Open Book

No title springs immediately to mind.

It's late Sunday afternoon, or early Sunday evening; depends, I suppose, on whether you are an optimist by nature or otherwise inclined. For reasons I can't quite articulate, I find this to be the most melancholy time of the week.

My planner is splayed in front of me, the week ahead laid out in a nice, orderly grid. The once blank, open-ended boxes are filling up with reminders, appointments, should-dos and must-dos, all color-coded and prioritized and organized.

Once upon a time, the mapping out of the chaos was critical to the ability to function on a daily basis. Once upon a time, I had schedules, deadlines, budgets, meetings, conferences, phone calls, training sessions, and more meetings. Once upon a time, I received upward of 200 emails a day, most of which contained more bits of information to plot in the nicely color-coded, orderly grid that told the story of my life.

These days, the planner seems mostly superfluous to the reality; a difficult habit to break more than a sanity-saving, efficient necessity. These days, there are big white gaps in between the highlighted entries. Big white gaps representing time. Unstructured, flexible, moldable, malleable, available time.

A gift from the gods.

Right?

I always thought it would be, once upon a time when having it in such abundance seemed the impossible dream. And when we first moved back home to West Virginia, it was a bit of a godsend. I was able to take care of the business of settling in, to turn the house we'd just purchased into a home, to meet up with friends I hadn't seen in ages.

It's been just over two years since we made the move.

And now? Well. Let's just say it's overrated, all this empty time.

The truth of the matter is simple.

I thrive on a full-throttle life filled to overflowing with organized chaos.

I'm starting to feel the old agitation that comes from being dissatisfied with myself. The nagging sensation of waiting for something to happen butting up against the nagging voice inside my head that scolds with the truth that I'm really waiting for me to make something happen.

There is a danger of folding into the emotional discomfort, enabling - if not outright encouraging, the mental disquiet. Old habits die hard, and old symptoms live disturbingly easy. Knowing what I know about myself, learning what I've learned, a sickly fear adds itself to the mix. Madness waits for no woman, but salvation is a patient friend.

So, enough. Enough of the wallowing and the hand-wringing and the Scarlett O'Hara-ing (Wherever shall I go? Whatever shall I do?) and on with the business of making it happen.

I need to spend this time I do have wisely. It's way too easy to give in to the urge to waste it away by filling it full of nothing, and therefore give in to...just...wasting away.

I need to work. Not for the money (although nice? yes, of course), but for my sense of self (well-being = priceless). The bookstore is lovely, but if I'm being honest, it's more a hobby than a vocation - especially since the decision was made not to buy it outright. I need to invest my time, my talents, my energy, my mind in something bigger than me. Something worthy and good and challenging. Something I can value, and in turn, bring value to.

I need to quit nibbling around the edges of volunteering and set my focus on a service to my community that fits my values, engages my sense, makes a difference, and feeds my soul.

I need to feed my brain, and in the process, tie up the biggest loose end in my life by getting my college degree.

I need to nurture my body and spirit, to be a better caretaker of this vessel, on loan for too short a time as it is.

This weekend, I've taken several small steps toward filling those needs with action. It's hard to describe how much fog has been lifted by virtue of making a series of simple decisions that led to more simple decisions that led to a few intriguing options and one declarative path.

I've applied for two full-time jobs, each with its own attraction to my sensibilities. I'm fairly certain I'm overqualified for both of them, but I'm willing to fight for the chance to make my case, because I also know, based on where I am in my life, that I am perfectly, exactly right for them.

I've been in touch with a friend who is hard-wired in the arts community in my town, and she has ideas for me that could tie my love of books, my belief in the "it takes a village" approach toward educating our children, and the arts as a means to an end in one nice big bow.

I've applied - and been accepted - into the Regents Bachelor of Arts program at a local university. We will meet this week to review credits earned at four institutions of higher learning, credits available to earn based on 25 years of real world experience, and the path ahead. In short, I will be designing my own degree program under the 'Interdisciplinary Studies' banner - which can be almost anything I wish it to be.

I've made appointments with my dentist and my doctor; I figure clean teeth and a full physcial work up are good starts. I got my bicycle out, pumped air into the tires, and will be riding it to work, weather permitting. And I made a promise to Jake the Dog: cool, early mornings were meant to be spent taking long walks along the riverfront with my favorite four-legged friend.

