The Curtain and Pen

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Sparks

You know how you watch movies and read books, and for the most part, the main goal is to reach your “happily ever after” in your mid-20’s and then the story ends?

I’m grappling with this. Not romantically, but with creativity in general. Sometimes I worry that I’ve missed my creative peak… like for me to have created anything exciting and passionate and valuable, I should have done it when I was in my mid-20’s, when I was actually experiencing things that were (traditionally and in my media-tainted brain’s sense) actually exciting and passionate.

And then, in swoops the domestic disclaimer: Not that what I do now isn’t exciting and passionate. Not that I don’t experience excitement and passion watching my family grow and reach milestones and achieve goals. Not that I’m discounting or regretting what I do now. Not that not that not that…

Not that I don’t love the choices that have led me to my now. I do love them, and I do love my now.

But. But I know that there’s more to my now that I can achieve, and I feel like I’ve finally gotten the right inspiration. There was a click and I heard it, loud and clear. I know that, despite my mostly practical appearance and very basic home décor and super-disgusting bathroom, I need extravagant beauty and lush fantastical emotion and I need that in fiction. I thrive on fiction and stories that could exist in another time, another dimension, another reality, and regardless of the fact that they’re not technically, in the most tangible of ways real… I need to create them. It will make my now more real to have done so.

I shouldn’t need a domestic disclaimer: Wanting more doesn’t make me discontent with what I have. I think that wanting more is, in fact, my creative “happily ever after.” Hope that there’s always more is what I need to carry on and breathe. Resources may run out and headlines may get more terrifying, but there’s beauty in the world and in my imagination and knowing that it’s there if I truly need it is deeply comforting.

Although, I totally recognize that I should probably clean my bathroom. That, too, might make my now a little more aesthetically pleasing.

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Lucille, at the Moment

(Photo courtesy of Brittany Brooke Photography)

Why is it so hard for me to write posts about my kids?  I plan on it and plan on it, and when it comes time to actually write one, I stress so much about it that it almost never gets written.

I suppose it’s a sign that I still have maturing to do as a writer… but that’s okay. Hopefully I’ll get there someday. I’m doing it now, though. I’m doing it. Really, here we go.

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Lucy.

She’s got about a bajillion nicknames, but I think my favorite one is Luey. Or Kabluey. We joke that if she ever gets into roller derby when she’s older, her name should be “Kabluey Bonk.”  If she does in fact become a roller derby enthusiast, my new nickname will be “Constant Almost-Heart Attack Bonk,” or “Nervous Nellie.”

I’m not going to spend the whole post comparing her to Charlie, but I will say that I expected my second child to be, I don’t know, just a version of my first… but slightly different.  I was toooootally wrong.

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Lucy is (duh, Lauren) a completely different kid. She is equal parts bulldozer and sweetheart. I mean “bulldozer” almost literally. When she’s feeling particularly surly, she will stick her belly out and knock people over… simply because they happen to be sitting on the floor, minding their own business. When she’s feeling sweet, she will put her hands on my chin, turn my head toward her face, and plant a big fat kiss on my lips. Or she’ll wake up in the morning and throw her arms around my legs, sighing “Mommy!”

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She has also started talking much earlier than Charlie did. Charlie waited until he felt he had a handle on a word before he even uttered a syllable… Lucy just goes with it. Sometimes she’ll let out a long jumble of words, looking me straight in the eye, and I will have absolutely no idea what she just said.  She also has these weird pauses before certain words that are surprisingly consistent, regardless of the word order. Here are some of my favorite Lucy-isms right now:

“I’m… not… a kitty. All right?”

“Two… meenits… Chawwie. No more eengy buds.” (Two more minutes, Charlie, then no more Angry Birds.)

“Happy to you. Happy to you, ah Mommy. Boo it?” (Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you dear Mommy. Blow it?)

“Hot… chockit?” (She sometimes likes to play a game where she makes hot chocolate and offers it to people.)

“You going Mommy? I meeeeess you. Hug me. Hug Chawwie. Hug Daddy.”

“Uh Bamma.” (This means “call Grandma,” but sounds REMARKABLY like “Obama.”)

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I’m finally starting to realize that she’s going to grow up and be an adult human being, too. As Charlie grows up, visions of him as a teenager are starting to appear in my brain. His face is starting to collect expressions and traits that will be with him no matter how old he gets, and that blows my mind. What blows my mind even more is that I’m going to have to clear room in my brain for teenage Lucy, too.

Lucy’s always been a sparsely-haired kid, and that has perpetuated the idea in my head that she’s still a baby. I still call her a baby, and dudes, she is NOT a baby. She is a full-on two-year-old… which will probably help me a lot when it comes to imagining what teenage Lucy will be like.

Her feisty, sometimes surly nature makes her sweet times even more wonderful to me… and her (rare but increasing) moments of empathy always make me all gushy and syrupy. Sometimes she’ll ask kids if they’re okay, patting their head firmly and giving them a hug. If I mention that I’m hungry while she has food in her hands, she’ll say “Want Cheerio, Mommy?”

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I’m curious (but not in a hurry) to see what kind of a human she’ll turn into… but from what I see now, I know she’ll be a human who cares and a human who gets things done… and that’s a pretty awesome place to start, I think.

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Camelot + Orpheum = Me All Aflutter

(HEADS UP! I’m being compensated by Omaha Performing Arts with two complimentary tickets to Camelot, as well as two tickets to give away to you awesome dudes. All words and references to fainting couches are my own.)

I thought about writing a nice flowery intro for this one, but I changed my mind… I’m just diving right in.

