Friendly inspiration/room to breathe

Kelly recently inspired me two ways:

She walked into our apartment the other day and exclaimed, "it looks so good in here!"  Very enthusiastic and heartfelt.  My immediate internal reaction was to feel a sham.  How could I receive such positive sentiment when I so often have negative niggling at me when it comes to cleaning and decluttering?  It was a good reminder to, first of all, accept joy whenever possible.

She mentioned that she is finding peace by keeping small spaces tidy and working from there.  This morning I have been sluggish of body and jammed of mind.  I started small with no regard for what would happen next.  And, yes, despite a laundry list of cleaning/decluttering tasks yet to be done in this room, the room we spend the most time in, the room we socialize in, the "big room", if you will...to have small spaces within the room "straightened" does bring with it some peace.

Thanks, friend.

Peace.

Soup's on

Onion, celery, carrot, ginger, garlic, olive oil, bay leaf, vegetable bouillon, water, and the last of the fresh turkey stock (gelatinous gold).  Not for the first time, I wish my blog had aroma-vision.  I'd call this scent Nourish.

The kids are grumpy.  We may go see Wreck-It Ralph.  (Not because they're grumpy, but because they've been wanting to see it and we finally have a free block of time.)

What I really want to do is stay in my pajamas and read all day.  The introvert instinct is strong today.

Peace and soup.

Time and ringtones

I am procrastinating doing one of the things I hate most: waking the kids up.  I am a firm believer in the restorative and healing power of sleep.  Sleep is good, 'nuff said.  But, this morning I must to traffic court.  At least I finagled an early morning playdate for them so they don't have to come to court with me.

Another thing I believe is that time is many things: fluid, elastic, cross- and inter-dimensional...and, yes, linear.  I realized this morning, apropos of nothing, really, that in two years I will have not worked full-time for as long as I did.  Food for thought, for sure.

A Facebook friend posted something about ringtones that reminded me that one of the fun things I can do with my new phone is play with ringtones.  I am adding that to the ever enormous pile of "things to do".

Off to sip some Irish Breakfast tea and wake the kiddos...

Cozy in connection

I am feeling a bit better today.

Ran a Christmas-y errand driving our "sled" through the snow and got lost inside the mall (which still perplexes me).

  

I am sensing, gratefully, a financially calmer holiday season.  I am not being as conscious/intentional/attentional to our finances as I could be, but am having some moments/flashes of clarity which are helping.

I have been more aware of my/our time.

Our cards are made, paid for, and in da house.  Hoping to get to addressing envelopes this week.

Kids' big presents have been chosen, bought and hidden.

The December weekends seem a little less crazy than the November ones.  Just a little.

This afternoon I have delegated and canceled and taken time to rest.  It has been nice to cozy up inside as the snow fell steadily outside.

The internet shared some cozy, too, about reading, knitting, unionizing...and transforming/persisting/inspiring/overcoming odds and naysayers:

Peace and love.

The twelve

I am in my seventh year of living in this town.  A place that chose me by an institution choosing my partner.  A place I came to from a place I had fallen in love with, unexpectedly fast and furious.

(Sacramento.  Yep, Sacramento.  A place most people have never been to/hardly know about, it's a secret gem.)

Lately, in answer to the question, "do you like living in _________?", I'd noticed my response had shifted from vaguely and barely positive to begrudgingly so.  Yes, it has grown on me.  

[Context: I am a very lucky person.  This luck has extended to the places I have lived.  NYC, Hiroshima, San Francisco, Cambridge and Sacramento (the dark horse).  All particularly unique and "known quantity" type of places to live.  Our town came with a pretty solid pedigree, but what it was not (and still isn't) is a city.  It has taken me a long time to realize that I am a city mouse and most unconsciously content when living in one.]

