Is Old-Fashioned Research Valuable At All Anymore?

In the wake of a newsworthy snowstorm, I spent the last two weeks re-learning the ropes of Stay-At-Home Mom-dom. It was kind of crazy, readjusting to every waking minute with my three boys, trying to find that mental control in every particular moment and every particular situation that comes more from practice than any natural instincts.

I think I had the knack down by yesterday.

It was not easy, then, to have to return to my teacher self and put on the dress pants and shirt that may or may not make me look fat (and the only ones who care are me and the middle schoolers who examine me instead of paying attention to the life of Poe and how to effectively annotate his biography). But I did it. I woke up, I put the makeup on, put the dress pants on, and somehow made it out the door on time.

The walk up the stairs to my classroom was very hard. Many, many stairs. The halls smelled like school cleaner and I was greeted by the custodians repairing the radiator in my classroom, which had caused a small flood along the back wall while we were off last week. I realized I hadn't finished my coffee at home and my eyelids felt like they weighed a hundred pounds.

That's when I had my terrific brainstorm.

I would turn the timeline of Poe's life into a BOARD game! Who wouldn't want to play that game? Man! Almost as fun as Pin-the-Apostrophe-on-IT S, I knew, and I got started straight away. The playing cards would each be a year from Poe's life, detailing significant events that would have influenced his life as a writer. Or would they? I'm so tricky, I began throwing in other odd facts, too, like the birth of Florence Nightingale and the invention of Heinz ketchup (which didn't even occur until twenty years after Poe died! Bwahaha! You wish you had my job!). Pull those cards, and your game piece would be moving back one space, oh yeah!

So, clearly I was excited about the new development of the day's lesson. I decided that the class would be broken into teams, and within each team, every student would be assigned a job. Because I'm weird, some students were the dice rollers and some were the card readers, but one job I was pretty psyched about was the Fact Checker. I loved this because it would allow the teachable moment of, "Hey, this is actually a job in real life!" and "Isn't research fun?" The only problem I foresaw was that there was no computer for the kids to go to for quick searches, and I couldn't bring myself to invite their smartphones into the classroom. I'm just not there yet. So, instead, I brilliantly assured myself, "No problem, I have that old set of encyclopedias in the back. Since this was all during the life of Poe, all these events should totes be in the encyclopedias." Totes. And they were. No problem, right?

Wrong.

My first clue that something wasn't quite right was when the birth of Florence Nightingale card was pulled during my third class of the day. The group was huddled up, feverishly discussing how old Flo may have affected the life of my good friend Edgar, but their brows were furrowed. Their hissy hushed voices took on accusing and indignant tones. Finally, the Fact Checker was shoved out of his chair and he headed to the back of the room, where, during prior Rule Explaining, I had directed them to go for encyclopedia use.

The Fact Checker stood helplessly in front of the shelves (and might I add, they are very pretty, well-stocked shelves). He first reached for a textbook, but his hand was slapped away by a student in another group. "That is not an encyclopedia!" she scolded. (Middle schoolers are a helpful people.) Finally, the Fact Checker seemed to spot the correct books. Randomly, he grabbed one and flipped it open in confusion. It was the 'G' volume. Because everyone knows 'G' is for Florence Nightingale.

At this point, the group's time had run out.

The class turned to me, looking bewildered. "Uh, do they get to move ahead?" someone asked.

"Well, no," I said. "They can't tell me who Florence Nightingale is, so they definitely can't explain whether she influenced the life or works of Poe." (The answer was NO, no she probably didn't, as he was nine when she was born in Italy and their paths never crossed in any way worth mentioning.)

At this point, however, the class ended and the packing up commenced and the next class spilled into the room.

The card that spurred the job of Fact Checker in this class was the one that included the names "Dostoyevsky" and "Baudelaire." I began to feel evil as the Card Reader stumbled over the difficult spellings and then tossed it at the completely daunted Fact Checker. I waited with interest as he (oddly, it was always boys who were assigned this job by the groups) made his way to the back of the room and stared blankly at the bookshelves. After another painful turn, the Florence Nightingale card was pulled by the next team, and the poor Fact Checking boy from that group stood forlornly by the green bound books.

What the?

As the group scrambled to prepare some sort of answer, I moved to the back of the room myself.

"Do you know what an encyclopedia is?" I asked the class in general. Imagine my shock when thirty heads shook. No. The boy stepped away in relief.

I sighed. "Have you ever heard of Wikipedia?"

Further relief flooded their faces, like Yay! She's speaking our language now.

"We know what that is, but we aren't allowed to use it."

"It's all fake and made up!" shouted a helpful Hermione type.

"Yes, well." I picked up the encyclopedia volume labeled 'N.' "Wikipedia is a similar idea to an encyclopedia. You type a keyword into a search box, like--" I paused emphatically, "FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE, and then a whole bunch of information comes up, all about...Florence Nightingale."

"Yeah, but it's totally fake," interrupted another charming student.

"But it is helpful if you're looking for a quick gist," I pointed out. "If you're just wondering really quick, 'Who is this person?' Wikipedia is a good starting point for you to start figuring it out." I flipped open the 'N' volume and started fluttering through the pages. "Back in the olden days, after we climbed out of horse and buggy outside the ol' library, we used encyclopedias to do that same job. Only we didn't have a computer and we didn't have a search box. Instead, we asked ourselves, 'What is the first letter of the thing I want information about? I know! N for Nightingale! Then we found the 'N' volume of the encyclopedia. Do you hear how it kind of even sounds like 'Wikipedia?' Then we had to flip the pages to find the topic. The 'N' volume is filled with all the topics that start with 'N'. See how they're all in bold? And helpfully, they're all in alphabetical order, too. So I know 'Nightingale' starts with 'Ni-' so I'm just going to skip past the beginning here and...."

And then something sort of clicked in my head. This was absurd. These children were watching me like I was a lunatic. The Internet literally does all of what I was demonstrating for them. Why was I even bothering? But the book in my hand, tattered and faded and shredded along its binding, felt so solid. I looked down at it, remembering countless trips to the library in high school and college, using the card catalogue, returning to a glass top table and my arms laden with heavy books, which may or may not contain any useful information. My God. Research is a totally different thing now. And my students had absolutely no idea what went into it, because ninety percent of the steps have been taken out of the whole process. To them, it's "I just want to know real quick," and the idea of taking any time at all to lift a book was blowing their minds. And I'm not going to lie. It was kind of blowing mine, too.

So in the end, I guess the question is, was I asking my students to do something ridiculous, or is there still some value in knowing how to use reference books the old-fashioned way? I have no idea, but I do know that for now, all I have is those encyclopedias, and tomorrow, all those Fact Checkers have their work cut out for them.

Poor guys.

My Thankful Prayer

I'm sitting in the middle of a snowstorm. I have been housebound since Monday night, as storm watches and warnings that I didn't really believe swirled around the news. I'm from Buffalo, and I've grown up with a "take it as it comes" attitude, with a side order of, "I'll believe it when I see it."

The snow is now covering our first story windows. In the street in front of my house, cars are abandoned and mostly buried. I've seen plows and policemen get stuck, I've seen neighbors plug their way through six foot drifts to help them. I saw a person, bundled up on a stretcher, carried down the street by six men. I distracted my children from this. To them, this is an adventure. It should be.

Facebook is flooded with photos and statuses detailing everyone's own personal storm. Many are without power or heat. Most of us have not been able to leave our driveway for days and aren't sure when it will be possible. Most are going stir crazy. They worry about back to work and back to school and groceries and all the things we all worry about even when there isn't a storm keeping us away.

But I think...I'm not just in the middle of a snowstorm. I'm in the middle of my family room bundled under two blankets, one of which is my sacred sweater blanket, the gift I requested and received from Joe the fall he spent working in Pittsburgh while the boys and I stayed behind missing him. My baby is napping, and from the next room I hear the sound of boys giggling together.

I don't want this storm to end. Easy to say, I guess, because I have power and food right now. Maybe I'll change my tune tomorrow or the next day. Probably. But I don't want to be at work, and I don't want to think about tests and quizzes and vocab, given or received (since I'm an ELA teacher). I want to not do anything. I want to not be going anywhere. I want to be, and have wanted since I went back to work in September, right here where I am. I'm not going to wish that away.

Baby Max and I were in my bedroom this morning, me in the rocking chair and him giggling at my feet. Suddenly, he reached for me. "Up!" he demanded. He's delightfully imperious. Imperiousness is only special at this age, of course. It gets a bit tiresome as they grow (evidenced by Noah). I obliged, and he leaned against my arm, smiling with eyes and mouth, the best kind.

I flashed back instantly to a year ago. Where was I then? Trapped at home again, though in a very different way. Max was just a few weeks old, and I was recovering from a very painful C-section and hernia repair. Max was not eating. I can't remember the exact day it was decided he would not be a breastfeeder, but it was somewhere around this date. And I was devastated. Of course I wanted him to grow. He had to start growing. But I had failed. At least, in my eyes. And I hadn't failed through any fault or choice of my own (despite what the midwives told me, but curse them, anyway). I had failed by my very nature, my makeup. I couldn't physically do what God had intended.

