Long Silences are normal and indicative and symptomatic

It remains true and bears retelling that not-writing is destructive to my mental health, and also what I tend to do when my mental health is tenuous.

But the difficulty of self-expression has been amplified by the myriad of ways I've been humbled and forced to re-learn my lenses over the last year.  Oliver/Sir O was diagnosed with Autism, anxiety, ADHD, a written expression learning disability, an executive functioning deficit, and classified as 2E last fall.  It was not an unexpected diagnosis, but it knocked the wind out of me and forced me into wildly unfamiliar territory in aggressive and unexpected ways.  I've been having to reimagine everything I've known about how minds work to make room for the neurodivergent ways my children interact with the world.  I've had to become aware of and name the herculean effort I put in daily to co-regulate with each of my children and their lagging skills with self-regulation.  It's been massive.

Then, just as I was beginning to be able to tell which direction wa
s up, the pandemic and all of it's attendant drama, discord, and carpet yanking happened.  I have had so many aspects of my view of and relationship with my own reality shaken and stolen away that the sheer volume of paradigm reconfiguring I've had to do is staggering.  My brain cannot keep up, and I keep emotionally forgetting what I cognitively already know and have processed.  On a much less traumatic scale it's like that moment when you wake up in the morning and have to re-remember that someone has died, only for scores of less earth-shattering adjustments.  I never quite have all of my feet under me.

I've been struggling to sleep.  My brain starts racing around 10 pm, and usually my heart starts to race too.  Lately it's been vivid sensory memories from my time in London in 2002.  Mostly really good memories, but they feel so immediate, like I'm actively living them, and the melancholy of how far gone and away they are (and how impossible they'd be to recreate in a pandemic) makes them really acutely emotional, melancholy, even tragic. I weep from midnight on until I finally collapse.

It's hard for me (and everyone else) to navigate next steps forward.  Goal setting and relationship maintaining and healthy recreating are so impossible to navigate in a world of infinite high-stakes unknowns.  Not knowing what the next school year will look like, not knowing what the economy might even remotely look like, not knowing whose careers will be affected in what ways, not knowing what social activities will be safely available or when...... nobody can plan their life the way humans need in order to stay sane.  And all this on top of the most dramatic civil unrest of my lifetime, when the stakes of so many things seem insanely high, dramatic, unstable, and tragic.

I remember, in the aftermath of the 2016 election, when I was really struggling, finding helpful metaphors in the language of deep festering wounds being opened up to heal properly.  Lots of things (power imbalances) that we (the privileged) pretended were overcome in the 80s have been forced into the bright light to be reckoned with and hopefully dealt with more thoroughly and honestly this time.  I don't know that we will altogether succeed this time either, but hopefully progress will be made. Hopefully the arc of history will lean toward justice and will treat us with some mercy.

I haven't had much luck finding my place or my voice in the current BLM moment.  Most white influencers I follow are tripping over themselves trying to find appropriate and sensitive content to post, mostly finding and sharing black influencer accounts and resharing their content.  I haven't got a business or professional identity to keep afloat right now, so it feels more safe and authentic to just literally mute myself, rather than to post about how I'm muting myself and then still posting others' content.  But it also feels odd/off to be silent in a moment when "silence is complicit" is au courant.  But I'm listening and watching and doing my best to start conversations with kids for whom all conversations are hard to have.  I'm sitting in deep deep discomfort with every facet of every previous self. I hope it is constructive, it's certainly painful.

In which my life exploded and I'm having to learn how to climb out from under it.

I'm getting better at being intentional with how I use my time and resources.  I'm a goal-setting fool and I keep track of my progress tightly, but I still struggle to come up with two minutes to rub together in a row.

Life with six kids is essentially kicking my butt. (And yes, Bunny cut her own bangs a while back and no, I did not handle it well.  Also, yes, meet baby#6 who is also boy#5).

I have learned really thoroughly to not expect relief from pregnancy until after the 4th trimester, because life immediately postpartum is always relentlessly intense.  Newborns, at least my newborns, do not tolerate mama trying to use both of her hands.  Nope, baby must be able to sense mom's heartbeat in order to refrain from that certain newborn wail that makes every iota of a mama's body and brain freeze up and her milk let down.  So, there are a very few things that I can manage to do while baby wearing - some food prep and laundry folding, but all the jobs that involve bending over and getting up and down from the floor, or being near heat or chemicals?  Nope  Not happening.

And this dysfunction is piling up on top of nearly 9 months of pregnancy neglect of my house and family management.  We'll call it discouraging, and leave it at that. No need to burden you with all the thought processes behind my daily pity parties.

But I'm trying to catch occasional footholds and allow myself the grace to start small, and start over small, and do what I can do and let it be enough, for now.

I organized the medicine cabinet the morning after Christmas when I wasn't the only adult in the house.  I purged one of the kids' bedrooms while Mr Renn took all the non-infant kids to see Luminaria.

I'm discovering that one of the keys to being an organized person is having enough garbage receptacles in all the right spots in your house.  (Because I don't have one in my bedroom, which also functions as my office, and trash seems to accumulate in here like breeding rabbits or field mice)

Also, I think I'm going to start scheduling regular purging sessions for once this baby more predictably allows me hands-free time.  On the calendar - the kids go somewhere else and I purge and organize for an evening an area where they would normally impede my progress.   Isn't that what most moms mean when they pine for a break?  Just a chance to speed through the tasks that weigh heavy on their minds without a litany of interruptions?  An opportunity to try out that productivity  phenomenon called deep work?  (Seriously though, I listened to that audio book and thought over and over again, "but what about small children and their constant, constant barrage of interrupting?"  The authors plainly showed their male privilege by being oblivious to this as a source of interruption and failing to address it.)

But I'm settling into the idea: this is my "one thing" for the year.  Possibly my "one thing" for a season of my life here.  I need to get my home and family life in order.  I need to do all kinds of damage control, we've jumped from one state of survival mode to another since moving to this house, and I've never gotten good systems in place and it's making life hard for everybody.  So, just as soon as the newborn survival mode begins to let up, I plan to use whatever time or energy I gain to purge and simplify and organize and plan.  And while I know time is set and finite, if my energy doesn't improve then I'll shift my resources to addressing that problem first.  The status quo is not sustainable.

