It's Happened Again

I've another car story.  This time I was waiting to exit a parking lot behind a woman in a big SUV.  She got stuck.  Don't ask me how, no one else got stuck and she was in the biggest vehicle around, but she got stuck.  Couldn't go forward at all.  So she looked in her rear view mirror, didn't see me.  (My little Sunfire is ... little).  She put her car in reverse and hit the gas rather hard.  Yep, backed right over the front of my car.

So to make a long story short ... no! where's the fun in that!  The guy at the body shop said that he's not comfortable with me driving the car because the hood is jammed shut and he can't tell what kind of damage might be inside.  He said that once he gets the hood open it's REALLY not driveable because the latch is messed up and it won't close. 

The insurance company said, based on his report, that they would rent me a car starting immediately.  I told them the smallest economy car they had would be fine.  I got a Mustang.  I'm convinced that if I hadn't gotten greedy once they said "Mustang" - it would have been a convertible.  Right up until that moment, I was just feeling so grateful that it was being handled and handled smoothly by the insurance people.  But when she said "Mustang" my pulse shot up and I said, "Convertible?!?"  No, just a plain old bright red Mustang with all the bells and whistles ... and I get to drive it until my little car is fixed. 

OH!  And when I went in to sign the paperwork, they told me they have an opening for a branch manager so I'm taking them my resume today.  If you aren't already, would you mind praying for me?  Please?  Because I really think that God is loving all the prayers on my behalf.  He's certainly having a fun time working things out. 

     ... I'm the only homeless person I know who's driving a Mustang.  Okay, I'm the only homeless person that I know, period.  But it just isn't at all what homelessness has been cracked up to be, you know?  One of the women at my church wrote a book several years ago, called Out of Control and Loving It ... that's where I am now.  I've never been so out of control, and I'm figuring out this is a great place to be.

Good People and Bad Things

Do you remember the old black and white television set?  The way that sometimes there would be "snow" across the picture?  Dad would go outside and twist the antenna trying to get a clearer image.  Sometimes that worked, and sometimes you just had to turn it off.  The snow collapsed to a point of light in the center of the screen and gradually faded to black. 

For months my life has been like living in the midst of a snow storm.  No clear picture to focus on, just fuzz and noise obscuring the signal that would show me what the answers are.  I still don't have any answers, but I have reached the place where I finally gave up and turned off the receiver. 

Monday was just one of those days.  I'm not sure it was so much worse than any other day but it was bad enough.  I met with the therapist that afternoon and ... well ... she's a good one.  She confronted me on several points, strongly.  And I left her office with homework.  I have to read a book (no problem), I'm supposed to write in my journal every day (no I haven't been making the entries private, I haven't been making the time to do it), and I'm supposed to say to myself a dozen times a day-hour-minute "that's not my issue." 

She would ask me a question and I would answer it and then say, "But what if ...." and she would look at me and say, "Who's issue would that be?"  Well, it would be my issue because I would feel terrible if so-and-so thought/felt/believed ...My therapist does this eyebrow thing that reminds me a lot of ... me.  And then she asks again, "Who's issue would that be?"  Um, it would be their issue because they are the only one in charge of how they think/feel/believe?  I'm making progres folks but it's kind of uphill climbing. 

I haven't been spending much time online.  The least amount I can get away with in fact.  This is because I didn't want to spend the money to buy the wireless card for my computer so my online time ties up my cousin's phone line.  Not very friendly of me to do that for hours a day.  Well, I gritted my teeth, broke down, and bought the wireless card.  Brought it home and installed it myself (which made me feel competent and that's a good thing.)  Fired up the computer and ... it doesn't work.  The signal from the router upstairs is too weak. 

Well, then Eliza and I had a talk and she told me about her day.  Her oldest daughter is autistic.  This summer, Rachel has been having some issues herself.  She's entering puberty, all kinds of changes are going on in her world and she isn't handling them well.  Not to go into extreme detail, the way that Rachel has been demonstrating her stress level is distressing to her and everyone around her.  It's probably not the case that my kids and I are the direct cause of her problems but it doesn't help that there are extra people in the house. 

The bottom line is that I have to move out. 

I'm not ready to move out. 

I don't have enough money saved. 

I don't have a place to go.

I don't have a job.

