SHHHHHH

I have a secret...

lists, anxeity

I am making lists; lists of Max's food, needs, clothes, sleep; lists of packing to dos; lists of work to dos; ways not to be anxious, ways to be anxious, ways to sleep, ways not to sleep... the world will go on without me.. list or none.

Oh, and by the way, it is day 29 of my cycle, negative pregnancy test this morning but no period. Would be nice to know before I take off for Israel...

I am roasting...

red bliss potatoes in olive oil and sea salt. Everyone should have such a simple moment... the kitchen is warm, my nanny left early for Good Friday so Max and I chased the dinosaurs at the AMNH and came home to our dinner, (breakfast for dinner!) bath, bedtime routine. Now I await T's arrival home from work, making our dinner, drinking pinot grigio, snacking on Pennsylvania Dutch pretzels and piave vecchio, cooking tandoori chicken breasts and the aforementioned potatoes. Mellow, domestic and calm. The house is silent, save the drone of CNN on the TV, low enough not to understand, just to offer company.  Needed to stop and chronicle this moment of red bliss. 

Measure This!

"If we really want to do work that makes a difference...then we have to know whether it's working. And if you really do it well, you don't only want to know what works; you want to know how it works." -- Rockefeller Foundation president Judith Rodin ("For Good,Measure." New York Times Magazine 3/09/08)

Just not so sure how I feel about this ... the pro-measurables movement often makes me nervous. I have been in the identity building field and have been asked to assess success for donors and it is very hard, bordering on junk science. Yet, have been told that it is better to make it up than say that we don't know. I do not believe that. Some things defy the ruler, some things just are transformative without needing statistics.

Poem for South African Women

Our own shadows disappear as the feet of thousands

by the tens of thousands pound the fallow land

into new dust that

rising like a marvelous pollen will be

fertile

even as the first woman whispering

imagination to the trees around her made

for righteous fruit

from such deliberate defense of life

as no other still

will claim inferior to any other safety

in the world

The whispers too they

intimate to the inmost ear of every spirit

now aroused they

carousing in ferocious affirmation

of all peaceable and loving amplitude

sound a certainly unbounded heat

from a baptismal smoke where yes

there will be fire

And the babies cease alarm as mothers

raising arms

and heart high as the stars so far unseen

nevertheless hurl into the universe

a moving force

irreversible as light years

traveling to the open eye

And who will join this standing up

and the ones who stood without sweet company

will sing and sing

back into the mountains and

if necessary

even under the sea:

we are the ones we have been waiting for.

from Passion: New Poems, 1977-80, by June Jordan

monday, monday

As evidenced by the mohawks ... little buddy had a nice overnight with his cousin, and we had a heavenly weekend ... pizza by firelight, impressionists at the Clark, massages, reading, fancy dinner by firelight, napping, breakfast overlooking a duck pond. Just what we needed.

Max got into The Mandell School

10 schools, tours, applications (and their fees), interviews, recommendations, open houses ... and it is over and we got our first choice. Little Max is going to Mandell. We are soooo thrilled.

let it all collapse, let the ceiling fall down

A friend emailed me the above in response to my accounts of the flu... I love this. So I have, and I am feeling quite a bit better today. Still have not eaten since the great stomach revolt last night, have some soup to try later. T brought me my fav chicken corn from Shun Lee. Might actually venture out today ... need more Gatorade.

depressed

I have not left my house since Friday at noon. I am sick and we are supposed to go away this coming weekend, just the two of us. This flu is kicking my ass, and speaking of, I just tried to eat for the first time in days other than chicken broth and the stomach part of the flu kicked in. I could cry. I hate being sick. I am so frustrated. WAAAAA!

Flu

T got a flu shot, darling son got a flu shot ... guess who did not make time to get a flu shot. Back to bed... 

sick, again

This time, fever of 102, coughing, sweating, chills ... but once again I thank G-d that I am not a single mother. My sweet husband has taken our son out for a day of errands and adventure, and I am off to bed for the duration. I don't know how you do this alone, I really don't.