Juxtaposition

[altarflame]

A. My weird, warped self image is still continuously morphing and tormenting me. Sound melodramatic? IT IS, believe me. I find myself relating to the words and overall tone of things like Linkin Park's "Crawling". Perfectly fitting, yet over the top bitter and angry. Like me. Except not.

B. Elise and Jake both got sick, I spent all of yesterday pacing with a baby in arms or sitting with a baby in lap; usually whoever I was holding was fussing and whining while whoever I wasn't was screaming and clinging to my leg. About 8 hours in I spent an undetermined period of time just sitting, zombie-like, as they both nursed and rubbed snot all over me (sexy, eh?), trying not to cry with them. Then they squirmed and whimpered their way through a feverish night featuring me being peed on. *sigh* At least it was only a 24 hour bug, that doesn't seem to have spread around the house.

---

1. Things I LOVE about our house:
-it's our house
-lots and lots of windows and french doors make for tons of natural light
-really luxurious amounts of closet and storage space; Ananda and Aaron's room AND Grant and I's room have his and hers walk-in closets full of oragnizational shelving; our dining room has more; there's a whole giant walk in closet ROOM, with recessed shelves, in the hall, plus two other independant, normal linen closets - and an attic crawl space, and it's just great
-having two different fenced yards the size of what I consider a normal suburban backyard to be, plus the front yard
-having a nice sized front porch, a huge side deck, and a little narrow "alley" that we plan to convert to an adult space (Since the kids get the side yard and the backyard is functional)
-huge kitchen adjacent to large dining room
-two very big, accomadating bathrooms, with things like 2 sinks in each, massive mirrors, and my garden tub
-having more than one "living room", so that we can set up a tv totally separate from the main room you walk into

Sometimes I really just can't get over this house. It is made for us. And yet it's still unbelievable that it all...belongs to us! I love it.

2. This has been an incredible week for Ananda. First, she had a good counseling appointment. Second, she started reading a chapter book rapidly and for pleasure with good comprehension, on her own, for the first time. Third, at her soccer game on Friday night, three different times I saw her intercept the ball from her defense line and kick it OVER THE HEADS of the opposing team and way back down the field towards her own goal. She is a very unmotivated player, usually, she tends to be doing things like biting her nails and scratching her knee on her defense line for most of the game, and these are kicks I've never seen any of the other girls do anything like, so it was pretty awesome. One of them resulted in an almost immediate goal for her team, too :D It happened to be the first game of the season that they won, so she was a bouncy chipper soccer player all night afterwards.

THEN. Today, apparently, in musical theater, she actually got up and did free style dancing to Mamma Mia in front of her class :O If you know anything about Annie...it's a big deal. Ingrid (the teacher) was asking them all to do this but everyone was afraid: Ananda and another girl were talking about how they both have the album at home and dance to it in their rooms throughout the week, so maybe they could. The other girl went first. But, man. This is such a liberating sort of WOW, for her! She said Ingrid loved her moves and that after she went everyone kind of loosened up and all but one girl took a turn. She was glowing.

We also went to Brian's birthday party today, and she picked out the gift he really fell in love with and obsessed over, and wouldn't put down for the rest of the party.

I am very happy for all of this. The past couple of weeks have held a few too many really depressed days for her, so much dragging and laziness and apathy.

---

Apparently kids at AWANA asked A and A who their family voted for. The askers' families voted for McCain, and when A and A said Obama, the other kids said, "Don't your parents know he is for abortion?" Annie said she answered, "Yeah, that's the only thing we don't like about him."

At soccer, Aaron's best friend (who's name is also Aaron) asked who his parents voted for in an anxious way, and when Aaron said Obama he was like, "Whew! Mine too. I'm glad you're on our side".

W.T.F.

On the way home from dance and lunch with G, today, in addition to the copious normal stickers and signs everywhere, I saw what looked like an individual printing job on a bumper sticker, reading; "Obama WILL destroy us..."

Sometimes I think people need to calm the hell down.