I will probably never fully heal from that.

My mother has always sworn that the first year of your baby's life is the hardest. She insists that it's that way for everybody, though I haven't seen much proof of it. Mostly people share the good things. The firsts, the milestones, the heart-to-bursting joy that only comes from being a parent. Some will share a crisis or two, but just enough to scare the hell out of you and then move on. I really want my mother to be right--she is about most things--because I don't want to be the only person who has struggled with things that I always imagined would come naturally.

I'm surprised by the number of people who have noticed the sharp decline in my blogging, more surprised still by those who bother to mention it. I'm flattered. I expected Max's first year to be filled with inspiration for me as a writer, but it has proven to be the exact opposite. Babies are exhausting, and so are nine-year-old boys and Noahs. (Noah, I have tiredly but lovingly determined, will wipe me out any time anywhere any age, just because.) I doubt very much that most people want to hear "I'm so tired" three-hundred-sixty-five days in a row; I can assure you, Joe is rather sick of it.

Returning to work this fall filled me with dread, and yet, there are days I guiltily consider it a reprieve from my real life. I drink hot coffee in the quiet solitude of my early morning classroom. There is no silence quite as lovely as a school without children; it nearly reminds me of a church before Mass. The trouble is, every second that I am at school my heart is aching to be somewhere else. I feel almost outside of myself for missing the life I lived for the last few years. It wasn't very eventful. It wasn't touching a hundred lives at a time through literature and writing (because I'm TOTALLY changing the world right now, making ALL the children love the written word). It wasn't glamorous at all--yoga pants and messy buns and cleaning grout. But it was hugs and kisses any time I wanted. It was arriving early to doctors' appointments and being there, ready to go, when everybody woke up in the morning. It was thankless, I can tell you. But it was heroic and life-changing to me. I loved it.

So. Snowbound with my boys and no hope of leaving? Thank you, God. You forever remind me of your goodness and all that I have. Please watch over those less fortunate than us during this crazy storm you have thrown at the one city I know can and will handle it.

Outside my house:

Inside my house:

Grandma

The hardest thing about it, I think, is the way my brain continues to be surprised. Each time I expect to see the strong person I have known my whole life, and instead I see someone exhausted and frail. Her mind is as sharp as ever, and my heart hurts knowing that she is acutely aware of everything that is happening to her.

My grandmother ran races and marathons until she was eighty-one years old. She worked out. And I mean, aside from running, she lifted weights. My friends' grandparents did not run or lift weights. She once asked me to polka with her. We were at my uncle's wedding and she wanted to polka. "I don't know how," I'd said helplessly. "That's okay," she'd replied, and she lifted me up off the ground in her strong arms and carried me around that dance floor, polka style. I was seventeen years old.

When I reach for her now, I am aware that she cannot lift me up to polka, but I am still surprised that her hugs are like a whisper. "I love you," they say, and I am grateful.

But I miss her fierceness. I miss seeing her at the dinner table, her elbows propped up, her hands clasped to the side of her face, joining in the conversation. She argued, she laughed, she drank wine with dinner and coffee at dessert. She passed the pasta and she declined the dessert placed in front of her, only to sneak a bite here and there when she thought no one was looking.

I have her eyes. She has always told me that. "Green eyes like Grandma." When I was young and foolish and knew everything and nothing, I'd roll my eyes and wish for blue eyes like my father or brown eyes like the Van Morrison song. But it is her eyes that still hold her spirit. They still have her spark, her lightness. She looks at me with her bright eyes and says what she has always said, "How's my Mary?"

If I close my eyes, I can still see her strong. Her broad shoulders, held straight and proud. I can picture a thousand different times she has found me in a crowded room with her green eyes to say, "How's my Mary?" When I was sick. On every birthday. Christmas night, after she'd finish the dishes and find me sitting at her piano. At Sunday dinner. In the hospital after all three of my children were born. When she held my hand and stared at me hard and said, "You cannot be a writer until you sit down and write."

She is eighty-four years old. She has cancer. And still she fights. She does not run anymore, but for her, the race is not over.

Please pray for my grandma. She is wonderful.

New Beginnings

Well, this is it. Tonight is it. It is the final hour of my stint as a Super Awesome Stay At Home Mom. Everyone keeps asking me, "How do you feel?" It's a question with fifty meanings of course, because I'm eight months pregnant and it's hot out and tomorrow I'm leaving my children and returning to work after two years of not working. Not that being home with Joey and Noah hasn't been work. It's just that doing something you love every day, and wearing whatever you want when you do it, and having a bathroom at your immediate disposal, doesn't feel as much like work as...well, work.

I am excited. It's an adventure to go back and have a room filled with faces who are waiting to hear me speak. I'm not their mother, so listening to me isn't being nagged as much as it's about getting good grades and establishing a positive reputation. They laugh at all my jokes. Middle schoolers think I'm really funny. I do know basing my self-worth on the opinion of a seventh grader isn't ideal, but there are days where it really makes a positive difference in my life. I love when people laugh at my jokes, and it's a very small, select circle of people who do. Middle schoolers just happen to fall into that circle.

I'm also excited to read poetry and write essays and talk about the crafts of reading and writing. I love when students walk into my classroom for the first time, a place I like to call "Bielecki Land" (which comes complete with its own queen--ME--and laws I can make up as I go). Their faces are so expectant and open. They have no idea what I'll be like (I'm told I'm very loud) or what they'll learn, and even the very worst ones have a light, an optimistic spark, on the first day.

It's just that in my heart, I can't stop repeating an old favorite movie quote again and again: "Well, I'm gonna get out of bed every morning...breathe in and out all day long. Then, after a while I won't have to remind myself to get out of bed every morning and breathe in and out...and, then after a while, I won't have to think about how I had it great and perfect for a while." (It's from Sleepless in Seattle. A little melodramatic, but par for the course if you know me).

What I remind myself of is this: No matter how hard it is to go back to work--and this is the really important part--it's temporary. Temporary is a concept I struggle with. When Joey was born and went through his colicky phase, everyone kept promising me, "It's only temporary," and I felt like punching them all in the face. "Temporary?" I wanted to scream. "Screw you! He screams for hours for no reason!" But what I've learned is...everything is temporary. Life is all ups and downs and lots of changes. Even the things that last manage to evolve so much over time that at the end of a journey, you can't believe what it was when it began.

So I'm telling myself: If I can do this thing, a thing that in great scope of life is small and quick, if I can get through it, it will be that much sooner that I hold my brand new baby boy in my arms. I will introduce him to his brothers and cuddle him for those amazing first few weeks. I will get this incredible chance that I didn't think I would have again. And that will be temporary, too, but if there is anything I have learned in being a Super Amazing Stay At Home Mom, it's that loving and raising a child is the most super amazing thing I'll ever get to do.

Here's to new beginnings.

Happy Anniversary: I Choose You

There are a lot of different ways my life could have gone. I think about that a lot--I know you're not supposed to, that it's considered, I don't know, ungrateful somehow to give time and energy to wondering how life could be different if you'd just turned left, instead of right, at that one fork in the road that one time.

I've come to a lot of forks. Knives and spoons, too, honestly. And sometimes I like to sit and wonder what I might be like, what anything would be like, if I'd made different choices. I just do.

I wouldn't have been a teacher. I know that for a fact. I don't know that I regret being one, because it's something that I love and that I'm good at, but it has never really felt like a place I actually belong. I've always felt a little bit like a kid playing school in the basement, with my mom's teacher manuals and an old half-used spiral notebook as my official grade book. More times than I can count, I've thought to myself, "I can't believe these kids are actually writing down what I tell them."

Joe and I got married when we were twenty-four years old. Nine years ago today. It was a beautiful wedding, really like a fairytale. At the reception, when the DJ announced us to our guests, "Mr. and Mrs. Joseph...Bielecki!" we descended from a mezzanine on a winding staircase to the theme song from Disney's Beauty and the Beast. I mean, it doesn't get any more fairytale than that. But when I look around at twenty-four-year-olds I know now, I think...Oh my God. I didn't know anything. We didn't know anything! What did we know, except that we'd already loved each other a very long time, and wanted to spend the rest of our lives feeling like we did on that magical day?

If you're thinking this is going to be all about what makes our marriage perfect and what makes one work, I'm sorry to disappoint you, because I really don't know. We are far from perfect. I really don't know how Joe and I have survived real life, and forks in the road, and really, growing up together. And not just for the nine years we've been married, or the ten years we've been together, but since we were kids. I've been calling the same person for nineteen years with my problems. And if you know me, that means Joe has received a LOT of phone calls, everything from "I'm in the ER" to "I accidentally splashed the juice of a Clorox wipe in my eye, do you think I'll go blind?" Everything from, "My heart is broken," to "My parents are going out for dinner without me!" Everything.

