Great show

Part of the fun of having a low-key schedule for the past couple weeks is that we have had time to do something spontaneous and life-affirming and marriage-building every so often. One night it was attending a little fundraiser at the VFW with friends for an organization that helps female veterans transitioning from the military to civilian life with resumes and business clothes. This weekend it was going to a play at the local community theater. They are having buy one get one free performances on Fridays, - although my husband only heard the "free" part when he said at 7:15 on Friday, "Well let's go then" to the 8 pm show. Still, the show was so good, I was almost sorry to not pay for one of our tickets. So I told the older kids I would pay for their tickets if they can find time to go before the show ends.

A rave review from the local paper: http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/entertainment/theater/sd-me-review-lambs-20180609-story.html

The play was Once, based on the movie set in Dublin about an Irish musician down on his luck and brokenhearted who is given a new hope by the friendship of a Czech single mother also looking for friendship who recognizes his talent and the power of music - and the power of a community of music lovers -  to knit hearts back together. I didn't know the music, but my second oldest told me when I looked up the soundtrack on youtube that he had been to a Glen Hansard concert a couple years ago. Funny thing, this small world.

I wonder why we don't go to the theater more, but perhaps the rarity of the occasion preserves its magic.  This show had all of the transporting elements of live performances.  The players at our little community theater brought a Dublin pub to life (complete with a working bar where the audience could buy a Guiness on stage and mingle with the players before the show and during intermission) and they took my breath away with their ability to play multiple instruments and to sing (with fake accents, no less) the parts of struggling, talented artists.  I loved the way a song would begin with the Guy and the Girl alone on stage, him playing the guitar, her playing the piano. Then one of the supporting players would come in with the banjo, another with a ukulele, another on the cello, then the bass, then the drums or beat boxes. The amplification of the song with the added layers of instrumentation raised the emotional effect as the symphonic power increased. 

The effect of playing together lifted up the talents of all -- and they were having so much fun! The joy of the cast and the enthusiasm of the audience were palpable.  They brought back memories of our trip to Dublin with our son, but also captured the ability of a kind word and a good tune to make a difference in someone's life.

Glad we went. Two thumbs up. I think I liked this live performance better than I would like the movie.

Reading review

Our house has been invaded this week:

There are books on the sofa, books on the floor, 

books on the table, books by the door; 

Books in the living room, books in the den, 

Books in the bedrooms, books on my Ben....

Ok, that last line is a stretch, but I don't have time to find a better rhyme. 

We've settled in to the summer schedule; a state of boredom is no longer being declared.  Trips to the library take place two or three times a week. The youngest and I are doing the summer reading club, and I'm trying to get the older ones to sign up at the teen desk, but they don't want to be official. The 12 and 14-year-old (we have had all the birthdays for the year now, and all the kids except the oldest are an even number) are doing the junior lifeguard program again from 9-2, so they come home exhausted, ready to collapse on the couch, and read. Well, really they want to play Mariokart, but we have negotiated a deal - an hour of brainwork (reading, writing someone a letter, a math page or critical reading workbook page) and a chore equals an hour of media time. The accord was accepted by all parties, and peace reigns --- for the moment.

What are we reading? The oldest is reading a variety of books given him by his Protestant girlfriend - surprisingly, they are The Benedict Option, Forming Intentional Disciples, and A Severe Mercy. Have I mentioned I really like this girl? She is a Program of Liberal Studies major after my own heart. I also picked up The Boys on the Boat for him, which I've heard good things about but haven't read. 

The second is slogging slowly through The Brothers Karamazov, while dipping into Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life. He has decided he is a Christian anarchist after listening to some podcast on his daily commute about anarchy.  We have had some entertaining conversations when he is not being an intern or making pizzas. 

Third son is reading The Kite Runner and Harry Potter in Spanish. He suddenly came up with this idea that he might double major in Spanish, even though he didn't want to take Spanish 4 last year in high school. He also wants to double major in Physics and Medicine or Science and Business or Science and Art. And he whipped out two pairs of winter handwear over the last couple of weeks: a pair of gloves and a pair of mittens in a Fair Isle pattern. This gave him the idea to sell handcrafts on the local facebook page, but I reminded him he needs a stash and the number of hours he spent knitting makes the profit margin slim to nothing unless he charges about $50 for a pair of mittens. His next entrepreneurial idea is to sell notecards he made for thank you notes. This is more likely to earn money than the knitwear but will see if this happens in the next month before he heads off to college. He still needs to sell his baby betta fish, who are thriving, while their father is wasting away. Something killed off three of our adult bettas (the girls each had one in their rooms), which makes me wonder if our water is tainted from the sewage spill in Tijuana... conspiracies...

