Pancakes

I tried a new and very easy pancake recipe the other day, and I am posting it now, so that 1) You can enjoy it too if you like, and 2) I'll have it handy if I want it when I'm in Texas.

Blend in a blender:

• 4 c. water
• 3 1/2 c. oats (old-fashioned or quick)
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1 tbs. maple syrup

That's it.  Then you let it sit for five or ten minutes until the oat bits absorb the moisture, thereby making it thicken up.  You can cook them on a non-stick griddle without oil on medium.  They take a while to cook on each side, but they come out nice and thin and crepe-like.  They claim it makes twelve servings, but given my eating prowess right now, I think it's more like two or three servings.  Maybe they meant it makes twelve pancakes...

A Love Story

...it's about a love seat.

Once upon a time, in a state far away (Ohio, that is), my roommates and I got a call from a family who had some old furniture they were giving away.  We drove east out to their home on Petrovitsky Road, and picked up the love seat and loaded it into my roommate's van.  We brought it home and put it in the living room of our lovely 1910's apartment with wood floors, picture molding, and a fireplace.  It was happy in its home.  One evening, two gentlemen were over to watch a movie.  There was a big bowl of popcorn.  The two gentlemen sat on the, let's just call it a mini-sofa, and the three ladies of the house sat on other things (perhaps a spare mattress and a bean bag?)  The two gentlemen found, alas, that the sofa was a bit well used and they kept falling toward each other in the middle of it.  Eventually, they discreetly put some pillows between them and clung for dear life to the arms of the sofa.  One day, not long after, my roommates acquired a new futon, thus sending the dear love seat to find a new home.  And find a new home, it did.  My friend Jared had just moved from a shared duplex to his own apartment and had only a bed, a chair, and a desk to his name, leaving his entire living room unfurnished.  Jared was out of town for a couple of weeks, and had left the key to his new place with me.  Beth (my roommate) and I loaded up the old love seat into the back of her SUV and drove down the hill to Jared's building.  It was a bit tricky to get the thing in.  We had to get someone in the office to allow us to use the freight elevator, and the only parking at the building was of the 5-minutes-unloading-on-a-busy-street sort.  Neither of us being extraordinarily brawny meant we were not having the easiest time getting this thing out of the back of the SUV, but at that time, a fellow student happened by who lent us a hand.  So the unloved love seat found it's new home on the seventh floor of a Cleveland apartment building, where I frequently visited it, sitting upon it to eat dinner and to rehearse the Kodaly Duo in excruciating detail.  A year later, its latest owner packed up his belongings in a UHaul and took off for Rochester to attend grad school.  The love seat was taken up the freight elevator to a little studio apartment on the seventh floor of an old, decrepit hotel, which had once hosted pretty much every famous person who had ever visited Rochester.  (And it turns out there were quite a lot of them.)  The summer following, Jared married me, and we moved into a larger, one-bedroom apartment in the same building, the love seat following.  It was back in my possession after I had so unceremoniously dumped it two years before.  That love seat saw the addition of Gregory and Black Bean to the family.  After four years on the third floor, it moved with us to Huntsville where it also saw the addition of Feathers and Nutmeg.  Then it moved to Birmingham where it played host to Ran.  And then it drove cross-country in an ABF trailer and has since graced our Kent living room, where it also hosted Roy.  It was my middle-of-the-night nursing destination with baby Anne before we figured out how to do that in bed.  It has been the scene of many naps.  And has been sat upon by parents at lessons day in and day out.  How can I part with it now?  Yet, it is old and weary, and later this morning we have a newer love seat coming to us.  I don't want to toss it in the dumpster, because I think I might cry if I do.  It has been advertised on freecycle in the hopes that someone nearby who does not have any furniture (and I think there must be such people) would love to welcome it into their lives.

You can see it in the background here of this picture Jared took of the day we brought Anne home from the hospital.  This is it's better side.  There are some bits the cats have worked on, and the fact that the whole thing is rather saggy....

Knitting Knitting Gig Blog

Ok, we've gotten down to the week before we head to Texas, so I am now getting super organized.  For example, I made a list of everything travel/holiday related that needs to be done and put it on my calender.  And in all the spare moments (ha!) I'm knitting on Anne's Christmas dress.  I'm woefully behind, but I haven't yet given up hope of getting caught up.

Today's list is:

• make a pack list
• make a task list and put it on the calender
• call the shop about renting a cello in Austin
• pack the gift box to send to California
• advertise my sofa on freecycle
• blog

Tomorrow we're getting a new sofa.  That's a separate blog post and it's on the list for tomorrow.

This blog is actually about what we did yesterday.  See, I'm supposedly a professional musician.  And last Christmas I had NO, that's ZERO, Christmas gigs.  Which is sad, because those and Easter gigs are my favorites.  This year I was offered two.  One was an offer to both Jared and me to play the Christmas portion of the Messiah.  But we ended up turning it down, because 1) it was two hours away, 2) it didn't justify leaving Anne with a sitter for that many hours given how clingy she is right now.  The other gig was for Christmas Eve just down the street here, but we're going to be in Texas.  So anyway, they hired a very capable student of mine instead.  But I was pretty annoyed about not having ANY Messiah gigs in particular, two years in a row.  So I took matters into my own hands and with the use of google, I found a family-friendly Messiah opportunity.  St. Michael's and All Angel's Episcopal Church in Issaquah has an annual play-along/sing-along Messiah to benefit Issaquah Community Services.  So we just showed up and played.  I was the standing member of the orchestra (as opposed to seated).  There wasn't enough music to go around, so I stood off to the side of a stand of first violins and read from a distance.  Fortunately I have practiced the hard parts before and have them close to memorized, so it was ok that I couldn't see every note.  Anne rode in the back pack for about the first half, then she got down and played at my feet, and I occasionally stopped to service her in some way.  But we made it through the Christmas portion and the Hallalujah Chorus.  And I had fun.  And all the sing-along-ers wanted to come and talk to Anne afterward.

I am waiting for a knock on the door at any moment.  Maintenance dropped off four toilets by the W building on Friday evening, and I expect they will be back to install them as it's now Monday morning.  I kinda think they're waiting for an inopportune moment.  Like when I take a shower.  (Which I'm about to do since the baby went down for her nap.)  Or maybe they'll wait 'til Jared and I both have students here this afternoon, so we can have a lesson in the living room, and lesson in the piano room, the cats quarantined in the bedroom, and the maintenance dudes in the bathroom and hallway.  That pretty much covers all of our rooms except the kitchen.  But that's where the stroller and cello cases will be.

Gifts

I was at lunch with some people I'd just met on Tuesday.  And this being December (just about my favorite month, in case you were wondering), a topic of discussion was our favorite gifts to have received and given.

People, I love gifts.  And it was so hard to narrow it down.

Some gifts I've treasured:

• A beautiful, green millefiori necklace from Italy my student Anna gave me right before I moved away.  I enjoyed her so much, and it is a reminder of her.
• A bonzai shrub from my student Eboni.  It's still alive, and every time I see it I think of her.
• My violin and my CIM education, curtosy of my parents and grandparents.  My six years in school were an amazing, intense, and formative time, and I am so glad to have had that in my life.  I also made some friends there, including Jared, who have been such a blessing to me over the years.
• Gregory and Black Bean - kittens I begged Jared to let me get one summer and told him they could be my combined birthday and Christmas present.  He relented, and we were both so happy to have them with us.
• The complete Calvin and Hobbes.  My parents gave it to me for Christmas, and I have read those three tomes through on more than one occasion.
• A crazy pink and green abstract top my mom got me once - it dresses up and down, and when I wear it, I feel more confident and powerful.  I've worn it for concerto competitions (which I didn't win...)  and for numerous other occasions as well.
• This list could go on and on and on, because basically everything I have is a gift, and maybe that's why I get so sentimental about "stuff".  [Upcoming blogpost about my decrepit sofa...]
• But far and away the best gift is getting to be the mom of a healthy, curious, exuberant little girl who loves life and smiles and giggles her way through each day.  That tops it.

Gifts I've given.  I enjoy giving gifts, although lately I've felt more like a taker than a giver...  When I was much younger (and had fewer responsibilities), I spent untold hours creating rather elaborate (and mostly useless) gifts.  Here is an example:  I once made a "fish tank" for my sister.  The tank was a large glass jar.  I put sand in the bottom.  And then I outfitted it with "fish" and other accessories, such as a pirate's treasure chest made out of wood, then painted, then wrapped in saranwrap to keep the water out (a bit gimpy, I know).  Then the thing was filled with water and a lid put on.  Also, I once spent months writing some little piano pieces for my middle school friend Alexi's birthday.  Alexi had just started piano lessons, and I have no idea if she stuck with them long enough to play the pieces I wrote her.  In college I once gave a surprise birthday party for both of my roommates at once AT our apartment with about fifty guests. The elaborateness of planning it and pulling it off was enough to make one's head spin and cause one to not sleep for a week while carrying out strange activities in the middle of the night.  On a slightly more useful note, in Birmingham I baked bread once or twice a week, and I usually made two loaves and gave the second away - to a neighbor, a friend, or a coworker.  It was fun to think of who to surprise with it.

