Respect. Diversity.

you know what's so strange? Well I guess not strange, but well.... amazing. The way that we are all a billion people going about our business every single day, but so many people, whether we cross paths with them or not, are doing completely different things? I don't mean like on a simple level, like you are a doctor, you are a policeman, you are a shop owner. This isn't Busytown I am envisioning. But seriously, the big picture.

Like you live in Some exotic locale and surf all day, and you live in some exotic locale and worry about where your next drink of water will come from, and you live right here in America and worry about national security, and you live right here in America and worry about road repairs, and you live right here in America and worry about being shot on your way to visit your grandkids, and I live in America and worry about having enough clean underwear. It's so bizarre, all of us being humans and all worrying about such different things. I think about animals. Are there cows living all over the world with all these different aspirations and worries? Hmmm. That might be a stretch.

It takes everything I have to make it through a day with two toddlers, worrying about raising them to respect people and raising them to be polite, and just plain RAISING THEM. And people often are perturbed that I don't know enough about the national debt, or the impact of clean water (or lack thereof) for people in far away countries, or the number of politicians in the senate and the house. And here I am struggling to get the laundry done, the tomatoes canned, the toys off the floor, and the kids taken care of. Nothing makes you feel more like an insignificant nothing... than thinking about all the people in this world, going about their own daily lives. It's overwhelming. It takes my breath away. And it makes me feel like a crazy person because I go to sleep wondering if that bag of freshly picked green beans will fill 7 pint sized jars or some odd number that's going to frustrate me when I can them tomorrow.

And sometimes, when I think of the sheer magnitude of the things that people accomplish out in this world, I think "What Am I DOING?!" What do I do with my days. Where do they go?

Raising my kids is the single most important thing on my agenda. Every. Single. Day. But there are scientists working on a cure for cancer. There are soldiers missing their own families to protect mine. There are actors providing entertainment, and artists decorating the world. There are chefs creating fabulous meals that wow everyone who tastes them and make our chicken noodle soup from a can and grilled cheese sandwiches look like a joke. There are people who aspire to go to the moon. And then there are people like me, who give baths and read stories and fold tiny pairs of underwear and match millions of miniature socks, and get drinks and snacks, and take walks and answer the 437 "why" questions that a four year old shouts out to us on a daily basis. Tonight I wonder how something SO incredibly important to me can seem so ridiculous in the scheme of things?

I then try to asses the situation and determine what exactly possessed me to grow up deciding that I wanted to be a mom. What made me so sure that the ONLY thing that mattered to me was having kids and raising them? The only answer that I can give, is that I don't want to be the one to cure cancer. I hope that there is that person out there that DOES, but honestly, it's just not my bag of tricks. I don't want to go to the moon. At all. Ever. I think we should leave the moon (and Mars and all it's salt water for that matter) alone. I don't think we have any business checking into another planet when we are about to destroy our own. But what do I know, I am just a housewife :)

But I realize that these people are doing these fantastic things, and doing fantastic job at them, because this is what they are DRIVEN to do. And I, fortunately or unfortunately, am driven to be a mom. I am driven to recycle like a maniac and pile cardboard to the sky as my husband looks on and shakes his head. I am driven to raise chickens and can food, and buy kid clothes at garage sale prices. I am driven to get my hands in the dirt and grow vegetables and water flowers, and pull weeds from around the inside of my little picket fence. I am driven to read bedtime stories and scrub dirty toes and brush rats out of a screaming 3 year old's curly hair. I am driven to try to make mom friends who aren't catty and judgmental of each other. I am driven to encourage others to believe what they want and stand up for themselves. I am driven to encourage others to agree to disagree and embrace the differences about our lives and love each other anyway.

I love my best friend who has been in the military her whole life. I love that what drives her, protects me. I love my best friend that protects wildflowers and trees and teaches me everything I could possibly need to know about being a responsible steward of the land and taking into account the impact my life has on our mother Earth. I love my friends who are interested in politics and can talk to me at my level and help me to see why decisions made are right or wrong. I love my friend who wants to go on mission trips to help people less fortunate, and my friend who wants to do AIDS research, and my friend who introduced me to the delicious cuisine of Morocco. I love my friend who is a fanatic Christian and my friend who is a fanatic agnostic. I love my friend whose excitement is her next Tattoo, and my friend who can cut hair like no one else I have ever seen. I love my friend who has an eye for photography unlike anyone I personally know. I love being fortunate to be friends with so many diverse, interesting, and DRIVEN People. Even if they are not always driven in the same direction as I am. ESPECIALLY if they are not driven in the same direction as I am. I don't aspire to hang out with a zillion people just like me. That is not my idea of a good time. I love diversity. I ADORE people who teach you something every time you talk to them.