More books: Fourth son likes to read but not to sit still. Big books don't interest him, but he is spouting trivia from Uncle John's Bathroom Readers, still sitting on the back of our toilet for 4 years or so now. We have three or four that they rotate. I also put Humility Rules: St Benedict's Twelve Step Guide to Genuine Self-Esteem back there, so we'll see if he reads that. Right now it is Paul Zindel's The Pigman and Hardy Boys books he's reading. Not challenging, but something.  The siblings are harassing him and me to make him read Great Expectations because they all had to suffer through it to get social media. 

What makes me happiest is my most reluctant reader, the 12-year-old, has been blazing through The Mother-Daughter Book Club series. Again, not challenging, but she's reading. And I told her I want her to pick one of the books they read for us to read together.  After months, she finally finished the fourth Harry Potter book, and really isn't interested in more. She likes real-life stories.

So does her big sister, who is reading Call The Midwife while we are watching the series some evenings. Love a good British series. I picked up the book from the Little Free Library for me to read, but I only got through the introduction because TIME, but I want to read it, too. She also is reading about a page a day of Portrait of a Lady in exchange for the three or four YA romances she read. I don't know if she'll finish it or not. She also is reading Unbroken and lots of recipes. Last night she made a homemade curry sauce that had us all sweating from the cayenne. But I have loved the help from the girls in the kitchen.

The littlest and I are reading stacks of picture books. She is picking out a few words on her own, and I have picked up some phonics readers, but we aren't being systematic about learning to read.  I've been trying to pick up some classic picture books and new books and books about real people and books about science things - Magic School Bus has been a hit lately. But she still loves Maisy and Princess Look and Find books.  I have noticed a trend in some of the new picture books lately to have high quality paper and retro illustrations with a mix of dull backgrounds and lurid splashes of neon color. It's an interesting aesthetic, but I can only look at so many pages before my eyes are maxed out.  Maybe it is our buyer at the library who is interested in them that makes it seem like more of the new books are in this style. They tend to be British or Japanese authors. 

Besides picture books, I am also skimming through a bunch of nature books. I am going to teach that class. It turns out that the university has a pre-school on campus that has space for LK, so we will go to school together two days a week. After visiting several little schools and interviewing a couple babysitters, I am happy with this option. It's are a Christian school, so they will sing songs and learn Bible verses, and college students who are education majors come in and work and do projects. And it was the only preschool with a decent outdoor play area, other than the one close to home that was full. And we'll have the drive time to spend together, too.

So I've been diving into reading material with gusto. So many good things! I've never read Silent Spring or A Sand County Almanac, so I've been skimming those looking for selections. The previous teacher assigned Frankenstein and Oryx and Crake, neither of which I think of as "Nature Literature." I haven't read the second, though. So I think I'll assign one full-length book and the rest essays and poetry. Need to decide the novel soon - I keep thinking of children's lit and Wendell Berry, but still exploring. Have been rereading Berry's poetry and picked up Gary Snyder for the first time. Excited to revisit Mary Oliver. And I need to pull out my Romantic poets to review.  I may assign Nathanial Hawthorne for the novel, but or should I just assign one of these "classic" nature writers? Annie Dillard? Jack London?

Another book I skimmed was Laura Vanderkam's I Know How She Does It recommended by Modern Mrs. Darcy, and while most of it was geared toward women who work a lot more than me, I have been keeping a time diary this week, and being more aware of how I spend time. I have become cognizant of how I don't really waste time - I am usually doing something, - but I don't work efficiently.  I need to set limits to email/social media reading and set a routine for times where I'm distracted by different choices of what to do. If I have a set work time, then I need to stick to those limits. I also need to set up a routine for chores - one thing a day (except laundry, dishes, and sweeping up). So vacuum day, dusting day, scouring bathroom day.  Watering plants takes a long time because I fiddle around. And I'm going to try to outsource more dishes to the kids, although during the school year, their time is limited. Schedules don't work really well for me, but routines do. So the book was interesting for highlighting the need to recognize the good things you already do.

These last two weeks have emphasized what a blessing it is to build in wasted time.  Another book I'm reading is Patricia Hampl's The Art of Wasted Time in which she writes in praise of contemplation, but she recognizes the struggle between being an active or contemplative person or a pilgrim or a tourist - most of us are something of both. It's a good read so far.

I also picked up Wild by Cheryl Strayed. I wasn't interested in reading this book because I don't really like reading about someone's drug and sex problems set as a memoir, but I picked it up because of this article.  Nonetheless, I read the first fifty pages about her mother's death, and I can see why people really like this book. I think I'll be conflicted about this book. She reminds me of a friend I had in high school who went from obsession to obsession, all in every time, passionate and emotional about each new project, but many of them ended in heartbreak or fizzled out. I tend toward stoic on the emotion scale, so I may put down the book in frustration, but I'm going to give it a fast read.

