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On Monday morning Gleek complained that she didn’t feel well. However in between complaints she bounced around cheerfully, so I sent her to school anyway. All seemed well, but after returning from school Gleek curled up on the couch and stayed there. I looked at her and could tell that I’d misjudged. She was sick and shouldn’t have gone to school that day. Sure enough she spiked a fever and had a restless night.

Tuesday morning there was no question about sending Gleek to school. She spent all day curled up watching movies, eating nothing, and sleeping lots. By evening she had perked up some, so I had hopes that she would be better in the morning. I didn’t want her to be sick on Wednesday and miss her beloved tumbling class.

Wednesday morning Gleek said she felt a little bit sick, but upon realizing that it was the day of her class, she insisted that she was plenty well enough to go to school. She cheerfully got herself ready and I dropped her off. When I picked her up from school she was happily climbing snow piles and tightrope walking along the top of the bike rack. She went to her class happily. Unbeknownst to me, Gleek was acting healthy through sheer force of will. The fiction unravelled during the last ten minutes of her class when Gleek simply had no energy left. She curled herself up into a little ball with the softest object she could find in the gym. It happened to be a martial arts punching mitt. This was all reported to me by my neighbor who was running the carpool for the class. All I witnesses was that Gleek arrived back home tearful and ready to be snuggled. I took one look at her wan little face and could tell that she was still sick and should not have been at school or at the class.

This reassesment was further cinched at bedtime. Gleek said I should let her stay up later because she’d had a nap. I countered that she couldn’t possibly have had a nap because she’d been at school all day. This was when Gleek told me that at lunch time she had crawled under the table and fallen asleep. She only woke up when the bell rang and she ran back to class. I can totally picture the chaotic lunch room full of kids and lunch helpers, all of whom are so busy that they don’t notice the little pink-coated bundle sleeping under the table. The thought makes me want to snuggle her up and keep her safe for a week. She is so brave and such a trooper.

Gleek is home from school today. She may be home from school tomorrow too. She’s fooled me twice already this week and I want to make sure she is really and truly healthy before I send her back to school again. I want her naps to be on comfy couches instead of curled up under lunchroom tables. And I need to remember that unlike my other kids who will languish from a runny nose, Gleek will continue to seem healthy until she is nigh death. The other three need me to teach them how to keep going in the face of mild discomfort. Gleek needs me to teach her how to slow down and let her body heal itself.

Today I have an abundance of things to be happy about.

A friend and I finally managed to have a long talk where we cleared the air and figured out why we have been accidentally hurting each other’s feelings repeatedly for several months now. I’m so glad to be able to talk to her again and leave the conversation feeling happy and more at peace with myself and the world as a whole.

I got a call from the teacher of the class where Kiki was teased for caring about grades. The teacher and I had a pleasant conversation where I made clear what has been going on with Kiki and how Kiki no longer wants to go to school. Teacher was very distressed by this and had some solid suggestions for steps we can take to remedy things. Teacher also promised to look out for Kiki and try to prevent similar incidents. I am so happy that once again I find wonderful allies in the teachers and administrators at my child’s school.

I put together a sheet of promotional bookmarks for Hold on to Your Horses. I wasn’t sure they were good enough, but Howard looked at them and liked them a lot.

The layout for Hold on to Your Horses is so close to done that I’ll probably be shipping files to the printer within a week. I’m so happy to be so close to finished. (I’m also terrified because what if I’ve done something wrong in the file preparation or what if I’ve miscommunicated with the printer? BUT, this is a happy post. I’ll save the angsty stuff for a different day. Besides. I’m happy right now and I don’t want to spoil it by dwelling on stuff I can’t change tonight anyway.)

I posted on a writer’s forum asking for marketing advice and several people expressed interest in the book and had some fantastic suggestions for how to let people know it exists.

My kitchen is clean even though I made dinner. I cleaned up after the mess.

Link has a new found fascination with jumping rope. It is because of an American Heart Association program at his school. But Link has been jumping so much that I think his legs are going to be sore tomorrow. I need to hit the dollar store and pick up a couple more jump ropes so the kids can stop arguing over Link’s.

Gleek and Kiki have not had a major row in days despite the fact that Kiki has been extra grumpy because of unpleasantness at her school.

The next Doctor Who disc arrived in the mail.

I have a hyacinth blooming in my house.

The schedule is sufficiently ingrained that even on a highly distracted day such as today I still made dinner, supervised homework, and got the kids into bed on time.

The doctor re-checked Patches ears this morning and they are no longer filled with fluid. Hooray for the curative powers of daily gum chewing!

There are more, but I have to stop the list somewhere. It has been a good day.

