What Are You Now?

Today a colleague turned to me and asked, so what are you now? 

I looked at her blankly. What do you mean? You know, she said. You were a New Yorker. What are you now... What do they call it in Massachusetts? Are you a Massachusetts-ian? I thought about it for a moment. I honestly didn't know, and it made me uncomfortable. I'm just a Masshole, I joked. But inside I felt slightly sick. Am I not still a New Yorker?

(I looked it up, by the way, and it's either a Bay Stater or a Massachusettsan.) 

It's been an eternity since my last post. We have been busy shutting down our lives in New York City and getting all of Teeny's medical and therapeutic services, all of both girls' activities and schools, everything we own and our entire lives uprooted to a brand new setting. We closed on our house about six weeks ago. Looking back at all we have done to get where we are is exhausting, because now almost everything in our lives is different. New house. (A house!) New town. (A town!) New schools. (Public!) New therapies. New doctors, new policies, new service providers. New people in our lives. Not a new job, but a very new way of doing it. New new new new new if I hear that word one more time I will just implode into an overwhelmed heap of introverted leave-me-alone. 

The best part is that we have everything. Really. Our little house sits on an acre of land, much of which is wooded, wild and brambly, and even though we are in a thickly settled area a block from a school in one direction and a block from a horse farm and half a dozen tiny businesses in the other, three miles from the town center and twenty miles from one of the biggest cities in the northeast, when we sit on our deck, we are in the middle of nowhere. The trees are tall and thick, hiding nearly all evidence of neighbors and neighborhood. Hilly, desolate hiking trails, an old, out-of-use railroad track and a big boating pond are within walking distance. Occasionally a dog barks far off in the distance to remind us that we are not as isolated as we think we are, which is both a disappointment and a relief. The birds are noisy and enthusiastic about the feeders we have set up for them. The local chipmunks, hungry and thinking about the winter, do their best to stuff their cheeks with bird seed before the girls catch them and shriek excitedly, gleefully, to shoo them away. We have plants. A shrub! Flowers. Basil, thyme, a green pepper. My thumb is not green; we water regularly, check for new leaves dutifully and hope for the best. Sap from a tree I cannot identify drips on my new car; spiders spin webs in the front bushes. The wind is whispery. We sometimes have clouds that take all sorts of shapes; on clear nights we have thousands and thousands of stars. The longer I look, the more I see. I could lie on the deck forever, soaking it all in. It is easy to understand why so many writers have made this neck of the woods their home. The muse is with me, too, out here on my back deck. I have had many happy places over the years but never one I actually lived in. Now, my happy place is my home and that is probably the best feeling I've had in the entire world. I'm like Dorothy: there's no place like home.

The first night in the house, Bee was so tired from all the activity that she drifted off before I could even kiss her. I crossed the room and knelt down to kiss Teeny, whose big eyes were still wide. Mama, she whispered. I can't sleep here. Her lip was quivering. In the darkness I could see she was about to cry. Why not, baby girl? Because, she started, and thought about how to formulate her words. Her voice was shaking and she reached out to me, opening her arms. Because I don't love it yet, she said quietly. She blinked, and the tears spilled over her cheeks. Aw baby, I murmured, and pulled her close. I stroked her hair, her forehead. I held her until she too began to drift off. I felt sad because I did love it and I wanted her to love it too.

Three days later, Bee was spreading her wings, zooming from one room to the next, running up the stairs to her room, lugging bags of her stuff down to the basement, frolicking on the deck and scaring off the cardinal family that visits every morning. She stopped long enough to exclaim to me, I love it here! I don't want to go back to New York ever again. Can we stay here? She flew through the house, making me think of a dog marking its territory. And Teeny, always listening, always copying her sister, threw her arms out and chimed in too. I love this house now! I don't like New York anymore. I remember thinking, well, that was easier than I thought it would be. Sure, Bee, I smiled. I love it here too. And I breathed a sigh of relief and I turned to Johnny and said, Yes! We did it! 

In the month and a half since then, I have retold that story countless times. Oh it's been great! I say to anyone who asks. Can you believe it? It only took three days to go from wide eyes in the night to never wanting to go back. The kids adjusted so quickly! Yeah, I'm traveling a ton for work but it's totally fine! Johnny loves it too! NBD!

Yeah, yeah. I know. I was silly to think it would be that easy. 

About two weeks ago the tears started. Shyness invaded. Moodiness.  At times our six year old transforms into an unfamiliar beast who storms the house with eyes that roll like a teenager's, a stomping foot, a balled fist and a sharp, whining voice like Veruca Salt's. My reaction to this is not always one I am proud of. When I am being my best self, I ask hey, what's going on with you, kiddo? in the calmest voice I can muster. I don't know, she sobs, suddenly a puddle of tears and sweaty emotion, climbing into my arms like when she was a toddler and could only get closer to me if she unzipped my skin and nestled into my bones. Mama, I am all mixed up.

I relate. I am all mixed up too, kid. We have traded an invisible life in a diverse, bustling, crowded city for life in a quiet town where everyone looks the same. We used to hurry along without stopping to look up, and now we take our time, looking around at all that space, breathing the country air. It's so green! And now I can't wait for New England in the fall. In the meantime though, I have weeds to pull, flowers to water, scraps to compost. I have furniture to assemble, paint colors to select. I am 43 years old and learning about septic systems, about tree sap, about the surprising complexity (to say nothing of the expense) of trash pickup. I stand in my driveway in the evenings and survey the property and all the things that need to be fixed and renovated and reworked and I don't have the first clue how to start. It feels like I have an awful lot to learn.

