Category Archives: Motherhood
Step 1 of Operation send NIC to the UK
Downloaded, completed and printed passport application.
I have decided to tell myself “Nic is going to England”.
No ‘maybe’, no ‘if I can’.
“Success is sequential, not simultaneous” it says on a white board in our office building … One step at a time for a goal I’ve already decided WILL be realized. 🙂
If you love someone – get them out!
Nic will be 18 in 18 days. I’ve struggled with this, of course, I want to keep him close. I don’t want his childhood to be over. I don’t want to lose what we have.
But God doesn’t have grandchildren.
Nic has his own life waiting for him. AND, it is HIS life. I can want things for him – as parents, we do that. But unless he wants something for himself, it’s not going to happen.
I could hand him a golden ticket to an Ivy League university – all expenses paid, but unless he WANTS to pursue academics, it would be a waste.
Tonight, my sons eyes lit up and I saw in him a ‘want’. A want that I can totally get behind.
My mom just returned from England. She was visiting my Nannie who just turned 90.
I was born in Windsor, England. Lived there until 1980, when we immigrated to the US.
Before that move, my mom and I traveled. We went from France to India cross-country. That deserves a post of its own. But suffice it to say, I experienced A LOT. We were crossing borders before they shut them down, Argo had nothing on us.
I digress.
Nics eyes were shining. We had been to my moms to collect the bits and pieces she brought back for us.
Photo time!
The English sweets I requested.
Nic with the Union Jack he requested
Me counting the English currency left over. No, I didn’t get to keep it.
Now look at this photo – this was taken around the corner from my house.
It says ‘Get Out’. I don’t know why. I don’t know who sprayed that on there. I’m sure there’s an interesting story behind the tagging.
Get Out.
Back to Nics shining eyes.
I still have a lot of family in England. And friends.
Nic has said before that he wants to go to the UK.
He’ll be graduating High School in May. My mom will be returning to England in July-ish.
I will be getting paperwork for a passport.
I will be saving every penny I can save.
I will push Nic out of this desert nest and into my home country.
I want him to have an experience. I want him to make some memories. I want him to be submerged in other cultures, other languages, other ideas and lifestyles. Nic wants this too.
I imagine him traveling to France, perhaps staying in a Hostel. (Hopefully not one out of that horror movie!)
Meeting family members he’s never met before. Spreading his wings and figuring out what he wants next.
I will miss him. I don’t want him just going for a few weeks – I want him to take complete advantage of being overseas.
I WANT to miss him. I want him to return (if that’s what he chooses) and have a purpose. Not be stagnant in a small town and enrolled in community college, while vying for one of a few part-time jobs in this area.
Hopefully, he’ll return with memories of adventures and an idea of what he wants to be and how he wants to achieve that. And I’ll support whatever that is too.
My mind is reeling trying to think of how to make this happen for him. What can I sell? How can I save? I will do this.
I will do it as if his life depends upon it – because in a lot of ways, it does.
Little laundry girl
There’s an adorable little girl at the laundromat. She’s sleepy – lids are heavy, but she’s having fun finding laundry carts and pushing them like little shopping carts. The mom is patient with her too. When she dropped her french fries on the ground, she just picked them up. Mom and Grandma are trying to fold 4 dryers worth of clothes.
Not much fun for the little one in adorable pink soft boots.
It makes me smile though, because she’s being a trooper, and her guardians are kind and keeping an eye on her. Of course there are one or two patrons that have cut her the eye because God forbid, she pushed a cart in their path.
It makes me sad – and mad – when little ones are left unattended or yelled at in stores for, well, just being ‘little’. An hour of grocery shopping, or waiting at a bank isn’t that thrilling for us, lets be honest. Imagine sitting in a cart or being told to hush or stay still for that long. Especially when their furtive imaginations and boundless energy longs to be free and to explore.
The one pat on the back I can give myself, is that I loved doing things with Nic when he was little, and put myself in his tiny shoes.
When he babbled in the shopping cart – I leaned into him, responding with things like “Really? Then what happened?” I found endless joy in his curiousity, his mischievious side and took great pains to remain calm when a trip had to be endured even though he was tired and cranky.
