Big day to fill some big horsie rainboots over here.
What a weekend. It's been a mix of fast action and something a little different. In many ways, the time I spent with infant Chaya, and when I was pregnant, I felt intimately connected with the divine and selfless.
It's only now that we emerge as separate individuals that I turn back to my own connection to _____ (insert something that doesn't sound prosaic and banal in attempting to capture something spiritua)l. Oh boy are we separate entitiies, as Miss Healthy-Attachment's new favorite game of "No MOMMA!!!" explodes into inconvenient timing galore.
For Lent, I decided to mix in a little mindfulness with my phone use (as usual). I also began engaging in something akin to contemplative prayer. I read a small passage from the Episcopal Services reader, then sat for about ten minutes listening to Palestrina's Sicut Cervus and a few others. I know silence is more apropos, but the music has always had a certain way of guiding me into and beyond myself. It's been sometimes challenging even to slice out that time, but valuable. And it's continued a path home that perhaps I'd begun some time ago. This simmered well into the culmination of Lent and all the depth of thought and passion involved.
This weekend was certainly a melee of colliding (and complementing) holidays colliding. As seems to be the case for several years before and to come Easter and Passover coincide. I love this in some aspects. It is also exhausting!
Chaya's Gramma Lisa and Tom came out for the weekend to celebrate Passover. And so forget Chrismahaunnakwanza. This was our Peachy Pascal Pesach Party Weekend.
The Pesach was rather appropriate for a holiday celebrating leaving in flight. If we don't have time to leaven the bread, then are we really going to actually come up with candles and matches and anything anyone needs at all?? There were some missed communications. I swear, I started with the best organization. I really did start making an inventory of our kitchen to supplement appropriately, but wires crossed. Not thinking the kitchen was going to be used, and then everyone thinking everyone else was making food and... naturally we ended up with the entire Seder meal being cooked in a kitchen that was particularly filthy, chaotic (especially since the whirlwind cleaning may have involved shoving several things into several drawers to free up space for impending ingredients). Naturally we had very little that was needed.
And in the perfect messiness of said improvisation we managed to pull something together quite perfect for toddling Chaya and her friends Sebastian and Cedrick.
Chaya guzzled enough grapejuice to give herself GI distress for a couple of days, but made up for that by eating almost entirely matzo bread. Cedrick proved to be the most adventurous eater of the kiddos, tasting a bit of everying. We sang and stumbled our way through Sammy the Spider's First Passover, the Haggadah that I thought perhaps was not going to be adult-approved after we reviewed several addition grown-up Haggadah the day before. Bitter herb and horseradish were consumed. And Affikomen was discovered with only a little - a lot - of adult help.
The weekend continued as full clip with a few meals out at glacially cuncatory restaurants (picked by the Wrights of course, but at least COA was delicious) and some excited tours of all the Non-Fred-Meyer places one might purchase foods, as some people apparently are nonplussed at shopping in a grocery store that also sells clothes, autoparts and hunting gear.
We made it out of the weekend with a new cast iron dutch oven and a grill. And the salmon from a local fish market made it into everyone's bellies. Chaya also led several excursions through the grass and otherwise delighted her doting grandparents (who likewise delighted her).
On Saturday, we also attended Chaya's third egg hunt of the season at Claudia's house. This time things clicked with the imp and she rounded up bags full of eggs. Claudia, being a very good witch, conjured up some beautiful weather, so all the children and families lolled on the grass in their yard afterwards.
Things capped off with a christening of the new grill and a slightly late and only moderately manic evening with the toddler.
Kiddo was scurried to bed in between some manic meltdowns, as she said goodbye t o her visitors and mommy and daddy cleaned and appropriately recluttered the kitchen.
Of course, we began the morning an Easter morning with a "basket" (ok, a strainer because it was the right size) to share with Daddy.
Needless to say breakfast was chocolate (other food thrown on the floor in disdain as Chaya demanded more CHICKEN EGG, which apparently meant easter eggs). I didn't even put that much candy in her bag, but that was all she'd eat regardless
She did enjoy her Easter bonnet though!
We perhaps were all feeling a little holiday burnout by this morning, but I'm happy that I decided to go ahead and try out the church service at the St. Paul's down the road. In all the hubub, I was struggling to have the contemplative time that usually attends Easter weekend.
The "Holy Week" (the stretch between Palm Sunday and Easter) is a complex cornucopia of mystical and familiar for children. I remember it well. The smooth texture of the palms across my lips, the tenderness and intimacy of foot washing, the solemnity of last communion, the pain of the cross mixed with a dizzying understanding of the Agape of self-sacrifice, the gravid state of loss and hope, and the eerie joy of rebirth. Tied to Christian theology, it is powerful. Even from a purely secular state, the messages are powerful, but I am not purely secular.
