21 weeks: Baby Girl Land

We've been busy.  Tyler and Violet have gone through various illnesses throughout the past few weeks, and we're bidding on houses, and trying to figure out how to make Christmas Christmasy without going home to California to be with our extended families this year.

I'm keeping my head above water, still exercising a couple times a week doing Zumba--which always sounds like a horrid idea when I'm sitting at home on the couch feeling lazy and pregnant, but always makes me feel like a million bucks when I'm actually out there moving around.  Energy is pretty good, spirits are high, time is moving forward, and we're somewhere around 21-22 weeks-- a little more than 5 months into this thing.  

Mid-pregnancy is a super exciting and slightly stressful time because it's when you get to go in for the huge show-stopper ultrasound.  

I think Tyler and I were both a ball of nerves going into the appointment.  There have been all of these little wormy thoughts and fears in our minds that this pregnancy might not actually be happening as it should--  still in disbelief that everything might being going as planned.  It's really hard having gone through a miscarriage before to not constantly have this little thought in the back of your head that something might be wrong.  

But, thankfully, we watched the silver-toned screen flicker for about an hour and saw this amazingly active and alive and seemingly perfect little person show off--  feet, hands, nose, head, kidneys, heart, and a spine like a fish with tiny little bones, all in row, curving down to a little round bum-- all moving in the dark.     

It's incredibly amazing.  Shockingly amazing.  Every little thing right where it should be; punchy little hands wave about and explore the face and find the nose and mouth.  There are fingers and toes.  There are eyes.  Bones and joints.  

We're on our way.  

And she is she.  A girl.  A second little girl for us.  

I feel like I'm the luckiest person in the whole world because I get to have not one but two girls to raise and watch grow up. 

I never had any sisters, although four brothers were quite fun.  I am excited for Violet, and for this little baby girl--  that they will have each other as sisters.  They can argue and sneak around and call each other when they need an opinion about something.  Is that what sisters do?  I wouldn't know.  I'm excited to find out.  

19 Weeks!

It's been a while since Ive posted anything about this tiny growing person inside my belly.  We're at 19 weeks now.  Do you know what that means?  It means we're almost halfway done!!
I have to say, in general this pregnancy has been much easier than my first one with Violet.  --Not that it's been a cake walk, but I generally I feel better than I did.  Maybe it's because I have my eating figured out these days (I know which foods create headaches, stomach pains, mood swings, lethargy, etc..).  Not that I haven't given into cravings for cheesecake and kraft dinner… but at least I can predict how I will feel afterwards and know how much is too much to send me on the fritz and over the top of a body-chemistry meltdown.  When I was pregnant with Violet, I had no idea any of these food intolerances were lurking with everything I ate.  I felt horrible almost the entire pregnancy.

Mostly now I just feel happy.

Also, I have so much support in my life these days than I used to.  So very much more support than I did five years ago.  I have made exercise a fun part of my weekly routine, I have my work that I love and that keeps me busy, I have a wonderful network of friends and moms who I can count on to laugh and cry with, and I have my most extraordinary husband (of course, he was there the first time-- but I feel like this time around he has somehow gone above and beyond every expectation with his greatness).
Also, this time, I have Violet.
Violet keeps my spirits up, and keeps me busy and distracted every day, which actually is an enormous help.
Next week we get to learn if it's a boy or girl kicking around.  Whatever it is, it feels strong already.
I'm feeling these little punchy kicks.
It literally feels like butterflies all flitting about at once-- knocking around, drinking root beer and pop rocks.  When I'm flat on my back it's a bit startling.  It's a good thing my brother and sister gave us a box of baby socks; I have a feeling those feet are going to need some protection against the wind when they're kicking wildly in the open April air, just 20 weeks away.

     

Appendicitis, or maybe Pneumonia, or maybe a Mystery

There are a lot of really tough parts about being a parent, but on Monday we got a tiny glimpse of what the hardest strand might look like.  

Violet had a bit of a fever on Sunday.  

Then, Monday that little-bit-of-a-fever turned into a raging fire fever, and I found her doubled over on the bathroom floor crying in pain that her chest and stomach hurt.  She was breathing in this really shallow quick way; she was in agony.    

