Pushing Matchbox Cars

"Sow your seed in the morning, and at night let not your hands be idle, for you do not know which will succeed, whether this or that, or whether both will do equally well." - Ecclesiastes 11:6

That's really all I want to say. I've tried to elaborate on this verse for the last fifteen minutes and keep coming up with hogwash. Everything I type sounds like a lecture I've been giving myself, about the energy I've drained at work and the ghost of a person I become at home in the evenings. As a colleague of mine said today, why should people at work get the best of me and the people I love get the rest of me? Well, he said it more eloquently than that. And his didn't rhyme.

The fact is that all of our activities deserve 100% of us, and that seems impossible. Work deserves that much, husband, kids, family, friends... but usually we devote 90% of ourselves to one task, and the remaining people and tasks get whatever is left, that slouched over, heavy-eyed, mumbling self looking for a quiet corner to avoid the rest of society.

Is there a way to balance? To pull your eyes off the computer at home and let them rest on the man you married or the kids you made? Everything in moderation? Yes. In fact, that good teacher from Ecclesiastes has an even more well-known little ditty that goes a little somethin' like this: "There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven: a time to be born and a time to die..." and so on. You know it. You are probably singing the song right now. Later on, Solomon has another refrain, "I know that there is nothing better for men than to be happy and do good while they live." That's all. Live.

What that means is it is okay to let go. There's a time and a place for everything, and that does not mean that the time for everything is right now. Sow your seeds in the morning -- that's when we do our work -- and at night, let not your hands be idle -- that's when we play. What if the souls you are investing in after work are the very same souls God wants to use to reach a hurting world? Don't they deserve your attention, too, attention of a different kind? Here's where the self-lecture comes in that I mentioned earlier.

Mostly I want to say that there is purpose in every minute of the day. There's always something we could be investing in - our relationships, our work, our prayer life, ourselves even. I do not know what is going to succeed - whether my work at work or my work at home, and maybe the most important task I do today will be pushing Matchbox cars around the living room floor, because that will be a moment my son remembers forever, a small expression of love that embedded itself in his mind. Maybe something else will be more dramatic and important. Ya just don't know.

So, sow your seeds in the morning, and at night don't let your hands be idle. You don't know which is going to succeed, whether this or that, or whether they'll both turn out awesome. You can only invest in it all. Live fully your life. "Purpose yourself to have a good day." ;) And since you can't do it all on your own, pray pray pray. Let God be the God of endurance, perseverance, and hope.

And stop griping all the time. It's not that bad. Really. And it isn't about you, anyway, so grow up. (Mini-self-lecture.)

Painting Nails and Gettin' Dolled Up for Work?!

In about three hours, the students and faculty will begin to arrive for the Ashland MFA program, and step one to prepare for the residency today: painting my nails. This is clearly the most important item on my agenda for the day, even though I rarely paint my nails, even for weddings. I even brought out the pedicure-pull-your-toes-apart things, AND used top coat. I didn't use base coat, sorry Rhonda ;) But Lydia would be proud - the color is a bit like a tangerine.

Don't be fooled by all of this girliness. The kit I own was given to me by my grandparents when I was in high school. The nail polish I used? Yup. From high school. Same kit. It might have even been in middle school, I don't remember now. Boy that was a long time ago. My nail polish is almost half my age. I wonder if good nail polish is like a fine wine ... does it improve with age?

I am thoroughly excited about the residency, which probably accounts for the nail polish. Why I didn't wait until after I showered, after cleaning the house, is a great question that we'll leave to the experts at Elle Magazine.

The family is on their way to Akron for the next two weeks, with the occasional trip back to Ashland for gym and swim class and a wedding. I will miss them, but selfishly, I'm relieved that they have somewhere to go for the two weeks. The residency is dawn-til-dusk and then later, even, and only seeing them for a few minutes here and there throughout the day would be difficult for everyone. I am grateful that our extended family live nearby so Brandon has some help.

Today begins two weeks of talking to people who all get me. Not that you all don't get me, too, but these folks are all crazy-passionate about writing, and it is SO fun. Exhausting, but fun.

So now that my nails are dry (and slightly dented from typing....), I am going to go prep for the day. Have a great one!

Waltzing

Sometimes the way we move about each other feels choreographed, we've been practicing it so long. It is a good kind of dance, where your partner seems to have mastered the steps and knows right when to lead, when to dip, when to spin, how to maneuver you just right so you feel as if this dance is really effortless.

It probably doesn't happen enough - most of the time, we fight to take the lead, would rather grapevine when our partner wants to cha-cha, and just when one person is warming up to the dance, the other just wants to take a seat and have a drink. But there are days when everything clicks into place and we're primarily interested in the welfare of each other rather than our own interests. This makes all of the difference.

