The Joy of Crayons

There’s nothing like a new box of crayons. Their smell – the sharp, new tips – the bright colors that just cry out to be used. I bet my feelings about new crayons are influenced by the fact that I got new ones every year for the start of school, so now they are wrapped up in the emotion and excitement of new teachers, new paper and pencils, a new desk, and new things to learn.

I watched some kids color this week, or more correctly, I watched the kids and their parents color. It seems like the parents get more into the coloring than the kids do, as if they’ve been dying for an excuse to get creative. I mean, here their kid is with a new box of crayons and a fresh coloring book, and the parent just HAS to color that tree green, or that flower red.

As I watched the coloring, I realized that one of my biggest art “revelations” involved coloring. My mom was an art teacher, so of course she never encouraged me to “stay in the lines;” she was prone to give me a blank piece of paper instead of a coloring book, to inspire more creativity.

The revelation came when I was pretty young. In a coloring book I was coloring a scene of girls sitting on a beach in bathing suits under an umbrella that I filled in with primary colors, and Mom decided to “help” me for a bit, as grownups do. I watched as she picked up a red crayon, held it above the page, and gently shaded a blotch of red on one of the girls’ bare shoulders. “She’s been sitting on the beach too long,” Mom explained. I remember staring at the sunburn Mom had given the girl, suddenly struck by the fact that there was more to this coloring book than just filling in the pictures. They could be my own, more than ever now. A blank sky could be filled with birds or a sunset or a hot air balloon. A field could hold cows or flowers or a picnic basket and blanket. I can’t help but see that very moment as when the world of Art was opened to me, truly. All by a little shade of red on a girl’s shoulder.

So if you have a little time, why don’t you “help” your kids with their coloring books. Show them what is possible. Or if they’re not around, grab a piece of blank paper from your printer and draw a little something. I know you want to.

Crazy Chicken

How do you handle stress? I have always felt I’ve been fairly good at it, ever since my Mom helped me deal with teenage stress when I was a kid. She helped me make a list of everything that bothered me, and then we went through it and decided what could be done about my stresses, if anything. She also taught me to keep a diary, and by now I have tons of them, some with happy entries, but many written when I needed to unleash all my anger or sadness or frustration, and I felt the tension release with the flow of my pen. A diary doesn’t judge or react; it just listens.

Other stress-relievers? I’ve found that attacking a home project, like pulling weeds or painting a room, can be fairly cathartic, and it has the additional plus of marking something off my To-Do list when I’m done. Another method is to create…to paint, write, draw, or do something to get into my work and out of my head. Sometimes I’ve gone to a movie by myself; being by myself with the characters on the screen is comforting. And finally, if all else fails, I could use another method Mom taught me…just go to bed.

I was pretty stressed this Sunday morning when I was out of the house early. The tension of recent events, combined with a fierce case of PMS, caused me to find myself in tears. I’ve always been a crier; it’s another good way to release tension – Mom taught me that, too. But this time, I had nowhere to go. We have a houseguest right now, so I couldn’t go home and cry. My husband was at work and unavailable, so I couldn’t call and vent to him. And faced with the prospect of just sitting in my car and crying, I called my girlfriend, woke her up, and asked to come over.

She greeted me in her pajamas and sleepy face, then escorted me to the kitchen for apple juice and Kleanex, and we spent the next hour on her back patio enjoying the breeze and the warmth of the sun on our feet that stuck out from under the patio cover’s shade. Thank God for friends.

Then as I drove away (I finally felt good enough to go write at Starbucks), I received a phone message from another girlfriend who moved away a couple of years ago. She mentioned that she had been “running around like a crazy chicken” and that’s why she hadn’t had time to call or write recently. Her phrase made me laugh, because I assume she meant “like a chicken with its head cut off.” And yes, lately I too have been a crazy chicken who needs to sit back, make a list of everything that is going wrong and stressing me out, and see what can be done. Then I’ll go to bed.

The Numbers

This week I began writing Part Two of my book. Or, actually I wrote PART TWO at the top of the page and then sat with George on my lap, staring at the screen for an hour. In the bottom corner of the document, it told me that I had already written 87,005 words. Those words are on 117 pages, single spaced. Not bad, I thought.

