Gaining a 2-Year-Old

When I found out that my niece was being taken away from her mother (no relation), my mind went into a bit of a fine frenzy. I had to make a decision. And I had to make it soon. DCFS gives a couple of hours to decide and you don’t just decide to take her for a few weeks, you have to decide, in that moment, that if her parents never get their act together, then you would be ready and willing to adopt the child. I sort of hate DCFS for that. I sort of love them, too. But right now I just think they are a little batshit crazy in asking people to make those kinds of decisions.

So—putting my brain in hyper-speed--I thought about it. Maybe I am the crazy one. Maybe the answer is such an obvious “YES” that the fact that I would hesitate so long makes me a bad person. Maybe it makes me selfish and self-centered. Or maybe it makes me intelligent and cautious. I’m not sure anymore because I haven’t gotten a full night’s sleep in about 7 days.

The thought process of deciding between having my niece come to live with me, and having her go with a foster family went something like this:

1.     Maybe foster care will be better. Maybe she will be placed with a loving couple who really wants a child. (I’d cling to this for about 3 minutes and then it would go away)

2.     Maybe she’ll be sexually abused in foster care (this one never went away)

3.     Maybe the mom will be home all day and play with her and help her learn and grow. (happy thoughts!)

4.     Maybe the mom will put her in front of the tv all day and ignore her and only do it for the government money. (sad thoughts)

And then the thoughts continued to this:

1.     I do not want kids.

2.     I love my life the way it is.

3.     What can I give to a child?

4.     How will I be able to afford daycare and babysitters?

5.     I had so many plans for my photography business this summer and a 2 year old is going to eat up all that time…how do I provide a living for myself...and her, now?

6.     My single friends aren’t going to hang out with me...or they won't understand...and....

7.     I’LL NEVER DATE AGAIN!!!!!

But, more difficult than processing all my rollercoaster thoughts, has been processing what people have been telling me:

1.     This will be good for you, it will make you softer.

2.     See, God really did want you to have children, so you got them one way or another (don’t you just love that Christian God? Always giving you what you need, instead of what you want? )

3.     This will increase your ability to love (again, because apparently, all single people are somehow so stunted in this area).

4.     This will give more meaning to your life (this one pisses me off the most, as I don’t really succumb to the idea that being childless means that I have less value or meaning in my life).

5.     This will be the best and hardest experience of your life  (this one confuses me).

I understand that I’ve opened myself up to all kinds of advice. I’m taking it in. I’m processing it, but, in the end, I don’t think I am going to fall into the nice little categories that everyone seems to create regarding parenthood. But, naturally, I'm also trying to protect myself from the real possibility that her parents are going to get her back and I'll watch them all fall into old patterns again. 

But, this week is probably not the best to assess it all as truthfully, I’ve mostly just felt numb.

As a friend said to me the other day, “putting on a play is hard, being a parent is hard, dealing with new situations is hard, trying to be patient with people who don't deserve it is hard, and coping with less than normal sleep is hard--but to suddenly deal with all of those things all at once!  I'm not surprised at you feeling numb--I imagine that, like a computer dealing with too many programs going at the same time, your body and spirit and mind are just trying to survive.”

There's Something About Martha

About twice a year, I indulge in a little secret and guilty pleasure. I buy a Martha StewartLivingmagazine. That means twice a year I actually have the desire to own an ice cream machine and make my own stationary. I grew up dreaming of the days when I would host dinner parties with my matching Royal Dalton fine-bone china. The courses would be numerous, the crystal would be Waterford, and the pearls would be better than June’s. I really, really liked the idea of hosting parties. I do not know now if it is something that came with the focus my family and religion put on my being a wife and mother--but I REALLY got into the "hostess" aspect of my expected future--everything else seemed a little too daunting to wrap my brain around (like the actual marriage and motherhood parts).

