"Feeling Beautiful" revisited for my daughters

Me, age 11

When I was five years old, the left side of my face was bitten by a dog. All that's left of the scar today is a little dent beside my eye and a tiny dot on my cheek, but it was a very defining thing for me when I was younger. My brother would tell people I'd been bitten by a crocodile. I remember being stopped in the store one day by a mom and her teenage daughter, and them exclaiming that the daughter had a scar just like mine, but that it was almost gone now, and so I didn't have to worry, because someday I wouldn't even notice it. It gave me a little hope, but it also made me realize just how noticeable it really was.

At age nine, I carried a 4H Fair brochure to my mom, in which I had circled all the categories I thought it would be fun to enter.

"And the baking, and the crocheting . . . and the beauty pageant. I think I'd like to do that one, even though I know I'd never win because of this scar."

I was totally matter-of-fact. I knew that I'd never be beautiful, and I was okay with that--this was still at the age when I thought I should be a boy, anyway, and scars were worth more than beauty; scars earned you respect, and showed you were tough.

I've never forgotten the look of helplessness on my mom's face, and the way she tried to tell me no one would care about the scar. I shook my head, pitying her for being so delusional as to think someone disfigured could win a beauty pageant. I thought she was just trying to make me feel better, and I walked away.

As a mom now, I understand. I understand how she must have felt, wanting to take my scar away for me, while also wanting to teach me to love myself with it. Wanting to scream at a world that had already taught a home-schooled nine year old that she couldn't be beautiful unless she was flawless. Wanting to take her little tough girl into her arms and hold her and tell her she could win anything she wanted, whether it was a beauty pageant or a spitting contest.

These bodies we have are so wonderful. And yet we all, at some point, don't like what we see in the mirror. I've read a lot of posts about bodies and body image lately. Posts about things to say to your daughters, things not to say to your daughters, and things you should never let them hear you say about your own body--especially your crazy post-pregnant body, with its droopy extra skin, stretch marks, and extra pounds.

Frankly, as a mother of two little girls, reading all these things is terrifying.

I know, at some point, I will feel what my mother felt. I will look at my beautiful girls, and I will see them in all their radiance, full of life and potential and pure beauty--and they will be frowning over the curl of their hair, or the crookedness of their noses, or the squishiness of their stomachs. Or feeling self-conscious about a scar.

I don't know what I'll say. I don't know if they'll listen. But maybe I'll have them read this post. And then I'll have them read this one. I'll give them a big hug and tell them they can do it; that I know they're beautiful, and that someday they'll know that too.

And I'll pray that's enough.

Happy birthday, Cim!

Cim got pizza for her birthday dinner. Lots of it. Heaven.

We went out for dinner with some of Ryan's classmates. We were invited by a classmate who shares Cim's birthday. 

She brought Cim presents. Huge princess coloring pages, a box of 120 crayons, and a Lisa Frank sticker book. Cim, pulling the tissue paper off each one, cried, "Just what I ALWAYS wanted!"

(Cim gave her a card on which she'd drawn a face and a spider using a Sharpie. It was awesome.)

On the way home, Cim said, "Where's my cake? 

Having planned to do cupcakes at a birthday get-together with some friends later in the week, I said, "We'll have cake another day."

Cim, lip quavering, and in a smaller voice than usual, replied, "But it's my birthday... I have to have cake on my birthday... Isaac had cake at his birthday, and today is MY birthday. I have to have cake."

We stopped at the grocery store on the way home.

Three candles and one extra for luck. She was so excited.

Ice cream cake on the special sparkly heart plate from Miss Stacy. What could be more wonderful? (We took one look at her face and removed her white shirt.)

Cim wasn't the only one excited. Mari jumped off a bar-height kitchen chair trying to get to the cake, which was sitting on the counter a couple feet away. Luckily the trash can broke her fall. We put her in her chair and let her have fun.

Dear Cim,

I can't believe you're three. What a crazy three years it's been. You have, in turns, made me laugh until I cried, cry until I had to laugh, and frequently just left me shaking my head (and then later posting the moment on Facebook). 

