Wicked

It's a tragic story really...

A troubled teen wildly overreacts to the empty threats of an elderly neighbor and runs away from home.  No mention is ever made of her parents contacting the local authorities or making any attempt to locate their missing child so we are left to assume she was unwanted to begin with.  She encounters some catastrophic weather and loses conciousness for an unknown period of time when she hits her head during the storm.  Upon waking, she discovers that she has unknowkingly committed a homicide during her blackout.

She is pursued by the grieving relative of the deceased and receives a tip from a local charlatan about a man that can help her get out of town quickly.  Walking the dizzying streets of this unfamiliar city, she is serenaded by some suckers singing about a world made of doughnut holes, attacked in the woods and ultimately duped into joining a gang of hoodlums who it turns out are victims of organ trafficking and psychological warfare.  They too are directed towards this local ring leader who might know how to procure them some replacement organs.

After several encounters with dangerous wildlife and an opium trip that lasts for an undetermined amount of time, the teen and her gang locate the residence of the man they seek.  The plan to flee the city undetected nearly fails when he is exposed as an imposter and turns out to be a completely incompetent imbecile that tries to distract the teen from his deception by suggesting she ruin a perfectly good pair of shoes by bashing the heels together and destroying the red glitter.

Then she wakes up and it turns out it was all a dream.  Or a bad trip.  The truth is perfectly unclear.

Things are not always what they seem.  Are they Dorothy?

Wicked right?

Occasion

My middle child, Mona, as we affectionately call her, went to half day kindergarten all but two days last year.  Long story short, that's over 175 days of public education...and she never once used the bathroom at school.  Not once.  She was scared to death of the flusher.  Some careful strategy on her part and a school day that lasted just over 3 hours allowed her to come home everyday and use her own potty before lunch. 

She headed off to first grade 4 weeks ago with a big backpack and a big problem.  From the time she headed out to the bus each morning to the time she returned home she would be gone for nearly 8 hours.  And she was bound to have to use the loo.  For several days, we asked about it and she avoided the question.  End of discussion.  I wrote a note to the teacher to have her make sure Mona knew where the bathroom was.  She did.  I suggested to the big sister that she escort the middle bit to the bathroom when they got off the bus first thing in the morning.  Refused.  So we waited.  And didn't make a big deal out of it, because that is the best way to push this kid over the edge.  But I secretly packed a pair of extra leggings in the bottom of her very big backpack...just in case.

Then at the end of the second week of school, she came in the door looking rather smug.  Something was up.  She unpacked her bag, brought me her folder and casually tossed out the comment, "By the way Mom, I used the bathroom at school today.  Just so you know."

Everyone stopped in their tracks.  She beamed.  This was a very big deal.   

When you rise to the occasion...it IS an occasion.  And in this house, that gets you candles.  In your after school snack.  And a strange wonderful family that sings together, "Happy Bathroom to You!  Happy Bathroom to You!"

It is what it is?

Actually, if you know my mind at all, you know I don't believe that.  You know I believe things are what you make them, not what their name or date or circumstance says they're supposed to be.  And when, after nearly 200 days at school, you finally work up the courage to use the bathroom, that's a special occasion.

We all need more tiny candles and silly songs to mark the occasion.  Go buy yourself a wee pack and just see how you'll start looking for a reason to light one.  To mark an occasion.  Start seeing things for what you make them.

First

Last Friday was the first Friday of August.

My Love and I showed up way early so we could be the first ones in line.

I took my first daughter to a rock concert.

Her first rock concert.

To see the first band I have ever been crazy about.

And we stood in the first row.

And they played her very favorite song.  First.

I was so over whelmed with stupid joy that I stood there and cried.  

Thank goodness for dark sunglasses. 

It was quite simply one of those moments I was talking about last week.  

One of those extraordinary moments on an ordinary day 

that is worth stopping to celebrate.  Woot! 

There will be lots more Fridays.  And long lines to stand in.  

She will fall in love with other bands and go to many concerts.

But there will never be another first rock concert.

  

For the rest of her life, people will ask her which was her first one.  

And she'll tell them about standing with me.  In the first row.

How much do I love this?  

More than alot.

Dynamite

So they set out to build a road.  A road to pave the way.  To pave the way to places that had never been explored.  They packed everything they could think of to help them on their journey.  It was going to be epic.

