dirt don't hurt

A normal little country mouse

2012-05-24T19:15:00.000-07:00

I have this theory that you make your own normal. Everything that you do, no matter how wacky and odd it seems to everyone else, is pretty standard in your life. And naturally it follows that whatever everyone else does is just plain weird.

My theory was once again proved true during a recent trip to the whopping metropolis of downtown Cleveland, where my husband and I met some friends and enjoyed a concert. Truthfully, I was a little excited to have this destination, because it’s not often that I step foot into a world of concrete with a plethora of shops and restaurants at every turn. (Some people might argue that Cleveland doesn’t have that many options, but those people have never lived in a small town in rural Ohio.) Visiting a city like this gives me a feeling of comfortable anonymity and the ability to step out of my usual self, to test the waters of a life I don’t normally lead knowing that I will be back home in a matter of hours.

The evening was lovely. We walked from our friend’s downtown apartment to dinner and the show, and out for a late night pizza before retiring for the night. Walking everywhere is definitely a perk of living in an urban area, and it was so late when we got home that we just went to bed.

I woke up in the morning at my own rhythm. There were no children to jump on my face, no dogs to nip at my hands, and no cardinals flying into my windows. I couldn’t hear the rooster that lives down the street from my house, and with the small window in the bedroom, I couldn’t even catch a glimpse of sunlight.

“Let’s get moving,” I said to my husband, wondering if he also felt like we were in a cave in the middle of a foreign land where no birds sing and no light shines. “I need some fresh air.”

We quickly dressed and headed down the apartment building’s elevator and I marveled at how life must be, always feeling like you’re living in a hotel. In my mind, no normal person would ever want to have one exit door and then ride a stuffy elevator just to step foot outside. These people, I thought, must be crazy.

When the elevator stopped, all I could think of was how I needed something. I needed fresh air, the feel of a breeze blowing through the trees. I needed a bird, a flower, a patch of dirt. I needed these things like I couldn’t imagine, and there wasn’t a trace of any of them anywhere. Sure, if I looked hard enough I could find them. The sunshine peeked over the tops of buildings, and a few ornamental trees dotted the streets along with the pigeons. But it just didn’t seem real to me, so unnatural. So unnormal. So weird.

We drove home early and I watched the concrete jungle disappear in the rearview mirror. Upon arriving at home, my dear husband saw the look in my suffering eyesw and promptly brought me back to life by building a small campfire in our backyard. He handed me a cup of coffee and there I sat, listening to the crackle of flames, the song of the cardinals, and watching a chipmunk snitch a quick drink from the birdbath. Maple seeds floated down with the sunlight and I took in a huge breath and then a sigh of relief.

Our friends from the city could never handle the peace of the woods, the quiet life of the country. To them, the smell of downtown and the scuff of cement is normal. It’s home. But to me it’s just painfully unnatural, to the point where I couldn’t be happier that I am weird, in my normal sort of way, where I can open a door and step outside to a sea of green and feel dirt between my toes whenever I want.

Yes, I want fries with that.

2012-05-24T19:09:00.002-07:00

Dear Fast Food Restaurants,

French Fry season is just about full swing, when busy families like ours simply have no other choice than to buzz through your drive through. Not that we don’t enjoy it, because we do. You have done an amazing job making your food mouth-watering and delicious, and I stand by my sentiment that anyone who says they don’t like french fries is just a just a downright, two-faced liar. We are Americans and have been raised to crave salt, fat, and sugar. There is no one better than you to give it to us.

As I said, we’re just about in that time of year when our family dines more frequently than we should at your establishments. It seems we’re always running from this game or to that event, often times changing clothes in parking lots. The back of my vehicle has been filled with the necessities of the season, from baseball gloves to concert attire.

My point is that I personally struggle to keep my family going to where they need to be and have them as ready as I can at any given moment. This also means that they need to eat swiftly and cleanly, because chances are we have about 4.2 minutes to eat our dinner without spilling on themselves before rushing to wherever we need to go next.

It is for this reason that I beg of you to please, please, please stop messing up our orders. If we order a drink, please give us a straw. If we ask for a burger, please remember to put it in the bag. If we have an order with two bags, please remember to give us both when we stop at the second window. If an item requires a fork, please stick it in there so I don’t have to eat with my fingers and drive. And for Pete’s sake, think about it—if I order three kid meals, don’t you think we just maybe could use a couple of napkins???

Like many people I know, we have tried to combat your forgetfulness with our own stockpile of supplies acquired also by your mistakes, such as when we order two coffees and you give us five straws. These extra straws are stored away in what I like to call the “supply cabinet” of the vehicle, the glove box. I have also squirreled away extra napkins, salt, ketchup, barbeque sauce, plastic silverware, and those little coffee stirrers which have at times doubled as any necessary utensil. Without this hoarded accumulation, we would be in trouble more often than not.

My request today comes with more than just complaints, it comes with a solution. Obviously the simplest answer would be to just stop botching up the orders and have extra training in condiments and accouterments. I know this isn’t always possible, so here are my slightly brilliant ideas:

Treat your value meals the same way you treat kid meals. Instead of putting in a little toy that will inevitably end up wedged between the seats of my car or tossed out with the wrappers, make the adult meal’s prize be a nifty little baggie containing all of the necessary items to enjoy their meal on the go.

And I know this is asking a lot, but add a third window as a last-step check point for your patrons. It could simply be a place where we could stop and politely review our order so that we don’t find ourselves steaming mad, screeching tires through your parking lot and storming into your restaurant and ripping sixty four napkins out of your dispensers (because that’s how many come out at once—are you aware of that?) or worse yet, bounding up to the counter to demand the french fries that you forgot to put in our to-go order. Because, as I’ve mentioned, they really are pretty delicious. Even when you only have thirty seconds and a coffee stirrer.

The gasses that we passes

2012-05-10T13:22:00.001-07:00

It’s time to get a little personal, and if you’re offended by the passing of gasses, I suggest you discontinue reading this column. For in the next few hundred words, I’d like to express my maternal nose’s lament and explain why I have sudden outburst that I never thought were possible. As a mother, you expect to yell things like, “clean your room!” or “finish your dinner!” Maybe even a rhetorical question such as, “why doesn’t anyone ever listen to me?” But it was a recent exclamation that got me thinking that no one really ever warned me about all this stinky stuff.

“I am so tired of smelling farts!” I yelled, in total honesty, on a chilly day when opening the windows wasn’t really an option. Because when you’ve got three kids, a dog, a husband, and let’s keep it real here, yourself all processing food, there are bound to be releases. I just don’t want them in such close proximity that not only does my nose burn, but my eyes also water.

“But farts are natural,” they argue. “Better out than in, isn’t that what you taught us?” they quip, trying to turn my own logic against me as I bury my nose in the collar of my shirt as a makeshift gas mask. And it’s true. Apparently the average person produces 2 quarts of gas a day and passes it 14 to 20 times. As food travels through our intestines, bacteria does its job aiding in digestion. Their byproduct, however, is gas. So if food is exceptionally slow or difficult to digest, the bacteria simply have more time to make more gas. It’s not just beans or cabbage that can cause these “stink bombs” as they are sometimes referred to. Everything from sugary drinks to bread to beef. One of my best parenting tricks, though, is to serve a big bowl of broccoli and cauliflower and promise a farting contest after dinner. Clean plates galore.

“But my farts don’t smell,” I often hear, which is a boldfaced lie if anyone ever heard it. (Although, true story, I once walked into my mother’s room and said it smelled like fresh cut flowers and she about fell over laughing at my smell description of her flatulence.) Mostly, children create gases potent enough to clear a room or in some cases, require me to roll down the car windows even if it’s negative thirteen degrees because my inner nose would rather freeze than register the scent of rotten eggs. One study that I read revealed that males have a higher odor quotient when it comes to farts—they scored a whopping 0.86 compared to a female’s 0.54. I have a sneaking suspicion that if they included dogs in this study, their stinkometer scale would have just shattered.

