Happy Birthday Dad

My dad's birthday is on December 29th, not the greatest time of year to think about gift giving. Usually I do his shopping along with the Christmas rush but this year it seemed to be more than I could handle. I just couldn't think of anything to buy. I sent an email asking for ideas and it was suggested that I write a letter to my representatives telling them to stop spending our money. So here is my gift to my dad.

Dear Representative Honda, Senator Boxer and Senator Feinstein,

On Christmas day there was a small article in my local paper, San Jose Mercury News, entitled “Congress Raises Debt Ceiling to $12.4 Trillion.” As a teacher who scrimps and saves to make ends meet each month, this got my attention. According to the paper, this measure was needed as a result of the out-of-control-budget deficit that is predicted to tip the scales at 12.1 trillion by the end of this year. Senators who were interviewed for the article all agreed that they did not want to vote for the bill but saw no other alternative. For several months now, that has been the bottom line; we see no other alternative but to continually increase our nation’s debt and hand out money that isn’t ours to give.

So the end result is that our government has once again voted itself another blank check with no concern regarding from where that money will come. This is a lesson that we teach our children from adolescence into young adulthood. You can’t spend money that you don’t have. When it’s gone you are left with two choices, you can either spend less or make more. The only way the government can make more is to increase taxes and fees and they don’t seem capable of understanding how to spend less. It is always more, more, more; more regulation, more government, more taken out of Medicare, more people added to the system, more spending above and beyond inflation, more pet projects, and more unfunded liabilities. When is enough, enough? When do we say stop? For me it is today. As my representative, I am telling you to stop the out of control spending!

For the first time in our nation’s history, we are almost certain to leave a country that is less, not more than what we received, to future generations. We are no longer respected on the world stage for what we create. The world now sees us only for what we can repay. We are debtors. We owe China 23% of our national debt and Japan 21%. We are quickly approaching a point where our Gross Domestic Product will equal our national debt. This is a very frightening position in which to find ourselves.

Our debt must now become the number one focus for our government officials to address. It’s not health care or crime or even national security. The ever-increasing public debt is the most important problem that we as a nation are facing. We can’t afford the current programs that must be funded let alone the new programs that are being voted in. When you return in January, the number one item on the agenda must be to cut spending. We cannot continue down this path of spending our children and grand children’s money. We are leaving for them a financial disaster that none of us would want to be a part of. It is time to make the tough decisions and make cuts. No more handouts to banks or car companies or anyone else that is supposedly too big to fail. There is no such thing. The only thing that is going to fail in this economic disaster is the hard-working men and women of America. There will be no other alternative than to increase taxes to pay for the debt you have created. And I for one cannot afford one more hit before I will be forced to make my own tough decisions.

The futures of the American citizens rest in your hands. Put yourself in the place of the more humble working class. We are just barely holding on, working hard and paying our bills month-to-month, hoping that the small amount of savings that we can steel away will sustain us in our retirement. We don’t want to live off of our government but it seems that now we will be the ones saying, “I see no other alternative.”

You have choices to make. They are not easy ones but there is no other option left but to make them and to make them now.

Going Mexican

The Giannini family went Mexican for Christmas Eve this year. It started off as a bit of a joke that ended up being a seed that planted and started to take root in my little brain. Tamales for Christmas... great idea. That means not having prime rib two days in a row. Being someone who rarely eats red meat anyway, the thought of an alternative was very enticing to me. That meant a search for the best tamales in San Jose. This was an adventure I greatly enjoyed in the weeks between Thanksgiving and Christmas. The answer for us was found at El Azteca on 28th Street. The menu took hold - tamales, enchiladas, Spanish rice, beans, corn pudding - and we were ready for the trial run.

The end result was that everyone agreed that this could be the beginning of a wonderful new tradition. There are many advantages to the Mexican meal on Christmas Eve. I LOVE Mexican food so in all honesty, this would probably work for me any day of the year. Cumin and red pepper sauce have a tendency to warm the nostrils even before you take a bite. We loved the warmth of the spices in the air as well as on our tongues. What could be better to warm your spirit on a cold and dreary winter night? In addition this meal included my two favorite beverages in the whole world - Mexican hot chocolate and margaritas. The clincher for me was that it was definitely cheaper and easier to prepare than prime rib. During the time of year that we need desperately to conserve both money and energy, what could be better?

Cookies: The Ugly Step-Child

It is Christmas time, a very big time of year for the lowly cookie. Much like merchandise in the stores, if they don't make it in December, it's not going to happen for them. Cookies have never been my favorite dessert. If you lined up a cake, a pie and a platter of cookies I would always take the cake first and the cookies last. Cookies are the everyday where cake is special.

Over the years, I've tried to make friends with the cookie. When my kids were little I did the cookie thing at Christmas year after year trying to duplicate my own childhood memories. There was the Swedish Spritz, complete with a cookie press and all the trouble of decorating them, cut out sugar cookies, chocolate crinkles, jelly filled thumbprints and pecan sandies. But as the years have gone by I am as close as I have ever been to banning Christmas cookies from my oven door.

