Monday, Monday

It's Monday again.... seems like Monday creeps up on me and I'm always taken by surprise when that 5:30am alarm goes off to start my week.  Right now, I'm settled on the couch, dog burrowed under the blanket next to my legs, catching up on my Facebook and Twitter feeds, thinking about what to write for the day.

In general, I try to look at Mondays as a fresh start.  It's a new week!  I get a new chance to get this whole mom-wife-coach-ME thing right.  As long as I remember to put the coffee in the pot BEFORE I hit brew (and yes, I have forgotten this important step in the coffee-making process), my Monday usually starts out pretty well.  Molly and I head out the door by 7:30 to get to school for her 7:45 am orchestra rehearsal.  I spend a few minutes with my calendar, figuring out my week... when will I be in classrooms working with teachers and kids?  When will I be in meetings?  When will I find time to finish getting all of our leveled books back on the shelves and make progress on my office/literacy room reorganization? Then it's off to the races!

I find that if I start my week with a positive outlook, the rest of the week is likely to follow suit.  I'm more able to find the silver linings in challenges and not let the little things get me down. I don't mind the Mom Taxi obligations quite so much, as they give me time to be quiet with my thoughts on my back-and-forths to the Y.

So I'll go brew my coffee and I'll pick out my clothes and I'll hit the door with a smile on my face and my week will be off to a great start.

Hope yours will be, too.

A Hole in My Life

Each of us has days that are etched into our memories: a wedding day, the birth of a child, the first day of school.

For me one of the biggest is March 2, 2005.  It started out like any other day... get the girls up, get them fed and dressed.  Drop them at daycare and head off to school.

The day did not end that way.

During my planning period, the principal and assistant principal appeared in my room and asked me to come with them to the office.  This was odd behavior.  Normally, our secretary would just call on the intercom or phone to ask me to come up.  They told me Dan and the girls were fine.  This immediately triggered a stab of fear in my heart.  That meant someone wasn't fine.

They escorted me upstairs to the office and into a conference room normally used for parent meetings.  Dan was there waiting for me.  I took one look at him and knew.... he didn't even get the words out of his mouth to tell me.  My Gram was gone.

I remember wailing... really wailing, and almost falling to the floor.  This wasn't supposed to happen, not yet.  She wasn't sick, she had just had her birthday days before.  I had just talked with her on the phone.

She died in a horrific, violent way that I wouldn't wish on another human being.

The next few days passed in a blur of rushing downstate to be home with my family as we made arrangements for her funeral. Then the visitations for her and my great-aunt Dorothy, her sister who was a victim along with Gram.  It was surreal to walk into the funeral services and see the long lenses of cameras capturing photos of the families and the other mourners, to be approached by a reporter as we left the church that awful morning we said goodbye.  It seemed unreal to see Gram's face and that of Aunt Dorothy on the news as reporters speculated on how long it might take the police to find the person who willfully, violently took them from us.  It was impossible to shield my nearly-five-year-old daughter from hearing things she shouldn't.

Every March 2, I think about the details of that day... that week... the ones that followed.  The trial that led to an acquittal of the person charged with the triple homicide.  The closure that we as a family still lack.

The rest of the year, I think about how special Gram was.  How she loved me unconditionally.
Her laugh.
Her bright silver-white hair (which if my own gray is any indication, she passed on to me).
Her generosity.
Her joy in her grandchildren and their accomplishments.  Her smile as we married and had children of our own for her to cuddle and love, just as she had for us as babies.

I hold her in my heart, and I think about her every single day as I go about my life.  I know that somewhere, someplace, she and my mom are with me, watching my girls grow up, applauding their accomplishments, helping to guide me when I need to comfort their hurts.

I hope she is proud of the woman I have become.  I love you, Gram.

Gram and my girls, just days after Abby was born.  June, 2004.