I can't speak for all people, especially in a world where most of them don't stay married, but maybe that's what has worked for us. The everything. Because when I look back on my life, every fork, knife, and spoon, there is one constant. One person who ended up beside me no matter what choice I made...and only half the time on purpose. I think that's pretty remarkable. I've made some pretty bad choices, if you want to know. I've made choices that deliberately put me in the opposite direction from Joe, and then turned around just to see him still right by my side. He's not always happy to be there, and I'm not always glad to discover him there. But in the end, the Universe has been pretty clear: it's where we belong.

When I was in college, my family had two dogs, Sam and Morgan. Sam was awesome and Morgan had issues. Anyway, I came home one afternoon to a house empty of everyone except Sam and Morgan, so it was my job to take them outside. We always had to take our dogs out on leashes back then since we didn't have a fenced yard. I hooked them both up, pushed open the screen door, and went to rest my foot on the top step leading down to the patio so the dogs could run past me and I could hold open the door.

The only thing was, I had completely forgotten that my parents were having the patio redone, and that the back steps which had been there my entire life were simply...gone. And not yet replaced. When I went to lean on that top step to let the dogs go by, I found myself falling out the back door, down, down, down, completely unable to stop the fall in any way, until I crashed on the concrete below, the dogs landed on top of me, and the door slammed shut above my head. (The dogs, bless their hearts, dashed madly away because doing their business was of greater importance than my well-being.)

They call it falling in love because it's just like that...it's unexpected, it's out of control. It's unbelievable! When it's happening, you think, "Oh my God! There's nothing to catch me!" but you can't help it. When Joe and I were first dating, he sent me these song lyrics: "we didn't know, we didn't even try...one minute there was road beneath us, the next just sky." 

Our lives have not continued on in that way, because just like that day with my dogs, eventually every fall ends. You land. And, if you're like me, you land on concrete and everything else lands on top of you. In the great scope of my life, it wasn't two dogs, but two children (and another one coming!). I think a lot of people hit the pavement and look around and say, "This doesn't feel as good as the falling part," and that's when they get up and walk away. It's probably never that simple, but in the end, I think the reason why I'm still married to Joe, who hasn't sent me meaningful song lyrics in years, is not because of the falling, but because of the choices. Because I choose him, and will continue to choose him. After nineteen years, I'm no longer surprised to look up and see that he's still there beside me, even when I've followed a path I thought was mine alone. Now, I expect him to be there, because it wouldn't feel right without him.

I have loved Joe through high school, when he broke my heart more than once. I have loved Joe through buying houses, and decorating them, which no one ever told me would cause arguing and disagreement, but it did. I have loved him through new jobs, and old jobs, and no jobs, and living in different cities. He has loved me through kidney stones and thirty-six hour labor and emergency c-sections. I love him every time he tries to surprise me, even though I hate surprises. He loves me despite who I am in the morning, which is something not quite human and feeds on despair and anger.

I think that, as we enter our tenth year of marriage, a milestone, a trophy of sorts, it makes perfect sense that our lives are about to change, AGAIN. And is it like this for everybody, where it can never just be a small change? I'm returning to work after two years off, and we're having a surprise baby after deciding we were out of our baby years. This is so not how I saw things working out...a phrase that makes me laugh because it reminds me of nearly every important thing that's ever happened to me, including the very night I met Joe for the first time. I had smoothed back my hair, put on my swagger, and gone to put the moves on him, Mary Pat style, when he abruptly turned to my friend and started dancing with her.

Maybe that's why I never mind spending time thinking about how different my life could have turned out. Maybe I'd be a professional writer. Maybe I'd live in England. Maybe I wouldn't be germophobic, or so quick to say no to everybody. But I also know that no matter what my life's choices are, they always seem to keep me with Joe.

Happy Anniversary, Joe Bielecki. I chose you all those years ago, and for every moment of every day, past and future, I'll choose you again. You are, in every way, my soul mate.

Panic Room

When you're married, there are days when you run out of fingers to count the ways the other person annoys you. There are also times, however, when a heavenly light shines down on him from above and opera music sings in your ears because you realize you're just that lucky to have found the right person for you.

This morning I woke in a panic because of a terrible dream I'd had. I won't get into too many details, but it was one of those vivid ones that feels like it's lasted for hours. I will say that in it, myself and my fictional dream family were being stalked and attacked by a vicious man and woman team who hoped to ultimately bury us alive.

Some people dream about rainbows and unicorns, I think.

Anyway, when I woke up, I ran up the stairs to check on my children.

"What's wrong?" Noah asked. He was already awake, but thoroughly confused by my sudden onslaught of tight hugs and hundreds of kisses.

"I just had a bad dream," I said. "I just wanted to see you."

He didn't look reassured or pleased. He looked completely bothered.

Anyway, it was too early for anyone to be out of bed, so I went back downstairs where I found my husband awake. Apparently, my antics had awakened the whole house.

"I had a bad dream," I said, pulling the covers back up to my chin, and from there I proceeded to relate each terrifying second of the story that had played out in my subconscious.

"That sounds really cool," he commented. "You should write that down."

Ugh. That's not the moment where angels sang. No heavenly lights yet.

"The thing is," I went on, "I've decided we should have a panic room."

"Yes."

I never expected him to agree so quickly. I really thought the costs of such a project would be an immediate deterrent. What does it even involve? Lots of steel, I imagine. Locks that work even in the event of a power outage.

Still, Joe's fast support was a big deal. Buoyed, my plan began to take shape in my mind. "We could build it upstairs off the baby's room."

"How would it get air?"

"I don't know," I said. "Maybe a window? Or a vent?"

"Seems flawed. A point of weakness."

I ignored him. "But then if it's upstairs, and there's a nuclear bomb, the whole thing would be wiped out. Maybe it should be in the basement."

"Yes."

"With a secret trapdoor from our bedroom down into the room."

"Don't stop there!" he said, his face becoming animated. I could tell my excitement for safety had become contagious. "We should install a fire pole from the boys' room all the way down into the panic room. No time wasted!"

"Oh, no!" I cried. "How would we get the baby down? I'm already down here! I'd have to run upstairs and somehow manage to slide down the pole with the baby?"

Joe waved this away. "Nobody gets to use the panic room unless they can slide down the pole themselves."

I whirled to look at him in horror. Before I could speak, he gave me a pointed look and said, "Right. Because that's where the conversation got ridiculous."

Cue angels.

Red Gatorade

One of my larger personality flaws is that I have a terrible intolerance for being made to feel like I'm somehow less than others. This has a broad range of situations it can affect, and while you may generously tell me, "Oh, everyone has that issue!" I'm quite sure I take it to a whole new level. For example, when I was registering for my baby shower eight years ago, I asked the salesman at the baby-stuff store whether they had a stroller with an adjustable handle. They make these now, but they didn't then. I was terribly troubled by the idea that when my baby was in the stroller, he wouldn't be able to see me.

"OH," said the salesman, as if he was about to tell me the most unfortunate news. "We do have one, but it's VERY expensive."

So there I was, having my own personal Pretty Woman moment. I could feel my heart start to race and my face get all hot and hands all sweaty as I prepared to shout, "I'll take FIVE!"

Luckily, I was with my sister who knows all the signs of such disasters, and she firmly grasped my shoulders to steer me away, all the while listening to my huffy rage over the nerve of that salesman. I mean, really! How does he know I'm not Mrs. Moneybags, ready to dole out whatever it takes to be sure my baby can see me from the walks I probably wouldn't take him on?

Anyway. Today I had another one of those moments while I was on the phone with my sister and Noah appeared before me with a drenched polo shirt. "Mommy," he said, "I spilled my drink."

Normally, I don't get very upset about spills because of all the things that can happen, they really are among the most harmless. But this was red Gatorade.

"Did it spill on to the rug, or just you?"

"Oh," he said casually, "I don't know."

I tucked the phone between my ear and shoulder as I grabbed towels and carpet stain remover and dashed into the family room.

"Oh! It really is everywhere!" I relayed to my sister.

"Is it red Gatorade?" she asked. "Why would you buy red Gatorade?"

It's a fair enough question, and the answer starts off simple. Because Noah has a lot of upset-stomach problems and Gatorade makes it better and he best likes the fruit punch flavor. But what irked me was my sister's tone. The question that began with the words, "Why would you..."

Not only was I gritting my teeth in preparation for what was surely going to be a know-it-all lecture from my know-it-all big sister, but I was also recalling a recent ruffling of my feathers at Wegmans. It was a rare shopping trip where I had to bring both of my children, which means I was trying to make it last the least amount of time possible. (If you're wondering, the fabulous Wegmans grocery stores do offer a convenient little childcare service which I promptly walk right past because that's entirely too germy for my crazy.)

