How do you find space to think or time to focus and write when you're a single parent? Especially with little children.
From the moment I get up until the moment they go to bed, I am rushing from place to place. Get up and rush everyone through showers, breakfast, and off to school. Rush to the kids school, hoping they aren't late and that there won't be a long line of cars. Rush to work, hoping I'm not late. Rush through the morning email and calls. Answer the phone 50 times. Read 300 emails. Put out a few fires.
Rush home, hoping I'm not late again and that traffic won't be bad. Get dinner on the table, keep the kids from killing each other, clean up the kitchen, get the kids to clean up their toys. Make sure homework is done and clothes are washed for tomorrow. Get the kids bathed and in bed.
They get out of bed. They want water. Or to go to the bathroom. But what they really want is me. Miss M is mad because Little J is keeping her awake. Little J cries because Miss M pushed her. Threaten confiscation of precious things if they get up again.
Finally, quiet. But I'm exhausted now. Think? Focus? Maybe tomorrow...
Monday, August 17, 2009
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Beautiful Sky over the Hudson
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
Up, Up, and Away in My Beautiful Balloon
My girls are coming home today! They've been at grandma's the last week and a half. Truth be told, she DROVE with them 13 hours to Indiana from Pennsylvania to visit my grandmother. And then she drove them back! I can barely stand to be on a plane with the two of them for 2 hours - let alone 26 hours in a car where you cannot even walk around. She's done it for 2 years now and I swear she's either a masochist or has early Alzheimer's because she did it again this year. And tomorrow she's driving 2 more hours to bring them home.
I miss my girls!!! I miss their little hugs. I miss their laughter. I miss Miss M trying to trick me into thinking she actually ate all her dinner. I miss Little J asking me where I want her to kiss my face - over and over until my entire face is covered with kisses. I miss that they both believe I really can eat their noses. And that they believe they can pull them back out of my belly button. I miss them so much.
It's strange without them here. They tether me to this world. Without them I'm like a balloon about to blow away in the wind. I lose track of time. I don't know what day it is. I oversleep and am late for work. I stay up late. I nibble instead of eating meals. Like a top that is losing it's spin, I'm wobbling about without a gravitational center.
Come home soon little girls before your mama blows away into some crazy land where night is day and day is night.
I miss my girls!!! I miss their little hugs. I miss their laughter. I miss Miss M trying to trick me into thinking she actually ate all her dinner. I miss Little J asking me where I want her to kiss my face - over and over until my entire face is covered with kisses. I miss that they both believe I really can eat their noses. And that they believe they can pull them back out of my belly button. I miss them so much.
It's strange without them here. They tether me to this world. Without them I'm like a balloon about to blow away in the wind. I lose track of time. I don't know what day it is. I oversleep and am late for work. I stay up late. I nibble instead of eating meals. Like a top that is losing it's spin, I'm wobbling about without a gravitational center.
Come home soon little girls before your mama blows away into some crazy land where night is day and day is night.
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
Joy of the Dentist
I have discovered a secret joy of going to the dentist. Nitrous Oxide. Once you go nitrous, you never go back. But that's not the secret.
When I'm on nitrous oxide, my body starts to go numb and I feel spaced out. That coupled with the medical scenario, reproduces for me the feeling of giving birth. I had C-sections during I was light headed and nauseous from the loss of blood. And from having my stomach open to the world. And in the midst of this frightening blur, my baby girl was handed to me.
"Here is your baby girl. " I will never forget those words. There are few experiences in the world that you remember exactly the way they happened - the emotion and the feeling in your body and mind at that moment. Having my baby girl handed to me was one of those moments.
I started crying and gasped the words 'That came out of ME? She's mine?' I was amazed that my body could produce such a perfect being. And lying there in the dentist office with nitrous flowing into my lungs, I re-experience it every time. It's almost ludicrously lovely. I could get addicted to it. I could go to the dentist every week just to feel that blend of fear, nausea, and the most joyful moment I have ever known. I never want the experience to end.
And then I hear 'Open Wide' and get all confused.
When I'm on nitrous oxide, my body starts to go numb and I feel spaced out. That coupled with the medical scenario, reproduces for me the feeling of giving birth. I had C-sections during I was light headed and nauseous from the loss of blood. And from having my stomach open to the world. And in the midst of this frightening blur, my baby girl was handed to me.
"Here is your baby girl. " I will never forget those words. There are few experiences in the world that you remember exactly the way they happened - the emotion and the feeling in your body and mind at that moment. Having my baby girl handed to me was one of those moments.
I started crying and gasped the words 'That came out of ME? She's mine?' I was amazed that my body could produce such a perfect being. And lying there in the dentist office with nitrous flowing into my lungs, I re-experience it every time. It's almost ludicrously lovely. I could get addicted to it. I could go to the dentist every week just to feel that blend of fear, nausea, and the most joyful moment I have ever known. I never want the experience to end.
And then I hear 'Open Wide' and get all confused.
Monday, August 10, 2009
The Ring
While sometimes I imagine that the River washes away my troubles, in at least one case, it did. I'm referring to my Wedding Ring. For over a year after my divorce became final, I kept The Ring. My husband left me - while I was pregnant and bed-ridden. And just like I hadn't wanted to part with my marriage or my husband, I didn't want to part with The Ring. It was the last tangible symbol of my marriage - other than my daughter.
