Clean floormats have to count for something

I purchased my brand-new car  to salvage my dignity and on behalf of the credit union I bank at five days ago. The new-car smell is oozing from her pores. There's nary a goldfish cracker crumb in the seams. She's shiny and pristine and parked a safe four feet on all sides from any other vehicle.

So how in the world did she attract this card? HOW DARE that little mustached teenager earning less than minimum wage violate her virgin exterior with this offer to haul her away whether she starts or not. WHETHER SHE STARTS? There's 112 miles on her, not 100,000!

Why the insults? Why the blame? Why blatantly call her a JUNK CAR when she's only been hanging out on the curb for a few days. Sure she was just a few yards away from lots of other dilapidated modes of transport, including one Big Red who was sent by her worn-out mother to a place where she can hobble along and clank and let her engine grind on and on half-heartedly with other cars just like her.

(It's OK, she's happier there. She took two ice scrapers and a Lego guy missing a head with her as memento of our adventures together. She can roam the used car lot freely with the other cars with seatbelts that never retract. We promised to keep memories alive of that time my dad got frostbite helping me change a flat tire in below-zero temps in January and how we will get that kid who stole the GPS from the console...one day!)

Big Red was so close to junk, but she definitely wasn't trash. And this car (Darth Vader? Death Star? The Black Pearl? She hasn't been christened yet) is far from all of that. She shall hold her remote-entry fob high and let her headlights dim automatically, slowly -- a stare-down to the metal scrappers who dare to question the rev of her engine, the trunk untouched by Trader Joe's recycled brown bags, the power seats with lumbar support.

You can leave your taunting advertisements, you junk-car dogs. This lady's calling card hasn't even been unwrapped from the plastic yet.

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Today, I celebrate my mother

It's my mother's birthday -- one of those milestone years that we share being exactly 25 years apart in age. It hasn't been an easy one for my mom to embrace, and I understand that given my own mixed-bag feelings about impending 40. It's also been a year full of loss and ache for her friends and mine, for people we both love. The place where my mom and I meet, even in our big gulp in facing a big birthday, is being here. Right here. On the phone. Five blocks away. In the kitchen together.

So today, I put aside the numbers and spotlight the woman who brought me into this world.

Teacher.

Writer.

Artist.

Calligrapher.

Naughty joke teller.

Fancy lady.

Reader.

Thinker.

Thank-you note writer.

Wife.

Math whiz.

Late-night reality show watcher.

Diet Coke devotee.

Mother.

 

Happy birthday, mama. You make this world a brighter place.

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Looking for love: in the clutter

There's a big pile of bills and receipts and expired Christmas coupons and catalogs stacked neatly at one of my couch. Before that, it was stacked neatly on my desk, tucked between my laptops, the perfect resting place for giant gravity-defying coffee mugs. I moved it a few days ago (OK, a week) to ensure that I'd sort through it all, patiently pay the bills, file the paperwork, sort the faded receipts. Instead, I just try not to look to the right while I'm watching some terrible reality show I really should be distracted from (why, "Project All-Stars, why?). I want nothing to do with that pile. At least for another day or two.

I don't want to deal with any of it except for one little slip of paper that flitted out as I pushed it into the snug corner of chenille cushions (alright, dropped).

It was a page torn from some tiny notebook, likely stamped with the  logo of a company I don't support with my dollars or taste buds or status updates that was procured as swag from a blog event.

The paper is so thin it's see-through, and it fell through the air gracefully, slowly, landing right at my thigh.

I could see only that there was a pencil mark on it. And since I save those little notebooks for my boy to draw on when he's bored in restaurants or on airplanes, I knew it had to be a message from him.

What I expected was a zombie with X-eyes or some character named Underwear Man or similar. But there were no brains oozing or tiny boxer briefs or disgusting references.

There was just a heart. Off-center at the bottom of the page. Folds creased just at the edges of each irregular arc.

I vaguely remembered it but haven't yet placed where it came from or when he drew it for me. As a farewell note before I left for a trip? To match the notes I place in his lunch every day? As a tiny surprise one morning while we rushed out the door? I'm not sure. But this heart, in all it's flimsy folds and lopsidedness reached me just at the right time.

This reminder that, even buried in the things we are not yet ready to face, our obligations and our discontent, there is love to be seen and caught might just be the very best reason to never get too organized.

Join me in my quest to see love in small places! Where have you found your heart?

I've spied it in the ocean.

On my plate.

In my cereal.

In the shadows on a run.

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