The orderly grid laid out in the planner splayed in front of me this late Sunday afternoon - or early Sunday evening, depending on your preference - shows a week full of highlighted possibility (blue) and promise (orange). 

A rainbow of organized chaos is beginning to take shape, and not a moment too soon.

Turns out, all I was waiting on was me.

Play day.

I spent all afternoon in my studio, playing. It felt good.
I've allowed myself to get out of the habit in recent months, and I've missed it.

That's the easel my lovely daughter bought me for Christmas two years ago.
I have very little talent for painting, but dabbling with acrylics on canvas has the same effect as putting crayon to coloring book - it inspires, relaxes, and takes years off one's mental age.

 

My muse. Bought it for $25 at a local antique store,
and it's my most prized personal possession.
The best part? It works!

The information you could glean from this picture tells you almost
as much about me as all the words in the 1072 posts of this blog do.

This is my sweet Maggie.
She hangs out in my studio more than I do.

A glimpse at maybe 1/6th of my art supplies stored in the little walk in closet. It's almost embarrassing. There is enough stuff in here, accumulated over YEARS and YEARS, to stock a craft store. Hey...some ladies are addicted to shoes and some of us are addicted to canvas, embossing tools, glue guns, fabric, pretty paper, yarn, jars, soap molds, beads, rubber stamps, epoxy...

Writing implements and a funky little nose to hold my
reading glasses when I'm not using them.

A gift from my BFF, who knows me well.
And loves me anyway.

And finally - this is how I spent my play day.
I might have issues. But hey!
There's only 119 days left.
Just sayin'.

 

I had a life once. Now, I have a computer.

1. The quote that titles this collection of thirteen vapid mundanities this fine Thursday was uttered anonymously by some very astute soul. Or by someone taking peeks into my own life without my knowing. Between Twitter, Facebook and this place here, it rings of a somewhat painful truth.
2. But then again, for a natural-born introvert like me, living virtually - and via the written word - isn't all bad. Just sayin'. 
3. And now that Words with Friends is on Facebook? Really? Just lock me in a bubble with my laptop, adequate power supply, access to sustenance, and intermittent (chaperoned) forays into the physical world, and I'm pretty sure (sad, but true) I could lead an ambiguously contented life on the small screen.
4. Oh, except not really. I rather enjoy my robust real world life, too. It's all about balance, right?
5. We have had big plans to visit our daughter, son-in-law, and grand-kiddy to be in Washington, DC this weekend. Hurricane Irene is doing did her level best to wash and washed said plans away. Stupid hurricane. I have been so looking forward to hugging my girl's neck, doing a little baby shopping, and tooling around our nation's capitol for a couple of days.
6. Speaking of natural disasters...we had an earthquake! And I totally missed it. Found out about it via Twitter, in fact (ironically) (and also, HA!).
7. My daughter is starting up a blog, an idea I heartily endorse! I can't wait to start reading about their adventures - and they've got lots of them in store in the days/months/years ahead.
8. I've been tempted, on multiple occasions, to give her a link to this place, but something always stops me. I'm not sure what. Would you want to read what is, essentially, your mother's diary? I can't decide if I am more hesitant on her behalf (to protect her from the inner workings of my mind), or on my own (to protect the sanctity of having a place to shed said inner workings of my mind in relative privacy.) Relative privacy. See what I did there? Heh.
9. If you have not read The Book Thief, hear me now: drop whatever it is you're doing, get your hands on this title and read. It is, hands down, one of the best books I've read in a long, long time. For a solid hour after I turned the last page, my face was contorted by the Ugly Cry. It's a read in the tradition of To Kill a Mockingbird and Catcher in the Rye; one of those books whose words weave themselves into the fabric of your soul and stay with you forever.
10. I've been cooking lots of cool weather comfort food meals recently - scratch made chicken pot pie, hearty goulash, etc. and so on. It's my way of urging Fall to get here already. If I'm not careful, I'll be in soup and stew mode any day now.
11. Watching a show on Discovery called "Rising: Rebuilding Ground Zero." It's absolutely fascinating. When it's finished, these remarkable new buildings and the stunning, solemn Twin Towers footprint memorial pools are going to be a shining monument to everything that is great about the fortitude and ingenuity of the American spirit. Have you seen the awesome digital rendering of the site?
12. In a couple of weeks, one of our city pools celebrates the end of summer by hosting a dog swim. The facility will be open Friday, Saturday and Sunday - just for canines. I cannot wait to take my little (ha) web-footed Lab to this soiree. I have a feeling he's gonna love swimming in the big pool...at least more than he enjoys his time in his wader. *snort* Poor little thing.
    
