Parenting

Zebra Stripe Blinds

When I sit down at my home office for our daily work check in, the light comes through the blinds creating zebra stripes on my face. I try to move the laptop camera to remove the shadows, and still the sun dances through the gaps. While the team Zoom call is short, only fifteen minutes or so, I find myself quickly giving up on my attempts to create a steady flow of light on my reflection.

Searching for beauty feels these days feels a little bit like living through the blinds. Christmas and New Years passed in a blur. We spent time with family, juggled a baby and her gear between houses, and intentionally rested. Last week was only the first week back sending emails and coordinating, and I was quick to move towards overwhelm. On Sunday, during another failed nap time, I wept about all of the things my old-self would have accomplished. The shadows of shoulds seem to be drawing lines, keeping me from fresh morning light.

Yet still, I’ve been ruminating on the joys of baby being witness to the mundane. Piles of burp clothes and bottles in the sink feel less than glamorous. However, the noise makers on the floor mix with tiny socks and colorful books, reminding me of the gift of a child so many others long for. How quickly these days will pass. I want to be present for them when I can.

A friend recently shared how passing into a new year used to fill her with melancholy. The aches of what could have been and fears of what might be in the year ahead shaded an attitude of possibility and creativity. On December 31st, I wasn’t feeling sad for what could have happened in 2022. We packed in a lot of life in those 365 days. I did, however, feel a bit of dreadful wonder at what may be this year. There are many unknowns on a clean slate. I’m so good at filling blank pages with catastrophe.

Much like the mixing light on my face in the mornings, I want to approach 2023 with an openness rather than foreboding. I didn’t set a resolution. Instead I’ll be focusing on the mantra, “Uncertainty doesn’t mean bad things are going to happen.” I’ll hold space for the negative possibilities (Hello. My name is Katie and I’m prone to anxious and catastrophic thoughts). And I’ll also intentionally move to let more light in.

When responding to a birthday invitation I recently sent out, a friend shared, “Thank you so much for including me. One more step back to “normal.”  Feels fun and also weird, doesn’t it?” 

Choosing to live in the light is fun, and after the last few years, it is weird!

So here’s to more time in the ball pit my baby received for Christmas. More invitations for brunch. More connection. More reminders that hospitality and caring for one another may be more important than promotions or the next big project. Here’s to reviving the sourdough, playdates in the park, and hugs for our childcare providers. Here’s to redefining the possibilities in uncertainty and in the handholding when things feel shaky.

Here’s to the continued search for beautiful things and the reminder that letting in the light, despite the shadows that may come, is a beautiful thing.

Self-Soothing at Christmas

My daughter struggles to nap in her crib. She’s been lucky to be held while sleeping and contact naps have been her norm. As I read parenting books and blogs about sleep training, the multitude of advice, best practices, and shoulds are overwhelming. General practitioners tell me to put her down, walk out of the room, and wait for her to cry herself to sleep. We’re behind, according to the internet, in that she ought to be sleeping better on her own by now.

In this advice, my heart breaks a bit. For how many times, as an adult, have I, too, cried myself to sleep? The cause of suffering, of course, is different. The magnitude of pain seems more allowable as adults. Yet, why are we teaching our babies to self-soothe, when quite often the opposite, a compassionate touch, a hand on a shoulder, a warm embrace is what we long for most?

Recent weeks have been filled with attempts at the holiday bustle. We’ve got a tree up, yet I haven’t done any shopping. We baked cookies and forgot to decorate them. I’m allowing traditions to be replaced with other things; mostly contact naps.

Grief seeps into this season in now expected places. I know I’ll want to send texts to Dad, want his perspective on our decorations, and long for his spot at the table to be filled. I’ll get a bottle of scotch to sip on and leave a plate of cookies on the shelf for him during Christmas week. While friends donated in his honor this month, I longed for his advice in negotiating dynamics at work and a shoulder to lean on as my grandmother’s house was sold.

This year’s grief expands as we have another empty seat at the table. I wish Grandma could stand at my stove top, and teach me how to make our German cookies that she taught my mother to make. The weight and opportunity of carrying on tradition is ladened with loss. In our mixing of sugar, flour and dough, we have sprinkles of old memories. With each turn of cookie press, I remember laughter at smoke-filled kitchens and crinkles of crumbs falling to the counter. To carry on what she started is both a beautiful mix of opportunity and responsibility. There is space for the missing to take different shape.

When illness hit our house last week, with changing child care plans and overwhelming amounts of snot, I was hit with an incredible ache. If Dad was still here, we’d have one more person in our back up child care arsenal. Instead, I took a sick day, and allowed myself to rest, with baby on my chest. As baby cried from exhaustion, I, too, wept and rocked myself saying “It’s ok. It’s ok. It’s ok.”