First of all, they are just a lot of trouble to make. Cookie batter is thick and hard to manage. It will burn up a portable mixer in no time at all. It is the #1 reason to invest in a KitchenAid mixer. A recipe of cookies will make 5 dozen tasty treats but that's 5 times of loading and unloading a cookie sheet. My favorite time saver as a young mother was to make a recipe of chocolate chip cookies and spread it all out into a jelly roll pan and bake it. TA DA! Cookies are done in one fell swoop! I did this long past the point that it was necessary for me to save time simply because the repetition of spooning batter on and scraping cookies off of a cookie sheet bored me. A batch of cookies takes hours where a cake is in and out of the oven in 30-40 minutes.

Cookies have a tendency to become dry and crumbly within minutes of their exit from the oven. Now, I will eat the crumbs of almost anything but 9 times out of 10, cookie crumbs go in the trash. After all the work of baking those things, you put them in a bag or cookie jar and as it comes toward your mouth it starts to fall apart. That doesn't happen to cake or pie because it's on a fork. Try forking a cookie and see what happens.

Cookies have a feeling of the ordinary. The action of spooning cannot compare with the drama of pouring batter into cake pans. There is a specialness to cake that just isn't there with cookies. It is light and airy where cookies are flat and solid. We take care of cake. We layer it and frost it and even try to make it look pretty on top. Not cookies. One of my favorite cookies of my childhood were Chocolate Frosted Cookies. Why? They had the soft texture of cake and frosting on them - yes, every one of them.

There's a reason Christmas cookies make a great Christmas gift. You look at them and you see the hours of dedication that went into just making them, let alone decorating them. Well you won't get cookies from me. I'm a bread, cake, nuts, and fudge kind of girl at Christmas time. Did I make cookies this year? Yes, one batch of Chocolate Crinkles and only because I remember how much my family likes them. It is the reminder of how homemade is filled with more than a recipe and ingredients. This we do for love.

So on Thursday night, I will set the cake aside and let the lowly cookie take center stage.

Dear Santa

This week my son asked me for a Christmas list. My first reaction was that I didn't really want anything. I had everything I needed. But then, of course as I thought about it I was able to come up with quite a variety of things - there's my Amazon wish list, Italian pottery, those cute little yellow dishes I have my eye on at Sur La Table, and of course the predictable sweater or pajamas that is always on my wish list.

The whole wish list idea stuck in my head and I started thinking about things I really want.

Dear Santa,
I know that you are busy fulfilling all the Christmas wishes of the good little boys and girls in the world. But I'm a little worried about the other 364 days for our children. Perhaps you and the elves could look into a few other areas. Here is my Christmas wish list for 2009.

World Peace
I am one of those products of the 60's that is always dreaming of world peace. I have read enough that I understand the psychology as well as the politics of the necessity of war but I refuse to accept it. Perhaps we could just start with the absence of war and see where we can go from there.

A society that values children
I am constantly appalled at the lack of attention that is given to our youngest members. We open their minds to violence, sex, and greed at lower and lower ages. Too many parents are overworked with no energy left for raising children so the kids are left on their own. There are no longer advocates for our babies that are growing up way too fast. And yet we are shocked that they are committing unfathomable crimes and we are left with no option but to try them as adults.

Clean air and water
As I said, I am a child of the 60's and this is more residue. We are making progress in this department but there is still a long way to go. We need to start functioning in the day to day with our grand children's and great grand children's lungs in mind. I want Baby Girl to enjoy the wilderness as much as her Grandma Tere does. I want her to have the pleasure of eating fresh tomatoes and strawberries grown in her backyard for her own children.

I want our parks to stay open. I want the homeless to have jobs, food, clothing and shelter. And while I am it, I want world hunger to end. I want people to respect one another; to just be nice. I want an end to racism and gender discrimination.

Now, here is what I will be giving for Christmas this year:
Warmth - both physical and emotional
Smiles
Laughter
Love - the unconditional kind
The sound of Christmas music
Kitchen smells that will seep into the heart to be reborn again and again
Pumpkin bread, fudge, spiced nuts, and red velvet cake
A chance to create new family memories around our Christmas Eve dinner table
Total commitment to living in the moment so I can enjoy each one deeply and completely.
A promise to let the Christmas spirit live long into January and maybe even a bit longer.

Santa, I'll do what I can to be the change in my little corner of the world. And as you're out spreading the Christmas spirit maybe, just maybe, 2010 together we'll begin to grow the dream of becoming the best that we can be.

