The Hurricane

This poem follows the Terza Rima format because... well, because I like rhyming poems, what can I say?

"Definition: 
Terza rima is poetry written in three-line stanzas (or “tercets”) linked by end-rhymes patterned aba, bcb, cdc, ded, efe, etc. There is no specified number of stanzas in the form, but poems written in terza rima usually end with a single line or a couplet rhyming with the middle line of the last tercet.  Dante Alighieri was the first poet to use terza rima, in his Divine Comedy"

The Hurricane


She leaves destruction in her joyous wake,
Spins past them, tossing aside their treasure,
Showing no mercy, nor reprieve, nor break.


Debris cast away with random pleasure,
Chaos reigns in the quaking domicile,
At her will, the damage goes unmeasured.


Once again, they begin a task, futile,
Of cleaning up the gleeful destruction,
Wreaked by a toddler full of cheerful guile,
They've lovingly dubbed, “Hurricane Brooklynn!”


-Laura Freeman-
April 2, 2014

NaPoWriMo anyone?

It's April again.  Which means its National Poetry Writing Month again!  To be honest, I am not sure that my heart is in it this month.  I'm so overwhelmingly busy with work and kids and too many pots in the fire.  But, I want to give it a whirl because I enjoy this and reading back over last year's poetic output, there are actually some gems in there among the rubble.

So, on this, Day 1 of NaPoWriMo, feeling uninspired, I turned to the daily prompt at http://www.napowrimo.net which in turn directed me to a wacky website called the Bibliomancy Oracle which generates random quotes  from literature (unless you actually fall for crap like that, then of course the quotes are divinely inspired.)

My randomly generated quote (okay, it was the fifth time I refreshed the page, the other four quotes were stupid), and the inspiration for today's poem, was:

Something above is showing great indifference.

Something will happen eventually.

From “A Story Meant to Teach” by Lizzie Lee Lenson

My poem is a bit dark, I'll admit, but it's been a crazy two weeks.  My children have been suffering from a nasty virus that apparently is wiping the floor with all sorts of Vanderhoof folk.  Alex has come through the other side a little paler and possibly a little thinner, but otherwise unscathed.  The other three are still in the throes of it, but I am hopeful that we can salvage a little bit of their spring break soon.  Anyway, here's what I am titling: "Ode to the virus that's been kicking my children's butts..." for now.  Should I ever compile an anthology for publication, I'll probably revise it! :)

The gods of pestilence,

Have cast their grievous blow,

Showing great indifference,

To the fateful few below.

A plague, in torrential rain,

Falls down upon their heads,

With despair, inflicting pain,

The infestation spreads.

The weak, downtrodden masses fall,

Succumbing to the plight,

Struck down, the young and small,

In seeming endless night.

Ever slow, the illness wanes,

It lifts then falls again in place,

The elusive end to the torrential rains,

Comes at an agonizing pace.

The weary few, in chorus sing,

Hope comes tentatively,

knowing in their hearts, something,

Will happen eventually.

Laura Freeman

- April 1, 2014 -  

Anyway, that's one down, 29 to go!  Enjoy reading them and I'll see you on the other side of April!  

I'm no less of a Mom than you!

The house is dark and quiet.  My offspring are asleep.  I tucked in the last one (again) ten minutes ago.  It's well past ten, nearing eleven, and it's finally my "me-time".  I'm wasting it messing around on the computer.  I always have a mental to do list of things that I should be doing instead of checking Facebook or reading blogs, and when I "waste time", I feel guilty.  I guess that guilt is the "Mom thing."

I read a blog post tonight.  My cousin-in-law shared it on her Facebook page.  And my sister-in-law commented that she loved it. And somebody else liked it.  And somebody else shared it. But I didn't.  I didn't like it or share it or comment or even poke it. It just didn't work for me. And it shouldn't have annoyed me, but I guess its because I couldn't identify with it the same way that they could.  Both of them have something in common.  They have two children.  Their husbands have professional jobs and work long hours so they can have comfortable lives.  And they stay home with their children.

They are stay-at-home moms.

It was an interesting read, and at first glance, was very empowering and flattering to the stay-at-home mom.  But as I absorbed it, it bothered me.  I suppose I'm not used to reading things that call me out for the choices I've made.  Namely, the choice NOT to be a stay-at-home Mom.

I work for a living.  I have since I was 15 years old (13 if you count my paper route.)  But I've also dabbled in domesticity.  I've had almost four years worth of time off for maternity leaves.  I've treasured that time with my children and used it to hone my household abilities.  But it certainly never came naturally to me and I'd find myself bored and wasting time doing things that didn't make me happy.  I like working outside the home.  Using my brain for things other than playing with blocks and reading books with one word per page.  Or singing along to the Wiggles while I scrape dried yogurt off the chair legs.  I'm not saying that's all there is to the life of a stay-at-home mom... but for me, that's pretty much all there was.

Maybe if my stay-at-home years extended beyond babyhood, I'd find them more interesting.  With all of my children immersed in the public school system, I'd have the time to do all the things I wish I could do for them.  I could volunteer at my children's school as a playground monitor or hot lunch cook.  I could attend every sports day and be their best cheerleaders.  I could sew funky costumes for them to wear in the school Christmas concerts and I could adorn my house with decor that seasoned pinterii would drool over.  I could grow my own produce and serve them sandwiches made from bread I'd kneaded myself.

