this week

this week, i found an easy way to reach bliss, and god: via the intoxicating perfume of the the iris plant and the apple blossoms growing right outside my window.
the apple tree blossomed last week, and already, the flowers are fading and petals have fallen all over the grass, making our yard look magical. i know that all the flowers on the tree will be gone with the first strong wind, and it's a little sad, but now the lilacs are flowering, and the feast for the senses is not over yet...

here are sena and aiyana enjoying the apple blossoms:



peace

two books i recently read

if you noticed, in my book list, i am now reading 'eat, prey, love' by e. gilbert. it seems that everyone is reading this book.... i heard a lot about it, so i borrowed it from the library. i got into it right away, it was so easy...i'm about two thirds of the way through it now, and i like it, but i don't love it. or maybe that's not right. there are things about it i love, passages i'd like to reread, lines i'd like to quote. but overall, there's something about it that doesn't grab me as much as it could...

this is a complete reversal of the way i felt about the previous book i read, 'a language older than words' by d. jensen. this book is really hard to describe. i don't even know if i want to describe it, because i will surely give you the wrong impression. maybe i'll just describe my reaction to it instead.

i read the first chapter of this book and had to put it down. i was so disturbed by what i read, by the rawness and honesty and beauty and suffering i found in there, that i could not read any more. i decided that this book would not benefit me right now, it would not make me a better person, it would not relax me, and since i didn't see how i'd get anything positive out of it, i decided it was not for me. somehow though, i kept thinking about it throughout the day, i kept being affected and disturbed by it; i also kept being drawn back to its beauty, and finally i picked it up again. after that, i could barely put it down, spending any free time i had with it. it was difficult to read until the end, but something in me felt compelled to keep going.
i loved it. but it was really intense. not easy to read. in that way, it was an order of magnitude different from 'eat, love, pray'.

see what you think...
peace

chickens, mushrooms and greens

we got chickens again. the family that gave them to us got sick of the rooster's crowing at 5am, and wanted to get rid of them. so we got the rooster, a hen and 2 small chicks. unfortunately, one of the little chicks died the night we got them, bc he fell from the chicken coop, and something ate it. i like having birds and animals, but i don't like having babies, unless they're my own babies, because they often die and i have a hard time dealing with it. anyway, the other little chick is doing fine. so far, we haven't let them out of the coop yet, just so they get used to it and recognize it as their new home. also, the rooster's call in the morning is not too loud, so that should not be a problem for us. the only problem is that the hawks are already circling in the sky, so i'm just hoping that when we do let them out, the rooster will protect the hen and chick, or they'll all be smart enough to go in the bushes. we could just keep them in the coop all the time, i guess, but i don't think that'd be too fun for them, as they love to be out, pecking around, stretching the wings and being free...

yesterday, we finally 'planted' the shiitake mushrooms i ordered last february. it was a fun project which took all day. we did it at our friends' farm, and the weather was good enough to be outside the entire time. shiitakes grow well on oak logs, so that's what we used. we had to drill holes in the logs, put shiitake spawn inside the holes, and cover it up with bees wax. we brought the logs home and put them in a shady spot, and now we have to keep them very moist, and if all goes well, in about 9 months we should have mushrooms growing all over the logs... i'll let you know.

ed picked his first harvest of greens yesterday: spinach, kale, and a variety of lettuces. they look beautiful and fresh, and taste amazing. this winter, esp twds the end, i was craving greens, but i felt bad buying stuff that came all the way from florida, california or even further. so now i am very excited that we're getting food from the garden again!

peace and happy eating!

mayday celebration

mayday is one of my favorite celebrations of the year. mayday falls on may 1st every year, and it's a celebration of the earth, of fertility and love. traditionally it's also been used as a marker for the time when farmers can start planting their crops.

over the past few years, we've been celebrating mayday at our friends' marcus and cindy's house, along with almost everyone else we know. it's really a lot of fun, as everything takes place outside, and everyone brings amazing food. the kids also love it - there are so many of them it seems, running, playing, and just being kids in a safe and easy environment.

the main ritual at mayday is dancing around the maypole, which is a tall tree trunk sticking straight out of the ground, with lots of colorful ribbons hanging from the top. people stand around it and pick a ribbon each, and then the dance begins. everyone holds their ribbon as they move round and around the maypole, in 2 opposite directions. eventually, all the ribbons get wrapped around the pole, and it makes a pretty, colorful pattern. as people dance, there are bagpipes and drums playing (i like the drums). it's all very crazy and chaotic and so much fun... put together good food, good friends and dancing outdoors and this is what you get, lots of fun. at least that's what works for me.

when night falls, there's always a big fire, which someone makes right by the edge of a field, overlooking the woods in the distance. last night two guys were playing drums as the rest of us sat around the fire warming up and watching kids roast marshmallows (i'm not a fan of marshmallows, i'm sad to admit).
drums and fire as the night gets darker and colder - i love it!

peace

lunchtime and retirement

i met 2 guys today at rein's deli. i was on my way home from ed's mom's house where i just dropped off the kids, and i was really hungry, so i stopped at this deli, which i used to like a few years ago. no space to sit though, it was lunchtime, so i had to sit at the bar on one of those stools that rotate. 1st time in my life...

it felt a bit weird at first, it was just me and a bunch of businessmen on their lunch hour. not my usual crowd (this morning i was at a tomato transplanting party with a bunch of earhty moms and kids, and this was quite a change from that).

