Body Image

I haven't talked to anyone but Jon about this stuff, but it's time to come out of the closet. For the last three months I've liked how I look. Not just a "these clothes look great on me" or "my eyes look nice today" but a no secrets, standing-in-front-of-a-full-length-mirror-naked, kind of like how I look. This is a new development.

When I was around ten years old I had this really 90's, floral print shirt with a metallic sheen that I LOVED. I thought it was the coolest shirt ever. Then, one day, I was walking by the mirror in my brothers' room and I saw it. The shirt was tight, and just over the top of my jeans there was a bulge. It stopped me in my tracks. I stood there, a little nervous, inspecting my pre-adolesent pudge. I have no memory of noticing something negative about my body before this day. I may have been home schooled, but I still knew that bulge wasn't "supposed" to be there. I was embarrassed. I wondered if anyone else had noticed. I changed shirts and never wore the floral one again. It was about this time that I started dressing in boy's clothes - the baggier the better. The feeling of hunger became a negative one, and I learned to suppress it. A few years later when I was thirteen my Mom casually asked me how much I weighed and I wouldn't say it out loud. I couldn't let others hear that I was up to a disgusting 120.

Once I hit my 20's I started working through some spiritual issues and as I became more confident inside, I stopped hating my outside as much. The big turning point though, was (surprisingly) right after I had Nathaniel. There was a tiny little shift in my perception of bodies. It had gone from "fat" and "skinny" to "pregnant" and "skinny". Since I wasn't pregnant anymore, I was skinny. It wasn't long before I started noticing things I didn't like again. I still thought my arms looked thick, and hated looking at my thighs and butt in the mirror. I wondered if Jon wished that I was different. I talked to him about it, and he said that I was beautiful but that I would never be able to believe him if shame was my standard.

It's been almost two years since I had my boy and took a step to get shame out of my life. Now, for the first time since that day when I changed my floral shirt, I don't want to lose weight. I have been working out a lot for no other reason than that I like how being active makes me feel. I've never, ever done that. For the first time, when I see a really thin woman, I can see that she doesn't look healthy instead of feeling like an ogre and skipping lunch. For the first time I don't avoid the mirror, or wince at a glimpse of my butt. I honestly like the way my hips curve out, and I don't mind the specs of cellulite on my thighs. I like that women's bodies look SO different, and I'm starting to get upset that we're shown that that's wrong - and tell each other (and ourselves) that it's ugly.

I am a small woman. I'm not overweight. A lot of people say I'm thin. My top (non pregnant) weight was 150. If you're thinking that I don't have any room to talk about being "fat", that I don't really understand, you're right. What I do understand though is what it's like to hate yourself; To get a sick feeling when you see the reflection of your body. My point is that shame and comparison KILL! They kill your spirit and your confidence and your beauty. It doesn't matter how much you weigh (or how much weight you lose), if you don't value yourself you will never feel valuable or beautiful to others. If shame is your motivator, it won't go away when you reach your "goal." Shame sticks around, and it's even tougher to get off than those last few pounds.

STC - The Day The Music Died

The prompt was "write a story in which someone dies." I'm not particularly happy with my effort at it, but that happens. I did end up learning that I'm afraid. Afraid of "leaving". Afraid of pain. Afraid of unknown. This story ended up being an allegorical peek into the less appealing days of my inner life and I learned a lot (or at least admitted a lot) by writing it. I'm adding a little insider info at the end for those interested. Enjoy!

