While on a phone call with my mom yesterday:
Me: The kids are great, but still, you know, horrible, too. I think it's the second week of school syndrome. They've all been acting out a lot lately.
Mom: Well, they do it with their mother because that's where they feel comfortable, Jenny. You once told me that you were so angry at me because you could be. That I was like a big comfortable chair you could just collapse into and not be polite with.
Me: Huh. I don't think my kids would use the same analogy. I think to them I'm like that familiar voodoo doll you can stab, coat in lighter fluid and burn who still loves you anyway.
Friday, August 31, 2007
Thursday, August 30, 2007
Philanthropy Thursday
So. I would like to start something, guys. It doesn't have to be every Thursday. In fact, how about just the last Thursday of each month? I would like whoever stops by this blog to take a second today and think, How can I make a small difference today? What can I do, however small, to make the world just a little bit better? My dear friend, Alice, and I often talk about doing something like this, so here goes. We're doing it.
I did something yesterday that was thrilling. And also a little nerve-wracking. I am selling something on eBay for the very first time, and the proceeds are all directly going to charity (assuming it sells!). It felt really good to do this. I mean REALLY good. This is the eBay listing:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=120156286254&ssPageName=STRK:MESE:IT&ih=002 but if you want to just read the product description, I've cut and pasted it below.
If you want to take part in my new idea for Philanthropy Thursday, would you post a bit on your own blog and help spread the word? If you don't have a blog, would you let your friends know, anyway? Then just shoot me a comment or an e-mail and I'll link up to you right here at the bottom of the post. I'd be so honored if you did. I know that there is so much amazing energy in this blogosphere, and if I could be a part of something small to make the world a little better? Well, that would be amazing. Here's the product description as it reads on eBay:
I have wanted to do something, anything, for some time to help the victims of Hurricane Katrina. Sadly, I am like most people. I live far from the damage. I have a busy, fulfilling life as a mother and writer. I am privileged, with medical care, adequate insurance, and family earning potential that would shelter me from the tragic circumstances of those affected by Hurricane Katrina.
I'm not rich, however. And so I go about my life musing how "one day," when we make just a little bit more, I will do something fantastic to help those in need. How many of us think this way? That if we can't do something grand, then we will not do anything at all? We will wait for the perfect opportunity to arise. Let me tell you, that is probably never going to happen.
And so fate had me at home in the afternoon today. With four children causing me to put more miles on my car than a NYC Taxi cab, I am rarely home when Oprah airs. And when I am? I am doing fun(!) things like cleaning toilets, dodging pets, agonizing over homework, or moderating yet another bickerfest between my older children. But today I was tired. And feeling sorry for myself. I had had it *up to here* with the eye-rollings and door slammings that are par for the course with preteens in the house. Poor me, right?
Oprah aired a show today showcasing the fallout of Hurricane Katrina, two years later. I was floored. In some areas, it's as if nothing has been done. Thousands of families are living in FEMA trailers that were intended as temporary housing. These families are now sick, due to the formaldehyde seeping from the particle board walls. One family shown, with five beautiful children, had the mom talking about how her children endured severe nosebleeds, were on handfuls of pills, and how her 18 month old son (who looked a lot like my own 13 month old boy) had to use a breathing aid every day, he was so sick from his own home.
I wept.
I learned that the crime rate is horrendous, rendering a certain section in New Orleans the worst in the nation. There is a fraction of the doctors and nurses there once was, few hospital beds, and an increased death rate.
This is America? This is how insurance companies pay back their clients? This is how we, as fellow human beings allow things to get? What if this were me? Or you? Or your best friend? What would you do differently?
So I've decided that the people in New Orleans are my new best friends. I have a wedding ring set that I was holding on to, either to have made into earrings or sell and fund a trip to Europe with my daughters. It's 1.3 total carats. We bought it at Fred Meyer Jewelers in 1993. The solitaire is just under .8 carats, and the ring wrap, which is sautered to the band, is four diamonds, totalling .5 carats. It's beautiful. Shortly after my husband and I renewed our wedding vows four and a half years ago, he surprised me with a different ring, which is why I have had this one, in its original box.
