mighty maggie

Another one for the Compelled To Update Despite Lack Of Update-Worthy Information file

I am so tired tonight. You know, when things start going well you stop complaining, and maybe it's the complaining that helps you remember How Life Is Going. Right? So when you have nothing to complain about, you don't complain, and the Complaining Theorem states that you won't even realize how good you have it.

Which is about how I'm feeling after last night, when Molly was never really settled and asleep, and woke up big time around eleven. Crying, thrashing, howling, etc. And because Phillip and I are still completely clueless as to what to do when one child is fast asleep and the other is possessed, we spent the next three hours playing musical beds. I don't even take the pack 'n play down in our room anymore, even though you can't get to the bathroom without sliding it across the room which then blocks my side of the bed.

But that's because they nap better (read: LOOONGER) if they're in separate rooms. And what am I going to do? I have to crank out 50,000 words by November 31st! I need nap time! They've been sleeping so well at night though - Jack hasn't been inciting world wars when it's time to go upstairs and Molly's been sleeping through. We haven't, however, been fully appreciating this turn of events and the Sleep Gods are annoyed about it, because last night killed me. I am DEAD.

We just don't know what to DO! And not that there's really anything to do, because obviously something was just off and wrong and there's nothing you can really do in that situation except wait it out, but you still feel like a sleep-deprived IDIOT. What do you DO? To our credit we didn't fight about it, we actually held civil conversations at 1am, YAY US. And after a while we just gave up. She hated our bed, she hated the pack 'n play, she hated us, she hated sitting, standing, walking, singing, her pacifier, her blanket, everything in the entire world. And since she wasn't really making loud enough noise to bother Jack we decided she could just go ahead and hate everything from her own crib.

Which doesn't mean we fell happily asleep forever after. It means we laid there, wide awake, feeling that so-tired-you're-sick feeling, until sometime around two when the shuffling and crib rattling and chattering stopped. BLEAH. 

I DESERVED a nice long nap today (DIDN'T GET IT) but you'll be happy to note I am keeping my chin up. I am not letting The Sleep Man get me down! Sure, I get sucked into the occasional "Why oh WHY can't I get my two children to sleep in ONE ROOM? FAIL! FAIL! FAIL!" self-lambasting, but I snap out of it with a bit of online house hunting. Although, now that I'm thinking about it, that just sends me into ANOTHER spiral of Blah.

Since both kids are sound asleep, Phillip is done with school and I am done with my word quota, I should probably get OFF the computer and GO TO BED.

What might have been

One side effect of writing 27,000 words about teenagers in 9 days (SO FAR!) is that you spend an awful lot of time thinking about being a teenager. Not just any teenager, mind you, but the teenager you once were. I don't think I have to explain why this is not always a fun place to be.

In addition! One side effect of being a rabid Mad Men fan is understanding that you have no choice but to stay up late to watch the season finale in real time, a privilege not afforded to any other show. (How people manage to watch The Biggest Loser in real time is BEYOND ME.) Which meant I was up another hour after THAT decreeing [SPOILERS! SPOILERS! SPOILERS!] that I shall NEVER get divorced EVER EVER EVER and WOE and SNIFF and WAH and can we have Season 4 now please?

Actually, Phillip and I stayed up talking about What Ifs. I'm not sure we've ever had that conversation before. Who we might be married to if we weren't married to each other. What we might be doing, how we might see life differently. Kind of a scary dangerous place to go, right? But it was actually kind of fun, which I think means that we are fairly confident in each other and our relationship. Whew!

It was just a strange and swirly combination of all the things I've been thinking about over the last week. I've been living in Teenage Girl Brain where you think you're going to marry your high school boyfriend, or sometimes you get a whiff of Reality and resign yourself to visualizing who you WILL marry and of course he will be all these THINGS. And you will go certain places and do certain things and live with these goals in mind and PEOPLE. Phillip is NOT what I pictured when I was fifteen! Or even twenty, for that matter, when I was sitting around waiting for him to realize I existed.