 Finnely was a surprisingly small little town, full of small houses and small shops. There were likewise, small schools, small cars, small roads, and even small pets. No one owned anything larger than a terrier. There was only one thing in this small little town that was big, and that would be the families. The bodies of the people themselves were accordingly small, but they were large in number. The least numerous family in town were the Shellhourns with a startling family of nine (eleven counting mom and dad, who would have liked more but hadn’t been able to get pregnant again after their youngest, Alice, was born). The vastest family happened to be that of the Mayor, Walt Winskey. At the ripe age thirty-seven, he and his wife Paula had twenty-eight offspring. On a good day, a Winskey family gathering would draw roughly five hundred people. A vein of fertility seemed to run through the Winskey line, but none had been so determined or successful as Walt and Paula in reproduction or profession. As I said, the families in Finnely were large. This is the point where the question of “where in blazes do they all live?” usually comes up. The answer is very simple: In their houses.
 Life in Finnely was very basic. There wasn’t the typical vicious cycle of small town gossip, and for the most part everyone was happy with whatever lot fell to them. People rarely became ill and no one had died of anything save old age in more than a hundred years. The only hint at restlessness was a small rift that was forming in the visiting habits of the townsfolk. No one really noticed this happening, but from my vantage point, we are fortunate enough to take in the whole picture. You see, over the last year the social habits of our dear Finnelyians have become bipolar towards the Shellhourns and the Winskey’s respectively. The first, though abnormally small in number, were extraordinarily kind. There were always more children playing on their street than any other because of Nora Shellhourns propensity toward baking and story telling. Mr. Shellhourn was often seen in the garage surrounded by his children and his peers working over some project or another. There was hardly a person in town who did not bloom a smile when crossing paths with a Shellhourn, but no one really noticed this. Conversely, while the Winskey’s were not unkind, there was no one that would call them charming, and had become somewhat isolated. They took little notice of anything that was happening outside of their surname, sporting a disposition and situation fostering the suggestion of aristocracy in their perspectives. There were more than a few people in town that were playing their best cards to gain acceptance into this exclusive club. No one thought of this as outre’ because no one really noticed.
  A while back, shops started giving discounts to Winskeys, and others would always add some extra produce to the Shellhourns’ order. Then it grew to the point that those same favors applied to people who were aquainted with one or the other family. Now it was so bad that many of the shops labeled themselves Win-shops and Shell-shops to denote their desired, if not required, patronage. The families themselves were starting to notice the separation. The Shellhourns urged strongly against such actions (solidifying the superiority of their goodness in the eyes of their friends) and the Winskeys just wrote it off as an alternate option for the unfortunate percentage of the population that didn’t care enough to be their friends.
  Cornelius Thunderbolt Winskey the 7th was the youngest of seven brothers and nine sisters. He was the great-great-grandfather of Walt and the oldest citizen of Finnley at the age of 97. Cornelius was nearly blind, halfway deaf and as dearly loved as any member of the Shellhourn family. He had outlived all of his siblings and friends, and even some of his children. On an average day, the aged man walked around the small town with his small dog, Chester, and dropped in on all the welcoming shopkeepers (his geniality and his name granted unbiased entrance). No one ever felt like the old man was giving them advice, and he didn’t feel like he was giving it either, but no one would argue that their days were happier and their income fuller after spending time with him. Overall, Cornelius was a very wise and a very popular old man.
  One warm day at the end of June, unbeknownst to Shellhourn or Winskey, an impromptu group of townsfolk gathered in the square. A Shell-shop and a Win-shop owner had gotten into a heated discussion over the price of turnips (and other various produce) and what Mr.Shell. or Mr. Win. would think of said price. Their voices escalated to shouts and crowds gathered on their respective sides. The debate gathered momentum quickly, and soon there were regular intervals of a lone, shouted point for or against, then a mass concurrence. The shop owners were speaking directly for either family now “Mr. Winskey hates Braeburn apples! He’s the MAYOR, and he thinks you shouldn’t keep them stocked!” “Well, Mr. Shellhourn loves Braeburns, and he thinks that this is still a free country!” If I had thought the shouting was at it’s maximum level, I was wrong. In a matter of moments the intervals of individual points had ceases completely and the sound was rising from a clamor to a roar, just like a wave rises before crashing down onto itself. There were fists shaking in the air and small fights breaking out where the seams of either group joined. Those small fights spread like water through a sponge and now the angry yelling was punctuated with cries of fear from mothers separated from children, or too-young boys thrown into the brawl.
  Once the morning broke over the small town of Finnely there were shattered windows and several smashed cars, but it was quiet considering the mob that had ribboned through the streets only hours before. The din had died down, quickly losing steam around midnight. More than once someone muttered the phrase “Not much harm done” in an attempt to grapple with the creeping shame on their way home and as the turnip fighting Shell-shop keeper turned the corner from the town square he did not see the pale, nearly blind, halfway deaf hand laying underneath the only overturned car of the night or the small dog curled sleeping on the pavement beside it.
  That warm day near the end of June was the day the town of Finnely suffered their greatest loss, but no one was sad because no one really noticed.

Note: The title is based off of Don McLean's song American Pie - a song about losing innocence in a way. This story is about that too, in a way, and I meant for Cornelius to represent that bit of me that holds the crazy bits together and helps them get along. Also, Cornelius means "Horn" and that was my obscure way of tying the title into the story.

