my own seat

love our warm respite.  love that child and her ways.

:::::::::::::::

how i feel:
fine actually.  thanks for asking. i love the weekends.  i can't decide if saturday or sunday is better.  they are such a team.  and what they do for me makes me like monday thru friday as much as is possible.


what i'm thinkin about:  mommy cultishness.  following along, and losing myself in the action of following.  just following is not my thing.  losing myself hurts.  i love finding myself.  i have been finding myself a bit lately.  where?  outside.  on little walks.  inside, with wool and needles, and a daughter.  finding myself.  yep.  in and out,  with long bouts of self reflection.  long periods of digesting painful feelings.  missing myself a whole lot through a lot of that time.  self-retrieval.  i hope that is what i've been doing.


 there was some real hide and seek going on here lately.  winding our ways through the days since david's dad has died, we have been deep in territory new to us.  new and dark and scary and sad.  and beautiful and heartheavy and endearing and lonely.  so much is questioned in this territory of feeling and contemplating death.  i obviously went off the deep end into my oldest wounds there a few weeks ago. had to do it.  no sweeping under the rug, thank you.  and i mean it, too.  thanks so much for being here for me and my choice to expose some story.

the give and take and the bending i've been doing for and with david these past two months, but actually these past 8 months or so, since we really knew hal was starting to die, all the emotions and the bending and all, it's been like doing yoga i guess.  emotional and spiritual yoga.  yoga is hard, you know?  i've been guided along by a few different therapists.  their guidance has been so helpful in how i traversed this rocky sloping very intense terrain.  i see a body worker every couple of months.  and then my psychotherapist i started talking with again recently.  oh how i love the way they help me wake up.  the way they help me open my heart and feel my own wisdom.  i have a sister who can feel what i'm feeling so well.  she cares so much.  and helps me to not feel alone.   i have a good good friend who can reflect for me in a very intuitive way, saying spot on what my soul is needing to hear to stay awake and on the path.  i am grateful for all the help i have in keeping me awake and open.  grateful to people who come here and connect with my words and photos.  so grateful!!!  thank you so much.

i might be in a place of acceptance.  i don't have a lot of close friends.  and i'm trying to realize that this is okay.  the friends i do have, that i choose to spend time with, i can fully relax with them.  it's a chemistry thing usually.  maybe i am a specific type of element, like in the elemental chart, that can only bond with a very select certain few other elements.  maybe this is why i have only a few good friends.  accepting that is very relaxing.  i have fought against it for a long time.  thinking, i must try harder.  i must break out of this shell and create a more happening social life for myself.  and then of course i don't.  and i feel like a failure.  accepting my social life as it is, accepting that i am a homebody, and all that that entails, is relaxing.  yay for relaxing.  my sister says i just need to relax.  like that's kind-of the only thing in my own way.  yeah.  pretty much.

crocus.  and my new clogs.  last time i got new clogs, was just before my dad died.  i wore them to his funeral they were so new and black and unscuffed.  i've always kind-of associated them with saying bye to my dad, and the period of my life since.  i've worn them a lot for the past 7 and a half years.  just after david's dad died, i got this feeling that it was time to get new clogs.  i like these new ones a lot.  and i still like my old ones a lot too.


little birds zhi and i began making sunday morning.  this morning.  i was itching to sit and write some words, and instead, i said, i can do that later.  this is the time to sit and be with my daughter.  thank goodness for that voice inside that tells me to tend to my babies.  that was some grounding felting we did.  made me feel better.  thank you zhi.



forsythia is just blooming

i am wearing all handmades here yesterday i realized.

dress by me, hat by me, little knitting bag by me, red sling bag by me.  ha!  show off much?  nah.  just the truth.  shoes and socks, not by me.  so there.  i haven't learned to knit socks yet.  nor to cobble.  david said to me yesterday that i needed a henna arm band tattoo and i'd be all set.  that i was looking like a magical creature.  that's definitely the kind of compliment that makes me smile.  he's got my number.  or i've got his.


so yeah.  the mommy cult thing.  (my digression is so huge sometimes.)   i love checking in to see if i am following blindly.  am i so distanced from myself, that i am looking to others to show me who i am?  or who i want to be?  maybe there's nothing wrong with doing that.  what i am saying, is that i like asking myself if that is what i am doing.

  about to head out on a date with this guy that made me smile so contentedly today as he put on roseanna very loud in the bedroom while he cleaned his laundry up.   yay.  love.

play

play.

to play around.  i feel i haven't been able to do that on this blog for so long.

what shall i play?

