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Gleek is sick again. She spent the week before last laying on the couch with a fever, body aches, and a rash. Then she got better and we figured she’d had her bout with flu for the year. No one else got sick and we counted ourselves lucky. Then Halloween night Gleek spiked a fever again. She has spent the last two days laying on the couch with a high fever, sniffles, a cough, and body aches. It is the flu again, only a different strain this time.

I’ve spent the last couple of days tending to her. It has been harder this time around because we went through most of our stock of infrequently watched movies just a week ago. Also Gleek feels the cosmic unfairness of the fact that she is the only one who has been sick. Twice.

I worry that this particular cosmic unfairness is likely to be rectified. A sniffle/cough illness is harder to contain than a rash illness. I’ve been in the most contact with Gleek, so I’ve been monitoring myself all day. It isn’t always easy to determine if that sneeze and slight sniffle are allergies or if it is is the beginning of something more dire. Are those body aches, or just stiffness from sleeping on an air mattress next to a sick child? Is that a slight fatigue headache?

I feel like a swimmer in the water during one of the Jaws movies. I’m out there in the open, completely exposed and I can’t tell if that thing which just brushed my leg is a piece of harmless kelp or a monster that will swallow me whole.

I really don’t want what Gleek has. I don’t want Gleek to have what she has. But if she still has it tomorrow, we’re off to the doctor again. Whee.

Both Gleek and Link are feeling a little under the weather today. This means that they want to sit on the couch and watch movies. For some reason the kids have been picking movies on our old VHS tapes. Those movies don’t get watched much, but they have a strong nostalgia component because they used to be watched all the time during our baby/toddler/preschool years. Now Gleek is 8 and Link is 12 and they’re curled up on the couch watching Blues Clues. It may be silly, but it warms my heart that they aren’t too old to shout instructions to Steve. If I squint I can almost see Preschool Link and Baby Gleek. It is good to know they’re still here even though so much else has changed.

A super spy white cat girl with sparkles and a ninja jump out of my car and dash into the church building. It is the night of the Halloween carnival and they have been looking forward to it for at least a month. My feet are slower, in part because I have to shut the car doors that the others left open, but also because my head is full of worries and things not yet done. If I had only consulted my own desires, I probably would have skipped the carnival this year. But if I had, I would have missed out. The carnival is nominally for the kids, but there truly is something for everyone.

The event is wrapped around food. Many good events are, because people enjoy sharing food. In this case there were ten different pots of soups, chilis, and curries lined up. All had been donated by members of the congregation. Sign-up sheets were sent around at church for weeks in advance until enough people volunteered. Howard was already there with our curry. He’d been simmering it all day to make sure the flavors were right and that it was sufficiently spicy. For those who like things even hotter, Howard had a bottle of Dragon’s Breath hot sauce in the pocket of his mad scientist lab coat.

The opening prayer was said and the line began to form. The potluck meal always takes place before the carnival games. This gives the parents a fighting chance to shovel some real food into small mouths before the candy is dispensed. Unfortunately the effort is undermined by the fact that the second half of the food sign-up is all about the desserts. Those are laid out right after the big pots of chili. Many a child has been known to pass on all the dinner food only to load up a plate full of dessert. By “many a child” I mean “my kids in particular.” Some years I have tried to fight the tendency. Other years I just let them eat whatever they choose, promising myself that I’ll feed them a solid breakfast the next morning.

This year I opt for the latter, and I’m pleased to note that my two boys actually select real food. Link selected his dad’s curry. I warned him it was spicy, but he merely answered that he knew. He sampled it and said “Oh man! That’s good!” A moment later he winced a little and said “But then it goes up to your brain!” He nibbled a few more bites before abandoning the curry in favor of a dessert.

As I ate, I watched the joyful chaos surrounding me. All of the kids, all of the teens, and about half of the adults were in costume. Many of the kids were running around in the big multi-purpose room. I watched a pair of Wolverines converse over the pots of chili. Iron Man dashed by followed closely by a pair of princesses. Ninjas and pirates engaged in epic battles full of running and giggling. Holly Golightly was carrying water back to her table. Superman and Wonder Woman strolled arm-in-arm. I was one of the boring mundanes. I thought about claiming myself as a browncoat based on my brown leather jacket. Unfortunately I lacked the props to really carry it off. I was just me, in full observer mode.

