this is what happens when i blog before coffee

Last night, all three members of my family slept in different houses. It was very odd.

I didn't sleep well. Taylor was nervous, barking at passers by, and I dreamed of paint. Which isn't as strange as it sounds, considering that my dad, sister, and I spent yesterday painting the new house. Speaking of - I picked a warm, neutral, slightly golden color for the living room. Only I'm afraid it's going to be a lot of work for cream-colored walls. That's what I kept dreaming - cream colored walls with cream-colored trim in a cream-colored world. But when the trim is painted bright white, I hope the yellow shows up a little more. I tried red in the kitchen, but my sister is right - it's going to become Stars and Stripes Forever, with the cobalt blue tile countertop. So now I'm trying a mustard yellow. Anyone have any other suggestions? What does one DO with COBALT BLUE?

So now it's 5:07 am. Starbucks isn't open for another 53 minutes, and they were a part of my master plan for the morning. Alas.

In other news, Georgia's Mom leaves for Israel on Wednesday. Seminarian that she is, it's a great learning opportunity, but if you feel so inclined, please pray that she comes home safely. She has babies and a dog and a husband and a neurotic friend to tend.

And I think Brian called in the middle of the night to tell me that Auburn beat Florida? But that must have been a dream ...

I love Elizabeth and I love her most recent post. Go read it, if you haven't already. In honor -

We Wear the Mask
by Paul Laurence Dunbar (1872-1906)

We wear the mask that grins and lies,
It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes--
This debt we pay to human guile;
With torn and bleeding hearts we smile
And mouth with myriad subtleties.

Why should the world be over-wise,
In counting all our tears and sighs?
Nay, let them only see us while
We wear the mask.

We smile, but oh great Christ, our cries
To Thee from tortured souls arise.
We sing, but oh the clay is vile
Beneath our feet, and long the mile;
But let the world dream otherwise,
We wear the mask!

backward, forward

I just realized you guys don't know that today is The Day. In about an hour and a half, we will be buying a house! Hooray!

A moment of silence, if you will, to reflect on the past year.

A year ago I was doing this:

(Lordy day, but I am not cute-pregnant. When I see pictures like this, I start to question my sanity for wanting MORE of that. But I digress). Except, I was on my feet every day all day, serving coffee in the mornings and teaching in the afternoons, while Brian was working four part-time jobs. I am still convinced that only by the grace of God (and some of you) were we able to stay afloat financially and otherwise during that time.

And now, in a little while, I will be doing this

(much cuter now, don't you think?)

here.


Now, Brian and I are both doing exactly what we want to do. I no longer serve coffee and teach only as much as I want to, and Brian is getting to play music and do a job he enjoys.

There's a quote from one of my favorite novels that comes to mind: "It seems I've stumbled into an embarrassment of riches." Me too.

And! This afternoon, I get to celebrate with Mikkee.


Hooray!

(PS I realize that "hooray" is a common expression only used by preschool teachers. I've been saying Hooray for three hours this morning, so it just fell out here, too. I should probably think of a more sophisticated exclamatory phrase, but unfortunately, the only thing taht came to mind just now is the awed "DUUDE" I can imagine the band family saying over something very cool. So. I am decidedly UNsophisticated today.)

hump day hmmm: good thing going

The other day I was rocking Asher, looking at his perfectly smooth little forehead, and thinking about how often I have held him. Nine months old, I kept thinking. Did I have enough fun at four months, or six? Did I pay enough attention? Did I enjoy it enough? You know what? I really did. I have thought many times that memories of his babyhood will be mine, not his. He will (hopefully) have the benefits of the time we've spent together, but he won't remember being rocked to sleep when he was nine months (or six weeks, or four months) old. But I won't ever forget it.

* * *

Have I mentioned this week how much I love my church? Or how much they love and value children? Last Sunday I was late (of course) so I was standing in the back, Asher on my hip. He was busy bouncing and waving to the music, and I was busy trying not to drop him, when my pastor, standing next to me, says, "I read your blog from time to time. Your whole life is wrapped up in him right now. It's a beautiful thing. You'll never forget this season. I am sad for the women who don't get to do what you're doing right now." I am too. I'd say I've got a good thing going.

he's been busy growing

on choice and Maher

I have been asked to comment here on Bill Maher's segment on breastfeeding. If you scroll down the Maher clip is its own post.

