Our wonderful sitter, Nicole shows up and after various configurations of hugs and kisses and last things with the kids, we are off. Our plan is to peruse the natural foods store kitty corner from our apartment for a few of our favorite snacks. Sincee site of the  graduation has the name “Lodge” in its name, so I’m picturing a lot of meat and grease on the food. I’m hungry, so I figure some hummus and a Kombucha sound a lot easier on my body than what’s likely to be served at the graduation. I’m psyched for our slightly devious plan.

To get to Lil’ Green Grocer from our place, all you have to do is meander through an urban park and your there, which is where I am now, searching for Kombucha in its usual spot, just below the iced teas, to the left of the locally-produced  fruit smoothies. It’s not there. Odd. I found out about Kombucha a few months ago and was mezmerized by this fizzy drink that tastes like a punchy, distinctive offshoot of sparkling juice – less sweet, with nuanced flavors and undertones that make it fun and interesting. Kombucha carries reputed health benefits ranging from sugar regulation to anti-aging properties, which in addition to whatever objective healing properties you actually imbibe, adds a fabulous placebo effect to the enjoyment of this cool beverage, which I recently began nabbing from the fridge of Green Grocer. I’m sorely disappointed to find an empty zone of fridge space in lieu of Kombucha of in a rainbow of colors and flavors.

I march up to the front counter and in a friendly tone (after all, I like the owner of Lil’ Green,) “What’s the deal with Kombucha?”

It turns out there is some question about the alcoholic content of Kombucha. Apparently rumor has is that a Kombucha set of Lyndsay Lohan’s alcohol monitor and that tipped off a frenzy of investigation, leading to the leading Kombucha company having to stop production until evaluation and possible relabeling is complete. Oh my freaking goodness. The other night I witnessed a drug deal right outside my window and when I called the non-emergency police number the lady spent five minutes trying to figure out which side of the cross street the dudes were on and by that time they drove off and she was basically like, “yeah yeah yeah, well call us if they come back.” She didn’t want their license plate number or want to know which way they went. But my gosh, if I’d said they were making Kombucha outside my window, maybe they police would have just looked up the cross street on their GPS and headed straight over to end the outrage, because the people who drink Kombucha might loiter around doing random acts of kindness and talking about the latest Green initiatives, and that would be a threat to society as we know it.

The owner of Green Grocer is on our side. In addition to being a sane and nice person, Kombucha is his best selling product. Sometimes life is just upside down.

So my Love and I get some hummus and some Mary’s Gone Crackers, and instead of Kombucha, I get an organic chocolate bar, 73% cacao. I like my drugs of choice to confer health benefits. Outside in the park, I lounge on my Love while we snack, and then we get in the car and snack all the way through rush hour traffic until we arrive at the such and such Lodge. I have asked my hubby at least three times if there will be dancing, or only food. I keep getting this answer: “Well, I’m pretty sure there will be food…and I think there may be music…” The thing is, for me food and music are almost meaningless without dancing. Moving to the music, letting sound and energy swoop through me is the thing that captures the purest sense of the word “Life” for this little woman typing words on a screen.

I ask my hubby to promise he’ll dance with me, even if there is no dancing. I give the face. You know the face. It never worked with my dad, but it works with my Love – and if relationships are at least a little bit about working through childhood issues, there’s a check in at least one box: Lover meets unmet childhood longing for adorable sad face to melt heart and lead to wish fulfillment.”

It turns out I was mostly right about the food. Lots of greasy vegetables, potatoes, fried chicken and some salmon that I’m pretty sure is not the Wild Alaskan kind that is supposed to be okay to eat. On the upside, the salad is unexpectedly delicious – dappled in cranberries, walnuts and enough dressing to clothe a small nation in oil. I also dig into the apple crisp, because it looks like the boring talks are in full force and I’m not sure I can endure this sort of thing without sugar.

The talks take up the rest of the evening, but they aren’t as bad as I assumed. A few are even funny. Of course it’s impossible for the evening to progress to its conclusion with me doing something mildly humiliating and that moment comes when the program director says in an artificially hyped up voice, “Let’s all give a round of applause for our support staff. YOU MAKE A DIFFERENCE!” I see some people stand up, and I figure it’s a standing ovation. I’m all in favor of a standing O for a population that gets little of the glory or the paycheck, so I stand and clap loudly.

My Love looks at me, amused and says, “I didn’t know you got a side job as a part of the support staff.”

The unendingness of introductions, speeches and awards is softened by the fact that several of the speakers are funny, and because some were funny in a sort of cruel way, I have to assume that there is a deep connection among the physicians and residents. One excerpt of an awards presentation for faculty member of the year or some such thing:

‘So when Dr. Flynn showed up for her interview three years ago, the first thing I saw was woman in a denim skirt, like the kind I associate with people involved with fringe religions. And she was sitting on a desk. She looked really tired, like she had cancer or something, [which she actually did at the time] and I wondered about her, but ever since she came on board, things have just really looked up around here. So since you seem like kind of a woodsy girl,  Dr. Flynn, we got you some camping accessories. Here [he hands her a bag of stuff that looks more like beach toys than camping equipment.] Thank you Dr. Flynn.’

After the official event is over, people circulate a little, saying hellos and “nice to meet yous.” A young woman in a flowery dress comes over and touches my arm almost as if I’m special fabric.

“You must be doctor Kwon’s wife. I’m Cathy, one of the medical assistants. I work at his station. We love doctor Kwon. He’s our favorite to work with, cause he’s just so nice and wonderful.”

“Yes, he is wonderful,” I say, trying not to laugh out loud. I mean it’s true, my husband is one of the kindest people around and he is nice and wonderful, and I’m not surprised that the support staff apparently have a collective crush on my guy. It’s just weird hearing him spoken of as if on a pedestal of admiration and me the lucky woman who gets to share his pillow. I knew this guy whose pillow I share when he was a medical assistant who preached at a Methodist church when the pastor was away. I would have been fine if he was a nurse. Or an EMT. Or a boat fixer. Just as long as he was himself, doing what gave him joy, I’d have been fine with it. I just love him. And the Great Physician has a imprinted my Love with a calling in medicine. So whatever. He’s a person and I’m happy we share pillows, among other things.

