I'm never gonna know you now, but I'm gonna love you anyhow.

Tragedy seems to hit my life from the periphery sometimes. I don't mean your grandma dying after a long and fulfilling life or the everyday work and wear of life that everyone mucks through with some regularity. I'm talking horrible, heart breaking adversity. Like when a high school cross-country teammate shot herself with her father's gun. Or finding myself bonding with a patient (whatever the reason...) and finding out through her medical intake that she lost her baby in the seventh month of pregnancy when her boyfriend decided to express his opinion regarding a late dinner with a bat to the gut.

I think of the events of this last weekend with my cousin in some random parking lot, and it strikes me again.

None of these are my tragedies. They are not my loss to feel. I remember giving a hug to the best friend at that high school reunion. I remember what that punch in the gut feels like when you know what's been lost is never going to be replaced in the here and now. I remember all that, and then I remember the two minutes I once spent convinced to my absolute core that it was my child being pulled unconscious from the swimming area. And I know there's no comparison between the two.

It's somber times like these that remind of something my Aunt Theresa told me when she very quietly and dependently distracted my children from entering an active construction zone while I was distracted and (take a guess) yakking. I was bending over backwards thanking her for not only keeping them safe, but also for being so patient and kind in the process. I felt like I hardly knew my aunt, since she lives more than a few states away and I only talked with her maybe every two years. For five minutes at a time. But she said something that I'll never forget and that rung so true for me that, dare I say it.... it makes me downright emotional remembering the occasion.

She just looked at me like it was the simplest thing in the world, gave me a hug and said, "Oh honey, you're family. You'd do the same for me." And just like that, distance had no bearing whatsoever. Of course I would. And that's when some very important perspectives starting coming together for me. We are all connected and we are all responsible towards each other in a very real way. We all come from the same place, and we all need the same things. If I give nothing else in my life, I want to give love and kindness freely, without price and without expectation. That's the lesson that Theresa showed me that day. There are no 'assignments', there is no 'duty',  there is only love. And that is ultimately what connects us.

And that is absolutely the sappiest I will get for tonight. It's been one of those 72-hour gaps where the appearance of a butterfly makes me want to sob.

Then, of course, one had to choose our driveway as his final resting place. Let's just say that was a final straw in the haphazard pile holding up the entirety of my mental health.

Come Wednesday, we're taking off to Spokane and I'm gonna give my brother and sister a huge hug.

Hair

My hair is about as long as it's been in several years.

So, naturally, I'm this close to getting it chopped. Summer is an interesting time of year for a lot of reasons, but cosmetically, it's downright humorous. Everything is too hot and close and intrusive. For example, my hair. I wake up in the middle of the night trying to free my ears from its tenuous tendrils, and it just doesn't go anywhere else, except glued to my cheeks and neck and everywhere else. My skin goes back to high school for three months as I break out in hives, pimples and general discoloring of my natural opaque coloring (aka: freckles. lots and lots of freckles) til I look like I'm a natural canister for all things greasy.

I am having fun tying it back though. Since I have, overall, been keeping my hair shorter, I am no longer in possession of a basic set of hair accessories (like rubberbands or hair brush, for instance), so I'm having fun working it out with clips, rubberbands from the daily newspaper, headbands and my boys' comb.

And the salon lady thought I was joking when I asked her if conditioner was really one of those necessary things.

'Just like putting lotion on your skin!'
'That's what that's for?'

Yeah, I was hilarious. Okay, half of that was a joke. I do know what lotion is for, but I tend to view beauty products (with the exception of toothpaste and deordorant.... and shampoo and soap) as mere... suggestions. Something fun to try if you happen to be really bored one day. I don't know that I've tried mascara since early college years, when I was attempting to care what I looked like to others.

All it did was make my eyes water, and subsequently turn red.

Anyway......
The summer continues on its' course here. The boys have settled into their routine of sleeping, eating, playing, etc. I've taken advantage of having a second parent around and have been up to my eyeballs with my apraxia literature.

I believe that I'm in the 'anger' phase of dealing right now. It's so frustrating to hear Ben 'speak' to me and not really know what he's even hinting at. I'm hungry for more than just a sign for 'all done' or 'more'. Body language is gonna get him what he needs with me, but how the heck it gets him through preschool or with other adults is beyond me.

I am aching for him every time I find myself thinking about it. Which is a lot.

And with Adam, my sweet boy, and his behavior stuff... I'm more at an acceptance with. That he has some challenges to work through, but that he'll ultimately be okay, because we have the support and follow through with people who have been down this road before and have worked successfully with kids like Adam before. I feel pretty blind with Ben. And I'm getting so much conflicting information. The books and websites will tell me one thing, but then the speech pathologist gives me another answer, and I just need to know I'm covering what I need to for him. Cause Lord knows, I do not know what I'm doing.

Which is why I'm gonna start supplementing with omega fatty acids. Can't hurt 'em, and it might just help.

More updates to follow, as always.

tradition vs the world

Just got back yesterday afternoon from our annual summer camping trip. For some reason, this year went really remarkable smooth. We all got sleep each night, no major injuries were incurred (only one minor burn and three bandaid-able offenses), plus, we stayed basically within budget (meaning we didn't have to pay for an unexpected motel stay because our camping site got rained out).

It's becoming a bit of a tradition that we take the kids to the ocean, and at least overnight camping in the woods. We drive up to the Forks region, pick a site nearby and used the daylight hours to tide pool and hike. Last couple years have been a bit less planned than this year, but the itinerary has basically been the same.

As in, we march them through the moss-covered forests, ooh and awe at the slugs and elk, try and convince the third of our family under 10 that mud is evil, run away from the incoming tide (over and over and over and over til our pants are simply too waterlogged to run any more), climb through the vast array of drift wood washed up to high tide mark (AKA: the best playground ever!) til finally collapsing next to the campfire we've (AKA: dad) has just spent half the night on and gorge ourselves with cheap hotdogs and marshmellows.

All in all, not the worst vacation ever. Even when you consider that I personally have spent two weeks perusing eye-witness vacation guides to the Hawaii islands.

It's odd how everything not-home can look so appealing. Just, better in almost every way. That's what I like best about summer vacation I think. It gives me a chance to catch my breath and remember what surrounds me every day of the year. Which isn't half bad.

I mean, really. Ocean approximately a day trip away? Rain forests and mountain ranges. Locally grown produce (not everyone can find local blueberries, you know?). Raptors, elk, sea life.... slugs? Right? We each live where we live and it's all pretty amazing and unique to that place.

Which brings me to what today is, naturally. I've been thinking a lot about heritage and culture, and how, as a white American, I feel pretty darn boring sometimes.... okay, most of the time. There is absolutely nothing exotic about me. Really. But, I think as I've kinda become fascinated with other cultures and tried to learn and absorb as much about them as I can (without ever really going anywhere, mind you), I've become more aware of what makes my perspective and life style and (dare I say it) culture what it is. Fireworks on Fourth of July for example. Christmas lighting festivals. Trick or treating. The special preschool songs that we all know. Those every day things I pass on to my kids without even thinking about it because they were passed on to me. How to tell yarrow from fern (who doesn't know this?), how you talk to someone older than you, what burgersmeasly consists of, yankee doodle..... I can't even put down half of what ran through my head, but it was a new thought for me. That I have a cultural identity and place in the world as part of a larger whole. That I'm not just a singular ugly American. Rather, I exist in this plurality.

Yeah. So, I'm totally spending Christmas in Paris.