Teaching Manners to Small Ones

20
Dec

…or Cut off Their Tails with a Carving Knife

Some people lay awake at night thinking about the future, some people about the past, some their finances, their children. I lay awake at night thinking about how to destroy mice.

At one time I thought the old nursery rhyme about the three blind mice was borderline inappropriate. I mean, running after three blind mice with a butcher knife? Come on people! Is this something you’d want your three year old doing? Dashing around the house chopping things with a sharp cooking utensil? I think not! But I have discovered that the nursery rhyme must have been written by somebody who had mice in her home.

I lay awake at night listening to a mouse. Well, I assume it is one mouse and I choose to refer to it as such, but there is the remote possibility there is more than one single mouse; however I find that possibility so repulsive that my mind refuses to seriously consider it. At night, the mouse begins his day. He makes some coffee, checks his email, reads the paper, returns a few voicemails, and goes about his business. This usually consists of making just enough noise to wake me up with scratching, gnawing, scurrying, and then he does his daily reconnaissance. He has rifled through bank statements, checked out the clothes my kids have outgrown, looked at various receipts and bills. He has surveyed the various corners and hidden recesses of my room, and might even be the cause of my missing socks. I am fairly convinced the mouse has stolen my credit card numbers and gone online to order himself Teflon booties, which he uses to walk across sticky traps with immunity — he can more easily slide across them even though the entire floor is littered with them. He just moseys around like he owns the place, I picture him with a little jaunty hitch in his giddy-yup as he roams the edges of the room, nodding at his peeps and even blowing kisses to the ladies.

You can see why I might take up a kitchen knife, just to show that little varmint some manners.

No Nutshell Here

30
Nov

I know I am not alone in this strange housing crisis, and there are those on the news that tell us we are coming out of the housing crisis, but I sure feel like I am still in the deep deep dark dark deep dark pit of the housing crisis. Allow me to elaborate…

At the end of September of 2009, my husband and I put our house on the market. Ah, what high hopes we had then. My hubby started his new job in January, which meant that he spent much of the week staying about an hour away, and came home only one day during the week and on the weekends. Did I mention that we have three young children? We did the long distance thing until the school year was done, then the kids and I packed up a bunch of stuff and we all moved into my in-laws house. We stayed there all summer, with nary a nibble on our house, which was still on the market. As the summer drew to a close, we finally had our first offer on the house. Of course, it was a…creative offer. It was complicated, but it involved the buyer moving in early and securing financing after a special date further into the fall. I know, I know, you’re saying that it sounds dicey, and I agree, but we hadn’t had any other possibilities, so we decided to gamble and accept the offer.

Now we come to present day. We discovered last week that it is extremely unlikely that the buyer will be able to secure financing and qualify for a loan to buy our house. But she is living there currently. We are definitely in a pickle. We technically aren’t due to close on the so-called offer until mid-January, so we have a little time to wait it out and see what is going to play out. But the chance of actually selling our house to the current “buyer” is very small.

It’s a tricky business. Do we get rid of her and hope to find someone else to rent the house? Do we rent a place ourselves now that we know we won’t be able to buy a house of our own? Do we go back to the long-distance scenario that we did last year? And since the current arrangement is all under the guise of an “early move-in agreement” as part of a purchase agreement, once that purchase agreement expires, so do the terms of the situation with the buyer. How should we go forward with any of this? Are you getting a headache yet, Gentle Reader? ‘Cause I certain have felt sick about it all. Unfortunately, there’s no resolution to this story, no denouement or unravelling of all the twisty strings. I wish I could tell you that it all ends up great, everybody wins, and things are even better than we could have imagined. And in my head, I know that God works all things together for the good of those who love Him, but I gotta tell ya, if He would just work those things out a little faster, that would make it a lot easier. That probably sounds whiney, and I am trying to adjust my attitude, I just don’t have it there quite yet. It is hard to see the way God is going to work this all out, even though I know He is active in the world and in my life. Patience is something I have to keep on learning, over and over again, my entire stinkin’ life. And here I thought I had already learned a lot about it from having kids. Sheeshkabobs. Guess I’ve got further to go than I thought I did.

