Previously on DWM: “Momma, can I read to you?”

Originally posted February 7, 2008. (Hey, I’m feeling nostalgic. So sue me.)

Alli stood at my left shoulder, resting her chin on the back of my chair to peek at whatever it was on my computer screen that held my attention. I could feel her there, fidgety and anxious, waiting as patiently as she knew how until I finished typing. Her warm breath tickled my neck, and I smiled to myself. I turned away from the computer (these days it is always the computer) to give her a smile, and that is when it happened. That is when I saw her.

Really saw her.

Of course you saw her, dipstick, you think to yourself. You were looking right at her. And you’d be right, of course, except for the “dipstick” part, because that is just plain rude. I looked at her. Of course I looked at her. But it was what I saw that startled me.

I’m not going to spout any hackneyed verbiage about seeing her “with new eyes” or “for the first time.” Nor will I wax allegorical about seeing beyond the outward appearance of those around us. Nope. It was simpler than that. I wasn’t seeing her anew; I was just… seeing her. Her sea green eyes, one magnified by a coke bottle lens, but both shining up at me, full of depth and warmth. The freckle on her chin. The wisps of unruly hair that danced around her hairline, escaped from the confines of her ponytail. The sweet little nose. The determined tilt of her chin, seemingly at odds with the amiable set of her lips. The almost palpable energy radiating from her body as her excitement and vitality threatened to spill over, to overwhelm me with, just… her, all of her, even as she struggled for composure.

She was so beautiful in that moment. Ethereal, yet so very real. I literally ached with the beauty of her. All of her. In that moment, she wasn’t just a spunky little mini-me with glasses and a propensity for chattering simply for chattering’s sake. I don’t know how else to say it. She was just… herself.

And it was breathtaking.

Alli shook my shoulder. “Mom? Momma?” She peered into my eyes, and a shadow of concern crossed her face.
Just a moment had gone by–seconds, really–but I felt both physically and emotionally exhausted, absolutely spent, as if I’d been traveling for weeks in some far off place and I was finally returning home. Trying to get my bearings.

I blinked a few times, fast, winking away any tears that dared to escape. I showed my tear ducts who’s boss, so to speak. “Yes, sweetie?” I finally answered.

“I love you.”

Now, I know for a fact that she had been about to ask me, “Can I read to you?” Because that is what she always asks when her homework is finished and she needs to read for twenty minutes for her reading log. But she changed the program.

“I love you, too,” I replied, then pulled her into my arms for a hug.

“I know,” she said simply. Then, “Momma?” she asked as she gently disentangled herself from my arms, arms which may or may not have been holding her a teensy bit too tightly.

“Hmm…?”

“Can I read to you?”

After a momentary glitch, we were back to our regularly scheduled program. All was well in the world.
But now, as I think back to that moment, I can’t help but wonder if Alli veered off-script because at that moment, that exact moment when she looked into my eyes… she saw me, too.

Taking Back the Blog

So, taking back the blog is actually much more involved than I initially thought. Turns out there’s, like, planning and time management and whatnot! Apparently blogging is NOT just like riding a bike. Blogging muscles atrophy if neglected, did you know? Well, DID you? Because if so, it would have been nice if someone had MENTIONED this to me! Good LORD, people! I’m stymied here! At a loss for words! No coherent thoughts! And I’ve MISSED blogging opportunities! Just missed ‘em! Opportunities involving my CHILDREN! So, basically, I suck, as a writer AND a parent, and it is totally not my fault. Oh, ho ho, that’s right! My suckage is on the heads of all y’all who neglected to mention to me that blogging is HARD and must be constantly worked at for maximum awesomeness! Right?! Right?!

Honestly. What were you thinking?

And look at that! My grammar is all over the place! All! Over! The! Place! Didn’t I just misplace a modifier or dangle a preposition or something absolutely ungrammatical like that?! WHY, GOD?! WHHHYYY?!

No, no, it’s cool. I’m good. No problem here. *breathe*

It’s just, well, DWM was like my journal. My not-so-secret cache of memories and moments all in one place, all here, one-stop nostalgia… and I’ve missed so much!