In the end though, I knew exactly which gift was the best I'd given, because of what the recipient told me afterward.  And that was letting Roy be part of our family for three months.  It almost a year ago - December the 18th to be exact, that he arrived at the airport with only four days warning.  He slept in a sleeping bag in our second bedroom and was a regular member of the household until the week before Anne was born.  He took three lessons a week from me and participated in our group class, where he was the star, both because of his abilities and because of his infectious personality.  He practiced umpteen hours.  He went off to audition at US colleges.  We got to show him snow for the first time.  He made friends with various people.  The day he left, he wrote up a detailed life history of his nineteen years and read it to us at breakfast.  It was then that I learned just how important this gift was to him.  

Ok, happy December.  I think my little girl has awoken.

A dishwasher and the short side of eternity

We asked maintenance a couple of days ago to come look at our dishwasher, because, yes, nasty mold or something of the sort is growing in it.  A very nice new fellow named Matt came to have a look.  Unfortunately, he told us what we feared.  It's an economy dishwasher, and basically our solutions to the problem will not involve management fixing the problem, but will involve: 1) Scrubbing it out ourselves, 2) Running an empty load every couple of weeks with some vinegar, 3) Loading it only about half way so that water gets better distributed, 4) Turning on the hot water at the tap for several minutes before starting the washer to get a hot start, and 5) Making sure the dishes are thoroughly washed before we put them in.  So, not the awesome solution I was hoping for...  However, Matt saw my Bible lying on the kitchen table while I was in the other room, and he and Jared ended up getting into a mutually edifying discussion of application of a Bible doctrine.  It was a nice connection.  Also, apparently Matt and his family eat the same brand of rice we usually do, which is to say Lundberg Short Grain Organic, which is what we get at Costco.

Two weeks ago we heard a really memorable (in a good way) children's story during the church service.  (Sometimes we hear memorable ones about the boy who disobeyed his mother and as a consequence got his leg run over by a train, or the little girl whose horse died in the tornado and they found it lying in a creek...  Are we feeling old-school German or something?  Max und Moritz?  Yuck!)  Anyway, this good children's story...

The man telling the story had a large ball of string, and he asked for two children to help him.  One stood at the front of the church and held the end of the string, and the other child held the ball and walked about three-quarters of the way down the aisle, leaving the majority of the ball yet to be unrolled.  The first ten or twelve inches were colored, and the rest was white.  So the story teller started at the end and pointed to various places along the string as he walked his way up the aisle telling the story:

...Here's where you're born.  Here's where you learn how to walk.  Here's where you start school.  Here's where some friends are mean to you.  Here's where you get your driver's license.  Here's where you lose a job.  There are some good things happening and some bad things happening.  Oh, here's where you come to the end of the colored part.  What happens there?...

[One little kid says, "You die!]  The story teller continues:

Actually, I was thinking that was where Jesus comes back.  Then what happens?  Here's where you get to fly all the way to heaven.  Here's where you get to talk to angels.  Here's where you get to see all kinds of amazing animals.  Here's where you see your friends and relatives who passed away.  Here's where you get to ask Jesus some questions you always wondered about.  You're not even still thinking too much about that colored part are you?  No, there are some many amazing things you're doing now, you almost forget about that little part of your life....

Anyway, I enjoyed the sweet reminder that this life isn't all there is, and there is much beauty and wonder to come.  Thank you story teller!

The week after Thanksgiving

It's been something on the order of a week since I last wrote.

Tidbits:

• We're having several cold, clear days where we can see Rainier from home.  Anne got to view her first snowfall from her stroller on Monday evening.  Don't think she was impressed.  But I was excited - but not quite cold enough to stick that time.
• Had a lovely several days in Oregon at Thanksgiving, hanging out with Jared's parents, big celebration at Aunt Julie's, a visit from good friends in town from Alabama, seeing Jared's grandparent's new home, and collecting some retro baby clothes from Jared's and siblings childhood.  Anne is trying out some late '70's through mid-80's styles.
• Decorated for Christmas yesterday to the extent I plan to - a wreath, a string of lights, and some centerpiece-y things on the table.
• Knitting away on Anne's Christmas dress.  Nowhere near done.
• Learned from my dentist that toothpaste isn't strictly necessary.  Good flossing and good brushing with water is perfectly functional.  This is amazing, people.  Amazing.  Because I hate toothpaste with a passion.  
• Jared made a pumpkin pudding type thing the other day for dessert, and we let Anne try some.  I've never seen her love a food so much - begging for the next bite!
• Enjoying a new 20-something violin student.  I asked her to come up with syllables for the Twinkle Variations, and I noticed her age specially when she came up with "Exhibition Showtime" for the first one.  
• Been switching outgrown baby clothes for larger ones today.  Bittersweet.
• Cat food is now relegated to the tub so that Anne doesn't make a beeline for it.
• A week ago, Nutmeg walked into the room, and I said, "Hey, Kitty."  Then Anne said, "Hey Kitty."  The week before that was proceeded by her saying something that sounded suspiciously like "kitty cat" repeatedly.  But since then we've heard no more of this, but instead a whole lot of "abababababa".
• Teeth numbers seven and eight have arrived.
• Our neighbor girl proved herself very trustworthy with the cats while we were gone.  We've used her for cat sitting before, but now I feel that I really trust her well.

Things you probably didn't know

A bunch of people have been doing these "12 things you probably don't know about me" posts recently, and I started wondering what silly things people don't know about me that would be shareable.  I don't think I've got twelve, but I have a few if you're ready for a small bit of amusement.

• I remember learning about the rainbow in preschool.  Ever since, I've had a thing about putting like objects in rainbow order.  Like M&M's and like Annie's stacking cups.
• For many years, the same piece of music was running through my head when all other internal or external sound was stopped.  It was the Bourree from Bach C Major Suite.  Except in G Major.
• When I was a child, I always wished I'd had one or two more siblings.  I'm sure my parents did not.
• You might never be able to tell, but I have an extremely thin skin when it comes to being criticized, having interpersonal conflict, blood and guts, scary stories, tales of woe, and seeing hurt of any sort.  I think I generally hide it well, but that doesn't mean I'm handling it well.
• My parents were into the Meyers-Briggs personality typing for a while, and ever since that time, I have been fascinated by it.  I'm often not good at guessing others' types, but if I learn their letters, I am able to understand them better.  One tiny tidbit is that in Jared's and my immediate families, I  am the only "P" surrounded by many "J"'s.
• You would be shocked if you saw how much food I put away in a day right now.  Nursing a growing child and running is a pretty winning weight-loss program.  I stuff my face to keep up.
• One of my family members had surgery when I was very small.  After that, I decided I wanted to be a surgeon, but I thought that was way too risque to tell my parents, so I told them I wanted to be a veterinarian.  Keep in mind, I was a preschooler at the time.  I am so glad I did not attempt to follow either of those career paths. (See point number four.)

Busy day, busy people

The baby had a good night last night, so I woke up of my own accord well before 7:00, feeling entirely human.  It's just starting to get light, and since the leaves are off the trees and it's a clear morning, there is a stunning view of Mt. Rainier from my dining room window.  Even if a lot of things go wrong today, that's a pretty wonderful start to the day!

It is quite cold out and was so overnight, so last night we brought the plants in.  There are a lot of them and they are bigger since we last had to bring in plants during the winter.  They take up about half the living room.  The cats and the baby were quite delighted, and they all four got busy digging in the dirt and eating leaves.  The funniest part was that Anne's entire face smelled like rosemary.  I've had this experience before, but with our cat Gregory.  He'd go to sniffing in the rosemary plant and then he'd smell like foccacia for days!  (It's been two years this week since Gregory died.)

I was feeling stressed out yesterday morning and I may or may not have been a little rude to Jared when he was trying to help me fix the problem on our walk/jog yesterday. ...I mentioned how I sent off at least sixteen emails in an effort to find more students.  So when people start replying to the emails, I then have to make phone calls and meet with people in person.  And the prospect of going out and trying to meet and request things from all these strangers is just a wee bit overwhelming for this very introverted person.  Anyway, I'll just have my meltdowns in private, and when I meet these people I'm very enthusiastic and direct.

Yesterday afternoon Anne and I went to meet with a man who owns a music store and has built teaching studios, to talk with him about renting space from him.  I asked him all kinds of questions, and I think I have a very clear picture of how everything works.  The jury is still out on whether I will do it.  Researching it and thinking it over a bit more.

Also yesterday, I spoke on the phone with a mother whose son had a trial lesson with me a couple of months ago.  The family wanted him to study, but they didn't like the price.  In our conversation yesterday I learned that the boy and his brother both study guitar, and the guitar teacher charges basically one quarter of my rate.  They are still interested in lessons, but don't think they can afford me.  I was quite interested in working with the boy, because I have the sense that practicing will occur.  I'm trying to decide what sort of work study to offer them.  I don't do scholarship students, because a) it's not fair to charge different students different rates for the same instruction, b) I do need some income around here, and c) I've learned through experience that students who have reduced rates often put in reduced work and/or take advantage of the teacher in various ways.  Work study might include caring for the cats when I'm out of town, babysitting, or preparing meals.  In the next few days I need to think about what price I'd be willing to offer them in conjunction with what work study needs to happen and how to write it up so that I don't get the bad end of the deal.  Been there, done that.

