Life-Giving

Had a really short, but great conversation with a (much younger) friend of mine yesterday. She mentioned that she wanted to point something out to her husband, but that it would not be "life-giving," so she didn't. Quickly forgot the term but remembered the gist and couldn't shake it from my mind, so this morning I texted her to ask her what the term was, so I could burn it in my memory.

She said that in Engagement Encounter they learned many things, but two that have been most helpful is that everything you do/say in a marriage should be life-giving, and you should hold hands when having a disagreement. She said it's very hard to stay angry when you're holding hands. I feel that I'd be  up to the challenge, personally, but I do like the life-giving part.

Today STM and I hung the art that I picked up from being framed two-and-a-half weeks ago. I no longer have the brain capacity to calculate where to nail a hole if I want two paintings to hang side-by-side, and still remain exactly centered over the couch. WAY over my head. Side note: in our basement I once upon a time managed to hang SIX pieces of art, perfectly level and with equal distances between them, AND centered on a wall. I marvel at my former self every time I walk by them. Alas, that was many ice-cream-truck-talking-about summers ago.

Turns out STM had a bit of a struggle with it, too. You don't even want to know how many tries it took us to get it right, and how many holes are behind the paintings. We at one point really over shot our capacities by trying to find studs and nailing two holes per painting, and have it all match up. Not possible by these humans.

I will say this about that - throughout the challenge we were able to stay "life-giving" with one another. Who cares that we have one extra hook next to the paintings? Who needs perfection? Marriage is not perfect. Our house certainly isn't perfect, but we can have the goal of perfect love.

Say it With Me...

So, I told you how on Rojo's birthday we got the letter in the mail saying he qualified for disability services. What with it being his birthday and all, and really not in the mood to deal with it just then, I skimmed the letter, saw the part where he doesn't need to be re-evaluated again until age 22, and then put it away. I didn't read down at the bottom to see who the case manager was that was assigned to him.

Tuesday night I was out with Woohoo meeting her new roommate, and a call came in. "Restricted Number." I do not answer those. No sir, I do not. Tell me who you are if you want me to talk to you (and even then I probably wouldn't answer your call, what with the phone phobia and all). Got home and there was a message on my home voice mail. Finally listened to my cell message, and they were the same message - our case worker was calling and wanted to set up a time to come meet with Rojo.

Her name rang a bell, but I didn't recognize the voice really, so I thought, must just be someone with the same name - pretty common first and last name, it surely can't be her. Called her back the next morning and she said, "We know each other. I am the cantor at church. I know you come to 5:30 Saturday Mass and you sit on the right in the back. I am SO excited to have Rojo on my case load! I will walk you through the whole thing, tell you what to do and not do, etc."

Rojo ADORES this woman (although until last night we'd never actually met her, just worshipped her from afar). He sings for days whichever songs she leads each week at church. He mimics her gestures to perfection. He thinks she's all that and a little bit more.

We could NOT have been given a better case worker if we'd asked specifically for one. In fact, if I'd known at all that that's what she does, I would have killed myself trying to get her.

But I didn't know.

But Someone did.

No accidents.

I'm Not the Only One...

Just saying! To order your copy of this unbelievable book, go here.

College Angst

I think I'm nothing but excited for Woohoo and the fact she's about to leave for college in, gulp, a month from Saturday. My nightmares say otherwise. Night after night I'm in college. I'm in huge, rambling, weird and wrong dorm rooms. I'm 49 and living in a sorority with 60 teenagers. I can't find my classes, forgot to study for the final, forgot to go to class in the first place, etc.

I do, in the light of day, realize she is the one going to college, and this is not about me.

I'm glad she is going to college really close to home (really, really close). It helps, psychologically, to know that I'm right here if she needs anything. If anything, I'm afraid I've under-prepared her for life on her "own." In some ways, as a special needs sibling, she's had to fend for herself in ways her peers have not. In other ways, because I have to do everything for Rojo - literally, do his thinking for him, it's hard not to carry that over to Woohoo - doing for her things she could, and should, do for herself.

STM reminded me of something I know, but choose to forget: if I never let her fall, she'll never know how to get back up. She'll never know how to rely on herself. She'll never know that making mistakes, changing course, righting the ship, is all part of life - actually, it is life.

And so, in a few short weeks, she will be living life - ready or not, here she comes.

Come see me at Hopeful Parents today! Thanks!