    
    
    
13. I've got to get up at an ungodly hour in the morning to open the store. The joys of retail, at times, can be a real pain in the arse. It's a good thing the coffee is strong and free, and my cup big and bottomless. Vive le bookstore!

The journal.

Giving in to an infernal funk settling around my shoulders like a handcrafted winter shawl, suffocating me with its warmth in the middle of an oppressively hot summer week, I packed up my car and drove to Kentucky.

The rationale was a visit with my mother. A checking in, to see with my own two eyes that she was adjusting well to her new life, one absent the constant presence of my father and his illness, absent the constant and absolute neediness that fed her innate nurturing nature and filled her days with the busy, exhausting business of being indispensable.

The reality was a pressing desperation to escape, even as I was cognizant enough to know that there is no getting away from the racing of my own thoughts, no matter how far or fast I might drive. Even knowing that with the sensible half of my brain, I determined that a change of scenery seemed as good a means as any toward the end of shrugging off the tender tendrils of a budding depression before it had opportunity enough to bloom in full.

My mother is doing fine. Better than fine. She's happy, moving forward, maybe even making up for lost time. She's filled her days with new routines, her calendar heavily marked with things to do, places to go and people to see. She's remodeling the master bath. She's planning trips with girlfriends. She's researching interesting new subjects to introduce to the adult Sunday school class she leads. She's enrolled in training sessions with her dog, Gretchen. She's developing a regular workout schedule with the trainers at her cardio rehab facility. She's looking into becoming a Hospice volunteer.

She's cleaning out Dad's old files and memorabilia, saving a massive pile of stuff for me to sort through, entrusting the determination of to keep or not to keep to my well-known sentimentality.

There is a black leather journal.

She found it tucked into the far reaches of one of the drawers in my father's closet. She opened it, realized what it was, and closed it again. She set it apart from the teetering pile of photos and newspaper clippings and notes.

She told me she didn't want to read it, partly being afraid of what she might learn, partly out of respect for his privacy. She asked me what she should do with it - throw it away? Burn it?

I want it, I told her. I may never read it, I said, but then again, I might. She handed it over without hesitation, with something resembling relief, and I tucked it into my overnight bag.

On Friday night, hours after Mom had gone to bed, I sat on her screened in porch in the dark, watching lightning dance to the booming bass beats of thunder as a storm meandered toward me, slowly and painstakingly, over the rolling hills of the horse farm across the way. I held the journal in my lap and suffered the pretense of internal debate; to read, or not to read?

Of course I read. How could I not? This was a piece of my father, written in his own hand, tucked away in the back of a drawer, knowing, without doubt, that someday, someone would find it. Quite possibly, I believe, hoping and wishing someone would.

The journal begins on December 8, 1992, a night, to steal a descriptive, that would live in infamy in the story of my parent's lives. It was the night a chasm was born, a deep scar that would define - or redefine - their entire relationship as it healed. It tells the story of a marriage, not unlike a million others, and offers a glimpse inside the workings of one man's heart and mind.

It is filled with desperation, the despair of longing, the fear of the unknown. It is infused with moments of self-loathing and self-doubt. It details the tiny fissures of a breaking heart, and lays bare the devastation of a broken one.

And yet.

And yet, there is not a single note of cynicism to be found.

Instead, it is overlaid and infused with hope and optimism, dredged up by force when neccesary, fueled by the course of events when possible.

It is my father.

Reading it, I was overcome with sadness on his behalf, with the bereft feeling of helplessness, wishing I could reach out and hug him tight.

But by the time I finished, closed the journal and lay it in my lap, listening to the rain fall hard a few feet in front of me, I was overcome with confirmation of a fact I've always known.

I am my father's daughter.

A crack of thunder filled the air, and a bolt of lightning lit up the sky in a glorious display, and I wept.

I am no longer able to take my father in my arms and comfort him.

But in that moment, he took my heart in his own sure hands, and I felt it began to heal.

A paring down life.

Maybe it was my father's recent death and the subsequent weeks of listening to my mother on the phone as she told me about the progress made in clearing out the detritus of his life from the home they shared for going on 50 years.

