our first job

Everywhere we go, this...tragedy? (is that even the right word?) is written all over the faces of everyone we see.  We don't say anything--for the children's sake, of course--but it's there.  It's the longer-than-usual eye contact with a woman at the market, her six-year-old daughter in tow.  It's in the heavy eyelids of our post-mistress; it lurks behind the jolly Christmas music in the produce isle.  It was just beneath the bright smiles of unusually patient parents as they waited in line with their kids to sit on Santa's lap.  

Juniper was scared to death to go to bed last night.  After we clapped five times for the bears and then the lions, I announced that big, strong mama can scare anything away; I kissed her on the forehead and said I was sending sweet dreams straight to her brain, I flipped her pillow to the "good dream" side, I did everything we have ever done in any given night to make her feel safe, but last night it wasn't enough.  She cried and begged and pleaded and said she just wanted "to snuggle with mama."  Oh, I nearly melted.  I curled up with her in the tiny little toddler bed, nuzzled my nose into her damp, clean hair.  She held my cheeks and kissed my face.  I started to drift off, then remembered I was in a fetal position in a toddler bed.  The instant I tried to move an arm, to peel myself away, Juniper tightened her grip, moaned, Noooooo, and wrapped her arms fast around my neck as though she were floating out to sea and I was her buoy.

Juniper doesn't know what happened on Friday, of course.  But lying there in her tiny bed, it occurred to me that she's picking up on the vibe.  I kissed her and stroked her hair, her cheeks.  I told her that she'll always be safe in mama and daddy's house.  I told her we'll always be there for her and we'll never leave.  She kept saying, "I'm scary."  (Meaning, "I'm scared.")  I tried to get her to name what she was afraid of, but she couldn't.  She just looked around her room, stuttering, then landed on the clothes hanging above her nightlight.  "I'm scary of my clothes."  I told her I would move her clothes and just like that, she loosened her grip and let me go.          

In the words of another blogger:
"My kids do not know what happened on Friday.  I hope it is a story I never have to explain to them. Because how can I? I can not comprehend it myself, much less translate it to my innocent six year old. Children - all children - deserve to live a childhood knowing they are safe. I'll do what I can to keep that belief alive."

We do not watch, nor do we have, television.  All of the news we've gleaned from NPR and a handful of internet articles.  Still, with Juniper, I think we'll need to be more careful.  She has asked us several times if we were sad.  We told her we'd heard a story that happened far away and made us very, very sad.  And then we told her how very much we loved her and how happy she makes us.  She smiled and giggled and asked us to read her another book.

This is not what I intended to write.  I wanted just to catch you all up on our holiday fervor.  But I just couldn't sit down and not acknowledge the thing that has lodged itself into the heart of our nation.  People who never cry, are crying.

"This is our first task -- caring for our children.  It’s our first job.  If we don’t get that right, we don’t get anything right.  That’s how, as a society, we will be judged."  ~ President Obama, Newtown, CT  

Up next: holiday fervor.  Promise.

change

Yesterday evening, once my man came home and kids were seated at the table...I sank into his arms and cried.  I went through the motions of getting supper on the table with heavy limbs, dragging leaden feet across kitchen tile.  I squeezed my kids, smelled their hair, memorized their profiles, their pudgy hands, their stained-glass eyes, their innocence.  I was up and down.  Weeping, mad, weeping.  I became impatient over stupid things then instantly felt like an ass.  My mind wandered to the dark place of an innocent school...and then stopped, and then started.  I can barely begin to imagine the life of a parent who had one less mouth to feed that night.

There has been lots of late-night talk in our house about guns, the absurd availability of body armor, video games, our culture of violence, the huge task of raising socially responsible boys.  Boys who aren't afraid of their emotions and can own them, express them through voice.

