I am "Mom"

Some of my youngest and best memories I have involve my mother. The fartherest I can go back in my memory, the first thing I can remember about myself is of my older brother and me playing in a sand box in the back yard of what was then our home, probably our first home in Tipton Indiana. We had a pail and a big plastic ball. Our mother called us into the house for lunch. I don't remember what the inside of the house was like, or what we had for lunch, but I remember the incident.
By the time I was in high school, my mom was my best friend and confidant. She always had something useful to say to a girl who didn't have much self esteem back then. I would go to her in tears because of some unkind person at school, and she would tell me not to take it to heart. She kept me on a pretty steady course and got me through adolescence. Barely!

Anyway, now I am "Mom". I have three great kids (two have spouses now.) I remember vividly when they were born, the thrill of every little new thing they learned to do. I remember sitting on a winter afternoon with one on my lap and two close beside me on the couch as I read books to them. We passed many winter days like that. (And summer, oh, and all the seasons!) I remember, too, loving them so much that sometimes I thought that love would just smother me to death. My mom always used to tell me that I would not understand how much she loved us kids until I had my own. If I had known how much she loved me, I know I would have appreciated her more back then.

You know, there are just some things that you really don't learn about your mom until you become "Mom" yourself. Like, remember when your mom would clean up after you when you had "been sick".  (Well, maybe your mom made you clean it up, but my mom cleaned up after me, at least while I was little.) I remember when I was an elementary school student a classmate vomited all over his desk. It was all I could do not to vomit too. How was our mom able to clean up vomit? When I became "Mom", I learned. You can do anything for your kids.

When I left for college, I drove myself away. Mom was in the kitchen and she wouldn't even say goodbye to me. I thought she was just mad; both she and dad were really not in favor of my going to school. I have since discovered how very much it hurts when your children leave to go and make a life for themselves. I am not ashamed to admit that I wept openly when each one of my little birds flew away from the nest. I have learned that it is best for my psyche to mark the changes of life by expressing the emotion that fits. I rejoice loudly when the occasion calls for it. I allow myself to mourn deeply when the occasion calls for it.

Because I am Mom, I know what it is to be the kisser of hurt knees, the guidance counselor, the judge of what is fair, nurse to the sick, sacrificer of self, birthday party planner, pet undertaker, the patient teacher, (and sometimes, the not so patient, eh?)
Never perfect in any of these endeavors, and filled with regret some days, but still, I benefit from the many joys that have been mine, because I am Mom. So here is to all Moms, everywhere, still four months away from "Mother's Day", because we all deserve it. And to my Mom, I love you!

Thoughts for a Snowy Day

If you get an opportunity to drive anywhere, or even to walk somewhere, right after a freshly fallen snow, similar to the one we have just had here this weekend, use your eyes.
Take in the sight of all the world around you dressed in white. If you really hate snow, I ask you to suspend your usual inclination to just say, "yuck", and try to see the beauty in the day.

At the moment of my writing this, Middlebury is covered in snow. The morning sun is shining down, lighting up all the white. Everything is covered with snow. I absolutely love it! I have a lot to do today, but I think I am going to go out for a quick walk in just a few minutes (right after I put another load of laundry in to wash) and take the camera.
I want to record some of this for some hot, sultry summer day.

On some future day, when summer is here and it is too hot to breathe, I will come in here to my computer. I will bring up my winter pictures. I will remember where I was and what I was doing when I took those pictures, and how cold it was. I will remember that there will be a return of this kind of weather. Though the older I get, the more the extreme temperatures, both hot and cold, seem to affect my body more adversely, I will still rejoice in the winter days that brought all this beauty.

In the photo at the top of this page, you will see another recording of a wintery day from years past. This picture is taken of a barnyard near Bonneyville Mill. I know, there is a dumpster right in the middle of the picture. That is unfortunate, but, to me, it is still an extraordinary memory. The picture was actually taken right after a late snow. It was, in fact, a March snow. I drove the back roads from Middlebury into Bristol and took several pictures along the way. This is one of my favorites because of the thick woods in the backdrop all covered with fresh snow. And I love old barns. I love that whole area of Elkhart County, anyway. But the barn with the woods makes it the best; along with the snow that is.

Anyway, I just want to remind you to enjoy the beauty. And to those of you who don't think it so particularly thrilling or beautiful, remember; "This too shall pass."

Is There Such A Thing As A "Good Sleep"

Sleep like a baby.

   It is rather frustrating getting older. All of the things that I did not understand about my parents and other elderly friends, loss of energy and strength, the not being able to open a jar of pickles, dislike of extreme cold or heat, etc...all of these things have come to haunt me! And the worst of the maladies that I now seem to suffer from is not being able to get a good night's sleep. Yes, that is the most frustrating of all.

