Witching hour

I apologize in advance for the pinball effect my brain is taking while writing this post. The night before last I woke up at 3:30 with a hot flash, 4:15 when Damon used the bathroom, 5:45 when Dada's first alarm went off, 6 when Carrie got into the shower, and I got up for good at 6:15. Last night I was awake again at three. I looked it up, idly wondering if 3 AM has any other names, and discovered it's called the witching hour. Here I've been using that interchangeably with the time between the kids waking up and leaving for school, the time they get home/eat dinner/attempt homework/leave for karate, and bedtime. I've told Dada on numerous occasions that I live three witching hours on a daily basis. Now I'll have to think of something else to call them. 

Anyway, what a bizarre beginning of spring. It's supposed to be a time of new life and warmth and vibrance. Saturday was close to 70 degrees. Last Saturday it snowed. Yesterday it was almost 70 again, yet tomorrow it's to be not quite 50. 

But that's not even what I'm talking about. 

Our high school lost a student this week, and, in the midst of state testing which happens on various days in different schools this week, one of our elementary schools received a bomb threat. 

My first thoughts were anger and frustration, and I almost blogged something incendiary and name-calling. Then I thought about how that could be like adding accelerant to a fire. Even if only my heart were affected, it wouldn't be a good or even helpful route. So I waited. And I thought some more. 

I'm still thinking, still processing all of the thoughts swirling around in my head. Our high schooler is a sophomore, the same year as the student who has passed away, though they didn't travel in the same circles. I myself was a sophomore when I lost a classmate to suicide, many, many moons ago. The similarities are striking; well-liked and active are the adjectives I'm seeing in the news. My heart won't even let me imagine the devastation his family and friends must be experiencing.

To go from that tragedy to receiving a phone call describing a received bomb threat and the sequence of events that sets into motion simply renders me speechless. How badly must you feel about yourself to attempt to win attention by threatening an elementary school? How is there nobody in someone's life to speak reason and truth and love into a desperate spirit? 

Who else are we missing?

My heart aches for these small kids who are already on edge about the big, scary state tests who are now reluctant to go to their school where they have every right to feel safe and loved. They should be enjoying the sunshine at recess, not worrying about bomb-sniffing dogs missing something important. My particular third grader wasn't reassured that the school would be checked and cleared last night because what if someone did something early this morning after they'd checked? No eight year old anywhere should have to have that cross their mind. And to the heroes who are teachers, I'm sorry that it has to cross your minds as well. Your jobs are hard enough already!

I get it that life for us here is mostly easy. I am well aware of true horrors happening the world over and that my kids have an incredibly cushy life by comparison.  And no joke, Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start the Fire" is playing right now as I type, reminding me that bad things happening is nothing new. 

It makes me ask, what are we missing? If looked at logically, we are making lots of positive steps: Buddy Benches, lunch and recess buddies, zero tolerance for bullying, all excellent components for a community of inclusion. I understand that there will always be those who slip through the cracks, deliberately or accidentally. 

My faith answers that we are forgetting to include someone in our strategies, the one who will go on once we are dead, gone, and forgotten. Whoever you are, whatever you're struggling with, and we are all struggling with at least one something, you need to know that you matter and that you are loved. We are for the most part so careful to teach this to small people, but the truth is that no matter how old we grow we will not need to be loved any less. We may be able to hide that we need it or even trick ourselves into thinking that we don't, but it most certainly is not the truth. 

A lot of people talk about taking God out of our schools. It can't be done. He is everywhere. However, where we need him most is in our hearts. If we invite him in, we will be secure in our identity in him and will not need to threaten violence in order to seek attention. If we invite him in, our small and human ability to love and accept others will be greatly increased as we access his love and forgiveness. I'm not saying that life with Christ in your heart is perfect; none of us can achieve that, not here in this broken world. I AM saying that life is better because you're not alone, because you have access to resources you don't have innately yourself, because you grow a community and a tribe and a family, because you matter and when you know that you matter, you realize that other people do, too. Other flawed, broken, misguided, unlovely people.  People with addictions, attitudes, and mistakes hanging onto them as a heavy chain holds an unruly dog. We have got to learn who to give this Stuff to so that our hands can be open to reach out to help free others. We need to stop holding on to what separates us from each other. 