Finally, my book club book is The Long Loneliness, Dorothy Day's autobiography, which I read before and just loved. Here is another person who was all in, but she lacks the self-centeredness that the Strayed has. Day's center is God and the people in His image.  I read this a few years ago, but am happy to revisit it. I just finished reading about her home life and education, and am reminded of two things - one, her love for her baby brother who arrives when she is a teen is a reminder that siblings are always a blessing - and two, her parents discouraged too much socializing. The Day children spent a lot of time home with books and coloring. They did wander the neighborhood a lot, but they also had plenty of daydreaming time. They read lots of great literature - she talks about Dickens and Tolstoy.  They also lived at times close to poverty and at times very comfortably because of her father's newspaper job, so instability was something they learned to survive. I know resilience is a trendy word lately, but it's easy to see why. Hovering parents are everywhere, including inside of me.

We have another evening with nothing on the schedule, so we'll sit down again amidst the piles of books to read and read, some leisurely and some with speed.

July celebrations

Remembering some recent blessings from the first half of July. What is not captured on film: some days at the beach, lots of time in the pool, a playdate with friends at the park, early morning walks with the teens, conversations over coffee on the back patio. The days have been warm and slow this week; we've settled into summertime.  The older kids are working, three at the pizza place, one at the candy store, one has a second job interning at an architecture firm. The kid who loves video games unplugged for a week on an island with the boy scouts at camp, where they snorkeled, hiked, kayaked, shot things, learned photography skills, and played a lot of gaga ball. When the kids aren't working, they have been painting and sewing and cooking. These are the moments that make a life.

Visiting the coast

A teen's picture of the Point Loma Lighthouse. 

Fourth of July exuberance

A highlight of the parade on the Fourth: Pearl Harbor survivors waving to the crowd.

Watching the show from a friend's rooftop deck.

A patriotic field trip: Visiting the Midway

Trying to pick out our house from across the bay

Last iteration of the pumpkin. Temps over 80 finally did him in. Almost made it a year.

Cake decorating contest

Difficult decisions

We are coming down from two months of excitement and celebrations. Last week my cousins spent the week with us, and we had a wonderful stay-cation that gave us time to reconnect as a family and to recover from all of the busyness of the previous months. We still had a full week: two birthdays, the Fourth of July, visits from other friends and another set of cousins. But the pace was relaxed, and the kids were mostly happy. Lots of pool and beach time. I loved seeing the four-year-olds, our daughter and our goddaughter, play so happily together. Pictures to come.

The happy week was a welcome break from decision-making. Or perhaps the observation of my cousins' family complicated my choices. I am faced with a decision and self-doubt and haven't found a satisfying solution.

This latest moment of self-doubt is related to another job offer. I re-submitted a few applications a several months ago when I got spooked by the reality of having three kids in college and a rent payment well over our housing allowance.  But financial motives were only part of the reason - pride, ambition, plus a sincere desire to be a part of an academic community sharing in the joys of teaching and learning all contributed to the thought that I might want to go to work. I love being on a campus. I lose track of time reading essays and researching teaching materials. I have daydreamed about having a job and have envied people who are able to go to work and experience the satisfaction of doing a job well. I have more than once confessed to envy, both of my husband and peers, of those who can point to work well done or an achievement they have accomplished. I wonder how the woman almost nominated to be a Supreme Court Justice, Amy Coney Barrett, a mother of seven who was one of my classmates, manages to have a family and a career.

The fact that I had trouble finding time to fill out the application perhaps should have been an indication that maybe now was not the right time to look for a job.

Nonetheless, I got a call last week from a small, Christian, liberal arts school here in San Diego, and went to the interview and then the second interview, and now have an offer to teach a Culture and Literature class on Nature Writing on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 10-1145. It's an eight week course that repeats during the semester, so I would teach the same class twice in one semester. That means fewer classes to prep.

If all the kids were in school, I would be turning cartwheels. Teach a class on Nature Writing?! At a small, Christian, liberal arts school?! Yes,  please!! It's a literature-based class, not creative writing, so even though I'm not a specialist in the genre, I have had a special interest in the topic. At one time, I thought I would write a thesis on Wendell Berry and rural literature of the Midwest. I can already envision a reading list, probably starting with a chronological survey - beginning with Aristotle and Genesis, and then addressing Copernicus and Galileo, then jumping up to the Romantics then the Transcendentalists, followed by another jump up to the beginnings of the environmental movement represented by Rachel Carson and maybe Aldo Leopold, and then spending a good chunk of time on contemporary writers.  The challenge would be to keep the reading list to a minimum. And I would assign student presentations to take some of the prep work off of me.