You have such a sweet, sweet spirit. Everyone who meets you is overwhelmed by your intelligence, your charm, and your vocabulary. I'm daily reminded just how much you're learning, and just how quickly. Mostly I just hope I can keep up. 

Happy birthday, my big girl. I love you so much. 

Mom

Good Samaritan Moments

I've been a little uptight this week. (Alright, my husband could rat me out, so let's be honest--I've been REALLY uptight this week.) Today was supposed to be the climax of a lot of that stress: the moving truck was coming, and I would finally have all my stuff . . . along with the task of finding a home for everything.

And it didn't come. And then they said it would. And then they said it wouldn't. And then they said it might. And then it didn't.

Let's just say I was not very happy.

So, at the end of this mess, I'm driving home from picking my girls up from a friend's house (who had kept them from 7:30 a.m. until 5:00 p.m. while I was stuck waiting around for the no-show truck), and I notice the rush-hour traffic slowing down near the light ahead. I'll be turning left, but I see a couple of cars in the "straight" lane swerve into the left turn lane and then back out of it to continue straight. "Either a newbie driving stick shift who stalled, or someone's car's broken down," I think. 

As I pull into the turn lane, there's one car ahead of me. The light's green, but traffic is thick from the opposite direction, so I know we won't be going any time soon. Accordingly, I turn my attention to the car causing the trouble.

It's an older, tan sedan, a little ahead and to the right of me. I can't see the driver, because I'm right in his blind spot, but I can see the smoke coming from under the hood. "That'll ruin your day."

Suddenly, the passenger door of the white car in front of me opens, and a man gets out. He looks to be in his early twenties, white t-shirt, jeans, flip-flops, scruffy cheeks, and a long cigarette dangling from his teeth. He comes back and motions for the driver of the other car to open his door. The door opens, and I see the arm of an old man, spotted and wrinkled and thin, gesturing as they talk. The young man nods once, then goes to the back of the car and starts to push. His own ride pulls out of the intersection, leaving space for him to push the tan car into the left-turn lane. 

I watch as he slides in his flip-flops, takes them off, and proceeds in bare feet to push the car into the lane in front of me. Seeing a gap in traffic, he bends down to start the car rolling once more, hoping to make it through the intersection, but the ground there is no longer level, and he struggles to get it rolling.

Just then, jumping out of a hastily-parked mini-van on the corner and running across two lanes of traffic, comes a woman, twenties or early thirties, dressed in knee-length hot-pink shorts and an electric blue t-shirt. She smiles a quick greeting and gets ready to push, but the light turns red. 

In my rear-view mirror, I see the couple in the truck behind me hop out, the wife running around to the driver's seat, and the man, in a plaid button-up shirt, walking past my van to take a spot beside the neon woman. 

And then, last but not least, jogging across the crosswalk from the other side of the intersection comes a soldier in full uniform, who arrives just as the protected-left light comes on. Together these four strangers lean into the car and easily roll it around the corner, laughing as the car picks up speed and they have to stop pushing or fall on their faces. The old man lets his car roll off into the grass, out of the way of traffic, and as I roll past, the young man with the cigarette is going to talk to him once more.

And just like that, all the stress of my day is gone, purged by witnessing this moment of humanity, of strangers reaching out. 

Those four people, such a contrast in appearances next to one another, stood together not because they were friends, but because each chose not to say, "Oh, someone will help him," or "I bet he has a cell phone." They simply got out of their own vehicles and did what needed to be done.

It didn't change the world. But I smiled the rest of the way home. 

I tend to avoid the news, because it always makes me depressed. I need stories like this to help me keep my faith in my fellow man. What "Good Samaritan" moments have you witnessed lately?

Starting Again

I wander through the mostly-empty rooms, stepping over plastic Easter eggs the girls found and scattered all over. I see a few bags of clothes, some pots and pans loaned us by our landlady, a couple of camp chairs. We're in a new home.

Again.

This is our eighth residence in the five years we've been married; the eighth place where I've stood, looking around, wondering just how our life will mold to fit this new living space.

This time, though, for the first time, I'm not starting a new semester, pregnant, both of those at once, or holding a young baby. As I look around at this adorable little house, the first place we've ever rented where we didn't share at least one wall with neighbors, I'm both nervous and excited.

