Half-started vs. Whole-Hearted: A Blog Theme Emerges, and I Fight It, Still

I don't want this blog to be a mommy blog. Really, I don't.

Half-started posts linger on my Drafts page. Blogg-ish thoughts lurk, un-inked, in my mind. Thoughts on yoga. On our transition to rural life in the Skagit Valley. On living with my feet in two worlds, urban Capitol Hill and rural Skagit. On excercise. On the TV show Hoarders. Yes, I said it -- lately I'm inspired to write about Hoarders. Ties into my fascination with thrifting and how our culture manages their "stuff." I have many thoughts On Writing. On Not writing. On ego. On clinging -- to a strong body, to a non-wrinkled skin surface, on clinging to ideas about what is and is not okay to write about on a blog.

And yet. Somehow. The blog posts I end up whipping out and clicking "Publish Post" -- end up being musings on my children, on motherhood, on moments in time as a mom.

And dang it, I end up sounding like someone who thinks parenting blogs are less-than. It's not that. It's that I think I'm less than, if I am presenting myself to the world and all I have to talk about is my kids. It's just so dang cliche.

And if you know me in the slightest, you'll know that I hate to be put in a box.

Box or no box, the fact remains -- my heart explodes for my children, my head aches with the growth that's in it for me. Year by year, I know -- the complexities will only magnify. So I'll probably keep writing about what it's like... And so, I just have to go with it.

I like to write about the sweetness of life. I like to write from my insides, the blood-thumping red rimmed pulsing insides of our selves. I can blather on about brilliant thoughts of mine. Insights. Theories. Observations. But little of it feels connected to my heart. So I let those thoughts linger on my Drafts dashboard. Try as I may to impress, to impose a representation of my different selves into this new-fangled way of showing my self to the world, the fact remains. I write from my core and my core right now revolves around tasting life as a mother.

Toot, Toot! (sound of my horn)

Hamma Lamma Ding Dong Triathalon finisher! And... #1 woman out of the water on the swim leg. Toot toot!

P.S. Rainiest tri ever???

Thanks to Becky & John Hamilton and all of us crew who pulled off the 2nd annual home-spun swim-bike-run from Seward Park this September. You guys rock. See you next year!

Book Review on the Brain

I'm polishing my final draft of a book review on Third Culture Kids--The Children of International Educators by Dr. Ettie Zilber (2009, ___ Press), for publication in The Journal for the Advancement of International Education.

I think I just put myself to sleep, listing all those long titles - and I also have double reason: that 10 month old who only fell asleep at 4:30 am, after screaming and wriggling for hours last night. Here I am, sitting upright, with her strapped to my back in the Ergo, sleeping against me, since I refuse to deal with another night like that -- and it was looking that way after her brother accidentally woke her up around 9 pm.

Wow. I must be tired. Because that's a really long winded way of saying -- I'm slightly incoherent, but I've got "TCK" on the brain.

You know -- Third Culture Kids. Well, maybe you don't know. People like me, who grew up outside of their home culture. In another culture. That essentially creates a the experience of a third unique culture inside one small soul. Such as myself.

Reading the TCK book for review brought up all kinds of memories, insights, and "family of origin" aha! moments. You'd think this would all be old hat, how growing up in five different countries from 0 to 18 years old impacted me. But since moving to the U.S. for college at 18, it's an identity I've gone under cover about. After all, I look-sound-smell... American. I've got nuthin' to show for my TCK-ness. Just lots of passports stamps and an inability to join in conversations about favorite childhood TV shows.

So, while coming across hard and fast evidence of "TCK-ness" may seem momentarily interesting to you -- it means the world to me. Like the news that not since John Quincy Adams lived in France for a stint have we had a TCK in office - until good ole Barrack. Turns out Obama appointed a slew of TCKs for office, including Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner. Heck, Geithner even attended the same high school I graduated from in Bangkok. And it's not that small of a world.

I haven't gotten the "aloof" accusation in a while, but I used to -- and it's a relief to read a quote about Obama like, "That cool manner of seeming 'above it all' is... a classic feature of the Third Culture Kid."