O Come, O Come Emmanuel

I´ve never really been a huge fan of Christmas. Don´t get me wrong, I like the giving that represents God's gift of Christ and sharing food with close friends and family. I like the cold weather and the tree and the decorations and traditions. I even like Santa. He´s a great story. I also like the Grinch and that Fa-la-soy-boo song they sing at the end while holding hands. I really like holding hands. The problem is that, all of these individual fancies don't combine into one big general appreciation of Christmas for me. For a long time I thought I was jaded for whatever reason, or that my Christmasy wire was loose... or that my heart was two sizes too small.
This year I've been doing a lot of thinking. Jon says it's the commercialization of the Holiday that I don't like. That may be partially true, but even if you took it away - if we didn't participate in the gifts or the decor or watch Snowman Burl Ives singing Silver and Gold - I don't think I'd feel better. Drastic measures are worthless if you don't fill that spot with something, and most the time it's a spot that can be filled without removing the "problem." Like I said, I like Santa and presents and lights.
Just after Thanksgiving, Nathaniel and I were running errands. I busted out the only Christmas music on my phone and listened while we drove around. It's a concept album called Behold the Lamb of God, The True Tall Tale of the Coming of the Christ by Andrew Peterson. I've heard this album dozens of times. I also don't cry often, but by two songs in the floodgates were open. Why? One of the contributing artists made a comment in reference to the album. He said "It's not really so much about Christmas as it is about Jesus." Its about Jesus. I know, I know. Baisic. So baisic I hardly ever think about it. For me, the Jesus of Christmas has been so intertwined with everything else that the real story is barely there anymore. I for one, would like to take a break from Frosty and shopping malls and take a moment to remember the true story. The real Christmas.

The Eight Stages of Creative Gift Giving

1. Make a list of people you want to give gifts to. Add a few more because you're just a dripping with generosity. Ignore the fact that in a few months you will have to mass produce personal, meaningful, and hopefully inexpensive bits of wonder that you've harvested from the depths of your soul.

2. Realise that Christmas is 6 weeks away so you might want to get this process moving, if you want to avoid finishing the gifts for people on Christmas day/in January. You shudder slightly and divide your list into "must gives" and "maybe gives".

3. Take an afternoon and surround yourself with inspiration. Get you coffee or whatever and start thinking. Last year you shot a little too high and ended up not even making most of the brilliant gifts you thought of. This year, try to think up something that is both mass producible AND personal.

4. After hours of research into how much book rings and card stock paper cost en mass, settle on the MOST BRILLIANT CHRISTMAS PRESENT IDEA THE WORLD HAS EVER SEEN!!!!!!! It's funny and personal and can be made cheap enough to send to every single person on your list! You are a genius my friend! Revel in the fact that all your friends are probably going to be asking you to make more of said gift to pass on to their friends! You might even become famous! (You feel slightly guilty about obtaining fame from something that is supposed to others-focused, but you don't mind too much.)

5. Begin production. It takes hours of writing and rewriting, making and remaking, thinking and rethinking, but you don't mind in the slightest because you are CREATING! You are forming little bits of love to give to all of your favourite people and they are just going to melt with gratitude!

6. Continue production. Okay, this is taking a little longer than planned. You start to wish you could do something different today. You start kind of disliking your once brilliant gift. You've already watched an entire season of Doctor Who and you're mad they changed the actor to that skinny, dorky guy so you have nothing to pass your time with.

7. Give. You finally wrote the last note, curled the last ribbon, and addressed the last package. You stare at your mountain of presents, ready to be sent. You should feel happy and satisfied right now but you don't. You start picturing people's faces as they open them and you project your current feeling of dislike for the gift onto them. You hear them say "Uh, thanks! This is really, um.... neat."and are flooded with insecurity and a little bit of self loathing for thinking such a dumb idea was going to turn out well. You consider burning them all, but you've already told some people to expect a spectacular gift from you and there's no way you can think of something better at this point. You drive, wincing, to the post office and drop them all off, swearing that you'll never create again.

8. Take heart my friend! You might feel like poo right now, but I'll bet when you wake up in the morning tomorrow you'll at least be happy it's done. Then some people will start getting their gifts and thanking you and tell you in a genuine, honest tone of voice that they really like it. You might not get famous, but you gave something to every friend you could think of, and went only slightly over budget, and Heck! That's something to be proud of! Happy Holidays!

