What a Week!

Well, last week was a doozy.  I can't think of a more difficult several days I've experienced since T left us a year-and-a-half ago.  In fact, part of me would like to stay in bed for another few weeks just to digest and assimilate everything that happened.  Monday night, Jonathan and I had (what I described to Kenzie as) a disagreement.  I won't go into detail, but the long and short of it was that he doesn't trust me as much as I thought he did. Okay, so I thought his trust was limitless.  What can I say?  I'm a girl who likes her fantasies.  But still, it wasn't a good way to spend Monday evening. Or all day Tuesday.

Tuesday afternoon, I wrote an emotional, rambling letter to Jonathan.  Oh, it was full of all the things I wanted to say but couldn't.  Or shouldn't.  It wasn't fair.  It wasn't nice.  But it was definitely raw.  Too raw.  So, I sat down with an old Jon Kabat Zinn book (Wherever You Go There You Are) and skimmed through it until something grabbed my heart.  There it was, the chapters on patience and letting go:

From the perspective of patience, things happen because other things happen.  Nothing is separate and isolated.  There is no absolute, end-of-the-line, the-buck-stops-here root cause.  If someone hits you with a stick, you don't get angry at the stick, or at the arm that swung it; you get angry at the person attached to the arm.  But if you look a little deeper, you can't find a satisfactory root cause or place for your anger even in the person, who literally doesn't know what he is doing and is therefore out of his mind at that moment.  Where should the blame lie, or the punishment?  Maybe we should be angry at the person's parents for the abuse they may have showered on a defenseless child.  Or maybe at the world for its lack of compassion....

Letting go means just what it says.  It's an invitation to cease clinging to anything - whether it be an idea, a thing, an event, a particular time, or view, or desire.  It is a conscious decision to release with full acceptance into the stream of present moments as they are unfolding.  To let go means to give up coercing, resisting, or struggling, in exchange for something more powerful and wholesome which comes out of allowing things to be as they are without getting caught up in your reaction to or rejection of them, in the intrinsic stickiness of wanting, of liking and disliking.  It's akin to letting your palm open to unhand something you have been holding onto.

So, I wrote another letter.  That's the one I showed to him Tuesday evening.  But, I still wasn't quite okay.  I still felt small and quiet.

By Wednesday, I decided that I had to get out of the house. Dress up.  Speak to people.  I decided I needed a day.  So, I started with my very favorite thrift shop and worked my way down the highway hitting used bookshops, garden centers, antique stores, my favorite taco place....  By Wednesday evening, I felt relatively normal.  Thank goodness.

Yesterday (Saturday), however, the three of us took a trip into Austin. Kenzie's birthday is tomorrow, and he's decided to become vegan.  He often uses his birthday to make big changes in his life, and when he does it this way, the changes tend to stick.  So, we went out to The Mellow Mushroom where he could order a gooey, cheesy pizza, and Jonathan and I could order a veggie pizza with a bit of Daiya.  Mmm....  Anyway, after pizza (and gourmet popcorn from Cornucopia!), we headed to the Texas Memorial Museum (aka the dinosaur museum) on UT's campus.  When Kenzie was little, we spent a lot of time there.  In fact, the last time we were there was when Kenzie was five.  He wore his dinosaur costume (he wore it most places in those days) and told me all about the dinosaurs whose fossils we encountered (he likes to teach).  Then, he spent the afternoon rolling down the grassy hill outside and climbing on the horse statue.

Here's Kenzie at about five years old.
Not sure where all the dinosaur costume photos have gotten to....

Well, listening to him tell me about the fossils yesterday, about the dinosaurs they came from and their behaviors and habitats and various extinctions, just like when he was little....  I got a bit nostalgic.  I wanted him to be small again - not a hulking nearly-fifteen-year-old.  (Oh, I love the teenage years, but I do miss those toddler/little kid years, too.)  And, as I've been quite broody for the last couple of years, it sort of spiraled.  By bedtime, I was a wreck.  Jonathan wants to wait until we're more financially stable.  Unfortunately, I'm 36 and he's 54.  We're quickly aging ourselves out of the baby game - something that keeps me awake nights.  Yeah, this is a point of contention between us.  I'm of the mindset that if everyone waited until they were ready for a baby, the world's population would dwindle to nothing.  Him, not so much.  We've been waiting for a year-and-a-half - talking about it, but waiting.  Sigh....