It’s not enough to tell someone I’m writing a book – I feel required to give some type of information to quantify it and make it real. And numbers give it validity - people hear how much I’ve written and know I take it seriously.

So while I waited for the first sentence of Part Two to come to me, I thought about other numbers I could give myself for validation. I often see on facebook that a cousin of mine ran 2 miles or rode her bike for 5, and I have to admit that these numbers show me she is serious. Just like in gym class in school, we can judge people’s fitness by the number of sit-ups they can do in a minute (I did over 30 back as a freshman) or how long a girl can last in the “Flex-Arm Hang” (about 5 seconds).

I have lived for 14,370 days on this earth, and according to life expectancies I have about 14,830 more to go. Or maybe I should count up the minutes – it makes them more precious, more important, by doing so.

During my singing & dancing career, I performed live for over 4,000,000 people. I always wish I could look at a map and have a light pinpoint every person who has seen me perform; it would feel like I have friends all over the world.

It took me 10 years to get my bachelors degree, and 2 to get my Masters. I am still paying for it all. I used my Masters for exactly 2.25 months. (But I don’t regret it at all; I would never regret education.)

I have been with my husband for over 1/4 of my life. My Mom was in my life for about 2/3 thirds of my years so far. George has been with me for about 1/6 of it. Those fractions will change in good ways and in bad ones over time.

I’ve lived in Vegas for 16 years and lived in my hometown in Indiana for 13, I think. That is a truly weird comparison – am I a Las Vegan now? The numbers may say so but my heart doesn’t.

I spend about eight hours a week at Starbucks. (I won’ t tell you how much money I spend there.) I go there to write, so I don’t feel guilty about those numbers.

As I write this, I am still sitting with George on my lap, waiting for the first sentence of PART TWO. Now I’m going to go buy another Chai Tea Latte (#5 for this week), write (or try to) for another 120 minutes, and then drive the 1.8 miles home. I still have 2,206 minutes left of my weekend!

“…drifting along with the tumbling tumbleweeds.”

When I was a kid, the idea of a tumbleweed was a foreign, romantic thing. They were those weird round things that blew across the road in old Westerns, across the brown landscape before the camera panned to Clint Eastwood who chewed a piece of straw in his firm-set jaw. So imagine my surprise last night when I drove home from work, and due to the recent windy weather, along one stretch of road there were ten or more tumbleweeds lined up along the sidewalk, some as wide as five feet. In Las Vegas tumbleweeds are common, but this many in one place caught my attention and I wished I’d had my camera.

So I wondered, how many things that used to be exciting or exotic are now commonplace or every-day? Or vice versa? Those tumbleweeds were so novel that after visiting me out West one summer, my Mom took a tumbleweed back to Indiana in the trunk of her car. She shared it with her rural Indiana elementary students and then hung it from her porch ceiling, where it stayed as a sort of natural art display.

Palm trees are another exotic element of my daily life; we have two in our front yard. But as a kid, I remember driving to Florida for summer vacations and leaning forward from the back seat, trying to be the first person to see a palm tree. They symbolized the start of our vacation from normalcy – the beginning of swaying palms and salt water.

The other day I saw a robin sitting on a tree branch outside my office window at work. It was the fattest robin I’ve ever seen, and I stopped and watched him for a long time. I’d never seen a robin in Las Vegas before – I thought they didn’t live here. It was nice to see this little touch of home, and it reminded me of seeing these orange-bellied birds in Indiana and knowing that the first time you saw one, it meant Spring was here.

So, FYI, Spring arrived in Las Vegas on Thursday, March 4.

Once again, the Universe has sent me a little nudge to pay attention to the little things – to remember those things that used to give me childish excitement. To recapture that feeling by noticing what I have. This summer, I think I’ll add a palm tree to the back yard - might as well bring some more vacation to our everyday life.

Yes, I competed in the Olympics.

One morning this week, I watched a group of six adults run laps around the soccer field next to the dog park. One was more athletic and eventually passed (several times) all those who straggled behind and were forced to walk. And as usual, I sat on my bench and tried to get motivated to exercise more.

