I woke up this morning to the news that Margaret Thatcher is dead. Good. I hate very few people, I hate Margaret Thatcher and I’m damn glad she’s dead. I’d love to be able to rise above that feeling, because hate is not a good thing, I guess I will eventually. But I have no sympathy for her, no compassion for any suffering she experienced.
That’s not really the point of this blog though. The point is that I am gobsmacked at the number of people who call themselves progressives but who seem to hold her in high regard. What. The. Everloving. Hell? WHY? I cannot for the life of me understand, but I have a theory. I think she gets a pass because she’s a woman. I think when many progressives look at her they don’t see a politician whose policies gutted trade unions, who refused to enact sanctions against Apartheid South Africa, who rubbed elbows and had tea with Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, who supported the homophobic Section 28 law, and who was a war hawk whose BFF was Ronald Reagan. They see a woman who held power. But, FFS, what did she do with that power? What is it about this woman that you admire? She was a woman, the only female Prime Minister of Great Britain, I get that. But if it were a man who had done these things she would not be revered by progressives, she would be reviled.
Think about it. You support someone because of their body bits? You fondly remember a politician not because of the things they believed, or the things that they achieved, but because they had lady parts? In what universe does that make even a lick of sense? This is why identity politics sucks. Honestly, you cannot even call yourself a progressive and admire her rise to power, woman or not, because think of how shedidit –on the backs of poor and working class people (there is a reason she was called “Thatcher the Milk Snatcher,” people!), on the backs of people struggling for freedom and equality, on the backs of people whose own government terrorized them, on the backs of Irish hunger strikers, and of the Irish people. While the world looked on in horror, her refusal to acknowledge that Bobby Sands, and others like him, were political prisoners and not common criminals led to their deaths (and anyone who wants to hound them for going on hunger strike in protest, please kindly read the cultural and political history of the hunger strike in Ireland here).
So come on, people! Look past her sex and to her actions, to what she stood for, to how she behaved while she was in power. Her legacy is not one that progressives should be putting on a pedestal, it flies in the face of the things we are supposed to hold most dear–equality, social justice, caring for one another, compassion, kindness. Truly, people, wipe off those rose colored glasses and see her as a person, not as a woman. To do otherwise is just sexist.
Yesterday we made our fourth trip to Parque Nacional Braulio Carillo, where everything seems to grow bigger, including the spiders, eeeek!
There is a picnic shelter that our daughter refuses to enter, she’d rather stand in the rain, because the underside of the roof is covered in these spiders.
As gorgeous as the beaches are here, I’m a mountain girl and I’d rather put on a pair of hiking boots than a bathing suit (and not just because my 41st birthday is sneaking up behind me). This particular national park is the perfect spot for a nice hike, an easy hour’s drive from our home as long as the dear hubby doesn’t try one of his infamous “shortcuts,” which he did not this time. There are two trails, both easy enough for our six year old to run along and lead the expedition– at least until he remembered there are big cats in the park, which might have happened when his panicked mother lost sight of him and started screeching “BIG CATS, RILEY, BIG CATS!” at which point he turned tailed, deciding he didn’t want to be line leader anymore and the middle suited him just fine.
I didn’t hold out much hope for our trip because this is what our drive looked like once we gained a bit of elevation:
It’s been a running joke between my husband and myself from before we were married that every outing we take always ends up in rain so “just another Turner family outing” has become our mantra. “Oh! Look! It’s that fun horizontal rain we love so much, honey!” “Yup, just another Turner family outing!” The nice thing about hiking in the rainforest, though, is that all the trees and leaves are massive so, unless it is truly pissing down, it’s still doable to hike in the rain and not be misearable. Plus, the rewards are worth it. Gorgeous scenery:
They don’t call it the Rio Sucio (dirty river) for nothing! Volcanic minerals are responsible for the color of the water.
Trees and mist, a lovely combo!
Flowers and plant life that resemble aliens:
Not a clue what this is but it’s pretty cool looking
There is a bug in this one, which I didn’t notice until I looked at the photo more closely–well done with the camo and thanks for not attacking my nose!
When we’re very lucky we see some wildlife:
Well camo’d frog
Fast moving, slightly pissed off, monkeys are hard to capture on film …
Despite the cover of the massive foliage, after an hour or so of hiking, we were quite soaked and chilled so we headed over to one of our favorite restaurants, La Fonda, right outside the boundaries of the park. It is a lovely Argentinian grill where everything is cooked on an open wood fire–and the fresh off the grill food is perfect for warming cold hands:
Freshly grilled cheese and veggies, perfect for hand warming!
All in all Braulio Carillo is a gorgeous way to spend a day. The pandas approve …
And Ry gives it two crazy peace signs up, it’s a win!
