Here's how the triathlon training is going: NOT. I can only run 2.5 miles at a time (per my PT guy's instructions), I haven't gone swimming in, gulp, two months, and my wee bike is dusty on its hanger-hook. I'm not worried about finishing the race; after two natural labors, I know I could slog through the whole thing with my kids tied to my back, but I had visions of being a bit zoomy this time. Of not flailing through the water like a drunken idiot. Of maybe placing in my age group. Oh well, I'm always up for a nice round of public humiliation.

Got me some new running sneakers, oh yeah, and at least I will float through my runs on wings. I suddenly realized that running camp is in TWO WEEKS. And I can only run 2.5 MILES. ACK. I won this trip to running camp last year, by writing a short essay on why a trip to camp would change my life. The piece I submitted likely got picked because the judges were afraid I would injure my children if they didn't send me away from them for a week; also, there were only two other entries. I got news that I'd won when I was in the depths of the mysterious Dengue Fever and had a left leg the size and mobility of a grass-fattened hog. To add to the humor of the situation, I was high on Vicodin when I got the phone call: "Hello, Linnie?" "Mmmmmm…" "Congratulations! You've won the running camp contest!" "Can't…walk…ug." When I called the camp director to ask if I could cash my prize in this year instead, the woman who answered sounded like a child. I really almost said, "Can I talk to your mom?" which would have at least established that I am a bumbling idiot; now I have to wait until they meet me for them to find out. But anyway, I just know she's one of these wee, twig-like super-fast runners next to whom I will feel and look much like an asthmatic hippopotamus. You know how hippos turn bright pink in the heat because all the blood rushes to the surface of their skin? I do that exact same thing when I run.

Ah, the joys of summer never cease. Here's a toast to imminent public humiliation!

Achieving Adulthood

It wasn't when I got married. Nor was it when I gave birth to my first or second child (though they may be driving me to an early grave). Buying the house gave me an inkling of it, though it still feels like a toy house, there is so much that is funky about it. No, the moment I felt that I had reached a certain level of maturity was when I accepted delivery (via the front window, since they wouldn't fit through the door of the toy house) of these items:





I'm not entirely sold on the chair. The couch, though, she is comfy and supportive and oh-so-preety. We are teaching the Labra-Spaniel not to leap on it; I felt so guilty about taking away his bed that I bought a new (color-coordinated) one for him:



He is confused but happy that we shower him with treats when he gets near it. Yes, I fear the inevitable stainage of the couch's pale green fabric. The new (similarly pale) rug had a deep purple cherry stain on it within forty minutes of me laying it down. But that brings in the adulthood part of it. The new furniture is about being mature and setting limits, for myself and my children. It is about saying, "No, you may not leap from the coffee table to the couch, naked, holding a technicolor permanent marker in each hand." (I'm not going to say whether that was me or the kids.)

Not Prepared For This One

Last night, while she was happily slurping her ice cream, the Biggie turned to me and announced, "Mama, I have two boyfriends." Hiding my shock, I asked, "Really, who?" "Connor and Wiley." This is familiar territory. She has proclaimed she would marry Wiley, an old family friend, since she knew about princes and princesses and the inevitable ending of every Disney movie. But what about this Connor character? "Why is Connor your boyfriend?" "Because he winks at me and smiles at me and we both like soccer." OK, I can handle this. A simple display of affection, shared interests. "But just because he likes you doesn't make you his girlfriend. Do you like him?" "Well of course, because we are the only two kids in class who play hockey."

If only it could remain this simple.

It's a rainy Ithaca morning, a day for puttering, reading the newspaper and drinking too much coffee. The Ithaca Festival is this weekend; perhaps we'll go later and try to catch another performance of Hilby the Skinny German Juggle Boy. But for now we are just lazing about the house. Or at least I am lazing. This is what my children are doing:

9:30 am: Biggie has cut a long, long piece of yarn and has tied it around the front doorknob. She is making a coyote catcher. The Wee One is screaming and hitting her for no apparent reason. Time out.

9:45: Biggie is tying knots in the string. The Wee One is climbing up on the counter to the water thermos and spilling ice water on the floor. Clean up.

9:55: Biggie is tying knots in the string. The Wee One is "helping" the Husband paint a column in my office blue. She starts painting the white trim and has a tantrum when I take her away. Time out.

10:10: Biggie is tying knots in the string, which is now a decoration for the year-end party at school. The Wee One is letting the dog out so he can poop and trying to clean it up herself. Then she wants to pee out there "like a doggie."

10:15: Biggie is lying on the floor, tying knots in the string. In the two minutes that I was upstairs inspecting the Husband's paint job, the Wee One has opened a box of rice mix, poured it on the floor, and is trying to clean it up with a wet rag. When I take over, she goes into the living room where the Biggie is knotting, and hits her. Time out.

10:25: Biggie is taking a break from the knotted string, which is now four feet long and "a world record." The Wee One pauses to fight with her over Cheez-It. She pours the leftover crumbs on the freshly vacuumed rug. No time outs this time, but I do start shouting. Grrrr.

When we took the Wee One to a pulmonary specialist this week, he said that her asthma could be limiting her growth and energy levels. While we waited forty-five minutes for the doctor to show up, she climbed up and down off the examining table approximately twenty times, ran up and down the hall proclaiming "I am Superman!" and washed her hands more times than I could count. She is indeed small for her age, but I'm wondering, what exactly will happen if we get her asthma under control? How much more energy can she actually produce, and can we in some way harness it for our personal use? I'm thinking jet packs.

Most of you are aware that in 1998 the Husband cut the top off of my Volvo. He achieved international notoriety for this deed when I called Tom and Ray of "Car Talk," the weekly National Public Radio show. The Husband and I were debating the structural integrity of the car, post-crewcut. He insisted that it was sound, even as the middle of the car sagged to the ground. Tom and Ray overwhelmingly agreed with me, ha ha, and recommended I wear a helmet when riding in the vehicle. Friends from as far away as Germany recognized my voice* and many people congratulated me on the…caliber of the man I married.**

For an inkling of the steps involved in the process of cutting the roof off a car, go to Fishsuit (see the blogroll at right) and view the video he has posted in today's entry. Also note the maturity level of the men involved in this endeavor; you will have a good idea of what I experienced in the early years of my marriage.***

(Special note to Charles: The verbal contract regarding the roof of our current car is still binding.)

*In a fit of anxiety-prompted formality, I introduced myself as "Linda."
**I remember this day fondly because not only did I appear on the radio, thus achieving 15 minutes of fame, but later on the Husband and I rode our tandem bicycle in the Fremont Solstice Parade, dressed up as grapes. Ah, youth!
***I accept no responsibility for the beheading of anyone's vehicle as precipitated by the viewing of this video.

Still Nothing Going On

Really. But people are starting to ask why I haven't been posting and I'm afraid I'll get kicked off Fishsuit's blogroll, so here we are.

The Wee One is upstairs, gritching about having to take a nap. The dog is dozing on the couch, having been up since 4 am (with me—insomnia strikes again). Biggie is at school, having finally gotten over a mysterious fever. The Husband is at job #2 for the day (of three total; yes, he will be cutting down and working a relatively normal amount in a matter of weeks). My work has been slow lately and I have been consumed by utterly normal homemaker-type things: processing endless piles of laundry, tending the postage stamp-sized garden and learning the ins and outs of composting, identifying the species of turtle I found in the road and took in overnight before releasing her back into the depths of Cayuga (Eastern Painted Turtle, Chrysemys picta picta). The Excite-O-Meter is definitely reading LOW, ladies and gentlemen.

But it's bordering on summer in Ithaca, so there's always a hum in the air. The waterfalls are flowing high, the birds are back, and the trees are blooming. The farmer's market is bustling, and there's a great blue heron fishing in the creek outside my front door. The students are getting ready to leave, and we grownups will have the place to ourselves for the summer, yeeha!

Our little town just got named as one of Kiplinger's Top Ten "Smart Places to Live," which makes me proud but causes an inward groan. After watching what happened in Seattle when everyone and their brother moved there (including me, but not my brother), I'm holding my breath and wondering how Ithaca will be transformed in the upcoming years. Ithaca as it is right now feels like Fremont (a formerly funky neighborhood in Seattle) did when I moved there in 1996. I remember that my beat-up 1970 Volvo fit right in there when I moved in, but by the time I left three years later, it stuck out like a sore thumb amongst the shiny new cars of my upwardly mobile neighbors (this might have had something to do with the fact that the Husband had sawed the Volvo's roof off and painted the car purple). Don't get me wrong, I'm all for progress—Fremont looked gorgeous when I zoomed through there on my way to a wedding last summer—and I love watching my property value go up as I sit idly by, but small-town character is so fragile. I hope the local economy and housing market can absorb the influx of "new folks" we're currently experiencing-of which I am one, of course-without forcing the local color out.

Well that's the dispatch from Central New York, folks. I hope all is well wherever you are—keep on keeping on.

Quistilton is leaping into the twenty-first century, ladies and gentlemen. First of all, the Husband and I joined a gym, a gym that’s so fancy I keep calling it a club and scurrying through because I think they’re going to kick me out for not shaving my legs. Second, I got an iPod, or iShuffle, or whatever the cheapest one is called. This thing is changing my life. I may be reluctant to embrace new gadgetry, but anything that allows me to rock out to Bad Religion while I’m walking the dog is alright by me.

The club, er, gym, is amazing. They have three pools, sauna and steam room, scads of running/stair climbing/arm-pumping, leg-wiggling machines, and will soon have a café. I am spending a LOT of time there. The best part about it is that I can now almost swim for real, i.e. after two weeks of diligent practice, the lifeguard doesn’t jump up nervously when I enter the pool anymore. I have already gone swimming more times than I did prior to my last two triathlons, COMBINED. Perhaps this year the kayakers won’t shadow me.

