Twinkle, Twinkle

Do you find that blogging helps you work through your emotions? asked my sister the other day, as I was venting to her in a long-overdue phone conversation.

Yes, yes I do. In fact, it was a crucial part of working through my depression and anguish and slow healing when my first marriage imploded, not to mention dealing (at long last) with a number of other issues that bubbled to the surface when I finally got help. Read my archives from 2009 and see what I mean.

Writing is a release for me, but I have discovered that I need an audience in order to write effectively. Private journals are worthless. Emails to a handful of people feel...insufficient. Blogging is a perfect solution, right?

Except that the anger and stress and anxiety with which I am dealing right now aren't mine to share with the world. Well, I mean, they're my emotions and whatnot, but they're about people and situations that leave me voiceless here. To write about what's going on would violate people's privacy and, quite possibly, make the situation worse.

So I'm usually silent. On here, at any rate. And Facebook.

(Because I'm not going to be one of Those People, that's why.)

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Christmas is a shining light in the midst of this swirling darkness, let me tell you. Or, more aptly, an array of twinkling lights. We have pledged not to go so overboard financially this year (I got a little carried away last year), but there are ways (other than the obvious wallet-related one) in which that's better anyway. I am thinking more carefully about what to get for each person, and I'm making a few as well. I'm also working with the kids to choose gifts for MTL and each other, because I believe strongly that children should give and not just receive.

I love making gifts for Christmas. It takes me back to my own childhood, when my sister and I rarely had any money of our own to spend on gifts for our parents or each other. We would make a sign for our bedroom door declaring it official Santa's Workshop territory and denying entrance to everyone else. Then we'd take odds and ends of this and that, raiding our mother's extensive craft cupboard for much of what we needed, and we'd make all sorts of amazing gifts. Looking back, I'm rather astonished by our creativity. Two different years we created panoramas for our mother. The one I remember most was this extraordinarily detailed rendition of a market stall, with "bolts" of fabric on the walls, little drawers made from matchboxes containing bric a brac, and people made from twigs and clothes pegs and beads. There was a woman with braided hair trying on a shoe (a singleton from a Barbie pair), a male merchant displaying cloth, and a woman unmistakably meant to be our mother examining the fabric.

This, my friends, is what happens when kids have lots of free time and no real access to electronics of any kind. IMAGINATION. CREATIVITY. FUN. <insert cantankerous grumbling about "kids these days">

I'm fairly certain the month leading up to Christmas was the one time of year my sister and I actually worked or played together in Peace and Harmony.

So this year I'm making a few gifts, and I'm helping my little KlutzGirl, who is never so happy as when making or drawing something, to make a few as well. In those moments, looking at the work of my hands and knowing that I'm demonstrating my love for the recipients in a very tangible way--that's when those lights twinkle brightly enough to drive the shadows aside for a breath of time.

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Part of the challenge of blending families is blending holiday traditions. MTL and I have been fairly fortunate. We aren't in direct opposition with any of it, especially since his traditions are more general and mine more specific. Last year I introduced a number of Christmas traditions to my new family, including putting an angel on the top of the tree, making Christmas Eggs for breakfast, and forbidding the children to leave their bedrooms on Christmas morning until they hear Christmas music start playing. When they emerged at last, impatient and excited, they found the Christmas tree piled 'round with presents, candles lit, and hot chocolate waiting for them.

They seemed to enjoy it, but one never knows how kids will react to New Ideas. On Sunday as we were waiting in the car for MTL to join us, The Padawan asked if we were going to do Christmas morning the same way this year.

What do you mean? I asked.

Like the music, he replied. I liked waiting until I heard the music and then coming down. Oh, and are you going to make those egg things again?

You mean the Christmas Eggs? I asked.

Yeah! Those were awesome.

Yeah! I liked all that too! chimed in KlutzGirl. And the hot chocolate and the candles and stuff. Are we doing that again?

As if I'd miss the chance to see those smiles on their faces!

***********************

This morning I proctored the first half of the PLAN test, since it's being administered to all the sophomores today and my first class of the day was a sophomore class. As I wandered up and down the aisles in the gym, I felt a sudden surge of warmth wash over me. These kids, these teens...they're annoying and frustrating and obnoxious as hell on a daily basis, but I love working with them. It's hard to remember sometimes these days, surrounded as we are by such negativity and derision directed toward my profession. I'm even looking into a new career path, because realistically I may not be allowed to remain in my career for sheer financial and political reasons. It's an ugly time to be a public school teacher, people.

But this morning, as I looked at row after row of faces, many of which I know, I felt the warmth and worth of what I do (yes, even when proctoring a damn standardized test), of working with these children caught on the cusp of adulthood. They are worth the sweat and tears and stress and time we pour into them every day, every week, every year.

I don't know how much longer I'll be a teacher, and I won't feel those warm fuzzies every day, but no one can make me regret the years I spend here.

***********************

It's a rough road I travel, at times. As my dear friend Amy said a couple of weeks ago, we are not women destined for smooth and easy lives. It would be lovely to win the lottery and not have to worry about money or debt any more. It would be lovely for the politicians to all have epiphanies and start working for the regular people instead of the corporations. It would be lovely for certain individuals to either undergo miraculous personality transformations or just....disappear.

I don't think any of those are likely to happen, alas. Life is not that neat and tidy.

But there are compensations. There are rewards for the pain. Sometimes the twinkling lights and silver linings are dimmed by the shadows and mist, but they exist.

They shine in the moments when my students understand a new concept, get excited by a piece of literature, and find safe harbor in my classroom.

They shine in the smiles on my children and stepchildren's faces, can be heard in their laughter as they rough and tumble with each other each afternoon after school, siblings in action and deed rather than just name.

They shine in the touch and looks and words of my beloved husband, who laid his head against me last night and told me he had never dreamed he would ever find his Home.

Twinkle on, Life. Twinkle on.

...laugh, leaning back in my arms

for life's not a paragraph

And death i think is no parenthesis

--e. e. cummings

Sunset

I wrote this one after driving west into a sunset too beautiful for words. But I tried anyway. This is the last of the nature posts from that assignment. Maybe next time I'll try to get out in nature itself a little more. You know, like in spring.

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The sky is orange tonight--such an insufficient word for that blazing color, "orange." So pedestrian and ugly, reminiscent of Halloween and pumpkins. This is no autumnal orange of squash and spice and spectral eyes. This is a blaze of color that sweeps across the west, vivid and breathtaking against the deep leaden grey of what is not touched by sun. It shades to a pink that once again surpasses the childishness of the word, and finally edges into a reddened purple that blazes one final moment. And then grey. All is grey and shades of grey, swirled across a sky that speaks of coming snow.

Gone in a moment, dipped too far below the edge of the world for light to reach the visible sky.

We speak of the sun dying on the horizon, traces of long-ago belief that the sun died each night, only to be reborn each dawn. Eaten by wolves, birthed by goddesses. Death in glory, birth in triumph.

Such beauty, this dying. The sun's death is painted by a Master hand, shapes and pigments no human agency could imitate. This is not the glory of violence, going down in a blaze of glory in some cliche rock n roll sense, but the blaze of a life well lived, beauty spread and love given and warmth shared, until the reflection of this life is as glorious as the one who lived.

I hear of such deaths. I think perhaps my aunt's was such a one, as hard and painful and horrific as it was from one point of view. But the reflection of her life--and even of her death, the going of it and her hope and faith amidst pain and knowledge that nothing more could be done, the leaving of her husband and young children--the reflection shone on all who knew her.