Yet my outlook is actually much more buoyant than that probably makes me sound.  I am so relieved at the prospect of spending a year not being pregnant, and at the idea of managing to prioritize things that matter to me, and at the idea of being able to muster emotional energy to care about things that matter to me.... it's all very encouraging.  So, even if I can't tackle much of it right.this.very.minute, I know that things are looking up.

Deeper Dog Days

Last Pregnant Summer
Last Pregnant Summer
Last Pregnant Summer

I am bored to tears of my own broken records, but it's been rough.  My kids who have historically gotten along pretty well have become prone to teasing and bickering, and there are just no breaks for the tired pregnant lady.  So far this summer everyone's home all the time, minus two weeks of swimming lessons, which gave some structure, but not much that I could call "breaks."

I did break down and buy a $30 inflatable pool, which has been good for giving kids something to do, but has not done a thing to reduce the fighting.

I'm sure I'm not done evolving, but I am so much more able to let life roll like water off a duck's back than I would have been 5-10 years ago.

This morning the baby (who got pseudonynm-ed the Duke, but I call him Squishy in real life), pooped in the tub, and I just sang a song about how it's not an emergency if it doesn't require an ER visit while I cleaned it up.  It's extra work, it's exhausting, but there's no resources in me to turn it into drama.

Anemia and low blood pressure are back with a vengeance.  I get short of breath and dizzy just standing up.

So, in that state of "I can't think of anything more unpleasant than trying to find clothes that won't hurt to wear and spending my energy getting into them," I indulged in some long-term planning in my pajamas this morning.  It was a really rough, loosely shaped 7-8 year plan.  But I'm giddy about it.

Because if I can make it to the other, more human, side of a last pregnancy, I can go on being human and having ambitions and goals without ever being T-boned by a pregnancy again.  6 pregnancies have pretty well decimated the last 12 years of my life, as far as personal goals, dreams, and ambitions go.  I do not manage to have them, let alone foster them, while pregnant.  So, is that worth it?  Well, I wouldn't ever change anything to un-have any of my kids.  I absolutely would make different choices to re-prioritize my education and goals way back in the days of being a newlywed though.  If, for example, I had insisted on prioritizing my own goals as a newlywed, I could have completed a masters degree instead of working a soul-sucking desk job for 2.5 years.  That would have left me eligible to apply for a PhD program while Renn was in Dental school.  For most of that we would have had one 1 kid, which is hard, but consider that now I'm having to manage 6 kids if I go back for a doctorate.  Doesn't compare.

It was dumb, fear-based decision making that led to 4 of the roughest years of my life, holed up in a cave of an apartment trying desperately not to atrophy beyond recognition.  Treating myself as nearly less-than-human and waiting for things to happen to me in order to start living.  Top that off with the skeletal and shrinking support system we had as a family at that time, and it was just unnecessarily rough. I would never advocate for anyone to replicate my path.

But, hey - I can still control/influence the future.  So sometimes I explore options and their timelines instead of adequately supervising my zoo.  It gives me just enough buoyancy to feel a flicker of hope and resiliency.  22-ish weeks to go.

Aim high

So...



Too late for New Years Resolutions, eh?  Well, it's never too late for a detailed goal with a well-mapped out plan behind it. And 2015, from the outset, is shaping up to be a big deal.  Paramount this year: finish my Masters Degree and graduate.  Also looming large: maybe begin pregnancy #5, and maybe find a part-time/freelance job.  Do those two seem to contradict each other?  Why yes, yes they do.  But the worst thing that can happen is things stay the same, so why not hope? Somebody somewhere might value my skill set enough to work around my schedule, and I am a much happier Emily when I feel like someone values my time enough to pay me for it.

Speaking of skill sets....

Other goals for the year:

(besides the elephant in the room: get my thesis written, submitted, and defended)

• develop a habit of using my Mint App, and feel more like I'm telling my money where to go than the other way around
• Survive Alt Summit, and make some friends while promoting my survey. (Emily needs friends, in the worst way.  Grad school has pretty well only amplified the lonely parts of my life.)
• Take an InDesign class
• Get Sir O started with formal piano lessons, and just maybe start taking some myself.
• Get large chunks of work done on our basement and our yard.  It will be a while yet before the work that we do there has any glamour to it, but progress is progress, and there's lots of potential in our Bantam Hill.
• Since the large house projects aren't likely to get to the fun or rewarding stages anytime too soon, I'm also hoping to do some things to brighten up the main level.  Dark crumbly rock fireplace, maroon accent wall, and cow wallpaper - I'm looking at you. (Hopefully not for much longer).
• Invest in my relationships more purposefully.  My family has born the brunt of the stress of school for the last year and half, and I frankly have some damage control to do.  (I also need to learn how to keep stress from snowballing into anxiety.)
• Read (and study) the New Testament.  Do at least some of this with Sir O. I'm starting with this book as a resource. 
• Start cooking and baking again, before the aforementioned pregnancy hits and I no longer can.  Though we have a conflict of interest at our house over trying to find things to eat that facilitate our picky eaters (Mr Renn and our Gentleman), fit Mr Renn's weekday vegetarian goals, and are low enough in calories, and high enough in other nutrients for me to reach my fitness goals, and oh-yeah, don't take 6 hours to prepare.) 

No excuses.

That was a long hiatus, wasn't it?  It's just as well I didn't make a detailed record of the last 6 weeks, because they have been pretty universally un-fun.  Thesis deadlines then comprehensive exams, then a couple of days then a Christmas I was unable to adequately prepare for..... complicated by more than one (unrelated) complete death of my one-and-only computer.  I am largely wallowing in emotional backlash that tastes the same as antepartum depression.  Too few happy thoughts  to penetrate the stress.



But hey!  Comps are over (other than defending them in February...) and Christmas is over (even if I resent how it turned out when I just couldn't do all the things I'm supposed to do for Christmas), so it's time to move on to new stresses.

