What Do You Want?

"What do you want?"

I was asked this question last week. Initially, I was at a loss for an answer. I haphazardly said, "I just want a normal life." (Because as everyone knows, my life is far from normal.) But I quickly retracted. "No, I don't," I said. "I had a 'normal' life. I was miserable. I was desperate to break out of it (and I did, without regards to those I hurt along the way)." So I threw around a few other answers that sounded good ("I want to be happy" -- lame. "I want to give my son a fun life." -- who doesn't?), but ultimately, I left that conversation a little bit disturbed, because I had no good answer. I had no idea what I wanted.

And then, on Saturday, in response to a very mundane text message -- that I was going to stay in bed for another hour and then go get a Christmas tree -- a friend said: "Your life is such an adventure." I laughed out loud as he insisted my life was worthy of a reality show. But as I continued to think about it, I realized that the irony, in my mind, is that my life is void of adventure. Over the course of the day, it occurred to me: adventure is exactly what I want. In fact, it is what I crave. The things that make me happy, the fun I want to show my son, the times when I am most comfortable in my own skin can all be concisely described as an adventure.

Since this epiphany, I have been full of mixed emotion. I have felt such satisfaction with the realization that the common denominator uniting all the little things that I strive for is adventure . . . satisfaction in finding an answer to the question. But I've been frustrated with the idea that there is no real adventure in my life. That my life is so predictable. And that I'm not even sure how to create that adventure, especially on a shoestring budget.

But tonight, while talking to the same friend who set this thought process in motion, I told him that I'd thought a lot about his text message. And that I thought it was so ironic because my life actually had no adventure. His reply was something like this: Krisi, I'm not talking about the things you do, but about your outlook on life -- the things you say, the attitude with which you approach life, as if it is one big adventure.

Wow, how that hit me. It doesn't take climbing Machu Picchu or backstage passes to AC/DC or having an exciting conversation with a stranger over coffee or taking a spontaneous 8-hour road trip in the middle of the night to have adventure. It is how I treat the mundane, the attitude that I take every day, that gives it the necessary excitement . . . the punch that's needed to get through the doldrums of life.

Do not be mistaken. I will continue to seek out physical adventure at every turn, but the conversation was a nice, gentle reminder that adventure is an attitude and that, viewed in those terms, my life is indeed an adventure.

**Author's Note** I've been doing a lot of thinking and self-reflection over the past few weeks. I've taken a break from many of the distractions in my life, some easier to break from than others, to focus on where I am and what I'm doing. It is both interesting and frightening the things that you can learn about yourself when you detach from the busy-ness of life and really get quiet. This may (or may not) be the first in a series of posts about what I am discovering. 

"A day I will never forget..."

"Oh, thats a day I will never forget." As I child, I vividly remember my mother using that phrase from time to time and wondering how in the world any day could be so memorable that it would never be forgotten. I usually couldn't remember what I ate for lunch on a given day (and oftentimes still can't), so the thought of remembering an entire day for the rest of my life was incomprehensible.

Obviously, in the years that followed, I would come to understand the meaning of that phrase, in many instances, wishing I could have maintained the naivete that accompanied my childhood. Today, at likely the same age my mother was in the first days I remember her uttering those words, I recall a number of days that I will never forget.  I remember the very first time I had that feeling -- I was probably 6 or 7, at a local art fest, and had found a craft that I just *knew* my mother would love. I grabbed it and ran off to show her, only to be apprehended by an over-zealous police officer with the words "you're under arrest." My heart stopped, and immediately realizing what I had done, I threw the object at him & took off running, also realizing quickly thereafter that he was likely only trying to frighten me.  But of all the days, both good and bad, one comes painfully back to mind every October 17...