The Day of Mars

  I'm inclined to view Tuesday as a sort of fragile, ill tempered kind of day. Monday gets all the flack, and having a reputation to uphold, has made outstanding efforts toward congeniality. Monday is usually kind, productive, and can carry on a friendly conversation. I picture Tuesday in the corner with a double shot whiskey, writing emo haiku.
  Tuesdays catch you off guard because you've just passed through Monday with mild surprise at her good manners and are left with a general sense of well being. This is exactly what Tuesday wants. Tuesday starts you off well and begins to gnaw quietly away at your happiness until you've not only forgotten what you came into this room to do, but it suddenly feels as if something terrible is about to happen. You wonder at this for a moment and go back to check your email because maybe that was what you were going to do but then you hear the neighbors dog barking and your mind is suddenly flooded with images of home intruders with machine guns and you hear a fighter jet fly by and listen intently, just in case this one was a bad guy and the bombs are now dropping. Then you make a plan for what you're going to do when this actually does happen. First, you carry a bread knife around, then you make a mental note of what you're going to text your husband or friend and where you plan to meet them. You write the text out, to save precious time. Then you think about how you and your son are going to get out of the house/city with only a motorcycle when all hell breaks loose. Would he be better on the front, or in the backpack being carried? You think the backpack would have too much wind. The phone rings and you jump and are pulled out of the Tuesday-mare.
  After checking everything off your to-do list and then adding more things and checking them off, you check the clock. 3pm. Tuesday has more minutes to the hour apparently. You decide to take your kid for a walk because Tuesday is also bad parent day and you're trying to appease your guilt at wishing he wanted to watch more TV or knew what cookies were so you could bribe him to watch more TV with them. The house is also seeming stuffy and you wonder if that's what happens when you have a carbon monoxide leak.
  You summon the most adventurous spirit you can muster from your disquieted soul and walk around your oatmeal and sometimes olive colored suburbia, hoping against hope to find something worth seeing. There are little bridges over a little ponds and cement tortoise lawn ornaments. There's the electric hum of a Toyota Prius driving around the streets behind you that all bear mildly regrettable names, in every case succeeded by the word "glen." Brickella-Glen, Salvia-Glen, Goldfish-Glen, etc. As if there is always a nameable valley you're about to come upon suddenly. Neighborhood watch signs are posted liberally vowing protection for you and your kin from everything save boredom and occasional gossip.
  You're walking to pass time and somehow the passing of seconds is easier to palate when paired with the passing of steps, but your mind is wandering again. You find yourself wondering what the difference is between Pipit-Glen Pl, Pipit-Glen Way, and Pipit-Glen Ct. and consequently, do the residents often mistake them? You wonder how many species of palm trees there are, and if there is a difference between a yellow fire hydrant and a red one? And can you park in front of a yellow one if you do so cautiously?
  Then you start making up stories about the people you see. The slightly hunched woman with the hook nose and chunky-heeled shoes, dressed entirely in black from the neck down. She's probably a Russian spy, or a librarian that hoards the best books and that's why you never got Harry Potter even though you had it on hold for 15 months. It's at this point, when the sun is setting and your reliable 72 degree weather is chilling slightly, that you catch a whiff of the smoke from some over enthusiastic holiday lover's fire and are instantaneously transported back to you parents house in wintertime. You're once again sitting in that dark room with the snow falling silently just outside the walls coating the world in a crisp blanket and making everything still. You and your siblings are scattered about the living room with stomachs full of casserole and hot chocolate and it never crosses your mind to worry about things like if it would be safer to go down the stairs or jump out the bedroom window if there was a sudden, violent earthquake destroying your house because you're just kids and you have parents to think about those things for you. You just sit there together and quiet and everyone watches the dance in the fire and everything is fine. Everything is overflowing with peacefulness. Everything is ok.

STC - Ulysses

To quote Krisann "This is an acorn story. You're an acorn that sees everything inside itself to be a huge oak tree, but you can't will yourself to grow. You're still a little acorn and it's a wonderful thing." With that said - my vocabulary is no where close to broad enough to capture the movement and emotion I FEEL in this story, but as she is right, and I'm still just the seed of a writer beginning to grow, I'm happy with it. Oh, and even though I know you're not supposed to have to set up a story, for your sake let me say: This is my take on the Odyssey.

