Is it so small a thing to have enjoy'd the sun?

I recently attended a book club meeting in which we discussed The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. One of the main characters, Elizabeth, has a quote she repeats frequently, "Is it so small a thing to have enjoy'd the sun..." My husband and I looked up the quote and discovered that it is from The Hymn of Empedocles by Matthew Arnold:

Is it so small a thing

To have enjoy'd the sun,

To have lived light in the spring,

To have loved, to have thought, to have done;

To have advanced true friends, and beat down baffling foes...

It is now one of my favorite poems. I love it because it's about enjoying the ups and downs of life and living in the moment. It reminds me of another quote titled "Success" that I learned from a friend in college:

To laugh often and much;
To win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children;
To earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends;
To appreciate beauty, to find the best in others;
To leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition;
To know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived.
This is to have succeeded.

They both espouse a very good philosophy and one that I need to remember as I grapple with the question of going back to work. How do I define success? Why am I in such a hurry to put my 2 1/2 year-old in pre-school all day? What is driving me to do it?

I thought I knew. I have been out of the work force for five years which is a long time to be out for a person with a technology degree. My two older kids are in school all day and my youngest is 2 and a half and she goes to preschool two days a week. What am I going to do with myself all day?

More later...

More on Mothers

I wonder if grown-ups who still have their mothers around understand how lucky we are to have had a mother raise us and still be with us.

I recently attended the Heart Gallery of Central Texas Gala sponsored by the Adoption Coalition of Central Texas. The Heart Gallery is a display of portraits of older children in foster care who want to be adopted into a family.

At this gala, I met a very nice young woman who at 36 was finally adopted. One would think that at 36 she would have already gotten used to flying solo in the world, but to her the adoption was the start of her healing. She had been searching for a family her entire life. She talked so proudly about her new Mom and her brothers.

But every where I look, I seem to find stories of people who long for a mother. I also recently met and befriended another very nice young woman who grew up in a house with a mother who had a mental illness. My friend basically raised herself and then got placed in foster care when she was in her teens. She is now married with children so she has created her own family, but not having a mother has really been hard for her.

The mother of one of my roommates passed away when my roommate was six. She left behind two little girls under the age of 7. My friend talked about missing her mother terribly. The only physical evidence that her mother had existed was a purse my friend had in her closet and a picture of her mom, her dad, my friend and her sister that she had on her dresser.

I attended a reading by Sandra Cisneros a few months ago and she mentioned that when her mother died, she cried because she felt like an orphan and she was 54.

And then there are the lucky people, like me, who not only have a mother, but also had a grandmother to care of me. My grandmother lived at home with us and made every one of my meals for my first 18 years of my life. She baked cookies for me. She sang me lullabies so I could sleep. She held me in her arms when I was sick or sad. She hugged and kissed me every day of our life together. My mother worked outside the home, but she was there for me always. My mother still calls me once a week, and she worries about me when I am sick or she hasn't heard from me in a few days.

I just cannot imagine the void that one must feel when that person who adores you more than possibly anyone else in the world, is gone.

I feel for those children in foster care and I wish I were in a position to adopt a few of them. I feel for my friends who carry this sadness inside their hearts every day. And I feel so fortunate to have been born into a family with caring parents and caring grandparents.

But I can't help but wonder, why me? And why were those children at the Heart Gallery born into families who couldn't take care of them? Why am I the lucky one and not them?

I wonder.

TTYL.

Are You My Mother?

For Daniel's Back-To-School Night, students in his class had to write a short description of one parent. The teacher read the descriptions out loud during the classroom meeting with all the parents. Parents then had to guess if the person described in the essay was them. Here is what Daniel wrote:

"Who Am I? By Daniel Kauffman

Do you recognize this elegant woman with dark brown hair?

My mom has dark brown hair, brown eyes and the smell of Pert [shampoo] when she gets out of the shower. She's short and old. Her eyes sparkle like water when the sun hits it.

My mom is always caring for me. My mom is funny. She makes me laugh. My mom helps me a lot. She is fun to play with. She's cool playing with me. She's very smart with computers.

My talented mom is good at making dinner and lunch. She is very fast and good at texting. She's very good at making me mad then calming me down. She gets scared easily.

My mom enjoys watching me play baseball and my sister soccer. She enjoys reading, writing, and math. She also loves school.

Are you my mother?"

I find it interesting that he thinks I'm elegant. :) I find that comment so endearing. I should ask him what his definition for elegant is. The other thing that cracked me up is that he notices the smell of my shampoo, which by the way, thanks to a new friend who knows a lot about hair, I am now using Nioxin shampoo and Redken conditioner and neither smells like Pert. I wonder if he'll notice the difference. I also thought it was funny that he mentioned that I text a lot. I'm a little embarrassed by that comment, but I can't blame him for writing the truth. I'm just glad he didn't write other more embarrassing truths about me...

And I'm not THAT old. :)

Never-ending Summer

Summer starts in Texas around April. That's when we start getting those 85 degree days regularly. By the time school gets out at the end of May, the days are scorching hot and the temperature is hovering in the upper 90's. So when the end of August rolls around and the heat is unbearable--always above 100 degrees, I am so ready for a sign of fall. Typically, that sign is the first day of school!

