Who are you when no one is looking?

“We do not need guns and bombs to bring peace, we need love and compassion.”

― Mother Theresa

He wanted spare change. He sat outside the courthouse in his tattered clothes; every indication that he was in some stage of homelessness. She reached into her purse and grabbed a dollar. She could have walked past him. She was headed to her internship on a busy Monday morning. But she stopped and gave him a dollar. She’s well-known for befriending homeless people. Sometimes she tells me that they even walk her to her classes…some even know her by name. A kind gesture from a poor college student. Her duties as an intern are to assist the judge in every aspect of the courtroom. The judge even asks her for her opinion on rulings, such as “What would you do if this were your case?”. Seated next to the judge, during a busy Monday morning, she spots the ‘homeless man’ sitting in the crowd of people waiting to see a judge. Immediately she notices that he is devouring a chocolate Snickers bar to the point, which she describes it to me as, “Mom, it was ALL OVER HIS FACE!”.  The judge saw it too and reprimanded the man by telling him to “eat like a grown up”, followed by asking him if he needs a napkin before the courtroom continues. She said it brought tears to her eyes because she knew it was the man she gave the dollar to outside the courthouse and that he must have been really hungry. The man proceeded to tell the judge that it was the only thing he has eaten for the last couple of days and says (pointing to my daughter), “the girl next to you gave me the dollar so I could eat”. A thankful stranger. A tearful daughter. A room full of strangers. Nobody knew anyone’s story…where they lived…who they were…why they were there….She proceeded to recall the events to follow. He was being evicted and he had nowhere to live. He was requesting the judge allow him to stay in his apartment for just enough time to gather the little belongings that he had and to take a shower because he knew his destiny was a life on the streets. The judge, noticing the tears in her eyes, asked her how he should resolve the case. She said I would let him take a shower one last time at his soon to be lost apartment. And he did just that. And for a small moment in time their paths crossed. He was more than a homeless man outside a courtroom. She was more than an intern. They were human beings…caring for human beings. She stayed over my house for a slumber party that night. We talked about her day in court. She actually always talks about the ‘wounded birds’ and the ‘out-of-luckers’. The moms who are trying to feed their kids. The thiefs who are trying to feed their families. The people who don’t know the right way to solve their problems. We laid in bed together as she shared her stories. A show called Intervention came on. Families dealing with drug addictions and all the illegal issues that surround that disease. We laid in my warm bed with four dogs at my feet…with the heat comfortably set on 67 degrees…after we washed our faces and brushed our teeth…after we texted all our family and friends who wait for their daily ‘Good Night My Love’ texts. We watched the families on tv struggling to save their children or mothers or fathers or sisters and brothers from themselves. I said that I was so glad that I will never have to go through that with my children…she agreed…because they felt loved and they felt needed and they felt wanted and important…she agreed. And we closed our eyes knowing that we figured it out…we grew into a family that knows that we stand together…with love in our hearts...no matter what…forever. As I fell asleep I thanked God and all my guardian angels guiding my life that my children grew into the people that they are today; people who know that they are loved…feel that they are loved…and have the compassion to extend that wisdom to all people…even the guy sitting outside a courtroom…when no one else was looking.

