are you there, dog? It's me, kerensa

Birth

2011-11-22T09:31:00.001-08:00

I am checking my watch (because in the olden days, there were no brightly lit cell phone screens to scream the time) every five minutes, convinced that the pressure I am feeling is my first child, making her way into our world. I question everyone around me, not sure I even know what to expect with labor. They all give me varying ideas, and so I convince myself this is it. I expect more fanfare- flags, trumpets, a baffled and eager husband to leave me stranded in my driveway a la She's Having a Baby, but business goes on as usual, and eventually the contractions go away. My work phone still rings, I still answer it, and another day passes with no infant to bring home. Each day is a mystery, not knowing how it will end. Perhaps I will go home and eat a burrito, or perhaps I will squeeze a newborn through my loins. I get butterflies every time I feel a contraction, I have a bag packed. And then repacked. And then packed again. I have utter conviction that I will do it all naturally, and argue with everyone who debates me. What an absurd idea that I will take drugs to do something so many women before me have done. I am standing in my kitchen when my water breaks, and it seems so un-monumentous, that I question whether it has actually happened. Unlike my third child, whose water will break like the unleashing of a tsunami, it is a thin trickle, like a whisper, and then it is gone. I am calm, and Jake is calm, and we even remember to feed the dog before we leave. I have a pillow, and a bag, and it is an easy route to the hospital, where it seems like such a farce to see so many cars in the crowded lot. Surely these other patrons have very small ailments, and why in the world would there be no parking for the women who have tiny skulls urging their way through the birth canal as they walk the spanse of blacktop. It is an absurdly hot day in July, in the one hundred teens, and for just a fraction of a moment, I think I would rather go back and rest in the pool. Once inside the doors, the universe changes. The mellow afternoon becomes a blur, with overhead speakers, and rushing gurneys, and the smell of antiseptics lingering around every corner. I accidentally make eye contact with an old woman who is surely dying, and I grip my stomach and pull it closer, so the death can not reach out and take hold.

Once inside, they discover I have had a slow leak for many days, and that my womb is filled with meconium. I am hooked to antibiotics, and petocin and am left in an ugly sterile room, a large but oh so small 21 year old girl, who is thinking there is no turning back.

It is a long labor, we play cards, we watch TV, and as I am denied food, I grow weaker and more tired. The pain begins in a bearable way, but becomes ferocious and when I try to rest, it snarls and snaps its angry jaws at me. I fight as long as I can, and then ashamed, admit defeat while they administer the epidural. The pinch in my spine is something I would never classify as a pinch, and then the pull of the drug as it goes through my blood is oddly hypnotizing. I can follow its path as it surges, and kisses the booboo all better. I am suddenly at peace. The beast within is asleep, and it allows me my own rest. The sleep is not deep, and often interrupted, but it has allowed me strength to push when morning comes. I do not feel the urge to push, but they tell me I must, and so I do. I had fear that I would not know how to push, but the instinct is animalistic, and I am only along for the ride as my body does its thing. I push for a long time. I wonder later if I was ready to push, or if my doctor wanted to make a tee time, but I will never truly know. When she begins her descent, it is a remarkable feeling. The fanfare is suddenly there. It dawns on me that of course there would be no fanfare during the labor, because it is all saved for this very moment. I am looking into Jake's nervous face and telling him I love him, while he holds one leg and my mother holds the other. I am watching a tiny bald head leave my body, and though I am seeing it through a mirror, I am feeling it as an out of body experience. There is no pain as she graces us with her presence. There is an immediate relief with no worldly comparison, and then suddenly there are frantic rushes around me. The cord is around her neck, she is blue, there is no breath. She is whisked from me, brought simply miles from my beating heart and suctioned and handled with such roughness, it is as if watching a petulant toddler with a ragdoll. I am vomiting, and seeing fear in my mother's face, which sets my blood cold. They are now delivering my placenta, so stained with the meconium that it is green, looking like something pulled from a Hollywood movie about aliens. And then there is the blood. A bucket below me catches it, and I wonder where it is all coming from. They are straddling my body, attempting to contract me down, but still the blood is everywhere, up to elbows, on the floor. I think I might die. I might die without holding my little blue baby.

And then, the chaos stops. The nurses and doctors leave the room, with sullied gowns and gloves, and barely a nod of recognition my way. Jake is holding our little girl, who has gone from a deep purple to a luscious pink. He cries, as he will every time I give birth (and in the case of Lucas, will hop around the room like a confused rabbit), and it brings tears to my eyes. He places her in my arms, my bleeding stops, and she looks at me, and I think, "I know you."

And I can tell from her complete and focused gaze, that she knows exactly who I am, as well.

September 11 through the years

2011-09-11T17:49:00.000-07:00

2001

Rhiannon is a little girl, just a month over two. She is a play by herself, hum on the potty, Elmo obsessed dollop of a girl, with blonde pigtails and wide brown eyes. I am just past my twenty fourth birthday, in an unsure place in my life, ironing my shirt in the guest room, with the only surety I have playing by my feet with found objects.

The phone rings. It is an old fashioned phone by today's standards, a black princess with a purring ringer, and a cord connected to the wall. It is my husband on the other line. My husband of only a year, one year of tumult and ships passing in the proverbial night. I turn on the television, per his command and am in time to see a second plane fly into a second tower. I sit on the bed in my bra, my wrinkled shirt forgotten. Baby Rhiannon sits, unknowing, singing to herself by my feet. My only surety, an anchor to reality.

In a month, I will be pregnant again, never questioning bringing another child into the evil, evil world.

2002

I am seven months pregnant. A month past when I would have been due with the twins I miscarried, two months before baby Morgan will grace our lives. We have left Virginia for the streets of gold promised in New York. We have passed the eerily solemn cavities with the dingy teddy bears, tattered photos and faded banners. The husband of two years works for a shoddy government project named, ironically, Homeland Security. A job he both detests and opposes. It is an agency that had profited from a horrendous tragedy, and spends as a young child would in a candy shop. He regales me with stories of the conference rooms, empty but for hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of unused equipment, forever to be left in boxes. He will leave this job in a year, and look back only as a means to justify his anger for our government, in a time when no justification is necessary.

2003

We have driven upstate and found a house on a whim, after the husband of three years has finally gotten a job. Rhiannon has graduated from pigtails to braids, preschool to pre-K, and a the bouncy baby Morgan is taking first steps, stepping toward her second year of life.

The war has been raging for two years, and our president has been swearing up and down, left and right and sideways that we are still threatened. That secret weapons are hidden in caves, that will singlehandedly send our country into Armageddon. The unity we found briefly two years ago has faded like the flags still shoved in walkways and window planters across suburbia.

We will be moving away from his job in the city, away from the aesthetically barren streets of Rockland, to go home.

2011

Fast forward to the age of Facebook. The husband of eleven years works away from home. Rhiannon is an argumentative pre-teen, trading in her braids for hair sprayed layers, no longer content to play with found objects at my feet. Baby Morgan has loaned her piercing baby blues to her young brother, and is struggling with a difficult fourth grade teacher. Baby Lucas has come onto the scene with a charming vengeance, and has begun first grade. Twins have graced our lives, and livened the rooms in our house. Osama Bid Laden has been lain in a watery grave, Saddam Hussein, whose connection to this day was slightly blurred and vague, has faced his firing squad, and his bloody remains are rarely spoken or thought of anymore.

The war still rages on, presidents have come and gone, the arguments and political nonsense have stayed the same. The anger has dimmed, and been replaced by reluctant acceptance. New fears have arisen... epidemics linked to birds, odd weather patterns in the northeast, and old squabbles being unearthed around the globe.

The firefighters and police whose lungs are now being devoured by the debris, breathed in so many years ago at "ground zero", have been turned away at the memorial. The families who were left bereft by the tragedy are not allowed closure, as the war continues and scrapes at the scars. Media still uses the indistinct threats against our safety as a ratings boost, and even the ideas to fill those long empty cavities with new life have caused controversy.

The White house will soon host a new family, tides will change, frustration will continue. The rest of the world will doubt us more, while the war robs us of money necessary to educate our young, feed our impoverished and care for our elderly. But in the age of Facebook, everyone has held onto the hope that we have solidarity once again, and that America is still a place of which to be proud.

I am sad for those who died such a violent and sudden death those many years ago. I am perpetually sad for the men and women who, in doing their jobs, were killed in front of their coworkers, while their horrified families watched on the television. Or the ones who are slowly dying now from their efforts so long ago. I am sad for the hundreds of thousands who died in another country, being punished for the sins of their religious beliefs and geography. And I am sad for all of us, who lack any control over any of these events, and whose hearts may never mend. We will spend each September 11th remembering less and less, history books will eventually have this listed as a small section of a chapter, we will continue to expand our families, change careers, make new friends, lose old ones, and grow old. But in both our hearts, and on New York ground, there will always be two dusty cavities, unfilled.

Amusement Through the Ages

2011-06-28T18:39:00.000-07:00

She is five years old, and although she is only five, she knows her parents do not have much money. She has asked them to take her to see ET in the movie theater and they have told her they will take her somewhere special, if only they can take a small nap. She asks them what she can do while they nap, and they say twiddle her thumbs. So she sits on the green couch in the living room, whose windows look over Hamilton Street, and spends a bit of time figuring out how to twiddle.

When they get into the car, the drive seems very long. Madison Ave is far in the rearview mirror, and she is getting sleepy in the car. Perhaps when they get there, her parents can twiddle their thumbs while she naps. Suddenly, an enormous ferris wheel catches her eye, and she feels a flip flop in her belly. She must not get her hopes up, but oh they float to the surface despite how hard she pushes them down. It is only when they pull into the immense parking lot that she realizes those fireflies of hope are free to fly.

Everything at the Great Escape has earned this park its name. From scary roller coasters, to calliope music, it is a treasure trove for each of her senses. It is a long day for little feet, but a day which has left indelible memories in a brain that will later prove itself to be a vault.

She is sixteen. She probably laughs at the idea of amusement parks to her friends, and casually dismisses the idea as juvenile, until the school sends them all to the Great Escape for a field trip. Getting out of chemistry to ride the Comet is really All Right. The bus ride is rowdy, with laughter as music, and no one even notices the eye rolls from the teachers. The students have wads of bills in their pockets, pockets which will come home empty and flat. They frantically list, in order of importance from greatest to least, the rides they must find and conquer. Though no one says it aloud, they each have plans to bend their lanky bodies in half to visit the shacks in storytown.

Between waiting in lengthy lines at the Scrambler, and trying not to vomit on the Rotor, she sits with her friends and eats fried dough. The powdered sugar bursts into little clouds, and it is hard not to taste the mere deliciousness of the day in the air. Later, her boyfriend tries to win her a stuffed animal in the arcade. After several attempts, and forty dollars wasted, he tosses the toy gun to her and tells her to take the last shot. It is inevitable that she will win, and she does, and she can only barely stifle the giggles at his wounded pride.

The bus ride home is quieter. It is a long day for these would-be adults. Girls have rested their heads upon boys' shoulders, stuffed animals have been placed lovingly into the bins overhead, and there is an aroma of confections in the air. The cotton candy ice cream hauntings of a good day.

She is on the cusp of thirty four. On a whim, she has taken up an invitation to bring her children to the Great Escape. This is not a trip she makes often. It seems somewhat daunting with five children, but the day is promising to be warm and uneventful, so she goes. She remembers to pack waters, and bug spray, and sunscreen and a change of clothing, lest little ones forget their potty training in the face of such excitement. They get sandwiches on the way, and the children are quiet, to avoid the fights she warned would send them all home early.

As they pull off the highway onto the exit for the park, the children all gasp and point as they see the looming roller coaster begin a new leg of its journey. They clamber over each other as they get out of the car, anticipation buzzing from them like electricity, almost audible in its intensity.

