Hodgepodge Questions-Volume 216

Here are the questions for this week's Wednesday Hodgepodge. If you're visiting today from the A-Z Challenge you'll find my Letter E post just before this one. Letter F will follow. 

Eventually. 

Hopefully. 

In the meantime, everyone is welcome to join the fun here on Wednesdays. Answer on your own blog, then hop back here tomorrow to share answers with the universe. See you there! 

1. Besides left over Easter goodies, what's something currently kept in a basket at your house?

2. 'The greater danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it, but that it is too low and we reach it.' ~Michelangelo Buonarroti 

So which one are you...the one who aims too high, or the one who aims too low? Have you ever seen The Sistine Chapel? Did you know Michelangelo's surname prior to answering this question?

3. April 7th is National Beer Day. Hmmm...wonder how that's celebrated? Do you like beer? Have a favorite? If you're not a beer drinker do you have any recipes you enjoy cooking that call for beer?

4. When did you last travel somewhere new? Tell us where? How'd it go?

5. The value of _________________________is greatly overrated.

6. What's a pet peeve of yours when it comes to restaurant dining?

7. It's Poetry Month...share a favorite poem, either the title, a few lines you find meaningful, or the whole kit and caboodle.

8. Insert your own random thought here.

Taking the Easy Way Out

It's Monday, Day 5 in the A-Z Challenge if you're keeping track, and already I'm wondering if I've over estimated a) my ability to complete the challenge this year, b) how far I can take this theme without boring you to tears, and c) I got nothin' but it seems like there should be a c. 

I guess I'll go until I run out of steam. Kind of like my car, which had to be towed this morning because it wouldn't start. Bother. On the bright side, hubs is at home to deal with such nonsense and that most definitely goes on the plus side of my 'pluses and minuses of retirement' list.

Since it's mid-afternoon and I'm just now getting to my blog, let's do something obvious. Ramble. 

E is for Easter

Speaking of change (my theme, remember?)...Easter looked a little different around here this year. 

That wasn't because we had snow on the ground, since sadly we quite often have snow hanging around in April. In fact, more than once we've had snow fall fast and furious on Easter, but thankfully not this year.

I took that picture on Thursday when the sun shone for a bright and brilliant twenty minutes. Please ignore my dead plants. They didn't get scooped up before our first big snow, and those pots are just now coming up for air. I'll pretty them up as soon as the danger of frost is past, which here in the Northeast is usually Mother's Day weekend. I know! Ridunculous!

We dyed eggs on Saturday. Is that sad? No girls in the house this Easter, but I was bound and determined to inject some color into our colorless landscape and hubs humored me.

I love colored Easter eggs. They say Spring even when the air says it's not quite sure. And because great minds think alike, Daughter2 living many states away texted me this picture-

One thing that didn't change-the ugly egg.

Only it kind of did, because this year our ugly egg was actually quite pretty. Hubs is in charge of the ugly egg every year, and here's the secret recipe:  dunk one egg in every color of the rainbow. Normally the egg turns a motley brownish-gray-green, but the color this year reminds me of turquoise jewelry.

My girls and their boys still got baskets, so that didn't change. Except I had to think and plan ahead, shop early, and then package and mail them to states that are not mine. States that aren't even close to mine.

photo credit: Daughter1

Hubs went with me to do the Easter basket shopping because that's what retirees do-they shop together. Ha! Kidding! Sort of?  He'll likely give that a miss next year, as he nearly had a heart attack when the cashier read out the grand total.

In my defense, these are the same sorts of baskets I've been putting together since 1989, except now my  girls are grown and I also buy for their boys, so four instead of two. 'Kids' only get more expensive in the basket department. Can't just toss in a snazzy pair of plastic sunglasses and a 50¢ bottle of bubbles and call it a day like we did in the way back when.

I'm not ready to let go of the Easter Basket tradition. Knowing my girls had a few little treats from their momma put a song in my heart. It almost makes up for the fact that when I look down the church pew I don't see their sweet selves dressed in smocked pastel.

