Picture in the Paper

My son got his picture in the local paper!

Our town celebrated the opening of a long-awaited bridge late Saturday morning. After accompanying me to the farmer's market in the early morning, I dropped him off with a friend and his mother to enjoy the opening ceremony and whatever else they had planned for the bridge celebration.

He and this friend had been avidly following the progression of the bridge construction, visiting the site at least once a month from the closest vantage point.

He came home Saturday afternoon full of talk about being interviewed by the newspaper people, and that he was going to be in the newspaper. He also mentioned that he didn't get yelled at by the police, because he didn't do anything illegal (which I thought was very amusing!), but that his friend did.

And then Sunday morning I got an e-mail from my brother-in-law with my son's picture from the local paper! I went out to get my paper, and sure enough, he made the front page of the Region section.

The funniest part is that the picture is of him and his friend's mother watching his friend climb the fence to get to the razor wire at the top of the Folsom Prison enclosure! I guess that's what he meant when he said his friend did something illegal!

Book Review

I finished Keeping Faith, by Jodi Picoult. The author holds my interest in that she does write out-of-the-box story lines. At the end of this book there is a Q&A with the author, and she mentions having an extremely uneventful childhood. She has balanced that with an active imagination!

The book is about a seven-year-old child named Faith who sees God after her parents get divorced. God comes to her as a female, motherly protector. When her grandmother dies, God tells Faith what to do to heal her. This begins a national fury that results in hundreds of media, religious zealots, and sick people congregating in their yard to get a piece of her.

The story begins with the divorce. Mariah finds her husband Colin in their bedroom with another woman. Unfortunately, Faith is with her, and sees this also. He leaves, and within days files for divorce.

Colin and Mariah met in college, where he is the handsome, popular jock, and she is the studious, loner who is hired to tutor him. She is so consumed by a sense of inadequacy when he decides to go out with her, that she totally excuses his indiscretions early in their relationship. She has no friends other than her mother, and is completely needy. She worships the ground he walks on even now, despite the fact that he had her committed to a mental institution the first time she discovered he was having an affair and tries to kill herself. She's a complete pushover who determines her own worth by how this man treats her.

Mariah tries to keep it together after the divorce for the sake of her daughter. Then her daughter starts talking to God. This makes Mariah nervous, so she takes her daughter to a psychiatrist. To her credit, however, she never once thinks her daughter is lying.

After a long drawn out media circus, performing several healings, experiencing stigmata, which brings on the attention of the Catholic church and her own Jewish leadership, and a lengthy custody battle, God leaves as quickly as she appeared.

The story is well told, if convoluted. I do appreciate the author's imagination when considering realistic, yet uncommon, experiences. If nothing else, her books make you think.

Protecting the Spirit of Childhood

Last night I learned that I just might have a passion after all.  Well, I don't know if I'd quite call it a passion, but it comes very close.

I met with my instructor to talk about choosing a topic on which to base my master's thesis.  I was somewhat depressed about this process, because the program is for a master's in education, with an emphasis on art in education.  Being neither an artist, nor a teacher, I was at a loss when it came to the constant discussion of incorporating art in the classroom, although I have been convinced of its importance.  That still left me with no relevant ideas for my final project.

In an effort to narrow down possibilities for my thesis, we talked about what I do for a living, and why.  I explained that although I'm good at what I do, this is my business, I did not get into it because of an overwhelming love for raising other people's kids.  I do, however, want to give these kids an opportunity to be kids.  

I realized that I believe in protecting the spirit of childhood (to steal a phrase from Waldorf), which is not the same, and may actually be the opposite of, protecting children.

What do our children need to become whole, healthy, empathetic, productive adults?  Is it really in their best interest to protect them from everything that might cause harm?