As the crow thins and various conversations wind down, the band is still playing. Several of the doctors are in the band, mostly playing wind instruments. My Love’s dad, who is a doctor also plays a wind instrument. Is there a connection between listening for breath sounds and creating them for pleasure? I wonder. I also wonder if my Love is going to dance with me, after all. I’m not the mood to force it tonight.

And just when I’m thinking it won’t happen, it does.

My Love gently grabs my arm and pulls me in the direction of the music.

“Is it time to dance?” he asks.

In a whirl of stepped on toes and spins and a beginner swing steps mixed with improv, we dance and dance and dance and laugh the whole time. It is as if the band is playing just for us.

Suddenly I smell something and it isn’t good. A girl appears in the doorway and she is the picture of a princess in pink: velvet leotard; chiffon skirt. head held high.

“I pooped.”

Yes, there is a clear pronouncement if there ever was one.

“Where?” I inquire, dreading the truthful response I’m sure to get.

“I pooped some of it on the stroller and some of it in the living room and part of it is in the bathroom and there’s some in my undies.”

I follow the trail of brown smelly substance on an obstacle course throughout the house and finally back to its source. Lovely.  Avsi’s wipe down is quite an understanding, but she stands there quite patiently. Eventually she is more or less de-pooped and ready for a bath. I watch her poor water and soap on her terry-cloth frog, cleaning him as I have just cleaned her. I wonder how much poop residue a microscope would find in the water that is “cleaning” her frog.

With that taken care, it’s time to get ready to go. I’m meeting up with a friend at Living Room Theater, and my Love is joining for the first little while before he has to get sign out from the daytime at the hospital and start his night shift. I’m doing some very minor primping when he walks in the door with a frown and sad, downcast eyes that would leave a toddler’s sad face in the dust most days.

“What’s wrong?” I ask. concerned.

“You know how there was that weird thing that was supposed to be at the end of the year that I told you about, well somehow it got switched around and I have to work tomorrow. I tried to get out of and trade with someone, but I couldn’t.”

Tears. A feeling like being punched in the heart with disappointment. A feeling like it is personal, like the program must have somehow known that I had just mustered up the faith to feel it’s okay to feel like the worst is over and they wanted to sock it to me one more time. It’s irrationally. I don’t care – that’s what feels true in this moment.

What makes this moment different from others like it is that we reach for us each other. Instead of my enemy, this is my friend, the one with whom I’m linked in body, heart and essence, happily so, even in times that just seem unfair. We hold each other and it’s okay that I’m crying and he looks like his eyes are breaths away from letting out their waters. It’s okay to feel…fully…in each others’ presence…about that which formerly stood as the great impassable wall between us.

Upon seeing me cry, Avriana stretches up her arms to be picked up, then wraps her entire being around me. “I love you,” she whispers. Avsi, my Love and I hug each other for a while, then I fix my eye liner, wipe my tears and give a few quick instructions to the sitter.

Our friend doesn’t know my hubby is joining us for a for a stretch before work, so my Love calls her on his cell (since I don’t have one,) and leaves a message, which sounds normal until he pauses at the end of it and says, “I love you, bye,” and then looks at the phone like, “What the?”

“Did I just say “I love you?” he asks, clearly disoriented.

“Yep, you did.”

“That was really surreal. My brain is doing funny things. Well, don’t worry, I don’t feel any eros (ie romantic) love for her.”

I’m laughing and crying at the same time, because I totally get that when you’re zombie-tired, you do things on autopilot – who does he usually call and leave messages for? Me. What does he typically say at the end of whatever other content in the message? “I love you, bye.” So his resource-depleted neurons have made the equation as simplified as possible: When leaving a message, end with saying “I love you, bye.”

Whatever. This is what it has come to – my husband is so damn tired that he is like a robot, telling another woman he loves her, bye.

It turns out our friend, to whom my husband has unwittingly professed love to is held up at a meeting and will be late which gives my Hubby and I a chance to have a little date. I go ahead into our chosen location, Living Room Theater, while my Love continues the search for parking. We hardly ever have to deal with parking, living downtown, but we’ll be parting ways after Happy Hour, me to go home and watch over our roost and him to go to work and watch over patients hooked up to various machines.

I seat myself at a cute little table with a couch on one side and chairs on the other. When our server approaches, I beg off the mandatory alcoholic beverage that is usually part and parcel of ordering off the happy hour menu and order an acai white tea instead. I’m on a cleanse, designed to help my overextended adrenal recover from the last few decades of life.

Soon our sweetly skinny, eccentric and almost certainly gay waiter sets down a lovely goblet of tea in front of me, along with generous a hummus platter, augmented with with thick, round, warm pitas. I  It’s lovely to be together over yummy food. I learn from my Love that the first official artificial life has been created – a DNA strand identical to that of a known bacteria – a bacteria within a family of bacteria that can be harmful to people. So now there’s this constructed life form that can independently replicate itself and I think to myself, Wow, another potential way for humans to destroy themselves as I dip my pita bread for more hummus. We hold hands, look into each others eyes. Perhaps the thought of the world ending is helping me keep own destructive emotions in check, at least temporarily.

Eventually our friend shows up. She isn’t totally sure she heard the message right. I assure her that she did and  then my Love explains how tired and out of his mind he is and we all laugh. Then my hubby has to go. We kiss sort of wistfully and in a whoosh of scrubs, he is out the door. It still feels lie our weekend has been ruined, but at least in this moment there is the sweet presence of love as I watch him exit.

I linger and chat with my friend for a while and it’s a good time. We talk about the different kinds of love there are in the world, about mother-daughter tensions with our kids, and about what makes connections magical. Before I know it the clock as struck 9 and I’m a few minutes late home to a house full of kids who have been tucked in to sleep. Within minutes, one sleepy little boy pads down the hall and hops into the pullout bed and squirms until he has found the perfect position.