The day goes by so very quickly. She notices as she gets on the rides, how so many are not there any longer. The Scrambler has long since abandoned its building, which now stands mostly hidden behind trees like a shameful secret. The indoor roller coaster is now a warehouse, and lonely limbs of dead rides lay scattered like minefields behind the tracks of the roller coaster. But as she is noticing this, and noticing that the gun game that won her a stuffed animal and a reason to gloat has been dismantled, her children are noticing only the glory of an endless summer day with promise around every corner. It is easy to see how the youngest two, the twins, are fascinated by the intermittent squirts of water coming from the ground geysers, and why the rickety wooden tracks of the Comet are calling to the others. When the divers fly through the air into filthy green water, she cannot help but be delighted with the group as they are soaked in the aftermath.

She thinks to herself this is an easy lesson learned. Spending so long in childhood longing to get out, and so long in adulthood wishing to be back in. They go for ice cream at the end of the day, and the sudden downpour washes away the dribbles of soft serve on their chins, and cools their flushed faces.

It is a long day for this tired mother, but despite the weariness in her shoulders and her feet, she finds she has a spring in her step.

What Gay means to me.

2011-06-25T15:18:00.001-07:00

The first time I met my uncle's partner, he bought me an ice cream sundae so large, I remember it to this day. We sat across from each other in a half empty ice cream shoppe before he gave me a Washington DC teddy bear and wished me a Happy Easter. I went home after my trip with stories about Uncle Tom's friend until my mother sat me down for the "talk". I was nine years old, and suddenly my world was bigger, and filled with a new kind of love.

Through the years, Uncle George became a fixture in our family, as beloved as the rest of the spouses in the family, and I always felt a certain kinship for him, as we were the unbloods- the ones born outside of the bloodline, with our own perspective in.

Knowing my uncles were gay from such a young age allowed me insight that other children my age did not have. I could recognize the boys in school who just didn't "get" the girl, as the other boys did. I was angered more easily than everyone else when words were tossed about like cruel confetti and then later, slung like arrows at the quiet boys in gym class. I was voted most politically correct in high school, but in retrospect, it is a shame that there is a distinction for that in high schools.

When I was nineteen, I came home from Arizona for a month over the holidays, and I sensed a change in my sister. It was a quiet change, but suddenly things made sense, and she came out to me on the couch after my mom was asleep. I think it changed things between us. A door I had thought open, and not necessarily open wide, was closed firmly, and in its place a new window appeared. I say a window, because while it is completely transparent, I will never quite be able to use it as an entrance into her world. It is a world so very unlike mine, and yet so tethered to me I often feel confused.

A year later, I met Jase. He walked into Chevy's Restaurant on my second day of work, with an aura so big, it filled the room. He was handsome and vivacious, and the clamoring bevy of girls should have tipped me off immediately. But it was only when he spoke to me that I realized he was gay, and according to his reminiscences, I informed him immediately we would be best friends. ( I don't recall this proclamation, but it sounds a little like me, so I roll with it) He introduced me to the purely platonic male female friendship. We went on roadtrips, shopped, whispered secrets and I fell very much in unromantic love with him. I have moved to four different states, and never has our friendship dwindled a bit, though our otherworldly lives are completely separate.

Since Jase, I have made other male friends, and met my sister's girlfriends and friends. The years have given me a growing populace of gay loved ones. Just last year, my cousin came out to me, one of the first people in our family she told, and she has now committed to a wonderful, artistic girl named Liz.

Last night, she texted me after the New York senate finally voted to legalize gay marriage. Different than the other jubilant responses I read on Facebook, hers was flowery and somehow bigger than what I could have said or felt. She told me that she felt a new kind of happiness, one that she is not sure she has been able to feel yet, and reading through my tears, I got it.

My sister and her beautiful wife, Adi, get to check married on their tax returns. When one of them falls ill, the other will be able to sit bedside as family, and sign the papers to help save a life, or help to end one when the time inevitably comes. They can proudly walk past the absurd protestors, who have no argument other than an antiquated bible and a homophobia that all but screams the Shakespeare quote, "I think thou doth protest too much". I will be able to be there as not only they, but so many of my beloved gays marry, then bring happy, well adjusted children into this world. And they WILL be well adjusted, as they will come into a world where an open mind is equal to an open heart, and trust me as I say from experience, it makes you happier in the end. They will grow to be fighters for civil rights, environmental lawyers, artists, musicians, nurses, physicists and unspeakably wonderful first grade teachers.

My Uncle George and Uncle Tom have since separated, after more than two decades together. Like every other married couple, they have had to split assets, divide household goods, and cry over old pictures. But I will always consider him to be my uncle, and consider my life to have been beautifully touched by not only him, but every other friend and family member (gay or straight) who has entered my life.

We spoke two months ago, and I told him that Morgan was now the age I was when he and I met, and he said to me, "time to bring her for an ice cream sundae."

Someday

2011-06-08T08:17:00.000-07:00

I am sitting in the parking lot of the video store, with my suddenly flatter belly, tearing up because I have left my four day old baby in the care of my mother for this errand. A small errand, to be sure, but the absence seems so thick, I am choking. I am flashing forward in my mind to six, eight weeks down the road, when I will have to put my tiny little person in the hands of a stranger, in hopes she will not be harmed, or lost in a shuffle. At the mere thought, I could vomit, and when I look into Jake's very young face, I know I am not alone. We are, at that moment, in agreement.

Thus becomes my accidental occupation. Being a stay at home mom was not my plan. Growing up, I wrote stories, and planned my future down to minute details. Which car I would drive, how many children I would have, and coincidentally enough- that my husband's name would start with J (thank you twirled apple stems). And never for a moment did I waver in planning to become a doctor. And yet, just like that, Rhiannon burst from me after more than 30 hours of labor, and every plan was thrown out the proverbial window.

I was 21 when she was born. I had not yet finished school, had a lovely job that did not pay very well, and lived thousands of miles from people I loved. One could look back, and in retrospect say that my idealism bordered on ignorance and stupidity. But Jake and I had made the decision for me to stay at home, and so I did. We lived on his meager salary as a beer salesman, and wholeheartedly moved from Arizona in a quest for new beginnings. We had a sparse two bedroom apartment in Tampa. We had only one car, so stay at home mom was not just an occupation, but a complete and accurate description of my life. We set strict grocery budgets, welcomed hand me downs, and limited our entertainment to board games and basic cable.

Throughout the years, more children came, and finances were easier. jake finished school, got a good job, which became a better job, and then a better one. Occasionally I would reflect on my career choice, and wonder if it was self- serving, if it would be benefit anyone in the end. But I have been reaffirmed every time. I got to be there on snow days, and really-really-going-to-throw-up days, I got to witness every milestone, from first steps to first words, to first crushes. My kids always got to know I would be waiting at the door when the bus pulled up to the driveway, and there would always be cupcakes and chaperones for class parties. People sometimes ask me if "someday" I will have a "real job", and I know there are so many somedays when you are a stay at home mom.

Someday, my car will be spotlessly clean. Someday my road trips will be lonely. Someday, I will finish writing my novel. Someday, I will have too much time on my hands. Someday, I will embark on worldly travels. Someday, I will wish my children were traveling with me. Someday, I will buy white couches. Someday, I will yearn for spots and tears and a lived-in look. Someday, there will be quiet when I have to use the phone. Someday, I will be listening for the roar of squabbles, and laughter, and conspiratorial whispers.

Someday, I may have a "real job", one that pays and offers insurance, and 401k and every other bell and whistle. But knowing how hard I have fought for the job I have right now, knowing every sleepless night, every anguished tear, every panic attack, every sports game, concert, school play, every cuddle, every living room dance party, it seems that my resume is rather full. I have foregone vacation days and paychecks for this accidental occupation, when really it was my destiny, all along.

Field of Dreams

2011-04-27T17:04:00.000-07:00

A tiny little boy in his Yankee cap, perched on the battered wood in the dugout waves to me, and I realize he is my boy. He has the flushed cheeks of an Irishman, and his hat is a bit askew. He has the nonchalance of a real ball player, and for just a moment, I am left breathless. A boy who only yesterday was struggling with his first steps, is now the beginnings of a tiny man, and I am a surreptitious observer behind a fence. I watch him joke with his friends, his effervescent grin spreading light throughout the dugout, his foot on the bench only slightly too small for the cleat it inhabits. I want to tell him I love him, but it will embarrass him, so I turn my head to damper the urge.

There are a thousand boys in the fields tonight. Some reluctantly, there to satisfy their father's need for vicariousness. Aging dads, with rounded paunches creeping over their belts, their caps hiding thinning hair and grey are holding clipboards and calling for the Mikeys, the Lukes, the Nicks to gather. Some boys are there because their older brothers, now legends in their own minds, have left footprints that need to be filled. And others are there because they believe they will someday be Derek Jeter, beloved and hated equally, but nevertheless a wonder.

My son is there because his mother believes in the simple life that baseball once epitomized. The lazy summers of apple pies and playing in the park till dusk. A time when our world seemed a little easier, or when children were allowed to believe in its ease.

I remember my own teenage years, perched at the edge of a hard metal seat in the score booth, watching a game with so much anticipation, I could taste it. Hearing cracks of bats at all the fields, lit by searingly bright lights, knowing that behind every bat crack was a girlfriend, a mother, whose heart had grown in pride.

When I watch Field of Dreams, I still cry inconsolably when Doc Graham makes the decision to leave, once again, his baseball dreams behind. So many of these little boys on this field today will someday stuff their old caps and worn mitts into boxes in the attic, and make their own metaphorical step over that invisible line. The line into an adulthood fraught with responsibility, and gravity. Their tanned arms and sunkissed noses will pale as they study in college, and later sit at their desks. And when they are home on the weekends, they will always find themselves just a little bit amazed at how very perfectly the baseball fits into the palms of their hands, as they toss it back and forth with their sons in the yard.

But for now, these little boys are bursting with possibilities, and dreams. Their summers are still endless, their apple pies still cooling on the windowsill, their mitts still not broken in.

I wiggle myself into a tiny spot to watch as the evening begins, my eyes glued on the little number 6, who is doing a little dance in the field. I am again hit with that urge, and I have to quietly murmur to myself that I love him, because if it isn't uttered, I will burst. I think Derek Jeter's mom probably does the same, and this thought makes me grin. I get to be Lucas' mom. Which in and of itself, is a field of dreams.

Teacher, teacher, can you teach me?

2011-03-22T05:51:00.000-07:00

I preface this by saying I am the daughter of a teacher, and stepdaughter of another. I am the next door neighbor to three teachers. I am the friend to many teachers. I have 5 children in the public school system.

Over the last several weeks, I have read the internet posts, the Facebook comments, the political diatribes and nonsense being spewed on Fox News, and very few stories have hit me quite like this one.

It is true that my mother got holidays and summers off. However, to supplement her very low income, she often taught summer school, volunteered to head extra curriculars, and mentored her graduated students well after their tassles had been turned. We did not live a particularly lavish lifestyle, but it was one filled with the same gifts she shared with her students. We visited museums, trekked through the woods to find and sample fiddleheads, and when an opportunity to educate us arose, she took it. Years later, I would take notice of how many of her students still chose to know her. She touched their lives with simple encouragement, and giving them generous allotments of her time. There was never a punching of a clock, when one day ended or began. It was like motherhood, a seamless blending of one day into the next, peppered with phone calls, and heart wrenching tasks. She attended student funerals, and art exhibits, weddings, and baby showers. She would sometimes be up past my bedtime, with the low murmuring of the TV in the background as she graded paper after paper, writing words of enthusiasm or constructive criticism. She became president of the union, and would often be on phone calls for hours while cooking our dinner, the phone tucked in the crook of her neck and shoulder, while she used the spatula to flip the food. There were notes scrawled throughout the house about upcoming meetings, calls to return, and thoughts she had for the next meeting. There were grievances to file, contracts to renew, budgets to amend. She made far less than other people with her experience who worked 9-5 for the state, or private corporations. But it wasnt about her paycheck. Or the crystal apple awards she won, or even being written up in the Who's Who of American Teachers. It was about the pride she could feel when one student became an FBI agent, and another a doctor attempting to cure cancer, and another an occupational therapist with a happy family.

