First Christmas Card!

In the middle of a bleak week, with end-of-semester grading blues, feeling overwhelmed, getting over bronchitis (but not fast enough) and taking care of my even sicker Chiclette, pondering bad job search news that should be good job search news (more on that later--possibly), having Charlie-Brownish thoughts about my mailbox, I received a Christmas card!! From our own bloggy-friend Sarah from just another day of Catholic pondering. And I've been such a bad blogger and blog-friend lately (and a number of other nouns I could add). Thanks for the smile, wish, greeting, blessing and precious pictures, Sarah! :)

If I did this Challenge. . .

. . . And I'm not saying I will. . .

Chris, bookworm extrordinaire, is always getting tangled in this web of book challenges over at his blog, Stuff As Dreams are Made On. It's a neat concept, much more attractive to me than the "community reading projects" you hear about from time to time--or the Oprah's Book Club kind of thing. For one thing, you don't get the impression that the people who start challenges have any hidden agenda other than to get other people to read what they want/like to read. In my discipline we get so caught up in balancing how much of what type of work and which kind of author and what social, political or intellectual currents, the whom-you-can't-leave-outs and the whom-you-should-really-includes according to this or that view go onto our various reading lists, from syllabi to prelim lists to works in papers and articles we write, etc., that I'm not sure we even know what it means to simply enjoy a work of literature anymore. Of course, this is a sweeping generalization, and so not entirely true, but you know what I mean. So I find this reading-blogging sub-culture is really cool. I want to get sucked into this level of enthusiasm. So Chris is currently doing one challenge (among many) that encourages people to read 10 books from a list of 1001 "must reads," thus making themselves 1% more well read. Certainly a noble cause. I could benefit from something like this, I think. So I perused the list. Many titles--er, most titles--are pretty unknown to me. And the ones I chose, I confess, are largely on my to read list anyway. And I'm not sure I can really do something like this--too many other things going on. But if I were to choose, and if cheating were permitted (that is, choosing with an eye to the "useful" or "things I planned to read anyway"), I would choose the following:

1) The Hours – Michael Cunningham
2) Memoirs of a Geisha – Arthur Golden
3) The Name of the Rose – Umberto Eco
4) If On a Winter’s Night a Traveler – Italo Calvino
5) A Passage to India – E.M. Forster
6) Jacob’s Room – Virginia Woolf
7) Ulysses – James Joyce
8) Tono-Bungay – H.G. Wells
9) Ficciones – Jorge Luis Borges
10) The Book of Laughter and Forgetting – Milan Kundera

Only the last one is a complete unknown to me. Sounds intriguing, though. I want to keep my eye on these book challenges--and get motivated & excited & stuff!--and I actually signed up for real for a different challenge that I'm behind on, so I'll talk more about that soon! I've got an idea for a Lenten book challenge for next year--Catholic must-reads of various types: choose one book of apologetics, one of fiction, one encyclical. . . you get the idea! If you have suggestions, let me know!

Catholic Capricorns

I find it very cool that in the course of reading blogs, I have found several bloggers within, well, 0-5 years of my own age who write about things we're all interested in. As Jen writes here, it's good to be a Catholic convert and a blogger, because you have a built-in support network. I hesitate to attribute too much to the web in general in this, because on the internet--as in parenting magazines--one can find someone with a web site to support whatever weird perspective one chooses to hold, and the subject of Catholicism is no exception! But I've heard it said by those who are exploring Catholicism (and here I would include myself when I look up answers online) that they could recognize the truth when they saw--read--perhaps "felt" it: I believe this* is related to the Church being guided by the Holy Spirit. Those who sincerely seek truth will find it, however long the journey. But I digress. . .

This month, I have become increasingly aware of the number of like-minded bloggers, and readers of blogs, who have birthdays in January! (Not that I have any particular reason to note this, mind you. . .) Sarah at just another day of Catholic pondering celebrated her 31st birthday on January 10th, Jen at Et-tu, Jen? also turned 31 this month, on January 12th. One of Sarah's readers turns 31 along with me on the 17th. ('77 was a good year for Catholics or, in many of our cases, Catholics-to-be!) I know of someone else who drops by occasionally whose birthday rings in the New Year. And my son's birthday is January 18th! So happy birthday to all of the Catholic Capricorns**!

*My dissertation director's favorite thing to do in my drafts is to circle every use of the word "this" in order to force me to be more explicit about the reference, which obviously makes perfect sense in my own mind. In this case, "this" refers to the ability of prayerful, truth-seeking Catholics to recognize the truth in representations of Church teachings.

**And to all the non-Catholic Capricorns, too!!--It was just funny, you know, "Catholic Capricorn." I know, I know--too self-consciously clever. . . :P

Status Update with Random Thoughts

Things have been going well lately, but though I've wanted to sit down & blog (or at least answer comments from previous posts!) I can't seem to manage a whole post. I've got some partial ones saved, but that doesn't count. In fact, a bulleted list of random thoughts about things that have happened lately is more my speed right now, so here goes. . .