Painted by a Master's hand.

Grace Notes

This has been a hard week. You'd think that having two snow days to start out the week would make it Teh Awesome, and it kinda sorta did, but driving on the Worst Ever In People's Memory roads wasn't a great joy, and the last couple of weeks have tended to be full of Stress! Stress! Drama! while quite short on Sleep! Blessed Sleep! Also, imagine the fun of trying to cram five days' worth of work into three before the students flee for a two-week break. Fun Times.

So stomachs have been clenched, muscles have been knotted, and teeth have been gritted. Needless to say, tempers have also been short.

Yesterday, in fact, MTL arrived home in a horrible mood--the worst, he confessed, since we've been together. My mood wasn't sunshine and daisies either. At one point, while trying to convince the %&#()@ cabinet drawer to get back on its runner and slide back in dammit, I slid back against the opposing cabinet, lowered my head to my knees, and let the tears just flow for a little while. It's all just the buildup of everything that has been going on, especially with The Dark One, and work stress, and extended family stress, and reaching a point of Deep Core Stuff in therapy, and....yeah.

Fortunately for those around us, MTL and I are self-aware enough to clamp down on our tongues and do our damnedest to Think before we React when we're highly stressed. I won't say we didn't trip up a bit last night, but there weren't the rages or tempestuous fights or OMG EVERYONE JUST GO AWAY moments that could very well happen at times like that.

Thank God. Which I mean literally, because I believe He helped, even if it was just having our guardian angels lay a finger on our lips from time to time so they didn't open until we'd had a moment to think first. And I'm also thankful that He gave us each other, because being able to debrief with and vent to and comfort each other goes a long way toward making it all survivable.

Today...well, today is a new day. MTL didn't get much sleep again last night, but I did, so at least one of us has some renewed energy to deal with Stuff. And it's the last day of school before Winter Break. And my students are being very sweet.

You know, it tends to be elementary teachers who get the cache of holiday gifts (which reminds me--OOPS) more so than secondary, but sometimes we still get a little something here and there from kids who want to suck up love us. My kids know my weakness. Oh yes, they do. A dear former student who was very sad to discover she would  not have me for honors English 11 this year showed up a couple of days ago with an adorable frosted sugar cookie man. Today another student handed me a heavy gift bag that contains a massive box of fancy European cookies. Yet another gave me a box of six Godiva Truffle Bars and a $10 Godiva gift card. (The girl is GOOD.) And knowing my tenth graders, I'll most likely have another few gifts as the day goes on.

But you know what my favorite gift was today? The handwritten note that accompanied the Godiva. Inside, it reads:

Dear Ms. [TeacherMommy],
So I swear to god, I'm not just kissing ass when I say this, but, thanks for being the first teacher in 5 years to make me love English again.
It used to be my favorite subject and I'm not sure what happened, but I'm actually starting to enjoy it finally.
So thanks.

I really need to start scrapbooking all those kinds of notes and cards and emails and whatnot. That's the sort of thing to pull out on the rough days.

Life is messy and difficult and sometimes overwhelming, but it's the little things that matter. The notes of appreciation from students, the kisses and cuddles and You're so pretty, Mommy! from my kidlets, the teasing from my stepson that says he is comfortable and affectionate with me in his own way, the I love you! on the phone from my younger stepdaughter, walking out to a car scraped off and warming up each morning thanks to MTL, the look in his eyes when he sees me, the words of appreciation and love that he gives me for the things I do to keep this crazy family up and running, laughter around the table while we eat or play UNO...

And above all, the sense that as crazy as life can be, I am Home.

Checking Myself

I stood in the Self Check Out lane for far too long, growing increasingly impatient with the fumbling idiots who apparently couldn't handle a process that a monkey could figure out. Why do so many seniors choose that lane and then demand the undivided attention of the lane monitor to help them lift each item and scan it through? Don't they realize that completely negates the purpose of SELF Check Out?

I was fuming by the time I stepped up to a scanner to run through my five grocery items. As I quickly and competently sped through the process, I noticed that the woman at the scanner next to me had run into an issue. She had run through a dozen cans of Pringles under a misunderstanding about the sale price and wanted to void them out--but, as the monitor tried to explain several times with little success, could no longer void them because she had already run through her card as well.

Around this time I noticed that, having run my own debit card through, the machine was stalled in a "Please Wait..." status. I growled and jabbed the "Call for Assistance" button. Some use that would be, with Ms. Don't Know How To Understand Basic Explanations still mumbling about the Pringles over there. Why does this sort of technical snafu always happen when I'm in a hurry? And when someone else is monopolizing the monitor? The day was just getting worse and worse. It had been bad enough navigating the treacherous traffic getting there, since the roads were filled with idiot drivers who needed to lose their licenses. The store hadn't had the meat I needed for dinner in a couple of days. It had been a crazy day following a crazy weekend. My feet were killing me. Now this.

I tapped my feet, impatient, huffing just loudly enough to let the monitor know I was waiting. She glanced at me, then focused again on convincing the other shopper to let her void the entire purchase and just run everything through again.

Finally, she succeeded with Ms. What Do You Mean I Can't Do That? and came over to me. She was an older woman with short, curling grey hair. She showed no sign of impatience or exasperation, and instead greeted me with a pleasant smile and an apology for my wait. I curtly explained my problem, and she glanced at the screen.

Oh, well, have you pressed the End Order and Pay button yet, dear? You ran your card through, but it won't complete everything until you press that. She smiled at me again, no trace of sarcasm or impatience to be found in her voice or face.

My face flushed. I meekly extended my finger, pressed the button, and watched as the machine finished the process and spit out my receipt.

There you go, dear. I know, sometimes it's a little confusing! I'm sorry again you had to wait. Thank you for your patience! She patted me affectionately on my shoulders and moved toward her monitoring station.

I quietly picked up my bags and left the store, mumbling a sheepish Thank you! as I passed her.

You're welcome. Merry Christmas! she replied.

I've been bitching lately about the lack of basic human decency in the world around me, about all these ungrateful, impatient, rude people I encounter every day.

It took a trip to the grocery store to make me realize that I'm part of the problem.

Forget waiting for the New Year for a change of attitude. It's time to start now.

While I'm Waiting

Some days are more frustrating than others. I've had a couple lately. Today I'm stuck inside waiting for a repairman who is supposed to appear sometime between the hours of nine ay-em and six pee-em. Oh yes, peoples. I was given a NINE HOUR time span in which I must roam the rooms of my (fortunately wonderful) new home and wait for someone to show up and replace a hose on the washer that was installed incorrectly a week ago. And since we're renting the appliance from some national appliance company, we don't dare make the repairs ourselves in case they then decide that we have voided the rental agreement/warranty/whatever. They're only showing up today instead of next Tuesday because I begged.

I just love those impersonal national companies that don't even have a clue where you're really located when you call them. Oh, you're in Detroit? the representative asks after pulling up your account, not even using your own phone number or address because it's kind of through the rental complex.

No; West Bloomfield, Michigan, you reply.

Oh. Well, I have a lot of S---------- Villas listed here, he says, apparently unable to figure anything out for himself. And then switches you over to Customer Service where, you hope, they train the representatives to think for themselves marginally more.

The new representative assures you that there is someone coming, but no, she can't pinpoint the time span any more than the NINE HOUR one already given.

You can always just let the leasing office know and give them permission to let us in if you need to leave, the new representative tells you in a cheerful voice.

