12.06.2014 -- Supposition and Surprise

Life is full of surprises. (No, really.) 

This summer, we discovered that cheerleading as a sport fits Lucy well. It’s a natural, more social, step from gymnastics and tumbling. Maybe you are like me several years ago. You already know what you think about cheerleading, even though you haven't spent much time around cheerleaders. You went to school with cheerleaders. You saw what they brought to basketball games and football games.

Please read and complete the following phrases:

White people are:

Black people are:

Asians are:

Polynesians are:
Vegetarians are:

Football players are:

Ballet dancers are:

Computer programmers are:

Cheerleaders are:

Let me tell you what cheerleaders are. Cheerleaders are dedicated, tough-as-nails (get kicked in the face much?), hard-working, funny, and smart. Cheerleaders spend hours and hours building skills and fine-tuning group routines that are physically and mentally demanding. 

Some cheerleaders are *amazing* tumblers. Some have to work harder to get their skills. Some cheerleaders look like they might model on the side. Some have more unconventional looks. Some cheerleaders are dressed to impress most of the time. To some, fashion isn’t even an afterthought. 

Cheerleading is a team sport. Nothing quite fosters team building than literally lifting, supporting and catching your teammates when they fly or fall (or flail). It’s as much a team sport as soccer. I love soccer. I love watching kids run after the ball and pour their own energy into a collective effort. I love games in weather and how kids and spectators are reminded that people don’t shrivel up when we are out in the rain or even snow.

When soccer was Lucy's main sport, I felt fine mentioning it. Lucy has soccer practice... Lucy has a soccer game. Because of my own prejudice, I am still wary of talking about her involvement with cheerleading. How sad. The sport of cheerleading is great, it's just different.

One thing that separates cheerleading from sports like soccer is the preparation time. Depending on the coach, soccer can be as much as 100% competition. Soccer athletes could still play games (compete) without practices, but, like gymnastics or dance, cheer(leading) has a very different profile. Competition time comes in closer to 1%, with practice at 99%. Like most other team sports, if a teammate is missing, it can make a truly effective practice nearly impossible. 

Did I miss national coming out day? I'm

coming out, world. I am proud mother to a cheerleader, an athlete who loves her time in the gym and her team.

I love watching my daughter at cheer practice. I love seeing her and her team all giving 100% to be in the right place at the right time, to put those hours and hours of training to work in getting their jumps high and right, to contributing their own hard-won tumbling pass to the routine, to (literally) supporting their teammates or trusting their peers not to let them fall. I see these kids practicing and I see kids (yes, her team is all girls) who are learning about the value of consistency, dedication, and preparation. They are learning that they (literally) have the power to send themselves or their teammates flying into the air, and to bring them down safely. I see girls who, despite not being built the same, are confident in their own skins because they can do amazing things with their bodies. 

I love cheer.

The other night, Lucy and I learned how to do her team's competition hairstyle and make-up. I feel like a dance mom/gymnastic mom hybrid!

10.28.2014 -- Middle Child Blues

Parents have lots of problems built in, yet we make more for ourselves all the time. For example, I started our first in gymnastics classes when she was 3, and encouraged her to take as many classes as she liked. Now that (only) two other children are in the mix, and Lucy is even busier, 3 or 4 classes a week turns into 9 or ...17!

I never did the math, even though I reminded myself from time to time that the exponential activity explosion would happen one day. Probably the bigger "problem" here is me trying to equalize my parenting and time allotment from child to child. A noble idea, but impossible and maddening.

If I were wise, I would just accept that the oldest will have advantages that the others won't, and that the youngers will have advantages the oldest didn't. It seems so simple!

Take Gabe's Kindergarten experience. His is very different from Lucy's, although they are both enrolled in the same school and we live in the same house.

Gabe is in a Chinese immersion program.
The only program available to Lucy was the... English immersion program.

Gabe's school day is much longer than Lucy's Kindergarten school day.
Gabe eats lunch at school. Lucy never did.

I took Lucy to school every day.
Gabe often gets to walk or ride his scooter to school with Lucy.

This is the tip of the iceberg.

