Eleanor Roosevelt said, “Do one thing every day that scares you.”
As best stories sometimes come out of their authors’ fears, what do you say for writing about one thing that scares you every day? For example, what scares you today?

I feel like nearly every day since becoming a mother, my life dictates that I automatically do at least one thing every day that scares me. Motherhood is one terrifying-as-fuck journey some days for real. I find myself fairly well-rooted in the fear that I am screwing up , even on the days when I grudgingly award myself an A- for parenting at the close of a particularly productive trip around the sun.

As my daughter rapidly approaches puberty, some days I am completely overwhelmed by those fears. We get sidelined by epic shouting matches as she seems compelled to argue with me over the most mundane things. It seems we are destined to never agree on a wide spectrum of topics from, "what shirt goes best with those leggings", or "why chicken nuggets are still chicken" to "why one particular Hamilton cover is in fact, not Sia but some other artist". Sadly, these are all very real examples drawn from actual arguments. I blame our most irrational debates on burgeoning hormones and on my patience and sanity, both of which have been severely compromised in the wake of COVID.

I try not to to think about the fact that she's not even a preteen yet. The truth is that real emotional fireworks haven't started yet and that thought fills me with a numb horror some days. I wonder how we will make it through these coming years, she and I. The anxiety overwhelms me at times and I have to take step back. I have to slow down. I have to acknowledge that we have amazing moments still too. 

For as much as we may battle, she will still randomly take my hand in the grocery store, unconsciously slipping her delicate fingers through mine. She still prefers to sleep in between us most nights and we one of us will always wake with her lithe body snuggled up against our back or her small face pressed against our neck. As much as she loves time with her friends, she seems content to settle back into time with us after returning from play dates and sleepovers. The graceful and forgiving truth is that as often as I have seen the budding adolescent in her these past weeks and months, I have also had glimpses of the loving, dependent child she still is in her heart and it gives me a beautiful respite from the fear.

Riding with the Wind...

As a parent, there are a few of those milestone moments you know are coming down the pike. Some of them are terrifying to contemplate, like the onset of puberty and all those awkward talks you just know are waiting in the wings. Then there are those moments you look forward to with sweet contentment, like the day the training wheels come off their bike and they learn to ride.

You think you know how it will go. There will be a few bumps and bruises but they will turn their  little faces to you, ready to sop up all your sage advice and guidance.  You will encourage and empower them and they will be determined and grateful. Then comes the reward, watching them glide away from you, the wind at their backs and their gleeful voices singing your praises for delivering them to this amazing new world. You have been their guide, their teacher, their hero. It will have been an amazing parenting win.

When I pulled my daughter's bike out of the garage, I fully expected the experience to live up to my expectations. I eagerly waited for her to don her helmet and knee pads. I was so sure that this would be the Rockwell-esque version of the milestone I had dreamt about. 

Here is how it actually went down...

As it turns out, my daughter would have been content to operate her bike with training wheels until she was ready to trade it in for a car.  Needless to say, she took to the task of learning with barely contained resentment, barking at me each time she wobbled or got banged on the knee by the pedals. If I tried holding her seat, I was doing it wrong. If I tried giving her advice or encouragement, she frowned and snapped at me.  Several times she broke into frustrated tears and more than once, I had to walk away from her as she bristled with child rage and hit me with a litany of excuses.  The seat was too high, too hard, too crooked. I was holding her wrong. The driveway was to uneven. We finally decided to take a break. She abandoned the bike and her helmet in a heap by the garage and I went inside to nurse my disappointment.

It was several weeks later before we tried again. The day was the perfect harbinger of an early Spring with a cloudless cerulean sky above our heads and a warming sun on our backs. This time I had reinforcements, my husband took a break from the yard work to lend a hand. I warned him she was liable to be difficult, even a little mean as she struggled hard to master something she believed she should just "get right out of the box". Even with my warnings, he was surprised at the level of open hostility she directed toward the lesson, and us, as her repeated attempts to gain her balance met failure again and again.  I could see the collapse of her confidence in her bowed head and welling eyes. My requests for "one more try", were met with deep frowns and groans but we knew we could not let her quit. As everything threatened to collapse, we decided to try another approach.

This time we took it to the street, at least the straight strip of pavement consisting of 100 feet between our neighbor's mailboxes. The roadway was level and the path open wide in front of her, no turns or inclines. We told her to get her feet in position and just get moving forward.  We encouraged her to keep going, even if she had to take her foot off the pedal once or twice along the way.

After a few wobbly attempts, she managed to stay upright and pedal for about seven feet. I saw the first smile break at the corners of her mouth and the glimmer in her sea change eyes that signaled the return of a little of her confidence.  She had done it, just for a few seconds, but it had been enough. I watched her rally then, engaging all her young grit and determination.  She immediately dropped the attitude and began to really listen to our advice and encouragement. After a few moments, she was managing to go almost the full span between mailboxes, pedaling and maintain her balance and at last, she was really smiling.

The last pass she made she cheekily told me to "watch out" in case she ran me down. Then, just like I told her she would, she was doing it, riding a bike on her own.  Just as suddenly, we were those celebrating parents from a Hallmark movie or sappy commercial, bouncing on our toes and clapping in the middle of our street.  Watching her riding away from me, the wind at her back, knowing she was smiling under that helmet and feeling accomplished... I had my milestone moment at last.  It might not have come to me the way I imagined but when it came it was no less sweet.