We paid $1,800 for the solitaire and $700 for the wrap in 1993. It's insured for $5,000. You can see no flaws with the naked eye, although with a loup I suppose you can, since it's graded as SI, with an H color. For all the years I wore it, I received so many compliments I lost count. It sparkles like crazy, and during our lean years as a young couple, I took a lot of pride in always having that one beautiful thing.
Whoever wins this bid will be required to send funds to the New Orleans Habitat for Humanity. I will not touch a check, since I would rather get the money to them as soon, and as simply, as possible.
My hope? That you all decide New Orleans is your new best friend, or daughter, or mom, and bid as much as you can and feel good when you send that check to a charity that will help rebuild part of America. Maybe a part of you will be rebuilt, too.
Ron
Lucky Candice
Robin
I did something yesterday that was thrilling. And also a little nerve-wracking. I am selling something on eBay for the very first time, and the proceeds are all directly going to charity (assuming it sells!). It felt really good to do this. I mean REALLY good. This is the eBay listing:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=120156286254&ssPageName=STRK:MESE:IT&ih=002 but if you want to just read the product description, I've cut and pasted it below.
If you want to take part in my new idea for Philanthropy Thursday, would you post a bit on your own blog and help spread the word? If you don't have a blog, would you let your friends know, anyway? Then just shoot me a comment or an e-mail and I'll link up to you right here at the bottom of the post. I'd be so honored if you did. I know that there is so much amazing energy in this blogosphere, and if I could be a part of something small to make the world a little better? Well, that would be amazing. Here's the product description as it reads on eBay:
I have wanted to do something, anything, for some time to help the victims of Hurricane Katrina. Sadly, I am like most people. I live far from the damage. I have a busy, fulfilling life as a mother and writer. I am privileged, with medical care, adequate insurance, and family earning potential that would shelter me from the tragic circumstances of those affected by Hurricane Katrina.
I'm not rich, however. And so I go about my life musing how "one day," when we make just a little bit more, I will do something fantastic to help those in need. How many of us think this way? That if we can't do something grand, then we will not do anything at all? We will wait for the perfect opportunity to arise. Let me tell you, that is probably never going to happen.
And so fate had me at home in the afternoon today. With four children causing me to put more miles on my car than a NYC Taxi cab, I am rarely home when Oprah airs. And when I am? I am doing fun(!) things like cleaning toilets, dodging pets, agonizing over homework, or moderating yet another bickerfest between my older children. But today I was tired. And feeling sorry for myself. I had had it *up to here* with the eye-rollings and door slammings that are par for the course with preteens in the house. Poor me, right?
Oprah aired a show today showcasing the fallout of Hurricane Katrina, two years later. I was floored. In some areas, it's as if nothing has been done. Thousands of families are living in FEMA trailers that were intended as temporary housing. These families are now sick, due to the formaldehyde seeping from the particle board walls. One family shown, with five beautiful children, had the mom talking about how her children endured severe nosebleeds, were on handfuls of pills, and how her 18 month old son (who looked a lot like my own 13 month old boy) had to use a breathing aid every day, he was so sick from his own home.
I wept.
I learned that the crime rate is horrendous, rendering a certain section in New Orleans the worst in the nation. There is a fraction of the doctors and nurses there once was, few hospital beds, and an increased death rate.
This is America? This is how insurance companies pay back their clients? This is how we, as fellow human beings allow things to get? What if this were me? Or you? Or your best friend? What would you do differently?
So I've decided that the people in New Orleans are my new best friends. I have a wedding ring set that I was holding on to, either to have made into earrings or sell and fund a trip to Europe with my daughters. It's 1.3 total carats. We bought it at Fred Meyer Jewelers in 1993. The solitaire is just under .8 carats, and the ring wrap, which is sautered to the band, is four diamonds, totalling .5 carats. It's beautiful. Shortly after my husband and I renewed our wedding vows four and a half years ago, he surprised me with a different ring, which is why I have had this one, in its original box.
We paid $1,800 for the solitaire and $700 for the wrap in 1993. It's insured for $5,000. You can see no flaws with the naked eye, although with a loup I suppose you can, since it's graded as SI, with an H color. For all the years I wore it, I received so many compliments I lost count. It sparkles like crazy, and during our lean years as a young couple, I took a lot of pride in always having that one beautiful thing.