So...what does that have to do with...anything?

Well:

The other day, I got an email from Gabe's Chinese teacher requesting help from parents in her morning class. She explained that the afternoon class was getting along fine, but that the morning class was falling behind due to "behavior problems."

When Lucy was in Kindergarten, I got into her classroom regularly enough. Not all the time (I did have Gabe to care for, after all), but I was able to squeeze it in. Before yesterday, I hadn't spent any time at all in Gabe's class.

When I read that email, I decided that I needed to find a way to help in Gabe's class. Imagine how much stronger that resolve became when Gabe's teacher approached me one afternoon - when I picked him up after school - to ask me to come to class to help Gabe pay attention better.

I guess it never occurred to me that Gabe would have any difficulty in school. In retrospect, I think I should've been more aware. When Gabe is faced with something that is new to him, it's pretty normal for him to get frustrated to the point of withdrawal. I've tried to teach him to tie his shoes at least 20 times. It feels like fifty. He won't sit through it. Its like the instruction hits the "special kind of torture" receptors in his brain. His Chinese teacher explained that Gabe often just goes into his own little world and plays by himself while the teacher instructs the class.

So, I made arrangements and spent 3 hours yesterday with Gabe in his Chinese class. It was fun. It was eye-opening. It was exhausting!

It has been a long time since I've learned much that was truly novel. Until yesterday, I had forgotten how exhausting it is to be immersed in a foreign language. I remember being absolutely wiped out when I was immersed in other languages in France and in Africa. Those three hours of helping the teacher and reminding kids to stay on task and not talk while the teacher was talking was a great reminder of what Gabe is doing every day in school.

I made arrangements to spend a couple of days each week in Gabe's class. I had a hard time getting to that decision - chalk it up to mom guilt - but I found someone to babysit Charlie who I feel will add a lot to his world. I am so relieved to have time scheduled for me to focus just on Gabe!

10.26.2014 - The Rainbow Bridge

Zoey has gone to meet her maker.                                                   (Euphemisms fascinate me.)

I just realized that this means I'll need to update the blog description, so I might as well write something about it, too.

We (our family of five) took Zoey in to the vet for euthanasia a few weeks ago. It was hard. She had fallen a few times - her legs just gave out under her while she was standing there - so I made a few calls and scheduled the appointment we had been dreading for years. The vet, Joe Liljenquist, is a friend of Brian's so we may have gotten extra special treatment, but I doubt it. All of the staff were great. They even sent us flowers!

All of us, except Charlie, shed tears by the time we'd left Zoey, still warm but unmoving, there in the vet's office. Charlie seemed to think it was no big deal: Zoey was going to be an angel dog and to live with Grandpa Dave in heaven. This seemed alright with him.

Having not owned a dog before, I didn't really know what to expect. In retrospect, I think I could've made an educated guess. When I was a kid, my mom made a difficult decision to remove a pet cat from our home. I loved that cat a lot. A LOT. I cried hard when I found out. I could've guessed that I would react similarly to Zoey being gone.

One of my cousins saw an online post of mine about losing Zoey and responded with the text of "The Rainbow Bridge," which I hadn't seen before. What a lovely thought, that Rainbow Bridge where our four-legged companions wait for us... I hope it's true!

When I read "The Diggingest Dog" to Charlie, he often requests that I change the story so the dog, Duke, is Zoey. Whenever Zoey is subbed in for Duke, Charlie asks that I also substitute Charlie in for Sammy Brown. This is how I know that Zoey still plays a part in Charlie's story. We have enough pictures that I think Charlie will always have "memories" of Zoey, but I don't know whether they'll come from him or the pictures.

Brian and I got Zoey for our one year anniversary. She enchanted us with her impossibly blue eyes and velvet coat. She destroyed lots and lots of things we were attached to. She taught us what it was like to leave a crying "baby" in a safe place to learn how to self-soothe.

Fifteen years leaves a lot of room for memories: I have so many of Zoey. There were so many things I got to experience because of her. I came to know new places, new people, and new things about myself. I wanted to put "the sweetest thing" under her name on the memorial plaque we ordered from the pet cremation place, but Brian won me over when he reasoned that we should leave it at her name.

