the weekend

things have been busy.  the last...three or four years...i've just totally lost my feet...the horse has been dragging me...i feel beat up...disoriented...hurt...even a little bruised, but i'm sure that's just from age and not my metaphor. 

we drove three hours friday night so my two middle boys could compete in our regional rock climbing qualifier.  this allowed them a chance to qualify for divisionals.  which will be a two hour trip (one way) in january, but i'm not complaining.  (well, not a lot...)  we stayed in a hotel friday night, took our three younger kids swimming (and that oldest younger kid is thirteen and in a swimsuit, his father and i really had a chance to appreciate how much he's grown...how big he's getting...i know his father noticed because we gave each other the same look at the same time and i just knew what he was thinking and he just knew i knew and i knew he knew i knew...after being together for almost twenty years, this is huge to have these moments in the midst of our chaotic life with five children).  anyway...digress much? 

i think the swimming was what did it.  i didn't even swim.  but my husband and kids had a blast.  i could tell he was all tanked up on those good feelings you get when the toddler who normally runs from you is jumping into your arms and yelling "daddy???  are you re-dee???"  and doing little butt shaking, wing flapping butterfly dances before she jumps to you.  i could tell he was drunk off of the puddle she'd melted his heart into.  but then there were also the swimming races with the thirteen year old.  anyone who has teenage boys knows (please tell me you know...humor me...make it up if you have to) there are those alpha male moments....where a simple race becomes the stuff that legends are made of...or movies...like remember the titans and, well, mommy dearest with guys.  where he's just playing with his son, but then somewhere between the start and the middle, it's like he's competing against someone trying to take his family...and he suddenly HAS to win...his family, his pride, his i don't even know what is on the line.  it's enough to make a middle aged dad pretty sore in the morning.  well, combined with all the dolphin rides for the pretty butterfly princess.

so it was tough getting everyone up in the morning.  if we were one of those families that did a million things and did them on time, then we might have been able to get into bed and get adequate sleep and be physically prepared for our next day.  but since we didn't get to the hotel until 9:30, and swimming took about an hour, well, the kids didn't get into bed until about 11.  or so.  and 8 o'clock came awfully early.  but we made it up and got our things packed with minimal arguing (hey, cut my husband and i some slack...we were tired) and made it down to breakfast at a reasonable time. 

now, i don't know if it's because we're a big family...maybe because my husband is the youngest in a big family....maybe because we've had some lean financial times (i always laugh when i say it that way...a family of six on school loans..."lean financial times" is kind of a joke...but i'm digressing again)...  anyway, my husband cannot turn down free food.  buffets are a terrible idea for him.  he always eats to the point of making himself kind of sick.  and breakfast was no different.  and it is hard to be sympathetic toward a man who is hurting because he over-ate.  again.  for the bla-bla-bla-th time in the twenty years you've been together.  add to that, him being sore from the fairy princess/testosterone driven episodes in the pool the night before, and you've got a dude in a pretty sad state of affairs married to someone who is just not feeling it for him. 

yes, we've gone from parents weathering and tolerating with love our children's tantrums to tantruming in front of our kids, getting overtired or underprepared and pissed about it, and hoping our kids will just stay quiet through it all so as not to turn any of our irrationality on them.  and they complied.  which i hope, in some way, is an indication of the good parents we used to be...but that's only to make me feel better about being so out of it lately. 

am i digressing again?  i'm not even sure what i was writing about anymore...

