5 things I would spend money on...According to Leela

This list was prompted by a discussion Leela and I had about budgeting and why we don't go the ice cream shop everyday.....I asked her what would be the things she would want to spend her money on and these were the top 5.

1- Candy
2-Gumball Machines
3-Paint
4-Make Up
5- Magic Wands that change stuff into other stuff(hers do not have this feature)

I think Eli's list might be
1-cheese
2-a toilet bowl you can play in
3-his own coffee cup(His favorite game is to sniff a coffee cup and say P Ewww)
4-complete access to the dashboard and steering wheel
5-free reign over all of the cupboards and refrigerator(he does not like child locks or being pulled away from these things ;)

When I grow up?

So Leela and I were walking together on our way into Target and she says to me, "Mom I think when I am a mommy like you I want to be a Dr. and a Cowgirl." So I say with lots of interest why would you like to be a Dr. and cowgirl Leela? She very quickly and confidently comes back with, "I am very interested in man parts and would like to look inside them, and I like to lasso stuff." Can't argue with that.....Recently firefighter and exercise person were added to the list however those were immediately following a great trip to the local fire station where she saw a demonstration of the jaws of life and how to put out a structure fire, as well as the exercise room where the firefighters work out so I am not certain they will stay on the list.

As Long as it Serves Me

There is something I have been wondering for a really long time, and of course after reading the Help I wondered about it even more, and today after driving through a neighborhood and seeing about 15 to 20 different type of domestic workers(gardeners, nanny's, cleaning people) and listening to each of them speaking Spanish, I couldn't help but wonder again is this Orange County's very weird political and spiritual hypocrisy? I mean is this the same thing as people have always done, hired people to work for them and then voted against or truly thought that those people do not deserve the same rights.

Trust me, I realize it's complex and messy, and that is why we are arguing about it so much while schools and hospitals struggle through it all trying not to financially implode. And yet people keep hiring other people to work for them, care for their children, be an intimate part of their home life just to then turn around and complain about what these very same people are doing to our Country, our education system, our health care system, the very fabric of our nation and culture. Would we not care if these same people disappeared tomorrow? Would they just be replaced by other people? Are we really like that? To be honest I hope not.

I'm not saying as a Country we can just do what I would like to do and be all inclusive all of the time, I mean there is a reason I wasn't a founder of this Nation, when it comes down to it, I don't think I have what it would take to make the tough decisions, however at what point do we have to call ourselves out on the hypocrisy of it all?

I'm not going to lie I get a little suspicious when I hear someone talk about building houses in Mexico(which is important and valuable) and then when it comes to helping the person who works for them all of a sudden there is some important lesson they need to learn about self sufficiency or better language skills. This is absolutely not all people by any means, however it is still there, this under current of it is only OK as long as it serves me. And the truth it seems like that might be what is going on with a lot of our struggles as a Country, State, City, or community in general. We have finally reached the height of our individualism and there is no where else to go, and now we have some tough things to face.

Is there a way to walk this immigration vs illegal immigration line in service of both human beings and our Country? Is it not possible to do both? Is it like it reads in Matthew 6:24 "No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money. And can money be replaced by Country? Or is this Country able to be served while treating people with respect and dignity? Can we as a Nation actually look at our lives really examine them, and change for the better, not just protecting commerce but preserving our founding identity. Does there always have to be a political side to choose? A bloody battle?

Within our cry for assimilation and preservation of American culture, do we really want illegal or legal immigrants to pick up on some of our bad habits, like buying things we can't afford and being responsible for the most garbage per capita in the world? Probably not. Is the problem in our Country that we can't all live like Americans, so only we want to live like Americans, and everyone else needs to pack it up, or have we just stopped talking, thinking and considering what our founding values were, and if there is a way to consider them now?

I came across this interview below(I think worth a read and if you can a listen www.onbeing.org) it made me hope above all hope that there are people in our government starting to really think about what our values really are as a culture and country, and is also made me a little( or a lot) nervous about what needs to be sacrificed in order to stand strong as a Country not just economically but ethically.............