Lately, the politicians and even citizens of this country have taken to blaming our public school educators for being greedy. They are accused of being "part time employees", who are abusing a bereft financial system. Without taking into consideration the amounts of money these teachers spend for their own classroom supplies, or offering special incentives for their students, most of our teachers are being paid less than $2.00 per hour for each of their students, which is far less than someone like you or I could make babysitting in our home. Our own Dave Herrington spends hundreds of hours of his afterschool time organizing and directing the fifth grade play, even though he hasn't a fifth grader, nor does he even teach fifth grade. Many of our teachers come to our PTA meetings and events, donate their time and money to our fundraisers, and attend the Board of Education meetings once a month. There are workshops in school, when many outsiders think the teachers are relaxing at home with their children on a three day weekend. They spend weeks inputting grades for report cards, and then days meeting with harried parents to discuss their children's progress.

The next time some plaster haired talking head appears on the news to discuss our greedy teachers, perhaps we could pause a moment to think of the teachers we have in our life, and think of their mansions, their Range Rovers, their Dolce and Gabana teacher sweaters worn at Christmas, their opulent parties and entourages. We could think of the trillions of dollars our country has sacrificed in the name of war, and stolen from the next generations of students and schools. And possibly think that without these same teachers, the moms who update their Facebook statuses with constant frustration over their children being in their hair, and driving them crazy, would be spending THEIR time homeschooling their kids for the next thirteen years, and magically, our perspectives may be put back in order.

Doing it Little House Style

2011-02-01T16:41:00.000-08:00

I am about to utter something I never could have foreseen myself saying. I am thankful to my parents for being pretty broke when I was a kid. When I observe the entitled children around me (my own included, unfortunately), I am surprised at their lack of life skills. Growing up on a mountain, I learned to fend for myself. When it snowed, we shoveled, we built forts, we sledded, we skied, we skated. My children ask for hot chocolate. Without daring to go outside. When we used to lose power, we read by candlelight, and pulled blankets up to the coal stove ( because we had run out of oil). My children ask if the DS is charged, and why our TV does not have battery backup. I pass by girls on the side of the road, with their overpriced SUVs sporting a flat, and I am concerned about the fact that she has not been taught to change tires, change spark plugs, change oil,as I was. I hope her beautiful SUV does not break down on her in a bad section of town at night. When I was young, I split logs on my porch, and helped my dad stack them in the backyard. I helped my mother hang sheetrock in the house, and epoxy her countertops. I helped lay bathroom tile, and watched all the neighborhood children. I don't know that many kids in this era could claim the same, and I fear that many do not even know how to use the washing machine or iron their own shirts. Girls are being taught that you feed your baby with canned powder, rather than the milk their bodies produce. Boys are taught to be aggressive and ruthless by the plentiful video games with war titles. Kids in elementary school are texting their friends with their iphones, but are having a hard time with simple division. I see myself writing this, and I laugh because I sound like the grandfather, bemoaning his walk to and from school in barefoot, uphill both ways. But each generation must be horrified of the next, losing the will to work for things, relying on dwindling fossil fuels, and refusing to learn the lessons that could keep them alive if survival of the fittest were put to the test. I am proud of the things for which I have worked. Jake and I have jokingly said that if everyone could live a life of poverty if just for a year, the world would be a changed place(with scads more liberals, I might add). It would be an interesting social experiment. To replace the opulence of the Real Housewives for the Real Little House on the Prairie. I, for one, look damn good in a bonnet.

I Don't Know How You Do It

2011-01-14T12:50:00.000-08:00

"I don't know how you do it", they say in a half-admiringly, half-dismissive way, and I wave them off, not out of rudeness but out of a sense of confusion. While many things in my life are far from easy, the things that make people say this phrase are among the easier. So I feel, when I hear this, that I must be missing something. If I were doing all the things I should be doing, would I still be able to accomplish these obviously extraneous tasks? If by making elaborate cupcakes, I am forgetting to clean the disposal, or by spending time with the PTA, am I forgetting to clean behind the stove? I am absurdly guilty on both counts, among many others. I am both envious and curious of those women upon whose floors you may eat, or whose curtains are freshly laundered, and beds always made. I forget the tiny things and they grow. I have long expired salad dressings in my fridge, and an old doctor bill I have forgotten to pay on my desk. My van is a veritable explosion of forbidden fast foods, legos and now ruined books and school papers. When pulling into my garage, I must have everyone exit on the left, for the right has yet to be cleaned and is too cluttered. My boys are often naked, or otherwise unkempt, and my own clothes have expired along with my salad dressings. My kitchen sink is rarely empty, nor is my dryer, and there are says when we are down to ketchup and syrup for dinner. When a friend stops for an unexpected visit, I find myself wondering if the toilet has been flushed, if there are undergarments on light fixtures, or if I had remembered to Magic Eraser the sharpie in the Family Room, and the answer is often no. My basement is a treasure trove of broken ornaments, tattered poetry, written in my angst filled college days, yearbooks I dare never to open, and books I will most likely never reread. I have bins of clothes outgrown by my ever growing children, that I intend on selling or donating, that I just can't seem to find the time to sort through.

I throw enormous parties for each of the kids' milestones, and throw in several for myself, as well. I bake cakes for people and events in which I am scarcely involved. I braid braids in Morgan's hair to rival the women in Medieval times. I make large and often gourmet meals for my family, with large and gourmet messes. I own a dog in the second largest breed alive. I write blogs about the minutiae in my life. I chair half a dozen events in the children's school, and hold the position of president. But things fall out of every closet in my home when the doors are opened, and my Christmas lights will be up until the snow melts.

Yesterday, an assistant in the class I am teaching informed me I obviously have too much time on my hands. It gave me pause because it was the antithesis of everything I have heard from everyone else since the twins were born. I was slightly offended, and I realized that I want to exist between the two statements. I want not to be noticed for the things I do, for fear of being found out for the things I don't.

I am mightily lazy, and abundantly self-serving. But I adore my children and am hopefully instilling good values, a sense of self, and allowing them to feel secure and loved. The microwave can wait, the weeds can grow, the cobwebs can droop. This is how I do it.

2010-07-07T20:09:00.000-07:00

I am packing up their things, preparing for remodeling and switching of rooms. Some things are easily thrown in a bag for donation, garbage... the random McDonalds' toys, plastic and tacky and resplendent in their blatant gare, Walmart brand button ups, in 1997's plaid, the errant pieces to a puzzle long since solved and tossed.
But then I come upon the treasures, the pieces I never even began to fantasize about in 3rd grade, when the dreams of babies began to creep into my mind. The American girl Bitty Baby, rife with accessories, and outfits, lace and pastels. The Eric Carle slippers, shaped like one Hungry Caterpillar, the tiny porcelain teat set, meant for a budding princess, but wasted on a wild three year old boy with sticky, lustful fingers. I touch each of these things, remembering birthdays and Christmases past, when paper was frantically torn, and voices enthusiastically embraced each piece. I think of pigtails and Thomas the Train pjs, and bold lights on a tree clinging to its last legs. I remember a time when time seemed to last forever, when there was never anything but the moment.
With these few un-tossable souvenirs of my children's youths, I carefully place them in tupperware bins with the inscription "for my grandchildren".
I think about the things I will do when my children have offspring. How, like my mom and dad, I will be an even better grandparent than a parent, spoiling at every turn, relishing every moment. How I will have a room for the granddaughters, with canopies and babies and pinks, and the grandsons with legos and bolds, and heroes. I imagine my grandbabies, and their parents at Sunday and Holiday dinners, bringing voices to an otherwise quiet world, memories and laughter spilling over like a brimming cup of hot cocoa. I see the Dan in Real Life, with arguing but agreeable siblings, and cousins whose very summer should equate other cousins. I see myself righting my thus far wrongs, the yelling absent, the punishments a late-night-over-wine joke among my children.
I am vacuuming up tiny beads of what looks like styrofoam peanuts and Barbie limbs and hair, and the twins are giggling uproariously at a half-working metal detector, while the girls fuss over a book that has gathered dust for months, and the middle child debates his new lego shrine, when the reality of it all hits me.
They will be those grown children before I can blink, stressing about mortgage and marriage. They will coast through high school, and colleges, forgetting their roots until their own children spring into the world with a bouncy step. And while I am packing their tupperware and fantasizing about grandbabies for pancakes, they are tiny and ever-needing before me. The American Girls, and Indiana Jones and Robert Munsch are alive and well and i am overlooking them.
I abandon my fantasies of future perfection, and wipe snot from a nose or two, and holler about misplaced shoes, and rub the back of a weepy child. Every moment lays before me like a train track... neverending in its finiteness. And while the chug of the train rings in my ears, I grasp each moment like a wish, and breathe it in.

Batter Up

2010-04-21T17:03:00.000-07:00

It is dusk, and a faint sliver moon is awakening in a clear sky. In the distance, children are hunting fireflies, and embarking on the start of summer vacation as only children can do. Sounds of balls hurtling through air that is sparked with possibility, echo across the ball field.
I am on the precipice of 16, the future not yet etched into my skin, invincibility in my every breath.When he stands up to bat, tiny hairs on my arms stand up, and a sport that was once not even a thought in my mind, is suddenly all that exists in the moment. He has baseball arms, and baseball arms seem like home. He looks up in the stands, and his mother waves, thinking he is looking at her, but I know that it is I he seeks. When the ball connects with the bat, the sound fills the space of the world.
Nearly two decades later, the smell of the cut grass at the field is enough to erase the minivan, the extra pounds from numerous pregnancies, the laugh lines, the mortgage and the knot of stress that rests itself perpetually inside my gut. The teenage girl emerges, full of hope, and a belief that sitting in bleachers with a dehydrated hot dog is life itself.
Guns n Roses croons on the radio about a Paradise City, and because these memories have taken hold, Wynantskill has become said city. It is easy to forget about acne, and bad teachers. I can overlook homework and ugly semi-formal dresses. I am convinced that early 90s fashion was timeless and not at all silly and arbitrary. It is Paradise City because my youth, and my passion and my vhemence is all encompassing. My heart is yet to be scarred by repeated shattering, my idea of chaos is cramming for midterms, and no one I adore has died and left me alone.
When I have passed the fields, and the song has ended, I have an indelible mark in my hand. It vaguely resembles that of another hand, a hand at the end of an arm, a baseball arm. A hand that has long since grown and become a different hand, but whose mark will always remind me of a time when baseball equaled beauty and the best place for hunting fireflies was paradise city.

Put on a Happy Face

2010-03-15T10:41:00.000-07:00

Those of us who have a loved one who suffers from depression, we know the color gray. We know how easily a day can go from technicolor to gray in a single phone call, a downcast look, a sigh.
We know that the only other helplessness that is even slightly akin to this, is that which we feel when our children are sick.
We think that if we could only make the right meal, say the right thing, plan the right event. We think if we could only smile that much wider, it would become infectious, and all would be all right.
We tell ourselves that this too shall pass, but it passes like molasses, and we wait.
Brave faces galore in public, nothing can be as it seems. How is your sister, your husband, your uncle, your friend they ask innocently. And you feel your face crack into a thousand pieces as you smile brightly and declare them to be fine. You hear the click of the wheels on the grocery cart as you walk away, and the only way you know how to keep walking without falling, is to align your steps with the clicks.
We read books and articles, recommend vitamins and exercise. We convince ourselves that a cure lays just beyond our reach, and that if we exhaust ourselves by searching, the puzzle will solve itself. On the down time, when the phone is silent, and the downcast looks are unable to be seen, and the sighs are out of earshot, life reassembles itself like a Salvador Dali in reverse. The clocks tick again, the birds sing, and our friend, Food, is once more able to delight us.
At night, when the exhuberant sounds of unknowing children have been tucked beneath blankets and lovey bears, and meaningless tasks have dwindled and gone, the fear and loneliness whistle in oh so casually, and you cry the emptiness out.
You may find, though reluctantly, that while your smile is not contagious, their depression is. Their power is too strong to resist. Down the rabbit hole, we go. And only then do we understand that our urging, our begging, our promises and our lies will do nothing to alleviate their pain. All that is left, at this point, is to hold them to you, tightly tightly tightly, so they can not float away.

