Oh, to be a Poet!

Drama lends itself to music. And music to drama. Which is why I used to write such fantastic songs. And, also, alas, why can't seem to write much of consequence anymore. When your heart and emotions are yanked this way and that, it sets perfectly to music, where it can reach right into your core and twist and turn in melodic reverie. But the subtle, the sublime, the quietly profound - these things are for poetry. These things set on a page in metaphor and silently enter the mind and heart of the reader, resulting, at best, in a whispered sigh of understanding and reverence. Not dancing. That's for music. And drama.

But my life now, and my struggles, and my realizations, my hopes, my heart's most fervent reachings, nowadays, are subtle, sublime, and quietly profound. And a poet, I am not.

I used to fancy myself a poet. When I was in the 4th grade. I even wrote a book of poetry and submitted it to a contest. I won. I was sent to the regional competition, and won again. I think I got a certificate with my name on it in calligraphy and a golden seal. And a coupon to the local bookstore for anything I wanted. Oh, I knew then that I was a poet for sure! When the famous author, Ivy Ruckman, came to our school... you know, Ivy Ruckman? Who wrote The Night of the Twisters? What, you've never heard of it? hm. how strange ["published" and "famous" are synonymous in the mind of a 4th grader]... anyway, when the famous author, Ivy Ruckman, came to our school for an assembly, I got to talk to her, and she signed my book, and also a little blank book for writing in, which subsequently became too precious to write in, as it was signed by a famous author and I didn't want to profane its pages with such amateur writings as my experiments. I wanted to save it for when I wrote really good stuff. Then I would write it in there. I would save it for something special.

I still have it. Still blank, but for Ivy Ruckman's autograph, wishing me good luck in my future writing career. Perhaps this was the beginning of the end. I don't think I attempted to make any of my writings public after that. I kept trying to write something really good first. In the 5th grade we started writing "essays," and I was good at those, and forgot about the juvenile poetry I'd loved so much.

By high school, I had started to write poetry again. I was, after all, a die-hard fan of The Cure, and I was moody and melancholy and tormented and fifteen. What better time to lament the bitterness of life? But I don't think my childhood talent carried over into adult-ish writing. In the 4th grade the pinnacle of my aspirations looked something like Shel Silverstein. I was good at rhyming, at silly puns, at frivolity in words. Trying to write like Robert Smith was another thing altogether, and so I never showed my poems to anyone I respected.

Soon, I got into songwriting. It was perfect for me. I was, in fact, better at writing music than the lyrics that went with it, but was a decent lyric writer nonetheless. Lyric writing is, after all, really the perfect balance between Shel Silverstein and Robert Smith. You have to rhyme, you have to express complex concepts in words that fit just so, but you have to be serious too. You have to have real pain and anguish behind what you're saying.

Lyrics would never play out without the music. It pains me to look at my lyrics instead of listen to them. It's not poetry (and don't get me wrong, poetry doesn't play well with music, in my opinion. It's painful to listen to songs that were written on the page before in the head. Just my 2 cents). Poetry is its own beast. Its own talent.

But I wish I could write it now. I wish there were a way to beautifully and artistically express my inner life, the things I'm learning, the things I yearn for, the things I think about, the things I love.

My life has become a poem, not a song. And in some ways, it's trapped, with no way to get out.

Should Be Famous

So, I haven't done a lot of music publicly in the last couple years (between Seville's birth and Jared's health, it's been a bit much to handle). And of course, the question I get asked most often these days - probably other than "how's it goin'?" and "paper or plastic?" - is something along the lines of "when are you gonna start playing again?" Well... the short answer to that is "maybe soon maybe I think." The real answer to that is long and complicated, and better saved for another post.

But in the meantime I have joined a fun little project as a co-host on the new Should Be Famous podcast. You should check it out. It's a little show where we three hosts (my brother Clayton, a guy named Chris, and I), find what we consider to be good music by people who are not professional musicians - basically, people like us. People who are busy doing real-life kinds of things -- like, say, working a real job, raising children, stuff like that -- but they have some talent or some luck or, in any case, some song that is really worth hearing. But because they're not promoting it, it will never get picked up by a label or a radio station and YOU would never get to hear it. Our quest is to find those songs.

So check out the podcast. The webpage is here: www.shouldbefamous.com or you can subscribe at iTunes directly by clicking HERE.

Hope you enjoy!

P.S. If you know of a great song by a non-professional musician, please let us know. We are finding them almost entirely by word of mouth.

Reunion '08

We've added some faces, and lost some (or at least they aren't here to join us), but I still probably never feel as happy, comfortable, and loved as when we oldies are all together. Thanks for coming over, guys. It was a sweet, if brief, reunion of souls.

Speaking of Death

A close friend of mine just lost a family member. Which causes me to think about my own experience with death.

When I was in high school, a close childhood friend was killed in a car accident. Her name was Jenny. She had lots of billowy, curly, long, blonde hair. She was famous for it. And she was cute. Mild mannered. Chronically likeable. Popular enough to be liked by everyone but not popular enough to draw any jealous enemies. She was the first friend I had in a new town. We were 5.

I remember her coming to my house and us playing in the yard, on the tire swing. I remember her telling me about the people in the Caldecott Tunnel accident, how it was so hot that they melted in there. I was new to the bay area, and didn't really know about the Caldecott Tunnel. I remember driving through it later, looking at the scorched and blackened walls and ceiling, thinking of what Jenny had said, imagining people melting. It was always eerie to me after that. Even by high school, when we would all compete to see who could hold their breath all the way through, I would anticipate the trip, wondering whether we would drive through the burned tunnel with the ghosts of the melted people, or one of the other two tunnels.

By junior high we would talk on the phone for hours, sometimes until we fell asleep and the phone would sit next to me on the pillow, a soft white-noise traveling from her bedroom to mine, until one of us woke up and called across the line to wake the other and hang up the phone. We'd gossip about our mutual friends, as pre-pubescent girls are wont to do. I remember when she got in a fight with her best friend, telling me all about it. I was friends with both, and tried to be neutral.

We'd grown apart in the years of high school. I started running around with a different crowd, and felt myself to be too busy for my previous, wholesome circle. The last time we talked was in the hallway between classes, "Wait. Stop and talk to me. You never talk to me." She had said, in a friendly, chiding manner. "I know, my next class is all the way in D hall" I responded, more as an excuse for my neglect than anything. "We never hang out anymore. We should hang out sometime." She said. I made some indication of intention to call and hang out. I remember thinking at the time that we probably wouldn't. We'd just see each other at random stuff we both ended up at. But I also remember being flattered that she still cared enough about my friendship to try and sustain it.

Soon after that I got a call from a mutual friend one night --a mutual friend who I thought was exaggerating and catastrophizing everything -- so when I learned Jenny had been in an accident, was in the hospital, and "might die," I pretty much wrote off the last part as unnecessary drama. But another mutual friend called a few minutes later, one who was decidedly more level-headed, and confirmed that it was really serious.

I wasn't sure what to do. We couldn't go to the hospital or anything, we just had to wait. I went in my room, on a sort of autopilot, and prayed for my friend, Jenny, that she would be ok. I remember getting the distinct impression that she would not be ok. Then the distinct impression that it was better this way, that for her to live would have meant incredible suffering and loss of capacity, a crippled life in many ways more painful than an early-aborted one. I felt a strange sense of peace.

Sure enough, about 10 minutes later I got another call. Jenny had died in surgery. They couldn't save her.

I didn't go to school for a couple of days. I remember walking to the swamp (now called "wetlands") near my house, finding groves of trees to hide in and cry. I looked in the water and counted crawdads. I passed time. I disappeared to the house of an older boy I was seeing in the next town, sat on his porch swing, stared into the distance, let him kiss me, laughed while he did. He asked why I was laughing and I couldn't explain.

I went to the school for an hour one day because there was a grief counselor coming for all of Jenny's friends. We met in a mysterious classroom I'd never seen before, in the administration building. A bunch of kids I'd never met before were there, along with people I knew to be her friends. Surely she had friends I didn't know, but it felt like some of them just wanted to get out of class, were just curious about what was going on. rubbernecking, essentially.

Various people talked about their feelings in the session. I remember the counselor kept urging us to set up a scholarship fund in her name. It started to annoy me. It almost seemed like she was more interested in the scholarship fund than helping us work through our grief. I remember thinking, "none of us have any money, lady. We're not trying to change the world. We're just trying to get our own lives back together." I can see why she suggested it now. Trying to get us involved in a productive way to express our grief. But I was already the president of the drama club, the junior publicity officer, the chairman of the Junior Prom, the lead in the school play, the volunteer coordinator for the battered women's shelter children's program, in the school chamber choir, and in a bunch of other clubs and organizations. I wasn't interested in taking on a new project, just managing the ones I already had on my plate.