It's the music, ritual, and community I've experienced since before I had the words to philosophize. It's hard to walk into a service and find myself unmoved. Each subsequent manifestation connects me through the ages to those times past. Yes, I can find myself a blubbery teary mess in any opera, ballet, or symphony because of a beauty of human experience too expansive to be described, and because of the childhood familiarity that draws me through time to my earliest memories. Church has a similar blend of spiritual transcendence with earthly roots for me.
I needed the familiar service today. Church here is quite different than the St. Paul's my dad attends. Church was quite small and the congregation only hinted at filling it halfway. There is no children's program. Instead, there's a place in the back for children to play. There is no choir. There is a beautiful organ and a few talented pianists and organists.
But the vibe is all so familiar.
As I come back to my own sense of the divine. I'm beginning to grasp the complexity of being an "interfaith couple." For quite some time I've considered myself spiritually fluid, believing that all religions are merely slivered glimpses of the divine. Before Chaya was born, I pretty well said that what mattered to me was finding a spiritual community. Jewish, Muslm, Buddhist, Unitarian... all would fill me with different expressions of that epiphanic spiritual joy. Granted, I still snuck out and attended services on my own time with my dad or alone... I see now how powerful that familiarity of the experienced rites are for me.
I don't want to force my faith on anyone, but (1) I want to find a way to share it, and (2) it is lonely not sharing it. Andrew's faith is his own to figure out, but his very strong roots and identity are based on Judaism. That is beautiful, and there is a lot of commonality between our upbringings in those regards. But for him it is very specific to the story of his family and their ancestor's experience. And, as perhaps is expected, there's an almost implicit hesitancy at expressions of a religion that has largely been used to oppress his own. I realize I've emphasized the secular aspects of the Christian traditions for some time because these feel less threatening. And that I want to find ways to celebrate my traditions in an open and non-doctrinal way with my kiddo. As much as I want him to continue to tell her the story of her Jewish family and their roots.
It can be especially challenging when religions and their holidays won't take turns!! I'm sure there are many more years to sort it out, but I'm glad to find a place that may be my spiritual roost for a while.
And, now that we've been gifted matches, we won't have to attempt to burn the house down trying to light candles on the electric stove burner... so perhaps a little Advent reading and wreath may be in order next year.
The end of the service heralded something our whole family can get behind though: brunch potluck with Easter ham for the big meat eater. Andrew and Chaya met us at the service and we brunched with another few families who were first time attendees, including one of Chaya's preschoolmates.
It was grounding, but definitely the easter grass that broke the bunnie's back for my little toddler, judging by the fifty meltdowns she's had leading into naptime today.
It's been an amazing weekend, but we may be about ready for a spell of perfunctory days. Or outright boring, since Preschool is on break this week. Ah well, at least mommy has to head out for a barium swallow tomorrow during naptime. I'm sure that will be exciting!
Until then, enjoy the smears of chocolate bunnies and extra hugs to you and your families.
For Lent, I decided to mix in a little mindfulness with my phone use (as usual). I also began engaging in something akin to contemplative prayer. I read a small passage from the Episcopal Services reader, then sat for about ten minutes listening to Palestrina's Sicut Cervus and a few others. I know silence is more apropos, but the music has always had a certain way of guiding me into and beyond myself. It's been sometimes challenging even to slice out that time, but valuable. And it's continued a path home that perhaps I'd begun some time ago. This simmered well into the culmination of Lent and all the depth of thought and passion involved.
This weekend was certainly a melee of colliding (and complementing) holidays colliding. As seems to be the case for several years before and to come Easter and Passover coincide. I love this in some aspects. It is also exhausting!
Chaya's Gramma Lisa and Tom came out for the weekend to celebrate Passover. And so forget Chrismahaunnakwanza. This was our Peachy Pascal Pesach Party Weekend.
The Pesach was rather appropriate for a holiday celebrating leaving in flight. If we don't have time to leaven the bread, then are we really going to actually come up with candles and matches and anything anyone needs at all?? There were some missed communications. I swear, I started with the best organization. I really did start making an inventory of our kitchen to supplement appropriately, but wires crossed. Not thinking the kitchen was going to be used, and then everyone thinking everyone else was making food and... naturally we ended up with the entire Seder meal being cooked in a kitchen that was particularly filthy, chaotic (especially since the whirlwind cleaning may have involved shoving several things into several drawers to free up space for impending ingredients). Naturally we had very little that was needed.
And in the perfect messiness of said improvisation we managed to pull something together quite perfect for toddling Chaya and her friends Sebastian and Cedrick.
Chaya guzzled enough grapejuice to give herself GI distress for a couple of days, but made up for that by eating almost entirely matzo bread. Cedrick proved to be the most adventurous eater of the kiddos, tasting a bit of everying. We sang and stumbled our way through Sammy the Spider's First Passover, the Haggadah that I thought perhaps was not going to be adult-approved after we reviewed several addition grown-up Haggadah the day before. Bitter herb and horseradish were consumed. And Affikomen was discovered with only a little - a lot - of adult help.
