When we went to Chicago for our bike ride, we started out with me pulling the bike trailer and my husband pulling the tandem bike attachment. However, about halfway into our day I tired out and this was the new arrangement. This might have been cute on the bike path, but we also went across the city like this! Pretty impressive if you ask me.
Would you believe it? After a very long season of dormancy I am starting up my World Religions hobby again. This time around I'm diving into Judaism, and I'm very eager to do so.
Studying Judaism is a bit complicated for me. My own faith, and my own life, is entirely based upon following a man who was himself ethnically and devotionally Jewish, and who made no attempts to become anything different. Much of our sacred scriptures is the telling of Israel's story. And yet current day Christians, myself included, are so very divorced from any real understanding of Jewish life, traditions, and mindset. How can we understand the man we believe to be the Jewish Messiah if we do not understand the Jewish mind or heart? How can we know the God who first introduced himself to Israel as Creator and Sustainer if we do not know Israel?
I have saved Judaism for last because it was so close to me - like a cousin I rarely met. Too close to be introduced without preconceptions, but too far away not to begin at the beginning. And now, here I am.
As it happens, the impetus to jump in came from a novel my online book club read this month, called I am Forbidden by Anouk Markovits. I found this book to be gorgeous and utterly compelling, as we follow the lives, beliefs, and dreams of generations of Satmar Jews (a Hasidic sect) from Hitler's time to today. From the eyes of children we see the horrors of Nazi Germany and as these children grow up we saw how the tragedies and losses impacted their understanding of themselves, their pasts, their future, and their choices. The author does an excellent job of showing us both the beauty and the liability of living and believing in a community such as the Satmars do, and the difficulty of taking one without the other. It was this that sparked my imagination and sent me back to the library.
There are many haunting scenes in this book, but the one that haunts me deepest taps into my other great hobby - the study of perspective. Josepf, whom the reader has known and loved since his terrible childhood, discovers personal news that he considers a sin. The law and scriptures, as he has been taught them, allows for no forgiveness or redemption in this area. He spends literally decades searching the scriptures and teachings, finding only a paradox - messages of God's unending love, forgiveness and mercy abound, but the law on this particular matter is unyielding and there can be no mitigation or repentance. Which of these is Joseph's story and path - the individual commands of the law and their consequences for failure or the overarching story arc of mankind's continued failures and God's continued redemption and faithfulness? The trees, or the forest?
So many factors determine which of these he will see - his own temperament, what he has been taught, and the questions he asks as he approaches the texts. The impact of our own perspectives on how we understand what we read and hear and "know" is so powerful, and so fascinating to me. Part of what I love in this exploration of World Religions is the ability to see this in others, and then learn to see it in myself.
What Josepf saw and decided was ultimately a combination of his community, his experiences, his beliefs, his mind, and his heart. The same is true for each of us, and for me as I approach this long distant cousin of Judaism.
Last week I registered my first born for Kindergarten. Wow! How did we get here! Actually, we could just as easily been here a full year ago but held off, for which I am entirely grateful. Last year, the idea felt so rushed, so wrong. This year it feels so exciting and full of life and adventure.
I signed papers, and read papers, and took a tour, and tried to imagine what next year will look like and the years after that. I was so very giddy with excitement you would have thought I was the one about to get new school supplies.
For his part, A is not so sure about this. He loves his Pre-K program, and his teachers, and his friends, and his routines. The whole experience for him has been so incredibly life giving that its hard for him to imagine it could come to a close, or that life could continue on the other side. Its hard for him to know that so much is just about to start.
But its only the beginning of May. We still have a month to say goodbye, and then a hot, busy summer to enjoy. And then....wonder of wonders, Kindergarten.
Remember I skipped "K"? There was only one thing I wanted to say that began with "K" and it was a week or so premature. But here it is! And I'm done! A-Z! And its only May 4th! :)
Last weekend we took our kids to a real Symphony Orchestra's "Family Fun Concert." It was excellently done and thoroughly enjoyed by all of us. But we were mostly there for B, who could talk of nothing else in the days leading up to it (or the days after it for that matter) and was entirely beside himself for over a week. At breakfast the day of he asked "is today my Orchestra concert?" When I told him it was he said in a soft voice "Oh, splendid."
After we arrived at the venue but before find our seats I found two fortune cookies and gave one to each boy. A's said "A short stranger will soon enter your life." B's said "A thrilling time is in your immediate future." The second one could not have been closer to the truth.
The next morning A looked puzzled as he munched on his cereal. "So B had his thrilling time. When do you think I'm going to meet my short stranger?"
