MaeLyn's Musings

A couple years ago, my mom told me about a book called " The Artist's Way ". It was supposed to help artists discover or recover their creativity. Curious, I looked it up at the library, and read it. It was interesting, and had a couple basic premises, one of which was to write "Morning Pages" or at least three pages, handwritten, every morning. They could be about anything and everything, but the point, as I remember it, was to get out the stuff that is milling around in the subconscious. It could be used to get out frustrations, to explore new ideas, or whatever. No one else was ever supposed to read them, they were totally private and personal. At the time I was intrigued by the idea, and tried to it. Within a couple of weeks, I stopped. Writing first thing in the morning wasn't happening for me. I couldn't sit down and write anything until the kids were at school, the house was under control, and I felt I had time to write. Another problem was that I...

I was sick on Monday. My head ached, my stomach ached, I had no appetite, no energy, and spent the entire day on the couch not throwing up, but burping up smelliness. Steven was kind enough to drive the boys to school in the morning, so I only had to leave the couch to take Peter to kindergarten and pick up the kids after school. Hannah made dinner. I slept. Tuesday I was feeling a little better. My head still ached a little, and I was still feeling a bit weak, but I was well enough to get up, wash some laundry and straighten the house a little. I decided not to help out in Peter's class like I usually do on Tuesdays, and spent that quiet time resting rather than exposing twelve kindergartners to whatever bug I had. Yesterday, (Wednesday) I was straightening the house and trying to get caught up on neglected housework when I realized I had forgotten to go to a breakfast at the school  for John, who was selected "Physical Education Student of the Month" by his PE teach...

A few days ago, John came home from school and told me he thought he had set a school record that day. Every day during his lunch recess, John runs around the track at his school. Five times around the track is one mile. Over the last couple years the number of laps he can run before the end of recess has been steadily increasing. On Wednesday, he ran a record breaking 8 laps! He told me he ran at a steady pace the whole time, and ran faster than he usually does. Wednesday afternoon I bought him some new shoes. His old ones were literally run to shreds. I wish I had taken a picture of them.

My last fish is dying. I wrote him a haiku: The last fish is sick Limp, it drifts, waiting for death. I'm like a vulture. I feel guilty, watching and waiting for him to finally die. I've enjoyed having fish. When we first got them, about six or seven years ago, I loved sitting and watching them swim around. It was relaxing. The first night we had fish, the molly started popping out babies and it was an adventure counting how many we had, when the number increased daily, and then decreased daily as the small fry were either eaten by bigger fish or caught in the filter. Only one of the babies survived to adulthood. Over the years we had many kinds of fish. Besides mollys, we had neon tetras, zebra danios, plecostumus, a shark, snails, and even a frog, as well as other types of tropical fish I don't remember the names of. But now it is the end of an era. About a year ago, when the four cats settled in and started stalking the tank, I stopped replacing fish...

I'm sitting down relaxing for the first time today. And I have an hour before I need to be off and running again. I have so much that I need to do and I don't know where to start, or what I have time to start, or if I even want to get up and moving. It's kind of nice to just sit here. This morning I got the kids off to school, threw a load of laundry into the washer, cleaned out the kitty litter, straightened the house quickly, made sure Peter had a lunch and his backpack and I had my Primary things, transferred the laundry to the dryer and tossed another load into the washer, hopped into the car and dashed to my presidency meeting. After the presidency meeting I drove by the library to drop off a couple books, then took Peter to school, where he ate his lunch on a picnic table near the playground, and then went to class. From there I got gas and picked up some milk and bread, returned home to put away the groceries, pull the laundry out of the dryer (folding mine and Stev...

Steven left early this morning to head back to camp. This is the second three day weekend of his Woodbadge scout training. The last several days he has been busy making preparations - everything from coming up with quick jokes and meaningful stories to share to writing "Owl Roost" with rope on a large board. He has been thinking about goals, and planning with other patrol members in order to create a scouting related board game. And this morning he left on his adventure. He'll be back Saturday evening with stories to share. Until then, we're on our own. Today being a single parent wasn't too bad, considering that he is usually gone at scouts on Thursday evenings anyway. I painted the ceiling in our hall today, and I think it looks pretty good. It's definitely better than the bare wallboard that has been exposed for the last month or so since we scraped off the popcorn. Unfortunately, when I took down one of the light fixtures something black fell on my head ...

Did you grow up with music in your family? Yes! Steven has told me that being around my family is like being in a musical; people have a tendency to break into song at the least provocation. We are a very musical family. My Mom plays piano. Both of my parents always sang in the ward choir at church, and my mom has conducted the choir at times. My mom taught me and most of my siblings how to play piano. Some of my favorite memories are of standing around the piano while my mom played, singing songs - especially the ones where we could split into parts. Frequently we would be working in the kitchen to clean up after a meal and someone would start, "I've been working on the railroad..." and before they got that far, everyone in the room would have joined in, some even making up their own harmonies. I loved it! My children sometimes wonder how I know so many songs, because I still like to sing while I work. Sometimes they are songs that they know, like the Railroad song, ...

Were you or do you remember anyone in your school class being punished by a teacher? The first time I remember being punished was in a very early grade when we read something about spitballs in a story book. The teacher asked if anyone knew what a spitball was, and I attempted to show her what I thought a spitball was. The teacher was not impressed or amused. I had to wash off the desk and sit with my head down on the desk for a while. I mostly remember the threats more than I remember actual punishments. In elementary school, we had a folder of our work that we brought home every week on Tuesday, and we had to bring it back the next day signed by a parent. It was called the "Tuesday Tattler". One of my teachers - and I honestly don't remember which one - told us that if we forgot to bring it back signed, he (or she) would hang us upside down by our toes from the flag pole! I remember wondering how one would go about doing that... but I never got to see it done. I ima...

Josh posing as a scarecrow in the garden. Our gardening days have come to an end and the little garden plot has been laid to rest. For this year anyway. It has been fun. We didn't plant tomatoes this year, and instead enjoyed broccoli, carrots, peas, beans, onion and corn plants. The broccoli was a new experience. It grew, the flowers appeared, and we hacked off the stalk and ate it cooked with cheese melted on top. Good stuff. The peas and beans grew well and plentiful, and we enjoyed several meals with them both cooked and raw. The onion was one that started sprouting in the fridge, and was transplanted to the garden, where it proceeded to grow tall... I'm not sure how new onions are supposed to grow though. I imagine it is like other bulbs that should be planted in fall... but when do you harvest bulbs? I don't know. We enjoyed the plants, anyway. The corn was a plant that Josh brought home from school last Spring. It took a while to get going, but eventually the ear...

Tell about what you did while visiting your grandparents or aunt and uncle. My Grandma and Grandpa McClellan lived in Hayward, California. My Grandpa owned a construction company, and much of the materials storage and management must have been based at his home because the long, downward sloping driveway led past the house, past an office, garages, woodpiles and tool sheds, on its way to a river that marked the end of the property. The huge area was a great place to play hide and seek. I have memories of looking for raspberries or blackberries to pick in the very back of the property, and pineapple guavas from a plant closer to the house. Inside the house, there were wonderful things to look at and see. I remember a statue of a knight in armor, a plethora of books, and lots of paintings and knickknacks that seemed fascinating to me. There was a collection of toys stored in small tables in the living room, including beads that could be strung together in long chains and a stereo pic...