True Colors

They say that the eyes are the window to the soul, but that is certainly untrue in my case. I've had people, strangers come up to me when I was in high school and ask if I was okay. The immediate thought that sprang to mind in that scenario was, "Do you see tears running down my face?" Unfortunately for me, my everyday face, neither happy nor sad, just standing there, my face leads people to believe that something terrible just happened to me. Normally, I am a very happy person but my content face looks anything but content. Curse my down-turned eyes! It also doesn't help that my bottom lip pulls the pad of my chin too far north so that from the side I look like Alfred Hitchcock's long-lost daughter.

(I told you)

When I was a teenager I hardly ever looked at boys in the eye, afraid that they might see how transparent I was. I was afraid my eyes would betray my perpetually hushed heart. I listened to my heart, probably more than most and probably more than I should have but I couldn't let anyone else know.

Perhaps, deep inside I am a narcissistic person and that's why I'm so hard on myself, because if I let myself believe I'm a good person or I'm good at doing things then I fear I've become too much of my true self. I remember working on a writing prompt for one of my teaching methods classes. The prompt asked, "What are you an expert in?" I distinctly remember I was having a bad day so I wrote, "Nothing." I felt I was neither good nor bad at a particular skill I had learned, but certainly not an expert. Expert to me implies, exorbitant amounts of wisdom or prowess for said skill. Does anyone else ever feel this way, or am I the only one that thinks too much about what others might think? Which in turn, brings me back to the thought, I must be narcissistic then. I might as well embrace it.

What negative character flaw do you have that you wish you could either embrace or suppress?

I Would Be Lying...

if I said I never dreamed of publishing a book, singing on Broadway or voicing a popular Disney cartoon.

So that means I'm jealous of Janette Rallison (Sierra St. James), Julie Andrews and Mandy Moore.

I've known Janette Rallison for a few years now as an adult but I've known of her since I was five. She is my stay-at-home-mom-published-author role-model. I wish I devoted more time to actually writing in my novel that I started three years ago this June (Sheesh! Has it been that long?). But it's entirely my fault since I think I love sleep a little more right now than she does. She is an inspiration to me since she's published a bazillion books it seems.

I've been jealous of Julie Andrews since the first time I sat through The Sound of Music. I wished I could sing as well as she did. I even bought her Christmas album for my dad one year (that ended up being for me after my mom told me he wouldn't really like it) and I've been trying to match her tone ever since.

I've been jealous of Mandy Moore since I heard her voice coming through Rapunzel's in Disney's Tangled. I saw an interview of hers on Regis and Kelly when they asked her about how excited she was to be voicing Rapunzel. She said exactly what I would have, had I been in her shoes, that she had been dreaming to be a part of a Disney feature as a voice since she was a little girl. I even remember going to see The Little Mermaid as a very young girl when it came out in 1989 and I too wanted to be the voice of a Disney princess.

What are your hopes and aspirations?

~ Lady Jane

When I Think of Home...

Due to my incomparable upbringing, I have always had an active imagination. I grew up in the same house for nineteen years, I had freedom to roam our expansive three and a quarter acre lot with trees, grass, our cats and friends. Many nights were spent gazing up at the stars on the trampoline. Running, climbing, and eating filled my days. My paternal grandfather, who I call Papa, planted fruit trees in the backyard. For seven years at least, my cousins and I enjoyed picking the ripe plums, apricots, and pears. Our saliva, sufficient enough to clean them allowed us to move onto our next adventure.

Even when I was a little girl, I dreamed of bringing my children to the home I grew up in to play on the swing set in the backyard, to show them that with enough sweat they could climb the walls with their feet, slide down the stairs on an old mattress or fall asleep on the living room couch as the din of family chatter in the kitchen wafted through the house.

My dream came to an end in 2006. I had no children yet and my parents were being forced out to rebuild a dying company that my father had put his life into. No longer can I bring my children to that home to see their Gigi and Papa and play with cousins uninterrupted in the basement, play a round of 9-hole golf around the house or come over for Sunday dinners.

I hate it when people say, "Let it go" or "It was a long time ago", that doesn't make me feel any better. It doesn't make feel any better to believe that my parents are giving another family the opportunity to make memories in that house too. As childish as this sounds, it was my house first!

The song, "Our House" by Madness, perfectly illustrates the kind of home I had. Needless to say it has become our anthem for my family. We even used it on a video montage for a family reunion.

