family
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my mother’s daughter
The older I get, the more I see my mother and my father in the things I do, the decisions I make, the way I smile. Family is such a strange thing — these people who raise you, who influence every nuanced part of who you are without you even realizing it … Until time passes, and you catch your reflection in a mirror, out of the corner of your eye, and instead of seeing yourself, you see your mother.
My mother is incredible. She is the most amazing human being I’ve ever had the privilege to know. She is wise, and thoughtful and diplomatic. She is beautiful and funny and creative and kind. She is all the good that exists in the world. I am a fraction of her (by default of DNA, really). A shadow of who she is as a woman. I am constantly impressed by her — in big ways, in small ways … really, in all ways.
I am inordinately proud to be her daughter. Just to know her, to have been raised and influenced by her — I consider it the greatest gift I’ve ever received (followed closely by meeting my husband, who is also one of the world’s truly good people).
I don’t have the words, or the ability, to properly articulate how much I love my mother, my father, my ‘little’ brother, my aunt. I have been gifted with the most incredible family — people of impeccable character, integrity. I don’t say it enough — don’t tell them often enough how much I love them, how endlessly grateful I am. Life seems to get in the way — petty, insignificant things that shouldn’t but do consume the hours, the days.
I am so proud to be my mother’s daughter. I think she is incomparable. She is perfection. And I love her more than any word, no matter how beautifully crafted, could ever explain.
the second
Today was rife with challenges, but setting all that aside (work politics will never not be work politics, no matter the industry, no matter the time) it wasn’t a terrible day. I got home a little later than normal — possibly due to the steady rain – and the man and I set to packing more boxes.
It’s sort of crazy how packing tires you out. I can feel the tension reaching a pitch perfect point in my shoulder blades, and it seems so odd that I feel it so acutely. What is so stressful about putting things in boxes?
Today was a tough day. Both personally and professionally. Have you ever faced a decision, a situation, and you really don’t know what to do? Not a moment when you know the ‘right’ thing and the ‘wrong’ thing and can’t decide — but a situation when you really have no idea how you want to handle it?
Yes. I’m there. And it’s excruciating.
So just for my own peace of mind — to be able to say something in my own defence even if I’m shouting into nothingness — I am not a bad person. I have never been a bad person. I may have made bad decisions, but inherently, I’m not a bad person.
However, I can’t convince people who feel otherwise of my belief in who i am. And honestly, the older I get, the less I care. If you don’t like me, if you think terrible things about me, well, first – I’m not interested in having you in my life. And second, I don’t care anymore if you’ve never really gotten to know me past your assumptions.
All that being said, it is different when it’s family. And there’s the rub.
If I could continue to ignore the situation, I would. But I’m getting on a plane in three weeks, and things will be addressed so I need to figure out how I want to handle it now — and just do it. But there are SO many factors, so many sides, so many shades of each color …. It’s driving me nuts.
Life. She’s a real corker sometimes.
dear john
My head is so full of conflicting thoughts I don’t know where to start.
I guess I’ll start by saying — again, repeatedly, forever — I miss you. Because I do. I miss you to the very core of my being, and the feeling envelopes me, it hangs in the air of our home, it blankets us as we sleep. The missing you, the emptiness, it never stops, it never ends. It is real, and complete and unimpeachable. It is life when you are not here.
I began today by making brownies. I don’t know why. I don’t need brownies. I wasn’t even really craving brownies. I think I just wanted something to do that had nothing to do with work. So now I have a pan of brownies, and they will either be completely here by the time you get home, or they will be completely gone. I cannot guarantee either outcome. It depends how the next few days go.
Next up — this afternoon I head into the city for a tasting — it’s a crudo tasting (please don’t be jealous — and I say that so you are just a little bit, just a smidgen jealous, which eases the ache of your absence just a bit, for a moment).
Lucy has been a pro — I know she knows you aren’t here, and because of that, she’s so gentle with me (99% of the time — she really loves the snow!! — until it freezes in her feet) and at the same time, utterly forlorn. Her eyes are filled with confusion mixed with sadness. Where is daddy? And ps. She still doesn’t tolerate any version of anything related to LoTR. Even when you aren’t home to completely capitulate to her big, brown eyes.