As I was placing some Gatorade in my cart, a random man stopped me and said, "Excuse me, ma'am. That's awfully sugary for your children." Whoa now. Stepping on the Mommy Toes. He continued, "These kinds over here don't have sugar."

Once again, my face grew hot and my hands were sweaty and my heart began to race as I said calmly, "Actually, those drinks have artificial sweeteners, which is a chemical I'd prefer to not give my children. But thank you."

When we walked away, I remember Joey commenting, "Wow, Mom, you were really nice to that guy!" I love his moral support.

This means, though, that when my sister was seeming like she might go criticizing my Gatorade choices, I became a little sensitive.

Instead becoming critical, however, she said, "Because they actually make clear Gatorade."

What??? Out loud, I said, "What???"

I have to be honest, though. The real reason I was so annoyed is because a few days ago, Noah said, "Mom, can I have some Gatorade while I watch TV?" and I'd said, "Sure!" and filled a cup and brought it into him.

He'd frowned at the cup and then at me. "Mom, this doesn't have a top. I'd like my cup to have a top because I don't want to spill."

My response? My cheerful response? "Oh, honey, I'm sure you won't spill!"

Then yesterday, Joe caught me bringing both boys Gatorade in the family room with lidless cups.

"Mar," he'd said to me, "are you sure it's a good idea to give them red Gatorade with no tops?"

And I'd said confidently, "Of course! I do this all the time!" I was more than confident, too. I was also offended that he was questioning my choice.

Because, you see, I couldn't possibly be wrong.

And then, well, today happened. So mostly, I wasn't mad at my sister, or at the guy from my Wegmans, or Joe, or Noah. I was mad at me. Two notes to self: 1) Lids on cups are a good idea. 2) Buy the clear Gatorade.

And if that guy was trying to be helpful, why didn't he point me in the direction of the colorless beverages?? Jerk. Actually, you know what? I am mad at the Wegmans guy. All that meddling and he didn't even tell me the useful information. I blame him.

Think of the Good Things

My Sicilian mother taught me that if you have a dream that someone dies, someone (not necessarily the same person) is going to have a baby. She also said the reverse is true, if you dream someone has a baby, someone else will die.

I have never found this to be true.

Oddly enough, however, every time I am pregnant, a lot of people I know pass away. I am not saying I have any sort of power over this. I know that I don't, I just find it to be an odd coincidence, especially in light of my mom's old superstition. Right around the time I learned I was pregnant with Joey, my great uncle passed away. "It's going to be a boy," my mother declared. Despite the fact that I called him my little Isabella until the sonogram, my mother was right. During that pregnancy, a number of other close relatives passed away, as well.

When I found out I was pregnant with Noah for sure (the only baby who was not a surprise in our house, despite what nosy, know-it-all onlookers may believe), my husband Joe was so excited he dashed out to tell the whole world. I was so annoyed! To me, pregnancy kind of "belongs" to the mother and he totally stole my thunder. I guess that seems unfair to a lot of people (namely men), but that's just how I see it. But it ended up being a wonderful thing that Joe did, because he was able to share the news with his grandfather, a very beloved member of our family, before he passed away just days later. And during the next nine months, though something wonderful and exciting was happening for us in our house, we lost several other people who we knew and loved.

Just a couple of months ago my sister invited me to help her paint some rooms in her house. She helps me with a lot of things (like...a LOT), so I agreed. On our way to buy the paint, I brought up Mom's old  superstition, and then shared my own experiences.

"That's weird," she said.

It happened that day that we had just lost our uncle. It was sudden, and he is our closest relative in our family we have ever had to say that kind of good-bye to. Jane, especially, was affected--I'm not sure if it's because she is the oldest, more sensitive than the rest of us, or just saw him often. For me, it was a shock. I'm not sure I'm even over it, or able to talk about it much. My dad's family is a huge part of who I am and choices I've made. Losing part of them is strange, especially since we didn't see it coming.

"Yeah," I responded to my sister after a moment. "Because I'm pregnant."

I'm pretty sure she almost drove off the road.

This week alone I've found out that two people I've known have passed away. I don't know if I'm seeing this because it's merely part of getting older and growing up--I'm sure my elders would assure me it is--or if it's my emotional state due to being pregnant. I can't imagine it's actually true that more people I know die when I'm pregnant, and yet as I feel myself growing excited about my something new and different, I am surrounded by a grief that doesn't seem to have a chance to lift.

I remember once when I was teaching, I asked my students what they noticed while they were reading. It's an innocent enough question with lots of room for right answers, but nobody raised their hands. (Typical little jerks.) So I prompted. I prodded. I threw out leading questions. They gave me plot summary, rather than the unusual and special little details authors leave in stories, like footprints to the ending.

"No!" I shouted. They all leaned away, as students in my class are wont to do because I'm told that I'm scary. "No! Don't you want to be noticers? How many of you can tell me what the poster above the drinking fountain says?"

None of them responded. (Typical little jerks.)

"It says 'Character is who you are when no one is looking.'"

One kid shouted out, "I knew that, I was just afraid to say it!"

Yeah, right. Like that person who watches Jeopardy! and always knows the answer right after the contestant or Alex revealed it.

Anyway, it led us into a huge discussion about how in life, it's really important to not just float along, taking things as they come, but to also notice things. People, though we might not often think about it, do act in a purposeful way. Signs are hung for a reason. Rules are there for a reason. Usually, there's a great story behind them. But if we try harder to notice the things that everyone does on purpose, and to even notice the patterns in things that aren't deliberate, we might become fuller and more compassionate people ourselves.

"Be a noticer!" I shouted with enthusiasm.

They rolled their eyes. Some yawned.

I learned this from my parents in very different ways. My mother always reminded me that people are always watching us when we don't know it. They're noticing me when maybe I'm acting like a jerk. "That's what they'll remember," she always said. "Not the good things you do to be noticed, but the things you do that show who you really are." She was always right about that.

My father, on the other hand, was more the type to pay attention to the small things. On warm summer nights, he could always be found lost in thought on the front or back patio, peacefully watching everything around him. It was these times when I loved to go and sit beside him, because he was likely to share a neat little story from when he was young. His life was fascinating to me. One night watching the sunset on the beach, he revealed to me that when he was a little boy, he'd sneak away from his family to come and sit just as we were. When I asked why, he chuckled and said, "Usually to sneak a smoke." He was seven in that story, by the way.

A lot of the time, we forget to slow down in our busy lives to be noticers. When I learned that a high school classmate of mine passed away suddenly, and my heart crumbled inside of me, I realized how much about her I could remember, though I haven't seen her in fifteen years. I remember the exact shade of her hair, the way she laughed at everybody's jokes in class. I realized she was in most of my classes all four years of high school, and while we weren't close friends, she was present in many of my high school memories, all of which have become a part of who I am now. Realizing all that I noticed, and all that we were both a part of, is both jarring and reassuring to me as I deal with how unfair it is that she is gone. Because while she is gone, she is still present in many, many people. She is a part of us.

The last thing I want to say incorporates two more things I've learned along the way. (Sorry if this is preachy...is it preachy? I'm sorry.) One comes from a friend and colleague of mine, a person who is crazily different from me, so much so, we end up believing a lot of the same things. (That's not the lesson.) Something she always says rings so true for me right now, as I feel all the the things pregnant ladies feel. She says, "It's amazing how weather is so often a metaphor for what's going on in life." After I dropped Noah off at school today, I was driving down one of the older streets in our town and enjoying the canopy created by the full, old trees lining the road. Noah calls them "summer trees" since they only have leaves in summertime. While I drove, I did something I do every year. I thought about all of the things that will happen while these leaves, these in particular, are in bloom. Everything that will happen before they fall for another winter.

When spring came in 2005, I thought about how those leaves would see my first baby. I would spend a whole summer learning what it meant to be a mother. In 2008, the buds on the trees meant my second baby would arrive at any minute, and the leaves would see Joey become a big brother and Joe and I struggle to learn how to do all the things we'd learned...with two.

This year, these leaves will be falling as our third child arrives. Before, having children seemed like new beginnings to me. And in a way, that's what autumn is. But to me, it's more about change. I am so excited for a last chance to do it all, for tiny clothes and tiny fingers and little hats and first steps. But this time, it will mean change for more than just me. It will be a change for all of us, who have grown into a routine we did not expect to be altered in this way. Noah, our baby, will surrender his throne to become a middle child. Joey will give up having his own room. And Joe and I will find out what it means to not have an even parent-to-child ratio. What it will mean to have an eighth-grader and a kindergartener, a college student and an elementary student. It is something new, it is something scary. It is something different.

But that brings me to my last lesson. Noah turned to me today in the middle of my morning grumpiness and said, "Mommy, mornings are okay. Just think about everything good. Don't think about anything bad. Then you can feel good again."