anyway...my guys competed.  it was awesome.  my fourteen year old is so tall, he was able to skip most of a route just by reaching up to the finishing hold and putting a finger from each hand on it.  he looked down at the judges like "is this legal?" and all the judges just started laughing and applauding.  he is really tall.  and he won first place in his category.  my thirteen year old won sixth place, which is a pretty decent showing for a guy just short of two years younger than his bigger brother and probably eighteen inches shorter and competing in the same category.  they had so much fun.  climbers are so fun to be around.  climbing families are just a wonderful family to be a part of.  they're a little well-to-do...but if you can look past that, they're pretty generous, kind folks.  and it was a good time.  the drive home was kind of brutal, with all the tired and cranky and sore parents, but the kids slept and we made it.  everyone promptly got into their pajamas (hey, it was 7 o'clock....that's not too early) and talked as little as possible.  well, the spouse and i talked a little.  i have to admit, as annoying as he was this weekend, he's kind of cute when he's all pathetic from overdoing it in the good-dad category...even if he does need to start taking better care of himself so he can handle this stuff better....  oh, wait.

ahem....  this morning has gone pretty well.  i'm grateful.

peace

another set of good words

i wanted to link to this blog post i read a few days ago.  man, did i need it.

http://holdontoyourcatholickids.blogspot.com

we'll see if it works or not.  the name of the post is unschooling, re-attachment, and spiritual development...fyi.

peace

good words

i had a lovely thanksgiving holiday.  considering i'm going through a sort of rough patch in life, it feels good to say i had a very lovely thanksgiving holiday.

one of the lovely things that happened this holiday is that i got to spend some time with my 89 year old grandmother.  she'll be 90 in may.  she told me that she isn't partial to any of her grandchildren, that she loves us all the same.  she's told me this before.  i believe her.  but this time, she told me that she wanted to see me and my family because we are not in town often and she knew she wasn't going to live much longer.  (if you could've seen her pull herself into my sequoia...that woman's still got some spunk left, lemeetellya...)  anyway, after telling me that, she then proceeded to say something i will think about for the next ten years or so. 

she was telling me about a situation with my cousin, years back.  my cousin's mother was getting remarried, and my cousin didn't want to attend her mother's wedding.  my grandmother wouldn't tell her she should go, but she wouldn't tell her she shouldn't go either.  she told her to pray and see what God told her she should do.  then she told her...and this is the part that makes me cry because i wish i'd been asking my grandmother for advice my whole life...that she should remember that her mother might feel like my cousin was doing her a wrong by not attending...and that my cousin might forget about this situation before she ever had a chance to make it right with her mom.

most of the things i remember my grandmother telling me are kind of mean...if i forgot something, it must've been a lie...if i stuck my tongue out at my sister, my grandmother would say "i wouldn't want that nasty thing in my mouth either"...stuff like that.  she was a strict german grandma.  not highly educated.  i don't think she finished high school.  but she was, and still is, one tough woman.  and she's simple...in a direct sort of way.  she smelled really nice this holiday.  when i asked her, she said it was her "dusting powder."  but she's never been really talky.  she was kind of bossy when i was younger, but she didn't always have a lot to say.  but this idea of not making a choice that someone might feel wronged by...or at least the idea of considering that when making your decision.  and the idea of losing an opportunity to right a wrong.  these are beautiful, beautiful things.

and understand something...my cousin's mom?...she's not any sort of mom of the year.  she's done some pretty awful stuff...to my cousin, to her sister's, to my grandmother's son who's her ex-husband.  she's got some pretty big addictions and issues.  but my grandmother doesn't hold that against her.  she just sees her as her granddaughters' mother, her son's ex-wife, someone her life will always be connected to, someone she once loved a lot and probably still loves...without partiality...equal to all of us.  which is cool also. 

i'm not such a great writer these days.  it's hard for me to capture what i feel, what i want to say in words.  that's part of why i don't blog much lately.  it's a pride thing.  heh.  but i wanted to write down these good words from my grandmother.  and i just wanted to write about her a little bit.  about her smile...she lets her eyes do most of the smiling these days because she's self-conscious about her teeth (she's only got a few left).  about her skin...that's smooth and light and thin.  about her hair that she wore permed and kind of poofed for so long...and how much i love it grey and straight.  and can you believe she told me a story about a guy hitting on her a few years ago?  and how she told him to go on.  and she giggled the whole time.  she tickles me.  and makes me proud.  and makes me humble.  i hope i can pass on some of the things she's brought to my life.