I love the internet, and blogs, and Flickr, and YES, I LOVE FACEBOOK. Because I am able to be connected to all of these people in some tiny way. Because I need to be constantly reminded that while I am out here thinking about what's for supper (yet again) they are thinking about someone who won't get any supper, or they are worried about How many trees were killed to make the paper plate that I am going to eat off because I can't find the motivation to load the damn dishwasher.

I want to be reminded that someone out there is incredibly angry at the house of representatives for passing a bill that will directly affect their small business. I want to know that The price of gas went up five cents and the stock market had a bad day. Even if I am not going to run right out and picket the gas station, or change my stock options, or pack my bags for a mission trip, I really, really, really, need these friends to remind me that there is so much more going on in the world. And I really need these friends who respect what I am doing, what I believe in, and what I am DRIVEN to do. These friends, these people who are not judging me, who are not hating me, and who are understanding of what I do and what I believe in, and what I stand for.... they do not expect me to be a cookie cutout of them. They don't want me to be like them, they don't want me to do as they do, say as they say, and believe everything exactly as they believe. They respect and encourage open debates and conversations. We are keeping each other on our toes. We are exercising our minds and reveling in our differences. THIS is why I love the internet. It provides us a way to be connected to so many different people, in different places, in different walks of life. They teach me something new every day. They drive me to "google it" and learn about something that I never even considered before. Their passions make me ask questions. Their DRIVE makes me rethink things that I thought I was sure of. Friends have a way of giving you their viewpoint and making you think.

After a long day of saying "don't do that" and "don't touch that" and "sit down on your butt" and "keep your hands to yourself" and "please put that back where you found it" and "buckle your seatbelt" and "turn off the light" and "Use the soap" and "Is that your inside voice?" - The last thing I want is to tell other people what to think, what to do, what to believe. I have my own kids to practice that with.

So, for all you friends who agree to disagree, and all you friends who are driven to do different things with your lives, and who are passionate about causes that I know little to nothing about... just keep it coming. Keep me posted, keep my updated, keep me in the loop. Keep my mind fresh and keep my heart humble. And thanks for tolerating all the little things that make the hours fly by in this little house :) You are great friends, and yes, even great acquaintances. Keep encouraging me to see the other side of things. Keep lifting me up when I have a rough day. Keep reminding me that my rough day is someone else's walk in the park. Even if I don't see you often, or ever, you are important to me. Reading what you have to say... is important to me. Keep being driven in a different directions, because that is what enables me to keep driving in my direction.

Long Lost Love

Dearest Blog,

I miss you. I promise we will be together again, someday soon. Wait for me!

Love,
Meagan

P.S. It's not you, it's me. Ardyn had croup and then walking pneumonia with a blistering ear infection, which we cleared up just in time for Marek's Birthday party. Then the day after Marek's birthday, he came down with Croup and I have been sleeping upright while holding him for the past two nights, and napping with him at brief intervals each day. Tonight we finally went to the ER for what we hoped would be a steroid shot and a breathing treatment, but instead were given an antibiotic. So now he is on oral steroids, ibuprofen, and amoxicillan. Hopefully he does better tonight because I could really use some uninterrupted sleep, or at least more than 6 hours of sleep ;) That is why I must go to bed instead of blogging now, because It's already nearing 1:30 am and I stayed up late to wash diapers because I am so far behind that we can't walk through the house without tripping, we have used every diaper in the house, and there is not an inch of counterspace or clean towels in the place. Forgive me, dear Blog....

When Hate Turns To Love...

You know, as a kid, there were very few things that I hated. I didn't mind snakes or spiders, or salamanders or frogs. I didn't mind broccoli, I didn't mind getting muddy. I wasn't afraid of mice. But I hated three things. Celery, Green Beans, and Tea. I still hate celery. Now I like Green Beans. But that hatred for Tea... it's a strange thing. My mom was the queen of iced tea and sun tea. There was always a big glass jar out on the brick patio in the sun. Whenever we were outside playing, she had a big glass of iced tea filled with ice cubes. I remember being little and going over to get a drink from her glass, and smelling that it was tea, and putting that glass right back down. Sometimes it would just be ice cubes and I would want one to munch on, but nothing ruins a glass full of icy cool cubes like the taste of residual tea. Yuk! It got to the point where I had spit out enough ice cubes to learn to ask first "Was this tea?" and then when the answer was yes, I 'd change my mind entirely about wanting an ice cube.