the guy next to me started talking to me half a minute after i sat down. he tried guessing a few things about me, but was wrong on all of them. then he gave up and started telling me about hmself. he was 71, he said, and working for an insurance company nearby. i asked if he's planning to retire soon, and he said maybe in 10 years. i gulped. 'dude, you may be dead by then', but of course i didn't say it.

then his friend showed up. he was even older. 93 years old, and as he proudly let me know, he waas still working too, in some contracting business. i couldn't come up with anything other than 'that's....interesting'. what i really wanted to say is 'sorry to hear that'.
but maybe they love it. i'm just projecting my own feelings here...

the 71-year-old guy then asked me if i work nearby. i said that i was retired. he was...surprised, but then i told him that i was home with my kids and he looked somewhat relieved, and said that that counts as work. then he said "what does your husband do", and i told him engineering, but probably not much longer because he really wants to quit and be a farmer. then he said, 'so your husband is very wealthy', and i said yeah, but i don't think we meant the same thing. i tried to clarify for him a little, telling him that we live very simply, small cars, no TV, not too many gadgets, all that. he looked puzzled. i don't think he knew what to make of me.

we all have our ways of categorizing people, and he probably categorized me as 'strange romanian woman' (he asked where i was from). i most likely categorized him and his friend as something they're not. it's hard to get to know someone in 10 minutes. still, it was an interesting lunch...

peace

on vaccines

my sister has done some pretty amazing research on vaccines, and i want to share it here.
i feel that it's very important to be well informed with something like this, especially since we're supposed to start vaccinating our children as soon as they're born, when their bodies are still so immature and sensitive to many influences.

like ed and i, my sister and ricardo have been doing their own independent vaccine research since before julia was born. my sister read over 10 books on the topic, and many articles. she tried to get info from sources with different points of view, and in so doing gather a well-rounded understanding of the relevant issues. recently, she put together 2 summaries on vaccinations, one of a book, and one of a video, which she found to be the most useful, and the least biased of all the info she's come across so far.

i am REALLY grateful to her for taking the time to write this down and share it with me and other people.

here are her summaries. please feel free to pass them along to anyone you think may be interested. i'd also like to add that my sister and ricardo did not start out thinking that they would not vaccinate. they started out wanting to know what's best for julia, and willing to spend a lot of time to find out. in my opinion, they're as unbiased as you can hope for, and so i trust their information and research.

----------

Dr. Sears "The Vaccine Book":

This is the best book I've read so far on the vaccines topic. Even though it is written by a pediatrician, and he is pro-vaccine, the book has less bias than most others I've read on vaccines, and contains a lot of useful information that I have not been able to find anywhere else (I think I've read about 10 books on vaccines so far, as well as seeing a few videos and reading lots of vaccine-related info on the internet).

His main conclusions are:

- Vaccines are important because they prevent some diseases which can be very serious/life-threatening

- Although disease-incidence may have been going down before the introduction of vaccines, he believes that vaccines have played a significant role in reducing or eliminating infectious disease in the US and have saved lives world-wide

- He believes parents' concerns about vaccines are well-founded and attempts to address some of them

- While he does not recommend avoiding all vaccines, he believes that not all vaccines are necessary, and that parents need to be well-informed and take responsibility for their decisions regarding vaccines

- He suggests selectively vaccinating and/or using an alternative vaccine schedule (which he has proposed) to minimize the risk of adverse effects

- For parents who choose not to vaccinate, he recommends breast-feeding for at least 2 years, and avoiding day-care and large play-groups.

- For each vaccine, he lists the different pharmaceutical companies who make the vaccine, and the ingredients used. I found this to be particularly useful/interesting in the case of the HIB vaccine, since it is the only one we've given to Julia so far. It turns out there are 3 different companies who make the HIB vaccine, and the ingredients are different depending on which brand you get. The one Julia got is made by Merck, and contains, amongst other ingredients, 225 micrograms of Aluminum. Dr. Sears has a long discussion on the potential problems with the use of Aluminum in vaccines, and recommends trying to minimize the amount and choose vaccines that do NOT contain any Aluminum whenever available. I didn't know it then, but we could have gotten a different brand of the HIB vaccine which DOES NOT contain any Aluminum. This is the first time I read this, and I wish I would have known it BEFORE we gave Julia the vaccine (Our pediatrician did not mention any of this, and has probably not even taken the time to look at the different ingredients for the different brands. I do think our pediatrician is well-intentioned and trying to do what's best for kids, but I also think that he's not well-informed when it comes to vaccines and the potential side-effects, I think he's just blindly following the medical-school mantra of "Vaccines good, Disease bad", as most other pediatricians/doctors.)

- Dr. Sears recommends an Alternate Vaccination Schedule which spaces out the shots such that an infant only gets one or two shots per visit, and only one of those containing Aluminum, thus minimizing the risk of adverse effects.

- Dr. Sears also talks about combination-vaccines, where kids get several vaccines in one injection. Although he does acknowledge the advantage of less pain from only getting one needle instead of several, he cautions parents to be careful w/ combination vaccines because some of them have a lot more Aluminum than getting the separate shots. For example, there's a combination shot which includes DTaP, HIB, and Polio, which kids are scheduled to get a 2, 4, and 6 months. The combination shot contains 1500 micrograms of Aluminum, which is by far the most of any vaccine, and it's a lot more than the sum of the three individual vaccines.