peace

looking back

i've seen some posts on my facebook today about what people were doing on this date, eleven years ago...

i was at home with my two little ones (my second and third borns), watching sesame street.  my friend, maria, who has since died of cancer, called me because she knew i'd be watching sesame street.  (isn't it funny to look back and realize who knew you best, or who knew you intimately for different stretches of time?)  she knew i would not know about the plane that had hit the world trade center because i was watching sesame street, and that they wouldn't interrupt cookie monster with such news.  so i changed the channel to a regular network station (we had already given up cable by then), and together, maria and i watched the second plane hit the second tower.  we were so confused and stunned and confused and sad and confused and worried.  it was hard to process what was happening, what we were watching, that this was real, and what it meant.  my first born was at the catholic school at our parish...i called and the kids had gone to the church to say a rosary.  i still believe God listens to children's prayers  a little more closely than adult's prayers.  and we went on with our day.  in a kind of underwater, slow motion haze.  we watched a lot of news.  felt a lot of different things...some of those feelings made me want to climb in bed and never get up, some made me want to buy a ton of dehydrated food and hide my family away in some remote area, some made me want to pull my family out of life and just stay huddled together in our room, and some made me want to just ignore that anything had happened...pretend it was a tv show and fiction and didn't effect all of american life.  i remember how much maria struggled with it.  how depressed and anxious she got for awhile. 

up until then we had always been the good guys...so good we were above an actual attack.  the people we'd attacked in the past were the bad guys...that's why were were attacking them.  it sounds simplistic, but for me, i do believe this was my underlying understanding of america and being american.  the attacks of september 11, 2001 changed that understanding profoundly.  we are not the bad guys.  that's not how it changed my understanding.  but it made me understand, that unequivocally, we are the same.  we all have good and bad within us, and we all hurt when we are attacked.  we cry.  we bleed.  we die.  we search our souls.  we reach out to each other.  we blame.  we suffer.  we heal.  we remember.

i have great hope, great faith, that one day we will all do these things truly together and not separated by anything...not by land, not by race, not by gender, not by social or economic status, not by political affiliation, and not by pride.

one year, the gospel on september 11th was about loving your enemy...and the priest did not back down from the obvious implication of that being the gospel for that day of memory.  today the gospel is about jesus calling the disciples, choosing the twelve (even the one he knew would betray him), and them setting out to do their work...healing and curing and sharing the good news.  time to get to work.

peace

other peoples' stories

i often struggle with blogging because i am tired of telling my story.  my story feels like it is a circle and keeps repeating itself lately...and it feels whiny and sad and depressing and not like something i want to keep telling.  only, i'm living it, see?  so i just don't tell any stories.

but i've been reading anne lamott.  and when i read anne, the one thing i always come away with, every single time, is that they're all our stories.  even the ones we think are crazy and totally unrelated.  like the cannibal guy in florida, high on bath salts, eating a homeless guy's face off.  when i finally googled that story to read it, it made me cry.  they're all our stories.  even my sisters-in-law...who haven't spoken in months...whose anger at each other has affected all of our relationships...when their mother was admitted to the hospital today, they both greeted her with the same exact words.  i'm telling you, like it or not, they're all our stories.

and being a part of a community reminds us of that.  i haven't had  a lot of community lately.  i've had some mamas i've seen, some i've talked to, the ones i feel closest to i'm on an online parenting board with.  but i haven't FELT the community a lot.  it's hard when the group you feel the closest to is scattered all over the country, in different time zones, all working damned hard at being good moms, good wives, good women. 

