If you come from nothing, work hard, and manage to support yourself, maybe you are Living the American Dream. We’ve heard of this illusive dream.  This America. But somewhere between belching out our light beer and clicking on pop-up ads, we’ve forgotten it.

People have almost died to get here.  They’ve puked and starved their way across the high seas or piled in the back of trucks where they couldn’t breathe – because this is the land of opportunity, fortune, and safety. A beacon of hope to all.

But what is this dream, exactly?

Maybe someone makes a living creating adult films, because they sell and a man can support his family and lo-and-behold his kids get into a nice school and his wife doesn’t have to clean houses anymore.

But wait.  Adult film? That’s not valuable to society.  That’s spreading filth and trash to an already overly-sexed culture.

Or they grow up in a well-known family. They love fashion and beauty and a girl starts to think of herself as a brand.  She surrounds herself with wealthy friends and gets photographed in exclusive places.  She earns enough money to buy a NYC apartment and fancy shoes.

But wait.  What did you actually do to earn that money? You’re famous but have no skill.  That’s not fair, and you’re basically manipulating everyone.

So what is the American Dream, really? Is it making something of yourself? Supporting yourself from nothing? Providing for your family? Because suddenly THIS doesn’t actually count and THAT doesn’t count.  You not only have to support yourself, but you also must do something unique and valuable (according to who?) and in a way that’s not offensive to anyone (according to who?) and not make too much money or earn too much fame or show off too much so other people won’t get jealous and throw stones at you.

This is an IMPOSSIBLE dream. A ridiculous pursuit of what is based upon the whims of society, who change their mind with the wind. This is in, that’s out.  A one-hit wonder in the Fall, then a pariah by Spring.

We cannot base our dreams on this. This, my friends, is shifting sand.

One of the beautiful things about humans is our need to be inquisitive.  To create, and wonder, and dream of something that does not currently exist.  In a place like America, rich in natural resources and wealth so it’s possible to meet your basic needs, curiosity can be explored and even rewarded.  Just imagine, sitting in your garage creating a machine that would change the world.  Coming up with the idea for an information superhighway.  A lab that can cure diseases.  In this land, people forged new trails, hunkered down through harsh winters.  Adapted. It’s also a place where inventions are encouraged, changes are supported, independence reigns.

We are a wildly creative, vibrant, and curious culture.  We cannot lose this sense of wonder.  We cannot sit idly by or take this freedom for granted.  America allows people not only the freedom to express themselves, but in a way that’s unique and different.

We all reap the benefit of this culture of invention – lowered crime, reduced disease, air conditioned homes.  And yet it’s a double-edged sword.  We have to guard against the stifled cloud of judgment that can suffocate us.  The idea that some dreams are not worthy because they are not approved by some overarching morality code.

So a man’s making adult films. A woman’s making money posting on Instagram.  What do you fear? Are you worried about the degradation of our culture? The lowered moral code?

Don’t do this.  Don’t trash the very society that allows us all opportunities and freedoms to be who we are.   

I’m a Christian. I feel the presence of God in my daily life.  He is a warm and merciful God, and also a God to be feared. But I also believe very strongly in freedom, to allow us all to explore our lives, and form our own pathways.

Jesus did not enter this world to force everyone to think the way he did.  He worked on his craft as a carpenter, entering society from a very humble beginning. He gathered a small group of close friends, shared the love he knew, and walked for miles and miles and miles. He posed questions, used parables, and created a since of curiosity. Should they cast the first stone? Were they really blameless? How would the multitudes be fed? Was God really God? And lastly, did Jewish law sometimes stand in the way of God’s grace?

People gathered around him, this Jesus.  Not out of obligation or guilt, but out of a sense of awe and wonder. Because he was a living, breathing, extension of the inner peace we all seek.