But, this morning, I'm fine.  (Phew!)  This week has really taken a toll on me, though.  I can tell I need to make some tea and... cake!  With Kenzie's birthday tomorrow, I'm planning to make vegan chocolate cupcakes with buttercream frosting - and sprinkles!  That cake is sort of a birthday tradition around here.

Here he is last year with his chocolate cake.  Yum!

Smoothie Goodness

There's just something about a green smoothie that makes me feel like I've got my life under control.  I must be doing things right if I'm eating drinking that many fruits and veggies.  Chopping up the apples, peeling the oranges, washing the kale....  Why, I must be the healthiest girl in the world - or at least in my little town.  Heck, I've even been fermenting veggies and growing sprouts and harvesting the last of the garden.  I'm a nutritional powerhouse! (Okay, a nutritional powerhouse who's been craving pizza all week - but still!)  Oh, and I feel a little better about my parenting, too.  Kenzie just loves green smoothies, and I love seeing him guzzle all those wonderful nutrients.  Yes, he mostly subsists on tostada shells with refried beans, pb&j sandwiches and the occasional bowl of oatmeal, but every day I know he's getting at least something wholesome.

I forgot to take a picture of my own smoothie before I drank it down, so I'll use a friend's photo.  I'm pretty sure she won't mind.

Not so green, huh?  Yeah, that's the berries.

Hello Again, World!

It is time to take this blog in a whole new direction.

Since the last posting, my husband left us and I've remarried.  I've moved several times.  I've been introduced to Buddhism.  I have become the best version of myself (so far).  And, my son (still unschooling) is now almost fifteen.  Whew!

So, I will chronicle my new life here - both the joys and the sufferings, something I tended not to do before.

The Three of Us

Fur-Covered Friends

Just a few pictures I found of some of our pets. One of our cats (Ezzy - so named because her back reminds me of the Hunchback of Notre Dame, but I couldn't bring myself to call her Quasi, so Ezzy (after Esmerelda) it became) isn't included. I'm not sure where the photos of her went.























This is Hep. She's named for Audrey Hepburn because she's small and cute and black & white.


















This is Blackie. She's Hep's daughter.


















Oscar (dog) and Incredible (cat) sharing a bed. Incredible died a few years ago. He was both FeLV and FIV positive. Given only a maximum of two years to live when we found him, he was with us for six. I really miss him.
















Alaska looking pensive (or guilty - he has a habit of chewing up hardcover books).


















Harold curled on the bed with the giant bone.
















Harold's sister Maude. She lives with my brother now, but she and Harold get together for playdates. They're definitely a bonded pair.

Calm

Life has slowed down quite a lot, and I'm happier than a junebug in a hall of mirrors. Okay, bad simile. I'm a lot calmer than a junebug. But that's just the point. I'm calm. I can breathe. I don't feel caught in a whirlwind of activity and guilt. Or inactivity and guilt.

I've kept the weight off (with surprisingly little effort - being vegan has so many advantages), and I feel good. Now, if we could only afford produce. Organic produce. (I'm missing my green smoothies.) At the moment, we're subsisting on beans and brown rice, with the occasional whole wheat spaghetti night to break the monotony. Just waiting for the coffeehouse loan, and everything will be cushty.

I don't feel overwhelmed by the number of animals living with us. Right now, it's six - three dogs and three cats. In the past I've taken care of sick animals as well, and it was just a bit too much. At the moment (knock on wood), all are healthy and happy. I've also started feeding and housing birds in the backyard. I've been watching a family of cardinals for months, and I'm just intrigued. I could easily see myself falling into birdwatching. I've skirted around the edge for several years - ever since K and I spotted that crested caracara just north of San Antonio.