I think I've written before about sitting up one night, mere months away from my wedding, and having the slightest of panic attacks because it had only then occurred to me that Phillip was missing a few of the Required Attributes. Basically I was sitting there wringing the sheets over the fact that Phillip did not (and does not, alas) read novels. How could I marry someone who DOESN'T READ BOOKS?!?!?!

In the end (which was only an hour or two later, THANK GOD, we all know I can let these sorts of things DRAG ON) I realized that even if I found a nice guy who read books and measured up in all the other designated areas, I would still want Phillip. Problem solved. Bring on the marriage!

But until last night I'd never heard Phillip's take on the exact same subject. VERRRRY INTERESTING! Apparently, and SURPRISE!, I am not exactly who he imagined EITHER! Shocker! He had always imagined for himself a career-oriented Asian-American girl. My thoughts immediately flew to the more, ah, successful couples we know: people who have important or at least importantish jobs and disposable income, the female half of whom would not be happy as a full time stay at home mother. Maybe this is weird but I can totally see Phillip living that life. I think, in a lot of ways, he'd have an easier time of it if I were 1) profit-driven and 2) Asian and 3) WAS MORE LIKE HIM.

And since I can't just let something go, I had to share what I'd pictured: an artsier fartsier type of guy, someone who not only read novels but liked to stay up late talking about them, who worked but knew work was only for funding travel and creative pursuits. In other words, someone MORE LIKE ME.

Phillip was pretty adamant about how it was RIGHT that he married me. I am the right person for him. He went on and on about how he's always pretty slow to make big decisions (OH REALLY?) but he'd never been slow about me. (A point we debated due to the aforementioned Waiting For Him To Realize I Existed which he then rebutted with some valid points I won't bore you with, at least not in this post, and now I agree.) While I, of course, was wishier washier and went off on my whole "but I CHOSE you" theory and "soul mates shmole mates!" blah blah blah. The fact is, we don't know what life would be like had we married other people. (IF we had married other people. It's not like I had a throng of suitors banging impatiently on my door.)

That said, I am not sorry I don't know. I feel like it turned out pretty well, don't you?

Teenage Girl Brain doesn't know this, though. Sure, some of us marry our high school sweethearts, but most of us don't. Most of us go out with total boneheads and immature jerks and spend many a night despairing that anyone will ever love us, that anyone will ever really KNOW us. I've been living in that place for nine days, and it made last night's conversation that much sweeter. 

P.S. As we were trying to describe The Person We Thought We'd Marry, Phillip paused, trying to find the right word, and I proffered: "someone with a work ethic?" Because GOD KNOWS I couldn't care less about a career, I'm anti-9 to 5 and completely stymied by people who answer work calls after hours. And Phillip, because he is the best husband in the WORLD even though he thinks the EXACT OPPOSITE of those thigns said, "No, you have a work ethic, just not for PAID work." Which is TOTALLY DIFFERENT, right? Maybe I can stop beating myself up about the lazy? Because: nine days, 27,000 words. Some of you may chalk that up to "obsessive" instead, but I hereby lift the self-imposed lifetime guilt sentence for apparent lack of work ethic. WOO!

EX. HAUSTED.

Just got back from the volleyball team dinner where there were NINE small people running around ONE small house. OMG.

Molly, miraculously and thankfully, was in a splendid mood and didn't do her usual Total Meltdown if anyone other than her mother so much as looked at her. I was even in the kitchen unwrapping my contribution to the dinner (cheesecake with raspberry sauce, there are leftovers, come on over) when the setter on the team yelled, "Maggie! Look!" And I looked around the corner and there was my girl sitting on another teammate's lap. NOT CRYING. I know! Amazing!

And my boy... MAN. That kid, sometimes he is sweetness and light, sometimes he's a pest and sometimes he's this weird mix of Totally Charming Yet Driving Me Crazy. So, for example, he spent a large part of the evening zooming back and forth between the living room and the two (two!) playrooms. (At least our hosts knew what they were getting into, yes?) And sometimes he would bring props, like, say, light sabers. Or plastic golf clubs. Or a BAT. You know, things you use to SWING AROUND and HIT STUFF. But then when it was time go he SHOOK EVERYONE'S HAND and chirped "BYE BYE!" about four frillion times and was basically the cutest most adorable little person IN THE UNIVERSE. And there I am wondering, "Is this one of those times when my kid is The Annoying Kid Whose Parents Are Letting Him Get Away With Murder or one of those times when my kid is obviously The Cutest Kid In The Room." Do you know how many times I have to think about that? What is charming to me is not, I am sure, always charming to everyone else.