By the time the funeral rolled around, I had cried enough tears that I was ready to stop. It was an open-casket funeral, and my first time seeing a body. Her famous, long, curly blonde locks had been shaven from her head, apparently in a last-ditch effort to drain the fluid from her brain. Her head was covered with a blue and white polka-dot scarf that didn't match her dress. Her lips were sewn together funny, so that she didn't look like herself. Her face was swollen, there were bruises here and there that the mortician had attempted to cover up, her chin sagged in a way that only the dead could have. I remember looking at her body thinking, "that is not my friend. Jenny is not in there." It was the single best moment of the grieving process for me, and I understood then why people do open caskets.

My friends were nervous to go look at her. I took a couple of them in, one by one, to look at the body. They cried, as I hadn't.

I noticed on the program that one of the pall-bearers was Jenny's cousin, a boy named Michael who was our age, and had been my first reciprocated love-interest as a pre-teen. We had met at the Santa Cruz Boardwalk on a youth trip while he was visiting Jenny one summer. We wrote letters back and forth for a while. She told me he liked me, which was virtually inconceivable to me, and endlessly exciting. He lived far away, though, and I never saw him again. I tried to recognize him among the boys and men carrying the casket, but couldn't tell which one he was. He probably wouldn't have recognized me either. I thought about asking around to find him later, but it somehow seemed inappropriate, under the circumstances. What was I going to say to him? "Remember me? Do you still want to hook it up? I can drive now." Now I sort of wish I had found him, expressed my condolences or something. But at the time I couldn't think very far beyond the fact that we'd once had a frivolous flame.

I cried again at Jenny's funeral, and it was the last time I cried for her. I was amazingly efficient at dealing with my grief all in a few days' time. Disturbingly efficient, I felt. I was over being sad, but not over being guilty. I felt guilty for not calling her. I thought I was somehow responsible. She'd just asked me to call and hang out. If I had called her, we probably would have hung out that night, and it never would have happened. It was all my fault.

I've since gotten over this illusion -- I think most people close to her experienced feeling like they were supposed to have intervened that night somehow. But remnants of guilt lingered for a long long time. I felt guilty for not being a better friend over the years. Guilty for drifting away in recent times. Guilty for not stopping to talk to her in the hallway that last time, or any other day before that. I felt guilty for underappreciating her friendship. For taking her for granted. For not thanking her for being my friend when I was the new kid, desperately needing acceptance. I felt guilty for still being here, not nearly as good a person as she, while she was gone. I'm not sure I don't still feel remnants of some of these things.

I remember seeing Jenny's sister sometimes after the accident. I never knew what to say. About a year later she said something about how it's still really hard, but the family knows Jenny is in a better place. I remember thinking that I simply couldn't fathom living the horror they lived through -- so much so that I preferred not to think about it.

Since Jenny's death I've lost a few grandparents, none of whom I was extremely close to. I cried then for my parents, more than anything. My paternal grandfather's funeral was almost a celebratory family reunion for me, greeting cousins I hadn't seen in many years but had loved as a child. My boyfriend once lost his brother. A casual friend died of cancer in my early 20s. Another killed in a car accident in my late 20s. But at 33, Jenny remains my closest brush with death. It was so long ago now that I feel like I don't remember what it's like. I'm left only with impressions and vague memories. When I see someone lose someone close, I am devastated for them, realizing that I cannot imagine what it's like.

Memory is kind, like that. It edits out the parts you can't live with forever, and leaves you with a general idea of what went on. Memory is a lot like a PG movie, actually. It suggests the horrible and evil things that happen so that you get the point, but it doesn't leave you with the shocking anguish and detail that you experience at the time. This is my sole comfort when I think about the fact that someday I will lose someone really close to me. I can't imagine going through it. I can only imagine the other side, and suppose that as life moves on, the shock will remain behind me, with only the flavor of that time lingering throughout my future. Enough to give me the experience to build on, not enough to drag me down.

Family Dinner

Invited by Sunstone to muse on a theme, I'm taking a crack at it. Any thoughts on the writing or strengths or weaknesses of the following are welcome:


In my college years, I came home for Thanksgiving one fall along with all my siblings. As my older brother asked for the stuffing, he was reminded that there were onions in it, and so he wouldn’t like it (he was famously opposed to onions in his food as a child). He persisted in asking, eventually blurting in a frustrated tone, “I like onions now, okay? That was, like, ten years ago! People change! I... LIKE... ONIONS... NOW!” It was clear that he'd tried to communicate this before, but old habits die hard, and the reputation seemed to follow him anyway. His outburst was funny and awkward and surprising, but we finally passed him the plate.

It reminded me how hard it is to change when those around you expect you to stay the same. That same weekend I noticed the difficulty of acting like an adult around my family. To this day, when we get together, all the siblings seem to revert to certain childhood roles and habits. In many ways it’s tons of fun, but I’m also often turned off by my own tendency to be funny, flippant, and bossy around my family. I act the same way I did when I was 17, despite the fact that I don’t act that way as an independent adult. When I'm with the whole family I cannot seem to stop myself, even though I recognize it happening.

This, to me, gets at the heart of the purpose of forgiveness. The Sunday-School-vogue it seems is to talk about the real purpose of forgiveness being for you, the forgiver: to free you of the burden of a grudge or ill-will. But I think this happy byproduct is really secondary to the real point. As with most of Jesus Christ’s teachings, our first and foremost concern is that of others, not the self. The most important reason for forgiveness is not so that we can continue our happy-go-lucky lives unfettered by the burdens of the local sinner, but so that he can. My own experience in something as simple as a family gathering is evidence that it’s extremely difficult to behave differently than expected by those around you. Despite moments of enlightenment, it’s very hard not to believe the subtle and unspoken suggestions by others about who you are, what you are worth, and what you will become. It’s one of the reasons “bad” kids sometimes stay bad, criminals often stay criminals, abused children frequently grow up to choose abuse.

Jesus Christ knows that if he wants his lost sheep back, he needs all of us. He needs us to expect the best of each other, to honor the divinity in each other, to treat each other as though we’ve already moved on from our hang-ups. He needs us to keep passing that plate of onioney goodness, even if we think it will be refused. Because people change. And it’s our job to not only let them, but to pave their way by treating them as though they already have. He needs us to forgive.

Away with Word Verification!!

Like most people, when I first started this blog I would get comments like this:

"Hey I like your blog. Check mine out at www.Isellworthlessherbalremediesforimpotence.blogspot.com."

...or some such thing. Thus, I turned on the word verification feature to weed out those annoyances. Since I've had a child, though, I've noticed how much effort it takes to type (usually one-handed). It makes me do more one-word comments. And more importantly, if there's word verification, sometimes I have foregone commenting altogether. Not on purpose really -- I just don't have the time.

So for the sake of single-handed moms everywhere, I'm getting rid of word verification! No more! It's been off for several weeks now, and I've had no solicitous comments. I think since it's not a new blog, it's no longer necessary. Anyway, I invite anyone else to try it, and let me know how it goes. Just curious if this is something we only need at the beginning when you can look up new blogs. Or if you're inclined to leave it, just enjoy the word-verification-free commenting on my blog. Feel the freedom? Can you taste it? It just makes you want to comment like crazy, don't it?

Bucking the Trends

It seems like all the rage lately to go retro with our communication and/or take a sabbatical from blogging. I have a few good friends who are either taking breaks from their blogs or re-evaluating the blog's value and place and how personal one should be, etc. It's understandable, really. You can absolutely bear your soul to the world (literally) and think that everyone is going to come read and post all kinds of supportive comments and stuff... and then maybe nobody does. When Jared & I first started posting about cancer we had something like 450 hits a week. As the drama leveled out, most of those have moved on with their lives and we get just a few comments here and there now (maybe we've failed to capture the imaginations of our family and friends, but how entertaining do we have to make our lives sound to keep our friends interested?)

When we all started blogging, I hated it. I didn't have time to keep up and felt like I was on the outs if I hadn't read every word of every friend's blog (and people were posting lengthy ruminations daily, it seemed). Now, though, I really love blogging (possibly partially due to my using a reader now). It's a way to keep in touch at our own pace, on our own time, however much we're able, however personal we do or don't want to be. But I, too, struggle with having multiple blogs with various levels of vulnerability, etc. And recently, one of the sabbatical-taking friends and I started emailing -- actually e-mailing personal messages -- and I realized that I was able to say things I never would have written here. At least initially.

