The Last Dance? Not yet, but soon....

Since my darling daughter, Erin, came blasting unexpectedly into my life almost 18 years ago, she has turned my world upside down and my life inside out. She is never more than a thought away from some devilment, and she usually keeps me on the edge of my seat, wondering what she will dream up next.

This is a big year in our household. It is a year of lasts, as Erin enjoys her final year of high school, and all the fun that goes with it. She is almost grown, a beautiful young woman, inside and out, with a zest for life and a knack for fun that draws people to her.

I feel like we have fast forwarded through the last 17 years, like some kind of crazy time warp, but this year is the fastest yet. I look ahead with both enthusiasm and dread at the separation that is coming so quickly, in so short a time. I can't help but wonder how we got from preschool to senior year of high school so soon. We have already seen the final first day of school come and go. This week, it was homecoming, culminating with a dance on Saturday night. Ironically, and perhaps fittingly, it was also Halloween.

Halloween is one night in the year when Erin always allows her imagination to run away with her enthusiasm. Never one to allow an opportunity for a good time to pass by without her participation, she was determined to have her final homecoming, and still enjoy Halloween as well.

Things started out traditionally enough. She fell in love with a dress she saw this summer, and it quickly became apparent that she was not going to be able to live without it. We took it home long before she knew that homecoming and Halloween would be the same evening. Fortunately, it was black and white, and would work with the holiday theme she ultimately devised.

Her first unconventional move was to join forces with her friend, Ali, to go as each other's date. The reasons why each of them was otherwise dateless don't merit discussion here - they both determined early on that they would have the most fun going with each other. It turned out to be an excellent choice, I would say, given how much fun they had.

They each had a beautiful little dress, Erin in black and white, and Ali in all black. Then, they added the zombie features that would turn the event into Another Fun Occasion. Erin and Ali, actresses both, with a flair for the dramatic, ripped their stockings, painted on their lipstick scars, and wore each a glove - the most captivating zombies I have ever seen.

The Zombie Dates - Erin and Ali, Halloween Homecoming, 2009

My contribution to the evening was their wristlet corsages, a last minute addition dreamed up from items laying around the house. The end result was festive, fun and cheap, and if nothing else, added a little flair to their costumes. One thing was for sure, no one else had anything like them!

As has become a tradition, Erin and Ali, together with the third musketeer, Kelly, took over my bathroom in the afternoon, and prepared for their big evening. As always, we took the first pictures of the three of them, posing in the living room, and just having the fun of being themselves.

Kelly, Erin and Ali - all dressed up and ready to scare!

They are a bevy of beautiful girls, genuinely funny and real and never afraid to throw themselves into the occasion. I will miss these opportunities next year, when I will no longer have the fun of peeking into their world for a few hours, and participating in their off the wall fun.

One of my goals as a mom has always been to be in the moment, to enjoy the time I am having now, and to not look backwards or forwards, regretting or anticipating another time. Next year, everything will be different, everything will change. In the end, I have only the limited time that I have now to build the memories for a lifetime, and I have to make the most of it before this time has gone.

But one thing will never change - my abiding joy at being Erin's mom. Erin has already given me a lifetime of joyous experiences, and the wonder of her has never ceased to amaze me. From her first dance, to the last, I cherish every moment.

Just one question - has anyone seen my bathroom counter? Because that's where the real scares can be found.

Happy Halloween!

About audacity and hope....

Five years ago today, the best thing and the worst thing that ever happened to us happened - Prince Charming jumped on the nearest passing horse and rode off into the forest with the wicked witch and her shiny, red, and ultimately poisonous, apple. What? Life isn't a fairy tale?

In that case, five years ago today, my husband of 20 years, the father of my children, the architect of our life as we knew it, walked out the door and into what he so charmingly referred to as his "New start."

For those who don't know him, he was serious. He seems to have been under the impression that if you really, really wanted to, you could stop your old life and start a new one seamlessly, effortlessly, and with no collateral damage. Like a mulligan on life, or something.

I only bring this up in case someone reading this has the same delusional game plan for their life [and the lives of their family, because whatever you are telling yourself, it WILL affect them.] Allow me to give you the benefit of my hard earned experience - telling the wife and kids that it's not about them, it's about you, does not make anyone feel one iota better about your choice.

