The Bike of Freedom

It was a force to be reckoned with. All chrome and wheels mixed in with a delicious blend of cherry red and creamy custard yellow. A banana seat and high streamer capped handle bars designed to work with me and the pedals to take me to the moon and back. Whenever I would step on and begin the pedal sequence, to my 7 year old imagination the wind in my hair was the feel of sweet freedom pushing me down the block.

With my bike came rules. I was only allowed enough freedom needed to ride to the corner of the block. Faithfully, with my imagination racing, I rode that path past the point of memorization. I knew every bump and every crack as well as the location of every deep edge off to the side of the walk. My little world began and ended with a multitude of daily pilgrimages to that little corner of my universe.

I was only allowed to ride on the sidewalk unless I was along on a ride with my mom. On rides with my mom,we took to the road single file behind her. And oh, how I looked forward to those mother-daughter rides around town. My sister and I followed behind her like little ducklings, learning the rules of the road and responsibility of handling ourselves in a mature and civilized manner. Our world became exponentially larger when we were allowed to explore with her.

Within the protective reach of or mother, we learned the route to family member's homes, how to cross busy roads, and more importantly, how to enjoy riding on tree lined streets. When we were allowed the luxury of a ride with her, there were no bumpy, cracked and peeling sidewalks marring the way and no corner boundaries. It was just the three of us,the breeze of freedom at our backs,and the steady smoothness of the unlimited expanse of road ahead of us.

Whenever I rode with my mother, I tried to be more grown up than I was. More importantly, when I was allowed to ride on the road I felt grown up. I felt at least 10. I soon began to recognize and know my way around town, the various routes to different locations and destinations. One morning after a trip to the town library and much begging, my mother agreed to let me lead the way home.

With two people riding single file behind me, I ruled the world on that bike ride. I puffed up with importance like a pride filled pastry. I led the way down the street, maneuvering out and around various parked cars, now and again glancing back to be sure my ducklings still followed. Of course they did. I was a brilliant leader and there was nothing to fear.

About half way home I looked back to say something to my mother behind me. The next thing I remember, there was a crown of stars spinning above my head and I was sprawled flat on my back on the road. A family full of people outside in their back yard were staring at me like I'd grown a second head. It took me a moment to realize what had happened.

Amidst all my puffing and bloating and leading, I'd glanced back just a little too long. I rode myself without slowing down into the back end of a parked car, smashing myself like a bug onto it's early 80's steel bumper before bouncing off and winding up in a deflated heap on my back on the road.

I wish I could say the first inclination of my beloved mother was to find out if I was OK. After all, this was the early 80's, a decade before the bounce-off-able bumpers of the Saturn car. Bumpers were there to stay. No budge, no give, no cushion. And I'd found my precious bike of freedom in a stand-off with one in all it's shiny glory and lost. However, that was not the case.

By the time I shook off the daze and got around to looking at her, I found her shaking uncontrollably with laughter, barely able to hold her own bike up. Apparently when her darling daughter rode her giant sized ego into a parked car without slowing down, it was funny.

Once I realized the humor of the situation, I was able to laugh right along with her. Running myself at full speed into a parked car WAS funny. And not just funny, but priceless funny. The kind of funny you still reminisce about occasionally even as many as 30 years later.

To this day, every time my mom brings up the parked car incident, the whole thing replays in my mind with the vintage tint of age. On that day, to this little girl, my beautiful bike of freedom truly took me to the moon and back, and allowed me to see stars. I even managed to learn a few life lessons.

Leadership means you must provide the way for yourself as well as others.

Worry more about the road ahead of you and less about what lies behind you.

It's important to be able to laugh at yourself on occasion.

Never let your ego get too large, for it will most certainly be deflated for you without your consent.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, even something that appears as benign as a parked car can pack quite a punch.

*Michelle at Scribbit graciously hosts a Write-Away Contest each month with a new topic and prize for each new month. The above blog entry was written as an entry for this month's competition.

A Family of Blessings

The time has come again for Thanksgiving. In just under two weeks, millions of Americans will face the dawn of a new morning and at some point during the day most likely take a mental tally of their blessings. I will be one of them. In a time of economic uncertainty, I am thankful for the simple things.

