Emotionally vulnerable...

No one ever told me that having a child, being a mother, would leave me with an emotional wound so raw that I will forever feel vulnerable.

Well maybe they told me, but they described it by saying things like "You'll wear your heart on your sleeve". Said it in ways that in no way, shape or form came even CLOSE to making me understand the astounding depth of vulnerability I would feel upon bringing that little human being into the world.

I have discovered that my heart is not 'on my sleeve', a piece of my SOUL happens to currently be 40 miles away from me. Wherever that little person is, find him, and you have found my heart, my soul. The moment he came forth from my womb, a piece of my soul was ripped from my core along with him and thrown out in the open to be forever exposed. Like a snail sans shell, that piece of me is and forever will be in imminent danger. While in my care, my soul was sheltered, hidden behind years of carefully constructed walls to keep out the pain...motes dug to discourage the enemy...structures built from lessons learned. Now, this piece of my soul is going to go through it all again...all the things that I cannot protect him from, those things he needs to experience on his own to build his own castle against will no doubt hurt me just as much as they do him...


All parents come to know this, but somehow it gets passed over amidst all of the other "Your life will never be the same" type warnings one receives while waiting for that first little bun to come out of the oven. Maybe that is intentional; if one knew completely the depth of this feeling prior to having kids, we may be less likely to undertake the task; that is, until we fully understand the depth and the massive expanse of the emotional fulfillment that also come with it. Quite possibly it is impossible; impossible for anyone to fully grasp the depth of the emotion without having experienced it for themselves, and therefore impossible to explain in simple words.

I wonder how my soul will be able to handle the additional burden of having another child? I wonder, seriously, if I am emotionally capable of spreading my heart out even more? I wonder how any parent ever goes on after some tragedy or another befalls their child? How does a parent cope with loosing a child? I honestly cannot imagine having to endure what must be immense agony that comes with that, and it scares me to think that I will be opening myself even more to that possibility by having another child...

Knowing that having another child means being even more vulnerable is a scary, scary thing.

But I do not want to; no, I CANNOT live my life in fear...WILL not give up the happiness because of fear...

Blogging enroute...

I wish I could blog while driving...maybe I should get a little hand held recorder so I can record my thoughts for later transcription to my blog. I always think of stuff during my 70 minutes of commute time each day, and I always get it worded just right or have this big epiphany during my drive, and then by the time I get time to blog it, too many thoughts have crowded back in and everything gets jumbled again, and what I put down here is no where near as eloquent as it was in my head.

The Story of Stuff

I think everyone should see this video. I hope y'all check it out.

www.thestoryofstuff.com

(The link is the title...I am still trying to get the hang of this edit html crap, ugh! I made it work on a previous post, but couldn't get it to work here...)

Something more...

I can't help but think I was meant to do something more than this...

I don't want to sound self important, but it has occurred to me lately that I think I was meant to do, to BE something more meaningful in this life.

I am an estimator / project coordinator for a construction company, and I like what I do, but the further along I get it in this journey of mine, the more it feels like this can't be all I was meant for. The further I walk along this road, the more what I do actually seems to be at odds with what I am finding to feel 'right'. The deeper I travel, the more irritated I get...irritated with myself for being so out of touch with myself when I made the decision of what I 'wanted to be'. I like what I do well enough, but it doesn't light a fire in my soul, it does not invoke passion...

Digging in the dirt, nurturing plants. Playing music on my violin. Taking photos of all of the amazing forms of life laid out before us. Doing things to cherish and honor and preserve the gift of this wondrous planet. Writing. THOSE things light a fire of passion within me. Running in this rat race, it is turning out, does not. And yet I feel trapped. Trapped because I LIKE the level of 'luxury' we live in (definitely using that term loosely, but honestly, I know we do have it pretty darn good). Trapped because the bills have to be paid. Trapped because I am scared. There, if we are being completely honest, change scares the sh*t outta me. I have a freakish, compulsive need for control, and the kind of change I am talking about involves releasing ALOT of control and having faith that everything will work out.

My friend L has told me a few times how she is envious of me because I get it. Envious that I got it so much earlier in life than she did. Right now, L, I feel like you are just flattering me. I may have gotten some things, but I guess I was just in too much of a haze to get the most important thing; me.

I feel like I lost so much time thinking I knew who I was and what I valued and what I stood for, but now that I am really delving into it, I am feeling like I let myself down. I am feeling like I have never really known who I am. Wasn't I sposed to have this all figured out by now? I feel lost to myself.