B was partially named for his Great-Grandpa who was a musician and an Orchestra director. When I suggested that B could do the same he quickly cut me off. "No, I'm going to be an astronaut." After I explained that astronauts can also play musical instruments he has allowed himself to really dream big. Several times a day now he'll casually say "When I'm older, I'll play the cello (or piano, or drums, or tuba, or...)" and then end forcefully "because astronauts can also play instruments!"
I'm not a very spontaneous person. I can enjoy surprises and spontenaety, but its not my native terrain. Most times I prefer to work ahead, plan things out, and be very very certain that when I'm saying "yes" to something I'm not saying "no" to something more important.
Earlier this week A had a day off school and it was raining. The boys and I decided to make a "reading nest" and read the day away. However, only two books in there was already fighting breaking out between Team Chapter Books and Team Richard Scarry Picture Books. And then there was C who was just mad she was not being held and/or allowed to eat the books.
I thought to myself "if we went to the library we could check out some really great classic kids books and everyone will be happy and we'll have a super special day."
Then I thought to myself "We're in PJs. By the time I get everyone changed and out the door and back again it will be time for lunch, and then naps, and then cooking dinner, and then we won't get a reading nest day at all. Plus, we already own several hundred children's books."
And then this foreign voice said "Or, you could just get in the car and go."
To all of our surprise, I heeded this radical new voice. I stood up and said "let's get in the car and bring home the Best Kids Books of All Time from the library." Even I was in my pjs. Why let a little thing like that stand in the way of a great adventure?
Yup. I'm a pretty wild and crazy gal. We can really get controversial around here.
Thirty minutes later we were back in our nest with literally as many books as I could carry (my fingers were numb from holding the bag handles).
I had a chuckle of irony when I read this in the front of one of our borrowed books, called No, David!
"Of course, 'Yes' is a wonderful word....but 'Yes' doesn't keep crayons off the living room wall."That's right. Good to keep myself in check before things get out of hand.
My current lifestyle doesn't leave room for much of what is commonly understood as "spiritual discipline." There's simply no silence or solitude to be found, and I am not the master of my schedule, my diet, my sleep, and in many respects, my life. I've many many times heard the message of "that's ok - there will be time for spiritual disciplines later in life" but I strongly disagree. The things mothers (and parents, and caregivers of all sorts) do with their energy may not be featured in any books on the subject but the reason we don't have much time for devotion is because we give of ourselves every moment of the day. There has been no steeper road of humility, surrender, submission, service, worship, and prayer in my life than parenting.
One of my greatest passions is to pull back the veil that we so often erect between what is "spiritual" and what is "everyday." When my hands are filthy from cleaning up another person's dirty diaper - this is my chance to learn service and humility. When my head is spinning with cries from a million places - I have the opportunity to clear my mind and stay attune to God and the real, live moment I am in. For a caregiver, opportunities for spiritual discipline abound in every moment, if we can look beyond what we have read and see how our souls can be shaped in our day to day.
One thing I do each day, whether I have time or not, is breathe - in and out, in and out, day in and day out. Why not use this as a vehicle? I have been practicing for a few years but was recently encouraged by this:
When we are born, we are born into a relationship with air, with breathing. How closely the words wind, air, life, and spirit are linked in human thought. We are creatures into whom life is breathed.
A word we have for inhaling is inspiration. When we are fully inspired, not only are our lungs filled - our beings are also filled, with hope, with potential, with the impetuous to express possibility.
Expired, we are over and done with, stopped...finished.
Our life is lived within this paradox. With every inhalation we are given life. With every exhalation we must surrender that life, for another breath to be given to us. If we could fully enter the rhythm of this paradox we would live with immediacy, and be intimate with birth and death and with life itself.
From Simple Ways Towards the Sacred by Gunilla Norris
Today for "W" I am re-posting my thoughts inspired by the musical Wicked, another oldie-but-goodie from five years ago. Enjoy! (and send me ideas for X, Y, and Z!)
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Last night as I was about to cook supper, I got an email from my husband: he had planned a surprise evening for us out on the town. Two hours later, A was with Grandma and Grandpa and I was downtown settling in to see Wicked (and what better timing than the night before Halloween?)
There's a reason why we preferred the good vs. bad version of the story in 1938, and this complex, morally ambiguous story today - we are living now in a postmodern world, and we yearn to see what makes people who they are. Most people who are anti-postmodernism are really anti-relativism. They suggest that a global philosophy of "whatever works for you" is going to end in chaos and destruction, that there are consistent patterns or ethics in the universe which, if we do not follow, will have consequences. I think, though, that most people, even most postmodern people, agree with that. But our societies have changed, not for better or worse, but radically and entirely. And with this change comes necessarily a new way of being ethical. Not less ethical, not even different ethics.