We ended up in the urgent care of Group Health-- and they started doing all of these tests--  putting IV tubes into her tiny arms, drawing blood, pumping her full of fluids, taking ultrasounds.  It's hard to have to hold your child while they are weeping in pain, and know that you have to be the strong one.  You have to comfort them and help them feel safe, even though you are scared bananas.  

Group Health decided without a doubt that it was appendicitis and that she needed to be taken to Children's Hospital to have surgery that evening.  So, off we went, in the middle of the night, across town to Children's.  

Let me just say first that Children's Hospital is an incredible place.  I was so impressed with them.  Every nurse and doctor there just showered kindness on our child.  Between talk and tests and fluid IV's we watched movies, played with play dough, looked at stickers….  and while we were all a bit distracted, they somehow were able to get her fever to come down a bit.  

More ultrasounds, and stomach poking, and X-rays, and finally we got word that the doctors and surgeons were not as certain of appendicitis as they originally had been.  We would have to wait and see if the stomach pain got better or worse and if it moved to the right side of her little bean body, and watch the fever too.  

2am, finally we were sent home.  

Tuesday, another checkup--  Violet asking me on her bed before we left "are they going to do more shots? do I have to go to the hospital?  am I going to have more sugar water in my arm through that tube?  sugar water, just like a hummingbird, that's funny!"  

But luckily, my little hummingbird has been getting better ever since Monday night.  They called and said it possibly could be a small case of what they described as "lower abdominal pneumonia", which often shows itself in young kids through similar symptoms as appendicitis.  

But her fever has tamed itself and she's jumping around like normal…so, at this point I don't really know what to think.  

Kids can get sick so fast.  It's terrifying, and its hard feeling so helpless.  

My tiny lady, who made me throw a birthday party for our cats last week, and who had me build her these giant fairy wings for Halloween.  I thought making fairy wings was hard, but let me tell you, this was so very much more difficult.  I would make fairy wings every day over having any of this happen again--  and really, even this could have been so much worse.  

Learning to Read

I've been ligging around the couch for the past three months, so extraordinarily tired and a bit ill.  Poor Violet, on the days when she's not in preschool, or doing ballet or soccer, she's stuck at home with her slug mom.  

But little people tend to be resourceful.  Yesterday she built a juicer out of tupperware, and I am constantly waking up from my couch naps to find tiny versions of Hawaii built out of legos and old popsicle sticks.
And when I'm awake, she sits with me in my big pile of cats, and blankets-- and we read.
We've been reading a lot.
We've been reading so very much, that she is now reading to me most of the time.
On good days, she takes my hand and pulls me up the road, past the troll, to the Fremont library to check out new "I Can Read Books", and then we bring them home and she devours them, along with juice and goldfish crackers.

I love to watch her face as she works out the words, the little sprockets in her head churning out all these sounds- "apple" and "puppy" and "time"-- with a little mumble to herself that the e at the end makes the i say it's name.  
It's so incredibly amazing.

Tiny little squirt, standing at the party with the Romans and Shakespeare, and Charlotte Bronte.  All the great readers and writers of the world, here comes my girl.  Smarty pants.
I'm a proud mommy.

   

11 weeks :)

Well. 

It's been an exciting couple of months.  Everything with the shoes, and our trip to Hawaii, and watching Violet learn to read and swim.    

And all that time, the most wonderful little secret stirring around...  

It's been a crazy year, with huge ups and enormous downs... and maybe that's why it was all the more amazing yesterday to see in simple hues of grey and white this eensy-beensy bean 11-week child waving around, kicking these wildly strong legs.  

We are cautiously ecstatic, but signs are good. 

If all continues to go well, April 11th can't come soon enough.      

  

Quiet

I was talking with a friend today, and I remembered something that happened about a year and a half ago--  It was a quiet afternoon following some sort of very social morning.  V  went into her room and shut the door.  And she didn't come out.  She was 3 years old at the time, and so naturally I felt a little worried at how silent everything was.  After 10 minutes, I knocked.  What are you doing?  Are you ok?  

And her answer was this mind opening moment of clarity for me: 

I'm ok. I'm working.  I'll come out when I'm done.  