I don't have any ideas.

Monday night I reached absolute rock bottom.  And then I got this clear vision of what I've been doing.  At first the problems I was trying to carry were like a heavy rock.  It was difficult but I could get it up to my shoulder.  Then they grew and it because a really heavy rock that I could kind of get up to my shoulder if I used both hands and bent my back.  Then it was a rock that I couldn't lift, but I could push it and roll it.  Monday night, I realized that I'm looking at a rock that's bigger than a house.  I can't lift it, I can't push it, I can't even see around it.  And I stopped trying. 

My problems have not gone away, if anything they get more impossible to solve with each passing hour.  But I'm not crying.  I'm not confused.  I'm not panicking.  I'm simply being.  

I had an interview on Tuesday that was the most promising I've had so far.  The position won't be filled before October 8, but I am being invited back for a second interview next week.  The position has good pay, good benefits, and it's in a good location in the north part of town just a little ways up the road from the church.  The people I met were all people that I would enjoy hanging around with.  Best of all the work is interesting enough that I'm excited about the possibility of being a part of it.  So I'd appreciate your prayers on this one. 

And I have to tell you this story, because it's just cool.  I had lunch with a man who's been helping me.  He advised me on my resume, put me in touch with people to talk with about job opportunities, and has even gone so far as to market me to people who have openings in their company.  He contacted me on Tuesday for the first time in a couple of weeks.  While we were talking, he said, "Hey!  I just met a woman who works for that company, let's just call her and see if she can give us some advice before your interview."  There are 500 people who work for this company, and when she got on the line, we quickly realized that it's HER position I'm interviewing for.  So you can't get much more inside information than what I had going into the interview.

I keep thinking about the book or at least the title, "Why Do Bad Things Happen to Good People?"  And I think that's all backwards.  See, I think we get all caught up in thinking of ourselves as good or bad people.  I'm good compared to some, bad compared to others.  Really really bad compared to Mother Teresa ... And when I think of it that way, it seems to me that the real question is "Why do Unfair things happen to people?"  I have unfairly good things that have happened like when Tom and Eliza went to the expense of remodeling their basement to make a home for us.  And then there are things I think are unfairly bad like things with the kids working out so badly that I can't stay here as long as we had planned.  There are unfairly good things happening me like when Frank happened to have met Bonnie who happened to be the person I'll be replacing if I get this job. 

Me, I've reached the point where I'm not worried about whether I'm good or bad.  I'm just a little dot.  In all the snow around me there are good things and bad things happening.  But trying to control them, trying to pick it all up and carry it, has become  impossible.  So tonight, I took time to watch the sun sinking behind Pike's Peak.  The sky was on fire, my heart was burning, and my eyes were drinking it all in. 

It's been a week ...

A week of a lot of just plain stuff going on.  I'm spending every day working hard to find a job, which is beginning to be like a job in and of itself except I have no income from the effort.  I got Michael an appointment with a psychologist last week, and after meeting with him, she decided that the best approach would be to work with me first and then address Michael's issues through family therapy.  And I am thrilled with Michael's teacher.  She and I have been communicating via email about how to get on top of some of his academic problems and I think we have a very workable solution. 

IN other news, I'm working on a Book that is a combination cookbook (candy recipes) and essays about my life with the boys.  I'm putting in a lot of time on that and hoping to get it out within the next several weeks.  I'll be self-publishing it with help from some top-notch people who are working with me to have two versions.  Paperback for those who want something they can hold in their hand, and an electronic version that will include a ton of photos of the recipes and the kids and maybe even one or two pictures of myself as well.  (You'd pay an extra dollar for that, right?)  Our working title is "Easy as Candy, a Mom and Two Boys."   There will be more on this in the coming days as I have more I can tell/show you!

Another note from last week ... Shanah tovah u mitukak!  (A good and sweet New Year!) to all my Jewish friends.  We observed Rosh Hashanah last week.  It was the first time that my kids had the opportunity to actually do the deal and they were loving it.  They've seen photos and we've talked about the shofar, but they got to hear and see the ram's horn during the celebration.  Tucker, of course, wanted to blow it.  Uncle Tom warned him that it's very difficult to get sound from a ram's horn and not to be disappointed if he couldn't make it work.  But Tucker blew it longer and louder than anyone.  He had such a great time that at bedtime amidst hugs and kisses he said, "Mom, do you think you could get me a goat?  I just want the horns, you can roast the rest."

o_0 

Chances Are, I'm a Bad Christian ...