My home is clean and (mostly) orderly, and it's been this way for many months, now. I love to tidy my bedroom, so it tends to stay clean. It's a beautiful spot, filled with lace and stones and fallen leaves and old photographs of people I've never met but know oh so well. It's easy for me to keep a beautiful spot clean, but I'll pat myself on the back for a while, nonetheless. The kitchen, however, has been more of a bother. So, I took a page from Flylady (!) and focused a bit on the sink. It's an old stainless steel thing, all scratched and marred, but keeping it wiped clean has been surprisingly helpful. It's like a small, shining beacon in my little galley kitchen, and it encourages me to continue washing things, even when I've finished the sink. I'll move on to the counters, the stove, the top of the fridge, the cabinets, the floor.... And, as goes the kitchen, so goes the rest of the house. The living room sparkles (or would, if I'd dust just a tad more often). The dining room/office is orderly and open. The bathroom is cute and inviting. I feel like I've finally gotten things under control, after so many years.

I enjoy a clean, calm, open house. Instead of thinking about everything that needs to be done, I can let my mind wander. I'm more creative in a clean space. I'm happier. That's not the way it is for T and K, however, and that's been a bit of a problem. I've been working with K, though, and he's almost finished with his room. He was so excited that he could see the floor; he must have mentioned that at least five times last night, cute kiddo. Cute kiddo who's almost thirteen. Wow.

He's decided he wants to watch The Rocky Horror Picture Show with me. I've forgotten most of the things one is supposed to yell or throw at the screen, but I'm sure there's a website or twenty that will spell it all out. It's been years since I've watched Rocky Horror, mostly because a good friend of mine who used to dress as Dr. Frankenfurter hasn't been here to watch with me. Of course, if there was any reason to watch it again, it would be watching it with K. How fun!

K loves my old movies, and there's very little that I own that I'd be uncomfortable watching with him (or that I know would make him feel uncomfortable). So, I often find him snuggled down in my bed watching a beloved movie like Peter's Friends or Harold and Maude or Tootsie. I'm stuck in the past with movies, I know. I prefer VHS to DVDs, and I have quite a large collection. Last night I was overjoyed to find a copy of Barefoot in the Park with Robert Redford and Jane Fonda for a quarter; I'd been looking for that one for the last few years. I like to watch movies at home where I can stop or rewind them at will. Still though, a dark theatre might be nice for a change. The last movie I remember seeing in a theatre was Last Chance Harvey with Dustin Hoffman and Emma Thompson a few years ago. I wonder if anything good is playing....

Off to work now, I suppose. Can't wait to give up this job and spend all my waking hours at my coffeeshop....

The Magic Mushroom

Well, it's been quite a while, and we've been going through lots of big changes on our little hill. I won't apologize for not writing or spend precious paragraphs categorizing the many reasons why. Simply put, I'm back, at least for this moment that is quietly slipping away.

I'm sitting beneath a lovely duvet I picked up cheap during the hot weeks of the summer. I just found a cover for it a few days ago - little lavender paisleys. (I was about to sew a couple of sheets together and have done with it.) I've never had a duvet before, mostly because the good ones are made of feathers, and I just couldn't (wouldn't) purchase one. However, this one was sitting unpretentiously in a Goodwill, sandwiched between a couple of terribly ugly polyester bedspreads, a $10 tag dangling from its side. I couldn't pass it up. And, I know my money is going to a good cause, rather than to murder birds. Win-win! I never knew before how warm and comfortable these sorts of blankets are. How did I live without one for so long? Next on the list - a duvet for K who loves snuggling down in his blankets.

So much has happened over this past year, I have no real idea where to begin. I guess I'll start with the big stuff. We're at the tip of a new adventure, standing at the top of a mountain with a snowball and a smile. We're applying for a business loan and dreaming of a coffeehouse. I finally finished the business plan a few weeks ago (!), and we're ready for the banks (!). T and I once owned a coffeehouse, though it was a ramshackle, glued-together affair. We opened it with my tax return of $1400 and the innocence to believe we could. It was housed in an old downtown hotel in Wichita Falls and was more popular than we ever could have dreamed. Now, we're dreaming bigger. Much bigger.