#Life

She was bending down to play with a furry caterpillar. She wanted it to climb on her. It kept turning away as she carefully maneuvered to try to coerce it to climb onto her tiny finger. Her mother told her to “leave it alone”…”hurry up”… “gross, just stop”. The little girl stood up and continued on the path to a breakfast table with her mom. I couldn’t stop thinking about that frozen moment in time. I often think that we are affected by all the events that happen in our daily lives…not just the big ones…but all of the millions of tiny little ones that often go unnoticed. The smile from a stranger that could make your day a little brighter… the perfect sunset to end your day… the giggle of a child to make your heart happy… a fresh cup of hot coffee on a cold morning… a text from a loved one… a new song…. that perfect soft spot on the couch…. They are everywhere. Perfect moments in time. Tiny little slices of the day that changes your outlook or mood. We are always racing to the big finish…the whole enchilada…the crowd roaring events… the perfect Instagram picture posts…the greatest Facebook updates…. and missing the other pieces of the puzzle. We all do it! I’m guilty a thousand times over. I have rushed a child or two in my time to get to where I needed to be. I’ve lived an event or two through the lens of my iPhone to capture a moment in time to share with the masses. Damn it, sometimes I even get more than 60 LIKES on some of them. Where do I pick up my award? ….oh, there isn’t one? (insert sad face emoji). I saw the Pope on tv. He was doing mass recently here in the US. Thousands upon thousands of people came to worship with His Holiness…… and there they were in prayer with the official Pope…with their iPhones recording all of it…arms not lifted in prayer, but lifted so their camera could be higher than the next person’s. I remember thinking A) omg awesome Instagram pic with the freakin Pope, B) Is anyone actually watching the Pope?... I began to pan the TV screen to find a person who wasn’t filming but actually listening… Pope version of Where’s Waldo…. I FOUND SOME! Not many…but some! Living in the moment… taking it all in… When did we stop doing this? This thing we call ‘living in the moment’? I want to stop and smell the roses, but I can’t if it’s an Instagram pic. Lauren Oliver, in Before I Fall, said that “the details that are life's special pattern, like how in handwoven rugs what really makes them unique are the tiny flaws in the stitching, little gaps and jumps and stutters that can never be reproduced. so many things become beautiful when you really look.” I understand the hustle and bustle of life. I know there are piles of laundry to be finished and homework deadlines and grocery lists and dirty gutters and emails to be sent and dinners to be made and dog poop piling up in the yard and only 24 hours in a day. Yup, get it! Totally get it! But don’t you DARE rush past the little things…. Stop once a day ATLEAST and watch a hummingbird… skip a stone… watch a cloud… smell a flower… find one teenie tiny thing that slows you down and refocuses your outlook on your beautiful and healthy life that you are so so so lucky to have… here and now…without filters or hashtags…. And whatever you do NEVER stop a child from getting that caterpillar on her finger. Namaste!

“It is always sad when someone leaves home, unless they are simply going around the corner and will return in a few minutes with ice-cream sandwiches.”

― Lemony Snicket

“It’s ok, because she is only going ‘down the street’”…”Thank God she’s staying in state”… “She’s 5 miles down the road”…. Does any of these things make you feel better? Does it really matter if she is 5 miles down the road or 500? Is it really the distance that they are from home base? I agree that I would die if she was going to college out of state. I already have planned on what will happen if the boys go out of state and I have two more years to worry about it. The odds that all of my kids will attend Arizona colleges are pretty slim. I don’t even want to be in Arizona. I want some sand in my toes and beachy tossed curls in my hair (wait we aren’t talking about me yet)… What it boils down to is that the distance doesn’t really matter when another kid leaves the house. It isn’t about WHERE they are. It isn’t about how quickly we can get to each other if we need to be. In a world of so many internet options is anyone ever really far away anyways? I mean I can stalk her/their Instagram, Snapchat, and Facebook if I want to see what the cool kids are up to these days; I do it now and she is only 17 steps upstairs. A parent that does not have a child leaving the so-called nest will never understand that it doesn’t matter how near or far they are when they step out into that great big world. What matters is that the four walls of your home and life as you know it are tumbling down. In 17 steps I can walk into the world that defines Ashley. I can open her bedroom door and step over mounds and mounds of clothes on the floor to discover her buried under a pile of blankets in her bed. I can ask her how her day or night was and ask her if she wants breakfast, lunch, or dinner. I can see that she spent the night in a Kardashian marathon on her tv. I can see that she must have gone downstairs and made herself a bagel in the middle of the night as pieces of it remain on her bedside table. In 17 steps I can see her makeup vanity, her messy closet, her empty shampoo bottles, her curling irons and brushes, her music choices, her high school memories scattered on cork boards. In 17 steps I can see what defines Ashley. Then those walls are broken down… and life as you know it isn’t the life that you know. Distance to college isn’t the issue. It’s knowing that this is the time that you prepared for all those years. Did I teach them enough about kindness and empathy? Did I demonstrate enough strength? Did I show them the road to happiness and friendships? Did they learn to lock doors and open hearts? Did they learn the importance of dedication and relaxation? Do they know how to clean bathrooms and bedrooms? When they are hungry will they have someone to eat with? Will they be ok if they are alone? Will they be confident in a crowd? Will they make new friends? Will they find their classes? Will they participate in school events like assemblies, and sorority rush, and volleyball, and dorm meetings, and football games? Will they know how to do all the things that I used to schedule for them? Did I teach them how to do these things? Are they ready? Am I ready? So we pack up the Uhaul with pieces of Ashley’s life. The comforts of home neatly compiled into moving boxes…the important stuff goes and the life she’s leaving behind stays in her old room and she prepares to scatter herself into her new life…her new home… into new walls that will hold new memories…a new beginning…a new Ashley. And it turns out that it doesn’t matter if she were going to a foreign country or down the street. What it’s really about is change…and change can be hard. I think of it as a ‘How to Parent’ test. A parent graduation of sorts. Did I do my best at the most important job that there is? Did I fill her up with everything she needs to be a good person. A kind person. Not just a successful student or the life of the party. Did  I make a GOOD person? A KIND human? So as she steps out onto this big blue marble that we live on I can only hope that she can look back at her childhood and the memories made in these four walls and think ‘What would mom do?’…”How would mom handle this?” and if she doesn’t know the answers or it gets to hard she can look behind her and see the trails of crumbs that I’ve left to lead her back to me to find those answers….I guess THAT is one of the benefits of being ‘just down the street’.

