One of the joys of being a parent is seeing your children discover the world. When they are first born, a child’s world is mostly a blurry vision of moving blobs in space. Soon, they discover that they have wondrous sucking things that parents refer to as hands and feet. As things come into focus and baby can sit up, they are introduced to the expanse of their crib and finally learn that they have parents. This goes on and on. The world they know gets bigger and bigger every day.
Kassie is coming up on the big oh-two. I found a stack of pictures the other day taken in the hospital when she was born. I can tell by looking at her that she was not happy that her world had gone from this warm, cozy, wet place where her activities consisted of floating and punching through my belly wall at the wand used to monitor her in stress tests. Back then, her universe was encapsulated inside my belly. Nowadays, she loves to run across open fields or point to objects and shout out their names just to show everyone how smart she is. How did I get from this teeny bundle to an extroverted toddler? I am not sure, but I know it has been an interesting journey.
One thing that never ceases to amaze me is how little Kassie's sense of smell and taste seem similar to mine. I will often find her eating things out of a tube. Scented lotions I can somewhat understand, but hydrocortisone? I have tasted the stuff. It is nasty. Kassie has also fostered a reputation as an accomplished poo painter. If we are not quick enough, she will take off her diaper and use the contents to create a masterpiece on her crib or her wall or even herself. I can understand the appeal since poop is similar in texture to finger paints and, on some days, Play-doh. But the smell should be a deterrent. I get knocked over when I walk into the room. Kassie just laughs and jumps in her crib obviously thrilled with her latest work. This early talent will horrify her later in life when I am telling it to her prom date, but, for now, she is so proud.
All of this is just the norm of development. All kids observe their world as its boundaries expand. It is fun to watch the discovery of how a toy works or how the TV will turn on and off with a touch of a button. This backfires occasionally when she hits the power button on the stereo and Papa has been listening to his music at high volume and forgot to turn it back down. But, I digress.
While all this discovering and expanding is really cool, the joy I find in parenting presents itself when I am forced to slow way down and take a good, hard look at the world. How many times have I been in our backyard, yet never really looked at it? The other day we were pulling all the vegetation out of the garden and Kassie came over to help me. Together, we worked until we suddenly found ourselves in one corner of a bed hunched over a caterpillar making his way across a strawberry leaf. While the sun beat down on our backs, Kassie stared in wonder at this furry little creature moving along in a way she was unfamiliar with. As he moved along, she would do her sideways crab walk to get a better view. I waited for her to reach out and grab the poor creature, but she just sat there, staring at it, taking it all in. I don’t know what she thought of the caterpillar, but she would point to the caterpillar and let out an occasional “whoa” followed by a string of sounds that are words in her own special language and then she would go back to watching the progress in the strawberry bed. This little bug captivated her for at least 15 minutes.
I have been weeding all summer and have seen a lot of these caterpillars in the past few weeks. Normally I will just scoop them up and throw them into some part of the garden t6hat still has vegetation in it. I had never really stopped to watch one. However, on this day, I really stopped to wonder about the life of a caterpillar. I don’t know much about bugs or their life spans. I know that this little guy would soon go into a slumber and wake up transformed into a beautiful creature with wings. I did pause to reflect on the meaning of his little life. What is the point? Why was this little guy in my strawberry plant? Where was he going? Where had he come from? Days later, I am still puzzling over it and rambling on about it in my blog. All this because Kassie wanted to stop and watch a caterpillar make his way across a strawberry plant.
What is kind of astounding to me is that all of this took place in the space of about a square foot. How many other square feet like this had I walked past completely missing the wonder contained therein?
Friday, September 28, 2007
Friday, September 21, 2007
Delving Into My Past
Lately I have found myself on the computer a lot and spending more and more time delving into my past. I don’t really know exactly why, but for some reason, I am fascinated with getting in touch with people I have encountered in my life. As the internet grows, the easier it is to find people whom I have long since lost touch with. Perhaps it is the fact that I am now a mother and really miss the reckless abandon of my youth? Maybe I just want to know what path others took? Maybe I need a new hobby? I don’t know.
What I do know is how much fun I am having. My internet adventure started almost 10 years ago. I logged on and made a whole bunch of new friends. It was so cool to have people to talk to at any time of the day or night. Since I was a student, I could often be found online at any time. It was a lot of fun.
I came online about the same time as Google. I can say that I have been using Google since it was fresh out of its beta stage. I wish I had applied for a job with them back then. Oh what could have been.