Do not chastise each other for living different dreams.  Live your own life, and do your own great work, and walk in your own sandals for miles and miles and miles.  We don’t need more box-checkers, or an army of morality police, chastising each other like religious zealots.  We need more people to truly say “I don’t understand your life. Will you teach me?” Or even harder, “you’ve desecrated my ancestors or enslaved my people.  Is there any way we start anew?”  This is the way to freedom, to sit with each other.  You, inside your dream and me, inside mine.  To laugh with each other.  To encourage each other in times of great trouble. We have to be a strong nation of encouragers, believers, dreamers.  And in order to do so, we have to kill that sense of judgment.  Strike it through its very heart and simply walk away with its carcass on the highway.

What is the American Dream? It’s living a full, rich life, doing the best you can, to the best of your ability, in a land that affords you freedoms to do so. Let’s celebrate it, and encourage it, and not push against it.

It’s a place worth living. It’s a country worth cherishing.  It’s a type of love that is worthy of a dream.

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photo:

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There is an unassuming little joint right off Highway 71 near Bastrop, Texas, in the middle of what used to be called the Piney Woods. The sign reads “Billy’s BBQ,” because the owner is Billy and that just made good damn sense.  We used to go there when we were passing through, a two-meat platter with potato salad, nothing fancy or famous but just staples of Texas that one grows used to.  Now barbeque has become such an ordeal, with restaurants like Franklins where lines last for hour simply for the pleasure of licking the charred end of a brisket. Presidents, celebrities, everyone’s cousin, and friends from California all want to know what’s the best, what’s the greatest, and who on this great earth makes the best sausage stuffed with jalapenos and cheese.  It’s all a big show these days, one restaurant claiming that “it’s had the same pit fire burning for over twenty years.”  For heavens sakes.

I was born and raised in a small town in Texas, where barbeque was consumed at almost all events without much thought put to it, like picking up a sandwich. You never had to worry about hipsters, wanting peached iced tea and pulled pork with cilantro.  I order the same thing every time at Billy’s, the burned ends with sausage, cole slaw, salad.  It’s hearty and filling, and it makes me feel like home.

The last time I stopped in I was wearing something sharp and black, coming back from a meeting in Houston, and although I ordered it to go I just didn’t feel like leaving.  Billy’s daughter, a heavy-set blond woman, had taken my order.  She seemed worn and tired from the monotony of things, but she offered a beleaguered smile as she handed me the Styrofoam box and bread.

I sat in the back, inhaling all that was familiar.  Billy was there with his wife, who kept meddling and interfering in things until their daughter told her momma to shush, that she had work to do.  But as mothers do, she stood up and shuffled to the cash register, her knee acting up again. Or so I assumed.

I went up to Billy and shook his hand, told him how I often came here, how it made me feel warm and comforted, like I was back in my grandfather’s sand and gravel shop in Kerrville. There was a Tom’s vending machine on the back wall, twenty-years past working with the cord hanging to one side, overseen by the deer heads with their proud antlers, mounted to the walls.  “Thankya,” he said in all one word, the same word he used for 31 years of being in business, cooking meat and scooping up beans, walking around in starched wranglers with a pearl button flannel shirt regardless of the season.

An old black man came in, a little toddler bounding in behind him.  Billy called out his name, said what a cute granddaughter he had, and the man beamed with pride.  Later another man, wearing wranglers and a fishing shirt and a straw cowboy hat, came in and started talking without even placing an order.  Billy’s wife was tired, it seemed to me, but she dished him up the usual and asked him about the bulldozer business.

There was an ease about the place, a familiarity with the smallness of it all, comfort taken that the food is always the same, the coleslaw sweet, the soda cold.  It is as if nothing ever changes here but the weather, which is the topic of much conversation.

I try to stop in every time I pass through.  I just rush in and order, eat until my belly’s full.  No one really knows me there, and it’s nothing to write home about.  Except that it is home, with the linoleum and antlers and salt shakers half filled. This is the Texas I know: a friendly and warm and welcoming place, where brothers shake hands and talk about land west of town for sale at a decent price.  These are people who love hard and don’t change and wear wranglers not out of fashion but practicality.