Because you're so comfortable with letting people in while you're gone so they can do who knows what and then feed you some bullsh*t about nothing being wrong and that leak being part of the service, isn't that lovely? It's a new feature! when you call to complain that you still can't run the clothes washer without flooding the utility room.

No thank you. I guess I'm stuck here.

It's been over four hours now. And we all know perfectly well he/she/it will show up at 5:55 this evening, right?

Face it, I'm grumpy. I'm feeling a bit guilty about that, because really I shouldn't be. I have so much to be not grumpy about.

The move went well, thanks to the invaluable assistance of ten other people, including five former students, who helped us move everything on Saturday and Sunday. I've been working steadily since then to unpack and organize everything, and overall it's gone quite well. There are only a few more boxes and smaller pieces of furniture to move out of the garage and into place, and I'll wait for MTL's help this weekend for most of that.

I love our new home. It's roomy--oh so very roomy!!!--and comfortable and feels like home already. The next door neighbor is very friendly and sweet and turned out to be the mother of one of my students who graduated last year. She and I have already exchanged numbers and spent time chatting, and it's lovely to feel a friendship developing.

At the same time, however, other stressors keep raising their uncomfortable heads. MTL started a new job last week, and although he's happier there and earning a bit more money and closer to home, he's coming home exhausted because it's more physically demanding than the last one. We've been very tight financially this week due to moving costs. We have a growing list of things we need to purchase, some more urgently than others.

With my personality, not being able to finish setting up the house and the kids' rooms bothers me. The fact that I don't have picture hangers so that I can spend my copious hours stuck inside by putting photos and art on the walls bothers me. Having to wait until next week to get the kids registered in school bothers me.

And not having had Just Us time with MTL in weeks bothers me. I've become a bit spoiled, I know. A bright, shiny silver lining in having Exes is getting fairly regular time to ourselves without kidlets around. Summer alters the schedule, and the various events of the last month have further mucked up arrangements. We haven't had real time to ourselves since we went out to Saugatuck the week after the Fourth of July.

Here's my confession: as much as I really do care about The Dark One and The Padawan and KlutzGirl, I'm still adjusting to becoming the stepmom, much less monitoring five kids. And reality alert! Working with teens in the classroom is a very different thing to working with them in the home. Especially when there isn't a bell that lets you kick them out the door after an hour or so.

What makes me feel rather small and petty are the occasional feelings of jealousy I have. Jealousy at having to share MTL with so many others, jealousy that their mother shares something with him that I can't, jealousy that my boys as well as his children sometimes would rather be with their other parents rather than us (and yes, I know how paradoxical that is considering my need for Just Us time with MTL).

I know this is pretty normal and that I need to get used to it and develop a thicker skin and all that, but yesterday was just Hard. My back was hurting and my allergies were so bad I felt cotton-headed and dizzy. I had KlutzGirl, DramaBoy, and The Widget with me all day. They play together quite well, but their noise level and the occasional need to referee quarrels were wearing me down. MTL arrived home exhausted. And then a minor difference in opinion between me and MTL on the issue of late-night snacking topped it all off, and I fell apart, leading to a rare argument between us.

The reality is that blending families is hard. We have it a lot easier than many, I know: both of us are amicable with our exes, our children like each other and us, and we generally have very good communication. But no road runs smoothly, and there are and will be issues that have to be worked out. Sometimes they seem to be minor, but the solutions aren't necessarily simple.

For example: I don't give my kids sugary snacks (or really, much in the way of snacks at all) later in the evening. They both tend to get a little hyper on sugar, especially DramaBoy. MTL's children don't react the same way, and he's never worried about their snacking, especially since he doesn't usually have much junk food around. But then we come up against situations, like last night, where I gave The Widget a graham cracker, but KlutzGirl wanted something else, and MTL gave her a little packet of Fruit Snacks (you know, the gummy thingies.) What do we do in these situations? Suddenly change the way things have always been for his kids and tell them they can't have what they've been allowed to have before? Deny my boys what the other kids are having?

It also goes to deeper issues, of course--and I'm not telling you the whole story, as there are aspects that are better left between me and MTL. But overall it does come down to blending two families into one, and we each are bringing in somewhat differing practices and expectations and parenting approaches. Sometimes that means we offer each other alternatives that are better than what we've done before individually; sometimes we don't see eye to eye. Add in two strong-willed individuals who have become used to doing things their own way, and we end up having to battle our own selves to find a way to compromise.

Our overall goals and desires for our children are essentially the same. What isn't always identical is the path we take to get there, and that is what makes the road a bumpy one. There are some very strong, solid foundations, however, that make it worth the work. We want to raise strong, independent children. We love our children, biological and not. And we love each other, enough to talk through the anger and the hurt and reach for the understanding on the other side.

Just...some days are a little tougher than others.

I'm not really asking for solutions here (and definitely not asking you to take sides on the stupid snack issue), though if you have practical experience in blended families, I wouldn't mind hearing what has worked--and what hasn't. I just needed to get it out, vent, throw the words out into the universe before girding my loins to return to the task at hand.

I think I need to go find that book on Stepcoupling I've been reading. I think it's still buried in a box somewhere.

And I still have four hours of waiting on that repairman to find it.

Not For Sale

A Cherry Coke, a Mountain Dew, and a bag of chocolate Donettes: $5.57 after tax, and he had four dollars cash in his pocket, his wallet left behind on the car seat. So I pulled out money from my purse, then realized I'd placed three dollars in the cashier's hand and snatched back one. I was about to replace it in my wallet when I stopped and put it in his hand instead.

I felt a bit odd about it--both the instinct to take it back and the decision to give it to him. I didn't look at his face, so couldn't tell if it struck him as odd or not. He did place the dollar in his pocket.

Three dollars. He paid for the pizza and salad and drinks we had for dinner, the movie tickets, the gas that powered his car. He generally does. I contribute financially in other ways. Grocery runs. A trip to McD's with our combined children. Helping out with the road trip costs. It's not like he carries the burden alone.

So why did I feel strange about placing that bill in his hand?

Perhaps because it was such a small amount. Perhaps because I was physically placing the money in his hand. Who knows? The moment passed and we moved on.

The memory revisits me tonight. The commerce of relationships. My mind flickers back to my brief flirtation with playing the field on casual dates. A few different men, a few different dates, all financed by them. I always carried my card and cash with me, just in case, as any wise woman would, but both parties went in assuming (as it turned out each time) that he would pay the costs of the evening.

So what did I contribute? The pleasure of my company? Some good conversation, a little light flirtation, a smile, a laugh? There wasn't physical "compensation" for their evening's investment, that's certain. If they anticipated such a thing, they hid their expectations well. And I? I didn't have to spend much on groceries for a little while.

Sounds cynical, doesn't it, put in those cold and impersonal words?

Romance is ancient enough, but relationships--particularly marriages--have long been based on commercial grounds, even when love was (and is) involved. Think back over the long history of human culture, all over the world. Examine contemporary practices, again all over the world. Dowries and marriage contracts, prenuptial agreements and insurance beneficiaries: the many and varied financial arrangements that wrap relationships in strings of silver and green and gold.

I taught Pride and Prejudice to my juniors this last year. We spent some time discussing the financial realities of marriage in that time period. "Gold digger" was the label many of the students attached to one character, Charlotte Lucas, who enters a marriage with the pompous, ridiculous Mr. Collins because she knows he will provide her with a solid financial and social position. In the (quite romanticized but rather excellent) film starring Keira Knightley, Charlotte tells Elizabeth Darcy that she "cannot afford to be romantic"--unlike Elizabeth, who refused Mr. Collin's proposal. And in the book, although Charlotte is not particularly fond of her husband (though quite good at making him obliviously happy), she is apparently quite pleased with her lot.