Merry Christmas, Santa. Enjoy the cookies and milk.
Love,
Tere

Giving Birth to a Grandmother

I am encroaching upon a new role in my life. I am being redefined. I am very soon to receive additional responsibilities in my job description of Mom. I will have a new title and even more fun. I'm about to be known to the world as Grandma Tere. Up until this point I have just felt happy about witnessing a new generation in the making. I love watching and listening to Maria and Bill talk about the new family they are creating. But lately I have become much more emotional about it all. There has been a softening of my heart that somehow matches the softening of the body that comes with age. I cry more than I ever have in my whole life - at movies, TV shows or just looking at Maria's changing body and thinking about the life that is growing inside. I see babies and toddlers everywhere. I watch them with so much more intent now and wonder what is going through their heads as they learn to navigate the world they have found themselves a part of. It is all I can do not to start talking to strangers' babies or grab their toes and give them a loving shake. My favorite is seeing them in the grocery stores still in their footed jammies, babbling away. It makes me smile, no matter what else is happening in the world.

As the new C-G develops, I begin to ponder the kind of grandmother I am about to become. I remember two of my grandmothers and they played a very important role in my childhood. Although they were very different, I appreciated both of them and still only think of them with love. One spoiled me terribly and would have given me anything I ever wanted if my parents hadn't intervened and the other has been an extremely important model for who I have become as an adult. She taught me that food speaks love and that the effort put into homemade only makes it better. I can't imagine grandparenting like either of them did but a mixture of the two might be nice. I can't wait to see this baby and talk to her and figure out the grandmother I will be.

I am learning that just as parents want to give their very best to their children; so do grandparents I want to make a difference in this child's life. I want to fill her with love and guide her journey in this life. I have learned so much in life since I was a young mom and want so badly to share it.

I am also filled with strange little feelings about the beginning of a new generation. I never was concerned with whether or not my kids had babies. I only hoped that any babies who came into the world would be wanted and loved. I have just seen too many who weren't. But now I find myself rather amazed at the birthing of a new generation. It means that we believe the world is good and that we trust the people in it to support this new life. It is the belief in the future; the knowledge that we will overcome the struggles we face today leaving a land of plenty for those who come after us.

So, welcome little Miss C-G. Welcome to this world. Welcome to this family. We will try to do our very best to create a world of beauty and kindness where you will know that you are loved and will be forever more.

Words are useless

I am in the midst of watching Joseph Campbell on DVD with Bill Moyers. He hits my greatest challenge of language right on the head. The things that are most important to us, the best things in life, those that transcend us can't be named. We are unable to talk about them. There are no words that can communicate what is a thought or feeling which is beyond our physical being. So when I attempt to write about feelings that run deep in my heart like the deep abiding love I have for my children or the passion I have for my profession, I am left wanting. When I talk about the more emotional events in my life, I often say, I don't have words for it yet. And I really don't. But I continue to attempt to define it. I have to learn to be content with saying, I don't have words for it. And now I can add, this is one my best things in life, it transcends both me and words.

Coming Together

It has been a bit of a rough fall for my children. There is no real beginning to the story; it just is. For several years they have been distant from one another. As a rule, we all came together for holidays but the rest of the year felt a bit like a void. As the mom, it was very difficult to witness. I love them both deeply; more than words could ever say. I understood each side of the story and ached for them both. As much as I love being a mom of adult children, at some point you can't mother anymore. You can't make your kids to talk to each other or apologize and say they're sorry. They're grown-ups with spouses who protect their great loves with the fervor that runs deeper than even a mother's love. Maria and Bill's baby announcement on Thanksgiving was thrilling and I loved being a part of it. But back in the recesses of my heart was a giant hole because it was the first Thanksgiving we had not all been together as a family. Things had come to a head and there appeared to be no turning back. It is always good for me to remember that despite the strength of a massive oak tree, given a powerful enough wind, it can still bend and break. The late days of November passed and a wind began to blow. Each of them put forth the effort and they came together. I don't know what was said by either of them and I don't need to know. The greatest gift that they could ever give has landed in my lap. They have both summarized it in the same way "I think it went well." My only response has been to finally breathe out all the worry that had accumulated around my heart and breathe in the possibility of being a family again.

I am simply thrilled that they sat together in a room and let down their respective walls allowing the deep wounds to be seen by one another. I just know too many people that have fought with siblings and died without reconciling. They lived their lives out to the end and most of them couldn't remember what the fight was all about. How sad. I didn't want that for my kids. And I didn't want to negotiate the mind fields of celebrating holidays and birthdays and births and deaths around a feud. A giant weight has been lifted from me. If I think about it very long I cry. I cry for what could have been lost; the chance for Dave to be once again loved unconditionally by his family. The chance for Maria and Bill to introduce their baby to her uncle Dave, who I know will fall madly in love with the little meatball the minute he sees her. The chance for us all to be a family again.

Christmas has come early. I need nothing more than this; but to see my children at the same table, eating and drinking together, smiling, laughing, and yes, even arguing - all the things that a brother and sister do to bind each to the other. I know that in my own life, my brother and sister have kept me grounded with the constant reminder of who I am and where I came from. We laugh about old memories and new, our parents, our kids and the trials that life can bring our way. I want that for my children; a love of their shared history as well as the joy of spending their futures together, side by side laughing and crying, knowing that life is better when we are together.