So in an attempt to revitalize the personal nature of this blog, I'm posting an excerpt of my email to her, responding to how I'm feeling about things and if I'm doing okay with everything going on in my life:

I'm really doing pretty well with things. Jared's on the mend and things are returning to normal, so I'm just trying to catch up on stuff and figure out what Normal Life With Baby is really supposed to be like. I'm looking forward to holidays and trying not to get carried away with all the things I think I'm going to be able to do. In fact, if anything, I'm feeling a little like I've missed something here. People have sent me books, articles, essays, etc written by people who had cancer, or were close to someone who did, writing all about What They Learned or How They Changed or How Their Outlook On Life Is Altered. They talk big. They talk like cancer was this big epiphany which caused them to question everything and turned their world upside down and helped them find God and caused all kinds of personal growth and made them start foundations to help starving babies and made them realize How Alive They Really Are and brought them peace within their souls and goodwill toward all men and world peace and stuff. Me? I'm just kinda trying to hold my marriage together and make sure I feed my baby enough. Cancer was hard. IS hard. still. Right now I'm in the aftermath, and there's a lot more cleaning up to do than I thought there would be -- probably because I didn't experience this life-changing catharsis all these more noble cancer-surviving families did. I'm not sure I'm emerging a better person. If anything, I'm emerging a little bedraggled and beat up and cynical and desperate to reclaim an innocence I think I may have lost -- but I'm holding out hope.

So... you know... other than feeling a little inadequate, life is pretty good these days.

If you still read this blog, I'd love to know...

Speaking of that last post...

It's a sucky position to be in, hoping someone else will be more kind than you have been, throwing your conscience at the mercy of the rest of humanity.

It occurs to me that different people can think very different things of us based on the moment they interface with us. One time I was driving Jared home from a doctor's appointment. Mind you, this particular appointment is every two weeks, we have to drive across town during rush-hour, and I have to drive because he's doped up on all kinds of drugs. The appointment itself is only for a shot, and takes less than five minutes, but it takes an hour and a half of driving to get there and back. In crappy traffic. I hate it. It drives me crazy. I have a sick husband and an impatient baby in the car and I just want everyone to get out of my way so I can get home already!

So this one time I was taking backroads (read: through town, stopping at every traffic light on every block) and this guy started crossing the street when the hand was flashing -- you know: the hand that means "if you're not already walking, don't start now because the light is about to turn." He even had a limp, so he was going slow and was not very far when my light turned, and I had to wait for him. I revved my engine a little in my impatience. Jared had enough wits about him to wave at the guy and tell him, "you're ok!" through the window before he turned and chastised me, "what the heck are you doing?! Why'd you go and do that?" I mean, he was right. I'm revving my engine at some poor guy with a limp because I don't want to wait a few more seconds?! People in cars can be so lazy and inconsiderate (I learned this during my bike-commuter days).

I felt bad about the pedestrian incident, and resolved not to be so lame. So later in that same drive I was at another intersection and I merrily waited for some folks to cross. A couple with a stroller was lagging behind, but I gave them that little "go ahead" wave you give, and they gratefully went ahead.

The limping guy probably thinks I'm a complete b****. The stroller couple think I'm a really nice person. And I'm sure this pattern appears elsewhere in my associations. Some people observe me doing really stupid and inconsiderate things. Others see me doing only really great, nice, kind things. Jared sees it all, like in that drive, and everything probably cancels itself out.

But I wish Jared (and everyone else) could see me as my newly resolved considerate-to-pedestrians driver. It's bites, kinda, that my past has to haunt me like that.

I think this is one of the most important and overlooked purposes of the principle of forgiveness. Yes, you free yourself of a grudge. Yes, you shouldn't judge others. But I think the real reason we need to forgive each other is to give each other the benefit of the doubt when we make positive changes in our lives. It's hard to feel like a truly considerate driver with Jared in the car if I know he's thinking to himself, "she's just doing that because she feels bad about being a jerk earlier." If I could find a way to wipe his memory and/or judgment, I could decide that "from here on out, I'm going to be considerate to pedestrians." And I could really be that, and own it, and be proud of it.

To the Little Old Man in the Shiny Red Car

I'm sorry! I'm sorry I honked at you! It's just... I had to slam on my brakes when you turned into my lane. You were tentative and... well... slow, and you probably weren't sure which lane you were supposed to be in because you were straddling both of them for a bit, weaving back and forth. Maybe it was a borrowed car and you were not really comfortable driving it. Maybe you don't drive very often. But I didn't think of that at the time.

See, we were in Lake Oswego, and the red car... well... it doesn't look like a little-old-man-car. I thought for all the world that you were some high-maintenance, self-centered, Lake-Oswegan, middle-aged woman holding her cell phone in the bejeweled fingers of one hand and the steering wheel in the other, oblivious to the rest of the world, not taking the mental energy to consider the other drivers around her. When I passed you and turned to give you a dirty look, it was only then I realized that you were just a sweet little old guy driving an uncharacteristically showy vehicle, and you were probably intimidated enough by the road and all the whipper-snappers around you before I had to go and do something so rude as to honk at you. You probably could have done without that. But I couldn't say so. There's no opposite of "the finger" really. So I'm sorry. And I can only hope someone else was more kind.

An Open Letter to The Tomato (pronounced "Teh-MAH'-tow" of course)

Dear Tomato,

I'm sorry. I know, I've been distant. It's been a while now. We used to be so close, you and I. I loved the way you were simultaneously tart, sweet, and savory. I loved your lush, red, meaty flesh, jewel-like and glistening. You added moisture and zing to an otherwise unexciting sandwich. You added vibrant color to a drab salad. You added the feeling of freshness to an overcooked taco. There was really nothing I felt couldn't be improved upon by the addition of you.

But then I was pregnant for a while. Your once-luscious flesh felt mealy and tepid. Your skin seemed too thin and sinewy - always rolling up and getting in the way, or preventing my teeth from breaking through and thus causing them to mash you rather than achieve a tidy bite. Your watery insides seemed too leaky, making your neighbors soggy. And then there are those squishy little jelly-covered seeds, squirreling around in my mouth or crawling through my pasta like weevils. Your once-beloved flavor became all wrong, a zest out of place on an otherwise comfortable grilled cheese, a fruit flavor among vegetables (you have masqueraded to many as a vegetable; I knew the truth, but loved you anyway). I began to favor the firmer and more subtle avacado, the zesty red pepper, the crisp romaine.

I thought it didn't mean anything, my cheating, at first, and assumed it wouldn't last long. When no longer pregnant I figured I just needed time alone. It was winter, after all, and you really were mealy and flavorless, a sawdusty February version of your July self. I anticipated summer, planted you in May, waited anxiously for the day when I could harvest you from my own garden, taste the gloriousness that I remembered from two summers previous, and re-ignite our old love and passion, for a second honeymoon together.

It just didn't happen the way I imagined. I tried. I really did. Early Girl, Willamette, Yellow Pear. I made a valiant attempt with my previous favorite, the Cherokee Purple. Beautiful, but the same spark just wasn't there. I had a wild but short fling with the Brandywine. I even entertained the Striped Roman and a yellow heirloom. For a short while I thought it was happening. But really, I was fooling myself. A few of you fell to the ground, uneaten, sometimes. I shamefully secreted you to the compost bin, and felt guilty.

Today I was in the grocery store and there you were looking up at me as you always have. I regarded you for a moment, remembering that I had none of you at home. You have long been a constant staple in my kitchen; I would never be without you or you without me. But... looking at you and considering today, I decided to face the truth: I have no need of you right now. I just... I'm focusing on other things in my palette. I just need some space. I think... I think... I think I've fallen out of love with you. So here's to hoping someday things will turn around for us. But for now...

...Goodbye...

Wildest Dreams II

It's funny. The last post has generated perhaps more personal conversations than any other. Some people commented online, others talked to me on the phone or in person. I've just had so many followup thoughts and input and fallout that I decided I need to do an actual followup post, in order to continue the thought experiment. And please note, this is a thought experiment for me. I wasn't writing things that I believe are irrefutably true. I am just experimenting with ideas and saying things out loud to see if they feel right or ring true to me. Or lead me closer to understanding something. (note: this post incorporates lots of semi-organized thoughts and it's pretty long. If you're not that interested, it's cool)

• Disclaimer: I do need to clarify that this thought experiment is not necessarily about my prevailing and dominant feelings. It is only one part of me that is rolling eyes over the Wildest Dreams list. Another, very conscious part of me is saying "Go Moonsoul!!" In fact, I would say the eye-rolling didn't even really kick in until a list was requested of ME. So this has nothing to do with whether she can get that 2 million dollars or not. Like I said in my last post, I've actually seen pretty amazing accomplishments out of her, and I doubt her nothing.
  