I realized--I noticed--that it has become a habit to me to always prepare for the bad days. The tough days, the ones when you don't catch a break. With kids, I find they come much more often than they did before. But I think I've become so used to preparing for these days that they have filled my head a little too much. Amidst the grief and the sadness around me, it will be okay if I follow Noah's advice. There are wonderful things, too. And as I fill my heart with prayers for the families and friends who need them, I think I will also fill myself up thinking about the dream I had last night, where I held a tiny baby girl in my arms and felt her soft fuzzy hair on my chin.


Disclaimer: I have not had THE sonogram yet. I have no idea if I'm really having a girl. It was just a dream. 

Things My Mother Taught Me

Happy Mother's Day!

I've been sitting here in front of my laptop for about twenty long minutes, a blank screen glaring at me all accusingly. The thing is, I know I want to write about my mother today, but the thing is, I have no idea where to begin.

The thing is, she's complicated.

I considered making this a tribute to how beautiful she is. No matter what else she's ever been--strict, overbearing, unreasonable, insane--she was always the prettiest mom. I look nothing like her, unfortunately. To my blond curly hair, hers is black and poker-straight. To my light green eyes, hers are, well, she'd tell you brown, but they're really black. In fact, when she's angry, they're a little on the satanic side. Especially since she wears such bold eye makeup. Dark black eyeliner and thick mascara, and then she'd look at you with her eyes all wide and perfectly round like saucers, and this black outlining the crisp whites, all around the coal black centers, and...man. When she looked that way, I saw my life flash before my eyes, I'm telling you. And, weirdly, she was always cooking, so there'd usually be some sort of weapon in her hands. Like a meat mallet or a wooden spoon. It's totally true that she chased my brother, sister, and me through the house with the spoon. She never caught us, though. We'd lock ourselves in the bathroom and she'd stand on the other side saying loving, coaxing things like, "YOU KIDS ARE GONNA KILL ME, DO YOU HEAR ME?" Well, actually, Mom, the whole state of New York hears you. "I'M GONNA CALL YOUR FATHER AND DO YOU KNOW WHAT'S GOING TO HAPPEN THEN? HE'S GONNA KILL YOU!" The important things to note here are: A) She put the fear of God in us and B) she always let us get away. I can say now as an adult: God, that's good mothering. I always try to do the same for my kids.

I considered discussing what made my mom different from other moms, aside from her beauty. But there are just too many things. Quite honestly, I'm so much like her, I think I'd just end up tooting my own horn, anyway. (Which I do enough in other posts.) So instead, I've decided to create a list of the best advice she's ever given me.

1) Make it garlicky, and make it sweet. When in doubt, add parmesan. (This is for cooking, but can be a life metaphor if you wish.)

2) Hair: the bigger, the better, baby.

3) Be bold. Stand straight. People are watching.

4) No matter how bad someone is to you, smile and be nice. Have a good time. No--have the best time.

5) Smiling makes you a thousand times more beautiful.

6) Isn't it just easier to be nice? (The answer is no, it's way easier to be a bitch, but nice pays better.)

7) Shopping makes everything better.

8) Giving to the people you love is the best feeling.

9) Always cook enough for 700 people.

10) Always answer the door and the phone.

11) Words our men don't like: No, Wrong, Don't.

12) Words our men like: Yes, You're Right, and What can I do for you, dear?

13) It's okay to have the loudest, most ridiculous laugh in the room.

14) ADD/being scatterbrained are hereditary. There's no hope for me, but I'm still awesome.

15) No matter how far you've come, how publicly or loudly you've committed, you can always change your mind and do the right thing. 

16) Family comes first.

17) Family love is unconditional.

18) Never upset the woman holding a meat mallet or large knife.

19) Never tell Judy bad news when she's driving.

20) If someone has just had eye surgery and says, "No, it's okay, I can drive," it's not true.

21) Act in a way that no one has anything bad to say about you.

22) It's never okay to fart.

23) When Dad gets really mad, it's kind of funny. But if he sees you laughing, he gets more mad.

24) When Mom gets really mad, it's not funny. Hug her and kiss her and tell her she's beautiful.

25) Don't make mistakes.

26) You can never go wrong with a Polo dress.

27) Nobody wants to talk to you when you're on the phone with somebody else. And turn off your ringer in public.

28) A woman is not just her husband and children. She is much, much more, and should have and do things that remind her of that daily.

29) When you are feeling angry and venomous, shut your mouth and walk away.

30) Those times when it seems like only you notice that a person is awful, don't be the one to continually point it out. If you're right, they will "dig their own grave." (That's a Judy-ism.)

31) Children need and want their mothers no matter how old they are. Children need and want their mothers no matter what they say. Children need and want their mothers, even when they think they don't.

There are a lot of things I can describe concisely and well. Big Macs. Paintings. Middle schoolers. But my mother? I don't think there is any one word for her. And it's not enough to say she's everything, either. She's more like...everything, lit on fire, rolling down a dry, grassy hill. She's also the person who knows me best, knows my thoughts and feelings before I even know they're there, gives me my words when I can't find them.

Dear Mom, you have been the lighthouse in my storm, every time. I love you.

A Little Bit of Kindness

Before I had school-age children, I had a lot of strong opinions about how the parents of my students dealt with their school-age children. For example, when a child in my homeroom came up to my desk in the morning and said, "I forgot my folder. Can I call my mom and have her bring it?" I scoffed at them. "Of course not," I told such students. "You forgot, and now you have to deal with the consequences." And in my head I would think, "What kind of over-coddling, helicopter parent would even do that for the kid?"

You know what I did this morning? I dropped my children off at school, only to discover that it was school picture day and we all had forgotten. I raced home, found them each a dress shirt, and...brought them back to school.

I have no idea where my standards have gone.

This is not to say that I was never kind and understanding. I was, on a lot of fronts. But I must say that at the school where I taught/teach, I had somewhere around one-hundred-twenty students total. Also, I teach middle school, not elementary, which I think is a big deal, since perfectly responsible angelic children morph into something other-worldly in seventh and eighth grades. If I let every kid who forgot their folder, or their school-picture outfit, or their anything, use my classroom phone to call home every time they forgot, I'd be working as an operator far more than I'd be teaching good and valuable testing skills--I mean, English skills (just kidding, and that was a shot at the state of affairs of education in general, not my district which is fantastic).

But I still look back and cringe. When I raced back into the building this morning with two button-down shirts (and an undershirt for Joey, who doesn't wear one under his uniform and therefore needed one), well, Noah was just confused. His class was already lined up to go down to have their pictures taken, and as I thrust the striped shirt that brings out his eyes over his Superman t-shirt, he demanded, "What are you doing? This isn't right!" His irritation was evident in his furrowed eyebrows and frowny mouth.  "Just do it," I said, buttoning as fast as I could. "It's what all the cool kids are doing."

What was his teacher doing? If his teacher was me five years ago, she would have been frowning with poorly hidden distaste as she expertly kept the other students in a military-straight line and led them in an organized fashion through the halls, so quietly you could hear a pin drop. But Noah's teacher is wonderful, so she smiled, began walking the somewhat squirrelly preschoolers through the hall, while her assistant stepped over and helped me button Noah's sleeves. "Don't worry," she told me kindly. "We have plenty of time. Isn't funny how forgetful we can be?"

After that, I rushed down the hall to Joey's classroom. Their school is small, so their rooms are on the same floor. I love this, because at least once a day they see each other. It makes their day. Joey's teacher greeted me at the door with a smile, then turned into the room. "Joey! Go ahead and change!" He came to the door, hugged, and kissed me in front of all his friends, who weren't even paying attention to us and who I really don't think would tease, because at some time or another their moms have come around and probably hugged and kissed them, too. They are a small, close-knit class who get along well. So cool. There was a moment when the teacher and I joked about how Joey and I are so forgetful all the time, and I was instantly put at ease about what I once would have considered my completely inappropriate presence in the school. In fact, I still do think it was inappropriate, but the nice thing is, it's a school that's about family and understanding, even when it comes to little things like this. My kids didn't have to feel uncomfortable because they forgot something (well, really I forgot, too). They didn't have a teacher who scoffed at them, or judged their crazy mom.

I'm going to admit I'm not thrilled about going back to work in the fall. I've loved being home with my kids and being there for them when they need me. But I can say this. My time home has made it such that when I DO go back, I hope to bring some of the kindness and understanding I've learned through being a parent of school-age children with truly wonderful teachers. Yes, I'll have one-hundred-twenty-some students, and it will be a different building with different rules and expectations, but you know what? Kindness is kindness, and today, it made my day. I certainly will love doing that for one-hundred-twenty-some families.

What I Missed

I spent this last weekend in New York City at a writing conference. It was one of those plunges where I knew the water would be a little too cold, that when I was fully submerged, my body would go into shock for a second before I kicked and paddled to the surface, where I'd feel even colder because there was a breeze that I'm pretty sure was nonexistent before the big jump. Yes. That was me and the writer's conference. Except...aren't we always glad we jumped? The exhilaration? The reward and surprise at yourself as you gasp, "I did it!" Yup. That was me and the writer's conference.

