J. Scott Savage, author of the wonderful Farworld series of fantasy novels, uses the phrase “Find Your Magic” to encourage his young and old readers to find the special talents and abilities they have within them. Savage writes about worlds full of magic and intrigue. He may be one of those lucky individuals who believe that our own world is still full of magic.
Both my grandmothers were such individuals.
Grandma Martin believed that leprechaun still lived in the forest of Ireland, and fairies could be found hiding in a bed of nasturtiums if you knew where to look. Well into her eighties, my grandma declared her conviction in the reality of both Santa Clause and the Easter Bunny. And I spent long afternoons curled next to her as she read me poetry and told stories from her own youth.
My Grandma Martha, on the other hand, believed in the magic of nature. She could take me on long walks in the meadows where she lived and name the wild flowers we encountered on the trail. She knew of spots where sweet artesian water bubbled to the surface of the ground and you could press you face against the cool watercress and drink to your heart’s content. And it was through her direction that I found how to crawl down under the blackberry bushes to the large metal culvert below, and sit for hours listening to the water flow below my feet eating juicy berries till my stomach was full.
So, as a grandma myself, I have been trying to think of the magic in my own life that I can pass down to my grandchildren. And though I do have quite a vivid imagination and a love for the out of doors, I find that my magic tends to be more earthy and domestic.
I believe in alchemy. Perhaps I can’t turn lead into gold, but I can do something even greater. If I mix sugar, butter, milk and chocolate I can create a fudge that is so creamy your tongue will think it’s died and gone to heaven. And if I add some eggs, flour, baking soda and salt then stick it in the oven… the scent alone will gather my family together in the kitchen like a magic spell.
I believe in poltergeists; evil spirits who lurk in my house and cause mayhem and chaos while I sleep. For instance, I can clean my kitchen spotlessly before I go to bed, and by the time I get up the next morning, the sink is full of dirty dishes, the floor is covered with crumbs and an unexplained puddle of honey adorns one corner of the counter. Some might blame it on a house full of teenagers, but I know otherwise.
I believe in whitelighters, (beings made famous in the TV series Charmed) or guardian angels. These creatures help bring out the best in their charges and help them when they’re in trouble. Except I call them Mom and Dad.
I believe in ogres, invisible monsters that lurk in strange places, like say the drier, and eat huge quantities of unsuspecting clothing. The jeans your daughter has to wear to the party tonight or your husband’s best golfing shirt. But although the ogres will eat anything, by far their favorite treat is single socks, preferably new ones without holes.
I believe we live in a world that is crazy and unpredictable. Natural disasters can destroy the lives of thousands in the blink of an eye, and man-made violence is even worse. Life is fragile and peace is often fleeting. And as we reach our adult years, it becomes painfully clear how little control we actually have over the events that shape us. In a world such as this, I think a little magic can go a long way to enhancing our lives and the lives of those we love.
I think that’s the magic within me that I will be passing down.
Thursday, December 31, 2009
There is Magic in the Air
Friday, December 18, 2009
If I Could Meet Myself For Lunch
“Today you are you, that is truer than true. There is no one alive who is youer than you”
—Dr. Suess
There is something about the end of a year that causes one to look to the past and try to find meaning in the time that’s already gone by. Perhaps it helps us prepare for the future, or reassures us that we have done more than breath, eat and sleep for the past twelve months.
The main problem I find when trying to analyze my own life, is that I’m doing it from the confines of my own head. This is certainly a biased angle, but it’s the only perspective I posses.
I wrote a book one time where the main character dies during the first chapter. I tried to imagine what it would look like to see yourself from the perspective of a detached spirit. Would I recognize myself from that angle? And would that slack muscle thing that comes after death, and causes the body to cave in slightly make identifying my lifeless corpse even more challenging?
Having never died, I can’t really say for sure, but I assumed that seeing yourself dead on the ground would be a somewhat surreal experience. And not one that I would be drawn to fantasize about. But what if I could meet myself alive, perhaps sit across the table at an Applebees, share an appetizer and make conversation. Now that would be an experience worth imagining indeed.
Would I see myself, the way I look in the mirror with those special light bulbs that make your skin glow like a twenty-year-old girl in love, or would the multiple layers of chin that I try not to notice each morning as I brush my hair, leap out like a crumpled paper bag around my neck?
