One Is Silver And The Other Gold

Last night when Bet looked at the caller ID and answered the phone, "What up G Dog Homeslice Pickles?" I was pretty sure it was our buddy Rob calling. (Rob, the one we called to ask what a spleen looked like - that Rob.) The call turned out to be from his wife - but Bet would have answered the phone that way for any of the three of them (Rob, his wife, or their daughter) because as she put it, "They are all G Dog Homeslice Pickles to me."
These are the folks that let us steal share their Christmas Cookie Day tradition. These are the folks who came and ran the Country Music Half Marathon (in tutus) with us. These are the ones who offered more than a couch by letting Bet be the crazy aunt in the attic (or really in the spare room with the piano) for a school year when she was planning to move to TN to be with us and didn't want to get stuck in a lease. The G Dog Homeslice Pickles are friends, indeed.

Tonight Bet and I are driving to DC for a girls' weekend away with my Navy buddies. LT (the one who retired, broke her collarbone, and is still training for the triathlon with us) has come east and DC is the central gathering point. LT, Bren, Jen and I have been friends for 20+ years and have many inside jokes (<-- some of them in Russian, which marks us not only as spooks, but old spooks.) There will be some newer shipmates of LT's joining us. (One new friend works in the Capitol, hence the private tour tomorrow - sweet!) I can't wait to meet LT's new friends and have Bet meet my old ones. The bonus is that we also get to see a college pal of mine, meet his new wife, and give them congratulatory hugs for their baby-in-process.

Linus has to work the weekend but Unky Dunky (who is an uncle by choice, not by blood or marriage) is going to come hang out with the kids and play Warhammer. I'm missing our other two uncles of choice (Karl and Richard) - but we can hardly complain as they helped us move and warm our house. It's pretty cool to have this many uncles for my kids without having had to put up with (smelly) brothers all those years ago!

Not sure why I'm rambling about friends this morning. Friendship is just on my mind. Maybe it's because my best friend from high school turned 40 last week, but I don't have a way to get in touch with her. (The silly rabbit moved to Florida and left her comcast email behind. Hello! Yahoo, gmail? Work with me here people! Noelly - I can't find you!)

Maybe friendship is looming large in my mind because I'm totally proud of us for spending $97 and saving $90 at the grocery store last night. I'm bragging on us even though we're not yet in the same league as C is for Coffee and Salsa Man (who once spent $133 and saved $211) much less with Sandra and Grant - who once worked it so that they "bought" forty (40!) boxes of cereal and the store had to pay them a quarter a box. Minor leaguers that we are, we wouldn't have known how to shop like this without the coaching from our thrifty pals.

Maybe I'm thinking about friends because I've just finished making my morning blog rounds. I've been blogging long enough now to have old webfriends and new! While I've only recently met friends like Titan and Not, I've "known" DebR of Red Shoe Ramblings for two years now. (In computer years, that's somewhat akin to having known each other since kindergarten, right?) Also, I've been skulking around the ether long enough to have imaginary friends. Er, that doesn't sound right. They're real, it's the friendship that's all in my head. Erm, that doesn't sound much better does it? What I'm admitting here is that, while I can't think of anything intelligent to say in their comments, I obsessively harmlessly lurk around mimismartypants', Maxine Dangerous', and Miss Zoot's sites. (Well except for that one time I accosted Zoot in the airport!)

So here's to friends - far and wide, old and new, known and yet to be known. Hip hip hooray (x3)!! Peace.

Morning News And Compulsive Peace

Maybe reading the news first thing in the morning isn't such a good idea.
This is sad. This is horrifying. Both are senseless. This helps if I can overcome my cynical side sniping and dismissing it as political theater.

My new wf Jeff asked me yesterday about my obsession with peace. I want peace. I yearn for it. I have a passion for it. I am searching for inner peace, outer peace, and sideways peace if it's available. I will visualize it, grow it, document it, explore it, sit with it, and share any little bit of it I can find. If I were a superhero, I would want my superpower to be peace. I'd dish up some serious Pax Lilymana. Peace talks, peace walks, peace deals - grasping at straws is better than refusing to reach. I don't mean to be glib as I repeatedly write the word peace, wish it upon random folks, and generally sling the concept around in my daily life. It's my way of praying without ceasing. It's my antidote to this morning's news - or any morning's news for that matter. The microscopic glimpses I have of peace are redemptive to the degree that I believe a full-sized, industrial-strength, global dose of peace would be nothing short of heaven. If we have the capacity to perceive even the shadow of it - how can we not ache to bring it fully about? Dynamic hope. Transformational love. Universal salvation. Divinity: inclusive, transcendent and immanent. Relational unity. The peace which passeth all understanding. That's what I'm talking about.
Peace be with you.