I would like to think my own wayward prince been enlightened now, but enough about him.

For anyone who may stumble across this and has been left choking on the dust as the king or queen of their own personal kingdom rides away, I want you to know one thing. [Enough allegory, I'm serious here.] You will gradually have less and less times when you hurt so bad you can't even breathe, and you will have more and more times when you laugh and feel okay about your life, until one day, somewhere around the two to three year mark, probably, you will realize you have gone all day without thinking about it, or him/her, and you will realize that you are, in the words of the most famous song in television history, "Going to make it after all."

Just don't go to Nicollet Avenue and throw your cloche in the air, because Minnesotans are pretty tired of that, and don't think it's cute any more.

Whatever you may think about President Obama, [and there is a wide range of opinions out there, I know,] he hit on the very combination of words that describe the best qualities of the human spirit - audacious and hopeful. No matter what has happened in our lives, somehow most human beings manage to sort it out, work it through, and arrive on the other side of the problem ready to move forward and keep on going. I am constantly amazed by that, and although each of us has a different method for surviving, they all have one thing in common - the audacious hope that life will be better if we just keep on trying.

On a day that I saw my family's world fall apart, I was still able to look forward and know that someday our lives would be better for having gone through that difficult time. That is audaciousness at it's finest, and I suspect that everyone who has ever gone through it has felt the same way, sooner or later. Hope springs eternal is not just a cliche after all.

Think about the people you see on television who have just been through crisis or catastrophe. You rarely hear them say, "I am giving up," or "I quit on life." Instead, you hear them talk about how it could have been worse, what they still have, how they will go forward - all positive signs that they realize that the future will someday overcome the moment. Audacity of hope in the flesh.

I could talk about the events of that day five years ago, or the events that followed, but that is our personal family history, and if you don't already know about it, then you probably are not on the list of those who need to know. Unlike a reality show, I believe there are some things that should be kept to ourselves, and not spread around the globe for the entertainment of others.

But one thing I will share with you, and if you are going through your own hard time, perhaps you can gain some courage from these words and live your own life with audacious hope - whatever heartache you are currently experiencing is only a brief moment in a whole life. You will get through it. You will laugh, and find joy, and have moments of peace and contentment again. Although your life may be forever changed, and it will not necessarily be a trouble free path, you will somehow find your way, and your journey will make you a smarter, more thoughtful, more compassionate person.

I audaciously wish you the hope of better days to come.

Birthday wishes times fifty and more....

Today is a very special day in the life of two people that I love, one from my family by adoption, and one from my family by choice.

I have been spectacularly fortunate in my extended family. I have cousins who are like sisters to me, I have aunts and uncles who I know I could turn to if I ever needed to, and each one has some special quality or characteristic all their own which makes them uniquely lovable.

My Aunt Shirley, my aunt because my Uncle Fritz had the good sense to marry her while he had the chance some time back, (I don't want to make anyone feel old, but the number 60 comes to mind,) is the best kind of aunt. She makes the world's best Special K bars, she has the most infectious laugh, she is the best hostess ever, she still worries about me getting sunburned at the cabin and reminds me to put on sunblock [too bad she wasn't here for the last Royals-Twins game I attended,] and she still loved me, even when I was an obnoxious teenager and everyone wanted to strangle me for being so mean to my mother. What more can you ask for in an aunt?

Although I got her a birthday card, it is, unfortunately, currently sitting somewhere other than in her mailbox. [I don't think we need to go into that any further. Blush.] So, to my Aunt Shirley, happy birthday to you, and many, many more. Consider yourself hugged!

The other special person who is celebrating a big birthday today is my long time friend and college roommate, Beth.

Beth and Sarah on May 23, 1982, when we graduated from St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minnesota.

We are not talking routine, run of the mill friendships here. This is a friend of the heart who knows all my secrets, so unfortunately for my readers, who are breathlessly anticipating my usual expose of humorous anecdotes, I will not be dishing any dirt here today. We have swept all that under the rug a long time ago.