I DON'T KNOW. I am just annoyed because my cheesecake was this light fluffy thing and everyone was all, "Oooh, I don't normally LIKE cheesecake, but this one is just so LIGHT and AIRY and how did you get it that way?" and I had to LIE because I HATE LIGHT AND FLUFFY DESSERTS and I RUINED IT that's how I got it that way. No seriously. You want to make me happy? Give me the slice of cheesecake that weighs ten pounds, or the chocolate mousse you have to cut with a knife. BLISS!

Oh my. HELLO RANDOM.

I need to get started on my words for the day - I kicked some major speed-noveling butt yesterday, but I haven't paid much attention to my [lame-o] characters today. By the way, are you guys bored stiff of this NaNoWriMo stuff? I hate to tell you, but there's not much else happening in my head. It's only been one week and I already feel like A New! Person! and the blog would be bursting with Irritating! Over! Enthusiasm! if I wasn't 1) supposed to be speed-noveling and 2) worried I was boring you stiff. There's a lot of despairing going on too, but I tend to save most of that for my emails to my NaNoWriMo partner in angst, Charlotte Pants. Poor Charlotte. I'm thinking, though, that I should republish her responses on the blog, for they are all hilarity. My favorite line is where she said participating in this NaNoWriMo insanity was "compromising my alleged artistic integrity". THAT'S EXACTLY WHAT IT IS.

Anyway. The kids are not cooperating with bedtime and you cannot see the floor and Phillip is feeling anti-schoolwork and I should probably go participate in my LIFE until things are asleep/put away and I can get back to my [lame-o] characters. Kisses!

Poetry Saturday

Jess wrote a post a million years ago about whether she liked surprises, and I made a mental note to send her this poem. I completely forgot (of course) but now that is to the benefit of everyone. Lovely!

Surprise - Jane Kenyon

He suggests pancakes at the local diner,
followed by a walk in search of mayflowers,
while friends convene at the house
bearing casseroles and a cake, their cars
pulled close along the the sandy shoulders
of the road, where tender ferns unfurl
in the ditches, and this year's budding leaves
push last year's spectral leaves from the tips
of the twigs of the ash trees. The gathering
itself is not what astounds her, but the casual
accomplishment with which he has lied.

OOOOOOOOH!

Seven really quick questions

1. Did you read my post at Parenting? No? Because my editors would LOVE IT if you did.

2. Be my Genius Playlist: if I like Taylor Swift, who else should I be listening to? And in this specific instance, I'm looking for content rather than melody. Who else speaks teenage girl?

3. Do you know what Twitter Lists are? If so, can you fill me in?

4. So I'm sitting here thinking of other questions I want to ask you and this just occurred to me: does anyone remember a post I wrote recently where one of the comments suggested I was about to announce I was pregnant? I am thinking VERY HARD about which post this was, but I can't remember, and I am realizing with no small amount of horror that I did not address that comment so I shall do so now: NO. NOT PREGNANT. DEAR GOD.

5. On the same topic, do you realize that when Jack was Molly's age, I was 7 months pregnant? CANNOT. EVEN. FATHOM. Stay tuned for related post 2 months from now, where I continue to not fathom.

6. Do you have a good (AND PG RATED) driving-in-a-car-with-a-boy story? DO TELL. I might want to steal it. 

7. You haven't written a single word of your daily 1,667 word quota. You are looking at a blank computer screen. You feel lost, bereft, panicked. You consider jumping out the window, hiding under the bed, quitting this stupid write-a-novel-in-one-month party, whose idea was that anyway, because it is the STUPIDEST IDEA YOU HAVE EVER HEARD. Then you think about how many people you told you were writing a novel in November and decide to eat your sorrows instead. You have a choice of 1) the four Lays potato chips your husband left in the bag or 2) store brand chocolate chips or 3) Weight Watchers vanilla yogurt or 4) leftover pot roast or 5) toaster waffles or 6) your two-year-old's fruit snacks. WHICH DO YOU CHOOSE?