Google was neat because you could find almost anything on it if it was online; including old friends. I didn’t have much success in those days, but that changed when Classmates.com came along. The idea sounded interesting so I signed up. I immediately got in touch with the guy who had a locker next to mine in high school. His was an interesting story. He was a preppy guy who was on student government. He was cute and friendly and all the girls with lockers in his vicinity had crushes on him or at least a moderate fascination with the man. Sadly, he got into drugs and dropped out of school without graduating. I had heard he was on track to be Valedictorian before his downfall. He eventually fell off my radar and I was left to wonder what ever happened to him or even if he was still alive.
When I got in touch with him, he was almost giddy to hear from me. Apparently, he remembered me and laughed that I thought that he may have been so far gone that he could have died from an OD. Yeah. Silly me. Anyway, he told me he was happily married and had a son. It was obvious from his email that he really adored his wife and I could almost see his chest puffing out with pride as he talked on about his son’s martial arts class. He is now a football coach at the high school we attended and it sounds like he is in love with the life he has.
Sadly, one major fault of mine is that I am so terrible at keeping in touch. I would have to say, if I were being honest with myself, that the majority of my friends fell by the wayside because they got tired of waiting for me to return phone calls and/or letters. I didn’t return the last email this guy wrote to me and I am too embarrassed about that fact to email him again. I am happy to know that he survived his drug phase and went on to have a good life.
After I found this guy, I became interested in finding out more people to see how their lives turned out. I reflected back to my youth and thought about how all these people had crossed paths with me at some time or other and we had enough in common that we forged friendships. I figured that, as our lives merged for however long, we were, in some way, on the same path. When our travels caused the path to diverge, it led us to separate adventures in life. I would often wonder how my life could be different had I (or someone else) made a different choice along the path. I wanted to know how their decisions had affected their journey and if I would even recognize in the adult the young person I knew back when.
Finally, I decided that I had to stop thinking and start doing. In the meantime, MySpace and Facebook came along. Google has much more information in it thus making it easier for me to hunt for people. I don’t have a lot of spare time, but I do have enough that I managed to find one of my old drinking buddies, several of my old best friends, a friend I was not so close to, and an old boyfriend. Sadly, not all the tales are happy ones. I found out that one friend didn’t want to talk to me since I had caused so much emotional damage upon parting, that he was still angry. I felt bad, but after 15 years...let it go. I left him alone. One person has apparently never gotten past high school and was a little too stuck in the past for my taste. Not surprisingly, she is still single.
I continue to hunt. Just yesterday I found an old friend who apparently lived near me in San Francisco and I never knew it. It looks like she belongs to a scooter club. Something I find so cool and so fitting for her. Looks like she never lost her punk rock edge.
I don’t know what the reason is for me enjoying this so much, but it certainly is fun when I find a friend and find out where life has taken them.
What I do know is how much fun I am having. My internet adventure started almost 10 years ago. I logged on and made a whole bunch of new friends. It was so cool to have people to talk to at any time of the day or night. Since I was a student, I could often be found online at any time. It was a lot of fun.
I came online about the same time as Google. I can say that I have been using Google since it was fresh out of its beta stage. I wish I had applied for a job with them back then. Oh what could have been.
Google was neat because you could find almost anything on it if it was online; including old friends. I didn’t have much success in those days, but that changed when Classmates.com came along. The idea sounded interesting so I signed up. I immediately got in touch with the guy who had a locker next to mine in high school. His was an interesting story. He was a preppy guy who was on student government. He was cute and friendly and all the girls with lockers in his vicinity had crushes on him or at least a moderate fascination with the man. Sadly, he got into drugs and dropped out of school without graduating. I had heard he was on track to be Valedictorian before his downfall. He eventually fell off my radar and I was left to wonder what ever happened to him or even if he was still alive.
When I got in touch with him, he was almost giddy to hear from me. Apparently, he remembered me and laughed that I thought that he may have been so far gone that he could have died from an OD. Yeah. Silly me. Anyway, he told me he was happily married and had a son. It was obvious from his email that he really adored his wife and I could almost see his chest puffing out with pride as he talked on about his son’s martial arts class. He is now a football coach at the high school we attended and it sounds like he is in love with the life he has.