And Happy it Was

Rojo had a really happy birthday. All his favorite people came to see him, and they gave him all his favorite things: money for the the ice cream truck, gift cards to frozen yogurt, junk food and college T-shirts. One family even made him a T-shirt (can't even imagine doing such a thing) with an ironed on letter on the front for his first name, and a "16" on the back. The shirt is florescent yellow and super cool. He wore it for two days straight and slept in it.

Somehow he got it in his head that now that he's 16, he can, and indeed should, say no to everything I ask him to do. He told me in no uncertain terms, "Now that I am 16 I can do whatever I want. I will say no to everything you ask me to do. I quickly cleared up the confusion. "Okay, when I'm 22 I will do whatever I want to do and say no to everything you ask me to do."

We'll cross that bridge when we come to it. It's funny, though, because this is the third time his 22nd birthday has come up in 24 hours. The first time was on his birthday when he went to get the mail to see if he had any birthday cards (he had two), and in there was also a letter from the Disability Services notifying him he qualifies (happy birthday!) until he's 22, and then he'll need to be re-evaluated. Apparently there is some government agency that believes it's possible in six years for him to suddenly be a fully independent adult.

Then today we took Rojo's friend to yogurt, and the friend said, "I'm going to take Rojo out drinking on his 21-er." I reminded the friend that he would still be 20 when Rojo turns 21. "Not a problem," he said, "I'll get fake ID for the night."

"I do not want to go out for a 21-er" Rojo piped in (he has no idea what a 21-er is) "I will go out for a 22-er."

There you have it.

Sweet Sixteen

My boy turns sixteen tomorrow, and no where on the planet is someone sweeter. This cute little thing has taken up so much of my heart and soul, I had to do a big remodel to make more room - fully outgrew the old set.

Before there was Elmo, there was Big Bird. Both were originally Woohoo's. Both became his and there was nothing you could do about it. Nothing at all, so we didn't even try.

Woohoo is about to go to college and just learned who her roommate will be. They have a lot in common and one big thing not in common. The roommate is an only child. Woohoo might as well be in the middle of 10. They'll get along great.

Woohoo is the first to say, "Just when you're about ready to kill him, he goes and says something so sweet you can't help but forgive him."

This boy came here to teach. He came here to teach patience. He came here to teach compassion. He came here to teach the shedding of the ego. He came here to teach life re-prioritization. He came here to teach love period.

And he's done so, sweetly.

Happy birthday, Rojo!

A Long Couple of Days

I would hardly call it a crisis, but the same day that blood showed up in Flicka's poop, Rojo lost his watch. Flicka will be fine, thanks to our friend and neighbor Greg, that did a house call, hauled her "sample" into work with him and had two prescriptions ready for me to pick up before 9:30 AM yesterday.

The watch, however, is a goner.

Rojo doesn't just like to wear a watch, he likes a very certain kind of watch. For years these were available at Target for $9.99, and there wasn't a problem. Only a couple of months ago his strap wore so threadbare it broke. Woohoo and her boyfriend were kind enough to alter their plans for the evening, and immediately high tailed it to Target before bedlam ensued.

No luck.

They came home with a watch, but not the watch.

Rojo wouldn't have anything to do with it. The next day after school we went from store to store to store, finally finding one at Walmart, making that my pilgrimage trip there, and basically a convert for no other reason than they put me out of my misery.

Last night the new watch broke in a different place - beyond repair. Woohoo AGAIN left the house in search of a watch. She went to Target, Walmart, Fred Meyers. Nothing. She was willing to give him her OWN watch, but he wouldn't take it.

I tried to be firm. I tried to strike deals. I tried to make him swear on a stack of Bibles that if we couldn't find the watch today, he'd agree to wear the one Woohoo bought him last time. The perfectly good one sitting in our kitchen drawer for just such emergencies.

He swore. And honest to God, I think he meant it. Nonetheless, we spent all afternoon looking at DIFFERENT Targets, Walmarts and the like, and still, no watch.

He is now convinced that we'll just keep trying, and in the mean time, he'll walk around with a big tan mark where the old watch used to be.

I don't want to keep trying. I want him to put on the flippin' watch and give it a rest already. If I have to hear one more word about the watch, in between questions about when the ice cream truck is coming, or what flavors of frozen yogurt they currently have in each different yogurt store in the metropolitan area (including Sherwood), I will lose what little is left of my mind.