I hope I’d like my smile or the way I try to look attentive when someone else is speaking. No doubt we would both laugh at the same funny stories, and that’s important. I once quit dating a young man because it took him nearly thirty seconds to get my jokes and another ten to come up with a polite laugh. It was like watching a TV show where the audio doesn’t match the video and the mouths move moments before the actual words come out. Timing is everything.
We’d talk about our mutual interests of course, our darling baby grandson and why See’s candy is the only chocolates worth eating. I’d hope I wouldn’t be too pushy with my opinions, and I might play devil’s advocate just to see how I respond when someone disagrees with me. Of course, I’d probably see right through that ploy, but still it would be fun to try.
Maybe we’d check out the handsome waiters, and reminisce about how young we use to be. Would I agree with myself that we still feel that young deep inside; deep deep where no one can see? And would we both cringe at that embarrassing thing we did when we were single and still chasing boys?
I hope I’d be polite, and even though I already know all my stories by heart, I’d listen to them again without interrupting and smile and nod at all the right places. I’d like myself more that way I’m sure. And I’d offer to pick up the bill, even though I know I would never allow myself to pay for me and we’d end up going dutch.
As I sat across from myself, could I offer honest constructive criticism of how I could be a better person, and would I be able to take it in the spirit it was meant? Or would I find it hard to be truthful about my weaknesses and get defensive when I brought it up?
When it was time to leave, I think I’d be sad about the separation, until I remembered that it’s me, and we’re always together. And then I would be glad to know I always have someone with me who totally understands how I feel.
So the next time I got too hard on myself or became internally abusive, I could remember what a great person I am and how much fun I am to be with, and I’d realize I need to treat myself with kindness and patience.
And that, my friends, is what it would be like if I met myself for lunch.
(–thanks Carrie!)
Monday, November 23, 2009
Count Your Many Blessings
Since my recent conversion to Facebook I have noticed an interesting trend. Many of my social networking friends have been spending the month listing all the things they are grateful for. This is an admirable exercise especially when you consider what a rough year this has been for many people around the globe. What’s more, there have been numerous studies that show the psychological benefits of taking time to count your blessings Here’s wishing everyone a wonderful Thanksgiving. 
So in that spirit, let me share some of the things I am thankful for this Thanksgiving season.
And finally
Saturday, November 7, 2009
Fifty Year of Marriage
Back in 1959 Fidel Castro’s army took over Cuba causing the then leader Fulgencio Baptista, to flee the country. The Soviet Union launched their first spacecraft Luna 1. Disney’s animated classic Sleeping Beauty debuted in theaters. Buddy Holly, Richie Valens and the Big Bopper, three major rock and roll stars were killed in a tragic airplane accident. Barbie made her first appearance in toy stores. President Eisenhower signed a bill creating statehood for Hawaii. And Richard Charles Savage and Vicki Dee Martin were married and sealed for time and all eternity in the Salt Lake City Temple.
In a day and age where half of all marriages end in divorce, Dick and Vicki have managed to keep their love and commitment to one another alive for fifty years. I should know, I’ve been there to see it first hand for nearly all of those years.
I am very fortunate to come from a long line of successful marriages. The year my husband and I were married my parents celebrated their twenty-five year anniversary and my grandparents their fiftieth. As I stood with my new husband at our reception, I could barely see more than a few months or a year into the future before it disappeared into a gray fog of incomprehension. Now, as we prepare to mark our own twenty-five years of married life, I have so much more appreciation for the work, sacrifice and commitment that is necessary to create a marriage with the staying power to last half a century.
In order to make their marriage work, my parents had to learn very early to put each other’s needs first. This can’t have been easy. My father’s strong will and stubborn streak came straight from his Irish immigrant grandparents. Qualities that were essential for success in many areas of his life could have been a recipe for disaster in his marriage. My mother too was a woman of confidence and tenacity. And occasionally they would find themselves on opposing sides of a dispute. Yet it was this same stubborn and tenacious quality that pushed them to solve and resolve marital problems and stay true and faithful to each other regardless of the circumstances.