This Woman's Work

2010-03-09T12:59:00.000-08:00

We take it for granted. At some point, between the ages of 10 and 15, we get our first periods, and for those of who avidly read Judy Blume, we begin counting down to that day from an early age. When it arrives, we quickly come to the conclusion that the nickname "the curse" was aptly given, and begin to wonder disdainfully if Margaret (of the Are You There God fame) was a little out of her mind for her eager anticipation.
Our mothers either alert the media with fanfare about their babies becoming women, or they are like my mother, who simply said "there's some stuff in the cabinet." I prefer Claire Huxtable's approach, taking Rudy for a carriage ride in the city, allowing her to play hooky, and if I were only a little more liberal, would appreciate the symbolism of the sip of red wine discussed in How to Make an American Quilt.
As we get older, we learn to swim while we have it, how to dodge messy situations, and how to buy tampons without furiously blushing and repeating the mantra "they are for my mother, they are for my mother" in our heads, in case we are somehow asked by the pimply faced checkout clerk at the supermarket.
And then we reach childbearing age, and what was once a curse, has become an elusive jewel of a grab bag gift. Each month becomes for some, a crapshoot, a russian roulette of sorts, for others, an eager calendar watch in the hopes that it has done its job, and for some of the latter, a heartbreaking and frustrating reminder of just how truly elusive it can be.
My own has been reliable in every sense of the word. After that initial hump, we eased into a routine, for better or worse, and when it was time to bear me fruit, fruit it bore. With our first, it produced a gorgeous 9 pound, 2 ounce baby girl after 25 hours of labor and one hour and 45minutes of pushing. We conceived her on first try, and Old Trusty held strong throughout the pregnancy. Then we tried for number two, and again, conceived the first time, and even left time to watch Dawson's Creek afterward. Alas, despite our valiant efforts, babies two and three lost the fight, and we were both left empty and achy.
Almost immediately, we counted down the weeks till a safe ovulation and our husband, who wanted so much to mend our broken heart, obliged and after one try, we produced a rotund and healthy 10 pound, 14 ounce baby girl. The void had been joyously filled, and the ache forgotten by all.
Two years later, the first boy arrived on the scene, all 8 pounds, 7 ounces of him, and despite gestational diabetes and a prior back surgery, Old Trusty came through and held that boy till he was perfectly baked.
Three years later, our husband, who had adamantly insisted two, then three, were perfect for a family, approached us for baby four. We hesitated. We were both feeling our age, and regaining our stride, but our heart won out, and we dove in. And I think both of us were confused as we felt random movements, and we both grew so very quickly. But our curiosity was quenched when the sonographer showed us our twins at week 19. "aaaaaah", we said together. "we can do this." And do it, we did. We stretched in all the right places, and glowed when necessary. We made it through insulin dependent diabetes, and thyroid complications, and an unwanted cesarean, and patted ourselves on the back when they gracefully pulled out twin A at 6 pounds, 1 ounce, and then a very squirmy twin B at seven pounds, 2 ounces.
And now, 19 months later, we see the CAT scan, with the tiny white spot where there should be none, and our bravado has begun to sink. We may not have to part ways immediately, the doctors say there may be other options, but realistically, our road together will not be much longer.
I have so much more to say to you, my friend. So much gratitude for your gifts. I would be lying if I said I hadn't considered coming to you again for more babies. You have been my Giving Tree, and I never knew it till now. So please know, Friendly Uterus, you will be remembered long after your strong, beautiful trunk has fallen.

The End of an Era

2009-12-14T10:59:00.000-08:00

I used to sit on her La-Z-Boy, eating her black licorice (which I hated, but swore that I loved simply because she did), watching soaps with her, because this is what was part of our routine.
As a five year old child, I knew to equate Patti Austin and James Ingram's "Baby Come to Me" with Holly and Robert Scorpio, I knew that Adam Chandler was a force to be reckoned with, and Tina and Cord were too hot to last. My grandma would doze in her chair, and I would sit with my crossword puzzle, awaiting the theme song of General Hospital, which started with a mournful siren and not the silly 90210-esque character montages of today.
It was a time of simplicity...being a child, being in the 1980s, thinking one could escape merely by watching escapist television. I think it is this fact that allowed me to justify watching these soaps for decades after this. As a teenager, I taped them every day on our VHS and watched them while i did my homework, my heart hurting for the love I had for Sonny Corinthos and Jasper Jax, and getting more involved in the rape trials on One Life to Live than in half the drama in my own school. It became a constant, something I always knew would be there. They played during the holidays, they never took vacations or left me when I needed them. When my beloved grandmother died, General Hospital stayed, and while all the characters had long since left the show, it never ceased being "our" show. As I got older, and my children started coming into the world, the shows made less sense to me. The same storylines were often recycled and were becoming more absurd and unbelievable by the week. I stuck it out as long as I could, for as long as I knew that GH would start at 3pm on ABC, I would know that somewhere, anywhere, my grandma was alongside me. I endured endless teasing and scoffing from my mother, who never understood the idea of a Soap Opera, and my husband, who equated watching soaps as being one of those cliched housewives eating bonbons.
When my son was born, life got crazier, and trying to keep up with the soaps on tivo became a chore. So I would watch the Friday episodes on Soapnet, and more often than not, got the entire gist of the storyline from these catchup nights. Then, it became once a month, then not at all.
I was reading an article today on CNN about a fan outcry because of the cancellation of As the World Turns and Guiding Light, neither of which were my soaps. Women were bemoaning the loss of people they considered to be friends, and the loss of a staple TV show.
What they are really mourning, as I think I understand more than many of the people who probably think of this as nonsense, is the end of an era. The end of a time when society embraced stay at home mothers, and provided them with coping mechanisms for long lonely days and difficult marriages. The end of a time when being green, and being fiscally responsible, and sexually chaste were not the headlines, and viewers were not ridiculed for finding enjoyment in such shallow behavior. The end of a time when all it took was a siren and an old love song to bring back a long gone beloved family member, if even for an hour.
I empathize with these women, who are all living the same day to day dilemmas, struggles, joys and ecstasies as myself and most of my friends. I empathize their need for that constant, when the world outside the front door is tumultuous and unknown. I empathize at the feeling of powerlessness, when something you have held dear for decades can be so eaily taken away for the mere sake of advertising dollars and ratings. But I also know that as a stay at home mother, it is our responsibility, no our RIGHT to abandon the age old labels and cliches that are placed on us. We do not need to cower because women who work out side the home think of us as lazy or spoiled, or because very little is done on the political level to assist families who choose to keep a parent with their children. We do not need soap operas to escape, because the mere fact that we get to be at home, watching our children grow from moment to moment is nothing to escape. I have found that turning off the television during the daytime has allowed me to hear so many things I would have missed otherwise. Babies laughing in their cribs, Lucas rifling his little hands through his lego bucket, in search of the one piece that would complete his masterpiece, and if I am quiet enough, oh so very quiet, I can faintly hear the drawer opening, and the package of black licorice being opened.

(old post)

2009-10-25T19:26:00.000-07:00

Friday, February 16, 2007

Halloween

I am not sure of the exact appeal to Halloween. Perhaps it is the pagan in me, longing to come out. The girl who used to burn black candles and listen to eerie music. Really, the only religions that make even the slightest bit of sense to me are taoism and wicca, but I digress. Perhaps halloween is as exciting as it is because of the anonymity of costumes, the idea we can each metamorphise into another being. We grew up in a small town, atop a mountain, so the trick or treating was sparse and difficult. As young teenagers, my friends and I would traipse around the center of the mountain, hunting out the best goodies (full sized candybars) and I would stand by and disapprovingly watch as they "tricked" the less than generous houses. Back then, parents were trusting enough to send their strangely clad children out into the dark to knock on strangers doors. We would all heed the rules about no wrapperless candy, knowing that evil disguised itself as razor blades in 3 Musketeer Bars. As a parent, my joy comes from the photo ops with my children....cute little cherubic faces peering out from nylon and stuffing, equal mix of glee and fear in their eyes as we walk up to the houses with hanging skeletons and luminescent jack o'lanterns. I love the horror movies they play for the last two weeks of the month, and have to wonder why we as a society love to be scared the way we do. Although I suppose that the fear we feel when watching halloween or Psycho or Pet Semetary is nowhere close to the fear we feel when at war, or when republicans are in office, but again I digress.
This year, my oldest daughter is unsure of what she wants to be. It started out as a cowgirl, then switched to a bat, and now it is wavering between a storybook character or a fairy. I have tried to tell her of the handmade costumes of my youth...my mother actually dressed me as Michael Jackson and Ben Franklin, but kids these days assume all costumes should come wrapped in plastic and match 20 other kids in their classes. There is palpable excitement in the air this week at my house. Our pumpkins are eager for their slaughter... the scarecrow grins through the dark, and the glow in the dark spider is happily awaiting the impending day on his web. And this year... I get to be the woman all the kids will long to see....for I, my friends, have Full Sized Candybars.

They are young

2009-10-09T22:47:00.000-07:00

There are tiny moments. They are sporadic. There is sometimes music beating time with the moments, and silence to mark the others.
She feels a lifetime in a moment, a mere minute in a year. This is the glory of youth.
James Dean and Marilyn Monroe, in black and white glory, line her walls- a tribute to a past she has not known, nor will she ever.
She reads On the Road and fancies herself a female Kerouac, she watches obscure movies at her tiny theater off Rural Rd. and fancies herself an amateur Siskel, but really what she is is young.
She closes her mouth in horror as her friends spin brodies off the Salt River Project, and in silence, watches the Phi Sigs play basketball out her window. She makes it to class when she can, and absorbs what she can, but really what she is is young.
She meets a boy at a campus party. He is lanky, she is lonely. they strike up a conversation, as it goes. She wants to be anywhere but here, anyone but this, but it sticks, and she is.
She studies, she forgets to study. She yearns, she longs to yearn, and she grows with each ticking moment, and learns while growing.
She watches the students traverse the campus, and pretends they are each as lost as she, she who envisions campus in a snow globe, and still counts signatures in her yearbook. The girls in their sorority gear, and the boys who lust after the girls in sorority gear...they are not ninth floor material. For the ones on the ninth floor have embraced their difference.
They are East Coasters. They have Someone back home. They protest while they obey, and regret only afterward.
She goes with him to a movie, only for lack of something else to do. And in the profile of the screen, she is lost in a possibility.
She is suddenly huge in a tiny world, and all makes sense.
There is a phoning, and a random nuance of astrology, and a poster of a swamp girl with outstretched hands, and she has lost herself in the cliche.
They are young. This is right.

Living the dream

2009-10-07T19:25:00.000-07:00

There were times... many of them, that I questioned whether or not I was doing the right thing. The times when money was tight, bills were due, tires needed changing, or credit cards were high...I wondered if I had mistakenly taken the selfish route. I could have been "bringing in the bacon", along with a struggling Jake. I could've been putting in my nine to five, dressed in nylons and a chignon, alongside the majority of American women, earning my keep.
But we saw her tiny face, pink and innocent, ready for everything the world was going to hand her, but so soft and needy, and there was no question that I would stay with her. She would not face it alone. There would be no daycare, no strangers, no missed moments. She would be one hundred percent mine. We gave up the idea of a house, of fancy cars, of restaurants and shopping sprees. And I spent each day, immersed in baby language and diapers, and meals for Jake. I took it for granted, knowing that as long as we were willing to sacrifice, this would be my life.
I have done this for a decade, now. A decade of occasionally feeling like I was a stranger in a strange land... dropped naked into an anthill of baby talk and spit up and Fisher Price. Sometimes feeling the need for adult conversation, a glass of wine, a day of just Kerensa.
I repeatedly asked Jake if this was right...should we struggle week to week, paycheck to paycheck so I could make rudimentary cookies with the kids and read Robert Munsch twelve times a day. He never wavered- yes, this was right. And I believed.
Now I know. These five brilliant faces, with expectant eyes who have never once wondered if they were the world's most gifted children, because I have told them they are. These ten loving arms, who embrace me like a superwoman, their hero, because to them- I am. These voices which clamor for me, but echo the sounds of true independence...the ability to know that I am always there no matter how far they stretch the limits. We have risen, like fiery Phoenixes from the ashes a dozen times...we have pushed past due dates and late paychecks and come to this point. A point that anyone would be proud of, and we are most proud of Them. The money is secondary, the possessions are secondary, the pride, surprisingly enough, is secondary. It is these children, who were put on pedestals, that puff up our chests like peacocks.
I know, now, especially when making comparisons, that I am living the dream. My picket fence is bright white, my breasts are proud and full of supple life, my home is bursting at the seams with love and laughter. Regardless what the future has to bring, we have done it right. Oh yes, we have done it right. Thank you.