I was never an athletic child. Sure, I took dancing lessons, played in the hills behind our house, skied at our local ski resort, and went to the public pool every summer, but I was never considered athletic. I did win first place in the skipping contest in second grade, but I was always one of the last girls chosen when we picked teams in gym class.

Despite this, when I was ten years old I signed up to be in the regional Girl Scout Olympics and run the 880-yard race in the big town of Bloomington. I have no idea what possessed me. Maybe I didn’t want to be left out. Maybe I liked feeling important when adding my name to the list. Most likely, I didn’t know how far 800 yards was!

While I remember very little of that big Olympics day, the race itself is very clear. I was the only contestant there from my hometown, and I realized at the starting line that I was way out of my league. This was no longer the Girl Scouts; this was like the Olympics I had seen on TV. These girls did not look like ten-year-old me. They were tall, lean, and chiseled. They stretched at the starting line and warmed up, knowingly. I looked at them out of the corner of my eye, copying the way they put their feet on the starting blocks.

The gun fired and we were off. I began running, trying desperately to look like I belonged. Most of the girls easily broke away from the group and picked up the pace. I kept running, trying not to think about how tired my legs were. This was far longer than I expected, and the end was nowhere in sight.

The girls were all far in front of me now, and I began to get embarrassed. I fought the urge to cry, and instead adjusted my arms to the position the other runners used. I tried not to imagine what the bystanders were thinking as they watched me straggling behind.

Eventually as the race went on, a runner moved to the side and slowed to a walk. As I passed, she leaned over with her hands on her knees in exhaustion. “She’s quitting!” I realized in surprise. And as I continued, another girl slowed to a walk, then another.

I kept running. By this time I had very little energy left. But I kept running. We had gone around the track 1½ times when I began to cry. I was tired and embarrassed and overwhelmed and wanted my mom. By now I had no semblance of form left. I saw the tallest, most graceful girl cross the finish line far ahead of me, with her arms thrown above her head and her back arched against the tape. An eternity later, I crossed the finish, my arms and legs flailing wildly, and sobbing uncontrollably. I kept running straight into my mother’s arms.

At the time, the race was not a momentous occasion. Mom cleaned me up and we drove home, stopping for ice cream on the way.

But looking back I am very proud of that day. Now when I face obstacles as an adult, I see my 3rd place ribbon and remember that somewhere deep down I have an inner strength. The little girl in me remembers that I am not a quitter. I may flail a little and shed a few tears, but overall I can hang on through anything.

Resolutions

A new year, another list to make! I love to make lists - of things I need to do, places to go, books to read - a list on paper is a visualization of possibilites.

I also use lists as a way to get information out of my head so I can quit stressing. Why give yourself the pressure of trying to remember things when you can easily put it on paper? Mom taught me this valuable tool when I was a stressed-out teenager who couldn't sleep due to...well, whatever teens stress about. One night I lay in my bed staring at the ceiling, and when she asked me what was stressing me, I said in tears, "Everything!" So she sat on the edge of the bed with a pen and paper and made me list every single thing that bothered me: tests, rehearsals, an upcoming speech, an insensitive comment from a friend. And once everything was on paper, I saw that it wasn't so overwhelming after all. We looked at the list and determined whether or not I could do anything about any of the items. And after it all was out of my head and onto paper, I could sleep.

And boy does it feel good to mark off things as I accomplish them. When I was a kid and hated to clean my room, Mom used to write a checklist of jobs to help me complete the sometimes huge task. At the top she wrote "Shannon's To-Do List," and then drew boxes next to each item. I got immense satisfaction in putting a checkmark in each box as I put all my books on the shelf or put my stuffed animals on the bed. Lists made the job bearable.

I have about eight resolutions on my list for this year, and I predict that I will complete three of them. But that's okay. Some are difficult (finish my book, eat better) and some are easy (walk George to the park instead of driving, take my vitamins every day) but either way, when I accomplish anything I will be happy in the mere knowledge that I am bettering myself in some way. I'll find happiness in any small success.