I've been reading Anne Lamott's Traveling Mercies.  She admits right up front that she's a bad Christian.  Well, maybe not right up front.  By the time she gets around to her confession, I already had a pretty good idea that she isn't the typical, stereotypical, or in any other way readily identifiable breed of Christian. 

Let me quote her ...

     "So there I was on a plane returning home from St. Louis.  Or rather, there I was in a plane on the runway at the airport in St. Louis with, I think, the not unreasonable expectation that we would be in the air soon, as our flight had already been delayed two hours.  I was anxious to get home, but all things considered, I thought I was coping quite well, especialy because I am a skeptical and terrified flier.  In between devouring Hershey's chocolate and thirteen dollars' worth of trashy magazines, I had spent the two hours of the delay trying to be helpful to the other stranded passengers: I distributed all my magazines and most of my chocolates; I got an old man some water; I flirted with the babies; I mingled, I schmoozed.  I had recently seen what may have been a miracle at my church and had been feeling ever since that I was supposed to walk through life with a deeper faith, a deeper assurance that if I took care of God's children for God, he or she would take care of me.  So I took care of people and hoped that once we were on board, everything would go smoothly.
     My idea of everything going smoothly on an airplane is (a) that I not die in a slow-motion fiery crash or get stabbed to death by terrorists and (b) that none of the other passengers try to talk to me.  All conversation should end the moment the wheels leave the ground.
     Finally we were allowed to board.  I was in row 38, between a woman slightly older than I, with limited language skills, and a man my own age who was readying a book by a famous right-wing Christian novelist about the Apocalypse.  A newspaper had asked me to review this book when it first came out, because its author and I are both Christians -- although as I pointed out in my review, he's one of those right-wing Christians who thinks that Jesus is coming back next Tuesday right after lunch, and I'm one of those left-wing Christians who thinks that perhaps the author is spiritualizing his own hysteria.
     "How is it?"  I asked, pointing jovially to the man's book, partly to be friendly, partly to guage where he stood politically.
     "This is one of the best books I've ever read," he replied.  "You should read it."  I nodded.  I remembered saying in the review that the book was hard-core right-wing paranoid anti-Semitic homophobic misogynistic propaganda -- not to put to fine a point on it.  ... the man with the book about the Apocalypse commented on the small gold cross I wear. 
     "Are you born again?" he asked, as we taxied down the runway.  He was rather prim and tense, maybe a little like David Eisenhower with a spastic colon.  I did not know how to answer for a moment.
     "Yes," I said.  "I am."
     My friends like to tell each other that I'm not really a born-again Christian.  They like to think of me more alone the lines of that old Jonathon Miller routing, where he said, "I'm not really a Jew -- I'm Jew-ish."  They think I'm Christian-ish.  But I'm not.  I'm just a bad Christian.  A bad born-again Christian.  And certainly, like the apostle Peter, I am capable of denying it, of presenting myself as a sort of leftist liberation-theology enthusiast and maybe sort of a vaguely Jesusy bon vivant.  But it's not true.  And I believe that when you get on a plane, if you start lying you are totally doomed.
     So I told the truth: that I am a believer, a convert.  I'm probably about three months away from slapping an aluminum Jesus-fish on the back of my car, although I first want to see if the application or stickum in any way interferes with my lease agreement.  And believe me, all this boggles even my mind."

   Traveling Mercies is not for the faint of heart or the delicate of ear.  I kind of amused myself by counting up the number of times I was either shocked or offended, but I quit that game after I got into the dozens in Chapter One.  Then I stopped snickering at the dirty words and started paying attention to what she was saying about living out a life of faith in spite of frequently falling into all manner of sinful behavior.  Lamott seems to have made a point of going through the list of seven deadly sins and asking with her life ... "Now that I've done this, God, can you still love me?"

     That's a question I understand inside and out.  I know what it's like to stand and wonder whether this time I've gone just a little too far.  I know what it's like to grit my teeth and steel myself to understand that this time, even the grace of God can't fix it.  This time the only way I'm going to make it is by finding a way to work myself out of the mess I've created.  Only, it never works to work because none of my works are every enough.  And I'm back again to seeing that I'm a bad Christian. 

