Day Twenty Two- P90X - 'I hate it...but I love it.'

  Last year for Christmas I bought P90X for hero hottie. He really wanted to try it; damn those infomercials, they really do work; but I couldn't think of anything else to get him anyway. He spent part of the next week watching the instruction video, reading the manuals, and deciding how we were going to follow the food plan.
   He convinced me to do it with him. Which at first I wasn't sure of. I was working lots of hours, always tired and struggling to get through my day, and I wasn't in shape at all. In fact, I had gained quite a bit of weight and felt sluggish and not so great about my appearance. It didn't help that I spent my days working with small tykes, who seem to stain every shirt I owned. I couldn't wear my hair down and I didn't dare put dangle earrings in, that was asking for trouble. My self image was as dank as the winter weather.
   So in the cold month of January, after putting on weight from too much pie and not enough exercise, I decided what the heck and I would give it a try. After all, how hard could it actually be?

NOTE: For people that are familiar with the P90X program, you can stop laughing now and continue reading.
For the rest of you; P90X is a killer exercise routine. If it doesn't kill you, than it makes you stronger. It is not for anyone that is afraid of sweating profusely, being sore for days afterwards, or hasn't taken any form of physical activity seriously before. And for the first few weeks you might be tempted to throw your weights at Tony Horton's face. Resist, you need the television to continue the program.

   First of all, the diet for the first month is very low on carbs. Very low. I stared at the menu over and over again, thinking to myself I can not give up my lovely bowls of rice, or my crunchy bites of toast. I didn't mind the heavy veggie part of it, I love vegetables and already ate quite a bit of them. But I was never a heavy protein eater. I liked my servings of grains a little too much.

   We bought the food we needed and I learned how to make Roasted Red Pepper soup (delicious) and really good omelets.

   My sister decided to join us on our journey towards fitness, which hero hottie has always been one to be fit. He rode in mountain bike races before we met and has a pretty labor intensive job, so getting ready for this program was more excitement than nervousness on his part. For my sister and I, who sports had never been a family pass time, this was still exciting but completely new.
   One night, a few days before we were going to start the program, we all took our measurements and weight. Urggh, did I really gain that much weight? It was horrifying, even more so because I had to share it with hero hottie. And we had to write it down. I couldn't forget the ugly number if it was written in black and white and hung up on the cork board.
   Then we shot our 'before photos'. Being the photographer, I shot their photos first. We used a white wall, my flash for the light source, and undressed to our unmentionables so we could record every detail. Hero hottie took my photos and then I looked at them.
   They were awful photos. It's easy to ignore the mirror some times, especially if you don't look until after you're dressed and your 'problem areas' are camouflaged by clothing. But in the harsh lighting of my flash, there was no hiding the fat areas. The extra chubbiness around the middle and the flabbiness of my arms and thighs.
    I was overweight and clearly heading down the wrong path. I tried to ignore the pain looking at those photos caused me, I didn't like the way I looked at all, but no amount of positive thinking was going to change the fact that I had put on a lot of weight. I slipped into the bathroom and cried. More than once.

  So our first day, or should I say night since we had to do our exercising after work, after dinner and after Bean and Abu were in bed, was tough. I had zero energy and just wanted to watch television and do nothing. What was I thinking? I couldn't exercise at eight o'clock at night.
   I started with three pound weights for the Chest and Back video. How pitiful is that? Three small pounds and I couldn't even keep up. By the end of the video I was dying. And then Tony Horton kept up the torture with Ab Rippers. Fifteen minutes of hell. My back was burning, my abs were on fire, and I went straight  to bed. Forget about doing the dinner dishes. I was exhausted.

  For a week I struggled through the series of video. I struggled with my habit to snack and I made myself stay away from the carbs. But I enjoyed the protein bars and shakes. They actually seem to help with the muscle pain.
  Night after night we encouraged each other to continue until we hit month two. We took more photos. And noticed how it was showing. Oh, not on me. But on my sister, who was trimmer. And even on hero hottie who was defining ab muscles.
   But on me, the difference was small especially after so much work. Again, I slipped into the bathroom and cried.

  We continued for the next two months and still I felt like nothing was changing. It was spring and than summer and I pushed myself. Towards what, I wasn't sure because I wasn't looking like those slim and fit people on the commercials. Heck, I wasn't even trimming down like my exercise partners. I was still fat and still struggling to get through the hour long routine.

  Slowly, our diet changed. We ate less carbs and the amount of food we ate at a time was smaller. In fact, we noticed when we went out to eat, the portions were entirety too large for us anymore. I couldn't finish the meals anymore. I snacked on more fruits and nuts and when I did eat rice or bread, I limited the amounts and didn't even mind it.

  Then I decided I needed something extreme. I wasn't any where near where I wanted to be after exercising for six months. Hero hottie and I started jogging the Hill. If P90X is extreme, than the hill is pushing sanity. The trail up onto the hill is a steep incline. The backside isn't too bad, I had to be careful not to go too fast or I'll end up tripping on the rocks and flying off the trail. We would finish by going back up the same trail we just came down. Somehow we were still supposed to be breathing at the same time.
   The first time I tried jogging up the hill, (should I started on a running track? I tried. I got bored. Maybe it was the P90X but I needed something that was going to challenge me to the edge of my ability. I was also desperate to see some results by this time.)
   -I jogged five or ten minutes and felt like collapsing. I went up the hill in a serious of little jogs and then walking. Little jogs and then walking.
   I finally finished jogging down the hill and had to lay on the ground to catch my breath. What the hell was I thinking? My head was pounding, I could hear my heartbeat in my ears, and my lungs were tight and burning.
   Then I turned to hero hottie and started laughing. "I did it. I jogged. I don't even like jogging."
   He grins at me.
   And then we went back up the hill and down again. My muscles were shaky by the time I was back to the car but I had done this wonderful thing for myself.

   Over the summer and early part of fall I jogged on the Hill as many times as I could. I was jogging longer and faster every time. I was finally starting to trim up and I was losing weight.

    Then I started on the P90X again. It was a completely different experience this time around. I was using ten pound weights instead of three, I was actually doing push-ups and I could keep up with the video. I also didn't feel like screaming at Tony Horton during the entire video. Suddenly he wasn't the bad guy. He was the guy who was going to keep me heading towards my goal of reaching pre-baby body status.
    I still have a ways to go. But I'm excited. I've trimmed up so much I need new clothes because the old ones keep trying to fall off me. My shirts are baggy and shapeless. It's awesome. I can't wait for spring so I can get back up on the Hill. I bet I do even better this time around.

    I have more energy, I eat better, and I don't feel tired and sluggish. It's difficult to find time to exercise and I always used that as an excuse before because it didn't seem as important as the other things on my list. But now that I'm getting in shape and feel so much better about the way I look, I remind myself that every thing else works better when I exercise.
   It might have taken this bookworm way too long to discover the benefits of insane exercise routines but now that I have, it's one of the first things I want to accomplish in the mornings. It's even better than a cup of coffee.  So thanks Tony Horton for designing an insane and crazy workout, because it works.

Day Twenty One- Friends

   I was moving soon with my entire family across country. And my seventeen year self was extremely excited. This was an adventure and since I had happily graduated early from high school over a year ago- it was time for something different.
   I had quit my job, helped pack up the house and visited all my favorite places and people one last time. I was nearly ready.
   Except for saying goodbye to my friends. That was the only painful part of my decision to move to a new life.


   My best friends at that time were Sarah and Gwen. They were a year younger than me but we hung out all the time. We did all the typical teenage things; movies, shopping, talking and drooling over boys. We also liked other things that weren't popular with the other teenage girls in our town, such as antique shopping; which Oregon has a ton of different shops to explore; and hanging out in the local college town coffee shop. But perhaps, we weren't as lame as the popular girls thought we were for hanging out at a coffee shop.
   Because it was a coffee shop catering to the local college students. And there was a lot of cute musician college boys that would play their guitars at night for the coffee drinkers. Not only did they have perfectly made coffee, delicious pastries but they had college guys.
   Of course, we were way too shy to talk to any of them. But we certainty liked to giggle over them.

