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16Jul

Wii Are Not Yet Fit

Posted by: Bethany in Uncategorized 1 Comment

Short-Distance Running on Wii Fit… With Children

Me (starting): Oooh, this hurts. Ow. Ow. I hate this.Oooooh.

Natalie: “LOOK! Look at that!! Who is that? Who is that? Who is THAT???!”

Me: (gasps for breath)

Natalie: “WHOISTHATWHOISTHATWHOISTHATWHOISTHATWHOIS—”

Me: “That… is… Daddy, see?… in the… black?”

Sophie: (grabs my left foot)

Me: Ow, ow, who invented running? Because they deserve my foot up somewhere very sensitive on their persons right now.

Natalie: “LOOK! Is that Daddy? Is that Daddy, right there? See the black? Is that Daddy? IsthatDaddyisthatDaddyisthatDaddyisthatDa—”

Me: “No… not… Daddy…”

Sophie: (crawls up my left leg)

Natalie: “Oo, look at THAT one! Is THAT Daddy? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it?”

Me: (clutching side, panting)

Natalie: “Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it? Is it?”

Me: Someone’s about to get hurt.

Natalie: “IS IT DADDY? IS THAT DADDY? Ooo, look at the puppies! IS THAT DADDY? IS IT? IS IT?”

Me: “NO!!!”

Sophie: (swings from my kneecap by her teeth)

Natalie: “LOOK! LOOK AT THAT! It’s Chicken Little! CHICKEN LITTLE! Do you SEE that, Mommy? Do you see Chicken Little? Huh? Huh?”

Me: (seeing stars, imagining Chicken Little in my crockpot, alive)

Natalie: “Do you see Chicken Little? Do you? Do you? Do you? Do you? Do you? Do you? Do you? Do you? Do you? Do you? Do you? Do you? Do you? Do you? Do you? Do you? Do y—”

Me: “YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Sophie: (wraps around my esophagus)

Me: This is the worst day of my life. I hate everything. I totally understand how video games turn people into mass murderers. I myself will have to go on a rampage after breakfast. I hope Nintendo is happy.

Natalie: “Oh wow, is THAT Daddy? I think it IS Daddy! See the black shirt? See? Is it Daddy? Do you see him, Mommy? Do you see? Do you? Do you? Do you? Do you? DO YOUDOYOUDOYOUDOYOUDOYOUDOYOUDOYOU???”

Sophie: “Tthhhhhbbbbbllllffffff.”

Wii Fit: “Congratulations! You have reached your goal of: 3 minutes! Well done!” (happy, shiny noise) “You have also unlocked: Long-distance run!”

Me: (has coronary)

14Jul

Wide Open

Posted by: Bethany in Uncategorized 3 Comments

This July, I’m digging:

Sophie’s chubby legs, round and kissable, her skin sensitive like her mother’s but happiest barefoot anyway.

Dan’s magical summer-green mojitos… especially watching him smash the limes with sugar and mint freshly picked from our balcony. (But especially-especially drinking them…)

Wearing my favorite extra-long jeans with silver ballet flats, strappy black stilettos, and $1 Old Navy flip-flops in a row.

Free jazz, funk, and swing concerts downtown, turned up LOUD to fill the whole park with colorful instruments and spontaneous booty-shaking.

Perfectly still afternoon naps, the fan swirling sunbeams in lazy circles around the bedroom.

Discovering my super-hula hoop powers on Wii Fit (watch out, world!).

Dinner guests at last (after a long self-imposed hiatus) with easy conversation and easy smiles, kim-bab and chocolate stout cake and cold slurps of watermelon.

Pony tails every day, no apologies.

“Fitness” berry blend, a.k.a gorgeous purple juice infused with caffeine—my groovy summer alternative to coffee.

The Polyphonic Spree music videos radiating ridiculous, happy energy (check out “Lithium” if you’re a cheery type of Nirvana fan).

Nine (nine!) new flavors of Lip Smackers to be left in strategic spots around the house and loved to lip-smacking death by Natalie and me.

Wide open windows.

11Jul

Eat Me, Uncle Moneybags

Posted by: Bethany in Uncategorized 3 Comments

Growing up, I learned to hate the song “Count Your Blessings.” (Please tell me some of you are old-fashioned enough to know it too?)

Are you ever burdened with a load of care?
Does the cross seem heavy you are called to bear?
Count your many blessings, every doubt will fly,
And you will be singing as the days go by.
(Lyrics by Johnson Oatman, a 19^th century preacher who probably got beat up a lot as a kid)

No matter how many times I sang it, its birthday wish mantra never worked. The magic elixir of contrived thankfulness turned stale when I swallowed it, and nothing ever got better as a result.

—

Dan and I lay awake in bed far, far too late last night talking (a bad habit that’s always been too delightful to shake) about the life we could be living right now had we just accepted it. We wandered through shadowy conjectures of a big suburban house and a six-figure salary. Bulging pockets. Unlimited comfort. Dollar signs popping out of our eyes just like in cartoons. We have been so tempted some days to quit our grad-schooling, world-traveling teetertotter life and grab the easy one dangling very much within reach.