well, first i shall play with a friend!  this friend did something so kind and giving for me last week!  i commented that i liked her fingerless gloves pattern, and wondered how to size it down for zhi.  she's been wanting some, and i keep wanting to use one of courtney's patterns.  well, we had a little phone call, she got zhi's measurements, and now i have me a pattern named after miss zhi!  woohoo!  i'm so excited to make these little cuties.  using some handspun yarn i thrifted a while back.  a quick knit sounds perfect right now.  and i love that i'm following up my last post on zhi's sweet tooth challenges with this positive zhi inspired beauty.

we had a little bit of fun play time last weekend while my sis and niece were in town.  butterfly pavilion was pretty fun.

i am so grateful for this sister.  it was her birthday yesterday!  i saw a flock of wild turkeys in the morning.  my first sighting of wild turkeys here!  or anywhere.  loved that so much.  no camera handy.  but they were beautiful and many and healthy and they flew on over this barbed wire fence so easily and magically.   just like claire does when she is too close to barbed wire.  wild turkey sister.


zhi is a magic creature to walk around with in the butterfly pavilion.  and a dream for a mama with a camera.







ready to come out anyone?

yesterday's weather, and the sights of all the buds swelling around me on plants and trees, was seriously almost too much.  i felt like i was gonna have a panic attack from beauty and joy.  it was horrible!  can you believe that!?  a beauty and joy panic.  come on!

well, i have a cure for a joy and beauty panic attack.  look at cockroaches.  yep.  max is busy staring at them, but zhi and claire clearly can't take another second of the sight.  ha.  so funny!



sister just sent me a link to this crackin~me~up site.  have fun there!


alright.  what else?  how bout this.  love mr. sunshine.  our lone duck, since mr. good~day died, has been enjoying his baths lately.  this video might just make you smile.  this was his first bath of the season.  after a long 4 or so months of now bath.  you can feel the relief, yeah?

and.  we're going to see these magical music men tomorrow night.  family concert night with some friends.  sounds pretty fun.  download their cds truth and darkness, and windward if you are inclined.  we absolutely adore them.  including the kids.  the two brothers.  that's what max calls them, and now we all do.  the two brothers are so fun to see live.  big energy.

alright.  i'll leave you with that for now.   

love.

love bucket

thursday:

we have a child with a strong sweet tooth.

her teacher just yesterday, in our parent teacher conference,  shared that she's noticed middle child seems to lose all sense of manners when the class has earned access to sweet treats.  middle child rears up in ways atypical of her, and asks like an angry brute, when the treats will be given out.  teacher said she wasn't concerned really, just a little surprised and taken aback at this side of our normally pretty great mannered daughter, and  that she's noticed it, as pretty much the only thing that makes her think zhi has some aspect to her that isn't seemingly dreamy.  she's a dreamy student.  that acts in a surprisingly rude way when it's treat time.

oh boy.  what do we have on our hands?

i can freak myself out if i read into this.

i've noticed when i pick this child up at the bus stop in the afternoon, she asks me in a similar brutish monster like way, if i have a treat waiting for her in the car.  sometimes i have been known to.  she has translated that into, 'you should always have them waiting for me, and if you don't, i will be a horrid force to reckon with.'  aka bitch child.  veruca salt.

fun.

have a little homework cut out for me now, don't i?  david and i contemplated this morning sending her with a whole package of oreos in her lunch box.  wondering if that technique of no limits might get this weird sugar bug out of her system.  i have a friend who's done unschooling to some kind of extreme, i think,  and she's not limited any of the things we limit.  tv, sugar, bedtime, stuff like that.  i've always wondered if that would work for us.  it works for her.  she has no control freak inside her.  she trusts. how lovely that would be.

and on a side note,  i've heard people who crave sugar might be having a protein deficiency.   that is not the case here.  this is also the heaviest meat eater in the family.  that too can sound unhealthy.  i'm just saying, she gets enough protein.  and i'm a virgo moon.  me and limits are lovers i think.

this sweet child.  i heard myself as i said bye to her at school this morning, saying, 'bye sweet~thing,'  or something like that.  it was sweet~something that i said.  sweetie~pie?   i drove away wondering if i stop calling her sweet~this~and~that, if that might be a good start.  instead, maybe  i could call her miss manners.  or she~who~does~not~too~many~sweets.    something that at least sets the intention for one of the issues involved here.  or love~bucket.  i call her that sometimes and it feels good and whole.  a whole full bucket of love she is.  well,  there are three options i have to replace the sweety name thing.  i will start a list and work on that.  we had a nice simple random talk about manners this morning.  i kept it simple and non-accusatory, while also calling her on the rude language and manners.  just like pragmatically identifying it.  i am feeling hopeful.


saturday:

we had a blow out last night.  it was max and zhi and me.   (david and olive went away last weekend on an adventure that i will tell the tale of later, when i've settled more with it.  mmmmm, mystery!)

