ramona and her mother

reflections/angst on a book, The History of Love

2012-01-23T13:46:00.000-08:00

he called her nova

it was the prettiest word he knew,

he called her nova

perfect for someone just like you

Allegedly, my dad wrote this. He wrote it sometime during the 70s. It was a song. A song my mother remembered, and he forgot. My mom remembered and it became my name. And this stanza showed up in a birthday card from my dad somewhere in my early 20s.

I've decided this is the way art works, and really not just the art, but also the teachings we receive. We hear what we want to hear, and we remember it in little fragments that we put together on our own. This is the way it goes.

I finished reading The History of Love by Nicole Krauss last night and it has invented enough feeling inside of me to break my silence on writing about books. Before I passed it on to the next reader, I searched this beautiful book for a sentence. Something to show you why it is to read. And every sentence reminded me of my dad's song. Because this book is somehow about a name, and remembering, and how the things we write move away from us and bring us things and never give us exactly what we are hoping for.

And it's about growing old. Not just old feeling. But honestly very old. And how we don't realize this now, but a lot of us will die alone. Our parents will be gone. Our mothers will not be there. The romantic loves we have lost will be more than lost. Everyone we know, gone. And we will hope to be seen by someone.

small and large things

2012-01-17T08:06:00.000-08:00

I had been saving all Ramona's little clothes for the last two and half years just in case we had another little girl. But we are not, and this is the last baby for me. So we get rid of them? Bin after bin of things my precious girl wore? We just give them away? I have tucked them in the basement, because I can't really deal with hard stuff right now.

I wasn't sure from where all the heartbreak came. After all, my new baby is coming and this is a time to be excited. What is wrong with me? Over the weekend I was going through my nephew's clothes. Some of them I liked, and others I didn't. I made quick piles of her things. No big deal for me. But my sister sat in desperation. Flinching every time I put something in the wrong pile. I chided her unkindly for acting crazy, and she responded, "But that's my life right there."

And those words settled into my brain. Crazy, and beautiful. That pile of old clothes her baby wore is her life? And I am just the same. I'm sad about the bins of pink. I'd be sad no matter what they looked like, because she wore them and she won't wear them again. These are the obvious lessons that come hard to moms.

How did we get to this point where a pile of old bottles, a plastic bin of onesies could become something we would point to and claim as our life? These small and large things are what will totally break our heart in the end.

the boy kind

2012-01-12T09:05:00.000-08:00

The reason we needed another baby is because of the florescent lighting in the bathroom at work. Every time I went in there I saw grey hair. Grey hair that is or isn't there. I'd glance at my hair and immediately my ovaries would begin to worry.

So, despite the fact that one is always enough, we are having two. And I am scared. And happy. But like roller coaster happy scared where you know it could be dangerous, but you believe everything is going to be amazing.

Our new baby is going to be the boy kind. I always wanted to have a son, even though I never wanted to have a son. Girls are my people. But at the same time, when I taught first grade I always found the boys daunting and lovable in a way that made me want one for keeps. But still, I'm nervous and feel like having a son is not unlike inviting a strange and funny monkey to tea.

new year

2012-01-05T12:02:00.001-08:00

This year has been new for five days. It's not too late to write about it. I didn't make a resolution this year, despite how I love setting goals, failing at goals, and feeling miserable about them. It wasn't a conscious effort. I just didn't get around to it. Kind of like how I forgot to write about Christmas.

I spent New Years with my sick little girl. Late at night, she woke with a high fever and a very scary dream about dinosaurs in her room. Her high fever scared me and the maturity of her dream made me so sad. I remember the scary dreams of childhood. So, I brought her to bed with me.

She was immediately comforted, so relieved to be in mama's bed. She sang goofy little songs to me, and told me weird, funny things. Oh Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree, I really like your branches. We laid there for awhile, scratching her back, petting her head, waiting for her fever to break. She coughed in my face, her hot arms wrapped around my neck. At the same time, my tiny little baby wiggled deep inside. My blessings all drawn up around me.

I am always surprised that Ramona feels the same way for me that I do my own mother. I somehow bring her the kind of comfort one expects from a Mother. Despite being flawed and all wrong, and sometimes unkind, I am exactly right.

war is over

2011-12-09T12:51:00.000-08:00

The morning after Occupy Los Angeles was cleared out I sat at the table with Brian, ranting with my loud and revolutionary heart. Somehow, things spill out of my mouth, as they have before, things filled with violence. I say things, angry things. People should be afraid to make that much money, I say. I know this is a threat.

On the radio, Happy X-mas (War is Over) plays. I pick up my little girl, I rock her and I cry. Because it isn't a civil war I am wanting. The anger is wetted by my sadness. I look at my breakfast, I look down at my daughter's head. I feel how complex the whole thing can be. I feel sad and scared. I feel mad and stolen from. I feel like fighting. I feel like making peace. Mostly I just feel bad and I cry.

toddler gift guide

2011-11-21T11:19:00.000-08:00

I asked Ramona a few days ago what she would like to get her dad for Christmas. I wasn't really expecting a real answer, but she told me she wanted to get him a toy. When I asked her what kind of toy, she said, "A flashlight!" I was amazed. Yeah! He would like a flashlight! Suddenly I realized I am off the hook on picking out gifts. I ask Ramona, she picks out something wacky and then we are done.

We are getting my dad Play-doh. He will love it.

A good friend of mine is celebrating a birthday today. This morning I asked Ramona what we should get her and quickly she came up with Christmas lights. Perfect!

Ramona is a gift giving savant. You have all been forewarned.

the lighter side of very good news

2011-11-16T07:20:00.000-08:00

A conversation between Ramona and her Mother:

Me: "Ramona, would you like a brother or a sister?"

Ramona: "Mama, I already have a brother. My brother Sophie."

Sophie is our dog.

once and again

2011-11-15T14:45:00.000-08:00

I was pregnant once. And then it went away, because it wasn't really there. I lost it in an afternoon. In a moment of across the great beyond knowledge I confessed to a friend, I'm holding onto this thing with everything I've got. I knew I guess, because a few hours later it began. I stood up from my desk and took myself home.

In the car I heard a song on the radio. This is all I remember. I remember that it was loud and I wanted to fill my ears up with it because I was losing something and I knew it.

One song turned into another, Personal Jesus performed by Mr. Johnny Cash, which only confirms for me that Johnny and God have close personal ties. This song served to remind me that I'm only the next in a long line of humans to have it given and taken away from.

Accepting the loss of that pregnancy was a strange kind of bliss for me. I'm holding onto this thing with everything I've got. I really was. And to just surrender was a relief. Of course, I stumbled with disbelief and hope, but by evening I knew it was going away and I just exhaled the rest of the way with it.

Now, I am next in the line to be given something. I am pregnant with my second child once again. I have been more afraid this time. I hesitated to tell anyone. Sometimes I am so afraid of the open wild possibilities of our lives. When I close my eyes I see the baby inside me floating in space. I have not wrapped my heart around this thing yet. But I will.

open door

2011-10-25T13:05:00.000-07:00

Teach us to care and not to care
Teach us to sit still. - From the poem Ash Wednesday by T.S. Eliot

I have a full heart of things to share. But I'm not ready. Closer...closer...not quite there.

Ramona asked if I could please not close her door at night. Please don't close my door, mama. If you close my door, I will cry in my bed. These little things are a clue to me she is growing older. These little movements of fear and control. So, she sleeps with her door open and it's fine.

She sits on my lap while I rock her and I notice how her back is so long. I think about how big she will get.

The door is open. Ramona's door. My door. Things can breeze by us. We are missing things. We are catching things. We care. We do not care.

I've got a bird that sings

2011-09-19T08:48:00.000-07:00

You start singing in the night, because you need to hear your own voice. You sing to your baby the songs you know. You change words, you forget words. Then you just keep singing these little songs you think you made up yourself.

Ramona, Ramona where you been so long?

Ramona, Ramona girl, where you been so long?

I been worrying about you, babyBaby, please come home

I've got a bird that whistles

I've got a bird that sings

I've got a bird that whistles

I've got a bird that sings

But if I ain’ got Ramona

Life don’t mean a thing

One night, after singing this silly little song for two years, Ramona interrupts. "Mama, I am home." I start to laugh and she laughs too. She says, "sing Ramona song" and her little mouth opens and she sings to me in a scratchy, squeaky baby voice. I been worrying about you baby, baby please come home.

And we sing together. And the sound of her sweet out of tune voice, it makes me laugh and cry. I'm smiling so hard I can hardly form words. We sing at each other's faces. And it's moments like this, I don't want to change her. Or teach her. I don't want to worry about her. Or plan for her. I just want to sing with her and never, ever doubt her.

into the morning

2011-09-12T13:27:00.000-07:00

Today as we were getting ready for school, Ramona decided to eat a plum. She watched me throw one into my lunch bag and requested one for herself. I handed her one, wondering what she would do. She bit into it. Not like a baby eats. She bit into it like a person who knows their way around a plum. She ate the whole thing, smiling, laughing through every bite.

When I drop her off at her school in the morning, I open the gate to the yard and she runs in. I call her back for a kiss and a hug. And then she's gone. Into the cool morning air, she runs. I wave at the other kids. Because mine is long gone.

This afternoon, I ate my own plum. It was so sour and cold. I thought of her the whole time.

happy heart

2011-09-04T10:49:00.000-07:00

I went on retreat yesterday morning.

The monks from the Drepung Gomang Monastery were visiting and led our half day retreat. There was only a small amount of meditation practice, but we were fortunate to be able to receive teachings on meditation, the life of the Buddha, and The Four Noble Truths.

I needed my attention brought back to Buddhism. Lately I've been feeling terrible. Crazy, and in need of help.

As I sat and listened to the loud horns, the clanging bells, I surrendered. I push away Tibetan Buddhism because of its mysticism. Its talk of ghosts and the ceremony that means nothing to the western me. But as the horn blasted into my ears, the ghost in me was moved away. The cobwebs cleared. And I just listened. And I sat.

There are ghosts all around me. Hungry ones. Ghosts that make it impossible for me to see the world as it really is. Ghosts that take me away from the ones I love. Ghosts that fill my heart with panic.

Yesterday, I was blessed to sit on a cushion in the heat. Fortunate that the path led me to retreat, where I sat in the heat to listen to a Tibetan monk teach the simple and confusing Dharma. Fortunate that the horn and prayers swept my thoughts away and I was left sitting. Sitting and listening.

This morning as I played with my daughter, we looked at each other in the mirror. She said, "whole family, Ramona and mama." Our cheeks pressed together, our smiles bright. And my smile matched hers. It matched in its reach, its happiness real and not manufactured.

suffering, revisited

2011-08-20T09:13:00.000-07:00

The art of losing isn't hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster. - From the poem One Art, by Elizabeth Bishop

Years ago, a dear friend lost her father. His death was a surprise and it was tragic. She came home to attend his funeral and pick up the pieces with her family.

And she went out to lunch with me. This friend and I were cut from the same cloth. Suffering rolls off of us. We laugh it off. We think it off. Masters of the art of avoidance. We sat in my car and howled at the hilarity of losing. We were in our early twenties. We were smart girls. We were angry, hard nosed little cynics.

I couldn't feel her suffering. I wouldn't. She didn't want me to,I told myself. We sat in my car, hard as little rocks.

I'm still a hard little rock. It makes me easier to love, I tell myself. Things can happen to me, and I will do you a favor by not expecting you to confront my suffering. We are all like this.

Life is suffering. It's the god's honest truth. I'd stare it in the face, with a softened heart, if I could. I would surrender to it, if I weren't so afraid.

so good to see you

2011-08-16T13:28:00.000-07:00

The summer is over. Ramona and I had so many weeks together that I forgot what day it was and the only clothes that went into the washing machine were pajamas. Being a teacher is smart.

I didn't blog much, because I didn't have many good stories and what I could eek out, I saved. Not to pretend though, what I saved wasn't great.

This blog turned two a few weeks ago. I celebrated by not posting. And it's ok.

Yesterday was my first day back to work. When I returned home, Ramona hugged me and said, "oh mama, it's so good to see you." I'm not kidding. That's what she said.

I'm not scared anymore. Ramona and I are going to go out in the world with our arms open and our heads up. She's going to start school on Monday and I'm trusting the world to see my baby is a great, good girl.

Because after a first day back to work she tells me how good it is to see me. That. Welcome to the year, people. Hang on, because this one is going to be so great. However it happens there will be a story here and whether I am attached to my life going perfect or not, the truth in my heart is that if there's a story in here, I'm satisfied. This is the redemption part of my story.

what I am is lost

2011-08-10T21:19:00.000-07:00

If what I am is what's in me

then I'll stay strong, that's who I'll be

and I will always be the best me that I can be

there's only one me, I'll admit

have a dream, I'll follow it

It's up to me to try......

-will.i.am

Here, watch this.

I watched it about 20 times tonight. Because it's August. And I've been in a slump. I can't write, can't practice, can't clean. But I can watch Sesame Street.

I'm going to get back to this. I swear. Because I keep getting Stronger.

graduation day

2011-07-16T09:58:00.000-07:00

I finished my paper. Today my professor said, congratulations on your excellent paper.

I beamed. Because it really is excellent that I finished it. And it proves to me that despite how difficult I am, my people will step in and pull me to the finish line. My people. My excellent people.

Ramona, Brian, Dr. Robins, Bambi, Daniel. My people.

Ramona: you never really cared whether I was there or not. Dad is just as good as mom, thank you for knowing that.

Brian: you are no hero. there is no magic here. you don't rush in to save me. you make me find my own way every time. you aren't living this life for me. you weren't put on this earth to make my dreams come true. you fought me over every moment I took. and that's the way it should be. I'd pick you out of every man on earth.

Dr. Robins: you taught me about being a great teacher. You never lowered your expectations, but also never hated me for failing. You offered no praise and in turn, no blame. When I came back, we just started where I was. This is teaching.

Bambi: you hounded me over this paper even when I had no intention of writing it. I wrote it to please you. I wrote it so we could be friends without you badgering me all the time. God's Honest Truth.

Daniel: you called me a Proust reading thesis writing bad-ass. Talking is not the same as writing, but I always did my best work after a good long talk. Everyone deserves a friend as wise as you.

I'm not going to "walk", there will be no party. It just took me too long and I'm ready to move on. This is it. Welcome to my graduation. Congratulations on your excellent paper, Nova Bradfield.

landslide

2011-06-24T13:04:00.000-07:00

Well, I've been afraid of changing, 'cause I've built my life around you.

I've heard Landslide by Fleetwood Mac so often I can't really hear it anymore, but somehow this morning, I heard it as if for the first time.

And I heard it in my head as Ramona and I watered the plants. And I heard it as we walked around the neighborhood. As we ate our peanut butter sandwiches. And when she exclaimed how much she loved her milk and her blankie as we got ready for nap the song broke open and soaked me with meaning.

Well, I've been afraid of changing, 'cause I've built my life around you.