---

My biggest new committment, and our biggest challenge as a family right now...is staying home. There are mountains of clean laundry not being put away, mountains of dirty laundry not being done, grit not getting swept off the floor, renovations unfinished, crafts with materials purchased but left unstarted...because we are simply never here. In our beautiful, OWN house.

Today it was dance classes and lunch with Daddy like usual, but also cousin Brian's birthday party.

Yesterday, the kids were sick so they and I were here but helpless to accomplish anything, and then soccer games.

Thursday, Ananda had counseling up in Kendall, then Laura asked us to come over for the afternoon, and then soccer practice.

Wednesday Grant and I took the gang up to Whole Foods for a couple of specialty things, and there's AWANA in the evening.

Tuesday I had two appts - the chiro and for bloodwork - and they have soccer practice in the evening, and we needed to go to the grocery store.

Everyone wants to plan a camping trip, we just got back from a vacation, tomorrow we'll be going to church and then, since the nanny will be here for the first time in over a week, G and I will have lunch and a movie or something.

When are we supposed to knit? Sew? Cook good things that aren't apples and cheese or chinese takeout? When are we supposed to have the alarm guys come fix their thing that needs fixing or plant a garden, or tend it? I hate this, but I feel like everything we're doing is important or at least beneficial and nice.

So far the only things I've been able to think of to help us stay HERE more are:

-turn Laura down on principle for the next couple of weeks (even though we're isolated stay at home moms and enjoy each others' company?)
-postpone playdates with an AWANA family I just realized is around the corner when we trick or treated, the mom of 7 who goes to the bookstore, Kristin and Michelle-mom-of-6...even though my kids are homeschooled and we'd all love it?
-use the nanny time when G IS home for double teaming home projects...instead of enjoying our shot at couples time?

This isn't working at all. I don't want one of those stereotypical always-running suburban soccer mom lives, but, well. I dunno.

I did order groceries to be delivered. I guess that is something.

---

EXTREME CHANGE: I, (1) figured out what was keeping me from sleeping. It's all wrapped up in my brain with the fight to stay alive last Fall, and general anesthesia knocking me out, and trying to maintain my semi-conscious haze in the ICU. I'm afraid of dying and sleep started feeling too vulnerable. Months have passed with me sleeping from, like, 5 am to 8:30 am daily. It was causing major problems. Knowing was half the battle. Then I (2) had a catalyst for change. My ear infection was so painful and so draining, and three nights in a row I went to bed on Vicodin, WAY earlier than normal (like midnight) and slept all the way through with no nightmares (!!). Since then, for A WEEK, I've been going to bed between midnight and 3 and sleeping through. Something got knocked back into place, in my head, and now I can get sleepy and get comfortable and enjoy it and lay down like a normal person again, without any anxiousness or panic or flashbacks or other hoohaw.

THE PROBLEM is that this means I'm not even up at night doing cleaning, crafting, planning, or commenting. So time has just sort of...dissapeared, for me O_o

Comments

[monkeyscience.livejournal.com]

Sometimes I think people need to calm the hell down.

Now that is something I could vote for with confidence! It's probably the most sensible political sentiment I've seen on my flist all week.

[marliah.livejournal.com]

maybe its cause of stuff like this that people are not so "calm"?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27628719/

I for one, as well as 99.9% of Christians I have talked to, have a hard time seeing how a Christian can vote for someone who so obviously stands by the murder of the unborn. So thats where the AWANA kids are coming from. My own son 7 years old, wrote about this. Hes a history buff and he said Obama is the new Hitler....I mean when a 7 year old can see that abortion is evil and wrong and that there is a massacre taking place here, something of historical proportions, and adults refuse to see it, theres something seriously wrong in this country.

As I said before, The Truth Project, seriously, we as Christians all need to see it. We have bought into the lies of the world really bad. There are sides....its a very real battle we are fighting. Not flesh and blood but spiritual....

[altarflame.livejournal.com]

I know where the AWANA kids are coming from.

I felt for a long time like I couldn't vote for Obama because of his abortion stance.