Two months from now my family and I will be back in Ireland, where we lived for close to three and a half years, and I am beyond excited! I am “OHMYGODICAN’TBELIEVEWE’REGOINGBACK!” excited. I am excited to the point where, when I think about it, my heart actually starts to beat a little harder and I get a stupid grin on my face. If I think about it in public strangers likely worry about my sanity as I stare off into space with what is probably a creepy, euphoric, “pull the children in close to you and don’t make eye contact,” look on my face. We have an awesome trip planned, all accommodation reservations have been made, friends have been notified of our dates, (SQUUUEEEE!), lists of “we have to go back here” have been started, revamped, and added on to several times.
First we are spending a week in Donegal and renting the lovely, traditional Fawn Cottage. I have to stop myself from looking at its website anymore because the drool is causing a rash on my chin. Cannot. Wait. Then we head over ancient homestead way and spend a few days in Blacksod Bay, where will will be staying with our friend Hannah, who is loads of fun and owns the best B & B in County Mayo (Leim Siar, check it out!). Visiting this part of Ireland is always very special for us, we get to see family, bring flowers to the graves of my great-great grandparents, drive by the cottage where my great-grandmother was born and raised, and stroll through Belmullet where every other shop has the name of O’Reilly on its front. My great-grandfather was a Reilly and our youngest, named Riley in honor of my family, feels like a king marching through those streets, chuffed that everything is named for him.
Our last stop is Dublin, it gives me a topsy turvey stomach just to type that because Dublin is, hands down, my very favorite city. We’ll be staying in Temple Bar in an apartment above the iconic Oliver St. John Gogarty pub. One of my Dublin friends teased me not to forget my ear plugs and I know he’s right but I’m so excited to be in the middle of that dynamic city! Just to stroll the cobblestone streets of Temple Bar in the morning with a coffee from my favorite little coffee house, to window browse on Grafton Street, picnic in Stephen’s Green, visit our favorite restaurants (if you’re ever in Dublin DO NOT miss a chance to eat at Urban Picnic in George’s St. Arcade, the food is phenomenal and inexpensive), heaven! I’m itching to go back to the museums where I spent countless rainy afternoons wandering, I’m pretty sure there was a meeting about putting my name on a chair in the room of the National Gallery where the paintings of Jack Yeats are hung because I spent so much time immersing myself in his work. Hopping the DART train to little coastal villages where we can sit with a properly poured Guiness and a heaping plate of chips, again, heaven! I could go on but that drool thing is kicking in and my chin needs a break. An Irish friend of mine sent me a text after I told him I was blogging about our trip that read “You got it bad!” He’s not remotely exaggerating.
So, Ireland is amazing, everything about it. The natural beauty, the vibrant cities, the warmth of the people, it’s got everything I feel I need in a country in order to be truly happy, and the hubby and I fully intend to plant our creaky butts in a tiny cottage on the coast of Donegal when the time comes to retire. But it’s also far more. We first visited Ireland eight years ago when my father, now retired from the Foreign Service, and step-mother were posted to our embassy in Dublin. We stayed for five weeks, had an incredible time, and my memories of that trip, like many memories I have of Ireland, are in technicolor. I savored every sight, every smell, every taste, every hug, every raindrop. Each experience, down to the smallest detail, was carefully tucked away by my brain, which often has trouble remembering why I’ve walked into a room so this is saying something.
The highlight of a trip full of highlights was when we went to Belmullet. Visiting the place where I was rooted, where my children were rooted, made me feel something I have difficulty putting into words. I was raised to feel a deep connection to Ireland; my grandmother felt it gave me a sense of history, an understanding of myself, and that it was important to remember the sacrifices my great-grandparents made in coming to a new country, leaving behind the place, and family, that they loved. Growing up I was surrounded by Ireland–the music, writings, folklore, photos, heirlooms, family stories–so walking the shores of the Atlantic, knowing that I was on the land of my ancestors, was something I did with great reverence. I remember crouching down to softy stroke the earth, overwhelmed by a sense of belonging to something greater than myself, feeling tears sting my eyes because it was the only way my body had to respond to such a piercing sense of place. Being able to tell my children “this is where it all started, this is how you came to be,” well, when I think about it I still get tears in my eyes.
The purpose of our trip to Belmullet, other than to visit the place of our roots, is a sacred memory for all of us. On a cold and blustery Sunday we went with my folks and our children to a tiny church whose priest, my cousin Liam, baptized our daughter. The church was empty except for us, the scent of the incense Liam had used in mass hung in the air, the wind roared outside, and I’d never felt such a sense of peace. I remember listening to Liam softly recite the baptismal rites in both Irish and English, remember watching him tenderly bathe Aisleen’s soft hair in water from the font, remember him smiling at our oldest, also a Liam, as he ruffled his hair and said he had the best name in the world. That afternoon is one of the most special we have spent as a family, my husband and I still talk about it and how it was a turning point in our lives and our communal sense of self. We have a baptismal certificate for Aisleen from the same parish as the baptismal certificate of my great-grandmother, it’s a special thing.