Sure, I’ve learned to self-soothe. Yet, I still longed for a warm hand on my shoulder, for someone else to get me a tissue, for the cause of the pain to dissipate.

I’m not soliciting parenting advice, nor am I sharing another “should” for those who are trying to get their little ones to sleep. Instead, I’m wondering why our culture starts us off, at such a young age, by encouraging us to cry ourselves to sleep in the dark, when perhaps instead we need comfort and connection. The world is overwhelming for all of us at times.

The holidays come with a jumble of joy, aches, wishes, and wonder. We’re all familiar with the ways in which our stories fall short of the Hallmark versions of reality depicted on television. Whether you’re sitting in feelings of joy and connection, or weeping in the dark, I hope you’ve found people to lay a warm hand on your shoulder. I hope you remember to whisper “It’s ok. It’s ok. It’s ok” Self-soothe if you must, and I hope instead you can ask for comfort.

Experiencing the gift a snuggle, the glow of Christmas lights, and the choice to nurture and be nurtured are beautiful things.

No Sunscreen

Upon reflecting on the end of the summer, I realized over the last four months I never once got out a tube of sunscreen. My arms remain pasty white, not covered from protective goo, but rather drool and spit up and diaper rash cream.  

Sure, I stepped outside, squinting into the sun with glasses on and dark circles under my eyes, but we didn’t spend time outside. Not really. This was a summer spent navigating the challenging demands of welcoming a new human to our family. We passed a baby between our hands, threw burp clothes across the room, and taped boxes with clear tape at our feet. We saw morning light, not dusk. We emerged slowly, wondering if the threat of Covid lingered, and asked how protective we should be for each other while tending to the care and keeping of our own small family unit. 

We hired movers, packed the kleenex, and remembered growing pains are, at times, just that. Painful. 

But like the sunburns I did not receive this year, the pain points of adding to a family left a tingly glow, freckles of her presence sticking with us as we move into the new chapter of being a family of three. We’ve peeled off sheets of skin of who we were, leaving new, fresh, vulnerable layers underneath. 

Adjusting to parenting hasn’t been easy, and the transformation has been beautiful. 

Recently, upon meeting someone new, I was asked what this blog was about. I shared my philosophy of searching for the good and about my dance with grief. I shared about the pandemic, and living as an anxious person, and trying to find gratitude in times of desperation. The new connection asked, “And what’s beautiful about this season?”

I had to pause, but it didn’t take long to name a few things. 

There’s beauty in the shape of my daughter’s mouth, and the way her hair curls on the sides when she gets sweaty from sleeping in our arms. There’s beauty in the routine forming, her exploration, and in my husband and I trying to move our feet to our faces like she does while keeping our backs on the floor. 

There’s beauty in smiles and coos, and messy buns, and at times, even the 6:30 am wakeup calls. How many years until she begins to sleep in again?

Back at work this afternoon, I took a walk around the park for a quick break. As the sun beat down on my pale arms, I was reminded how much things can change with warmth and a bit of vitamin D. I heard the church bells ring in the distance. I’ve been walking that path for five years now, and yet, the afternoon bells had a different tinkle to them in this season. 

While the paths we walk may remain the same, we as humans aren’t meant to remain stagnant. I’m changing and growing and walking forward, still. 

No sunscreen this summer, what a beautiful thing.

Daaad, can I have one beer?

“Daaaad, can I have one beer?” he squeaked out from the corner of the table.

A little boy wearing a navy winter coat stood a foot behind his father, pulling on the older man’s black puffy jacket.

“Can I please have one beer?”

The dad stopped, put down a bulky baby carrier and turned to address his curly hair child.

“Yes,” he said, “but how will you choose which type to have first?”

“Blue sprinkles,” said the little boy. “That’s the one I want to have here.”

I had heard the young one incorrectly, and perched on my orange bar stool, I started to laugh.

Sitting in a busy donut shop on the morning of Valentine’s Day, I watched families stream in with little children. Grub hub delivery people stood patiently in the corner with their branded red bags. Office managers waited patiently as steaming-hot clumps of dough got dipped in strawberry frosting, rainbow sprinkles, and the good part of Lucky Charms cereal.

One man in his twenties was working hard solo, filling the orders with patience and frosting smears. His eyes opened wider each time another person walked in the door.

It was a simple Friday morning. I was invited for a coffee and a donut with a dear friend. We sat on orange bar-stools, and sipped bad drip coffee, and filled our tummies with sugar and dough fried in lard. I watched the woman scrape mounds of lard into the fryer.

We need not go far to be delighted.

Hard working people. Lines of people on their way to work waiting patiently for fried dough. Sprinkles. Smashed cereal and chunks of chocolate and raspberry glaze.

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Say what you will about donuts, sugar, health food and habits, but for just that one morning, I felt the love.

What a beautiful thing.

