Be Super Sneaky...

It's a proven fact. Get a bunch of crazy kids hyped up on sugar, and silly, yet awesome things will happen. Such is the case with my family, and my devious siblings. All of what I say is true, and must be believed.

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times... I only say this because I believe I was in junior high school, which sucked for everyone... Come on, don't delude yourself, it sucked. Anyway; it was also the time when a single memory-creating movie came out. Enter the catalyst of my tale, Pearl Harbor.

This movie spurned one of the funniest memories I have. It all began with Pearl Harbor. Yes, we watched it, and yes we fast forwarded like good self sensoring pros. But the one scene that captivated the imagination me and my siblings and fellow conspirators was the scene where the nurses are telling stories on the train of how they met the main "hunk" (I say this with air quotes for appropriate sarcastic effect, which needed to be noted). All the nurses are attending to their nursly duties when one guy starts complaining about one of the vaccines the nurse is giving them, to which the nurse proclaimed the famous line;

"The government says stick'um, so we stick'um!"

Now let me set the scene. It's quiet down stairs, little does mom know an onslaught of giggles it about to explode. Upstairs in the family play-room are OUR set of family nurses. Never had our training been rougher, never had our determination been greater. We, the Todd kids were about to embark on a journey of grand sticky proportions.

I'm not sure how we procured so much of it, but we had a fist size ball of sticky tack and we were ready to use it. Small pellet sized chunks were soon created, warmed to the proper consistency in our warm hands. Then with a collective cry, we would shout our newly inspired war cry and propel our weapons into the air. They flew majestically and collided with our enemy with a series of small thuds.

They were like cannon fire to our young, silly, probably hyped on sugar hearts. Sticky tack flew as we proclaimed our catch phrase, "The government says Stick'um, So we Stick'um!" Soon the nine foot ceiling was peppered with small wads of gray sticky tack. And we in our exuberance only now were aware of our strategy failings. Our ammo spent, now stick to the ceiling, we needed a tactic to get us behind enemy lines to re-procure our arsenal of sticky tack.

A plan, a new more ingenious plan was spawned from the mind of my younger sister Kjarsti. The vacuum tube which connected the head to the handle would suit our needs perfectly. Once more we threw with glee, sticking and retreating the sticky tack, completely unaware of the doom our warfare with the ceiling was creating.

Soon footfalls we're heard on the stairs. Switzerland was no longer neutral, and was ascending onto the battlefield. Our ammo currently spent and stuck atop the ceiling we knew we had to be careful. Mom was here, and she didn't look happy. We braced ourselves, not a lip moved to utter a word, we just gazed in amazement as soft thuds began to be heard as my mother asked the question we were braced for.

"What's going on up here?"

Then Switzerland heard it, our ammo returning to the floor. Little impacts could be heard as they fell in mass. Thud, thud, thud...

The stickiness our hands had imbued into our ammo was now cooling. Thus effectively rendering our missiles volleys of attacks from the sky above.

Thud...

Thud, Thud, Thud...

We waited, worried we'd give the game away. But to our relief an explanation to the noises formed in behind my mother's eyes. Quickly she moved toward the open window and peered from it, gazing for the truth she had formed in her mind. Someone was throwing rocks against the house she had concluded.

Eager to shift the blame, we rushed to the window to look for the assailant.

"Maybe they ran off?" Suggested one of us.

"Maybe they ran around to the other side, let's go look! Said another.

Crafty delight in our childish eyes, we raced from the room, falling bits of sticky tack plummeting around us. Like triumphant warriors returning from the war, we ushered Switzerland from the room and down the stairs, away from the carnage of battle still sounding behind us.

Mom never did find out ... And to this day, it remains one of my favorite memories. The day we fought the ceiling, and the day we fooled mom into thinking some kid was throwing rocks at the house. :)

No wonder I think of the movie Pearl Harbor every time I put a poster on the wall, feeling that sticky tack roll between my fingers. Ahhh, to be young and victorious against a great and powerful enemy. An enemy such as nine foot ceilings!

Be Josephine March...

In my mom's house, all growing up; was a display cabinet where my mom's collections of china dolls were displayed. I always had a girly fascination with it. How could something as silly as a doll hold such a place of honor in my mom's house? I thought it was the neatest thing. It was like you were giving value to things; things that you yourself found important or precious, and it didn't matter if anyone agreed with you. You put them under glass, just like a jeweler would do for his expensive rings and precious stones.

Naturally I wanted to have my own knick-knacks displayed in the sparkling glass case along with my mom's treasures. And when I asked she said yes. So for years there were two of these little figurines of my own presented behind glass right along with hers; holding a place of honor. Truthfully they were rather ugly, but mom let me display them anyway. That made me feel loved.

High above my own ugly knick-knacks, way upon the topmost shelf of the glass cabinet, was a set of five dolls. Mom always said that they represented each of her girls. They were little china dolls of each of the women from the book/movie "Little Women".