Maybe.

But I don't really think so.

Because intermittent thoughts about purging my own life of its own detritus have been flogging at my brain for a couple of years now, truth be told.

A rubber cat, a gift from my father's mother when I was a very little girl. It used to make a squeaky sound, until the end of its tail got bitten off. A Cinderella watch, with a perfect pink band, that was my prized possession once upon a time. My first pair of doctor prescribed glasses in a psychedelic green and yellow case; he told me if I could be good and follow his instructions, I wouldn't need to wear them after one year; but if I could not, he warned ominously, I'd be wearing them for a very long time. Nine months later I took them off for good. A yellowed softball with the letters MVP written in Dad's inimitable upper case scrawl; this one stays.

Wandering through my house, there seems a constant bumping into stuff. Evidence of days gone by, stacked in boxes in an attempt to capture documentation of the oh-so-fleeting moments for an eternity. Evidence of grand plans never acted upon, stored on shelves or hidden in closets, out of sight, out of mind. Evidence of steps taken on journeys never finished, piled in corners that might as well have a neon "Incomplete" sign hanging overhead given how glaring their contents are to me, who knows them well.

A scrapbook of sorts, filled with pages of movie tickets that say Admit One; evidence of our dating life, once upon a time, with no indication of what films we actually saw. A handmade wax paper bag containing dried rose petals from the first flowers he ever sent me. These, I think, I'll set aside. Random labels pulled from random bottles of beer, with no larger meaning than that. What was I thinking? Why did those matter enough to stick in a book for safekeeping?

The stuff fills up the unused spaces in the basement, or my neglected studio, or the little narrow storage room on the second floor, conveniently ignored. And lately, I've been feeling an ever more pressing urge to get rid of it all.

A box. It must weigh 30 pounds. Filled to the brim with colorful ceramic tiles from a particularly manic artistic period. I haven't crafted a mosaic since I tore out the wall behind our stove in Virginia and built, piece by piece, a cracked image of a flower. It took me three days, start to finish, with no sleep. It was nearly 15 years ago now.

Maybe it's the idea of my husband and kids having to sort through it in my absence, touching and looking, wondering and debating. What is this? Why did she keep it? Does it mean something, could it mean something, to anyone but her?

The truthful answer is no, probably not. The truthful answer is that if any of it were salvaged by the hands or hearts of family left behind, the sentiment attached would likely be guilt. If she kept it, it must mean something. It must mean we should keep it, too.

And that wouldn't be fair. Not to them. Not to the memories or deeper intentions of the things in question.

A small cedar box, containing a POW bracelet, my grandmother's engagement ring and a packet of letters written to me over the course of a lifetime. Dear Jennifer, Love Dad. These stay, too. A shoebox full of greeting cards received through the years, mundane acknowledgements of a birthday or Easter or some milestone or another. On one, a simple Thinking of You card dated September, 1981, my grandmother's handwriting wishes me well on my first semester of college, and misses me with all her heart. The rest can go; just not this one.

I want to be the one to pare down the physical reminders of my life, to separate the wheat from the chaff, to rip out the weeds so the seeds of worthy memory have room to bloom. I want to be the one who decides what stays and what goes, what is archived for historical posterity and what is, for lack of a better word, just so much junk.

Because, in truth, I feel these things weigh me down with a near-oppressive anchor to the past. I feel these things tethering me to moments gone by, or failures owned, until the act of looking forward - much less moving that direction - becomes difficult, and the safety of sitting in what's already been takes on an air of false comfort.

The File Drawer of Broken Dreams. I know it's there, and what it contains, despite not looking at its contents for months, years at a time. College transcripts and course listings, residency forms and applications. Writing samples, dating back to 1969; a dramatically illustrated book of poetry wrapped in a red construction paper cover, tied with strings of green yarn some forty-plus years old now. Notes and outlines and research, page after page printed off the internet and stored in brightly colored file folders, waiting. Two business plans, complete with long outdated information on starting an LLC. I used to go through this place and feel a wistful sadness. Going through it now, I decide this place needs a new name. The File Drawer of Possibility. And it stays, too.

I want to go through all of these things myself, one by one; I want to appreciate them one last time, give them a chance to tell me again why they're still here. I want to look at them with an objective eye, tuck them into my heart of hearts, and release them.

So they can, in turn, release me.

 

 

 

Reflections from the Front Porch

I'm experiencing a bit of a Sunday morning miracle.