“But farts are funny,” they say, and for that I have to agree. Historically speaking, farts have added humor to just about every culture since before the dawn of whoopee cushion, which really only added to the snickers and giggles. If you find yourself in a quiet room of people and the only sound you hear is someone doing the one cheek sneak, if you’re not laughing out loud, chances are you’re working hard to hold it in.

In reality, farts hold a special place in my heart, because like many kids I was never allowed to say the “f-a-r-t” word. I was required to call them stinkers or tooters, and being so very desperate to verbalize this funny and forbidden word, I would go into by bedroom, shut the door and bury my head in my pillows. Only there, when I was sure my soundwaves would be safe from adult ears would I chant, “fart fart fart fart fart.” It wasn’t until my parents deemed me mature enough that I was able to use the actual word in public. Are my children allowed to say it? Yes. Better out than in, as I always say, but too much of a good thing isn’t always the best. So they must learn to use moderation when it comes to the sacred word, just as they must also learn to hold them in until they’re out of earshot and farther than the range of my sniffer.

A pleasing night of P’s

2012-05-10T13:17:00.001-07:00

Alliteration, if you can’t remember from way back in high school English class, is the repetition of similar first syllables used in adjacent words in literature. Or basically, a bunch of words start with the same letter. Technically, Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers is more than just a tongue twister, it’s alliteration.

This wacky little English tool has been used for hundreds of years, and was quite prevalent in old English, but something so spectacular seems to spread though the centuries. It’s used in advertising, cartoons, poetry, music, and just about everywhere else, including my own home on what turned out to be an excellent evening of events. We simply dubbed it “The Night of P’s.”

The first great thing about The Night of P’s was that it was just G’s, as in just girls. With just my two daughters and my dog, we were free from the plagues of the boys, including passing gas, paper airplanes, and persistent pestering. We all four sat huddled on our couch, my two daughters and I snuggled under a soft red blanket and our puppy perched on the top like a princess. It quickly evolved into one of the best evenings I’ve had in, well, about forever, and I have these “P’s” to thank for it.

PJ’s. No comfy night in in complete without them, these rewarding clothes at the end of the day, because they truly are a reward after a hard day of work. After hours of wearing clothes that have to look nice enough to be seen in public, pajamas are the wardrobe’s way of whispering to the world, “you had your fancy stuff, now I just want to relax.” (Note: This is the philosophy behind why people who wear pajama pants during the day appear lazy.)

Princess Protection Program. This triple P is the actual name of the actual tween movie we chose to watch that evening, that we actually enjoyed. There’s something to be said for movies produced specifically for that age group that has outgrown animation and not yet progressed to the violence and adult content that is sadly most of the entertainment world. They’re sweet, family-friendly, and there’s always a hint of life lesson and a speckling of immature humor that appeals to just about anyone who is sacked out on the couch wearing pajamas.

Polish. As in nail polish. Chimpanzees and other animals use grooming as a very important social tool. They bond over picking bugs off of each other’s skin, and it’s something we humans may never understand. But I reckon that if a chimp could watch a bunch of girls paint each other’s nails, it would totally get it. Nail painting is one of those mysterious activities that brings two people close—physical contact, decorating the other person, and the whole issue of trusting that the painter isn’t going to spill the paint or really botch up your nails, even though you chose to have your nails painted green and pink.

And finally, popcorn. (You must have guessed that one by now!) This tasty treat has been a tradition for us just as it’s been at every slumber party/movie night since the dawn of the big screen. The girls in our family are most fond of this food, so when the boys are away, the corn pops away. It wasn’t just any old popcorn, it was “mommy’s famous popcorn” and while knew we may delight in digestive difficulties at a later time, we didn’t care and devoured two entire delicious batches.

And there you have it, the six P’s that came together so profoundly to bring this parent a feeling of peace and prosperity, pride and pleasure, and primarily perfection.

Mommy’s Famous Popcorn
In a lidded pot or large pan, heat 2 Tbl olive oil over medium high heat. Add ½ cup popcorn kernels (or less depending on the size of your pot) and cover. Shake frequently and don’t remove the lid. When popping has nearly stopped, empty popcorn into large bowl and toss with more olive oil and popcorn salt.

There are more than fifteen uses of alliteration used in this column. How many did you find?

An Arbor Day Anthem

2012-04-27T05:15:00.000-07:00

“People!” she said with a sawdusty sneeze,

“I’m not the Lorax. But I speak for the trees.

I speak for the trees, for the trees have no tongues.

And I’m asking you, people, at the top if my lungs”-

she was very upset as she did shout and yell,

“Don’t you have a tree that you once knew so well?”

Perhaps it was in your yard’s back or the side,

Maybe the trunk was thin or quite wide,

Was it the kind that had leaves that turn in the fall?

Or needles so green that they don’t change at all?

Did you play underneath it, climb to its top?

Take a big leap that ended in flop?

Did you once find a nest hidden safely so high

And watch as the birds had their first chance to fly?

Did you take the branches that fell to the ground

And turn them into swords for the enemies you found?

Did you take the leaves red or orange in their looks

And press them between paper, stacked between books?

Did you sit in its branches and contemplate life?

Did you carve in initials with an old pocket knife?

I, not the Lorax, have something to say,

I’ve had a tree or two in my day.

There have been forts underneath that I carefully made,

I’ve leaned on their trunks, I’ve sat in their shade.

I’ve made piles and piles of their leaves that I raked,

And I’ve cursed them again as my shoulders they ached.

But I’ve never saw a tree and said, “hey, you know,

That old giant tree there? It’s just got to go.

It’s ugly. It’s pointless. My view is impeded.

The shade and the oxygen, it’s really not needed.

That kid that plays there, he’ll not know it’s gone.

Let’s chop it down and let the grass grow right on.”

Instead I’ll say things like, “That tree there’s a beaut’,

From the top of its crown to the base of its root.

It’s taken forever for it to grow to this size

And someday when this gargantuan dies,

It’ll crash with a boom and I hope I’m not near it!

(But I wonder then, if someone will hear it?)”

At the end of each April, on the last of Fridays,

There’s this wonderfully simple of all holidays.

It’s Arbor Day! A day that speaks for the trees,

That started around eighteen hundred seventy three,

And reminds us each year that these things growing tall

Shouldn’t be taken for granted at all.

So this year, I urge to you take a quick look outside

Where the big trees grow and the Lorax abides,

And find a nice tree to call your own,

And perhaps a fresh spot where one can be grown,

And plant in a sapling, so fragile and frail,

Give it water to drink from an old wooden pail,

Give it rich soil too so its roots can have room

And watch as the leaves soon blossom and bloom.

Do this year after year, it’s more than a ploy,

So your grandkids can have a tree to enjoy,

Just as you, in your youth once did,

When you were just tree-loving kid.

Arbor Day this year is celebrated on Friday, April 27, 2012 in Ohio.

Dirt really doesn't hurt

2012-04-21T08:14:00.000-07:00

God made dirt, and dirt don’t hurt.

I can’t take credit for this phrase that I use so often. I first heard it somewhere lost in the wilderness of New Mexico from a friend on a backpacking trip while discussing living in our own filth for the past five days.

“God made dirt, and dirt don’t hurt,” she said, and then we scooped up a handful and wrote empowering words all over our selves with the dark brown mud from the forest floor and went on our way. Filthy, stinky, and quite happy.

As it turns out, we were really doing ourselves some serious good by using the natural body paint, and even more, my friend’s phrase seems to be truer than we accepted.

Researchers from Oregon State University have concluded that dirt does more than just not hurt. It may actually be healthy for you! (Feel free to go outside, dig up a good mushy bit, and slather in all over your face right now. I don’t, however, suggest eating it.)

