Happy birthday, sweet girl

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Dear Paige,

Yesterday, you turned 3.

Today, you climbed under the covers next to me like you do every morning once the sun is up and you know I won’t send you back to your own bed. You snuggled in, curling your legs into my tummy, digging your feet into my skin, as if that gets you even closer.

You laid there with your big eyes open, just looking at me, like usual. I steal glances at you sometimes, at your soft, milky skin, at those eyelashes, those shiny eyes. I think how much I love you, even when it’s 6 a.m.

After a few minutes today, your little voice woke me.

“Mom? Am I still 3?”

I smiled, through the sleep. “Yeah, baby, you’re 3. There’s no going back now.”

The past two days have been emotional. I’ve found myself looking at old pictures, baby pictures of my babies who are no longer babies. It’s the ultimate cliche, but where does the time go? How do we all grow up so fast? How do we slow it down?

You came into my life two weeks early, sweet girl, amidst a series of events that are barely even believable. On your brother’s fourth birthday, our cat was attacked by a neighbor’s dog. I hopped a chain link fence to try to save her. Somehow, I freed her from the dog’s jaws, climbed back over the fence with my dying cat and put her gently in the passenger seat of my car.

At the emergency vet, I must have been a sight to see. Full-term pregnant woman with cat blood on her shirt, under her nails, everywhere.

Rye’s birthday party was that afternoon, and that night, at 3 a.m., I knew you were about to make your entrance. That wasn’t just any back pain that woke me up.

That morning, May 18, 2009, the cat had to be transported from one vet to another and your brother, bless him, started throwing up. Grandma drove in from out of town to watch him, so I could go to the hospital and have a baby.

So I could have you.

I can’t believe that was three years ago.

I can’t believe the little girl you have become. I can’t believe how amazing you are.

Three going on at least six, you are wise beyond your years. You are kind and empathetic and concerned and vivacious and full of life and so, so smart.

You are busy all the time.

You love purses, bags, anything you can put other things in. You go shopping to buy us bananas, ice cream and Dora Band-Aids.

This week, in the car, you took a pad of sticky notes and wrote directions on them. Scribbles that told us which way to turn to get to the store or home. “You go south and then left. OK, Mom?” You lined up those sticky notes on your car door. You gave each of the rest of us one of our own.

You text people. You talk on the phone. You admonish your babies (“I am so disappointed in you. Listen to me.”)

You tell stories – creative, imaginative stories. You sing songs. You know every word to many of Kyle’s songs. Last week, at his show, you sang unabashedly along, dancing, in your own innocent world. Two women at the table behind me said, “She is so cute! How does she know all the words?!”

You are precociously adorable.

You are a chatterbox who loves making us happy. Lately, you ask for a long pony, rather than one pulled into a bun. You like your toenails painted like mine. You like to run and tumble with your brother. You like to play guitars with Kyle.

You like to help with everything.

Lately, you have make-believe friends. Their names are foreign-sounding: “Doh-dio, Wishka and Boopie.” Your imagination is unstoppable.

You are unstoppable, strong, brave.

I am so proud of you.

You make me remember how much hope there is in the world, how much promise there is of what’s to come, how good we all have it already. With you, we can conquer anything.

Your smile rights every wrong (or at least lessens the blow). That laugh is infectious. Those eyes light up the dark.

What a wild ride, raising you.

Happy birthday, baby.

I love you so much. Forever.

Mom

Today, you are 7

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Dear Rye,

Today, you are 7.

Holy, moly, cow. You are 7.

At 1:59 a.m. seven years ago, you finally entered this world. I was 25 and naive. Giving birth was nothing I could have prepared for. I remember saying, in the early hours of the morning on your birth day long ago, that I’d rather run two marathons back to back then ever do that again.

Ha. I was nothing if I wasn’t dramatic.

But I was in love. With a sweet baby boy. And you were instantly worth every second of pain, every millisecond of effort. I’d had a baby.