The people we have met are nice. No, better. Nice is an understatement. They are amazing. We have been embraced strong and hard by a few families with special needs kiddos, families who get it. We have had a number of play dates, ones that we actually enjoy and we come home and look at each other and say, I think I could be friends with that person. But still, I worry that they won't want to be friends with me. I am too weird, too poor, too tattooed, too progressive, too vegan, too unavailable, too employed, too sober, too uptight, too serious. And then I remember that I already have friends who love me perhaps in spite of or perhaps because of all these things and I made the choice to leave them and here I am in the most beautiful place in the world but I feel like no one here gets me. Yet. But the evil voice in my head hisses: I am not one of them. I'll never be anything but an outsider. 

We make an effort with our neighbors. We greet the letter carrier, the trash collectors, the FedEx woman, the dozens of contractors, delivery people, house cleaners we see on our street every day. We say hello to every single person we pass. We wave. We smile. We small talk until our faces crack. Oh it's really such a pleasure to meet you. Yes, the house halfway down on the right. That's the one! Awww, hiya buddy! He's so cute, what's his name? Nope, we don't have a dog. Yes, from New York. Uh-huh, we lived right in the city! In Manhattan! No, not on the Upper West Side. We lived in Harlem. Yep, you're right, it sure is changing quickly there. No, they went to private school. Oh yes, my older daughter will be starting there in the fall too! No, we haven't joined the rec center yet, but we did sign one of our girls up for piano lessons. The other one has a neurological disorder; we take her to a number of therapeutic activities after school. Yes, she uses a walker on short distances now. She's such a great kid, she sure is. Yes, I do actually work. My spouse stays home with the girls because I travel quite a bit. No, we don't have a contractor yet, but could you recommend a plumber? On and on and on and all the while my eyes are wide with house envy and I try not to react at the enormous homes with their museum-worthy landscaping, their beautiful showers that work, their finished basements, their centrally air conditioned bedrooms, their renovated kitchens and their garages and the luxury cars within. And I feel ugly all of a sudden because I feel greedy and entitled to more than I have and more than I need when having less never bothered me before. I have never been especially materialistic, I remind myself, and I remember the time not so very long ago I when I lived in a 750 square foot apartment with my spouse, my two babies and sometimes two cats, sometimes three, and I saw a meme that said "Some people are so poor, all they have is money" and I smiled to myself because I had so much love in my life that I felt it even when I was up late at night playing with a checkbook that just wouldn't fucking balance but I knew it would be okay because I was happily partnered with someone who worships the very ground I walk on and my kids are enthusiastic about every single thing and they even eat broccoli without putting up too much of a fight and I have a job I absolutely adore and I never ever thought I'd be where I am in life and who cares if my apartment is small and I ask for hand me downs and we can't afford to go on vacations because I made all this happen and I love every minute. So why am I having house envy now? Why am I scared to invite people over? Why do I think that their lives are easier or better or more loving than mine for a second? For even a single second? I don't know. But I do. 

The girls are growing tall. They are tan from beach vacations, the new neighbors' pool, weekend picnics on the deck. They are ready for school and I am dutifully adding orientations and welcome sessions and pizza parties and ice cream socials and moms nights out to my calendar. And suddenly I think about being a Massachusettsian or whatever it is and wonder, who in the world am I really?

Right now, I am not really sure. So I asked my spouse. 

You're intelligent, he said. Hard working. A dedicated, loving mother. You love to read; especially novels and memoirs. You read about real life, about people. You like thinking about other people's lives. You're extremely organized and you get a lot of stuff done very quickly. You are too tightly wound and don't laugh or relax enough. You are chatty and friendly and outoging but you snap at people when they try to talk to you when you are engrossed else. You don't sleep enough. You're passionate and caring. And you're hot and I love you like crazy.

Yeah, I said. But who am I? I asked again. I don't know what any of this means. He gave me a look and went back to his book.

I know this: I am address labels on my unread New Yorker magazines, carried everywhere I go and ultimately tossed in hotel room garbage pails because I just didn't get to them. I am brand new frequent flyer numbers and hotel rewards program usernames. I am a name on a mailing list that someone sold to someone when we bought our house; I am the piles and piles of personally addressed letters and promotional material from businesses in a 50-mile radius begging me to let them offer me a quote to fix my this, renovate my that. I am exercise gear that I bring home from a work trip still clean because I just didn't find the time to run. I am the new kid in a town that is wonderful and beautiful and welcoming but where I have no friends and where the good coffee is not walkable and where people stare at me because I am not blonde and thin and beautiful and wealthy and where I feel like an outsider. I am the dream of having nothing to do but sit on my deck and read a novel and drink tea and hug my children. I am how I think my neighbors might see me: alternately the cool, hardworking, sophisticated city slicker, maybe a little artsy, maybe a little mysterious, maybe a little edgy; alternately the weird girl from Beetlejuice or maybe Girl, Interrupted only grown up now, but still crazy. And then I am how I see myself, which is tired and fat and always struggling to do more, be more, have more. I have gone from being someone who felt confident and satisfied to someone who is just not good enough. 

So now it's late and I still have a couple emails to finish so instead of thinking about this, writing about it, or better yet just shutting all my shit down and going the fuck to sleep, I head back upstairs where I am too tired to focus well so I internet-shop for an hour or more until my spouse notices that I am missing and comes to hunt me down and drag me -- literally kicking and screaming because I'm an adult and don't I get to decide my own bedtime? -- to bed, where I act like I'm five, carrying on that I'm not tired and I just need to read this and order that and I'll go make a snack and then it's after midnight and before I know it my happy and beautiful and brave and brilliant six year old's face is in mine and she's pulling my eyelids open and Mama, can we go for a bike ride? 