It was my second trip to New York City. Interestingly, I was pregnant for both trips. Here's what I have to say about the city itself: A land of many bridges. People walk right into you and don't say excuse me (I found myself being so surprised--every time--that I said it instead, because there was a clearly a need for someone to excuse themselves and I can't let things like that go). The sun only touches the ground in the middle of the street, which is generally a bad place to be standing. The skyline of Manhattan is so crisp and clean it looks like it's made of beautifully painted boxes instead of steel and brick and cigarette smokers. And, oh, yes, right around the time you'd want to fall asleep, men stand on the sidewalks with whistles and blow them all night long.

Joe the Husband came along for my protection. Since I am pregnant and cities are big and I am small and, on a scale of one to ten, my sense of direction is negative forty, I felt horrible calamity might befall me if I chanced it alone. I was probably right. Plus, Joe is one of those cool, collected people who loves to be in a group or can go to the movies alone and be fine either way, so he was able to enjoy the freedom of the New York streets while I spent the days smartering myself on the glorious and limitless facets of being a writer.

I was shocked then when each segment of time we spent together began and ended with the phrase, "I just miss the kids so much." For the record, this was spoken by Joe, not me. It's weird. Back when they were smaller, I was the one feeling achy and sad for them, but now they're big and crazy and a lot of trouble, really, so I wasn't falling into so many of these sentimental lapses as Joe was. Then I felt guilty. Joe's face would grow long and moony while I was cheerfully sitting there all carefree and out-of-sight/out-of-mind. What a downer. I mean, this probably our last getaway for the next five years. Toughen up and have some fun.

Anyway, we ate a lot of great food, and we got to see Jersey Boys, which was totally awesome since I grew up listening to the Four Seasons. And when I say I grew up listening to them, I don't mean, like, when I was too young to choose my own music and listened to whatever my parents played. I mean that even when I got to high school and developed my own opinions, I still chose to listen to music of that era. I just prefer it. Joe gives me a hard time about this, since he's like, Mr. Nineties Alternative and his soul moves for Pearl Jam and Alice in Chains. Here I am, wanting to swing my snapping fingers side to side, hip to hip, smiling and light-hearted, and there's Joe, all broody in his flannel shirts feeling anger and bitterness and groaning along with the grunge. Yeah. I'm totally the weird one.

Joe loved Jersey Boys, too, though, because how could you not, and then finally it was time to wrap up our trip and head home. We came in on a late flight, and this morning went to my mom's (my amazing, heroic mother who babysat not just two grandkids but FIVE this weekend since mine was not the only trip and she's some sort of saint with superpowers) to fetch our children.

I'll admit that when I woke up this morning my heart was fluttery. I think it may have actually left my body, crossed the street, and camped out at my mom's front door, impatient for me to shower and get dressed. I did miss them, even though it was nice to be away and I was able to do things that would have been impossible to do had they been there. But they smell so good, you know? And their smiles are so twinkly. And their arms are so small and their hearts are so big.

I walked into my mom's house to silence, which could only mean one thing. They weren't sleeping, Noah wouldn't allow that the entire time, apparently. No, they had to be watching television. I tiptoed into the family room, and waited to be noticed. Joey and Noah were cuddled together with their cousins on the couch, everyone in pajamas with bare feet and messy, sleepy hair. Joey turned quickly, and his face lit up.

"Mommy!" he shouted. He flew off the couch and threw his arms around me. "I'm so glad you're back."

But nothing prepared me for Noah's reaction. He was slower to react. Maybe it was because he's not a morning person like Joey or maybe he just couldn't believe I was really there. This little boy, my Noah, my troublemaker, my monster, my Mr. Crazy Pants. This boy who said to me on the day I left, "I don't like mothers and I don't like you. My life is horrible!" He climbed out of his seat and ran to me. His small arms didn't hug me, they clutched me around the neck and he whispered over and over, "I knew you'd come back. I knew it. I just missed you so much. I missed my mommy so much." He buried his face in my neck and his hands played with my hair. I couldn't believe that this was my little tough man. "I cried and cried for you," he moaned, "and Grandma didn't even care!"

"That's not true!" my mother said indignantly. "He didn't cry once."

"No, I didn't," he amended, "but I was very, very sad without you."

Joe stood behind me a long moment, waiting his turn for such a Noah greeting, but my little boy just wouldn't let me go. He nestled himself on my lap and curled into me, and said, "Don't go away again, Mommy."

Joe did eventually get his hug, and we took the boys home and fed them squished street pretzels from New York City and got them ready for school. My house smells like old laundry and needs a good cleaning, and I have to pick Noah up from school soon. I thought I was sad my special "me" weekend was over, but now...I think being home with family is even better. Here's to getting back to the grind.

Simplify; Hop Over Detours

Rule 5: Simplify. Focus. Combine characters. Hop over detours. You'll feel like you're losing valuable stuff but it sets you free.

Once again I am struck by the way that the Pixar Rules of Storytelling match life. Imagine this not as a strategy for good writing, but one for life.

Think of the most recent problem/setback/stress in your life. The one that gave you that piercing headache in your eyebrow, made you want to pull the covers over your head, and eat a lot of carbs. (Wait. Doesn't everyone do that?) What did you have to do to get through that problem? Well, honestly, I can't know. Maybe you did fill up on bread and French fries and pretzels and...okay, pregnant lady is getting distracted...

Back to the point. Whenever we're bogged down by life, we generally need to take a step back. See the proverbial big picture. There are a lot of details about the situation, a lot of backstory, that we get all hung up on. There are what-ifs or could-haves. There are worst case scenarios and distant, but probably unattainable, possibilities. There is so much to the whole circumstance that our brain overloads just thinking about it, resulting in that piercing eyebrow headache.

So what do we need to do? Cut to the point. Every problem has its solution, even if we don't like it. Even if it's hard. And it's not just hard to carry out that solution, it's hard to forget the little things that we know about all the rest. The he-saids and she-saids, the fine print, the emotions. But we have to forget all that, and ask, "What is really the issue here?" and "How can I best fix it?" So we have to forget. Or put to the side. Grow larger and force ourselves to remember those things are smaller in the grand scheme of things.

Simplify. Focus. Hop over detours. Let go of what seems important (probably only to you) in order to be free to correct the problem.

And that part about combining characters? In writing, this is important because too many people with too many roles is confusing and cumbersome both to the reader and to you, the writer. There's too many "he saids" and "she saids" and varying scenes and details to remember. In life, it's no different. We tend to spread ourselves out among the people we love or value or even dislike, wearing ourselves thin and knowing we'll never please everyone.

As a writer, I say choose the qualities you like from each character and place them into one great person, or two great people. For a life situation, limit yourself in a situation to the people who will help you the most. If you are bogged down by the negative things people have said, or the scary things they've predicted, or how a person has hurt you, cut it loose. Forget it. Focus on what you can learn, what you can change, and what you can control. The rest is useless.

The truth is, life is just writing your own story. No, I know I didn't invent that. But it's such a valid point I had to use it here. In both a good story and the lives we want to lead, we've got to eliminate what holds us back. We must be strong, we must be choosy, and we must make our story worth telling.

Please check out what the other bloggers are saying about Rule #5!

Kate Brauning  Alex Yuschik  Regina Castillo  Talynn Lynn

Letting Life Happen (And Rule 3)

Rule 3: Trying for theme is important, but you won't see what the story is actually about til you're at the end of it. Now rewrite.

There was this boy I knew in high school. Average height, blond hair, blue eyes, always wore his varsity jacket. He scored crazy high on his SATs, getting the math part totally perfect and coming close on the verbal. He had two sisters and a brother, and he drove one solid minivan.

Oh, yeah, and I was in love with him.

The night we met, I found out his name, where he went to school, and what sports he played. That was when I decided I wanted to marry him. Astonishingly, he did not feel the same way. But I persisted. I was like a hangnail, I was. Impossible to get rid of, constantly annoying. Even when he tried to forget about me, I made sure there were constant reminders of my belief that we were meant to be together (phone messages, notes, a mutual friend dropping "accidental" hints). After awhile, he relented and got to know me as a friend. It was probably both his biggest mistake and best decision.

To him, I was Annoying Girl Who Inexplicably Loved Him. To me, he was Amazing Guy I Would Someday Marry.

By becoming friends, however, and having to bother getting to know each other, I found out he had a strange and quirky sense of humor. That he laughed too loud at movies and ruined every romantic moment by shouting something obnoxious and irrelevant. I learned that while he didn't love the idea of accounting, he knew he'd be good at it and wanted to be successful in life. He loved funny movies and he was really good at making me laugh when I was having a bad day.

About me? Well, quite honestly I have no idea what he found out. I never really asked him, because I was so busy being shocked by the fact that this guy, this Amazing Guy I Would Someday Marry, was an actual person. His name was Joe and the things he said and did reached into my heart and made me feel tingly.

