Words in Sentences

Sum of All I Have Taken In

May 7, 2019May 7, 2019by ErinLeave a Comment

I am writing tonight at the risk of putting myself right to sleep but in hopes of a rally brought about by the sum of all I have taken in. Establishing some allowance of pause.

My brain is tired. After what seems like forever, I would confidently say I am “in process” (meaning, I am rethinking the way I approach a given theme in or aspect of my life) on top of running the gamut of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs: engaging the people I love, re-joining Twitter in the spirit of being awake, all while considering the day job and organizing – cleaning – feeding – showering. (A lot. Showering. A lot.)

It started over the weekend when an Instagram post from Nadia Bolz-Weber requesting prayers for the health of an author I knew about but did not follow came full circle as a friend informed me the author, Rachel Held Evans, passed away. She shared insight into the posts that were going around (I have been off Facebook – hard delete – for a year) and speculated the next couple of days would be laced with grief and mourning from our post mod Christian peers.

A little ahead but basically running parallel with this conversation in my life was a Friday morning stop in at City Hall to pay a way (way) overdue parking ticket. It has been awhile since I was in City Hall and I remembered that there were a lot of local Webster and Saint Louis things on my mind. Excitement for the new brewery and annoyance from belligerent opposition to Better Together motivated me to start talking a little more often with the people in my community.

Come Sunday, during hour 47 of cleaning (I believe I was about to organize a cabinet), I googled “Rachel Held Evans interview” and clicked on the first one I found: an interview with her at a college about her writing. I listened while I sorted and started immediately gaining from what I was taking in. Things like: “Do not try and start the conversation, join the one happening” and “Read everything you can get your hands on”.

A new Twitter handle, countless posts and articles on the impact of a woman my peer in age, four Audible downloads, Haveli lunch with an old friend and one Call to Courage replay during a deep dive into the Parable of the Talents later and you have a completely mentally drained me. I was talking today about “Inner Worlds” and kind of realizing as I tried to bundle an idea of how I wanted to connect that that this all sounds really exhausting. And, I’ll admit, it is a lot. The fact that Better Together was pulled the day I decided to start digging into the conversation was honestly relieving. (Not to mention that both the belligerent oppositions and the intelligent oppositions illustrate the fact the conversation is so overdue and necessary but Saint Louis needs a mulligan…)

Surfing hashtags and reading New Yorker articles and comparing favorite personalities and processing whether or not you are using what you have been given is a lot and there is no real way to share it all, I don’t think, outside of connecting on interesting articles, in hugs and by conversation. It’s like this lesson I learned a long time ago to just talk or do rather than talking about what you want to talk about or do.

And I suppose all of this makes me thankful for rest and svasana and the concept of integration and sifting so that tomorrow I can get up and try, once again, to focus my energies on the things I feel compelled to explore and do so eagerly and with ease.

I am glad I spit this out so I can go into my next round of my evening: listening for the completion of the checklist I made for the girls when I excused myself to my room to get a little work done with a glass of zin. Now, if somebody wants to come cut the grass for me – that would be great 😉

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Words in Sentences

You are Going to Be Okay if the City and County Merge

May 6, 2019May 6, 2019by Erin

I am growing impatient with stale voices opposing Better Together in the spirit of self-preservation and fear of losing what is “so perfect” and “so good”. St. Louis’ embodiment of familial traits offers a literal investment in the evolution of our city. Evolution with potential so great and profound that those faithful in this region would be wise to consider. Think of your family: you have each individual personality (your Webster, your Kirkwood) and you have your family name. Better Together is positioning our region to be a family. The threat of losing individuality or care for individual needs is not real unless you allow it to be real. Be an advocate for the components you care about (for me, it’s police oversight) but resist being a show stopper. Become educated on Better Together rather than simply reading one-sided fear mongering news. Think about the possibilities for future generations: what if our kids’ kids had a city that is on the map in a way that has re-engineered community for all? Use your voice to influence change, not to stop it. The only thing to fear is limited thinking.

Words in Sentences

“I’m Multi-Tasking!” (10 Year Old Milestone)

August 13, 2018August 13, 2018by ErinLeave a Comment

I was folding laundry when I heard Lucy make this announcement.

“I’m multi-tasking!”

I looked over and sure enough her body was turned towards this little blue bowl where she was mixing an egg with a fork and then she would turn towards the stove, where she was tending to scrambling the egg she had going. Then back to the bowl. Then back to the stove.

I smiled.

This may seem like nothing. But Lucy does *not* multi task. As her “high functioning single mom” (words of my friend), I need to be mindful of how my extreme task-orientation (“Hey babe can you grab the towels on your way upstairs – make your bed and we will be ready to go as soon as you have your shoes on, don’t forget your charger”) can stress her out.

For me, I kind of see the opportunities as I move through my house. I have progressed even to where most rooms have “transition baskets” – artfully placed bowls or baskets that are for those things that are on their way somewhere else… This, ahem, efficiency can give Lucy anxiety. So the fact she was doing two things at once, naturally, on her first night making scrambled eggs – was. a. big. deal.

It was one of those parenting moments you don’t try for – when they grow in big ways because you were both confident in their abilities and a little tired.

We went out to my parents tonight to drop off a birthday present for my dad and an anniversary parent for my parents to enjoy. The girls swam for a little bit and we decided to make a run to Lucy’s new school to time and clock mileage.

(Side note – I gave my 13 year old daughter the task of being my phone personal assistant and today, over the course of driving from Webster to Kirkwood, she had cleaned up all my apps, cancelled subscriptions I wasn’t using, organized them into folders and updated everything pertinent. I highly recommend this service. “Next, mom, we are going to do something about all these photos.“)

Anyway – by the time we got home from our test run, I was tired. We fed the animals and Lucy wanted to make the cat a treat. Out of cat-obvious options, we decided to try and give her scrambled eggs. Lucy asked me how to make them and I just talked her through, without moving from my seat.

Pet friendly, of course.

Grab a bowl.

Water instead of butter.
No milk. No seasoning.

Stir egg with a fork, counting to 45. (Even though I have never counted stirring eggs, I find the more specific I am, the more trusting the girls are of my instructions.)

She did it entirely on her own. She turned the stove on and off. She got the bowl down, she cleaned up her dishes. She purred over her kitty (who, we discovered, doesn’t like eggs) and she multi-tasked.

She felt grown up.

I sat there and finished my La Croix then folded laundry, simply because I wanted the sweatpants that were dry.

I like this phase of parenting. I like allowing them the space to do the things they want to do because I like validating their ideas about how to live their life. I like supporting anything they want to do that is to care for, feed or tend to a human, animal or plant. I like seeing them really proud of themselves and process their results.

I like that I am about to have (human) scrambled eggs at 9:30 at night because she knows how to do it now and so – well – we’ll probably be eating scrambled eggs a lot.

But not before school.

Because, according to our test run, we need to leave the house at 6:50am CST…

Till next time :) erin