Author: Bethany

7Oct

Highland Fling – Part 2

(Part 1)

I feel like the next part of this tale doesn’t exactly warrant telling, but it was a near-spiritual experience for me, so… I’ll try to make it quick. On our way out of Cambridge to the wilds of northern England, we stopped by a Tesco Extra. Tesco, I was already familiar with from our grocery trips in Ireland. The Extra, however, was new to me; it wasn’t until I was standing in the store’s entryway with my jaw somewhere under the cart that I realized it stood for Everything That Can Be Sold Inside a Building And Then Some. Over the past three years, I’ve grown accustomed to small specialized stores that don’t worry themselves unnecessarily with options. I don’t mind the Italian way of shopping, really; once you learn where to go, when, and for what, it’s a simple process. But stepping into that multi-story metropolis with its book store and baking aisles (multiple!!) and 24-hour pharmacy made me want simultaneously to cry and to start groping the merchandise. I went with the latter. It took us an hour to get the four grocery items on our list and twenty not on our list (we’re lucky your dad forbade me from so much as peeking into the baking section), and back in the car, you girls fell promptly to sleep.

Magellan's seen plenty of naptimes by now If I had not felt the need to ask your dad important questions like, “Did you see the blueberry muffins, did you? The big ones? With blueberries in them? And individual packaging? Next to that other brand of blueberry muffins? Weren’t they beautiful?” steadily for the next three hours, I would have passed out too.

Had we realized that Cambridge would be our last brush with civilization for almost a week, we could have spent our time at Tesco stocking up on salt pork and hardtack, but we were too excited about hitting the trail… and I do mean “trail” literally. Our next stop was a section of Hadrian’s Wall with little around besides wind-whipped skies and a vague path shoeprinted into the grass. That is our absolute favorite kind of place to end up—enough remaining history to fuel our imaginations and enough nature to let us off our leashes. You girls didn’t need instructions. While your dad and I goofed off in Milecastle 42 pretending to be the ancient Roman IRS faced with unruly Scotsmen, you skipped off together toward the rolling green.

Girls on a missionNot even Tesco Extra tempts me to live in the UK as strongly as this scene does.

You were the height of adorable, holding hands and racing away on your own little adventure. Just before you left earshot, your dad and I saw you point to the obviously bovine creatures in the distance and exclaim, “What could those be? Cows? Horses? Wolves? We don’t know!” So adorable. Your dad and I were still chuckling about it when we realized you girls were much faster than we gave you credit for… and that you had gotten alarmingly close to the cows/horses/wolves/wedon’tknow while we were preoccupied with your adorableness. Parents of the year! We caught up just as you, Natalie, were remarking, “Yep, they’re cows.” It would have been hard not to identify them, seeing as how several had planted themselves squarely in your path.

Attack of the cows 1 - Copia “Moove it, bipedals; this is our turf.”

The black cow in front had a decidedly unfriendly gleam in her eyes. The other cows shifted their hooves, glanced at her, and muttered to each other in moo, but the black one stood as rigidly as a block of ice freezing us with her glare. Apparently, we didn’t take the hint. With no warning (other than the daggers shooting from her eyes, of course), she sounded the charge. Her posse began advancing on us. We began backing away. They stepped up the pace. We began to run. A few seconds later, we looked back to discover that cows are more agile creatures than we knew. They were galloping full-throttle at our backs, and the black one may or may not have been shooting flames from her muzzle. We scooped up you girls and bolted for the far end of the field, shrieking with laughter. There was something absurdly funny about escaping from a bovine lynch mob, and once we made it through the safety gate, we collapsed more from the hilarity of it all than from exhaustion. Well, three of us did. You, Natalie, surprised us by bursting into tears. “I’m scared of the cows,” you cried. “What did they want?” Your dad quickly tried to comfort you. “It’s okay, honey; the cows probably just wanted to eat.” Your cry immediately grew into a full-fledged wail. “THEY WANTED TO EAT MEEEEEEEEEEE?”

Survivors! Parents of the year!

