sueeeus

I find corporate buzzspeak so wearisome.  What does it actually mean?  Drives me nuts.  So, enough of that.

Today I woke up feeling happy.  Not that I don’t usually wake up happy, because I tend to be a morning person, but today I awoke in better spirits than usual.  Which is quite nice.  And to add to an already pleasant morning, BamBam (I’m thinking that I will begin referring to them as Pebbles and BamBam, assuming the peanut really is a girl!) actually woke up on his own.  Which meant that we didn’t have the normal get dressed and ready and out the door struggle. 

I wonder if it has anything to do with the fact that, for the first time in I can’t remember when, I didn’t have to get up in the middle of the night to attend to a child or my own bladder that can no longer be ignored.  Or, perhaps it has something to do with the fact that I actually exercised yesterday.  Yes, stop the presses.  We joined a gym, and I’m loving the aqua aerobics.  Especially because the pool is full of real people with real shapes and sizes, and not super models and beach bunnies.  I feel so much more comfortable in this gym environment than I’ve ever felt in the past.  I think it’s part of why I’ve hated gyms for so many years.  The gyms I belonged to in years past tended to be filled with vain and superficial people for which the external appearance was paramount to anything.  Not my scene.  And I even looked good back then! 

Now, I don’t usually do this, but I feel compelled to share a link to an amazing talk given by an amazing woman.  My sister has written a book (and I hope she publishes it soon, because I just know it’s incredible, and want to buy a bazillion copies to send to all my friends –okay, several copies, because I don’t actually have a bazillion friends) and found this link, which she says describes some of the characters in her book.  It’s really great, because it’s science that corroborates her art.  It thrills me!  I listened to it at work — multi-tasking, of course — and ended up needing tissue to dab away tears.  It was that good.

Now, to take some of that insight and do something with it.  Translation:  I really, really, really need to tap into my right hemisphere more.  The question is, how?

It’s an excellent day. It all began last night when the satellite couldn’t capture the signal. No point in trying to watch House. So off to bed by 9:30 p.m., and, surprisingly, no struggles from the nearly three year old. Woot! A good night’s sleep. Up at 5:30 a.m. Poor little guy was having a bad dream. A slug on his pillow. Too scary. I let him crawl into bed with me and snuggled him back to sleep. He’s the sweetest little thing. I could have stayed in bed, but decided to seize the day instead. I had a full hour to get ready, so indulged in a cappuccino and went about donning my carefully constructed costume, all the while smiling at how pleased my beautiful boo boy would be when he learned he could be Superman all day long. What a wonderful start. And when we got to daycare, who was there? Peter Pan. And tonight? His cousins will be here, and then we will all go trick-or-treating. I am just bursting with anticipation, once he discovers that he gets to be a superhero and walk the neighborhood with his becostumed cousins, knock on people’s doors, and get candy!! It brings back such sweet memories. The happiest moments I recall as a child were Halloween, opening my Christmas stocking and finding my Easter basket. Now I’m a mother and the idea that my own child will soon experience this wonder and delight has me beside myself.

My costume today? I am a teenager. I think the look is more aptly the skateboarder look. Blue jeans. Long black camisole layered under a short dragon-emblazoned glitter t-shirt, layered under an even shorter crimson hoodie with long cuffs that cover half my hands. Messed up hair (well, that’s my everyday look, but it works). I am so pleased with myself, giggling at my own silly humour. As if anyone is going to get that I’m in costume. But it feels good to feel young. I feel young. I should have started Zoloft years ago.

I’ve had a box of course work that I’ve toted about for the last twenty some years. I don’t remember why I saved it for so long, other than a vague notion that I’d refer to it once in a while and refresh my memory of lessons learned. As if I would need to know how to do a Laplace transform. Or remember Thevenin’s equivalent. Or differential equations. I have used the equations I learned in economics for calculating amortizations and present and future values, before the advent of the www with its plethora of readily available calculators, but now there’s no need to remember how to calculate them by hand. It does astonish me, somewhat, to imagine that those squiggly scratches made some kind of sense at one time. Oh the things we can do when we’re young!

I bought this pencil in 1982 or 1983. I put much consideration into the quest for the perfect pencil, and it was a splurge, at $8, for a student on the brink of poverty. It continues to serve me well, and it reminds me of my youth. In retrospect, money well spent.

College for me was drudgery. I didn’t enjoy engineering school. I wanted a decent paying job at the completion of my degree, so it was merely a means to an end. I couldn’t imagine spending so much time and money on an education that wouldn’t serve me. That was back when I naively thought that the road to financial stability was the road to happiness. How often I’ve looked back and regretted not investing more in my heart. How different my life would be now.

All the same, my path is my path, and here I am. Learning to revere the journey. Learning to revere the day. This day. This moment. Now.

Had I not followed that path, where would I be? I can’t imagine a life without my beloved boy, so all steps that led me here were necessary steps in the journey.

So I wouldn’t change a thing.

And look at me now.  Mother of a superhero.  Can it be any better than that?

The other day as I was leaving work, about to enter the freeway, I saw a family standing on the corner, hoping for a ride. A very large man holding a large sealed cardboard box. A fairly large woman holding a sleeping child, draped in an afghan. The child looked to be five or six, judging by the length of the body compared to the woman’s stature. It struck me deeply in many ways.

I wanted to stop and give them a ride. But I didn’t.

I see my own sleeping child. In my arms, he is just as big as that other child. I carry him upstairs to put him to bed. How grateful I am that my child is safe and sound in a warm home with plenty to eat and a comfortable and safe place to rest.

How frustrated I am that the possibility that these people weren’t who they represented themselves to be would overrule my natural inclination to help my fellow man.

How I wished my husband had been with me. Then we could have given them a ride.

Were they homeless? Where were they going? Where did they come from? My office is so close to the airport, and there are regularly scheduled buses. Could they not afford bus fare? Was everything they owned sealed carefully in that box?

So many people have shared warm and kind sentiments at the loss of my brother. Some friends I used to work with sent this gigantic and fabulous bouquet of Peruvian lilies, which I adore. I am touched by all this kindness that is pouring out for me and my family. Thank you all so very much.