but, like i said before, sometimes i wonder if limiting the sugar / tv / gamesonphone / whatever~it~may~be~that~is~bad~in~large~doses, if the limiting is what the problem is.   ?    if actually,  they need to find their own stopping place on their own, their own internal desire to stop.  to say nah, i don't want anymore sugar.  mom, where are the  nuts?  so because i wonder that as often as i do, i let the reigns go yesterday.  they had a pretty sweet breakfast, pretty sweet granola and milk.  we had beans and rice and egg kinds of things for lunch.  huevos rancheros for max and i, and a brown rice and black bean/cheese burrito for zhi to be exact.  at dot's diner.    then i bring max to school and zhi and i go to a coffee shop together, while we pass the time max is at school,  and i say get what you want, basically.  whatever.  i feel relaxed about it today since it's friday afternoon...weekend time.  oh, i also let her play hooky.  my sister and her cousin were in town, they had just spent the night, and sending zhi off to school, after her dad and olive just left, and her favorite girls were in town, just didn't seem right.  so, she gets and italian soda and a (large) date bar.  she eats it all.  no big deal.  i had a rooibos tea.  with milk and honey.  and a few almonds.  cuz you all want to know what i had too, right?  then after we get max at school, we meet my sister and niece at the bakery.  i say have whatever you want again.   they split an izze soda, and each have a black bottom cupcake.  i have a ginger tea and an old b cookie. claire has an earl grey tea and a black bottom. juniper is asleep in the car.   then i take myself max and zhi to a movie.  claire and june go to another date they have planned.  we might have gotten pop corn at the movie, but i mixed the times up in my head for the lorax and the secret of arrietty, and get there just as the previews for arrietty are ending, so not enough time to get popcorn.  but it's 4:45 ish, so no big deal, to just eat dinner after.  after the movie, zhi asks if she can have a honey packet.  there are some at the concession stand she spots.  i say no.  we need to stop eating sweets now and get some dinner.  she gets really mad at me.  i get really mad at her for not being cooler about this.  we walk in silence to the car from the theater.  we get in the car, and i go on some rant about how hard it is to monitor their sugar, but if i don't they act like jerks and won't ever stop asking for it.  max had asked right as we got to the movies, if he could have a soda.  i said no, he had just had one that he had just finished 10 minutes ago.   i remind zhi how she will not feed her rats one tiny bit of anything with sugar in it, because we were told that sugar is very bad for rats.  i go on this rant and zhi cries.  max is just in a daze.  i drive us to the grocery store and say ok.  let's go in and get whatever you want.  and i am bitchy.  i say, you guys can get cake cookies ice cream whatever.  they won't get out of the car.  so we go home.  in silence pretty much.  we get home and i say just get in your pjays and we're going to bed now.  like i am totally not gonna make dinner.  i can't eat when i am mad anyways.  and i'm being a bad mom all around.  they get ready.  i get ready.  brush teeth. me and max.  zhi doesn't.  i notice this but don't say anything.  we all get in bed.  it's quiet and i'm tense.  zhi puts on her headlight and reads.  max just lays on his bed.  i lay down for 5 minutes and just swirl.  and then i guess i stop swirling.  i have this idea come.  i call them in to my room, on my bed, and to listen to something i want to tell them.  i have a hot water bottle on my bed that zhi notices and hugs to her belly.  we all sit down in a circle sort of way, and i tell them that i realized, after noticing what happened today, was that i like limiting their sugar.  that i did an experiment with them today by giving them almost as much as they asked for, and they acted like total assholes afterward, well, mostly zhi did.  AND they were still asking for more.  i said i am not gonna do that again anytime soon.  that i feel good about choosing to limit sugar.  and that i am gonna continue to do that.  they both seemed relieved.  we moved on and watched tom and jerry in bed together, and then they both slept with me.  slumber party in mama and papas bed.  just me m and z.  so nice.  i woke up at 2 am with zhi's foot in my face.  the blankets were more tangled than ever.  there were crumbs all over the sheets.  it was crazy and it was lovely.  i will do that again if given the chance.  slumber party with my kids after a fight in a grungy bed.  awesome.

i woke up the next morning and got my moon blood.  well that explained my horridness.  i can see now after writing that all out, that i am a full on control freak.  i just am.  take it or leave it.  it's a blessing and a curse.  i feel embarrassed to share the details of all that we ate on friday, because really it's not like they had that much sugar.  but they are sensitive.  i know these kids.  behavior goes down the tubes the more sugar they get.  they stop wanting to eat real food.  do i seem crazy?  sometimes i want to curse this society for targeting sweets to kids everywhere we go.  for blowing this culture's relationship with sugar into this huge obsessive unhealthy thing.  these little kids are so innocent.  that makes me crazy for sure.


