a toddlery morning

I don't know that there's anything more joyful than running in a big field with a toddler. Little kids have the best grins, the biggest laughs, and the most willingness to have a rollicking fun time. And when they fall down, they laugh harder.

You can probably guess how I spent part of my morning. It was great.

Fall has been my favorite season for a long time, and being able to scamper outside through piles of leaves with a laughing munchkin makes it a zillion times better.

The crickets are singing.

The sound of crickets singing in the early evening is one of the most comforting things, like the smell of warmed honey or peony roses in summer. It's the sound of childhood nights: the window cracked open, a mercifully cool breeze finally starting to blow, clean feet tucked under the sheets, their day's worth of dust washed off in the old claw foot tub, and comic books pushed down the side of the mattress.

It's a sound I didn't hear for many years while living abroad. Another little thing in life to enjoy.

Goodbye, tree.

The box elder is coming down.

After a series of storms that have left its limbs broken, hanging and scraggly, the 50 foot box elder tree that hides between our garage and the neighbor's fence is coming down.

Sure, last year it dropped thousands of seeds all over our yard and clogged the gutters. Ok, the summer before that, it drew thousands of box elder bugs to our yard, and an entire side of the house turned red and black, blanketed with their soft little bodies. And, all right, some of them snuck in the windows. Yeah, and the whole thing is probably a hazard, ready to clunk down on the garage in the next wild windstorm that races through town.

It's just that it's such a pity to cut down a tree, especially on the prairie.

As a friend said the other night: the best times to plant a tree are 40 years ago, and today. It's time to think about planting.

On Kim Kardashian, pregnancy and image

Well, I sent this in to the local paper tonight. Let's see if they print it...

An Open Letter to Local Grocery Stores:

Let me start by saying that I’m 8 ½ months pregnant, which means that like many women in this stage in their pregnancy, I bear a strong resemblance to a July watermelon.

Sunday evening I stopped by Dan’s Supermarket in Arrowhead shopping center to pick up a few things for dinner. As I waited in line to pay for my groceries, I passed the time by scanning the magazine covers stacked next to the gum and chocolate bars. That’s when I saw the cover of In Touch Weekly magazine. This particular magazine featured a photo of a pregnant Kim Kardashian, dressed in a tank top and unzipped jacket. There was a blown up detail of her armpit. To be more specific, there was a blown up detail of a skin fold in her semi-exposed armpit, labeled with a supposed quote from Kim herself: ‘even my armpits are fat!’ The cover’s main text reads: “I’ll never be sexy again. Desperate after gaining 6 lbs in a week, pregnant Kim eyes an extreme liquid diet & resorts to even more drastic measures. PLUS her obsession with her teen sister’s body.”

Well now. There’s an unexpected punch in the gut for a pregnant lady.  

Here are the messages anyone could take away just from that magazine cover alone, without even looking at the story inside: Looks always trump health. It’s ok to scrutinize and criticize women’s bodies, no matter what their circumstances may be. Gaining weight during pregnancy is not acceptable. Fat, or even enlarged breast tissue in the armpit area is not ok when the body is preparing to lactate. Liquid diets are something a pregnant woman could reasonably consider in order to avoid gaining weight, never mind the effect on her growing child. Pregnant adult women should want to resemble teenage girls. Bottom line: Pregnant women should be ashamed of their changing bodies.

One could argue that the magazine is taking more of a ‘look at this wacky celebrity’s approach to pregnancy’ but even so, those negative messages are still there, blaring out from the newsstand.

Of course, this is just a symptom of the wider problem: the media’s treatment of women’s bodies, pregnant or not. We are to look a certain way, and our health and happiness is secondary to our looks. We are disgusting if we don’t fit the media’s mold, even when our bodies are nourishing a baby.

