I was looking at old pictures today of when my kids were really little. There are many pictures of them, cute as buttons, laughing and hysterically giggling, and playing and posing. They really had a great time. I realized so many of those great times were when I got together with my friends or my sister or my sister in law with the kids and we went off on adventures. Sometimes, we were at amusement parks, or Sesame Place, or the beach (lots of times) or parties or school functions or pumpkin patches but the most impressionable aspect of those pictures were how many of my friends and their kids were with us for the whole day. They are in all the pictures, year after year. They are friends that are still around, still close to me, even though many have very changed lives now.

My kids didn't have schedules then, only a few sports to follow. No one worked, of course. No girlfriends. No time without me! I remember days and days of me and my friends with the kids outside playing in the street: baseball or under the sprinkler attached to the plug or at a public pool or park. We packed lunches and extra clothes, we took frozen juice boxes, we took toys and sandals and towels or ski trips with 40-50 people, every year for years. I arranged for so many days of what they call "play dates" now..only then it was just the girls and the kids and maybe lunch or snacks and we let the kids play and run and have a ball. Sometimes I even made crafts or pizza with the kids, and they loved it!

I wonder if my kids know how lucky they are to have spent the thousands of hours not only on the beach but with kids that they grew up with every single summer (this being our 12th year)..coming together again and again, just swimming and surfing and fishing and playing ball. I have pictures of a few moms and about 30 kids. All with big smiles. And my kids remained friends together with all these other kids. Aside from a few special close friendships, there were years that ALL my kids were friends together with all the others..age really didn't matter..it is almost like a family at times.

Sometimes we had a big party for a birthday, sometimes we had a store bought cake with a few candles. I have pictures of christenings and communions and graduation and proms but those supposedly, poised and controlled important events look almost meaningless next to the days and days of everyday real fun and love and friendship. Those kid play dates brought me closer to my girlfriends and my kids. It was an excuse to get together and stay together for a while. We really enjoyed our kids, every day. Now it is so hard to get together ourselves let alone with our kids, but we do try, especially in the summer. I don't know if this is a South Philly thing but I know in South Philly we treasure that kinship.

When my kids were little they used to beg me to take them to Woodstock Street. I laugh when I think about it. Woodstock Street is still there, still full of kids and fun and friends. I live on a large main street with a park across the street. When my kids were little there weren't many little kids around..so 1 block over, on a small typical South Philadelphia street, the infamous Woodstock Street, were tons of kids and fun and my kids would BEG me to take them there in the afternoons...so many days I did and I am glad because tons of our "kid connections" came from that street.

One summer day I remember turning up the street and one of the mothers was on a plastic beach lounge chair in a bikini on her sidewalk. No one thought it SO strange. Every now and again she'd spritz herself with a spray bottle of cool water. She had the best tan on the block.

We'd sometimes talk about the city and it's dangers and it's darkness. We'd sigh at a big open back yard and maybe a private pool. But we know those things are for OTHER people; people who want privacy and control over their kids days and rooms to look at. This neighborhood in South Philly is all about the crazy wild kids who go from black top streets during the school year to sand filled beaches and rough waters during the hot summer months(most of us head to the shore in the summer either for a week, a month, weekends only or the summer).

Now, looking back, looking at those pictures, I am soooooo glad my kids had those experiences. I don't know if they will always be friends with the kids around here (they still are) and the kids at the shore that they see every summer. I do know they will have great memories and hopefully want their own kids to have those close friendships and hours and hours and days and months of special times. Nothing that money can buy. Nothing could matter more. I truly hope they realize it!

"A visionary is one who can find his way by moonlight, and see the dawn before the rest of the world."

When I was 16 I worked for a periodontist. After school, I'd hop on the bus to center city and "assist" in the patient rooms. I don't know if many people suffer from periodontal disease but when I worked there it seemed like everyone was getting their gums "done". That dentist made tons of money grafting skin from the roof of mouths to the gums. I had the very important job of handing sponges to the dentist as he needed them when grafting the gums and autoclaving the equipment after the patient left the room.

I knew working there, I'd never be the same again.

I learned the certain and specific ways of doing many things. I learned office etiquette and center city lingo. I learned a certain kind of professional behavior. No one shared last night's lasagna with the patients nor did the patients bring in homemade cookies or lemoncello to the doctor. No one knew my mother or my uncle or was my cousin or my best friend's sister. Patients paid their bill with checks or credit cards. No stacks of 1 and 5 and 10 dollar bills. No one asked to use the phone. Center city was a different world.

What I liked most about the job was the people I met. When I was 16 this was a big deal to me. I worked with all center city "types" which to me was just NOT the South Philly types. It seemed sophisticated and city chicish. The dentist I worked for was about 5 foot 3 inches tall and wore a long mink coat all winter long. He drove a convertible tan Mercedes and had big straight glistening white teeth before they were a stepford wife "must have". One time he reprimanded me for having peeling polish on my nails. ..."I don't mind polish, but it's either all on or all off". I was a bit mortified especially since one of my very good friends whose family was from Italy wore chipped red polish all the time. I think she painted her nails on Christmas Eve and then left them to chip away until the next year. I thought THAT was cool until I was "told" about it.

I hoped Pam didn't hear him telling me because she was THE most stylish person I ever met. She drank water all the time and told me it was good for the complexion (1978). She was about 5 '7" tall, wore flats and heels with equal poise and grace and had long straight golden brown hair to her waist. I was in love. Not with Pam. With her hair. I've always been obsessed with hair since I hate my own.

One day I walked in on Dr. E. He was on the floor in his office holding his knees and rolling around like a volley ball. "Oh, excuse me", I said. "Oh, come in!" He was delighted as a coach to teach me a grate spine stretch. I smiled through scrunched up eyes and hid my nails in my pockets. My chic urban boss was starting to seem strange. It was OK though because he was always nice, always helpful and liked to teach and give advice.