And you were the most beautiful, most precious thing I’d ever seen.

My life changed forever that day. Of course it did. I cannot imagine who I would be without you.

In as many ways as you are still my beautiful baby who needs his mom, you are also my too-grown-up adolescent with his own opinions, his own sense of humor, his own style and his own fears.

You are amazing.

You are sensitive and passionate and quiet and determined. You are still figuring this world out (me, too), and you handle yourself with a quiet serenity I wish I had. You think before you speak and I am so proud of the mature child you have become.

The changes you’ve handled so far in your life have been many. And while I wish our path would have been easier, I cannot tell you how proud I am of you for waking up every morning, getting dressed and getting on with this life with your head held high, with that quiet look in your eye that tells me, “Mom, we’re going to be OK.”

I know you carry a lot on the inside. I know you worry. I know sometimes your feelings get hurt. I know sometimes the anger burns.

But listen to me, babe: We are OK. Our path now is paved. And we’re headed up to the hills where the skies are clear and the air is crisp and where little boys can worry a little less about the weight of the grown-up world and just be … little boys.

Over the years, as I’ve tucked you in and said goodnight, I’ve whispered these words to you: “You know how much I love you? You are my sweet, smart, strong, special boy. I’m always here for you. I love you forever.”

And then I say sweet dreams and turn off the light. You used to go straight to sleep. Now, because you’re no longer a baby or a toddler or a preschooler, you use your iPod. You play games and listen to songs I don’t even know. You get up and use the restroom on your own. You come out and put your glass of water by the kitchen sink. You act … grown-up.

There’s no question you are your own thinking, feeling, breathing human being with your own tastes, your own humor, your own style. (Those Baby Gap hoodies I dressed you in as a toddler wouldn’t make the cut anymore. I know.). You have me “do” your hair in the morning before school.

Last night, I read your sister a book that I used to read over and over to little-boy you. You walked in at the part you used to say with me. As I read the lines of “The Apple Pie Tree” I could hear so-much-smaller you saying them with me and almost, I remembered what it was like to have you on my lap instead, to steal kisses on your cheek, to catch a whiff of your hair, to feel what it’s like to have a son to hold onto. That is a memory I will always keep.

Thank you for being sweet, strong, smart, brave, special you.

Happy 7th birthday, baby.

I love you forever, my special boy.

Mom

Where that strength lies

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What would we do if we lost our babies?

Last week, we went to Arches where the wind has blown the land into unearth-like formations of red rock. Literal arches of rock paint the sky, as you walk along, feeling small, remembering your place in the world. Liking it all.

We took the kids with us, our beautiful babies, who are now somehow almost 7 and 3 years old, on this first venture ever into the national park just north of our new home.  

It was a 3-mile roundtrip hike to Delicate Arch, that image you’ve seen on postcards and websites and after any Google search for “Moab.” 

The kids can do it. Yes. Let’s go.

And we set off, stopping to look at petroglyphs just off the trail, the little girl and I falling just slightly behind. 

“I can do this myself,” she kept saying, so proud lately of her independence, even though she’s always been this way. She’d smile that confident, wide grin at me, her eyes a reflection of my own, her arms swinging as we walked along.

About a half mile in, the terrain got steeper and the trail a bit more narrow. The terrain was rocky, sort of like gravel back home, only mixed with fine red sand. 

The little girl slipped. 

I lunged to catch her, to stop her from tumbling right over the edge of the trail, which dropped at least 5 or 6 feet to our right. My right arm scooped her up, and she was fine, though we were both on the dirt floor now and my knee was bleeding.

I bit back tears, and I heard my husband say, “What’s going on back here?” as he doubled back to see why we were sitting on the trail instead of walking. 

I tried to tell him, to somehow paint the picture of what had happened, what could have happened, but I knew I couldn’t really articulate it. I knew I couldn’t make him feel that instant pit in my stomach, that sudden shot of adrenaline, that surge of relief, that comfort of her body in my arm, that way I felt all those emotions over about 8 seconds.