Deciding

Each March TwoWritingTeachers sponsors the Slice of Life Story Challenge.  Bloggers who participate write every day in March, link to the TWT website, and comment on other Slicers' posts.  Last March was the first year I succeeded in posting EVERY DAY in March.  It felt amazing to complete the challenge and to participate in this community of writers.  I felt like a much better writer at the end of the month than I did at the start.

It seems, then, that the decision to participate again this year would be a no-brainer.  But this year is not last year.  This year I feel a bit like I'm drowning, struggling to keep my head above water with being a mom, a wife, a student, a literacy coach..... I wasn't sure if "writer" was a tag that I could really add to that list.

but.....

Then I thought about how the act of sitting down for 15 minutes at some point of each day might help me find that center I'm missing in the craziness of my life.  It might help me focus my thinking about some of the issues I'm struggling to figure out.  It will definitely help me strengthen connections that have frayed a bit over the past year as I find my way in my new role at school.

So I'm in....
My goal is to write just a bit every day.
I might not comment on as many posts as I'd like each day, but I will comment, and I will write, and I will link.

And I will think and laugh and cry and celebrate and mourn and live along with the rest of the Slicers who've also made this commitment.

What about you?

One Little Word 2014

The past few years I've seen many of my online network of friends choosing their "one little word" for the year.  The idea is that the one little word will be a reminder of something they want to work toward or change.  I've thought about those one little words, but I've never jumped on the bandwagon, partially because I was already feeling overwhelmed with life.

BUT...
the past several months I have been doing some soul-searching about that overwhelmed feeling, and I think perhaps having a mantra of sorts would help me remember to slow down and be more purposeful about the ways I expend my energy and the ways I react to situations or events or people who get me stressed or upset.  I know that how I view my life and experiences is completely up to me, and I am the only one who can decide how I will live my life.

With that in mind, I've thought about several possible words.

I thought about PRESENT - a reminder to be fully present in each moment and to enjoy the amazing things that happen every day and learn from the mistakes I make along the way.

I thought about BREATHE - a similar reminder, to slow down and take a deep breath before reacting or speaking.

I thought about NO - a word I don't use often enough.  I'm more of a yes-girl, which can be a big problem!

In the end, I decided on.....

be

I though this would be a word that encompassed the others that I was considering.  I need to BE present.  I need to BE open.  I need to BE calm.  I need to BE mindful.

So there it is... my one little word for 2014.  I'll be checking in from time to time to let you know how I'm doing with this word as my focus.

What's your word?

Five Things I Love About Fall and One Thing I Don't

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Well, hello, first Tuesday of fall!  Your gorgeous sky and cool breeze have me wishing I could spend the day outside, enjoying all of your glory instead of inside in meetings today.

In honor of today's glorious weather, here are five things I love about fall:

1.  Honeycrisp apples.  Yes, I know everyone seems to love these beauties.  I'm not a super-sweet apple fan, and honeycrisps are the perfect balance of tart and sweet.  When they're on sale, I load up and eat them at every meal.  It's a bit ridiculous, really.

2.  Lightweight sweaters.  My favorite days are when it's cool enough to pull a lightweight sweater on but warm enough to go without a coat.  The air seems fresher and lighter, somehow.  Perhaps it's because the humidity that makes Chicago summers so oppressive is gone.

3.  The new TV season.  I don't watch nearly as much TV as I used to, but I still get excited about the new TV shows.  I like seeing what's new and returning to fresh episodes of my old favorites.  Though it seems like there are always new shows to watch due to all of the cable channels available as well as web-only shows, nothing seems as good as those first few new shows in September and October.

4.  The Anderson's YA Literature Conference.  This is an annual weekend for my friend Sarah and I to get away from our busy lives for a day and meet up with friends old and new and talk books.  If you've never had the opportunity to attend this event and you live within a few hours' drive of Naperville, Illinois, you should definitely try to come.  Anderson's is one of the largest independent bookstores in the area, and they bring in amazing authors for the day.  I've had the opportunity to talk to some of my very favorites because of this event.  Eventually, I'll have to start bringing my daughters.

