Best Friends

Naomi: Nobody wants to be my friend.

Me: Naomi, that's not true.

Naomi: Nobody wants to be my best friend. Everybody has a best friend at school and nobody wants to be with me.

Me: You know, there weren't a lot of kids in my neighborhood so when I went to school I felt like nobody wanted to be my best friend either.

Naomi: What did you do?

Me: I learned to read because a book can always be your best friend.

Naomi: Mom, a book can't go on the Monkey Bars!

A House Full of Women

McKibbin trekked to Western Nebraska this weekend. I watched his car kick up the dust as it rumbled over the gravel in the back alley yesterday. He'll roll back into town sometime late tomorrow.

In the mean time ours is a house filled to overflowing with X chromosomes. Naomi and I laid in bed to read magazines, painted ceramics, purchased a pair of lovely and utterly impractical shoes, sang karaoke, and polished off the day as we watched sad movies with a box of Kleenex very, very near by.

As Naomi was asleep I described the day to McKibbin via telephone. He chuckled out two words which summed it all up. Estrogen overload.

iRoomba

I've never been particularly skilled at keeping a clean house. Let's just say that becoming a parent had a gravitational effect on my meager domestic skills. Housekeeping has fallen to its lowest possible point. To save my family from the dust bunnies breeding under our beds we agreed to purchase a Roomba for Mother's Day.

Have you heard of these Roombas? They're disc shaped vacuuming robots. Plop one in the middle of the floor, press go and leave the thing alone. Come back later and the room is completely vacuumed. The technology itself piqued McKibbin's interest. Naomi asked if she could name the robot as though it were her pet. The last to get on board with the robot-vacuum idea was fuddy-duddy-me.

I kept thinking I should be better about keeping a clean house. My mother managed to swing it. Then, I had to get over the idea that I was inviting Hal (the computer from 2001: A Space Odyssey) into my home just to clean the place up a little.

Honestly, though I was surprised at how quickly my reservations fell away. Naomi and I fired up the Roomba this morning and I headed downstairs for breakfast. We giggled and sang at the table for a long time as the Roomba tackled the upstairs vacuuming.

One lazy Sunday morning and I'm sold. This Roomba-gizmo stepped up to be a mother while I sat down and enjoyed two of the most delightful people I know. I'm sure women felt the same relief as they embraced garbage disposals and automated washer/dryers. Its not flowers and candy, but the Roomba made for a happy Mother's Day at our house!

Morning Stretch

"Naomi, would you please get out of bed?"

"I'm stretching."

"Yes, but you've been stretching for 15 minutes. You don't have that much surface area, darling, and I need to get to work."

"But I'm doing something healthy."

The thought not uttered: "True enough."

Cans for Books Drive

The Cans for Book Drive was a big success. With the help of neighborhood businesses, friends, and family Naomi collected thirty-nine pounds of aluminum which garnered $23.⁵³ for the Prescott School media center. Naomi was pretty thrilled by the impressive load of cans she and her dad drove to the recycling center.

I speak from both the parent and former student perspective to say the support of this community gives rise to strong schools. Thank you to everyone who donated your recycling stash, or in some fashion allowed us to haul off your aluminum to benefit the Cans for Books program.

13.1 Miles

Ugh. All I can say is that my feet managed to take me from here to the finish line. I did run the entire half-marathon course at my signature slow and steady pace. I kept waiting for my mojo to kick in and mask how far the thirteen mile course would feel. By the end I had to conclude that if you've spent thirteen miles searching for your mojo, it must have called in sick today, because it ain't gonna show.

The race did conjure several pleasant happenings. One of the few advantages of being toward the back of the pack was reading the messages various runners scrawled on their jerseys. One woman, for example, used her jersey to itemize the cost for her chemotherapy($715,000), radiation ($45,000) , a pair of running shoes ($175) and the priceless nature of participating in the race. A turbo-charged runner whose mojo showed up for the race sprinted past me sporting the phrase run fast, run hard, or run home. My personal favorite, however, was the jersey that said Our Lives Are Not Measured By The Challenges We Avoid But By Those We Face. It was a message that resonated down to my toes.