The basis of the article is nothing new, that playing in dirt when you’re a kid introduces your body to all kinds of lovely bacteria and germs so that you can build up your system to fight off other things as you grow older. Allergies, immune deficiencies, etc. Instead of getting vaccinated at the doctor’s office, you essentially get vaccinated in the mud, and having held down my children while getting shots, I can personally attest that playing in the dirt would be a lot less stressful.

The main point of the article, though, is not necessarily about the mud, but who plays in it. Girls just aren’t getting enough dirt. Whether its because parents like to dress their daughters in frilly white clothes or whether society has pre-programmed girls to think playing in outdoor conditions is just “icky,” there’s a definite shortage of muddy misses who aren’t getting their recommended daily allowance of bacteria and germs. The scientists in the study think this lack of exposure to yucky stuff has had serious effects on females as they age, stating that women statistically have higher rates of asthma, allergies, and a 3:1 ratio compared to boys when it comes to autoimmune disorders.

And apparently all we have to do to protect our children is to open the back door and kick them outside.

It’s more than just mud vaccination, though. Countless studies have been done about the whole life benefits of playing in nature. The American Academy of Pediatrics suggests that children play outside for 60 minutes each day. Physical fitness is well accomplished by playing tag and other such games, and being outside helps improve vision, vitamin D levels, and motor development. Sadly, a recent study by some other long-named pediatric group concluded that nearly half of all children between the ages of 3-5 are not taken outdoors every day. And while I understand that climate and weather can skew some studies, but this is just plain depressing.

If you forget about the girls vs. boys issue, the autoimmune disorders, the epidemic of childhood obesity, and every other scientific study out there, a few simple things remain.

Playing outside is fun. Dirt is good for the soul. Sunshine makes you smile. Rain inspires dance. Stars can’t help but make you dream.

Just yesterday I found myself in a situation outside with my children where there was nothing around except a large grass-covered man-made hill used for sledding in the winter. While I sat there, I couldn’t help but watch and admire as they truly played on this hill, rolling down, running down, making dandelion chains and more. When they came back to me covered in mud, grass stains, and dandelion stained faces, I heard, “sorry I got so dirty, mom.”

“No worries. God made dirt, and dirt don’t hurt.”

Thankfully, someone else somewhere made stain remover and high-powered laundry soap for some of the healthiest kids I know.

ps. Yep, that's me on the left, after my friend and I got into a bank of good, Ohio clay.

Our own hunger games

2012-04-21T08:08:00.001-07:00

Please don’t think there is any more violence than normal in our kitchen. I can assure you that the only bloodshed is by myself, mis-slicing an onion. And the only things that truly goes from alive to dead are the meat and vegetables we eat.

But there are games we play, and there are battles we fight. And like you might imagine, there is a definite government among the people and just a bit of monarchy when it comes to ruling the refrigerator.

And because we all know the story of the Little Red Hen, I can sum it up in one sentence. “There’s the stove, and if you don’t like the meal that I planned, purchased, and prepared, make your own lousy dinner.”

As you might expect, they don’t make their own meals, which is a rather good thing because we would eat butter noodles and chicken nuggets and huevos rancheros (I have one wild eater) every night of the week. Their stunning apathy when it comes to meal preparation leaves me in charge, the sole and absolute ruler of the kitchen. And being in charge has its benefits, such as I get to control what goes into the mouths of the people that I love so much. If I don’t buy donuts, they won’t eat them. Likewise, if I really want banana chips, the delicious snack that no one else but I enjoy, I have the power to throw them in the cart. This is the perk of the monarch.

Like in most government situations with one head honcho, my power is always being tested. Constantly creeping under my skin like toothpicks and kebab skewers is the most frustrating bit of food known to mankind: The snack.

If I had a nickel for every time someone has asked me for a snack, you’d find me sitting in a diamond chair on top of my golden palace, with a coffee fountain and a lifetime supply of banana chips. These children, they know exactly how to play a parent when it comes to eating these small bits of food between meals that they claim to need or else they’ll fall over and wilt away into a puddle of slime.

It always happens that they ask for a snack at such a time they won’t be hungry for the delicious dinner that I planned, purchased, and prepared. (See Little Red Hen comment above.) And thus begins our very own Hunger Games.

Scene: Mother busily cooking dinner. Pots are on the stove, bowls and ingredients all over the counter and as usual, we have about 30 minutes before some evening practice event.

“Mom, I’m hungry. Can I have a snack?”

“No. Are you blind? Can you not see that I’m clearly making dinner?”

“I know, but I’m soooo hungry right now I think I might die if I don’t eat something.”

“I’m soooo sorry,” I respond and I find myself chopping onions with a little more vigor.

You can imagine this goes on for quite a bit, until the child slinks away to prepare his or her next strategy. Eventually the child returns.

“What about a healthy snack? If I eat something healthy would that be OK?”

“Maybe. What do you want?”

“Um, is pizza healthy? It has tomatoes and dairy products and protein, right?”

At this point, the games are in full swing and this lady isn’t backing down.

“I will allow you a healthy snack. If you are so hungry that you fear for your own life, I will certainly give you a healthy snack. Here are your choices. You may have a dish of radishes, a can of garbanzo beans, some delicious kale, or a big brimming bowl of unflavored oatmeal. I would be happy to prepare any of the above for you,” I offer with the grin of the century on my face, knowing full well that this mom has just won today’s rendition of the hunger games.

Things that go bump or blah in the night

2012-04-21T08:03:00.001-07:00

It started with a pork roast, but we’ll get to that.

Sleeping next to the same guy every night, in the same room, with the same surrounding noises, has had very different responses over the years. I don’t think either one of us considers ourselves necessarily a light or a sound sleeper, and on any given day, I just count my blessings that I’m actually sleeping at all.

Such is the life as a parent.

And there doesn’t seem to be any real rhyme or reason as to what jerks me out of a deep sleep and keeps my husband snoring away, or what keeps me in dreamland and has him racing frantically through the house. There have been times that the mere cough of a tiny infant has had me rocketing up and sprinting down the hall, and other times when a bulldozer could have backed into the kitchen and I would have not noticed a thing. I’ve also become quite adjusted and able to sleep through his alarm clocks, his late-night business phone conversations, and when he was on the volunteer fire department, blaring sirens and details of calls.

Likewise, he quickly became adjusted to sleeping through baby cries and when the kids rolled heavily in bed while things like a falling stuffed animal sent me running.

All this seems irrelevant, but really is perfect background knowledge for what made for a long night for him, a sleepy night for me, and a video I hope never goes viral.

Like I said, it started with a pork roast, and more importantly a pork bone. When my kid asked if he could give the bone to our dog, in a frantic dinner frenzy I said “sure” and didn’t think twice about it. For the record, small dogs shouldn’t eat giant pork bones, and while she enjoyed it very much going down, it was not quite the case when it came back up.

All. Night. Long.

This was one of those cases when my body must have been so tired that I completely shut down all ability to hear a vomiting dog in the wee hours of the morning, or else my brain was smart enough to not wake me up because, essentially, dog barf is gross. According to my husband, the bone ‘resurfaced’ starting around midnight and kept resurfacing via both ends for hours.

I woke up in the morning to find the bed empty and figured he must have left early for work or went for a jog, only to find him camped out on the couch with a pathetic dog on his feet and a roll of paper towels and a bottle of carpet cleaner on the table.

“Check your email,” was all that he said.

And when I did, I saw it. A lovely little self-filmed video sent with a subject of “thanks for your help last night” that has this very script:

“Good morning. It’s one AM. The dog has puked twice. I’m standing out in the hallway outside our bedroom with all of the lights on. I’ve been scrubbing carpets and where is my wife? Sleeping through the whole thing. Let’s go check on her to see if this will wake her up.”