By not letting our children climb trees for fear of the chance that they may fall and break a bone, we are stealing from them an experience they deserve.  What if by protecting them from this experience we are inadvertently teaching them to keep their feet firmly planted on the ground, and to never reach for the stars?  By denying them the thrill of climbing high, of achieving greatness in this small thing, we could be forever crippling them from attempting to achieve greatness in the future.

By helping our children achieve success at every task, in order to save their feelings from hurt, we are denying them a valuable lesson.  Does not failure teach us to try harder?  By never putting our children in a situation where they have to try and try again to achieve success, we are robbing them of the feeling of triumph that will motivate them towards success in their future.  We could very well be disabling our children into not being able to succeed without help.  What happens when we aren't around?  What happens when they become young adults, and this safety net is withdrawn?

By protecting them from seeing poverty, we are missing an opportunity to teach empathy for those less fortunate.

By giving them everything they ask for, we are teaching them that they can forever have whatever they want, when they want it.  Are we then cultivating the sense of entitlement that got us into the economic bind we are currently struggling with?

By forcing onto them our cultural taboos about sex and the body, in an attempt to protect them from predators, or teen pregnancy, or STD's, we are denying our children an opportunity to see their bodies in the beautiful way they were created.  What if our culture created this harmful environment of predators and sex offenders by shaming our children into denying their sexual nature, and thus forcing them to prey on the helpless or weak in order to satisfy their need?  By focusing on the danger, we miss the opportunity to teach our children the beauty of the body, the appropriate time and place to explore their bodies, and instead leave them with feelings of guilt, or shame, when they do have sex.  What if we are driving them to give their bodies away earlier and earlier in an attempt to find out what all the fuss is about?

Life is about risk.  Sometimes, only by risking much do we achieve much.  If we constantly shield our children from risk, are we losing a valuable teaching opportunity?

Book Review

This post is about the books I've read recently.  I've taken a break from the business-related books (lifestyle entrepreneur, self-help, how to find your dream job books) and am just reading for the fun of it.

The last book I finished was by Jodi Picoult, entitled My Sister's Keeper.   This was an intriguing book from the very beginning.  The story is about a girl who was basically engineered and implanted (through IVF) to be a perfect donor match for her older sister who has a rare form of leukemia.  The parents mean well, thinking they would only need to use the umbilical blood to put their daughter into remission, but eventually the older sister has a relapse and this daughter is required to give more and more of her body, culminating in the need for a kidney transplant.

The book begins from her point of view, but each chapter is written from the viewpoint of a different family member.  Every family member speaks with the exception of the leukemia patient.  It's obvious that everything that happens in this family's life revolves around her, so it's really about how this fact affects everyone else in the family.  Instead of sympathizing solely with the character you are reading about, you get a balanced look at how this trauma is affecting each member.

Ultimately, the ending is still surprising.  Altogether, this was a great read, and rooted (although it is fiction) in very real issues we are facing today.

I'm moving on to another book written by this author, but I'll have to tell you about that one later, as I've just started it.

I started and discarded a book called Money, A Memoir by Liz Perle.  It is a book about how women view and deal with money, and how this is different from how men feel about money.  I was really hoping it wasn't another book about a woman who let her husband take care of all of the finances until she suddenly finds herself divorced and in charge of her own future.  However, in this I was disappointed.  Hence, the discard.  

I don't know why this is true of a lot of women (which is what the book was trying to tell me, had I really wanted to know) but I'm tired of hearing the same sob story.  Just because you're not interested in paying bills does not mean you have to be clueless about finances and how much money your family does or doesn't have.  Wake up and quit whining.

Before that I read a whimsical story called World of Pies by Karen Stolz.  This was a book I found while cleaning out my son's bookshelves.  I have a bad habit of stopping at garage sales when I see books being sold, and then buying every children's book they have.  Usually this consists of a box or paper bag full of god-knows what.  I then deposit the entire collection on my son's bookshelves, waiting for the time when he's reading well enough to be interested.  So far, it's slow going.  So in the interest of giving him a little more space, I cleaned out his bookshelves of anything he would probably never be interested in reading.