  While I am not so young, I am not so old. Yet, I find that I frequently cannot lay down at a reasonable hour and sleep until another reasonable hour. NO! If I lay down to sleep at 10:00, I must get up at 11:30 or 1:00 for a nature call. And, for no reason known to me, I must always wake up again around 4:00 a.m. I don't really "have to go", but I do, because, most mornings, I don't need to be up and around until 6:00. So I "go" and then hope that I can go back to sleep for a couple of hours. But it's a crap shoot if I will be able to sleep those extra two hours.

   I will say this; while I was getting up and walking regularly for those months before the week we went to Mississippi, I was sleeping better. I think there is something to that "fresh-air-and-sunshine thing, and its effects on our overall health. I can still walk mornings. It's just that, since Christmas, I have not been out more than three times. It takes a lot to get up on a dark, freezing morning, get bundled up, and go out for a thirty minute or an hour jaunt. I am determined to get back to it, but just haven't had the will power the last two weeks.

  Anyway, I know there are sleep aids. I know they work, too. I took melatonin for a little while, and it helped. I do not want to be dependent on yet another "product" (read P-I-L-L) for another function of life. I am only 53, and it looks like I will be on thyroid medication for the rest of my life. Now the Dr. has put me on iron tablets because of low hemoglobin, I am hoping that is temporary. I would really like to solve as many health problems as I might be presented with natural remedies. So, even though it is cold, and I must get up at 5:30 instead of 6:00, and it is pretty dark right now at 5:30 am; I must get back to my early morning walks!

House of Cards

  This is a little more political and a little less of my usual "Ponderings" sort of offering. It is just that I heard a brief mention yesterday morning on NPR (yes, that is National Public Radio) that the national debt is nearing its "cap" of some $14 trillion, and something about if Congress doesn't "raise the cap", well, honestly, I don't know what they said after that. My head was just spinning. I keep hearing about countries, entire countries, going broke.
   There was another story they did last week covering the situation in Spain. The way it was presented, there is no "bail out" if Spain falls. And then, it will have a domino effect across Europe. It was said that if it becomes popular belief that Spain cannot pay its debt, then other countries will stop loaning it money. Spain will go bankrupt. If Spain does, then Germany will be next. Eventually, it would be the US. Kids, the whole economy is just a house of cards.
   I know a whole lot of people don't want to believe that. We all just keep hoping that things will get better. We try to prop ourselves and our economy up by believing it is getting better. But I can't stop this gnawing anxiety. What is it really going to take?
   I remember this song by Randy Stonehill that I knew years ago. A snatch of it was "Our economy is shrinking. Our money is a joke. We should go back to trading seashells and just admit that we are broke..." Every now and again, that song rises up and sings inside my head, just because it is so true!
   We can't trust our government or anyone else's government to fix this economic problem. Do you think they can fix it? I don't! I think they keep propping it back up, kind of like a tent in a wind storm. Just when you think it is steady again, the wind comes whooooooshiiiinnng up. I really do believe that is all going to blow away one day. I know I am so pessimistic about it. I admit that I am. But I just want to kind of be prepared in my mind and heart.
   I used to have a friend, Veda Powell. She would call this "catastrophizing". You think up the worst possible thing that can happen. Some of us just do it naturally. I come from a long line of worriers, and I am really good at this! The bright spot is that most of the things that you worry about never happen. 
    Anyway, this was just bothering me, so I thought I would tell you about it and see what you think. I welcome you to totally disagree with me and offer me three helpful examples and statistics of why it is not going to all fall down, like a house of cards.

Pensive Ponderings

   The Christmas Season, along with the New Year, can inspire great bursts of energy from me. I decorate and cook and bake myself into a tizzy. Really, I do. Then, when it all over and done, I am left with that post-partum-let-down. That all comes to a head when I take down the Christmas tree. Now that the kids are all grown and gone, I am left this lonely chore. Jay does not decorate, nor undecorate. It falls to me. I solemnly make the trip back down to the basement to bring up the "Christmas Decorations" box. I carefully remove all the ornaments, ribbon, lights. The lights are the hardest. I have this inner struggle to just put the rest of the decorations away and just leave the lights and the tree for one more weekend. Nah. I am doing this now, they must go into the box with everything else.

  So, now that's done, for another year. Time for me to re-claim my pre-Christmas energy and throw myself into the next task. Which is? I decided to treat myself to a post Christmas shopping trip. And I am going to go see a movie that Jay will not care to see. Then I have rehearsal tonight. Then, tomorrow, I return to work for the rest of the week. And all the pensive ponderings about what Christmas brings and what it leaves behind will leave me. At least, it will leave me until about this time next year. Love to all!