Ramona's going to preschool in August. And I'm scared. I'm scared she's too young and I've chosen wrong for her. I'm afraid she's a baby and they won't let her be a baby. I'm scared she won't be a baby anymore. I'm afraid, I'm afraid, I'm afraid.

I'm afraid because I've built my life around you.

Want to hear the truth? The you is not my Ramona. The you is The Way I Know You To Be . The World As I Know It. My fear takes stupid twists and turns. It follows a logical line, until you see it's built of bull. The truth is that I've built my life around things being just as I know them to be.

You are nearing a change, just as I am. And we don't even have to let go, it will let go of us. The landslide will bring you down.
Good luck, My Friends. Woooosh.

quiet kingdom

2011-06-22T11:59:00.000-07:00

Before bed, I quietly rocked Ramona. I stared at her. She stared at me. And then she pinched my t-shirt between her fingers, brought her hand to her mouth, and pretended to "eat" what she had plucked. And again and again. Her little mouth smacking, no smile. A serious endeavor, eating whatever off my shirt. Off my cheek. My shoulder.

I whisper quietly, mostly just move my lips, what are you doing? I am not incredulous, I just want to know. I get no response. But I see her small monkey face and she seems more baby than she has felt in months.

Perhaps she was a monkey, perhaps she was my monkey?

It's times like this, when I see all the past and the present mixed up. I see the moment, there, standing all alone. And it breaks my heart because it's beautiful. And it's slipped away. It's moved on to its next spot. And I really should just close my eyes and reopen them.

Since then I've turned that part of an e.e.cummings poem around in my head...I'll get it wrong maybe, but this is how I remember it....I do not know how you close and open, all I know is the blue of your eyes is deeper than all roses.....and I remember being a primate and sitting, relaxed in the shade, my sweet mysterious baby, miracle, eating fleas from my shaggy coat. And not thinking, not wondering, not weeping. A monkey mind.

notes from the room

2011-06-18T09:25:00.001-07:00

I'm into Oprah right now. I've been watching her network and reading old O magazines my mom has laying around. I'm a mess, maybe.

I have spent two weeks at home taking care of Ramona. I have rules. I have to eat breakfast and lunch, not too much coffee. And I have to at least clean up lunch during naptime. Then I read until I fall asleep. This is what I can accomplish for myself. I can eat two meals and wash a few dishes. A quick wipe with a washcloth. And then I am free to read and sleep.

But the waking hours of Ramona. Holding her hand. Coaxing, coaxing her to play my games. Change a diaper. Read a book. This is easy. I can do the things that would never land on a list. I can smile. I can pet her sweetheart head. I can do these things.

Oprah says, "Nova, you need a place to work. A desk. A place to focus your dreams!" So this morning Brian drug up an old crappy desk from the garage. I wiped it clean. I opened my computer, laid out an old list. And I began to peek inside. Inside the inbox. The lists. The plans. my heart.

I do this while watching out a window. Watching them play with the hose. I want to run out there and push all this off. Fall into the pace of the day. Fill a sippy cup, fix a shoe strap, change wet diaper, put the babydoll nigh-night. I will myself to not give into the pull of the day. I will myself to face the blog, face the research paper. Face the inbox.

remembering the rapture

2011-06-06T11:24:00.000-07:00

I was "taking a break" from blogging during the rapture. Remember a few weeks ago when everyone was making all those rapture jokes?

I'm not going to lie. I was totally freaked out. I have anxiety issues that are set aflame very easily. I can't hear something even remotely scary without making it ten times scarier in the horror show studio of my head.

From time to time Christianity brushes by me in the dark. The day of the rapture, I thought, this is it, I'm going to hell. And then I had this strange reassuring thought, well....god will be down there with me. He didn't bring me into this world to abandon me now.

And anyway, hell will be a just fine place to practice Buddhism.

how hard is it?

2011-06-03T18:35:00.000-07:00

The month of May is not for me. As usual, I got buried in work, birthdays, weddings, showers, graduations, illnesses, and I just zombie-walked through the whole thing.

Until yesterday, when I noticed it was June. When I noticed that the school year was over, that the schedule that never slowed down, suddenly stopped. Without a lot of hoping and counting down the days, the school year ended.

We said goodbye to our babysitter of two years. I said goodbye to some dear fifth grade readers. I said goodbye to a newly made friend. I said goodbye until my heart crashed to the ground, and I pulled over the car to sob. I mostly cried for me, I think. Because I have failed so much.

I failed Proust, I failed at 30 day yoga, I failed everything I tried. How hard is it? Can I try again? Can I just stop trying?

I'm not sure how to end this one. All I know is that it's June and I feel like if I could bake myself a cake, and lure my heart out into the open, I would apologize. I would say, "sorry for making this all so much harder than it really needs to be."

this baby was a baby

2011-05-04T11:54:00.000-07:00

When I taught first grade we read this little story every year, An Egg is an Egg by Nicki Weiss. It's a simple, repetitive story. Easy to read. But hard to read. Because, it's about change. This post is inspired by the writing of Nicki Weiss and by my little girl's birthday.

An egg is an egg until it hatches and then it is a chick.
Nothing stays the same
Everything can change.
My little girl is now two. One was easy. One felt like thank god she's one and sleeps through the night. Thank god that scary wonderful year is over. But two? Oh, two is different.
This baby was a baby until she grew
and now she is a girl.
How much longer is she a baby? Every morning I greet her, and she's new. Every afternoon, I reunite with a new lovely stranger. She grows in every second.
But you can always be a baby
You will always be my baby.
Two feels like please let me gather up your small hands in mine. Two feels like let's press every moment into a book before it leaves us forever. One felt like regaining my footing. Two has turned me into a weeping fool.
Some things stay the same
Some things never change.
I don't know that part yet. I don't know the part that doesn't change. I see you growing so fast and I see me trying not to miss a thing. I see me missing lots of things. But I love you. I love you, I love you.
Some things stay the same
Some things never change.

happy birthday, beautiful.

one thing leads to another

2011-04-23T08:12:00.000-07:00

I had a headache for a year.

It was about stress, anxiety, tension, and hunger. But mostly it was about pain and not taking care of myself. About a month ago, I went to a chiropractor. I know people are skeptical about this medical practice. I am too. But after two weeks, I didn't have a headache. And I felt my body waking up. I started to stretch. I felt the word heal in my heart.

Last year I tried to take a yoga class, but it didn't work. It was too hard to commit to a practice that pulled me away from my family for two hours every week. I need all of my practices to create peace and comfort, not tension. And I wasn't learning a daily yoga practice, I was just leaving my house to do yoga for an hour and then going home to the place where not-yoga happens.

So, I signed up for 30 days of yoga with Marianne Elliott. This is an online yoga sadhana (committed practice) that lasts for 30 days. She teaches through videos and e-mails. I really emphasize the word teaches. This isn't like following along with a yoga DVD that runs through the postures as fast as possible. The purpose of this teaching is that when you are done with the 30 day sadhana, you will be left with a daily practice. You can just do yoga, every day, before the baby gets up, before the day begins. Just get up, and do yoga in your quiet room. This is something I can do for myself, that doesn't require taking anything away from anyone in my family. This is a comfort.

My intention is to heal and my commitment is to try every day.

rain forest

2011-04-21T07:56:00.000-07:00

Every summer, I would spend time with my cousins at my grandma's house. It was the best time I've ever had in my whole life. It was the joy of a week long sleepover, picking right up with best friends as if no time had passed at all, even though in fact, a year had passed.

Each summer we would go to the zoo and in particular the rain forest exhibit. I've been back since and it's pretty nice. But as a kid, to me it was not just an exhibit, it was The Rain Forest. And most importantly, it was a signpost in the large world of my childhood.

The summer I was ten, while visiting the rain forest with my cousins, I sat down on a bench and really noticed where I was. I remember clearly thinking, I am here. I will think of this all year and for the rest of my life, but right now, I am here.

Every once in awhile, I am able to notice that this life of ours, this short little burst, is a love affair.

"hold it" - my kid is cute

2011-04-20T07:09:00.001-07:00

In the name of keeping this blog going while I finish up my paper, I am now going to tell Cute Kid Stories.

Ramona is pathologically fearful of loud noises. When she hears a loud noise outside she shouts, "elephants!" And these are not the friendly type elephants either. These are the kind that charge. She runs to me, grabs my leg and says, "it's okay".

She does these sweet little pat pats on my shoulder. She tells us "I yove you".

When she wants us to pick her up she says, "hold it".

A few weeks ago when we would ask her what her name was she would say, "mount". Now she includes what she is doing, like, "Monut eating yogurt!"

And she counts everything. two, nine, ten, eleven, eight. Today she diligently counted her peanut butter.

And in one week Monut will be two. (but she says she will be four, nine, ten, eleven, eight.)

the best moms of my generation

2011-04-19T08:05:00.000-07:00

I might have blogger's block. I had hoped by now my paper would be done and I could get to the redemption part of my story. However, that is not the case and so I get scared every time I try to write. So, I'm going to just start throwing some small stories out there, because a blank blog hurts worse than a silly blog.

Small Story:

Conversation between Nova and Husband Brian this morning:

Nova: I'm like Allen Ginsberg. You know, like in Howl.
Brian: oh really.
Nova: Yes, all the best minds of my generations are being driven mad.
Brian: laughs....do you mean, like, just yours?
Nova: Nope, everyone I know is really crazy right now. It's not just me.

nothing, right now

2011-04-12T06:49:00.000-07:00

I grasp with two hands. Lately I grasp with the hands I don't even have yet. This is not a resolve to postpone the writing of this blog until I have my paper written. This is not a resolve to take vitamins. Be a better Buddhist. Take better care of my skin. Write my words in a small notebook at the bottom of my purse. Write a blog post that tells you what's in my heart and asks what's in yours. This is not my resignation. This is not a new plan to maximize my productivity. This is nothing. I am a poet with no poems.

the madeleine

2011-03-30T12:05:00.000-07:00

Perhaps you have heard, I'm reading Proust's Rememberance of Things Past, Vol. 1 Swann's Way. Yesterday, I read about The Madeleine. The small shell shaped cake that had the power to evoke a flood of memories.

This is the most famous "thing" in literature. Little Marcel sits down to tea with his mother and takes a small bite of tea soaked madeleine....

"but at the very instant when the mouthful of tea mixed with the cake crumbs touched my palate, I quivered, attentive to the extraordinary thing that was happening inside of me."

Then he tries to hold onto this fleeting memory. This powerful, joyful thing.

I wish I had not known about the madeleine. I wish I could have tasted it for myself.

that's my heart in there

2011-03-25T18:28:00.000-07:00

I've been writing a lot. But not on this blog. What I have been doing is finishing my thesis, for real. It went from being an impossible burden, to a list of things I'm crossing off one at a time. Sometimes I look at what I've written and it's strange to see nothing of myself on that page. Even if I squint, I can't see myself in there. I wonder if it is possible to put your heart into academic writing?

See this picture? This is me, in front of the library at my University at the start of my graduate program.

I love this girl. This non-mother person. This hard working, small dreaming girl.

I'm not that girl anymore. I have huge dreams. I have so much counting on me. But still, I can write a poem. And then another. I'm going to write a book. A text message. A letter. I'm going to write the thing that makes your heart sing, yearn, hurt, take refuge. I'm going to make you feel more like yourself. Because see, I'm writing my favorite story. And so are you. Get out a pencil, see if you aren't.

It is all wide open now. Let's wash a floor. Let's make some art. Let's make some heads shake.

union maid

2011-03-12T18:19:00.000-08:00

You know what's a bad idea? Taking this sweet blog about my baby and my spirit, and writing about politics. But I write this because watching Wisconsin this week has reminded me that I was taught to be a political activist. My parents were serious union people during the 80s and 90s. I know what to sing at a political demonstration.

My dad worked as an unskilled laborer my whole childhood and was paid a living wage because it was a union job. I was able to go to a state university and get a good job as a teacher. It's easier to raise your children well if you make a living wage.

Poverty is what's wrong with America's schools. My students live in poverty. I have sad stories.

You know what's not poor? The way we feel about our students. Honestly, I think my co-workers are catty bitches, but they are competitive and proud. The teachers at my school care about their kids and care about teaching well. We want to do well, because we want our kids to learn.

I have no idea who these bad teachers are that everyone talks about. They don't work at my school. Oh sure, I've seen bad teachers. But they don't last. This job is too horrible to endure if you do it badly. Did you know that half of all teachers don't make it to their fifth year? It's an unforgiving profession. If you aren't good at it, you cry every night until you either get good or you quit.

Merit pay? You can't afford us.

There is a bill being considered in Missouri that would recall all teacher tenure. My union will fight it. Teachers will fight it. I doubt we do a proper job explaining why we think it's important. It's pretty clear to me that this is about money. This isn't about getting rid of bad teachers. This is about making it easier to cut positions. This is about making class size huge. It's about shortchanging your child of their American right to the best education in the world (challenge me on that one....I'm ready). It's about breaking American schools.

And pay attention to where the money is shifted to. Pay attention to who's getting it. They aren't building roads with it and they aren't giving it back to tax payers.

I see you

2011-03-08T09:40:00.000-08:00

I took Ramona to an indoor playground for very little kids. When we walked in, Ramona was shocked and delighted. The stuff to climb on! The bright colors! and all those friends!

She stood in the middle, waved and shouted, "It's me! It's Monut!" But they all just whooshed by her, and she stood like a pebble in a stream. The friends were gone. She tries again, "It's me! It's Monut!" But she's alone.

I know in my head that I'm overwrought here. My daughter is growing up. That's life. But "it's me! It's Monut!" makes me tear up every time I hear it echo in my heart. It was the cry, the "see me, see me, friends" plea. It was the subtle look of surprise at being ignored that makes my heart ache.

I was standing back, observing, but from afar I smiled big, caught her eye and said "Mama sees you, Monut!" But it wasn't what she was looking for. She bounced to the next fun thing, whatever. But I did not. I did not bounce.

I reveal despair banishing projects, # 2

2011-03-01T16:30:00.000-08:00

As I moped around my house during snow day number 8, I noticed the book More Home Cooking: A Writer Returns to the Kitchen by Laurie Colwin sitting on my bookcase and then I really felt bad.

When I was in my early 20s I had some very lovely ideas about domestic life. About making a home and being a mom. It's so strange to me now, but I never considered my career. At the time I was going to college to be a teacher, but I never saw myself as a working mom.

I glanced at the spine of this book and felt distain for Colwin and shame for myself. I opened the cover and for the first time I allowed myself to be taught by Laurie Colwin. I felt her warm love for the first time. The way she says in so many different ways that being a working mom is hard and that we must re-invent ourselves as cooks. She writes:

A person cooking is a person giving: Even the simplest food is a gift. Both happy people and sad people can be cheered up by a nice meal. This book was written for the sustainers and those who will be sustained.

This isn't about to become a food blog. But I am going to re-read Colwin, do some shopping, do some cooking, and bridge that gap between a fantasy and seeing the world as it really is. With Colwin as my loving, kind teacher.