She was building a tea party of great complexity with every animal and bottle cap and marble she could find... 

  

Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking.  

Have you heard of this book?  If not, you should google it, or check it out, or just jump in and start reading it.  My friend, who I love so incredibly much, and who happens to be one of the most lovely extroverts I know, also read it and adored it.  

Whether or not you consider yourself an introvert, it's a book that is worth reading. --One that I wish every single one of my school teachers had read growing up.  Anyone who ever felt as kid that Kick Ball is a bit like Lord of the Flies revisited could relate.  Especially now, raising a very introverted child, this book truly made me realize that being an introvert is not something to overcome.  When nurtured and supported, Introverts can be some of the best innovators, teachers, thinkers, creators, and even leaders.  I feel like I finally truly see it in my own kid-- and I am at peace with it, because I see it in myself too-- that all she really needs is down time each day, a quiet space for her mind to stretch and recharge.  Anyway, I could say more, but really.... just go read it.  It's short.  And it will help us all understand each other a little better.     

  

Quiet child-- go inside your Rubik's Cube.  

Take your time to line up all the greens and reds and blues as only you know how 

and come out laughing.    

--And watching,
mapping every word we say
in inky eyes, wide and brown
to translate all the noises into craft and cake
and stories that we'll read someday in magazines
or framed on walls in some museum
built for quiet contemplating minds.     

Monday in June.

Rainy June morning, after all that sunshine.  It provides a quiet space and moment.  Here we are-- Off the sidewalks, out of the sun, inside making lists.  Organizing work.  Did I clean my brushes from the other day?  Some old bank statement under little torn off bits of sponge.  And scraps of tissue paper kept from Violet's birthday that I thought were sweet and might use again for something.
A bottle cap, a spoon, a dried up tea bag in a cup.
Pencil shavings; sketches waiting to be hole-punched.
This is my desk.
Hello Monday.  Tired, aren't we.
Rub your eyes, this week is on and you are still in slipper feet.

Ceremonies

Ceremony season has nested fully in our home, with cakes and velvet regalia; flowers, balloon animals, champagne, family filtering through in soft-leathered shoes, and phone calls from those who are far away.

Yesterday was Tyler's commencement; He was hooded for his doctoral degree.  It was one of those rare exquisite moments that for years to come will be displayed in my mind as little snap shots--  His royal purple gown, and puff-pie pillow hat-- very medieval looking-- and his official hooding, with all his future colleagues cheering on.  Violet on her chair, starfish hands waving for her dad who began this whole endeavor before she was even alive.  

There is something special about these moments where we sit and gaze so intently at the life and achievements of someone close to us.   I remember as a kid watching my dad give talks.  All of these eyes focused on him, and the applause that would come at the beginning-- even before he had said anything-- it always made me realize (even if just for that moment) that my dad was in and of the world.  And it was no different with my mom.  She ran a toy shop, and I would sit and watch her running the counter, handling money, chatting up the customers, winning smiles and hearts.  So in charge.  

I think as adults we don't do this intense gazing enough.  But these ceremonies take us back to that spot, watching from the bleachers, as those who are closest to us achieve a formal place in the world of doers of great things.  

_____

As an interesting epilogue to yesterday's festivities, today Violet had her first ballet recital.  All done up in stars and tights and nerves, I left her with her dance-mates back stage.  It was a very strange feeling to just leave her there, and then sit and wait in the audience for the show to begin.  She kept saying to me this morning "yesterday we cheered for my daddy who was on stage, and today you guys will cheer for me"-- this little mantra going through her head, I could tell, up until the very end.  

Really remarkably strange-- sitting and watching my kid from afar.  Really watching her with that same intense graduation gaze.  As much as we're focused on our kids, I think (at least personally) it must be very rare that I actually take the time to silently just watch her like that, as her own little person with goals and hopes and dreams.  

I expected her to be fearful and miserable up there...  but she was beaming.  Costumes and dancing, friends, music, applause.  It was overdone and silly, and she was absolutely in heaven.  And then the best part: her glowing self pride at the end of it all.  Like she had done exactly what she had always wanted to do.
Goodness, I love my family.  And phew, I'm happy it's summer.  Time for a little rest and woods, maybe?  