This morning, I hopped in the car in my pjs.  I have a cold, didn't want to get dressed, but was obsessed with borrowing The Twelve from the branch library.  (When I went online to request it through the library system over the weekend, I was shocked to find that: 1) the system is being overhauled and they are not taking requests till mid-December (my literary lifeline!); and 2) there was a copy available at the little branch library in town.  Mind you, if the system was functioning as usual, this copy would have been whisked away by someone's electronic request.  I am sure of it.)

I parked in the quaint little lot, walked up the stone steps into the quaint little historic building, immediately spotted the book on display (this library is tiny), self-checked it out in seconds, paused to take the snapshot above, got back in the car, and was home in no time (super pooped, these colds, they suck the energy right out of you).

Somewhere in there, as the wintery light clarified the edges of my mind and the cold air brushed through my hair and I held a beautiful new book that cost me nothing with hands newly freed from holiday and birthday activity standing on old stone in fleece pajama pants tucked into cozy boots...I thought: I love this town.  

I love this place that gives me moments like this.

Peace and sniffles and rest.

From the kitchen

It was a productive kitchen day cooking down contents of the fridge and pantry.

Turkey hash w/acorn squash; apples sautéed w/onion (in lieu of shallots) and seasoned with thyme and salt; cream of tomato soup using Thanksgiving Day turkey stock and coconut milk; meat sauce w/Anthony's grass-fed ground sirloin.

Had a spot of peach tea with Tiina and now on to dinner and prep for Sag's birthday party tomorrow.

Bday portrait

11

Our "heavenly sound" boy turned eleven today. I am smiling reminded of Spinal Tap thinking this child lives life turned up to "11".

He completed our nucleus. He fills me up every day. Massively lucky and utterly
in love is how he makes me feel.

He shares his birthday with Cap's mom. We had a lovely day together. Turkey, the fixings and birthday cake.

Peace and love.

Hey

Just wanted to check in because it's been a really lovely day and our evening, in particular, has been full of cozy.  (I am waiting for the sauna---the one my father-in-law built---to heat up...this gal is gonna sleep well tonight.)

I realized my present experience is in such contrast to where I was yesterday/last night.  I felt reassured and wanted to reassure any of you here, in case you were concerned.

I am feeling much better.  Almost unrecognizably so.  Which is kind of scary.  But hormones...chemicals...they can really pack a punch when telling a story.

Peace and love and a big pink hug.

D.C.

Most of these pics are unprocessed.  Raw, for what it's worth.  The equivalent of putting something down on paper.

It's been busy.  The weekend in D.C. was great in many ways.  (Unfortunate in only one: dire lack of sleep the first night, only marginally improved the second night.)  Fulfilling.  But, returning has meant diving into getting ready for Thanksgiving.  And Sag's birthday.  He was born on Thanksgiving Day and his birthday falls on it once again.

I'm also PMSing and am feeling, acutely, the effect of Mercury in retrograde.

Not feeling good.  But I am not forsaking flow.  I keep swimming into undertows, but gratefully, am finding reserves and unexpected strength in my limbs as I swim my way out and tread about.

This afternoon I felt self-loathing.  Something I haven't experienced in a long time (but used to, quite often).  A very real sign that things are off in my internal universe.  (This will be dealt with, once this busy-ness lets up a little.)

Enjoy the holiday, if you are celebrating.

Peace and love.

Occupy

Thanks to my friend, Elizabeth, who coordinated a hyperlocal effort to donate to the greater Occupy Sandy relief efforts underway in parts of NY/NJ, I was able to do something to help today. Picked up supplies (pet food, instant coffee, and stuff for bagged lunches) and made some vegan sammies. She is on her way to the Rockaways, her Kia loaded to the gills.

(There was homemade hummus meant for the sandwiches...but it ended up locked inside a house this morning... Whole Paycheck to the rescue...)

The NY nieces came over yesterday.  Exhausting but fun.  (One does forget, survival of the species imperative, like forgetting the pain of childbirth, how much energy is required to care for and entertain a toddler.)  Crazy auntie face or crazed auntie face?

Today is day 2 of gluten- and sugar-free.  More to come, decided to do this in phases.  Asleep by 9:30 last night.  Feel both good and bad today, the good outweighing the bad, for sure.

