Loving Life

No time for talk.  No time for chat.  No time for anything, other than art.  Spaghetti art, fish art, peace and love art.....Having the time of my life right now persuing a dream I never knew I had.  I want to have more time for my family, and I will, but for right now, we are filled with paint and promise!

Father's Day

On the eve of this Father's Day, I really need to take a moment or two to reflect on the fathers in my own life.......

Daddy.  Thank you.  Thank you for loving me when I was not so lovable.....when I snorted through my nose all the time, and keened "crocodile rock" in the car.  Thank you for loving me enough to call my husband "that boy" for a full five years after we married.  Thank you for all the times you told me, "Keep your eye on the ball, Lori", and "shine that flashlight right here"  I must have been the proudest girl ever....Thank you for taking me to the mall and buying me that sixteen dollar smock top that you said you would never buy "at that ridiculous price"...I still remember the print and the feel of the fabric.
Thank you for all the sugar cookies, cans of tuna and cheerios you bought for me and the kiddos over the years. .Thank you for showing me the beach, the mountains and the movies, places I would never have gone without you.  Thank you for trusting me enough to let me ride my bike all over South Arlington.  Thank you for never, ever forgetting how much Sundays meant to 4 little girls who missed their Daddy all week.  Thank you for wiggling my toe when you visited me in the hospital after Johnboy was born. Thank you for all of the Shirley Temple's you got us at Duffs in Winchester and every frozen custard I ever had.  Thank you for being my Daddy, the one mom blamed on me having a pound of cheese in bed with me when it was only gum, and the Daddy who sang "He's in the jailhouse now", and "Chewing Chawing Gum".  Thank you for the picnics and parties you took us to.
Daddy, my life would have been so empty and colorless without you, and I am everything I am because of you.  I am strong and loyal and loving and compassionate and sensible and hard-working and quick to laugh because of you.  When I felt ugly and clumsy, you were always the man in my life who loved me just the way I was, and that, Daddy, made all the difference.  Thank you.

To my husband....I am not sure I could be the mother I am if you were not the father you are.  When I want to run and hide and pretend, just for a few precious moments that I don't need to worry about the kids, you are the one who worries for me.  When I am the lamb, you are the lion, and when I need to shout, you keep your calm.  When the world is tumbling down around us and I don't know how we are going to feed these people, you always make a miracle happen.
You are as capable at changing diapers as I am, and as likely to buy feminine hygiene products for our girls.  Nothing shakes you, rattles you, or scares you and you make a mean roasted chicken, (thanks, by the way...dinner was great). You cook, you clean, and you cut hair.  When I need to feel like big Mama, you let me and enjoy it, and when I need to cower and shake, you hold me tight till the shivering is over.
You have been "team mom", chauffeur, and life coach, and on occasion, mother hen...when I need to work to feel good about myself, you keep our home running, and the dentist on time, and when I need to nest and be a home maker, you  keep the fires burning and the wolf away from the door.  You let me be whatever and whoever I need to be without ever losing who you are.
I love you, my beloved Michael.  You are everything to me and I am everything I am because of you, too. You are my best friend, and my yardstick for everything good in life...

So, to these two men, my past and my future, and everything right now..............Happy Father's Day.
I love you.

Saturday Observations by an old lady

or not so old....................everything is relative, right?

 

So, I wake up this morning with all the best intentions.  Planning my day, this luscious, early June morning, why wouldn't one want to clean floors, fold laundry and wash dishes?  Well, THIS one didn't.  want.to.  and so, like so many Saturday mornings before, my resolve rapidly melted and before long, not only was the regular debris on the floor, my intentions were as well.

I did manage to collect a trash bags (and I mean a contractor bag) worth of bills, junk mail, catalogs featuring thin pubescent girls modeling scanty swimwear, and old newspapers...(I know, I know, I need to recycle.....but when you are gone 12 hours a day the very LAST thing you want to do is spend a luscious June morning sorting paper goods)  but I digress..........

