Quickening

Sunday evening, Alexander needed me to sit in his room with him while he fell asleep. He's going through a phase of fear of being alone, so we find ourselves doing this often. With one of us there, he generally falls asleep quickly.

As I sat reading quietly on Sunday in Alexander's room I felt the first unmistakable stirrings of the babe within. I recognized it immediately, even though it has been at least 5 years since I last felt those first flutters of movement. Alexander was asleep by this time, but I remained for a few minutes more, cherishing the soft gentle nudges while they lasted. Historically, this was considered a sacred moment -- the moment the fetus became a person. In spite of all of our knowledge of fetal development, it still feels sacred and significant for me, as it does for most moms, I think.

Casualty

This is what happens to a Slinky when two children want it and both refuse to let go. Of course it was ruined for good and had to be thrown away. I tried to make it a teachable moment for my children. Without compromise, we often end up in a situation where both parties are unhappy. Had one child agreed to have a turn after the other, the slinky would still be intact. But no -- the principles of Who Had It First vs. Who Owns It vs. Who Had Been *Planning* to Play With It First vs. Who Had the Better Idea for What to Do With It seemed too important when the slinky still had value.

It occurs to me that children aren't the only ones who need to learn this lesson. We all sometimes make matters worse by focusing on ego-driven factors. Unfortunately, we adults sometimes break hearts and lives instead of toys. And sometimes we even start wars that break a heck of a lot more than we can ever repair or replace.

Where did my baby go?

She's already tall and smart and well spoken. Now that she's loosing all these baby teeth, she's looking even older! Luckily, she still loves pink and goofy jokes and cares not one whit for fashion. She may not be a baby anymore, but she's still my little girl!

Cultural Memory

So I have some cream sitting in my fridge, and I don't dare disturb it. You see, it's not cream that came nicely prepackaged in a little cardboard carton from a diary company 3 states away. It's cream that I skimmed myself from 3 half gallon glass jars of milk from an organic dairy farm near my home. Cool, huh? But here's the problem: the cultural memory of how to properly collect the cream from milk has been lost somewhere in the last century and I'm stuck! When I initially skimmed the cream, I knew I got a bit of the milk mixed in. (I was just winging it after all and didn't know how to avoid that.) So I put a lid on the glass bowl of freshly skimmed cream and set it in the fridge to let the milk settle out again. This it has done nicely -- there is about a half inch of milk settled below the 3 inches or so of cream.

Now what? How do I get all the cream off without disturbing that half inch of milk? Did women used to use this 2 step method? Did they have special equipment? Was there a "trick"? I will probably find some instructions online, but how much nicer and more personal it would be to have someone show me!

This experience got me thinking of all of the other kinds of cultural memories that are casualties of the rapid progress of the last century. The way we live and relate to one another is so different now than it was 100 years ago. We can barely claim to have a common cultural experience with our own recent ancestors.

There are lots of things we have gained and many reasons *not* to want to go back, of course. My marriage would have been illegal 100 years ago, and my children outcasts. I make my own bread, but I knead it with the dough blade in my food processor -- a time saver that makes all the difference. As a woman, I have choices and options about work and family that I cherish and that I want to maintain for my daughter.

Nevertheless, I feel a certain sadness for what we have lost. I sometimes envy those who live as their ancestors have lived for generations. It's hard to put my finger on why without sounding hopelessly nostalgic or naive about the past. It's not that I want to live just like my great-great-grandmothers did. It's more of a sense of spiritual loss that comes from losing touch with what was steadfast about life and what was known without knowing. The details are much less important.

Still, I would like to know how to skim cream properly...

