated corners of cluttered shoeboxes, unmarked envelopes, and half-finished family albums for photographs; gathering keepsakes more intentionally into a single box of memories. Images of my childhood and my children’s haphazardly overlapping in a beautiful chaos of sentiment.
As we settle into our new home, I have come to visit these images regularly; a practice that speaks love and connects me more tenderly to the girl I was and the woman I have become. It is an indulgence of time I cherish, meditative and nourishing to my soul. In these moments, I am at once both daughter and mother. More myself and less of myself.
Today my heart rested on a rare image of my father and I. It is the way I most remember loving him; completely and effervescently, eagerly and devotedly. Without pretense or hesitation, with blind trust and unconditional faith.
For those who know me best, it is a relationship complicated by the contradiction of emotions and experience. We are broken and bound by imperfect love.
My mother tells me stories of how my father loved me, but I am most torn by what I do not remember. I have no memory of my father holding me or the sound of his voice forming words of love or praise, encouragement or pride. There is grief in this knowing even as there is peace in his absence, it is no more and no less than the truth between us.
My father is a faded reminder, not of his love, but of my own; paper that holds crisp the condition of loving.
Whatever disappointment may have once accompanied my memories, there is now only a mindfulness for the preciousness of love and the richness of distributing it enthusiastically to those I love least they live unaware of their worth.
I let the love I wish for the girl in those yellowed photographs illuminate the love I give my own children, unconditionally.
silence
February 4, 2016 § 4 Comments
It is my favorite sound. Second only to my children’s laughter or our pup’s eager paws scrambling an anxious greeting.
Peace pregnant with ideas that move fluidly in the space between speech; truth we hold tightly against the brashness of daylight, like a sacred mantra of self.
In my stillness I am more intuitive, less responsive to my surroundings; more attune to a gentler voice.
This week I can feel the conflict of thought against the noise of the mundane, the friction of demands that interrupt a sanctity of silence.
Words like promises on the tip of my tongue, lost to a language of busy distractions.
Rather than wrestle the noise, I am moving more stubbornly within it; reaching just past the cacophony for quiet.
a mused
February 1, 2016 § 4 Comments
I worried for a time my joy was too intricately tied to my children’s. From the moment they were born, I could lose myself just marveling at their presence; counting fingers and toes as if to challenge the impossibility of their reality.
Its undeniable, children radiate the most gorgeous, extravagant love. It’s the purest, most uncomplicated and terrifyingly all consuming affection.
I wondered if that energy would change as they matured into new phases and tested expressions of self. It didn’t. Their humor and compassion, the messy mistakes and the perfect clarity of innocent wisdom still leave me winded with gratitude for their presence.
In motherhood I found a new calling of self, too.
I make it my work to assign value to the hours my children are absent in my days, to fill my day with purpose and interest, accomplishment and engagement. The small pursuits and larger dreams that by day’s end reflect my light in their company.
We inspire the best of one another, for one another, together.
This first day of February, I am dwelling in a sentiment of love, a muse of gratitude.
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