America"

June 28, 2012

It's easy to forget, especially around U.S. Independence Day, how much trial and error went into the creation of American democracy, how much of what Americans now take for granted wasn't fully formed for decades after 1776.
The warm and wise philosopher Jacob Needleman looked back at the American founders with this in mind for his book The American Soul. He took apart the ingredients that grew up our democracy. And he found that every iconic institution, every political value, had "inward work" of conscience behind it. Every hard-won right had a corresponding responsibility.
It feels important to me to revisit the conversation I had with Jacob Needleman about this in 2003, and have been formed by ever since. In our historical moment, it is as clear as ever before that the American republic is an ongoing work in progress. At the very same time, young democracies are fighting to emerge across the world and are looking for instruction and models. To rise to this occasion, I believe, we need to remember and pass on this inward work as much as the outer forms of government that were long in the making. As we created this show, we also pulled in words Jacob Needleman points to — of founding voices of "the idea of America." These include George Washington and Thomas Paine, but also Frederick Douglass and Walt Whitman.
For this journal, I offer excerpts of Jacob Needleman's insights from our interview — and a little Walt Whitman — for remembering and reflection.
On the rights of the individual

"Individualism and individuality have to be separated. Individualism can take a turn where it's a kind of egoistic, selfish thing: Me, me, me, me, and what I want and what I care, what I think and what I like. Oh sure, we need to have the liberty to express all that, but a real individual is a different thing. And to be truly one's self is to be truly in contact with this great self within, this divinity within. And the paradox of true individuality is that the more you are in touch with what all human beings have in common under God, the more you are uniquely what you, yourself, are. And that's why I say we need to bring back the obligations that go along with the rights in order to understand the depths of what the human rights really mean."

On freedom

"A democratic citizen is not a citizen who can do anything he wants. It's a citizen who has an obligation at the same time. And just to give you an example, if I may, the freedom of speech, what is the duty associated with it? Well, if … I have the right to speak, I have the duty to let you speak. Now, that's not so simple. It doesn't mean just to stop my talking and wait till you're finished and then come in and get you. It means I have an obligation inwardly — and that's what we're speaking about, is the inner dimension. Inwardly, I have to work at listening to you. That means I don't have to agree with you, but I have to let your thought into my mind in order to have a real democratic exchange between us. And that is a very interesting work of the human being, don't you think?"

On conscience

For the founders and for all spiritual teachers — and by "founders," by the way, I want to broaden the founders to include people who came later, including such people, of course, as Lincoln and also — one people may find strange — Frederick Douglass and people like that who spoke very powerfully of conscience. Conscience is an absolute power within the human psyche to intuit real values of good and evil and right and wrong. We are born with that capacity. It's not just socially conditioned into us. This is what the great traditions teach. This is what I think. But it is covered over by a lot of the egoism and chaos of our un-free inner life."

On the importance of "thinking" in public, political life

"Shouting is not thinking. 'Come let us reason together,' the prophet says, God says to Isaiah… I think the moment you start thinking together with someone, immediately their eyes light up… I must confess I spoke to — I won't say who, but I spoke to some members of Congress not long ago. We had a very quiet evening together and we started opening up, just what you and I are doing now. And they said, in effect, you know, 'We never get a chance to do this. We're in there trying to, you know, speak to television cameras or make points with electorates or with lobby groups, but we never…' I said, 'You mean you never come together and just reflect together?' And they said no. To me, that's the dirty secret of America at the moment. That's the problem."

From Walt Whitman's essay "Democratic Vistas," which Jacob Needleman also includes as part of the long tradition of the foundational "idea of America," and which ends our show.

"I say the mission of government, henceforth in civilized lands, is not repression alone and not authority alone, not even of law, nor the rule of the best men, but higher than the highest arbitrary rule, to train communities through all their grades beginning with individuals and ending there again to rule themselves. To be a voter with the rest is not so much. And this, like every institute, will have its imperfections. But to become an enfranchised man and now, impediments removed, to stand and start without humiliation and equal with the rest, to commence the grand experiment whose end may be the forming of a full-grown man or woman — that is something."

