As Others See Us

A scouting colleague of Andrew's, whenever he has popped by, has found us playing host to the five thousand. He never comes to the house but we have 15 people, half of them kids, running around, we've usually just finished dinner and there is a table full of detritus and crumbs, a kitchen full of cups and dessert plates, and a multi-coloured throng of children racing in and out, slamming the screen door and laughing and shouting. There was even a couple of dueling fiddles last time he was here.

It's not usually this chaotic, I want to shout over the din. But it's not true. Not to him, anyway.

Another friend once said to me that our evenings must be so relaxed and peaceful. I think I'd mentioned how we all like to read, and in his mind's eye I am certain he saw us spending many long evenings curled up on the big comfy couches in the living room, the light subdued, the music playing, and the only sound that of a turning page, or a muffled chuckle.

Not quite. There are often people talking about their book, fighting over a book, discussing their book, reading from their book...and that's doesn't even cover the nights when reading time is five minutes squeezed in between karate and bedtime.

Last weekend, I was saying my house was cluttered (which, truly, it is) and that I'd like it to be organized and elegant. Another friend (obviously a good one) disagreed with me. She said she always thought of our home as cosy, warm, friendly, whereas elegant homes often seem distant, cool, as if nobody really lives there.

It seems all my acquaintances have their own ideas of what my life is like. I say I live on 50 acres in the country in an ancient farmhouse...and it conjurs up a picture that, depending on the person, seems idyllic or the very definition of insanity. I once mentioned the philosophical dinner parties we occassionally host and years later was told by a woman how she had been intimidated by what she assumed was our collective brilliance.

She knows me better now and is aware that any erudition is fleeting at best. But it's funny how others see us. Not always as we see ourselves, and perhaps not always the reality, but somewhere in the middle.

Flash

It's no secret that Fall is my favourite time of year. I drive home the long way just to travel the winding country roads in their mantle of vibrant oranges and dusky reds; I take the dog for long walks just to kick up the coppery leaves on the road; I rake the gold and crimson and brown into piles just to watch the kids dive into them and throw them up into the air again.

But today...ah, today...

I walked out the door at 7am this morning into a perfect world. The sky to the south was layered - dark clouds the colour of granite over silver clouds with peeks of bright blue beneath. To the east, the sun, low in the sky, beamed brightness over the corn fields, just tipping the golden sheaths in the fields and highlighting a broad swath of metallic colour across the fall forest.

It was like being hit by a flash of something so grand that words, pictures, even thoughts could not do it justice. I felt like I'd been consumed by the moment and all I could do - all I even wanted to do - was stand there and be part of it.

Just me...and the sublime.

It's happened before. Many times, but more often as a child. I used to call it the "flash" because that's how it seemed to me. A moment of intense beauty and the feeling that all's right with the world. It's there and gone in a heartbeat sometimes, and other times - like this morning - lingering, slowly fading away, but leaving me with an overwhelming sense of goodwill. Today, I might describe it like a veil being lifted to reveal a world more gorgeous, more breathtaking than I had previously imagined. If I were religious, I might call it divine. Certainly, Gerard Manley Hopkins - poet, Roman Catholic convert, and Jesuit priest - springs immediately to mind:

The world is charged with the grandeur of God.
It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;
It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil
Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?
Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;
And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;
And wears man’s smudge and shares man’s smell: the soil
Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.

And for all this, nature is never spent;
There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;
And though the last lights off the black West went
Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs—
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.

Voter Undecided

I voted. Of course I did. But it was not easy. I am feeling jaded and cynical these days about politicians and voting and governement, and there were days leading up to this Ontario election when, frankly, I really felt I couldn't be bothered to vote. Apathy and futility raised their ugly heads.

I had the discussion with some of my critical thinking students way back at the start of the semester. One particularly bright student made an articulate and impassioned argument for not voting at all, and that got me thinking. I vote because I feel it's my duty, but really it's just my right. Just as it's my right to reject voting. For lots and lots of reasons I do vote, and I encourage my kids to follow election issues and discuss politics as well. I put on a good face. But underneath I am tired.

Tired of voting not for the person who inspires me, but for the person who least offends me. Tired of voting not for the party who represents the interests of my family best, but for the party who appears to have done the least damage recently. Tired of voting for all the wrong reasons.

Fall

Superwoman...

Yesterday I posted this on Facebook:

Recommended two books for acquisition, proofed back cover copy for a third, made lasagne and soup from scratch, washed all the windows, paid bills online, organized for a scout meeting, marked essays and am off to get kids. Most. Productive. Day. EVER.

A number of people commented that I must be Superwoman, to which I modestly reply, Why, yes I am.