The small ones are well. The Biggie had her second report card, and got all “Excellent” marks in gym. She says it is because she is going to be a hockey goalie for Big Red, and is already in training. The Wee One has not been sick or injured in any major way for two months, yeeha! (Knock wood!) The Husband has been transforming the kitchen from its formerly oddly patched-together state into something resembling normalcy, albeit in our typical eclectic style (faux slate floor, burgundy tile countertop as well as the preexisting blue petroglyph and butcher block countertops—you have to see it to understand, but it works!). What pleases me is that the washer and dryer are no longer in there, and I can wash clothes without the sensation that a rocket is being launched from the kitchen.

That’s about all; there is no pressing political, child-related or societal subject bugging me lately—now, isn’t that nice for a change?

Dooce has an interesting discussion going on at her site, which I added to (see comment #789) but of course I don’t really think she’s going to write BACK to, so I’m shifting the discussion over to this site. I’d like to know what my little audience thinks. The basic gist of the discussion is the stay-at-home mom route as a valid choice for educated women, whether it’s anti-feminist, and whatnot—see her post for more details. You are all educated, some of you are stay-at-home moms, some are work-at-home or out-of-the-home moms, some are not moms (or dads) yet, and some never plan to be parents. What I’m curious about is, are you doing what you really want to be doing? If you’re a parent, do you feel like you spend enough time with your kid(s)? What is “enough” time, anyway? If you’re primarily at home, do you feel it is by choice, or necessity? If you’re working in addition to caring for your kids, do you feel it is the “right” thing to do, or do you feel pressured (by society, family, whatever) to do something different? If you’re not a parent yet, what do you think you’ll do when you have a kid? If you never plan to be a parent, was that decision made in part because you wanted to focus on your career instead?

I’m just curious about this. Personally, I wasn’t cutting it as a stay-at-home mom, so I got a job. The nature of that job, however, allows me an enormous amount of freedom that most workers don’t have. I think true feminism means that you can choose to take whatever route you’d like, without fear of societal backlash. The reality is that there is an enormous amount of societal pressure to live to your full professional potential, and simultaneously enrich your kids to their full potential. Are those two things truly compatible? I see a lot of women who are trying to do it all, at great personal cost.

Exercising your choices of course requires a certain amount of economic and social mobility, which I’m not really authorized to comment on (what am I authorized to comment on, emergent medical technologies?), but maybe you are. Let’s hear about it.

Come on, comment, because if you don’t I’ll feel like a loser. And don't use any swear words, because my auntie reads this site.

I added three new links in the ole' sidebar, there. I wanted a direct link to "Goddess of Clarity" so I don't have to sneak through "Fishsuit" every time I go there. "Passing Understanding" and "East Providence Zoo" are from folks whom I harassed into starting blogs. I have to work on the enthusiastic harassing; sometimes people don't like it. At a wedding the Husband and I attended last summer, I harassed everyone about dancing more to the incredible 80's music they had on. After a while, one (fairly drunk) woman looked at me and said, "You are very small, but I am still afraid of you, Dance Pusher."

Elmo is a just a red Grover.

Yesterday the Wee came home from daycare wearing a borrowed shirt, since she’d gotten hers wet. The borrowed shirt was a snazzy blue fleece number, with the googly eyes, round pink nose and crooked smile rounding out a face so familiar from my youth. “You’ve got a Grover shirt on!” I said to the Wee as I picked her up. She threw her body back and cried, “It’s Elmo!” “No, Elmo is red, this person Grover is blue,” I replied. “No, Elmo! ELMO!” she shouted.

At least we know she’s not racist. Though maybe she’s just colorblind.

To continue in the current vein of relative unimportance...

Upon serious contemplation, I really have to say that rather than Kiki's Delivery Service, a much more endlessly watchable film is Totoro. There. That's been bugging me all day.

Oh, and a much weirder habit than getting up at 4 am would be my obsession with organizing the groceries on the converyer belt at the store. I group them by type and weight, with the heaviest items, such as cans and boxes, first. Frozen items go next, all together so they end up in the same bag. Then dairy, then durable fruits and vegetables, then those of a more fragile sort. Lastly, chicken/fish/meat/eggs.

Alrighty, here’s yet another meme (That’s what they’re called! Don’t I sound hip?) which everyone seems to be doing. (Are you really interested? Don’t answer that question.) (Could I make MORE parenthetical comments?)

Four jobs I’ve had:
1. Apple packer
2. Barista, before I knew that’s what they were called. The psycho owner accused me of stealing $15 from the cash register, which was tended by five employees simultaneously. I sincerely regret working as hard as I did for that woman. (And no, I didn’t take her lousy 15 bucks!)
3. Pathology assistant. Duties included singing the entire soundtrack to “The Sound of Music” during specimen gross-in with one of the particularly goofy pathologists (they were all lovely and weird)
4. Sandal maker/vineyard worker. Really. (I got paid in wine.)

Four movies I can watch over and over:
1. Say Anything
2. The Sound of Music (duh!)
3. Harold and Maude
4. Kiki’s Delivery Service

Four places I’ve lived:
1. Westford, MA
2. Ithaca, NY
3. Seattle, WA
4. Uhhh…wow, that’s really it.

Four places I’ve vacationed:
1. Orcas Island, WA
2. Portland, OR
3. All over Alaska
4. Silver City, NM

Four of my favorite dishes:
1. Pizza
2. Lentils and tomatoes with garlic
3. Peanut chicken soup, the only reason to own a crock pot
4. Sopapillas from Sadie’s in ABQ, though they are really more like a snack

Four sites I visit daily:
1. Google News
2. Dooce
3. Pubmed
4. Overheard in New York Well not daily, but whatever.

Four places I would rather be right now:
1. Baxter State Park, Maine
2. Orcas Island, Washington
3. Fishing in Alaska (in the summer!)
4. In a Cessna, 2000 feet up

There’s no one else to tag, everyone has already done this one! Argh.

OK, so according to “What Free Time,” I am “tagged,” I’m “it.” I’m supposed to post five weird habits I have. Here goes:

1) I chew my fingers. Not my fingernails, my fingers.
2) I repeatedly fail to buy bread and
crackers at the grocery store, fantasizing that I will make my own. What this really means is that the family is on a default low-carb diet.
3) This is a bad, bad habit: I passive-aggressively correct the Husband’s grammar in front of the kids by repeating what he says in the “right” way. He probably didn’t even realize I was doing this—until now. (Dang!)
4) Ummm… Aha! I am a little freaky about saving money, and enjoy thrift store shopping and free piles. A book I spend a lot of time with is the complete collection of “The Tightwad Gazette,” by Amy Dacyczyn. (Of course, then I go and pick one of the most expensive possible habits, flying—I’ll pay for it with the money I save by wearing $3 jeans and freecycled boots.)
5) I get up at 4 am and write in the blog.

All the people I want to "tag" don't have blogs--come on Jenn, Amy, Leah, Diana, Jean, Melissa and everyone else--get on the ball! Oh yes and the Goddess--tag right back at ya!

I knew it had been too long since we’d spent quality time at the hospital.

The Wee One and I just got back from an overnight, not a big deal, really, just the old pneumonia, oxygen tent, prednisolone, screaming blood draws and massive injected antibiotics routine. Really, though, does she have a punch card there or something? I can see the appeal; they bring her unlimited pizza and pudding, there’s cable TV, the nurses fawn over her and give her as many stickers and band-aids as she wants.

But it’s getting old for me. I know all the nurses and the names and ages of their children and dogs now, and can tell when the vaporizer runs out of distilled water just by the slight change in the pitch of its vibration (and that was while I was sleeping). And I’m not proud that I secretly order the “cheesecake with cherry topping” off the hospital menu knowing that the Wee One will not touch it and I can devour it myself.

SHE is doing fine, by the way—her white blood cell count is down by 10,000 and she knew her way around the hospital playroom and peds unit corridors by yesterday afternoon. She charmed the pants off everyone and informed them, “I probly go home later today”—turns out she was right. But I, I am not fine. I am getting too old for these misadventures, and clearly should have commenced having children years ago, at least if the children were going to be as fragile and accident-prone as Ms. Wee One. It’s just so hard to keep them alive and healthy, you know? Anyway, I committed a frightening amount of online retail therapy today (note to the Husband: do not look at the balance on the debit card account), and will be feeling better after I get at least a night’s full sleep (unlikely in the near future, since the Wee needs nebulizer treatments at midnight and 4 am, argh). But enough whining. Peace to all, and happiness and health to you!

Happy New Year! My, it has been a long time. The Quistilton Gang has been busy traveling to Massachoo for the holidays, attending Cornell Women’s Hockey games (The Wee One’s chant: “Let’s go Big Red let’s go clap clap!”), and I, personally, have been engrossed in some new activities of my own. First, I’ve been reading “Eats, Shoots and Leaves,” by Lynne Truss. My brother and my sister each gave me a copy this Christmas—should I take this as a hint? It’s a hilarious account of punctuation—yes, I used “hilarious” and “punctuation” in the same sentence (twice, actually)—by a woman whose rally cry is, “Sticklers Unite!” (Now I want to go check out the book and see if I punctuated that last sentence at all correctly.) She stood outside the premiere of “Two Weeks Notice” (if that makes you cringe, you’re a stickler) waving a giant apostrophe after the “s” in “Weeks.” She is also helping me feel confident in my persistent placement of commas and periods (she calls them “stops”) inside quotation marks—as in the previous sentence. Americans put them inside, and British folks put them outside. Here is an example of the British version:
Lynne Truss nearly got arrested for hitting someone on the head with a giant apostrophe at the premiere of “Two Weeks (which should be Weeks’) Notice”.

The fact that I so enjoy this book and another gift, the new illustrated Elements of Style (why won't Blogger let me underline?), is evidence that perhaps I should’ve been an English major. Or at least a spinsterish old grammarian. But the thing is, I was never taught grammar! Were you? They just sortof forgot to cover it, back in elementary school. All I remember is a lot of brainstorming going on. (Remember that? Brainstorming was the hugest thing to hit education since Skinner!) Sorry, this whole post is full of inside jokes and useless, boring information. I will commence with the good stuff.