Plenty of hugs (and a few parental giggling fits) later, we headed back to the campground. This one didn’t have a playground, but what it lacked in plastic slides it made up for in wildlife. We socialized with the resident puppies, made fascinating discoveries about chicken’s sense of hygiene (as in, they don’t have one), and followed a rather important looking mallard giving his two ducktweens a tour of the grounds. Your favorite part, though, was the pond. Safe in a circle of bullrushes, a mama duck clucked soft goodnights to each of her dozen babies, caressed their fluffy heads, and tucked them underneath her feathers for the night. You watched spellbound, even as the daddy duck hissed ineffectual curses in our direction, and other campers gathered around to watch you. By the way, there’s something truly special about the little communities that form between people at campgrounds, even if it’s only during an overnight stay. Sleeping outdoors enhances one’s capacity for wonder, and our campground acquaintances tend to notice small joys—puddles ripe for splashing, pink-tinged clouds, little faces lit up over ducklings’ bedtime rituals. Just by being yourselves, you inspired joy and camaraderie… and it was perfectly natural for us to stay long past checkout time the next morning so you could fly kites with the girl-next-tent, Evi, while your dad and I swapped funny travel stories with her parents. It’s just what you do when small joys win over boring old farts like standoffishness and punctuality.

The kite flyer 2 This is the kind of thing that makes souls breathe deep.
Well, this and being attacked by ravenous cows.

~~~

On to Part 3…

6Oct

Highland Fling – Part 1

For the past three years, I’ve been writing monthly letters to the girls as a way to chronicle their childhoods and show the threads of love woven throughout. As much as I enjoy reading other bloggers’ similar letters (that’s where I got the idea in the first place), I don’t usually post my own because I don’t want to censor the me that my daughters will end up reading one day. However, I think this letter can be an exception… mostly because I don’t feel up to re-writing this sucker. Whew.

Without further ado, I would like to present Part 1 (out of 37,156,044,192,518) of our epic summer camping trip to Scotland.

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~~~

Sweet girls of mine,
One year ago, when your dad said, “Let’s camp our way to Ireland!” I laughed. Then I said, “He’s kidding, right?” Then I laughed some more. Then I said, “He’s not kidding.” Then I searched psychiatric help sites for Delusions of Travel before curling up in a ball and leaving the suitcases to pack themselves. (I blame our unfortunate lack of raincoats and fleeces entirely on them.) As you may recall, it rained fifteen days out of fifteen on that trip. We cooked pasta under umbrellas, woke up partially underwater, and aspirated mint tea to keep warm. One of us (name rhymes with SOPHIE) got skid marks on her face running pell-mell down a cliffside, and I had to buy blanket-sized tissues for my historical head cold that I no doubt passed on to the rest of you each time I spread peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with my fingers in the front seat. (I blame the unfortunate lack of table knives on the suitcases as well.) This year, however, when your dad said, “Let’s camp our way to Scotland!” I immediately began researching tent sites. Such is the growing power of Bassett insanity.

Car collage It’s okay, I hear insanity is often associated with genius.

I hope that you girls inherit this knack for adventure; otherwise, this summer is liable to come up in therapy one day. A fifty-one hour drive has the potential to turn anyone into a card-carrying basket case, but a fifty-one hour drive involving seventeen cities, two ferries, eight campgrounds, three hundred and seventeen requests for bathrooms in the middle of Nowhere, Belgium, two guest bedrooms, one hidden apartment, seven hikes, and a delegation of hostile cows… well, maybe I should start from the beginning.

Our plan for the first day was to drive the few hours from your uncle’s in Milan to the city of Luxembourg where we would get ourselves delightfully lost in the casemates, nibble on plum tarts, and try to act like we speak one of its three national languages instead of two irrelevant ones. However, our plans were no match for the mighty traffic of Switzerland. While you girls marveled at the mountains (and discussed their eating habits, much to your parents’ amusement), we sat in traffic. While you napped, we sat in traffic. While you dissected your sandwiches, we sat in traffic. While you sang along to the entire They Might Be Giants’ “NO!” album several times over, we inched forward… then sat in more traffic. Once we finally arrived in Luxembourg, we barely had enough daylight left for setting up camp and eating supper. Of course, that didn’t stop us from jumping on the campground’s trampoline for an hour first. Responsibility has its limits, after all.

Totally almost legal circumventing of traffic in Switzerland Totally almost legally circumventing traffic to get to a Swiss rest stop
(Having a newly-potty-trained passenger makes it okay, right?)

Day 2 was much more enjoyable, despite the stretch across Belgium which is so completely and mercilessly boring that one is tempted to stick a fork in one’s brain on the off-chance of seeing stars. We did have a few attention-grabbing moments when the fast lane narrowed to the width of an anorexic bike path, but we were still glad to board our ferry and wave au revoir to mainland Europe for two weeks. When we crossed the Channel last year, we took the Eurostar which was charmingly Seussical at first—in a car, on a train, under the sea, for a fee—but rather claustrophobic by the end. This year, however, we wised up (wose up? wizened up?) and paid a third of the price to cross the Channel in a floating internet café (yay! said your dad and I) with a colorful indoor playground (yay! said you already halfway up the rope ladder).

Coming up on the cliffs 3 If the ferry’s other features hadn’t won out, the view certainly would have.

When I heartlessly insisted on going above deck for the last five minutes to see the cliffs of Dover, you allowed yourselves to be dragged, but neither principalities nor powers could convince you to look at the stunning scenery. Natalie, you protested the injustice of it all by collapsing onto a picnic bench and announcing to everyone on deck, “Please leave me alone; I am BASKING IN THE SUN.” Not to be out-dramatized, you, Sophie, promptly chimed in, “I’m basking TOO.” I took this to mean that the ferry was a hit. Oh, and I have to say, you two have excellent taste in protest activities.

 

Basking in the sun We could see the thought bubble forming above the picnic table:
“I am NOT going to enjoy this, I am NOT going to enjoy this, I am NOT… dang it.”

Despite how much your dad and I like making you suffer, we set up camp that afternoon smack dab in a magic forest. True, the forest had only one tree, but the Fenland isn’t typically known for its foliage, and that one tree trumped all others in your world. The third most common question your dad and I were asked this summer (after “You’re driving where?” and “Just how far were you dropped on your head at birth?”) was “How do you manage camping with two young children?” This is our secret. It starts with “play” and ends with “ground,” and somewhere in the middle are the delighted squeals of girls exploring a magical treehouse while their parents set up camp and maybe even get a little unsupervised flirting in.

The girls' favorite campsite yet The Swiss Family Robinson was on to something…

Actually, that’s not our only secret. We also heavily rely on a parenting strategy known as Wearing You Out. Here’s how it works: After callously insisting you come down from the treehouse for a delicious supper, we bring you to historic Cambridge for an evening stroll. We pass punts along the river, plot  how to take over King’s College, squirm in front of the incredibly creepy Corpus Clock, and discover that British squirrels can swim. Oh yes, and we march a few miles. By the time we return to our tent, your minds have had their fill of amazing new sights, your bodies are properly exhausted, and you are only too happy to curl up in your sleeping bags and say goodnight to another brim-full day.

Did someone call for two beautiful girls Every little girl’s dream is to claim a phone booth as her new living quarters.
(Fortunately for the sake of continued tranquility across the UK, we found two.)

