Feeling Orange

I thought I was getting the flue. My body felt all kinds of achy, stomach wanted to revolt and I was getting a grump on. My body said "quit" but my brain said "sit". "Sit down and put your feet in a big bucket of hot water until it looks like you are wearing pink socks" was the exact direction. A lady from the CA St Grange had emailed me and gave me this advice when I told her I felt like I was coming down with something.
Feet in hot water? That's it? No 12 dollar flue medicine? No special potion with green goop?
I did it anyway.
I sat there for twenty minutes or so, feeling like a pilgrim who should have had a string of garlic around my neck as well.
Ten minutes later, when my feet and lower legs were pinker than a pig in July, my kids came home from school and sitting was not really the best of options. Snacks needed to be somewhat monitored or an entire weeks worth of chips might be inhaled. So I got up and put my feet in arm socks like she directed. And I felt awesome. Totally clear and good!

Wednesday afternoon is my "alone time, art lesson" with Ben. Although I normally would have blown it off and pleaded still sick, I felt fine, so I set up the colored pencils, asked him if he wanted to learn how to draw a portrait and we set to it. I picked purple. He picked orange. He learned the techniques of portraits. I remembered that, damn I can still draw!

After our sketching, I wanted to know more, not just about what he can, like draw a really cute portrait of himself, but how he thinks too, so I told him about an old friend who used to have an email address "Taylorfeelsorange@aol.com"
and I asked Ben,"If orange were a feeling what would you feel like?"
He mused "Hmmm... well, orange maks me think of pumpkins and pumpkins make me think of Halloween, and Halloween is like tricks...so I think mischievious!"
"Red?"
"Love"
"Green?"
"Hmmmm...recycling...so Helpful!"
"Blue?"
"Well....sad." His face drooped.
"Pink"
"Filled with peace!" Easy grin...I loved hearing how he thought!
"White?"
"Normal...umm balanced."
"Purple?"
"Healthy!"
He smiled his big beautiful happy smile, I loved everything about him, and I was so glad I wasn't sitting in bed having a pity party.
I was so glad I used an old fashioned tip to get healthy and have a new moment of connection with my son.
There is nothing more important than health. Our health gives us access to do all the other things we want to do and be all the other ways we want to be...like mischieviously orange:)
Here's to making extraordinary moments, living life to be creative, and listening for creativity in even the most ordinary of moments.

Zen Honeycutt

Monsters and Bad Guys

This morning I got up earlier than I usually do because my middle son announced that Bronson had left the hose on all night. As I walked through the kitchen I remembered that it is "My Surprise Thursday," one of the theme days I made up for each day of the summer. So I pondered what would be a nice surprise....and what would matter to the kids. (It would be a nice surprise for me if they all did the windows and cleaned the grouting but I concede that surprises are better when fun for everyone.)
I thought of Bronson not wanting to sleep in his own bed last night. When I asked him why, he described in adorable detail how a monster would try to get in his window and eat his "nosey". I agreed that that would not be nice. I just got him. Soon he was talking about how we made cookies and the monster was temporarily forgotten. But monsters and bad guys are a big deal of a child's life. Most often we parents negate them, shush the child and basically tell them all their fears are unfounded and frivolous. Rather than comforting them, we leave them feeling unheard, unimportant and unloved. Asking our child to tell us more about their fears opens up worlds, creates contentedness, fosters trust and acceptance. It most likely will melt the fears too and allow the child to move on into creativity and empowerment.

So this morning, in what took less than a minute, I grabbed the big roll of paper (inspired by my sister and her daughter's artwork they mailed to us and my brother's artistry of monsters) and unfurled it over the kitchen table. I grabbed a box of crayons and wrote "The Monsters in Our Dreams" and left to have a talk with Bronson about the hose and when we use water.
It turned out that Daddy sheepishly confessed he left it on, when taking out the trash he thought it would be nice to water my herbs...what a sweetheart! How could I be upset about that? It's just water...and money...I realize that no matter who left it on, neither my sons or my husband are the monsters or bad guys. They just want to play and make me happy.