• I'm amazed at how many people identified with me on one level or another. Honestly, I thought some people would think I was being pretty lame. Instead, I've had a number of people almost thanking me for posting.

• Since I posted I've realized this is far from a new issue for me. If anyone remembers the monologue entitled "Grown Up" from my CD Release concert (I'm sure you don't, but I do), it is a discussion about Dreams vs. Reality, in which I assert that I'm not giving up on my dreams. That was 5 years ago! In fact, that same monologue was also inspired by MoonSoul, when I barely knew her (Wow, Moonsoul. Way to inspire). Anyway, I was struggling with these issues back then too. Also, if you look at my post just a couple before this where I talk about there being a time and a season for all things, you can see that I'm dealing with these things there too. One of the thoughts I've had since posting is, "for heaven's sake, Skye, sort it out and get over it already!" Am I seriously going to be hung up on this one issue forever? (you know people who have a pet issue, and it bugs them their whole lives it seems? Like my mother. She is constantly saying, "this year I'm going to try and not schedule myself so much so I have some time for myself." or, "I just need to learn to do things for myself once in a while." She may make progress, but she still says that year after year after year. Anyway, I kind of want to learn my thingy and move on.)

After many thoughts and conversations, here is the stuff which I think is closest to the truth:

As I said, I've apparently been wrestling with this issue for years. In one way I think I should make a decision about how to live my life and move on, as I said above. But I also realize that we daily make decisions about what to do with our time and what goals to pursue. I can't expect, especially now that I have a child, to make one decision to doggedly follow a pursuit and just do that forever, not taking into consideration the feelings of others or repercussions to my family. I have to constantly be taking the temperature of things and adjusting accordingly. Maybe this is why I still and will continue to struggle with this idea. In order to not let go of dreams I have to do a constant balancing act. Like many things, I believe it is in managing the paradox that you find true happiness and self – in this case, a balance of selflessness and selfishness. So how could I really expect to just move on without constantly thinking about this issue and trying to figure out the right balance? I don't want to be lazy about it. I don't want to lose myself in mothering and wife-ing. Nor do I want to give up any of my relationship with my child or husband in my pursuit of self-fulfillment. So.

And as for my sensitivity, there's that recent post about there being a time and a season for all things. In that post I was reminding myself that I had done many great things for myself, and now I am entering a time in my life where I will - yes - give up on certain of those dreams for a time. As a friend told me on the phone this week, "you're the classic over-achiever. You don't feel good about yourself unless you're doing a million things," which is true. Some people need encouragement to get off their duffs and DO something with themselves. But some people don't need that, and maybe, in fact, need the opposite: reminding that it's ok to not do everything in the world you're capable of. So it's something I try to remind myself of, in order to not be so selfish all the time (another of my constant battles).

The Times and Seasons post was an effort to let go of some personal expectations and close a chapter of my life for a time, in order to do other things. But I can't pretend that is easy or painless for me. It's actually quite difficult, even though it's what I really want. The Wildest Dreams list, I think, opened a freshly closed wound, in a way. I know it wasn't meant in any way that should have done that, but nevertheless, when I think of my wildest dreams, I AM thinking of things I have chosen to leave by the wayside for now. And so somewhere deep inside I couldn't bring myself to write them down. It would have been like that scene in Harry Potter, where he writes "I must not tell lies" and it cuts into his skin each time. I could just imagine cutting into my heart with every line item that I know I won’t pursue right now.

So now I’ve decided that what I've learned from this is that I really DO need to write a list of dreams – but a NEW list. In my adjusting of my expectations, I need to not just leave my previous dreams by the wayside, but to also find new things to focus on that really excite me. You know: instead of switching from a positive to a negative focus, switch to another positive focus.

So here’s my first draft, in no particular order:

• I teach my children to love music.
• My children are happy
• My children and husband feel loved by me
• My children have faith in the world and people around them.
• My children grow up to be well-adjusted adults who know how to have joy in their lives.
• Jared becomes cancer-free and stays that way for the rest of his life.
• Eventually we are able to buy life insurance
• I keep a clean house
• I become a great gourmet cook.
• I become a great cook of healthy food.
• I learn to really support my husband in what he wants to do
• I am one of those people who is always willing to serve
• People trust me with their feelings.
• I make a difference in my community -- at church and other places -- by helping where I can, and being a person people admire
• I become a journalist or writer
• I find a fabulous collaborative music project to embark upon, and have tons of fun doing it.
• I help Amy Pixton market her TyBooks and she makes millions of dollars on them.
• I help Clayton with his CD and it becomes the most popular hymn CD among LDS people and seals his music career
• I have an annual reunion with my beloved roommates from my pre-marriage days
• Jared and I invest in real estate and become independently wealthy
• I lose my pregnant weight and become a "hot mom"
• I get 8 hours of sleep almost every night
• I learn to love Jared the way he wants and deserves to be loved.
• I learn to really commune with God
• I learn to act consciously, and not reactively, more often

Wildest Dreams

A friend of mine recently sent me an email about her "Wildest Dreams." In it she detailed all the things that she wants to happen in her life, much of it "wild" indeed, and unlikely to ever come to pass. But her enthusiasm is genuine, and I must admit that I've seen this friend accomplish many things that I thought were unrealistic and unlikely to happen at the outset. It's amazing, actually. She asked me to write my own list of wildest dreams and send it to her. And I can't bring myself to do it.

I've been somewhat surprised by my reaction to this email. I find myself rolling my inner eyes. "all that 'magic' ... and all that crazy 'creating my life' stuff... It doesn't measure up to reality. It just sometimes gets old" another friend told her. And I was surprised to find myself identifying with the friend, though I would never want to admit it.

Well, here I am, admitting it, I guess. My inner cynic is affecting this exchange too much to ignore. I don't consider myself cynical at all. In fact, I think this friend wouldn't probably say that I have inspired her significantly (which I don't say to flatter myself -- though I would be flattered -- but because I think it's relevant to the thought). Despite my personality of idealism, next to my friend, I am a complete nay-sayer at this moment. Have I always been? Is this a recent development? What is it about this that bothers me?

I don't know. So in order to sort through my psyche, I've decided to engage in a thought-experiment about it. I'm going to brainstorm and explore possibilities, none or all of which may be true.

here we go.

Why don't I want to write a list of my wildest dreams and pursue them? Possible reasons:

• Disillusionment: I've already tried following my wildest dreams. I believed in myself every bit. I enlisted lots of people to help out. I worked my a** off. And I was really really good at what I did. It didn't work out. Not because I'm not good enough or didn't work hard enough or anything. Sometimes the stars just don't line up right. I mean, when you're following something that isn't likely to happen, it's entirely possible that it won't happen, right? So what's the big deal. Still, now I am struggling with what to do with those dreams. I haven't played a gig since Seville was born, over 8 months. I'm not ready to say I've quit, but I don't have tons of enthusiasm to keep going. It seems like it might be more peaceful for my life to just admit that, hey, sometimes dreams don't come true. But is also feels like a colossal waste to stop. Partly because it's like letting go of a long-term boyfriend whom you have invested so much in, and partly just because I really believe I have something great to share with the world. A world that will never hear it.

• New Perspective: My perspective on fantasy and romance has changed, generally. I am a big believer now that life is beautiful, romantic, and miraculous just as it is, even without all kinds of drama and fantasy involved. I think too many people are looking for drama and fantasy, and I think they hold their own happiness hostage by being unable to accept the beauty that is their life, the blessing that is their circumstances, the joy that is that guy/girl who isn't perfect, but would make a great companion. (disclaimer: the friend in question is absolutely not guilty of this, for those who know who I mean). I'm not sure that coming up with a bunch of far-fetched "dreams" is going to improve my quality of life. Rather, I prefer to rejoice in what I have, am, live. I really feel strongly about this, as it's something I've learned mostly in the past couple of years. There is much excitement in pursuing bigger and better and more and different. But there is much peace in being still and loving what you have.

• Competition: I am a competitive woman by nature. I have tried for years to calm down my competitive side, but sometimes it surfaces. For example, I almost always have to fight feelings of resentment if I hear of another female folk-singer having success at all. Silly, I know. And embarrassing. But if I'm going to be totally honest about myself here, I have to admit that. So maybe part of me simply resents my friend for doing what I am not: following unrealistic dreams. And for accomplishing what I am not: seeing some of those dreams become reality.