Whoever wins this bid will be required to send funds to the New Orleans Habitat for Humanity. I will not touch a check, since I would rather get the money to them as soon, and as simply, as possible.
My hope? That you all decide New Orleans is your new best friend, or daughter, or mom, and bid as much as you can and feel good when you send that check to a charity that will help rebuild part of America. Maybe a part of you will be rebuilt, too.
People who are making a difference today:
Ron
Lucky Candice
Robin
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Broken Shell of a Woman
I have this great memory. I was in my early twenties and working at a law firm, finishing college, and one of my work buddies was Valerie, an "older" woman who was married with a toddler. She was ancient; if memory serves, she was 26 or 27 at the time (gack, struggling for breath here). She was a real grown up: house, husband, baby, four door sedan and a full-time job. I really looked up to her, and thought her lunchtime anecdotes about daycare, home budgets, and Pampered Chef parties were fascinating.
One day, Valerie was sick and at work anyway. I asked her why she didn't just go home and rest. She told me it was easier to be at work sick than at home sick, because she would have to pick her two year-old up from daycare, and that just wasn't worth it.
"Well why don't you just ask your daughter to play nicely while mommy rests? Explain to her why you're not feeling well. Give her things to do and go lay down." I waited, smug in my knowledge that I had outsmarted the mommy. Sometimes, people just can't see the forest for the trees, you know?
I don't know why she didn't just bean me with a legal file, or worse, stop talking to me. She must have been extraordinarily ill. But that's not the point of my story. I remember thinking to myself, and later telling my fiance, that when we had kids, things would be different. Yes, not only were the first seeds of mommy judgment planted that day, they germinated alongside the hearty flora and fauna of Futurous Maternalous Planneous. It's a bitch of a plant.
We would raise cerebral children. Our kids would be precociously verbal, either because of genetics or our diligence, or both. Our children wouldn't watch television, unless it was a video to supplement their sign-language, or Russian, or European history facts.
We would not bribe our children, or yell; reasoning and calm would prevail. The family dinner table would be laden with several healthy, lovingly prepared options that our future Rhodes Scholars would devour without complaint. We would giggle over one of the children's observations that the jicama salad resembled the profile of Mao Tse Tung. Bob and I would hold hands while we listened to our children stumble over their first pronunciation of denouement. After dessert of fresh berries, picked from the garden planted earlier in the year with the children, we would read aloud from the Classics.
I would excuse myself after dinner to read in my favorite chair, as the housekeeper finished the dinner dishes (our trilingual PhD candidate housekeeper who taught our children Mendel's genetics through the pea plants in the aforementioned garden) and the sounds of the viola, piano and cello would waft through the house. I would note the time each night, after losing myself uninterrupted in yet another novel, and quietly announce that the children needed to be in bed. Somehow, they would hear me, and they would all put their instruments away, brush their teeth, say prayers thanking God for their amazing lives, and wait to be kissed goodnight.
Yes, I was certain in my abilities that not only would I do it all right, but that when my friend did it wrong, it was simply a matter of course correction. Judgment? Meet blind optimism and her date stupidity.
Tonight was a stream of consciousness bickerfest between the older three that ended with me telling the girls that everytime they argued, shouted, or used harsh words, their baby brother's brain stopped growing (I was serious). So when my daughterwhined asked for help with her homework when she should have been in bed, I looked at Bob with wild-eyed desperation and hissed, "I will do anything you want later tonight if you will just take care of homework."
He did. After helping her for a protracted amount of time, wherein I heard the muffled cries of distress over fractions, he emerged from her bedroom. He silently went into the kitchen and took a fork out of the drawer. He walked over to me and handed me the utensil.
"Please. Just stab me in the eye."
I think we have some weeds in the garden.
One day, Valerie was sick and at work anyway. I asked her why she didn't just go home and rest. She told me it was easier to be at work sick than at home sick, because she would have to pick her two year-old up from daycare, and that just wasn't worth it.
"Well why don't you just ask your daughter to play nicely while mommy rests? Explain to her why you're not feeling well. Give her things to do and go lay down." I waited, smug in my knowledge that I had outsmarted the mommy. Sometimes, people just can't see the forest for the trees, you know?