It’s in instances like these that I’m reminded of the tale of the woman whose child is trapped under a car. And she simply lifts it up.

Not that I did anything of the sort, not that the little girl was even in real danger, but it’s the split-second reaction of a mother, any mother, any parent, to help her child avoid any physical harm.

So we picked ourselves up and carried on. The little girl rode on my back up the steep Navajo sandstone. Then her stepdad held her around the much more precarious final curve and up to the spectacular arch (she got a ride in his arms all the way back down, too, I might add). 

The drop-offs from the cliff’s edge really were drastic; they really were dangerous. But there was enough room to sit and have a snack and take photos and marvel at the arch away from the edge, without much worry. 

Still, I kept telling her: “Sit down. On your bottom. Right now. Sit.”

Because there’s just no second chances in cases like that.

Back home, there is a woman whose daughter is dying. Dying. The family has chosen in-home hospice care for their little girl as she lives out her last days. 

I’ve been following her story on Facebook. Yesterday’s updates were heartbreakingly sad. 

I don’t even know that family. I just know of them, I know their story. I know they have a second child with the same awful disease their first is dying from.

And I can’t help but wonder how you ever move on. How do you say goodbye to your children? 

I do not pretend to know that answer or where that strength lies, and I pray to the powers of the mighty universe I never have to know that kind of resilience. Please, I do not ever want that kind of strength. 

I guess maybe the answer is courage. You just wake up in the morning because the day comes up whether you want it to or not and you get dressed. And you go on.

And you live, as brave as you can. With hope and faith and the promise of better days, even if the bend is far, far ahead.

Amy Price, I’m asking the universe to pull you through.

Sitting on a thrift store couch

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I’ve run this route out our front door down Spanish Valley Road about six times.

I’ve been waking with the day, around 5:45, to pull on my shorts and my shoes and head out. I sleepily slide the iPod on and earbuds in and step out onto the peeling wooden porch. This morning, I tried listening to something different, something old, something I used to love. But Ben Kweller sounded like nothing but noise today, an irritation more than a distraction. I turned it off and went back to the playlist I’ve listened to on every solo morning run since I’ve been here.

There’s something to be said for familiarity.

We are here in this desert, and it’s beautiful. The sunshine is brighter, the air is crisper and more than anything else the landscape is spectacular. I run toward the Manti La Sals to the south. I have this idea that if I could just keep going, I’d reach them. Someday, of course, I would, but I’m training for a half, not a full, and today isn’t the day.

To the west is what I think is called the Moab Rim, which reminds me of the Bookcliffs back in Grand Junction, those searing, ridged rocks that dare you to tackle their steep rise. I climbed them once, one foot in front of the other up that steep, narrow spine. I was 23 and had no idea who I was or what I wanted. My son, my grown-up, sensitive little boy, wants to climb Moab’s version. I looked at them as we drove past, on our way to school, and had no idea where we’d even begin, if there was a trail or if we’d have to make our own or if we’d be foolish to even try that hike.

“Sure, we can, babe,” I said.

And somehow, because he wants to, we’ll figure out how to try.

To the east along the road I run is a Navajo sandstone wall, bubbly with texture. I pass horses and cows and a hodgepodge of modular homes and “ranchettes” with pickup trucks and dogs tied up in front yards.

And those La Sals loom in the background.

One of my favorite things here is the time of day when the light changes, the way the light illuminates only the tops of all these geographic wonders, in the early morning as the sun rises and in the evening, as the sun sets.

We sure don’t have views like this back home.

As I ran today, I thought about that word. Both my husband and I have referred to Omaha as home. I wonder how long we’ll say that.

I’ve been wondering when home starts to feel like where you are, instead of where you were.

How does that transition happen and can we speed it along?

What is the trick to adjusting to a new space with people you don’t know, streets you don’t recognize, routines you don’t have?