Nothing really makes sense to me right now, but these bike rides are everything to me and symbolic of so much. Together, she and I can take on the unknown. Early mornings in our town are quiet and beautiful and we ride and ride and ride. It doesn't matter who we are and where we come from. In those moments, the world is ours.

Motherlode article!

Hey, y'all! My latest blog post is in the Motherlode blog of The New York Times!

Sticks and Stones

Last week, someone called Teeny the r-word. 

I wasn't there for it, but hearing about it from Johnny felt like a kick in the stomach. He was taking the girls to the Y for their swim class when it happened. On our street. On our block. Where we walk a hundred times a day. There was a group of teenagers leaving the playground that my family was walking past. It went something like this: 

"Look at that girl in the stroller. She looks fucking retarded."

"Dude, she probably is retarded, just look at her father."

"That thing behind the stroller? Oh shit, that's a man?"

"Look at that fuckin' faggot. Do you see what he's wearing?"  

Blissfully, neither child noticed anything because Johnny stayed calm and didn't acknowledge them. He just walked them past the group and to the Y. Then he called me. And a million things went through my head at once.

First, I tried to make Johnny feel better. I tried to make it seem not so bad, like it was no big deal and he should let go of his feelings. At the same time, I thought it was sort of ironic that not four hours earlier, I had posted this video on Facebook:

This video validates the power of words and why words like the r-word are never okay. (Also, I just loved Paul!) I scrolled back down my page and watched it again and I cried thinking about all the people in the world who are marginalized for some real or perceived reason and have to suffer the indignity of being disrespected or mistreated. I cried thinking about my own child who will someday have to find a way to tell mean kids and adults to go fuck themselves, that she is as capable as anyone else. I cried thinking of the times she has already said "I can't" when I encourage her to do something by herself that might be really hard. 

Then I got angry. I thought about all the times Johnny or I have been called names and we'd never spoken up for ourselves because we feared for our safety. Johnny's been called a fag a million times. Lots of times when we walk down the street together, men catcall to us "ladies." Cashiers and customer service reps call him "ma'am." I have been called a dyke. A poser, a loser. Freak. Walking past the gutter punks on the Lower East Side back in the 80s and 90s, they'd always catcall at me. "Oh my GOTH!" they'd howl. We have been teased for our clothes, our music, our hair, our shoes, his accent, my last name, my being Jewish, our economic statuses, even our veganism. At the awful summer camp I was forced to go to for ten years because my mother worked there (and therefore I went free), I got made fun of for my area code (really!) and for living in an apartment instead of a house. I was tormented when I was little just because there always has to be someone and I was an easy target. The kids made me cry and because I always cried, they tormented me more. After a while I stopped saying anything to the kids who picked on me and cried alone instead. But the pain didn't go away and by the time I was 12, I had stopped crying. I'd learned to take it out on myself. Eventually, I really believed I deserved their hate and that I deserved to be punished. The ACT UP activists were right. Silence really does = death. 

I cried because I don't want my daughters to learn that kind of self-harming behavior. I cried for my younger self, for not feeling like I'd had a support system to help me get though my adolescence and early adulthood. I experienced rage and depression and twice I attempted to take my own life because I felt so alone. I also cried because I felt compassion for those teenagers, growing up without being taught to love and respect others. I felt sad that they probably go home to families who use words like that all the time. They probably thought they were being funny or cool or maybe they just didn't think at all. I felt sorry for them because I was an unhappy teenager too and I remember very clearly what that felt like. I had hated the world. I had hated my life. I know there were things I did and said when I was with my friends that hurt people I didn't even know, maybe for no other reason than I was trying to impress some kid so they wouldn't make fun of me instead. I cried because as I remembered my own adolescent behavior, I felt shame for judging these kids -- and without ever having seen them! I made assumptions about them based on what they said and where they were and I hated them for doing something that 25 years ago I was probably doing too. 

So I told everyone I knew about what happened. I shared on Facebook. I texted friends. I told coworkers. I wanted to expose this dark thing to the light, to diminish its power in whatever way I could. Turns out everyone I know has a story. Most people I know are or feel marginalized in some way, and many in multiple ways. The world has become a much more tolerant place than it was even very recently but we have a lot of work to do before I am convinced that we are really there. This may have been the first time Teeny was called this awful name but it won't be the last. As her mom, I want to give her all the tools she will need to teach the haters a thing or two. But the truth is that I don't have them. I am still a crybaby. Words still really hurt.

I know she is loved. I know she is growing up in a family that embraces difference and diversity. I know she will have good days and bad days and that every day she will come home to parents and a sister who will listen and be there for her consistently and lovingly. But in the face of cruelty, we will have to trust her to find her own way. I wish I could package this up as a teachable moment, but it's too painful. Instead, it just has to suck. I hate that I look over my shoulder every time I pass the playground on our street, wondering if the teenagers hanging out by the baby swings are the ones that accosted my family.

We've had some really wonderful days since then. Teeny had and loved her first hippotherapy session. We went to the ballet at Lincoln Center and saw Cinderella. We played in the park in beautiful sunny weather. The girls got cookies and smoothies at Peacefood. We bought them new sneakers for spring and when they got haircuts they left with pink balloons. And yet it lingers. Its ugliness, pervasive. If I had a nickel for every time I heard as a kid that sticks and stones can break my bones but names will never hurt me, I'd be a millionaire. I didn't believe it then and I sure as hell don't believe it now. It's in the back of my mind. Etched onto the insides of my eyelids. I can hear the word in my ears when there is quiet. It makes me look at my daughter differently. It makes me whisper the question to myself: Well, is she? 