   One day, just a week or so before I was moving, my friends show up in Gwen's clunker of a car. I'm not sure which junk yard she dragged it out of but if she jostled the gear shift rough enough it would eventually pop into drive and it would actually get you to where you were going. The car was a two door, blue and rust color vehicle with more noise than a locomotive.
   It was a sunny summer afternoon when they unexpectedly pull into the driveway.
  "Hey, what are you guys doing?" I asked.
  Sarah grinned smugly. "We have a surprise for you. Your Mom knows about it, so don't worry."
  My friend could be a bit wild so it was natural to wonder if her surprise was Mom approved. Turns out it was, so I got ready and we hurried out to the car.
  "You're sitting in the back." Gwen said, pointing to the small backseat. I hated sitting in the back, it was cramped and had no leg room.
   I frowned and rolled my eyes. "Fine."
   Sarah grinned again. "And we're going to blind fold you."
  "What?" I screeched.
  They were both grinning as Sarah waved the bandanna in the air. "It's a surprise, remember?"
  I shook my head and it took them a few minutes of earnest pleading on their parts to convince me to don the blindfold and then sit in the back of the car. So not only was I stuck in the back, I couldn't see anything. What was I thinking?
   What was my Mom thinking?
  I had great fun with my friends but this was like giving them permission to be as wild and crazy as they wanted. I couldn't believe I had agreed to this.
  The first few minutes were okay. I noticed just how loud the car protested being driven, now that my sense of sight was behind a stupid blindfold. My friends just giggled smugly as we drove. They were enjoying this surprise way too much. Probably because I was always the sane one. The one who didn't want to get into trouble doing something. Maybe not a daredevil, but still they enjoyed my company.
   Now I was trapped helplessly in their hands. Of course, I could have just taken the blindfold off but they kept warning me to keep it on. They had a great surprise for me and they didn't want me to ruin it. Sure, use guilt and my own nature against me. I didn't want to hurt their feelings so I kept the blindfold on.
   Suddenly, the car is spinning round and down a steep hill, making me dizzy and sick. I don't even have time to rip the blindfold off, I'm just holding onto the seat, wondering if I was going to be alive in the next few minutes.
   Sarah is screaming at Gwen to slow down but the car still turns precariously and frantically. I close my eyes under the blindfold, holding my breath.
   "Shut up, Sarah." Gwen screams back. The car does a 180 turn and comes to an abrupt and noisy stop. We are alive. I let go of the seat and reach up to take off the blindfold.
   My friends grab my hands. "You can't do that." Sarah says. "We aren't there yet."
  "You almost killed us."
   They start laughing hysterically. "No, we're fine. Gwen just took the hill a little fast. Keep it on, please."
Sarah doesn't let go my hands until I nod. This surprise had better be good. Since they almost got me killed. I fold my arms and glare at them through the bandanna.
   "Don't be mad at us. You're going to like this." Gwen says softly.
   "I better." I muttered.
 
  A few minutes later, we finally arrive. Where. I'm not sure. I have to climb out of the car with the blindfold on, each friend flanking my side and guiding me. The happy noises of other teenagers fill the open air and we walk across the grass until Sarah whips the bandanna off my eyes with a dramatic flourish and a wide gesture of her arms, encompassing the surprise.
   We're in some one's yard which happens to belong to a nice and fancy house up in the hills surrounding our town. Huge trees adorned the property and a small gully runs across the backyard. It's probably twelve to twenty feet deep and only ten to fifteen feet wide.
  And kids are swinging across it on a rope and plank hung from a beautiful hardwood tree.
  "Surprise." Sarah says. "This is my friend's house." She points to the blond teenager next to us. I smile at her. "And she said I could bring you here to enjoy her backyard as a going away gift."
   Gwen is silently grinning from ear to ear.
   I gulped. The kids were laughing and enjoying themselves but even though the gully wasn't that big it was still big enough to hurt if the rope broke, or went the wrong way or...I was worrying about all the 'what ifs'.
   "Come on." Sarah grabs it when the last kid is finished and holds it while I nervously climb onto the plank of wood. Will it hold?
   I grip the rough, scratchy rope and then she lets go.
   I fly through the air with dizzily speeds, crossing the gap a few times before I slow down enough for someone to grab the rope.
   It was awesome!!!
  We spent the rest of the afternoon taking turns on the rope swing, resting on the grass and talking while we waited. The conversation isn't anything I remember in detail. We spoke of the college plans we had, the boys taking their turns on the rope who were cute, and what things I would miss the most when I moved.
   My friends. Definitely my friends. I said. That part I remember.
   I also remember the fun we had that afternoon, swinging and laughing and talking. It was one of those 'perfect moments.' The ones we don't forget. The moments we carry with us like little treasures because they warm our hearts when we need some warmth from the harshness of life.


   We need friends. And I have some absolutely great friends right now. People that encourage me to be creative with my writing. Thanks neighbor!! And friends that remind me that with even being a busy mom that there is still time for fun.- Grown up and still talking about cute guys fun.- (Sorry hero hottie, but I know what guys talk about so I think us women can discuss sexy movie stars. It's only fair. :)

    Friends are like icing on the cake. And I'm so grateful to have mine.

Day Twenty- To Blog or Not to Blog

   I started blogging last year because a literary agent suggested in her newsletter that all good little writer wannabes that wanted to make it in the publishing world should have a blog to build up their readership.
   And not just any sort of blog but one with actual readers. And lots of them.
  I'm sure someone forgot to tell her that if you're spending time on a blog then you're not spending time writing novels. And if you can't get your novel done than what is the point in having a blog to build up readership before you're published?
  I bet she gets confused with time travel stories too.

  When I was first trying to get published, you just needed to make sure your query letter was professional and didn't contain spelling and grammar errors; for some reason agents start to doubt your ability as a writer if you send them a letter that has tons of errors.  :)
  This was on top of a lot of stringent rules that had to be followed or they wouldn't even acknowledge your existence.
   Sort of like don't feed agents after midnight, don't get them wet, and no bright lights. Otherwise, sane and normal agents turn into angry agents that like to say things like, 'What? You actually thought you could write?'
  
   Then they started demanding a list of previously published works. I sigh heavily since my publications had only been published locally. This gave me a slight edge, but no more than say the Postal Carrier that brings them their mail.

   And then they wanted blogs. So I started one. And I called it 'Just the Other Moment; because life is made up of moments interwoven together to form life. My life. 
 Plus, Just the Other Day was already taken which was my first choice.

  Well, this agent didn't sign me on even though at first she was interested in my work. Didn't even tell me why she didn't want to represent me. Just a no thank you after all but keep on following your dream. It would have been nice to know why she decided against it. But sometimes rejection by agents start to sound like bad relationship breakups, 'No, it's not your writing. It's us, we just are looking for something else. But don't worry, it's not you."

   This was a major disappointment that took three different things to get over.

    One: lots of hugs from Abu and a reminder that I'm the best Mom ever and she loves my stories. (I love it when kids are young. They are so unconditional.)

     Two: A reminder from Bean that I can't give up because I never let her give up on anything and it wouldn't be fair if I could and she couldn't. Ah, it's the 'I'm a role model since I'm a parent' thing.

    And Three: A stern warning from Hero Hottie that I wasn't allowed to give up and what could he do to stop my tears because nothing else he was saying was stemming their flow.
    "Just tell me you think I'm good enough to succeed...Someday...At something...Preferably writing." I cried, wondering if there was something wrong with me to pick a path in life that requires you to be constantly rejected just to reach small goals. Yes, I'm crazy because I'm sure there are things easier in life than writing. Like teaching high school math. Or running a restaurant. Or working in customer service.
    He interrupts my moody thoughts with his gruff reassurance. "Yes. You are. A good writer. Now stop crying. We aren't going to worry about silly agents that had dreams of being writers and didn't make it so they're dealing with the pain by shooting down other writers."
     "Are you saying I'm going to end up being an agent?" I cry harder. Oh, I don't want to be an agent.
     "No. But can I get you some chocolate?"  He's sounding quite desperate at this point and ready to call the agent on the phone and yell at her for making me cry.  This makes me feels better, that he's willing to face the mysterious creature they call, an 'literary agent' and tell her off. I turn down his offer of assistance in battle but I willingly take the chocolate.


    But a few days later I decide that since agents wanted to see blogs than I was going to make a blog. What I was going to write about I wasn't sure. Or how often. Or how to obtain readers.
    I dove headfirst into 'writing a blog' thing, almost expecting it to bring agents to my doors. After all, they were the ones who had demanded it.
    The door was sadly silent. But not my email, it continued to fill up with rejections.
    I kept plugging away at my blog, surprisingly building up a readership...from around the globe. I may not be published but I've been read internationally. It's an awesome and weird feeling.
   Now I enjoy having a blog. It's challenging. Especially when I try to write a new blog every day in the month of December. What was I thinking? Grin.
   But I have to thank my readers. For reading my writing. For enjoying it. For encouraging me with their kinds words. I would have quit by now if it haven't been for those kind words. Thanks.