There was Marmi, Meg, Beth, Joe, and Amy. And mom said that they each reminded her of one of her own little women. First there was Marmi. She didn't represent one of us, but she was the mother figure. I'm sure that mom, never thought herself correlated with the character of Marmi. I however can't think of a better correlation to draw. Marmi was strong and opinionated, she cared deeply for people and was a force for good. She was a kind healer and a voice of wisdom to her little women.

I think my mother will always be akin to Marmi March, and I'll stay happily deluded no matter what anyone might say to the contrary.

Next in line was Meg, the eldest and she represented my sister Melisa. Melisa is the eldest of my sisters, she is deeply passionate and deeply empathetic toward those she comes in contact with. Meg's character marries a gentile and kind man, and I can't help but smile because I know my Melisa will no doubt do the same. Meg felt the burden of being the eldest, knowing how she married would effect her family. My sister Melisa may not be burdened with the obligation of marrying well to support her sisters, but she is definitely burdened with the role of being the eldest. She finds much responsibility thrust on her shoulders, and I can't express enough, how grateful I am that she is able to take that responsibility and keep our family together. I'm blessed to have Melisa as my "Meg" in my life.

The next young woman is Beth, who correlates with my sister Autumn. Through the story, Beth is always the figure of sweetness and kindness, with a streak of teasing proficiency that I clearly see in my sister Autumn. She's the backbone of the sisterhood, the sounding board of her sisters cares and
the tender heart that feels deeply for those she loves. I know that her influence on my life will have a lasting effect on me forever.

Mom correlated the next of the little women with myself; Joe, the awkward and vibrant one. I can't say how abhorrent I found the correlation to be when I was younger. Joe was the one who made the stupid choices, she was the one that turned down marriage proposals, then ended up with the old guy at the end of it all. But having re-watched the movie since my mom has passed away I'm left reflecting. Joe was the one who the story followed, and who we saw the most of, and I'm quite flattered now to be compared to this character. I'm left to wonder exactly what qualities in me, that my mom saw, that made me her Joe.

Joe is supremely talented, she has such a gift for writing, (my pinky toe into literary waters hardly qualifies me to claim such a correlation with abundant enthusiasm, I flatter myself slightly, all the
same), she was awkward and strange, and she had a great selfish streak in her that I can see in myself. But she was willing to do anything for her family. She cut her hair for train tickets to send her mom to her fathers side. I feel pleased to be so correlated. If my mom saw me as such a passionate person, someone with creativity and a desire to always become something more, than I couldn't be more thrilled.

Lastly of all the little women is Amy, and my sister Kjarsti whom she is correlated with. Amy's character was a little brat. Haha, I know on many occasions that I indeed found myself seeing only the negative correlation between my youngest sister Kjarsti and Amy. But now, re-watching the story I'm finding what I think my mom did; Amy is a character of deep longing, she wants to be like her sisters, she wants to be included, but Amy has such great insight into people throughout the story. She understands things that her sisters did not. She had a great capacity to love and to see the true potential and intentions of others. This is what I think my mom saw in my sister Kjarsti. She is unbelievably kind and sees such goodness in those she works with. Only someone with such a soul could spend their profession caring for the elderly with such joy and love. (I'm so impressed with Kjarsti for this, and I admire her for that.)

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I'm so glad mom thought so highly of us, and now that she's no longer around to protest it... I'm happy to think so highly of her too. I miss my Marmi. I know all all her little women do, and what a blessing it was to be yours; Your own little women!

Be Proud of Your Accomplishments

Back in mid June of this year, I decided that I had an itching to be more creative. At the time I was working a graphic design job that I was more than capable of doing and it wasn't challenging me or stretching my abilities much, but it payed and I was complacent because I could in turn pay rent. But there was that itch, I wasn't fulfilled and I wanted more.

I've always been silly, strange and creative, I've doodled, and written little stories and put on elaborately choreographed interpretive dances. (Thank you Pocahontas and Little Mermaid for bringing out the best interpretive dances...)

So I had this thought. Maybe I'll write a story, see if that helps me feel creative again. So I dug up this list of book ideas that I had generated over the years, and poured over it. Seeing if anything sounded fun, and what perked my creative juices.

So I started to write.

I wrote a lot, I was averaging over a thousand words a week. And considering I was also working and doing all sorts of other activities, I was rather proud of myself. Writing continued and at the end of my first month I had 27,000 words. This was huge to me, I'd never written anything so long.

Three months accumulated and I was at 91,000 words, that's roughly 230 pages. :)

The story has been so fun to write and has evolved into something much longer and more exciting that I thought. Yesterday I finished 1/3 of the story, the first "act" if you will; and I've written 127,659 words. That's 290ish pages, (8.5"x11") Roughly a bit longer than Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban which sits at 107,253 words.

This is my first draft, and I know there will be lots of editing and some re-writing and cutting, but I'm ecstatic. Golly this is fun!

Be Sad Sometimes too...

I had intended to write on this blog fairly often, but circumstances have a way of making the best of intentions, especially the less important ones, moot. Two weeks ago, I received a phone call from my sister telling me that my mom had been found dead at home by my brother.