sunday:

i asked zhi yesterday to tell me what i said to her after our fight friday night, in bed.  to remind me please, cuz i was curious how she remembered it.   she said, 'you said you did an experience and that it didn't work.'  she meant experiment.   then, i ask, 'how do you feel about  that, and about me feeling like limiting your sugar is the best idea? '  she says, 'i feel great about it.  i don't want to eat sugar all day.  doesn't feel good.'  and she's sincere.  and happy.  and connected as she says that to me.  looking me in the eye in a relaxed way.

mmmmmmmmmmm.  i want to say to her, then why do you ask for it all day long?  but i do not.  in a way, she's still just a baby, and this is a chance for me take care of her, and i'm glad it all went down the way it did.  she knows how much i care.  and she can say from experience, that she doesn't actually want to eat it all day.  she might just want to push up against me.  fine babe.  you can do that.  you can do that as much as you need.  i feel i am in such a better place with this.  before, i was questioning if i should be limiting them.  now i know, for me, for us, the answer is yes.   i doubted.  i lived.  and now i have faith in my decision....  for now.   ha.



monday:

limiting sugar intake is not fun.  even after my revelation, it is not fun.  i just wanted to say that after doing some limiting today.  limiting anything with children is not fun.  teaching them to night wean for example.  or to night pee in the potty.  limiting limiting limiting.  that part of parenting is not fun.  BUT.  knowing this is my way at the moment, helps.  it really helps a lot.  to not have the huge permanent question mark in my mind.  for now i know this works best for us.  and how lovely it is to have my girl affirm that too.  it's not gonna be easy breezy now, but it's better.  i love that we are talking about it.  that there's a dialogue happening that we can reference.  i like being relaxed.  i like setting boundaries.  i like having faith in the boundaries i set.  sometimes it takes a lot of work to find that faith.  worky work work work.

but listen.  this girl is just down right sweet.  look:



 everyone's wanted to kiss her sweetness since she was a baby.  love love love her.  just gotta find our balance.  hers as a kid, mine as a mama.  we are getting stronger and more balanced together.   another reason i get hung up in keeping my faith strong, is that scott noelle guy.  sometimes it takes me a while to find his daily groove.  he says nature follows the path of least resistance, and that parenting can too.  well sugar follows the path to tooth decay and ill health.  and if i don't resist it, i will be passively guiding my child to those outcomes.  however, i am not totally dumb.  i just space out here and there and can be very literal.   but when i go deeper to try and understand him, i feel like what he means, in relation to this situation, is that my path of least resistance is kind-of the one i ended up taking friday night after the fight.  talking.  in a circle.  calmly.  i wasn't resisting that and neither were my kids.  is that what he means?  wonder wonder.  figure figure.  i say yes!



and sew.  on to a little sewing report:

this love bucket has learned to use the sewing machine.

it is a pretty big deal.

those bee patch squares i got a while back on ebay?

she's sewing them into a patchwork something.  i think a pillow.  she's not fully decided yet.  it might be for her teacher who is a beekeeper.  i love that.  or her grandma who just had to say bye for this life to her husband.  i love that too.  she's so thoughtful.

she's a natural.   and i'm of course watching her every stitch right now, just about, being the spotter, controlling, virgo mama i am.

she's indefatigable with her sewing.


olive and i played memory match while zhi sewed.  she's a tricky player.  she likes to set the game up with some matches already in her mind.  such a cheater!  ha!   watch out.  and she DOES NOT LIKE IT when others get too many matches.  gotta take it slow with her.  however her memory is  better than most, but this child has not learned how to lose gracefully.  and you know, of course she hasn't.  we have to keep it fun and silly.  and us competitive adults, have to chill ourselves out and play at their level.  which is good for us.  so so good.  thanks babes.  you guys make me a better person every day.  thank you so much.




no wonder she wanted a honey packet.  but let's say we were bees.  as her sister bee, i'd have to teach her that we can't eat the honey stores all at once.  we have to regulate.  to make it through the winter.  and so we don't keel over from sugar overdose.  right?  oh.  the lovc bucket.  the love bucket of honey that she is.

really weird side note:  as a kid, i once ate from the honey bear until i threw up.  at about her age.  i was all alone in the house i guess, and just ate honey till i couldn't take any more.  i also did this with vitamins once.  sweet kids' vitamins.  when i was 5 maybe.   i probably can't see this all very clearly because i think i had a similar issue.  doing my best here.  yeah?  yeah.  dang.  so tricky!

shedder

the fun had this past weekend.

there was an impromptu feast with the dearest of friends on friday afternoon.  an early dinner at a dorky restaurant.  somehow it dawned on me afterward that it had the vibe of a feast.  the energy, the love, the children, 6 of them, the parents happily conversing with each other and the children in an unusual medley of harmony, not that typical feeling of constant interruption.  the shared margarita.  the early hour, so that when all was done, we got home and the kids to bed a fine early hour.  yay.

