It wasn’t the graduate degree, the husband, the signing my name to a big ass mortgage or the baby. Not even the social security card.

Nope.

It was this.

Now. I know. Most of you are like, huh? what? Big deal.

Oh but just let me tell you.

I get skeeved out by:

1) touching raw meat

2) “bad bites” of food (you know, when you bite into something and there’s something… odd in it…. oh God, my mouth just watered a little bit…. not in a good way)

3) chicken skin

4) the feel of anything slimy

So the idea of dumping a chicken into a bunch of water, boiling it, dismantling it, and then using the byproduct to cook from – never on my list of things to do.

Then my SIL Mrs. Deacon sent me a recipe for Chicken Soup and got all braggy about her mad domestic goddess skillz. (Actually, untrue, her comment was, “Ah, where did the undomesticated Mrs. Deacon go? We like her better …”)

Then I was in the grocery store and they had chicken broth on sale for 3 bucks instead of 3.50. I reached out to get some knowing I already had 3 at home, but chicken broth is one of those things I always need.

I paused. 3 bucks? And for a container I couldn’t recycle?

The time had come.

So today I put the bird in the slow cooker along with onion and carrot. I let it cook. I tore that mofo apart, by hand. I did not gag once. I now have 4 containers of chicken soup starter and 2 containers of straight broth.

I am domestic. I am eco friendly. I am cheap.

I have become my grandmother.

Except I’m pretty sure she never said ‘mofo’.

I’m whoring for free again. But I saw these over at Cool Mom Picks and I just can’t help myself. I want everything in this shop. Girl stuff, boy stuff… all of it..

http://www.naturalpod.com/shop/

On the cheap.

I used the 20% off coupon and got a set of full sheets for 34 bucks. Then I got the crappy 20 dollar polyester gross mattress pad. Sigh. But it’s all about baby steps right?

I’m less in love with them now that I’ve washed and dried them because they wrinkle like a mutha. But I’ll get over it, especially since it might be because I had the dryer set on “nuclear”.

(Yes, I said dryer, remember, baby steps.)

Today was just a normal day.

We woke.

We took a photo.

We got lost in town.

We went to the Farmer’s Market.

We went to see Scout at work.

We talked to my SIL.

We napped.

While Alex napped, I read. And my heart was touched many times.

MetroDad – who lost his friend

From the Frontlines – who knew her husband would fight and defend

The Dana Files/This Full House – who smelled New York

WhyMommy – who watched the smoke in DC

Growing a Pair who wonders just how do we teach our children about our world now?

JurgenNation – who echos my heart the closest.

It’s the ties flying up in the air. It’s the jumping out of the buildings that shook me most (still does). No one gets up in the morning, puts on a tie and goes to work expecting to jump out a window knowing this is the end. No one does that.

I wish six years ago today would have stayed just a normal day.

Six years ago today I sat in class, learning about this, wondering why my teacher cared about it on that particular morning. Too immature to give him the credit to realize he just hadn’t seen the news yet.

Today, I’m having an all day moment of silence, no blogging or commenting. (I’m sure I’ll still read, because, hello, addict. But I need to be quiet today.) I’m going out with Alex to play in the sun. I’m celebrating that WE CAN, and doing it to honor those who can’t.

Eh. Okay, I tried to be funny.

Guiding truths for my closet, adopted today. 9/8/7 (cool date!)

A) Buying organic, free trade things and throwing out all my perfectly good clothes does not make me a better consumer, it makes me worse. Therefore I will keep everything in my closet until it 1) doesn’t fit 2) is worn out 3) I hate it so much I would go out naked instead.

B) My retail dollars count and send a message.

C) I will have a gameplan for what I buy. (Another post, another day.)

D) At least 50% of the items of clothing I buy in the next 365 days will be organic and free trade. (They seem to go hand in hand but I’m having a bit of trouble finding information on websites promoting their product as free trade – which you think they’d be screaming from the mountaintops – however I’ve found a couple of retailers who seem to have good ethics and free trade is part of their mission, so I will trust that they have done the research (which could always bite me in the ass.))

Links to either actual companies, or quick and dirty lists of many companies. This was a pretty preliminary search so if you find something fishy, please, please post in the comments, if you find something awesome, please, please post in the comments.

http://www.stewartbrown.com/ (I drool here)

http://www.hug.co.uk

http://www.harmonyart.com (fabric)

http://www.nearseanaturals.com/ (fabric and yarn)

http://www.hannaandersson.com/ (unsure about fair trade, I’m just being suspicious really, they seem to be a good company)

http://www.ralper.co.uk/

http://www.birchclothing.com/merch.asp

http://www.biggreenpurse.com

http://www.theworldwomenwant.com/

Okay, hard plastic bottles are bad, chemicals in clothing are bad, buy organic, buy free trade, buy local, can, jar, preserve, CFL light bulbs, all toys will kill your baby, water conservation, global warming, rising gas prices, walk more, drive less, drugs are bad mmmkay, cloth or disposable, spit or swallow, attachment parenting, cry it out, exercise more, vaccines – lifesaver or evil, smoke less, who will be president, Iraq war good or bad….

Have you seen “Waiting”? (You should, if for no other reason than the gratuitous Ryan Reynolds showing off his abs and fuck muscles scene). One of the waitresses freaks out and screams “Gooooood-dammiiiiiiiit!” and it brings things to a lull.