This is Mother's Day

Yes indeed, tiny love, this is Moth Ers Day.  Thank you for this card, and for the 10-bead necklace of little plastic hearts.  With your eyes an inch away from mine, your single-breath decree: mama, you can wear this all day it's for you and it's made of hearts because I love you.  

Dress-wearing, garden-digging, baseball-watching, breakfasting like royalty.
This is Mother's Day.  And I miss my mother who is far away and enjoys all of these things.
Distance is so hard, they say, and it always is true.

With Oregon and half of California in between us, I sent my mom a book with a published poem, my own little version of a 10-bead necklace-- Because she is marvelous, and I am still wide-eyed and wishing I could do more.  I was remembering today how she taught me all of my times-tables in third grade.  She let me jump on the bed while reciting my seven and eights, which are tricky.

Mom, you taught me what motherhood is all about.
It is hard, and fun too.  A bit like learning your eights while jumping on the bed.
I love you, and I love my girl who ended the day by making me a red and green Christmas Zoo out of legos (because, as she poignantly put, Christmas is a really fun and special treat to have on Mother's Day).  
This is Mother's Day, and this is Motherhood.  What a kick!  She's such a little friend.

Oyster uncertainty friends.

Baseball friends.

Dress friends. 

****

Thank you, Mom, for finding in your 

wallet every year a spot for my school 

photo.  Even in 8th grade, when my face 

was mostly dental work, you found a space.  

What a gift of confidence this gave me, just 

knowing in my goofy grin you took a little 

pride.  

And even now, in my adulthood, as I 

wait in grocery lines, it makes me smile to 

remember hidden deep within your wallet, 

you have aligned my face with opera stars 

on ticket stubs, your favorite cookie fortune, 

and that one-hundred-dollar bill 

you found in 1984.  

Speaking the Language

When my kid is sick I find myself doing all these things my own mother used to do.  I set her up in this little picture of what I hope will help-- there's a small bowl of apple slices, a glass of water, a stuffed toy to hug, a kitchen pot just in case the breakfast toast comes up.  She sleeps in socks, under a pile of pillows and blankets, with the mid-day light of Thursday filling up the room.

Sometimes I feel so completely inadequate as a mom.  Maybe we all do.
When I was trying to learn Italian I remember someone telling me that you couldn't do it by translating in your head everything into English.  You had to just start thinking in Italian.
So uccello isn't bird.  Uccello is just uccello.  
I think about that a lot.
Motherhood is its own foreign language, but maybe it's something like Latin-- and some days I can't quite crack the code or get into the flow of it because it only really exists in poetry.  So I'm making up all these things to fill in the gaps as I go along, and just trying to think poetically instead of logically.

So I'll hold your foot while you rest, and know that somehow it helps.  Later, we'll do puzzles to help reduce your fever.

Violet's Map

I was listening to this interview with Simon Garfield on NPR a few months ago, and haven't been able to get it out of my head.  It was all about maps-- the making of them, how they are varied and flawed, and how historically they are these beautiful pieces of art.

But what really stuck with me was the author's point about how different one's experience is with a map than with a GPS.  

A simple point, but the author talks about how we lose the romance of maps when we turn on the GPS; we lose site of this whole unfolded huge beautiful large world that is out there-- valleys and rivers and mountains-- when we turn on the GPS we see only ourselves; a flashing dot that moves from A to B without a a larger vision of the surrounding world.  As the author says, "you get the feeling, actually, 'It's all about me'... It's a terribly egocentric way of looking at the world".  

Anyway, maps.  

I think this interview has been on my mind partially because Violet is totally and completely into maps. She is always handing us imaginary maps when we drive places these days, and whenever we go to the zoo we spend a good chunk of our time there just staring at the zoo map board.  When we get home, she unfolds her paper map and gets out some little people to trot along the yellow trail line, and shows how they can go from the goats to the bears and see the penguins and snakes along the way (but if they want to see the giraffes and elephants, they'll have to go a different way). 

I don't really know how she got into maps.  Maybe it started with India a few years ago, when we got her a playground ball that looked like a globe, and showed her Seattle and then India.  Then we started talking about other places, like Berkeley and Chico, and then Wisconsin and Whidbey Island.  