And What If We'd Said Rubens Instead?

Two more tidbits from the San Diego trip:
Thing 1) On Sunday we sat around recovering from the busy events and watching football. I mostly bonded with Lisa's husband and sons over this because LT, her daughter Meg, and her friend Rose weren't particularly interested in it. By the third game (classic NFC rivalry: Eagles vs Cowboys!) I think Rose was ready to scream. But boredom often presages some great creative endeavors. She and LT started watching the people watching the game rather than the game itself. LT, Rose, Meg and I were piled up on a feather mattress on the floor - brushing each other's hair, giving back rubs and commenting about all kinds of things about the game besides the plays. Not catty things - but we talked about things like the announcers (I LOVE Madden and Michaels) and the Philadelphia fans (who are ridiculously quick to boo their teams!). Contrast that to LT's husband Rob and her two sons (ages 17 and 21). The boys were all sitting at least four feet away from each other doing separate and silent things like reading the paper, playing PSP, and searching for internet connection while watching the game. Earlier during the exciting game the guys and I had all been on the couch watching intently and talking a lot and exclusively about the play(er)s, coaches, teams, philosophy of positions like Tight End etc., but by the third game when we had all mostly worn out our football jones - there was a definite slide back to the mars/venus ends of the spectrum. Very interesting.

Thing 2) When the family stuff was getting a leetle overwhelming (Saturday night?), LT and her 18 year old daughter Meg slipped away from it and into the room that Rose and I were sharing. We talked girl talk. It was fun to have Meg there - beautiful, adult, compassionate, quirky Meg. She's right at that cusp where she's welcome and valued in adult circles but can still sit at the Thanksgiving kids' table if she wants to. I'd been in her car earlier with two daughters of a friend and a young cousin. The thirteen year olds were all adoring of Meg because she's a fabulous illustrator and an expert in manga. Their conversation veered into the weird as they discussed which anime boy they had "dibs" on if he ever became human. (It took me a while to cotton on to the fact that they were talking about Bleach, not bleach. I'm quick that way.) Anime boys are the updated Prince Charming archetype; this generation's version of the old Teen Beat idols like Scott Baio and Shaun Cassidy. With a difference. The unattainable celebrity boys of my generation were at least - um, real to a certain degree. They were at the core - human beings even if their press was over the top. I overheard Meg use the words "tasty, male flesh" to describe fugiyachimoogu (or somebody like that) and I thought, "Tasty? Tasty how? What could he taste like? Paper?" I'm ok with all of that though. I like that the girls are taking their time dreaming about unreal boys. I like that they're spending their time building friendships not drama prone romances. It was fantastic to see how comfortable Meg is in her own skin - how easily she navigated between being the new girl in her mother's circle of friends and being the older, wiser, cool cousin. The gate between girlhood and womanhood used to have everything to do with marriage and babies and now it doesn't. Some girls get lost in nowoman's land - but LT has been such a good mom and helped Meg find her own transition. I loved getting to be a part of the circle.

Thing 2b) I just remembered one more bit to share. We were lounging about discussing unwanted curves in our figures. I will never be able to see this picture again without thinking of my dear friend and her daughter. Rose and I were cheering LT up with references to womanly figures in history and Meg misheard us. Meg heard "pot of jelly". Much hilarity ensued, including the words, "Repeat after me. 'I'm proud of my jiggly butt.' " (And if you do not know Foamy then follow the link and click on Jiggly Butt. You will be disturbed but amused, I promise.)

Peace.

