The Days of Day

My grandmother, my mom, and I are all on a year long altered book round-robin journey.  We call it We Three and these three books travel the country from Lawrenceville, Georgia to San Antonio, Texas to Washington, D.C.  We haven't missed a single month and are in fact so excited that we have to KEEP from getting ahead! Each month we have a shared prompt and our hope is that in December of this year or in January 2011 we'll be able to all sit in one room and ooh and aah over our year of creative exploration together. So, the other day I was looking through some photos that I hold as precious gems and I saw this one of Mimi, my grandmother's mother.  I love Mimi, who went on to see Papa in the land of generous spirits several years ago, like she's still sitting in the warm, humid air of south Georgia waiting for my family to come for a visit.  I love her because she is Person 1 in our chain of women who love each other.  She is the one who taught us all to lo...

I've been begging God to slow down the passing of time. It hasn't worked. It turns out that those immutable laws of nature are immune to my wishes -- to all of our wishes. Today my youngest graduates from preschool and I feel like time has passed so quickly that while I love him with every fiber of my Self, he somehow feels ephemeral, unknown to me... like I've passed up too many opportunities to sit quietly and hear his imaginings and wishes. I know that I'm an attentive mother and that he will probably never suffer from any thought that I ever neglected the sound of his voice.  But today, on a life-threshold, I can't breathe him in quite enough.

"Elijah remained in the wilderness for forty days and nights -- the period of time in which so many Biblical transformations take place."  -- Again from YEARNINGS, by Irwin Kula Last night I dreamed that all my teeth fell out and once they were there piled up in my hand, I grew more and those fell out too.  My dream life is pretty vivid and illuminating, but this waterfall of little teeth was a new one for me.  So, after completely disgusting my family at breakfast with my revelation about my dream, I scooted over to the computer to see what the top-three-Google-hit "experts" had to say about it.  The most relevant verdict was that I am facing a change or transition I am afraid of making. Nailed it. I'm hoping to go back to teaching part time next year  while my boys are in school and, while I can't wait to already be good at juggling my loves of family and teaching, I am afraid of the transition of LEARNING to be good at it. Reading Kula's words...

What a strange thing to consider... that we have domesticated ourselves, tamed our Selves to fit into this culture of other tamed Souls.  We've sold away the wildness and stumblings and colorful details that make us unique in favor of walking a straight line and talking quietly or more than we feel like talking all for the questionable benefit of fitting in. We say, "This right HERE is who I am and have always been and will always be.  If I dream a dream of being different, I should tuck that Self away to be glimpsed only on those dark days of looking for a way to not feel lost."  Glimpsed but not embraced because embracing would mean changing in a public way... would mean maybe sacrificing our place on the orchestrated skyline of other people. Again from YEARNINGS by Irwin Kula: "As cognitive scientists are now discovering, the notion of a single enduring self is just a way to describe how we've temporarily domesticated our inner world.  Identity is just ...

This from the book YEARNINGS by Irwin Kula: "What makes you unique?" My daughter Gabriella was asked this question on a high school entrance application.  The essay was due in a couple of days, and it seemed simple enough.  Yet she put it off and put it off. When I finally pushed her to complete the essay, she said she couldn't figure out what to write. "Dad, nothing about me is unique."  Had Gabriella entered that notorious stage when girls lose their sense of self in the swirl of adolescence?  My wife and I were mystified.  Gabriella was a developing artist -- designing her own clothes -- and a talented writer.  She was effervescent, living, and always making new friends.  Didn't she see how special she was?  Her response blew me away.  "Yeah, Dad, but lots of other people are those things.  And besides, none of it is all of who I am.  I'm everything put together, and not even that.  There's always new stuff."  Her ess...