Tonight my husband and I are going to watch the movie Patton, because we are making our way through the American Film Institute's list of the 100 best movies of all-time. When it's over, I will cross out the word "Patton" with a bright blue highlighter and bask in the satisfaction of another accomplishment.

Christmas Trees

On Sunday we decorated for Christmas, and now the house has that festive vibe and a faint smell of pine. George spent the day following us from room to room as we unpacked boxes and climbed up and down ladders, and he finally fell asleep under the table during dinner because he didn’t get his usual afternoon nap.

I hadn’t planned on buying a real tree this year. Tired of the same decorations going in the same spot every year, I thought I would just make do with the small fake tree we usually put in the dining room. But at Home Depot on Sunday morning I had to walk past the area where all the trees were displayed and employees were cutting and wrapping trees, where families were picking out the perfect one to tie onto their car and take home.

It was the smell that got me - that sharp pine smell that suddenly made it feel like Christmas and put a warm, cozy feeling in my belly.

So I bought a tree in Home Depot. A small one that we put upstairs on a table in our TV room to be different this year. It’s short and fat and fun, and we covered it only with the ornaments we’ve bought when we’ve traveled, to make it personal and different.

Picking out a tree has to be at the top of my list of favorite holiday activities. It was always fun to go with Mom to the tree lot in the freezing cold and pick out just the right one. When I was little, my Grandma used to cut down a tree from the woods behind their house – usually a cedar whose branches were so flimsy that they would fall over like Charlie Brown’s tree when we hung anything on it. And before I was born, my Mom once used a tumbleweed as a Christmas tree, when she lived in New Mexico.

When our schedules cooperate, my husband and I go to Utah with our friends to get a tree from the forest there. And it is so much fun – her whole family piles into several trucks and we drive forever on bumpy unpaved roads to the location that her dad has scoped out already. And we walk, freezing, spreading out through the trees, searching for the perfect one. The great thing is that no one is rushed. No one gets impatient when I need to walk 100 yards back to the tree I saw before, just to see if it is better. They understand the fun of the hunt. And when everyone has their perfect tree, we throw them into the back of their pickups and head back to her parents’ house for hot soup and to warm up by the fire.

Tonight my husband and I will have our annual tradition of sitting by the Christmas tree after it’s decorated, with only the tree lit, and we’ll listen to Bing Crosby, sip eggnog, and sit and enjoy the calm of cold December night. I hope you all can find some quiet time by the tree, too.

The Search for Home

When I was a teenager I gave my mom a Mother’s Day card that said, “Wherever I travel, Wherever I roam…Wherever my Mom is will always be home.” And because of the special connection she and I had, she knew I meant it, and she framed the card in a black frame and hung it above the piano in her collection of family photos and artwork.

That framed card is in my house in Las Vegas now, and whenever I look at it I wonder exactly where home is for me now. Mom passed away over ten years ago, so if that card’s sentiment is still true, I am a little lost.

I’m writing this from Indiana during Thanksgiving Week, in the town I grew up in, where memories (good and bad) lurk around every corner. And the whole time I wonder, where is home? When I’m in Las Vegas, I refer to my hometown of Paoli, Indiana as “home.” But when I’m in Paoli, Las Vegas gets that title of honor. So, what is home to me? I’ve lived in Las Vegas for over 15 years, yet I don’t feel that it will ever feel like home. And it has been twenty years since I’ve lived in Paoli…I appreciate and miss the family history I have there, but it doesn’t feel like Me anymore.

So, if Paoli isn’t home but neither is Vegas, where would be the ideal place for me? My husband says no to anywhere he would have to shovel snow, so that limits my choices. Lately I think we would really like it in the Northwest, maybe Portland, Oregon, but the funny thing is that I’ve never been there! I’m looking for a place with open-minded people, people who appreciate nature & culture, a university, and access to city life and natural beauty.

But would that finally feel like home? The location would be great but still there would be no family connection or history, none of the friends from Vegas we’ve known for years, and my mom still wouldn’t be there.

I don’t think there is an answer. Instead, I will go on making memories, enjoying life, and making our current place a home. And then finally, someday, I’m sure I will suddenly realize that Home has a definite location for me. Someday.

