Stupid Layouts

Well, it occurred to me finally that though I liked my old layout, it wasn't the most interesting thing in the world. And though I may not myself actually be the most interesting thing in the world, I like to think that I am at least a little interesting, and it would be nice if the appearance of my blog reflected that. So off I went in search of a new layout for my blog.

And then I was immediately reminded of two things: one, the world (as it is represented by the inernet) is an extremely big place. And two: I am not good at anything more technologically advanced than an egg beater. So it took me most of my free time yesterday (which is probably a couple of hours in real time), but I did find a layout that I liked and that seemed to function with the limited instructions I was able to give it. ("Here. Go here. Be Pretty.")

So please let me know what you think. How does it look? Should I just go back to the old look? Does the new one work on computers other than mine? Are you there, Internet? It's me, Kendra. Any and all feedback is appreciated, since it lets me know I'm not completely talking to myself here.

Come Together, Right Now, Over Me...

I've been thinking a lot about community and what it means. I started a blog partly to reach out to a world from which I've felt very isolated. I wanted to feel like I am making some kind of meaningful connection with all the other people in the world. And between writing here, following several other blogs, and commenting there, I've really started to feel less alone; I feel like there are a lot of people out there in the world who make sense to me. I read a blog and read the comments left there by other readers, then follow those readers over to their blogs, and before I know it, I feel like I've discovered this whole hidden world of people who, in another world or several years ago, might have been the girls I went out drinking with in college, the ones who told me whether my professor was actually being a jerk, whether I ought to just quit my bartending job, and yes, whether that guy was in fact worth my time.

Now, my darling husband, God bless him, has no faith in the internet at all. As far as he's concerned, it's just a way for people to scam other people. He uses it, checking his email regularly and checking sports scores, but you would never find him on a message board or Facebook. He just fundamentally doesn't trust them. So after I read about the tragedy that was Maddie's passing, I immediately went and made a donation to the March of Dimes in her name. Just $10, not a huge sum, but it seemed like it would be an even greater tragedy if I knew there was something I could do to prevent losses like this and I didn't do anything at all. Shortly after that, Stephanie of Baby on Bored suggested that if people wanted to help, she would organize efforts to send Maddie's family meals for the next couple of weeks. I can only imagine what her family is going through and would guess that eating is not one of the things they're thinking about much. So I offered to send them a meal one day.

Later that evening, my husband opened the computer and saw the automated March of Dimes email thanking me for my donation. He immediately asked who I'd met on the internet that I was giving money to. I explained that a family had lost their daughter, and I'd made a donation to the March of Dimes for them--totally reputable charity. He said that was fine, but remember that you can't trust people on the internet; they could be anyone, running any kind of scam. He went on to use this example: "If you meet someone in the grocery store who says they just lost a $20 bill, give them $20. But don't just hand out money online." Okay, I agree with the last part of that--don't send your bank account number to the Nigerian prince, because you're not going to get the money he promised you. But that guy at the grocery store? Dollars to donuts, he's running an even simpler scam. I decided not to start that argument with my husband and didn't mention that I would be sending this family a meal later in the week. He doesn't need to know everything.

But this got me started thinking about the very idea of community. Are relationships by definition more meaningful because of the way they started? I also belong to a message board. When I found out I was pregnant with Zachary, I didn't even know where to start, so I think I probably just Googled "pregnancy." I found a message board of women all due in the same month. Now our kids are all roughly 5 1/2, and I still keep in touch with most of them. My husband gives me a hard time about these "pretend" friends, but what about them isn't real? No, I haven't seen most of them in person. But we've known each other for more than 6 years. Doesn't that count for anything? When I read about Maddie, I was overwhelmed by this family and their story. And now I read about another little boy whose family is mourning today. And it's not that I sit around and search for bloogers who've lost their children; I assure you, I have no desire to track down that kind of story. It's just that as I try to feel connected to the other people in this world, bad things keep happening to those people. Has the world always been this cold, this uncaring, this just plain cruel, and I just didn't know it? Part of me wants to say, "Okay, this was fun, but I have to call it a failed experiment. I tried to connect to the world, and all that happened is that I found out that the world is full of pain I cannot heal. So I am going to crawl back into my hole, watch CSI, and complain that I don't have any friends. Because I can't take this kind of pain." But isn't this what it means to be part of a community? That you identify with one another in meaningful ways, and when someone in your community hurts, you remind them that they are not alone in their pain.