Table for 3

I am assuming everyone has kind of been in a situation that you know you should be grateful for and yet you still kind of take it for granted and just gobble it up a bit greedily, until, well it changes. That is right where we are.

I honestly knew how blessed I was that Miles made it home for dinner almost very single night at 6, sometimes even 5:30 and on a rare occasion when things were slower at work even 4:30. I could really depend on hearing his feet crunch the gravel outside of our door and know that all would be well, we had made it through the whole day, everyone alive, maybe a few coins needing to go into the theoretical therapy jar for the kids when they hit their 20's or 30's however for the most part a thoughtful, loving, needs being met kind of a day completed. I can't say I met Miles with the enthusiasm outwardly I felt inwardly each time he came home, sometimes I mentally checked out or talked about how if it had been a minute more it could of gotten ugly(yes I have walked to the end of the driveway and waited with the kids) however him coming home was a beautiful thing. A new energy, someone to talk to, play with, help blow on food at the dinner table and wipe down everything, again.
A God send of laughter would come from bath time and pajama time and new games would be invented, games I never would of invented because my brain had somehow just stopped working that way by 7, or maybe by 4:30. I'm being dead serious when I say how glad I am that I don't have an addictive chemistry in my brain because some days instead of music, a walk, or delving deeper into play with the kids, I may have started drinking. I think I get it a little, that need to check out, to get through, to depend on something, control something. Miles' being home for dinner was my control. I could mentally prepare myself, OK he will be home by 6 so just get to 6, play until 6, be filled with patience until 6, that was the magic number. I liked that dependability a lot, it made me a better mom in some ways, like an athlete who had trained for a certain event, I could make it to dinner time. I remember one night when Miles had to go to a work dinner and Eli got really really stuck in his high chair and I ended up calling a good friend of ours to help me, I didn't even hesitate to call, in my brain two adults made sense at dinner time. I did get Eli out by myself but with Leela screaming about it in the background and Eli crying at the top of his lungs I was not prepared, I had not trained for dinner alone, so inwardly, I panicked a little.
We are now almost 7 months in of Miles rarely being home by 6 or even by 7. I know he misses it, that time right between dinner and bed when the kids could soak him in, Love him completely and he them. Laughing and screaming not extinguished by a tired mom but kindled by dad. Eli barely got any of that time and although both kids if awake when he gets home are genuinely excited, there is a difference in energy. The magic moment between dinner and bedtime has passed when he comes home and he still needs to eat and shower(the difference between an office job and one fixing bikes ;) I know it's not forever and if our former rhythm changed so can this one, however I miss our evening routine. I am not so dependent now or controlling about making it to a certain time which in some ways has made me a nicer wife, just letting things be as they are. However I must say a dinner table with more residents 3 and under than over, is not quite the balance I once enjoyed.
There are lots of nights I am not really sure I ate dinner and Leela is running around wild while Eli works intently on a way out of his high chair, onto the table or into my chair to eat off of my plate.(note the pictures below)

 Post bath, I promise I went to help Leela for 10 seconds and this is how I found Eli. In his defnese I quickly grabbed the camera insted of the plate, not my first mistake of the day.

 As I went to rescue Eli and clean up the broken plate I turned around to find Leela cutting apples on the furniture. Yes I moved her, however I felt the need to document how much dinner and bath time has changed over here.

Miles does get dinner with the kids(without me) on Mondays one of his days off  of work and one of mine on, and we are gifted with some good breakfasts in there a couple of times per week, however I must say a table for 3 feels incomplete, distracted, disconnected, often disorganized for me at dinner time, maybe it's all the nakedness and imminent danger my young table guests get into when I am spent and dad is "almost" home.

Can God Say Damn It?

Many months ago I am changing Eli's diaper and Leela says to me, "Mom Why can't I say damn it?" I'm thinking Ah so this is where it begins. I for a moment look forward to the many conversations we will have about words, how to use them, what they mean, how hard they are to take back and how much I fear the written word for my children within the context of technology. Technology I have quite honestly not caught up with yet. Yes I am that mom who still has a pen and paper handy quite often. I know, sad.