Peace.

Today's internet awesome

Misao to fukumaru (Misao and Fukumaru)

Stephen sent me a link this morning that is all sorts of wonderful.  Thank you, friend.  Check it out here.  You will not regret it.

Meow.

Barely

Hey there.

Sorry for my quiet here.  I have been under the weather...under "life"...in an under-mood.

The lice thing is looking up.  My friend, Kate, combed my hair with her much bosser nit/lice comb.  (As soon as I saw it, I knew the job would be much less tedious than the comb we'd picked up suggested.)  For this kinesthetic learner/being, it made all the difference to have someone guide me through the experience of combing.  I am forever grateful.

Her experienced eye found nothing in my hair.  I went home and combed all three dudes and found nothing.  That was Election Day.  I've been combing the boys and myself once a day since then and we've been "clean".  I'll have our doctor's office check us out tomorrow or Monday and with their official word, hopefully, this episode will be in our rearview.

There isn't much else to say.  I am barely here.  Skimming surfaces.

Music, when it arises, as always, is a balm.



Peace and love.

& then afterward

A poem I found beautiful, lyrical, haunting...and yet hopeful.  You can read it here.

Tired silly after staying up to watch Obama speak.  He is really quite the orator.

Peace.

From the reader

Some good stuff... here and here and here.  (On writing, a recipe and on politics/the storm, respectively.)

Peace and love.

What it is...at least in this tiny little corner of it

The opposite of eloquent is what I am.  The opposite of elegant is what I feel.  (Though, come to think of it, have I ever felt elegant?  Not sure...)

So, we have had our closest known encounter with head lice.  It happened last Thursday evening and drama ensued.  This Friday, on the advice our family doctor, we'll all go in and get our heads checked. 

It turns out what do to in the interim depends on who you are.  I have received lots of personally truthful experience- and evidence-based advice.  And not only have these stories been all over the treatment map, some of them have diametrically opposed each other.

I have been grateful for the tips and advice, nonetheless.  We didn't have internet the first couple of days after exposure and we felt very much in the dark.  We picked up a special lice comb and some tea tree oil, but I haven't actually done any combing.  (For those of you who don't know me, at my best...which I have not been lately...I am extremely reluctant to perform tasks which my brain red flags as "tedious".  Prophylactic combing was setting off all sorts of tedium alarms.)

For now, I am sitting tight on the lice.  Hoping that we have been spared.  Trying not to let my itchy scalp drive me crazy.  (The mere mention of the word lice is enough to get my scalp going.)  I have a tendency to pull my hair out anyway (googled it last night and it turns out to be a thing) and there has been a spike in that behavior.

Oy.

Sag still doesn't feel great.  We think he may have a cold on top of the strep.  And the antibiotic wouldn't vanquish the cold.  I seem to have a cold, too.  Or, we're just more externally symptomatic of being run down.  I am not sure.

It's hard to post, to share, to reach out, when there are still thousands of households right in our small town who remain powerless.  Temps have really dipped and people are cold and in the dark.  Some are friends, some are elderly, some are mentally ill, some are homeless. Expand the circle outward and there are people in our county and state who have lost homes and loved ones because of the storm.  Our community is small and I feel confident that no one is falling through the cracks.  But, it's a much bigger world out there, even right next door in Newark.  Cory Booker is truly a superhero.  He is working his ass off trying to make sure everyone in his city is safe and warm.

It's all hard to reconcile.

Halloween, which had been "rescheduled" for this afternoon has not happened.  Sag was not well enough to go out (he cried), Gem decided he didn't want to go out once he realized his brother and usual trick-or-treating partner, Owen, could not go.  Gem has been more sensitive to the de-occasioning of the holiday by the change of date and the state mandated trick-or-treating curfew of noon to 5pm.