Fears of Impending Motherhood

I'm expecting my third baby in September. It wasn't a total surprise, just a small one, but it's still hard to imagine how our lives will change with this new baby. I find that I'm more sober this time around. When Brianna was born, I knew life would change, but I had no earthly idea how everything was going to change -- even the way I related to the rest of the world. I had barely had time to absorb the realities of motherhood when Alexander was on his way. Brianna had been an "easy" baby, so again, I had no clue what was in store for me. I was unprepared for a baby who hated to sleep, refused any and all pacifiers or lovies, and needed nearly constant skin to skin touch. By the time he was 2, Firmin and I were sure we were done having children. He had the most delightful and entertaining personality of anyone in the family (still does), but he exhausted us. Thus, both my pregnancies were spent in a kind of naive bliss; the first a product of total ignorance, the second a product of false confidence. This time, my happiness is more tempered. I trust that this baby will be a bigger blessing to our family than I can now imagine, but I also know that every change brings challenges and even some loss.

I'm hopeful about many aspects -- having a baby with 5 and 7 year old siblings will be dramatically different from the last time, when we had a 24 month old toddler. Brianna and Alexander can put on their own clothes, coats, and shoes. They can get their own breakfast and drinks of water. They can buckle themselves into the car on their own. They can do simple housekeeping tasks without much supervision. Both will be able to hold and play with the baby and mind it for short periods while I shower or make lunch. Brianna will be able to pick the baby up and carry it once it can hold it's head steady. They are both eager to be helpful and loving, and I know they will be.

In other areas, I'm preparing for changes that will be inevitable. As Brianna and Alexander have become more independent, I've created routines that take up more time or require a more stringent schedule than a baby will allow. Baking and cooking mostly from scratch, tending a medium size vegetable garden and preserving the produce from it, knitting, reading for pleasure, going to museums on the spur of the moment -- all will become more complicated, and many will have to be put on the back burner for a year or more. I know these are small things, to be postponed only for a time. It's just that I feel I've only recently reached this point of contentment and confidence as a mother, and soon things are going to be thrown up in the air again. It will be a spiritual exercise in patience and acceptance of one's season of life. How we will manage our homeschooling is another open question. I'm the kind of person who likes to know how things will go in advance so I can plan, yet there is just no way to know how this baby will affect our routine. We will simply have to wait and see and work with the baby's rhythms.

This time around I know something I didn't fully know when I was expecting my last two babies. I know that by welcoming another child, I'm signing on for more joy, laughter, and love; for more growth, challenge, and uncertainty; and yes, even for more pain, tears, and difficulty. One thing I've learned in nearly 7 years of parenting is that it's a package deal. You take the bitter with the sweet, the self-sacrifice with the gratification, the fear of the unknown with the thrill of moving forward in love.

Come September Baby, I'll welcome you with arms, heart and eyes open wide.

Some Pictures

It's late on a Sunday night, but I didn't want to wait any longer to update this blog! It got neglected in the holiday glow, and I just haven't gotten back to it. Here are some pictures from our trip to Boston to visit Firmin's family over Thanksgiving. The other two little girls are Firmin's sister's children.



This rope climing structure is so cool! I wish they had them around here.



Poppy's birthday party at Uncle C's new restaurant. That's Brianna in the foreground and Alexander in the red and white shirt in the back.


Christmas morning! This one's not from Boston, but I realized I haven't had a good picture of Brianna up in quite a while!

Santa, Poverty, Charity, Jesus, Peace: Some Thoughts for Christmas

Well, it's official -- Alexander does not believe in Santa Claus. He asked me this morning if there was "really a real person" named Santa Claus. I asked him what he thought about that. He said no, he didn't think there really was. My Santa policy has always been not to actively promote belief, but not to actively discourage it either. I believe Brianna was also 4 when she came to the conclusion that Santa wasn't a literal person.

