. . . after the break.
Sorry, blogarama fans! I'm on a business trip and my hotel has (*#$&#(!!% for a wireless connection . . . and it's a nice hotel too! I figured out this morning that I have a great connection in the living room area of my room, just not in the bedroom area of my room (where I was when I was attempting to get online last night). Soooo . . . too late to throw some thoughts out into the universe today. I'll be back on Monday!
Muah!
~Audra
Thursday, May 20, 2010
Sunday, May 16, 2010
I'm Such a Dirty Girl
There’s a picture of me taken when I was five years old. It’s 1977. I’m standing in a field next to the freshly poured foundation of my family’s new home. Well, new to us. It was actually an abandoned farmhouse my parents got for free. All they had to pay for was the construction of the basement and the moving fees. The rest they bought with a currency made of sweat and elbow grease. My dad and grandpa spent the summer remodeling the old house that would be our family’s home for the next three decades.
I love this picture of me. I’m in pigtails and a cookie monster tank top. My legs are brown and my face expectant. But what I love most about this picture?
Is the dirt.
Because even though it’s a blurry shot I am fairly certain I’m covered in it. My outstretched palms, I can assure you, are filthy, my fingernails harboring more mud than the bottom of a shoe, and more than likely my legs really aren’t as tan as they look.
They’re probably just that dirty.
It was glorious.
Because on a farm life happens in the dirt. The soil holds the secret to each crop’s success or failure, the muddy puddles of spring bring endless opportunities for farm kids to slosh and explore, and the family’s gardening is carefully planted, tended, and harvested in the earth’s cool darkness.
Dirt is life. And it’s everywhere.
But it’s not 1977 anymore and I no longer live on that farm. I gave up my country mouse ways long ago and traded them in for a little historic house on a shaded street. Although my cottage did come with something spectacular: Dirt.
And a lot of it.
The home was meticulously landscaped when I bought it and it is my honor and joy to maintain its endless perennial gardens, trim the roses, and make way for each spring’s release. The sun was barely up on Saturday when I found myself intending just to do a bit of yard work. Two hours later, I hadn’t started anything I’d set out to do (like mowing) but instead had dug out two dead bushes, edged the front yard, weeded the shrubs, trimmed two bushes, and dug out a couple dozen dandelions. I was filthy and bloody.
But mostly.
Happy.
For although I wasn’t wearing a cookie monster shirt and pig tails I was very much at home surrounded by the scent of earth and flowers, soil and sun.
Doing what I love to do most.
Playing.
In the dirt.
Thursday, May 13, 2010
Link to my KFGO Radio Interview; April 22, 2010
Great news blogarama fans!
I actually figured out how to archive my radio appearances for play back later online. Sooooo . . . if for some horrifying reason you missed my last radio interview on KFGO: never fear technology is here. (In fact, rumor has it you can download this file to your iPod and . . . holy cow, I think I just made my first pod cast!)
So, if you want to hear me expound upon some of my more jaw dropping social debacles that never made the blog, click the link above to download the audio either to your computer or an iPod. You can take me on your walk/run/trip to the grocery store.
After all, I am here to entertain.
Thanks for reading (and listening)!
~Audra
I actually figured out how to archive my radio appearances for play back later online. Sooooo . . . if for some horrifying reason you missed my last radio interview on KFGO: never fear technology is here. (In fact, rumor has it you can download this file to your iPod and . . . holy cow, I think I just made my first pod cast!)
So, if you want to hear me expound upon some of my more jaw dropping social debacles that never made the blog, click the link above to download the audio either to your computer or an iPod. You can take me on your walk/run/trip to the grocery store.
After all, I am here to entertain.
Thanks for reading (and listening)!
~Audra
Monday, May 10, 2010
Some Days I Just Wanna be a Dude
It has been raining for far too long the past couple weeks. And there is nothing worse than a string of gloomy days to make me all introspective and philosophical. At least that’s what happens to me when Mother Nature gets all soggy on me. I start musing over this that and the next thing, examining the wayward dynamics of life on this human journey.
