Debating working and/or staying home Mothering...

I don't have any debate within myself about why I stay at home with my two boys, it was timed with a move and money and a lack of career-path-set-in-stone... but here I am, the second year of the first time since I was fifteen that I HAVEN'T worked. Its cool not to work, to have no timetable but one's own... almost like Woolf's room of one's own but - not quite. We're poorer financially, certainly. And I readily and frequently throw my hands in the air and dream about working and being able to finish something more meaningful than the laundry or dinner. And then I think of all the stress and shit that go along with jobs, and bosses and nylons that bunch at the ankles, and I'm looking around at the mess that no one but me will tackle and it seems more palatable. I think we all do what we have to do, and I'd be working if I had to and I'm sure I'd like the change of pace. It would be nice if we could drop our guesswork/judgement about other women and their mothering. Its not all about the kids. reminding ourselves of that seems to be a daily task for those of us who've taken our 'feminism' classes. Sometimes I feel incredibly duped by the woman's movement... it sure didn't let me know what motherhood was going to 'fulfill' in my search for self-identity. It focused more on what was lost. - and there is that. really and truly, today is the day I feel a loss, a woman full of fury at the job of taking hands out of the toilet, fending off filth as though it mattered or was a one-of. . .

there is a poem out there by adrian blevins... let me see... can't find it, for new mothers in america or something like. find it yourself.

still trying to read adrienne rich's Of Woman Born, but I find myself arguing with the book and generally skimming through it to find more of RELEVANCE to me. in my day to day, i just do not care about institutionalized patriarchy or the wildrumors of a godddess-led matriarchical past. I want to know how to balance what my life is like against what i had thought it would be or what my mother expected for me. ( not MY mother in particular because i don't want to get into it, but mothers in general in a generational sort-of way)

Preservation of Luminosity

Here am I, in all my pearlescent glowflow- bundled in several layers of wool, J's enormous thick athleticsocks, pumas, polishing off a bag of smartfood, all to battle the rainychill of the weather. Can you feel the damper on the glow?
I'm working on it, while the baby sleeps and the husband is off finalizing plans for our new future together. Its such a large transition for us to make and so many belief systems to get through. Do I actually let go of my money issues at some point? Do I insure him for a million dollars so I can exist if his plans fall through? heh. What will I do if I don't have a constant strain/stress on my life and spirit because of monetary stricture? Will I qualitatively change? quantitatively? What kind of mother will I suddenly have time to be without all that worry? Or will I just find something else to fill up that void?

-shamelessly picked up phrase from russel's latest post about aethelwold

Pride, and no Lion involved... unless...

This morning is one of those times that I am very proud of my husband and what he does for other people. His job is as healer - but the majority of the healing, i believe, comes from his ability to listen attentively and to comfort. I am something of an emotional treefrog so it is easier for me to type it than to say it and I am happy that he will read this soon. Way to go.

-sidenotes... i have incredibly talented friends and they help me out in very generous ways and I am very grateful to Russell and Annie for helping me with a fabulous invitation.

clearly, it is sunny today and I'm getting some needed vitaminD and am able to see all sorts of good things around. . . one of the kids is napping and the other is hooked to the pink panther. what else is there?

LOOK, I made something!!

HOLY MOLY... I made something which uses up some of the fabric I got at Mood the weekend with R & A and some floral from my grandmother's scrap stash.. Look, A real thing... I didn't carry it in my womb for nine months but C'mon, its an actual pocketbook, even has a pocket on the inside. We'll see if I can use it practically once the weather gets a bit better...



the kids are with my parents - as a Valentine's Day gift to J and I... we elected to stay home and do things we've been wanting to do- but can't with rats underfoot. rugrats I mean.

So I made a bag, J made a fire and is cleavering up a chicken in the kitchen as I type, after having read by the fire in peace and quiet all afternoon. I ate a bag of candy by myself and am feeling my teeth rebel all by myself as well.



I feel very guilty that I love being by myself so much. VERY. but I don't know how else to keep track of where and who I am in this baby-raising time. It is so evident that I am critical to the lives of these two kids and yet I am constantly wanting to be away, craving a solitude of 'nunnery' proportions. How to balance what we all need? How do I manage to keep them fed and relatively happy when I haven't showered in a week or can hardly feed myself in all the insanity?
And I am just tired to hell of doubting that I should be anyone's mother. as if I could change it now. This is the rock, that exists because I kicked it. okay?



Look, I made something else too!! Who could ever want to escape that?!

Pete and rePete in a boat...

I'm a big damn fan of the ellipsis...

too much too much with us, I know. I'm trying to think of a single thing that I have felt today or said or done which is not a repeat of something I've already felt/said/done this week. Laundry, wife-husband talk, filling the 'car' boxes, laundry, dinner, vacuum, mindless mindless childcare... and I still think it is February calling but feel the extreme disgust and angst of a teenager, wanting nothing more than to ditch. The kids are fine, I'm trying to take more photos so I can distance myself from the behavioral modification monotony that is motherhood for me right now. see evidence in posting... I'm also trying to sew some things, be some sort of crafty ... and it all is just a waste of time - all my amateurishness just fueling the need to go Goth... and get the hell out of here...

Lions Lions Lions

Its been a wild tease to have spring-y weather up here, I've been pounding the pavement in search of the vitamin D of my childhood and have yet to get the good soak that I'm looking for. Supplements and wisps of sun-between-clouds are all that are getting me by. And so, the subject of this post: Lions. Sun animalized? Aslan as a faith-based vitaminD shot? Anyhow, as the February month of monetary extremism and fraudulent weather forecasts continues, I am on a mission - get me my Lion.