Although, if I were going to dish up some funny stories, I could theoretically reveal we might have considered doing a little more sweeping and vacuuming while we were in college. Of course, we would have had to work around the less than cleanly dishes. Which might have been under the closets hanging on the wall. Not that I mean anything by that. Just throwing out some hypotheticals, here.

Beth and I have gone through a lot together, and I recently remarked that we seem to find ourselves going back in time. It's like we just graduated from college again - single, broke and trying to figure out what to do with our lives. I think I can safely speak for both of us when I say we are now ready to pass go and collect our $200.

The choosing of a college roommate is an inexact science, and you never really know how it will work out until you try it out. Living together in a dorm room reveals the cracks and fissures in the landscape of your relationship. There is no guarantee that living with someone just like you will be a success. And that doesn't mean opposites can't be best friends and work it out.

When I think about Beth and me, I am reminded of a Donny and Marie song from longer ago than I want to remember. [For those youthful brats who pretend they don't know Donny and Marie, that would be Donny Osmond, teen idol, and Marie Osmond, who used to be a country singer before she became the poster child for post-partum depression and whatever other causes she is currently representing.]

Beth was a lot country, I was a little bit rock and roll. Beth was an athlete, I considered moving from my bed to the sofa to be a major workout. Beth was a morning bird, I was a night owl. (The only way we were awake at the same time was if she lapped me getting up in the morning before I got to bed.) She was a blond Norwegian, I was not. She took school seriously, I took boys (and hooking rugs, for one memorable finals period) seriously. I was a creative writer with no self-discipline, she was a serious student that put me continuously to shame. We had nothing in common, if you looked at the surface.

Yet, despite our differences in nature and personality, our three year stint of rooming together worked out so well that she is still one of my closest friends, godmother to my children, [some more recently than others,] and keeper of my deepest secrets I wouldn't dare to tell anyone else. I know there were a number of people back then who wondered how we could possibly live together so successfully, since we were so different. The answer was pretty easy. Compromise, honesty, and shared values was the secret to our success. A secret we both evidently forgot when choosing our life partners, I would add, since we both ended up with the wrong people, which is how we ended up single once again.

The two special people who share this natal day remind me of how truly gifted I am in my life. As this day has approached, I have contemplated at some length how truly bereft I would be without all the people I love, and who love me back.

You are never alone when you have people who love you. The gift of love, freely given, is the only thing in life that is truly irreplaceable. Cherish those you love, nurture those relationships, and when you have the chance, let them know how much you care about them and about the relationship.

Aunt Shirley and Beth, you each have a place in my heart that cannot be filled by the love of anyone else. Wishing each of you the happiest of days, and in Beth's case, I wish that 50 times over! Happy birthday, happy year, and I want you each to know that I am looking forward to many more happy birthdays to come.

Reasoning.....

I have heard that everything in life happens for a reason. Good. Glad to hear the universe is not as random as it usually seems. The real question, though, is when, exactly, do we get to know what that reason is?

I look at my own, rather average, pretty normal life, and I wonder, what, exactly, was the reason for the tires on every vehicle I own (that would be three,) to go bad at the same time? In a rational universe, that seems ridiculous, since the tires that were on the vehicles were not all originally purchased at the same time.

I wonder what higher purpose was served by my broken foot on the Fourth of July? Did it save me from some dreadful fate, a la "Sliding Doors," because I wasn't able to drive somewhere for a couple of weeks while it healed?

What could be the higher meaning for the flu vaccine running out immediately prior to our arrival, thus causing us to run around town looking for an alternative provider? [The reason being my daughter was required to have it for her class the following day, which she didn't know until that week, because she was out sick the week before, when the rest of the class found out, and no one told her. See? Totally random.]

The things that plague me are mostly small things, I realize. Nothing too serious or earth shattering, just the stuff that keeps you up nights wondering.

But there are bigger questions, too. What betterment of the universe could possibly have been served by The Great Depression, our current recession, the Holocaust, rampant unemployment, or any of the other major issues of this, or any, day, that seems to plague us in this world.

To me, the world appears very random and haphazard. My favorite poem, which I have posted here previously, is about God as the master weaver, and he sees the fabric being woven from the upper side, where the pattern is clear, and the outcome neat and orderly.