This was clearly a book intended for a young woman.  It is the story of a small town girl living in Texas.  It begins when she is about 11 years old, learning to make pies from her mother.  It ends with her teaching her daughter this skill when her daughter is about seven.  The best part about the story is that it ended with a list of recipes for all of the food items mentioned in the story.  Some of them look good enough that I'm going to give them a try before passing the book on!

These kinds of books make me wonder how people get published.  I mean, the story isn't amazing, there is no real meat or moral.  It is purely the chronicling of an everyday life story.  The author is a decent storyteller, but not exceptional.  What part of this would get a publisher interested?  Is it really not that hard?

Mistake...

I made a mistake.  Against my husband's wishes I cosigned on a car loan for my nephew.

I talked to him extensively about what he was getting into, what it would require, what he would do if everything didn't go according to plan, and what his exit strategy would be.  I stipulated that he contact me as soon as he knew he wouldn't be able to make his payment on time.  I lectured him on responsibility and how to break away from the losing example of his father.

It seemed like everything was going to be fine.  I felt really good about giving this boy, at 19, a helping hand; an opportunity to establish a credit history, and show responsibility.  I remembered trying to buy a car at 19 without a cosigner, and the exorbitant interest rate I paid because of it.

I started paying for this mistake in the second month.  Because it is considered a high-risk loan (I've learned) the lender starts making phone calls within 10 days of being late on the payment.  It was then that I realized that I was the primary on the loan, and apparently the only one answering phone calls.  I tried to get a hold of him, but like I said, he wasn't answering his phone.  Neither could he return a phone call.  Or an e-mail.

Eventually he made the payment.  But it continued like this every month for a year.  I would receive a phone call, try to track him down, then he'd make the payment.  Rarely did he call me, and usually only after I'd gotten so mad I'd leave a nasty message on his voicemail.

And then, one month, he didn't make the payment.  I got a call warning me it was going to be 30 days late, and again I jumped through hoops to get him on the phone.  His mother finally called me to inform me that they had made payment arrangements with the lender, so it was all good.  I let it go until I found out I had gotten a delinquency notice on my credit report.  I was pissed.  I called him again.  He promised he'd get it off of my credit report.  I called him again a couple months later, and he said they had agreed to remove it.

That's when I started calling the lender.  Eight months later, they haven't removed it as promised.  Now I'm wishing every day I had not believed in this boy.

It gets worse.  Last month, he didn't make a payment at all.  When it got close to the 30 day mark, I made the payment.  I figured I'd give him a break, and when he made the payment he would then be ahead of the game.  Only, he never did.  Now we're getting close to the 30 day mark on the second month, and I've decided to repossess the car.  After getting no response to e-mail, I called a repo man to go pick up the car for me.  I even asked the police in their city to do a welfare check to make sure they were still in their house.  I then left another nasty voicemail.

Finally, he called me.  I told him I was taking the car.  He was remarkably cooperative.  He gave me the information I needed to look up the value on KBB, and I find that it's worth about $6k less than what he owes.  So it looks like I'm going to be paying for this mistake for at least 3 years to come, even after unloading the car.

If this was the first financial mistake I've ever made, I probably wouldn't be so torn up about it.  Live and learn, right?  But I seem to have a long history of "helping" people who can't seem to help themselves.  Time after time I loan money to people who are desperate, just to get them "over the hump", only to find out that the hump is really a steady incline.

A few months ago Suze Orman was on Oprah saying now is not the time to cosign for a loan.  Apparently, two years ago wasn't either.  I apparently have to learn my lessons the hard way.  Again and again.

Church

I had a conversation last night with a friend about church; what church is, versus what church should be.  I fell asleep thinking about what it must have been like for the early Christians.

Right after Jesus ascended, as the early church was forming, there was such an excitement among the people who believed his message.  There is a comment in the book of Acts about how the believers gathered every day to eat together and fellowship.