I’m so damn proud of you, Billy.  All these years you’ve made it.  You must be nearing 90 by now, the way your skin sags and you have to catch yourself as you stand.  You remind me of Papa, the quiet way you talk, the blurring together of words, the way your gait is uneven and your hair thin. I see the dark spots on your forehead, the ones you get checked every year to make sure the sun didn’t burn you with cancer.  You’ve likely braved the storms and heartbreak that are bound up in marriage, business, the pit fires that burn.

I’m going to keep coming back to see you when I’m heading to Houston.  I’ll get the two-meat platter, the cole slaw and salad, and smile at the non-working Tom’s vending machine.  I’ll sit for a while and listen to the random, idle conversation.  Because this is my living room and my heart and my history.  My personal nostalgia, all wrapped up in the charred ends of a cow.

This is my one and only political post.  It’s more about talking dogs, really.

I read the Mike Rowe story focusing on voters, and not encouraging blind voting based upon flippant celebrity endorsements. I’ve read that and a hundred other stories on how we got ourselves into this hot mess to begin with.  #nevertrump and #neverhillary.  Who is left? A 40-year old write-in candidate? Gary freaking Johnson?

I dunno. I kinda like celebrities pretending they know something about NATO and China’s economy.  After all, they are actors. They can pretend.  But aren’t they also Americans, who actually might care?

So maybe voters (or voter fraud, who knows) put us into this mess to begin with regarding two very unpopular presidential candidates.  And while I understand Rowe’s point, that we should all be educated and take our role as voting citizens seriously, do we dare take it to its logical conclusion, that the uneducated populous should refrain from voting because it’s somehow irresponsible?  After all, it’s a right not a duty, and who wants to be irresponsible when exercising a right? Would we want mental health patients firing weapons? Do we want people who believe their dog can speak voting for president? If voters don’t read books on economic theory, are they even qualified to vote?

I think the answer is simple.  Yes.  A resounding yes.  Even people who believe the world is flat and believe the moon landing was a contrived government conspiracy.  Even they should vote.  Because it’s part of who we all are as American citizens.  We are privileged to have this right.  Even people who eat nothing but cheese and pickles have a voice in who leads us, even if the majority of us think they are misguided.

The rights we are endowed with to assemble, protest, vote, and speak our own voice are not just an assurance that the best ideas and best candidates come forward – it’s a hope that we as a nation of citizens should have a voice in leadership, and that we can all participate in the marketplace of ideas.  I would hope we value every unique person and every heart and every opinion, even if it differs from our own. Although the Constitution does not, at the present time, allow talking dogs to vote. There is always hope in the future.  Amendments happen.

Rowe’s theory, while understandable, can be a slippery slope toward an age where wealthy white men of privilege, the “educated ones,” the people who are “responsible voters,” get to make decisions while the undereducated masses (minorities? the poor?) simply trust the “smarter” few to make decisions for all. Who decides who’s smarter and more responsible? What if dogs really can talk? How the heck do we really know.

In my opinion, voters have brought forth a candidate like Trump because they are living in a state of fear.  Fear of terrorism, fear that they have become unheard, fear in the wealthy, fear that all the diversity and social change have somehow gone too far, and something snapped in our collective consciousness.  Many people grew so angry that no one “believed in anything anymore” that they needed to take a hard-line position.  They needed someone to tell them what to do.  To make promises, even if they were only half-believable.  To say “political correctness” is just a heaping pile of shit, which is what folks were thinking anyway.  And this boldness in speech was so refreshing voters lined up to subscribe to this ideology, this anti-establishment.  An authoritative populism emerged that was similar, in fact, to Hitler’s own rise to power.  After all, Adolf was attacking the monopolies, wanting to make Germany great again, stressing the importance of country and loyalty, and showcasing his power of media and influence.

So yes, maybe we as a country did it to ourselves, but we need to ask why it got to this point.  Why the masses felt it was so important to shift the tide. Are Trump voters all dumb sheep with no coherent thoughts? I don’t think so.  I think it’s growing anger and fear that drives this train.

