Blogging, Belching and Blueberry Pancakes

"Don't write that stuff," said Balthazar, when he read my last post, "A Mighty Battle."

"What stuff?"

"Personal stuff," he said,"I don't think she (The Storm) would like it."

"Get the hell out of my breathing corner," I wanted to say--but I didn't, of course, because I've chosen a public forum for my breathing corner, where everyone else is welcome, so my good husband and his genuine concern for our children, certainly, has every right to be here.

"What should I write?" I said, instead. Although, when I did, I felt my insides fold a little around the already dim writer's light inside of me--because all day long I write what other people tell me to write, and here, in the early mornings or late at night, when everyone else is sleeping and when I have time, I write what I want to write, about the things that matter to me: Mother, Wife, ...and Writer.

"Write about cookie recipes and stuff. The good things about us."

"Hm," I said, so that he would know I was considering what he said.

But..., but I am Mother, Wife, and Writer, and this third piece of me, well, it has me inclined to honesty.

"But it is good stuff," I said to Balthazar, after a few minutes.  "It's a triumph.  Sure, she had some difficulties, but she overcame them. You can't have triumph without adversity. The good and the bad come hand-in-hand."

"She wasn't on the bench all season," he said.

Well, none of us are, but neither are we always on our game, and I don't believe we do ourselves any favors to pretend we are. At least here, in my little breathing corner called Haphazard Truths, I want to keep it real.

Still, there are a few issues. First there is the matter of those two small titles that always fall before Writer, and the obligations they entail.  Then, there is the integral contradiction within the concept of my public private breathing corner.

A conversation with an old friend, earlier this week, wherein he said, after admitting he reads my blog, "I almost feel I know too much," has given me further pause, and caused me to recall my communication with another writer, whom I very much admire, who referred to blogging as "burping on the page for a mass audience."  ...And so, right here, right now, Confidence just took the upper hand, and my wrists are bent back--which, incidently, is opposite of the position they need to be in for me to type at the keyboard or even push a pen.

But, I haven't cried mercy, just yet. I have some thinking to do, thinking about privacy and family and writing, and how this might or might not all work out. Perhaps my Haphazard Truths belong in a handwritten blue ink and in a drawer in my bedside stand. Perhaps I should share less, edit more. Perhaps I should cry mercy. Perhaps I should cry Writer, like Joan Didion and a hundred other Mother/Writers before me.  Perhaps I haven't the heart. Perhaps I haven't the right. Perhaps I haven't the talent.... (See how she does that? How she slips away? Confidence, she is an elusive bitch!)

In the meantime, to appease Balthazar, the love of my life; and because it is Sunday morning and Sunday mornings should be reserved for long, lazy and delicious times of family, and big breakfasts, and late-morning sunshine streaming in the windows; and because it is nothing short of a crime that I sullied yours with all my ugly page-burping (although, that mighty burps tends to follow majestic feasts reminds me again that the good and the bad are highly co-dependent); because of all this I offer you my favorite recipe of all time, my Blueberry Pancake recipe:

1 and 1/2 c white flour
1/2 c wheat flour
2 and 1/2 tsp baking powder
2 eggs
1 and 1/2 c milk
1/4 cup butter or margarine
clean, fresh blueberries
vegetable oil
syrup
cream cheese (optional)

1. Mix flours with baking powder.

2. Add eggs, milk and butter.

3. Whisk until smooth.

4. Add blueberries.

5. Heat a tsp of vegetable oil in pan at medium high.

Balthazar's grandmother made a habit of throwing away the first pancake she made of each batch because, she said, "The first one never turns out well. The pan isn't hot enough yet."  Our generation values each and every pancake too much to waste any, so I like to set my pan at medium high, waiting a good several (maybe 10) minutes for the pan to get nice and hot, before I turn the stove down to medium for cooking. While I'm waiting, the yeast in the baking powder gets a chance to start working, so the pancakes are flufflier.

5.  Reduce heat to medium. Spoon batter into pan in shapes and sizes to your liking.

6. Flip when you begin to see little air bubbles popping up in the pancake.

7. Serve hot with syrup.

8. Or for my famous Ruby Cakes, pile two or three cakes on top of one another, each separated by a thick layer of cream cheese.

