I’ve been daydreaming lately.

My current daydream is about my dream house; specifically, building my dream house.  I’ve sketched floorplans and considered traffic flow.  I’ve envisioned the roofline, brick, and trim.  I’ve thought about color palettes and storage space.  I’ve been thinking it through in bits and pieces for the past month or so and I’ve pretty well got the whole thing mapped out in my head.  It’s not an enormous house, but it fits our needs precisely.  The figuring-out process has been fun.

As I was telling a friend about this the other day she was, I think, a bit surprised at how detailed all of this imagining has gotten.  She said to me, choosing her words quite carefully so as not to sound pejorative, “You’re sort of prone to flights of fancy, aren’t you?”  I thought about it and told her that I supposed she was right.  I’ve spent time dreaming out the details of more than one small business idea.  I’ve outlined ideas for books.  I’ve run mental simulations of what I would do if I ever won the lottery (which, as I understand it, would require actually playing the lottery – so I assume my chances here are pretty slim…).  I’ve envisioned a time when horses will be a part of my life again.  And now I’m mapping out – in surprising detail – my hopefully-someday-future house.

“Yes,” I said to my friend, “it’s a fantasy.  Hopefully not an unrealistic fantasy.  But it’s not anything we’re doing right now.  Nevertheless, it’s still fun to have a mental project.”

That’s how I think of it: as a mental project.  And I think that mental projects are good for a couple of reasons.  For starters, they are fun.  I’ve read one after another statistic that says making future plans is an effective way to boost your mood, improve your outlook, and increase your overall happiness.  Granted, most times I’ve read this statistic the implied nature of the future plans were more along the lines of making a date to see a movie with a girlfriend, but I contend that the benefits hold true for longer ranging and more abstract planning.  Further, big plans like these help us to identify our goals.  By exploring these flights of fancy we get to try on future versions of ourselves and our lives.  We get to think about what we would like to become.  And we are better positioned to recognize and take advantage of the right opportunities when they present themselves.  When such opportunities come along we know what we want to do with them.

Sure there are pitfalls to all of this daydreaming.  We have to be careful that we’re not so busy imagining some future incarnation of our lives that we forget to get out and live the lives we have today.  But as long as our fantasies don’t supplant our realities, I think our time spent dreaming is usually a good thing.

And with that, I need to decide if I prefer louvered or paneled shutters.

PS – Sorry this post is a day late.  SSP has decided that two overnight feedings are more fun than one.  So I’m a little tired lately.  I’m afraid this is going to be a two-post week.  I’ll be back on Monday, hopefully with a nap or two under my belt!

About nine months ago my mother and sister started yammering on about some British series that I absolutely had to watch called “Downton Abbey.”  I blew them off.  While I can certainly appreciate a good British production my tastes are typically more mainstream than theirs.  These two can devour episode after episode of the most obscure film or series.  I assumed this was more of the same.  Then the Emmys rolled around and “Downton Abbey” cleaned up.  Over the holidays when we all gathered here for Christmas their well-intentioned suggestions started afresh.  Finally, a couple of weeks ago I gave in.  And…

They were right.  It’s wonderful.  The scenery and costumes are stunning.  The characters are fresh.  The dialog is clever.  The plot is intriguing.  In short, I am hooked.

Imagining a life of evening gowns and ladies’ maids is mind candy enough.  But when I stop daydreaming there are other aspects of this show that pique my interest even further.  The biggest “for instance” in this category is the sense of honor and pride exemplified by many of the characters, most notably the staff.

These are people who are, by all practical means, condemned to a life of service.  There was no way out of the class you were born into in England at that time.  Cooking and cleaning.  Being always present but still invisible.  Tending to the needs – however superficial – of other people all the time.  Zipping dresses they’ll never get to wear and fluffing beds they’ll never get to sleep in.  This is largely thankless work, but these characters take a surprising amount of pride in doing it well and bringing honor to the family they serve in the process.

