We just got back from the drive-ins. Its late. 12:42 to be exact. I have to mitigate how often we attempt this annual event. We do go every year, usually only once or twice. I have a couple of solid traditions that go into this thing:
Tradition number 1: peanut butter wafer cookies. Its the only time we eat them and its the major reason that I agree to going.
Tradition number 2: some sort of chips.
Tradition number 3: Pillows and blankets, and normally pajamas. Well... for the kids at least. I remember loving being in my PJ's and going to drive in's... why is this feeling awkward...
That's really it for the traditions, oh other than either suffering through plague levels of mosquitoes, or rebreathing everyone's air in a sealed up car. I choose the rebreathing while occasionally turning on the car and blasting the AC. We saw the new Ice Age, which Jenny surprisingly enjoyed, and Brave. They were both ok. The kids sat in the front passenger seat, and Jenny laid in the back. We also found out that our new Mazda 5 isn't the best for watching movies in, too low and... supine.
I took off the kids training wheels about a week ago. Today, I thought it would be a great idea if I took them to center of town to teach them how to ride. It didn't go very well. Both kids were in tears. It is such a hard balance to cut: pushing them past their fears inspiring confidence, or, being a completely overbearing jerk and doing permanent damage to your kids by not relenting when they are terrified. Today, I think I cut the line a little too near the latter.
Henry wasn't scared. He said he was, but he was really just very upset and way out of his comfort zone. I remember this. I remember feeling afraid of things, like learning how to ride a bike or how to dance, or getting a job for the first time... I remember feeling out of my element to the extent that I was terrified. It was something that I had to work through... on my own. If I had thought more clearly I would have remembered that last bit a lot better. The picture was taken pretty early on in the whole event. Actually, Nora finally gave up and Jenny let her. I didn't let Henry give up. I kept with him, while he was crying and peddling. I told him he had to balance on his own for at least one "mississippi." He pleaded over and over and I told him I wasn't listening. One second of balancing and we were done. I ran with him, held on to him, over and over. I think it took about half an hour.
I was caught in this whole circle of not letting the bike get the best of him. I feel pretty bad about the whole thing. He forgave me for not listening to him. I always listen to him, it is central to our trust. He tries new things, but at a pace that is much slower than I tried for today. I told him why I wanted him to keep going and I think he understood. It didn't end horribly, or very well either. Just one of those grey area days that you hope isn't something he's going to remember when he is in college and writing about his childhood.
My kids are getting older. When I was a kid, there wasn't a whole lot to be involved with. That might have been for a couple of reasons: A: I lived in Templeton. B: I wasn't really a group sport kind of kid. I did play some things: football, baseball... but they all ended up being kind of awful experiences. Kids now have some serious choices available to them. Henry just finished Fencing lessons (not building them). Nora takes dance. Henry is in cub scouts. Nora starts soccer in a couple of weeks. Henry took soccer and T-ball, and football. We just gave him a trial lesson at Holden Martial Arts. Seems like a great place, but we decided not to do it.
I know many people involve their kids in tons of activities and it works great for them. I just can't see burying them in activities. Henry, for one, doesn't really love sports. He likes the exercise, but his attention span for sitting around a baseball field isn't really that long..... at all. We are big on letting them choose their own things, except for music, they will all take music lessons of some sort, but as far as what they take up otherwise, its pretty much up to them. Nora loves dance, and I love that she loves it. Henry likes to explore things and look up things in books (he was just looking up what tetnis looks like under a microscope tonight. He is OK with fencing. I think Martial arts would be great for him, but Holden wanted him twice a week. I couldn't do it, not with what I know about him. Later maybe, when he is older. But as it stands, we go out as a family every Monday, he has boy scouts on Wednesday. He has had homework every night since first grade. I think he needs his space. He needs to pursue what he wants, not what he is being told to. He will get enough of that in school.
I am still looking for a martial arts place to take him to. Ideally, it would be somewhere that centers on focus and meditation, clarity of mind, singleness of purpose. Oh, and probably, one night a week would be a great start as well.
I woke at 5 this morning to my bedside light on. My best guess is that Nora woke sometime during the night and came in to our bedroom to make sure we were still there. She then went to sleep in Henry's room. She denies it, but I am right.
I was up early so I took Chaucer for a walk. I got this picture for Henry. We have been waiting for the crab spiders to come out. This one's early, they normally show up in August.
Rich Mullins was a man. I think that is how he would want to be remembered, and that is why I love him. He died in a car accident a few years ago. He was a "Christian" musician. I call him that because his music was predominantly sold in Christian music stores. I don't trust Christians a whole lot, not because they are bad, but more because they aren't trustworthy. They are always looking for ways to say things are better than they are, or making up reasons where none exists. And if they aren't doing that, then they are blaming others for not doing that. Rich Mullins was the opposite of that. He was just a man and because of it, an amazing one.
I have been thinking about one of his songs now for days..."Hard to Get." Beautiful and sad, he wrote it just a bit before he died. I found this video of him preforming in someone's living room on youtube. In it, he says something that I find profound. "One of the things that continues to blow me away is how [the scriptures] say all the wrong things. Your Sunday school teachers ain't gonna tell you what the scriptures mean. Cause ah... We want God to inspire confidence, and what God wants to inspire is fear. We want God to give us all kinds of assurances, and what God wants to give us is faith. And we want to become healthy and prosperous and unaffected by the world, and He wants us to encounter the world in such a way as he did, which is a way that will eventually kill us. So we ask for all the wrong things and we get all the wrong things. That's why I think its hard for a rich person to get into heaven, because they've been going the wrong direction for so long, its hard to turn around."