The other activity which has been in the way of the blog has been flying. Yes, I am finally learning how to fly. I say “finally” because my first lesson happened 17 years ago, and I haven’t had another since. (Angst-ridden teenage Linnie plus well-intentioned pilot Dad in a small plane 3500 feet up—bad idea. We ended the session with an agreement to not try and have a conversation until I was 25. Happily, we have moved beyond this.) But “learning to fly” is still a stretch, at this point, since I haven’t yet passed my flight physical. In order to take one lesson at this school, I need to have a third-class medical certificate which requires an extensive physical with vision and hearing testing and all sorts of weighing and measuring of my poor child-destroyed body. Now, I am probably the only student pilot who nearly failed the vision exam because a toddler peed on her leg. The whole thing took so long that I had to leave the doctor’s office and go get the Wee One in the middle of it. Then, the nurse kept leaving me in the examining room while she went off to get snacks. I wouldn’t have minded so much if she had shared. I mean, really.

So anyway, two and a half hours after I initially got there (do doctors think we just have all day to spend in their offices?), I thought I was all done, only to find that one trip to the emergency room for an asthma attack three years ago might flub the whole thing. Now I have to get my doctor to write a letter assuring the FAA that I won’t start wheezing and fall out of the sky (knock wood).

This is certainly the most expensive, selfish hobby I have ever undertaken (my parents might argue that “college” would more aptly fit that description), but think of it—soaring up there, above the clouds in the clear blue with the whole world laid out before you—it’s heaven, both literally and figuratively.

Yeeha! Here’s to a magnificent 2006, filled with clear, artful punctuation and high-flying Mamas!

The Attack Spaniel Turns One

When we picked this guy (i.e. when he scrambled into my lap and started licking me with irresistible puppy breath), the SPCA told us he was a "lab/cocker spaniel mix." Sixty pounds later, there is nary a cocker trait in sight, unless you count the occasional lack of bladder control when he is spooked by the Husband or other Large Brown Men. Happy birthday to my officemate, hiking buddy and lap warmer. Thank you for guarding the house and tolerating the Wee One. May you always have a cat to chase, a hand to lick and just a little piece of cheese.



His Highness as a young pup



Milo's S*&%-eating grin (this is a literal definition)



Optimal Dinnertime Positioning (I'm pretty sure that puppy has since been eaten, thus confirming reports of viscious Labrador cannibalistic tendencies)



Note the absolute lack of any Cocker Spanielish tendencies. (This look means, "Squirrel?" or "Cheese?")





Running With His Pack

Heck of a Commute This Morning.

Yep. Stubbed my toe on the door jamb between the bedroom and the office.

Piggy Bank

The VCR stopped working a few months ago. I found a DVD inside (courtesy of the Wee One) and removed it, thinking I had solved the problem. No dice. Every time I put a tape in it whirred, whirred, whirred, slowly coming to a stop with fuzzy screen. After it devoured “Arthur’s Family Fun,” we stopped using it altogether.

Last night, the husband bought a new 19-inch TV to replace the sad 13-inch model. (I know, we are leaping into the twenty-first century!) It’s one of those combination deals, with a DVD player built right in. The whole shebang was too big to fit into the TV cabinet with the VCR (which, though long broken, was of course still sitting in there). When the husband pulled the VCR out of the cabinet, it…jingled.

Oh, and it's Amy and "anonymous" who have got it! (Charles, was that you?) "Umpooka" is umbrella, indeed!

Leah, yogurt is "yoga" which also means "Yoda"--that makes for some confusing conversations. As in, "Me be yoga, me use light saba, eat me yoga!" (this usually said while brandishing a yogurt-covered knife)

Thanks for playing, ya'll.

Special Bonus Wee One Word: umpooka

If you can guess the meaning of that one, I'll reward you by publishing your name here on Quistilton News. I get at least three hits a day--you'll be internationally known in short order. Leave your guesses in the comments section.

So I turned on word verification for the comments section. Sorry.

This means you'll have to read a funny-looking security word and enter it when you leave a comment. It keeps robots from leaving unwanted spam comments. And you know, I was starting to get tired of deleting entries such as this one: "Hey, just read your blog, and boy is it GREAT! My friend has a blog about Indian wedding dresses!! Why don't you check it out? You can see all the best deals on Indian wedding dresses HERE (insert appropriate annoying link)." They weren't even putting them just on the home page, where I could find them--they were being hidden in old, archived posts. Grrrrr. Hopefully this security feature will work.

Why We Live Here

Wee One Translation Handbook

egebaytah = elevator
pooyah = pillow
woo-woo (recently also “woobie-woobie”) = dog
Hiyaeen = Halloween
hing (As in, “No me not hing!” ensuing tantrum) = swing
mine = my (this just has the effect of making her sound German)
Wega = Wegmans (as in, “Me go a Wega me get f(r)ee cookie!”)
white = green, pink, brown, blue, red
geen = gold (as in the shiny gold ford focus)
hank = thanks
Mama = Apparently, any woman she loves

Favorite song: Happy Birthday, preferably sung to the dog
Favorite phrase: “Me do it me own!”
Favorite activity: Clutching the dog’s lips

Kindergarten is AWESOME!

We have settled into a lovely pattern here, with my working-morning weekdays and the Wee One napping and the Biggie’s trumpeted arrival home from school. I finally feel like things are resembling normalcy, in a way that they never have since the Biggie first burst upon the scene, all big-eyed seven pounds and two ounces of her. My mom was right, I crave routine. It’s strangely comforting not to have to decide anew what to do, every single day.

The Biggie adores kindergarten, the music, art, Pledge of Allegiance (“for Richard Stands”) and gym class, everything except the bathroom. The teacher and I recently realized that she is not going at school, she’s waiting until she gets home. Although that is no great length of time compared with her pee-holding record (16 hours), it is simply not sustainable over the long haul. Argh, the heart-shriveling specter of potty training haunts us once more.

But the rest of kindergarten rocks, and I am wondering why we were paying $300 a month to send her for two days a week to a little monochromatic preschool where they only served vegan snacks and the art corner was a pile of paper scraps. (“Why won’t she eat hummus?” they asked, as if it were some serious spiritual shortcoming. I hemmed and hawed over that one, having the grace not to reply that it tastes like feet dipped in lemon juice.)

I am sad because the Wee One’s babysitter is having a new baby of her own, and won’t be able to watch Wee anymore. (Of course I’m happy about the baby itself!) Sad especially because the Wee One loves the stuffing out of her, and calls her “Mama Manda”--I am referred to as the “Biggie’s Mama.” It will be nice, however, to save another $300 a month, though this will require me starting work at 6 each morning, so the Husband can watch the small ones while I surf and type away. Automatic coffee machine = New Best Friend.

Fall has come to central New York, and with it the rain and the smell of wood smoke in the air. We are preparing for winter’s hunkering down, buying long johns and sweaters, pulling out the down comforters and the flannel sheets. This is my favorite season; everything is dying in an orderly, preprogrammed way that makes you see the beauty in this aspect of life.

Hot cider, anyone?

The Stats

We went to the doc today, twice. Due to their mess-up (I scheduled these appointments at 3 and 3:15 in MARCH), the Wee One went at 2:00, then I had to go get the Biggie at school and bring her back at 3:15.

The Wee One enjoyed her appointment immensely. She stripped off all her clothes and was allowed to remain that way, IN PUBLIC, for 45 minutes! Heaven, as far as she was concerned. Plus she got to show off her jumping and mega-climbing skills. We finished on time, I zoomed down the hill and got to the Biggie’s school at 3:00—excellent!

Except that the Husband had her booster seat in his car. Thought for half a risky second about driving without it, then called the husband and got him to drive the booster downtown. Will buy new booster for other car this weekend.

We were only ten minutes late. The Biggie was fine until they went to take her temperature. “DO NOT PUT THAT IN MY EAR! IT WILL HURT!” she screamed at the bewildered, kindly nurse. There was a similar reaction when they wanted to test her hearing. “Don’t worry, the doctor will talk to her,” the nurse assured me as she left us in the airless, rapidly shrinking room. I was sweating bullets—I know my daughter better than she does. The funny, grandfatherly doctor whom we all love entered the room. The Biggie showed him how she could jump and stick out her tongue and list words that begin with the letter “A.” Then he took out the ear-looker. “NO!” her face contorted into a demonic scowl and she covered her ears. He tried telling her there were butterflies in her ears (a bit amateurish, I thought). He let her put it in her ear herself. He let her put it in HIS ear, and look for the butterflies (“They have blue and yellow spots!” he exclaimed. “I do see them,” she replied.) Then he tried to look in her ears again. “NO! NO! NO!” I melted into my seat. “Is this…an extreme reaction?” I asked. “Well, yes, I would definitely say that,” he replied as he wiped the sweat from his brow. “You need to make sure she doesn’t think she can take control of everything in this way.” I sank further into the chair. He left the room for a moment. I used the opportunity to attempt a bribe: performance of hearing check in exchange for apple pie at the Rarely-Visited Golden-Arches-Type Heathen Fast Food Restaurant. An extremely rare tactic, the Outright Bribe; even more rare, the heinous and despicable Junk Food Bribe. I don’t believe I have ever used that one in such a bald manner, to tell the truth.

So of course when he came back, the first thing she did was tell him about it. If I could get lower in the chair, I would actually be under it, licking used gum off the seat.

He tried again to look in her ears, and was visibly frustrated with her anxiety. Man, if a professional is having a hard time, shouldn’t I feel good about how I deal on a daily basis? Or maybe this guy is just easily flustered. I mean, she wasn’t even pulling out all the stops.

I could have forced her to do it, of course—held her down and threatened punishment if she didn’t stop whining, but the doctors have always seemed so unwilling to cause any trauma. I was following their lead. I am never sure what to do in these cases—I mean, do they really NEED to see the blue and yellow butterflies?

When he finally left the room, sweating bullets, I helped her get her sneakers on. I offered her one more try—ears for pies. She said resignedly, “Oh, ok,” and immediately tried to bargain for a new My Little Pony as well. (Request denied.) And then she did it for the nurse with only one or two squeaks. ARGH!

Wee One: At two years, 23.6 pounds and 32 inches. Biggie: At five years, 38 pounds and 42 ¾ inches.