Or maybe I should just be thankful that I have several places to call home. I’m lucky to have fond memories of the hometown where I grew up and the city home where I’ve led my adult life, and maybe many more places will earn that title of honor, even temporarily. If home is where the heart is, I can just spread the love around, right?

I write this from the only place in Paoli where I can get an internet wireless connection, with a view toward the southeast side of town. Let's see what memories I can stir up from my view out this window - memories that happened while Paoli was my home:

I can see the back of the library building, where I used to go in the side entrance to the children's section in the basement, where Mrs. Ott used to read us stories.

The market I sit in right now used to be the Variety Store, where as a child I loved to go because you could buy lots of cheap things - candy, toys, sewing projects, kitchen trinkets. Mom received many Christmas gifts that I purchased here, and when she was a child she used to come here with her mom.

My Grandma's church would be in view if it weren't for a large semi trailor that is blocking my view. During my childhood I spent summers in their basement for Vacation Bible School. It's also where we gathered for a free dinner with family and friends on the day of my Mom's funeral.

Farther on is the liquor store, where we never went, since my Mom was a teacher and this is a small town in the Bible Belt. I went in there once a few years ago and couldn't shake the feeling that I was being bad!

I can see the roof of Crockett's Flowers & Gifts, the florist from whom we ordered flowers for Mother's Day or birthdays or funerals, and where I would run inside to pick up my friend Pam for a playdate in elementary school. Just up the hill was where Jennifer C lived in a large yellow brick house...I think I may have spent the night there once or twice.

The highway that heads out of town to the southeast logged thousands of miles during my life in Paoli, when Mom and I went to Louisville to see musicals and ballets, to Kentucky to visit relatives, or to Florida or South Carolina for summer vacations.

And through the trees I can see the roof of the old brick Stalcup building - now converted into a business, where my Grandma, and my Mom and her sister, went to high school. Tall and stately above the trees, it was on its grounds that we rehearsed for the musical Oklahoma! when I was a kid, and I still refer to that time as "the good old days", when I began to love the theatre.

All of the above memories, just off the top of my head, from this one tiny window view.

I feel lucky to have called this place home, even if it was only for a while. And I think it will always stay on my list of places to call home. I'm thankful for that, no matter where I end up.

Halloween

I wish I had a front porch to put a jack-o-lantern on. Setting them out by our front door in the warm Vegas sun doesn’t have the same effect as the pumpkins from my childhood. Then, I remember creeping out onto the chilly porch with my mom to light the candle at dusk, the sweet smell of burnt pumpkin still hanging in the air from the previous night’s burning.

And costumes were better back then. They did have those cheap plastic costumes at the stores in town, but I snubbed my nose at them, preferring the challenge of creating my own costume from the closets in our house and at my Grandma’s. Most kids made their own costumes, probably because of financial reasons, but this made us care more about what we wore, because we spent the weeks before Halloween planning and scheming and coming up with the perfect costume. The immediate gratification of buying something at a store would have robbed us of half the fun.

I grew up in a house on a country road outside of town, so there were no nearby neighbors to walk to for trick-or-treating. Instead, we got into the car and drove to all our family members’ houses, stretching the night’s fun longer into the evening. In contrast, a few years ago I went trick-or-treating with a friend and her family, and I have to say the difference between Vegas trick-or-treating and my rural childhood’s made me a little disappointed. I had expected a leisurely stroll from house to house, but because Vegas houses are crammed so close together, the kids ran like banshees from door to door, sometimes hitting three houses within a minute.

As a kid, half the fun of Halloween was giving out candy to trick-or-treaters who came to our house. But since we lived in the country, hardly any ever came. In fact, I remember one year when I was about 10, and Mom bought special little individual treat bags that I painstakingly filled perfectly with equal amounts of several kinds of candy and then tied with a black and orange bow. I excitedly waited for the kids to come, but no one did. The pitfalls of living in the country. But all I needed was one trick-or-treater to be happy, and usually I got that.

One unusual year Mom and I had several trick-or-treaters, and we had to quickly drive into town to buy candy. While we were gone, someone soaped our windows in clever pictures of smiling jack-o-lanterns and the words “Happy Halloween!” Mom and I laughed about it afterward, happy to be living in a town with such wholesome pranksters.