For awhile, I tried reading into the nice things he said to me. Things like, "Your hair curls up in a crazy way at your temples. I call it your Squiggle," and, "Why don't you ever just be yourself around your friends? I can tell when you're pretending," said to me, "He notices me! He sees all the things no one else does. He loves me!" Because I was still rooting for my first impression to be right, to be real.

And then one spring night, he told me he wanted to ask my best friend to the prom.

I had spent all my time trying to force a theme into our relationship. I wanted it to be romance. I wanted it to be true love. But that's not what it was. It was friendship. And I had to acknowledge that as much as it pained me, the two characters in our story took the plot in a different direction.

We can't force themes into our lives. We can't take the things that happen and make them mean whatever we want them to. Rather, we have to look at the things outside of ourselves to find meanings. Whether they're real people, characters in books, or characters we write. If you want an authentic story, fiction or nonfiction, the characters will be different from each other and have minds of their own. Their interactions will build the plot. Sometimes, it will be exactly what you want. Other times, it will serve a crushing blow. But most importantly, it should be surprising. Stories are meant to mirror real life, and real life never turns out the way we think it will.

Because if it did, once I realized that Joe liked my best friend and not me, we would have drifted apart, lost touch, or maybe I would have forgotten him. But I never did. I never could. And it turns out, he didn't forget me either. We lived our lives, we wrote our stories, until one day, we came back together. And I don't think it took him more than five minutes to tell me that seeing my face was like "coming home."

In less than a year after that, he asked me to marry him.

I think it's always best to let a story unfold in the way it's meant to. Let it surprise you, or make you cry, or be angry, and let it live. A story, truly, has a life all its own, as unique as the people in it. And it's only once we look back on it that we see the themes that truly matter. Not the ones we tried to make happen, but the ones that did all on their own.

Please check out what the other bloggers are saying about Rule #3!

Kate Brauning  Alex Yuschik  Regina Castillo  Talynn Lynn

Pregnant Lady Super Powers

The average person's body temperature is 98.6 degrees. I think right now mine is 1000. I'm like Jake from Twilight. Also, I'm producing like 75% more stomach acid than regular people.

God gave pregnant women super powers, but they're not really any good. Like, what's up with my sense of smell? I'm a bloodhound. Actually, if you gave both a bloodhound and me a piece of fabric to sniff, I'm pretty sure I'd find the criminal first. The other day, my family and I were sitting in the family room watching a movie. After about ten minutes, Joe had to pause it. "Why are you sniffing like that?" he asked. "It's so loud I can't hear the movie!" It's true. I was sniffing. Somewhere around me I could smell something foul. Turned out it was the garbage in the kitchen. Nobody else noticed a thing. I recognize that could be because they're all boys, but since this issue has only arisen in the last few weeks, I'm thinking it's me.

I have the power to fall asleep anywhere, any time. This one just takes a power I already had and kicks it up a notch. I've always been a powerful sleeper, but now? In the last two weeks, I have fallen asleep in the bathroom (Noah was taking too darn long), in the hallway (another incident with Noah), on the couch, in a chair, and at the kitchen counter. It's partially my fault, I know, because I stop to take little rests and, well, one thing leads to another, but after a point it becomes ridiculous. I looked the extreme exhaustion up online. Apparently, all my energy is going into building a placenta. So, okay. Super power number five.

I could probably be dropped off a twenty-story building, and if I landed on my breasts, I'd just bounce gracefully up to my feet, completely unharmed.

I have really thick hair. Take that, world. Oh, and super strong fingernails. Ba-bam!

I burp like a fifty-year-old man with a beer belly at a bar.

My brain has morphed into fluff. That's not a super power, though. It's really more of...a super excuse. Today, for example, I had no memory of the fact that it was Noah's snack day, that Joey was having a party at school (for which I was meant to buy treats and actually come in to help), or that Joey was getting his report card. I also just now realized that at least eight times in the last forty-eight hours Joe asked me to take care of something in the mail and I still haven't done it. And I mean...I haven't even opened the envelope. Honestly, I don't even know where the envelope is. I also sat on my glasses when I got into the car. Because instead of putting them away, I just left them on the seat. Why did I do that? I don't know. I have fluff for brains.

Oh, and what about this horrid taste in my mouth all the time? I never had that with my first two babies. You know that taste you get in your mouth after you've accidentally fallen asleep? The one that makes you frown and slap your tongue around in your mouth for a minute before you get up and brush your teeth (I hope)? I have that all the time. And you want to know the kicker? Brushing your teeth makes the taste worse. I thought I must be crazy, but then I Googled it. Some other pregnant lady out there in the Internet void had posted about it. Her solution? Swish baking soda and water around in your mouth. Well, super. If I weren't so nauseated all the time, maybe I'd get right on that. Anything pasty looks gross to me right now. Along with raw meat, wet paper products, and bathrooms in general. Although...again, I do live with three boys. That bathroom thing sort of goes for all the time.

I cry at really strange things. Anything with children. Kay Jeweler commercials. My children crying. Banging my elbow for the fortieth time in one day. Actual sad things, of course, like terminal illness and death. Running out of laundry detergent. Indigestion. Although, go back to paragraph one, my indigestion might make The Rock cry.

I think it would be really funny if I somehow managed to save the world using my new powers, but for now, I'll just keep reminding myself why I have them. It's kind of the greatest super power of all.

I'm growing a person.

On Having More Children

This is for all those annoying people who find it humorous to nudge Joe and me in social situations (a little too hard, always, as they prepare to love their own joke) and say too loudly, "Why don't you have another baby?" I mean, seriously. What is wrong with people? Even worse are the people who respond to my polite, "Probably not," with, "Don't you want to try for a girl?" Ew. I really don't like that expression. Try for a girl? Like...it's just rolling the dice? Because if I don't get a girl, I still have a whole person, you know. I'm not going to fling my hands up and cheerfully say, "Whoopsie! Roll again!"

So, to all those people, I'm going to go ahead and share the reasons that my husband and I have for deciding our two boys were enough for us.

1. Joey and Noah are as perfect as two kids can get. We feel so lucky to have had such great kids, we  don't feel it's fair to monopolize the Universe by adding another perfect child to our family.

2. Money. We currently have negative dollars. I mean, we're not dressing the kids in brown grocery bags yet, but don't be surprised if that's what you see in a few months. Maybe some cardboard box shoes, too.

3. Joey is seven, Noah is almost five. We have reached that comfortable point where our children are big enough to have earned us our freedom. I don't mean I'm taking off for a global cruise and leaving Joey in charge, just that they are independent enough that I can leave them with a babysitter any old time, or have them stay overnight at my mom's without worrying. (Much.)

4. I probably would not survive an additional person needing me in the middle of the night. Perhaps if Noah had EVER slept through the night, it would be a different situation. I'd also like to add that his sleep issues are not because I'm stupid or inept. I'm pretty hardcore about sleep, as I myself need more than normal people. However, it is has been a learning experience for me as I've come to accept Noah is a person who A) is different from me, B) needs less sleep than anyone I've ever heard of, and C) doesn't conform. On that last note, I'm a big enough person to point out that one day (though not now, or any time in the next twenty years) that will serve him well and make him awesome.

5. Joe would not survive me not surviving an additional person not sleeping in the middle of the night.

6. We are thirty-three years old. If we had another baby, we would be fifty-one when s/he graduated from high school. Unacceptable. My own parents were much older than everyone else's and I felt like an outcast. I won't inflict that on my child.

7. Babies make me nervous. Nay. Scratch that. Never mind. Yes. Babies make me very, very nervous. They are small, they are helpless, and they cannot verbalize their needs. What a nightmare. Also, I never really overcame my fear of their wobbly, vulnerable heads.

8. I hate potty-training. Nothing good about it.

9. Joey and Noah would have to share a room. I had to share a room with my sister and it made her hate and resent me. My brother also hated and resented me, but it was because I was not a boy. That hardly seems fair so I'm moving on. When I was born, baby number three and a BIG surprise to my parents, who were super content with their one boy and one girl in their adequately built three-bedroom house, my mother put me in the bathroom. I will not inflict that on my child. (It's unclear, btw, how long that lasted. She gets all vague and sketchy when you ask her point blank.)

10. There is no guaranteeing I would have a girl, and I don't even know that I would want one. I'm a lot of work, and I certainly don't think I could handle another me. Also, maybe Noah would be really scarred. He's quite content to be the baby of the family, and both children are old enough at this point to be insanely cognizant of the goings on involved with pregnancy and new babies. Unlike Joey, who was unsuspecting at age two when Noah arrived, both boys would see their lives changing, and they will remember it forever. I don't want to scar them!

11. I do not enjoy being pregnant. I've also been working on a top-secret recipe/experiment for permanently removing stretch marks after the birth of a second child. If I had a third, all bets would be off and I'd have to start all over again with my ground-breaking work.