So, as I mentioned, I did manage to remove alot of junk off the table surfaces of at least one room.  I also threw away a variety of empty boxes, cartons, and plastic bags....Really, kids....is there even one good reason to return an empty box of cereal to the pantry.  Sometimes it feels like a dirty trick, quite frankly...I notice more often than not, it is never the raisin bran, it is that tantalizing, forbidden box of fruit loops on the top shelf that I have avoided for days, knowing that "no one can eat just one" (Yes, folks that is as true for sugary cereal as it is for Lay's potato chips).............

I'll look around, ascertain whether there are witnesses around, and then slowly, quietly reach for those fruit loops, and bam!, they are empty, and even worse, the box is sealed up like it just came off the shelf at the Safeway.

Hmmmmmmm.....A lesser woman would hide her fruit loops.....fortunately for you all, there is not enough room in my dresser drawers and living in a house that is  127 years old, there are no closets...

I did manage to "get my art on".....a project I am doing for someone I deeply admire, and though my husband laughed at it, (and laughed and laughed and laughed) I feel good about it...or maybe I don't..Sometimes I don't recognize my feelings, kwim?  Do I feel good about it or do I feel good about it being ugly?  Do I feel bad about it or bad that it isn't good enough?  Am I crazy or am I crazy to not be crazy?  (you see where I am going with this)  Think about something long enough and you won't know whether you are coming or going....and of course, everyone who knows me KNOWS I think too much.

Am I coming?  Or going?

But, what I most wanted to remember and to write were my observations tonight.  Sometimes I see things so beautiful that I feel them....I get lost in them, roll around in them, and my worst fear is forgetting them.... I have often wanted to wear a wire just so I could talk to myself so that I would remember later what I thought and said....Was I coming or going?

I am so grateful for this beautiful place that God saw fit to drop me....The dropping blue shadows that fall between the hills as the sun sets..............................the gentle mountains that frame this valley, that indigo ridge that follows me as I drive, golden sunshine warming them, and the dips and swirls of waving fields of bluegrass, and shiny fields of emerald green field corn.  It seems, when I think back on it, these are the props that have surrounded me all of my life, and for that I am thankful.

This same landscape, grey and misty on a November morning draws me to slumber, lures me into a sense of deep time and place, and reminds me that this is exactly where I am meant to be.

And so I wonder.....how can I forget this so quickly?  There are days and weeks at a time when I feel disconnected and far away, when I am unable to see that this place, this space is real life.  MY own real life. I think they say, "live in the now" for the same reason...I need to slow down every day of my life and look around.  See the glory in every tree, bush and bramble, and remind myself that while on any given day I may not "see" the glory, it is still there, always there....This is the place where my mom lived, where my Dad farmed.  This is the place where I learned arithmetic, music and first love.

This is MY land, and no one can take this history away from me.

And isn't it funny how life goes around and back and around again,and before you know it, you are back where you started, but a little older and alot wiser...

All of my roots run deep, and when I grow away, I come back and grow again, and oddly enough, in the same spaces and places....seeds spread deep into fertile soil.

Funny enough, I am teaching less than 2 or 3 miles from my old primary days....I live in the town where my children's father was a boy scout.....I am so far removed, and yet so deeply attached, and any detachment I feel is of my own doing. (although overpopulation by the newly arrived herd doesn't help)

I won't do it.  I will not give up my heritage, my poor man's working class love of the land,  and respect for the land that bore me, fed me, and nourished and nurtured me, body and soul. What I will do is love this land, in the moment, every moment, and stop thinking about it so much.  It is.  It just is.  No other explanation is required.

Now that I have reflected on my overactive and oft times hyper-stimulated thought processes, I am quite hungry.  Think I'll have some fruit loops...

The 22 things I have lied to my children about...

and, before I begin, I *will* say this.......................some of these were lies of omission, some of them not lies, really, just misinformation I thought was true at the time....

1.  SUGAR IS A VEGETABLE.  Sugar is not, in fact, a vegetable, and I knew it all along.....but it is vegetative, and I do think, (much like carrots supply us with a necessary nutrient) that a certain amount of sugar each day is essential for good spirit development.

2.  YOU CAN DROWN IN A TEASPOON OF WATER.  In my defense, this lie began well before I became a mother,........and if it kept you all from falling asleep in a swimming pool, I will not apologize.