I don't know why she didn't just bean me with a legal file, or worse, stop talking to me. She must have been extraordinarily ill. But that's not the point of my story. I remember thinking to myself, and later telling my fiance, that when we had kids, things would be different. Yes, not only were the first seeds of mommy judgment planted that day, they germinated alongside the hearty flora and fauna of Futurous Maternalous Planneous. It's a bitch of a plant.
We would raise cerebral children. Our kids would be precociously verbal, either because of genetics or our diligence, or both. Our children wouldn't watch television, unless it was a video to supplement their sign-language, or Russian, or European history facts.
We would not bribe our children, or yell; reasoning and calm would prevail. The family dinner table would be laden with several healthy, lovingly prepared options that our future Rhodes Scholars would devour without complaint. We would giggle over one of the children's observations that the jicama salad resembled the profile of Mao Tse Tung. Bob and I would hold hands while we listened to our children stumble over their first pronunciation of denouement. After dessert of fresh berries, picked from the garden planted earlier in the year with the children, we would read aloud from the Classics.
I would excuse myself after dinner to read in my favorite chair, as the housekeeper finished the dinner dishes (our trilingual PhD candidate housekeeper who taught our children Mendel's genetics through the pea plants in the aforementioned garden) and the sounds of the viola, piano and cello would waft through the house. I would note the time each night, after losing myself uninterrupted in yet another novel, and quietly announce that the children needed to be in bed. Somehow, they would hear me, and they would all put their instruments away, brush their teeth, say prayers thanking God for their amazing lives, and wait to be kissed goodnight.
Yes, I was certain in my abilities that not only would I do it all right, but that when my friend did it wrong, it was simply a matter of course correction. Judgment? Meet blind optimism and her date stupidity.
Tonight was a stream of consciousness bickerfest between the older three that ended with me telling the girls that everytime they argued, shouted, or used harsh words, their baby brother's brain stopped growing (I was serious). So when my daughter
He did. After helping her for a protracted amount of time, wherein I heard the muffled cries of distress over fractions, he emerged from her bedroom. He silently went into the kitchen and took a fork out of the drawer. He walked over to me and handed me the utensil.
"Please. Just stab me in the eye."
I think we have some weeds in the garden.
Tornado Tuesday
Tuesdays at our house are fast becoming the busiest day of the week. The girls have more than one dance class today, and we aren't all home until 8:00 p.m.
It's also my first day of kindergarten playground duty (oh, yeah) with a regular crazy day sandwiched in between. In the fall, Tuesdays are my soup day.
So, since I have to bolt out of the house in less than thirty minutes, and my hair is still wet, I thought I'd share a quick, simple, but incredibly healthy soup that my kids devour. I'm no Pioneer Woman, with step-by-step pics, but this soup is so easy, it doesn't need it.
Fabulous Enchilada Soup
I lb. ground turkey or vegetarian crumble
1 pack enchilada seasoning
1 large can diced tomatoes with garlic and olive oil or two regular cans
1 can corn (or cup and a half of fresh)
i can black beans, drained
2 tbsp olive oil
Cumin, salt, pepper to taste
1-2 cups shredded sharp cheddar cheese
Brown the turkey or vegetarian crumble in stock pan with oil. Add seasoning. Add corn, tomatoes, beans. Let simmer while you take out bowls, set the table, or whip up some corn bread. I like cumin, so when I salt and pepper to taste, I add extra cumin. Ladle into bowls, top with cheese.
It's also my first day of kindergarten playground duty (oh, yeah) with a regular crazy day sandwiched in between. In the fall, Tuesdays are my soup day.
So, since I have to bolt out of the house in less than thirty minutes, and my hair is still wet, I thought I'd share a quick, simple, but incredibly healthy soup that my kids devour. I'm no Pioneer Woman, with step-by-step pics, but this soup is so easy, it doesn't need it.
Fabulous Enchilada Soup
I lb. ground turkey or vegetarian crumble
1 pack enchilada seasoning
1 large can diced tomatoes with garlic and olive oil or two regular cans
1 can corn (or cup and a half of fresh)
i can black beans, drained
2 tbsp olive oil
Cumin, salt, pepper to taste
1-2 cups shredded sharp cheddar cheese
Brown the turkey or vegetarian crumble in stock pan with oil. Add seasoning. Add corn, tomatoes, beans. Let simmer while you take out bowls, set the table, or whip up some corn bread. I like cumin, so when I salt and pepper to taste, I add extra cumin. Ladle into bowls, top with cheese.