- As I said above, he spends a lot of time discussing Aluminum, and agrees that there is reason for concern. He quotes several studies published in Medical journals that show that Aluminum can be toxic even at lower doses, and he highlights that no one has yet shown what is a safe dose, especially for a small infant. He says he is frustrated that no one has done the research on what amount of Aluminum is safe in vaccines, the only articles published are about aluminum in the solution used in hospital IVs, and there is evidence that some newborns (particularly premature babies) have suffered toxic effects due to the Aluminum present in the IV. He also says he is
frustrated that the IV bags have a warning stating that the Aluminum could be toxic, but the vaccines do not have any warnings about Aluminum.

- He states that some diseases are no longer occurring in the US, such as Polio and Diphtheria, and some parents may want to skip those shots; he supports that decision, but says you may have to reconsider if you travel to some parts of the world where these diseases are still a problem

- He acknowledges that some illnesses such a chickenpox are really mild and suggests that parents who are concerned about vaccines may want to skip the chickenpox vaccine until the child grows up. If the vaccine is required to get into school, then you can get a blood test to see if the kid already has antibodies, and may be able to skip the vaccine altogether

- For measles and mumps, he says that the diseases are pretty rare in the US, so these vaccines are not as important/necessary as other ones and can be skipped

- He explains that some diseases are mostly a problem for infants or kids under 2, but for older kids, the diseases are a lot milder. There are 4 diseases that fit into this category: HIB, pertussis, pneumoccocal, and rotavirus. The alternate vaccine schedule he proposes includes these 4 shots for kids under 2, but he says that if you choose to delay all vaccines until after 2 years of age, then you might as well skip these 4.

- He argues that it makes no sense to give a Hep B shot to an infant, since it is mostly an STD, so he recommends holding off until the child grows up to be a teenager, when he/she may actually be at risk of catching the disease.

- He states that tetanus almost never occurs under the age of 5, so he recommends that if you are not concerned about pertussis and want to skip the DTaP shots, then you can hold off until the kid is 5 years old for the Tetanus shot

- He discusses flu shots, which are now part of the routine immunization schedule. He says some flu shots still contain mercury (thimerosal), and he strongly advises parents to make sure that any flu shots their kids get are mercury-free. However, there is often a shortage of the mercury-free flu shots, and if that's the case, he advises parents to just skip the shots, he
says the risk of the mercury is not worth it

- He acknowledges that some vaccines have more adverse effects than others, and says that although there is no detailed data on this, in his experience, HIB is the least problematic of the vaccines, and Hep B and MMR are some of the most problematic. He actually gives a whole list of vaccines from the least to the most problematic.

- He has an entire chapter where he does a numerical analysis of the risk of a severe negative outcome from catching each disease vs. the risk of a severe negative outcome from getting the vaccine (and by severe negative outcome, he means needing an extended hospital stay, and/or resulting in a permanent disability, and/or death, but does NOT include ER visits). I found
this to be one of the most useful and interesting parts of the book. He acknowledges that there is not a lot of reliable documentation on the adverse effects of vaccines, and he got most of his info from the VAERS (vaccine adverse reactions) database. Unfortunately, the VAERS data has
NOT been sorted out for each disease, so the best he could come up with is that the risk for any one child to have a severe reaction to a vaccine is 1 in 2600, although he acknowledges that some vaccines have more risk than others. Then he goes through each disease and works out the risk of having a severe case. For some diseases, that risk is 1 in 500, for others it's 1 in 10,000. Based on this analysis, you may conclude that the risk of the vaccine is higher than the risk of the disease.

- He also mentioned that some parents are concerned about the animal and human tissues present in vaccines, and recalls how vaccines in the 50's and 60's were contaminated with the SV40 virus which came from monkey kidney tissue. That virus is known to cause cancer in lab animals and has been found in cancerous tumors in humans. There is definite proof that the SV40 found in these human cancerous tumors is the same virus that was in those contaminated vaccines.

- He also acknowledges several other vaccine screw-up's, including the oral polio vaccine which cause paralytic polio, the DTP shot which had a high risk of seizures and neurological damage, and the rotavirus vaccine whichwas recalled after causing several deaths as a result of a severe bowel obstruction. He also spends some time talking about the problem with mercury and how if you summed up the amount on mercury in the recommended vaccine schedule, it far exceeded the "safe limit" set by the EPA. However, he states that this is no longer an issue now that thimerosal has been removed from almost all vaccines.

If you want to read more, I would recommend reading the book. I managed to finish it in 3 days.

His web site also has a lot of good info:
http://www.askdrsears.com/thevaccinebook/

-------------------------

And this is the summary of a 2-hour video of a talk on vaccines given by a pediatrician from California. His name is Dr.Jay Gordon, and he is fairly well-known (he also has a web site). His views are similar to Dr. Sears, although "The Vaccine book" by Dr. Sears is a lot more detailed than the 2-hour DVD by Dr. Gordon. In any case, I hope you get a chance to see it. Here's what I took away from it:

- Dr. Gordon makes it clear that he is NOT anti-vaccine. He believes that some vaccines can be beneficial in certain situations (for example, for people who travel to third-world countries and get exposed to the local population - he gave one example of someone who traveled to some third-world country to work in an orphanage). He makes a strong point that in his opinion, the vaccination schedule in the US makes not sense, and it is harmful to kids who get some many shots all at the same time, when the kids are so young.

- He recommends selectively vaccinating depending on the needs of the individual child/family. He also recommends delaying vaccines at least until the child is 6 months, but would prefer to wait until the child is 2 years old.

- There are certain vaccines that he thinks are no longer necessary for the majority of the US population, such as Polio, Diphtheria and Hib.

