Forgetting My Own Rules

It seems I'm forgetting all of my own rules.

Last night, I offered Aviva a band-aid for an itchy mosquito bite. "Mama, you're forgetting your own rule!" she told me.

"What's my rule again?" I asked.

"No blood, no band-aid!"

Oh, right. That one. (Thanks, Mom.)

This morning, it happened a second time. We were prepping the challah french toast, our Saturday morning ritual. V was cracking one egg after another. I handed her a bowl to put the shells in. "Mama! We have to scrape out the last bit of egg white. You're forgetting your own rules again."

Right, that one, which has become a habit ever since I read an account by a survivor of the Warsaw Ghetto, where she recalled that extra bit of egg white could no longer be taken for granted, discarded.

"What was the one I forgot last night again?" I asked her, forgetting my own forgetting. "The band-aid," she called from the kitchen as I went to write these things down. We have kids, teach them our rules, forget our rules, then relearn them from the children we've passed them along to. Talk about circular.

All day, I've been figuring that forgetting my own rules could be a sign of getting older. It might mean I'm loosening up (finally!).

My hunch is that these are probably the same thing.

We all have a lot of rules, by the way, whether you think of yourself this way or not. One client of mine realized last week that he has a rule that in order to "count," it has to be big. I asked him to make a list of all the things his rule discounts as not really counting. He wrote things like, "Talking to neighbors," "swimming," and "riding my bike." Everyday things. Simple things. Many of the things, it turned out, that bring him joy, that make him feel like himself, i.e. authentic. His homework was to pick one of those things to "count" each day.

We all have rules.

Another client recently shared what sounded like a rule to me about passion. Passion, as I heard her defining it, requires a person to devote her entire being to something. To eat, breathe, sleep it, to be willing to die for it. Dara Torres, the Olympic swimmer, was her model for this. We kept talking. And as we did, it became apparent that the bar for passion was set at such an extreme height that she felt it would forever be out of reach. Her homework was to draw a "mind-map" of passion, to begin to tease out what other hidden or unconscious "rules" she might have about this thing she finds so elusive and unattainable.

In the meantime, even as I'm helping others notice their rules in new ways, I'm forgetting mine. And this feels simultaneously ungrounding and exhilarating, as if I could float up into the sky like Danny Deckchair (if you check out the link, ignore the mediocre rating - this is a gem of a movie!).

I think I have a general rule about blogging and politics. The way I see it, motherhood is inherently political. So is marriage, or sending your kids to public school, or riding a bike or owning one car or planting tomatoes or teaching or paying taxes. A consciously lived life is arguably a political commentary in and of itself. And yet - I have typically chosen not to use this space for politics in any overt way. Why is this?

Fear, perhaps, of pontificating, of putting off readers. Or maybe it's that my intention is to practice looking for, experiencing, and exploring how my ideals, values, and passions play out in real time - rather than writing about them abstractly or in a way that's removed from my life. Or maybe it's the simple fact that I don't think of myself as articulate when it comes to my political leanings and beliefs. (How's that for a rule of the self-limiting variety?)

I want to say I'll get back to blogging as usual soon. I have everyday, real-life things I want to write about, like kindergarteners playing soccer and potty-training toddlers and pms and everything-in-its-own-time. About turning seasons and evolving friendships and that sensation of immersion, like I'm a foreign exchange student in my own life sometimes.

But here's the thing: No change, no challenge, no growth, no life.

And so.

These are not usual times.

If you are on the fence about this election, please read the link below.
If you know someone who's on the fence about this election, please send them this link and ask them to read it, to consider its implications.

In terms of politics, I live in a bubble. To be honest, I know very few McCain/Palin supporters. But more likely, I don't know that I know many McCain/Palin supporters. For all I know, you're one of them. Please, keep reading. I'm about to share a link to a piece about Sarah Palin. This was not written by Gloria Steinem or Thomas Friedman or any other pundit or luminary who could be labelled or accused of being "elitist," "liberal," biased, or even just preaching to the choir. This is not propaganda or schadenfreude. This is a testimonial written by an Alaskan who has known Sarah Palin since 1992.

You've probably already read it. If you haven't, here it is:
Please click here to read Anne Kilkenny's Testimonial

Here's to forgetting our own rules.
Here's to bandaids for bleeding wounds.
Here's to scraping out the last bit of egg white.
Here's to believing that the small things count.
Not only that: They're everything.
Here's to passion being something we don't have to die for.
Here's to hope in action.