The choice would be simpler if I hadn't just decided a couple months ago to homeschool the four-year-old. If she wanted to go to preschool and I had signed her up, all would be nice and easy. But I went through all that angst a while ago and chose to homeschool her at least another year or so and see how it goes.

Then I spent time with my cousin and her beautiful, happy, well-behaved, homeschooled children.  Other encounters with homeschoolers and the votes of my previously homeschooled children assured me that I should return to a home-based education for our four year old.  My cousin loaned me Sarah MacKenzie's Teaching from Rest, which I devoured in a couple hours. It made me see how essential an eternal perspective is and question my decision to send the other kids to school.

But I also had just finished One Beautiful Dream by Jennifer Fulwiler, which gave me the hope that my desire to work can be balanced with teaching children at home.  I like her perspective that mom's work can be a part of the family mission. She also has a long-term perspective after a revelation that she was living a life "ruled by the tyranny of the immediate." I think that limitation led me to put the kids in school. She has this insight after witnessing a Mexican family enjoying each other's company and getting a family photo after church.

Here is her quote about creative work that identifies some of why, even though teaching would complicate our lives, I have trouble turning down this opportunity: "Being part of the creation of new life was an experience of God. Yet I also felt something similar in my work. It astounded me whenever I considered that only the creatures made in the image of the Creator can create. Among all the animals on earth, humans alone have the gift of creativity -- and, as people had experienced through the millennia, to use this gift is to experience something of God.

"Now I wondered: What if all desires to create -- both with children and with work -- are, in fact, all pointed in the same direction? What if both are different but complementary ways of getting in touch with the ultimate Source of creativity? What if following your God-given passion is not just okay to do during the baby years, but actually something that has the potential to enhance your whole family's life?"

My children also think I should teach at the college. They don't see the conflict. Just find a babysitter. It's only six hours a week. (Plus prep and grading...) Easier said than done.

I have both selfish and idealistic attitudes about teaching at the college. I also have idealistic attitudes about homeschooling, but they are contrasted with very real concerns about the souls and attitudes of my two younger children, whom I sent to school earlier. Would these children be different if they had been homeschooled longer, or would our temperaments have been in conflict? The old nature/nurture question haunts me.

As a parent, I note my failures more than successes. Maybe those words are the wrong choices to use. I liked Mrs. Darwin's recounting of the unique individualities of her children a couple weeks ago. Our kids are all different and unique, and our situation with moving made life complicated for a few years. We know homeschool families whose children have dropped out of college and floundered a bit. My husband reminded me of Mother Angelica's quote that the past is past and we can't change it, so there is no use in regrets, but I still wonder if the decisions we have made have been for the better or worse. For example, we could have chosen the tiny, conservative Catholic school up in North County, but my husband would have an hour commute, and tuition was pricey. Should we have made that sacrifice? I wonder. But disrupting our situation now would cause resentment. The kids like their school, despite my reservations.

Perhaps I can somehow incorporate some of what is best about homeschooling into our home life? Reading aloud more at night? A "Finer Things" night once a month?  (Combining Sarah MacKenzie's suggestion of a family symposium on truth, goodness, and beauty with the humor of "The Office.")  

And I know my own faith life needs to be deepened. My relationship with Christ is often pushed to the side while I focus on a to-do list. Time for prayer and contemplation is rare. I lose track of the centrality of my relationship with Christ - and family - easily. Will finding a creative outlet keep me focused on what is important at home?

Some people have the gift of being able to clearly see what their role in life and responsibilities are.  They are strong in their faith and clear about what is right and wrong. They can make a decision and stick with it. They have principles that guide their decisions, and their actions are in conformity with their beliefs. They don't second-guess everything.  I think I used to be this kind of person. I had a pretty clear picture of what I wanted our family life to look like. I remember going to a retreat based on that book "A Mother's Rule of Life" and filling out worksheets on our family mission. I wish I could find that page now because I feel like I've lost my way a bit.  Dante's "Midway through life's journey I found myself in a dark wood because the straightforward path had been lost" keeps echoing in my mind. 

My husband suggests trying out teaching for a semester. I think he would be happy if I could be content to stay at home. I know it would be hard to start something and then stop. Every morning I wake up wrestling with what to do and every night I go to sleep wrestling with the same questions. I don't feel at peace when I imagine saying no to this opportunity, nor do I feel at rest when I imagine doing it. I'm giving myself one more week to consider the options. May the Lord give me clarity.