Today I get to do something uncannily normal: attend an elementary school function for our oldest – WITH my husband.  It’s daughter’s end of the year party, which is held early, due to the teacher’s upcoming foot surgery, which is complicated enough to warrant miss the last two weeks of school and being off her feet all summer. A  sub will see the kids through the last two weeks of the academic year. It’s the first time in a long time that we’ve gotten to go to one of her things as a couple. Most of them coincide with when Daddy is on call. The one other time he’s come to one a thing since internship started, he swore up and down the wazoo (whatever the wazoo is,) that he’d be home by 6:30, to pick us so we could go as a family, in time for our daughter to get there by 6:45, which is when the teacher expected her in the dressing room for the 2nd grade play. My Love (though I didn’t call him that on the evening in question,)  arrived 45 minutes late, with no phone call and twenty reasons why, until it was too late, he really thought he could get out on time. During that 45 minutes, of course I had to take the kids on my own, not knowing what was gong on.  It was that time of the month, to add insult to injury.  I was so mad I made him sit separately from me when he finally arrived.

I keep learning again and again that if you choose to hold expectations of life, then your happiness will be dictated by luck and a plethora of capricious influences outside your control. I keep learning this lesson over and over again because of two annoyingly simple and painful words: Unfair, and Promise. Immediately these two words put you at odds with other people, life and possible God. They even pit you against yourself, though whereas we tend to feel rage and self-pity when someone or something outside ourselves screws us, when we are unfair to ourselves or break our own promises, the emotion we typically feel is guilt. Lovely. Unhelpful.

With fortune on our side today, this elementary school function t is actually  fun.  My Love and I walk across the grass from car to classroom with linked arms and enter portable 2. It’s cool to see our oldest girl in her “other” environs; to observe her cruising around the room arm-in-arm with her best friend; then to our 2nd grader  sitting at her work table (albeit eating pizza and popcorn instead of working on class assignments,) and to watch her reaction when a boy offers her his crackers (something between polite disdain and innocent amusement.) When the party winds down, we thank her wonderful teacher. In the course saying goodbye to a fellow parent, I mention all the fantastic qualities of this fine educator and how perfect she is and then casually say something about how our daughter Nika said that while she’ll miss her teacher, the sub gives longer recess. At that moment,  As fate would have it, at that very moment, the teacher walks right by. I’m fairly certain she heard only the last bit. Food in mouth. Foot in mouth. And off we go to pick our little ones from preschool.

In a few short hours, my Love will be back at work for the night.

I’m feeling uncertain about the world – the shootings lately, (fictional and real,) the increasing natural disasters and international strife; the plane that yahoo told me just went down in India; the collapse of the Euro; the homeless guys I see on the corners and on the steps of forsaken businesses around town…and even though I’m looking out the window of my two-bedroom apartment on the posh scenery of the Pearl District, I wonder how long it can last – how long can islands of ease, relative safety and loveliness built on questionable financial premises can continue their peaceful strut, untouched by the throes of terror and tear that rock  untold innocent lives in our interconnected world. I’m scared, with a marinade of helplessness frying my nerves. I wish I could wrap my arms around the world and save it. I wish I could tell my kids that everything will be fine for them, with the confidence I’d be telling the certain truth. Certainty is a crock, I get it. I  try to meditate on the love casts out fear, but I can’t fully get the images of terror from my mind. Has that ever happened to you?

The whole Kwon family is due at noon at the home of our friend Liz. She is one of our most cherished former babysitters and we are getting together for a potluck.  Liz lives in Southeast portland in a house with a huge backyward garden. If a catastrophe did strike locally, she and her roommates would probably be found among the survivors, thanks to the abundance they grow in their enormous plot of earth. Irises and pink daisies announce that, whatever may or may not happen to us in the future, LIFE IS FLOURISHING! We each pick a singular strawberry – only a few are ripe – and then head inside to munch on homemade hummus, quinoa salad, cranberry-nut-salad,gluten-free pizza and gluten-free chocolate chip cookies, which are incredible. I ask Liz where she got the recipe and she shrugs with a smile. “Online.”

All around the house their are pets to pet: three cats, named Sercy, Hades and Kitty-pie, and a service dog, whose name escapes me. Sweet black lab, slightly hyper, incredibly loyal to her companion, Jess, who is visually impaired. While Avsi and Nika seem most attracted to the dog, Gabe coos at the kitties. “That kitty loves me!” squeals Gabey with delight.

I check the time periodically. My Love will soon be driving me to the Bagdad Theatre  to see Nobel Peace Prize winner, Muhammed Yunus. We have to leave at 1:30.

When it’s time, Nika and Avsi hang with Liz, while Gabe comes with my Love and I in the car. I wave to my boys as I get dropped off a block from the Bagdad Theatre. It’s been raining, sunning and hailing intermittenly all week. Presently it’s pouring rain as I scamper toward an old movie theatre sign that reads “Muhammed Yunus,” in red lettering, and right below, “Alice in Wonderland.”

Inside the venue, a variety of young professional and middle-aged intellectuals have gathered to hear one of the truly great individuals of our time. He comes on stage with a huge, genuine smile and makes a joke about how such cultural accommodations have been made for him that even a Moonsoon has been facilitated on his behalf, to make him feel more at home. Listening to him speak about how his model of Social Business is lifting people out of poverty all over the world, it fills me with the tinglies. Yunus started out giving out $27 loans to 42 women and has since developed his model of Social Business to the point where there is some form of it found in every country on earth. His model is simple, brilliant and powerful: A business is created specifically to meet a human need or problem, without consideration of profit margins, so long as the business can be self-sustaining. All profit, if there is any, either goes into expanding the business or into the pockets business owners IF they owners are poor people. Success is measured exclusively in terms how effectively the business addresses the concerns of the people or problem it was designed to benefit. 98% of of borrowers return the money. 97% of borrowers are women — because Yunus found that women are more likely than men to use the funds from their business to improve the life of the entire family.

Yunus critiques contemporary capitalism for its failure to recognize the fullness of human nature. Human beings, argues Yunus, are both selfish and selfless. No one is just one or the other, yet our current system is based only on our selfish instincts. We need a system that includes, in addition to our drive to take care of ourselves and “our own,” space for our our sense of connection to the wellbeing of others and our selfless desire to help those less fortunate than ourselves.

Yunus is at his most inspiring when he talks about how, thanks to affordable loans to poor people, illiterate women collectively own banks — and their children are going on to higher education. When the young people get out of school, sometimes they come to Yunis and say, ‘We don’t know what to do. Where are the jobs?’ And he says, ‘Go talk to your mother. Your mother owns a bank. She can help you finance whatever you dream of creating. Don’t be a job seeker; be a job giver. Don’t be an employee; be an employer.’

