Feminism Friday! The Idyllic Land of Norovirus

I wanted to write a status update (a la my friend Joan who writes small missives about her day) in the moment about this little experience, but then it seemed like I had too many things rolling around in my head. (I love Joan's status updates. It reminds me the good things that can happen in rough schools with the right person wearing her heart on her sleeve!)

We have a wreath because adults have wreaths. 

Lately I've been taking a step back, career-wise, and re-evaluating what I'm doing with my life. I worked really hard and nearly non-stop in my twenties and had a lot of stressful years. I have a lot of things I'm proud of-- a Master's Degree, many travels, much writing. Lots of stories from times spent with friends, romance and breakups, and laughter and tears. I said goodbye to my grandmothers in my twenties and I hold them very close in my heart-- their words sometimes echo in mine and I smile to think of all the skills and loves I share with them. Crock-pot cooking with whatever is in the house? Grandma Jane. Flower arranging (ah, dried eucalyptus smells so good!) and wreath making? Grandma Marilyn. I pulled out my watercolor painting supplies and have been working on those-- a skill I practiced while in one grandma's native Italy, the other's love of travelling firmly instilled in me.

The days of working 12 hours and feeling like nothing I do matters, even though I'm pouring my heart into every minute of planning, teaching, listening to, working with, assisting...lessons with children? That's on pause. And man, it feels GREAT. Teaching is rewarding, but it's become a field synonymous with levels of exhaustion akin to having triplet newborns. You love what you're doing, but as soon as one mess of poo gets cleaned up, there's another one waiting.  So a gap year of sorts was in order for me.

I've been nannying and babysitting for families in the suburbs of Denver. I love it. [Any names I use for children have been changed for their privacy. Any pics have their identity obscured because I think kids should be protected from the evils of the interwebz before they're in high school!]

Crockpot stew like Grandma Jane's

The town where I have been working is a very special place. There's a manner of frozen in time going on with these kids' childhoods! Kids walk, bike, and razor-scooter to school. They ride their bikes and take the local bus to the ice cream shop and have milkshakes before heading to the library, skateboard park, or nature trail. They play musical instruments and soccer...and the parents are in the stands or audience, cheering for their babies. In a word, it's idyllic.

After working in inner-city and OTP Atlanta for 10 years, I was left with the sinking feeling that childhood was a myth. Kids had to deal with food stamps and immigration (and they still do), and were generally learning skills (manipulation and lying) to serve them in a life that I wouldn't be proud, personally, to live. They were learning that school was about test scores and nothing more. It is incredibly disheartening for all parties involved-- parents, kids, teachers, administrators, law enforcement. Where did middle class America go?

I found it! (And I dearly wish it for every kid everywhere.)

The cul-de-sac where I've been finding myself every afternoon, Monday-Friday, has kids with swings, apple trees, scooters, bikes, gardens, friendly Fidos, and sassy cats. There are a group of little boys (ages 5-9) who play outside every day. One was using a magnifying glass (from his chemistry set!) to try to start fires. I shared, "Oh, I used to do that when I was a kid!" and he responded, "My mom said the same. It must be a rite of kid passage." Gulp. Wut? Kids talk like that here.

No Holy Grail outfits, but they looked like this. 

The boys also were playing with one of the oldest toys that any parent knows will entertain kids for hours-- a big ole box. I looked out the porch window and thought, "Oh dear. That child has a battle axe."

Box. Best. Toy. Ever. 

Yup. The neighborhood boys were demolishing a large box with their medieval (plastic) swords and battle axe. Boys will be boys, but it sure looked like fun to me. They jousted, they hacked, they smashed, they pillaged. And when the box was in pieces (and had been converted also to a dinosaur costume), they placed all the pieces in the recycling bin. One of them asked if I could try to bring a box from my house tomorrow. I promised I'd do my best. (Recycling dumpster, don't fail me!)

One of the boys noticed my State Park sticker in the windshield of my car (oh skills of observation, very coveted!). I felt that I'd been transported to a beach in SoCal-- as he put his little hands up (in a stop gesture) and said, "Whoa! Whoa! Do you go to Eldo, like my Dad? He has a sticker like that on his car from Eldo." -- yeah, bro, the hiking and climbing at Eldo are totally choice.-- Not really, I said, "Oh yeah, this is a State Park pass for Colorado. You can go to any of the parks. You've probably been to Golden Gate Canyon and Cherry Creek? But I like Eldorado Canyon too." Totally rad sticker, dude-bro.

Just painting this picture of the nature of these kids. They play outdoors. They eat actual food (one of the kiddos had a playdate, in which she searched the fridge for cherry tomatoes she'd picked from the garden (because "they'll go perfectly with our snack!") to go with the berries, cheese, and pretzels. They make their beds. They have TV time limits. They are adorable.

