American Flag - Fiction

Sometimes a wind is content to wrap itself in the flag that is raised and lowered every day by my grandfather. At night he takes red stars off the strings, carefully collecting the corners of blue stripes in his thumb and forefinger. He folds across an imagined square, then hides the extra bit of rectangle inside to allow for the next step, making perfect right triangles. The material swings back and forth in halves that grow smaller and smaller until a thick handful of pillow-like nylon folds one last time into itself and is put to bed in an undisclosed location.

This daily ritual feels significant. Tanned faces down the row of white houses and pastel-rock covered lawns, nod as they watch him crank, pull, tie. All the bobbing heads seem to be a tribute to the flag and something bigger then their summer vacations along the Jersey shore.

I watch the flag from the side yard after lunch, where I sit along the steep inlet water way and throw rocks at a horseshoe crab lurking at the foot of the long latter to the sound three feet below. The wind whips hard, flapping the fabric over and over, holding the material straight, then swirling, then letting it go for a second before another gust pulls the stripes smooth again.

My brother watches with me for a minute before grabbling a life jacket and walking the dock to the sunfish sailboat, tied down as if it knows nothing of the wind. He climbs aboard saying, "Don't you wanta come?" I scold him and say, "You need to ask mom if its okay." He throws the rope that hold the boat to land and pushes the rudder down, steering towards the open ocean. I tell myself that he can sail alone because he looks like he is older than thirteen.

I see the big lumbering army crab hover at the ladder and I climb down the steps, dunk under, eyes closed, and grab the long triangle shaped tail. I pull the monster up and feel legs flail against my chest. The moment I get to the air, my arm muscles strain and I fight the possibility of it attacking. I have him and I hold tightly as he flits bits everywhere. I picture my dad at the beach when he tried to scare me by walking towards me holding one over his face like a mask, when I was six. Should I smash this one against the cement wall? Where are the eyes? Does he have anyone who will miss him? Is he really a mother, looking to feed babies? Would I cause her to abandon someone for my own freedom to walk tippy toe along the edge of the wall without it's body getting my feet? It is just shell and legs and nothing more, I decide, swinging it backwards as if to prepare a pendulum that will make it crash into it's death. The pole in my fist is sharp and the creature throws itself backwards on the out-swing, causing me to to lose my grip. It falls, dive bomb style against the water, back breaking the surface, splash squirting my eyes with salt. I close and scream in pain. When I test my sight, squinting to see light on the water, the bottom looks murky and the creature is gone.

The flag stops banging momentarily and falls limp against the pole. The sun sizzles my shoulders and nose and I lie stomach down on the rocks and watching the horizon for the boat to return.

*Note: The first line was taken from Capriccio In E Minor For Blowfly and String, by Paul Muldoon from Sugar House Review.

Tough God

This month I have been trying to make God make sense. My dilemma with a good God is that I can't figure out how he can be in my court, when I am not following him. In much of the Old Testament, God is letting people die. I read story after story to my three year old about mass destruction, Noah's Ark, Joshua conquering Jericho, Pharaoh's army being covered by the sea,  David killing the giant. In studying the book of Amos, I learn that God finally says to his people, this is it, I am not going to listen or relent, i.e. the dialogue is over and now many people are going to be wiped out.

I believe that God is just and perfect in his love, but I don't understand how I fit, because what I do leads me to think I should be punished. What can he be thinking when I try to ignore my screaming kids for 5 more minutes in bed. Does he want this world, this way? I have to think, "No." Does he have a choice about what happens, "I believe he does."

Last week I ask some friends why God created us, when it feels like we never do anything right. One said, why did you become a parent? I know that Christ died for my sin, so the equation changed. That God does label me by what I do, but sees Christ death as the payment for my selfishness. I know that I choose kids, even though I struggle in it and that terrible things will happen to them in their lives. I don't want to live on the set "The Truman Show," all happy and fake.

I want the raw and the pain and God's word saying, even though you have done it again, "I will relent." I want to hear him say, "Sonia, I want to know you and be with you despite everything you did today. " I feel the same in responding, "Despite your wrath and even knowing I have to accept Christ died on my behalf, I can love and not fear my future, or that of my kids. I could lose the things most precious to me and be rejected by everyone I care about, but God will not leave me. Today, I reach for that.

Starting Over Again Again

I ran two consecutive days last week, after taking a year and a half off. Many people ask me if I am running and I end up looking at my feet and wishing I could say yes. With my depression, my husband asked what I thought I needed and my instant response was I need to run. It feels great and hard and freeing.

Once I have run a few days, I instantly think ahead to two weeks out when it will feel simple, a month out when I can play with speed and hills and distance to become faster. Then my mind gets lost in what feels unattainable, too difficult, and I lose my grip on the experience itself. The cycle of starting my engine after years off, of my propensity to quit over and over, make me wonder if my body will seize up on me this time, the way our van did when it ran out of oil, rendering it totaled.

