Adventure Mom

Direct Pressure for a Wounded Heart It’s June 21 st in New Zealand (the 20 th in the US) -  the shortest day of the year in the Southern Hemisphere. I’m unaware of both facts as I pedal my bike to the Scout hall to meet the Joggers for a run up the Mount.  Antarctic winds gust against me as I plow forward.   I feel deflated. Today, I want my Old Life back. The one with Sean in Spokane. Barring that, the earth can swallow me like a snake devours a mouse – a single jaw snap transforms the mouse from Creature of This World to Thing That Was. Do I really want to be Someone Who Was?   No. I just don’t want to feel like this. Real Life has invaded my island paradise and it hurts like hell. I’m grieving again. Fresh sorrow ruptures the sutures of my wounded heart. The bleeding that had long ago been stanched has resumed – gushing and spurting, making a mess of the life I’ve largely reorganized. I don’t want to feel like this. I recently took a First Aid c...

Miss Nine Runs Barefoot You’re speeding down the grassy corridor before the finish chute. I recognize your long brown hair tied in two ponytails: one on top, to prevent bangs from flopping into your eyes, the other in back to collect the rest of your thick waves. You’re wearing the navy blue Bloomsday t-shirt you earned walking twelve kilometers in Spokane’s race last year. Tiny pink cotton leggings end just before your knobby knees. You are my colt, my rakish nine and-a-half-year-old, steaming to the end of a mile-long race. I snap a picture, capturing the glow of your pink cheeks.   My heart must be beating as quickly as yours, and I’m standing still. “Go Fiona! Good job, Fiona!” I cheer as motherly pride swells in my chest like a one of those Styrofoam creatures that grows in water from thumb-sized to palm-sized. My girl. You emerged as a four-pound twelve-ounce bundle, so tiny we once placed you in an empty box meant for Sean’s size-ten shoes. Today, you’re runni...

Pit Bull Paradise Everyone’s Hawaiian vacation story goes something like this: “We stayed on Maui for ten days at a resort, and it was delightful! The beach was gorgeous, our condo had an ocean view and we spent almost all our time relaxing.” Am I right? Do you have one of these stories? I’ll try not to envy you too much, because in January, I had the anti-Maui experience. The Ewa Experience. I’m gonna say I did it because I needed more material for this blog. Welcome to the Neighborhood We’re traveling South on Fort Weaver Road, driving to the rental we’ll call home for nearly two weeks. “Those houses over there look pretty nice,” says Dad’s wife, Kathe. “But that’s not where we’re staying.” ‘Those homes’ are part of a new community that advertises ‘3 & 4 bedroom homes from the $500,000’s.’ We pass manicured lawns, high wooden fences, landscaping and a new shopping complex with a Safeway grocery store. The Safeway is a tribute to American supermarket architectur...

Say it With Me It’s Wednesday night, and the kids and I are holding one of our (now-regular) Family Dance Parties. Chris Brown’s “Say it With Me” blares from my iPod speakers.  Fiona, Finley and I jump in a circle, singing (Fiona and I) and yelling (Finley) the refrain: “Say it With Me, Say it With Me, Baby…” I bounce onto the tile patio and face the ocean across the street: “Say it With Me!” The ocean whooshes and rumbles her reply. I turn up the music. Can anyone coming over the rise above the beach see me? I’m too blissed to care. At that moment, Pete strides into the living room. Dapper in his flight school uniform, with the short-sleeved white shirt (he actually irons them), navy and gold epaulets and navy pants. I want to jump him the way you want to jump someone whose looks, warmth and scent give you nerve-deep shivers – the kind you get during a really good massage when, suddenly, the therapist's hands palpitate your scalp. The only jumping we’ll do for no...

Pending What if, when people asked, “How are you?” You said, “Pending.” That’s how I’d like to respond. Decisions are Pending. Actions are Pending. Everything feels Pending. Becoming a stranger in a strange land will do that. Applying for permanent residency in New Zealand will do that. I hired a highly-recommended immigration advisor, who gave me long lists of documents to compile. Plus, the kids and I would need medical exams. I was blood tested for tuberculosis, syphilis, AIDS, and liver problems (among other ailments), had a chest x-ray and even had my waist measured, to ensure I wasn’t too fat to immigrate. The kids had simpler physicals, minus x-rays, blood work (thank God) or waist measurements because they’re under age eleven. I got a certificate from the FBI stating I've never stuffed a corpse into a freezer or failed to pay parking tickets. Pete has provided copies of his New Zealand and British passports, plus notarized affidavits stating we’re in a relationshi...

January 23 rd Yes, I know what today is. Or, in five minutes, was. The day Sean died. Three years have passed. That’s 1,095 days. It's easy to lose track. Days breed like sneaky rabbits until your basket of bunnies becomes a warren worthy of Watership Down. I don’t mark the anniversary of Sean’s death the way I used to. I'd light a candle or drink a Guinness (Sean’s favorite beer) the first several months after it happened. It was a way to remember the day dividing our lives into ‘before’ and ‘after’ and a way , I thought, to honor his memory. Those thousand days have changed us. We have a new perimeter circumscribing Before and Now: it consists of our world trip, our anything-but-free introductory period to New Zealand, our return to the States and Kiwi Adventure, Take Two.   It’s like we’re in the calculus class I never took (and surely would’ve failed, having never attempted trigonometry) in high school – had I opted in, I might have learned what Archim...

This is NOT a Christmas Letter                                       It’s not a ‘see what I’ve/my children/my partner have accomplished. It’s not about where we’ve traveled or what we’ve acquired so much as about how we continue growing into our funny/flawed/fearsome and fearless forms. As I sit at Pete’s sister’s kitchen table with its red vinyl cover, staring at fluted glass pedestal plates of oranges and bananas and procrastinate, er, write, I imagine what I might tell you about the Year in Review. Here’s what didn’t happen: ·          No one won Lotto or a major award. ·          No one landed a new (full-time) job. ·          No one bought or sold a house or new car. ·          No one gained acceptance into a major (...