This afternoon Anne and I will be going to coffee with the head of the music department at a community college where one of my students studies, to talk with him about expanding their instrumental offerings.  No clue where the conversation may go; it may just be a "good to put a face with that name" meeting, and that's fine.

Tomorrow morning Anne and I will be going to meet with the orchestra director at the high school just east of us during his planning period, to give him Jared's and my business cards and to put a face with a name.

Anyway, that's what came out of my emailing bonanza in the first twenty-four hours.  We'll see what other opportunities turn up today.

Anne has gotten so busy it's hard to get her to bed at night again.  She is crawling around.  She is pulling up to kneeling and standing.  She is finding new things to get into.  All the time.  So I lay her down on the bed.  She is exhausted.  I more or less lie on top of her, pinning her down, to nurse her.  And she takes a couple of sips.  Squirms out.  And starts crawling around the bed.  And then I have to stop her from torturing the cats if they're handy.  And crawling off the edge of the bed onto her head.  Repeat this process for about half an hour.  Then give up, and decide she's not going to bed yet.  Then go get myself ready for bed.  Then Jared and I lie in bed and do our Bible reading.  While she is using both of us for a jungle gym and trying to get her hands on the Bible.  With the intent of getting her teeth on the Bible.  Keep moving the Bible out of range.  Once everyone in the house is asleep, she is ready to consider it.  Having so much fun with her, but I'm not sure I'm ready for her to be so grown up yet!

Also in the last few days she's started initiating peek-a-boo on her own.  At dinner she'll pull her bib up over her face, or in the stroller she'll pull her blanket over her face, and then say "Eh!" until you notice.  Then she uncovers herself and smirks or giggles.  She is going through a really clingy phase right now.  No one except Mommy or Daddy can hold her, even if we're standing right next to her.

But when one of us is holding her, she is quite happy to meet new people.  The other day at the Bible study, she and I went into the nursing room, and an older lady was in there.  And at some point Anne was sitting on my lap, trying to get this lady's attention.  She kept smacking her hands on the arm of the chair and saying "Eh!"  until the lady noticed her.  And then she was all grins.  Quite the little charmer.

I'm also quite sure she is working on saying "cat".  A week ago she'd look at the cat/s and say "kh!" Now she looks at them and says, "kaa!".  My parents said my first word was "kitty cat".  So there you go...

Empty/full

As of yesterday morning, my Tuesday schedule was looking unofficially empty.  As in laundry, running, Bible reading, practicing, taking care of the baby, and finishing my knitting project.  After a phone call in the evening, my Tuesday schedule became full.  I did some laundry.  Anne and I went out to a Bible study this morning to see if we want to join it.  We do.  Then we took the recycling to a drop off point.  Then we came home and went running with Jared.  Then my co-teacher came over and we watched the videos from our Sunday studio recitals and discussed students' progress.  We also brainstormed about how I'm going to get more students.  Then I put Anne down for a nap and undertook the follow up of the brainstorms which involved a lot of web searching and then the sending of at least sixteen emails.  Haven't done the practicing or Bible reading yet.  Those are next on the list.  And maybe I'll finish my knitting project tomorrow (it's Jared's metronome case) so I can start on the next one, which is Anne's Christmas dress.

End of a weekend

The quick rundown of the weekend.

Friday night - family walk in the rain followed by dinner
Saturday morning - church
Saturday afternoon - read and worked on a puzzle during Anne's nap
Saturday evening - my brother called on his way home from work, and he came up the hill and joined us for a walk not in the rain.  And then his wife called after her tea party outing and joined us.  And we all had an impromptu family dinner at our place.  And Anne sat up from crawling on her own.  A first!
Sunday morning - Skype lesson.  Recital preparation craziness.
Sunday afternoon - Two studio recitals.  Successful, both.
Sunday evening - not doing much  :-)

I'm sure that was fascinating...

Bookaholic

Hello.  My name is Ruth Marie.  And I'm a bookaholic.

Monday I pulled the second book off my must-read-before-I-die shelf, and I read and read, ignoring all but the most essential duties of my week until I finished it yesterday evening.  I've had this problem ever since my dad got me started on Nancy Drew during a road trip in NJ/NY/PA when I was maybe seven.  I have a problem with narrative stories which are remotely gripping.  Sometime in college I mostly gave up on stories, choosing to read only non-fiction/non-narratives.  That's because I can pick them up and put them down at will, and I wouldn't ruin my entire formal music education, being sidetracked by my informal literary education.

Anyway, the book I just finished is called Bend, Not Break: A Life in Two Worlds by Ping Fu, founder and CEO of Geomagic, Inc.  As you might guess from the author's credentials on the front cover, the story has a happy ending.  People, there is a lot of pointless suffering and collateral damage in this world.  There is a shocking amount of carnage and pain and hopelessness.  It's on my mind all the time.  So when I'm going to read a story, I need a happy ending.  It doesn't need to be a Disney "...and they lived happily ever after" or a Hollywood they just knew they were meant for each other and walked off into the sunset, nevermind all the unanswered questions.  Yeah, maybe I'm a little too cynical to enjoy those sorts of endings.  I like a little reality in my stories.   But tragedies aren't for me.  And endings where everything is left hanging are not for me.

When Bend, Not Break opens, the author is twenty-five years old and is being deported by the Chinese government, leaving behind everyone and everything she's ever known with no hope of ever seeing her family again.  She's headed to the US with no English and no money.  And upon arrival she is kidnapped and imprisoned by a refugee living in subsidized housing.  So obviously there is a long way to go to get to the happy ending.

But here's a cool thing about how the book is set up.  After she tells about the start of her life in the US, she goes back and tells about the start of her life in China.  Then she tells the next little piece of her life in the US and then the next little piece of her life in China, filling the story in checkerboard fashion.  So when there are horrible bits, you can also, in the same chapter, look forward or backward and see some hopeful bits.

This was the first time I've read a first-hand account of someone who lived through the Cultural Revolution.  I once, for a few months, studied with a piano teacher and her daughter, who was our translator, who had lived through the Cultural Revolution, but I was only a child and had no idea what that meant.  Well, I guess even now I've lived a good amount of adult life without really knowing what it meant.  But now I know what it meant for one individual.  And it was pretty horrifying.

I enjoyed reading about how the author founded, and has continued to run, her high-tech start-up Geomagic, Inc.  I couldn't really understand all of it - so much business jargon goes in one ear and out the other.  I hear that sort of jargon from my dad, since he is a serial high-tech start-up guy.  But I have a hard time translating it all into English for myself.  But what impressed me about this part of her story is her complete humility, reporting where she made mistakes and hurt people and the company, and reporting what worked well, without any self-agrandizement.

Since we had Ran for our roommate in Alabama, I've had more of an interest in China.  It was so interesting to hear his perspective on his country and his culture and his government and try to mesh that with what we know in the West.  I'm sure that not all that we know about China is accurate, but I am amazed at how much censorship and revisionism is fed to the Chinese people by the authorities.  After reading this book, I know that not all Chinese citizens believe what they're told.  And also, I really want to go to Beijing to visit Ran's family and see what it's like.  I know I can't imagine it properly.

Throughout the book, Ms. Fu shared important lessons that get her through challenges, and three of them stick out to me.  One lesson is called The Three Friends of Winter, and it's where the title of the book comes from.  I'll let Ms. Fu tell you:

There are three friends of winter: the pine tree, the plum blossom, and bamboo.  Pine trees are strong.  They remain happy and green throughout the year.  In the unbearable heat of summer and the severe cold of winter, they stand unperturbed....  The crimson petals of the plum blossom gleam brilliantly against the white snow.  The ability to bloom in the midst of misfortune suggests dignity and forbearance under harsh circumstances....  Bamboo is flexible, bending with the wind but never breaking, capable of adapting to any circumstance.  It suggests resilience, meaning that we have the ability to bounce back from even the most difficult times.... Your ability to thrive depends, in the end, on your attitude to your life circumstances.  When you are like the three friends of winter, you take everything in stride with grace, putting forth energy when it is needed, yet always staying calm inwardly.

A second one is Who can say what is good or bad?

Among the people who lived close to the border, there was an old wise man who led a kind and peaceful life.  Without reason, his horse escaped one day and fled into barbarian territory.  Everyone is the village pitied him.  But the old man said: "What makes you think this is not a good thing?" 

Several months later, the old man's horse returned, and a superb barbarian stallion accompanied him.  His neighbors congratulated the old man.  But he said: "What makes you think this cannot be a bad thing?" 

The old man's grandson enjoyed riding the new horse.  But one day, he fell while riding and broke his hip.  Everyone pitied the old man once again.  But he said: "What makes you think that this is not a good thing?" 

One year later, a large party of barbarians invaded the border region.  All the men from the village drew their bows and went to battle, where nine out of the ten of them died.  But because he was lame, the old man's grandson did not have to go to war.  His life was spared.