October 17, 2002 - A Thursday night, I was at my house in Clinton, Mississippi, when my phone rang. Molly Walker was calling -- just a few hours after I had left her house to drop off an edit of a law journal article she had written -- to tell me that my best friend, William Gates, was dead. "Krisi, it's Molly," she said.  "I have some bad news. William was killed in a car accident tonight." Even as I sit here typing, my chest is getting tight, remembering how I physically collapsed  upon hearing those words. Immediately replaying that day's events in my mind... trying to call him with no answer several times on my way home from Molly's, wondering where he was and why he wasn't answering... And the last time I had seen him... the previous afternoon, we met on the street corner outside my office to exchange a VCR tape containing episodes of Ed that I had recorded for him. He wanted to catch up before the new episode that night. (In law school, we watched it together every week.) The absolute agony I felt that night, and in the ensuing days, is no less strong today than it was eight years ago. Not only will I never forget the events of that day, I will never forget the feeling.

I wanted to describe all the things that William was. But I am at a loss. The best I can say is that he was my best friend. He was my voice of reason, my sounding board. He let me be a compete dork (I carried around a random stick the entire exam season my fourth semester of law school), he fed my neuroses (he sat in front of me wearing a green Masters hat during every exam, and even went home to get it once when he wore the wrong one), but most of all he kept me in line.

I will never forget, the summer of 2001, we were both clerking in Nashville. I called him late one night, fretting about a boy who was not my husband. He asked me to meet him for brunch at Noshville the next day, which I did. William was a jokester, hardly ever serious. But he looked at me very seriously over eggs benedict and said "Krisi, PJ is your husband. It shouldn't even be necessary for us to have this conversation." I respected him so much, respected his opinion, respected his advice, that I immediately tucked my elementary feelings away, and slid back into my corner. Embarrassed, in fact, that we were indeed having the conversation.

I remember that day often. And in the past eight years, as I've thought about William, I've thought about that conversation. I've often wondered about similar conversations we might have had, had he been alive. I have NO doubt that he would adore his little namesake, were he alive to know him. But I have to wonder, had he been around, would things have been different? Would one of his few "serious" conversations have prevented any of my many (mis)steps along the way? 

Sorrowful & thankful at the same time, I'll never know the answer to those questions. Instead I will pursue this life, hopeful that I can raise little Gates to be the kind of friend big Gates was to me.

Scratching Number 15 off the list (VIDEO)

Why Me?

Yesterday: A young couple from my hometown lost their 7-month-old daughter. When they woke on Sunday morning, she wasn't breathing; she had suffocated -- or gone into respiratory failure -- I don't know them and I don't know the details. What I do know, however, is that literally overnight, their world was turned upside down.  And for 36 hours, they were in pure hell as doctors worked to save her precious little life.


Yesterday: I had one of the most difficult parenting days I've ever had. Despite my best efforts to do everything the "right" way, it was still a big fail. Gates really struggled on the soccer fields, not just athletically, but his head was a million miles from playing soccer. I know it was fatigue, but there was no good  reason for it. He'd had 12 hours of sleep and a nap at school, we never do caffeine/sugar, and he eats a very balanced diet. I couldn't explain it. I was frustrated beyond belief and wondering how in the world I had so monumentally messed up.


My struggles yesterday were NOTHING compared to the struggles of the sweet parents I mentioned above. Nothing. But when tragedy strikes, especially involving the life of a child, and on a day when I'm already questioning my parenting, I can't help but ask: WHY ME?


Why would God take a child from these parents, probably just as they were becoming comfortable with parenthood, parents who were set to give this little girl what would appear to be a very "normal" happy life, and yet spare my child, who is being raised by a mom alone -- a mom who can never quite seem to get it together? Why did God choose me to walk this path, to mold every single aspect of this little boy's life, and take away baby Rylan before her parents even got a real chance to experience parenthood?


As I sunk to a very low place last night, forcing myself to reconcile these two situations, I realized "why me." It had nothing to do with some bad person/good person dichotomy. And I didn't just happen to get lucky while this couple fell victim to a more tragic fate. It is because God CHOSE me to walk this path, because He has a plan that is beyond what I can understand or even imagine. I cannot and will not attempt to understand why a 7-month-old had to die yesterday, but I can only believe that it is part of a bigger plan. He is not through with that family. Just as He is not through with me.  And He is not through with my son. If He operated the way my finite and earthly mind is trained to operate, I -- one of the "bad people" by earthly standards -- would never have the opportunity that I've been given.