For My Daughter, Age 8

My daughter celebrated her 8th birthday over two months ago and this one felt just a bit harder for me than the one before. At age 7, she still had seemed that shy, quiet child who wanted me to walk her to her classroom each morning and follow behind me like a shadow everywhere else. The transformation between age 7 and age 8 was something I had not fully been prepared for. It seems that overnight she has discovered the joyous fun in reading graphic novels, the scientific discoveries of slime and geodes and the finer points of picking just the right outfit and tinted lip balm. She is still shy with adults, but she is loud everywhere else. She sings and dances with abandon and often performs with a silly, wanton joy.  Yet, she becomes embarrassed to the point of tears if she hears me telling anyone, anything about her. It's as if she is our secret firefly, you can catch her sparking brightly but briefly, if you know where to look.

Age 8 has brought eye rolling and a new streak of defiance to our negotiations. She argues, I believe, just for the sport of it. She pans refusal for almost everything I suggest she try. She doesn't like what I pick for her to wear and hotly contests any adjustments I insist she make to outfits she assembles. She can be aggressively stubborn. At age 8, she has tapped into a new sense of drama. A recent visit to the doctor for her annual flu shot treated her father and I to an almost Oscar-worthy performance where we might have assumed she was about to have her arm amputated without anesthesia. Each injury, no matter how slight, now seems to be accompanied by copious tears and irrational claims that, "you don't care when I get hurt."

Despite the challenges, age 8 has given us the opportunity to see her reach out and seize opportunities to do things she really enjoys. She has found her voice, found new levels of confidence. Without much prodding, she will play piano now for friends and family. She is clearly proud of her burgeoning skills and I'm happy to see that music is still so much part of what she loves about her world. She is one of the few girls in her ninja warrior class, a fact that does not seem to make her self-conscious in anyway. I can see sparks of a competitive nature in her. She likes to be the last one to release her plank during warm up, likes to know her time is that much faster each run at the obstacle course. She makes it up the warped wall in one take, but still freezes at the top. She says its the drop that scares her. She describes the feeling of gravity acting on her limbs as an unwelcome and uncomfortable intrusion, something she feels she can not control. We watch her, perched on the edge of the wall, her small frame tense with the desire to jump, only to back herself down. I ache for her and for myself, not knowing how much to push her past her block.

My daughter has always managed to forge wonderful friendships. One of the best things about this age is discovering that she has continued to grow into a loving and loyal friend. She has never forgotten those special friends from preschool and she reserves a portion of each party invite list for those friends she may not see every day, but still counts as part of her little circle. Her delight at seeing their faces, at sharing experiences with them, warms my heart beyond measure. She astounds me with her kindness, her limitless expressions of love toward her besties at school. She adores her friends and her book bag bleeds a regular stream of crayola-stained testimonials that prove they adore her back. Age 8 brought the very first friend sleep over, a play date that picked up Friday after school with her very best friend and ran straight through the next mid-morning. They stayed up far too late and got up way to early but the house was filled with their playful giggles and running feet. After they had finally dropped off to sleep I crept into her room to check on them and found them, heads pressed together, faces soft and serene in sleep. Physically they are polar opposites and they looked  like a sweet composition in cinnamon and sugar. It made me think of my first sleepover with my bestie, whom I still treasure to this day and I felt happy for these two the special bond they have forged.

Age 8 has given me such bittersweet moments. I have been so proud of her, surprised by her sudden fierceness, delighted by her antics and frustrated to tears by some of her habits. I have discovered pools of her slime in the rugs, her hair and on the dogs. I have lost hours of my life collecting discarded clothes from her floor and rehanging them in her closet. I have caught a glimpse of her applying lip gloss in her room, her face a mask of concentration. I saw the little lady in her suddenly gaining on the child - and it wrecked me for hours. I am not ready for so much that I see coming but I am so excited to see her becoming her own beautiful all the same.

One day this past month, I had a rare day off with her. We went to the mall to do some shopping together. At some point, she surprisingly slipped her hand in mine and we walked through the mall hand in hand. I was very conscious of that moment, it felt crystalline and rare. I had to fight down the lump in my throat. I was filled with gratitude that at least at age 8, my daughter still wanted to hold my hand in public. Before that moment, I don't think I had been so sure. As I listened to her happy chatter, I felt blessed in the knowledge that at that moment, there wasn't anyone else she wanted to be with more than me.
At age 8, she is my fierce little firefly, my bright spark of light in my wide night sky.

Image Courtesy of Firefly Bookstore

The Patience of Teachers and Toothful Pursuits

Yesterday, my daughter lost the last remaining front tooth during lunch. She could barely contain herself as she waited for me to sign her out at pick up. She grinned, showing off the large pink gap in the front of her small mouth. We had been at the dentist that very morning, where she had soldiered through those uncomfortable bite wing xrays that always make me gag. The dentist had pronounced her as "transitioning to her adult mouth" and I could actually see my daughter beaming with pride. I felt slightly saddened recalling all those teething adventures and her perfectly tiny white toddler teeth. Last night she wrapped her tooth up in paper and ribbon and handed it over to me without ceremony. She was thinking only about the impending visit from the tooth fairy.

The stages pass so quickly now. For my daughter, every day is about mastering something new or breaking through one milestone after another. I mark those same passages always with some degree of grief, knowing we two shall never pass this way again. Motherhood is wonderful and achingly beautiful and also bittersweet.