.My flash forward was but a moment before I quickly replied, "well Damn It is a word mommy's and daddy's sometimes use to express frustration but there are much more thoughtful words you can use to express that emotion."......Leela thinks....."Well since God is the daddy of everyone can he say damn it?".....I think...."Yes God could say damn it, but I don't think he would choose to."  Never mind most of my wrestling's with God and Scripture surround the very concept of damnation in the Bible and yet I stand by my first thought, I really don't think God would choose to say it. :)

Now, Leela's daddy. He may have said it. Poor Miles, apparently this is how the damn it conversation started. Again while changing Eli's diaper(which Miles is very good at by the way) Eli apparently got his hands all in it and Miles uttered the word damn it and that was it. Each time Eli reached to get at his diaper and bum leela would say, "oh man daddy he damned it, Eli damned it again." Miles trying to be quick with a response albeit flustered fell into the oh so famous parenting trap of saying, "Leela don't say that word." I think he may of even followed up with the word, "because" when challenged further. Oh how the best of us fall. So i guess the truth is most of us don't often say damn it and God would not choose too unless of course, He was elbow deep in poop, then maybe.

"A Case of the Mondays"

Really the photos that I will attach here will say it all for how Leela was feeling this Monday, however I am wordy so I will explain.

For what seems to be over a year Leela has been asking me to take her to a dance class. I of course am certain she is too young for a formal dance class and have encouraged her to just dance in the living room(we did upgrade to pandora one),  told her she could use her dress up slippers as ballet slippers, and assured her you can still tap dance on the kitchen floor without tap shoes. Needless to say she still starts a lot of conversations with, "When I'm in dance Class," or "When I am so and so's age and in dance class," and pretty much wears the one hand me down leotard we have with pretend ballet slippers everyday for part of the day, and on our trip to Chicago informed me I should pack more tights. Yes she wore tights one day in 100 degree weather. After all that I couldn't help but think maybe I am being a little uptight about this dance class thing.

So when the City of Costa Mesa's Parks and Recreation catalog arrived in March and I happened upon Fairy Tale Princess camp which is basically intro to tap/jazz, songs, stories, and crafts for three year olds with an affinity for dressing like princesses' and talking about their future enrollment in dance classes I thought, we are in. I was surely the first person to sign up and get the deal on early bird registration, and kept it a secret everyday for the last 4 months knowing full well something may derail this dream dance camp.

I honestly only told Leela about dance class Saturday evening to encourage her to get some sleep and be excited for the plane ride back to California(there was a lot of talk from her about moving to Chicago) and so that she would have a little heads up of what was to come Monday morning.

We did almost miss our plane(that might be an entire other post) and part of me thinks what kept her little 3 year old legs running through midway to catch it, was the hope of finally setting foot in a dance class with real ballet slippers and tap shoes. I didn't tell her they have dance classes in Chicago too.

Fast forward to Monday morning and there we were Leela actually sitting fairly still for me to brush the tangles out of her hair and pull it back, fully dressed in her black tights and leotard, which are always a highlight when out in public. I mean she was ready. No arguments about putting on shoes or getting in the car or why we can't take a bath right this minute, or pour food coloring on everything or even why it isn't really all that possible to paint really quickly before we get in the car.

The good news seemed to just keep rolling in. We went through the mail and in it was her info packet for preschool the highly anticipated picture of her teacher waiting inside.

Certain this morning couldn't get any better she encouraged me to tear it open since we had some extra time and this might be where things started to take a turn. We pull out the picture and Leela just looks at me like, what? Your sending me to school with him? Yes that's right Leela's first preschool teacher, is a great teacher, who also happens to be a young man. A young man with a shaved head and two largish round earrings one for each ear. He basically turns everything little LP knows to be true about teachers, gender roles, and life as a 3 year old right on its head.