Right now, my obsessive checking of the weather tells me that Monday could be dicey. I hope it is not — that’s just something I don’t want to deal with while you are away. But if it is, I’ll do a short day in the city and make sure I’m home with Miss Lucy. For her benefit, as well as my safety (who wants to drive during rush hour when freezing rain could be involved?).
I’m hoping to spend all of tomorrow in my pajamas on the couch. I know it sounds like the epitome of laziness, but this week has nearly beaten me, and I’m tired and palpably sad. It is during this time that I cannot predict the fate of the brownies. I’m looking forward to Wednesday for many reasons — you will be home, and our little family will be whole again, but also I have my next infusion. And I am very much looking forward to that.
January seems to be slipping through my fingers faster than I can keep up —
I hope you are enjoying sunshine and warmth. Please know that I love you, am enormously proud of all you do and your success, but mostly I’m hella grateful that we somehow found each other and despite everything (bad timing, weird circumstances, vast disapproval) we stuck with each other — we knew it was bigger than all that bulls*t.
You are my everything. And I am utterly and completely humbled by that and by your partnership. Thank you.
I love you. Be safe.
tis the season
This morning, as the man and I carefully unwrapped ornaments and hung them thoughtfully on our Charlie Brown tree, I reminisced about how our lives have grown in the time we’ve been together.
Our first year, everything was a merge of ‘my’ stuff and ‘his’ stuff. And slowly, year by year, things have become ours, ornaments with history and meaning — commemorating special times we’ve shared. A golden leaf from Jackson Hole, a horse-drawn carriage from Williamsburg, a snow globe in a stocking from Hilton Head. I love that warm fuzzy feeling when the paper peels back to reveal what had been previously tucked safely away. The first ornament we hung this year was a beautiful boxer with a red and white scarf, given to us by our great friends (it looks surprisingly like Lucy!). John asked her where she wanted to hang it and she replied with a quizzical look and a suspicious sniff of the ornament. It was adorable. She’s still not one hundred percent sure she understands why there’s a live tree in the living room. But she seems okay with it.
It’s always sort of interesting to contemplate the holidays as you gear up for them — how celebrations change and how they stay they same, how you personally feel about the time of year. This December feels uncharacteristically mellow — I ordered our Christmas cards the first week of November and they are all sitting neatly stacked in ‘domestic’ and ‘air mail’ piles by the front door. We have essentially completed all of our shopping, our tree is up, and we aren’t having a party this year ….. So that’s that, right? It feels a little bizarre — anti climactic and strangely un-Christmas-y.
I have led a somewhat charmed life to this point — in that there was not a lot of drama during Thanksgiving or Christmas growing up. When my brother and I were young, we spent Christmas Eve with our Italian relatives (Italian-American — my dad’s side) and there was always a table heaping with food (the seven fish my friends) and I barely ate any of it — and we all ran around and had wild conspiracies about Santa Claus and it was glorious. And Christmas day was spent at home, opening presents and then eating a huge British Christmas lunch (my favorite) and then lounging around in sweatpants watching ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’ while messing around with all our new swag.
But as you grow up, and become part of another person’s family and holiday celebrations, you begin to realize that things morph — I think it has a lot to do with children, actually — and even if things had stayed the same, they would inevitably also be very different.
On our very first date, John and I wandered down the main street of Manayunk, grabbing drinks at bars that we would otherwise never have gone into (in an effort to avoid running into anyone we knew …. it’s a long story). We ended up sitting outside at a tiny bar at one end of the strip, telling each other how much we loved Christmas, why and millions of stories of minutiae that we remembered with glowing detail. It was June then, and I remember hoping my beer would never end, and that I could sit and talk with this wonderful man forever.
Luckily, that wish came true. And the first year we lived together, every inch of our apartment was decorated for Christmas — ornaments and garland and twinkly lights festooned every corner of every room.
So this year, with our understated decorations, and no party on the agenda for the first time in four years, it feels quiet, and subtle … and somewhat out of character.
