Just Write

Slap slap slap. Her little feet on the floor. Slap, slap. "Ami?" Her little voice soft and kind. I open my eyes. She is standing at the side of the bed. Her face close to mine, smiling. Her curly wild mess of hair piled on top of her head she is holding a small green comb. "Hi baby" I say. She takes it as an invitation to climb onto the bed. I shove the palms of my hands down into the sheets and slowly sit up in bed. "C'mon Ami, I show you" she says as she squeezes her body between mine and the headboard. She combs my hair. Tears form at the corners of my eyes when the plastic tips scrap my scalp. "So boofull" she says softly as she continues to comb. Her hands on my shoulder she peeks around to look at my face. "I brush your hair!" Her chin bobbing up and down. "Yes baby, thank you." I say. Truth is I can't think of many other ways I'd like to be woken up. The mornings are slow and easy and I am continually thankful.

Linking to Just Write at Extraordinary Ordinary

Once Again

And finally the days are getting longer, the sun is warmer and life seems to be finding a rhythm once again. I was not born to live in snow and ice, this I am confident of. Since visiting this space the last time there have been revelations, remodeling, celebrations and something we can always rely on, change. It's good to be back in Northern California amongst family and friends. People that give without you asking and want nothing more than for you to share a bit of their happiness. Now that we can go without multiple layers of clothing the kiddos and I are beginning to feel ourselves again. Wiggling our toes out of our open toed sandals and feeling the suns burn on our bare arms. Our life outdoors can commence...
This past week we have taken family big rides in Bidwell Park. The little ones even dared to get in the creek to look for fish or some strange thing that might move or glimmer under water. We enjoyed the company of a egret bird perched in a pine tree in the yard just before a spring rain shower. We walked the Farmers Market with friends and wiped strawberry juice from our chin and hands. The three of us squat down, our faces near the ground to inspect our gardens seedlings rising from the dirt. Our ears burn as a cool wind blows through on North Rim trail. We slap at mesquitos in the evening and warm our faces with a bonfire at night. This is what life is to me. My life outdoors.

Linking to The Extraordinary Ordinary for Just Write

Fire

Laying in front of the fire again. This time atop a pile of moving pads (the kind moving companies use) neatly folded and cleaned they where the closest thing I could find to a blanket without searching more boxes. The fire is hot. I can feel the warmth reach my bones. I am home. As in my own home. One that has my heart, sweat and tears. My Mr. and my hard earned dollars and precious time invested. My hands dry and cracked from hauling wood. Tiny cuts on my fingers from opening box after box. Labors of love, all of it. I am happy in front of this fire. Chaotic, complicated or confused my mind rests at home. Torn, broken or aching my heart is full in this house. A haven to nourish and grow my precious family. How can something such as walls, bricks and wood a bit of dirt and hard work make me feel so whole? So calm? I am happy lying in front of this fire.
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Wind & Rain

The wind pushes the leaves and rain past my window. The oversized wind chimes sound softly even with big gusts of wind outside the window. I've missed the wind and rain, the cold and leaves. The way I feel so refreshed and energized by it. My Mother tells me how it stormed the night I was born every year on my birthday. Each time she tells it I smile. Today it is rainy and cold. A mild stormy winter day for the region. Today is my birthday. As I wrap myself up in one of my mothers ill fitting coats to shop for Thanksgiving dinner I'm reminded of one of my favorite movies, Home For The Holidays. It's a funny, realistic look at what Thanksgiving is really like for a lot of people. There's a break in the rain and the birds immediately start singing. There songs are clearly heard through the closed windows and walls. My toes cold inside my boots I wiggle them just a bit to warm them. A dialogue starts in my head, me telling Joaquin and Stella about the days they entered the world. What beautiful days they where because they had arrived.
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Otoño

We are here and it still doesn't seem so. Here but not settled and not in our own place. Our belongings are boxed up inside a truck somewhere between here and there and when it will arrive remains to be seen. In fact we told them to hold on for it now, we will let you know when we are ready for it. And this makes my stomach knot and flip and sit in my belly like a brick. Our house needs fixing before it becomes once again our home. I'd like to pick it up and shake it until all the dust and loose parts fall away leaving a clean slate, a fresh space to start. In a way that is what we are doing just in a smaller, slower way. The air is crisp and the leaves have begun to fall. Autumn visits here in this place we will once again call home. It's display of color steals my heart year after year sending me out for more walks than usual. The in between can be quite beautiful in the earths seasons. The change from Summer and Winter brings glorious Fall. This change in season for us is also glorious, outstanding and truly a gift, an opportunity. The limbo I am now feeling will fade and a sturdy foundation will form from routines, family, our beloved outdoors, community and a home.
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As Different As The Lives We lead