I imagine it was like the release of the new iPhone.  When all those techy geeks couldn't help getting together to talk about their new toy, and compare applications, and share discoveries on how it worked and what it could do.  Everyone was talking about it, writing about it, excited about it.  The non techy's couldn't help but see that excitement and wonder if they shouldn't also have an iPhone.  I mean, if it was that great...

Now imagine 2000 years ago.  These people were living through a time of unrest.  They were being occupied by a government so powerful they couldn't do anything about it.  They were powerless to shield their children from seeing their own people being horrifically murdered on crosses lining the streets.  The most they could hope for was that the occupying army wouldn't destroy their temples or force them into breaking their own laws.  There were many/some/a few scholars who believed that the prophecies pointed to this time as being the time of the messiah.  There was supposed to be a liberator coming soon.  

There had already been a few attempts.  They had seen men come and go claiming to be the messiah.  These "messiahs" would be charismatic enough to gather large groups of followers, and inevitably their message would turn to revolution and liberation from Roman rule.  They would then be crucified for treason, their followers would all go home, and the whole thing would fade away.

And then came Jesus.  He was charismatic -- at least there was something about him that drew crowds.  He claimed to be the son of God, bringing salvation.  Somehow, though, Rome and the occupation never seemed to come up.  All he ever seemed to talk about was the character of a man.  He seemed much more concerned with the individual than the nation of Israel as a whole.  He talked on and on in riddles and stories about fictional characters.  Yet it seemed that every person in the audience connected with him.  Whatever random story he told seemed to be about them, or for them, or somehow related to them.

Even without the stories people came, though.  Sure it was cool to hear him speak, but he was healing people at the same time.  People near and far had heard about him restoring sight to the blind, healing cripples, touching lepers and healing them of this hideously deadly disease.  That was the interesting part.  He actually TOUCHED all these unclean people, who by law should be shunned.  Who wouldn't be interested in seeing a guy like that?

Granted, when his following got large enough, everyone WANTED him to start talking about revolution.  I mean, what was a messiah for if not to end this oppressive occupation?  Didn't the prophecies say he would save them?  But Jesus stubbornly refused to comply.  He always had some slippery answer that wasn't really an answer whenever someone brought up the subject.

And then he ended up dead.  Just like the rest of them.  Crucified, no less, which was even more humiliating and disturbing.  Enough people witnessed his death that the news spread like wildfire.  Those closest to him, his disciples, were at a loss.  What would they do now?  They had spent the last three years of their lives following him around and spreading his message.

Then the sightings began.  First Mary and Martha swear they saw him alive.  Then the disciples, then hundreds of people witness it.  He was alive?  How could that be?  But they had seen him with their own eyes, touched him with their own hands, and finally understood what the liberation and salvation was all about that he had talked endlessly about.

This was exciting!  How could you not be excited about seeing a dead guy alive again, and then SEEING him going up into the light?  So many people saw it that they couldn't very well ALL be dismissed as insane.  That, coupled with the amazing things he had said and done before he died made for interesting conversation.  How could you not get together to talk about this?  Add in the fear of ending up just like him if they were caught, and you have a group of people that TRULY believe that Jesus was the messiah, the christ.  You couldn't be a half-believer.  The risk of death was great.  Too great to be unclear about where you stood.

So this group of excited believers get together on a regular basis to talk about what they'd seen, who had witnessed what, how they had personally connected with the message Jesus brought.  Then, one day, as Peter is preaching this message, the holy spirit comes to them.  The spirit filled the room in a physical way.  Everyone could SEE the spirit hovering over everyone else, and all hell breaks loose (so to speak) as people start weeping, and laughing, and jabbering in languages they didn't know.  This was real.  It was something they could see.  It wasn't an "I think I've got the holy spirit" kind of thing.