I relay this to wanting to play the guitar, which I also wish I could do. I have taken lessons a few times but the idea of having to start again, knowing it will be slow and hard and I may never sound good, leaves me feeling tired, distracted, disillusioned and then drives me to quit before I even get my guitar out.

Maybe Spring is about renewed hope in growing and changing me. I expect that the acts of making, doing, working creatively might cure me of the holes that apathy bring. I knowing I will start, dream big, stop a thousand more times, but I may get a bit closer to what matters. I enjoy believing in myself, but I hate the idea that I will fail one more time. In my head I know that a part of me has to choose being in the struggle; letting go of any other hope beyond creating from where I am now. I should redefine success to be the act of creating in this moment as the end goal. Rather than wish I were confident, brilliant, accomplished, belting James Taylor from my porch while my kids rid around the circle, I want to enjoy doing basic music ladders and making up my own lyrics about the orchestra of frogs in the retention pond.

The truth is that running or writing or playing my five chords wake up my brain. They allow me to observe beauty and see the world with fresh eyes. In one 35 minute run, I can write five blogs, processed all the voices in my head that are vying for my attention and dreaming about possibilities.

Fritos

I recently bought Fritos for a good-buy party for a good friend from church. They were on sale and made me think about my mom. She loved them along with butter pecan ice cream, Triscuits, mound bars, raspberries and hot water. The description on the front of the Fritos bag read all natural, gluten free, no trans fats, so I believe them to be a health snack that I can enjoy without guilt.

My cousin told me that my grandmother began buying at the age of 90, after my grandfather passed away. She would pull out a bag, pour a few into a little bowl and enjoy them with her afternoon coffee. She said, "I like to take a few of these in the afternoon. I never bought them when Tigger (her husband) was alive, because he didn't care for them. She sacrificed for sixty some years, tolerating his bugles instead. I am guessing that he did not even know that she liked them.

I think about that as I enter my 13th year of marriage. What have I given up that I might really enjoy, artichokes, lobster, control of our finances, hiking, dance classes? A 26 year old neighbors son asked me to go salsa dancing saying, since you are married, being your partner wouldn't be weird. But the truth is, I kinda want to dance with my husband, and for him to want to go Scottish dancing, swing dancing, even though it might not be cool, or to just slow dance in some cheesy dance hall.

My husband is always saying, eat what you want, dance, hike! The trouble is that I want to do those things with him, but the him who would agree to enjoy it, if that is even possible. Maybe this is the year I will become more secure in my adventures and go off to do them without needing approval or to be accompanied.

At a minimum, I would like to put some dreams on the board to work toward. I know they might never happen and some will take years to manage, but here goes.

- Be in each moment with my kids - Enjoying our time together! (writing it and living in it)
- Get out of debt and start saving
- Tithe consistently
- Settle on a regular writing schedule
- Plan and take a hike
- Buy some piece of clothing that feels like me
- Co-managing our family finances
- Read one book from my mom's list - God of Small Things
- Subscribe to and read a lit magazine (and submit work to it)
- Run
- Make art
- Play Guitar

I know I can't do them all today, but having a point to shoot for gets me closer. Looking over my list, they all speak of a kind of rhythm that I long for in my weeks.

Planting

I planted raspberries at the top of the hill in my back yard tonight. It took hauling in dirt, wood chips, 15 little plants and a lot of digging and mixing.  I have never had my own land, so it is exciting to look out my window and see the red line, where the pine mulch surrounds my hope of fresh fruit this summer. We had them growing up and my mom and I would collect a few every day for most of the summer. It is a way to remember the colorful spaces that she and my dad created for us.

Being the Odd Woman Out

I have worked many jobs in my 35 years. In them, I live by the motto, I will figure it out. The insurmountables were overcome as I stumbled through financial formulas in Excel, developed courses in communications and fired several people while being empathetic.

In each role, I have had to pretend I was competent until others and I believed it. Running for Nike, working in HR and now being in a "mom" role are challenging. My skills are not the traditional ones you would seek out if you were looking to hire in the exacting work they require. Each has a lot to do with planning, hyper-sensitivity and having the ego of an expert.

It is not that I can't have an ego, but it takes an hour of looking in the mirror and saying the, "I'm good enough, smart enough and people like me" speech first.  The confidence does not last longer than the event I target and so I go back to being a nervous reck until I launch into the psych up process all over again.

The irony is that I love an audience. There is nothing better than reading my work to a class or talking in front of a group. It gets me all pumped up. This blog is a thrill to write, because you are reading. I just reviewed my hits to this site for the first time and am floored that at one point I had 183 viewers, which makes me feel like sprinting around my circle while screaming at the top of my lungs!