Happiness Depends on a Good Breakfast

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The author William Martin wrote a book on parenting, The Parent’s Tao Te Ching: Ancient Advice for Modern Parents, and in it he shares the poem above.  I’m not a parent, not yet, but I do suppose I’ve been parented (that’s a word right?).

Well I’ve seen the poem before and I’m sure I nodded along saying ‘yes, yes, those words make sense.’ This week I saw the words again, and they oozed into my being. I accept the lie that I am NOT extraordinary much too easily. My thoughts bounce and roll upon gritty terrain in my head as I beat myself up for not having the right career, not being travelled enough, not yet earning those expensive letters behind my name. I get stuck staring at choices and wonder if MBA, or LPN, or LCSW, or MFA would fit me best. Sure, sure, I can appreciate a great peach, but I haven’t published a novel and I haven’t been listed on the ‘thirty under thirty’ list of young, successful business leaders in my community.

Stop!

When I come to the surface again, and can calm that pounding drum of a thing called my heart, I remember to reevaluate. Like Martin says, ‘striving seems admirable, but it is a way of foolishness’. Silly me, how foolish. No one wants the letters F-O-O-L-I-S-H on a resume.

The letters that suite me right now are as follows.

W-R-I-T-E-R

I’m growing into these letters and embracing the truth that these letters are a gift. Being able to eloquently communicate thoughts, observations, human emotions. What a beautiful thing.

W-I-F-E

I used to roll my eyes at the women who used those letters to define themselves. Psh – MBA is much better. Nope. Nope. Wrong again. This journey called wife is immensely extraordinary.

E-M-P-A-T-H

I am one sensitive stinker and sometimes this hurts. As I’ve written over and over, the world is a hurting place. Being empathetic, sensitive, and observant means you can’t ignore the world’s suffering. It like walking through sandpaper, always living with some level of texture in the air. The ever present grains of sand rub away at the calloused layers of pain that try to make your heart hard. I can’t do it. I refuse to turn off my sensors that allow me the ability to view other’s pain.

This sensational quality of being an E-M-P-A-T-H gives fuel to my other letters. It makes it easier to be a W-R-I-T-E-R.

Take off the smudged glasses of striving, and the world begins to be a remarkable place. Andy Rooney captures this so well when he says,

““For most of life, nothing wonderful happens. If you don’t enjoy getting up and working and finishing your work and sitting down to a meal with family or friends, then the chances are that you’re not going to be very happy. If someone bases his happiness or unhappiness on major events like a great new job, huge amounts of money, a flawlessly happy marriage or a trip to Paris, that person isn’t going to be happy much of the time. If, on the other hand, happiness depends on a good breakfast, flowers in the yard, a drink or a nap, then we are more likely to live with quite a bit of happiness.”

Put on the hiking boots of extraordinary and you can travel well through all terrain.

This week I went to water aerobics for the first time. The youngest in the pool by twenty years, I walked the lanes, and did my lunges, and water rolls with a funny group of older people. Have you ever thought about the magic that is a swimming pool? Someone figured out how to get hundreds gallons of water inside, how to keep it clean (we hope) and a decent temperature, and some fitness instructor figured out that we can jog laps with low impact on our knees. I’m not sure if I’ll go back, but trying something new with people you’ve never met, while intimidating, can be a beautiful thing.

I also brought dinner to one of my friends from high school who just had her second baby. Meet Evelyn.

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What an extraordinary thing that the people God gave you to be your friends can create tiny humans! No really, they made TWO babies! As I was walking around Trader Joes, picking ingredients for their dinner, it stopped me in my tracks to realize how extraordinary it is that we have the potential to bring babies into the world. I put a small bouquet of flowers in the basket, and Dark Chocolate Peanut Butter Cups too, because dessert. A beautiful thing. Tiny toes, and delicate fingernails, and baby snuggles, even more amazing. Let us walk together through all stages of life.

I go back to Martin’s poem and I reflect on the way I was parented. Sure, there was a large amount of encouragement to strive. I was an over-productive high school student with amazing amounts of ambition and extra-curricular activities. I remember sitting in a Harvard informational session at the age of 13. I blame Gilmore Girls for that experience.

Yet, as I continued to grow into adulthood, lessons of empathy and emotional intelligence and self-acceptance rose to the top. My parents were really good at getting me to calm down, to stay grounded, to keep my crazy striving in check.

Another set of letters that describes me is D-A-U-G-H-T-E-R. I have this horrible thought that because we lost my dad, I’m maybe half of that now. A daughter only to one parent, not two. Like maybe the letters should not be capitalized, or truncated to half of the word.

F-A-T-H-E-R-L-E-S-S

These letters sting a little. I became fatherless just over fifteen months ago.

Stop!  The grandest of magnificent lies.

Yes, it’s true that my dad left this world.