Our lives as nomads can be a whirlwind of adventure. They can be full of incredible, once-in-a-lifetime experiences. They can also be lonely and isolated because we are usually very far from family and friends. My husband and I struggle to give our children a sense of belonging and to nurture the roots that we gently uncover, pull up, and travel with every few years. It isn’t always easy and our kids sometimes have difficulty understanding that they have a nationality, they are American. They feel connected to the US, they love going home and seeing family and friends, but they also live with the realization that they are children of the world and in many ways their roots are global. They feel a deep and binding connection to Ireland. I know it is in part because we lived there for a good chunk of time, in fact it is the first “home” that our younger two remember. It is also because it is so much a part of me that it is an easy love for me to nurture in them, but they have their own love for it and, most importantly, they know in a tangible way the story of them started there. They’ve been shaped and molded by their experiences there–long afternoons spent racing through rolling, green hills, early evenings spent in conversation in front of a roaring fire in our cousin’s home, countless days spent on beaches where they swam until their teeth chattered and we would fold them in their towels for a warming snuggle. Their imaginations have been fertilized by abandoned famine villages, ancient castles of the Pirate Queen, hikes through forests where pookas are said to roam. So, while America is their home, Ireland is also their home, and being able to go back in two months is an incredible gift.
I was chatting with a friend of mine with whom we are planning a mad night of fun in Dublin and he said “Heather, we will give ye a proper homecoming!” A homecoming. That has such a lovely ring to it …
Top Ten Reasons Why My Awesome MIL Should Visit Us (in no particular order):
1. Beautiful Weather: They don’t call the weather around San Jose “Eternal Spring” for nothing! The average temperature in the valley is between 78-82 degrees and even during the rainy season it’s sunny most of the time. The times it is raining make it perfect for napping!
2. Fresh Mountain Breezes: Our house is high in the hills which means that there is always a lovely breeze to enjoy. I find it meditative to just sit and watch the windmills on the mountains by our house, it’s soothing for some reason. Which leads me to number three …
3. Three Lovely Outdoor Sitting Areas: The gazebo by the pool has a table and chairs, lovely smelling lavender, and plenty of flowers to dead head. The back patio has two comfy lounge chairs that are perfect for an afternoon nap, and the terrace has two big adirondack chairs and a Buddha fountain, can’t get more relaxing than that!
4. Lots of Cats to Pet, Love, and Brush: Most of them are sane. Crazy Soshi is a different story …
5. You Can Perfect Your Spanish: Who doesn’t want to squeeze in a foreign language? It’s enriching!
6. Liam:
7. Aisleen:
Riley:
Smiling Riley!
9. A DIL Who is Crazy About You:
10. Last But Not Least, This Guy:
The awesome hubby and dogs
So, there ya have it! My case for why my wonderful mother-in-law should come visit us and stay for as long as she wants. Just rest, relax, read, enjoy the grandkids, and soak in the tropics! Come to Costa Rica …
I’m not much of a football fan, more of a rugby girl, but football is a big deal in my house, more to the point the Baltimore Ravens are a big deal in my house. I married a Baltimore man who has passed on his love (or obsession, you know, whatever) for football and the Ravens to our children. While I love that the hubby and the kids get the chance to bond over football, and I find no small amount of amusement listening to them yell at an inanimate object while watching a game, game time was always just “me” time–time to read a book or do my nails since I had zero interest in football. Then I learned that several of the players on the Ravens are involved with an awesome campaign called Show Your Soft Side, which promotes kindness towards animals, and I immediately went from “don’t care a bit about football” to “awww, how can you not love a bunch of big, tough softies and want them to win?” I mean, seriously, how can you not love this
Torrey Smith with his ridiculously adorable dogs
I even sat down and watched a game when the Ravens played the Eagles, in part because I took great pleasure in watching Michael Vick get the snot sacked out of him by the Softies (as the Show Your Soft Side guys are called). I’m not usually an advocate for violent retribution but I make an exception for Vick and his dog torturing, dog fighting ass.
Each time a photo from the Show Your Soft Side campaign pops up in my FB feed I smile. Far too often we only hear about the bad things that happen in cities like Baltimore, but it’s so important to focus also on the good that people do in order to combat cruelty and promote kindness. As I started learning more about the ways in which these Softies not only promote compassion towards animals but also involve themselves in their communities I found myself slipping deeper in love. A shining example of this is Running Back Ray Rice who, when he learned about an 8-year old fan whose family lost their home and their pets in a fire, and the ways her school was rallying around them, decided to throw a school-wide party for the students. The girl’s mother said “It was shared with Ray Rice on his Facebook page. His publicist came out and contacted us immediately and he was touched by two things. He was touched by the kids kindness and the school because he is all about anti bullying, and about the pets, the loss of the pets.” I’ve never been someone who thinks that sports figures, or celebrities in general, should be held up as heroes simply for their talent but these are some awesome guys who have involved themselves in their communities and with campaigns that make a difference.
