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Friday Blog Roundup

by Mel

Show and Tell. I was able to read every post and comment so far and it had an added side benefit. I usually start pulling together the Friday Blog Roundup on Thursday night, currently prime blog reading time, so now I can come for the Show and Tell post but stay for the incredibly moving post below it written about an upcoming appointment and get two things for the price of one click. I listened to the class member and I rounded out the Roundup. See, added benefits to the move. And I Kirtsy’d one of the Show and Tell posts this week. When I read them on the weekend, I wouldn’t remember them for the LFCA during the week, but here I could just open up the post and pop it in there. See, change can be good. And the list is still open. Which means that if you have missed out on the fun up until this point, it is not too late to write your own post and show something to the figurative class. And if you can’t get your act together today, there is always next week or the next week or the one after that. Show and Tell will always be held on Wednesday to Friday from this point on. The thing I love about Show and Tell–and the whole basis for starting it a year ago–was that sometimes you have something that you just want to hold up and show everyone, but you feel strange making a whole blog post about it. But here is this built-in space for that random sign you saw or the purse you bought or the song you heard on the radio that reminds you of this story. Just like you stood in front of your kindergarten class holding a random Barbie and saying, “this is doctor Barbie and she’s a doctor,” come stand in front of your figurative class and show us a random thing since you have our rapt attention. And if you want to participate and can’t get to a computer during the day, send me a link to your post and I will upload it to Mr. Linky for you. See, no one needs to miss out by the move.

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I wanted to upload some more of the pictures from lunch last weekend. Not as exciting as pens and breasts, but still, some lovely pictures of Katie’s purse.
Our Family Beginnings, telling a story
The Happy Hours and B, listening
Body Diaries by Lucy, Sell Crazy Someplace Else, and The Happy Hours
Chez Perky, A Little Sweetness telling a story, and my new cousin, Hoping for Another Lovebug
A Little Sweetness and Hoping for Another Lovebug
B
Our Family Beginnings, Chez Perky, and A Little Sweetness
The purse is made out of seat belts. Seat belts! What will people think of next. I think if I owned that purse, I would never stop touching it because it felt so smooth and nice. Can you imagine the photo journal you’re going to get from BlogHer this summer now that I have my new, fun camera? It’s going to be candid blogger photos 24/7, bay-bee (I mean, after I’ve asked if I could take the picture because I’m all anal like that).
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Remember my obsession with Smith Island? Oh, it’s still there. We’re going on holiday with another couple soon, which is totally going to be a Vampire Shabbos (as opposed to a werewolf seder) complete with Buffy episodes. I am trying to sell them on coming with us to Smith Island for the day. It is brilliant fun to have a four-year-old drive you around the island in a golf cart. But my new obsession is Sapelo Island in Georgia. I got sucked into a “news” story on Yahoo that had great islands in the US and saw a picture similar to this. Beyond the sheer beauty of the place, two things drew me towards it. (1) You cannot visit the island unless you live there or are part of an organized tour. I love places that are difficult to visit and fussy. (2) There is no school on the island. Which sounds like the anti-me. I mean, I loved school so much that I became a teacher just so I wouldn’t have to leave the warm bosom of the classroom. But I love the rhythm to a school-less day. I have been waiting months for summer vacation and have big plans on spending it on trips to the farm and swimming and car dealerships (the Wolvog likes to sit in the cars and pretend to drive). We’re going to go to Harpers Ferry and have playdates and take wrong turns to see where they go. I know they go to school on Sapelo Island; the school there closed in 1978 and they head off every day to the mainland. But there must be days that they can’t go to the mainland, where they get an extra home day or two. It’s my new goal. Sapelo Island or bust.
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The Weekly What If: What if you were given an all-expenses-paid trip for a month to the place of your choice (imagine going to Fiji on someone else’s dime for a whole month!) but the drawback would be that on the last night, they get to break your arm. They’ll take you immediately to the hospital to have it properly set, but you know…you’ll have to endure a broken arm. Would you do it? And could you ever think well of that place again after having your arm broken there?

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More thank yous for people who have up the Navigating the Land of If badge on their blog. I know I must have missed people again, but that’s the good part about rolling thank yous; I will catch them the next time.
What? You want the code too because you’d love to help me spread the word about the book? Well, you can get it right here.
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And now, the blogs… An Unwanted Path has a post about wishing for impossible things. It is about the unused spaces in her house and contains this gorgeous line: “there are people out there envious of all this free space… but I can’t stand it. It’s so empty.” I love this post because it literally aches. There is still hope inside of it–she knows she will become a mother one day–but you feel as if the rooms are literally surrounding you as you read the post, visually facing the effects of someone’s infertility. It is a really beautiful post. Bottoms Off and On the Table has a post about how she views a statement now that she is on the other side. She mentions a comment on a bulletin board written by an IVF vet and how when she first read it, she felt guilt and then pity. And now, life has changed her understanding of the words. She states: “I understand how it feels to transition from infertility that is treatable to infertility that may be terminal.” I found her words incredibly moving.
MLO Knitting has a post about how infertility cuts ties and how we need connections too. I think for me, the brilliance of this post comes with the juxtaposition of the cancer diagnosis with the infertility diagnosis: “Cancer has made me want to see my friends more – even as my energy has waned. Stupid painkillers make me drowsy while screwing up my internal clock. Infertility just made me want to curl up in a ball and not have to talk to anybody. Getting ovarian cancer that led to a hysterectomy has just made me mad, sad, and needing to reach out.” Please go read the post in full. Lastly, My Pathway to Motherhood has a post on sensitivity. Not just insensitivity or the things we do and say without thinking about how the receiver is processing the moment and not just the sensitivity that can come from being rubbed raw by loss and passing cycles. From a series of unconnected moments, all tied together by the making of gingerbread men, she states with deep honesty: “And maybe this post is about me not believing I will ever be a mother.” Your heart breaks, maybe due to your own sensitivity to those words, from the contrast of the sweetness of the cookies to the bitterness of the acts. Gorgeous writing and thoughts.