Nobody should be afraid to go to school. Nobody should feel like there is not one person out there who gets them. Yes, we are all busy, but busy doing what? Are we busy doing what is going to make a positive impact in someone else's life? What would it look like if our hearts were full enough of compassion for others that there was no room left in them for fear? I realize that only one of us isn't going to save the world. Recycle anyway. Volunteer anyway. Love anyway. Forgive anyway. Bless others anyway. It's only a drop in the bucket, you say. Yes, but look; the ripples from that single drop changes the surface of the entire bucket. Better families lead to healthier communities, which bring up our state, which strengthens our nation, which helps stabilize the world. Do good for others. You might help save us all.

Timing is everything.

I have a story that some of you have heard snippets of already, but first- lilies! These gorgeous flowers grow a few streets away from us. I pass them all the time when I'm driving and never get a chance to stop and see what they were for sure. They are indeed lilies, orange with brown spots. There is an older gentleman whom I see puttering around amongst them sometimes, but as I'm always driving, I never get to talk to him. Our friend Sally from our neighborhood two houses ago had poppies like this, so when I saw they were finally open, I knew I had to stop on this bike ride. I've never seen lilies bigger than me before!

Dada took Monday off to recover from vacation (more about all that later) so of course we had to have a bike ride. We had the bike trail mostly to ourselves since everyone is either on vacation or at work on a Monday, so we got to see our usual friends belonging to the flower, bird and bunny varieties. 

We're cruising along and we notice purple morning glories are growing all throughout the soybeans and were musing about how they got there. I have some which I let Grandma Barb babysit for a summer; they took over her entire front porch area, climbing their way up all her trellises and posts and other plants. As purple was her favorite color, she was delighted! I got my potted plant back and have spread them around at both this house and our previous one. Are they helper plants? Are birds spreading the seeds? Planted in with the beans? What in the world? I want to know!

Then further down the path we noticed pinker ones growing along the edge of the corn field, behind the fence, which is behind the rather fluffy and overgrown evergreens of some kind. We'd noticed on previous rides that the shrubbery trees and thistles had been reaching out over the bike trail to grab unsuspecting passerby, and had commented on the 6+ feet of cleared, mowed land on the other side of the trail. At some point in these musings, Dada cracked about the morning glories being a distraction to waylay the unwary so that the children of the corn could grab them. Having read that particular Stephen King tale, I got big-eyed and mentioned that I didn't like that idea very much...

...and promptly ended up riding into the embrace of the evergreens. 

Eep!

I didn't fall off, but wobbled back out, laughing about needing to watch out for evergreenery and not corn. Didn't even get scratched up, and should have learned a valuable lesson about bikes having brakes for a reason.

Well.

Further on down the path, we then notice an older gentleman walking a big, furry, pink tongued, unmistakable ball of fuzz that could only be a Newfoundland. With huge smiles on our faces, we sail by, calling out our hellos and good mornings and have a good days. I can't speak for Dada, but generally, good things don't happen when one is not looking in the same direction in which one is riding. I face forward after ogling the adorable dog, notice immediately that my bike is way too close to his bike, shriek something softly about "eek, move" or something. I then try to veer right to where there is plenty of room. At no point did the stupid idiot brain which takes up residence in my head remind me the evergreeny lesson about bikes having brakes. 

I clipped his rear wheel with my front tire and crash over onto my right side. The Newfie looks back at me and keeps on walking as we were just far enough out of earshot to not be noticeable. Thankfully I was wearing gloves, so my hands were not scraped up. My right shoulder is sporting an abrasion (I can't decide if "abrasion" or "road rash" sounds scarier...) even though my shirt didn't tear. As of two days later, it looks almost like a patch of sunburned skin peeling off. 

