Mom is Just a Nickname

I’m reading Madeleine L’engle’s Walking on Water: Reflections on Faith and Art and I’m finding it an interesting read. L’engle has always been a favorite author of mine, ever since I read A Ring of Endless Light when I was in junior high school. That book opened my mind up to so many theories and ideas that I’d never considered before, about life, death, religion and the universe.

The book I’m reading today is also enlightening. It is a book about how her Christian faith has shaped her writing. It also seems to hold some rants about the world, but I sympathesize with these rants of hers, so I don’t mind reading them. Funnily enough, they are rants I have read in other books recently. I didn’t think the books were at all related (the other one being Confessions of a Slacker Wife by Muffy Mead Ferro, I believe) but the rant is similar: They both think that the use of “he/she” is pretty absurd, that saying “Chair” or “Chairperson” instead of “Chairman” is ridiculous, awkward, and belittling to the position. One looks at it from a secular position and one from a religious position. I think it’s funny that I’ve picked up two such different books and come across rants of such similar sentiments.

Some of what I’m finding fascinating in L’engle’s book are her words about writing. For example, she says,

The writer does want to be published; the painter urgently hopes that someone will see the finished canvas (van Gogh was denied the satisfaction of having his work bought and appreciated during his life time; no wonder the pain was more than he could bear); the composer needs his music to be heard. Art is communication, and if there is no communication it is as though the work had been still-born.

She goes on to say, “The reader, viewer, listener, usually grossly underestimates his importance. If a reader cannot create a book along with the writer, the book will never come to life.” This correlates with how I feel: I put my writing online so that it will be read. I crave having people read my writing, especially my fiction writing, for the simple fact that I want to know HOW it came to life for them. I want to hear their reactions to it. I want to know if readers were able to see, hear, smell, taste, and touch the story that I was trying to communicate.

I get absurdly excited when I see the stats for my fiction blog. On the best day, I’ve had 32 readers, and I’ve rarely had less than 3 readers on any one day. I love the days when I see readers have clicked through all of the story “An Unexpected Reunion” because it means they were caught enough to want to read not just the post visible on the main page, but to see what the whole story is so far. I hope that means that it is coming to life for people. If it’s not, I’d like to know why. The most valuable thing the blog-o-sphere has to offer to us, in my opinion, are the comments of people who take the time to read what we write.

So I invite comments on this blog and on My Muse Speaks Softly. But hey, if the only feedback I have is a consistent readership and new readers clicking through the story links to see the beginning, I’ll be happy with that too. I will believe that it means my story is coming to life for some one. And that makes me happy.

What is it, seriously?

Is it sharing the bounty of the season with those less fortunate, a la Scrooge?

Is it the anticipation of waiting for Christmas morning, so you can open all of the “loot” (my husband’s word for gifts)?

Is it the wonder of seeing the sparkling lights on the tree or decorated houses?

Is it the fun and joy of having family together, of recalling old memories and making new ones?

Well, I suppose it’s all of those things and more. I used to get alot more excited by Christmas. Even after I had kids, I wanted to make it as great for them as I remembered my childhood Christmases. I think my excitement about Christmas has become dulled since 2000, when Sullivan was hospitalized.

It truly was a Blessed Christmas in many ways. We found more joy in small things, we found more hope and compassion in strangers, and we found more love from family and friends than we knew existed. Still, the realization that our newborn baby was in the PICU, fighting for his life, dampened the excitement.

And today, the memories of those days in 2000 continue to make the holidays less than magical for me. The Christmas season, and even New Year’s afterwards, continue the months’ long time of anniversaries for me. Not good anniversaries, although there are surely some good things happening between October and New Year’s. There are birthdays and wedding anniversaries that we celebrate for those that are still with us. There seem to be far more days of sadness to remember in that time though: October 1st (the day Sullivan died), November 7th (Sullivan’s birthday), December 14th (the day Sullivan had his near-miss SIDS incident).

There aren’t actually more days of mourning in that time. There are more birthdays and holidays and days that we should be smiling and enjoying ourselves. But it’s the ANTICIPATION of these days of sad memories, it’s the way they dredge up all of the hardest emotions. It’s the way all of these feelings simmer in my head, combined with the way the sunlight is fading with winter’s approach; it’s the way even the good holidays are tainted by how we celebrated during Sullivan’s life and how the celebrations feel so empty without our second child here with us to enjoy them.