Too

So I wrote a book. Not a book, actually, a bunch of pieces pre-blog. Didn't get very far with it, but now looking back, am surprised I even got one single publisher to consider it (before rejecting it). Wrote another book. This time landed me an agent. Love her. She loves me. She loved the book, and away we went - sure I was headed straight to Oprah's yellow couch and the New York Times Bestseller list.

Not so much.

Wrote another book - third time's the charm, right?

Agent went to town again. Lots of nice feedback. Loved the book. Loved me. Loved Rojo. Loved our story. Too spiritual. We exhausted mainstream presses and went to Plan B - spiritual imprints. Too Catholic for the Protestants. Too Christian for the Buddhists. Too something for everyone. Got so far as to have one editor love it, take it to he "pub board" and really fight for it, but in the end, it was just "too" for them.

Here's the deal. If I had written a work of fiction (and we considered at one point fictionalizing this), I could keep reinventing the story to be less "too" and more whatever it is that we thought might sell. But this is a true story. It's our story. To the best of my knowledge, ability and integrity, the story happened exactly as I write about it. There isn't a lot of wiggle room and I don't want to turn it inside out to make it anything other that what it is - a book of love.

After much soul searching we (my agent and I) have decided to self-publish it. She is going to help me, because she is that awesome, and believes in the story that much. I have lost all hopes and desires of being famous. I have dropped expectations that everyone I know will read it, help promote it, and it will   sell enough copies to ever recoup what I've put into it. I do, however, want to finish what I started, and put it out there for whomever "needs" to read it. When it's ready to go, you'll be the first to know.

Art

My dear and holy friend, Candace Primack is among other things, a fine artist. I recently bought four of her incredible pieces, two sets of companion pieces. The two above are "Love Your Neighbor" and "Do Unto Others." The two below are "Love Is" and "Blue Benediction." You can't see it here, but there is writing on the paintings, cool, powerful, spiritual words that bathe me when I read them.

You can't tell by looking, but the frames are really big. Candace helped me decide on mats, frames, size and where to hang them in my house. Goodbye framed posters with Target frames. Hello, ART. Dragged Nancy with me Monday to go pick up the finished pieces. "Welcome to adulthood," she said. At least three of them are going to go into the "sitting (on your *&^) room," with the recently re-slip-covered furniture. When everything is done in there I will take pictures and show you. I know you're dying to see where it all goes down.

Candace is a theologian who uses art to express what she believes about God. She prays over her pieces and lets the Divine come through. These photos don't do them justice. The Good pops from behind the UV protectant glass and museum matting. No telling what all is going to come from my future "can" time.

Keeping Your Marbles

When I was in college learning to be a teacher, one strategy for classroom management involved a glass jar on the teacher's desk, and when the class was being good, the teacher put a marble in the jar. When the class was acting up, the teacher silently removed a marble. When the jar got full, the class got a party.

Lately I've been thinking a lot about the term "losing your marbles" and my opinion that if you can only have one thing in this world, it sure as hell better be your mental health. I believe hell and heaven are states of mind, and that we are always moving along the continuum between one and the other, "happy" when we are at least in the middle, and at times experiencing both the pits of hell and the ecstasy of heaven.

I'm already driving STM and my dearest friends crazy with constant reminders to "put a marble in your jar" - make the choice that fills your mental health jar, not the one that takes a marble away. This is really just another expression for self care, but self care I'm afraid has a "selfish" connotation, even though we've come to know better than that, haven't we?

Kathleen and I had an interesting breakthrough recently when we discovered we had too narrowly defined self care. We thought it it wasn't manicures, pedicures, massages, doing a crossword puzzle, sitting in an over-sized chair with an iPad, etc., it wasn't self care. We had not deeply considered what would put the most marbles in our very individual jars.

We are each super programmed to save money at all costs - including the cost of our wellness. To break that "cheaper is better" thinking is a challenge, but we start by adding tiny marbles every time we choose "yes" to the online shipping choice that guarantees what we need will be here when we need it, rather than saving $5 and freaking out it won't.

Because I am a proud gold card carrying member of Starbucks, after 15 drinks they send me a card in the mail for a free one - any drink at all. I carried the last card in my purse for over a month, visiting Starbucks many times along the way, refusing to use it because I had it in my head that because the drink would be free, it needed to be fancy. I didn't once consider my usual tall cappuccino "enough." I finally realized how ridiculous I was being and sipped my free drink of choice with great delight.

What will you do today to help fill your marble jar?

America's Newest Citizen

Meet Sonam, America's newest citizen! Sonam and Kunga came up to Portland yesterday, and today Sonam took her oath and it's all official - see her flag? She and 52 other new Americans from 23 other countries, swore to uphold all that is good and right in this country. It was really moving!