I think my first experience will be Colwin's black bean soup...

Nova Reads Proust vol.1 sleeping and name dropping

2011-02-28T16:41:00.000-08:00

Now, begins Despair Banishing Project #1.

For the longest time, when I lay down at night I think of instances in books and movies when the characters sleep and I pretend to be them. I'm Katniss strapped to a tree, Kevin McCallister in an opera house storage room, I'm held hostage in South America sleeping on a grand living room floor. Whatever happens to my Proust project, at least I have a new sleep story to add to my collection.

In the beginning, a young boy (proust?) tells us about going to sleep. Its goodness when it is easy, and the scary way it can allude you. Winter bedrooms, summer bedrooms. Falling asleep in the late afternoon light before your very late dinner. About how your mother comes to you or doesn't come to you and the way you hold back your plea for love. Because that can make the whole thing go away, can't it? In the first 25 pages, with lots of words and very few periods, we hear a lot about saying goodnight.

(We also meet M.Swann and there is a lot of French name dropping that was a little lost on me.)

But despite this and the very unsure ground I stand on regarding what this book is about, I've buried my rundown brain into its pages and have been thankful for getting lost in all the beautiful words.

I reveal despair banishing projects, # 1

2011-02-26T06:56:00.000-08:00

I have fallen into a despair with my current career as a reader. I've been reading some books. But I don't feel like a reader right now. A reader reads every day. And writes about what she reads. And drives everyone nuts with what she's been reading. That's what a reader does.

I have three projects I am currently working on to fix all that.

Project Number One: Nova Reads Proust

I've been a book gobbler. I need to slow down. I need to trudge. I want to read each word with no thought of the future. I need to read Proust. I have a copy of Swann's Way (it was a gift). And I have tried to read it, but oh my, it is Proust. and I am an idiot.

But I have read To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf, I can do this. I can read the words and see what happens. I can go in search of lost time. But, here's the thing...this is the project. I'm going to write about it as I'm reading it. I like to finish a book, do some research and then write. Especially with smart books. But no, this is the Nova reads Proust in her underwear project. I know that I will misunderstand stuff. I will reveal my stupidity. But in the end, we will know exactly what it looks like when Nova Reads Proust.

Project two and three will be revealed when I figure them out. But I want you to know that I am ready to go full on Julie/Julia. Hint Hint! This life is going to be exciting and amazing* to me. Despair Be Gone!

*these are new words Ramona has been throwing around. Mama, it's amazing!

love note - so much space

2011-02-14T18:29:00.000-08:00

I need space. Room to love and pine, to sit. Room to grow and shrink, space to double over.

To change everything. To start over, again.

See it? This love with elastic, this love made of giving and letting go? We are seeing not a marriage, not something sealed with commitment. but a sky.

I don't know what you married, I don't even know what I married, but in the years that follow I feel his space rolling out, rolling out over the years. a sky. I married the sky.

Happy Valentine's Day, World. Love it up.

look! notice! there it IS!

2011-02-08T19:57:00.001-08:00

I lack faith. The wind blows, and I'm looking around for a savior.

I wrote a note for my pocket:

The problem is I need someone to pray to right now.

I wish I could borrow yours.

Brian and I were having a bicker. Fighting bitterly over something momentarily really important, next moment non-existent.

Ramona interrupts, babbling sweetly, "mama, mama, look Buddha".

No kidding. She points to the Buddha on my bedside table and draws my attention to it.

Sheesh, girl, I get it.

something different,something wonderful

2011-02-08T19:30:00.000-08:00

I'm not quite downhearted, for I've been much worse. Even last year, I was worse. Last year was indeed harder. But I'm hating everything these days. Things aren't quite right at work. I have all these ideas, but I'm so fuzzy I can't settle down and focus.

Mothering right now is like watching birds hatch from a nest, like seeing a new butterfly unflap two wet wings. The girl speaks! She says dear, dear things. She sings a song she invented herself. mama,dada,mama,dada,bop,bop,bop!

Yet, I am like a person who has eaten too much of one thing and needs another. Something wonderful, something different. I need perhaps a rock, a sunny one, and a case of wine. To drink with a best friend. To drink with my best friend.

To feel different than I do now, because I am only ambiguous. To write and write, but to not know where to put it. I dream a big dream for myself. I imagine to create something wonderful. But then I step right back, re-think, re-think, re-worry, edit. Edit it down, down to the point of not happening.

So, I'm going to get out of the head. And just write a little more. More doing, less worrying. And I know this feeling is just a whole lot of February. And it's not here to stay.

mama quiet

2011-01-20T10:51:00.000-08:00

At night, after the books, after Ramona drinks her milk, right before I put her in bed, she talks to me. Without the distraction of the day, sitting in the dark, wrapped in a blanket, I listen to her stories. After 20 months of mama talking, talking, talking. I listen.

Quietly, sleepily, she tells me the names of all her friends at day care. She tells me about a "party". My little girl is learning how to tell me things. Not just that she needs milk and her blanket. She's learning how to tell me about her day. About what happens when I'm not there. She's learning how to tell me about her.

Her babysitter tells me that Ramona talks about me too. She tells her that "mama is sleeping". She tells this to Brian too. Mama is sleeping. In her mind, if I'm not with her, I must be sleeping.

This Ramona is a new girl. This daughter is a new love that I'm dizzy with. And honestly, I feel like a new mother too. A quiet mom. A listening mom.

The Wordy Shipmates - no kidding

2011-01-14T10:05:00.000-08:00

I finished reading The Wordy Shipmates by Sarah Vowell about a week ago. I love Vowell's funny voice so much, but this book was a little too much like a thesis paper for me. You know how when you are talking to someone at a party, and you really like them, and you are sort of interested in what they are saying, but then your eyes kind of glaze over? And you hate that, because you want to pay attention, but oh my...... This was The Wordy Shipmates for me. (It really freaks me out, but I KNOW more often than not, I'm the one that makes the people's eyes glaze over.)

But I appreciated the book and her devotion to teaching us who we came from. I am proud of our puritan ancestors. But in my heart, I am sort of a Calvinist. I told a friend once that if I were Christian, I would not pray for things. I would just pray as often as possible for God to have mercy on my miserable soul. A few days ago, I heard of a yoga teacher telling her class that they were not the ones that really needed this mindfulness training, it was everyone else that really needed it. Preaching to the choir, and that sort of thing. I shook my head so hard on that one. I do need the training. I believe that in my heart we all need the training. None of us are the elect.

Monut

2011-01-11T10:54:00.000-08:00

I am having a snow vacation. School was cancelled for Monday, Tuesday, and now for Wednesday. I feel very certain this is a cosmic gift to apologize for the really crappy Christmas.

I've been doing all the things that I wanted to do during my real break. Cleaning, cooking, and being with Ramona. She has been so entertaining. All day yesterday when I would ask her questions the answer was "no way!" I have no idea where she got that. This morning she was playing in my room and she was putting all my rings on the head of the little Buddha that sits on the table by my bed. It's not a shrine exactly, but that little statue never fails to soften my heart and remind me to practice. She used to call it "booty" but today it actually sounded like "Buddha". I have no plans to take Ramona to the dharma school, but I admit that I love seeing her grow up in the home that I've created. And there is Buddha in this home.

Another funny Ramona thing is that she refers to herself as "Monut". Today it was "Mama's coffee, Monut MUCK!" (translation: mama is drinking coffee, so Ramona would like some milk.) I really dislike the nickname associated with Ramona, Mona. I just can't ever call her that. But I think Monut is hilarious.

I can't get enough of this charming girl. This snow vacation is just what I needed.

Freedom

2011-01-05T10:43:00.000-08:00

It turns out freedom ain't nothing but missing you - Taylor Swift

(I don't think Franzen would mind the Swift quote. Pop book, pop song, it's all just chicklets/candy anyway.)

During the Christmas break, I finished reading Freedom by Jonathan Franzen. There are a lot of different ways to feel this book. I had never considered that it was about anything other than marriage, until I talked with a friend about the book. Maybe Freedom is like a Rorschach test to determine the most difficult relationship in your life.

For me, Freedom is about marriage. The marriage of Walter and Patty Burglund.
When I read it, I would go from feeling my marriage was superior to that of Walter and Patty. And then something would be a little too familiar and I would feel shame. Shame for feeling superior. Because, during a dark moment, don't we all feel like the whole thing is just about over?

The book includes a section where the character Patty writes her autobiography to explain that "mistakes were made". God, what a completely heartbreaking utterance. Mistakes were made.

Early Christmas Eve morning, 30 pages from completion, I read the letter Patty wrote to Walter, explaining how she wanted him back:

"She can imagine that, if she could somehow be with Walter again, and feel secure in his love again, and get up from their warm bed in the morning and go back to it at night knowing that she's his again..."

"It comes to her day after day, year after similar year, this yearning for his face and his voice and his anger and his kindness, this yearning for her mate."

After reading this, I closed the book. Rolled over, into my husband's arms and thanked god for Franzen and fiction. And for Brian. And for knowing that this is just the story of a marriage and mistakes will be made.

2010, just as it was

2010-12-31T11:25:00.000-08:00

I didn't have a very excellent Christmas Break.

I hate writing about illness, but sometimes it's the only thing in the storyline. That has certainly been the case for me. I got sick on the Friday of the last day of school and have been sick every second after that. This depressed me very much, which made the sickness worse and it's gotten to the point where I can't separate the stomach bug from the sadness.

It's New Years Eve and I'm thinking it's time to stop feeling sad for the lost two weeks. Time to just let it be what it was and move on.

Move on to 2011. I have seen several blogs where they have highlighted their year in blogging and although I hate to join and copy, I feel like it is necessary to resuscitate my spirit. So, here it is, 2010, as it was:

In January, I tried to teach Ramona to sleep through the night.

I got a baby ready for the day in February.

I broke down in March.

In April, I shelved some books.

On May 1, 2010 Ramona turned one and then she scared the hell out of me.

In June, I began to practice, for real.

I cleaned out a closet in July.

On August 17, I turned 30.

In September, I ate some soup.

In October, I learned to ride a bike.

I played the viola in November.

And a few days ago, in December, I remembered.

That was 2010. Now I'm going to leave you with my husband Brian's New Years Resolution:

"I'm just going to keep trying."

Well said, huh? Happy New Year.

a christmas memory

2010-12-20T11:12:00.000-08:00

Last week, during a staff meeting, we were asked to tell a favorite holiday memory. A couple ideas occurred to me, the year I got Super Mario Bros. 3 was a good year, I liked going to the Nutcracker ballet with my mom....presents, lights, hams, fudge.......all fun....all good. But not really a memory.

This is mine. And I shouldn't tell it. It's one of my best stories.

In high school, my chamber music group played city hall during the month of December. We set up in a small out of the way alcove, to play to people doing business. Walking to lunch, moving the wheels of bureaucracy. We had plenty of time. Time to get bows ready, music straightened, strings tuned, and then we began the noisy buzz of string players with nothing to do but wait.

I sat and waited. Once I was tuned I was too self conscious to ever warm up. So I sat and enjoyed the city hall architecture, the red bows, the lit trees, and the swirling sound of a small orchestra off kilter.

And then, from behind, amidst all the noise, a song. My teacher, who was sitting among the group, was tuning his violin as well. The same warm up noise, double stops, adjusting, until notes began to piece themselves together from the fray. The notes became the smallest, saddest Christmas song in the holiday oeuvre. have yourself a merry little christmas. It sounded like a bird, a message that pushed against the noise, but did nothing to fight it. I listened, watching, seeing every sweet note travel to the impossibly high ceiling. Filling each corner. I was not listening to this from my seat. I was having an experience from far away, I was far more than a bystander, I was listening from another world.

This dark, but light sweet sadness was oppressive to me. It was the most beautiful thing I have ever heard. Everything else is the exaggeration, this is the truth. This is my favorite of all memories. Listening to a sweet violin, from a great height, finding a treasure.

From now on, our troubles will be out of sight. they will be miles away.

the song ended. I sat in my seat, choked with beauty and love. A tearful acknowledgement of having actually noticed one of the moments of my life.

And then it was time to perform.

Merry Christmas from ramona and her mother

2010-12-13T17:52:00.000-08:00

We are 3 days from Winter Break! I am celebrating by sending out my Christmas Cards. By "Christmas Cards" I mean "this blog post".

This was Ramona and Santa last year:

This is Ramona and Santa this year:

If I were a meaner mom she would be on his lap, screaming. In this particular scene she is whimpering into my shoulder and clutching my arm tightly. She had some kind of Santa radar and would begin to tense up whenever she could sense his presence.

It's so weird to celebrate Christmas with such a little girl. It's like the lights are half on and some one's home part of the time. Last year we didn't bother. This year we are kind of bothering.

I made this video with Brian. I was originally going to play solo, but I sounded so bad I decided I really needed someone to smile at. I'm glad I invited him because we had such a happy fun time making bad music together.

To answer potential questions, yes, those are my pjamas and no, we don't live in a bunker.

We actually made this video for the Fifth Annual Blogger Christmahanukwanzaakah Online Holiday Concert. I think this performance might even be cooler than the year we did the Christmas Recorder Duets (I wish I had filmed those).

Enjoy the sneak peek.

Happy Christmas! War is Over! If you want it!

Love,

Nova

ecstasy/agony

2010-12-08T19:01:00.000-08:00

Last week was the best week of my life. It really was, in all its ordinary glory. I got my worst teaching day out of the way on Monday and then just sailed into the week. I never had to be to work early, and every day I spent a nice morning with Ramona before starting my day. I was creating these little reasonable to do lists with just like 3 things on them. And getting them done, every day. I took care of stuff in the library that I've been dreading for months, worked on my paper, cleaned my house, took care of family and myself. Everything just felt so pleasant. Work was easy, family was easy. I bounced through the whole thing, smiling like an idiot and bragging to all about my Wonderful Week.

Not to sound like a mega pessimist, but I totally knew this week would be no good. However, I didn't know how hard it would be to come back to reality. I started the week with my hardest teaching day. Tuesday I went to the dentist first thing in the morning, so I felt off the whole day and had a miserable headache. Ramona has been throwing these truly amazing mega fits. I can't believe what a fuss she can make. I have to be at work an hour early tomorrow. I can't find red tights for Ramona's Christmas dress and she sees Santa on Saturday! Ack!

But I also feel like all my creative plans large and small are drifting away from me. I have lots of ideas, and then I go to bed. When I wake, I fret about what I want from it all. What do I want? What do I want?

The ecstasy. The agony. (on second thought, I take it all back. I'm having such a Dramatic Week! Everyone, I've been having such a Dramatic Week! Fun!)

every book in the world - book talk

2010-12-03T04:46:00.000-08:00

I've done a pretty sad job of writing about the books I've read since the beginning of fall. I wrote about Eat, Pray, Love and I kind of emoted all over the place about The Hunger Games trilogy. But I never got into all of the middle grade award books I felt compelled to read at the beginning of the school year. The Mark Twain Award nominees weren't very special this year. I don't know, maybe I'm too hard on these little books, but there just wasn't a Paint the Wind among them. However, I do want to mention some here now just to clear the air on the unspoken 12 books.

