Some Days are Smooth, Some Days are Chunky

The story goes like this:  Once upon a time, my mother and father had to attend a child-free function,  which, when you have Four children, can be something of a challenge.  They called upon my father's mother, who, if unenthusiastic, was brave, and at least close by.  Ruth's own children had numbered only 2, and had been raised the old-fashioned way, with live-in help, and then sent away to boarding school before getting old enough to become too obnoxious.  At least that's the way the her 2 children tell it; as child #5, all of this was substantially before my time.

Anyway, Ruth somehow sustained the evening unharmed, and my parents returned home to find all four offspring tucked safely in their beds.  But Ruth had split.  Made a break for it.  Gone while the gettin' was good.  In fact, there was no trace of her having been there at all, except for one thing:  A note scrawled in an unsteady hand, proclaimed

"You're out of Peanut Butter.  Heaven Help You."

Since then, the level of the peanut butter in the pantry has been the unofficial gauge of health, wealth and fortitude, for everybody in my family.  We say to each other "Yeah, but it could be worse - it's not like you're out of peanut butter...".  Like having a full tank of gas, or a $20 bill, or a clean, ironed shirt in the closet, a full jar of peanut butter makes makes me feel like the minimum standards are being maintained.  Not rich, you understand, but prepared.  Capable.  Self-sufficient enough to handle whatever hand the Universe is planning to deal next.

This morning, Campbell's backpack (which suffered a massive juice-bottle breech yesterday and had to go into the washing machine) was still wet.  And worse than that, it had gone into the washing machine containing not less than 24 unsharpened pencils.  And the cardboard box which held them.  The carnage confronting me inside the washing machine, with less than 7 minutes till the bus came, was indescribable.  I abandoned the whole gory mess and hooked Cam up with a knitting bag to carry his lunch and homework in.  Lunch.  That I still had not made at T-minus-seven minutes till the bus.  I flew to the kitchen at Mach 2 and assembled bread, juice bottles, goldfish crackers and apple slices in a cheetah-like blur.  And that's when it happened.  I heard my grandmother's voice, bell-like and serene: 

"You're out of Peanut Butter.  Heaven Help You."

In my panic, I think I may have packed my children Nutella and mayonnaise sandwiches.  On whole wheat.  Mother. Of. The. Year.

Without peanut butter, the balance of the Universe is compromised.  Without peanut butter, the wheels abruptly fall off the wagon.  Without peanut butter, you start looking around for the four horsemen of the Apocalypse.    I have failed to maintain minimum standards. 

I know it's not actually the end of the world, but I'm thinking this could be one of the seven signs.  There are things you should be able to take for granted, and peanut butter is one of them.  I'm going to try to put this behind me.  Bootstrap myself into this day and carry on without further panic.  And, armed with tweezers and a vacuum cleaner, I'll try to extract the pencil shrapnel from my washing machine. 

Sometimes there are sentences I just can't believe I've just written.
 

*Not Actual Size

Unnoticed by me, my family have been observing me, in my natural habitat.  Campbell, in particular, has drawn some conclusions about my lifestyle as a knitter, now that the pressure of book writing has caused me to go feral.  I haven't looked up in a while.  Like, Days.

He presented me yesterday with this scale model of his mother, working:

Originally, there was also a Lego Daddy (wearing a tuxedo, natch) who stood by looking helpless but supportive.  Unfortunately, the cat knocked him off and batted him somewhere inaccessible before I could find the camera.  I think it's important to know that Lego Daddy is there in spirit, in spite of the feline predation. 

Campbell's tableau includes all the details of my native environment, right down to the ball of yarn parked on my desk.  The only thing missing is a bottle of gin, but let's assume that's hidden under the desk.

It's just possible that my family are not receiving enough of my attention at the moment.  Luckily, it looks like I'm receiving theirs.

In Lego We Trust.

My IN Box

Less than two years ago, I lived in a cubicle.  I drove forty miles a day through glacial traffic to and from it.  Within the cubicle, I was assaulted by e-mails and text messages and phone calls and visits from angry little creatures who neither wanted nor understood the technology I was made to foist upon them.  My associates and I were chronically understaffed and overmanaged.  And the virtual workpile, no matter how deeply we shoveled, was always up to our chins, and threatening greater height.  For 14 hours out of every 24, I was focused (or supposed to be) on the needs of my workplace.  Every day I would arrive at the cube farm, disarm access points on 5 different locked doors, dutifully place my dog collar of an ID badge around my neck and fire up my cell phone leash.  Three giant monitors on my desk would blink groggily to life, as I tried to do the same, aided by burnt coffee with polymer whitening-agent.  I punched a digital timeclock, which tracked my hours.  I logged into the networks, where the digital workpile lived and festered.  I logged into the phone system, which tracked my every voice communication, and where my conversations could be monitored from any telephone on earth.  I was physically tethered to the cubical, too.  A headset connected me to the land lines and allowed me to continue working the keyboard and touch screens which threatened my wrists, while the angry little creatures sniveled directly into my ears.  There could be no more efficient assault on all the senses at once.

And then, for some reason, after 14 years in the cubicle, I quit.

The soul-sucking dehumanization of my life as a technologist had finally taken its last from me, and away I went.  The door didn't hit me.

Now my IN box looks like this:

And This

And also, THIS

Now I interact with people and things that I like.  Almost every single day.  When I'm hungry, I eat.  If I'm sleepy, I take a nap.  If I need to breathe air, I open a window.  And there are these people who live at my house that I finally am getting to know.  I thought we were a family when I lived in the cube, but it turned out we were only weekend associates.  I actually know things about them now, like how and when they like to sleep, eat and play.  Stuff they never did during the two waking hours of each day that I was available to them, back in the old times.

Free of the tethers of access badges, time clocks, network use tracking and call monitoring, I have almost entirely regained my humanity (though I still have a distrustful relationship with my TV remote). 

And yes, if you're wondering, our financial world is completely different now, too.  We don't eat out, or have a housekeeper, or go away on vacation any more.  There are days when I don't know where the next bowl of Froot Loops is coming from. 

I wouldn't change a thing.

I am so blessed to have met my family before they outgrew me.  I am so lucky to have friends who support me in my work.  I am so fortunate that my health allows me to take eating and sleeping and running and jumping totally for granted.  Many Thanks, God, for all you give to me and mine.  I hope we can be worthy.  Speaking of which, I have a lot of hard and delightful work to get to.  My IN box is overflowing.