of zen goddesses

Life’s seemed a little rough lately.

There’s Brad’s very sick grandmother whom we worry about. There’s the fact that the unit she’s in is housed inside our hospital and thus we run up to the 6th floor whenever we have a rare spare moment — which means that really there are NO spare moments anymore. There’s the fact that we often have family staying with us (which has been enjoyable. truly. i adore my mother-in-law) and the boys stay wound up and excited to have so much time with their Grammy.

There’s also the fact that work is crazily busy lately. There’s the fact that I’ve been working in the EP lab and loving it and learning so much that my brain feels full to bursting. There’s the fact that about a hundred zillion databases all have deadlines looming and somedays I feel like I will never catch up.

There’s the fact that the kids are back in school and we are helping them with homework every night and I am stressed because my youngest child seems to care less about learning to read and I don’t know how to motivate him. There’s the fact that that my oldest son is pre-pubescent and moody and he obsesses over his clothes and hair and takes three showers a day and can’t seem to remember to bring his lunch box home from school whereas his six year old brother never forgets.

There’s the fact that the new principal and I took an instant dislike to each other and now I am volunteering at the school because I am determined to charm my way into her good graces because I am convinced that her intentions are good and pure but she just has a very aggressive personality and off-putting communication style and I can totally relate to that. And, I am also volunteering because, you know, it is good to be involved in the kids’ school. Even though I am not very good with any kids except my own.

I could go on. But I like you all too much to do that to you.

Meanwhile, I went on a dinner date with my husband tonight and soaked in my jacuzzi tub and now I sit here with one of my puppies snuggled against my leg and I keep gazing upon one of my favorite sculptures of a beautiful woman in a flowing dress who is gracefully lunging forward and arching her back with her faced turned upward, toward the sky.

She looks like some sort of zen goddess and I just like looking at her.

lifting my voice

The thing I love most about blogging is the sense of community. My blogroll is full of links to other moms, nurses and medical professionals, bloggers who are about my age, and, of course, some of my lovely real-life friends.

If ever I start feeling like the challenges and speed bumps in my life are unique to me, all I have to do is click around for a few minutes before I am reminded that 1) there are very few new problems in the world, 2) there’s always someone whose challenges are greater than my own and 3)those someones usually deal with their challenges more creatively and less hysterically than I deal with my own.

The other thing I always notice when I click around? Damn, there are some awesomely talented writers out there!

Being a word nerd from the time I was knee-high to a grasshopper, I can definitely appreciate good writing. Being someone who aspires to be a mediocre writer and who knows exactly how difficult it can be to get one’s point across in print, I can also go green with envy when I read good writing.

I’ve been surfing around lately, looking for some new and interesting reading, and have not been disappointed with my finds. In fact, see my new Blogger Chicks blogroll in the sidebar. It is jam packed with insightful, funny, poignant, and entertaining blogs.

I could easily become a whacko blog groupie to Her Bad Mother, Slouching Mom, and Redneck Mommy. Then of course, there are the bloggers I’ve stalked admired for years like Sharon, Monty, Pammiecakes, and Jellyhead.

I’m rich, indeed, with so many fabulous blogs to read. The problem is, I could write every day for the rest of my life and come nowhere near having the talent that many of those bloggers have. The ease with which some of these writers can drag me with them through despair and sadness and, somehow, leave me inspired and challenged and, oftentimes, grinning or flat out belly laughing by the end of the post simply amazes me.

Writing a post in which one’s point is made, clear and true, and the reader’s attention is held until the very end is not as easy as it looks, I’m sure. The mark of a really good writer, I think, is when their readers are convinced that, given the opportunity, they could be best friends.

More times than I care to admit, I have found myself staring at my monitor, fingers hovered mid-air over the keys whilst chewing my bottom lip just waiting for inspiration to strike. Most often, it’s not inspiration, but anxiety and self-doubt, that strikes. I close my eyes, cradle my head in my hands, and slowly lower the screen on the laptop. It seems so overwhelming to write when I feel that I am a mediocre writer adrift in a sea of literary excellence.

I am trying to take a more positive approach starting here and now. I’ve yet to meet a writer who doesn’t suffer a little bit of anxiety before putting their work out for God and everybody to read and comment on. I’m certain that every single blogger whom I admire also admires other bloggers and writers and feels slightly inadequate in comparison.