   Now, agents want you to follow them around to every conference they attend and try to get their attention that way. I think I'm going to worry about improving my writing instead.
   And I rather see where this blog takes me than spend endless hours worrying about ways to capture the attention of a literary agent. 
   So perhaps having a blog wasn't my idea but I'm glad started one.

Day Nineteen- All Dogs Deserve a Soft Bed

Tandy

I was surrounded by the barks of dozens of dogs as they all verbally fought for my attention. Years later from my first visit when we adopted Buddy, I was back and the place hadn't changed. The pound was still just as loud. The smell was still that powerful mix of dog and cleaning supplies. 

            Claws hit the cement floor and made frantic scratching noises as the dogs would run around in their small cages, trying anything to get my attention. They knew what it meant when someone showed up.

            One of them was going home.

            I had dragged my Mom and my girls, Bean age six and Abu age four, down here in the middle of fall, bundled in bulky clothes and boots, to find a friend for our older dog, Buddy. He was lonely and needed a doggie pal. He had plenty of people friends being the social dog he was but he needed canine friendship. His hip problem made it impossible to get a bouncy, bubbly puppy but could I find him a nice, older dog?

 My girls loved all the different dogs and wanted to take them all home. Their hearts were so big and generous, they would have cared for them all if we could.  I was busy searching for that older dog.

We had walked around most of the aisles when my Mom stops and peers into a cage. I hadn’t even noticed the occupant staying in there, she was curled up on the cement floor in a tight ball of misery and depression.

She was a bluish, black color and blended into the cement color. Her little body shivered with the chilly floor and the cold outside.

We found her name on the sign, Tandy, not sure if that was her name before she arrived here a month earlier or if that was a name given to her when someone just dropped her off.

At first she didn’t respond, so lost in her despair that there was no point in raising her head. She already knew, no one takes the old ones home.

We shouted louder and she slowly looked up at us, her expression empty and all hope lost in the shadows of her eyes.

She finally stood up and looked at us further, but no interest showed in her face. For a month she had been locked in this tiny cage while dozens of people had past her by because she was a senior citizen.

Tandy, was a petite blue heeler, who was at least six or seven years old. She was exactly what I was searching for and I asked to meet with her in the tiny visitor room. She was quiet and unassuming even though she was eager for the dog treat from the pound tech.

I fell in love with the older dog and took her home.

The girls were happy, she was smaller than they were and they could easily walk her around the block.

Buddy was ecstatic and eagerly sniffed at her. He wagged his tail and a big doggie grin spread across his face. Then I let them outside together and the petite little dog started doing what she was bred to do. Herd sheep.

Except she didn’t have sheep to herd, so she tried to herd Buddy. And needless to say, he did not appreciate Tandy biting at his ankles.

I was worried. My plan was quickly unraveling. I had two elderly dogs in my house that were so used to having things their way, they were unwilling to adjust to having someone else mess up their routine.

Tandy was clearly acting like a dog that never lived with another dog in her entire life and Buddy didn’t like it when she tried to steal his bed, or his left overs, or my attention. They quickly become like two grouchy old people, always complaining and sighing.

I took Tandy to the veterinary and found out she wasn’t only old she was a little old lady. She was probably around ten or eleven years of age. And she acted like it too.

She would eat her food carefully. And trot around the yard with delicate steps. At night she would curl up in her bed and I couldn’t get her to go outside for the potty after nine o’clock at night. The little old lady was tired and down for the night.

If she did happen to get up, she didn’t like to walk downstairs to go outside.

After a few months, Buddy and Tandy finally started being friendly with each other. They would share their food and even cuddle doing the cold weather. Cautiously, they started being friends.

A bit of hope started shining in her eyes and sometimes she would even try to play a joke on me and then grin about it. She relaxed and would try to climb in my lap to lick my neck, and my hands and love me right back.

And she even stopped biting Buddy ankles, which he greatly appreciated.

I had to give them their medicine and supplements in the mornings, for senior dogs need their pills. They toleranted it, but just because of the yummy peanut butter I would hide the pills in.

When the weather was cool, we would go for walks around the block. But only short

walks as the arthritis in their hips and joints act up if we go too far .

I bought them thick, luxurious beds, not just to spoil them but because they got sore sleeping on the carpet.

And at night, when they go outside to use the potty one last time, I smile as they slowly walk to their beds and go to sleep.

We had Tandy for about three years before sickness made her life miserable and she was ready to go. Then my Mom and I took her to the vet, where she tried to kiss my neck with her wet little nose as I held her during her last moments. If we hadn't adopted her, she would have been put down in the cold and cruel place of the pound, instead she was loved and cherished in her old age. And held in her last moments. 

Having a senior dog was a lot of work but the love I received from her in return was worth it. And I'm starting to think there are angels at the pound, trying to find every dog and cat a home. :)

           

Day Eighteen- The Wonders of Grocery Shopping Alone

   Since winter arrived today and I'm missing the nice autumn-like weather of the last two weeks I'm going to write a bit of humor today. So yes, I'm grateful for grocery shopping by myself. It is so much easier to accomplish buying groceries when you don't have your own personal helpers to point out everything you  should be buying; like ice cream, cookies, chips; you know, the healthy foods. 
    Shopping alone and in peace, well almost in peace. It's difficult to ignore the piped in music and the harsh glare of fluorescent lighting otherwise it's almost like a spa day or like a mini vacation.
   Almost...if I wasn't going to Wal-Mart. 

Great things can happen on a solo shopping trip.

1. You actually can shop without it becoming another chance for the children to test your patience level. Of course, you still have to deal with shoppers that turn their carts horizontal across the aisle while they're shopping and talking on their cell phones. And you still have to avoid grouchy old ladies that will literally push you out of the way with their carts. What do they do with their cars?
     But you don't have to listen to kids complain about going shopping with you. And when you get up to the check out lane, you don't have a dozen unplanned items that you don't need.

2. You can buy a treat for yourself...and you don't have to share because they don't know about it. The chocolate is finally all yours.

3. You can blare the music in the car while you're driving and its not Backyardigans or the sound track to Shrek. You can play... grown up music.

4. When the hunk in the convertible glances your way, you know its because you're one hot mama and not because the kids are making weird faces that involve straws and nostrils.




5. You can purchase underwear and other unmentionables without your child broadcasting to the entire store personal information about the size and color of your underwear.

   There's plenty of reasons to shop solo. But if I didn't have a budget, I wouldn't go at all. I would hire one of those grocery services that deliver to your door and I would sneak off to the spa instead. Now that's a mini vacation.

Day Seventeen- Abu the Great

   Abu is a character of the funny and cute sort. That kid spreads joy where ever she goes. I remember one time we had gone to her regular dentist for a cleaning and it was right after a friend of his had died and Abu, who was seven at the time, took one look at his long sad face and must have decided to spend the next half an hour trying to cheer him up. She was goofy until she worked a small smile from him and then she was really goofy until he actually laughed. Around the dental equipment she would keep grinning at him until he had to respond because her joy was contagious.
   I'm not sure if she knew why she felt the need to cheer him up but it worked. And she wasn't afraid to either. How many times have been around people lost in grief and didn't say anything because we were afraid of saying the wrong thing?  She was just herself.
   And I have to say I feel blessed to be the Mom of a kid that possesses such a beautiful heart.

   She also has a quirky sense of humor that I would like to share.

When Abu was five, she raided the bathroom for some lotion. I had given her permission to use some. I should have known better. :) 

           Abu comes out, telling me she used all the wonderful colors of the lotions she could find. It had blended together into quite a strong smell but she was excited about something so I hid my grimace. 

            “Smell me, Mommy.” She offers, holding up her leg.

            I smelled it appreciatively and told her that her leg smelled nice.

            “I smell like a rainbow.” She says.

            “Why?” I ask.

            “Because I put all the different lotions on my leg. So they would smell like a rainbow.” She grins.

    One time Abu was eating a bit of Cool Whip, when she comes into the bedroom, white, fluffy Cool Whip was over her face and the biggest grin from ear to ear. And she throws out her arms and proclaims,               
      “Powered by Cool Whip. I am Powered by Cool Whip.” 
    
     (I have seen the power of a kid hyped on Cool Whip. It's too bad they can't bottle the energy of an over sugared kid. It would be cheap, clean and efficient energy.)