Or, "'I laughed when I heard a commentator call Barack exotic and elitist,' says Lois Bushong, an American who grew up in Costa Rica and now works a therapist for internationally mobile families. 'How exotic or elitist can it be to go home to visit your grandmother, even if she lives in Hawaii? She’s still your grandma. This TV guy seemed to forget that the world many see ‘exotic’ is simply home for TCKs.'"

I want to get back to web surfing and quit my exhausted blathering. One day I will put together a fabulous anthology of stories from us TCK folks--about growing up, about the dilemas we face raising our own families now (where? give our child a place to call home? or ramble, as we are used to?), about the every-day-ness of living our lives the only way we knew how--no "exotic" rose-colored-glasses crap.

For now, I just need one good night's sleep.

Between the various princesses, he chooses...

At what point is my son going to stop thinking of me, adoringly, as an angel? Perusing a catalogue of kids' Halloween costumes tonight, he pointed to the costume he picked out for me: "Beautiful Angel." Well, it was between "Beautiful Angel" and "Bride to Be" on the same page -- both decked out in angelic frilly white, looking lovely, peaceful, and perfect. Yes, ahem, that's me...

And it's damn sweet of him. Between the 24 pages of costume choices, between the various fairytale princesses and Queen Nefertitis and young vixen-y pirates--he chooses the virtuous for me. Gotta love him.

So. I'll take the compliment and fold it into my heart. At the same time as wondering, bemusedly of course, at what point along the parenting path will Noah's brain & being no longer adore me unfailingly.

By the way, he chose the 'baby pirate' for Katie (super cute choice); the football player or man-eating-shark for his papa (odd and fitting, in that order); and some Clone Wars/Star Wars-looking outfit for himself. In his mythical dream vision of family. Or, just want he thinks everyone should be for Halloween this year.

A (Good) Day in the Life of...

We are eating breakfast in the sun room, Ken and I, when we hear the front door slam. Question mark. Did someone just leave? Or come in? No sound after that. I sit and listen for clues. Hannon appears in the door frame. No hello. He simply announces in his 5-year-old voice, "I-want-to-play-with-No-ah." Stacato emphasis on each syllable. Legs planted wide, mismatched socks.

It's cuter than heck, his no-knock entrance into our house, his one blue sock, one white sock, and his no-hesitation proclamation. It makes me laugh, and my heart feels light at the sight.

"Well, I'd like you to play with Noah, Hannon, but unfortunately we have a rule about not letting him play with boys whose socks don't match."

Hannon's brown eyes give me a steady gaze, waiting to see if I'm bluffing. I give him an eye twinkle and he knows I'm kidding. He smiles, walks into the sun room, snuggles up next to Ken on the brown leather couch.

Saturday at Walker Creek Community. Noah, still sleeping at 10:30am, praise the lord. Hannon leads the way up the stairs to wake him. Ten minutes later, another front door open and slam. Joe, Hannon's dad. Needs to help build sets for the play down at Big Lake Elementary. Can Hannon stay here, or does he want to come with Joe? Hannon says he'd like to go, but wants Noah to come with. Joe,that okay with you, I ask? Yup. Alrightie then, quick dress & shove a buttered cinamon raison english muffin in Noah's hand, watch him clamber into the back of Joe's giant red truck.

Baby Katherine nurses and falls asleep in my arms. The next few hours, Ken and I lounge in the sun room and listen to This American Life. Wow it's nice (and entirely rare) to be uninterrupted. I listen with my eyes closed. I hold my sleeping baby who just yesterday Noah sniffed and announced, "She smells like blueberry pie!" She does. This is bliss. I sink deeper into the couch.

The red truck roars back around 3 pm. Someone showed up with cheese pizza at the school, Joe says. They each had a slice. Can you take them for a while now? Yup. No sweat. Noah's already flung his boots off, barefoot stomping and giggling in the garden dirt. "Hey! Not in the garden!" I point them to their Dirt Fort, roll up Noah's pants legs, and off they go. Darn, they are playing with the hose water again, I can hear it spraying full force. "Hey! Turn off that hose, guys." Katie on my hip in the sling, I hump a wheelbarrow over to them and fill it with water. "Have at it, this is your water quota for the day okay." Immediatley they chatter plans for how they will make their mud city.

