my place is of the sun...

indigo girls lyrics. and i've always identified with them. this weekend, i did something i haven't done since high school. i laid out in the sun. now, in high school, it was about achieving the tan. but this weekend, there was just something pulling me to get out there and let that sun touch my skin...let my skin soak up that warmth. it was kind of odd. so, i went and bought myself a fairly skimpy bikini (no, there will be no pics of this...thank god for privacy fences) and some oil with a low spf and laid out a sheet and soaked up some sun. my attention span allows almost a full ten minutes on each side. it felt like heaven...warm, sweaty...it smelled so good outside...and the breeze...it was healing. i can honestly say it's the quietest my head has been in a long time. i did it saturday and sunday. i didn't even tan any. but it felt really good. makes me want to get back up on the treadmill and sweat a little more. but not today. i had my nephew today...who i love dearly. maybe tomorrow. or maybe i'll just lay out a little again. it's nice to have options.

peace

early morning blogging

with all this change in schedule this semester, i can't find a rhythm for blogging. i like to blog at night...kind of wipe the slate clean so i can sleep easily, but i'm usually too tired by then. but this early stuff? i mean, i haven't even poured the coffee yet... it feels weird. kind of choppy. not too coherent and what if my buffer goes out? who knows what i could post here?

ok, so i poured coffee...and it disturbs me. it disturbs me that without any caffeine in my system, i don't think so well. as i was pouring, i was thinking about how the sun comes up earlier now than it did a month ago. my teen used to watch it come up on the way to his class, but now, it's already up when he leaves. and that made me think about "springing ahead"...and i cannot figure out if that will make it daylight sooner or later?...i mean, if what was eight is now nine after we spring ahead?...if the sun comes up at seven, which will be eight?...if i wake up at six, which will then be seven?...oh hey, i get it. but i couldn't figure it out earlier, k?

maybe blogging in the morning isn't my thing...
peace

sun and moon

ok, i'm a little tired, but i've been thinking about this one for a few days now...

saturday, as we drove to our robotics competition, at the butt crack of dawn...no, i don't know what time that really is, but i am not a morning person...if it is still dark and we are calling it morning, i call it the butt crack of dawn...so there's that.

at the butt crack of dawn on saturday, we were driving down the interstate. on the left side of the interstate, the sun was just barely beginning to put a little light in the sky. on the right side of the interstate, i could still vividly see the moon behind clouds. i do want to say that i was a passenger that day, so i never really dialed in to what i was seeing. i did think it was beautiful and i did comment on it, but then i just went back to staring at the road ahead and not thinking of much of anything.

but this morning, as i drove my teen to his first day of his dual enrollment class...at a campus where almost everyone smokes, and many of the young men drive horribly, and they all have their pants hanging below their butts (i mean what is that? i know i did some goofy stuff to fit in...yes, my hair was quite tall for awhile there, but what's the deal with wearing your pants below you ass? can you even reach pockets behind your knees? i don't think so...)...anyway...you get the idea. it was kind of a more grown up thing that when he takes biology in a classroom with bible verses all over it, if you know what i mean. but on the way up there (because it's an hour drive...feel free to recommend or lend good audio books), the sun was up and the moon was still out. we watched the sun come up. it was neat. we kept waiting for the moon to retreat. but it didn't. i don't know where it finally went. it was like instead of going down, it was backing up...almost vaporizing itself or something.

and it made me think of the duality of things. opposites. can you have one without the other? and can they exist at the same time? i don't normally think that opposites can happen at the same time. i know my kids can be beautiful and awful...but i don't normally feel both at a given moment. it's like a movement between these two extremes along a continuum...so how can it be both at once?

this weekend was the culmination (for now anyway) of much practice, much work, much learning, much growth. and it was not all fun. it did not all feel good. i don't even know if you put the warm fuzzies in one side of a balance and the pissed off freezies (like that one? i just made it up) in the other, which side would be heavier... but it was good. many, many good things came out of it. and i am glad we did it. it left me empty as hell last night. (AND i started my period...how is that fair?) but it will fill me up for a long time...and give us so much fodder for more growth.

here are some lyrics to a song i was listening to today that i really liked...

every day is a bank account
time is our currency
no one's rich, no body's poor
we get twenty-four hours each

so how are you gonna spend
will you invest or squander?
try to get ahead
or help someone who's under?

that's just the stuff my worn out brain was thinking about today...not a whole lot of conclusions...just some stoned on tired observations, i guess...
peace

hunger for the light

when i left for vacation, i think i mentioned our departure time was scheduled for three thirty in the morning... unGODly early in my book. and we made it out on time, too. i put my sleeping kids in my loaded car and i was on my way, coffee in my thermos, cds in the console (i'll post later about the fun of driving music).

and i drove

and i drove and i drove through all these little towns. there were hardly any lights much less anything as significant as a street light. but i wasn't really thinking about the lack of light. mostly i was just navigating and trying to pour more coffee without spilling it and change the cds without driving off the road...you know, important stuff like that with four little ones in your car. (yeah, i know, they're not all so little anymore...humor me)

but when i could see the light beginning to break through in the sky, i cannot even explain how excited i got...how full of anticipation and relief and impatience and so many high energy things i was. those two and half hours before day broke were like driving into eternal night...i don't even think the moon was out. it was kind of oppressive, only i don't think i felt that until i saw the day beginning to break. it was a different feeling for sure because i am not a sunrise kind of woman. i am a sunset and moonrise kind of woman. i don't really do early...

anyway, the feeling was so intense and the sensation of being so almost desperately relieved that the day was here so overwhelming that i gave up a few minutes, because i was making kick ass time, to snap a picture of my moment of salvation as it was...

for what it's worth, it's also how i feel now that i'm home. like i found some light while i was gone that i didn't know i was missing or lacking...but now it's dawning and, again, i feel gratitude. not quite desperately relieved, but definitely relief. but then i guess that's just how life goes. i used to think i'd finally one day figure out that thing and that would be it...i'd be there...done. but like annie says, there's always another circle of light to step into...or another sunrise to be delivered by.

peace