Jesus said that the two greatest commandments were to Love God and to Love one another, but most of the time, we are wrapped up in numero uno - what can I get, who's serving me, how am I being left out here, what wrong has been done to me, me me me. As Toby Keith (that fountain of wisdom) has said, "I wanna talk about me, I wanna talk about I wanna talk about #1 oh my, me, my what I think what I like what I know what I want what I see..." That is where I reside most of the time, unfortunately, and also most unfortunately, this is where we are most unhappy.

But when we start getting down to the basics of loving God and loving one another, when we start turning our eyes outward to our fellow human beings as opposed to focusing on our own inner wants and needs, suddenly all of those wants and needs are minimalized and we can see the world much clearer. I think we tend to slip into a cross-eyed vision - not only can we only see the end of our noses, even that ends up distorted.

So back to this dance thing. It is necessary to practice the steps every day. Somedays, we'll be full of grace, our relationships will seem effortless yet meaningful, and we'll end the day content and relaxed. Other days, the dance is all work and no fun at all - your partner is difficult and so are you, but you have to suck it up, pour them a cup of tea too, determine to be happy that they switched the load of laundry and folded the whites even though the shirts aren't creased the way you'd like and the socks are all in balls rather than tucked neatly together. Because the basics Jesus taught, love God and love one another, aren't about feelings. It is about choice. Obedience. Commandment. These are conscious decisions, not flutters of heartstrings.

The next time you watch "So You Think You Can Dance," remember, those steps that look so effortless, the way the partners seem to glide across the floor as if they are one, that took hours of grueling effort, sweat, and patience. Let's invest that kind of energy into our relationships, so we can move as if we are one.

Pancake Saturdays

This isn’t your everyday Bisquick pancake;
we follow the supreme recipe.
My daughter begs to stir and measure
milk and mix. Crack an egg,
warm the griddle, summer whispering
through the open window –
slow rise, tea pot whistle, cooking oil sizzle –
the rest of the day impatient
to begin, percolating our morning –
Is it ready yet? No, we need more
time to spoon the sweetness in.

Potty Training Adventures

I have never been so proud of bowel movements.

We began potty training our son, Elvis, a few weeks ago. We eased him into the process with the convenient yet pointless Pull-Ups and their sneaky tricks to entice you into buying boxes and boxes of them under the guise of "potty training" when really, they are just absorbent underwear, diapers without velcro tabs. Annoying.

So after messing around with the Pull-Ups for a while, we decided to go all out. It was time to buy the underwear. Naturally, we made a big deal out of the "big boy" undies and their manly navy blue with baseballs and basketballs all over them, snagging a box of Disney Pixar Cars underwear for after he goes in the potty -- "Now you get to wear the REALLY COOL underwear!!!!" And thus, the pants-wetting began.

It was slow going at first - lots of walking around in wet pants as if nothing at all happened down there between his legs. We escorted him off to the bathroom every 30 minutes, kept him in his underwear and a t-shirt all day (no sense wearing pants during this process, people), and did our best to stay patient and calm... after all, this is a big deal, this potty business.

Some people have begun potty training their kids as soon as they can sit up, and I have to admit I'm amazed and envious. How?! The child can't even feed himself but we're pooping in the potty? Amazing. Absolutely amazing. We have not been so motivated - infancy was a time reserved for bewilderment and frustration ("Why is he/she crying now?!"), and adding in random and unpredictable trips to the bathroom to prop my head-bobbing child on a potty seat just wasn't going to happen. I am certain I would have let them tumble into the toilet. I know these things about myself.

Our goal has been to potty train the kids before two hits - that momentous occasion when children decide that everything their parents have ever wanted them to do was the most ridiculous idea they've ever heard, a phase that lasts approximately until the children have children. Elvis will be two in August, and we have many a vacation and road trip and wedding to attend in the next few months, so it was now or never.

There have been many marshmallows promised in exchange for pee. Bribery is not a tactic of which I am proud, but sometimes you have no choice - half a marshmallow for pee, a whole marshmallow for poop. The kid will have diabetes by the time he is three. The first time our son finally peed on the potty, it took him ten minutes of sitting there, resisting sitting there, and then being somewhat pinned to the potty seat by mean old Mom, but once E succumbed, crying, to having to pee on the seat, there was much rejoicing. I think I screamed. Hooray, Elvis! Great job little man! Elvis peed on the potty! Weeee! Lots of this sort of thing.

The first go-around is the hardest - breaking down the fear and confusion, dissolving the idea that pee and poop in the pants is the way we've always done it, what's wrong with it, what's the big deal - these are the barriers that must be overcome. Much like any bad habit or sin, the first phase is denial - there's nothing wrong with what I'm doing. And then we move into grief - mourning the fact that I have to give up the ability to go whenever I want, however I want... even though it stinks, literally. Later, there's repentance - okay, okay, I get it, it would be better for you and me if I did things your way. And finally, reward - we begin to see the benefits and advantages of doing things God's way... or the big boy way, in Elvis's case.

And it appears as if we have arrived. Tonight, Elvis pooped in the potty for the first time, ever. A momentous occasion - one wildly celebrated by everyone in the house. Marshmallows for everyone!

