Soap Box

Bye-bye 2009

I guess those silly glasses can finally go. You know the ones where the zeros frame your eyes. I am done with the zeros. This decade has been a ride, one that I would take again with the instruction manual.

I remember I used to say if I can just get to July (2002) everything will settle down and there will be time to enjoy life. Well, I never took that time. I got pregnant in August (2002) and life has never had a dull moment since then.

Usually I spend New Year's Eve making goals and plans for the next year, five years and ten years. But this year I will spend it saying good bye to all the baggage and crap I learned in the last decade. Tonight is not about pushing myself to the breaking point for the next five years, it is not about making the most money or having the best house, it is about saying good bye to all the perfect that never was. Good bye to the competition of life. Good bye to this decade.

I know I am not alone in wanting this year over. Let alone wanting this decade over. It has been one of the hardest times I have ever seen on my friends, my family, people I don't even know. It has taken it's toll and we (I hope) are going to be better for it.

I am starting fresh next year. And my focus is simple ... happy. I am going to go back to the things I love - like working and watching good TV and making my kids laugh. I am going to take the time to breathe and dance and sing and smile. I am going to take joy in the little things. I am going to remember to laugh and cry with my friends.

I am reminded of the way Carolyn acts towards others in this world. It is simple and real. It is through the eyes of a child, where we, all of us, are the same. I will tell myself this story over and over for the next year to bring me back to reality of what life should be about.

About three years ago I brought Carolyn to Northampton to hang out with my birth-mother and have some girl fun. She picked out some magnets for her dad (Father's Day was around the corner) that she was so proud of. As we were walking along the street she stopped to show this guy her magnets that she picked out. He was a homeless guy. And she made his day. He smiled and told her how much her dad was going to love them. There was no judgment by anyone, there was no holding her back, there was no scolding that she was talking to a homeless man, there was no fear.

And she just beamed.
And he just laughed.

And that is what life is about. Bringing joy and happiness to everyone, no matter if they have a mansion or cottage or shelter. Making a difference, for the better, in this world starts with a smile and a helping hand. One that a child gives so freely and with pure love.

May a smile cross your face this year and may you pass it along to someone who needs it. And may you find the happiness your heart desires because we only get the chance to do this once. Sometimes we take that for granted. Happy 2010 to all of you.

Christmas: Together Through Death

In three days it will be 15 years.
Fifteen years since I have been with my mother on Christmas.
Fifteen years of Christmas joy that really never came.

My mother died on Christmas at around eight o'clock in the evening. After she tried to hold on to make it through the day. See her mother died on Christmas Eve, when she was 13, and she never really found the joy in Christmas again. And as any good mother, she tried to spare that for me. But she couldn't hold on for the extra four hours.

So when you ask me why I sleep so much or don't listen to the radio or am not in the Christmas spirit, that is why. I do have the spirit, it is just different, it is one of memories. And I cherish every one. I would not change my path because I got to share the first 20 years of my life with my mother and because of her death my life was placed on this path, a path I treasure.

My mother was an amazing women.
I am not going to go into every aspect of her life that touched so many. Just know, on that cold day after Christmas, the church was packed as we all said our last good-byes.

So what is Christmas about? Really in 2009, what is it about? It is not a celebration of Jesus' birth because he was born in March. It is not to help your neighbor because I bet you have spent more on gifts than volunteering your time this year. It should be about family, and therein lies my problem. There are so many in this country that have forgotten that. Greed, "Christian Values", over indulgent parties. If it really was about celebrating Jesus' birthday, as many claim, they would be tolerant and excepting of all people in this world and giving of their money and time to help those less fortunate.

I tolerate Christmas. It is better these days with the addition of Carolyn six years ago and Bobby this year. It is about them now. It is about the joy in their faces. It is about lighting a candle to remember my mom and talk about her to the kids so she can live in their memories. It is about family again. Not the gifts, not the clean house, not the over the top. Just simple and basic. Santa brings some gifts, we make cookies, and we get to spend it with the people we love.

Happy 15 years mom. You are missed everyday. 

And if you have a mother out there, call her, just to say hi - nothing more. Once she is gone you are never the same, trust me. So remember this year it is the simple things in life that mean the most. A call, a helping hand with the snow, a smile when you pass them on the street begging for change. We are in this together, this life thing, and sometimes it takes death to remind us.

The Hometown "New"spaper

I don't live in the town where I grew up. In fact, I live about 103 miles from Agawam, Mass. Which I bet, when compared to my other classmates from '92, is pretty close. But I don't get the Agawam Advertiser at home weekly like I used to.

I loved my hometown paper. I would cut things out and save them in photo albums... photos, important articles about high school, sports events ... I had boxes of them in my parents' basement. They got damp and were tossed in the big move years ago. But I still remember going through the paper every week, my hands black from the ink, and reading about everything happening in my life and the lives of my friends. It was my source to find out the news.