Why Do I Try To Take Them Shopping?

Highlight of trip to Kmart: Wee One pulling down her pants in the cart and yelling “Me Poo Poo!” at the top of her lungs, with bare tushy in the middle of the party supply section. Run to bathroom; false alarm.

Highlight of trip to Wegmans, directly following: Same procedure, this time in canned goods. During whirlwind zoom through the store I keep saying, “Just hold it in, we’re almost there, wait until we get to the bathroom,” to which the Wee One keeps replying with her favorite new word, “Why? Why? Why?”

Upon return to the Quistilton Ranch, Wee One insists upon walking around the house with her pants around her ankles, eating a banana.

Why?

All Hail the Wee One!

I have mother-guilt because I don’t publish the sorts of obsessively detailed, isn’t-my-child-amazing posts about the Wee One as I did about the Biggie. But then I realize that it is her own fault, since her relentless quest for self-destruction is what keeps me from my keyboard. She is amazing in her own way, and for the sake of efficiency, let’s adopt a list format. Keep in mind that she will be two on Sunday, and is the size of many twelve-month-olds:

She can climb up (and down) the ladder of the bunk bed. (“Me kime buck bed!”)
Since she was 20 months old she has been, for all intents and purposes, potty trained.
She has a sixth sense regarding the location of any knives, scissors, open containers of liquid, and anything which could cause a stain. This is uncanny and applies to households other than our own.
She hangs and swings from perilous heights off the side of play structures, dropping herself to the ground below. The first time I saw this trick, I thought she was falling.

And so on.

I remember when we moved to Ithaca and first hit the local playground scene. I met a boy who was the same exact age as the Biggie (then dba Toddlerita). The Toddlerita and I watched him, she clutching my hand, as he clambered over the monkey bars, swooped down the slide, and generally kept himself elevated six feet in the air, in constant motion. I threw dirty looks in the direction of his neglectful mother, who was chatting calmly as her child hurtled about. Why wasn’t she spotting him? He could fall and break his neck! I gently supported the Toddlerita’s rear as she clutched the railing and took the steps one at a time up to the slide, which she would not go down. Ahh, remember those days?

Now I know why that woman was so unconcerned. I know that she was so far beyond being able to control his movement that she had come to terms with the sheer impossibility of the task, and had let go, attaining a zen-like state of mothering. She was not standing under him, holding her breath, because she knew that he probably wouldn’t fall—he was that good, that astoundingly coordinated. And I have a feeling that he was also a grocery cart stander, and a couch-to-coffee-table leaper. And that she, like me, probably smiled graciously at gaping passersby as her child squealed and flailed like an angry, acrobatic demon-pig whenever she DID try to restrain him.

Happy almost-birthday, my dear Wee One. I am posting this now because you are asleep, and lord knows when you will allow me to write again.

So it has happened: The Biggie has started kindergarten. I have such seesawing, ambivalent feelings on this subject. On the one hand, YEEHA! Less work! Less guilt about not responding to her every intellectual query! Etc, etc. On the other hand, YIKES! My baby is with relative strangers for thirty hours a week! My baby is riding, UNSEATBELTED, in a bus with twenty other screaming (and bigger) kids! What about her fear of imaginary violent play? What if she can’t get her overalls unstrapped when she has to go to the bathroom?

For the first two days, I put her on the bus, rode to the school to meet the bus and bring her to her classroom, and did the reverse at the end of the day. On the first day, the bus actually beat me home. Can you imagine that—me huffing and puffing with the Wee One behind me in the little bike seat, dying of humiliation when I was NOT THERE TO MEET MY CHILD OFF THE BUS ON HER VERY FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL. Many caring friends and relatives having convinced me that this is a sappy, ridiculous gesture, I put her on the bus this morning, stayed home, and am now waiting for her to arrive. She is ok with this, I think. I’m not sure if I am.

She has some concerns. She is worried that they are not learning anything—I think she thought she would already know how to read books by now. On Friday, when we were walking home (because she decided NOT to ride the bus that day), she started sniffling. Ah, here it is, I thought—the expected mental breakdown, the stress and trauma of it being just too much time away. “I missed you all day,” she said through tears. “I know, honey, is that why you’re crying?” I patted her on the back. “No—I’m crying because I can’t go back to school for two whole days!” She likes being so big, and buying chocolate milk at lunch (though I don’t think she drinks it). And she likes sitting at the peanut-free table with her allergic friend.

On the whole, I think it is a good thing, though we are all going through adjustments. The Wee One is having the worst time of all of us, I think—she’s just not used to being alone with boring old me. All day long, it’s “Me go, see Biggie at Biggie’s park!” (That’s what she calls the playground at school.) She calls for her as she falls asleep for her nap, and the first thing she says when she wakes up is “Biggie COME HOME!”

****************************************************************

So she comes home, and what’s the first thing she says? “Kindergarten is AWESOME! I want to ride the bus EVERY DAY!”

An era is over.

Kindergartner Question of the Day: "Which is more brave, bees or rain?"

There has been an appalling lack of quality updates lately, and I apologize. Much energy is going elsewhere—work, housework, travel, etc. But enough excuses!

The Biggie is preparing for kindergarten (she refers to herself as a “Kindergartner-in-Waiting”). We recently found out who her new teacher will be, and I am secretly thrilled that she happens to be the wife of a local unicycling juggler. How cool is that? The Big and I bought ALL the hippest size-5 stuff at one of our local consignment shops yesterday. I am pretty sure she will be the only kindergartner with a purple faux-snakeskin jacket.

The Wee One is mellowing with age, meaning she now frequently responds in words rather than screams and displays marginally acceptable behavior in public. She sat in the grocery cart all the way until checkout today (at which point she started using my body as a jungle gym—better me than the candy rack), and I only had to bribe her with a cookie and a bagel. Yeeha! We attended an absolutely lovely wedding this weekend and both of the kids had this strange, sweet glow about them. When they got tired they smiled and drooped on our shoulders, rather than whining and transforming into rabid, anti-social lemurs. The other kids there behaved amazingly as well. (Hmm, five kids, no tantrums despite it being naptime—was there something in the cake?) There were many adoring, childless young newlywed-types there, and I won’t be at all surprised if there is a fresh crop of babies in nine months or so.

Well, there is much more to report, but sadly, no time. I would at least like to send great big internet shout-outs to Jenn, Nicole and Amy—rock on, mama soul (and literal, at least for Jenn) sisters!

(Shhhh, do not tell anyone that I let the dog up on the couch with me. Or that I gave him a cold-pack cheese food-coated cracker.)

Not That I’m Complaining, But…

Why, exactly, do they give me the senior citizens’ discount at the Salvation Army?

OK, this definitely falls into the category of, Only the Parent of This Child Would Read This Entire Entry, but this is the closest thing I have to a baby book for her, and I’m saving this, damnit. Or dammit. Whichever you prefer. As far as I know, she has never actually seen the movie of The Little Mermaid, but she has read those wretched Disney storybooks and their “sequels”—hence the appearance of “Malady.” I have no idea from whence came the land snake/sea snake plot twist.

As quoted to the Husband of the Blog, verbatim:

“Ariel Gets Married to Prince Eric and They Decide That Mermaids and Humans Could Go On the Land”

Once upon a time there was a family of snakes and the mom and the baby were regular snakes but it was different because the dad and the sister and the brother were all water snakes and they loved the water. So the mom and the sister were blue and the brother was green and the baby was green and the dad was black, but they loved the sea but there was one problem with the sea, I mean the ocean. Well in the ocean there was lots of sharks, but it was very good actually because they actually liked sharks and their, one of their mermaid friends' (and they liked mermaids too) name was Ariel and but Ariel had a pet fish named Googa wooga toogle wooga was a yellow fish with black stripes and Googa wooga was very funny because he always went, "Googa tooga wwooga lita tita googa woooga tiga, googa wooga is my name." He always said that to Ariel and Ariel said, "What, what, what are you saying I can't understand you, why do you talk in such a silly voice." And the family of snakes, the momma didn't like this because the momma was a land snake and all of the others were water snakes, the only one that was a land snake was the momma.

And the momma was very very silly and because she was silly, because her parents were silly because they were silly, because their parents were silly because they were silly, because their parents were silly because they were silly, which was very very very very silly. And the mom lived in a cage of rocks, because she loved rocks and the sister lived in a cage filled with water, so did the brother and so did the dad, the dad had water that had rocks on the very very bottom and that was not very comfortable so he got a tiny bit of leaves so he put a tiny bit of water into it and he made it into a little cup and he got a piece of grass one day when he was walking on the land and he tied it around the leaves to make it shut so it would - pretend we were making the movie - so he decided to put a whole bunch of water and the kinds of food he liked to eat into there so it could be a bag of food and every single day he went out to make another one so he could survive and he did survive, but he always got tummy aches because he ate four every single day because they were so so so so good.

He really really needed to see Ariel, because it was very very very close to the day Ariel was going on a very long vacation because so he decided to take the kids on a special adventure to her house out in a big big pool of water to see her fish pet Inkle winkle dinkle tink tink wink dink tola and then she had a magical X-wing fighter that could float deep within the big ocean which was totally blue so the bad witch who had octopus legs could not see it and would think it was part of the sea and would swim right in front of it and get crashed by its big cannons and she would think the sea was shooting her, not a big ship. And she loved the way it had so many water cannons and torpedoes on it and it looked like a gigantic shark and she did not like sharks, but she liked sharks and the sea witch did not like sharks because they would eat her kids and she had a kid every single day that would always appear magically and the sharks would eat it because they were Ariel's friends and Arieal was trying to protect herself because she was a very very brave mermaid because she was very good at saving herself.

And the snakes loved this because it was so fun riding in an underwater X-wing fighter, but she didn't tell them that she was actually going on a boat and getting married to her boyfriend Prince Eric. She absolutely didn't tell them because it was very sad to them because they wouldn't see. They decided to be land snakes so they would see Ariel more. And so they on the day of Ariel's vacation she found a big blue boat where her boyfriend was and they decided to hide in it and they were turned into a person now because the bad sea witch gave her a potion to turn into a human because she thought that humans were bad, and she thought that humans would not kill her children and would take away sharks, but they wouldn't because they were afraid of sharks.