That was also way back when, and this is now. Hubs and I in our church pew, and my girls in their church pews. Now if only all the pews were in the same state, same building, but that's for another someday it seems.

This season has a sweetness all it's own. Like every season. And while there are no little toes to wrestle into socks whose seams make you want to lose your ever lovin' mind, you can put your own clothes on and know you're leaving the house zipped, buttoned, and spit-up free.

Here's something that changed this year. I did not cook my traditional Easter dinner. I love pulling out my wedding china, buying spring flowers for the table (we're certainly not picking our own yet!), and making the same menu from year to year-baked ham, pineapple stuffing, roasted asparagus, and deviled eggs. I mix things up in the dessert department, but the entree never changes.

Except this year I had fish.

Which I didn't cook. Hubs and I met up with some neighbors for brunch at a restaurant in town. I'm generally not a big buffet fan, but I have to say this one was so well done, not overly crowded, and the food was really tasty.

We had planned to meet our neighbors at 12:30 as I knew church would run until about 12:15, and the restaurant was nearby. After the message, as the service was wrapping up with some special music, I felt my phone vibrate. I glanced into my purse and saw it was our realtor calling. Hubs ducked out to be sure she wasn't at our house with a potential buyer while I mentally tried to remember how many pair of hose I'd left on the top of my dresser.

Somebody wanted to come see our house.
At 1 PM on Easter Sunday.

Does that sound strange to you, because we found that a little bit strange? The thing is, when you're selling a home you never want to say no to a showing, so we did an insane mad dash home to give everything the quick once over.

Moments like this one are when I'm happy I married a neat-nik. Things were generally in order, aside from the 'getting ready for church crazy' that happens in most homes on Sunday mornings. Hubs vacuumed like a rock star while I stashed the panty hose and folded towels neatly onto towel rods, emptied the kitchen trash, and picked up the dog bowl and the dog to be contained for the duration.

We flew on into the restaurant just a few minutes late and only slightly out of breath. I have to say, it was so nice to sit down to an already prepared meal and enjoy good food and friendly conversation. No hectic busy preparation many days before and no dishes to wash after.

I tend to hold tightly to things that in my mind and heart I've filed under family. I'm learning this year that God might very well shake up the traditions and routines I hold too tightly in order to make room for what I need right now.

I always smile when I get what I need without knowing it was what I needed.

Dear Daughter

Caveat: Not every letter will be about the basement boxes, but I did find some gems in there which I plan to use somewhere in the challenge.

Like when the hard letters roll around...Q, X, S.

Yes S is hard. In my experience the letters with not enough words are a problem, but so are those with too many choices. Like S. Anyway, today is D and it's back to the basement boxes I go.

D is for Dear Daughter

My dad was always Dad. I don't remember calling him Daddy, but maybe when I was very small? He was just Dad. Or sometimes Gordy when we kids wanted to tease and were feeling brave. My younger sister had a book called Gordon the Goat, which we thought was hilarious. I guess my dad did too.

He passed away some 21 years ago which sounds like a lifetime. It many ways it was because my girls were small. He loved those little girls so much. He would love them still, would be so proud I know. There is comfort in the knowing. 

My dad was a Marine. He retired from the Marine Corps after a long career and went on to work for a large University, but in my mind, and I think my siblings would all agree, he was always a Marine. He was the strong silent type, not a big talker or overly effusive with his emotions, yet I do believe we all felt loved.  

In last week's basement purge I came across a whole box of correspondence, mostly from my college years. You cannot imagine how this distracted me from the task at hand. I finally put them all into another box and carried it upstairs to read later. There were letters from my sisters which I'll definitely revisit somewhere in the alphabet, letters from my then boyfriend, the one you all know as 'the hubs', there were letters from girlfriends, and church friends, and even some from campers who lived in my cabin during those long ago summers I spent on the Bay. 

