Poppy, Darla and Poop

Here are a few pictures from our week.

First roses of the season.  Surprising since the plant was pelted in the storm last week.

This girl is drinking from a cup without spilling.  She still prefers her other cup for now though.

I think she misunderstood.  I said, "would you like to watch tv?"

I am in the kitchen fixing dinner when I hear, "Momma . . . momma . . ."  I come around the corner and again with the climbing the bookshelves.

Many times, as a single mom, you realize you haven't heard from your child in a while.  Not even a peep.  So you go looking for them.  She wasn't  hiding, per se.  She was coloring on the back of the blinds with a green marker.  Fortunately the green only shows up if it contacts the special paper in the color book that came with it.

Letter to the Editor of the Fairy Tale Times:

Dear Sir, 

I understand that when you build your house out of candy there will be some silliness to be expected.  This is getting out of hand.  Please see the attached picture.  I found her in my pantry.  My oven already full, I had to put her out in the back yard.  If anyone recognizes this child please come get her.  I have all I need for the year.

Sincerely,

The Old Witch In The Woods.

I don't mind her drawing on the sidewalk with chalk.  I just want her to stop eating it.

Name droppin'

How's this for name dropping?

Deputy Secretary of the United Stated Department of Agriculture Merrigan addressing leaders of Native American tribes in Shawnee, OK May 13, 2010.

The Week in Photos

I don't have a lot of words for you this week.  Just some pictures to look at.

These are Portia's kids.

This is why I love my cousins.

Of course I happen to think she has excellent taste in shoes, but then she does her shopping in my closet.

The dog is shedding.  So I broke out the shedding comb and asked Xyla if we should wash the dog.  I am guessing this is an affirmative.

The Crossroad.

I am at a very scary junction in life.  It isn't about the decisions I have to make that makes it scary.  It is the fact that once again I am standing here alone.  I have told many of my friends that their hearts wouldn't long for a partner in life if it weren't meant for them.  I don't know if I believe that any more.  Every man I meet sees me in this way that they can't describe but then cannot be the man I need them to be.  One of them actually told me that.  At least he was honest with himself and with me.

I know that the man I am looking for exists.  I have met him many times.  He is many friends of mine.  He is always interested in some one else.  He always marries someone else.  He always just wants to be my friend.  

The problem seems to be that I need a man in a way different from the way other women need a man.  I can take care of myself, not because I am passionate about independence but because I have had to be.  I don't know any other way.  At least four times in the last few months I have really needed someone to be there for me.  Each time I reached out, the person I reached out to didn't hear what I was saying and added his own fuel to the fire.  I did what I always do.  I shut down, realized this person is not the help I am looking for and I moved through it as quickly as possible.

I have worried for a long time that I have very little feelings.  I have thought that is why I have been able to withstand working in television news with all of the things we see that are hard for the average person to deal with.  It's why I don't cry very often.  Tonight I want to cry out of exhuastion.  I am not exhuasted with my responsibilities, I am exhuasted with the weight of loneliness.  I have been carrying this burden for a long time.  I don't want to make a mistake and choose the wrong person, but there are days when it seems like at least the wrong person would be someone.

I spent four years with a wrong someone.  I know how much worse the loneliness feels when the wrong someone who is supposed to be there just isn't.  I wore myself out trying to be the best me I could be, in the end it wasn't enough.  I wasn't the right person for him either.  So tonight I am praying that the right person who can see the way I need him and fill that need will come into my life soon.  I am tired and I need rest from the loneliness.  But I have to continue on this path, even if I have to go alone because the blessing of the right person will wash away all the years of burden.  So let me pick up this old pack again.  Let me start walking, let me keep praising God for his goodness.  Let me keep trusting that he is leading me toward the blessings he has for me.  Let me be strong.  It's who I am.

What I learned at school today.

The following pictures are a part of a project that I ran across on the New York Times website called a moment in time.  The idea was for as many photographers as possible to take a picture all at the same time, which was 10:00 a.m., CST.  I only really half planned the photos because I know so much of what makes a picture good is the unplanned moments.  I knew Xyla might like to go near the duck pond, what follows is worth a thousand words . . . 

We drove down to the University.

We visited one of the place of beauty on campus . . . the duck pond.

We took in some of the wild life and discovered that playing "Duck, Duck, Goose" with real ducks and geese is very different from the way we play at daycare.

We put sticks in the water and found out they float.  Mommy said not to get to close but . . . I fell in and found out that I only sort of float.

This is the picture we took at exactly 10:00 for our moment in time.

My clothes are drying.

And I am still a happy baby.