RISING TRIBES

3 minutes

my son is sleeping, which has been a hard task for him as he is getting his top 6 teeth simultaneously.  my daughter lays with her father reading books as its time to go to sleep.  its dark her, and wind is blowing harder and harder as the minutes go by, the trees sing along.  I guess my main thought right now revolves around the question, what is culture?  and does community come before culture, or culture before community? can they be separate?  but mainly, why am I spending my precious “washing dishes” 3 minutes asking questions that may or may not have answers, and better yet could very well be pointless.

they are singing now.  she loves being sang to sleep.  i love my children, and could not for see having another kind of life right now.  In my personal case, just as I was beginning my professional life, motherhood arrived, and with it a vast array of truth to uncover, discover, and understand.  On a daily basis I am smacked with a self that has to become more and more sincere.  my turn to sing…oh…she is sleeping!  as my man sighs “Man Ebay!” (he just lost an auction).  And just like that my 3 minutes have turn to an open night of sleeping children…but should i write, or should i clean, both equally needed…hmmmm.

I guess i’ll end with this thought, (make some space for cleaning), i take parenting much more seriously than I did my professional life.  As an educator, when I had a job, the ability to go home at the end of the day, even when I would still take work home, or my students would call me at home, there was “space” and “distance”  to claim as time for self to be and do what one pleased, to even think about work from a far away place, and even to separate the working self from the self. There is no such thing for parenting.  Beyond it being a 24 hr task in terms of “care and responsibility for others” it is the most raw form of self development.  And it is in that space that I am gifted true growth, not quantifiable by books to be written, or conferences to attend, or awards, or even a job, but revealed in the challenge of creating daily moments for self love, and family love; which in true honesty require the most work.

maybe i’ll sing myself to sleep.

in 5 minutes

my daughter will come home from her weekly kids gathering in five minutes, which gives me just enough time to share my thoughts after watching “I know I’m not Alone,” a film by Michael Franti.  We have been ravaged, and i mean, torn into fragments of total confussion and utter detachment that causes us to  go from happy to sad, from loving to violent in any given moment, and for any reason.  it is an epidemic, a total bi-polar expression of what happens when a human being identifies with himself as a make up of external factors i.e. culture, country, lover, materials, money, food, family, land, creativity, political systems, religion, and on and on.  So who are we really?  Have we and do we only know us as such?  Is there a point in human history where we understood that perfect did not mean flawless but just another being in nature?  What is the reference point from here that we can pin point and say “aha, we have been so we can!”  Or are we doomed to destroy each other and everything else on our path?  she’s home.

15 years later

I was putting my son to sleep, when I had a flash.  Pan 15 years ahead, he is leaving from the front door as he decided that he will go to that concert with his friends, even after a long stressfull conversation over dinner where we have given our final “no.”  Our daughter watches him go, but mainly is quite observant of our reactions to him and finally explodes  yelling “why do you let him do everything he wants! you always have kept me in line, I can’t do what you let him do!”

For those of you who know us pre-family life might be wondering “where the hell is this coming from?”, for those of you who have either been there or have had some experience with this are probably thinking “ha! told ya!”    In my mind however, which has been  working over time, it makes perfect sense to be imagining a life with my two teenage children, even though they are presently 3yrs old and 7 months.  The truth of the matter is that I have been a totally different parent to the both of them.  And while I have from time to time played that guilt game with myself, most of the time I really have admired my ability to understand that my children are different and hence have different needs from the same parents.  And when I say different, I mean like day and night.  Today I watched my 7 month old son fall and hit himself over and over as he attempted yet again to reach  a higher surface to pull himself up from and  ballance with one hand, heck, he even tried to let go both hands just to see what would happen.  After bruising his head, and crying, he pushes himself away from my embrace to try the stunt again.  Is it a boy thing?  My daughter at 7 months sat inside a bath tub covered with a blanket, looking at me  cook.  For hours she sat there, she would play with some spoons, and maybe suck on her blanket,  she was all about observing what was happening around her.  she had no idea what her body could do, not crawling, not even rolling, and forget pulling her self up again and again.  But she could tell the difference between time and space.
At 3 years old, she is definitely an amazing child that listens to what she is asked to do and is in constant observation of how others act, react, move and talk. When she tries something new, she makes sure that she is safe and that of course we are looking at her try her new stunt.   Upon our second’s child arrival, she has definitely had to grow into a responsible big sister, both in terms of doing things on her own (which as an “i do it!” proffetional, she doesn’t mind) but mainly she has had to do what i need her to do so that I can mother an infant and a toddler, be a partner and do the rest of the things that need to get done on a daily basis.

I thank her deeply, every day, when I get to put her to sleep, I cuddle with her and whisper in her ear “Thank you my dear Ceiba, for being such a warm big heart, for  helping me by listening to me, for loving your little brother and all of  us.”   Because at the end of the day it is her personality, her character of being a true giver, lover, listener, that allows  her to really embody and withstand the huge shift of being the only child who receives all my attention to the responsible child that needs to do what i ask in order to create time to get attention.  Can that be healthy?  My son in the other hand, needs to experience everything with his body, he has been running and going since he was in my womb.  I walked hours every day after birthing him just to assure him that he was moving.  And at 7 months, well, he’s mastered learning by trial and error,  with an unwavering sense of determination that can get him around the entire house, up the stairs, over boxes and into each and every thing, until exhausted and absolutely unable to move anymore.  How will this insatiable need to move be in any way molded into doing what he is asked to do?
So, how do you assure your children that they are both appreciated and loved for who they are? That even though they are  parented differently, they are and can be their full selves without being deprived of what the other receives? did that last one make any sense? How about this one, how do I ensure that all of their needs are being met equally? Common’ parents! I am asking for wisdom here, because I am certain that there are models out there, experiences that have led to building stronger, saner and at least more whole human beings.  I expect to have challenges later, just like I have had so far, but how do you ensure that even in those challenging moments your children’s spirit is not broken by the  mistakes parents who don’t know how to be parents make?  I wonder if you will say “no one is perfect.”
Yeah, another day of parenting life.  What a priviledge to be able to have time and space, to observe, learn, question and put into perspective the experiences of mothering two beautifully different and equally powerful children.  It is, in case you haven’t noticed, a goal in my life to ensure that our family unit can prosper in this utterly insane society that has developed the sickest environment for what it calls “family.” Though if you really think about it, its purpose is not to build families, but a set of individuals that can follow orders and systems, and at the end consume what it has decided to sell you as “family life” at your local Wall Mart.
any thoughts?