When I read Martha Stewart, I get carried away to a land of what might have been—still could be. I dream of a place where children are well-behaved and have perfectly curly hair--and they run through fields of daisies with you, hold your hand, and then tell you all their secrets. I dream of a place where my husband (one of which I do not have) would wear a salmon colored tie on Easter because it went with my dress and he likes to match. I dream of the ideals of what I grew up wanting. I've never been able to actually face the realities. Perhaps that is why Martha's monthly publication still holds power over me. It represents something I could never fully embrace, even though I was taught to, even though part of me wants to, even though it sounds more than divine.

Why, in this issue alone I had all of the following thoughts:

1. I want to weave my own picnic mat and then learn how to tie it together with beautiful twine—take it to the beach and eat freshly made custard, berry tarts with little sprigs of mint on them.

2. I want to create a pattern for my very own utensil holders for each place sitting. I will make them out of cute plaid material made of out woven hemp (durable for years to come!).

3. I would like a butterfly stencil. I will use this to cut out various colors of butterflies and attach them to a white table cloth to create a harmonious look for my summer party. There will be butterfly shaped place cards with names written in my perfect calligraphy. I will even make butterfly shaped ice cubes to put in the Wonderful Watermelon coolers I will have juiced myself that afternoon.

4. I will have a lazy afternoon brunch that consists of chive omelets with chanterelles, cornmeal-fried trout (I caught myself), tomato-sorrel-basil panzanella, and fried squash blossoms. Note to self—what is a chanterelle?

5. I will get good at croquet. I will. I promise--in a sundress, with a headband, and a perfect tan.

6. I will grow and pick currants and raspberries and make them into jams and chutneys.

7. I will make fresh lemonade daily.

8. I will learn how to fertilize my peonies…I will first learn how to grow peonies.

9. I really want to tidy up my non-existent potting shed by “sprucing” up the paint and shelving.

10. I really want my sheets to match my nightgown (which is diaphanous).

And while it is hard to write these things without sounding like I’m mocking them (and her)—part of me still wants this life. Part of me wants to make homemade sorbet instead of buying it from my local neighborhood grocer. Part of me wants to make scalloped edged, delicate notes in dreamy handwriting instead of sending e-cards. Part of me wants those perfectly coiffed children and husband in a pink tie. And part of me wonders if it will only ever come true (and rightly so, as I am so perfectly content in life right now that I can't imagine having the energy for the ten things listed above, let alone babies and husbands) in my daydreams. I'm sort of ok with that. Actually, I'm MORE than ok with that.

Until Further Notice

So, this blog will be closed until further notice. I've had such a summer, such a year. I've put myself out there a lot. I've defended my beliefs. I've argued and battled. I've thought deep thoughts and I've rallied the troops. I've had the spark of a firecracker for a long time....and I've burned a few people.

And now, I'm just ready to bake beautiful meals for my close friends. I'm ready to watch the sunset without worrying about life. I'm ready to simplify my time and my efforts. I'm ready to take all those parts of me that I have made public for so long and just put them back inside of me and rearrange them a bit until I feel confident again in the person that I am and the person that I'm becoming.

That doesn't make any sense, I know, and it's not supposed to because all these summer stories and all these big events and all my deep thoughts are actually just for me right now and I'm kinda liking it that way.


Sending out loads of love into that big universe which holds the power of each of you.


D'Arcy

My Story and Yours

New Years Eve has come and gone. I went to a swanky party and decided to wear this little number on my head. I got it at Urban Outfitters back in the Summer and I have NEVER worn it because I get self conscious to be that fashionable out in ole Salt Lake City. But I threw caution to the wind and decided to just wear it because I think it's pretty, even if everyone else would mock (which they didn't, and they all probably secretly wished they had one too!)

MY NEW YEAR THEOLOGY

Life in this physical body is VERY short, even if we live to be 100. When I think about this, I have to conclude that I want to waste NO time creating conflict with people I love. I want to REALLY love people for who they are on a day to day basis. I want to enjoy them, and I have learned (in a VERY REAL way this year) that I do this by loving them for who they ARE....not what they BELIEVE. The stories that each of you create for your lives is not what is most important to me. YOU are important to me. 

Let me explain.