It's kinda hard to tell you this, but she was hoping to turn into a human, so she could marry Prince Eric so she got married and then months months later she had a baby and she just remembered that she was trying to name her Malady and Malady once went into the sea, but she too turned into a mermaid. So Ariel turned back into a mermaid and Malady turned back into a human so Ariel turned back into a human so they decided that some humans could go in the water and some humans could go on land and some mermaids and mermen could go in the water and some mermaids and mermens could go on the land.

The end.

Trying to follow instructions from the obliging Goddess of Clarity (thank you, madam!), I rooted around in my code for a while, but decided that what Quistilton really needed was a facelift. And republishing the blog with a new template just happened to fix the spacingness problem. So, voila! “What Free Time” and Shane will return soon; I need to find their links again.

I just finished the John Irving novel, all 820 pages of it. I didn’t start liking it until I was halfway through. Then I loved it, and could not stop reading—I was up until 5 this morning. (The kids got up at 5:30.)

Do you think I’m going to start the new Harry at this time of night? You betcha!

Things I Never Thought I Would Have To Say, Part One

“Get your foot out of your yogurt.”

“Stop licking your sister.”

“DO NOT EAT THE POOP!” (This to the dog, mercifully.)

It has finally happened. They are both sitting on the couch, reading the “American Girls” catalog that I didn’t manage to toss in the recycle before the Biggie snatched it. The Biggie is saying, “Do you like this one? Or this one? Or this one? Or this one?” and the Wee One is saying sullenly, “Mo. Mo. Mo. Mo.” But they are sitting calmly, together, while I hide over here and play on my little computer. If only I had that latte…(see the entry from July 10, 2003).


Murphy’s Law rules again…Immediately after I wrote that, the Wee One, naked except for striped socks, climbed into my lap and thrust her sticky fingers in my hair. Ahhh, popsicle season!

HELP! Does anyone know why my posts are coming up in this funny format, with the big spacing-ness?

Great Expectations

I am genetically incapable of waiting patiently. The night before I started kindergarten, I went to bed, only to rise and don my red corduroy knickers and Winnie-the-Pooh shoes, go downstairs and find that my parents had not yet gone to bed. It was 10:30 pm.

When I went to Disney World at the age of 6, I woke up in the hotel at 4:30, ate my little cardboard box of Sugar Smacks, and proceeded to perch on the end of my parents’ bed and wiggle until they had to get up and take me to the Magic Kingdom.

Needless to say, most of the Christmas presents in our house growing up had finger-pokes in the paper or mysteriously loose tape before December 25th.

And now, there’s a whole week of breathless anticipation ahead of me. I don’t enjoy breathless anticipation—I have asthma. John Irving’s new novel comes out today, but I have no way of getting to the store anytime soon. Harry Potter will be released on the 16th. Lisa, A and O of "What Free Time?" fame are arriving in only a few days. And Fishsuit’s baby is refusing to exit the womb.

Argh!

A Little Burst of Sunshine in the Nine-to-Five

I just love my job. I am paid not-insignificant wages to sit in my house, at my computer, searching the internet for interesting (at least to me) information. I can do it whenever I want, there are no real deadlines, and there is no commute. My dog is at my feet. My children are playing happily next door with their way-cool babysitter, and if one of them gets sick I can be there in thirty seconds. And the wardrobe? Jeans and flax, baby, jeans and flax.

What is weird about this? Many things. I took five years off, and assumed I would have to start from scratch, career- and reimbursement-wise. Instead, this company basically found ME, and gobbled up my hodge-podge resume with relish, saying I was perfectly suited for them. Each person I spoke with told me how excited they were to have me on board, and they offered me more than I made at my last job.

I am still in shock, waiting for the other shoe to drop and the bubble to burst. (“Oh, did we mention that you have to do all of this UNDERWATER, writing with your own BLOOD in SWAHILI?”) I was used to explaining and deemphasizing my flaky past--”Oh, well I didn’t really end up using that Classical Civilization major...” “The poetry award? Yeah, well, that was a different time.” And I didn’t even have to mention the utter dominance of my children over my career, free time, and workday. Almost all of my coworkers are women, moms, and most of us work in home offices while running households. I tell you, how much cooler has the world gotten?

At my most recent in a series of seemingly dead-end jobs, I worked evaluating the financial losses of folks who have been injured (hi, Bob and Heather!). While performing this work I came across a disturbing little nugget of information: a college-educated woman who takes time off to raise her family loses approximately one million dollars of earnings in her lifetime. That comes from taking time off for childbirth and childrearing, fewer and smaller raises because of the loss of professional experience, taking the lower-key positions which are more compatible with the demands of family, etc, etc. One million dollars!

But what is lovely, and circular, and contributes to my belief in a guiding higher power, is that the experience I gained at that job (which seemed so meaningless and frustrating at the time), is what landed me this lovely, rewarding, fantastic position which will certainly help make up for my million-smacker loss. So Bob, remember when you gave me that new, “senior” job title instead of the raise I expected, and I looked at you in disbelief and more than a smidge of anger?

Thanks.

Pediatric Conflict Resolution

Biggie: “Sit down for a minute, I want to talk to you.” (Wee One sits on the nearest available chair, which happens to be the potty. She pees.) “The dalmation puppy you’re holding is very special to me. Do you remember that I got it at the Salvation Army?” Wee One: “Mm-hmm!” Biggie: “And you know how special it is to me?” Wee One: “Mm-HMM!” Biggie: “So can I have it back now, please?” Wee One, standing and wielding the puppy in question: “MOPE!” (=”Nope!”)

And You Thought You Knew Me...

I am probably the only person in the universe who has both Dooce.com and Flylady.net on her bookmarks bar.

What A Long, Strange Trip It’s Been

Hi all, sorry so long without an update. Much has been happening in the land of Quistilton. The first no-blogging excuse was that I got a job. Yes! After five years of near-unemployment, I reentered the workforce with a vengeance, in high-powered suits and heels, running knock-down drag-out business meetings, putting in 12-hour days, the whole shebang.

OK, so I’m lying. I’m doing internet research and writing up reports in our dining room. The company has about fifty employees, primarily other ladies in home offices like myself. They don’t care how little I work each week, they’re funny and smart, they’re understanding of the demands of family, and needless to say it’s quite a raise in pay. I immediately went out and bought myself a work wardrobe made entirely of FLAX--now that excursion is a whole other blog unto itself.

Then I got some sort of unidentified dread disease which we’re calling the Dengue Fever. It started out with a dizzy, fevered weekend I spent in bed. Then weird spots started appearing on my body, and growing in a disturbing, flesh-eating-virus sort of way. One hideously swollen limb later, it morphed into migratory arthritis affecting almost all of my major joints. After a couple of office visits and ER stays, I came away with four conflicting diagnoses, prescriptions for two different antibiotics, steroids, and pain medication, and a strict, heartbreaking order--stop nursing the Wee One immediately.

If any of you has ever stopped nursing cold turkey after five and a half years of being pregnant, nursing, or both, then you’ll know what my beat-up bod has gone through for the past two weeks. Puberty was nothing compared to these hormonal windstorms. At one point I found myself breaking down on the phone with the garbage man because he fined us twenty dollars for putting out the recycle on the wrong day. I actually stooped to this: “Well (sniff) it’s entirely possible that I put it out on the wrong day (snuffle), as I have been in and out of the HOSPITAL lately.”

And the boobs. Don’t even mention the boobs. Let’s just say thank God for the Vicodin.

Of course, the Wee One was absolutely fine. I nursed her one more time before I went on the medication, and explained the situation to her. She was a little sad, and asked for it a few times, but generally went along her merry way. She does occasionally make me pretend to nurse her dolls. Oh, and last Friday she decided to potty train herself. She sat on the toilet in the morning, and asked to go every time she felt the urge. There was not a single wet or dirty diaper all day. All I can say is, I SO DESERVE THIS after my last indescribably hellish experience with the transition from diapers to toilet. The difference is so extreme. Last time, the then-Toddlerita would expound endlessly upon the reasons that she could neither wear diapers nor pee on the potty, using multiple descriptors and colorful language. The Wee One is so wee, and so relatively inarticulate, that she simply grabs her crotch a la Madonna and says “pu-pu” regardless of which body function she wants to perform. I have no idea where I am going to find such tiny underpants. No, I shouldn’t say that; Murphy’s Law with its accompanying Toileting Corollary will smite me. I have heard too many stories of early toileteers regressing on a whim and ending up back in diapers until they’re five. All I can say is, THANK YOU. This may be what finally cements my belief in a benevolent higher being, or at least karma.

What else is going on? The Husband is doing well, and the Biggie is diligently working on reducing her whining. We went to kindergarten screening, and she was in her element, performing for the teachers. The dog is growing exponentially, and mellowing as he leaves young puppyhood behind. This morning I found the Wee One walking through the kitchen with him, leading him by his TONGUE. It helps that he spends every day wrestling with the 90-pound Lab “puppy” who lives in the adjoining yard.

That’s about it on Planet Quistilton. A great big internet shout-out to my parents, who sped out here last weekend and saved the day, to the tireless Husband, who is on eternal kid duty while I sit with my useless legs up, and to all my family, friends and neighbors who are offering emotional support, babysitting and making us lovely food. Thank you!

Parenting Olympic Level Challenge: Maintain your place at the front of the line at the DMV for two hours and five minutes while simultaneously entertaining a hyperactive 18-month-old with a propensity for personal harm. You are armed only with a cell phone and a tube of chapstick. Cell phone may not be used to call for reinforcements.

Yesterday the Biggie acted out an elaborate story called “Crocus: The First Sign of Spring” starring two stuffed Peeps. It included, among other things, a skating lake of rainbow ice and a magical crocus garden which caused the Peeps to shrink down in size and then grow into giants, a la Alice in Wonderland. The Peeps were sent to us, along with real marshmallow Peeps, chocolate eggs (which I sneakily stashed in the pantry and have eaten almost all of), jelly beans, etc, etc, by the saintly Grandma Dubbidu, who knows I am forever and always a sugar addict. Hm--maybe she meant for the KIDS to have all that stuff.

