this woman’s work

You are browsing the archives from 2007 October.

If you’ve written me and I haven’t written back it’s because I haven’t had time to give your email the attention it so richly deserves! You know how yesterday I took off? Today I’m accidentally taking off, too. Brett is back at my dad’s still painting and Noah is still at his playdate (it turned into a sleep-over). Madison is dancing to Jack’s Big Music Show right now, thus allowing me to update my blog but that’s it. There won’t be any time for work. Hopefully tonight because I really want to work on my friend’s new wordpress site and I could always be working on my chapter. But this afternoon will be about niece Lucia’s 3rd birthday party!

I’m trying to figure out if my state of grouchiness is PMS or related to a need to change some behavior. I’m leaning toward the former. Plus I need to exercise. Brett took me off couch to 5k because he thinks I need to walk some being that my shinsplits are so damn bad. I think they’re worse because I’ve been limping to semi-limping for a year. (And my toe? Still hurts if I step on it wrong so I have to concentrate to walk correctly but in a way that doesn’t hurt it — in other words, I still catch myself semi-limping.) Walking is less fun that “jogging” (I put that in quotations because one could not call what I do actually jogging). I’ve been downloading podcasts to ease the boredom.

Ok so it’s PMS and the need to walk, this grouchiness. Also that sage burning we did when we first moved in didn’t seem to work. The house seems to be living in its own state of grouchiness. I told you all about the bad dream I had about the guy who lived here? Let me find it in my archives. Here it is.

We’ve since found out that the man who lived here wasn’t nice in lots of other ways, too, like poisoning the dogs belonging to the neighbor behind us. And we both still feel him here. I don’t know if he’s dead, which is to say I don’t think we’re being haunted — I think it’s left-over bad energy. (I’m not a woo-woo person so writing this, I’m kinda cringing but it’s what we’re feeling about the place.)

Our last house had been a rental for the past 20 years and it felt blank to us — no matter what we did, the house seemed neutral. Friendly but neutral. This one feels like it wants to be friendly but can’t quite let itself. Anytime we do any home improvements, we notice an immediate positive difference. But it still feels … off.

I’ve got a friend who might know some house clearing people (that’s clearing not cleaning) and I’m thinking about it. Except it’s hard to rationalize what with our current budget freeze. But I tell you — we think about moving all the time even though this house has many things we love and it’s in a location that’s perfect and even though there’s no way we could afford to move and the house needs too much work to put it on the market anyway. But still, we think about it a lot. And that makes us sad because we loved our old house right up until the end despite it being small, cramped, without insulation and in a location that was no longer working for us.

Brett is painting my dad’s house and Noah has a playdate so Madison and I are painting pumpkins. Well, truth is she blew through the painting and now she’s listening to her story CD — Gingerbread Man, which is her favorite and was Noah’s, too.

I’ve been missing full-time parenting these days because fall is my very most favorite time to bake pumpkin muffins, make crock-pot meals, etc. Sadly on my day off I can’t bake anything because the cupboard are bare and Brett took the car. But it’s a pretty enough day that just hanging at home and catching up on laundry sounds positively marvelous!

Madison had her first field trip this morning (to Lynd’s Farm for my local readers!) and then I had an appointment with a potential client (my first response from my postcard mailings). Last night I went to a networking event where I didn’t see Eve although she saw me. The event was interesting. I met a couple of intriguing people (neither of whom have client potential but that’s not the only reason to go to these things) and the food was great and I was able to get chocolate back home to the family, which is always a good thing.

I’m thinking about fear today because as I walked up the hill of the parking lot after my potential client meeting I was sick to my stomach with foreboding. (By the way, we left the meeting with the understanding that they’ll probably be giving me a try-out and when I told her my rates she just smiled and didn’t a) laugh; b) snort with disgust; c) blanch. But as is appropriately themed to this entry, I’m now wondering if I should reinterpret her pleasant smile as a smirk. Ugh.)

