Full Disclosure (Almost Full, Anyway)

A few weeks ago, a line from an article in The Atlantic caught my attention:

The Internet offers both a vast potential audience, and the possibility for anonymity, and if not anonymity, then a carefully curated veneer of self that you can attach your name to.

As someone who maintains two blogs, I've been considering this idea for awhile. Through the power of the Internet -- Facebook, my blog, online forums, etc. -- I've cultivated relationships with people who know me only through these venues. While I appreciate these connections, I sometimes feel that they are based on false pretenses.

Naturally, when I create a post, I'm not going to write about my miseries. I usually pick positive topics, subjects that make me smile or feel good. However, as a result, I think an idealized version of my life emerges. In that way, I'm kind of like a bag of potato chips -- highly processed (and maybe even half-baked). Likewise, the eternally sunny, heavily edited version of me that people encounter online has transformed her annoyances, dismay, shock, horror, irritation, anger into something laughable or profitable -- or even into something that can be ignored altogether. Blog Julie is as unlike the person typing this post as a chip is unlike a humble spud. They might both come from the same place, but one has a hard time believing it.

Blog Julie is sweet, unflappable, maybe even funny or smart at times, and usually has it all together. Real Julie wakes up with messy hair and bad breath.

Blog Julie gets to dance, sing, and play all day. Blog Julie's children are immaculate and perfect in every way. Blog Julie has moments of quiet reflection and peaceful activity. Real Julie scrubs toilets and folds laundry. Lots of toilets. Lots of laundry. Actually, Real Julie dances and plays, too, but all the spinning makes her motion-sick. Real Julie's untidy, unkempt "crumb bums" love each other, but they also can't seem to go one afternoon without bickering over something. As for quiet reflection and peaceful activity, HA! Real Julie wakes at an obscenely early hour just to get a few moments alone each day. Of course, her DH (who may be reading this post), is perfect.

Blog Julie is a saintly devoted mother. Real Julie would never even be a consideration for Mom of the Minute. To illustrate that point, here is a true story. Real Julie has one gregarious boy whose amp goes up to 11. Her days are full of reminders to him to "use an inside voice" or just tuning out. However, remember that Real Julie rises between 4:30-5:30 am, and as the day wears on, her patience sometimes wears out. Toward the end of one busy day full of nonstop shuttling, Real Julie was stressing over being late to skating lessons (oh yeah, she's obsessive/compulsive regarding time). Meanwhile, Boy 2 was barraging her with questions at the top of his voice. Why is ice cold? Who invented ice? What if the world didn't have any ice? What if I fall? What if I'm the worst skater? What if I'm the best skater? Why is it winter? Why do these laces have to be so tight? etc. etc. Ever blithe Blog Julie is too patient, too indulgent to be phased by this kind of thing, which in the grand scheme of things, is nothing. Real Julie cracked under her self-created mental strain. To her eternal shame, she exasperatedly burst out, "Please, just stop talking until your skates are on. I've had a noisy day, and I need a couple minutes of quiet right now." The other people in the room were probably thinking, "Whoa! Should we call Child Services?" Yeah, Real Julie is not a shining example of motherhood, but this post is about full disclosure.

What else can we say about Real Julie?

• She possesses a phenomenal talent for saying precisely the wrong the thing at the wrong time. 
• She's rubbish at keeping house. 
• There is one day every month when she doesn't want to see, hear or speak to anyone. If you happen to spot her on this day, run away.
• She frequently doesn't shower until noon. 
• She measures time in half-hour blocks. 1:01 is almost 1:30. 1:31 is 2:00. (I told you she was neurotic about time.)
• She has an annoying habit of saying "I told you..."
• She procrastinates.
• She doesn't like sweating, but she'd rather be slightly sweaty than cold. Unfortunately, 75% of the time, she's freezing.
• She refuses to run. At all. Ever. For any reason.

I could go on. The point is, dressed-down, unedited Julie is an entirely different creature than her online counterpart. And I suppose this is where I circle back to my original musings. Is the everyday woman whose day is spent on mundane activities and details the real person? Or is the woman who writes about her inner life the real one? Which version is the real one? 