I like Moab – for the unparalleled beauty, for the desert heat, for the dry air, for the blonde horse at the house next door, for how much my husband feels connected to this land.

But it doesn’t, yet, feel like home. In the quiet space of my mind, where my truth teller sings, I miss so much about “home.” Not so much the place but the people and the routine.

My son’s former teacher e-mailed a few days ago. Many of the kids have been saying how much they miss Rye, she wrote. I had to turn my attention to something else – to stop from crying right there at my desk in my big, lonely office.

Yet, when I dropped him off at school two days ago, his new school, I smiled as I drove away because he was walking in with a friend. They were talking, and my little boy was smiling.

Change has never been easy. I can be the bravest woman in the world, game face permanently on, and still not be comfortable with everything that’s new. Even if I’m comfortable, I can still be skeptical.

Even if I’m happy (I am), even if I finally have the love I’ve always wanted (I do), even if my beautiful family is always there at the end of every day (they are), I still have that space in my heart that misses home. I miss my friends and my family.

And I long for the day – hopefully not too far off – when I feel peace here. When I feel like I’m home, not just the sense of home I already feel with my husband, but the bigger sense of the word – the all-encompassing, this-is-where-you-belong peace.

Have a great weekend, friends. Check out Ben Gibbard:

“You Remind Me of Home” 

Here in this desert

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Photo by Kyle Harvey

We live in the desert and it’s beautiful.

Last night, the moon shone through our bedroom window and I imagined it made us safe, that the man in the moon of our childhoods existed and watched down on us as we slept, dreaming dreams of islands and babies and loves and futures together.

It was bright and I pretended it made our skin look creamier, milky with innocence and passion and dreams, as I curled myself into the curve of my husband, his back my shield from the anxiety that sometimes comes.

We slept and tossed and rested and woke with the sun, my son, who got up when the day did.

The routine isn’t the same yet, for anyone. My babies are happy. I see it in their smiles, hear it in their laughs, know it when they skip down the hall or curl up in the reading chair with a DVD.  Yesterday was different than before. They are connected to their stepfather, who cares for them during the day, who plays with them and makes them swings and sings them songs on his guitar, who has a way with them now that I don’t.

I am grateful for this connection. I am happy they are loved and safe and content and silly and full of the life we should all feel.

I am adjusting to not being as integral a part of that web of family we have. I am getting to know my role as newspaper editor, working mom in the true sense, not the privileged sense I had for the past two years where I worked full-time but picked up my kids from school every day at 3:30. I am getting over myself, my maternal longing to always be there, to take care of everything not just for my babies but for my husband, who doesn’t need me to do those things like make the bed or cover him up because he’s not cold or take the trash out the morning before it has to be set out anyway just because he mentioned it.

I am adjusting to this new me.

We are adjusting to this new life that is miraculously beautiful, full of experiences and moments and just getting by and holy-cow-this-is-my-life and anticipation for what’s to come, the show three weeks from now, the Easter Egg hunt this Saturday, the swim lessons that start Monday, the newspaper that publishes on the 18th, the everything else.

Here in this desert where love blossoms freely.

The bends of this life

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“Just around the bend there is a life like you could never imagine.”

I think I’m here, brave girls.

Around the bend.

In this life I didn’t know existed.

I married the love of my life on Sunday, March 11. It rained and we had to change some plans, but it was perfect. Lovely. Couldn’t-have-asked-for-anything-more-magical wonderful. Nicole Ferguson took amazing photos. We laughed and cried and hugged and felt happy.

And then, five days later, we loaded up all our stuff and moved.

Far away. Out of the Midwest and into a new timezone, new area code. New town. New house.

New life.

It is beautiful. Everywhere we look. At our fingertips are outdoor adventures that will probably never end. Outside our front door (and our back) are amazing natural landscapes we never could have imagined back home. Our neighbors even have horses.