I had a tiny, tiny experience with this yesterday.  Jared and I went out running with the stroller, and I ended walking a bit of the way, so when we got close to home, I decided I wanted to run a bit more.  Jared went home, and I went back out with the stroller.  On my way home again, my hands started to get cold, which was the bad thing.  So I reached into the stroller for my gloves and found that one was missing.  Which meant that I knew to go back and look for it.  Otherwise, I might not have discovered the missing glove until another day and by then I wouldn't have been able to find it when I retraced my steps.  So the cold hands let to the return of my missing glove, which was a good thing.  Rather a tiny point, but the experience stuck out to me since I had just read the story.

The third lesson which the author learned again and again was that very small kindness went a long way, and the benefactors of those small kindnesses may never have known the large impact they would have.  Just a little reminder to me to keep my eyes open for how to deliver even little blessings.

I am amazed at Ms. Fu's overall optimism and at her continued growth throughout her life.  She never feels that she knows it all and is always striving to learn new things.  Very inspiring.

Once-in-a-lifetime experience

I'm hoping that I just had a once-in-a-lifetime experience, but I'm not counting on it...

Got a call from our co-teacher who was in a lesson with one of her students I saw last week.  They decided to change the student's piece for this Sunday's recital from A Major Scale to E String Concerto, and they wanted to hear the accompaniment part.  So I walked in to the piano, put myself on speaker phone, and played the piano part... while standing in my bare feet in cat barf.  Yeah, I didn't see that 'til it was too late.  And playing the piano woke the baby up from her nap.  Oops.

Family history

I just got back from having all my fillings redone.  And seriously, this dentist is amazing.  While I was lying there having my mouth worked on, I was thinking, what am I going to do if we move again or if I outlive this dentist???  I've never liked going to the dentist, but this one is great.  Period.

Anyway, let's not discuss my teeth.  Instead, let's discuss the fact that Anne is in the middle of a big transition today from army crawl to knee crawl.  Meaning she is going to be a lot faster.  And she is also working toward pulling up to standing on her own.  She's got the pulling up to kneeling thing nailed.

We went to Oregon over the weekend, and Jared's Grampa had his 90th birthday party.  Jared and Anne and I were three of the eighteen people who were there are lunch.  Grampa said we need to come back in ten years, because he'll have another birthday then.  I told him that Anne would bake the cake next time.  Anne was a little unsure of seeing all those people at once.  But she bonded with cousin Erik at lunch.  She kept throwing her sippy cup on the floor on his side, and he kept picking it up for her.   Also Aunt Claudia brought her some new percussion instruments, which she has been enjoying quite a lot.  When it was nap time, and she was exhausted, but she was too wound up to sleep, we went outside where Uncle Matthew's and Aunt Marie's dog was hanging out.  Anne loves animals and was quite delighted to see Lotus.  We went on a walk which hit the spot for the dog and put Annie out for her nap, so it was a win-win.

I wish I'd been in on more of it, but after all the eating was done, there were old family photos and things pulled out, and stories of forbears told.  I am interested to learn more about Jared's family, to see where various bits of things come from.  So fascinating to be part of a family which isn't mine by blood.  One sort of assumes things about all families from one's own flesh-and-blood family, and then come to find out that other families do and see things quite differently!  That's one thing about marriage I wasn't really expecting before we got married seven years ago.  Anyway...  There was a picture of Jared's paternal grandmother as a toddler, which Aunt Julie thought resembled Anne.  I thought so, too.  Jared never met her - she passed away shortly before his parents were married.  The day after the birthday party, when Jared's mom and I were working in the kitchen, I asked her if her parents' personalities were the same now as when she was growing up, and she told me a lot about her childhood.  I enjoyed hearing about it, and learning new things.

...It would have been a lot better if I had knocked out my violin practicing for the day before I had my entire face numbed.  I may wait a few hours before I fulfill that particular duty...

Schedule schmedule

Tuesday felt really weird, because other than one Tuesday in June, I have taught every Tuesday since Anne was three weeks old, and this Tuesday was nothing.  Although I did get a lot of other things done, including the programs for our studio recitals for next weekend.  Yesterday, however, I taught twelve lessons.  Don't think I was super busy all day, though, because they averaged out to about twenty minutes each.  (Of course there was a lot of pre-cleaning and between-baby care...)Two were mine, and the others were all students of my co-teacher, most of whom are in group class. This morning I'll be seeing an adult student I've not yet met of my co-teacher, and then a family of five kids who will all have lessons in the space of an hour.  It's sort of like institute teaching, I guess!  Then this afternoon, I teach my Skype lesson, get in the car and go straight over to Group Class House, teach two more students I don't know, teach group class, and then afterward teach two of my own students.  I started pumping milk yesterday for today's extravaganza since I should be booked solid from 3:30-8:15, but Anne drank all of it yesterday during my teaching.  So I'm still working on that project so she won't be a disaster this evening.  Debating about going out for a run.  It was raining cats and dogs a few minutes ago, and the radar doesn't look promising for the near future.  Hmmm...

In other news, she is seven months today.

And for Edith's benefit, here is a picture from a couple of weeks ago in which Anne is wearing Edith's booties:

Busy baby. Three-car garage.

Baby girl has been very busy in the last week.  She has figured out how to crawl backwards.  She has further attempted to get her knees more involved in her crawl.  She has discovered that she loves mashed green peas.  And that she loves shaking her spoon with Mommy.  (That's Mommy's game to try to get the spoon back from Anne so that she can reload it.  This child is all about "I'll do it myself" when it comes to feeding.  And most other things.)  I'm pretty sure she's been trying to sign "kitty cat" recently.  That is probably the sign we use the most with her other than "milk," which she started using herself when she was five months.  She has also figured out how to get from sitting to crawling without falling on her face.  And she has figured out how to pull her front half up via a box or the dishwasher or a pillow so that she is close to kneeling.  At the very moment she is hanging onto Daddy's endpin while he practices.  I'm sure she is getting some nice vibrations.  The other first we are dealing with right now is her first cold.  She's had two bad nights of waking up crying in the night, like, say, every hour.  Basically I'll just say that she does not cry at night; only a couple of times when she's had a bad dream, so this is pretty unusual.  Hopefully she'll feel better really soon.

Been doing a little daydreaming, which is not something I've done a lot of recently.  But I've figured out the perfect housing situation.  What we need is a small place - two bedrooms is just fine.  Not a lot of space to have to clean.  But the key element here is either a large basement, a three-car garage, or a good sized outbuilding.  Any of which could be outfitted as two good size and comfy teaching studios - one for violin and one for cello.  Then we could have all the convenience of teaching at home without all the inconvenience of teaching in our living space.  Because I spend hours of my week cleaning before lessons which wouldn't have to happen if our spaces were separate.  And it would be easier for the non-teaching adult to do things like cook dinner during a lesson.  Without all the incovenience of commuting to work.  Anyway, yeah, I'm not in the market for a house right now, but I know exactly what sort of place I need.

I actually finished reading a grown-up book.

Bedroom reimagination basically complete, minus the top of the bookshelf right by the door (still a disaster) and the large off-white space taken up by the box spring.  I'm really pleased with it, and now the bedroom is my favorite room in the apartment, since it is the cleanest and best arranged at the moment.  If I could only manage to have all three of our official rooms in the same status simultaneously!

And I finally finished my first book off the shelf of "I'm going to read these before I die".  The Magic Years by Selma Fraiberg.  It's one Ed Sprunger has referenced on multiple occasions, so I knew I wanted to read it.  Written in 1959, it's about the first six years of child development from a Freudian perspective.  While I know that Freud has some good things to say, I dislike some of his views, seeing them as strongly influenced by his time and culture.  Being somewhat familiar with the circumstances of his culture through music history and such, I think that there is a lot of dark imagery, grandiosity, and symbolism that aren't to my personal taste.  Partway through the book I wanted to give up, but I'm so glad I stuck it out.  There was some really excellent practical material on a variety of topics in the later part, and I'm going to let Dr. Fraiberg speak for the rest of the post.  An excerpt from Chapter 8: Education of Conscience:

Another aspect of parental uncertainty in moral education is seen in the attitude of parents toward the crime and horror fare that is provided by television, movies and comic books.  Most parents deplore this stuff; some defend it as a harmless means of discharge of aggression.  Very few parents who deplore, however, are willing to take a stand - really a moral stand - on their children's reading and viewing tastes.  Now a child who is exposed to the education of these stories of murder, violence and sadism will acquire a set of values that are certainly at variance - to say the least - with those values that his parents desire for him.  After witnessing a dozen or more screen murders in an afternoon and evening in his own living room, day after day for so and so many years, he cannot hold sacred the idea of a human life, nor can he regard the ending of a life as a tragedy.  At best he will acquire a spurious moral lesson intoned by the sponsor while a janitor sweeps the corpses off the stage: "Crime does not pay!"  Now the moral principle behind the civilized view of taking a life is not that it "does not pay," i.e., "you'll get caught in the end."  This is like the morality of the two year old, the child who has not yet acquired a conscience, who judges the "rightness" and "wrongness" of an act according to whether he gets caught or now.  It is also the morality of the delinquent.  But the civilized man abhors the idea of murder because he exalts the value of human life and because the destruction of another man's life would be morally impossible for him even if there were no possibility of discovery of the crime.

