Dear Reader,

Wow.  This week was clearly designed to test my mettle.   I was so full of plans and optimism at the beginning of the week.   Then, the strep virus tore through my little family unit causing both strep throat (with rash) and impetigo (a childhood illness that I knew not of until this past week).   Two days of juggling work with at home childcare.   A couple of hours thinking that one of my kids had an allergic reaction to amoxicillin.   A final blow to my peace of mind when, after dragging the kids out to the grocery store to get basic supplies, the wind blew the car door SHUT on my son's thumb.  I will tell you that there has never been that quantity and quality of profanity coming out of my mouth in such a short period of time.   Luckily, no bones or spirits broken.   And, with a bit of luck and some antibiotics doing their job, the kids will get to go to their Valentine's Day party tomorrow afternoon after I do a final bit of juggling by bringing them to my 9am class because of the 2 hr. delay for public schools.

But, good gracious, I must have been getting all of the karmic retribution saved up from a couple of years worth of thoughtless deeds.   Especially after about 2 weeks of my own sickness.  This was truly the short end of the stick.   However...

If there is one thing I am learning and re-learning in my life, it's that when you think you are getting the short end of the stick,   a) you are probably not that bad off, and b) you must just decorate that short end until it becomes the most beautiful stick you've ever seen.  Throw some glitter and pom-poms on that puppy.   :)    Early in my career as a college professor, I had a colleague with whom it was extremely difficult to work.   A complete immovable object when it came to moving our little department forward and championing progress.   At least in my mind.   So, after beating my head against the wall about it for a couple of years, I finally began to see that I just had to plant some flowers and vegetables and assemble some beautiful garden art around this particular mountain.   You can't change the thing itself.   You really never can.   But, you can change your perspective on it.  I may have mentioned this before on this blog.  I seem to remember a whole post about perspective.  Well, anyway, this particular colleague transplanted his mountain majesty elsewhere, but it was a valuable lesson for me.

Perspective is everything - is it not?   Case in point:  Valentine's Day.    Now, no one can argue that kindergartners and first graders exchanging little hand made hearts and eating heart-shaped cookies isn't a truly lovely thing.   If you do argue this, HAVE YOU NO HEART?   I mean, think of Charlie Brown and the red-haired girl.   Even unrequited love is sweet when you are in elementary school.  Come on!    Then, along comes middle school and you are awkwardly hanging out with your four girlfriends at the side of the school cafeteria during the Valentine's dance.  You are not sure what this is all about, but it's just kind of awkward.   Fast forward to high school and there are roses being delivered to English and Chemistry and French classes everywhere.  You are either not getting any of that, or you are getting it but not really sure that you are into the person who is giving it.  And, if you are a guy, you are cursing the heteronormative/gender biased crap that propagates  this kind of thing (OK, you are probably not actually framing it that way in your mind, but you are kind of annoyed, aren't you?).

Moving into adulthood, you are either single and, as Jim Gaffigan eloquently put it recently, feeling like a vegan in a steakhouse on Valentine's Day or you are married and feeling pressure to give your spouse a card that someone else has written about how much you love them or trying desperately to arrange childcare while going out to an overpriced dinner after a long week when you'd really just like to curl up with a good book in front of the fire.   AM I RIGHT, PEOPLE?

Anyway, I can feel as sentimental as anyone else on Valentine's Day (especially now that I have kids):

Martha Stewart, I am not.  But, these cards will be hidden in some lunch boxes tomorrow and may give my kids a little boost in the cafeteria!   And, of course, I do love them beyond all rational explanation, so having a chance to let them know this is pretty sweet for me.   And, their earnest efforts, even though they were sick, to write out little notes to their classmates melts my heart.

So, yes, perspective.   I have been single now for 43 Valentine's Days.   Occasionally, I have been lonely.   Mostly, I have been surrounded by friends (speaking of which - I am still in love with Parks and Recreation, as all my dear readers know, and yet another of Leslie Knope's brilliant moves is the establishment of Galentine's Day on Feb. 13.   Seriously, that woman is who I aspire to be.   Happy Galentine's Day to all of my women friends tomorrow!) and have been happy to, as James Taylor puts it, "Shower the people you love with love.  Show them the way that you feel.   Things are going to be much better, if you only will."    And, if I feel like I'm lonely because I don't have a romantic partner, I think of this poem by Adrienne Rich:

Song

You're wondering if I am lonely:
OK then, yes, I'm lonely
as a plane rides lonely and level
on its radio beam, aiming
across the Rockies
for the blue-strung aisles
of an airfield on the ocean
You want to ask, am I lonely?
Well, of course, as a woman driving across country
day after day, leaving behind
mile after mile
little towns she might have stopped
and lived and died in, lonely
If I'm lonely,
it must be the loneliness
of waking first, of breathing
dawn's first cold breath on the city
of being the one awake
in a house wrapped in sleep
If I'm lonely
it's the rowboat ice-fast on the shore
In the last red light of the year
that knows what it is, that knows it's neither
ice nor mud nor winter light
but wood, with a gift for burning.

Ah, perspective.   Thanks for that, Adrienne Rich.  

So, after a crazy awful week, I can still say that this happened:

And, this:

And, this:

And, this:

And, this:

(Be still, my heart.  This is the first time that she has, in my presence, picked up a book - not assigned to her in kindergarten - and read it to herself all the way through.  She was into it.   I was trying not to embarrass her by crying at this epic moment.   Oh, what reading has given to me.   I want it for her and for him!!!)

So, yes, the short end of this stick seems to have an abundance of beauty, if only I look closely.  I started the Cravings Cleanse today and my first assignment in this week 1 of preparation for the detoxing is to take a half of a day sometime this week and create what I would consider a perfect way to spend four hours and SAVOR every moment, every physical sensation, every breath.   Now, that's a way to start a lifestyle change, if you ask me.   This I can do!  

In honor of Valentine's Day, I will post a sentiment that I wholeheartedly agree with:

Don't we all just want to be seen and then loved - in that order?   Let's do that, if we can be brave enough, for our loved ones.   And, let's be brave enough to feel worthy of that ourselves!    

Thanks for reading!