And in the middle of it all was a letter from my dad. A letter he wrote me my first semester of college, which was actually a quarter because universities favored the quarter system back then. As soon as I saw the front of the card I remembered it. I wonder now if he chose it himself, or if this was a card my mom had in the house. The Holmes quote across the front makes me think it was chosen, but I can't say for sure.  I do remember how surprised I was to find a card from my dad in my university P.O. box. 

He wasn't a man given to talking at great length about his feelings, and this card was full of feelings. Written in his still familiar chicken scratch across both sides and the back too, were all the things I think he wanted to be sure I knew he felt about me. Perhaps these words mean more because he wasn't a man who very often or very easily articulated what he was feeling. That's not a criticism, it was just a different time. He was from a generation that took life as it came, and got on with things. I don't know what prompted the note, but he was about the age I am now when he sent it.

Change is something we experience all throughout our lives, but maybe it's in this middle season we have the time to step back and examine it's effect. Maybe I went off to college many states away, and he noticed the family shift, felt the change in an unexpected way. Maybe he thought about it, and needed to write.

Same as me.  

Put It In Your Pocket

Day 3. The letter C. Which brings me to what I think is key to managing change. My key anyway.

C is for Compartmentalize

I excel at compartmentalizing. It makes my hubs a little bit crazy, because whenever we have a lot of big stuff happening he wants to talk about all of it, all at once, all the time.

I can't. One big thing at a time please, otherwise I become ridiculous. 

You may recall back in early fall I was knee deep in wedding planning. Wedding planning for a daughter living in one state while I was in another, the groom in yet another, and the wedding venue in still another. I know! It was lovely though.

In case you'd forgotten.

Anyway, as I was plugging along, maintaining my binder and my checklist and my emotional stability, trying to stay three steps ahead of the avalanche that is all things wedding, hubs felt we needed to discuss... among other things-

his retirement-as in should we or shouldn't we

managing retirement money

selling our house

buying a house

buying a lot

building a house
buying a fixer upper and renovating

 would we move the piano if and when we move house if and when he retires

drawer pulls and light fixtures for that house we might maybe possibly build somewhere sometime

the pros and cons of putting down roots in various states across the southland 

the quality of air on Jupiter

Okay, that last bit I made up, but he might as well have asked me about the quality of air on Jupiter, because I was planning a wedding which required me to plug my ears and brain to all the rest. Call it compartmentalizing or maintaining one's sanity or preventing the crazy, whatever... it's how I roll.

I can multi-task with the best of them when it comes to the everyday bits and pieces of home life, but when we start talking about great! big! huge!, life-changing decisions I require a clear head, a clean house (it helps!) and an organized thought process. In the middle of planning a wedding I had none of those things. When enormous change looms I need focus and lists and most of all I need time. 

Time to digest the big ideas.

Time to break the big ideas into smaller more manageable chunks.

Time to pray.

Time to think about how a new 'thing' will feel in the day to day running of a life.

I need to let it all settle on my brain and work out some of the obvious kinks before I'm ready to leap. Operating this way allows me to lay my head on the pillow at night and fall blissfully to sleep. Hubs asks how can I sleep when there's so much going on?!? 

Well, in my mind there's not so much going on. There's one big thing going on, and some other big things tucked into my pocket to be pulled out and examined later, after I have a really good handle on the current big thing. The thing that must be dealt with in the immediate.

There's a verse in the Bible that says, 'Do not worry about tomorrow for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of it's own.' (Matthew 6:34).

At first glance that sounds a little depressing, but I actually find the verse very freeing. It doesn't say ignore the important, or don't ever think about tomorrow. It says don't worry. 

I know in life there may be times where circumstances collide, and it feels like lots of big changes roll at us all at once in the form of a giant snowball. In those times we sometimes do have to react more than we think and act, but that's not the norm.

When I look back at the big changes we've experienced, and at the current big changes we're navigating now, I can honestly say I saw them coming, felt change approaching. As it approaches I have some time to process and pray and park myself on whatever's next before I actually have to do anything about it. 

