Walking in a Winter Wonderland

Sometimes life feels stagnant. As if it has always been this way, and will never change. Good or bad it feels as if we were in a stand still. The world leaders have been the same forever, and inauguration is some day in the distant future. The cool crisp sunny days of fall were going to continue endlessly. Babyjama's 5-word vocab. was going to continue to be our basis for communication until the end of time.

Then, on a dime everything can seem to turn. The five days that papajama was home were fraught with change. This morning (as is one of my customs), I turned on the last few minutes of Rachel Ray to see if she was cooking anything that could be converted to vegetarian fare. But as the picture and sound came on, the Obama press conference was on and he had just named Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State. It's not that I'm surprised with his choice, I mean come on...they've been telegraphing this move for quite a while. However, I was struck with the fact that time is moving forward. Changes are occurring regardless of anything that is happening in my own life.

Thursday morning, papajama and I awoke early. Happy to be readying ourselves for the day's festivities, however, the air was warm outside and I remember remarking to him that it didn't feel like Thanksgiving. Then yesterday as we drove to my parents' house for breakfast, papajama stopped mid-sentence as he noticed that I was staring out the window with a glazed over look on my face. We had had a sprinkling of snow overnight, and the powdery white on the deep jade evergreens and on the spindly maple branches forced me headlong into winter wonderland visions complete with the soundtrack.

Later on by the fire (imaginary), babyjama's face lit up when she awoke from her nap to the living room all decked out with a Christmas tree, complete with lights and ornaments (even a tiny gingerbread man that she calls "beebee"). It brought to mind how last year she learned how to roll over beneath the Christmas tree, and how so much has transformed about her to create the toddler that she is now. And although I aided in those changes, I didn't cause them, and I definitely can't take credit for them.

All of this change and transformation surrounding me has brought some insight this way (along with making me feel like a nostalgic fool). So much of my life I try to orchestrate, and yet I have so little control. Okay, that's hardly insight...I mean everybody knows that. However, what was new for me was that every time that I try and get the perfect outcome out of something that I have absolutely no control over, I'm taking responsibility for the outcome, which causes me stress, which makes me feel guilty, which makes me vow to be better, which causes more stress, which causes more perfectionism...and on and on and on.

Every time we go out of town this seems to happen. I stress over the packing. I want to make sure that everyone has all the right stuff. So I pack for every scenario that I can think of. I get myself in a tizzy pacing from room to room and yelling to papajama things like "But what if it's unseasonably cold in June?". Then when we arrive I find out that I was so caught up packing for every kind of weather, but we're going to eat spaghetti 5 times, and I only brought two bibs. Obviously I'm not at fault for not knowing what we're going to eat, but I take responsibility for it as if I should have known, as if it's my fault for not knowing what to expect.

I think most people get that they don't make the weather...and I've always understood that too, but the other things. The unexpected occurrences, the relationship fallout, the seemingly coincidental freak accidents. Somehow I feel that I should be able to dodge them. Anticipate their arrival. Analyze eight moves in advance and dance to the finish line. Instead, I'm giving myself permission to not have all the answers, and therefore the permission to not take all the blame.