Stress #1: I have a thesis to write, and while I am paying for my thesis advisor's time, there's really nobody who's going to keep me on schedule besides myself.  I have about 30 distinct insecurities that each bring me to tears when I try to figure out how to make this happen.

Stress #2: During an emotional high in August, I bought a ticket to Alt Summit.  Then deadlines and comps dissolved me into a puddle of introverted insecurity as well as rendering me totally unable to actually prepare for an over-the-top networking event.  I am terrified, and unprepared in most ways.  Plus, did I mention my computer problems?  It's hard to design a last-second business card for your thesis survey without any software. Plus, I'm not even sure if I can find the business cards for this blog...... haven't seen them since the move. ENTROPY.

Stress #3: Christmas Break.  All my kids home all the time.  I love my kids and I'm trying to enjoy their company.  But oh, the messes.  The energy, the hurt feelings, the drama, and the messes some more.   They make me tired, and sometimes make me want to hide in a closet to be alone for a few minutes.  They have all been sick and stir crazy and sugar glazed.

Stress #4: Money.  New homeownership (spending money on fun things like tree removal and a water softener) + a Christmas I wasn't very organized about + unexpected computer repairs + dentists don't get paid leave for holidays.   None fun.

None of these stresses feels quite as heavy or immediate as comps did, but half of the stress of comps was the way it was infringing on my ability to pull Christmas off.  I'm still emotionally recovering from the whole ordeal.

But, lest I leave you with that bullet train of whine, here are some silver linings.

Silver Lining #1: While our house has proven to be way too dark for me (and skylight windows keep getting bumped up my renovation priority list), the snow we've had since Christmas has done a lot to help brighten up all of our north-facing windows.  Plus my parents gave me a happy-light for Christmas.  (My life is so glamorous).

Silver Lining #2: While Bunny continues to be absolutely insane (so stinking strong willed and flat-out strong for a 2-year-old... let me show you the fat lip she gave me on Friday when she started flailing with a toy in her hand after I picked her up) she also says please and thank you without provocation.  It always thrills me when I get an unexpected "Thank you, Mom" out of her.

Silver Lining #3:  Sir O is as sneaky as the day is long, but he's also got an innate sense of paternal fairness, so when he sneaks a treat, he sneaks one for all of the siblings.

Silver Lining #4: Despite all the stress, illness, and lost sleep this month, I only missed my 6am M,W,F workout class twice. I am proving to myself that I can make a difficult lifestyle change and I'm holding my holiday calories at bay. I still hate doing it half of the time (especially when I'm sick and tired), but habits don't start sticking until you convince yourself they are not optional.  If you are me, anyway.)

Silver Lining #5: The list of house projects is mind bogglingly long, and the budget is hard to predict, as our income varies each month.  But we finished our basement storage room before Christmas and moved half of the bins and boxes living in our garage down there, so parking is less precarious.  Plus now we can move on to parts of the house that we actually intend to live in.

Silver Lining #6: Despite some really disappointing and emotional numb days, I've been pretty easily moved by the spirit this month.  It's been a humbling experience, but usually when I was most overwhelmed, I'd get subtle reminders of how small my stresses are in the grand scheme of things.  This didn't always keep me from being grumpy or withdrawn, but it helped.  Plus I cried a lot.

Silver Lining #7: Despite working on a thesis about blogging, I have not been able to string 10 minutes together to write anything coherent for my own blog.  I'd have lots of thoughts I wanted to write down during the day when my hands were full, or late at night when I was finally laying in bed and getting sleep was a high stakes game.  So here, look at me!  MAKING IT A PRIORITY!   Sometimes giving myself permission to prioritize things that don't matter to anyone but myself is really difficult. But this matters to me, and I think I am a much better person when more of my experiences have gone through the organizing filter of being interpreted and recorded in a searchable way. So while I can't currently edit photos (grrr to the computer problems again), I can write!

Filling in the Blanks (big news in here)

I came thiiiis close to having a genuine, physical, hyperventilating panic attack this past week.  I just keep telling myself I'm not allowed to internalize my stress too much, because nearly every iota of it is self-inflicted in one way or another.

Finals have done their usual round of damage, only with the bonus rounds of spending 3.5 days right before finals at a family reunion with no wifi, and also, of trying to make up for all the times I was circumstantially forced to slack in my "independent study" efforts.  (Directed Readings and my correlated annotated bibliography)  I'm realizing that working on my thesis "on my own timetable" is going to be a massive battle between me and everything and everyone else that thinks they should be a higher priority than my thesis.  I shall have to carve out adequate time, and guard and protect it with hyper vigilance.

But I've learned, and read, and thought, and made all kinds of interesting things this past term, and that is always good for my self esteem.  Unfortunately compelling blog posts have not really been one of those things I've made.

I completed my 6 weeks of boot-camp this past week, and while in some regards (tracking all my food) I failed miserably (after 3 weeks I thought my head would explode from the added stress of that and other things and the balls started dropping), but HEY!  I attended every single 6am workout session.  That's like, well on my way to establishing a healthy habit.  That's exciting for me.  The complicated part was the several many mornings when I had to wake up at 5:15 for bootcamp after having gone to bed past 2am.   (That's a recipe for really floppy burpees, by the way)

Which is the part where I point out that I am dangerously exhausted.  All the time.  (Also it is summer, so my kids are home.  All the time.) Lack of sleep, and very messy, often rather bored kids are the center of my universe right now, and profoundly affecting how I function every single moment.  Not good.

So, on top of all of those rather boring updates, here's this: we're buying a house!

Yeah, only one exclamation mark, though after a nap I think I could muster two.