I assume only a handful of my classmates still live in Agawam, many live in the surrounding 'burbs so they see each other more. I have not seen a high school classmate in at least a decade - and I can't even think of who that might have been. I miss many of them because ... I loved high school.

And then came Facebook, and I am instantly connected again, with friends from all parts of my life.

The other day a status update took me by surprise. One of my friend's, brother posted that his other sister, Lisa Uneegar, had died. I was shocked. She was 17 days younger than me and she was dead? I thought this could not be. But it was. And then I realized I would have never known if it weren't for Facebook.

Facebook is our new hometown paper. No more reading the marriage, birth or death announcements in your local paper like our parents did. No more getting the police blotter in the paper. No more starting our days quietly reading the local events over coffee. We get all this plus pictures and links to articles on Facebook everyday, instantly. And I am thankful for it.

People no longer stay in their hometown and raise the next generation. We move, we explore we find a new town and settle in. But all of us still want to be connected to our past, in some form. And Facebook gives us that. Facebook tells us when someone we know goes into labor, when a tooth is lost and when a divorce is happening. Facebook is our way of staying in contact with our friends we have made along the way.

I wish I had not seen that status update because she was a very sweet person and had more to offer this world. I still remember her laugh and they way the three of them used to fight. But I am thankful that I was friends with her brother on Facebook so I was able to read about her passing.

No matter what we call our daily update on Facebook, it is not an addiction, it is not something that takes time away from our families, it is our hometown paper. The place we check out daily to see what is happening in our friends' world. It is the place where we can be a community ... even though we can't touch each other, we offer support, we give advise, we congratulate each other on our accomplishments. We have created our own spheres of community, people who are there for each of us.
Just like our hometown community.

Reflection on the Decade

It is the end of the year and decade. And oh what a time it has been.

I am getting ready for all the people of the year and the year in review and those who left us this year. But those list compilers have an extra step to do, they have to find out what this decade was and remind us of just how hard it was.

I, like all of you, have changed in the last ten years. I started this decade as a single, care-free, young woman, living in Chicago, working at one of the best newspapers in the country and living in a cool artists' building (even though my bathroom was down the hall). And I am exiting it a stay-at-home mother of two, mortgage and bill paying member of society, pre-middle-aged, and a marriage that well, ... we will talk more about that in 2010.

This decade has been a hard one for many of us. And after reading Time's article reviewing this catastrophe of a decade, I realized that we are lucky it was not worse. Maybe it was the time in my life, this coming of age, but this decade boggles my mind at all the craziness - no wonder why George W. Bush was President! It started with a fiasco of a Presidential election and ended with one of the worst financial crises in the history of this country. When you sit and review it was like every year had it's fair share of heartache.

Now onto the teens.
Will we rebel like any good teenager does?
How will we reflect and change for the better?

I would not change this decade or my path in it for anything. I have two beautiful, wonderful children and family and friends who lift me up everyday. I have never been an optimist but I am looking forward to the next decade and what life changes it brings. I am using the end of this decade to reflect and remember all those we have lost and those who have entered our life.

I am a realist - at least that is what friends call me. Bring on the next decade and let us not forget what brought each of us to this point.

Truth or Dare

I have talked in the past about Circles of Friends and how they intersect with my life. Last night I was thinking of this again. And wondering what term you would use for people that are more than acquaintances but not close friends who know about your life.

And I am stuck on that.

It is the end of another year but more importantly another decade. I have many more circles of friends but how well do they know me and I them? We now live in amazing time where we can be socially connected to anyone in about .5 seconds. People we haven't seen in years, people we hide from our news feed, people we wish we could un-friend because they changed so much and yet Facebook calls them friends.

When I started this decade at 25 years old, I had a completely different group of friends. Now, at 35, my circles have expanded and grown just like me. But do I know one important thing in each of these friends' lives that impacted them in a dramatic way? Do I know their story? Probably not, some I do, but  most of them I do not.

And I have assumed many things about people. I thought I could joke around with a former colleague but that person took offense to one of my comments. I guess at the end of the day you can have hundreds of friends, colleagues, drinking buddies but you only have a handful of friends. Friends who know that you are a happy person who has to deal with a lot, friends who you don't have to explain everything to, friends who at the end of the day, look at you and know what to say.

Maybe we all should take a moment and play that Junior High game of Truth or Dare and get to know someone before we make comments or judge or call them a friend. Because I bet we could all use a little more truth about each other and a little less dare. That is one thing I hope to work on next year.

American Girl

Yesterday, I ventured into the world of the unknown.
I went to an American Girl Doll store.
I have now reached a new level of mothering a young girl.