We walk inside after the family talk on water conservation and the kids see the paper and title. As I make breakfast, they start to draw, and draw,and draw...and I join in and soon we are having the most imaginative and fun conversation about monsters and bad guys. I feel my own fears oddly real and then disappear as I draw my childhood bad dream of a windowless tower that I am trapped inside as I am being chased by a witch in circles. An alligator snaps in the water below and as I draw it out it becomes just silly and funny. They describe their Giant Frog, Puffy Muffy Monster and Mr. Alien Butthead. Our morning is delightful. The kids are empowered. We are creatively connected.
Then my reminder alarm goes off and it's "Time to Stretch!". So Bodee leads us in stretches and exercise and I am filled with joy from being surrounded by the good guys.

Zen Honeycutt

Giving Up or Choosing

Ben has a sad face. He walks towards the car and it gets sadder and longer the closer he gets. He is holding it in and by the time he gets seated and buckled in the dam breaks.
"Oh Mom, it was a terrible day!"
I ask him why, truly concerned. he hasn't had a terrible day in months.
" Today the teacher showed Lydia's art, Lydia's my best friend and she's a good artist, but Ms.Cline showed her art and not mine and she showed the whole class and she's a better artist that I am!!!"
Big crocodile tears are rolling and plopping onto his sweatshirt.
"I used to be the best artist and now I'm not and the teacher never shows my art so I'm not going to be an artist anymore!!!'
It's decisive. He is killing off his artistic expression. "The word decide is from the family pesticide, homicide, insecticide," (to quote leaders from Landmark, a breakthrough personal training and development program),"it kills off something in your life. It is very different from a choice, which is to choose freely after consideration."
Ben was killing something off in his life. It was very difficult for me not to make that wrong, to make him wrong. But I knew making him wrong about that would just have him hold onto his new decision with more vigor than ever before. I just needed to be with it.
"Wow, you are really sad." I said, running my hand over his shiny hair. " Yeah." he said and went onto describe in further detail how he is going to stop making art and instead just spend time with his family. Compassionate, but still limiting. Okay.

I listened while driving until he was completely emptied out, then I pulled the car over.
"Ben can I tell you a story?" He nodded.
"When I was a girl, I took a dance class with my sister Chi. Jazz. We had black outfits with fringe on the arms, we practiced for three months. Then we had a dance recital. Chi was shorter so she was in the front row. I was taller so I was in the back. I was nervous. I really wanted to do it right. At the end of the dance our father came up and said " Wow, Chi what a nice big smile you had, you look like you really enjoyed it!" Then he looked at me and said " Zen, where was your smile?"
In that moment I made up that Chi was a better dancer than I was, that dance was " her thing" and I shouldn't dance. So I didn't. For a long time. I missed out on alot of fun.
Then, when I lived on my own in New York City, I met your Daddy and we took dance lessons together, had a lot of fun and fell in love. I took a chance by dancing again. If I hadn't taken that chance then Daddy and I wouldn't have gotten married and you wouldn't be alive today."
Ben said " Well, that's what I am going to do then, not do art for a long time."
I told him that the point was that I could have been having fun all those years and dancing anyway, it doesn't matter about anyone else. He can do whatever he wants, and he can always change his mind and do art again, today even, either way it's his choice...
He soon, sighed, nodded his head, changed his mind and said he chose to do art again.

As we walked into our home he sighed and said " Thanks for telling me that story Mom, You know, parents are useful. They have been kids and they know stuff." I felt so touched by his simple wisdom and acknowledgement. Oh Thank God, I thought, my child does listen a little bit and does learn a little bit from my experience.

The next day, he came home, beaming, that his teacher had shown his art at the front of the class, shining, happy and still best friends with Lydia. He said he learned from what she did and the whole class learned from what he did. That's my boy!

Zen Honeycutt
www.zenspurplegarden.com