9. Top with syrup.

10.  Enjoy! (Burp into your napkin, if necessary.)

A Mighty Battle

Last spring, on the soccer field, The Storm struggled with confidence.  It was a dreadful season that she spent mostly on the sidelines while her teammates went on to earn her medals that she cherished, because she's nine and they're shiny medallions on necklaces of ribbon. But it was complicated for her. I could see it in her eyes.

Feeling something bigger than soccer threatening our little girl, Balthazar and I grew frustrated. With the game. With the coach. With each other. With The Storm. 

"Why aren't you even trying?" we'd ask in the car after another full weekend of tournament games that we'd spent watching other people's daughters race around the field, while The Storm sat watching from the bench.

Occasionally, when we'd hear the coach call out her name, we'd perk up in our lawn chairs, fold our hands as if in prayer to hold near our faces while The Storm took her jog across the field into position, looking so tiny in her uniform with her shoulders curled in around her chest.  Still, we hoped, we hoped with every ounce of our parental beings that this would be the game when she would rise, let loose, show the world what we knew was inside of her and her sized two and half cleats.  Even though her posture told us otherwise.

Then the coach would call her out again.

Confidence. She and I have battled more times than I care to count.  On the page, in the mirror, in my own backyard--you name the arena, she and I have had a go-round there.  Some years she wins. Others, I own that bitch.  But, I can't exactly tell you how I win, when I do. Sometimes I get lucky. Sometimes, I'm just stronger or smarter; I've slept a better night or eaten a better breakfast; sometimes I'm just so damn desperate that I have no choice but to take her down.

"You're one of the best players on your team," I kept encouraging The Storm. But the minutes on the bench were adding up to an entire season and The Storm was losing faith in herself as quickly as her coach and her teammates were.

She would be asked to leave. Other girls, her bench friends, had already moved on.

And this is where it gets complicated because this is The Storm were talking about, and she values her friendships above all else. Plus, she is excruciatingly socially aware and if she were asked to leave her team of friends, she and Confidence would simply take it off the field to the schoolyard, and the classroom, the pool and the park, maybe even to middle and high school where her adversary's younger meaner cousin, Low Self-Esteem, might bully the crap out of her.

I've lost years to this nasty piece of work.... So, how could I let her get her claws into baby so early?

Ten minutes, maybe two, before the coach would come to me to talk, I went to him. I asked him for the summer and he, the father of his own soccer players, consented.  I hired private coaching for her, not so much to improve her skills as to make her believe she'd improved her skills. I took her out as often as I could, all the time staring down her confidence issues from the sidelines. Like a mother bear.

And slowly, ever so slowly, over the course of the summer I saw her shoulders settle back into place.

On Saturday, at the first game of the first tournament of the season--in sized three and half cleats now--The Storm played the best game of her short little life. And she played it the way only her parents ever knew she could.

"Perfection," said the coach after the game.



"Perfection," we agreed.

Take that you bitch!

Cranberry Chocolate Chip Cookies

It's back-to-school week and I'm just so darn overjoyed about it that I've decided to share my favorite cookie recipe with you.  These incidentally are the cranberry chocolate chip cookies I pulled from the oven to serve warm to the kids when they arrived home from their first day. Enjoy!

What you'll need:

1c and 2 tbsp flour
1c chocolate chips
1/2 c dried cranberries (optional)
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 c butter (room temperature)
1 egg
6 tbsp white sugar
6 tbsp brown sugar (not firmly packed)

Before you begin I should warn you that I've made this recipe at least 100 times. Maybe 85 times they were very good, but on the 15 other occasions they were downright magical--as in super fluffy and of a certain melt in your mouth fantastical scrumptiousness that weakens the knees.  My problem is that I don't know why sometimes they're just good, and other times they're to die for.  I've experimented with various items and techniques--butter temperatures, the consistency to which I beat and cream the batter at various stages, cookie sizes, and cooking times--but yet I can't seem to pinpoint what the trick is. If you figure it out, I beg of you to share.

Anyway, here goes:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Sift together flour, salt and baking soda. Set aside.
3. Cream butter.
4. Add sugars gradually and continue beating until creamy.
5. Beat in egg and vanilla.
6. Stir in sifted ingredients.
7. Stir in chocolate chips and cranberries.