I’m glad this year is going to be low-key, and I’m glad that as of the seventh of December, we’re pretty prepared for the holidays. I just hope this isn’t the beginning of the end of the magic. Because to me, this as always the most magical and beautiful time of year. And to imagine that feeling fading — well, that just about breaks my heart.
thanksgiving
Over a month ago, I spent some time at a great retreat in Austin Texas. Along with teaching me that (basically) I don’t eat the way I should at all, the retreat also focused on mental and spiritual health. And I found those sessions and that information so incredibly enriching.
To save this blog from being REALLY long, let me just say that OHI really focused on the power of gratitude. And having just completed a seven day gratitude ‘challenge’ on Facebook prior to arriving, I was completely on that bandwagon. Thinking about the things we are grateful for on a daily basis — and articulating those things –is incredibly uplifting and powerful.
So in honor of the things I enumerated on Facebook back in September — here’s a re-posting. Wishing everyone a beautiful Thanksgiving surrounded by those you love.
Sept 20, 2014
Nominated by my wonderful friend Angie — — thank you for thinking of me! Three things I am grateful for today (and then the following six!)
1 — Most obviously I am grateful for my husband. He got more than he bargained for when he married me but his is my strength, my laughter and my best friend.
2 — I am grateful for my Lucy. To have an animal look at you with the love that fills her big brown eyes — takes your breath away. It is truly a gift….
3- I am grateful for my family. The last two years of MS and cancer (not both me!) have shown the true strength and integrity of my parents, my wonderful second mother (my mum’s twin) and my insanely amazing brother.
When you’ve had the journey I’ve had recently — you definitely see with crystal clarity the things for which you are grateful. Thanks for the nom Ange!
September 21, 2014
1 — I am grateful for ceiling fans. They just make everything better — especially sleep!
2 — I am grateful for football. I just love it, and I’m not going to use this as a place for anything other than positive stuff right now. (Editorial note: Ray Rice and Adrian Peterson were dominating NFL news at the time). I have been so lucky to have so many great memories throughout my life that have to do with football — PSU, Steelers, PR Rams & Fedko, Womissing Saturday day games & away games on Friday nights — the Flemington Falcons — football has always been a big part of my life. And Sunday is the best day for a shout out.
3– I am grateful for Starbucks. And on that subject, I am grateful for Ted — for introducing me to the soy chai latte in college — it has been my drink for over 10 years & I love it. I am grateful to all my baristas who know me, my hubs, my drinks and my football teams. They always brighten my day. I love Starbucks.
September 22, 2014
Day Tre —
I am grateful for —
1 — All the failed relationships and friendships I have had to this point in my life. Those failures taught me about myself, my strengths and weaknesses and the kinds of people I know to be true friends and in the case of my husband, my partner.
2 — On that subject, here’s to ALL the mistakes I have learned from throughout the years — as my dad once said, if there was hard way in which to learn something, I found it. Maybe I just liked knowing how everything worked from the inside out — needless to say, those mistakes have helped me figure myself out, and I’m grateful for that.
3 — I am grateful for Aman and Les, the guys who work the floor I park on in my garage. They make every day better with their smiles, the knowledge that my car is safe and protected and the friendly way in which they handle even the most stressful of parking garage situations. Five years in, and i couldn’t imagine parking anywhere else. No matter how bad my day might have been — they are there, smiling, asking about Lucy & John and just generally being good humans.
September 23, 2014
Fourth Day of Gratefulness — the Work Edition
1 — I am grateful for my boss. He took a chance on me and believed in me and supported me & what I was doing when other people might have been telling him that it was crazy to give me the responsibility he gave me. And when my whole world changed he gave me flexibility to pursue my health, the time to do it, and many other resources on which a price can never be put.
2 — I am grateful for my co-workers, and especially my two ‘partners.’ It is a great feeling to get to work in an industry you love, with people who are fun to be around — honest, decent people who care as much as you do about the success of what is being done. People you survived the trenches with — who have your back and you have theirs.
3 — I am grateful for my Aunt & Uncle — it was through them I learned about the art of hospitality, the love of food and the great industry that I have found a home in. Sitting beside an indoor pool at one of my uncle’s hotels in the UK at the tender age of 8 or 9, he told me with a laugh that I had rich taste (as I sat noshing on delectably buttery smoked salmon & caviar) and should marry a rich man. Well, Uncle T, I did you one better. I’m doin’ it myself — and I learned my fundamentals from you.