The Mysterious Case of the Allbright Academy: This was the weirdest damn book ever. It's about these kids that go to an elite academy where the school serves mind controlling drug brownies which causes the students to become amazing students and palatable human beings. And this is bad, so our main character kids vow to shut the operation down.

I thought this book was strangely subversive and made me a little nervous. I feel like singing "Another Brick In The Wall" every time a kid checks this one out.

Stolen Children: What children are ok with is amazing to me. This book is about two children who are kidnapped and taken to a remote cabin in the woods, where they execute an escape plan. As a parent, this book scared the hell out of me, but when I would talk about how frightening this book was the kids acted like I was mental. Stolen Children isn't scary, Mrs. Bradfield, Coraline is scary. (They are right about Coraline though, totally scary.)

I also read this cult favorite among my most favorite library girls, Warrior Cats. If any of your kids like this series, I feel for you. Yuck.

I'm a librarian, so I read. I read and I read. I have just put in a large book order and I'm truly excited to read some of my selections. But before I do that, I have to finish my holiday reading.

What is holiday reading, you ask? Well, it's when I read all the books I'm planning to give as gifts. I've got two really neat gifts in the works right now.

One is the crazy huge Mark Twain text book that is the Autobiography. I'm getting it for my dad, but it's such a huge piece of work I'm starting to chew through it, adding tabs in hopes of making his reading more enjoyable.

The other is The Zen Works of Stonehouse: Poems and Talks of a 14th-Century Chinese Hermit. I won't say who's getting it, because it's a secret. This came as a recommendation from Karen Maezen Miller. These poems were written in the early 1300, yet somehow they feel exactly as new as you have noticed the world to be, just now. Notice, notice, notice. These poems are about noticing. They reveal to me that noticing is my birthright. Merry Christmas, indeed.

Before I started on my holiday books, I was and am still reading Freedom by Jonathan Franzen, which I'm not going to lie, is messing me up. Hello, my name is Nova/Patty, nice to meet you. This is my husband Brian/Walter, we are trying to hold it together. Is marriage for real? I expect nothing less from Franzen.

As I continue to read, I will do a better job of blogging about the books, so that we don't get posts like this in the future. Clearly, this one was a real mess.

turkey hangover

2010-11-29T08:02:00.000-08:00

I never got around to writing a "being thankful" post in honor of Thanksgiving. I never did it, because I couldn't put my finger on for what I was really thankful. I've been walking around with my brain turned off somehow. And when I feel it starting to turn back on, I close my eyes and hide. When I come to terms with what I really know, it's depressing. This didn't seem right for a pre-holiday posting. Far better to read on a Monday, back at work, back to life as we really know it.

As bleak as it sounds, I am thankful for my current tight money situation. I'm thankful for breaking down in the grocery store. Thankful for putting things back. For nearly crying when speaking to the cashier. For feeling honestly overwhelmed at the cost of food and how sophisticated our wants have become. Lately I feel dire about how much my small family wants to consume. I'm thankful for this feeling. We should all be thankful to feel a bit more poor. It's the true state of things, really. Look around.

I have happy things for which to be thankful, of course. But, right now, I'm feeling pretty dark.

starting over, yet again

2010-11-21T18:45:00.001-08:00

I began work on my graduate school research paper again. The road began with apologizing to nearly everyone at my University. Apology is the beginning I think.

I have begun for real. I, Lucy, promise to not pull the football out from under your feet this time, Charlie Brown. I am both Charlie and Lucy, of course.

Today I was loading the washing machine and I nearly panicked. How can I be this person? How can I do all the things that will make me good? How?

Then, as clear as a bell, this bit of worry was labeled for what it is. Thinking. And breathe. And count. And load the laundry. When I write the paper, I will write the paper. Then I will go do something else.

Today I started reading the edits and comments my professor had made. For the first time. And it hurt. She started out positive, but as the paper wore on, I could hear her weariness. I have a lot of work to do. But, I'm going to do it. And put it away. And then go do something else.

violist, interrupted

2010-11-12T13:39:00.000-08:00

In college, I was awarded the principal viola position. This sounds more important than it was. It was a terrible orchestra, in a weak music school. I was the best of the worst. I was doing okay, until we were given a very difficult piece to play that included a viola solo. I am not a soloist. I lived in panic, dreading each rehearsal. But I was holding it together. Until, the choral recital.

Because I was principal violist, I had a seat in the school's string quartet. One night, we were accompanying a vocal student during his senior recital. Easy music. Whole note city. But I lost it.

On the dimly lit stage, looking out into the blinding light, out of the blue, I began to shake. It was probably low blood sugar, just a coincidence. My bow arm began to tremble. I panicked. Sweat. More shaking. All during a very quiet whole note. I can't believe I didn't run. I stopped playing, held my bow off my instrument and tried not to die. Things were never the same after that.

When I met my dad after the performance, I was in shock. "Dad, did you see what happened?" He had not. He couldn't see in my head, didn't notice the sweat and shaking, the panic on my face. The experience frightened me so much. I knew I was done playing. But, I still had several weeks left in the semester. And I still had to play my solo. I also knew, without a doubt, without even trying, that I was never going to be able to play without shaking.

I spent a lot of time in bed.
I tried to practice my solo. I tried to find cures for the shaking that would start every time I placed my bow on the viola. Mostly I just stayed in bed. I was so alone. I tried to speak to the conductor. But I guess I didn't properly convey to her that the symphony was ruining my life. I even worked up the courage to call my university counseling center. They didn't have any available appointments.

I made it through the semester and the last performance. Who even knows what I sounded like. I didn't care. I just wanted to not die of fright. I celebrated my success by never going back to the symphony, hiding my viola in storage, and putting the whole thing behind me.

I walked away from the viola.
Until recently. A fellow librarian invited me to join her string ensemble. Just three old friends that like to play together. I said no before she could even finish her sentence, but she gently pressed. "We play easy music. We just love the harmonies. We'd really love having a violist." Her kindness won me over. I went over and played. I had forgotten so much. Key signature, time signature. But, I had also forgotten my fear.

Playing with the quartet was fun. But, what has been amazing and restorative has been playing by myself. I've started playing after Ramona has gone to bed. I get out the music and I play for myself. It doesn't sound that wonderful, but I don't care. It feels nice, puzzling this instrument out by myself.

I am endlessly enchanted by the circular motion of my life. I step away from things, I come back to things. A kind new friend invites me to play an instrument buried deep in my basement closet. I can let go of things that have happened. I can say yes and I can start again.

on blankets

2010-11-06T17:43:00.000-07:00

A blanket changed my life when Ramona was about 9 months old. You experienced moms can go ahead and laugh at me (and believe me, they have), I am petrified of babies and blankets. It's not my fault. Nurses brainwashed me during my pregnancy.

So, my Ramona, even in the dead of winter got no blanket. When Ramona was about 8 months old, I grew very weary of getting up to nurse once or twice a night. I fretted a lot that she should be learning to sleep through the night. I consulted several sources and they all talked about "loveys". Introduce a lovey. I tried a tiny blanket with a bear head. Didn't work. Then, because I was cold, I started wrapping Ramona and myself in a small crochet baby blanket while nursing at night. Nursing in the dark, with the thing pulled to my chin, I could almost believe I was still in bed. And then the soft little thing started making its way back to the crib. Night after night. And after awhile, Ramona slept through the night. Magic. Soft, subtle, slow, easy magic.

The blanket is not that special. It wasn't given by a beloved family member. Just a little something someone made for a baby. Any baby. But it happened to be my baby.

In the last week or so it has become obvious that Ramona has outgrown the old pink baby blanket. It's gotten cold at night and she needs real warmth. My mom vows to make her something special. Something wonderful. But in the meantime, she lent me a real wonder. A toddler sized afghan that my sister slept under, made by our great grandmother.

When I spread it over her at bedtime, Ramona wiggled with pleasure. Under its weight. Under its warmth. Old pink is in there too, snuggled in her arms. Tonight, I'm thankful for the goodness of it all.

come on, revisit Halloween with me

2010-11-02T18:45:00.000-07:00

Listen, I know you don't want to hear about Halloween 2010 anymore. Blogging is a timely art. But, I'm getting my ass handed to me this week and I really really wanted to write about Ramona and Halloween. See, Ramona loves holidays. Even last year when she was only 6 months old, she partied it up on Thanksgiving. She watched the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade and refused to take a nap the whole day. I know that isn't much, but she seemed really excited. She really seemed to understand that holidays call for joy.

This year, for Halloween, I had modest expectations. I put together a simple costume; a ballerina. I really hadn't planned to take her trick or treating. Mostly I just wanted to take some pictures of her so she can enjoy them someday when she's big. (There are some pictures of me at two years old in a clown costume, which always fascinated me as a child because I was terrified of clowns.)

Trick or Treating must be an instinct, because Ramona howled until we took her outside. Then she naturally picked up her pumpkin and proceeded to march up and down the side walks and into driveways. The girl was dying to trick or treat. Brian's convinced she learned it from television. We let her watch It's the Great Pumpkin,Charlie Brown. She couldn't say trick or treat, but she did say Bye-Bye a couple of times. We let her trick or treat one house, but I really feel like she would have stayed at it all evening if I would have let her.

I love that little ballerina girl. I love how she is always up for good times and joy.

addicted and attached

2010-10-26T10:06:00.000-07:00

I got into a very satisfying rhythm last week. I was going to bed much earlier than usual, I was forgiving myself for being tired in the evening, I switched my meditation to the morning.

Then two forces came into my life that wrecked it all, The Hunger Games Trilogy and my hot water heater.

I've already talked about The Hunger Games. I enjoyed it a lot. But something happened on Sunday night while I was reading Catching Fire (the second book). I got insanely addicted and was determined to read the whole thing. I read well past midnight. I did the same thing Monday night and finished it. I tweeted something desperate about my head hurting and reading being like drugs. I like dense, slow books that you read a few pages of and then go to bed on time. Books that are like dark chocolate, not Cheetos. I usually steer clear of page turners. The kind of book that shakes you up and dehydrates you. I don't really see how reading a book like this is any different than doing drugs. Now I am reading Mockingjay (the third and final book) and trying really hard to be a moderate book user.

See, the thing is, my hot water heater went out on Sunday. Again. I knew I was going to have a weird, shower-less, miserable morning. So, I simply decided to go off the rails. And I did. I woke up sore, tired, grumpy, dirty.
Whatever.
Yesterday, I woke up to hot water and my morning meditation. My cup of coffee. I folded some laundry and re-loaded the dish washer. (I can do that stuff now that I have hot water.) I'm attached to all of it. This all makes me smile very much. I realize that this might be the best go-around I ever have. I have so much peace and bounty around me. I used to feel so much sadness that things never stayed done. That I was always righting myself, only to have them quickly fall apart again. Right now I am just watching things go from great to not good. Watching things break. Watching me mess up. Picking up and trying again. Without anger. Just starting again. And again.

losing my religion

2010-10-21T08:35:00.000-07:00

It's a matter of faithlessness sometimes, I fear.
But I have felt not just not Buddhist, but not anything. Like a white plate, emptied.
I had a shrine, but I turn away from it. I face the wall.
I say no prayers. nothing happens. But sit. sit, count, try again, and again. I sit every day. Every day. Sometimes short. Sometimes shorter. But I always sit.
No longer at night, because by then I am hating. Now, I just go to bed. and get up early.
And sit.
I am somehow scrubbed of feeling. I am scrubbed of my religion. I have no religion I think.
I have not said a prayer, not dedicated any merit, not sat in a Buddha-field. But I have sat.

This morning after my practice I thought, this is no practice at all. Is this Buddhist? Am I Buddhist? Or am I just a person who sits? Is there any difference?
I don't know anything. But I do wake. I do find myself sitting on my cushion. I do find myself there.
I do find myself.

look

2010-10-19T09:50:00.000-07:00

One of my favorite authors is Kate DiCamillo. She also writes a stunning blog. But it isn't really a blog. It's a monthly journal entry and it always takes my breath away.

My student book club and I are currently reading DiCamillo's first novel, Because of Winn-Dixie. During our author study we came across this little quote from DiCamillo, which has kind of become our group's mantra.

Reading should not be presented to them as a chore, a duty. It should, instead, be offered as a gift: Look, I will help you unwrap this miraculous present. I will show you how to use it for your own satisfaction and education and deep, intense pleasure.

I love this so much. But not for the same reason as my students. They hold it up against me, against all their teachers. As a defense against testing and being looked at as a number. As a call for respect.

I see it differently. I don't see the word reading here at all. I see everything. Tucking my daughter in, washing dishes, teaching my lessons, turning my car left, brushing my hair from my eyes. "Look! I will help you unwrap this miraculous present", Kate says to me, "Look!"

stories from the trail

2010-10-18T10:25:00.000-07:00

Brian and I did the impossible. We left the girl and we went on a mini-vacation. We biked about 15-ish miles in the warm autumn sunshine. I didn't embarrass myself out there, so all the practice payed off.

I only fell once. When a ladybug landed on me. I tried to play it cool, but having a bug riding around on my arm freaked me out, so I brushed her off. And immediately crashed.

Here's another story from the trail:
A mom and her kids stopped next to a cliff with water dripping off it. She turns to her kids and says, "look! A natural spring! It's one of God's Wonders! It's God's Bounty!" To which her 13 year old son snarked to himself, "it's more like God's Pee Hole." He was kind of right, because it was just a drainage pipe.

The whole day was like that. Fun and funny. Just out in the air, enjoying the deer, the Missouri river, and the funny children. (I saw a 14 year old boy scout pour about a cup of sugar into his coke and then take a drink of it to impress his friends) We ate fried Okra and corndogs. We drank some beer. We felt a lot more like Nova and Brian, than mama and dada. It was so restful.

The next day, Brian and I went shopping. We got a pumpkin, apples, tomatoes, incense, flowers and yarn. And then we went to get our girl. We missed her very much. But we all did fine, and Brian and I were grateful for time spent together.

marriage, husbands and The Hunger Games

2010-10-14T08:02:00.000-07:00

I can't stand that nagging feeling of having not written. I forgive myself though, because October is a notoriously difficult month for teachers. And my house is clean-ish, my baby and husband are well loved, and my laundry is done. I've even been doing a lot of reading.

As geeky as this sounds, as cliche and book-mark slogany as this will come off, books are my light at the end of the tunnel. I smile when people say, "I wish I had time for reading!" I hear that all the time. What does this mean? I wish I had time for reading? We have time for everything. One thing at a time.

I've had a lot of time for Ramona lately. We have fallen securely back into our school life routine. She comes home from daycare, I come home from work, and then we spend time together until bedtime. Being with her brings peace. Looking at a book, building a tower, throwing a ball. Every moment with her feels timeless.

My life has been simple and sweet. Sometimes hard, but always simple.