also, 

i made this ridiculous shirt.  i finished on saturday, just after the babysitter came.  i went over to the studio and hemmed it.  i like it and i am embarrassed by it.  but i've worn it three times now.  sometimes things are just flops.  this one rides the edge of flop so well, yet hangs onto the side of cute just enough that i can't decide.  i feel it is a shirt i will wear when i feel amazing.  when i feel i could wear anything and look cute cuz my energy is just that awesome.  and at those times, when i feel like a goddess incarnate, i may wear this shirt and give it some time to shine.  but if i'm feeling less than amazing,  i feel the shirt swallows me up and i look a little lost in it.  however.  both my girls really like it.  that might be all i need to know.  and my husband.  and another sewing friend  who i emailed a picture of it to, said she loves it and that i need to wear it out on the town....  ha!    however, in yesterday's out and aboutness, not one compliment on it.  hmmmm.  it's one of those, i~have~to~own~it pieces of clothing.  i was not owning it yesterday.  it's simplicity 1997.  i feel it coming in chambray too.

after finishing the silliness of that shirt, it was time to go.  dinner and a date with the husband,  ani and gregory.

dinner before going to hear the singers sing.  mmmmm.  it was very good.

there's ani down there.  all lit up.

(that's us waiting for the show to start.  i didn't bring my knitting.  i was fidgety.  but it was instant mesmerization once gregory started his set.  all the way through to ani's last song.  on the edge of my seat in love with spectating that girl.)

on sunday morning, the p90xworkout was the thing to do for david.  and he dragged me on into the experience.  it was pretty funny and fun.  the kids were very entertained by the whole deal.   they were swimming in the little pool david has in the studio.  peering out watching the weird adults.  the first 10 minutes were a yoga warm up.  then it got into martial arts/boxing types of exercises.  that's what was amusing to the babes.  mom and dad fake fighting with the air in front of them.  i am sore still, 2 days later.  mostly from the yoga.  haven't been doing that so much.  i like being sore.  it feels good.  

here are some of olive's colorings from lately.  i love her style.


she likes me to go through her coloring book and tell her which pictures are my favorite.

i chose these two yesterday.   not an easy choice.  i am noticing both my favorites have mushrooms.  hmmmmm.










the thread, of my last handful of posts continues on.  i feel that i am doing some serious spring cleaning.  of the shadows in my closet.  i LOVE doing shadow work.  it is so freeing.  all those stories, all those words, all these thoughts.  all these memories.  clearing.  healing.  accepting.  growing.   i say i love doing shadow work, and what i love is what i feel like afterward.  like a few days, or weeks afterward.  not right after.  right after is hard.  the integration of the new me, takes a bit of time.  you know, of course it does.  there's some vulnerability at first.  shedding skin.  that is an event.   the new skin is like a baby at first.  gotta cover it in mud for protection for a few days.  today, though, i begin to feel relief.  renewed.  regenerated.  for people who go through these experiences with me, you are warriors.  i couldn't do it without you.  you stay focused on the heart of the matter while i thrash.  that is not easy to do.  i do this for my loved ones too, i know it is not easy sometimes.

ok.  i feel the urge to move on.





ssssssss.


i was listening to the radio this morning and learned of story corps.  had a good cry driving max to his reading lesson.  i mean a good one, from listening to one of the stories.  i hope to listen to more soon.  and maybe read the book too?

love.

what i wants....

  when i think about what i want, it is not to have a blog where i share my crazy sad darkness.  i'd rather just show my gleanings and musings.  for one, though, i wonder how often i'd post.  once a month, right around ovulation?  for two, how many times have i been getdownonmyknees grateful for reading some other woman's words, where she bares it all, including but not limited to all the dankly dark grit, and how many times has the reading of others' stories been what's kept me from feeling completely alone in this experience of being the woman that i am?   and third, how many times, have i, been relieved, by sitting down and writing my stuff out?  how many?  a zillion.




(our burned mountain)


