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Posts Tagged ‘life’

Revisiting mediocrity

Posted in Musings and Epiphanies, tagged , , , on January 15, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Do you ever have a day when you wake up and think it’s not going to be a good day?  You wake up and just don’t feel good about yourself?  Then you go somewhere and you hear something that makes you re-examine the whole thing?  You say to yourself, wow…it’s all good.  Life is good.  You are good.  You are as good as you need to be.  But then the day progresses.

Finally you find yourself sitting, feeling confused, at 9:30 at night and wondering if it’s too early to go to bed when you usually go to bed around 1:00am.

I find myself in a place where I am so confused, wondering how and where to find the answers.  Then it seems like I’ve found some clues to point me in the right direction only to have them stripped away as quickly as they were given.  This was one of those days.  I felt like I had found some great resources to look into, where I might find a deeper answer.  Then the day totally turned around.  I feel more lost than ever.

I have snippets of seemingly everything going through my head.  In trying to make sense of it, I only confuse myself.  Am I doing what I should be doing?  Am I doing the right thing?

Searching for one’s passion when you already know what your passion is makes one slightly bonkers.  When you can’t pursue your passion full-time, what do you do to keep yourself from going completely crazy?  I am doing what I believe I need to be doing.  But which is the better route for me and for my sons?  I want to teach them to follow their dreams; yet if I can’t do it myself, how do I help show them the way on their journeys?  How do I incorporate my passion in to my everyday existence?  I can tell you that I’ve tried filling the hole with other pseudo-passions and man, I keep getting knocked down.  I think I may have finally learned that lesson.  Trying to force a non-passion into the space previously occupied by your true passion does not work and inevitably makes you feel worse.

I have attempted roles that I am not suited for in any way, shape, or form.  I knew it before I even started them, yet still went ahead and moved forward.  I’ve done this over the course of my life.  You would think I would have learned it sooner than this.  But no, I am only beginning to understand the mistaken choices I have made.  At least I stopped making big bad choices.  I made a few of them in my past and they are messy to clean up.

So.  Now realizing that I’ve been spinning my wheels and truly wasting time in some of these endeavors, I know I need to refocus.  This will, in theory, offer more time for me to pursue the endeavors that are a better fit.

What am I so afraid of anyway?  Okay, I know the answer to that one.  I’m not good with risk-taking.  I like to take risks that I know will work out in the end.  Granted, by definition, that’s not a risk.  And that is my exact point.  If it’s a safe risk, I’m your girl.  Therefore I will wholeheartedly pursue my safe risks and scrape off the pursuits that simply do not fit.

 

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Rotten bananas

Posted in Musings and Epiphanies, tagged , , , , , , on January 4, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Bananas are about the best fruit in the world.  When ripe, we use them in so many ways: sliced on top of cereal, banana split sundae, funky monkey bread, as a delicious stand-alone fruit snack.  This can be said of many fruits.  But I ask you this: how many fruits do we get equally excited about when they are just about rotten?

Almost-rotten bananas make lovely banana bread…or as I recently snacked on courtesy of a friend at work…lovely banana chocolate chip cookies.  Not a lot of things have a second life upon rotting.

What other things in life get a second life?  We all love to donate our goods to various charities because it’s the socially acceptable thing to do.  Reuse, recycle.  Find another use for an item.  I feel though as if our society is missing the bigger picture.  We didn’t waste as much before.  We were more resourceful.  Now we recycle yet so many things have become disposable.

Imagine if we went fully back to the idea of local.  A dairy farm in every area.  Reusable glass bottles versus the plastic gallon jugs.  Local farms, butchers, small-town doctors.  I feel like other countries get this idea and haven’t over-expanded as we have.  We are so hung up on status, stuff, and schedules.  I have less and less interest in this type of existence.

Yet at the same time I’m planning to take my sons to the store tomorrow so they can get Pokemon cards.  Where is the balance?  How do I keep my sons’ priorities balanced?  How do I keep my own priorities balanced?  Where is the place between ripe and rotten?

I’d love to stumble upon the answers but I am not that smart.  All I can do is remember that one is enough for anyone and let that guide the choices I make regarding the material things in life.  Little by little I whittle down the “stuff” we have placing the focus on needs and a few wants.  It’s tough to keep that focus.  The boys float from craze to craze, fad to fad, ripe banana to rotten banana.