Back in February we put in an offer on a short sale and I felt like God was in His heaven and all was right with the world.  The house was a perfect fit for our family and it was just sort of landing in our laps, with an amazing absence of stress and marital discord.  It felt like such a tender mercy.  Then it fell through, and essentially went into foreclosure, and nothing else in our price range looked remotely tempting compared to it (though I kept looking), but prices were on their way up (faster than we could squirrel away money for a down payment), and it was looking like the short sale house was going to be out of our price range by the time it was re-listed (which was going to take up to 18 months).  All of these things led us to the purchase of a house that is perfectly good, if in need of an overhaul, but also pretty lackluster compared to where my expectations were 6 months ago.  So it feels like settling, but it's very comfortably within our price range, so I should be able to actually give it some of the face-lifting it needs, and our kids won't even have to change schools.  But really friends, there is nothing intrinsically endearing about this house.  I shall have to build all of that into it, and it feels like a daunting place to start.

It all makes sense on paper, I just wish I could muster more enthusiasm for it.  I deeply suspect the lack of enthusiasm has to do with the lack of sleep, and the way this house will double my already intimidating to-do list.

There are still some tender mercies.

We will have a nice big window of time for moving.  We are only moving 2 blocks away, so frequent trips back and forth are perfectly feasible.

And after 10.5 years of marriage, Mr Renn is finally talking about tackling home projects as something we can do now instead of something we will do someday (maybe).  The proof will be in the pudding, but it's a welcome change. There are certainly plenty to choose from, and prioritizing the list will be maybe the hardest part.  Actually, I take that back.  From where I stand right now, trying to pack and move at the same time that I am starting a brand new semester of grad school will be the hardest part.

But we're going to do our darnedest to find the fun in it, and fully plan to overcome all symptoms of lacklusterness.

Failing and Being Wrong

I'm having a bit of a low-point this week.  You know how a couple of genuinely disappointing experiences can suddenly flavor your world so that even small disappointments, that you'd normally rebound from almost instantly, start to feel like an endless flow of lemon juice on your paper-cut? You get trapped in a spiral of negativity that quickly feels like it's eating you alive?  And suddenly all of your happy thoughts have holes in them, rendering them useless for floatation. It's usually the sort of situation that is resolved by a crying jag, a good-night's-sleep, and possibly a cyclical hormone shift.  Or, if it goes on long enough, by therapy and anti-depressants.

Hopefully that's not where we're headed.  But I've spent two weeks under the influence of seasonal allergies, a head cold and a sinus infection, dealing with the abbreviated mental/emotional whiplash of ending one semester and starting the next a week later, all while having certain hopes dashed and certain facets of my self-defined identity rendered insecure when, suddenly, decisions and actions I felt sure I was prompted to make fell apart and left me with no answers. I'm in a place where nothing about my life feels safely positive.  None of my relationships are reliable sources of positive emotional energy, at least not the kind where you can push the button for more anytime you need it, like the pain-med button in a hospital room. I'm not definitively good at anything I'm attempting to pull of right now.  I'm regularly confronted with my failings as a student, parent, friend, and spouse. And by regularly, I mean almost constantly.

It's a humbling, humbling place. I got more upset than I should have by negative feedback on one of my final papers, and couldn't seem to allow for the fact that I was interrupted probably 4 or 500 times while writing and editing it. It is hard, hard, hard for me to be in a place where my best is treated as obviously inadequate. Hard - primarily because I have so many nagging doubts (self-doubting doubts) that I have a hard time silencing even when I'm not dealing with negative feedback.  Sometimes I am just too delicate for real-life. And regularly putting myself through growth-inducing experiences has done nothing to toughen me up. I can't figure myself out.

Anyway - that's the gist of my current bluesy spot.  I have no shortage of them so far in this grad-school adventure.  Every time someone says to me, "How do you do it all?" My answer is "Not very well."  But I still haven't quit.  Quitting would be perhaps the only thing more emotionally devastating than sticking to it.  The whole reason I'm here is because I hate that I quit before, and if I quit now then I may never manage to disassociate myself as a quitter. That is sometimes the only thing that sounds more depressing than pushing through yet another semester or term of being a chronically sleep-deprived, distracted, inadequate mother who can't seem to write very well.  So then, onward and upward.

The good news: these Ted Talks Exist at moments like this.

cost benefit analyses

from etsy shop print revolution

I fell asleep on the way to school tonight.  I was waiting at a stop light, and suddenly startled awake to the realization that the light was green.

I have not made it to bed before 2am in 3 weeks, and have probably only managed it 4 or 5 times total since we got home from our Anniversary trip.

There is always so much to do and it is always urgent.  I need to be honest about how difficult this is.

But still, I really want to find out whether this ambitious goal of mine, to juggle so many demanding balls without utterly shattering any of them, is possible.  I want to find it out for myself, and for every other woman in my life.  I feel like culturally, there is a lot of perfectionism that infiltrates the female psyche and drastically limits our productivity.  We are only willing to try to do as much as we think we can succeed at, so we rarely find out what our limits actually are.  We don't spend a lot of time wrestling with that risky territory where failure is a real option.  Somehow, for those who have a choice, that place has been reserved for mostly men, and only brave ones at that.

I'd like to be able to push women that I know to set more goals and take more risks, and to be purposeful but daring with them. (Though not necessarily to risk driving drowsy, don't you worry)  I don't think anyone should spread themselves too thin to be useful just for the sake of being busy, but I do think that too few women have a healthy sense of their own power for determining their own destinies.  If we can be willing to be more vulnerable, and to spend more time in the failure zones, then we will ultimately feel far more in-control of our own lives.

And those thoughts are hugely motivating to me as I stumble through stupefying sleep deprivation and wrestle through readings as dense as lead.  As I constantly struggle to manage all the things that absolutely need to get done, I inevitably fail.  I fail every day.  Dinner doesn't get made or the laundry gets behind, or (most of the time) I have to give up sleep and don't make it to bed until 2 or 3 or 4am.  I fail as a mother quite regularly (but with the kind of sleep-deprivation I'm dealing with, I actually think I'm managing better than might be expected).  I am failing every single day.  If I allow failure to be grounds for quitting, then I will never finish this.