Good thing I don’t live in Seattle.
I’d probably be a poet. And flat broke. Because I am not a poet and I know it. Any prior attempts I’ve made to construct a creative verse or two just reads like the insane ramblings of a homeless maniac.
Where is my life?
Where has it gone?
It was here a moment ago.
I think I left it on the counter.
Next to my keys . . .
See?
Crap.
Told ya.
So instead I’ll just torture my blog fans with my rainy musings of late which is:
What is it with women and friendships? We are either clinging to each other like Titanic survivors or ripping each other to shreds with unnecessary drama. Truly, some days I find myself wondering: if I had a penis would my life consist of blissful boring exchanges about beer and bimbos?
After all, men don't appear to have any drama, not the kind women do. No matter what happens between them they just sail along all even and blah. No matter what.
They do! Don't believe me? Well, when is the last time you’ve overheard a couple guys exchange the following:
“That Doug, I tell you. I could not believe he gave my secret BBQ recipe to Stan. He knew it was a secret, yet he just went blabbing it with zero regard for my feelings. So you know what I did? I sent him a text and told him exactly what I thought about that. Yes I did. See if I invite him to my Super Bowl party. And he can forget about that hunting trip to Montana in the fall.”
Uh, yeah. That doesn’t happen. Men are more like this:
“Doug, you gave Stan my BBQ recipe? What the f*ck?”
“F*ck You.”
“Oh yeah? F*ck you.”
Two seconds of silence.
“Wanna get a beer?”
“F*ck yeah.”
Hello? They grunt at each other and drop a few f-bombs. Either men suffer from short term memory loss and verbal communication shortfalls or they totally have friendships figured out.
Because really? I think we women routinely make Everest out of speed bumps. We don’t let anything roll off our back. We brood, we sulk, and then we tell five other girlfriends all about how we were wronged in a transparent effort to rally the troops to our side should “she” start talking smack behind our backs.
It is exhausting.
I have two great friends I’ve had for twenty years. They’ve seen me at my worst and they still love me, and vice versa. It's effortless.
In other words, we’ve evolved to a guy type of friendship. We’ve been through so much together that if things ever do go south and one of them gives my super secret aunt Edna's BBQ recipe away you know what will happen?
This:
“Thanks for pimping out my BBQ to Marge, bee-otch."
“Kiss my bumper, ya hooker. Marge won't remember it anyway."
Two seconds of silence.
“I've got some wine chilled, want a glass?”
“Absolutely.”
Now that’s.
What you call a real friendship.
(And I didn't even need to grow a penis!)
Good thing I don’t live in Seattle.
I’d probably be a poet. And flat broke. Because I am not a poet and I know it. Any prior attempts I’ve made to construct a creative verse or two just reads like the insane ramblings of a homeless maniac.
Where is my life?
Where has it gone?
It was here a moment ago.
I think I left it on the counter.
Next to my keys . . .
See?
Crap.
Told ya.
So instead I’ll just torture my blog fans with my rainy musings of late which is:
What is it with women and friendships? We are either clinging to each other like Titanic survivors or ripping each other to shreds with unnecessary drama. Truly, some days I find myself wondering: if I had a penis would my life consist of blissful boring exchanges about beer and bimbos?
After all, men don't appear to have any drama, not the kind women do. No matter what happens between them they just sail along all even and blah. No matter what.
They do! Don't believe me? Well, when is the last time you’ve overheard a couple guys exchange the following:
“That Doug, I tell you. I could not believe he gave my secret BBQ recipe to Stan. He knew it was a secret, yet he just went blabbing it with zero regard for my feelings. So you know what I did? I sent him a text and told him exactly what I thought about that. Yes I did. See if I invite him to my Super Bowl party. And he can forget about that hunting trip to Montana in the fall.”
Uh, yeah. That doesn’t happen. Men are more like this:
“Doug, you gave Stan my BBQ recipe? What the f*ck?”