Sadly, addressing fear with brute force, isolation of certain groups, and marginalization will not be the fix our country. If there was only a way to put a salve on the wounds of the hearts of our citizens.  To have someone who will protect, shoulder, act as a parent who does not hurt but heals.  Someone who may actually listen to the heartbeat of a country who feels disenfranchised, and yet help them rise above it, love each other, and re-focus the hate into mercy, grace, and self-sacrifice.

We hunker down, and we shall live with the election results that come. We may believe this world is not our forever home, that the struggles of this life are not eternal.  But the impact we have upon our fellow man on earth does linger.  It creates a rip-tide of calm, like antacid in the stomach. People are bubbling over. And it’s up to us to speak for ourselves, our children, or families, our communities. We can peacefully stand up as our great brother Martin Luther King, Jr. once did, fighting for equality without rage or malice toward our fellow man.  We have to remain strong and vigilant in love, fighting for what’s right and providing an outlet to so many who seek a leader.

What this means is that we refrain from harsh words.  We don’t always one-up our neighbor. We get low, and serve others before ourselves.  We don’t always unfriend someone for an unpopular opinion.  As hard as it might be, we guide our path toward greatness as a nation with gentleness, self-control, goodness, patience, and all other fruits that are produced by good and strong trees.  So invite a Trump supporter to coffee, even though the Donald makes your blood boil.  Try to understand why women have such a positive reaction to Hillary being the first woman president, even though you don’t trust Clinton as far as you can throw her.  Try to open your mind, be understanding, and with every single person you come in contact.  Work to eliminate fear.  Muzzle the harsh speech.  Touch their arm, smile in their eyes.  Connect, and be human, and bring them into the light of love.

One nation, under God, indivisible.  That’s the only way we’ll survive this. At least that’s what the talking dogs tell me. And I, for one, believe them.

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Photo:

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Forever a culprit of modern society’s overbearing influence to be thin, I’ve been on some form of low-carb diet since college.  I eat normally for a while, then end up loading up on sugar, regret how that makes me look and feel, and end up eating nothing but protein shakes and salami until my pants fit.  I’m not saying this is a responsible way to live.  It’s just the pattern that has emerged. One day my son was like “why do you like salads so much” and my response was “it’s complicated.”  I don’t want to give my children body image issues by saying “I eat greens not for my health but so I can fit into that tight Michael Kors dress.”

But today, I had enough.  I’m so tired of eating grilled vegetables (no carrots or corn! Low glycemic index!) that I just craved things.  Strawberries, blueberries, YOGURT.  So I dusted off my Vitamix and determined that my body would, in fact, survive the sugar impact of a fruit smoothie with honey.  Also, I remembered that I had a bunch of almost-rotten kale in the refrigerator.

I buy kale from time to time when I go the grocery store in the morning, fueled with coffee and optimism, when I think “I’ll make kale chips! My children will love it! I’ll whip up some creamed kale with hatch chilies sprinkled with cheese!”  It sounds legitimate at the time, but you must realize I’m drugged on morning happiness and espresso. When the caffeine high recedes I’m like Oh crap. What do I do with all this kale. No one in my family eats it. No one likes it.  I get blank stares from my kids followed by “why aren’t we having broccoli” and “what are we having for dessert.”

So I dig this wilted kale from my crisper and decide it will be barely recognizable in my smoothie, the one I’m having with no protein powder, filled with things like DAIRY and FRUIT and ALL THE FORBIDDEN THINGS.  I stuff a big wad of this lettuce-like substance in the blender with wild abandon. Because I have this imaginary world that exists, promoted in part by Whole Foods, that says my body is very unhappy with cheese and hummus, and yet fresh salads and things like beets and heirloom tomatoes cause my inner organs to moan with joy. The blood will flow better!  The heart will beat longer!  The brain cells will fire faster! And when you eat cheeseburgers all your inner organs are depressed as hell and want to just die.