Silly moments with the kiddos, wherein we learn just how much I’ve rubbed off on them and how very funny and sad and scary and sobering that can be;

Stolen moments with TGIM watching television or riding birthday bikes or hiding away in our room eating Nielsons chicken strips and fries– with fry sauce!– while our kiddos are downstairs making frozen tortellini;

How I’m missing my BFF Paige while she travels all over the place, and totally missing the opportunity to talk about taking care of her cute little buns while she’s on vacation, because honestly, how could I pass up the opportunity to talk about Paige’s cute little buns?!;

Not to mention all the television, movies, books, and, gosh, even WORK, that I have discovered, rediscovered, enjoyed (or not) over the past year and didn’t taken the time to make a memory, to show that, yes, I was HERE, a part of it all, with my finger firmly pressed against the pulse of pop CULTURE!

I’ve missed the moments, people! The MOMENTS! And try as I might to recall them– maybe just a few, right?– to set them away for the future, it’s not the same, I can’t bring them back like that, the moments, because I’m seeing everything with different eyes now. Distant glimpses. The rearview.

And that sucks. Big-time suckage, that.

So… I’ll be taking back the blog now, thank you very much. That’s right! Planning and time-management be damned.

Just so you know.

“Spin With It” or “The Stupid Wasp”

I’ve been feeling anxious lately. Unsettled. Discombobulated, even. And if you’ve ever been combobulated, you know how unsettling the opposite of THAT can be. I’m only saying.

Perhaps it is the heat. Here I am hard at work inside, while the sun is shining away outside, all, “Come out and PLAY, cave dweller!” And I’m like, “Don’t interrupt! RUDE.”

Perhaps it is the sounds of imminent summer pressing against my bedroom window. The first wave of summer bugs and their veritable cacophony of buzzing, chirping, whirring, zitzing. Distant mowers and leaf blowers whining and buzzing intermittently. A wasp, trapped between the window and screen, thumping fitfully against the pane. I am painstakingly ignoring the wasp’s plight; hornets make me cranky. I am aware of the inherent pun.

Even still, my house seems unnaturally still, somber… withdrawn from the restless, almost-but-not-quite-summer day brewing outside, and I wish I could withdraw and still the restless anxiety softly brewing inside.

Of me, not my house. Pay attention.

It is as if I am waiting, holding my breath, but I don’t understand why or for what. You know how there are times when you gaze out the window of a moving train or vehicle or airplane, and find yourself mesmerized by the scenery flying by… but not while you are the one in actual physical control of the vehicle or plane because that would be super dangerous? And although the scenery is moving by in lightning-quick flashes of lakes and trees and earth and sky, you struggle to capture it, to put it in your pocket, all of it—the meadowy greens and azure blues, the earthy browns and oranges and purples, even the strips of barren desert or occasional muck along the way—because it is just… so… breathtaking… it is!… and all that beauty is yours at that very moment, and you have no doubt in your mind that if you could just grab it and hold it all in your hands for even a teensy second then it would be the most wonderful, most perfect second of your life?!

But you can’t touch it because you can’t slow down, you can’t just stop, you’re not where you’re supposed to be yet? And your chest tightens and you can barely take a breath? Because as the scenery continues to pass by, to elude you, it changes, it always changes, and though it is still oh-so beautiful and utterly mesmerizing and you know that there is more to see, so much more, you also know in your heart that the you can never get it back, and you will never see it exactly the same way again? And even though you never had it, not to keep, not really, because it was never yours to take… still, you feel the loss?

Yup. The anxiety I’m feeling is a lot like that.

Like my life is speeding by in a whirl of restlessness and obligations and TGIM and my kiddos are only a mesmerizing blur along the way—lightning quick flashes of growing and changing and learning and becoming—so beautiful, yet so fleeting… and I can’t make it stop! I can’t snatch my children out of time and hold them close to me just as they are, so lovely and young, so full of innocence and love and trust, because there are miles to go and places to be and that’s just the way it goes, this life. And before I know it my son is a teenager with braces and hormones and opinions, and my daughters are not quite as grossed out as they used to be when they see people kissing and they will soon be too cool to cuddle up with me and ask me to read them bedtime stories.

So I’ve been feeling anxious lately. Unsettled. Discombobulated.

The wasp is still trapped. I hear it thumping futilely against the pane, and it strikes me that its only thought right now is probably to get out, get out, get OUT of the place in which it is stuck. And if the stupid thing would only slow down for a moment, take a breath—although insects technically breathe passively, but work with me here—maybe it would realize that, hey, it got itself IN there—it crawled right in, uninvited and whatnot—so it can certainly get itself the hell out. There is ALWAYS a way out! A way to move onward, to be free from the frenzied, futile thumping, because what you are doing is not WORKING.