 It had been twenty years. Twenty years since he had pulled the life of Ithaca’s air into his lungs or filled his blood with the warmth of wine and kin. Twenty years of war and wandering. Twenty years since that fool Palamedes had called him out of his feigned stupor and gave flesh to the prophesy he had been trying with every fibre in his being to outwit, outrun. In a day it was all gone. The velvety green hills scattered with rock and beast, the musk of a morning’s hunt with his son, training the boy’s eyes and arms, and always, always upon return, the beauty of Penelope’s face... oh, her face. His eyes habitually closed at that thought to find her, but he was losing her more every day. His mind, filled with blood and metal and endless sea, was pushing her image away despite his daily struggle to keep it close. She used to call him home. He used to see her standing on the edge of the sea and singing a wordless song that ripped his heart in two and filled him with longing and hope. Now the effort to recall his wife only produced a vague shadow, blurry around the edges. Of all the horrors he had faced in the last twenty years, all the challenges, nothing had put fear in his heart... nothing except that fading image; the loss of what was keeping him sane and bringing him strength, and calling him home.
 Closing his record book, Ulysses stretched his substantial limbs to their fullest, pushing back the walls and thoughts that were closing in on him. Heavy hearted, he climbed out of his cabin and onto the deck. He always took the night-watch. The sailors thought he had assigned himself to this post because of the multiple times they had run aground or been attacked by various monster or beast under cover of darkness, but it was not. Ulysses walked the ship at night because, in the darkness, his footsteps echoing on the deck seemed to fill the air instead of drowning in it, the sound of water on wood was easier to imagine as wind in the trees behind his home. In the darkness you could pretend there was no ocean, and the stars... the stars reminded him of her. They shone with a high beauty. They twinkled, and he could almost see her eyes. They gave him hope and called him home. They were the only bit of her he had left; and he clung to that because his life depended on it.
  The night descended on his spirit like a fog. His mind, always searching for employment found nothing to occupy itself on and settled into numb recollection. Scenes of the last two decades scrolled across his consciousness and his feet paced across the boards. First was Calypso - fierce and strong. His barren heart had found a landscape of beauty when he first saw her. A stunning face and fiery eyes... Just like Penelope. He wished she had been her. He tried to make her into his wife and to renew the fading hope of love, but the longer she kept him, the more the nymph faded just as Penelope had. The ache for his love could not be soothed by another. He could not stay. The shipwrecks flashed and faded in a wave of ragged memory, and he paced still. Whirlpools, monsters, fantastic dangers and adventures all came and went and nothing stirred with their memory. It was excitement he couldn’t even have dreamed of with his young, islander imagination that longed for purpose and identity so many years ago. None of it had given any life or glory. Nothing gave satisfaction; but left only emptiness. Then came the Sirens. Here he lingered in thought for a moment. He was a wise man, and had not thought himself above their deception, but with caution and restraint he heard their song. With the first note Penelope’s face rose out of the mist. It was her song rising from beyond the railing! The wordless one that had called him home so many years ago, but since faded. He had fought against his cords and screamed for her. It had to have been her! But through the fog and melody there was no wife and sank again his hope with this reality. Just remembering it he could see her face again in the fog. That was the closest image he had to recall the one his heart could never forget. The memory of his dead Mother, with news of Ithaca’s treachery and his family’s faithfulness, did nothing but aggravate his sense of helplessness and he let it fly by quickly. Then Circe and the cannibals and the cyclops and Poseidon's storm all swirled around the steady image of his island on the horizon - the only glimpse of home in all these twenty years, stolen by greed... and greed for gold no less! What had the crew expected? That the tiny bag could hold enough to repay them all for their faithfulness? That in my joy upon return I would forget to reward them with honor and riches for their service? But no! They condemned us all to this ship, and that is their reward. Life and death at sea. Isn’t that all that’s left to us? The promise that took me away has been driving me away ever since. I’m fighting and I’m losing, but what else can I do? I have nothing left but to set my sail for home, always home. I’ve been stripped to my core and I’ve been defeated and yet I sail. I cannot cease. There is nothing left for me but to sail, sail, forever sail away from that rising sun that fades the stars as time fades her face. I hope she holds fast, for I have no strength left.

 Twenty years of trial. Twenty years alone. Twenty years of sunrises that held no promise of an end. Today was no different. Today the sun rose on a man clinging to the last hope in an empty soul. Today the sun rose and relieved him of his watch. Today the sun rose and he thanked the gods for the hours of sleep that would take him away from this, even just for a moment, and as Ulysses lowered his head into the dark cabin, the sun rose on a yet unseen speck of gold on the western horizon. 

Oxford, Round 2

Today, November 2nd 2011, my husband is sitting the elusive Oxford Thinking Skills Assesment test. With mixed feelings of confidence in his maturing brain and worry for his exhausted emotions I wished him luck as he rode off on the beast today. He is applying for another course in January, but in a lot of ways, this is it. This is what we failed at last time, and this is what says if he's done with school this year or has 3 more years of academia. If he does get in, we have to go..... who turns down Oxford, right? Especially if you're the first in your family to get even an Associates degree from a community college. Who could say no to just three more years that will have such a huge impact on not only our future, but on the future of our children... our children who may only know their father in spurts of school breaks for the first years of thier lives..... Lord, oh Lord give us wisdom.