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Simplicity and hoarders

Posted in Musings and Epiphanies, tagged , , on December 19, 2011| Leave a Comment »

The other day I attended a lovely holiday shindig.  The home was extremely clean and tastefully decorated.  Yet there were very few items that seemed to possess sentimental value.  The house had no clutter anywhere.  Even the storage spaces were tidy and organized.  I realized if the owner of this house came into my house she would think she had walked into an episode of Hoarders.  So I began to wonder if my “hoarding” is connected to something.

The things in my house are hard to get rid of because I feel an emotional connection to them.  Yet I know I don’t want to keep many of these things for a long time only to then throw them away.  But I don’t want my home to feel sterile.  When I was younger, some of my friends’ houses seemed that way, like nothing in it belonged to them or meant anything to them.  How do I figure out what is crap, if you’ll pardon the expression, and what truly has value, enough to keep?

Then my thoughts wandered to my quest for simplicity and how the clutter simply does not work with simplicity.  And really, do I need the “things” that remind me if the memories?  I stopped saving every movie ticket stub years ago, yet after seeing The Muppets with my sons I find it difficult to throw those stubs out.  It’s not like I won’t have the memory of the theater experience without the tickets and they don’t really help me remember anything except the day and time we went-but I don’t actually care about that-I care about the smiles, the laughs, and the conversations we had that day.  So no, I don’t need the stubs.  I don’t need the cards, the ribbons, the stuff.  I keep the memories in my heart.

Life would be so much simpler without the stuff.  I will be off from work next week for the holiday and will be the queen of purge.  The quest for simplicity without sterilization continues.

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Friend is only one letter away from fiend.

Posted in Musings and Epiphanies, tagged , , , , on December 1, 2011| 1 Comment »

This evening my oldest son teased his father using a less than flattering phrase he learned from his “friend”.  He apologized to his dad and knew that tomorrow he would be spending the afternoon in his room.  As my son and I discussed why this “friend” may not be the best friend he wants him to be, his younger brother chimed in with the various ways this boy has teased him.  I reminded my oldest that he didn’t stop this friend from being mean to his brother.  I reminded him of his two other friends who have said they didn’t want to play with this boy because he had been mean to them too.  I pointed out that this makes three children who he has been mean to.  It isn’t hearsay, we know this from the actual children.  We discussed again some of the things that this boy has done over the past few months.

This is when my six year old informed me of what the friend’s older brother had called him.  I will not write it here because I believe our country has been working to end racist behavior.  Still, this 12 year old called my six year old a dreadful term.  I know I didn’t teach it to him, yet there my six year old son sat explaining to me what the word means.

This is a lesson I didn’t want them to have to learn this early in their lives.  But, I don’t get to choose when they start learning life lessons.  The oldest took it rather hard when I stated they were not allowed to play with the boys until my husband and I have a chance to discuss how we plan to handle this situation.  Do we sit down the parents and explain the situation to try to figure out where, why, how their oldest came upon the word?  Do we pull back for a while and just let the relationship wither away?  I don’t know yet.  Time will bring me the answer.  Time will hopefully help my oldest realize that sometimes a friend is closer to a fiend.

 

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Made in the USA

Posted in Musings and Epiphanies, tagged on August 11, 2011| Leave a Comment »

I received an email from a friend suggesting for the month of August we all buy only products made domestically in the USA to strengthen our economy and make a statement to the international market.  Wow.  That’s hard to do.  It truly disappointed me that I struggled to find everyday items that were made in the good ol’ US of A.  I remember when I was a kid if a something was made elsewhere, the general assumption was that it wouldn’t last long because it would break very quickly.  This proved to be true a good amount of the time.  But now our society has grown into a rather “disposable” one-it seems that even if it breaks, it doesn’t matter—buy another one.

I also remember when I was a kid that “specialty” items came from different countries because they had the technology and were “more advanced” than we were.  That concept seems to have faded from every day conversation, but I think we created our own self-fulfilling prophecy.  What are products that are uniquely American?  I’d love to your thoughts, Gentle Reader, because I’m drawing a blank other than “entertainment” or “celebrities, sports figures”.  In other words, I can only seem to come up with people.