Except for when I open the window and swat it dead, of course.

Hey, I TOLD you. Hornets make me cranky.

But, I’m thinking. Just like the poor deceased wasp, maybe what I ought to do to dispel the unnamed restlessness is to slow down for a moment, breathe, look around. Take notes. Enjoy the view. I mean, I have traveled this far, and I know the ultimate ending, but if I am always waiting, holding my breath, always searching for something more, or looking for a way to get… oh, somewhere else, I am missing what is plain, what is right in front of me. The mesmerizing blur, so to speak. And I can’t get that back! Like it says in “World Spins Madly On” by the Weepies:

Everything that I said I’d do
Like make the world brand new
And take the time for you
I just got lost and slept right through the dawn
And the world spins madly on

So, pay attention, me!

Also? Occasionally I am melodramatic and strange.

Dance in the Stillness

I have the house to myself.

It’s been so long since it’s been this quiet. This still. So here I am, curled up under my comforter savoring the view of the small patch of grayish blue sky I can see while staring through the slightly parted curtains of my bedroom window. There is something so freeing about lying in bed in the middle of the day with the curtains open, letting in the sun and the sky and the light, not blocking it all out, not shutting it all away, even if I might want to nap a little or perhaps just close my eyes for a bit—just a few moments!—because I know it will still be there when I open my eyes again. The sun and the sky and the light. There. Quiet and still. In the middle of the day that is MINE. I can’t explain it! I can’t! It is just so.

The thin branches in the tree outside are softly swaying and waving as the bitter winter breeze batters and bends them, tearing from them any remnants of clinging leaves, setting them free. But these leaves, remainders of the fall, they don’t dance with the wind. They are crinkled and paper thin and they break apart, disintegrate before my eyes, and swirl and twirl away, painting the air with warm earthy hues of russets and browns until they are out of sight.

But I push these thoughts away, because it is my day, my light and sky and peace, and I am snug, burrowing deeply into the soft down duvet. I’m soothed, running my hands across the top of the blanket, savoring the feel of the smooth expanse of well-worn cotton against my palms while I again allow my thoughts to drift upwards and out. Unfortunately, my thoughts never will stay elevated for any great length of time, and while I want to close my eyes, to enjoy the peace, I quickly lose myself in thoughts of the mundane. Chores. Responsibilities. My developing MarioKart skills. How I really ought to be filming a TechnoGeekery episode or doing something productive, dammit, rather than burrowing away from everyone and everything, staring out the window. Frustrated, I close my eyes, which is particularly effective in shutting out unwanted, intruding thoughts. Ah, stillness. Quiet. Peace. Gradually, however, my thoughts slip into imagining that new pair of Uggs I am absolutely coveting because they may be the fugliest footwear imaginable, but DAAAY-UM they keep my tootsies toasty and make mighty fine slippers and my old pair have absolutely no traction and I don’t want to bust my ass again slipping down the icy steps…

I just opened my eyes and the digital clock on my bedside table caught my eye. It is staring at me in silent condemnation, all “Look at the time you wasted! Just LOOK!” With a rueful grin, I move to throw back the covers, and then another leaf catches my attention. It swirls and twirls and disappears from my view. Then another blows by… and another.

And I realize that I am holding on too tight, I’m not letting go, when I should be breaking free to dance with the wind, to swirl and whirl and paint the sky, lush forest green with hints of olive, goldenrod, and palest yellow, and perhaps even a thin streak of burgundy running throughout, with really only one possible destination, but it is okay, more than fine, because it is my time to fly, my journey to enjoy, not half-assed, but wholeheartedly.

I smile and sink back into my cocoon of blankets, stretch lazily, and welcome the sound of stillness as it washes over me, through me.

Let it blow, I think to myself. I’m ready to dance.

Oh, Think Twice

There’s a man… living in a cardboard box… down by the White House.