But I think that Christians are not helping people or our spiritual war by voting only based on abortion, while things like stewardship of the world God entrusted to us, wars that also kill the innocent, and aid to children who have already been born are ignored on the ballot.

We keep electing pro-life candidates who ONLY have being pro-life going for them, from a Christian perspecte.

I'm not sure that's the Christian thing to do, either.

[treading.livejournal.com]

Tina, I came across an article that said pretty much exactly what you are saying, plus went into a lot of the details of the politics and law behind it. Wanted to give you the link in case you were interested: http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/catholicamerica/2008/11/catholic_disconnections.html

[altarflame.livejournal.com]

Also - that analogy (obama for hitler) is insane.

Obama is one man in a chain of hundreds of other politicians and activists and doctors who is allowing women to make choices about their own pregnancies, including ending them by abortion. He's not torturing people, or committing genocide on a particular group. Regardless of the legality of abortion, you and I should both have faith in the holy spirit to move in the hearts of people. Regardless of our political affiliations, we should know that abortions DO decrease in societies where people have confidence in their abilities to raise a child in a safe and healthy environment, and he does at least pay lip service to moving in that direction, whether or not you or I believe him.

God does not make sin impossible to commit, he gives us free will to sin if we're going to, with it all on us (along, of course, with an infinite amount of grace for forgiveness). He doesn't remove temptations, weapons, drugs, pornography, abuse, etc from this earth - he allows Satan to reign here and calls to each of us with a still small voice in our heart, and directs us through scripture and by prayer. So you could just as easily use that metaphor, that Obama is like God in that he will leave each woman's baby's safety in her own hands, despite the broken human hearts they possess and the wrong choices they might make for those babies.

I fully stand by teaching our children that abortion is killing, that it's tragic, that it's never the only option like our society would lead us to believe. I have a strong, emotional reaction to abortion - I'm truly horrified by the idea, the procedure, the reality. There IS a historically significant massacre here.

But Obama as Hitler? This started way before him, and he is in a very real way only a symbol of the beliefs and desires of millions of people for decades.

[marliah.livejournal.com]

Well I agree with what you are saying, I just don't see how voting for someone who is more pro abortion than any other candidate to ever run helps ease any of this.

The fact that he is anti-Christian bothers me greatly too. I posted video a while back of him mocking Christianity....I agree the Republican party is far from perfect....

[altarflame.livejournal.com]

I don't really feel Republican or Democrat. I'm an independant. Sometimes I think I'm libertarian, but only in certain ways, so, eh.

What it came down to for me was, did I really think abortion would stop being legal and widespread either way? I did some research, asked some questions, prayed on it, and really...I don't think so. I don't think McCain could have overturned Roe vs Wade. I'm not sure how much of a difference it would have made if he had, at all, but especially in the long term. We've had a pro-life, anti-stem cell research president for 8 years, and we have 4000 abortions a day. We have activists passionately calling you and I misogynists all over the internet, as if 4000 a day is nowhere near enough, and people crying and wailing and protesting about how much more accepted and accessible abortion needs to be. And, I think that in this society, with our constitution, and the last 30 years - there's just no way. It's not going to be about law, I don't think, not here. Not ever. It's going to be what it comes down to for each individual woman.

When I really saw that and felt it was true, I took that part of it off the ballot for myself, and THEN, I felt like the choice was clear.

I still have misgivings about his policies re: abortion. They ARE extreme. But I don't feel guilty for my vote because I truly believe that him vs McCain vs anyone as president is still going to amount to the same thing: legal, widely available abortion throughout this country. I think I can make more difference walking around young and happy with my 5 beautiful kids and making every waittress, cashier, neighbor, etc stop and say, wow, you're really doing that, huh? And you aren't homeless or miserable? And you still go out places? Huh.


I didn't see the video. I mean...he IS christian, isn't he? He thanked God in his acceptance speech and has belonged to a church for a long long time...