If we’ve made it too difficult to set up shop here at home then we need to change that.  I’m not a political junkie, I don’t claim to be overtly knowledgeable in the ways of politics, economy, etc.  I cannot discuss the challenges companies face to have a manufacturing plant in USA.  Still I have made a personal goal of buying American for as many items as I can.  It’s my own little personal statement and contribution to our economy.  Granted, on my budget, I won’t impact the stock market.  I strive to purchase local produce when it is in season (Jersey Fresh…oh yes, the corn is a nightly part of the feast right now)…why don’t I apply this same approach on the other things I purchase?  Or don’t purchase, as the case may be?

I’m proud to be an American…I want and need to show that in how I live and consume.

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Really?

Posted in Musings and Epiphanies, tagged , , on July 17, 2011| 2 Comments »

My sons.  I love them.  The disrespect flying out of their mouths today was enough to make me want to go Joan Crawford on their asses.  (Note–I said want to…I didn’t.  Before you get your panties in a bunch, there were no wire hangers involved.)  For years people told me, “you’re going to be a wonderful mother.”  Parents wanted me as their nanny.  Children (of ALL ages) I teach now say how much they love me.  What an awesome mom I must be.  Could somebody please tell my sons?

I don’t want to be their friend.  That’s not my job.  I’m their mom and I understand that a certain amount of dislike and a belief that I am the enemy is a part of that.  But the disrespect has ended.  They were literally shocked that I made them spend three hours cleaning their toy room.  Hello, the mere fact that they have a “TOY ROOM” says something.  We’ve spoiled them.  It’s us.  We did it.  Now we’re undoing it.  The only people unhappy about that are the boys.

I’d write more but I have to go arch my eyebrows.

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Chopped Liver

Posted in Musings and Epiphanies, tagged , , , , , , , on July 16, 2011| Leave a Comment »

I don’t know how it happened.  I do know when it happened.  This is the summer of my discontent.  My sons have taken the first step to independence and I have become chopped liver.  Their world was parent-centric.  Now it’s play-outside-all-day-and-what-do-you-mean-I-have-to-come-in-centric.

Yes, I’m happy for them.  Yes, it’s means they’re growing up just like we want them to, with independence and confidence.  Yes, it means so many wonderful things.

But, first I’m going to have myself a bit of a pity party.

Where are my babies?

Okay, pity party’s over.  What an exciting time.  Yeah, yeah, for them, but I mean for me and my hubby.  We could pick up our hobbies again.  Heck, I’ve already been cast in a show.  I’m going to rehearsal tomorrow and the boys have to come with me, instead of me going with them.  My husband and I have had actual conversations in the recent weeks.  Conversation that were uninterrupted by “Mom, he’s touching me.”  I’ve been completing whole thoughts all at once.  I’ve been working on house projects, including catching up on Hugh Laurie and House.  I’ve done, dare I write it, reading for FUN and the book was a grown-up book with no pictures.  I’m current in the grading for my summer class.

While it is hard to think that the early childhood years have almost passed, it is invigorating to know that the early work took hold.  Our sons are getting it.  No, not perfectly-we really need to work on that talking back to your mother thing-but they are problem solving, compromising, sharing, thinking of others, and having fun with their friends.  They have entered that time of their life when they have secrets that mean the world that they forget the following week.  They make secret clubs and handshakes.  They can do anything, be anything.  It’s the time of youth when everyday objects hold magical powers, the days are never long enough, and the plans they make will really happen.   This summer marks the beginning of one of the best times of their lives and, oh my sweet sons, I am so happy for you.

It’s like the summer in It when the six of them first battle It.  Okay, I don’t hope that my sons end up in the bowels of the sewers battling a monster so hideous one can only call it It, but this is like that summer.  The summer of innocence when a child can still believe in monsters and the tooth fairy.  This won’t be their only summer like this, they’ll have four or five more, but this is the first one for them.  One of the boys they play with (an older boy, he’s 11) is in his last summer of innocence.  You can see it changing for him.  Some days he can completely suspend disbelief, other days he struggles and usually goes home.  The summers of suspension of disbelief.  They’re awesome.

My job now is to let them have their grand adventures.  To let them believe.  To quickly bandage their scrapes so they can back out there.  To hug them when their feelings are hurt and they’re never going to talk to so-and-so again (at least till they’re back outside talking to so-and-so again).  I’ve got to say, it hurts just a wee bit to let them have the space and time away from the “safety” of home.  But only until one of them runs in to get a toy, and pauses to come to me, wrap his arms around me, and say, “I love you, Mom.”  Then the hurt is not so bad.