Could my nephew BE any cuter? He knows it, too. Now his new thing is saying, out of the blue, "God bless you, Carrie," with a huge grin on his face. 

One of Sonam's biggest dreams is to travel to Tibet - her homeland, yet she's never been there. Now with her American passport and visa, she should be able to travel much more safely and not worry about detainment.

God bless you, Kunga. God bless you, Sonam. God bless you, America!

So

So, here's what you've missed since I've been absent from the blogosphere:

* Woohoo graduated.

* Before the Baccalaureate Mass STM and I took Woohoo out to dinner. This is what she wanted in lieu of a big party - dinner with both, and only, her two parents. Feeling like *&^% that this is far too seldom the case, we of course obliged. We had a nice time, gave her our gift, and toasted to her overall awesomeness. At one point in the evening she said something about how nice it was without Rojo tapping, singing, thumping his leg, interrupting, etc. STM said, "Oh, Rojo, you'll never know what he's done to us!"

Woohoo didn't miss a beat and said, "I wouldn't say to you, as much as I'd say for you. You aren't the same people you'd have been without him."

* She's clearly wise beyond her years, and so ready to have a life that isn't about him. Speaking of which...

* At the Baccalaureate Mass one of the salutatorians mentioned Rojo by name, and said the moment he won the Timber tickets and the whole school gave him a standing ovation, was the proudest moment for the school in all her four years.

* At least three times at the graduation something was said in one of the speeches, or during one of the award presentations, about the impact of the program Rojo is in, on the rest of the school. One of the boys that went WAAAAAYYY above and beyond (missed his Senior Skip Day to stay and help Rojo), got a special award. We nearly clapped our hands off for him, and later got a picture of him, his parents, his award, and Rojo.

* After the graduation, graduate after graduate came looking for Rojo to get a picture, a hug, a hand shake, a goodbye.

* One graduate had leis flown in from Hawaii for everyone in her family. And Rojo.

* There was an all-night party afterwards and I volunteered to help the first shift - 10:30 - 1:30. God love the people that came at 1:30 and relieved us.

* Woohoo came down with some flu bug right before the party, got picked up by STM at 5:00 AM on Sunday, and virtually slept for the next 48 hours.

* The next day was Father's Day and we had combined it with a graduation party for Woohoo. She missed the whole thing. Her "Congratulations, Woohoo" cake was delicious. We took a picture for her.

* Rojo will start his summer job of "working" at the same preschool he did last summer, on July 2nd. Until then, he is mine, mine, mine, and there is no end in sight of talking about the ice cream truck. Modern technology has only added to the frenzy. He now has friends positioned all over the neighborhood, poised and ready to respond the minute they hear the sounds. There is Face Time, texts, e-mails, phone calls, you-name-it, all in an effort to find the truck each and every day.

* He's now discovered Garage Band on his iPad and taps out songs to... say it with me... ice cream truck tunes!

* I had cataract surgery on Wednesday. The operation could NOT have taken more than 5-6 minutes. STM said he didn't spend 10 minutes total in the waiting room. Went great, and although there is some strobe-like thing going on now, I can already see better. I'm not even wearing my ill-fitting, very smudged, very cheap readers right now!

* Best thing about the surgery was the two days off I milked it for - the full day of, and the following day. Let's just say I am almost through Season 4 of "Private Practice," and leave it at that.

I am at Hopeful Parents today with an inspiring story of a friend's journey from tragedy to triumph!

Running errands around after I picked up Rojo from his last (1/2) day of school:

Me: Oh, darn, I forgot to get gas before I picked you up, now I'm low.

Him: Honey, you don't need gas, LOVE is all you need!

Normal

When Rojo and I met with his new developmental pediatrician (and she went through our story from the beginning), she asked a lot of questions about how things operate now for him, and for the family. I think she was trying to have the full picture in her head so she can advise us going forward, and I appreciate it. We aren't in crisis. I told her we weren't in crisis. I told her we used to be and now we're not, and really, we're just after staying the course we're on.

About every two minutes she said, "So, you've adapted..." or, "Wow, you've really adapted," or, "That's not a problem because you've adapted."