3.  IT'S AS EASY TO LOVE A RICH MAN AS IT IS TO LOVE A POOR MAN.  This could not possibly be anything but a lie, as noone, and I mean NOT ONE SOUL that I have ever known has fallen in love with a rich man.

4.  NICE GIRLS DON'T WEAR THONGS.  Nice girls DO wear thongs.....if they feel like it. They wear granny panties, bikinis, the occasional pair of men's boxers, and even no panties at all.  "Nice" is a function of the soul, not the behind.

5.  UNSWEETENED TEA IS ILLEGAL IN 8 STATES......(refer to lie # 1)

6.  OUR REFRIGERATOR IS A TEST GROWING SITE FOR THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENTS OFFICE ON HOMEGROWN ANTIBIOTICS.... Not..........Mommy has no time to clean the refrigerator, but it felt like you all would buy this lie. Mold after all is intriguing.

7.  A CLEAN HOME IS A SIGN OF A SICK MIND....Truthfully, a dirty home is the sign of ADHD run amuk....................the only thing sick about someone who can manage their life, their job, AND their home is that they often run in families, and alas, not ours.

8.  "THE FORMULA"...(Girls, you remember this.......when you buy something, and then have to explain the cost of it to your husband, you subtract 70% of the purchase price, then add 1.87 for the total that you tell him)...  It is 2012.....you deserve it whatever the cost, and it is alright to tell the truth..however, a brief mention of an overstock sale can still go a long way.  Also, the purchase of some small incidental for said husband can really smooth the way for your new purchase.

9.  MOM'S SPECIAL RECIPE................one word here............"butter"  If it tastes better when mom makes it, it is just the addition of one little ingredient...

10.  "I NEVER INHALED"  ....................enough said....

11.  CHOCOLATE IS A DAIRY PRODUCT.....just because some of it is called "milk chocolate" does not mean you need 3 servings a day.

12.  DUCT TAPE IS A GIRL'S BEST FRIEND.... a loving, caring and kind husband is a girls best friend, but without a doubt duct tape IS a girl's best thing to have in an emergency.

13.  A BUBBLE BATH WILL RELAX YOU MORE THAN ALCOHOL... all those long baths you remember mommy taking?  can we all say amaretto sours?...(I am kidding, kids.....kidding!!)

14.  LAUGHTER IS THE BEST MEDICINE....money is actually the best medicine.  It can buy real medicine, good food, a night on the town, a good night's sleep and a night at the comedy club....

15.  THEY CALLED ME EINSTEIN WHEN I WAS IN SCHOOL....No, they didn't....they called me "short bus, Lori"

16.  MY FAVORITE GIFTS ARE CHILD MADE MISSHAPEN CLAY ASHTRAYS.  My favorite gifts are grandchildren.

17.  PRETTY IS AS PRETTY DOES..really?  This lie has been told for generations.......let's face it, we all know that beautiful woman who routinely lies and cheats and steps on everyone in the name of attention, and has anyone EVER said, "that woman is just soooo ugly"?

18.  YOUR TEACHER KNOWS WHAT SHE IS TALKING ABOUT....she might just be fudging to get through the day to that bubble bath.

19.  REAL MEN EAT QUICHE.....none of the real men I know do...............they eat meat that has been drug through the yard by cats, cookies left in the oven for days, and cereal after all the marshmellows have been picked out, but they do NOT eat quiche.

20.   IT'S THE THOUGHT THAT COUNTS....only to your mother.  Everyone else wants cold hard cash.

21.  GRAY IS THE NEW HOT....this is the desperate claim of a not so gracefully aging Mama..

22.  IT'S NOT FAT, IT'S RELAXED MUSCLE.  It IS fat....( and I apologize for the genetics you have inherited...

and HERE is the list of something that has never been a lie................NEVER HAS, NEVER WILL.

I love you all more than you can imagine,.....more than all the sands on all the shores of all the seas..
more than I ever thought possible, and YOU, all of you, are my crowning jewels, and nothing you can ever do will change the amount of love I have for you.

(disclaimer....regarding number 13.....I never drank......wasn't safe to keep in the house with you all.)