I am keenly aware of the ways my situation could be immeasureably more dificult than it is. I hesitate to be honest about how hard this is for us, especially knowing how dire other people’s lives are. There are many people who don’t have family to crash with, who don’t have a supportive husband to help share the burden, and who don’t have a group of friends who sympathize and try to help as much as they can. I do have those things. So should I shut up and quit feeling sorry for myself? Probably. And I will. But I just had to have a week of being down-in-the-dumps. I will do my best to rally, Indulgent Reader, and I hope that future posts will be highly optimistic and generally uplifting and positive. *Here you must imagine the sound of someone blowing an enthusiastic raspberry.*

Easily Distracted

29
Nov

Lest you, Dear Reader, think that I forgot or have been neglectful of my garden responsibilities, I wanted to let you know of the developments. I did get the winter garden constructed, and it was all done just before the cold snap we experienced a couple weeks ago. The design is less than fancy, but it works and so far it has been successful. There is a low-watt lightbulb inside, and since the shower curtain was too small, I opted for heavy duty plastic sheets that I bought at a home improvement store. We planted some herbs and the previously thriving lettuce and spinich is doing fairly well. The basil didn’t make it through the first trial, so it must have needed more heat. I will try to keep you informed of any other revelations as they develop!

I must mention here that I have a fairly short attention span, and my garden has lost some of its shine for me these days. There have been enough family distractions that have diverted my energies, so the poor, sad garden has really been left to its own devices. Which makes it all the more impressive that there’s anything left alive! I would say that I resolve to do better, but I just can’t make that claim right now. So we’ll just see how things play out as nature takes its wintery course.

Can I Just Say Ufda?

3
Nov

Has anyone else tried looking for a house to buy lately? Holy shnikes, it can become all consuming! The possibility that there might be a new listing, that your online search might not have had the right parameters, that you’ve used the mailing address rather than the city address, that you’ve limited yourself to a specific area and if you just went one mile out from those parameters…well, it can drive you to your computer for endless hours of research. Then when you tag on the actual showings you might arrange, and since no one has come up with a real-life version of the Star Trek transporter unit that I’ve been made aware of, you have to allow some time to get between houses. It can easily cost you weeks of your life, maybe even more.

And then there’s the mental games you can play with yourself about downpayment options (have any of you Gentle Readers ever heard of someone coming in with 20% down who was not independently wealthy? Just wondering.), percentage rates, closing costs and the like. You could spend more weeks trying to compare costs and rates in any of those areas too. That’s why I’m proposing a change.

I think there should be live-in realtors. Doctors used to make house calls, I think realtors should come with a blow-up airbed and hunker down on the floor of your living room for a week. It would be much more efficient, especially for those who are truly ready to make a decision about a place. Between the realtor and the buyer there would be better communication, more dedicated efficient energy expended, and some real friendships could even grow. Some people meet their spouses in stressful situations and are bonded for life by the experience, why couldn’t your new best buddy be your former realtor?

It seems like it would work for everyone. The realtor is motivated because they don’t want to spend any more time at your house than they have to, so they can dedicate all of their time to finding the right house for you and closing the deal. Meanwhile, you can squeeze every last drop of real estate knowledge from them, examine the various subtleties of short sales vs. foreclosures, and even send them out for Chinese food, should the opportunity arise.

Admitedly, this could also cause quite a bit of tension. What if your realtor snores terribly and keeps you up at night? Or what if your realtor is deathly afraid or allergic to dogs and you have two of them? Then there’s the possible sharing of a bathroom and that comes with obvious potential for awkward situations. I’ve seen many of the Glamour Shots photos of realtors, and I’m guessing they take a lot of time to get ready for the day each morning. You could really use a second bathroom. But maybe that’s why you’re moving in the first place! Ah, what a circle we’ve drawn here.

I hope that you are comfy in your cozy home right now and don’t have to do any selling or buying. Or maybe if you must buy, I hope you don’t have to sell. It can be so discouraging, especially if you like the house you live in. When other people don’t want to buy your house, it is hard not to take it personally.

So to any of you who are buying or selling a home, stay strong, my comrades, stay strong.

Not for the Faint of Heart

18
Oct

Okay, folks, this winter garden is proving to be a tad more complicated than I predicted, particularly because I’m trying to do it on the cheap. My dad had some random pieces of wood, and he was kind enough to slap together a frame for me. And I had a shower curtain lying around that was the wrong size (didn’t even think to check the size when I bought it — never really knew they came in different sizes). But as you can see from the photo it is too small. So now we’re stuck with a covering that doesn’t fit, much like the Dr. Seuss character who can’t get his whole body to fit in his little bed. There’s still quite a bit of work to do, and I have to keep drilling myself to remember to leave a flap that can open in order to access the stuff inside. That’s just the kind of thing that I would forget until after the project was complete, then I’d be stuck cutting a hole with a kiddie scissors or something. Not nearly as neat and professional as what we’ve got going on now! *smirk*

Just wanted to give you a progress report. The fall is cooling down and the air feels different even from two days ago. I’ve got to get this thing done if we’re going to have a fightin’ chance!