I’m looking at little laundry girl and thinking of Nic. If he could just be small, for 24 hours, I would love that. I wouldn’t wish him little again – his life is in motion. But, to hold him one more time – to pick up his spilled food that his tiny hands couldn’t hold on to, to chat with him in the grocery cart. Oh yeah. One day. Just for 1 more day.
Photo therapy
Lay in bed this morning with not a fiber of my being wanting to get up.
I am in a funk of all time funks for a myriad of reasons. But life goes on.
Laundry was skipped last weekend due to my tooth pain – blah, blah, blah – I’m so over talking about that. But, fact is, I had to do laundry today.
I milled about the house, crawled back into bed. Found myself watching ‘The Shahs of Sunset’ reunion show on Bravo. What the hell? I don’t even watch the show – no clue who the people were. But evidently, reaching for the remote and changing the channel wasn’t in the cards.
Get up Amanda.
I sat outside.
I haven’t been reading as often lately, tried to read a few pages. Haven’t picked up a paint brush in a while either, nor my camera.
“Go do laundry, and take some pictures” a voice in my head told me. From where I sat, I could see fog over the river – the mountains looked beautiful.
Okay. Get dressed and just DO IT!
So I did it. Shoved our laundry into a couple of washing machines and took myself and my camera off for some quality time.
Heads up – I’m the Queen of zoom and crop. Whereas, my son captures a subject and leaves in the surroundings, whether aesthetically pleasing or not, and his photos end up amazing. I love that about him. He doesn’t edit life. I just have a problem not editing my mouth.
Without further ado:
The reason I took my camera. Fog is rare here in the desert. It called to me. The Colorado River creates it from time to time, and every time it does, its gorgeous.
Decay and growth. I loved the juxtaposition of the two.
And here too. The area I was shooting in is prone to fires. The tree in the back obviously burned and the new growth in the foreground just made such a pleasing image.
Love the curl of this metal.
Beauty and the desert beast
The reservations irrigation system.
Looked like a mirror – or a framed picture to me
Gawd I loved these
Spent shell – wonder what was on the receiving end of this?
He’s a rocks rock
On my knees in rams head weeds to get this shot, pretty sure I have a couple of puncture wounds – but worth it
Home now – this little guy is growing through the steps. I won’t go into that metaphor. But I was proud of it and that little flower inspires me.
On the way home from the laundromat a song came on that for that very moment in time, couldn’t have been more apropos. Every word spoke to me. And I don’t know when this funk will break – but I know it will. I know this. But I’m nothing if not authentic, and I never ‘fake it til I make it’. I’m not going to plaster a smile on my face. I don’t feel like smiling just yet. I have big decisions to make, big changes to consider and time is slipping by quickly. I am sad, scared, 50 shades of blue and deep in thought. But life is still beautiful. I am still grateful. And tomorrow is another day.
Here’s that song.
‘TGIF’ WTH?
TGIF! I say that to fit in. I don’t really subscribe to it.
Not to leave you men out – but generally for women, especially working women with children, the weekend is as much work as Monday-Friday.
TGIF I think was coined by single people in their 20’s with Friday night plans and no weekend responsibilities.
For me, it means I get to stay up past my bedtime (which I struggle to do if I’m being honest, gawd I’m getting old lol). I try! I do! I struggle and end up like a sleepy toddler fighting sleep, just to take advantage of the fact that I don’t have to hit the hay at 9pm.
So much for that myth that ‘grown ups get to do whatever they want’. HA!
It means I don’t have to set the alarm for Saturday – but my internal clock doesn’t cotton to ‘sleeping in’ and neither does Butters, my staring, wagging early bird dog.
Saturday means, errands. Groceries are gathered, the house is cleaned, and of late, Nic and I have decided it serves us well to clean the offices Saturday night to afford us one more morning of ‘sleeping in’. He manages this – we’ve established I don’t. But it’s still nice to get up with some measure of leisure.
Laundry – that’s the Sunday task. And I have this bonkers clock thing going when it comes to Sunday. A countdown. Only 10 hours ’til bedtime, 8 hours ’til bedtime, 4, 3, 2 … crap, Monday is around the corner. That’s how Sunday goes.
There are times it’s more relaxing to actually BE at work.
One day, I’ll schedule a ‘staycation’ and clean like a fiend and shuffle around in my PJ’s with NOTHING on the agenda. ^_^
Debauchery Soup 