Springtime and new beginnings

Okay, so here, apparently, is the thing?.... I want to write. But it is all happening so faaaaaast. So I think I will wait until I have time to write? But then zoooom it all happens so faaaaast.  And weeks go by.

So I'm gonna do some catching up.  Not literary genius.  Just writing.  To friends.  Who wanna know.  And who love us, and support us, and wow, I couldn't live without ya'll!! smiley face!! (are you allowed to put a smiley face in a blog?!  Hey, wait! That is exactly the thinking that stops me from writing in the first place! It is MY blog!  I can put smiley faces, or write the words "smiley faces," as often as I like!  And now I'm deciding, in this fit of enthusiasm, that if I ever publish a book (giggle, laugh, sigh), I will demand unlimited use of smiley faces! :-)  (um, yeah, cuz that's how the publishing world works, Liz, you get to demand stuff, before you've even written a word?!  Yes, that's my next goal. Write a word.)

It is the first day of Spring!!!!

The birds are singing!

Spring is springing!

Listening to my 7 yr old in bathtub singing some random song of her own creation.  While birds singing.  In my yard.  The yard filled with trees.  While my Black Lab lays by my side.  I deep sigh.  Soaking it all in.  

I think we are feeling more settled.  If I sound vague, it is because it is like sedimentary silt, like in the bottom of a pond, it feels uncertain, it can be changed and stirred up at any time.  I know it is all "a process."  I know it will take "a long time."  People keep telling me it will take a "long" time.  How long is a long time? 

Aidan talks about a girl at his school that he is now friends with.  She "doesn't have any friends, just like me."  Oy.  That is hard for a mom to hear.  Although of course it is normal.  I guess. I can't know "normal" is because, although I changed schools myself, I haven't been a parent of a school age child who moved to new school in a new state before.

I will do all I can to help them make new friends, friends to play with, friends to make it feel more "normal" to be here, in this new place, in this new home, in this new life.  I have class lists with home phone numbers, and will set up playdates.  We have signed them up for baseball and softball.  (At Ashley's age it was called teenerball in our old town.  Sigh.  Tired sigh.  So many changes.  So much different.  It tires the brain.  It tires me to even list it all.  Hence the not writing blog posts. Tiredness equals not writing.  'Cuz then I might just write "It's hard. They're sad. I'm tired.")

The hard-ness, the difficulty, the sadness for my heart for my children, probably reached its peak when Aidan said to me "I wish it were all a dream."  The move.  So, like in a dream, he could wake up from it, and it would never have happened.

Oh.  My.  Goodness. 

That was a hard thing for a mom to hear.

But, like all pioneers, we keep on truckin'.  (yes, I am mixing Laura Ingalls Wilder and the 1970s anaologies there.  This represents my childhood era.)

Ashley came upon a new type of flower blooming in our yard yesterday morning, and ran full speed into house to tell me.  We looked at those blooms, and all the other green shoots awaiting display of what type they are, and she exclaimed "I love this house!"

Well, that's a start.



This is the new flower Ashley saw in our yard,
and then ran to tell me!
(Hyacinth?)




Anticipation!
We are (im)patiently
waiting to see what these will be?
Daffodils?
(and I must remove all the sticks, etc, on top of them!)




The Day Before The First Day of Spring!
Just before this photo
she had exclaimed
"I love this house!"



As the sun comes up

So here I am 24 hrs after that last post.

24 hrs?!  That seems like 12 days ago.  Or 12 eons ago.

I am tired.  So tired that when right now, at 6:00 am, I saw that tonight is PTA meeting night, I literally thought "Oh dear, I cannot imagine myself being able to have clean hair and drive down the street for that...."  TWELVE hours from now!! hahahaha!

Oh, speaking of that laughter, have I told you that I have a new crazy laugh?  Oh yes, not crazy like funny, but crazy like a person who has gone cuckoo?  Ashley complains when I try and talk during this laugh, because she cannot understand what I'm saying.  My guess is that this laugh was born of all the stress and surreality (yes, I just created a word?! did I?! should I stop and google it?!  No, I'm too tired to do that.) of the past 6 months.

