100 Things, Part Two

It’s cold and rainy here today, so I thought it would be a good day for dreaming. And it was, although it seems like this list is a bit more coupled than the previous one, i.e. two points having to do with travel, two points having to do with writing, with the kids, etc. It’s interesting how this stuff comes to me. I’m writing in the library today, so my first thoughts had everything to do with books and writing. But eventually spread out to my two favorite dream topics – travel and food. It’s been a trying day, so this was a good exercise in letting it all go in favor of focusing on the happy, the jubilant, the everything there is to look forward to.

26. Read at least one “classic” book every three months
27. Go on a girl’s getaway retreat every year
28. Have cats
29. Have the time to go through every part of The Louvre without rushing
30. Have house plants
31. Figure out how to grow a huge herb garden inside so I always have fresh herbs
32. Become fluent in German again
33. Learn Brazilian Portuguese
33. Always have fresh cut flowers in the house
34. Go to SouthxSouthwest
35. Make my children laugh every single day
36. Go on a driving tour of the Pacific Northwest for our 10 year wedding anniversary
37. Figure out how to paint my own toenails whilst pregnant
38. Adopt a baby
39. Have a dedicated space to write that is chock full of all my favorite things
40. Find the perfect BBQ
41. Learn how to make the best fried chicken
42. Write a story about dragons
43. Go into space
44. Find a way to finance a trip to document the origins and best comfort food in the world for a book
45. Go back to Nebraska every year to visit family
46. Cook with the children as much as possible
47. Go on a trip entirely of my husband’s design
48. Start a children’s museum
49. Find a fly fishing mentor for The Boy after his Papa is gone
50. Own a car with flames painted on the sides

100 Things, Part One

Ok, so I decided to copy cat L’s idea and come up with my own list of 100 things I want to do in my life. And she was right it’s really hard! Although once I let myself distinguish between goals and dreams, it got a bit easier. Because I got all serious and started out by thinking that the whole list had to be goals. Things I wanted, and needed, to accomplish in my lifetime. But I think the whole purpose is to let yourself just dream and think about all the things you’ve always wanted to do, without constraint or judgment. And that made it a bit easier, but it’s still hard. Like I said yesterday, I think my dreamer is rusty. It’s just been so long since I just let myself daydream. Because while it’s good for the soul, it can also be dangerous. So as with everything else, it’s about balance. Learning how to dream without getting attached to the dreams. Or more specifically, without attaching expectations to the dream. Because it’s always the expectations that get me in trouble.

So, without further ado, here’s my first 25 to start with:
1. Write and publish a book
2. Only wear clothes that I love everyday
3. Get Lasik surgery so I don’t have to wear glasses anymore!
4. Take my family to Europe
5. Go white water river rafting
6. Swim with dolphins
7. Learn how to make perfect pad thai
8. Get scrapbooks for the kids done through their childhoods
9. Adopt a Greyhound
10. Live by the ocean
11. Become a bone marrow donor
12. Go on Wheel of Fortune
13. See the Colts (with Peyton Manning as QB) play in person
14. Find the perfect shade of lipstick
15. Have a hot stone massage
16. Teach the kids how to batik
17. Go whale watching
18. Get all gussied up for and go to a red carpet event
19. Go to a strawberry festival
20. Re-learn how to make perfect tortillas
21. Learn how to walk in stiletto heels
22. Go on a ghost tour
23. Learn how to sew
24. Have horses again
25. Find a muse

Inspiration

I have a good friend here who is one of the most extraordinary women I know. She is the least afraid person I know. She decides what she wants and then she just flat makes it happen. She and her husband decided they wanted to live in an RV and take their two kids on the road. They’ve been talking about it for a while, but recently the just decided to make it happen. And the most incredible thing about it is that they did. They just made it happen. And I am in awe of their ability to do so.

My husband and I have been talking for years about the things we want to do, with and without the kids. But here we still are, in Colorado Springs, him working a job he’s very good at but does not love, me trying to figure out to be writer and struggling, and both of us trying to figure out how to juggle being the parents we want to be with “real” life. And I think what I love so much about L and her husband, is that for them, there is no “real” life. There is simply the life they create. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t, but regardless they consciously chose it and live so completely present in every single moment of that choice that it no longer matters if it works or not.

She has this amazing list on her new blog of 100 things she wants to do in her life. And I love it. Because it’s not all “climb Mt. Everest” or “go to cooking school” or other huge things. There are also things in there like, “get a facial” and “wear blue contacts” and have a pet turtle.” I just love it. And it’s incredibly inspiring. So I think I’ll get to work on my own 100 Things I want to do list. I’ve been so completely rooted in every day, which is a good thing, that I’ve forgotten a bit about letting myself dream, which is not a good thing. And I’ve lost some of my internal inspiration along the way. It’s time to get it back.

