Seasons of Change

This is the kind of day poems are made of
The verses all but write themselves:
The sapphire blue sky, cloudless
The trees a palette of crimson, flame and gold
The water sparkling a thousand diamonds
The autumn sun deliciously warm

As I stand at the river’s edge,
I am reminded—
I have never gazed upon these waters before
And I never shall again
Though this is a treasured place in my heart
And I visit often

There are stories in this river
This the great gurus knew
I listen
And somewhere deep inside
I hear
These waters flow through me
Mixing with my blood
Merging with my essence

Wisdom gazes lovingly at me from across the shore
And to her I bow
Buddha smiles at me from beneath the gentle current
And to him I bow
I bow to the tremor that joins me
With them
My words are an inadequate homage
But in this form it is all I have to offer
Let it be complete

Finding A Space of My Own

I love my home.  My family lives on a dead end street surrounded by  woods in a close-knit, supportive neighborhood.  My kids walk to school almost every day, and we are in walking/biking distance from swimming (in two of the city pools or the Merrimack River), a local ice cream shop, hiking trails, and many of our close friends.  The one drawback is the house itself.  While I absolutely adore our little bungalow with the big yard, our family of 8 (including the 2 dogs and a cat) is bursting its seams.  As my mother never hesitates to remind me at each visit, we have way too much stuff in way too little space.  In attempt to create more space, we’ve expanded in every direction possible: an addition added off the side for extra bedrooms, a deck out the back for warm weather enjoyment, and a partially finished basement for a playroom.  Not another inch can be squeezed out of our poor old house, yet I am not willing to move from this place we’ve made our own. 

So, what is a weary, privacy-starved mom to do when she needs to get away for a few minutes and breathe?  And how is she supposed to establish the meditation practice she so desperately needs when there are children and animals to distract her around every corner?  Enter what my kids affectionately call “mom’s nook”. 

The second floor of our home is just one room, my bedroom.  Ordinarily, I don’t spend a lot of time up there because of the constant clutter.  It’s the only room in the house no one sees, thus it tends to accumulate a lot of “I’ll put it away later” piles and “the vacuum is too heavy to lift up the steep stairs” dust bunnies.   Until recently.  Several months ago, I transformed an unused corner of the spacious room into my own private sanctuary.  A folding screen  physically separates this oasis from the chaos of the rest of the room, allowing me to pretend it doesn’t exist (out of sight, out of mind!).  Within, I’ve created an altar of sorts, which is bathed in natural light  and adorned with greenery and sacred objects, there to remind me of my true path.  Walking into this space quite literally feels like a warm embrace-- my breathing slows and my muscles relax.  And, for those few stolen moments, I can let it all go.  Bliss!

Having such an area to call my own has made committing to a meditation practice a little easier both logistically and mentally.  I’ve created a space that I actually want to retreat to.  My kids are drawn to my nook, as well.  My oldest, an 8-year old boy in every sense, has actually tried sitting quietly with me there, a feat I don’t think I can quite make anyone who doesn’t know him truly appreciate.  My daughter has begged me on several occasions to create a similar area in her room, and my youngest, a toddler in every sense, really likes to smell the incense!  While I am happy to share my space with them, they know that when I am in there, it is my time for quiet reflection.  And a peaceful, relaxed mom makes for a happier family!

A Precious Moment

My to-do list hovers above like a thundercloud

Bulging, roiling, ready to burst its seams, releasing its flood of tedium:

Laundry, dishes, meal prep, housecleaning

But beneath the gathering storm, I sit with you, an oasis of peace

Your head is nestled in the crook between my neck and shoulder

At almost two, your body will soon outgrow this spot, but for now it’s a perfect fit

You’re having trouble falling asleep

Your toddler bones itching to move,

Your curiosity unquenchable

So we rock

Back and forth

Back and forth

Slowly

So slowly and rhythmically that my own eyes are growing heavy

To give in to the doze would be to sacrifice this rare, beautiful moment

Not yet

So we rock

Back and forth

Back and forth

Your limbs grow heavy, and in the end, mine too

 

As any mother knows, my job is never done

The chores are infinite and will be there when I wake

These moments, however, are fleeting and numbered

So for now, I have nothing to do but rock with you.

Greening Christmas: A Progress Report

At the end of last year's Christmas season, I wrote a blog post (January 2011) lamenting the excess and waste that seems synonomous with the holidays and vowed that the next year would be different. Well, it's Christmas 2011 and I am proud to say that I wasn't just blowing smoke! Determined to cut down on the amount of paper I use to wrap our gifts, I saved a bunch of wrapping paper from last years gifts (my kids are surprisingly gentle unwrappers!) and upcycled my own paper from package "stuffing" we received throughout the year.  

While I haven't tackled wrapping the kid's gifts yet, I have finished with my husband and extended family (sister, mother, grandmother, etc.), and can say that about 90% of their gifts were wrapped with reused/repurposed materials!

While making your own wrapping paper does take more time, it is certainly cheaper (I used stencils and paints I already had) both in the short and long term, because you can bet after all that work I am going to try my darndest to save every scrap for next year!

Keeping the Peace Through Humor

I was really intrigued by an article written in our local newspaper by a fellow yogini proposing the adoption of a new hand gesture that would indicate, “Oops, my bad!”  I would use this gesture daily!  She proposes some way of indicating to an offended party when you know you messed up, like when you don’t stop for someone in a crosswalk, or cut ahead to a newly opened register in the supermarket when others have been waiting longer.  I always feel so guilty when I realize what I have done, but have no way of rendering an apology aside from a sheepish look and embarrassed  half-wave.  