Kyle and I went for a hike the other night and found ourselves in backcountry that felt reserved just for us. In the two hours we spent walking, we saw one other person, a lone mountain bike rider. We crossed streams. We looked up and ahead in a feeble attempt to somehow try to take it all in. We said, “We live here.”

It’s awesome. It’s spectacular, in many ways.

It really is.

I’m still trying to wrap my head around it all, to let my heart adjust to this new space, this new routine, this new way of doing things. The kids came back today – they’d spent the week with their dad. Now, finally, I feel like I can fully set about giving this new life 100 percent.

Thank goodness we get to keep the things that matter most close to us, as we navigate the bends of this life. My husband, my kids … if all is right with our little family unit, I know we can do anything.

I know now more than ever that the rock star is right: We will always be OK.

***

Thanks to an amazingly thoughtful, spot-on wedding gift, I’ve been listening to this on vinyl (and when I’m not listening to it, it’s in my head):

“Holocene” by Bon Iver

Thank you, everyone, who’s asked about us on Facebook or elsewhere. I’ve been trying to get my feet under me before offering an update. The new job starts Monday.

Onward.

Where the happily ever after begins

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So sometimes that dark cloud just disappears.

You know the one? That low-lying thunder cloud that for so long just seemed to hang around, out there on your horizon, dirtying up the view?

That one that even when it gave way to the sun every now and then always came back. Same spot. Just sort of there, in the way of all that sun, all those rainbows, all that everything else.

Well. It’s gone.

Maybe I just had to wait long enough. Maybe I had to try hard enough. Maybe I simply had to let my life unfold as it should.

Either way.

That cloud’s been replaced.

I got a job.

A really exciting job in a really amazing place doing what I want to be doing: Writing, editing, managing. I start in two weeks.

Much more important than that, though: I’m getting married. This weekend. To the most wonderful man I’ve ever met.

To my best friend, my best time, my true love, my rock, my world.

I am so happy. As my sister said online today, life is good.

Finally!

With the rainbow at the end

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I dreamed about my wedding last night.

It wasn’t anything like what we have planned.

We stood holding hands, waiting for the ceremony to begin, on the steps of a church, our backs to the entrance. It was chilly outside and I stood as close as I could to the man I was about to marry. There were people all around us and we were waiting for when we were to walk ahead to whatever outdoor space we’d picked.

Despite all those people – many of whom I didn’t seem to know – I remember feeling completely focused on Kyle, and he on me. We were happy, smiling. We kissed while we waited.

Out of the crowd, my ex-mother-in-law emerged. She was dressed up and holding an umbrella. She offered a quick congratulations, handed me a gift and then disappeared. The gift was unlike anything I’ve ever seen: a beige handkerchief tied to a twig. It resembled a tiny flag. I wasn’t sure what to do with it.

That’s when I noticed my clothes.

“I’m not wearing my dress!” I said and laughed. Kyle smiled and said he didn’t care.

Still, we went inside, up the church steps and into a hotel room (I didn’t say this dream made logical sense). There, I tried on a pink chiffon dress I can still picture. It wasn’t unlike the dress Rachel McAdams wears in “The Vow.” It was beautiful, but I didn’t like it.

There were other people in this room with us, too, including my high school boyfriend. It seemed everyone was focused on us, but all I could see was Kyle. It was as if we were in the center of a kaleidoscope, all the pieces around us moving, spinning, but we were still, completely grounded, in the middle of it all.

I remembered finally that I had a dress for the wedding – the one I actually do have – and I put that on.

And we kissed again and we were married.

Just like that. Happily ever after, without any worries at all.

It was such a good dream.

Today is Feb. 28. Our wedding date is April 7 (though if I get this far-away job I’m still waiting to hear about, we’ll get married sooner). Either way, five weeks from this Saturday, we’ll be on our way to the next chapter.

I can’t wait.

There was a time during and following my divorce when I couldn’t understand why anyone would get married. My parents are divorced, and so many people I knew then didn’t seem happy with their lives.

But then something changed.

I met this man.