I would like to write something thought provoking and eloquent, but almost every time I approach a parenting topic, I come off as defensive. Which probably means I AM defensive, sadly. It's hard not to be - as my friend Halle said once, parenting is the one thing I want to do well in my lifetime. Me too, Halle.

I never nursed. Never wanted to, never tried (I was asked three different times about this yesterday - weird, huh? As if I did something interesting by bottle feeding). We talked about it when I was pregnant, and decided against it. I wanted Brian to be able to bond with Asher, too, by being a part of caring for him. It wasn't really about sharing responsibility so that I could get a break (though we do, and I'm thankful for it). I just didn't want Brian to be left out of the first few months of his life, when feeding is one of the few ways you get to interact with a baby. Also, if I am honest, the prospect of my body being wholly responsible for nourishing another life was more daunting than the prospect of birthing a baby while living in my parents' spare bedroom. And that's saying something.

But, as others have said, I am thankful to live in a society where I get to choose. And because I'm an American (and not Chinese, as Maher pointed out - do you really want to talk about parenting options in China, Bill? Is this really a goal for which we should strive?), I even get to choose if I want to follow in the footsteps of the Duggars (www.jimbob.info - no clue why blogger is not cooperating this morning) and have 17 children (as an aside - it is fascinating to me how angry people get when they hear about large families. Parents of large families understand children and raising them differently than mainstream society. How is that an insult to you? I don't get it. But I digress), though I don't imagine that will be my path in life. For one thing, I don't trust my body with that many pregnancies. My track record's not good, in case you haven't heard. My point is I have been blessed to be born in a society where it's my choice how and when and if I have a family, and how and when I care for them. Yesterday I fed my baby sweet potatoes sitting on the middle console of a Civic, turning the spoon around and over for every bite, and pulling a muscle in my back. It was a messy choice, but it was mine. Bill Maher gets to choose to make his living by insulting others, and I get to choose how to feed my baby. Everybody goes home happy.

I don't deserve a medal. Was it Aristaeus that mentioned recently how the most personal experiences are also the most universal? I've thought about how true that statement is since I heard it. A baby is born every minute of every day. Does that make mine any less valuable to me? Absolutely not. I'm not asking for Bill Maher's applause, though I am occasionally guilty of asking for yours.

But Maher was right about one thing - our "causes" are mostly narcissistic. And the repeal on the nerd tax? That's just good television.

thoughts on parenting

Many of my friends who read this are not parents, so you may not be aware of the obsessive nature of motherhood. There's a hazy line between conscientious and neurotic. If I'm not careful, parenting begins to feel like a multiple choice test. There are several options, but there is one right answer and three wrongs. If I believe the hype, my life as a parent becomes about trying to thread the needle of my child's psyche. The goal, it seems, is to build a bright (but not nerdy), cute (but not cutesy), confident (but not conceited), vocal (but only when it's appropriate), obedient (but not robotic) child.

Right.

In our current post-miscarriage, pre-moving, sleep-losing, food-defying stage of life, I am learning something valuable. It's never going to be perfect. The perfect day that I spent several months constantly obsessing over? In which he takes two solid naps, eats full meals, goes to bed without complaint, and doesn't pull any blunt object over onto his head? It isn't possible. Because he's only human. No matter what I do as a parent, he's going to have faults and weaknesses, just like everyone else. He's entitled to a bad day, he's entitled to gag if he doesn't like his food. He even gets to decide whether or not he sleeps (though I get to decide when he's in his bed). Perfect is never going to happen. So be it.

Parenting theories are fine. But we aren't talking about an algebraic equation - we're talking about a person. With his own temperament and personality and responses and sense of humor and imagination and curiosity. Would I want him to be anything else? Of course not. So why am I responding as if his personality is a problem that can be solved? Why am I sighing at the things that make him who he is?

Recently I've had a few friends who have been criticized for their parenting decisions in public. It hasn't yet happened to me (only because my baby is too young - my time is coming, I'm sure), but whenever I hear stories like theirs, it makes me want to rant. Though this isn't universally true, about my friends I can safely say: We all love our babies more than we know how to express. And we're all doing the best we know to do, making the best decision we possibly can in any given moment, feeling the constant pressure of wanting to do the right thing and not having time to deliberate.

There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are raising their babies in love.