News of death this morning has me shaken. I wander the halls and garden and am only momentarily distracted by the blooming lavender or sweet basil. Death can be a release, a calm, an anticipated goodbye, celebrated even. When death finds the incredibly young, or is undoubtedly painful or lonely I am sent searching for explanation though. Death finds us all so why should the matter in which it arrives be so different? As different as the lives we lead. How can we make sense of a tragic end for the one that's end has been met? Why must our imaginations take us to their last moments in search of explanation? It is not the way we die but the life that we have lived that is important. Mindful, I shall fill my life with beautiful things. I will love fully and without hesitation the people and things that mean the most to me. I will celebrate life, however simple, refined and true. In living thusly perhaps we beat death in whichever form it chooses to arrive. Albeit quietly, horrifically or accidental.
What of the mothers, brothers, friends and lovers left outside deaths doors? How will they continue on without precious loved ones? Let me breathe in all that was given over the years and not what was taken so quickly. Let me be present for those that need it most. Let them know this life was not lost, but lived!
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Generous

Distracted is what I feel. There are plans to be made. People to contact, appointments to be arranged. Things to be done but not yet, it's too soon. But perhaps I will start anyway...I pack bags in my mind and watch as our home is wrapped up and placed in boxes. We've done it before. How many times again? But this time seems different. A home is waiting for us on the other end of this migration. Our home. Not a house, not a place to stay. Our home. A home with imperfections and lots of heart. My heart too. The simple thought and vision of it sends me off to sleep at night. To dream of it a bit more. Will it remember us? I imagine my children squealing and smiling as we swing open the door, or maybe it's me. Yes, me too. I see leaves turning colors of gold and red the air becoming cold a fire roaring and cracking in the hearth. Things perhaps I enjoy more than I realized before? My feet will be much father from the sand. I won't smell the sea salt in the evening air. These things I adore. We came by choice and circumstance to this lovely place. Its windy and warm beaches kissed our cheeks and noses. For the same reasons we arrived, we are leaving it now. But there is love and family and full houses where we are going. Generous hearts and arms outstretched. And hands to help without asking or owing. Distracted my what is coming but present for the beauty that is around me know. The sand between my toes and cold salty water. The endless amount of sunshine warming my shoulders. I breathe deeply the ocean air and will remember what it is like to be here..

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The Waiting Place

I've found myself in the waiting place. A place I try so hard not to go. Perhaps you've heard of it or found yourself there as well? For those of you unfamiliar, the waiting place is a funk of sorts. A place where hoping and dream take over and the today's just pass by, they come and go. This most miserable and useless place has me confused and intoxicated with the "what might be." I will find my way out, I always do. I hope there's an exit door coming up soon! Because the today's are beautiful and the now IS happening. I'll leave the dreaming for bedtime and the doing for now. It's just so darn hard to keep my feet facing forward and my head clear of the clouds.

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(This post is an obvious ode to Dr. Seuss. He does after all have a way of explaining things in the most useful ways!)

Jibber Jabber

Sitting in the early afternoon shade I'm watching my sweet babes splash in the shallow pool a few feet away. four or five inches of water in an absurdly orange plastic pool is all you need to cool off when your two and three years old. There naked little bodies splash about as there imaginations take them to far off places and adventures. I wonder for a moment how much longer they will play in the nude. Such simplicity and innocence at this age. "ayudame, ayudame" Joaquin says almost in song as he rescues a Rollie Pollie from the intrepid depths of the orange plastic sea. He races over to me his cupped palm stretched out proudly. He jibber jabbers his brave rescue story and rushes off to splash again, his trusty partner waiting with a smile. She turns and squeals as he jumps in and i admire her unruly curls now past her shoulders. a cool breeze passes across my toes and the lemony fragrance of lavender plants reach my nose. My body relaxed and my mind calm I long for nothing more than this very moment.
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Outside My Window

In my usual position, left foot curled over my right, knees pulled up, the right side of my body caressed by the soft sheets of the bed. My sweet Stellita shares my pillow, her entire body pressed into mine. My eyes closed I breathe slowly and focus on the sounds outside the window. The humming sound the cars make as they whiz past on the highway. I think of it as a blowing wind as the sound of all the cars mix and become one continuous woooosh.