I realize I’m being awfully melodramatic these days what with the fear, the loathing (no Las Vegas — ha! ha! I kill myself!), etc. You know, the whole plummeting self-esteem thing. But as I was walking up that hill almost wishing she wouldn’t send me anything to write because then I wouldn’t have to fail miserably I got to wondering why on earth I have these terrible fears of failure given that failure has not yet killed me.

One could surmise that perhaps I didn’t have enough practice in my formative years. Like many a bright child, I deliberately avoided situations that might actually challenge me. I only entered contests I thought I had a good shot at winning (and I often won them) and I only participated in games in which I thought I’d shine, (which means I spent a lot of times moping on the sidelines). One could surmise that. But then one would be forgetting that I have in fact had some marvelous failures and rejections and I’ve been fired and dumped. (Oh lord, maybe I should assume the worst, eh?)

No. I guess I just fear failure because I’m a normal person and lots of us do. So enough with WHY and on with the what in the hell am I gonna do about it?

I’m tired of fearing failure. I think fear of failure is why I haven’t actually written a book proposal for a book I’d want to write. (I’ve written two for books I don’t want to write.) I think it’s why I spent an awfully long time pitching service magazines when I really wanted to be in Harper’s and why I’m having a helluva time with this sample chapter. (Although I’m moving on it, I swear.)

Sometimes the anticipation of success is just too much fun to take the chance on actual failure. But daydreaming isn’t serving me well. I need to knock it off and stop letting the stomach ache as I leave the meeting dictate my next course of action.

(Still, I’m nervous every time I hit “send” to a client even when it’s a client who has sworn up and down that she loves me. I hope that clears up with practice.)

I have to tell you something. I’m glad to know Jenna for her own self and now I’m glad to know Kate for her own self but there’s another reason I’m glad to know them and that’s because they’re first moms. Of course, through the miracle of the internet they’re not the only first moms I’m lucky enough to know but I am specifically glad to know them because I know them in real life and (here’s what makes me truly gleeful) my kids know them.

See, the only “out” first mom my kids know is Jessica. (And they know the person in my family but again, she’s not out and besides we see her so rarely that it’s almost like she’s imaginary.) And they know another person I adore who is also not with her children although her circumstances are different.

I want them to know these people in part so they don’t think that Jessica is a freak of nature. I can’t remember who was talking about being concerned about “normalizing” first parenthood for adoptees (expressing concern that normalizing does not bring enough critical thinking to the whole of adoption — it was one of the first mom bloggers but I’m blanking on who). It’s a valid concern. But I think that knowing other women who are without their children helps my kids to see the variety of adoption experience (and mothering experience) and helps them appreciate even more that adoption happens in other families and that it happens beyond the specifics of adoptee experience (or adoptive parenting experience although I do think that most kids think their parents are blank like manila folders and likely any experience I’m having won’t really be meaningful to them ’til they’re post-teens).

I just think it’s good for them to know concretely that Jessica isn’t the only first mom in the world. I mean, I tell them when we meet other adoptees, “See, so-and-so has a birth mommy [because this is the term we use] and an adoptive mommy [what Madison calls a mommy mommy], too.” We know big kids who are adoptees, and little babies who are adoptees, and grown-ups who are adoptees and we know both adoptees who “match” their adoptive parents and adoptees who — like Madison — don’t. That’s all good. And we, of course, know the parents of many of the adopees so we know adoptive parents. And we know first parents, too and this is also good.

I haven’t thought long and hard why this is a good thing but it makes sense, doesn’t it? I hope someday that Madison gets to meet Ariana with Jenna because as far as I can tell, she’s having the most similar experience of adoption of the adoptees that I know.

I feel like this sounds dangerously close to turning Jenna and Kate into tokens and I want to emphasize that this is just a happy byproduct of getting to know them. I can say with absolutely certainty that I would feel lucky to know both of these woman regardless of their experiences with adoption although I’d also have to admit that knowing them would be a lot less likely considering how we met!

I feel like I never left — I’m knee-deep in my to-do list again. Although I just finished off my last big project and so I’ve got a minute to catch my breath and work on that chapter.

I have a meeting with a potential new client on Thursday. This is the first person who’s gotten in touch with me directly from my postcard campaign. I also sent out my next batch of postcards this month in honor of National Cookie Month. I’m holding a contest on my site to try to build a better prospect list.

