When my adorable husband and I first started dating, he introduced me to prospecting. That is digging for gold. It isn’t something that will make us rich some day, but I have learned to appreciate the process, and I actually consider it to be fun, peaceful and a great way to spend time with him. Our gold digging has taken us to the great outdoors at the San Pedro Mountains, Pilar, Red River, and for course my home town of Taos. If you haven’t been to these places I highly suggest you pack up your stuff and take a road trip. These places are full of  beautiful mountains with lots of new trails to explore. You do need to be careful with the rattle snakes though, I had to save Dan from one at one time,but that is another story for another time. I truly believe that the mountains are  God’s country… wild, free, and just breath taking.

Finding gold is not easy. The first step is knowing where to dig. Digging is something I am not rather good at, (or rather I don’t find rather luxurious), so I leave that part up to Dan. So while he digs and digs I enjoy the beauty that surrounds me and the love that I feel deep inside and out. Sometimes I enjoy a good book.

When the digging is over, the fun part begins. Panning. Now panning is interesting because you need a lot of water. In order to find gold in the dirt, you have to wash away the dirt. Apparently gold is a heavy metal, so it sinks to the bottom of the pan. So very slowly and carefully, you wash away all the dirt, and then poof, gold appears!  I am always fascinated with this process because when you look the big pile of dirt before you, you can’t see any gold. Add some water, clean up the dirt and then holy shit, GOLD!  It’s like catching fish when you’ve been fishing all day, or finishing up a beautiful project of some sort- there is satisfaction in the hard work you put in.

The other day when Dan and I were enjoying an IPA and panning for gold, something special came to mind.  So special that I smiled and laughed and  filled with joy when I once again found little specs of gold in the dirt. WHY? Because that something special is me and you! Think about it. Don’t we all have a little gold in us too? The little spec of precious shiny stuff inside of us, hiding in the dirt. The shiny stuff that is worth so much and is so precious and valuable. It’s the unique essence of what makes us who we are. Our character, our values, our personality and mostly our capacity to love.

I know, I know,  we tend to only notice “the dirt” that we don’t realize that there is gold in there. Sometimes the dirt seems so heavy and dense that there is no way gold can be hiding in there. Or sometimes we think our dirt is too dirty, so why would something so beautiful, so precious and so valuable be hiding there? Or worse, maybe we know about the gold inside of us but we hide it! We hide it because our specs are not as big as the others. Or we think our shiny precious light is not enough so we pretend we don’t have any.

Maybe what is even worse than that, is when we do discover our gold and we share it with other people, but instead of accepting it as a precious gift, they laugh at us or reject us! They tell us our gold is too small, or not enough. Or they get scared and tell us to hide it because the world just doesn’t want our gold. Or they become angry and jealous because they don’t want to discover thier own gold, or compare ours to theirs and find thiers inadequate so they make us feel inadequate. So we think the best solution is to keep our gold a secret and keep showing off our dirt instead, so that others are not threatened or angry with us. How sad but true! Here is why….

We don’t give people an adequate amount of time to surprise us. We see nothing but dirt and we judge them, shame them, blame them or cast stones at them. We interact with them a few times and make a judgment. A judgement, in my opinion, that is not accurate. You really do need to take the time to know someone before tossing them away, or talking negative about them.

I know for a fact that I am not the same person I was ten years ago. I also know that I do my best to be better than I was yesterday. I work hard to find the gold inside me and to let it shine. It’s easy to reminisce in shame and regret rather then with grace and forgiveness. I think the water that washes the dirt away is just that- grace and forgiveness. The more we give people grace and forgiveness the more they will soon realize that they are worthy.

I need to do better at seeing the gold in people. I need to realize that we are all in the same boat as far as trying to wash away the dirt. I know I can’t control other people and I can’t wash away their dirt for them. I can tell them I see the gold there, but I can’t make them see it for themselves. More love, more grace, more forgiveness. That is all we can do.

What I struggle with the most, is when others don’t see the gold in me. I want to physically open their eyes, and show them that it is there. I suppose it’s the insecure little girl inside me that cares if this person sees me or not. As I grow up and mature, I realize that it is out of my control and is none of my business what others think of me. However, it especially hurts when it’s someone who you care about and no matter how much effort you put into making the relationship work, they refuse.

This is my philosophy when it comes forgiveness- when we withhold our forgiveness to someone, it is essentially an act of self-righteousness. Forgiveness is simply a reminder that I am on equal ground with every other child of God. We all fuck up. We all have dirt in our lives. Who are we to withhold our forgiveness as if we have never fucked up or indulged in our dirt before?