September 24, 2014
Cinco!
I am grateful —
1 — for the small moments in life — being half awake in the grayness of the morning and hearing my puppy’s snuffles and cuddling up with my hubs … the cool autumn breeze blowing leaves in the late afternoon sunlight … the woman in the elevator who likes my dress … the crackling of a good fire pit … things that create the depth of life.
2 — for my time in Wyomissing. We moved so much throughout my youth, that I went to two elementary schools, two middle schools and two high schools. But just being at Wyo for 2 years has impacted my life in such a positive way, even sixteen years later. I’m grateful so much for that. Makes me feel like I did actually come from somewhere.
3 — for contact lenses. I can’t imagine what it must have feel like for people with vision like mine prior to glasses, but contacts were a huge improvement for me. Maybe lasik one day ….
September 25, 2014
Grateful Day #6
1 — I am grateful for diversity. Yeah, sometimes people who are vastly different from ourselves can prove to be infuriating. But minus the idiots from Philly (editorial note: this was written at the time when some real geniuses thought it would be fun to beat up a gay couple … basically in center city) and others who commit just unspeakable crimes — doesn’t being different add to the spice of life? Doesn’t it sometimes help us see things from an entirely new viewpoint? I like to think so.
2 — I am grateful for my faith. It’s mine, and it’s personal and when things feel dark and when things feel light, I always feel as though there is a reassuring hand on my shoulder keeping me steady.
3 — I am sincerely grateful for sleep. I know it’s a necessity of life — but I relish it. I love slipping into cool clean sheets and snuggling under soft blankets, close to the ones I love. It’s a haven of peacefulness that comes every night, and I am supremely grateful for that.
September 26, 2014
I want to preface this by saying thank you to Angie again, because sometimes, the things we are grateful for become the things we take for granted. And this exercise has reminded me that even in the tough times, life is a phenomenal adventure filled to the brim with wonder.
On this final day of FB status updates, I am grateful for …
1 — Yoga. It has helped me climb from a place of physical desperation to a place of acceptance. Maybe I’ll never teach yoga, or be anything close to physically proficient. But it has reminded me, through this new part of my journey, that even though some things have been taken away — and I often mourn those things more than I should — some things have not.
2 — Humility and self-awareness. I am a perfectly imperfect human being. I’ve made a load of mistakes, I’ve inadvertently (and not-so-inadvertently) hurt people. But I’d also like to believe I’ve lifted some people up, passed along the gifts that have been given to me throughout my life. I’ve learned that being humble is a vastly preferable alternative to being bombastically egocentric. Both personally, and in those I spend my time with.
3 — Passion. I spent the early years of my life pursing a passion, and I may not have found a career in it, but nothing will ever lift up my soul quite the way belting out a good song does. Transcendent, if I’m being passionate about it.
how we say goodbye
On Sunday, when I opened my phone and saw that my mum was calling, I knew what she was going to say before I even answered.
The sun was slanting through the windows of our favorite sushi take-out, and we were the only ones there, chatting with the owners as they rolled our order. It was a moment that had occurred a hundred times before. But on Sunday afternoon, it was different. Because at that moment, I knew that my Granny was no longer with us.
Life is funny; families are funny. There are layers upon layers of emotion, memories, misunderstandings, triumphs, trials, tribulations. In the moment you say goodbye, it’s all distilled down into one clarifying thought. The journey as you’d known it is over.
I grew up in America, the daughter of a man from Pittsburgh Pennsylvania and a woman from Edinburgh Scotland. My father is an only child; my mother is dead center of five siblings – 4 girls, 1 boy. Moving around every few years, my brother and I never really had a strong connection with either side of the family — distance being the major factor. We were lucky enough to spend a lot of time in the English countryside as youngsters — but we were never English and an inability to fully understand our family always existed. My brother — always the diplomat — will most likely remember things differently than I do.
