Tues Ten 041211: How Does Your Garden Grow?

I’m not a gardener. I’ll get that admission out of the way right up front. Still, I enjoy a good outdoor space. They are especially nice this time of year in the South when the heat and humidity haven’t yet made their full onslaught. I mention it because I spent part of the morning yesterday working outside at my patio table. It represented a small triumph for me, something that gave a Monday morning a nice celebration quality. Inspite of my non-gardening tendencies, I’ve been diligently working to reclaim my backyard over the last few weeks. With the help of my Mama (who is, fortunately, quite the gardener), I’ve been making plans involving plants and patio furniture and playhouses, and putting them slowly into action. I began by removing a huge debris pile that had been gathered and allowed to dwarf my view over the last few years. After that came the pruning of many wayward vines and tree seedlings in several areas of the property, and then choosing plants to add and dreaming of various garden ornaments and accoutrements. I still have much planting to do and budgeting for ways to implement my dreams, but the process feels like a celebration even though it’s incomplete. My gifts have enjoyed “helping” and talking about the possibilities. I’ve enjoyed tackling a long-overdue project. And yesterday, I enjoyed a few quiet moments of relishing my accomplishment so far. In celebration of my burgeoning green thumb, I give you the Tuesday Ten: Celebrations from a Morning on the Patio…

1. Bare earth is better than bare branches. (at least when it comes to debris piles)

2. The first step in growing something new is clearing out what’s dying or misplanted.

3. Hearing birds while I’m emailing is a wonderful thing — sponsored by patio tables and wifi.

4. Progress SHOULD be celebrated and taking the time to do it is time well spent.

5. Tea Olive shrubs smell divine this time of year.

6. It’s a blessing to have the freedom to set my own pace — in work, in gardening, in growing — no matter how frenzied a pace it might be at times.

7. Watching my gifts plant and prune and water lets me see they are growing.

8. It feels good to see the results of my own handiwork.

9. Shady places are inviting.

10. Growing is good, even when pruning is required.

Something to Hear

A few weeks ago I had one of those experiences with my children that stuck with me. It was a moment I’ve been pondering for a while, knowing I needed to take it to heart, to glean from it–a moment I knew was important and profound in its simplicity.

Little Drummer Boy was in bed. As I was closing the Transformer book and pulling the blankets closer around him, he inquired (as only a 5-year-old can), “Mommy, while you’re rubbing my back, can I ask you some questions?”

Can I ask you some questions? It was such a simple request, but there was also such a look of anticipation on his face that it stopped me. Normally at this time of night I might have told him to wait, or reminded about bedtime or even warned about waking up his brother. But, there was something about his face. This was important to him. This was something special to him. So I said yes.

How could I say no to that opportunity after all? He had a smile on his face in the request. He had a look of excitement when I said yes. Then, I could see him thinking, his little mind processing and scanning. It dawned on me that Little Drummer Boy didn’t have a burning question on the tip of his tongue. He was searching his mind for his best inquisitive response. On the fly. He just wanted the opportunity to ask.

So, I took the opportunity to answer. I honestly don’t even remember what the questions were. Except, I remember they were wholly ordinary–at least for an inquisitive, car chase-loving, story-telling five-year-old wonder. They were burning inquisitions like “what makes the water hot when you turn the faucet?” or “where did that picture on the wall come from?” or “when will we get to go to the zoo again?”. They were all the voices of his uncensored thoughts, the stream-of-consciousness of boyhood.

The haphazard responding and clear confirmations that Mommy does not, indeed, remember everything she may have ever learned about science and/or the animal kingdom, and that she most certainly doesn’t have all the answers (at least not the correct ones) may be a subject for another post, but the process also brought to mind my own burning question…. Why don’t I do this every night?

In the rush to teach and impart, how often do I shush those seemingly random questions–the ones that belie the much greater underlying truths of love and security and acceptance? In the journey of parenthood–in the journey of everything–I sometimes spend so much time having something to say, be it teaching, reminding, cajoling, distracting, correcting, admonishing, sharing or instructing, that I forget what a blessing it is to have something to hear.

Sometimes I spend all my time looking for the opportunity to speak, to talk to someone, to impart information. To influence. To offer my own point of view.

Sometimes the greatest opportunity is the one to listen.

And so I did on that night. I relished taking the opportunity to give Little Drummer Boy a simple gift–one so easy to give it’s almost embarrassing how often I withhold it. It was the gift of sending him off to sleep knowing he’d been heard. Knowing he had an audience of one. And a standing ovation. The gift of time. A listening ear. An easy explanation. Or a hard one.

“Can I ask you some questions?”

Translation…
Can I talk?
About anything I want?
Can I tell you what I’m thinking about?
Do you care what I think is silly?
Do you know what I think is confusing?
Can I show you my heart?
Are you interested?
Will you explain something?
Will you give me your undivided attention?
Will you listen?
Will you answer?
Am I important?
Do I matter?