My friends, we will never fully know what motives or circumstances that cause another’s behavior.

I truly believe that to find gold in others, is to also find gold in yourself. That means to give them the benefit of the doubt, because more than likely they are doing the best they can.

I suppose there are times that the dirt is so thick and dense we can’t see the gold. We forget or chose not to see it is there- but it’s there, I promise. Give them enough time and they will surprise you.  All I know is that it is there. It is in you too. And maybe when we summon up the courage to let the world know, maybe the world will see the gold too. Maybe the world will start to be more accepting and less judgy, and then when we encounter one another, we will see the gold that is there, hiding in the dirt, and smile with joy and love, rather than with disgust and judgement. Even if the gold is tiny little specs. We will notice them in others because we know it is in us. And then we can stop the hiding and the pretending and just let our gold shine!

I saw this post on my Facebook feed this morning:

“As Men we often take for granted the ultimate sacrifice women have to make during the 9 month pregnancy process. Her body will go through unbelievable changes. She will be at risk of several different serious health issues. Her eating habits will increase. Her moods will swing. Her sleeping patterns will adjust. He self esteem will take a hit. And most importantly her life will be at risk. But we unfairly expect her body to snap back in place as if she was the mother on the Incredibles. She will be left with battle marks and scars. She will try and hide them. She will struggle everyday with the feeling of if she is attractive enough. But the reality is, she has sacrificed her body and vanity to bring a life into this world. We should cherish her, compliment her daily and let her know that she is even more beautiful now than before.”

I teared up when I read that. One, it was written from a man. Two, my tummy looks similar to the picture above. Three, I have had issues with my body image since having children.

I know I can’t change society’s perspective on what female beauty is, and even though I see posts like this one, and super models advocating about what is “real” beauty, it’s all bullshit.  Our society puts way too much pressure on us women to look a certain way. So much so, we are willing to “sacrifice” our own life to go under the knife and change our bodies. If that is not an option, we will starve ourselves, purge and take extreme measures to accomplish an unrealistic view.

Before I met Dan, and after my divorce, I dated a man 15 years my senior, who thought it would be a good idea to “buy” me new boobs and a tighter tummy. He actually made me an appointment for a consultation with a plastic surgeon. This was the beginning of the end for that relationship. Not only did I begin to feel insecure about my naked body, I discovered he had a secret that most people would consider sociably acceptable. That secret, however, not only ended our relationship, but destroyed my self-esteem.

It took me a few years to feel good about myself again. I met a wonderful man and then one year later I got knocked up, my third pregnancy. Since I was a bit older with this one, I gained a lot of weight. What’s so funny is how people thought it was okay to verbalize their opinion on how I looked. My favorite was, “WOW! Are you in a lot of pain?” The most common remark was, “Are you having twins?”  Even now, I still have a bit of baby fat around the waist and still get snarky remarks. Isn’t it funny how I was told I was too skinny when I was younger, to now being told I carry a little too much around the waist. And then we wonder why us girls struggle with body image?

I could go on and on about this topic, (perhaps another time) but it’s not really what I want to write about. What I do want to discuss isn’t easy for me to write about. I know it won’t be easy to read either, so I ask you to bear with me for just a few more minutes.

I know having a baby is one the joyous moments of a person’s life. As the gentleman on the above post stated, a woman goes through a lot of changes- not only physically, but emotionally as well. Sometimes women go through the baby blues, and other times postpartum depression ensues.

Postpartum depression (PD) is tricky- but very real. It isn’t a black and white condition- in fact it can capture it’s victim in many forms. My PD was severe enough I wanted to die. I wasn’t suicidal, just kept thinking and believing I would have been better off dead- that my family would be better off if I was dead. I isolated myself as well, and was angry at the world. Of course those are just words on a screen, going through emotions like that isn’t easy and isn’t easy to describe.

What makes PD worse is that the people around you don’t understand what the fuck is wrong with you. Those close to me, besides my husband, probably had no idea. I mean having a baby means joy and warmth and love and rainbows and butterflies- not grief, anger, pain and boy was there a lot of pain.

I am not sure what it is about pregnancy that suddenly a woman’s body is no longer her own. It’s like all the rights are stripped away once conception takes place. She can’t eat that, or drink this– she’s not gaining enough, she’s gaining too much– natural birth vs. epidural. I just don’t understand why suddenly a pregnant woman is nothing but an incubator and no longer a person. Just ask any pregnant woman who has had strangers touch her belly. We would never just put our hand on a stranger’s belly, but for some reason we think it’s okay to do so if she is pregnant.