[marliah.livejournal.com]

well the issue isn't so much McCain being able to overturn Roe vs. Wade (although at least he would have tried) as the issue of Obama overturning the partial birth abortion and infanticide ban....I mean thats ridiculous. Why on earth should it be legal to birth a baby feet first up to its head stab it in the back of the skull and suck its brains out? There is absolutely no case under which there would be medical necessity for such an act and its violent murder of a baby that could survive on its own outside the womb....as for infanticide, you know what that is? It means if a baby does survive an attempted abortion it can be left alone in a corner cold and hungry to die. Unwanted and unloved.

That is beyond my comprehension of evil.

And then there are the other policies, like he wants a nationwide police force (sounds a bit Hitler like to me).

He wants to overtax the rich who have worked very hard, to give money to the poor or unworking.

And what about his pastor who hate America and everything about it, and Obamas supposed "not knowing" about his hate. I mean give me a break, anyone who goes to a church that long either knows what their pastor is saying, isn't going to church, or isn't listening. Surely it wasnt a surprise when he heard his pastors hateful comments on TV.

Look at the mans friends, he is friends with some of the most American hating people on the planet...

He says he is a Christian but someone saying they are and being one is not the same thing.

Matthew 7
15"Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves. 16By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? 17Likewise every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. 18A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit. 19Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. 20Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them.

21"Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. 22Many will say to me on that day, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?' 23Then I will tell them plainly, 'I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!'

I can't say he isn't a Christian, only God knows that, but from what I know of this man his fruit is bad, rotten stuff.....

Just look up some of the antiChristian stuff he has said and the way he has twisted the Bible. It ought to concern any of us.

Anyway. I disagree, I think his election is going to have a huge impact on America and its not for the better...too late to change it now though so I'm done talking about it. :/

[marliah.livejournal.com]

oh and thank you for not getting all defensive on me. I left the house after posting and was really hoping I hadn't come off the wrong way or as judgmental or rude.

sigh

[redcosmic-earth.livejournal.com]

there are just no words for this.

[babyslime.livejournal.com]

I love that album.

[babyslime.livejournal.com]

Wow that was a pointless comment.

[altarflame.livejournal.com]

I couldn't tell at first if you meant Linkin Park or Enya, but I'm going with Enya since I said "album" in reference to that, and was really only talking about a single Linkin Park song.

[babyslime.livejournal.com]

I do like a few of the LP songs, although as a whole I'm not a big fan of artists that scream into microphones and call it singing.

I was referencing the Enya CD, it was my favourite when I was younger. I have amusing stories about the most feared, loud, mean, angry teacher in my high school and his rather odd soft spot for Enya, specifically "Sail away", which he would play during our exams and sing quietly to throughout. If you so much as twitched when he pushed "play" you'd be deaf and in a bloody pulp with a big fat 0 on your test. Good times.

[chadwah.livejournal.com]

My husband teaches fourth grade at a local charter school and was having a helluva time with the kids' obsession about the election.

One day, one kid came up to him and said "There's a kid going around asking who you're voting for, and if you say Obama they say I hate you."

It's like, um, YOU ARE TEN. YOU ARE NOT VOTING. DEAL.

[chadwah.livejournal.com]

I don't like that Obama is going to be our next president, but I'm not sure if I'd prefer McCain to him.

Both of them support (at least in the form of the corporate bail-out) the bizarre kind of socialized business we have in this country, and many, many people are going to die no matter who was elected.

I at least had some respect for McCain before the election, but the way he run his campaign destroyed all of that. (Not the worst campaign in history by a long shot, but still not one to be proud of).

And Obama is an extremely intelligent man (and I am a sucker for his speeches), and I admire his move towards a more civil political dialogue, but he's never stood against his own party (which is frightening given the overwhelming Democratic majority in both houses of Congress), and while his public positions are to the left of moderate, I think his personal inclinations are even more liberal. (Ex: a reference in one of his books about wanting the death tax to be 100%... which in effect means no one inherits anything from anyone, and all the money people had put away, say, for retirement is piped straight back into the government).

I'm also suspicious of his change.gov position on charter schools -- it seems to imply that he wants charter schools to be accountable to their local school boards. School boards that traditionally hate charter schools and would shut them all down if they could.


But either way? The parties, at this point, have all the worst qualities in common, anyway.