Gifts from Cape Hatteras

Last summer our family went on a vacation.  It was a miracle.  We almost never go on vacation.  We saved and we planned and we went and it was beautiful.  

Now, during this summer of craziness and stuck inside, we pack and a child heals and we save and we plan, and I return to those pictures and those memories.  I reopen the gifts of Cape Hatteras.

The Gifts:

Relax.  Just sit.  Soak up the good feelings when they come.  Just sit and be empty and be full, both at the same time.

Say "Why not?" way more often than you say, "Why?"

Creation is really, really awesome.  Creation is not tame or safe but it is in-your-soul-beautiful.

Squirrels can crawl under the edges of mosquito tents and eat your bread. They like butter cake but not caramel frosting.  Just thought you should know.

Run and play and don't care how you look.  Floppy hat, floppy shoes, floppy butt, nobody cares just run and play.

Making really fabulous memories doesn't have to cost a bunch of money.  We tent camped on Hatteras Island, which is almost 30 miles out into the Atlantic and only a few feet above sea level. We were sort of perched out in the ocean in a tent and the wonder of being in it all was thrown in for free!

Don't be surprised when the rain comes.  You don't have to be afraid, just get in a tent if you can and plug the leaks with whatever you have.  Find a bright side in the situation, like eating the s'mores supplies even though it isn't perfect.

Don't let it ruin your trip if a crab bites your heel.  However, if he is edible, eat him.  That's what he gets for not being properly subdued by mankind.

Life doesn't have to be perfect.  Don't miss out because you are waiting for everything to be just the way you planned.  You will make the others in your circle miserable but you won't make perfection.

There are times when your hair (or whatever) just doesn't matter at all.  Let it go.

Respect the sun.

Take the best part.  Give up on having everything and just take the best part.

People are nicer than you think and people really do need people.  Real people, in person, to eat ice cream with and tell stories with and ride boats with and it doesn't hurt at all to be friendly.

You never know which little wave is going to move something really big.  Most of the really big stuff starts with one little action.  Islands shift one little wave at a time.

Be grateful when you get to see one of THOSE moments.  My son, Nathan, was afraid of the water.  He was sitting on a boogie board on the wet sand and a big wave came.  Those inches of water picked him up AND HE RODE several feet.  I saw it in his eyes.  That wave washed away fear and replaced it with potential and we had to drag that boy away from that beach.  He asked for swimming lessons last fall and I am pretty sure he has grown gills.  I watched that moment.

You have to be watching to see those moments.


Thank you Cape Hatteras, we are grateful for your gifts,
m

Other posts you might like:
More about Nathan...
When ordinary is a gift...
Our adventure at Tough Mudder

Heavy, Heavy July

The weather is cool for July.  July is for lakes and watermelon and air heavy with water that soaks into my skin and through my clothes.

This is the coolest July that I can remember.  It feels light, like spring instead of the dog days of summer.

Days and days of rain and temperatures in the 80s have made this summer delightful.  It's also weird.

That swimming pool membership I wanted didn't pan out.  With rain several times a week, the swimming hasn't been that great anyway.

That camper we didn't pursue would have been sitting in the driveway.  We have other things to do this summer.

Possibilities hover around us but never land.  So we wait in the weight.  July is light but our hearts are heavy.

Difficult decisions hang on and on and how do you KNOW what to do?

Houses sit empty too long and cost too much and the decisions of the past come and ask questions that simply can't be answered.



I drive myself crazy.














A little girl turns seven in July and the doctor says it's time for a new eardrum.  She's ready to get her ear fixed but she doesn't know everything that I do.  It'll be fine, God willing, but my heart hurts when I think about it too much.

How do you KNOW?

I worry about the past that can't be changed and the future that isn't even real and I go crazy.  My mind knows it is useless and even worse, it's faithless.

My worry is faithless.

There is only one decision that can be made.

Take the next step.  Then take another one.  Keep on going until I come to a crossroads then make the best decision I know and take another step.

Take a step now.  Not in the impossible past or the imaginary future but now.  Today.

still grateful,
m

Unplugged...living a real life.

