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Grays and Colors

November 3, 2010 By Kelle

I am an eternal optimist, but I like to think, as a good persuasive argument paying recognition to an antithesis confirms even more the intended point, my optimistic philosophy is likewise strengthened when I give room for what can sometimes be a disheartening reality. I try to balance my self-reflection somewhere between laziness and annoying hyperstimulation, so I hope this comes out as I intend…somewhere in the comfortable waters of “I’m treading, I’m figuring this out, I’m doing what works for me.”

I see the good and talk about the good and my outlook fits me like a well-tailored suit, allowing me to use my strengths and yet paving the way for growth from the not-so-pretty times. Likewise, I know and love and respect others with different philosophies and have had discerning moments of clarity from their sometimes more dismal perspectives. Because sometimes life is hard and reality does suck and ignoring that fact does not give room for the progress and production that can come from those moments.

While progress comes most naturally for me from expressing gratitude and painting strokes of vibrant color where I can, when more painful moments come–and they do–I want to pay appropriate attention to what they can teach me. Sometimes when anxiety or discomfort or that throat-constricting sadness arrives, I want to heave it along like a hot potato that doesn’t belong amongst the yellows and ceruleans I aim to create. But gray has a beauty all in its own. Gray is purposeful too, and while I may instinctively attempt to quickly fold it and stash it away, I am learning to first run my hands along its threads and find the beauty in cold and calm as well as warm and spirited.

With that unnecessarily long disclaimer, I think it is only fair I pull out the gray I folded up earlier this week and let it have its moment too.

My dad tried to keep it from me, but he finally felt he needed to share a rough week he had at work last week. He spent every day visiting a 50-year-old woman who had come to the hospital from a group home, and her health slowly deteriorated until she died on Friday. She was alone and incoherent. She had Down syndrome. My dad said he spent an inordinate amount of time with her. She became a favorite and he spent many hours sitting with her, talking with her, even though she did not understand. He gave her a stuffed animal. But still, she was only 50. Alone, unresponsive, and she did not make it.

And here’s the deal. Life expectancy still scares the hell out of me. I know things have changed and individuals with Down syndrome are living much longer now. I am hopeful, and today is really all that matters–and today is good–but somewhere there is a part of us that hopes every day that, no matter what, our kids will outlive us. It’s a parent’s greatest unwritten plea. And knowing that I have scientific data that increases the likelihood that I will hold her hand before she holds mine made me really, really sad this past weekend.

I held the hot potato, I felt the burns, I cried and used it to fuel me. I am at peace now and am grateful for our very beautiful right now. I will not dwell on tomorrow, for it is unknown and filled with voids. Today is quite the contrary. Today is good. And I write not for sympathy or to ignite a discussion of optimism vs. pessimism but simply to slap a valid antithesis among “enjoying the small things.” It makes the small things even better.

Which is why I’m completely geeked about my spontaneous decision to redo my bathroom this weekend on a very tight budget. The challenge thrills me. And while I actually considered painting the walls a languid gray–because gray is good too–I have settled for a vibrant, crazy aubergine. To thine own self be true.

Life is sometimes hard. Reality sometimes sucks. But most of the time? Most of the time, it’s amazing.

Like these wicked cute reversible bibs? Brooklyn Bib Shop is giving away a quilted bib/burp cloth set to a random commenter on today’s post. But wait…

With the yin and yang of discomfort and joy, I want to know more. While I’ve made peace with my gray this week and am finding joy in a can of Inkberry #73RB, tell me briefly…what’s your “gray” this week, be it large or small…and what little happy is bringing you color?

To Thine Own Self Be True.

October 21, 2010 By Kelle

This above all: to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.
Farewell, my blessing season this in thee!

~Shakespeare

Please watch THIS to begin.

I am so excited to promote Dove’s Self Esteem Movement and to invite you to participate with me this weekend in the first ever Dove Self Esteem Weekend where one hour of your time can make a difference. Visit this site to find ideas for self esteem activities you can participate in over the weekend and place on a map. By joining this movement, we are being asked…what do you know now that you wish you would have known at 13?

The women and girls featured in this post are all beautiful souls I happen to know and love. Thank you to all of them…for answering an e-mail all-call and showing up the next day to be photographed.

What do I wish I could tell my 13-year old self?

To Thine Own Self Be True.

