www.reflexbluestocking.org

I’ve enjoyed the blogs of friends, acquaintances, mentors and even strangers for years. It’s easy to sit on the sidelines and watch (sometimes in awe, sometimes in amusement) as they explore the various aspects of their lives in text and pictures, uploaded for the online world to pass judgement, respond with reassuring support or demoralizing silence.

And so now I join the ranks, inspired to blog by someone who is currently a continent away and completely unaware, as men tend to be.

A little bit about how my blog’s name came to be (if you are curious): Reflex blue, for those of you who are not print designers, is a deep sapphire blue. It is my favorite color, my birthstone, and oddly enough, the school color for the university by which I’m employed.  

A bluestocking is basically defined as “a woman having literary or intellectual interests,” and though I find myself cleaning out some of the cobwebs of my intellect as of late, I do believe I’m a good fit for the bluestocking crowd. I don’t know that I’d be welcome at the Algonquin Round Table with Dorothy Parker, but I’d be happy to tend bar.

I’ve been married for twelve years to a man who is training to be a physician. Do not tell me I am lucky–I have been through three tries into med school, five years of med school in Memphis ( a lovely place to visit), and am now beginning the fifth year of residency, after which we will continue to pay off a substantial debt for another ten years.

I have two absolutely incredible children. A beautiful, creative, wildly intelligent little girl and a sweet, handsome, smart little boy. They are my best and proudest creations. I never planned to have children, was told that I could not, and yet, here they are. They surprise me every day.

Recently, I discovered that I had forgotten who I was. In the rush to raise my kids, be a wife to a guy who’s never home, have some sort of normalcy in a resident family’s life, do all my shoulds, duties, and musts, I forgot all about that person that I was. The fine artist, bluestocking, music lover all but disappeared under the professional, hostess, mom, wife. And then something weird happened.

A student.

I avoid them most of the time. They tend to leave. But this one kept drawing me out. And I started to do things like see live music again. Listen to my old jazz CDs. Buy some new ones. We didn’t go bankrupt. Pulled out my sketch books. Read books I’d been meaning to read. Took the kids to see jazz in the park. They liked it. The house didn’t fall down.

And now, here I am. Blogging. Who knows where I’ll go from here.

I’m reading Eats, Shoots and Leaves by Lynne Truss (and surely breaking numerous rules)

Listening to Legs to Make Us Longer by Kaki King for Ryan on another continent