• Overwhelmed: I am a bit overwhelmed these days. I have a husband with cancer, a baby who is struggling with eating and waking me up for hours at night, I'm sleep deprived, fat, tired, squeezing a budget, and generally exhausted and overwhelmed all the time. In some ways I think it's just that the idea that I should be trying to do any more than I'm already doing just makes me want to smash some china and cry. I would be happy right now if I could get dinner on the table each night and have clean clothes once in a while. Let alone following some "wildest dreams" nonsense. Maybe the idealist in me is just really struggling with the reality that I live, and the fact that day-to-day life is consuming every ounce of my energy, leaving nothing surplus for the fun and exciting stuff.

• Gratitude: Maybe I don't want to have wild dreams anymore. Maybe I just want to be happy with what I have.

That's all I am coming up with for now. Maybe I'll wake up in the middle of the night and think of something else, but for now I guess I'll sit with those thoughts. And see if they lead me anywhere.

Nekkid

Recently one of my brothers was on his way to an ultimate frisbee game straight from work. He passes my house on the way, and often stops here to change. I was talking to him on the phone and he said he might just skip it tonight: he had just looked in his trunk and only had his shoes, but no shorts.

"Jaaaared!" I called across the house. "Do you have any shorts Bryce can wear for ultimate frisbee?" Jared did, of course, and I offered them to Bryce so he could still play.

He still hesitated, "I mean, I don't have a shirt either."

"I'm sure Jared has a t-shirt you can wear. Heck, I have a t-shirt you can wear. Come over!" I protested.

"Well... uh... it gets worse than that." At which point I had to snicker. No, actually, I laughed out loud. Then I said, "I could ask the question, but I'm not sure if you would even want to borrow any... thing else." He confirmed.

This caused me to wonder. I personally have either loaned or borrowed skivvies from a girlfriend or sister in need in the past. And I know that other women do this too, if need be. Not that it's probably anybody's favorite thing, but it's not that big of a deal either. We have washing machines, after all. Men, on the other hand, I think would generally rather die a slow, painful death than share anything that intimate.

When we were backpacking last May, the subject of sleeping naked came up. I asked Jared if he would ever borrow another guy's sleeping bag if he knew the guy had slept in it naked. "Never in a thousand million years" was his response. Which is funny to me. I mean, I understand, but it still makes me laugh. Men are so phobic about contact with other men.

Death Cab for Cutie has a song about "brothers in a hotel bed," their point being that two men in a bed will sleep stiff as boards and as far away from each other as possible. Me an' the girls? We just cuddle up together. It seems healthy and good, to me, to get physical attention and affection outside of sexual relationships. Sometimes I wonder if men and women are different this way because for men, physicality is inherently sexual, and so no contact is without connotations, or whether our culture so teases "sissy-boys" that men have become paranoid about what would otherwise be a healthy way for them to experience physical touch. Are men so sexual because it's the only kind of contact society allows them? Or does society only allow it because men are, truly, just more sexual about contact?

hmmm....

For All Things a Time and a Season

With marriage and having a baby comes a new lifestyle. I made all sorts of vows to be the kind of parent who wouldn't slow down, who wouldn't make others bend to my children's "naptimes," who would still travel, still go backpacking, still be hot, still gig on the weekends, still do many amazing things.

But my ideas about that are changing (as usually happens when you predict what kind of person you will be in a situation you really know nothing about). Yes, I could be all those things. But at what cost? Am I really more concerned about my seeing Machu Picchu or about Seville's happiness and well being.

There is a time and a season for all things, and I'm starting to realize that my life will be fuller, happier, more peaceful, more loving, more fulfilling if I simply accept that the time for certain things has passed, and a new time has come. A time for certain self-less sacrifices. But they aren't really sacrifices as much as I thought. What you gain is far more enlivening than world travel.

I am grateful, at this time, that I lived a pretty full single life (and childless married life). I can say I did lots of things. I have:

• Been to London, Paris, Germany, Belgium, Denmark, Mexico, Costa Rica, Hawaii, Alaska, New York
• Backpacked a fair amount in Southern Utah and the Northwest
  
• Been sent boxed roses
  
• Been taken to the Opera
• Gone on a date to Pier 49 and Ghirardelli Square, having ridden a train, a trolley, a limo, and a car all in one evening.
• Stayed up and watched the sunrise with a boyfriend
• Been kissed on the beach
• Dated a man almost 20 years my senior
• Dated a younger man
  
• Competed in a Latin Dancing competition
• Won a snowboarding contest
• Owned a surfboard, a windsurfer, rock climbing gear, snowboarding gear
• Stayed up until after 4 am with beloved girlfriends talking about men
• Had a long-distance relationship
• Played a regular ladies-night gig at a club downtown
  
• Become intimately acquainted with the sweat-lodge, the pipe ceremony, and the Peyote Ceremony
• Dated college athletes
• Dated college drop-outs
• Loved a man with long hair
• Been taken on a trip to the Ashland Shakespeare Festival
• Gone mountain-biking on Bainbridge Island
• Had a broken heart
• Broken some hearts (oops.)
• Had real girlfriends
• Rafted the Paquare River
• Climbed Mt. St. Helens and Mt. Hood
• Fit into size 6 shiny red pleather pants, and looked good (6 is pretty skinny if you're 5'10")
• Had a raging New Years Eve party at my house
• Had a record/production deal and a manager for my music
  
• Sung the national anthem at an NBA game
• Played the Crystal Ballroom, the Rose Festival, MusicFest Northwest, Been on a "Tour"
• Had a drink bought for me by an Oscar-nominated movie star
  
• Got a college degree
• Been camping in Alaska

For these things I have to thank Dale, Mike, Eric, John, Clif, Jared, Emily, Lumina, Michelle, Aimee, Andy, my Dad, Lisa, Jeremy, my Mom, Alex, Graham Greene, Arlin, Fernando, Mitchell, Dave, Tara, Sam, and myself.

Can I really complain at this point? I don't think so.

What have you done that you can check off your list?

Surgery Day

I think there must be a requirement that anesthesiologists are funny. I've never met an anesthesiologist that wasn't joking around while going through all the pre-op questions. Even Jared's college-buddy -- from whom I've never had anesthesia personally, but who is, in fact, an anesthesiologist -- is a really funny guy. Maybe it's somehow the professional version of your friendly neighborhood dealer. You go to him for your happy fix, and he is all casual and relaxed and funny and personable making you feel all relaxed about the drugs you're taking, like it's the most normal thing in the world.

***

Various nurses, doctors, and other personnel explain the procedure to us. They'll make an incision above Jared's sternum, in his neck, reach down and around from there, blah blah blah, take out a chunk of the tumor. The pathologist will take it away and biopsy it on the spot. If he has enough, he'll tell them they're o.k. to sew Jared back up. If not, he comes for another piece and tries again. Jared gets tubes down his trachea and such, but he won't remember them. He'll wake up, drink some apple juice, eat a cracker, pee, and go home. If all goes well.

***

Sitting in the pre-op area, Jared's veins are being pumped with saline solution. Measurements on the bag are in increments reading 1 through 9. 1 through 9 whats? Not milliliters. Not ounces. "Probably cc's" says Jared.

"Oh yeah," I say. "cc's." I think about that. "What are cc's anyway?" Jared shrugs. Some word they use on E.R., which is the only reason we thought of it.

***

A song comes on the speakers -- apparently they pipe music into the pre-op area, for the nurses or to calm the patients, I don't know --it's that old Paul Young song from the 80's: "every time you go away/ you take a piece of me with you."

"You should sing this song to the pathologist," I say to Jared. He laughs.

"No. I'm probably not even going to see the pathologist."

"The surgeon then! I dare you!" I probe. Jared refuses, but we chuckle at the thought. Later, after the surgeon has talked to us and is walking out of our stall, I almost sing it through the curtain, but I don't.

***

My cell phone is ringing off the hook. I know people are trying to be supportive, but for some reason I feel annoyed. That makes no sense. I guess because I can't answer my phone in the hospital, and I'd have to leave this waiting room, which I'm afraid to do, so I feel all conflicted and torn because I want to talk to people, but I can't, and I just have to keep turning my ringer off and apologize to whoever is there. I wish I could instant message everyone.

***

The waiting room is in the center of the hospital. It's small. It has other people in it sitting in chairs, reading magazines, in various stages of stress and worry, it's over air-conditioned, the television is on, the newspaper sits on the coffee table untouched, the plants are fake. Everyone here has either a furrowed brow or a blank stare; it feels like they're all smoking, but they're not.

