A small gesture of thanks from a six-year-old had perfect timing.
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As with any tradition, the package of beach stories is equal parts people and places. We’ve stayed bayside, oceanblock and oceanfront, downtown, a strong stretch between two places on 64th street and close to the Delaware line.
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It turns out being asked to pay attention to my thoughts does not serve me well. I’ve been meditating for the last few years in an effort to quiet my brain that will not stop talking. I wake up in the middle of the night in a dialogue with myself. I have full circle conversations in my head. I want to quiet the noise, but how?
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The notion of the insurance post is a little ridiculous, since I said I’d write for 40 of the 45 days of this Lenten season. However old habits die hard and the thought of not making it to the full 45 days makes me feel queasy. Changes in our Lenten practices take time to settle in I suppose.
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As someone who doesn’t love surprises or big changes, I find the tease and beginning of spring to be a frustrating cycle of uncertainty. Round and round we go until one day you walk outside and it seems overnight the buds have opened up, the leaves are returning and you get that one perfect day that promises you are right where you are supposed to be.
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I wish I had been more honest with myself to recognize I could have stopped nursing/pumping simply because I had had enough.
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Being an observer raises the question of if/when to intervene. When they were younger, playground problems were simpler to manage. Asking kids to take turns on the swings or apologizing if a sand castle was crushed were easy choices. Today I watch and wrestle with how equipped my girls are to manage bigger kid playground problems.
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I think that’s what this writing experiment has been for me - a nudge to get unstuck, to move closer to an end or a new beginning.
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For a long time I wanted the glimmer. Today I want the truth. Even if it means we’ll eat nachos twice in one week.
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In many ways we’re still trying to find our way. I didn’t think March would hit as hard this year but it has - harder in some ways and gentler in others. I don’t know if in the end, this story will have a warm, fuzzy ending.
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I wrote about the art of forgiveness and how I wish I could figure out how to truly forgive and let go.
I wrote about how hard it is to be true to what we know deep down inside so instead we mask it by picking our fingers until they bleed and apply the literal and figurative bandaid to make the problem go away.
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With the confidence of a young child who thinks they can sing like Elsa, I copy the text from the Google Doc to my email and then over to Instagram. Inevitably I’m met with “Your caption is too long.” There is no guidance that states how long is too long, just that you better cut to the chase and figure it out.
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While I have loved writing these stories, looking back at the pictures invites memories I’d forgotten about and reminds me of how much we can change yet stay the same. Thank goodness for the family archivists out there who collect all the memories and moments, preserving the roots of the stories.
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The stories I’ve had in my head for so long have a plan for how they will take off and cruise into the middle. But when it comes to the landing, I’ve found myself stuck on multiple occasions.
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I sat less than two feet away from S in that debrief and not once did I pick up on his body language. In the four hours I spent watching the video, I focused on what we were saying and what I was doing. I never bothered to look up and just watch the video. Maybe if I had, I would have seen what was actually happening.
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I can’t bear to part with all the things because they hold the promise of possibility and the persistent question, what if? But what if by holding onto what if, we’re robbing ourselves of the opportunity to consider the alternative?
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I wasn’t a terrible racquetball player but I was a terrible self cheerleader. As soon as the possibility of defeat emerged I began talking myself out of the win and stood by to witness my own demise. It became easier to tell myself, “You know you’re going to lose,” than to consider, “Today will be your day.”
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My grandfather was a Sanka drinker and I can still remember taking a sip and then grimacing if it was a sip near the bottom of the cup where the grinds from his instant coffee would settle. At Grandma Traber’s house, we were allowed to have a cup of decaf once we had our shot of orange juice first. That decaf coffee may have been the inspiration for the line of coffee drinks that taste nothing like coffee as a few packs of Sweet’N Low and milk made for a delicious cup of Joe’s sweet, weak cousin, Jeff.
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We rescued basketballs from the gutter at the end of the street and from under my dad’s car, affectionately called The Gray Ghost. When the ball got stuck under The Gray Ghost multiple people had to partake in the rescue effort as it was a 1982 Chevy Impala and approximately 23 feet wide. Baseball bats were occasionally involved.
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I wonder if a major contributor to the challenge of parenthood is that at times, we parent the kid we think we have, or the kid we thought we would have, and fail to consider the kid we do have.
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