Realize that You Have a Say

18
Oct

A Review of Donald Miller’s A Million Miles in a Thousand Years

While trying to come up with books to review, I discovered that I have a few that I just can’t get enough of. Donald Miller’s A Million Miles in a Thousand Years is one of those books. I’ve only read it through one time, but I’ve picked it up and read bits and pieces here and there since then, simply because it is so full of insight.

Donald Miller tends to be somewhat sarcastic, sometimes snarky, and self-depreciating. While in his earlier books these characteristics got to be tedious, making me cringe to read the mean things he said to the people he encountered, this book is less filled with those things and more focused on changing his story. I must say that throughout his previous work he was honest about being a jerk, though, and most of the jerks I know don’t realize it about themselves. Anyway, it sounds like he needed the change, and we get to be a party to the steps of his transformation.

The part that jumps out at me when thinking about this book is the point he makes and proves with his own life about choosing one’s story. He gets off his couch and starts challenging himself to do some crazy stuff that he’s never done before, stuff that he is scared of, stuff he’s not sure he can actually do. And we get the privilege of watching what happens to him. It’s great. But besides the voyeuristic pleasure there is in hearing about this guy joining a group to ride across the country on a bicycle with very little advanced training (just as one example), we get to see how this changes who he is, changes his story. And it is more than just “creating memories” although there is value in that aspect as well. He discovers things about himself and about others that he never would have known if he hadn’t made the essential decision to take a risk and invest in his own story, his own life.

Just to give you one little snipett, in one portion of the book he re-tells a scene that happened to a friend of his who had a teen-aged daughter who was making crummy choices: dating a questionable guy, telling lies, and generally veering from the path her parents had laid out for her. The dad reviews the situation and realizes that he has not offered his daughter a better story to be a part of. Then he does something about it. He offers his daughter the chance to be a part of something better, something more meaningful and interesting and worthwhile. And she quits her previous behaviors and jumps in to this new endeavor with both feet.

I love it. I loved the imagery of the adventures Miller and his friends take on. Even though the book includes a lot of sitting around or waking up late and then sitting around, this helps to contrast Miller’s old life with the one he is striving to create for himself. Which of us makes a resolution and immediately casts off our old habits or vices? That’s what makes this book authentic. The author doesn’t pretend that he has immediately arrived once he decides to liven things up, and that gives me more of a chance to connect with him and what he’s trying to accomplish; I too have tried to turn over many new leaves, only to find them flipped back over a few weeks later. But Miller’s A Million Miles in a Thousand Years is good at inspiring me to flip over just one leaf and see what that can do for me and those around me; my family and friends, even those I meet just in passing. It challenges me to be purposeful about my life and decide consciously what I want it to be about.

It’s a worthy read, and one that I think you’ll come back to over and over again.

Fluffy but Fine

9
Oct

Mostly Just Fluff: A Review of Karen Kingsbury’s Like Dandelion Dust
The author of this book makes sure that the readers all know it has been made into a Hollywood movie. Did you see it? The book claims it came out in August of 2010, but I sure didn’t see anything about it, even though the book cover highlights the fact that the movie version stars two nominees/winners of prestigious acting awards.

And that’s how we start the book Like Dandelion Dust, with pages of dedications, thank-yous, and self-congratulating acknowledgements. Now, I don’t see this as an over-arching pet peeve of mine, but I do find it a bit tacky to drag out the beginning of a book in this way. It requires the reader to page through extra material in order to even find the first page of the story. I wish she had included it in the back of the book, rather than assuming that I am one of her loyal readers who feel an emotional attachment to her career. If a book is worth it, I will read these types of things in the back once I’m done reading it. But to place them ahead of the story seems presumptuous.

Is the book worth the trouble of flipping the extra pages to find the beginning? Well, sure, I guess. How’s that for a half-hearted endorsement? On the one hand, I read it quickly since the story moved along and it had a very limited number of characters. In that sense, she made some smart, strong choices: characters with definite personalities, a terrible crisis they had to face, growing tension between the characters, and a pleasing denouement.