With that, he walks the camera into our room and pans around to display my sleeping self, sprawled out in a sleep so deep that even the a video camera doesn’t wake me up. In fact, nothing woke me up, as the dog continued to be sick all through the night.

All’s well that ends well, though. The dog recovered, the carpets were unscathed, the pork roast was delicious, the video never made it to YouTube, and I made my husband a nice, strong cup of “I’m sorry” coffee in the morning.

Running Away

2012-04-18T20:01:00.002-07:00

I would be lying if I said I’d never thought about running away. There are fleeting moments of hopping in my car and my last words being something like, “you guys drove me one mile past crazy. I’m outta here!” There are other times when I feel like gathering up the whole crazy-inducing gang and leaving town and living in the middle of nowhere so that my kids are safe and protected from the scares of the day and the mean kids in school.

I would venture to say that I’m not alone when it comes to the thoughts of heading for the hills, and this week I’ve had to deal with two runaways from my own home. When the dog took off after a bunny or a cat, I knew she’d eventually come trotting home. But it boggles my mind why anyone would want to leave this miraculous place where their mother feeds them, clothes them, teaches them, and horror of all horrors makes them get along, practice piano, and do their homework. Still, such was the case a few days ago when I almost lost a redheaded son to the lure of the rails.

He comes by it honest, though, if I’m being truthful. I remember countless episodes as a child preparing my escape. I would pack a few clothes and my teddy bear into my Barbie hard-sided suitcase and plan to hit the highway, or at least the road to Grandparent’s house where I’m sure they would never yell at me and feed me bread and butter and peanut butter crackers and ginger ale until the cows came home. I never actually made it there, but in my mind I was already walking down my street and contemplating how to cross Sate Road, never looking back.

I don’t remember what set me off, and I’m guessing that my son has no idea of why he wanted to run away this week, but he was thinking ahead and really planning for his survival.

“Mom, I need you to go to the grocery store for me. I need some bottled water and I need it soon. I’m leaving at 8:00 sharp. Downtown.”

Naturally I dove right in, and asked him why he needed water and why it was downtown.

“I need fresh water to drink. And it’s a train, duh” (As a sidenote, he went through a phase of being infatuated with hobos and hobo symbols, and riding the rails seems pretty glamorous in his eyes.

“Hmm. Do you want food too?” I asked.

“Nope. I’m going to get a part-time job. That’ll be enough to pay for food and I probably won’t make it past age 14 anyway. Starvation, I’d guess.”

“Well, swing by your grandparents on the way out of town. I’m sure they’ll want to say goodbye. And I can drive you to the train station later so we can stop at the store and get some water for you.”

And away he stomped, off to sit in the tree house and eat crackers until he came to apologize and tell me he’ll stay which is good because I’m guessing life on the rails isn’t as lovely as it looks in the movies. Plus I kinda love my kid.

As silly as it sounds, there are a lot of kids that do run away for real, and as a parent I couldn’t even imagine how scared I would be. The US Department of Justice reports that over 450,000 missing children each year are runaways, and that one in seven children between the ages of 10 and 18 will hit the road. Some return in a few days, but most stay away from anywhere between one month and one year. A portion of the runaway children come back on their own accord, and others never come home—they either start a new life or find their own ended by assault, illness, or suicide. Sad statistics, and if you ever see a redheaded boy playing a harmonica with a handkerchief pouch on a stick, send him this way. I’ll be mighty appreciative.

Down to the last pair

2012-03-29T04:17:00.001-07:00

When you’re married for a few years, life has a way of just starting to flow in an unspoken smoothness. Some may call it a well-oiled machine.

In our house, there are certain signs that alert each of us to something going on in the other’s life. If my husband heard me tossing and turning or handling children during the night, he will have the coffee made before my eyelids finally push their way open. Likewise, if I know he’s had a rough day at work, I try to gather the troops and welcome him home with love, hot food, and if at all possible, keep the kids from fighting with each other.

Sometimes, though, the simple situations are more practical and less emotional. Not being a milk drinker myself, if we’re out of milk there will be an empty jug placed on the counter and I’ll know immediately to add it to the shopping list. If we’re out of shampoo, there will be a bottle out of place on the bathroom counter. Same goes for the kids when they stand at the fridge and not so politely yell “there’s nothing to eat!” and I look inside only to find they are right. Pickles, mustard, and maple syrup do not make for a delicious after school snack.

While I consider myself a “modern day” woman, I still have accepted the role of housekeeper and have control over my domain, even if it means that that control comes with the tasks of shopping, cooking, cleaning, and most dreadfully, laundry. Clean clothes are my downfall, simply because the act of laundry doing takes so long to complete, that by the time I’ve finished, the hampers are already full. Too frequently I have to finish laundry just to have the baskets free to begin again. It’s a dark, dark place in my life if I’m being honest.

My beloved husband knows this. He knows how much I despise it all—the carrying, sorting, washing and drying, folding and putting away. He knows how cranky it makes me, and even more, he knows that if he plain out tells me that I need to do laundry I might just snap.

So in a symbolic act of love, we have worked out a system to alert me that the time has come for me to saddle up and ride that horse into the dark cave of detergent and fabric softener. It comes in the form of none other than flannel undergarments.

We don’t know where the Cleveland Browns flannel boxer shorts came from, but at some point were a gift because my husband assures me that he would never purchase anything so warm. They are, in fact, so uncomfortable that he will wear every other pair that he owns before finally putting them on, which is the subtle clue that it’s time for me to empty the hamper.

“Are the Browns playing this afternoon?” he’ll say.

“Gotcha, dear,” I’ll reply. “Sorry about your day.”

It’s funny what women talk about when there are no men around. We don’t discuss sports or cars or the weather. We apparently talk about important things like our husband’s underwear, and in one recent conversation I learned that this laundry alert system that we’ve designed isn’t all that uncommon. Without potentially embarrassing anyone, let’s just say that a purple pair of briefs hangs locally in warning when one husband is running low, and another girlfriend of mine said she uses the alert system on herself.

“When I get down to the giant ones leftover from my pregnancy years, that’s my blaring reminder to start the laundry,” she admitted.

“I understand,” I said. “If it’s not December and I’m wearing my holiday undies, you know there are a few dozen load of laundry waiting for me at home.”

Therefore there is one heartbreaking conversation that goes on in my home:

“Go Browns!”

“I know, honey. Merry Christmas.”

Bowling makes a comeback

2012-03-16T08:11:00.002-07:00

One would think that I would be a decent bowler, considering how much time I spent in a bowling alley during my childhood. One would also think that since a large portion of females in my family bowled on leagues and even had their own fancy shoes and balls that I would be a respectable bowler. One might even think that since my mother had a plaque hanging on the wall of the Seven Hills Bowling Alley commemorating her perfect bowling game that maybe one of those skillful bowling genes could have gotten passed down to me and I would be able to follow in her stylish footsteps.

But if one thought that, that person would be sadly wrong, and I am left to scar the family name in the world of bowling. I may never know if I disappointed my mother by being so terrible that breaking 100 is cause for exuberant and exaggerated celebration, but chances are she’ll tell me after reading these words.

Truth be told, bowling was a really big deal for me growing up. I spent many a Tuesday night while my mother and grandmother had their league at the lanes. I used to hop around the building on the colored tiled floor with some pattern game I created because when you’re a kid alone in a bowling alley with a hundred women, what you do is drink root beer and eat pretzel rods and hop through a haze of smoke. I probably should have paid more attention to the game, but you have to realize that every Sunday morning after church we would go to my Grandparent’s house to do three things: eat, watch the Polka Variety Show and move the coffee table and dance, and then put the table back and watch bowling tournaments. There is only so much bowling a non-bowling kid can handle.

