Living-Deliberately.com

My jungle babies and I rode a funky wave yesterday. I’ve learned that sometimes, “sucking the marrow” means feeling the low parts of life intently too…not just covering over them. And how.

A day of jamma-wearin’, TV Watchin’, junk food eatin’, moping around is sometimes called for…like it or not. Feel it to it’s fullest, then take a shower and get over it.

I let them outside yesterday for the first time. I mean, without myself or an organized activity for the first time since we moved here. It was thier “shower”. An hour’s free play in the bushes behind the car…a seeming wilderness to explore though there are buildings just through the hedge not 100 feet away. Ideas and imagination and exploring refreshed them like nothing else could. A little time in the adult-free child world. A fort. A trail. A make believe camp site.

They came in new children. Like flower heads lifting up after a summer rain, vibrant and happy. Andrew sat down at the table and within two hours, went from stick people to full fledged bodies, with porportions and details. He asked for an art lesson and instruction. It was as if his little mind just went into a hyperdrive of ideas and inspiration. He was utterly compelled to create.

It’s how children grow. I knew this, I believe in this. They need room; not just physical space, but mental space. Room to dream, imagine, experiment. They come back to learning, come back FROM learning. It’s not so different than my need yesterday. We’re all just people of different sizes and sometimes our needs are amazingly similar.

I spoke with an old neighbor yesterday as well. It was part of my “shower”. I needed to hear what I didn’t want to hear…what did my garden look like. Never a showcase, it was my labor of love. I knew the family buying the house didn’t care much about it but I didn’t think they despised it. Had I known that, I would have found time and energy to transplant each one.

She says they are “allergic” to fresh things. So they’ve ripped out each plant and trashed it. The beds, with thier dark, rich soil that I’d built up, are gone. The heirloom veggies, the berries, the flowers, the herbs…all gone. They have plans to rip out the trees: the pines, the magnolia, the little apples I’d just put in this spring.

One can hope they run out of money for the carnage.

It’s thiers. Not mine. And yet….mine. My sweat. I created most of that garden while I grew a baby. My little fat baby is as much my “garden”. Today he’s in a sweet, soft cloth diaper. The paper imitation sits on the shelf. Something about thick cotton makes me feel a grounding deep within. Like I’ve hit some kind of “reality” beyond the temporal of our daily lives. I get the same tingle with dirt. There is an essense, a simplicity in my hands, that transcends time and plastic.

I come away with something that can’t be torn down. Children are eternal. How I grow them matters.

Our doubts are traitors, and make us lose the good we oft might win, by fearing to attempt.

William Shakespeare

I was reminded of this beautiful painting on another blog this morning. Appropriate with a hurricane coming, it also makes me inhale with the memory of all that’s happened this summer. Another breath down to the depths of my lungs where I can feel I’ve not breathed before. I’m excersized, a little weary from the strain, and yet refreshed with all that’s new. The air, like life, is not stagnant.

The ocean is on a short list of about five things, and most of those are people, that I miss about Florida. The beastliness of September, as it’s coming to be known to David and I, is not on there. What used to be such a glorious month, with a change of the seasons and bringing with it renewed energy and inspiration, has become a parade of catastrophe with ripples that reach down into every crevice of our lives.

I clamor for quiet. The constant sound and chaos wears on me like the incessant scatch of Florida cicadas in August. It’s not physical crowding that I find challenging; not square footage or scrambling little bodies or a full calendar. I long for a quiet corner where my thoughts can shout unhindered to completion within my own head, where ideas can flow in one continous stream to thier fruition.

Somewhere, there is such a corner waiting for me. There is a room with a window and a gauze being teased by a sea breeze from an unseen ocean, where I will send out my prayers, inhale and create and think, and then leave, having purged and cleansed my mind.

Friday: we had yet another FANTASTIC field trip. The started out rainy and wet. The rain here is so different from the afternoon deluges we are used to; it’s more constant and light and go on and on and on….But our trip was mostly indoors so we stuck to the plan.

