I took Echo to art class today. The class is designed for toddlers so "class" really means a designated room with lots of supplies layed out and tons of mayhem. But I love it because she loves it so much. She loves the very idea of it. She marvels at the fact that she has an actual teacher, and there are chairs just for kids, and that she goes to school. To say it's a big deal is to put it mildly.
But you'd never be able to tell from the outside. This girl's waters run deep and she doesn't reveal anything on the surface. She picks a spot at the table and methodically goes about her work. She puts layer after layer on her piece of paper, stopping to observe everyone around her but never losing focus. It's incredible to watch.
I did a fair share of people watching too though I tried to keep my blinders on a bit because other parents in a setting like that can drive me insane. It seems every observation gets turned into an evaluation, Good job squeezing that glue! , to which I am sensitive only because I choose to avoid these kind of comments. (See here.) There was also a fair bit of, Be nice!, when any child objected to the actions of another. Grrr.
But at one point in my more minimized people watching I saw another mom walk in and I realized I had just started reading her blog. I am aware that every Tom, Dick, and Susan has a blog these days, probably a good portion of that room has a blog, but I couldn't help but be a little star struck. It wasn't exactly like Soulemama entering the classroom, but on a small local scale it kinda was. From the outside there is no way to tell if a particular blog is wildly popular or not, I only know that late at night in my living room I read about this particular woman's life, which makes her someone other than ordinary in my world.
In any case I went about helping to glue beads and snapping a couple of pics so that I could post about art class when the other mom brought out her camera and started snapping pics for, I assume, her blog. It was so strange because the blogging world was entering the real world, which in my experience just doesn't happen that often, and the other strange part was that I noticed weird feelings within myself. I thought maybe I was jealous of her camera, or too aware of the fact that I was too shy to approach her and confess to reading her blog, but then when I stripped it all down, even though those thoughts were all true, I basically was just preparing myself to not like her.
What is that? I have been disliked by other women my whole life and have never enjoyed it or understood it. And today I was that person. I mentioned it to Kris later and she said fear of scarcity is the cause of those kinds of thoughts. That makes sense to me. For so many of us there is the sense that if someone else has something, or is something, then there won't be enough left over for the rest of us. Looking back on all the women and girls that have made efforts to take me down a notch I think Kris is right. One of my best friends in elementary school read my palm and let me know that it looked like my dream of becoming an astronaut wasn't going to come true. The girl couldn't even read palms she just wanted to cut me down a bit. We were ten.
Well this lady, from the two seconds that we interacted, seems very nice and deserving of anything and everything wonderful that comes into her life. I'm glad I caught myself at the very onset of those feelings before they clouded my vision and prevented me from seeing another awesome mom, in this awesome community, for what she is. Here's her blog if you'd like to check it out.
Speaking of blogs, we want to change the name of this blog. We started it as a place to give updates on things related to Feeleez but as it turns out, I like writing! And I have things to say. So, as you all know, the topics have strayed far away from that starting point. Does anyone have any good ideas for a new name? What do you think the overarching theme is around here? Please help! xo