But so far failure is just part of the process.  I'm managing to be forgiving of my own failures.  I'm sort of managing to be my own cheerleader, kind and supportive toward myself.  And I remind myself often that I was still failing regularly when I was making decisions based on fear of failure.  That fear didn't really save me from anything.  I still failed as a mother often enough, maybe more often really.  Now I have the benefit of a clearer sense of purpose to balance out the yelling that occasionally surfaces when I'm clinging to consciousness by my fingernails and I encounter sticky messes that everyone knew better than to make.

I'd like to think that if I see this through to the other side and finish what I start, then I can, in clearer conscience, challenge other women to do the same.  Maximizing your potential looks different for every single person, but I still feel that far to few people give themselves permission to try to do it.  Because they might fail.  And failure is terrifying.  If you let it be.  There are often real consequences to failing, but there are always real consequences to not trying.  We too often forget to weigh them against each other.

So, while you wait for me to finish school so I can finish owning my cheerleader mantle, you can go read some Brené Brown and start pondering what brave plans you want to tackle with your fleeting and precious life.  Sure, you might fail.  But is that really an excuse to never try? Is failure really worse than living in fear of failure?

Hobble Creek Canyon last Autumn, just because

Adjusting expectations

So... my life is a little bit, a lot, crazy.

Luckily, it's the good kind of crazy, but still, stress and time-shortages are still stress and time shortages.

I've been at this parenting gig long enough to know that when the crazy level amps up, it's time to lower the bar.



This blog space has fallen to pieces over the last couple of years.  It's had at least a dozen identity crises and lost almost all of its readership.  I've been averaging 1 comment every 6 weeks.  Go me.

But I fear that if I drop this ball altogether, my record-keeping will suffer horrendously.  There needs to be a place that I keep a record of my life and my story of mothering my crazies while also attempting to keep myself growing, my household reasonably intact, and my marriage strong.  I can't be maintaining this space for anybody's benefit besides my own and my family's right now.  So the lousy comment stats may be okay after all.

But here's what lowering the bar is going to look like.  I can't plan, and I can't edit.  I can't be consistent, and I can't be thorough.  I will not manage to have a picture for every story or anecdote I want to share, and I may not manage to provide much of a story for all the pictures I may want to share here.  I anticipate we will mostly devolve into image-less text posts and nearly text-less image posts.  It'll still be a record of my life and our story, and it'll still be valuable.

Bar lowered.  Carrying on.

typography

I finally bit the bullet and am attempting to slip an Adobe Illustrator class under my belt before I start school in September.  (Mostly because I know I won't have time for any such shenanigans for the duration of my Grad program).  It's a four week class through Nicole's Classes, taught by Alma Loveland and I'm just eating it up.  It's beyond delightful to be able to create something that stays created when you have four tiny embodied entropies cycloning around your ankles all the time (sweet and beloved as they may be).  I cannot overstate how vital it is to my well-being to have some such creation going on.  (Nor, conversely, how destructive to my well-being the relentless, thankless entropy can be.  Counterattacks are appropriate).

So this, this is good.  My 1st week homework was to create a typography poster.  I created 3, because it's addictive.  They are nowhere near where I'd want them to be, but since I'm still learning what tools I have in my belt and how to use them, I'm going to be kind to myself and say it's a decent 1st attempt.

This is from the novel Housekeeping, which I just finished.  It is devastating and hypnotic.  Lots of tremendously deep thoughts, but not a terribly redemptive piece, all told.  

I love just about anything that flows from Brian Doyle's mouth or pen.  

From A Blog about Love, which is consistently outstanding.  And which everybody ought to enlighten themselves with. 

Bob

Summer break, huh?  As badly as I want to look forward to spending time with my kids, this prospect of zero moments to catch my breath has me just barely getting by.  I can't seem to squeeze in any time to write anything at all, let alone write it well or edit it.  There is always somebody vying for my attention, until those lonely precious late night moments when I should really be sleeping.  I tend to squander those with reading and listening to podcasts and ted talks and folding laundry.  The laundry, and the clean/cook cycle in the kitchen seem like a top-strength vacuum eager to suck every bit of my time I leave unguarded.  I'm trying to get organized enough to keep a steady stream of meals and snacks coming with minimal mess, but haven't quite pulled off a convincing attempt yet.

But I think, hope, think, that my kids are having and headed for a perfectly childlike summer.  I'm trying to plan enough outside activities that they don't spend the warm months sutured to the television, but I'm not going to make it a point of contention. There are too many fun things to do to be fighting over it.



I've just resigned myself to the fact that they'll probably be stuck to the screen all those moments when I'm planning, scheduling, cleaning, cooking, or on the rare occasion sitting down to blog something. There is, after all, only one of me.  And there are four of them.  To call me outnumbered is to commit a gross understatement.

But I'm having a phase where I like my kids a fair amount.  Sometimes I feel like they are out to get me, but lately I have a reasonable amount of patience for the crazy, messy things they do.  We just have to get out of the house often enough to keep from going totally stir-crazy.  And luckily I've passed that magic 6 month postpartum mark where I start feeling like I can actually leave the house alone with the kids.



And in every iota of "spare time" I'm wishing I could study and prepare for the GRE some more.  I have taken some practice tests, and plowed through a fair amount of study material.  If I'd been more on the ball I would have taken the test by now, but I didn't dare register until I felt halfway prepared, and by then the earliest available dates were mid-June.  I am so incredibly ready to put that squarely behind me. I need to be spending time re-reading old textbooks instead of studying for this bizarre and rather silly test.



So while I can't claim undaunted, I'm still shooting for optimistic headed into June.  Here's to holding it all together. I'm always up for tips and tricks if you have some words of wisdom for me.

interim

I'm not very good at capturing my thoughts lately.  I have them in droves, but life always distracts me "before my pen has gleaned my teeming brain," and by "life" I mean the four children, one husband, and one house that do not function without my assistance.




I've been in need of a pep talk lately, and no-such thing has been surfacing on its own.  Doesn't take much digging to find pep talks for mothers in May though.  Still, this Spring has consisted primarily of disillusionment, with the bright and shiny exception of being accepted to the Grad school program I applied to.  It's a provisional acceptance; I still have to take the GRE in a few weeks.  Spending every spare moment either studying for it or feeling guilty that I'm not studying for it is getting old fast. Let's get on with life, shall we?