"Keep two pieces of paper in your pockets at all times.  One that says, 'I am a speck of dust.' And the other, 'The world was created for me.'"                           Rabbi Bunim of P'shiskha This is the opening quote in a book my mom just sent me called YEARNINGS, EMBRACING THE SACRED MESSINESS OF LIFE.  The words resonate so deeply with me because without having heard them before, I know I have always wanted to live my life in such a way that shows I truly believe that I am no more important or more talented or more deserving than any other person, but that I know that the earth's abundance was created for me to explore and share. I imagine my next few postings will be responding to this book.

I recently discovered a video of a guy named Ken Karbone .  As a lover of altered books, I was particularly taken with one part of his video in particular.  He says that for every book he reads he scans the cover and makes a tiny copy on heavy paper.  He uses the tiny copy as a book mark while he reads and then when he's finished he glues the tiny copy in his book journal and then writes about what he learned or ideas he had while reading the book.  I'm trying to do the same thing.  (My sample is shown.) Yesterday I shared this idea with the Language Arts Committee at my son's elementary school.  I talked about how we keep writing portfolios to show students how they have progressed with writing and how maybe some teachers might like the idea of doing the same thing for reading to illustrate for students how they have grown as readers... to show how much they've read.  I shared my actual journal as an example. One teacher in particular was drawn to t...

Click HERE to see a video of Marcus talking about his sculpture. To quote some guy on Star Wars... "I see the Force is strong with this one."

When I stand before God at the end of my life, I would hope that I have not a single bit of talent left, and could say, ‘I used everything you gave me. :::Erma Bombeck::: I think that if you have ever felt the power of the River of In-Spir-ation, you'll know what I mean when I say that allowing it to flow through you is nothing if not empowering.  When I was little and I'd sit at our round oak table and cut dresses from magazines and then trace them and create a new pattern for the fabric, or when I'd get into my mom's scrap bag and make myself a costume, or when I'd build an imaginary world for myself... those were the times I learned to live life the way I should.  (I'd hazard a guess that maybe it's the way we all should live our lives, but I don't want to be presumptuous because I haven't met all the people yet.)  Those were the times that I lived without regard for what anyone else thought or believed to be true about me.   After I make som...

You gotta love keeping scraps around... just in case.  My current mission is to make things with what I have or things I find.  I'm only allowing myself to buy things like glue ... at least for a few weeks. My first completely true to the mission project: my clip frame. There are over 60 clips for bags of glitter and beads! Yes... I actually had over 60 clips... also some bottle caps courtesy of my mom's wonderful friend who saves them for her. The boards are left over from mine and my neighbors house projects... and the sticks are from the spring winds. I'll take another photo when it's full!

For years, if someone asked (and even if they didn't), I'd say, quite proudly, "I am not a competitive person."  But, as I look at this awesome crystal trophy and think about all the hours of practice and planning I put into the event I just participated in, I think it's time to face the facts.   My name is Day Anna Leary and I am a competitive person. It's been about five minutes since I admitted that to myself and I don't think I'm too comfortable with the idea.  Growing up in Southwest Texas, I think it was probably better for a boy to call himself competitive than a girl, or at least somewhere along the way I grabbed a hold of that idea.  If you were a competitive girl you joined the choir with an incredible voice... or you went to softball practice every day.  You joined beauty contests thinking you'd probably win.  I never did any of those things.   I ran for offices of any clubs I joined because other  people saw something in me, no...

My eight year old wore a tie.  He wore a three-button, navy blue suit and a white, long-sleeved dress shirt.  He wore black socks and dress shoes. Jackson has lots of models of professional manhood -- a father who advocates, a grandfather who wears work boots for teaching, a grandfather who worked on computers, a couple of uncles who fight fires, an uncle who helps businesses be more successful, an uncle who runs his own business, and an uncle who fixes teeth.  All these men, and the men who are in our circle of friends, show him and his brother how to juggle lots of balls... phone calls, e-mails, clients, issues. Our boys will not have to raise their arms and swing their sickles through grass and bushes that have never been cut to create a workable path through life.  Instead, they'll be able to spend their energy exploring their hearts and souls to decide how to walk a well-worn path in their own way. Jackson also has models of being a man that expr...