   We have a wonderful art cupboard for the girls. I knew Abu thought it was great because her pencils, paints, stickers and paper were in there but I didn't know just how wondrous it was until one day Aunt Stacey and her are searching for a pencil. Abu stands in front of it, grandly gestures towards it and tells Aunt Stacey. 

    “This is where the magic is.”  

   We were getting ready to play math games when Abu says, “I have a little idea.”

            “A little idea?” I asked with a slight chuckle, because my girls never have little ideas. 

           She shakes her head,  “Pretty much a big idea.”

      Ah-ha, now that sounds like the Abu I know. 




   I'm grateful for people like Abu, who pretty much always have big ideas, they believe in the magic of imagination and they're powered by Cool Whip. :)
   Us adults, we're fueled by coffee. And sometimes lots of it. Cool Whip sounds much tastier.

Day Sixteen- It was an accident!!

   Parenting is not for the weak of spirit. It's takes courage, guts and a strong stomach. A tons of patience, quite a bit of self sacrifice and the ability to laugh.
   If you don't want to clean bedsheets in the middle of the night or search poop for swallowed toys or be mortified by the outrageous things kids can say, then I would stay away from parenthood. It's not for you.

   If you want a new adventure all the time, if you want to feel just how much love the human heart can hold, and if you're up for sleepless nights, then parenthood will be your grandest venture.

   I hope, by being in this world, I have at least raised two wonderful children, ready to make the world a better place just by being who they are. And that's as sappy as I'm going to get in this blog entry. Because I'm a Mom, I could go on for pages about all the great things I think my kids are capable of or how many things they have done that have made me smile. I won't but I will share a funny story about Bean to remind us that children are a blessing, even when they have stretched our patience.

  Bean, age 4 and Abu, age 2, are quick. And they're good at working together when they want to. I had only left the room for a few minutes when I came back into the living room to find that my beautiful white couch had been colored with Crayola crayon on the entire back. 
  Their movements are fast, as their little hands work on this big blank canvas. And it's not light crayon colors they have picked to make their masterpiece. No, it's blue and red. On a white couch. Their 'painting' is loud and vibrant. I close my eyes and take a deep breath before I speak. It's better for them if I take a few extra seconds to compose myself.
   They just grin and show me their picture. Oh, kids. After a bit of scolding and reminding them that they can color all they want on their art paper. But not Mommy's furniture. I clean the couch and surprisingly it comes completely off with nothing more than warm water and some Dawn soap. Amazing.

   Then a few days later Bean decides she needs to draw a picture on the wall near her toys. I sighed and scrub some more. It comes off, mostly.

   Next, Bean paints the kitchen blue. I had just left to use the potty for one minute while they were busy painting some paper. One minute. That was it. A Mom does have to go potty sometimes, after all. And while I was gone she decided the cupboards needed new fronts. Most of the blue comes off them. Even today I can still see a bit in the seams. Oh, well.

   This went on for quite a few weeks, where she was just constantly testing us. It was taxing and I was growing impatient with her. And she knew it too. Because with every new offense I was quick to send her to her room and not even listen to why she was trying to paint the walls or climb into the cupboards or push things down the drain. It didn't matter anymore, I was so tired of cleaning up after her. Part of me loved that she was a little scientist and was trying to figure out how things worked, the other part of me needed a break.

  One day I had finished making spaghetti for dinner. I had dished out the girls' noodles but the sauce was still in the jar. It would be easy enough to spoon a couple of spoonfuls of the sauce on the hot noodles when we set down to eat. Bean was hungry and impatient to eat but I told her to wait a second while I went and got hero hottie from the bedroom.
    He was on the computer and wanted to show me something. So quickly I looked but it was too long. Not more than a minute or two but we had young children. It was a minute or two too long.
   Suddenly Bean comes running into our bedroom. Her eyes are wild and panicked. Her voice is frantic when she speaks. "It was an accident. It was an accident."
   Oh, no. What did this kid do now? Hero hottie and I rush into the kitchen and freeze. My mouth falls open as I survey the damage done to my kitchen by a tiny four year old. It's beyond believing and we just stand there for a second, trying to collect our thoughts.
   Bean is right behind us. "It was an accident." She's not being blamed for this mess.
   Spaghetti sauce covers every surface of the kitchen from floor to ceiling. The red sauce forms nice patterns of splatter droplets all over the white walls and ceiling and it looks like a crime scene. The heaviest drops are on the ceiling right above where she had been standing and travel across the entire breadth of the kitchen, where they go right on down the opposite wall from where she was and onto the floor.
   We look at her about to ask her how it happened. She interrupts, shaking her head. "It was an accident."
   She's definitely thinks she's in trouble for this mess. And a mess it is.
   I glance at Hero hottie and we both break into uncontrollable laughter. It was the worse mess she had ever made and 'It was an accident.' What must she have thought when she saw the spaghetti sauce everywhere and knew I was tired of her making messes on purpose. I'm pretty sure she thought she would be in time out forever.
   She probably thought, "Oh, no. Mom's really going to mad this time. I have to convince her right from the start, even before she sees it, that 'It was an accident.'"
    Apparently, she couldn't wait for us to dish up and she decided to put her own sauce on her spaghetti. But somehow, she got her spoon in the jar at just the right angle that when she went to pull it out, she must have caught it on the inside edge and it went pop, sending an arc of mess everywhere. Somehow, and only Bean could make a disaster of this size in less than one minute, the spoonful of spaghetti sauce managed to cover everything in round splats of wall staining red.
    It took over two hours for me to scrub up that mess and it was still stained no matter how much elbow grease I put into it.

   Now days, when ever a mess is to be had, we know which kid to ask first. And her first response is always, "It was an accident." She never means to make a disaster zone, it just seems to happen.
  But at least, now she's old enough to clean up her own messes. :)

  

Day Fifteen- The Angel at the Pound

Young Buddy- curious about the camera

  