Years ago, I learned an acronym which helped explain the concept of grace:

Gods

Riches

At

Christ's

Expense.

I have done nothing to deserve the privilege of raising this amazing little boy. It is only because of God's grace and Christ's sacrifice that I've been given this opportunity. And I must not squander it.


"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." -- Jeremiah 29:11

Five Years

As I lay in bed with my sweet boy tonight, being attacked with kisses because I'm leaving town tomorrow, I couldn't help but remember where I was 5 years ago today. Few times (if ever) in my life can I remember feelings of love, fear, helplessness, and family come together in such a remarkable way.

Living in Jackson, Mississippi, I was about 175 miles north of any coastal waterfront, but all accounts indicated that we were going to feel serious effects of Hurricane Katrina. I was about 18 weeks pregnant, living alone in a house on a lot so filled with aged pine trees that my street was named for them. As I had been for the previous 29 years of my life, I was viciously independent in my pregnancy. Going it alone, I was determined I didn't need anyone's assistance for anything. But this pregnancy was still "new" -- although I (and my friend April) had known for almost all 18 weeks, I'd only told my parents at week 14, and had only started telling others in the very recent days.

But despite my independence, as the storms strengthened on the night of the 28th, April finally convinced me (likely at the behest of my parents) to pack up my dog and come to her house, in a newer neighborhood a few miles away, but most importantly with no trees. She had refugees from Mobile staying at her house, as well as her boyfriend from across town -- five of us, in a two-bedroom house -- and as the rains continued at the same pace of a good summer storm, I began to question my sanity for being there.

As we watched storm coverage that night and into the morning (being relegated to the sofa, I'm not sure I ever turned the TV off that night), my mind conceived of trees down, roads flooded, even casualty in the extreme cases of those who attempted to "ride it out." But what it could never conceive was what I actually witnessed and experienced in the following days, weeks and months. My beloved Mississippi Gulf Coast -- where I had lived for a summer in college, lifeguarding and sailing, in whose casinos and hotels I had spent weeks on end during my legal career, taking depositions and mastering blackjack -- was gone. My sweet New Orleans -- where I grew up taking Sunday shopping visits, where I'd just weeks earlier disclosed my pregnancy -- was under water.

The storm didn't reach Jackson until a little later that day. My old house lost a few trees (and thus, a few windows) and lost power for what turned out to be about a week. But April's house, miraculously, never lost power, and the cable only blinked for about 5 minutes. One would think this was a good thing, but in reality, it was a mixed bag. In the ensuing days, when most of our city (and all of my family in the rest of the state) was without power, cable, water, etc., I became glued to the television. Watching footage of what was once the bridge I crossed everyday in Bay St. Louis, now destroyed, watching as residents of New Orleans sat on rooftops waiting to be rescued, watching as evacuees filed into Houston and even my own now-dysfunctional city of Jackson, watching mothers, desperate to find the children they had been separated from, watching video footage on a seemingly endless loop of water flooding into the upper levels of the Beau Rivage, watching families, clinging together when they had nothing else to cling to. Until that time, I had never felt more helpless (and dare I say, hopeless) in my life.

And then I felt it. A feeling I'd never felt before, but the source was unmistakable. The little lima bean growing inside me was moving! It was the weirdest feeling I'd ever had.

I'd like to say that it changed my life. That it snapped me out of the pit I had quickly fallen into while watching all of the devastation, but in reality, it just scared the shit out of me. I was met with the very real truth that a person was depending on me and would be for the foreseeable (and not-so-foreseeable) future. And here I sat, on someone else's couch, watching someone else's television, drinking someone else's water. I couldn't leave the house because there was no gas to be had, anywhere in the state. I couldn't even take care of myself at this point.

