Cute Kids

Head over to
my sister's blog
to see a cute video that she and her kids made. I know I'm biased, but I still think you'll like it.

Things I Actually Like About $4.00 a Gallon

1.  It gives me a good excuse not to drive to Holland for "voluntary" work events.

2.  It makes my husband think twice about driving all over creation for volleyball.

3.  It gives me permission to ask people to meet me half way instead of feeling like I have to do all the driving myself.

4.  It makes me do the environmentally responsible behaviors I should have been doing for years, things like drive slower and consolidate my errands.  I'm not a big fan of either of those things, so I need the motivation of pump pain.

5.  It makes me look for places to ride my bike, and I love riding my bike!  I love how it feels.  I love that sense of accomplishment as I try longer and longer rides.  I love that I get exercise at the same time.  I love that I see all kinds of things that I never noticed from my car.  I love the good excuse to stop and get ice cream more often!

It's only five reasons, but it keeps me going in troubled times :-)

I Love My Clothesline

This may not actually be news.  I've professed my love of the clothesline before.  I've even admitted to standing in my kitchen, gazing out the window at the clothes blowing on the line.  Some people like to watch fish in an aquarium, I like to watch cloth move in a breeze.  It relaxes me.

I thought some other people might be contemplating the clothesline for environmental and/or economic reasons, so I thought I'd share some of the benefits I've observed this summer. I- or rather, Russ and my dad- put the line in last fall actually. I used it into November because the autumn was so mild.  I opened it up again this April.  I believe that give me three different seasons of experience with it.

First, because money is so convincing, it does save you actual money that you can see on your bill.  Although, it might make more sense to compare kilowatt hours instead of dollars because the market is not a stable thing.  I compared my kilowatt hours from last May to this May (my most current data) and found that I had decreased my usage by 4.2 KWH.  You can't quickly change that to $ because the KWH are charged at different rates depending on the time of day that they're used.  What's even more interesting about this number is that during the same time I was running my new pool filter and heater!  We also added in a few more fluorescent bulbs, but not using the dryer was the big change.

Another plus to my clothesline is that I can get through the laundry more quickly.  Everyone knows that a load of laundry spends more time in the dryer than in the washer, but with the clothesline I can dry two and sometimes three loads at a time.  On a nice day I can dry clothes as fast as I can wash them.  I also find that I get the laundry folded sooner, but this might because of the pool.  I have to be out in the backyard so much anyway to lifeguard, that I find I have time to fold the clothes as I take them off the line.

I also love the smell of the clothes that have been on the line, and this benefit only gets stronger as the weather gets colder.  This spring I pulled out a shirt that had been dried on the line last Fall and it smelled as fresh and crisp as that Fall day. I'm a smeller and so that joy lifted my whole day.  I know that you can get good smells from fabric softener, but this just does something different for me.

I don't know that this last thing will sell a lot of people on the clothesline, but it is important to me.  The clothesline brings me back into the rhythm of the natural world.  Be honest, unless you're planning a picnic or a soccer game, the weather doesn't really connect with your real life. If it's too hot or too cold or too wet, you just go into your climate controlled building.  With the clothesline I have to actually work with the weather.  I have to plan my life, to a small degree, around how the weather is going to work out.  I see that as a plus, not a minus. It is being shown by people who study these things that a disconnect from the natural world is having a profound negative impact on children and adults.  

I also am more aware of the seasons and what the natural world is like during the seasons. Last Fall, for the first time ever, I really noticed the changing path of the sun through the sky as winter loomed closer.  I could see the angle of the light on my clothes changing each week. It just serves to remind me that there is a whole world that I am a part of, not the point of.

There are some challenges to the clothesline, but I figure there are to the dryer too.  If you want to give it a try, but are wondering how I worked out- or learned to live with- some of those challenges, let me know and I'll try to answer your questions.  For now, any little step you take to live more with Creation and not to just use Creation is a good step.

I'm Just Sayin'

I listen to the Satellite Sisters' podcast.  I enjoy it; it's funny and even informative sometimes. The last two episodes have had the subject of vegans and trying not to eat meat, and both times someone went on and on about all the meat substitutes that are now available.  Apparently it goes way beyond toferky now.

Which brings me to an odd and long standing pet peeve of mine.  If you're going to not eat meat, go for it, but why substitute with "food?"  If you look at the ingredient list on the meatless chicken nuggets, it's a good paragraph in length and many of the ingredients are unpronounceable. I don't see how that's any healthier or environmentally friendly than meat.  The only thing it has going for it is that it's not obviously cruel.