So why did I call this post Feminism Friday? Well, one of the kiddos (who's a girl) was having a playdate with two other friends. They carefully sat down at the table and completed their math  homework and quizzed each other over their analogies. I interrupted only to remind them at you have to say all the words that the colons stand for in analogies, or they don't really make sense. "Ship is to sailor, not ship dot dot sailor, as the colon suggests." These kids are that driven and sweet. There was no inkling that "math was hard because we're girls" and that's refreshing.

There's tons of statistics  (like college enrollment rates) and research that support that women are still underrepresented in the STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) fields. Women of color (more specifically Black and Latino) are terribly underrepresented, with this fear of science stemming (sorry) from elementary school years. Motivation, gender, and color are huge when it comes to which people will finish school with which degrees. Particularly, Latino girls see themselves as caretakers of others, and will, if they choose to seek a career, mention ones that relate to taking care of children and babies (teacher, day care worker, nurse), more than any other field. It's incredibly limiting and sad as a society to see this play out. The truth is, we need a society with women AND men scientists and doctors. Women and men bring different roles to the proverbial table, which makes better workplaces for us all.

(Quick side note: I just read The Green Glass Sea, which is a children's book that received the Scott O'Dell award for Historical fiction. It was GREAT. It dealt with a girl protagonist living on the base of Los Alamos when they were building the atomic bombs. The kids meet all the scientists you think about learning the early stages of radiation studies. It's a different side of WWII book than I'd read. If you have kids-- 8-12ish, make them read it.)

Imagine my surprise when the girls trotted upstairs to gather (it seemed like) every stuffed animal and

baby doll known to man to bring to the basement to "play daycare." I was a little disheartened-- these are girls who have scientist and engineer parents-- why are they stuck in this gender-role play?

I gave it some time, and laughed as I came downstairs to check on them. The babies were all in the side room-- in quarantine. They were using makeshift cell phones -- calculators, old phones-- to call all the parents at the day care. They'd come, not as day care workers, but as CDC doctors to quarantine the Norovirus. Yes. The Norovirus. One kiddo warned me, "Don't go in there. It's the Norovirus.  There's vomit. EVERYWHERE! We have to keep these kids on lock!" They giggled and laughed as they put on their imaginary medical gear to take care of the babies and to put on press conferences about spreading the virus. They put on serious voices and made day care outgoing messages for the parents of the children struck.

With the Ebola virus crippling Africa currently and scaremongering laypeople about hospital care of those aid workers returning home, (even in my native Atlanta and alma mater Emory) it seemed prescient that these kids were playing doctor/scientist/aid worker in the basement in Colorado. They are neatly living this beautiful idyllic childhood, but the real world exists.

And this highly-contagious world may have a few health care workers coming up through the ranks in a few years!!

What a difference a year makes...

I was having a conversation with one of my few friends out here in the West. I was saying, I've had some odd crystalizing moments with moving-- and most of them have to do with the concept of home, life, and identity. I still refer to Atlanta and Georgia as "home." When people ask where I live, I usually say Grant Park, which they ask, Chicago? But you work in Denver. Then I remember, oh yes, there are other famous Grant Parks out there, not just my beloved one in Atlanta. And technically, I live in Denver. The Denver in Colorado.
    *            *                  *

I asked my friend, "Do you ever feel like your life is just displaced? That you're kind of watching it, like a play, and you're disconnected from it,  but you don't belong in it?"

He said, "No, I feel like my life's a play, and I'm in the audience and shouting at the people on stage and in the audience to interact with me, but they can't hear me."

That made me think. Is my life a play?  I *am* attempting to act the best that I possibly can though.
*         *         *

As of June 2013, I didn't know what my job was going to be in the fall. For a teacher, this is really frustrating and anxiety-bringing. I was in Grant Park and sharing a ramshackle townhome with the wonderful Tricia, and we were having brunches and trips to the farmer's market and runs/walks in the humidity together. My sister was expecting her baby, my aunt and my mom were recovering well-- my aunt from Guillaun-Barre and my mom from her hysterectomy. My friends and I were solid- brunches, astrology, book club, etc. I was dating a guy, a neighbor, who was from a different country and had a really different culture than mine-- and an accent. (Mmmm, accents!) But a cute guy with an accent is not really enough to stay in a city that doesn't quite feel right.

Allyson and I...friends for over a decade, July 2013

Welcome sign right over the KS border

So I moved. See this post here. The song in my head and on the radio was "Cups: When I'm Gone." There sure have been mountains, rivers, and shivery sites on this journey.  