And when I did, it was like the clouds just cleared. The path was straight ahead. I could instantly see what marriage could be, what true love meant, what a family could be like, the value in taking care of someone because you want to, because you love him so much.

This is the path with the rainbow at the end, the trail with the hope just around the bend.

This road is the one I get to travel with him, hand in hand.

Forever never felt this happy, this full of hope.

***

One night, early on, Kyle asked if I liked Ryan Adams.

I hadn’t ever really listened to him, I admitted.

“What?” he said. “Oh, babe, you’re gonna love him.”

And I did. I do.

This song is one of the first we listened to, on my computer, thanks to YouTube. It will always remind me of the simple beauty of those early days, and of the promise of everything ahead.

“In My Time of Need” – Ryan Adams

Giving it all a go

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My back is burning and I’m eating graham crackers, the snack that always makes me feel like a kid.

The rockstar is asleep on the couch, fighting a cold or a fever or allergies or exhaustion or some combination of all of the above.

The little boy is playing Legos and the little girl is out and about.

I’m sitting here, by the fire, cat purring by my leg, trying to think of something to say.

Wondering if I want to have anything to say.

I do, of course, have things to say and like it that way. But what I’ve been trying to figure out for the past few weeks is whether I want to continue to share everything. Here or on Facebook or in any other virtual space.

I’ve been feeling like maybe not being quite so … open. Maybe not being quite so quick to write about the bad stuff that happens to good people, or the good stuff that happens to good people.

Or any of it.

I’ve been realizing maybe it’s not anyone else’s business.

But I don’t want to give this up (though I’ve considered it). I have such appreciation for those of you who support me and my family and my choices and check in every now and then at this little blog.

I love writing, the power of words and stories and the difference sharing our lives can make.

It’s incredible. Really.

I don’t want to lose the connection I have with so many of you.

But I don’t want to feel judged. I don’t want to be judged. I just wanted to do this little thing and live and laugh and learn and grow and let this just be what it was: a blog.

So the past couple weeks I’ve been up in my head, exploring my heart. Just trying to figure this all out.

(Yes, I know, universe, that will be a constant in this life.)

I’m writing now, my back to the fire, the cat purring, the rest of the house quiet. I’m giving it a go. I’m seeing where this post takes me.

I’m thinking once we move out of here, if I’m fortunate enough to get a job some place nice, I’ll keep our new locale to myself. I’ll set about making a home for my family, making sure my husband is happy, my kids are healthy, that my home feels like home.

Our home.

The thought alone makes me smile.

There, we’ll finally start the next chapter, with love.

This love story

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The first time I fell in love I was 4 years old and obsessed.

The object of my affection had curly red hair, a voice that could win over even a stodgy bald rich guy and the awesomest, spunkiest, don’t-ever-give-up attitude ever.

She had the sweetest friend, Molly, a locket I coveted and a story that tugged at my little-girl heartstrings.

Her name was Annie and she taught us all, way back then, that even on the worst days, the sun comes out tomorrow.

My love affairs moved on, over the years, to include such characters as the Scarecrow from the “Wizard of Oz,” Charles Ingalls from “Little House on the Prairie” and Kevin Arnold from “The Wonder Years.”

And then there was that boy band in the late 80s/early 90s. I might have had a little thing for them.

Real-life love stories are a lot different than celebrity crushes, of course. We all learn this (the hard way?) growing up. Middle-school, anyone?

My real-life love story, has several chapters.

Though my book is far from finished, I’m on the last chapter. It’s going to be a long one, so settle in.

Being with the man I know I was always supposed to find is the perfect ending to my love story that’s just beginning.

Our love story that’s just beginning. (!!!)

So the final time I fell in love I was 30-something years old and head over heels.

There is a sense of peace about our lives now that I’m not sure I ever remember feeling.

I like it.

And I’m grateful. So thankful.

How lucky we are.

Happy Valentine’s Day, my love, my babies and everyone else. Here’s to new beginnings and final chapters!