Sir O and the Captain are about to begin Summer break, and I'm trying to envision/prepare a new routine for us.  Preferably one that does not involve endless hours of screen time.  I'm refusing to be overwhelmed though very little besides my own obstinance seems to be on my side there.
Mr Renn will be working a lot, and the budget for summer activities is.... well there isn't one.

Let the sunburns commence.

Submit - the overwrought button

Well then world, have you wondered where I've been?
Not really, eh?

Well a month ago Mr Renn had a day off work, and I indulged in taking Bunny on a girl's trip to BYU campus.  Women's Services was putting on a series of lectures and workshops about women and education.  Also, I'd been wanting to assess my options for going back to school.  I'd pretty well convinced myself I could handle 3 credits at a time, and I wondered if there was anyone anyplace willing to let me try.

Turns out there isn't, exactly.  But if I'm flexible enough to try 6 credits instead, then I was invited to apply for a Master's Program.  Only catch was that there was no time to contemplate the option.  If I was interested I had 3 weeks to apply.  (And another month or so to get the GRE taken.)  And so riding a wave of positive energy (and support from Mr Renn) I devoted every spare moment of those 3 weeks to getting that application ready.  Graduate school applications are not meant to be 1 month wonders.  I had to do major work to what I could recover from my undergraduate degree.  (Floppy disks = my worst nightmare)

But I did it.

I applied.



A lot of things could still go wrong, but for all intents and purposes I'm proceeding as though I'll be taking two night classes come Fall Semester.

Am I crazy?  Well, is this the first time I've made you wonder about that?  Everybody is their own kind of crazy, this is mine.

There is an indescribable lightness of being that comes when you are me and you've got some momentum to ride.  When you're actually doing something, and acting rather than being acted upon.

And never for a moment am I thinking this will be easy.  It will be ridiculously difficult.  I shall have to structure my time and productivity a lot better than I have in the past.  (Which is its own sort of hard wonderful)  I will certainly have a nervous breakdown or three.

But I'll be doing something that allows me to value my self, my talents, and my education.  To give myself permission to spend time cultivating them.  To interact with people who have patience for my infinite questions.  The results are bound to be good.  And if I can teach my watching children how to do difficult things, how to do terrifying things, and how to give themselves permission to try for the things their hearts long for, well then that'll be worth it right there.

In the meantime, my life is getting restructured and overhauled in a rather welcome way.  Having some external structure to base our everyday lives around is looking to be really good for us.  Once I take the GRE in May I'll need to be reviewing my 10 year old textbooks and re-learning writing and annotating styles.



Need.

Such a cool word, and it's nice to be able to use it about something that isn't one of my children.  Their needs still trump, but to have other "needs" to dance around.  It's kind of electric.

2013

I don't suppose it's surprising that the new year sneaked up on me. Or is it that the old year sneaked away from me?




2012 was beastly around here, folks.  It was full of wonder and blessings, but most of those blessings were the kind you choke on as you swallow.  And then there was an abundance of pure crap thrown in just to keep life messy.  In fact, the healthy and safe entrance of our baby Bunny into this world was the singular untainted high point of the year.  And if we're honest, that's plenty to make it a good year.

But if I'm honest, March through September of this year was a loss.  (Then throw in family drama to round out the year and it's all a rather sour memory.) I tried to be a halfway decent person while I was incapacitated by pregnancy, but by and large I failed.  Epically.

And so I find the new year hitting me at an oddly appropriate time.  I'm not much in the mood to ponder on the past year, because I know it was crap.  BUT I feel unbounded optimism for the future because there's hope for me to be able to function and use my agency and whatnot.  In 2013 I hope to be more of a human and less of a moaning beached manatee.

I hope to be more of a mother, and for my kids to spend WAY less time watching netflix than last year. I hope to get and keep my home in better order - in a "work smarter, not harder" sort of way.
I hope to get more art on our walls.
I hope to take some classes and acquire some skills.

Those ought to be resolutions rather than hopes, but if the last year has taught me anything, it's to recognize that I'm in a stage of life that involves a lot of letting go, control-wise.  Setting myself up to feel angry and deprived if things don't work out doesn't feel smart.  I'm learning to be kinder with myself, and it feels refreshing and healthy.

And so while a year doesn't seem nearly the long, ponderous space that it did before in my life, most of this coming year is still composed of question marks for me.  I don't have enough information to create realistc expectations, and so I'll create some lacy hopes instead.

On the Job training

I've been attempting to re-evaluate my expectations and definitions of my mother-of-three life of late.  This is part of fine-tuning my New Years resolutions, which are bound to be ready to share soon.



The biggest issue I'm coming up against is that all too often, I have a hard time getting over myself and really focusing the appropriate amount of energy on my kids.  I still spend too-much time and energy thinking about me.  About what I want for me.  And on really cranky days, thinking about what I want for me but cannot have.  It's not hard to see that this self-absorption is a fast-pass to a permanent state of cranky, listless discontent.  A place I know too well.



So, the task at hand is to get over myself.  And this is done.... how?  I'm figuring it out.  Here's what's helping:

1. Spend a few moments every day just soaking each child in and adoring them.  Just like a marriage, a mother-child relationship benefits from the power of intentional positive amorous brain time.  If I can remember how lucky I am and how tremendous these little people are, well then I'm half way there.  Even on their crankiest of days, I can still manage to step back and wonder at the scope of their souls.  These moments also help me to view their experiences and frustrations through their point of view.  And to remember that they aren't so quick to make expensive messes just because they want to make me feel all my efforts are futile. (That is my emotional response to their messes, and it's just out of line.)  It helps me remember that it's my job to be the mature one and that they still have a ways to go before they will be able to think outside of themselves the way I need to.  And it's my job to teach them how to do that - mostly through my example.