   It was a warm summer Saturday afternoon and we had been married for just over six months. We were bored inside our house and decided to go for a drive.
  A few days before we exchanged vows we had closed on a little, tiny cottage house. And when I say tiny, I mean four hundred square feet of living space. HGTV would probably describe it as "The turn of the century cottage with lots of charm right in the heart of the city."
   I think it used to be the guest house for the much bigger house next door. But it was a wonderful house for newlyweds. We only had a small yard to worry about, tons of privacy since we weren't living in an apartment and we had a great boulevard to walk on in the evenings.
   But that day we had to escape the small confines. While we were out for a drive, for some reason, we started discussing dogs. If we should get one; if our house was big enough for having a pet; if we had the time. We both had dogs as kids and wouldn't mind eventually getting a dog for ourselves.
   We stopped by a pet store, just to window shop. Inside there was a tiny dog, perfect for a small house and the idea started growing on us. Perhaps we could have a dog but we would have to get one that fit.
   This dog though was not for us. She was tiny and just the right size but her attitude was horrid. Bark, bark, yip, yip and snap with razor sharp teeth. We tried to pet her. Snap, snap like a piranha. An ankle biter. I shuddered. I was not getting an ankle biter.
   We left and decided to go to the Humane Society. But we weren't really going to adopt a dog today. After almost being attacked by a furious fish with legs, the idea of being responsible for an animal while we were in college and working maybe wasn't such a great idea after all.
   The pound was loud and stinky. Even from the front room where papers were signed and the lives of cats and dogs were decided, you could hear the cacophony of dog barks from the kennels. It was deafening. Like a low roar that filled your ears and vibrated your chest. The smell was a mixture of dog; wet, dirty, poopy; and cleaning products. It wasn't a pleasant place.
   We entered the kennel and headed for the first cage. I don't even remember the dogs in the first two cages. They were large and sad and I hope someone took them home. But we haven't even seen more than those two dogs when an angel appeared.
    She was young, a teenager and had long blond hair. Her smile swept across her face and her eyes sparkled with intensity.
    "I know the dog for you. Come here."
    I shook my head in bemusement. "We're just looking."
   "No, you have to come with me. I know what dog you need. He's perfect. You need to adopt him." She was confident and determined. I gave hero hottie a confused smile. He shrugged, looking just as puzzled as I felt. Who was this young girl?
   "I know he's the right one for you. Follow me." She walked away, knowing that we would follow her.
   And we did.
   She stopped in front of a cage, a huge grin on her face as she pointed to the small pup inside the metal bars. He looked at us and then started throwing a toy around using all the puppy charm he possessed, which was quite a bit.
   "See. He's perfect for you. You have to adopt him." She gave the puppy a dazzling smile and then pinned us with a look of pure determination. "He's perfect. You need to adopt him."
    My heart was already melting at the sight of him. He was a rolly ball of gold puppy fur, quizzical black ears that arched every time something caught his attention, and his eyes were big with joy. He tossed his toys around, doing it higher and cuter, the more praise we gave him.
   "You have to adopt him." She said again and then she disappeared around the corner. An angel with blond hair and stylish clothing.
   "We can't." Hero hottie said, squatting down to touch the puppy through the cage. The puppy soaked it up, making faces at us, pawing at the cage, rubbing up against our hands.
    "We have a private room so you can spend time with him." A Humane Society worker noticed that the puppy still held our attention after a few minutes.
    I saw the warning glint in hero hottie's eyes. And knew just what he was thinking. We couldn't adopt such a large, fluffy puppy. He needed a house, not a cottage. He needed a yard, not a few patches of grass. But the puppy peered at us with his warm and curious brown eyes and we found ourselves telling the worker yes.
   She takes him out of his cage and we go into the small room. "I'll leave you alone for a few minutes."
   The puppy realized this was last chance to make an impression on us and he went into full 'I'm the cutest dog you have ever seen' mode. He played with his toys, tossing them about, pouncing on them, but he wasn't just playing. Every once and in a while, he would peek up at us, making sure he had our attention. And the more we laughed at his adorable antics, the faster he would do them.
   Then a voice went over the intercom system and he froze, his ears arched up and a frown between his brows as he listened. His playfulness dimmed as he walked around the room, trying to figure out where the voice had come from. He looked at us, and the question was so deep in his little puppy dog face that even though he was a just a canine there was no doubt that he was trying to solve this mystery.
   Hero hottie was sunk at that point. Not only was this puppy just about the cutest and most charming critter we had ever seen. This puppy was smart and curious.
   I was lost by this point. There was no way I could let him go back to the cold, and barren cage that had been his home. He was going home with us. I just had to convince hero hottie that we could manage a puppy with paws that were quite large.
   "We can't. He's going to be huge." Hero hottie shook his head. "Where would he play?"
   "I could take him over to Mom's every day before work. He can play with her dogs. It would be like doggie daycare." I said, surprised that I would volunteer to take a dog to daycare every day but this puppy was special. I wasn't leaving without him.
    "Everyday?" his eyebrows arched in disbelief. "Would your Mom even agree?"
    "She won't mind and he would love to play with the other dogs." I petted the puppy behind his ears. He loved this and leaned into me.
    "And we could walk him on the boulevard at night. He's so sweet." I added.
    Indecision cross his face. Suddenly the idea we had been playing with could be real and we would be responsible for a puppy. Did we really want the work?
   I held my breath waiting for hero hottie to agree with me. He still wasn't sure when he said yes but it was one of the best decisions we had ever made.
   I felt giddy. This wonderful ball of soft fur was going to be ours. After filling out paperwork and paying our adoption fees, which stretched our budget for that week, we were after all students, we climbed into the car. The puppy sat on my lap, and he was busy loving me with little sniffs to my neck and his wet nose pressed against my skin. For some odd reason, he already loved us and was eager to go home with us. His fur was so soft and he had that puppy feel about him. We had to show him to our parents and took him to meet his 'grandparents'. Both sets were excited to meet such a charming dog.
   He worked his magic on them too. Running around as fast as I had ever seen a puppy run and then tumbling into everyone's laps with this uninhibited expression of joy. This dog could bring a smile to your face no matter what mood you were in.
    He had everyone laughing, his spirit was contagious. Everyone that met him, loved him. Even people that didn't like dogs.
    Since he was so smart we wanted to give him a smarty sounding name like Einstein or Galileo but they didn't fit. So while Hero hottie tried to find him a name of a scientist we liked, we resorted to calling him Buddy.
    And in time it stuck. Because he was everyone's Buddy. Dogs, cat, or person, he didn't care. He just wanted to make friends.
    
    He quickly outgrew that cottage house. But even though his paws told tales of a bigger dog he didn't grow all that big. Perhaps he was like a goldfish and could only grow as big as his environment. I took him to doggie daycare every day while he was little and he loved the car rides over to my Mom's. The feeling was mutual, he was my companion. My Bud.
   In the evenings we took him for walks on the boulevard. And on weekends when we stayed home, he would sit on the porch and spend hours watching the people and their dogs walking the tree lined boulevard. But he wasn't idly watching them, it was always with intense focus, like he was studying them. The dog was curious and lost in deep thoughts. I wished he could have shared. What does a smart dog think about?

   I don't know who that girl was that was relentless with us at the pound. I like to think she was Buddy's angel, looking after him and making sure he went to the right people. I'm glad we were those people.
  And perhaps she wasn't a heavenly angel, but an Earthly angel that just happened to say the right thing at the right time and changed the course of our lives.
   Who ever she is, I thank her all the time.

Old Buddy still trying to figure things out

Day Fourteen- Meeting Hero Hottie

   I was eighteen, in college and working part time at a photography studio in the mall. At least it was only supposed to be part time.
  I glanced at the clock again, and the lateness of the afternoon. I was scheduled off at 3:00 so I would have time to get to my English class at 4:00 o'clock but the big hand was already pointing to the six and my manager was being difficult about letting me leave since the studio was busy.
   But she had promised that on days I had class it wouldn't be a problem to leave on time, even during the busy holiday season. That was our agreement when she hired me. And being only eighteen I actually believed her when she said she understood the importance of showing up for class on time.
   I enjoyed photography and had wrongly assumed this was the perfect job to work in while I went to school. I had been mistaken and was not completely happy with my 'fast food photography' job.
   I finished up with my customer and turned to my manager.
  "I have to go. I'm going to be late."  I said, pointing to the time.
   Her lips pitched together, her eyes narrowing. The seconds ticked by as I held my breath, waiting for her to okay my leaving. She nods and turns to deal with the mess of the holiday Christmas card season.

    I drove the twenty minutes to my class, rushing through the building and quietly sliding into my seat. Class had barely started and the attendance sheet was still on the other side of the room. When the sheet of paper came over to me, I looked at hero hottie's signature. It had taken me a few classes to figure out who's name went with the cute guy across the room but I was pretty sure which one was his. The signature was a decisive and no nonsense lettering.
   We still hadn't talked, but he was the hottest guy in the class and the only one who had caught my attention. I had started college to get my degree, not spend time drooling after boys but here I was spending more time watching hero hottie from across the classroom instead of paying attention to the teacher. Lucky for me, passing English with an A wasn't a problem even though I spent the entire semester distracted.

   He still hadn't talked to me. In fact, he was very quiet, entering and leaving class quickly. And I was way too shy to initiate a conversation. Then the universe stepped in.

  I walked out to my car and curiosity took over. I watched hero hottie walk out to his car. I wanted to see what he was driving. A car can tell a lot about a person.
  Hero hottie walks over to a red car; I suppose profiling people based off their car choice would make more sense if I actually knew the names of the vehicles; but I discreetly watched him as he started unlocking his car. Then I was going to leave but something odd happened, so I stood beside my car, quietly watching. He was still trying to unlock the door. Moments passed as he still messed with the lock and then he knelt down, studying the lock and the key.
   I'm not sure where the courage came from. I didn't even think about what I was going to say, it just came out of my mouth, loud enough to be heard across the parking lot.
   "You're either having trouble with your key or you're admiring your paint job." My first chance to say something to him and I resort to sarcasm to catch his attention. But it must have worked...
   He turned, a bit startled and stared at me. Then he walked over to my car. "The key broke in the lock."
   "Seriously, the key broke in the lock? In the car door. I have never heard of that happening. Ever." I had to tease him a bit. It sounded like a poorly thought out pick up line.
   He nods. "Can you give me a ride to the gas station so I can call my Dad."
   Part of me was more than willing to give hero hottie a lift down to the gas station. It would be a chance to talk to him, spend some time with him. It was the perfect opportunity to catch his attention.
   "No. I can't. I'm sorry." I said. All those years of Mom's warnings not to give rides to strangers were very loud in my head and so I told him I couldn't.
   He frowns. "You can't?"
   "You're a stranger. I don't know you. You know." I must have sounded so young as I shrugged, hoping he would understand. It was just down to the gas station but it must have been all those years in big cities in Oregon. You just don't give rides to strangers.
   Confusion crossed his face but he nods. "I guess I can walk."
   I felt a bit guilty because he was definitely going to miss his next class by having to walk down to the gas station to find a phone and I almost changed my mind but I really didn't know who this person was.
   We started talking for a long time about everything and anything. Finally he writes his name and number down on a piece of paper.
   I had his phone number!! Even after refusing to help him out and drive him down to the gas station, he still wants to talk to me more.
  