One of my favorite blog writers, Alice Bradley, writes a column called "Write Anyway," and when I read it right now, I thought this applies to me, especially during this time of my life.  I have wanted to try and write.... no, "Do or do not, there is no try".... Craig likes to quote Yoda to me.  Often. ...... I wanted to write daily, on this blog, to get back in the habit of writing, to wake up my writing muscle, "Hello, wake up!  You've been dormant too long!"  But then I'm too tired.  I will wait until I am not so tired.  Hey, you know what?! Write anyway!  (besides, when you are not too tired will be when you are 112, and rocking in a rocking chair, and sipping iced tea, and that is a long time from now.)

I got up at 5:30 am.  Do not be impressed.  I went to sleep at 9:00 pm.  This is quite late for me, since I've been going to sleep at 8:30 pm.  Like, yes, moments after my children climb into bed.  Like, yeah, me closing my eyes while they are still adjusting their blankies and stuffed animals. 

I am sitting in our new family room.  New to us.  It is amazing to watch, through these large windows, the day go from black to lighter to sun shining through.  I might start doing this routine every morning.  With Dakota snoozing by my side, like he is now.  But don't quote me.  I still have sleep in my eyes.  Great thing about writing, no worries about you having to endure my morning coffee breath. hee hee.

Aidan's alarm clock went off.  It still strikes me as so darling that his 9 yr old self chooses to set an alarm clock, chooses to wake up early, on purpose, on schooldays.  He began this last fall, when third grade began, he was age 8 then.  He likes to have time, as he says, to do all of his own stuff without me hurrying him.  I can see that he likes to get all the "work" out of the way, getting dressed, eating breakfast, brushing teeth, so that he then has a solid chunk of time to do what he wants to do, to enjoy that, before the schoolday begins.  (That is probably two words.  I am making it one word.  No one is allowed to correct grammar on my blog. hee hee)  And he is often disappointed to find me up and awake already, because, I think, he'd like to experience this new independence all on his own, without any parent around, awake, and interfering.

See, I'm writing.  Absolutely nothing of importance, zero content, but still, writing.

Oh, that's right.  24 hrs since yesterday morning.  Ashley got better as the day went on yesterday.  Just like everything in life, after it's over, one can say "Of course it all worked out fine."  In the morning she ate toast, and drank Gatorade, and then drank gingerale, and stayed home from school, was weak and had a headache, kept on drinking to rehydrate... and by the end of the evening she was laughing it up with her brother.

We'll see how today goes, back to school.

Flu and worry

I thought she was coughing.

I woke up and heard Ashley, but when I walked into her room, I saw it wasn't coughing, it was throwing up.

My kids have thrown up so few times in their little lives, I think it might be twice.  I have girlfriends who have the whole routine down pat, putting out blankets and sheets and towels, their little ones throw up often during cold and flu season. 

Girlfriends.

Since I didn't have any knowledge about what the right things were to do, I called my girlfriend on her cell, at 7:30 in the morning.  She answered.  This is the great thing about having awesome, helpful, caring, understanding girlfriends.  They answer the cell phone at 7:30 in the morning, even when they are tending to their own brood and heading out the door to work, to answer your questions about barfing and ginger ale.

Neighbors.

When you live in a new town, and your nearest family members are thousands of miles away, you will forever be grateful to the lovely senior citizen neighbors who were home on a Monday morning, and offered help, and drove to the grocery store upon request, and delivered popsicles to your door in a matter of minutes.

Oh, my baby girl.  How I hate hate hate seeing you sick.  I don't want my blog posts of late to all sound like life events are only happening to me, woe is me, I'm so different, any of that.... not at all.  I know we all go through universal experiences.  I think the ones lately that have thrown me are those I haven't experienced before.  Like moving to a new unknown state (both literally and figuratively?) with young children.  And like watching my youngest throw up, when I haven't before.