I'm not what some people call "a bucket-list person," but if I were, if I had to do it over again, if I could somehow benefit from my own life experience and advice... I would put "own an awesome dog for 15 years" on that list. (That's a lot of ifs, I know.)

10.25.2014 - Stress Writing

It has been a long time. What's that song? ....It's been a long, long time coming, Lucille?

Never mind.

Kenny Rogers is underrated... that gravelly voice...  the songwriting... I almost never listen to his music, but when I do, it gets me every time. Hey: did you know that at least several educated people believe that listening to music is super good for you? See?

If you follow those last couple of links, you will find links to studies/articles on how music reduces cortisol. Cortisol, the primary stress hormone, is great if you need to engage in fight or flight, but chronic stress (high levels of cortisol) makes many people's health goals harder to attain. It's a big deal.

Stress is on my mind, because I'm human and I'm an American! Kidding aside, though. Stress is a risk for everyone, as far as I can tell. Lately, I've been accepting stress in the forms of having our house on the market (uncertainty about the future), worrying about our kids (there's always something), and getting things checked off my Responsible Adult To-Do List (RATDL). 

Sometimes, I successfully flip stresses on their backs by breathing deeply, listening to music, chewing gun, exercising, writing, and letting go and letting God. It doesn't happen as often as I would like. (This is where I wanted to insert a gif of a turtle or a beetle stuck on its back, all of its legs wiggling uselessly in the air.) 

Internet: please make an gif of a turtle stuck on its back. 

Thank you. 

I did find this, however:

Huh. Before 10:45 p.m. on October 25, 2014, I was unaware that "Let Go (and let God)" is actually a song. I would really like to include a link here on the origin and history of "let go and let God," the phrase, not the song, but I can't find anything on the interwebs after my exhaustive 6 minute search. Here's a music video, though.

The above song by Dewayne Woods doesn't really do it for me, but at least now I know! (I love to know, by the way.) My amazing husband gives me a hard time, sometimes, for "being on my phone too much," but what I think he fails to understand is how often I am just using that phone to find the answer to a random question I have, or read up on something I'm curious about. I rationalize that this shouldn't count against me as "phone time," because I could be doing this with other resources, the phone is just faster and more convenient. Same with using my phone to communicate with friends. I feel so much better now that the world has access to my personal excuses on this publicly accessible blog! (wink)

Update on the kids:

I went to a gym sleepover with Lucy last night. We stayed up until 4:00 a.m. Many wise people collected their children before it got too late. They are undoubtedly much better rested than our family today, but it felt good to support Lucy and to get to know more people involved with her gym better. Three separate people decided to share their (unsolicited) opinion about Lucy. They love her. These things are good for a parent to hear.

Gabe has a new obsession passion: Skateboarding. Today, he spent a good amount of time lamenting his lack of skateboard instruction. He just feels that his dad has failed to adequately teach him how to skateboard. He IS five. That's a lot of wasted years! I'm going to have to work that parental shortcoming into his therapy budget. Gabe loves time with friends. It fills his cup. Love him.

One of Charlie's new things is his way of saying prayers: He has ditched the old format and in favor of his own. His prayers sound like Power Rangers adventures. They are different every time, so he has that going for him... Charlie loves preschool and loves the air of authority he commands by walking around with his fists on his hips. He's gotten very good at telling all of us what we ought to do at any given time.

Brian is busy with... well, mostly the same stuff, but not the same... (I don't REALLY know.)  ...Since nature abhors a vacuum, I will just say: Brian has been spending a lot of time thinking about how amazing I am and how lucky we are to have each other. He has been losing sleep trying to figure out how best to memorialize our love. He thought of buying a constellation, or having one formed with satellites. He thought of doing a sort of "Mt. Rushmore West" with our faces immortalized in stone - forever locked in a passionate kiss. Of course, I told him that was really too much, and that he could just rub my shoulders next time we are sitting next to each other.

Well, hello June!

What was I thinking? I was excited for school to end until it ended and I realized that my beloved children would be home all the time, making messes and eating all the time.