Because frankly, any day where I get done even half of what I want to get done...well, that's a good day.

The turht is that almost every woman I know out there, both online and in real life, is Superwoman. You pretty much have to be to get through an average week. And yes, I know there is no such thing as an average week, but this is the sort of thing I know you are all doing:

• Getting children up, dressed, breakfasted and onto the schoolbus
• Working outside the home
• Working inside the home
• Grocery shopping
• Meal planning
• Meal cooking
• Ferrying the kids around to after-school activities, to weekend activities, to extra-curricular activities
• Homework helping
• Homework whip-cracking
• Homework frustration management (LOL)
• Finding quality time for your family
• Finding (any) time for yourself
• Organizing appointments and commitments, and coordinating meetings and gatherings
• Cleaning and vacuuming and dusting
• Running errands and meeting deadlines
• Being the connector for playdates, family events, etc
• A thousand other things, small in themselves, but which add up and add up and add up...

...And that's just daily life. If you have someone who is sick, or a work emergency, or anything else to worry about, this is just the tip of the iceberg. And so sometimes things don't get done. The dishwasher doesn't get unloaded, or we cave and let the kids eat cereal for dinner. The floor needs to be washed or we postpone taking the car in for maintenance. The grass grows under our feet and we feel overwhelmed, as if we can't quite keep on top of it all.

Because we can't. Not all the time, anyway. And that's okay. For most of us, the trick is keeping as many balls in the air as possible, and if one drops, to let it go with a shrug. We can always pick it up later.

So this post is for you. All the Superwomen I know.


Note: While researching images for this post, I was amazed at how many variations of Superwoman there are.



Sweet Cartoony Version



Bombshell version



Identifiable version





Heroic Version - check out those boots!



Couldn't resist version

Which version of Superwoman are you? (Or Superman - we don't discriminate here).



Newton's Laws - or how I got stumped by a third grader

Grace was pushing Erik's buttons. To be fair she does it very well, as well as only an 8 year old can when dealing with an older brother. This particular instance - and there are many - took place in the car. Grace was asking Erik what French words meant, and he was getting irritated. Very irritated.

I finally turned around. Enough is enough.

You're in French Immersion, Grace, and Erik's strength is not languages. It's like me asking you - I racked my brain quickly for something that would stump her - what Newton's Laws are.

That's what I said. What she said (without missing a beat) was this.

An object in motion tends to stay in motion.

Uuuuummmmmmm.......

This is the really sad part: I had just tossed Newton's Law at her. I didn't actually know in that instant if what she said was one of them or not. It sounded right...why didn't I pay more attention in grade 10 physics?

And how the heck did she know anyway? (Grandpa, apparently. At the science museum in Vancouver.)

Erik saved my bacon.

And got his own back. That's just the third law, he told her.  What's the first?

Just don't ask Mom. Contrary to popular belief, she doesn't know everything.

Book Club

Tonight is the first meeting of my book club post-summer and the theme is to come, meet new members, and discuss the kinds of books we want to read this year. The kind of books we like to read.

I found myself at a bit of a loss. I'm sitting here in my office, in my small but chock-filled library, and I am having trouble deciding what to say.

You'd think it would be easier. I've been around books all my life--my first "library" was an ancient wardrobe with an old fashioned key that I locked my books away in as a child and would get right inside with a flashlight to see all the titles; I don't recall a time when I wasn't reading something; I studied books in university; I edit books for heaven's sake! I should be able to come up with something concrete about the books I like to read.

But it thwarts me, this narrowing down of genre. I'm sitting on the literary fence and I don't want to leave any books out.

I discussed this dilemma with a friend of mine over strawberry dacquiri's last night. She used to work in marketing at chapters (dream job, anyone?) and part of her role was to co-ordinate book clubs. There was the mystery book club, the romance book club, the sci-fi book club...every kind of book club was available, but I can't see myself ever limiting myself to one kind of book. At the two ends of the scale were the following: the serious book club where serious literary adults discussed serious literary works, and the Martini book club, where the focus was only marginally on books at all.

What I suppose I'd like, ideally, is to fall somewhere in the middle. A book club that is sociable and fun, relaxing yet insightful. And I think, for the most part, we've achieved that at my current book club. We don't read much "serious" literature, but we do like our books to have some meat to them. You can mock Oprah all you want (and I frequently do) but her book club titles are usually quite well chosen in terms of a rewarding but not too analytical read.

Because in the end, reading should be fun. And a book club--for me at least--should not be work.

Are you in a book club? What kinds of books do you like to read? And how do you format your meetings - structured or free-for-all? Chime in below.