We, on the other hand, see the weaving from the underside, where everything is a mess, there are strings hanging everywhere, the pattern is not evident, and all is in disarray. I don't know about you, but if life could array itself, even briefly, it would really help me out while I'm going through the struggle.

I don't mean to imply, for the relatives and friends who are suddenly feeling panic clutching their hearts, that I am deeply depressed again. I am not, so breathe! I am just contemplating the random nature of the world, and wondering if, in telling people there is a reason for everything, we are not doing them, and us, a real disservice.

Perhaps, instead of seeing reason in everything, we should just accept that some things have no reason, no purpose, no ultimate meaning. Perhaps, sometimes, life just happens. Sometimes it happens good. Sometimes, it happens bad. But all in all, mostly it just happens.

I have always been fascinated with the concept of people who have missed this tragedy or that happening by seconds because of some random thing that occurred. Someone with a flat tire missed one of the flights from 9/11, and they are here today because of it. While they no doubt cursed their bad luck at the time, I am sure that ultimately it appeared to be a blessing.

What we don't hear is that because that person had a flat tire and missed that flight, there was probably another person on standby that perished that day because of the flat tire. Is there a higher purpose for that person to have died, seemingly out of turn? I think, perhaps, it was just a matter of random luck, happenstance gone wrong.

There is such a thing as karma, I think, because bad living always does catch up with you, sooner or later. But I'm not sure that it is truly a tit for tat type of thing. I think that if you live your life badly, sooner or later, you will run into the wrong person, abuse the system one too many times, or do something so egregious that you ultimately end up getting caught. While it may make the people on the other side of the equation feel better, I'm not sure that it is a balancing of the universe so much as having pressed their luck one too many times.

We frequently hear about prayer being answered, usually because people are thankful for the positive outcome of a situation that only God could have saved. But the truth is, more people have prayed for the same outcome for their loved one that never happened, so why one and not the other?

Prayer is everywhere, despite the naysayers who howl that prayer is being removed from our world by the atheists and the ACLU. Truly, we are a very prayerful nation, and everyone from the president to the smallest children can be seen praying, or talking about praying, any, and every, day of the week.

Where are most of the preschools located? In churches. We find polling places, where people go to vote, in churches across the nation. We hear the president in the middle of a catastrophe talking about praying for the victims. We see sports teams talking about praying for the outcome.

Prayer and Christian values are seen and heard almost everywhere we look in this nation, from the courthouses to the schools to the workplace. We get married in churches. We have funerals in churches. We discuss almost every important concept in the context of our religious values, from abortion to economics to the weather. Who has not heard a weather forecaster talking about praying for rain?

I have noticed, however, that it is usually the victor who is seen talking about how their prayers were answered. Curiously, we rarely hear from the losing side, talking about how their prayers were not answered. I always wondered, did one side pray harder? Were the prayers more virtuous? Did they have more people, like some sort of other-worldly reality show, where the pray-ers vote for the winner with their prayers?

We pray for jobs for those we love. People find jobs every day, of course, but we also hear, all too often these days, about people who searched diligently for months to no avail. Are they not praying hard enough? Do they not have enough people praying for their success? Do they need to find another team, perhaps? One with a more direct line to God's consciousness?

We pray for a cure for cancer, hoping for a miracle for the people who are important to us, or those on our church prayer chain. So why does one person receive a miracle, while another one does not? I have no answers.

I have truly felt the power of prayer, and I believe strongly in it. I know that prayers are sometimes answered, and other times they are simply not. And at other times yet, they are answered in ways that are revealed only months or even years down the line.

I know of a family that prayed for custody of the children in a divorce to go one way, while it went exactly the opposite. Yet, in the end, the children ended up exactly where they belonged, for a complex set of reasons that don't matter here. Was that a long delayed answer to prayer, or was it simply that things worked themselves out as best they could, under the circumstances? I don't know.

I know that the right thing ultimately happened, although it took a very winding path to get there. But I will never know if it was God's hand that drove it, or simply that things worked themselves out in the end, because people are who they are, and don't really change, over the long term.