Sadly, one major fault of mine is that I am so terrible at keeping in touch. I would have to say, if I were being honest with myself, that the majority of my friends fell by the wayside because they got tired of waiting for me to return phone calls and/or letters. I didn’t return the last email this guy wrote to me and I am too embarrassed about that fact to email him again. I am happy to know that he survived his drug phase and went on to have a good life.
After I found this guy, I became interested in finding out more people to see how their lives turned out. I reflected back to my youth and thought about how all these people had crossed paths with me at some time or other and we had enough in common that we forged friendships. I figured that, as our lives merged for however long, we were, in some way, on the same path. When our travels caused the path to diverge, it led us to separate adventures in life. I would often wonder how my life could be different had I (or someone else) made a different choice along the path. I wanted to know how their decisions had affected their journey and if I would even recognize in the adult the young person I knew back when.
Finally, I decided that I had to stop thinking and start doing. In the meantime, MySpace and Facebook came along. Google has much more information in it thus making it easier for me to hunt for people. I don’t have a lot of spare time, but I do have enough that I managed to find one of my old drinking buddies, several of my old best friends, a friend I was not so close to, and an old boyfriend. Sadly, not all the tales are happy ones. I found out that one friend didn’t want to talk to me since I had caused so much emotional damage upon parting, that he was still angry. I felt bad, but after 15 years...let it go. I left him alone. One person has apparently never gotten past high school and was a little too stuck in the past for my taste. Not surprisingly, she is still single.
I continue to hunt. Just yesterday I found an old friend who apparently lived near me in San Francisco and I never knew it. It looks like she belongs to a scooter club. Something I find so cool and so fitting for her. Looks like she never lost her punk rock edge.
I don’t know what the reason is for me enjoying this so much, but it certainly is fun when I find a friend and find out where life has taken them.
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
Starting Over....Again
I decided to start another blog. I wanted a fresh start for my new commitment to getting my writing going again. Why do I feel I need a fresh start? Is it because of past pains I am having trouble getting past in the blogosphere? No. Could it be that I think a clean slate will make me a better writer? No. Truth is, I couldn't remember my password and it had been so long that I didn't think it exists anymore. So, out there, hogging up one of the many clever URLs out there is my other blog...empty. That was a fresh start that went stale and eventually just became a petrified shell not doing much except keeping anyone else from using the URL andbabymakesfour-kelster for their blog. Next time I try and find a title for my new and improved blog, I will suspect that someone is out there neglecting their blog on MY URL. Yes, I think the world is full of rotten people with nothing better to do than get me.
So, here we are. A new frontier. It has been a long time since I have steadily written. Pretty much since graduation in 2004. What can I say? The next day I started packing for Portland and then we moved and then I got pregnant and then I had Kassie and suddenly it was yesterday when Heather reminded me that maybe my writing would be a good thing. Inspired by my friend Shelia, I struck while the iron was hot. I wasted no time trying to get to my blog. Sadly, I found that something over time had gotten in the system and I can no longer log on so I just created a new blog. I am aiming for an hour of writing a day. I am sure it wont be every day, but as long as I write more often than Shelia works out, we will both be in good shape.
You may be wondering why, after such a long stretch of time, did I suddenly decide that I needed to write. Well, in another of my abandoned blogs I mention that my muse was pounding on the creative part of my brain threatening to erase every crush I had in Jr High if I didn't let her out. Well, I let her have a wee furlough, but then got distracted by life and have decided that I really need to do this.
Recently, someone sent me to a link for an eBay auction of Pokemon cards. The auction description was hilarious and there was a link to the seller's blog at the bottom. I went to it and started reading. What I found was a normal woman (who was all over the news and had six kids and wrote with a wit and humor that I aspire to match...other than that, pretty normal) who just decided to start a blog. Now her posts all get more than 100 comments and her blog gets over 30,000 hits a day. While it would be really cool to have that many people read my ramblings by choice, that is not why she inspired me. She inspired me because she has six times as many kids as me and still manages to churn out something that makes me smile every day. If she can do it, so can I.
The kicker was when I was relaying a really cute incident to Heather and I didn't feel I was conveying how cute it was to her. I knew I could do it in writing, but not spur of the moment. I needed to sit back with the mental image and translate it into prose somehow. I needed to let the emotions stew until they were ready to make the leap onto the page. This process takes time. So, Heather mentioned that maybe I should write. Then, when I saw her yesterday, she asked me if I had started. I hadn't yet, but I have now.