Summer Curriculum:

Swimming

Gymnastics

Music

Reading

Mathematics

*Cleaning/Organization*

05.02.2014 -- A Little Lower

Two things:

Miss Swan is like a three year-old.

Lowered Expectations is a principle that can be applied across many disciplines. Dating AND blogging, for example!


With that in mind, here is today's blog entry...

Gabe has been having pretty heavy seasonal allergies recently. The last few weeks. This has left his eyes red and his nose runny most of the time. Last night, Brian noticed that his eyes (one eye especially) were worse. One was swelling up, and Gabe was rubbing it like he had no choice.

After running to the store to get some Benedryl for what we both thought was allergies that had run amok, and giving Gabe 1/4th of a tablet, I looked at his eye again and recognized a swelling that I've had before. Cellulitis.  I know that there are more accurate words to describe his condition, but I'm not going to worry about it right now (Lowered, see? This has to go both ways, Dear Readers).

Plans for the evening went out the window in favor of getting Gabe to the doctor. The doctor prescribed eye drops for pink eye, and an oral antibiotic for the cellulitis. The prescription was supposed to be called into our pharmacy, but didn't show up in the pharmacists computer when we finally made our way to the front of the line in the drive-up window.

It was the most eventful wait in a drive through that I've ever had! Brian heard a customer yelling at the pharmacist from her car.  She had been there for quite a while. He got out because he could hear her trying to start the car.  He and another guy pushed the dead minivan out of the line then got our jumper cables and helped her jump start her vehicle. It must have been a rough day for her.

Speaking of antibiotics and prescriptions...  I heard on the radio the other day how differently nations deal with antibiotics.  Apparently, France uses a lot of them, Sweden, not so many, and in China...  In China, apparently, antibiotics are available over the counter and are used a LOT. What does this mean? Apparently, friends, we are headed for a post-antibiotic era.

I put a lot of links in the above paragraph in case you are interested in learning more about antibiotic and antimicrobial resistance. Here's another one.

     

Now. Before you leave this page, watch this:

03.25.2014 -- Ch-Ch-Changes

If I were the type to hyperventilate, I would be hyperventilating, I think.

My niece is going to have a baby.

This bumps me back a generation!

I got about 60% of my hair cut off today, and colored.  It turns out I have a decent amount of gray hair.

I like change, or at least, I like to say that I like change.  In reality, change makes me nervous. It makes my mind race. It makes me reevaluate my life and my choices more than normal, and I find myself trying to evaluate my life and my choices a lot even on the most standard days.

I have two nephews on missions.  Three nieces have graduated high school. Gabe will be entering  kindergarten in a few months, and Charlie will be in preschool.

I like change, I do.

I just want to be able to do things perfectly, that's all. I just want to be a perfect mom and a perfect aunt, a perfect wife... You get the picture. Sadly, I routinely forget birthdays.  I forget important meetings. I neglect to follow through on things like daily violin practice. I don't do laundry every day or even every week.  I hardly ever iron.

Sigh.

I have worry wrinkles.  Or are those deep thought wrinkles?  Let's go with deep thoughts.

There are some big decisions that weigh heavy on my mind right now:  Lucy has asked to reenter the gymnastics program at her gym.  That is a big commitment of money and time, but a worthy pursuit. Gabe will be eligible to enter a Chinese Immersion program at the local elementary school.  I have him in a Chinese/English Preschool right now, and he often complains about having to go. For me, the gift of learning a second language so young is such a valuable one, that I am willing to push him into it.  I almost don't care if he likes Chinese. ...And what if he loves it?  What if he falls in love with the language and the culture and moves to China when he's an adult and I rarely see him or my grandchildren?

See what I'm working with?

No wonder I have wrinkles.

02.16.2014 -- Ode to Zoe

Our dog, Zoey, seems to be on her last legs.  This is the sweet, sweet, sweet dog that has been with us for nearly 15 years.

In the beginning, she was velvety soft and incredibly destructive.  She chewed up hundreds of dollars worth of shoe leather and furniture.  Crate training was incredibly painful; she would cry when she was left alone.  We took her everywhere with us.