   I was late for my next class but I didn't care. I was on cloud nine. I had met a cute boy and he gave me his phone number. And it happened because his key broke in the lock. When does that ever happen? Just when two shy people need a good kick in the rear to get a conversation going.
   From there, the rest is history. But hero hottie still likes to give me a hard time about not giving him a ride down to the gas station.
 
  Why do things happen as if they're supposed to happen? I'm not sure but I can say that I'm grateful for a broken key.

Day Thirteen- Halfway There and Further Away

  So we're halfway there, a couple of days behind schedule and I feel further away from finding an answer than I did before. But I think this is what happens when you get close to some new understanding, obstacles are put in your way. On purpose, I'm sure of it. By who, I can't say. It is God, the universe, ourselves? But why it is when it rains, it pours? Or when we're so close to success, everything goes wrong that could? Like Murphy's Law but with a cosmic twist.
    I had my furnace quit on me. It decided that it couldn't break down during tax refund time or perhaps even after Christmas, it has to go on hiatus two weeks before the holidays. And not only that but it was taunting us. We had air blowing, except it was cold. There's nothing like blowing cold air in a poorly insulated house when it's twenty degrees outside. Brrr.
   The furnace is stuck behind the coat closet, so I emptied out the space into my hallway and living room. How did that much stuff accumulate into one tiny area? And who keeps bringing these things in that we don't need?
    I have a sneaking suspicion of who the culprits are and it's funny how as a Mom, we are prone to believe guilty until proven innocent. But after all, Bean's favorite saying is, "It was an accident."
    Today, I found a bucket of bird feathers under Abu's bed. I'm not sure what the intended purpose of them is or if that is even healthy but they had obviously been carefully collected and saved. Why is this info important, probably because children notice the little things in life that we have become too busy and hectic to pay attention to. Finding their little treasures reminds me, to use a cliche, stop and smell the flowers. Or if I don't have time to collect bird feathers with Abu than I'm probably doing too much. Just like most Moms. Just like most parents.
   But how hard is it to find time when life falls apart around you.

    Luckily with hero hottie's uncle working in the repairing business our furnace fix was cheaper than it could have been. It was only $450 instead of $800.  The gift of heat is priceless though.
    This number will either make you cringe for me or you'll shake your head and wonder why this is such a big deal for me. Money is based off perception. For people that have plenty of it they don't understand that obtaining the basics is a struggle. Daily. Relentless. Without break.
   The movie, 'In Time' tells this story for survival quite well I thought. And I'm not even a big Justin Timberlake fan, I thought the movie was fairly well done. Sad though. Just switch money for time and it's no different.

   Bean, Abu and I are going to make ornaments this weekend- in between getting ready for Christmas and finding time to catch up on my blog entries. Sorry about my daily blessings being a bit behind. It's ironic that I'm writing about finding faith but then I get so busy I'm having trouble finding the time to practice it. And if the furnace was the only thing this week I would dismiss it but since it's only one of a long list of things that have gone wrong, I almost feel like it's a challenge. The universe is asking, "Are you serious about finding faith or can you be easily dissuaded if a few more problems come your way?"
   I would have to answer, "It depends on the problems. I would have to bow out if I have to eat rotten cow brains, like on Fear Factor. Yuck!"
   Joking aside, I think we all have times where we feel like things grow tougher when they're already tough and I don't know why this happens. There has to be rhyme and reason to it but it's a question I don't have an answer for.

  So sometimes I have to say having faith feels like a game of Fear Factor. Which I'm not sure if it's proper to compare it to a game show but that's just the mood I'm in right now. You have to have humor to make it in this world without turning bitter in the end.
   Perhaps a little glitter on the floor, left over from our ornament making, will remind me what's important.

Day Twelve- Always There

  Years ago I wrote a bit of faith on a scrap of paper, never quite sure what to do with it. It wasn't about me or anyone I knew but it spoke to me. I will share it with you today.

   Always There

by Christy Hammond

    

She sat on the church pew wondering why she was there, when a man passed and she dropped her head in prayer.

            “Where are you, when I need you so? Look what has happened, you have abandoned me here, am I to give birth with no one that cares?”

            She wept on the wood, silent tears of grief, when the same man who had passed came and stood by her bare feet.

            He didn’t say a word, and she wished him to leave, hiding her dirty toes underneath the seat. She kept her head bowed, her hands clasped together, and still he did not moved but continued to linger.

            “Go away,” she muttered, finally at last, her soiled fingers fanning across her swollen belly.

            The silence grew long, and the man did not shuffle, and finally she could not keep her head down any longer. She raised it up, and gasped.

            “You asked me here, so don’t send me away. I thought you needed me, but even if you don’t, I will still stay.” The man spoke gently, holding out a hand.

            She felt ashamed, her hands all dirty, but he did not care as he held them firmly. He helped her from her seat, her body heavy with the tiny person she had made.

            “I will be there, please do not worry. I will be there for you and your baby.” The man walked her to the door, that lead out of the chapel, and waited while she looked at the rest of the hospital.

            She looked at him with fearful eyes, and then wondered why she had doubted. Of course, he would be there at her side. Waiting with her, for her new arrival. She clutched her belly, with the wave of pain and knew she needed to find a doctor.

            “It will be alright, go now, your child awaits.” The man leaned forward, and kissed her head, not caring of the dirt, and oil, and smell that clung to her skin.

            She stepped and turned away, knowing that he was going to be there, with her, through the whole thing.

            And after her baby was born, and slept so soundly. She slipped to the chapel, with her sore body. Her mind was tired, she could hardly think, but she whispered some prayers, and gave him thanks.

Day Eleven- Casper the cat and his sad start

    It was nearly summer in Oregon. And we actually had a bit of sunshine. The house we had moved into during my fifth grade year was in a cul-de-sac, so although across the street on one side was the horrid railroad track; on the other side of us, between the two houses built in the arch of the cul-de-sac was a gate to the city park.
    What kid doesn't love having a park next door to them. It didn't have a playground, but it had a track, baseball fields, tennis courts and big trees to climb.
    Lining the park was a eight foot chain link fence, separating the houses from city property. They didn't have much privacy but it was difficult for people to trespass into their yards. One of my new friends lived in one of these houses and I spent quite a bit of time over there, especially since I could walk to her house.
     Her name was Sam and she had wild, tangly yellow curls, was willow branch thin and jumpy like a popcorn kernel in oil. We played Barbies in her huge, old- fixer up house, that had more old than fix, and out in her yard where her Dad let the grasses grow as tall as her we played pretend. We would keep an eye on the park and when we saw someone we knew we would struggle through the grasses to reach the fence and chat for a while. If middle school was awful, at least the friends I had made around the neighborhood were great.
 