I don't care if my mother's story doesn't agree with mine (which it doesn't at all, we are VERY different, and she would like me to be her perfect little mormon girl again, in a big way). I love my mother, I enjoy her. I have learned not to impose my story upon her (ie, I think she needs to do this and that and be liberated in this way and explore these thoughts). I don't want to impose my story on anybody. I respect my mother. I respect her path. I listen to her story, and I don't make it wrong.

I have also learned (IN A VERY BIG WAY) that if other people try to write your story, it means they don't respect you. They don't respect you because they don't consider that you are in tune with yourself to know what your story should be, even if it goes against everything in their story. But listen up, I was born to write my own story, and so were you and you know what WE ARE BOTH RIGHT. 

I now respect myself so much that I am NOT going to allow anybody else (or my desire to please them or feel accepted by them) to write my story. My story is my responsibility. It's my creation. I am the artist. I respect my own art. I can compare my art with other people's art, but I make my own choices, and I take responsibility for my creation.

I'll be doing a series of posts in the coming days about Creating our Stories....so stayed tuned.

CHRISTMAS RECAP---IF YOU CARE TO KNOW
Christmas Eve: April and I dressed up in legwarmers, fingerless gloves (I'm wearing those), popped open a can of tab, put blue eye shadow on our eyes and made one awesome music video (which I will NEVER post here and will NEVER show anyone!) But the memories that night created are priceless. We get most of our moves from the ending scene of Girls Just Want to Have Fun.
The above photo is why April is my best friend in the ENTIRE world. This girl plays along with whatever I create, and vice versa.


We bought these hats three years ago on a random late night shopping spree to Target. It was during our "Jackie Kennedy Phase" as we called it. However, even though these are hats not usually worn in public, we both vowed to wear them EVERY Christmas day, no matter where we are going, who we are seeing, or what we are doing. And we do so without apology or explanation, though she usually gets all the Jackie Kennedy references and people ask me what part of Russia I am from.

One more time in black and white, cause it's just classy....(and Shoog, this counts as my self portrait, yes?)

Hello July

2009 is all aligned for amazing things. It's in the stars, but more importantly, it is in ME. 

I wanted to share with you my AMAZING apartment that I have secured for the month of July. Yes, for the month of July I will eat, sleep, and drink in Paris. I will speak and kiss in French. I will write by day and find at least 4 (one per week, is that a good goal?) French beauties to walk, talk, smile and flirt and sparkle with (with a hell-of-alot-a French kissing thrown in). I will enjoy being young, being talented, and being alive. I'm livin' all I can right now, but it would be hard not to admit that July has captured my heart.

Hello July.

My Phoenix Flames

A phoenix is a mythical bird with a tail of beautiful gold and red plumage. It has a 600-800 year life-cycle, near the end of which it builds itself a nest of cinnamon twigs that it then ignites; both nest and bird burn fiercely and are reduced to ashes, from which a new, young phoenix, reborn anew to live again.

The bird was also said to regenerate when hurt or wounded by a foe, thus being almost immortal and invincible — it is also said that it can heal a person with a tear from its eyes and make them temporarily immune to death; It is a symbol of fire and divinity.

This has been my year of the phoenix. This has been a year that all I knew and all I was went up in flames. December has been a month of seeing my life rise up in flames and swirl down into gray-white ashes, floating around me, with no chance of using them to rebuild anything.

Today was the day that I came out of those ashes reborn.

Today is the day that I leave all that this year brought to me exactly in the past, where it belongs. It was complete, it was perfect. Each person, each one of you, each moment that I shared with others this year was just as they should have been.


I've been thinking about the human tendency to get stuck in the past or to live in the future. We are the only animals that do this. Think of a lion on the hunt. If he missed his prey, does the Lion sit back, and think about what he should have done differently "Oh, man, I should have zigged when I zagged. Or I should have gone the other way. I'm a failure. I'll never catch anything." Does the Lion get caught up in the past, in the what ifs and never hunt again. Does the Lion bring on his own death with his paralyzing fear? No, the Lion gets right back on track and keeps going until he's gotten his dinner.

That's something I've learned about myself, no matter what life serves up...I'll keep rising. It's the phoenix inside of me. 