Well, long story short, Violet made her own map at preschool yesterday.  I think it's somewhere in between the romantic idea of a traditional all-encompasing map, and an egocentric (haha) GPS.  But, well, such is the mind of a 4 year old.  

Children's Concert at the Seattle Center

This afternoon we got dressed up in our fanciest of fancies and made our way to the Seattle Center for the annual Children's Concert.  We've never been, but now that Violet is 4 we're starting to do all this real person stuff with her like go to little shows and have extensive conversations about how peanut butter is made.

Anyway.

The Children's Concert was awesome.  It is put on mainly by the Seattle Men's Chorus and Seattle Women's Chorus, but also features acts from kids theatre groups.

The whole thing began with the men's chorus standing on bleacher steps singing Abba songs.  SO fun! A live orchestra, and so many fun interactive songs for the kids.  I was completely impressed.


Also, a storytelling of And Tango Makes Three.  Have you heard of this book?  Apparently it's controversial, and even banned in some places, because it tells the true story of two male penguins in a zoo who pair off together and sit on an egg and raise a baby chick with each other.
Can I just mention again how happy I am to be living in a city that would host a free concert for children that focuses on love no matter what the flavor?
Love is love is love, (at least in this family) and what a beautiful way to celebrate it today.  I am so excited that we get to raise our child here.  She will grow up in a community that is open and supportive and filled with so much love.

Also, I know I keep saying it, but I can't believe how suddenly grownup my kid is.  She wore this beautiful dress that she got for her birthday, and sat just like any other person in the big velvet theatre seat. She clapped and was attentive and laughed at all the jokes.
Also, she got to see a disco ball for the first time ever (yes, it blew her mind).  

Thank you, Seattle.  What a great public event.  Can't wait to do it again next year!

 PS-- We walked a mile in the monsoon to save $13 on parking, so we decided we all deserved a quick sushi snack after the show :) 

Chowder's Garden

Last October we lost our wonderful siamese cat, Chowder, after only having him for a year.
It was so rainy and dark.  Everything was stones and gravel and frozen dirt; and we had to burry him late at night, in the wet cold beginning of winter.
It was horribly sad.  Really unthinkably sad.
We still miss him; his eyes were the color of peacock plumes running toward me in the morning begging for breakfast.

In the week after he died, I found this paper sack of tulip and hyacinth bulbs that my mom had given me, shoved in the closet behind the summer sand toys.
Still trying to figure out how to deal with all the sadness of losing Chowder, Violet and I decided to plant a little garden for him.
So we went outside and sat in the dirt planting bulbs for an hour.
And it helped, just a little.

Well, it's spring now, and Chowder's garden has come into bloom!
It was hard to think, on that horrible stone cold October night that it ever could have happened.
You think life is gone, permanently, and then in the rosiest shade of rose, up it comes, and stands proud on the straightest green legs you've ever seen.
Your tulips, Chowder-- They look like flamingo eggs waving in the wind outside our window.  
We wave back.
They've made us happy.

Easter Birthday

When we brought Violet home from the hospital after she was born, I was terrified to take her outside.  I couldn't believe that she had made it safely into this world, and that we somehow had survived the first car ride home;  She was so tiny and I had no idea what to do with her, so I decided that the most sensible thing to do was to lock every door, swaddle her in a blanket, and just sit on my inflatable donut cushion for the rest of our lives together.  

Well, after two days of that, Tyler and I, coaxed by our parents, decided to take her for one very short walk around the block.  

We were petrified.  

I remember looking down at her-- this itty bitty little squish faced person rumbling along the sidewalk in an oversized stroller-- and I thought this is it.  She is not going to survive this.  There is no way.  Also, why is our block so big?   

But, somehow, I also remember looking up at the sky for the first time in probably a week, and it was blue as all get out, and the cherry trees which had been sticks when we left for the hospital were now in full blushing bloom.  Like the world was celebrating the arrival of my baby girl.  

  

It was spring, and it was gentle.  Thank goodness she wasn't born in winter.  I really don't think I could have handled snow.  

WELL, what I am trying to lead up to is that I always enjoy Violet's birthday partially because it usually falls in the middle of the rushing welcome into spring.  