Outside it's 75 degrees and sunny and beautiful. I go out and try to find a place to sit on the hospital grounds, but there's only a smokers' bench, complete with Smoker. I find a bus-stop across the parking lot, where I pretend that every bus that comes just isn't my bus. I stay there as long as I possibly can without feeling like I might miss the surgeon who will look for me in the waiting room -- and in the waiting room only. I call Emily Potter and say things I've been meaning to say, ask things I've been meaning to ask. I relish the diversion. 45 minutes later I know I have to get back, and in the cruelest real-life-soap-opera-to-be-continued way I have to cut off our conversation.

***

Any minute now he'll come in here and tell me Jared's diagnosis. Will he have a prognosis too? I don't know. I doubt it. Why do so many medical terms end it "nosis"?

***

He came. No diagnosis yet. I guess the pathologist feels confident he has enough tissue, but is still "cooking" as the surgeon called it. It looks consistent with lymphoma. Maybe we can get preliminary information by Friday. Probably no final diagnosis until Tuesday. Drat! I was totally expecting to know today.

***

Jared's Mom keeps calling. She's his mom. She wants to know. I have to tell her... what? That I know nothing? Yes. I have to tell her that. She's his Mom. But I don't feel like talking to anyone. Anyone but this blog. ...Hello blog. How are you? Fine, you say? Very good. Oh, me? Why, how kind of you to ask. I'm fine too. Actually, I've been better, but I'm getting by...

***

All my friends are at a barbecue, watching a movie on an outdoor screen. My baby is with them. I keep forgetting that we can't just go over there when we're done here at the hospital. If there were longer to wait, I'd go over there by myself. Jared would want me to. But I never know when they'll come. And besides, what kind of a perverse wife goes and barbecues with her friends while her husband is having surgery next to his heart?

***

I was thinking, "hospitals have cafeterias," so I'd be fine for food. But I'm afraid to leave this little waiting room! What if they come for me while I'm gone? What if I trade a rubbery grilled cheese and room-temperature pickle for my chance to see Jared again? And if I missed them, what would I do? It's 7:30pm and all the personnel desks are empty. The waiting room desk, the information desk, the admitting desk, the day surgery desk. An occasional nurse with a clipboard walks by. Men of non-European descent wearing scrubs are pushing carts around the hallways bearing various items -- towels, blankets, linens, laundry, files, cleaning supplies, body parts for all I know.

I get a text-message that my baby is finally eating (she had been refusing before -- apparently she's become a breast-milk snob. She won't drink formula, and now I guess she won't drink frozen breast-milk either. Only the best and freshest for baby. She takes after her food-snob mother, I guess). Anyway, I'm relieved. And I wish I was eating.

***

My Mom calls. She's been out of town, hard to reach, and it's good to hear from her. I give her the update.

She has this habit of cutting off conversations before I'm ready to go. She's not unnatural about it or anything. I think she must just feel that the conversation is over, I've given her all the information I'm going to, and so she says something like, "I'll be keeping you in my thoughts," and suddenly she's saying goodbye. And while I'm always a little taken aback, and I often want to say, "wait, I wasn't done talking to you!" I don't really know what else I would say. If she were to say, "Oh, I'm sorry, what else did you want to talk about?" I would have to think about it and say, "I guess... nothing." And that would be the truth. I think the thing is sometimes you just want to talk to your Mom. Sometimes you just want to feel like she's paying attention to you and she's there, and it doesn't matter what you say. And so once the substance of our conversation is finished, I really have no logical reason to keep her on the phone, except that I don't want to hang up.

***

A man and a woman just walked past. I heard them before I could see them. She was saying, "Oh my God," quavery, under her breath. When I saw her she was crying, her hand was over her mouth, she looked shell-shocked. The man's arm was around her shoulders as he walked her toward the exit.

Reality Check: I am sooooooooooooooooooooooooooo grateful that Jared's cancer is a treatable one. Highly treatable -- assuming it's what we think it is. It's easy to think of all this as so dramatic painful scary awful, to expect people to pity us, to pity ourselves. But, really, this is not so bad as all that. There are far worse things that could happen. I'm so glad that my surgeon came and told me that everything went fine, that it looks like lymphoma, that I'll see Jared in an hour or so and then we'll go home and soon we'll arrange treatment. I'm so glad I'm not the lady crying down the hallway with my hand over my mouth and "Oh, my God" echoing through my head, anointing my trembling lips.

***

It's waaaaay past the time I expected to get to see Jared again. The anesthesiologist said he's as healthy a person as he ever sees, so he expected things to go smoothly, and quickly. We're not past the normal-sick-old person timeline. But I didn't expect the normal-sick-old timeline. Where are they? He's... fine... right?

***

They forgot about me!

A guy in scrubs just came in asking for someone else (who wasn't here). I said I wasn't Tina, but did he know anything about a Jared E****? "The the guy with the biopsy?" he asked, pointing to his neck where they cut Jared open. "Yeah," I replied. Turns out Jared had been in a regular room for some time. He asked when his wife could come in, and they said any time, but no one notified his wife. grrrrrrr....

***

I got pulled over on the way home. Figures. Apparently making a quick divert action to the exit to avoid piling up traffic is not really considered safe. But talk about having the ultimate sob story! "My husband has cancer and I just picked him up from the hospital and we need to get his medicine right away, officer!" Naw. I didn't really say all that. But I did mention the hospital and pharmacy part, and he could see that Jared wasn't looking too hot. He didn't even check my license and registration. Just told me to be careful and sent me on my way.

***

I get a call on my way home from one of my best friends. She was going to bring us dinner tomorrow night. Apparently she went to the doctor today and found out she's dilated to a four (she's pregnant). They put her on the strictest of bed rest. She has 7 month old twins. She's only 19 weeks along, which means she'll be in bed until October and can't take care of her babies. Her husband goes to work every day at 4am. How on earth is she going to manage? Can you even hire help at 4am? I started making all sorts of statements about going over all the time, and she had to remind me that I, myself, have a sick husband and I'll probably be needing to prepare for the long haul and take care of him. Oh yeah. I forgot.

Drama all around.

People with Babies, Pregnant Friends, Parent-friends, Grandparents, etc...

Time for my personal soapbox of... Products I Would Endorse For Free Because They're The Best and Everyone Should Know About Them. Up first....

TyBooks!

These are the coolest coolest things! They are indestructible baby books that feel like paper, but can be chewed and crinkled so babies love to play with them! Seville has had a prototype for a few weeks and they're her favorite thing. My sister-in-law just launched the company this week and they have some introductory prices at www.TyBookInc.com. They are well worth the price. Here are excerpts of their announcement:

Anybody who's ever watched a baby knows what will happen with anything he gets his little hands on--he'll put it straight to his mouth! Books are no exception. In fact, paper seems to be a favorite material for chewing, crinkling, crunching, wrinkling, sucking on, and playing with. Unfortunately, paper books (even board books) can get soggy and come apart, not only destroying the book but becoming a potential choking hazard for baby. Don't you wish you could let your precious little one delight in exploring books the way she'd like?

Now you can!

TyBook introduces a revolutionary new baby book invented by a mother of triplets who wanted to share books with her babies, hassle-free. They are water-proof, tear-resistant, and baby-durable, making them the perfect books for babies who "read" with their little hands and mouths.

• Tear-resistant - can hold up to baby's tugging and pulling (see "Dare to Tear")
• Waterproof - can be chewed and sucked on
• Simple stitch binding allows them to slide easily into a diaper bag
• Easy-clean with water and soap if needed
• Great baby-shower gifts!
• Age-appropriate, wordless pictures to encourage dialogic reading
• Featuring illustrations by artist, Kaaren Pixton
• Meets ASTM safety standards

Grown Up II

Tonight I read, in response to a lamentation about "growing up" (excerpts):

"Where childhood is simple multiple-choice, adulthood is an open-ended essay question. Where childhood is your heart soaring at the site of the City's skyline, adulthood is being initiated into the architect's secret and building skyscrapers of your own. Where childhood is staring in gape-mouthed wonder at the magic of the world, adulthood is the opportunity to see your enchantment, your candleglow reflected in someone else's eyes.

Childhood is a wonderful time for discovering this life. If you play it right, though, adulthood is an even better time for taking life and creating of it whatever you will. For the living, adulthood isn't forgetting the magic of childhood... it's making it yours."

~name withheld for now

I was thinking about Vermont Villa and Seville Seraglio, the two houses I lived in during what I consider The Best Years of My Life, the most internally refining of times, the renaissance of my soul. I was thinking about the women I lived with, who reached deeper than had any man (much to my surprise and despite my resistance), woke me to the possibilities, unearthed the truest and most pure from within, loved me into being.

Several months after living together at Vermont Villa, we moved to the new house, Seville Seraglio. While I have the fondest memories of both places, their essence was each different, and after I got married and we all went our separate ways, I often thought of the move to Seville as the beginning of the end.