We went to the Ramsey Plantation. It’s in Knoxville, on the east side, about 20 minutes from here. The Ramsey family started UT and a bunch of cultural stuff in Knoxville…thier home was the first to have a full size basement and the first to be entirely built of stone with an attatched kitchen. It has 18 inch thick walls! The windowsills were amazingly beautiful…they had full inner shutters with panels and were deep enough to sit in. The staircase was carved in the builder’s signature “hoop”. The guides also held a candle dipping class with the kids. We went with a bunch of church friends, saw wild turkeys in the fields, walked the gardens in the cool drizzle, and otherwise thoroughly enjoyed ourselves!

From there we had to finish our errands and spent the afternoon getting groceries. I am finally on my structured meal plans which leads to big time savings at the store. That friday “happy weekend” surge started taking over; it would have been a GREAT day for date night. I was, in a few words, ready to be my man’s BABE rather than MOM for a few hours. No sense dwelling on what couldn’t be though. We’ve been shoe shopping for the BABES, with rather difficult criteria:

-no laces or thick velcro; either slip on or “cinch”
-no white whatsoever
-all weather
-similar to each other but one pair had to be girly enough for Celia (witout being pink, purple, or white!)
-I didn’t want to spend more than 25 a pair

I’d found what I wanted from Lands End but dindt’ want to pay shipping. So the plan was to go to the MALL of all places, to try to find a sale.

First though, was dinner. We’d tried Uno’s pizza before; good food, bad service, and that usually seals a place’s fate for David. But I wanted pizza and salad and he was willing to give it one more shot. Our pizzas were great….when they finally came. After a long wait for seating, drinks, menus, a highchair, dinner, and the CHECK, plus all the stuff she just plain forgot, they confirmed the “bad service” reputation. Scratch that one off the list. Maybe we’ll still get it for take out now and then.

That didn’t leave us in a great state of mind for that bastion of insanity before us…the MALL. I usually avoid that place like the plague. We went into Sears and found thier shoes but they only had Andrew’s size. From store to store we went, getting very strange looks from salegirls who couldn’t figure out what I have against laces and white trim on shoes. Well, none of them were moms! Wearily we closed along with the mall, scooting out just as they were locking up. I came home and orderd my LE shoes in three differnet colors and sizes, the deed done. So nice and easy to just “click”!

Brings me to Saturday: Muffins and juice and birds on the balcony. Shin guards, long socks, pony tail, soccer games. They had pictures first and then thier games. They have a blast playing. The weather was trying very hard to be cooler than it was…blazes in the sun and pleasant in the shade. All that rain on Friday made for lots of RED MUD. I see raincoats and galloshes in our future.

It ended up being a very pretty day though. We finished it with an afternoon in Cades Cove for a hike and a tour of a few more houses and buildings. We just missed the blacksmith but found out where to go for a hayride; we’ll be doing that soon! The valley view halfway through the scenice drive was AMAZING. We’d missed it last time for the rain I guess.

The mountains look folded, just like some giant is laying on it’s side under a blanket, with ripples and folds. There were sections of the fields that had been cut and were bright green and others that were meadows covered in yellow goldenrod and some kind of purplish grain. The sun fell in dusty beams over all of it. And there were shadows of the clouds falling on mountians and fields alike. With the breeze, we could have sat there drinking it all in for the rest of the day!

Sunday: lazy and beautiful. Another rousing worship experience, utterly blessing with every element. Fellowship and connection with the members. And then off to the Cove park down the street for a most picturesque picnic.

We planted ourselves about 4 feet from the water’s edge, sitting beneath a hemlock and a tulip poplar that had turned a vivid yellow. The sailboats were out bobbing and fishing, the wind was soft, and we stretched out on the grass. I’d packed fried chicken made last night (Joel, it was cold LOL), white stilton with lemon, sourdough rolls with the Amish butter I bought this week, apples, and cider. Simple and YUMMY. The sun glistened on the water and there’s not a time I see that where I don’t remember the very first time I noticed it at Ludington Park as a kid in Michigan. Whether it’s the ocean, the St. John’s, or a Tennessee lake, the memory comes back just as strong.