Hanging his picture on the door seemed to help and telling her he will visit us at home first because she is new to the school helped a little more, then finding out her first week we can all go as a family for an hour to check it all out helped a little more, and knowing that at least she was going to have a dance teacher helped a lot more. So there we were a little shaken up on our way to dance class, Leela asking me if I would wait outside and read a book just in case she needed me on her first day of dance camp(or in case the dance teacher was a man too), of course I will, I assured her.

As we arrive it takes a minute to find the right building the right door and then somehow as I go to open the door I look through it and all looks dark, no one around, and sure enough the door is locked. Yep locked out of Fairytale Princess Camp. I of course thinking, I have somehow gone to the wrong place call the city to find out the right place, and as it turns out we were not only the first people to sign up for this particular dance session, we were the only people and someone out there in dance camp world forgot to call us. All that needs to be said at this point is note the difference in facial expressions from Leela pre dance lockout and post dance lockout........not her best Monday.

The good news is Leela got to take a dance class for real Tuesday afternoon for free and wore real tap and ballet shoes and the city will refund us so we can take 3 more dance classes the next 3 weeks. She really loved the class as much as I thought she might, and followed instructions for an entire hour and I have to admit her little feet in first position and tapping around the house trying to shuffle are adorable.

All we have left to do is meet Kunaal, Leela's preschool teacher who smiles down at us from the door where she wanted to hang his picture and be glad he will probably not lock us out on the first day. :)

Crying Over Carpet

I cried over carpet today. I mean literally leaning against my front door with a rag in hand and a spray bottle in another taking on a position of defeat over carpet. It is important to note that this is carpet I can only assume was installed in the late eighties, mid nineties at best. Carpet that has been the bane of my housekeeping existence in our otherwise charming in a very rundown way apartment.

Honestly my tears were not just about the carpet. I learned in a class called conscious mothering a couple of years ago about a concept called "broken cookie syndrome," which in the simplest of terms refers to a child having a breakdown/tantrum over let's say a broken cookie or certain color cup, when in reality the breakdown is not fully the result of said cookie or cup. The actual, crying, screaming, however your little one chooses to express themselves and throw down the emotional gauntlet, reflects a deeper hurt and the cookie/cup is just the final trigger, the proverbial straw that breaks the camels back. So I guess this carpet is my straw and in the last few years has been at the center of a few of my mama breakdowns.

 It is also important to note that I have very strong feelings about where I would like carpet in my living space and where I would not. I did not know how strong these feelings were before I had children. It seems ridiculous to me for instance to install carpet in a an eating area, as well as in the entry way of a home. Really any high traffic area, or area where there is water like bathrooms or kitchens. I understand the beauty of carpet when you want to lie on the floor to watch a movie, right when you get out of bed in the morning and your feet hit the floor, and when your children are learning to walk and climb. However in my day to day life carpet is mostly my broken cookie.

I have kind of accepted that our apartment doesn't have a dishwasher or a washer and dryer and have given myself some Grace in terms of the time it takes to get those things done with two little ones running through sippy cups and clothing. However the carpet throws me every time. I think what gets me the most about it is that it turns what is just normal day to day life with kids under 5, maybe even over 5 I don't know, I'm not there yet, into time consuming scrubbing, blotting, drying and let's be honest ruining of said carpet.

When the baby eats food it gets all over the floor every time, and yes we put a very wipeable durable garden mat that looks like a carpet under the table but the truth is no mat is big enough to encompass how far a baby can get food from their tray just by the simple exercise of learning how to eat. 3 year old art projects, dirt from outside, even our landlord's friendly handyman wears his dirty work boots in here, marching all over the carpet whenever anything needs to be fixed. On any other floor these things would still be a little bit annoying, however soap and water takes care of it and scratches or nicks over time build character on a floor(well maybe not a laminate floor:) but not on carpet. Carpet just gets dirty, dingy, ripped up, matted down, stuck on food,  and quite honestly a little bit scary. Yes you can hire carpet cleaners and we have, however there are just some stains that never come out and in a couple of weeks most are back right where you left them, in fact carpet stains have to be given credit for their wherewithal and tenacity. And normally I don't care that much about this kind of stuff, which most people who have been to our place can attest to from our lack of coordination in decor and willingness to accept any furniture hand me downs, and decorating help. However carpet makes me crazy because it makes normal things that kids do, even more frustrating.

