A Good Poem I

On the Strength of All Conviction

and the Stamina of Love

Jennifer Michael Hecht

Sometimes I think

we could have gone on.

All of us. Trying. Forever.

But they didn't fill

the desert with pyramids.

They just built some. Some

They're not still out there,

building them now. Everyone,

everywhere, gets up, and goes home.

Yet we must not

Diabolize time. Right?

We must not curse the passage of time.

Off Season.

Since Valentines Day is Saturday, let's post some pictures of Christmas and New Years, shall we?
Let's.


The following pictures are us playing Quelf on New Years. If you have not played this game, do so. Immediately. If you are pathologically shy and introverted, run the other way.

Here's Mark watching Bo do...something. I don't remember what Bo had to do, but I do remember that Mark had to speak like a Charasmatic preacher every time he read a card aloud. And thus sayeth I, it was HILARIOUS. Can I get an AMEN???

I think Zach's card said that he was Santa Claus and everyone had to sit on his lap and tell him what they most wanted, or they had to go back one space. And then Josh had to sit on his lap until his next turn.

Jenny had to make a fort and stay in it until someone rolled a four. I think it was her favorite part of the game- or at least she liked it better than I liked wearing toilet paper on my head like a mummy until a certain card was drawn.

Zach and Emma being very adorable. Not part of the game, but hey, when you're adorable, you're adorable.

And this is the part where Drew had to put a towel on his head.....HEY WAIT.

Wha???? Ohhhhhh. Never mind .....

Moving back a week, we now find Christmas and the Pagent presented by our lovely offspring.

Drew, Josh and Zach were the three wise men.

Joseph, Mary and Baby Jesus, respectively. (They had IKEA in Bethlehem, right?)

This is Drew's 16th Birthday Party In Which a Game of Spoons Was Played.

Here's to the happy end of yet another sick week.

Stay healthy, yo. I mean it.

Premium Brand

Some things going on right now.

The Flu.

Journalling (not by me, but the two offspring. Bo's reads like Twitter, a blow by blow account of the details of his day. Emma's contains drawings of herself wearing jewelry and hairbows.)

Facebook. Sigh.

Drew's 16th birthday. Holy cow.

Pokemon and Hannah Montana Valentines.

Me wishing I would finish something creative.

Dad playing tennis.

Pretty much being bored with this post and thinking I'll delete this second attempt which, as it turns out is super lame, because I wanted to post a poem I read, but don't want to be hoity toity and high falutin' so I'll put this wretched bit in as a palate cleanser, so to speak.

It's a saltine, kids. How good can it be?

If you're looking for me, I'll be playing solitare.

Dad

I'm still angry, but thankfulness rushes over
the sharp edges of it,
and is the overwhelming emotion
For most things.
Except the words "heart attack"
Then I'm angry again.
But I remember that pulsation,
pressing against my finger-
so o o o o s l o w,
but under the familiar texture of his skin
strong.
stronger than anger,
than fairness
stronger than the alarmed response
to technology's brazen beeps
and jagged colored lines
strong.
The living
moving
healing
blood of my father.

Snowed in.

I'm here in my cozy home, pj's on, 3rd cup of coffee in hand and the kids are playing happily in their room.

Ok, so I'm not snowed in. I'm not even rained in. I'm cloud-ied in. It's not even in the 30's right now- or 40's for that matter, but it IS 50, and grey.

Don't judge. It's Saturday morning, and I'm feeling slightly under the weather (so to speak) and there is nothing more gorgeous than taking it slow in the mornings. With a veritable buffet of things to do, I sit at my computer and let them parade in my thoughts, eventually picking out of the line-up the most time-wasting and unprofitable. "Doing Laundry" and "Make the Grocery List" and "Getting the Kids to Clean Their Room" glide past gracefully, and wedged in there like a troup of clowns in a tiny car between the gorgeous and ornate floats comes "Sit Down on the Compy and Post Something Improvised." Clowns. Love them or hate them, but they win the grand prize in the Putzing Parade.

Today we live up to our middle-class status in all outward appearances. Pancakes for breakfast, video games in the morning, Emma has an ice skating party this afternoon at the mall, and I plan to take Bo to the game store during that time, and perhaps pick up an overpriced coffee while I wait. Sounds totally staid and un-thrilling.

Below the surface of this "normal Saturday" are the undercurrents of something richer. Something you have to take time and breath to sense and feel. A relaxing in the shoulders. The happy sound of children who have gotten off the tv and are creating worlds together. The trees chuckling and shaking in the wind. The sense of a Lord who is new each morning, and yet the Same. His joy permeating and changing everything.

My life is not what it appears to be. My life is what I am Living. If you pass me in the mall today, I'll raise my paper cup of mocha cappucino, and hope the riches that are stored up in you find their way to the surface of your day.

Here's to cloudy Saturdays.

"I feel like the maid...I just cleaned up this place!"

Now that I have so much storage space, I still have SO much JUNK.

How does this happen?
I'm still trying to simplify, still proud of the fact that we downsized so much in the last year. But now I have more space and those empty corners seem to attract junk like the disposal attracts spoons.

We spent a goodly portion of the evening working on Emma's room, and my goo'ness does that girly have alot of sparkly plastic things. Combs, bracelets, costumes, crowns, pens, ponies, even books are coated in sparkly plastic. It's quite the phenomenon. Luckily, Em is not too sentimental about things she's outgrown. All the princess stuff? "Gone." as she put it. "Trash." When we wailed on and on about her Little Mermaid Doll that she used to take EVERYWHERE and sing with and play with and love, she looked at me and said "Well, you keep it then!" Bo, on the other hand, stacked up the books that were his favorites long ago which got handed down, and then outgrown.
Ping
Hug (He and I will still say "Bo Bo!!!!" "Mama!!!!")
Toad Makes a Road
Bill and Pete (about a crocodile named William Everett. A must-have for a boy named William Everett.)

WHAT? Bo's name is William Everett????

Well, that's a story for another post.


Anyways. About this crap around the place. I really want to keep up with it, honestly, but my kitchen keeps pulling me back. It calls me down the corridor... "You really want to try something in that new dutch oven of yours!" And my new griddle cries out "Pancakes! Your kids NEED pancakes!" And once Betty starts her seductive whirring...well, I'm just lost.

But seriously. I really needed those things. OK. I've lived without them for 33 years now, but I think that's long enough to prove a point.

Besides, I still have empty drawers in my kitchen. So there.
And you know what? I plan on keeping them empty for a long time.
Space. The final frontier.
It's not just for Trekkies anymore.

Live long and prosper.

2009

You lucky year, you.

2008 did all the hard work
saw all the changes
the dramas
the boxes filled up
emptied
filled up
emptied
filled up
emptied again
and disposed of
new jobs
new schools
major shifts
in thinking
living
goodbyes.

so hello '09.
with hope
I anticipate
comparatively
little out of you.