Our Lady of Sorrows

I like words.  I like the way they fit together to make memorable sentences.  When I find a really great quote, I write it down and keep it.  Sometimes I want to put a particular quote up where I can see it often, and think about what it says.  So I arrange my quotes in a way that I find aesthetically pleasing.  I am far from the world’s best layout & design person, but here are a few of the quotes I’ve arranged lately:

I love this quote, because it gets at something at the heart of the blues music I love so much.  Sometimes life really, really sucks.  Blues knows all about that, and doesn’t try to hide from it, doesn’t try to disguise it as something else, just accepts it and keeps going.  And in the process, it makes something beautiful.

 

This quote is from the movie You Kill Me, which I watched recently and absolutely loved.  Every addict believes in their heart of hearts that they could be sober if only the people around them weren’t so damn crazy.  This is the version of the Serenity Prayer that comes before you find a little recovery.

‘nuf said.

Gotta love the Hitchhiker’s Guide.  Sigh.  I made this for my brother when he was stressing about his wedding and vow renewal.  I strongly suggested that he use it as his desktop wallpaper.  Feel free to do the same.

This is one I made for myself when I was getting wigged out about wearing makeup, and the way the men around me reacted to me wearing makeup.  I framed it, and put it on my dresser to remind me that it takes courage to allow yourself to be beautiful, and that it’s ok to embrace my own potential for beauty.

This isn’t technically a quote, but I love it so much I decided to include it anyway.  This is my free printable instant Halloween costume.  All you have to do is print it out (if you’re fancy, you can print it on a sheet of label paper to make a big sticker), pin it on, and voila, you’re wearing a costume!

Feel free to print these out, use them however you like.  If you do something particularly cool with them, please let me know!

St. Kingsmark

I know you guys won’t believe this, but I think I may have found another family even cooler than my own.  I know.  The mind boggles.  And yet I am steadily becoming convinced that this just might be true.  As evidence, I present the facebook status updates of both the father and mother of the family, mostly about the antics of their five children: three girls aged 9, 8, and 5, a  3 year old boy, and a 1 year old baby girl.  (You may remember this baby girl as the ridiculously photogenic baby at our most recent Midsummers Party.)  Read, enjoy, and be convinced of their general amazingness.

Status updates from the Dad:

Dinner this evening was interrupted when Girl2 and Girl1 paused to perform an interpretive dance expressing their feelings in regards to French Bread.  I think the basic feeling was positive. The dance was kind of like “hips don’t lie” with disco pointing thrown in.

Girl1: Don’t be silly. Ladies don’t smoke!
Girl2: I think sometimes, some ladies smoke candy cigars.

Overheard from a young man, “Got to get my socks on and be a dog.”

From this day last year:
Fairy Tale Justice: The girls just finished performing an extemporaneous musical best summarized as a cross between Annie and The Princess Diaries. At the conclusion, the king announced in regards to the proprietress of the orphanage, “I think I will have her killed, probably by hanging, but you can throw things at her first if you want.” (They did want.)
Yep. Same kids…
I asked: So who played the orphanage proprietress and how did she handle the things being thrown?
Dad replied: I think she was a doll voiced by Girl2, but I can’t recall for sure. (Large productions invariably result in multi-role casting and inanimate doubles.)
Further detail: I believe it was Girl1 voicing the king who pronounced sentence.

Deep Questions:
Girl1(age 5): “Daddy, do all people go to heaven?”
Daddy: “Well, all people who live good lives and love God go to heaven. We certainly hope that each person goes to heaven, but some people might not want to go there.”
Girl1: “But can anyone go to heaven?”
Daddy: “If they want to.”
Girl1: “Even people from Texas? Or is that so far away they have a separate heaven just for Texas?”
Friend: Has she caught that anti-Texas bug that’s been in the air lately?
Dad: I figured it was more that she was Texan enough to figure that Texas probably got its own heaven.
Friend: Ever see the Simpsons clip where Homer goes to Catholic heaven?
Dad:You forget that I missed out pop culture. I was in the bathroom or reading a book or something.

Girl1 says, “Never going to tell a lie. Never going to make you cry. Never going to say goodbye. And then, I forget the rest.”

That would be Girl3 singing “Goodbye Broadway, Hello France” and Girl1 warbling out “Would You Rather be a Colonel with an Eagle on Your Shoulder, or a Private with a Chicken on Your Knee?”