Events from the day and people's faces appear. They are telling me things, giving me advise. Can't they see I am trying to drift into dream land those fools? I brush them aside and quickly focus on the blowing wind out my open window.

Faint sounds of a baseball game trickle in from the living room. "...heater inside...base hit(cheering crowd)...right center field..." Stella's body so forcibly pressed against mine I've begun to perspire. I pull away to find myself at the edge of our king sized bed.

My eyes stay closed there is nothing but the darkness and the whooshing of the cars. My mind wanders. There are people again, looking at me. They stare as if to want answers, explanations. They want something from me but I turn away. Sleep. I want to sleep! I pull the corner of my pillow in tight and imagine a field. The wind blowing with the whoosh of the cars I feel my body sink a bit deeper into the welcoming mattress. The field is thick with flowers, yellow flowers, black eyed Susan's I think. They sway in the wind and I catch a glimpse of Stella's unruly curls and the white of her teeth. Joaquin is there and greets me with a smile so big and bright. He waits until I am close then quickly races away. They run and play, criss-crossing as I chase after them. I can almost hear there giggling, almost. My Mr. is watching us from a distance just inside the shade of an old building. My heart swells and a sense of belonging fills my relaxed body as I fall into sleep. I feel Stella's arm touching mine and hear the whoosh outside the window. I press my face into the pillow and I'm back to running through the flowers.

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Potato Salad Memories

I spoon the last of my moms potato salad onto a plate for lunch and a text comes in from my brother. He says he had a great time and his sunburn is just about gone. I smile. I slice apples for the kids and catch a glimpse of the ice chest just outside the door. "must remember to take that to the garage." I walk past the guest room, the bed still needing to be made, air mattress to be folded and put away. Later maybe. It's warm on the patio, hot even and all I want to do is sit in the warm sun and close my eyes. I do. JQ quickly joins me, squeezing his little body next to mine in the chair. We say nothing. I smell his hair and rub my feet together. Stella plays on her bike a few feet away. A piece of purple crepe paper confetti stuck to the front tire. Her legs too short to use the pedals she pushes herself along chatting and singing to herself. Joaquin is up and on his bike too. They exchange chatter, brother and sister and I smile because I can't understand what they are saying. They laugh and head off together. The sun burns my shoulders and the birds sing. The water from the fountain seems loud against the quiet in the yard. I try and picture all the faces and sounds that filled this space just a few days before and it seems unreal. Like a dream. Then the quiet is gone. Stella at my side requesting help with her shoes and I am up.

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Coming Through In Waves

We lay on the rug in the living room in a rectangle of light, warmed by the late afternoon sun. On our sides facing one another the windows are open and it is quiet in the house. Rare to have JQ, my sweet boy, quietly lying with me. He is holding his canteen in one hand(his comfort) and rubbing my elbow with the other (something he has done since he was a baby). Stella is napping down the hall and I close my eyes. He is as sensitive and emotional as he is stubborn these days. Balancing these two things has me scrambling for a new approach. A new Mom strategy I guess. I can't seem to get threw to him. Maybe in bits and waves and at moments but not the way I am so delicately trying to. In a steady, routine, affirming way. He regularly over reacts, cries easily and shouts in disapproval at me. I miss my playful, active boy. Did some of that get lost in the move? I set the thought aside and peak to see if his eyes are open, they are. He too is searching. Searching to understand the changes, the distance and why much of his family can only be seen and talked with on a screen. Searching to comprehend the meaning of new words and explanations given to him. He is growing and discovering. The beach, the park, the kids in the neighborhood. These thoughts and images fade in and out as I peek open an eye to find him looking back at me with his fathers gorgeous dark eyes. I could easily fall asleep here on the floor if only he would too. But we won't. We will lye in the quiet, peeking at each other now and then. He, still rubbing my elbow and occasionally giving it a pinch. I love this little guy with all my heart and then some.

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