The Ultimate MeMe Award

You never know where inspiration will come from. The Official Seal of the Ultimate Meme Award was given to me by Earthmama. Thank you I feel honored to be one of your five chosen. It was fun to follow the blogger who sent it to you and the other bloggers they sent it to, etc. I found so many new fun blogs in many different areas of the world. When I first read about the MeMe I thought, oh a chain letter in blog form. First impressions can be deceiving. Most people write a short list of things for each category they pick but somehow mine turned into a much longer post. Once you get me started it is hard to get me to stop. I will quote my design mentor, Douglas Marmee: “What is worth doing is worth overdoing”. That' seems to be my style. Sometimes I took myself too seriously and a few times I sat at the computer crying but I also had fun coming up with the categories and hopefully the bloggers I send it to will also. Anything can be a starting point for inspiration. My categories brought up things I hadn’t thought of in years. I allowed my choices to be a bit gnarly. One might wonder if they all truly fall into the category of favorite things. Some of my responses aren’t standard happy. Happiness for me isn’t always puppies and kisses. Sometimes it is writing and capturing the bad feeling just right.

Here are the fabulous five blogs I am passing it on to. I love what you have to say and I hope you have fun with this if you feel inspired and remember, most people just write a list. I pass the award to:

http://www.thesparklingmartins.blogspot.com/

http://www.honeysmoke.com/

http://www.mommazen.blogspot.com/

http://lydiaslifeofserendipity.blogspot.com/

http://backwoodsboogie.blogspot.com/

To accept the award, post a post on your blog, and link it to the person who gave it to you (me).

Pass it on to five other people (if you want to) by posting links to their blogs and leaving a comment in their comments. The meme that goes with this award is to think of five random categories and tell us in a post five favorite things about each category. I think the challenge and the fun comes from thinking outside the box although there is nothing wrong with listing your favorite songs or foods and as E says, there is nothing more serious or important than food.

OK now for my meme

(What is worth doing is worth overdoing.)

1. contradictions

I.

I want to like myself more and I keep doing unlikeable things.

II.

I want chickens and land and a vegetable garden and a NYC apartment with a sushi restaurant across the street that I can go to in my slippers (I used to have that). I want the smell of Indian food in the courtyard and Latin music playing in the street; I want it to be so dark the only light is stars and the only sound is crickets.

III.

I want to travel and nest. I want solitude and more children.

IV.

I want an organized home and I don’t want to clean. I want to collect odd things at garage sales and I want a house clear of clutter.

V.

I want to be thin and in shape and I love to eat and hate to exercise.

2. Love

Sometimes I am amazed at all the love I feel, how the same word can feel so different and the same.

I. daddy love

I aspire everyday of my life to be like my father but I know how I fall short. Daddy, how did you manage to always be so kind and loving? I haven’t been spending time with you lately and I feel so bad about that. Several times I have started to drive to your house and on the way I start crying so hard I turn around and go back home. Daddy, I miss you so much. How can you be right in front of me and not be there? Alzheimer's is such a cruel disease. Please come back. I am like a young child bargaining with god. I want to say please god, I will be good, give more, I will give up ______ in penance for my sins if you please bring my daddy back. I am humbled by how much it hurts everyday. Love is messy. Every day of my life, even when he was unhappy with me about something I knew shining through it all was a love for me that never wavered. Thanks you dad, for teaching me what love is.

II. mama Love

I wake up in the middle of the night and am soothed just listening to the sounds of their sweet breath. I love being sandwiched between my children. They smell deliciously different. Mikaela smells like sweet grass and clover; Nigel smells like dew and coconut. My love for them is fierce and imperfect and grows more each day even when I think it is not possible. I could move mountains for my kids. I look at them with wonder. Who will they grow up to be? Where will their lives lead them? I am honored to be their first guide through their miraculous journey to the rest of their lives.

III. hubby love

He makes me so crazy and what he thinks matters so much to me, my Damn Husband. He creates a boiling pot inside me. I try to remember what date nights used to be like. I remember going to Lincoln Center to hear Carmina Burana. I started walking up the subway that led directly into Lincoln Center and there he was, standing at the top of the stairs, shockingly handsome in his Hugo Boss suit. As he smiled down at me I felt dizzy walking up the rest of the stairs. I knew that we would be walking together from this point forward and I knew that it wasn’t going to be easy. It would be oil and water, fire and ice.