Monday, August 27, 2007
My Own Big Love
While watching HBO last night with Bob, two lines made him chortle like a Christmas elf. The first, Our husband's dating life is none of our business! came from Big Love and the second, Wives are like a case of herpes. They come and go as they please came from Entourage.
After his first guffaw, I looked at him and said, "Fine. Go ahead and get a second wife. Except you can't sleep with her and she has to cook. Tell her I like dinner on the table when I come back with the kids from dance class."
Bob held my face in his hands and gently told me, "I would never, ever, want another wife. I can't even handle you sweetheart."
Except now, the idea of a wife? Someone who knows I like my eggs over hard and makes the beds while I'm in the shower? Someone who is there to lovingly watch my children should I need to be gone at a moment's notice? Someone who will "magically" clean the bathrooms?
We've got some extra room.
Check out this week's issue of Top Blog Magazine for some great stories, plus a new one of mine. Go on, you know you need to procrastinate some more. The work will be there when you get back.
After his first guffaw, I looked at him and said, "Fine. Go ahead and get a second wife. Except you can't sleep with her and she has to cook. Tell her I like dinner on the table when I come back with the kids from dance class."
Bob held my face in his hands and gently told me, "I would never, ever, want another wife. I can't even handle you sweetheart."
Except now, the idea of a wife? Someone who knows I like my eggs over hard and makes the beds while I'm in the shower? Someone who is there to lovingly watch my children should I need to be gone at a moment's notice? Someone who will "magically" clean the bathrooms?
We've got some extra room.
Check out this week's issue of Top Blog Magazine for some great stories, plus a new one of mine. Go on, you know you need to procrastinate some more. The work will be there when you get back.
Friday, August 24, 2007
If Lovin' You is Wrong, I Don't Wanna Be Right. An Ode to My 1998 Ford Expedition
This is a tribute to someone very special. Big Red.
Big Red, you entered my life when I was hugely pregnant with my third child. Where others thought me rotund, scarily fertile, you? You embraced me in a way no one else could. You cupped me from behind, your soft, leathery embrace creating a sense of security I'd never felt before you came along.
No matter what the weather, no matter where we were, you were there to push us through, protecting me as we took our journey together. There were others before you. We both know this. But they were smaller than you in places where it really counts. You took me places the others couldn't, pushing us both to new heights. The others were bald and stout and unable to get me up to the altitude I needed for real thrills.
As the years passed, I knew other women who strayed. Other women who decided that they need an upgrade in their lives. You and I both know, Big Red, that you were the one for me. I remained loyal, even when my friends urged me to get rid of you. They said you were too needy, too high maintenance. That you needed to much to get you going, that you were unfashionably big with loose belts and a craggy exterior.
Who has the last laugh now, Big Red? That's right. You and me. Those friends of mine all upgraded to fancy, new loves. Sure, they're sleek and look great. But they can't enjoy life, since all their money has been spent on acquiring and keeping these new, younger companions. We're together out of true love.
This is part of a PBN Blog Blast for Friday. Join in! Go to PBN for details on how to play along and maybe even win some cool stuff from Ask Patty.
AskPatty is a fantastic website providing automotive advice for women. It was highlighted on Cool Mom Picks last fall, and the AskPatty staff has recently launched CarBlabber, a place for women to write about their cars - the good, bad, and ugly - and to learn what other women think of their own cars.
Big Red, you entered my life when I was hugely pregnant with my third child. Where others thought me rotund, scarily fertile, you? You embraced me in a way no one else could. You cupped me from behind, your soft, leathery embrace creating a sense of security I'd never felt before you came along.
No matter what the weather, no matter where we were, you were there to push us through, protecting me as we took our journey together. There were others before you. We both know this. But they were smaller than you in places where it really counts. You took me places the others couldn't, pushing us both to new heights. The others were bald and stout and unable to get me up to the altitude I needed for real thrills.
As the years passed, I knew other women who strayed. Other women who decided that they need an upgrade in their lives. You and I both know, Big Red, that you were the one for me. I remained loyal, even when my friends urged me to get rid of you. They said you were too needy, too high maintenance. That you needed to much to get you going, that you were unfashionably big with loose belts and a craggy exterior.