Enough reminiscing about my childhood and how much better things were back then. After all, back then I didn’t have a patient dog named George who allows me to dress him as Superman. Things are good.

Books

There’s a man at the dog park who is originally from Indiana like me, and every time he sees me he yells, “Hey, Paoli!” (I'm from Paoli, IN.) We’ve had some interesting conversations over the past year because our political and religious views couldn’t be more opposite. But I don’t really mind. He obviously likes to talk, and he thinks opposing opinions are amusing. Most recently, our conversation led to the safer topic of books. Now that’s a conversation I can get into.

I grew up always with my “nose in a book,” as Mom would constantly complain when I tried to read during dinner. But she didn’t really mind, because she gave me my love of literature, starting by reading me books such as Goodnight, Moon and Where the Wild Things Are, and reciting James Whitcomb Riley poetry she’d memorized when she was a kid. I was always excitedly scared by her rendition that ended “…and the gobblins’ll getcha if you don’t watch out!”

When I was young, Mom bought me the first of the Little House on the Prairie books. Every time I finished one, we made a special trip to the Bloomington mall, where I was allowed to purchase the next book in the series. And on New Year’s Day 1984, just after I turned thirteen, we sat together on our blue living room sofa as Mom began to read aloud the book 1984, beginning many deep discussions about its meaning. To this day, I’m disgusted when people think Big Brother refers to the TV show instead of George Orwell.

I was very lucky to have excellent English teachers in high school, including the eccentric Ruth Uyesugi, who taught Senior English. In fact, Mrs. U, as we called her, taught English for so many years that my mother had her for Senior English, as did all my aunts and uncles. Mrs. U made Literature seem scandalous and exciting, introducing us to novels that included incest, insanity, or murder. We thought we were getting away with something in her class, when it was actually just her master plan of giving us a lifelong love of reading.

When people see the huge library of books I have in our front room, I always tell them, “I buy books like most women buy clothes.” And I can’t resist the possibilities inside a new book. Certain books have a cozy feel to them, making you want to stroke their covers like a cat. And an old book’s musty smell brings back childhood memories of rainy days, curled up with an afghan and a book on a lazy Saturday.

I still have all the books from my childhood, and someday I look forward to sharing them with my children, introducing them one at a time, like precious gifts. They are, after all, aren’t they?

July in France

Tomorrow morning I’m sure to wake up and start going through Tour de France withdrawals, after having watched it faithfully every morning live on TV for the past three weeks. And during that time I’ve been in a constant Tour-haze in which I check the standings and interviews randomly throughout the day, constantly second guess my choices for that day’s online Fantasy Cycling, and always count ahead to see what time it is in France. Oh, they’re waking up now in France. Then, They’re having lunch now. They always start racing hours before I actually wake up, making me feel very lazy.

Why do I watch the Tour so fervently? It all started when I was a kid and my mom watched the Tour de France every summer. The Tour couldn’t have been farther away from our little rural Midwestern town of 3,500 people, but every July, France entered our living room. I knew it must be special, if my mom watched it.

Years later, I discovered excellent coverage of the Tour on the Versus channel, and here I am. It’s the only sport I can actually explain to someone and can actually understand the pre-stage discussion by the commentators every morning. Little-Ol’-Me can actually discuss rules and strategy of a sport. Go figure.

This year was the 96th Tour de France, and it is fascinating to look at old black and white photos of the race, back when they didn’t have cars to follow them for support, when they rode on unpaved roads and smoked cigarettes on their breaks -for their health. In contrast, the science that goes into the race now is unbelievable, making the guys super-aerodynamic.

The cameramen themselves are impressive on the Tour, riding on motorcycles for hours every day, backward, filming the important strategic moves or simple smiles or grimaces of the riders. And the helicopter cameramen follow the line of cyclists as it snakes across the French countryside, past fields of crops, along rivers and the sea, through valleys and over mountains. My favorite shot from this year’s tour was when they caught three white horses running in a field as the cyclists rode by. Oh – and also the shot of the snail who was slowly trying to cross the road as the cyclists flew by in a blur behind him. The cameraman patiently focused on the snail who was lucky enough to be too slow to get into their path.