Soon enough I started to grow. Suddenly my hands were big enough to reach all three holes in the ball and strong enough to hoist the heavy thing down the lane. Still, the hours I spent among bowling did nothing for my abilities and when we had a school field trip to the bowling alley to practice our math filling out scoring sheets (I’m not making this up, and if you’ve ever scored bowling by hand you know what a great math exercise it actually is), my math skills were barely used; No strikes or spares makes for an easy addition grade.

But this was all so many years ago, and someone out there might argue that bowling is a dying recreation. I beg to differ, based on the rebirth of bowling that has taken place in my own family. Besides the bowling video game that has become so popular, my family has found a new love for the real deal. The magical invention of automatic bumpers and automated scoring and the smoke-free environment makes it a great place to haul your kids. It’s a real, tangible game in a world of electronic entertainment that requires you to actually hold a heavy object in your hands and flop it down the lane. It’s a turn-taking, cheer-on-your-friends, wash-your-hands and then go eat-some-snacks kind of evening that takes old-fashioned family fun to a new level. And you don’t even have to do the math.

I like to think that one of life’s purposes is to make memories. Not that you should live in the past, but there’s something sweet about bringing a piece of your past into your present, even if that something sweet is the smell of bowling shoes and the depressing fact that no matter how hard you try, you’ll never out-bowl your mother. So maybe you’ll just grab a root beer and hop around and hope that your kids pay attention to the bowler in the next lane.

Living life by the seasons

2012-03-16T08:09:00.002-07:00

The infinite jokes about living in Northeast Ohio involve the same things: sports teams (or lack there of) and the weather. “Don’t like the weather around here? Wait an hour, it will change” is more than just a silly joke, and anyone who lives here can attest to it by admitting that he or she has literally used the heat and the air conditioning in the very same day.

But griping about the weather never does us any good, and instead we try our hardest to convince ourselves that we love the seasons. “Oh, I could never live in Florida,” we tell people. “I need the change of season or else I’d go crazy.”

But is it true? Do we really need the change of season?

Scientifically, yes. This year’s mild winter is wreaking havoc on our natural world. According to a news article by Discovery, our current warm winter is going to cause us a doozy of a flea, tick, and mosquito season. And beyond that, bears are waking up from their winter slumbers earlier than usual, and may wander a little farther in search of food that should be there according to the temperature, but isn’t quite ripe for the picking yet.

Socially we need it, too. There are way too many of us out here who were gifted fantastic sleds for the holidays or bought our kids new snow boots for the season, only to see them stacked in the garage, perfectly dry and clean. Not even a trace of the telltale mud that comes along with our Ohio snows caked into the laces or clogging up the handles of the sleds.

Emotionally, though, we Ohioans will take as much sunshine as we can get. Data from the NOAA say that on average we get about 200 cloudy days and 100 partly cloudy days each year. (Do the math—that’s only about 65 days of sun, a disgusting 17.8%.) And while I can’t prove that cloudy days make me grumpy, I know my world is a much happier place when the sun is shining and the bright blue sky lights up everyone’s grinning faces. Sunshine makes you smile, don’t it?

But if there’s anything we know, griping about the weather won’t get us very far. So what’s left to convince ourselves to find the joy in every season, whether it be winter, not-quite-winter, morning-winter, or evening-spring. I’m not naïve enough to think I could tell you to find peace and serenity in scraping the ice off of your car or love the humidity of a summer day while weeding your flowerbeds. But I can give you a few tips to get through these transitional days between spring and winter and whatever other season it happens to be at any given time of day. Next time you find yourself with the late winter blues, peek out your window and let these five things brighten your day.

1. Gray skies and leafless trees make a great backdrop for spotting last year’s bird nests or early birds starting to rebuild for the season.
2. Even the saddest, muddiest, brown/gray flowerbeds are brightened by the tiniest of bulbs poking through.
3. Puddles bring out the kid in all of us, except when we’re wearing white (which we aren’t supposed to do until Memorial Day, right?)
4. Mud isn’t all that muddy when it’s frozen.
5. Chilly days have the ability to warm your heart as long as you’re inside, sipping tea and looking out the window. You can snuggle in and look out at the constantly changing weather, wonder what the forecast for tomorrow will bring, and enjoy what we have while we have it.

No matter what it is.

As it turns out, I’m slightly normal

2012-03-12T13:00:00.001-07:00

(I'm pretty behind in posting columns...sorry! I'll catch up this week!)

“I have to send you this article,” my mother said over the phone. “It was practically written for you. It’s called “Are you normal or nuts” and I found in the Reader’s Digest and according to this article, you’re actually not nuts!”

Seeing as these were such pleasant words and I’ll gladly accept any confirmation that I’m normal even if it is from my unconditionally loving mother, I prodded her to continue describing the article and finally reading to me.

The words were comforting in the wake of one of those life events that you swear are being filmed for a hidden camera video and that found me making a complete fool of myself in a public place. I am well aware that I have an emotion problem, or rather a problem containing my emotions. At any given program at my child’s school or church, at even slightly sappy movies, or even for no good reason at all, my eyes turn into water faucets. Crying, for me, is a completely normal thing in times of sadness, happiness, and especially onion slicing. I even cry during times of extreme humor, which is where our story begins…

My husband sent me a text telling me to stop at the store and pick up a medicine for our dog’s eye cyst, which I considered to be a totally legitimate chore. In my heart of hearts I thought that after their visit to the vet that morning, I had a prescription to pick up at a human-type pharmacy. It’s happened before, so I thought nothing of it. So during a night of shuffling children and running other errands, I popped into the local grocery hub and wandered to the back where the pharmacy was located. After waiting in line, I told the technician that I was here to pick up medicine for my dog’s eye. Unable to find it, she checked through everything and even waited to confer with the busy pharmacist.

During all of that, I was texting my husband in confusion, making sure this was the correct pharmacy and what name the prescription was under, and his response was not something I expected.

“I was joking. There’s no prescription. R U seriously asking the pharmacist??? Lol.”

I thought I was going to die, right after I killed him for making me feel like a fool. There I was, explaining to the pharmacy about my old dog’s eye cyst with medical detail.

Once I got his self-confessing text, “lol” is what I did. Trying to keep my laughter at bay, I explained to the technician that it must have got sent to a different pharmacy and turned around to quickly slink away with my uncontrollable snorting laughter.

Was it that funny of a situation? Probably not to the average person, but at that moment in my life, it was funny. Reeeeally funny. And I, victim of my own extreme emotion, absolutely lost it. By the time I reached the front of the store, I was in full convulsive sobbing, tears streaming down my face, unable to breathe and contorting my face into deep frowns. I nearly ran into a man who certainly thought I was just delivered awful news, and as I made my way past the check out lanes, I tried my hardest to get out between sobs, “it’s ok. Nothing’s wrong. I’m just laughing.” (I felt I needed to explain the spectacle of myself because people were starting to stare.)

It took hours before I could calm myself down between laughs and tears and ended up not killing my husband.

Sounds crazy, but according to what my mother read, I’m not as nuts as you’d think. Experts say that crying is just a response of an emotional extreme, whether it be happy or sad, good or bad. And in the end that makes me a totally normal person, with a big heart and an even bigger funny bone.

(But no eye cyst medication for my dog.)

End note:

RIP Belle, 1999 - 2012

You were one heck of a smelly, wild dog.

Plug it in, head outside. Slow Cooker fajitas!

2012-02-26T10:45:00.000-08:00

The world of Pinterest is a good one, although I can see what was once an online place for your favorite things can turn into a bunch of garbage with people being mega-pinners. (If this stuff doesn't make any sense to you, ignore it and head down to the recipe!)

But there are wonderful things to learn from Pinterest, and here is one that I found, tweaked, and instantly found crock pot bliss. The beauty of meals like these is that the ingredients are realistic, simple, and quickly go together. So when you wake up one day and the sun is shining and you just want to head out to enjoy what's there, plug this in and come home, adventure-worn, and walk into a house full of deeeelicious smells.