This year, however, summer seems to be dragging on. After spending countless hours getting ready for school --organizing school supplies, picking out clothes, packing lunches, getting backpacks ready, and finding that shoe that always seems to disappear when you need it most--Daniel wakes up with a fever on the first day of school. How can a child who has had one cold all year get sick the day school starts? Somehow that one little incident has thrown off my entire plan for the week. I was supposed to walk three miles this morning, go to the grocery store, mail my sister her reading glasses, drop off some things at Goodwill, write thank you cards, etc., but now it's noon and I am sitting here in my PJ's reading Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood, and taking my son's temperature every hour. I have spent most of the morning playing with our new dog Sadie and my two year-old. I guess I am disappointed because it feels like a normal summer day and I m so ready to get back into our fall routine. Hopefully, for his sake and mine, his fever will break and he will be off to school tomorrow so fall can officially start (for me. )

TTYL.

Texas Round-up, Here I Come

I am not sure why I was so nervous about the 10k I walked/ran today.  I loved it.  Absolutely loved it.  I didn't die (not yet anyway).  My brain didn't swell.  And they do have porta-potties along the route!  Woohoo!   

My friend Julie and I walk/run a lot together so it was fun to do this race with her. We didn't run the whole way, but we did run a lot.  I didn't train as well as I should've. I know this because I am lying on the couch nursing my very sore legs.  They feel like they are going to cramp up any second. My awesome neighbor across the street, who happens to be a nurse in a cardiac unit, brought me a gatorade and an orange this afternoon after I told her I had a headache.  She said I was dehydrated.  So no, not everything was perfect, but I had a great time walking and running those 6.2 miles this morning.  

I had expected to be done in 2 hours since it normally takes me 45 minutes to walk/run the first 3 miles and I was sure it was going to take me more than an hour to finish the second 3 miles.  I told David and the kids to meet me at the finish line at 11 a.m.  Well, to our surprise, we finished in 1 hour and 42 minutes.  My sweet husband showed up a the finish line right at 11 a.m. and we had been sitting for more than 15 minutes already waiting for him.  I felt so bad for him.  He had the camera ready to go and he had missed me crossing the finish line. Oh, well. Next time, the whole family is going to run the race so no one will miss any of it.  

I loved it so much that I am considering running the Texas Round-up 5 K on April 25th.  

TTYL.

Race Nerves

I am getting very nervous about the Capitol 10K this weekend. Why did I sign up for that? I am not a runner. I am so dreading this. The first thing that got me nervous is the waiver I had to sign. It talks about runners who die during the race having no legal recourse. Die? What did I get myself into? Then I took a look at the elevation map: lots of hills. Ugh. I hate hills.

I actually waited until the last possible moment to sign up for the race perhaps hoping that something very important might come up and I wouldn't be able to go through with it, but no such luck. I am on for Sunday at 9 a.m. Deep breath. What if I am the last one to cross the finish line???? No. That won't happen. What if I drink too much water and I get a swollen brain???? What if I have a heart attack in the middle of the thing or an aneurysm???

Ok, back to reality. This ain't no marathon. It's a six mile race. Who dies in a six mile race? Right? I will be fine. I will be fine. I will be fine. I will not be the last person to cross the finish line. I will not let my brain swell from all the water I'm going to drink. Oh, no...what if I have to go potty from all the water I might drink??? Are there porta-potties along the route??? Aaargh. Too many scenarios I have not thought about and probably shouldn't...

TTYL.

Rice Sandwiches

I went to a reading last night by my favorite author, Sandra Cisneros. The Austin Public Library Foundation sponsored the reading in honor of the 25th anniversary of the publication of The House on Mango Street. As with most things good that have happened in my life, my husband introduced me to her writing.

When we first met, he owned a copy of The House on Mango Street, a collection of powerful short essays about the lives of Latinas in poverty. I read it voraciously. I could identify with the narrator of almost every story. It seemed that her stories were about me.  

My all-time favorite short essay is "Rice Sandwich," about a little girl who wants to eat in the "canteen" with the kids who bring lunch to Catholic school every day. After relentlessly pleading and begging her mother to please pack her a lunch, her mother agrees, but they don't have lunch meat so all her mother can pack her is a sandwich made out of rice. The little girl couldn't be happier. She walks in to school with her lunch and a note from her mother asking the mother superior to let her daughter eat in the canteen. But the little girl is not prepared for the humiliation that awaits her.

Every time I read that story, I weep. Seriously, not just tear up a little, but really cry a flowing river of tears. I guess it's because the story reminds me so much of when I was a little girl and how badly I wanted to take a lunch to school. My dad always said no because we already got a free lunch at school. I couldn't stand those free lunches, especially on the day they served Tortilla Soup. It was so gross.  Everything was all mixed together. It looked like it had already been processed in someone's stomach. I longed for the day when I could bring a lunch box to school filled with goodies from home and then one day, I met my friend Julie Farmer.  She brought a lunch to school every day and she hated that. Funny how life is sometimes, but what a perfect opportunity for both of us! I gave Julie my free lunch ticket and I got to eat her delicious bologna or peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.  

Anyway, last night Sandra Cisneros read two new short stories.  Like the rest of her writing, they were powerful and funny. I did not realize Sandra was such a funny person. I should've known since her stories can be very funny. Her last story was about her mother dying when Sandra was 53 and how that made her feel like an orphan in the world. In the story, two little girls who just lost their mother also lose their cat, Marie. 

"Have you seen Marie?" the little girls walk around asking in the neighbors. 

"Marie, where are you?!" they call out.  

They don't find Marie but in the process of looking for Marie they discover that they are really looking for their mother. When they finally start asking about their mother, her spirit responds: "'Here I am!' says the Wind."  

"Here I am! say the Trees."  

"Here I am!' says the River." 

As usual I am not doing her story justice.  It was beautiful and as with most of her stories, by the end, I was sobbing like a baby. But the beauty of being in a room full of Sandra Cisneros fans is that when I looked around most people were sobbing, too.  

TTYL.