But she married him for money! one student protested. She doesn't even love him!

Well, yes, I responded. And when we see people, particularly women, who will be with someone just because they have money, we do call them "gold diggers". But let me put it in a different context. Keep in mind that women in that day and age were quite dependent upon men to provide them with stability, unless they had unusually excellent social rank and independent wealth. What if today we looked at a women who was widowed or abandoned, with several small children, and little ability to support them? What if she met a man who wanted to marry her and take care of her children, and although she did not love him, she was willing to do her best to make him happy in exchange? Would you call her a gold digger?

Well, no, they admitted. But that's different!

And it is, from a certain ethical standpoint. It still doesn't match our ideal of true love.

How many relationships do? And does the presence of that commercial aspect automatically contaminate the purity of the love that exists? What contracts do we create, on paper or in our minds, that govern our relationships? Are they financial? Physical? Emotional?

They vary for each situation, I know. There are the couples where one person contributes the money and the other contributes...well, that depends. Time spent raising children. Keeping house. Companionship. Sex. Other couples both contribute money and divvy other responsibilities between them. Others--well, others have their contracts people on the outside simply cannot comprehend.

If the couple is healthy, whatever arrangement is made works for them and they are content, happy, fulfilled.

If not...Well, we've all seen the many forms dysfunction can take and the varied roads those couples travel. Some of us have been there, walked that.

Too often the dysfunction lies with the calculations. What is the give; what is the take? What concepts do we have of what is obligated by each party? What are the expectations and how well do they match? How much do I have to give and how much can I get?

Ah, and there's the rub. There's the greedy, selfish, ugly-side-of-capitalism twist of relationship commerce. There's where "don't be a doormat" deforms into "don't let him/her get the better of me." There's where love distorts into manipulation.

A woman told me some time ago that the best advice she ever got on marriage came from the man installing the new carpet in her house.

How much do you think each person needs to put into the marriage to make it work? he asked her.

Fifty-fifty, she replied.

Nope, he said. It's one hundred - one hundred. Each person has to put in everything, without expecting the other person to meet them halfway. If you don't commit fully, it'll never work fully.

A relationship comes down to more than how many dollars we each put in. It has to go beyond whose turn it is to do the dishes or take out the garbage or pick up groceries or take the kids to appointments. When we start keeping our mental tallies and budgets, when we start begrudging little things like back rubs and bigger things like who's paying the bills, when we start looking for what we can get instead of seeking for what we can give...

...then we're holding back more than our "share." We're holding back our hearts.

Love isn't a contract. My heart isn't a commodity. It is a gift, and by giving it away I get far more in return than any sale could ever bring.

Shame and Consequence

Here's the true nastiness of sin: even once you've asked and received forgiveness, forgiven yourself, moved on...the consequences don't end. Actions have reactions, and the fractures we make ripple out through the crust to create shock and aftershocks.

It's not punishment, you see. Punishment is finite. That was your crime: this is your punishment. It comes to an end.

Consequences are simply (and yet so not simply) the logical and often perpetual result of actions and choices.

So even when I know, to my core, that I am cleansed of my sins, I will still see consequences for them in this life. A shattered relationship that will never fully heal, revisited with pain and hurt and lashings-out in cyclical fashion. Children facing upheaval and uncertainty and change and pain that they did not earn. Friendships weakened and damaged and even lost by torn loyalties. An insidious doubt lurking in the mind of my beloved.

Long ago the people my mother works with gave me a name in their language. I cannot replicate the name here, since my keyboard lacks much of their alphabet, but the name means, essentially, "the shame is gone." They gave me the name because I am my parents' firstborn daughter--and therefore the end of culturally "shameful" childlessness.

These days I claim that name for other reasons. Do you have any idea how precious that idea is to me?

My Shame Is Gone.

There are those who would wish it to remain, who would pile it back upon me. I'm learning to ignore that. Every now and again I feel that burden creeping back and have to remind myself to let it go.

My Shame Is Gone.

But the consequences remain.

Today

Today, it's all too much, all at once. The ups and downs of this and that, the rollercoaster ride of expectations meeting reality. There's the death of the old, the next stage in joy with the new, bumps appearing in the road that once was broken and now is healing and yet and yet

life does not run smooth

I was foolish to think it might. There's that odd optimism raising its head at the wrong moment, bashing against the edge of reality. However better I am for being where I am now

life does not run smooth

and the road will bring new obstacles, new cracks, new heartaches to face.

Today I sit and stare at the great mounds of papers that must be graded, for time has run out. I have no interest. My mind has already skipped over the next week into this summer: bags to fill with trash and donations, boxes to line with books and toys and clothing and the necessities that will carry over into the next stage, places to go with friends and children and my beloved, hard days of work and long nights of play. The clock is ticking, and so much must be done. I mix anticipation with apprehension for what is to come for

life does not run smooth

and though I know I have strength I lacked before, love I lacked before, health I lacked before, still the anxiety of all the unknown wells in my throat.

Of some things I am certain:

faith

love

hope

and knowledge that there is nothing I cannot surmount because of them. I have been to the depths and back. I have known the dark of deepest night, wept my tears of pain and loss and heartbreak, faced the dragons of my despair and lost the battles.

But I won the war.

My chains are crumbling. My armor is stripped away. I have walked the broken road, followed dead-end paths, traversed the bridges built by God and family and friends to reach again the stretches and signposts that led me here.

And the rewards, the blessings: they overflow. New life, new hope, new faith, new love.

life does not run smooth

for life is imperfect, the road broken in a world that is broken. I have learned that the paths that appear easy are those that hide the greatest pitfalls. Anything worth having requires that a price be paid, a sacrifice be made.

Today I am overwhelmed and the tears run close to the surface. But I do not despair. Strength lies beneath, and Today will pass, and Tomorrow holds such brightness that I must catch my breath with the beauty that lies ahead.

new

This poem was originally written back on March 19th, but I didn't feel comfortable posting it here until now. Credit my love for e. e. cummings and the influence of a muscle relaxant (my back was BROKE, peoples) for the slightly unusual style.


i screamed openmouthed in terrorwise
link    ed to you despite sp ac e

strung like pearls on rope  made of
lies
i am
not wondering where you are
closeor                          far
i sang my sorrowsong already and look over
there
is the note against the sky
a bird poised like music on linesofcommunication between
you
and me

i am exempt from your pain

tattooed my denial of despair on skinsmoothsilk
flash my hope at every
one who glances at my feet

theyve trod many a broken path and been worn down to
cracked and bleeding remnants of memory

been there before
been there again
wandering in circleslikestuck

and c   u   t the ties finally broke the chains
though bound by life we made
and now the screams have vanished and I sing
new
love like sweetness on the tongue after bitterhate
i am newtoo
and will not coat my heart in nacre to hide the wrong
with  in

no
i shine like diamonds

Reheated Coffee

For various reasons, I'm reposting this poem (sorry Lauren, I know you aren't fond of my poetry) from November 17th. This event was real. This is a conversation I've had in various forms with a far larger number of people than any of us would like to think over the last year. It's a far too common story.