"Blog City ~ Every Blogger's Paradise"
Day 926 September 20, 2016
Prompt: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow liked the month of September. Does any part of the year feel more inspiring to you for your writing?

In my part of the world, September marks a month of pronounced beginnings and endings. Some years the summer seems to come to an abrupt halt where suddenly, despite the continuation of boating season, the sea suddenly turns too cold for anything other than basking in the ocean shallows near the shore. New Englanders will often keep their boats in well after the coastline erupts in colors of Autumn but summer clearly ends when most children retire swimsuits and swimmies and began donning uniforms and crisp new school clothes. September marks the beginning of the school year and children file into bright, brick yellow buses as the landscape transforms around them.

I love the Fall, and September remains one of my favorite months even though it has been marked by loss in my life. I feel promise in that new chill at night and that first expectant harvest moon. I find that I feel the tug of my craft more acutely at this time of year. It is like the coming Autumn fires me in some way, setting off nerve connections that have been driven dormant by the summer's distraction. The world around me shakes off the humidity and heat and begins to ripen in a way that makes me feel peaceful and focused.


"Blogging Circle of Friends "
DAY 1406 September 20, 2016
" Patience is a necessary ingredient of genius."~ Benjamin Disraeli Do you agree or disagree? Who is the most patient person in your life? How do they accomplish it?

I am not patient in most matters that require it. It is a life skill I have yet to even apprentice in. I marvel at people who display patience, who have that virtue ingrained into their natures. I envy them. I think teachers are some of the most patience people in the world. Children of all ages can be challenging and most of our teachers are managing classrooms that are far too large. They are charged with not only our student's academic progress but a lot of their social achievements and advancements. In many cases, they are the first line of defense against cruelty, fear, insecurity and social isolation. They keep our children safe, encourage good habits and behavior and work to keep them all on the path to becoming sensible, upstanding adults. They need patience in truckloads. Their profession is one of the last truly noble vocations left.

Human Slugs and Looking Up

I feel very much like I have been slogging through today. My desk has been a jumble of the kind of work you need to catch up on periodically like piles of junk mail, industry publications to sort, followup letters to go out. They are necessary tasks that give you no level of satisfaction when completed other than a space of clear real estate which will be inevitably filled by other things in piles before the day is out. I'm struggling to keep a bad mood from growing worse and failing miserably. I want to go home and crawl in bed. I want to wake up some other random week.

I'm trying to focus on the bright spots lately. My daughter lost her first tooth this weekend...a tiny one in the front of her mouth. We never found the tooth but her wide, proud smile was a beautiful thing to see. She had been waiting patiently as friend after friend regaled her with stories of losing their teeth and visits from the tooth fairy. It was one of those sweet first moments that mark the passage of time in family's journey together. Thinking of it now makes me feel marginally better but I know it won't stave off the black mood hovering just under the surface for very long. Maybe it has sometime to do with turning 42 this week...maybe its just an accumulation of the stress and frustration that's been building for week...maybe its just the general discontent that seems to resonate from everything these days. I'm so sick of the same talking heads, the same obnoxious bullies spewing their political garbage and turning the world into a place where I feel divided and isolated instead of welcomed and included. Maybe...I don't know. I just know I feel like a human slug, a moderately unhappy one at that!

After several prompts have slipped by unaddressed over the last few weeks, I have to get back on track with at least that part of my life so here goes...

"Blogging Circle of Friends "
DAY 1356: August 1, 2016
Prompt: "My first poem was a bolt from the blue... it broke a spell of disillusion and suicidal despondence... it filled me with soul satisfying joy." - William Carlos Williams.
Have you ever written something or encountered a piece of writing that filled your soul with joy. If you haven't had that type of experience when writing did you have it at any other time. Tell us about it.

I wish I could say that something I had written had filled my soul with joy. I think I am too much of a self-critic to let that happen. I've written things that have brought me peace and closure which I am thankful enough for. I think joy is an emotion reserved for very powerful experiences. It just seems much less accessible than happiness, less stable. Joy seems to be a more compelling, encompassing feeling that overwhelms you temporarily. Joy seems to me like it may be too intense to be experienced in any sustained state. You experience joy at those tremendous moments of life. For me, my most joyful moment was seeing my daughter for the first time. I had been an emergency c-section and the sudden onset of fear and trauma had been almost too much to bear. Then, that moment when they brought her to me, showed me her perfect little face, and I knew my daughter was healthy and well...that's when joy hit me. It drove everything else out and I was floating - blissfully.


"Blog City ~ Every Blogger's Paradise"
Day 876 August 1, 2016
Prompt: Right now I am looking up at the ceiling; when outside, I look up at the sky, the clouds, and the tops of trees. Do you ever look up, and what does looking up mean to you?

I try to remember to look up now and again. I had a good friend once who tried very hard to impress upon me the wonder of clouds. He spent a lot of time looking up there, into the blue. He could always find the most amazing things. He told me it wasn't about what you could find, it was able taking the time to look. In my busy life, I do try to take that time. Not just at the clouds, but into the vast network of limbs of the oak in my yard or out into the wide expense of long island sound. I look. I remember. Sometimes I am even rewarded by a glimpse of a massive owl, a fleeting hummingbird, the rolling back of something big breaking the water. It is good to look up, to look out. It gives us a few minutes to breath and connect with ourselves and the world around us.