~~~

On to Part 2…

1Oct

Injustice, Double-Scooped

Here’s my problem with grace.

Terrorists attack New York City, killing thousands of people, and a conservative public figure follows an illogical accusation of feminists, gays, and pagans by saying that the people who died probably deserved it.

Forest fires ravage parts of southern California, and a famous radio and television host tells its victims they had it coming for hating America.

Young men die overseas, and a Baptist pastor brings his extended family to their funerals with signs saying “Thank God for Dead Soldiers” and “God Hates Cripple Soldiers.”

A hurricane takes a tremendous number of lives and livelihoods along the Gulf of Mexico, and the founder of a Christian organization blames the destruction on New Orleans’ wickedness.

An earthquake destroys much of the poorest country in the Americas, and a prominent televangelist tells them they brought it on themselves by making a pact with the devil.

A seven-year-old girl is beaten to death by her parents who are steadfastly following a parenting movement, and the author of that movement laughs in response.

A college student subjected to a cruel invasion of privacy ends his life, and it’s only a matter of time before someone issues the first official “good riddance” statement.

There are many, many Christians doing immeasurable good in the world, but it seems like the ones who get the most attention are the ones spewing prejudice, judgment, paranoia, and calls to violence. It makes me so furious I can’t see straight, their bitterness blurring my vision and reflected back at them. I don’t hear a trace of Jesus in what they say, but I’m afraid that their victims do, and the injustice eats me alive.

