Boy and Young Man

This week my boy was sick!  He eats poorly whenever he gets the chance and has still to master the importance of hydration, although he is getting better, however the result is that he seems a bit more prone than some to the usual nasty stuff that goes around when the seasons change.   I grew up missing very little to almost no school but in fairness also not getting sick very often.  I think it is for these reasons that when the boys are sick I tend to be more of the “soldier on” type as opposed to the “start pumping you full of medicine” type.  I have always believed that for the most part, the body can handle most of what is thrown its way and that it naturally gets more resilient if you let it fend off what ails it.   I am that mother that once received a call from the school nurse who said, and I quote, “this child should never have been sent to school today.”  She was right and I was wrong on that occasion.

Fast forward to Tuesday afternoon and the school was calling saying he had a slight temperature but did not need to be picked up unless we decided to do so; nothing alarming about that.  When I arrived home he was covered in blankets and was my little boy rather than the teenager and emerging young man of late.  He wanted his Mum and the hugs and comfort she brings and it was nice to be needed by him.  I thought I should get him moving around and get his mind off being sick (remember Me, the mother who says “soldier on”) so I announced that since the weather was getting cooler we needed to go and check out the latest fashions and get jeans.  Being in 8^th grade and at a critical point in terms of what he wears and what others think of it, this boy enjoys a good shopping trip.  It was not a good sign when he turned it down and I immediately knew we might be dealing with something more serious than a cough.  Between Tuesday evening and waking up on Wednesday morning his temperature had spiked.  At least he was sleeping soundly so I let the school know that they would have to muddle through without him that day.  He slept the day away but mustered up the energy on Wednesday afternoon to go to the Health Fair with us so I thought we were past the worse.  I was so gladdened by the signs of recovery that I offered Subway to this sweet loving boy with no energy.  This is another relative rarity carried over from my childhood.  We didn’t eat out every week and when we did it meant something.  In most ways I think I have turned out alright despite the lack of dining out in my childhood so we tend to make dinner for the boys and enjoy the family time around the table.  One day when I have the stamina I will document meal times at our house!  Again, the offer was not met with enthusiasm so I knew we were not out of the woods yet and even though I didn’t want him to be sick I was enjoying this boy who needed me to care for him. 

Impressively, the next morning he got himself up and out the door at his usual incredibly early time to start the learning day at 7:25am.  The call from the school came an hour later and I scooted over there to collect a boy who was shivery and pale.  He walked listlessly into my arms and I helped him to the car and fussed over him.  I had arrived at the crossroads and decided to call the doctor’s office and describe his symptoms which now also included headache and frequent full body evacuation (if you know what I mean).  They suggested bringing him in since we apparently have an outbreak of listeria in Colorado and some nasty viruses going around.  Once we stepped foot in that office, while the energy did not return his independent streak did and he answered every question maturely and honestly without any help from me.  There was no exaggeration to get sympathy and if he didn’t understand the medical terms he asked.  I was looking at my little boy but I was hearing someone on his way to becoming a man.  It was such a twilight zone in his growth.  At the same time as being proud of my young man, once we got back in the car armed with a prescription for a virus that would run its course in 7 to 8 days, I was happy that he is still my little boy. 

I Am

Have you ever seen the project that many children do at the beginning of the school year where they draw a picture of themselves and describe who they are and what they like beginning each sentence with “I am…”?  It helps the teachers and students learn about each other and perhaps it helps our children think about who they are and what matters to them.  It helps them see themselves in their different roles; son or daughter, sibling, cousin, grandchild, player of sports, lover of music, and so on.  I thought I’d give it a try; it’s random but aren’t we all ;o)