Watching “Downton Abbey” I can’t help but wonder how many people today put so much of themselves into their work.  I’m not just talking about long hours in corporate cubicles.  Many people put that much of their time into their work.  But how many people derive such a sense of honor from their work?  How many of us avoid foolish behavior because of the shadow it might cast on our employer?  How many of us would tender our resignations because an embarrassing incident from our past came to light and might be seen as shameful to our boss?  I can’t get over the extent to which these characters’ identities are inextricable from their work in the household.

Of course they are fictional characters.  They are largely painted in shades of black and white in the way that many imagined characters are.  So this phenomenon I write of here is likely exaggerated for the screen.  Nevertheless, in shows and films that take place in present day we see characters compartmentalize their personal and professional lives.  (Granted most of us don’t live in our bosses’ homes.  That presents an additional dynamic.)  We see characters try to explain away their mistakes and bad behavior.  We see them fight for their personal gain.  We rarely see such devotion to any person or cause outside the character’s own self.

I suppose what I’m angling at here is that in looking at our culture today I see a lack of service.*  Yes, when earthquakes and tsunamis hit we line up to donate blood and money.  But on a regular basis I don’t typically find that service – to the greater good in any of its forms – is a driving force in the lives of many people around me.  To clarify, I don’t think that being a footman or a ladies’ maid in an aristocratic British house really did that much for the greater good either.  But these characters (most of them, anyway – there are a few weasels in the bunch…) exhibit a true spirit of service, and pride in doing so.  And that is a quality I don’t see much of.  And it’s a quality that I think, if more prevalent, could be an incredible agent for change and improvement in today’s world.

*And I’m not the only one.  Earlier this week I read this article that looks at the career choices of Prince William’s classmates at Eton, sadly noting that most of them have chosen careers that afford them great opportunities to make vast sums of money, but little opportunity to do much real good.

In mid-December I got a text message from my work friend Layla* asking for prayers for her brother’s family, as his pregnant wife had been diagnosed with pre-eclampsia at 32 weeks and was having to be induced.  The next day another text told me that the baby had severe health problems (entirely unrelated to the pre-eclampsia).  Layla and the rest of the family convened in her hometown where her brother and his family still live.  Shortly thereafter the baby was airlifted to a larger city with a larger hospital for more advanced treatment.  It was also there that they learned the baby’s diagnosis: Trisomy 13.

Apparently only 10% of babies with Trisomy 13 survive pregnancy and make it to birth.  Of those that make it to birth, only 10% live a single day.   The doctors told Layla’s brother Jack and his wife Meaghan early on that their little boy wouldn’t be able to overcome his conditions, and so they treasured every day they had with him, knowing that the end would come soon.  This little boy fought for his life for nine days.  He was truly amazing.

It is worth nothing that December is an emotionally grueling month for my friend’s family.  Her birthday falls in December.  One of her niece’s birthdays falls in December.  And her youngest sister Catherine’s birthday is in December.  Two years ago Catherine was home for Christmas and out of the clear blue died of an undiagnosed heart condition.  She was in her mid-twenties.  They buried her on Christmas Eve.  And then again this past December tragedy struck again.  Indeed, December is filled with heartache for this family.

Jack and Meaghan have two beautiful little girls, May and Emily, who are about four and two years old, respectively.  When their brother was born they were told that he had arrived, but that he was very sick.  After he passed May asked her grandmother what had happened to him.

“Well, you know how your Aunt Catherine went to heaven and now she flies around with all the angels?”

“Yes.”

“Well, your brother went to heaven to become an angel too.”

And then May said the thing that makes this whole, miserable, heartbreaking story worth reading.  She hollered to her little sister, “Hey, Emily!  Did you hear that?  There are baby angels flying around all the time and our brother gets to be one of them!  Isn’t that wonderful?!”

What a gift it is to see the world the way a child sees it.  What a gift it is to see joy where we only saw pain.  Whether you believe in heaven and angels or not, there is something inspiring about the way these children experience loss – with a silver lining that not only softens the blow, but supersedes it altogether.  What an incredible gift it is.

*All names have been changed.

The story below came to me in a Christmas letter from a dear family friend.  This story is a true one from her childhood.  She wrote it down for her own children about 15 years ago.  She tries to share it with new people each year and this year included it in her holiday mailing.

It was early December in 1942 in a little copper mining town in Southern Arizona when my dad sat my little brother and me down tot ell us there would be very little money for Christmas gifts that year.