Which brings me to Brendon Ayanbadejo (you can find him on Twitter here). Ayanbadejo is not only a Softie but also an outspoken advocate for marriage equality which, particularly in the arena of professional sports, is a big freaking deal. In an editorial he wrote for the Huffington Post in 2009 Ayanbadejo wrote
If Britney Spears can party it up in Vegas with one of her boys and go get married on a whim and annul her marriage the next day, why can’t a loving same sex couple tie the knot? How could our society grant more rights to a heterosexual one night stand wedding in Vegas than a gay couple that has been together for 3, 5, 10 years of true love?
He also made this spot in support of marriage equality in Maryland
Apparently he and Viking Chris Kluwe, who backed Ayanbadejo up when he caught heat for being so outspoken about marriage equality, were even named Honorary Gays of the Year by GQ. I didn’t know that was a thing but I’m going with it.
So what’s my point, other than indulging in some post-Superbowl rah-rah for the first time ever? My point is that I LOVE to see these big, tough football players do tender things, love to see them speaking up for equality and kindness, love to see their acts of compassion, their dimensions, their depth, and to see them live with grace and courage (Wide Receiver Torrey Smith, who features in that first Softie photo up there, is a perfect example of living and playing with grace and courage.)
One lesson we’ve always driven home while watching sports with our kids is that you don’t succeed by giving up, or losing faith in yourself. You succeed by moving forward, sometimes slogging through. We’ve also stressed that success doesn’t always mean winning a prize or a game, it’s also defined by graciously accepting defeat, and by having the courage and determination to give whatever you are doing everything you have. So thank you, Softies, for being a great group of guys and for doing good things. I feel pretty darn good about holding these guys up as examples for my kids of good men doing good things. Congratulations on winning the Superbowl and we look forward to another season of you giving it everything you’ve got!
There are some people you come across in your life that seem larger than life, my hubby’s step-father was one of those people; a story-teller, an artist, a soldier, a builder, a world traveler, a husband, a father, a grandpop, a friend. Friday morning we learned of his passing, the time since then has been for shock, coping, crying, and, most of all, recalling the remarkable life that he led. I’ve spent a lot of time in chin-up mode, steering the children towards focusing on life instead of death but also, over and over, telling them that their grief is natural and, whatever course it takes, valid and personal. Hubby left for Baltimore to be with his mom and the rest of our family the day that we learned of Bill’s death. He needed to be with his mom as much as she needed him there and, since I could not love her more if she were my own mother, I was grateful for his going. I wish very much the children and I could have joined him, not being able to grieve with family and friends feels wrong, but not much we can do about that, we make the best of it. So I figured writing would help me sort things out a bit, we’ll see. I’m not the right person to paint a list of his accomplishments, or give a run-down of his life, but I want to put into writing some of my favorite memories of Bill.
Bill always greeted with hugs, kisses, smiles and a big “how ya doin’?!” He was one of those people I could not help but smile around, one of those people I always learned something from when I sat down and talked with him. He was famous for his shaggy dog stories and, in contrast to some other tellers of shaggy dog stories (I’m not naming names) his were masterful. Plus, he cold make his thumb “disappear,” which never ceased to fascinate the children. He had a toy parrot named Polly who, when you pressed its belly, said rude and vulgar things and made the children giggle at the naughtiness of it all, which made Bill burst into laughter. He always had something interesting and special to show the kids–a huge model city that took up an entire room, toy antique cars, a trinket he picked up on one of his travels–if grandpop was around, things were fun.
In the downstairs “powder room,” as he called it, of 2309 (the official title of the house he and my mother-in-law lived in) he painted a stunning four wall mural of the Fall of Icarus. “What I decided to do, after getting a pour of vodka and about 17 tubes of Prussian Blue …” is how he described the birth of the mural, it’s all very Bill. When the house was sold losing that room was, in the minds of many, an incredible loss. Luckily, Bill and my hubby’s brother documented the room and its creation:
One gorgeous Summer day Bill took my children into the backyard of 2309 and built a teepee from nothing but wooden sticks, rope, and a big tarp. It was pretty much the coolest teepee ever, sturdy, meticulously designed. When Liam, our oldest, asked if he could play with Bill’s hatchet in the teepee Bill, ever the indulgent grandfather, stopped and considered the request, mom and grandma Betsy quickly shouted out “NO!” in unison. Bill, shrugged and said something along the lines of “mom and grandmom have spoken, kid, sorry.”