She couldn't keep anything down.  I spoke with the pediatric nurse.  She told me to watch urine output, that if my daughter were to go 12 hours without peeing she should go to the hospital for hydration.  Fortunately after the morning, she was keeping down sips of water.  And then at night two saltine crackers and Gatorade.

During the day, my tendency to worry arose.  I can't help but think that other mothers' brains tell them "This is the flu.  This is normal.  This will pass easily.  This is cold and flu season."  My brain, however, worries and frets and fears, and jumps to things like "What if?!"  I think my worry is added to by the fact that Ashley has several times experienced a dizzy sensation.  When we saw a pediatric neurologist, she came up with what I believe is the answer: these events usually happened either during an illness, or during summer, and both situations could be when Ashley was dehydrated.  Yesterday during her throwing up and not being able to keep down even sips of ginger ale, or little bit of popsicle, she felt dizzy.  Fortunately the sips of just-water stayed down the rest of the afternoon.  The dizzy episode added to my worry.

Here I am the next morning.  She is sleeping, she slept through the night.  Her head and body felt warm/hot yesterday, so I am assuming a flu bug.  The pediatric nurse said they are seeing a lot of this going around.  My girlfriend in Arizona told me she knows a mom and a 4 month old who are sick with it right now.  Somehow hearing that other people are dealing with it also makes me feel more calm.  And then that feels odd, to feel comforted by others being sick also?  Sigh.  I overthink.  And then I overworry.  And then I overfear.

We will see how she is today.  I will continue to wash loads of sicked-on items.  My husband is now home with a headache, I hope he is not getting sick too.  But him being home means I won't have to drag the sick child out in the car with me to take the other child to school, as I had to do yesterday, resulting in sick child getting sick in the car.

March sucks.

Spring, hurry up.

Limbo

I know we will all be fine.

I know this is a transition.

For now, though, we are feeling what we feel.

That is my phrase I always say to myself, and share with my girlfriends, when I am, or they are, going through something: "Feel what you feel."  Maybe I got this from reading about Zen Buddhism, the whole "be where you are" type philosophy.

And, as a mother, even though I know it is
normal
will improve
will change
not a crisis

..... it is still hard on my heart.  Very hard on my heart.

"I want to go back to my old school."

"Are we even ever going to visit my old school?"

"I have no friends at school."

As their mother I made a life for them.  A stable, consistent life.  We went to preschool, next door to grammar school.  We made friends, who we then knew in grammar school.  The younger child saw the older child experience grammar school, then began there herself.  We made friends in that school.  We made connections at the library, at the pool, at sports activities, at children's choir and family activities at our church.

Children thrive on consistency, experts say.  I liked that for my children.  I felt it was one of the reasons why they seemed calm, happy, well-adjusted.

And then that all changed with a move.  Well, not really.  That's an exaggeration.  I know that the calm they feel also goes with us wherever we go as a family.  They still seem calm, happy and well-adjusted.  But it is still a lot.  A lot of change.  A lot of not knowing.  A lot of unfamiliar.  A lot of being strangers in a strange land.

I think the usual upsets my children experience on a day-to-basis at school seem exacerbated when experienced in a new setting.  And my reaction to them is much more protective.  7 yr old Ashley got into the car her second week at the new school, and promptly burst into tears because girls had told her about a ghost with a knife.  It could be just that she reached the finish line of the safety of the car with her mother, and could let it all out, the new, the different, the uncertainty.  But why are first grade girls talking about a ghost with a knife?!  Sigh.

Everyone keeps reassuring me it will all be fine in time.  I keep responding that I have no doubt of that, I am not saying that, I am just "feeling what I feel" today.  Knowing it will all change someday does not help one bit today.  Well, maybe it does.  Maybe if I thought this is how we would all feel forever, it would feel much worse.  Yes, probably so.

And it is not all sturm und drang.

The kids are also
playing
laughing
joking
drawing
exploring the new backyard
making snow angels
having snowball fights

All is well overall.  Just getting used to a lot of new.