I am thankful for a roof over my head, nourishing food to feed my children, and warm winter clothing for them to wear. I’m thankful for my electricity, gas, and water. I am thankful we have a hot water heater that works, and a furnace as well, for winter life in Chicagoland would be brutal without either of those.

More than that, though, I am thankful for what I would have left if all of that were suddenly taken away from me- my family. My family is by far the greatest blessing, triumph, joy, and challenge of my life. And while most people count their blessings, I nickname mine.

Bonehead: My husband makes me laugh daily. Most people who know him know his dry sense of humor is backed by an intelligence that makes him quick on his feet and an easy target for saying funny things while simultaneously sticking his foot in his mouth by doing so. What they don’t know is that his heart and spirit possess a sense of chivalry and loyalty to his family that can’t be broken. They don’t see how hard he works to support his family, and the sacrifices he makes without asking anything in return. They don’t know that when he loves it is unconditional, that when he plays it is spontaneous and free, and that when he breaks down it echoes in his soul. No matter how much I might grumble about picking up after him, or doing his dishes and laundry, he is a blessing. I am thankful for every day I can look into his eyes and see them sparkle with laughter and mischief.

Smoochie: My oldest son gave my heart a home. He has always been a good boy, better than I deserved. He’s never colored on a wall, cut his own hair, or removed his own diaper for exploration purposes. What he has done is lightened my life with laughter, filled my heart with pride and smiled at me with his sweet smile. He has always had an uncanny ability to put others before himself, which made him odd at 3 years old, when he would readily pass up dessert to help someone in need of help. He has shown my heart how full and warm and happy it could truly be.

Critter: My baby boy is 9 months old, and in the space of 9 months has been the single largest challenge of my life. He has turned my life upside down and spit me out the other side, to be perpetually tired and weary. He has the biggest bluest eyes I have ever seen, and when I hold him close and look into them, he fills me. I have grown a second heart to hold my love for him, and although it is different than the love I have for Smoochie, it is no more or no less than that I hold for my firstborn. He has a temper. He will challenge authority. He will question everything and he will have his father’s ability to see things outside the box. I want to hold him close and protect him from the hard life lessons he will have to learn. I want him to stay my baby blue eyed blessing forever.

My nicknames are terms of endearment for my family, and I am thankful every single day for the joys and challenges they bring into my life. My family helps to make me who I am: A cook, nurse, entertainer, housekeeper, and too many more professions to name. Most of all, though, they make me a wife and a mother, which are the two most blessed titles I’ve experienced in my life.



*This post was created as an entry for November's Write Away Contest, which is graciously hosted by Scribbit each month.

Melancholy Chasing Color

As the shroud of gray descends upon the season to hug it close like an old friend, I try to comfort myself with the knowledge of the brighter moments that will seep in. It is September now, and the weather shifts quickly like a fly in motion. Most of the time on the path to winter and solitude, but not without the stray brightness of a moment in the fall.

Without fail, September triggers the melancholy side of me. When the month first appears, its wet grayness seems to speak to me as nothing more than a mere whisper of an errant gloomy day or two. But as the month progresses and rolls into the next, the volume quickly crescendos to a roar through my veins. It speaks to me of the promise of winter, full of blinding lonely white days and long velvety black nights. It pulls me in and holds me close in the embrace of damp gray.

I try to remind myself of the brilliant mood of fall that will find me soon. I love the world after the leaves have changed. Outside when the air has lost the sticky claustrophobic feel of August, I can relish its cool crispness like apple juice through a straw. I can drink in through my eyes the oranges and the yellows, with magentas and russets providing crisp contrast in the beautiful canvas of trees.

These moments, when the color washes over me and the tart air fills my lungs, are my favorite moments of the year. I am sure it is because on each side of the moment, it is flanked by gray, making the colorful beauty pop to my soul. It is nature at her finest, walking her runway with pride and regal beauty.

And though it is gray now, I hold my breath in anticipation of the moment to come. I will wait with patience barely contained, for I know when it arrives, I will need to drink in enough melancholy chasing color to last another full year.

*This post was created with the intention of entering September's Write Away Contest hosted by Scribbit. Once again, win or loose, I had fun. So much fun, in fact, I didn't even procrastinate until the deadline, which is very, very uncharacteristic of me.

