we shall inherit the earth....History Part II

I think poverty is inherited just like wealth. There are the vast majority that don’t choose to be poor, but are simply born to it.

What I’m finding is the majority of the pundits have never gone to bed hungry or suffered the social stigma of uncut hair or clothes that don’t fit. I am the youngest of five. My grandfather came to this country and picked oranges in ventura county. He came here with a dream of liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That dream he held to the very end and died with him clutched in his calloused hands and weathered skin from many many long days in the sun. My grandmother with her eighth grade education worked in the Sunkist packing plant along with my great aunts. My mother found herself, as many women did of her age, a bride at the end of a shotgun with two children by the age of 17 and not able to go beyond the 10th grade. By the time my father left, we were standing in the long lines for government cheese in the central valley. The land of dust bowl migrants of the depression era. My school lunches were provided by the state. All of this was lost on me for the most part early on. The realization came slowly. Like a cruel inside joke that becomes clear to it’s victim long after. The lunch tickets for the poor kids were a different color. I quickly learned to palm my ticket and slip it to the lunch lady unnoticed so as not to endure the snickers from my peers. Being the youngest, most of my clothes were hand me downs. Hand me downs from used clothing to begin with.

Why is it that those that want to blame the poor for being poor have never gone without?

We were a welfare family. That is to say we leaned heavily on what the government could provide so my mother could do what she needed to do. She went back to school and still managed to hold two jobs. She raised 5 children on her own. She never missed a payment on the mortgage and proudly paid off her house some time ago. We have all made a better life than my grandparents, or my parents. I am certain this would not have been possible without the aid of welfare. I can also say with certainty that these programs that raised me are no longer there. Just like music & art classes. they are more urban legend to kids today. Sadly the effort to better ones life is so extreme that the American Dream is more of a fairy tale than a possibility.

Some ask why the poor have so many children. Several reasons. First, children bring an amazing amount of joy to ones life. I know this is true as a mother myself. Second, the government can’t tell or some how inhibit you from doing so. And perhaps it can be said that we are sexual beings. and lets face it…if you have nothing to do, nowhere to go, not sure what is going to happen to you and your life, sex is a great alternative and stress reliever.


Ya know what else? We need a leader that has at least once in his life, eaten a ketchup sandwich. I’m not kidding. I think Bill Clinton has had a ketchup sandwich. Hillary, maybe not. Obama, i'm not sure either. And I’m not talking about ketchup from some fancy bottle either…I’m talking about room temperature packets that have some kinda dried crap on the outside that force you to be very careful when opening them as not to get said crud on anything you are possibly going to eat. I want my leader to have been so poor at least once in his life, either as a child or perhaps in the college years, or maybe even later in life, say, after the first child came and you were busy feeding it and making your due with a big ‘ole ketchup sandwich on cheap white bread.

in case you were wondering what it's like....

The First Audition.....

I wasn’t expecting the harshness, first off. That is something I certainly see happening with adults, but no way did I see it coming as I walked my not-yet-three year olds into an overcrowded casting office. The two twenty-somethings checking in seemed quite overwhelmed. The young man pointed to a sheet and told me to sign in. Neither asked for anything nor did they even look up really. Rather than march right up and let them know it was our first time (which in hindsight might have been a better route), I decided to quietly observe. The guy was trying to take snapshots of some of them. Seemed like there were too many people to have a clear wall…soon that was abandoned altogether. Then some time later I overheard the young lady tell someone else to sign in and fill out a blah-blah card….so I grabbed one, looked at it, had many questions, but the two staff were more than busy shuffling papers and what not. I tell ya, I tried for the better part of 10 minutes trying to get another person to make eye contact with me to no avail. i then decided writing just their names and the agents would be enough and handed them over with their photos…... There was no direction really…not even from the seasoned parents that for whatever reason could not, or would not make eye contact.

There were perhaps a dozen or so children crowded around a play table with both parents and adult actors as well, in a small waiting room meant to accommodate a third of that. It was very hot and at times very loud. The rest had spilled out to the main corridor with many seated on the floor along the walls. I would guess at the height of it there were perhaps 40-50 kids and twice as many adults…easily. The studio was only using one room for all applicable actors (two men, a mom and child is what the synopsis called for).

