I have a question

What do you think of men? That's the short question.

Long before I counted myself a member of the finest club on earth (The Lesbians), I had observed, lived to know, etc. that men come and go and are not to be depended upon for mental or emotional stability. Bringing home the bacon? Sometimes. But only when I was recently full of chicken.

I was told tonight that "there are some good ones, few and far between maybe, but there are some good ones." OK. I all but told her to "go on with her bad self."

Strangely enough, my front porch mentor on the subject of "good men" went on to tell me the saddest story of her perfect man, her "Bubba." This is a man that raised her and loved her though he had no biological or legal reason to. She loves him. He loves her.

Unless . . . she brings home a black man (she's white) or a woman. And in which case she's "done."

A similar situation in my own life put the nail in my "good men" coffin.

So the long question is, Ladies, straight, gay, ambiguous, young and old, how do you live with, communicate with, make love to, leave, stay with, defend yourself from, cling to, hope for, grieve for the men in your lives?

Do you revel in their different-ness? Celebrate the wonder of life? Do you endure heartache? Abuse? Have you found your "other half"? Do you clamor sometimes foolishly for their attention? And if so, to what end? Why? Do you trust them? Do they disappoint you? Do they lift you up? Do they take care of you? Do you take care of them?

I am truly and gratefully interested in the good, the bad and the ugly.

Celebrate!

Thank you, Judge Vaughn Walker. You helped a few more of us "climb on, two by two."

Revel

I've been away forEVER. My last post said that I wanted to revel in my family. So here goes . . . It is late. Too late. Margo has taken our newest best friend around the block to prove to her that a certain landmark is in fact, this direction from my front porch and not that direction at all. They are both very funny people.

And in this cloud of directional confusion (and especially from my own front porch) I find myself reminded of my True North. Margo sights me.

"My Butt Grow!"

Ray is skinny, super skinny. He's 3 and wears a 3T shirt which is expected. But he wears 18 month pants because his waist hasn't caught up to his legs, which is to say that he has been wearing capris and long socks all winter.

Several months ago for reasons unknown to me, my aunt Mimi got Ray to eat by telling him that it would make his butt grow. He is totally taken with this notion.

He talks about his butt all the time. Before dinner, during dinner, and especially afterward when he has us examine his butt to see if it did indeed grow. If his pants fall down, he says he needs to eat to make his butt grow. If someone tells him that he's gotten so big, he turns around and shows them his butt. "My butt grow!"


I know this picture is terribly blurry, but his pants! How hilarious is this? :)

Dixie's Babies

So there's this lady, no she's not a lady, she's an angel. Her name is Dixie. She was on a church mission to Haiti years and years ago and didn't leave. She has started and continued to run God's Littlest Angels Orphanage in the mountains there.

I first saw her on TLC's Adoption Story about 7 years ago. A family from Edmonton was traveling to Haiti to get their son, Brian. The mother said that Dixie had sent them several profiles of children in need of a family, and when she saw Brian her heart lit up. "That's my son. That's my boy."

The adoptive mother and father flew to Haiti and spent several days on site with Brian. Dixie seemed ever present. She arranged for the adoptive family to meet Brian's much older biological sister. It was amazing to see the love that she had for her baby brother and the joy and hope that she had for his future.

The new family flew back to Canada. They dressed Brian in a snow suit on the plane. There was a most priceless clip of Brian standing in the cold night watching the snow come down. Without looking at her, he reached up and took his mother's hand.

I haven't been able to get Brian or his mother and father or Dixie or any of the other children there out of my head. Out of my heart.

Dixie has a blog that's well worth the read. She has a life that's well worth the upper echelons of Heaven.

If you are searching for something to put your positive energy or dollars towards, please click on either link and help Dixie help so many.

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Crabby

I've been lost in my own brain. Believe me, it can get sticky and dark in there.

I found myself mired down in all the drama that attacked our little group here. It made me sad. It shook the comfort that I took in our strange but I thought powerful friendships. So I retreated, telling myself that I had been let down once again. I was wrong.

I let myself down. I realized that this space that began as a place for me to purge and also celebrate my sometimes quirky life stories had become over the months something of a chat room. I was writing to you and for you and not for myself. And I grew tired and felt a little bit empty.

In a house with 6 (sometimes more) people, there are very few things that are just mine. In fact I can think of only 2, my bras and my shoes and that's only because they don't fit anyone else. Small favors. But this space was all mine. No one else's, until I gave it away. I never claimed to be a genius. Well, there was that once, but that came crashing down as well. In short, I missed this little nook that I had carved out for myself.

So I'm back. (Is AC/DC playing as loudly in your head as it is in mine?) Hopefully with more discipline to record my life with my kids and my Great Love and our wonderful friends and less compulsion and desire to make you all like me, not that I wouldn't take that if it came along.