I have recently become wrapped up in the saga, The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. This is a young adult, pop book trilogy. I highly recommend it, because it is easy and fun.
This quote was my favorite part:

Having a partner lightening the load, could even make the arduous task of filling my family's table enjoyable.
I became a much better hunter when I didn't have to look over my shoulder constantly, when someone was watching my back. Being out in the woods with Gale...sometimes I was actually happy.

When I read this, I heard my own life echoing off the page. I don't think marriage is all that romantic. Marriage is about having a partner, someone to lighten the load. Someone who somehow makes sitting in the woods enjoyable. What could be more loving than that? Who else does so much to bring your life comfort and joy? If I were to re-marry Brian, I would put this quote from The Hunger Games on a cocktail napkin, because this, to me, is the essence of why we choose a partner, and why we stay together.

soup

2010-09-29T11:00:00.000-07:00

Today I ate a bowl of soup at my desk. Warm and spicy. But at the same, not food. Not really. The soup was a moment. To sit and not think. To eat a noodle, and feel like a scarf was being wound around my neck, but not worry about buying a scarf or making a scarf. Or teaching the dictionary. Or make a better commitment to my students, my child, my bathroom floor, my marriage, taking vitamins, flossing my teeth.
Just eat the noodle, drink the broth. Not even hungry. Just doing what a mouth does.

have faith

2010-09-23T19:38:00.002-07:00

Awhile back, we listened to a guided meditation recorded by Alan Wallace. (I have a funny story about this! On the way home from class I told my mom I had trouble following because his accent was hard for me to understand. My mom says sarcastically, "yeah, that California accent can be tricky.")

Anyway, despite his difficult "foreign" accent, he did say something that has been kind of holding my hand lately. This isn't an exact quote, but it feels like he said:

You may find that you have to start over. In your practice you start over again and again. It's ok.

I have had to start again with my meditation practice. And I've also had to start again with Ramona.

Since the little tantrum I had about a month ago, things changed; things got easier. I started over. A friend said, Toddlers are destructive. Keep your routines consistent and expectations clear. But mostly just ignore that stuff. They move onto something else anyway.

This is very gentle advice. Advice with love as the only motivation. Nova, start over.

When I return to my practice, I see that it has been waiting for me. Waiting for me to start over again.

Ramona in a nut shell - also known as, Ramona is a nut

2010-09-22T08:26:00.000-07:00

Last night when our parent educator came to visit, the girl really put on a show. She played intelligently with the toys for awhile, but after she got tired of that she hopped into the materials tub and shouted "WEEEEE!"
When it was time to clean up she got really angry and dumped the tub full of stuff on the ground, and threw herself down and screamed. However, she dusted herself off quickly so she could give her teacher a nice hug and a two handed "bye,bye".
What a girl.

book talk - Eat,Pray,Love

2010-09-20T07:12:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure how it happened, but I read Elizabeth Gilbert's book Eat, Pray, Love. I have a bunch of things that I've committed to reading and Eat, Pray, Love was one of them. At first, I snubbed the book's somewhat silly tone. But, somewhere around Rome I gave in and just started loving it.

I have realized that I love travel books. I was reading this completely silly book from school called Go Big or Go Home by Will Hobbs. In the story, 13 year old Brady's bedroom is hit by an asteroid and he is infected with super Martian bacteria and is blessed with amazing super capabilities. He also begins to "go dormant" because of the Martian bacteria. It was so silly that every once in awhile I would stop out of the blue and read a sentence to Brian because it was so hilarious. But I loved the book because the characters live in the Black Hills of South Dakota and spend most of the book biking, fishing, and camping. It's like reading a Black Hills guide book as long as you don't let yourself be distracted by the unbelievable asteroid named Fred. I've long forgotten Fred, but I'm still loving the Black Hills.

But, back to Eat, Pray, Love. I am obsessed with this book. I am not a very good traveler. I prefer to stay home and read a book. About someone else's travels.
For me, traveling is like going to the zoo. It's something that seems like it will be totally great, but once I am there I hate it and can't figure out why anyone ever does this. (I hate the zoo so much.)
If I have any criticism of Eat, Pray, Love it's that I'm afraid people will come away with the wrong idea about meditation. You do not have to go anywhere to meditate And really, I don't think you should indulge very much in reading about other people's successful practices. Of course it's more fun to read about meditation than to actually do it! Meditation is hard and has zero glamour. I'm not judging Elizabeth Gilbert. I promise. I'm just saying long after I've forgotten how fulfilling it was to read about Gilbert's practice, I'm going to be loving Bali.

learning to fly

2010-09-08T14:23:00.000-07:00

I'm learning to fly, but I ain't got wings - Tom Petty

When I was little I must have been inundated with a lot of books about one's "special gift" because I was really driven mad by the whole concept. My mom said that when I was young I would always ask stuff like, "mom, what's my special gift?" This was not said like a casual musing. It was a desperate, worried plea for help in finding something lost.

This makes me smile now, because a grown up doesn't worry about her special gift. By the time you become a grown up, you have spent such a long time tending your precious ego that you have developed quite a list of why you are so special. Sometimes I'm just so done in by how special I am I worry how people can carry on in my absence.

But this post isn't about special gifts, it's about learning to fly. Which I have learned to do.

When I got home from school yesterday, my bike was waiting for me in the garage. My 19 year old, never ridden bike. My dad and husband had spent two hours fixing the tire and breaks so that I could finally learn to ride a bike.

Sure, I already knew how to ride a bike. When I was in fourth grade, my best friend finally got sick of my crap and bullied me into learning to ride. She was a tiny little drill sergeant of a girl and I was pretty much terrified of her. We must have been a funny sight. Such a small girl, holding the back of her best friend's bike and forcing her to learn by sheer fear. She did in a matter of 30 minutes what my father had failed to do my whole childhood.

After that afternoon, I knew how to ride a bike...sort of. However, If you combined my total bike mileage, you wouldn't have a mile. Not even close.

Last night, I sat on my bike, at the edge of the driveway. Scared of falling, scared of the cars, scared of looking stupid. But I pushed off and rode. Slowly and with my hand clutching the brake, but I rode. And it felt like flying.

I'm going to keep practicing. I'm going to practice until the bike becomes a vehicle for enjoying the fall leaves and the company of my husband on our romantic weekend away.

memoir in 6 words

2010-09-04T12:13:00.000-07:00

My dear friend and fellow teacher, Lindsay Neal, presented this idea at a staff development meeting. I found the whole thing very appealing.

A writing teacher gave his students the task of writing a statement that summed up "who they were" in 6 words; a 6 word memoir.

This is mine:

A heart: sitting, bouncing, trying again.

september song

2010-09-04T11:02:00.000-07:00

This is what happens when I over-think things.

Sometimes I let too much time go by before I publish a blog post. I start lots of posts, but then worry they aren't coherent enough to share. And then here we are, a week and a half goes by and the stories I've saved up are stale. And I feel like I've undershared and you don't understand me anymore. So, let's catch up.

The weather is very nice and September actually feels Septembery for the first time in years. Lately, I've been under the impression that "September" was a myth. But today, September is crisp, but still warmish. I've been living here (for the second time) for about two years and this year is the first I've noticed how early our backyard trees lose their leaves. Especially our ornamental crab apple, which is quite a nice tree. It's wonderful and dramatic somehow. It gets white flowers in the spring and in the fall we get these idyllic red berries. Now, I have another reason to love this tree, because it gives us Fall first, before anyone else has gotten to enjoy the season. Lucky us.

Ramona has entered what I'm going to herein refer to as The Golden Age of Toddlerhood. (I know, a far cry from the whine fest from two weeks ago) I am enjoying her very much. She's been so loving and funny. She says weird one-time-only-words like "sock" and "snack" and "poop". She loves to play ball, run, and jump. I'm amazed by her athleticism. For me, it's like finding an alligator in my nest instead of a chicken. I am starting to see the person Ramona, not baby Ramona. I think accepting our children without judgement, worry, and concern could be the greatest gift we ever give to ourselves.

Brian and I are planning a Romantic October Vacation! We are going to leave Ramona with my mom and ride bikes on the Katy Trail. We are staying in a quaint town and plan on enjoying the local pubs. Ready for the punch line? I don't really know how to ride a bike. If you combined my total lifetime bicycle mileage you would probably not have a mile. But, in a dream a few weeks ago I was riding and it felt amazing. I will deal with this issue in the way that I deal with all issues, by practicing. A little every day.

Ah....I feel better already.

Oh, the days dwindle down to a precious few, September, November, and these few precious days I'll spend with you. These few precious days I'll spend with you. September song. -K.W.

book talk - John Updike Edition

2010-08-25T14:22:00.000-07:00

I was having a conversation with an older teaching friend once and she remarked that she just had to finish this puzzle she was working on. It was one of those huge jigsaws that take up an entire kitchen table. She muttered something about "once that thing is done I can get on with my life".
I feel the same way about books all the time. I realize that reading is a pleasurable, free time activity, but I also see it as something you kind of need to motor through. For the last few weeks, Rabbit, Run by John Updike has been my jigsaw puzzle.
I loved reading adult fiction this summer, but I have a lot of children's books piling up on my desk that I really have to read. Last night, I finished the first of Updike's Rabbit books. At first, I didn't love it. A story of a man abandoning his wife just bugged the hell out of me. Especially a wife with a drinking problem and a two week old baby. But, I liked Rabbit, Run's stream of consciousness because, it reminded me of the stuff I enjoyed reading in high school and college. I like Updike. I read The Complete Henry Bech a few years ago and really enjoyed Bech as a character. I think of Updike as being like an author's author. He seems pretty snooty to me. Probably because of the whole New Yorker thing.
Anyway, when I was reading Rabbit, Run I kept whining to people about how much I disliked Rabbit (Harry Angstrom) and what was wrong with John Updike to create this horrible character and then go on to write 4 more books about him! My dad is like this too, he always hates to read a book that has nothing but bad guys in it. I gave him Blood Meridian for Christmas several years ago and didn't like it because "stories should have a good guy". I used to think this was silly, but I guess I've turned into my dad.
But, towards the very end, Updike starts writing from the perspective of Harry's wife, and that's when I saw the merit in the book. Updike knows what it feels like to be a woman. He knows. He made me feel like he knows the physical and emotional toll giving birth has on a woman. And he knows that losing a child by your own hand is "the worst thing that has ever happened to a woman". And then I came to my senses and realized that Updike doesn't really "like" Harry either, but that's not the point.
Some day I will read the rest of the Rabbit books. Like maybe when I'm 40.

When I dropped the book in the library drop box this morning I felt refreshed. Sure, I still had my late night reading hangover headache. But at least I was done and ready to move on with my life. And the 12 Mark Twain Award Nominees that my library students are expecting me to have already read.

time out

2010-08-23T14:36:00.000-07:00

This weekend was really tough. Ramona was just not herself on Saturday, she spent the whole day crying loudly at me. She had a bit of a cold and was also working on some molars. It was a long and tiresome day for us all.
Yesterday was a lot better, Ramona was back to her happy self. But, in a way, the day was harder. She spent a lot of time doing things she shouldn't do. Touching the tv, climbing on EVERYTHING, throwing food, getting into the dog's water. My dad says we named her wrong. Instead of Ramona Maple, we should have named her Ramona Monkey.

I worry that I'm not teaching her properly. I'm worried that people will think I don't care enough to discipline her. I hear from my pediatriatian that I tell her NO too much, I hear from friends that I need to put her in a time out, babycenter.com says I need to place her on a bench and offer choices. Other people say she needs a swat and that my pediatrician is an idiot.
What the hell? She's a baby! She needs a hug, a pat on the back, and a distraction. Right??? Right?
But I dislike permissive parenting. I did when I taught first grade, anyway.
I am writing this because my heart is hurting. I feel anger at myself for being disloyal to Ramona. The avalanche of worry began, and it's still coming. I first began to doubt my parenting and it quickly became a doubt of Ramona.

Why is she so wild? Why doesn't she listen to me? Is she behind in cognitive and language development because she can't understand a no or a time out. Are other people's babies better than mine? Are other mothers better than I am?

The truth is that we parents are all experts. Of our own children. In the space and time that we inhabit, we have found some success. When we hear some poor dolt whining for an answer, we deliver it, probably along with a little bit of exaggeration and forgetfulness. I am guilty of it too. Parenting is not in itself hard. It's hard because of babycenter.com, it's hard because of "norming charts" and parenting contemporaries who have "been there and done that".

My heart says not to worry. Everything changes, usually on its own. My wisdom from teaching other people's children tells me that children will blossom in their own time, in their own beautiful expression of themselves. My practice reminds me to be gentle with myself. To be gentle with my child.
Why do I still feel like this?

this life

2010-08-17T09:19:00.000-07:00

My very best friend designed a new masthead for Ramona and Her Mother and also gave it a little spruce while she was at it. Gorgeous girl, gorgeous photography, gorgeous friend.

Awhile back, I read something on twitter from Karen Maezen Miller. This life of ours, it is the life of a Buddha.
This morning, I turned thirty. As I got ready for this day, as I looked in the mirror, this bit of wisdom took hold of my heart.
I don't feel desperation. I have felt, in the past, that I was coming up short, that I was never going to get "there". Right now, I don't feel like I'm coming up anywhere, and I am beginning to understand there is no "there". I see that this wisdom about the Buddha and about me is true. I am on a path. And it really is nothing less than the life of a Buddha.

This life and death we are encountering all the time is no other than the life of the Buddha. - Maezumi Roshi

a place to practice

2010-08-15T08:56:00.001-07:00

Yesterday, I attended the last of my summer meditation retreats. It was kind of grueling. The Rime Center is not air conditioned, which is usually kind of pleasant, but lately with the extreme heat it has just been too hot. By the 5th sitting the sweat was rolling down my body and I was having trouble breathing.

I am always surprised that I've never seen anyone hurl a cushion across the shrine room and stomp out. That's the kind of stuff my students do when they're frustrated and I feel like doing it all the time. Grown ups really have a lot of self control.

Sometimes Lama Chuck will do a dharma talk during retreat, but yesterday it was all meditation. Sitting and walking. After 3 sessions of sitting and 4 sessions of walking, I was walking by a window and "accidentally" gazed outside. I saw a car driving down the street, and then another, and then a bird flew by, and then someone honked. It was the most beautiful thing I could remember seeing in a long time. As I returned to my cushion, my mind went to Ramona. I saw her face in my mind and tears came to my eyes at the preciousness of her. I marveled at how after just three hours of meditation, after just three hours of not being at the mercy of my constant flow of thought, worry, and fear, the world seemed so fresh and so very beautiful. Can you imagine how precious you would find your family after a weekend retreat? How miraculous shopping for groceries among your fellow neighbors would feel after a week long retreat? Lama Chuck says that going on retreat is one of the kindest things we can do for ourselves. I believe it.