I have wonderful memories — picking baskets upon baskets of raspberries right across the border in Scotland, and gorging myself at the dining room table after dinner. (Nothing is quite as decadent as clotted cream and fresh raspberries.) Sitting in my grandparents living room listening to a crackling radio, doing crossword puzzles and hoping that Granny would bring the tin out with Kit Kat bars as an evening treat. Driving up to Inverness one summer, stopping along the highway at a Loch and enjoying a fully home-cooked picnic of sarnies, Scotch eggs, pork pies …. raspberry fluff. As I got older, and went to visit my Gran over spring break during college (when most people my age were partying on the beaches in Mexico) I remember sitting on a step in the kitchen as she made tea, or cooked dinner and she told me story after story of when my mum was a little girl, or stories of during the war when she met my Grandpa — who gave up his seat on a train to her. Some of her best stories were when they all lived in Malaysia for a few years — the journey by steamliner from England all the way around to the other side of the world, skinning snakes to make shoes and purses, armoured cars gliding along rain drenched roads in the dark of night.
My Granny didn’t live an easy life. I know there were struggles that I will never truly understand. She was a tough woman, a strong woman, a stubborn woman. She was above all else — a survivor.
I didn’t know her very well — sporadic visits across my thirty-four years of life never allowed for a closeness that exists between some grandparents and grandchildren. I know she loved me — even if she didn’t always understand me. She loved all her children and grandchildren fiercely — the only way she knew how. She lived ninety-two years; ninety-two years of memories, laughter, tears, struggle. My heart broke on Sunday, not because it was too soon, but because for the eleven direct descendents left behind, a hole was created that will never again be filled. And while that is an easy idea to understand on a purely intellectual level, when has life ever been purely intellectual?
My mother’s voice broke on the phone, cracked open momentarily with the raw emotion of losing a person who had been so far away for so long — but always there, a steady heartbeat creating the rhythm of life. We all stare down the truth of death — but no one is ever prepared to walk through the door of acceptance until we have no other choice. And we are left, full of stories, full of justification … full of words to ease the unwanted pain.
honors
Yesterday, I became an officially official Godmother.
My great friend and her husband -the parents of ridiculously beautiful children – honored me by asking if I would be Godmother to their son. I think I can’t quite explain adequately how incredible it was to be asked, and how full of love my heart is, and will always remain, for my friend and her gorgeous family.
Listen, life isn’t always a smooth ride, and I would be telling a huge fib if I pretended that Minda and I had an easy journey as friends. We didn’t. But I think the truth is at the bottom of it, at the heart of the struggle. We lived together for a total of two and a half years … as real, true adults ~ and ps. that ain’t bad! We managed to remain friends through the transition from college, through a nearly two year separation, the fickleness of female friendship, three weddings and a partridge in a pear tree. (Juuust kidding about the pear tree.).
To be the only person (out of four) who isn’t related by blood to be her child’s Godparent? Yeah, that’s for real.
I remember when we moved in together, and our goal to have our first ‘grown-up’ apartment. (We achieved this, thanks mainly to Minda). I remember a snow storm, watching movies curled up under blankets on the couch and great food (I didn’t cook at the time, so it was all Minda). I remember the other things too – when we fought or vehemently disagreed. But here we are, over ten years later, still friends. And that speaks more to me than a small incident years ago. We chose -as individuals and as friends – to let the small things slide and stay friends because the big things were more important.
I wonder, sometimes, how similar female friendship is to sisterhood. I don’t have a sister, so my knowledge is limited. But I’ve always explained Jess & my friendship as a sort of sisterhood. Even when we want to kill each other, we love each other more.
It was such a great honor to become a Godmother and I hope that I am better to my Godson than my Godparents were to me (aka, absent. For my whole life). But mostly, it makes me feel as though Minda decided to actually make our friendship a family. And I love her and thank her for that.
good mornings
Some of my most favorite moments include the gray early morning, when Lucy hops up on our bed and curls up down between our feet. I’m usually still half asleep, but those minutes before the alarm goes off, with our whole family snuggled together, count as some of the most precious of my day. Lucy’s breath evens out and she begins to snurfle and I feel completely contented, safe and warm.
This morning the man disturbed this loveliness by heading to the gym. Me and my bum legs stayed at home and enjoyed sleeping in a little longer.