The child who is glutted on television and comic book fare will have a hard time discovering for himself that his society regards a human life as sacred.  Who can hold a tragic view of death when the static of pistol shots assaults the ear from 4:00 p.m. to bed-time and the cheery voice of the sponsor rises over bloody screams and death rattles to bring the message of the hearty breakfast?  The parental voice, if it is heard at all above this din, will have a tough time competing with the education of the screen.

But most often the parental voice is not heard at all.  For although most parents detest these stories and their degradation of human beings and human values, they also tolerate them.  While they hold their own values and live by them they do not raise objections to Johnny's other education and Johnny is afforded the privilege of most nice children in nice homes of being entertained and educated by gangsters, dope addicts, sadists and morons in his own living room.  By this I do not mean that such programs are an education for delinquency.  Delinquents are not made this way.  But I do mean that human values are debased in these stories, and in the endless repetition of these stories and their themes, they undergo some debasement in the child's mind, too.[...]

[...] I think we need to take the child's television, movie and comic book entertainment very seriously as educational influences.  We need to consider what it means to a child who receives a moral education from his parents and is entertained in his own living room, with the consent of his parents, by a constant flow of visitors from the underworld and outer space whose views on society and human values would have been barely tolerated in a Neanderthal cave.  We do not ordinarily invite such visitors into our living rooms and we do not regard murder and brutality as home entertainments.  If we are earnest and moral parents, we have spent many years in building an attitude in our children toward raw aggression, violence and sadism.  We have considered it necessary that our small children give up the primitive pleasure in destructive acts and acquire a civilized attitude of revulsion toward sadism.  But when murder and violence are offered as an entertainment diet, how is the child helped to give up pleasure in the destructive act?  

Reimagining the bedroom

Jared saw a cartoon recently where a couple was "reimagining" their bathroom.  The shower ended up on the ceiling.  The toilet was on the wall.  The sink was upside down.... Well, I am in the midst of reimagining the bedroom.  For real.  This is because Anne sleeps in our bed right now.  And she is also a very good crawler.  And she can crawl over the barriers we have set up around her during nap time.  So to keep her from killing herself, we took the bed frame and the box spring out from under the mattress.  The mattress is now directly on the floor, which means that she only has six inches to fall if she is so inclined.  The bed frame folds up, and I'm going to stow it in a closet or under the couch or something.  There were two storage bins under the bed, and I think I'll stack them under the laundry basket, because you know, blue plastic is a nice touch in any bedroom decor.  And then there's what to do with the box spring.  I unhung the pineapple drawing from over the head of the bed and unmounted our two shadow boxes which were serving as nightstands.  And in their place is the box spring, standing on end, acting as a headboard.  The side the cats ripped open is to the wall, so they can't climb around inside it.  The other side is facing the room.  That's right.  Seven feet of off-white taking up precious wall space.  So I had this brilliant idea to use it as a felt board.  But then I discovered felt won't stick to it.  I may get a piece of cloth or a large piece of felt to create a picture background, and then we can felt board on the front.  Changeable art!  The other fun thing about this is that Feathers is a climber.  Around 8 am yesterday morning, she walked straight up the front of the box spring and lounged around on the top end for quite some time.  Anne woke up and giggled at the kitty looking down from ceiling level.  So there's the whole jungle gym aspect.  Misplaced pineapples and nightstand shadowboxes are looking for a new home in the bedroom as well.  Having fun!

Friendship.

Certain members of the family are napping right now, and Feathers and I are sharing a walnut snack...

It has been a bonanza week for this individual who has mostly long-distance friendships.  I got a call from a friend in Alabama.  I got a call from a friend in D.C.  I got an email from a friend in Germany.  I got a call from a friend in Minnesota.  I got a call from a friend in Ohio.  I chatted online a bit with a friend from New Jersey.  And I got a call from a friend in Kentucky.  Incidentally, every one of these ladies I mentioned I met while we were living in Cleveland.

And I got a call from my brother and sister-in-law this afternoon, and we're going to have dinner together tonight!  A little local relational action.  :-)

Also this week, Anne got a box of little shoes from a woman at our Huntsville church whose daughter had outgrown them.  Cute stuff!

On a completely different note, I've found that people who have tattoos enjoy talking about them.  They put a lot of thought into them, and when and why they chose them are important parts of who they are.  Next time you're looking to start a conversation with a stranger and notice a tattoo, ask to hear the story.  Chances are good your new friend would love to tell you about their tattoo and will throw in some of their life story, too.  I sat with a lady at church today who has nineteen tattoos, and I enjoyed hearing her stories about them after the service.

Friday ramblings

Baby was back to sleeping five-plus hours stretches last night, so I was up and cheerful earlier than usual this morning.  She's still asleep.  Cutting her four top teeth this week made her a bit cranky for a while.

Back to my knitting hobby after a year's hiatus.  After my fourth attempt and the use of youtube tutorials, I made Anne a pair of thumbless mittens in a toddler size so she can still wear them next winter.  I'm about to start on a new metronome case for Jared.  Also, if I get super ambitious, I might knit Anne a Christmas dress.  I found a free pattern for a really cute one...  I'm pretty sure I'll need a lot of youtube tutorials to figure it out.

My latest and greatest musical plan is to take some Suzuki piano training.  It won't be hard to make the audition video since I've played the required music before.  Will be harder to find a book 1 class which is remotely convenient to take....  That might not happen this coming summer.

November 17th we (Jared and our co-teacher and I) are having two joint studio recitals.  Working on getting students distributed and orders made.  That's one of the parts of being your own secretary.  Also, this coming week is my last week covering for maternity leave way up north.  I'll miss the kids, and I've enjoyed the group classes (a whole group class of just book 4 students????  A first for me!)  But the first week of November I'll be covering some of our co-teacher's lessons when she is gone for a few days.  That will be fun.  It's mostly kids I already know from group class, and we'll be working on their recital pieces.  And also, two of my students who had been doing very little practicing (literally like 20 mins. a week) have bumped it up to more like 200 minutes a week thanks to my handy-dandy little practice chart I passed out.  Why did I not do this sooner????  It's not like I haven't found this to be the case in the past!  (Yes, I did have an article published recommending passing out practice charts.  Take your own advice, lady!)  Anyway, expect some super-Jedi progress.

It's not super foggy today, which is unusual this week.  By super foggy, we're talking, you can't see that there is a traffic light until you're right up to it.  It's been very interesting and very localized.  Like on Tuesday, it was shockingly foggy at home.  When I drove down the hill it was only very foggy.  When I got downtown it was brilliantly sunny.  And when I got to where I was teaching I could see the fog sitting just to the north and west of us.

Also, for the first time in my life, I found a dentist I like.  If anyone is looking for a dentist, I can make a recommendation to you.  Even if you're from out of town, but occasionally visit Seattle, I'd tell you to go to this guy!  I learned that Seattle is considered the best city in the world for dental care.  In my consultation appointment, I learned more about teeth than I had learned in my entire previous life.  And I was treated like an actual human being and a partner in my personal tooth care and was not talked down to or chastised.  And unfortunately I'm going to have to have all the rest of my fillings done in Alabama replaced, since they actually were sub-par (by which we mean that either they weren't properly bonded or the batch of filling material was contaminated or both).  Apparently this is not uncommon for fillings done in the South.  Hooray.  Their badness is not a result of my lack of care of them as the previous dentist I visited in Kent intimated.

And lastly before I stop rambling, I'll mention that one of my violin buddies in Huntsville has decided to memorize the Sermon on the Mount, and I'm going to join her.  She's working on a timeline for the project this weekend.  I think this project will take a while.

Ok, I should go take a shower before baby wakes up and then do some housecleaning before my cat-allergic student arrives for her lesson in two hours.

Paved with good intentions

I suppose this is a follow up to my thoughts about running, and it's been percolating in my head for days?  weeks?  now and is getting longer and longer.  Hopefully something sensical will come of it.  Perhaps it should be titled "Spiritual Lessons Learned from Running".

When we ran the half in Birmingham, one of the people out cheering us on held up a sign, which said: 1 COR 9:24-27 .  After I got home, I looked it up and Jared and I memorized it.  It says:

Do you know that in a race all the runners compete but only one receives the prize?  Run in such a way that you may win it.  Athletes exercise self-control in all things.  They do it to win a perishable wreath, but we, an imperishable one.  So I do not run aimlessly, nor do I box as though beating the air; but I punish my body and enslave it so that after having proclaimed to others I myself should not be disqualified.

It's amazing how much more I get from scripture that I memorize than what I only read.  Jared and I have gotten away from our scripture memory project, but we've at least gotten back to reviewing our list.  (Plug: If you've never done any regular scripture memorizing before, I highly recommend it.  It has been a real blessing to me personally.)