And this year, as luck would have it, her birthday was the day before Easter.  Really, what could be more fun?  

And, as an extra bonus, it was a gorgeous weekend, probably the warmest we've had in months.  

So, without hesitation, we moved her entire party (all of my uncles, aunts, cousins, etc), outside onto our driveway/lawn strip.  

And with Violet's flashy new turquoise bike perched against the house, I couldn't help but think how far we've come from that first terrifying walk with her.  

Photos!  

Violet's new big-kid bike; I might have to be terrified again.

Easter-birthday decorations are so fun, easy, and sweet.  Just bring in the bunnies, eggs, and flowers!

A few of the honorable guests!

We went to Kwanjai Thai for dinner; V's favorite restaurant.

The new marble game is fun for all!

Violet's new Hourglass shoes.

Now we match!

Four tomorrow

Four is so big.  Really, so much bigger than three.  And what's so crazy is that it seems like it was not yesterday, but maybe just last Tuesday that we were flying home from India and she was turning two.

Four climbs trees.  Four is sassy with these twirked and questioning expressions.  

Four is wanting to help with every single thing.  Making pancakes, digging flower holes, feeding the animals.  

----

I remember so well when you couldn't hold your head up; when you couldn't chew a bean.  

And now you are asking for more chutney at the dinner table, and we're giving you a bike to learn to ride.  

You are so independent with strong opinions about coats and teeth brushing, and you drive me crazy when you holler about the bath-- both getting in and getting out, giant protests.  

But mostly you are my snow day, and I love you more than I ever thought I could love anything.  

Sleep well, Violet.  Tomorrow you are four, and four is so big.  

All of the Good.

One year ago my job was a mess.

And I hadn't exercised in 7 years.

And I was having severe stomach pains and migraines, completely unaware of what was causing them.    

And we were making plans to move to Kansas.  

I was depressed.  

I am not joking.  

That was one year ago, almost exactly to the date.  

I don't think we stop often enough to realize and recognize the good that has happened in life.  And today I just can't help but sit here, almost in near shock, as I think about everything that was going on a year ago-- 

--and now where we are today.  

It seems like it's all very sudden--  until I realize how crazy hard the past year has been.  It has been a year of settling ourselves-- mind, body, and soul....  and working our booties off to get ourselves together.  

And now, officially, with my husband (the newly made Professor Sprague), we get to call Seattle our forever home.

Do you know what that means?  It means the world.  It means I get to wrap myself in the amazing community of friends we've made here over the last several years, and hug you all and tell you that we get to watch our kids grow up together.  It means I don't have to figure out how to participate in this beautiful business painting shoes from 8 states away.  It means that we maybe eventually might possibly move out of our tiny apartment, and find a little house and buy a paddle boat for the summer evenings.  And adopt a dog, and have backyard birthday parties.  

It means I get to watch Tyler do what he was put on this earth to do.  And I get to dream of a real studio space that is larger than a computer desk.  

I am in love with my job.  I am in love with this city.  I am in love with our YMCA and the way it has made me feel alive in my own skin again, especially through these stressful months of uncertainty and medical issues (especially recently).   

Mostly, this week, I am in love with my husband who has spent the last 6 years pursuing his dream of becoming a professor at the University of Washington.  He never gave up.  And now, after so many years of worry-stress-uncertainty, we get to breathe, and plant our feet into the ground.
Afternoon champagne??  Yes please!   

Waiting for Spring

Thank goodness spring comes.  Every year.  

Something consistent is needed right now.  

What joy to see the tiny turned up noses

of the flower bulbs from fall 

just sniffing the air, ever so slightly out of the ground this past week.  

As if testing and asking the question 

is it safe to come out yet?  

Yes, by all means.  Yes.  Come fast.  

We are so very ready for winter to finally end. 

Come by bike, by train, by bus-- 

Use the trail 

we live right near the bakery.  

We are watching out the window 

we are keeping on our porch light.  

We are ready.  Come on in.

Don't even bother taking off your boots.  

Sit down, that chair is fine.  I have lots to tell you. So much took place while you were sleeping.  