Here’s what I have to ask the grocery stores in Bismarck: why on earth do you stock offensive and damaging material in almost every checkout aisle? By displaying materials like this week’s issue of In Touch Weekly, your businesses are actively helping to distort the general public’s view of women, women’s view of themselves, and little girls’ expectations of their future looks. Let’s not forget pubescent and teenage girls, with their constant self-scrutiny. Is it kind to push these messages on them when all they came in for is a bag of oranges? At the very least, surely encouraging body dysmorphia and the eating disorders that come with it are bad for the food business.

Wouldn’t a special checkout counter with these magazines be more appropriate? Just like the cigarette counter, people who want to expose themselves to such nincompoopery could go out of their way to do so, leaving the rest of us to peacefully contemplate what kind of gum we want.

Even better, why not stop participating completely? Why not refuse to stock magazines that feature such ridiculous covers? If not for me (after all, I'm perfectly happy with my current watermelon shape), then for the legions of little girls who go home from the grocery store check-out line questioning the value of their own round little bodies.

On Women's Little Christmas, and why it's a brilliant idea.

Today is January 6^th, Epiphany, Three Kings Day: the last day of Christmas. And the twelfth day of Christmas. Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night? A play widely believed to have been written for tonight, the twelfth night of Christmas. Twelve drummers drumming? Today. We keep our Christmas tree, nativity scene, and decorations up until today is over… because it’s still Christmas and not, as the shops would have us believe, the start of the run-up to Valentine’s Day. Yes, I’m clinging, but what harm?

There’s a special aspect to today that I miss, which to my knowledge is only celebrated in the southwest of Ireland, especially in Cork and Kerry: Women’s Little Christmas (also known as Little Christmas, Little Women’s Christmas… you might get the idea). Today makes me think of the way women are celebrated on January 6^th in that part of the world: with free drinks and the teeniest of mince pies! What else could a girl want on a cold day?

So what’s the story? Well, you know that your mammy and your granny probably have always been in charge of the real Christmas goings-on every year, yes? The shopping, the wrapping, the hint-throwing, and the stocking stuffing, not to mention the cooking. All usually handled by a woman. What's more, they probably did something special (like feed you and everyone else within sight) for St Stephen’s Day, for New Years’ Eve, for New Years’ Day, etc etc etc.

Poor mammies, they’re probably exhausted by now with all the excitement of the Christmas season.

And so, the idea is to give the ladettes a day to put their feet up, have a day out, and get a few free drinks in.

I don’t need to convince you of what a fabulous idea this is.

Here was my experience of Women’s Little Christmas in years past: gaggles of women out on the streets, going from pub to pub. Inside, if there’s a fireplace, there is usually a fire roaring. The landlord pops over with some hot whiskeys, hot ports or hot brandies and a plate of mince pies for the gerruls – at no cost. It's a Little Christmas miracle! When you’ve finished, you either stay to have another one (which you have to pay for yourself, come on now) or abandon this lovely pub for another lovely pub, similarly full of women, firelight and warmth, and probably with a different beverage on offer.

And here’s what I say: like the Spanish siesta, the north islander eleven o’clock snack and four o’clock tea time, what a great idea. Why not bring it here? Americans could use more things to celebrate, and believe me, once you’re used to something (like elevenses, by golly) it’s hard to give it up completely.

So in an attempt to instate Women’s Little Christmas on the prairie, I’ll be swinging by the mammy’s with a bottle of port and a plate of cookies. Kettle on, oranges sliced, and we’ll be right as rain.

Happy Women's Christmas, laydeez. Go on, you'll have another one.

Salthill Prom, Seamus Heaney, and a poem.

It's only been an age since I last posted. Ah well.

Our city is wearing snow well this year, and just in time for Christmas, for everything resembles a Christmas card. The trees are coated in frost, the lawns are thick with white, and the moon shines brightly enough to illuminate a bedroom at night.

In between laundry and wrapping birthday presents and all the other things 'to do' this morning, I found a pocket sized notebook from my post-college days, when I was teaching in Galway. There are a few pages where I wrote about seeing Seamus Heaney do a reading on Salthill beach in 2006. It goes a little something like this:

Sun beating down, casting short shadows on the pavement. Jackets off, sweaters around the waist. A gathered crowd at Ladies' Beach. Schoolchildren form a sea of green uniforms.