The truth is that you will never know what might have happened had you taken the road less traveled, the other fork in each decision-making situation that you faced. While you can speculate on what might have been a better choice, (i.e. if I had married B instead of A, I wouldn't have gotten divorced,) you will never really know what would have happened, because you don't know all the ramifications of having made that other choice.

I look at my own life, and speculate occasionally on what might have been. I don't find it to be a particularly helpful exercise, nor a particularly appealing one. But every now and then, I play the "What If" game as well as anyone else, and although I don't have the answers, I try, at the very least, to use the speculation to learn and make better choices the next time I am faced with a similar situation.

My own life of sliding doors, those instances where I made a decision, and things haven't worked out, or perhaps even when they have, is not that exciting, overall. I have made many mistakes in my life, like most people, but few of them were truly life changing. I have been able to recover, more or less, from pretty much everything that has ever gone wrong in my life, and even now, have hope that the greatest disaster to befall me, divorce and financial ruin, will ultimately work itself out. [Although if anyone has a spare million or so sitting around that they want to get rid of, I could use a hand. Just sayin'!]

And so it is with most people, if you look at their lives as a whole, and not in small part.

That is the interesting thing about life, something which my 82 year old mother holds at the heart of her optimism. No matter what has gone wrong for me, [and she knows everything that has ever gone wrong, and has patiently heard about it in minute detail, whether she wanted to or not, which I think probably assures her saintly passage straight to the right hand of God when she leaves this earthly life behind,] she has held fast to the phrase, it will all work out in the end. It's her mantra, and generally, it turns out she is right.

Perhaps that is really what is meant when we say, everything happens for a reason. Perhaps there is no intentional meaning at all. Perhaps, as human beings, we have been created to be resilient, so that whatever comes our way, we will shift gears, fire up our brains, and turn it into something that will work for us. Maybe the reason is simply that we will self-direct to make whatever happens work for us, in the end.

I think that might be the most hopeful part of the human spirit, this never ending ability to change directions and to accept and move forward, whatever happens. People who have terminal cancer continue to hope, against all odds, that they will beat it, and sometimes, for no apparent reason, they do. In the depths of despair, we search for anything positive upon which to hang our hats, and feel good about having done so.

There is a Minnesota phrase, [perhaps other people say it, too, but I have never heard it uttered from anyone who was not from Minnesota,] "Well, at least it's something." It is a to-the-point analysis that while everything is not perfectly ordered, there is at least one thing that is going okay.

It is almost breathtakingly poignant in its simplicity, and it's truthfulness. I have yet to find a life situation in which I could not utter those words; well, at least it's something.

I guess, if there is a reason for everything that happens in life, at least that's something. I'm not sure what, and if you figure it out, let me know. Until then, I, for one, will continue to watch out for the strings in my eyes, and the potholes in my path, and look for that silver lining. Maybe I can sell it and get some money to pay my bills. Now that really would be something!

Reality world USA.... [Updated]

Today I looked at the headlines and realized that a profound change has come to America. No longer satisfied to lead the world in innovation and productivity and creative genius, we now have Captured the Flag in global narcissistic feeding at the fountain of celebrity. It is not something of which to be proud. I am filled with a profound sense of despair for our country, as I look over what passes for news on this dreary October day.

Jon Gosselin, [whose name no one should ever have heard in a rational universe,] is an international celebrity, who is being sued by the very network that put him on the pedestal in the first place. His completely dysfunctional family has not only not hidden their very personal and private problems from the glare of international attention, they have persisted, actually insisted, on playing out their entire drama on the cover of People magazine and TMZ.

Whether or not their marriage was doomed from the start should not be the topic of the world's interest, when sixteen little eyes and ears are wide open and listening. Call me old fashioned, but I think there are some things best left unsaid. Pretty much anything Jon or Kate have to say falls into that category, if you want my opinion.

One might think that the many political crises currently under way would dominate the political news of the day. Health care reform? War? Disease? Economic meltdown on a scale not seen since the Great Depression? Insignificant, when compared to the sudden realization by the media and the political machines of both major parties, not to mention the American public, that John McCain's attractive 24 year old daughter has cleavage.

Well. Stop. The. Presses.