     I said it to a friend the other day that it follows me like a shadow at the back of my mind, a little voice whispering in my ear "unconditional love is a nice idea ... that God reserved for other people."  And even after more than thirty years in the family of faith, I find myself far too often in the same place I've been so many times before, unhappy and anxious; unable to rest in grace; trying to figure out what else I can do.  Henry Blackaby says that God is crying out to His children, "Don't just do something, stand there."  But standing is hard.  Standing means that I have to be still and trust.  I'd much rather be busy and not think about it.  Yep, I'm a bad Christian.

    I'm reminded again of a story that I've heard used to illustrate a number of  wildly different points (so you might want to write this one down, I promise it's an all-purpose little sermon in a couple of sentences.)    Question: Do you know what they call the person who graduates at the bottom of his class in medical school?  Answer: Doctor. 

    I am a bad Christian, but at the end of the day, it isn't my goodness or badness that matters in the slightest.  The only thing that matters is that I am loved, and whether I can believe it or not ... unconditionally. 

Kid Quotes

The kids have not been quiet, oh, no.  I hope that my lack of talking about them hasn't given the impression that they have faded into the background of anything.  They haven't.  Both of them have had a date with Mom this week and that inspired fantastic conversation, some insights, and a lot of laughter. 

Michael noted that at times I seem a bit ... distracted.  Well, I do have a lot going on, but he thought it would be best if we fix me.  "You just need a new memory stick for your head."  His date was at the Mission Inn Mexican Restaurant which had fabulous food.  I let the server choose for me because I couldn't decide.  I had a pork and guacamole burrito with green chile which was to die for.  The rice was spicy and the beans were plentiful.  But I couldn't even finish the burrito, it was that big.  Michael is growing into a man-sized appetite so he did finish his lunch and wanted to order dessert.  That's cool, he was on a date, so treats were encouraged.  He got a fried ice cream that when it arrived eclipsed his head. 

In between laughter and discussion of my fading memory (its terrible to have to deal with an aging parent ... ) we played tic tac toe.  He hasn't yet figured out that there isn't really any winning at the game, although I did show him the trick about putting your mark in opposite corners which meant that I had to pay much closer attention afterwards.  I lost count but I'll bet we played at least 30 games while we talked. 

Tucker wasn't so interested in talking during his date, he was about action.  So we went to play mini golf.  (That was actually his second choice.  Number one on the list was to go to the Focus on the Family Campus and play in their family center with the three story slide, and Adventures in Odessy sets.  It closed at 4 and we weren't leaving here til 3:30 so that's on the list for next time.)  Mini golf with Tucker is always fun.  He has been known to hit the ball from one green and sink it in a cup three greens away.  This week, his play was subdued after he had to crawl under a juniper bush to retrieve his ball on the second hole.  I didn't do so well.  He thought I was doing it on purpose and kept telling me to stop kidding around.  I would tap the ball just that much too hard and it would roll around the edge of the cup and off to the side.  You know, when this happens once or twice it's frustrating but funny.  When it happens once or twice on every hole, it gets irritating in a hurry.

Tucker also told me how I can safely have a motorcycle.  He had my attention with that beginning and I wondered what my seven year old could possibly know about my bike fantasy.  The open road, wind in my face, the roar of the engine, and leaning into the curve ... Aaaaaaaaaaah.  He said, "I have it all figured out ..."  Which immediately caused my blood pressure to do erratic things.  Remind me to apologize to my dad for every time I've ever uttered those words.  I can't think of many things that would be more frightening for a parent to hear.  But anyway, Tuck has it all figured.  He told me that all I need to do is get one of those little wagon things and then he can ride with a seatbelt, so he'll be safe while I motor him around.  You know, it's one of my favorite stories of C S Lewis' life that he came to faith in God while riding in his brother's side car.  Maybe Tucker is on to something. 