So here is a personal story for you. It is my story and I feel strongly that it needs to be told and heard. Please take note that this not told in judgment or blame. It’s just what happened.

When my third baby came into this world, she came via cesarean section. I labored for more than 14 hours(maybe more than that, I really don’t want to remember) and even though I was almost completely dilated, she wouldn’t drop. My epidural didn’t take either, so even though I couldn’t feel my legs, I could feel every hard contraction. The last contraction I had, her heart beat dropped significantly, so much so that the doctor stated that I needed to have a C-section. The hard news was given to me as they were prepping for surgery. Since the epidural was not working I was to be put completely under and my husband was not allowed to be in the room.

Naturally I was terrified. I had never been under before so I wasn’t sure what to expect.

Everything went black.

When I came to, I was shaking, cold and my womb was empty. My husband was  holding our daughter trying to comfort me,  but I couldn’t hold her. I had missed the first precious moments of her birth. I had planned on doing skin to skin moments after birth, and then nurse her. I was looking forward to having a life moment with my husband since this would be his first experience having a baby.

It wasn’t until a few days later that I found out other people met and held my newborn while I was still unconscious. I can’t explain in words how upsetting that was for me. Not only was I disappointed in having a cesarean, a cesarean where I was completely unconscious, but I was heart broken that I couldn’t be with my husband the moment she was born.

The first year of her life was very difficult emotionally. Lack of sleep, sore nipples, healing from the C-section, and processing what happened at her birth.

We are so hard on women sometimes. The gentleman in the post said, “But we unfairly expect her body to snap back in place as if she was the mother on the Incredibles” I know he was referring to her physical body, but we need to be more sensitive and aware of her emotional well being as well.  It is unfair to expect a woman suffering from PD to snap out of it and go back to “normal” in a time frame that is convenient for everyone else.

What was most upsetting was the lack of support I received. I was somehow “over reacting” or needed to “get over it.” See, because I was unconscious, meant that I shouldn’t have been upset that other people met and held my baby before me. I should be happy that the baby and I were healthy- who cares if I had a cesarean.

The message I received was that I was only an incubator. My feelings on the kind of birth I wanted and grieving over the loss of that was somehow selfish and unnecessary- so I felt even worse about myself for feeling that way because I wasn’t SUPPOSE to feel that way. I was suppose to be happy. PD is something a person just cannot control.

It’s taken a couple of years, with a lot of therapy and the grace of Prozac (I love you Prozac!)  where I am finally starting to feel like myself again.

I can look back and not feel as emotional, although it still brings a ting of regret, but I learned a great lesson.

I would rather be a kind, forgiving, loving and gentle soul, than have a body that society thinks I should have. A woman’s beauty is not her skin, or hair, or a Victoria Secret body, but how brave and courageous she is in times of adversity, to stand up to the bullies of this world and to love her family unconditionally. Sometimes being brave is asking for help when you need it. Sometime acts of courage is forgiving others. Sometimes being kind is saying good-bye to relationships that are harmful. Sometimes beauty is in what we do for others, and not what we put on.

I wish we could stop praising and criticizing our looks, and start noticing the bravery and the beauty we bring to the world. Imagine our conversations and Facebook posts consisting of “I was nicer today then I was yesterday.” or “I brought beauty to my home today when I listened to my child talk about her world.” or “I finally forgave him.” Instead we focus on the physical- we notice she doesn’t wear make-up or she wears too much. We notice the big boobs- or lack of. We notice the kind of clothing she is wearing-or lack of.

We rarely take the time to really know someone. To know if they are struggling with the confusing and painful issues of depression. To know if they need help. To know if they need space. To know if they need support.

A woman is so much more than her looks, and her body- and a woman who is pregnant or has been pregnant, doesn’t deserve our harsh judgment. There is always more to her story than she gives- so be kind, be loving or just shut the fuck up.

Love Always.

When I was in the first grade I was beginning to learn how to read. I was put in the lowest reading group in my class because I still could not decode the letters into words. For some reason I found it difficult to do. I was jealous of the higher reading groups because they made it seem so easy.

I come from a family where it isn’t too common to have a higher education. In fact, my own mother never graduated high school. She dropped out of the eighth grade to help her single mom pay the bills. Four years later she met my dad and started a family. My dad was able to finish high school, but did not pursue any education beyond that. His mother, my dear and faithful Grandmother, never went to school. In fact she never learned to read. So growing up, I didn’t have bed time stories or some one reading to me in my pre-school years. So it makes sense I was put in the lowest reading group in my first grade class.