8. Roll batter in small (teaspoon size) balls and place on cookie sheet.
9. Bake at 350 degrees for 8 to 10 minutes.

 



10. Let cool just slightly and serve with a big glass of milk.

 

Good, huh?

All-Star Kids

A demanding nine-year old, two teenagers and a menopausal mom have emotions running a little wild in our house, these days, as the back-to-school jitters set in. Lately, it seems someone is always mad at somebody, but there's nothing like the promise of new shoes to make everybody get along for a spell.
 

"What do you think?"

"Do I look like a star?"

Hollywood getting smart.

"Sob. I can't find the shoes I'm looking for."

"Those ones, near your head?'
"Oh, ya, those ones. Thanks, Mom." 



Word.

And, with our shoes tucked safely under our arms, the shoe shop magic wears off and the camaraderie disintegrates.

Oh well, it was nice while it lasted!

Lousy Myths About Some Not-So-Monkey Business

I'll always remember the spring of 2012 as the time I went nearly went buggy over lice.  The Storm brought it home and spread it about with her fantastic hugs, until we all had it. You can read about our hell here: http://vegasseven.com/latest/2012/08/23/summer-our-house-went-lousy

Finally, after five months, the lovely Carrie Burts of LiceDoctors arrived to rid us of the nasty things, once and for all. 

 

 

 

The ordeal left me a bit of an expert on the subject, so here are so many myths dispelled; the truth about this not-so-monkey business, if you will:

1. Only people who are dirty get lice. Not true. Lice is attracted to clean hair, where the nits can more easily adhere to the hair follicle.

2. You need to bag everything up (stuffed toys, pillows, etc.) for two weeks, or a month. Not true! Without a scalp to feed on lice will die within 48 hours.  Nits, or rather the larvae within them, also cannot survive for long out of the nice warm nesting ground of the human head.

3. Lice can jump and fly. Nope! But they can crawl really, really fast, and when you are digging through hair to find them they do this, instinctually racing from the light that moving this or that strand brings. It’s the reason you don’t often see live lice. 

4.  Lice carry disease. Yes, if embarrassment is classified as disease. Besides the itch (or possible rash) the social stigma of having lice, and the frustration associated with ridding one’s family or self of lice, is the worst of it.

5. Lice aren’t particularly common. Not true.  Lice are very common. Only the common cold is more common than lice. The thing is people aren’t apt to complain about it in public because of the negative social stigma associated with it. (See #4)
 

6. The most common way to catch lice is by sharing hats, helmets, and hairbrushes, etc.  It’s true that this is one way to catch lice, but head to head contact is the most common way that lice spreads. You want to avoid lice? Skip all physical contact--but I've got to say, as sucky as lice is, my babies' hugs are worth it.

7. I’m not itchy so I can’t have lice. That would be wrong. Just like some people go itch crazy over mosquito bites and other people don’t, so it is with lice. It’s an allergy thing.

8. Pets can get lice. Nope. Not even if your pet is a monkey.  Human blood is the feast of the head louse.

9. I used a lice shampoo, so now I'm in the clear. No way.  You also need to do a thorough comb through of each infested or even possibly infested head. (Get a quality micro-grooved comb! I can't emphasize this enough) You also need to launder all contaminated bedding; bag or put away all pillows and stuffed toys that might be contaminated; or stick these in the dryer on hot for 30-40 minutes; boil all hair brushes; thoroughly vacuum carpets and furniture; and don't forget about hair ties and carseats.  Then you need to do it all again approximately 10 days later.   

10. I did everything in #9, so now I'm definitely in the clear. Not necessarily. There is significant and mounting evidence that lice has developed immunities to the over-the-counter products, so it isn't a given that they work at all. The point is: You need to continually monitor the beautiful heads in your home. If you discover that you are not in fact rid of the critters, you need to find an alternative treatment. Definitely do not use the lice shampoos beyond the recommended dosage. There is also significant and mounting evidence that these are dangerous the first time round, forget about the second and third time you use them..  

Here's the deal: There is a ton of confusing, conflicting, controversial and political information surrounding these shampoos, and getting to the bottom of it is a bit of a chore, but do some homework before you expose your children to what is very probably a treatment far more dangerous than the disease.  Remember, lice is a nuisance but it can't make you sick or kill you.