As I walked out of the Rime center yesterday I felt gratitude. Sometimes I feel lost because I haven't found the perfect teacher, the perfect Sanga, the perfect place to retreat. But yesterday, I felt simple gratitude for having a place to practice.

back to school night

2010-08-04T19:13:00.000-07:00

I remember thinking in 6th grade how much I hated the first week of school. I remember very clearly telling myself that in just a few weeks it would all feel like old hat. That pretty soon I would have my schedule memorized and I would have a rhythm to my day. I have always really struggled with transitions.

Tomorrow is my first day back to work after my two month vacation with Ramona. I had a very nice time with the girl who isn't really a baby anymore. I also had a tough time with my new role. Brian and I have a hard time when I'm home for the summer. We struggle with who should be doing what and that breeds animosity.

I am feeling a lot of anxiety this evening, because as relieved as I am to be going back to work, I also feel nervous that I don't really belong there either. I should have done some lesson planning and professional reading. I feel like all of my fellow teachers are really fired up, and I am lacking the ability to feel any of their excitement.

So, I feel like I don't belong anywhere....but my bed, with the covers pulled up over my head.

The 6th grade Nova is telling me to hang on. Give it a couple of weeks and it will all be old hat again....

happy birthday,blog

2010-07-30T22:32:00.000-07:00

Ramona and Her Mother is a year old.

I have no ambition for this blog, but I am happy to write and I'm proud to be getting better. It pleases me to have readers.

In the beginning, it was the best I could do to get a couple ok posts out a week. Sometimes I can't even do that. But, the thing about practice is that it is the only thing that will fix us. After a year of writing, I'm a writer. I have returned to the practice of keeping a daily journal. I write every day. I keep notes on my family and on my heart.

from my journal:

There is a lot more to me. But, aren't I hoping for there to be a lot less?

When I hold a pencil in my hand, these little thoughts rise to the top, a poem peeks from the margins. I've spent pages and pages trying to separate truth from myth.

I feel like it's very important for me to have unpublished writing again. To have a place unpolished.

I hope this time next year I have another 100 posts to re-read. Because, honestly, I'm this blog's biggest fan.

she speaks!

2010-07-29T11:57:00.000-07:00

I'm going back to work next week. In the span of two months I have, like always, completely forgotten about my previous life. The life of a teacher. The life of a working mom.

I'm here to tell you, this stay at home mom business is not cake. This is real work! First of all, the job is never over. Second, every day is pretty much like the next. I get this serious case of the blues around 3 o'clock. It happens every day.

But, there are amazing things about this job. You get to watch your daughter grow! You get to be stuck like glue to her and be her most important person. It is lucky to be with Ramona right now, because she is growing and changing so much.

She has hair! And a little attitude and all kinds of goofy facial expressions. And she talks! For posterity, I'm going to tell you some of her best words.

Hi! (This is way cute. She says this when she's doing something naughty and has been caught. Also, to be used at the bank when she needs everyone to become her friend.)

Bubbles (This is probably her best real word. She says the entire thing and says it when she sees or wants bubbles.)

Mama (This is only to be used either when mama isn't around, or when she is repeating it like a parrot for mama. I was harassing her so bad to say mama one day that I said "Ramona?!" and she answered back in a tired, bored way "mama".)

Ball

Shoes (this sounds like Shoo!)

Outside (Sigh!)

Sophie (So! She says this to mean any dog and also this is what she thinks a bark sounds like.)

Happy (I know, strange word. It started out like a nonsense word *yobby* and we helped her turn it into happy. If anyone says anything about being happy, she will repeat it over and over again.)

Note that I put exclamation points at the end of the stuff she says? Well, she is just that kind of girl.

my first Saturn Return

2010-07-21T11:57:00.001-07:00

I declare the reverie complete. I allowed the letters and pictures to tumble out of the boxes. I sifted and sorted, did a lot of throwing out and airing out. Now the artifacts of my past are neatly stacked and sitting in the deepest closet under my stairs.

Why all of this? Well, I'm experiencing my first Saturn Return. I'm turning 30 in a few weeks. I won't have time to ponder it all later, because it will be the start of school.

I have time now.

Of all the things I came across in my reverie, the artifact that moved me the most was a project I did for psychology class during my senior year. It was a large goal setting/life inventory project. You know what my major long term goals were?

1. To be a librarian.

2. To be a mother.

Isn't that just the darndest thing? Honestly, I swear to you that I stumbled into both of these things. These were the things I became almost by accident, by luck. They were the things that came easy. I did not spend very much time lamenting or worrying about becoming either. Sure, I did stuff so the path could align. I got pregnant on purpose, I applied for the job I have now. But, these things came easily. Everything else was incredibly hard.

So, should I do it again? Set another two goals, secret goals, and put them at the bottom of my side table drawer. Do I look at them again once I am 60?

I feel like, for me, goals are a thing of the past. My greatest hope is to have a stable mind, to see the world as it really is, to ease the suffering of others, to pay attention. This is what I work for right now.

college poem

2010-07-18T19:29:00.000-07:00

I loved college so much. I did a lot of pinning and made a lot of very questionable choices. I also wrote this poem:

Tri Sigma

On this day, even very old I be

they've been there and they've frightened

me,

but in my divided time

in that baptized blue Olympiad,

my likeness has been absorbed,

and at once a member

of which I have never been before.

(I have to tell you, this poem is about liking the sorority girls in my water aerobics class. Cute, huh?)

love poems

2010-07-18T18:53:00.000-07:00

There is nothing more deranged than a teenage girl. During this drawn out reverie, my mind keeps coming back to Ramona. My baby who is a girl. Someday I'm going to slap my hand to my face and say, "what the hell is wrong with that girl?".

I just hope she never discovers Sylvia Plath.

So, in honor of that. In honor of being sick with love and very young; some love poems that are only slightly deranged:

coming clean

On a clear day you come pretty clean

and I can see you for miles.

Going north

I found tides of you

and boats white with destination.

I've found you

and you are lost again,

you do this easier with the cold.

I bought a big coat

to not think of you, it is not of you

that I teach school; I've buried myself

with books of penmanship, I can hide

from you while grading,

grading him, grading math.

But only on clear days

your house stands white.

And your brown smokestack

navigates me,

knows that I step on snowy steps,

on broken boxes to look deeply into you.

This morning, found

and found to be lost again,

I found a great land in your

deep wide steps.

you love others

You love others

and this drops me into a deep draining pit,

slipping,

my neck is gone,

my toes went long ago.

Water stole my face and my name,

and it can not matter because you might be in love.

more "uncollected" works

2010-07-17T12:42:00.000-07:00

I wrote this when I was about 19. I shared it with my dad because I had a desperate need to communicate to him how worried I was for him. How sad I was that he and my mom had separated. I gave him several poems, and then left him alone to ponder what the hell I was about. Then a week or so later, during dinner, the stack of papers came out of his pocket. Along with his reading glasses. And we really talked about what I had written. This conversation made me feel heard as an author and as a daughter.

I apologize for the violence in this poem. It was reality for me at the time.

********************************

traditional hanging

It is sick and unnecessary

but I am always scared to open

closed doors in our home

because I fear I would see

your body hanging,

hanging on the last thread of the house,

hanging mute with mistake.

reverie week - short story

2010-07-15T07:03:00.000-07:00

This is a very short story I wrote during a really hellacious breakup during the early 2000's. I had a nice boyfriend in high school. But, eventually it was just time to move on. For both of us. Nothing has ever broken my heart in quite the same way and honestly, I'm still not over losing that friendship.

This is a breakup story. Plain and simple.

*********************************************

Widowing

You can haunt the halls, but you can't ask me to make you feel at home.

- Liz Phair

I've always liked the idea of the young widow. The tight lips and the extreme lack of sun in the skin. I've always liked the idea of forced mourning. Wearing black for a prescribed amount of time. To be grieving a boyfriend is entirely different. You feel like you should be drinking a malt with his letter jacket around your shoulders. I knew a girl in high school who made t-shirts to honor her boyfriend when he died in a car wreck. Really, you just have to keep quiet and pretend that it wasn't all that serious.

But the truth is, we felt pretty serious, and it's been months and I'm still not okay. During lunches with friends I sit nervously in my chair, because I'm waiting for the inevitable sentence to drop, "I know this great guy, and you really deserve to be happy."

I feel pretty crazy lately. See, he's a ghost in my house. I'm not speaking of a listening to sad records and drinking wine haunting. I'm speaking of the real thing. At first it was the mirror sightings. I'd be plucking my brows and I'd see the zipper of his backpack darting through the door. Then he began hiding things. Normally I loose stuff,but this paired with the zipper gave me the idea that I was in a scary movie.

I've never been a brave person, but I handled it well in the beginning. I slept with the lights on, but I stayed home more than ever. When I was little I devised a plan that I would go hang out at the mall if I ever experienced a ghost invasion. But, when it first started, I stayed in as much as I could, because I didn't want to miss what he would do next.

We never lived together when he was alive. I never felt comfortable bringing it up because he was very afraid of being stuck in an apartment with me forever. Now I realize that he was smarter in life than in death. We were not meant to live so close. I'm a lot less full of love now and we don't even talk. I feel like the sister of a deaf kid, always interpreting what he wants. "My Ghost needs more room on the couch" or "I'm sorry, you can't come home with me because My Ghost likes to watch "Seinfeld" and he needs to be alone when he does that". I've moved my belongings, because he needs so much room. I miss having the place to myself, I liked it better when I was just sad and wished we were still together. Sometimes it's less like a fun joke and it gets prickly. The lines of reality get really light and for a few hours I can't move from my chair by the door.

This morning I woke up and read two People magazines. Finding this totally satisfying I went back to bed for an afternoon nap. Now I'm laying here trying not to hear him turning the pages of my magazine beside me on the floor. He gives each page one minute, and then swish, on to the next. His human laugh of disdain is nothing compared to his ghostly one. Full of knowledge of the beyond, and now totally sick of me. I could handle the midnight clangings, but the mockery is just too much for me.

After the magazine thing I was so pissed that I went to the mall. I've always really admired the way crazy people talk to strangers and report on the things that are bothering them. Inside the Gap I am joined at the sale rack by a woman who looks quite understanding. I have not really gotten to the point where I can do truly insane things, so I don't tell her about the ghost in my apartment. But it is tempting to turn to her and say, "hey, you know how sometimes you have a really terrible break-up and it hurts so bad if feels like someone has died?".

But, I didn't tell her. I did not tell her about how my ex-boyfriend could be in two places at once. At the same time he was in my apartment looking for the extra syrup, he was also across town playing video games with his new girlfriend. I didn't tell her, "My boyfriend isn't dead, he just doesn't want to be with me anymore. I think I'm going nuts."

I look slim in black, so I keep wearing it even though I'm trying not to indulge in the whole mourning thing. I'm keeping the lights blazing, and I'm not letting myself see him dead in my bathroom anymore. It wasn't really all that crazy, it was just something that got away from me and ran far and fast.

deep cleaning and reverie

2010-07-15T06:26:00.001-07:00

The show Hoarders, the mountains of old baby stuff, and the fact that I never properly moved into this house has led me to a massive reorganization of all closets. It's also probably because I "work from home" right now. If you stare at the stuff long enough, you want to do something about it.

So, I've been emptying closets and bins, boxing up old books and clothes for Goodwill and we have made some major progress. I'm a get rid of stuff person. I've been working on Brian all week to do the same. It's been a slow process; we both have countless boxes of love notes and old journals, mix tapes, and weird collections of small, strange trinkets.

This big house project has inspired another project. I declare the rest of this week, Nova Retro Week. This means that I will be airing out my old boxes. I will be slapping up some unpublished works of Nova. Some very old, pre-Internet publishing stuff that has had me in reverie all week. It's not good stuff! But it's young and sweet and sad. So, if you want to skip reading for the rest of this week, I will understand.

My first act of retro week will be to put up an entire short story, so you were warned.

retreat number 2

2010-07-12T11:39:00.001-07:00

You know what attachment is? It's going to a meditation retreat and being pissed because they aren't running it "right". I wasn't going to write about this. Mostly because I thought it would be me tattling about the bad behavior of others. Now that I realize it's my own bad behavior it's open season.

I've been going to little summer half day meditation retreats. These are small things, just three hours. They have been like little life rafts for me this summer. Small places of refuge every month.

Something has happened to me recently. I've lost my beginner's heart. The retreat wasn't run the way I prefer. The teacher said things with which I disagreed. It didn't fit with my beliefs about retreats and the purpose of meditation. And I was actually pissed. I pouted instead of meditating on the last sitting!

I was right. I really was. Meditation should be done sitting on a cushion or sitting in a chair. We don't meditate laying down with our eyes closed, because we don't meditate to go to sleep, we meditate to wake up. I don't mediate to relax. I do it because it's the only way to put out the 20 foot flame atop my head.....

But I was wrong, because we meditate to see the world as it really is. We go to the retreat we are at, not the one thirty days ago, and not the one 10 years in the future.

I love how this life is practice. You know why I was angry? I was angry because I had not done my daily practice that week. I was counting on that retreat. I was greedy for it, because I was counting on it. Do not waste my time, I'm a harassed wife and mother, I don't have time to do anything but my practice at this retreat.

Being blessed with a great retreat is good karma riping. I should have done my daily practice all week. Expectation is attachment, and it's what causes our suffering.

How do you keep a beginner's heart? How do I get mine back?

(on a side note: this was my 100th post. Was it worth the wait?)

the old college try

2010-07-09T05:39:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, Brian and I celebrated our 4th wedding anniversary.

Brian was in the third grade class next door to mine. He was the first boy I ever kissed. He is the person that held my hand tightly when I gave birth to our daughter. I can't hide a thing from him. That's why I married him.

He was also the first boy who ever gave me a gift. A cassette tape of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. This was in eighth grade, when he was just a friend. He was a sweet and unassuming boy, kind and smart. The perfect catch for a geeky girl like me. Brian was my first kiss. But these things don't last, thank goodness.

About 6 months before I graduated college, I put it all on the line. I had been pinning for an absolutely ridiculous and make-believe love affair. It ended, leaving me a mess. Brian was suddenly there. We drove around in his car, late at night, with friends. We sat in his cul-de-sac talking. He adopted me. He brought a sad, friendless girl into his life of friends and good times.

I remember telling a friend, "okay, here's the thing. I want Brian to be my best friend. And I don't want him to be friends with anyone else, oh, and I would like to kiss him". I deduced that it was turning into a crush. We started making out at parties, but kept flaking out on turning it into something. Then Brian said the words that meant more than his wedding proposal several years down the line.

He said,"hey, let's just give it the old college try".

Let's try. He had me. I wasn't afraid to try. I was afraid of everything else. But I wasn't afraid to try.

We still try. Through everything, we are still just giving it a try.

buying a car and two other things

2010-07-05T11:41:00.000-07:00

I've been quiet on the blog and also twitter because my car broke down beyond repair and then we started looking for a new car.

I hate to be all woe about a car, so if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all.....