My sweet husband got me an iPhone.  I love it.

Do you have any idea how many studies have been done that show the direct correlation between hours spent in front of a screen and the lack of ability to focus?  Lots.  Get comfortable and Google it.  This is just a blog and I don't have to do everything for you.  Besides, I am trying to optimize my ability to focus by decreasing my screen time.

I have been unplugged lately, hence the lack of blog.  I have neglected all things requiring a glowing screen and it feels good.  It feels good to walk the talk so to speak.

Been thinking, with all these kids around and warm weather coming...been thinking that I am tired of talking and maybe I would like to do more walking.  Simple, cheap stuff, you know.  Maybe dust off the free bike I picked up in an uncharacteristic moment of assertiveness when I rang a doorbell, "Is that bike by the road going out with the trash?"

"Yes, please take it," she said and now all five of us have wheels.  My husband and kids washed it up for me one morning and my bike, it has a basket.  Seriously.  I love it. Sort of purple and the seat is waaayyy better than the others.  Wider, you know, more accommodating for a behind that has followed me through three pregnancies and more than my share of brownies.

And that new basketball goal.  sigh.  The kids are crazy about the goal.  I am not a fan of sports and particular of basketball.  Dare I say this in print?  However, I have been feeling lately like maybe I want to go out there and shoot ten or twenty baskets when the sun is warm and see if I can make two or three for no other reason than because it's there.

One thing I don't want to do is shoot imaginary baskets on our Wii. 

Now I am not saying my electric stuff is evil. Our iPad and DVR have brought things to us that we would probably never have seen and my kids talk about things like whose music they like better, Vivaldi or Beethoven and how cool it is that crater lake was formed when a volcano exploded so violently that it blew the mountain away and left a hole and whether you can see Ursa Major or Canis Major from our hemisphere.  This stuff comes to us in full color care of our connectivity.

Warning: Rabbit Trail Ahead
Oh, by the way, before I paint too unrealistic picture, my children also talk about terrible things like gas and I don't mean petroleum, the dog's pooping habits and their current favorite word, constipation.  Honestly, does it ever end?  Ever????  I just wanted you to know in case there is anyone else out there whose childrens' brains seem to have been incubated in a bathroom. You are not alone, maybe I am, but you are not.

Back on track now...
But I think, right now, I would hope for all of us that we remember to live a real life, not watch a virtual one.

Remember how the sun feels on your skin and how the wind smells when it brings rain and real bowling is way harder and way more fun that Wii bowling.  

Go see one of your Facebook friends in person.  If I am one of your friends, I could really use a trip to a coffee shop, consider this an invite.  Come over and please ignore my kitchen.  Maybe I can make you an iced tea and we can chat while I wipe off the counters and sweep.  You don't mind, right?  You don't even have to schedule a playdate for next month, come over and we will walk to the playground today and the kids can scream all they want.  Mine wash up all right, yours?




If I am lucky I am only about halfway to dead and I don't want to lay in assisted living with the only thing I have to talk about being what I liked or pinned and the memes I shared.

Modern education theory says we need to focus as much on our kids' EQ (experience quotient) as on IQ and that may be true for us too.  

Instead of buying more stuff, maybe we could put our resources into experiences.  Instead of a new device, what about a trip to the ocean?  Instead of six new toys, what about an amusement park?  Remember, how fun it was to ride the scariest rides over and over?

There is a lake about an hour from us and it would cost about $20 in gas and a packed cooler to spend an entire day there at a real lake with my real toes in the real water and a real cold coke freezing my real fingers.  My real kids could dig in the real muck and find real "things" under the sand and even if something bites or stings, well that is real...life does that sometimes.

You should know, I write these things and I don't even know if anyone reads it so I write them to myself, not to preach to anyone else but to remind myself.

What I want to remember is that I want to live this summer, not watch it.  I want to feel this summer.  I want to remember this summer, soak it up and experience it.  This world may be but a shadow but while I am here I want to really live!

In the interest of complete disclosure, I do still love my iPhone.

Really,
Michele