However, there was a cute kid at stake, which seems like a cheap shot to me – I mean, what heartless cynic would you have to be to not be moved by hardship experienced by a child? I know that Kingsbury wanted to connect with the emotions of her readers, but I couldn’t help but feel a tad bit manipulated, even as I felt bad for the poor kid and the situation he and his family faced.

It was clear that Karen Kingsbury wanted the characters to struggle with their relationships with one another and with God, which I’m all for, but the treatment she gives God is abbreviated and doesn’t go into much real detail. I thought the way she handled the child’s interest in God was the most accurate, an organic growth from a single seed of observation. The adults are more herky-jerky, falling into more stereotypical roles – even when these stereotypes are true to life they can still be written with more attention to the specific individual and why that person holds that viewpoint. Oh! I almost forgot one more detail: on page 223 there is a glaring mistake. Suddenly Bill’s wife and Molly’s sister is referred to as Brenda. Before and after this, she is called BETH. Big whoops. I figure that if I, the reader, can catch this, the people making their living by proofreading novels really should have seen it.

All in all, the book was light entertainment, much like a soap opera when there’s nothing else to watch on a summer afternoon. It has some action, intrigue, and stories, and if that’s what you’re looking for, this will do you fine.

http://www.karenkingsbury.com/

2+2=19

7
Oct

2+2=19

Ooo, I just got a new phone. Well, when I say “new” I more accurately mean “new to me” since it has been used by another individual, a lovely friend with beautiful hair who gave me a great deal. Anyhoo, it is a Blackberry (and no, I am not a paid spokesperson so there is no need for any full disclosure or anything so I just tell you so you know what we’re working with here – don’t you have to be some kind of super-something in order to be a spokesperson? How could I get in on that gig??) and quite different than my previous phone. And I am very unfamiliar with how to work it. I think I might be able to call someone, and I did figure out how to play solitaire, always essential, right? But here’s the question I’ve got: why oh why do I have to pay for two lines individually rather than getting to add a line for $10 or whatever? And if, technically, one could add another line for the aforementioned $10, why wouldn’t a bunch of friends and family get together, get a plan with unlimited minutes, and then just pay $10 plus chip in for the initial line in order to have super cheap phone service??

I actually have friends who banded together with their neighbors and went in on a dumpster for their alley rather than each family paying for their own individual trashcans and garbage service. True story. And what a great idea! It makes so much sense; why pay more separately than you would collectively? For the convenience of walking to your own driveway rather than an extra fifteen feet to the dumpster location a couple doors down? Certainly that can’t be the deal. I think it is because we as Americans in general think we are flying solo. It’s the whole bootstrap idea of doing a thing on your own without help from anyone else. Like that somehow makes you stronger than someone else. But what if that’s your natural bent? Wouldn’t it be stronger of you to receive assistance of some sort? But I digress. I’m more interested in the concept of community and working together to make us stronger than we would be individually. It’s like the groupon idea.

There is a growing movement for people to work together to negotiate better prices on services or merchandise. So in China, apparently, people show up to the store that sells siding for your house, for example. You, gentle Reader, probably know more about this than I do! But these people go somewhere together and say, “Look, we all want siding, and we’re willing to buy it in bulk from you, but you better get us a good deal.” Then the employee/manager comes up with a certain price. And if it’s not good enough, the people demand a better price. Maybe the manager throws in some fascia (you would never know what fascia is unless you’re in the industry or you’ve had to fix it on your home! The word gives no hint as to its identity!). And the people decide if that deal is good enough or not. If it isn’t, they stage what amounts to a sort of sit-in to get a better price. “No, no, we won’t go!” And they hang around, taking up space and applying pressure for the store to give them what they want. It’s not like the store loses out in the deal – think of the sales they’ll generate if they lower their price but give that price to tons of people instead of giving a higher price to only a couple people. How cool is that?

And I’ve seen advertisements for a similar idea here in the United States. Some company contacts a retailer and works out a group coupon, or “groupon”, for that day only, and anybody who wants to can use that discount. Now, if that coupon was on milk, bread, bananas or graham crackers, I would jump on it in a heartbeat. I can’t keep those things stocked in the house. Or diapers? Hook me up! I do hope we’ll be done with them at our house soon, but until then, I’d love to pay half as much! Maybe I could arrange a groupon for Christmas presents this year instead of trying to make mittens out of old sweaters (didn’t work) or knit hats for family (ended up being more of what can only be described as a tea cozy or toaster cover of sorts). I think everyone would thank me. Power to the collective people!

http://money.usnews.com/money/personal-finance/articles/2010/09/29/7-things-you-should-know-about-groupons.html

Gardening in -30 degrees

4
Oct

A winter garden…in Minnesota? It’s madness, I know. What am I even thinking? I don’t know exactly, but I have been reading about people creating winter gardens in places that are sortof similar in climate as the great Northern Tundra, and they’ve had success. Okay, partial success. But hey, I count that as a victory. And I’m just now learning about how certain vegetables benefit from a good freeze, and become sweeter and tastier because of it. That tends to be the opposite of what happens to me after a good freeze (can’t really speak to the “tastier” description, but I know I ain’t any sweeter in disposition!). So I am going to give it a try.