I could actually unpack all the boxes. I could hang curtains. I could MAKE curtains.

For the first time in our moving history, I'm seeing these types of things not as things I should do, or wish I were the type of person who would do, but as things I can and will do.

I know myself. I tend to get overwhelmed when faced with a large project, such as unpacking/organizing a house. But this time, part of me keeps saying, it'll be different. Not just because circumstances are different, but because I'm different.

With every move I've done a little better, become a little more of a homemaker. With every move I've felt a little more drive to actually hang pictures on the walls, or put clothes into drawers. And with this move, more than any other, I can feel myself stepping into the role of keeper of the home.

I'm sure I'll still get overwhelmed when our things get delivered (tomorrow morning, yikes)--but I'll work through it. I've gotten a taste, these last weeks in an empty home, of what this place could be. Now I just need to make it into that.

I bought fabric for the girls' curtains. Purple and sparkly. I'm going to do this.

Looking for readers

Cover credit: Nate Hebbert -- Drawing/inking; Ryan Cooley -- Coloring/cover design

Dear friends,

I've been working on this book for the last 2.5 years, and I plan to eventually start pitching it to agents/editors. Before that, however, I'd like to do at least one more round of 10-or-so readers. If you're interested in being one of my guinea pigs, please leave a comment either here or on facebook, and I'll send you the file. Here's what I'm asking as far as feedback:

1. Where did you lose interest?
2. Were there things you didn't understand?
3. Were there things you just didn't believe?
4. Who was your favorite/least favorite character?
5. Was there anything you particularly liked (so I don't accidentally change that in a rewrite)?

Thanks! (Now here's hoping I get some takers...)

-Shannon

"Why Lightsabers are Better than Blasters" -- A look into my early education.

I found this essay tonight. I wrote it in late 3rd or early 4th grade. It's just one example of a multitude of 5-paragraph essays that I wrote in my early childhood, which effectively prepared me for the SAT and sundry other standardized tests later in life. Thank you, home schooling. (Note: all spelling/grammatical errors are transcribed with exactness. Also, you should picture this written in my best cursive... which of course is terrifying.)

Why Lightsabers are Better than Blasters

Lightsabers, were the acient weapon of the jedi. jedi often made their own, but some were passed down from jedi to jedi. They were sacred weapons, while blasters were ordinary. That's why it's my opinion that lightsabers are better than blasters.

Lightsabers were more powerful, they could deflect blastershots. They were much more dangerous, though.

They're also more elegant, though harder to find, unless you make your own.

They can go through more, in case you need to remove a panel, to get at some wires, though it might go too far, and slice those wires.

I hope you will agree with me, that lightsabers are better than blasters, despite the difficulties.


Here was the reaction from the first people to read this essay in 16 years:

Dad: "Pretty persuasive, wouldn't you say? Would you ever choose a blaster after reading that?"
Ryan: "Depends. How big is the blaster?"

Story Time

This is Daddy's Father's Day present.

Daddy's home now, and that means more exciting bedtime stories for Cim. Last night her request was for a "chomping food" story. It went something like this:


Once upon a time, there was a little girl who liked to chomp her food. She would chomp food all day long if it was available. 

One day, her mother approached her and said, "You chomp your food like a goat. You chew your cud like a cow. You nibble like a horse. And frankly, it's disgusting.

And the little girl said, "Why, whatever do you mean?"

The mother said, "In polite company, we chew with our lips closed."

The little girl considered this, and then protested, "But if I close my lips while I'm chomping my food, that places my lips dangerously close to my teeth. How will I keep from biting them?"

The mother replied, "That, my dear, is one of the dangerous orthodoxies with which we live. So from now on, you will please chew your food with your lips shut."

So the little girl began to chomp her food with her lips shut. At first, she was nervous, afraid that she would bite her lips. But she didn't. And in the end, she realized that chewing with her lips closed was not only more couth and polite, but it prevented her half-chewed food from falling back out of her mouth again. From then on both she and her mother were much happier at mealtimes--which, at this house, were frequent.

The End

Colors of Spring

Our spring has been changing colors. 