Our mom and dad had come to Arizona from Arkansas because friends from their hometown sent word that jobs were plentiful in the underground copper mines.  That wasn’t the case in depression era Arkansas.  So my mom and dad boarded a train that brought them to this mountain community, and my dad did indeed find work in the copper mines the very first day.  But what he really wanted was to work in the accounting offices of Phelps Dodge Mining Company and applied for every opening.  Each time he was passed over by someone with a college degree.  He finally convinced Phelps Dodge to give him a chance. He offers dot work for 30 days for free and at the end of that time if they didn’t like his work, he’d go back in the mines.

Daddy began his trial run in the accounting offices on December 1st – and there would be no paycheck that month.  He was understandably concerned about how he could provide for his young family that Christmas.

My brother and I assured him he didn’t have to worry about us.  We’d written to Santa and we knew Santa would come through.  My brother had asked for an Army Jeep – one you could sit in and drive – with a big silver star on the side.  This was World War II every day we went outside and played War.  And I wanted a doll with long blonde hair and a black net dress trimmed in pink ribbon – exactly like the one my mother wore to her meetings of the Order of the Eastern Star.

Easter Star was my Mother’s big night out.  Once a month, Mama would don this beautiful gown and my brother and Dad and I would diet on our front porch on the side of the Bisbee mountain and watch my mother until we lost her from view.

I can see her still as she was then – a beautiful young woman, sweeping down the side of the mountain in that glorious dress.  She had made her dress.  Mama was a wonderful seamstress and since Christmas was coming she was at her Singer sewing machine constantly, crafting gifts for family and friends.  My brother and I “helped.”  He worked the pedal and I would turn the wheel that drove the needle as Mama guided the fabric.

My dad was busy getting ready for Christmas as well.  He and a friend were meeting in the friend’s garage most evenings working on some book shelves that would be a surprise for our mother.  My brother and I were sworn to secrecy.

Finally the preparations ended and it was Christmas.  And when my brother and I walked into the living room that Christmas morning, it was just as we had known it would be.  There beneath a sparkling tree was a little wooden Army Jeep with a big silver star on the side that my brother could sit in and drive.  And right next to it was the most beautiful doll in the world.  She had long blonde hair and a black net dress trimmed in pink ribbon, exactly like my mother’s dress.

It was a magical morning, and at one point my brother magnanimously offered to let me take my doll for a ride in his Jeep.  So I gathered my doll and we settled into the little Jeep.  I put my hands on the steering wheel – and froze.  I knew that steering wheel.  It was unmistakably the wheel form my mother’s Singer sewing machine.  I sat there stunned.  It wasn’t too great a leap to put this together with my dad’s carpentry project and realize our dad and his friend had built more than a bookshelf – they had built the little Jeep.

But that didn’t explain my doll – and I so wanted Santa to have had a hand in that.  I thought I knew how to find out, so I marched into my parents’ bedroom and opened the closet door.  To my great relief, there, hanging where it had always hung, was my mother’s black net dress.  But something was different.  The pink ribbon was gone and it had become a short dress.  It was then that I knew how my doll’s dress had come to be.

I also knew what it had cost my mother.  In that place and at that time – and perhaps still – you couldn’t attend a meeting of the Eastern Star in a short dress.  This had been her only long one.

I try to share this story with someone every Christmas, for two reasons:

1. It’s my way of honoring two wonderful parents who tried so valiantly to preserve the magic of a Christmas morning for their small children.
2. It is a personal reminder to me of the profound truth I learned – that the most previous gifts are born of sacrifice.  These gifts need no wrapping paper.  They come wrapped – in love.

I was very moved by this story, that I thought I would share it here as well.  I hope you all have a wonderful holiday season, in whatever way you celebrate it.  With that, I will be on a blogging vacation for the rest of the year.  I’ll be back sometime after January 1st with my thoughts and plans for the New Year.

I have a friend who has the kind of hair that every girl envies.  It is fine, but thick.  It is the perfect shade of blonde.  It is well-behaved and straight.  It falls with conviction down to the middle of her back.  It swings when she walks and bounces when she runs.  If she weren’t one of the nicest people I’ve ever had the privilege of knowing, I might hate her for it.