Distanced, now, by three years, a husband, a baby, a cat, and more outward concerns than The Great "I" that consumed most of my thoughts back then, I remember things differently, and I think the above quote gives voice to what I now see as the real difference between the two places.

Our time at Vermont was innocent and pure and exciting. Our love and discovery was so new and fun. It was the gape-mouthed-wonder days for the four of us. But with the move we took things to a new level. I have long melded the two houses together in my mind, but I realized only tonight that all the "Performance Art Nights," all the reaching to new forms of expression, all of our sharing our passion and experiences with other friends happened only in Seville. Vermont was the magic of childhood and discovery, and Seville was truly making the magic ours.

The grown-up experience of bearing our souls to others came with some pitfalls. We could probably all four say that there were things we didn't do right, or well, or with the purest of intentions or the purest of love. Or maybe I am just speaking for myself. In any case, it was imperfect. I'm not even sure we could have made it last together, had I not married and left anyway.

BUT, this is the thing... all of my most most most fond memories happened at Seville. The most edifying things we did together happened at Seville. The things I grew the most from happened at Seville. Our souls found expression in art and performance and friends and novels and music... at Seville. Seville was not just the feeling and experience of soul and passion, it was the actual embodiment and incarnation of it.

And now it's to another level, isn't it girls? Korea, India, Seattle, Portland, Salt Lake, Boston. They are all recipients of our original lessons as goddesslings. Let's not forget. It's so easy to forget. Let's not forget.

Disaster Strikes

Yesterday Seville was napping and I was fertilizing my roses. I use an organic fish fertilizer, which is essentially a bottle of pureed, rotten fish-parts. The stuff is rank. My mom and I have joked many a-time about how you can still smell it on your hands 3 days after using it. You water it down to a tablespoon or so per gallon of water, and it just reeks -- and YOU reek if you touch even the watered-down version, no matter how many times you wash your hands.

So, anyway, I'm wandering around my yard fertilizing and decide to cut through my house instead of going around the side. I walk in my front door, and SWOOSH, the bottle slips out of my hands, hits the floor, goes CRACK, splits open, and dead rotten pureed fish splatters and oozes out into a big puddle all through my entryway. "CRAP!" I shouted. This is the concentrated stuff, not the watered down version that makes your hands smell for merely 3 days. I ran like the wind downstairs to fetch every towel I could find that I would mind throwing away. After wiping up as much as I could with raggy towels (while trying not to vomit from the stench), my definition of "what kind of towel I don't mind throwing away" changed, and I grabbed just about any absorbent object I could find to get this stuff OUT OF MY HOUSE! After wiping, washing, scrubbing, mopping, spraying, washing, scrub-brushing, fingernail in the crevices-ing, washing, mopping, deoderizing, etc, you could still hardly breath to save your life if standing in the entry. Even Richard Parker (my cat) stopped dead in his tracks when attempting to cross the threshold. He paced back and forth for a while before he gave up and went downstairs.

This is my ultimate fear in life: having a weird, smelly house. You ever go to someone's house and it smells funny? And of course, you never say anything. But I always think, "Man, I'd hate it if my house smelled weird." One of the main reasons I don't want a dog is that (forgive me, my dog-owning friends) dog-owning houses almost always smell like dog. Even very classy, very clean dog houses smell like dog. I know you just get used to it, but I abhor the idea or having a house that smells gross to outsiders. And here I have managed to make my house smell like dead, rotten fish. Good one, Skye.

I ended up calling an industrial-cleaning supply company and buying this crazy enzyme/deodorizer that eats any human or animal matter (vomit, poop, urine, blood, rotten flesh) and I've used it 50 million times in different concentrations on the area. After which I showered using every soap I could find, and then put every smelly lotion in my possession on my body. I still gagged when smelling my hands last night.

But I think I may have got it out of the entryway, believe it or not. At least I can't smell it now. But I'm afraid that maybe I just got used to it throughout the afternoon. So, here is my charge to all of my in-town friends:

When you come over pleeeeeease tell me if my house smells weird! It's the only way I'll ever know for sure.

Keeping Up With Skye (& Seville & Jared)

My blog has a new feature! Now you don't have to go to both my personal and family blog to see what's new. You can just look at the "Skye's Family Blog Posts" widget over there on the right. If there's one you haven't seen, you can click on it. -->

Thus I intend to stop double-posting stuff. Family stuff goes there. Personal stuff goes here. All accessible from one big happy webpage. :)

Anonymous Comments

Occasionally I get an anonymous comment to one of my blog posts. And I see them on my friends' posts too. They are almost always negative, and very often -- or am I biased? -- grammatically incorrect, conceptually unclear, and misspelled. Okay, that part might be my imposing an overly-critical eye to people who won't fess up to who they are. But, seriously, I get annoyed. In a way I totally understand people wanting to be anonymous when they are going to say something negative. But, hey, I put myself on a limb to be personal here. If I didn't ever say anything frighteningly honest it wouldn't be interesting to read. And if you aren't willing to sign your name to something you say, maybe you shouldn't say it.

The creepy part is this: there is a limited circle of people who check and comment on my blog. Every time I get a negative "anonymous" comment, I naturally assume it's from some schmoe who just happened to stumble across my post. But in all likelihood it's actually one of my friends, whom I would never suspect could be so vitriolic. So every time it happens I invariably end up thinking about each of my friends in my mind wondering, "could it be him?" That's the part that sucks. I don't like imagining my friends saying those things. And I don't feel like I can ask any of my friends this lest I offend them (I'd be less than excited if one of my friends thought I had done it) (Except maybe not James. But I don't think James would ever feel the need to hide behind an "anonymous" tag, even if he were going to say something opinionated and un-p.c. In fact, I can only imagine James using the "anonymous" tag if he were going to say something that was p.c., boring, unremarkable and totally inoffensive.)

So... I have to assume it's strangers. Strangers who never post on my blog otherwise. Strangers who.... wait! Strangers are reading my blog? Now that's creepy.

ooooh! ooooh! I just had the creepiest thought of all! Maybe it's my husband, who never comments on here. I don't even know if he reads this. hmmmmm....

How does anyone else feel about anonymous posters. Does it bug other people too? Obviously, I "allow anonymous comments," so I think there's a place for them. But... I guess it seems like sometimes people feel that common decency isn't required if no one knows who you are. This just highlights the value, to me, of real interpersonal relationships.

Jared and I were talking the other day and I lamented that I didn't live in my childhood "hometown." I never run into high-school friends and have no around who has known me longer than about a decade. He was like, "you would want that?" We then speculated on what it must be like for some people we know who are grown up and married but attending their parents' church congregation. We both agreed we would hate it and we feel sorry for them. But it also makes me wonder if there isn't something valuable about a life-long community that we're getting away from now in our post-modernist, detached, individualistic culture. People used to grow up in a town from birth to death. People knew each other and watched each other move through phases of their lives. And along with that, people had to be careful with other people. People had to be careful of what other people thought of them. People were less inclined to go offending their neighbors unless it was for a cause they believed in. People cared about honor, responsibility, community, integrity. Sure, some of that was because of others and not from within, but does that matter so much? Isn't that how we learn?

These days everyone can hide behind something -- telephones, computers, other obligations. Everyone can move around and discard people and friendships when they're used up. Even marriages get discarded more often than not now. As if hiding behind a screen-name isn't enough, we can now hide behind an "anonymous" tag. And thus with the freedom of our newfound alienation we are alienating ourselves from each other. Is the freedom and individuality worth the cost?

A Great Injustice

I have to tell you something. This is the saddest thing, and I haven't wanted to admit it, but I've decided it's true. Here goes.... my baby doesn't like it when I sing. sigh. Oh, ok, maybe that's too general a statement. She likes it when I sing "horsey horsey" or "sleep tight, sand-man's a comin'" or anything else a'capella and sweet, baby-ish. But when I sing -- I mean really sing, I mean if my guitar or my piano is involved sing -- she starts to cry. I've been trying to gradually get her used to it, but she just doesn't like it. I think the power and resonance of my voice, at its most passionate (or even just kinda passionate) sounds too much like crying or yelling to her. Maybe it's just too loud (not that can't be it, because it's even if she's on the other side of the room). For whatever reason, it's too much for her.

This makes me so sad. I always imagined singing my heart out to my little girl, and I can't do it. I can't even sing in my own house. Not when she's awake because she cries. Not when she's asleep because it wakes her up. I can't sing. I have been silenced. Because there is nothing so unbearable as doing something that makes your baby look up at you with sweet, clear blue eyes; makes her face turn downward, her eyebrows furrow; makes her bottom lip start to quiver; makes her eyes start to glisten; makes her open her mouth and start to sob. I can't do it.