What I find most interesting about this story, is that not only did my Grandma not know how to read, she only knew about a handful of English words. Her native tongue is Spanish. So there was a bit of a language barrier, but somehow we always managed to communicate- we understood each other just fine. I believe that is how true love works. Love only knows one language.

So being the little naive girl I was, and of course since I was determined to get out of the lowest reading group, I made a deal with my Grandma. If she would teach my how to speak Spanish I would teach her how to read. Little did I know that teaching a woman how to read in English when she only spoke Spanish would be quite challenging- not to mention that I still didn’t couldn’t read either. It sounded like a good idea at the time.

As you probably guessed, I didn’t learn Spanish and my Grandmother didn’t learn to read. We did, however, had a great time trying. We spent a lot of time in her front porch, after she was done making her homemade tortillas, and I would sit on her lap and practice, I mean, teach her how to read. The book of choice was called, “There’s NO Such Thing as a Dragon,” by Jack Kent. It’s a cute little story of a little boy who finds a dragon in his room. The dragon is small at first, and then when the little boy tells his mom about the dragon, she doesn’t believe him, she tells him, “There’s no such thing as a dragon.” The mother’s unbelief causes the dragon to grow, because if there is no such thing as a dragon, then there was no need to tell the dragon to stop growing. Eventually the dragon gets so big it filled the entire house and relocates it to another part of the city. The only way the dragon was able to shrink back to its original size was when they admitted his existence.

It was the first book I could read all by myself. By the end of the year, I was placed in a higher reading group. I now hold a Bachelor’s Degree in Accounting and a Master’s Degree in Elementary Education and teach English to a bunch of stinky 7th and 8th graders.

I had to work harder then some of my peers because I didn’t have the support from home. If you read any of my other posts, you know what I mean. I do remember my dad helping with a few  school projects, but that was about as much support as my sister and I got. (My student loan balance would agree with me!)

There is a lot of anger and confusion these days with what is going on with public education. All I know is that if it wasn’t for public education I wouldn’t be where I am today. Public education gave me the tools I needed to be a productive member of society and it taught me a lot more than just math, science and reading. Public schools are more than just a place to conduct experiments and recite poetry, for some children it is a place of wonder, a place of belonging, and a place to learn about what it means to be successful and what it means to fail. School gives us friends, and teaches us how to stand up for ourselves. School is only the doorway not the destination.

I am weary when I hear the people around me talk about their apathy as if it’s something to be proud of- they say that they don’t have time to vote for our local school board- They say teachers don’t matter because it’s the parents who make their kids successful- they say it doesn’t matter who our Secretary of Education is because in the end it’s the support they get from home that makes our country great!

I suppose there is some truth to those statements- but like most statements with a lot of fluff and glitter, it isn’t the WHOLE truth.

Just like the dragon in the children’s story, we deny the existence of our apathy and so it grows and grows and grows until one day it’s so big it fills the White House, our local government, our communities, our schools and then our homes.

What more needs to happen before we realize that it is our apathetic attitudes that have caused this mess- does public education need to disappear completely? God I hope not! I can’t imagine a country, a world that only the privileged and well off families are allowed a decent education. Honestly I don’t think we realize just how horrifying that thought really is.

I am thankful for the people in my life who didn’t have this attitude that their kid was the only kid that mattered. I am thankful that the few who saw something great in me pushed me, and encouraged me. I am thankful that I learned to be respectful, and courteous from my teachers and peers instead of looking down on me as some sort of burden to society.

We are all in this together my friends. The children who don’t have the support from home NEED us- as much as we will NEED them one day.

The argument goes: picking up the slack where others lack is unfair, but if that’s the whole truth then read my post on Pro-life. We have NO RIGHT to ban abortion and then not give a decent education to those children.  To force a woman to raise a child without us graciously picking up the slack is to deny human rights to that child. How dare we sit back and do nothing or think our problems are going to go away without us doing our part to help a child get the education they deserve and have a right to.  Otherwise it’s hypocritical to be pro-life and then be apathetic, judgmental and indifferent to the needs of that mother and child.

It does matter! Our votes matter! Our Secretary of Education Matters, in both the federal and local offices. Who put into the Governors’ Mansion matters!! Teachers matter!!!!! ALL CHILDREN MATTER!!!!

Until we admit the truth- the dragon will grow and grow and grow….