So I'm doing this A-Z challenge during the month of April, but I'm falling behind. I think today is supposed to be X, but I'm writing V...and that's only because I did both T and U yesterday and skipped K weeks ago. But oh well, better late than never. Its not like the last letters of the alphabet are going anywhere in May.
Falling behind is not something I do very often. I am, in fact, the girl who wrote five research papers during Spring Break my Sophomore year in college because I just needed to know they were done. That's a poignant example, but that's how I do most things in my life. If you invite me to your house I'll probably show up 15 minutes early on accident. I can't help it.
But these days, all my time and energy easily go to the most urgent things on the list - taking care of my kids' most basic of needs and keeping on top of my part time job. Then comes the important things that will become urgent most quickly if left undone - cleaning the kitchen, washing the clothes, going to the store. If there's anything left it goes to the third tier of urgent whatever that happens to be on any given week - the broccoli plants that will wilt if not planted, the folded laundry that hasn't been put away in 10 days, the bathrooms that haven't been cleaned in (indistinguishable mumbling).
If I had my preference, I'd still be working ahead. My house would be clean and organized, I'd be doing any number of fulfilling and educational things for my kids and for myself. There are a lot of things I'd like to be doing right now that are just not rising to the top half of the list. But that's how things go with three little ones.
Recently I had the chance to chat with a panel of published authors. When I described to them a bit of what was on my plate they looked about to swoon with exhaustion. One asked if I would ever like to write something to be published and then stopped herself. "You have many years ahead of you to write, but this is your only chance to have a three year old."
She's so right. Someday, my house will be tidy and my lawn will be mowed and my hair will be cut and I'll be reading books and writing down my ideas and spending time with friends. There has been time for that in the past but this time I get to wake up every day and see these lovely faces. This time, and never again. I'm going to keep falling behind and drink them up, every drop.
What does it say about me that all three of my children said "uh-oh" before any other word, and then said it again, and again, and again as though it were their favorite sound in the world? I've never claimed it as anyone's "first word" because it seems more like babbling the way they do it. But before A started saying "hot/honk!" and B started saying "A" and before C started saying "dada" they have all said "uh-oh!" at least a thousand times per day.
C is currently in that phase. She loves to talk so she'll chatter on and on, saying "uh-oh! uh-oh! uh-oh? uh-oh!" It means "look at this thing I just picked up!" and "did you see me crawl?!" and "can I have that toy?" and "will you pick me up?" She's created a few variations such as "uh-oh-wuh-oh" and "uh-oh-eee" which are very cute.
Even cuter is hearing her try out "real" words. Her favorites include "dada" and "mama" and "all done" (it comes out "owie"), "Diego" (diiiiio), and "brothers" (bubbaee).
What a sweet pea.
It took me ten minutes to convince C that she could sit in her chair without screaming and eat O's and let me get started on dinner, but no sooner were my hands covered in raw meat than B ran in the door yelling for me. With his face beaming with excitement he beckoned me "Mommy! Mommy!! You have to see this!! Come on Mommy!! Come on!!" I looked at my newly settled baby, my newly messy hands, and the clock. "I can't right now, Honey, but I will soon. Could you bring it to me in here?" I asked.
But he was too excited to take no for an answer. "No Mommy, come quick! I have something in the yard to show you! Its a surprise!! Come and see! I can't bring it here, come see the surprise I have for you!"
Who can turn down such a hopeful and excited three year old? I set aside dinner (again), cleaned my hands (again), and grabbed the baby (whom I knew would probably not agree to sit quietly again when we returned) and headed out the door.
Head held high, B marched me through the yard, shouting out promising predictions about how exciting and special and wonderful this was. I was curious and increasing excited myself. What could it be? A shoot coming up in the garden? A berry newly formed on our strawberry plant? A bird's nest? An egg?
"Dog poop!" he yelled, pointing to a fresh, moist pile in the grass, as our puppy napped in the sun a few yards away. "Dog poop, Mommy!"
Truly, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. At least he didn't bring it inside like I'd asked.
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Now that our chives are growing again I like to sprinkle some on my daily lunch of cottage cheese. Today A (who won't come near an onion) decided to try some as well. He took one bit and leaned back with a look of satisfaction. "Ahhhh....chives, you really get the right spot." But then a moment later he frowned and started poking at the roof of his mouth. "I need to brush my teeth - there's a chive in a place where its not welcome at all."