Gifts

Ever since I went to that workshop a weekend or two ago I've been thinking more and more about where I put my energy. Especially these last few days when I've spent so many hours writing. It's only been four days, but I'm already wondering if this is a way to create a habit, if, when Phillip goes downstairs for his nightly hour or so of homework, that will be my time to write. I'm excited thinking about it, because that's definitely an area where I know I went to expend energy, and where I know I'm not doing enough.

But there are other places that don't feel that way. Or only sometimes feel that way. I think back to that workshop and try to figure out if those are places where I feel 'gifted'. And it's not that I don't want to do anything I'm not gifted in, obviously, but sometimes I fall into the trap of feeling like I HAVE to do something because it's a GOOD THING TO DO even when I DON'T WANNA. The example the priest at the workshop used was volunteering at a soup kitchen, which he dreaded and hated. Was it a bad thing to do? No. Was it something he should never do? No, of course not. But did he need to feel guilty about not wanting to work in a soup kitchen when he was obviously gifted in other areas and found joy volunteering and serving in other ways? NO.

So I have a few soup kitchens in my life. None of them are as... worthy as a soup kitchen, I should say. But I have a few Good and Fun For Other People things going on that I don't always feel Good or Fun about. But sometimes I do? So it's confusing? I guess my three years on the church committee is a good example of this. Was it a good thing to do? Sure. Was it the best place for me? Was it the best use of my time? Doubtful.

Anyway, I've been thinking about these things and today I was feeling sort of down about one of them. I was comparing myself to everyone else and thinking: gee Self, you sort of suck at this. Maybe you should step down. Maybe that would be a GOOD THING. Maybe it's OKAY to suck! OWN THE SUCKITUDE!

Right? Totally okay things to say to yourself. But I swear, not a minute after I decided I would put in my resignation, I got an email FULL of affirmation. FULL of encouragement. FULL of gratitude that I was involved. So I ask you, good friends in the Internet, what the heck am I supposed to do with THAT?!

Well, of COURSE I did a complete 180 and am now totally and complete re-energized in this particular department. Nothing like a little flattery, eh?

AND THEN (and this is the OTHER thing I've been thinking about re: gifts) I was all, "OBVIOUSLY The Person Who  Sent Me The Email has the gift of Encouragement!" I've been sort of annoying with the Gift Labeling lately. As I sat through the workshop I wasn't only tallying up my gifts* but all of my friends'. I'm such a dork. 

Like, I was thinking about this one friend of mine who always knows what to DO. I mean, physical tangible things to DO. (This would be, for the uninitiated, the gift of service.) When both of my babies were teeny tiny she would come over and suddenly all my dishes were washed. I wouldn't even notice her doing it. Or when we get our kids together to play, she always picks up the toys and cleans up the lunch dishes. I don't do this at her house. I HATE admitting that, but I don't. And it's not because I don't WANT to, I just don't even THINK about it. I suppose that could mean that I don't want to, because if I wanted to I'd be thinking about it, but I liked the way the priest put it. He doesn't have the gift of hospitality. He doesn't walk into coffee hour and notice who is sitting by themselves. It's not even on his radar. And that's how I am with other people's dishes. NOT ON MY RADAR.

But it's totally on my friend's radar. And I have another friend who, I've noticed, always says the right thing in a crucial moment. WITHOUT FAIL. I don't know what gift that is - wisdom? knowledge? - but SERIOUSLY. I know this because I'm the one sitting there all "Uhhhhmmmm" and she's asking, like, INSIGHTFUL QUESTIONS and singling out the IMPORTANT ELEMENTS. Whatever gift that is, I DO NOT HAVE IT.