-the kids are both asleep and I'm eating chocolate coins and tortilla chips to get me through to the evening when hubby gets home. My days have become overwhelmingly repetitive, regardless of what happens in them. Is this just February or should I be medicated? I ask in seriousness. - that said, I think its just February.

Go for it, Spidey...

THe ever-loving relationship with the superheroes in my house continues... while Mom runs in a fog of sunless circles, three year old C is having his way with the men in costume. (No suggestion of impropriety. ) I've not found the Paley book I'm looking for yet, but in the search, I've been discovering tons of other things. Not only do I personally own Hundreds of children's books, but I also managed to put into the meagre storage that we have, yep, all my datebooks for the past three years. OK? away they went. Storage, plus. But while I was up there (our storage unit is above the ground by about 9 feet and a jump, so my oldest calls it a 'tree house') I found post-its carefully saved for the future, cufflinks my husband thought he'd lost years ago in their fancy padded box, lots of cheap stickers for the children I was a teacher to... and so on. What is with the hoarding? For chrissakes, I could be using that space to HIDE in...

no one but Spidey, if he could figure out how to get himself out of the contortion he's in, could get up there without help. There's even a light, I could read... imagine that, READING...

+still have my hearing, still have large lumps of time when all I can think about is how tenuous all that I have right now actually is. I suppose its true of everyone, but I can't say I'm the better for knowing. . .

flimflam

My son is on a big trip concerning superheroes and their mighty powers. BIG. and i have been feeding him his archetypes in many ways, movies, books, toys... what a way to figure out the world- in light of goodguys and badguys and tricksters and the like. (not a lot of girls in the mix- but we'll deal with that at some later date) I feel like my superpowers are fleeting and temporary. While I do fight the powers of darkness on a daily basis and keep my children from all sorts of dangers, I am constantly flung into the pits of hell for my doggedness. This trip of mothering is a constant stumble. I roar into the living room to pull E's hand from the mouth of his brother and I yell at the baby when he won't let go of my leg quickly enough. I want to be all shiny and new, like the loveboat. And instead I am swamped in simile and dinghy.

Along with all this superhero play is the costumed/imaginative play. He's constantly asking me what I want to be when I grow up and I have yet to come up with a goddamned satisfying answer. "Mom" just don't cut it and isn't the reality, its not a thing 'to become' to me, evidently. ITs a real problem. What the hell am I going to be when I fucking grow up? And I am also convinced that Vivian Paley has a book abou all this boy-learning that I own somewhere and I just cannot put my hands on it. Somebody get an effective mother into this goddamned show. WHere the hell is that book? and why am I swearing so much today?

AND i'm still praying every night in a sort of a huddle for hearing to still be with me in the morning. so far so good. GOD. yikes.

weepy

There are definitely times when mothering is a crock of shit. And while it is not generally described as such, it is an incredibly appropriate description. Maybe it is more extreme today because I was/am trying to be so mindful of how much I can hear and how much I would miss if I couldn't hear, but it just is overwhelmingly sucky right now. C. is sick, lying on the sofa and whining until he falls asleep (and its amazing how demanding a whine can be). The younger one is now asleep but the fifteen minutes of nursing seriously depleted my ability to be mindful. REALLY. fuck all y'all. I want to run away and just stay there. It is snowing now and I think I am going to go crazy if school is cancelled for tomorrow, I just can't bear the idea of all being stuck again....I don't think that I can look around at my house with any more feeling of disgust or burden than I am doing right now. There is nothing that I look at that does not bespeak some task left undone or some failing of the mother. Laundry, which sometimes makes me feel productive, is a pile of other people's dirty clothing today. Maybe I'll get one pair of clean underwear from the work. If lucky. WHoopee. I jsut don't feel the brevity and light of my Self right now. I wish the pendulum would swing less wildly.

***Loki and Thor added post-posting, the two sides of the issue. . . superhero and foil, brothers, sort-of...

Citified!

I just spent the night with Russell and Annie in Manhattan. John, too. no kids. Spent the day walking and buying fabric, eating and drinking and just listening and looking. It is so hard to be in such an orgy of sensation and then return to this life of mothering. I'm trying very hard to see my children as my art, my work.. so that I can feel the power and majesty of creating that R and A must feel so often. The problem, of course, is that the boys are alive- they make their own movements away/towards/up/down/in/out with absolutely no regard for my plans or desires for their completion. While I type, and the baby would ideally be asleep- instead he rolls on the floor and cries intermittently for attention/food/expression. And I lose track of what to say and how I feel about the beauty of other lives and what looks like ease in a world where kids are what belong to others.

Anniversary

A year ago this weekend I woke up with no hearing and had none for nearly six weeks. This year, I woke up with my son sleeping with his feet in my face and my older boyson with his head on my chest and I HEARD myself sigh. I am so happy that I could hear them, that I can hear, that I don't have to have that terrible experience today. I may be crazed with exhaustion, annoyed by the ceaseless demand at the most inconvenient times, but I can hear my children... I can have a fruitless conversation with my husband and hear the very timbre of his frustration - I can spend a weekend in New York City with amazing people and laugh at the bulk of their wit. I don't have to think about closing myself away for the betterment of the family, or how long it'll take for my husband to take a mistress for conversation... and all of this is today.

I am torn between the beliefs that life is random and that there is a plan, albeit unknown. But in the randomness, there may be an order which makes it just as likely as not to make this an anniversary, get it?

Last night, I was sure saying my prayers - please let me keep my hearing, please please please, let me not have that experience again, please don't let that happen to me again. please. and, thank you for giving me a year in which to hear and recognize what there is to miss. and, the world is good, I deserve good as much as I need to BE good, I have the glowing lamp of God within me... please please please.

and for today, I can hear.