I just found this post I never had the courage to put up while I was living in the Roach Apartment. Now that the season is behind me, I frequently find myself reflecting on the significance of that time and all I learned. This is just a few things (and not the significant, life changing ones!), but I decided I'd put it up in honor of so many in our country and around the world living in similar situations and much, much worse.
Things I understand now
I understand why so many people eat food primarily out of cans or boxes: previously a critic of both, I now find no greater relief than opening something I know was sealed so tightly nothing could have crawled into it.
I understand why many in other countries buy only enough fresh food for one day: any produce I bring home is nibbled by six-legged creatures before my family can get to it.
I understand why some people pray on prayer rugs: I wouldn't put my my jeans-clad knees on this carpet unless I had to, much less my face.
A week or so ago our yard (and our lilac bush especially) was suddenly bursting with tiny butterflies. There aren't as many now but they're bigger. Here's one I managed to catch with my camera.
I first posted this over four years ago, but it remains one of the things I would say again and again.
Over fifteen years ago I set for myself a goal that I still have today - to keep both my eyes and my heart open.
By eyes open I mean looking at things as they really are, no matter how hard the truth may be, never sugar coating or escaping.
By heart open I mean continuing to make my spirit a place where love can easily flow in and out, where there is joy and hope.
Either of these is fairly straightforward to do on its own, but it is not enough. Attempting to have both eyes and heart open is one of the greatest challenges I know because the more one's eyes open, the more one's heart tends to close; and the more one's heart opens, the more one's eyes begin to close.
If my heart is open to love and joy but my eyes are closed to pain and reality then I am naive and can be of very little use to bring healing in the real world. If my eyes are open but my heart is closed I become cynical and jaded and I am very little beneficial use, period.
But to have both - to see and know and understand and yet to feel and love fully - what could we not do if we were able to stand in this place?
Before having children I knew exactly what kind of mother I was going to be, and I very carefully honed the skills I would require. I imagined myself entrusted primarily with shy, sweet, sensitive daughters who needed gentle encouragement and patient engagement. These imaginary daughters were eager for my approval. My role would be to nurture their sensitive spirits and I was so ready to nurture them.
Yes, I can hear you laughing, dear reader. But it wasn't totally far fetched - I myself was such a daughter (right Mom??).
Skills in hand I threw myself into parenting when A was born, just as I had planned. I remember my husband remarking on how patient I was. And I was! I drank in every moment and poured myself out and didn't care if there was anything in it for me. I was so ready to love this little person unconditionally and offer him all the comfort I could bring to his experience of life.
As it turned out, I had not spent any time preparing myself to nurture these little boys, chuck full of initiative, energy, ideas, and destruction*. I had spent years readying myself to coax a timid soul into full blossom but had no skills whatsoever to meet little tornadoes who couldn't hear (much less care) my instructions because they had landed on earth with both feet and were prepared to take it by storm.
Needless to say, very few of my carefully honed skills have been put to use. Even when a gentle hand is needed I'm generally too dizzy from the going-on-six-year roller coast ride to even notice. The reason I remember so clearly how patient I started out is that I am almost never patient now.
I know you're still laughing, which is appropriate because the joke is certainly on me. I wouldn't trade these crazy boys for anything but it feels like studying for 10 years for the MCAT and when you show up its the Bar Exam. I so badly wanted to ace this test and most days it feels like I'll be lucky to even leave it intact.
I'm still getting my bearings here, six years down the road though we may be. And I'm realizing that though I have to yell to have my voice heard, even though even the tiniest instance of obedience requires me to stand my ground, my rambunctious children need nurture just as much as the imaginary children I thought I'd have - they just need it differently. Perhaps I've got it all wrong; maybe I was so advanced as a parent that the Powers That Be put me right through to the challenging sections. Yeah, I'll keep telling myself that.
So that means that my challenge isn't just to make my voice and opinion heard above the din of my children dismantling my house, but to continue practicing those nurturing, encouraging skills and find a way to bring them to bear on my actual children's actual needs.
This morning I read to A a post I wrote about him years ago. He listened and then said "I think the reason why I loved you so much when I was a baby is that you were the first person I met." He looked pensive for a moment and then said "Hey, when I'm older, can you help me start a blog? I know!! That's how we can stay in contact when I don't live in your house anymore!"
That sounds great, Sweet Pea. I wouldn't trade you and Little Bee for an army of compliant daughters.