Anyway, I don't like the idea of spending a lot of money on a car. I also don't like to get all caught up in letting a car (or any purchase) symbolize who I think I am. Also, I don't like to be extravagant. All of this makes me just hate the process of buying a car. However, I am coming out of hiding and am shopping for a new car. Hopefully a car with a big enough backseat for diaper changing.

Hey, two more things:

I noticed today that Ramona's fingers are getting long and slender. Like a little girl.

Second, I finished Brooklyn by Colm Toibin, which I read on request of a friend. I love how sometimes reading a friend's favorite book can give you a glimpse into their heart.

chatter

2010-06-29T10:54:00.000-07:00

I stayed up until 12:30 last night reading The Last Olympian by Rick Riordan. I know, I was complaining a few posts ago how tired of this series I was. But the last two books were so great. I would even say they were close to Harry Potter.

Here's the thing. It was very romantic. Riordan was able to convey the stupid/incredibly sweet way that 16 year olds intimate their romantic feelings perfectly. I was actually a little giddy. It was enough to make me kind of understand all that Twilight business.

Brian just thought I was plain old weird.

I just put up my next two books. Both of which are grown-up books. I hope my brain can handle it.

On another note, I talked to the other moms at baby music class today. It's like the 4th week and the only people that interact are the kids. Weird. Anyway, today I made some mom type friends and we asked each other panicky mom type questions. Ahhh....bonding.

last night

2010-06-28T11:25:00.000-07:00

Last night we walked to a small park in our neighborhood. Climbing up the slide, walking over the poles, running on the bouncy turf. As the sun set lower and the breeze came in, we all owned the world. Well, we owned the playground.

On the way home, Ramona rested, Brian and I chatted about the houses in the neighborhood and what we think of the world. As we neared home, I noticed that Ramona wasn't really awake, nor asleep, just some place in between. I commented on this to her dad. Brian said, "remember when you were little, listening to your parents talking quietly, and it was so comforting..."

In our yard, I held Ramona. She's not usually very affectionate. We show our love mostly by letting her be, she shows her's by letting herself be caught from time to time. But not this time, in this moment. She put her arms around my neck, and placed her open mouth to my cheek. A kiss and a hug. A miraculous show of affection from my very bright and busy daughter. Said in utter wonder and love by Brian, "oh, she loves you".

solitaire

2010-06-23T10:25:00.000-07:00

When I was little, my grandma taught me Solitaire. I liked playing by myself, but it brought out a secret competition that I normally didn't have when playing games with other people. I really, really wanted to win. It drove me nuts when I would see a card I needed, but not be able to grab it. I asked my grandma, "is it ok if I just take that card anyway?"

She said, "Nova, who are you playing against?" And left it at that. She really had nothing else to say and had moved onto something in the kitchen.

So, sometimes I grabbed a card I wanted. Most of the time I didn't. But I always knew who I was playing against.

I haven't thought of Solitaire or this 19 year old conversation in a long time, but it popped into my head last night. Last night on the cushion. I was sitting very sweetly, but doing a horrible job of not following my thoughts around by the nose. It's just that I kept thinking of so many lovely, fun things.

I thought to myself, "so what, so I sit and indulge a little. I want to be thinking about these things. At least I'm sitting! At least I look like I'm being attentive".

That's when it happened. That's when the voice of wisdom traveled 200 miles straight to my heart. "Nova, who are you playing against?"

book talk - The Georges and the Jewels

2010-06-19T10:57:00.000-07:00

Remember when I said I was taking a break? I wasn't planning on writing about books for the rest of the summer, but The Georges and the Jewels by Jane Smiley was so neat I can't help myself.

Jane Smiley wrote an adult non-fiction book called 13 Ways of Looking at the Novel. I didn't actually love the book, but I loved the list of 100 books that she read as a project while writing her book. I have read a lot of these books, and I turn to the list when I'm wanting to read something adult and need direction. She is kind of like the librarian's librarian.

So, I was happy to see that she had written a middle grade novel. And it's a horse book!

The story takes place on a ranch in California during the 70s. The main character is a 7th grade girl named Abby. She and her fundamentalist Christian family live on a ranch where they train and sell horses. Things have been tough for Abby because of some social problems at school and family problems at home. Her 16 year old brother has run away because of a disagreement with the father, so now Abby is up to her eyeballs in work training horses. Her father's business is built around the slogan "we sell horses that a little girl can ride", so it is up to Abby to do the lions share of the training.

This book had some problems.It almost feels like she should have spent a little more time on it. If I could ask Smiley one question it would be: what did you read to prepare yourself to write a middle grade novel? Can I recommend some books I would like for you to read before you try again? And yes, try again, please.

Here is what I loved:

I have no idea if Smiley is a Christian or if she set out to write a Christian book, but this is a beautiful example of a book that centers around faith. As soon as I saw that a fundamentalist Christan family was in the forefront of this book I panicked. I thought, oh god, it's going to be like Footloose. This is going to make Christians look bad and this book is going to piss people off.
It so didn't. The role God plays in the family's life is never rocked. Smiley shows this family realistically. She shows how strong and good the family is because of God's influence. As a teacher, I was touched by Abby's attempts to hide her school curriculum from her family. I came away with a stronger compassion for religious families who want to shelter their children from certain curriculum. And also a stronger compassion for students who want to shelter their parents from the school's judgement. As a public school librarian I was very nervous about religion being a major element of the story, but Smiley did a beautiful job. Despite some rough language, I would actually recommend this to my Christian students.

I also loved Abby. Oh, what a lovely and good character. Abby works harder than the average grown-up and I was charmed by her cowgirl attitude. Abby's big problem in the story is an unruly horse. Now that her brother is gone, she is expected to train all the horses, even the tough ones. A "horse whisper" type trainer comes to the ranch to help with the horse, and actually spends more time teaching Abby.

I tried what he'd taught me on Socks George and the two mares, but what he had taught me, even though I could remember a lot of the very words he had used, was like a refreshing fog that slowly lifted and wafted away. After awhile, I had no idea whether I was doing the right thing or not.

That passage was my favorite. Such an exact description of what it is like for a student to carry on after the teacher has left.

Like I said, not a perfect book. The trouble at school is weak. The situation with the brother is never cleared up. It's hard to know exactly what the main problem in the story is. But there was enough good about the book for it to hold up. I hope Smiley comes back to try again.

under toad

2010-06-16T11:12:00.000-07:00

In high school, there was this book that my friends and I really liked, The World According to Garp by John Irving. Something from this book that has stayed with me was The Under Toad. In the story, it was a family inside joke. They would go to the beach and warn the kids, "look out for the under tow". The kids misheard and referred to it as "the under toad". Watch out for the under toad! For the father in the story, this was a phrase that highlighted his anxiety, anxiety specifically about mortality. Garp...realized that all these years Walt had been dreading a giant toad, lurking offshore,waiting to suck him under and drag him out to sea. The terrible Under Toad.

This has been us. Life has been great on the surface, but I have felt the under toad hopping around underneath it all. A feeling of dread, of foreboding. Before I get into the toad, I would like to point out that in actuality the surface is all there is. The world as it really is. I wish I knew this in my heart like I do in my head.

Speaking of hearts, at Ramona's 9 month appointment her doctor heard a murmur. Then they heard it again at her 12 month appointment. Yesterday we went to the cardiologist.

I have felt a dark cloud hanging over my head since her 12 month appointment. The idea that she could be sick, seriously sick, had her dad and me very frightened. At first I wasn't too worried,we made the appointment to see a cardiologist and I neatly put it out of my head. Almost. But then I googled heart murmur and clicked on congenital heart defects, and then it was an all out avalanche of worry.

Yesterday, our cardiologist looked into my eyes and said "her heart is fine". I wanted to hug him. Her heart is fine. He said other things, other things about her heart. But more than anything, he wanted me to know her heart is fine.

More than any lesson I am learning, I am second by second seeing that the present is all there is. Her heart was always fine. Who knows what will and won't be fine in the future. Right now is all there is. And really, if we stop thinking, we will see that every moment really is and always has been fine.

retreat

2010-06-12T21:45:00.000-07:00

My first meditation retreat was today. So much drama, in such a quiet place. I am amazed to think my body looked quiet and still, despite the ruckus of my mind.

I have dedicated myself to having a daily practice. I have been sitting every day and have finally gotten my body to be still. Now, I'm free to see what a mess my mind is. I am reminded of Ramona, the way she walks over and over again to our TV to press the buttons and how I just bring her back. My mind is the same. I try to be as sweet to myself as I am to Ramona. Just bring it back, patiently and without anger.

Sometimes I do this ok and sometimes I don't. During one entire walking meditation I berated myself for my foot falling asleep. This has been a major issue with my meditation. One time, my leg fell asleep so bad it was just like having an epidural. It actually scared me so bad that I had a panic attack and ended up sick in the bathroom. Anyway, I thought I had solved this problem and it scared me that it had re-appeared. I shouted at myself for the next 10 minutes.

But, problems aside, when Lama Chuck said that going on meditation retreat is one of the kindest things we could do for ourselves, I agreed. I feel so wrapped up in my practice right now I actually laughed at the idea of myself participating in some form of exercise. "You want me to exercise! No way, I am way exhausted from meditation." So, obviously I need practice. Luckily there are two more this summer. Now, if only I could convince Brian and Ramona that I would be nicer to them if I could go on a real, multiple day retreat......

book chat - summer break edition

2010-06-10T19:57:00.000-07:00

I'm taking a break for the summer. Well, sort of. First I need to read the new horse book by Jane Smiley. I'm actually looking forward to this one. I like Smiley a lot and this is her first middle grade fiction piece. And it's about horses!

And then I need to read the last two Percy Jackson books. I am so tired of this series. I just don't give a rat's ass anymore if Percy does or does not defeat Voldemort....sorry, Kronos. But, if you are an elementary school librarian you have to read all the Percy Jackson books to be respected. It's the only way to show kids you know your business. So, onward I read. (The only thing I'm getting from these books anymore is lots of neat name ideas. The next kid, cat, or warthog I'm in charge of naming is going to get something cool like Demeter. Demeter Bradfield. You heard it here first.)

So, after I read three more library books, I'm going to read something just for me. I haven't decided what it will be, but it will be grown up and wonderful.

And then it's back to the shelves so I can get started on the 2010-2011 Mark Twain Award Nominee Books!

working

2010-06-08T19:39:00.000-07:00

This is my first summer "break" as a mom. (I do not count last summer. Last summer didn't happen. Ramona was teeny and she cried a lot. I never saw the sun. I was a basket case.)

One of the best things about being a teacher is having the time off. I gladly trade what I lose in money for the time away from work. As a working mom, it is really a wonderful prize to have two months at home with my baby girl. Also, I get a lot of nice little week long breaks throughout the school year.

I have done a lot of thinking about the meaning of work in the last year. Before Ramona, I was uninterested in housework. Every night I did work for graduate school and enjoyed my television. I created huge messes. But I was working hard.

In the last year I have thought about how much I would prize having some time to wash my kitchen floor or do a load of laundry. I swear to god, for the greater part of this school year I was either teaching, pumping milk, nursing a baby, or patting a baby to sleep. I was working hard.

Now, I'm home all day with Ramona. Working hard.

I am done trying to figure out what I think work is. I envy women who have older kids that have time to keep their houses lovely. But then, a few weeks ago my cousin stopped me from giving my nephew a bottle saying, "oh you get to feed babies all the time, let me!". I think of feeding a baby as work and she thinks of it as a treat! I used to hate the idea of cleaning my house, and now I beg Brian to take Ramona so I can be alone with my broom. Irony!

That's the thing: All thinking leads to irony, really. Labeling one thing as hard and not hard is silly. Deciding that one thing is work and the other is not work is pointless.

So, I'm at home with Ramona right now. I am working hard at every job that falls into my lap. This is fine. But in general, I'm doing a lot less thinking. A lot less judging. A lot more working.

sweet, sweet little ramona

2010-06-07T09:54:00.000-07:00

Nicole and Brandon Parigo from Parigo Studios came over to do Ramona's one year photo shoot yesterday. Brandon shot a little video while he was at it and this is what he came up with:

Ramona from P A R I G O S T U D I O S on Vimeo.

See why I'm so exhausted all the time! See why we think she's the bee's knees!

Thanks to Brandon and Nicole, we are lucky to know you. Life is impermanent, nothing stays the same. Having these beautiful reminders of our girl is nothing short of an ordinary miracle.

is it possible?

2010-06-02T08:55:00.001-07:00

How is it possible that I only posted three times in the month of May?

Well, I was busy. And I was crazy. Totally crazy. I tore around the month of May pulling my hair out.

But a lot of things happened to me and I learned things.

Things like this:

I stopped nursing Ramona. My plan was to nurse her for a year and then stop, but I wasn't going to be too hard on myself about when to actually kick the habit. I figured we would just get there. We got there one evening about a week ago. I was nursing her to sleep when I realized I was clenching my teeth. She wasn't exactly biting, but she was sort of grinding her teeth on me. I simply wasn't enjoying doing it. I hated the idea of being done, but I honestly wasn't enjoying the actual event anymore. I walked out of her room and announced that I was done. The next evening, I gave her a bottle. I wrapped my arms around her tight. I put my face on top of her head and breathed her in and exhaled over and over again. It felt amazing. (I still miss nursing her though, but it's ok.)

My mom and I went on a road trip to Northern Iowa to hear a public talk given by His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama of Tibet. I took diligent notes. I planned on writing extensively about this teaching. But, then I got crazy and life took over. But it's better this way, because the thing about Buddhism is that there really isn't much to it. I could go on and on with every little quaint/profound thing he said, but I won't. I'll just spit it out:

Soften your heart. Be warm hearted. Teachers, your job is to teach the brain, but most importantly, teach the heart.

And, I met Karen Maezen Miller. I went to a morning workshop led by her and the incredibly sweet and kind, Jill Tupper. Maezen said a lot of things, but two really stuck with me. She said, "this life of ours is hard" and she also said "if I didn't have my practice on the cushion, I would not be able to practice at the sink". I realize now that having a daily practice isn't an item on my "to do list". It isn't something to think about. Buddhism isn't something to think about, or read about. Buddhism isn't something to talk about. Buddha sat, Maezen sits, I will sit. I will sit and sit and sit. I will sit because it is the only way to follow the path. When do we actually have the practice we say we have?

Now, we have it right now. It's all possible, now.

book chat - Crow Call

2010-05-14T09:28:00.000-07:00

I've been reading Crow Call by Lois Lowrey to my students, because it's a great example of a personal narrative. The absolute best thing about being a librarian is reading great books aloud. I love when an author has given you something amazing to perform. Crow Call is like this. You do not just read this story, you perform the part. I feel like taking a bow at the end of this book. The vocabulary is advanced and intricately woven. This is not a read a loud for the young, this is for older students, 4th and 5th graders.

Crow Call is about a day Lois Lowery spent with her dad soon after he got home from the war. I would guess that she was about ten years old at the time. He is a stranger to her and she feels self conscious calling him daddy. He buys her an overgrown men's hunting shirt, because it is rainbow colored and she really wanted it. Then he takes her out for breakfast where they eat pie and joke around. The mood changes when they set out for the real reason for the trip. Hunting crows that have been eating their crops.