Enter my problem: The Jesus I know—the one who taught compassion and wonder and unfailing love, who healed heathens and hung out with society’s rejects, who befriended prostitutes, who famously wept at a funeral, whose words still inspire incredible acts of kindness—came to bring a double scoop of grace to people tied up in laws and traditions. He showed that all the religious regulations people tried to follow were tyrants and insatiable ones at that. He came, despite the murderous impulses of near-sighted men, to demonstrate the spacious love just beyond their line of vision.

Which means there is compassion for the Jerry Falwells and the Pat Robertsons of the world too. While the injustice of indiscriminate grace gnaws at me almost as much as Christian hate-rhetoric does, it’s also the main difference between the God they know and the God I am growing to know… and that one difference makes all the difference to me.

29Sep

Happiness Upgrade

Happiness v. 09.2010:

Midnight blue nail polish
Pounding bass lines
The smell of leaf fires in the mornings
Glee (I can’t help it!)
Shiny floors
Running in the park over lunch break
The circus camels hanging out there
Richard Scarry
Crockpot meals that last a week
Short hair
Good old-fashioned e-mail
The return of the comforter
Settling Catan
After-school snacks
Monkey hugs

What’s your latest version?

28Sep

A Daily Dose of Beauty ~ September 2010

September 1st – Listening to our new little reader entertain her sister with a Seuss classic.

Natalie trying out her new reading skillz on her sister

September 2nd – Getting treated to an exclusive performance of The Best Circus Show EVER!!! with the world-famous ringmasters (and tightrope walkers and clowns and trapeze artists and magicians and unicyclists) Natalie and Sophie.

September 3rd – Watching the follow-up to the circus show: The Best Puppet Show EVER!!! (It was.)

September 4th – Finally checking out the local library that looks like a pink spaceship—to the girls’ delight—and bringing home a stack of storytimes.

September 5th – Appreciating how this week’s preacher included the Sunday-schoolless kids in the sermon and kept it short and relevant… as opposed to last week’s long droning discourse about Tamar and Judah. (The mind, it boggles.)

September 6th – Getting a fresh burst of excitement about this fall when Sophie exclaimed, “Natalie and I are about to go to school, and Mommy’s going to write and write and write! And make lunch!”

September 7th – Trying very, very hard not to giggle at the dinner table as the girls seriously discussed the perils of pooping.

September 8th – The usually horrible Festa dell’Unità playing Stevie Wonder through our open windows just when I needed a dose of happy.

September 9th – Watching a marathon of the girls’ baby videos with them, no matter how desperately it makes me want to cry.

September 10th – Introducing the girls to the magic of Totoro.

September 11th – Ending a full day of shopping with… more shopping, and speculating about all the fun memories the girls will make in their new fall clothes.

September 12th – Turning a failed picnic into an afternoon of games and relaxed conversation with one of our favorite families.

September 13th – Sending two thrilled little girls straight into the arms of their favorite teacher at school.

First day of school! 2

September 14th – Meeting the words I’ve been trying to find for years as they tumbled out of my fingers onto the page; mornings like this are why I write.

September 15th – Seeing evidence of my sweet girls’ care for our family and each other in action.

September 16th – Enjoying roasted tomato soup with a supersized helping of friendship.

September 17th – Snuggling up for a movie night with my favorite husband.

September 18th – Taking Natalie out for a mom-daughter shopping date and chatting up a storm.

September 19th – Indulging my inner heathen and taking a much-needed day to relax and watch the clouds blow by.

Vivid - 4

September 20th – Squelching my fear of failure and utter hatred for running to complete nearly three kilometers with my longsuffering Dan.

September 21st – Easing back into teaching English and remembering how much I really do enjoy it.

September 22nd – Accepting a last-minute playdate invitation and getting to know the warm and bubbly woman who is Natalie’s future mother-in-law.

September 23rd – Kissing my girls goodbye and watching them gallop hand-in-hand to their classroom, giggling all the way.

September 24th – Discovering an entire group of friends who share my background and are working together to forge a future full ofhope.

September 25th – Baking illegal chocolate cake with plenty of sticky-fingered help.

September 26th – Cracking up with the rest of the church band after an increasingly awkward list of song selections, including the same one called twice in a row.