As I watched, I began to think about how amazing this particular event actually is. There were about 200 people participating together in an event which depends upon volunteerism to run at all. People volunteered to bring food. The people on the activities committee volunteered to organize. Someone had to come early and set up nearly 30 banquet tables, then cover them with brown paper, and scatter candy corns across them for decorations. Decorations adorn the walls as well. Other people stay after the event to clean up. The teens plan and then run carnival games for the younger kids. There are adults guiding that process to make sure that the games are ready on time and are run safely. In past years the evening has included shadow plays, skits, or pinatas. It is a lot of work to put together and yet the work is spread across so many willing hands that no one is crushed by it.

The more I thought about this Halloween Carnival, the more amazed I was by it. The fact that such an event can exist without drama is a testament to the amazing neighborhood community in which I live and participate. It was not always this big and amazing. I remember when we first moved here, how the teen groups griped about running games for kids. I remember that there were minor squabbles about who had to run the thing. There were some years when the carnival almost didn’t happen at all. None of today’s teens complain about running games because they grew up playing them. The event has a momentum of it’s own. Everyone knows ahead of time what their jobs will be. The people on the activity committee have in past years been in the youth leadership or have been among those who bring food.

But even more than the momentum of tradition, this carnival builds upon all the community connections that are built all year long. We live next door to each other. Our kids go to the same schools. We meet on the street, at the grocery store, at church, or during church assigned visits. Our church is one that emphasizes reaching out to others, helping each other, getting to know each other. We try to extend this community to those who do not attend church or who attend other churches. The fliers listed the carnival as a neighborhood carnival to which all were welcome. Because of all this community building during the year, people are willing to put in extra effort to make the carnival happen.

The carnival is worth the effort. Just as I was scraping the last of my soup from the paper bowl, the carnival games were opened. Children and teens scattered to the classrooms surrounding the big multi-purpose room. Many parents went as well, particularly those with small children the shepherd. My kids all ran off without me. With the room less crowded, I was able to observe as groups of people gathered, talked, and broke apart to form new groups. I finally got out of my chair to go participate actively instead of passively. I can entertain myself for hours just people watching, but it was in participating that I found the true value of the community. I had several conversations that eased my heart. I now have new information to apply to the challenges my kids are currently providing for me. It is so nice to discuss these things with other parents who are or have been in places similar to mine.

It takes a village to raise a child and the carnival gave me a chance to reconnect with my village. I see many of these people frequently, but we are all running around getting things done. The carnival is unique because the only agenda is social. It provides time to just visit, to commiserate, to catch up.

The closing events included prizes for adult costumes. This was announced in advance to encourage adults to dress up. There weren’t prizes for kid costumes because “all kids are winners.” This was a nice solution. Besides all the kids got prizes from the carnival games. The last event was a costume parade. All the kids lined up and snaked their way past the tables of adults. They marched triumphantly, joyously. The costumes showed the ravages of the evening. Make-up was smeared, wigs were askew, many a shirt had smears of chocolate or frosting, some eyes were red with the aftermath of a child size tragedy, but they marched smiling and waving.

Then the event dissolved into scattered conversations, parents trying to herd children into vehicles, and the clatter of tables and chairs being stowed into their racks. Within 40 minutes the space that had been full of activity and laughter would be dark, clean, and empty. I took my crew home. We went through the spoils of the evening. My daughter had harvested candy corns from the tables and packed one of her white gloves full of them. She ate a few, but the rest we stowed for later. I hustled them off to bed. They needed to be rested for trick-or-treating the next day.

People think that Halloween is about costumes, candy, and creepiness. For me, Halloween is about community. It is groups of people stepping outside their regular lives. It is ringing the doorbells of your neighbors and smiling. It is the school parade and waving not just at my kids, but also the kids from church, neighborhood, and friends. It is trailing your six year old son down the street as he collects candy and stopping for a moment to say hello to the parent traveling the other direction down the street. It is the Halloween Carnival where dozens of people work together to create an event for everyone to enjoy. Such things take hard work and effort, just like building a community. But it is effort well spent.

I used to be the person who had her Halloween costume planned months in advance. This was true even after I was an adult and even after I became a parent. We have portraits hanging on our wall of the year our family went medieval. Howard and I smile in our garb while holding an adorable pair of dragons. There were cyberpunk years and more eclectic years as well. It was a tradition, part of who we were.