"one night over coffee"

you werent the only one
she said
and gazed out the window at the sun
dying in crimson glory on the horizon

i knew there was a reason i was drawn to you
a similarity of pain
our scars are sisters in formation
her mouth twisted a moment and then

her face was blank
no one looking at us would know
we spoke of secrets held for decades
not forgotten

never forgotten

but stuffed beneath our breasts
in pockets of poisoned past
lives we lived in another space and time

perhaps her eye glistened a moment
as did mine
but there was no breaking down
in tears or gasping sobs
that too lay in the years gone before
shut away by minds well trained
no breaches of security
for public curiosity

i cried in the shower the other day
i said
my lips moving in subdued confession
it just happened
i found myself on the floor
with water beating on my back
and tears streaming down my face
and didnt know how i got there

she nodded
ive done that too
but not in a while
it catches me by surprise sometimes

did you ever tell
i asked
and knew the answer before she spoke

i tried
but the only ones who believed
were the other ones they did it to
our parents didnt want to hear
didnt want to believe
because of who they were

im lucky
i said
my parents didnt know
but at least they believed me
and they are mourning now

i looked over her shoulder
at the older man sitting behind us
his eyes kept flickering to my face
to her back
and i wondered if he could hear
the murmured words

his eyes were avid
almost hungry
for what i wondered
salacious stories
of ancient pain
and modern wounds
or confirmation that
he too was not the only one

or had he been one of those
who had torn and ripped away
someones innocence
in the long or not so long ago

too many stories
too many sides
too many scars
and ours will not be the last

Unto the Least of These

All that will do is raise taxes and give free shit to those lazy welfare people who sit around and let other people work to support them. --J. Q.

I'd like to excuse him on the basis of being sixteen and stupid. He's never had a day of hunger in his life. He's never had to work to put his Abercrombie & Fitch clothes on his back. He doesn't pay the bills for his funky little I-Phone and the I-Pod that's constantly plugged into his ears.

At least he has that excuse, if you consider it one. There are plenty of others who don't.

I don't get into political crap on my blog, generally speaking. I'm an independent, somewhat left-leaning, somewhat middle-of-the-road reluctant voter who hates conflict. I have friends spread out all over the political spectrum. Some of them would fight like cats and dogs if put in the same room. They're all good people. They all have what they believe are good reasons for their stances. Sometimes, I agree. Sometimes, I don't. Usually, I keep my mouth shut.

I do, however, believe in social justice. I believe that we are commanded by God to care for the poor and abandoned, the orphan and the widow, the persecuted, the least of these. So do most, if not all, of those friends I mentioned. How that is to be done? Ah. Well, that's where the debate begins, isn't it?

I'm not here to debate that point. I am here to speak out about the reality of poverty, a reality that far too few of those outspoken people know first hand. Today I read an amazing guest post by Mad over at Frog and Toad are Still Friends. This is the reality of poverty in America, a form of poverty that is overlooked by so many of the smug White Tower WASPS. (And yes, I know they're not all actual WASPS and and this is a generalization, but you get what I'm saying. Let's move on.)

I have been fortunate in my life. My parents were never wealthy, and apparently there were times that were lean indeed, but I never remember going hungry or without. We always had presents at Christmas and dinner on the table. I was able to go to college, although I racked up debt doing so. I earn a good wage and can provide for my own children in turn. My boys are well-dressed, well-fed, and have toys up the wazoo. I don't worry about whether they have enough; I worry about whether they have too much.

There was a year in college when I had very little money. I did not have a job, and I was getting by on macaroni and cheese, cheap frozen salisbury steak, bread, and tater tots. I became ill after a few months, and the doctor at MSU's Olin Health Center told me that I had no choice but to get some vegetables and fruits into my diet. We scrimped and sacrificed to add some canned vegetables, to add just enough nutrition that my body would not shut down.

And even then...I had a roof over my head. I had food in my belly. I was still going to school. I knew it was a temporary situation. If push came to shove, there was family that would help. I was still fortunate.

I have witnessed true poverty. My parents earned less combined than I did alone my first year of teaching. Compared to the vast majority of people where I grew up, however, we were wealthy. We were surrounded by the least of these.

About five years ago my parents received news about a small family they had taken under their wings: a widow with many health issues who had two children and no support whatsoever. No one took care of them. Her children were bright and hard-working. They wanted to get educations, but the cost of schooling was prohibitive (no "free" public education over there, you see). The mother earned a few francs here and there by picking mangoes from the trees in my parents' yard and selling them in the market. Abou, her son, who was one of my brother's best friends, and Giisongi, her daughter, would work around my parents' house. They would bake bread and cookies, clean, do odd jobs. There still often was not enough to pay the school fees, which ran around $200 a year. Nothing much to us Americans, but astronomical to a family that lived on a few dollars a week, if they were lucky. I remember doing a fund-raiser with one of my classes to raise the money to send them to school for one year. We were able to raise enough in one month, mostly through bottle returns. That's all it took.

When civil war broke out and my family was evacuated, then lived here in Michigan for three years before it was safe enough for my parents to return, that little family was left without even that much assistance. Every now and then they would hear from Abou, who would call them on a friend's cell phone. But it wasn't until a mutual friend called and talked to my father that my parents found out just how much that family was struggling.

Do you know what "chaff" is? It is the papery husk that covers certain kinds of grain, such as wheat and rice. It has no nutritional value. It is removed during the threshing of grain. Since it is worthless, it is often abandoned on the ground.

This little family no longer had money for even the most basic of foods. So they were going to the areas where women would thresh grain, and they would gather up the chaff left in piles on the ground. They then would put the chaff in a pot with water and boil it into a tasteless, gritty porridge. If they were lucky, perhaps there would be a little bit of vegetable to add.

They may have been tricking their bellies into thinking they were being fed, but the truth was that they were slowly starving to death.

Ah, but that's in a third-world country! you say. It's not that bad here!

Want a taste of reality? Go read this. Or this. The reality is that poverty is alive and well (so to speak) in America too.

This is the harsh truth, folks. As a species, we haven't been doing too well on the social justice front. The wealthier and more comfortable we are, the more distanced we become from the reality of those who are less fortunate. We sit in our ivory towers and mutter about the laziness of the poor, how only the deserving should receive.

Those weren't the commands given to us by Christ. He didn't say to do good unto the least of these--if they've shown they deserve it. And Paul didn't qualify his words in James 1 as caring for widows and orphans who have worked hard enough to be rewarded.

I think a lot of us--and yes, this includes me--need to reread Matthew 5 a few hundred more times. Because we may find that our ivory towers are no more than crumbling plaster and all our self-righteous words are no more than worthless babbling when exposed to the light of the Son.

***********************

Because apparently I'm in a self-flagellating mood today and want to invite conflict (dear God, my stomach hurts now), I'm going to go ahead and Flog My Blog on this post of all posts. My darling Brenda over at MummyTime does Flog Yo Blog Fridays, and I've been meaning to do this, and so, whatever, I'll be brave and do it now. Click on over and check it out!

Love Lessons

I'm learning. It's slow, it's gradual, but it's becoming more and more real and natural as each day goes on. I'll never be June Cleaver, but it's possible, just possible, that I might become a Good Mommy.

Not just a Good Mother, you see. I am that. When it comes to taking care of the necessities, making sure my children are well fed and dressed, clean and healthy, cared for in the ways that make them strong and beautiful and brilliant, I can do that. I've been doing that for years.

I'm talking about the Good Mommy aspect: not trying to just keep out of the dark, not hoping that I'm doing just enough to get by as a parent. I mean enjoying my children. I mean having far more patience with their annoying and aggravating aspects, even finding humor in the crazy moments. I mean noticing, even while getting frustrated with my DramaBoy because he's fooling around instead of getting dressed when I've asked him to do so umpteen times, that he just executed a perfect somersault. And then praising him and encouraging him to show it off a few more times, even though it means a couple minutes' delay. I mean deciding to just laugh to myself about the endless stream of poop jokes coming from the backseat rather than getting irritated and grossed out. I mean taking the time to sit with my son and watch the game he's playing on his Leapster, encouraging and praising him, rather than dismissing his request with a list of No, honey, I have to...s.