I think if you're going to give up meat, and I've been taking some small steps in that direction, it makes more sense to me to substitute in real foods.  I like to replace meat with beans, cheese, eggs (I know these are still animal products, but I just can't go all the way.) and tofu, but not tofu that has been turned into fake meat.

Chore Time

I'm sure I'd get few arguments, except from kids, that chores are good for kids.  It builds character, makes them more responsible, less selfish, blah blah blah.  I think kids should do chores because it's good for their imaginations.  Chores are boring and mindless at any age. Kids, who are extremely allergic to boring and mindless, have to find some way to cope. 

In exchange for being let off cleaning the playroom, JD has agreed to scoop dog poop in the yard every three days.  Believe it or not, he never complains. He doesn't rush out to do it, and it can take him awhile, but it gets done.  The other day I looked out the window to see if he was still working and I saw him leaning on the shovel talking away to someone, someone only he could see. True, if he were a little older that would be cause for concern, but I'm pretty sure that ten year olds should still be making up imaginary scenarios. I had to giggle because I remember quite clearly talking to myself in the mirror while I cleaned the bathroom when I was a kid.  I used to make up commercials for my cleaning products.  Who knows what JD was talking about.  Perhaps he was making up another song.  Earlier in the summer he made up a little work song for himself.  He used the tune from a little kids Sunday School song called, "Who needs help?"  JD's version goes,

"Where is the poop?

I look and see

There is the poop

Right next to me!"

Repeat until all poop is scooped.

JD is not the only creative soul at our house.  Later the same day that I had seen JD talking to himself, Abby stopped me as I was walking past the bathroom.  She was supposed to be in there cleaning the sink. 

"Mom, Mom! Wait! Come in here!  You have to see my special scrubbing that I do! Watch!"

She then proceeded to do a scrub job that pretty much used every part of her body.  You might have even called it a dance.  There were large arm circles that sped around the sink in a sloshing motion and then hip circles and shoulder shrugs as well.  There was also a little song that went with it, but I didn't quite catch the lyrics as they weren't all words that were known to me.  It was something to do with scrubbing and dubbing and do dah do do dah scrub, something, something, something.  She was very proud, and the sink, as well as the floor, were quite clean.

I haven't caught Rachel with anything too creative yet, unless I count the endless organizing of her possessions into "art studios," or "offices," or "club houses," etc., as creative.  I suppose it might be. 

At any rate, I see this whole chore thing as a win win.  We'll see what the kids say in twenty years.

A Story and a Few Questions

You may or may not know that I have really wrestled with prayer over the last few years.  Sadly it's not that I've wrestled in prayer, although sometimes that has been the case.  I've longed to find the meaning of it, the purpose of it, the peace of it.  Because I've been unclear in my own mind about prayer, it's been more than a little challenging to teach prayer to my children and answer their questions.  

I don't know, perhaps my children are ordinary, but to me their questions and musings are quite extraordinary.  They ask me why bad things happen, is God punishing them, does God really love the people in the stories to whom bad things happen? You know, stuff like that.  JD is especially thoughtful about all matters, outside of keeping track of things and everyday tasks. I don't invent answers, and I never claim to know it all. They would find me out much too quickly.  I usually reply with whatever honest answer I'm at in my own journey.

JD has had two bikes stolen from the library near our house in the last month.  It was particularly devastating the second time because it seemed so cruel.  Both JD and I shed tears over the matter, although he doesn't know that.  At dinner on the day of the second incident it was JD's turn to pray.  Of course he prayed for God to find his bike for him.  My willingness to try praying for anything that matters has improved lately and I joined him in his prayer, in my own heart.

This morning JD seemed pretty cheerful and didn't even mention the bike situation himself.  I suggested that we both think of ways to replace the bike,  jobs he could do to earn money, that kind of thing.  We didn't really dwell on it though, too depressing for me.

Around 11:00 the mom of one of Rachel's friends phone to invite her to play.  I know the mom pretty well and we spent a few minutes catching up with each other as we were making plans for the girls.  As is my usual custom, I walked around my house putting things away as I was talking on the phone.  As I came up the stairs from the basement something of JD's caught my eye, probably his shoes laying in the middle of the floor.  The sight triggered a thought.

"On a completely different note," I said to Suzanne, "You don't happen to have a boy's bike that you're getting ready to sell, do you?"  Suzanne has a son that is a year older and a good deal taller than JD.

"Actually," she said, "I just gave away a bike to a friend, but the last time I saw her son ride over here, he wasn't riding that bike.  You know what I can do? As soon as I get off  the phone with you, I'll call her up and see if her son is using the bike."