I remember going to Herban Kitchen (NYC) on Valentine’s Day. After our five course meal with organic wine I felt so light and happy holding his hand. It was such a shock to leave the warm restaurant and be outside where the cold wind was whipping down Hudson Street. It felt as though we glided back to my apartment laughing the whole way. That night we made Mikaela.

Things have changes so much; our days are filled with work, kids, finance troubles, obligation after obligation. We just keep putting out fires and in the process we seem to have put out our fire by mistake. He is a lumbering beast that comes and goes. I wonder at times if I even know him anymore. Where did our soul connection go? It is like searching inside a dark caldron for something delicate and tiny that we forgot to nurture. For now we get by knowing it is still there, somewhere, and we make due with sloppy kisses and morning mini conversations over the kids’ giggles and squeals. Love sometimes hides and lies dormant.

IV. quiet love

When I look up at the sky and feel small and full of wonder and gratitude at being alive, at being a small piece of this world.

When I take a photograph and succeed at capturing a feeling.

When I read a poem and it gives me chills, when I listen to a song (the Tinderstix) and I feel a raw knowing, a connection in my solar plexus. (I love the song, Trouble Every Day but not the movie. A friend who knows me well warned me not to see the movie and I listened to her.)

When I stop at a red light and look at the person next to me and they really look at me and see me and smile and I smile back; this small moment of connection with a stranger I will never see again.

When the balance of ordinary objects causes a startling beauty that makes me appreciate the day, my life: Mikaela’s little wooden chair, a tossed sweater and an open book; the sun creating a glow through the glass kombucha jar and casting light on an acorn and a shell; Nigel’s chubby fingers holding onto Michael’s t-shirt just above rumpled covers, two sleep faces nearly meeting.

V. self love

Neglected, boisterous, roiled, formidable. It prevails. Here I am.

3. Dreams

I. exposed

I am naked. My teeth have fallen out and I am searching the ground trying to find them.

The curtain opens and I find myself on stage. I do not know the play, it isn’t even in English. I try to act casual, I try not to be noticed, I try not to be distracting as I walk off the stage.

II. inquiry

I go to bed with a question foremost in my mind and I dream the answer.

I see my father walking through the forest. He is taking his time, strolling and stopping to look around. I have never seen him so happy, so relaxed. A few times I see him laugh out loud to himself.

I hear a baby crying. I can’t tell where it is coming from. I am frantic to find him. I follow the sounds through strange dark rooms and finally I see a small bundle. I kneel and pick him up. He quiets and stares at me.

III. lucid dreaming

Guns are going off all around me. I am angry. People are hurt and lying in the street. I am very frightened but I realize I am dreaming. To make sure I put my hand through a wall. When it melts through the wall like air I know for sure. I walk out into the gunfire. My heart is pounding. I hold up my hand and watch the bullets tear through my flesh without pain. I pick up a little girl and carry her off the street. She becomes a bird and flies away. I raise my arms and fly after her.

I see a lion off in the distance. I know I should run but I am mesmerized by the power and beauty of him. He sees me and starts to run towards me. Still, I can’t run. I watch his powerful muscles contract with each leap towards me. I know there are no lions near where I live. It takes all the strength I have to stand my ground and not run. He leaps at me and I sense that he is only wanting to play. His huge paws hit my shoulders and he knocks me over. I grab his mane with both my fists. His claws leave long blood lines down my chest. I stare into his eyes and he disappears. I stand up. I am stronger and larger than I have ever been. His power is inside of me.

IV. parallel universe

I can not sleep and I get out of bed. My house is small and I live alone. It is so quiet. I open the back door and breathe in the cold early morning air. I put on boots and head towards the mountains.

She is staring at me and screaming. Her pain is boundless. I have never seen skin so black, a body so thin, an anger so deep. I am staring at my reflection.

V. Nightmare

I have become a hideous monster. The seven deadly thrive inside me. I am an outsider, too much in my head to stay connected. Friends turn on me. I tell them a secret. You are not what we thought, they say, and back away. I am awake.

4. What I do not want to live without.

I.

Books. Wherever I go I have at least two books. Always prepared in case the doctor’s office wait is long or the car breaks down and I am waiting for a tow truck. Sometimes I am sad not to wait because it is a missed opportunity to read. I will take books to purgatory. I love to find a dog-eared, underlined book and read it thinking about the person before me reading it. It is like reading with a friend.