A mom I know of a kid in Teeny's class shared a story with me. She said that she overheard a little boy on the playground ask his dad "What's wrong with that girl?" The dad said, "There's nothing wrong with her. What's wrong with you?" I loved that and it stuck with me. I know there's nothing wrong with Teeny. She's perfectly right just the way she is. What could be wrong about someone who makes me -- and so many other people -- so happy? But what's wrong with me that I'm still struggling a week after this three-second incident? What am I so afraid of? I accept her and love her and get so much out of knowing her just the way she is. Why can't I accept that other people might not? I say I don't care what other people think. So why does it hurt so much? What's wrong with me?

Nothing Changes on New Year's Day (I Will Begin Again)

What? 2014, where did you go? Suddenly here we are and it’s 2015. There is so much about the past year that I want to record that I haven’t. There is even so much about the past week that I want to record. 

More than once this past week of vacation, I’ve felt like I should just follow my children around and write down every cute or funny or inspirational thing they say in a notebook that I can reread when they are grown. I wanted to write down the time a couple days ago when Johnny was leaning in to turn up the volume on The Nightmare Before Christmas. Teeny, currently obsessed with Jack Skellington, was afraid he was turning it off. “No!” she cried. “Don’t turn it off!” I was amazed. I didn’t even know she could say that. In a flash I remembered how a year ago I had created a list of all the words she could say and put it in a Google doc. I gave her teachers and therapists access so we could all update it whenever we heard new words. At the time, her words were so few and her pronunciation so poor that most people had great difficulty understanding her. That list, on a spreadsheet that included a column in which I tried to recreate the way she pronounced particular words and phrases (like “AH-waht” for “I want”) served to help everyone understand what she meant when she tried to express herself and I wasn’t there to translate. 

Now she speaks in complete sentences almost routinely. They are slow and deliberate but they are pretty accurate and, to most, pretty clear. What’s funny is that I don’t always like what she has to say! “Did you finish peeing? Wipe yourself please,” I will say, a thousand times a day, handing her a wad of toilet paper. “No. YOU wipe me,” she will retort, pointing a finger in my face. These days she so is full of “No. YOU do it” that I have just started doing things for her that I know full well she can do herself. But this is dangerous territory for a three-year-old, neurotypical or otherwise, because as soon as I do that, she will of course shriek, “No! Teeny do! Teeny do!” and collapse into hysteria if I dare to do so much as flush the toilet for her when she’s finished because she decided a nanosecond too late that she wanted to do it herself. 

She’s becoming very stubborn. Half ultra-independent (“Teeny do it self!” and “No, I want own muffin!”), half-clinging to Mama (“I want to sit lap, Mama” and “No, YOU do it, Mama.”) Always pointing. Usually polite. And for me, never resistible.  As frustrating as it was to be outside with Bee when she, at eleven months, was taking her first steps, needing a half hour to cover one city block, it is a thousand times more frustrating to be outside with a three-year-old who wants like hell to walk but simply cannot. “I want WALK!” she will shout as we are loading her up into her wheelchair or her stroller or carseat. But then as we are putting on her shoes she will declare, “No braces!” When she doesn’t wear her braces, her ankles collapse easily and even standing becomes more challenging. So we try to reason with her about that, which gets us nowhere. Sometimes she wins and sometimes she doesn’t. When she wins, we walk. But it doesn’t stop there. “Just one hand,” she will instruct me as she pulls herself to a stand, leaning on me. To step without her walker, she needs to support herself with both arms, but this is too restrictive for her liking. I automatically take both her hands in mine to help her, but she invariably yanks one hand away from me, repeating “just one hand!” When I can, I let her try this even though we both know that she can’t take a single step without us holding both of her hands. I redirect that other hand to whatever’s closest – a chair back, a table edge, a windowsill, another person’s hand. This clearly makes her feel more independent. But it would probably take us a year to walk down one block. We take one very slow step after another, correcting the way her right foot crosses her left when she isn’t paying attention and the way both feet do it when she gets physically tired. But she presses on until she can’t go any further. “Take a break,” she will announce and sit down right in the middle of wherever she is, whatever she is doing. Two minutes later she’s usually ready to try again. This kid’s spirit is almost indefatigable. (Almost. She does have moments of extreme frustration when her body can't do what her mind tries to command it to.) For me it’s an exercise in patience and self-restraint that I do mostly happily because I know this new level of determination is a sign of incredible progress. Plus there’s something about it that’s awfully endearing, even when she’s at her bossiest.

Bee is now six weeks away from her fifth birthday. She is both sassy and sweet. This week she helped us with the border of our 1,000 piece puzzle, scouring the piles for corners and edges and seeing where they fit together. She happily sorted hundreds of pieces with me by color and pattern. “Oooh, Mama!” she announced, waving a tiny piece at me. “I think I found another piece of that lady’s green dress! Look!” Later, border complete, we were chomping at the bit to get started on the rest so we set the girls up with a movie. “Are you almost done with the puzzle?” she called to us, about a half hour later. “No,” I answered. “It’s a big one. We’ll be working on it all week!” I could hear the smile in her voice when she responded, “All week? Oooh! That means more screen time for us!” 

Cute, right? But I don’t need to follow them around with a pad and paper. Kids are cute at every stage and in thirty years I will look back and some of it I will remember and some of it I won’t and that’s okay. I don’t need to post every little thing they say and do to Facebook or other social media since my friends all have adorable children or cats or dogs or hobbies or homes too. They get it. I don’t need to do anything except enjoy it. And for me, sometimes that’s really, really hard.