There followed a rather extended and wonderful conversation -- in which we were joined by Brianna -- about the meaning of Christmas, the giving of gifts to those we love, baby Jesus, the story of the real St. Nicholas and care for the poor. We all agreed that it was fun to pretend about Santa and that we would continue to do so as much as they wanted to. Toward the end of the conversation, I asked Alexander if he wished there really were a Santa. (I'm confident in my handling of this topic, but there's always the possibility that my children won't agree!) He said "no" so emphatically that I asked why. Apparently, the idea of an all-seeing, all-knowing large bearded man in a red suit invading one's home in the middle of the night can be just a teensy bit scary to a preschooler, even if he *is* bringing presents! LOL!
___________

The topic of care for the poor came up in our conversation because Brianna's First Day school class has sponsored a family struggling with poverty for Christmas. They are providing clothing, toys and food for a mother and her three children. It was the First Day school children's idea, which came as an outgrowth of their explorations of the Quaker peace testimony. They have been actively involved in raising money, shopping for gifts, etc., and the Meeting as a whole has caught the spirit as well. In addition to supporting the children's fund raising efforts, several adult members of meeting have made direct donations, while the Peace and Social Justice committee has allocated some money from their budget for the project.

I have conflicting feelings about this situation. The fact is, that without the help of the Salvation Army (or some other such organization) and/or caring people who respond to the need (like the First Day school class), there would be no merry Christmas for this family. The happy stories of Santa Claus would ring hollow for the three children. One of the First Day school teachers has been the primary contact with the family and has already been to the their house to deliver winter coats and other clothing items that just couldn't wait until late December. She confirmed that they have almost nothing in spite of the mother's employment (probably at a minimum wage job.) Confronting this kind of poverty in our wealthy country always makes me a bit angry. I love that Quaker children and the Salvation Army are lending a helping hand, but a working parent in the United States should be able to buy her children a couple of Christmas gifts, not to mention winter coats and good food! The current system being what it is however, I'm happy that our children want to help and that the mother was willing to ask for help. I wish she could see the innocent enthusiasm of the Quaker children as they undertake this project. There is little or no pity or condescension, only joy at being able to do something helpful in the "real world". I think children so often feel helpless or vulnerable, and they are so often the recipients of help from others, that they don't see these situations as out of the ordinary or shameful. I'm overjoyed that the children in the sponsored family will have many of the gifts they asked for, new clothes for school, and some extra food.

I hope the sponsored family is touched in a positive way by this experience. Charity can be tricky in our society, so there's no guarantee of that, but I'm optimistic. I know the Quaker children are learning a most vital life lesson: We can't leave it to Santa or even to God to care for the physical needs of those around us. We are God's agents in the world -- the hands and feet of the Divine Spirit. (Santa's elves, if you want to be secular about it.) Our good gifts come from those who love us if we are lucky, or from those who care about our welfare generally if we are slightly less lucky.

A larger lesson -- one the 6 - 8 year olds aren't fully ready for yet -- is a harder one. Jesus's birth was hailed with prophesies of "Peace on Earth". If we really want to see that ideal come true (be it physcially or spiritually), it's going to take more than pizza sales by Quaker kids and Salvation Army bell ringers. It's going to take a world where poverty is much more rare, and love of neighbor much more common. I doubt Jesus would care one whit about how, or even whether, we celebrate his birth. Imagine if we (as a society as well as individuals) took even half the collective time, energy, and economic power we spend on Christmas and put it into practicing the lessons Jesus taught as a grown-up: "Do unto others as you would have done to you", "Love your neighbor as yourself", "Turn the other cheek", "Love your enemies", etc., etc. We just might get closer to actual Peace on Earth than we ever thought possible. In the mean time, I wish everyone reading this peace in your hearts and homes this Christmas and always.

Best Buddies (or, My New Favorite Snapshot)

Alexander has his first best friend. Since I never had any brothers, I always wondered what little boys did when they were one-on-one with a best buddy. I'm still not sure, but it looks mighty important.

Not Old

This morning, Alexander climbed into my bed to wake me up. After a few minutes of grogginess, I reached out and said, "Give your old Mommy a hug!"

He giggled. "Mommy, you're not old!"

Me: Why thank you. I was just joking. I wonder who you know who *is* old?

A: Me and Brianna. We're old.

Me: I didn't mean old like a big kid, I meant like an old person.