That’s what is in my mind right now.

Time to pull back and evaluate.

I talked about changes I want to make before. This week has just shown me that I’m on the right track.

I can’t fix everything at once, but I can try to do a little bit.

I will think about food and what I can do to make responsible choices for my house. (Please note that what is more responsible for my house may not be more responsible for yours, it’s all a definition of terms and I don’t have a definition.)

I stepped on the scale this morning and it was 161.5 for a flash of a moment before flashing to 162.5. It’s better than 164.5. And this fits again (with the extender in the back, FINE, make me go for full admission). So clothes are on my mind.

Today I will ponder clothes, tomorrow I will come back and report what I’ve figured out for me. I’ll try to post links galore so you too, can check it out.

Mmmm… clothes….

Oh today.

Ohhhhh today.

Oh woe is me.

My baby won’t sleep well, I have to continually pump milk, my husband is on the road and won’t be home till late, I haven’t been able to prep dinner yet, the glass baby bottles I ordered showed up and I’m such a dumbass I ordered 4oz instead of 8oz and will now have to sell these on ebay and order new ones.

Oh woe the f is me.

Woe. Or, if you prefer Joey Lawrence. Whoa! or Keanu Reeves. Whooooooa.

So in my incapacitated by baby actually napping on me status, I’ve been making my Google Reader blow apart at the seams by going through the Oh the Joys Blogroll and adding a gazillion new sites to check in on. In my frenzy, I found this.

Yeah. So let me reframe my above tale of woe into something more grateful.

I love my baby. I may not love spending quality time with him awake round the clock, but I love my baby and I’m so grateful he’s with us.

I have the superpower ability to pump milk for my baby. I have not run out. I have enough. He is not hungry. Nor am I. And if I so chose, I have the finances and the clean water to make formula.

My husband is coming home to me. He’s safe another day. And he’s not off with some skinny bitch secretary.

I have food for dinner to prep. Organic, grass fed, food.

Ebay. Lord. I’ll probably make a profit on what I spent on the bottles. So I’m a dumbass. This is not new information.

So. Philanthropy. Which goes along with my Gen X Grandma Values I’m trying to work into my life.

My college sorority has asked the alums to send them products to donate for care bags for a local women’s shelter. I had finally cleared out all the sample sized stuff I had that would be practical. It’s sitting on the end of my bed ready to be mailed. The philanthropy post brings me back around to the gratitude of having enough to share, and chips away at my fear of “but I could use that!” When? Let it go. Bless someone else.

The thing I regularly do is tithe. And here’s how I have been going about it, I share this to be a part of the Philanthropy Thursday concept, but also because this might inspire you to determine your own level of “enough”.

My second year teaching I estimated what 1% of my paycheck would be and rounded off. 10 dollars, twice a month. My third year of teaching, I made it 2% (20 dollars, twice a month). This year, even though I am not working, I have decided to go ahead and increase it again, to 30 dollars, twice a month. We have enough.

For me the key is where I chose to send my money. One check goes to the church we attended before we moved, and I will continue to send my money there as long as we don’t have a home church in the land of the vices.

The other check is the one that is closer to my heart. My grandma (mom’s mom, not dad’s mom from the other post), died at the end of my first year teaching. She had lived in a tiny town with a tiny church that she was a member of for 89 years. 89 years. My great great grandma helped build that church congregation. There are few members because there are few people in the town. When were back for the funeral I knew this was a place where I could feel good about sending money. 240 dollars a year was a percentage of their budget. My money would matter to them.

But it’s really a selfish thing. Once a month, I sit and I write out a check. The entire time I write the check, enter it in the ledger, and address the envelope, I am thinking of my grandma. And I feel grateful for her. I remember. It’s my own monthly communion.

So there’s my Philanthropy Thursday.

I’ve always been one to recycle. I’ve always been one to forget to turn off a light when I leave the room (but I’m trying to remember). I read treehugger daily.

(I live in a 2200 sq ft McMansion with two cars plus a company car in the land of the vices. And I lurve me some air-conditioning.)

I’m a geek for Anne of Green Gables, Jo March Bhaer and Laura Ingalls Wilder. I love the routine and simplicity of each day in their lives. I yearn for an apron and a nail to hang it on.

(The reality is that I admire hard work but seem to spend a whole lot of time on this here computer rather than going about a routine of actually cleaning up said McMansion or even getting dressed to the bra, forget to the shoes.)

I admire my grandmas and I realize they would be considered very “green” by today’s standards. In one house if you had enough bathwater to reach the back of the tub, then you had enough. (I have a deep whirlpool. I justify that at least when I turn on the jets that I’m giving baby a bath with me.) In the other house the bags from the insides of the cereal boxes was saved for waxed paper and the plasticware and cups were washed (no dishwasher) and reused each family event.

(Guh, washing dishes skeezes me out. )

I know that they were this way because they grew up and married in the midst of the depression. That the rels who had moved away to the city moved home to the farm because they could survive out there. Their lives were about saving for the future (my 3000 in retirement just won’t cut it), and decreasing their needs for “now”, Using what they had and not buying more.

It was about recognizing “Enough”.

I want to do better at this. I want to recognize what “Enough” is in my life. I want to work on answering the question about can a Gen Xer be more like her grandmas without being crunchy crunchy hairy legged girl.

(Oh, I guess if that’s my condition then I better go shave.)