12. I've used up all my time off at work. I simply cannot have another baby.

I'll wrap this up like a middle schooler writing an essay. In conclusion, as you can see, there are many reasons Joe and I have decided--firmly--not to have another child. So to all those people with their smug smirks and light social laughter, kiss off.

And anyway, none of it even matters. Because as much as we all love to make plans and think things are in our control, God points and laughs at us and then fills our lives with special blessings we never thought we'd have. SURPRISE!!!!!

Peaceful, Easy Feeling

Sometimes, there's a time in life where everything screams that what you're about to do is logically and inherently a bad idea, and you do it anyway. And sometimes, it blows up in a million pieces. Other times, however, it ends up being just exactly right.

I learned in a pretty harsh and brutal way when I was twenty-three that everything I had believed to be true was...not. I learned that things I had either taken for granted or dismissed completely made the biggest difference not just to me but to life in general. But hardest of all was that I suddenly knew in the most crystal clear way that I was not the person I always thought I was. It was like every time I looked in the mirror I was meeting a new person. Of all the words to describe the feeling that evoked, I can only come up with...weird. Unsettling. Upsetting.

But there was this one night where I realized that all of that was okay. That I was okay, and everything else would be, too. You see, it was one those times where I did the dumbest thing possible. Having realized I knew nothing of myself or the world, I called up a boy. This would be the exact moment where a best friend or a sister or a mom would stretch their lower lip off to one side in a grimace and say, "Is that really a good idea right now?" And they did say that, all three of them. But I did it, anyway.

When I climbed into that boy's black Chevy Blazer, the strangest thing happened. It seemed that despite all my own personal confusion, he knew me. He knew all about me, including the mess I was at that very moment, and he could look me in the eye and say, "You look great." He asked, "Are you cold?" and pretended the button for the seat heater, located along the bottom side of the seat, would be impossible for me to find. He leaned all the way across me from the driver's seat, his arm across my waist, to flip it on for me.

Then, across the shadowed console of the dark car, he took my hand and started to drive. Red taillights glowed against our faces, and green traffic signals and white streetlights. We started at one end of Union Road and drove as far as it would take us. An hour and a half later, we were in another county. He swung the car through a U and headed back from where we came, stopping off at a Mexican restaurant that featured a mariachi band. He opened the car door for me, quickly grabbed my hand up again, and walked me inside.

I wasn't really hungry. He ordered himself some food, and when the waitress came over to check on us and asked, "Is everything okay?" he said, "No, it's really not good," because it wasn't and he's like that. The waitress walked away in a huff, and he looked over the table at me with his eyes all a'twinkle. He smirked, reached over and covered my hand with his. Almost more than anything, I remember how he just didn't want to let go of me.

Then the mariachi band took their break and regular music came through the ceiling speakers, probably a little louder than they intended. As the words to the song began and we recognized it, he started to sing. First quietly, and then a little louder and more boldly.

When I was a little girl, I always imagined that a boy would stand under my window with a guitar and sing to me. Then when I was a teenager, the fantasy changed to a boy in a trench coat with a boom box held up above his head. And now, I realized that the gesture was finally happening. Not outside my bedroom window, but in a Mexican restaurant whose food had not been good that night and whose mariachi band was on a break.

There's absolutely no reason that something so mundane should be important to me. But like everything in life, it was more about when it happened and how it lined up with everything else that was going on that made it matter. A long drive in the car at night, holding hands with an old friend, lousy food at a Mexican restaurant...so what? Except it was that night that I suddenly remembered who I was after all. Sometimes we have to remember we aren't just individuals struggling through a journey alone. We're meant to have right times, right places, and right people around us to offset the unfair imbalance that life often brings. They give us that small tilt, a shift, a nudge in the other direction, so that things fall evenly and we can say, "Hey. I'm going to be okay." So that in the middle of a big mess, we can get a...peaceful, easy feeling. ;)

I guess what I'm trying to say is, sometimes the thing that seems like the worst idea can lead to the best of everything.

Non-Negotiable

My mother bought me this really fantastic hair straightener for Christmas. I used to faithfully straighten my hair every day, until one day I realized that stepping out of the shower and just being ready is actually way easier. Who knew? So I gave up straightening my hair for many, many years.

Until my mother bought me this present. I must admit, it's pretty amazing. It doesn't take me very long--which is saying something, since my hair is pretty thick (I've actually been told by snarky hair dressers that I'd just better WARN them on the phone next time because my hair is "unreasonably thick," as if I have any control over that), and it doesn't make my hair all large and in charge, either.

Well, today, time wasn't on my side and I didn't have time even for the super fabulous quick straightening, and I wore my hair curly. I must tell you, each time I passed by my own reflection it was like seeing an old friend I'd been missing. And oddly, I felt relieved. Like for a little while there, I hadn't quite been my real self, and now I am again.

The more I thought about it, the more reflective I became about when exactly I became definitively me. Waaay back when Joe and I first got engaged, a friend of mine and I were discussing the various ups and downs of embarking on a new life with another person, and she quite wisely said, "You just have to be really clear about what you decide are you non-negotiables." My response was quick (if naive), "That he love me, take care of me, not leave me or cheat on me or hurt me," and she sort of laughed and rolled her eyes and said, "Well, aren't those everyone's non-negotiables? What are yours?" But for me, at that time in my life, those were it. I'd actually been in a place where they weren't glaringly obvious to another person, and I figured I would never need much more than that, so as long as Joe could be counted upon to be, you know, a decent human, we'd be all good. And since I'd already known Joe at that point for ten years, I felt pretty confident I knew what I was getting into.

Lucky for me.

Because quite honestly, if you asked me today, I bet I could brainstorm a whole shiny new list of what my non-negotiables are. Topping the list would be do NOT roll your eyes at me and do NOT move things from where I put them. Ridiculous? Yes. Negotiable? No.

So what happened between then and now? The obvious answer (and the cliche one) is life. Life happened. More specifically? Let's see if I can outline a few of the more glaring specifics that have changed me into the curly-haired person I was so relieved to see in the mirror this morning.

1. Children. Children are messy and annoying and dealing with them alone totally sucks. Dealing with them with another thinking human is, like...impossibly hard. Imagine: I have one idea of how to handle Noah singing "Video Killed the Radio Star" at 2 am, and my husband--what is he thinking?--has the audacity to have a different one. The moral of the story: Nobody can predict their child will have an affinity for singing vintage rock songs in the middle of the night.

2. Mail. Young people really don't understand about mail. My older sister was completely in love with it. The affair began when my parents first subscribed to TV Guide, and it only became more passionate from there. For this reason, I wrongly predicted that one day receiving my own mail would be a magical and satisfying experience. How wrong I was! Mail brings bills and other kinds of bad news. It is a reminder of everything you have to do but don't want to do. It contains advertisements for things you want to buy, but your bank just sent you a letter saying you can't afford to. Sometimes, it contains random letters you suspect might carry illness. (At least if you're me.) And then these envelopes, these harborers of evil, pile up and up in a really inconvenient place in your home. Because half are for you and half are for another person and some are for now and some are for later. You create a system for managing it all, and then the other person, the person who was only meant to love you and take care of you and never hurt you (non-negotiably), comes along and moves the system to a different place. A secret place. It might be the garbage. It might be the cupboard. It doesn't matter. It was moved. Moral of the story: My sister is weird and mail is bad.

3. Modern literature. I have one name for you: Jodi Picoult. Reading Jodi Picoult, or any other writers who have subscribed to using her kind of endings, is akin, in my humble belief, to a person offering you a basket of freshly baked cookies. "They're still warm," the person might say. You're elated.You heart soars. Warm cookies? you think. How delightful! Calories? I don't mind spending them on freshly baked cookies! You reach in, take a cookie, and bring it to your mouth. You bite. And then, more than anything, you want to spit the cookie back out. Those were not chocolate chips. They were raisins. Oatmeal raisin cookies are my equivalent to Jodi Picoult books.

4. Owning a dog. I understand that Joe and I did things a little backward. The way most people do it is they get the dog before they have the children. Joe and I messed up. We had the babies first. Babies are hard! Babies are trouble! Babies do not sleep and then they grow up and sing "Video Killed the Radio Star" at 2 am. I actually rolled my eyes and laughed at people who owned dogs but had no children. But now? Now I see the usefulness of their choice. How much more patient I could have been with someone who isn't human if I didn't actually already care for and nurture small humans. Now, all I keep thinking about is, "I have to clean up your mess and you're not even a person. This blows." No moral here, as far as I can see. But I may not be seeing things in the clearest light since I've been up at 2 am for almost five years listening to rock songs.

I became a teacher because I was done with college. I became a wife. I became a mom. I own a house. I have an SUV that seriously hates me. I hate cold weather and I live in a place that has miserable weather for at least eight months of the year.

But when I looked in the mirror this morning, and saw my own old face surrounded by curly hair, I smiled and walked on, humming a certain Buggles song under my breath as I went. Behind my eyes a slide show played, showing me an array similar to the following.