II.

A journal so I won’t have to write notes on small scraps of paper, along the edges of junk mail envelopes and find that an important thought got washed away in the laundry. I hate post its. They give the illusion that they are trustworthy and will stick where you leave them but they will only let you down. You will find them on the floor, stuck to your sweater, lost in the wind. I liked lined journals with soft leather covers. I have kept journals for as long as I can remember. I write my thoughts, my dreams, overheard conversations; what happened and what I wish had happened with no differentiation between them. When I am tired of being where I am I trade in for a new journal so I can start fresh with a new attitude. Sometimes I just grab any old journal and write in the empty pages. I rarely date my entries. A turn of a page could span ten years. if someone were ever to pick up my journal they might be very confused. But probably they won’t be able to read a word because my handwriting is so bad.

III.

My imagination, often the out of control troublemaker, the black sheep, the one who takes a simple list of favorite things and turns it into this. My imagination, my best friend.

IV.

Choices. I have so much trouble making them sometimes but I don’t want to loose them. This or that. One or two. Big or small. Now or later. I’ll take the remorse about making the wrong choice over not having a choice at all. Sometimes when I feel unsure I become more adamant in my decision making to compensate. Absolutely not. I will not do that. Yes, I am taking that.

Should I stay or should I go?

V.

My camera. I love taking pictures. I am a novice. My camera is much smarter than I am. I love to see a moment and capture it. The mood, the light, a second in time that will never come again. I look for secrets.

5. Secrets

I.

I saw something nasty in the woodshed, a movie line that reminds me that we all have our pain to contend with. Jane Hirschfield’s poem, For What Binds Us, talks about proud flesh:

“And see how the flesh grows back
across a wound, with a great vehemence,
more strong
than the simple, untested surface before.
There’s a name for it on horses,
when it comes back darker and raised: proud flesh,

as all flesh
is proud of its wounds, wears them
as honors given out after battle,…”

I hide my proud flesh and in doing so I have hidden myself, created a hindrance to becoming, that I have never recovered from.

II.

I long to take things, but I never do. When I was young I saw a Mary Tyler Moore episode where she was hired by a department store to test their security. She was to go into the store each day and steal whatever she could and bring it back to a undisclosed location. She loved the job. The trouble was the man who hired her was a fake and she was caught in a crime ring. Of course it ended happily after she told her story and the security men shook their heads at her naiveté. (When no one was home I used to sing the Mary Tyler Moore theme song out loud and throw my hat up into the air.)

I loved the idea of being able to steal without thinking of going to jail, without really sinning. Just seeing what I could get away with. I want to take little things that can fit in my pocket so when I feel like it I can reach my hand in and roll the trinkets around in my fingertips. I don’t remember ever taking anything. Not even as a child. I was always worried about getting a black spot on my soul, something the nuns assured me would happen if I ever committed a sin against god, which stealing surely is. In my life I have committed other sins against god according to the Catholic church but because I am no longer in good standing I can not go to confession to absolve them. Funny, although I no longer believe in confession, I can still feel the black spots arrive on my soul, black tar residue sticking to my good intentions, but I have no way to make them go away. Sometimes this helps.

III.

Don’t tell anyone. I am sometimes not very confident in my abilities. I lack assertiveness and look to others for approval. What? You knew that? Who told you?

IV.

I really like doing dishes. Strange but true. I don’t admit this to the Damn Husband because as far as household chores go, he abhors doing dishes. So as a favor to him, I have taken over that chore on a permanent basis. I never expect him to do the dishes. But I like him thinking I am doing him a big favor out of the kindness of my heart. I tend to be a very lax housekeeper. (I love the Robert Hass translation of Kobayashi Issa’s haiku: Don’t worry spiders, I keep house casually) When I need to start cleaning I always start with the dishes. (and sometimes end there) It is generally very satisfying with quick results. There is a pile of dishes. Fill the sink with warm water, wash, complete. It is my daily water meditation with a lavender scent of the dish soap. I am not so in love with doing dishes that I would turn down a dishwasher if one came my way. Until then I will enjoy my wet meditation.

V.

No. Not this one. Some secrets are meant to be kept. Forever. Remember the quote from the last line of Catcher in the Rye? “Don’t ever tell anybody anything. If you do you will start missing everyone.”