My parents sacrificed a lot in order to bring children into the world and raise them. According to the USDA, the cost of raising a child to the age of eighteen years is approximately 208,000 which means that my parents spent over a million dollars to feed, clothe and educated two daughters and three sons. And that doesn’t count the emotional and physical drain that comes with five teenage/young adult children. And yet I never heard them complain about any lack of finances in our home or the economic compromises they chose to face.
As children we spent many summers camping. Those were occasions of wonder and exploration. As my father would pull out the tent and sleeping bags to pack in the car, the smell of pine sap and outdoors clinging to the fabric would excite emotions of joy and anticipation in all of my siblings. It wasn’t till years later that I learned why we camped so much. It was the least expensive way of vacationing with a large family.
Over the years I have watched the kindness and compassion my parents have shown one another. My mother spent countless hours keeping our home neat, my father’s clothing cleaned and pressed and supporting him as he worked many long hours at his job and then took college courses after work, ultimately graduating with a bachelor’s degree. Later when my mother’s health deteriorated, I watched my father take over these tasks, caring for her needs, keeping the house clean and staying informed on the latest theories and breakthrough’s related to her illness. I believe it is these countless acts of love that account for the framework that has supported their marriage for so many years.
Four of their children are married with strong families, and number five will be joining our ranks very soon. There have been no divorces among us, not to say that there haven’t been trials and challenges. But we have been taught firsthand how to choose our spouses wisely, work through our differences and never give up. A legacy we hope is being passed down to the next generation.
And so it is, with love and tremendous admiration that we celebrate my parents golden anniversary and the fifty years of joy, pain, selfless love and respect that goes along with it. Happy Anniversary Mom and Dad.
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
Okay, so it’s the week of Halloween and my thoughts have been drifting to all things ghoulish and scary. I’m not a big fan of fear that is induced my lots of blood and guts. You won’t see me anywhere near a slasher movie. But what I do enjoy is a good psychological thriller like Alfred Hitchcock’s classic Psycho. Nearly fifty years old, made in black and white, no special effects and I still can’t watch it when I’m alone in the house.
Another wonderfully frightening story is The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louise Stevenson. This novella has been made into countless movies and theater productions. It’s popularity due in part, I think, to how much many of us can relate to the idea of the split personality. The good and evil that constantly wage war within our own conscience.
In the story, a chemical substances was ingested by Dr. Jekyll that had the side effect of releasing Mr. Hyde, Jekyll’s evil alter ego. As a mother, I have often witnessed this unusual phenomenon in the life of my own children.
Take yesterday for example.
My twelve year old son stayed after school to try out for the school basketball team along with fifty other little boys. I had to sign a couple of papers at the office, but before I left, I took a peek into the gym.
Now those of you who are familiar with twelve and thirteen year old adolescent boys know that there is a huge range of height and weight associated with that age. Boys of every shape and size were running around the gym throwing dozens of basketballs at all the available nets. Scanning the crowd I finally spotted my son a few feet away, blocking a short blond boy who was trying to make a shot.
“Hey,” I yelled at the top of my lungs. “Good luck and don’t be nervous.”
He looked up, made eye contact for ten seconds then turned away without response.
“Whose that?” asked the short blond boy.
“No idea,” answered my son without another glance in my direction.
Evidently Hyde has taken over my sweet son’s body. Fortunately the transition is temporary. On the ride home he was back to Jekyll, responding politely to my questions and begging me to pick him up a combo meal at Wendy’s.
It’s the same with my fourteen-year-old daughter. Ninety-nine percent of the time she is great to get along with. She laughs at my jokes, willingly helps out with dinner and accompanies me to the grocery store (as long as I agree to buy her something.)
And then, it happens.
This afternoon I walked passed her open bedroom door where she and her friends were discussing the pros and cons of the uniforms that are required by their junior high.
“Well,” my daughter said, her voice dripping with distain. “If they made us wear those plaid skirts or navy jumpers, I would just tell my mother that I wouldn’t go. I am not a dress kind of girl.”
I smiled, peeked my head in the door and announced. “That’s right. She’s the only girl I know that will be wearing satin white jeans with beading on the ankles and a white T-shirt on her wedding day.”
I thought I was incredibly funny, but three pairs of eyes stared at me coldly.
Perhaps they hadn’t understood. “You know, she said she wasn’t the dress type,” I tried to explain. “And how everyone always wears dresses when they get married, but she would wear….”