• A thought to add to Sarah's 40 reasons to have kids: Holidays are more fun when you have young children whose innocent delight reminds you of how to enjoy the trappings of the holiday!
• I have finally had success with a baby carrier! A pouch sling that I made from the directions on this web site. So now I want to make more for myself!!
• Things have been going much more smoothly with the toddler. She seems better able to understand what we want, and we are more able to communicate to her. Perhaps a breakthrough? (She's so sweet, I hate to sound as if she's trouble, and I hate to see her cry in anger, hurt, or frustration.) :(
• Newborn screenings are a pain. My baby has tested positive at the 2 week screening for a rare enzyme deficiency that only occurs in 1/60,000 infants. Yeah. She tested positive--along with 3 other 2-week-olds tested on the same afternoon at the same pediatric department at the same health insurance run clinic. Can we say lab error? Can we also say 4 sets of stressed parents??? Waiting for results from the retest. :(
  
• I did have some thoughts on discipline, but I have lost them now that things are better on that front. My brain can only hold one or two things at a time these days.
  
• My toddler is peeling off the little stickers on the back of breast pads and spreading the pads across the floor, but I'm nursing and can't stop her. And you know what? I don't care even a little! ;)
  
• Someone once told me that if you pray for patience (for example), God may not give you patience so much as the opportunity to exercise and so develop patience. I've thought about that a lot lately, like yesterday, when my toddler was trying to pour herself a cup of water out of the 1/4 full gallon jug. I went over to help her just as she inverted the jug, pouring water on the table, herself, and the floor. It was one of those slow-motion moments when you just can't seem to do anything. Soon, the gallon was empty, and she said, "Uh oh! Rain!" I laughed, sighed, and cleaned it up.
• Yesterday I managed to put both babies to sleep all by myself! Today, I managed to bathe & get dressed while they were both sleeping. Now, if I could only manage those two tasks on the same day. . .
• Another thing that having babies does is this: Children help their parents analyze and develop how they practice their faith (that is, when they aren't disrupting said practice of the Faith by driving the parents to distraction in Mass!!!) ;) In the coming weeks, we will begin planning for the baby's baptism. A thought that occurred to me is that, while I feel competent enough to teach my children the ins and outs of the practice of Catholicism, where I feel I am lacking is the ability to teach the love and awe--of the Church, of the Church as the Bride of Christ and of the Church as representative of the Body of Christ-- basically, awe and love of God through awe and love of the Faith that unites us. Is this something parents can teach? Likely. I frequently take lessons from Melanie and Bella (such as this one, and this one, and this one). I don't believe it has to be taught, but how wonderful if we could give something like that to our children! And if it begins growing in early childhood, hopefully the child will always have that as an anchor. But I don't know how to teach it. It is at these times that I realize that I am still new at this, and wonder where to go from here. . .
• I love Advent!! I love the decorations, the readings, the music--especially "O Come O Come Emmanuel," which I had never heard before I became Catholic. It is the time of the liturgical year when I most feel the awe and love--of God and the Church--that I mention above.
  

Hope to post more in coming days, if I can. I think the prospect of a unified post intimidates me lately, so I may stick with the bullet format.

Time for Another Madonna Lactans -or- Breastfeeding as Sacred Sensuality

I have been "pacing" my breastfeeding Virgin images, which I intended, though I had not intended to lose track of them for so long. Though there is a sensuality in the Madonna Lactans images, the sensuality is not to be confused with "sexuality," which was the subject of my past breastfeeding post. Rather, the sensual nature of mother-child contact is shown here in a sacred context, as the contact between mother and child is also the scene of the nurturing of the Son of God.

Kate commented on my last breastfeeding post that it is always good to take the opportunity to appreciate the spirituality of day-to-day activities, and I know that's a useful reminder for me. I have posted before on maternal spirituality, and how I find it difficult to see daily tasks as a path to holiness in the manner of a Saint Therese's "Little Way." Breastfeeding, in practice, is not very spiritual for me when I'm doing it. There are usually other distractions. Though it is nice sometimes to have the presence of mind to realize that this is not just a mundane reason to stop whatever else I was doing; rather it is an excuse to stop what I'm doing and focus on my son or daughter, whom I may shuffle aside for one reason or another at other times. Interestingly, this is not what Michelangelo portrays here. Rather, this Virgin is somewhat distracted from her rather older Christ Child, perhaps anticipating that the supper will burn! She is in motion, and even the unfinished, sketchy nature of the image conveys the motion, as my life has been in motion of late--so much so, that I have not even thought of maternal spirituality, or of much that is spiritual. Other bloggers help me with that by posting their own reminders, for which I am constantly grateful. I DID learn recently that Schubert's 'Ave Maria' has a strangely calming effect on me when I am agitated. Another nice reminder, and one of the few semi-spiritual connections I have made of late.

Something I've got to get off of my chest. . .

It's been bothering me since I started the first "friendship" post. I felt awkward theorizing about friendship and talking about failed friendships when many of the people who read these posts are, indeed, friends to me--albeit virtually. The friendships I had in mind were those formed in school, lasting for a year or more. Theorizing virtual friendships would be an entirely different task--and I think I would have to include in that people whom I know in real life, but whom I have come to know more closely through blogs and email. But, really, that kind of thing is such a new experience (for people in general, and for me in particular)! Anyway, this is my disclaimer! I have had more contact with people who do, indeed, see more or less eye-to-eye with me, and who have more in common on a deeper level online than ever before. But it's such a different experience. . .

I also want to mention that Melanie gave me a lead to follow up for Catholic-specific discussions of friendship in a comment to this post! Thanks!