I am a woman. Someone’s daughter. A lady, a girl, a female, a what-have-you, but I join the other millions of double-x chromosomed beings in this amazing place called womanhood. And while I have walked years on this Kotex-buying, perfume-sampling, leg-shaving, tear-jerking, hand-holding, nail-painting, hair-dyeing, love-falling, soul-satisfying path, it wasn’t until I was lying on a table holding Brett’s hand watching a wand circle over my jellied belly and hearing the nurse say “Right there…yup, it’s a girl” that it hit me. This being-a-girl thing.

It’s one thing to find yourself, to know yourself, to love yourself and dwell confidently as a woman in a world that can seem to gnaw at your perceptions with expectations to be smarter, prettier, richer, funnier, faster, better, different from any marvelous thing you already are.

But, how will I raise my girls to know this? How will I teach them to believe that they are as amazing as I know them to be?

I wish I could have known what I know now back then.

When I wore Escape perfume just because I heard the guy I liked loved it when really, it was too sweet for me and gave me an asphyxiating headache every time I wore it.

When I drew in a mole above my lip with a chocolate eyeliner because Cindy Crawford had one, and everybody thought she was pretty.

When I cried because my mom bought me knock-off Keds instead of the real ones and I thought everyone would think I wasn’t cool. At least not cool like Jorie Kutzy because she had the real blue label on hers.

When I wore long shirts that covered the butt of my jeans because I thought it made me look less fat.

I wish I would have known that Confidence is Beautiful.

I wish I could take that girl I was and tell her from my grown-up self…

Be yourself. You will stand out. I promise. Just be you.

In my thirties, through both the joys and hardships of my life, I feel I am finally arriving to the very comfortable place of knowing myself, accepting myself, and celebrating the intricate infrastructure of assets and flaws, talents and fears, strengths and struggles. I own them and revere them.

The women I think as most beautiful in life are always, always…the confident ones. And the traits I remember about my favorite people are never their waistline or their face symmetrics, how well they did in school or how much money their parents made. No, it’s their infectious laughter. The way they scrunch up their nose when they smile. The way they freely dance, run to hold a baby, sing off-tune, rock out Navaho jewelry at a black-tie event, compliment others, accept a compliment, look for beauty and believe in who they are without any apology. The way they proudly, beautifully swim against the current.

Don’t quite fit in? Fantastic. Not like everyone else? Even better. Curves? Embrace them. Freckles? Love them. Braces? Own them. Laugh lines? Rock them. Take everything you are–your background, your family, your history, your story, your community, your style, your job, your dreams, your talents, your body, your humor, your sorrow, your joys and make them yours. Be ashamed of nothing. Make the most of what you have and Girl, make it look damn good…because you can.

And when you doubt yourself, when you feel unsure, let these words fuel you: To Thine Own Self Be True.

To Thine Own Self Be True.

…and no one can ever take that away from you.

Are there days ahead where I console the tears of my teenage girl because someone made fun of her or will I watch her try to be someone else while she figures it all out? I’m sure there are, and that kills me. But I will show them the way. I will celebrate their strengths and help them use their struggles to balance it all out, to learn something new, to feel the victory that comes when you conquer hardship, when you discover a little more amazingness about yourself.

Not caring what people think is difficult and, as one who just wants everyone to be happy, I struggle sometimes with the choices I make and what people will think of them. But I am always happier when, in a moment of doubt, I return to that peaceful, comfortable place of To Thine Own Self Be True.

What I’m really trying to say here is, Dammit 13-Year-Old-Self, you have no idea how fabulous you are. But you are. Breathe it in. And let it out. You are fabulous. And when you are true to yourself, you will grow. No, you will soar.

I think women are amazing. Hell, we can thrust living beings out of our bodies in one grimacing push. That, in itself, is impressive. But we have to learn to celebrate our beautiful differences…for ourselves, for our children.

In celebrating this weekend and the power of girl’s self-esteem I’ve collaborated with jewelry designer Whitney Hill of Belkai Designs to create a piece I am so proud of. I’ve been wearing it all week and feel empowered just in doing so. I can’t wait to have my girls wear this same necklace, and to know they are learning and believing this powerful truth: To Thine Own Self Be True.

The Empower Necklace.

10% of the profits of each necklace sold will go to Girls, Inc.–inspiring all girls to be strong, smart and bold. And certainly, to be true to themselves. Don’t forget, for a limited time, use the code ‘kelle’ at check-out for 10% off. A perfect gift for a teenage girl, I’m thinking. But, then again, I’m 31 and need to be reminded too.

