Mornings are Not My Thing

On January 22, 2015January 22, 2015 By aftheadIn UncategorizedLeave a comment

I am not a morning person. I have friends who are morning people and I have coworkers who proudly show up at the office every day at 6:00, or so they tell me. I have never witnessed them at this horrible time of day, because I am still sleeping, almost always. Occasionally a friend can coerce me to meet her for a run at that time of day, and I am usually surprised about 6:15 that I am dressed and moving outside at a quicker than walking pace. Once I enjoyed such a run wearing two different running shoes. Mornings are dark and shoes look similar before dawn breaks. Lesson learned.

I harshly judge myself for my morning choices. A litany of self reproach runs through my head each morning when I wake up realizing I have turned off my alarm in my sleep and once again it’s 7:30. “You’d be skinny if you got up earlier and worked out.” “Your book would be done if you’d just get up and write.” “Good people, smart people, worthwhile people are morning people and they probably delivered papers when they were kids and what did you do? Oh sleep, just like you do now. Loser.” Being mean to yourself is not a great way to start your day, but five days out of seven it’s my first item of business. Well second item, after turning off my alarm set for 6:00. “Loser.”

This evening on the way home I finished listening too 10% Happier by Dan Harris. I really liked that book. I liked his message. I have been enchanted by Buddhism for much of my life and the real world, scientific perspective he gave to meditation, mindfulness and that asshole in my head spoke to me. He made me want to get up in the morning and meditate, but I’m trying to be realistic here. Am I going to do that when running (which I love), writing (also love), and work (pays for my house) don’t provide enough motivation? Will meditation just become one more thing I beat myself up about, or will meditation replace the loser-talk? One way or another, the mean person in my head must be replaced by a better morning habit. She’s annoying.

In response to The Daily Post’s writing prompt: “Two Right Feet.”

The Death of a Matriarch

On January 15, 2015January 15, 2015 By aftheadIn Uncategorized1 Comment

I was looking through my closet tonight trying to decide what I’m going to wear to the funeral this weekend. l have a hard and fast rule that I only wear things to a funeral that I am willing to never wear again on the off-chance that it becomes “the dress/pants/sweater I wore to Emily’s funeral”.

Funerals make me sad, and that’s hard as part of my husband’s family. They are quiet-solemn sad people. I am a blubbering red-swollen-face sad person who blows her nose, a lot, and they tend to avoid me at funerals. I do acknowledge that in this situation, my awkward fear of sobbing in front of them is nothing compared to their pain. Emily was their matriarch: mother of four, grandmother to seven, great-grandmother to my daughter and three others with three more great-grandchildren on the way. Her 95 years on this planet were full of learning, creativity and love.

Emily was an inspirational, story-telling, life-loving matriarch. I am jealous of my husband, and my in-laws as I see the Facebooked and e-mailed pictures of Emily. In one, she is pulling her grandkids on a sled dressed like Jackie O. In another, she has two kids on her back playing horse. My husband is unusually sentimental when he talks about his summers with Emily: eating fudge swirl ice cream and sugared cereals. She loved her family ferociously and they loved her.

I didn’t know her like they knew her. Our relationship was focused in short intense visits with my husband where we would sit and talk with her for hours. She awed me with her experiences every time I saw her. I remember clearly the day I said to her, with the hubris of a 21st century mother, “I just don’t know how you did it, having four kids.” She replied, “We didn’t have any way to stop them from coming.” Her stories of boiling diapers and feeding two babies with one bottle – because when you can’t stop pregnancy the babies come close – they weren’t just nostalgic stories: they were her life. Her stories about boarding with a family and cleaning their house so she could go to college to be a math teacher put in perspective how much she valued education and what she had to sacrifice to do what I took for granted.

On Saturday I will go and mourn with Emily’s friends and family, and celebrate her life and how she enriched our lives. I will shamelessly cry for her family and what they have lost. I will cry for the end of her stories. I will bring extra tissues in case this time the loss is great enough to open other’s flood-gates. Today though, I write to remember her and to bring her essence to a few more people, because not long ago she said to me that I should be a writer. While I never told her about my novel or my new writing avocation, her words inspire. Today I write a little of her story to thank her for the extra confidence she gave me, because I never thanked her in person.

Now I’ll go pack my favorite grey sweater and black boots for the funeral, because remembering Emily often might be an okay thing.

The Nutcracker Redeployment

On January 11, 2015January 30, 2016 By aftheadIn stories1 Comment

“Well troops, today is the day where we must migrate from our dignified post across the staircase and return to our plastic storage container home.”