I look at the pictures and I am not that person anymore. I do not have the time and creative energy to spare for elaborate costuming. I sometimes miss being that person. I particularly miss it today when I sit to watch the school Halloween parade wearing my mundane clothes. I feel boring, uncreative. I miss it when Patch turns to me with his wide eyes and asks “Mom? What are you going to be for Halloween?” and I realize that he can’t imagine why anyone would choose not to dress up. It is hard to explain to a six year old that I barely found enough energy to help four kids scrape together costumes, finding further effort to create a costume for myself does not feel worth it.

I don’t regret the person that I am. I don’t hit October with ideas burning to be created because I’ve been using my creativity all year long. The enthusiasm that used to be spent on costume creation is instead spent on writing; and on book layout; and on figuring out where my kids needs and wants diverge; and on meeting all the needs and some of the wants. My creativity has been particularly tapped out this Fall. I feel like I spend all week flailing around trying to keep everything afloat. I look ahead to the weekend like a swimmer striving to reach a log where she can rest. Only when I grasp the log, it often twists in my grip and I am as likely to end up underneath it as on top of it.

So I will participate in Halloween to the extent necessary to make sure that I don’t spoil the enjoyment of my children. They need to have the fun holiday to which they have been looking forward. Some other year I will fully embrace the joy of Halloween again. I will make a glorious costume. I will have someplace exciting to wear it. I will find happiness in having energy to spare on the creation of a holiday that is all about imagination and possibilities. This year, I will wave at the parade and hand out candy.

Dear Universe,

This note is to excuse Sandra from today’s task list. She has been feeling under the weather and also very burdened by the unrelenting list of things to do. She noted that while the things on today’s list really do need to get done, none of them are either urgent or critical. She’ll work extra hard tomorrow to catch up.

Thanks.

I had my house to myself for three whole hours today. Two of them I spent asleep. The other was in pieces before and after the sleeping. It was so marvelous to have the house quiet. No one needed anything from me. No one called. The doorbell did not ring. Days like today I understand the attraction of the hermit life. I could use another three hours just like it.

I don’t get another three hours of quiet today. I have to pick up the kids from school and resume answering their needs. But I don’t mind too much, because the quiet hours today reminded me that quiet hours exist. I will get to have them again. I may even get to have them tomorrow.

I don’t have an infinite capacity for the absorption of silence. If I had uninterrupted days of silence, I would soon be longing for interruption. I would be longing to be necessary and needed. I just crave silence right now because the needs have been abundant and the silence has been scarce. I think a better balance is in my future, possibly before New Years. With the turn of the year, the kids will settle more. They will not need so much intervention. So I may have a peaceful month in January before business tasks fill up the available space as we gear up for a Schlock shipping.

Until then, I will treasure the small spaces of silence I can find and protect them from random small tasks.

I’ve not had any emotional energy to spare since last Friday. At first I was attributing this to how much intervention my kids have needed over the past few days. But the fact that I crashed on the couch and slept for most of the afternoon may indicate that something else is contributing as well. I don’t feel at all sick. I just feel like I stayed up too late. But feel that way despite the fact that I got a full night’s sleep in addition to the hours I slept on the couch. It is possible that the fatigue is due to extreme emotional drain, but it is more probable that I’m fighting off some viral bug. (I hope not. I particularly hope not since I went out to lunch with a couple of good friends and I would feel bad if I had anything communicable. That would be a poor way to repay the lovely time I had visiting with them.)

The sleep was punctuated with waking up to negotiate squabbles between kids. I can’t say I managed the negotiations at peak efficiency, but I didn’t lose my cool either. Of course cool is easier to maintain when you’re too tired to attain a mental state more energetic than “groggy.”

Of late Link and Kiki have been absorbing all of my focused parenting energy. Today I focused a little more on Gleek. Mostly I tried to just notice her and figure out what she needs so that she’ll stop deliberately provoking her brothers in the middle of a previously peaceful game. I think I’ve figured out the shape of her needs, but I need to talk to her teacher to make sure my picture is complete.

I need to talk to Link’s teacher too. I need to talk to these teachers even though I dread learning about further needs that I have to address. Also I’m feeling a bit burned out on the whole communication with teachers thing since I had meetings with four of Kiki’s teachers just last week. (3 very happy meetings, 1 not at all happy meeting with final determination still pending.)