Emails, Texts, and Tweets

“You know when you send a text message to someone and you don't get a response right away, you feel depressed? You send a text message to someone you really like and you get a response right away you feel happy? You feel happy, the body, it creates the chemical dopamine, the dopamine, it goes through your blood and you become addicted to that dopamine rush, and you associate that dopamine rush with the happy feeling of receiving the text, and that's why you got people sending 3,000 fucking text messages a day, right, we're not even paying attention to what we're saying anymore it's just like a, like a morphine drip, right, it's like a dopamine drip! HAPPY BUTTONS! HAPPY BUTTONS! HAPPY BUTTONS! TIME TO PLAY WITH THE HAPPY BUTTONS!”

― Tom Green

I noticed a husband and wife eating breakfast together. She was on her cell phone texting and he was writing letters. I thought OMG what the hell is going on there? WRITING LETTERS!!!??? It's not even Christmas…

It's all about the fast track to get a point across. As I type this I actually had to think about spelling out 'breakfast' and not 'bfast'. I spend entirely too much time pondering which emoticon to use that could get my point across when three-letter acronyms are simply not enough…LOL :) .

Our methods of communicating have changed so much and I often think about what will it be like when our children grow up? What will their memories be? Do written words have more value if done with a pen and paper, then thru cyberspace?

I have always collected words, quotes, notes, cards…I have been kicked out of classrooms for written and passing notes. I have been grounded for a bazillion years for my parents finding my notes. I have used letters to mend hearts, beg boyfriends, and coerce parents and teachers. I have one note that my mother saved that says that I would kill myself if I didn't get a parakeet. I don't remember writing this note, but obviously it was all there in black and white, reflecting the true level of honing my narrative skills at an early age. My best college friend, Laurel, known to be quite the hoarder (obvs), ventured into the trenches of her closet and lo and behold found a letter…from me…circa 1990 something. Three whole pages filled with hope, new love, laughter, and young woman insights into the future. WTF!!! What kind of concussion did I receive that makes me not remember ANY of this? Alzheimer's? Should I check myself in now to the senile association? The only familiar thing on the pages were the innocent handwritten that i recognize as my own. It's not just these few examples. I have many, many letters that have surfaced throughout the years that reminded me of who I was at a time when I didn't know who I was. They show the Amy that has been lost behind the many hats of Mother, Aunt, college graduate, daughter, private investigator (wink). It's all there in black and white. They weren't lost in the rubble of many travels, or moving houses, or garage sales, or messy cars. They were saved because they meant something to someone at time or another. They were special.

I am guilty of this same hoarding of notes. I have every letter my mom sent to me or my grandmother. I have letters my Aunt wrote when she was dying of cancer. I read every note from the hospice nurse about my mother when she was dying. I keep these things near and dear to me because I swear I can FEEL the people who wrote them I can hear their words while I read them. I can hold the paper that they held. I feel connected.

My kids live in an age where life is fast and immediate. Instant gratification. If you don't believe me, turn off our internet connection and listen 5,4,3,2,1… surprise! you found your kids. A slow internet connection is the equivalent to running out of cassette tape ribbon when you're trying to record American Bandstand. JUST THE WORST EVER! They receive birthday notifications from Facebook and not face to face. The love notes occur over direct messaging and Twitter. Even pictures can disappear within seconds on Snapchat never to be seen again. I read an article saying that yearbooks are almost extinct! STFU! Where will everyone write, "Stay Cool!" at the end of the year. But this isn't where we are headed…this is where we are!!!! My 90 year old mother in law doesn't have an email and I think that she should receive some kind of award for that, because I followed some lady named 'Grandma Betty' on Facebook AND Twitter and she's like 100 (she WAS 100, Bless her soul).