About a half hour later Suzanne called back. "Cara is on her way with Jennifer to pick up Rachel.  They should be there shortly.  And I talked to my friend.  She's not using the bike. She'll drop it off in a little bit and you can pick it up when you pick up Rachel."

I was stunned.  I actually stood still. "Seriously?!  I can't believe it.  Thank you so much!  Will you let me pay you for the bike?"

"Tonia, I gave the bike to Patrice, of course I'm just going to give it to you!  I hope JD will like the bike.  It's pretty heavy duty. Actually it's a stunt bike, but it looks cool for sure."

Later, as we were out and buying a bike like, JD said something about how amazingly it had all worked out.  I decided to take, in my view, a risk.

"Well, I guess this is how God answered your prayer to get your bike back.  He does tend do things  in unexpected ways."

"You're right mom!  And I thought God was just punishing me for something bad I did.  Maybe my bike was stolen because I'm meant to have the stunt bike so I can grow up to be a BMX rider!"

I went with the extremely safe, "We'll see."

Since that conversation, I've been rehashing like crazy.  What do I want JD to take away from this experience?  I've come down to three important questions and there are no easy answers to any of them.

Did God really answer his prayer?

Does it matter?

What will happen when God doesn't or seems not to answer his prayer?

I'm relieved to say that for now, it's just me asking those questions, but the day is coming when he's going to be right there wrestling with me.  I hope when that day comes I have the strength to let him do his own wrestling and not try to hold him back with easy religious cliches.

Miss Reid, It Wasn't Enough

When I was tenish I was playing in my Grandma's backyard with my cousins.  I have quite a few cousins who are right around my age so we made quite a gang.  A gang like that needs organizing, so, as I often did, I organized everyone.  Unfortunately, I organized whatever it was we were playing to my benefit.  It seems like we were doing wagon rides or something and I was getting more rides than the other kids. We were taking turns pushing each other I guess.

I can't recall now who was pushing the wagon, but as it careened across the patio and past the sliding glass door, my Uncle Hack stuck his head out and hollered, "Hey, how come it seems like Tonia is always the one riding in the wagon?  That doesn't seem fair!"

Immediately I hopped out of the wagon and reorganized the game so that I had fewer rides than the other kids.  I was mortified that someone would think that I was mean or took advantage of other people.  It changed my whole life in fact.  A few years later when I was organizing my neighborhood friends to do a backyard play, I took great care to give the starring role to another girl.  I retained the part of director, but I figured that giving up the glam job of  leading lady was keeping things fair. 

It seems reasonable that his was not the only comment ever made to me about my leadership style.  I must have been called bossy by a lot of people.  I guess you could say that Uncle Hack wasn't even saying I was bossy, just unfair, but I lumped it in with all the other, "Tonia, you're too bossy," comments.  In fact his comment cut right through to my heart and have stayed with me for about 30 years becoming the representative memory of all the times I was told that I was too bossy.

I kept right on taking charge of things though. I don't think I could stop myself.  It must have been pretty noticeable too because when I was in the ninth grade, my history teacher, the adored Miss Reid, told me I should run for student council because I was a "good leader."  

I told her that it would never happen because, "Student council is about being popular, not about being a good leader."

I didn't even try student leadership for another five years when I went off to CMU.  Then I was elected to be the floor rep for my hall council when I was a freshman. Later I took on many other leadership roles including being not only a resident advisor, but one who trained other RAs. 

So it seems like I got over the comments about being too bossy and even took the good in the comment from my uncle and tried to be fair while I was being bossy.  I practiced what my mother called, "The art of letting other people have your own way." They were happy, I was happy, things were good.

And then some jerk, whose opinion means NOTHING to me, told me that in our group of friends everyone always did whatever I suggested and no one else was allowed to have ideas or steer the group in any direction that wasn't mine. This person is a whiney, immature, ego maniac, and somehow he was still able to instantly kick my butt back to being ten years old.  I wouldn't plan or organize anything straightforwardly again.  I ceased to be a real and decisive leader.  Immediately.

This time there was no Miss Reid to give me the power to lead and somehow I haven't become adult enough to take the power for myself. I never, or rarely, feel like it's my place to say something. I usually go find someone else, tell them my idea and then convince them to bring it to the group. I do it both with friends and coworkers.

I've been thrashing around for a conclusion to this post for about thirty minutes now. You might be able to tell by the length.  I don't know what the final observation should be.  I don't know if people without clearly defined authority given to them by a position or title should just take charge.  I don't know if adults even want to be organized by their peers in the same way that kids do.  

I don't know.  I don't know a lot.  I do like to think though that I'm not bossy because mean goes with bossy.  I just have a lot of ideas and I get excited about them and I want to try them out. What do I do with all of those ideas if I don't share them?