Jaden Laughs

My daughter has been in summer camp now for nearly two weeks. She has grown into it, day by day. I get few details about her day when I ask her. She's often worn out at pickup, preferring to climb into the air-conditioned car and sit quietly listening to the radio. When she decides she wants to talk it is usually much later, right before bedtime or when I'm trying to get her into the shower. She suddenly has lots of stories to tell me, like about her going underwater during swim lessons, getting pinched by a baby crab or a new friend she made that day. She chatters on, animated, her green eyes wide and her tan arms and legs in constant motion. My daughter at six is a whirlwind. I can barely keep up with the new lingo, expressions and interests she seems compelled to pick up on a daily basis. I find myself just looking at her, watching her playing with the neighbors or riding her razor around the yard, marveling at her beautiful, strong little body and her boundless energy. I wonder, had I been so full of promise and wonder at her age? So full of sass and spice? My favorite thing about this stage of her journey is the laughter. She has developed several distinct laughs and I hear them at regular intervals. There is the shy giggle, her old standby. She's got a mischievous snicker, reserved for times when she pushing the buttons and almost certainly bound for trouble. There is that slightly less than sincere chuckle for the times she knows the polite thing to do is laugh but she's not really feeling it. My favorite is the completely natural and hearty guffaw that rolls from her in unbridled waves, unhindered by self-consciousness. It is a sound rich with joy. It comes from the center of her budding sense of humor, from the untapped reservoir of fun and childhood mirth inside her. I love to hear her laugh like that. It is heartwarming and infectious.


"Blog City ~ Every Blogger's Paradise"
Day 858 July 14, 2016
Prompt: Collect moments, not things. Do you agree?

It is easy to lose the value in material things, to become trapped by the representation of success. Moments are fleeting cross-sections of time and space that can bring far more lasting joy than more tangible things can. I try to remember that its not the vacation photos that matter but the moments captured in those frames, the experiences and the feelings shared and exchanged. I know people who are consumed by the things they have or can obtain but their lives have a vapid quality, something seems lacking despite their obvious success. I think that is sad.


"Blogging Circle of Friends "
Day 1338 July 14, 2014
Do you see podcasting as a means of getting your writing out there? Pros and cons?

I am new to all things "podcasting". It seems very "brave new world" to me and I think overall its great exposure for writers who understand how to use it. I am not one of those writers yet though. I have to garner my audiences in the "old ways" and that seems like enough of a challenge for me most days.

Atwood's Handmaidens and Independent Moves

In this past week I've feel as if I've been battling a post-vacation hangover trying to reinsert myself into the chaos and demands of a stress-inducing job. I find myself checking email during dinner, waking up in the middle of night running worst case scenarios and generally worrying about the bottom line in a particularly slow cycle of sales. There doesn't seem to be much time or opportunity to write anything, let along work on my submissions. I keep telling myself I just need to get out in front of my work and I can score some breathing room to work on some things but so far that seems like little more than a lofty aspiration. One thing that hasn't escaped my attention is how drastically my daughter has changed in this past year. I was so blessed to have had a full, uninterrupted week to spend with her on vacation. I found myself just watching her at times, transfixed by how much she's matured this summer. First off, she's shed every once of baby fat, revealing that she will most likely and thankfully take after her father. I can see the familiar lines of his lithe build in her physique and also touch of athleticism I wished I had possessed at her age. The Florida sun turned her skin its loveliest shade of caramel which has brought out the jade colored flecks in her eyes. She seems for the first time, to be wholly unlike either one of us, but rather uniquely herself. She is developing her own sense of humor and her own sense of style. She had a variety of laughs at her disposal...a quiet giggle, a playful snicker and a full-on belly laugh that makes my heart joyful when I hear it. She often walks aside of us now but just as often slips her hands into one of ours and readily returns our hugs and kisses. She is still sweet, occasionally saucy and simply amazing to behold. And now for the prompts...prompts keep me focused, they keep me "in the ink" so to speak...

"Blogging Circle of Friends "
Day 1324, June 30, 2016
PROMPT: throughout history, stories have influenced a change in society (for example Jules verne's " from the Earth to the Moon,inspiring the moon landing, or 20000 leagues under the sea inspired the creation of electric submarines, or George Orwell's "1984" inspiring the NSA spy scandals, Using a specific literary work, explain how a novel might influence
change in society.

I think either read this prompt a little differently, or have a slightly jaded take on it because the novel that came immediately to mind was Margaret Atwood's "The Handmaids Tale". I read the book over a decade ago but the story stayed with me. For those who are unfamiliar, the novel of speculative fiction, tells the story of a future where women had been striped up their most basic rights. Following a terrorist attack and subsequent takeover, society has been rigidly restructured into a caste system whereby women are divided and devalued based on their fertility. It is a vivid depiction of the worse scenario for women in a society ruled by controlled by men and their archaic and brutal philosophical ideals. The reason this particular novel comes to mind is that we live in a time when the debate of abortion repeatedly surfaces in nearly every political race or round table discussion. The women's right to chose is repeated challenged, with constantly changing laws shifting the power balance in one direction or the other. It seems unstable and precarious sometimes...this sense of control over our lives and our bodies. We all know about places in the world where women do not enjoy the same freedoms, the same rights. We all know of places where women are not free, are not safe. We all know of places where women are enslaved by political and religious idealogy. There are places where the parallels between the fictitious Gilead and modern day society can be clearly drawn and that should be frightening to every global citizen. It certainly frightens me. The right over my own body is God-given and sacred and the thought that any government could lay claim to that right, could move to supercede my own authority over self, is simply not acceptable to me.