I know this is dumb.  I blame Jessica Alba.

So I drink this smoothie filled with three-day old kale, and realize that something keeps sticking in my teeth similar to the texture of homemade paper.  I’m concurrently picking out seeds with one hand and bits of green paperkale in the other.  I am not sure if my body is all jazzed up about this.  My mouth actually whispered “what happened to you eating eggs. I liked the eggs you cook with butter.”

“Whatever, mouth,” I say. “Butter is for losers. It was my brain’s turn, and it choose this strangely viscous papery smoothed-together fruit concoction made with Greek yogurt, because the yogurt from Israel was taken.”

But who are we kidding. Yes the honey and strawberries are nice, but at what cost?  I think the moral of this story is to not eat kale.  Just walk past it in the grocery store.  Do not believe your fake energetic morning voice that says you will roast it with oil and seasoning. Do not think if you put it in your blender it will mesh into the almond milk and become unnoticeable.

Let my story be a lesson to you.  Walk away from kale.

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photo

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I was struck today as I sat on my front porch about the number of weeds that proliferated my front yard, mixed in and amongst the grass, swaying in the humid air. I was also thinking of the number of people I know on social media, outspoken and outraged, furious at our country’s politics and certain social issues.

And it reminded me of a story in the Bible about weeds, a parable that Jesus painstakingly explained to the rather dense and bumbling disciples. I am like the twelve in the fact that I’m always wondering, questioning, failing, not understanding. I also drink wine and like a good footbath, so I’m just exactly like these people except I bathe more. But when God is with me, sitting next to me, whispering in my ear that he is never far, I still tremble at times about things I cannot control. I turn and ask, dimwitted and weak, for answers.

But the parable is simple. A man sowed good seed in his field, but an evil one scattered seeds of weeds in among the wheat. When the wheat sprouted, the weeds appeared. The owner’s servants were appalled, first questioning the owner. “Did you not sow good seed in your field?” they asked. I like how their first instinct was to blame the master. Are you a stupid idiot, planting weeds in your field? Were you on facebook when you planted the damn seeds and weren’t paying any attention? The bible didn’t say that part. That’s my own addition.

When the owner indicated it was done unto him, the servants offered to pull them up. But the owner was insistent against it. “No,” he answered. “because while you are pulling the weeds, you may uproot the wheat with them. Let both grow together until the harvest. At that time I will tell the harvesters; First collect the weeds and tie them in bundles to be burned, then gather the wheat and bring it into my barn.” Matthew 13:24-30

I find this parable interesting, especially with so many people expressing righteous indignation about so many things, discussing their version of family values or the Christian way, dabbing their napkins at their own dirty faces and tisk-tisking everyone. There is so much opinion about what is right and wrong, to the extent that we not only believe our own positions, but we are personally offended if our views are not shared, re-tweeted, applauded, and encouraged. Everyone needs a stage these days, clucking and trumping themselves up. You saw what I did right there, didn’t you? Anywho.

The list is long. Attend church, pray at night, do the right thing, rebuke evil, refrain from cussing, don’t do drugs, brush your teeth, move your ass, show up on time, say thank you, eat your vegetables, support women’s rights, love everyone, hate those who do not, be funny and forgiving, unless the people are morons and then be sarcastic and disparaging, love puppies. The list changes, bullets deleted and others added, and this list is highly dependent upon your background, race, income limits, and location. I’m sure if I think about it long enough I have a list, although it’s on recycled paper embossed in neutral tones, which would be very pinterest-worthy. Because that kind of thing is important to our eternal souls. #bestlistever

This checklist we have made defines what is good and acceptable, good seeds that we are taught by our leaders or parents or upbringing. But people all have their own boxes, and it’s hard to keep track what’s on the list.  Although I’m fairly certain most lists involve the virtues of coffee. Ours in particular, however, we have deemed good after much thought and supplication, and thus we feel very powerful about sharing it, encouraging others to follow it, and pointing out how wrong people are if they disagree.