Amen.

quote, news, dogs

1. Tonight I have a quote to offer. From another blog -

"Faith is better understood as a verb than as a noun, as a process than as a possession. It is on-again-off-again rather than once-and-for-all. Faith is not being sure where you're going but going anyway. A journey without maps." - Frederick Buechner

2. The Jena 6 - is everyone keeping up with this? What, as a white (southern) American, can I do to be supportive? I'm not sure. But I feel like this question comes up often. As a middle class white American, I was born into an embarrassment of priviledge. And I agree with the protesters - why the disparity in the prosecution? One interview I read quoted the DA as saying the white students did not break any laws. So maybe that's the good that will come from the protests. Maybe the laws will change. But seriously, how can I show my support? I never know.

3. A dog in our community was chained, beaten, and burned by his owner. There's been an outcry, as well there should be. I was watching the segment on the news and remembered something from school: did you know the first cases of child abuse were prosecuted under cruelty to animals laws? There were laws protecting animals before there were laws protecting children. Huh.

the view from here

If there's anything cuter than a baby boy in overalls, I haven't seen it.

thoughts on compassion

This topic deserves an eloquent post, but more likely, it will just be my thoughts dumped out. Sorry about that.

I've been thinking lately about compassion. Mikkee was telling me last night about her trip to Peru. She spent 10 days with abandoned children who are now being raised in a group home, and she came home changed. She can't stop talking about the 26 boys living in the jungle that she quickly grew to love. (Mikkee, do you mind me sharing this? Mikkee is one of my favorite people, and Asher's godmother, and I've promised an Ode to her soon, but it's been hard to write. The people closest to me always are. But I digress.) She cried as she said, "Those boys need a mother." They will not be adopted; they're too old, have been through too much. But Christian Peruvians have given them a home, an education, a future. And, under Mikkee's leadership, a church in Nashville is helping fund their efforts. It's not a perfect solution, but where would those boys be without it? On the streets of Lima, where they would most likely die trying to survive.

This conversation came on the heels of toddler church yesterday morning. Out of six children in the room, four of them have been foster children (two have been adopted out of the system, the other two are still in foster families). I was talking to one of the little boys, an 8-year-old helper who was adopted out of foster care two years ago. He's a sweet, average kid. He's the kind of little boy who doesn't usually get noticed, because he follows the rules and blends into the crowd. And he likes being a helper in toddler church. He stays with his two-year-old foster brother and plays trucks and pours juice. He was talking to me this week and I remembered that he was six when he was adopted - old enough to remember life before adoption. I kept thinking, I don't even know what has happened to this kid. I don't know what he knows. Foster care is messy, adopting an older child is messier. But this kid has a life now. He has parents and brothers and sisters and grandparents that love him. Where would he be if he hadn't been adopted? Not in toddler church, pouring juice. That much is certain.

Compassion. It's the word that kept coming up for me on our retreat. We talked about the story where Jesus feeds the five thousand. Jesus had just found out his cousin had been brutally and unjustly murdered. He wanted to be alone, but people kept following him. In that moment - in the middle of his own grief - he looked at the crowds and had compassion on them, "because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd." It's easy to be compassionate when I feel good, when life is going the way I want. But to care about another's need out of a poverty of spirit, not an abundance - that can only come from God. There's nothing natural about that.

God is challenging me to be compassionate consistently, out of my poverty and out of my abundance. Once again I am reminded, as Valerie says, that Jesus came to turn the world on its ear. Not just the world - me. Thanks be to God.

grade for the week

If I was handing out grades, this week would earn a C. Here's why:

1. Asher has been learning how to fall. He pulls up onto the couch, plops on his bottom, smiles, and applauds himself. It is definitely the cutest thing I've ever seen. So, that gets an A.
2. He also drank four ounces of spoiled formula this morning. He's okay, though; he's thrown up twice, but the doctor assures me it happens all the time, and he will be fine. Definite F.
3. I had the BEST conversation earlier this week, about how God takes care of us despite our best efforts to ignore him. Again, an A.
4. Whenever Brian and I are sleep-deprived, we have to try very hard not to cuss just because we're tired. It almost never works, though. When Asher was an infant, we would promise each other every night, "We're not going to cuss tonight." Inevitably, someone would lose it at 1 a.m. I bring this up because we were up until 1:30 last night, taking turns rocking a baby who was BENT on not sleeping. But we didn't cuss! So C for not sleeping, B+ for not cussing.
5. All of these factors are brewing into the perfect storm of stress - the spoiled formula, the sleep deprivation, and the kicker - we're going out of town this afternoon. Anyone care to join us in the Civic for four hours of nonstop fun? The thought of four hours in a small car with a sick baby - D.
6. But when we get there, it IS going to be nonstop fun, because we are going with our friends Jeff and Carrie. Hanging out with Jeff and Carrie & Co., A.