     One day we were skipping through the wilds of her backyard when a five year boy named Laser started yelling at us from the park. He was always roaming the streets on his bicycle; left alone and lonely; he lacked compassion because in his own short life he had been shown very little. Always finding trouble, he was constantly showing us small toys and candy he had stolen from either the store or other people's houses. This time he was carrying around a square metal lunchbox that had been clearly taken from someone else. But it was what was in it that would end up being quite shocking.
     "Hey, come here. I have something to show." He hollers, starving so much for attention that even as a fifth grader I could sense the desperation that clung to him. But there wasn't anything I could do for him.
     I looked at Sam and shook my head. "It's probably stolen."
    She nods, "Let's go see."
    We get to the fence and he's kicking the lunchbox around. Then tossing it up in the air or throwing it across the grass. Each time it lands with a thud. Each time something rattles inside it.
    "I have something in here." He says and gives it another hard kick.
   "Okay, so show us." I said, rolling my eyes. I rather be playing with Sam then playing a guessing game with a five year old.
   Sam agrees with me. "What?"
   He smirks. "I have cats in there."
   We both frown. "Yeah, right."
   He squints his eyes, his dark eyes completely serious. "No, I have baby cats in there. I took them from their mom. I killed the other babies. Drowned them in a puddle of water. But I have two left."
   I froze, staring at the lunchbox lying on the grass. It's grimy and dented from being tossed around. Was there baby cats in there?
   "Show us." I say, wishing the fence wasn't so high because I would simply grab it from him if I could. Instead, I had to convince him to throw us the lunchbox. Sam looks at me, and her wide eyed shock says it all. We have to see if he's telling the truth.
   "They're still alive." He boosts.
   "We want to see. Throw us the box." I smile.
   "You won't give it back." He grabs the box and holds it tight.
   Sam shakes her head. "No, we'll give it right back. Just let us see them."
   "Throw us the box. We'll look and give it right back." I act like I'm not lying. A feat that's difficult for me. I'm not a liar, but if he has cats in there...we have to get them. We have to save them.
    It takes a few more minutes to convince him that we will give him the lunchbox right back after we take a peek. He's eager to show us his 'prize' and is fairly easy to win over. Finally he agrees.
   "Catch it." He tosses the lunchbox over the fence. As it flies through the air, I'm praying that I won't drop it and then it lands in my arms and the breath I had been holding rushes out.
   We quickly kneel on the ground, with Laser on the other side of the fence watching us intently. Sam gives me a look, an expression that matches my own. We don't want to see what might be in the box. The thought is horrifying.
   Then we hurry to unlatch it, flipping the lid open and peering inside. We are stunned into silence. A thick feeling of dread and horror fills me as I hesitantly touch the two, incredibly tiny baby kittens, nestled together with an alarming lack of any movement.
   We look up at Laser, who isn't saddened by what he has done but is smiling, now that he has shown someone what he has.
   "Are they dead?" Sam whispers, reaching out and stroking the kittens. They are no bigger than the palm of my hand, their eyes shut tightly and their bodies fuzzy but not furry. Their tails are naked and they barely look like cats. I've never seen a baby cat before and the sight would be amazing if it wasn't for what had just happened to them.
  "I don't know." I touch the soft black and white body. The kitten is warm...and breathing. "Yes. Oh, my gosh. Sam. They're alive."
  "What do we do?" she asks, picking one of them up and holding it close to her warm body. I pick up the other one and snuggle him between my palms. They make small mewing sounds.
   "Hey, give them back." Laser demands.
   I look at him and shake my head. "You are not getting this cats back. Go. Go home."
   Angry cuss words stream from his mouth but we ignore him.
   "My Mom will know. She has had kittens before. Hurry." We run to my house, holding the kittens close and burst into the house, our frantic story tumbling from our lips in such a rush I don't know if she understood at first what has happened but she sees the helpless creatures in her hands and goes right to work.
   She pulls out a box from the garage, sets a heating pad in the bottom, followed by a blanket and sets them in there. A small towel becomes their blanket, an eyedropper is used to feed them. Over the course of the next few days she spends hours with them, a boy and a girl, keeping them warm, wiping their bottoms so they can poop, and feeding them one drop at a time. Their mews grow louder, their movements stronger... and then they start sneezing and their mews grow faint again.
    The girl kitten dies and we bury her in the flower bed.
    We take the boy kitten to the vet, who diagnoses him with pneumonia and shakes his head sadly. He explains that the kittens were only a few hours old when Laser stole them from their mother. The kittens didn't receive much, if any, of the valuable colostrum milk and this last surviving kitten's chances were near zero. He gave him an antibiotic shot for free, compassion in the gentle way he handled him and sent us home.
    The boy kitten who we named, Casper, struggled to breathe. Mom kept feeding him, getting up every couple of hours to nurse him. I spent time petting him and talking to him but we still didn't know if he was going to make it. 
   
    Then the sneezing stops, the runny nose dries up and his mews grows strong. He starts trying to move around and he's eager to wiggle against Mom when it's feeding time. After a while his eyes open. He's growing and turning into a kitten, walking and rolling around. His black and white fur grows fluffy.
    A bit more time passes and he survives. He's a full grown cat, healthy and sassy and he lived a long and happy life, thinking he was a real boy not a cat but that was because he didn't know how to be a real cat. 

    I look back at Casper's rough start. It was a terrible way to join the world. And what must have happened to Laser in his short life to cause him to behave with such cruelty? What must he had done after that? Children that are cruel to animals are prone to take that cruelty further. I think teaching children compassion towards animals is highly important. It's part of the bigger picture, acting with compassion in all aspects of our life.
   It was lack of compassion on so many levels that almost killed Casper. It killed the rest of his siblings in a horrible, violent manner.
   But it was compassion from a few different people that saved him. Humanity can't function without compassion. And it starts with teaching our children as soon as they're born.
   The human race needs compassion, without it we can't even find the road to our faith.

Day Ten- Carry a Light for Faith

  

    I was reading some one's advice on how to deal with our faults and negative emotions. They suggested 'embracing the dark side' of the emotion, letting it grow inside and then trying to control it. Sounds a bit like creating a monster and then trying to rein it in.
   Mmm, I have a lot of issues with this advice, especially as it was given to someone I care about and it was given during a moment when they were upset and just wanted someone to listen to them.
   First of all, we all know what happens to a person when they go towards 'the dark side of the force.' Although, Anakin's intentions were good to begin with; he wanted to save the love of his life; by embracing the 'dark side' he was no longer in control and was consumed by it.
    If you want to get rid of the shadows in your life, don't extinguish the lights, instead fill up the room so brightly there isn't any more room for the shadows.
   I'm not saying that we aren't going to experience emotions that we consider more on the negative side, such as anger, sadness, worry, etc. And it's not wrong to feel these emotions, sometimes they are very necessary things.
   Sadness has to be felt; either to properly grieve or to change things. When confronted by a situation that brings us sadness, we can direct that emotion into compassion and  do something positive. Such as volunteers, mentoring, or taking care of each other in our times of need. But we can't just waddle in it otherwise it will send us into a well of depression.
  
   A bit of time worrying over situations or people shows that we care. If we control the worry to solve our problems and help our loved ones, and not allow it to swallow all our other emotions, then we can use it. (I'm not so good at not worrying, especially as lately. Hero hottie is the loud worrier. I'm the quiet, let it collect in my gut worrier. I'm working on this one. Of course, when the science channel told me the sun might burn out in billions of years, I couldn't resist making fun of my own tendency to worry and turned to hero hottie with a laugh. -- "Oh, great. Something else for me to worry about now." )

   Anger, can be directed towards change, if we use it positively, such as to discuss problems in a relationship, not resorting to name calling or violence. We can use it to change injustices in the world without using the violent side of this strong emotion. I have never seen a person able to allow the anger to grow into a fiery rage and not be close to losing control of it. Perhaps that is why anger reminds us of fire, the stronger and hotter it gets, the harder it is to put out. This emotion, along with jealously and fear, can be quite dangerous and that's why I feel like advice given to embrace the dark side of these feelings is foolish. Terribly dangerous.

   You can not find your spiritual path, your journey to faith in the black places of the dark side. That's not to say that your path may not wind into these tough and despairing destinations where hope is a bare, thin thought, but we do not leave these places by dwelling in them. By embracing them- the dark side.
    We survive these lost areas of our soul by finding a light to guide us. To find our faith. Our path. To shine on the road so we don't trip over the stumbling blocks; such as people that either enjoy the dark side or have been so lost in it they are blinded by the light that searches for them and want company.

    I admire people whose lights shine brightly, for they bring hope along on this collective journey of faith. And we all could use a little extra helping of hope on this tough journey we call being human.

Day Nine- Middle School Hell

   Some times the things we don't realize are blessings at the time end up being some of the most important events in our life. They're path changers. Forks in the roads. Speed bumps so big they threw us onto another street. And often times that's what it feels like too, a kick in the rear.

   
    Half way through fifth grade my family had to move. The rental house that we had lived in, the one right across the street from my elementary school, was being sold. I had been attending this elementary school since half way through first grade and I had friends, buddies, boys that I had known for years that I like to beat at wall ball and math. It was a decent school and I was finally inside the building for class. I had waited years to be a big kid.
    (Fifth and Sixth grade were in the actual school building, they had lockers and a warm hallway. The other grades opened to the outside and you had to travel across the courtyard to reach the music room, the library, the office and the lunch room.)
     But all that didn't matter. I had to tell my teachers and friends I was moving, pack up my room, sit in the trees in my yard one last time. The trees that I would spend hours in. Sitting in their big, beautiful branches reading books, or playing pretend or waiting for Mom to get home from the grocery store because I was so high up I could see the road she would be driving on.
    It was change and I thought not such a great one, especially when we had to move to a completely different town to find an affordable rental house. My Dad's commute was now longer and we would have to ride a bus to school, instead of just walking across the street.

