Lori Bourne

Regrets Only

Most people have heard the famous (and somewhat overused) quote by John Greenleaf Whittier, "For all sad words of tongue and pen, The saddest are these, 'It might have been'." I don't know if that's completely true, but I do know that as I get older, I think about the things I might have done differently. I have a few regrets, and I'm wondering if I should take the time to correct them.

In the interest of full disclosure, I'll share one thing I wish I could go back and change if I had a chance. Back when I was in college, my high school drama teacher (who had been in poor health for several years) passed away. Many of us who had been in his classes, plays, and musicals went back to our high school for a special program that the school put on in his memory.

After the program, all of my friends and I went out to dinner. I was excited because I had just gotten engaged, and wanted to show off my engagement ring and talk about Bruce to everyone there. During the entire evening, I never went over to the drama teacher's son (who had been in my graduating class) to tell him how sorry I was about the loss of his father.

Granted, I wasn't very good friends with him - he had only attended our school for his junior and senior years and we hadn't really hung out in the same circles. But his dad had just passed away! Someone who I admired and respected! I have no excuses. I was boorish, insensitive, and rude. It may have been a sin of omission, but I still think about it a lot.

I've Googled the guy, but I haven't come up with anything. If I find him somewhere, I'll definitely send an email and ask him to forgive me for being so unfeeling. I'm not wanting to do it just to feel better about it myself, but because it's the right thing to do. If I can reach out to him, it will be one less "might have been" to weigh on my conscience.

Should Blogging Have Boundaries?

I love blogging. I really do. Between this blog and my Montessori blog, I've written several hundred posts over the last two years. I also love to read other people's blogs - I could spend a whole evening just surfing from blog to blog.

But one thing I've realized is that I will never be the kind of blogger that blogs about everything. Some people do. They seem to have no problems sharing really intimate thoughts with an audience of thousands (or hundreds of thousands). A few that spring to mind immediately are Heather Armstrong at dooce.com, Penelope Strunk at the Brazen Careerist, and Lindsay Ferrier at Suburban Turmoil.

These fearless ladies are willing to talk all about their marriages (and marital strife), parenting, families, personal struggles, and lots of other stuff. It definitely makes for fascinating reading. (When I went to each of their blogs to get the link, I couldn't help but start reading their most recent posts). And yet, I can't bring myself to do likewise. I often wonder, while reading their blogs, if their approach is actually healthy or not.

A good case can be made for keeping some boundaries while blogging. All three of the bloggers I mentioned above have mentioned times where they've gotten in trouble with family or friends for things they've said in their blogs. Hurt feelings, broken trust: is that necessary just to have a compelling blog?

It seems to me it's a big trade-off - on one hand, "tell-it-all" blogs are likely to get lots of links, generate lots of comments, and create controversy (which means people will talk about you...which is almost always good). On the other hand, you have lost your privacy and in some cases the special bond you have with people who truly know you. They're not likely to share their true feelings with you if they know that anything they say can end up in a blog post.

I definitely do try to be very honest when blogging, it's just that I limit the subject matter. Twice, I've opened up more personally on my business blog, and it felt pretty good. In the first one, I talk about the loss of my daughter; in the second, I give a candid overview of a typical day in my life. Both of them were hard to write, in a way. The first because it was painful, the second because I really had to stop and think about things that I often do without thinking about them.

I will continue to blog (it's certainly addicting), but use it as a way to instruct (my other blog) and a sort of online journal (this blog) where I can share thoughts and experiences. I've had a pretty interesting life, and I like having a place to talk about it. Most likely, it will still be more than anyone really wants to know about me ;)

My Life, In Miniature

When I was young, my parents bought a dollhouse for me and my two younger sisters. I don't remember if we asked for it or they surprised us with it, but either way, it was love at first sight for me. My sisters didn't really care too much about it, so quickly the dollhouse became mine. I think I was about 10 when we got it, and immediately I started buying and making stuff to put inside it.

The dollhouse and I were best buddies - it became sort of a training ground for me to try out different skills, and over the years I painted, wallpapered, shingled it, and even wired it for electric lights. Of course, I could never get all the lights to work at the same time, and spent hours testing connections to try to find out why one light wouldn't work one day and then work the next.

Because of the frustration with wiring it, but having the strong desire to see it lit up, I started to rely on miniature candles. Yes, they make real miniature candles. Why my parents let me routinely light 4-5 candles in my (highly flammable) dollhouse, I have no idea. Perhaps they didn't know what I was doing.