in thinking about how i've been on here lately, i wonder this.....
why don't people talk about stuff more?  i often wonder this, actually.  why do i feel so alone in sharing my hard times.   we go around with our 'i'm ok, i'm fine, i'm good' faces and words, we display that to the world for the most part.  because it's not acceptable to be real with our hard sad pain and anger.  it's just not.  our culture for the most part has shadowed it all to the back of the closet.  pack away your hard feelings.  put them in the suitcases and pretend they're not there.  it's like using the bathroom.  you're taught to go into a private space to be with these feelings.   ( and just for the record, i am glad we all go to the bathroom in private.  but i question going to the back of the closet for 'negative' emotions.) or the kicker for me is this:  i was taught as a young adult, just through experience, cuz noone in my life had been there for me the way these people began to be,  that the main best way to be with these unacceptable feelings was in a private room, with a person i'd never known before, and i had to PAY them to hear me express my hard confusing feelings. and PAY them to talk back to me.   it's a very very disturbing reality, i find.  a disturbing reality that i'm glad to have been introduced to.  i am.  if it wasn't for this psycho~therapeutic reality, i'd have self~imploded long ago most likely.  but still, isn't it sad that that's where our culture has brought us.  so many of us feel we have to go pay someone to listen to us.  so many families were shrouded in shaming  negative feelings.  i'm hoping to start a small change in this little family of ours.  talking about whatever, anything and everything, nothing is taboo to discuss.  parents are tuned in, maybe sometimes too tuned in to kids' emotional states in this house, and kids are pried open even.  i remember going to my teachers at school to talk about how sad i was at home.  that never worked.  i would be sent to some office to talk to some lady i didn't know about my feelings more, or worse, they would call my parents at home to tell them what i'd said, even after i begged them not to, and then i'd get in trouble at home,  for saying i had it hard.  'you think you have it hard?'  i got that speech.   how insane is all that?  us poor humans.  trying to be all cool and rise above stuff, trying to teach our kids to brush their feelings aside.  i remember being brought to church to tell the preacher what i had done, disrespecting my parents by sharing private home-stuff at school.  i remember my dad telling me to smile at this one christmas gathering at my step mom's parents' house.  i had been crying before we went over there, and he said if i did not smile the whole night i was gonna be in crazy big trouble.  you know, that might be why i have the biggest aversion now to faking my way through feelings.  not only do i have an aversion to it now as an adult, i can't even do it.  i have friends who can put on the most presentable face any time they have to.  and they tell me they're faking it.  cuz i ask.  they just have that skill.  i do not have it.  it sucks a lot of the time to not have it.  it makes my social skills look so piddly sometimes.   that might be why i love it, that at zhi's school, she is never told she has to share in the morning check in sharing circle.  it is TOTALLY fine if she wants to pass.  she passes every time.  i've said that before here i think, how she does this.  i just love it so much.  no shame for feeling shy.  if she wants to outgrow that she will.  but she will not feel shame for feeling how she feels.  she is pretty confident at school.  and she simply doesn't like to share with the whole group.  someday she may be in a class where it's required, but hopefully at that point, she'll have a really secure sense of herself, and it won't be so painful.  don't know.  but i'll be there cheering her on, and honoring her feelings.



i want to ask again, why don't people talk about stuff more?   actually why never really gets me anywhere but further into my head.  instead of going there, i'm gonna just share what i've noticed.  as a kid, i learned that the effect of sharing my truest sadnesses with people who i thought would listen and care, meant i would get in trouble at home.  i didn't want that again and again.  that was worse than dealing with the way things were.    i learned sort-of fast not to talk about my sadnesses.  it simply meant shame and spankings and trouble.  then as an adult, with my first baby, i learned pretty fast, that no body really wanted to talk about what it was like to have a baby with a brain injury and those big honkin hearing aids on his head.  i wanted to talk about it, with people who understood.  that's a big part of it.  sometimes our experiences are just very unique to us.  sometimes it is true that no one can understand.   it was impossible.   or maybe sometimes there were really kind souls who wanted to hear and inquire about how it was going, but my sadness then, would be so unbearable to me, that then I couldn't go there.  i'd stuff it in and just focus on the joy.  and that wasn't so bad.  the irony of that time, is that as painful as it was, i experienced some of my highest joys being with max as an infant.  that boy was magic, and it was literally impossible to not be sucked into his joyful vortex.  it still is like that, thank goodness.  when i get paralyzed in fear for him, he is the one, with simply his roots in the joyful present moment, that catches my attention and gets me to feel things other than just fear.  but life seems to sometimes do that to us.  gives us these experiences that for a while anyways, we have to weather alone.  or with a therapist.  that has been my experience a handful of times.  i am faced with feelings and experiences that just don't feel appropriate for anywhere other than the closet.  i was taught this.  we have all been taught this.  shame.  shame.  shame.  be perfect.  be perfect.  be perfect.  (maybe this blog could be called the shadows in my closet.  or maybe i need two blogs.  the shadow one and the light one.)

and what about with marriage stuff.  why is it so freaking taboo to get real on what it's like to be married?  when d and i were going through our 7 year nasty freaking horrific itch, there was nobody really, no woman that i knew, who was willing to say what it was really like to be married.  to share what the sexual relationship was like.  the psychological one.  the spiritual one.  buttoned lips were all i found.  or turn~the~other~cheek kind of advice (pervert pun!!).  that was unbearable.  so of course, back to the therapist i went.  david and i actually had one couple friend who tried to call an intervention when they saw what a bad space we were in.  that was brave and cool and i'll never forget it.  it helped.  that guy friend is who suggested david do the mankind project which was a definite turning point in our ability to connect deeply, on the level we were needing to.  that couple has since divorced, though.  we couldn't help them.  but they also did not go to years of couples therapy.