I take it back. Some monumental moments that are surrounded by planning and list-making and going and doing do carve out a sacred space and breathe their own air. We watched Jackson's First Communion, surrounded by family and friends.  We looked over a few rows and saw him sitting in a row with other children he doesn't know well and he sang songs and showed the other children what page we were on.  He listened and smiled.  I felt assured that regardless of what spiritual path he chooses as an adult, that Tom and I are showing him some good options.  But mostly we're teaching him that HAVING a spiritual path is important.... that finding a comfortable language to use to commune with the Spirit is important.

I love a good monumental moment -- those planned and anticipated and those that surprise us with their sudden appearance.  But I must admit that these monumental moments lose some of trade bittersweet emotion for just good old fashioned stress when there are so many of them marching one behind the other. In a span of seven days we will have had kindergarten orientation, Marcus' five-year doctor visit (complete with shots), a Mothers' Day Tea with Jackson, my Toastmasters speech competition, the arrival of 30+ wonderful family members into town for the weekend, Jackson's First Communion, the First Communion picnic (complete with moon bounce), and the orientation session for Jackson's potential new school for next year.  Ordinarily any one of these would have held some poignancy for me -- yes, even the shots, but today they feel like a constant parade of instruments each playing a different tune, each requiring a different rhythm. So, today when the pediatrician looke...

We're in the van and the boys are riding in the back seat.  For once, Marcus, who is four, has the floor. Marcus : Mom, can we talk about male and female again?  (He had asked about what those words mean a few weeks before and had since asked a couple of times to repeat the conversation, but this was the first time to do so in front of Jackson.) Me : Sure.  What does male mean? Marcus : boy Me : What does female mean? Marcus : girl Me : What does a male have? Marcus : a penis Me : What does a female have? Marcus : a vagina I see Jackson's head swivel from Marcus to me and he said: Did you TEACH him that? Me : Yeah. Jackson (age 8) :  WHY? Me : Well, he asked.  (Jackson has never asked about the birds and the bees so I thought I'd offer a little invitation in case he was interested... so I continued: Me :  You can learn a whole lot of things if you just ask.  You learn about anything you're curious about. There was a long pause, during which I thoug...

Yesterday I went to BJ's, one of those big-box-warehouse-buy-a-whole-lot-of-stuff stores (like Sam's or Costco).  I left thinking that being in that store for the hour I was there was the opposite of painting, collage-ing, drawing, or writing.  For the first few minutes it lured my mind into the attitude of discovery.  I might just find the best deal I've ever seen -- almost free -- on just the thing I've been hoping to find.  I might find the neatest thing ever, that I didn't even know existed (my internal voice was getting louder now)... the one item my home had been missing (voice rises again)... the one item that would eliminate steps in a tedious chore (internal voice got louder and took on the tone of a television announcer)... the one thing that would, for once and for all, erase the chaos of getting ready to leave the house in the morning... the one thing (my mind was shouting by now) that would eliminate all stress in my life! By about the third aisle I ...

When I was little I overheard my parents talking about a friend of theirs who had decided to go and find himself. I remember breaking abruptly out of my imaginary world to address that new and very weird idea. My imaginary friend patiently waited while I listened a little more to make sure that this wasn't some sort of a joke and that there wasn't some sort of punch line like, "And there he was, under the table all along." But it wasn't a joke. It was for REAL! There was apparently such a thing as a person who could hide from themselves and then go and look for themselves! This idea held enormous potential for a little girl who actually BECAME her own imaginary friend, Lisa. Eventually, I had to sadly recognize that in my world, the one person I could never hide from is myself. At least not for long... Later, when I was a young teenage girl I remember my mother talking about people needing to like themselves. Again, I don't think she was actually talki...