Very grateful for the original post, here is my take on this "I can't believe this was made in a slow cooker" fajitas...

Slow Cooker Fajitas

1 good sized onion, sliced

3 sweet bell peppers, sliced (those packs of yellow, orange, and red? perfect.)

1 1/2pound chicken breast
1/4 cup chicken broth or water

1/2 tsp salt

2 Tbl cumin

1 1/2 Tbl chili powder

1/2 tsp dried oregano

hot sauce (we <3 Frank's for everything except doughnuts!)

tortillas

Fajita toppings (cheese, sour cream, salsa, etc.)

Looks rather yucky in the cooker. Have faith.

In a greased slow cooker, put onion and pepper slices. Lay chicken right on top, pour on broth or water. Sprinkle all of the spices (salt through oregano) all over the chicken. Cook for 8 hours on low, then shred the chicken with two forks. Add hot sauce to your taste, a twist of lime if you've got it. Best to serve it with a slotted spoon so you get the goodies and not to broth. (Stir some of the broth into a can of refried beans for a taste of homemade!)

Shredded up, it's a big pot of yummy.

Waking up is hard to do

2012-02-20T19:30:00.000-08:00

I have a rather hokey nightgown that sports a bear with half-open eyes holding a mug. “Bearly awake before coffee” is what it reads, and it’s been a needling point for my husband, a genuinely morning person. And by morning person, I mean he can wake up and not stomp around and it doesn’t take him 20 minutes just to be able to function enough to make coffee to be able to drink it without spilling it all over his pajamas.

But I am not so lucky. I don’t want to be talked to, touched, looked at, or even near anyone except the droning sound of the local news station.

And then, maybe then, I’ll make you breakfast.

Before I was blessed with motherhood, this sort of anti-morning-person phenomenon didn’t bother many people. My husband knew to keep his distance until the caffeine set in, and things were fine. Then, having babies in the house throws off the schedule so much that while you may be a morning person, your morning had just been dedicated at 4:30 AM. Full nights of sleep consist of three hours and you find yourself forgetting how to set your alarm clock because the baby will do a perfectly fine job of waking you up at whichever hour they choose and crave immediate attention.

And this is why, I believe, babies are so absolutely adorable. If they weren’t, sleepy people like me might not be so kind in the wee hours of the night.

But time goes on and our children grow up and reach that awful stage of not being able to control their internal clocks and also not being able to sit quietly and read while mom is snoring away in the next room. This is the span of time when your alarm clock is again not needed because instead of a crying baby, you get an actual child yelling your name from the foot of your bed asking for a snack or a bathroom break.

Or worse yet, when they just stand there, hovering over you without making a sound and some strange sixth sense wakes you up because you can literally feel their presence. They’re lucky you don’t reach out and slug them in your broken slumber bewilderment.

Currently, we’ve reached the school-age stage, where my mornings are studded with packing lunches and gathering items for all of our days, which begin promptly at the same time every morning with no leeway whatsoever. This lack of spare time crunches non-morning people like myself who bumble around for a good chunk of the morning and by noon can’t honestly remember what I packed in their lunches and hope that it wasn’t a potato and a bottle of salad dressing.

And so for the good of the people, I finally decided that in order to not be the wicked witch of the morning and also that my children are semi-well fed, I actually need to get up even earlier. I require a 20-minute buffer between sleep and functionality and subsequently set my once-dusty alarm clock to smaller and smaller numbers to protect the ones I love.

A 2007 poll by CBS News found that most people are most productive at 10:00 AM, followed by 9:00 AM and finally 8:00 AM. They also found that the older that people get, the more likely they are to wake up earlier naturally. And finally, there was a direct correlation between salary and how much of a morning person people are; most people who earn more than $75,000 actually prefer early mornings.

It doesn’t take me 20 minutes of a sleepy blur to figure out my own patterns. By the time my kids are finally old enough to not wake me up or require lunches and eventually move out of the house giving me total freedom of sleep, I’ll be old, hopefully wealthy, and happily wake up at the crack of dawn with nothing to do.

Here’s hoping my nightgown will still fit.

Sunshine inspires stovetop granola

2012-02-13T13:23:00.000-08:00

All it takes is a day of sunshine and I start to get spring fever. And for whatever reason, spring fever for me inspires me to eat real, wholesome, from-scratch food.

I usually make granola in the oven, in huge batches and it takes all day. I tried a new recipe and with a few alterations found a great combination of flavors for my kids. And me. It’s sinfully delicious.

Ingredients:

▪ 1 Tbl olive oil

▪ 2 cups rolled oats

▪ 1/3 cup butter

▪ 1/3 cup brown sugar

▪ 1 Tbl honey

▪ 1 tsp vanilla

▪ ½ cup chopped pecans

▪ 2 graham crackers, broken into pieces

▪ milled flax seed (optional)

Directions:

1. Heat olive oil in skillet. Add oats and cook until oats are toasted but not burnt, about 5 minutes. Remove oats to a cookie sheet to cool.

2. In skillet, melt butter. Add brown sugar, honey, and vanilla. Heat and stir until bubbly. Turn off heat.

3. Return oats to skillet. Add nuts, graham crackers, and flax seed. Stir to combine.

4. Pour onto cookie sheet to cool.

Notes: Feel free to add dried berries after it has cooled. You can also experiment with different nuts, coconut, sesame seed, sunflower seeds, etc. This is a good base recipe that is quick, easy, and doesn’t make 10 pounds, nor cost a fortune. Put it on some whole milk yogurt for a real treat!

Becoming a penny angel

2012-02-09T17:16:00.000-08:00

“See a penny pick it up, all day long you’ll have good luck. See a penny let it lay, bad luck you’ll have throughout the day.”

I am not one to tempt fate or superstation, so when exiting my car at the grocery store this week I was astounded to find not one, not two, but three pennies. Oh, the luck!

But what’s unlucky is looking like a goofball crouching down in the parking lot to pick up dirty pennies, and then having to deal with the road sludge that usually covers each one.

I was faced with a decision.

My husband, who hates pennies, would leave them. In fact, he may have even been the one to throw them down because he doesn’t like puny coins weighing down his pockets. “I’ll just leave it for someone else, send them a little luck,” he admits. But like I said, I didn’t want to tempt fate. If I didn’t pick them up and then went on to have a really lousy day, whose fault would that have been?
Exactly.

Truthfully I didn’t really want the grimy pennies, either, so right there on the spot I came up with what I think is a genius idea. I picked them up, and then one by one, tossed them back on the ground, scattering them around the parking lot for others to find and be joyous about.

Convinced I had done a decent thing and changed the course of destiny for three soon-to-be lucky people, I went into the store and prepared to treat myself to a cup of coffee to celebrate my new intelligence. Wouldn’t you know, there was someone chatting up the barista. A long story short, it was a very nice barista and a very nice man and after striking up a conversation with both of them, the man actually bought me my cup of coffee.

In my world, there are few things as fantastic, fabulous, wonderful, amazing, spectacular, etc. as a free cup of coffee. In all seriousness, it sends me into smiley giggle fits just thinking about it.

Call it luck, call it coincidence, but I would be remiss if I didn’t attribute at least a few sips of the java to the luck of the pennies in the parking lot.

As it turns out, this lucky penny thing is nothing new. For centuries people have considered copper a serendipitous metal, because copper was seen as a gift from the gods, and anyone who carried it was therefore protected from evil. Others thought the luck came from just being a free piece of money. And for some people, only pennies that are heads-up are the lucky ones, because in a world of only good and only evil, even ancient cultures believed that heads represented the positive and the measly tail came straight from the dark side.

