EW

Ramblings on writing, crafting and life.

My oldest came to me today with the helpful suggestion “We should probably go school shopping soon, don’t you think, mom? Maybe this weekend would be good?”

My poor, addled brain recoiled. School?? Already? Now, granted, she’s asked/reminded me about this perhaps a dozen times in the past week. But I’ve conveniently pushed it aside in favor of dealing with current chaos. So with each new reminder I feel shocked. Why am I avoiding you may ask. Well, several reasons. Two of which are paramount. First – Call me crazy, but I love having them home over the summer. The youngest still isn’t school aged yet, but the other two are (1st grade and 6th). Our summer days are long and lazy, and yes, chaotic. But it’s a lovely kind of chaos. Noisy, messy, requiring lots of bathing and swimming in the pool, but it’s mine. And as I watch them grow and get older, I’m amazed by them. They are very cool little people, notwithstanding their ability to drive me to the brink of insanity in under 5 minutes. As they get older, and more able to act as individuals: choosing their own clothes, visiting friends, begging for cell phones, I realize how short my time with them actually is.  Second – My oldest is going into Middle School this year. The leap from Elementary to Middle is fraught with challenges for her. We’re hitting the puberty landmark. The hormones, the moods, the physical changes, and the questions and fears raised by these. We’ve been doing our best to approach these things calmly, and to reinforce the idea that all of it is ‘normal’. She’s one to stress herself over any kind of change, and this is her biggest change to date. So it’s been our imperative to project calm for her. Anchoring her, in a way.

With this graduation to a new shcool, comes the freedom from the everpresent school uniform. This will be her first year without a uniform, and to say she’s looking forward to it would be an massive understatement. I’ve been pondering my reluctance toward shopping today, and I realized that it all hinges on the first reason. This will be our first shopping-for -clothes-for-school-trip and there is an equal mix of dread and excitement at the idea. My little babygirl, is taking those first steps into young womanhood. (even typing that I cringe, not only because I have to say it, but because I’m maudlin enough to think it needs saying) Whoever says a blog can’t be cathartic, is full of horse puckeys. Tossing my dread out into the blogosphere helps diffuse it. I want to be able to hit the ground running on this adventure. To be the first person there cheering her forward when she decides she wants blue hair, or goes through a punk phase, or chooses a college two thousand miles away, or takes up mountain climbing, or even when she decides to have babies of her own.  I’m at once terrified and elated to see the woman she will become. More than that, though, I’m feeling incredibly grateful that I get to be involved in the process with all three of them. I’ve been incredibly lucky in my family.

I couldn’t really ask for more, save perhaps that at least one of them will share my love of shoes.

I’d even settle for boots.

M has been recently embroiled in a debate with a relative. Actually, debate is too kind a term for the exchange of emails. Harangue would be more appropriate. Said relative has recently (sometime since his last visit about a year ago) become a vegan. M asked some questions of him regarding his choices and beliefs, in an honest attempt to understand them. It all began civilly enough, but quickly descended into an all out flame-fest, where-in with all the “Veganomicon”-thumping fervor of the newly baptized, M’s cousin labeled our lifestyle and practices “abhorrent”, questioned M’s morals and values, referred to both M and myself in the pejorative, and tried to relate my oldest child to a cow (don’t ask me why, but this one really annoyed me).

Invectives hurled, threats of not being worthy of future communication, yada yada. It was an amazing process to watch really. Let me preface the rest of the post with this. Since my release from the recovery period of my surgery at the beginning of the year, I’ve been eating a mostly vegan diet. When I say mostly, I mean 99% of the time. I’ve included eggs occasionally, or some other animal protein when I started feeling a bit deficient. Probably no more than a handful of times since I started in the first week of March. I made this choice from a health perspective, not as a moral choice. As a family we have drastically cut back our meat consumption, and both M and I agree that what meat I do serve needs to be re-sourced. The meat industry’s general practices (and this a sweeping generalization not meant to include those farmers and ranchers engaging in conscious business practices, who routinely treat their animal humanely and don’t drug them to the gills to better their profit margin) aren’t ones which we want to offer our continued support. So, as a whole, we are fairly sympathetic to our relative’s choices. But, none of these things were mentioned, because M wasn’t given a chance before he was told he was (and I paraphrase) a murdering bastard. And honestly once someone starts questioning your value as a human being, telling them you’re even vaguely on the same page as they are feels…apologetic.

Now, I’m not trying to create a vegan vs. carnivore/omnivore debate here. Both M and I are currently figuring out how we feel about it, where we stand. What I AM questioning is the idea that rabid sermonizing actually converts anyone who is thinking. I mean really, jabbing me in the posterior with a verbal cattle prod is more likely to have me telling you to get over yourself than slip into line like a good little sheep. The irony here is the imperative is created to “think for yourself” to see outside society’s little marketing boxes and make informed decisions. Yet when you don’t immediately roll over and agree with everything being thrown at you, because you need to consider things, you’re branded a non-thinker. This ‘my way, or the highway’ type of thinking is, for me, a deal breaker. If you want me to respect your beliefs, to hear them, isn’t it logical you afford me the same consideration? I get that you think you’re right. We all do. I get that you think yours is the way we all should be living. Would it not be more effective to create an open dialogue? A kind of free-flow of ideas and thoughts, so that everyone involved could come away informed and edified.

At the core, I think if you want to change the world, you have to be willing to change yourself.  Food for thought (and it doesn’t even have a face).

My blogging break turned out to be an extended hiatus.  Initially I just didn’t have much to say, then the usual round of life interferences reared their ugly little heads, and by the time I shook free, the blog had become my albatross. Dreading a return, wondering what I have to say that anyone really needs to hear. All those pestersome voices that rattle around in the guise of the internal editor, affirming I’d just be better off shutting up anyhow. Tonight I find myself gripped in a frenzy of accomplishment. Little tasks really, but who doesn’t love scratching things of the To Do List of their life? And in honor of that idea, here I am again.

The book still rolls, I’m hoping to have the first draft finally done by the end of September. Yes…you heard it here first folks! The magnum opus nears the first round of edits.  Is that the Hallelujah Chorus I hear? The non-fiction proposal is on the shelf till I complete this first draft.  And miraculously, on a drive up to the Wannee Musicfest in April, M and I came up with the plan for another series. Young Adult, still in my favorite genre of urban fantasy. I have the outline for book one finished, and the start of book two’s outline as well.

As I think you realize, it’s not a dearth of ideas from which I suffer. But a lack of …well not effort…but ass to chair-fingers to keyboard time. I’ve read an obscene number of writing how-to books, self help for authors etc. (a habit for which I get no amount of flack from M) Always looking for the trick. The AH-HAH! that would help me finally get over the hump and finish. And the most repeated theme was – “If you want to write. Just write”  Surely you jest, I’d think. it can’t possibly be that easy. But that’s the trick. Right there. It’s NOT easy. It’s anything BUT easy. If it was easy – everyone would be doing it. There’s no substitute for time put in at the keyboard. None. Much as I keep hoping some magical Rumplestiltskin Muse will come along and grind out my last few chapters for me, it’s on me.

Ahhh well. Maybe the brownies will at least do the laundry?