It's weird to watch someone reflect back to you your life as they see it, particularly an "expert." I would never have used the word "adapted" to describe what we've all done, but that's exactly what it is, we've adapted. Rojo has done his share of adapting, but by in large, STM, Woohoo, his family, friends and I, we've adapted. One might call it "giving up," but I am going to go big with adapted. Do the four of us ever go to a restaurant? No, we've "adapted." Do we ever go see a movie, or even sit around the flat screen together in our very own house? No, we've "adapted." There is very little about our lives that looks like everyone else we know, but we're so used to it now, it's our normal. Our at long last, adapted, accepted, at peace with, normal.

Eenie, Meenie, Miney, Massage

I have piles all over and around my desk. Each one is a stack of ick I care not to deal with, each one more depressing and off-putting than the next.

I straightened the piles. I got out my Post-its and made notes ON the piles. I put dates on my calendar of when things really needed to go down, in relation to the piles, but I didn't actually tackle the piles. It was more of a pre-tackle.

Then I asked myself, "Where is the trip to Tahiti pile?" There is no pile of fun going on.

Immediately sent an e-mail to my favorite person in the world, the massage therapist, Miho. Because there are no accidents, she e-mailed back within 5 minutes and could see me that very day for one hour of pure relaxation and self-care.

It might not be Tahiti, but it sure was Heaven.

Just Like in the Movies

Woohoo's and Rojo's high school had their equivalent of Field Day on Friday - a day spent having fun. Yummy food, fun activities, a time to be with all your friends and just goof around together. Both kids were really looking forward to it - Woohoo, because it was her last, and Rojo, because it was his first.

The school has had year-long fund raising efforts to help support their sister school in Kenya. On Friday they were raffling off four donated tickets to the Portland Timbers, to raise money for their favorite cause. I'd given each kid a few bucks to spend on food. Rojo used some of his to buy a bag of popcorn, and spent three dollars buying three raffle tickets.

At the end of the day there was an assembly, where various things took place, not the least of which was the drawing for the raffle. You guessed it, Rojo won. Out of 600 kids in the school, he won. That was great, but not the greatest part. The greatest part was what happened next - his name was called and the WHOLE ENTIRE SCHOOL spontaneously stood up, clapped, cheered, and chanted his name. And there were tears. Lots of tears. Lots and lots of happy, touched, thrilled, tears.

I had people coming up to me in the parking lot after school, calling, texting, e-mailing, stopping me when they saw me in the neighborhood - everyone had heard or was there.

It was a Hollywood ending. Sometimes things really do happen like in the movies.

What They Don't Know

After handing over two million pieces of paper to both the Department of Disabilities Services and the new developmental pediatrician, all of which painstakingly documents Rojo's weaknesses, I was once again struck by how little they actually know about my boy.

Do they know that he is funny?

Do they know that he is deeply spiritual?

Do they know that he can diffuse any stressful situation with just the right retort?

Do they know that he has endeared himself to hundreds of people?

Do they know that he knows everyone's name, how old they are, and what their interests are?

Do they know that if you tell him what's going on with you, he will follow up on that? "How was your surgery/trip/meeting/game?"

Do they know that if he is given a $20 gift card to the neighborhood market for his Confirmation, he will spend some of that money buying his mother a gift?

Rojo had been planning on what to spend his $20 on for weeks - over a month. Finally, on Saturday, he rode his bike up there, took a reusable bag in bright magenta, and executed his plan. He came home beaming from ear-to-ear. "Care, I spent $15.79. They crossed off $20.00 on the card and wrote, 'Balance: $4.21.' I bought a water bottle, licorice, Annie's fruit snacks, Goldfish, and something for YOU! Care, I bought you a present! Are you excited to see your present? Are you excited to see what I got you at the store?"

He reached in the magenta bag and pulled out a pint of half and half. "Care, this is for your coffee! I know you like to put cream in your coffee! I bought you a present! Do you love your present?"

STM walked in during all this, and seeing his excitement he asked, "Rojo, are you more excited about using your gift card to buy treats, or the present you bought Care with the gift card?"

We all know his answer.

On a Brighter Note

Got a good laugh yesterday when a friend of mine told me she'd taken her 8th grade daughter shopping for a graduation dress, and each dress the mother held up, the daughter said, "That's a Carrie Link dress."

Of course, she whole-heartedly rejected each "Carrie Link dress," but nonetheless, it's nice to know I have a look, and it is recognized, if not appreciated, by the 14-year-olds in my world.

I bring you an example of a "Carrie Link dress:" (And I do, in fact, own this very dress. Bought it to wear for Woohoo's graduation and a wedding I'm going to this summer. Just can't go wrong with a classic sheath!)