Wonder Woman

It was every parent’s nightmare. It was her nightmare, too. She was pregnant at 14 years old. She waited to tell her parents. She waited until she couldn’t hide it from them any longer. She was showing and it would be all too obvious very soon. She knew deep in her heart she might be a great disappointment to her parents.

She finally chose to face the music and tell her parents. Against their wishes, she made the decision to keep the baby. By the time the baby was born, she would be 15, and he would be 16. And she would step up to the plate and be a mom- way too early, much too soon. She would change diapers and soothe the late night crying and bathe and care for a baby when she should be worrying about who to date, what lip gloss to wear, and how she did on her math test. Her decision meant she would have to drop out of school and get a job. She wasn’t even old enough to drive yet. But somehow she knew she had to be old enough to be a mother.

Her parents wanted them to get married. His parents said there was no way they would force children into marriage, and that if or when a marriage happened between their two children, it would be a decision they would make themselves, not their parents. There were lots of tears and lots of disappointment for a childhood lost, but when it came down to baby’s arrival day, all the parents would be as supportive as they possibly could be.

He stood by her and soon they had a little girl. All of the sudden their tumultuous teenage years were splattered with dirty diapers and spit up. They had to grow up faster than any child should. She had to face the responsibility of raising a child while still growing up and learning herself. He had to do the same, and it was a struggle for them both.

She could have passed off the responsibility to someone else. She could have let her parents raise the baby, or his parents, for that little girl quickly worked her way into the whole family’s heart. However, she had this stubborn determination to make it work and be independent no matter how difficult the road may be. So she worked as hard as she could, earning next to nothing to try and make ends meet. Having not finished high school, she didn’t make much money.

She stayed in the relationship which was on-again-off-again like most teenage relationships are. One minute totally in love, the next totally in hate. There were arguments and tears, but there was beauty and laughter mixed in too.

When he got accepted into the Marines, she followed him to California. Things soon became more difficult as she realized she was pregnant again. Her own mother passed away around her 18th birthday, leaving her 6 months pregnant and grieving fiercely. And then they made the decision to marry. At 18 she married the father of her soon to be two little girls.

Things continued down the same path with the two of them trying to be as grown up as possible in a difficult world of parenting, living hand to mouth, and often wondering where the money to pay rent would appear from. They both tried their best to raise two little girls the only way they knew how- to learn as they went along.

One day no one had planned on, he was in a car accident. It seemed he would be OK, but there was internal bleeding that no one knew was there. He passed away, leaving her 20 years old and grieving the loss of her husband, with two daughters to raise on her own.

And so she did. She did the best she could, sometimes just living each day from start to finish and nothing beyond. She made mistakes but she did a lot of things right. She missed a lot of moments from their childhood due to working hard to support herself and her girls. She went back to night school and got her high school diploma. She missed school plays and track meets. She missed lazy summer days and volunteering in the classrooms on holidays. But she sacrificed all of that out of pure love for her little girls.

And with a lot of prayer, hard work and perseverance, she now has two grown daughters with 5 beautiful grandchildren between them. That's a lifetime of accomplishment for not being 50 yet.

She is my mother. I am her oldest daughter, and can not tell you how proud I am of her. Not everyone would have made the decision she chose to make, or stepped up to the parenting plate at such a young age. I know that her decision is not the right one for everyone. Being a teenage parent is not glamorous. Being a parent at any age is the most challenging and long term job a person can undertake. She had so many curve balls thrown at her early on she could have easily thrown her hands in the air, and screamed “I give up.” But she didn’t, and that makes me unique and grateful for a childhood and life I might not have had at all, or might have had with a completely different family.

My grandparents (his parents) once told me that they believe all things happen for a reason. The great disappointment of him having children so young turned into one of the greatest blessings of their life. They realized after his death at 21 years of age that my sister and I were meant to be. I think of this often, as well as the best advice I’ve ever received from my mother. She once told me the following:

“God will not give you more than you can handle. Put your faith in him, and no matter how dark things seem for you, and even though you don’t know how, you will make it through with his help.”

I have watched through example how my mother has lived her life according to this advice. As a parent, she tried her best and loved us both unconditionally and that’s all I could have asked for. That makes her my Wonder Woman.

**This post was created with the intention of entering July's Write-Away Contest hosted by Scribbit, one of the blogs on my daily read list. It was a fun process, whether I win or not, and I will definately enter again.