A: Ohhh. Grace is old! [Grace is our 11 year old cat]

There followed a discussion of different family members and whether they qualified as old. "Old" according to Alexander is "When they get kind of worn out." Here were the verdicts:

Mommy -- not old
Poppy -- not old
Granny (Firmin's mom) -- old
Grandpapa (Firmin's dad) -- kind of old, not very
Grandma (my mom) -- not old
Grandpa (my dad) -- after a long pause to consider -- not too old
Great Grandma Betty -- "oh yeah, she's *really* old!"

Gotta love those snuggling in bed morning conversations, especially when you are deemed "not old"! :o)

Julie's Mom

Tonight, I was getting in my van after Brianna's swim class when a woman I know passed right in front of my headlights. She is the mother of one of Alexander's preschool classmates. I see her almost daily at the preschool, and we've chatted briefly a time or two. Tonight I saw her clearly, and it seemed as though she was just averting her eyes after seeing me. I moved to call out a hello, but stopped short. I didn't know her name! "Hi Julie's Mom!" seems a strange greeting between two grown women after dark, so I just buckled up and drove away. She seems to be a woman of average friendliness, so I'm sure she would have called out a greeting herself had she been able to call out something other than "Hi Alexander's Mom!" :o)

I'm going to look her up on the class phone tree tonight. I bet she's looking me up right now...

Sorry for the long break between posts. I haven't been feeling very introspective lately, and we're having trouble downloading pics from our digital camera all of a sudden, so I can't even do fun photo posts. Gotta get that fixed before Thanksgiving so we can take pictures! :-O

Simple Gifts

Alexander has learned the first verse of the song Simple Gifts in his First Day School at Quaker Meeting. He loves to sing it, and I love to listen. Tonight at bedtime he sang while I hummed the tune. After we were done he smiled and said, "That was nice."

It was nice. But I was touched in another way as well. As we sang, I was reminded of the pain of the Amish community this week as they mourn the horrible deaths of their daughters in the latest school shooting. Quakers are sometimes confused with the Amish. Although our theology is quite different, we do share a few things in common, such as the call to simplicity and nonviolence. I looked in the face of my little son and remembered that many of the Amish boys had been forced to leave their sisters in the one room school with the killer. I wondered how this incident will affect their faith as they grow. Then we prayed for children everywhere.

I heard on NPR today that as the members of the small Amish village prepared to support the families of the victims with meals and helping hands, they were also asking about the family of the man who victimized them. They were preparing to stand by and support that family as well. The NPR guest said they had "already moved on to forgiveness". I'm not so sure about that. Such an analysis makes the Amish reaction seem somehow super-human, or at least super spiritual. The Amish are human beings like the rest of us. I'm sure they struggle with doubt, anger, grudges, and grief, just as we all do. Forgiveness may come later, at different times for different individuals. Rather than forgiveness, I suspect the Amish show of love for the family of their enemy comes out of a consistant *practice* of humility and of seeing others as God sees them. When a person or a community practices these things, they can choose to respond with love even in the face of persecution or tragedy. They can more easily see through facades of negative emotions and behavior to the broken humanity that lies beneath. It's a "Simple Gift" to see and respond to such truths. A simple gift borne of coming "down where we ought to be".

Simple, but not easy.

Biology Lesson

Me, driving past a field of cattle: "Hey Brianna, did you know that cows have 4 stomachs?"

Brianna: "Yeah." (pause) "Whales have 3 stomachs."

Me: "They do??"

Brianna: "Yup. Probably, it helps them digest their food."


Wow. You learn something new every day.

Kinda weird to have the tables turned on you by a 6 year old, though!

The Other Anniversary

While we remember the tragedy that befell our country and the world 5 years ago today, I invite everyone to remember a more hopeful and heroic anniversary as well. 100 years ago today, on September 11, 1906, Mohandas Gandhi launched the modern non-violent movement. This movement has inspired hope and effected meaningful and lasting change throughout the word, including here in the United States.