A gentle breeze shifts the sands. An elderly man kicks a red football toward the brown seaweed scattered shore - his grandchild runs barefoot after it.

And Seamus Heaney, standing on the daisy studded verge between the strand and the street, began to speak of a poem written on the Salthill Prom: "the golden moment of 1965 when I saw them come out of the water, gleaming." Girls Bathing, Galway, 1965.

Wind blows strands of hair, strollers pause, hypnotized; dog leashes lay in the sand. Bicycles park along the wooden benches that run the length of the beach. Dogs lay on the sun-warmed pavement while some go on interrupted by poetry - by the poet. Schoolkids turn cartwheels in the grass, and photographers snap pictures.

Afterward, crowds gathered to get him to sign books, pages struggling in the Atlantic breeze. People wait patiently for his attention - a handshake, a scribble, a nod.

On being Pro-Life, all the way, in an election year.

Halloween has come and gone. Two trick or treaters, the only ones who came to our house, were given generous portions of candy. The rest... is mine. 

Meanwhile, we are counting down the days to the election. Some people are sick to the teeth of political ads, others can't get enough out of a good debate with friends and family, even more moan about the undecided voters, while some 'undecided' voters declare themselves independents who have long since decided, thank you very much.

Ah, polarity. It is usually strong, but right around now the strength that people feel their convictions is staggering, sometimes. It always comes as a surprise when friends open their mouths to chastise one another based on differing political opinion. 

This week the New York Times published an editorial called Why I'm Pro-Life, and it has been on my mind since I read it a few days ago. You may have seen it, it's made the rounds on Facebook, often posted by people who would not normally call themselves pro-life. 

Reading it was like a light turning on inside my head, a sunbeam splitting the clouds, a choir opening up into song. Thomas Friedman put into words what I have felt and thought since reaching the age where I could vote, but have been unable to articulate. He pinpointed the frustrations I feel as a voter, and a citizen. 

I suspect that I'm not alone in this.

In his article, Mr Friedman says:

"The term “pro-life” should be a shorthand for respect for the sanctity of life. But I will not let that label apply to people for whom sanctity for life begins at conception and ends at birth. What about the rest of life? Respect for the sanctity of life, if you believe that it begins at conception, cannot end at birth. That radical narrowing of our concern for the sanctity of life is leading to terrible distortions in our society."

He also says: 

"You don’t get to call yourself “pro-life” and want to shut down the Environmental Protection Agency, which ensures clean air and clean water, prevents childhood asthma, preserves biodiversity and combats climate change that could disrupt every life on the planet. You don’t get to call yourself “pro-life” and oppose programs like Head Start that provide basic education, health and nutrition for the most disadvantaged children. You can call yourself a “pro-conception-to-birth, indifferent-to-life conservative.” I will never refer to someone who pickets Planned Parenthood but lobbies against common-sense gun laws as “pro-life.”"

Here, here, Mr Friedman. 

This is why I have such a hard time in election years - the fact that neither party espouses these values fully - and friends have expressed the same dismay. Many are pro-life in the thorough way that Mr Friedman demands in his editorial. Personally speaking, my trouble comes from my conscience, which has me in turmoil until a week after I step out of the polling booth. 

See,  I have yet to find a candidate who is, like me, pro-life, Friedman style. That is, I'm a strongly anti-abortion, pro-gun control, anti-war, anti-death penalty, pro-social justice, pro-insurance reform, environmentalist, pro-gay equality, Catholic feminist voter.

Now I ask, where is my candidate? 

Where is my party?

Who can I vote for that will stand up for everything I hold to be important? For human rights from conception until death,  for quality of life, for respect for our land? Who can I vote for without making an enormous moral compromise?


*crickets* 


But I'll still vote. Always do.