I didn't know Maddie or Thalon in life. I, probably like a lot of other people, got to know them only when they were gone. Does that make me nothing but a voyeur to other people's pain? I hope not. I hope that what it makes me is someone who is trying to establish connections in a world where it is so easy to go through life in a box. I hope it makes me one more thread in a web that can help to keep parents afloat in a time when it would be so easy to drown in their pain.

My husband talks a lot about things like the homeless people who gather in the public library; there is, he says, no substitute for actually seeing the people who populate our world, and it is a privilege to visit the world from our computers, one we should not accept as a substitute for "real interaction." And I would not want to live in a world where the only people in my life were seen through the screen of my computer. But I also want--need--to feel like the community that has been created this way is a real one, that I can be there for its members when they are in need and that maybe, someday, I can count on support from them too. And that's real community, isn't it?

Madeline Alice Spohr

I am not what you would call a person of faith. More like a person of doubt. I was raised in a church but have spent most of my adult life struggling with the most basic questions. I am deeply envious of people of faith, since they seem to have something to lean on when things are difficult. But on this day, I am calling out to whatever is out there, in a prayer of equal parts gratitude and confusion.

About 6 months ago, I got a copy of Sleep is for the Weak. It was funny and touching and introduced me to this world of mommy blogs--that though I didn't know them personally, there was this whole world of funny, supportive, smart women who were moms, just like me, dealing with kids just like mine. And I started reading these blogs--the ones I link to from my blog. These moms are so honest about their lives, so caring of their kids and their friends. And they make me feel so much less alone, in this world where I really don't have that many connections with other women.

Tuesday I learned for the first time of a little girl named Madeline Alice Spohr. Unfortunately I met her too late. What an ungodly tragedy to meet someone when it is too late to know her. I read of her on Baby on Bored and on Mommy Wants Vodka. And though it is always horrendous to learn of the loss of a child, something about Maddie has touched me deeply.

Maybe it is her beauty. She is so vibrant in all the photos I see, so very present, that it is so heart-wrenching to think that she is gone. Maybe it is the way I see she has touched the lives of people who have touched mine. Becky, of Mommy Wants Vodka, insists that "Because Maddie Alice Spohr was here, dammit, and she mattered." Yes, she was, and she did. Maybe it is because my own children are driving me crazy today. And as I try to deal with them and all their minor dramas, I am torn between finding it hard to focus on who stole what from who, with my mind full of the loss of a beautiful life, and wanting to scoop them up and hold them tight, so grateful am I that they are here to fight and scream and complain.

And maybe it's because this doesn't feel like something that happened to someone else, someone so unlike me. When I first read about Maddie, I went to her mother, Heather's, blog, to get a sense of who she was and who she had been. And as I read down the posts, I got her April Fool's Day post. Every year, I read or see something that reminds me why April Fool's Day is just about my favorite day of the year. Google's annual joke, or someone telling me they just got convinced that the government is going to start subsidizing pet health insurance. It's such a delightfully silly day, and I enjoy all the ways people celebrate it, with such wonderful humor. Heather's post was one of the best. An April Fool's grilled cheese sandwich, made with pound cake and frosting. She describes it so simply, even including pictures of the process--and, of course, of her dad falling victim to the prank. She had me smiling and thinking, "I'm going to have to try that one!" And at the end of the post, a picture of sweet Maddie, enjoying the prank and the laughter. And that got me. No matter what I'm doing, I keep stopping to think of that silly sandwich. Just such a beautiful, simple moment, the sort of thing that wouldn't really stand out in a life over all--except that to me, who only got to know her after she was gone, this is Maddie. Surrounded by people she loves, who love to laugh, who are just so much like us.