What was the cute incident? Well, I was sitting in the living room with Kassie on my lap. Because she was so comfortable, I didn't want to get up so I called out to Kermit. Then I heard this tiny voice say "koo moh". Again I yelled for Kermit. Again the voice echoed, "koo moh" A third time the same thing happened. Then I knew it was deliberate. I had noticed that Kassie had been parroting us on occasion, but nothing like this. Never had she addressed either of us as anything but momma and poppa. I was not even sure she knew those were not our names. I still am not sure if she knew I was calling for him or if she was just repeating what I was saying. It was such a striking moment.
It was the first time that the name of my soul mate passed through the lips of the lovely little being I love more than anything. It was also the first time that it really hit me that when she is mimicking me, it is because she wants to emulate me. I thought back on all of the new things she had been doing lately. She gets up into the front seat of the van and pretends to drive. She even puts her seat belt on before moving the steering wheel and fiddling with the A/C dials (what? It's summer. It has been hot out.) and making vroom noises. She invades her diaper bag and will pull out the changing pad, a spare diaper, and a wipe. She will find one of her stuffed animals and immediately proceed to "change"him...including the wipe. It is so awesome.
I am sure most of you know that I never thought I would have kids and I absolutely detested ankle biters. But, having one was the best thing I ever did. I just hope I don't mess her up.
So, here we are. A new frontier. It has been a long time since I have steadily written. Pretty much since graduation in 2004. What can I say? The next day I started packing for Portland and then we moved and then I got pregnant and then I had Kassie and suddenly it was yesterday when Heather reminded me that maybe my writing would be a good thing. Inspired by my friend Shelia, I struck while the iron was hot. I wasted no time trying to get to my blog. Sadly, I found that something over time had gotten in the system and I can no longer log on so I just created a new blog. I am aiming for an hour of writing a day. I am sure it wont be every day, but as long as I write more often than Shelia works out, we will both be in good shape.
You may be wondering why, after such a long stretch of time, did I suddenly decide that I needed to write. Well, in another of my abandoned blogs I mention that my muse was pounding on the creative part of my brain threatening to erase every crush I had in Jr High if I didn't let her out. Well, I let her have a wee furlough, but then got distracted by life and have decided that I really need to do this.
Recently, someone sent me to a link for an eBay auction of Pokemon cards. The auction description was hilarious and there was a link to the seller's blog at the bottom. I went to it and started reading. What I found was a normal woman (who was all over the news and had six kids and wrote with a wit and humor that I aspire to match...other than that, pretty normal) who just decided to start a blog. Now her posts all get more than 100 comments and her blog gets over 30,000 hits a day. While it would be really cool to have that many people read my ramblings by choice, that is not why she inspired me. She inspired me because she has six times as many kids as me and still manages to churn out something that makes me smile every day. If she can do it, so can I.
The kicker was when I was relaying a really cute incident to Heather and I didn't feel I was conveying how cute it was to her. I knew I could do it in writing, but not spur of the moment. I needed to sit back with the mental image and translate it into prose somehow. I needed to let the emotions stew until they were ready to make the leap onto the page. This process takes time. So, Heather mentioned that maybe I should write. Then, when I saw her yesterday, she asked me if I had started. I hadn't yet, but I have now.
What was the cute incident? Well, I was sitting in the living room with Kassie on my lap. Because she was so comfortable, I didn't want to get up so I called out to Kermit. Then I heard this tiny voice say "koo moh". Again I yelled for Kermit. Again the voice echoed, "koo moh" A third time the same thing happened. Then I knew it was deliberate. I had noticed that Kassie had been parroting us on occasion, but nothing like this. Never had she addressed either of us as anything but momma and poppa. I was not even sure she knew those were not our names. I still am not sure if she knew I was calling for him or if she was just repeating what I was saying. It was such a striking moment.
It was the first time that the name of my soul mate passed through the lips of the lovely little being I love more than anything. It was also the first time that it really hit me that when she is mimicking me, it is because she wants to emulate me. I thought back on all of the new things she had been doing lately. She gets up into the front seat of the van and pretends to drive. She even puts her seat belt on before moving the steering wheel and fiddling with the A/C dials (what? It's summer. It has been hot out.) and making vroom noises. She invades her diaper bag and will pull out the changing pad, a spare diaper, and a wipe. She will find one of her stuffed animals and immediately proceed to "change"him...including the wipe. It is so awesome.
I am sure most of you know that I never thought I would have kids and I absolutely detested ankle biters. But, having one was the best thing I ever did. I just hope I don't mess her up.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)