I'm not saying I wouldn't address the marker on the floor, the paint on the floor, the muddy feet on the floor or the many meals that end up there, I would and I do, however if it wasn't this carpet that probably shares my birth decade or at least my AYSO years those things could just be wiped up and moved on from. It's obvious all over our floor that no matter what I have said or done consciously or unconsciously as a mother, Leela still writes and paints on the floor with all types of art medium. Eli misses his mouth entirely at some point during all meals which he should do at this age and half our backyard and neighborhood lives within these fibers. To one extent it is slightly reminiscent of a faint penciled height chart in a home to mark all the growth and years, however all of this dirt is not ours(much of it is, but not all) and we are certainly not getting our security deposit back. So why can't I just let it go? Take it for what it is. Why am I leaning against my door crying over this carpet?

I think because it is the thing that pushes me over the emotional edge of what I have energy to deal with each day. I mean it is the law of little ones that as soon as you sit down to feed a baby or rock them to sleep your other child/children need your help in the bathroom immediately, or have found all the knives you thought were safe and decide now is the time to learn how to cut their own mango(yes that happened this week.) It's those times of unplanned silence when you know something is up, a friend of mine calls it, "paying for silence," and upon investigation there is flour all over the floor, or hair has been cut or scribbled murals adorn your walls. There are many times when everyone is crying and needs all of you right then, multiple times a day, or you are changing a diaper and at the moment you are elbow deep in it, there is a call of distress from a 3 year old and you are not sure if they just want to show you a cool bug they found or they are in a spot of potential danger. It's the meals you don't really eat because you are cutting up tiny food, while teaching how to make guacamole, arguing over who gets to pray first and answering literally the 200th why question of the day. It's the days of seeing the deep hurts of your kids while they rail about a wrong song or ill fitting shoe and you see the broken parts of yourself in them, your deep hurts showing in their tantrums and spilling out of emotions, and you are all at once terrified that you can't keep them from really seeing and embodying parts of yourself, and incensed that they even consider acting the way they do.

It's all that and so much more and then all of a sudden just as you think you have made it through a day of loving with Grace for you and them, you set up some paint and paper outside and quickly run to the bathroom. Moments later your little one comes to you with that look of mischief in their eyes and says, "come see what I did." And there they are, many orange footprints all over the carpet. You try to keep it together teach about cleaning up, treating property with respect, and being responsible with paint, but really you just end up crying by your front door because somehow right then the baby woke up, everyone needs to be fed soon, it's Saturday and you miss your husband, and try as you might, if you don't use harsh chemicals(which I can't bring myself to do) the carpet is never really going to get clean.

From one perspective our carpet is full of all the things we are in process of learning in this house, a canvas of pushing boundaries and testing limits and you would never see it and think we haven't lived. Yet it bothers me.It is a direct reminder of the defiance's of the day, the times I took the risk and let there be silence and exploration, and it at least in terms of carpet, backfired. I also think somewhere living in my mind is the idea that if your carpet is clean you are a better parent and a more respectable person. If your carpet is clean, I do respect you, call me. It's just that I know how much heart I put into parenting and it only goes so well in the here and now, so things like carpet that are straightforward, seem like things you should be able to manage and control. Try as I might I am really not in control of how this whole parenting journey turns out, just in how I approach it and I won't really really know if my kids are OK, if my approach is what they needed until they are my age, probably older, maybe never, so it seems like carpet should be a non issue. If I take carpet out of the equation it feels like there might be a little less to fight against in the things that don't matter category and a little more energy to deal with what is really underneath the orange footprints and my tears at the end of a trying week.The security deposit would be nice too.

I was in no mood to photograph the carpet however you get the idea of where these footprints were headed.

Also my new favorite picture of Leela and Eli cheering on Ben Thorburn at his soccer game.