“F*ck You.”
“Oh yeah? F*ck you.”
Two seconds of silence.
“Wanna get a beer?”
“F*ck yeah.”
Hello? They grunt at each other and drop a few f-bombs. Either men suffer from short term memory loss and verbal communication shortfalls or they totally have friendships figured out.
Because really? I think we women routinely make Everest out of speed bumps. We don’t let anything roll off our back. We brood, we sulk, and then we tell five other girlfriends all about how we were wronged in a transparent effort to rally the troops to our side should “she” start talking smack behind our backs.
It is exhausting.
I have two great friends I’ve had for twenty years. They’ve seen me at my worst and they still love me, and vice versa. It's effortless.
In other words, we’ve evolved to a guy type of friendship. We’ve been through so much together that if things ever do go south and one of them gives my super secret aunt Edna's BBQ recipe away you know what will happen?
This:
“Thanks for pimping out my BBQ to Marge, bee-otch."
“Kiss my bumper, ya hooker. Marge won't remember it anyway."
Two seconds of silence.
“I've got some wine chilled, want a glass?”
“Absolutely.”
Now that’s.
What you call a real friendship.
(And I didn't even need to grow a penis!)
Happy Monday!
Yesterday was Mother's Day so I took full advantage of the lazy pass . . . that is, right after I took my kids to church, my mama out for brunch, and volunteered at my daughter's dance recital. Oh yeah, and I let my mom drag me to the flower shop where I promptly lost her in the hanging baskets. "Mom? Mom? Mooooooooooom!!"
I almost had to put out an Amber Alert . . .
At the end of the day, I finally collapsed on the couch, Riesling in hand. And needless to say, I did not crack open the laptop.
This mama will be bloggin' tomorrow. I hope all the mom's who read this had a fantastic mother's day!
~Audra
P.S. Oh, I did finally find my mom. She was in the geraniums.
I almost had to put out an Amber Alert . . .
At the end of the day, I finally collapsed on the couch, Riesling in hand. And needless to say, I did not crack open the laptop.
This mama will be bloggin' tomorrow. I hope all the mom's who read this had a fantastic mother's day!
~Audra
P.S. Oh, I did finally find my mom. She was in the geraniums.
Thursday, May 6, 2010
Tell Me a Story . . .
“Mom, tell me a story when you were little.”
This is my little girl’s nightly request. I have no idea how somewhere along the line she decided that my childhood was good bedtime fodder. Maybe it’s because of the time I relayed the story of how a tornado once lifted my family home into the mystical land of OZ. (Hey, a person can only tell so many stories about growing up on a cattle ranch before taking liberties with established plot lines. That being said, no comment about the time I woke up to find three bears looming over me while I napped in Baby Bear’s bed.)
I wrestle with her plea and finally settle on one of her all time favorite stories, one she loves more than OZ and bowls of porridge.
In my home office is the wedding picture of my great great grandmother, Minnie Nelson, a brave Danish immigrant who left her family and home in 1906 for the promise called America. And in my living room is her trunk, a modest century old wooden vessel, leather straps still intact, that held all of her material possessions and misty dreams.
A mere six years later, a different wooden box held all those dreams.
A coffin.
Minnie died of an infection shortly after giving birth to her fourth daughter. She’s nothing but a historical statistic on childbirth related deaths in the last century but a vital branch on the tree of our family. The ten-day-old daughter Minnie left behind was too much for her Norwegian husband to handle. The newborn was given up for adoption, disappearing from our family like a gasp.
The oldest of her remaining three little girls, my great grandmother, Agnes, was six years old when she lost her mother. And a mere two years later, she said goodbye to her littlest sister. Her name was Hazel. And she died from pneumonia at the age of four.
Little Hazel still rests in a shaded cemetery next to her young mother. I visit them with my daughters every spring and place fragrant lavendar lilacs on their graves.
And so I tell the story to my little girl again. The story of Minnie. Of the missing baby. Of little Hazel’s death. And of her great grandmother, Agnes, and how all of these women were here before her, and how she is here, because of them.