Then there were the years of boundless (truly boundless) energy.  She almost bounced around the house.  She was an amazing partner on long hikes and bike rides.  Although she could never be called an aggressive dog, she did start barking once at a man standing on the street in the dark while Zoey and I were out for a run.  It was the only time I have ever changed my running route because of fear.

There was a lot of destruction in these years, too, but by this time, we were used to it, even resigned.  It was toward the end of this era when we started bringing babies home.

Brian and I both not-so-secretly believe that we are Zoey's favorite, and the "alpha dog."  I can't speak for Brian, but Zoey seemed to act differently toward me when I was pregnant.  She wanted to snuggle more.  She liked to smell me more.  She was more gentle with me.  I am aware, of course, that this change in attitude that I seem to remember observing could be all in my mind, but that's what I remember.

She was intrigued by Lucy when we brought her home in the car seat.  We had tried to follow all the best practices of incorporating a baby into a dog's home: bringing a blanket home from the hospital first that smelled like baby, and giving her lots of love.  By this time, Zoey was 7 years old and had calmed down so that she wasn't jumping all over every person who came in the door.

We brought Lucy into the master bedroom, beside the gargantuan log bed made of Idaho pine that Brian and I had finished together.  We were sitting on a black floral love seat borrowed from Brian's mom.  Brian held our tiny Lucy, hair the color of honey, and I held Zoey by the collar.  Zoey started sniffing like crazy and almost started to quiver a little.  She snuffled Lucy through the pink blanket and I started to relax.  Then Zoey nibbled one of Lucy's tiny, perfect fingers, and Lucy began to cry.  In retrospect, I am sure I over-reacted, but instincts kicked in and I felt like I was on auto pilot when I pulled Zoey back fast and gave her a *very* stern lecture on not biting (nibbling) the baby.

She has been such a good dog.

Although we have called her Zo-dog here and there since she was a puppy, we switched to using mainly Zo-dog for a few years when the house next door became home to a cute little girl named Zoey.  It just didn't feel right to stand at the door and yell, "Zoey, come!"  when Zoey Burgess was doing nothing wrong.  Gabe differentiated them best by calling them Zoey-the-dog, and Zoey-the-human.

Zoey-the-dog is very patient with kids, although she does have her limits. She will not endure painful yanking or poking.  If kids are too rough with her, she snaps right out of her sweet, complacent state and gives them good, close look at her long, pointed teeth, and demonstrates a vicious snarl.  There are often marks left on kids faces.   This can mostly be avoided by explaining to kids that Zoey really doesn't like to be hurt and that she will never hurt you if you don't hurt her.

These days, I have put away the pills that are supposed to fix Zoey's incontinence, I have stuffed the dog diapers away in my laundry cabinet, and we just deal with dog pee spots.  The places Zoey likes to lounge (couch, ottoman and chaise lounge) are covered with blankets that get washed when they're compromised and I have become very skilled at cleaning carpets with our shop vac, dishwasher detergent, and copious amounts of hot water.

We're watching Zoey's lipoma lumps grow.  Watching her sometimes lose her footing as she wobbles around on the tile.  Watching to see if she's still breathing as she naps on clean blankets in her favorite spots.

These days, she either ignores most sounds or can't hear them.  She does respond to clapping.  Her eyes are the color of silver from cataracts.  She really seems to be content, happy even.

I don't want to think about our family without her.

Love that dog.

02.02.2014 -- Day in the Life

Lucy has curlers in her hair this morning.

For a while there, she wanted nothing to do with me as her personal hair stylist.  However, she has since come to the conclusion that maybe I actually can do her hair in a flattering way.  Of course, she hasn't said as much, but she has started asking me to do it for her again.  That's good for me.  I like doing Lucy's hair a lot.  It's one of those things in my day where I get to be creative.  I heart being creative.

Yesterday being Saturday, Brian and I decided we would try to get out skiing.  He went early to do some "big boy" skiing with the expectation that I would bring up the kids later.  Lucy didn't want to go.  She found even the idea of having to wait for Gabe tiring, I think.   She has turned into a really good skier.  Gabe is good, too, and can actually keep up pretty well with Lucy, but doing straight shots (no turns) doesn't build good habits, so Brian and I "make" him turn, turn, and turn.  This takes a lot longer.  He gets tired faster than Lucy does, too.