The problem really lies in the execution. See, I tend to be a person who has great confidence in my abilities. There are very few things I am sure I cannot do; most things tend to fall into the category of the achievable. Call me an optimist, call me go-getter, but I’m usually pretty game to take things on without a fear of failure. This can be endearing, or super irritating, since I seem unaware of my own limitations and usually tend to downplay the limitations of others. Want to drive across the country and find jobs once we get out there? Sure thing! Wanna try to go indoor rock climbing and hook up your own gear without the help of a trained staff person? Yeah, I think I could do that. Feel like taking a run-down car to a friend’s cabin for the first time late at night? I bet we can find that without any trouble! And what happens in these situations? You get across the country and can’t find a good job so end up working at IHOP, the trained staff person comes over and gives you a lecture on climbing safety and shows you that you would have fallen to your doom if she hadn’t stopped you, you can’t find the cabin and the brakes of your old car go out on the way home!

But these are the things that seem to be the exception to the rule, at least in my mind. It was just so strange that they worked out that way! Hmm. So a winter garden I shall have, doggone it, even if I end up eating shriveled spinach and garlic until spring.

Thoughts on The Help

4
Oct

I went out for a special coffee date with a dear friend about a week ago. When she asked me what I was reading, I answered, “Nothing! It is driving me crazy!” She quickly recommended a book she had recently enjoyed. Two days later, another dear friend asked me if I was reading anything interesting, and when I answered in the negative, without a word she dashed out of the room. A moment later, she returned with a book that made me literally squeal aloud. It was the same exact book my other friend said I should read. The name of the book? The Help by Kathryn Stockett.

I won’t go into a big recap of the story line, but just know that it is set in Mississippi in 1962 and explores the relationship between white women and the black women they employ to raise their babies, clean their houses, do their laundry, keep their secrets and cook their meals, amongst other things.

I burned through this book in three nights, staying up way too late even though I knew I would be up in the middle of the night with a daughter who was learning to stay in her toddler bed (or learning how to come out of it, depending on your point of view). Even though I knew I would spend at least a couple hours sleeping on the floor next to her bed come 2am, it was worth the sleep deprivation.

The characters are complex, much like the situations in which they find themselves…even if they seem oblivious to the complexities. The interactions between the two sides are not easy to stomach, as my “modern” sensibilities are offended by the way the white women speak to and treat those in their employ. But even in the midst of that messed up hierarchy, there are those few women who form a genuine bond, and some change their previously held views — or maybe more accurately, they realize and adopt a well-considered view rather than just going along with the way things have always been.

The book flows well with plenty of action and dialog to move it along, and though it raises difficult issues, it allows the story speak for itself. There are one or two characters that I wonder about, mostly why are they included, but I’ve come to think they serve best as a foil to other characters, allowing the other characters to express their side of the story. Even the one incident with what can only be described as a random flasher, serves to reveal a different side of one character who seems one-dimensional beforehand. There is domestic abuse, rampant racism, gender inequality, and discrimination of all sorts. But the story ends up being about overcoming these obstacles, or functioning within them in the hopes of telling the real tale.

I found it almost impossible NOT to ask what this book, set in 1962, says about current society. Are things so different? Are we not still segregated to a certain extent? Are there not still people who are looked upon as second-class, asked to work silently at those jobs that much of middle-class America would consider beneath them? Just get the job done and go home, right? But what if “home” is not originally this country and that person has entered illegally? Is it then fair to treat that person as less human? Less deserving of a fair wage or legal rights? Hey, listen, I’m just askin’. I don’t have any hard, fast answers here, but is it hard to miss the parallels between the treatment of blacks under southern Jim Crow laws before the Civil Rights Movement and the debate going on currently about immigration (do I dare mention the law passed in Arizona?). I wonder what we’ll have to say about it when we look back 50 years from now.