Of course it's called the "modern" non-violence movement for a reason. There have always been visionaries who have called for a counter-intuitive response to provocation. Jesus comes to mind, for one. Today, I'm spending time remembering the shocking and sad events of 2001, but I'm also envisioning an evolution toward peace in the world and in myself. Perhaps one day I can muster the strength of character to fully embrace what Jesus, Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., (and thousands of other brave souls less well remembered) knew to be the only way to lasting, sustainable and Spirit-filled peace.

Glimpses

Sometimes we are blessed with glimpses of our children's most authentic selves. Today I got to see such glimpses in Alexander -- twice.

The first time was when he gingerly took a baby doll from Brianna's arms and held it just as gently and lovingly as he may one day hold a child of his own. He carefully pulled the blanket close around it's shoulders and softly stroked it's cheek. Like all children, he often treats dolls roughly, as the mere inanimate toys they are. It's touching to see how tender he is when the doll becomes a real baby in his imagination. It felt like a peek into his future.

The next moment came late this afternoon when Brianna and Firmin were away on a bike ride. Alexander took advantage of a rare opportunity to play outside by himself. I busied myself in the house, but peeked out at him often. He was doing such classic "boy" things -- throwing his new football up and catching it, poking at bugs on the fence, looking under rocks for critters. I watched him be his true self -- perservering, curious, adventurous. What I saw out the window said little about his past or his future, but was a beautiful snapshot of the 4 year old boy he is right now.

All those nights (those many, many, many nights) of sleep deprivation were worth it.

Taking Notice

Remember Slugbug? The game where you punched your sibling or friend in the arm every time you saw a VW Beetle? I couldn't help myself -- I taught it to my kids. Soon thereafter, their cousins introduced them to a new variation: Pinch, Poke, PT Cruiser, which is pretty self-explanatory and quite a bit more annoying than slugbug, if you ask me. Before the children were into these games, I saw VW Beetles and PT Cruisers only occasionally when I was out and about. If asked, I might have estimated seeing them 2 or 3 times per week. Now I see them *everywhere*! Every time we go out I see at least one of each, and usually far more than that. I would guess now that I see an average of 5 of each model every day. Has there been a surge in sales of cute little cars? Of course not. The only difference is that I am taking notice.

Sometimes our blindness to things we aren't paying attention to can be complete. A couple of years ago, in the fall of the year, one of the children got a book about trees. In it was a picture of a smoke tree. I had never seen a smoke tree (or so I thought) and assumed that they must grow in some other climate. The following spring, when our next-door neighbor's smoke tree bloomed, I recognized it from the book. Suddenly I saw smoke trees every day. On a street that I traveled about once a week, I noticed that almost every house had a smoke tree in the yard! It's hard to believe these beautiful trees went completely unnoticed by me for 34 years, but it's true.

It makes me wonder what else is all around me that I don't take notice of? And what do I notice too often, so that my perspective is distorted? For example, is our culture really as "uncivil" as it appears to many people? Are there perhaps just as many "nice folks" as there have always been? Are most Americans really "sheeple"? (sigh -- I must admit that I'm pretty convinced the answer to that last one is "yes", but perhaps that makes it a good test case, lol!)

What would happen if we picked one assumption we have and spent the next week or month trying to change what we take notice of? I think I'm going to try it.

P.S. If you want a definition of sheeple, there's a good one on this site. The rest of the site does not necessarily reflect my own beliefs, however.

Peace

Peace is such a small word -- easy to say, easy to oversimplify, easy to underestimate. My thoughts about peace have been challenged and stretched in the 3 years I've been worshiping with Friends. The peace testimony has been the only one of the Quaker testimonies I've had reservations about. I'm coming to realize that I've confused peace and non-violence with passivity and naivete. As I come to recognize the spiritual underpinnings of peace, I see the strength and power of true Peace. Frankly it scares me a little! Genuine peace-making requires boldness and resolve, humility, love, courage and mental toughness. If we let the peace makers have some space to do their thing, (or better yet, if more of us join them) perhaps there will yet be an Earth worth inheriting.