Blessedly, I never set the entire dollhouse on fire. However, there was one time that I lit a candle in the middle of the dollhouse dining room table, which I had made myself out of cardboard draped in fabric - with a flower arrangement in the middle made from tiny pieces of curled paper. Basically, a bonfire waiting to happen. I turned my back for a second, and when I looked at the table again, the entire thing was on fire. I don't remember how I put it out, but luckily not much damage was done.

When I got older, I thrilled to put things in my dollhouse that reflected my own life. They included real miniature pictures of our family in tiny frames,  a lovely mini oil painting I bought in Greece, and a tiny carved marble village from China. Every time we traveled, I tried to buy something for my dollhouse. If it was Christmas, I put up a tree (and lots of other decorations) in the dollhouse.

When I got married, I made a miniature wedding reception shadowbox. By then, I was pretty good at making miniatures.  I would even make little shadowboxes as gifts for friends and family. But I haven't done that in a long time. And I finally sold my childhood dollhouse a few years ago, as we didn't have room for it and I plan on buying a bigger and better one someday.

My parents bought a dollhouse for my daughter last year, and I've had so much fun buying things for Anna to put in it. I've also saved all my dollhouse furniture and accessories, and though many are too small or delicate for her to use, many of them have found their way to her dollhouse and I love seeing her play with them.

I have lots of dollhouse memories, like how the very morning my parents gave it to us (it was waiting under the Christmas tree), my cousin who was visiting got so excited she leaned on it and broke the railing of the balcony. But my favorite dollhouse memory is when I decided to put my hamster, Nathaniel, in the dollhouse because I longed to see what it looked like with a "real" tiny being in it. I think I was about 12 years old. When my parents found out about my plan, they (wisely) forbade me to do such a silly thing.

I decided to do it anyway (big surprise). I set Nathaniel in the dollhouse living room and watched his plump hamster body knock over chairs and tables. I went to go get my sisters and show them this wondrous sight, but when we returned I couldn't find Nathaniel in the dollhouse anymore. We searched the entire dollhouse, and the floor, and the room, and he had literally disappeared. I thought my heart would leap out of my chest, because now my parents would find out for sure.

Suddenly, we heard a scrabbling noise and found Nathaniel hidden behind the dollhouse staircase. I don't know how he got there, because the staircase was pretty heavy and it would have needed to move for him to get behind it, but there he was, gnawing on a tiny wooden watermelon he found in the kitchen. I was so relieved. And I still have the watermelon with Nathaniel's teeth marks on it -  a fun memory of the time when miniatures ruled my life.

I Just Can't Stop Reading

I'm a reader. There's no way around it. I love (and live) to read. But lately I've been completely out of control with reading. It started at Christmas, when I got a couple of new books as presents. I enjoyed the books I got, so naturally I bought some other books by the same authors. Then we went to visit my in-laws, and my mother-in-law had some new books I hadn't read yet (we have similar taste in books).

Within a two week period, I read 15+ new books for a total of a many thousand pages. They included all of the Clare Fergusson/Russ van Alstyne mysteries by Julia Spencer-Fleming, which I loved and highly recommend. My mother-in-law had the first one, In the Bleak Midwinter, and I was delighted to find that there were four more in the series. They were all great! The next one is due out in June and I cannot wait!

I even reached the point where I started checking books out of the library to feed my book hunger. I know! I usually buy books, to the point of ordering from Barnes & Noble several times during the week and then going to the store on the weekend. It just got too expensive! Our local library is old and gloomy (they're planning to build a new one this next year), and yet they do have all the books I've been looking for.

I don't want to get too introspective about my love of reading, but I will say that I think I use it as an escape, and not always in a good way. I sometimes choose books over spending time with friends and family, or doing chores or projects that I know I need to do. At certain points, when it's really gone too far, I stop buying or checking out books so that I don't have anything new to read, which forces me to turn back to my other responsibilities.

You might wonder how I find time to read, what with homeschooling, running a business, blogging, and all the other stuff that goes along with life. It helps that I'm a super-fast reader, but also I do purposely make time for it - and I watch a lot less TV than the average person, which helps a lot. I really, really hope to pass on my love of reading to my kids. So far, things are looking good - they love to read and to have us read to them.

Can You Be Too Organized?

