If it's not fatal...

Beckam has carried a bruise on his forehead for the last year.

 It migrates, but it is always there.

It is his war badge, his stamp of bravery and I am proud.

We had to superglue it shut once last summer.

His skin popped open on the edge of a rock.

My rugby playing brother came over for dinner last night.

The first question he asked the 2 year-old was,

"Come here Beckam. You got a bruise on your forehead?....Oh, yep.  There it is."

I just read an article about a school in New Zealand.

http://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2014/01/recess-without-rules/283382/

They have recess without rules, and the results are positive.

The school now has less bullying, less vandalism, and higher concentration levels during class.

Their students are learning how to deal with risk, and with this comes accountability, common sense.

It also breeds self esteem.  I remember looking at neighborhood trees as a kid and thinking, "I climbed that."

I didn't swing from below the monkey bars, I walked on top of them with bare feet, toes wrapped around them like a monkey.  I remember the floating transcendence when this skill clicked, and I can also still do it.

The article makes another good point, a more subtle one.

It is one thing to read such an article and think, "Yes, we coddle our children too much, this needs to stop!"

However, are these readers able to allow their own children to get hurt?

Are they able to let go of the impulse to hold someone else accountable?  Can they give administrators, teachers, and coaches the space to let kids run free?

Last year at gymnastics, Sophie broke her arm.

She dove into a forward roll and dislocated her elbow.

Never once did I think to blame her coaches.  She is a gymnast.  Gymnasts get hurt.

My daughter wore that cast like a soldier in uniform.  

She had the experience of heart ache while watching her team-mates compete.

She attended their meets in her cast, with a smile.

Granted, she did cry all the way there, and she didn't want to go.

Her Dad told her, "You are a part of a team, and you will go support your team."

So she suited up in her GTC warm-ups, cheered them on, and learned the value of good sportsmanship.

I watched her struggle to regain the skills she'd lost while injured.

I saw her work hard for something she wanted.  The decision was hers.  The commitment was hers.  I am a teacher.  I know how difficult it is to teach kids to be intrinsically motivated.

The article's last point is this, those of us who remember free play will preserve it.

I would never want to rob my children of these medals.  My tag-line is:

If it's not fatal, it's okay.

Sophie belaying Pepper while she climbs in Big Cottonwood

The Truth about Baking a Cake

I programmed myself to wake up at 6 a.m. just so I could write.
I have been missing this time.
The rest of the world is asleep now, and I can sneak into my own heart.
Because once everyone wakes up, it belongs to them...and that is exactly how I want it.

When this life is over, my heart will be the most ragged stuffed animal.
It will be the t-shirt I can't give up.  The one so thin it looks like cheeze cloth.
It will be my 28 year old brother's baby blanket, whittled down to a 1 foot square and still draped over his shoulders in the morning.
It will be my husband's Big Book held together by duct tape, with a broken spine, and highlighted paragraphs.  The pages soft and brittle on the edges, like Grandma's skin.

I get hurt often, and I am grateful.
There is a line from the Big Book which I often meditate on, and it says:

"...we invariably find that at some time in the past we have made decisions based on self which later placed us in a position to be hurt."

In the margins I have written:

"I am not a victim."   and    "Not so bad, that I am human."  I am a willing participant in this human race.


Yesterday my daughter Sophie decorated her cousin's birthday cake.  He is turning 10 and he loves Batman.

We went to the craft store and bought black fondant.  She is pumped.  We baked cakes the night before. They sat perched on the kitchen counter, waiting to be draped in Batman's cape and logo.
She watches Cake Boss  with the eager face of a teenage groupie.
That guy can dream up any cake and make it happen with precision.
So, in her mind, her cake is supposed to be masterful.  It is the 2nd time she has used fondant...in her life.
To her, this does not matter.  She is supposed to be able to make her cake look like "The Boss's" cake.

I coach her through, just as my mentors have done for me.  They remind me that I am learning, and to take it slow.  This is impossible for me.  My ambition drives me smack into the solid wall of reality.  It hurts.

"Ugh!  This fondant work is sloppy!  Look there's a hole in it!"
She stomps around in her boots and sticky fingers, fluffing hair from her eyes.

"It's okay Sophie.  I promise, people won't see it as you do.  It is a small hole.  Let's wrap a band of fondant around the bottom to hold the frosting in.  It is good to learn to work with your mistakes. Because you will make them.  You are learning. It's okay.  It looks better than you think."