Who has the last laugh now, Big Red? That's right. You and me. Those friends of mine all upgraded to fancy, new loves. Sure, they're sleek and look great. But they can't enjoy life, since all their money has been spent on acquiring and keeping these new, younger companions. We're together out of true love.
This is part of a PBN Blog Blast for Friday. Join in! Go to PBN for details on how to play along and maybe even win some cool stuff from Ask Patty.
AskPatty is a fantastic website providing automotive advice for women. It was highlighted on Cool Mom Picks last fall, and the AskPatty staff has recently launched CarBlabber, a place for women to write about their cars - the good, bad, and ugly - and to learn what other women think of their own cars.
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
Bifurcation
One of the things about motherhood that I still don't get, even after more than a dozen years of this parenting gig, is how I can feel so many things about my children in the span of one day.
Take yesterday. Please. My morning started wonderfully. I was up, showered, and out the door with the kids by 7:45. I don't know about you, but if I'm showered and ready first thing? I've got the tiger by the tail, baby. A bad day always involves me in a shirt, no bra, sweat in places where moisture shouldn't be, and piles of things to do. A good day? Well, yesterday looked to be headed in that direction.
It started at the kids' school. This year, the older three are all at the same school. You have no idea how much this enhances my life. The name of my blog largely was born from the fact that I had three kids in three different schools. Not. Fun. So instead of doing a little at each school, PTA at one, Girl Scouts at another, and so on, I am able to focus my energies in one place. And it feels wonderful. I met with our PTA president, made the rounds in my kids' classrooms, and charted out my plan of attack for the first half of the school year. This kind of stuff really makes me happy. I've always done PTA (or PTO or PTG) and when we lived in Georgia I even sat on a Department of Defense school board (now that is another story all together).
Then I thought I'd head to the gym, where I would stash Jack in the nursery and get a workout in before lunch and picking up Jacob from kindergarten. Except Jack wasn't in the mood to let mom get her endorphin rush, and the workout was cut short because Jack doesn't understand that the only reason I'm not on some cocktail of pharmaceuticals is because I self-medicate with exercise. So I was irrationally irritated at my one year-old for not understanding that I just needed thirty more minutes on the elliptical. Which made me feel guilty, and subsequently more pissy for feeling that way in the first place. Aack.
Then I picked up Jacob. He was in a mood: surly, disheveled, and not wanting to come home. I knew he'd be fine in kindergarten. "Mom! I want to keep playing!" I explained that he got to stay with me for the afternoon and that we would be doing fun(!) things like grocery shopping and heading to the post office, and maybe even the craft store to obtain 342 miniature starfish for a PTA project. Jacob growled at me in a very scary neanderthal way he has that makes me worry he will be a thug one day (does anyone else do this? Project dire things into the future when their child acts in anti-social ways? ). He huffed his way into the car and screamed at me that I got an X! Jacob has recently taken to keeping mental files on each of the family members, and an X? Not a mark you want in your file.
Then, the girls. My precious, hormone soaked, mercurial girls. Notice I didn't say bitchy. Because that would be wrong.
As they skipped out of their classrooms after school, my heart swelled with pride. They are just so lovely, so full of life, and already more than I ever expected they could be. I paused to talk to each of their teachers, happy that so far each girl seems to be doing swimmingly. What gets me is this: in school and anywhere else, they have a smile on their faces, they are helpful, polite and articulate. They jump to help others and are kind to kids younger than them. When I see this, I feel at peace with how I've done so far as a mother.
By the time we get home, this facade has unraveled, the faces of two delightful girls in a puddle at the bottom of my car, having been replaced with those dreadful stepsisters from Cinderella. They are at each other's throats, or bickering with Jacob, or heaving heavy sighs of pain because they just learned we won't be having dessert with dinner. Sometimes the eye rolling becomes so severe I am forced to wonder if they are indeed experiencing a Grand Mal seizure. Ghetto kids have nothing on my girls. My girls have to clean their own rooms, wipe down their own bathrooms and generally be helpful around the house before riding their bikes, or climbing the tree house or being transported to one of the myriad of activities they've suckered me into signing them up for. It's a hard life, and they let me know it with door slams, stomping, and furrowed brows. Occasionally, a venom laced invective is hurled my way through a closed door and I have to remind myself that I choose to stay home with these people. It is, in fact, a privilege.