On Parties And Parenting

We had a fantastic housewarming party last Saturday. Our dear friends C is for Coffee, Salsa Man and their two kids made the drive out. Bet's mom and Karl (a troll boy) also came for the weekend (uh, separately - in case that wasn't apparent. It would be terribly odd to think of them showing up together. Karl is 6 ft 8?9?11?! - a red headed, former rugby-playing giant of a (bisexual) man and Louise is a 5'2" smart yet scrappy, gum chewing grandma also known as Ya-Ya.) Anyway, I forget how many people we'd invited to the party, but I think about 75 showed up. Food, friends, crazy loud conversation (especially from the corner of our kitchen now known as Mojito Bend) all warmed the house. Havoc had chosen to make a special appetizer for the party. He'd listed out all the ingredients the week before, made most of it the night before, and had it perfectly displayed at the head of the food table the day of. I wish I could show you a picture of his scrumptious cheddar cheese, white wine, pecan encrusted cheese ball - but I didn't take a picture of it before the party. And it was gone before I knew it. I did have C is for Coffee take a picture of the plate - scraped bare with a few forlorn crackers abandoned and adrift. Havoc was pretty darn proud of that empty plate! I personally loved that our closest friends helped us hang shelves and art work mere hours before the party. Their touch, their mark, their laughter - it's still here even though they had to leave. I think that's what a house warming is all about. (That, and Dude, if you ever need some mums, have a housewarming party! Seriously, we have more mums now than we know what to do with and they're gorgeous!)

The rest of this week has been by turns fabulous and irritating. Parenting teens is more of an emotional roller coaster than I thought possible. I thought the infant stage (with the new mom hormones, the lack of sleep, and the baby changing every day) would be the most volatile. I mean, I knew teenagers themselves were volatile and challenging but I guess I expected the process of parenting them to be an unremitting struggle - a constant slogging. It's not. It is up and down and all over the place. We've got good grades and smiling faces. We've got a bit of slyness, a nudging of the boundaries, and a wholesale trample of the rules followed by, "Wuh? What did I do?" We've got restriction and recrimination. We've got hilarity at family dinner and full participation in family movie night. We've got treat wheedling and homework frustration. We've got a first break up for the second child to date. He's ok. Not quite broken hearted. Maybe a bit confused. Apparently it was a mutual break up for no reason. Sometimes that's the way it happens. We've got a kid scratching the word "Justis" into his arm. (Clearly, we've got spelling issues too.) Decoration by Sharpie is one thing, decoration by sharp object a whole other thing. We've got a call in to the therapist. ("Oh hey, Dr. Smith - you missed something here!") We've got hugs and tears, beautiful school pictures and kids who are even more beautiful in real life. We've got memories of our own teen struggles overlapping our understanding of what our kids are thinking, doing, and saying. In short, I think we've got the usual quota of joy and terror. I could use a little less terror, but hey!
Peace.
And speaking of peace!! How about that kick ass committee in Stockholm awarding Al Gore (and the global warming group) the Nobel Peace Prize for all of their work?!! I think it is awesome and far sighted and much deserved. We have the movie "An Inconvenient Truth". We're watching it on Family Fun Night next week.
More Peace.

Shopping Carts And Bicycles

I don't know what it says about our shopping habits that we have discovered the following since the move:
-You can buy caskets online from Costco.
-You have to be careful in the freezer section of the grocery store lest you end up with these instead of the ones for kids. (By the by, do you know what national holiday August 2nd was? Random, I know. Also? I missed it. Wasabi didn't though! He celebrated with his new favorite treat.)
-Here broccoli is more expensive (in a price per pound kind of way) than steak. Linus freaked out a little bit about that.
-Feeding ten children dinner at a baseball game takes almost all nine innings. Baseball fan that I am (not), I think this is the exact right proportion of funnel cakes, cotton candy, and hot dogs to strikes, balls, and conferences at the pitcher's mound. As an added bonus, you get to say things to the kids like, "Stop touching your uvula!" This won't stop them from daring each other to do weird things in public, but it will ensure that the other baseball fans scoot over to give your group a wide berth. You should try it sometime. Of course, if you happen not to have ten kids of your own, you could maybe borrow some of mine. They're the four on the back row and the one in front on the left. You'll have to talk to St. Ann about borrowing the other five.

Although now might be a good time to ask, because she could use a break! On her drive back to PA, she ended up with a scarily high fever from mastitis. Instead of staying in bed (or going to the hospital!), the crazy girl went to her job interview on Monday. Sure hope she gets a job she wants that bad! Send some good mojo her way.