I ended up dropping Lucy off to play with cousins for the afternoon and took the boys up to Snowbasin.  Brian's phone had died from the cold, so it wasn't as straightforward a connection as we had hoped, but it turned out great.  I skied behind Gabe, and Brian skied down backwards with Charlie straddling one of his skis.  I don't know if there are times I feel more love toward Brian than when he does stuff like that.  He is incredibly patient and good.

After a few runs, Charlie was knackered,  so I left Gabe to ski with Brian and took Charlie down the mountain with me so we could get Lucy to her Suzuki Graduation.  It's a sweet thing to see dozens of kids performing together, knowing how much time has gone into building the skills they're displaying. And they're young enough that they haven't taken control of their faces yet, some of them.  Their frustration, concentration and excitement comes across loud and clear in their expressions.

Pretty cute!

01.24.2014 -- Learning Curve

A few days ago, the kids and I decided to make a maiden voyage to Brian's "new" office.  "New" in parentheses because they've been in this new building for more than a year.  Can it be more than 2?  It probably is.

The drive went much faster than I had anticipated.  Gabe started falling asleep, but we started a round of "The Storytellying Game" and it kept him awake.  The Storytelling Game is sort of like a live MadLibs/improvisational storybuilding game.  Most of the time I am "it," but Lucy will take a turn once in a while and even Gabe will if his mood is right.  I was happy that when I stopped the story and got Gabe to fill in the blanks, nothing had to do with poop or farting.  (It's the small things.)  No, this story was about a boy and his giant (as big as a building) wolf.  Charlie added a tiger to the story.  I forget how the story unfolded exactly, but there were mice involved and magical shrinking.

The kids were beyond excited to see Brian's office.  He joked that he had to have them come so they wouldn't wonder any more if he actually does leave for work every day.

After the grand tour, we all piled into Brian's truck and headed south to a favorite burger joint of his.  Lunch went reasonably well.  There was that episode of a cup full of Powerade spilling all over, but it mostly ended up on the floor.  Eight years into this parenting thing has left both Brian and me very skilled with paper towels and/or napkins, so it was no big deal.  I was even able to lure a company guy over with his mop and bucket to get the job done right.

On the way back to Brian's office, Gabe said something in the back and I didn't really focus on it well enough to "get it" until he had said it a couple of times.  What did he say?  "Boy, I'm going to have to take a bath when I get home..."  Zero urgency.  I looked back at him to see what he was talking about and saw that there was something on his arm.  It kind of looked like a bandage, like he had found something funky in Brian's truck and wrapped it around the upper part of his wrist.  (This is very unlikely, due to Brian's extreme car/truck cleanliness.)

While I was still twisting around in my seat, trying to figure out what Gabe was talking about, Gabe started to send his chin forward a little.  That's when I realized what he was talking about and alerted Brian.  "Gabe is throwing up."

Silly kid.

While we cleaned up on the side of the road as best we could, I told Gabe that no matter what, if he is ever in a car (or truck) and feels like he has to throw up, he can and should yell it out and we wouldn't care.

When I was young, I was with a friend and her family on a ride somewhere fun.  I had been screwing around with the power windows right when we got in her dad's car, and I was quiet until he parked at our destination and turned off the car.

"Excuse me," I said.  Mr. Stanford turned around after I said this a couple of times.  "Could you please roll down the window?"  He looked at my hand, which had been up at the top of the rear window the entire drive.

"Why?" he asked.

"My finger's stuck in the window."  This episode isn't incredibly clear in my mind, but I'm pretty sure that's pretty much how it went down that day.  When he asked me why I didn't say anything, I said, "My dad told me that we shouldn't disturb the driver."  And that was true, but I think that mostly I just felt dumb for having been messing around with the windows (which led to my friend's dad locking them).