My little girl knows the rest of the story by heart:
How Agnes grew up and became a well-loved teacher in one-roomed schoolhouses scattered throughout the county. How she married a carpenter named Clarence and had a little girl named Cynthia. How twelve-year-old Cynthia met a boy named Alan one day while visiting her mother's rural school, and how Cynthia thought he was such a repulsive farm boy with cow hair on his hat. And how those two grew up and went to high school together, and how Cynthia must have gotten over the cow hair because she married Alan. And how they named their first born daughter Pam. And how Pam grew up a tomboy but became a beautiful girl in bell bottom jeans only to fall for a rebellious boy from the next town who drove a sports car and liked to laugh. And how Pam married that boy, moved to his family's farm and had a daughter named Audra who spent her childhood playing in the haybales and romping through the prairie with the wind in her hair. And how Audra grew up and had two daughters of her own.
She knows all of it. The story of her. The story of me. The story of Pam, and Cynthia, and Agnes and Minnie.
The story of our family and all of the girls.
When we were little.
This is my little girl’s nightly request. I have no idea how somewhere along the line she decided that my childhood was good bedtime fodder. Maybe it’s because of the time I relayed the story of how a tornado once lifted my family home into the mystical land of OZ. (Hey, a person can only tell so many stories about growing up on a cattle ranch before taking liberties with established plot lines. That being said, no comment about the time I woke up to find three bears looming over me while I napped in Baby Bear’s bed.)
I wrestle with her plea and finally settle on one of her all time favorite stories, one she loves more than OZ and bowls of porridge.
In my home office is the wedding picture of my great great grandmother, Minnie Nelson, a brave Danish immigrant who left her family and home in 1906 for the promise called America. And in my living room is her trunk, a modest century old wooden vessel, leather straps still intact, that held all of her material possessions and misty dreams.
A mere six years later, a different wooden box held all those dreams.
A coffin.
Minnie died of an infection shortly after giving birth to her fourth daughter. She’s nothing but a historical statistic on childbirth related deaths in the last century but a vital branch on the tree of our family. The ten-day-old daughter Minnie left behind was too much for her Norwegian husband to handle. The newborn was given up for adoption, disappearing from our family like a gasp.
The oldest of her remaining three little girls, my great grandmother, Agnes, was six years old when she lost her mother. And a mere two years later, she said goodbye to her littlest sister. Her name was Hazel. And she died from pneumonia at the age of four.
Little Hazel still rests in a shaded cemetery next to her young mother. I visit them with my daughters every spring and place fragrant lavendar lilacs on their graves.
And so I tell the story to my little girl again. The story of Minnie. Of the missing baby. Of little Hazel’s death. And of her great grandmother, Agnes, and how all of these women were here before her, and how she is here, because of them.
My little girl knows the rest of the story by heart:
How Agnes grew up and became a well-loved teacher in one-roomed schoolhouses scattered throughout the county. How she married a carpenter named Clarence and had a little girl named Cynthia. How twelve-year-old Cynthia met a boy named Alan one day while visiting her mother's rural school, and how Cynthia thought he was such a repulsive farm boy with cow hair on his hat. And how those two grew up and went to high school together, and how Cynthia must have gotten over the cow hair because she married Alan. And how they named their first born daughter Pam. And how Pam grew up a tomboy but became a beautiful girl in bell bottom jeans only to fall for a rebellious boy from the next town who drove a sports car and liked to laugh. And how Pam married that boy, moved to his family's farm and had a daughter named Audra who spent her childhood playing in the haybales and romping through the prairie with the wind in her hair. And how Audra grew up and had two daughters of her own.
She knows all of it. The story of her. The story of me. The story of Pam, and Cynthia, and Agnes and Minnie.
The story of our family and all of the girls.
When we were little.
Sunday, May 2, 2010
Pain in the Booty? Try Budda.
I’m kinda crabby.
And this is why.
