Hero Worship

     The water running off my older brother’s hands in the sink down the hall from the kitchen was always slightly brown. I watched in awe as the dirt tinged water washed down the drain and wondered how I could color it that way, in what ways I could manipulate my small world to somehow have it coincide with his. I worshipped those hands, that boy, from the small altar of the powder room and that feeling of awe at being in his presence has remained to a lesser degree, even as life has made equals out of us, young families with children, spouses, and mortgages. His laughter at something I’ve said is still a ticket into a world in which I’ve always wanted to live. 

     One of the joys of parenthood, I have found, is seeing things in your children that remind you of yourself. However, when I see my daughter, Claire, adoring at the temple of Gavin, her older brother, it somehow slowly breaks my heart for her. While Christmas shopping, she found a wall hanging of African animal masks for him at Goodwill. She was so excited to give it to him, so sure he would love it, that I almost cringed. I saw myself at her age, handing over a pair of air tube dice covers for my older brother’s BMX bike that I had bought with my own money that I thought would finally make him really think I was cool. He threw them across the driveway after opening them and I can still feel, viscerally, my heart breaking into pieces in front of our house.

     On Christmas day, the present opening extravaganza began. I knew which present Claire had lovingly wrapped for Gavin and mercifully, I didn’t have to wait long for him to open it as she was more excited about the giving than what she had received. She shyly handed it to him and said, “Here, Gav, I got this for you.” I held my breath as he tore open the paper. He smiled and said, “Wow, Claire, I love it.” No gift Santa brought her that day would equal the smile she had when he hung it on the wall next to his bed.

     Sibling love is a unique kind of love, reserved for people we remember before we can actually remember anything. Their voices, their laughs recall a time before memories have hardened into things that can be analyzed, judged as being detrimental or beneficial. Therefore, love of a sibling is never questioned because it existed before that separation of emotion and judgment.

     Older brothers seem to embody this love beautifully; they are usually bigger, stronger, faster versions of our smaller selves. How can we measure up when we are fundamentally always behind? How can we not idolize them when from the first, their lives are presented to us as something to which we can look forward. They seem perfect to us and we never, even as adults, quite take them off of that unrealistic throne. It is true hero worship and it continues in varying degrees, as far as I can tell, for a lifetime.

    I have a younger brother too, to whom I feel very close, despite infrequent phone calls and an even larger geographic distance. I am not slightly afraid of him as I am my older brother. He and I created our own language, sang fifties songs in the back of an old BMW on a horrific family road trip, and secretly adopted animals wild and domestic whenever we could. He was often a partner in crime, always someone fun to be around and someone, to whom, I could be my true self because his acceptance of me was not paramount to my happiness.

 I wonder, now, if the hero worship I felt for my older brother and that which I see Claire feeling for Gavin is somehow detrimental to both the adored and the adorer. I wonder, as an older brother, if it’s hard to live up to such blind devotion; if, ever, resentment builds at never being seen as real, but instead as someone larger than life.  In reality, no life is that large, no hero without flaws and, in the end, seeing someone as they are enables us to love them truthfully.

 Only recently have I begun my journey to honesty with my older brother, to let him see me as I am and not only show what I think he wants to see. Now that I am able to truly see him, flaws and all, I see that he is someone who is worthy of all of the love and affection I have stored in my heart since I first met him. He is no longer a hero on a pedestal, but someone who stands beside me, someone with whom to walk through life. Being a younger sister has been a heartbreakingly beautiful journey and I am grateful for every single step because it has led me to the truth of my brother and it is this: he is, and always has been, one of my best friends.

paradox of parenthood

Driving home today, listening to music, I was reminded again how tenuous are our holds on the people we love. The life force feels so strong and so sure when they are right next to us and we forget how suddenly things can change. As a mom, I am terrified at least once daily about something that could separate my children from me forever, some small act, some wrong turn, a missed stop sign, a tragedy. These things scare me so much and make life seem dark, uncertain, paralyzing. To calm myself down, I remember that literally the only thing we have is the here and now, this second of this day, right now when my 20 month old is sitting on my lap, waiting for my attention, her tiny pigtail sticking straight up and tickling my chin.