The front end of change is often fraught with what ifs and maybes. It's easy to hop on that path and become stressed out, confused, and anxious.  In reality, none of us knows what tomorrow may hold, but we do know Who holds it. We can tuck tomorrow in our pocket and deal with the pressing needs of our current season because He's got tomorrow covered.

I compartmentalize not to avoid change, but rather as a means of helping me get on board with whatever new direction life is heading. It's not something that has always come naturally to me. Worry is what comes naturally to me, but I've had a lot of practice in dealing with change in my adult life, and when you practice something you get pretty good at it.

Not perfect, but good enough to keep the crazy at bay when your daughter gets married, your husband retires, and you put your house on the market in a three month block of time. 

Baby Love

B is for Bitty Baby

Also boxes and basements.

And blond-haired beauties who grow up but still need to know their  mama has not thrown their childhood out with the trash. Turns out mama needs to know it too.

When we moved to the UK back in 2003, my youngest daughter was not quite 13. We left the US in record time, like fugitives running from the law except we weren't. We were just expats trying to get across the pond before the new school year got underway.

We almost made it too. I mean obviously we made it across the pond, but we missed the first day of school by a couple of weeks. We didn't know that wouldn't matter. In our American brains, hard-wired with the American way of doing things, we felt like our girls missing day one in a brand new school would be disastrous. That they would start off three steps behind in the social world of teenage-dom, thereby marking the whole experience as something to later headline a list entitled, 'How My Parents Ruined My Life'.

Oh the things we don't know we don't know. God is good that way.

On the Maryland side of the pond we sold a house, car, and boat, we packed, loaded, shipped belongings, and were on our way 21 days from the day we said we'd take the job. In a word-insanity. I'm not kidding, it really was, but we put our heads down and plowed forward.

Part of plowing forward meant not having a lot of time to negotiate with my then 12 year old about the fact that she would be at least 16 when we made our way back to the US to live. That at age 16 she would not care about stuffed animals, toy cash registers, and one of a dozen baby dolls along with all her bits and pieces, namely a high chair, changing table, diaper bag, wicker carrying case, bottles, play food, and more.

We don't do anything by halves here.

The philosophy I adopted for making it to England without going off the deep end myself was to let my girls keep mostly what they wanted to keep.  Not to argue much or persuade, but to throw it all in bins labeled 'Daughters childhood' and watch those bins leave the driveway in a truck headed for storage. It might have been hard to watch them go if I'd had any time to think, but there were a thousand million things to be done to get to England 'on time' so we got to gettin'. I told myself I'd deal with all the 'stuff' they'd kept when we returned.

For three weeks life moved at mach speed. I fell into bed every night exhausted by the reality that was now mine. It felt like I was standing on a rug one minute, and before I could take it all in someone had yanked the rug right out from under me. I spent those 21 days trying to regain my footing.

It took a little longer than 21 days.

Fast forward to last week. In our shared agreement not to move any boxes that were delivered to our house here in NJ some 5 1/2 years ago without knowing their exact contents, specifically those boxes that came from a storage unit following our move back to the states in 2009, hubs and I got serious about opening all the boxes. Boxes labeled 'daughters childhood'. And there she was.

Bitty Baby.

Turns out I was wrong. For about 5 minutes back in August of 2003 I had tried to convince my pre-teen that she wouldn't want to keep a baby doll. That she'd grow up and come back here and that doll would be just a doll. Something she used to play with, but had now outgrown. Daughter2 wanted no part of it, so we sent her to storage.

I lifted the doll from amid the packing paper, sans clothes of course because even though she had a diaper bag and wicker suitcase filled with no less than fifteen outfits Bitty went to storage in her birthday suit. Seeing her there my heart filled up with a longing for my own baby girl, so visceral I wanted to cry. Not because I wish my girls were still small, but because I miss their daily in person presence in my life. Their chatter at the dinner table, a hairbrush on the sink, the sound of footsteps racing down the stairs.

I look at that baby doll and remember the sweetness of having little girls to tuck in beside their Bitty Baby at night. My 'pre-teen' was 19 years old when we returned to America to live, and she'll be a quarter of a century on her next birthday.