Overall average, as I said, would be a C. But it's only Thursday; the week still has time to pull its grade up, if it hunkers down.


Asher preparing to show off his accomplished falling abilities.

clear eyes, full hearts

CAN'T LOSE.

I'm deep into the first season of Friday Night Lights, and this is all I have to say about it. Clear eyes, full hearts can't lose. Isn't that a great phrase? You have to say it as a chant to get the full effect. And you really need some high school football players with their helmets in the air to back you up ... but you get the picture. How can you not love this show? Although when you watch the episodes back to back you start to see some holes in the plot. Such as - why doesn't the sun ever shine? And when do they go to class? Why didn't Jason Street go back to school? Why hasn't social services intervened in the Riggins home? Things like that. Even so, it's my new favorite program. And I don't even like TV. Not much, anyway.

It's the kind of week where my external life is rolling right along, and my internal life is processing, so I'm afraid I don't have much to report. Naps are still iffy, but my attitude about them is better, so that's something. Asher has started waving hi to his dad when he sees him. Also - if you see Brian this week, ask him about the guy at the stoplight with his bass turned up to a visceral level in rural Alabama today. He turned off his music to compliment Brian on the George Clinton he was blaring from the state car. We want the funk ...

Last thing - Happy Birthday Elizabeth. I hope you find an Americanish birthday cake in Hong Kong. And clear eyes, full hearts can't lose.

if we were having coffee, we'd be sitting at naptime for this post. if i ever see a naptime again, that is.

Sleep, friends. Sleep is my problem.

To all you sleep trainers out there, I have nothing but love for you. And I'm not opposed to tears, as long as they are productive. But we've had close to a month of tears with no success. I've had all the crying I can take. So this is me, throwing up a white flag. Score one for the baby. I don't care if I rock him until his first prom, I'm done forcing the sleep issue.

I am also done obsessing over why he's not sleeping. It feels like my life's work is to get this child to take a nap. And really? It's not. For a while I blamed stress in the home. Then I blamed a tooth (I'm still partly blaming a tooth, because that's the standard catchall for baby weirdness). Then, today, I remembered a curse Georgia's mom bestowed on me when Georgia was the age Asher is now. "You did this," she said, after a string of sleepless days. "You taught my child how to sit up, and now she won't lie down." Maybe Georgia's mom has more spiritual power than she realized. Or maybe karma exists.

Or maybe he just doesn't want to take a nap. How should I know? What I do know is this - between his burst of movement, and his lack of naps, I feel like our lives are too negative. I'm saying "no" and lamenting his nap all day, every day. No more. If that means fewer naps, or even a more tired baby, so be it.

thus and such

I feel like my house has gotten to that stage in Tetris where it's easier to let it pile to the top of the screen and start a new game. In my bedroom, at this moment, aside from the normal bedroom stuff, I am currently housing a ten-speed bike, two guitars, a stack of real-estate related paperwork, and an extraneous 17-inch television. We won't even talk about what's in the closet.

PS - It occurs to me that some of you may not live with a musician, so your bedroom may not traditionally include the same things as ours. When I say "normal bedroom stuff," I am including an amp, pedal board, microphone, microphone stand, and roughly half-million cords. I am also including the post-its and receipts upon which my husband has recorded Very Important Information Which Must Not Be Discarded, ever.

Clutter bothers me deep in my soul, and this apartment has reached maximum capacity. Also, I am sure you have all experienced the phenomenon in which as soon as you know a change is coming, your current station becomes intolerable. It happens with jobs, with pregnancy, with houses - anything. Now that I know we're about to have a house, the apartment feels ... paltry.

Clutter in my bedroom, clutter in my brain - that's my life right now. So this is me, trying to organize my thoughts, since the bedroom seems beyond repair.

1. ABA therapy for children with autism: as a teacher, using this approach is like watching paint dry. But it WORKS. It is more reliable than any other therapy approach I have ever seen. I can't get over it. I spent today at an ABA clinic, and even though my philosophy on teaching argues against this type of therapy, I just can't say enough how well it works. Today, for about two hours, I really missed working. Not enough to change my mind, but still. How lucky am I to have a career that I MISS? So few people have that.

2. My husband won't stop doing nice things for me. In response to my frazzled state, he bought me Season 1 of Friday Night Lights. Wasn't that nice?