This afternoon we have plans to attend Chestnut Hill’s Second Annual Harry Potter Festival. One of my girlfriends found a House Quiz, and I will be decked out in HufflePull colors this afternoon, while the man will be Gryffindor. Cheers to fun things to do on the weekend with friends!
favorites
Today, after smoothies for breakfast and salads for lunch and all the good mumbo jumbo, the man and I cooked and enjoyed Quiche for dinner … for the first time in a looooong time. I could have made gluten-free crust (but I did not) and I like to think it’s good for me because of the abundance of spinach. Solid. 🙂
I will say that I should have checked the weather when I did my Sunday meal planning (we are trying to plan and grocery shop for the upcoming week … which is more challenging than I thought it would be). Had I checked to see that it was going to be stinky hot for October, I might not have chosen Quiche for tonight’s dinner (which necessitated the oven being at full force for over an hour). But I didn’t, and we made the Quiche … and it was glorious.
Glorious, I tell you. And I won’t take it back for anything.
On a completely unrelated tangent, six years ago today at about seven in the morning, I was driving home from the gym (I used to be uber-inspired, and work out with the dedicated folk of the six o’clock hour … God bless them) and the phone rang. It was my mother, and she let me know that my grandmother had passed away.
My grandmother ~ as I have mentioned in this blog before ~ was no ordinary woman. She was a corker, a force of nature … a stubborn anomaly of her generation. She was amazing. Hearing that news, as the sun blinded me in the passenger seat of the car, and traffic edged forward in a painful stop and go motion ~ was utterly devastating. It felt as though the air had stopped going to my lungs … I couldn’t breath, couldn’t speak. Something had ended that I would never get back.
Today, six years later, my mother had a follow-up with her doctor. She’d had a few tests run a week or so ago, and the whole family, whether we outwardly admitted it or not, were on pins and needles worrying about the results. I know that no one’s heart was in quite the vice grip that my mother’s was … I know this from the sound of her voice on the phone, but also from the tension that I held for weeks waiting for my own results to come back. It’s agonizing, torturous … a vast plain of speculation and fear.
And when my phone buzzed with a message from my father, a positive, upbeat “it’s good news” message, it felt as though the weight that had pinned the corners of life down had been released.
I can wax poetic about a lot of things … I’m good at it. Adjectives are my friends. But today, words couldn’t possibly capture the relief and joy I, along with my family, felt at the good news.
My brother (himself quite familiar with adjectives and powerful language) wrote a beautiful note that equated the karmic balance of today’s significance. Six years ago we lost a woman who shaped our lives and we will never fully heal from that. Today, we were given the gift of my mother’s life and health. And nothing can fully explain the power and intensity of that. To whomever we each individually believe in, I think I can say unequivocally that we are all grateful beyond measure.
let’s hear it for the boy
I meant to hop on here yesterday, but here I am, a day late again.
In 30 days the man and I will be saying “I do” and in honor of that, I thought I’d share a few pics. It’s a really exciting time ~ but also full of so many things ~ I hope that when I look back I remembered to take enough time to savor it. It’s a huge promise and one I am humbled to make. My best friend, my sounding board ~ my partner in crime always.
This was in our very first year of dating.
Is he not the cutest thing in the whole world? Unconditional love.
Us at Longwood Gardens to celebrate my 29th birthday. We love Christmas!
At Alex’s Lemonade Stand’s Fundraiser, “The Great Chef’s Event.” We were lucky enough to go in 2010 and 2012. We’ll miss it this year because we will be on our Honeymoon!
The one time the man got me to dress up for Halloween ~ and I actually had a lot of fun!
One of my favorites ~ Dinner En Blanc Philadelphia last year. I love that we do fun stuff together like this ~ I’m really hoping it happens again, but so far, I haven’t heard anything. Makes me sad … but glad we did it last year!
Our four year anniversary last year. This year, we’re upping the celebrations. But boy oh boy do I love Va La Vineyards.
This one is an oldy ~ back when my hair was pretty blond! It’s funny to look at pics and realize that even though you don’t think you’ve changed all that much … you have! I love John’s smile in this picture. Too bad I look so solemn!
This is funny ~ our very first Art Museum date. We talked about going from the very first conversation we ever had. It took us over four years to get there. Silly us.
One of my all time favorite pictures ~ wearing our football gear, out in Wyoming’s early morning, driving through the parks. It was such a great trip.
John’s funny face.
My funny face.
He’s the love of my life. I can’t wait for June 1st. xoxo
D5 Creation