Is this not what we want to do with voters we don’t agree with, people who do evil things, terrorists, racists, small-minded people, and weeds? We want to root them out, pluck them up, unfriend them, clean out the flowerbeds. If only people could just be reasonable. If only they could just do all the things on the list like we do.

But my dear friends. The friends who are so loving and supportive, reading my words and being so kind to me in all sorts of trials, friends who call me and put up with me and tell me it’s okay that I’m controlling and like linen so much and host extravagant dinner parties and have poor hearing. Hear me on this.

It’s not our job.

What Jesus is saying is that there will always be evil, weeds, distractions, sin, people who will not agree, lives that somehow proliferate but bear no fruit, Kardashians (I’m sorry Kim darling you’re so fun). And yet we are to live amongst all the noise, the hard, the negative. We must rise up our heads higher, and keep putting our roots down deeper, and realize that someday the weeds and the wheat will be separated by hands more powerful and more discerning than we can ever be. We are not to play God, for we are not equipped for this task. We trust the angels to know our hearts, and to protect us from harm. That is our comfort. Truly, in God we trust.

So let us all grow together, being kind to one another. Even our enemies amongst us. We are provided a sun above to light our face, a field of moist earth upon which our feet rest and allows us to flourish. Let’s not look around and cast judgment or try to make circles around our hearts so that we are safe. We are never safe. Living in a world of temptations means we have to find the inner strength to survive.

And survive we will. Tall and strong and hearty, like wheat stalks rustling in the harvest breeze. Yes, there are racists and haters amongst us. Protect yourself, but it’s not your job to round them up and eliminate them. It’s your job to grow tall, produce fruit, trust God, and thrive.

Also it’s your job to bathe. Because hello. I am standing right here next to you and we all share the same air.

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photo:

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As I get older, I’m becoming keenly aware of what letting go really means.

Admittedly, I have control over small things. I choose what to cook for dinner. I choose what clothing to wear. Menial choices through the day I dictate. Sometimes, just to shake things up, I brush my teeth last or shampoo before scrubbing. I can choose to be forgiving or harsh, yell or speak. I can choose to take a stand or be quiet, be involved or in the background. I can even choose to spend three hours watching Julia Child videos.

We have the luxury to live in a country where food is plentiful, choices can be made. We have freedom to roam and explore, think and create. And worship without being killed for it.

There are always things we can control. Each decision forms us, creates something of an imprint upon the world. Our interactions with other humans creates a ripple around us, and eventually those ripples become waves, and can change the tide of history. We can teach our children to abhor hate, quell violence, love the unlovable, forgive. It is hard, but doing hard things is what makes us valuable.

And yet there are times my sense of stability comes from the mirage of control, that somehow I singlehandedly can keep my children safe, keep my world safe, build protections around my heart so I am not easily injured. I like to build passageways in front of me, paved and clean. I think I know what’s best. How to raise children. How to discipline. How to create a healthy home. How to teach about God.

But maybe I don’t. What the hell do I know.

After the birth of my daughter, I had a life-threatening infection. I had no choice to let go. Because my body was literally too weak to go on. When I was going through a divorce that cut my heart out and shredded it into pieces, I collapsed and let it all go. Not because of my own strength, but because I had no more to give.

And here I am now, facing other life pressures. A future that’s uncertain, a life that’s so full of burdens. Questions that are seemingly unanswered, despite my pleading and begging and fasting and quiet. And it’s not through my perseverance that I trust and obey, but because of my weakness that I submit. I can choose tuna over ham, Mexican over burgers. I can put my high heels on or my sandals. But those decisions have no lasting consequences.

When it comes to life’s big turning points – Things That Need To Be Answered, all I have the strength to do is let it go. As if to the wind, carrying my prayers off on the waves that I’ve seen throughout my life, the spirit that flows in and out of me. Sometimes this current is strong and other times it recedes. I do not understand God, nor am I enlightened enough to see his divine handiwork. And yet I feel God at work in my life and in the lives around me. I feel it ebb and flow, in and out, always.