I am sending prayers, tears, and...hope...to the people of Newtown.  But...I am pissed.  How many more have to die?  Guns are just a piece of the puzzle, but they're the deadliest piece.  I am a gun owner.  I probably always will be.  But it's true, it was easier to acquire my guns than to sign my 3-year-old up for preschool.  Nicholas Kristof wrote a fantastic column today: click here to read it.  I love the way he puts things in perspective:

"The tragedy isn’t one school shooting, it’s the unceasing toll across our country. More Americans die in gun homicides and suicides in six months than have died in the last 25 years in every terrorist attack and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq combined."  --Nicholas Kristof    

~Hug your children, teach them peace, change the world. 

rocks & pistols

In the years preceding my temporary split with Wyoming, I was a pretty outspoken little cus about the rampant oil and gas development in our wild, pristine part of the country.  My public letters and commentary cost me more than a couple of job opportunities.  I was loud enough to land myself in the professional world's equivalent of The Principal's Office on charges of insubordination.  (But as my commiserating coworker's said, You're not doing your job if you don't have a letter of reprimand in your file.)

There are certain truths that I hold to be self-evident and in the twenty-first century one of those truths is: What's left of our wild lands should remain wild.  I would go to the conservation group's meetings to help gather local steam and in the beginning I noticed two things: A) I was the youngest person there, and B) nearly everyone else was retired or had some other form of independent income.  I found this both frustrating and depressing.  Didn't anybody care?  What the hell, Generation X, where are you?  I heard people complaining in private, but they were all tight-lipped in public.  Come on, people.

These are photos from the last week and actually have little to do with this story.  Sorry.  


This winter, one of the issues I've been following for almost 6 years came to a head with the publication of a draft environmental impact statement for oil and "natural" gas drilling in a mostly roadless area of the Bridger-Teton National Forest.  (This is not your average Not In My Backyard, we *already* have it in our backyard--in the high desert just south of our forest the oil and gas development in the last ten years has been monumental.)

We are huge supporters of sustainable heating fuels.  


Turns out, my fellow Wyomingites had one eye open all this time.  They were waiting for a line to be crossed and when a Texas oil company came along and stuck one foot over the edge, holy hell, watch out.  Hunters, anglers, ranchers, outfitters, hikers, bikers, bird-watchers, tourists, business-owners, high school kids, former and current employees of the Federal land management agencies, and oil field workers themselves came out loud and strong.  "Not Your Average Treehuggers" their slogan reads.  They stepped up to the plate with their spurs on and pistols strapped to their belts.  Look out.  

I am beaming with pride.  Last week, the Forest Service expected to receive 10,000 comments on this proposal.  They received 30,000.  As a birkenstock-wearing, everyday, average treehugger, I feel like I only count for three-fifths of a vote in the wake of these shit-kicking, well-armed men and women.  Between our three-year absence and a toddler, I am not as involved as I should be.  Yet last week reminded me that those truths I hold to be self-evident are strong as ever and are now serving the new purpose as the foundation on which to grow my family.  I want to show Juniper we can stand strong on top of our ethics and push the envelop for what is right.  Get your spurs on and your pistols out, here she comes.

Armed with a handful of rocks and a giant heart...even better.         


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:: In other, unrelated, news maybe you noticed the spring-like dress in the above photo?  The mittenless hands?  We may have started the week like this,

But then we got some of this,

Which led to this,

And inevitably to this,

Then, ta da!, asphalt, mud, rocks and leaves.

Getting outside is becoming less of a dress rehearsal.

:: New words: knee, toe, nose, toy, pato, wallet, mouse, moose, chicken, wood, rocks, and--just today--Owen.

Favorite words: eyes, uh-oh, ow-ee, no.

Favorite new pastime:

And, three new molars.

:: One last thing.  We're under contract on a house!  And if it weren't for daily conversations with our banker, I could hardly believe it myself.  Juniper and I have been busy drawing plans, sketching out a very necessary kitchen/dining expansion and daydreaming of where we'll set up her art table.  I am sure you will hear more details in the coming weeks and months.

Thanks to everyone who weighed in on our small house/ big house dilemma.  We went with your advice (and our own gut) and opted for the small house, awesome area.  Cheers.  