And then the persecutions really ramped up, and the people scattered, sharing this amazing thing with anyone who would listen.  And as they spread, they gathered new groups that would come together on a regular basis, at least on the sabbath, and talk about this new experience.  This was joyful community.  They had everything in common with each other.  They believed something that could get them killed.  But how could they not when they could see every day, with their own eyes, the manifestations of love that resulted from this?

This church was a community.  They couldn't wait until their day of rest, or the end of their workday, so they could hang out together and share their hospitality and experiences.  They were so excited about what was happening in their lives, they couldn't shut up about it and mind their own business.  There was no doubt about the reality of what was happening; they could see the holy spirit come into a person, and witness the gifts that came with that.

This was noticed by outsiders.  This movement was noticed as far away as Rome itself.  People were drawn to this community of equality and belonging.

This is not how I see the church today.  Christianity is not exciting.  It is not about love and worship, equality and sharing.  When I think of Christians I think of hypocrisy and name-calling, exclusion and self-righteousness.  Who would be interested in joining that?  I'm not.

Time

It's amazing how the days fly by without even noticing.  It's Friday, finally.

My mind is a whirlwind of fragments.  No thought is sticking around for long, which inevitably puts me in a state of panic.  I feel like I'm forgetting something, or missing something important when my thoughts aren't cohesive.

And for the first time ever I'm having trouble sleeping.  Well, I guess ever is not the right word.  This problem started this year, so it's not exactly new.  But it is still surprising, because I've always been able to sleep through anything.  Nothing ever bothered me enough to affect my sleep.  Now I stay awake at night trying to remember the things I'm supposed to be doing, or worrying about things I can do nothing about.  I always thought that was an old person's affliction.  Am I that old? 

It's Monday...

...and although I'm not happy about that, I am thankful for a wonderful weekend.  Although I didn't get everything done on my to-do list for the weekend, I did have a very nice weekend.

Avery was grounded from watching any television or playing any video games the entire weekend.  So instead of letting him watch his shows (he only gets to watch on the weekends as it is) while I did whatever I usually do (homework, computer work, television, etc.) this is what we did:

Friday evening Avery played a very boring game of Boggle Jr., which he says he enjoyed, although the game entails spelling three or four letter words, then checking if your spelling was correct.  This seemed like something that would not interest him, since he is just learning to read, but he enjoyed the challenge, apparently.

He and I discussed moving his bedtime up from 8:00 pm to 7:30 pm, since he is no longer taking naps, but still needs the extra sleep.  He was upset about that, so we made a deal that if he avoided trouble at school (the reason for his grounding this weekend) for an entire week, we would move his bedtime back to 8:00.  We'll see how it goes.

Saturday morning he got up and played more Boggle by himself.  This is usually when he watches television, as his parents are not early risers!  He fed himself breakfast then came up to see what we were doing.  Saturday morning was our trip to the Farmer's Market for the nutrition class I mentioned, so we got up and got dressed so grandma could pick us up at 8:30.  We were there for two hours, and Avery always likes the Farmer's Market because all of the vendors give taste tests!

The trip ended rather eventfully since he mistakenly chose to sit on a red ant hill to pick a sticker out of his pants, and didn't notice them swarming up his legs until they started biting.  That was traumatic!

When we got home, I made hamburgers for lunch that were oh-so-good!  I've been craving big juicy hamburgers, and none are better than home-made, imho!

We played Monopoly Jr., then Avery and I walked to a nearby park, where he played while I read the chapter in my textbook that was on my homework list for the weekend.  My husband picked us up from there so we could go to Chicago Fire for dinner.  Yum!

Sunday morning Avery got up and took a bath!  Without my telling him to!  Granted, he didn't seem to have washed much, and was not convinced he should get back into the bath once he was out and dried, but I appreciated the initiative!  Then he worked on building Legos while I got showered and prettied up to go out.  It was Grandpa's birthday this week, and we were celebrating with a lunch on Sunday.