They had no idea what was out there.  So much ground to cover.  So many challenges to encounter.  Deserts that threatened to lay them bare. Jungles that nearly swallowed them up.  Trees to step around. Animals to run from.  Wide open spaces where it seemed like nothing could possibly grow.  Thick tangled messes where it seemed like nothing could possibly pass.

And there were amazing treasures to behold.  Unobstructed sunsets unlike anything they had ever seen.  Glittering rivers that held more bounty than they could believe.  Amazing scenes that they could never forget.

So they made their way.  To pave the way.  The lot of them with their baggage.  They hauled their equipment for making the way.  Day after day.  And left a ribbon of road stretching out behind them.  That others could follow.

Until one day they came to a huge mountain.  It loomed over them. An immovable obstacle.  And the Captain of the group said, "This is unlike anything we have seen before, but we must pave the way.  We must go forward.  We must go over."

So the men strapped their equipment to their backs.  They loaded their heavy baggage and headed up the mountain to pave the way.  But they could not move ahead.  They lightened their load.  But they still made no progress.  It was one step forward and two steps back.  One of the crew said, "Captain, we are not equipped to climb this mountain.  We do not have the right tools.  We do not have the right experience."

And the Captain proclaimed, "We cannot go over.  But we cannot go back.  We must go around.  Let us find a way around.”

So the group traveled east for days and days.  And the mountains got taller and taller.  And there did not seem to be a way around.  One of the men said to the Captain, "This cannot be the way.  We must go back to where we started and try the other way."

So they retraced their steps to the place where they had first met the obstacle and they tried the western route.  More mountains.  And endless chain of the same overwhelming obstacles met them at each step.  They had traveled for many days and nights when one of the men said, “Captain we have gone so far and we have not made any progress.  We have gone from east to west and side to side.  We have walked for days and days but we have not gone forward.  We have not paved the way.”

The Captain was defeated.  He said, “This mountain cannot be conquered.  Maybe this is the end of our journey.  Maybe this is the place we are supposed to be.”

And there was a tiny voice from the back of the group that said, “Captain, there is another way.”

“What is this way?  There does not seem to be another way.”

And a young man came forward with a box that read TNT.

“Captain.  This box contains something amazing that will let us go through the mountain.” said the young man.

 

And the company laughed.

 

“Boy, you have no experience!” 

 

“Ha!  What do you know?”

 

“You have been nowhere.  Done nothing!  This cannot possibly be true.”

“Nobody goes through a mountain.”

And the young man said, “I assure you Captain.  The contents of this box will allow us to go through the mountain.  It will take down parts of this mountain.  It will be destructive and I cannot imagine the perils that await us on the inside, but if we are careful, and we learn as we go, we can make our way through to the other side.”

The Captain said, “Boy!  We have had this box all long and you said nothing?”

“Yessir.   We did not need this box the cross the river.  We did not need this box to cross the desert. The contents of this box would not have made the sunsets more beautiful or helped us to gather the treasures along the way.  We have not needed it yet.  But we have had it all along.  Yes.  And we need it now.”

So they began to go through the mountain.  It was slow.  And it was treacherous.  The men were terrified and the way was dark.  But it was forward.  And that felt good, because they had not been moving forward for a long time.

Before they knew it the first cracks of light began to show.  And the cracks became beams of sun and the beams became spaces to gaze through.  When they finally emerged from the other side of the mountain they looked back on the immovable obstacle that had stalled their progress for so long.  

The Captain proclaimed, “That is one huge mountain.”

And the young man said, “No sir, actually, now it has become just one more thing we had to get through.”

What is your mountain?

What have you carried with you all this way 

that will make that mountain 

just one more thing you’ve got to get through?

Story

Laundry, sink full of dishes, puppy peed in the foyer, blahblahblah…story of my life.  Pickle jar spilled in the fridge, backed over my new sunglasses with the car because I was rushing, cell phone is so broken it requires duct tape, blahblahblah…story of my life.  The Father is traveling, my only adult contact occurs on Facebook, nobody is everfreakin’ home to help me when I run out of toilet paper, blahblahblah…story of my life.

This week I didn’t feel like I had much of a story.  The roaring declarations of last week’s post were a barely audible squeak.  Freaking out by Wednesday that I had to write an essay inspired by the word ‘story’ and certain by Saturday afternoon that I had nothing.  I actually had a bunch of stuff.  A bunch of junk.  Fits and starts.  Rants about Cinderella’s story and meditative thoughts about life’s chapters.  Looking everywhere for inspiration from the word ‘story’.  Nothing.  Too much.  Not enough. 