A book I read a couple of years ago which I keep coming back to is called Bullet Proof: The Making of an Invincible Mind, written by Chuck Holton.  Chapter ten is called "A Spirit of Self-Discipline".  Here are two bits I highlighted:

Self-discipline is the act of choosing the difficult right over the comfortable wrong.  It is the practice of controlling one's will.  Recognizing the bent of human nature to follow the path of least resistance, the self-disciplined individual chooses the neglected path of the hard road.  A disciplined person knows that discomfort is the stimulus for all growth.  Self-discipline, then, isn't just about learning to accept discomfort, but choosing it for the sake of personal growth.

*****

Unfortunately, real self-discipline is one of our society's rarest qualities.  To put it bluntly, the world - particularly our Western world with its many comforts and luxuries - is full of wimps and pansies.  To the extent that any believer can develop the habit of consistently making the hard choices, he or she will stand head and shoulders above the crowd.
Think about it.  Whenever you are faced with a difficult decision, isn't the more difficult choice usually the right one?  So when we make a habit of choosing the more difficult path in the small things, it makes us better prepared to do so in the things that really matter.  Self-discipline is like mental muscle, and it has to be exercised if it's going to grow.
William James penned the following in the last half of the nineteenth century.  Though somewhat arcane in its language, this selection from his book Habit contains a real nugget of wisdom on the subject of self-discipline.
"Keep the faculty of effort alive in you by a little gratuitous exercise every day.  That is, be systematically ascetic or heroic in little unneccessary points, do every day or two something for no other reason that that you would rather not do it, so that what when the hour of dire need draws nigh, it may find you not unnerved and untrained to stand the test.  Asceticism of this sort is like the insurance which a man pays on his house and goods.  The tax does him no good at the time, and possibly may never bring him a return.  But if the fire does come, his having paid it will be his salvation from ruin.  So with the man who has daily inured himself to habits of concentrated attention, energetic volition, and self denial in unnecessary things.  He will stand like a tower when everything rocks around him, and when his softer fellow mortals are winnowed like chaff in the blast." 

This is why training for a race is valuable to me.  I actually would get decent exercise without it.  But it's good training for me in doing hard things.  Training I personally need.

It's also a good reminder for me about doing my daily worship time.  Reading the Bible.  Meditating on memory verses.  Praying.  For the same people.  Over and over again.  Sometimes it's a real drag in the sense that it might be boring, and I don't wanna.  But I have to keep reminding myself that I can't give up before the race is over.

I've been thinking about my character a lot lately.  Sometimes I get into these little jags where I think about what a good person I am.  Like how I'm not like these people who _____________ (fill in the blank of the week.)  Basically, that's a lot of baloney.  Being a mom now, I spend several thoughts on what sort of character I'd like my child to have, and frankly, I see how I'm lacking.  And if I'm lacking, how can I expect more of her?  I want to grow Christ's character in me.  A character which is one of working for the highest good of everyone else.  Which loves even when the cost is great.  Which is oriented toward truth.  Which takes ownership of the mind, the desires, the will.  Which always seeks for God's glory.

My life is full of unfinished projects. As the saying goes, the road to hell is paved with good intentions.  I, like Paul, want to be tough on myself so that I can finish the race well.  So I'm trying to do hard things on purpose.  

Half Fennel

It has been a busy few days.  Busy.

Thursday.  It's my easy day, because all I have is a Skype lesson and group class.  So I also took Annie to her six month doctor's appointment.  And the post office.  And I did how many loads of laundry?  And went to the grocery store.  And practiced. And ran. And rehearsed for our Monday gig. And did the Skype lesson and the group class.  So it all added up.  The doctor asked if Anne could sit up on her own, and I said no.  But I came home and tried it, and she can, it turns out.  Also, we started her on some rice cereal on Thursday.  She wasn't too sure about it, but Friday she decided she really liked it and wanted to help with the spoon, too.

Friday.  Jared and I rehearsed in the morning, then he went out to Ellensburg to a teacher workshop.  I cleaned before my student came who is allergic to cats.  Also folded many loads of laundry.  And practiced.  And cleaned the kitchen (which was several days behind.)  And Jared's parents arrived.  In all I taught five lessons, and they visited with Anne while I was teaching, which was a great help.  Also, they brought dinner and did some cooking for Saturday's afternoon meal, too.  Jared got home around 8:00, and we had dinner, all five of us together.  Anne was pretty excited from having her grandparents in town, and it was a little hard for her to go to sleep.  Jared and I had to giggle a number of times as she lay in bed trying out every possible dinosaur noise she could make to keep from drifting off.  I didn't know how creative a six-month-old could be!

Saturday.  Jared had some duties during the church service, and Anne slept for about half of her Sabbath school class.  But she woke up when they handed out jingle bells and maracas to the kids.  Then she participated in the rest of the class.  Her favorite parts are the song about taking turns when riding (and they get to ride on a rocking horse), the song about bubbles (when they bring out the bubble machine), and the song about stars (and they bring out little twinkle star wands).  After we got home from church, Anne and her grandparents hung around while Jared and I had to make an almost-two-hour round trip up to pick up our race packets.  Then we had a nice dunch/linner together, and Jared's folks left to go back to Oregon.  The other three of us went on a walk before it got too dark, and then Jared and I practiced and rehearsed.

Sunday.  Jeffrey and Linda arrived shortly after 6:00 am and took over on the babysitting duties, which involved two hours of napping, which I'm sure was a blessing to all.  Jared and I drove up to run our half marathon, the course of which was around Lake Union.  You know the houseboat from Sleepless in Seattle?  That's the lake we ran around.  Cheesy movie, but now I want to see it again, since I've been on the ground in that particular location.  Folks, there's no way around it.  Running a half marathon is hard.  The training is hard, and the running is hard.  This one I think felt a wee bit easier than the one we did in Alabama for two reasons:  This one was flatter, and this time we trained up to twelve miles rather than ten.  So in the end we finished about 2 1/2 minutes faster than the Birmingham race, and that even included the five minutes I had to stand in line for a port-a-potty mid-race this time.  After we got home, we were both supremely fried.  I took a nap with Anne, but I was still fried the rest of the day.  But I practiced and we rehearsed.  And Anne and I skyped with my folks.  And I also sat around and read a new cookbook Jared's parents brought us.

Monday. Gave Anne a bath.  Did tons of laundry.  Cleaned, since 1) we'd trashed the place over the weekend, and 2) we had a student coming who was allergic to cats. Practiced.  I taught 2:00-4:30.  Jared was gone to his public school stuff in the morning/early afternoon, then he taught at home 3:30-6:30.  We crashed through some dinner and rehearsal, and got to our gig by about 8:00.  Classical Revolution Seattle!  I'd say that was my first professional performance in about a year-and-a-half.  Considering playing for church and at nursing homes and group class as non-professional.  We played the Cirri Duo No. 3 - he's a cheesy Italian Classical composer.  We played the Gideon Klein Duo - he was deported and died in a death camp during the Holocaust, and this work was found, unfinished, in a suitcase in 1992.  And we played Mark O'Connor and Edgar Meyer's arrangement of Limerock.  We got to hear the group before us, and I wish we could have stayed longer, but little girl needed to go to bed in the worst way.

Fennel.  The Greek word for it is marathon.  So the ancient city was named for the plant.  And then the race was named for the city.  And now I'm debating my future with running.  Do I train for another race and try to improve my time?  Do I train for a different length of race?  Do I just run for fun now?  Do I give up running, having accomplished my goal?  Do I put running away and then pick it up to train for another race?

Along similar lines, I should be finished with my 100 consecutive days of practice tomorrow, Lord willing.  And I'm thinking I might try to go for 365, since I've never done that.  Not positive yet.

Practice bow

In case you missed my status updates the other day:

Anne has spent a good amount of time today following Nutmeg around the living room talking, grinning, giggling, and smacking her hands on the ground. Nutmeg has spent a good amount of time today staying *just* out of reach.

Also, Anne is wielding her practice bow, and Nutmeg thinks it might possibly be a cat toy... and has once or twice wondered what was poking her in the behind.

Practice bow - an old, defunct fractional-size violin bow Daddy gave her so she wouldn't play with his cello bow

Baby had a very musical day yesterday, which included watching her dad teach a cello lesson, participating in a Dalcroze presentation for piano teachers, listening to her dad practice, and attending choir practice with her aunt and uncle.  The kid has an unusual life, I know.

****** 

A piece from the NY Times blog about empathy I read this morning:
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/10/05/rich-people-just-care-less/

It is looking at the more global implications, but it explains to me why I've felt put off by some doctors who won't really listen to me, and some administrators who didn't seem to care about how their policies were affecting teachers working for them.  Also important, because I may want to become more aware of whether I'm really paying attention to people who are somehow "lesser" than me - in particular I'm thinking of homeless people on the street and people who hold what I consider to be simple-minded views.

I've been thinking about how to be more empathetic and help my child develop empathy after a friend recently said something about how her son was extremely empathetic just like his father.  It's a good trait to have.

The latest tricks

It's been a busy week for my girl, who is going to be six months on Monday.  Can't believe it.

Her army crawl improves by the day.  My student who saw her doing it on Wednesday described it as slithering.  As of last night, she was slithering about six feet in one direction, rolling, and slithering five feet in another direction.  We'll see what today brings.