I am a little girl and a grown woman

I am a daughter and a daughter-in-law

I am a mother and a stepmother to our four fabulous boys

I am a wife and I am madly in love with my husband

I am proud of our family

I am an orphan but I am not alone

I am a best friend who needs her friends more than they know

I am a sister, a sister-in-law and an aunt

I am a colleague and a student and I want more from life

I am strong and I am weak

I am angry that my parents had to miss so much

I am thankful for a family that welcomed my sons and I in with their open hearts

I am a cyclist who feels a bond with other cyclists and checks out their bikes

I am excited and sometimes cry when others cross the finish line

I am aware of the beating of my sons’ hearts

I am a Steelers’ fan

I am awed by the mountains and I am inconsequential

I am hurt when I am excluded

I am addicted to my morning coffee and the welcome of my Starbucks

I am a reader who gets lost in the moments of other lives

I am a writer because it helps me understand myself a bit better

I am a drinker of wine and beer, but not at the same time

I am finally confident enough to dance and sing aloud (even though I am terrible)

I am shy and it surprises me that others find me intimidating

I am sociable and love to laugh because it connects me to others

I am thrilled when my husband walks through the door

I am happy in company and need time alone

I am at peace with a good book and chocolate

I am organized but I want to be less controlling

I am trying to write something meaningful that will one day change a life

I am Nicola

Let's Not Be Strangers

One of our middle schoolers started drama club recently and for their second meeting this week everyone was asked to give a monologue.  We were quite amused when he said he was doing a monologue with his friend but resisted the temptation to point out that this is a dialogue.  In the end his friend was not able to make it to drama club so in the spirit of the best of actors, he improvised.  He quickly scanned a book of ideas for monologues and gave what must have been a fabulous performance because the teacher was very impressed. 

He also came home with an observation; people like to imitate the British accent.  Apparently several of his peers, when giving their monologues had chosen to deliver them using a British accent.  We had a chuckle because he feels that he is “qualified” to assist in this area since his Stepmom is English and frequently is asked to perform British-isms at the dinner table.  Requests for “Say tomato, say banana…” are made with a certain level of frequency but the two the fellas like the most are “garage” and “missile”, the latter being the one that solicits the most amusement and pleas of “Say it again, say it again.”  Not only has our thespian started to master the differences in the accent, he has also noticed that there are different dialects and is working on those too.  Fairly soon he’ll be ready to pass as a Londoner in London! 

Amid all the fun, I started to think about the meaning and relevance of where we are born, our nationality, and patriotism, especially on this 10^th anniversary of 9/11.  My Dad once said that where you are born is purely an accident of birth and I find that to be true.  My older son was born in America and my younger son was born in England quite by chance; there was no plan or design or deep desire to have a child born in the motherland, it simply happened through life’s rich pattern of circumstances.  I have now lived almost half my life in America and it is home just as much as England is home, which means I appreciate the differences and also think we are bound together as people by things far greater than the soil where we are born.

I was in England when 9/11 traumatized this great nation and received the horrified phone calls at my parents’ house telling me to turn on the television.  It was as surreal there as it was here but I don’t think I can ever fully imagine what it was like to be in America that day and the subsequent days.  Friends and family have told me how stunned everyone was and how they felt they were barely functioning because everyone’s beliefs were shaken and there was no reasonable way to understand what had happened.  Arriving back two weeks later, I noticed it made us all kinder to each other in the following weeks and months as we realized that there are some fundamental values that we hold dear and they had been violated in the worst possible manner.

Yesterday I was checking out at the grocery store and a lady leaned over very quietly to the soldier in uniform and said, “Thank you for serving.”  Very humbly he quietly replied “Thank you for saying that.  No-one should forget and no-one should be forgotten.”  There are people everyday that are willing to die for this county, that are willing to put their lives on the line for me and my family.  To them and their families, I want to say thank you; the way we talk and the name of the town where we were born plays a role in who we are but ultimately it is the allegiance we have to one another and our way of life that supersedes all else.  We are strangers     but we are all in this together and there is nowhere I am prouder to live and work and raise a family.  Families I will never meet and thank have suffered the ultimate loss for my family and other servicemen and women and first responders live with that threat everyday.  Thank you, all of you…you inspire me to be kinder and more understanding everyday knowing that you are out there building a safe place for us to live together. 