   Next to our house, right across the road and then a small field was a railroad track. That night in our new house, Dad laid all our mattresses on the living room floor, since he hadn't had time to put the beds together. It was strange, listening to the unfamiliar sounds of the new house. Watching the odd shadows play on the walls. And then, the Amtrak train, traveling at around eighty miles per hour, rumbled past our house. The windows shook, my mattress vibrated and the sound roared loudly in the ears. My parents sighed and I knew they were just as unhappy about the move as us kids were.

   The schools in this district were divided differently than my last school. Fifth through eighth grades were in middle school. Suddenly I went from being an elementary student to being a middle schooler. Yikes. My fifth grade teacher was crazy. She had a metal stool she liked to pick up and smack against the linoleum when ever she was upset with us, which was just about every day.
   We had gangs in the school, luckily not into a lot of on-campus violence but there was more than enough vandalism, thievery, and bullying to keep the school in a constant state of tension, fear, and anger.
   By sixth grade, the battle field lines were drawn between the girls, you were either on one side and popular or you were on the other side and clearly not popular. I made things complicated by being friends with JD,one of the popular girls at the same time while also being considered teacher's pet because I enjoyed school.
   This wasn't an ideal situation and pretty soon JD wasn't my friend and I was deemed an easy target by the other girls. I was still a kid in sixth grade and not ready for the 'Mean Girl' environment. I only had one bad teacher in sixth grade, he came to school high on something and unable to teach math. We scrapped by just enough to count for test scores.
   By seventh grade I had a knot in my stomach every day before school. I had an hour bus ride in the morning and whereas I had a funny bus driver, his jokes were highly inappropriate and dirty. On top of the way he would flirt with the high school girls, it was not a great bus ride. My brother would get on the bus with me but he had to stay on longer than I did and was picked on horribly as soon as I wasn't there to protect him. In school he was losing ground in math and my sister was being taught that you can spell a word any way you want and it's correct.
   The girls were horribly cruel to each other and all the jokes were demeaning and heartless. The P.E. teachers were sadistic if you weren't athletic and my science teacher would threaten to kill us and stuff us in the cupboards if we didn't behave.
    It was not an ideal learning environment. And probably not even that safe.
    So I suggested to my parents that they should home school me. A couple of weeks later, when the situation had reached a boiling point for all of us siblings, they decided to take us out of school and do it at home. I'm not sure if my siblings were in full agreement, my brother didn't like school no matter where it was and my sister liked being around other kids. But the school district had failed us in so many ways and we couldn't transfer some where else.
 
   Home schooling was easy for me. I was already a good student, it wasn't any different at home except it only took about three hours a day to finish my work. What kid doesn't mind being done in less than half the time as before? We took field trips, studied things that were important and interesting, my Mom read Mark Twain to us, I read the other classics, and we volunteered at quite a few places to interact with people and the world. I wasn't stuck in Middle School Hell anymore, I was out in the real world and it was wonderful.
I didn't even wake up with a stomach ache anymore.
    I had freedom to be myself. I had time to think, to learn, to feel safe. I still had friends, but I didn't have bullies.
   At the end of that year I was testing beyond the high school level. The person administering the test suggested I skip high school and move right into college. I didn't because I wasn't ready emotionally for such a huge step but it was a confidence boost for my parents.
   They took us out of school and took on the task of being our teachers. Especially my Mom. She didn't have a background in teaching but she was going to take that leap of faith and cross her fingers that it worked because she knew we couldn't stay at the schools we were going to.
    It took courage and faith. And sometimes in life we have to take that leap. Sort of like Indiana Jones when he has to cross the bridge except he can't actually see it...he just has to have faith that it is there.
   We can make all the plans we want but when it comes down to it, sometimes the best things are the changes we make with nothing more to guarantee that we're on the right path than our faith.
    That's a tough one to follow but I'm sure glad my Mom did.

    

Day Eight- Overwhelmed and Tired

Being overwhelmed makes life difficult.    It also makes finding the time to practice our faith a frustrating situation.
   How can we take the time to pray or meditate or just simply practice our faith when we're swamped with a hundred million things?
   Yet, if we don't take the time and make the effort to find our spiritual side, then what are we losing?
   We have to have morals, values, and ideas that we live by. That we practice day in and day out.
   That we teach our children.
   I'm disturbed by the amount of lying, stealing, and cheating that happens in schools, even good schools.
   I don't tolerate lying from my children. And when they've done wrong, I make them apologize, or clean up their mess or fix what they have broken.
   It's teaching honesty and courage to your children when you make them step up and take responsibility for their actions.


   Bean knows all about having to apologize. A few weeks ago she had a slight lost of her manners with the principal.
    She was helping me in the office with PTO stuff. I had pulled her out of school half an hour early because her class had finished their Starbase graduation before the day was done and we were waiting on Abu. The principal, who I think is awesome, had just finished making the end of day announcements and was still sitting by the school intercom system. We were chatting and everything was going well until Bean forgot her manners.
    "Can you do something?" She asks Mr. H.
    He smiles and nods.
    "Can you tell Abu to get her butt down here now?"
    The entire, busy office went silent. Everyone was focused on me and Bean and I was desperately wishing that I could freeze time and escape.
    "How should you say that?" He asks, luckily not too mad but irritated that she was rude and demanding.
    She frowns, "Can you tell Abu to get her butt down here now, please?"
    At this point I was sure that everyone in the school would think that my child lacked any manners. Or that she regularly speaks like this. (She doesn't.)

   "You want to try again?" He's surprisingly patient and I think it's only because Bean has been student of the year every year she has been there.
    "I think she forgot she's not at home. Bean, try again, like at school." I step in, hoping that the help will remind Bean that she's in school and speaking to the principal.

    Suddenly light dawns on her face and then her eyes grow wide as saucers and her mouth makes a perfect 'O' before she grimaces, finally realizing her huge blunder.
    "Can you ask Abu to come to the office, please?" she asks in her politest tone of voice.
     Mr. H nods and calls Abu down to the office. One of the teachers, who heard the entire exchange, tells me I should use a spanking stick on Bean and I'm just wishing we could hurry and go home. But there's something Bean needs to do.
     Once Abu arrives, we go outside and find Mr. H.
    "Bean, you need to apologize for the way you spoke." I whispered in her ear, gesturing towards the principal.
    She grimaces again and her chest heaves with a huge sigh. She closes her eyes for a moment and then nods. It takes a bit of courage on her part but she walks over to Mr. H and waits for his attention.
   When she has it, her voice is strong and clear and sincere. "I'm sorry I said it like that."
    He nods, patting her on the back. "It's okay. I think your Mom was right, you just forgot where you were. It's alright now."
    A simple apology but worth so much more in the long run.

 
    I wish the parents of politicians have taken more time to teach morals and values to their children. And perhaps they did but once some one's voted into office- absolute power corrupts absolutely. I'm not sure why they're so corrupted but I do know they're cowardly. Because it takes courage to stand up for what is right.


    Bean has had things stolen from her at school. Right out of her desk, in elementary school. Two years ago I had my mountain bike stolen right out of my backyard. And I live in a decent neighborhood.
   Did our entire culture become so busy that we forgot our humanity?
   I may not agree with all the ideas of the Amish but I do admire how much effort they put into living their ideals. They still help each other out when times are tough, they work hard and they take time for their faith.
   And perhaps that is how we find faith. We don't just search for it a couple of times a year around Easter or Christmas. But we simply live it. Kind of like the Amish but without the strict rules of no electricity or shunning people who struggle with their faith.

  We should place our faith in the center of our lives and teach our children about honesty, sincerity, helping others, having courage to do the right thing, by example. Too many parents lie, steal, and don't help others. What do their children learn?


    How simple of a concept but so difficult too. We're not always going to succeed but we should try.
   But it's a good thing humans aren't supposed to be perfect because I would be in trouble if they were.

   Today I lost patience with Abu. Her frustrating day of recently put in orthodontic equipment, lost hats, fights with Bean and forgetting to do her homework...
   became my frustrating day. And when I could have handled things with more patience and firmness...
   I yelled instead.


  It's a good think that part of finding faith is realizing the importance of forgiveness. For ourselves.
  For other people.


  This faith thing is complicated and trying to find it is quite the interesting journey. All in the month of December. The second busiest month of the year for my family.


  Still, when we feel like we're fumbling then we need to take the time to catch ourselves, or we land flat on our faces.
   We need to help catch each other. Because sometimes a kind word or gesture is all a person needs to keep from losing faith.


  So for all my readers out there, I say a little prayer for you and your families, because I know how difficult life can be sometimes. :)