Coupled with that is her new hobby of picking up lint and other unsavory things out of the carpet and putting them in her mouth.  This also includes picking at the part of the sofa the cats have shredded and putting the stuffing in her mouth.  Let's just say that all good sofas come to an end and I advertised on freecycle last night to find a non-shreddable futon.  On Wednesday while Jared was teaching a lesson she picked up a tiny little piece of broken plastic which Jared couldn't get out because it went too far in, but the mom who was there has special training and so turned her upside down and whacked until the thing came out.  Now Jared knows what to do, too.  Don't think we're not keeping the floors clean.  We vacuum several times a week.  Anyway... not a good hobby.

Last night after group class I was helping her balance while she was standing and she started clapping her hands for the first time.  Not a lot of sound, because she was working with rounded fingers, but she's getting pretty coordinated.

Her new addition to the peekaboo repertoire is that if I put the blanket over my own head and say, "Where's Mommy?" she'll pull it off me.

Yesterday I had her in the stroller and we were at the mailbox.  After I got the mail, I bent over to put it in the bottom basket of the stroller and she started laughing uproariously.  Don't know what was funny about that, but for the rest of the day, any time she was elevated (stroller, changing pad) and I bent over she went into conniptions.

Syrian Crisis

If you are worried about the Syrian refugees, here are two highly rated agencies you can give to which are working on the ground right now to help.

ADRA

World Vision

SuperMom

There was only one thing I was worried about in being off facebook for the week - missing the news of my friend's new baby.  But another friend emailed me with the happy news this morning, so I'm good to go now.

The other day (or should I say, the other night), I was imagining what sort of mom I want Annie to have.  The list of attributes got very long.  Here's a shot at transcribing some of them:

• Calm and peaceful in difficult circumstances
• Ready for adventure
• Sense of humor in fun moments and in tough ones
• Patient with her 
• Kind to difficult people as well as friendly ones
• Generous with everyone
• Curious about people and about the world around
• Lover of books
• Untiring in prayer
• Someone who teaches her practical skills: cooking, cleaning, laundry, cat care, home financial management, tax preparation...
• Someone who encourages her to pursue her unique gifts and interests
• A person who enjoys nature and the simple things in life
• Someone who, day by day, points her toward the Kingdom
• One who is  careful to use words to build others up rather than tearing them down
• Openness and honesty about personal faults, mistakes, and sins
• Openly dependent on God and his righteousness, rather than being self-righteous
• Supportive and open to discussion, rather than judgmental

...So, wish me luck on finding such a mom.  ;-)

Evidence based medicine

While I've been off facebook this week I've had some time to research some health topics of interest to my family.  And I've been thinking about how in the last ten years I've become a sort of health nut.  Pause right there.  Some definitions are in order.

"Sort of" - Well, I do love a deep dish, stuffed crust, extra cheesy pizza, followed by a decadent, dark chocolate brownie (size extra large), followed by sitting on my rear on the couch watching a flickering screen while snacking on goldfish crackers and peanut M&M's.  ...Although I don't like how I feel after indulging in such an exercise.

"Health nut" - I like feeling well and energetic.  And I've ended up doing quite a bit of reading and other types of media intake on the topic for practical reasons.

Our typical Western medicine is very good at helping people in crisis situations.  I will now list, in no particular order, conditions that people I know have found themselves in where our Western medicine has been a Godsend: near-fatal car accident, snake bite, gunshot wound, twin to twin transfusion syndrome, broken arm, acute bacterial infection...

However, there is less across-the-board success when it comes to another class of ailments that people I know have experienced: cardiovascular disease, diabetes, neurological problems, autoimmune disorders, thyroid problems, fertility issues, allergies, backache, ADHD, autism, and cancer.  When people end up with these problems, some of today's best evidence-based medicine hasn't made it into traditional medical schools yet.  I have a lot of faith in science to discover useful solutions to these problems, and there has been a lot of exciting research along these lines, but if you go to your typical MD you're likely not going to get the latest and best evidence-based medicine for these particular issues.  You might have to fight to see a doctor who actually thinks you can be healed and who has read the most recent research on your issue. (Speaking from experience here.)

So without further ado, here's a list of some sources I've loved which give you some info on that second set of topics if you, like me, want to be better informed about your health.

The China Study
Cornell University nutrition researcher T. Colin Campbell takes an in-depth look at the chemical and mechanical causes of some common ailments in the developed world: diabetes, cancer, cardiovascular disease, and autoimmune disorders, among others, and he does it in a way that laymen like me can understand.  Then he presents the latest research on diet and its role in preventing and healing these diseases.  He looks at the work of several notable doctors who have used diet as an important part of their therapy in healing people of these diseases.  He also looks how special interest groups shape public policy in the US and why some of this well-documented research is largely unknown to the general public, including the graduates of good medical schools.

Forks Over Knives: The Extended Interviews
This is a great documentary if you don't have time to read the whole China Study.  I'd recommend the extended interview version, because it has more information, and let's face it, it's still only an hour and a half out of your life.  The makers speak with a number of doctors, researchers, and public policy people who know more about diet and its relation to health than your average Joe.

Pain Free
Author Pete Egoscue is an expert in the workings of the musculoskeltal system.  He spends the first part of the book explaining how the body is optimally designed to function in an athletic and everyday sense, and explains that pain and discomfort is the body's way of saying something is wrong.  He shows how in our society we suffer from a lack of motion.  We do a lot of sitting, and when we do move, we tend to move, and particularly exercise, in very motion-repetitive ways like jogging or walking or biking.  He then goes on to explain how our bodies get imbalanced from the wrong exercise or insufficient exercise, and then the chapters that follow present "E-cize" menus for helping you restore the balance needed to rid various parts of the body of musculoskeletal pain.  He also gives tidbits about how these methods have saved the careers of professional athletes who had become practically handicapped.  If you sprain your ankle, get tendonitis, or have backache, a gimpy knee, a sore shoulder, or fallen arches, this book is for you.  He also runs some clinics around the country where the specialists have lots more E-cizes to draw upon.

Take Charge of Your Fertility
It's a book for women by Toni Wechsler.  An odd caveat - I admit, I actually haven't read it.  But I have read a lot of other books and sources on the topic, and almost every one of them references this book as *the* source to go to for more information.  And I intend to read it at some point.  The book is specifically written to women who are actively trying to either achieve or avoid pregnancy, although I imagine it would be of interest to other women in the twelve-to-fifty age bracket to whom that doesn't apply.  Because, unless I am badly mistaken, it gives detailed and helpful information about how women's bodies are supposed to work and information about how to deal with problems when things aren't working properly.  My guess is that there's a lot of day-to-day useful info in there that your typical OB/GYN isn't intimately familiar with.

Ina May's Guide to Childbirth
Ok, so this only applies to women who are pregnant...  And it does come from a particular ideological background, but if you have a low risk pregnancy and you want some statistics on the helpfulness or harmfulness of various common pregnancy, birth, and newborn interventions, this book has a lot of good stuff.  It also explains how the midwifery model of care for low risk pregnancies holds up better under scientific scrutiny than the typical obstetrical model.

Ok.  That's my go-to list.  Are there any great resources you know of which document for the layperson important evidence-based health info that I should know about?

Outside sources

Here are some words that struck me when I was doing some reading Sunday morning:

He who upholds the unnumbered worlds throughout immensity, at the same time cares for the wants of the little brown sparrow that sings its humble song without fear.  When men go forth to their daily toil, as when they engage in prayer; when they lie down at night, and when they rise in the morning; when the rich man feasts in his palace, or when the poor man gathers his children about the scanty board, each is tenderly watched by the heavenly Father.  No tears are shed that God does not notice.  There is no smile he does not mark.

If we would but fully believe this, all undue anxieties would be dismissed.  Our lives would not be so filled with disappointment as now; for everything, whether great or small, would be left in the hands of God, who is not perplexed by the multiplicity of cares, or overwhelmed by their weight.  We should then enjoy a rest of soul to which many have long been strangers.

Italics were mine.   God gives encouragement just when I need it.  It's from a chapter called "The Knowledge of God".

Also, I got ahold of the article I wanted in the New Yorker, because, hallelujah, it was free online!  So you can read it, too.  It's about the leader of Iran's Quds Force, which is their combination Special Forces and CIA.  I actually don't know that much about the Middle East, and I imagine that some individuals I know who have served in the armed forces in Iraq and Afghanistan know lots about the Quds Force already, but you can learn a few things here:

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2013/09/30/130930fa_fact_filkins

And, if you are fascinated by places you'll likely never visit and also want to be thankful for the freedoms you do have, read this short article about North Korea:

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2013/10/north-korea/sullivan-text

Too much deep stuff

I've got too much on the brain, and so I'm taking off a week from the wild, wonderful world of facebook.  Don't get me wrong; I love facebook.  But I need a break from the political bickering, the occasional unkind words, and the gossip overload, which... I am not immune from participating in.  I'll probably write some more about facebook on here later this week.  I'm planning some time to sit and ponder what I hope to get from facebook, what I hope to give on facebook, and how to make some changes in my usage.

