Green Leaves

This weekend has been filled with balmy, tempered winds. The green leaves are falling like snow, blowing here and there, finally settling and cocooning my sweet purple, yellow and white survivors in the front flower bed. It smells deeply fresh, like late spring, and I am soaking it up with the windows open and the vacuum rolling to and fro.  A cloud has settled, in my soul, in my bones. 

I learned this week that my youngest son has surpassed me in height. This guy spends his time in seclusion - for that is the phase he is in.   I know he will come back to me and when he does, well, he will have forever left Tooker behind.  Both my children now look down to me and, honestly, nothing could have prepared me for the feeling that accompanies that knowledge.  Forever gone. Forever independent of mother. I knew, of course, it would happen one day. I knew it, but, I didn't know the hug your child gives you from above is like receiving comfort rather than giving comfort. That transition, well, it feels like permanency, and it feels like I didn't get the opportunity to celebrate the last moment I was the giver.  It bowled me over. Literally.  It will now be, "I'm hugging my mom because that is what a good son does. I'm hugging my mom because she needs my reassurance that she is still treasured."  

My oldest son caught me as I feel off his skateboard this week.  HE caught ME.  The baby with the million dollar smile is now a man child, trying to share his passion with me, and when I fail, he is catching me.  He and I spent hours this week talking about about a variety of topics.  I listened to him and thought, "It is so strange to talk to your child like an upcoming equal. He has his own thoughts, feelings, instincts, drive, conceived notions. When did it all happen?"  

All this Texas time I feel stuck in a time/space continuum, as though I have not come from anywhere, nor am I going anywhere.  I feel almost entirely separate from my own life and then there are this intense moments in which I feel like this Texas time has catapulted me too far into my future.  It's too much.  It's too fast.  I'm not ready.  And so this cloud has settled in which I have tried to recall every childish voice, mannerism and story.  I looked at the past and the present and spent time trying to marry the two in my mind. 

And so, dear reader, I have spent the last two days trying to refill my love bucket. The bucket that my husband knows, and likes to say, is so large, maybe larger than most.  (Simply meaning, I have a lot to give but I need a lot poured back in.  It's a big four lane highway.)  Between work and the stresses of the winter storm, and the personal losses of the last couple weeks, I feel my soul laid low and bare.  I read a book in it's entirety - 564 pages - in one day.  I ate silver dollar pancakes, which are my favorite, and which Ryan made just for me. Does anyone really like pancakes that are as big as a plate? I submit they just don't taste as good.  He knows food is the way to my heart; I am pretty girly but I also have some man tendencies, and that is one.  Ryan also got our old lava lamp working and it was comforting to watch it swirl and glob and blob; it reminds me of my childhood.  

I continue to wonder how the settling will be.  When will I feel it?  When will it be complete?  This disconnect seems foreign.  Is it completely new or have I just forgotten how lost you become?  I guess maybe what I forgot is every move has been its own phase of child rearing.  It has compounded the issues and this phase is the one in which I let my children go.  It is compounding the feelings of loss, and increasing the feelings of instability.  

I didn't count on that.  A marked flaw in the master plan.  

What if I still lived in NY?  What would it look like?  What would I be doing?  Would I be happy? Would my kids be happy?  Or would we all be longing for a change we didn't know we needed?

Please, Jesus, send a sign that we are in the right place.  Send us some old friends that take forever to grow.  Or, help us to watch the green leaves falling to the earth like snow, in February, with an appreciation of the deep smells of late spring.

One Thousand Nights

A warm hello to my dear readers....

I think many of you have been battling some colder conditions and some difficult times.  It warrants the need and desire to come in close and converse with a dear friend.  I, for one, do not so much subscribe to the "keep distant" philosophy that has been circulating for nigh on twelve months.  Can you believe it?  Twelve months upcoming.  I could not have expected it, and as you might guess, I can still remember what I was wearing that first and fateful Friday.  (It is these details that has earned me a name in my family.  How and why do you remember stuff like that?  Dear ones,  I cannot say.)