Stuck

I wrestled with this week’s story all day long. I am not even kidding. I started completely over three times. I’ve just got this idea, from another dream I had, that I can see and feel so clearly and I cannot figure out how to translate it into the story that it already is. I feel like I am trying to compose in a different language or something, that’s the kind of disconnect I’ve got going on. I am fairly sure that I’m totally over thinking the whole thing and thus making it much more complicated than it actually needs to be. And I think I’ve got myself in some kind of self sabotage brain loop to boot, i.e. the genre that this particular story falls in is way out of my typical comfort zone, so because I don’t know this genre very well it makes sense that I can’t find my voice within it. And while I think there is probably something to that theory, I also think it is a big mind fuck to explain my inability to write the way I want to. Either way, it’s infuriating. The good news is that I finally finished a draft that I didn’t want to immediately erase. The bad news is that there is a very good chance that I will wake up tomorrow, re-read it and immediately want to erase all of it. Which means I would be starting all over again on the day of my deadline. It’s all quite maddening really.

But I am going to try to put my mind down and walk away before I re-read it tomorrow and hopefully I’ll be able to lend an objective eye to the piece and either know there are big problems with it, fix what I can and publish it anyway or just give up and publish it anyway. Either way, I will be publishing something tomorrow. I just hope I don’t cringe when I do it.

There are 48 more stories to tell this year, I’m sure this will not be the last time I get stuck, I just hope I figure out how to deal with it better the next time.

Next....

As it’s becoming more and more obvious that my career in nonprofit is over, I’ve been spending some time thinking about what’s next. Since we’ve got the bankruptcy in process and our financial woes are going to soon be considerably lessened, I’ve been trying to give myself permission to look at what I want to do from the point of view of what makes me happy, what I feel most passionately about, what makes me want to get up in the morning instead of what I’m qualified for and what’ll pay me the most. And it’s interesting the things that float to the top when you allow yourself to focus on what you really want rather than what you must.

So what gets my blood pumping? Writing and motherhood. Pretty simple really. And I think I’ve known this for a quite a while, it’s just taken me this long to have that fact be ok. And to try to figure out how to do something more with those two passions than just be them; a writer and a mother that is. I’m fairly sure I don’t want to be a freelance writer. I like to write what I want to write too much to write just for the money. So that leaves me writing because I love it, not because I ever expect to be paid or published for it.

That leaves motherhood. How can I kick that up a notch and do more as mother? Bring my passion and love of motherhood to more than just my friends. And I immediately thought of becoming a doula. And to be honest, it’s something I’ve thought would be amazing for quite a while, it’s just not something that I actually let myself think about as a real possibility. But why not? The opportunity to assist women in obtaining the empowered, dream birth they’ve always wanted would be such a gift for me. To be able to advocate on their behalf, to help them plan and realize the labor and birth experience they’ve hoped for would be like making the most nurturing part of my own role as mother tangible.

So let the research and planning begin.

Nightmares

I sometimes feel like I’m not very good at this whole day-to-day life thing. It just feels like my process for living is just not all that compatible with the rest of the world’s population. Or maybe I’m just totally thrown off-kilter today because of the horrifically bad nightmare I had early this morning that I just can’t quite get away from.

It wasn’t one of those dreams where you wake up screaming or sweating or even bolt straight upright in bed. I just simply opened my eyes but the images were so vivid and so awful that they still flowed in front of my eyes. And I realized that I was awake and it was indeed just a dream and when I tried to go back to sleep the dream just kept going, in my waking mind. Going back over the worst parts again and again. I dreamt that The Boy was killed in a truly frightening way. And I was there, watching the whole thing. And the two points that stuck out the most was the sheer quantity of blood and the absolute feeling of desolation after I knew, in my dream, that he was gone forever.

I haven’t had a dream like this since I was pregnant with The Girl. That’s actually usually the only time I ever have dreams like this is when I’m pregnant, but since that is definitely not the case right now I’m going to have to chalk it up to stress and my subconscious wanting to supplement my waking stress with some dreaming stress.

When the kids came in to wake us up, The Boy crawled in next to me and I immediately started crying. Am still crying looking at him now as he’s playing superheroes with The Girl on the floor with NFL Countdown on in the background. I just can’t quite seem to shrug off the sorrow of this dream.

Which is really screwing with my plan for today to bring myself back from the solitude seeking, brain candy book immersed, disengaged place that I’ve been in for the last several days. This dream makes me want to crawl right back in with renewed commitment.

Dreaming Stories

I woke up with a dream lingering in my mind. It was equal parts strange and beautiful and I’ve been trying to hang on to it all day and somewhat unsuccessfully. As the colors started to define themselves in my memory and the characters started to reveal their voices to me, I thought wow, this might be the start of a lovely story. But then the day began, with the whining and the to do list and the everything else and as the day has worn on, the dream has started to fade. I’ve forgotten most of the characters now and the circumstances; mostly it’s the colors that have stuck with me at this point.

And the colors were so extraordinarily vivid for a dream like this. There were the most gorgeous shades of orange; bright golden, shimmering hues of orange that billowed in the air like clouds. And every possible shade of brown I could have ever imagined. We were in the desert and it was lovely. I don’t think I’ve ever quite seen a landscape like that before. It was a little like when I wrote about seeing southwestern Colorado for the first time; really seeing all the variance in color and texture where before I had only seen scraggly bushes and dirt. It was like for every minute I looked at the barren rock and sand and dirt, new colors emerged, new levels of texture and dimension. And interwoven into everything were the vast oranges.