"I want to scamper ahead of him like a puppy, kicking the dead leaves and reaching the unknown places first, but there is an uneasy feeling along the edge of my back at the thought of walking in front of someone who is a hunter"

She is torn between the fear of hunting and the fear of disappointing her dad.

When the crows come out in response to the crow call, she becomes wrapped up in the delight of being a bird.

"Listen, Daddy! Do you hear them? They think I'm their friend! Maybe their baby, all grown up!"

Of course, her dad doesn't shoot the birds. How could he?

"I feel there is no need to say thank you - Daddy knows this already. The crows will always be there and they will always eat the crops; and some other morning, on some other hill, a hunter, maybe not my daddy, will take aim."

This story has inspired me to write my own personal narrative. Something from the long past. I don't know what it will be yet, but I'm going to keep Crow Call close for inspiration.

problem, not a problem

2010-05-11T18:46:00.000-07:00

My work inspires me to write, it also takes up a lot of my writing time. This is a problem and a not-problem.
9:08 AM May 7th via Twitta

I said this. I'm lucky to do the kind of work I do. Work that pays well enough, and encourages me. It also takes up my time. And it distracts me from my family.
Speaking of distraction....this has been a crappy week. We are still kind of reeling from this, and then this happened:

Our dogie is home safe. We got so lucky.
3:24 PM May 10th via Twitta
Our dog is found!!!
9:01 AM May 10th via Twitta
I keep hoping I will find her hiding in my closet.
7:15 PM May 9th via Twitta
It just went from zero to blame in like 5 minutes.
6:41 PM May 9th via Twitta
I think we might have lost our dog. I feel so careless and horrible. I hope she comes home soon!
6:04 PM May 9th via Twitta

I let you read it backwards so you would know ahead of time to expect a happy ending. Yes, we lost our dog. It took us about seven hours to realize she was missing. This is like the opposite of paying attention.

This life has been such a huge distraction.

I was at school until 8:00 last night trying to get an important project done. I didn't get to see Ramona before she went to bed.

I haven't had time to write about the things I really want to write about. I haven't had time to take the breaths that I really want to take. I haven't had time. But at least I know I want to. Right?

The bad thing about all of it is that I know better. I know this is what I have to work with. I know there isn't some better, more manageable life around the corner. I know this is me. The mom that sometimes is working too late to see her child, the person who lets her dog go missing for seven hours before realizing she is gone, the woman who has been washing her clothes one outfit at a time all week. This is me,this is me right now.

happy birthday, beautiful

2010-05-04T06:59:00.000-07:00

Ramona's birthday didn't go as planned. I was going to spend the evening before her birthday reminiscing about her birth and getting ready for her big one year old birthday party. I was going to write a post about the day she was born. I was going to write a post about her fun party.

What happened is that we got sick with a horrible stomach bug. All three of us, and then some. We had to cancel her party.

But I still did a lot of reminiscing. As I went to bed the night before her birthday, I thought, "this time last year I thought she would never come". I went into labor with Ramona with a bang at midnight. From nothing, to two contractions and then broken water. By 6:17 am we had our little girl. I will never forget the moment she was put in my arms. I felt choked. I couldn't squeeze out words. I held a sob in my body. At that moment, holding Ramona, I felt there was no difference between mother and daughter. I felt like I had been born enumerable times. And I felt shock at seeing Ramona again. I felt certain that I knew her, like I knew myself, like I knew nothing.

I've felt a lot of other things in the last year, things less pure than that. Things muddied by life and expectation. But that moment. That moment of holding out my arms, and getting back myself. That moment I will think of in my last breath.

I was disappointed that we had to cancel her party and were too worn out from our illness to make her first birthday very special. We took advantage of the fact that she's one and had no idea that a fuss should be made. That evening I decided to make her a special birthday dinner. Not some crappy baby food, but a real meal. Scrambled eggs, toast, and banana.

I'm going to just cut to the chase and tell you that we discovered that night that Ramona is allergic to egg. We had to rush her to the doctor. Ramona is fine, it was as small of a deal as a big deal can be. But the limitless possibility is what scared me, and still scares me. As we were rushing to help, I was trying to determine how bad this really was. Could she breathe? Was her silence a bad sign? Am I going to lose her in this seven minute car ride?

Friends, my child didn't come close to that. But my mind went there. My brain eeked out, screamed out the words, "Are we going to lose her?".

Today, my baby girl, Ramona Maple, is one year and 3 days old. She walks beautifully and doesn't say a single word. She speaks her own cute language of strung together syllables. She is willful, but sweet. She loves jokes and dancing. And I feel never-endingly fortunate to be her mama.
Happy Birthday, Beautiful.

approaching one

2010-04-29T19:53:00.000-07:00

When I was pregnant with Ramona I thought I wanted to nurse her. I didn't have a reason why. I'm not a person who gets up on the soapbox of natural, nutritious, organic.....it's just not my thing. I also don't really go for all the scientific study stuff about the benefits. (I know...I know, you're right, I'm wrong.....)
I just felt in my heart that I wanted to do it. It was simply that I wanted to experience that aspect of mothering.

When I brought Ramona home from the hospital I somehow forgot how to do it. I roamed around my house trying to find the perfect spot, but I just couldn't do it. I was panicked because I knew she should eat and she needed to make a wet diaper. It was late that first night and I was a mess. Then Brian saved me. He stopped me, grabbed my hand and said, "Nova, look at your baby. (She was sleeping sweetly in my arms) Does she look hungry or sick? Does she look like there is something wrong?" Those words, "Nova, look at your baby" echo in my ears still. He was right. She was fine. I eventually found the special spot and I sat down and proceeded to nurse her for 3 months straight.

My heart is grieving a little bit, because this special aspect of my relationship with my daughter is coming to an end. I keep telling myself that she will always be my baby. That I will find new ways to comfort her. I'm still a little sad to see the time pass.

getting older

2010-04-23T18:53:00.000-07:00

Yesterday morning I was getting my teeth cleaned, and the dental hygienist happily chirped:

I saw your birthday on your chart. I noticed that you're turning 30 this year!

She had her tools and stuff in my mouth at the time, so I wasn't able to speak. My first instinct was to correct her, "No ma'am, I am not going to be thirty!". Seriously, I think we should all walk around with fingers and tools in our mouths all the time, so our brains have some time to think before we speak. See, I AM going to be thirty this year. Actually, in just a few months.

At that moment, 30 sounded shocking to me. It sounded grown up. I didn't disagree with her because I didn't want to be thirty, I disagreed because I just found it unbelievable.

I'm not the only person who is getting older. Ramona will turn one in exactly one week. ONE. Prepare yourself for a deluge of posts about this girl's birth and birthday and birthday party. I'm realizing that your own personal birthday is just a day to get older. But for your mother it is an event, it is the day the biggest thing ever happened. It is a day to remember.

the buddha

2010-04-18T10:05:00.000-07:00

I finally got around to watching the PBS documentary on The Buddha. It was simply the story of the historical Buddha and I felt so refreshed by it.

Most of the readers of this blog are Christian and don't know the story, so, for you I'm going to stumble through the telling of the life of the Buddha. I'm going to do the best I can.

****
Siddhartha was born a prince. He lived a sheltered life with great pleasure and riches until he was 29. On a trip outside his palace he saw suffering and death. He was so disturbed by the suffering he saw. A question formed in his mind, How can we live with so much suffering and change? In order to answer this question, he left his palace, wife, and baby to become an ascetic.

During his six years of asceticism he tried to reach enlightenment by torturing the human desire out of his body and mind. He was trying to answer the question of suffering and gain enlightenment. During this time, he ate one grain of rice a day, he ceaselessly meditated. He became a living skeleton, but he got no closer to the answer.

After six years, he stopped. He thought of the happiest he had ever been. His mind went to the quiet repose of a childhood memory. He decided that fasting was killing him and that he needed to live as a human. A young girl offered him rice pudding that he ate. He was then so nourished by the rice that he sat under the Bodhi tree and began his meditation. It was then that he became the awakened one. He achieved enlightenment on his own, he found the answers he needed from within. He saw the world as it was. His desire did not go away, but he lived in the balance of equanimity. The good and bad, the right and left, it all fell away. He then left the Bodhi tree and began his teachings. He lived into his 80s teaching the Dharma.

****

Simple. No magic. Just an ordinary man, waking up.

I am so moved by the thought of Buddha sitting under the Bodhi tree, seeing the world as it really is. It fills me with joy to know that this is our work. To pay attention without judgment. To see each moment as it really is. That's all it is. This is not an easy thing, but it's not complicated either.

Book chat - Hand Wash Cold

2010-04-14T18:16:00.000-07:00

I read Momma Zen: Walking the Crooked Path of Motherhood by Karen Maezen Miller when I was pregnant. I have read it again and again since. I know the thing by heart. As I would sit in the dark, nursing and rocking, gripped with anxiety and fear, I would pull the book out of my rocking chair and read. Those words were a life jacket for me. The love in them kept me afloat. A simple book kept my postpartum depression at bay.

I have been looking forward to Maezen's new book, Hand Wash Cold: Care Instructions for an Ordinary Life for months. But, not really. I loved Momma Zen. How on earth could she do any better than that? I was afraid I would not like the book at all.

It came in the mail about two weeks ago, and I read it up fast. Too fast. So, I read it again. Momma Zen cradled my heart. Hand Wash Cold spoke right into my bones. It's not about being a mom or a wife. It's about being you.

I don't want to review this book. I want to write every word right here on this blog for you to read. I want to sit around and read it to you, and nod and smile with you.

Here is my favorite thing about this book : Karen Maezen Miller lives in the oldest private Japanese garden in southern California. She lives in a Zen garden and I don't, and that has changed my life. My husband says "Well, that's pretty fancy. It's easy to be Zen if you live in a Zen garden". "It's easy to think laundry is cool if you used to have someone doing your laundry for you." (I bet my husband and Maezen's husband would get along really well.)

But, when he said this to me, it clicked. Everything she said clicked. My life is what it is. My practice is not anyone else's. It's my job to do what is at hand, for me. My practice is to love what I have in front of me. And what else is there?

This book is magic. Ordinary magic.

"it's actually kind of meditative"

2010-04-13T11:04:00.000-07:00

I've recently begun doing a task in the library that I previously thought was below me.

I absolutely hate shelving books. Especially non-fiction, but really especially all the books. I am rare as far as librarians go, because I'm not hugely in love with books. I love stories, words and characters, but I am not in any way attached to "books". I do not romanticize books. Books are heavy things that you have to pack when you move. Books are things that you have to dust and shelve.

This stubborn stance has wrecked havoc on my library. Last year I had a volunteer that came in to shelve for me, but I wore her out. (She was old, ok.) This year began with no one to help. I have an assistant, but that poor, wonderful woman has her job cut out just keeping me in line. She has as little time to shelve books as I do. But when they would pile up into massive, train wreck heaps, she would give in and spend the day shelving.

Not me. I have important lessons to teach. I have a budget to spend and manage. I am a person of advanced degrees. I am above shelving.

But then, a miracle! I was bestowed the gift of a new volunteer. (He's old, but not as old.) As I set about the task of training him I soon discovered that he hadn't thought he would be shelving books. He thought he would help in more meaningful and important ways, but he seemed agreeable to doing what I wanted him to do. And to soften the blow, this little bit of "wisdom" snuck out of my mouth:

"Oh, shelving books isn't so bad. You will find that it's actually kind of meditative."

uh,oh. Did I say that? Did I actually call shelving books meditative? A job that I refuse to do!

So, because of my little verbal outburst of truth I put aside my "real work" and began to help the help. I have been shelving a little bit every day. It never ends. Just as I put the last one on the shelf, a child scurries in and throws another one across my desk.

My library has never looked neater and I feel like I know my collection better than I ever have before. These are extras. Little rewards that come from thankless work. Thankless meditative work.

lovely road trip

2010-04-11T18:10:00.000-07:00

This weekend my mom and I took Ramona on a road trip to see my grandparents.

It was lovely. She was sweet and it made up for the fact that we hadn't been there since Thanksgiving. (Not really, but better late than never.)

Ramona is a pretty good sleeper. Not the best, but not the worst. She has to be left to fuss a bit sometimes, but she usually finds a way to make it happen. All of this goes out the window when we leave town.

Last night was no exception, and quite honestly, it was The Hardest Night Ever. As the mother of an almost one year old, I have become spoiled. Gone are the nights of wondering if you will be lucky enough to sleep. For the most part, she goes to bed like cake and sleeps all night. If all else fails, I can always just give up and let her cry. She's old enough to know that I'm really devoted to her, but sometimes Mom just isn't going to take it anymore.

But I just don't have the nerves or conviction to take this approach when I'm away from our home. So last night I struggled to get her to sleep. I swear, it took hours. At one point she was actually jumping on the bed. I called her dad so he could talk some sense into her. Now it seems funny, but at the time it felt so dire. When your child won't sleep, it feels like they may never sleep again. You make declarations in your head like, "We are never coming back" and "I will NEVER have a second child".

After she finally gave in, I still kept an all night vigil. Last night every little whimper and cough woke me up. I was relived when the night was over and I could give up the pretense of sleep.

I called last night The Hardest Night Ever, but I know better. I really do. We have hard days and hard nights all the time. We move on from them, we give up the pretense. We move on and sleepily enjoy the day. It's lovely. It really is.

sick baby - again

2010-04-07T18:58:00.000-07:00

Ramona has been sick, so I stayed home with her on Wednesday.

Then on Thursday, she just didn't seem right to me. Not horrible sick, but not her bouncy self. So, I let go and let Grandad. I called my dad and let him watch her for the day. Ask around, I called that man non-stop. He did great and I got a happy, much healthier baby back.

Ramona and I are lucky. I'm lucky to have someone in my life who doesn't have much going on and can drop everything at a moments notice to rush in and take care of us. I find it really easy to overlook anything that happened in the past, these days. I'm finding that my heart is more forgiving. It has to be. The lucky thing about being at the brink all the time is that you grab a hand. You are lucky enough to not have to be so choosy anymore.

I'm tired of choosing. And I'm tired of judgment. I'm ready to grab hands.

admittance

2010-03-31T11:52:00.000-07:00

Last night I left yoga feeling like a broken-down mess. Not the desired effect probably.

I am getting over a two week marathon of illness. I am a skeleton girl. My boney fingers are haunting to me.

I went to a yoga session that I had no time for, because I thought it would "right" me in some way. It had the potential to, but it didn't. It didn't because my mind won't let go. I refuse to let go.

I didn't linger after class, I tore out of there. As I was pulling onto the highway I had a desperate thought. A sob rose up though my chest and throat. I pulled it together and wouldn't let go.

I don't know where to begin. I am admitting that I don't know anything. And I am also admitting that I'm afraid I might end up being a person that chooses her fear and worry over an actual life.