Broken hearted

So yesterday..............Friday, my in-laws took us out to dinner.   (by the way, I HIGHLY recommend the crab cakes at the Blue Ridge Grill).....It had been a glorious Friday.  A sunny beautiful end to a tiring week.  All things considered, not a bad week......but a tired week.  Five straight days of toiling away, doing jobs I like (mostly), but don't love....or to be more specific, I love and yet oft times don't truly feel like myself when doing.

So we are lingering over coffee and dessert, and I hear a small child-like voice behind me, "it's my art teacher"....Then I look up to see this beautiful child, and her family and the mama says, "oh my goodness, look Reagan,....................it is your art teacher"  And then came the hurtful words:
"We'll see you in a few weeks....Reagan has signed up for your class again".............I smiled, said the appropriate words, even joked a bit with Mom and Dad, and told Reagan that she mostly clearly had become a successful artist, since she was wearing something pink and shiny.

The heartbreak?  I am not teaching art this summer....and sadly, may not ever again...not exclusively..
And then it hit me....

I can remember feeling the paint flow through my fingers like cool blood.......giving life to everything in my soul......and giving a voice to all I want to do.  The sound of fingers rubbing oils into pastels, making them into colors that only I have names for.....the way that wet clay opens itself up to you to become anything you choose it to be, (or...if you are like me, anything IT chooses to be)....
I remember a class last year with only 4 girls....we spent every idyllic summer day that week in quiet rhapsody, each of us moving from station to station, going where the spirit moved us in open studio.
Music played low in the background, and there was the gentle murmur of quiet conversations, spoken to oneself, mostly, or now and again to the artist working beside you.

It was during that week when I made the realization that all of us, every thinking, creating one of us is an artist, deserving to be heard and seen and understood, no matter what our age or our station in life...and these girls taught me that.

When I think about my teaching, and about where I am now and what I am doing....I feel this salty, gritty lump rise up in my throat.  It feels like I am struggling to breathe, as I writhe against it...Sometimes I show my kids art, how to make it, who else makes it, how people think about it, but I never truly am one with them in spirit, and in the spirit of the art these days...

I lay out the paints, the paper, the tools of my passion, and then I take as much time as I can to tell them what we are "trying" to do, but time, that cruel stealer of all things worth caring about is a harsh taskmaster, and while I try so desperately to say this:

"You are the master of your own art destination.  You can go there in any color you wish, in slow motion or at a breakneck speed...you can paint yourself into your picture or anyone else...someone you love, someone you are afraid of, someone you want to be....You can feel good or bad or angry or sad or any way you choose to feel, and no one can take that away from you...There is joy in creation"

while I thinking this, feeling this, willing this for my students, I have one eye on the child in the corner, trying to put fuse beads up his nose, and one eye on the clock, so I am not late putting snack away....I am trying so hard to please the teacher, to be her helpmate and supporter, to know her needs before she even knows them herself....I am trying in my own way to be all things to all people, and in the mix, I lose the soul,...the "milk" of this art that I so dearly love, and dearly love to share with these young and talented thinkers.

So yes, it feels like heartbreak..............I am only a child myself, unable or unwilling to put away the pleasures in my own life, or at least, unable to do two things at the same time, and do them well.
I hate this...........................I hate doing something halfway..........I want to BE their art teacher....No, I don't, because in all reality, I am not teaching them anything they don't already know.  Yes, I might show them a new technique or a new material, I might introduce them to cubism, or impressionism, I might even guide them in a study of contemporary American artists, but what I really want, what I really need to do,.......I want to BE with them in that moment when they recognize a part of themselves in that crayoned landscape....I want to be a part of the fabric of creativity.  I don't want to miss a thing....I want to be a part of the conversation, and the beautiful realization that we are all together in this...There is a union among artists...It transcends age and race and gender, and most of all, I want to be THERE when these tender young artists find their voice.  I want to be the one to hear it first, acknowledge it, and give it the glory and purpose it deserves.....

But, in the meantime, I go on....the teaching assistant, a child herself.....learning to give in and give up, to show patience and dignity and kindness and tolerance, all the while stamping my foot at the gate, waiting for my race to begin...

And in the waiting, I grow......and my heart breaks......