And so the musician's guitars sit in their hangers collecting dust. The piano languishes toward out-of-tune. My fingers become soft as the callouses heal. Songs remain unsung. Lullabies remain unwritten. My heart continues to bust its seams without expression.

This is so unfair.

Nature Baby

For Mother's Day, we took Seville backpacking. Here she is sleeping to the sound of birds chirping, bees buzzing, a brook babbling nearby, daddy in the background hangin' out at camp. So much fun. You can see the (short) photo album by clicking the image above. Or go see the (even shorter) run-down at my other blog.

Whaddya call it NOW?

We've developed some names for some of Seville's special talents. My personal favorite:

The Snart.

I laugh every time she does it (that is... sneeze and fart simultaneously). I know, I'm so mature. There's also the "fough" and the "farcup" which happen less often, but are equally funny.

Speaking of bodily functions, what are we supposed to call the regular version now that we have a kid? I can't bring myself to refer to Seville as having "farted," nor can I abide the idea of a little child running around using that word. I mean, I've never even been really comfortable with it myself, for gosh sake.

When I was a kid, we called it a "bomb," a word that came from my mother's childhood in an English boarding school. It seemed totally normal to me all my life, but I realize it's weird to most Americans. And it certainly is weird to Jared. Other possibilities that hail from my British relatives include: "fluff" and "dust." I have stories of my stuffy English Grandmother turning up her royal nose and demanding, "did you dust?" (yes, royal. My English side is/was nobility, so imagine the scandal in a polite noble household.)

Jared suggested using "pass gas," but that's a) too cumbersome and, b) too adult/medical. It's like referring to poop as a bowel movement or sex as intercourse. Not things I'm going to have a child running around saying (I guess she hopefully won't be referring to sex for several years anyway. Especially since Jared says Seville's not allowed to date until she's 30 years old. still.)

Other rejects: Cut the Cheese (too adolescent), Break Wind (too... I dunno), and Barking Spiders (did anyone else use that one, or is that a Bryce Pixton Original?)

I've experimented with the word "toot" and it seems like the most likely champion. Even though I couldn't stand it as a kid when my friends called it that. It seems to fit a cute baby the best. Does anybody have any good suggestions?

The Great Northwest

When I posted my pictures of Seville at a week old, I included a nursing picture. I thought it was a really sweet picture. Her head is covering anything "significant," and it's not like breastfeeding is sexual or pornographic anyway. I wanted to include that picture and memory in my collection of sweet moments. It is, afterall, what I spend a huge amount of time doing with her (about 8 hours a day at the time), and a significant part of the wondrous and beautiful miracle of motherhood. It's very goddess-like, being able to provide absolutely everything this little person needs, right from your own body.

Anyway, one of the responses I got was from my Manhattan-residing brother-in-law. "Aaugh! I didn't need to see that! You Westerners!" He didn't say this to me, of course, but I heard about it. It was all in good fun, and I laughed (nevertheless, it did contribute to the eventual removal of the photo from the online album).

The Northwest is a funny place. I'm proud of most things that are characteristic of Portland. For example, I recently learned that Portland has twice the number of women doing natural births than most other places. Bravo! (I was planning a natural birth, but had an emergency cesarean birth. I hope and pray I have no complications next time and can do it then). One can also note that the Northwest is particularly prone to cool outdoor activities. I mean, we have three R.E.I.s in the Portland Metro area alone. And our whole sense of fashion reflects our outdoorsiness. We don Keens and Merrels as everyday wear. Show up in all-black New York City in a fleece vest, Columbia Sportswear pants and Chaco sandals and you'd stick out like a sore thumb (sore from rockclimbing, probably. ha ha). In Portland people go to the theater in that kindof gettup.

The question on my mind is this: Am I at home in the northwest because my personality naturally leans toward these things? Or do I lean toward these things because I live in the northwest and am influenced by the sociopolitical mood here?

A couple weeks ago Jared and I went hiking in Forest Park -- a very Portland thing to do. While hiking we saw graffiti on one of the trail fences. Now, you see graffiti all over the country. But THIS graffiti said... get this... "Mother Earth Feeds You." --! This is what a good-for-nothing subversive outcast troublemaker in Portland graffitis. "Mother Earth Feeds You" (sucka). I can just see him in his bandana made of hemp, spray paint made of renewable recycled paint, and hiking boots, painting his message to the world. "That'll show them! Stick it to the man!!" he must have been saying to himself.

so funny.

I think the punk kid is influenced by living here. Here is someone who, if born and raised in L.A. would have written "Black Gangsta Disciple." This is the northwest's version of a punk kid.

What I Meant to Say Was...

Paul and Dani's wedding: What a great and original celebration! Paul took the performance art we've all been playing with to the most extreme. The ultimate performance. Bravo, Paul and Dani. Bravo.

Singing at Paul and Dani's wedding I introduced my piece as it relates to "The Great Paradox" as they called their "performance." I fumbled over my introduction, unable to remember how I had worded it in my letter to them. I should have just read it, but there you go. Here it is, as originally written:

THE GREAT PARADOX

Love is a paradox indeed. It is both the time when you have to be the most honest with yourself, and yet the most willing to overlook reality in favor of a more hopeful and perfect view. It is a time for acknowledging harsh reality, yet for wearing rose-colored glasses. You must both love someone exactly as they are and also give them every benefit of the doubt, overlooking flaws in order to enable their growth toward something new. Love is both having absolute faith in the constancy of your partner, and also having enough faith to allow your partner to change and move through his or her own life and discovery. It is the paradox of two individual parts which are actually one unified whole. It is both embracing and letting go of someone at the same time. It is where you lose yourself to find yourself.

I chose to share my piece because the songs are about those things: The first about letting go of a fantasy in favor of a real person, and all the associated adjustments of the heart and mind. The second, about letting a real person be a fantasy, and allowing them to become something greater than they are. Sometimes relating to someone as they may potentially become is more honest than relating to them as they currently are – simply on a path toward a truer self.

It is in the juxtaposition of a deeply honest love and a forgiving ennabling love that makes us able to accomplish the greatest things. It is both humility and vision that I hope to convey.

I love you Paul and Dani! Have fun on your adventures together!




Here are the lyrics to the songs I sang:

Betrothed
by Skye Pixton
(see live video snippit from CD Release)

Walking away from
all the past lives that I’ve tried to lead
I’m walking away from
all the mistrials, all those memories

Taking a last walk
through my girlhood, through those moonlit streets
I’m taking the fast road
to the next world, to my destiny

Help me to be honest
about what I am
about what I feel
Help me to be honest
about what I need
about what is real

I know that some days
won’t be the bliss that I’ve always dreamed
and I know in some ways
you are bound to be disappointed in me

Take me as your angel
as your demon
if that’s what you need
take me as a stranger
as your best friend
anything, I can be

All of you and all of me
Nothing less will do
All my sorrows, all your dreams
Make one life of two

I’ve got a feeling
there is something that’s been on your mind
My head has been reeling
I’d be shocked if you didn’t need some time to think

an’ I’ve had my moments
I’ve had times when I thought that I couldn't breathe
well, please, love, just know that
if it’s part of you then it’s alright with me

Give me your rejoicings
all your sorrows
your fears and your shoes
Give me all your mornings/mournings
your tomorrows
anything that is you

Help me to be crazy
in the moments when logic
can’t stand
Help me to be graceful
in the moments when things don’t
go as planned
Help me to be honest
About what I need
about what I feel
Help me to be honest
About what is me
About what is real
What is real
What is real



You
By Skye Pixton

I stopped believing the world was crazy when I was in your arms
I met you and suddenly there was light behind the stars

with you there’s never any night
with you I’m alright
you know, somebody once told me if I hang on
There would be somebody someday
well I look into your eyes, and see the way

There was a time I was afraid to swim; now I’d sail the seven seas
and now I sometimes dare to hope for things I never thought could be

with you there’s never any night
with you I’m alright
you know, somebody once told me if I hang on
There would be somebody someday
well I look into your eyes, and see the way

I once believed in a thousand fables
they were lies
I used to wait for a guardian angel
that passed me by
But when you touch my face
I can have my dreams all over
And you give me faith
To know that I can start all over

and now I
Believe that I could walk on water
If I
tried I’d probably walk through these walls
You and I
together we could surely fly away

And when you think that your world’s gone crazy
I’ll be there
And when your walls seem to fall before you
I’ll be there
Just take my hand, my love, you know
I’ll be here

I could fly away with you.