Crumbs, dear friends, loss, strength

That is mos def one of the vaguest post titles I have ever written and will ever write. It's ridiculous. But so was today.

After a very emotional weekend which included an enormously beautiful memorial service for a friend gone too soon, one of my dearest pals arrived into town last night. This was a balm. I was covered in cat hair and wore no make up. Jack was raising hell about going to cotillion's Holiday Dining Etiquette class which, let's be honest, is the reason I registered him for cotillion in the first place. Eating soup with one's hands? Not appealing anywhere, and yet he persists. Oliver had just split his pajama pants from knee to ankle and was slightly overtired-manic after a perfect day at a pal's house. Tom was goggle-eyed because he'd been to memorial part deux until 2 am. 

If a friend can saunter into that fray, you know she's a good one.

As such, Anne and I celebrated with cocktails, and a large skillet of pasta, and laughter and the realest sort of talk. And then Oliver went to sleep, and Jack came home with a large pamphlet from National Protocol, LTD (OMG, that is so intense! But he did learn so much! Amen!), and Tom went to bed because he was drained, and then we exhaled and clinked glasses and felt the same gratitude- for good friends and bedtimes.

She and I are taking yet another online writing class together. That's how we met, and today found us beginning the fourth or fifth one anew. We wrote together this morning, quietly, at my kitchen table, and then parted ways for several hours.

During that time I saw another friend who lost her mother two months ago and her husband on Thanksgiving. The pain of 2016 is unceasing it seems. Oh, and Ben Carson is heading HUD? What? I am struggling to ingest this news. It's like every day brings a new presidential appointment or expose which is rather like ripping a whole body scab off each and every morning; they are all that terrible. 

Anne walked back in as I was snarfing salad from the mixing bowl and attempting to roll out large amounts of butter cookie dough to stamp before the boys got home to decorate them. Teacher gifts. It's a good thing I wasn't mainlining Xanax, for christs sakes. I mean, shit, 2016.

We caught up from our days, and I was starting to feel centered again and then two hours later, there was a debacle with an over-frosted cookie and a brother and awful words were screamed from one brother to another, and one ended up with a swollen ear, and both were crying, and I just sat in the kitchen like someone who'd just dared look Medusa in the eyes. Frozen. Stunned. Immobile.

Tears coursed down my stone face, and rage through my icy veins, and I was surrounded by crumbs of the cookies I'd just spent hours rolling and baking and cooling, so thoughtfully and hopefully. And that's really the worst of it, I think. That hope and time all in smithereens on the floor around me with kids crying amidst it all and a friend watching on. As if anyone should see the inside of the sausage.

But of course we all see that, just not together. And we should, and Anne did. And she said, "Well, my goodness, I am right at home." Which is, of course, just perfect because she meant it so sincerely and with such love. Because she, too, has found herself crying and surrounded by crumbs and  fighting children and a complete shock at just what the fuck happened on a random Monday night for which you had planned and had such hopes.

It is an hour later now, and I have stopped shaking from rage. I have had some wine. One cleaned the smashed cookies, and I put the others are in Tupperware. Ben Carson is still head of HUD but everyone is standing up for Comet Pizza (as they should), and so many are brave in this fight for our country.

I think about the historical arcs which great countries summit and bend round. I think about how imperialism died and dynasties fell and greatness was vanquished, and I wonder if this is not our time to fall so deeply and so hard. I wonder if the cookie crumbs are the hopes of American progressives, who see the better whole we could be but aren't. Sometimes, hard landings are the only way to learn. 

I think about the resistance, the fight for better. Hell, the fight for good. The fight towards a better, more cohesive tomorrow. And I think about how I will always fight for that, even when I am covered in cat hair and my crow's feet are pronounced and my kids are melting down and I am ashamed of my country's leadership-to-be. This is precisely the time to fight, to resist, to march, to stand up and speak out. It is the time to "feel at home" and to find strength in that and to make the perpetrator sweep the crumbs and to all work hard tomorrow. Damned is the one who won't, for he will lose in the end.

When your son returns to visit his elementary school; Botanic Garden follow-up

Today, Jack had a day off from 5th grade as the middle school teachers wrote report cards. (I have regularly been amazed by the thought that goes into my kids reports and am very appreciative. So even though I could have used today, go forth teachers and write! And thank you!) 

In any case, as Oliver still had school, we all decided to park and do a quick visit as Jack has been back to the lower school just once since graduating from 4th last June. He'd spent six years on that campus and was so excited by the prospect of seeing his former teachers.

Our quick visit turned into the happiest hour-long reunion. I felt so lucky to be there, to see my boy glow with love and memory and appreciation. His comfort was palpable. It's the sort that comes from having been deeply happy and known somewhere. Of having been a real part of a tightly-knit, sincere community. Of having always been appreciated for just who he is. I wish all children had such educational experiences.

In his 3rd grade classroom, he was invited into the gathering circle by his teachers, Elizabeth and Sarah (see middle right and bottom two pics below). Those two could be a wildly successful comedic duo but, fortunately, decided to be educators, and Jack's year with them was stellar.