   Maybe this weak hold on the strings of life are part of what makes it so beautiful, so rare, so worthy of adoration. The beauty exists because we are here, we are here together, right now.  Nobody knows what will happen tomorrow, next week, next year and that uncertainty is what stops us in our tracks, what makes the tears come when we hear a certain song or a certain story. But then, mercifully, we are thrown right back into the beauty of here, the beauty of a dirty diaper to change, a busy schedule,  the beauty of the strings that hold us to each other, that recognition of an unseen bond. And, really, in the end, the fact that the bond is unseen is what makes it so beautiful. That bond doesn’t exist in this physical world but in the realm of the ethereal, that which we cannot see but know with a certainty is there. The terror comes from not being able to see it, not being able to feel it and hold it to you. When a moment comes to stop and think, it is so crystal clear that love goes on, despite broken strings, despite distance, despite the end of life.

     My sister in law, who held her beautiful infant son as he passed away, sent me an article about a pediatric oncologist who is touching kids lives in more ways than one. He was talking about dealing with the death of a child and how to prepare for it. One of his patients was nearing the end of his life, after years of treatments and medicines, and his mom was in his hospital room. The boy asked her what death would be like and she stood up, closed the curtain and talked to him from behind it. “It will be like this, you won’t be able to see me, but you can still hear my voice and feel that I love you. I am still here.” What a gift to be able to give your child when you are in the throes of the greatest terror a mom has. I’m sure she went home and cried; I’m sure at some point she had railed against the unfairness, the fragility of life. But in that moment, she saw those strings of life and how the thing that holds us here is not physicality but love.

                At the end of my teary solo car rides, I get out and am greeted by smiling faces, a thousand questions, and sticky hands. Life comes clearly through in full force and I am surrounded by its richness, its texture, the glory of it all around me. Mostly, I am thankful that for now, our paths run together, I can see my loved ones on it all around me and it is beautiful. Love in all its terror and its glory is beautiful, and I am eternally grateful for this moment.

What the monkey is the barley doing in the fish tank??

  Today was one of those days. To be honest, it was one of those days I used the F-word. I rarely use the F-word and when I do, you can make a strong case for me being at the very end of my rope. My neighbor and good friend was the lucky recipient of my verbal bomb, but luckily knew enough to drop a couple of F-bombs herself to make me feel better before commencing to make me feel better (as she always does) with more soothing words...

     Why was today a bad day? Let's start with the pouring rain that nixed my 530 am run. I don't mind my alarm going off at 520 if I am about to get outside, breathe fresh air and run in the dark with my friends. However, this morning I woke up to my alarm, got all dressed, contacts in to come downstairs and hear the rain pounding my roof. Unable to go back to sleep, I worked out in my living room but was really angry about it. (As in, "fine, I will do more stupid pushups on this stupid rug and get covered in more stupid maroon rug fur because I can't think to check a weather report the night before.") It might be a fault of mine but I always assume the weather the next day will be exactly like the weather the day before. It didn't rain Sunday, so why would it rain Monday? Unfortunately, it doesn't work in New England. Case in point, tomorrow is going to be 72 and the next day we will get 9 inches of snow. No lie. That is the actual weather report here for the week.

     After writing that paragraph and rereading the weather prediction, I now want to say one last giant F!! but will not because I am at my limit for the...year.

     So, anyway, after getting the kids to the dentist and school, i set off for the grocery. Not the three normal grocery stores within two miles of me, but the cheap one where I have to put a quarter in my cart to make it come with me. I originally thought they made you deposit a quarter so you wouldn't steal the cart. (There is a large segment of the population at this grocery store that looks like it might just run off with a perfectly good cart.) My much less intelligent in every way except any way having to do with common sense or useful knowlege when it comes to life husband corrected me by telling me that I have to dig to the bottom of my purse, among gum wrappers and used mouth guards, for a quarter because the grocery store saves money on cart collectors this way, thus passing the savings on to me, the customer. So, after renting my cart and shoving the gigantic wad of reusable bags into the dirty south of the cart, I head in, slightly perturbed but ready for saving tons of money on not quite top quality apples.

     Apples, other second rate produce and organic milk (but 50 cents less per 1/2 gallon organic milk) in hand, I head home to unload. Unloading groceries might not seem like that bad of a job, but for some reason, I hate it. I hate finding spots in our too small refrigerator for all the food that will feed our family 147 meals this week. (That's right: 7 people times three meals a day.) I hate finding half a container of old fashioned oats when I thought we had none and then trying to hide it so my husband won't say, "you know we already had oats, right?"