5.  My electric blanket.  I know... I know... why would I love my electric blanket?  My bedroom is FREEZING and my Land's End electric blanket is soft and fuzzy and warm.  The best part is the dual control, so I can have my side cranked all the way up and my husband can have his completely turned off.  It's the BEST!

and the thing I don't:

Ugh.  Squash.  Right now my CSA boxes are loaded with the stuff.  Spaghetti squash.  Acorn squash.  Delicata squash.  Soon we'll have butternut squash and even the dreaded pumpkin.  Every fall I try new squash recipes, hoping I'll find the one that will make me change my mind.  So far, no luck.  The only way I'll really eat squash is in butternut squash soup.  Of course, I'm the only one in my family who will eat it, so I never make it.



So there you have it.... five things I love about fall and one thing I don't.

What's your favorite thing about fall?

The Family Dinner

When I became a parent 12 years ago last month, I set a goal to have dinner as a family every night for as long as we could make that possible.  For the most part, I have been successful.  Somewhere between 6:15 and 6:45, my daughters set the table, Dan turns off the TV, and we all sit down together to my favorite time of the day.

We have a couple of rules at our dinner table:

1. No books. (I know... I know.....)  This rule is sometimes suspended on leftover night, because I just can't face leftovers unless I'm distracted.
2. We use our good manners.
3. No TV.
4. You have to try everything, even if you think you won't like it.

My girls are great about three out of four of these rules.  Occasionally Abby makes fart jokes or shows her sister her chewed up food.  Sometimes Molly pokes Abby under the table and starts a fight.  But for the most part, we have a civilized dinner and we TALK!  I love hearing about what my girls learned that day - they know "nothing" is not an acceptable answer.  We share our favorite parts of the day and describe a problem we each had to solve.  I like to think that when we sit down to a family dinner, whether it's in our home or at a restaurant, Dan and I are reinforcing for our girls how much they mean to us and how much we value what they have to say.  I know I'm teaching them how to have conversations and how to dine in polite company that will serve them well in their futures.

This school year is the first time that we will not eat together TWO nights of the week.  Because of Molly's dance schedule, she must eat either before the rest of the family or after.  When this happens, I sit with her at the table, sometimes with my dessert, to talk to her so she doesn't have to eat alone.  I don't want her to feel left out of this important family time.  I'm sad that her busy schedule has interrupted our family dinners so soon... I was hoping to make it to high school, but I'm not in charge of the Y's dance schedule.

I keep telling myself that the other five nights of the week, I have my family around me, usually not complaining about dinner, sharing our trials and triumphs and just enjoying being a family.

I'm pretty lucky.

Pre-teen smiles

This, my friends, makes my day:

Those moments when I look over and see my 12 year old daughter genuinely, unabashedly, can't-smile-any-larger happy.  It seems sometimes like I'll never see that smile or hear that infectious laugh again as we enter the mother-daughter-love-hate-dance that is adolescence.  I know she loves me, and I she knows that I love her more than words can say.

And yet....

We push each other's buttons.  We make each other frustrated.  We don't always HEAR what the other is saying.

It's not a new story.  Moms and daughters have been doing this dance as long as there have been teenagers.  Intellectually, I know that this is normal... it is all part of growing up and becoming an independent person separate from me and the rest of the family.  Emotionally?  Well... that's another story.


SO.... everyday I try to think of a way to make her smile.  To hear that giggle or at least to avoid the dreaded eye-roll.  I think twice before I say something I might regret, and I try to temper the tone of my voice so she realizes I'm just trying to make conversation, to learn about her life and her day, and not nag her about her laundry or her homework.

I want to enjoy these 12-year-old moments so that in the blink of an eye when she is off at college I'll know that I did my best.

And that's the best I can do.