Maggie the Cat and Jake the Dog are peacefully co-existing on the front porch, as I sit here enjoying the unseasonably exceptional weather, sipping coffee, perusing the paper, and watching the world go by.

This can only mean one thing: end times are nigh.

These two have lived in the same house for a year and a half now, and have never given each other the
time of day, beyond the occasional staring contest with Maggie safely ensconced at the top of the back staircase while Jake wiggles with Herculean self-restraint at the bottom.

I love watching them. Maggie pretends to pay Jake no mind until he dares to saunter too close to her self-defined bubble of safety, at which point she hisses and mews like a lioness until he backs up and plops himself down with a heavy sigh. He can't understand her put-out-edness. "I just want to play!" he says with the hyper-jaunty wag of of his tail.

 

She's not buying it. Not for a doggone (see what I did there?) second, as she lets him know with three laconic blinks and a barely perceptible narrowing of her eyes.

Not a single word is spoken, and yet so much is said.

It's like a bit of Animal Kabuki theater, for an audience of one. Namely, me. And - being the easily amused type - I find it all highly entertaining. The only thing that could make it even better is getting a photo with both of them in frame.

Alas.

Not gonna happen.

So, I'll take what I can get.

____________

 For most of the summer, we've shared the same oppressive heat as the rest of the country. The kind with the suffocating humidity that lathers you up in multiple layers of fine, limp-making sweat.

This weekend has been different. Here it is, the middle of August, almost noon, and the air outside is gracing us - teasing us? - with autumnal blessings.

It's my last day of voluntary solitary home confinement, and I've spent the bulk of it parked here on the front porch. I'm finding myself hard-pressed to come up with a reason why I shouldn't spend all of it this way. I just poured the last of this morning's pot of coffee into my Jamaica - No Problem!! mug, but there is a full pitcher of fresh brewed iced tea and another of mouth puckering lemonade to tide me through the afternoon and evening. There is the Sunday crossword puzzle and the promise of the last few chapters of my current read to wile away the hours.

The husboyfriend is, at this very writing, in Pinehurst playing his fifth round of golf in three days. He'll be rolling back into town just in time for dinner. Of course.

Which is fine, really. Might even be argued that this is my best justification for topping off this do-nothing weekend with a do-less-than-nothing day. I'll fix him a nice hearty Sunday dinner as a welcome home gift, and dare him to comment on the fact that the house looks exactly the way it did when he left Friday morning, down to the pile of undone laundry in the upstairs hall.

Maybe I'll even finally take a shower and make myself presentable as the cherry on top, and double dawg dare him to say anything besides, "Smells good in here!" and/or "I missed you!"

Heh. That's 29 years of knowing someone wrapped up in a self-rationalized bow right there.

Not that there's anything wrong with that.

In fact, quite to the contrary, there's just about everything right with that if you ask me.

 

 

 

Decade 4, Volume 8

1. Last Friday was the first day of my 48th 365-day journey around the sun, give or take a leap year or twelve. Translated into normal person vernacular: I had a birthday!
2. Want to know what I've learned in lo, these 48 years of walking (mostly) upright on planet Earth? I've learned that it's true what they say: time does fly. Most especially when you're having fun.
3. I decided to develop a loose theme for this particular year of my life. It's a simple one, full of winding complexities. This is going to be The Year of Living Intentionally. 
4. When I pronounced it thus on Facebook a few days ago, a few people emailed me or commented, asking me to elaborate. I can't really. It means what it says, and says what it means. I plan to spend this year being of each moment - for better or for worse. To be more mindful of the energy I waste, more attentive to the people in my heart, more cognizant of the time that slips away, more purposeful in thought and deed. I plan to live with intention. And that, really, is the best I can do.
5. I have been reading so many good books lately. One in particular got under my skin in a big way: Dara Horn's The World to Come. The story itself was an engaging page turner, but more than that, it made me think. It made me curious about the historical backdrop - Marc Chagall, Der Nister (penname of 'The Hidden One,' Pinchus Kahanovich), the Night of the Murdered Poets, Yiddish literature - to the point where I had to put the book down in the middle of a random page to research further. I love these kinds of books that encourage you to expand your brain, your little bank of knowledge.
6. Right now, there is a massive Chagall biography on the table beside me, already dogeared and highlighted, its footnotes scoured for "suggested further reading." I'm also on a mission to acquire a copy of the translations of Der Nister's work, even if only in a collective anthology form. My obsession with Kahanovich's work stems from this one breathtaking line, found at multiple sources (including the ubiquitous Wiki):

Israel Joshua Singer, another famous Yiddish novelist, once said of Der Nister that "had writers of the whole world been given a chance to read [his] work, they would have broken their pens."