 you know, the skills required to guide people through feelings like these, traumatic feelings, aren't had by everyone.  so that's a good thing for me to remember.  it makes me feel like therapists are superheroes.

the other deal, is this:  it sucks to go into my pain and talk about it.  that means i have to feel it.  i'm guessing this is the biggest reason for why it's not done more, being real about hard stuff.  and to top that off, it sucks also to feel what it feels like after sharing hard stuff too.  it's so exposing.  after we've been wired to feel ashamed for sharing dark feelings, it is terrifying to do it.  BUT.  i feel like most of the time, if i shared my feelings with integrity, without shame, without trying to hurt anyone in the sharing, as much as it sucks, both during and after, since i've been an adult, and there is not fear of getting in trouble, there is some freedom that i gain, that does make it worth it.  a bit like childbirth.  there's just no way around the pain.  and then there is the almost guaranteed gain of more freedom.  for those of us who signed up to syphon pain through our systems anyways.  some of us, don't have a clue really, as to what would make a person need to share their stories.  that's ok.  but i am onmyknees grateful for the people who feel the need to and then do it.  they are my lifelines.  i wish my parents had shared their stories.  they were too painful i guess.

how much longer am i going to resist who i am, or what i feel?

how much longer am i going to feel lame for having to, needing to,  reveal my darkness?  even when i feel so held in people's responses when i do go dark.  i still want to ask why so hard?  just is.  i hear a therapist telling me that.  it just is.  gah.  crazy making.  i read elizabeth zimmerman's opinionated knitter book all saturday morning this weekend.  she was light and funny and got down to business.  i want to be more like that.  god damnit.  maybe i will be someday.  right?  maybe. maybe that's just my goal.  but i'm not that way now.  and the only way to get any relief from my darkness is to be with it and let it have space.  respect it actually.    to be real about it when i feel it, and perhaps someday, i really will feel very free.  and i will have mostly lightness and humor and ease to share.  and all that.  mostly though, what i want more than that, is to get to a place where i don't resist what comes through me.  where if i fear feelings, i don't fear them for long.  cuz i'll remember who i am, under the feelings, and that girl is not afraid to be herself.  she is strong.  and capable and here to teach like she's been taught, how to be cool with feeling what she feels.  how to feel unashamed of feeling what she feels.  how to say with words, both spoken and written, what she feels.  how to respond to others' feelings openly, honestly and fearlessly.  the feeling warrior.  heh.

there's something i'm getting about, yes this is hard.  really really hard.  and like max showed me when he was just a month, 3 months, 6 months old,  it can also be really really joyful. hardness and joy playing around together.  they happen at the same time.  if you know it.  if you look.  if you choose.  if you see.  he was so easy for me to see when he was so little.  he still is.  and he was so good at sharing his joy.  he still is.  and the girls are too.  if i choose.  they are so easy to feel joy oozing from their spirits.  and i can be like that too.  i got some good tastes of feeling myself happy last night, listening to the music we went to hear.  ani.  happy music high.  they don't negate each other.  the pain and joy.  i am feeling that as radical at this moment of insighting it.  like childbirth.  are the birth metaphors getting annoying yet?  they kind-of are for me.  but they keep coming.  it's not all like childbirth, obviously.  there are some pains we feel that don't necessarily guarantee we will walk away afterward with a baby, or something we could relate to as a metaphorical baby.  and still, i am wondering if even in these kinds of experiences, like when someone you love dies, there can still be times in the days, of joy.   i know this to be true.  and i need to write it anyways.  i want to remind myself of this.  and when those moments aren't here, it is time to honor the ones that are.   but maybe,  i'm getting an understanding i think of how people can struggle and seem so genuinely happy sometimes, even at the moment of feeling horrible internal emotional pain.  and maybe i'm  even getting an understanding of how those people i know, are able to turn on the 'fine' vibe when really if they are honest, they are not feeling fine at all.  is it some kind of reservoir they tap into, or some kind of knowing, that this fine channel is available too, and maybe switching to it cuts them off from current other feelings if they choose to change to it for the sake of being socially acceptable, which is why my friends who do this,  say it's not actually enjoyable to fake it like that, but maybe i'm thinking, that is how they do it.  they are genuinely rooted in joy and can switch to it if need be.  but it doesn't take them away from the pain that gnaws away inside, cuz it's needing its own time being tended to as well.


 my step mom and me watching soap operas.  that was the one time i remember feeling that i could trust her.  she'd do laundry then usually, and it was such a mellow hour, watching those stories on the tv.  we need our stories.  they are like some light in the dark for sure.  and some kind of trail map.  many to choose.  and she and i watched the saddest juiciest dramas together.  and felt comforted by them.   but she had no way, no resources or knowledge, for how to transfer her inner world to health.  that's all i'm trying to do.   it's a big process.