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What about Bob?

Posted in Musings and Epiphanies, tagged , , , , on June 14, 2011| Leave a Comment »

OCD can be a blessing and a curse.  My talent for alphabetizing is truly neat and I catch little mistakes that probably wouldn’t make a difference in the grand scheme of things, but in my line of work these two things do come in handy.  Catching the little mistakes more so, but if I do ever decide to pursue the “woulda, coulda, shoulda” path and become a librarian, both will be truly purposeful.  I am glad that my boss really appreciates my ability to catch most errors (not all, I’m not perfect).  When I do miss one, I actually question myself-how could I have missed that? It was so obvious!

It’s a curse when you live with the three stooges who do not possess the same affection for order or organization.  But on my journey for self-improvement, I try to remember it is me stuck on this need.  It does get in the way at times because sometimes you simply cannot be ritualistic about order, which is my natural desire.  A place for everything and everything in its place.  I also like to keep to the schedule I set forth each day.  Obviously with two young boys, I’ve had to adapt.  I have a few new things I do that I can control and they help.

I get an everything bagel four days a week at work.  I don’t get the bagel on Friday because it’s early closing at the moment (so very nice) but also I prefer things in even numbers.  Messiest bagel out there, but I always check for poppy seeds after I finish and I’m mindful not to get seeds and such on my desk.  I put the cream cheese on it the same way each time and cut each half in half the same way.  It sets the day to a pleasant tone.  The nice ladies in the cafeteria set one aside for me now Monday through Thursday in case I can’t down till a little later in the morning.  I also found the bagel balances my blood sugar nicely throughout the day.

I’m following a regular bedtime.  It’s really early for me…11:30…and it’s starting to feel like that’s late!  It helps me to let go at night.  I’m no longer staying up randomly trying to finish one more thing.  It’s helped with simplicity-setting simple goals for each day and accepting that they may not all be achieved.  It also helps me to enjoy my time after I get home from work more.  It relaxes me knowing that the day will in fact end and I’ll be able to rest.

Another ritual that has returned is reading Stephen King again before I go to sleep.  The old friends are nice to reconnect with and a reader always brings something new to the text, so many are like brand new stories.  I’ve also been reading at work.  It’s been a goal to read research articles and such and I’ve actually been doing it.  Today, my head was simply swimming with wonderful information, but I then had to follow it to some kind of end, which there wasn’t a neat and tidy ending to get to and this created frustration.

The newest obsession is developing my personal philosophy, theology, understanding of my place in this world, and the calling put out for me.  It’s stalled at the moment, or it feels stalled.  I’ve plateaued and I’m not sure where to go next.  I’m in the zone of proximal development and I need the More Knowledgeable Other to scaffold me to the next level (yes, my inner geek comes out!).  So I will read the good book and see what I can discover in the Word.  Then I will read Uncle Stevie and fall asleep around 11:30.  Compulsive rituals are not always a bad thing.

Something I have noticed as I tweak my use time from fungible to epochal (yeah, go look ’em like I had to) is that I share so much more with my family.  My youngest was out in the back yard the other day, using nothing but pure imagination.  It was one of the most beautiful things I have been blessed to watch.  He was talking away to the trees, the dirt, or himself.  I don’t know who he was talking to, but he was having a grand time.  It was pure childhood joy not being interrupted or interfered with.  In letting go of the human constructs of time, I saw these moments he was having in discovering himself within the world.

I am finally finding a balance and a positive way to use the OCD.  Like Bob in What About Bob?, it’s baby steps.  Baby steps every day.

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Caterpillar Whisperer

Posted in Musings and Epiphanies, tagged , on June 12, 2011| Leave a Comment »

My youngest found a caterpillar a few weeks ago and named him Steve.  Steve was set up in the bug playground.  It’s a bug box, but with miniature playground equipment ( a very cool present for my boys from my boss).  The boys kept adding grass and leaves thinking that’s what Steve was eating, while I made sure the cotton ball stayed moist with sugar water.  Steve made a cocoon in about a week.