Listening to this guy is the perfect antidote for hopelessness and paralysis. You can’t help but feel optimistic that it is truly possible to impact formerly intractable problems when innovation is in the hands of the right messenger at the right time.

Another thing I learn: all over the world, the banks founded Social Business Principles have been doing just fine throughout this financial crisis, while profit-hungry, collateral-dependent giants next door fall and flail. How about that?

Later, I head to Cup & Saucer, where my Love and I are meeting up eventually. The kids are home with a wonderful sitter, with whom I trade kid-care for coaching. A total win-win situation.

I order a cup of  organic Lavender Lemon tea from my robust (in a good way) waitress who is wearing a turquoise skirt and wide-rimmed glasses. Periodically, while I flip through some of the pamphlets I pocketed on the way out of the theatre, various servers refill my stainless steel teapot with hot water, for which I am unbelievably grateful. It’s like unlimited tea!

I’m only a few pages in Yunus’s new book, “Social Business,” when a familiar face peers at me through the window located directly behind me. Squishing his nose up to the glass is my Love. For some unknown, unspeakably wonderful reason, I’m happily excited to see him – you could say giddy, in love, or some such thing. I rise from my seat and meet him halfway between the entrance to Cup & Saucer and the booth where I’ve been enjoying myself immensely. Hugs and kisses happen and soon we are seated together.

It takes us a while to order, because we have so much to talk over with each other: I’m thrilled to share my experiences hearing Muhammed Yunus share his wisdom, and then of course there’s the unfortunate tickets that my Love incurred on the way home from Liz’s house: one for turning too late on a yellow arrow; the other for improperly installing Avsi’s booster seat. Who knew? The funny thing is that in order to avoid having to pay out that latter ticket, my Love has to sit through a two hour educational shtick at the hospital where he did his peds rotation, called “Nurses get tough.”  Of course learning to properly install your kids’ seat is important, and I had no idea ours was improperly installed, but who can help but laugh at a re-education seminar called “Nurses get tough”?

I’m picturing white-clad nurses with boxing gloves, possibly riding on Harlies. My love and I laugh — whether more due to the innate humor of the situation, or more owing to our sense that laughter is exactly what the Doctor ordered for us, it can’t be said for certain, because as I mentioned earlier, certainty typically has no place in life.

For food, we finally order an avocado veggie burger sandwhich, without the bun, and an additional tea – Jasmine, I think.

Well, she isn’t exactly a grandma in the way she thinks she is. It’s not her grandson’s biological child. Instead, the baby is a product of rape. Grandma’s son has agreed to step up and parent this precious human being with such unfortunate beginnings. Perhaps the baby has gotten his fair share of bad luck out of the way early in life.

Boyfriend knows the truth. The entourage in the waiting room, well they have no idea. The boyfriend’s sizable family gathered in the waiting room assumes this baby is genetically linked to their familia.

The social worker on the case wonders how long this couple will able to keep their secret with that baby looking as white as the snow on Mt. Hood. And as for Grandma, would she really think he was a slacker if she knew he was intentionally embracing the the responsibility to raise a child conceived from a coercive sex-act between his girlfriend and some slimy other guy?

How would Grandma feel? Would she still think he was a slacker? Or would she see him as a potentially-freaked out good guy – possibly even a hero? Or would disapprove of his involvement in a situation he didn’t catalyze with his own body?

Why did the girl and her boyfriend elect to hide their secret? Perhaps, my Love and I muse, by the time the larger family finds out, baby will be integrated into the group, loved for who he is, rather than where he came from in the first place. Let’s hope paternity is the only the first word and not to defining word in this child’s life.

Fatherhood cannot be reduced to a paternity test.

“Daddy” is a word that ought to for men who honor women, while  participating, in whatever ways they can, in the wonder, growth and wellbeing of the kids in their lives. “Daddy” stands for someone you, their kid, can count on to love you no matter what you do, where you go or who you become. “Daddy” is the man you would want to walk you down the aisle at your wedding, which may or may not be the person who put it in your mother with on the day you were conceived.

Once in a while,”Daddy” is a word fit for more than one person. Maybe you have two dads because your parents are gay. Or like my oldest little girl, perhaps you have two daddies because both the man who catalyzed your earthly life and the man who loves your mother recognize that fatherhood doesn’t have to be a competitive sport; having two dads who love you unconditionally is simply wonderful. Of course my daughter will have to pick for herself how she wants to walk down the aisle, if in fact she walks down an aisle, but I would smile if she someday walks with a father on each arm.

Cheers for the dads who stay involved with their kiddos even when involvement with Mom ends – and here’s to the dads who would fail a paternity test, yet pass with flying colors the tests of parenthood.

On Friday, the homeless kid I offered to coach for free shows up, perfectly on time for his appointment, experiencing effects of an unexpected reaction to some recently prescribed valium…or something. Then he proceeds to hit on me. I have never seen anyone so crestfallen to hear that I’m happily married, and in particular someone who is literally drooling. I set some hardcore boundaries around any future coaching and, instead of hooking him up with me,  hooked him up with some great resources from a friend of mine who works with people in transition who are dealing with mental health stuff. I hope the best for him, and if he can show up somewhat sober and professional, I’d coach him again. After all, if showing up is half the battle, he’s well on his way to showing up appropriately, on the path to a healthy life.

Saturday is one of the worst days. Have you ever had one of those 24 hour periods where absolutely nothing you do has any effect and it seems that the world is set on either falling apart or coming together to drive you mad? It’s one of those days. My Love is on 27 hour call, it is that time of month, and, in spite of my best efforts to do creative problem solving, the situation as a revolving – or devolving door of sibling in-fighting, mommy-limit-testing, smart-alec antics, general grumpiness and all-out tantrums, including one where Avsi is convinced that what will make her feel better is to bite me. By 1pm I’m severely burnt toast. Like the kind of toast that is more black than brown, with sooty edges. I’m crumbling.

I go in the bathroom to cry, and as if on cue, the towel rack clatters to the floor with a crash.

Eventually, three little people join me in the bathroom; The little two plop in my lap. The oldest and I take turns lecturing each other. I’m in the middle of a strong rant when that almost-eight-year-old smiles a oddish smile. I’m about to get really pissed, because she’s been acting “smart” all morning, when she announces, “Hey my tooth just fell out.” We have a good laugh. Gosh, her teeth fall out at the funniest times. One fell out at her Dad’s med school graduation; another fell out in a taxi van on the way home from the airport; and now, for the rest of her life she’ll have this great story about how her mom was giving her a mother lecture after this really terrible morning and all of a sudden, her tooth fell out!