I mean perhaps, just possibly, being willing to take the risk of loving my children completely.

And that is a lesson worth learning.

Surprised by Joy

On Sunday my assistant pastor preached on the topic of Joy, the Joy that comes from having one's roots firmly planted in the living soil of God--or, as discussed in John 15:1-11, being a branch that is firmly connected to the One True Vine. How often do we discuss Joy? she asked. We talk about love all the time, and that is right and good, but how often do we talk about Joy? And how often do we experience it?

You see, Joy is not mere happiness. Happiness is circumstantial; it ebbs and flows, comes and goes, as our situations change. Joy exists on a deeper level, sustained through difficult times as well as easy. Life's path does not have to run smoothly for us to experience Joy.

A month ago I wrote about catching a glimpse of Joy. Since then, I've caught it again. And again. Is life simple right now? Heck no. Is everything smooth and copacetic? Not a chance.

I mean, look at the facts. Still going through the process of divorce? Check. Kids getting sick and dripping snot all over the place? Check. Allergies rising up at the hint of spring? Check. Hips and back creating agonizing pain for over a month and a half, making me think that perhaps I need to get an MRI to see if something more sinister is going on in my lower torso? Check and dammit check.

And yet, there's an underlying sense of well-being; a solid belief that not only will I survive all this, I can and will rise above it all; a deepening sense of Joy. My students are starting to look at me sideways, checking for signs that perhaps I'm a changeling. I mean, I'm positively NICE.

Not to make it sound like I'm walking around like Polly-frickin'-anna, because that would just indicate a high level of mood-altering drugs, which are not actually in my system these days. I still get annoyed by argumentative, sulky, uncooperative preschoolers and teens (and isn't it remarkable how alike they can be?) I still lose my temper from time to time. I still get anxious over my future and what is coming my way. I still feel overwhelmed with all the Stuff That Must Be Done. I still get very frustrated with this ongoing pain and how much it is hampering my life.

But the darkness that used to sweep over me at times like this? Nowhere to be seen. The occasional shadow lurks but never overtakes.

C. S. Lewis wrote a book titled Surprised by Joy. This is what I am: surprised by Joy, by the grace extended to me, by the peace that underlies the turmoil. The uncertainty that strangled my thoughts is not solved, but neither do I find myself so breathless because of it. I find myself able to set aside doubts that tangled me before, accept the gifts freely offered me, receive love and friendship and give it in return.

And I am grateful.

TeacherMommy 2.0

This post today...it's important enough that I created a calendar reminder for it. And now I sit and stare at this screen wondering where to begin. I texted wrote a friend about it. He tried, he really did, but it's a tricky little conundrum.

TM: i restarted my blog a year ago today. i want to write a post about it, but i'm not sure what i want to write about.

J: How far you've come and grown over the past year.

TM: yes, but HOW
not sure how to approach it
it's one of those things that's sort of massive, so i don't know where to start

J: At the beginning.

TM: oh, that helps. i'm not sure where the beginning is....

And that is the problem. Where is the beginning?

Almost exactly fifteen months ago I wrote this. And then I vanished from the blog for three months. On Tuesday, March 12, 2009, I returned with this post. Just a short one. But there are words in there that speak a great deal about what had passed during that space of time.

Twelve months ago...the time seems both massive and fleeting in retrospect. One thirty-second of my life. So very much has happened during that time: the attempt, and failure, to save my marriage; the decision to file for divorce; slow renewal of faith; the discovery and development of new friendships; the rediscovery and deepening of old friendships; renewed interest in teaching; slow growth and change in my parenting; facing and grieving and healing from a very old wound; and so very much more.

Above all else: the discovery of Myself. I spent so many years hiding my true Self from not only other people, but from myself. I hid behind walls of my own making in the belief that if I let anyone behind them, much less tore them down, I would be wounded anew. I had no faith in the love and forgiveness of others; I had no faith in God's ability to heal; I had no faith in myself.

I have so far to go, still. Life is, after all, a journey, and if I were to believe that I had nothing more to learn, well then that would mean I was once more hiding from the truth. But when I look back over this year of pain and joy, wounding and healing, learning and growing, I realize that who I am now is Beautiful. And as I learn to love myself, I learn how to love others, how to open myself up to the possibilities that life and love have to offer, and how to give myself fully rather than always holding something back in reserve.

It's time to put all my chips on the table.

I'm All In.

The Hourglass

They rush forward into time, always looking ahead to what's next and where they're going, so eager to be Up and Away. Year after year I see them yearn for the After of this place, believing in their ignorance that life will be easier, that the soap-opera drama of their teenage years will turn to Hollywood happily-ever-after. I look at them from the lofty heights of my two and thirty years, shaking my head at their naivete. Youth is wasted on the young and so it is. Time flits by ever faster as day after day slips through my fingers in a sandy rush, trailing behind me across hills and valleys, plains and bogs, the journey of a lifetime a mere three decades in the making.

My grandparents are all still living, leaving their eighth decades and entering or already in their ninth, the paths they've trod telling tales of hardship and joy alike. I wonder whether their days flow by even more quickly, if they blink and night has come again. What memories come to the fore after thrice my years? Which ones recede into the background? How does Time's fluid nature exist in their minds?

I find myself repeating the error of those youths. I am in the infancy of a new life, a new era. Yet I, too, yearn for the After of this time. In my own naivete I think that once certain uncertainties are made certain, that once specific events are made final, that somehow the path will become smooth. The reality of life says otherwise: there will be more mountains to climb, valleys to traverse, obstacles to block my way. Pain will come my way again, and the nature of that pain is yet unknown.

Perhaps this is the blessing of our blind futures. Perhaps if we knew what hardships lie in our path, we would live too much in fear to truly live. Instead we exist in our aging youth, always pitying those younger than we, always pitied by those who have already lived our age. For life is a series of lessons learned, and it is only when we learn to embrace the wisdom brought by pain while glorying in the joys that we live fully.

Yet...Time passes so swiftly. And each shining grain of sand that pours through the hourglass is lost if we do not live in the moment.

laugh....
for life's not a paragraph
And death i think is no parenthesis
--e. e. cummings

Release

I lay there as she stretched my limbs, easing them back until the tight muscles groaned then released in submission to her inexorable persuasion. She returned me to rest, then had me ease to my side. Her strong forearm pressed with increasing firmness on my hip, slowly grinding her elbow into the stubborn knot at the joint. I winced and turned my head into the pillow.

Breathe, she murmured.

I drew in a deep draught of warm, incense-scented air, then let it flow slowly from my lungs. The knot tensed a moment, then twisted loose and vanished. The pain ebbed into a delicious ache.

For this side, she said softly, I need you not to try to help me at all. I don't want these muscles to seize up again.

I consciously relaxed my muscles further and lay limp, unresisting, as she eased my leg up and back, one hand braced on my lower back, the other supporting the weight of my limb. My ankle rested on her shoulder as her strong, sure hands smoothed the taut, corded muscles and ligaments until they, too, surrendered. The pain that had been screaming along my nerves all day retreated. I remained pliant as she gently returned my leg to rest upon the bolster.

