Mama's Musings

Lit Agent, Day# 2

It's only day two, and I've already heard from one lit agent! Stop holding your breath. There's no need to send flowers yet. Her answer? No thanks. But it was such a nice 'no' that I thought it was worth noting. If ever I'm in New York, I'll blow a kiss to her skyscraper window for making this process a little less hard today. No need to send funeral flowers, either people. This project will live. Whichever form it takes, it will live large!

Proud Mama

My six-year-old blows me away. Yes, there are some days when she pushes me to the brink. But this evening, she made me so proud!

She learned to read and write in her German primary school within six weeks. Now, she can read not only German, but English books, too. Here are the books she read tonight:

The V Word

Vulnerability has the color of grey – it is a sheath, a cloak, a rubber mat you put under your bum so you don’t wet the bed.

Vulnerability means the rubber pants I wore when I was a potty-training two year old. The smack of plastic rubbing my chubby toddler legs. The disapproval of not getting it right. Again.

It’s how I feel today. I’m having one of those moments where I feel like everyone else is smarter than me.

I graduated college, right? I blink dumbly into the mirror. I’m fluent in two languages. The image nods at me. I have three published works. The trappings of savvy don’t mean you are, I hear the voice in the mirror glibly say. Ouch.

The reason for my feelings is simple: I sent a book proposal to a literary agent today. Pressed “send” at 9:15 a.m. her time. I held my breath, then freshed the page eighteen times to see if she was so blown over by my prose that she would immediately respond.

Dumb. Dumb. Dum da dum dum!

Nope.

Challenge yourself, they tell you as a freshman in college. Then you spend the rest of your life trying to get over what you have learned: that you are never done learning. Ever.

Nathalie Milz -- the BEST babysitter EVER!

This is Nathalie, our babysitter of three years. She is the best babysitter ever. She's always on time (and works weekends, too!). We love, love, love her! Sadly, she is graduating this year. Quick! Somebody call the lab where Dolly was born. We need a clone -- ASAP! :)

A Southern Transplant

Hold your breath. It's going to be in the double digits this weekend. We're not talking minus degrees, people. We have achieved almost warm status. Houston. I think we've landed.

It is hard to avoid the DJ's cackling diatribes about the WINTER THAT WILL NEVER END as I tool about the frigid Bavarian countryside in my husband's beat-up Fiat. We have experienced sub-freezing temperatures for five months straight. I realize I said in an earlier blog post that there's nothing you can do about the weather. But that was BEFORE the WINTER THAT WILL NEVER END. Now I'd take on any global warming activist and throttle him in his t-shirt and shorts. I think the moths have eaten mine up. No, wait a minute. Live moths would require warmth, and we don't have any of that.

Yet.

To offset my steady, foul mood about all things meterological, I have spent my time booking exotic vacations to places as far as Flordia. Drooling over a particular Orlando vacation home I found on the Internet, I am determined to force warmer climes to cast their heat onto my clammy, cheesy skin.

A friend of mine recently wrote: "Where is Ghana? I am brown." She is a dear Ghanian friend living in London. I replied, "Where's the warmth? I'm a white girl from the South..."! This too shall pass, I am told.

Yes, it will. When we move to a warmer country!

Love, Marriage, Mom & Dad

Jennifer Roback Morse said it more eloquently than I could about the importance of motherhood. In her TownHall.com essay, A Duel in the Mommy Wars, Morse challenges Linda Hirshman to a knock-down, drag-out fight over the issue of contemporary motherhood:

"I challenge Ms. Hirshman to debate the proposition as she herself stated it: 'An educated, competent adult’s place is in the office.' I will debate her on the airwaves. I will debate her in print. I will debate her in person."

So tell me this, does a home office count?

Several researchers at the University of Virginia have shown in a recent study that women define happiness in marriage more by their husband's 'normative commitment to the institution of marriage' than by their level of household involvement. That means he says "yes" at the altar and means it afterwards. Who mops the floor is less material. As a practicing wife, I will substantiate that claim. A committed husband is not one deserving of being committed, as many social standards have purported. He deserves to be honored as much as we women claim we are not.

