I'm on Top of It!

Even if "it" is starting to resemble a ball.
A big one.
One that is careening downhill.
Faster and faster and faster....

Today I am finishing up the charity gifts. Why are there always five missing... and those five belong to people who did not sign their names on the sheet and therefore cannot be called with a reminder that the gifts were due four days ago?

Tomorrow Miss Abby is having tubes put into her ears and her adenoids removed. She has made me "promise to visit everyday while she is in the nursing place" Don't worry, we should only be there for a few hours. Her great-grandmother is having some tube work of her own done at the same out patient facility at the same time! We've been joking that the 91 year old and the 5 year old could share a bed and we could get a discount. Which would be nice since they've already asked me for a check upfront to cover the out-of-pocket/deductible costs.

I am almost completely done with the shopping. Only Mr. "What the heck do you get the man who goes ahead and buys what he wants before you have the chance to get it for him" remains on my list. I have a few more things to wrap and then the gift stuff is done.

Christmas Cards you ask? I'm joining Fairlie's crusade to turn the Christmas card into a January thing.... I'm not nearly so stretched in January.

There is fudge to made, cookies to whip up and munchies to be mixed. But I'm on top of it. I may be one small slip up away from becoming road kill on the holiday highway, but I'm on top of it.

Fa la la la la, la la la la!

Out-of-Season Fruit

Friday was "one of those days". At work, we hosted a meal for the family of a dear woman who lost a long battle with a progressive disease earlier in the week. She and her husband had been married for 56 years. Her devotion to her loved ones and theirs to her was a beautiful thing to witness over the past few years. Her husband humbly took care of her with great care, patience and devotion. He and I both cried a bit when I gave him a hug.

The schedule for one of our busiest days was a bit off due to this and I finished up about 30 minutes late with the "have-to" tasks. Saturday was the Christmas Bunch for Rob's co-workers... for which I volunteered to bring a fruit dish. In my dash to the grocery store on "everyone shopping today because Saturday is supposed to be really nasty" Friday evening, I forgot one essential thing.

No. Not my purse. Or my wallet. Or my debit card. Or my coat.

I diligently checked the quality of the fruit. Examining grapes to be sure there were no mush ones in the bottom of the bag. Poring over the blueberries to be sure they were all unspoiled. Gently squeezing the cantaloupe to test for ripeness.

The price of the fruit piled into my basket never tabulated. In fact, the checkout was loud and I didn't hear the total and never glanced at the cash register display. If I had, I might have realized before I got to the parking lot that I had just spent $27.88 on fruit. Ouch!

To make matters worse, the heavy $7.50 cantaloupe rolled out of its bag and bounced around the trunk... partially crushing the $6.99 container of blueberries. Fortunately the $8.99 grapes were unscathed.

Making a List....

Checking it twice!

The kids are working out their Santa lists. Good thing since "Santa" is making the shopping run tomorrow! J.T. listed out a bunch of expensive things: X-Box, Nintendo DS, Games for Nintendo DS, Batman lego.... and had to be reminded that Santa has to be paid for the toys he delivers. the Batman lego seems doable. Except for the fact that they don't make Batman lego anymore and judging by the prices listed on Ebay, made very few at all! $200 for a 200 pieces of lego in a box? Not so much.

Abby keeps adding to her list. Nintendo DS, Dora game for Nintendo DS, lipgloss and nail polish, Splashy the Whale, and hundreds of "I want that!" moments in Wal-mart and during cartoons. Oh how I wish I had developed the idea of Dora or lego.

The tree is up and has been (thank you very much) since the day after Thanksgiving. It is leaning a little. Maybe alot. But the ornaments are staying on! I think I forgot a crucial piece when packing it up last year. Something to do with fitting the pole into the base? (Shut up Aunty Evil). It's a lovely pre-lit piece of fake greeny that takes all of 2 minutes to assemble. I LOVE it. Bets the heck out of the one we had with 60 branches that had to be matched into color coded slots.

I've even already purchased a few presents. Rob guessed his before I even got the bag out of the car. It's a bathrobe to replace his tatty one. "What else would you buy me from the mall?" he says.

The Christmas tunes are on high rotation. Abby has altered the lyrics to "Rudolph" by changing the "guide my sleigh" bit to "guard my sleigh". Which really does make sense. There have to be millions and millions of dollars worth of toys piled into that thing. An enterprising elf could make a fortune on the black market with some of those electronics.

One of my work projects has been a Giving Tree. The tree is loaded with cards. Each card lists the name of someone, their clothing size, shoe size and a wish list item. Most of the names are for school age children. It is heartbreaking to read hand-written notes from teachers: "Really needs new shoes" or "desperately needs underwear and socks". We live a life of plenty when so many don't. It is wonderful to see people taking the cards and coming back with armloads of gifts. Most people have gotten every single item listed on the cards, even though they were asked to just choose something.

So... after feeling behind to start the season, I'm beginning to find my feet and gain a little traction on the road to the holidays. I hope you are all good enough to find a little something from Santa under your tree this year. A couple of you (ahem, you Aunty... and your favorite Abby) need to get cracking though!

Melinda, a.k.a. Old Square Butt

The girl told me yesterday that my butt was square, not round like hers. It also "looks old".

Thank you darling. Thank. you.

Hello, weight watchers?

P.S. I helpfully did not point out that childbirth, age and gravity have contributed to my square butt condition... don't want to polish the rose color off those glasses just yet.