Mr Clean’s Magic Eraser: For those times when a two year old finds three Sharpies and the piano keyboard.

‎”There’s nothing like the mid-air kill,” says The Dad, brandishing a fly swatter.

Daddy: “Boy, you need to go potty.”
Boy: “Won’t go potty.”
Daddy: “Why not?”
Boy: “The cats been peeing in my potty.”
Daddy: “What? The cats don’t pee in your potty.”
Boy: “Hate those stupid cats peeing in my frog potty.”

The girls are discussing how A Little Princess should have ended. It would seem they’d favor something more like the ending of the Odyssey. Children have an over-developed sense of justice

Mommy Wars in the play room:
“Oh yeah, your baby doll has marker on her head.”
“That’s not my fault! Girl1 colored on her when she was a baby.”
“What kind of mother lets Girl1 color on her baby?”

The dishwasher is out of commission here until the repair guy comes on Monday. Girl3 and Girl2 have taken to dish washing and drying with all the excitement that comes with novelty, but this doesn’t put them above epic complaining.
Last night I overheard Girl2 telling a friend, “Don’t even *think* of coming to our house after dinner. We do nothing but dishes these days.” A pause. “Unless you like being treated like a servant.”

Girl2 opines, “If we go out to eat you won’t have to cook or do dishes; all it takes is money.”
Mom: The name [Girl2]  is so glamorous that the very appellation draws one toward a life of elegance and ease.

Girl2, outraged at the treatment of Boy, asserts, “You can’t just make him go potty and not give him a treat!”

The kids have put a “do not disturb” sign on my back — but I’m keeping it.

Through greatness of spirit, I’ve decided that if some terribly rich person wants to pay me to read and write whatever interests me, I shall not say no. If you fit that description, please drop me a line.

On being warned that if he didn’t stop using his current favorite words of derision (“hate” and “stupid”), he would be spanked, Boy responds, “Hate stupid spanking!”

Girl1 has taken to demanding that she lead the middle of three Hail Mary’s in family prayers: not the first, not the last. When an explanation was demanded of her she explained, “The first will be last and the last will be first, and I won’t want to be either one of those.”

The Black Stallion Returns: Zombies of the Knacker’s Yard

Catholic Parenting Fail:  Tonight, at the homeschool blessing mass here in Columbus it was our daughter who raised her hand after mass when the bishop offered to answer children’s questions and asked, “When are you going to retire and get a wife?”

Status UpdatesFrom The Mom:

Girl1 dashes over to look at the gaping hole left by Girl3′s newly-departed tooth. “Disgusting!” she shrieks ecstatically.

Finding it a little hard to believe that all the teenagers at the skate park at 1:30 were homeschoolers with no parental supervision.

I need my tea to rise up and slap me awake.

The advertisements for family board games never show what happens when you add a 5yo, a 3yo, and a 1yo into the mix of players.

Just had to instigate that awkward “your child was trying to hit the power line in my backyard with the rake from my garage” discussion with the neighbors down the street.

I stopped my nine-year-old from getting off the couch and said, “Where do you think you’re going? It’s reading time.” And she said, “I read it all,” and proceeded to give me all the salient details of Through The Looking-Glass, which she’d picked up, unassigned, not two hours before. That’s my girl.

Charging all over the house, trying to figure out whether the smell is something burning inside, or a skunk outside.

So peaceful here while the three big girls are staying at Grandma’s for a few days. Peaceful, that is, until the baby gets a little tough love from The Boy.

Oh friends, do not, I beg of you, intermingle discussion of an article on IVF with the reading of Dr. Seuss, or you may find yourself dissolving into peals of hysterical laughter when you hit the line, “Our chap counts these balls as they plup in a cup/ And that’s how we know who is down and who’s up.”

The sound of distant thunder underscores the happy shrieks of the children playing outside.

The Dad, aghast: Did you just say your cell phone “needs charged”?
The Mom: No, I said it needs “to be charged”. I haven’t gone native Ohio yet.

Baby sings: “People! Who wake people! Are the most horrible people in the world!”

“Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed and some few to be chewed and digested; that is, some books are to be read only in parts; others to be read, but not curiously; and some few to be read wholly, and with diligence and attention.” — Sir Francis Bacon, “Of Studies”
Dad: Has baby been eating books again?
Mom: No, but she threw down all the bottom shelves again looking for a tasty morsel.