I do not have that kind of hair.  My hair is not especially thick; perhaps a bit thinner than average.  It is naturally a bit wavy, depending on the humidity, but I can’t really rely on it ever to do the same thing twice.  My hair and I get along the best when I keep it trimmed just above my shoulders, and I pull it back into a low, parted ponytail quite often.

My friend – the nice one, with the killer hair – isn’t just nice.  She’s better than that.  She is good, and kind, and generous.  Every few years she goes into a salon, sweeps her hair back into an elastic, and instructs the stylist to cut 10 or 12 inches of perfect hair off of her head.  She places it in a plastic baggy and donates it.  Every time she does it I’m inspired.

Because my hair isn’t particularly suited to the half-way-down-your-back look, I’ve never let it get long enough to donate.  (I am a big fan of charity, but also a big fan of personal grooming.)  But with this most recent pregnancy, I had a game plan in place.

When I was pregnant with IEP I discovered that something about pregnancy hormones causes my hair to roughly double in thickness over the course of nine months.  Instead of shedding dozens and dozens of hairs every time I shampoo I lose only four or five individual hairs.  By the end of a pregnancy I have hair that is legitimately enviable.  The flip side to this coin, though, is that a few weeks after delivery karmic justice rears its ugly head and all of the hair that didn’t shed out during the pregnancy exits stage left over the course of about 10 days.  It breaks my heart.

So this time around I decided to trade my heartbreak in for something a little happier.

More than a year ago, before SSP was even in the works, I started growing my shoulder-length locks out.  By the time SSP was born I had enough hair to follow my super nice and super generous friend’s incredible example.  (That photo up top was taken when SSP was two weeks old.)

And last week I walked into my salon looking like this:

Cold feet struck me when I sat down in the chair at the salon.  My stylist gave me a much needed pep talk (“Gale, you have hair and some kid out there doesn’t.”), and then when I gave her the final go-ahead she started snipping.  About an hour later, she stopped.

I walked out looking like this:

Most of my charitable acts are financial donations to good causes, casseroles made for the church food pantry, and time spent volunteering at the local children’s hospital.  But something about this felt different – both bigger and smaller.  I gave, quite literally, a piece of myself.  It wasn’t a ton of hair and will certainly have to be combined with other donations to make a single wig, but, like the widow’s mite, I gave all of what I had, and it was a fundamentally different experience.   It feels quite different to give all that you can, rather than to make a token offering that only represents further generosity that wasn’t extended.

I am amazed by the people like my friend who give this incredible gift over and over.  I wish I had the kind of hair that I could grow out and donate repeatedly, but am thankful that I had the opportunity to do it this once.  It feels good to lay all that you have out on the table.  I should do it more often.

I suppose that if you asked 100 different people what hope looks like you would get 100 different answers.  That is human nature.  If I were one of those 100 people and you asked me that question today the answer would be: these pajamas.

A few weeks before IEP was born my mother was in town for one of my baby showers.  She took the opportunity to spoil me in a variety of ways, one of which was to take me shopping for pajamas to wear in the hospital so that I would have something comfortable but attractive to wear when friends and family came to visit me and our new baby.  One pair was pale blue with a chocolate brown floral pattern.  The other pair was white with spring green leaves and periwinkle blue birds.  I loved them both.  But, as it turned out, no one ever saw my cute pajamas.

Just hours old, IEP was transferred to a children’s hospital for treatment by teams of specialists.  (He is fine now.)  This meant that I spent my two postpartum days in the hospital alone with my mother, waiting for my phone to ring with news of my baby’s condition and prognosis, while GAP tended to our son across town.  I won’t lie.  It really, really sucked.

Now here I am, three years later, preparing for the arrival of my next baby.  Perhaps I shouldn’t be, but I’ve been trying fairly hard avoid thinking about delivery.  They were complications during delivery that caused all of IEP’s problems, and it’s hard to think about the actual birth of my second son without my mind going to a worst-case-scenario kind of place.  We have taken all the proper steps to ensure a healthy and safe delivery, which does put my mind at ease a bit.  Nevertheless, I struggle to envision exactly what it might be like to go through labor without incident, and to relax in the hospital with my baby for a couple of days before we head home.