On a cold, winter afternoon Bill brought Liam into the basement, where he had his studio, to build a birdhouse for us to hang in one of our trees once the Spring came. They were down there for hours, hammering and chatting, and I only panicked a little when I heard the electric saw start to whir.
The backyard of 2309 was also a place for making things go “BOOM!” Bill and our oldest would lovingly carry out cannons that Bill built (yes, built), along with an enormous supply of caps. I would watch them out there, placing the caps in the cannons, bracing myself when Bill shouted “FIRE IN THE HOLE!” and Liam repeated “FIRE IN THE HOLE!” BOOM! Followed by huge peals of laughter from Bill and Liam. Grandmom Betsy would smile and shake her head and I would giggle, feeling delight at the sheer joy my child was experiencing.
One of Bill’s cannons, in the process of being built
Right before we moved to Ireland we learned that we’d failed to cross a “t” with the paperwork for our cats, we had to start the incredibly arduous import process over from scratch, which resulted in a three month time gap between when we left for Ireland and when the cats could join us. Bill and Betsy welcomed our cats into their home. They had a cat door for their own cat, which proved a challenge since ours weren’t allowed out. But Bill, ever the engineer, built an enormous floor to ceiling wall that closed off an entire floor (with access for someone with thumbs) so our cats wouldn’t have to be confined to a room. We had one cat, however, who was an escape artist. No matter what Bill tweaked about the enclosure Arthur always got through, Bill started referring lovingly to him as “that son-of-a-bitch,”. Eventually, the cat door was barricaded and Arthur was set free to roam the house. I remember Bill saying to me “Say! Did you know that son-of-a-bitch likes Scotch?” No, Bill, I didn’t know that but it doesn’t surprise me.
One Spring Bill and Betsy came to visit us in Ireland. That was the Spring Bill became a local in our village, it took him about two days before he was accepted into the folds of the tribe at the village pub. The men would sit and talk for hours, I’m not quite sure about what but I’m positive, with Bill, diagrams lovingly drawn on napkins were involved. On his way home from the local he would stop off at the bakery, picking up various yummy treats for us–pies, cupcakes, muffins, he was thoughtful like that and delighted in seeing the children so happy. During that visit Bill also taught our children “perspective” in drawings. He sat with them, every morning, with his special artist pencil, patiently teaching them perspective. It was a lesson that stuck like glue and I don’t think there was a visit since then when the kids didn’t draw something for grandpop that used perspective. They would rush up to him, drawing in hand, and say “Look, Grandpa Bill! I used perspective!” He would take the drawing, look it over and say “Heeeey, kid, that’s pretty good!!”
Each time we visited Bill and Betsy we always went to Sabatino’s restaurant in Little Italy, sometimes for special occasions and sometimes just because. Bill ordered the Bookmaker’s salad every time, sharing it with Betsy. He would laugh at the children making funny faces at themselves in the mirrors of the restaurant, play peek-a-boo with them when they crawled under the table, and, when they got too rowdy, say something along the lines of “I think you’d better stop cause it looks to me like your mom might blow a gasket, kid.” He also never let the bottom of my wine glass show and always asked me, “how’s the food, kid?” Divine, as usual, Bill.
There are a lot more memories, and we will delight in them together, or with ourselves in the quiet, in the days and years to come. There will be more tears, disbelief, aching from the loss, but the nice thing about someone who was larger than life is that it’s very easy to keep them alive in your heart. Every memory I have of Bill, over the 17 years I knew him, is in technicolor–vivid, sharp, alive. Grief is a roller coaster, spinning, turning sharply, bouncing you when you least expect it. I figure I’ll hold on tight and let it take me where I am meant to go, hanging on to the fact that each slam, each twirl, each scream is only felt so strongly because of love. This morning, our daughter turned to me and said, “Momma, do you think Grandpa Bill is heaven’s artist now?” Yes, baby, I think he is. God speed, Bill, and thank you for a life well, and fully, lived.
Break it to my mom it’s all her fault that gun violence in our country is out of control.
Break it to my dad it’s on him too (I believe in spreading the love)
GAG
Of course, this isn’t the first time a politician has shifted the blame for all that is wrong with our country onto the shoulders of single parents, ahhhh, Dan Quayle, bless that tiny, shriveled pea passing for a brain in his noggin.
During the debate I was messaging with an Irish friend of mine, in part because he’s awesome and in part because I am always interested in what folks who aren’t American think of our politics. This was his response to Romney’s statement
ooooohhhh!!!! there he is again with the moms n dads thing!!!!!
single parent family more lio raise violent kidskely t
my keyboard just went backwards
I hate that point, it’s as backwards as me keyboard
Yea, couldn’t have summed it up better myself. Rather than addressing the question about gun violence in our country he meanders down a rambling road of, what? Moralizing? I don’t even know because my brain went “pop!” when he did the “just blame the single mommies” thing.