That’s what I sat down to write about tonight. It’s January 1, a day of resolutions and new beginnings. In the past I would resolve to get skinny. To work out every day. To make that person fall in love with me. To stop saying stupid things. You know what I mean. At some point, though, I realized that those kinds of resolutions don’t work, that despite my determination, a half hour into my starvation diet I was ready to eat the house, that I hated the gym, that I had no control over other people and that maybe it’s not that I said stupid things but that I just didn’t have the confidence to believe in myself and to own what came out of my mouth. So I stopped making resolutions and started to think about ways I could be the person I want to be. I didn’t have to wait for January 1^st to do any of that. I could do that today, like right now.  

  

This year I want to do a little of both. At the tail end of a vacation in which I was essentially forced to unplug, I realize now how much I liked it. Work was, for all intents and purposes, closed for the time I was away and I had next to no responsibilities or reasons to even check in. Cell phone service was intermittent at best, so my phone was quiet except in fits and starts, and wifi in the house we rented was weak so powering up my laptop was pretty useless. I sent texts and social media updates in a flurry of strong reception, usually when we were in town for some reason, and then had little to no way of responding to the replies back at the house. Making calls in one spot not moving at all lest the conversation dwindle into “what?? You’re breaking up. What?!?” got tiresome and after a day or so I gave up on emails altogether. But you know, a girl could get used to that. I found myself spending the week with my family. I mean, with. I wasn’t multitasking. I wasn’t in a million different places while sitting on the couch with my kids. I wasn’t constantly thinking about what I had going on at work that wasn’t getting done or that I had to email so-and-so before falling asleep or what I was going to make for brunch when company comes next week or the bills that needed to get paid or that the cats didn’t get fed yet or that what Teeny just said would make a cute Facebook update. I was there. I was here:

One morning Bee woke me up early. Teeny and Johnny were both still asleep so we pulled on our coats and hats and boots and went for a walk in the woods. We talked about metta – the Buddhist concept of lovingkindness – and, stretching our arms out, we practiced throwing some love out into the universe. It was a pretty sweet moment for me, seeing who came to mind for her as we named many people and animals we loved and for whom we wished happiness, health and peace. When we came back to the house, I took out the box of items I have for when I meditate and I explained to her what they were. I showed her my little meditating Buddha statue, the lotus candle holder, the mala beads. She loved my Tibetan singing bowl and she sounded it several times before setting the timer. She settled in next to me and tried to just breathe. She was fidgety, so we tried putting our fingers on the mala beads. That worked for a little while. But after three minutes I could see her mind beginning to wander, so I let her sound the bowl again and we put everything away. Honestly, I wasn’t sure what she really learned, if anything. After all, she is only four. But she talked about that experience quite a bit and a day or two later she asked if we could light the flower candle again and sit with the Buddha and the beads. I was pretty surprised, and happy. And today on a walk in town, we stopped in one of those hippy-dippy tourist-trappy stores for rich white ladies trying to get in touch with themselves, full of overpriced jewelry and self-help books where everything is breakable, nothing is kid-friendly and where they play Enya and burn incense all day long. “Look!” she shrieked, and tore into the store, the door's chimes tinkling as she went in. A hundred disapproving eyes were instantly on us. Disregarding them, I looked. And following her gaze, I smiled. “What are those, Bee?” “They’re Buddhas, mama,” she answered proudly, pointing. They were!

Maybe she will retain nothing from those three minutes, but they were among the most important minutes for me of this whole week. I felt truly present. I was there. With my kid. It didn’t matter to me what she took from it. It didn’t matter whether she was really meditating or just trying to sit still because I asked her to or if she understood that by sending love out into the world the way we did, we really did make the world a better place. It was a moment we had together and it was fun for both of us. We were talking and we were listening to each other. It was only a few minutes, but they were uninterrupted minutes for a mama and her girl and they meant a lot to me. For a moment I was, as a friend of mine likes to say, where my feet were. That’s presence.

I was fully present in other ways this week. With the phones taking a backseat, I noticed that we talked more. Johnny and I completed our 1,000 piece puzzle working together over three awesome, engrossing evenings. We had friends join us for two days and we all sat around the table and talked and took turns playing with the kids. 

We walked in the woods behind the house, jumping on logs and inspecting the stream and the ice forming at its edges. “Look at that ice! It’s freezing over! I think Elsa has been here, don’t you, Mama?” Bee pontificated more than once. 

I let Johnny sleep in one morning and he let me, too. I had a little time to myself when I needed it and so did he. I brought a new cookbook with me and together he and I picked out new recipes to try. I dutifully made a shopping list two pages long with all the ingredients I would need to make those several very complex dishes. Our afternoon shopping trip outing -- one I was really looking forward to -- would involve a couple of different stops: at the supermarket, a gourmet grocer and the food co-op. We were thirty miles from the house when I realized I had forgotten it. I was devastated and the afternoon I was so excited about crumpled before me. But I realized I had a choice about how to behave. I decided to enlist my family's help to find everything I needed, and in the end we had great fun doing our food shopping together. And because I had been so involved in what I was doing, because I was so committed to creating these new dishes and because I had been so fully present when I made the list, somehow, I remembered every single item except one, and that one was easily substituted by something we already had. I couldn’t believe it.