We sort of wander around looking for a place to land. Walk the length of the place and around the circular center half wall. Wyatt is counting off the numbers on the door. The boys want to keep moving and there isn’t anywhere to sit other than far away. We finally sit on the floor and give them a snack. A man that looks like what I describe as the rhythm section for Santana and mommy honey says is more like ‘the remains of Stevie Ray Vaughn’ (both are correct, you decide which one is funnier), pokes his head out the door and yells, “can someone make sure they can say their first and last name and age, because none of them seem to know that”. So the young lady repeats; they will need to be able to say their first and last name and how old they are. So could we please make sure they can do that….we practice….it’s really funny because our last name does not exactly roll off the tongue of a not-yet-three year old.

The boys want to go back into the tiny kid room. I leave mommy honey there with Wyatt and walked David around a bit. He’s much more restless if there is too much noise or too many people, particularly if they don’t acknowledge him (he’s a talker).Also, mommy honey had made the mistake of telling him he was going to ride a bicycle so every time the door opened and he saw the shiny red tricycle in there, well…what can I say…he’s not three. At some point they began to line up little boys in groups of 3-4 along the walls. And there they stood for what seemed like an eternity. Nothing seemed to be moving. (it was the only time I heard another parent complain) I took david up front, to the bathroom, and outside for a bit and back in. We pass the window to the very small kids waiting room and I see mommy honey has become the pied piper with a handful of children playing with her. Wyatt has retreated to a small area right up next to her where he is playing by himself (he does that when he’s insecure)…then it’s back around and around and around the half round wall with David, admiring the little ikea stools I also have in my studio. At one point we passed a very serious looking slight woman with dark hair and glasses that reminded me of my sister….i saw her later at the check in table, giving the youngsters a firm talking to. She didn’t seem too pleased (I’m thinking it was the actual casting agent??).

I took a look over at the check-in to see if perhaps our cards were coming up soon, because the boys are getting beyond restless and things are progressing rather slowly only to see quite a few before us with ours somewhere in a stack of applicants off to the side. It was getting close to 5…and then the door swung open to the young man yelling for the next group. “Michael, Johnny, sam & blah-blah! You’re up! Come on!” and these little guys kinda hesitated (shit, I would have run the other way) . then he sort of barks at them the same sort of command only louder and that’s when I decided I’d had enough (and I think David too). I have to plead with him to go into the noisy kid room again and I tell mommy honey that we should go. Then he yells “yeah honey, let’s get outta here, let’s GET OUTTA HERE.” Loud enough that the whole room sort of stops and looks at us.

I could not, in good faith, feed my children to the wolves on this day. ‘cause that’s what it was starting to feel like if I would have let them go into that little room. I cannot even image what was going through David’s head…his imagination is greater than mine.

That is the narrative of the day. Now, here are my thoughts on it all….

The most unnerving thing for me was I’ve never been in a room with that many children and mothers gathered, where not a single, passive, friendly conversation took place. I also wasn’t prepared for the competitive nature of these things. It’s quite palpable. I suppose the upside of that is I will be better prepared the next time?? i don't know if i'm down with a next time. In talking to my mate this morning we both made some decisions about how to better cope with that kind of situation if faced with it again…big IF here. Her plan is to concentrate on the children and spend her time in play (she’s rather good at that) because it was her assessment, there was very little interaction between the kids and their parents. I feel if we bring plenty of distractions, toys, food, and most importantly, A PLAN (a reasonable time table for audition and a plan for exit if it does not meet that time) it would be less stressful. Also I think last minute calls for audition like this one are probably not for us until the boys are older.