Kiki just came storming in after her second miserable school day in a row. This is the second time in two days she’s been required to do group work with kids who don’t care about getting good grades and who tease her because she does care. I now have to figure out how to walk the delicate line between letting Kiki solve her own problems and going to bat for her. The first step is to gather more information. I’ve left messages with the teachers. Hopefully they’ll get back to me soon. Mostly this is just a reprise of the ongoing disconnect between Kiki and her age-peers who don’t often share her interests and are not her intellectual peers. I know so much that would help Kiki deal with this stuff, but I can’t give her my experience. She has to muddle through and learn her own lessons. Much in the same way that I am still muddling through and learning lessons.

For the first night in what feels like forever I feel like I’ve managed the day well. It did not start out well at all. It started with three kids running late and a big argument between Kiki and Gleek. Howard and I waded into the middle of it and there was much sadness all around. By the time I got the kids dropped at school (late) my head was so full of stuff that I couldn’t sit down and work. Instead Patches and I tromped through the yard to visit my backyard neighbor. She kindly let me sit in her kitchen for 90 minutes and rant about the minute details of things that have been bugging me. Some of them were big things some of them were little things, but the accumulation was overwhelming me. It is possible that the problem with January was that I never stopped to allow myself time to rant before moving on to solve problems. Sometimes we just need to whine a little, stomp our feet and shout about unfairness even if we know that no one ever promised fairness.

My friend had many valuable insights and thoughts for me, but the one that jumped out at me was a sentence in the middle of a story about something that she has been dealing with lately. It was “You just don’t recover from that in a couple of months.” I’ve made major shifts in our rhythm of living. These shifts are correcting long-term problems and I’ve already seen improvements, but I was feeling like a failure because it wasn’t all fixed yet. This morning I realized that I haven’t given things enough time to heal. I haven’t given time for everyone to grow and develop into the new structure. Three weeks may make a habit, but it is still a shiny new habit still worn uncomfortably. The path is right, I just need to stay on it and the rewards I want will come. The healing and new confidence I hope for in my kids will come. Patches will feel more comfortable and stop fighting sleeping by himself. Kiki and Gleek will begin to love and understand and respect each other. Link will learn to ease his own transitions and keep himself on task. I’ve made the structure, but I have to give the kids time to grow into it. I have to give myself time to grow into it.

I came home with my head clear and proceeded to amaze myself with how much stuff I got done. All the shipping, all the accounting, made dinner, snuggled and tended Gleek who proved herself to be sick by crawling into bed and staying there, hugged and listened to Kiki who had a truly horrible day at school, helped Kiki to practice her hated clarinet despite the bad day, helped Link with homework, had a snuggly reading time with Patches. It was all good. I finally feel like I did all the things with my day that I’m supposed to do. But of all the pieces, the one that makes me most happy was mediating an agreement between Kiki and Gleek that hopefully will raise the civility level between them. Gleek is going to try to answer words with words instead of objecting squeals or hand motions (both of which drive Kiki to fury.) Kiki is going to try to make sure that she starts every interaction nicely thus giving Gleek the chance to answer Kiki’s nice requests with words and open a negotiation rather than both sides instantly opening fire. I’m going to have to be on hand to mediate this for quite some time, but at least I’ve got both of them admitting that they don’t like the way things have been and being willing to change a little to make things better. It is progress.

And as I wrote this entry I remembered that sometimes the process of fixing something first makes a bigger mess. But the mess is necessary so that things can be better. Growing is often messy and painful.

January was a difficult month for me. I kept things upbeat in this journal because the stories we tell ourselves shape what we believe to be true. Nothing I wrote in the journal was untrue, I just left out the darker, more discouraging bits. I did this in conversations as well; trying to will myself into happiness and contentment. I still haven’t pinned down why January was difficult. Perhaps it was the deliberate change in our family schedule. Perhaps it was the extra tasks attendant on creating and shipping more merchandise which compressed free time right out of my days. Perhaps it was just midwinter blues. Perhaps it was some stage-of-life thing that goes with turning thirty-five. Whatever the reason, I ended most of my days feeling like a failure or oppressed by the schedule ahead. Good things did not make me as happy as they should have, bad things made me more discouraged than they should.

January is now over. I have a shiny new month. It is still a winter month, but it is a short one and it is the only one left between me and spring weather. I crave flowers, the smells of spring. I finally found a potted hyacinth in bloom. I bought it and it now sits and wafts the smell of spring through my house. It speaks directly to my back brain, reminding me that winter is not forever.

This next month is also full of things. All the months between now and August are full of things, but I just need to manage one month at a time. This month I need to ship files for Hold on to Your Horses to China for printing. I need to prepare promotional materials for Hold Horses. I need to help sell and ship Schlock t-shirts. I need to attend LTUE and be on a couple of panels there. I need to do layout on The Teraport Wars. And I need to plan a big party for Howard’s Fortieth birthday. These are all cool things. Right now I feel excited and anticipatory about them. I just hope I can hold onto that so that they stay delights rather than burdens.