See what I mean?  Awesome.

ETA: Also, they have a blog.  Of course.

All Saints

Wedding Epicness continues apace.  On Saturday Sae and Mr. T, with a revolving cast of Mariah, Indy, and Rosie, toured various venues and had tasting appointments with a few caterers.  They’ll do this again next Saturday, this time with both sets of the in-laws-to-be, and then I think we’ll have a final decision about that.  So far there’s a clear favorite at least for the venue, but you never know.  I think I mentioned that we have a date (May 28), and Indy is drawing like mad creating what is possibly the most beautiful invitation ever.  We have colors now too, though it’s not one or two colors, but a whole palette of various shades of blue, green, and pink.  We’re not completely sure what we’re going to do for bridesmaid dresses, though Sae is leaning heavily towards the “send everyone color chips and have them get something formal that matches one of the blues” idea.  My bright idea was that we should have all the bridesmaids also wear white, and then have accents (a sash, a large flower brooch, a hair ornament, something at the neckline or the hem) made from fabric in the wedding colors (sing withe me: “Girls in white dresses with blue satin sashes…”), but Sae wasn’t crazy about that idea.  I had been cherishing visions of making myself a supremely fresh and pretty fifties style frock from white eyelet, but I guess that will have to wait for some other occasion.

We also don’t have a wedding dress yet, though I think we’re closing in on one.  Sae has very specific ideas about what she wants, which is surprisingly much more elaborate than I ever would have guessed.  I associate Sae much more with a down to earth sort of unfussy elegance.  This is definitely not that.  In fact, I think this is Sae channeling her Inner Princess with a vengeance.  It’s beautiful, just a little surprising to me.  We had thought Indy had found the perfect dress on eBay, but when we compared Sae’s measurements with those of the dress, we realized that the only way the dress would fit is with some fairly aggressive corseting.  So, yeah, no.  Sae would like to be able to breathe on her wedding day.  Yesteday we went over to Aunt B’s, who has Grandma’s wedding dress, to see if that would fit Sae.  It isn’t the style Sae is looking for, but if you can fit into your grandmother’s dress (and it is a lovely dress) that tends to trump just about anything.  I had pointed out that Grandma S was one of the Little People when young, but we thought we’d give it a shot anyway.  The dress was indeed beautiful, though Aunt B only had the sheer overdress (tight lace bodice with high v-neckline and long tight sleeves with little buttons at the wrist, sweepingly full organza skirt with ruffle at the hem).  Sae gave it a shot, but wasn’t particularly disappointed when only her head and one of her arms fit inside.  She tried on Aunt B’s wedding dress too, just for good measure.  It was beautiful, but not really what Sae’s looking for.  Still, it was fun seeing it on her, and talking together about ways that it might work.  It was a very sweet family moment, with Sae, Mom, Indy, Aunt B and myself all crowded around Sae in Aunt B’s upstairs hall, admiring Sae and the dress.

The thing I’m dithering about today is whether I should try to find a suitable bridesmaid dress I can afford in the right color and in my size (a Holy Grail if I ever heard of one), or make my own.  I know exactly the kind of dress I want.  1950s style with a fitted bodice, ballet or scoop neckline, cap sleeves or no sleeves, and a gorgeously full skirt, possibly with petticoats, that is no more than calf length.  Basically this dress, but for half that price, or this pattern, if it were in my size.  Ironically, I actually own that pattern, except when I bought it I didn’t understand that sewing pattern sizes and ready to wear sizes are radically different (basically, I have to sew a pattern two or three sizes bigger than the size I would buy off the rack in a store), so it’s not my size.  It’s possible that I could maybe grade the pattern up to my size, but I’ve never done that before, I’m not that accomplished a seamstress (I just graduated to actually finishing my seams), and I’m pretty sure that I would make a mess of it.  Plus there’s the time factor.  And then, unless I found a really, really good bargain in silk or satin fabric in just the right color, I might not actually save any money by making it myself.  So I’m torn between wanting to make something beautiful, and feeling humble about my skills and pessimistic about my available time.  I figured a few of you might have opinions on this, so I thought I’d let you weigh in:

Also, I should mention that this wedding planning has started to be the occasion for some memorable quotes.  My favorite so far is from Saturday:

Sae: Mr. T, am I a crack baby?