Today I noticed that after five minutes walking in the woods with me, Bee’s conversation shifted from Elsa and toys and stuff in general to exercise, air, trees and love. This evening before dinner we walked the half mile to the end of our road and back, and we discussed the week we’d had and what we liked best. We talked about who and what was waiting for us at home, what we had coming up in the next few days. As we walked, she took my hand and said “I really like our house, Mama.” Which one? I asked her. This house? Or our apartment at home? “Both!” she said, smiling. “They’re cozy. Can we skip now?”  So we skipped the rest of the way down the hill holding hands to keep our fingers warm. 

This year I want more moments like that. So my resolution is to be more present. That’s vague and it’s meant to be. Maybe it means unplugging a little more, so that I unlearn the this-is-a-Facebook-moment-wait-where's-my-phone thought that I think at least a dozen times a day. Maybe it means doing one thing at a time and letting go of the notion that I am a good multitasker. Maybe it means putting myself first more. Maybe it's about worrying less and asking for help more. Spending more time listening. Meditating. Writing. Reading. Exercising regularly in ways I really like because I love my body and I love to be outside. Doing the things I love with the people I love and for the people I love. Maybe it's a little of everything. 

And yet as I type those words, my brain is already working against me. “You should have your resolution be clearer so you can hold yourself accountable,” it says. "That's what it takes to get things done." Maybe that's true for short term goals, but I want to change myself in this way for good. But my brain wants my New Year’s resolutions to sounds like this: You should read 50 books this year. You should work out six times a week. You should sleep at least eight hours a night. You should see friends once a month, balance your checkbook twice a week, eat only this number of calories every day. You should meditate once a day for at least 20 minutes a day. Do a blog post once a week. Read a book on active listening. Take up ceramics. Go back to school. Put the phone on airplane mode for two hours a day. My brain is yelling at me. “Those are all loving things! Accountability is key! Do them all and do them all right!” 

Maybe “be more present” means nothing more than that I stop telling myself all the things I should do and that I am a failure if I don’t do it perfectly. My brain wants to quantify everything as though it’s a measure of accomplishment – or more like a measure of my failure since there is no way I can hold myself accountable to that much. My brain challenges me: if you can do all of that, why can't you do more? But if you know you can't do it all, then why even try? Because clearly you’re awful at everything and you can’t get anything right. 

I don't want to hear that talk anymore. If I'm so busy crossing stuff off my list, am I really enjoying any of it? I do a lot of those things a lot of the time already. Isn’t that cause for celebration? And wouldn’t it be something if I could let myself off the hook for not being perfect and savor the truth of the many the things I do mostly right most of the time? 

I am so controlled by the clock, by the Outlook calendar, by timers, alarms, reminders and confirmation calls. I look at a clock to know when to eat, how long to run, where to be, how to get there, what to wear, whom to contact. Some of it is unavoidable, but the truth is that I can’t remember the last time I tried listening to my body, looking out the window at nature, or looking at the expressions on my children’s faces to make the decisions I have been allowing a beep or a ding to make for me. I am tired of being so overscheduled that I can’t use the present moment to help me determine whether tonight is a good night to read one extra chapter at bedtime because I am instead too busy thinking of all the things that might go wrong if they are up ten minutes later and all the things I still have to do and oh yeah we still have to water the plants and when will we be able to afford bunk beds for the girls and is that my phone ringing and goddamn it I forgot to put the wash in the dryer and I still have that thing to do for work so these kids have to get to sleep now so I can make some tea and fire up the laptop, and then I’m so lost in thought that I haven’t heard a word the girls have said and I completely missed bedtime anyway even though I was sitting right there.

I am not naive enough to say that this all stops today, New Year’s Day. But I can chip away at it. Over the past week I have felt a new love for my spouse and a genuine appreciation for the things we have in common – shared interests like music, certain kinds of food, doing puzzles, walking in the woods, stopping for coffee -- and a real respect for our differences too. We listened a little better to each other this week and we helped each other more. Our voices stayed a little lower and we laughed more than usual. And my patience with the girls lasted longer than usual too, and that was thanks to being present. So what if Teeny was always insisting on being in my lap or on my hip? Why should that be annoying? So what if she’s getting heavy and I can’t check my email while I'm holding her? It was an opportunity to smell her hair, sneak a kiss on her cheek, give her a squeeze. So what if Johnny was sitting reading his book instead of helping me in the kitchen? Preparing a meal is meditative for me, so how much help did I really need? And besides, isn’t he on vacation too? I loved seeing him engrossed in a book and when I really needed his help, I got to practice asking for it. So what if Bee wanted to play hide and seek, choosing the same hiding spot over and over and clearly not understanding the point of the game as I knew it. “I’m hiding in the closet, Mama!” she said every single time, giggling and hopping up and down like mad whenever she heard me come near. This gave me a chance to get creative. “I’m looking in the cabinet, and she’s not in there! Hmmmm… no Bee in the dresser drawers! Where could she be this time?” And this had a real snowball effect: I snuggled with Johnny and the girls a little bit more than usual, I offered to read to them a little more, I hung out in the bathroom longer than I usually do while Teeny splashed in the bath busily pouring water in and out of an empty bottle of shower gel and I spent a lot longer preparing new, interesting, loving and healthful meals for our family. These are things that I do already, but this week I did them a little bit more and with a lot more love, because I was really there for it all, soaking it up and feeling the effects resonate in my body, my mind and my heart.  

So here’s to another imperfect year. But maybe a just little bit less imperfect, with me being a little more present.