Schools in town have not re-opened.  You can imagine the mass confused energy.  That's a lot of kids home for a week with no regularly scheduled activity built into their days.  In direct and more subtle ways, routines have been broken.  We are lucky to be maintaining some of ours, yet the undercurrent of chaos is strong.

I don't even know what I am saying here.  This cold is reverting my brain back to a shell shocked state...or maybe I never quite left it.  Cap did make me laugh earlier today which felt like a burst of light.  Holding that memory like a precious ephemeral thing.

Peace and love.

And just like that

...I feel much better.

Monday evening as Sandy bore down on us, I think my brain was fried a little bit.  It did something to my chemistry.  I've been dogged by imbalance for days.  Something shifted overnight (perhaps the sugar in the cookies I indulged in at common meal last night?) and when I woke up this morning I could feel a distinct and happy difference...in my mood, my outlook, how my body/mind felt.

Grateful.

...our phone/internet/cable was restored.

On Tuesday morning I used up nearly an hour of my limited mobile phone minutes on hold with Comcast to generate a ticket for a technician to come out at some point in what I thought would be the distant future.  Because the telephone wires had been brought down by the tree section in the driveway, I knew it was going to take more than flipping a switch to restore service.

The landlord cleared the very large tree section (branch doesn't do it justice, it was a big thing) yesterday afternoon, Comcast came by this afternoon (serendipity) and now we are back online.

Grateful.

...Sag was diagnosed and began treatment for strep.

Late last night he began complaining of a very sore throat.  Honey didn't help, salt water gargle didn't help, ice cream did.  But he had a lot of trouble settling to sleep.  A backrub past eleven pm finally did the trick.

This morning, we discovered that our family physician was providing care with a shivering skeleton crew.  With no power and no phones.  She performed a rapid strep test which came back positive and prescribed antibiotics.

He's already starting to feel better.  He took a 3 hour nap.  We are gently feeding him ewegurt (a locally made sheep's milk yogurt) and toast.  By this time tomorrow, I think he'll be close to back to normal. 

If she hadn't been open, if we didn't have a neighborhood doctor, we'd likely be at an emergency room right about now.

Grateful.

Peace, love and light.

P.S.  I will leave our recent exposure to head lice (by a family who knew they had it) for another post...

And so it unfolds

I am sleeping. Dreaming nasty dreams.

Waking, alternately moving through a foggy fugue state and doing what needs to be done.

Keeping devastation and crisis at arm's length. What seeps through renders me liquid.

Though we have electricity (which is inconceivably huge), I feel the weight of this surreal bubble atop us.

Everything is still while recovery is furiously taking place elsewhere. But the stillness is a facade.

Hearts continue beating, at times racing. Memory is being made. Process is percolating.

Our unit here is living along. We are holding together with our neighbors. Strands pull together as we go to and receive friends in support.

It is becoming clearer that there are pockets of true that are hardly known.

A report from the East Village (Marcella) of people dumpster diving and bathing at hydrants not a relief vehicle in sight. They have evacuated to Brooklyn down to the last drops in their tub and a kitchen with only rotted food left.

This from a healthy unit of two adults and one young child. I am shaken to think of the elderly, mentally ill, physically disabled, etc. populations in lower Manhattan, NJ, Haiti, and other areas knocked on their asses by this storm and their proximity to the sea.

The stories and moments of not only survival, but grace in adversity are encouraging. But the energy of souls suffering and perishing...I am feeling that, too.

Peace.

P.S. Thank you for your comments and for reading. We don't have internet and I am blogging bare bones using my phone. Not sure how to get to comments to comment back yet. I do receive your comments via email though and am reading them. Thank you.

Post-storm

We are all fine and the car is fine. And, surprisingly, we have power.

The worst of it has been that a ginormous tree branch came down in the driveway. The driveway is impassable and the phone line was brought down. So for now, no landline, no Internet, no cable tv and no car.

Our landlord has more significant issues at his primary home so we are sitting tight.

I am very grateful we didn't lose power. I have been cooking, which is therapeutic.