Bravery is a muscle

"Do one thing everyday that scares you."  -Eleanor Roosevelt

I've realized lately that bravery is a muscle.  And if you don't use it, it gets weak.

Yes, I'm sure that this is already well known, and many people have probably already written tomes on this subject.... I'm realizing it for myself now.

I was driving on a highway in New Jersey, where I'd lived for 10 years.  For the first time, probably ever in my life, I noticed I felt slight apprehension about driving on a highway.  This is me, who learned to drive, on a stick shift, on the hills of San Francisco.  (I kid you not.)  This is me, who drove the six hour Highway 5 stretch from LA to SF and back like it was a breeze.  This is me who spent 4 years driving from Pasadena to West LA and back, alternating between inching along in traffic and zooming along with crazy drivers.

So my brain said "Me?!"  (or "You?!" ... does the brain refer to itself in first person?  I should ask it.  Okay, I did.  It says yes.) 

And then I realized, I had been cruising around on only surface streets in my New Jersey suburban area for many years, often going months without even needing to get on a highway, or go over 45 mph.

Probably a small thing, not driving on a highway.  It reminded me, however, that if you let your world get smaller, it can contract your bravery muscle.

This month I have moved to a new state with my husband and our two young children, and I have been writing on this blog about how hard all of this change has been for the kids.  How hard it was for me to move as a child.  Friends have commented how strong this experience will make my kids in the future, which is true.  My mind is drawn back to what I've realized before: many of the experiences that I didn't like as a child, that I thought I would go back and change for myself when looking back at them as an adult, are the exact situations that made me the independent, adventurous, courageous person I am today.  I didn't want to have changed schools 6 times between starting kindergarten and graduating high school.  I didn't want to have changed houses 8 times between starting kindergarten and graduating high school.  I wouldn't have chosen for myself to have been on my own at home after school, starting in 5th grade, even though it was very common in the '70s.  But, as an adult, I realize that all these experiences contributed to me being independent, to being capable of dealing with change, to being adventurous.  People ask me "How did you move to New Jersey sight unseen and knowing no one?  How did you go into New York City and figure your way around and get a job, having never been there before?"  Never occurred to me to be any other way.  I didn't know there was a choice.  I guess when you move that often as a child, you have to sink or swim.  When you are on your own, you are forced to be brave and strong and confident.

"Character building."  Ugh.  As a mother that wants to nurture her children, until now all those type of "toughen-up" phrases have made me flinch.  But now, probably also because at this stage my kids are old enough to be at school all day on their own, I am realizing the time has come to accept that it is not only positive, it is required, for me to allow them to experience change, allow them to flounder with hardship, and it will only make them stronger.

And still I make a frowny face just writing that.

Once the painful adjustment period is over, I will (probably? maybe?) be glad for my kids to have experienced this change. 

If they end up as adults that have strong bravery muscles, able to be courageous, able to embrace change, able to embark on adventures, these are some of the best things in life I could wish for them.





love



This never fails to make me smile!
I've always called this doggie action
(rubbing back on ground, legs wild in air)
"The Dance of Joy"
(based on Balki Bartokomous from the '80s tv show Perfect Strangers)

 


New routine for us at after school pickup,
there are adults that walk the students out to the parents lined up in waiting cars.
(My motto in life seems to be "Why choose between smiley faces or hearts,
when you can have smiley faces IN hearts?!!")





It warmed my heart for Aidan that every student in his 3rd grade class
filled out one of these and gave it to him.

 


A girl in his class made this paper ring for him.



A boy in his class gave him 3 Pokemon cards.
He is all about Pokemon cards right now.

 


Ashley chose these flowers at the store.




7 yr old Ashley's drawing of flowers in vase.
She loves to draw.





I dig the sunrises in our yard.

 


I continue to see lots of things in Massachusetts I haven't seen before,
even during 12 winters in New Jersey.
These salt/sand containers are everywhere.
I am guessing this bodes of much much snow.



Coyotes and kindness

Coyotes.