 

 "Yes, I did, but I am practicing for a contest where you try to shove as many things in one pantry cabinet as possible and oats are what I'm working on this week. Last week, it was rice vinegar (3 bottles and counting) and the week before that, it was barley (2 bags up.) "

 

 Anyway, the groceries do eventually get put away with a little help from the kids. Help, as in them asking if we have any more blueberries.

 "Yes, I bought 2 pints."

"I just ate those; did you get more?"

"No, have some goldfish."

"But you only bought one bag and we just finished it while you were lugging in all the oats."

 

     The day went on and on, with a giant mud puddle overflowing with every garment my children previously had on, glued on grass sticking to my feet that was leftover from a diorama on ecosystems, muddy footprints all over the kitchen floor, and monkeying barley in the fish tank. That last one really put me over the edge. I am proud to say I have kept this carnival-won goldfish alive in a $1 goodwill tank on our kitchen counter for four months. If barley is the thing that does him/her in, I'm going to be super upset. When I saw the little grains floating in there, I looked at all possible suspects and said, "who did this?" Of course, no one admitted to it. I was still hoping for a guilty plea when my oldest son said, "why does it matter Mom, you have, like, four bags of it in the pantry."

Always in the audience, never the band

     Yesterday morning started off bright, beautiful and relatively warm. I was so grateful to be able to get outside and go for a run on my favorite course. As I started my ipod, I turned to the playlist I had made my daughter instead of my usual running mix. There were so many good, clean, uplifting songs on there and my mood improved as I pounded the pavement, the sun hitting me directly in the face. With each additional step, I felt lighter, my feet stopped hurting and I could see so many possibilities in my future. I dreamed as I ran, listening to Whitney Houston, Rascall Flatts and Louis Armstrong.
     I had forgotten the power of music to take us away, to heal, to excite and to empower, even if only for the length of a track. The lyrics sang out to me and for a few seconds I wanted to belt them out too, alone on my quiet country road with no cars or people in sight. I wanted to be part of the music; the one that inspired and healed. I pictured myself up on stage, sitting on a stool with my guitar and an audience in front of me. And then it hit me, the fact that despite my hours of practice in the shower and the car, I am no singer. As anyone who came to my third grade violin or piano concerts can tell you, I am no musician. Instead, in this realm of life, I am a spectator, a recipient of the gift instead of the giver.
     I have always been able to accept that visitor status on a hike through the Berkshire Hills, in the beautiful desert of Moab, by the ocean. I am not a part of the landscape, just someone who is walking through it, enjoying its beauty. So, too, with music. I will never be the one on stage, but I am so grateful to be a momentary audience. Because, as Louis Armstrong so beautifully summed up, as I listen to music, "I think to myself, what a wonderful world." And so it is.