Marriage really has gotten a boost recently. It's not only reserved for American thinkers. The University of Zurich just released a study which said married couples are generally happier than single people. Somewhere, just north of the Alps, there's an American housewife smiling...

Compassion Literati

Compassion, the love of others, is an undervalued notion. To put yourself in another's moccasins and walk a mile is to understand we all harbor different beliefs, varied perspectives, and, on occasion, completely opposing views.

My mother did a great job in teaching us to judge not lest we be judged. She was right. We all have the right to our own opinions. As a member of a democratic society, we all have a right to be heard.

Yesterday, I learned that lesson all over again. This time it wasn't my mother who imparted her nugget of wisdom. It was my daughter.

The sky, in its cobalt blue allure, drew us outside to the snow-covered hill next to the school. Four mothers and eight children braved the whipping winds to frolick once more in the powdery whiteness. In our "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em" attitude, we realized we can't control the weather, but we can control our attitudes about it.

As the children sledded down the hillside, an occasional spill brought a child or two to tears. My kids remained relatively quiet.

"I'm so lucky to have such well-mannered children," I thought snootily, watching the other kids whine and carry on.

One of my daughter's best friends fell face first into the snow after her brother rammed into her with his sled. Sophia lovingly fed her friend food from her own snack box. She tended to her friend's hurt ego. Again, I beamed.

"I just love my friends," Sophia confided in me as we took a quick bathroom break in the adjacent building. She skipped back to her buddies in great cheer. Moments later, I heard her cursing and crying. She had taken a fall down the snowy hill while her friends laughed at the top. More curses were traded between the girls.

One of the children's mothers demanded her laughing daughter come down to her sobbing friend (Sophia) and tell her side of the story.

Sophia started by saying she felt hurt that they were laughing at her. She didn't like it so that's why she called them $%§%§$&$%/%&/!!!

"How am I supposed to know how you are feeling?" Sophia's friend demanded.

I stopped cold in my tracks. "How am I supposed to know how you are feeling..." Compassion would tell you.

Sophia looked at her and said, "Because I just told you." Wiping away her tears, the girl's mother thanked them both for telling their side of the story. They went off to play harmoniously once again.

Standing tight-lipped in the chilling wind, we marveled at our daughters' ability to immediately forgive and forget. We could learn a thing or two from them.

Economic Slowdown

According to today's issue of the New York Times, women are de facto responsible for the nation's economic slowdown.

A report by the White House Council of Economic Advisers, presented to
Congress in February, contended that the slowdown in the rate of women
moving into the workplace, was weighing on the nation's potential for
economic growth.
"The new factor at play," the report said, "is the change in the trend
in the female participation rate, which has edged down on balance since
2000 after having risen for five decades."

Now that's rich.

PR Postcard

Along with my latest book project and the German translation of SAHM I Am: Tales of a Stay-at-Home Mom in Europe, I have started a weekly PR newsletter. In an upcoming issue, I talk about how you can make money blogging. It's a great way to exercise your skill as a writer and to subsidize your marketing campaign!

For more information on my new PR postcard:

Fill out your e-mail address to receive the Author's Companion PR Postcard!
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Nostalgic moments

My mother-in-law stumbled across a box full of old letters and paraphanelia from my husband this weekend during our brief visit to their house. It contained a handful of cheap wedding favors from some cousin’s wedding from the early 90’s, a note that read “send flowers” and an old Reichsmark from before World War I.

“Forget flowers! We could buy gold bars with this one!” I squealed like a farmyard hog. My husband flipped over the bill to show me. It was blank.

“It’s not real, is it?” I said, shoulders dropping in a moment of grandiose deflation.

“No,” he smiled. “But these are!” he laughed, holding up some old love letters I had written him while living in Vienna.

Nostalgic moments like these bring me closer to my younger self!