This is the Life

My son is learning to play Monopoly. He is passionate about it. When he is succeeding (which in his world is buying properties, he has little interest in collecting rent -- like his mother, he is better at spending than he is buying), he leans back, laces his fingers together behind his head, and states, "this is the life".

I have at times, questioned my path, but it is moments like this that bring my life in clear perspective. Today, I watched my son walk a balance beam. I watched my daughter inhale a milkshake in the lap of her great grandmother, smiling with each sip and slurp. Together they splashed me like the Titanic going down as they demonstrated their ever-growing swim skills in our small backyard pool. And as I write this, he is setting up the Monopoly board yet again.

So as the summer days wane and I look to the scheduling serenity of the school year, I am taking this moment to embrace the last of the summer chaos and remember that yes this is the life!

Day 216 or April's Fool

Okay. I am still recovering from my blogging injury but I couldn't let the first day of April pass without acknowledgment. I love, Love, LOVE Spring. It is my favorite time of the year. Here in Austin, we are having a glorious spell of weather. While I wish I could enjoy it pain-free, I am committed to enjoying it.

So if it's lovely where you are, go revel in it for me. :-)

Also, today is the last day of my giveaway. Now in retrospect, April Fool's Day was probably NOT the best day to complete a giveaway. But it is no joke -- I have a great giveaway. In fact, I would say FABULOUS giveaway. It is a Little Tikes Turtle Sandbox. I wish I could enter myself. But alas, I can't enter my OWN giveaway, but you can. You have through tonight if you haven't entered. Please click here to check it out.

So since I am still nursing my shoulder, I thought I would share a little April Fool's History. I found this at Wilstar.com. I thought it was interesting.

Unlike most of the other nonfoolish holidays, the history of April Fool's Day,
sometimes called All Fool's Day, is not totally clear. There really wasn't a
"first April Fool's Day" that can be pinpointed on the calendar. Some believe it
sort of evolved simultaneously in several cultures at the same time, from
celebrations involving the first day of spring.

The closest point in
time that can be identified as the beginning of this tradition was in 1582, in
France. Prior to that year, the new year was celebrated for eight days,
beginning on March 25. The celebration culminated on April 1. With the reform of
the calendar under Charles IX, the Gregorian Calendar was introduced, and New
Year's Day was moved to January 1.

http://wilstar.com/holidays/aprilfool.htm

Day 215 or Ouch!

So I am not posting tonight because I just threw out my shoulder. Bad. You know my blogging shoulder and like any great athlete, I have to know when to step out of the game and see the trainer. So please forgive me if I don't visit for a day or two. Ice might be good for a shoulder but it is terrible for laptops!

By the by, tomorrow is April 1st, the Pagan New Year and while I am not pagan, I am so open to a new New year. After two horrible illnesses, the loss of a beloved family member, four cavities in my daughter's mouth, and now this, I am ALL about a reboot. Now if you are thinking I already re-booted at Chinese New Year, you are right. But just like my aging Dell, I need another reboot. So happy new New Year, y'all. See you in 2010, version 2.2!

Day Sixty - Five -- Halloween

Halloween is the beginning of my favorite time of year. The air starts to get cool and crisp even in Texas and to me it marks the start of the holiday season. Not Walgreen's Christmas decorations next to turkeys and clearance jack-o-lanterns holiday season. It seems that Thanksgiving is almost forgotten in the rush from orange and black to red and green. But I treasure all the holidays and I need those more subtle browns and yellows that fall between.



So after an almost coma-inducing sugar high (no, I'm not speaking about the kids -- I love Halloween candy. The opportunity to have a Milky Way and a Three Musketeers in one bite is a little slice of heaven. Oh, and candy corn and the array of alternate flavors that Tootsie Rolls are available in and... well, you get the picture) I start pulling out sweaters and boots and packing away tanks and shorts.

And I start to dream of turkey and dressing and all of the other delicacies of the day. But it's not really the food I crave, it's the collection of mismatched tables shoved together that are never the same height but we seem to ignore because the table cloths match. I long for the uncomfortable familial pauses that start to melt as the room temperature and the spirits rise. I cherish the moment when the masks fall off and the smiles rise to the faces with less strain and more heart. That is when turkey day becomes Thanksgiving for me.

And so I try to take it slow from October 31st through the New Year. Not forgetting to say thanks between haunted house and the trip to Santa, not just on the day but all the way through.

Day Sixty or Slow Down Pt. 2

So a couple of days ago I told the story of learning the lesson of slowing down. Well evidently, Officer H. isn't the only one sent to teach me this lesson. So is my daughter.