We also need to discuss the various ways we can prepare the boys before they even get to an audition in a way that will not ultimately affect their personality or well being. We need to find a way to describe what is happening and what they are going to be doing. I feel like we totally didn’t think of that. At the same time, I don’t want to turn them into little robot children. I'm also very clear on following their lead. The boys are going to dictate how this all goes and i'm completely fine with that....

you're probably wondering at this point why i'm doing this at all...right? the most i want out of this is a little something for the scrapbook and couple extra bucks in the college fund for them. i have several people lined up to knock some sense in me if they feel i'm out of line in any way. trust me, they will.....

chosing words carefully

my sons are at an age where absolutely everything is taken in, processed and spit right out again. a favorite being when my words or exact inflection is repeated....

when leaving the store..."Was that fun, mommy? was that fun?"

after signaling it's time for bed..."Two seconds, mommy. Just two more seconds."

as i hand over the toy i've just retreived from a high shelf in the closet..."Good job, mommy! you got it!"

when repeated efforts have been made for me to dress up like a princess or fairy and climb inside the tent they have made out of blankets and the diningroom chairs...."Can you just try once for me, mommy?"

it's adorable...all of it. i swear, i can be in the worst mood or completely preoccupied with some task or some thing and those little sentences just slay me.

we've been in the midst of potty training. at the tail end (no pun) with no accidents for days now, but there is still the occasional check. today i'm right out of the shower, in my bedroom and my boy says, "can i smell your butt, mommy?"

oh, i have to have a little talk with mommy honey later about that one. and i had just got them to stop calling farts, 'butt hiccups'....she thought that was hilarious, as well.

In today's mail....

the boys got into the local favorite pre-school. they hold a lottery for new students...you would have thought we received an acceptance letter to Stanford, the way we were carrying on.

now i have to write a letter begging for a scholarship being that we are starving artists and all. the worst part about where they are going, is they will be surrounded by children of priviledge. [read: tiny little monsters] locally we are called the hillbillys of the southbay because we inherited our little beach shack..otherwise, we couldn't afford to live here. [shrug]

The History of Me...

This is my father. I named one of my sons after him. i did that as soon as i knew baby A was a boy...and fate made sure that baby looks just like him. His mother, my grandma Mac, wanted to see him in the moving pictures. put him in acting classes and had several professional headshots done. I never met my grandmother. She died when he was 12 and i don't think he ever got over it. He didn't pursue it, not just because he was sent away to live with relatives and hollywood doesn't exist in the deep south, but because of his staggering grief, and anything that reminded him of her. He lived the very hard and short life of an alcoholic and died at age 49. i've done my best to get over him as well.

It has been 22 years now that i've been without a single social lubricant. The intervention happened in my late teens and while there have been many times i've questioned the self-title of alcoholic/addict, the idea of testing that theory has little, to no appeal. i've stepped away from the confines of AA for the most part but practice the principles and find other ways to quell my obsessive nature. when asked or rather, when i find myself in the company of a 'pusher', my reply is a simple, "no thank you, i've had enough".
when i was in early therapy, my dad showed up in all his sloppy drunk glory. there was a brief battle of where i would live...where the best and safest place for me because my mother and i had such a toxic relationship. my dear sweet pop. i think he just wanted to be the knight that came to save me. he wrote a letter because sometimes the words got caught behind his tongue. in true 17 year old fashion, i dismissed it...dismissed him...chided him for being dramatic. the best i could do is hug him and tell him i loved him, but sobriety would be hard fought and rarely won in his company. that was a difficult truth then...and probably more so now. i think now he believed we could save eachother.

many years later i came across the letter during a move. i read it aloud to a handful of friends that had just spent the better part of the day, lugging very large heavy things for me. it took me a long time to get through it because the words kept getting stuck behind my tongue...it said:




Dear Kristi,

This is no bullshit. I look inside you and see enough of myself that your present position scares me. I have always been an iconoclast, by always, I mean to the extent of my memory; which not too long ago was last weekend. Now I can remember a world that couldn’t be made right without my effort and when it looked like my effort wasn’t going to be enough, I went somewhere else. Into this place where I couldn’t be touched, where I was alright and the world was fucked up. That worked fine until I realized that I wasn’t the center of the universe and that whatever I did would really matter very little in the entire scope of things. Now comes a time when I want so very much for what I do to matter. I am sometimes sad, and sometimes angry because you would hurt someone who means so much to me – you. Maybe I am being selfish; like in the movies when it’s alright for some people to die because they aren’t the stars. To me you are a star, shining in the universe to fulfill my destiny, my very reason for existence.