Besides that I’m having post-presentation let-down. I hate this about myself. Good things happen and once they’re over I get awfully morose. My self-esteem plummets and I wander around thinking ugly thoughts. I think part of this comes from how much effort it takes to put myself out there; I think it’s part of being an introvert. I feel really depleted by even great things like the conference and then I come home and feel very teary even in the midst of all the inspiration. I feel like I need to crawl under the bed for a day or two and ignore the world.

Again this is one of those times where I have to step back and objectively acknowledge the general goodness of my life and also acknowledge that very often my emotions aren’t an accurate mirror of how things are. It’s funny because I’m all about honoring feelings but in these cases, my feelings are dirty rotten liars. So I accept I feel this way but I also know it’s a big fat fake. (sigh) By the same token sometimes when I’m in a group of people I’ll all of a sudden have huge anxiety that I’m a sham, everyone knows it and they’re about to run me out of town with torches. And I have to breathe deep, keep smiling and wait for it to pass. It’s not like an anxiety attack — I don’t have any physical symptoms other than the usual nerves (you know, sweaty palms, nervous giggling) it’s all up in my crazy little head. I think it’s what Becca is talking about here only taken to the nth degree because I’m a nth degree kind of person.

This is what I think: I think most people freak out in new social situations. And the ones that do are too freaked out to notice how freaked out you are. And the ones who aren’t freaked out can’t comprehend people who are freaked out so they don’t notice either. Basically I think that when I’m standing in a room full of people (or in front of them) and all my terrors are coming home to roost that everyone is either too wrought up in their own terrors to notice or one of the lucky few who exude confidence and joy in new situations, in which case it doesn’t occur to them that I might be about to faint dead away.

Ok, so maybe some people are noticing and judging but even then, what can they do? They can’t really run me out of town with torches so what do I care. That’s my mantra when I’m about to sink into panic, “What the hell.” That’s what I said before the conference, the night before to be exact when I was already late and couldn’t do the open mic reading I said I’d do and already felt left out and unhappy and all grungy from a long car ride. “What the hell,” I told myself. “Who gives a damn.” (Never mind that I gave a damn, a great big enormously detailed damn — false bravado works nearly as well as real bravado.)

But it takes a lot out of me and that’s how I found myself in front of this keyboard all miserable and stuff.

At least the bigger of my kids and I are taking my mom out to see Hairspray. That ought to cheer me up tonight. Edited to add, too: Also Brett, who noticed that I’d lost my mind on the way up to the conference made a point of saying, “I’m really proud of you for putting yourself in situations that scare you.” And that made me feel a wee bit better. At least it made me feel appreciated, which can’t help but make a person feel better.

Help Me Fill My Kitchen with Kitsch « ReadingWritingLiving

This is important, people! That napkin dispenser must fulfill its destiny by completing her orange-ish, napkin-obsessed kitchen!!!!

It won’t be complete or necessarily coherent.

First the panel. I was nervous, nobody else seemed nervous although Jenna says she was. (Oh my god, people, I just have to say that her husband is as handsome as his wife is lovely and he looks scarily like their son! Nick is gonna be a heart breaker and one can only imagine that Parker will follow in his footsteps!)

Ok, so Shannon presented a hugely moving paper about the voices of her children’s first mothers, their absence in the discourse and her struggle to figure out how best to serve them. Then I spoke (I took Becca’s advice and told everyone I was nervous so there was a murmuring sound of support right off the bat). Then Susan spoke about her blogging journey and she included a piece of her blog that I’ve loved and I got a little choked up. And then Jenna was sort of a grand finale because she had this forceful, inspiring look at first mother blogging and it was a great way to end the panel, with this triumphant assertive paper about the voices of first moms. Then we put a whole bunch of blogs up on the chalkboard and kicked ourselves for not making a hand-out.