50 things I Love About Teeny

Last week was the New York City marathon. We live right on the course towards the end, so every year we watch as much of it as we can. This year was the first year Teeny could actually watch with us and follow along. It was a really cold morning, so we bundled up to head out early. As we waited for the elites, Teeny sat in her wheelchair and clapped for the para-athletes soaring by in wheelchairs of all shapes and sizes. Because it was so early in the day and it was very, very windy, we were among the few out there watching. There was no music, no party, no masses of people dancing and screaming and holding signs like there would be in another hour or two. It was an oddly melancholy moment. I felt a little like we were in a Giorgio DeChirico painting, standing there alone on the eerily empty, cold and windy corner of a street set up for a much bigger crowd. Most of the runners wouldn't see this particular intersection for another two hours or more, yet the para-athletes were zooming along one at a time, accompanied by some of the fastest cyclists I've ever seen. I stood next to Teeny, pointing out the different kinds of wheelchairs as they passed us. I explained to her what they were doing. We cheered and clapped and I wondered vaguely if any of them noticed her. I cried as I watched her watch them -- I couldn't help it. At mile 21, many of them looked very tired but they all had that determined look I know so well. It's the expression I see on Teeny's face every single day. 

Maybe Teeny will grow up to be a para-athlete like the ones we saw that day and maybe she won't. Maybe she will get a PhD or maybe a GED or maybe she will be happy well into adulthood just singing her ABCs. Whatever the case, a good friend said today that she will definitely surprise us. And it's true. She already has. 

The day we got her MRI report I thought my life was over. Two years almost to the day, I now know it's not about me. It's all about her. And my life is far from over. It's so much better, and that's so much because of her.

So since internet lists are all the rage lately, here are 50 things I love about Teeny today:

50. She loves the soundtrack to The Nightmare Before Christmas, which has been one of my favorites since the movie was in the theaters ages ago.

49. How she says "MORE AH-WEEN! MORE JACK! I want JACK!" when it's over. (She seems to speak in all caps quite often.)
48. She wiggles her butt when she's dancing.

47. The pure joy she finds in so many things in life.
46. She is able to use language to do more than express a need or a want. For example, when you call her name, she often answers with a deadpan "what," like a totally typical teenager.

45. Putting her on and taking her off the school bus is a family affair we all have come to love.

44. How she sings the ABCs and counts on her fingers to ten.

43. Her adorable little lisp.

42. She gives high-fives.

41. The way she has decided to call Johnny "dada" even though we all call him Daddy.

40. Her big round butt that is the only physical feature of mine she seems to have inherited and how adorable it looks in her new Hello Kitty or My Little Pony underwear.

39. She doesn't mind long car rides.

38. How she claps and shouts "I PEED!" when she uses the potty.

37. She uses the potty about 75% of the time now. We thought we might be changing diapers forever.
36. Listening to her repeat everything anyone says to her and knowing she's trying her hardest to understand and contribute.
35. Her big beautiful eyes.

34. Snuggling with her, breathing her in and having her ask me for more hugs and kisses, most of which she now plants squarely and very wetly right on my lips.
33. Her determination. I've never seen anything like it.

32. She's a fairly adventurous eater and will try almost anything at least once.

31. She hugs her baby dolls and makes them sleep, cry, eat and walk.

30. Her funny pronunciation of everything.
29. The way she says "I love you... too!"
28. She brushes her own teeth.

27. How she always wants to do everything by herself.
26. Except when she doesn't. "No. Mama do it!"
25. She has a crazy sweet tooth, especially for vegan chocolate chips, chocolate chip cookies from Whole Foods and any cupcakes I make.

24. How she refers to herself almost always in the third person.
23. She says "Easy, Mama!" and "Be nice!" when I get cranky.
22. She loves her adaptive ballet class and begs to wear her ballet shoes all the time.

21. How she turns the pages of books when we read to her.

20. Her little index finger, always pointing at something.

19. The way she sleeps, rolled in a ball, butt in the air.

18. Kissing her soft skin all over.

17. Watching her learn.

16. She's becoming very girly and often insists on wearing my necklace or bracelet.

15. How she says her own name.

14. She plays her dada's guitar.

13. She says hello and goodbye in such earnest that you know she's genuinely happy to see you come and sad to see you go.
12. She likes to wear costumes and play dress-up.

11. How much she charms everyone who meets her.

10. Kisses, band-aids and the little icepack shaped like a ladybug make every boo-boo better. And how she says "I'm okay!" whenever she tumbles because she knows we all worry she's going to get really hurt.

9. She loves Daniel Tiger, Piggie, Winnie the Pooh, Ponyo and many other endearingly sweet characters. 

8. She idolizes her sister.

7. She helps take out the garbage.

6. She likes to have her nails painted.

5. How badly she wants to walk and how hard she works at cruising, climbing and taking steps every single day.

4. She has surpassed every expectation any of her doctors or therapists have ever had.

3. I watched her come out of my body when I gave birth to her at home and I was the first person to hold her and kiss her.

2. Her amazing manners: she says please and thank you without being asked.
1. She gives the best hugs of anyone I have ever met.

FOR TEENY, WHO HAS PLENTY OF TIME

To my beautiful, courageous, determined Teeny on your third birthday:

This week I spent some time researching elementary schools for you. I know you are just starting at your current school, but you know I'm a planner and I like to do my homework. It was ultimately an exercise in futility, but a happy one. I realized I just couldn't know how much you will grow and where you will be in two years. You could be anywhere, doing anything! Today in the hallway at your school, someone I didn't know stopped me to tell me how smart you are. "You know," she began, while I wondered who she was and how she knew you, "she's bright and engaged and cognitively right where she's supposed to be," she said. "I can tell. She just needs a little help is all." I beamed. Because really, who doesn't need a little help? Reading about schools, I tried to imagine you at five or six. I pictured you in elementary school, learning to read. Doing math. Studying history. Making shoebox dioramas. Walking. Baking cookies with your sister and me. Whatever kids do. Someday, you will do all those things, and more. I know it.