However, I will always always be Roy’s D-A-U-G-H-T-E-R.

The lessons he gave me will always be extraordinary.

I’ve thought a lot about how I wanted to honor him on this second Father’s Day without him. Last year I spent the day in tears – my sweet in-laws being amazingly supportive as I snuck away, not once, but twice to call my mom. I sat on the porch wiping my tears and snot on the grass (sorry Mike, the smears on your lawn probably washed away).

This year, I become green with envy every time I see an article that was published in a magazine about another W-R-I-T-E-R’s father, or loss, or grief, or missed chances with their paternal person. I’m not yet ready to submit my story to a formal publication (here I go striving again).  I plan to stay off of Facebook, and will spend time with the best father-in-law a D-A-U-G-H-T-E-R-I-N-L-A-W could ask for.

I can, however, leave you this list of the things I ache for as my dad made the ordinary come alive.

  • Waffles on Sunday mornings. He would shuffle into the kitchen in his nasty plaid pajamas and make beautiful, fluffy waffles for us. Chocolate chip for me, topped with strawberries and whipped cream. He was good at weekend breakfast.
  • Fishing on the river – he always made us be enthusiastic outdoor adventurers. He would smile at us as my brother and I grimaced, lugging our fishing gear to some remote spot to put a fly in the water. He wouldn’t get too mad when we splashed upstream, probably scaring away all of his fish friends. Splashing brought joy. Casting did not.
  • He taught me to follow through. When I was getting my driver’s license he made me drive up to Wyoming and back at night so I could get my night hours. “Most parents just sign off on these Dad,” I grumbled. “Well, I’m not most parents,” he replied, “let’s get in the car.”
  • He drove me to junior high every morning. I’d be sleepy and cranky in the front seat, yet he always tried to have conversation. Not the best timing for connecting with a thirteen year old, but the effort was there.
  • Screen Shot 2017-06-17 at 8.47.33 AMToaster hash browns. My favorite breakfast for years. Morning routines were Dad’s responsibility and he kinda sucked at weekday breakfast. Over-cooked eggs and toast with peanut butter smeared with mayonnaise because he always forgot to wash the knife between making our sandwiches and our morning meal. It was hard for him to screw up toaster hash browns. I’m going to go find a box. Dad loved breakfast. Like Andy Rooney, he knew, happiness depends on a good breakfast.

Happy Father’s Day papa. I miss you so very much.

Papa

Take a moment to think of the ways in which you are influenced by others. What some of your mentors, friends, coaches have taught you along the way. This week, in honor of Father’s Day, I was reflecting on the ways in which my dad has influenced me. Maybe you get nostalgic in stages, maybe it’s just me, but this year was one of the better Father’s Day experiences our family has had. I know, not everyone has happy memories with their parents. If Father’s Day is painful for you, my heart expands as I send compassion and light your way. I hope you can find connection to the positive interactions with people who have supported you as you became who you are today.

My dad and I have not always been the closest. As I’ve gotten older and tried to separate from my family like normal adults do, my appreciation for my parents has grown ten fold. This week, I’m grateful for the beautiful parts of my dad that I see in myself.

Here are a few:

My love of coffee, road trips, potato chips. A chocolate chip cookie does constitute as breakfast. So does cold pizza.

While preparing dinner we sneak little pieces of cheese, or chicken, or nibbles or bread crusts with butter. Sometimes these snacks fill us up before the meal reaches the table.

We are both “thrifty”, or ok fine, cheap. We reuse, we recycle, we have holes in our sneakers until my mom tells us it’s time to get new things.

My dad can be the quiet, pensive type. He taught me to observe before speaking, and to choose my words wisely. He can also talk to anyone  in the grocery store and connect over bacon, or a bag of onions. I watch this skill, and observe wisely, trying to pick up his ability to talk anyone who cares to make eye contact. Private processor, publicly friendly. I want to be better at this.

My dad never doubted my dreams because I was a girl. Thank you for teaching me to play ball, hold a hockey stick,  how to fill the car with gas, answer my insurance questions, wipe my tears, and encourage me to catch creatures in boxes if they aren’t supposed to be living in your house. Remember the mice incident? Thank you for letting me be afraid of birds.

My dad has taught me to find things to laugh about. We text back and forth jokes that are witty and stupid and charming. It’s a way to stay in touch and remain wired through laughter. Isn’t that a beautiful image? What if the whole world was wired through laughter. Positive energy wandering the waves over our heads and into our hearts. He is the goofy in my blood, the wiggle in my dance, and the quiet reminder to be proud of myself.

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I don’t say this often, and we don’t always connect, but I am immensely grateful for his presence in my life. Thank you for wanting to choreograph our father daughter dance at my wedding, for walking me down the aisle, for teaching me how to walk.

Happy Father’s Day Dad. You are beautiful.