but i have been listening to a number of different stories lately.  mamas breastfeeding, mamas recovering from illness, mamas climbing walls taller than they ever thought they could, mamas in relationships, mamas dealing with their children's illnesses, mamas struggling with money, with children growing up and making mistakes...  my own oldest son was trapped in a bathroom in wet clothes, his friend showering, and girls in the room.  i will pray he found a way out of that situation that preserved the dignity of those involved, that mirrored the spirit of the God they were making the trip in...and i write that knowing that the Holy spirit moves each of us in very diverse ways...and i accept that...and i pray i can find the grace when i hear the story.  there's a mama laboring right now, too.  i'm sure there are many laboring to give birth right now...but the one who's laboring with my husband watching over her, sleeping at the hospital waiting for her birth...she's the one who reminds me to pray for laboring mamas and their stories tonight.

so, now that my beautiful, beautiful children are asleep, i'm alone.  and i remembered this story.  it's a story of a man who works at the rock climbing gym my children climb at.  he told me this story the day i told him the story of my oldest's struggles with his ex-girlfriend, his school, and a speech and debate tournament he'd attended.  this man cares a lot about kids.  but he has a special place for those that are making the crossing from childhood into adulthood...and i've learned from him that this crossing can span years...can occur at different stages for different people...and often comes later than we think it does.  he watches over these crosslings...mentors them...prays for them...gives them counsel and job and money and sometimes a place to sleep (in the rock gym, as a matter of fact).  he always sees the promise that they carry.  doesn't judge where they are at (although i believe he is a rather traditional christian in his theology).  and after hearing this story, i guess i understand better...and appreciate the light he shared.

he grew up in a very religious family.  (he is still pretty religious, for a guy who hangs out with rock climbers.)  he credits his family with the foundation they provided him for right and wrong.  but when he went to college, like so many of us experiencing that degree of freedom for the first time, he found a whole new world.  he learned he could be pretty cool.  and at one party, as he was walking in with boxes of beer and booze, he saw a girl making out with a guy on a couch.  and he knew he wanted to be with that girl.  so he waited til she was finished making out with the other guy.  and by morning, they were together.  and it turned out that she'd had a pretty religious upbringing as well.  and together, through their college years, they formed a relationship and then got married.  and together, they also found their way back to a path that was natural to them...a path that got them out of alcohol (he may have developed a bit of a problem) and loose relationships.  they now have two beautiful kids and a family that they feel at home in, that they grow together in, and that they are able to minister to others in.

the best part of his telling of the story was after he finished the details, and then reminded me that they would never have met if they had not strayed from what they knew was right.  if they had not made pretty terrible choices (i mean, no one died...but seriously, who wishes for their children to be alcoholics or having tons of sex?).  and so he doesn't question where people go, because he believes they'll all get where they're meant to be.

and that is gold.

i will hold on to it.  because this is my story, too.  and the story of almost everyone i can think of.  (and i only say almost because i am a stickler for facts and assume i can't remember everyone right now...but i'm pretty sure it's almost everyone i know...)

this story grabs me tonight because i realize that i fight so hard going to those dark places.  they are there.  i am ashamed when i visit them, but i'm kind of the kid in the room of bad things, doing a few of the bad things, but i have my eyes closed, pretending i'm somewhere else.  i'm always compelled to go to the bad places, but i have such a hard time enjoying them.  or even really acknowledging i'm there.

so i'm going to work on that.  i'm going to work on being aware of where i am, WHEREVER i am.  even when i'm somewhere i don't want to be.  because it is hard to confront bad choices when i'm not even really aware of them fully.  and i'm so tired of trying to be someone i'm not.  even though i know it is good to aspire to be someone good.  i am good.  even when i'm not.  because i know where i want to be.  and beating myself up on the way, or looking the other way when i feel like i'm less, is not helping my progress.

peace

the house we bought

third time's a charm, right?

so...here is a picture of the front of the house we bought in december.  i blogged about it back when we first got it and showed a few pictures of the remodeling project underway.  but life got busy...so, a recap.  here's the front.  i mentioned how you can tell the windows on the left end of the house (facing it) are garage bays where they converted the garage into a kitchen/sitting area...

