Zen and the Litter Box

This morning, I met peace over the litter box.  My younger son, a floor above me, was 15 minutes into a rant about damage to a Nerf sword, and I was working hard to keep my cool.  Not everyone may choose scooping cat poop during these events, but I've yet to find ways to consistently keep my cool during these loud, protracted tantrums, so I gave it a go.  It worked.

My younger's tantrum verge on the legendary.  They're long, loud, aggressive, and sudden.  Eight and a half years of these beauties should have inoculated me against their effects on my heart, but time hasn't helped.  (Okay, they were nonverbal for the first year, but at what age does protracted unexplained screaming morph from colic to tantrum?)  He's inconsolable, angry, and out of control during the events, and they generally just have to run out of fuel on their own.  On my best days, I can keep my cool for the duration, keeping my voice even and expressing what I imagine his feelings are (he doesn't use those confusing feeling words often) while he interrogates me relentlessly, looking for the answer he wants and erupting more when I don't give in.

Until today, ear plugs have been my best defense. I can hold my temper better when my ear drums aren't threatening to explode.  While I wish a hug and open ear helped him, these tactics only fan the flames.  Answering a few questions to assure his understanding then refusing to continue the conversation seems the best tact.  So I often move around the house, cooking, cleaning, and tending to simple tasks while I wait out the storm.

Today, I headed toward the litter box.  With six kittens in my charge, there is no shortage of poop to scoop. Once by the basement box, I search through the sand with my blue scoop.  His voice fades a bit with the distance, and I sift through the box for telltale clumps.  It's oddly soothing, and soon my mind is only on those stinky lumps of clay.  Too soon, the job ends.  After reluctantly setting down my scoop and tossing my findings, I return to the tantrum still in play.  It's easier now to weather the storm.  His raging continues for another 20 minutes or so,  but my storm is past, thanks to the litterbox.

Dragons are About

I have dragons on the brain. Specifically, I'm imagining a scarlet-backed, small-winged beast about 4 feet tall. He's a bit grumpy at times, but we've been living together for awhile now, and I'm gradually learning the art of sharing my life with him.

A recent sermon by Alex Riegel, Feeding the Purple Dragon, crystallized my process of coming to terms with my separation from my husband of 15 years and upcoming divorce. To briefly summarize the 30 minute sermon, dragons are those people, events, and situations we face that, if ignored, grow larger and more troublesome. We often do just that, pushing the issue away from our minds in an attempt to avoid pain and conflict within our selves or with the dragon itself. Or we try to slay the dragon, but this is a rather messy and ineffective way to go through life. The radical alternative? Learn to accept the presence of the dragon: learn its habits, its feeding needs, and live accordingly.

The divorce process itself is one of my dragons. He's not my ex-husband-to-be. He's divorce and all it's layered meanings to me. My first head-on encounter occurred when the papers arrived. Sword in hand, I railed against him, but he joined my household anyway. Dealing with the legal end of this process, face-to-face or from my home, can leave me in a cold sweat. Impatient claw clicks grow louder as the Judgement of Divorce statement sent from my lawyer sits in my inbox, needing comments and revisions from me. Once I look at him head on, read the papers, fill in the necessary blanks, and send them off, he retreats, returning to his spot in the house.

At points, my sadness about this divorce overwhelms me, tears flow and sobbing leaves me exhausted. Following my honest acceptance of my feelings about this life change, he actually shrinks a bit. When fear of the future floods my system, he feeds heartily, growing more threatening as my anxiety deepens. Only when I can face his gaping maw, brimming forth with smoke and oppressive heat, does he back away, having seen the strength I possess. He requires honest acknowledgement and forward motion to maintain an even temperment.

My dragon's not leaving. Divorce is forever with me and my children. Living with it peacefully, repecting it's reality and responding honestly without excessive anxiety is the choice I've made. I've layed down my sword and face my newest resident accordingly.

