The water is back on today, it was a long time coming and it is a long story and feel free to ask but I am determined not to vent here.
However, what it did was to make me realize how not-come-to-grips I am with my own childhood. The clashing aspect here is that at the time, I didn't mind how bizarre and moment to moment - while being eternally languid - my childhood was. However, as an adult, trying to achieve the American holy grail of "normalcy" in my life and the lives of my children I have to admit that it was out there, and therefore, by default - so am I.
I guess, when I thought I'd leveled out, all I had done was to distance myself from those days. Those dirt-floor-shack poor days. The ups and downs of living in ranch country where your nearest friend lives 3 miles away and that is also basically your nearest neighbor. Where no one can hear you scream - no seriously, they can't. Where when the well burnt out and we couldn't afford a new one yet my grandmother taught me how to steal water.
The place where if I didn't want to get up on a morning like a normal teen girl, and I didn't feel like doing my chores lives were lost. Real alive things died because of me. Granted not people, but ducks and chickens and living breathing things nonetheless.

The life I locked up and threw away the key to because when I tell the stories I laugh and cry at the same time until I'm shaking. The life I locked and threw away the key to because I got tired of the look I'd get in the normal world from people who couldn't believe that such times and such places exist in real life and they were too shocked or horrified to really want to hear it. The look I'd get when people were either sorry for me or disgusted by me because it challenged their perceptions of what is and isn't going on in this world in the modern era. The life that leveled the playing field with me and people 50 years my senior because poverty is the great leveler and living without electricity and or water and or heating are universal amongst people in any country time or age who have been through these things.
Things I forced down because in trying to understand common human nature, I had to lock my own relative existence away. Because I couldn't understand pettiness or the fatigue a person felt because it was laundry week. I could only understand the fatigue a person felt when they had to walk around miles and miles trying to find the horse that slipped the fence -- again.
The things I forced down because I needed to move on and I was really just ready for the next adventure. The things I forced down because the world needs someone to blame and because they couldn't blame me, the child in the scenario they'd blame my mom - and sorry but she's sacred. You don't get to blame her, no one does. Not even me. She did her best, I was there I saw it.

All of this is melodramatic to say the least, and exhausting. Very psych 101 and probably predictable if only I were watching from some vantage point far away.
That's the point I think, I'm exhausted. When the water came back on today I actually found myself going through the routine we used to go through when the water came back on when I was a child -- and when I realized that I became physically and mentally exhuasted.

SO we have a long weekend because of President's Day, kids are off school on Monday. Brian and I talked about what to do. We decided we could re-arrange the bookshelves. Certain activities in my house are getting on my nerves, mostly because I don't have the time for them but I want to. I want to be able to get the books organized and every time I take them down to organize them something happens. I need to catch up with house work after a week without water. I need to do laundry and mop, do dishes and wipe surfaces. I sometimes resent that the only times the place gets a good clean are when something is going on that forces the issue. We have people over, the furnace people need a clear path to the garage -which causes me to clear the path in the garage full of boxes. Sometimes I want to just stay home and do nothing but organize and make the place nice for me on my terms and lock the door to the outside world that dictates what I do when and how. 

Then sometimes you have a friend that calls you and says she is going to Taos for the weekend and would you like to go too? You think to yourself, Taos. Taos, pretty, real mountains, snow, and calm. Then, you think books, mops and clean the house? Then, you think but I'm so tired - I could sleep more if I stayed home. I could rest more if I went to Taos.  To Taos or to Clean?

Okay, so in the interest of not sounding like this blog will never lighten up, I thought I would publish my first post on things we actually love about living here.

Perhaps I started this blog at the wrong time of the year, but reviewing it makes me feel and sound depressive - so I am going to try and shake that. For today anyway.

White Sands, New Mexico

Today, we're going to start with White Sands. It is contrary to the beginning of the alphabet and no where near Albuquerque, therefore perfectly logical choice. White sands is not totally unique in the world, not even in America. However, as far as sand dunes go, the place is utterly charming. The sand is white due to gypsum deposits, this also causes it to glint like snow. The temperatures are amazing because you can sun burn even the dead of winter - as with skiing, due to the reflection of the sun off the sand. The sand is incredibly soft and appealing. There is even a type of lizard which has evolved to be white to camouflage into the sand.

You can buy, or even rent, sleds to go out on the dunes, the sled wax is almost as much fun as the sled itself, as it reminds me of the beach and surfing. There is an endless amount of fun you can have on shifting dunes, with a sled or two and a bunch of kids to guide you.

White Sands also refers to the missile range.The missile range is home to the "Trinity Site". Going to the site is surprisingly moving, especially given that all you can see is an empty gravelly flat area inside a fence. They make it easier to visit the site with transportation to and from the gates and the site itself is open to the public twice a year, during which there are available tours and huge amounts of parking. There is of course a tuck shop and an area to buy White Sands memorabilia. Removing Trinitite is verboten but that doesn't stop every small stop along the road for miles in any direction off the range advertising it as a good. You too can own a piece of radioactive material for display in your house! Either way, the Trinity Site was as good an experience as I was hoping for, and I am genuinely glad I took the kids there.