Anyone who knows me will testify that I am very organized. I can't stand clutter - my house doesn't have those mysterious "piles" of mail, papers, magazines, etc. that seem to plague many other people. I love to read books about conquering clutter, but more because I can sort of gloat about how I don't have a problem with it, not because I'm trying to learn anything about it.

One thing my mom drilled into me and my sisters is that the kitchen must always be clean. "As goes the kitchen, goes the whole house," says the Flylady, and she's right. My husband mentioned this Simpsons episode once where a meteor or something is about to hit the Simpson house, and Marge runs back into the house to do a few dishes before running back out again to safety. Totally true!

There are times when it's a pain to be a super-neat person. For instance, my kids and I can be getting ready to go out (piano lesson, field trip, etc.) and I need just a few more minutes to straighten the house. I love coming home to a clean house. But there are times when I have to say to myself, "Well, Lori, what are you going to do? Take the kids to the planetarium or do the dishes?" Because I can't do both. I usually try to choose the kids over cleaning.

My mother-in-law, Pat, has told me many stories about her mother (Bruce's grandmother), Anna Elliot. She was evidently a very lively, fun person but her house was always in shambles. However, Pat has so many fond memories of her mom and all the great things she would do with them. She mentioned one time when they were done with dinner, and instead of clearing the table and doing the dishes, Anna just threw a sheet over the entire table and took the family out for ice cream.

I admire that. I think there's something to be said for putting the kids and fun family times ahead of cleaning and organization. It's really hard for me to do that, but I'm trying. I'll never be messy, but I can learn to "let go" of some of the smaller, less important chores so that I have more time with my family.

Migraines Ahoy!

Wow, I've been gone for a long time. I've just been so busy with my business, my other blog, homeschooling, and the holidays that I haven't had a chance to post here.

I am afflicted with migraines. I always hoped I wouldn't grow up to get them. I watched my mom suffer with them for so many years when I was growing up. She had been plagued with them since childhood. It was much worse for her - there were no medications targeted to migraines when she was young; really, not much was known about them at all.

I live in the age of Imitrex, which has been such a blessing for me and my mom. I don't know what we would do without it. I get two-day migraines a couple times a month, and although the Imitrex doesn't take the migraine away completely, it does provide a lot of relief.

I've tried to figure out whether they're the result of stress, things I eat, lack of sleep, etc. but the only pattern seems to be that they're related to monthly hormones. And, of course, they're hereditary.

My sisters don't get them, and I'm so glad about that. I really hope that neither of my kids take after me in this regard. We'll just have to see. In the meantime, I'm on day two of this month's migraine, and I'm really hoping it goes away soon.

Can Atheists and Christians Ever Get Along?

The other day, I got an email notification that someone had left a comment at this blog. Since I don't get many comments here, I was interested to see what someone wrote. When I clicked on it, though, I was really surprised to see that it was a nasty insult about me being religious (of course, I'm not religious at all, just a Christian, but that's another post). I won't repeat the comment here, but I was taken aback to read it.

Anyway, I emailed the person who left it and basically asked him why he did. I didn't say anything rude in return, just that I was curious as to why. He replied and said it was because of a video that he thought I had posted to YouTube. He said this video was a stupid attempt to disprove atheism. Intrigued, I went to YouTube to watch the video.

Of course, I've never posted any videos to YouTube, but someone with a very similar name to mine had, and when he Googled that name, my blog came up. The most recent post at my blog mentioned God, so he assumed this person was me.

I won't link to the video, but I watched it and was basically a very poor attempt to try and prove that atheism is false. In other words, it wasn't anything that I would ever remotely do or be a part of. Not only was it overly emotional and illogical, but it was full of grammatical errors (as a teacher, this part bothered me most!). As a Christian, I was embarrassed for the person who made it. It's precisely this kind of thing that gives people the wrong idea about Christians.

Okay, so video aside, one thing really intrigued me. It's the fact that this man called me names for using, as he termed it, "circular logic" to try and prove a point. He's right; the video did do that. But I guess it never crossed his mind that he was also engaging in a logical fallacy: that of personal attack. It's probably one of the most common logical fallacies that I see all across the internet. People do it so frequently, they don't even realize that they are.

After a few civilized and enlightening emails, we discovered that we're both Digg users, so we befriended each other on Digg. Strange world, isn't it? I wish that atheists and Christians could have more interesting, intelligent discussions without resorting to name calling or any other logical fallacy. After all, there are valid points to be made on both sides. Most Christians I know (especially me) have questioned every aspect of the Christian faith over the years, never content to just accept conventional wisdom when it comes to eternal matters.