indefatigably

insouciant

my new favorite vocabulary words.  thanks to virginia woolf and elizabeth zimmerman.  learning me some new words.

i want to be indefatigably insouciant.  but i'm not.  and i bet you i never will be.  but here and there, maybe so, that would be cool.

mushroom

such discomfort in sharing my dark hardness.  and such appreciation for all of you who made me feel so not alone and so heard and seen.  somehow i know i need to get real about how hurt i've been, so i can get better and better, and sometimes the hurt me just rears up and says, 'hey you, i am so so hurt.  pay attention.  don't act like nothing happened to you.  you need tending.'  and then i tend, and it's somewhat shocking to accept it on those deeper levels, each time.   feeling pain on a level i kind-of never allowed myself to, each time.  endurance.  or something?    i really really feel so thankful for my angelic friends who meet me here.   thank full.  thank you.  i feel you are all as brave as i am being sharing, just by witnessing my pain.

so to give my discomforted self a little space, i'm gonna share some happy thrifting finds.  yeah.  sounds cool.  i'm really so depressed feeling, this better pick me up.  it sure picked me up to find these fun things last week.

but before that, i want to link to an old post of mine i just read, from back when i was pregnant with olive... reading my own old words is so nice to do sometimes.  soothing reminders of where i've been, and of knowledge i've gained and then forgotten, sort-of.  and that post in particular just resonated with me quite a lot.  similar themes i ponder round and round.  and how interesting that it was written at this same time of year.

thrifting.  first, it was just me one day, in a thirty minute window while max was at a lesson.  i skipped over to the nearest thrift.  i had been thinking for a couple days that max needed some new pants.  grower.  score on this day.  they had about 6 pairs of size ten pants that are just his style.  loose, comfy, thick cotton, mostly llbean, hardly worn.  woop!  that was freaking awesome.  i forgot to photo them.   but here's one shot of him in some.  as he stares at the tv.  with wallet in hand.    i'm telling you.  he is obsessed with counting his money.  could it be the jewish genes?  is that horrible to generalize a culture like that?  david does it with jewish culture stuff, but he's jewish.   he's allowed.  but i don't know if i am??  i think it's maybe like calling your friend a ni**a when you're african american.  only they can get away with that.  foot in mouth much??   keep me in check people.  anyhow.  max is set for a while on long pants.



alright.  then another day last week, olive and i stopped into another thrift shop one afternoon.  she picked out these fake flowers. i was hesitant to say yes.  in fact, i totally said no at first.   i have judgement on fake flowers for some reason.  tacky!!   but i let it go, seeing her passion for them. she did NOT want to put them back.   i am so glad i gave in.  she also picked out this tiny muffin tray.


okay. how sweet does it get?  little girls save the world i say.  so do little boys in their way.  but this is a little girl thing that just melts me.  SO glad i let go of my judgement on fake flowers.  cuz now?  now i am in love with them.  ha!  leave it to these kids to open this locked up mind.

her open imaginative mind.  heals me so much.


this little drawing was definitely saying zhi's name very clearly.  we framed it, with a frame from the thrift from long ago,  and it hangs by her bed now.  so sweet.  it turns out, her rats and our cats are sort-of friendly to each other.  pretty much just like in this picture sometimes.  there was someone's whole collection of drawings at the thrift.  so many sweet animal drawings.  we just got this one.  for a dollar.  sweetness.



and then.  olive saw a little rocker at the thrift.  i told her no. again.  that we still had one in the shed, that we had cleared out of the house a while back in a fit of needing floor space.  she remembered first thing when we got home to remind me to go and fetch it.  she got to rocking that baby right away when the chair was delivered to her.  rocking that baby in the sweetest tenderest way.  i could just fall over with adoration sometimes.  instead i grab the camera.



and here is a side trek, following zhi around outside, i got some photos i am smitten with too.


look at that angel boy.  all strong and healing up.  it's a slow healing though.  when he opens his wings up, you see the injury, the extent of it still.  it was massive.  love him so much.

the animal whisperer.  she's been that way all along.  it is a joy to witness.

2 more thrifted treasures:

this little piece of art here.  see the tab on the side?  guess how much kids like this?


push the tab down, and what does it say?


yep.

and then there's this wrought iron scrap from i don't know what exactly.  i think i am using it upside down here.  like maybe it was part of a light fixture?  well, i'm hoping it can be a candle holder.  but until i find a way to place it on the wall in a safe straight up and down way, it's a mushroom holder.  mushrooms are sacred.


so i'll just hold the candle till then.

i did not thrift this candle.  d gave it to me for valentines day.  i posed with it.  feeling moved this one afternoon to photo myself with a candle.  ha!  how funny are we sometimes?  i like the photos though.  so there.

love.

speaking of love.  i am excited to begin checking this site daily now!!!