Then there was the whole charming “binders full of women” comment, the basis of which, turns out to be false. In my mind, however, that’s not even the offensive part of the whole quote (and it has resulted in some hilarity, which is awesome). In my opinion, this is the truly offensive quote:
We’re going to have to have employers in the new economy, in the economy I’m going to bring to play, that are going to be so anxious to get good workers they’re going to be anxious to hire women.
Wow. So anxious that they’ll even hire women? Gosh, we’re humbled, really. It’s not even the quotes, or the missteps, or the fumbles, it’s the ideas those things reflect. The idea that women are not capable of making decisions about our bodies, that fact that he won’t stand up for fair pay for women, the belief that we alone are the ones who need to be home to get that dinner on the table. Hey, you know who else likes to make dinner for his family? My husband. Yup. Sometimes he even does it without me in the room. Sometimes he even does it when, gasp, I’m. Not. Home. I know, it’s crazy.
So, damn. Nothing about last night’s debate surprised me. To be honest, I don’t even bother being personally offended by Romney because what’s the point? Plus, in contrast to what some people seem to think, single mothers, heck, mothers in general, can poke fun and put together things like this:
Romney’s views are, however, offensive. Simple as that. They’re also dangerous to women and, I don’t know about you, but I’m happy in 2012 and would prefer not to go back to the days of back alley abortions and even lower glass ceilings.
It’s also no surprise that I thought our President was awesome–strong, focused, detailed, even dressed Romney down nicely when he forcefully made this statement
The suggestion that anybody on my team, whether Secretary of State, our UN Ambassador, anybody on my team, would play politics or mislead when we’ve lost four of our own, Governor, is offensive. That’s not what we do, that’s not what I do as President, that’s not what I do as Commander-in-Chief.
In the end, because the political is personal, the first few seconds of the President’s answer to this question brought a huge, “OHMYGODHELOVESUS!,” grin to my face
Mr. President, you have our backs and we have yours. Forward!
Election season. Yea. Sometimes you just need to step back from it and bleach your brain out. So I’ve been thinking on the things that make me smile, that make me feel grateful. These are the bottom lines of my life, so to speak, the things or people that, when I think about everything that is hard or negative or wrong I remind myself of–yea, this sucks, yea, people can be crappy but my kids are safe, happy, and well loved; my husband is there for me, a true partner and a stunning example of unconditional love. Or they are the random focal points of my life, the things that help me come back to myself if I get upset, that lift me when I’m down, or just make me smile. I thought I would put a few of those things in this blog just to remind myself that they are far more important than any negativity and ignorance, that they impact my life in greater ways than random asshatery.
First in line is a very silly poem my husband and I wrote when I was pregnant with our first child, Liam, now eleven years old. Last night I stood in the doorway of our office and watched Liam typing away on the computer, hard at work on a project for school. It was one of those moments of clarity, “Whoa! Eleven. Wow.” How did that happen? He’s always seemed older than his years, he’s an old soul, that one. He’s also scary smart and his school here discovered that within about five minutes of meeting him, so they asked if we would be okay with moving him ahead a grade. We hemmed and hawed, a lot more went into it than is relevant for this particular blog piece, and agreed. He struggled academically last year, for the first time ever, it wasn’t a bad thing. He learned he had to work, be dedicated, be responsible. This year I’ve seen him rise to the challenge of seventh grade and, last night, he said “I’m not going to use my video game time today, too much homework.” Without grumbling, just this matter of fact statement. If you know any 11-year old boys you’ll know this is a big deal. Watching him mature into a young man who makes me very proud brought me back to this poem, written very close to his due date, when he was just a little creature kicking it in my womb:
Twas the night before Christmas and in our little house a tiny creature was stirring underneath Heather’s blouse
The hospital bag was packed with great care in hopes the sweet baby soon would be there
Parents-to-be snuggled warm in their bed while visions of dirty diapers danced in their heads
When suddenly in the quiet there arose such a clatter “Ouch! ouch!” “Is it labor?” “No, it’s just my bladder.”