Two years ago Daddy and I were just learning about your neurology. We were scared and sad and we just didn't know what it was all going to mean for you and for us. But you were unfazed. You did what no one thought you could do: everything. You rolled over. You sat up. You huffed and you puffed and you pulled yourself to a stand. You said Mama. Dada. Bee. And now, on your third birthday, you're in school. People ask you how old you are and you shout "three!" You count, you sing the ABCs. You like to do everything yourself. "I do it!" you say a thousand times a day. You climb all over everything, trying your best to walk. One day, you will. You speak in sentences and you always say please and thank you. You ask questions that start with what and why. You laugh with us, chiding "be nice!" when we run out of patience or get silly. You're constantly announcing "have to pee!" and every time, we all stop what we're doing and hurry you to the potty. Some of the time you don't even have to go. You just like to sit there with us and have us read potty books to you. You smile wide and hand me Time to Pee or Everyone Poops and I know I've been had. But you're having fun! Nowadays, your language expresses more than just wants and needs. We hear you interject "oh wow!" and "awww, silly Mama!" and "oh no!" into conversations and we know that you're listening and we know that you get it.

Daddy and I stayed up late last night, baking cookies and cupcakes for your school birthday party, talking about how magical you are. You are our guide, our teacher, our shining star. Your daddy always says that you might look like him but you have my determination. I am not sure that's true. Yes, I'm a hard worker and I have tenacity. Just like you. Yes, I get things done. Just like you. He may never tell you this, but your daddy is a tough cookie too. He is a survivor. He's been through more adversity than most people and he has somehow found the will to turn his challenges into opportunities. Opportunities to learn, to change, to live his life to the fullest. He keeps going and keeps growing.  Just like you. So it's in your blood; it's your nature to fight. But you have a spirit that is unique. You're a fighter, yes, but you don't flail. You just do. Sometimes your life is hard. Sometimes it's really, really hard. But this is the only life you know. You are just you -- and you love being you.

Today you are so in love with life. From the moment you wake up until the moment you conk out at night, your life is full and wondrous. Your eyes widen and you gasp with excitement a hundred times a day. You worship your big sister. You love cupcakes. The potty. Your My Little Pony collection. Queen Elsa. Singing and dancing. Books. Hugs and kisses and nibbles. Mama. The school bus, which you look forward to with an impatience I just don't understand. You love school, the park, the pool at the Y, taking baths, even pushing your wheelchair. You just started adaptive ballet and you can't get enough of your fancy tutu and ballet shoes. You are beloved by so many. Never in my life did I think we would have such a well-attended birthday party for a three-year-old. People came in hordes: your first teacher, your old school's director, your past therapists, your family, your friends, and a lot of people who just love you to pieces. No one could get enough of you and you loved being passed from one person to the next, soaking up the attention. You haven't even been at school for a month, and everyone knows your name. "Oh, you're Teeny's mom?" someone will exclaim without me even opening my mouth. "She's the cutest thing ever!" they will gush, and share some sweet anecdote about you pushing the elevator button every morning or getting people's names right by the third day of school or getting an ice pack after bumping your head and announcing that you're all better.  "She's already the mayor of the school," someone else pronounced, in the second week of September when you'd been there just over a week. People adore you. Simply put, you sparkle.

This week someone explained to me that there is a correlation between the cultivation of gratitude and the ability to problem solve. Apparently both concepts live in the same area of the brain. Until you came, I lived my life feeling very entitled and angry. I deserved this, I was owed that. I worked hard for things and felt robbed when I didn't get them. It never occurred to me that I might already have everything I needed and more. Right around the time that you came, I started to understand how fortunate I was. I am married to the love of my life! I am the mother of two incredible children! I have the best job in the world! I have so many wonderful people in my life! And slowly, the anger and resentment began to fade and it was replaced with a willingness to share my feelings, ask for help and embrace the abundance of love and support that began to come our way. And I realized there was a lot I could do to help get you what you needed, so as I have written about time and time again, I got busy.

Maybe I will always be sad that you were not given the same chance that your sister got. Maybe I will never understand why or how it happened. Maybe I will always be tired, maybe the list of calls to make, appointments to schedule, and bills to pay will never end. But I'm not sure any of that matters anymore. I am so proud to be your mama. I can't think of anywhere else I would rather be in the world than right beside you. I am so grateful for you -- you, exactly the way you are. And we have so much time. There is no rush. You will get there when you get there and you are living every moment in the fullest color. You are like Milo of The Phantom Tollbooth, my favorite character in my favorite book. His adventure began with a gift and a note: FOR MILO, WHO HAS PLENTY OF TIME. As he went on his quest to rescue the princesses of Sweet Rhyme and Pure Reason, everyone he met along the way said there was one very important thing about it that they couldn't tell him until he got back. When he finally returned safely, there was a huge celebration in all the land. The kings quietly reminded him of what they'd said at the very beginning.

"I remember," said Milo eagerly. "Tell me now."
"It was impossible," said the king, looking at the Mathemagician.
"Completely impossible," said the Mathemagician, looking at the king.
"Yes indeed," they repeated together; "but if we'd told you then, you might not have gone--and, as you've discovered, so many things are possible just as long as you don't know they're impossible."

So, happy third birthday to you, my beautiful daughter, my love, my light, my inspiration. May you have plenty of time. And may your life be full of possible.

I love you.
Mama