Tues Ten 020811: Sugared Up

What’s Valentine’s season without a little love baking? And what’s baking without three side-kick chef’s and their sweet tooths? And what’s the use in having three side-kicks without a few sugar kisses to seal the deal? I had the pleasure of experiencing it all recently in a little baking frenzy with my gifts. Nothing gets me out of my work or life worries quicker than three gifts covered in flour and sprinkles! Just so you know the lay of the land… The ones with the fancy artistry (scoff!) are mine. The ones practicing writing the alphabet in the A-A-B pattern (don’t ask) are Little Drummer Boy’s. The ones with the frenzied concentration of sprinkles and colored sugar are Bug’s. And, the ones with the finger swipes are Baby Girl’s. Typical.

In commemoration of our hearts-and-stars love-fest, I give you the Tuesday Ten: Ingredients for Getting Sugared Up…

MOM’S SHAPED COOKIES

1. 1 cup butter

2. 1 cup sugar

3. 1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla

Cream together. And add…

4. 1 egg

5. 1 teaspoon water

Beat until light and fluffy. Separately, combine

6. 3 cups flour

7. 1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder

8. 1/4 teaspoon salt

Mix to form dough and chill.
Toss flour, referee brothers, catch Baby Girl, roll with rolling pin, take turns, resist tasting dough, give in to tasting dough, cut cookies, arrange on greased cookie sheet, and bake.

350 degrees for 6-8 minutes.

9. Icing

10. Sprinkles

Ample wash cloths were put to good use. And a good time was had by all!

Moments of Wonder

A few nights ago I was giving Baby Girl a bath. I do it every night before reading to her and rocking her to sleep. And although sometimes I can’t help but view bathtime as a chore, every night I’m more keenly aware that these moments are fleeting. I already have phenomenally fewer of them with Little Drummer Boy and Bug. There was nothing particularly special about this night, a Tuesday like any other one. But somehow, this bathtime inspired all-too-common questions. As I sat beside the tub, responding to her squeals, I could feel it rising.

Baby Girl is most often filled with giggles and energy for her bath. When I’m not distracted by the rush of the day and the task list of bedtime routines, I watch her. I see her carefree little body standing there too busy to sit in the bath water. Her pudgy tummy and pudgy cheeks, her hands all in motion and eyes full of light, she laughingly fills a cup with the water’s flow and pours it back into the tub for the simple pleasure of seeing the bubbles. I can’t help but enjoy the simple pleasure of her wonderment myself.

On this Tuesday, she accompanied her water play with talk of Frosty the Snowman. I guess she’s been reading (or singing) about him at daycare and her new snowman washcloth inspired the recollection. For Baby Girl, all snowmen are Frosty. All baths are for bubbling water. In these moments, I’m amazed at the simplicity life boils down to in a two-year-old world.  Her splashing and squeals pierced the sounds of brother car chases and computer clicks just a room away. Their own imaginations hard at work awaiting their turn with the suds. Sitting on my heels beside the tub, I matched her height, and I could look straight into her uncontained eyes. They were completely oblivious to me, and yet they gripped me. With a soapy washcloth in hand I could feel the pull of that required moment of whisking her away from her water experiment and on to more practical cleanliness. But even though the night was getting away from me, I just sat and watched her.

In that tug between my own time constraints and her wonder-full display, that’s when I felt it rising. That’s when the tears began to well. I felt it overtaking me. That odd mixture of overwhelming love and wonder mixed with second-guessing and fear. This little child before me in her innocent playfulness. This precious one who without even realizing it had placed her whole world on my shoulders. And thereby captured my lifelong gaze.

And so the fear and self-doubt rise in proportion to the love.
Can I do it? I ask myself.
Can I give them what they need? What they deserve?
Can I hold their hearts? Until they grow the passion to do it themselves.
Can I mold their whims and nurture their gifts?
Can I provide for them?
Will I be able to fund their warmth and their table and their opportunity?
What if I can’t?
What if I mess up?
What if I get side-tracked and miss something?
Something important?
Can I really do this?

I sat beside the tub and watched her. And cried. I can do that with Baby Girl. She’s so young that my tears are blissfully invisible to her, unlike the array of questions they would produce with her brothers. I took it all in. The carefree spirit. The joyful eyes. The concentrated movements. Filling the cup. Pouring it out. Squealing. Giggling.

The more I sat, the more I wondered. How can I shield them from the worries of living and providing? How do I keep it from creeping in when their only concerns are whose turn it is to choose a movie and how long they get to make bubbles in the bath water? How can I give them that privilege of childhood and ignorance? That sweet and oblivious face standing there by the faucet where the whole world is filling the cup and pouring it out. How can I give them everything I want them to have? How can I make their worlds safe and full and at peace all at the same time?

It’s in moments like this one that I realize what she’s teaching me. That moments of wondering find their rest in moments of wonder. The carefree attention that simplicity provides. The place of wonder she shows me in filling the cup and pouring it out. The sheer amazement of something as basic as a bathtub full of water seen through the clear blue depth of a two-year-old’s eyes. When I stop myself and my rampant thinking–when I let go–in that place of wonder, I am master rather than slave to the onslaught of worry and concern and self-doubt.

So, I look at her. I look at them. Their beauty. Their exuberance. Their joy. Their wonder. And I know.

If I can just keep my eyes here.
If I can just focus here.
And see.
We’ll be ok.

Tues Twenty 122110: Sights of Christmas 2010