- He also explains that he is strongly opposed to the chicken pox vaccine, and thinks it will do more harm than good because it is shifting the incidence of chicken pox from childhood, when it is a mild disease, to adulthood, when it is pretty serious (especially for pregnant women).

- He said he is okay with people who choose not to vaccinate at all, he believes it is a personal decision

- He said people ask him if he was to give just one vaccine, which would it be. His answer is that he would want to vaccinate against pertussis. But there is no vaccine against just pertussis, so you need to get the combo w/ Diphtheria and Tetanus i.e. the DTaP vaccine. So he recommends giving 3 doses of DTaP starting at 2 years of age.

- The most interesting question he answered at the end of the video is: if he had a newborn baby, would he vaccinate? He said that he probably would not, but again, it's a personal decision.

more for mamaia

i've been thinking about mamaia a lot this week: when i saw the big maple in front of our house open up her leaves in a burst of green, within the span of only a few hours; when i heard the hawks' and the mourning dove's cries; when i lay down with the kids for a nap; at night when everyone else was sleeping; when i hung the laundry; when i cooked; when i've been upset at ed (we've been having difficulties in the past couple of days)....

on thursday, i went back into the woods, at the spot where i left the food (after the ritual my sister and i held); the banana and chocolates were gone. the tangerine was still there. hmmm...i was actually wondering if she'd like the tangerine. i guess the creatures of the woods don't like it either.

i went back to the same spot yesterday, to make another small offering. i needed to do something tangible for mamaia, and this is the only thing i could think of. this time, i brought her 2 cloves of garlic. she used to pop garlic into her mouth like candy; i'll go back there today to see what happened.

the following pictures are also for her.
this one is from the ritual my sister and i held in her honor, showing the setup we had:

and here is thinking of her on a perfect day:

peace

mamaia

mamaia, my grandmother, died yesterday.

here are the tangibles:

her name was Maria Mocanu; she was 94 years-old; she's been in a nursing home for the past 2 months, after having had a stroke in february, which affected the left side of her body; she died of another stroke, her third in the last 2 years. until this past february, she was fully independent and lived alone.

here is the less tangible stuff:

we all knew this was coming. in many ways, i think her death is a relief: to her, and to us because it was hard to be in a nursing home, among strangers and machines, and in pain.

i spent the first fourteen years of my life seeing mamaia every day. she took care of my sister and i while my parents were at work. she came over early each morning, and left after my mom or dad got home, in the evening. many times she slept with us, or we slept with her at her apartment. i cannot speak or think about my childhood without including her. she was ever-present, a central figure in my life, as we were in hers. thus, she is a part of me, in a very real way. consciously and unconsciously, i learned and picked up many things from her, that make me who i am: mannerisms, ways of being and thinking, emotional responses, etc. i feel that i (or at least a part of me) embody her, and therefore, she is not dead.

at the same time, however, mamaia has not been part of my life, physically, for over 20 years, since we left romania in 1986. she stayed behind, and although i went to visit her 4 times, overall, she's been physically absent from my life. in this way, i feel like she's been gone for a long time.

so what does her death mean? she's been out of my life for over twenty years, and yet, i carry her around in my body, my emotions, my memories... i don't know what it means; i just know that when it catches me unexpectedly, the knowledge of her death gives me a sudden twist deep inside my stomach.

on monday, the day before she died, i felt an urgency to send her a card. i had been thinking about her a lot, and finally i decided i had to do it. i got a beautiful card with butterflies on it, that said something about her being in my dearest memories. i normally find pre-written cards impersonal, but this one expressed the way i felt very well, so i got it, wrote a few lines wishing her well and telling her about how beautiful spring is. i knew she would enjoy hearing about flowers and birds, and about how much the kids love to play outside in the sun.

i also put my favorite picture of her and i inside. i messed up the enveloppe though, put the stamps on upside down, and thought that maybe it was a bad sign, but dismissed the thought and sent it anyway. i really wanted her to have that picture.

sena, aiayana and i walked home from the store where we bought the card, and on our way, i noticed a beautiful flowering tree covered with delicate pink blossoms; it caught my attention because it was so fresh and vibrant, and also because it was in a weird spot, seemingly growing out of a swamp. i took a closer look and discovered that someone had actually cut down its trunk, and thrown the entire tree in the swamp. the flowers were still pristine. it must've just been cut. this made me so sad! i saw the stub that was left of the trunk, protruding out of the ground, and saw pink ribbons from surveyors; somebody was probably just doing their job, landscaping or whatever, but part of me still cried, how can you cut down a tree that just bloomed?

mamaia always told me i was beautiful, from as far back as i can remember. when i was little, and later, when i became too concerned with my clothes and the way they made me look, she used to say to me: you can wear a potato sack, and you'd still be beautiful. she also told me how full of beauty and possibility my life was. even as i turned 36, she said to me "you have your whole life ahead of you" in such a way, that i could feel how much she trusted me to create a beautiful life. and how much she trusted life itself.

i knew the day would come when she'd die, but i'm still having a hard time. i just want to understand what happened to hr, where she is now, how i can relate to her....

i wish i could've been there with her at the last moment, to hold her hand and hear her last breath. i would've told her that part of me is going with her; i would've also told her that she'll always live in me.but i wasn't there. so instead i asked my dad to put a picture of me near her, in the coffin.

i feel like i need some closure on this. some acknowledgement, some kind of transition. i won't be going to the funeral, which is tomorrow in bucharest. istead, my sister and i will have a small private ceremony in her honor later today.