So while a part of me was aching, yearning to be on the Coast right that minute, working, helping, picking up the pieces, there was another part of me that was thinking "I can't even take care of myself and my child." As the days turned, and I couldn't go home because I had no power, and I had no gas, I wondered about my future. While others, many who literally had nothing, turned to their families for physical and emotional support, I wondered where to turn. Because of health concerns (for the baby), I was not allowed to go do physical labor on the Gulf Coast, the only place I may have felt less helpless.

But it was in those helpless, frustrating days that I realized this important truth: these people that opened their home to me, that I shared a table with, and tears with, for days on end -- THEY were my family. My dad, and his friend who owned a gas station, who managed not only to get me a tank of gas, but also to get enough gas for them to drive 2 hours and back to bring it to me, for the sole purpose of getting me away from the depressing scenes on television, THEY were my family. The neighbors, who came and cut up the fallen trees in my hard, THEY were my family. The folks at the MS Bar Center that I joined hands with, doing legal work for Coast residents from afar, THEY were my family. But most importantly, the little lima bean that was rumbling in my tummy, giving me both physical feelings AND feelings of love that I had never before experienced: HE was my family.

Family isn't just those you choose to place in your life, but oftentimes, most importantly, it's those who are placed there for you. Today, five years later, I am thankful for my family of fellow Mississippians, for showing the resolve & determination to overcome what many said they couldn't.

Bucket List

A few weeks ago, I made a conscious decision to start LIVING. And there's no way to do that without some concrete goals. Maybe this is only a start, but it's a good start. So here they are:

1. Learn to fly a plane
2. Run a marathon
3. Have a pool in my backyard
4. Skydive
5. Party at the Cabo Wabo Cantina
6. Learn to play chess
7. Spend the night (or a week of nights) in Cinderella’s Castle at the Magic Kingdom
8. Thru-hike the Appalachian Trail
9. Adopt a WLBT Wednesday’s Child
10. Return to post-baby weight!
11. Write all the stuff that stays in my head
12. Start the blog I’ve been squatting on for over a year
13. Visit all 50 states
14. Take a cross-country train trip
15. Ride a mechanical bull
16. Start a girls’ poker club
17. Get laser eye surgery
18. Watch a centre court match at Wimbledon live
19. Watch Gone with the Wind
20. Memorize the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7)
21. Win my March Madness bracket
22. Bartend
23. Quit my day job
24. Live on a boat
25. Take ballroom dance lessons and actually use them
26. Write and have granted a petition for certiorari to the SCOTUS
27. Drive to the airport, buy a ticket to anywhere, and go!
28. See a classic rock show at Red Rocks
29. Learn the guitar
30. Plant a garden and sustain it to harvest
31. Spend a month on Jost Van Dyke
32. Have my own original artwork hanging in my home
33. Beat @TDubb at scrabble (and have him acknowledge it)
34. Learn to be on time
35. Find a life where being on time is irrelevant
36. Spend a week at the Neshoba County Fair
37. Homestead under the lights
38. Have fluent conversations with my son in a non-native language
39. Take a ride on the Orient Express
40. Build and own a little cabin in the woods of south Pike County
41. Wear a big hat to the Kentucky Derby
42. Sleep in an open-air bedroom on the beach
43. Attend a football game at all 12 SEC stadiums
44. Attend the Mississippi picnic in NY
45. Dance all night at Billy Bob’s Texas
46. Jimmy (Buffett), James (Taylor) & Kenny (Rogers)
47. Ride cross-country on the back of a Harley driven by a good-looking man
48. Sit for a boudoir photo session
49. Enjoy a Blues-weekend in the Mississippi Delta
50. Meet the President

Welcome!

Family Magnetism is an idea that has been churning in my little brain for quite some time, but being the hyper-detailed neurotic that I am, I couldn't launch it until all the pieces fit together. However, I've been squatting on this site for over a year now, and it's high time I get my butt in gear & make something of it. My first real post (that will follow this) is My Bucket List. One of the items on the list is to start this blog. So here we go...

I look forward to sharing all the ways in which family makes my world go round. And not just the mom/dad/sister/son/aunt/cousin family that you might expect. For I believe that family is a bigger concept than that -- a concept I look forward to developing every day.