So I lay down at the very feet of God, curled up like my son does at night when I read him stories. My son buries his head in my chest as I read about turtles and aircraft carriers, dogs and bears. I, too, lay down at the feet of a father, soft and yet unyielding, not needing to be defined but only fully loved.

I need to know that I’m not wasting time. That all my life choices were not in vain, but have purpose. Trusting God is the only way through, and somehow I’ll make it through. This is the security that I seek. Not in my own control but in letting go. Always and forever safe in these arms.

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photo:

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Dear Teacher,

Well, it’s almost here. Thursday is the last day of school for our little munchkins. Can you believe it? The last day you’ll see my daughter’s hair half-brushed with nests of tangles curled up underneath like nobody would notice. The last day a jumper is thrown in the dryer with fabric softener so that it will smell clean. The last day I stuff lunch boxes with cheese [because we are out of bread and ham] “just like the French.” And the very last day you’ll have to listen to the rumblings of my daughter, who says things like “Ann of Green Gables has too much dialogue and not enough action. At least in Clone Wars there is fighting.” She’s strong with the Force, that one.

I know this time of the year can be challenging. But we are all tired. For example, my daughter’s birthday is in the summer. When this happens with other children, mothers lovingly celebrate it mid-year, called The Half Birthday. They bring doughnuts and dress in skinny jeans and they do these great things mothers do to celebrate their little one. I think this is slightly ridiculous. Not the skinny jeans part, which I wholeheartedly support. Nor celebrating their little one. I told you I make fancy French lunches, so you can see that I care. But we don’t have half-weddings or half-promotions in life and we certainly don’t celebrate half-done projects. So let’s make them PUSH ON THROUGH until the actual day, when three people will actually be in town. Not everyone will make your retirement party either, kiddo, and you’ll only end up with a desk clock. Hard life lessons.

But my daughter begged for me to bring treats the last week of school. Because KIDS and SUGAR and EVERYONE ELSE DID. Why not, I said. There’s not much else going on. Except for a million emails from the school about summer reading and all the dryer sheets being consumed.

Let’s be honest. I’m much too tired to bake cupcakes, which is of course standard birthday fare. But we did have a brownie mix (SCORE!) so my sweet girl whipped up a batch that we will cut into teeny weeny pieces to make enough for her entire class. Because we are resourceful. Unfortunately, when I tried to slice them they crumbled and broke and we ended up with a platter of gooey crumbles.

So we improvised. That’s how we roll. So rolled we did, crumbly gooey baked brownies into tiny balls. We call them “brownie bites.” It was my daughter’s idea, which is brilliant. I know you want her to be creative and unique, so we made a treat tray with our chocolate bites and leftover Christmas cookies from the freezer and seven tiny cupcakes from Target we had left over. The reason for this creative display is not because we necessarily feel 4^th graders need choice, but because we simply do not have enough of each separate confection and we are lazy.

Soon it will be over. You won’t get emails from me bailing on field trips (well I had a meeting, alright already?) and you won’t get papers back from my daughter challenging why the math quizzes always involve the eating (and taking away) of so many waffles. She won’t write any more essays on why barbarians “really aren’t that bad” and you won’t see all my pride swell up all these miles away.

Because I’m so damn proud of her. I just want her to think and create, to challenge and to be different. I want her to roll up crumbled brownies and sing silly songs and not care so much about the rest. I want her to love with her entire heart, even if it hurts.

Thank you for putting up with her, with me, with us. Thank you for letting her be a Jedi at recess, and for using Jolly Ranchers as currency with the other students in order to buy their pencils. Thank you for letting her somehow shine through the private school regime and be herself.

I hope you enjoyed the smashed brownie balls. After all, it’s not her real birthday so who cares. Choose a Christmas cookie instead.

Yours truly,

Amanda