Today I spoke with a neighbor and was telling her about Hold on to Your Horses and the steps we have left to get it printed and promoted. She sighed, patted her 8 month pregnant stomach, and said “It must be nice to finally have time to chase a dream. With three little ones I hardly know what mine are anymore.” I sat dumbstruck for a moment, realizing that I am not just chasing a dream, but grabbing it and putting it into my pocket. And the dream is not alone in there. I’ve got a pocketful. I’ve spent the last month treating my dreams like they were chores. This month I want to feel the wonder and the joy that is my life.

This morning Kiki helped me get the kitchen and front room really clean. Having clean space in my house makes a world of difference in how I feel about myself and my life. Tomorrow I’ve got to tackle the family room. We’re having Gleeks birthday party in the afternoon and then a gaming group in the evening. Unfortunately we still have the futon in there. It may have to be evicted to sit on the front porch. This would be unfortunate since we have more snow predicted for next week and getting wet would not be good for it.

Lately I have been lamenting the things in my life which must lay idle. I have the capability to make my home truly beautiful. I have the ability to create a wondrous garden in my yard. I could write stories and novels and get them published. I could devote myself to my children and help them to excel. I could push forward on efforts to help the cartooning business grow. If I pursued just one of these things I could be superlative. But in order to be superlative in one area, I’d have to give up other areas. And so I must pick and choose. My inner child whines and stamps her feet at this because she wants it all.

Then today came several reminders that I, who am incredibly blessed, should not be so greedy. Today I heard from a childhood friend whose current life is extremely narrow because of ill health. The life she is living does not at all resemble the one that she dreamed of when we spent hours spinning futures for ourselves. Today I heard from another dear friend who is struggling with an extremely high-risk surprise pregnancy, a house to sell, a house half-built, four kids, and the probable loss of the job which pays the bills. Many factors in her current situation are not of her choosing. Today I thought of friends who struggle with depression. Today I thought of friends who live far from family and have no companionship local to them. Today I realized that I am not the only one who cries tears in private over things she can not do. Today I remembered there are people who have so much more right to cry than I do. Today I wept a little on their behalf.

Today I realized that rather than stomping my feet and struggling to pick up all my things at once, I need to leave some of them laying where they are. Then my hands will be free to reach out and help some of these others who are suffering so much more than I.

Patches has been having trouble sleeping. At the beginning of January both Patches and Gleek were having bad dreams. I started sitting in the hallway at bedtime and the issue resolved for Gleek. Patches kept waking up at night to come crawl into bed with Howard and I. He claims he does it because of bad dreams, but is unable to describe the dreams to us.

Then this morning he curled into a little ball and wailed because his ear was hurting. Everything clicked into place. Children with fluid behind their eardrums will frequently have disturbed sleep patterns. They go to sleep just fine, but the fluid collects and pressure builds until the kids wake up. Now I’m looking at all those awake-way-too-early mornings and the irrationally cranky times that Patches has been having lately. It is suddenly blindingly obvious that he’s been suffering from chronic fluid filled ears. Both Kiki and Link suffered similar problems, so I’ve seen this before.

I took Patches to the doctor. Sure enough, his ears are filled with fluid. So now we spend a week giving him decongestants and letting him chew a lot of gum. Then next week the doctor will look at his ears again. If they’re still full of fluid, then we’re off to the ENT and probably headed for ear tubes. I’m so glad to have found an answer to why Patches has been struggling and cranky for this whole month.

I have been very concerned lately about the relationship between my two daughters. Kiki thinks that Gleek is rude and annoying. Gleek thinks that Kiki is just mean. This makes me sad. I want them to be friends. I want them to find joy in being sisters. I know that it is very common for siblings to squabble while growing up, but then be great friends as adults. That’s the pattern I had with my older sister. But I still feel like they are missing out right now.

So today I tackled the problem. I have a marvelous parenting book “How to Talk so Your Kids Will Listen and Listen so Your Kids Will Talk.” I decided to take chapter one “accepting feelings” and teach it to our family. The idea is that in order to really communicate with someone else, you have to accept how they feel even if you wish they felt differently. This acceptance opens the path to further conversations. I don’t know how much the kids absorbed, but the concepts have been introduced. It is a start.

After the lesson was over, I realized that the biggest offender on the “not accepting feelings” count, is me. I don’t want Kiki to grouch and Gleek, so I jump in and explain why Kiki should be tolerant. Or I jump in and make Kiki stop. I do everything but listen and accept because I don’t want to accept that my daughters annoy each other. The honest truth is that there is only so much that I can do to improve their relationship. In the end they are the ones who will make it good or bad. I have to accept my lack of control and only make myself accountable for the things I can do. And one of the things I can do is stop reacting defensively and start really listening to what my daughters feel about each other.