My knees, though. Some of you saw the Facebook picture already and expressed your sympathies. My knees could match any eight-year-old's who has spent any time on a bike this summer. I am going to have shiny, glossy knees that most certainly are not going to match the rest of my tan until next summer. You know how, ladies, when you're shaving in a hurry and cut too hard with your old razor and see white and think, "oh yep, that's gonna hurt when the water hits it"? Yeah, that. Nice, shiny white whatever is under the epidermis. I suppose that'd be my dermis, dummy. Ick.

Dada hopped off because miraculously I hadn't upset him by wrecking into him and sluiced my knees off with his water bottle. We walked our bikes a little ways and then rode the last tiny bit to our halfway point where we could sit down and stretch and get fresh gum and assess the situation. I was afraid sitting and stopping would make everything stiffer, so after our rest we got ready to head back. Lo and behold, here comes our fuzzy friend again, on his way home!

After some chit chat and love and pats and croonings, we all went our separate ways. Please only look at the adorable dog in the above picture, not at me. The one you want to see is below this.

Yep. That one. Left knee, on top, has one boo boo. Poor right knee, bottom, has two ewwy ones. The kids, who did express much sympathy at first, have been laughing at me about my "Bandidos" on my booboos.

The positive to come out of this whole thing is that Liam, who until this summer has moaned and complained about riding his bike just about every time we brought it up, has ridden two nights in a row and been confident and delighted. He even tipped over last night in the middle of a tight turn and scraped his left knee, got back on, told Dada about it, and just kept going. This is huge. Before this, he would have been in orbit about falling over or off, and as to getting injured? Fahgetabouthit!

Instead, he came home, clomped inside and announced, "I match you, Mama!" Proudly displayed was one skinned knee. And he wanted a Bandido.

So. Important life safety lessons here are:

1. Exercise is hazardous to your health.

2. Evergreens, like haystacks, are not as soft as they look.

3. Consider somehow attaching a first aid kit to your bike when riding with someone who forgets bikes have brakes.

4. Don't attempt to operate a bicycle on 4.5 hours of sleep. Surely that has something to do with reflexes and decision making skills, and not in a good way.

5. Most importantly, get off the dang bike before ogling cute dogs!

6. And most, most importantly, those things attached to your handlebars are called brakes and you can use them to stop yourself before running into other objects. Magic. Imagine! 

*Disclosure: No matter what you may have heard or thought, I solemnly swear that Dada did not push me over or into any evergreenery. I am perfectly capable, apparently, of causing all my own disasters, thank you very much. Take it easy on him. He really is doing his best.*

Just another manic Monday...

Since the camera chip reader and the laptop are still acting like a bunch of junior high girls (read: are not talking to each other), I thought all y'all might appreciate what a typical Monday morning looks like here. And my apologies if you now have Cyndi Lauper in your head. 0=D

From 6:30 AM- 10:00 AM

Get dressed
Feed baby
Change and dress baby
Feed kids
Eat breakfast
Make coffee
Let dog out
Have kids gather laundry
Send Care Bear to clean up her room
Start laundry
Vote online for Pepsi contest*
Confiscate toys from home which are trying to migrate to school
Reheat coffee
Check kids' "brushed" teeth
Walk to bus stop
Chat with other moms
Return home from bus stop
Send Liam to clean up beads from pulverized bracelet in upstairs hall
Let dog in
Feed dog
Gather mail to be mailed
Rekennel dog
Drive to post office to drop off mail
Drive Liam to preschool
Drive home
Let dog back out, or in, depending
Feed baby
Change diaper and clothes
Head back out to do errands

From 11:20 AM- 1:30 PM

Drive to preschool
Pick up Liam
Drive home
Supervise washing of hands
Make lunch
Clean up from lunch
Brush teeth
Get Liam situated for break
Feed baby


Just another manic Monday! Wish it were a Sunday...

* To participate in helping Care Bear's school win $50K for technology at school, go to www.refresheverything.com/perrysburg and create an account by clicking "join refresh everything" in the lower left hand corner. Choose a password and then vote daily. Click "vote for this idea" which is "student led computer classes for senior citizens in our community." I suppose there are more details on the site. So far we've voted once for the month of October... =/