And so I turn to pajamas – two pairs, one floral and one polka dotted – which to me represent hope, optimism, and the faith that this time will be different from the last.  They arrived in the mail yesterday and shortly after I got home from work I tried them on.  Then I called my mother and said, “My hospital pajamas came today.  And I’m bound and determined for someone to actually see them this time.”  She knew immediately the significance of my statement.

It’s hard for me to think about delivery.  But in my own way I am mentally preparing for a different experience this time.  For me, right now, hope looks like new hospital pajamas.

There is all sorts of conflict in this world.  And there are all sorts of philosophies about how to resolve that conflict.  We debate.  We fight.  We go to war.  We stage sit-ins.  We write op-eds.  We kill.  The human race has tried everything we can think of to either bridge or eliminate the gaps we find between our beliefs and those of people who disagree with us.  But I wonder how often we try to understand and really take to heart the experiences and beliefs of the person standing opposite us.

I think the answer is: not often enough.

Story Swap International agrees with me.  Last night while perusing headlines I came across this post by Reza Aslan.  In it he explains that , “as the Palestinian Authority heads to New York this week to confront the Israeli government at the United Nations with a declaration of statehood, back in Israel a group of Jewish and Arab kids are laying the foundations for a more hopeful future through the art of storytelling.”

Story Swap was born out of the Aspen Writers Workshop in 2007 and has been used in various environments worldwide to help resolve conflict.  It calls upon us merely to listen – to hear the whole story of someone on the other side of a divide – and to consider their point of view.  It does not ask us to solve a problem.  It does not ask us to bless or sanction or approve.  It does not ask us to forgive.  It asks only that we listen to another person’s story.  And, perhaps amazingly (or perhaps not), we find that when we’ve heard another person’s story we respond to them differently.

These kids in the Middle East will hear each other out.  They will open their ears and their minds and perhaps even their hearts.  And as they watch the Montagues and Capulets of their lives continue to battle each other they may be some of the first to view their counterparts with empathy instead of enmity.

I can’t speak for you, but I suspect that my life will never know the kind of cultural conflict that generations of Israelis and Palestinians have known for generations.  It is nearly beyond my comprehension.  And yet I know that I could better exemplify tolerance and acceptance on a daily basis.  Despite my best efforts, I sometimes fail.  I evaluate.  I compare.  I judge.  I recognize that some of this is human.  How else can I understand and fortify my own values and beliefs without recognizing how the world around me stacks up against the various lines I have drawn?  Nevertheless, I fail.

How much more accepting might I be if I stopped to listen to the story of someone I might otherwise judge?  If teenagers in the Middle East can set aside their prejudices and cultural barriers to listen to each other’s stories, why couldn’t I do the same?  Better yet, why couldn’t I just assume a position of tolerance without having to hear the story?  Ideally wouldn’t that be my default position?  Or is our tolerance and accepted enhanced in untold ways by hearing the story?  While a default position of tolerance is certainly an admirable approach to take, I wonder if our empathy is truer, more heartfelt, and longer lasting when we understand what our tolerance might actually mean to that person.

Perhaps this approach is naive.  But it seems to me that the world has enough cynicism.  Perhaps a little bit of innocent hope accompanied by open minds and hearts would carry us further than various peace summits and political treaties ever have.

Sometimes we women just don’t do ourselves any favors.

That was the thought that coursed through my mind as I read this article entitled “Do Women Choose Beauty Over Health?”  According to the United States Surgeon General Dr. Regina Benjamin, women are inclined to forego exercise on any given day because they don’t want their hair to get sweaty or to have to wash it.

Really?  We need the Surgeon General to tell us that fitness is more important than good hair?  Unfortunately the answer is Yes.

I suppose when you get into the heart of the issue it’s a little more understandable than it sounds on its face.  Dr. Benjamin explained that lots of women (especially African American women such as herself) spend a great deal of time and money achieving a certain hairstyle.  The thought of going to that time and expense again is a big disincentive to exercise.  She also commented that this is particularly true when we are looking for reasons not to work out in the first place.