mamaia wasn't an extraordinary person in any obvious or easily describable way. she was shy and timid (except for in the kitchen, where she wasn't afraid to pick up burning-hot pans with bare hands). she was one of 8 kids, born in the small village of Siret, in romania; she studied and eventually moved to bucharest, where she worked as an accountant; she married and had one son, my father. she retired from her job to take care of my sister and i; after my grandfather died, almost 30 years ago now, she lived alone, in a quiet, undisturbing manner.

what mamaia had, which i find extraordinary, was a quality of presence, which i can't capture in words, but i can definitely feel. this quality of presence prevades all my memories of her and of my childhood; and it is, i realized, one of the few things worth striving for. i would like to give that to my children, my grandchildren, and anyone else in my life. i would love to be remembered the way i remember her.

mamaia rarely gave us presents; but somehow, despite the fact that i loved presents as a child, i never really noticed this. her own presence was such that presents were insignificant by comparison.

(later...)

my sister and i just held our ceremony to honor mamaia. we did it at my house, and it felt really nice. we set up colorful blankets outside, under an apple tree that is about to blossom. we burned a candle and some sage; i got some of mamaia's favorite food at the co-op yesterday: bananas, oranges, and of course, chocolate. we put the food down in front of us on a blanket, along with pictures of mamaia, taken over the years, letters and cards that she sent us, fresh flowers (dandelions, my favorite), and a special tea-set that used to belong to mamaia before she passed it on to my sister. we brewed some tea and drank it out of her cups. my sister wore mamaia's ring on a string around her neck, and i wore a necklace with a small cross. i also had an orange scarf holding my hair back; both the necklace and scarf used to be hers before she she gave them to me.

we held a very simple ritual that we made up. to begin, i read a meditation focused on the cycles of life and death, and on honoring the pain and sadness we feel about mamaia's death. we sat in silence for some time, feeling our emotions and any thoughts that came up.

then we read parts of the letters and cards she sent us. this was very emotional, her presence almost palpable. the pictures too, made her presence feel very real...

then, roxi and i shared some of our favorite memories and stories about mamaia. there was a lot to share, as things kept coming up from the distant and recent past. mostly, sharing these memories made me feel happy. there was a lot to laugh at in some of the things we remembered about her, and about us as kids.

we also shared the food i bought. we had 3 bananas, one for me, one for roxi, and one for mamaia; 3 oranges, and 7 chocolate-covered-apricots (mamaia got 4 of those, she really loved chocolate. my sister told me a story about how mamaia ate a full toblerone bar, one of the big, foot-long ones, in one night...).

we finished our tea, talked some more, sat some more, and soon enough julia, who'd been sleeping in the car all this time woke up, so we knew that it was time to end. my kids are at their grandma's house today, and i am grateful to her for helping me have this time to remember mamaia.

to end our ceremony, i took mamaia's food, and brought it in the woods. i peeled the banana and orange and arranged them in a circle on the ground, and sprinkled the chocolates here and there. i invited mamaia and the animals of the woods to enjoy them.

walking back to the house, i could feel a gentle breeze blowing back my hair. it's a beautiful, perfect day: sunny, warm, comfortable; the birds are singing, the flowers are out. i know mamaia would've enjoyed it.

enjoying my life, i realized, is the most meaningful thing i can do to honor her.

last night, we had a beautiful sunset. before i went in the house, i paused and thought of mamaia and how she won't be able to see sunsets anymore; somehow, this didn't make me sad, but on the contrary, it made me want to soak in this, and every other sunset, even more.

if i had to sum it up, i'd say that mamaia's life and death inspire me to be a loving mother, and to enjoy my life deeply. this is her parting gift to me.

i will end with a list of memories that come to mind about mamaia:

• the smell of her cooking, stews and dill in particular
• the smell of garlic on her breath;
• the stories she used to tell my sister and i every night: real stories about her youth and our childhood, and made-up stories about little girls and witches;
• sleeping next to her at night;
• how she cried so easily and was so emotional;
• how one time, when i got a 7 (out of 10) on a math test, which i was really upset about, she didn't tell me not to worry, she didn't try to get me to forget, she just sat down and cried with me;
• how she never yelled at me or hit me (and i really mean never, as far as i can remember; not that i have my own kids, and yell at them daily, i find this even more amazing);
• how calloused her feet were and how she picked at them whenever she had a chance (i certainly embody this one, just ask my kids or ed);
• fightning with my sister over the scrapings off the pan, when she cooked eggs and potatoes for us;
• her letters and cards, full of poems she composed for us, as well as praise and good-wishes;
• the impromptu shows my sister and i put up for her when we slept over;
• the sweets she baked for us: mucenici, cornulete, coliva, cozonac, bezele...
• how easy she was - we could always get our way with her...
• how she came downstairs to get me when i got home from school, candle in hand, when the electricity was out in our apartment building (this happened daily, for hours at a time, government rules). when she didn't come i had to go up 7 flights of stairs in complete darkness.
• how tattered her stuff was, her clothes, furniture, everything she owned really, used and reused to the max.
• how much she loved her plants, and how, when one would flower, she'd look at it as if was the first time she'd ever seen a flower;
• how different her standards of cleanliness were from everyone else's; she'd swish a dirty plate back and forth in a bucket of (not too clear) water, and call it clean.
• how she washed our school uniforms and other laundry by hand for years every day. and then ironed them.
• how she took any left-overs on our plates, and put them away to enjoy later, by herself.
• how she loved food so much, yet always felt too embarassed to say yes when someone offered her something.
• how she'd go to sleep sucking on hard candy (i'm glad i didn't pick up that one...)
• how she always regifted.
• how i cannot speak or think of my life without her in it.