Several of the older more claustrophobic nutcrackers faint at the news.

A new-this-year nutcracker pipes up, “What do you mean? Do we have to go back to our boxes?”

“No, no.” The lead nutcracker chuckles, “Your new home is this industrial grey box, but take comfort that once a year we will return to the glory of the shelf and again be organized in formation from tallest to shortest.”

Nutcrackers in a bin — As the leader of you troops, and the tallest, I’ll be residing in the green bin with the wrapping paper.

(Part of me really believes these guys are alive. I anthropomorphize everything. No wonder I hate those elves on shelves, huh?)

Have courage brave soldiers! Until we meet again in December!

The Magic of Christmas at Six

On January 8, 2015March 16, 2015 By aftheadIn Uncategorized1 Comment

The holidays are over but next year, I beg you, go find a six-year-old to spend Christmas with you. It’s the closest thing to magic I’ve experienced in my adult life.

The wonder starts from the moment elves on the shelves start their creepy spying from bookcases and shower heads and ovens. (No elf on the shelf at our house: too beady-eyed stalkerish for me thanks.) The parental threats of “Santa’s watching” with every misdemeanor cannot squelch the excitement. Santa’s watching is a mystery to be explored. He knows if you’ve been bad or good is a rule to ponder. Santa Claus is coming to town is a fact full of anticipation. Rudolph’s colleagues would be sued for discrimination in this day in age – shun the different guy – is a parental minefield.

At six though, the magic isn’t just in the belief; it’s in the new-found logic ability.

“Mom, that Santa at the mall, he’s not the real Santa. The real Santa is too busy getting ready for Christmas at the North Pole. Why is that fake guy here? He’s scary.”

“Why do you think he’s here honey?”

“I don’t know.”

“Did you believe in him last year?”

“Yeah… oh… he’s there for the little kids. The ones who don’t understand that Santa is real and needs to be at the North Pole with the elves. They need to see him, even if he is scary. I’m a big kid now, so I know better, but I won’t tell the little kids.”

The joy of that interaction: the unquestioning belief in the real Santa and all the work he needs to do; the logic of the scary fake Santas; the pride of figuring things out; and the understanding that you don’t ruin it for the little kids. That my friends is a Christmas present of joy wrapped in belief wrapped in magic wrapped in logic wrapped in empathy in a box of parental astonishment right there.

I was almost sad to see Christmas morning knowing that six won’t last until next year. There were only a few pictures as I immersed myself in the moment.

“Mom! Santa gave me coal in my stocking, but I got other stuff too. I bet I got it because he knows I love rocks and would want to study it.”

“I’m sure you are right sweetie.”

Merry Christmas wishes from the Afthead family to you and yours. Wishing you and us magic at the holidays for years to come.

Introductions

On January 6, 2015 By aftheadIn Uncategorized5 Comments

I guess the first step here is to introduce myself. So far I’ve been yammering on like a new hire at orientation without the good sense to tell you a bit about myself. By now you are probably rolling your eyes and wishing you had sat next to someone else. My apologies for being rude and self absorbed. I’ve never been much for small talk. So here goes:

I am a manager of a team of 13 web developers, database administrators, analysts and projects managers and have a degree in chemical engineering
I am a mom to a first grader which means I am also a soccer coach, a working mother, a doer of laundry, and owner of two cats, one hamster, about 50 snails and a host of roly polies.
I am a crafter with a primary focus on knitting, but also enjoy sewing
I am a reader, currently engrossed in John Scalzi’s “Lock In” and listening to Stephen King’s “On Writing”

While I think this all makes me a fascinating well rounded person, it does not explain why I am publically entering the blogosphere. I am also an aspiring writer and novelist (holy crap it is scary to write that out loud.) My first book is about half done and was abandoned because my second book couldn’t be ignored. It flew out of me in a frenzy, and the story took my breath away. I was about three quarters done when my husband suffered a major depressive episode. (He doesn’t believe in half-assing anything.) I sporadically worked on my book, but life took so much out of me that I had no emotional energy left to give and the project languished.

In November my husband was declared cured, for this episode, and I had my own mini-breakdown. Then, my characters started calling to me again, so it’s time to start writing. This time I’m going two directions: the blog and the novel.

Why the blog? Well, it’s really because I could buy the afthead domain and I love the idea of aftheads. I also have the occasional story that has nothing to do with my novel. I am not really sure what I hope to get out of the blog. I make a good living, so I don’t need to make money from it. I guess I’m looking for some virtual companionship while I go on this new journey into the writing world.

Nice to meet you!