Talking with teachers is exhausting. Usually the result is happy or at least cooperative towards a happy end. But I can’t know ahead of time exactly how the conversation will go. Interactions have the potential to go wrong and it is important for me to build cooperation not damage it.

Also pending are Halloween costumes and pumpkin carving. I need to find the energy for those in the next two days.

Howard rescued the evening. He made dinner. This allowed me to organize the homework load. I played divide and conquer. I tackled each child separately rather than attempting to administer a communal homework time. I was so grateful to Gleek who cheerfully did all of her work the very first time I asked. The other three needed cajoling.

Now they are all in bed. Next I will sleep and hope for a more energetic tomorrow.

The sound of waves on the beach is very soothing. The sound waves of childhood crisis…not so much. Today has been one wave after another ever since the kids got home.

First Link did his daily stomping before settling down to finish his writing assignment. This was accompanied by requests for food from Gleek and Patch while Link loudly insisted that everyone had to be quiet so he could write.

Next came Kiki with whom I needed to sit down and do an extensive post mortem about an ongoing difficult situation. She also had ancillary stresses which needed dissection.

During the lengthy discussion with Kiki, Patch needed food and I had to explain/remind Gleek and her friend that due to Saturday’s territorial infringement’ the bedroom which Gleek and Kiki share is off limits to friends for the rest of the week.

Somewhere in the middle there was about 30 minutes of non-crisis where I went outside with a shovel and dug up a thorny weed.

Then came the crying disaster that Link got to go with his scout master to work on a swimming merit badge while Gleek did not get to go swim.

Following that there were the dropped mini, arguments over dinner, the wanton destruction of the domino constructions created by others, children claiming themselves to be stupid and/or mean while hoping that others will make them feel better, and other random emotional conflicts.

Around 7 pm Howard called me into his office.
“You look like you need help.” I think it was the thousand yard stare that clued him in. So he went out for donuts and then there was bedtime.

Some days “bare minimum” is harder than others.

I have been stable this Fall. There are no major crises in my life. I don’t have trials I am trying to manage. I don’t have emotional things that I am trying to sort through. This should mean that my life is peaceful and calm. But I keep being thrown into turmoil by the crises of others.

There is a level of detachment when the crisis does not truly belong to me. I can sympathize when Kiki has a stressed meltdown over school and homework. I certainly feel sad that she is struggling. I may even wrack my brains trying to find ways to help, but the crisis is not really mine. I am not swamped by it the way that she is. I can walk away and still have the rest of the day be good.

Sometimes it is tempting to do just that, to walk away from the drama. A crisis is exhausting. But I don’t walk away because I love the people involved. So I sit next to Gleek and help her work through her feelings of guilt so that she can apologize and make amends to someone she has wronged. I listen when Link tries to articulate that he feels angry all the time and doesn’t know why. I drop what I’m doing and drive over to the school to bring a child emergency pants. I spend time talking with teachers to clarify communication. I weep with a friend who mourns. I brainstorm with a friend who is problem solving. I do all these things because I love the people, because I am glad to help. I am glad that I can be available.

And I do make a difference. I can tell that I am soothing the crisis, that I am helping to calm the storm or at least to sail safely through it. I am tired and wrung out when the crisis abates. It is a happy tired, because I have done a good work. The hard part is that crises have been hitting hard and fast of late. I often don’t have recovery time in between. Most of the crises are child-sized and manageable, but even small waves can make me tired if I am chest deep in them. And so sometimes I am tempted to step out of the water, away from all the crisis.

And then I discover that someone I know and love has just been smacked with a rogue wave of crisis. It is one of those extra large waves that spring up out of nowhere, threatening to swamp everything. It makes me think of this photo taken by Jean Guichard.

I see the wave, the crisis, and it is not mine. It would be so easy for me to turn and walk away so that it does not touch my life. It would also be easy for me to dive in to the middle and be swept up into the crashing chaos. Instead I have to find some middle ground. A place where I can stand and help without being drown.

The challenge with kid-size crises is to remember that what feels small to me is huge to them. I have to be patient and stable so that they can grow and learn. I have to remember that I may see a small-survivable wave, but the child feels like the man in the picture. It feels like they are doomed and there is no escape. The man in the photograph was not washed away by the wave. Both he and the lighthouse were still there when the wave was gone. They were wet, but still standing.

Similarly, I need to remember that I will not always be yanked about by the crises of others. Several kids are going through a rough time right now, but the waves will pass. We will have calm sailing again.