I'm going to stop with this short post for today. I don't want to exhaust all the nice things I have to say about New Mexico in one single day. Besides, I want to give you a moment to ponder how much you actually want to visit New Mexico just to see the White Sands, steal trinitite, worry about the radiation you are sucking up by standing at 'ground zero' and many more exciting adventures I will lay out for you soon!

Trinity Site Memorial

Today was one of those odd days that come from time to time, neither nor.
I've been exhausted lately and feeling very lazy and haven't been able to bring myself to finish the laundry or come online. Figuratively or literally.

I have a cold - I give in, I admit it. The last time Queak had strep throat I got a cold. This time Queak has had strep throat - and here is my cold. I am glad I cannot (within a small percentage actually to be totally honest) get strep again since I had everything tonsil/adenoid removed years ago. However, this seems to be my body's new way of handling things. Since the cold started with 3 solid days of progressively worse sneezing I was trying to talk myself into allergies until tonight when I sneeze half my head out onto a kleenex and then realized my throat and head were also throbbing. The roof of my mouth hurts even and my eyes just won't stop watering or glazing over.

I woke up against my will today, with a dry mouth from living in the desert and coming onto a cold. This morning of fun was followed sometime later by the realization that our water has been turned off. This was the result of a water leak some time ago that was so substantial we are still paying it off . However, because our bank just changed hands and because the debit was scheduled over a weekend it all went to hell, the water company never got paid and shut us off before I'd even checked our account to see that everything was as it ought to be. Damn. This happened at 1:45 pm, you have until 2 to get to the water company in person to pay the bill.
We can get in tomorrow, but today has been fun - seriously. Thankfully this is just one day and not like the good old days of my childhood, growing up in ranch country where from time to time the water went out, the well needed re-drilling or what have you. That is another story.

So that's my health and the water. I left with Brian to take him back to work, we trade the car in the middle of the day. He added to the curious day we were having by telling me something that I needed to know but put a serious damper on the rest of my mood. So that's mood, water and health.

At which point whilst turning onto the freeway the car began to struggle violently against Brian, and he managed to pull us off to the edge. We got out and discovered a massive screw in our driver's side tire.
That's when I realized that was our spare (we use full sized spares). I had forgotten that we had replaced it some time ago and then hit a financial wall the following months - leading me to forget to replace the spare. Had I really been driving without it? Yikes.
Luckily, I  always have excellent road side assistance and so the tow truck was immediately dispatched.
So this is Health, Water, Mood, Car. I'm a roll - seriously.
My friend came and rescued me and the Mup because the tow truck only had 2 seats. Brian would ride with them and the car and the Mup and I would ride with our saving friend. Given I was feeling increasingly rough I thought I would go home and have a nap (though the idea of no water was daunting). However, Brian asked me to come to the tire place to "translate" for him. Given that I had just heard him on the water company say the word water 7 times to the lady on the other end (because you know what else would he be calling for?), given the day we were having, given what the day means to Brian, and given I was feeling empathetic because of flashbacks to my days in Britain when I had desperately wanted a translator ( "why yes, I specialize in English to English") I agreed. I went in and negotiated the tire and then Brian agreed to wait while my friend took me home.
We had a pleasant enough chat and I was looking forward to a nap to fend off what was surely turning into a cold when Brian arrived.
Brian had taken the afternoon off work when we had not known how bad the car was (just a tire we hoped - we think the shocks and struts are going too and that was the first fear). Before he was entirely out of the car he was on the phone to his work though, as they had misplaced the time-card for one of his work study people.
I'm pretty sure the only reason he decided this was his problem is because he knows what it is to not get paid on the account of other people being idiots. He called the work study kid who desperately insisted the time card should be in his slot, where he left it. Then, Brian announced that he would come in to work and find it himself.
The deadline was tight as the payroll department closes at 4:30 and it was now pushing 4. I figured I would ride along. I didn't know why, maybe because being without water actually depresses me. The ride seemed like a better idea - also not leaving me to roll about in the misery in what was minute by minute turning into not allergies but a real live cold.
We got back in the car and I got a phone call, the boys usually finish later on Mondays because of their extra class they get for being native. This is a service provided to native families in the area to keep the kids in touch with their roots. We also get lots of free tutoring - and a few other perks. I always hesitate to take these gracious things since we have not been very big on raising the kids native - I feel like I'm stealing. The kids identify more as English and Jews. This new aspect of themselves has led to deep awakenings in my oldest son and utter bemusement in my younger son. 
At the beginning of the year, during a class they were re-named, now I have Raindrop (apt for my moody sensitive child) and Firewalker (also apt for my stronger more gutsy child).
Apparently, today though, there had been a family emergency and the boys needed retrieving by - yes - 4:30.
So now you can add time-stress to my day of sick, car-troubled, declining mood, waterless existence. 
Luckily, Firewalker's teacher also happens to be one of my closest friends and she was still on the ground there at the school, so I knew they would not be on their own and abandoned at half 4.
After Brian came out (having found the time card, oddly enough where it had been allegedly left by the work study kid - and then run it himself over to pay-roll) we rushed over to the school which is luckily close to Brian's office - something we used on our plea for transfer to that school.