Being a project coordinator isn't meaningless; not to the owner's of the company that I make money for. Not to the sick people who visit the clinic or hospital and maybe receive a bit of comfort from their surroundings, which I played a role in making a reality. It is not meaningless to me and my family in that it helps pay the bills; it helps us have a home, and 2 decent cars for us to get to work, and to pay for things for my dear son, and to help pay for our trip to the cabin which we are able to take most years. But when you get down to it, I am finding it meaningless to my SOUL. I am in an industry that eats up open land building new buildings, eats up natural resources to produce the carpets and vinyls and ceilings and walls and furniture and all the STUFF that goes inside. An industry that fights legislation intended to protect the Earth and the valuable resources she provides us because it cuts into their profits; affects their ability to achieve the 'American Dream'. I am in the rat race to make more and more money, because no matter how much you make them, it is never enough...

It is starting to feel like it is directly opposite of what I want to be involved in.

I know that the last 10 years have not been a waste; although I may feel as though I cheated my soul of valuable learning time, lesson WERE learned. Sometimes we have to travel through the forest and emerge from the other side before we can see the trees. I know that this may suffice for now; my soul may allow it to continue to enable me to support my family while my kids grow. But I can't help feeling that at some point I will find the time has come for the 'something more'.

"Daddy says I don't have to take that sh*t from no one!"

Here is the story behind probably my earliest memory...at least I *think* I remember it, but it may be one of those things that is more a 'memory' because the story has been told so many times :0) Either way, it's a cute story that I like...

So when I was little my dad started his auto repair business at home, and stayed home with my brother and I...I was always mature for my age, and dad would have me answer the phone for him while he was out in the garage working (this was before we had the extension in the garage). The story goes that a lot of times I had backwards numbers and letters, but when dad asked me what it was sposed to say, I could always tell him, and it was always right when he called the number! Most of the people who had dad do regular maintenance on their vehicles knew that I would answer the phone for dad when he was busy, and I would take a message, and that the message ALWAYS got to my dad, and so no one had a problem leaving a message with me.

One day, when I was 4 or 5 (my brother would have been in school all day at this point), he had to go up the back road for something (or something like that; I guess that part of the 'memory' is foggy), and told me to stay in the house, and if someone calls, to tell them he couldn't come to the phone right now and take a message.

When dad returns to the house, he finds me curled up in a ball, red eyed, wet cheeked and still sobbing...He asked me what was wrong, and I went on to tell him that "A mean man called and asked for my Dad and when I told him he couldn't come to the phone right now but could I take a message he yelled at me and told me if I don't put my daddy on the phone RIGHT NOW he was going to come over to my house and spank me".

Now, I don't remember my dad's reaction, but I know exactly what he looks like when he is really mad, and I am sure that I know EXACTLY what he looked like that day! He had this look he used to get in his eye, and that look was only ever directed at me once, when I was 18, and I made it very clear to him that he had better never aim that look at me ever again...I knew all to well what came after he got that look in his eye, but that is another post I am not ready to compose yet...

I do know that my dad didn't know for sure who it was, but I do know that he found out later and let the dude have it...I would not have wanted to be on the receiving end of THAT.

So when my mom got home that day, I told her right away about the mean man who called and told me to put my daddy on the phone or he was going to spank me, and I went on to tell her, with hands on hips of course, that "Daddy says I don't have to take that SHIT from no one!!"

It's still one of my favorite, and one of my few, good memories.

How I came to start a blog...

So, I got the idea to do this blog from my friend R...who rocks, BTW. She started one because writing has always been near and dear to her heart, and has helped her get through and sort through rocky times in the past, and she is hoping that it can do the same for her again.

We met for lunch a couple of weeks ago when we discovered we really needed a bit of each other's energy; we really needed to take a minute out of our busy lives and have some US time. Unfortunately, that is something that doesn't happen as often as we'd like, but luckily the foundation of our friendship is ROCK SOLID, baby, and we know that just because we don't see each other as often as we may like, we love each other no less, and that when needed, we are only a phone call away, with shoulders always ready to lean on.

So in the course of our lunch, we determined that we both are feeling a bit lost in our lives right now...both feeling like we are floundering a little, looking for something that we can't quite name; can't quite put our finger on. I am not sure that the something each of us are looking for is necessarily the same, but it is leaving us with a similar taste in our mouths. I know a lot of mine has to do with my spiritual journey; my journey away from the patriarchal religion of my childhood and onto something different that feels much more like HOME to me. It has to do with all of the doors that my journey is opening, and all of the questions that it is raising, and all of the unknowns that I am trying to make known. It would be easier if I could just feel HOME in that which I was raised, but I can't. But, I digress, that is another post all together.

R's life journey is currently presenting her with trials much different than those that I know in my adult life, but IMO it all boils down to the same thing in the long run; the lessons we are here to learn in this life...

So R tells me the other day that she has started a blog....getting back into writing hoping it will help her sort through everything. I asked her to send me the link, if she didn't mind. She did and I read it...