So I am reaching out today, to whoever is listening, whether reading this blog or up in the heavens somewhere. Thank you, thank you, with my whole heart and soul, for the safety and well being of my family. I know that I am lucky. But why? Why must another mother suffer a loss I can't imagine? I don't know if this pushes me further toward faith or doubt, only that it makes me feel more like there ought to be answers somewhere.

And the final reason I may feel so deeply the loss of Maddie: her name. I have been nervous about what to share in a blog. How private ought we to be? I don't want to be unsafe, in a world where you don't who you can trust. So I haven't shared much in the way of identifying information. Sure, if you knew me and you came across this blog, you'd almost certainly be able to identify it as mine. But a stranger wouldn't be able to track me down using the information in here. I haven't even shared my kids' names. But in honor of sweet Maddie, I'm going to trust the world a bit more. My kids are Zachary (5), Ezra (3), and Matilda (13 months)--Mattie. And every time I look at my chubby, spoiled, loud little Mattie, my heart breaks yet again for a family that has lost theirs.

I wish I could do something to ease the pain, but I wouldn't know where to start. Instead I will send them a meal from a friend they didn't know they had--one they didn't have until just now. And I will pray--for guidance, for answers, and for grieving families.

(If you would like to donate to the March of Dimes in her honor, visit http://remembermaddie.com/ and you will find instructions. It is the most tangible way I know to help a little life.)

Project Honesty

I recently heard an author comment that he found, in writing his memoir, that the more intensely personal he was in his writing, the more nakedly honest, the more universal he found that his message was. This was really a powerful insight to me, and I've been thinking about it a lot. Deep in our cores, we as humans are all really similar. We differ from one another in a lot of ways that are very important as well as in ways that are not at all important. But we are all afraid, we all want to love and be loved, we all want to matter. In the most important ways, we are exactly alike.


So in that spirit, I hereby launch Project Honesty. In each entry, I will discuss something about myself in as honest and open a way as I possibly can. It won't necessarily be of the "tell me something you've never told anyone before" variety, but it will be true. I will attempt to strip away all the things I usually say that make me look better, or that make me sound wittier, or that I just don't want to admit to. I will attempt to simply be honest.


Today's entry: No One Knows About This Blog

It's true. I have a husband, a few friends, a mother, a father, a sister, a brother; and none of them know about this blog. If anyone has read it, ever, it has been a stranger who either found it accidentally or who followed me here from a post on another blog. At first, I was just not sure what I was doing, and I was embarrassed that someone I know might read my words--sort of like my mom reading my diary, which is silly since you don't publish your diary on the internet if you want to keep it a secret. I was also concerned about how honest I would be able to be if I knew the people in my life were going to read it. I mean, it's a little hard to talk about my dad leaving my mom for a woman who was formerly my best friend... if I think any of them are going to read it. I read several other blogs, and I'm regularly amazed at how open they are with the details of their lives, not only with things like pictures of their kids but with being honest about things that I don't think the people in my life would love me sharing. I'm just not that comfortable with the idea of how unhappy people might be with what I'd say about them.

But now I just feel kind of dumb. My dad (who, despite having married my friend, is someone whose opinion matters to me) commented recently that he thought I ought to start a blog--because I'm such a good writer that I ought to easily become one of those people whose blogs gets read. Now, to be 100% honest, I think I'm a so-so writer. I read enough to have a good sense of what words look good together. I think I have a decent sense of humor, enough to recognize when something is witty though not necessarily enough to produce it myself. But mostly, I'm really good at spelling, commas and knowing when to use "your" and when to use "you're." I'm not really sure that makes me a good writer, it just makes me relatively good at passing for one.

So I'm trying now to put my words out into the world, to feel like the things that I say matter... but I'm not telling anyone about it. That must be some major kind of statement about my emotional well being. If you're reading this, thanks. If you comment, thanks even more, because it's the only tangible evidence I have that my words, sent out like some sort of sonar, have hit something and returned. I promise to be as honest as humanly possible, though not necessarily as entertaining as I'd like. But I'll work on that too.