A life lived in distance is no life at all and that is all I will say on the matter. 

If you are still near my fireside....

Let us embark on the tale of a thousand nights....

Perhaps, perhaps it was not quite so long as that but it seemed it, surely as I am sitting here with my reading glasses and a stick of Trident.

I am newly transplanted to central Texas, still settling, still learning what is my favorite local restaurant, still adjusting to the yielding yellow arrow.  I have never lived in a southern climate and it has been a most unique experience.  I did not have it fully in my heart to embrace a warm Christmas; although, it did have a perk of walking the beautiful neighborhoods full of amazing light displays.  We don't all put that much heart into it in the cold areas of the world.  Upon relocating, I could not have anticipated the winter experience that was ahead for me.

The power in our home went out in the early hours of Monday morning.  I was already slated to be off for President's day and it was feeling like a bummer of a day off.  I had worked all day Saturday painting my bedroom and Sunday was spent cleaning the house and preparing for company that did not arrive.  Monday was the day of rest and I had visions of a couch, a blanket, sleep, and movies.  It is amazing how little you rest when calamity strikes.  There isn't anything you can do, so that couch, blanket, sleep thing could still have been on the agenda but it decidedly was not.   We had little cell service that day and certainly it felt like we were an island.  We cooked dinner by candlelight and hoped for better days ahead.

Tuesday dragged on and it was colder and colder.  We decided we would drive to San Antonio to see if we could acquire a generator.  It was a two hour trip; the warm car and cell service was delicious.    The weather conditions were much better down there and we were hopeful.  We spent a good deal of time calling and trying several stores, but alas, it was not fruitful.  The Home Depot had a line, manned by store personnel, for the plumbing aisle.  The women's restroom was completely unusable but not labeled out of service.  I could only venture a guess that the locals without power might be coming to use the restroom at the store.  They all overflowed.  (I never saw so many men going into the men's restroom - I had to wait on the MEN to come out.  Write it down.)  My bladder suffered.  We stopped at three other locations but no one was allowing anyone inside.  And so I thought of other things and rode home to Round Rock in silence. I drank hot tea, took ZQuil, crawled under 4 layers of covers and, mercifully, slept.

By Wednesday, I had this thing figured out.  Layers.  Layers win the day.  I read most of the day and played games with my kiddos in the evening.  It was miserable yet pleasant by the company I kept for the teenagers have ventured to the side of their mama.  We had mashed potatoes and pork roast so dinner was quite pleasant.  I never knew how well I could mash potatoes with a whisk until I had to do so. ( I do not like lumpy mashed potatoes - they must be smooth.) It became humorous and memorable to see the kids and Ryan roaming around with headlamps, to see how much hot chocolate and hot tea four people could go through in three days, to see how eventually everyone accepts the fate that is dealt.  I can still see my baby son cuddled up with me on the couch; I don't know when last his head was on my shoulder for more than three seconds.  I can see my oldest son teaching me card games that he learned at boy scout camp. I can see my husband cooking, and eating, breakfast for dinner for possibly the only night of my entire life.  These are some precious takeaways from some very stressful days.  For, as I said, we are not made to rest when calamity strikes.  We are constantly trying to find and reach ahead to the end solution.

Seeing the trees, the sidewalks, driveways, roadways...  Ice upon ice upon ice.  I have never seen such ice accretion in any of the states I have lived.  It's been something to see and something I will always remember.   I prayed Jesus to watch over my pansies and my Egret friend who looked so, so cold each standing in the near frozen pond.  I anxiously await a glimpse of Edgar and the sight of my pansies when they are unwrapped.  I believe God cares about even the little things. 