I know this isn't any great revelation or news to anyone, but the idea that I don't have to be good at everything, that I don't have to LIKE everything - that knowledge has been freeing in a new way lately. In the last couple weeks I've been giving myself more grace than usual. Which is, I'll just say it: MIRACULOUS. Instead of being jealous and/or coming down with a total inferiority complex next to the friend who always knows what to say, I've been able to remind myself that THAT IS HER GIFT. And IT IS NOT MINE. I'm the friend who, when another friend was informed of an unthinkable family tragedy, sat her butt down in front of the computer and found the fastest cheapest plane ticket out of Seattle. That's the kind of thing I can do.

I do it with you guys too. Some of you leave the most encouraging comments or send the most affirming emails. I suspect things about you based on your own blogs. And I've met some of you in person, and I know you have the gifts of craftsmanship and hospitality and faith and teaching and pastoring. It's so much FUN, this gift deciphering. 

Aaaand, I think that's enough procrastinating for one evening. I'll be lucky if I make my daily quota today. LE SIGH.

*when I use the word "gifts" I'm using it in the context of "spiritual gifts" or, in the Catholic tradition, "charisms". I'm not referring to the "fruits of the Holy Spirit" found in Galatians, but an unspecified number of spiritual gifts (again, according to the Catholic tradition) that show up primarily in Romans 12, 1 Corinthians 12 and Ephesians 4. (And yes, I totally just looked in the book for that information. SUE ME.)

Brought to you by stubborn determination to update the blawg no matter WHAT

There are some days when I feel like a Successful Parent and then all the other days, by which I mean Pretty Much Every Single Day, when I wouldn't exactly recommend my parenting techniques. Like this morning when Molly was screaming bloody murder and I had no idea what her deal was and after a half hour of Incessant Scream I just started screaming back. That was about as effective as it sounds. But I didn't know what to do. I couldn't even put her in her bed to get all her screamies out because Jack was still sleeping and everyone knows you don't wake Jack up unless a dinosaur is about to stomp on the house or something.

But it sounds like Seattle mothers were in God's favor today - all the friends I spoke to today were in mild states of shock over how late their kids were sleeping. ALL of them. Was it leftover effects of Daylight Savings Time? The fact that it was a beautiful glorious morning and we'd all had the foresight to send our little beasties out for tiring exercise? Did God hear our collective cries for relief? I love my babies, I really really do, but I loved them even more after a three-and-a-half hour nap.

I had my house professionally cleaned last Thursday, but it hasn't even been a week and you'd never know it. I still haven't returned about half the emails I told myself I needed to send this weekend. The results of my online shopping spree have started arriving on my doorstep, and now my dining table and kitchen counter are littered with packing materials and cardboard boxes. Some nights I don't bother putting the toys away - this is one of those nights. And I opened the bag of chocolate chips because all the good Halloween candy is gone. I feel like I need a do over.

On the other hand, I've written over 10,000 words for NaNoWriMo. I am not saying these are GOOD words, but they are generally coherent and form sentences and follow most grammatical rules. I've given myself a nice cushion for week two which I've heard referred to as "a creative wasteland" and "when you consider sticking your head in the oven". I ran into a tough spot today - I spent about an hour this afternoon wondering if it was too early for a glass of wine (yes) so I wandered around the house talking to myself and making notes on Post-Its (I threw them away) and looking up lyrics to Taylor Swift songs and refreshing Twitter every thirty seconds. But for the most part I'm kind of surprised at how easy this is going. (And yes, I know it's only Day Three. But allow me my small victories.)

I credit a few Psychological Tools. First: I have a note taped to my computer that says REVISION IS FOR DECEMBER. Every time I want to rewrite something (or, more likely, delete it and deny I'd ever written it in the first place) I walk myself through a scripted conversation between me and my brain. Basically I tell my distraught and horrified brain that I am well aware those are the worst words every strung together in the English language, but that I need them for WORD COUNT. In November I am a slave to WORD COUNT, not PERFECT PROSE. It's totally like that one paper in college (or all of them?) where you've run out of time and you still have 3 pages to go and you're playing with fonts and margins and wondering how much of your introductory paragraph you can repeat in the conclusion.