And just like that, the honeymoon is over.

No, it is not that quite that dramatic, but still, thud, clunk, aack, I'm disappointed and frustrated.

I grew up spending every summer in the foothills of a Los Angeles suburb.  Coyotes were vaguely referred to, but were generally considered a skittish lot, who only grabbed an outdoor cat once in awhile, and were rarely, if ever, seen roaming the streets.

The coyotes in our new town are apparently neither skittish or unseen.

A few months ago my neighbor was with her two small dogs at the end of our driveway, and there was a coyote.  It did go away when she yelled at it.

Another incident was a coyote trying to grab a small dog and the coyote bit a child on the backside.

I was told they prey on sick dogs, one coyote even sitting outside a house waiting for the dog to come out.

After ten days in our "Big House in the Little Woods," as Aidan calls it affectionately, I've grown to love living surrounded by woods.  Ashley and I saw a large group of turkeys wander by.  I had envisioned deer, racoons, chipmunks.

I had never for a moment thought about carniverous predators.

I'm not naive, I camp, spent the last two summers in Shenandoah hearing of bear sightings daily, saw a bear cub scamper across a road, hiked by a tree with freshly made bear claw marks tearing it open.

Somehow, I had not yet thought of any un-cute animal here in our yard.

My very nice neighbors told me they actually deliberated on whether to tell we newcomers about the coyotes.  I thanked them for their sensitivity, but appreciated their candor, and felt it extremely necessary that I know this information.

This changes a lot.

Although my two large dogs are not technically sick, they are elderly and beginning to have joint soreness and stiffness, and move slower.  We will now no longer allow them to spend time in our yard alone on a lead tied to the house, as we had been doing.  They would not be able to get away from a coyote.

We will not allow the kids to play in the yard unsupervised.

Nature.  It ain't all cartoon bunnies.

And now, from the serious to the sublime!

Craig jokes that we've moved to Mayberry!

I tease him that he is going to go bankrupt paying all of the town residents to be so friendly, a la the Chevy Chase movie Funny Farm!

Our moving van hadn't but pulled away that our neighbor Ed walked up our driveway, introduced himself to us, and gave us his phone number.  By the end of the conversation it was all I could do to stop myself from throwing my arms around him and hugging him!  He and his wife Anne have lived down the street since the '60s and they knew the former owners very well.  I loved that his name was my grandpa's name, and my son's middle name, his wife's name is my middle name, including the -e on the end. 

We are living far away from everything we know.  Family lives many states away.  We barely know anyone in this entire state.  We have zero persons to list as local emergency contacts on our childrens' emergency contact forms at school.  Craig works an hour from our house.  I have not yet made the friendships and rapport that stay-at-home moms who-also-have-no-family-in-the-area require to keep their sanity, knowing there are people to turn to if something comes up.

So when, on my 5th morning in our new town, when my children were emotional and at their 3rd day at their new school, I was at Target, my cell phone rang, my neighbor Ed letting me know today was rubbish day, and that he had marked a map of our town to give to me, with all the stores and important locations in our area, it really touched me.

I am so grateful for our friends and neighbors in our previous town, for the peace of mind it provided me, to know they were the emergency contacts on my childrens' school forms, to know they could help me get in when I locked myself out (who, me?!), to be assured they could pick up my kids from school when I was running late, to be comforted when they would show up at my door with homemade soup when I was sick in bed and my husband was out of town on business.

So when, on our 10th day in our new neigborhood, our neighbors showed up at our door with a basket of homemade chocolate chip cookies, welcoming us to the neighborhood..... it made me feel like oh, okay, I can survive this change, and it looks like I will hopefully yes, make good friends and neighbors here like I did in our previous town.

I get such a good vibe in this house.  And that vibe only continued when the previous owner, now retired in Florida at age 87, wanted to call us and talk with us.  My girlfriend said to me "Who does that?!  That never happens!! That is amazing!"  I look forward to speaking with her, we have exchanged voicemail messages so far.  I think the Hungarian background of she and her husband reminds me of the heritage of my late Grampa Eddie.  And with that, I cry.  Did you know that moving away from all you know, to somewhere you don't know, with no family, makes you cry?  Often?