But no matter how beautiful the bait looks, we know we are happiest as free fish with the whole ocean to play in. We need adventure, he and I, even if it sometimes looks like instability. Money matters so much less to us than experience… though, admittedly, a lot of experiences are easier to come by with a fat wallet.

I’ve been skulking on the outskirts of panic lately, and it helps to keep all of this in mind. It is so easy to feel lost in a new culture, especially with talk of moving to a different city soon. Especially with quickly growing babies and quickly disappearing time. Especially with the kind of urgent, helpless inspiration my brain manufactures without warning. Especially when unexpected expenses converge like thunderheads over water and more water, no dry land in sight. It’s the price of diving headlong into the ocean.

So I beat myself over the head with logic and lecture myself with my own beliefs. Keep everything in perspective… and This will all be worth it some day… But for all the mental haranguing I do to keep myself on track, the only thing that truly brings me out of dark moods is thankfulness—spontaneous and unplannable. It happened today when the girls woke up from their naps together with that gorgeous, sleepy glow of afternoon dreams. I looked at their faces, and simple as that, I was floating. To be able to know these vibrant little people, to be able to kiss their cheeks and read them bedtime stories and add beauty to their eternal souls was like a living in a sudden song. Unexplainable joy.

That’s how thankfulness got me out of our tightly-walled house and into the sunshine today. The girls and I had to go out for a necessary purchase—strawberry gelato with two spoons—and a playground date. We really had no choice but to have a perfect, panic-free evening once I realized how ridiculously, extravagantly rich we are together.

Of course, later came a particularly fussy bathtime and dirty dishes and the dull thud of reality and the fear that everything good about my day was horribly cliché…

But if sunwarmed giggles with these two and overwhelming lightheartedness become cliché for me, I will have more to appreciate than Uncle Moneybags or even Johnson Oatman himself could ever count.

—-

By the way, and on a completely different topic, I wish everyone in the world could get a chance to read this.

7Jul

Ain’t Nothin’ Better

Posted by: Bethany in Uncategorized 5 Comments

In honor of our fifth wedding anniversary, which slipped away on a cloud of jet lag Saturday, here are five of my favorite things about being married:
– Never having to say goodnight
– Falling asleep locked together like puzzle pieces
– Hugging in the middle of an argument
– Cracking up over years of inside jokes
– [Censored for your protection… hehe]

If jet lag weren’t STILL kicking my rear, I would write about how each year together is immeasurably better than the one before… how familiarity only breeds contempt if you forget to make out regularly… how I kind of hate Shania Twain, but I can’t help singing “Ain’t nothin’ better, we beat the odds together,” at least until Dan begs me on behalf of everything sacred in this world to stop… but I’m out of eloquence at the moment, so I’ll keep this simple: Here’s to the wild, wonderful adventure of spending life with the one you love best.

4Jul

Pause

Posted by: Bethany in Uncategorized 6 Comments

July feels uncertain this year. We’re finally back in Italy, recovering from a stateside vacation I didn’t know how to write about, and my finger’s on the pause button. Only, time doesn’t pause; just myself.

Is today really a holiday? I vaguely remember promising our friends a hot dog cook-out, but I’ll be caught under the tide of jet lag and personal culture shock until well after supper. Tomorrow’s a holiday for us too—our fifth anniversary!—and more than any other time of year, I want to bounce and sparkle… but I get the distinct impression I’m still going to wake up as a human bathmat. Enthusiasm today on a scale from 1 to 10: Flubbb.

I can’t be sure on this of course, but I think this vacation may have been the toughest we’ll ever have to pull off. There were relaxing bits and fun bits, and the two even coincided from time to time, but they were sandwiched between the longest, cryingest plane rides ever a Sophie was taken on.

Re: that –
6/28/08
Dear incisors,
I understand your innate need to poke out of my daughter’s tender gums; it’s gotta happen sometime. But did you really have to make my baby scream and flail and refuse to sleep for five whole days? And which of Satan’s minions possessed you to wait until our LONG LONG INTERNATIONAL PLANE RIDE to saw your way out? Thanks to you, I’m going to have to buy Benadryl for all our fellow passengers on the return flight just to satisfy my conscience.
If you need me, I’ll be in the lavatory giving myself 30,000 feet swirlies,
Bethany

So, long trip, teething, Texas. Soon after arriving, we ran headlong into some old family tension—the complicated, spiderwebby kind that leave tendrils of guiltpitydisgustangerbetrayalremorsesadnessannoyance sticking to everyone’s faces. However, there were also important conversations and Krispy Kreme excursions and rollercoasters and tiramisu and so very many activities including the extreme wearing of leather pants.

Re: leather pants –
Dear [14-year-old brother],
I want to be as cool as you when I grow up.
Love,
Bethany

Besides the teething and the tension and the lack of sleep, we had fun… but it was mostly the kind of frantic fun that requires intense scheduling and secretarial help. And then catching the 6 a.m. flight to Florida? The English language needs a new word to describe our level of exhaustion at that point. Like “death.” Anyway.

