Me vs. Us

I think, despite my history of ricocheting among intermittent commitment, all-consuming fixation, and wandering focus, I am finally becoming something of a runner.

After days, weeks, months, years and years of near-obsession; after ruining what might have been a perfectly good life-long relationship; after wasting what should have been the most productive years of my youth; running and/or athleticism and my body have lost their death-grip on my psyche. My day is no longer lost or won by the turn of a workout.

I have always wanted to be this person. And despite myself, I may have even become quite fast.

I am thrilled.
I am having enormous fun.
I am tired.

This morning at the gym as I was enjoying the fruits of my previous blazing workouts, Cindy informed me that I have too much energy for my own good. The realization, after the initial shrug-off, that I was pouring all that energy out at 6am at the downtown YMCA hit me rather hard.

All I could see in the wake of Cindy's comment was an image of my 8pm self, struggling through barbies and duplos, hoping that Pip goes down quickly and easily so that I can get a little rest.

Pip was not at the YMCA with me, neither were my family and friends. The only things present at the 6am downtown Y were me and my self-centered pursuit .

I frankly don't really know what to think. I know that it is just another chapter in my never-ending saga of Deborah versus mother, but I can't seem to shake the guilt or second-guessing.

Running is a hobby of seemingly endless benefits; I get quality girl talk time with my friends, I work off stress, I fend off depression, I get outside, and I rejoice in the shear physical pleasure of it all. But it comes at a price to everything else.

So where do I end as an individual and begin as a mother? I know that I need to feed myself in order to optimally care for my baby, but where does (should) the dividing line fall?

I expect to be wresting with this for eons to come.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

I think I might be broken

We have been sick; lethargy-inducing, stupefyingly sick. The sickness has come in waves, with a better day here, a worse one there. Through it all though, I have never ceased feeling like a terrible person.

The thing is I am crotchety. Little things are getting to me and I am taking my irritations out on my family. My irritability has formed a toxic miasma in which I reside. Its foul odor emanates from me, and I witness its foggy tentacles creeping out before me as I step into a room. The frothy pink bubbles rising from my mother's, father's, and baby's lyrical play put up stiff resistance but can, and do, succumb to my malodorous cloud. I am toxic.

The toxic haze is even less called for and more puzzling during this most recent bout of familial illness. My mother, the unfailingly generous and kind woman who cares for my daughter while I am at work, woke the other morning feeling worse than she had the night before. My response, the response of an adored daughter who should thank her lucky stars to have such a giving mother? I sighed. I sighed, became irritated, and started contemplating what this latest development would do to my morning run. Who behaves that way?

The trouble, on top of the toxic fumes that intermittently burn the eyes and throats of my loved ones, is that I am having a really hard time changing. I most emphatically do not want to be an irritable person, but the sourness inevitably wells up inside. I am meditating, writing thank you notes, running, and generally trying to be good, but I have not yet banished this foul, ungrateful creature inside. help.

- well, there it is... posted from my iPad

Thank you family

It is Sunday morning and I have just spent the first hours of my day sipping tea, meditating, and listening to a dharma talk on the interconnectedness of all beings. I read Aloo-Ki and the Three Snow Bears with Pip. We dressed her in her two favorite butterfly shirts and shared laughter as she ran through the house sans diaper and pants.

I have not spent the morning logging endless hours at an exhausting second job, quarreling with my indescribably wondrous (but often trying) two-year-old, or slogging though countless hours of housework accumulated over the work week.

Pipi and I are joyful, secure, (relatively) peaceful individuals due in no small part to the love and support you give us. We are able to pursue our dreams, delight in life, and fully inhabit the world around us.

It is not easy to give up your quiet, tidy house to the chaos and noise of a young mother and her toddler. It is not easy to live with and put up with the irritability of your grown daughter. It is not easy to be asked to help parent a two-year-old. But you two do it with grace, love, and patience. Everyday you give us the greatest gift we could ask for - the two of you in our lives.

Thank you.

Much love, D & P


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

The smallest of Peanuts

Although due to arrive on the 20th of December, baby Peanut Butter decided to delay her appearance until 2009 - perhaps to join the ranks of those born in the year of the Ox. Intelligent and hardworking with the eloquence of a born leader, I think she could be my baby.