Christmas Hope

I admit I'm in denial that there are only 40-something days left until Christmas and far more tasks to be done than can possibly be fit into that time frame. Decorating, shopping, cooking, shopping, baking, shopping, class parties, shopping, charity gifts, shopping, gift wrapping.... Ugh.

A 112 yearold editorial from The Sun newspaper of New York City. This letter, and Francis Church's reply were originally featured on page seven, 8th letter down (after a letter about those new-fangled chain bicycles) during the Christmas season of 1897. It is the most reprinted editorial in the English language.

Rob and I were discussing how wonderfully this letter rises above the innocent question of a child and challenges us to take on the roll of Santa ourselves to those we love and to all of those with whom we share this world. I have highlighted my favorite sentiment of Mr. Church's wonderful response to little Virginia.


DEAR EDITOR: I am 8 years old.
Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus.
Papa says, 'If you see it in THE SUN it's so.'
Please tell me the truth; is there a Santa Claus?

VIRGINIA O'HANLON.
115 WEST NINETY-FIFTH STREET.

Virginia, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except [what] they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men's or children's, are little. In this great universe of ours man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect, as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.

Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus. It would be as dreary as if there were no Virginias. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.

Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies! You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas Eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if they did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that's no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.

You may tear apart the baby's rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived, could tear apart. Only faith, fancy, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, Virginia, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.

No Santa Claus! Thank God! he lives, and he lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay, ten times ten thousand years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.

Be Careful What You Wish For...

... you just might get it!

A post or two ago I told you that life was rockin along, boring as usual. What a CLASSIC "spoke too soon" moment that was!

The girl is recovering from her third double ear infection in just over a month. And as if the agony of earaches was not enough to wipe us out, she managed to pick up a virulent streptococcus infection in her throat. The antibiotics taste HORRIBLE! You don't even have to taste it to figure that part out. The ten minute, tag-team effort to shove 1 teaspoon of medicine past clinched teeth should be proof enough.

Lack of sleep, medicine battles, and anti-biotic induced crankiness have made our house a cranky place to be. So don't pop by without warning! You may be roped into motrin-giving, yogurt-coaxing, I'll-buy-you-the-moon-if-you-just-take-this-tiny-bit-of-antibiotics...please bribery.

On Thursday she refused to wear anything but a red dance outfit. It was the first truly cold day of the Fall, so the heater had to be turned up. The heater that hasn't been used since last winter. Apparently dust builds up on the heat strips in one's attic space and will create a strong burning smell (even though nothing is burning) and set the fire alarm off! Who knew?

Soooooo... the Fire Department made a visit just to check things out, and, lucky them, got to pick their way through the attic that is NOT tidy. This was after they had stepped over 15 toys, two towels and other items in a house that has been functioning on emergency clean-up only basis for most of the week. At least we know the fire alarm works just fine and that our local firefighters have a response time of under 10 minutes!

Friday was just...just... NUCLEAR! She was well enough to go back to school after four days out, but had to spend two hours with me at work after school. During which time she did the exact opposite of what she was asked to do or not do at least 50 times. I counted. It's no exaggeration.

After work we stopped by the Rec Department to sign the boy up for tennis lessons. So of course, while I was paying for said lessons and engaged in conversation with the clerk, she slips away to the playground... after being very directly told "NO!" in response to a playground visit request less than one minute before. Grrrrrrrr! So pixel nanny privileges were suspended for the entire weekend. Which resulted in a 30 minute meltdown. Melt.... down... I'm surprised you couldn't hear it all the way at your house!

Get your guest room in order Aunty Evil. I'm one tantrum away from sending her over!

The Fixer

"When we honestly ask ourselves which person in our lives mean the most to us, we often find that it is those who, instead of giving advice, solutions, or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a warm and tender hand. The friend who can be silent with us in a moment of despair or confusion, who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement, who can tolerate not knowing, not curing, not healing and face with us the reality of our powerlessness, that is a friend who cares."

— Henri J.M. Nouwen

I think of myself as a "fixer." An analytical thinker who, given a problem, instantly begins the process of weeding through ideas to find a solution. When I was pregnant, I read a bazillion articles and books about pregnancy. Soon the firstborn was keeping us up at night and the "What to expect" book was never too far out of reach. Google has been both friend and foe in the effort to tackle such parenting issues as picky eaters, weird ailments (see Fifth's Disease... transmitted to us electronically via Stomper Girl, impetigo and the MRSA scare).

My brother died. You can't fix that. Can't read an article, attend a class, find a resource to make your life, the lives of those you love, magically return to the sunny days of "before". But by God I tried. I read books on grief, stupidly offered them to my mother, thinking that grief and loss is something that you "fix." Then I stumbled upon this. And I knew. This isn't fixable. It doesn't go away. It does change, life can still be good. But it doesn't return to what it was. How can it? All of life's experiences change us, make us different people than we were in the before.

I often wish that instead of shoving solutions her way, I had just sat with my mother and done nothing. Just helped her carry the weight of grief. I wish I had just been there. Just given my love and my sorrow and my own sadness. Simply been there.

Today I have read of two people who are touching wounds with warm and tender hands. Instead of fixing, they are giving love and hope. It reminds me that life is not always warm and safe. But there are friends who make it not quite so dark. Not quite so lonely. Not quite so sad.

Thank you friends.