I spent all week looking for the story.  Thinking.  Wondering.  What’s her picture going to be about?  Where is she looking for her inspiration?  How is she seeing ‘story’ this week?

 

So that’s the story.  On the week when the story of my life was not a bestseller.  The story is about two busy women, sisters, mothers with their hands full, wives with often absent husbands…who are apparently crazy because they agreed to write a blog together, on top of everything else they have to do.  The story is about two crazy women who go about their week and occasionally think about the same word.  The story is about how you can search in very different places for the same thing.  Story.  Inspiration.

Love this quote.

“Shoot many arrows.  Where they land, call that the target.”  Tom Quinn

That’s kindof what I did this week.  Just send them all up.  And see where they land.  With a yeah I meant to do that attitude.  And on a Saturday afternoon, when you’ve got your headphones on and your children plugged into a movie so you can have a few moments to yourself to peck out a blog post on the computer you get interrupted by a child…blahblahblah…story of my life.

“Hey Mom!  Mom!  Maaaaah-mmmmmmm!”

“Yes Love?”  No, it doesn’t matter that I was in the middle of something else…I’ll stop what I was doing and listen to you now thankyouverymuch…sigh…

“Hey Mom!  What building on Earth?  On Theee.  Whole.  Planet?  Has the most stories?”

“Oh seriously…I have no idea.  It’s probably in Dubai or someplace like that with a lot of sand.  Is your movie over already?”

Eye rolling from the 8 year old…seriously who teaches them this stuff?

“Alright fine.  I don’t know.  What building on Theee Whole Planet has the most stories?”

“The library Mom.  Duh.”

Heh.  Ok, she got me.  I didn’t see that one coming.  Funny kid...story of my life.

Right on target.

Foreign

Not native.  Not familiar.  

 As in this doesn’t feel like me.

Because that's it, isn't it?  It's foreign.  

You don't understand it. 

You've never had it, seen it, been there, done that before.

It takes awhile…before it's not foreign anymore.  But that’s the great thing about foreign-ness.   

Foreign things are those things that could become familiar if you make an effort.  

To go there.  Do that.   

They could start to feel like you, if you make an effort.

A story just landed in my lap this week.  A story that so perfectly captures the unease of foreign.   

The experience of knowing something is outside of your box.   

The first steps towards taking foreign and making it familiar.   

The strange discomfort you get from knowing 

that other people do/eat/have/use this foreign thing all the time, 

but not you. 

Such a perfect thing happened.  Here's the story... 

She got herself dressed.  Not headed out for a night on the town, 

but to the grocery store of all places.   

Is getting dressed a foreign thing? Certainly not. 

It was the fashion choice that was foreign to this girl.   

Somebody she trusts told her she looked cute in those skinny jeans.

So she sent me a picture of herself and said, “Be honest.  Can I wear these?” 

Not native.  Not familiar.  As in this doesn’t feel like me.

This story is not about fashion 

or feeling confident in garments with spandex.  

 It’s about the experience of going outside of your comfort zone.   

It’s about the first steps towards taking foreign and making it familiar.  

 It’s about the special nature of a foreign thing 

that makes it possible to have it become familiar.   

It can become your thing.   

You can go there.  Do that.   

Foreign things are special that way.  

 They can change.  If you make an effort. 

Red

I wore red shoes on the day I got married.  The most spectacular little red satin slides with a big red bow across the toe.

I remember the day we bought them.  We weren’t looking for wedding shoes that day.  I didn’t even have my dress yet.  They were up high on a pedestal, literally, in the middle of a very fancy shoe display at the Neiman Marcus in Scottsdale, Arizona.  We were not shopping at Neiman’s, we were simply walking through the store because it was the shortest way to get to our lunch destination from the parking lot.  I just saw them, and I knew.  I very clearly recall the exchange I had with my mom.  Pointing at the shoes, I said, “That’s them.”  And without missing a beat, she knew exactly what I was talking about and replied, “Of course they are.  You’d better try them on.”

Mostly, it was a secret.  There was a very short list of people who knew that tucked under that full white skirt was a little bit of red.  Hiding.  Until at the very end of the most beautiful wedding, my new husband and I turned around to make our way up the aisle together and I had to lift up the front of my dress just a bit to navigate the steps.  We got to the back of the church and we had just moments to ourselves, but I wanted him to see.  So I pointed my toe and lifted the hem of my dress to show him my red satin beauties and he simply said, “Of course you did."

Can something be totally unexpected and completely predictable at the same time?  Maybe.