“Patience, patience” said the Daddy, the Mommy just sighed. “Oh this waiting!” she exclaimed. She was fit to be tied
So on Otto, on Moya, on Arthur, and Guini! Please bring us labor pains and bring them aplenty
We’re waiting, you see, for this sweet little baby. Will he be here next week? Who knows! But, just maybe …
Next in line is this rug:
When my husband was serving in Iraq it was hard on our entire family, for whatever reason it was hardest on our middle child, who was seven. She had a tough time talking to him on Skype, I think it was just too taxing emotionally, and she would cry after because she missed him so much. Hardest was bedtime because he is the story reader, she didn’t even want me to read to her, I wasn’t daddy. One thing you should know so the rug makes sense is that she has a phenomenal imagination, she creates different characters for herself and weaves fables around those characters. So, on his first R & R, he brought her this rug. He told her it was a magic rug and that, when she sat on it and closed her eyes, she would fly on the rug to Iraq and they could be together. After he went back to Iraq I would see her sitting on the rug in her room with her eyes closed, a smile on her face because she was with her daddy.
Then there is the absolute silliness and charm of our youngest. This morning he was upset because he’d hurt his mouth, I was considering keeping him home. For a sore mouth. My husband just laughed, shook his head, and held up his little finger. “This is Ry.” Then he wrapped his other hand around his finger. “This is you.” Ha! It’s true though, for some reason that little one has me wrapped tightly (also, his grandfather, probably even more so, AMIRITE, Dad??). All I have to do is see his face and I smile. How could you not?
There’s also this, my husband leaves the flowers from our gardenias and roses on my bedside table so I see them when I wake up or when I am rushing around to get ready in the morning
To complete this list is the music of a man I discovered the first year we were living in Ireland. We’d gone to see one of my all time favorite musicians, Christy Moore, and this man was a guest of his–to say his music has been a cornerstone of my mental health since is a slight understatement. He is an incredibly gifted singer, songwriter, and musician but, more to the point for this list, he is a person with great compassion, empathy, and passion. He has a way of examining the difficulties of life, in the personal and political, and still remain unfailingly positive and whole. His grace shines through in his music and has lifted me many times:
Title track of his new album:
Rainy Night in Soho, written by Shane McGowan and covered beautifully by Damo here:
Interview that encapsulates, in three and a half minutes, why this man is so special:
So, there it is. This will be the piece I read during this election season when I get angry, frustrated, bogged down in the spins and nastiness. These people, memories, and things are my antidotes.
This morning I woke up, checked my e-mail, and was reminded that I am blessed in so many ways–not the least of which is I have a grandmother who sends me such beauty:
I have been glad that I traveled those nine months with the 29th and got to know and care for those men and their wives. It helped in those awful first years after Da came home. In the first year he went over every battle with me. He didn’t go into details on the horrors, but I think he just could not believe he survived. When we left the Beach he said he finally believed he survived. I knew wives who said it was over and they didn’t want to hear about it. I believed it helped that the loss of friends was personal to me and in a very small way I could grieve with him …World War Two soldiers didn’t talk about depression. They didn’t talk about the war. They went back to school, bought small houses, all with help from the GI Bill …
Enough of this. We have been God Blessed with our daughters, grand-daughters and the fulfillment of those special three. We’ve had great friends, loving family, wonderful trips. And, we’ve had each other, and that has been a beautiful reality …Always remember how precious you are to us.
My Nana and Da can pull at my heart in a way few others can, I don’t think I have to explain to anyone why that is.
Long before my time they made sacrifices that I have benefited from, long after my time our country will continue to benefit from those sacrifices. I have been the beneficiary, my children (“those special three”) have been the beneficiary, our country has been the beneficiary. You know who else has? And here is where the personal becomes political because, in the end, politics is about people and that makes it inherently personal: Mitt Romney has been the beneficiary. And he has the nerve to dismiss people like my grandparents, members of the greatest generation, as the 47% of folks who won’t vote for him so why should he be arsed to care about them. You know what, Mitt, you are an American and if you, God help us, become president, you will work for my grandparents and all the rest of the “victims” you can’t be bothered with. Our working class, our poor, our children, our elderly–the key word in that sentence, Mitt, is “our.” OUR, they are ours, they are citizens, they are people who scrape to get by, who don’t make enough money to pay federal taxes, or who, because we do some things right, don’t pay taxes on money they earn in a war zone fighting for their country, or money that they earned because they fought in battles 68 years ago that they were lucky to have survived. You dismiss them, you belittle them, you think they are so repugnant and that they feel “entitled.” Guess what, they are entitled. Entitled to a decent life, to be able to earn enough to not have to worry about feeding their kids, to a helping hand should they need it, and to some damn respect from you.
I was outraged when I watched that Romney video the first time but when I read the e-mail from my Nana this morning it dawned on me that he was talking about them and how fucking dare he. What, dear Mittens, have you done for our country that even begins to touch what my grandparents, and others like them, have done? Nothing. You, you self-righteous ass, are the one who feels that you are entitled. Guess what, you’re not. You are not entitled to be president because everything else has been handed to you, because you have money, because you are not one of those “victims,” not one of those disdained 47%. You pale in comparison to my Da and to my Nana and to others who serve our country in so many ways–soldiers, teachers, firefighters, police officers, those dreaded (ACK!) federal employees, volunteers, and everyone else who knows that there is a country bigger and greater than themselves that needs to be helped along. Come November sixth you will learn, as I think you are now, that the presidency of OUR country does not belong to you. Move on. And don’t let the door hit you in your entitled ass on the way out.