So, I am going to try to remember that the beauty of the blogosphere is that there are so many unique voices and personalities in the mix. The bloggers I relate to most may not strike a chord with someone else. And as insecure as I am about my own writing (in)ability, someone else may read my site, relate, and feel a little less alone in the world.

I’m going to keep writing, keep asserting my personality, and keep lifting my voice for anyone who might want to hear it.

And for anyone who isn’t all that fond of my particular tone or style of writing, I’ll refer them to any of the talented writers in my sidebar in the hopes that they are lucky enough to find a writer to stalk admire, just as I have.

skidding

I like to grumble a little about being a harassed housewife and part-time nurse but the truth is that I am a very lucky girl.

And the reason I am a lucky girl?

Well, I have a hunky and attentive husband who earns a very decent living, treats me like a princess and still makes me feel like the sexiest, most beautiful woman alive. I have two handsome, intelligent, talented children who are still unashamed to give me hugs and kisses. I have a great job where I am well-respected and where I set my own schedule. I have the best friends a girl could ask for spread far and wide across the country and even across the globe. In fact, I received gifts in the mail from two of them today.

But none of those people are the reason I am luckier than most. For the purposes of this post, the proof positive of my above-average luckiness is that I have Raquel.

Raquel is a dream, a God-send, and proof that God loves me.

Raquel has worked for us for more than six years. I make out a paycheck to her once every two weeks but she’s really more like family than a household employee. We hired her when Crash was three months old and I had to return to work. Out of all the candidates interviewed to be his nanny, she was the only one who asked to hold him and who cooed and smiled and rocked him back and forth in that natural way that mothers have with babies.

To be honest, the language barrier was a little bit of a problem in the beginning. Raquel was born and raised in Mexico and her English was stuttering and broken when I met her. She even brought a family member to the interview to translate for her. It was easy to see, however, that the language she spoke and understood most fluently was that of love and kindness.

I put aside all of my purely cerebral concerns and beat down my anxieties and listened to my heart, my gut, and my intuition — and hired her.

She has loved my children like her own and I never hesitate to leave her with them. Crash spoke Spanish before he spoke English and I have long considered Raquel to be his second mother. Not because she spends all that much time with him — I only work part-time and she doesn’t see him that much during the school year. No, I consider her to be his second mother because of the emotional investment she has made in him and because of the trust he has placed in her.

And did I mention that she also cleans and does laundry? The older the kids get, the more they entertain themselves and Raquel has time on her hands. Instead of watching soap operas and eating cheese puffs, like some babysitters, she washes dishes, vacuums, does laundry, changes sheets and, oh yeah, cleans floors.

I heart her.

Speaking of the floors . . .

Yesterday afternoon, I came home to find the house looking especially sparkly. Raquel had done all of her usual magic but she had also swept and mopped the natural wood floors throughout most of the house. I was giddy with glee as I changed out of my work clothes into something more comfortable and fairly skipped on my bare feet into the hallway. With a smile still frozen onto my face, my feet flew out from under me, my arms flailed uselessly for a hand hold, and my rump and back thudded heavily onto the shiny wood floor.

Blimey, that floor was slick.

Later in the evening, I sat cross-legged on my bed, reading my e-mail when I heard someone say, “Whoa!” just as a human body skated on its heels past my bedroom and down the hallway until it finally hit the dog gate and, like me, landed on its arse with a thud.

Bump rubbed his posterior with a puzzled look and I just grinned a little and told him it might be a good idea to wear shoes in the house for the next few days. Later in the night, Crash was initiated into the club when he mimicked one of those cartoon falls you see where the feet slide in every which direction before the character finally lands face down with an Oomph!

None of us were hurt badly. In fact, all three of us giggled uncontrollably once we stopped skidding helplessly across the floor. It should be noted that Brad is the only member of this family who ever wears shoes in the house and thus he escaped our wibbly-wobbly fates.

All I could think as I brushed my teeth and headed for bed last night (after nearly falling again on my way in the bedroom but mercifully catching my balance mid-skid) was that, even when I am hydroplaning across the black ice that is my wood floor, I am still the luckiest girl in the world.

Because I have freshly laundered, folded piles of laundry waiting in the laundry room, a spotless kitchen, and children who are safe and happy. And even though the floors were a veritable oil slick? Well, they were clean and they got that way with absolutely no effort from me.

Ka-chow.