File this one under inspiring stories: one race participant is ninety (no, that's not a typo. ninety) years old. Not to be callus but just to clarify for the record: I was, in fact, faster than him but only marginally. I was generally impressed by the enthusiasm of the younger kids lined up along the curb to slap high-fives. The embrace of my mom, my husband, and my kid at the finish line was sure sweet.

May Day Mystery

Naomi loves to deliver May Day baskets. She's a crafty sort of kid who likes to assemble things in general. Flowers and candy in hand, we delivered a couple of baskets yesterday to teachers and neighbors. As we arrived home Naomi and I were blown from the car to the front door by a hot, gusty wind and found a basket on our own doorstep.


Its a collection of fragrant flowers, a stuffed bear, a small clay pot, a jig-saw puzzle, a tootsie roll, a microwave egg cooker, face scrub, moisturizer, toothpaste... its a lovely, eclectic group of knick-knacks. Naomi was content to call the gift-giver her "sneaky-sneaker" and leave it at that. But this is our second year of being gifted with a mystery May Day basket so McKibbin and I were more determined to extract clues about the giver by close examination of the contents. I love mysteries. So much so that I never developed my detective side.

When mentally listing the potential culprits I was inspired to recognize the the wealth of thoughtful, generous people we have in our lives. The whole experience made me scrunch my toes and breathe a big thank you to the person who sneaked onto the McKibbin family porch to leave us these goodies. The gifts are lovely and the mystery made me grateful for the abundance of sweet surprises and the general goodness of this life. Namaste.

Istanbul Was Constantinople

Full disclosure: McKibbin and I have been watching Northern Exposure re-runs. This blog post is heavily influenced by my love of Chris In The Morning.

This morning I was making coffee in the break room and I switched on the television as the Today Show cameras found Matt Lauer in Istanbul, Turkey. Immediately I started to humm a song by They Might Be Giants (…if you’ve a date in Constantinople she’ll be waiting in Istanbul…) .

Lauer offered some sound-bite history of Turkey. He mentioned the Ottoman Empire, the culture of Turkish coffee. He rendered a 1630s report of some guy climbing to the top of the Galata Tower, wearing a pair of artificial wings, and leaping from the tower to fly about 3000 meters.

All the while I hummed (…Istanbul was Constantinople, now its Istanbul not Constantinople…) and made coffee at the power plant. My inner narrator thought, obviously this winged-guy from Turkey wasn’t afraid of heights or flying.

It was the sight of the Blue Mosque that stopped me in my tracks. I was bedazzled. Its not often that one of my senses overloads the others. I’m such an auditory person its even less usual for my eyes to lead the charge, but, the mosque was that lovely. I had to come back to my computer and search for something to write... "Named for the blue tiles that decorate the interior, the Blue Mosque is a working religious facility. Completed in 1617, it has 16 balconies, six minarets, and an underground pool that regulates the inside temperature."

Only I would find the underground pool HVAC system interesting. The mosque, however, was a work of sheer inspiration and artistry.
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Speaking of art, remember my ROAR post about my brother’s art show in February? One of his photos won an award from the Nebraska Arts Council. How genius is that?

I might be the first to say so in cyberspacethe award is well deserved. Give it up for my brother who stepped out on a limb, showed what he’s got, and won an award for it. Congratulations, Matt!

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The Blue Mosque also raises the topic of an international experience. With that mention I have to, have to, have to hoot-and-holler with admiration for my friend Becki. She's is off to Tanzania for a two year stint in the Peace Corps.

Becki has a compassionate nature and a rousing sense of purpose. She offers the Peace Corps skills, an open mind, and the enviable ability to pick up foreign languages. The Peace Corps, and the rest of us, are lucky to have such a compassionate person volunteer for the Corps. Straight-up: Becki is my Peace Corps hero.

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I am surrounded on all sides by greatness. And, sigh, I have to say it feels terrific!

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As a parting thought, Happy May Day!

If you have the chance, I suggest hugging your local union rep. For most of human history the weekend was nothing but a pipe dream. It took the labor movement make it a reality. Enough said.