Today is the almost half-way point of the March slice of life challenge. My biggest fear when I decided to take the plunge was running out of ideas, so I started to scribble thoughts down at the back of my journal whenever something hit me – a safety net of sorts for those days when I could do nothing more than stare at the blank page. When was interesting to me was how reading the posts of other slicers gave me ideas, and when I did begin to write, ideas fueled other ideas. But this morning I found myself facing the blank page. Thankfully, my notebook saved the day. I returned to an exercise I used earlier in the challenge about looking through a junk drawer for ideas, but this time I used a junk drawer in the bathroom.
You are probably thinking that looking through a bathroom junk drawer could be dangerous, but the one I chose held mostly half-used cosmetics, samples from Estee Lauder and Clinique, and some travel-sized bottles of shampoo and toothpaste. But I also found a small gold-plated heart-shaped box engraved with “To Mommy Love Brian.” It was a birthday gift from my son when he was two. I suddenly recalled his chubby-cheeked, toddler face with his fine blonde hair looking up at me with pride and love, and I melted.
Inside the box I found a broken gold bracelet, a pony tail holder, and a small round lapel pin – CEA Volunteer. “What’s this?” I wondered. The image on the pin was an outline of a mother and child. My mind went back and back and I recalled the time I volunteered as a nursing mothers’ counselor, trained by the Childbirth Education Association of Philadelphia. It seemed to me like a lifetime ago. It was an experience that not only was rewarding, but that gave me the opportunity to meet other young mothers and share ideas as my teaching career took a different path for a time - I coached, counseled, and became a trainer myself. It was also my first experience of belonging to a volunteer organization, and that has remained a constant in my life. I thought about all the experiences that combine to make us who we are, but that may manifest themselves differently at various points along life’s journey. Deep thoughts for a Sunday morning.
You are probably thinking that looking through a bathroom junk drawer could be dangerous, but the one I chose held mostly half-used cosmetics, samples from Estee Lauder and Clinique, and some travel-sized bottles of shampoo and toothpaste. But I also found a small gold-plated heart-shaped box engraved with “To Mommy Love Brian.” It was a birthday gift from my son when he was two. I suddenly recalled his chubby-cheeked, toddler face with his fine blonde hair looking up at me with pride and love, and I melted.
Inside the box I found a broken gold bracelet, a pony tail holder, and a small round lapel pin – CEA Volunteer. “What’s this?” I wondered. The image on the pin was an outline of a mother and child. My mind went back and back and I recalled the time I volunteered as a nursing mothers’ counselor, trained by the Childbirth Education Association of Philadelphia. It seemed to me like a lifetime ago. It was an experience that not only was rewarding, but that gave me the opportunity to meet other young mothers and share ideas as my teaching career took a different path for a time - I coached, counseled, and became a trainer myself. It was also my first experience of belonging to a volunteer organization, and that has remained a constant in my life. I thought about all the experiences that combine to make us who we are, but that may manifest themselves differently at various points along life’s journey. Deep thoughts for a Sunday morning.
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