All these feelings, in the span of less than one day. It wears me out. My hope for today, as I reflect on yesterday, is that I obtain that thick outer shell I've somehow lost over the summer and not take the mood swings and normal squabblings of children so personally. And that my state legalizes the use of elephant tranquilizers on children.
Take yesterday. Please. My morning started wonderfully. I was up, showered, and out the door with the kids by 7:45. I don't know about you, but if I'm showered and ready first thing? I've got the tiger by the tail, baby. A bad day always involves me in a shirt, no bra, sweat in places where moisture shouldn't be, and piles of things to do. A good day? Well, yesterday looked to be headed in that direction.
It started at the kids' school. This year, the older three are all at the same school. You have no idea how much this enhances my life. The name of my blog largely was born from the fact that I had three kids in three different schools. Not. Fun. So instead of doing a little at each school, PTA at one, Girl Scouts at another, and so on, I am able to focus my energies in one place. And it feels wonderful. I met with our PTA president, made the rounds in my kids' classrooms, and charted out my plan of attack for the first half of the school year. This kind of stuff really makes me happy. I've always done PTA (or PTO or PTG) and when we lived in Georgia I even sat on a Department of Defense school board (now that is another story all together).
Then I thought I'd head to the gym, where I would stash Jack in the nursery and get a workout in before lunch and picking up Jacob from kindergarten. Except Jack wasn't in the mood to let mom get her endorphin rush, and the workout was cut short because Jack doesn't understand that the only reason I'm not on some cocktail of pharmaceuticals is because I self-medicate with exercise. So I was irrationally irritated at my one year-old for not understanding that I just needed thirty more minutes on the elliptical. Which made me feel guilty, and subsequently more pissy for feeling that way in the first place. Aack.
Then I picked up Jacob. He was in a mood: surly, disheveled, and not wanting to come home. I knew he'd be fine in kindergarten. "Mom! I want to keep playing!" I explained that he got to stay with me for the afternoon and that we would be doing fun(!) things like grocery shopping and heading to the post office, and maybe even the craft store to obtain 342 miniature starfish for a PTA project. Jacob growled at me in a very scary neanderthal way he has that makes me worry he will be a thug one day (does anyone else do this? Project dire things into the future when their child acts in anti-social ways? ). He huffed his way into the car and screamed at me that I got an X! Jacob has recently taken to keeping mental files on each of the family members, and an X? Not a mark you want in your file.
Then, the girls. My precious, hormone soaked, mercurial girls. Notice I didn't say bitchy. Because that would be wrong.
As they skipped out of their classrooms after school, my heart swelled with pride. They are just so lovely, so full of life, and already more than I ever expected they could be. I paused to talk to each of their teachers, happy that so far each girl seems to be doing swimmingly. What gets me is this: in school and anywhere else, they have a smile on their faces, they are helpful, polite and articulate. They jump to help others and are kind to kids younger than them. When I see this, I feel at peace with how I've done so far as a mother.
By the time we get home, this facade has unraveled, the faces of two delightful girls in a puddle at the bottom of my car, having been replaced with those dreadful stepsisters from Cinderella. They are at each other's throats, or bickering with Jacob, or heaving heavy sighs of pain because they just learned we won't be having dessert with dinner. Sometimes the eye rolling becomes so severe I am forced to wonder if they are indeed experiencing a Grand Mal seizure. Ghetto kids have nothing on my girls. My girls have to clean their own rooms, wipe down their own bathrooms and generally be helpful around the house before riding their bikes, or climbing the tree house or being transported to one of the myriad of activities they've suckered me into signing them up for. It's a hard life, and they let me know it with door slams, stomping, and furrowed brows. Occasionally, a venom laced invective is hurled my way through a closed door and I have to remind myself that I choose to stay home with these people. It is, in fact, a privilege.
All these feelings, in the span of less than one day. It wears me out. My hope for today, as I reflect on yesterday, is that I obtain that thick outer shell I've somehow lost over the summer and not take the mood swings and normal squabblings of children so personally. And that my state legalizes the use of elephant tranquilizers on children.
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