Faith in God is something that I try to encourage without pushing.  It's a delicate balance I think.  And I'm so tempted to really be heavy with it sometimes, like when he's in the midst of tormenting Hannah, again.  I would really like to haul out a real threat, like ... God will cause you to break out in boils on your backside if you don't stop it.  But I don't think that God works that way, and following His example neither should I.  No, I truly believe that in the long run, it's kindness that leads to repentance.  ~ sigh ~ and in the meantime I'm trying to figure out how to lead my son to make choices that will increase the chances of peace around here instead of generating chaos.  When I get it all figured out, I'll let you know.  Then you can be scared.

I'm cooking now ...

Yes, literally.  I'm spending the day in the kitchen, except I'm taking time out now to write a blog.  o_0  If I think about that too long, I'm sure I'm going to start having an issue.  LOL.  I've been working on a cookbook.  The recipes are all candy recipes so I'm riding the wave of reaction to the Lo-Carb diet craze that I'm hoping is going to pick up momentum just about the day that I get this book ready for sale. 

I've needed to have a day for where I could just play in the kitchen and take photos of finished candies.  Today is that day.  But of course, once I got my hands on the kitchen and everyone else was out of sight, I couldn't stop with a few batches of goodies.  Oh, no.  I'm in the need of serious comfort food.  So I am cooking real stuff too.  Let me back up a step.  On Wednesdays Eliza takes her kids to enrichment classes in the morning and swim lessons in the afternoon.  My kids started back to school today after a five day break.  For the first time since I've been in Colorado, I don't have a million things that I HAVE to do.  So I'm alone in the house.  Alone in the kitchen ...

I'm making cajun stew, squash casserole, and rice. 

And about 7 batches of candy for later.

I need a little comfort, because I'm starting to stress over things that are going and not going according to my grand plan for how I'm going to be totally on top of my life. 

I went in yesterday and took the tests in Microsoft Word and Excel that the temp agency requires for placement.  I scored 100% on the Word test and 88 on Excel.  Those figures are high enough that if I take the full tests, I can be certified by Microsoft.  this may or may not help me find a job, but I like the idea of certification.  It's a validation of my skill that gives me a little boost in confidence.  Ordinarily those tests cost money.  But the temp agency has an arrangement with Microsoft so I can take them at no cost to myself. 

I still don't have a job.  Everyone who interviews me or talks with me about employment seems enthusiastic about me.  But either they don't have an opening right now, or the openings they have are not a good fit, or else they want me to work on comission which is scary to me.  So I spent the weekend redoing my resume and reviewing material for these tests I took yesterday morning.  Today, I'm kind of ... cooking. 

Cajun Stew (A La Joseph Verrette)

1 pound kielbasa sliced (I use the fat free turkey kind even though it really doesn't taste as good)
1+ pounds of diced chicken
onion
celery
potatoes
carrots
red bell pepper
worchestershire sauce
garlic
parsley
basil

Spray a large dutch oven with non-stick cooking spray and brown meats.  Chop veggies in whatever ratio appeals best to you.  I like a LOT of carrots and not so many potatoes. 
Add to pot with a cup and a half of water.  Cook until veggies are crisp/tender about 45 minutes.  Then add seaconings to taste.  I use approximately a half bottle of worchesterhire, four cloves of garlic, and I'm liberal with the parsley and basil.  Cook another 10 minutes.  Serve in a bowl next to a helping of ...

Squash Casserole

6-7 yellow squash sliced
2 onions, sliced
1.5 cups of mushrooms, sliced
2 boxes of cornbread mix
1/2 cup of biscuit mix
2 eggs, beaten
1/2 c milk
1 can cream of celery soup
1 can cream of chicken soup

In a large skillet, sprayed with the non-stick spray, cook down the onion, squash and mushrooms until they are reduced in size by about half.  The squash should be done but not "mushy".  Combine veggies in a large casserole dish with remaining ingredients.  Bake on 375 for  40 minutes or until set in the center. 

I'm a happy camper.  Now we'll just have to see when the others get home whether they will eat it. 

I love to cook anyway, I especially love to cook in the fall.  I like squash, pumpkin, apples, all kinds of things that I think of as fall foods.  I like when the days get cool enough that I can make stew or chili and hold the bowl in my hands to warm them while I slowly eat it.  Fall is coming already.  The air has a little bite in the morning.  I've seen a few trees with yellow leaves already.  It's all good.

At My Church ...