I would like to report that Gabe learned to speak up when he felt sick, but a few days after this, he launched barf all over the floor at the gym where he and Lucy take tumbling classes.  After I cleaned up that mess, on the way home, he gave me a glimpse into his mind.  "Mom," he said, "When I was on my way to the bathroom and I was throwing up, there was a girl texting and she saw me throw up and she said, "Ew! Gross."  He was so embarrassed, he left the building.  We found him standing beside the door outside.

Maybe next time he will make it to a can.

01.19.2014 -- People Lover

I'm not really good at answers...unless they're in essay form.  I can get a "yes" or "no" out, but it's still painful, despite a lot of years trying to train myself to "just pick one." It's much less stressful for me to practice thinking and talking and exploring ideas.  (And that leads me to my post today!)

People are like art.  Don't you think so?  Or music...  People are like art and like music.

Here's what I was thinking.  People are fascinating to me.  I love them.  The problem with a statement like that is that it has no oomph.  It's way too general: "I love people."  It could mean a lot of different things, really.

First, what does it mean, to "love people?"  Does that mean that I... like humanity?  Really?  You LOVE every individual in the world?  That's a hard sell, frankly.

I guess appreciate might be closer to what I mean.  Even with a word like appreciate (that allows for the inevitable distance between me and nearly all of the rest of the human race) it still rings a little false.  How can I appreciate what I don't know?  Even what I do get a chance to observe is only a fraction of a fraction of everything human that could be observed...  No, appreciate doesn't really work, either.

But what about art?  What about music?  It's not too strange to call yourself an art lover or a music lover, right?  What fits under the art umbrella?  Cave painting, impressionist daubs of hand mixed paint, simple pen and ink, sculpture, installation art, photo realism...  Art is something that we can experience with our eyes (and sometimes other senses) that is made to evoke a response from us or tell a story.  (Yes, that definition is mine.  Here is a much better qualified definition. ) Art is an effort to capture beauty, initiate change, make us curious, frighten us, terrify us, or educate us.  And music is just as broad.

Music... At Thanksgiving dinner this year, a brother-in-law of mine said he was thankful for music.  When you stop to consider how music enriches your life, you might find that you become more consciously grateful for music, like I did.  A parent's lullaby, a soaring movie soundtrack, deathmetal scream fest, the latest top pop song, the unfamiliar rhythms from someone else's continent...  Music is amazing.  Music, for me, gives my soul room to spread when it connects with my own emotions.

I'm fascinated by the difference in what people connect with, too.  I've heard from a lot of people that deathmetal is relaxing.  For me, it's the opposite.  To some people, though, music that makes me angry, lets them feel peace.  That's what I've been told.  But I'm not trying to talk about art or music.

I want to talk about people.

No, I don't know every individual incredibly well.  Obviously.  I probably only know a handful of people really, really well.

But I love watching people live their lives.  I love trying to be aware of what secret histories may motivate him or her.  I love seeing similarities and how they combine differently with different character traits or lifestyle choices.  Maybe I can draw a comparison with music and Pandora here.  Put the name of a song into Pandora, and a complex decision procedure will search out similar songs using nearly 400 different attributes.

Here's a bit from the wikipedia description of the Music Genome Project: each 

 "gene corresponds to a characteristic of the 

 music, for example, gender of lead vocalist, level of distortion on the electric guitar, type of background vocals, etc. Rock and pop songs have 150 genes, rap songs have 350, and jazz songs have approximately 400. Other genres of music, such as world and classical music, have 300–500 genes. The system depends on a sufficient number of genes to render useful results." 

In art, of course, you have hundreds of attributes as well.  Has anyone done an art genome project?

(Well, I'll be darned.  Look here.  Then look here.  And here.  Amazing.)

See?  I love people.  I love trying to become aware of an individual's unique collection of not-so-unique attributes.  I love seeing those unique personalities react with a person's past and present story, and their environment (macro and micro).  (This is as good a place as any to add that if I've ever told you that you remind me of someone, it's just that I've noticed some attributes that I think you have in common.  It doesn't mean I think you've somehow been cloned.)

I love people. 

(Incidentally, being a parent is a pretty good position to hold as a people lover. Lucky me!)