Well, I have determined another instance where I need some sort of code word or hand gesture to indicate feelings or reactions that I just can’t muster the energy to explain or rescind.  Lately, my husband and I have been working really hard.  He has been putting in really long hours between working at his day job, maintaining a very popular blog, and writing a book.  His long hours and physical and mental absence trickles down to long days for me with the three kids and a home to manage basically on my own.  Needless to say, we are both fried!  As often happens when two adults are running on fumes, we bicker about really stupid things, but don’t have the time or energy to set things straight.  What I propose is some sort of code word (preferably something ridiculous) or hand gesture (again, the sillier the better) to break the tension between us and show each other that we get it.  We understand that we are being stupid because we are way overtired,  feeling underappreciated, and craving intimacy by way of a decent conversation or heartfelt cuddle. 

I recall a time in the car when my youngest was inconsolable and nothing any of us said seemed to make him feel better.   Seemingly defeated, we all fell silent listening to his wails, when out of know where, my husband turned to Benjamin and blurted, “poop poopy do,”  as if that were the hidden password to his happiness.  You had to be there, but the kids and I started busting up at the inanity of it!  And, I think our reactions finally calmed the baby.  So for our family I propose “poop poopy do” as our code word, our “my bad” go-to statement.   I am fairly certain that it will at least elicit a smile, if not a hearty snort.  Because, laughter truly is the best medecine, and heck knows we could use more of that these days (laughter not medecine!).

Getting Kids to Eat Their Vegetables

I was sure, after observing the eating habits of my firstborn, that the kids-hating- vegetables thing was a gross exaggeration.  My son routinely eats all the fruits and vegetables on his plate before even touching his protein or carb.  Much to my amazement, I often find myself saying, “no more [insert vegetable of choice] until you eat  your sandwich or chicken (or whatever other main course I was serving).”  And, he doesn’t discriminate; he loves it all—broccoli, cauliflower, zucchini, carrots, lima beans, green beans….  Wow, how did I get so lucky?! I must just be an awesome mom, right?  Well, then I had my daughter.

Emma is a carb queen!  She is the flipside of her brother, devouring anything loaded with flour or sugar, or preferably, both.  She could eat macaroni and cheese three times a day and would not shed a single tear if she never saw another vegetable again (or fruit for that matter).  The only way we have been able to coax her to eat broccoli or green beans (the only 2 passable options) is to lather them with butter and salt, causing us to question whether it’s really worth it at that point?  Maybe I wasn’t so awesome at this mothering thing after all (because, of course, her shunning of vegetables is a direct reflection of my parenting!).  But, then, quite by chance, my passion became her salvation.

Within the last few years, the locavore movement has become something of an obsession of mine.  I am determined to become more connected to the food we eat-- to know where it comes from and how it was grown or produced.  And, I am determined that my kids know this, too.  As a family, we have started visiting local farms to buy our meat and “meet” the animals; we have made shopping the local farmer’s market a Saturday morning ritual; we pick our own (http://www.pickyourown.org/) strawberries, blueberries, raspberries and apples in season; we have started a fairly respectable home garden, and we have joined our local Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) group (http://www.localharvest.org/csa/).  As a result, the kids have a new appreciation for what’s on their plate and even enjoy their role in the food system.  Dare I say fresh fruits and vegetables have become fun and desirable. 

The girl who would once shun a salad will now happily race her brother to the snap peas and cherry tomatoes growing on the side of our house to make sure she gets her share.  She will now pick a cucumber from the vine and eat it whole before it has a chance to be part of our dinner.  The highlight of last year’s growing season was the long-awaited day in which she could dig up our potatoes, and she eagerly awaits the carrot-picking this year.  How did such a drastic change come to pass?  How is it that my veggie-phobic daughter will now greedily horde the vegetables we pick up from our CSA (she and her brother had an all-out war over cherry tomatoes during one recent car ride home ).  I am not exactly sure, but I do know that fresh vegetables taste better, and growing or picking your own food is deeply satisfying on some primal level.  Regardless of the cause, it’s working!  Now, don’t get me wrong, Emma still prefers carbs and sweets to anything green, but getting her to eat her vegetables has gotten just  a little bit easier.

Flip and Tumble Produce Bags: A Review

I have a thing about plastic bags…I hate them!  According to reuseit.com, 500 billion to 1 trillion plastic bags are used every year worldwide, where each bag can take up to 1,000 years to degrade.   Their decomposition causes tiny toxic bits to seep into soils, lakes, rivers, and the oceans, and they are the second-most common type of ocean refuse (after cigarette butts), causing the death of countless marine animals every year.  As far as I am concerned, there is nothing good about a plastic bag, and thus, I try my hardest  to bring reusable bags along on all my shopping excursions.  I even have portable, packable bags that fold into themselves and clip onto my purse for unforeseen shopping trips.  One place I have trouble avoiding the use of plastic, however, is in the produce aisle of the supermarket.  For the most part, I go sans bag (much to the cashier’s chagrin as he/she juggles my avocados and zucchinis), but for things like apples, where I purchase larger quantities, I am forced to use a plastic bag….until now!

I recently purchased a set of 5 produce bags from a company called Flip and Tumble (http://www.flipandtumble.com/shop.html) and I love them!  They are roomy (I routinely buy 6-8 apples a trip) and durable and have kept my produce fresh for extended periods in the fridge thanks to the mesh design.  I would recommend purchasing a carrying pouch (offered by the same company); however, to keep the bags neat and organized among your other reusable bags.