What breaks my heart about this phenomenon is that it points to how little we actually count health in our estimation of beauty.  When we see a beautiful woman with glowing skin, white teeth, and shiny hair we immediately want to know about her daily personal care routine and what products she uses.  We don’t wonder about whether whole grains and lots of produce are key components of her diet.  We don’t readily consider what she does to keep her stress levels low and get enough sleep.  We don’t ask if exercise is a regular part of her life.  And yet when we get down to it the things that we find most attractive in ourselves and others are typically the byproducts of a healthy lifestyle.

This outlook holds true on the new website YouBeauty which works to inspire women to live healthy lifestyles through the incentives of improved appearances.  However, in spite of its basic premise the site’s CEO commented that the best way to get women to do anything healthy is to tell them it will make them more beautiful – eat broccoli, work up a good sweat, you name it.

I’ve addressed the issue of vanity in a couple of different posts recently (here and here), and I’m not quite sure why it’s resonating with me so much right now.  I suspect it has a lot to do with the fact that at 31 weeks pregnant I’ve had to sacrifice much of my vanity and focus much more heavily on my health.  My baby needs me to be healthy, not beautiful.  What interests me about this is that it’s not at all uncommon for pregnant women to find renewed energy for a healthy lifestyle.  When we are growing another life we take great care of ourselves.  We eat balanced diets.  We are willing to gain weight.  We go organic.  We drink more water and rest more.  We give up caffeine.  These changes and sacrifices are not insignificant.  We do all of these things for our babies, yet we are disinclined to do them for ourselves.

This makes me sad because it means that what effort we go to is always for someone else.  Whether it’s a husband or a job interview or a 20th high school reunion, the fact remains that we are certainly willing to jump through all sorts of hoops for our looks.  But by and large those hoops don’t benefit us.  In a perfect world we would all eat nine servings of fruits and vegetables each day, sleep eight hours each night, exercise for an hour five days a week, and drink 64 ounces of water daily.  We would do these things for ourselves – to live longer, healthier, and happier lives.

I’m not here to say that superficial indulgences aren’t perfectly acceptable from time to time.  (This is the part where I confess that the zippered makeup case in my purse contains at least 20 different seasonally updated shades of lipstick, gloss, and liner at any given time…)  But those indulgences should be the frosting, not the foundation.

Ladies, healthy is beautiful.  If we’re going to go through contortions for our appearances, let’s at least go about it in ways that benefit our health.  I’ll go to the gym if you will.  Deal?

I had a different topic in mind for today, but I’m interrupting our regularly schedule programming because this is more important.

Yesterday while checking in on Facebook I noticed a link posted by my good friend and fellow blogger Aidan at Ivy League Insecurities.  Aidan is currently in the midst of a month-long blogging sabbatical, so I was surprised to see a post from her and immediately clicked over.

I will let you read Aidan’s post yourself, and I hope you will because I think it is valuable, but I will give you a little foretaste.  I’m sure you heard in the news recently of the 30 Navy SEALs who were killed in a helicopter crash in Afghanistan.  It was the largest single-day loss off life for American troops since the war began nearly 10 years ago.  As it turns out, one of the troops killed in that tragic event was the brother of the fiance of one of Aidan’s girlfriends.  When Aidan reached out to her friend to ask what she could do the friend requested a blog post dedicated to her fiance’s brother.  And that is exactly what Aidan did.

When a war has dragged on as our war in Afghanistan has it is easy to grow numb to the depressing statistics that roll through our media month after month.  It is easy to hear the numbers without attaching names or faces or grieving families.  And so I think it is important that, from time to time, we take the time to learn the stories of the soldiers who have sacrificed their lives in service to our country.  It should be painful.  It should be uncomfortable.  It should hurt.  These soldiers are more than talking points for politicians and fodder for cable news pundits.  They are people who have given their lives in service to our country, which is more than any of us have done.

Please click here to read Aidan’s post.  And if you feel so moved, please leave your condolences for Sgt. Hamburger’s family in the Comments section there.  And please, if you do nothing else, give some thought today to all of the families who continue to grieve the loss of their loved ones.