  

March 1st

The 1st of March, and I had the most wonderful day with Violet.
I'm not sure where this enchanting day came from; it was like waking up, and seeing snow.  How did it come so quietly without my knowing?
We went to the thrift store and found a huge sack of play jewelry for $2.  We potatoed on the couch with our lady cat (Pigeon), and watched cartoons.  She told me that we were going to have soup and corn, and grapefruit for lunch.  And so we did.  
She hovered over my shoulder for over an hour while I tried my darnedest to assemble this wooden penguin model (also a thrift store find).  And finally she told me that it was ok, and that we should just play a game instead.
We stopped by the studio and saw Lisa and Kira, and they gave her a purple balloon, which immediately flew away once we were outside.  So then they gave her two more, and she held on with every ounce of her being onto their yellow strings.

Fridays are always funny and fun because we don't have preschool, I don't have space or time to work, there's no ballet, we don't usually go to the gym, and it usually is raining.  Sometimes the freedom of having nothing to do, even for one day a week, is a little daunting (especially with an almost-four year old).
But today was nice, and I realized two things:
1) She is turning 4 soon, which means this will be my last year with her before she is sucked into kindergarden all day (for better and for worse).  
2) I could watch her eat a grapefruit half forever.

Seeing the Girl with a Pearl Earring

Vermeer's painting, Girl With a Pearl Earring, has played an interesting and ongoing role in my life.
When I was about 12 years old, my grandma Daisy (who loved art and was an artist and was one of the kindest and cleverest souls this world has ever known), cut a picture of the painting out a magazine and stuck it in a thrift store gold frame and gave it to me.  She said, Rachel this looks just like you.   


I remember sitting at the dining room table in my grandparent's house, and staring down at this magazine painting, and it honestly was like looking in a mirror.  But some sort of bizarro mirror, where everything I knew to be awful about myself was reflected back as beautiful.
I know this all sounds a little arrogant.  I mean, who compares herself to a famously beautiful painting and gets away with it?
Well, maybe I should preface this entire thing by telling you that I was absolutely and completely the embodiment of awkward when I was 12.  (Well, at least that's how I felt about myself). I was so incredibly tiny-- short and skinny and pale with eyes that were way too big for the rest of me and that weren't really any color at all.  Not brown, not green, definitely not blue.

Whether or not I actually ever looked like that painting, something about it struck a chord with me.  She was so odd and snowy, just like me.   And caught in this moment of having something important to say, but being a bit startled by everything.  And that large dangling earring, just hanging there like some secret life ready to begin.

Anyway, I hung the picture in the bathroom basement, next to my bedroom.  And looked at her while I brushed my braces (I mean teeth) every morning.  And I would try to decide if I was oddly beautiful (like her), or just plain odd.

Well, I pretty much grew up, and moved away.  Then when I was 20-something I was teaching art to these wretchedly over-priveledged children, the Girl  reentered my life.  One day, this kid (who was 6 and always sort of an outcast to his fellow classmates), was flipping through an art book and happened upon that picture.  He brought it up to me and said Why are you in this book?  
I kind of just stared at him speechless.  I think I sputtered out something about how it wasn't me, it was a famous painting.  He looked at me like I was nuts and walked away.

Anyway, what I'm trying to lead up to is that over the weekend I actually got to see this painting in person for the first time in my life.  I was down in California visiting my family, and there it was too--  in the de Young Museum in San Francisco.
It's this whole exhibit of Dutch paintings.  It's all just gorgeous.  But they have her in a room all to her own, and when you see her, down the hall, it's this huge tunnel of darkness with her face just glowing, staring at you from across the view, as if you just called her name to ask when she'd be home, and she turns and looks and almost answers.
I have seen this painting in books, magazines, on busses, posters, mugs, puzzles... I have stared at it in my basement bathroom for years.... but seeing her in person.  There are no words.

It almost felt like I was 12 again, seeing her for the first time.  Could she really be that strange and beautiful?
I started crying, just a little.  The shock of seeing something you've always known, but then realize you're really just seeing it for the first time.
I don't feel like I look much like her anymore.  I've sort of grown up and into myself they way we do when we hit 30.  Which is not a bad thing.  But there is a huge part of me that is so protective and in love with that weird little person I was at 12.  Maybe it's because I have a daughter of my own now, and I want so desperately for her to know that she is gorgeous and funny and interesting at every age, even, and especially, when she is 12 and 20 and feeling lost and snowy and startled.