The Tikkun Community is circulating an ad calling for a new approach to peace in the Middle East -- one that is based on the principle of the sacredness of all human beings, rather than who is in the "right" and who is in the "wrong". I encourage anyone who has been sickened by the reports of the death and suffering of innocents in Lebanon and Israel to take a look at it. You may be moved to add your signature to this effort which appears to me to be truly Spirit-led. In addition, though it is not a document crafted by Quakers, it could be. The approach of mutual accountability and responsibility, and the call to address the root *causes* of war are very much a part of the Quaker peace tradition.

Peace to you all -- in your hearts, in your homes, in the world.

Let this be a lesson to you

If you choose to grow zucchini, check it often.
Every single day would be good.
Maybe twice a day.

Good Times

Sibling rivalry gets a lot of press because it drives us parents nuts. Not only that, it makes us profoundly sad sometimes. A child that you adore causes physical or emotional pain to another child that you adore. No matter how a parent chooses to deal with it, it's a toughie, and since all parents of two or more children face this issue, we like to commiserate. What gets much less air time is the cooperation, love and support that siblings often show toward each other. It's a shame that we don't talk about this more often because these positive interactions are among the most gratifying moments in parenting. I suspect they are among the most important moments to the children as well. I'll share a recent example from our family.

Yesterday, Alexander wanted to build a skyscraper with Legos. He enlisted my help, and agreed (rather reluctantly, I must admit) to let Brianna help as well. Brianna sat down with us and announced: "Alexander has the best ideas for Legos. We should do his idea." This is a major compliment coming from Brianna, who has a healthy self image and generally likes to be in charge.

Alexander picked up on it right away. "I have great ideas for legos! I always have the best ideas."

Brianna wasn't done. "Alexander could build buildings when he grows up. I mean he could design them."

"You think he would make a good architect?" I asked.

"Yeah, he would be a great architect."

"I'm going to be an *architect* when I grow up!" Alexander declared. As we built the skyscraper, he continued to talk about being an architect. He's been talking about it ever since, as a matter of fact. (He's even got it all worked out how he can be an architect, a firefighter and a rock star at the same time -- he'll do one job each day on a rotating basis.)

When the skyscraper was done, Brianna declared it so wonderful that Alexander "should get a medal for it." She got one of her father's running medals and presented it to him. Then they posed for this shot:
It's a bit blurry, but you can see the love and pride in their faces.

The "bad" times are so easy to focus on, but most of those negative moments mean next to nothing to siblings and are quickly forgotten. My prayer for today is that I can forget them just as quickly and savor the positive moments longer.

The Easy Life

My Great Grandma arrived in the mail yesterday. I was momentarily confused by the large padded envelope. It was hand addressed to me, with an unfamiliar return address. "Handle With Care" was stamped on it, along with the hand-written phrase "Grandma inside!" and a smiley face. I opened it and discovered that it was indeed a memory of my Great Grandmother who died a few weeks ago at the age of 102.

Great Grandma was nearly 70 when I was born, so although I knew her for many years, she has always been elderly to me. When I got the news of her death last month, I regreted that I knew next to nothing about her life as a younger woman. I hoped the funeral would include some hints of who she had been in her prime.

I was in luck! Turns out, one of my dad's cousins put together a book about my great grandmother in the late 1990's, interviewing Great Grandma and soliciting remembrances from her sisters, her children, grandchildren and others. At the funeral, my father read some of the remembrances of Great Grandma's five children. What I learned startled me. The lonely, cranky old lady that I knew had been a patient, tolerant mother (by the standards of her era anyway), an outdoors woman, a hunter. She had taken in laundry to earn money, and done it all by hand on a wash board. She had preserved nearly all of her own food, and made all of her children's clothing, including their underwear. She loved to camp and could get chickadees to land on her hand. The book clearly contained much more than the several pages my father read at the funeral, so afterward I tracked down my dad's cousin and gave her $5 to print me a color copy of the book and send it to me.

