journey – Page 84

I can see clearly now…

Published on July 17, 2012January 17, 2013 by Mae @ Rainydayinmay1 Comment

Last night we had the really cool opportunity of doing some volunteer kid time at a local women’s and children’s home. We did some art projects with them, played with them and otherwise just chatted with them about things.

It has been ten years since I worked in a children’s home, and nineteen years since I’d grown up in one. It’s funny how the day to day monotony of life glosses over those memories.

Regardless of where they are, or who is there with them, at the end of every day these kids are just kids.

They love and want to be loved.

They play and want friends to play with.

It was really bittersweet for me.

Only one of my kids never lived in a place like that, and it is no surprise that she is the most entitled and ungrateful of my kids. I know that sounds harsh, and I am not (by any means) belittling her or the hard beginnings she had before coming to us… Mostly, my criticism is of me.

Living in a place like that, whether you are there with your mom or not, isn’t easy.

It is isolating, can be embarrassing, it challenges your worth and causes (usually) some degree of damage. While this can be made better, or worse, depending on other factors (like staff, degree of life outside of the group home, etc) this is just a reality.

My perspective was shaped by my six years growing up in a home. My perspective was further shaped by my 5 years collectively working with three different Children’s home facilities and later, coming to love my two older kids (who had spent middle and high school in one of those homes).

I expect Genny to not take for granted. I expect her to be grateful for things and opportunities. I expect things that I don’t even know how to summarize in words, from her- that I feel, or that my two older kids possess…

But from the age of 4-13 she has led a privileged life. She’s had her own room, and her own things, and a loving family, and family traditions…

And suddenly I realized, she isn’t the one who’s got it wrong. Her entitlement and lack of gratitude might be less of those, and more of comfort and stability. She has a gift that we didn’t have, and when it’s all said and done- that “second nature” is not something she should be punished for.

Even if I can’t relate…

the habits that I can’t break…

Published on July 16, 2012 by Mae @ Rainydayinmay4 Comments

When i was little, (and I mean way, way little) I remember countless nights of getting ready for bed, with my grandpa. He’s swish his Listerine and challenge me to do the same. Mouth full, eyes watering I would try to tough it out, for something close to an eternity- (or probably about fourteen seconds, in reality.) After he died, sometimes I would sneak into my grandparent’s bathroom closet and take a swig of that yellow grossness- holding it until my gums ached that good ache and my gag sensor could stand it no longer…

Now, in my thirties, I use Listerine (the blue stuff though, no yellow for us) every night.

It’s so important and, if I somehow forget, I won’t be able to sleep until it’s done…

I fall asleep praying. I learned this from my grandma.

I have done it for as long as I can remember.

I am incapable of staying quiet, when a song I love plays across the car stereo. Couple that weakness along with a road trip and it’s car karaoke all the way. I get this from my mother. Growing up, a lot of the car portion of trips were just her and I and those are the moments I remember her the fondness…

But there are other things too. The sharp and cutting tongue when I am tired, or irritable. My lack of patience. My sometimes judgmental first responses… These come from her too, but I can not blame her for my use of them. Habit or not, influence or not- they’re up to me.

Worry? Where do I get that? This sick inability to trust or believe that I am worthy of anything amazing happening?

I am tired of feeling that way.

I want trust to be my first instinct.

I want peace of mind and optimism to weigh in there too…

I don’t want to be a doubting cindy, heavy on the side of negative nancy.

I want to be me.

But better. Wiser. Calmer. Less worried…

I guess the bright side is- I should always wake up with great breath.

Some days…

Published on July 10, 2012January 17, 2013 by Mae @ Rainydayinmay3 Comments

Some days you wake up fairly upbeat but barely make it to your doorway before life tries to beat you up.

Some days you open the dryer to find wet sheets, from five days ago, that your 13 year old “forgot to start”…

Some days your feelings get hurt, even when you are pretty sure the other someone didn’t mean to hurt you.

Some days are hot, and your allergies are consuming and your head hurts because the air pressure is changing.

On those days, you might lay down for a nap, in an effort to help your headache.

On that day, an absolutely amazing thunder and rain storm will come through your neck of the woods and you will sleep through the entire thing, only to wake up congested and sorely disappointed.

And the dogs won’t stop barking…

And the wind will blow your fence down…

And the dogs will run away…

And you will have a dozen different calls to (and from) your attorney…

And you might (if you are me) realize your friend quantity is sorely lacking (in the personal reference variety).

It is on these days that dinner will be the furthest thing from your mind, and the nearest thing on your family’s. And so it’s on an evening such as this, when an old fashioned Poor Man’s Hash will have to suffice- (complete with hot dogs {GAG!}, potatoes, garlic, red onion, grape tomatoes and fresh green peas.)

If your luck is as good as mine, your husband will spend the whole of dinner prep, dinner, and post dinner hour(s) on a conference call where the very whole of your future could hang on the brink of.

And it leaves you to have to clean the stainless steel skillet that has a lovely crust of hashed up goodness, all alone.

And all at once you realize you are now behind on three major freelance assignments and today, the boldest thing you did was fold some laundry and scrub an icky dryer.

THANK GOD that every day is not a some day, or at least not this kind anyway…

photo by incurable_hippie

Water your lawns, ya’ll…

Published on July 9, 2012 by Mae @ Rainydayinmay2 Comments

I am stuck, headphones in my ear, in a 90’s funk. Nothing like the soothing, when life was simpler, nostalgia of a little Goo Goo Dolls, Savage Garden and Blind Melon.

I have been hairline deep in a writing deadline, and it seemed the only times I would come up for air would be to deal with kid drama.

You know, the kind where your kid is exceptionally self destructive and there seems to be a million different non-solutions but no actual ones. Except for the one we’re trying, anyway, which involves a whole lot of “So what?” and secretly I really like it. It also involves more constructive uses of her time. We’ll see…

Anyway, back to my 90’s funk.

Here’s the thing, life sucked in the 90’s.

Every few months I was hospitalized, in surgery or having a miscarriage.

My family all but ostercized me, for one reason or another.

I became a foster parent and was on my way to adopting two twin girls that I adored, when they were ripped from my heart due to a loop hole.

We were young and broke.

I had the confidence of a mud puddle.

My husband left me for another woman.

And those are honestly just the highlights of suckage…

And yet, a song can come on the radio or playlist, and my heart can swell with nostalgia.

Suddenly I can think about that time that one boy sang me that one song.

I can remember how great that ridiculously large Italian soda tasted on hot august days, or how amazing that beach summer, full of first love was.

Somehow memory filters the complete psychoticness of the singing boy, the horrible cream belly ache of the soda and the unbelievable heart shattering of the post-beach summer.

Are we wired to want anything that is not right now?

To remember the past with admiration and fondness, or to stare off into the future in the hopes of a plusher green grass to press our toes to…

I don’t know… I just know that though the nineties currently play on, in my ears, I am going to borrow a little wisdom from someone who is here RIGHT NOW- (well not “here” as much as here…)

“The grass ain’t always greener on the other side,

it’s green where you water it.”

~ Big Sean (in Justin Bieber’s As Long As You Love Me.)