And since last June, my friends and family helped me pack up my life, yard sale stuff, free cycle stuff, move furniture to my mom's house, and get in my '03 Taurus and drive the 1500 miles through Tennessee, Kentucky, Illinois, and Missouri (the guy with the accent had a very nice friend who treated me to dinner in St. Louis and broke up my trip), then finally to Kansas and Colorado. I'd never driven anywhere that long, and definitely not by myself. Solitude has a new meaning for me out here. Independence too.

So, in a few words, the things that have changed for me over the past year:

1. Friendship- I've been pretty independent here in Denver, and found it hard to make new friends. I have a few. But the friends that are my long-distance friends are closer than ever to my heart. You know who you are.

Sonja and I at Frozen

2. Family- Other people's families have taken me in, in a sense here. A lovely Canadian-American family has me to their home often, and my coworker, who is Peruvian, has shared her children, her sister, her baby niece's Baptism, her parents, and her beautiful kids with me. Seeing family at Christmas and Spring Break-- not seeing my mom and my sister Emily every day or every week-- it's been an adjustment. Not being in the hospital room when my baby sister had her baby-- I never expected that. Another unexpected change in my life is my relationship with my father. I'd talked to my dad exactly 5 times in the previous 7-8 years and I, after soul-searching, and endless conversations with Allyson, Tricia, Marcus, Trina, and Chelsea, attempted to bury the hatchet with my father and tell him about me leaving for Colorado. He's been kindly supportive (with moving) and lots of texts and calls to check in on me. I think he and I both don't know the steps to this adult dad-daughter dance, but we're working on it. And it feels good.

Proud papa James Earl

10 days old

3. Stella- This one gets its own entry-- Stella is no longer a Belgian beer. She's the most perfect, happy, sturdy, beautiful, jabbery, blue-eyed, messy-haired little 6 month old girl who I call my niece. She's a little star- a little gift to everyone she's around. Her parents are lucky to have her and she's lucky to have the best momma and daddy. Get used to all the Colorado presents and shirts, little baby. You're gonna get those and post cards and notes from your Auntie Moto for the rest of my life.

Many bandages...

4. Pet companionship- I had to leave my Petey Bella at home with my mom when I left in July. It was heartbreaking for me. When I got back to her in December (I meant for it to be September or October, but it didn't work out), it was the sweetest reunion. She's saved my life and my sanity so many times since her bizarre winter-blizzard drive across the country with me and my friend Dan. I have many entries about her Mast Cell Tumor cancer and her life living with those yucky cells in her here.

Double rainbow in September past the Continental Divide

 5. The West- I adore Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman, and the Little House books, so I fancied myself a bit of an urban pioneer, uprooting my life at 30 to come out West. The West is so many things. Rugged (oh, MOUNTAINS!), spacious, friendly, unfriendly, dry, high, open-minded, and simultaneously full of hyper athletes and lazy hippies. Denver drivers can't handle rain (particularly floods), but bulldoze over everyone in snow. Again, the West has meant solitude to me. I'm okay with it-- I'm independent, and I found out just how much independence was in me. And I also found out how much my Southern roots meant to me too. As a friend of Jimmy's (Dave Mitchell) stated well, "There's nothin' like voluntarily exhiling yourself from a place to find out how much of it is in you."

Feb- Indian Springs- 108 degrees but in snow

Jan-- A frozen over Echo Lake- and Mt. Evans

Love seeing NY this way

Rockefeller Square in winter. Ahh.

6. Travel- I've traveled 3 times for work-related courses for IB this year. My apartment felt like home for the first time when I returned to it from LA in October. Speaking of-- in L.A., I got to touch the Pacific Ocean and have dinner with Ford (Marcus's brother and big shot academic) and Vicki (Girl Scout leader and friend Devin's mom). It was the first time since August, I'd seen people I KNEW. I felt like a deflated balloon once I left them, because I felt like I was in my own skin once again.  In Salt Lake City, I got to see the beautiful

Subway: I own you!

Mormon architecture and spaces, and enjoyed dinner and a night with Annalise's girlfriend Mel. Hospitality DOES exist out here, somewhere! And in November, I got to go to New York (I adore New York) for the second time and I got to see Broadway shows, sightsee, take the subway, stay at a friend's  in the Upper West side (thanks Camilla and Larry!) and visit with a friend from the 3-Day, the dear and hilarious and kind (and TALL!) Annie. What a trip.  I packed in a backpack too--
for cold and 5 days. I'm a badass. Travel back to Atlanta-- in December- meant I bought a car and brought my pup back to Colorado. Travel for Spring break meant my sweet pup got to stay with my neighbor Danielle while I was gone. Meeting sweet Stella and seeing my friends...oh, the preciousness of those moments.

 7. Road travel- Selling my Taurus was bittersweet, but I got the cute little AWD Suzuki because I

Can I drive the next leg, Dan? Sure, Bella.

wanted something for the snow. My long time BFF Dan drove with me across this great United States. Getting to see the country covered in snow was mind-boggling to him, and was beautiful to me. Staying at a hotel with a big giant bulldog in a sweater, hilarious to see other people. Making that trip on I-70 in winter with a partner...very different than solo in the summer.






