Posts Tagged Under By Marianne Lonsdale

December 13th, 2008

A Winter Ritual’s Location Is Changed So ALL Are Included

My son’s school has used the auditorium at the Oakland Mormon Temple for many years for our annual winter concert. 

The auditorium can accommodate the crowd of several hundred students, parents, grandparents and friends who flock to this holiday highlight.  The huge outdoor light and nativity display add to our anticipation as we walk through the crisp night air into the warm theatre.

We relish the familiarity of this winter ritual.  The opening act is the kindergarteners (don’t they absolutely get more adorable each year?) marching down the aisles in angel garb. 

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November 22nd, 2008

My Roaming Troubadour’s Free Spirit Lifestyle Makes Me Feel Sort ofCool

When I first met Jeff, he was a young teenager and I was in my mid-thirties.  He was a sweet, introverted, Keanu Reeves look-alike.   

I’d not seen him for fifteen years when he e-mailed me last summer. 

Now he was a thirty-year-old struggling singer-songwriter, touring the country.  He might be in the Bay Area later in the year.  I told him we’d love to see him and he was welcome to stay with us.  I was both surprised to hear from him, and to find he’s one of those people I feel connected to no matter how much time has passed.

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November 6th, 2008

What We Remember and What We Forget and Forget and Forget. . . .

My memory is lost. Between Mom Brain and menopause, I lose chunks of memory for minutes or hours.

I’ve gotten used to it.

I don’t get flustered if I can’t remember my next-door neighbor’s name – I know that her name will return to my memory at a later date.

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October 19th, 2008

Terror Deep Into the Night

The sound of Nick’s quick steps on the hardwood floor awoke me before I heard his voice at my bedside. 

“Mom,” my eleven-year old said.  “I had a really bad nightmare.  I’m so scared.”

I pulled my covers back and pushed my body upright.  I’m always a bit surprised at how easily I spring into mom mode in the middle of the night.

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August 31st, 2008

An Eater of White Foods Discovers Color!

My eleven-year old son, Nick, was one of those picky eaters. 

A white eater – left to his own devices he would eat only white bread, white rolls, potatoes sans skins, pasta and his very favorite, steamed rice. 

Most parenting books said not to make food an issue.  But my husband and I forced some concerns.  He had to eat green vegetables.  He eats a bowl of steamed broccoli almost daily and has for years.  We no longer buy white bread although I just stopped cutting the crust off the wheat bread last year.  We’ve exposed him to so many different foods because we like variety and different ethnic flavors.

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August 18th, 2008

A Girl’s Just Gotta Have the RIGHT Black Bag

She stood in front of me in line, chatting with a man several years her senior.  We were waiting to be let into Il Fornaio restaurant in San Francisco, for a luncheon with Mario Battali, celebrity chef. 

I recognized the man, a local restaurant critic. 

She and I were both dressed in the uniform of big cities – black pants, black jackets, black shirts, black bags.  I looked like an aging business woman.  She looked hip.  Her boot cut pants had two thin stripes of tiny white stitching down the middle of each leg.  Fitted black t-shirt and cropped jacket that could fit in San Francisco or on a humanitarian trip with Bono to Africa. 

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July 14th, 2008

Bonjour Books

Planning for my family’s June vacation to France started months before the trip. 

One of my first considerations was what books I would bring.  Paperbacks for sure.  No lugging of hard backs.  Adam Gopnick’s book of essays, Paris to the Moon, was the first book in my France stack. 

An eye-catching cover in blues and yellows with the name French Dirt caught my eye at Book Passage and that was the second.  I’d avoided Peter Mayle’s classic, A Year in Provence.  I wanted something a bit less known.  But when I found it used for six dollars, I added it as the third and last book for my time in Paris and Provence.

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July 3rd, 2008

Allowing Your Child’s Personality to Emerge

I pity the poor kids — and mine is one — who do not relish group activities.

We’ve come to think that happy participation in groups is normal and required behavior.

By the time most kids are toddlers, their everyday happiness depends on how they navigate in groups – daycare, Gymboree, music classes.

I remember leaving my howling three-year old son in a gymnastics class. I hovered in the hallway, dialing my husband on my cell phone for advice.

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May 30th, 2008

Defining Feminity

I was driving my seven-year-old son, Nick, and his friend, Ryan, home from our swim club. Ah, I loved the easy days of summer spent poolside. A little chit-chat with other moms, a short nap and time to flip through trashy magazines.

The only thing I didn’t like about summer was the incessant need to shave my legs and other more difficult to reach areas. As a woman of Italian heritage, daily summer shaving was another mark of summer. I’d never started fussing with my brows or upper lip – too much maintenance.

Ryan interrupted my hairy thoughts.

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