the extra light in your eyes
It was a Monday, the first one of daylight savings. The sunrise was spectacular, had it been that wonderful while we were plunged into the slow, ticking hours of winter clocks? I can't say.
I asked a friend to ditch her normal Monday plans for coffee and that is an excellent way to start a week. We taught a literature class to 30 homeschool kids at 1:30 PM for two years, so it's a serious bond we have forged. She was never supposed to teach, but when a spot opened up, she jumped in and drove to my house one day. She admitted that she didn't love literature and we made a great team. Some friends are surprises, you know.
I stopped in to deliver a large amount of coffee and sell a painting, when I caught sight of one of my pieces hanging over a mantle. It filled me in an unexpected way, in this season when my supplies are packed and walls are bare, waiting in anticipation.
There was lunch, falafel, hummus, grape leaves and tabouli, soft warm pitas to hold the flavors as they danced in my mouth.
I saw friends, mothers on the same homeschooling journey. We celebrate victories and wait through the struggles together. Life is messy and complicated, children are brilliant and madness. We put ourselves at risk when we dare to venture through motherhood alone. Let people in and watch them surprise you. Even the super crunchy ones. Even the ones who don't want Disney movies at home. Let them surprise you too. You won't be sorry.
I gathered art supplies and a broken computer and met with students who create and dream and work so hard. Today, I asked them to push past their perfectionism when I ask them to create like Jackson Polluck just this once. Let this art be open, don't set out with a plan, use your whole body and all your emotions. Give it a try. Can you picture the moment in all my art teacher glory? I played a clip from Mona Lisa Smile, you know the one, and in the same manner, I asked them just to consider a work of art. I checked a box on my lifetime list.
I gathered my offspring who are both thriving and giving each day an effort, which feels like winning to me. Thriving and effort should be acknowledged.
I sat at a table with a patient and very tired husband as we signed loan papers, papers with a particular address that we are willingly claiming for what seems to be an unimaginable amount of years. An unimaginable amount of years. This thing that normal people do all the time, it's one hell of a ride. I've priced RVs just in case.
But anywhere with this guy is where I will go and I still find it hard to believe we landed here.
Dinner is hard on Mondays, especially the one after daylight savings, because the light is kind of shocking and everyone thinks they are hungry. Nachos and taquitos and oranges and what may forever be called "anbleloupe." You should know my melting cheese on chips skill was highly praised. The kids made jokes with fruit puns and the post-dinner exhaustion was just the same, slightly unbearable. I noticed the sunset as if it happened for the very first time.
And at the end of the day, I opened a book, written by a genius so many years ago. In it a character asked a question that I felt beating through every moment of this day.
"Tom... does everyone in the world know... that he is alive? Oh, I hope they do." -Dandelion Wine, Ray Bradbury
Maybe it's the extra light that lingered in our dirty windows or all the little things that add up in this wildly surprising life and overwhelm you with goodness.
Certainly it's the tucking away of ideals that you've carried in many forms and boxes across all the dashes on the map and seeing with wide and weary eyes that you are no longer waiting to be alive.
And that's something to know and remember time and time again.
I asked a friend to ditch her normal Monday plans for coffee and that is an excellent way to start a week. We taught a literature class to 30 homeschool kids at 1:30 PM for two years, so it's a serious bond we have forged. She was never supposed to teach, but when a spot opened up, she jumped in and drove to my house one day. She admitted that she didn't love literature and we made a great team. Some friends are surprises, you know.
I stopped in to deliver a large amount of coffee and sell a painting, when I caught sight of one of my pieces hanging over a mantle. It filled me in an unexpected way, in this season when my supplies are packed and walls are bare, waiting in anticipation.
There was lunch, falafel, hummus, grape leaves and tabouli, soft warm pitas to hold the flavors as they danced in my mouth.
I saw friends, mothers on the same homeschooling journey. We celebrate victories and wait through the struggles together. Life is messy and complicated, children are brilliant and madness. We put ourselves at risk when we dare to venture through motherhood alone. Let people in and watch them surprise you. Even the super crunchy ones. Even the ones who don't want Disney movies at home. Let them surprise you too. You won't be sorry.
I gathered art supplies and a broken computer and met with students who create and dream and work so hard. Today, I asked them to push past their perfectionism when I ask them to create like Jackson Polluck just this once. Let this art be open, don't set out with a plan, use your whole body and all your emotions. Give it a try. Can you picture the moment in all my art teacher glory? I played a clip from Mona Lisa Smile, you know the one, and in the same manner, I asked them just to consider a work of art. I checked a box on my lifetime list.
I gathered my offspring who are both thriving and giving each day an effort, which feels like winning to me. Thriving and effort should be acknowledged.
I sat at a table with a patient and very tired husband as we signed loan papers, papers with a particular address that we are willingly claiming for what seems to be an unimaginable amount of years. An unimaginable amount of years. This thing that normal people do all the time, it's one hell of a ride. I've priced RVs just in case.
But anywhere with this guy is where I will go and I still find it hard to believe we landed here.
Dinner is hard on Mondays, especially the one after daylight savings, because the light is kind of shocking and everyone thinks they are hungry. Nachos and taquitos and oranges and what may forever be called "anbleloupe." You should know my melting cheese on chips skill was highly praised. The kids made jokes with fruit puns and the post-dinner exhaustion was just the same, slightly unbearable. I noticed the sunset as if it happened for the very first time.
And at the end of the day, I opened a book, written by a genius so many years ago. In it a character asked a question that I felt beating through every moment of this day.
"Tom... does everyone in the world know... that he is alive? Oh, I hope they do." -Dandelion Wine, Ray Bradbury
Maybe it's the extra light that lingered in our dirty windows or all the little things that add up in this wildly surprising life and overwhelm you with goodness.
Certainly it's the tucking away of ideals that you've carried in many forms and boxes across all the dashes on the map and seeing with wide and weary eyes that you are no longer waiting to be alive.
And that's something to know and remember time and time again.
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