Of course I’m incredibly inspired by the riders in the Tour. Few sports require such endurance. I love watching them climb the Alps and marvel when they climb past the tree line, their faces stoic with concentration. And they reach incredible speeds as they ride the straightaways, risking crashes that could end their dreams for this year’s Tour. And you can’t use the word inspiration without mentioning Lance Armstrong. Seeing him ride again is like welcoming back an old friend. I even donated to his charity.

Someday I will go watch the Tour live in person; I have no doubt that I will. And I’ll probably shed a few tears as they pass by me. I always tend to get overly sentimental at events where so many nationalities gather together. Men from all over the world join together on these teams, and all nationalities wait patiently together on the roadsides for hours, just to root them on.

And the French people also love their Tour. Knowing the helicopter will possibly put them on TV, farmers construct intricate designs in their fields, shaped like bicycles or spelling words of encouragement. People stand atop castle turrets and wave at the camera, and this year someone released hundreds of yellow balloons as the peloton passed. Their enthusiasm is infectious, even here in my living room 5,412 miles away.

And let’s face it, the Tour is just plain romantic. The commentators have great English accents and gracefully pronounce all the French names of the chateaus and cities they pass. The gorgeous countryside passes by every day, in real time, and I get my own personal tour of France. And sometimes it rains, and I watch through a rain-speckled camera lens as the guys try not to crash but seem unfazed by the downpour. Even the podium presentations at the end of every stage are foreign and romantic, as the podium girls kiss each winner when they receive that day’s jerseys. I never can guess how many of those European cheek-kisses each rider will give. Most riders do two; some three; and a few get four. I’ve always liked those kisses, and I missed them when I moved back to the States after living in Europe years ago.

I guess I should mention this year’s winner, the dark and handsome Spaniard Alberto Contador. He never faltered the entire race, proving that he was to be the overall champion. But instead of writing about him, I want to mention the man who finished last. Yauheni Hutarovich. From Belarus, he finished in 156th place, with over four hours between him and Contador. More than twenty other riders didn’t finish at all, due to injuries from crashes, finishing too far behind the pack and being disqualified, or simply needing to drop out. The ones who finished survived the heat, wind, and rain, climbed mountains, rode 3500 kilometers, and inspired television viewers around the world, including one thirty-something woman who watched faithfully every day, often going late to work so she wouldn’t miss that day’s finish.

I’ll be going to France again next July. Won’t you join me next year?

1944-1999

This week marked the ten-year anniversary of my mother’s death. For those of you who weren’t lucky enough to know her, she was an artist, writer, painter, pianist, nature-lover, philosopher, poet, and all-around amazing person. And I have to say, writing that last sentence was difficult, because she was so much more than words could ever express.

Lance and I started dating about a year before Mom died, and one of my biggest blessings is that he was able to meet her. And even though their two meetings were brief, he was able to see how special she was. She was (and is) such a part of me that it was imperative that he understand. I am very lucky.

I wanted to include a poem of Mom’s here today, but it’s so precious to me that I’m afraid of putting her poetry on the Internet and having someone use it as their own. So, I will share a small paragraph of hers that I have always loved.

Mom taught elementary art in a school where sports were the priority, as they often are, and the Arts were almost always low on the list of school priorities. At the end of every year there was an awards banquet for all the kids, and Mom sat and waited through dozens of sports awards before she gave hers for Art. The superintendent always took the majority of the time, going on and on about each sport and each team, on and on about the excellence of athletes and the importance of the athletic department. Finally Mom couldn't take it anymore. She grabbed a crumpled envelope from her purse and furiously scribbled, completely changing the speech she was about to give:

"Art is not a competitive sport. Prizes are not given for making the biggest sculpture or painting, or the most paintings, or for mixing the bluest blue, or for drawing the straightest line. That’s not what it’s all about. The measure of art is really how each person learns to be sensitive to his environment and to his feelings – and how he learns to express that in his own personal way."