And when this generation is older and wiser and reflective, where will they go to visit the person that they were? Where will they go to 'feel' the words that their loved ones wrote. I found the card my mother wrote to me when I was turning 14 signed "I love you, Mom' and I instantly recognized the handwriting. It was my mother's. I tattooed it on my wrist, in my mother's handwriting, and so help me God, if it were in the form of a text it would look like shit! Miranda Lambert, my future husbands current wife, has a song titled Automatic, and she sings,

"If you had something to say...You'd write it on a piece of paper...Then you put a stamp on it…and get it three days later….it's only worth as much as the time put in". It's only worth as much of the time put in…hmmmm. Maybe it's time to slow down.

It's only worth as much as the time put in. If everything is sent through texts, and snaps, and Tweets, and IGs…what will we have to hold someday when we need to feel a connection that isn't around anymore?….. So I take out my journal and I write about anything and everything so that someday my kids can have something to hold that I held…and something to read that I wrote…with my own hands……from my own heart…...that won't disappear if the battery dies...

Ruffled Feathers

“You've got this life and while you've got it, you'd better kiss like you only have one moment, try to hold someone's hand like you will never get another chance to, look into people's eyes like they're the last you'll ever see, watch someone sleeping like there's no time left, jump if you feel like jumping, run if you feel like running, play music in your head when there is none, and eat cake like it's the only one left in the world!”

― C. JoyBell C.

This week I have seen some pretty remarkable things and some pretty fucked up things, so basically, another day in the life of Amy. Time to bring the house DOWN (but don’t worry, there’s a point to all this). My mom was bedridden for much of my life. She used to say that there are angels living amongst us that look like ordinary people, but they are here to guide us and make us better people. I believed her! I believed that she had some insight, due to her illness, that no one else had. Gigs up! You guys can’t hide from me anymore. Tuck those wings away all you want, but I saw some pretty amazing angels this week, front and center!!! I saw a friend that I haven’t seen since college drive far, far away to attend Tameria’s benefit, without ever having met her, because that’s what friends do when bad/sad things happen…they show up! I saw two friends drive to California with the goal of sitting in a hospital just to see someone smile. I saw the labor of love of making a zillion meatballs so we could feed our stomachs and our hearts. Bad things happen sometimes. The people in your life are how you get through it. It takes a village to raise a child they say. Why stop at children? It takes a village to raise adults. Your peeps. Your rocks. The people you text, or hug, or share a beer with. Sometimes just to say HI and sometimes to have a shoulder to cry on…ok and sometimes to have a Karaoke partner, but for some reason you guys kinda suck at letting me do that..anyways…my daughter has a friend that texted her in the middle of the night and said she was in trouble and needed her help right away! After much discussion I allowed her to go pick her up…on the side of a road…in the middle of the night…with two plastic bags to her name…homeless…scared…beat up…addicted. She texted my daughter, 'Help me'. And my daughter was there. She felt like she had no one. She tried to overdose to make it all go away, and thankfully she survived. 18 years old and believed she had no one. Everyone, no matter who you are, defines their ‘angel’ through their own eyes. The people who show up, when it’s ugly and dirty and sad and painful and no filter can make it look any better. Your beacon of light when it seems really dark and scary in this big, messy, fucked up world. My sister in law had a party with all her friends…to celebrate summer…happiness and smiles were flowing. She told me they, “danced like it was their last day on earth”. It ended with her friend thinking that this life was too hard for her to handle…she gave up….she left her four kids and loving husband and friends and probably a dog or a cat and gave up……………………………. A phone call or a text or a whisper or a note or a tear or a scream from the highest mountain and someone would have been there to show her all the reasons why she was loved. Why she should live! That call never came. Her ‘angels’ were right there, but she didn’t see them or felt hopeless that there weren’t any. And all of the friends are left with the ‘whys’ and the sadness and the confusion. The impact we make in the lives of those around us are not always visible. The impressions we make on other people in our lives effects people differently and for different reasons. Have you ever run into someone whom you haven’t seen in ages and they tell you a memory about you that you don’t even remember yourself? Something you did or said and you’re all, “OMG I don’t even remember that?”. But they remembered it. It meant something to them. You did something so insignificant to you, but it engraved in their memory. Perhaps to make them smile, to help them out of a hard situation, to change their life. A grain of sand on the beach seems so insignificant, but so crucial to the big picture. It all adds up. Make it happen. Share love and smiles. Hold hands and hearts. Laugh and cry and get raw to the point that you can’t bear to hear anymore. Be present. Sometimes I just want to scream, “YOU ARE MY PEOPLE” at each and every one of my friends. The family that I chose to make me smile, laugh, cry, and sometimes crazy. The people who ‘show up’ when things go dark. The beacons of light. You’re right, Mom…there are angels disguised as regular, ordinary people living around us. except, I call them my friends.

P.S. Yes, this counts as church.