 

 

 

I am about to reveal just how old I am by telling you that I first learned how to type on an actual typewriter. Not one of those electric ones where you can plug-in the margins and type on a small screen and then it magically appears on your paper. I am talking about the typewriters where you literally had to change the ribbon  when you ran out of ink, and there was this great satisfactory fulfillment when you heard the ding as it approached the end of the paper and then swish the handle and start over again. Mistakes were unforgiving, because if you made a mistake, you better have some white out or start over.

My first typewriter was a gift from my grandfather a.k.a. Pita. I am not sure why he was called Pita, it was a name we had always called him. I have never known him by any other name. Henceforth, Pita is what we will call him from now on. Pita in my youthful eyes was a gentle old man who loved his family very much. He was also very tough and one hell of a cook, I can still smell the fresh red chili with lamb (a lamb he butchered himself). He adored both my sister and I, but I can admit that he adored my sister a tad more. Heck, I don’t blame him. Pita was also famous for making wood furniture with the classic Spanish Carvings, and boy, did that man love to fish. Every fond memory I have growing up revolves some sort of fishing trip. Our favorite fishing spot was a beautiful lake up North called Eagles Nest Lake. I learned to hook a worm and gut a fish before I learned how to put on eye liner. My love for nature definitely comes from my family taking me fishing and camping. There is just something about being in the open wilderness that makes my heart full.

Pita was also notorious for being quite frugal. Perhaps he was this way because he was always rather poor. I remember waiting in line when free food was being distributed- I was always so frazzled that they didn’t give away Twinkies. However, they did have the best cheese I ever tasted. This cheese was very similar to Velveeta, it came in a box and did not need to be refrigerated. It was good, good! This was also the first time I was introduced to powered milk. That milk wasn’t so bad when mixed with corn flakes and about 4 tablespoons of sugar. I love you sugar, but damn you for the cavities!

Going to the local dump was also a past time Pita enjoyed. I know it sounds rather odd for us moderners, because really, the dump. Mostly he went there to dump junk he needed to get rid of, and sometimes my sister and I would tag along. If she was telling this story to you right now, she would probably go on about what an awful brat I was because I wanted Pita to stop the truck and give me the red ball that was hanging on the telephone wire- you know those red balls to help airplanes see these wires so they don’t crash. I wanted that ball sooooooo bad. I like balls. Just ask my hubby. So anyway, my sister would probably exaggerate on the kind of fit I threw, about how I cried and cried and how I ruined  everyone’s trip to the dump. But she would be exaggerating, because I knew how to take no as an answer.

If you have never visited a dump, I recommend it. It’s certainly not a place to take someone on your first date, but it certainly puts perspective into you. WE THROW AWAY A TON OF SHIT PEOPLE!  That’s all I’m going to say about that.

So one day when I was happily playing with my Barbie doll, and it just might be that Barbie and Ken were about to get it on, when Pita showed up with a typewriter. It came with a cover and the ribbon was still good. He handed it to me and said, “Here, hita, for you.” I took it, put on my bed, looked for a clean sheet of paper and tested it out. He told me he found it at the dump. I didn’t care.

For the next few weeks my nose was glued to that piece of machine. In fact, I wrote stories that only a child would create. I wrote about “The Secret of the Stuffed Animals.” It was about the stuffed animals on my bed and how they only came alive when people were not around. They would then go on these grand adventures and somehow make it back in time before anyone knew they were gone. Sometimes one wouldn’t make it back and it would explain why we sometimes couldn’t find one of our favorite stuffed animal. Sound familiar? It should, because Disney stole that idea from me! You know the famous “Toy Story” animation. Fuck you Disney and Pixar for making something I thought of into a master piece!  That’s all I’m going to say about that.

It’s a good thing I have this blog now, that way whatever great idea I come up with next won’t be stolen from me, since I now  have copy rights to everything I write here- so take that Disney! Ha Ha!

I don’t know what happened to that typewriter. Maybe it ended back at that dump. Maybe someone who eventually works at Pixar found it and then found the story and that’s how Toy Story came into being. Maybe I am overly dramatic. Maybe. I do know this though– My Pita knew, somehow knew, that I would love that typewriter. I didn’t even know he knew I enjoyed writing. When he was at the dump he saw this old beat up typewriter that someone didn’t want anymore, and thought of me. He took it home, polished it up, gave it a tune up and then delighted to see me write with it. What I loved so much about him was that he was always like that- taking something or someone who was unwanted and then making it shine again. He took two little girls and loved them so that they would shine one day.

Pita died when I was 12 at our favorite lake on June 4, 1990. So this little post is dedicated to you Pita. I know you are proud when see how brightly your girls are shining.

Love Always.