"Blog City ~ Every Blogger's Paradise"
Day 844 June 30, 2016
Prompt: What is the most independent thing you have ever done?

I feel that I have been pretty independent my whole life. I've made some mistakes but I've always tried to push myself too. I elected to go to college out of state and after that first summer break, I made the permanent move out. My parents were already in the middle of divorce and after several brief months bouncing between "his" and "her" houses, it was very clear to me that I was better off on my own. I think though perhaps the most independent thing I have ever done was to buy my ex-husband out of of the house in the divorce. It was my first home and it was terrifying. It was a project to renovate, both emotionally and physically. The house had seen its far share of discontent and there were lots of bad memories there. I was determine to look past that and start over. With very limited knowledge, I patched all the fist-sized holes and battered doors. I threw away all the garage-sale furniture that was a scarred as I felt and replaced it with the bright and the new. I repainted, repaired and replaced with abandon. Eventually, I felt like I had reclaimed the space as one I felt safe and secure in. It wouldn't truly become a home for me again until I remarried and gave birth to my daughter. Today it is the first place I really feel happy and complete. My husband and our daughter have really been what have made this house a home. I'm grateful though, that I took that leap for myself. It was such an instrumental part of becoming the person, the mother and the wife I am today.

Escaping Octopi and Sweet Moments of Motherhood

"Blog City ~ Every Blogger's Paradise"
Day 829 June 15, 2016
Prompt: What was your worst summer job? What was your best summer job?

The best summer job I ever had, was oddly enough, also the worst. I'm not sure it would even qualify as a "job" in that I didn't even get paid. It was a volunteer stint, meant to garner my resume and expand on my experience, as a Sea Urchin at my local aquarium. The job lasted approximately three months and provided many rich experiences for an aspiring marine scientist.

Not all those experiences were wonderful however. The work was tough some days. Messy. I spent lots of hours pressing meds into the gills of freshly gutted mackerel or blending the odious mixture of "fish chum" that comprised a major part of our exhibit's diets. I also cleaned tanks, scrubbing stubborn deposit stains off the glass until my fingers ached. One time, while cleaning a bi-level exhibit featuring a trout stream, I slid down the artificial hill and into the "stream". The thigh high waders I was wearing quickly filled with the cold water and the trout. I struggled to find my footing and my dignity while an excited family laughed and took pictures on the other side of the glass.

The worst day of that summer job however came at the hands of our aquarium's residence Pacific octopus. I loathed cleaning that dark tank and had to lean way over the edge to scoop out the strands of feces at the bottom, my eyes constantly darting back to the blurry pink blob pressed into the far corner. This one particular day, as my luck would have it, the octopus made his move. He grabbed my pole and used it to lever most of his body up and over the edge of the tank. I'll never forget the cold, fleshy feel of his tentacles sliding over my arms or how quickly it moved. My heart racketed with alarm and I fought to drive him back into the depths. I've never quite gotten past the experience and I never cleaned that tank again, begging off each time it appeared on my roster.

"Blogging Circle of Friends "
DAY 1309: June 15, 2016
Open Prompt

My daughter open her sleep tired eyes this morning and told me, with a furrowed brow, that she had a bad dream. It was only 6am and since school is out for the summer, it was very early for her to be awake. I pulled her close and felt her little arms encircle my neck, felt her slide one leg over my hip, drawing our bodies even closer. In a few minutes, she drifted off to sleep again, feeling secure and safe from whatever had chased her in her dreams. I gave myself an extra thirty minutes on my alarm and settled in with her, feeling secure and safe myself. At 6, my daughter is more than capable to sleep in her own bed, on her own. She does, on occasion, spend entire nights there. More often then not, I wake up to her presence in our bed, waking to find she's wriggled between our sleeping bodies in wee hours of morning. The truth is, I don't mind. These moments of comfort and cuddling will be sweet but brief. She won't always want to sleep in our bed. She won't always need my reassurance after a bad dream. I won't wake up with her arms or legs wrapped possessively around me, or open my eyes to find her and her father entangled, face to face and snoring happily. Fleeting are the sweetest moments of motherhood. I cherish these little moments - treasure our sun-filled Sunday mornings, our family walks, our lazy afternoons....

Jaden, My Crazy Love

Sometimes I have a moment when I understand why I've always been driven to write...why it has been always been such a huge part of how I define myself. This morning my husband sent me a link to a blog entry I had made years ago when my daughter was just about 17 months old. The date/time stamp reads May 20th, 2011 12:42pm. I took a moment to read over my words from that time and I was instantly transported back there, to that shining and wonderful moment when I was still a new mother.  It makes me realize and remember that I write first and foremost for me, because having this testimony feels like the best gift I can give myself on this journey of life. My words give me the vehicle to look back, and experience those moments again in living color.  I love this entry so much because I see myself as that new mother just taking in all the joy and wonder of raising a daughter.  It is such a bright and sweet snapshot of our amazing journey as a family. 