Honestly, I am a bit of a mess. If you know me, you know how sensitive I am to low pressure systems. Well, Sandy was the mother of them, felt like, and I suffered.

By 6pm last night I was pacing. So restless and wired. I had a headache that was more pressure than pain that did not relent until this morning.

I fell into bed before anyone (we made a shelter camp in the kids' room) out of sheer adrenalized exhaustion. I half slept and half intense-dreamed the whole night as the wind continued to gust.

This morning I held it together long enough to fix the kids something to eat and communicate with the landlord and neighbors and the phone company (30 mins on hold).

Lost it mid-morning to Cap.

Could not stop the shaking inside. Like fury, clawing desperation, spiraling out and out.

Cap and the kids accommodated my meltdown. I felt much better afterward, it brought some pure relief.

They are now at Danielle's for Internet and play. I am catching up with texts, emails and tweets. I need to call my mom. She lives on the collapsed crane block and was evacuated yesterday.

I also just need to breathe. To enjoy the silence.

I am, truly, so grateful. We were very lucky. My heart goes out to those who were less lucky and who face and are facing terrible loss and recovery.

Peace and love.

Note to self

When I am upset (especially when my body is in inflammation mode from being back on grains and sugar) I look for signs that whoever I am sharing my moment of upset with actively relates to how I am feeling.

If there is no outward (or the more subtle energetic) indication of the other person/people being upset in solidarity with me (changes in facial expression, body language, voice quality) or of their going into empathy/sympathy mode (changes in facial expression, body language, voice quality)...

...my brain/nervous system registers this as confusing.  As opposed to comforting.  Which is what I am instinctually seeking.  And I go from feeling generally (and reasonably appropriately) upset to specifically vulnerable.  Which can be confusing to the person/people I am with.

This is part of being highly sensitive.  My feelers for how people and experiences feel are usually deliciously tuned.  But if I am thrown off by something (and sometimes the balance is delicate), my receivers can cut me to the quick and leave me feeling raw.

I become much less able, in those moments, to see clearly that a passive reaction is not anything more or less than just what it is.  Nothing to get even more ruffled by.

I remind myself what I say to my kids (and anyone else who will listen): let go of the worry, take away the lesson, find the peace.

Library love

Ran into Kelly and her powerful warm hugs. Had some delicious, fair trade, organic and/or locally sourced soup, pie and espresso which was at least one thing too many. Picked up a long-awaited book. Had an hour to myself.

Warm wool

This shawlette was finished over a year ago...at least. Actually, it has been waiting to be blocked for probably closer to two or maybe even three years. Time can be weird that way. I simply do not accept time as purely linear. In a case such as this, it would just be too painful.

I'm wearing an unusual get up today because both my bras are being laundered. My go to in this situation is what I think of as a dancer's top. It's a leotard-y tank. The 3/4 sleeve cotton cardi was not cutting it against the morning chill.

I had already prompted Gem to keep his neck warm as he headed out this morning with his brother and father, handing him a cozy scarf. It has become that time of year.

The shawlette caught my eye when I grabbed his scarf out the "hat box". Throwing years of non-action to the wind, when I felt the chill myself, amidst math figures and the latest spit bubble wonders, I placed this beauty upon my shoulders.

And once more was reminded of the magic of wool. Of fiber art. Of how it all connects and comes together.

Warmly. Absolutely. Incredibly. Simply.

Peace and yarny stitches.

Boom

Haha, the photos uploaded crazy big, but I was quite delighted to post my last post from my luxe phone.  Posting musings and pics from a cabin in the woods.  Yay for small first world pleasures.

The tumbling, joyful, chaotic energy and activity of Fall continues.  In retrospect, I am really glad I took that California holiday.  I didn't realize how far reachingly nourishing it would turn out to be.  I was initially distracted by the jet lag.

The kids are due back any moment so it's bullet-time:

• Homeland.  Watch it.  The best thing to come to the boob tube since Arrested Development.  Both shows inform their genres (schools them clobberingly, really, on what is clearly possible) and then bust out of them, lifting us all to a transcendent place of...tv heaven.