It wasn't something any of us expected. She had dealt with many hard things in her life: A broken back, the death of my father, fibromyalgia, a tumor in her pituitary, hormone replacement therapy following the removal of that tumor, and the daily stress of raising six kids all on her own. But despite all this, we weren't ready for such an event, and had no prior reason to assume mom would pass away.

My mom was only 55, and would have turned 56 at the end of November this year... After loosing my dad at the age of four, loosing my mom at 26, feels really unjust. The world has a way of making you feel completely forgotten. However! The Lord has a way of making you feel very much remembered.

I've been so blessed.

Let me count the ways... Prior to this last couple months, I lived with my sister Melisa for nearly 3 years. A housing endeavor some were advising against us making, but I know that it was supposed to happen. God wanted me and my sister Melisa to develop a relationship which couldn't and hadn't
been fostered at all until that point. With a five year span between us Melisa had always left the next stage of school before I was able to enter it to join her. (i.e. Moving out to collage as I moved into high school.)

I could not have handled all that's happened recently, without that friendship. See, god knows things.

I've also been blessed to have such an amazing family: Five amazing siblings, two awesome sister-in-laws, one fantastic brother-in-law; and let's not forget my supremely-much-cuter-than-yours nephew. Filling up the ranks of the amazing army of family I have are my extensive Boekweg relations and my Todd side of the family.

No matter what I say, I'm extremely grateful for them. Not to mention the countless ward members, friends, and distant-people-I-didn't-even-know-existed, who have helped with food and funeral stuff.

Thank you!

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Even so, I'm still not really completely ready to deal with the world, and all the daily problems that come from living and working, and maintaining an existence. I'm numb, and a bit depressed. And I have on many occasions these past couple weeks; wished that I could tattoo the phrase, "No, I'm not okay!" across my forehead to divert the frequently posed question of "how are you doing?".

I'm not doing okay, but I will...

In the wake of my mom's passing, I've been writing. The following is another poem I've written in tribute to my mom:


Missing Mom: (a poem)

I was so young, and you seemed so old,
I lost so much then, which only death could withhold.

You seemed so strong, as I cried out my tears,
For you it was a nightmare, a horror, your fears.

My grief was short, I then too young to know,
That dad was gone, and the effect that would grow.

I resented later, my father passed on,
Of things never said, of should-have's now gone.

You were alone now, with little ones... six,
You hid all the sorrow, that pain which inflicts.

I have so say, I'm left quite in awe,
Of everything you've done, In spite of it all.

You kept trudging on, thru pain of your own,
Kissing scraped knees, no inkling you'd shown.

And even when things, would turn to the worst,
I was never aware of that more, of which you nursed.

In all that you suffered, I scarcely can say,
You've found release now, yet how I dreaded this day.

My heart is braking, it's echoing my hurt,
You've gone and joined him, I'm acutely alert.

Twenty years plus, you've suffered the loss,
Pressed on when even, the days seemed a wash.

Now that I'm older, I'm feeling the sorrow,
The emptiness, pain, suppressed till tomorrow.

Lightened by thought, of understanding one thing,
You've mended a union, death no more has a sting.

Your finally with him, and your pain gone away.
No more can it cling, nevermore can it stay.

If freedom is life, then in death did you find,
That peace and that rest, that soundness of mind.

I love you mom, And a day won't go by,
Where I'm not thinking of you, or even may cry.

I miss you deep down, and I will evermore.
A bond between hearts, an un-quenching outpour.


All Rights Reserved, Elyse Todd, 2014.

Be Someone Else...

First off, I freaking love halloween, it's the only holiday where I can dress up in the most completely ridicules outfits and it's socially acceptable. It's one of the days where disguising yourself as someone else isn't seen as shifty or suspect. (Don't get me started on what happens if you wear your super awesome poofy-sleeved pirate shirt on other days of the year - simpletons!)

Over the years I've had some awesome outfits.

I've been a bushel of grapes, a pineapple (Tragically I've not yet been the entire fruit-of-the-loom cast as of yet... That's the dream!). I've also been Brunhilda, the opera Viking; complete with swirly tinfoil  breastplate. (Hot right?), a super awesome Pirate, Ursula the sea witch (Can we talk about tentacle weight? I can't believe how much stuffed tentacles weigh. A few shattered dreams there, I'll tell you that much.) Then last year's amazing Klingon outfit. Stunning pleather garb and homemade head ridges... It was glorious.

But now I find myself wondering what to do this year! My initial ideas are:

1. The MatchMaker from Mulan (very attractive ink facial hair possibilities).

2. Professor Sprout from Harry Potter.

3. The Wardrobe from Beauty and the Beast.

4. MaryWeather from Sleeping Beauty.

5. Mama Odie from Princess and the Frog.

6. Dolly from Toy Story 3.

7. Lady Kluck from Robin Hood.

8. Mad Madam Mimi's from Sword in the Stone.

There they are, eight ideas, and I'm sure there are more... But I'm at a loss as to what will make me most awesome this year. What costume I'll be putting together. Let me know at you think! What dose the adoring masses want from their leader of awesome? How can I serve your need to laugh at someone this halloween?

Or just be surprised... You know, if you roll like that!