I want The Magic Mushroom Coffeehouse and Cafe to be the "Third Place" we've been searching for. I want K to spend his adolescent years in a bustling, friendly, everyone-knows-your-name sort of hippie hang-out. I do. At the old coffeehouse, when I was pregnant with K, I had dreams of bringing up a little one there, surrounded by people who cared for us and in the center of an ever-swirling whorl of activity. I think this sort of "Third Place" is almost a necessity for the unschooler. For many, their "Third Place" is also their home - filled with all sorts of folks at all hours. Not us. Almost no one visits us on Tangled Hill. This has never really bothered me, though, as I'm a fairly private girl, and I hate cleaning for company. Still, I think K has suffered a bit, and the coffeehouse should help with that in amazing way.

Also, the coffeehouse, by all accounts, should make reading our bank statements a bit more enjoyable. We've lived a simple, quiet life for a long time, now, and we've needed very little money to do so. We work to live, rather than the other way 'round. Still, money equals choices, at least to a degree, and there are a lot of choices that haven't been available to us. I have always wanted to learn to pot, and I'll be able to take classes. K is thinking about Aikido or theatre. Perhaps both. T mostly wants computer gadgets. And, we'll all be able to attend concerts, festivals, and what-have-yous. Yeah, I'm allowing myself to dream a bit.

I have so much to say about the simplicity I wrapped around myself here, but it just doesn't seem to fit this post. I guess I'll save it for later - perhaps tonight. I'll pour a cup of hot tea, pull my sweet little duvet over me, turn on some Iron & Wine or Hem, and consider this past year.

Updates Galore

Lots of updates. I guess that's not overly surprising, since I haven't written in such a long time.

K and I have been über-sick for days, now. Swine flu? A cold? You know, the symptoms are eerily similar. We've got sore throats, coughs, stuffy/runny noses, aches, fatigue, fever, and headaches. Hmm.... I'm not an alarmist when it comes to illnesses, but I'm tired of checking off nearly everything on the list of swine flu symptoms. I'm so ready to be done with this one.

We've started a strawberry cyser. Strawberries were cheap, so we decided it was high time we made something with them. It's gorgeous. The color is this amazing red, and the combination of apples, honey and strawberries smells bewitching. Of course, it will be another year to a year-and-a-half before we can drink it. Still, it's lovely to watch it bubble in the carboy.

We're getting ready to be backyard beekeepers. We use so much honey in mead making. Of course, we use it for tons of other things, as well - cooking, home remedies, facial cleanser, etc. Once we harvest our first honey, I plan to use it in soap making, as well, and to use the wax for balms and candles. I think the biggest hurdle will be in getting support from the neighbors. People have lots of fears when it comes to flying, stinging insects, even docile honey bees. If we do get everyone's okay, we figure we'll gather equipment over the next eleven months, read like crazy, and become bee parents around April of next year. I can't wait!

I was perusing Craigslist this evening and found six good-quality bookcases and a set of outdoor furniture for free. It took two trips in our sedan (T is a master at tying things down - we once furnished an entire 4500 (yes, 4500) sq. ft. coffeehouse using only a 1967 bug), but we've got it all home. T has put all the bookcases in the garage. He's been looking for bookcases for such a long time, and I'm so happy I could find some for him. He was busily setting up his books all evening. I think that brings his bookcase count up to nine. I just counted mine and K's, and we have ten between us. That's nineteen bookcases. We're a veritable library!

T has switched to veganism again. I'm hoping it's permanent this time. He goes back and forth from occasional meat eating to vegetarianism to veganism and back again. The last time he was vegan for any amount of time, he lost a good amount of weight, got his diabetes under control, and lowered his blood pressure and cholesterol. Yay veganism!

The other night, K and I watched a fabulous documentary, Consuming Kids. I read Susan Linn's book Consuming Kids a year ago and had no idea there would eventually be a movie based on it. It's one of those books you read that changes your perspective just enough to tilt you off balance for a while. I love books like that. I think, if I hadn't read the book first, the movie would serve the same purpose, at least to an extent. It doesn't go as in-depth as the book (of course), but it does grab you and shake you up a bit. After we watched the movie (at the address I linked to above), we stayed up late into the night (yay unschooling!) talking about marketing - why it's done, how it's evolved, how it's shaped our culture, and the effects it's had on children and on childhood. He absolutely loves movies like this. It amazes me. He just seems to sense when I'm watching something with a cultural or political slant and comes running (this is a child who adores Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow and who gets all excited when Frontline comes on PBS - go figure).