"No Mom! It is NOT ok!  It looks terrible!  I hate it!"

I remember this.  I remember studying art in school and feeling this way.  I had an idea of the painting but couldn't execute it.  My professor would say,
You have to paint a hundred bad paintings before you will paint one good one.
To which my head would respond,
Not me.  I'm going to paint a good one, now.

But he was right.  I am only barely able to paint...kind of...how I want to...sometimes.

I know she will kick against me.  I know I can't take away her frustration, because it comes from hope.  It comes from caring.  I will simply keep telling her the truth, no matter how many years it takes, for both of us to bring about the desires of our hearts.

still falling...

I'm wearing my knee-high Doc Martin boots he gave me 5 years ago for Christmas.

The world around us is rocking and booming and ending.
People are throbbing and sweating.  We are in a bubble.
We create that, still.  I don't have to go looking.  I have found exactly what I was seeking.
I need only what is inside this bubble.  He knows everything I can't say.
We don't find ourselves here as often.  Life crowds us tightly.

"I always get a little nervous on New Year's Eve," he confesses.
But his eyes say otherwise.  They have crinkles of joy at their corners and his grin is that of a Cheshire cat.
"Oh really?"  I bend backwards at the waist where his hands are locked.  "Yeah, you look very scared...."

Before our first New Year's together I told him,
'This is a very significant holiday.  If we kiss at midnight and it falls flat, then it's a sign.  If I look at you and dread the year ahead...well...that means maybe we probably won't make it.'
The poor man spent the whole day twisted up and afraid he would not pass the test.
But our kiss was luminous, and every year since then, the world stops for us on December 31st.

Sometimes I get scared this is too naive of me, too superstitious.
But I don't think so.  I don't think it is silly that I want to be in love with my husband.
Because if my eyes are wide open, If I am really looking, then I cannot help but to see him.
What I see is more and more about what it takes to be the man he is, and I cannot help but adore that man.
So I suppose it is an exercise in awareness too, and honoring something sacred.
For reasons I cannot understand, I was graced with an immense love for another person.
Every year my resolution is the same:
                                                 Do not forget to honor what Grace has given you.
                                                 Do not get too busy to see him.

How do I do this?  How do I stay awake?  The answer has been the same since I was a hormonal little twirp with a journal in junior high...keep writing.  That is it.   The resolution.  Do not forget.   Keep writing.

just before we took the plunge...

tummy juice

Too long since I've awoken and claimed a morning to write.
Perhaps it is the stillness that only comes from new snow.
It's grace floats into my kitchen and reminds me.
It reminds me of the voice I can only hear when it's quiet.
Now it finally feels like Christmas.  The twinkling tree in my living room does not feel so out of place.
We've been listening to Christmas radio in the car, but that doesn't cut it.
Pepper has been memorizing all the lyrics.  She sang them for her Dad last night.
And I sat tall and proud as she bee-bopped along to Santa Clause is Coming to Town.
I kept looking from him to her to make sure he was smiling.  He did.  Good.
How could I not see her as a reflection of me?
It is so hard not to take her accomplishments personally, to take credit for them.
Even one so trite as a 4 year old singing.  
I know better.  I know the danger of this, but I fall into it anyway.
Pep is so like me already, with her love of books and words and metaphor and irony.
For the last month she's been enlightening me with homophones.

"Mom, a bat is an animal and a toy.
Mom, a rock is like a rock and you Rock OuT!
Mom, a brush is like you brush your hair and a paint brush!
Mom, a cat is like an animal AND a Name!
Mom, squash is like you eat it and I squash you!
Mom, Beach is like Sophie's friend AND it's the ocean in California!"

I can see in the slim rectangle of my rear view mirror, her mind is blown, every time.
This just keeps happening!  One word.  Two meanings.  Crazy!

See the green tummy juice?

She has also taken to writing the names of:  Mom, Pepper and "Dod."
Then she draws us.
Yesterday when her Dod's mouth ended up a straight line, she started laughing.
"Dad's mad...cuz he just got home from work."
She saw it.  That subtle change in his mouth communicated emotion.  I love her for seeing that, and for finding the humor in it.
She also draws each persons' tummy, with the tummy juice inside.
This is clearly important, because she rarely leaves it out.
I am not certain what the "U" after each persons' name is for.
I'll have to ask her when she wakes up.