I am conflicted with this store for obvious reasons. Anyone charging $95 for a doll has no idea what real American girls can afford or their parents. But the store was packed. People (mostly women) buying multiple dolls. Hundreds of dollars on dolls? I had entered a whole new level of status symbol.

The concept is interesting. Pick a time period in American history and create a doll to represent that era. Then create accessories, outfits, pets, best-friends, story books everything that these young consumer driven kids want. And these women were buying them ... huge boxes of kitchen sets or bedroom sets. It was a sea of red and pink.

I think it is very important for young, impressionable girls to understand American history and how they and we got to this point. I am not fully against the concept of these dolls. But they are so out of reach for most of the girls in this country. And there are only three dolls of color out of the thirteen era dolls. I don't think I saw one person of color in the store yesterday, and I am not surprised.

So what exactly are they teaching girls? I guess that is what I am trying to figure out. This is a new thing for Carolyn to be doing. Her Grandmother (my in-laws) got her a Bitty Baby when she was a toddler and this summer got Carolyn the Elizabeth doll. It seams they do have a very nice story about the particular era they are from, so I look forward to talking with Carolyn about that and expanding it with my feminist lens.

But they are a status symbols among young girls and I do not think that is a good thing to be teaching. So I am conflicted. We ended up with the Kit doll, from 1934 so we get to talk about the depression and men losing their jobs. I guess Carolyn can relate that to present day, except women are also losing their jobs now, interesting twist.

Bobby and I got out of the store alive and unharmed with our over-sized red bag with our precious doll tucked safely inside. I am entering this with my eyes wide open. And like everything else, I will see it through my experience and how I want Carolyn to grow up. I guess the only American girl I want is the song ... which is now stuck in my head.

Learning Everyday

I am that person who always asks the questions that many only think about asking. Sometimes my filter is broken and I put my entire self in my mouth. Thank Goddess I have a quick comeback that makes people laugh at me. I am usually the one that people tell to ask their questions. Straightforward and to the point, that's me, and it ALWAYS takes people a minute to catch their breath upon meeting me for the first time.

For example ...

Yesterday, while visiting old colleagues at the State House, I met a very nice young woman who is new to the Senator's staff. As I was asking her questions about how she came to the job she mentioned Chicago. I quickly engaged on this topic as I too once lived in Chicago. She told me she used to work for Dick Durbin as his Asian-American liaison (or something like that).

Why? You're not Asian? --- Yeah, that was me, totally not the PC thing to say. 
She look at me like I was the craziest person in the world and said yes, I am. I said aren't you from India? She quickly informed me that India was part of Asia.

Since when? --- Yeah, me again.


Since forever. While everyone else in the room seemed to know this, I had no clue. I always thought India was it's own thing and Asia was, well, Asia. She must have thought I was kidding because that nervous laughter had started ... from everyone.

I said well I never knew that, I must have missed that memo since I have been at home with the kids (all of 15 months) and it has felt like foreever. Laughter is the greatest thing, it puts everyone at ease immediately ... especially when you can be the one making a fool of yourself.

I then thanked her, because seriously, I never knew that.


So yesterday I learned something new. It was a good day. And I am happy I said what I said and asked that question. It is always humbling to know you have more to learn and I can't wait to see what tomorrow brings. And to that sweet, young woman ... I wish her the best. Next time we can laugh over drinks because I am sure I will put my entire self in my mouth again. But hey, you might learn something new too!

Inbox Full but Still Thinking

I have about 45 minutes until I go back to work.
My life is in 4 hour intervals. 8am, 12pm, 4pm, 8pm

And rarely can I accomplish all the tasks on my list before I am too tired to think. I have come to realize that being a stay-at-home mother is totally overwhelming and lonely. I have also been awakened to that fact that people who do not have children have no concept of time restraints on mothers.

I would say about half of my friends do not have children. Therefore they get to read the latest blogs, newspaper articles and New York Times opinion pieces. Something I have not really had the time to do since 2003 when my daughter was born. The kicker is then they e-mail the pieces they think are important to get feedback from their wide group of friends. I swear some of the e-mails I have in my inbox are the size of a dissertation paper. And then all the other childless friends respond back and by the time I get to read the original e-mail, not even the piece they are commenting on, they all have moved on.

I can't keep up. And I know it is not just me. I have no nanny to help, I have no job to go to so I can read these articles, I have the 45 minutes (3 times a day) during a nap to catch my breath and write. I am a typical mom. One day I am going to write down everything I do and that will open many eyes.

So, I wonder then, who is driving the conversation for women like me?

The first thing that popped into my mind is the Republican party. Why? Because they can tell you the bottom line in about a minute. And they are attracting moms because they make it easy. Who has time to think through your answer and back it up with the latest research when you can't even use the bathroom without a child screaming? I am not surprised that women are changing political parties. They are not put down for staying home, they have easy actions to feel involved and most importantly they are talking to them and making them (me) feel valuable. Where, in the last decade, did feminists forget that mothers, still have something to add to the conversation.