01.05.2014 -- BICHOK

Butt In Chair, Hands On Keyboard: BICHOK.  (The/A secret to productivity for writers.)

Warning:  This post is messy.  It may not        

really have a point and it's vague most of the     

time, but my butt is in my chair, and my hands.... 
You get the picture, right?   If you enjoy unbridled 
philosophizing by lay philosophers, by all means, 
read the whole thing!                  

I've seen a meme on the internet lately that says....  .....hold on.  (I'm sure I can find it and put it up for some visual stimulation....)

 ...Don't mention it.  It was no trouble.  To be honest, I am a big fan of visual aides, too.

What do you think?  

Here's what I think:

First of all, when I was in high school, I had some long, written conversations (notes passed back and forth) with a friend in math class. The only "conversation" I really remember is the one we had about Love and Passion.  My friend argued that Love was stronger and better.  I argued for Passion.  

I see his point now.  I could argue still for Passion, but it would just be for fun.  Love is bigger and deeper.  Love includes patience and self-sacrifice.  Love is like the ocean. Passion like a wave.  High School Me might've said that Passion is the wind that fills the sail.  (Pretty sure I did write that.) Middle-aged Me would say that Love is the ocean that holds the boat.

So...  My views have changed over time; but that's almost unrelated, isn't it?  This meme that I've posted above isn't really about "Passion."  It's about "Love."  At least that's how it seems to me now. This could all be debated.  (It could be a looong debate, too, because I like the give and take of debate and I'm pretty undisciplined...)

I bet there are a lot of people out there who think about their calling(s?) in life.  For me, it has been something I've come back to since...  well, since I started to think about the future.  Probably when I started playing house or playing school with friends, and when I actually thought about the perennial question adults ask kids: "What do you want to be when you grow up?" 

...A teacher.

That was always my answer--until I realized there were, oh, a million different jobs and not just 10:  a teacher, a fireman, a doctor, a lawyer, a farmer, a banker, a police officer, train engineer, artist and a pilot.  Of course, those are random, but eight year-olds don't usually consider careers in Public Relations Management or ... Sheet Metal.  I always said I wanted to be a teacher, but I think I really just wanted to be a mom.  I've also wanted to be a doctor, a writer, and artist and... a teacher.

 

***

 

pas·sion  noun \ˈpa-shən\: a strong feeling of enthusiasm or excitement for something or about doing something

Passion.  Now we're getting somewhere.  An exact definition helps.  

Using this definition, I am going to spend a few minutes trying to list my passions:

• creating
• seeing/helping people grow, develop or learn
• learning
• science
• psychology/sociology/why people act the way they do
• language
• art
• seeing compassion and empathy increase in the world
• recognizing and making visible diverse beauty in the world
• the value of labor (work)

What would your list look like?  How many of the passions in your life do you get to dabble in daily?

01.03.2014 -- Miracles Do Happen

Until tonight, I hadn't realized that I've never had a drama-free violin practice session with Lucy. 

But it is possible!  It happened!  Amazing!

Exclamation marks!

I know, she doesn't look very excited.

In one of my last posts of 2013, I wrote some questions.  Here they are again with their answers:
 
1) Will my kitchen table ever again serve as anything other than a (messy) Christmas staging area?

• Yes!  As I wrote on Christmas Eve, we did eat dinner on the table.  And that surface became a prep space directly afterward.

2) Will I address and send all of the Christmas cards I have before the 25th?

• I ended up needing more than I had....

3) Will Lucy practice her violin again before performing with the local Suzuki Strings group?

• Nope.  But it turned out well anyway.

4) Will any of my children make it to school this week?

• Lucy made it back for Friday.  Little victories.

5) Will Gabe ever go to preschool again?

• Yes!  And although he complains A LOT about going almost anywhere, including birthday parties, he is satisfied and happy when I pick him up.

6) Will my children discover my Christmas gift hiding spots this year?

• Nope!

7) Will I ever again get to go to my adult gymnastics class to learn the art of artfully flinging my middle-aged body upside down and rightside up again?

• Yes!  But this is still hard.  I can't seem to get the world to stop allowing other things to happen on gym night.