My gorgeous, loving, stubborn, infuriating, piece of perfection pie daughter.

I have also mentioned in past posts that she is firmly in the "I do it myself" stage. She doesn't want help no matter how ridiculously out sized she is for the task.

Well, I've noticed a trend. The more I want her to hurry up and complete a task. The slower she goes. And if I try to insist on helping, well, she has to start all over. So as we were dancing this dance for the 5th time today, I got it. (Don't tell me I'm slow on the pick-up!) If I would relax and give her space, she would either complete the task or ask for help but in my impatience I was making everything take longer. Just like the ticket that I got because I was afraid I would be late that became the reason I was late.

I think that life is that way too. Maybe one can want something too much. We rush it or squeeze the life out of it. Who knows where any of us would be if we changed even the slightest things? I sure don't know. I know this, though. Maybe if I'd gotten what I wanted, I wouldn't have gotten what I needed. And maybe, just maybe, if I can learn to slow down, I might find everything I want all in its own time, like a two year old learning to do it all by herself.

Day Fifty - Eight or Getting Ahead of Myself

So I got a great lesson in slowing down today.



As I mentioned previously, I have been under the weather as of late. (What does that phrase mean "under the weather"? Are we ever over the weather? I mean, I've heard of Over the Rainbow but where is Over the Weather? All right, all right, I digress.) I've been under the weather so long that my two-year old daughter has taken to asking in her delightful two-year old dialect "You betta mommy? You not sick animah?" (translation -- anymore) You know it's bad when your child wants a daily health forecast.

So despite being less than 100%, I had my teaching gig today. And before you worry, I am not contagious!!! I have a couple of conditions (of which I will spare you the less than exciting details) that cause me to feel rotten for a long time after I am a carrier of anything. I have no cough. My temperature has stayed safely below the 100.3 marker and I have the "okay". Most importantly, is that I LOVE my kids. Teaching is a real passion and I would NEVER do anything to endanger my kids. So I hope that is cleared up. Now back to regular programming.

This morning. I was moving slowly and I left a little late for work. SO what does one do when they are running late? Certainly not speed. Certainly not me. So of course those were not red and blue lights spinning behind me. No, not me. Not this morning. Not when I am already running late.

The truth is, I needed to slow down. I was actually stopped by a truly nice officer who only gave me a warning, despite the fact that my husband forgot (AGAIN!) to put the new insurance card in the car. ("It was in my wallet, babe" is not helpful when the officer needs proof.) He was nice enough to say that I wasn't speeding too badly -- only 58 in a 45. Whoa! I'd hate to see bad. But really, what was I doing? I was so caught up in my anxiety about being late that I had no idea how fast I was going. As I said, I needed to slow down.

Now I should interject here. I hate, Hate, HATE being late. Although I am not nor ever have been together, I am usually punctual. I literally get physically ill when I am running late. But...

I needed to slow down. So I sat there while the gentleman (he really was!) filled out all the computer info and I thought about the fact that I had lost sight of what I was doing in the moment and was worried about what might happen if I was late. If I was late. Here's the kicker. It took twelve minutes to get the non-ticket and I was six minutes late! So, even with my less than average math skills, I wouldn't have been late. I would have had SIX minutes. If I had just slowed down. So thank you Officer H. You were right...

I needed to slow down.

Day Fifty - Three

I have a tremendous fear of depression. I have seen too many people I love immobilized by it so I have spent much of my life running from it. I see now, however, that running from something doesn't necessarily get you anywhere.

When my brother died, I never stopped just to be sad. I was so intent on "living" and "doing" and "succeeding" in honor of him, I never took the time to take in the profound loss in my life. I had grad school auditions to prepare for and I was hell bent on getting into a good school. I was successful. I got into ACT in San Francisco, a fabulous school but then proceeded to spend my first year there doing the mourning I ran from the year before. (Sorry to my classmates as some of my acting exercises became informal therapy!)

Today, I run in a different way. I focus so hard on having a forward-looking positive attitude and a dream for the future. Which sounds terrific. Except that I sometimes have the blinders on to today -- to life, both good and bad. While I might skim over some rough parts of life this way, I also skim over some real happy moments, as well.

That's one of the reasons I started this blog. So I would stop running at least for a few moments a day -- to take stock and to see my life as it is today, not as simply another box to check off towards tomorrow. Life is not a giant to-do list. And if I don't stop running, I'll look back at a calendar full of "X"s but no real memories. And that may the most depressing thing I ever heard.