Instead, we eat a lot of packaged foods, we step over the clutter, my kids live out of laundry baskets full of clothes that rarely see the inside of their drawers, and my daughter frequently leaves the house with a jumbled rat's nest of hair on her head.

That's just how we roll, Monday to Friday.

I've been asked how I do it.  How I can possibly work outside the home with four young-ish children (although my oldest is getting pretty independent these days) to look after. And I can sense the disdain. I know I'm being judged for my selfish decisions.  We live in a community that is very traditional, very religious, and dare I say it, somewhat narrow minded.  There are a lot of families that believe that the woman's role is to raise the children while the heads of their households go out and earn a living for them.  Those are the women I get to know when I'm on maternity leave. Those are the ones that sing the praises of being home all day raising their children.  The ones that cast their judging glances or pitying stares when they assume that I drop my children in a daycare every morning.

When I'm not on maternity leave, and I'm living in my working world, I meet the other women.  The ones that don't have children or those like me who've turned our backs on what is the expected norm in our town. Those like me that chose to juggle a career and family.  Although I'm not really juggling. I do both at the same time with a minimal amount of fumbling.  My career and my family, they co-exist.  They are both halves of what makes me a whole.  The mom-me and the professional-me.

And these other moms raise their eyebrows when I tell them that my children are not in daycare.  That my children are not even being baby-sat. They're home with a parent every day. Because I can hold down a career while raising my children at the same time.  That's what I do.  And that's what my husband does too (although arguably he would NEVER say that his job was a career).  I work during the day.  He works during the night.  We share the childcare duties.  Neither of us is a stay-at home parent, but one of us is always home with the children.  It's a good system; not without its flaws, to be sure, that's been working for us so far.

Our daughters are going to grow up knowing that they can marry and have children if they want to, or they can have a career; or they can do both at the same time.  Our sons are going to grow up knowing that its okay for them to take their toddler to story time at the library and sit cross-legged in a circle  and sing "Row Row Row Your Boat" with gleeful abandon with all the other daytime parents.

So I'm going to say it.  Yes, your life as a stay-at-home parent is rewarding, rich, and busy.  You are raising the future generation and you are doing the most important work that there is to do.

But so am I.

Just because I work outside of the home, doesn't make me any less of a mother than you.  We have chosen different paths, temporarily, but we're going to end up at the same place, watching our children walk down that aisle to pick up their diploma and turn and thank us for being there for them when they were younger (kids do that, right?).

What's so bad about that?

Her perspective

I picked my daughter up from dance class after work.  It's an easy ten minute walk home (going her pace) and we've been enjoying the brief alone time that it gives us once a week.  Tonight as we passed by the same corner that we've walked past several times, she asked me, "Who lives in that big house?"

I replied (pleased to actually be knowing the answer) that it was the Safe Home.

"What's a safe home?" She asked me.

And once again I found myself thinking, is she really old enough to handle this kind of answer?  "Well," I said, "the Safe Home is a place where women can go to get away from men that treat them badly."

She considered this.  "What do you mean?"

"Well, sometimes there are men that hit their wives, and hurt them in other ways.  And its dangerous for the women to stay with their husbands, so they have to leave. And they need a place to stay where they can feel safe, where he won't be able to come after them."

"Do they bring their children?"

"Of course," I said, "the home has room for children too, so the whole family can be safe." I decided to turn this into a life lesson and I told her, "You should never stay with someone who treats you bad, even if you think you love them."

"Daddy's never mean.  Sometimes he acts too silly and tickles us and gives us horse bites but he's just being goofy."

I nodded.  "Yes, we'll never have to go to the safe home.  You kids don't have to worry about that kind of thing."

She nodded.  And then in all her five-year old wisdom, asked me, "So if that's the house for women, where's the house that men go when the mommies are mean to them?  There has to be a safe place for them, too."

And I stopped walking. And I thought about it.  And I didn't have an answer for her. So I told her, "I really don't know. I don't think there is one."

"Well, that's not good," she replied, gravely.

And I have to agree.  She has a very valid point. I know that there are men out there who are victimized by their partners, whether those partners are female or male. But I never stop to think about them.  To light a candle and march for them. To declare a day of remembrance for them.  They are the hidden victims. The unpopular ones.  My world view has been shaped by my white, middle-class, privileged upbringing, with hefty doses of socialism and feminism thrown in to the mix to make sure that I'm the right kind of activist.  But my daughter, so far, has very little of that. And I marvelled at her ability to see things with a different lens than mine.  Her world view, not yet clouded by the realities of all the evil that people do to one another, still sees things with innocence and open-mindedness not coloured by sexism, or racism, or homophobia she hasn't learned about yet.

And its humbling.

Alex's Christmas concert

And here's Alex's performance.  What a beautiful job!  Too bad you can't hear it over the cries of my baby who was done by this time in the performance.  :)

Connor's Christmas concert

My handsome little Connor singing "Canadian Jingle Bells"... cut a little short because I forgot to turn the camera on.  Oops!

Kirstin's Christmas Concert

My little girl singing "Mary Had a Baby"  --- she's a little under the weather, so that's probably why she's not smiling!  Pretty adorable, though! :)