Twenty minutes later, the art therapist arrives. We are swapping services:  coaching for “Creative Day” with the kids. I’m convinced she’s going to find the children raumatized, declare me an unfit mother and send some sort of report to some sort of gatekeeper who decides these things about parents. While I head out for an hour to walk among flowering trees, find center and wait for the gluten-free pizza I have ordered to emerge from the oven of Pizza A-Go-Go, the kids make puppets and play games with them. When I return home, the art therapist tells me that the kids are happy, internally organized and smart. Her goal is to help them come together as a team. Her only concern about Gabe is that instead of participating in the creative activity, he wanted her to make dots for him to trace letters and numbers. I have to laugh.

It’s one those truths that bring us both sorrow and joy: everything passes. For today, I’m thanking my socks of for impermanence.

At last its evening and after clean up and stories, Gabe & Avs are breathing the in and out rhythm of sleep, collapsed on my leg, which is sprawled across the couch. I carry them into their own room and kiss them. Nika and I  pull out the couch into its bed shape and watch Emily of New Moon, relaxing into each others’ unfettered company. When everyone is asleep, and I’m starting to close my eyes, I remember to put on my metaphorical wings and took a little love gift from the Tooth Fairy in with my oldest daughter. I leave her a dog-themed charm bracelet and a white stretchy headband with clear rhinestones sown into it next to her clay tooth jar.

Sunday arrives and my Love returns home. I get a chance to stretch in the sunshine and breath in the effortless space of having to do nothing. I pick up a Tooth Fairy present from Green Frog, for Nika has yet  another loose tooth dangling from her mouth.

Later, I taking Avriana on a Mommy-Avsi date. First we head to Goodwill and she holds, so earnestly and perfectly in her arms, a skirt and shirt for me, while I look for sweatpants to wear to NIA, which is my latest hobby-ish passion, combining dance, empowerment and tai chi. Next Avsi and find Frozen Yogurt. We share a vanilla Cinnamon, with strawberrys on top. We pretend our cups were a Mother-daughter horse pair, and make them talk to each other in funny voices. The cups nuzzle and kiss. We try to ignore the homeless guy outside the window who is slowly raising and lowering his middle finger at another homeless guy. Avsi tells me her favorite current book is “The Fairy Tale one.”When we finished our frozen yogurt, we placed our corn-based utensils in the compost and Avsi said, “Member the song the girl at the farm made up about the worms?”

“Yes, that’s a fun one!” I say.

“Munch Munch Munch. Wiggle Wiggle Wiggle. Poop Poop Poop” – we chant together as we walk out the door.

Our next stop is Laughing Planet, to pick up supper for everyone to share at home. While in line to place our order, my little girl and I dance to the music, which is happily grooving in the background. Our movements have a light, silly harmony to them. Life is effervescent. Another woman standing in line start to groove with us. Of course, Avsi then hides behind my leg, holding on to my shirt with her little fingers.

Once our order is placed, scamper outside, and descended into a thick grove of bushes with little stones for a floor bed – a perfect hideout. Avsi plops in my lap and we clap stones together for fun.

The evening is as lovely as the afternoon. Our whole family enjoys the Laughing Planet supper, immensely. The table is filled with an enjoyable quiet as we chew our food and savor the company. Halfway through supper, Nika loses her 9th tooth. I feel like she has lost more than that, but I haven’t been counting. Thankfully, I have been in communication with the tooth fairy, and operation pillow present is in place and ready to go. I stopped by Green Frog earlier on my own and picked out the cutest Little Critters beagle twosome. It’s a bit extravagant for a tooth fairy gift, but my little girl is growing up so fast, how many will I have left?

When our plates are empty we play a round  of “telephone,” which is a fantastically good time, followed up by a round of “The Minister’s Cat,” which engages our oldest while the littler ones hop off to do their own thing.

Everyone helps out with cleanup unusually well. I teach Gabe how to wipe the crumbs from the table into his hand.

While My Love helps Gabe & Avs prepare for bed, I read to Nika from one of her favorite Felicity books. Avriana eventually joins us, draping her body over my shoulder, with her head nuzzled in my lap I’m snuggled, happy as a clam in between my two wonderful daughters, who happen to be two of my favorite people – ever. Was it less than 24 hours ago that I was chanting in my head, “If this is what motherhood is, I think I don’t want it!?”

One of the things I’m learning is that allowing all those forbidden feelings, like temporarily wishing away our kids – or underneath that thought, wishing away the feelings in us that they evoke in us at times, is the fastest way to create space for the abiding love to surface from the clear depths where truth calls out to Itself, is to watch our feelings and thoughts with care and understanding, without taking them – or ourselves too seriously.  If I were to define my littlest daughter based on her temporarily conviction that biting me is the answer to her angst, what kind of person – or mom would I be? Likewise, if I condemn myself based on a transient wish to offload my kids and quit the hardest job in the world, what kind of person – or friend to myself would I be? I think life works better when we hold lightly the temporary insanity that each of us experience from time to time as part and parcel of the human condition. A light hold allows it to pass through, returning us and our loved ones to our underlying state of connection and wellbeing within ourselves and in our relationships with our fellow incarnate travelers.

Once the kiddos are soundly sleeping in their beds, my hubby and I huddle in for a flick. I have secured, what I hope is a good one, and it doesn’t disappoint. David and Leila is the love story of a Jewish American guy who owns a bachelor-oriented cable show and young Muslim woman – a Kurd – whose family has been gassed by Saddam and has 30 days to get married “for real” or else face deportation. It’s filled the nuance, history, zest, stereotypes, sadness, joy, humor and sexiness. Best of all, it’s based on a true story and it has a happy ending.

My evening ends happily too.

Small hands wrap around a plastic cup of orange juice and a little face appears unbelievably peaceful as it looks off into space, as though watching heaven float by on a fluffy white cloud. It is as if Gabe’s whole body has lightened, and even though he isn’t much for talking, the contentment emanating from his sweet-boy self is obvious, at least for anyone with eyes to see. Which I do, sitting across the table from my little boy at Camellia Tea Zone.