Readings and Reading

This weekend, I had the great joy of reading at the Columbus Arts Festival. You never know with poetry readings - there could be dozens of people, or there could be one: your husband. Fortunately for me, the Columbus Arts Festival drew thousands of people, and a few of those folks stopped to linger around the poetry tent as I read at 3:20 on Saturday. It was a great experience, and a beautiful day. The festival was huge! I hope to be able to read there again next year.

The rest of the weekend was spent with friends and family - the best way to spend the weekend. Friday, we went to my parents' campsite and enjoyed brats and good conversation around a campfire. We drove up to Akron on Sunday for a graduation party and to spend some time with Brandon's family. I love being close enough to both sets of grandparents - the kids adore their grandparents. We are so fortunate to have great relationships with all of them. I know most families do not have that support system built in.

I'm on significant revision #3 of Sustenance, the working title of my first full-length collection of poems, and it is on its way to three generous readers. I still feel a bit ridiculous referring to myself as a "poet" - I just don't take myself seriously enough - but that feeling is beginning to fade a bit.

My library books are due this Thursday, so it's time to report on a collection of poems I have been reading, In the Middle Distance by Linda Gregg.

Anyhow, the more I've read from In the Middle Distance, the more I've enjoyed Linda Gregg's work. This is a poet I should be reading - I can connect with lines like, "I fell in love. I believed people. And even now I love the yellow light shining down on the dirty brick wall." (from Staying After), and from "Marfa," "I keep thinking that if I go alone into the size of this silence, we can straighten things out. To know what to question, and what to believe. How to let my heart split open. To print in clear light the changing register of this grand world." Gregg is poking around in my territory - that land where the natural meets the spiritual and the human meets the divine - and finding joy, complexity, sorrow. There is also a lot of reflection and looking back on the past here, finding peace and love enough to reconcile all of the waiting and hurt. This is most evident in "Arriving Again and Again without Noticing". She ends with "I finally fell in love with all of it: dirt, night, rock and far views. It's strange that my heart is as full now as my desire was then." Really beautiful work.

I'm looking forward to tracking down more of her books.

Reading for a change

In case you haven't noticed, I've been doing a lot of writing as of late, and frankly, I'm all poemed out. For the time being. I am tired of reading and tired of writing poems. Give me something book-length!

So I read Patricia Hampl's The Florist's Daughter this weekend and started in on Letters to Malcolm by C.S. Lewis. I had forgotten how much I LOVE C.S. Lewis. But before that, let's talk about Hampl.

I've heard it said by someone (Joe Mackall, I think), that Patricia Hampl is the only writer who can write about nothing in particular for 250 pages and succeed. Which means he thinks midwestern life without crises equals nothing. I loved this book. Set during the days and hours prior to the death of her mother, Hampl describes and explores her lifelong relationship with her parents leading up to their deaths, effortlessly gliding back and forth across time and space to accomplish a beautiful narrative. The reader is allowed to experience the love for father and changing appreciation for mother that evolves into deep love throughout the book without feeling sentimental. Her style is simply delicious. I like the word delicious. I think I use it to describe literature more often than I ought.

So, Hampl was amazing. I'd like to read more of her in the future.

We're at my in-laws' house this weekend, and I finished The Florist's Daughter around 2 yesterday, which means I was in a reading mood only half-way through the kids' naps. I found a book by C.S. Lewis called Letters to Malcolm, which, as it turns out, is about prayer. I've been thinking a lot about prayer the last few months and this was exactly the sort of book I was looking for. It is really quite fabulous. I'm only 50 pages in, but it is a short book, something I should be taking slower. C.S. Lewis is one of those writers whose pages end up ear-marked every other page, there's just so much good going on. A few favorites:

"...no one in his senses, if he has any power of ordering his own day, would reserve his chief prayers for bed-time - obviously the worst possible hour for any action which needs concentration. The trouble is that thousands of unfortunate people can hardly find any other."

And this, talking about praying for things or desires:

"It is no use to ask God with factitious earnestness for A when our whole mind is in reality filled with the desire of B. We must lay before Him what is in us, not what ought to be in us. Even an intimate human friend is ill-used if we talk to him about one thing while our mind is really on another, and even a human friend will soon become aware when we are doing so."

And further down the same page:

"If one forcibly excludes them, don't they wreck all the rest of our prayers? If we lay all the cards on the table, God will help us to moderate the excesses. But the pressure of things we are trying to keep out of our mind is a hopeless distraction. As someone said, 'No noise is so emphatic as one you are trying not to listen to.'"

And still more, of course. There's a reason for a volume entitled, The Quotable C.S. Lewis. He's just that good. I haven't read C.S. Lewis in a while so it is nice to get back in to that voice and reflection, especially on a topic I've been thinking about a good deal. I'm not really a very good pray-er -- I'm the sort who waits until the end of the day to pray or rattles off something here and there throughout the day, which is the rarer sort. At any rate, it is an area of my spiritual life in which I'd like to improve.

Happy reading!