When in high school and college, I tried hot tea, specifically and first I tried hot tea at Chinese restraunts. Yuk. No thanks. I branched out. I tried flavored hot teas. Yuk. I added SPOONFULS of sugar. Yuk. Tea was just not for me!

Then one day about two years ago, I ate Moroccan food made by Monika at the Chestnut Street Inn in Sheffield. She had hot tea... Moroccan mint tea. It was to die for. I started out on a search for a mint tea that I could make at home, and bought some Tazo. The only other tea that we had at our house was Lipton Ice Tea, and I used that to put in Vodka Slushes, where I couldn't taste it. After the Tazo mint tea, I thought I might be able to find some that I would like. My midwife recommended Chamomile Tea before bed when I was pregnant, to help me sleep. It was then that I decided that perhaps CHEAP tea was not the way to go, especially if you were picky about your tea. I had bought the Tazo Mint at Austin Parker Naturals in Princeton, so I went back to look for the Chamomille, and liked the Republic of Tea Brand because it came in a reusable tin, and the teabags were round, and without a string and tag, designed to sit in the bottom or your cup, under a spoon. I bought a tin of Chamomille and Lemon for $9.95 and was instantly pleased. I drank at least one cup a night. I loved tea! What had happened! Then when I was hoping to go into labor, my friend Trish and all the pregnancy message boards recommended Red Raspberry Leaf Tea, and Trish brought some over. So I drank that, even double strength like she suggested. No labor, but the tea did taste good! After the baby was born, I started drinking Yodi Brand Mother's Milk Tea, to help increase and maintain a healthy milk supply... and I bought it in Bulk from amazon. Something like 6 boxes of tea, 96 tea bags total. And I am on my third box of Mother's Milk Tea.

Now I love to look at the Republic of Tea catalog and wish I had unlimited funds so I could try all kinds of tea. I wish someone would get me a gift certificate. I wish someone would buy me a cute little tea for one set like this one, and this one, or even this one. My mom makes fun of me because I have always wanted one of these, but never had a reason because I hate tea. She used to laugh at what I was going to use it for if I don't drink tea. Then I start to covet "special" teacups and mugs. I want one with a saucer. I want to feel special and I want tea time to be a special occasion. I saw this hand thrown mug and saucer and it about KILLS me not to buy it up and stand at the post office waiting for it to arrive. I drink tea at work, and when I remember, I drink tea at home.

Isn't it strange when something you hate can become something you love? I guess it's easier for me to release a grudge I have against tea, even when I can't release a grudge I have against a person. Lucky tea.

Drip Dry My Keyboard....

You know, sometimes reality really sucks.
That's stating the obvious now, isn't it?

Tonight I am trying to pick up my disaster of a house. It's not pretty. I thought I was going to get SO much done this weekend. Heh. It MIGHT have something to do with the 13.5 hours that I spent reading the vampire books. But reading those books and feeling such strong emotions just reminds me how everyday life can be a total drag. And it reminds me of how much it can also be so very dramatic.

In books and movies, the characters often talk about the hole that's left behind when someone you love leaves you. And that is something that I have felt before. I think that's something that we have almost all felt before. Everyone responds to that feeling differently. I tend to shut down. I don't eat. I don't do much of anything. I go all zombie. One foot in front of the other. When I went through times like that in my life, I remember literally trying to "sleep it off" because that's the only time that I didn't hurt. Now granted, there are such things as nightmares, but I have always been more the type to have dreams of the reality that I wish I was having. Dreams of feeling whole again, and happy.

I remember that feeling, like you might just die. Where it physically hurts. When everywhere you turn, you are reminded of the person that you are missing. I don't know what is worse, losing someone that you love, or having someone that you love die. I have been lucky enough to not have very many people close to me die. I can't even fathom it. What's worse? Knowing that someone that you care about is out there leading their life and they don't want you anymore, or knowing that you can never see them again and they DID want you? I can't even imagine.