3. A lyric for Aristaeus. It's by The Wailin Jennys, but it sounds like something Whitman would have liked.

All or nothing now
Might as well be true
Leave the dream of hearth and home
That never will come true

Live and die and gone
Live and die and gone
Leave the dream of hearth and home
Live and die and gone

Sweet wild road ahead
Sweet wild road ahead
If I lied and said that all was well
I might as well be dead

Single I was born
And single I will die
I'll marry myself to the whole wide world
And never make her cry

4. I'm feeling very opinionated tonight, but I'm not sure I want to post every single thought. The whole traceable-for-all-of-posterity issue, you know. But I will say that I heard something interesting about Larry Craig on the Today show this morning: the guilty plea he keeps saying he didn't really mean? It was filed two months after the charges were made. I had envisioned an immediate filing without consulting a lawyer. Two months? He had that long to consider it, or to consult with whomever, and this is what he decided to do? And now he's going to try to undo it? Good luck with that.

5. I understand that choosing a single topic makes for a larger blog readership, but honestly, I don't want to. I do this because I like it. I don't want it to feel too much like work. Having said that, I AM preparing to do some actual work for a church's website. I am hoping they'll let me write their weekly devotional blog. It would be so fun. And, in direct contradiction to what I JUST said two sentences ago, a little self-discipline never hurt anyone. Just - don't make me do it here. Here I like to ramble.

6. In honor of ABA therapy, which dictates that you always end a program with something positive - a picture of the cutest baby I know.

forlorn

on symbolism and camp

Below is a comment that took on a life of its own. I am answering a question asked in the comment section of "And It's Good Enough for Me" at Wheels on the Bus. To understand what I'm talking about, please read the post first. You can follow the link from the sidebar. You won't be sorry.

The Christian faith, in essence, is a story of a rescue. We were separated from God by our sinful nature, but through the sacrifice of Jesus, we have been reunited with God the Father and saved from eternal separation from Him. And Christian community (i.e., the Church) described by the New Testament is a group of people who are so overwhelmed with gratitude that they escaped through Jesus that they can't help but love and serve their neighbor. They can't help but be peaceloving, because they know they are free, and they know what their lives would be like if they weren't. Christian community in its purest form is a reprieve, a place where love is the law, and a solace for those who have been battered by a dark world. At least that's what the Apostles heard God say to them as they were writing to one another.

But modern day Christianity has become about a lot of things besides forgiveness and service and love. When I think about the modern Church (myself included), I think about Professor Trelawney from Harry Potter. We are mostly silly, mostly wrong, mostly laughable in our attempts to live out our salvation in the example of Jesus. But sometimes, when we aren't looking, Christian community works the way the Apostles described it. Sometimes we are so overcome by gratitude (not guilt, but genuine gratitude) that we carve out a little sacred space, a little time and place where love is the law and God's rescue is remembered. And you stumbled onto it, at a camp somewhere in the Northeast twenty-five years ago. For nine weeks one summer you had a reprieve, a place where two girls could hide, catch their breath, eat a good meal and sleep in a bed for a few weeks. And in that moment a real-life rescue took place.

The symbolism, Emily? Is that Jesus came to seek and save that which was lost. Including two battered Jewish girls from Massachusetts. Canoes and skinny dipping notwithstanding, I can't help but think that God would be proud.

going with

First of all, Amanda is my HERO for forgetting her sound machine in Alabama and offering it to me. Yay for sound machines. We played with it for a few minutes and watched for a reaction. When I turned on the "heartbeat" option, Asher got still, so heartbeat it is. What's funny is that the whole house seems to dial down when we hear the heartbeat on the sound machine. Maybe there's a primal reaction to a heartbeat. Maybe we're all remembering the womb. Maybe it's why percussion instruments are present in every culture. Who knows. Anyway, he's a better sleeper, and I'm a happier mom, because of the sound machine.

Second, an update on Bob and Flo: We did more research on the area, and found out that Flo's neighborhood is more stable than we had originally thought. It has appreciated at the same rate as Bob, and average number of days on the market is actually fewer for Flo. So we made an offer, and it was accepted on Friday. Barring anything unforeseen, we'll be moving at the end of September. Meet Flo, everyone. Although Flo sent me an email shortly after she first appeared on the blog and said she resented the nickname, it sounded so out-of-work-waitress, and she preferred to think of herself as a little more hip than all THAT. So heretofore she will be known as ... what? Shirley? Meg? Lovey? We'll see.



P.S. Brian said this post should be named, "We're going with the Flo."