One Day More

In the months following the death of my mom I used to have vivid dreams about her. There was never anything spectacular in the dreams; we weren’t skydiving over an ocean of grape jelly or anything (yes, I have actually dreamt that before, which, of course is an absurd concept… I would never skydive!) But we were sharing routine time together.

In one of the first dreams we were in the basement of our old house sorting hot socks out of the dryer; most of the socks were white, but still, it seemed that not many of them matched. We stood side by side in silence, sorting through the socks and folding the obvious pairs together, and setting aside the orphan-socks in a growing pile.

“This is stupid,” I said as I tossed more socks on the orphan-sock pile. “Half of these socks don’t even fit together, why did we even wash them? We should have only put pairs into the wash to begin with, and then we wouldn’t have wasted soap; we should just throw them in the trash bin!” I tossed a sock, yellowed from over-bleaching on the top of the pile.

Mom didn’t look up or say anything; she just kept sorting and folding, her rings clicking together the way they always did when she and I did horrid-looking latch-hook projects together on Saturday afternoons in the Winter.

I was frustrated with her silence, so I threw the next sock with more force than I needed. and it flew over the pile and slid into the crack between the wall and the dryer; I grabbed at it and missed, barely feeling the warmth of the cotton before the sock disappeared. I turned to roll my eyes toward mom in a “that figures” sort of way.

She was gone.

The basket of matched socks was gone as well; it was just me and the pile of miss-matched socks on top of the dryer. A wave of grief hit me hard enough to wake me from sleep. I sat up in bed and cried deep, heaving sobs knowing that she was really gone.

I sometimes wonder what, if anything, the socks meant. Sometimes I imagine that the socks represented all of the foster-kids she took in, myself included, and how she “put us through the wash” instead of letting us be “tossed in the bin.”

I also wonder how much valuable time is lost to being frustrated with one another over things as silly as miss-matched socks. It would be a gift and a curse alike to be cognitive of how short our time with one another really is, so we could get up above all the drama and get on with the business of living. Of loving.

Often I think about the things I would do with mom if I had just one day more: take her out for the perfect meal; sit in the coffee shop on a Sunday afternoon drinking in raspberry mocha's and easy conversation, or maybe a walk on the beach not talking, but just being together. Any one of these things would be spectacular, a blessing, but the truth is, I would do something as simple as sorting socks with her, if given the chance to see her for just a few moments more.

An Actual Rant: Who Moved My Country?

Why? Why must the Big American Puppet (any media outlet in this country) keep broadcasting the so-called "doomed" state of America's financial health; thus doing nothing more than perpetuating that state?
I know how it works: The Government controls The Media, The Media controls The People, and The People control the finances of the country... Wait! "The People control the finances"?
First of all, don't be offended by how much we allow the media to control us; who else has a cupboard full of rice because of the supposed "rice-shortage" a few months ago? (A shortage that, by the way, never seemed to transpire, and seems vaguely familiar to the butter-fat-shortage a decade or so ago which drove the cost of milk, butter, and ice cream to levels that never quite came down again... Hmmm... Perhaps The Dairy Farmers will be the subject of my next go-round.)
What would happen, I wonder, if "we the People" stood up and made financial decisions on our own; smart financial decisions, that is. What would it look like if we stopped buying the bull***t that we are far too ignorant to make these decisions on our own?
There would be plenty of people that would not be responsible, but isn't that the beauty of allowing independent thought and actions: The freedom to experience the natural consequences of choices. From the time we are tiny little Americans, it is the responsibility of our parents/caregivers to hold us responsible by allowing us to reap the natural consequences of our actions, both good and bad. It is how we learn.
It's how we learn; learning is power.
Learning is power.
I get it. If learning is power, and the "powers that be" want to keep the power for themselves, mayhaps we are not meant to learn. Should we stand for this blatant attempt to keep us, "the people" uneducated, poor, and, in light of the fuel situation, immobile?
We do not have to stand for it! Look at what is happening around you, and where you can, affect some change for the better!
Talk to an elderly person, and then listen to them! Teach your children the importance of saving, and take that damn cell phone away! There have been generations and generations of children that have *gasp!* survived without a cell phone; teach them how to conduct face to face communication with respect, and eye-contact!
Let's give our children the gift of hard work, hand-me-down clothes, and community volunteering. Do not give your children an education; give your children the desire for an education that they have to work hard for!
Pick up a book; and for the love of God, shut off the noise of CNN or MSNBC, or whatever media outlet we are allowing at the moment to tell us how much to spend, where to spend it, what to drive, where to go, what to fight for. We are a more intelligent people than that!
The only way to pull this Country out of the state that it is in, is by becoming a country again! Our Country is what we decide it is!
What do you want your country to look like; what are you willing to do to make it so?

Live Victoriously!

Isn't it empowering to realize that the choice to be victorious is up to us? God wants us to succeed; He has given us the desire and ability to pursue it, and it is up to us whether or not to do so.
When my husband and I were at [big-box-books] the other day, I saw a book titled: "You are poor because you choose to be!"
I was offended by that! Why was I offended by a book title? We are usually offended by things that are either abhorrent, or things that speak truths about us that we would rather not face up to.
It is really easy to (excuse the cliche) chalk things up to: Bad luck, the actions of others, being in the wrong place at the wrong time, etc., etc., etc.. However, it is really (really, really!) difficult to accept responsibility for our own failures and short-comings, to admit that: I am here because I chose (blank) over (blank).
Like I said to my husband yesterday: "If I were truly dedicated to finishing my books, I would be up every morning at 4am before the house got up." It is horribly uncomfortable truth for me!
I am finding that the truth behind our circumstances lies within our efforts, or lack thereof.
I am tired of being weak, bitter, and quick to blame others around me for my circumstances. I teach my son that we choose to be angry; people cannot "make" us angry. Good lesson, perhaps I should listen to myself!
I want to be victorious in my efforts: I choose to live victoriously!