Laughter is truly the best medicine

     28 hours ago, I was saved by laughter. I was holding my dog on a leash outside in the freezing cold snow, spraying hydrogen peroxide down her throat. Before you call the ASPCA, please let me explain... 28 amd a half hours ago, my dog consumed half of a Mississippi mud cake, made with pure cocoa. From the recipe I elicited from my mom on the phone, we figured out she had consumed 1/3 of a cup of pure cocoa, along with walnuts, marshmallows and my much looked forward to dessert for last night. As soon as I found the evidence (or lack thereof) I called my little brother, who is a vet in California, for advice. He said, and I quote, "yeah, you need to make her vomit. A lot." He told me how to do it and as soon as my husband got home from work, I proceeded outside with my supplies and my oldest son, hoping to prevent a visit to the local emergency vet. And right there, in the middle of the yard, while watching my poor dog and hoping her burps were going to turn into a chocolate gold mine soon, I lost it. I went completely hysterical. My poor, sick, bewildered dog looked at me as if I was nuts, as did my son who was wondering what, exactly, was so funny.
    To say that yesterday was a hard day would be an understatement. After having been up most of the night with my very ill one year old, I had gotten an appointment for her at her pediatrician first thing in the morning. This being vacation week and my husband having to work, I needed to drag all five children with me, swath them in antibacterial gel and hope for the best. When we got there, I left my three oldest in the waiting room with the toys and our favorite receptionist keeping half an eye on them. I took my two youngest daughters into the room with me and waited for the doctor. My very sick daugher was lethargic, a puddle in my arms whilte being undressed, poked and prodded. When they first took her temperature, there was no fever. After listening to her lungs for a long time and me holding my finger to my lips with a death stare at my two year old daughter, my pediatrician said he believed it was just a virus. He swabbed her for flu, then RSV ( a virus common in young infants)  and left the room to wait for results. When he came back in, she was flu negative, RSV positive and getting sicker by the minute. Her breathing was ragged, her pulse was rapid and I knew there was something more wrong with her than a glorified cold. My good, patient pediatrician listened again for a long time, took her temp again (which had gone up to 102) and watched her breathing and timed her pulse. Then, he left while the nurse administered albuterol through a nebulizer.
    Meanwhile, things were not going well in the waiting room. I heard my older children from down the hall and, swaddling my sick girl in my jacket, went to warn them that they needed to be quiet, now. At that point, they started filing in and of the room as they watched our pediatrician check their sister. Finally, at the end of my rope with trying to comfort my baby and make sure my older children were not running amok, I had them sit against the wall without talking so the doctor and I could focus on what was wrong. Finally, he recommended a chest xray, just in case. As I started to get her dressed (after one hour and forty-five minutes) she started breaking out in a rash all over her body. I had my oldest son call the doctor back and he said it was a viral rash, which was pretty common.
    At that point, I knew I was grasping at straws but remembered that when I was little, I had strep throat which turned into scarletina. I asked my doubtful pediatrician to swab her for strep and bundled up the kiddos, anxious to get them in their car seats, still and quiet. When I asked at the desk if the culture was positive, they said they would call with a result. As we pulled away, I was inundated with questions which I didn't have the brainpower to answer. I finallly asked, again, for silence and got it, in some form, for a few quiet minutes. The chest xray was uneventful and we proceeded home.
     After making lunch with one arm for the older kids, I sent the nappers off to nap and sat down to hold my poor sick daughter. She dozed fitfully in my arms while I waited for a phone call from the pediatrician. When it finally came, it brought relief. She not only had RSV, but also pneumonia and strep throat as well. The anitibiotic was called in and relief was on its way, to some degree. I was grateful but still unsure how I could make dinner with one hand, change my two year old's diaper with one hand and keep my sick daughter asleep through it all. At that moment, I heard a loud crash in the kitchen, which I knew wasn't good. It was the Mississippi mud cake, and it was gone by the time I got there. After the phone call to my brother, whose chosen profession has saved us a lot of money on sick dogs, rabbits and chickens, I cried on the couch, giving in to the stress of the day.
   After what seemed like a long time, I heard my husband's car pull in with the antibiotics in hand. I passed my sleeping daughter off to him to take care of the dog. And, relief on its way for my dog as well as my daughter, I started to laugh and felt all the tension of the day leaving my body and my mind. For the first time, I was grateful for my weird habit of laughing at inappropriate times (funerals, when I see people fall, when I accidentally ripped my then-fiance, now husband's jeep wrangler door off at 5 in the morning on the way to JFK airport.) This time, my laugher was my savior. Letting it all out in the backyard (my dog was in good company) did me so much good that I was able to see that tomorrow would inevitably be better, because there was no flipping way it could be worse.
    As my wise mom said to me on the phone yesterday, "this too shall pass." And, it did. My daughter is so much better today, on her way to being her normal happy self again, and my dog is chocolate free and just as irritatingly lovable as ever. I am pretty sure I'm still going to laugh at inappropriate times, and maybe that's not such a bad thing after all. Maybe all that laughter has kept my blood pressure low and allowed me to let go of my usual very tight grip on life. Either way, I am grateful for it. And, if I ever see you trip and I start to giggle, just remember that I'm laughing at you, not with  you. But, it is good for me.

Two hours in the life of me: this is how we roll Murray style

     For the many, many people who have asked me, "how do you do it?" this is for you.