If that’s too heavy for you, start your own goddamn destiny. And for the sake of those who love you, broaden your horizons beyond the scope of the next moment in the heartbeat of time. There is a world out there full of love and good, notwithstanding the shit you may have to wade through.

I love you Kris, live, come home with me and when the time is right – you can fly.
-Dad

we are mostly the same on the inside too

ya know...even though she's a famous wife of a rockstar, reading her blog makes me feel normal in my done-birthed-twins-too body.

damn, i gotta change this layout though. the brown/tan has got to go.

a soldiers heart

This is a soldier. A Lieutenant. His specialty is blowing things up. He named his baby girl after the God of war. However, watching him whisper sweet words to his newborn daughter, i knew his life would be forever changed....therein lies hope.

i was editing this session with my ipod cranked up and on shuffle. George Michael's "mothers pride" started to play and i competely lost it. i swear, God is my deejay sometimes.

all families are special

yesterday on Oprah, the show hosted several adults conceived by donated sperm. my twins are the product of that science. needless to say, it brought up a swirl of different and slightly unexpected emotions for me. the decision to use donated sperm rather than a known donor (oh i have the most excellent male friends) was one of the most difficult decisions i've made in my lifetime. it wasn't my first choice. but i'll get to that some other time....

the show was well done, i think, although the producers did a good job justifying the argument that all donor conceived long for the biological connection that is lacking. i say that because the opposite was not represented and i know those people exist. i came away from that show feeling primarily grateful that my boys have each other and that i have made a connection with two SMC families so they will have other siblings available if or when they feel the need to reach out for what is not obviously present (but present inside them all the time).

what i was stuck with today, however, came out of a conversation i had with some friends that are also a same sex couple with a daughter by anonymous donor. their reaction was quite the opposite. they are not interested in the donor registry nor are they going to actively pursue any relationship even that of a simple exchange of contact information for future use. this puzzles me on many levels. so i pushed further to find they are, simply put, afraid of stuff. what that stuff is exactly, i wasn't able to tease out, but what words they used were along the lines of...."afraid of confusing our daughter"..."we want her to know we are her family"..."the donor is in no way a father, dad or participant in any way and we see it as more along the lines of someone donating blood"..."and thus, these other kids are not what we consider brothers or sisters because that is something else to us". one even went so far as to tell me that if she were the wife of someone that had donated sperm in college, she would absolutely not allow her husband to have contact with the "product of that". her feeling is that it would take away from their potential children and the attention he would need to devote to them. however, they did say that when their daughter was an adult, she could pursue any contact she wanted because it would be her decision. hmmmm. okay, i can sort of appreciate tiny bits of some of that but something didn't feel right about our conversation.....

now keep in mind, i have yet to see a program about donor offspring meeting their biological father and the kids reaction being that of regret or distain. i have only known people that have been raised, or ignored or abandoned and have reckoned from early on that their father was a disgusting jackass...somehow in my mind, the sperm banks are getting pretty good at screening for jackass tendencies...but i digress...

here's my gig: every day seems to be a practice in living for me. today, i'm reminded of how much it takes to not operate in fear. to resist the darkside. to live in the light that is love, and acceptance and inclusion and celebration of all things surrounding that. i want my boys to know they are loved and that my partner and i will always be the foundation of family for them. i hope that they will feel the same. it is within that hope i wish to do my best to model these values. i will do my best to keep both my mind and my heart open to people that by my direct effort or mere folly find their way into our lives. the human heart has infinite capacity for love, both given and received. there is always going to be enough to go around....

so this is how it begins....

It started innocently enough. A friend has persistently suggested i submit my babies to a modeling agency. She has her two daughters represented by a well known agency and they have had a lovely time of it. Mostly catalogue stuff....kohls, pennys, and the like. She tells me it's something for the scrapbooks and a little college fund money to boot. So i did it. i submitted them to two local agencies (here in lala land that is very understated to do just two). lo and behold they both come calling. what i'm about to share with you is every little gritty detail i have experienced thus far and if i have the stomach for it, every little thing along the way.

stay tuned.....