7. Somewhere in this rambling mess of Thursday Thirteens, random thoughts, and Dear Diary - these are the days of my life blog posts is a list of 100 things I'd like to do before I die. Or, less depressingly, while I am alive and able. A fair number of the items listed there are infused with the concept of putting myself out there. A fair number of the remaining posts here are infused with the concept of internalized fear as a perpetual roadblock. One of the first things I did in my quest to Live Intentionally was polish up my resume, and send it along to a couple of people I've come to know and admire since we moved back to West Virginia. In doing so, I put myself out there, despite my myriad of fearful insecurities. Go me. 
8. It has already paid off. As it always does, and always has, despite my incorrigibility in terms of learning this truth, despite 48 years of evidence. An opportunity is out there; a potential, yet still quite tenuous, prospect. And whichever way the wind blows for its fruition or lack thereof, I want to remember this feeling of ... well, accomplishment. Confidence. Belief in my own abilities. Sense of worth, even, if we're digging that deep. And I'm full of all of that just for the trying, mind you. Not even for the conquering. Just for the trying. Lesson learned? 
9. My apologies for this post being such a discombobulated mess. With small effort, it likely could have been a normal, flowing post. But I noticed it was Thursday, and took the easy, disjointed, "here are thirteen thoughts, good luck deciphering" way out. Besides, I have a meeting in less than an hour, my mind is racing and so are my fingertips. It's the best I have to offer just now. It's...INTENTIONAL. Ha.
10. The husboyfriend is leaving tomorrow on a golf trip to Pinehurst with the boys. I've been wanting this for him for years now, and I am so glad he's finally getting the chance to do it. I'm also not exactly sad at having the house to myself for three whole days, with nothing more on the agenda than reading, trips to the dog park, and solitude. Who knows? I may even take myself out for a nice dinner one night, reading material in hand. Let's face it: the people watching is so much less blatant when hidden behind the pages of a book.
11. Grandmotherdom update: we are now into week 14, and the grandkiddy is the size of a peach, with 10 wiggling fingers and 10 perfect tiny toes. There is even a 3D ultrasound video to prove it (!!!).
12. The son is also away, helping his girlfriend move to Charlotte, where she starts her first year of law school next week. This duo has been utterly inseparable all summer long, and I know this distance between them will be difficult. But given their respective schedules in the coming months, I believe the time will go by quickly - as we've already determined it is wont to do. There will be weekend trips, and holidays, and...well, yes, it will be tough. Something tells me they'll work it out.
13. And in one final thought, I'm going to try to pull this whole messy thirteen thoughts thing together, and I'm going to do it by leaving you with a passage from the aforementioned book, The World to Come, one that spoke to me on so many levels, it left me gasping for breath. Maybe you'll see what I mean. Maybe you won't. And maybe all that really matters is my heart remembering what it heard the first time my eyes drank it in greedily, as if dying of thirst.

One night when he was still a young man, the headmaster dreamed that he had died, and had arrived in the next world. When it was the headmaster's turn to appear before the divine throne, the Holy One took him by the hand and brought him to a small door. The door opened, and the headmaster found himself in a luminous room filled with books: shelves and tables loaded with books, manuscripts in high stacks all over the floor. The headmaster looked around the secret library and smiled. he was sure this room was the place that had been reserved for him in paradise. But as he reached to take a volume off the shelf, the divine hand suddenly grabbed his shoulder and held him back. "These are all the books you were supposed to have written," the Holy One said. "Why didn't you write them?"

This, that, and another thing, none of them related.

THIS

 For all of the...let's call it "eventfulness"... of the year to date, there has been little opportunity for quality relaxation time. No rest for the weary. This past weekend, that shifted a bit when the husboyfriend and I took off for three days of chillin' and thrillin'.

We drove up to Glade Springs on Friday and spent the entire afternoon lounging by the pool, sipping Crown and Cokes, reading, sunning, swimming, talking and laughing, followed by dinner al fresco and a peaceful stroll through the resort's lovely grounds. It felt like we had the place to ourselves, as our fellow guests were otherwise engaged in the activity an hour up the road, at the Greenbrier Classic. And it was one of the finest days of 2011 so far, in my book.