Bike Geek

At some point this week I realized I may be become a cycling geek.  Not just someone who enjoys cycling, but actually a bit of a cycling geek!  Upon reflection, I think this process has been working insidiously in the background for some time but my full emergence from the cycling closet has been accelerated with two notable events in the last few days. 

The transformation must have started about eight years ago because before that, at least as an adult, I went on the occasional bike ride on my pretty heavy mountain bike but was not the instigator of these activities.  For a while, it was a way to get some exercise without having to be confined to the sometimes claustrophobic atmosphere of the gym.  Eventually I was persuaded that real bike riders go clipless and had these egg beater contraptions installed instead of platform pedals.  After a couple of painful “leg plants” I finally got the hang of disengaging my cleat from the pedal before I fell on my right knee…again.  I tackled a lot of obstacles I was not ready for on my mountain bike and in the process inflicted some pretty nice cuts, bruises, scrapes, and one small but well-earned scar.  That is when I took pause and jumped at the opportunity to ride my mountain bike on the road with a couple of friends riding road bikes.

I immediately loved it.  It felt natural and the hard work was gratifying but now the dilemma became whether or not I should invest in a road bike.  I started to shop and test rode some bikes but I still was not ready to donate several, and I mean several, paychecks to this worthy cause.  I carried on riding and little by little got stronger and enjoyed myself more and more.  I never expected in my mid-30s to happen upon an activity that made me feel so true to myself.  The fight was over and I handed over the money in exchange for my new, lightweight, shiny road bike.  It did not have the top of the line components, nor was it the kind of bike that makes people cycle up next to you and say “Wow, nice bike” but it was 10 lbs lighter than my mountain bike and felt about a hundred times faster. 

Fast forward through several years and witness me cycling several times a week when preparing for a ride, tackling my first century and then several more, and riding RAGBRAI last year.  For my last birthday, my amazing husband built and presented me with a lightweight mountain bike so that we could load up both road and mountain bikes for our weekends away exploring.  Yet it really was just this week that I realized that I often think in terms of bikes and frequently experience the cycling high, hence my impending geekdom.  My first awakening was when we took the fellas to Denver last Sunday to see the final portion of the last stage of the USA Pro Cycling Challenge which had kicked off in Colorado Springs just six days earlier.  I choked up with excitement when those incredibly fast Tour de France winners flew past us five times on the final loop.  I could barely breathe, I had a lump in my throat and I definitely could not operate the camera; thankfully our youngest took over and got some incredibly good shots instead.  I was shaking with the sheer joy of being close to something so momentous.  See, I sound like a geek!

My second moment of awareness came when, barely recovered from the Pro Cycling Challenge excitement, but now back in the work setting a few days later, a small group of us worked on putting the finishing touches to a client’s proposed campaign.  The client was requesting more quantity for the same already cut-to-the-bone cost and of course high caliber results.  Without realizing it I parroted a passionate cyclist friend, who if he reads this will know who he is (thank you for letting me steal this), and lectured to the following point.  “This situation is like buying a bike.  There are three things that must be balanced and considered when selecting a bike; weight, strength, and cost.  You can have any two of the three but you cannot have all three.  For example, you can have a bike that is light and strong and it’s going to cost you, or you can have a bike that is light and cheap but it won’t be as durable, or you can have a bike that can take a beating and is cheap and it will weigh a little more.  In each scenario, an element has to be sacrificed to some degree so which one is it and who’s going to tell the client?”  I beamed victoriously around the room and they gave me that look of bemused disbelief they often give me.  I realized they were giving me the “what a geek” look and I was irrationally happy that my destiny as a bike geek in the workplace was forever sealed in cycling analogies.  Bike geeks of the world unite!