Togetherness.

When I arrived home the other night, my little V was already in bed.  Tyler said she had been awake only moments before and had been asking for me, so I crept inside her room to say goodnight.  

Her tiny half-dark room with the Peter Rabbit night light shining in the corner, her santa blanket left over from Christmas, her little pink face bundled in damp bath-time hair;  this is my beautiful daughter finding peace at the end of her day.  And she was sleeping, but maybe sensing I was there, she all at once looked up and said "mama, I was worried about you".  



I feel like lately she's been sensing my unease with the world.  She watches from the window while I take out the trash, as if I'm crossing the freeway--  just for 20 seconds I am gone-- and when I come back in she wipes her little crying eyes, saying I just want us all to be together.

We hold our children in our hands like tiny glass-boned birds.

--they are looking, longing for togetherness where ever it may be.
Because, at least for my child, this feeling of togetherness, is the food that fuels her day and settles her worried little heart.

I wonder of these people-- who hug their weapons close as second skin-- fighting for the right to fill each home with the artillery of armies-- and who think the answer to a tragedy is to make each man an island.
How could you stray so incredibly far?  --So far from that childhood longing to approach this world together?

You must have forgotten what it's like to watch from that lonely window as your mother takes out the trash.      

Kitten toddler road trip Christmas

Hey, January.  It's nice to see you.  I love the fall, all dressed up with pumpkins and magenta trees--  and the year's end with Christmas bells and lights and fa-la-las.
But January is nice in that way that most quiet things are nice; it just lets you be.  It is the return of everyday life.  Of making simple dinners; of working; of walking to the bank; of feeding the pets; of going to bed and waking up in the morning and making oatmeal.

And as we settle back into the everyday--  after being distracted for a good three months with holidays and honey hams-- we are given this unique chance to see clearly again life in its natural state.
January, you're a good friend who listens openly to hopes and concerns about the future.





But back to December.  We made the decision this year to take a road trip down to California for Christmas, and to bring our kittens with us.  Definitely an idea that was two parts wonderful and one part crazy.  In case there was any doubt, let me tell you-- kittens do not enjoy 13 hour car rides.  Neither do 3.5 year-olds. But, all things considered, everyone did very well, and California welcomed us with it's familiar open arms.

To everyone in Chico:  Thank you for providing my girl with endless walnuts to crack, and for sharing your sun spots (Sammy dog).  Thank you for welcoming me as a guest into your zumba class, and for providing endless warm fires in the stove.  Thank you for the rice chips, and for every thoughtful meal. Thank you for looking at my daughter with stars in your eyes, and for giving Tyler and me the chance to slip away and see a movie for the first time in over a year.  Thank you for the beautiful tree to decorate, and for the fun cousins to play with, and for the beautiful gifts.   Thank you for Penny, and for all of the wonderful community of people who care so much about us.  Thank you for the rainbow sprinkles that were the highlight of Violet's world that night.  Thank you for a trip to Coit tower; I have always wanted to go!  Thank you for your warm send off, it kept us going all the way home.

To everyone in Berkeley:  Thank you for the trip to the merry-go-round that remains a magical memory in my girl's little heart.  Than you for holding my kittens in your arms, and welcoming them under the Christmas tree and laughing when they were naughty.  Thank you for providing so very many loving cousins, but especially thank you for Rose.  Thank you for ensuring my girl that Santa would come, and for finding a stocking for Violet, and also one for me and one for Tyler (even though we are old and unsure if Santa really exists).   Thank you for making three batches of alternative flour cookies, even though you thought they tasted too much like beans.  Do you know how amazing it was for me to eat cookies again?  Thank you for lighting the Swedish candle thing every night for Violet, and for running a bath for me when I was too confused to figure it out.  Thank you for the endless warming meals at the big round table, and for several special eatings-out at Vic's and Lily's and Juan's.  Thank you for so much brother fun.  Thank you for helping me feel like Berkeley is still a place that part of me can very much call home.  I can't wait to see you again in a month!