every crooked stitch

here's a little excerpt from bella's christmas chorus. she's the red sparkly one up on the left.

good to be back, kiddos. life, as i know it, anyway, is slowly returning back to some semblance of normalcy. my sparkly one goes back to school tomorrow, after nearly a month off. and i think i'm gonna miss the little buggar. she actually did a first this morning, and slept in, just a little. i woke up to her whispering in my ear, in all seriousness,

"mama. maaaama. mama. guess what. bandit's getting his taters took off today, poor guy."

bandit is the rescued pound kitty that my mother in law got as a present for bella and promptly kept at her house when we found out. and what i felt was most amusing about that little exchange this morning, is that i feel like i kinda understand what the poor guys' going thru. sometimes, i feel like i'm on the dawn of having my "taters took off" and all i really have time for is a quick breath before walking thru those doors.

y'know, as the new year approached this last week, i found myself in a kind of surreal state of mind. for the first time in years, not making a list. not planning a party. instead, my thoughts were scattered; my heart full. full of options and possibilities, decisions and choices. a little bit of uncertainty. maybe some dread. full of a contented anxiousness, if you will.

'still reeling from the overwhelming warmth of a thousand tiny memories that color the pages of my past few weeks....still basking in the luxury of sleeping in, and sleeping off the jet-lag as *life* as i know it, was not yet fully a reality til i went back to work this weekend. and then, ohhh, how it returned with a vengeance.

on the "flight of miraculous wonderfulness", otherwise known as the denver-to-knoxville connection that went off without a hitch, i snagged an old copy of Good Housekeeping and read this article that really hit home. i encourage you to take the time and read it, when you catch a minute.

just the night before, on jasons 30th birthday, sacked out in a super 8 by the airport, i'd laid awake watching one of my favorite musicals of all time: The Sound of Music. i'd tuned in just at the part where all the von trapp children trek over to the abby in attempt to convince maria to come back. not allowed in and terribly dissapointed, they return home empty handed. their visit did not go unnoticed, however, as the reverend mother decides its time to have a heart-to-heart with the passionate and willful maria, who admits she's torn between her devotion to God and yet also to this man, the childrens father, whom she's fallen in love with. fast forward to the good stuff with the cheesy song and the smooching under the moonlight and the confessing their undying love for eachother and whatnot. he asks her what the reverend mother said, and she says:

she told me you have to find your life.

today, i find that i've been actively searching for a life that in large parts, i lost, somewhere along the way. that looking back is often neccesary; even healthy. but that staying anchored in the here and now can be a hard but oh so important and rewarding part of your journey. and that finding your life will always be a sort of work in progress.

i actually lost weight during the holidays, thanks in part to the hustle and bustle it takes to help keep 4 children and 7 adults happy, healthy, entertained, fed, and overall satisfied in cold weather and a 2 bedroom trailer. i couldn't have done it without my sister. and don't worry. with all the goodies left over, my fanny is finding ways to compensate for any fat-loss.

our boxes of treasures arrived from home this afternoon, via UPS. and as we dug into them, i found myself just overwhelmed with emotion, bringing me back to christmas morning and all of us crowded in the living room in our christmas pj's covered in a blanket of wrapping paper and smiles.

despite the stuff ....the filler, that accompanies any family gathering, this christmas was beautiful.

kim and dustin will understand what i mean when i say there's so much i'd like to say, but i can't. and maybe i never will. but i think, if possible, my most favorite day of being back home at mom & dad's, aside from christmas, was moving the living room out to put the new carpet in. it was aggravating and dirty and frustrating and time-consuming. but in the midst of all of that, we had fun. and we shared a closeness. a closeness thats been stunted before. by words and people and places and things and circumstances and all those things that get in the way. but that day, we shared a closeness that's been a long time in coming ~ in many ways continuing to come. and i think its an awesome thing, when you have the presence of mind to catch the meaning and appreciate the lesson of a moment, when your'e smack-dab in the middle of chaotic dysfunction.

i'd planned and planned some more, down to a precise schedule and budget, prior to embarking on our little holiday adventure. and beginning @ 7 am on the 19th, i think i literally heard God chuckle and shake his head with an "oh, katherine. you're so naive. buckle up", as all my hard work dissapeared like a fart in the wind. due to catching the tail-end of some pretty nasty storms, chicago welcomed us in like the weird aunt gertrude in a mumu and red lipstick, who never.lets.you.go.

and so we spent the next 10 hours trying to wriggle free of her greasy clutch. if i never see chicago again, it will be too soon. no wonder oprah has problems. i've been thru o'hare many times but this one took the cake. wall-to-wall people. standing room only. and delay, delay, delay after cancellation, cancellation, cancellation. perhaps you saw the karaeoke on fox news? mm.

so how we actually got home was so far-fetched you wouldn't believe me if i told you. but i will, cuz i know you're a sucker for a good story. leaving out the multitude of details, including ol' flo making her visit halfway thru the day, i'll share the skinny. my dad is a truck driver and was up towards ohio when we arrived in chicago around noon. by the time the last flight took off @10:30 friday night and we were numbers 22,23 &24 respectively, on the standby list that didn't get squeezed on, dad was on the outskirts of chicago. so we took a taxi to a truck-stop and rode the rest of the way into nebraska on an 18 wheeler. i don't know when i've ever been so happy to see my dad. he was santa in disguise.

nothing in my *plan* went according to plan. nothing but getting to the people i love. and tho i had a couple momentary and obligatory melt-downs along the way, in the big scheme of things, getting to the people i loved is all that really mattered anyway. it was the reason we spent 10 hours in the chicago airport and 8 more on a truck. the reason that we dealt with and overlooked and laughed and cried and smiled sweetly and soldiered on.

this visit back home was cathartic for me. its hard to believe its been nearly 3 years since our brief stay and then our choice to come back yet again to tennessee. 3 years since divorce was mentioned. 2 years since my rape. 1 year since my breakdown that led me to this road of healing.

that i'm still kicking...that my marriage has survived...that my sanity isn't in a million tiny shards around my feet, that God forgives and forgets and holds me ferociously to Him either way, i find miraculous. the strength and the courage and the joy that He's led me to in the darkest, most unlikely places, is amazing. and tho the lessons continue, i'm more grateful than you could know, to be right here, right now. for me, thats an enormous step.

as of this moment, my life is in a major upheaval. the knowing whether to stay or go, is a little unclear. jason and i have a really crucial meeting this afternoon that i feel will answer some questions but most likely raise others. afterwards, i have an interview for a 2nd job. and for all my questions, i don't know any of the how's or why's. but i'm choosing to believe and trust, that the answers will come, as they need to.

so right now, i'm gonna re-watch this and borrow a little joy.