Jaden, My Crazy Love...                                                      May 20th, 2011 12:42pm
Jaden is feeling better. There is still a slight rumbling sound when she breathes but her eyes are bright and her laughter and smiles are again effortless and joyful. She bounced around the house this morning leaving a narrow swath of destruction in her wake. She kicked over the dog's food bowl, scattering pieces across the floor, tossed my neatly folded laundry all around the living room, crushed a graham cracker under her shoe in the kitchen and left a trail of cherry puffs down the walkway. I followed after her, amazed by her energy and enchanted by her gleeful giggle. There was a moment this morning, when I was so captivated by the beauty in her little face, that the world stopped for me. There was only the morning light and the perfection of her tiny profile, still so much her father's yet still so exceptionally unique at the same time. If she would let me, I'd love to cup her little face in my hands and just study her, every inch, so I could memorize her features before they change again, before she grows up - growing ever closer to the girl, the teenager, the woman she will one day become.

When Fatih and I got married, we played Van Morrison's "Crazy Love" for our dance with our wedding party. I always loved the song. I always wanted to be loved like that, have a love that was that powerful, consuming, unconditional. Dancing with my new husband, I had felt like I had found it at last.

This morning, that song came on the radio and as I listened, I found a whole new meaning in it, a new connection in my life. That feeling I get with Jaden, the desire to hold time still and just watch her, take her all in until my heart aches with the impossible fullness of it...that's my Crazy Love. She is the thing that "brightens up my day", "takes away my troubles, takes away my grief" The heavens really do seem to "open up every time she smiles" and I feel as if I could, without any effort at all, "hear her heartbeat for a thousand miles", that same sweet sound that pulsed inside me for nine months. But nothing is more true about this Crazy Love, than the fact that her very existence makes me complete in a way I never imagined was possible...

"Yes it makes me righteous, yes it makes me whole, yes it makes me mellow down into my soul.."

Playdates and the Power of Descriptive Writing

"Blog City ~ Every Blogger's Paradise"
Day 793 May 9, 2016
Prompt: What, do you think, creates the most delightful usage of language in literature? Descriptions, dialogue, rhetorical devices, style, voice? Anything else?

The authors that I admire the most are the ones I believe to be descriptive artists. These writers can describe a place or setting with such exquisite detail and attention, that I am virtually transported there through the magic of their phrasing and use of language. For example, when James Lee Burke writes about the bayou in New Iberia parish, I can see the tall cattails swinging at the water's edge in that moonlight southern night. He delivers me in an unparalleled way to a place I've never been but can come to know through his words.

"I drove north along Bayou Teche to Carmouche's home. The house was dark, but next door the porch and living room lights were on at the Labiche house. I pulled into the Labiche driveway and walked across the yard toward the brick steps. The ground was sunken, moldy with pecan husks and dotted with palmettos, the white paint on the house stained with smoke from stubble fires in the cane fields. My face felt warm and dilated with alcohol, my ears humming with sound that had no origin." An excerpt from Purple Cane Road, James Lee Burke

In much the same way, Stephen King masters the task of taking me into dark places. King has so often found the right mix of words to describe his disturbing nightmares so compellingly that they take life. You can feel the terror as a visceral thing in your gut, leaving you uneasy hours after you close the book. Who can forget the lasting impression Pennywise made on them the first time they read about that manic clown?

"And George saw the clown’s face change.
What he saw then was terrible enough to make his worst imaginings of the thing in the cellar look like sweet dreams; what he saw destroyed his sanity in one clawing stroke.

They float,' the thing in the drain crooned in a clotted, chuckling voice. It held George’s arm in its thick and wormy grip, it pulled George toward that terrible darkness where the water rushed and roared and bellowed as it bore its cargo of storm debris toward the sea. George craned his neck away from that final blackness and began to scream into the rain, to scream mindlessly into the white autumn sky which curved above Derry on that day in the fall of 1957. His screams were shrill and piercing, and all up and down Witcham Street people came to their windows or bolted out onto their porches." An excerpt from Stephen King's "It".

Description, for me, is one of the most powerful forces in literature. I have tremendous respect for those writers who have perfected tool. They are artists with words. The power of their descriptions transcend time, and even translate across language barriers. For example, in case of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, for whom English was not the language he wrote his masterpieces in, his descriptions are so acute and beautiful that they read perfectly even after suffering translation into multiple languages.

“Then, for more than ten days, they did not see the sun again. The ground became soft and damp, like volcanic ash, and the vegetation was thicker and thicker, and the cries of the birds and the uproar of the monkeys became more and more remote, and the world became eternally sad. The men on the expedition felt overwhelmed by their most ancient memories in that paradise of dampness and silence, going back to before original sin, as their boots sank into pools of steaming oil and their machetes destroyed bloody lilies and golden salamanders.”
― Gabriel Garcí­a Márquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude

I spend a lot of time thinking about description in my own writing. I think about how a place or situation affects all my senses and then try to convey as much of that experience into words that justly represent those qualities. It isn't easy though these writers I've mentioned make it seem effortless.

"Blogging Circle of Friends "
DAY 1272: May 9, 2016
Prompt: Title: A Popularity Contest. Take this any where you want. Write a story, a poem, an essay, or a rant. Have fun. Be creative.

Clara glanced at her phone to check the time. She had less than an hour. She raised her eyes and confronted the tired, unadorned face in the mirror. She groaned aloud. She looked every bit like a woman pushing forty-three who spent far too little time in the gym or the cosmetic department for that matter. Clara rubbed concealer under both eyes in a last ditch effort to mask the dark circles before applying the rest of her make-up.