Naked Front Door

2009-09-09T19:17:00.000-07:00

I took the curtains off the sidelite windows yesterday, in preparation for our new storm door, and each time I pass it by, I am startled by how naked I suddenly feel.
Our world has become one whose hatches are battened, toggles are buttoned and seams are sealed tight. Fifty years ago, it was customary to pop your head in your neighbor's door and let out a "yoohoo", and now the door has become deadlocked, barricaded and made of steel.
I have mentioned before that I was raised on a mountain, where privacy was not only possible, but all too often the norm. In winter, the street was dark as pitch, because the inhabited homes were few and far between. My parents would go to sleep early, and I would be left in the quiet, longing for companionship and the noises of a suburb.
Friends who lived below Taborton led, in my eyes, an easier life. They did not help split wood with a hatchet in November, or drag mattresses in front of the coal stove during power outages. When they wanted a "playdate", a simple bicycle ride could get them there. My first taste of this freedom was in college, and by golly, I took advantage.
My entire adult life, I have longed for the random neighbors popping in for a cup of coffee (though I would have to be taught how to make it first) or the nonstop ringing of the bell on Halloween evening. I have wanted to shoo my children out on their bicycles only to have them return with a handful of friends begging for dinner. I am chastised by my husband, my parents, my more urban friends because I only lock my door while sleeping. I laugh thinking that if I were to have my way, the door would be a swinging one, alive and busy with the visitors bursting forth.
Now that Jake is living elsewhere, and school has begun, I am immersed in quiet once more. My lovely little tree frogs have started to take shelter, and the windows must be shut against the early morning chill. The dark yawns wider and earlier each night, and so the door becomes locked for longer periods of time. I walk to the mail box at one each afternoon, when the twins are safely ensconced in their crib, and the street has become deserted. This is a far cry from just a few weeks ago, when lawnmowers, teenagers and hesitant children bikers were littering the front lawn of every house.
Like a chameleon, I must adapt now. I must draw closed the curtains when I tuck the kids in, and avert my eyes when a winter weary neighbor trudges past. I must pack away my summer smile with my good weather wardrobe, and accept the solitude until April.
But I have decided, being the rebel I am, to leave the curtains off my sidelites. My private middle finger to the laws of reclusion. If you drive by, and you think my door looks a bit naked, you may see that the light is also on. This is my plea, my friends: Please poke your head in and yoohoo.

First Day

2009-09-08T18:13:00.000-07:00

First Written Friday, February 16, 2007

So apparently, according to my mother, I am an odd duck. I used to look forward to the first day of school with fervor. The smells of new shoe leather, the classroom and supplies. The feel of your new first day dress, and perfect September air. Everything was new, and fresh, and full of promise. Which teachers were to become your destiny? The ones who drove you crazy with their stupidity, or the ones who picked your brain and tested your limits? Would your friends be in your class, or in your lunch? What about the guy you had a crush on?
I want to tell my children they will have great teachers, and terrible ones. They will make some amazing friends who will bring them nostalgia in adulthood, and they will have some friends who cause me to inwardly cringe. They will have fabulous days, and atrocious days, but the good days will outnumber the bad. There will be a lot of learning experiences that will be invaluable to them for their entire lives. But these are things about which they will not listen to me. I am an old woman, I know nothing about what it is like to be in second grade/fifth grade. They don't think I remember that my second grade teacher wore a red dress on the first day of school, that I learned to ride my bike without training wheels that year, that Mark Perry broke his arm and we got to sign his cast, that Laura Perez told me there was no Santa Claus. They don't think I remember the feeling of being the new girl in school, or the embarrassment of when my wraparound skirt fell off in the hallway after recess. They have no idea that I still remember buying a stuffed calico cat for my favorite aunt at the school christmas shop for 10 cents.
Their closets are ready to go- they have accumulated absurd numbers of outfits, and an Imelda Marcos-worthy wardrobe of shoes. They have their pretty new Gap backpacks all filled with colorful supplies, and the chore list is ready to be tacked to the kitchen wall. I will cross my fingers that they will get to a point, as this summer winds down, when they are filled with anticipation and eager for the sounds of the bus arriving at the corner. I will stand in the front door, and watch them run down the driveway with the backpacks they picked out by themselves bouncing against their tiny hips. They will sit in their assigned seats and wave emphatically at me while the bus roars away, and my heart gets tugged along with it. And all the while, they will have butterflies playing tag in their bellies. This is my hope for them. Let them be odd ducks, too.

Posted by kerensa at 9:37 PM

Homemade Skidz and home of the bedazzler

2009-09-04T20:06:00.000-07:00

Like kids in a candy store, they are furiously digging their grubby paws through the clearance bins, in search of an item, any item, that would make this dig pay off. They eagerly examine scrapbook stickers and notepads (although the monogram P and V are all that are left), until they find something random and I agree to add it to my basket.
We are there to buy supplies for their Halloween costumes, and before you get overly impressed with my superwoman skills, I must admit this is the first year I am attempting homemade costumes.
When my sister and I were growing up, my mother was that aforementioned supermom. She made us gourmet meals on a tight budget, managed a full time teaching job and still managed to be the mom who dug out her sewing machine periodically. When the kids in 7th grade were all buying Skidz pants (atrociously ugly), she actually made me a pair so I could fit in (though I never wore them- because I was a perpetually embarrassed preteen) My handmade costumes ranged from Michael jackson, to Strawberry Shortcake to (believe it or not) Benjamin Franklin. Though I still receive massive amounts of flack for the Michael Jackson costume (in black face and all, before PC was PC), I admire both her ability to conjure up such eclectic ideas, as well as seeing them through so successfully.
As an adult, and mother of five now, I am drawn to store made, over the top and ridiculously expensive costumes. Adding up the totals for my kids' costumes last year, it came to more than the cost of my wedding dress. And yet each year, after only two hours of gorgeousness, the costumes come to a heap at the bottom of a tupperware, and are never to be appreciated again.
This year, I fell in love with two costumes on ebay, but the woman who designed them was charging an absurd $125.00 per each, and I quickly came to the conclusion that for only a few hours of my time, and less than 25.00 per costume, I could make something equally (if not more) amazing, and perhaps earn the respect of my children, as well as my handy mother.
Thus, the trip to Michaels. Row upon row of colorful ribbon and silk flowers, kits for impatient children and imperatively patient mothers. Bejewels, bedazzles, baskets and batting. Frames, and scrapbooks and cake supplies. Every aisle holds a treasure...and the promise of a possibility. Aisle 1B, the cake supplies- completed the 4 courses, thinking I would be a cake decorator. Front of the store, supplies for wreath making- bought the supplies with every intention of making my own last year, only to donate it to an auction. Scrapbooking section- $1200.00 spent on stampin up and scrapbook pages, convinced I would make a killing making greeting cards. Kid craft aisle- 27 aprons, 24 fabric markers and a set of 12 puffy fabric paints for Morgan's birthday party last year.
The list could go on and on. I fondle things in this store, as odd as that is. I find gadgets I know no common use for, and still think- I must have this. I finger the spools of ribbon, nylon, organza, and grosgrain, and think- I should buy it now and someday I will need it. The yen to be crafty has been in me since childhood, but the talent has simply eluded me.
Jake speaks of Michaels, as an ex-convict would speak of the hell in which they once did time. He was dragged there by his own mother, and as he tells it, survived it only by the skin of his teeth.
I worried that bringing my three oldest there today would be the same, but as I let them pick out a craft each, and they eagerly grabbed boxes and colorful patches and foam objects (that I just know will eventually be thrown away), I saw that the need to create is more than just a learned need. It is something that comes from within, a happy surprise in a world so dead set upon destruction and decomposition. With the simple idea that in an afternoon, one can juice up their bedroom, put their face on a plate or make a vase filled with colorful explosions of hope, we are given a taste of optimism. It may seem like I am overstating, but boiled down, it really seems to be the case. My children are no more proud than when they have a new art project, or have learned a new song on the piano. Their floor has permanent bits of glitter embedded in the carpet, and they have overflowing "special boxes" in their closets, meant for sketches and palm print thanksgiving turkeys.
Knowing this, I have decided to add Michaels to my list. The list that is a bit meager with my children of such varying ages: Hoffman's, the park, the pool... After all, you can only be a kid in a candy store but for so long. I will post pictures of my homemade costumes, rudimentary though they may be, and do not think for a second I am not oozing with pride. I also will post pictures of a perhaps off-kilter foam Haunted House, a model car (taken over by daddy when little fingers grew restless) and a shockingly yellow shirt covered in an odd array of patches. And rest assured, I will also post the pictures of the happy faces from whom these creations were born. The happy faces of my very own amazing creations.

Thinking Inside the Box

2009-08-31T19:31:00.000-07:00

They are immersed in a conversation only feet from where she sits, and it is a dialogue in her own language, but she is unable to comprehend. They are speaking of the depths of the latest foreign film they have seen, and of the new exhibit at the modern art museum. They speak of their trips overseas, and of obscure Indian Food restaurants, and of communes and underground music.
She scrambles to pick up after one baby, who has littered the floor with a mosaic of rice and beans. Another child is showing her their bubble blowing abilities in soda.
She searches her brain for a piece of titillating gossip, news or random trivia she could bring to this table, but she is at a loss. She could speak of the new way the babies say thank you, or of the upcoming school year. She could recite Stand By Me word for word, and give a recipe for macaroni and cheese she stole from Paula Deen.
An invisible mirror is suddenly before her and she sees an overweight girl with hair that actually looks frayed along the hemlines. She sees hunched shoulders, and tired eyes. She does not see a higher than average IQ, or an ability to speak rudimentary French. She is mom, and while that is exactly what works on any other given day, it suddenly falls short at this table. Mom ceases to be interesting or well read. While the others at the table talk of Shakespeare and Tolstoy, she is midway through a Judy Blume. While they talk of kayaking through cold, open waters, she fantasizes about someday soon taking a solo soak in the bathtub.
The mirror girl, the one who often speaks in words two syllables or less and who sometimes wears the same jeans three times in a row, eats chips so as to seem too busy to join in the conversation, which has moved to the concert in the park. She notices a pee pee dance, and ushers children to the bathroom. She averts her eyes when the strangers at the next table disdainfully watch her shrieking baby. She feels wider and more bland than even five minutes ago, and wonders if when she goes to stand, the chair will accompany her hind quarters.
They leave the restaurant, and drive to the park, where the suburban moms in their suburban cars have unloaded double strollers and Target brand Crocs. She separates herself from her group, and accompanies her son as he climbs and swings and jumps and slides. She feels a little taller, and thinner as the man with two children of his own acknowledges her tiny waddling baby, and taller still when another asks how many she has, and impressed, calls her brave. She thinks to herself that the women on the park bench could surely tell her the meaning of supercalifragilisticexpialodocious, but hesitate when asked about health care reform. The air feels clearer here, and it helps to ease the fog that had come over her brain. She suddenly remembers the new band she had been reading about, the book she recently got from the library, and the research she has been doing about mood disorders. She looks to find her group, to let the information out, but when she finds them, she sees one making a sand castle, and another giving a piggy back ride.
The girl in the invisible mirror packs up the bag, and baby bottles, secures carseats and drives away. She knows it will not always be like this. Someday, she may be the one in the nearly empty restaurant with oodles of ideas and conversation fraught with nuance and irony. But for now, what works for her is for the box to be compact and light. There are enough holes poked in the top to breathe, and the light that filters in this afternoon illuminates the contents in such a way that the girl in the mirror begins to look rather lovely.