The arrival of the package was honestly the most exciting thing to happen to us all week. We’re in the long, slogging, almost-spring time now. It seems like each new day MUST be when it’s going to happen--winter will truly be over! But then it starts to snow, or sleet, or the sky simply turns that soul-defeating gray I became so familiar with while living in Seattle. We’re ever-optimistic here in the hinterlands, though. I was driving down the street the other day, windows open with a warm breeze blowing in, soaking up the sunshine and feeling like a million bucks, when I passed one of those electronic thermometer signs. It was 38 degrees.

The dog is getting bigger, and no longer eliminates randomly throughout the house. The Wee One is becoming ever more dangerous and unpredictable in her movements. Her charm factor is increasing, however, as she adds new songs to her repertoire. (She currently performs “Where is Thumbkin?” “The Goodnight Song” and the opening notes of Beethoven’s Ninth, as well as unidentified succession of notes which is accompanied by a bottom wiggle and means, “Hey, I want that!”)

The Biggie has turned over a new leaf with the whining, i.e. it’s diminishing at last. The school board finally redistricted the elementary schools and we can tell her which one she’ll be starting at in the fall. Fortunately it’s the one with the most amazing playground on earth, complete with a miniature Cornell bell tower, awesome swings and ride-on dolphin sculptures. Because, you know, that’s what’s really important in an elementary school. Anyway, I digress, but it’s all pretty much digression, isn’t it?

Are there any brownies left in the cookie jar? Off I shuffle. Hope you all are well.

CUTE.

The man who Milo and I met at the park today told me all about his “pedigree Datsun.”

(Milo is the new pooch, by the way. See homepage for pic.)

Overheard on the Telephone This Morning

The four-year-old talking to her friend* Riley:

“We were quite concerned that my Po doll was in the attic, actually.”

* A few months ago, the Biggie said to me in a matter-of-fact manner, “Well, Riley told me that she hated me, so I don’t know if she wants to play anymore.”

It’s a Far Cry From “Footloose”

Did you know that Kenny Loggins had a kids’ CD out? The “Neverland Medley” is our new “put it on repeat so that mama gets five minutes to herself” theme.

Thank you Elaine!

I Am That Mother

I am that mother whose toddler stands up in the grocery cart. Give me all the evil glares you want--and then why don’t YOU try keeping her strapped in. Yes, I KNOW she can climb from the seat into the cart by herself. Believe it or not, I AM WATCHING HER.

I am that mother who, when her preschooler with the ear infection bursts into tears in the hair care aisle, gives in and lets her have the hairbands AND the barrettes AND the obnoxiously tiny, chokeworthy butterfly hair clips.

I am that mother whose snot-dripping toddler, shrieking with glee, redistributes the bottom two rows of cold and flu aids while the aforementioned ear infection sufferer screams that she will NOT share the headbands with her younger sister, NO!

And I am that mother whose prescription is rushed by the pharmacist so that she will get the hell out of there before her kids destroy the store.

Yep, that’s me. Happy RSV* season, everyone!


*RSV = Respiratory Syncytial Virus, the cold of choice of my children. It and its look-alike landed the Wee One in the hospital not once, but twice, last winter. The fact that she reacts so strongly to it (virtually everyone gets it, but not everyone's lungs crackle and pop like breakfast cereal when they have it) means she'll probably have asthma when she's older. Yeeha!

I'm Psychic (Though In My Family We Call It "Psycho")

“Look at that UPS truck! Maybe there’s a surprise package in it for me!” I swear I said this to the Husband of the Blog only yesterday, as I drove him up to the airport. “Ooh, or maybe there’s a package for me in THAT truck--or THAT one!” I love packages, and there has been a lot of crazymaking going on lately--maybe that's why I was having the idea that someone might send me a package out of nowhere.

So then, when we arrive home from the Wee One’s doc appointment (cast all gone, yeeha!), what is there waiting on the doorstep? A SURPRISE PACKAGE. Containing the TWO BEST surprise package ingredients EVER--chocolate and coffee.

Thank you, Ms. Lisa. You are indeed a good, good friend!

Why I Am Never, Ever Going Outside With Them Again. At Least Not Until It Stops Snowing. Which Will Be In May.

This morning I hit upon the idea that we should get out, out of the stuffy house, out into the lovely beautiful snowbrushed landscape. Kids like snow, right? Kids want to play in the snow. I shouldn’t deprive my kids of that simple pleasure. So it’s decided, then. We’re going out in the snow!

I made that foolhardy decision at 9:19 this morning. We actually stepped out the door at 10:05. The preceding 46 minutes were spent locating coats, snow pants, mittens, hats, frog boots, frog boot liners, blankets and the sled, then wrapping the Wee One’s cast (don’t ask) in plastic bags and large socks, maneuvering both kids into previously mentioned snow gear, listening to them gritch about the heat while I tried to find MY snow gear, stuffing cookies and water and overdue Teletubbies videos into my backpack, securing the Wee One in her sled and squeezing out through the mudroom all at once because the Biggie was suddenly too shy to leave my hip and walk out one foot ahead.

We then commenced on the four-block walk to the library, a trip which would normally take a brisk walker like myself seven minutes, tops. Our first stop was 35 feet from the front door, when the Biggie had to kick snow into the creek from the bridge. This is good, I thought, this is the playing in snow type of stuff I was thinking about. We went one block, and then she had to sit in a snowdrift and take a drink of water to “give her legs engerny.” Half a block further, and we dallied by a bush while she dug through the snowy envelope to create a soft, soft bird’s nest. “I am making it extra-soft for the little birds, Mama!” Never mind that all the little birds are sipping Shirley Temples in Florida right now.

Then came the spike in the foot. “Oh, there is a spike in my foot!” she cried and dropped into a snowdrift. Off came the boot and sock, which were each carefully inspected by the chief spike-remover and found to contain no sharp objects. Back on went the sock, tucked carefully into the snow pants and topped by the boot. Upon standing and shuffling forward, “OW! Spike in there!” She took them off again, foot naked in the 16-degree air. Another inspection. Another redonning. Another shuffling. Another removal. Another inspection. Another redonning. Another shuffling. Another removal. This time the spike was on the side. “Can you just walk on the bottom of your foot so the spike doesn’t hurt you?” NO. Off again, inspected again, still nothing found, but this time the spike mysteriously disappeared. I suspect it’s because the chief spike-remover energetically threatened to turn around and go back home again.

By this time, we were nearly two blocks from home. Thirty minutes had passed. The Wee One, immobilized in her sled, was starting to turn a beety shade of pink. At regular thirty-second intervals she was shrieking that shriek of unhappiness, the ear-melting shriek that makes me want to fill her prescription for Tylenol with codeine over and over again. I tried to speed up, but this caused massive outbursts of whining: “You are going too fast! You are going to lose me! STOP! WAIT FOR ME!” Copious tears. Have I mentioned the exponential increase in whining activity lately? How it starts in the morning, gathers momentum in the afternoon, peaks before dinner and ceases only when she starts snoring? (“Ah, this is what three is like,” her teacher says in a knowing way. Um, well she’s FOUR, but I’m sure there’s a nice, pat, unchangeable explanation for it at that age, too.)

Somehow I hustled them over the last two blocks to the welcoming entrance of the library, where we ditched the sled, two layers and the whining, for the moment. Total time elapsed: 52 minutes.

Do NOT ask how we got home.

“Mama, do you want to know what makes a baby in the mama’s belly?” “Sure.” (I’ve dealt with this before--see the entry for August 25, 2003.) “A little bit of love on a little honeymoon.”

This is what happens when you allow your child to listen to country music. We have the Husband of the Blog to thank for this, NOT ME. He has them trouping about to the melodies of Alan Jackson and his ilk. Not that I ever listen to it, no. It’s not like I have the lyrics to “Livin’ on Love” and “Drive” memorized, no way!

Again with the sudsy diapers! What is UP? Does anyone know anything about this weirdness? It is only with diapers, and only since I got Wegman's brand detergent. This is what I get for being a cheap hippie.

A great big thank you goes out to Susan in Seattle, who just sent me a collection of all the cartoons ever published in the New Yorker. I will reemerge from the bathroom in approximately ten years.

Snapshot of the Quistilton Household, 12:06 pm

I am washing the French Press in the bathroom sink. Why? Because there are 36 clean, but soap-saturated cloth diapers in the kitchen sink. I am washing the French Press because I was awake from 1 until 5 this morning, after falling asleep with the Wee One at 8 last night, and I either need to drink more coffee or prop my eyelids open with toothpicks. I can’t find the toothpicks.

The Biggie is playing “School” with remnants of a piece of multigrain bread. “See, Mama, these crumbs are the students and the sesame seed is a teacher!” This is because we are cruel parents and don’t allow her to have real toys. The nine-and-a-half foot tall tree (which blocks out 50% of the natural light coming into the house) is listing to one side, after I stripped three broken light strands off it this morning. (Have you ever taken lights off an already-decorated tree?) The washing machine is continuously washing, mysteriously not draining soapsuds (see first sentence of blog).

The Beginning of the End of the Not Sleeping, Maybe

I have decided to teach the Wee One how to fall asleep at night without nursing, so that theoretically I might one day be able to leave her with another person and know that she will not spend the entire sleepy time screaming. I know that many of you think I should have already done this. I know that many of you probably think it’s weird that I’m still nursing her at all, since she can walk, climb on top of the kitchen table in less than ten seconds, and drive a stick shift.

So, filled with fear and trepidation, I nursed her the other night in the rocking chair, telling her all the while that “When we’re all done with milk we’re going to go upstairs and just fall asleep, like the Biggie!” And that’s what we did. She squirmed, yelled for ten minutes, and then, miraculously, settled into a quiet state during which she stared into my eyes while I sang “Wheels on the Bus” approximately forty times. The next night, there was no yelling at all. I am in shock.