A friend of mine recently made a comment about new love. She got a wistful look in her eyes and mentioned how sweet the feeling of new love is. I remember that feeling too. After 10 years with my husband, It's hard to fathom that feeling of new love. We are so in tuned with each other that we know what the other is thinking. We know what will happen next. There is nothing that can compare to that familiarity. When the other person knows what you are thinking and feeling. Knows what music you want to hear, and what food you want for dinner. That person that knows so much about you that you start to feel like that's the way life will be forever.

What scares me more than the loss of a person who you loved once in your life, for a fleeting but powerful amount of time, is the potential of losing someone with whom you have gained so much more familiarity, or with whom you have a relationship so powerful that you take it for granted every single day, even when you don't mean to. We all have fears. I don't like flying. I don't like water. But you know, my biggest fear of all is losing someone so incredibly close to me that I can't imagine life without them.

The best friends that you met in kindergarden. Your parents. A sibling. The love of your life. Just the thought of that, the honest thought of "what if" I never see this person ever again.... it just about tears me in two. That handful of people that are your world. And I can feel the overwhelming gaping hole, rough around the edges, that makes you gasp for breath, that puts a huge weight on your chest, and starts the tears rolling silently down your face. I think of the "what if" and I envision it at different stages of my life. I think "what if" something happens and we never get to have kids together. I think "what if" my husband leaves me with small children. "what if" he leaves me when my kids are grown. "what if" I am 60, or 70, or 80. When would that "what if" ever be okay. When would I EVER be able to deal with it. When would it be harder, or easier, for me to lose someone that close to me? Never. The answer is never. It's never going to be okay. I am never going to be okay without him.

My husband always says I worry too much. He always says "I won't ever leave you." and I know that's a promise that a person can't make. I know that the world and life itself is out of his control... and is out of everyone's control. Some people turn to "faith" and turn to an afterlife to get them through thoughts like that. But I have to honestly tell you, it's not the afterlife that worries me. It's life right here on earth without that person. It's the thought of waking up alone in the morning. It's the thought of having no one to curl up on the couch with. No one to take for granted. It's not having to move his deoderant out from in front of your face wash every morning. It's not knocking his toothbrush out of the holder every time you reach for yours. It's the thought of no wedding ring on my finger. Of no one to kiss me goodbye in the morning. It terrifies me. It's almost crippling. Those are the kinds of things that I think about every day. The things that start to make me feel like something is crushing my chest and tearing my heart out. And I know that someday that will happen to me. Someday I will feel that feeling again, with more force than I have ever felt it before. And when I thought I would almost die the first time, with a relationship that in the end turned out to be insignificant and small... what would a real loss do to me? It makes me shudder.

It amazes me that not everyone thinks like this. And I think to myself, why do I have to be this incredibly sensitive person who thinks of things like this? Am I living my life to the fullest, or am I just being stressed and drug down by the weight of the fear of losing someone? Am I too passionate? Too dependent on the relationships that I have with others? Why am I not able to distance myself from these thoughts, from this anxiety that I feel everytime my husband gets on a plane, every time his car pulls out of the driveway? What is wrong with me? Why do I see the dark side? Why do I stress out so much about the end? Sometimes I think to myself, wow, in two years I will be 30. Assuming that I live to the ripe age of 90, my life is 1/3 over. That always makes Evan laugh. He says I am melodramatic. He says I should show some optimism.
When I was a junior in high school, my english teacher had a conversation with me once about romaticism. About going through life with "rose colored glasses." She told me that I am a helpless romantic. And she hinted towards how painful that can be in live. She said the worse part of life would be when those rose colored glasses came off. And when it happened, all I could think about was what she had said. And I started to think that if I just never put them back on, I would be able to protect myself. And I tried it for a while. But somewhere along the way I would put them back on, almost by accident, like my future was shining so bright I needed them- and then someone would always succeeed to knock them off. To screw me over. Basically I would get royally fucked over and the glasses would come off and I would think "how did you NOT see that coming?" and then I would vow NEVER again would that happen. Never again would I not see it coming. And after a few times of "learning my lesson" after trusting someone completely, I started to rely more on the "look out for number 1" theory- and I do alot of thinking "what if?"

So how does one go through life without thinking "what if?" And I don't mean regret. I don't look back and say "what if." More often I think back and say thank GOD that didn't happen. Thank GOD that prayer wasn't answered. What happened was for the better. It was destiny. Fate. Right? So how do you look FORWARD and instead of thinking "what if" just think that it's fate or destiny, and whatever happens, happens. That there is no way to prepare yourself for the worst. How can you force yourself to wear those rose colored glasses when you know they will just get shattered time and time again?