• Dragon's Way: class has been awesome.  uplifting.  nourishing.  the food shift is going slow but is happening.  the practice shift is happening only a bit faster, but is, importantly, happening.  it feels like an organic part of my current process.

• nothing says "let's bang out some holiday cards!" like a weekend in foliage country.

• stuff is getting rassled up.  been taking my Chinese herbal sleep aids the last couple of nights.

• craft fair Friday, Halloween next week.  handmade takes time...eek!

• Louis C.K. with my honey this weekend.

• in less than a month Sag turns 11.  oh my.

• I have a ton of photos to process from the weekend (I took about 400!)  here is one I love that did not make the cut for our card because as Gem observed, "I have an eye patch".

Peace and love.

In the woods

Ahhhhh... Huge life-giving breaths of air and light and love here amongst the trees and sister and brother-in-law and nephew dog.

So so lucky, much much gratitude.

Peace.

Étrange

Have been still today. 

Slow to wake (kept falling back into dream-filled sleep until 9:30am).  In a state not quite tired.  Blank of energy.

Read Johnny's memoir. 

I lost count of how many GFCF cupackes I've consumed (leftover from last night's common meal, homemade by Cap). 

Immune system powered up, I believe.

The rain all day didn't help.

I am loving my new phone camera and the filters on Instagram.

Peace.

Uncle

The hormonal surge has passed and I am left with the dregs of funneling in high octane dairy and fats into my body for four days running.

Uncle.

Common meal tonight at our house.  I made a lovely dairy-free root veggie Thai red curry.  Looking forward to it.

Every day is a new day.

Also looking forward to:

• seeing how things unfold as Gem is challenged by dealing with a subject he cares beans about.

• starting my next book, Johnny Weir's memoir: Welcome To My World.

• making time in the schedule to play the piano.

• getting back to our Hobbit read aloud.

• leaf peeping and pumpkin picking up at "the Cabinet" this weekend.

• making Halloween costumes.

• helping with Fall Craft Fair products.

• finishing a long hibernating knitting project.

• catching up with episodes in the DVR (AHS: Asylum, Call The Midwife, Revolution, All On The Line, Be Good Johnny Weir...there is totally not enough time...this is on top of the stuff I am caught up on!)

• planning a date night to squeeze in somewhere, somehow.

Peace.

Flat earth

New song I'm loving.

Cap is cool

Cap's been exploring the photographs of Robert Frank with the kids.  This one stopped me in my tracks.

Hanging in the balance

Day 3 of Dragon's Way.  What is it that I/we have the urge to compartmentalize time.  Bracket it.

Ovulation-related hormone surge or dip had me nodding off in Vinny's waiting room yesterday afternoon.  Both pregnancies, I'd come home from work and nod off on the couch while sitting up.  (Muscle) memories.

And I cannot get enough dairy in me.

Balancing resting with the demands of daily life.  Always, but some days it feels more pointed than others.

I started the book yesterday.  Wow.  It's a good one.  Powerful swings from horror, heartbreak and hearty laughter.  A whodunit ensnared in cultural commentary.

Had myself an early dinner, solo, while the kids were at Video Game Design class.  It was a nice respite from the rush of the day.  The boys behind the counter were a delight to eavesdrop on.

Beginning to feel the instinctual shutting down for Winter.

Chopin, take it away.

Bits

Jet lag continues...though I am less draggy, my mind less mushy, with each passing day. 

I am exploring my new phone, digging Dragon's Way class which started last night, chipping away at bills-y kind of paperwork, getting back into the saddle of the schedule, etc.

I have Louise Erdrich's new book from the library for eight days.  Have not had the wherewithal to start it...

I read a poem I liked this morning.  You can read it here.

After Comic Con we walked from the Javits Center to Midtown Comics and from there to my mom's.  It was cool to be on foot passing the entrance to the Lincoln Tunnel...new perspective of a familiar landscape.

Peace and love.