Yes I did put Bitty in that red dress and take a basement selfie with my grown daughter's childhood baby doll. Then I sent it to my daughter via text and got a happy message back.

You don't think so much about the fact that your kids will never live at home with you again, until they don't. As the years roll by you might sometimes allow that thought to prickle at the back of your brain but it's elusive, not something you can get your head around. You let it rest in that far off someday called the future, while you stay busy packing lunches and checking homework.

Funny thing about the future though...it kind of sneaks up on you. A gradual unfolding until one day you discover you're firmly on the other side of an invisible milestone you didn't realize you'd passed.

In my first real post in this year's A-Z challenge I want to state for the record that change is hard. We know this, yet it's rarely said aloud. We're told to 'go for it!', 'take risks!', and 'think of it as a challenge!' always with an exclamation point.

Why write about something that occured so long ago? Why pull up the memory and examine the thoughts that memory stirs?

When I look back at how change has occurred in my own life, almost all of it's been hard on the front end. Whether it's moving young teenagers to a foreign country, navigating the tricky waters of their transition to adulthood, or figuring out my own empty nest, there's an element of courage needed on the front end.

The before.

But there's always an after too. A vantage point from which we see it all in hindsight. Where we recognize a lesson learned at age 42 might be useful to us in circumstances we face at age 54. We can't always see the purpose in change as it's happening...it's in the after we most often find a nugget of truth to hold on to. Some piece of wisdom to tuck away and remember, to use when more change comes our way.

And it will.

Because life isn't stagnant, or at least I don't want it to be.

Bitty Baby helps me remember why.

ABC. Easy as 1.2.3.

Hi Hodgepodgers! And A-Z'ers! And random people reading here! If you're visiting from the A-Z challenge today you'll find my post for letter A in #8. I host a weekly meme on Wednesdays, and try to keep it going during the A-Z. 

Everyone is welcome to join the fun here on Wednesdays, but I will ask you not link to the Hodgepodge unless you've answered the questions. Thanks for that! 

Now on with the show-

1. In honor of the date...when were you last sent on a 'fool's errand'?

It might have been just before Christmas when I bought the wrong colored outdoor lights and the wrong colored candles for my Advent wreath, all on the same trip. I hate when I do things like that. 

More recently, I sent hubs on a 'fool's errand' just yesterday. I gave him the empty print cartridge boxes to replace, and he did. Except our printer has two different black cartridges and I gave him the wrong box for black ink, so he's headed back to the store today to get the right one. He's a good egg. 

2. Peter Rabbit, Bugs Bunny, The Energizer Bunny, The Easter Bunny, Rabbit (Pooh's friend), White Rabbit (of Wonderland fame), or the Trix Rabbit...which of these 'famous' rabbits can you best relate to right now?

Peter Rabbit is described as mischievous and disobedient so much as I love him, I'm not him. Rabbit is described as liking to be in charge and a little bossy...hmmm...that could be me, although not so much this week. And I'm definitely not feeling energetic or silly just now, so let's go with The Easter Bunny. I did manage to fill baskets for my chicks and even got them shipped in a timely fashion.

3. When did you last find yourself scrambling to get something done? Explain.

Probably finishing up the tax organizer on the very last day of February. I have a system for completing these things, which goes against the general rules you'll find in every 'how not to procrastinate' book. I answer all the easy questions first. Then I go back later and fill in the questions that I have paperwork for, but that don't require a lot of data uploading. 

On the very last day, the day it is actually due, I scramble to fill in the hard stuff. And by hard stuff I mean the investment categories because those sections use terms like non-qualifieds, ISO's and other ridiculous words that make my brain hurt. I always get it done though, and isn't that what really matters?

4. Last time you were up at the literal crack of dawn? Why? Last time you stayed up all night? Why?

I'm up most days at the literal crack of dawn because that's how my internal clock ticks. I enjoy early mornings, seeing the sunrise over the mountain, and most especially the quiet and that first cup of coffee. I've never been a person who functions well late at night, not even back when I was a college student. I don't think I ever stayed up all night studying. 