And believe it or not, lucky pennies have even secured their own obscure holiday. May 23rd of each year is supposedly Lucky Penny Day, a holiday with an unknown origin, but a great day for someone with a few pennies weighing down their pocket to toss them out and make someone like me very happy. Almost as happy as getting a free cup of coffee.

The strangest thing about my day of lucky pennies has an even better ending. After my morning of luck times three, that evening I was at yet another grocery store, walking through aisles and thinking about what happened to me that very morning. Suddenly I looked down to find – you guessed it—another penny. I just had to pick it up. And then I just dropped it in the next aisle, the pinging sound of evil-thwarting copper landing on the tile floor, laying in wait until the next lucky person walked by.

Mom-haustion.

2012-02-06T04:27:00.000-08:00

There’s no denying it, that the older we get the more we complain. I don’t I’ve had a conversation with my grandparents or parents lately that doesn’t involve some aching knee joint, a change in the barometer, or how the weather is always better somewhere else.

We “youngins” sit back and laugh and promise to never get like them, and if we do, we have written permission from our bestest of friends or siblings to send us away on a ship, never to return. We laugh and joke, but deep down we’re honestly hoping to not turn into a whiny old person.

But the funny part is that we mothers are just as bad. (Before I get started here, if you are a mother who has never once been low on energy and never moaned and groaned about diapers or the drop off line, the rest of this article does not pertain to you or anyone else on your planet. Please don’t take offense.)

I, for one, am always telling the world how tired I am. Mostly it comes out in three words, “large coffee, please,” but at times it rears its evil head in a soliloquy of raving mad stories and pleas for a shred of sanity. For a job we all love this much and the vast majority of us asked for, we sure do whine a lot as mothers.

“I haven’t slept through the night in 12 years.”

“I haven’t eaten a warm meal since the millennium.”

“I’ve been wearing the same shirt for three days because I don’t have the energy to do laundry and/or change it.”

“Just once I’d like to see a movie that isn’t animated.”

“My behind has been completely reshaped to a flat pancake because of all of the time spent on a bleacher.”

“I could theoretically survive in my car for weeks.”

And so on and so forth, and we moms get together for “playdates” so our kids can fight and for just a few brief seconds we get to sit down on a park bench or in a church basement and unload our tiresome woes.

The following are actual stories of tired moms collected in the past week. I truly wish I was making these up, including the first story in which I was sending a business-type email and signed it “Love, Karrie” and couldn’t even muster up the energy to write an apology. It was 9:30 PM.

My dear cousin and mother of two recently put her food in the refrigerator to be warmed up, and then turned on the microwave. She reports that it took her at least a minute to figure out where her food had vanished.

A friend of mine says that on more than one occasion she has found the cereal in the refrigerator, which for me happens more than I’d like to admit. And yes, the milk is usually in the pantry. Or the freezer. Or one time, on the washing machine.

Another friend has tried vehemently to open her house with her car fob, clicking unlock unlock unlock and couldn’t understand why it wasn’t working.

And the winner of them all, another friend recently brushed her teeth with cortisone cream.

These women are all very well educated people, tremendous parents of fantastic kids, and excellent whiny mothers. We all are, and we don’t do it to be frumps looking for attention, we simply want the world to know that our intelligence has been temporarily halted due to some maternal functions such as lack of sleep and the preparation of fourteen thousand salami sandwiches and by matching tiny socks and carpools and checking math homework and playdates and board games all of which we lose because we can’t even focus long enough to get through Candyland without cheating.

We may not be rubbing on the Ben Gay, but I think our motherhood complaints are well-deserved enough to declare a new official term for the tired mother syndrome: Mom-haustion.

I think it works well. I also think I have it.
Love,

Karrie

Making giant memories

2012-01-23T15:43:00.000-08:00

There is something to be said for memorable vacations. I’m not talking about the kind where everything goes as planned and you have perfect family photos in matching outfits on the beach and when people ask how your trip was you simply say, “it was very nice.”

I’m talking about the OTHER kind of memorable. The kind where, if someone asks about your trip you bust a gut. I’m talking about the kind where, years down the road when my kids tell their own kids about their vacation, they don’t remember the things that all went routinely but can recall, with detail, the quirky things that made those days away special.

Because for me, that’s what vacation is. It’s a step out of your normal life, into a pretend time where there’s a tiny coffee maker in your bathroom and someone gives you clean towels. It’s a time where you roll your eyes at laundry and don’t do any cooking but think it’s perfectly fine to eat a can of Pringles for lunch. It’s a time when you focus more on the living and less on the life.

And then, in your foggy bliss of junk food and pool chlorine, something so bizarre happens that it catches you off guard and makes that extraordinary day so astonishing, it’s forever engrained in your mind.

When I was eight years old, we visited Disneyland for the first (and only) time. I can’t tell you about the roller coasters or Donald Duck, but I can tell you that I ate too much candy and then took antacids that had accidentally soaked up nail polish remover and got very sick in a very public restaurant. I can also tell you that I was one person away from winning a camera while standing in line for the Monorail. End of story.

If you ask my children about their first trip to Disneyworld, I’m sure they will tell you one thing: Giant underwear.

Sadly, the most memorable thing from our entire recent trip was indeed giant undergarments. And somewhere, there is a large lady thinking that our memory wasn’t so great and probably yelling at her husband for not packing them. The story goes, after checking into our hotel, we scoured the room for extra blankets and pillows only to find instead a drawer containing someone’s pressed, folded, and neatly stacked panties. Maybe we were slap happy from a day of the happiest place on earth, but we couldn’t have laughed harder if Mickey and Pluto jumped out of that drawer and did the hula dance on the bed wearing a toga made from bleach white hotel towels and then flew out the window singing She’s a Grand Ol’ Flag.

Naturally we had to confirm with photographic evidence the unexpected treasure and even though it was past our bedtimes, I still allowed the sporadic giggles I heard throughout the hotel room, mostly because a good portion of them were mine.

And as I was finally settled down enough to think about a day full of lines and rides and lost tickets and tired children, I was calm enough to be thankful for those giant undies and the impermeable memory they gave my family on what will probably go down in history as one of our best family vacations ever.

Charlie Chaplin once said, “A day without laughter is a day wasted.” And Walt Disney said that “Laughter is America’s most important export.” And somewhere, I’m guessing a sweet, kind lady is saying, “I don’t think it’s very funny that I left ALL of my underwear in Disneyworld.”

But I for one can truthfully say, “The happiest place on earth gets a little happier when you come home with laughs, smiles, and great, big memories.”

The happiest place on earth, if you can get there

2012-01-19T19:32:00.000-08:00

Years ago when our first daughter started in her princess phase, I put my glass-slippered foot down, right then and there. I told my husband and anyone else who would listen, “I refuse to take our children to Disneyworld until they can walk the whole park because strollers irritate me up to here and I’m not parking it out in the middle of nowhere when we all have to go to the bathroom at the same time.”

And pretty much I started training them all since day one, forcing them to take long walks through the woods or around the block. It wasn’t so much because I was yearning to take them to Disneyworld, but more because I knew that there would at some point be a window of magic and fantasy for all of them at the same time. Before the oldest got too old, and when the youngest was not too young, we had to be ready and raring to go.

Not only that, but having talked to friends, I was just downright scared to try to book a Disney vacation. “People write entire books on this stuff,” I said to my husband, who had ordered a set of DVD’s that would take longer to watch than actually going on vacation. There are packages and plans and about a thousand different choices in every category, and, silly me, all I wanted to do was to fly to Florida, buy a ticket and get our picture taken with Mickey in front of Cinderella’s castle.

Anymore, that’s too much to ask for, I guess, and in frustration I threw up my hands and gave my husband the luxurious job of planning the trip. For one, he’s a thousand times more organized than I am, and secondly there would be a good chance I’d slug Mickey when I saw him if I had to do the legwork.