A few minutes earlier, we’re dropping Gabe’s sister off at WeVillage, our posh neighborhood drop-in daycare center, which is owned by a fabulous woman with a son in my oldest daughter’s class at school.  Little Sister is happy to go to WeVillage. She has no problem getting dropped off for the purpose of giving her brother a chance to have some Mama time. Her date is coming on Sunday.

On our walk to WeVillage from home we pass Mark on the sidewalk. Mark, as in the flirty neighbor who kept telling me how pretty I was, then apologizing for it the other night when I hung out with him and Jon the Mon for all of fifteen minutes.  I mentioned that situation to my Love when he got home from call a few days ago and joked that my one takeaway from the whole thing is I can always say, “But I thought I could say whatever I want and get away with it because I’m pretty. That’s what Mark said.”

My Love laughed with me on that one. And I got tickled. Though I’m sure he doesn’t relish the idea of other people digging his wife, he is not at all the jealous type, which I’m thankful for, and somewhat bewildered by, simultaneously. I, of course am prone to jealousy over the mere thought of my husband performing a pelvic exam of a woman with an STD, or checking the cervix of a lady in labor. I wish those things weren’t part of the job, frankly.

In passing today, Mark politely said only “Hi” with the air of someone who is trying hard to act professional and respectful. At least he’s trying.

A few blocks from home, it’s rampantly apparent that the boots which Avsi picked out to wear today– the blue and green ones formerly belonging to her older sister, and approximately one hundred two sizes too big — are definitely doomed to fall off her feet every time they are replaced on said feet.  I put her boots in my bag and carry her barefoot on my back. When we finally opened the door to WeVillage, the lady at the desk inquires if she has socks. Thankfully, I have a random pair of purple socks hanging out in my purse. So I leave Avriana and her socks in the care of others to spend forty-five minutes one-on-one with Gabe at Tea Zone, which is where I am, savoring the peace in his angelic little face, watching him ease the orange juice up his straw in unselfconscious bliss.

Intern year has been tough on Gabe. Lately, he wants Mommy and Daddy to stay with him “all the days and all the nights.” It is as if he is on guard, vigilant and fussy and loving all at once, against the inevitable separations that are part of our life. An hour or two away from Mommy is devastating because it is in the context of days on end when he may or may not see his Dad. Even as an adult, it’s taken me three fourths of the way through intern year to finally feel like I’m in an emotional equilibrium where I can flex and thrive happily. Over the weekend, our Man was home for two days in a row, which is like finding a quartz crystal in a driveway – not totally unheard of, but pretty rare.

On Saturday we hosted Avsi’s friend birthday, which was full of lovely people whom we all like very much. I’m pretty sure the adults had at least as much fun as the kids. Two of the grownups slid down the railing at Tanner Springs for the first time, for one thing, and everyone who came was just exactly the kinds of people you hope to hang out with as a part of life – fun, wholesome, multi-cultural, intelligent, spiritual, open-hearted, zesty. A little past noon we ended the party, and our friend slash sitter stayed and watched the kids for an hour-and-a-half while my Love and I enjoyed a fun rendezvous at Fat Straw, where we sucked tapioca through a straw and sipped a white mocha to the last drop.

We spent the later afternoon with new family friends that we met through the internet. Or more accurately, I am on this parent coach’s awesome online newsletter, called the Daily Groove, which gives pointers on parenting using the Laws of Attraction, and when I saw that he and his family just moved to Portland, so I called the dude up and said, “Hey,” which led to a family get together, consisting of us, him and his wife and their two girls, one of whom is about Nika’s age.

On Sunday we hung out just our crew, doing things like playing a family game of “Sorry” and watching the Mama and Daddy ducks at Tanner Springs.  My Love and I snuck out for another 1.5 hours of time to chill with each other. He read to me from What the Dog Saw, and we talked about ideas and life and our kids. And we laughed together. In the evening we loaded up everybody to drive around Portland, exploring possible neighborhoods for the someday when we are ready to find a home that is, as Gabe put it, “Somewhere between a cottage and a big house.”In the evening, when we tucked everyone in, Gabe reiterated his theme song: “I want Daddy and Mommy to stay home all the days and all the nights and I don’t want Daddy to go to work or be on call any of the days.” He punctuated his statement with a grunt at the end, for emphasis. It’s become his trademark.

Now it’s Monday. As Gabe and I order, in addition to the orange juice, a gluten-free brownie to share, and a skim chai for me, Gabe’s dad is on his first day of a new OB rotation. In the space of five minutes, I manage to knock over the sugar container twice. Gabe doesn’t knock over anything. He is quite serene, basking in this zone of unconditional presence and intentional togetherness.

I pull out a notebook I brought and draw some shapes and words and pictures for Gabe. He doesn’t like the kitty I created for him, which is surprising. He wants me to draw him a rectangle. “Do you want me to put the kitty inside the rectangle?” I ask. Gabe’s little face lights up. “Yeah!” He giggles, enthused. “I want you to draw a rectangle and put the kitty in it.” Which I do. He counts the sides of the rectangle: “one, two three FOUR!”

After a while I invite him to come sit on my lap. With earnest attention, he moves his plate and juice to the spot in front of me, before making his way around the table and onto my lap. We sit happily together for a while. Until I remember it’s Monday – Nika has French, which means I’m supposed to pick her up. For some reason I had it in my head to get home in time for the bus. Oops! I scoop up Gabe and head to the cash register to pay our bill.

“You card was declined” says the woman behind the pastry counter. Oh man! I remember that last week I lost my wallet for a few hours, before finding it in the kids’ room at the floor. In the intervening time I canceled my cards.

I am cash-less. I do, however have one check left in my check book! It’s my lucky day, because they take it, and we’re off, Gabe snuggled into the crook of my neck as I carry him toward WeVillage. “I love you Mom” he croons. “I love you too, sweatheart. So much.”

I check out somewhat hurriedly from WeVillage, signing out the time of kid-retrieval and scooping up Avsi, her boots once again stashed in my bag for safekeeping. I’m four feet out the door when I realize, I haven’t paid yet. I’m five feet out the door when I realize, it isn’t gong to happen today. I couldn’t have paid if I tried. Interestingly, no one asked for payment when I thanked them very much and headed out. I figure it must be understood by a higher power that while I cannot pay today, I will pay tomorrow. Luck seems to materialize when you let go of control and celebrate the ways that the Universe, G-d, The Great Whatever/Whoever, is cavorting to help you out – in spite of your silly little flaws, like forgetfulness, in my case.