As I read the book cover to cover last night, I was struck most by two things. The first was how much I resonated with her life. I think I'm a bit (a lot?) like her in many ways. I have some of the same passions, and I suspect some of the same foibles. Some time ago, I took her unhappiness in her advanced age as a personal warning. I recognized in myself some of the same tendencies toward self-pity and inertia that I believe contributed to her dissatisfaction late in life. I am thankful that I now have positive connections with Great Grandma as well. I now know that she liked the outdoors, gardening, being a mother, and learning new things, just as I do. I know that one of the qualities that first attracted her to her husband was his kindness, just as my own husband's kindness was one of the first things that attracted me to him.

The second thing that struck me came at the end of the interview with her granddaughter who put together the book. Naturally, I had been comparing the stories of her motherhood years to my own, and thinking primarily of how much easier it is to be a woman today. I was viewing her life as one would view a museum artifact: respectfully and a little in awe, but not quite able to touch the reality of the past. Her final statement caught me up short and made me wonder if I had been indulging in some generational (even cultural) bias. I've been pondering it on and off all day, still not 100% sure what to make of it. For such a short statement, it contains a lot to reflect upon. I share it here in that spirit.

"I grew up the hard way, but really it was easier." -- Opal E. (1903 - 2006)

Rest in Peace, Grandma. I'll join you on the other side some day, and then we can talk. :o)

Brianna and the Bee

Yesterday, the kids and I were perusing the offerings on the newly installed cable TV, which we only get for a month or two every 4 years so that Firmin can catch every possible minute of World Cup soccer he can manage. Anyway, we ran across the 2006 National Spelling Bee on ESPN. Brianna was hooked right away and we watched over an hour of the middle rounds. When we learned that the finals were to be shown in prime time last night, I agreed to let her stay up and watch. We had a wonderful Mommy-Daughter time complete with a bowl of popcorn and a supposedly unabridged dictionary, lol! Her idea -- not mine! -- was to look up the words as the contestants were spelling them, but it proved to be too difficult, especially given the fact that hardly any of the words were in our "unabridged" dictionary!

You know what I liked best about the spelling bee? The fact that the contestants were mostly middle school kids. (I believe kids in grades 4-8 are eligible.) What other event showcases humans in their most awkward, geeky stage of life? We see lots of dimply-faced elementary cuties on TV -- especially precocious ones, as the spelling bee contestants undoubtedly were just a few years ago. We also get to see lots of fresh faced teens, looking confident and cocky. But we don't see the 11 - 13 set all that often. There's just no denying it -- these kids are smack up against the horrors and humiliations of puberty. Their bodies are oddly proportioned, their faces are often spotty, their senses of humor are embarrassingly immature. They hover between childhood and adolescence, and the balance is a tough one to maintain.

But the Bee revealed the best of this stage of life. They were old enough to sit quietly awaiting their turn, yet young enough to be touchingly authentic. Old enough to hold in the tears at the moment of elimination, but too young to pretend they didn't care. One boy exited the stage with a stoic expression, then collapsed in his mother's lap and buried his face in her shoulder. (That sure melted this mom's heart!) These kids had a certain gawky charm that was so real you could feel it right through the TV. I felt very silly at the number of times I actually choked up watching them.

I doubt kids in the midst of middle school misery would have noticed the sweetness that was so evident to me. I know that at that age, I would have been more embarrassed my fellow specimens of puberty than anything. ("Do *I* look like that???") But perhaps they noticed the final few contestants, all of whom were 8th graders aged 13 or 14. (The 13 year olds must be close to 14 by this time in the school year.) No geeky, odd looking kids in that bunch. By 14, the awkwardness is fading fast, and the bloom of adolescence is apparent. The final 3 contestants were all confident, beautiful girls. (Go girls!!) As sweet as those 11 and 12 year olds were, I know it can be a harrowing time of life. It's good to be reminded that it does come to an end!

See and read about the winner of the Bee here.

Ack! Don't even ask me how many misspellings the spell checker just caught in this post, lol!
"embarassing: E-M-B-A-R-A-S-S-I-N-G, embarassing"
DING!
Needless to say, spelling was never my forte.