In some way this feels like my accomplishment.
Even though all I've done is facilitate.
I read her books, and I answer her questions.
I tell her she is smart, and I am proud of her.

See how long and capable her fingers are!

However, I wonder if there is a better word than proud.
I've always wondered this.
Am I setting her up to please me, rather than pursue her own identity?
Some would say I am thinking too hard, but I disagree.
I am leaving space for Grace to claim her magic.
In reality, I am no more responsible for Pepper's artistry then I am the snow lying smooth on my back yard.
I cannot conjur the spell she casts on the world at Christmas time.
I cannot claim Pepper as a thing I have made.
I didn't teach her to draw fingers on her figures.
I am not the narrator on our walks to school.
She hears her own voice.
A voice very similar to this one I find on quiet mornings.
So maybe I can approach her as I do the snow, with gratitude for her presence and her magic.
Maybe instead of saying,
"I am proud of you."
I can say,
"Thank you for sharing your drawings with me.  It makes me feel so happy to see your art work.
You are very good at using your imagination, and I love how you draw the tummy with tummy juice in it."

Sophie's birthday

She loves her Dad

We stay at the campfire long after the guests are gone, playing music in the dark.
Just Sophie, her Dad (AKA Jeff-dad), Pepper, Beckam, their Dad (Andrew)...and me.
I am the rope linking these two families.  The mother of both.
I don't know where to sit.
So I sit in the middle by the fire, pretending to be cold.
We all enjoy each other.  We are there because we want to be.

Pepper wears Jeff-dad's head lamp and frolicks like an erratic dear.

Happy birthday girl

She giggles and points her light in his face, then down at her shoes.
Sometimes she is more like a fairy then a solid person.
Her imagination dominates, and she gets lost easily.
She speaks in a vocabulary too abstract for a 4 year-old.
Yet somehow, she cracks it with a poet's whip.

Jeff-dad finds her hilarious.
He has to cover his mouth and look away so she doesn't see him laughing at her naughtiness.
This makes it easier.

Jeff getting Pepper ready to climb
Myself and Andrew in the background

I may not know how he sees me, or my new husband, or my son who looks just like Andrew.
But I know he adores Pepper.

Earlier in the evening, we took Sophie and her friends climbing.

Team Gymnasts teaching Pepper

I belayed Jeff so he could lead the climbs.
He still talks to himself while he's up there.
Then he belayed me, so I could clean the routes and bring down his gear.
When a move is hard, we exhale the same breath.  It makes the same sound.
Because he was my teacher.
We rarely made eye contact or spoke.
But there was trust.  Right?  There must have been.
Even though I chose to end our marriage, we still have a partnership.
This amazes me.
And yet, it is simple, we do it for Sophie.

Her birthday cake was a pan of brownies with a ridiculous marzipan frog perched in the corner.
That was my job.
Her dad brought hamburger patties stuffed with whole cloves of roasted garlic.
After we ate, there was a cloud of garlic floating from guests' mouths.
I can always tell when Jeff's been cooking, because Sophie comes home with breath that knocks me over.
Andrew sweetly and patiently sat with Baby Beckam.
He knew I needed to be with my "other" family.  I don't know what else to call it.
He supports me with no strings of guilt - just simply and wholy.
I don't have to explain.  He gets it.

Jeff, Sophie and I are like a goofy three-legged dog who still runs even though it's not supposed to.
We are broken, but not totally.  And we certainly have not given up.

Beach helping Pepper

First day of class

student #1

I didn't get the job.
The letter came on Saturday.
I was lying on the couch, holding Beckam and watching The Very Hungry Caterpillar.
Andrew flipped it from the stack of mail,
"You'll probably want this one."
As soon as I saw it, I knew.  The position had been filled, by someone else.
I read it.  The letter was short, courteous and precise.
Beckam shifted his weight and I snuggled deeper into him.
Relief.
In the days following my interview, it became clear.  I cannot be his Mom and their employee.
One will have to suffer.
Either I will be scrambling to care for my children, or I will be coming up short as McGillis' art teacher.
It is not time.

I was somewhat disappointed.

Student #2

I mean, how can an interview go any better than that!
I guess I'll never know why they
didn't hire me.
But I am grateful, because they chose right.