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The weekend continued as full clip with a few meals out at glacially cuncatory restaurants (picked by the Wrights of course, but at least COA was delicious) and some excited tours of all the Non-Fred-Meyer places one might purchase foods, as some people apparently are nonplussed at shopping in a grocery store that also sells clothes, autoparts and hunting gear.
We made it out of the weekend with a new cast iron dutch oven and a grill. And the salmon from a local fish market made it into everyone's bellies. Chaya also led several excursions through the grass and otherwise delighted her doting grandparents (who likewise delighted her).
On Saturday, we also attended Chaya's third egg hunt of the season at Claudia's house. This time things clicked with the imp and she rounded up bags full of eggs. Claudia, being a very good witch, conjured up some beautiful weather, so all the children and families lolled on the grass in their yard afterwards.
Things capped off with a christening of the new grill and a slightly late and only moderately manic evening with the toddler.
Kiddo was scurried to bed in between some manic meltdowns, as she said goodbye t o her visitors and mommy and daddy cleaned and appropriately recluttered the kitchen.
Of course, we began the morning an Easter morning with a "basket" (ok, a strainer because it was the right size) to share with Daddy.
Needless to say breakfast was chocolate (other food thrown on the floor in disdain as Chaya demanded more CHICKEN EGG, which apparently meant easter eggs). I didn't even put that much candy in her bag, but that was all she'd eat regardless
She did enjoy her Easter bonnet though!
We perhaps were all feeling a little holiday burnout by this morning, but I'm happy that I decided to go ahead and try out the church service at the St. Paul's down the road. In all the hubub, I was struggling to have the contemplative time that usually attends Easter weekend.
The "Holy Week" (the stretch between Palm Sunday and Easter) is a complex cornucopia of mystical and familiar for children. I remember it well. The smooth texture of the palms across my lips, the tenderness and intimacy of foot washing, the solemnity of last communion, the pain of the cross mixed with a dizzying understanding of the Agape of self-sacrifice, the gravid state of loss and hope, and the eerie joy of rebirth. Tied to Christian theology, it is powerful. Even from a purely secular state, the messages are powerful, but I am not purely secular.
It's the music, ritual, and community I've experienced since before I had the words to philosophize. It's hard to walk into a service and find myself unmoved. Each subsequent manifestation connects me through the ages to those times past. Yes, I can find myself a blubbery teary mess in any opera, ballet, or symphony because of a beauty of human experience too expansive to be described, and because of the childhood familiarity that draws me through time to my earliest memories. Church has a similar blend of spiritual transcendence with earthly roots for me.
I needed the familiar service today. Church here is quite different than the St. Paul's my dad attends. Church was quite small and the congregation only hinted at filling it halfway. There is no children's program. Instead, there's a place in the back for children to play. There is no choir. There is a beautiful organ and a few talented pianists and organists.
But the vibe is all so familiar.
As I come back to my own sense of the divine. I'm beginning to grasp the complexity of being an "interfaith couple." For quite some time I've considered myself spiritually fluid, believing that all religions are merely slivered glimpses of the divine. Before Chaya was born, I pretty well said that what mattered to me was finding a spiritual community. Jewish, Muslm, Buddhist, Unitarian... all would fill me with different expressions of that epiphanic spiritual joy. Granted, I still snuck out and attended services on my own time with my dad or alone... I see now how powerful that familiarity of the experienced rites are for me.
I don't want to force my faith on anyone, but (1) I want to find a way to share it, and (2) it is lonely not sharing it. Andrew's faith is his own to figure out, but his very strong roots and identity are based on Judaism. That is beautiful, and there is a lot of commonality between our upbringings in those regards. But for him it is very specific to the story of his family and their ancestor's experience. And, as perhaps is expected, there's an almost implicit hesitancy at expressions of a religion that has largely been used to oppress his own. I realize I've emphasized the secular aspects of the Christian traditions for some time because these feel less threatening. And that I want to find ways to celebrate my traditions in an open and non-doctrinal way with my kiddo. As much as I want him to continue to tell her the story of her Jewish family and their roots.
It can be especially challenging when religions and their holidays won't take turns!! I'm sure there are many more years to sort it out, but I'm glad to find a place that may be my spiritual roost for a while.
And, now that we've been gifted matches, we won't have to attempt to burn the house down trying to light candles on the electric stove burner... so perhaps a little Advent reading and wreath may be in order next year.
The end of the service heralded something our whole family can get behind though: brunch potluck with Easter ham for the big meat eater. Andrew and Chaya met us at the service and we brunched with another few families who were first time attendees, including one of Chaya's preschoolmates.
It was grounding, but definitely the easter grass that broke the bunnie's back for my little toddler, judging by the fifty meltdowns she's had leading into naptime today.
It's been an amazing weekend, but we may be about ready for a spell of perfunctory days. Or outright boring, since Preschool is on break this week. Ah well, at least mommy has to head out for a barium swallow tomorrow during naptime. I'm sure that will be exciting!
Until then, enjoy the smears of chocolate bunnies and extra hugs to you and your families.
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