Also, they're fashionable, and I learned some tips from them. And laughed pretty much every time we crossed paths. I would happily hang with those two on a Friday night. And don't even get me started on 4th grade. It was also insanely stellar. And full(!) of laughter, both in class and when I saw the teachers. So much happiness everywhere at school. Thank god Oliver is still there for 2.5 years (one of his fab teachers is the woman in the top two pics; she and Jack got to know each other last year in Homework Club).

Classes did start and we did need to leave and so we did. Remember the cool Junior Botanist program we did at the US Botanic Garden this past summer? And then remember how Jack sent all of his work in and received a certificate and all kinds of swag and an invitation to visit the Botanic Garden's growing facilities which are otherwise open to the public just one day a year?

I remembered this invitation two days ago and was amazed to find that the botanist we were encouraged to contact, Kyle, was free today. To the greenhouses Jack and I went. And for 2.5 hours we stayed. Kyle was in no rush, and it was such a fantastic and educational experience. Check out a sampling of the pics I snapped. 

Jack tastes a toothache plant. Tingly!

The nectar is SO sweet.

Walking home with an eight-foot Christmas tree

Y'all may recall that I have sometimes referred to Thanksgiving as little more than a speed bump on the road to Christmas. This year (as I noted yesterday), Thanksgiving was really wonderful, and I was grateful for the slowing down, the taking pause, the bit of tuning out I was able to do.

On Sunday, however, I could wait to start Christmas no longer. I LOVE CHRISTMAS! On went the carols, out came the decorations, up went the wreaths. The kids and I were determined to get our tree.

Someone very important to Tom, a mentor of his not much older than we are, passed away suddenly just about ten days ago. It has really shaken Tom, and our hearts ache for the wife and children this man left behind. As he mourns, I have tried to give my dear T some extra love and care and space when he needs it. On Sunday, he desperately needed to burn some stress and so I sent him to the tennis court with a bucket of balls.

In the meantime, and because T always wants a smaller tree than I feel is acceptable, the kids and I walked to a Christmas tree lot that pops up each year just around the corner from where our new house stands. Isn't that a magnificent coincidence? 

We picked out a towering fir, and emboldened by the fact that there no sibling fighting occurred during the choosing of said tree, I said, "Boys, we are awesome. Let's walk this puppy home!"

As the man helping us gave our tree a fresh cut and shook all the old needles free from its boughs, I regaled the kids with the story of the Christmas in New York in which I bought a tree, dragged it several blocks up Lexington Avenue and up the four flights of stairs to my tiny studio, and set it up in a stand ALL WHILE WEARING a skirt and heels. 

"So you see, boys, we three have got this made."

I took the trunk end while they flanked the lighter top, and we started our 0.3 mile trek home. 

People, an eight-foot fir is not a lightweight item. We were all sweating and covered with sap and Ol said a branch hit him in the penis and Jack exclaimed that he was surely acquiring a bruise and we took many breaks and I am certain people were thinking, "WTF is that family doing!?!"

At some point, Tom called and asked where we were. I told him we were walking the tree home, and he was like, "You're walking the tree home? Do you want me to bring the car?"

"No," said I. "We are intrepid."

About 45 seconds later, he showed up in the car. We had gone approximately 0.2 miles. My arms appeared to have cramped into 45-degree limbs, and so I agreed to let T put the trunk of the tree into the trunk of the car, and then I insisted on walking behind the car so I could hold up the top of the tree so it didn't become disfigured in any way. 

You can imagine what this parade looked like. One dear neighbor put her hands on her hips and just laughed. I mean, what else would you do? I said, "Can you tell we didn't really think this through?"

And we all laughed together.

And now our tree is up and perfect and it makes Oliver and me deeply joyous and Jack a little bit less so, and I think Tom is totally ambivalent but he did buy us new lights because we lost the others in the move and now instead of five strands that I had to crimp together we have just one and it's full of LEDs and those things are both so nice.

Decorating the tree is one of Oliver's favorite life activities. Here we are having just begun.

The tree is now dripping with ornaments. Most of those are treasures that elicit a range of happy memories.

The glass typewriter I gave Nanny ages and ages ago after she had a stroke and couldn't write well and so started to type letters to me? Mom gave it to me after Nanny died, and I cherish it.

The perler bead ornaments that map the kids' passions over time? I love them- from utter nonsense to Minecraft to a periodic table, they remind me of my boys' curiosity and enthusiasm.

The many fleur-de-lis I've collected and been gifted? You know just whose tree this is.

The red cardinals? Those are a tradition in Tom's extended family, and I love the sweet material depictions of all a marriage brings together. 

The stuffed felt Enemen (enema men), courtesy of a Fleet pharmaceutical rep who visited my dad twenty years ago? Those are campy vintage awesomeness.

The collection of Bronners ornaments? Those have been given to us and the boys, a new one for each over the years, by my Mom. She has beautiful and fun taste. 

And on and memorably on.