peace

spring on!

phew, what a week!!!

we've all been sick with a stomach virus. the kids got it on wednesday, and they were flat out until today. i never saw sena so out of it, she'd just lay down for an entire day, totally drained. fortunately, (really fortunately for me), the weather has been gorgeous, so i was able to take out blankets and pillows, and have the kids lay outside in the shade of the apple tree. we didn't have to be stuck in the house for 3 days, or i would've gone crazy. being outside was really nice and peaceful, and sena even commented on how much she liked lying there and listening to the birds "speak to her".

things got harder yesterday, because ed also got sick. he's been feeling really bad, and can't do anything other than lie down, and even that feels uncomfortable. i think i got it too, but pretty mild by comparison. i'm somehow still able to hold things together, and take minimal care of the kids. tonight may be tricky, since sena and aiyana are both pretty much back to normal, energy-wise, while ed and i are both dragging. i got some movies for them to watch, so ed and i can get a break.

other than this virus, which most of our friends also had and have, things are amazing. spring is out in all beauty. flowers, birds, bees, all over the place; around our house, the daffodils, hyacinths, tulips, crocuses, and forcynthia have bloomed, and the apple trees are going to any day now. there are so many different birds chirping morning till night, and ed's bees are busy collecting pollen, building their hive, and feeding their babies.

i'll end with a line from sena this week. we've been reading tomie dipaola, and came accross the word 'diploma' in one of his strega nona books. sena didn't say anything at the time, but days later, we were sitting outside when she turned to me, seemingly out of the blue, and said "mom, i don't need a diploma to be a real sena". i was surprised and loved what she said. i smiled and said back to her "no you don't". she then followed, "i already have everything i need". more smiling on my part, more thinking of how deep this is. her final statement was "i have my egg", and then after some hesitation, "but i don't have my period yet". (she was referring to the eggs inside her body - she's totally fascinated by the egg and sperm thing, especially after she saw them in the encyclopedia).

i love it how she'll say things and i'll get all excited about it, thinking how deep it is, etc, etc, but then she'll follow up with a comment like the above, that makes me laugh and brings me right back to earth.

kick-ass recipe

everyone who tried this recipe LOVED it. i mean, everyone.
also, it takes about 5 min to make, no cooking involved. you can use it as: dip for raw vegetables, salad dressing, pasta sauce; it's great over soba noodles, or whatever you can think of. here it is:

4 Tbs toasted sesame seeds
2 Tbs olive oil
2 Tbsp tamari sauce (i think you can use soy sauce and it'd be ok)
2 tsp vinegar (i use apple cider vineggar, but try whatever you have)
1 tsp honey
1/4 tsp salt
dash of cayenne (or to taste)
dash of black pepper (or to taste)
1 Tbs water

toast the sesame seeds until light brown, then grind them into a powder (i use a coffee grinder for this). mix in the remaining ingredients in whatever order you want. that's it.

(i got the original recipe in one of madhur jaffrey's books, but it called for a bunch of ingredients i didn't have and could not easily buy at the co-op, so i modified it and came up with the above).

enjoy!

gnostic gospels

in the past week or so, aiyana suddenly developed a fear of the dark. even though she sleeps right next to ed and i, and to sena, she's been crying every night before bed, and been clealy scared of something. i can't explain why it came on so suddenly, she's been fine all this time, and then one night she just got so upset...

the only thing i can think of that makes sense to me is that she finally got a sense of self as separate from everything else, and hence the fear...

we've tried to be as suppostive as we can, but she still cries...
when we ask her what she's afraid of, she says bears and wolves. we don't have TV, so i know she didn't see any there, but i have told her some bear stories in the past. the bears have always been harmless though...

yesterday, when we got up from our nap, she was very talkative, and mentioned her fear of bears and wolves again. i asked her what she thought they would do to her, and she said that they would rip her books in half....cracked me up. but then again, i wouldn't want anyone messing with my books either...

speaking of books, i just finished 'the gnostic gospels' by e. pagels, and found it enlightening. i liked learning about the history and roots of christianity, but my favorite were some quotes attributed to Jesus and others. a very different view of christianity, that's for sure, and one that at this point, i feel more drawn to than what i've heard in the past.

I want to share the following from The Gospel of Thomas. they are attributed to jesus, on the topic of self-discovery:

'if you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. if you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you".

and about the turmoil of self discovery:
"let him who seeks continue seeking until he finds. when he finds he will become troubled. when he becomes troubled he will be astonished, and he will rule over all things".