I don't have time for a 10 page article or some lofty idea that takes me 15 minutes to read. I need to know what you want me to do and I need to know when my deadline is. Sitting in some coffee shop and talking about the future of the generations is something I have no time for, unless you are my financial planner and we are discussing my kids' college funds. Moms want to be involved but we need you to sell me on the idea in a sentence or two. When the kids are older we will have more time to read the impressive articles that you have written but until then please climb off your mountain for a minute.

You are missing a two-for-one opportunity when you move without the mothers. See, you want me involved so that my children grow up watching your organization and they in turn become involved with it. It is like the churches, when you get the moms you get the kids and when you get the kids you get the moms.
It is not rocket science folks.

My 10 minutes are up. Off to make lunch before the baby starts crying. Maybe I will take a shower today, maybe I will get through my list of "to do" items and just maybe I will get to respond to 1 of the 47 e-mails in my inbox. But that may be expecting too much. We moms are here and we have better days and worse days and we are a growing population. I know for sure we are still thinking and still forming opinions and still wanting to be involved. It would be wise if you all noticed that too and took a breath for a minute to let us respond and value our input.

Quick Thought

While reading about the "Decade from Hell" in Time magazine (more about the article in another post) this morning it struck me that it really was an awful decade. I thought about our friend Bernie Madoff and how much he played a role in our hellish decade and just how much people, including me, are blaming him.

Then I though, he is a genius. And good for him. He made millions off of our greed.

I had no money invested with him, so he did not ruin me personally. I don't condone what he did, I am happy he got caught and I am pleased with our judicial system for finding him guilty and giving him the punishment he deserves.

But wow, what a smart man. I am amazed at how intricate and huge this scheme was. People believe what they want and last time I checked we can't get rich fast (usually). And if you can't look at yourself and see how you influenced this man to construct this scheme then it will happen again.

Greed and Gullible mix very well for some.

The Point

Why is it that people always say "she wasn't practicing safe sex?"
When did women become the only people responsible for sex?
And how is it possible that only women are having sex?

I just read an article that a young friend of mine posted on FaceBook about a woman who shook her 1 year old to death, in Mississippi. This could be anywhere, it happens in Massachusetts. I am proud to say we passed a bill to teach parents about shaken baby syndrome in the hospital. And while it may not prevent every death of an infant, it may help parents to learn different ways to handle a screaming baby.

The point is that education will help save lives and that is what was missing here.

While this story is tragic and awful that is not the part that struck me.

One comment under this posting, by a man who I will presume is young, said "I'll start by saying that safe sex has nothing to do with the story on the surface, but the story wouldn't have even happened if she'd used some protection and not had the child she obviously didn't want to begin with."

OK, back up ... beep, beep, beep.

How do you know she didn't want that child? This young mother who has been charged in the death of her infant daughter is 22 years old. She is eight months pregnant with her FOURTH child, the other kids are 3 and 2. As a 35 year old mother, I can tell you there are days that put me flat out and my kids are 6 and 6 months. I can't imagine having that many kids so close together ... it is like the days of yore on the farm!

I bet she wanted each one of those kids. I bet she knew nothing different. I bet she was doing just what her mother and aunts and sisters and cousins have done. I bet society, including you young man, have judged her for the choices she made. Why aren't you saying anything about the father(s) of these kids? Where were they? Why didn't they practice safe sex?

Newsflash ... women like having sex.

And while I will agree that women are more responsible and are smarter, I will not agree that we are solely responsible for procreating. Yes, she had choices along the way. He did too. Last time I checked you did not need a prescription for condoms, in fact I think they sell them in the bathroom for about a dollar. No need to spread your legs for a doctor to check you out, to write a prescription, to take to the pharmacist, to take for a month before they start working, all the while being judged and paying roughly $100 and then making monthly payments to ensure you don't get pregnant.

The point of this horrible story is that nobody has ever told this young woman how valuable she is to the world. Nobody has ever told her she deserves more then the vicious cycle she was born into. Nobody has ever taken the time to encourage her to get an education. It is about how we, as a society, perpetuate this cycle.

So my friend, before you go making comments about a woman you have never met, living a life you will never understand, I suggest you think about her situation. And then think about the men in her life. You tell me if safe sex would have prevented this tragedy. I think not.

We need to start paying the people who work with these families a living wage, we need to pass more laws educating parents about how to help their kids, we need to make birth control available to everyone who wants it - free of charge, we need to lift people out of this cycle and help them get the education they deserve, and we need to be a community raising all of our children - again, just like on the farm.

This woman and her kids don't have a chance until you and society stop judging and start helping. Safe sex starts with education and education costs money - something I am pretty sure she did not have.That is the point.