September 27th – Being treated to the most delicious pretend picnic of all time by my dear Sophie who came home sick from school.

September 28th – Having a little dance party with myself to this song while putting on my makeup.

27Sep

Non-Event

My husband and I come from very different backgrounds, so it has always amazed me how perfectly most of our opinions align. Early on, we discovered our matching views on money, church,  life purpose, Star Wars, education, making out, and how many children we wanted to have. We knew a lot of couples who disagreed or vacillated on family size, but we were united in our hope for two. Two children with whom to travel the world, play board games, and scream ourselves silly on rollercoasters (okay, that one might be just me), two children to be automatic friends to each other while providing space for other relationships, two children into whom we could invest time, attention, and personalized love while still pursuing our own careers and social lives. We both adored kids, but the prospect of a large family didn’t resonate with either of us. We had our magic number.

That’s why I was so surprised to find myself, shortly after Sophie’s birth, flushed with baby fever. Not just surprised, but alarmed. I was deep in the clutches of postpartum depression, and the demands of my two sweet girls were often more than my filigreed emotions could handle. Another pregnancy would literally have endangered our lives. Yet every time one of the girls snuggled up against me or I peeked in on a sisterly giggling fit, I was overwhelmed with the wish for more.

Sweet sisters 2
(Just look what I was up against!)

Eventually, the craze subsided. My mind climbed back into the light, I began to enjoy parenting again, and I was able to recognize that my motherly instinct—that mysterious part of some women’s brains that makes us sniff newborns’ heads and coo over diaper commercials—did not need to override my logic. I loved my Natalie and my Sophie, and I knew that in order to keep loving them well, I couldn’t lose myself to another baby. It wouldn’t be fair to them or to Dan, who was just starting to get his wife back. Our magic number hadn’t changed; we gave away the baby clothes and began living out the future we had hoped for…

…Which brings us to this year, behind a locked door where I clutched a pregnancy test wondering how in the world I was going to explain things to my husband. I didn’t even know how I felt, or rather, I couldn’t narrow down which of my conflicting emotions was predominant. One part of me was already picking out names and anticipating the exquisite joy of welcoming a new little one into the family. The other part of me was dreading the exhaustion, the C-section recovery, the financial strain, the enormous time taken away from the girls, and the million necessary adjustments to our life. I felt selfish for both my reluctance and my excitement, and confusion swirled my insides until I thought I might puke. Of course, I would be doing plenty of puking in the weeks to come; might as well get used to it.

Except that I wasn’t pregnant. Against all expectations, the test turned out negative. A test the next week was negative too, and at last, my body finally confirmed what they were saying. There would not be any morning sickness, hospital stays, baby blues, pumping paraphernalia, or minivan shopping. I would not have to explain to a single concerned Italian grandma that yes, I know how this happens. I would not risk hurting my friends whose hearts are being dragged through the devastating cycle of infertility. Our family would remain just as we’d hoped it would be. Yet a peculiar ache settled in the empty space between my arms like a phantom limb. I was relieved not to be pregnant, incredibly so, but was also caught off balance by how strongly I could miss someone who never existed.

I don’t know how to uncomplicated a non-event any more than this:

For three weeks, I was mama to a baby-who-wasn’t.

Today was our due date.

 

23Sep

Joy Ride

Sunlight is skimming across terra cotta rooftops and bell towers this morning, darting through each daisy petal on our balcony before swooping off to light the cypresses on distant hills. Our palms bathe their faces in it. Dozens of newborn strawberries blink and stretch in our little patch while fresh chilies glow like potted flames. The mint we cut down mere days ago is lush once again. Yesterday’s laundry line-dances to the church bells below our house while sparrows sing backup. This cannot be autumn.

But it is, of course. The girls’ tank tops have been packed away to make room for plaid skirts and jewel-tone hoodies, their flip-flops traded for boots. The watermelon bins at the grocery store are now filled with cabbages. Limoncello perfume for blackberry, scarves for sunblock, Jack Johnson for Sufjan Stevens, mojito nights for school mornings… the evidence is pretty compelling.

I refuse to give in, though, not while summer is still joy-riding through our open windows. There will be plenty of time for cinnamon cappuccinos and crisp, pumpkin-laced daydreams next month.

(Right?).

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