"rather the Kingdom is inside of you, and it is outside of you. when you come to know yourselves, then you will be known and you will realize that you are the sons of the living father. but if you will not know yourselves, then you dwell in poverty, and it is you who are that poverty".

i'm still a bit turned off by some of the terminology, but i'm trying to get over it and focus on the heart of the message instead. i'm looking fwd to reading 'the gospel of thomas' next (also by pagels).

peace

last saturday morning

here are some pictures from saturday morning. i was having some time alone, and i drove by a swamp on my way to the library. i thought it looked interesting and stopped the car. there was nobody else there, so i got out and walked around a little. i eventually made my way to the very edge of the swamp, and found a little mossy clearing. i stayed there, squatting, just looking over the water and listening to the incredible sound of birds, frogs, and many other creatures i could not identify, all mixed together. it was so peaceful and soothing. i love being by myself in silence, but when i hear the sounds of Nature, i love it even better. it just makes me feel so... outside myself, and it reminds me that i'm part of something so much bigger, and that feeling is very freeing.




peace

offended by breastfeeding?

a few days ago i found out that some people in my circle of aquaintances are offended when i nurse aiyana in front of them. i was told about this indirectly, through a woman i'm close with, and i found out that it's been going on for quite sometime.

of course i'm aware that nursing raises uncomfortable issues with some people, but i haven't had to deal with it on a personal level until now. in our community, i.e. among the people i find myself with on a regular basis, nursing is in the open, easy and natural. it's a non-issue. my friends nurse, like me, on demand, at home, in public, wherever we happen to be. we nurse as long as the child wants to nurse, so it's not uncommon to see 3 year-olds who still nurse on and off throughout the day. this may be shocking in some cultures, but not all.

despite lack of public acknowledgement, even conventional institutions such as the AAP (American Academy of Pediatricians), or the WHO (World Health Organization) now recommend nursing for a couple of years. nursing is acknowledged by conventional and alternative medical authorities as critical to children's health and emotional well-being (both short and long-term).

so the whole thing with the couple that got offended came out after their baby's christening. we went to church (and i nursed there), and then we all went out to a restaurant. i don't think anyone saw me nurse in church, but at the restaurant, aiyana was intimidated by the new environment and everything going on, plus she was tired, so about half-way through the meal, she wanted to nurse. by the time we left the restaurant she had nursed two or three times, and i tried to be as discreet as possible covering myself with my sweater, but i did not leave the table or anything like that. i just behaved normal, continuing to talk to people, just being my natural self as i am whenever i nurse. but, i guess this was a big deal.

the baby that got christened was about 3-months-old, and of course, he had to nurse too a few times while we were there, but the mother took him to the bathroom, and nursed in there. there was only one bathroom in the restaurant, for men and women together, a small room with one toilet, a sink, and no space to sit (unless you brought in a chair which is what she did). to quote my sister, this is how i feel about nursing in the bathroom: "would you want to eat your meal in there"? probably not. so that's not an option for me.

i discussed this issue with the woman who made me aware of it. i guess i was a little hurt that this couple has been privately harboring negative feelings towards me for quite some time (i've been nursing for over 4 years now); but mostly, my reaction was just wanting to understand where they come from and how can we find something that works for everyone.

this woman, who i talked to also disagrees with nursing in public. but i really respect and like her, because we can have a positive conversation about topics we feel very differently about. she told me that nursing in public makes people uncomfortable because people here don't like to expose their bodies. well, i kind of had to jump on that one. why then are women exposing themselves everywhere you look? TV, magazines, the internet, advertisements; women (and men sometimes) wear revealing clothing, and exposing their bodies, stopping short only of being completely naked. this is considered acceptable, even desirable. do the people who are offended by nursing ask themselves whether it's ok for women's bodies to be used and exposed in order to sell something?

even the mother in this couple, who felt compelled to nurse in the bathroom, is otherwise not shy at all about wearing very revealing clothing, such as skin-tight, low-cut shirts, or bikinis that leave very little (only the nipple really) to the imagination. come to think of it, all throughout my 20's i used to wear the same type of clothing, the more revealing the better, and i never offended anyone with it...certainly not in the same way as nursing.

i think that men and women are uncomfortable with nursing because breasts, and women's bodies in general, are seen as sexual objects first and foremost. to me, whatever your feelings about breasts are (different cultures have different views and hangups around them), one thing that seems obvious and universal is that they are there for nursing children. yet women will get upset seeing other women nurse because (and i have heard this myself) "my husband doesn't need to see that", and men get upset too because, i don't know, i guess they feel nervous, they just don't know how to deal with it in a non-sexual context.

but anyway, when it comes down to it, i have no problem respecting this couple's wishes and not nursing in front of them again. my big concern with all this, however, is that i truly feel that i have a moral obligation to myself and others, especially mothers, to breastfeed openly. i feel that if i start hiding myself and giving in to the pressure, i am implicitly perpetuating the views and taboos i disagree with; if i hide, i feel that i am giving the message that there's something wrong with breastfeeding, and more importantly, i am making it harder for other mothers to breastfeed. i feel that the only way people will come to see nursing as a natural part of life is by seeing women nurse. (incidentally, if i had taken out a bottle and given it to aiyana at the restaurant, do you think anyone would have been offended? i doubt it. it would've been seen as normal for a young child. this, to me is a perversion of the natural way, where the breast is what is natural, and the bottle an artificial replacement.)

so i've decided that with this one particular couple and their family, i will be discreet, and leave the room to nurse. i also, unfortunately, feel less drawn to attend gatherings with them...but in general, i have no good reason to stop nursing in public; i feel that it's important to support breastfeeding and to help change people's taboos about it, and for me, the best way to do so is to nurse openly and freely.

peace

this morning

this morning, when i stepped outside, the wind smelled like flowers. just a suddle, sweet smell, that made me forget for the moment, that it was rainy and gray and very very windy. that is until the wind ripped the door out of my hand and slammed itagainst the side of the house...

well, anyway, it's definitely getting warm outside, and tomorrow they're anouncing 50'sF and sunny, so it's very exciting.