We live in this violent world, and its hard. I am desperately afraid of losing the ones that I love, or having them lose me in some awful way. This is no small thing, and to make light of it, or it's effect on the people that live in this world seems so wrong to me. I hate the whole "God has a plan" mentality, because if it was God's plan for Molly Bish to be murdered by some terrible person, then that is not a good God in my mind. People die of diseases and their kids are left here, hurt beyond healing, and we see it happen and are hurt as well. And what is left is a world veering from injury, desperately trying to avoid horror after horror. Diets, security systems, door locks, medicines, vitamins, wealth, good neighborhoods, Christianity has somehow become a guide to the good life, and those who fall short are cast out for fear of contamination... an insult to injury that is so commonly committed. Why can't we all just say that we don't understand why all of this happens here and be done with it? Why can't we just comfort those who mourn without trying to find their faults? In my understanding of God, He came here to suffer and find us in our suffering, not to create ways for us not to. What kind of God does that, and why would He? What is there for us to find in all of this?
This world is a violent, beautiful place. We love so strongly here. We tie ourselves to others with commitment that must transcend death, because it has suffered through an amazingly traumatic life and survived. And the terrible drama of it all is that we are still taken from each other. In the face of our promises and oaths and desperate need. We are taken in violence and sickness and in turmoil and sometimes in peace. But we are all taken, one by one. How can anybody look at that and then blame the people that are suffering for their own actions. My only hope is in a God that loves so strongly and with such abandon, that he can see into our hurt and understand us and our misgivings, even about Himself.
Here are the lyrics to what has been taking up room in my head for the past few days. I will put a link up to the song as well. The quality is low because it was taped on a tape recorder and he died before it was able to be produced.
You who live in heaven Hear the prayers of those of us who live on earth Who are afraid of being left by those we love And who get hardened by the hurt Do you remember when You lived down here where we all scrape To find the faith to ask for daily bread Did You forget about us after You had flown away Well I memorized every word You said Still I'm so scared I'm holding my breath While You're up there just playing hard to get You who live in radiance Hear the prayers of those of us who live in skin We have a love that's not as patient as Yours was Still we do love now and then Did You ever know loneliness Did You ever know need Do You remember just how long a night can get? When You were barely holding on And Your friends fall asleep And don't see the blood that's running in Your sweat Will those who mourn be left uncomforted While You're up there just playing hard to get? And I know you bore our sorrows And I know you feel our pain And I know it would not hurt any less Even if it could be explained And I know that I am only lashing out At the One who loves me most And after I figured this somehow All I really need to know Is if You who live in eternity Hear the prayers of those of us who live in time We can't see what's ahead And we can not get free of what we've left behind I'm reeling from these voices that keep screaming in my ears All the words of shame and doubt blame and regret I can't see how You're leading me unless You've led me here Where I'm lost enough to let myself be led And so You've been here all along I guess It's just Your ways and You are just plain hard to get ~Rich Mullins
So, I forgot my camera at my friend Amy's house the day before yesterday..... awful. I can't believe how aggravated I was. I have really grown accustomed to having it with me, due to this blog. I pretty much carry it with me all the time. I was in Gardner this morning and pretty much killing myself because I didn't have it with me. Crazy. So, This entry is for Monday. I don't have one for yesterday or today because of my freaking missing camera.... grrrr. But I am back in business for tonight and tomorrow.
Monday, we get together with a couple of other families, I know I have talked about that before. We have food, we talk, its nice. Tonight I brought a bunch of summer rolls that I made. They were in the new fine cooking magazine that I have been getting for over ten years. Henry is complete obsessed with egg rolls, spring rolls, and now summer rolls. They were kind of intensive to make, but they were fun and light and the three dipping sauces that I made: Sweet and Sour, Spicy peanut, and sweet hot oil, were really good and fun to dip into.
So, that's my recap. Glad to be con-camera. Back to it.
I am 41. I never thought I would last this long. Seriously, I used to pray that I would make it past 30. I think my Wolff Parkinson White Syndrome thinger really played a big part of that. Something about your heart speeding up to super-human levels and going off into crazy rhythm patterns at random times gives you something of a death fixation.
My birthday was actually kind of wonderful. As I grow older, life is becoming less and less about myself and more about the people around me. Its nice. Its definitely a product of having and and truly caring about my kids. Such a strange thing, this transition of life moving away from myself... god I hope its not a transition to death... slowly losing yourself into oblivion. I chose my own gift this year, it makes it a lot easier on Jen. She kind of stresses out about those kind of things. I chose a nice pan and some silverware....slipping into oblivion. Whatever, I do a lot of cooking around here, and I wanted a nice searing pan... we have all nonstick, and I needed one that could put some crunch on some chicken skin!
Jen made this awesome cake that she has made for the last couple of years, pineapple on the bottom, cream cheese on the top. Yum. I made lobster rolls and a cold corn salad. My parents stopped over for a tiny bit with half a blueberry cake, that was really good. The McRells came over on a whim and ate with us. Nice, relaxed, lobster, no drama, just life. It was great. 41 is actually feeling pretty good. Now if I could lose this weight. :)