Our chickens rolled up thier pant legs and played on the rocky edge, eventually with all three of them falling completely in. There is a swimming area about 20 feet from our picnic spot, so that wasn’t such a big deal. It all washes :-). We finished up by swinging on the large porch swing under the trees, the kids playing imaginary “ice cream shop” with new found friends.

The rest of the day will be mostly about getting ready for another week. I hope you all are well.

Over the proverbial hump….ready for the weekend to approach!

Little moments:

Wheaton, coming out last night, all bed-headed and droopy to say, “Dad…they’re having a battle. Bears and bunnies and swacking each other.” Sometimes sharing a room 3 ways isn’t so fun.

Rowan, learning to make a “mad face” with no tears behind it, just to show his displeasure at being left in his crib or high chair. He screws up his nose and scowls and grunts.

You may have to understand the 7-9 year old sense of humor to appreciate how hard it was for us to get through an art lesson today on the Renaissance. All those naked people, on chapel cielings no less…..I think I’ve heard “ewww…it’s a winky” enough today!

Rowan slept through the night last night to 4 am! No crying at 11! Or 1! Or 3! And he nursed and slept to 7 after that! David woke up astounded that he’d had DREAMS last night! I don’t think my body quite knew what to do with all that sleep!

Wheaton went to work with David today; usually one child at a time gets to go once a week on one of his runs. It’s a definate perk of this job. All those winding Tennessee roads did a number on W’s tender tummy…he puked into a coffee can and slept the whole way home. Getting onto our street he woke up and said, “Well! That didn’t take too long!”

He’s been a character today for sure….he has started narrating his moves. He’ll run through the house saying, “and he runs! He scores! He goes in for the tackle!” and we don’t even watch much football! Later today he was on the couch with his blanket on his lap saying, “I’m nursing my old gah. Here…time to nurse him on the other side.”

It’s been a pretty good day. David got an order with a really big company he’s been working on and the admiration of his bosses, who’d been unable to get the business themselves. We’ve had three good school days and pretty, if warm, weather. The Bolognese sauce on our gnocci was particularly good tonight; warm and comforting…the kind of italian that makes you think you hear distant accordian music. Just needed a nice wine with it and some hot bread.

There’s one sleepy headed baby man needing to hit the hay, so off I go.

Take one: lost when a phone call that didn’t come through anyway, kicked me off line.

Take two: lost when I tried to save it midpost and hit “paste” instead of “copy”. Gone, gone, gone.

Take three: Here it is. Only I’ve lost some steam. We’re having what is suposed to be a very calm day after yesterday’s very hectic one: the first day at co-op. It was fun but very draining being around people all day long. I like a good “hermit” day to recharge my batteries after that. The weather is gentle but will warm considerably today; cooler days are headed this weekend. The coffee is long gone and school is underway. Wheaton is already dressed for this evening’s soccer practice and Andrew is complaining as usual that we give him too much work. He has *such* a hard life…..

We’ve had a horrible accident this weekend. Investigation is still underway but the ruling will either be Attemtpted Suicide or Homicide. The victim: one Natty Bear, bought during my first pregnancy for a little son, but not adopted until Nasty Baby disappeared (hmmm….a trend?) and a Poofy Girl made do. The Crime Scene: three stories below our balcony, where the body was discovered after dark by flashlight, face down, starfish style. Motive: if suicide: the bear may have been the first to cave under the sometimes-stress of our tight living quarters and unhappy at “his” being forced into dolly clothes each day. if homicide: there are two suspected brothers, who like to see thier sister squirm. The victim was missing for 48 hours before being found, which means said Poofy Girl did indeed squirm before the rescue. So far, all persons are mum and not cooperating with investigators.

The van had a brain transplant yesterday which was ineffectual. It is going back the dealership today which most likely means our turnips will return to the blood donation center to under experimentation. The attempt is to discover how turnip raisins can be made. Apparently, they are still too juicy.

He Who Will Not Sleep is improving! The last two nights we have been able to settle him repeatedly without nursing all night and last night he SELF SOOTHED twice! We are still getting up to leave the room but it’s not nearly as involved, so the hope is rising that we will soon all have our first uninteruppted night in a year SOON! The prayers of many are being felt.

Three takes and my time is up. Time to educate the masses.