I want to write something longer about this, but can't right now.
Today was stressful, and all I could think about doing at the end of the day was coming home and playing piano.
And I did and everything felt better, or at least more right, and I don't know why it makes me so happy, but it does.

There was a light in my day, it means more work, but I walked down the sidewalk in the cold, wet, non-Spring weather with a smile on my face this afternoon.
I can do it, I can do it, I can do it......

the day

Work, run, home, garbage, laundry, made soup, made muffins, made granola, cleaned kitchen, collapsed.

Yeah, you know I miss him.....

Feeling artsy

Ben came home last week with a library book on Monet and told me that he was going to be an artist when he grows up. So we all sat down and looked at the book, and talked about the paintings. This week he brought home a book on sculpture, which we've also enjoyed perusing. This morning after gymnastics, we hopped in the car and went down to the museum and looked at the art. The MMFA has a nice collection, and I am eagerly anticipating the reopening of the renovated buildings across the street. Everyone was well behaved (a huge difference from when I took them to the Chinese warriors, which I should write and post) and we all found things that we liked.
Both kids thought the Picassos were hilarious. How come he didn't know how to paint a face properly? What a silly man.

am I here?

I feel invisible today. Like I could not be here and no one would notice....

perfect moments

My son running towards me up the sidewalk on a sunny morning shouting "I Love you, Momma!"
What my sad heart needed today.

"Jogging is very beneficial. It's good for your legs and your feet. It's also very good for the ground. If makes it feel needed."
Charles Schulz

Spring

Spring is lifting my heart. This winter felt a bit too bleak and cold for me. It had wonderful moments, but not enough to sustain my joy and hope. Now, the sun has started to shine when I wake and I spend a lot more time smiling. Things have not really changed, or maybe they have?
Either way, I am inspired and am back to feeling full of possibilities. Now I only need a slight change of scene and an amazing lingering kiss to start the season right.

Rook to Queen

She woke next to him in the dark. He was curled away from her, mostly uncovered and snoring softly, occasionally saying words she could not understand. She pulled the blankets back over him and wrapped her arm around his chest. He snuggled back into her warmth and let out a soft, contented sigh, something he would never do when he was awake. She smiled and placed the lightest kiss on his shoulder and hugged him tighter, silently wishing that he would be there come morning, before she fell back into a deep sleep, dreaming of cheese and chessmen.

Perfect moments

Naomi came into bed early this morning and moved over to share my pillow, her sweet little head nestled up against mine, breathing softly. Is she really all mine?

I still smell him in my hair.....

Goodnight Moon

Tonight there was a super perigee moon, the first in 18 years. My kids and I have a little love affair with the moon, so after sunset we put on snowpants and coats and went out to find it. It was hidden on our street, but when we got around the corner to the top of the park, there it was, shining low over the playground equipment, bright and huge and yellow. The kids ran to the bottom of the park for a better look. Ben said that it looked like a big bubble, or a balloon. Naomi said it looked like a circle. My camera battery died after a couple of pics (dang, should have checked it this afternoon), but we were entranced.
I sat down on a bench and let the kids play for a while in the darkness, hiding in the shadows, sneaking up the slides and racing down them. I listened to their whoops and whisperings as the moon lit the cratered landscape of countless footprints on the soft snow of the afternoon, now lightly frozen in the night. So much beauty and happiness, and under it a gnawing sadness because I would have loved nothing better than to be watching it on that bench with another, someone who looked up into the sky tonight and whose first thought was to tell me about it, wishing that he was there to kiss me under that wonderful moon.
We walked up to the top of the park again and said bye to the moon. I looked at the kids yelling, "Goodnight Moon!" and I remembered that the next time a moon like this comes again they will be grown.
Then we had a really good howl and walked home. Goodnight moon, I love you.

I have reached the weepy stage of exhaustion. Something has to give, and it can't be me anymore. Universe, please give.

Good quote

"Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid."
— Albert Einstein

The hopes under my pillow

So, Naomi lost her first tooth yesterday. It's the bottom middle-right, and the left is already loose. I missed it, but I'm told that she was very excited and talked of nothing else the entire day. A great deal of attention and thought was given to how exactly to ensure the tooth's safe dispatch to the tooth fairy. She finally decided on a box within a box under her pillow. The twoonie received in payment was almost completely ignored - she was just relieved that the tooth was picked up.

It seems too soon. Ben is two years older and he just started to lose his teeth last year, but it's not about the timing. She's my baby and this means more than just a tooth under a pillow. I thought that I could find a way to write about my kids growing up that didn't sound cliche or overly sentimental, but I'm not having much luck.

I can't wait to find out what they will be like when they get older, I am so curious about who they will become, what they will be passionate about, who their friends will be, what they will accomplish.

But I don't want them to be any older than they are at this very moment, when everything is fun and people are all nice to them and they invent games and make up stories and laugh and sing with abandon and crawl into bed with me and cuddle up and tell me their dreams. At this moment they are perfect. They are not limited by anything.

I don't want them to lose this moment, this feeling of everything being possible. Faster than I can believe, I know that the spaces between parents and children appear and are filled with new interests and people and independence. It's what has to happen, parents move further back, taking on more distant supporting roles, guiding gently and hoping that the basic things that we teach them when they are so close are enough to help them make decisions that make them happy later on. Some days I'm proud of the job I'm doing, other days I feel like I'm failing.
But right now, they are still perfect and it's so easy to keep them safe and make them happy and fill them with confidence so they can create the beautiful things they do.

And I don't want that to come to an end, even though I know it has to.

things you eat when the kids aren't home

I found the best bread yesterday, I should never go to Akhavan hungry - the bread, stuffed grape leaves, hummus, smoked salmon, feta, almonds, yogurt = eclectic dinner. I wasn't surprised when I woke up from a nightmare involving purple trees that talk like Dame Edna.
Could not get a last-minute ticket for the MSO last night, truly bummed because I was looking forward to it. I needed some beautiful moments.

A simple request

my hero

You have ridden in on your white horse and saved me so many times.
And you were there again yesterday.
Your initials are scratched into my heart because the marker started to fade.
Thank you.
xox