This was a tough crowd. I could see that right away.
“Well, anyway,” I said, trying to save face. “Back to what you were talking about. I have laundry to do or something like that.”
As I slunk away from the door I heard my daughter whisper to her friends. “Just ignore her. I think it’s some menopause thing she’s going through.”
Hmmm, raising teenagers. Talk about a psychological thriller…. Maybe I have the makings for a classic.
Happy Halloween
Monday, September 21, 2009
Second Chances
We all live our lives from day to day assuming that when we go to bed each night, we will awake to another sun the next morning. We worry about paying our mortgages, fitting into our skinny jeans and whether the neighbors think we are still good people even though we let our front lawn get over-grown with dandelions all summer; every day ordinary worries that seem so important until something comes at us from out of the blue. Something so unexpected that it throws our whole world off kilter.
A large mass had been growing in my son-in-laws heart for weeks without anyone being aware of it. He had interviewed and been hired for a new job. He and my daughter were excited because it was closer to home with wonderful benefits. On the negative side, the pay would be lower to start off with and they had been stressing about how they could trim their budget to accommodate the lower salary and still keep her at home with their one-year-old baby son.
As the mass grew bigger it began triggering a series of small strokes in his brain, most going unnoticed. He developed flu likes symptoms and took to his bed. It wasn’t until a mini stroke occurred in a part of his brain that controlled short term memory that my daughter realized something was terribly wrong with her husband.
Doctors took tests and suggested various illnesses until a CT scan showed the frightening mass in a chamber of his heart and announced open heart surgery would be necessary.
I drove up the night before the operation so I could be there to care for my grandbaby when my daughter left at four the next morning for the hospital. She wanted to be there early to spend as much time as she could with her husband. The doctors had warned that if he survived the surgery at all it was very possible he could sustain life long brain damage. These might be the last few hours she'd have to be with the man she'd married.
The night was dark as I drove to their home that night, as were the feelings in my heart. How could my young twenty-three year old daughter survive this? Though we had many friends and family praying and supporting her, when push came to shove, she would be forced to deal with the outcome of this surgery in a very personal and solitary way. Like everyone else, I felt helpless. I was her mother, and I couldn’t fix this.
It’s a very strange position to be in, preparing for the possible death of a loved one. And stranger still, it’s not that unique. Every day, families sit in hospital rooms knowing the end for a loved one is near and trying to figure out how they will go on living without someone who has become so essential to their own personal happiness.
And it is in those dark and harrowing hours and days that the things that matter most become clear and indelibly imprinted on our brains. While other less imporant life issues fall from our minds like dead leaves in the autumn.
Thankfully, due to the skill of the doctors and the faith of so many people, my young son-in-law made it through the surgery with both his life and his mental facilities intact. An outcome that surprised many of the medical professionals who’d been working with him. There is still a long road to recovery and my daughter is still shouldering challenges beyond her years, but for now the worst is over.
This experience has reminded me again of the fragile nature of life. The fact that that though we may feel we are in control of our lives, our futures are not in our own hands. Life can change in the length of a breath, and people and things we count on can be taken suddenly from us like a magician ripping a cloth out from under a set table.
I wish this clarity of thought and appreciation of those things most important in my life would stay with me longer, but I know my own nature, and it won’t be too far in the future before I’m back to stressing about bills, calories and messes. Still every time I see my daughter's sweet family or watch her husband playing with my beautiful grandbaby, I will remember that his life, like all our lives, is a temporary gift, and maybe I will appreciate mine and the people in it just a little bit more.
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
The Coupon Queen
When I was a little girl, I loved playing paper dolls. Do little girls still do that? It took lots of time and concentration to cut the doll out just right. (Fingers and feet where so easy to snip through). And then the clothes, pages and pages of clothes with those paper tabs that held the outfits in place.
So what happens to little girls who cut out paper dolls when they grow up and get married? They turn into Coupon Queens, trading paper bike shorts and evening gowns for fifty-cents off on a bottle of mayonnaise and a dollar fifty off on cases of diapers.