I thought of selling it. It wasn't worth much. Just a simple tiny gold ring. But I couldn't imagine The Ring floating out there among the general population just waiting to ruin someone else's life. I knew someone who threw his in the trash. It's somewhere in the San Francisco City dump. But throwing it in the trash seemed anti-climatic. And it wouldn't have been gone right away. It would have lingered in the trash for a few days and then traveled to the dump before it was actually gone. I wanted something more final.
The River gave me the perfect solution. One warm summer evening, I got out The Ring. I sat on the porch drinking an ice-cold Corona. I turned it over in my hands a few times, got a little teary eyed. Then I walked to the edge of the water. It was high tide. I cranked my arm back and tossed The Ring far out into the River.
I imagined The Ring dropping to the bottom of the River. I pictured it sinking in the mud where the tides would wash it into the unknown never to be seen again. Or maybe a goose would come along and eat it. Then it would end up in a goose dropping somewhere. Fitting. Or perhaps a fish would swallow it. Then the fish would be eaten by a bigger fish. Then maybe a shark would eat it. Some fisherman would catch the shark and open it up to find a ring. It would be a ring then and not The Ring because he wouldn't know about the misfortune it had brought me. And certainly all the bad luck would have rubbed off in it's journey.
Bye Bye Ring. Hello.....
p.s. - I do not advocate throwing things in a river. I've done it only twice. Once in a Buddhist floating candle ceremony after Sept 11th. And then The Ring. Usually I'm cleaning up things out of the River.
I thought of selling it. It wasn't worth much. Just a simple tiny gold ring. But I couldn't imagine The Ring floating out there among the general population just waiting to ruin someone else's life. I knew someone who threw his in the trash. It's somewhere in the San Francisco City dump. But throwing it in the trash seemed anti-climatic. And it wouldn't have been gone right away. It would have lingered in the trash for a few days and then traveled to the dump before it was actually gone. I wanted something more final.
The River gave me the perfect solution. One warm summer evening, I got out The Ring. I sat on the porch drinking an ice-cold Corona. I turned it over in my hands a few times, got a little teary eyed. Then I walked to the edge of the water. It was high tide. I cranked my arm back and tossed The Ring far out into the River.
I imagined The Ring dropping to the bottom of the River. I pictured it sinking in the mud where the tides would wash it into the unknown never to be seen again. Or maybe a goose would come along and eat it. Then it would end up in a goose dropping somewhere. Fitting. Or perhaps a fish would swallow it. Then the fish would be eaten by a bigger fish. Then maybe a shark would eat it. Some fisherman would catch the shark and open it up to find a ring. It would be a ring then and not The Ring because he wouldn't know about the misfortune it had brought me. And certainly all the bad luck would have rubbed off in it's journey.
Bye Bye Ring. Hello.....
p.s. - I do not advocate throwing things in a river. I've done it only twice. Once in a Buddhist floating candle ceremony after Sept 11th. And then The Ring. Usually I'm cleaning up things out of the River.
Sunday, August 9, 2009
BBBBB log?
I've decided to blog. Not sure why. It is odd spilling out your guts for the world to see. It feels narcissistic. This could be a short lived experiment.
Once upon a time I liked to write. I even won awards in grade school. Somewhere along the line though, I lost that voice. Maybe it was in engineering school where English was overrated and underutilized. Math was the linqua franca - even the marching band cheered in equations. But it's more likely that the sucker punches you take along the way in life forced the air out of me. So maybe, just maybe, this blogging thing will loosen up those old vocal chords and let the air back in.
I guess if I'm going to do this, I need to introduce myself. I live on a pier. No kidding, I guess you figured that out by now. Living on a pier is beautiful, especially when Manhattan is on the other side of the River you are living on. Of course at the moment it's really loud because a party boat is going by. Sound carries with almost no decibel loss across water. It so loud that the passengers must be really drunk and really deaf.
But I promise, living on a pier isn't the most interesting thing about me. All the other blog names that I wanted were taken. :-o The name does seem to fit. The water swiftly flowing about 15 feet beneath my chair is one of the constants in my life. Sometimes I think all of my troubles seep down into the floor and then are washed away by the water beneath my home.
It's a nice thought anyway.
Once upon a time I liked to write. I even won awards in grade school. Somewhere along the line though, I lost that voice. Maybe it was in engineering school where English was overrated and underutilized. Math was the linqua franca - even the marching band cheered in equations. But it's more likely that the sucker punches you take along the way in life forced the air out of me. So maybe, just maybe, this blogging thing will loosen up those old vocal chords and let the air back in.
I guess if I'm going to do this, I need to introduce myself. I live on a pier. No kidding, I guess you figured that out by now. Living on a pier is beautiful, especially when Manhattan is on the other side of the River you are living on. Of course at the moment it's really loud because a party boat is going by. Sound carries with almost no decibel loss across water. It so loud that the passengers must be really drunk and really deaf.
But I promise, living on a pier isn't the most interesting thing about me. All the other blog names that I wanted were taken. :-o The name does seem to fit. The water swiftly flowing about 15 feet beneath my chair is one of the constants in my life. Sometimes I think all of my troubles seep down into the floor and then are washed away by the water beneath my home.
It's a nice thought anyway.
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