What a wonderful week. Being, just being, with the kids has been magical and full of tiny little treasures. Moments i will hold close to my heart. Forever.
i promise to keep you in my heart forever.
As always, as humans, i am constantly moved by the passing of time. How we grow and change. How my oldest daughter, at twelve, feels suddenly like an adult beside me. We have the same shoe size and she is in spitting distance of growing taller than me. She is a magical creature. Full of grace and beauty. Understanding and kind. Fiery and ferocious. Precocious and cool. She is everything anybody could ask for in a girl. I am already fighting back the sad that she will probably be gone on to a lifetime of adventure in six short years. God i adore her.
promise me you will have a life full of adventure and love
The kids have been spending a large amount of time with my babysitter. She is an amazing young woman who treats them with respect and love and cares for them so well that i never worry, which is a magical thing. They go to the lake three or four times a day. How lucky we are to live here, to have a beach as close as a frisbee toss. I met them there after work the other night and being in the middle of a heatwave i marched right in the lake in all my work clothes. And they laughed and were full of glee to see me home early and there with them being silly. And parker suddenly knew how to swim. Something he couldn't do one week prior. I was momentarily sad to be missing these events, but so proud of him.
I feel lucky and proud and that my life suddenly, finally has a little magic in it.
i will always be there for each of you. i will see the grace.
This was, hands down, my best BlogHer experience ever.
no links. It's too hard and those of you will know i'm talking about you.
Sure i may have been the drunk girl on one (or two) occasions. And maybe i spent a lot of time alone. But, i also spent so many hours with great people it totally blew my mind. Really.
Did i mention it took me 16 hours to get home? And that, upon arrival, i slept three hours before rushing to pick up my kids? and i also broke into tears in the chicago o'hare airport when they canceled my flight and said i wouldn't be home till the next day.
I went to one panel that inspired me and gave me magic. I went to the community keynote which was more than worth the price of admission.
As an aside, as i type this i have every light in my house turned off and all the doors and windows open. It is hotter than hell here. And the only light the million bugs in my house are attracted to is my monitor. So, as i sit and try to put in words the amazing time i had i am being attacked by hundreds of bugs.
What i really took away was inspiration. I am so inspired.
I listened to someone talk of the magic that was happening at the conference and i talked to someone else about how much power we have and how we are missing it. That there must be a better way to go about it. We are so powerful. I realized that.
It had nothing to do with free shit, or recycling being thrown in the garbage, or walmart and pepsico. It was us. We are powerhouses. We do not need to sell a whole day of our website for a book, or a game, or a fucking girdle. Go out and buy those things. Buy them in your community, you'll do a lot more for your immediate wellness that way.
Instead, become writers. Become storytellers. Your story is amazing and beautiful and inspires. Strive to inspire.
I was so thrilled that so many people came up and talked to me and said they loved my writing, my photos. I loved it. I was thrilled. This is work. This is my passion.
And i will name one name, those women who created blogher are amazing. They inspire.
So, anyway, i have this story to tell. It really has nothing to do with anything. But it's my story.
On saturday night as everything was winding down, it must have been 2am or later. I suddenly missed my kids. A heart-hurting miss. And i panicked. My first anxiety of the whole weekend.
Oh my god, i'm never going to get home.
And somehow i was without shoes or my purse. And i freaked out. Freaked out. I am never going home, my credit cards, my passport gone. I longed to be on a plane. On my way with all the grumpy people looking towards home and the hours to endure between then and now.
I wandered back to all the places i had been. All the parties. What was that suite number? I called the police. I texted everyone.
thank you for the business card. thank you for the quiet conversation. thank you for traveling from paris. thank you for baby ezra. thank you for inviting me to the party on walnut street. thank you for taking me to bed. thank you for that quiet chat in your room. thank you for being quiet in the morning. thank you for lunch and dinner in restaurants. thank you for being my "go to" person. thank you for spending so much time with me. thank you for hanging out in robes. thank you for that swag free party. thank you for your tattoo because it made me realize i didn't need one because you have it. thank you for being awesome in the vancouver airport.
And i gave up all hope. I was never going to see my kids again. I went up to the room and demanded wine. And we sat and chatted. It was 4am or later, i think. And then i looked at the foot of my bed and said "there's my shoes!"
1. schmutzie and the palinode as roommates.
2. meeting and falling in love with amy turn sharp.
3. being inspired by a great panel on storytelling.
4. the whole damn weekend.
5. no drama at all.
I have had a great few days. A great few days that have left me on the verge of total exhaustion.
In preparation for taking off for chicago sometime in the next 36 hours i have been working a lot. A LOT. And i will work even more when i get back to make up for missing three shifts at work in the middle of the very busiest time of year. A time when we are NOT allowed to take time off.
Luckily for me i have a co-worker who happens to be one of my very best friends and understand how it is important for me to take off to this crazy conference that i can't afford so that i can feel a little bit more connected to this crazy internet life i have created. We have been planning how we will pull this off since i bought my tickets in january and low and behold the time is now and we worked it out and she is working a crazy week so that i may go and have some fun.
So, back to the good week i have had. I finished work extra early on friday night and headed into town and watched an open air concert, enjoyed some sushi with a cute and good person, had some beers with some other cute and good people and finished the night off with some tequila shooters that i probably should have avoided as i was spotted by a co-worker stumbling along the city streets at two in the morning.
Then on saturday the kids and i swam in the river which was incredible. Amidst hundreds of tubers we swam up current and floated back down. Magical.
Then! Last night at work my boss/owner of the restaurant called me in the middle of work and thanked me for my hard work and all the extra things i do and told me to take any bottle of wine i wanted. Any bottle. At first i wasn't going to take one because i was so happy just to get the appreciation. But then, any bottle? Really. It took me a whole day to decide and tonight i brought home a lovely italian wine that i have never tried and i put it up on my shelf. I am going to save that wine for the first time i cook dinner in my new home. My own home. I may have dinner with my kids or, hopefully, i will have someone special to share it with.
See you in chicago.
1. coming home from work at 11pm to find all my kids awake because "they wouldn't stop reading."
2. the resulting sleep-in until 9:30.
3. busy, busy nights at work spent talking to people from all over the world.
4. beet salad made exclusively from my own garden.
5. watching a mother and two baby deer relaxing in the backyard at 1am.