Holy Days

It's the International Day of Peace, one of the only, well, created days that I can get into. Except I forgot it this year. I saw it on the calendar when scheduling an appointment for my younger a few weeks back. It was announced from the pulpit in church yesterday, along with Eid-al-Fitr, the end of Ramadan, and Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, both actual Holy Days. The real schmeal.

Since becoming a Universalist Unitarian, I feel a bit like a woman without a Holy Day. Our church mentions all the big ones and many I'd never heard of before attending UUCF. Since our congregation's focus has been on the six sources from which we draw our living tradition, I've added Holi, Budda's birthday, and Darwin's birthday to my awareness. Since so many of these are announced at services, along with the more familiar Easter and Christmas, perhaps I'm a woman of many Holy Days.

But I'm not. Those Holy days are not mine. Not as truly holy. My boys and I celebrate Christmas with songs, a tree, and gifts. We talk about the birth of Jesus and the message of love Jesus brought to the world. At Easter, we discuss rebirth and celebrate life, but I know for both we're somewhat co-opting the days, celebrating them in a way that works for us because they're big deals in this country. We celebrate Hanukkah with my mother, a Reformed Jew, the lights of Hanukkah next to the advent candles we still use to mark the coming of Christmas. The boys know the stories of these Holy Days and many others, and while we fall prey to American Holiday Greed disease, I try to balance it with plenty of homemade giving and time with loved ones.

Still, I have my doubts. These aren't my Holy Days, and I'm loathe to misappropriate customs and practices from religions not my own, but I feel a bit short of Holy Days as a Unitarian Universalist. Perhaps this explains my draw to the International Day of Peace. I'm not taking it from anybody, it's celebrated around the world, and it's in concert with my UU belief system. Not a bad Holy Day, in my opinion. I wish I hadn't forgotten this year.

Peace be.

War and Peace

My younger son is a war fanatic. For the past two and a half years, not so coincidentally starting when we began our study of history, he's obsessed over the wars throughout recorded time. His first true passion was the ancient Romans, specifically in the Punic Wars. I knew nothing of the Punic Wars before our year of ancient history, on of many blanks in my shoddy history education, while he was well versed in the years of that conflict at age 5. I can see the appeal of Hannibal crossing the Alps with a herd of elephants, but this wasn't but a small part of the interest to him.

So why does he love to read about, talk about, act out, and discuss war? I believe the answer is three-fold: weapons,conflict, and power. Those parts of history enrapt him, and war embodies all three.

Weapons. While I'm a pacifist by nurture and nature, I can see why a small child would delight in weapons. The catapult and trebuchet are pretty fascinating machines, but even the spear in all its simplicity captivates my son. Longbows, crossbows, swords, maces, cannons, guns, and bombs hold endless delight to him, in structure and use. All allow one to reach beyond the self with greater force than can be created by a small human body alone.

Conflict. My younger lives in conflict with his world. He's still quite convinced that he is indeed the center of the universe (aren't well all, really?) and dares anyone to oppose. He creates conflict with his brother when bored, hungry, or fatigued; holds firmly to his view of the world in spite of evidence that contradicts his view; and can't stand his own human imperfections, preferring to blame personal shortfalls on the wrongs of others. He's been at conflict with the world and himself since soon after birth.

Power. Nothing like being the youngest in the family with a streak of perfection to create a quest for power. Feeling powerless clashes with each person's ego, and while some of us either gain perspective then peace regarding our place in the universe or learn to struggle less overtly, meeting this powerless feeling head-on suits my younger's mindset right now. Warring with the world and his own fallible human nature, he searches out weapons with which to settle the conflicts resulting from his feelings of powerlessness.

Weapons, conflict, and power. Whether our weapons be words or wealth, our conflict internal or external, or our power quest overt or subtle, we all share the elements of war. As I watch my younger reach for his duct tape sword or home-made armor, I know I'm seeing him play with struggles we all face and know he's relating to history and the world as works best for him now. I also have faith he'll move beyond this obsession and can see progress in this area as he notices patterns through our studies that brought nations to war and the patterns of his own behavior that bring him into conflict with others. I have faith that we all can grow right along with him.