I'm glad that this guy mistook me for someone else. I think it worked out much better than if he found the other person. God works in mysterious ways, don't you think?   

That Perfect Moment in Time

When I was in high school, I auditioned for the Illinois All-State Choir and made it. Basically it's an event that happens once a year, probably in most states, where the most talented singers from around the state can gather and sing together.

The year that I was in it, the director of the All-State choir was a man from the Chicago area. I'm afraid I don't remember his name, but he was young and good-looking (yay!) and was the director of a local chorus. One of the songs we sang that year was some version of an "Alleluia" that was very lovely, with lots of intertwining harmonies as all the parts (soprano, alto, tenor, bass) sang their own melody line in counterpoint to everyone else.

The first time we sang the song together, in rehearsal, it sounded really nice. You know, rehearsal rooms often have better acoustics than actual auditoriums - they're just tile and cement walls, whereas auditoriums have carpeting and upholstered chairs. So when we sang this song, it sounded great.

However, the director thought it could be better. He told us he was going to conduct it by moving his hand slowly from one point up in the air and then back down again to the other side (picture him tracing a rainbow in the air from one end to the other). We started the song again, and it was magical. The notes just shimmered; everyone was in balance and no one voice stood out. We were all mesmerized, watching his hand move slowly in a perfect arc. It was sung as perfectly and beautifully as any song I've ever heard.

When the song ended, no one spoke, not even the director. The hairs on the back of my neck were standing up, and I'm sure they were for everyone else. We didn't want to break the moment. When he finally spoke, the director said, "These moments don't happen very often; you'll remember this for the rest of your life." He was right - I have. He also told us not to expect the same magic during the performance later that day, and he was right about that too. It was a great performance, but not magical.

Those kinds of moments can happen in many ways - a gorgeous purple and orange sunset, a delicious dish where every ingredient is just right, a piece of writing where every word is perfect and no improvements can be made (think the Gettysburg Address). The thing is, they don't happen very often, and if we're not paying attention, we'll miss them. I'm going to start paying more attention to those rare, fleeting, magical moments.

I'm Still Here!

I know I haven't blogged here in awhile - it's been a crazy month and a half. August is so busy for me, with my business, and then I started up homeschooling again, etc. etc. Since my last post was a downer, I figured it's time to come back and post something more cheerful.

So, what has happened recently? My grandparents celebrated their 76th wedding anniversary in July, and then my grandfather turned 105 in August. I don't really know how they've lived so long, but they are eager to go to heaven. They think God has forgotten them, the poor dears. Amazingly they are still able to live at home, with the care of my aunt and some nurses and caretakers. They are one of the oldest living married couples in the world, both by length of marriage and by their combined ages.

When I was growing up, I had a friend who had hermit crabs as pets. Naturally, I thought he was a geek (sorry, Eric!) Recently I decided to get some hermit crabs for my kids, and have found myself totally smitten. I love them! They are hilarious to watch, and it's fun to let them run around on the carpet. The highlight of my day (I'm easily amused) is to give them a piece of banana and watch them go crazy.

My husband has a doctor's appt. tomorrow, and hopefully his hand will be healed enough to get his cast removed. We are all eagerly awaiting this day, as he's been in a cast for a full six weeks at this point. So let's cross our fingers (ouch) that everything will go well.

Sadness Is Upon Me

Yesterday, at church, I heard some of the saddest news I think I've ever been told. A young mom of two kids - someone that I know a little, although not well - took her own life by jumping out of a tall building in downtown Chicago two weeks ago.

To say I was shocked to hear this is an understatement, and the people I spoke with yesterday (who knew her better than I did) are in shock as well. By all accounts, she was a happy, energetic person who loved her kids very much. Evidently she had been suffering from depression and sleeplessness recently, but I feel like there must be more to the story than that.

I don't know what drove her to take such a terrible, irrevocable action. Maybe no one ever will. Most of my thoughts have been for her children, who must be deep in grief as they contemplate life without their mother. My prayers will be with them in the months to come.

I've been very affected by this loss, I think mostly because I am the same age as this woman and my children are the same ages as her kids. I don't want to say "it can happen to anyone", because I'm not sure that's true, but the old adage about most people leading lives of quiet desperation is very true.

We will probably never know the heartaches of the people in our lives - even those that are closest to us. I felt an extra motivation yesterday to hug and kiss my kids and tell them that I love them. I don't want to take another day for granted.