I've figured out which superpower I want...

A couple of weeks ago my 3-year old and I were getting ready for a playdate, and she kept insisting that, "We have to go now!"

"No, your friend won't be home until 1. It's only 11 now."

"Hold me," she exclaimed. When I picked her up, she gestured to the oven. I carried her over, and she began jabbing at the 1 on the oven clock.

Frustrated, she cried, "It won't change to one!!!"

I tried explaining that even if one changes the clock, one can't change time -- it doesn't go faster, slow down, or even rewind. It was a hard sell, though, and I'm still not sure she entirely believes me. Apparently, though, I have the maturity of a 3-year old because I think that would be an awesome super power.

The last few weeks have been crazy busy for me. This year, I decided to pick up some freelance work, and it's started pouring in lately (which is brilliant timing, btw, with Christmas coming up, so no complaints here). I've also been dealing with the aftermath of a tree falling on our house a few days before Thanksgiving. (Do you have any idea how hard it is to get work done between Thanksgiving and Christmas? Everyone is on vacation!) Of course, this is all on top of all the other business of being a mom to three kids, and I would love the ability to manipulate time. I'd add about four more hours to the day, I think.

How cool would that be? Instead of a day planned around and dictated by alarms, appointments, and deadlines, I could plan activities around when I actually felt ready for them! How great would that be in the morning! No more hitting the snooze button.

So this got me thinking. If I could gain an extra few hours, what would I fill the moments with? I wish I could say I would do something wonderful. Maybe read a novel, sew a quilt, go for a hike. Knowing me, though, I'd probably pull a Hermione Granger with her Time-turner, turning back time only to fill it with more work. In my case, more projects around the house, more laundry, more scrubbing. What a waste of time! Alas, I'm probably better off without any super powers.

How about you. If you had a superpower, what would you want?

The Life of a Leaf

In high school, one of my teachers observed that most people she knew were either leaves floating idly along the river of life or motorboats with speed, direction, and purpose. I used to think that was a motorboat, but I was wrong. I'm a leaf.

Tonight, my kids and I were going through some photo albums, and a realization hit me. Most of my life, so many of my favorite memories are just products of chance. Jobs that I've taken, places I've visited, people I've met... They've all been strange, random twists of fate.

I recall that I had a plan once long ago, but it was derailed, and I never bothered to make a new one. Since Baby #3 was born, I don't think I've ever been able to stick to a plan that extended later than dinnertime.

My husband -- I met him through a bizarre chance of fate. He didn't even live in the same city, but his mother and I worked at the same school. He was there to visit her, and I bumped into them in the teacher's lounge because I was changing to go running. That may sound pretty normal, but I never run. Never. Ever. Not for fires, not for shoe sales, not for anything... I was on a train in Paris once when we got a bomb threat. Sirens were blaring; the gendarme were whizzing through the cars to evacuate us. I didn't even break into a trot. What in the world possessed me to go running that day, that one day of the year that I would meet him? Any other day, I would've hopped into my car parked near my classroom and missed him altogether. As I recall, I didn't even like him at the moment, but here we are, nearly two decades later.

Those oft-quoted lines from Robert Frost's "The Road Not Taken" come to mind:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Most people infer that the road less traveled is the superior one, but I'm not so sure. Sometimes, I think that's just an elegant way to say "I've made a hu-u-u-u-u-ge mistake."

My father has wisely stated, "A lot of things could've been, but I don't bother thinking about them because there's no point." Sadly, I lack his placid temperament, and I often wonder what life might have been if I'd stuck to a definite plan. Easier? More focused? More profitable? For sure, I'd be doing something more productive than posting blog entries between bouts of ring-around-the-rosies.

On the other hand, if I'd been more goal-oriented, I'd have missed out on some of the best memories I have, like karaoke-singing on the Champs Elysees and "The Lebanese Detective" (that's another post maybe). Heck, two of my children were complete surprises, and I can't imagine life without them.  These memories, these people that have come in and out of my life -- a motorboat would've missed them, but they really are the details that make all the difference.