:: A final, random note: our Christmas tree continues to grace our livingroom window.

And, wow, did you really make it to the end of this War & Peace post?  

in the purple overlap

It feels wonderful for Wyoming to extend her reach in a positive way.  This year, we won't be known for the brutal murder of a gay man, or a vice president who doesn't know how to aim a shotgun (at anything other than his friend's face, anyway).  This year, we'll be known for the 87 year-old, 67-foot tall Engelmann spruce that will grace the west front lawn of our Nation's Capitol next month.  This year, Washington D.C. won't seem such a far stretch from the least populated state in the nation.  That's right.  It's the Capitol Christmas Tree and it was cut from our backyard.

My man has a little something to do with this whole tree project, so Juniper and I went into town to see The Tree before it embarks on its cross-country journey.  Well, holy cow.  I guess everyone in town decided to do the same.

It was all very Norman Rockwellian what with everyone bringing their children and gathering in the town square on an unseasonably balmy November afternoon.

It was standing-room-only except where parade horses left some apples.  Yes, even in a western town folks will avoid the big piles.

Juniper was mesmerized by all the people and children and horses and dogs.  Not sure if she even noticed the tree.

 
When it was time for The Tree to head to the fairgrounds where its branches would be tied down, tamed and contained in a cargo box, a yappity-yipping Iditarod sled-dog team pulled up the rear and Juniper got so excited pointing and saying, Doh, doh doh!

::          ::          ::

:: Just when I was starting to think that I don't get to have adult conversations or adult thoughts anymore and that I am oh-so-out-of-touch, this last week has been chucky-jam full of political conversations with mostly strangers.  My hairdresser, my life insurance salesman, the guy that brings his kid to Juniper's swimming lessons.  My hairdresser: talking about what a great job she thinks Obama is doing despite everyone being all poo-poo about him.  My insurance salesman: pointing out how right now, tax rates for the wealthiest Americans are at historical all-time lows.  The guy in our swim lessons?  Turns out he's a policy advisor for the Tea Party Patriots (apparently different from Sarah Palin's Tea Party Express--see? learn something everyday) and just returned home after a stint in Washington D.C.  

So today--between dunking our kids underwater--I mentioned to the Tea Party Policy Advisor dude about what the Insurance dude said about taxes being at an all-time low and he was all, Yeah, but that's going to change in January.  And then I got to thinking about this Tea Party Policy Advisor dude and what I know about him: he is a pretty chill guy and a great father.  Also, he has three kids, his wife stays home with the kids but also has a nanny for 15 hours a week plus a housekeeper for 15 hours a week plus he owns a home in Jackson Hole (re: average home price ~750K) plus a second home in Arizona where they spend 6 weeks of the year plus they send their school-age children to a private school.  Hmmm.  I think he might be worried about his taxes increasing in January.  Am I sweating bullets for him?  Hell no.  That said, he is still a pretty chill guy and a great father.

:: I heard from my husband tonight--(who I won't see again until December, so yeah, I'm single-mom'in it).  He is currently zig-zagging across Wyoming with The Tree and I am really quite astounded at how popular that 87-year-old spruce is, even when she's all boxed up.  At every stop there is some whoop-la: fireworks and singing and mobs of school children.  The Tree is too long and wide for her driver to make regular turns safely, so she gets a police-escort in every town.  Other than those who are already employed as public servants, the Capitol Christmas Tree is entirely funded by donations and volunteers.  The best part?  The volunteer truck driver (who, bless his heart, is super excited to play such a leading role) is from Georgia and has never driven on snow or ice.  

:: At the end of the month Juniper and I will be joining our better half in Washington D.C. and I have to admit: I feel all warm and fuzzy with this Wyoming-U.S. Capitol connection.  I feel proud.  And I can't help but think about the underlying political colors: Wyoming an unwavering blood-red state, the top seat at the Capitol inhabited by cool blue.  And in the purple overlap there is simply, a tree.  

      
Oh yeah, and one hell of a sunset.