It's Time to Start Back Up

I suppose the kind thing would have been to blog that I was not going to be blogging for awhile. Back around the time of my last post I was having a hard time keeping up with everything. All the things I loved doing were becoming chores, which is always a good sign that stress is getting the upper hand.

There were several things I decided to put on hold so that my mind would quit pestering me to get them done. Blogging was one of those things. I had a couple other creative endeavors that needed immediate attention, so I decided to focus there.

All in all the conscious decision to let go was a good one. I'll have to practice it more often. I think I get pulled in so many directions at times that nothing gets done well. But until I say this, this and this is officially off the to-do list, those things continue to nag at me. I like the peace of the decision-making. Now to remember that.

Plus the creative cogs never stop turning. There is such thing as "gathering material" which translates into "living life."

The last three days especially would fall into that category.

I had two little girls staying in my house that carbonated my life. They were sparkly, bubbly, popping, always moving, rising to the surface and bursting then rising all over again. Never ending, streaming, joyful. I had forgotten a lot of the joy and wonder that comes in the package of little ones. The joy that comes from watching my older ones make their way through their own worlds is different, mostly I think because it is so apart from me. I'm not in the immediate picture with them, but with the five-and-under crowd, sharing is a big, big part of the process.

For example, one night at dinner the youngest (almost 3) was quite adamant she didn't want corn on the cob until, after everyone had finished and gone their separate ways, I sat down beside her while she finished her milk and started eating a lukewarm ear of corn.

"Wassat?"

"Corn."

It took awhile to digest that, but I believe she finally recognized the kernels. They just weren't in a pile on her plate.

"But wassat?" she asked again, pointing to the bite I had just taken out of the ear.

"That's where I bit the corn."

"But wassat?" She pointed again to the small area void of corn, this time poking it rather firmly. She wasn't going to stop until I understood what she was asking.

"That's the cob. This is corn (pointing to the yellow kernels) and this is the cob that holds the corn."

"Can I bite it?"

"Yes, you can bite it."

I handed the ear of corn to her. She tried to eat it like she eats bananas. Not from the end; she bit into the side close to where I had, but she did try to fit her mouth over as much as she possibly could before she bit.

Success! She chewed and thought and looked and thought and smiled and chewed some more before she turned the ear and asked, "Can I bite there?"

After I gave her the go ahead, she proceeded to eat about half an ear of corn on the cob completely at random. We've all heard the round-and-round or side-to-side preference for eating corn on the cob, but I have never before seen someone turn and bite just wherever they pleased. If it landed next to another bite, great. If not, better!

And grin! Those little chompers were so busy, but her lips could still smile and her blue eyes sparkled with delight.

When she'd had enough she said so and handed the ear back to me.

If we could just hold on to finding delight, opening our world to new and different things and simply enjoy the experience. Of course, at first she wanted no part of it. She'd already decided she didn't like corn, mostly I think because her big sister doesn't eat it. I think as adults we fall into a habit of doing that--refusing before we know because someone else--older, or "wiser" or who we looked up to--led in that direction. But in the end, she allowed the curiousity that developed later to lead her into experimenting.

Where do we lose that and why? Do we just not have the time as adults to indulge in the new and different? Or is it our adult arrogance that thinks we've pretty much experienced all that's important? Or is it the fear we learn when experimentation goes horribly wrong and we end up scolded or hurt or bruised from our "failure."

Not all experimentation is good. My mind goes instantly to drugs and sex. There are plenty of examples of what can and does go wrong that can deter that sort of experimentation from early ages. Thank goodness.

I'm talking more about learning. Taking up ballroom dancing because you've always wanted to do it. Forget the fact you can't afford it; rent videos from the library. Forget the fact that your husband hates it; draft the son who loves you and needs to move anyway. (Just promise him no one will ever know.) Forget the fact that you've always been clumsy. Perhaps dancing is just the thing you need to help dissolve some of that. You don't need to be a Fred Astaire or Ginger Rogers. All you need to do is try it. Let your eyes sparkle with delight. Who knows, in the process, you just might invent a whole new way to waltz.