Two weeks ago when I spoke at my Mom's Group, I remembered my love of an audience first hand. I had three things to share about starting a Freezer Meal Club. Here is the gist: 1) If I were to decide which sister I was between Martha and Mary (from the Bible), I would have to say I am the third sister, sitting in my room with a book. 2) If I were being considered for the job of "mom" based on what I perceive to be the job description, I would never be hired. All the planning, organizing, cleaning, disciplining and directing do not come easily. My mom didn't care about that stuff and neither do I. I watch other moms do the grunt work with the grace and ease of a ballerina pirouetting across the stage. It is not even that I am choosing to spend more time with my kids over these things as I often sit in anxious land worrying about how I will get those freezer meals made for tonight, finish the book I am to lead at book club tonight, and handle the basic needs of my family. 3) Freezer meals and babysitting co-ops and any number of other support systems are about sharing the load. I wonder why parenting is not more corporate in that I could share resources and strengths, while strategizing on the stuff I am not interested in, to make the whole situation more enjoyable. I love group planning, generating the ideas for businesses, food prep, childcare or writing. I would love to have a joint play-group and clean house event, where we could make housework about socializing over isolated manual labor. I work best with others, and thus, wonder what I am doing at home alone with my kids.

All I can think is that God has a sense of humor and is wanting me to grow more dependent on him and to let go of the formula's of others. I don't have to work inside anyone else's job description. I am my own boss and can make up my own rules! That being said, if anyone wants to have a cleaning house party or a monthly meal planning event, I am in!

The Editing Process

On Wednesday, I met with my writing coach to do an in-depth edit of a short story. I had my ten month old and three year old in tough and traveled over an hour to hit my destination, Lansing, MI. Once inside Decker Coffee, my baby was happy roaming around the coaches and entertaining himself. My three year old was the opposite, repeatedly asked if we could leave and edging towards the door. He was terrified of the the skeletons and big alien eyes of the heads painted in black and white and red art pieces littering the the walls. Every day since, he has told me he does not want to go back to Decker's.

In the midst of that, my coach and I managed to do a line by line review, where in some cases, each word in a sentence was examined. My piece included many words like, "it" and "that," where we talked about giving the reader more concrete descriptions. I noticed how the sentence structures were often repetitive. Then there were tenses to play with, hyphens to add and an endless list of ideas for making my work stronger.

I have also been reading a lot of short stories to try and understand what makes a good one (i.e. how do I write like others so that I can get published). I feel like I am staring over a huge valley, knowing Atlantis is hidden in the trees or clouds and that the only way to the promised land is by bushwhacking with a large machete and a good pair of boots.

I sit in a similar quandary about reaching God. I know it is not about building the Tower of Babel, but I watch my friends from church "working out their salvation" in how they live, serve and share themselves authentically and I feel like I am 10,000 miles from reaching their circle of faith.

I am guessing at the way forward being things like, running, a therapist, writing, me showing up in the dialogue of this entry, showing up to find the plants worth tilling the desert in my soul. I have been avoiding my desk since the Wednesday's sit down. Likewise I have been avoiding God, because I am afraid that I don't have what it takes to make it through the wilderness to some brilliant understanding on the other side. I know that there are only two choices though, sit here in fear, or put on my running shoes and attempt the impossible in writing one word to get me closer to experiencing God.

One Hope to Fill the Void of This Day

I am all emotion spilling out of my weekend of late nights and good-byes. I have looked the deep void within my soul in the eyes and I am afraid. The eyes that as a child would watch couples kissing and think they were so happy, making me want the same attention.

I watched Water for Elephants and the main character's chief aim in life becomes satisfying his wife with every good thing she never had before their embrace. In the end she dies and leaves him anyway. I look to friends, my husband, buying more stuff, anything to plug the great obis that cries out for me to fill it with white noise. I want it to scream up at me things like, "you are not alone," "I desire you," "i'm not going to leave you," but the truth is, no words can reassure me. Even in making my husband repeat back what I believe are words of reassurance, they echo around my head and I keep grasping for more words, stronger words, better phrases that can fill me. With twelve years and 12,000 I love you's I still doubt my ability to be loved. All the insecurities and attempts at finding the exact right kiss feels like a chasing after the wind.

Today I sit at Jesus's feet knowing that to truely be free of this, I have to accept the "brutal reality" that even if I lose everything, my husband, my kids, my mom, my friends and am completely alone, I still have "fierce hope." I can only know for certain that Jesus will never leave me and desires me and loves me and that is it. So I just need to be with Him, because every other thought makes me frantic to the point of breaking.

So today I put down his words:
Psalm 121
I will life up my eyes to the mountain;
From where shall my help come? (everyone around me? NO)
My help comes from [you] Lord;
[You] who made heaven and earth.
[You] who will not allow [my] foot to slip;
[You] who keep [me] will not slumber.
Behold [You] who keep Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.

[You] are my keeper;
[You] are my shade at [my] right hand.
The sun will not smite [me] by day,
Nor the mood by night.
[You] will protect [me] from all evil;
[You] will keep my soul.
[You] will guard [my] going out and [my] coming in from this time forth and forever.

(paraphrased from New American Standard Version)