The last time I was up all night was April 29, 2011 aka Will and Kate's wedding. Yes the royal Wills and Kate. I got up in the middle of the night to watch coverage from the very beginning, and then we had company come for the weekend, so essentially I stayed up a whole 24 hours. 

5. Crack a book, crack a bottle, crack a joke, crack an egg...which one have you done most recently?

Probably a book. I crack one of those open pretty much every day. 

6. What's your favorite part of a typical weekend? Tell us why that's so.

Friday afternoon. Okay, I know that might not technically be the weekend, but I love the sense of anticipation that settles in around here on a Friday afternoon. It's a solid chunk of time where I don't feel like I need to be ticking something off my to-do list, and we normally have a relaxed casual dinner out that evening, which I look forward to.  

7. What's something I'd find on a bookshelf in your home? Other than a book I mean!

Framed photos. I realized just how many we have when we put our house on the market. Realtors recommend you remove some of the personal from your home so potential buyers can picture themselves in the space, and not be distracted by your adorable children. 

They don't say that exactly, but that's what they mean. 

8. Insert your own random thought here.

Today begins the April A-Z blog challenge, details of which you'll find by clicking the button on my sidebar. Most days I'll write a separate post to cover the letter of the day, but on Wednesdays I will likely incorporate the day's letter into my random space as part of the Hodgepodge. 

Here we go-

A is for All About My Theme

Well, not all about my theme, because telling you everything on Day 1 would defeat the purpose of the challenge. Also, unlike years past I haven't thought this one all the way through. It's going to be a bit of blogging by the seat of my pants, which I like to think I'm something of an expert at so not gonna worry. 

Except I kind of am, because lately I feel so out of synch with my blog, and more importantly with my writing voice. We all have one and normally mine runs nearly unceasing like a loop through my head. These days there's so much else clamboring for brain space that I'm going to have to work to become reaquainted with the writer in me. 

Raise your hand if you've hit mid-life and are surprised to find your brain is too full instead of nearly empty? 

'They' say when you hit a writing roadblock you should just write what you know. True confession here, the list of what I know is actually not that long-ha! And I've covered much of that short list in previous A-Z challenge years, namely travel, parenting, marriage, so what's left? 

What's left is probably the elephant in the room and my theme for this year's challenge. In the past three months I've seen my first born marry and move to the other side of the country, my husband has retired from the company he worked for some 30 years, we've put our house on the market, and are relocating somewhere sometime. 

Change. 

We all deal with it, embrace it, or avoid it at various points in our lives, so it feels relevant. Plus it's broad, which leaves room for me to talk about pretty much anything under the sun, but also share some of what I've learned, and continue to learn as life swirls and shifts and goes left when I thought we were going right. 

Stay tuned. 



I couldn't resist. 
And y'all know there was some truth in the lyrics of this earworm. 
You're welcome. 

Hodgepodge Questions-Volume 215

I considered declaring today Spring Break in the Hodgepodge, but since it snowed here this morning I felt it best we carry on. I'll probably take a week off from the HP sometime in April, because I know that whole A-Z thing will begin to wear me out.

Blogging's fun, isn't it?

Let's get started....here are the questions, you provide the answers, then hop back here Wednesday and we'll compare, in a good way of course.

1. In honor of the date...when were you last sent on a 'fool's errand'?

2. Peter Rabbit, Bugs Bunny, The Energizer Bunny, The Easter Bunny, Rabbit (Pooh's friend), White Rabbit (of Wonderland fame), or the Trix Rabbit...which of these 'famous' rabbits can you best relate to right now?

3. When did you last find yourself scrambling to get something done? Explain.

4. Last time you were up at the literal crack of dawn? Why? Last time you stayed up all night? Why?

5. Crack a book, crack a bottle, crack a joke, crack an egg...which have you done most recently?

6. What's your favorite part of a typical weekend? Tell us why that's so.

7. What's something I'd find on a bookshelf in your home? Other than a book I mean!

8. Insert your own random thought here.