On Saturday and Sunday, we shuttled an hour up the road ourselves, joining the throngs to spend the day following men in brightly colored clothes as they attempted to hit a little white ball into a tiny hole in the ground, chasing  low scores up the leaderboard. The heat was brutal, but the atmosphere surrounding the tournament, and the world renowned hospitality offered by the fine folks at the Greenbrier, made it beautifully bearable.

I'm not the biggest fan of golf in the world; even so, I have to confess to allowing myself to be drawn in to the storylines, the personalities, the crowds (175,000+ !!!), and the drama. Oh, yes, the drama. The tournament finished with a three-way playoff, and was eventually won with the confident draining of a six foot nine inch putt by a young kid looking to break through. I readily admit to adding my voice to the raucous roar of the massive gallery surrounding the 18th green and to walking away from the event with the thrill of passive adrenaline rushing through my veins, and a smile planted firmly on my face.

The weekend was near perfect.

And I'm already looking forward to doing it all again next year.

______________________

THAT

My daughter remembers an event from her childhood that I have no recollection of whatsoever.

As she recalls, one summer day when she was eight or nine, she and a couple of neighborhood friends went up to the school to play. Two of the boys she was with spotted big trash bags sitting by the backdoor, and upon investigation, discovered they were full to overflowing with those annoying little styrofoam packing peanuts. Somebody got the bright idea that it would be fun to bust open the bags, spread said annoying little styrofoam packing peanuts all over the playground behind the school, and run like hell.

Fast forward, hours later, and my sensitive girl remembers herself tossing and turning in her childhood bedroom, unable to sleep because of the overwhelming guilt by association taunting her thoughts. Finally, seeing no other option, she makes her way downstairs to my room, shaking me awake to tell me, in a quivering voice, about the deed that had been done.

According to my daughter's memory, I got out of bed, threw on some clothes, and drove the two of us up to the school, armed with fresh trash bags. According to my daughter's memory, we spent a couple of hours picking up thousands of annoying little styrofoam packing peanuts in the dark of night, until she was satisfied that we had successfully righted the wrong.

She remembers the entire thing in vivid, technicolor detail.

If such a thing ever happened, there is zero evidence of it stored within my memory bank. I would like to think it is the kind of thing - a bonding moment - I would remember, with pride and warmth.

So did it happen or did it not? Did she dream it or did I lose track of it? Will we ever know for sure? Will the unanswerable nature of this question eat at me for the rest of my natural life?

______________________

 ANOTHER THING

I have been journaling, in one form or another, since I was a very young girl. Every now and then, I come to this space and scold myself for being such a pathetic blogger in recent times, feeling most particularly remiss in ignoring the diarist within, documenting the trivialities and momentous moments of a life. Namely, mine.

When I get in these moods, I find myself scrolling through the years captured here and am often gobsmacked at the realization that I've been writing this blog, for better or for worse, since 2004. And then I get lost in the archives, reliving days gone by, refreshing my memory, overcome by a touch of gratitude that it's all here. Seven years worth of good and bad, trials and tribulation, love and despair, life and death, stagnation and growth.

This place has served as a saving grace, a place to release torment or pain or difficult things. It's served as a release, a place to vent or complain or rationalize. It's served as a road map of sorts, with reminders of goals and dreams, markers of milestones in my life and the lives of those I love, and reality checkpoints showing where I've come from and the way forward. It's served as a place to celebrate. To reflect. To exercise creativity. To explore possibility. To remember.

It's served - in short - as a friend. One who is always here for me, no matter what, sans judgment. One who puts up with my fickle behavior, my on-again/off-again reciprocal commitment. One who knows me, when taken in totem, better than I know myself.

Reading the past gives me hope for the future.

And that's a gift I'm just not ready or willing to toss away lightly.

So, Open Book, I guess what I'm trying to say is, you're stuck with me and the days of my life.

For better or worse, there's just no letting go.

Nuffin.

He doesn't see me standing in the doorway, watching.

He sits on his knees in the middle of his bedroom floor, head bent intently over something I can't see completely, a red crayon gripped in his fist, a wily grin on his face.

Impish is the word that springs to immediately to mind.