Second: I tell myself that bad things can happen. In fact, they NEED to happen. I am bad at allowing bad things to happen in my writing because, well, I don't LIKE bad things. What I DO like are my characters and I can be all proud of the 10 pages I wrote only to go back the next day and realize that I wrote a 10 page character sketch, not a chapter of a novel. I like to write about, for the most part, people I would want to know in person and I am loathe to make their lives miserable. Unfortunately this makes for a terribly dull novel. Bad things must happen. I shall make it so.

Third: I keep asking myself what happens next, and whatever I come up with, I USE. I don't sit there going, "OMG, there is no way, that is the dumbest idea ever, why I don't I go eat lunch/take a shower/do the dishes/take a nap and the thing that should REALLY happen next will MAGICALLY APPEAR." It doesn't work that way. I know that. You have to keep writing and maybe the ridiculous idea turns into something awesome. Or, more often, you start writing the ridiculous idea and THEN the thing that really happens next magically appears. Sometimes you have to delete, sometimes it fits with what you're already doing. Using my first idea is probably one of the largest contributing factors to the Unreadableness, but it's what's working for WORD COUNT and see point number one, where WORD COUNT IS KING.

Fourth: By the time I get to this point in my conversation with myself it is time for wine. Excellent.

I'm exhausted. I'm going to gear up for tomorrow (which may or may not include a phone call to the doctor re: Jack's mounting and various weirdnesses, which are not SWINE FLU but still sort of concerning) by going upstairs to read my Donna Leon mystery (set in Venice, and I'm really enjoying it except for the graphic descriptions of FOOD which makes me 1) hungry and 2) sad about not being in Italy) and fall asleep with my glasses on. A note or two before I leave though: I'm about forty frillion emails behind. I'm also despairing that I will ever manage to keep up with my feed reader, let alone leave a coherent blog comment, during the month of November. Will you still love me? 

In which I mention pot and my mother can't believe I actually POST this stuff on the INTERNET

I decided to run around the lake today because 1) the kids stayed with grandparents last night and we weren't going to pick them up until dinner time and 2) the weather was awesome and 3) I've been heavy on the Halloween candy and light on the exercise and it's beginning to show. Well, not physically (YET) but last week I had a definite case of Uh Oh, It's October, Where Is My Vat Of Vitamin D.

And of course it surprises me. Like I haven't been anxious on cue for the last seven or eight years. I'm all HEY. Where is THIS coming from? And then I realize that I've been sitting on my butt eating candy, nervously wandering around my house, NOT exercising, counting up all the little stressors I've got going on... other people stay in bed and mope in October and November, I feel like I've drank fifteen pots of coffee in one sitting. 

[Tangent! Caffeine, which did nothing for me for years and years and years, even though I WANTED IT TO, now makes me, if I drink more than half a cup, INSANE. It's awful. It's so bad I keep my coffee pot in the cupboard and only sometimes remember to get it out when my caffeine addict family members come over. When I order coffee I almost always order decaf. Isn't that pathetic? But the caffeine in coffee is nothing compared to the vegan brownie I ate at 5pm one day two summers ago. The intense and horrifying crazy I experienced from that admittedly delicious vegan brownie was so unbearable I remember it from TWO SUMMERS AGO. For shame!]

[Another! Tangent! So long long ago I was telling a friend that no I'd never smoked pot, was she kidding, did she even KNOW ME? but that I was mildly disappointed with myself for not having any Rebellious Youth Stories and then she OFFERED to bake me a POT BROWNIE. (Because I had also told her I was never going to smoke anything, ever, no way, NO.) And I was all: interesting! I actually gave this some thought, I really did, because, you know, THE EXPERIENCE. But ultimately I decided I would SO be one of those people who get freaked out and paranoid instead of mellow and chill. I mean, IS THERE ANY DOUBT?)