With the recession hitting so many of us below the belt, coupon clipping has become all the rage. Here in my county, the local newspaper has embraced this fad by hiring a coupon clipping expert to help guide her readers through the always confusing, but sometimes profitable world of cut out money. She instructs her readers to purchase binders and fill them with plastic sheets used to organize trading cards and load them with the coupons they collect. It is not an unusual sight on a Saturday morning to see a focused shopper with a binder full of coupons open in her cart and more coupons fanned out in her hand analyzing the volume of a box of cereal to make sure the product and the coupons match.
Never one to be left out of the current craze, I decided to jump into the coupon madness with both feet. I signed up to receive FIVE Sunday newspapers, each the size of a large chunk of firewood. The purpose of the FIVE Sunday papers is, of course, to have five times the coupons to choose from, but there are other benefits as well - everyone gets their own copy of the comics, and there's even an extra copy to leave in the bathroom for those who need entertainment while using the facilities.
Once the papers have arrived and are hauled into the house and dumped on the kitchen table, the real fun begins. Among the colored ads for popular clothing, hardware and office supply stores are hidden the real treasures. The coupon booklets - one, two sometimes three different ones. It's better than an Easter egg hunt.
Once the coveted booklets are found, we get to scan through them, searching for prizes beyond our wildest imagination. Like a dollar off of the bathroom cleaner with the tiny bubbles that cleans a toilet while singing Just A Spoon Full of Sugar. You've seen the commercials. Even as you watch, they makes quick work of the grossest stains.
"Can we really get it?" ask my children in wide eyed wonderment?
Normally, I stick with the bargain brand of toilet cleaner myself. It doesn't actually clean, but it makes the water so blue that you don't even notice how the bowl is still dirty. But with a dollar off coupon, the sky is the limit.
There are other coupons as well. Shampoos of every color, scent and bottle size just waiting to be purchased at forty cents off when you buy two. And frozen foods you wouln't give a second glance in the store, but are suddenly irresistible when you can buy one and get a bag of frozen french fries free.
And the dog food. You know, I have a hard enought time coming up with meals that my kids like beyond the basic Mac and Cheese and Hot Dogs in a bun. Why would I worry about variety in my dogs meals? But there must be people out there who thrive on purchasing little cans of gourment meat chunks seasoned with oregano in a red whine sauce (whine... dogs... get it? But I digress).
So after a lengthy conversation with my family, the coupons we want are chosen and the cutting begins. Hours of cutting, piles of newsprint tossed into the garbage and the painstaking process of finding just the right place in my coupon binder for each coupon. Do cookies go in Breads and Grains or in Misc? And if I have a catagory called Junk Food, can I ever save enough money on it to make the purchase worthwhile? These are the philosophical questions I face each week. It's no wonder I never have time to actually read any of the FIVE Sunday newspapers.
But at last, the coupon are filed away and the newspapers are in the recycle bin (the least I can do after killing all those trees to save a few cents on yogurt that comes in a rainbow of colors and can be used as finger paint). Then the real work begins.
Sure you can save forty cents on a bag of hamburger buns, but the big money comes when you combine your coupon with a sale!!! This is where the true coupon queens really shine. You get an ad from a grocery store that is selling its Marshmallow and Chocolate Sugar Crispi Cereal for $1.50, a 50% savings off retail. Then you add your forty cent coupon on top of that. Well, I don't have to spell it out for you. Big BIG savings!
(Disclaimer - Savings does not take into account the cost of the dental bill incurred from your children eating too many bowls of Marshmallow and Chocolate Sugar Crispi Cereal.)
You may be laughing out there, but truthfully, this stuff is addicting. (The coupon clipping not the sugary cereal). I actually embarrassed the life out of my son by picking up coupons that someone had dropped in the grocery store parking lot, and yelling, "Eureka, I struck Gold!"
Granted it's not always feasible to use coupons, and sometimes, no matter what, the bargain brand is just a better deal. But other times, despite all the craziness involved, coupons can actually save you money.
My son got tired of his electric razor and wanted a closer shave so he decided to buy a straight edge razor.
"Don't go yet," I called to him as he headed out to his car. "I think I have a coupon for that."
Sure enough, I did. Four dollars off, in fact.
An hour later I got a call from him."So the razor was normally ten ninety-nine and the store had it market down to six. After the four dollar coupon I only paid two bucks. Is that great or what?"
I could only smile. My son's a coupon queen.