Mr. T: Well, if you are, you’re a cute one!

See why he fits in so well with my family!  Gosh!

St. Faustina

This was going to be a blog post all about the wedding I was in this weekend, and how lovely it was to see ‘Sup Doc and Ducky be wed, and how great my dress was (when the groomsman I was going down the aisle with saw me in it he said, “Well, hel-LO!“ then turned to the groom and said, “I get to go down the aisle with that?!” which was very gratifying, even if I had to pretend not to hear), and how much fun I had dancing with Sky, etc., but first I have to brag a little.  I mean, a little more than I’ve bragged already.

See, tonight the UD Swing Club officers unveiled the potential designs for this year’s club t-shirts, and to my utter surprise and delight, one of them had a quote from me on it!  It was from when we were teaching guy turns, in which the guy places the girl’s hand on his shoulder (or stomach), and turns himself.  The girl leaves her hand where the guy left it so that he can maintain connection with her, and pick up her hand again at the end of the turn.  When we’re teaching this I tell the class that the rule is that the girl leaves her hand wherever the guy puts it.  And then I always add, “Within reason.” It’s mostly for the laugh which always comes, but also because I’ve been in classes with guys who liked to push things.  I want to nip that sort of thing in the bud before some poor girl gets traumatized and decides she doesn’t like dancing after all.  Anyway, I forget what the t-shirt design had on the front, but on the back it says, “Always follow the lead… within reason.” I can’t tell you how much joy it gave me to see that.  It’s only one t-shirt design among many, several of which were also strong contenders.  We’ll find out later how the voting turned out.  But I don’t care which design they choose for the t-shirt – it makes me all warm just knowing they thought up that design.

Now that I’ve got that out of my system, the wedding this weekend was wonderful too.  I don’t think we could have asked for a prettier day.  The sky was so bright blue it matched the bridesmaid dresses.  Everything came together smoothly, everyone behaved themselves, and it was just lovely.  The wedding was at 1:30, but everyone who was in the wedding had to be there at noon for pictures.  Some of the pictures they had on the list to take were funny.  One was, “Bridesmaids with bride, laughing.” So the photographer had us cluster around the bride, and laugh.  Johnsy had the fakest laugh ever, which made us all laugh for real, and then we couldn’t stop laughing.  It was kind of awesome.  Everyone looked lovely in their dresses, including me.  The ceremony went off without at hitch too.  I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone proclaim their vows as clearly and definitely as ‘Sup Doc did.  Also, she remembered my brother in the petitions, which made me tear up a little, but in a good way.

I had a great time at the reception, for which I have mostly Sky to thank.  Since I started swing dancing wedding receptions have become more and more frustrating.  I used to be able to just boogie on down without thinking there could be more, but now I know that there is.  It’s not so bad when they play regular dancing music, but then a swing song comes on, or some classic Motown, and I want to swing dance so bad my bones ache.  And there’s never anyone to dance with, except that one guy who took three East Coast lessons four years ago and thinks he might sort of remember how it went.  It’s just agony.  Except this time it was great because I had Sky with me.  I love dancing with Sky, in part because I know he likes dancing with me too.  We danced a lot, and even though I was dancing in socks on carpet (I think I had slight rug burn on the balls of my feet by the end of the night), it was wonderful.  It was fun getting to know Sky a little better too.  All in all, I had a wonderful time.

It was funny seeing other people’s reactions to us dancing.  Usually when I dance I’m with other dancers, who take the fact that we can dance for granted, nothing special.  It’s a little startling to remember that other people don’t do this.  Towards the end of the evening I was having a fun dance with Sky, and a lady at the side of the dance floor started exclaiming about how wonderful we were, that we danced “like Rock Stars!” Then Sky dipped me, and she was astounded by that too.  “Look!  He dipped her!  He really did!” The funny thing was that as she was coming over trying to compliment us, Sky and I were having a small argument over whether I had dipped low enough or not.  Lately he and Mr. Zoot have been trying to get me to dip lower (I think they should be grateful that I dip at all), and he didn’t think I was cooperating as much as I possibly could.  So we were disputing this while this lady was practically hopping around at our shoulders, beside herself at the awesomeness of our dancing.  It was, frankly, a little surreal.