My youngest was sad that Steve was following his life course, felt lonely, and found another caterpillar.  The bug playground could really only support one caterpillar, plus Steve had attached his cocoon to the flip top so to open it would probably kill the little guy.  We made another bug playground out of a to-go container.  This caterpillar was named Steve Montgomery (my son’s middle name, to distinguish the two Steves).  More leaves and grass, another cotton ball with sugar water, and another cocoon.

Steve Montgomery emerged today a beautiful moth.  My little guy released him into the world while shedding tears that his little metamorphosed friend was leaving him.  It’s a good way to learn about how life goes, an awesome experiential learning moment and a demonstration of amazing luck that the caterpillar survived the process and emerged a beautiful moth.

We’re still waiting on the other Steve.

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Unattainable Expectations

Posted in Musings and Epiphanies, tagged , , , , on May 23, 2011| Leave a Comment »

Wilson said to Cuddy in an episode of House that women set unrealistic expectations and then overly criticize themselves when they don’t reach them (I paraphrased).  My husband says this to me all the time.  I do set unrealistic expectations and beat myself up when I don’t achieve them-regardless of the fact that no one could achieve them in the manner and time-frame I set forth for myself.  I am attempting to change this habit and the results will be twofold if I achieve the change.  I am already prepared for the reality that this change will take time.  But the twofold payoff is a valuable incentive.  Be the turtle and that big calling.

The first payoff is that I will transform myself from the hare into the turtle.  I always rush through things to be able to check them off of my list and in the process I miss the joy of the journey.  Becoming a mother began this transformation, but I have been resisting it in all areas of my life.  See, childbirth doesn’t go by the schedule I put forth.  I had to be the turtle in that instance.  My sons were going to come out when they were ready and only after patiently going through the process of giving birth.  So I savored each of their births and each was different from the other.  I have embraced my boys uniqueness since their births and they have proven to be very different boys .  But I will confess that I have not always been a turtle when it comes to them growing up.  Obviously I can’t make them grow faster than the good Lord intends them to, but I also have to keep myself in check to let them be the age they are and not rush them through to the next phase, because the contrived development can be sped up.  I want them to stay in childhood for as long as it is healthy for them.  I want them to believe in as many things for as long as possible.  There is no way of knowing if this helps builds their faith in other things, but I figure it won’t hurt.  So I strive to be the turtle.  Take it slow, enjoy the journey, smell the roses, and see the scenery in all its glory.

The other benefit of theoretically lowering standards and extending personal deadlines relates to the big calling I’ve been pondering over.  I have this life and need to make it what I want it to be.  I want to suck the marrow out of life.  One could miss opportunities for sucking the marrow if you’re always on a deadline.  You could also neglect the gifts that God gave you and miss hearing your calling.  I am striving to embrace me for me again.  I always think of the line from This Is Spinal Tap when the band is checking into the one hotel and they mock the guy behind the counter (I think the neighbor from The Jeffersons played the guy) and he responds “I am just as God made me.”  Dude, he’s so right.  I am just as God made me.  My faults are only faults if I don’t acknowledge them or try to improve upon them.  My quirkiness is a gift.  I still don’t always know when to “hide” it, but if people don’t get it, they can deal with it.  It is one of my gifts to see the world a little skewed.  It is a gift to remain optimistic.  It is a gift to resist cynacism.  It is a gift to still have child-like belief and fascination with the world.

Did you ever see the live-action film of Scooby Doo?  Scooby is the office of the owner of Spooky Island.  He sees a bobble head and keeps playing with it till the owner tells him to stop it.  My boss has a bobble head of our school’s mascot on her desk.  One of the secretaries brought it in and asked if one of us wanted it.  It sits on my boss’ desk because I would sit there all day making it bobble if it were on my desk.  The wonderful simplicity of a bobble head amuses me.  The joy my sons have when I bring out the face paints.  The joy of temporary tattoos is another great thing.    I’m digressing somewhat, but my point is that I don’t have to always be a grown up.  Who wants to be that?  I know when and where and how to fit into the different circumstances, but dagnabbit, the rest of the time I can my own quirky self.

It returns to my earlier posting about rediscovering the audacious self.  Letting go of societal standards except when absolutely necessary.  It returns me to Hank.

“As for the complex ways of living, I love them not, however much I practice them. In as many places as possible, I will get my feet down to the earth.”[Henry D. Thoreau, Journal, 22 October 1853]

The simple things at a turtle’s pace with standards that are actually achievable.  A bobble head bobbles.

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