We left early from there to go see a local production of Snow White.  We were meeting a friend of mine, who has a six-year-old boy also, and although Avery professed NOT to like Snow White, or the dwarves, or any prince/princess movie, he sat entirely enthralled through the whole two-hour production!

My friend offered to take him back to her house so the boys could play, so I got three hours to myself.  My husband and I had daytime sex, which was fantastic, and then I made a nutritious, yet yummy dinner.  :-)

All in all it was a nice weekend.  I did squeeze in two 30-minute sessions on my Wii Fit (which is usually the extent of my exercise routine these days), but I didn't get the homework done for my Wednesday night class.  I really dislike the class, so I know I am avoiding doing it on purpose.  I also know that this is going to catch up to me soon, but ah well...  At least the Snow White production counted as work for the class, since it is a Children's Theater class!  Interestingly, the part that I dislike about the class is all the writing required.  Go figure!

Nutrition

Last week, I signed up to take a nutrition class.  It was recommended by a friend.  It's a 6 week course meeting once a week.

I've been interested in improving my nutritional intake ever since I did a three month "experiment" to clean out and heal my body.  I went to a holistic doctor who taught me quite a bit about how what we eat affects all of our body health, not just the parts that get fat!  During the three months I honestly ate the foods he recommended, I felt wonderful.

The constant migraines that had plagued me for many years were completely gone.  The neck and shoulder pain that I attributed to tension was gone.  The subtle aches and pains that I rarely notice because they are always there were also gone.  I'd never felt so good.

However, eating nutritiously takes a lot of time and sacrifice, and I wasn't able to sustain it.

Because of this, I wasn't expecting a whole lot from this class, but I am always willing to hear about how I SHOULD be eating.

But the instructor, Amanda (www.eatyourroots.org), said something that struck me and was super simple to understand:  we need to eat like people ate 100 years ago.

It seems that around 80 years ago, there was a butter shortage in this country.  This instigated a government push for an artificial substitute, which started a whole series of artificial additives and  preservatives being created.  I know that might be a bit simplistic, but that was the gist of the lesson.  The point is, in the last century we've been morphing our food into something so very far from it's natural state that our bodies have a really hard time dealing with this foreign matter.

However, this instructor's focus is attainability!  Which is good.  Because the hardest part about eating healthy is the time it takes.  A lot of time is required in planning, purchasing, soaking, thawing, and cooking naturally.

But on the bright side, she did take us to the farmer's market and gave us good examples of the questions to ask farmers about their farming practices.  Ok, so I'm not quite to the attainability part, but maybe soon?  We're only a week into the class.......

Killin' Time

I'm busy.  

Aren't we all?  

I have several unfinished projects on the back burner.  And my day job, of course.  And school.  

But lately, for the last two weeks or so, I feel like I've just been killing time.  I'm not sure why, exactly.  I've been ignoring my school work, and not even thinking about the unfinished projects.  I've barely been getting from one day to the next.

I have been fulfilling my duties for work.  I've also been consistently working on my obsession to finding the secret to lowering my grocery budget, as well as figuring the best budgeting technique for our needs. 

I know part of the problem is that I've been indulging my love of reading.  I love to read fiction.  I have a strict policy of not reading for fun while school is in session, because I can easily get lost in a book and neglect everything else.  However, I have a box full of books I haven't read sitting outside my bedroom door taunting me every time I go in and out.  So, yeah.  I read a couple of them this week.

I've also been watching TV again.  I don't know of a bigger time drain than television.  I generally don't spend much time on that.  The few shows I am interested in get recorded, so I can watch without commercials.  However, watching television is exactly what I want to do when I don't want to think, and I've noticed that I've been doing that a lot these last couple of weeks.

I don't know what the problem is.  I can't explain the sudden lack of focus.  I just know I've been killing time.

Funny.  I didn't think I had any time to kill...