Before I knew it, we had plane tickets and hotel reservations at “the most complicated place on earth” and began our at home preparations of packing and dreaming of sunshine and blue skies.

That first daughter who has been deprived of Space Mountain and Fantasyland for so many years made numerous lists for us, all of the items practical and thoughtful. “We need good walking shoes,” she said, well-trained child that she is. She has an autograph book and pen ready and waiting and overall she’s way more prepared than I could ever be.

My son was concerned about one thing—his carry-on bag and how many things he could take on the airplane. A Cub Scout and an outdoorsman in the making, we had to search all of his bags for the predictable pocketknife that he has stashed for preparedness in every pocket. (I was not, however, surprised when at the airport he pulled out two plastic tanks to play with on the airplane. Because everyone needs some tanks on the airplane, right?)

The youngest princess has not slept well in days and has asked us 47,839 times how many more sleeps until we get to Disneyworld. She has had her princess dresses laid out and will tell anyone and everyone of our upcoming destination, no matter what they ask. I have the slightest feeling that when she actually sees a real live princess she might very well faint. Perhaps I should have packed smelling salts.

And so, not-well rested from late-night packing and throwing ourselves into this adventure full bore, we venture on our first family vacation to the happiest place on earth. If we could survive the planning, surely we can survive the few days of wonderment that we’ve been training for all these years. And I have a sneaking suspicion that even if I did do the arrangements myself, I would still give Mickey Mouse a hug rather than an uppercut.

And take a picture.

Resolving to remember potato chips

2012-01-05T14:52:00.000-08:00

My mom has been hobbling around on her bum knee for years. If the weather was colder or if she spent an exceptionally long day chasing after grandkids, it was pretty obvious in the cockeyed shuffle she perfected. But enough had finally been enough, and she recently went in for knee replacement surgery.

The procedure itself went well. Her recovery in the hospital was as it should be, long, painful physical therapy, and mediocre (at best) food. None of this was new to her, because she had her other knee replaced just a few years ago so she knew exactly what she was getting herself into.

On her third day in the hospital, I went to visit her for the first time since the operation. I walked in and when our eyes met, I immediately saw that quiver in her chin, that automatic response that somehow keeps our eyes from turning into water faucets. No mother ever wants to break down in front of her children. We instinctively want them to always see us as strong, unbreakable, and the care-givers, not the ones who need the care. Having faced a number of heath hurdles myself in the past year, I know this feeling all too well. But here I was, staring my mom in her watery eyes.

Because my family is better at making jokes than facing reality, my dad and I instantly went into humor mode. “Karrie, come eat this soup. It’s like a dead chicken ended up in a toilet and they heated it up and poured it through a dirty sock.”

“Oh yum, I can’t wait! Is there enough to share?” I answered, and this is how we got through the first few awkward moments. To get through my mom’s physical therapy, she had me dig out the sweat pants that my dad bought for her to wear home—a size 3X. My mom does well with a Medium, and so when I put both of my legs into one of her new pant legs and danced around the hospital room, we all couldn’t help but forget about the pain my mom was facing.

Before long, therapy was over and my mom was going to be released to go home. My dad left early to prepare their house, and I was left alone with my mom who was fighting the pain and hadn’t eaten much all day. She said she wasn’t hungry, but I knew it was more than the dirty sock toilet chicken soup, and even a daughter knows when her mom needs a little something something.

There was a small bag of potato chips left over from her lunch still sitting on her tray. My mom can’t resist a salty snack, but when I offered them, she sadly passed.

So I plopped down in the chair, threw my feet up on the side of her hospital bed, turned on a cooking show and tore into the tiny bag of chips.

Making conversation, I crunched on a chip and slyly handed her one to eat. We chatted about how much we disliked the dish that was being prepared, and I handed her another chip. The nurse came in to check on something, and when she left, I held out another chip to my mom. By the time the next show came on, she had eaten pretty much the entire bag of chips without even knowing it, leaving me hungry, craving salt, and smirking at every chance I got.

I’m not sure she’ll remember eating the bag of chips for all of the pain medication she was on, but I will never forget it. It was one of those tiny little moments of life that can slip by if we don’t take the chance to pause for a second and realize just how good we’ve got it.

How ideal that this all happened to me as people everywhere are making ridiculous resolutions for the New Year. Instead of trying to make drastic changes to my life, maybe I’ll make drastic changes to the way I appreciate little moments. And, of course, potato chips.

(Ten bucks says my mom cried when she read this, almost as much as I cried when I wrote it.)

Four and twenty thousand blackbirds (giant flocks...what gives?)

2012-01-03T19:16:00.000-08:00

It is said that there is power in numbers, but nothing can compare to the numbers of the massive swarms of birds that swirl around us when the weather starts to turn colder.

If you’ve seen them, you’ve stopped and stared. Chances are you may have even counted one-Mississippi, two-Mississippi, etc to see how long the train of blackbirds lasted, and most definitely you’ve marveled at how fluid and graceful such a group could be. (Until they land in your yard, that is.)

Such an impressive act of nature deserves a moment of your time, I think, and what makes it even better is to know a little bit about what you’re looking at.

As it turns out, they aren’t all blackbirds. Well, they’re all black birds, but in fact a few species are usually involved in the dark streaks of night moving through the early winter sky. Brown-headed cowbirds, common grackles, European starlings, and even red-winged blackbirds all join together while making their migratory journey towards warmer weather, exactly what we humans wish we were doing while we stand bundled up and watch them swim above us.

It is pretty easy to figure out why these birds all fly south for the winter. The bugs die when it gets cold, and without a decent food source and no invitations to holiday parties, the birds throw their wings up in the air, look at each other, and decide to get out of here. I don’t know that I could blame them.

What is most interesting about these giant flocks of birds are the birds that make them up. Brown-headed cowbirds are generally not very nice birds and lay their eggs in other birds’ nests. Red-winged blackbirds are so territorial that I have watched them dive-bomb each other among the marshes near my home. Starlings are known to be aggressive and if you’ve got a bird feeder in your yard, you’ve probably seen the common grackle claim his role as the hog of the seed, scaring other birds away and generally being a pig.

But then, when the food supply is suddenly low, they all become buddies and head south to the beautiful marshes. It’s a bit of a mystery.

Some say that they realize that there is indeed safety in numbers, that when you’re hanging out with hundreds of thousands of other birds, there’s a decent chance that if something’s coming to eat you, you can happily dodge it and leave the fate to another bird. Others say that it has something to do with the history and the arrival of agriculture in North America. Others chalk it up to a pattern of nature, that birds that share speeds and habits and that birds of a feather just happen to flock together.

No matter the reason, during this season of holiday and togetherness, there are a few lessons to be learned from these awesome assemblies of aviators.

When the going gets tough, the tough fly south. (Although we northerners insist that the tough stay here and brave the winter months, the road salt, the ice patches, and the constant shivering while we poke fun at everyone who migrates while secretly being jealous.)

Keep your friends close, your enemies closer --just in case someone wants to eat you, or because that enemy might know where the good grub is. (This also applies to holiday parties.) And yet, enjoying the company of others isn’t all bad, and when the weather gets chilly, time might be best spent with a few thousand acquaintances.

But mostly, when the world gives you a show as amazing as hundreds of thousands of blackbirds soaring and swooping in a waterfall across the sky, maybe it’s best to stop for a second or two, and just stare in wonderment. Maybe the birds would get just as excited to see a swarm of humans of all types, standing still for a moment.

This is your brain on Christmas

2011-12-23T05:24:00.000-08:00

This is your brain, any given day,

When the sun shines bright or the sky is gray,

January, November, July, June, or May,

But this is your brain on Christmas…

You wake up in the morning, at half past two,

And make lists of all you have to do.

Shopping, baking, and caroling, too.