My first garden is coming along beautifully. When I was pushing seeds into the earth, I told myself, "Hopefully, at least one or two veggies will come up." Well, eveything has come up. Now, I'm going to have to learn how to thin the plants!

The book I'm working on is coming along, slowly but surely. I'm nearly done with the outlines, and I'm about to start writing the actual content. I just hope there are people out there who want to read what I have to say!

Okay, enough updates. I'll try to post more regularly (try being the operative word, here). Hope everyone is having a lovely spring!

Just in case anyone was wondering...

I'm tired of cleaning up after people who are perfectly capable of cleaning up after themselves. That is all.

A Well-Deserved Day Out

Today, we celebrated the end of a difficult week. We waded through lots of family/friend drama this week, and it was so nice to come out on the other side relatively unscathed. We decided the day called for something special. We all woke up early prepared to hit one yard sale after another, but being so close to Easter, it seems no one had any inclination to haul their stuff onto their lawns this morning. So, instead, we visited our favorite Austin thrift store, Thrift Town. I found the most deliciously vintage dark green pea coat for $5.99 and three brand name cloth diapers for $.69 each.

Then, we headed out to several Half Price Books stores where K sat and read manga for hours, T picked up a few brewing books and I found a $1.00 compilation of Leon Hale's Houston Chronicle articles from the late 1970's and early 1980's called Easy Going. I'd never read Hale's work before, and now I'm entranced. What a magical writer! I also found a Sue Bender book I hadn't read before called Plain and Simple: A Woman's Journey to the Amish.

What a haul, huh? I'm elated! I was searching for a good book on organic vegetable gardening, but no luck. I just started gardening, and as much as I enjoy it (is there anything more fulfilling?), I feel a bit lost. Oh, well. Maybe next time.

Then, we stopped by Austin Homebrew (the "Make Your Own Damn Beer" guys) for some fixin's. Tonight, we bottle the mead and start a batch of raspberry beer. Yum!

After that, it was on to the Mediterranean buffet for all the hummus, tabouli, dolmas, falafel, baba ganoush, lentil soup and baked cauliflower we could eat! Not surprisingly, I'm stuffed. Amazingly, T is in the kitchen right now cooking up berry pies for tomorrow. He's spending the day with his boss and a friend, while K and I visit my grandmother a few hours north of here.

As I type this, my eyelids feel heavy and my body seems to be melting into the couch. It's been a long day, but a good one. Still have to bottle and brew....

Update - 11:00 PM: Damn, the malt and hops boiling on the stove smells good!

Update 2 - 12:30 AM: All done. 24 beautiful, corked, amber bottles of spiced ginger cyser and a 5 gallon carboy full of fermenting raspberry beer. Yay!

Just a Quick Note about Aprons

I kinda like 'em.

Right now, I'm wearing a mushroom fabric half-apron. I also own a hippie-looking batik half-apron and a green gingham half-apron with green and pink rick rack. When I wear one of them, I feel so... domestic. And productive. I swear, I accomplish twice as much each time I knot one behind my back. Today, for instance, I purged almost all the plastic and lead items from the kitchen (for some reason, I wasn't ready to toss them all out before, so I had shoved them to the back of the kitchen cabinets). I also swept and spot mopped, cleaned off the fronts of the kitchen cabinets, moved my teapot collection to the top of the cabinets, made bread, cleaned the stove and counters, did the dishes, and rearranged the contents of all the cabinets to suit my diabolical needs.

Okay, so the aprons may not be the source of all my powers. The coffee might have had a little something to do with it, too.

Now to direct my super cleaning powers to the master bathroom. Bwah hah hah!

(P.S. I want an apron like this, next. Wow....)




















Update: Well, I ended up doing much more than I listed here. I swept and mopped the bathroom, cleaned the counters and toilet, rearranged some things in the bedroom, vacuumed, and then spent some time with my brother. Phew!

Second update: I bought a new (to me) apron for $1.50! It's another batik half-apron, much like my first one. Utterly cool. Yay domesticity!