2. Take an occasional constructive mommy time-out.  A selfish "time-out" will only increase the self-pity.  I've been guilty of pulling time from my family in order to indulge in fantasies about how I wish my life were different.  Or worse, how I wish my life were more like someone else's.   Hello ornery and unmotivated version of myself!  If I really want to change something about my life I need to set a goal and create a realistic plan for change.  I also really need to remember how great my life is and can be.  So when I'm in danger of losing my cool and need to take a time out - the purpose of my time out needs to be recalibration, not gratification.   Instead of spending those moments focusing on what I don't have and can't do, I need to turn it around and remember what I do have, and commit to what I can and will do.

3. Respect your children.  Sure they are "just kids".  But truly, do you feel that different inside from when you were a kid?  You have more stress and more responsibilities.  You've learned a lot.  But are you not still the same person?  If you can back your lens way up, you realize that there's not such a difference between your kids learning how to be pleasant people and you learning how to be a parent.  You're both learning as you go.  Respect that your child's journey and experience is a real and immediate to them as yours is to you.  Their frustrations (which may seem trivial to you) are perfectly valid in their eyes.  Be as patient with them as you hope God can be with you.  I suspect He sees us all as little children with a terribly limited understanding, and is oh so patient with us.

4. Approach your least favorite tasks as a direct service for the people you love.  I cannot tell a lie, the super-repetitive parts of running a household can sometimes drive me batty.  The dishes?  The laundry?  The kitchen floor?  I sometimes get defeated by their never-ending-nature and my motivation to deal with them shrivels and flops.  They don't stay done and the sense of accomplishment I feel at completion is hardly proportionate to the fatigue I feel when the next dish or dirty sock surfaces 3 seconds later.  So how can I keep this fact-of-life from running me over?   It's an instance of not changing what you are doing, but changing why you are doing it.  When my housework turns into a gift I am giving to my kids and my husband, it becomes much easier to do it happily and well.  And so the drawers of clean and folded clothes, the reasonably straight kitchen, and the less-than-disgusting kitchen floor are all gifts to them.

5. Adjust your expectation paradigm for how you are thanked for your work. Relating to #4, it is not reasonable to expect your children to line up and give you angelic smiles and thank you for each task you complete on their behalf.  (If they do thank you for anything you do - that is purely frosting on top). If you want more verbal thanks, try giving more of it to your spouse.  The way your kids show their appreciation for your gifts is by using them.  Thinking this way helps to circumvent mountains of frustration.  I remember being told that being a mother is like being a Chef.  You send out a beautiful, delicious dish.  If the plate got sent back still looking beautiful and full of food you'd be sad!  Yet that's often what we expect our kids to do when we work to make our homes neat and attractive.  The way they are attracted to the toys or the rooms we just cleaned up is their way of appreciating our work.  We need to learn to view it as thanks.

6. Give yourself permission to take a little pride in doing things your certain way.  If I'm going to be a mother, homemaker, housekeeper, babysitter, etc.  I'm going to be a good one.  You cannot possibly do everything well as a mother, there are not enough breaks or enough prep-period for that.  But you can take a little pride in the things you can do well, especially the things you get at least nominal pleasure from doing.  I take pride in ironing everyone's dress-shirts, in setting the table for dinner each night, and in thoroughly lubing my boys in some super-beneficial lotion after a bath.  I know nobody else would do these things for my family as well as I do - and that most people wouldn't do them at all.  It's like my signature, and I'm very attached to it.

7. Search for opportunities to share things you love with your kids.  This can be one of the most fun aspects of parenting, but also a really hard one to prioritize.  Yet nothing makes you feel as accomplished  or cool as a parent as having a child that has been taught to appreciate something they can enjoy the rest of their life.  A certain music genre, a favorite movie, a beloved hobby?  Get your kids involved and enjoy it together.  In the process you will also enjoy each other more.

8. Take care of yourself in order to have the strength and energy to enjoy life and your family for years to come.  How many mothers forget to feed themselves in the course of they day?  What is the consequence of that?  I don't know about you, but at our house hungry people are usually pretty crabby.  It's not selfish to let your children cry or wait longer for what they want so that you can eat a balanced meal or go to the bathroom.  And making time in the day to exercise and feed yourself spiritually ultimately blesses your family with a mother who is balance and strong and has the energy and well-being to be present.  I have done much better at parts of this, and my biggest goals are to improve at the remaining parts.  I really believe in this, even if I also recognize how hard it is to make it happen.

9. Define what you are and are not responsible for.  Your kids' approval is never a reliable gauge of how you are doing.  Your goal as a parent cannot safely be to make them happy either.  Guess who decides whether they are happy?  They do.  It's important as a parent to clearly define what you can and can't control, and what is and is not your responsibility.  Make sure you are not owning their choices.  You don't own them, you are a steward over them.  Your job is not to control them or their choices, but to teach them and equip them to be able to make good choices.   It helps when your child is throwing a public tantrum to remember that you aren't the one exhibiting embarrassing behavior; they are.  Be embarrassed for them, not for you.  When you aren't trying to control things beyond your control, or feeling responsible for things you can't control, it's a lot easier to feel good about the work you do, and to focus your energy where it can do the most good.

10. Learn to recognize and act when you're being derailed.  But be patient with yourself.  You're learning too.  I am as prone as anyone to feeling like a failure at the end of the day.  I expect myself to do everything I know I should do, and I always fall short.  On the days I can give myself credit for improving without beating myself up for being imperfect and human, I find I can spend a lot less energy beating myself up and spend it instead on things that actually make a difference.  There's a lot of wasted energy in being a perfectionist.  When I sense I am getting frustrated and getting all wound up inside, I try to remind myself that I should do something productive with that energy instead.  I try to quickly think about a few things I do have and a few things I can do, to get myself in a better frame of mind.  And then I try to remember what a waste of energy frustration can be.  You can only be frustrated if you have unmet expectations, and the less fair and realistic your expectations are, the more energy you will waste being frustrated.  If your expectations aren't met, try to give them up, even if they were reasonable.   Holding on to them won't make them happen, especially if they involve other people's agency.