It was all about trust. Trust that she knew what to do, that any pain she caused would be for my benefit, that when she was done I would be able to rise from the table and walk without the limp I'd had all day. It was all about releasing control and letting someone else bear the weight for a time.

My life, too, is full of knots and strained nerves. There are days when I can barely lift the lightest of my burdens without fear of causing myself injury. Still I cling stubbornly to the illusion that I have control, that I can Do It All Alone.

Perhaps it's time to let go, to trust, to let others carry my burdens for a time. Perhaps it's time to let the control rest in Someone Else's hands.

journey

we wander through this life
never knowing
who
or what
will come our way
and change us for all time

i used to fear the unknowing
of what was to come
(truth be told it scares me still)
but am finding adventure
in what lies next
around the bend

tears may have been my yesterdays
and may yet drench my tomorrrows
but today i laugh
and line my soul with delight

for sorrows fade with memory
even pain dulls its edge
when moments of joy become
frequent visitors instead

Vulture's Prey

Many years ago there was a young girl who had very little self-confidence. She knew she was intelligent; she had a feeling she was attractive; she was fairly sure she was an interesting person. What she didn't believe was that anyone else (other than her parents, who of course didn't count) could see or value any of this. She also believed that she had enough flaws that anyone who got to know the real her would reject her. So she walled herself off from the world, sat in the corner, and watched life go by.

She was very lonely.

The girl had a few friends here and there, but because of a life spent living overseas and traveling back and forth and always saying goodbye to people, she struggled to maintain those friendships. She struggled even more to make new ones. One year when she was back in the strange unfamiliarity of Michigan, she somehow was drawn into a four-way friendship with three other misfit girls at her school. They all sat near each other in several classes due to the accident of alphabet and last names, and for some reason she never understood, they welcomed her into their little group.

Over time, the girl became increasingly close to one of the girls in particular. This other girl was a rebel. She was edgy and dangerous in a sneaky sort of way. She held herself with an air of confidence and take-no-prisoners attitude that the girl envied. So the girl overlooked her friend's tendency to use her. When her friend started taking the girl's geometry homework to copy, the girl said nothing. When her friend would ditch the girl at the last minute because something else came up, the girl said nothing. When her friend would talk endlessly about her own drama and showed no interest in what the girl might be going through, the girl said nothing.

She was just grateful to have a friend.

The girl went back overseas for two years, and her friend never replied to any of the letters she sent. This wasn't anything new, however, so the girl said nothing. And when she returned to Michigan for college, she reached out to her friend once again, who was more than happy to accept the girl back into her life--without the other two friends, who had all drifted apart once the girl left.

The girl started changing, however, and started realizing that perhaps someone who was a real friend should care more about the girl herself rather than how she fit into the friend's life at her convenience. The girl started standing up for herself a little bit. She didn't drop everything at a moment's notice for her friend any more. She started making her own story and her own needs known a little more.

And her friend stopped calling. She stopped answering the phone when the girl would call. Finally, when the girl called her to ask if they could get together over a school break, the friend told the girl that she really didn't have time to see her anymore.

The girl hung up, shrugged, and never called the friend again. She realized, finally, that this other girl had never been a true friend at all.

Years and years later, when the girl had grown even more and was finally becoming the person she wanted to be, she made many true friends. One day one of the dearest of those friends sent her a song to enjoy. There was something about the song that struck a note in the girl. She would play the song again and again, caught up in the music. The lyrics, too, struck something in the girl. One day as she read them again, she realized that the lyrics were singing the song of that old, false friendship.

And she breathed a prayer of thanksgiving that she no longer thought that this sort of friendship was the most that she deserved.

Little princess, with no need for empathy when we will
gather at your feet to give you anything you need
and feel privileged
just to have you hang around
so we can look you
up and down and hope for you
to turn around and maybe notice
all the things we have inside
things that you pretend to provide
to get yourself around in life

So, sorry to get in your way
It seems that I forgot my place...
A means to your superficial ends
Here, let me scratch your back again
Sweetie

Little princess, how could I be any use?
Might I assist with your abuse
and whatever else you choose?
Good thing you're pretty
or else you'd be no good to me
Your fake concern is rather weak
I hear an echo when you speak
but it's ok...
Manipulate me all you need, for we are all
your currency...
even your spite is flattering

So, sorry to get in your way
It seems that I forgot my place...
A means to your superficial ends
Here, let me scratch your back again
Sweetie

Little doll faced vulture, circling round...
captivating as I lay on the ground
waiting for you to come swooping down
to feast on my weakness
and move on through the crowd

Sometimes the Road Seems Endless. It's a Good Thing I'm Building Up My Endurance.

You may have noticed that I had a bit of a meltdown yesterday, dark attempt at humor notwithstanding. I'd love to tell you that things improved after that last post, but I'd be lying. And since my resolution last year was to live with honesty, and I'm still working on that, I won't lie to you.

My day got worse.

Maybe I should rephrase that. Other than an unexpected (read: I forgot all about it and was caught off guard by the reminder that I would have to sit through one of those mind-numbing time-wasters) staff meeting after work, there wasn't much that really was BAD about the day itself. The roads were driveable. No one delivered horrible news to me. A dear friend offered to write one of my vocabulary exams--and in the spirit of asking for and accepting help, which was another resolution/lesson of my last year, I accepted.

Yet my mood continued to spiral down until the panic was in control and logic was out the window. Rage started taking over: anger at the world, life, the universe, everything. I wanted to hit something or someone. I drove home and desperately worked out. For those forty-some minutes, in which I was pleased to discover I'm getting a handle on this Zumba workout, I was able to let go...mostly. And then the rage came back. So I took a long hot shower. And the rage came back. I texted a friend and she called me back and I paced in the snow for who knows how long pouring out my anger and hurt and panic and fear.

She told me I'm allowed to break down, I'm allowed to have my weak moments, I'm allowed to admit that sometimes LIFE SUCKS. If I don't let go and let it out from time to time, it will just build up and fester and prevent me from being strong all the other days and times when I need to keep it all together. Since that's the sort of thing that got me into my huge mess last year in the first place, I have a feeling she's right.

You see, while talking to her I finally put my finger on the trigger to yesterday's debacle. I had been going through my exams from previous years so that I could draw from them for this semester's exams. And I was missing exams from this time last year. Why, I wondered, didn't I have anything for my eleventh graders at all?

And it hit me. Last year at this time I fell into a black hole. Last year at this time I was absent from work for around three weeks. I vanished. I had no exams prepared, piles of papers left ungraded, and no lesson plans left for those struggling to make sense of my classes. My amazing colleagues pulled everything together for me. They parcelled out the papers and got them graded. They pieced together exams from other teachers' after consulting with my students about what we had covered. The head counselor even created, from scratch, an essay exam for my Media Literacy class, since I was the only teacher in the school who taught or had ever taught that now-defunct elective.

(They did this, mind you, without a word of complaint or censure or guilt-tripping. They were deeply worried for me. When I finally returned, all I heard from anyone was how relieved they were that I was back and that if I needed ANYTHING, just ask. They have continued to be a source of amazing support and love and generosity in all the time since. I am so blessed.)

But yesterday, when I realized why I was missing so much information, I was swept back for a moment into that time of despair. While I am so very, very much better in almost every way in comparison to that time, nevertheless...It was so difficult to revisit that darkness, even for a moment. And then the sheer weight of responsibilities and the chaos of my life and the uncertainty of this time, a year later, crushed me.

