Voted Most Valuable Person

I love checklists. There's a sense of purpose and accomplishment to look at a list of tasks and be able to cross off achievements:
Pay bill ✓
Drink coffee ✓
Schedule doctor appointment ✓
Write to friend ✓
Feed baby ✓
Clean bathrooms ✓
Drink more coffee ✓

I confess I tend to peek over my husband's shoulder to compare his list to mine. Aha! My list is longer! Or, if it's shorter, then it's because my tasks took longer to do. So in a very sick sense, I compare our lists and then slip on my judge's robe to determine who has more value to the family.

Why do I do this?

Because I'm insecure. I feel like I have to justify my existence by what I accomplish, and hope it's enough to warrant my being here.

If I were on Survivor, I'd be the one hauling fire wood, gathering berries and building a fire. And at the end of the day I'd point out all my accomplishments as if to tell my tribe mates, "See! I have worth. You can't vote me out."

Unfortunately, that's not how life works. Those who we view as worthy often are not, and those who work behind the scenes often get overlooked. Also, accomplishments do not = worth.

So my desire is to get to a point where I'm not trying to throw everyone else out of the boat in an effort to be crowned Most Valuable. Life is not a drawn out game of King of the Mountain, and I don't have to prove my worth by what I do. But, more importantly, neither does anyone else.

Leprechaun Conspiracy

My husband insists that Cassiopeia isn't a real constellation. Instead, he calls it Onamonapia and creates legends about how the constellation commemorates some shrew of a woman who was banished to the skies.

A few years ago, my father and I found some sea shells in Pensacola Beach and concocted tales about how the shells were relics from spaceships that had crashed on the planet eons ago.

When my youngest brother was in elementary school, he set a mouse trap to catch a leprechaun. While he slept, my father and I tripped the trap and laid at the base a peeled potato that we had carved into the shape of a finger and dyed green. We also put a spurt of ketchup on the end for good effect. I was awaken the next morning to Ashton's sobs as he reported that his trap had maimed some poor leprechaun.

I can't wait for Addison to discover the wonders of a well-used imagination.

Dear Chicken Carcass

It saddens me to think that you preferred death by falling to death by mauling. I know you and your chicken friends probably clucked cheerfully as you were loaded onto the Tyson truck, believing you were going for a scenic drive. When the road turned into a highway, though, I imagine your little chicken brains began to question your assumptions. And then Chatty Chicken, the one who prides herself on knowing everything, began clucking that the end was near and you should all repent for the sins you committed during your short lives. And that's when you made your choice. You would rather risk road rash or death by flinging your feathered body from your gilded cage rather than face whatever horror awaited you at the end of your journey.

So you jumped.

And flopped.

Then smooshed.

I am sad, little beaked friend. You would have been tasty.