And, we are giving away one Empower Necklace to a random commenter on this post. Tell me, what do you wish you could tell your 13-year old self? Winner will be announced Saturday evening.

Feeling blessed to know the beautiful women and girls in this post, many of which have weathered some pretty rough storms in life. And feeling blessed to share the rich world of womanhood with them, with you and to passionately accept this role of empowering the future for our girls.

…and props to Diggy for turning me on to the Matisyahu song.

There You Be

August 13, 2010 By Kelle

Nella Cordelia is named after Dorothy Cordelia Cryderman, mother to four boys, grandmother to thirteen grandchildren, and great-grandmother to thirty, although she never had a chance to meet the last seven.

Today is Dorothy Cordelia’s birthday. She was a matriach, a virtuous woman, a strong and loving soul. She was my grandma.

If your first name is common and your last name defines you, then what lies in the middle is the mystery of who you are, the secret of what lies within.

I knew her middle name would be Cordelia before I knew her first name would be Nella. And it was so very meant to be.

Shortly after she was born, I talked to my grandma hoping that maybe somewhere she could hear me. I told her I was so happy my girl bore her name. I told her if she had anything to do with giving me this gift…then thank you. I told her I missed her and that I wished she was here so that I could watch her rock my girl, humming soft songs like she did to all the other grandkids.

For three years in college, I lived with my grandparents in a little blue house on Dorothy Lane in Spring Arbor, Michigan. It was a small town, vast with cornfields and deer-stocked woods–deer that felt compelled to ram themselves into the cars of just about every member of my family, thank you. I was an off-campus student at a small Christian college living with my grandparents and I was nervous, lonely and homesick like hell at first. I wasn’t sure how to act—if I was supposed to be home a certain time or have friends over or tell them where I was going when I left the house. There was old people furniture and orange linoleum floors in the kitchen, a doll with a big crocheted skirt that sat on top of toilet paper rolls on the counter in my bathroom and about a hundred ceramic knick-knacks for every square foot of space. It felt very un-college student, and I wasn’t sure if I would fit in.

Oh, but I did. We fit like a glove. And for three years, I became witness to the love, the art, the magic of Dorothy Cordelia.

Alzheimer’s stole a bit of that magic those last years, but it still dwelled deep within her.
And in October of 2005, on a cold rainy night in Michigan, Brett and I drove like mad in the darkness, windshield wipers screeching, from Detroit Metro Airport down I-94 to get to her. I remember my cell phone ringing, just ten minutes away…”Hurry,” my cousin said, “please hurry. I think she knows you’re coming.”

I made it. I made it in time to have a moment alone with her. To kiss her face and wash her cheeks with my tears. To brush her hair and tell her I would always remember the grandma I knew…the one who hummed in the kitchen and kept Fig Newtons in the cookie jar. The one who bathed all her grandkids in the Airstream trailer bathtub with Avon bubble bath–the pink bottle. The one who combed the “rats nests” out of our hair and tucked us in at night in the twin beds of their guest bedroom with the flowered wallpaper and whispered “There you be.” I told her I met someone and that he was wonderful and that we were going to get married. I told her that someday I would have babies and that I would tell them all about her.

She died the next day. And when we got the call, we did not fall to our knees or huddle in tears. We smiled. It was okay. That night, our family huddled in a private room at our favorite Italian restaurant. And we laughed. Told stories. Sipped wine. And cried. And those last days of gathering together with cousins and aunts and uncles to remember her…to make beauty of her memory…was nothing short of sheer poetry.

I think of my grandma all the time. And I believe my girl carries more of her than just her middle name. I think she has a piece of her heart.

Both my Lainey Love and Nella Cordelia have the faint pink speckles of a “stork bite” on the back of their scalps. And I tell them it’s where Grandma kissed them in heaven.

My grandma was a matriarch. She left big shoes to fill, but I’m working on it. I’ve learned to hum in my kitchen, keep my pantry stocked with Fig Newtons and tuck my girls in with a “There you be.”

And I’m so happy my girl carries her middle name. And on this, her birthday, we’re remembering our grandma.

And the giveaway winner for the Vintage Pearl gift certificate is Comment # 1735:

Jen: I can’t wait for the day Hayes decides she wants to take ballet or play softball or even join the wrestling team! It’s so wonderful to see a mommy pouring herself into her babies. Thank you for sharing!

Jen, please e-mail your contact info to: kellehamptonblog@comcast.net
Congratulations!

There you be.