I'm letting go of the definitions that held me to me. I'm no longer defined by a religion. I'm no longer defined by my degrees or education. I'm no longer defined by the trips I've taken or the things I've seen. I'm no longer  defined by any of these things. For it is only when we stop placing ourselves in the boxes that have defined us that we realize we are free of confinements, and free to fly.

I am new, I am reborn. I am a phoenix.

Oh yeah, and I'm back....big time.

Slip Into Your Skin

Time is getting faster, can you feel it? Emotions are governed more by techonology than they are by actual interactions with people. 

What used to take our ancestors a few weeks to get a reply to (like a love letter)--takes us a second. One second. People connect with each other in virtual worlds now more than ever. Does this result in virtual realities? Virtual assumptions? Virtual opinions? Virtual selves? While a minute is still only 60 seconds long, about a million more things are now able to come to pass in a minute in 2008, then there was in 1888. Time is speeding up, do you feel it? These photographs posted here show that clearly....our new ability to catch a tiny nano of space and time...and capture it forever. Does this mean our feelings are more virtual?

This morning I woke up to the feeling that my bed was shaking. I felt it. I thought it was an earthquake. And my first thoughts about this supposedly happening disaster were not normal. I actually felt a small sense of relief. I actually wanted most of my things to be destroyed so I could be free of them all. With that destruction would come a newfound freedom. I have felt tied to Utah. Tied to my furniture and belongings. I want them all to go away somehow. That's not normal, is it? Of course, as we all read each others blogs, we know that the word normal is more a myth and idea than an actual truth. But, I was still a bit baffled by my reaction.

So what is my truth? I've lost my religion this year. I've lost friends. I've lost foundations and ideas that all used to make my life make sense. Why is it that part of me feels like it's time for marriage and children, and the other part of me feels like I should shave my head of this blond mass that many use to define me and that I should go on a pilgrimage of sorts? But, it would be aimless wanderings, yes? Because, honestly, I'm not even sure what I am looking for or where I want to go. 

The one call I hear is Paris. This past week confirmed to me that it was time to go back for more than just a few days. So, I have decided one thing. I'm saving now to spend a month in Paris next summer. The month of July will find me in an apartment in Paris, writing a book. No other connections but Paris and the characters that have been yearning to be created.

So, yeah, I've been in a weird place all year. A place that isn't fully me. A place where I feel like I have to figure things out. Figure things out. Make sense of things. Decide my future. And it's left me, in this final month of December, quite melancholy and lost. And this pressure of time. The daily mirror reminders that I am getting closer to death, that in fact, each second that I am alive, I am, in fact, dying too. The shaking of my bed, the dependence on virtual friends, the lonely echos of my footsteps along a dark sidewalk in my small neighborhood. All of these are reminders of something I have forgotten, or I never knew, or maybe part of me knows but hasn't told the other part of me. Can you have secrets from yourself?

I've been addicted to Regina Spektor, listening to her over and over and over again. There is her song, On the Radio,  and the lyrics say, 

This is how it works

You're young unitl your not

You love until you don't

You try until you can't

You laugh until you cry

You cry until you laugh

And everyone must breath 

until their dying breath

No this is how it works

You peer inside yourself

You take the things you like

and try to love the things you took

And you take that love you made

And stick it into someone elses heart

pumpin' someone elses blood

And walk arm and arm

And hope you don't get harmed

And even if you do, you'll do it all again....

I don't think that the lyrics only mean people in romantic love. I think any kind of love requires putting some of our hearts into someone elses. I just like that idea at Christmas time.

I finally figured things out this morning. What I figured out is that I don't have a damn thing figured out and that that is going to have to be enough for now.  What I think I will do, however, is use these next few weeks to really connect to the real people around me. The living, breathing, growing old, humming, singing, dancing, crying, sobbing, blue, and red, and green, and yellow people around me.

So, I'm signing off for the rest of the year friends, and I'm going to try and slip into my skin fully...or figure out how to make the skin I have on right now fit a little better.

Merry Christmas.