Titanic Love

2009-08-29T19:46:00.000-07:00

Friday, February 16, 2007

If you have watched the movie Titanic, you know what I am talking about when I say Titanic Love. I saw this movie when it first came out, Christmas of 1997. I has just had my heart broken and a great friend brought me to see it, and let me cry in the theater while Jack froze to death in the water. Titanic Love is a love that is destined to fail, to sink if you will, but is so worth the pain, you would go through it a thousand times. Jack and Rose had two days together before she was selfish enough to steal the door out from under him and let him die, but in that time, they felt true passion and romance that rocked her world for the next 80 decades.
For many, Titanic Love is a dream. The idea of a soul mate is a dream. For those who have experienced it, you know that there are some things that surpass words and time.
Your life is made up of moments. Some are trivial and forgettable. Some are momentous, like childbirth, your wedding vows, graduation. And some are what I call "movie moments". The moments that are so vivid, you could remember smells, sounds, and visions even after many years have passed. The incredible romantic moments that feel surreal, the tragedies that make you sob hysterically, the crazy adventures that you can't believe you did. I have many of these moments. In my early twenties, my life was such a turmoil. From one moment to the next, I could never tell if I would be in crazy love, terrible angst and loneliness, or content in Arizona nights. I had many beautiful people in my life, many whom I miss terribly. I had Titanic Love, I had cheesy crushes, I had roommates who would cruise Mill Ave with me, listening to the Fugees and talking about dreams.
For my own daughters, I will tell them....make sure once in your life, you have Titanic Love. Make sure once in your life, you get your heart smashed to smithereens. Make sure once in your life, you make a beautiful mistake. Because above all, it will be fuel for the rest of your life to never stop searching for movie moments. We all deserve movie moments.

Old Entry from Previous Blog

2009-08-27T20:04:00.000-07:00

Friday, February 16, 2007

Valentine's Day/ Snow Day

This morning, we awoke to six inches of powdery snow, and a snow day, and so began a glorious Valentine's Day. Chocolate Chip pancakes for breakfast, and chilly romp outside, a crackling fire, and homemade Valentines have all continued to make this the sweet day tradition says it should be.
Many believe that valentine's Day is merely a holiday perpetuated by mass corporations like Hallmark, capitalizing on peoples' needs for passion and romance. It trounces on the lonely and heartbroken, and empties the pockets of the desperate in love. But does it have to be that way? I spent four and a half hours making homemade valentines cards for the kids classes, complete with ribbon, and gold embossing, only to meet with a disdainful Jake, wondering why I wasn't buying the 99 cent cartoon character cards at Wal Mart. But don't those cards go against everything that Valentine's Day should stand for? If we so easily forget to pay attention to these little things, aren't we merely exacerbating the already dismal situation of current romance patterns in our society? Call me melodramatic, but I truly believe that the downfall of our culture relies mainly in the laziness we have all come to embrace. We take short roads, when the long ones may be much more scenic, we microwave when the oven adds more flavor, we drive when the walk would do us good, and we buy cheap ugly cards when we could show the recipients we care enough to spend a minute on them. And, of course, this is all metaphorical. Cards are just a small reminder of how quickly we disregard that which comes from the heart. I will always be the romantic who believes that flowers plucked valiantly from a field say more than a bouquet designed by professionals. I will always believe that a goopy peanut butter and jelly sandwich created by a husband for a wife with cravings is a thousand times more delicious than a veal dish in a five star restaurant. It is all about relishing moments, creating lasting delicious minutes. I will spend laborious hours hand-piping frosting on the heart cookies for Morgan's school. They will be eaten quickly by greedy four year olds' hands, but Morgan will remember the time I took forever. The way I will always remember my own parents sketching me homemade cupid cards when I was small, or my mom stitching my costumes at halloween. Small thoughtful things are lasting. After valentine's Day my senior year, an ex-sweetheart sent me a lavish bouquet of roses to patch my grieving heart (my grandparents had just died). Valentine's Day of my freshman year at ASU, a friend ran after me in a parking lot to deliver one rose and a card because they truly just felt I deserved it. One year when we were down and out, Jake brought me home a crossword puzzle book, which meant more than jewelry ever could. I suppose we could sum this up with the old cliche- It's the thought that counts. And it does. So to all of you who are looking forward to your evenings with your special someones, remember that offering them a drink when they haven't asked for it, or covering them with blankets when they have fallen asleep on the couch, or bringing home chicken soup when they were up all night coughing....they will remember these things long after the petals have dried and fallen from the flowers, and the chocolates have been eaten and the shiny heart boxes discarded. I wish you all a day of old fashioned romance, vibrant passion, and heartaching saccharin. But most especially, I wish them to still be there tomorrow.

Colonoscopy cont'd...

2009-08-26T15:15:00.000-07:00

I awoke this morning, feeling clean and empty but nervous. Because I had not eaten in more than 24 hours, the butterflies were given free reign in my empty stomach. Appropriately, my dad drove me in to Albany Memorial, and after the standard check in procedures and insurance rigamarole, I was laid on a bed in a private room. To one side was a large flat panel TV and a number of machines. I was told to lie on my side, revealing all that I own, as my threadbare gown made no attempt at modesty. Electrodes were fastened to my chest, an IV was inserted in my hand, and oxygen put in my nose. I pictured the ocean to calm my nerves, and that particular strategy may have been too successful, the alarm blared to notify the nurse that my heartbeat was too slow.
The doctor came in, briefly squeezed my shoulder and ordered the "cocktail" of versed to be pushed through. As I began to doze, I heard the song "Baby, Come to Me" on the radio, and I remarked that it always reminded me of sitting in my grandmother's living room, watching General Hospital with her. For just one second, I pondered that if the great beyond truly did exist, she could be sending me a sign, but with that...I was out.
I came to midway through the procedure, with the extra large images of my colon, bile and all, directly in front of my face, and an intense pain surging through my gut, as they pushed air in to fill the space and make room for the camera. I watched for a bit, until I could not stand the pain anymore, and they gave me more versed.
The next time I awoke, I was in recovery, surrounded by the sounds of other patients being urged to, and finally succumbing to passing gas to get the extra air out from their procedures. The nurse was at my side almost instantaneously, and informed me that they had found two polyps, one large and one small, and had removed both. They would be sent in to be biopsied, and I would have to meet with the gastroenterologist again in two weeks to discuss not only the results, but the fact that I now was going to be considered more of a high risk patient, and how it would be necessary to test me more often to keep tabs. I stored those words on a shelf in my mind, where all warnings go, so that I could listen to the kids excitedly tell me about their adventures in the park (Morgan-stung by a bee not once but twice!), McDonald's (Lucas- had lemonade! Babies- went up and down the stairs!)
When I came home, my ravenous hunger and thirst had all but disappeared, and in place, I was suddenly queasy, and shaky and after removing my warning from my dusty shelf, a little worried.
There are very few things I know for certain in this life, but what I can tell you is that getting a procedure like this done is worse in anticipation than in reality. The relief you feel post- appointment, far surpasses any embarrassment you may have had before. When I was downstairs in the playroom with the five kids, I thought of how selfish it was for me to have ignored my problem for close to a year. How selfish and irresponsible to think myself invincible, or too busy to get to a specialist. I will not make that same mistake again.

Colonoscopy Eve

2009-08-25T17:33:00.000-07:00

I was thirteen when I found out she had cancer. Amazing, how it was 19 years ago, and I still recall so vividly where I was standing when my mother told me. It was, in a way, similar to the stories we hear of when John F. Kennedy was assassinated...everyone remembers minute details normally forgotten by day's end.
My grandmother was what I consider to this day to be the quintessential grandparent. She bought us new coloring books for each visit, fed us ice cream past bedtime, and nestled us in her bosom when we needed comfort. Her house always smelled like food, whether it was stew or spaghetti, and my grandpa always smelled like smoke. He was a volunteer firefighter, and would often come home at night to kiss us, enveloped in a smoky heroism I relished. They lived in probably a mere 1200 square feet, but as a child, it was a palace, with its patterned carpet, and cushy la-Z-boys. When we spent the night, she made sure to use the sheets bought specifically for me, white with pink roses and a ruffle along the top sheet.
Finding out she had cancer was a devastation, but despite the somber adults, I was convinced she would come through it. And she almost did. But when they thought they had it beaten, after it had spread from breast to lung, it suddenly cropped up in her brain, and it was too late. Every day, after school, my sister, my mother and I would drive to the hospital, and watch her be slowly erased. Thanksgiving, and then christmas were spent in the hospice unit at Samaritan Hospital, the very hospital whose doors I would exit carrying my twins more than a decade later.
A week before she died, my grandfather was diagnosed with terminal cancer, and the cycle continued. Within a year, I lost my grandparents, my parents were separated, and my high school sweetheart and I parted ways. I felt a desolation that to this day has not been replicated. Nights were long and horrific, as I fought off nightmares that would cause Wes Craven to cringe. School became a chore, and maintaining relationships and friendships was exhausting and emotional.
My father was told almost five years ago during a colonoscopy that he, too, was now to be forever known as a cancer victim, a cancer fighter, and ultimately- a cancer survivor. He sported a port in his heart where chemo would be injected, and a brazen scar across his abdomen from surgery. Last year, during Relay for Life, he marched with my kids, and it took everything I had to not sob aloud while I walked.
I have my first colonoscopy tomorrow. Today has been a day of fasting, and laxatives and terrible cherry drinks, but more importantly, a day of reflection. I am certain my results will be much more benign than those treasured family members before me, but I cannot help but think of them tonight (as I do often). I am always certain, when Stevie Wonder croons from my car radio, that my grandmother, ever the same age, is seated next to me. When I pass a fire, whether barbecue or brush, I see a fleeting, tall man who resembles my grandfather, ever the quiet hero. And when I see my dad playing in Indian Lake with my children, his scar proudly on display, as a badge of courage, I say a word of thanks- to whom I do not know.
It is brief, this life, briefer still for too many. I will go to my procedure tomorrow, and will come back home to give hugs that last a bit longer than usual, and when I am told good news, I will close my eyes and suspend my disbelief in the spiritual for a moment, to thank my grandparents, my guardian angels.

Food is love.