Finally, we're leaving tomorrow morning to bike to the beach. Yes, it's 103 degrees here. Bet and I have realized that we cannot possibly plan a big bike trip without the weather gods freaking out. What with record high temperatures for us in Canada and NY last summer and record low ones over Spring Break - we've come to accept that we're doomed to bike in extremes. If you have any mojo left over after sending some to St. Ann, you could send the remainder out into the Atlantic to make sure we don't have a surprise hurricane or something.

Peace.

I Am A Sunflower (NOT)

I am a Sunflower What Flower Are You?

I took an online quiz to determine what kind of flower I am (do not ask me why - I don't know) and this is what it came up with: a sunflower. Bleck. Sunflowers are boring. I'm not so fond of yellow to begin with. Add to that the fact that real sunflowers grow taller than I've managed to and then end up bent over and sad looking - and you can see why I don't like them. They are FAR from one of my favorite flowers. They make me think of cheap, overly-coordinated kitchens - rooster themes, country apple motifs, cheery sunflowers. Bleck, bleck, bleck. I tried changing some of my answers - which my buddy Duncan (AKA Unky Dunky to my kids) says is cheating. Who cares?! I don't want to be a sunflower! I challenged Dunk to take the quiz and find out what kind of flower HE is but he declined. However he informed me that he had just taken an online quiz to determine whether he'd survive a zombie apocalypse. He rated as a Zombie Slayer. Considering I don't even know what a zombie apocalypse would entail - I think I'd probably be the equivalent of a sunflower on that quiz to. Stupid quizzes.

The Z-Man Smileth

This is my godson Z-Man. I flew to Philadelphia this weekend to meet him and smother him with kisses and cuddles - and oh yeah, to promise to help raise him in the faith. I renounced all the forces of wickedness (again) and prayed while my godson was being marked up with oil and splashed with water. I loved it. Of course, I pretty much love all the liturgy in the Episcopal Church. Sometimes my witchy side cringes when certain priests get going - especially if they start to get all Baptist on me and say the words "precious Lord" too many times. I figure it balances out because my churchy side gets squicked out by some of the more froo-froo New Agey folks in Circle. I try to focus only the parts I like from both of my paths. I'm a blend, blend, blend kind of gal.

I tell you though, it's a darn good thing I renounced the forces of wickedness (and yea, verily did I renounce them) on Saturday morning. Otherwise my fellow godparent might have become headless. St. Ann is one of my dearest friends and her husband, John the Magnificent or JTM for short, is a prince of a guy. JTM's parents are kind and funny. I enjoy them very much. JTM's brother, on the other hand, is a dickhead. I'm talking, a total asshat. I guess it happens in the best of families.

On Saturday there was a lot going on. Baby ZMan was being baptized and 50 someodd folks were being confirmed or received into the church. JTM was one of those being confirmed. The plan was to all go to church and then head back to St. Ann's for a luncheon. There was even MORE going on when JTM's other son (who is 6) decided that he didn't want to wait and get baptized all by himself. Apparently he'd been talking in Sunday school about getting baptized but waited until Saturday morning to let his parents know that today was the day! The rector agreed to it, the Bishop thought it a fine idea, and luckily his Sunday school teacher was in the pew right behind the baptismal family's and whispered a smiling "Yes, I'd be delighted" when asked if she'd like to be an impromptu godmother. (She even had a present for him in her car! We had to rush to the church gift shop after the service but that woman was prepared. I can only dream of being that prepared.)