So dear readers, what would you add to my list?  What keeps you levelheaded and purposeful when you start to slip into a rut?  Do share, because I still have a long way to go!

for a cause

It's been an emotional weekend here at Grandma's house (if you are me).  BYU lost, Mr Renn made significant headway in the realm of career decisions, I attended the General Young Women meeting for my church, and I tried to be supportive of several friends going through really hard times.  As we've pointed out, that is sometimes tricky for me.  Plus my heart sank and dissolved into a puddle at my feet when I learned that a friend from my neighborhood growing up (Laurie Moss) was recently diagnosed with Stage 3 Hodgkin's Lymphoma.  Her little family is out in Michigan where her husband's attending medical school and my little brain has been trying in vain to comprehend all the implications of such a difficult situation.  But, what I can do - I will do.  And I'll challenge you to do the same.  If you're localish - here's an opportunity (you can bet I'll be there...):

productive nothings

Despite the sparsity of posting I've been crazy busy of late. Any moment that the weather cooperates my boys and I escape outside and I weed like the dickens trying to get flowerbeds presentable. The first flower seeds came in the mail this week and I mapped out an elaborate sowing schedule.  Spring spring spring spring spring.  Can't get enough of it.



On top of this lunacy has been the unglamorous process of getting a business up and running.  A friend from high school asked me to do her wedding flowers in April and I decided to take the plunge.  I haven't got much to show for myself yet - I own a parked domain name, I have a tax id and my business license is in the mail.  But I've been pouring hours and thought into it.  And I'm apt to steal hours and thought from blogging rather than from my boys.  Can't exactly apologize for that.  Although eventually it ought to all mesh such that my business ventures are more bloggable.  That's the goal anyway.



AND teething - there's been lots of teething.  See? - crazy busy.

growing green

i had intended to spend my single mother nights watching a Katherine Hepburn movie marathon. I still think that would be a fun way to treat myself if I stumble upon any large blocks of alone time. But somehow instead I spent the nights Mr Renn has been away (job-interviewing) poring over these:



I have an enviable list of exact species I should very much like to plant someday. I just need some dirt.
If you happen to have dirt, I hope you are doing something fun with it. Few things are as therapeutic as helping something grow. (And plants don't talk back or require potty training).

The Friz and Me

I'm not especially keen on Sir O's latest attachment to my parents' collection of Magic School Bus books.  I've been trying to get him attached to The Little House and Bread and Jam for Frances.  But he's determined that the most colorful book with the least palatable form of didactics will be his favorite.  Se la vie.



But while reading one of his favorites, The Rot Squad, Miss Frizzle told her class, and subsequently told me, to "Take Chances!  Get Messy!  Make Mistakes!"

Wow.  Really.

If I could get over my fear of doing exactly those things, then I could experience such a revolutionary freedom.  I think a lot of us get so caught up in trying to avoid risk, avoid messes, and avoid mistakes that we create a rather narrow version of reality for ourselves.

Which reminded me of a favorite, if over-used passage from Marianne Williamson,

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.

So I've been contemplating what fear is keeping me from doing lately.  And sadly, the answer is "quite a lot."  I'm awfully afraid of failure.  But I'm also aware that life is too short to be afraid of good things.  And a lot of good things require that you're out in the realm of taking committed chances and living on purpose.  So I'm recommitting to my principle of not making decisions based on fear - and I'm mapping out some concrete goals, a few of which involve this blogging space, a few of which involve my family, and a few of which involve just little old me.  I don't want to wake up and be in my twilight years and wonder what I did with my life.  It's time for being alive, and living intentionally.

A few small adjustments I hope to make in the coming months:

• planning date nights in advance so they actually happen, at least 2x/month even if they cost money.
• actually starting a company for wedding flowers and events (I need a tax id# to have an account with a wholesaler).  I was going to wait until after our move - but I figure having a Utah tax ID might be useful anyway - since I will inevitably be in and out of Utah for the rest of forever, and want to be able to do weddings here.
• allow myself to start planning a garden without an actual garden to plan
• encourage Mr Renn to go to every job interview that he can secure, and not pressure him to make a choice until we have all our cards on the table
• Purchase a web-domain so I can begin the process of weaning myself from blogger and exercise more control over my site.
• Start keeping track of all those blog-post ideas that I never actually remember when I sit down to compose a post.
• More actively seek out opportunities to learn from other people - both for the knowledge and for the relationships.  This means not being afraid to ask - or rather asking despite the fear.
• Find more ways to be cognizant of people outside of my home, and look for opportunities for me and my family to serve others.  (Even if our service comes with sticky fingerprints and missing pieces)
• Find more ways to show my Husband I love him, and that he's important to me.  (Because severe sleep deprivation sometimes takes it's toll in the most important places, and taking one's spouse for granted always seems to be the first thing to slide).

What can you do, big or small, to make your life a little bit less afraid and a little bit more on purpose?  Is there a chance for failure involved?  Can you try it anyway?  Do tell.

Projects: mom binder

Sometime shortly before Christmas I snagged a free download of Jessica Getsgow Fisher's "Organizing Life as a Mom" pdf for creating a "Mom Binder".  My tried and true method of writing a list from scratch for the next day has been falling to pieces since I became a mom of 3.  It was time to try something a little more comprehensive, and that could do a little bit more of the remembering for me.  (Because my short-term memory is a joke right now).

I remembered that my friend Aubrey had something like this and it had made it easy to step in and be the mom when we house-sat for her and watched her older kids for a few days.  It was almost like a manual, "everything you need to know to run this household and keep the small kids in their groove."

image: the mom writes

It's taken me over a month, but I finally have one notebook with all my calendars, lists, schedules, routines, important phone numbers, budgets, and menu planning information.  If I can just keep this puppy close at hand throughout the day, then we stand a chance of staying on track and actually accomplishing what we plan to accomplish in any given day.  Well, until something unexpected throws us off track.  But I still prefer to start with a plan!

What has worked for you in managing your household and all the people relying on you for order and instruction?  (And food?)

And yes, someday I expect a smartphone and google calendars will do all of this for me.  But for now I can afford paper and printer ink much more readily than a smartphone and a data plan.  Regardless, what apps have you or other moms loved for running life smoothly?