The other funny thing was dealing with my groomsman.  The guy who escorted me down the aisle was an friend of the groom’s from the Yellow Springs fire department, a very nice older gentleman who did his best to be courtly, but really didn’t have much in common with me at all.  I was friendly with him, but didn’t really expect anything from him.  I mean, I had lots of friends at the wedding, plus Sky.  Even without Sky, I’m well used to taking care of myself.  I think the groomsman was a little taken aback at my independent attitude.  He kindof hovered around a little at different points, and then would go away again.  At the end of the night he said, “You’re the most low maintenance bridesmaid I’ve ever seen!” And to be honest, until that moment, it didn’t occur to me that I could/should be anything else.  So I have to put this question out there for others who have more experience than I in The Way of the Bridesmaid: Are you supposed to treat your groomsman as your date?  Or rely on him to pay attention to you?  I figured his duties ended after he got you safely back down the aisle.  Is there more involved?  Please let me know!

St. Damian

So I finally went to see my Hero Doctor on Tuesday.  One of the side benefits of being back in school is that I can go to him again, which is awesome.  I’ve missed seeing him, not just because he prescribes me lovely drugs that help me breathe and think and stuff, but also because I like him and the staff at the Student Health Center.  I’ve been needing to go see my doctor, not just to pick up some prescriptions, but because I need to get my heart checked out.  See, it’s not normal for an otherwise healthy, non-smoking, active 30 year old man to keel over with a massive heart attack, unless there’s some other factor involved, usually genetic.  Up until a month ago (and it is exactly a month today), I did not have much of a family history of heart disease.  Now I do.  When we were in the hospital, all of us siblings looked at each other and said that now all of us need to get checked, cuz I don’t know if we could survive going through this a second time.

So I’m doing my part.  On Monday I’ll go to get some blood drawn to check cholesterol and a few other things.  If the test comes back high, like it probably will, I’ll have to go on medication.  My doctor says that diet and exercise can help, but given the situation he’s not going to mess around waiting for oatmeal to bring my cholesterol down.  One of the big questions right now is how I’m going to afford the cholesterol meds, but my doctor says we’ll figure something out.  He’s pretty good at that.

In other news, I really gotta start getting a little more sleep at night.  It seems like I’ve been up late pretty much every night for a while.  First it was studying for Biology, then writing a summary of Socrates’ Apology for Philosophy, then more studying for Biology (I had the Huge Biology Test of Doom on Wednesday), and then, when that was done, I went to go seeCoraline with Rosie last night (and it was totally excellent, and all of you should go see it.  Soon.)  All of this has been kindof a lot.  I’m getting pretty tired.  Unfortunately, my schedule doesn’t look like it’s going to let up much any time soon.  Tonight is CL (my Catholic young adult group), and then tomorrow night the men from my CL group have decided to cook a Valentine’s dinner for the women (and have I mentioned how amazingly cute they’re being about it?).  Saturday night is The Boilermakers at Miami U., and then Sunday is TOT planning.  Also, this is the weekend that Johnsy has decided that all the kitchen cupboards will be painted.

So, you know, my life is full.

I’m doing my best to help things be a little less full.  I know I can’t keep pushing myself like I’ve been and expect to come through it in any kind of shape.  It’s frustrating not being able to do all the things I want to do, to get tired so fast, how things take twice as long as I think they should.  I know that it won’t always be like this, that little by little I’ll get back to my old self.  However, for right now I have to be patient, take it easy on myself, accept myself the way I am.  Sadly, one of the few things I’ve identified that I can let go of for now is some of my swing teaching commitments.  So Monday and last night I talked to SD about it, and we came to an agreement, and I’m going to take a break from teaching for Swingout Dayton for a while.  Hopefully it won’t be long – maybe just until my birthday (May 1).  By that time the school semester will be over, and hopefully I’ll be in a better place.  I’ll still be teaching for UD, so it’s not like I won’t be teaching at all.  Just, you know, not so much.

Prof. Peat Quote Book:
“It’s the New Testament, or as I like to call it, The Sequel.”
(To a student coming in late) “You didn’t miss anything.  We were mostly playing canasta.”
“This would look really good on the evaluations: What I learned from the Greek philosophers is that my mom is stupid.”
“There’s a really great movie of Crime & Punishment with Gene Hackman as Raskolnikov.”
“There are logicians who like to think contradictions can be true, but we make them live in Australia for the most part.”