8. Work- I learned to value my time, my trainings, my experiences, and my talents so much. I put together great field trips, shows, events, and experiences for my kiddos. I got to have colleagues from all the continents, but Australia. I now have friends from China, Africa, SOuth America, Central America, and Europe. Oh, and I took kids on public transportation, made a fire, painted fingernails and toe nails, taught songs in many languages, taught swimming and ice skating. Yes. Me. Ice skating. It's been an emotional roller coaster of a year, but I've learned a ton from the kids, parents, and teachers. Wow. What a year.

Outdoor Art Gallery

S'mores at the lock-in- Denisse, Griselda, me, Alphonsine

The Sinclair dino in Golden, CO

Rainy Red Rocks Ampitheater

 9. Love- Man, I fell in love this year, and I fell hard! I met a couple people to date since July, but none of them were quite right. I love love love love LOVE. And this blue eyed boy who looks out for me, takes pics of me when I'm at races,  makes me breakfast, goes on adventures with me, dances with me at concerts (both Arcade Fire and Fray), walks my giant dog (and doesn't care when she gets fur on his couch), listens to me babble incessantly,  pushes me out of my comfort zone and expects me to to the same for him, and takes care of me when I injure myself...well. As another Chris in my life likes to say, "He's good people."

10. Sports, Hiking, and Athleticism- Denver is a sports town. There's college and professional baseball, basketball, football, hockey, lacrosse, soccer...why the heck hasn't this place hosted the Olympics?? People are always in athletic gear and I joke that as soon as there's 12 square inches of grass soaked in sunshine, there are shirtless men playing volleyball, dodgeball, soccer, kickball...whatever. Being healthy here is pretty much the norm-- and it's infectious. I've hiked huge and not huge trails in Colorado State Parks, Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado Open spaces, and nature trails.

Chilly Cheeks 4M, Cherry Creek State Park- Feb

Finishing the Colfax 5k- May

Picnic at CC Reservoir, Oct

In July on 2013, I was caught up in the energy at Race Expo for the Peachtree with my best friend Allyson and I signed up for a race in Atlanta in October, not dreaming that I'd live 1500 miles away. Since then, I have run 5ks, 4 Miles, and 10ks, and signed up for several more-- some of which were thwarted by weather, injury, or transportation issues.  Nevertheless, I wasn't particularly athletic-- I like swimming, yoga, and jogs with my dog, but running races has inspired something in me.  I love to see new courses, go to places I've never been, and feel the energy from running in a group. I plug in those headphones, tune out the world, and tune into my body and feeling my cells the way one feels the wind through leaves of a tree-- on a wholesome and healing level.

Sparing you the swimming pics- here's ice skating March

 I've been to hockey games (peewee and pro), Rockies baseball games, and I had tickets to a Lacrosse (the Outlaws) game, but I tripped down my stairs and was too hurt to go that night. (ugh, injuries and clumsiness!) I played soccer for our field day with my students and colleagues and had a blast. I never thought of myself as an athlete or interested in spectating, but it's been a new side of me. Who knows how many sides we have to our personalities-- I think we're only as limited as we want to be.

Walker Ranch Trail and Falls March

Shannon and I at the Avs (vs Blackhawks) Feb

*        *          *
In further contemplation over my friend's statement about shouting at the players and actors, wanting to participate...what can I say, I may not every feel at home here in Denver. I'll always be an outsider who says "y'all" and is confused by architectural differences in buildings here as in the South (swamp coolers, what?). I can say nothing but I'm actively participating in my own life here. I like to think that some of the things I did in my younger years (traveling to Italy, for example), I wouldn't have done, if I'd known JUST how scary they might be...but then again, I'm braver than I ever knew I was. This solitary move out West has proven that to me. The Sara Bareilles song, "Brave" was very popular as I was driving last July, and the words still work for me:

Maybe there’s a way out of the cage where you live
Maybe one of these days you can let the light in
Show me how big your brave is
Say what you wanna say
And let the words fall out
Honestly I wanna see you be brave

Clear Creek Park in Golden in Feb.

So, all this bravery didn't come from nowhere. I've teared up several times writing this, as I think about the love that's held me up and given me faith. I didn't put music in my list, because music is always in me-- it's always in my head and gives my heart strength. Thank you to all the friends who wrote me letters, emails, and cards, facebooked, and visited when I was in town. I'm glad I've gotten to share a bit of my Colorado, my Denver, with Abe, Dan, and Thacker, when they visited.  Thanks to all the people who've listened to me work through any and all solitude and conflicts that I've struggled through here. Your "big brave" has made me strong.