First it was yellow.

Her sister decorated her head with dandelion shreds.

Then it went white.

And then purple.

And we're enjoying every minute of it.

Rainflowers

I regret not taking many pictures in China. This one is borrowed from here.

Rainflowers

Red city—

Rusted metal, russet bricks,

Stringy weeds masquerading as grass on
Playing field of cardamom-colored clay.

No sunflowers here.

Watch for rainflowers.

Fuschia, cobalt, goldenrod, lime,

Bobbing above slender, black-haired stems

Tugged by winds of tardiness.

Thousands of blossoms

Sprout from window grates,

Rooted by handles

Thrust hastily between schoolhouse bars.
Abandoned, they drip down the wall,
Casting rainbow shadows through windowpanes,
Illuminating textbooks until lunch.

While it rains, the air is clean—

Clean enough for flowers.

They shrivel away with the return of

Red sunshine glowing through smog from

Motorcycles, buses, factories,

Soot from burning garbage.

Part of Me

Misc. tickets, envelopes with toilet paper/napkins (we were never sure what they were meant for, but we carried them everywhere since most bathrooms didn't have toilet paper), a little plastic charm given to me by a student, a cell phone charm made by another student, and the battery to my Chinese cell phone. 

This weekend we went on a trip to Boston, and while there, we attended church. It was the first Sunday of the month, and in our church that means that anyone is allowed to go to the microphone and share some thoughts about the gospel.

A blonde-haired girl who looked to be about my age got up and began to talk about trials. She talked about a time when she and her husband had just returned from living in Chile, and how she sat in church and reveled in the "American-ness" of the lesson, and was just so grateful to have finished the Chile experience, and to be able to put it behind her and move on.

I'd never seen this girl before, but I saw my eyes in hers as she smiled wryly and spoke too lightly, mentioning the experience only briefly and then skipping past it. Skipping ahead before the memories got too painful.

China, my mind whispered. Only you can't claim you've moved on.

I've written before about trying to overcome my China experience. I said at one point that I was going to start writing lots of posts about China, to try to help me work through it all. I then wrote 3 more posts, none of which had to do with China, and then quit blogging at all for the next six months; in part because every time I went to write, I felt guilty for not writing about China.

I've told myself so many times that I want to put China behind me, yet in the same bag I packed for Boston this weekend I carried all the items in the picture above--they've been in that same bag, the bag I use for nearly every trip I take, for the last 4.5 years. In one pocket of a jacket I wear every spring and fall, I still carry a Chinese bus ticket.

I've come a long way in the last 4.5 years. I'm not as jumpy. I'm not quite as cynical. I've even started to study Chinese again, and, for the first time in years, I was listening to a Chinese podcast the other day and had the sudden desire to go to Asia--not China specifically, but maybe someday I'll get that far.

But I haven't moved on. I haven't given up my bitterness for not getting the experience I dreamed about for so long. Despite many people's reassurances that someday I'd look back and only remember the good things, my memories of China jump straight to the depression, the sickness, the frustrations, the injustices, and the week at the end that left me with 6 months of PTSD.

As I've thought about how to put China behind me, though, the answer I'm coming to is that I shouldn't. Instead of trying to put it behind me, I think I need to take it inside me, and make it a part of me; not in the traumatic way it's been a part of me up until now, but in a conscious, I can learn from this sort of way.

Up until now, I think I've done that only with one aspect of the China experience: being sick. During my first pregnancy, as I got up every morning and puked before heading off to class, I reminded myself that I did the same thing in China, and that I was still somehow able to go stand in front of classes of 50-85 students and teach. Because of that precedent, I knew I could go sit in my classes and finish my degree, even while sick, and even when my burgeoning belly no longer fit in the desks and I had to sit sideways. I received power because I internalized a difficult experience.

I don't know what lessons I'll learn from the rest of the experiences, and I may not have a "lesson" attached to each post I write. But I hope that, in writing out some of these things, I'll be able to learn the lessons that this experience was meant for. That I'll find power, instead of pain, in my memories.

After all, I survived. And anything which does not kill us is intended to make us stronger--if we will let it.

(Now lets see if we actually get any posts about China this time...)