I'd been watching Brian closely as this is the anniversary of his father's death on the secular calendar. We've never really made a big deal of anniversaries like this. On my mother's and a few others I will light yahrzeit candles but that's about it. In the past I have attended services to say kaddish with a minyan (editor's note - this article mentions men, as many congregations being more egalitarian also recognize women over 13), though I did not this year. This year we decided on the yahrzeits we would celebrate them and not let the children forget the unknown family by having family dinners focused around that person's delights. My grandmother for example, we would have square potatoes and fried cornmeal mush, black bean soup and root beer, or sour kraut and potatoes. For my mother it would be chicken soup, or another of her fantastic homey - famous-in-our-family meals with cockeyed cake for dessert.
We had not come across one of Brian's anniversaries when we made this decision at the start of the yarhzeits this year. Also, then there was the point that his family was secular, and so we would not bother with yahrzeits but just the family meals. This is a thread in families I know who deal with conversion and conversion issues - your dead ancestors did not convert with you - to yahrzeit or not to yahrzeit? 
Today, on the anniversary of his father's death, Brian was showing no signs of worry or sadness, but then he never does. That usually comes later, after the kids are in bed and he's sat at the table alone looking lost and bleak.
I decided to leave him the car and run in myself to the class to get the boys, having JUST met the 4:30 deadline. When I opened the door to the room I was slammed into by this wall of sage and something else intangible. 
Their native teacher looked at me and said " You have chills and goosebumps! That'll be the ancestors!"
As I sat, she explained that they were having their friendship party and discussing who they would like to invite that might not be there. Like for example their Mom, or their friends from another school, or your older siblings who are in middle or high school. This is when my son - Raindrop - announced that what he really wanted was to invite his dead ancestors to the party.
I blinked when she told me this part, because I was positive there was no way he'd know what today was, we've not really talked about it at home and he's very young, too young to remember us mentioning or observing his grandfather's death before. Why today, why just then?

I go back and forth in my life with belief systems. If in doubt I will go with whatever is Talmudic. However, there have been times in my life when I undeniably believed more. However, I have never been satisfied with explanations on cheese-filled paranormal web sites, tv programs or books - never. Therefore, by and large, I find it a lot easier to err on the side of believing less, feeling less, admitting less and letting less in.
Plus, it is against the Talmudic side of all this to evoke/invoke dead people. Which I have struggled with on a daily basis since my mother died.
It doesn't help that my mother comes to me almost every day since she died - in my imagination or not depending on your own belief system. That I find myself talking to her, and having full-blown conversations. Then, on days when she doesn't come, or for weeks when she doesn't come, I find myself desperate to call her to me. "Where are you? You're missing things! I need you..."

There was this -- a room full of native children, with the most open minds - like pools of water - who if anyone in this earth has the ability to summon they surely would. Having decided to call our dead ancestors to the party. Later I asked Brian why no one had thought to use this before, because surely a group of native, open, willing, loving children would have to have the catalyst power - as opposed to a group of nutty, closed-minded adults with a Ouija board or a seance table.
So - back in the room -  rather than packing up that second I sat at a table and let the goosebumps run up and down me for a while, wondering who was there - were they there? Did we all just want them to be there? Were they really there? How could children call someone they had never met?
Then, I decided not to push myself back into realism for 5 minutes. My day needed some spirituality, so I just breathed in the sage and welcomed whoever had come and asked them to look at my beautiful children, the light shining on them. My beautiful children who had never been held by their grandparents or great grandparents. See them? See how like you they are?

I waited till we were home and alone to tell Brian. My completely rational, non-believing husband then asked flatly - "was my father there?" To which my son - who turned out to be standing behind me answered "yes, and your mother too." For whatever reason, this lightened the mood in the house completely. All the tension drained out as I am sure at the same moment my husband and I were just swelling with pride and joy at the imagined thought that our parents got to see their grandbabies -they'd know we are ok, they'd know there was this short-term happy ending.


Today has no happy or unhappy ending. Today, really just had the come home and pass out from the unbearable cold ending - we did nothing for Valentine's Day. We decided since we couldn't taste anything and most of us were tired, coming down with colds or coming off of colds that we would postpone tonight's big family dinner in honor of their grandfather. We picked a rain-check date. We made cups of tea with water from bottled water. Then all but one of us fell asleep - and that one is off too now.