I have spent such a long time functioning on so little sleep that I don’t know what I’ll do with myself when I get a solid eight hours a night. What do you people do, you with the sleeping and the restfulness? Will the bags under my eyes disappear? Will I stop telling everyone everything twice?

Will I stop telling everyone everything twice?

Overheard on the Monitor: “Calvin, why don’t you make your own triceratops sandwich?”

There Really, Really Are No Brain Cells Left

I just called my friend Debi and left a message on her machine asking her to save milk cartons for me for a Christmas project. Then I called my friend Brita to ask her the same thing. And then I called my friend Debi, to ask her to save milk cartons for me for a Christmas project.

Sadly, that is not a misprint.

I will continue to alienate my Republican readership (all two of you) by offering the following, sent to me by my dear friend Sharon.

Bush Haiku (not really)

This is a short poem made up entirely of actual quotations from George W. Bush. These have been arranged, only for aesthetic purposes, by Washington Post writer, Richard Thompson.

MAKE THE PIE HIGHER

I think we all agree, the past is over.
This is still a dangerous world.
It's a world of madmen and uncertainty
And potential mental losses.

Rarely is the question asked
Is our children learning?
Will the highways of the Internet
Become more few?

How many hands have I shaked?
They misunderestimate me.
I am a pitbull on the pantleg of opportunity.

I know that the human being
And the fish can coexist.
Families is where our nation finds hope,
Where our wings take dream.

! Put food on your family!
Knock down the tollbooth!
Vulcanize society!
Make the pie higher!
Make the pie higher!

In the spirit of trying not to think about the abomination or elation tomorrow’s election may bring, I decided to perform one of the Quistilton Family’s most hedonistic rituals: The Returning of the Bottles and the Cans and the Change. This ritual involves dredging up the huge trash bags filled with deposit containers (Coke cans, beer bottles), dragging them to Wegmans, and counting them up to receive a measly 5 cents per container. We always wait eons to do this, until we have three or four garbage bags of funky cans and bottles, and then I force the Husband to bring the beer bottles back because I don’t want to look like a desperate alcoholic toting wee ones to the store for her deposits.

And then I have so many cans that they clog the machine and I have to move to another machine which they also fill up, while the Wee One is climbing out of the grocery cart and I can’t grab her because my hands are sticky with Old Coke Shmutz.

But then I return the change, and it’s always worth far, far more than I think it will be. Today it was $40, and that was only a paltry few handfuls of nickels, dimes and pennies. Yeeha! On to the sushi bar!

Because of course the hedonistic aspect of this festival is that it all feels like free money, so we get whatever we want in the WHOLE DARN STORE. This is what we got today, crazy nuts that we are: Two trays of sushi, Jergens intense moisturizing cream, chondroitin and glucosamine tablets for the Husband’s knee, Viactiv milk chocolate calcium chews for my poor mineral-leached bones, pink lemonade for the Biggie, and *gasp* a six-pack of beer. Good lord, someone arrest us for our folly!

Except we almost couldn’t buy the beer. “Marva,” our lovely hostess, wouldn’t allow me to buy it because the Husband didn’t have his ID with him. Somehow she believed that we, with our fatigue-aged faces and young children in tow, were attempting to illegitimately buy booze and get the naive young Husband liquored up. Dude, PARTY!

So the Husband, seething, left the store while I went back to the beer section and tried to get another six-pack of our favored local brew (“Cascazilla,” named after the lizard and Cascadilla Gorge). There wasn’t another one. Annoyed by the inconvenience, and certain the Wee One was gritching for her dinner outside, I marched haughtily to the manager’s desk and demanded, “Um, where do the cashiers put things when customers can’t buy them? See, uh, I was going to buy this beer and then she said we couldn’t because my husband didn’t have his ID and then there wasn’t another six-pack and then, um, so...” all along feeling the New Englander’s Guilt--I WAS ACTUALLY GOING TO BUY BEER. AND I ADMITTED IT.

And it turns out Marva was wrong--they’re allowed to sell beer to married people. Because presumably we need it. So, Pfffflllbbbt to you, Marva! And cheers to the rest of you. May we all survive tomorrow.

This essay was e-mailed to me today by a friend. I edited it a little for length, my apologies to the author.
***********************************************************************************************************
How Women Got To Vote (by Kathy Acuff)

A short history lesson on the privilege of voting...

The women were innocent and defenseless. And by the end of the night, they were barely alive. Forty prison guards wielding clubs and their warden's blessing went on a rampage against the 33 women wrongly convicted of "obstructing sidewalk traffic."

They beat Lucy Burn, chained her hands to the cell bars above her head and left her hanging for the night, bleeding and gasping for air. They hurled Dora Lewis into a dark cell, smashed her head against an iron bed and knocked her out cold. Her cellmate, Alice Cosu, thought Lewis was dead and suffered a heart attack. Additional affidavits describe the guards grabbing, dragging, beating, choking, slamming, pinching, twisting and kicking the women.

Thus unfolded the "Night of Terror" on Nov. 15, 1917, when the warden at the Occoquan Workhouse in Virginia ordered his guards to teach a lesson to the suffragists imprisoned there because they dared to picket Woodrow Wilson's White House for the right to vote.

For weeks, the women's only water came from an open pail. Their food--all of it colorless slop--was infested with worms. When one of the leaders, Alice Paul, embarked on a hunger strike, they tied her to a chair, forced a tube down her throat and poured liquid into her until she vomited. She was tortured like this for weeks until word was smuggled out to the press.

So, refresh my memory. Some women won't vote this year because--why, exactly? We have carpool duties? We have to get to work? Our vote doesn't matter? It's raining?

Last week, I went to a sparsely attended screening of HBO's new movie "Iron Jawed Angels." It is a graphic depiction of the battle these women waged so that I could pull the curtain at the polling booth and have my say. I am ashamed to say I needed the reminder.

It is jarring to watch Woodrow Wilson and his cronies try to persuade a psychiatrist to declare Alice Paul insane so that she could be permanently institutionalized. And it is inspiring to watch the doctor refuse.

Alice Paul was strong, he said, and brave. That didn't make her crazy. The doctor admonished the men: "Courage in women is often mistaken for insanity."
***************************************************************************************************

OK ladies--get out there and vote. And I might even forgive you for being a Republican, as long as you don't rub it in if Dubbya "wins" again.

Why, oh why, must cats express their discontent by peeing?

The same Husband who did not want a dog, who made it clear that the dog would be entirely my responsibility and had a detailed list of annoying habits the dog simply MUST NOT HAVE, spent the night on a mattress on the floor next to the dog's bed, so that Roger would not be so lonely.

Got Me a Dog

It's 7:50 pm, and all the Quistiltons (save myself) are asleep--including the newest Quistilton, Roger. Roger weighs about 50 pounds, is black and tan, short-haired, and kinda smelly. (Ah, yet another hapless being to blame the family gaseous emissions on.) We are thinking German Shepard-Random Hound mix. I'm trying to post a picture of him, but since I have the web abilities of a sea sponge, I can't figure out how. Tell ya what, do a google search for "tompkins county spca," go to their home page, click on "dogs" and scroll down. He'll be on the site for a few more days, taunting others with his cuteness, though they CANNOT HAVE HIM.

Charles, the non sea sponge, has figured out how to post a new picture of Roger. He'll sit on the home page of quistilton.com for a bit.

The Scene This Evening, 8:13 pm:

Me, scurrying down the stairs holding a coffee-clouded fishbowl, high-pitched shrieks of “I don’t want my fish to die!” echoing in the night.

The cat drinks the fishwater, and I have taken to filling it back up with the water that the Husband leaves out for the Biggie when he puts her to bed. I didn’t think about what ELSE might be in a cup on the kid’s bureau.

That was one buzzed beta.

So Much For Not Having Cable TV...(from the "Where Did THIS Come From?" Department)

(straight from the mouth of the babe)

I am Fiona, the Bad Ogre Slayer. I use this whip to snap the bag ogres in the eyes. I snap them and then they get all messy everywhere, and my husband Shrek comes and cleans them up and puts them all in the garbage, even their muscles, because we don’t want to have their slimy meat in our stir fry. We go to the grocery store to get chicken for our stir fry, and eat it up with broccoli.

This is my whip, and first I snap one eye of the ogre and then the other, and then it can’t see and I crack it on the head really hard with the air conditioner and it dies. I am very strong, you see.

Shrek, my husband, and I have children now. We have a seven year old and an eight year old and a nine year old and a ten year old and an eleven year old and a twelve year old and some babies. How many kids is that? I kill the bad ogres because they try to eat my children. They don’t hurt grown-up ogres.

Upon viewing the Biggie on tiptoe on the back of the couch, holding on to the precariously installed air conditioner for balance: “Please get down so you don’t fall.” “Oh, but this is how they taught me to do it,” she replies authoritatively. “Who?” “Mr. Nobody, the ghosts, and Peter Pan.”

More Jokes: “How did the grapes cross the road? In the belly of a kid!” “How did the playground cross the road? Got taken apart, put into boxes in a truck. Went across the road, and put back together again by a kid and her mama, in some mulch.”

Why There Are No Brain Cells Left

Over breakfast: “Can I have a spoon, please?” When given spoon, gently places it next to cereal bowl. Starts eating with fingers. “Please use your spoon.” “OK.” Uses fingers to put cereal in spoon, then puts spoon in mouth. Puts spoon down next to bowl. Starts eating cereal with hands. “Please use your spoon, sweet potato.” (Attempt at parenting with kindness.) “OK!” Continues to eat with hands. “Please stop eating like a monkey, and use your spoon.” (Attempt at parenting with humor.) “A monkey! HAHAHAHAHA!” Continues to eat with hands. “Mama, what do monkeys eat? Are they carnivores like us? Or do they eat--MONKEY BREAD?” “USE YOUR SPOON!” (Attempt at parenting with volume.) “WHAAAAAAAAA! Mama, don’t use a mean voice to me! I want to hang out with a nice mama, not a grumpy mama!”