I truly am a perpetually positive person but I have this sabotaging force in my life called “the ex-husband” whose presence is as constant and unwanted as a hemorrhoid. Which personally, I feel is a perfect analogy considering the anatomical geography of such an affliction.
Unfortunately, this patooty pain is the father of my wonderful children, a fact that requires me to smile politely and nod when he says or does something completely and absolutely asinine instead of saying, “That was completely and absolutely asinine!” I have to bite my lip, say nothing, and instead be satisfied by simply thinking to myself:
“That was completely and absolutely asinine.”
Yeah.
Not so satisfying.
I am a Christian, Catholic actually, but I really think that divorce (when children are involved) should require a person to temporarily borrow from the Buddhism buffet when times are trying:
I’ll take the “every other weekend” helping of nirvana, please. And why yes. A dash of grated enlightenment sounds wonderful. But just a sprinkle.
You see, I am well aware that Christianity is founded on a plot line all about endurance and suffering, one that leaves we believers subsequently touting “we all have our cross to bear.”
Yep. We sure do.
And mine is about 6’2” and 195 pounds.
But in this divorce situation, I think I may have to start practicing a limited version of Buddhism. Because the gurus aren’t so much down with cross toting as they are with tolerance, which is just a fancy way of telling people to just ignore something. (If this is true, Christian mamas everywhere are preaching Buddhist doctrine on a very regular basis. After all, who ever heard their mother tell them to forgive their little brother’s incessant irritation? Nope. It’s more like, “Just ignore him!”)
So if I am going to be a weekend Buddhist, that conveniently means I don’t have to forgive my ex-husband's challenging moments. Instead I can simply say: Not my problem. My peace and happiness is not going to be driven by your unpredictable insane train. Enjoy the ride, I am not buying a ticket, stopping at the station, or even watching you chug on past. I am going to:
Ignore you.
The philosophy is quite liberating actually. Because life is just far too short for crabby pants and crazy trains.
(Or six foot tall hemorrhoids . . . ouch.)
And this is why.
I truly am a perpetually positive person but I have this sabotaging force in my life called “the ex-husband” whose presence is as constant and unwanted as a hemorrhoid. Which personally, I feel is a perfect analogy considering the anatomical geography of such an affliction.
Unfortunately, this patooty pain is the father of my wonderful children, a fact that requires me to smile politely and nod when he says or does something completely and absolutely asinine instead of saying, “That was completely and absolutely asinine!” I have to bite my lip, say nothing, and instead be satisfied by simply thinking to myself:
“That was completely and absolutely asinine.”
Yeah.
Not so satisfying.
I am a Christian, Catholic actually, but I really think that divorce (when children are involved) should require a person to temporarily borrow from the Buddhism buffet when times are trying:
I’ll take the “every other weekend” helping of nirvana, please. And why yes. A dash of grated enlightenment sounds wonderful. But just a sprinkle.
You see, I am well aware that Christianity is founded on a plot line all about endurance and suffering, one that leaves we believers subsequently touting “we all have our cross to bear.”
Yep. We sure do.
And mine is about 6’2” and 195 pounds.
But in this divorce situation, I think I may have to start practicing a limited version of Buddhism. Because the gurus aren’t so much down with cross toting as they are with tolerance, which is just a fancy way of telling people to just ignore something. (If this is true, Christian mamas everywhere are preaching Buddhist doctrine on a very regular basis. After all, who ever heard their mother tell them to forgive their little brother’s incessant irritation? Nope. It’s more like, “Just ignore him!”)
So if I am going to be a weekend Buddhist, that conveniently means I don’t have to forgive my ex-husband's challenging moments. Instead I can simply say: Not my problem. My peace and happiness is not going to be driven by your unpredictable insane train. Enjoy the ride, I am not buying a ticket, stopping at the station, or even watching you chug on past. I am going to:
Ignore you.
The philosophy is quite liberating actually. Because life is just far too short for crabby pants and crazy trains.
(Or six foot tall hemorrhoids . . . ouch.)
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