Re: vacation part 2 –
Dear Florida,
You divide my heart. On one hand, I kind of hate you. You’re freakishly hot, everything is at least half an hour away, and room-service cereal costs $22. All this, and your drivers are really, really bad. I mean, terrible.
On the other hand, I love your glittering beaches and blue, blue water. I love the thunderheads piling above your oceans and the warm nights. Your wildlife is great—pelicans and herons and ‘gators, oh my!—and you make relaxing effortless.
If you would just work on the driver thing, oh, and maybe give me a lifetime membership to Disney World, I think we could have a future together.
Sincerely,
Bethany

Time with the in-laws was great as usual—Natalie’s never had so much fun in her long three-year-old life—and Dan’s and my getaway to the beautiful Marco Island was just what we needed (even though I was lame and spent vastly more time reading in bed than sunning at the beach, but you have no idea how lovely it felt to read in bed! hello, lame).

Re: my main inspiration for reading lamely in bed –
Dear Sony “not Kindle” e-book reader,
You have just exempted me from other birthday or Christmas gifts for the next nine years, but I have only this to say: I love you madly.
Yours,
That person who spilled crumbs on you because she wouldn’t stop reading Dracula during breakfast

So we were finally so relaxed that we were smiling on a regular basis again and enjoying the last few days of our vacation when we found ourselves rushing to the emergency room, trying not to panic, praying breathlessly that we would be able to take both girls back to Italy with us.

Our little Sophie sat limply in her car seat, her face bulging and purple, eyes rolled back in her head, breathing heavily like an animal – “hunh hunh hunh.” I had never felt such a rush of fear before, terror instead of adrenaline coursing through my blood. I still don’t know how to describe that drive to the hospital except that I hope never to experience it again.

The doctors assured us later that it was no big deal—“only” a seizure, “only” a spike in fever—and I couldn’t figure out if their words were meant to comfort or belittle. Neither mattered, though, once we could look into her eyes and see our baby there again.

I don’t think anyone really relaxed after that point. Amidst the flurry of packing up, my mind swam with the image of Sophie’s purple face and the ludicrous hospital bill and all the What Ifs that I couldn’t not think about. I felt a thousand times more a mother than before yet hopelessly inadequate, and I shook the last hours of our plane trip back to Italy while Sophie wailed in my lap.

That brings me here—back, but not really. Suitcases are still piled around the house, and I fully intend to unpack them once I can drag myself out of the Twilight Zone. If only time would pause for a day or two or seventy-four…

9Jun

To Do

Posted by: Bethany in Uncategorized 3 Comments

To do:

Twirl

Open a window

Ask

And then listen

Wear your favorite color

Be imperfect

Tickle

Create something beautiful

Giggle

Breathe

Light a candle

Or twenty

Sprinkle sugar on your cereal

Sob

Bear-hug

Write a letter

Sing

Cheer someone on

Daydream

7Jun

In Hiding

Posted by: Bethany in Uncategorized 6 Comments

I just realized I’m in hiding. I haven’t been to church in three weeks, and I’m feeling nauseous at the prospect of tomorrow. We haven’t entertained guests in even longer; I actually cancelled an invitation to have lunch with friends last week. Grocery trips broadside me, the unfamiliarity of aisles and aisles, the threat of another language. I’ve been grasping at solitude, even tucked away here at home. An hour alone, headphones on.

Is it just cowardice? Maybe I’ve depleted my stores of bravery in these last ten months of culture shock. Or could it be dysfunction finally taking over my sense of logic and social responsibility? All I know for sure is that I’m tired. Inspiration comes in fitful bursts but never stays long enough for me to build up energy. I have projects on the burner, but the pilot light is out. No more fuel.

Sweet Dan gave me the afternoon to write my short-short fiction piece for a contest next week, but the instant I sat down, I slammed into a brick wall. It doesn’t feel exactly like writer’s block since I’m bursting with ideas. It just feels like can’t. So I bit my nails and beat myself over the head with guilt and read bits of Jen Lemen’s beautiful blog in search of inspiration until I found this paragraph in her archives:

Sometimes an internal monologue of shoulds is a sign that some little voice is calling the shots, and it’s not me. At least not the me that understands deep down that love is always the way, that TRUST melts into opportunity, that the joy of discovery is the most creative, fruitful enterprise every single time, that I always finish best in an atmosphere of grace not just pressure.

I desperately need that atmosphere of grace. I suspect I am the only one keeping myself holed up in isolation until the imagined pressure of church and guests and writing deadlines is too hard to face. So here’s a teeny flutter of a plan:

Tomorrow morning, I’m going to go to church without worrying what I look like and say hi to people because at least that I can do. I will breathe.
Right now, I’m going to feed my crying baby and put the computer open on the table in front of me. Maybe I’ll come up with a sentence in between spoonfuls. Maybe I won’t, but it’s okay. This week is not my last chance to write.
And later? I’m going to go to bed early. I’ll stretch out and make happy, comfortable noises and not worry about a single thing because all I should be doing at night is getting enough rest. So I will. It’s a start.

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