Gee, I thought, I think I may enjoy that too. I could use it right now as well. I too have a history with the written word; a rummage through my old 'treasure chest' will produce roughly a half a dozen notebook journals from my preteen and teen years, a time of much turmoil in my life. (I know that by no means do I hold the trademark on teenage turmoil.) But they are there, none the less...Writing helped me sort through a lot of stuff, and I just can't bring myself to throw them away, even though I feel weird reading back through them. I mostly just use them for date references when DH (dear hubby...'dear' used loosely sometimes!) insists that X happened before Y but after Z, and I need to prove him wrong.

So I have plenty of history and love of keeping a journal, and so I thought I would try this blog thing, and ya know what? It feels REALLY good. I composed my first post yesterday, and it felt SOO GOOD to put it all down on paper...err, um on computer, I guess, LOL. That is the one thing that is going to take a bit of getting used to, the idea that this is out there on the world wide web (hehehe) and that really anybody could 'potentially' see it, but I guess when you think about it, it is less scary then a paper diary, as those who are likely to stumble across a paper diary are more likely to be those that you DON'T want to see it, where those who stumble across this are more likely to be people I don't know and never will know...I also kinda miss the personal touch of actually writing in my own hand, but MAN typing is a lot easier and quicker!!! I haven't even told anyone about it yet, haven't given anyone the link...that may take awhile :0)

So, I started this blog as a place to record my thoughts and this journey that I am on. I actually named it after one of my old journals, a journal of poetry and thoughts that I started when I was 17 and encompasses only about 2 years of life. It was called "Me from the inside". It was pretty deep, lol. So I guess this is going to be an extension of that...only like 12 years later. If anyone is reading this, I hope you enjoy my random thoughts.

How did I get here?

On my mind today....



My 'baby' will be turning 18 mos old tomorrow, and I am feeling quite melancholy about this at the moment...Something about saying "My baby is *18* mos old"...A year and a half...I feel like I cannot say he is my "baby" anymore. He has reached one of those invisible milestones that, for some reason or another, come to mean so much to us...In the blink of an eye he has gone from this teeny, needy, nursing, coo-ing, rolly polly little baby to a running, talking, climbing, jumping, independent toddler who is showing us more and more everyday who he is inside...I used to be able to hold him on my chest by cradling his little bum in one hand, and now his legs dangle down when I carry his sleeping self in from the car after coming home from somewhere after bedtime...

At least he is still small enough to wrap up in my lap and read a bedtime story. But how much longer do I have before he overflows my (ample) lap? Not long enough, I fear...

I think the saddest part is that I know that in what feels like the same 'blink of an eye' I will be feeling melancholy because he is turning 18...


This morning, a guy at work was singing that Talking Heads song that goes "And you may ask yourself 'Well - how did I get here?" I agree - How *did* I get here?

Wasn't I just like 5 years old answering the phone for my dad during the day while he was working in the garage??("Daddy says I don't have to take that shit from no one!")

Wasn't I just 7 (or was it 6?) meeting the "new girl" in first grade who, unknown to me at the time, would go on to be my best friend long into our adult years (and hopefully till the end of our days in this lifetime!); the 'new girl' who went on to become one of the most valuable people in my life?

Wasn't I just 10, running around at the Wahkon Campground with all my camping buddies, not a care in the world besides what I was doing at the moment?

Wasn't I just 14 feeling the rush of emotions that comes with young love and experimentation?


Wasn't I just 18, graduating from high school, the world laid out before me like the sea, the possibilities glistening endlessly on the surface?

Wasn't I just 19, graduating from tech school, starting my career in the 'real world', feeling excited and terrified of the road ahead of me?

Wasn't I just 20, going through one of the hardest periods in my life to date; loosing Paul to suicide and 6 mos later loosing my Linda to a drunk driver? My Linda who, although our time was brief in this life, was and is my soul mate...My soul mate whom I know I will meet again in another life, just as my soul has met (her) in many lifetimes before this one...

Wasn't I just 25 and totally in love and getting married to my high school sweetheart and enjoying our most AMAZING honeymoon?

Didn't I just YESTERDAY give birth to this amazing son who is now turning 18 months old? This little miracle that sprung from our love, and who grew and flourished inside of me for 10 months and continued to thrive solely on the fruit of my own body for an additional 6 months...who has gone from a helpless little being into an independent little person who every day is discovering new things and growing into himself??

How can it be that I am a MOM? How can it be that I am an *adult* with adult worries, adult responsibilities, adult problems, adult thoughts? I spent so much time wanting to get here, and now that I am here, I have a hard time believing it...

So, yes, I wholeheartedly agree you Talking Heads...How did I get here?