this morning, sena was taking pics with our camera, and she got one of me, in which my head was not chopped in half, so here it is:

getting the bees into the hive

ed's honey bees arrived last sunday. he had built a hive for them already, and installed it in the field in front of our house. the tricky part now was to get the bees from the box they came in into the hive. here are some pics from the operation:

here are the bees in the box they came in, all clustered together around the queen

now here's ed trying to open the box so that he can get the bees into the hive:

here, ed took out the queen, which came in a little box inside the big box. the queen had to go into the hive first. then the other bees would cluster about her again (hopefuly).
here are the kids watching the whole thing:
and finally, ed putting the cover on the hive, once all the bees were in

saturday morning, unplanned

i just came from the lake, where i went on a whim earlier this morning.
lately, my time off on saturday mornings has become stressfull, because i have so many things i want to do, that i end up wanting to cram everything in too short a period of time. i want to go have coffee and read, i want to go to the gym, go to the woods, i want to write, you get the idea. then, what happens is that regardless of what i'm doing, i end up thinking of what else i could be doing, putting pressure on myself to hurry, not really enjoying anything. eventually i just get mad at myself for being so greedy, for ruining everything.

this is how it has been the last few times i was by myself, and i decided that it is ridiculous and i have to stop it. so today, i purposely did not make any plans. i still thought of my time alone with anticipation, but i tried not to decide anything i would do in advance; instead, i tried to see how i felt an the moment, and go with that. this was hard, you know how the mind can get so out of control....

i went and got a coffeee and did a bit of reading, which felt alright for a while. then i felt like i wanted to be outside, and the exact place i wanted to be at came to me clearly. i drove to the lake, parked the car, hiked down by the water, found a little rocky beach that was in full sun, and sat down for a while. this mostly felt delicious, and by the time i left, all i could think of was 'thank you'.

so that's how my morning went so far. i'll leave with some quotes i liked from 'the invitation' by Oriah Mountain Dreamer:

"this is the sacred marriage: the coming together of two who have each met themselves on the road. when two who have this intimacy with themselves are fully with each other- whether for a lifetime or for a moment- the world is held tenderly and fed by the image they create simply by being together......
if, having met myself in the empty moments, i am willing and able to bring all of who i am to another, receiving all of who they are, then we are truly together..... this is the fullness of the homecoming for which we all long."

peace

kite flying

here's sena, flying her kite on a wild, windy day, and loving it....

aiyana and i were watching sena in the field in front of our house


peace

egg hunting last sunday

here are some pictures from sena and aiyana's egg-hunt last sunday. they had a lot of fun, and so did ed and i.

ed got the eggs ready in the morning, before the girls and i woke up. he hid some in the house and some outside. sena and aiyana got really excited every time they found an egg; then opening them up to find what lay inside was even better. they loved the beads we got for them in northampton, which ed had put inside the eggs, as well as some nuts, raisins, stickers and hairpins from grandma, and some dental floss, which was a bit odd, but generated lots of excitement anyway...

dig me up

i'm standing in front of our house, peeling a carrot. i'm overlooking a field of dry grass, and bare trees in the distance. despite the fact that everything looks dead, i know that life is pulsing through it all; soon, buds will appear, blossoms will open, and spring will show herself unmistakably.

my kids are outside too, playing, running all around me, laughing, climbing, chasing each other. i wipe their runny noses when they need it, mitigate things when they get into squirmishes, and i try to answer their unending questions and demands as calmly as possible.

like other women in my situation, other stay-at-home-moms, i too ask myself: is this why i went to school all those years? is this why i tried so hard to succeed in my job?
standing at the edge of the field, carrot in hand, the answer comes easily: no, but this is so much better...

i guess i'm lucky that i feel this way. i know, and can see how, someone else wouldn't. it is easy to feel discouraged, having to give up your career, all the hard work you put into it, dealing with the insecurity of returning to work after a few years' absence, clearly at a disadvantage to others... so many have said it, but now i can really appreciate it: it's really hard to be a woman and find yourself torn between the needs of your family and the demands of your career.

i don't know why i've never missed my job. i really liked my colleagues, and i enjoyed what i did most of the time. i guess, though, that by comparison, that life was so much more boring and unfulfilling than the one i'm living now. i find so much richness in my life these days - i know that it's up to me how much of it i let in, how much i open myself to the joy and beauty of each day. definitely, my attitude has changed a lot since having children. i had to let go of a lot of attachments, had to build a lot of tolerance and understanding for other's needs. but somehow, the difficulties of being a mother opened me and allowed me to experience everyday life in a way i wasn't able to before.

on a different note:

sena asked me today: mama, when you're dead, will you still love me? will you remember me after you die?
i didn't know what to say. i can't imagine not loving her...
then, she concluded by saying: mom, after you're dead, i'm going to dig you up so that i can see you. i laughed, but i could also feel how much she loves me.

peace

northampton

ed and i had a great time in northampton (MA) yesterday. i heard a lot about it, and it's only 1hr north of here, so we went, while the kids were with grandma and grampa. we just walked around, ate at a Tibetan restaurant that played great tuva music in the background, went to a bead store, got a chocolate croissant at a little bakery, and sat on the grass in the sun, talking and relaxing just before we came back home. it was very simple and sweet, and i feel that we should do stuff like that more often.

i really liked the bead store, we got some beads for the kids to hide in their easter eggs, and i can't wait to see their excitement. i've never done easter eggs before, so this will be my first time as well as theirs.
i got some really cool jasper stones at the strore, which i made into earings, and i now have as a reminder of the day...

peace