SO ANYWAY. After three days of consecutive exercise, three days of purposely going outside around noon, three days of not eating sugar for breakfast, lunch and dinner and three days of popping excessive amounts of Vitamin D I'm feeling lots better. I honestly have no idea how much the aforementioned Healthy Living Tactics affect my delinquent brain chemistry, but even if it's a placebo effect I'll take it. I will run around the lake EVERY day if that's what it takes to keep the anxiety away.

Which reminds me: this is only the second time I've run around the lake and this time I didn't want to throw up when I finished. Progress! The lake is 2.8 miles, which is peanuts to a lot of you, I know, but the most I've ever run is 4 and on a typical day I only run 2. And I've only run around the lake once before because I can't just GO there. I have to psych myself up to run in PUBLIC. With people who run FAST. Who are possibly on their second LAP. I prefer my little neighborhood jog, but it was gorgeous today and I didn't have kids to worry about and I knew I'd feel awesome when I finished. And I did.

It's a lot harder to exercise and eat well now that I've given myself permission to Un-Obsess Over Weight Loss. Especially when you spend a week eating Halloween candy, ignoring the scale because OMG you've been so bad, but then when you are dying of curiosity you step on the scale anyway and you haven't gained any weight! OBVS this is a fluke, but you still sort of feel like you're going to make a million dollars peddling your surefire weight maintenance plan and who needs to exercise NOW? NOT YOU!

But no. NO. In three days I've gone from a 7 or 8 on the anxiety scale to a 1 or a 2. Which is a huuuuuuge difference.

Of course, this may also have to do with the fact that I don't have any time to be anxious as I am attempting to write the world's most unreadable novel in 30 days. I better get back to that.

Weekend in orange and green and tulle

Remember how I said I would be busy today and all you'd get are Halloween pictures? I WAS RIGHT.

"Don't WANT to touch punkin guts, Mama, want SPOON. No! Don't WANT TO TOUCH!"

"I want nothing to do with this disgusting tradition."

"I will wear this tutu and this ridiculous headband and these ridiculouser shoes, but don't expect me to look at the camera and don't EVEN think about taking my pacifier away."

"I not alligator. I DINOSAUR."

"Okay, Jack. When they answer the door, what do you say?" "PWEESE?"

"I don't want dinosaur hands, I want my BOY hands."

"When you're the first girl grandbaby your grandmother can't help herself in the face of craft fair tutus."

"Am Halloween princess, OBVS."

3600 words down, 46,400 to go.

Poetry Saturday

A few days ago a friend told me she was watching PBS and "there was this GUY reading POETRY and it was about a LANYARD and I can't remember anything else about it, just that it was about a LANYARD and I knew you would LOVE IT."

I looked it up. And she was right, I do love it.

The Lanyard - Billy Collins

The other day I was ricocheting slowly
off the blue walls of this room,
moving as if underwater from typewriter to piano,
from bookshelf to an envelope lying on the floor,
when I found myself in the L section of the dictionary
where my eyes fell upon the word lanyard.

No cookie nibbled by a French novelist
could send one into the past more suddenly—
a past where I sat at a workbench at a camp
by a deep Adirondack lake
learning how to braid long thin plastic strips
into a lanyard, a gift for my mother.

I had never seen anyone use a lanyard
or wear one, if that’s what you did with them,
but that did not keep me from crossing
strand over strand again and again
until I had made a boxy
red and white lanyard for my mother.

She gave me life and milk from her breasts,
and I gave her a lanyard.
She nursed me in many a sick room,
lifted spoons of medicine to my lips,
laid cold face-cloths on my forehead,
and then led me out into the airy light

and taught me to walk and swim,
and I, in turn, presented her with a lanyard.
Here are thousands of meals, she said,
and here is clothing and a good education.
And here is your lanyard, I replied,
which I made with a little help from a counselor.

Here is a breathing body and a beating heart,
strong legs, bones and teeth,
and two clear eyes to read the world, she whispered,
and here, I said, is the lanyard I made at camp.
And here, I wish to say to her now,
is a smaller gift—not the worn truth

that you can never repay your mother,
but the rueful admission that when she took
the two-tone lanyard from my hand,
I was as sure as a boy could be
that this useless, worthless thing I wove
out of boredom would be enough to make us even.