So...I'm driving into work today, listening to Pandora (I freaking LOVE my I-phone, ya'll!). Michael Jackson's "Man in the Mirror" was on and it set me to thinking of MJs need to reach out to others with his music. Say what you want about his personal life (because it was hard to understand and outside of established social perameters), his music was brilliant and changed lives. The beats draw you in but the lyrics...the lyrics can (and sometimes do) make you take a deeper look at who you are and at the world you choose to see. This, my friends, is art at its best.

Anyway, I've discovered something remarkable in my musings: my whole life, I've wanted to be one of those people who wasn't afraid of anyone. I wanted to know that I was open minded enough to accept all races, creed, colors, orientations and cultures...even those I didn't understand. This is not an easy goal in our country. Quite frankly, Americans take nationalism to a level previously only established by Bismark and Hitler. We are fanatical about being Americans (go to Texas...you'll understand) and our media supports this. And, after 9/11, it took all of my higher intellect not to join the fervor of the morons who decided to forever after block all things Muslim and Middle Eastern from thier consciousness. Or worse...harm them.

I am not proud of this part of my being. And because I don't like it, I've tried very hard to change it. I've had wonderful help along the way. My dear friend Elena, who has spent sooo much time in the Middle Eastern countries and has adopted the Muslim religion as her own, Mary, who is deeply connected to the Muslim world through her dear friends, the Nazirs and Marina, who lets me see the world, every day, through the eyes of someon who didn't grow up here but spans two cultures beautifully, effortlessly and with intelligence, wisdom and humor. I am deeply lucky in my friends and I'm grateful, every day, for helps they probably aren't even aware that they give.

And Grey has given me one more. You see...it struck me as I was driving in, today, that the connections I'm looking for between myself and others who live lives that are not like mine is nestled in my tummy. Become a mother and you will know what it is to have a connection with every other woman on the planet. Feel your child move for the first time and then think about the fact that on the other side of the planet, there's a woman your age who is feeling the same thing...with the same wonder and awe and joy. Because, statistically, it's true. Somewhere in a culture I don't understand, in a country being run by madmen, there's a young woman who only wants her child to be happy and safe and loved. And under her Burka or Sari or beret is a heart that cares only for the ten tiny toes and ten precious fingers she's helping to create. As her stomach swells all that will occupy her mind will be her hopes and fears for that child. As my hopes and fears for Grey are all that occupy mine.

We are as different at can be...and yet not different at all. Because we are also connected to something so much more primal and powerful and so much...bigger...than politics and borders and all of the other things that the men on this world find important. And because our greatest power doesn't have physical force behind it, we have to be far stronger for far longer than those who do have force at thier disposal. And we are. We heal wounds, mend hearts and sicknesses, we send out countless prayers to various Gods. We are constant, faithful, loving and steady. And yet...we'd rip the still beating heart out of the chest of any person who hurt our children.

We are mothers.

We are amazing.

And we are exactly the same, all over the world.

Breathtaking, isn't it?

I am addicted to logic and reason. I reach for rational thinking like a desperate junky reaches for a needle. I feel myself relaxing the exact same way as objectivity starts to flow through my consciousness like heroine through a vein. It feeds me, this impericism. The rules, the order, the understanding...they are vital for me to continue to find a psychological center.

I find myself frustrated beyond all reason, today. I am dealing with legal matters on behalf of my one and only. I don't mind doing this for him because, as I've stated many times...I take care of the big things, he takes care of the small ones. I am not good at remembering to hang up my bath towels or putting the cap on the toothpaste. Eric is. And he lovingly does all of these things without reproach. Along with helping me through dizzy spells, being endlessly patient when I make him late (which I do often...and HE HATES BEING LATE!) and laughing instead of screaming when I dump lotion all over the car floorboard (which I TOTALLY did this morning...UUUURRRRGGGGHHH!) I, for my part, deal with legal matters, doctor's appointments, bills, budgeting and remembering birthdays and such.

Eric, like all of us, made dumb mistakes when he was younger. It didn't help that a vicious, vindictive ex-wife decided she was going to make him pay for every blessed thing she could. She took a young man of less than 22 and pasted him to the wall financially and made it impossible for him to see his children at all.

I am having issues because, quite frankly, it is impossible for me to find objectivity in this. It took a metaphorical act of God for me to settle down and find something more important to me than my career and my own inner musings. Eric was that act of God. Objectively, he is a perfect compliment to my mercurial, complicated mind. We love each other deeply and passionately, without reservations or conditions and that is apparent in everything we do. I hurt more than I'd ever have thought possible on his behalf. And looking back at how unfairly he was treated, how guilty he still feels over what transpired with the twins when they were born and watching his hesitant, tenative steps to have a relationship with them now (when usually he's sooo confidant and self assured!) breaks my heart in ways I don't even have words for.

I don't know how to handle this. I'm desperately grasping for the handhold of reason. I've done everything I can think of. I've supported his time with his children wholeheartedly. I've tried to walk that fine line of being involved without intruding. I want his kids to know that they are welcome additions to mine and Grey's lives because they make thier father happy...and all I want in this life is his happiness. I'm calling attorneys to attempt to restructure the child support and parenting plans so that they aren't so damned one sided and I'll do whatever is necessary to convince anyone I have to that, yes, he may have made mistakes once...but who he is NOW was indelibly shaped by them...and he'll never, ever make them again. My husband to be is a good man. And he should not have to pay for his youthful mistakes forever. Every pennance should have its end.

"I cannot do the God-like things I would like. If I have learned nothing else, I have learned this." ~Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood (paraphrased)

Please, all of my friends, angels and higher powers...help me to learn this thoroughly...so I can let go of some of my sadness for a little while.