I want to joke. It’s what I do. You must understand: it is genetic. I had absolutely no say in the matter. Because, yes, you see, I have inherited the Loud Laugher/Loud Talker gene from my mother’s side of the family, which makes for good times in cubicle-land, let me tell you. Especially when I get phone calls. Or an especially funny email. I get shushed. I do! And when I break my butt walking down icy stairs , I laugh (after I pass out). When I pass out (again) while locked in the ER restroom, resulting in a twisted ankle and a bruised up face, I laugh. When my husband hits me in the head with a racquetball going mach 7, after I cry like a baby and cuss him to bits, I laugh. When I joke about someone hurting my feelings or breaking my heart, I laugh. I can’t help how I am.

But I can’t find the funny in this.

I work in DC. A block away from the White House. (And that’s all the details you’ll ever get out of me. Because it’s none of your business where I work, THAT’S why. STALKER.) And when I remember to get my hyper-focused self out of my cubicle and into the fresh air, I see him. During the bustle of the midday lunch crowd, there he is, right there on the sidewalk, fast asleep on a ratty old bed of blankets and newspapers, wearing several layers of clothing, his only possessions (as far as I can tell) an old metal shopping cart, a coffee cup filled with change and folded-up dollar bills, and a plastic drugstore bag filled with well-worn paperback books and assorted paraphernalia that is usually resting against the abandoned storefront window. The first time I saw him, I thought, Why doesn’t anyone steal his money? Or his bag? He’s SO out. Because I am a horrible person and that was the first thing that popped into my head. Theft. Yes, my parents are so proud. But in thinking that thought, I realized that no one stole his stuff… because they didn’t see it.

He wasn’t even there.

She calls out to the man on the street
“Sir, can you help me?
It’s cold and I’ve nowhere to sleep,
Is there somewhere you can tell me?”

And now it’s winter, and it’s bitter cold, and today I actually remembered to get my hyper-focused self out of my cubicle and into the fresh air. And I discovered that where the ratty old bed of blankets and newspaper used to be is a cardboard hut, built in a sort of half-hexagon shape and propped pretty solidly up against the abandoned storefront window. It’s a pretty intricate structure, with a swinging door (blocked by the shopping cart when I walked by). The coffee cup was there, filled with the usual change and folded-up dollar bills. And this time I thought, How did he build that? Did people stop and watch? Did anyone help him? The authorities have to know he’s here. Are they going to make him tear it down? Good LORD, he is LITERALLY living in a cardboard box! People don’t live in cardboard boxes. You can’t LIVE in a cardboard box. And I thought all this as I pulled my coat more tightly around me and pulled on my mittens to help ward off the icy wind blowing by.

But y’all? There’s a man living in a cardboard box down by the White House.

I have a confession: If he were awake when the crowds bustle by, perhaps sitting on his blankets reading, or talking to himself, or simply staring into space, I probably wouldn’t be able to recall such vivid details of the living space he has staked out as his own. I couldn’t. Because I know in my heart that I would probably look away. Like I do when the strange, shouty man at the corner of the street by the Metro entrance waves his coffee cup full of change at me as I rush to get to the train on time. Because I never have cash, and even if I did, I wouldn’t know what to do with it. Is it like a Ding Dong Ditch? Drop in a dollar, make no eye contact, and hurry by? What happens then? Will I be obligated to drop money into his cup every time I pass him? Will he expect it? I don’t know! I don’t!

Today, from across the street, I watched covertly as others hurried by him. Some dropped change and dollars into his cup, thus earning his strange, shouty thanks. Some smiled in his direction as they passed, flashing him a “Sorry, buddy, not today” type of gesture. But mostly? People walked on by, some even quickening their step or swerving as far from him as possible as they passed.

He walks on, doesn’t look back
He pretends he can’t hear her
Starts to whistle as he crosses the street
Seems embarrassed to be there

Yes, the economy sucks. Yes, people are losing their jobs. Yes, we need a change. Yes, we need hope. So I can’t help but be bewildered by this sense of complacency regarding homelessness I perceive in our nation’s capital, this abandonment of the needy, people who have the time and the wherewithal to build cardboard huts on the streets, right in front of us, right outside buildings where thousands of people work, only a block away from the home of the most influential person in the entire country, and yet… there they are? Are we, as a whole, complacent? ARE we? I don’t know! I don’t! I’m not judging. I’m ASKING.

Because there’s a man living in a cardboard box down by the White House. And I can’t find the funny in that. I just… can’t.

Oh think twice, it’s another day for
You and me in paradise
Oh think twice, it’s just another day for you,
You and me in paradise

Just think about it.

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