I’ve been trying to figure out why I’ve been out of sorts the past few days, aside from the obvious. Something was banging around in my brain, just below my line of conscious thought, but I could not figure out what it was. So much has gone ass over tea kettle, it was hard to know where to start …
First, there was the heinous attack on our Consulate in Benghazi, Libya that killed four of our own. Then it was like watching a landslide–anti-American protests at our embassies all over the Middle East, in North Africa, India, Indonesia, on and on. Every day there were more, still they continue. I knew I was very upset because of the deaths, that was something beyond articulation; I knew I was upset because of our flags being ripped down and destroyed, because members of our State Department family (both American and local staff) were/are in harm’s way, because it’s unsettling to watch angry mobs chant hateful things about a country you love. But, honestly, I’d seen much of that before and, while it upset me, I could tell there was something else getting to me, something concrete I couldn’t put my finger on. Then I had my moment of clarity, after my thoughts and feelings had been given time to bubble around in my brain, and I knew what was eating at me.
In our nearly eight years with the Department we’ve experienced a whole lot of changes, but one of the things that always stays the same is how I feel when I walk into an embassy, safe and at home. When my son, our driver, and I found ourselves tripping into a clash between protesters and police during the civil unrest in Guinea I knew if we could just get to the embassy we would be safe. We weren’t supposed to leave our house but our son, then six, was sick and needed to see the embassy nurse, so I’d made an executive decision to take a chance. We were five minutes from the embassy when Ousman slammed on the brakes, narrowly missing having our car pummeled by a large rock that pounded the road in front of us. Then came the gun shots. I reached into the back, where our son sat buckled into his car seat, and tried to push his head down between his knees while Ousman threw the car into reverse, driving like a bat out of hell, away from the flying rocks and gunfire. As we tore through bumpy side streets I radioed the Marine on duty at the embassy and told him what was happening, the calm with which he conducted himself helped ease my nerves and I reassured our son, “we’ll be safe when we get to the embassy.” We wound our way along dirt roads and, somehow (thanks to Ousman) found our way around the violence and to the embassy. I walked our son past the local guards, up to the Marine I’d spoken with, he was visibly relieved to see us, he greeted me with a smile and “It’s good to see you, ma’am.” I breathed a sign of relief, we were safe in the embassy.
Now I watch as our embassies around the world are under attack and, while we are very safe and sound where we are, something about witnessing all of this, even from halfway across the world, rocks my sense of personal safety. While dropping our kids off at school this morning I was talking to a friend, another mother whose husband is also an FSO. There was a loud bang inside the building and she startled, “what was that?” It was just someone moving a set of flags inside but I saw, then, that I was not the only one on edge. We laughed a little, we know it’s irrational, we know we’re safe here, but still …Today my husband is attending the well publicized docking of a US Naval ship and, because of what he does here, he is always very visible when he goes to those sorts of things. This morning I was seized by a fear that he wouldn’t be safe, I felt a little frantic, the docking was too public, too easy of a target. “Geez, Heather, he made it through a year in Iraq, you’re being totally irrational, you’re in Costa Rica for cripes sake,” but still …
My point in all this rambling is this, our embassies overseas are safe havens, we bring our children there, we gather with our fellow Americans there. I can walk through the doors of any embassy and be greeted by Marines, I can wander the halls and be surrounded by photos not just of our host country but also of home. It may sound kind of silly and sentimental but, despite the fact that our embassies are there for international diplomacy, they’ve always kind of been like a slice of home for me–safe, secure, nothing much changes from one to the next, it’s comforting. Of course they’re still all of that, embassies have been attacked, guard posts have been heavily damaged, entire motor pools have been burnt to the ground, but at each of our embassy compounds the main buildings, the chanceries, have been safe. I know this in the thinking part of my brain, but the primal part is panicking a bit.
This morning I learned that there were anti-American protests scheduled for Guinea, which I found shocking because we’d never seen even a shred of anti-American sentiment there, getting caught in the rock throwing was just a wrong time, wrong place event for us. Thankfully it appears to have ended up being a non-event, which is more in line with what I know about the Guinean people. But still … something had been planned and that felt like one more shard of glass in the armor I build around my family. “We’ll be safe when we get to the embassy,” that’s what I told my child, my child, the day of the rock throwing and gun shots. And we were, then. The uncertainty of tomorrow is what has me worried.
Torrey Smith with his ridiculously adorable dogs