When do you know you're a member of any group?  Yesterday the pastor at the church I've been attending clarified the membership policy.  "We don't keep member rolls here because we noticed that frequently people who were very involved were not members and members on the rolls never came.  So we say that you are a member when you say you are a member.  When you start thinking and speaking of this as my church instead of their church or that church ..."

I'm enjoying this church.  I'm not quite ready to call it my church yet, but I suspect that's only a matter of time.  Wanna check it out?  There's a website where you can listen to sermons (I like the kid who preaches on Saturday night as much as I like the teaching of the pastor on Sunday morning.)  Anyway, it's New Life Church in Colorado Springs.   

I had an interesting experience at church a couple weeks ago that I'm still processing.  Those of you who are uncomfortable with God talk and so forth please hang with me to the end of this story, okay?  And then you can offer your take on it.  If you aren't comfortable leaving a comment in my public comments box, you are always welcome to email me at either terriverrette@yahoo.com or quiltnmomi@hotmail.com (If you email me, please identify yourself by something I'll recognize.) 

Here's the story.  Sunday nights are hectic because church starts at 6, too early for the kids to be hungry enough to eat dinner before we have to leave home, but late enough that they have to have some kind of snack or they'll be gnawing my leg on the way home.  We do this little ritual thing where I offer them food and they say "no I'm not hungry for that" until it's time to head to the car where they are suddenly dying of starvation and simply cannot bear to see the Wendy's fade in the distance. 

The boys have a Boy Scouts type group that meets during worship so I get them dropped off before I go into the auditorium.  I'm usually late.  Two weeks ago, I was late.  When I slipped into the room people were already singing and praying.  Some were kneeling, some were dancing.  (Are you getting the impression that worship is rather ... informal?  You'd be right.)  As soon as I opened my mouth to sing, tears began to pour down my face. 

This happened to me once before this summer, when I visited my parents' church and I had that wonderful sense of homecoming.  So already you might want to chalk up my unusual evening to my being in a state of heightened emotion.  That's where I was prepared to go.  I was glad that I was in the back of my section so no one would pay any attention to me.  I'm really not all that overtly emotional and it's well, embarrassing to be caught in crying my room much less standing in a public place.  Okay, I'm emotional, I laugh a lot, but I don't cry for pity's sake!

And why was I crying, anyway.  I couldn't tell you then, I can't really tell you now.  I know that I was feeling an overwhelming sense of being loved. 

Just before the sermon, the speaker rose to address us.  "I have a special sense of the presence of God ministering in our midst tonight.  And I also have a special sense that there are people here who have strong needs for prayer and support.  Look around you, you'll know who they are.  Let's pray for one another ..."  All of a sudden there were people, a LOT of people looking at me.  Since I was the only one with mascara running down my face, I was kind of the obvious poster child for our area. 

Soon I was surrounded by people who were praying for me.  One in particular took the lead and began to speak aloud, not so much speaking to God on my behalf, but speaking to me the things that he was ... receiving? sensing? hearing?  how would you put it?  (If you're charismatic, you'd say that this man began to prophesy.) 

I can't tell you everything he said.  (although as soon as he was done I did immediately write a lot of it down.)  What I can tell you is that the words he spoke showed me myself in a light of love, acceptance and hope that I have not felt in a long time.  It was ... nice. 

It got my attention, but I'm still not really sure what it all means.  So in the meantime I'm hanging out at church.  And who knows, someday soon, it may be my church.

Connecting the Dots

I'm praying for the health of our former President.  I think it's no secret to those of you who've been reading my site for the past three years that I lean toward the liberal side of the political fence.  When I took an internet quiz to determine my political position, it put me just slightly more toward the center then Ghandi.  (I wonder, before internet quizzes how I ever had any self-awareness at all ...)

I've heard it said that statistically speaking there are no more than two people between you and any other person in the United States.  You pick a person, any person, and you probably know someone, who knows someone, who knows that person. 

I grew up in Arkansas.  I know a great many people there still.  Some of those people know the Clintons very well.  So see, if you were wondering whether you had a connection to them well, I'm one away from you, and there is at most one other person between me and them.  (I have met them both in person on more than one occasion, but obviously we aren't close friends.  And no, he didn't make a pass at me.  )  My friend, Mary, has also met the Clintons in a social setting and it was a lot of fun when we realized this and were able to compare impressions.