In the evening, Nika and I snuggle up for our weekly episode of Emily of New Moon. Propped up with red,  blue and black pillows from IKEA, Nika and I snuggle contentedly, at ease and enjoying each others’ company. The story line is about a mentally-ill man who was conceived “on the wrong side of the blanket” who is both feared and ostracized by the locals. At the end of the episode, Emily writes in her journey, ‘I thought he was a serpent, but he turned out not to be a serpent, but a terribly lonely, sad man.” That line sticks with me.

I scoop up my oldest little girl, who is almost as tall as I am, and carry her like a baby to her bed. I am so lucky.

There’s just one thing missing. Well, actually it’s a someone. He won’t be back until tomorrow, about 2.

In the last 48 hours of so, it seems like it’s been raining random guys for no apparent reason. Two  innocuous – one potentially suspect, one clearly suspect.

It’s Tuesday morning – I’m at the coffee shop, sitting on a stool with a book by  Hazrat Inayat Khan, called Being and Becoming. In addition to repotting Sufism, which is the mystical branch of Islam into a more universal, westernized context, Khan founded the particular Sufi commune where I was born at home, in an octagonal log cabin. I up and decided the other day that it was time to read his work. A familiar looking man is sitting on a stool in the same area as I am and after one has seen a face in a coffee shop long enough, it seems appropriate to make small talk, so I ask him if he’s reading anything interesting in the paper, which is holding. “Not really” he says, and asks what I’m reading, which leads to a fascinating conversation, starting with his friend who likes Sufi poetry, branching out into a conversation about what we do for work (he helps people buy and sell companies,) and culminating full circle in a bit about which comes first, music, or dance. Does the music create the dance, or does the dance follow the music? Which is a funny thing to think about, since on a physics level, we are all vibrations, and vibration is the sound of movement. The chicken is the egg.

On Wednesday morning, I’m walking home after a fundraising meeting for a local non-profit. In front of Rite Aid sits a kid with a cardboard sign inked with”Anything helps.” His face is down, eyes closed, in the posture of humiliation and withdrawal apparent in the body language of countless homeless people I’ve seen across town. Except this looks like a kid. He looks maybe 17 or 18, newly hopeless. I have a feeling the lights are still on in there.

“I’m not going to give you money,” I say, “but here’s my card. I’m a life coach and I’d love to do a free session with you. You can do more than this with your life.”

His eyes perk up, as he takes my card.

“Thank you. I’d like that. Can I call you?” I invite him to give me a call to schedule at 8:45, wondering what type of phone access he has. Then I realize I haven’t gotten his name, so I ask.

“Phil” he says (not his real name).

“Nice to meet you Phil. I’m Jemila.” I smile genuinely, but do not shake his hand, which is probably irrational since studies have shown fecal bacteria on the hands of average people who have homes.

It’s 7:35 on a Wednesday evening – I’m out for an hour while our new, very competent sitter holds down the fort and folds the laundry. I’m walking along on the sidewalk, soaking in the warmish cool evening air and doing some conscious breathing. I notice how when I lift up from my core, my shoulders drop and the whole world seems lighter from the inside out. I smile. Out of the blue, someone says, “You must be having a good day – look at you smiling!” I find out he is a former homicide detective who know works for the state. I tell him what I do. He tells me a lot about his life and then wonders aloud, “I don’t know why I’m telling you this.” We exchange cards.

It’s 10:15pm, still Wednesday. The kids are asleep. We had such a good day. Lots of hugs and horsey rides, moments of connection and understanding. We even got to share a lovely family picnic with Daddy at the Tanner Springs, the park only steps from our home. It was a satisfying day and I’m tired. I look tired. I hoist the trash over my shoulder, exit our apartment, lock the door, lug the trash down the hall and heave it down the garbage shoot into the abyss of who-knows-where.

On my way home, I run into a guy from our building I haven’t seen for a while. I used to know his name, but it’s inaccessible, because my brain is toast. We chat briefly. He asks what I’m up to. “Reading a book and going to bed.” He harangues me. “BOOORING.” I say something the value of books and and how they can change the world and how they put me in my happy place. I say. “What are up to? I ask. I’m watching a movie over her here in 229 with my friend Jon the Mon. You want come? I hesitate. Is it a good idea? I conclude that since I haven’t had much of a purely social life in while, it might be fun just to stop by. I’d only be a few doors down from my apartment and I’ll only stay a few minutes. Put in an appearance, then go home and find my bed before the little ones find it and find me missing.

“Let me go home and read my book for five minutes, and then I’ll come for just a little while.”

I return home to pour myself a mug of hot chocolate, which has been heating up on the stove, and to spend a few minutes with my book.  I also ask for higher guidance. “Go with caution” is the word.

I meet up with this guy,  who I’ll call Mark at his friends’ house, who I’ll call Jon the Mon. A decision is made to move the party over the Mark’s house, which is a welcome relief, since Jon the Mon’s place reeks of smoke.

Mark’s studio is a prototypical bachelor pad. Reasonably neat and clean, slight smell of smoke, glowing neon sign that says “Mission Burrito” on the wall, which he got when his old employer decided to change the name of the business, and little tiki torches on the porch, also from the former employer. Mark has, apparently been going job to job and his plan is to “take a break” and go on a motorcycle trip across the West Coast, with Jon the Mon, who is a large man with an auburn beard, who used to build bridges, including the one that goes to the zoo. Jon the Mon is retired. He owns a Harly. I ask why the trip. Mark explains that Jon the Mon has a brother he wants to see in Cali. Then Mark points to a photo on the wall of him sitting opposite a hot woman, who from a distance, looks like Marylin Munro wearing black leather short shorts.  Mark and this girl met on myspace and she’s a nurse, “but a sexy nurse,” Mark explains. She lives in California. They are friends. He could fall in love with her. She is either the reason for the road trip, or the excuse for it. I’m not sure which. Or it may be like the the chicken that is the egg; the vibration that is both the sound and the movement. In the interum, Mark tells me four separate times how pretty I am. Then he invites me, my husband and my kids to his birthday party, which is to be hosted by his friend, who is “the” pdx speed dating coach, and lives in a posh loft behind the post office. I thank him for the invitation and remind him that my husband might treat him in the hospital someday, so it would be good for him not to mess with me.”I’m gonna go now” I say.