*****

Don't know if you want to wade into the following murk...

I heard a sermon this morning about our Christian responsibility to spread the message of the Good News about Jesus...  And I chaffed.  In asking myself why, it occurred to me that some of my mind has been occupied for some time with wishing I had been born in a happier, safer, lighter time.  A time where I don't have to worry about [fill in the blank].  Of course, if I take a look at world history, I'm not sure when that better time would be.  As I wrote recently, I dreamed about being a slave on account of having been born with a certain look.  So antebellum America wouldn't have been a better time.  And a couple of nights ago I dreamed about witnessing a fight to the death between an abbot and an organist/carillon-ist.  It involved stabbing each other with pencils, and I think the dispute involved the right of the organist to keep a pet hare.  The oddness of the dream aside, the Middle Ages wouldn't have been better either.  [Side note: don't get all Freudian about the dreams - just that when you wake up multiple times a night to feed a baby, you are more inclined to remember the strange things which flicker behind your eyelids at certain hours.]  I digress.  But what's bothering me, in part, is maybe the "conservative impulse" - wanting to go back to some other point in history.  I can't.  I have the world around me which I've been given, and that is the reality I have to deal with.  I'm thinking of the verse in Esther where Mordecai says to her, don't think that since you're in the palace you'll escape the destruction decreed for the Jews.  You'll be on the hit list, too.  So you have a choice.  Do something about it, and maybe die trying, or sit back and relax and certainly die not trying.  "Perhaps you were born for such a time as this."  My point to myself is, I can't do anything about when I've been born, and I have no choice but to live in the perilous times of this particular day.  Wishing it weren't so won't change the reality.

And also, there's another reason I chaffed at the sermon.  Because many other people appear to be living a happier, more care-free life than I am, and I am envious.  There are two ways to have that life.  One is easy.  One is very hard.  I gravitate to the easy.  I could ignore what I know and just go out and have the happy, relatively moral, pleasing life I want.  Or I can pursue the hard road and take on the heavy responsibility of being part of God's light to a hurting, breaking, dying world.  Yet paradoxically, the hard life is the life which is truly joyful and free from care.  I know that's not just a cliche, because I've met people, saints, who know far more of hardship than I do who are peaceful and radiant and generous.  Jesus said, take my yoke upon you for my load is easy and my burden is light.  That's the better choice, but sometimes I listen to voices around me and the voices in my head which say, don't be so serious.  Just have fun.  A little bit won't hurt you.  Just be moderate.  I guess I'm a little like the violin students who show up and want to have the rewards of becoming talented musicians without putting in the work it takes to get there.  Ok, so basically I'm saying, I'm lazy.  That's nothing new.

Also, my brain is full, because I've got mortality on the mind.  You know those Midaeval scholars who kept a memento mori on the desk.  I've got mine in the brain now.  I spent my whole young life racing toward becoming an adult.  Looking forward to the 20's.  Then the 20's came.  I thought, I've arrived.  I'm here.  This is real life.  And then I came to the 30's.  An age I never imagined being, and had never invested in.  And you (or at least, I) start reaping the consequences of your choices.  Your body can't rebound from all your bad choices the way it could earlier.  Don't get me wrong.  I'm in better physical conditioning now than ever before, and I'm more disciplined than ever before about many things.  (That's maybe not saying much, because discipline does not come naturally to me...)  Now I can see that I'm on the downhill side of life from a physical perspective, and that is a reminder that I can't just ignore reality forever, that my life here has an end as well as a beginning.  Also, having a kid makes you think about such things, because as a parent you are the protector.  You have to use your imagination to see what harms can befall your peewee and then take action to ward them off ahead of time.

I think the turn of summer to fall takes me down this road, too.  I love the Washington summer.  It is glorious - sunlight when I get up and sunlight into the late evening, clear air, breezes, wonderful temperatures, green everywhere, and oh, the mountain views!  But just as I did in Ohio and NY, I have some heartache when summer turns to fall.  The nights get longer, the weather is in flux, the leaves start to age.  Summer doesn't last forever.  And maybe if it did, I wouldn't appreciate it so much.

I loved the snowy, snowy winters of the Great Lakes.  And I had the same heartache when the snow started to melt, the beauty of the crystaline white turning to mud, and the sharp intensity of "living on the edge" turning into dreary rain.  Until the flowers started.  The glory of Rochester in bloom is almost too much to handle.  Optimism abounds.

Trade offs

My nonpartisan political thought of the week:

If you cut assistance to quit funding the freeloaders you'll cut out some people who genuinely need assistance.  If you extend assistance to everyone who needs it, you'll fund some freeloaders.  You have to decide which error is worse.

My Better Homes and Gardens thought of the week:

If you have a larger dwelling, a little untidiness can go largely unnoticed, but you will spend a lot of time vacuuming, scrubbing, dusting, mopping, etc.  If you have a smaller dwelling you will spend less time cleaning, but far more time tidying, because a few needed items pulled out for the evening - a cello, some sheet music, a baby blanket, a toy, and a book, pretty well trashes the place.  Needless to say, I spend hours of my life tidying, since we have students here almost every day.

• I think I'd like to get a copy of the current New Yorker.  Heard a mind-blowing Fresh Air interview about Iran-US relations by a contributor which shocked Terry Gross.  

• I'm loving my new water bottle.  Glass with a rubber web on the outside.  Well-engineered pop top.  Brand: ello Color: blue

• And if you're not on FB, I don't want you to miss the photo of the week:

This is what I saw when I came home from work last night.  Jared was practicing for Dalcroze class, and Anne was providing a very enthusiastic obligato.

Baby updates

Some things she's been working on in the last week...

She's been working on her army crawl.  She can also roll consecutively and rotate herself 360 degrees on her stomach.  So although it's not an official crawl yet, she's getting pretty mobile.

In the last week she's learned how to pass toys from one hand to the other and back.  Makes it way more fun to play with her farm toys at Grandma's and Grampa's house.

Also, she's started signing "milk" when she's hungry.  I was surprised she caught on so fast, because we only started signing to her about three weeks ago.  So far we've signed "mommy", "daddy", "cat", "milk", and "piano".  I want to look up a few more today.

She's also getting more interested in petting the kitties, but we have to help her do it gently.  She likes to touch.  And then grab a handful of fur.  And when possible, grab a tail to stick in her mouth.  Making her not popular with the feline set.  But she loves to watch them, and has giggled at Nutmeg.

The latest joke which cracks her up is when Jared pretends to sneeze.  Although peek-a-boo is still a favorite for a good laugh.

Over the weekend, she got to sit in a little high chair at Grandma's and Grampa's house during meals, and she was allowed some real food to play with - namely pieces of baked potato and banana.  I'm not sure that she has actually ingested any, but it was a big hit in the experiments department.  She especially loved the banana for the texture and flavor.  And it was also disasterously messy.  I have seen the future, and it involves a lot more laundry and vacuuming.  And also a trip to Target to buy a large plastic bib with a pocket on the bottom.

At her last drs. appointment (which was last week) she has turned up in the 43rd percentile for weight and a whopping 93rd percentile for height.  Jared and I have never been 93rd percentile anything, so I think she is perhaps taking after her Uncle Jeff, only he has always been more in the 5th percentile for weight.  She might be taller than me by the time she's in the sixth or seventh grade.

Vivid and strange dream

So last night I had this incredible vivid dream which came from who knows where?  I'm not entirely sure what point it had, but if you're feeling brave, read on...

...I was a black slave, one of many belonging to a cruel and capricious white master.  The master was preparing to throw a huge banquet or party of some sort.  He selected a group of us, all female, for a particular job.  I was not quite clear what the job was, and I don't know that the other women and girls selected knew what it was either.  We had to dress up in fine clothes for it.  We were told to wait in a certain place for more instructions, and we did, nervously chatting amongst ourselves, not knowing what may be in store for us.  At some point, the master, another of the slave girls, and I had gone off alone together, and the master tried to harm the other girl for no apparent reason.  In defense of her, I took him down and started pounding on him, while telling the other girl to escape.  She didn't run; she was a defeated person; she just stood quietly waiting for her punishment.  I didn't just take the master down in defense of the other girl, though.  I was very cruel and mean to him, just as cruel as he was to us.  It occurred to me that even though he was the oppressor and I was the oppressed, I was no better than he.  Anyway, the other girl and I ended up rejoining the group of females waiting for orders, and the master came waltzing in with a big platter of unusual and expensive food for us.  We were all wary of eating it, assuming it was some sort of trick.  Either we would be punished for eating food meant for the banquet guests, or perhaps it was poisoned.  The master began eating it, convincing us to partake as well.  So we did go ahead and eat, and it turned out there were no negative consequences for eating.  Which was good, because we were half starved and needed something to eat before all our still as yet unnamed duties of the day.  When the party started, there was some sort of play going on, and it turned out that the group of females to which I belonged was to recite poetry for the guests.  I don't think we knew any, so we were quite nervously trying to come up with some.  And despite the master's momentary kindness in providing the lovely food, my crime against him was not going to go unpunished, and at the end of the party I was executed.

The End.