Today, I had lunch with a man who has a weekly standing phone conference with the White House.  He doesn't speak to the President every week, but President Bush calls him by first name.  According to an article in the Wall Street Journal a couple weeks ago, he's one of the men who may make the difference in the coming election. 

Isn't that just interesting?  It makes me wonder who you know.  How are we all connected?  And it makes me realize that we aren't simply random dots.  We are part of a pattern that makes sense from some perspective that's broader than I can quite grasp. 

And just in case you're wondering if I've tipped my hand today ... let me go all the way. I registered Libertarian when I moved to Indiana.  Before that I was an Independent.  And now, I'm trying to decide what I should do about voter registration in Colorado.  I am persuaded by Yorel's argument that registering as anything other than one of the two major parties simply causes my vote not to count.  But oh, I do despise the things I see the major parties doing.  (I'd probably despise the Libertarians if they were big enough and got enough exposure for me to see their warts as well as I can see the others.  But I  appreciate their political philosophy better than that of the other two parties.)

I believe it's my duty to research issues, listen to candidates and cast my vote according to the dictates of my understanding and my conscience.  I'll be there in November, part of a great pattern of dots that may be better explained by chaos theory than any other formula, but still connected to all you other dots. 

Split Personality

Okay - I'm going to come clean.  Sometimes I write things other than the chatty Momi blogs that are the core of the quiltnmomi site.  If you've been a long time reader you know this because I have from time to time posted short fiction or poetry here.  But when I say - "time to time" - I mean maybe a half dozen times over the past 3.5 years.  (see I REALLY like statistics)

I'm opening a new site for poetry and fiction. 

I want to keep that site separate from here for a long list of reasons.  Primarily because what I post there will be poetry and FICTION.  I don't want people who read those things confused about who I am or what I'm talking about.  And although I know from past experience that it's pretty hard to convince people, I want at least enough separation that people don't automatically assume that anything I write is autobiographical.  Very very little of the stuff I "make up" has any bearing on my real life.  Which, if you read it, you'll know. 

Plus, I know that poetry isn't everyone's cup of tea and I'm vain about the number of people subscribed to this site.  I don't want to see you leaving in vast droves because I post bad poetry.  I'm not abandoning quiltnmomi.  This site is a big part of who I am and I'm not sure how healthy I could be without this place to pour out my life and receive your encouragement to go on.  So if you come here because you like to hear about me, about my kids, about the books I'm reading (and I just read another that bears a LOT of thinking about, I'll have to tell you about that later) I'm not going anywhere. 

If you are interested in poetry, fiction, and more creative experiments.  Then feel free to come on over. 

www.xanga.com/Mysterri

PS - I am feeling much better.  Thank you for your kind wishes!  I'm still very sore from the tummy trouble, but I'm not feverish, I'm not shivering under blankets.  I'm hoping that maybe sometime in the next several days I can slip out with Michael and he'll have his date.  I used the suggestion that you gave me to give him a literal raincheck.  He and I both loved that.  Thank you.

It's a GOOD thing ...

That I'm living with a doctor.  This week I've had some kind of stomach thing that I just can't shake.  I'm not able to sleep because I hurt.  And I'm cold all the time.  Dr. Tom isn't sure what's going on.  He prescribed Zantac for the stomach.  And I've spent much of my day huddled under a pile of blankets - shivering.

Last night, in a stroke of weird luck, I found a needle that had been dropped in the carpet.  Dr. Tom used the pliers to pull it out.  Tucker (who was the one playing with Aunt Eliza's sewing box earlier) was all relieved that I wasn't crying and having a fit.  He said, "Wow, Mom, I'm glad that didn't really hurt ..."

Aunt Eliza set him straight.

Now, I'm disappointed, because tonight I was supposed to have a date with Michael.  But there's no way I can take my son out feeling the way I do.  We missed our date last weekend due to other hindrances.  I'm really fretting about this because I think it's extremely important that he know he can rely on me to keep my word.  I try not to make him too many promises because I know how easy it is to have something happen out of my control that would bring disappointment.  But I wanted to do this.  And I will.  Just as soon as I can. 

Now, because I've promised to take care of myself, I'm crawling back under those aforementioned blankets.