When we had Sullivan, we looked forward to the joy of raising two kids so close in age. We wanted it that way. They were two years and two weeks apart, on the dot. And Jillian loved having a baby brother. We were joyful and thankful for our baby son.

Now, we have two children to raise. They are five years apart. Instead of having a beautiful daughter and two mischevious sons, our family portrait (if we were to take one) would be missing one child. We can never take a family picture with our whole family. Every time we do take one, we look at it and wonder where Sullivan would be. Every time we have friends born around the same time he was born, we wonder where he would be developmentally, or how tall he might be, or who his friends might be. If he were still alive.

And so it is at the holidays. When we sit down to open gifts in the morning, I think of how much more chaotic and … joyful … it would be if we had all three of our children with us to celebrate. And when we see family newsletters come in, and no one ever says a word about our Sullivan anymore….to the family, I’m not a mother of three. I’m a mother of two. I have two children, not three, when they introduce me to friends. And somehow it seems like they’ve forgotten our Sullivan, although I know that is not their intent.

So, the holidays have lost their glamour. I go through the motions to meet my children’s expectations. I go through the motions to please my family. Really, though, the holidays just make me realize again that I have a great gaping, bleeding hole in my life and my heart and I fear it will never heal.

In sugar, anyhow. Having been diagnosed with prediabetes several years ago you’d think I’d know better, but I don’t. I give in to the cravings. *sigh*

Why do some people find it so easy to eat well and exercise often and others, like me, don’t even think about it? Or we think about it and put it off, save it for another day, or we’ll be good for awhile and then go back to all the bad habits…

I need a personal trainer, a personal chef and a personal lifestyle coach or something. ugh. People to keep me out of the kitchen, in the gym and off my butt. Surely I can write while striding on a treadmill!

I could swim. It’s even free, if you don’t count the gas money to drive there. Every time I go I’m the only adult with my two kids, so I end up having to hover around X. And lately he hasn’t been wanting to move from the shallow end. It’s very frustrating.

I could walk. It’s free too, and my neighborhood has sidewalks. The weather’s pretty nice. I have to take X. He walks slowly. So I walk slowly. And feel like falling asleep as I walk. It’s frustrating too.

How do any moms get in shape while having kids? If you have any suggestions I’d love to hear them. I’ve tried pilates videos at home, and invariably throw my back out when I do them. I’ve tired bellydancing videos at home, but after one of my daughter’s friends laughed at me while I was doing one, I feel awkward doing it. Kids can be so cruel.

This is a pity party. It’s following my sugar-binge day yesterday. Tomorrow will probably be yet another day of self destructive behavior and then I’ll get over it. Or not. Who knows? The winter doldrums are here?

Today’s the shortest day of the year. Winter Solstice. I’m stuck in a halfway place where I want to celebrate Solstice with rituals and festivities but I also treasure my Christian based Christmas celebrations. What to do? I can’t reject all of my families’ traditions. They mean something to me beyond any religious holiday. Then again, I’m not sure the Solstice can qualify as a religious holiday for me.

I’m not atheist, I don’t think I’m agnostic….pretty sure I’m not Christian. But I’m not sure what I am. Another source of frustration for me.

Toph and I try to live by this rule. Today, I broke it. I forgot to eat breakfast and didn’t realize it until I was at the store. Then, suddenly, everything bad for me looked oh so good. Don’t ask me what I bought. I am too ashamed. *sigh*

Now I have to go find places to hide the evidence. lol.

My first attempt at cooking lunch burned. I was too absorbed in posting something on a board. whoops. So, I’m trying again. I’m making asparagus with garlic and lemon juice. It’s more than I usually make myself for lunch, since I normally just have a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

I bet it’d smell real good if there wasn’t the stench of burnt butter and garlic hanging in the air. I used olive oil the second time around…decided that I don’t need hte extra calories and fat that’s in the butter, anyhow, and maybe the fact that it burned was a sign to me. lol.