And the wee one: “Yaaahhhh!” “What do you want, little one?” “Whaaaa!!!” “OK, do you want me to pick you up?” Pick up; she immediately starts contorting her body; flinging it back and forth like she wants to get down. Put her down. “Rrrraaaaahhhhh!” accompanied by mama pant-leg clutching. Pick up. Body contortion. Put down. Scream. And so forth.

These two sets of interactions occurred simultaneously, and this is how I frequently start my day. Some women I know have reserves of calm, pools of serenity which surround them as they go about their mama-work. They are able to turn each of the neverending queries into an opportunity for education. They are immune to the ear-blistering shrieks of the small ones. I am working on this. I am not so naturally gifted, but I’m trying, and on most days I do a good job. But then there are the days where the shriek volume is set to extra-blistery, and the migraine fairy camps out on my shoulder, waiting for an opportunity to sneak in. On those days I am flabbergasted that the human race has made it this far.

Thunderstorms and pouring down rain all day, every day, for what seems like a week now. Isn’t this why we left Seattle? I am waiting for the basement to flood, checking it hourly. There are cracks in the foundation, you can see stripes of the outside through them. Are there lares (household gods) of gutters? What could I give them as an offering, buckets of rustproof paint? The promise of biannual deleafing? There are inches-deep puddles in the yard and the patio is completely underwater. Maybe the koi pond I wanted isn’t so unrealistic, after all.

I like the rain and the cozy closed-in, hot cocoa feeling it brings, but the kids are nutso, and driving me there as well. The Biggie has been pretending to be the Wee One all day, crawling around and saying “HIYA!” This is fine, except when I’m trying to get the real Wee One down for a nap, and she keeps jerking awake to the sound of shuffle-shuffle-”HIYA” downstairs. Grrrr.

The Wee One would be walking now if she chose to, but has no patience for it. Why would she, when her legs-blurred supercrawl is faster than light? The Husband often remarks that her face must hurt, she smiles so much. There are not dimples, there are craters, black holes sucking all sunlight into the middles of her cheeks. I am savoring the baby chub while it lasts, because when this kid takes off, it’s going to be all muscle from there on out. I’m thinking wrestling, soccer--anything that will get her a scholarship.

The Biggie is, I hate to place on the record, going through a major whiner phase. She is probably just sick of hanging out with her domineering mother (“Do NOT paint the table with yogurt!”). I need to find her a preschool. (The preschool did implode after all, and we are out of luck for the fall.) All of my superkind, kid-centric attachment parenting techniques have no effect on The Whine. When it starts, my head whirls around like a top and veins start to bulge out of my neck. Maybe I’m just drinking too much coffee.

Sigh. Time to check the basement again.

The Biggie recently learned (sortof) how to tell jokes:

“Mama--MAMA! How did the King Salmon cross the road? HOW? Slither, slither, slither!”

“MAMA! How did the box cross the road? On a truck! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!”

The Best Birthday Present Ever

The night I turned eleven, my parents blindfolded me and told me to get into the back of the car. We cruised in the 18-foot Lincoln through the chill New England night. “Don’t look!” my mom said. “You know where we’re going, don’t you? She knows where we’re going,” she said to my dad. “No, I don’t!” I protested giddily.

We parked and I peeked. Bill and Andy’s bike shop. This was late December. “Well, you said you never got summer presents because your birthday was in the middle of winter.” (What a rude kid I was!) “We want to get you a ten-speed.” Shocked, I stumbled inside where we were greeted by a gentleman, possibly Bill or Andy. He steered us right over to a fleet of gleaming, impossibly fast-looking Raleighs. “This one looks about right.” It was. It was the most beautiful bike I had ever seen. Sparkling blue-gray, nice cushy saddle, sleek, skinny wheels. I think it cost a hundred and twenty dollars, an astronomical sum. I fell in love, we took it home.

I rode the next day, for hours and hours, past my dog who nearly broke his neck barking at me from the end of his rope, with mittens on in the icy air, around the block a thousand times. It was freedom and power I’d never known, like flying, like a carnival ride except I was the one making it go.

My dog got hit by a car three days later, on New Year’s Eve. My sister says I tried to kick the police officer who came to the door to tell us; I have no memory of it whatsoever. It was the first time I was depressed, and I didn’t know what to do with that sick, useless feeling. I just wanted to get away from it, like it would disappear if I went far enough, fast enough. I rode, and rode, until I started to feel better.

Now I know that’s what always works. I need exercise for my twitchy brain like I need food for my growling stomach. That’s why I did the triathlon, that’s why I get up at 6 a.m., sneak away from the babies, and run. I can’t bike for hours now because the wee one needs me, but when I do get away even for twenty minutes I get that same feeling of freedom from everything that binds me.

A few weeks ago the Husband of the Blog asked me what my inseam was, comparing it to his to mock my shortness, so I thought. Later that day he came home and pulled the tiniest road bike I’ve ever seen out of the back of the car. It’s white, with extra-small wheels so they don’t bump into the midget frame when I turn, and it weighs less than my baby.

It took me a while to figure out the “intuitive” shifting, and the seat leaves my nether regions whinging (“It’s what all the female racers use,” the guy at the shop said--well then! *Insert comment inappropriate for my family blog here.*), but when I’m in stride, on top of that big fat gear, it’s the same euphoria I remember from my eleventh birthday. And to be able to have that back, to be thirty with two kids, a penchant for migraines and a career crisis sniffing at my heels, but able to hop on and fly away for a while--why, that’s just priceless.

Thanks, hon. From the bottom of my jock-girl heart.

FYI

Yes, you can spell it "triathlon" OR "triathalon."

Also, yes, the period belongs INSIDE the quotation marks if the last word of the sentence is in quotes. I may not know a lot about editing, but this, I know.

Hiya, long time no blog! Much has been happening lately, much too much for my poor sleep-deprived neurons to handle. Here is a brief update:

Moved into the new house at the end of July, though construction still continued. Cursed self by joking with head contractor, "Heck, we've messed with every system in the house except the electric!" Two days later, was informed by an electrician that our GE breaker box was "crap." Was also informed that the Husband of the Blog would be attending a conference for a week, in South Africa. Dear, dear friends left town for various too-far-away states. Found out that the wee one has a slightly elevated lead level (one unit above normal); have spent most of waking time wiping her hands and removing foreign objects from her mouth ever since. Was called by the Health Dept. because of the lead, and though I explained that we have moved to a new environment which has been extensively renovated with lead removal a goal, they still want to come visit and check me out to make sure I'm not feeding her paint chip cocktails.

Oh yeah, and then there was this triathlon I was training for. The swim, which I had completed just two training sessions for, was first. Oddly, my awkward, flailing sidestroke did not place me near the front of the pack. There were three or four people (out of a couple hundred competing) behind me at the end of the swim, and when I got onto the bike I just started passing people. I was so far back, the first people I was passing looked like they hadn't ridden in years. They were literally weaving back and forth on the road, looking down at their gears in confusion. I say this not to disparage them, but to point out that I was BEHIND these folks, I was so damn slow in that swim. I kicked some booty on my sweet new bike (gift from the Husband of the Blog, who understands that diamonds are not THIS girl's best friend), and continued passing on the run. The knee condition I'd been coaxing into submission during all of the training finally reared its ugly head during the first mile of the run, but I gimped across the finish line in an hour and 52 minutes, which is about how long I was in hard labor with the wee one. Needless to say, the triathlon was a cakewalk in comparison.

Next year, an hour and a half, baby. Bring it on.

So here it is, a link to the triathlon web site. Yep, it's real. Yep, it's only a few weeks away. Yep, I'm gonna die. CLT 2004 Index

These Are the Days to Remember

I don’t have a “for pay” job. I spend a considerable amount of emotional energy thinking about this issue, thinking, maybe I would have more brainpower if I exercised my noggin, maybe I wouldn’t be so bitter about housework if I felt like it were more equitably shared with the Husband, maybe I wouldn’t feel so guilty about spending money if I made some. And other thoughts along these lines.

I think everyone has their reasons for how they resolve this issue in their own families, and I wholeheartedly support folks in finding their own solutions. I firmly believe that a mama who is bitter because she gave up a satisfying, hard-earned career is NOT going to raise well-adjusted kids. One of the wonderful things about living in the time that we do is that there is flexibility surrounding the childcare issue--mom can choose to stay home instead of feeling forced into it, dad can stay home if mom makes more money, there is part-time work to be had, there are fantastic care providers who can enrich your kids’ lives. Everyone can be made happy to a certain degree, at least if you’re settled snugly in the middle class.

So every once in a while I have to remind myself that I am choosing to do this. I have a Master’s degree, I could go out and make, well, SOME money (the degree is in education), but I’m deciding to forego the working world for this funny stay-at-home-mom existence, with its 24-7 workday, its piles of poop, its screaming coworkers, its neverending stacks of dishes and laundry and “art project” remains. Because I also get uninterrupted sweet nursing sessions, leisurely puddle-splashing walks, and unexpected tiny, fierce hugs throughout my workday. I don’t have a retirement account or a shot at making partner, but I do have a boatload of sweet, treasured memories of watching the creatures I produced develop and grow.

I’m not fooling myself into believing that my sun-glossed memories of these days can support me in my old age any more than Social Security will. I’m fully intending to get a for-pay job when these ragamuffins are a little older. But I know, deep down, that if I had chosen “the other way” for these first few years, there would always be something missing in my heart. Because it’s just who I am now--it’s my life, this is what I want, and I decided to do it.

I’m just reminding myself, that’s all.

Why Parents of Preschoolers Are Insane (Conversation had while driving in 91-degree weather, rush-hour traffic with screaming baby.)

“Why did you not have a cat when you were growing up?”
“Because they made Grampa sneeze.”
“Why?”
“Because he was allergic to them.”
“Why?”
“Because that’s the way he was born.”
“Why?”
“Because maybe his mama or his papa was allergic to them too.”
“What does allergic mean?”
“When something makes your eyes water and makes you sneeze.”
“Why?”
“Because your body doesn’t like it.”
“Why?”
“Some people’s bodies are just like that.”
“Is that why you didn’t have a cat when you were growing up, because of cats making Grampa’s body sneeze?”
“Yep.”
“Why?”

And so on.