She stopped midway through her mascara to call up to her daughter.

"Jenny, we are leaving in five minutes."

She prayed Jenny's six year old mind had reasoned that sneakers, and not white patent leather heels, were proper footwear for a play date at a playground. It had been a discussion she had failed to have with her in advance of today, one of several she thought about now.

Clara went back to her face. The blush and gloss and bit of color on her lids did make some improvement and she felt her mood, if not her anxiety, lighten a little. Having waited well into her thirties to have Jenny, Clara was one of the older Moms among Jenny's circle of friends. She was also one of the few that worked full time, a discrepancy Clara felt more acutely than the age difference. Most of the other moms showed up to school for pickups looking fresh from the or comfortably dressed, ready to engage with their children over how their day had been. Clara, on the other hand, often rushed in at the eleventh hour, hobbled by her heels, her work clothes rumbled, her cell phone pinned between her shoulder and her ear. She tried to disconnect, but often failed miserably. At school functions, her phone often buzzed so loudly despite being on silent mode, that she was certain every parent, teacher and administrator could hear the offensive noise.

The truth was, Clara had worked hard to find the balance between raising a child and having a successful career. Most days she felt she was doing a pretty good job at both but still felt the judgment every time she walked into a PTO meeting late, or had to skip school function for work. There were also the days she felt inadequate. The other moms always seems so much more youthful and engaged, free to be more... cool? Was that the word?

Jenny's best friend was a girl named Samantha, "Sammie" as she was known to all her peeps. Sammie's mom was definitely the "cool mom", sporting a nose ring and a cherry red jeep with a "Shoreline Roller Derby" sticker on the bumper. Clara often saw her striding across the parking lot at pickup, instantly envious of her black hair tied in a knot at the base of her neck, her doc martins and torn cut-offs.

Gabby's mom was the other end of the spectrum. She never missed a PTO meeting or a chance to volunteer. She was indelibly cheerful, smiling warmly at Clara over the bake sale table as she accepted her tray of store-baked cupcakes, careful not to let the judgment show on her pretty, Mary K perfected face.

"Mom...let's go!" Jenny appeared in the doorway, bouncing in excitement, her pretty features glowing. Clara was relieved to see the pink sneakers on her feet.

Three minutes later they were in the car, headed to the park.

Gabby's mom had organized the play date as soon as the weather had turned warmer. She had billed it as a relaxing afternoon when the Moms would be able to "hang out", while the girls played in the park. Clara didn't feel relaxed though, she felt nervous. As she drove and Jenny fiddled with the radio, Clara agonized about finding common ground with the other moms and being the "odd mom out". She realized with growing dismay, that this play date felt more like an audition for a part she knew she wasn't 100% right for. It felt like a popularity contest she could never really win.

Jenny found a song she liked and was soon dancing in her seat and singing along with all the carefree abandon of a happy six year old. Jenny was happy. Clara thought, "I have a happy child, who has a lot of good friends." Clara thought that had to mean she was doing something right after all. As she rounded the bend, Lighthouse Park came into view. She pulled in along side Sammie's Mom's jeep. Without waiting, Jenny bolted from the car, racing toward the little group of girls. She stopped just before reaching them, turned, and ran back.

Clara's heart burst with gratitude as she realized her daughter was coming back for her. Jenny slipped her hand in Clara's and looked up, smiling. "Come on Mom, let's go find the other Moms for you."

Clara looked down at her daughter. "Yes, she thought, I am definitely doing something right with this amazing kid".

Chasing Success and Getting Lost Among the Momeraths

"Blog City ~ Every Blogger's Paradise"

Day 753 March 30, 2016 

Prompt: Why are we conditioned into the strawberry and cream, Mother Goose world, Alice in Wonderland fable, only to be broken on the wheel as we grow older and become aware of ourselves as individuals with a dull responsibility in life? Sylvia Plath.  What is your take on this?

The brilliance of Plath’s tormented insight has been revealed to me more and more I as age.  The way in which she viewed the world around her and her place in it, was remarkably developed and venerable for someone so young. She tragically bore the “dull responsibility” in life for as long as she could and I think of her struggle often these days. Writing, I hope, brought her some respite from those dark hours.  I know that it does that for me sometimes.  I think I agree that we, young girls in particular, are conditioned with fairytales and fables. I think they are far less a staple of growing up than they used to be.  I believe the collective conscious of today crafts warrior princesses who do the rescuing, brave girls who engineer and invent and young minds who solve problems and tote the motto, #smartisthenewcool.  I like to think mothers today raise girls who have a confidence and a vision for themselves and like me, look for the real life lessons in those old Mother Goose stories. Also, I’m not sure I see myself as an individual with a “dull responsibility in life”.  There are days of drudgery of course, but those days don’t carry the script of my existence.  Have I been broken on the wheel? Absolutely. Several times over at certain points in my life…but for each “down” there has always been a resounding “up”.  Becoming an individual is the beauty of the journey, with all its vivid pain and joy. The times when I have been broken, have allowed me to grow into something more. I love Alice and I wish sometimes the world was more “Wonderland” but one can only get lost among the mome raths for so long before having to grow up.  I know that and I make sure my daughter does too. I might not be able to spare her the wheel but I can do my best to prepare her for it.

"Blogging Circle of Friends "

DAY 1232: March 30, 2016 

Prompt: What does success mean to you?