“Jon the Mon, stop making her feel uncomfortable!” says Mark, as I walk out the door.

Once I’m safely back in my apartment, home before the little ones ever noticed I was gone, I settle in with my book again. I’m reading 10 Principles for Spiritual Parenting by Mimi Doe with Marsha Walch, PH.D

It’s 8:45 on Thursday night. I check messages and Phil has left one! A day late, but he called! I’m tickled and elated. I press “88″ to call the sender and wonder what line I’ll reach. Phil answers the phone!  He is as intelligent as any young person. In brief, Phil’s story is that he had a job and an apartment, but he lost the job, then the apartment. Phil’s only family  in the area is comprised of his two kids – they are in fact the reason why he is homeless here, instead of having a place to go with his own parents elsewhere. Phil’s father pays for the cell phone. He is living at a youth shelter. Don’t ask how someone young enough to live at a youth shelter has a five year-old and a two-year old. This is the first week that Phil didn’t look for a job. What he really wants to do is get an education.

We are meeting on Friday, the 23rd at 9:30 at Starbucks. The one by Pioneer Square.

Avriana, Nika and Amy the Giraffe

It’s 9:20am. I look up from what I’m doing at the sound of the shower going. When I look up I see a huge giraffe in my living room and it puts a smile on my face. The giraffe’s name is Amy, and it turns out she is a huge hit with everyone in the family. I’m also happy because my Love has arrived home after another longish night at the hospital. The schizoprenic, suicidal smoker has agreed to stay in the hospital, and is allowing the staff to check his sugars. He continues to refuse insulin. Apparently he hears voices saying bad things about his father and about himself. I suggest maybe they could hypnotize him and change the voice to a nice voice that says compassionate things. “Yeah,” says my Love, “That’s good. Cause his dad had issues and he committed to suicide, so maybe we could change the voice to say, “You’re father is at peace and he loves you.”

I have forty minutes until I have to be somewhere doing something work-related.  I contemplate the sound of the shower pitter pattering in the bathroom and announce, “I’m coming in.” Two human beings strip down and hop into the streaming flow of water. While who-knows-what germs are washed of our bodies (especially his,) we revel in saying “Hi, nice to see you” in this intimate setting. And we talk. Ultimately, we end up having a fantastic conversation about our kids’ futures, there education and the idea of unschooling. How would we have reacted to it as kids? What ingredients do each of our kids need to thrive, with their own particular personalities, predispositions and unique expressions of life? How could we integrate learning into the fabric of family life, as an expression of who we are? What’s the sweet-spot balance structure and open-endedness, between the virtue of practice and the value of unhindered wonder. Or like I said in my last post, the finesse of sensing when to interfere just a little, then zip it and let life do what it does. It was our most fun, jubilant and fruitful conversation about our kids’ education ever, and when we emerged dripping wet from the flow of water, I mentioned that our talk was sort of a quintessential expression of unschooling, because well it wasn’t planned, there was no agenda, it happened spontaneously out of the attraction and engagement of two intelligent individuals who care about something in common and who happened to be in the shower, happily enjoying life together.

The conversation is so great, I’m late for class. It turns out fine. After class I find my love curled up on the bed in the cutest, snuggliest position. I wiggle in. I won’t tell you what happens a few minutes later.

Would it surprise you to know that a guy who’s been sleeping with a knife every night for a month almost left that hospital against medical advice because a) he didn’t want to talk about his diabetes, and b,  he wanted a smoke? Maybe not. You know this guy’s got issues, because his been sleeping with a knife for a month. He also happens to be schizophrenic.

This morning my Love wanders in the door this morning after another sleepless night,  with a relieved stagger as he tells me how they nearly had to commit the guy against his wishes, but avoided it by appeasing him, at least temporarily.

To the patient, my Love says, “Okay, we don’t have to talk about your diabetes.” I guess getting somebody to settle down is sometimes more urgent than treating their condition.

“And you can go outside the hospital to have a smoke, as long as these two guys from the hospital go with you.”

I guess life is about priorities. For the guy, having a smoke was more important than his mental or physical health. Avoiding the anxiety of talking about his diabetes was more of a priority than getting help for his out of control sugar levels. For my husband, as the physician, it was more important to secure the patient’s voluntary stay at the hospital than to force the issue of his diabetes or his smoking habit.

There’s  young woman I like and respect who works at a coffee shop across the street. In a few weeks she’s moving to Seattle. Not long ago, I saw her smoking outside and asked if she’d thought about quitting. She said she had quit for six months once, but that for some reason it’s hard to quit in New York and in Portland. I offered to do a smoking cessation coaching group for her and her friends. She said she’d talk it over with her pals. I didn’t bring it up again until today, when she told me that she’s moving to Seattle, when I mentioned it would be great if she took advantaged of a free coaching session to help her quit before she moves away. Of course setting the agenda for a coaching session is completely un-coach-like, but I hate to see people I like smoke, and I’m pretty sure she’s not going to take me up on my offer anyway, so I throw out the rule and put it out there.

“Actually, I haven’t smoked for a while” says the girl, continuing on: “I was around my family for a week and I didn’t do it while I was with them, and then I started reading this book about quitting that focuses less on scare tactics and more on why people smoke and kind of dealing with that.” I’m happily relieved. I don’t have to coach her on a goal inappropriately set by me. Plus she is caring for herself and taking healthy steps! Who knows if I influenced her choice to think seriously about quitting, or if it would be have come about naturally without interference.

Interference. When is interference the presence of serendipity intercepting the status quo, and when is it us offloading our need to help, fix, etcetera, etcetera onto unsuspecting innocents? Which was it with the coffee shop girl? If I had it to do over again, I’d still ask the question, without expectation: “Have you thought of quitting?” Instead of offering to do a coaching group for her and her friends, I think I’d offer information: “I facilitate coaching groups and if you or any of your friends are ever interested, I can do one with a focus smoking cessation.” I think that’s where I’d have left it.

So much of life is learning to interfere just a little, then zip it.