It really was beautiful.

And there were camels. I think. And we were on an adventure of some kind. I can’t remember much more than that anymore though. The whos and the whys have been swallowed up by the farmer’s market and playing in the fountain and cooking dinner.

It’s the first time in a very, very long time that I’ve woken from a dream and thought about writing it out. Letting the dream guide my writing into something that probably would not have occurred to me awake. So I am a little sad that I lost it, but at least the colors stayed with me, it’s just about worth losing the rest just for the colors.

Fairytale Childhood

I’m sitting here trying to figure out what to write about as my mind swirls with sweet memories of the people we’re travelling to see today. Part of the problem is that so many of their names start with J so I’m finding my fool proof system for keeping anonymous those I love foiled. The other part is that so many of my memories are comprised more of feelings, responses and emotions than actions.

Walking down a country road picking wild flowers to go see Sweet Lady J’s chestnut horse or chasing her golden retriever through the meadows. Watching her throw pots and create Father Christmas; an amazing, huge pot with a lovely face always smiling out at exactly my height.

Chasing and playing and dreaming with Brother J until way past both of our bedtimes. Everything from board games to elaborately constructed journeys into some other world created by nothing but our imaginations and wonder. Him being four years older and having such unending patience with me as I lured him away from the grownups talk back into some previously imagined escapade.

Listening to Uncle J tell the most amazing stories. Stories that brought so much more color and encouragement to dream up fairytales of my own. Giving me permission to create an extraordinary life; to connect the dots between my imagination and the “real” world. Almost demanding that I color outside the lines and carve my own path through the daily convention.

It’s so easy for me to slip back into those feelings of being so completely safe that I could do anything. Living room plays. Stories of my own. Dreams of meatball downpours and skipping stones across elven rivers.

And Brother J is now a father and I a mother. I hope that we create the same kind of safe and gorgeous world for our children to grow up in. I hope that regardless of the number of siblings our children have, that they can find the trust and love that we found in this extended family. I hope they can cultivate the same vibrancy of growth that we were gifted.

Weaving an unbreakable foundation for a future of brilliance and beauty.

4/6/09 - Dreaming

I go to sleep at night not knowing what awaits me. I don’t know whether or not I’ll be able to sleep. I don’t know whether or not I’ll be able to stay asleep. I don’t know what sort of dreams I will or won’t have.

I used to take refuge in sleep. And now it’s just a great unknown.

I’m back from my lovely girls’ weekend, where I spent three and a half days relishing in not having to be anything other than me. I was with three women who simply by being with me agreed without words to take me as I am. And I spent all weekend not wanting to run or hide.

And now I am back and one of the first thoughts I had was that I wanted a cigarette. And I wanted to hide and disappear. And scream. I missed my babies. But I did not miss participating in this life as it is.

I had a dream last night where an old love came to find me. And he told me how long he had been looking for me. He told me how everything was forgiven. That he still loved me. And that he wanted me to be with him; he wanted to take me away from this life. And it was a lovely dream. To feel adored and taken care of. To be able to relax into being loved. And then I woke up of course. And I was so angry to have had this dream. Like my mind is intentionally trying to make me sad and restless in this life I am currently living. Like my mind is intentionally trying to make me crazy by injecting these dreams full of fairytales and romance into my oh so non-romantic life.

I am so full of resentment towards this dream and towards my mind for doing this. I want to be able to stay present and live this life, walk this path that I am on. Do the work in front of me. I want to be content with the present. I want to want this life. I want to breathe in and out the luxury of being.

Dreams

Over the past year or so, I’ve had four car accident dreams. They are a little unsettling as I’m sure you can imagine.

The first dream was of me and the kids driving into town and suddenly we were going off the road, down a fairly steep hill and the car was beginning to roll. It was at this point in the dream that everything slowed down and I distinctly remember thinking to myself, “Oh my God, this is really happening.” Then I woke up. The spookiest thing about it was that I know exactly where on the road it happened, along the highway that I drive almost every single day.

The second dream was on the same highway, but in town this time, and I watched a huge accident happen in front of me mostly involving construction trucks. They spilled concrete, metal and equipment all over the road. And I knew I had to find a way through it otherwise the other cars behind me would slam me right into it. But I couldn’t figure it out and slam me they did. My car was shoved underneath one of the large trucks. A long metal spike came through the windshield and stopped just a millimeter shy of my throat.

The third I was driving on the Navajo Dam road in New Mexico and was, again, suddenly going off the road and I had to choose between going into the water or going down the very steep and very far down side of the dam. I chose the water because I thought we’d have a better chance of survival with a shorter drop.

The fourth, which was last night, was simply me having a head on collision with a shiny, silver Mercedes. He just wouldn’t move out of the way and I had nowhere else to go. At 55 miles an hour. I woke up when I realized that the air bag had failed.

I don’t know what these dreams mean or why I keep having them. But given my love for driving, I find them a bit disturbing. Or maybe they don’t mean anything and they’re just an extension of my crazy. Any ideas?