Everyone so far here has been so friendly, at our new school, even strangers at the grocery store.  The day before the kids started at their new school, I arrived at the school to pick up forms, and there was the principal, in a suit, holding a pink rose, happily loudly greeting all the students with Happy Valentine's Day and a big smile, standing in front of a large colorful mural painted on the wall.  I said to myself this is gonna be a good new school.  As I write this right now, I start to cry.  Happy, grateful tears.

If you are reading this thinking "Of course you will make new friends!  Of course the new school will be fine!" then I am guessing you, yourself, have never moved
to a new state
where you know no one
and have no family
with two young children.

Because if you had, you would know that it is, quite simply, like moving to Mars.

First day of new school

Sigh.

That was heartbreaking.

I knew the first day at the new school was going to be.... choose an adjective, hard, difficult, awkward, challenging....

I knew it would take a LOT of getting used to.

But somehow I had not braced myself for this.

The moment the minivan door closed, Ashley burst into tears.

And began her list of all the hard moments.

She said someone had yelled at her for being late for dismissal.  I told her I would find out what happened.  Aidan wanted me to go in right then and there and find out what happened.  (I loved that big brother instinct in him.) 

She said there were so many things that were different, recess before lunch?!, snack in the afternoon?!

She said she wanted to go back to her (much loved) 1st grade teacher's class in our previous town, in our previous state.

Crack.

Heartbreak.

In the car it took all I had not to burst into tears myself.  For her.

Instead, I parked the car, came to her side, and hugged her.

I told her I completely understood how hard it all was, how much change this all was, how many things were different, how she missed her old teacher and her old class and her old school.

Aidan scowled and frowned and said everything was weird and strange and different.

We got home.  Daddy and our doggies were there, familiar cartoons were on, things were calmer.

When I tucked her in that night of the first day of new school, she said to me "I don't want to live in Massachusetts."

Crack.

Heartbreak.

I know that all of this is "normal."  I know that people move.  I know that children move.  I know this very well because I changed schools myself many times during my childhood.  And every single time it was hard.

I let my kids know that I've experienced what they are going through, as a child myself, and I remember very well what it feels like, so they will know I can relate, firsthand.

During this whole process of 3 months of knowing we were moving, I've told them over and over that all of their emotions were normal, and they could tell me all they were feeling, all of it, and that it was okay to feel mixed emotions: excited, scared, sad, nervous.  I'm glad they talked about everything they were feeling, everyday, between when we found out in August that we were moving, to now having moved.

I know that one of my jobs as a parent, as a mother, is to teach them to be tough, to be strong, to embrace change, to learn how to handle new situations.....

And you know what my heart says?  Blah, blah, blah, to all of that, I just want to protect them.

I've had a veryyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy hard time during these 9 years so far of parenthood learning that I am not going to be able to, nor am I supposed to, protect them from hard experiences, hard emotions, loss. 

But, I know that I have to accept it.

The next morning when we arrived at school, and I parked, she told she did not want to get out of the car.

So, in a new spirit of pluck and encouragement, rather than go the hug and cuddle route, I put on my Ma Ingalls hat, and said in a chipper voice "I know, this is all a big adventure for all of us, Daddy is driving into work for the first time today, so we are all being brave and strong!"

And held my breath until dismissal.

They got into the car chattering away, telling me all about their day and their specials and the playground.  And exhale.

Perhaps tougher moms are reading this and chuckling and thinking "Oh honey, you gotta lighten up, sister!"  But that's not me.  I'm the worrier, the is-everything-okay-'er, the how-can-I-make-it-better-'er.  We all get to choose the kind of parent we are gonna be.  Or maybe we have no choice at all in the kind we naturally are.... but we gotta add parts that are necessary.

One of my favorite blog writers titled her blog "Motherhood is not for wimps."  Amen to that, sister.