If I had to do it all again, I most definitely would skip the trip to the drugstore--which proved futile, anyway--and head straight to my kitchen cupboard for the olive oil. Actually, if I had to do it all again, I'd call the LiceDoctors on Day One: http://www.licedoctors.com/

One final note: What it really means to contract lice is that: a. You  have clean hair; and b. You are sociable. Nothing more. Get over it, and get out the olive oil.
 

A Conversation With a Teenager

"So, I'll never be allowed to have boys in my room?" said Sunshine.

"Never," I said

"Don't you trust me?"

"Oh, Honey, of course I trust you," I said. "You’ve never given me a reason not to trust you. You’re good and you make good choices.  You’re smart and you make smart choices.  You’re wise and savvy and kind, and you bring all of these wonderful traits to your decision making, and I believe, I hope, that you will continue to do so."

Then I couldn't help but jump in: "But, Sunshine, you are coming into some very different territory where the terrain gets tricky to navigate. There will be pressures, social pressures and pressures from boys, beyond any pressures you’ve come up against already.  And your head and your heart will conflict, to leave you uncertain. Forget about the wild hormones that will throw everything off kilter to mess with your thinking.

Yes, I trust you, Baby, I really do, but I’m afraid for you, too.  I’m terrified.  The choices you’ve made in the past have been of mere training ground for the choices you’ll need to make in the future, grown-up choices of the adult world, where the consequences are real, long-lasting, and life-altering.

And while you make good choices, the whole set up is unfair because you’ll be forced to make choices that, as a teenage girl, you’re not even equipped to make. You’ll be forced to make grown-up, long-lasting, life-altering choices, wrought with social and sexual pressures—and yet, you aren’t psychologically, emotionally or even mentally fully equipped to handle these choices because, Sunshine, the human brain isn’t fully developed until a person reaches something like 25 years of age. 

What this means, Beautiful Girl, is that even though you are a good girl, a responsible girl who makes good choices, until you are older and more experienced, you can’t fully understand or completely appreciate the potential consequences of your choices—the life-altering consequences.   

So, Baby Girl, while I trust you—I really, really do—I’m afraid for you.  It’s the instinctual fear of a parent and I hope that you can forgive me for it because, Sunsine, this fear of mine might be the only thing to level the land a little, keep you from tripping early on this new path.  Make sense?”

I breathed, hoping that she understood what I was saying, hoping that at least one or two words registered.

One or two words did: "Speaking of fully developed, can we go bra shopping?”  

A Rain Dance

There sits a decorative block on the dresser I share with Balthazar, that I picked up several years ago. It reads, Life is not about waiting for the storm to pass, it's learning to dance in the rain.

I don't usually buy home decor with inspirational quotes. It's not really my style. But we were going through a rough patch at the time. Balthazar was working in Vegas, coming home weekends only, and I suddenly found myself a single parent from Monday to Friday, in Des Moines--while we waited for the house to sell, so we could get on with things. Things being our new lives in the desert, where he had a new job. 

This went on for a long time, until the job wasn't new anymore, and our situation was just old.

It was hard. We began to lose faith in one another, and in ourselves.  Money was tight. Time was tighter.  And life was hectic as all hell.  Then, when finally we found buyers for the house, our basement flooded to chase them away.  In ten years, the basement had never seen water, but the Iowa rains were unusually heavy that spring.

Anyway, it was right about that time, on another cloudy day, when I'd been waiting for a full year for Balthazar's plane to land, and the house to sell, and our lives to continue, that I came across this inspirational knick knack, probably in a Hallmark store. 

I set it front and center in our bedroom, and I quoted it often to Balthazar when he'd hold his forehead in frustration, or hang it in misery. I said it to myself, sometimes my morning mirror mantra, other times while I cried myself to sleep, alone in our bed. It helped.

Then the storm passed. We finally sold the house and came together as a family in our new home in Vegas.  Balthazar and I have grown close again. (God, I love that man!) And life is a little easier for us. For now.

But I keep the Hallmark block around anyway, not so much as a source of inspiration anymore as a reminder of who we are and how we persevered. Of how hard it is to dance sometimes . And how important it is to cup your ear, listen for the beat in the thunder. Sway to the rhythm. Move your feet.

Anyway, there arrived a fantastic storm on our desert doorstep this afternoon. 

It made me smile to find Hollywood dancing in it.

Life is short. Drink it up!

And dance!