Link dashed off to his scout troop meeting cradling his backpack in his arms. Except the “dash” was more of a plod because the backpack was full of books, Legend of Zelda manga books to be specific. I suggested that he could wear the pack on his back, but shook his head and insisted that he did not want his books damaged. So off he went to learn about collections and to work on a collections merit badge.

Link returned happy and handed over the unfinished packet to me. I glanced down to see what work was left to do. Quite a lot. I flipped through the pages and was startled to see how adult-centric the questions were.
Discuss with your counselor how investing and speculation would apply to your collection.
What would you look for in purchasing other collections similar to yours?
What would you expect in return value if you decided to sell all or part of the collection?
Half the questions carried the implication that the value of a collection must be measurable in dollars. Link doesn’t care about the monetary value of his manga books. He collects them because he loves to read them. He keeps them safe and sorts them because he loves the stories inside.

This money-centric view of collections is common. I’m afraid I’ve fallen prey to it myself from time to time, particularly when I discover that one of my kids has decided to collect pea-sized dried mud balls which are disintegrating into dirt on the light colored carpet. (I confess to throwing out the mud-ball collection without worrying too much how precious it was to the child who made it and then forgot it.) Some of life’s most personally valuable collections are simply not salable. One year Gleek and Link collected a water bottle full of little air-soft BBs by scouring the gutters on their way home from school. Link has a box full of little twisted bits of metal he discovered the same way. Patch has piles of tiny paper notes he cut out himself and collected into a box. Kiki has porcelain dollar store statues that she still loves. I have pressed flowers. Howard has a stack of sour-patch kids cards lingering in a box in the garage. These things represent something that mattered to us at the time. Each item in the collection has a story, a memory attached. Even when the collection itself is long gone, the value of collecting remains. I still remember fondly the drawer full of snails that my friend and I carefully collected. I was so angry when his sister let them all go.

I don’t collect in the same way that I used to. I place far less value on physical things. But collections of things still come into my life, are organized and used for awhile, and then are passed on. I loved our collection of Sandra Boynton board books. We had them all and read them to our kids repeatedly. Over the years the books themselves were eaten, smashed, ripped, or otherwise destroyed. The few we had left were outgrown and given away. But the memory of that collection remains precious to me. I remember standing in the book store with Howard and deciding to splurge and just buy them all. While we had them, I enjoyed lining them up in a neat little row where the toddlers could pull them out. That collection added joy to our lives without having any resale value whatsoever. I still have those books collected in my memory. (Literally. I can probably still recite most of them.)

I think of Link’s box of twisted bits of things. Then I think of Shel Silverstein’s poem Hector The Collector. As a kid I read that poem and thought how silly Hector was to collect such pointless things. Now I read the poem and want to cry because I have my own little Hectors who all bring home treasures that others consider worthless. I have to be careful not to squelch their enthusiasm for discovery while also suggesting that perhaps we should let the roly poly bug collection go.

The letting go is important. We can not keep everything and yet somehow we try. I have sitting in my closet a pair of old Star Trek book and record sets circa 1975. They were given to me by a dealer at the first science fiction convention I ever attended. I have no use for them. I haven’t lived in a house with a record player for two decades. But I continue to hold onto these books, partly for sentimental reasons, (I remember listening to Star Trek books on record as a kid), but really I hold on the books because they are old and they might have value. They might matter to someone else. If I just give them away, then a piece of history may be discarded or destroyed. It is so easy to fall into this trap, to cart around things that take up space in our lives not because they make our lives better but because of an ephemeral “what if.” The thing is that everything is a piece of history and we can’t keep it all. We have to choose what we’ll allow to take up space in our lives. There is no point in maintaining a collection if it does not provide some sort of joy or satisfaction. I need to look around my house and figure out what else is taking up space.

Fortunately for us, Link’s scout leaders are good, sympathetic men. They did not devalue Link’s collection of books in his eyes. I will be similarly careful as we finish the packet. It will give Link and I an opportunity to discuss how some people view collections and collecting as a form of investment. How for some collections the monetary value is part of the point. This too is a valid reason for collecting things. I’ll just make sure that Link understands that it is not the only one. After that we can move on to discussing how even though we love the things we collect, sometimes we have to stop collecting. We only have so much space in our lives and in our houses and collections can over flow the bounds to take over. It will be a good discussion and I look forward to having it.