Pam had lots of duties. She had to answer the very busy phones, screen the calls (she was great at that), and keep the flowers fresh throughout the office. On Thursdays she always came in at 12 noon with loads of fresh flowers. She'd arrange the different very fancy vases as her hair swayed and her very vogue dresses or skirted suits swished as she danced about the office. ..I was 16, very impressionable.

She'd call a taxi or stroll on home to her apartment while I waited for my boyfriend to pick me up. One time Pam left and Dr. E asked me to go around to the garage and get his car. I ran out the door with the keys very excited to drive that car. I didn't even have to move the seat. And I didn't hit anything.

A couple of times I had to go to the other office which was a few minutes out of the city. I was excited to go to the "Main Line" even though it really was only on City Line Avenue. That office was in Dr. E's house. I never really saw a house so big.

One Saturday I got to the office early. I put on the coffee in the tiny employee kitchen and turned on the lights and autoclaves. I heard Pam come in a few minutes later. We met up in the kitchen for coffee and I stood frozen in my tracks. Pam had a new hairdo. A pixie.

I knew I'd never be the same again.

Crash with Sandra Bullock...she wasn't the main character but I cannot remember anybody else's name....was excellent.

We are all prejudice in some ways, we all discriminate at times; sometimes those times are the right time and sometimes those times are the very wrong time. Every minute we live, every experience, helps pave the way for our reactions thereafter.

Good show.

Today, when discussing a new project with a friend, she told me I make her feel inadequate and something like unaccomplished. Where do I find the time and energy to do all that I do? Little does she know the lists of things I want to do. It is my nature to DO..to be curious, to be interested. I cannot help it.

Dare I tell her that my husband did all the laundry all week while I was sick and watching TV and sleeping? Should I reveal how I cry sometimes that I can't have a certain dream or goal? Or should I tell her how I planned an education and career totally AROUNd having a large family, almost 25 years ago.... THAT is the entire reason I went to Nursing school..for the flexibility, for the quick trip to professionalism....and that is the same reason I missed the opportunity to know that writing is my love and what I could have done if my family was not always my priority. Should I say that planning really makes a difference? That being a person that never, ever "winged it" or thought my parents would do it for me, or my husband would just always be the magic prince that would allow me to always put my needs of the day before anything else. I never thought that, I would never want that, and because of that some things seem easy for me. But the planning, the doing and the maintenance is never easy, and it comes with costs.

You know, this has always been a fear of mine. I am not at all so successful or accomplished. I do have a lot of energy and a lot of interests and hobbies. I really like being organized and productive and actually feel bad when my day or week is unorganized or unproductive. I also Plan everything. But I do not have things so well under control. No one does. But I am conscience of it all and that really is what allows me to move forward and do more...that and compromising and a husband that does the same.

I know, in the past, other friends have felt less than proud of themselves because of the ground I cover. I know I do a lot. It is me. I also know I do not spend a lot of time wasting time. For me that sometimes means I do not spend as much casual time with friends as my other friends or just hanging around or doing nothing..which in many ways is very good for you. I sometimes get very inpatient with people and I feel like lots of conversations are not important enough to continue. I do not like those things about myself. My friend who said that today is a person who takes tons of time with everyone, even strangers...it drives me nuts but also makes me feel less than nice because I will disregard a LONG casual conversation with a stranger that sometimes can be a very nice thing.

I refuse to spend too much time on the phone, in traffic, or doing nonsense like shopping or unproductive errands or even staying out too late too many nights. I like to be efficient and sometimes that can mean I am nervous and not so free spirited (my sister got those genes)(I call them my mother's gypsy genes)(I make fun but really am jealous at times). I will not even do tons of "kids things" because it takes up too much time and I think it isn't even so good for kids to be taken to every movie, event, show, play date, restaurant, etc...I even think it is silly for a parent to have to feel like they must go to every game, every performance...I know support is wonderful...too much support is kind of scary and weird.
What I mean is ...we all make sacrifices. Mine are just harder to see.

sooo..I wish I wouldn't make people feel that way but we all sacrifice things to have the things we want. Sacrifice is all it takes to get what you want. Life is a big give and take.

Nowadays that book "The Secret" is the big thing. I did not read it, yet. But I am a big believer in being able to have what you want by thinking you can have it...really thinking about and knowing what you want and then taking the steps to getting it. Sometimes it happens in little doses. I believe in planning and doing the things you love..that really takes conscience effort to NOT do the other things that come along and distract you. Some things cannot be done now, they must wait a while when your life is better situated to cradle that goal or wish or love. You have to recognize that...

My priorities are my family, their happiness and my happiness. I will not do anything that takes me away from them for extended periods of time. I had this family because I wanted it and I plan to be here to do what I can and what I need to do and to enjoy them and for them to have us and our time and our thoughts. I believe in being with my family physically and emotionally is very important and every minute counts to me. I do actually plan time for me to think about new projects, write, read, movies, cook, hang with my kids and husband, reflect on my life and be grateful to my Creator for what I have and to ask Him for what I want and need..because those are the things that are most important to me..
then there is the second list of priorities and the third, etc..etc...

When I look at public figures like Martha and Oprah and Mother Theresa and political figures and historical people and my own mother and grandmothers and mother in law and sisters in law and some friends and even some of my neighbors I feel inadequate in lots of ways...but those people are meant to be inspirational not a means of judgment.

We all have our strengths and weaknesses and I believe we can all change those strengths and weaknesses if we want to and if we try. The secret is...we are all capable and just realizing that can change lives for the better.