Our power returned Thursday by God's good grace.  The agenda for the day was fuel and food of which we only acquired fuel.  I've never seen a store devoid of groceries.  Aisle upon aisle upon aisle of empty shelves as though the Grinch stopped by and bent over to pick up that last bulb of yogurt and tucked it into his sack.  What an unusual experience.  The reports I gather indicate it might be this way for awhile so perhaps the days ahead will be a little more testing, because I simply did not stockpile for the end of the seventh age.  I am a hobbit and it will be slightly difficult to lay off some of the options of elevensies, lunch, dinner, tea and supper.

It has been a hard, but precious week.  Stress was evident, but what I know of hardships is that it bonds people.  The best camping trips are the ones that are actually unpleasant.  Twenty years later it is the "rained for 96 hours straight in '86" that will be dug out of memory and passed around rather than the "three uneventful days of sunshine and sailing in June of '92."  The best and worst come at us; we sort it out and we soldier on with the people at our left and right.

I've lived a thousand nights in 5 days and the tale is not over just yet.

I leave you, for now, with these final words that will forever conjure memories of a record setting winter storm in central Texas, in the year 2021, when I was a mother of two teenaged sons and the wife of one good man.

"Forget vegetables. All we're going to need is beans, bacon, and whiskey." 

Stress Management: Take One

When we are completely stressed and overwhelmed, we need an outlet.  For me that outlet would typically be writing.

Here's the thing....  My life pattern has a lot of consistent elements which means there is little to say. The last four months feel like the equivalent of years.  NY feels like 633 years ago. When did I last look upon your face? When did I last hold you? When did I last toast a new journey? Why is my life in the slowest motion of all time?  

There are some good things, I have recently mentioned them, but otherwise my life sometimes feels like groundhog day and I don't have a lot to talk about. I rarely leave the house.  I haven't done anything cool.  I do the same things every day.  And this racks up some stress over here. Lavender soap, lavender candles, lavender cream....lay it on me. I will use it all. 

I have to really force myself (and I'm rather unsuccessful) to not reach backward.  Don't chase people. Don't text.  Just let it be.  It's so hard for me. I have to verbally tell myself....stay here.  Focus here.  Continue to live this day.  At some point, something will change in this new place.  You already know it takes years to build old friends. It takes years to build "home." Nothing has changed with that, but do give yourself the point that pandemic feelings/situations are a brand new factor in this equation. 

Middle age is about structure and process, I think we covered that in an earlier session.  Thereby, my process to combat stress and sameness and claustrophobia is to write what I am feeling, pray for purpose - Jesus, give me a wheel to take (and let me drink coffee),  keep walking, and start to plan one weekly activity for myself that is outside the home. (Drive ten miles west, avoiding cow pies take selfie with steer, come home - you know, something like that)

Step One:

Today, I am really stressed and the feeling I want to verbalize is: trapped.  I feel trapped in my work. I feel unable to correct the situation because I am deeply entrenched, not entirely respected, and my stress is intensified by feeling unable to convey the emotion I feel from myself to a third party that is not invested in the same work.  (Readers - you are now my third party. You are my  peeps and you are listening to me unravel my tale of woe. Thank you.) 

Step Two:

Jesus, thank you for listening to me everyday.  Thank you for always being a party, although you are not third because you are deeply invested in all that I do. Please show me what I can do for you.  Send me someone who needs love, send me a note that says "serve here," send me a neighbor that needs some cookies.  I need some purpose, please give it. Amen.

Step Three:

I did not walk as much as I should have today. 

Step Four:

My outing this weekend will be to visit and take a photo of Georgetown Square. (Maybe I will go there by motorcycle.) 

I feel better already. 

Friends. You might see more of this type of expression as I work through my pandemic move experience.  It's taxing some days, but I have a step by step plan to deal with my stress rather than let it consume me. Cheers, middle age, kicking butt and taking names.  

Feel free to send any scavenger hunt ideas for my weekly activity.  I'll find every steer in Texas. Just for you.