If anything I want to slow down.
I want to make Mickey Mouse pancakes for breakfast and pile them with blueberries.
I want to teach Pepper how to read.
I want to cook colorful dinners for Sophie.
I want to serve her a palate of purple, orange, red and green.
It makes her feel loved when I feed her vegetables and good sources of protein.
Why would I not encourage that!
However, in my haste, I throw toast and prepackaged bars at her.
She flicks her eyes sideways at me in quiet dissapointment.
I can do better.
I want to give my children all that I would my students.
My creativity, my art, my patience, and my hands flailing wide in passionate explanation of what is possible.
They are only here for a little while.
I don't want to waste it because I am confused or dilluted in my efforts.

I didn't get the job, and it is the best thing that could have happened.
It opened my eyes to who I am supposed to be teaching right now.
And it's not someone else's kids.
It's mine.

Student #3

Annie

Sophie and Annie at Strut your Mutt 2006

Sophie's dog Annie, is dying.  I saw her yesterday. Her head is cocked to one side and leads her on a crooked path.


Simple acts like hopping off the curb are impossible and she falls down all the time.
Her tail, once perky as a squirrel's, has lost it's curl and now slumps behind her.
She rarely wags it.
She wanders the house not sleeping.  She pees and poops in the house.
She is lost, I can see it in her eyes.  I think that's why she doesn't sleep.  She just paces the house, her nails clicking on the wood floor.

Every time we get in the car, Sophie gazes out the window and starts to cry.  She has done it five times.
It all started out optimistic.  There might be a cure.  Now it has been 3 weeks, and the possible cure is not touching Annie's ailments.  She is getting worse, and Sophie knows it.
We drive home at sunset, and she starts talking,
"Yesterday Dad let out a huge sigh.  When I asked him what was wrong he said, I'm sad about Annie.  I can tell he's going to put her down soon.  I know she's gonna go."

Then she erupts into tears again.  I look over at her as I drive.  I get goosebumps and tears in my eyes too. Her sorrow is contagious.

"I don't want Annie to go..." Her bottom lip protrudes and I remember her as a toddler.  I wish I weren't driving so I could hug her.  But she doesn't need me to hug her.  She can endure this kind of pain, because it makes sense.

she picked out her own princess outfit

"When I'm around people, I don't really think about it.  But then when we get in the car, it's quiet, and I think about Annie."

"I understand.  I cry in the car too,"  I tell her.

At bedtime she asks me to climb up into the top bunk with her.  I feel like a giant spider as I clamber up over the edge and fold myself into place.  She wants to talk again.  She wants to talk about the difference between her Dad and me.  We've been divorced for 8 years.  We got Annie-dog the year I left.  The three of us went to the animal shelter.  It was my idea.  Did I subconsciously know I wouldn't be there to care for them?  Did I pick Annie to take my place?  Sophie was so little then, only two.  Annie lived to play, to run as fast as she could, every chance she got.  Her gold coat stretched thin over muscles taught and toned as a race horse.  She stirred up the air and demanded we all stop and go to the park, now.

"Mom, I think I know why you picked Annie...cuz she is so bright and free like you."

I can barely stand this.  Knowing the years the three of them got by without me.  Knowing Sophie had only Annie to fill the gaping hole left by my absence.  I picture them walking to the grocery store on Saturday mornings, just Jeff, Sophie and Annie.  A three-legged animal who will not give up.  I know the pit he must have had in his stomach as he cooked her breakfast on his old iron skillet.  The one he wouldn't let me wash with soap.
This well is endless, and will always bring up tears.

"Mom, it's weird.  Dad acts more sad about Annie then he did when Nannie Bonnie died, and that's his mom.  I never saw him be sad."

"Ya, I understand.  Dad doesn't show a lot of emotion.  Even though you didn't see it, I'm sure he was sad.  Maybe he was being strong for you.  Maybe some of his sadness for Nannie Bonnie is coming out now."

"Ya, I think so.  You're good for different things.  I love my Dad for the way he supports me in gymnastics, and how he keeps me on track.  And I love you cuz you are the fun path, and I can talk to you, and you understand me."

"That's good Sof.  We both love you in the ways we know how.  It's good that you understand that...wanna pray?"

"Sure....
God, please help me say goodbye to Annie...even though it's the hardest thing to say.
Please help me know it's what is best for her.
Thank you for letting her have such a good life.
Thank you for my Mom and my Dad and how they are different and they both love me."