 and here's the new front.  they took the front off the garage conversion and made it look more like an original construction.  we also put a new metal roof on, only because the old roof had more waves than a water bed and had to be replaced anyway and my husband and i have grown to love the metal roof in our current house...they last forever and we love the sound of rain on metal roofs.  so here's the house now:

 when you walked in the kitchen door, this was the view in december.  the floors were gross from two small dogs who were not very house trained and owners who didn't clean up very well after them.  the kitchen was very cramped and the two level floor (because they had to raise the floor to run the water pipes from the original kitchen) made the space very awkward.  i loved the wood stove, but the dryer vent pipe that was rocked into the surrounding wall made the whole thing something that was too expensive to redo and keep.  i'll miss the stove in my kitchen, but it sits in my garage, waiting to be put into the apartment conversion we'll do to half of our four car garage.  :)

and here's the new view from the kitchen door, which was scooted over some.  the whole addition was taken down to the two by fours.  the floor was evened out (which means these are the shortest ceilings in the house).  we moved the island back and made the kitchen space much larger, but there's still a lot of breakfast area space.  we put in wood floors because wood will give a little more on these uneven base of the floors, and we just like wood a lot more.  we also removed the post they had (it wasn't structurally needed...i was assured...pray...) in the middle of their kitchen, took out that overhang, and removed the stove that divided the kitchen area from the dining/living room area.   it's kind of a wide open space that we aren't sure what to do with, but i think it's just going to be nice to have that much space with all these kids growing up and becoming much larger young adults.

 the fireplace that was along the back wall (and thankfully leaked, so we had to remove it):

the back wall of the house now:

 and a view into the kitchen area from the back door:

the same view now, sort of...the stove is not there anymore, that's the main thing:

so that's the house i keep talking about.  i'll post pics of the view when i get some i like.  it just looks kind of scrubby in the pics i have now.  oh, and that fridge in the last picture?  our nine year old fridge?  well, you can't tell from the picture, but it was dropped in the driveway at my present house.  the oldest son and the husband were having some communication issues that resulted in the oldest moving it along on the dolly and the husband not helping but instead walking away to let down the trailer gate...so it really looks like it came from a scratch and dent sale...a BIG scratch and dent sale.  it ties the rest of us in to such a shiny new space.

peace

reflection

i know, i know...twice in one day.

the previous post was a reset...meet my kids sort of deal.  see how much they've grown.  it was shocking to me in some ways.  i've gone back and reread some of my blog.  it's fun.  i have changed so much and so little.  reminds me of the indigo girls line "every five years or so i look back on my life and i have a good laugh...you start at the top, go full circle round, catch a breeze, take a spin...ending up where i started again makes me want to stand still."  A.M.E.N.  i have spent the last two years trying to stand still.  and it doesn't work.  things still move.  if i could get the whole world on board to stand still...eh, it'd be so boring.  oh well.

so speaking of trying to stand still for two years...  my oldest left wednesday morning for a mission trip.  he's made some decisions in the last year that seriously made me wonder about his character.  which might sound kind of superior of me, but i'm pretty sure he's had some serious doubts about his character as well.  he's in such a state of flux...now that he's gone over to the dark side, made some serious mistakes, looked some serious issues in the face (with his parents right next to him because much to his horror AND his relief...life's funny like that...we're just that kind of family), realized he is not perfect, is capable of great selfishness and deception, he has to find his balance.  his happy place where he can be happy AND feel good about himself.  judging by his mom, it'll take him at least another twenty years before he even begins to buy into the truth that happiness and feeling good about himself are the same thing.  but i digress...

my oldest was gone for all of fourteen hours when i was driving my other kids around, and my youngest son, who's eight and the most honest person i know, who also has a question for any quiet moment, asked me, "mama, was there ever a time when you were as busy as daddy?"  now.  there are so many responses i'm sure this could conjure up in a person.  my twelve year old immediately began the line of defense about how i'm so busy with all of them, taking care of them, etc.  (God love the twelve year old, he is one loyal guy)  and i probably would've felt pretty defensive, pretty hurt...EXCEPT...my oldest had been gone for fourteen hours.  i had taken him to his school at 5:45 that morning, watched his luggage that he'd set on the grass get soaked when the sprinklers suddenly came on, seen that "that kid" that i don't really like was going on the trip as well, helped everyone pack the van, talked with some parents, and prayed with the priest who came to bless the kids that the trip would be a success and they'd be God's light and return safely.  traveling mercies....