*Disclaimer: Any perceived generalization about behavior and gender is purely coincidental - I actually did imagine having such daughters, and I actually did have such sons...that's all I'm saying! :)
When B was just barely two years old we found ourselves at the Madison Children's Museum. There were a million fun things to see and do but our Little Bee could hear drums beating somewhere. Though we dragged him to other exhibits and rooms he kept asking "please can we find the drums?" Once he saw them we could no longer hold him back.
The sounds came from a man conducting a drum exhibit and clinic. It was four hours long and by the time we arrived there were three hours left. He had drums of all kinds - from true African djembes to kitchen pots and pans - and a great deal of talent. He played and played and played, encouraging the kids roaming the Museum to stop and listen or join in.
B sat right down in front of this man, sitting as only a baby can do with his back straight and his legs right out in front of him. He fixed his eyes on the man, gripped drums and sticks in hand, and dived in.
He was entirely immersed. He didn't resurface for hours.
Hundreds of children came and went, hours past, rhythm morphed into rhythm and still B sat and drummed and watched, never hearing a word we said to him, never moving his head. After an hour or so I moved off to the side where I could watch him but be a bit free of the cacophony; it was like watching a time lapse movie in which everything was moving at a loud and frenetic pace but my own Little Bee sat in the center of it all, never moving or distracted.
Only after all the children had left and the man had stopped playing and packed up his drums did we have the heart to pick up B and carry him away, screaming for more. He had sat and play, transfixed, for three solid hours.
The drummer came up to me then and said "Wow. I have never seen a child respond to drums or music like this before. You need to get him lessons." I was a bit in shock myself so I mumbled something like "Yes...yes we do...."
I've rarely seen a person of any age exhibit such focus and intensity for so long, much less a 25 month old who, on all other occasions, is best described as a tornado of energy; clearly he had found something that tapped deep within him. Looking back through my archives to his babyhood I see myself describing him as learning the ABCs and number by rhythm rather than words, and always always dancing.
Now, he's a year older than he was when he fell into his drumming trance at the Children's Museum, and I love to see his musical nature expressing itself. He bops along, head cocked to the side, playing his air guitar to a song he's singing to himself rather than walking most of the time. Last week I called him to dinner but he kept bopping and strumming away until he reached the last extended chord of the song, brought his invisible guitar up in the air and...wait for it...slammed it to the ground on the final beat.
Seriously, how does he learn this stuff?
When he's not rocking out with his air guitar he's drumming with anything and everything he can get his hands on - drumsticks, kitchen utensils, sticks, and dog bones will do. His drum of choice is our couches, tables, chairs, floor, legs, heads, noses. At every meal he'll ask "do you want it quiet, or loud?" and then will drum with his spoon in the air to my specifications. On his toy piano he'll pound out "Count It Higher" every day at least twice; on my real piano he'll carefully pick out a scale. He used to have a piece of scrap lumber that he used as a guitar but the last few birthday and Christmas occasions have allowed him to amass a "music corner" complete with toy piano, guitar, percussion table, and three drums. Woe to the person who rearranges the instruments in this corner.
My musical B shared his due date with his Great Grandfather's birthday, awe named him for this same special man. I never had a chance to meet my mom's dad, but he he was an Orchestra director and musician. I think his protege might be the little Bee who insists I sing the same song to him each night as he falls asleep.
It is not easy for me to stop my mind from wandering and focus on what my body is doing this moment but today I manage to reign in my thoughts for a few seconds and notice.
Notice that I am sitting in a rocking chair, gliding softly back and forth, holding my daughter. She has attached her body to mine and, though I cannot see it or feel it, we are connected by a lifeline. From somewhere deep within me flows sustenance which has kept her alive and thriving for almost 11 months.
In the handful of times that my babies have had the stomach flu I have marveled at being soaked, suddenly, entirely, in ounce upon ounce of warm milk. Where did all this come from? My babies and I have performed this ritual again and again, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, year upon year, and yet somehow I find it difficult to believe that these miracles are actually taking place: my body creating food for her, it flowing into her, it transforming into her.
Neither she nor I can handle being apart from each other for more than a few hours. Emotions aside, our shared physical need - her emptiness, my fullness - pull us together, hold us together. Often this tangible tether feels like bondage rather than the lifeline that it truly is, for both of us.
Her wiggling and giggling have stopped and my ever-growing baby is lying asleep in my arms. I quietly break her latch and watch for the thrilling moment when her face turns peacefully towards mine, lips still puckered, fast asleep. As she drank from me now I drink in her downy hair, her baby cheeks, her trusting weight in my arms.
Surely breastfeeding, with all its difficulties and sacrifices and joys and pains is a true spiritual discipline - I give of myself and she is made; I pour myself into her and I am filled.
