A little honesty

Let's have some honesty about school Christmas concerts. And let's get real about bridal and baby showers. While we're at it, let's share our true feelings about graduations and fundraisers and wedding toasts rife with cliches. We? We do not like them. They're interminable. We would rather be sitting at home in our Forever Lazy watching an infomercial on cubing fruits. All speeches feel hackneyed, and you can only hyperventilate over so many gifts. But sometimes we just have to go watch the 3rd graders slide their trombones and mimic a pack of perishing elephants. And sometimes you just have to force a giggle over the bride-to-be forcing a smile over the fifth lacy neglige she has unwrapped today. Oh honey, if you only knew... Baby Girl's Christmas concert was the other night. Friends, of course I wanted to be there to swell with proud THAT'S MAH BABEH GIRL UP THEYARR! But you know how parents at these things are: like a whole swarm of hovering helicopters with their flipcams, or a bunch of honeybees bumping into one another, their gazes fixed on their iPhones. Those parents. Of course I was rebuked when I saw how precious the kids were, how proud they were to perform, how incredibly deliciously sweet their voices resounded in the church sanctuary. I am, however, also not going to pretend I was not glad that my kid is in pre-K and her class performed first, for a total of three whole minutes, and we got to leave right after. Concert began at 7:00, home by 7:25. Done and done. *** Sheeplets in the green room

Content

I just typed the word "content" above. I used it in its adjective form. Emphasis on second syllable. Content. Satisfied with what one is or has; not wanting more or anything else. I did not mean the noun form of content, emphasis on first syllable. Content. The subject or topics covered in a book or document.

As I typed, the thought struck me: I struggle with the adjective every day even though I spend my days and late late nights dealing with the noun. I write and edit content for a living. And yet I struggle to be content.

I am convinced that this word was given us by a woman, a Middle Englishwoman, struggling through a day of nursing and spooling thread, of hemming and bending over kettles. She was all pondering the Latin past participle continere, and thought, this grind isn't so bad. I mean, it really contains my day, my family, my life, me. I'm contentus, that's what.

She had found the secret. That girdle-rocking woman toiling away on the English moors discovered that contentment was a state of being contained by all the things that occupy the mind and weary the body, of being held by all that pushes the bounds of the heart until the last specks of sunlight, until the dancing doubt of night rushes in.

What does it look like to be contained, to be bound by the content of your life?

I am terrible at contentment, this incurable case of antsypants that ails me, these real estate woes that plague me week after week, these deafening fears about the great what ifs of my children's futures, these first world entitlements that cloud my view of what really matters.

This week we give thanks here in the land of plenty and I will think on at least a million and four things for which I should be thankful, if only...

But I am contained, I am hemmed in by a God who cares and who has eternity in the palm of His hand. I am not reaching beyond that which is in my power to change. I am not perseverating on minutiae. I am choosing to be contained and therefore I am content.

*** Leafpile with our neighbor gals. I enjoy how Baby Girl is off in the distance like a frankensteiness rising from the leafpile crypt.

And then here is my other child, looking a little indignant about autumn.

More to come on this crafternoon with Baby Girl Angel

Pageturner for Every Parent (teedleehee!)

My friend Althea sent me a package full of things I accidentally left at her home, along with some gratuitous stickers to cover every surface of my new home. Because Althea? Is a true friend. And friends don't let friends live without every surface of their microwave covered in Hello Kitty. Included with the lovemail contents was also this treasured tome.

Fanclub, I think you know you can rely on me for sound literary counsel. And I think we all agree that I am bar none The Doyenne of parenting advice. Now wrap that all up in some seaweed and cover it in wasabi and soy sauce and what do you have? Parenting Manual Sushi is what.

I can't tell you what a TOTAL GAMECHANGER this book has been for me. How to Raise Children at Home in Your Spare Time has changed EVERYTHING for me. I mean, here I was, all this time, nearly four years of thinking that parenthood was something of a vocation, a breaking down of self to honor something greater than oneself, training up to little souls.

But I was so wrong.

As this book points out, parenting is merely a hobby! You can do it at home in your spare time WHILE YOU ARE ORDERING THE NEW RACHAEL RAY WAXLESS CANDLES FROM QVC!

Again, this book is sparing me the stress of having to occupy my ankle-biters because, 'scuse me, little trolls, trying to grout some tile here!

Seriously, this book has opened up a whole new avenue of choices for me. The book recommends that you wean yourself off of parenting books. The author did not mention anything about irony, but this was a 1966 edition, so it's possible that it is missing some pages, too, I'm sure?

I am absolutely keeping this book in my bathroom. It's not fair of me to tease you like this. So come on over, borrow the porcelain and drink the Kool-Aid of premier pediatrics.

***

This is one of my fave pix I've snapped. It is entitled, "Daylight Savings." Look at Loverpants.

And here are some catch-up shots from Halloween at the Chattanooga Market

Build-a-Pooh-Bear

Our mate Kate

This apple spice crepe was reedonk.

My smart boy found himself on the wrong side of the dog park fence. Wearing a bear suit.