"Whatcha doin', buddy?" I ask, as nonchalantly as possible.

"Nuffin," he says, two beats too quickly for comfort.

"It sure looks like you're busy doing something."

"Nope. Not nuffin, Mom." He stares at me, exasperation in his voice, and I can feel him willing me to be quiet now, to quit asking so many questions.

"Well, all righty then. I'm going downstairs for a while. Lunch soon, okay?"

"Um hmm," he responds absently, head down, hard at work again on nuffin.

________________________

We took long meandering walks through the neighborhood nearly every afternoon on our way to retrieve his big sister from elementary school, our schedule dictated by his habit of avoiding the shortest distance between two points at any cost. Every day was a new adventure, with unknown territories to explore and fascinating discoveries to be made.

More often than not, I would weigh ten pounds more on the trip home than I did starting out, pockets filled with a treasure trove of rocks, broken pieces of brick, and sticks. More than once, we were late greeting Jessi at the corner because we'd become engrossed in a line of marching ants or because he'd taken a liking to a comfortable looking rocking chair on a stranger's front porch. More than was probably proper, my oldest child would feel the need to scold us for our abhorrent behavior. She'd throw a tsk-ing look my way while stomping up the steps to a random house and grabbing her brother's hand, chiding, "Get down from there. You can't do that! You don't even know these people!"

I always felt a little bit chagrined at moments like those, when my daughter turned to parent me, the wayward child.

But not enough to put an end to his endless wide-eyed curiosity.

________________________

I worked during his nap time, squinting at the computer screen, trying to make the text fit into its allotted space. Designing ads. Writing articles. Engrossed in new layouts, or fonts, or artwork.

I'd hear the pitter patter of his tentative tiny footsteps padding through the kitchen and look up to the top of the stairs as he rounded the corner, knowing exactly where to find me. He'd stand there, sleep still weighing down the corners of his eyes, but grinning. Always with the grinning.

"Hi, buddy."

"Hi, Momma. Momma? Okay. Come on. You ready, Momma? Okay?" he'd say, squeezing the words out around the thumb planted squarely in his mouth. "Okay, Momma? Now! Come now! OKAY???"

"I'm almost finished," I'd mumble.

"MOOOOMMMMMMAAAA! Please? Come now! Okay, Momma?"

"Just a minute," I'd reply, knowing what would come next; I'd reply, because of what would come next.

"NO! NOW! MOMMA, GET OFF THE POOOOOTER!"

I shouldn't have laughed. But I couldn't help it. Every single day. For months.

________________________

Stirring Spaghetti-O's on the stove top, I try to act like I don't hear him slinking through the dining room. He peeps around the corner; I busy myself getting his Big Bird bowl out of the cabinet. His foot starts to tap, softly at first, then louder, louder, until I finally look over, acting surprised to see him there.

"Well, hey there! Ready for some lunch?"

That grin. It has the power to burst my heart with the purity of its expression across the expanse of his cheek-pinch worthy adorableness.

He leaps into the room, and thrusts a carefully folded piece of paper in my direction.

"What's this?"

"Nuffin. It's for you. I made it all myself," he says, beaming with pride.

I sit down, slowly and carefully unfolding the gift on the table in front of me.

There is a giant fuzzy blob of red, taking up nearly every inch of the page. It's a heart, and I know this only because his sister has been drawing them for weeks, making Valentine cards. Across the top, in the scant white space available, he's written 'MOMSCOTTMOM', all one word.

"You made this yourself?" I exclaim.

"Yes! All myself!" he nods, proud as proud can be.

"Wow! It's a beautiful heart!"

"It's yours. See? It has your name on it." He points for emphasis, to make sure I can't miss it.

"I love it. This is the best heart I've ever gotten," I say, securing it front and center on the refrigerator, where all great works of art go to show off. "You must have worked very hard to make this, especially for me."

He shrugs, still beaming, hands on hips in a super hero pose.

"It was nuffin."

________________________

Not true.

It was everything.

The little moments, compressed like so much carbon into memories, each one a shiny diamond with a glinting clarity all its own. The tiny pieces of the everyday, tucked away like treasures in the time capsule of my mind for safe keeping, for remembering.

All the nuffins, adding up to the very something that is the stuff of life, stored away in my heart, each one a warm, tender hug reaching for me from the past.

Sometimes, when I least expect it.

But usually, just when I need it most.