Father wears his Sunday best

Mother's tired she needs a rest

The kids are playing up downstairs

Sister's sighing in her sleep

Brother's got a date to keep

He can't hang around

Our house, in the middle of our street

Our house, in the middle or our...

Our house it has a crowd

There's always something happening

And it's usually quite loud

Our mum she's so house-proud

Nothing ever slows her down

And a mess is not allowed

Our house, in the middle of our street

Our house, in the middle or our...

Our house, in the middle of our street

Our house, in the middle or our...

Something tells you that you've got to get away from it

Father gets up late for work

Mother has to iron his shirt

Then she sends the kids to school

Sees them off with a small kiss

She's the one they're going to miss

In lots of ways

Our house, in the middle of our street

Our house, in the middle or our...

I remember way back then when everything was true and when

We would have a very good time such a fine time

Such a happy time

And I remember how we'd play simply wasted the day away

Then we'd say nothing would come between us two dreamers

Father wears his Sunday best

Mother's tired she needs a rest

The kids are playing up downstairs

Sister's sighing in her sleep

Brother's got a date to keep

He can't hang around

Our house, in the middle of our street

Our house, in the middle or our street

Our house, in the middle of our street

Our house, in the middle or our...

Our house, was our castle and our keep

Our house, in the middle of our street

Our house, that was where we used to sleep

Our house, in the middle of our street

Our house, in the middle of our street

I loved my house, still do to this day. I've even thought of knocking on the door just to ask if I could look around. I wonder what stories my house would tell me since my family's been gone? Don't you wish if you just pressed your ear up against the walls hard enough you could hear everything the house has been through?

Monday's Child

Do you know the poem, "Monday's Child"? It was my earliest memory of reading. My mother had one of those Little Golden Books full of nursery rhymes and that one was always my favorite.

Monday's Child

Monday's child is fair of face,

Tuesday's child is full of grace,

Wednesday's child is full of woe,

Thursday's child has far to go,

Friday's child is loving and giving,

Saturday's child works hard for his living,

And the child that is born on the Sabbath day

Is bonny and blithe, and good and gay.

I too was born on a Monday and as far as this poem serving as a horoscope goes, it is still true to this day. Even growing up in a hot climate-where the sun shines 345 days of the year-I managed to stay fair. The European roots of my ancestry holding too hard onto me, I suppose. Always jealous of the girls in my class that could tan, I bet they don't get confused with teenagers. That was really embarrassing when I was six months pregnant with my son and working at a high school. I even wore a different ring on my left hand that was more obvious to prove I was in fact a married lady. Speaking of which, I have been married over eight years and have an almost two year old little boy.

My little guy was born on a Tuesday, and he is the most observant little boy I've ever met. I'm not ashamed to admit that I'm a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, or a Mormon as we're more commonly known, I think. And my little boy has been close to heaven since the day he was born. At a young age, he's learned to fold his arms for prayers and says "Bless you" after he or someone else sneezes. My little angel, born on a Tuesday is full of grace.

My husband, was born on a Thursday. When I think back to the poem I chuckle quietly to myself because it is so fitting for my little family of three. When I first met my husband, he wanted to study international business, then he decided to go the route of business management (not that different right?) all while working for a student loan company. Then he got laid off and had to find a job. He doesn't do well with not having anything to do. He came across a company that seemed to fit for him, however menial his tasks seemed. It was while working at this job that he got heavy in economics, specifically the Austrian Economics philosophy of economics (if you are even at all interested, my husband would be so proud first of all and secondly, here is the address http://mises.org/) Then, he decided he wanted to become an Economics teacher. When he realized that he would have to take too many classes to cover an undergrad degree in Economics, the idea of becoming an instructor in the field waned. He, I hope, has found a joy in his current line of work. It would certainly open a lot of doors for him to attend economic conferences with the Mises Institute in his spare time as a hobby. This Thursday's child has far to go and has gone far too.

I will try and post once a week as I work through Natalie Goldberg's "Writing Down the Bones" an excellent book to help the writer who doesn't want to give up on writing. I wish I could say I was this excited to go through her book when I had to for college creative writing class, but here's to trying. I'm somewhat glad that college bookstores are terrible for trying to sell gently used books back, but I probably wouldn't be in possession of half the books I bought if the bookstore took them back.

~ Lady Jane