2009-08-24T03:57:00.000-07:00

On Saturday night, a family friend came for dinner, and as I cooked for him, I was reminded why one finds such comfort in the kitchen. For the past several months, the kitchen has lost its appeal, because the other adult with whom I share meals is absent, and while my children are open to many kinds of food, their palates are certainly not advanced enough to appreciate good cuisine.
My own childhood was filled with such flavor. My mother was a self-taught cook, never afraid of experimenting beyond the pages of Betty Crocker, and while there was occasionally a misstep or two (anything containing raisins or curry will always be a misstep for me), dinner was a consistently pleasurable time for our family. Each member had their self assigned seats, and we spoke of our days over steaming platters of artichokes, or clams with melted garlic butter. I have many memories that still bring me laughter- my sister stuffing peas into her tiny nose like pistol bullets, my mother serving me detestable brussel sprouts covered in chocolate as a cruel joke.
I really cannot remember much of what we discussed in those days. It was before my parents' divorce, and while there was most certainly tension, what I remember is the bright little breakfast nook, and chipped plates, the dog pattering beneath our feet, and chatting between mouthfuls. At holidays, my mother often hosted the festivities, and our guests were treated to appetizers, feasts and cascading desserts. No one left hungry, no one left empty.
As an adult, I catch a whiff of certain aromas, and I am quickly brought back to this childhood, the childhood that contained its share of trauma (as many do), but that I remember with warmth and peace. My grandmother's spaghetti with braciole , slow cooking all afternoon- she would let me dip a chunk of bread in after lunch to taste test, crockery with piping hot french onion soup, and heavenly chocolate mousse, a specialty of my mother's...these are the scents that fill me with nostalgia, and oddly enough, hope.
Those who know me, know how particular I am about my kitchen. I don't like having help with meals I am preparing, and I prefer you not try to clean up once the dinner is through. I have an absurd amount of tools and appliances for my culinary experimentation, and I enjoy plating the meals rather than serving buffet. There is no greater compliment to a cook than when a guest, for whom a lavish meal has been lovingly prepared, asks for seconds, or pauses after the first bite because they are stunned by what they have eaten.
I do not cook low fat foods, though I know I should. I liken myself to Paula Deen because I, too, love rich, thick, bubbling tastes. While quinoa and alfalfa most certainly has a time and place, I prefer Hollandaise drenched salmon or pesto mixed with cream cheese. I warn those partaking in my food that if they were to eat with me often, they would find themselves chunky and perhaps someday needing bypass, but sometimes, it is both deserved and necessary to allow yourself such luxuries.
On Saturday, with our guest watching me prepare his dinner, I felt most at home. As we spoke, I sprinkled pieces of our conversation throughout the food. He spoke of his love for his wife, and the amazing hand with which she raises her children, and I took those words and poured them over the sauce. He spoke of disappointments with work, and I crumbled in an extra dash of hope in with the cheese. My ego, my narcissism emerges only with my food, for I believe that while it may not be a refined talent, and certainly nothing unique, it is my one true talent. I learned it from my mother, who during our times of poverty, could pull scraps from the refrigerator and combine them in such a way that we felt like kings.
If you are ever in my area, soon to be a completely different area, please stop by and let me cook for you. We can talk about old times, or times to come. If it is cold outside, I will wrap you in a thick soup, if it is warm, I will douse you with sorbet. But when you leave, you will leave full, and I will sleep well. Food is love.

Insomnia

2009-08-15T19:20:00.000-07:00

It began 9 years ago, in the blistering wet heat of Florida. While the world slept, I watched the clock ease its way through the late night. I learned the joys of ebay at midnights, and reruns of Friends at 2am, and infomercials where I was promised a double order plus free shipping and handling if I.Just.Call.Right.Now! I watched Rhiannon asleep, still a baby, with sporadic phantom boob suckling. I was startled by Jake's sleepwalking/sleeptalking/sleepbasketball playing. I took showers stealthily in hopes it would trigger drowsiness, but to no avail. I cannot exactly tell you what would run through my mind as those minutes and hours dragged on. In retrospect, I assume I was suffering from postpartum, and my mind was whirling like an out of control carousel. Jake and I were planning our wedding, though in all honesty, Jake took more of a bystander role. With a limited budget, I hunted down guest books and veils from novice auction sellers, and panicked about paying DJs and photographers. I had a young baby, and I fretted over my every misstep. I lived far from my family and any support, so I spent eons yearning for companionship, and it spilled over into the night, I suppose.
When I moved to New York, the insomnia lowered its ugly head, and while I never was one to achieve more than a solid few hours of rest without nightmares, night pees, or muscle cramps, I did not suffer those evenings of watching the clock, thinking- if I fell asleep right this minute, I would get 3 hours before the alarm goes off....
And now, my world has once again been shaken like a snowglobe, disrupting those once peaceful particles and swirling them around my head. The calliope music has begun once more, and the carousel, my friends, is off and running. I sit here at Jake's computer, in his apartment in Raleigh, and for the life of me, cannot fathom sleep, or even its lowly imposter, catnap.
On this night alone, I have tended to crying babies, children with nightmares and children with headaches. I have watched Hulu and scrubbed Jambalaya dishes. I reorganized jake's bachelor pad-esque closet, and scrutinized facebook. The quiet (besides collective snores) merely exacerbates the angst in my head, like my brain in the midst of a tantrum.
I have tried the suggested means of sleep begetting.... counting sheep becomes a fluffy woolly mosh pit, picturing myself melting muscle by muscles becomes an electric Dali painting in the works. Taking a warm bath reminds me of places needing a razor, a pluck or a buff. I could take a drive, which almost always acts as a surefire method of sleep when done during inappropriate day hours, but my GPS does not recognize this apartment complex, and therefore I would become lost.
I am reminded by friends, family and even by inner intellect that this too shall pass. Soon, it will be behind us, and we will have squared things away. In the grand scheme of things, our stress is miniscule and petty. I could put things in perspective by reading CNN, though I am doubtful whether stories of war, drunken mother drivers and kidnapped disabled boys will be the antidote for my insomnia. Instead, I suppose, I will take this opportunity to reflect. Or catch up on shows I have missed during these travels. I could play childish pranks on my sleeping family, or seek out faraway friends for an IM session or two. I could listen to some of jake's random music, so as to give my moshing sheep music to which they could behave badly.
As the minutes are ticking, on my friends and readers, I wish you sweet dreams and a lack of bed bugs ( which, I have learned, are not fictitious creatures).

Thank you for being a friend...

2009-07-22T16:52:00.000-07:00

I flip old photo albums, and rifle through past love letters or letters written to me in my most homesick moments in college. I hear from a friend of a friend that their lives went on just fine without me. The old wound opens and what comes from its gaping mouth is a certain sense of grief.
Over the course of our lifetimes, we meet so many people, and perhaps make many casual acquaintances, but a true and steadfast friend is a rarity. It could be the girl, who in 4th grade, had to hold her purple pleather pants up with both hands while trying to run the laps in gym class. Or the other girl who drunkenly made up (or helped to make up) your high school nickname. It could be the girl who sat with you during American history, who made you laugh till you peed a little. Perhaps the college roommate whom you fought with constantly, or the other college roommate whose parents sent you Halloween care packages. Or, it could be the boy who brought you a rose on Valentine's Day freshman year because your own boyfriend had forgotten you.
Regardless of how you met or befriended them, the friendship got you through times you thought were nothing short of devastating. They were your broad shoulders upon which to cry when you were dumped, your empathetic ear when all seemed lost, and the one who held your hair back for you the first time you were stupid enough to drink blackberry brandy. In a way, I think most of us assume that all of our relationships will be eternal, and perhaps often take them for granted. We let petty arguments grow into mountains, and forget simple days that mean so much to them. Our own worlds are so large and encompassing, we become absorbed in ourselves and our own minutiae.
And then those people, whom we loved fiercely and loyally, begin to drop off, like lost meteors escaping their path through the galaxy, and like those meteors, it is a near impossibility to track them down. At first, you reassure yourself that either you will get them back, or that they were unnecessary in the grand scheme of things. But once it hits you, there is a certain grief that swallows you in tiny gulps. Little reminders left behind have your heart aching a bit. You realize
the person you cared so much for will never again grace your home, your phone, your heart.
I have managed, through Facebook, to find several people I once thought to be lost in the infinite galaxy, and yet others I know will forever deliberately keep themselves off of my grid out of resentment or anger, or perhaps even pity. At one time, I may have felt wronged by this, by these days, as I see my life passing so quickly, all I can find is this:
I wish you a lovely life. Healthy children and healthy marriages. I wish you prosperous enough to coast, and yet not so bloated with wealth that you lose your vision. I wish you joy in the small things, like canoeing a lake or feeding babies ice cream. I wish you peace with your past, peace with your decisions, and peace with your family. And if one day, in the recesses of your beautiful mind, you happen to remember our late night talks, or slumber parties or sundae making fiascos, you get a little warmer, because I still am holding you close.

Uncle Tom's Cabin

2009-07-19T19:45:00.000-07:00

It is not perfect, most certainly flawed, and yet has a certain undeniable charm about it. The walls don't quite meet in the corners, and the showerhead is at mid-chest level. The floors slant just enough so that the baby teeters and occasionally falls when walking. I try not to notice the bottoms of our feet, which are now covered in a dense grey dust, that I will find later takes more than three showers to remove. At night, the tiny black flies worm their way through the holes in the screens, and I fear that a raccoon or an errant chipmunk will discover that the rear door doesn't close completely, and will have their way with our meager camp food supply.
But the view...the view is amazing. At night, the moon sends its brilliant shadow across the water and it truly looks like the lake is glowing from within, which at one time in history may have helped tired sailors to hear the Siren nymphs singing before they drowned. My sister and I stand, one night at midnight, to watch as intense July lightning strobes its way across Indian Lake, and for each tiny brief second, we see the cliffs and islands across the water illuminated in all its mystery. During the day, the white caps reflect the rising sun and Lucas remarks that the lake is full of crystals, and I cannot correct him, for I am sure he must be right.
Family members come to the door at all hours with requests for blankets, bowls or can openers. They want to play with the babies, they want the children to go on the boat or dive from cliffs. Modesty is not an option, so private things must be done quickly, for I never know when I will be caught dressing or breastfeeding.
Lucas is aglow with his new-found independence. He wakes in the morning, ready to visit grandpa, whose cabin is a mere hundred yards from our own. He spends hours tossing rocks into the water and fishing with his dad, though he is hesitant to touch the worms. Rhiannon and Morgan are seldomly seen, as they are entertained by cousins who all live much too far from here.
One family is visiting from Brazil, traveling for more hours than I care to count, to reside in a lopsided cabin on the hill with no real ammenities of which to speak, but are content in their vacation to be with family. Two cousins are military, on leave, spending what little time they have roasting marshmallows and appeasing the little ones who desire constant attention.
Each day, I watch these family members, who at times seem like strangers, for how well could one know people living on a different continent, but at other times, so alarmingly familiar. Each child there has grown lovelier, and succeeded in so many different ways. Children I once diapered have now graduated college, children I teased mercilessly in our youth are now teachers and soldiers. Children with whom I baked countless cupcakes are soccer phenoms and lifeguards. Their parents make sometimes disparaging remarks about the aging matriarch, and reminisce about childhood summers spent at this very camp. They playfully tease each other about their shared genes and apparently ingrained traits. They bicker about politics over barbecue and speak over top of each other when discussing plans for tomorrow. I cook them dinner, and am awed when half a dozen,without speaking, begin an assembly line for dishwashing. I shake my head ruefully when the matriarch makes demands and people rush to obey.
I have a couple of drinks with the cousins in the bar one night, and I see them in such duality. Once again, they are strangers, who like odd music and have stories I think I should already know. But they are also instant friends, obligated to love and protect by mere familial bonds.
When it comes time to leave the lake and the leaky, creaky cabin on the shore, I feel a terrible sense of loss and sadness. Like christmas, it has come and gone too quickly. I sit in the chair on the deck and listen to the sounds of promises being made- keep in touch, will visit soon, should do this again next year and I think of this family...It is not perfect, most certainly flawed, and yet has a certain undeniable charm about it.

Weight...just a moment...