When I am at that level of stress and panic, the best thing for me is some sort of physical outlet. If I creep into a corner, the darkness wins. So even though I had already done a grueling workout, I took a walk. I walked down the road as quickly as my legs and boots and the snow would let me. After only a few minutes two pieces of advice came to me--Heidi's mention of meditating techniques and Arby's advice to pray. I knew there was no way I could put together an extemporaneous prayer in my mental state at that time, so I began to run through the Lord's Prayer in my mind, over and over again. Gradually I found a rhythm to the words. It became a chant, a mantra and prayer that moved from my mind to my tongue as I found myself marching down that dark, empty, snowy road.

Our Father which art in Heaven
Hallowed be Thy name
Thy kingdom come
Thy will be done
On Earth as it is in Heaven
Give us this day our daily bread
And forgive us our debts
As we forgive our debtors
And lead us not into temptation
But deliver us from evil
For Thine is the kingdom
And the power
And the glory
Forever and ever
Amen

As the words became smoother and flowed more naturally off my tongue, my mind finally could focus enough on what I was saying. Certain parts jumped out at me.

Give us this day our daily bread: I struggle constantly to focus on the day at hand. I have learned not to linger on the past much, but I worry about the future, all the things that are to come and over which I have so very little control. Here I ask for what is enough for this day. This one day, this one moment, and the simplest needs. Bread. Nourishment for body and (if one goes off into the philosophical and religious significance of the word) soul. Sufficient unto this day...And that's what I need. Enough for this day. Tomorrow will be time to ask for what is needed for tomorrow.

Forgive us our debts: So much of my darkness, both last year and now, was of my own making. Debts are both sins (the word trespasses is often used here) and what is owed. I feel, so very often, that I owe so much, too much, to everyone. I feel as if I have wracked up such a tremendous load of spiritual and emotional debt that there is no way I can ever repay it all. And I'm right. I cannot pay it back. So here I ask that those debts be forgiven--both the sins and that which is owed--so that I may walk free and light again.

As we forgive our debtors: But there is a codecil. Just as I ask to be freed of those debts, so must I free others. When I cling to resentments and angers and hurts, I not only refuse to grant that freedom of debt to others, I also refuse to free myself from the burden of being the debt-holder. When I harbor anger because someone has hurt me, I only poison myself. When I harbor resentment because someone has not acted or done or said what I want from them, I only worsen the situation. Last night I expected someone to be a mindreader, to magically understand that I was in a very bad state without my having to really express it verbally, to somehow know exactly what to say and do to handle the situation. I had to let go of my resentment and, without anger and without censure, let that person know what was going on and what I needed. I let go of the debt. And we were both freed and lightened and drawn closer in understanding. This is how it needs to be, both with those we love and with God.

Lead us not into temptation/But deliver us from evil: Tom Shippey suggests that these two lines emphasize the dual nature of evil. One kind lies within us--it is internal in both source and effect. Therefore we (I) ask that God not "lead us"--or perhaps, more clearly, allow us to lead ourselves--into temptation and darkness. This is all too real to me. Most, if not all, of my distress yesterday was created within my own mind. It was my own darkness. It was my own evil. And if there was an external source of Evil playing on that weakness last night, urging me on towards acts and words of anger, misplacing my own pain onto others...well then, we (I) ask that God "deliver us" from evil, both of the internal and external sorts.

God has that power.

After almost two miles of walking and chanting, I was finally calm enough and clearheaded enough to think through my situation and my reactions; thank God that I had not, in fact, said or done any of the things I had felt the urge to say and do; and work through where to go from there.

So I went home. I did and said what was needed, and I received the comfort that I needed.

And I ate pizza.

And today is better.

I am not naive enough to think this will not happen again. But this time last year I had almost none of the tools or support or wisdom that I needed to face my darkness, and yesterday's experience taught me that this year is indeed different.

It's another day. It's another step on that winding road, and even though the fog lies thick on the path right now, I know I've seen a glimpse of the joy that lies ahead. So I'm choosing to continue walking.

But MAN do my legs hurt.

Because It's Not Just Kids Who Have a Sense of Toilet Humor (Warning: Not for the Overly Squeamish)

For decades people have discussed, debated, argued, and even screamed about an enormously important issue that is central to the lives of most Americans. Friends discuss it in a friendly fashion--unless they are roommates and on opposite sides of the issue, in which case the friendliness vanishes. Advice columns cover the topic once annually to address the flood of letters. Spouses seek counseling over it. For some dating couples, this crucial issue can be a deal breaker.

I speak, of course, of the Great Toilet Paper Hanging Debate.

Over or Under? Chances are you have an opinion, and it's a strong one. For many, the directionality of the toilet paper roll on the toilet paper holder is passed down from generation to generation. In peaceful households, all are in agreement, until some interloping in-law introduces riotous disfunction when he or she loads a new roll improperly. In other, less fortunate households, the debate rages on between family members, leading to sneak attacks and middle-of-the-roll alter[c]ations.

Most advice columnists say there is no Right or Wrong way to hang the roll, that the choice is ultimately up to the individual--and therefore an ongoing issue for debate. However, I am happy to inform you that there is, indeed, a Right way to hang the toilet paper roll, and I have incontrovertible support for my position.

Diagram courtesy of treehugger.com

I'm so sorry, Under people, but you are Wrong. The only Right way to hang toilet paper is Over, and there are three strong reasons for this.

Any parent who has potty-trained a child knows that the ultimate goal is for that child to be able to wipe his or her own butt. Even after the days of diapers are long past, every parent knows all too well the lilting song that issues from the bathroom, often loudest in public restrooms, of Mommy! Daddy! Come and wipe me! There may no longer be a soggy disgusting diaper of which to dispose, but for quite some time you must still place your hands into the depths and wipe off what your child cannot reach.

Or you could just deal with some truly disgusting laundry and bad cases of rear-end rash. Your pick.

Therefore, anything that simplifies the transition to your child being able to do the wiping is all to the good. Watch a child attempt to gather toilet paper sometime. Toilet paper that hangs Over the roll is simpler by far for those chubby little fingers to grasp than the elusive end trapped behind the bulk of the roll in the Under position. Be kind to your child. Use the Over position.

A similar situation applies to adults as well. No doubt everyone has experienced middle-of-the-night bathroom adventures, usually complicated by an inability to wake fully during the experience and a reluctance to turn on any lights. In such a semi-somnolent and darkened state, the last thing anyone wants to do is fumble for the end of the toilet paper, again trapped behind the bulk of the roll in the Under position. Likewise, not all toilet paper hangers offer easy access to Under-hung toilet paper, particularly in public restrooms. Just yesterday, at a doctor's office, I found myself in the highly frustrating situation of fighting to get more than a few shreds of flimsy single-ply paper off an Under-hung roll a little too big for the limited space between hanger and wall. Granted, I would have struggled somewhat even if the roll was Over-hung, but the fight would have been far simpler to win. At the very least, the shreds of paper would have been significantly larger and more useful.

Besides the issue of easy access, however, we must acknowledge the crucial component of cleanliness. Bathrooms and toilets are already germ factories, and any reduction we can make in the general nastiness is vital. When toilet paper is Under-hung, people's hands come into contact with far more paper than necessary, especially on second and third wipings (for those of us who are thorough and therefore civilized). Just imagine the filth that is left behind for the next person to use that roll! I shudder to even think of it.

So if you have been hanging your toilet paper properly (i.e. Over), then give yourself a pat on the back--once you've washed your hands thoroughly, of course. And if you have been falling into error all this time (i.e. using the Under method)...

Repent. There is still time to mend your ways. Forgiveness is freely offered.

I'm generous like that.