Highlights for me — meeting a woman in person I’ve talked to via email who lives here in town and is a first mom and who I want to hang out with more; meeting Marley Greiner (who also lives here in town) and who is NOT scary like I was afraid she was and is, in fact, totally approachable and nice! Then there was this very cool part where I saw this woman and noticed her tag and thought, “Mia, naw, it’s not that common a name but really!” And I kept noticing it and then in the conference she said, “I have a blog” and I realized! It was Mia’s Saving Grace! I love her blog!! I also got to meet Abebech but only for like an instant.

I took Brett to see Outside Looking In and even though I had to stand outside the auditorium with Madison who was mad spinning girl and unable to sit still because she is, of course, only three, I got to see it, too. Brett cried afterwards because he says that he often feels like the well-meaning but misguided parents in the film and he also still struggles with being witness to the surrender. He said (in part), “Sometimes I don’t know what to do with all of the sadness I feel about it all” and I said (as if I’m Queen of the Answers) that I think you use the sadness to inspire you to do the best you can. There’s no turning back so we’ve got to move forward with as much love and compassion as we have.

My own realizations:
1. I need to plan a trip to see Jessica’s mom again. We need to meet her aunts. I need to talk to Jessica about getting this firmly in place.
2. I need to keep thinking on the presence of possible half-siblings and how to handle that (on Madison’s paternal side) while maintaining the necessary boundaries for the rest of my family (including Jessica).
3. I need to find more compassion for the adoptive parents who frustrate me. I need to react more with kindness and find a place to understand them even when I don’t agree with them.

And you know what? This will probably be one of those things that I forget about in a month but I’d love to do a very mini-conference in Columbus for open adoption folks. I mean really mini. I’m going to be thinking about that and hitting up my new in real life friend Kate (hear that Kate???) to help. And our first scheduled speaker can be JENNA! Because nervous or not, she did a great job and I think she’s due to take over the world as soon as Parker is on solids, no kidding.

The presentation is OVER and it was FUN (once my knees stopped knocking) and the other papers were FABULOUS and I got to meet a ton of people I’d either never met or only met virtually including two people from Columbus!

I can’t write more because I’m both wired and tired, which is a deadly combination.

We got here too late to do the open mike I agreed to do (must remember to email organizer) and I only got to go to the very last session but it was really really moving. I want to write about it more but I’m tired and Madison is literally bouncing off things in the room. (She’s spinning and ricocheting off of the furniture.)

I took notes for my book during the session because I was so inspired. I’m thinking about choice and the context of choice and the way hindsight changes our interpretation of things so that it’s all fluid. And I’m thinking about how I want to write about why I won’t write about Jessica’s decision to place Madison with us. That’s how I want to start the book — by explaining why I won’t talk about her decision to place and why there’s a whole lot of the story I’m leaving out. But I’m going to make the leaving out underscore the point of the box (because I think I’ve figured out the point of the book.)

Enough. I’m exhausted. Time to hit it.

Things I didn’t have time to do yesterday before our trip:

• Finish the article due today (I got an extension);
• Pad my presentation paper enough (I padded it two hundred words and they didn’t make a damn bit of difference time wise);
• Have a clothing crisis to find three presentable outfits;
• Learn how how to do my new haircut, which no longer looks impressive at all and just looks messy and sad.
• Comment on the news (Congratulations Doris! Congratulations Al!).

Things that freak me out:

• People who insinuate to me that their child’s first mom was basically a handy conduit for their child that accidentally was conceived in her body (have these people not read my journal? don’t they know I’m the wrong person to say this to?)
• Road rage;
• The number of thirty-something women on myspace of my past acquaintance who say something like, “I refuse to grow up if growing up means not being cool” or “I am so hip that I refuse to actually behave like a thirty-something person and I see this as mature”;
• The fact that I haven’t had a clothes crisis yet and we leave in two hours.

Things that bring me joy:

• That my mother-in-law (visiting her youngest son and his family in Portland) is coming home with two dresses for Madison from the Hanna Andersson outlet;
• That I’m going to meet some very interesting people even though I will probably do it with a haircut that looks like a rug, in clothes that I should have vetted first, and while reading a paper that’s too short despite the padding;
• The kids, in theory. Actually they’re being annoying this morning;
• My husband who hasn’t yet been annoying but he’s getting close.