550am: Wake up to the sound of youngest son sucking thumb next to my face and dog whining to go out.
550am-553am: Stumble around to find pants, glasses and slippers.
554-6am: Let dog out, make tea for me, coffee for husband and hot chocolate for thumb sucker
601am: Am told thumb sucker only likes marshmallows if we are camping or at a bonfire
602-612am: Make lunches for school goers and work goers, snack for preschooler
613am: Hug the first sleepyhead that shows up in kitchen; she commences sucking thumb and looking like she is asleep while standing up
614am: Begin to make pumpkin pancakes and wrestle with the mess/letting kids learn issue when youngest son asks to pour batter into pan
615am: Clean up spilled batter all over stove
617am: Might hear first rumblings in little girls' room; decide they need to wake up for a few minutes.
618am: Oldest son wakes up and informs me while snuggling against my hip that the most poisonous snake in Australia is not the taipan, as I told him, but the tiger snake.
619am: Wonder if the taipan really is a snake or possibly something else
620am: Begin serving first round of pancakes while listening to many, many snake facts. For instance, a forest cobra can kill an elephant with one bite. Joke that I'm glad I'm not an elephant. Crickets.
620am: cut up three sets of pancakes, pour more maple syrup, get cereal for original pancake requester who has decided he doesn't want pancakes
622am: Get little girls up and strap them immediately in their high chairs.
622-624 am: Listen to one year old loudly request pancakes
625am: microwave tea for the first time and then continue to not drink it
625-630: still making pancakes, wondering if insatiable eight year old has a tapeworm
630-639: change two diapers, scrape them and put them in appropriate pails
640am: decide disposable diaper users care just as  much about the earth but are averse to their homes smelling like poop. Also decide they are much wiser than I.
641am: microwave tea for second time with the really strong intention to actually drink it this time
642am: Encourage those who are done with breakfast to get dressed and brush teeth
643-650am: Practice multiplication flash cards with oldest son
651am: Husband appears and looks so grateful for having slept in. Put his coffee and pancakes on the table
652am: Husband asks where coffee is; I can only point in annoyance
653am: Strongly encourage those done with breakfast to get dressed and brush teeth
654-710am: Bundle up youngest son and self and head outside: collect eggs from chickens, refill their water, throw ball for the dog repeatedly
711am: Inform those done with breakfast that getting dressed and brushing teeth is not an option, but a necessity
712am: Microwave tea for third time and take first sip. Remember how much I love tea
713-715am: sit to eat cereal and blueberries
716am: listen to two oldest children pick their animals (much like fantasy football with teeth and claws)
717am: Drink tea while thinking about own fantasy animal team. I would win if I entered the contest, especially if the taipan is actually a snake
718am: Look up taipan in snakes book and find it. Feel vindicated.
719-730am: Get two little girls dressed
730am: Ask oldest children if they left their pajamas on the floor; they answer in the negative
731am: Based on history, check rooms and find out children might have something wrong with their vision
732am: alert children to clothes on floor situation, hustle them back to their rooms to pick up clothes
739am: Wonder how it's possible that picking up pajamas could take 7 minutes. Decide to investigate.
740am: Remind children of why they came to their rooms when I find them playing with pajamas still on floor.
742-750am: Tell oldest children to pack their backpacks and bundle up for school.
751am: Surprised, again, at the fact that I miss them as soon as they walk out the door
752am: Happy to find half consumed tea on counter. Microwave it again. Ready to start the next segment of my day...

Yoga pants and double chins; the art of my Mommy style

     I have spent the better part of the last few months trying to recover the person that existed before and in between each of my five pregnancies. I have fond memories of someone that fit in all her jeans, did not cringe when she looked at pictures of herself and even had hair that was all one color. I tried to explain this attempted transformation to my muddled husband.

 "I just don't want to look like a mom. You know what I mean?"

    He had no idea what I meant but continued to support me on my quest, nonetheless. He never asked why getting my hair done takes three hours (although, in truth, I don't know the answer either) and didn't flinch when I said, "you're on breakfast duty; I'm going to work out." He just kept telling me how much he loves the way I look and who I am. "Hogwash," I told him and left for the gym.
    Then, as I was literally running home after getting my hair cut and colored, new locks flying behind me in the wind, I had a realization. I am a mom. Why was I trying so hard to look like someone else? I have earned the right to wear yoga pants all day, the right to be just a little bit chubby, if I so desire.  I am Mom. I am the one who gets called first for every scrape, the one who gets all the exciting information right off the bus, the one who holds hair while kids get sick, the one who gets the joy of having these five little beings depend mostly on me.
     So, who, exactly was I running from and who, exactly was I running towards? Chasing someone I used to be seemed pointless, when I really thought about it. Sure, that mom of two I was who had the time to work out for two hours each day and still give enough love to everyone was great. Shopping for clothes was easy and I didn't have to hold a child just so in pictures to camouflage that extra chin that appeared sometime between #4 and #5.  However, that person, or at least parts of her are gone, just like that time is.
     There might come a day, a while from now, when all of my children are older and slightly less needy on an hourly basis and I can take that long Sunday marathon run that I love. But for now, I am more than content to run my four mile route, speeding up the last half mile because I know people will be looking out the window waiting for me: to make lunch, to tell me a joke that's not funny, to be there with them. And, when I think about it, there is exactly where I want to be too, looking like who I am: Mom.