Success is something I think a lot about. My type A personality tells me that the more power and authority I have in my career, the more successful I will be.  I am driven, at times, beyond my own real ambitions I think. If I were to consider the question of what success legitimately means to me, I think my actual opinion would be far less lofty and almighty.  I would like to have recognition for my accomplishments in a very male dominated industry.  I would like my contributions to the company to be acknowledged among my peers in that industry. I would like to be seen as someone who “knows their stuff” and who’s opinion and insight matters.  Do I need to be CEO?  Some days it is easy to get lost in that fantasy but truth be told, I don’t want to sacrifice all that I would need to in order to be a good CEO. Having the finances to make home improvements, send my daughter to piano lessons and summer science camps and to take that annual vacation…that’s a more attainable way to define my success. I think just being able to live life as full as one can, with as much contentment as possible and without the stress of surviving from paycheck to paycheck, I think that makes us successful. 

I remember growing up my parents never let us quit anything, at least not without a credible reason. My brothers and sisters were into sports but I gravitated toward other pursuits, some of which turned out to be more challenging than I thought they would be. My parents were pretty good about saying "yes" to things I really wanted to do. Except for the "whole cage diving with great whites" request I made as a senior in high school...that one was immediately and resoundingly vetoed. But they did let me get my scuba certification as soon as I turned 15. I was the youngest in the class of mostly adults. In my part of the world, scuba lessons ultimately cumulated in an open water dive in typically choppy, and always murky bays of long island sound. I remember the day and how cold and raw it was. I was the last one to go in the final exercise of my certification, which was removing my weight belt - holding it free in one hand and then replacing it around my waist. It sounds fairly simple but by the time I went, the chop had kicked up and even just below the surface, I felt like I was being tossed around by vengeful ocean gods. My fingers felt like frozen sausages in my gloves as I fumbled to latch the belt. It slipped off time and time again before I could. It was the first time I thought, I can't do this but I refused to be the only person that didn't pass, especially with my family watching. So, I hung with it and eventually got it back on. It took me several attempts and by the time I finished my arms ached and I was exhausted. The instructor admitted when we surfaced that he had been ready to call the lesson, it had just gotten too rough. It would have been so disappointing if he had.

In my house now, we have a "no quit" policy in place too. This past Thursday my daughter's school had an event at the local roller rink. At first my daughter had no interest in skating but then once she was there, her interest was piqued and she asked me to rent her skates. We laced them up, got her a plastic skate buddy to support her, and she was off. Almost. She quickly became frustrated. She couldn't figure out how to transfer her weight and get a forward momentum. She watched the other kids with big, tearful eyes. She struggled, she fell. She cried some more. She adamantly declined my offers to don skates myself and go with her. By the time I took her aside, she was red-faced and heartbroken. I asked her if she wanted to take a little break and try again in a few minutes. She shook her head. "I have to get this," she told me, brushing at the tear tracks with the back of her hand. She started off again, into the throng of skaters, toward her friends. I watched her from the sidelines, resisting the urge to dash across in my heels to help her up when she fell or throw myself in the path of a whizzing skaters who threatened to collide with her. Instead, I stayed put, grateful for every skating parent and older classmate who stopped to help her or give her some tips. I saw her connect with a group of her friends, most of whom were also just learning. They moved together, an awkward but determined cluster. Slowly, I saw Jaden being to "get it". She figured out how to move forward, to turn and by the end of the night, she was crisscrossing the rink behind her skate buddy frame, full of smiles. It was a proud moment, knowing quitting hadn't been an option for her. She showed grit and determination and as a reward, she had a blast. She's already bugging us to go again. The next step is to move away from using the skate buddy and skate freely on her own. Knowing my daughter, I imagine she's already got to do just that.

And now for the day's actual prompts:


Blogging Circle of Friends
DAY 1213 March 11, 2016
Do vacations help you relax or stress you out?

Vacations as a child were a mixed bag. I remember driving to Florida in the back of an unreliable station wagon with my siblings which translates into the opposite of "relaxation". There was also that trip in the Winnebago where we got stuck in a campground in the pouring rain and my little sister got sick and ended up throwing up strawberry yoohoo all afternoon. I give my parents credit that we even had more than one family vacation. However, I remember the trip to St Thomas and the lovely afternoon we all spend snorkeling in turquoise waters and feeding schools of yellow and white banded fish. Family vacations are maybe more about grabbing those good moments and making memories rather than "relaxing". Even our own family trip to Disney was far more stressful than I imagined. It was a long day of picking rides and waiting in lines, finding something she would eat in the park that wasn't sugar-based and keeping it together waiting along hundreds of screaming, tired children after one of the boats went out of service. There were moments though, back at the house when we could sit by the pool and let her play, where we relaxed. It made up for the frantic bustle of the Magic Kingdom, which by 3:30pm, hadn't seemed all that magical to me.


Blog City ~ Every Blogger's Paradise
DAY 734 March 11, 2016
Some personalities are high energy all the time, others so low energy you wonder if they're awake. Where do you think you fall on that spectrum and why?

Most days I feel like I fall dead center on the energy spectrum. I think it depends on the time of day too. If I get enough sleep, I tend to be a morning person. I enjoy waking up early, taking the dog out before the sun. That quiet time of early dawn makes me feel open and engaged. I envy high energy people, they seem to operate with limitless reserves.