Four posts, all a little sad this week. It’s not that the funny posts didn’t make me laugh, but all four of these made me think deeply and stuck with me for a long time. It’s strange when it works out that they’re all the same note rather than a few funny, a few angry, a few sad. Maybe what I needed to read found me. The roundup to the Roundup: Join in Show and Tell on its new day. More pictures from TOOTPU. Sapelo Island rocks! Answer the Weekly What If. Many thank yous for the book badge. And lots of great posts to read. Hope you have a wonderful start to the weekend.
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0 comments

1 FET Accompli { 06.12.09 at 7:47 am }

Response to the Weekly What If:
I wouldn't do it – for me, it wouldn't be worth going away if I were to have my arm broken in the end. Once part of you breaks, it's often never quite the same…

2 Cara { 06.12.09 at 7:57 am }

I just wanted to say, that transition is hard for me. I love routine. Hmm…I wonder where Bear gets it? (ha!) It's not that I CAN'T do it – for you know I'm a S&T addict, but this wed felt like taking a stutter step to get back in line with the other marchers in the band.

*whew* – I couldn't get there. So, till next week!

3 PJ { 06.12.09 at 8:14 am }

Ah, good one to pick, that Bottoms Off the Table. She's SUCH a good writer.

Re What if: Having (badly) broken my arm twice, I wouldn't do it! Too great a price to pay.

4 'Murgdan' { 06.12.09 at 8:56 am }

My husband and I got some Georgia tour books in an attempt to find some local vacation spots given our personal financial downturn lately….and I too was fascinated by the description of Sapelo Island. I live here, and I'd never even heard of it.

Let me know if you do it…because I know myself and some fellow Georgians would gladly join you for an 'organized tour'–since it would take that to get onto the island and all.

😉

5 Kristin { 06.12.09 at 9:31 am }

I've been through a major broken bone before so I'm not sure I could deal with that as a prerequisite for a trip. If the break was in my lower arm and my elbow wasn't immobilized, I might be able to handle it. Oh yeah, it would also have to be my left arm.

And, if you head to Georgia, I expect y'all to stop of in NC so I can meet you.

6 Faereyluna { 06.12.09 at 9:40 am }

Weekly What If… Okay break my arm for a free vacation anywhere I wanted to go? Not sure I would do it. Especially because it is not like it would be broken by accident. You would have spend the entire trip thinking about how in the end someone is going to grab a hold of you and hurt you. I don't think I could enjoy the vacation at all knowing the whole time that I was going to be physically accosted and hurt at some point along the way.

Hey I live in Georgia too! I have never been to Sapelo Island but I have been to Jekyll Island and I love it. I would love to visit some of the other islands on Georgia as well. We have a small but beautiful stretch of coast here. 🙂

Hugs,
Adela

7 Liddy { 06.12.09 at 11:33 am }

Okay I am so excited to meet up with Jendeis and maybe the TOOTPU crew when I am out there in 2 weeks. The pictures look to be way too much fun with some awesome women. And I love my seatbelt purse too, but I don't think I could pack it and bring it to D.C.

8 LJ { 06.12.09 at 11:33 am }

Bish plz, I've had that badge up (maybe not the official one) since before it was hip…and on TWO blogs.

And hmm. That's crazy tempting to go. How bad's the break? Can I be drunk on all-expenses paid booze when it happens?

9 M { 06.12.09 at 2:37 pm }

What If: that's interesting, i love travel and am a huge clutz– i tend to break things anyway, so my first response was 'of course!' but then i realized, i'm still reeling from being broken on my last vacation… and while losing my children is different then breaking a bone, i haven't been on vacation since and i still wince whenever someone mentions the bahamas. so perhaps, i'll change my answer to no.

10 Billy { 06.12.09 at 4:16 pm }

Thank you so much for having my post on your Friday Blog Roundup (and I was wow just reading what you wrote about it, so thanks again :-)).

And as for the what if – I've always wanted to break an arm and wear a cast, so yeah, I would go on that amazing vacation and have my arm broken [but please, could I ask it to be my right arm? LOL], and I think that, however much pain and inconvenience it might be, that I will look even more positively at that vacation, as I would be fulfilling a childhood dream…

11 Lorza { 06.13.09 at 2:03 pm }

Weekly what if- HELL YEAH! Do you get drugs after they set it? Can I chose were an be drunk when it happens?!?! 🙂 I could totally spend someone else's money to make it work it. 🙂

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