The fact that the latest controversy-that-isn't was sparked by a self-posted picture that is more modest than half the outfits I see in church these days doesn't give me a whole lot of confidence that our politicians have their eye on the right ball. Seriously, can we redirect our attention to something more important than what kind of push up bra a rich and foolish girl might be wearing at home?

Next up, we have the six year old who was, then wasn't, in his family's hot air balloon flying 7000 feet above Terra Firma. While I'm sure the saga itself was gripping to those who have absolutely nothing more pressing to do, it is the aftermath that has gone completely viral, as the entire world weighed in on whether or not the family did this as a publicity stunt, and what kind of parents they are, anyway.

Update: Turns out it was a publicity stunt, after all, which just makes my point even more effectively. If we, the world at large, had not given his parents the platform from which to make this ridiculous stunt a world-wide happening, by paying far too much attention to something that should have been of local interest, at the most, they would never have done this in first place. That would have saved tens of thousands of dollars, not to mention police and volunteer man hours and resources, which could have been used for a more appropriate purpose. But just wait, I predict this is not over yet, because you know there will be a book deal and a reality telelvision show in it for someone.

On a side note, I glanced at some comments following a brief article on CNN, and the number of people pontificating on how parents SHOULD carry out their duties was stupefying. You would certainly think there was never a child with a broken arm, or a bean up their nose, or a penny down their throat (my own personal debacle,) that didn't come with an abusive failure of a parent.

Here's a flash for all the back seat parents out there. It's not as easy as it looks. I would match up a creative three year old against a tired parent any day, and I wouldn't bet against the kid.

Apparently those who were commenting have never, for even an instant, allowed their six year old out of their sight. That explains the parents who are following their children to job interviews, I guess. Personally, when I heard about it, I was just glad that it wasn't my kid, because then I didn't have to decide whether to hug him or kill him for scaring me that way.

I am fascinated, in a way, by the ravenous desire for celebrity that our culture appears to have spawned. I remember a time, it doesn't seem that long ago, when you didn't talk about your family's dirty laundry in public. These days, you are not only talking about it, you wear it out for everyone to see, via your facebook, your blog, your twitter account, or on You Tube. There is no stupid act that cannot be exploited, no foolish moment that cannot be replayed endlessly, for the merriment and lucrative return on the few seconds of posting time investment.

I have begun to wonder over the last couple of months whether the name of my blog is fair to apply to my life. Since Elizabeth Edwards made a fortune, and the cover of People magazine, on the shifting sands of her husband's faithless actions, I am not so sure any more that I was ever lost in Springer-land at all.

If I dropped in from outer space and read the headlines today, I would think I must have found a perfect world, because certainly there are no real problems in a place where Anna Nicole Smith's addictive habits are leading the headlines two years after she died from an obvious overdose. (I mean, seriously, we all knew the day she died that she overdosed. The only thing that sets her apart from every other anonymous addict who dies from going to the well once too often is the fact that she stripped naked for Playboy magazine, which is where her saga really begins.)

It's an interesting new reality when my life, a soap opera if ever there was one, looks tame in comparison to what is hitting the headlines on an hourly basis in our 24/7 news cycle. I am left wondering why Lindsey Lohan going to court once again is more interesting, or more important, than the details of the health care bill about to be foisted on us, which may or may not cover everyone or anyone, and will cost either more or less than the current system, but we can't agree about that, either. Maybe it's just me, but I don't get it.

I am not sure that a country which considers anything Levi Johnston does to be noteworthy is really eligible for the moral high ground, telling the rest of the world how it should conduct itself, but we persist in doing it, anyway. There is something rather strange and pathetic about the pot calling the kettle black, especially when we are sitting in the middle of the fire while we do it.

I say it's time to step away from the intoxicating trough, and work through the hangover until we are sober again. If we fail to pull this country back to the brink of sanity and fix the real problems in which we are engulfed, we will deserve what we get. Of course, it's our grandchildren that will have to live with it if we fail in our obligation to future generations. In the end, it is they, not we, who will pay the price for our inattention now.

Nero fiddled while Rome burned. For us, it's a coyote running away with a dog named Daisy. But the downfall will look the same in the end.