Teresa wanders over to get the community mower. It's in our front yard from mowing yesterday. "Have you seen one of these before?" she asks, waving her new weeding hoe like a proud flag. We talk weeds, county issues, and walk the community raspberries recently mulched with sawdust. She rides off on the mower full-speed down the driveway, white hair flying, waving her long hoe in the air hooting like a wild rodeo mow-girl.

I catch up with her later in the meadow. Shovel plowing up deep weeds from the edge of her garden in big dirt-sodden clumps. Katherine's getting heavy in the sling. I sit down on a nearby bale of hay, solid and only slightly damp. Baby K sits on the dry cardboard below me, pulling at the grass in front of her. Fist + blade of grass pushes into her mouth. I alternate between monitoring the grass intake and the clumps of grass Teresa's tossing into the wheelbarrow. V wanders up, kisses for T. Wanders off. More fistfulls of grass pulled up by baby K. More clods of earth dug up by Teresa. Joe wanders up. Kid logistics. Sure, we can take Hannon for the night. What's the school thinking to schedule a play showcase at 9:15pm? Sheesh.

Kid report from Joe, too. Hannon and Noah are playing down at the creek. Ken's with them, he's just cracked a beer. Hannon and Noah are splitting a beer, har har.

The college kids from Sherwood are circled in the meadow, bundled in cold sunshine. Their second annual retreat here at Walker Creek, free and sister community, why not. I don't know a single one of them. I do remember being them. Young and just me.

My black boots kick through the wet grass, I walk by them, smiling, baby K leaning towards them from my left hip. Her eyes bright, watching them. The basket of dinner greens I just harvested from the greenhouse bounces against my right hip. Two things I've grown, both held in the crook of my arms. Baby Katherine on one side. Greens on the other. My jean hems soak up the moisture from the grass. Another good day at Walker Creek.

Feeling Forty: On Fashion

Enter, 40. Enter, The New Fashion Demographic. Or shall I say: the Old Fashion Demographic.

I look around at the new fashions parading Broadway Avenue in Seattle. I was never eternally hip, but I do recall noticing new fashions and choosing whether I wanted to partake of them or not. I look at the puffy elastic waisted minis now and realize - even I wanted to wear that, I should not.

Young fashion, at forty, suddenly no longer feels like a choice. Why? Because I would now not look fashionable. I would look like an aging woman, clinging to youth. Ouch.

Jeggings? Joke. Robin Hood boots + cuffed shorts? Uh, not for me thanks, pass. Now to stay younger-looking, I have to stick to flattering classics. And worse - clothes that are hip and appealing to my demographic. The Born in the 70s and Now Forty Demographic, say Helllllllllo! "Comfort over style, baby, Comfort over style."

Wind in My Hair, Now - Still.

The wild hairs, they disappear so slowly these days I barely notice. These days as a mother now for nearly five years. Five years of now mostly keeping the windows rolled up so I don't blast the sleeping baby in the back seat. Five years of turning the music down low so I can hear my son talking to me from the back seat. Where is that woman I knew so well twenty years ago? The one with the wind whipping through her hair, across her face, as she drives with the windows down, cool air and cool tunes thumping through the car's body, feelin' free.

She's kid wild now. Laughs with abandon at her four year old son's joke. Cranes up at the sky and the trees with her 10 month old baby in arms looking up too, sharing love for the blue and the green, the shape of the earth above us.

She's definitely kid wild now. This woman who once drove a motorcycle under a moving truck. The one who knew she'd have made a great EMT or stunt woman had it occured to her just a little bit sooner along the career path. Her risks now? The most fearless includes: a hand down the back pants of her baby's dipe, to check for - well, you know. Brave mama, indeed. Fearless lover of two.