and on the way home, i'd thought about the last trip he'd been on...and the horrible choices he'd made...and the slow weeks that the full ramifications of those choices played out...all the way to the end of the imminent consequences...where we'd all felt like we'd dodged a bullet but realized we were still left with a lot of rebuilding now that the universe had decided we could carry on as usual and our lessons would be our own to learn and make a study group to figure out.  and, not surprisingly, this filled me with so much anxiety, i considered turning my truck around and picking him back up, telling him i'd made a terrible mistake in letting him go, that i didn't know if he was ready, but that i realized i wasn't.  then i remembered that he is seventeen.  and will be a senior in high school next year.  and was on a trip to repair houses for impoverished people in the rio grande valley...and do arts and crafts with their children...and play his guitar and sing jesus music with the kids...and to be the hands of God in reminding the people that they are loved...that well-to-do kids who could spend their week playing video games and watching movies wanted to ride eight hours to do these things with them and for them because God loves all of them, and it's in the doing that we realize this most fully.  how much trouble could he get into doing that?  how much room could there really be for him to fall into horrible choices?  ok, so the answer is, as we've all learned, that possibility is ALWAYS there.  so i prayed he'd make good choices.  for himself.  because i want him to realize he's a good guy.  i want him to feel like one of the good guys.  i don't want him to hide himself because he has so much to share.  and so i prayed, because really, that's about all i can do.  i prayed he'd feel the love of God and share the love of God and that those two things would be enough for him.

but back to my eight year old who thinks i'm lazy...  just joking.  i don't think he thinks i'm lazy.  and with my oldest son off fighting his own internal battles, i didn't have to fight his judgment of me (which is something he does to distract himself from working on his own shit).  i was able to talk to my kids about how mommies are tired when babies are born...how mommies' bodies are working to make milk and feed babies at night when no one sees them being busy.  but then i acknowledged that my energy has not been what it was.  and that i was hoping it would get better.  and everyone seemed concerned and contented and relieved that we didn't have to worry about mommy feeling like she'd just been accused of being a lazy ass...me especially.

it has been a very different time for me.  of course, i read this blog and realize i've always struggled.  but i definitely see that i used to be a much quicker rebounder than i am now.  and the things i know will help me feel better?  i just don't always do them.  i'm tired.  i'm tired of working so hard to feel better just to get knocked down again.  now, i know things are probably going to stay pretty even for awhile.  and we're getting ready to move into this house that i really think will change things up quite a bit for us.  but i am still struggling.  it's been a rough journey...medical school with four kids...having a fifth child during residency...now a husband working as an ob/gyn...with a high school senior and a high school freshman...and a toddler...people die...people move on...parents struggle...family fighting...balancing money...these are real challenges.  i give myself credit for that.  i know i'm not making this stuff up.  i struggle between trying to control it all and surrendering.  it's like pulling on the rope with all of your might and then letting it go.  i get nowhere.  yet i'm still exhausted and my head pounds.  i know i'll get through this.  but i think it might be time to call in the cavalry.  i'm not exactly sure who the cavalry is, but i suppose if i put out the call, whoever shows up is the cavalry. 

i appreciate this time with my younger guys.  they are not in such flux and my relationship with them is so different.  they're not the first...the one i over-identified with...so they do not convict me at all.  well, if they do, it's so little i don't even notice.  i don't blame my oldest for the way things are.  i hope he's enjoying himself these days he's on his trip.  i hope he is lifted up by who he sees he can be...who he is.  i know my time with my younger guys has already done that, at least a little, for me.  and i'm grateful.

peace