Baptisms are lovely affairs where we get to march to the baptismal font for some splashing and we get to pray that the newly baptised be guided in all good things and be given an inquiring mind and a discerning heart. The words of the BCP are truly beautiful. Did this impress the godfather? Not so much. He leaned over halfway through the service - about a nanosecond after the baptisms and confirmations were done - and whispered loudly, "Hey, we're gonna go back to your place. You gotta spare key?" Before the service the priest had made sure to tell us that the little boys were welcome to go play on the playground after their part. They'd gotten squirmy and we'd sent them out. You'd think that the 36 year old could manage to stay for communion, wouldn't you? Wouldn't you think that the godfather would be willing to stay and meet the priest at least? Guess not. Of course this was the guy who had called to bitch and whine about having to wear a suit to this thing. Can you imagine? Making the most of it, JTM asked his brother to take the two boys with him. After the service, Nana (St. Ann's mom) took the two girls (8 and 10 years old) back to the house to start getting the luncheon things set out while we mingled and made a quick run through the gift shop. As we were leaving the gift shop, which was waaaay down in the basement of the church and sort of around a corner, the youth leader walks in with St. Ann and JTM's sons and says, "See, I told you we'd find them. They're right here." WTF??? They were supposed to have gone with Brother Can't Be Bothered 45 minutes ago!!!!!!! The boys told us that he had come out to the playground to get them but they had wanted to stay and play. So he let them. That might have been fine IF HE HAD LET US KNOW!!! What kind of grown up takes responsibility for two little guys and then just leaves them? To make it worse, when JTM asked him about it he got PISSED and said, "What? They didn't want to go. I wasn't going to make them." He completely missed the point about letting someone know. St. Ann said he is self-centered like that. She was surprised that he hadn't just helped himself to the food before everyone got back. Apparently he's done that before. He had helped himself to some beers already but that just made St. Ann and JTM laugh. The beer he snagged was left over beer from the wedding (in Sept!) that no one else would touch. He spent the rest of the afternoon saying embarassing and hurtful things about his 5th grade son. One of the guests tried to get him to change tracks by saying, "Man, you're embarassing the guy." Brother Asshat's response? "Well, maybe he'll go away and stop bothering us then." Geez! The kid was great. He was just sitting talking with the grown ups because he was the oldest kid there.

As far as I'm concerned I'm a single godparent. Oh wait - no. St. Ann's brother is a godfather too even though he couldn't be there on Saturday. He's a pretty cool dude. I think he and I need to get together and quietly vote Brother Blacksheep off the island. ZMan will thank us for it later.

The rest of the weekend was fantastic! It was relaxed and fun. ZMan is a jolly boy and a big flirt. The other four kids were sweet to me and LOVED showing off their brother. Hanging out with St. Ann and JTM was exactly what I needed. It is so nice to compare notes with good friends who understand the challenges of a big, blended family. I even had a nice trip back - once we figured out that the huge, black plume of smoke rising up from behind the airport was garbage/something being burned at an industrial facility and not a problem on the runway! On the plane home I met a sparkly, young gal who had been in Philly to see her boyfriend. She's from Alabama. She and her boyfriend have been together for three and a half years and plan to marry - but she worries about how their families will get along. She thinks all the parents will be fine but their brothers will be a different matter. Her future brother-in-law is a self-important wiseguy named Tony, who talks like he's in the Sopranos. She described her brother Tooter as "Kramer all jacked up on redneck." I wished her luck and said that it sounded like a reality tv series in the making. All families have their issues, don't they?

Currently my family's issue is that we have too much crapola! After the kids had lugged a few boxes to storage, they got on board with the idea that we should throw/give stuff away. Now. This very minute. Before it gets packed in heavy boxes that have to get moved to storage, then into a truck, then into another house. I'm a smart mom for packing all the hardback books first, aren't I?

Peace to the People!

Calorific

My beautiful friend (I mentioned I have beautiful friends, right?) C is for Coffee has been such an inspiration to me. She is dynamic and creative and has been losing weight and shaping her body in the healthiest of healthy ways. I've been following my own little plan. I've been changing one small piece of my pattern each week with the eventual goal of losing these pounds and completing the Pacific Grove Triathlon. Next week, my one new thing for the week is to keep a food journal. I have been dreading this task for 11 weeks. I knew it was the new thing for week 12 and I have been absolutely dreading it!

I have had internal temper tantrums. I have thought about skipping that week. I have been scared of writing everything down for fear of triggering those old obsessive and addictive habits. Five years of anorexia/bulimia leaves its mark even after 20 years of recovery!! And in the last two weeks C is for Coffee has helped me get over all of that fear. She didn't even know she was doing it. She tracks not only her food but her calories! She's a great role model. She is interested in the caloric cost of food. She doesn't use the calorie information to deprive herself or chastise herself. She uses it to make good choices. Of course I KNOW that that's what you're supposed to do. I've just never had faith that I could do it that way. That is, until I watched her. She makes it look doable. Still doubting myself, I've spent the last ten days quietly checking the packages of food I eat or looking up info on calorie counter websites. It has not been hard. It has not meant I don't get enough to eat. I've just become aware of the caloric cost of what I do eat. I haven't written it down yet - but suddenly next week isn't scaring me at all. It feels safe.

I think I'm going to change her name from C is for Coffee to C is for Cool Calorie Counting Chick!