I hope you all have had someone in your life who has opened the world of Art to you. Its value is immeasurable. Mom taught me that.

Trust me.

There is a lot of mutual trust at the dog park. I trust the woman who gives George a treat from her pocket. I trust that George won't dig in the dirt and get muddy. I trust that the stranger sitting next to me on the park bench isn’t a weirdo. I have a tendency to give people the benefit of the doubt, and a general optimism about the world, which I learned from my mother.

Of course parents often know when their kids aren’t being truthful. It’s easy and understandable for parents to know the truth and demand it from their kids. But I feel that sometimes it’s also important for the kids to feel trusted. Completely. And I have a reason for this belief.

When I was a teenager, I wasn’t one who disobeyed the rules very often. Sure, I would stretch the rules and come home a little past my curfew, or I would talk on the phone too much or roll my eyes indignantly, but overall Mom and I trusted and respected each other.

One Saturday night when I was sixteen my friends Kat, Chad, and April (names not-so-cleverly changed to protect their identities) piled into my car for a weekend drive through town. After several loops around the town square, through the Pizza Hut parking lot, and up to our hilltop ski resort Paoli Peaks, Kat suggested we go to the Riverside Café, a tiny local bar where she knew she could pass for 21 and get us some alcohol.

Now, please know that this was not our normal weekend routine. We were nerdy theatre kids who usually spent the weekends at rehearsal or playing cards at our director’s house. But Kat was more worldly, more mature, and more daring. So we nervously sat outside, not thinking about the fact that we were in a small town where anyone could recognize my car and wonder why we were parked there. And what was I thinking? My Mom was a teacher – in the Bible Belt – where people who drank were marked as sinners. Mom used to buy her wine coolers in a town 30 miles away so people wouldn’t gossip, “I saw Mrs. Bradford buying alcohol at the liquor store today!” She had a reputation to uphold.

Anyway, that Saturday night wasn’t momentous. Kat bought a six-pack of wine coolers, we kept driving around town, and later I dropped everyone off at their prospective homes and went home. I never even had a drink. Like I said, we were nerdy.

The next Monday, Mom picked me up at the front of the high school at the end of the day, and I knew by her face that something was very wrong. Instantly my stomach turned to rock. “Look in the back seat,” she told me, her mouth in a hard, thin line. I turned to see the six-pack of wine coolers sitting defiantly on the seat. Kat and Chad had left them in the car! Quickly I searched for an excuse and put a confused look on my face. “Where did those come from?” Mom asked. “Um, I don’t know,” I said, stalling. I looked back again at the incriminating evidence and continued to look confused. Then I came up with a story. “We were up at the Peaks this weekend,” I began. “And I gave the car keys to Kat so she and Chad could hang out at the car while April and I were inside. Maybe it’s theirs?” Kat had a reputation for being a little wild, so I hoped my lie was convincing. Luckily, Mom accepted my story. After a few more questions we drove home, my stomach still in knots and her face still frozen in anger. We never talked about the incident again.

Looking back, Mom probably knew I was lying, but she gave me the benefit of the doubt. She trusted me, or at least gave that impression. And how completely different our relationship would have been without that trust. Deep down she knew I was a good girl, so instead of demanding the truth and instigating an argument, she accepted my story and left it alone. She gave me maturity and responsibility by accepting what I said. Instead of yelling, “I know you’re lying!” she questioned, listened, and then accepted it. After all, all the wine coolers were unopened, so how bad could we have been?

When I was tiny, I stole a pretty scarf from my Aunt Mary’s house and stuffed it in the pocket of my overalls. When asked about it later, I told Mom I had put it there “so I could play with it later.” Instead of forcing me to admit it was a lie, she made me go back to Aunt Mary’s, return the scarf, and tell her my excuse. I was nervous, but it taught me to fix my mistakes. And it taught me that Mom trusted me.

Some may read this and think Mom was too easy on me. Of course you can’t always accept the lies your kids tell. But sometimes, showing that you trust them is more important than demanding the truth. Mom and I had the greatest, deepest, closest relationship a mother and daughter can have. Don’t be afraid to trust your kids. Even if at times they don’t deserve it. Trust me.