I have a full-on THING for King Arthur. Not just Arthur himself, but also pretty much everything associated with him. Arthurian Lit was my 2nd favorite class of my entire undergrad experience, and, let me tell you, the King Arthur portion of Victorian Lit (my #1 favorite class) practically gave me the vapours.

I recently watched the entire series of Merlin on Netflix, and when it was over I was practically devastated.

Have you noticed the hyperbole? The italics? The use of the term “vapours?” I tend to get a little ridiculous when it comes to the Once and Future King.

SO, you can imagine my exclamation point usage when Omaha Performing Arts contacted me to go see and blog about the upcoming performance of Camelot at the Orpheum. It’s a newer version of the show everyone’s familiar with, and it looks a little dark and broody. I’m always up for dark and broody. So, let’s get down to business, shall we? Here’s the info about showtimes:

There will be 8 performances of Camelot at the Orpheum: Tuesday, January 27th, Wednesday, January 28th, Thursday, January 29th at 7:30 pm… Friday, January 30th at 8:00 pm… Saturday, January 31st at 2:00 pm AND 8:00 pm… Sunday, February 1st at 1:30 pm AND 7:00 pm. Tickets, which start at $35, are available online at TicketOmaha.com, by phone at 402-345-0606, or at the Ticket Omaha Box Office in the Holland Center (click here for a map!).

(You guys, I don’t know why my font does that to numbers with a “th” on them. Ugh.)

Now that the official stuff is out of the way, we can get to the fun part… the part where I give away two free tickets to Camelot and you get the chance at seeing me fan my giddy self with a program a few rows away.  All you have to do is keep an eye on my Facebook page and answer the trivia questions that I will be posting this week and next. Each time you answer (whether it’s wrong or right) will count as an entry in the contest… so, you know… keep checking! I’ll keep the contest open until 10 pm CST on Thursday the 22nd, to give the winner enough time to find a babysitter/dogsitter/whatever-they-don’t-even-need-a-sitter.

If you want an extra entry, I’ve got a question for you: If you were in charge of casting a Camelot movie, who would be in your dream Arthurian Love Triangle? Let me know in the comments! Here are my choices:

King Arthur: Cary Elwes

Guinevere: Amy Yasbeck

Lancelot: Michael Vartan

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(Psssst. If you want to enter EVEN MORE times, check out the other local bloggers who are participating in the giveaway: Kitty and Kevin, Her Heartland Soul)

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A New Tradition

Charlie and I have accidentally started a Christmas tradition, and it turns me into a ridiculous, gushy bag of emotions just thinking about it.

Last year, we went to see Elf the Musical together at the Orpheum, thanks to Omaha Performing Arts, and this year, we got invited to join my friend and her son in seeing A Christmas Story at the Rose Theater.

(Just to clear it up, this post isn’t sponsored… I just love these organizations forever long time.)

Walking up to the theater holding an excited Charlie’s hand will never get old… even when I’m forcing him to do it as a 17-year-old.

Last year, Charlie got a little upset at the tension before intermission during Elf, and fell asleep in Act II, but he still talks about it to this day. This year, at A Christmas Story, he stayed awake the whole time and only got a little distressed at a few of the conflicts that came up in the show.

I don’t know if it was the fact that I was with Charlie, the show itself, or the amount of time it’s been since I’ve last seen a play… but I was emotional almost the entire time I watched that show. I’m sure it was a combination of all three factors.

The show truly was wonderful. I have some lack-luster onstage memories of the Christmas Story production I was in in college, and this has done a great job of re-instating the love I have for the show. The original movie was a HUGE DEAL in our house during my childhood, and I’m happy to add more layers of love to it. The actors were pleasant and endearing, and the boy who played Ralphie hit some notes that made me almost burst into tears every time.

I think what I loved most about the show itself was that there seemed to be a lot more love at the heart of it than there is in the movie… or at least obvious love, anyway. The father was a much more likeable character, and the relationship between him and the mother seemed more fulfilling.

For the most part, Charlie was old enough for the show… there were only a few moments that he had a hard time with. The bullies and the breaking of the leg lamp got him pretty worked up, and he had difficulty understanding Ralphie’s bouts of imagination that were mixed in with “reality.” He thought the imaginary sequences were fun, but just couldn’t quite get the fact that it wasn’t really happening.

The Rose Theater is GORGEOUS, and the people there were so kid-friendly, I could barely believe it. A replica of the department store Santa slide was out front, and Charlie and his buddy got to take a trip down it before heading to their seats.

At one point during the show, I looked over to see Charlie imitating the arm gestures of Ralphie’s old man, and almost lost it again. I’m telling you, it was an emotional night. We left the theater, boys holding hands with moms, all singing “Ralphie to the rescue, ohowhooooaaahhhh!”

He says he would like to be in plays, too, and that’s so cool. Whether that’s true or he was just caught in the moment, it was incredibly heartwarming to share with him something that was once such a huge part of my life. He couldn’t believe that I had played the part of Esther Jane (one of the school girls), and was so excited to see which one she was.

Another cool thing about all of this? If Charlie wants to take some little kid acting classes, he totally can. The Rose offers classes for kids 3-18 years old. THAT IS AMAZING. Can you imagine teaching a bunch of three year olds acting classes? I sure can’t, but the fact that there are people in town who can is just crazy, crazy awesome.

So, big thanks to my friend for inviting us, thanks to the Rose for putting on such a wonderful show, and thanks again to Omaha Performing Arts for getting this tradition started.

If you have a chance to go to the Rose or see a kids show put on by Omaha Performing Arts, please do. If you’re not in Omaha, but have a local theater, see if they’ve got children-friendly show. I think it’ll end up being a pretty special experience for you.

Okay, I’m going to go somewhere and cry it out now. Thanks for reading.