2009-07-10T19:49:00.000-07:00

I stepped on the scale, and despite my justifications and excuses (heavy sweater, change and keys in the pocket, winter boots), the number before me was unfathomable. I have never been a petite person, one of the tallest in elementary school, one of the first to get boobs and hips, so much so that I escaped to a stall in middle school to change for gym class out of embarrassment. Most of my friends were smaller than I, fitting into the cute clothes in 5-7-9 that i could only admire from afar. I tried fad diets in high school, though let's face it- to be that size again would be heavenly.
When I got to ASU, my pockets were empty, and the job market for an inexperienced eighteen year old left much to be desired. I began working at the movie theater, which meant crazy hours, unlimited free popcorn, and most importantly, an absurdly meager wage. At 4.40 an hour before taxes, I barely made enough to buy school supplies let alone feed myself, so I turned to what every college student subsists on: ramen. And bean burritos at midnight from the Taco Bell in the Palo Verde cafeteria, and pepsi. Pepsi. Pepsi. The freshman ten became 15 and pushed 20 before I went home for the summer.
After the breakup with my live in boyfriend in 1997, I lost 30 pounds at an alarmingly fast rate, I assume half was due to dehydration from tears wept, and the rest from my inability to stomach food in my state. I began working at a restaurant (where I met and fell in love with Jake), and the access to the food and drinks during and after all my shifts was dangerous, and even more dangerous was when I became pregnant with Rhiannon. The cravings were not crazy, but at times intense. When in Rome (or close to the Mexican border)...I craved guacamole. Guacamole. Guacamole. I could scarf down tubs, and because Jake and I were broke as young twenty somethings often are, the dollar double cheeseburgers at McDonalds were all too tempting. I gained 33 pounds with Rhiannon, and it showed everywhere- my face, my legs, my stomach. But being 22, I lost it all immediately, and wondered aloud many times why so many women complained about the difficulty of losing baby weight.
I chuckle now at my naivete, because after having five, and now being in my thirties, I realize that life gets in the way. To be comforted, I turn to ice cream and fatty gourmet French foods, to celebrate, I turn to pizza and pasta, to mourn, I turn to cake and pastry. I gain weight with pregnancy, and am instructed not to diet until I have finished nursing, but once I have finished nursing, I become pregnant again rather quickly, and for much of my adult life, my body has not been my own.
Two years ago, I faced it head on and lost close to 50 pounds. For five months, I ellipticized and journaled and did it all the right way. I vowed to make it a way of life, allowing myself one cheat day per week, to have a light at the end of the proverbial tunnel. The pounds melted away, and a joy broke through me that had long been absent. It once again became fun to try on clothes, especially when I had to call out for a smaller size. I no longer shied from mirrors, and things I once thought to be vain and shallow began to make sense: manicures, pedicures, eyebrow waxes, highlights.
And then we decided for another baby. And that baby became two babies. One of which they were unsure would be healthy. And I was diabetic (again), but instructed to consume enough calories to keep up a multiple pregnancy. When all was said and done, I went ahead and gained all of my weight back, like the mound of it crept back in through my window and nestled back into its comfortable, familiar place around my middle.
The twins turn one next week, though i find it so hard to believe so much time has gone by. My self esteem is at its lowest, I believe, in my lifetime. The clothes I relished only two years ago are stuffed into shopping bags at the back of the closet, and I enjoy most the days when I can wear sweats and tee shirts. But it is time. I want to do this for those twins, so I can mark a milestone with another milestone. I want to do it for my husband, who spent so much time encouraging the last time, and who still calls me beautiful. I want to do it for all my kids, who deserve to have a mother who has years of unclogged arteries and working kidneys ahead of her. But mostly, I am doing it for myself, so that when I am sitting in my big ole soccer mom minivan, belting out the lyrics to Fergie's Glamorous (as I did two years ago), I will think...dammit I will KNOW...that she and I are singing about me.

Success

2009-07-02T19:06:00.000-07:00

My mother and I recently had a conversation about success. It began with her telling me of a wall they are devoting to successful graduates in her school. She told me of a former student who now works for the FBI, another who went on to master not only law school, but music and scads of other professions, and yet another who works to find cures for disease. For each of them, she had awe and respect, and the tenderness in her voice was akin to that which she reveals only when she speaks of her most prized pupils. It brought about an interesting question- what is success? She mentioned that many nominations for the wall had come in, parents raving about their daughter who became a doctor, a family who proudly proclaimed their son had been a janitor for decades in the high school...My mother was solid in her belief that while they were admirable jobs, they were not the epitome of success, and therefore could not rival for those positions on the wall.
She reasoned that while all parents are proud of their offspring for their various endeavors, the true meaning of success was to do something grand, something life changing. World changing, if you will.
I disagreed, and still do.
Success is made of numerous factors. Happiness is key, for no matter how hard one works, or how well they are compensated monetarily, without joy in what they do, it means nothing. A man could climb Everest, but if he does it only for the prestige, it is a hollow victory. He must see the world for all of its beauty to have made the climb worthwhile.
Honor is necessary for success. Knowing that what you have achieved, you have done so with your morals and ethics intact, and never had to tread on another to get there. You must be able to have dignity, and never have secrets aching behind your breastbone that could ruin you.
Love, as trite as it may be, is essential. Regardless of how hard you work, at the end of the day it is the people who surround you whose respect and adoration will mean the most. To celebrate a victory alone is like a tree falling in the forest when no one is around to hear it.
Passion....the pulsating writhing grip of fiery beliefs that propels you toward greater heights. This idea is lost on those who have chosen a job or career that does not fulfill them, but merely pads their bank accounts. They forget in the day to day that each moment is sacred, they yearn for their vacation.
In the disagreement we had, my mother did not concede that I earned a spot on the wall of fame, but informed me that my sister and I had done much to make her proud. This is the pride I have sought out my entire life, ever afraid of disappointing, or making the wrong decisions. From early on in my life, I was convinced I would be a doctor- bringing new life into the world, my mother insisted my calling was in writing. I was a moderately good student, I got into the only college to which I applied, and could have made my dreams come true. Only somewhere in that time, the dream changed. My idea of success was altered. I fell in love- with a boy, with impetuosity, with children, and long lazy days of independence. I realized that all I wanted from my life was not fame, fortune or gainful employment, but to chew on bliss. To raise my kids to be happy and strong, and loving and loved. In the back of my mind, I questioned how my family saw this change in me. If they felt cheated out of boasting rights, or disappointed that I had fallen so far from a path I had been so righteous about for so long.
But hearing my mother tell me she was proud, gave me an inner peace. While I may never sit on a wall of fame somewhere, my children might. They might cure cancer, or lead the free world, or write the great american novel. On the other hand, they might spend their days playing this little piggy and making dragonfly pretzels- and the only thing I ask is that they do it because it brings a smile to their face, and a song to their heart. And then, and only then, I will consider them a success.

Buyer's Market

2009-07-02T05:52:00.000-07:00

So, you find a house after looking at three dozen, with three bored children in tow, and an exasperated husband, who says repeatedly that he does not want to have to do any "work" on a house. You look through strangers' closets, and in the darkest corners of their basements, which turn out to be creepier than they should, and you see glimpses into many lives much like your own. You notice the tacky wallpaper in the entry, the stray suspicious hairs on the bathroom floors, and the numerous piles of dog excrement littering the backyard. You make notes about the sizes of the bathrooms and bedrooms, yards and garages. You attempt to mentally arrange your own furniture in rooms normally inhabited by floral fabric loving old ladies, and try to picture your own children coming in the front doors after school. But all too often, you just don't feel "it", the overwhelming need to make this house your home, the feeling that all will be well once you get your things unpacked...so you move on. And on. And on.
Each house becomes more laborious to look through, more exhausting in the realization that perhaps your perfect home does not exist in your perfect price range. And that as it is, your price range is probably a bit out of your price range, but you and your tired and sore husband are through with sloping floors, leaky roofs and drafty windows. You want newer, dammit, cleaner, fresher!
And then one August day, under a hot and prickly sun, with those three bored children whining from the backseat, you pull in front of a house. And from the front of the house, nothing could be written to the folks back home. But you walk inside, and within moments, are in true blue head over heels love. From the gazebo to the half round windows, and all in between, you have become smitten. There are candles in every room, and the scent of cookies, and even your cynical side who knows to ignore these cliches, is enamored with the gesture. You find yourself pleading not only with your husband, but with yourself and making promises, grandiose vows, that you will do whatever you must do to have. This. House.
You are making offers before you see the upstairs, sure that it must be as lovely as what you have seen, and later, once you have left said house, you will find it almost impossible to recall the interior of the rooms, as if you were in a doped fog when browsing through. You will make an offer too high, out of naivete and eagerness, and wait up breathlessly with the call. The call that names you as a homeowner- an owner of furnaces, deeds, property lines and square footages.
For the next three and a half years, you marvel at your home, and take pride in every dinner party, and family holiday. This is your home. You eat grilled ratatouille in the gazebo, and roast marshmallows in the firepit in the yard. You spend weeks, literally weeks, erecting a wooden swingset next to your husband's finely cultivated vegetable garden. You watch your son take his first steps, and your daughter begin kindergarten. You watch your other daughter have her first sleepover in the basement, and welcome twin boys, and lock yourself into your oasis-like bedroom, healing from casarean wounds, while nursing those twins, and never feel less than perfectly at home.
And then, you decide to sell it.
Once it is listed on the market, you begin to find the flaws. The why-didn't-I-notice-these marks and abrasions, the evidence of lives lived and the abuses of time and children. Cleaning becomes more than a chore, and the home you once considered your paradise, your beacon, is once again a house. You must distance yourself from the marks on the wall from the growth of your children, and the barely noticeable crayon mark through new paint, and the spot you were standing when you handed your husband the pregnancy test that would ultimately change the very core of your lives. You must move past the room that your daughter sobbed in, over petty suqabbles with friends, and later echoed with the laughter of your daughter and said friends. You must move past the room made for a princess, where countless bedtime stories had been read and reread, until No, David could be recited from memory. You must move past the room with the bunk bed that not only holds a sleeping Lego fanatic, but his precious imaginary friend (who apparently really likes macaroni and cheese).
You must move past the double cribs, only one of which is used for spooning twins, and the bed you spent your early married years in debt over. You must move past the dining room that once held celebrants for Easters, Thanksgivings, Birthdays, Christmases, and random Sundays. You must try not to notice the little remnants of pine needles from the last three years's trees, decorated lopsidedly and luminescently beautiful by eager, chubby hands. And you must not look in the basement, where the toys graduated from Elmo and Dora to XBoxes and synthesizers, and then back to Elmo once again.
Every time the phone does not ring with a prospective buyer, or another box is packed, your heart clenches a little more, until you are sure it will crack under the pressure. You wonder how it is someone could walk through the doors of number 19, and not feel the emanation of love, and warmth, and Halloween costumes, and piano recitals. And you spend every night, immersed in the quiet left behind by your long distance husband, and you breathe it in. You breathe it in like a drug, filling your lungs with this house. This. Home.

Roller Coasters, Sleepovers and Pool Parties, Oh My!

2009-06-26T12:36:00.000-07:00

I am 31 going on 32 ( in just a few short weeks, 32 shopping days to be exact). This week, I got to be a ten year old again- albeit an incredibly stressed out and uber responsible one, but a ten year old all the same.
Tuesday night was the pool party, complete with snocones, muscle floaties and bug bites galore. In celebration of the entire year, or perhaps nothing really in particular, a friend had the girl scouts out to her home, and the mothers (who declined to wear bathing suits, each believing they had a flaw to hide, and yet each knowing that of all groups, ours would be last to judge) sat in lawn chairs and discussed mother things like summer camp, teachers, and communicable diseases. The giggly gaggle of girl scouts, clad in vibrants tankinis, bikinis and skirted one pieces, flopped and splashed and dog paddled for hours, coming up only for air and slowly congealing pizza. I sat between the two groups, because as mother of little babies, one must be always on toes, always quick to be the rescuer, the nurturer, the consoler. The sun was bright on Tuesday, and it was warm and breezy, and truly one of the days that reminds you why you may you have moved back to the northeast in the first place. I let the ants scuttle across my bare toes, in search of the abundant crumb hills left by the children in their haste, and felt the heat and excitement of the day lay baby kisses across my nose. I listened to the sounds of exhuberant children who knew they were within a hair of summer vacation, and I suddenly became one of them. The day suddenly became endless, and the idea that fireflies were merely lying in wait on the other side of the woods was titillating. I could hear music where there was none, and laughter bubbling up from within myself when really, no jokes had been told. Suddenly, the house for sale no longer belonged to me, and the children I had sired were just old friends. The bills in a growing pile back at home were addressed to a neighbor, and my lumbering old body was suddenly lithe and perky once more.
These feeling were able to live through the next day, as we joyfully welcomed the end of the school year (as short as it seemed) and the beginning of a summer of unknowns. I giggled when Morgan's classmate threw up his ice cream outside the tilt-a-whirl at Hoffman's, and screamed with the girls as the umbrellas tossed them into the air. I ate over-fried cheese sticks with Rhiannon and Lucas, and salivated over the huge pile of presents in the corner.
Then, last night, the slumber party. Whispering with Laurie in the basement, as the girls let each new drama unfold like a favorite sweater, making towering sundaes of pure disgustingness, and staying up much too late, making pipe cleaner animals.
And then...today... I aged 22 years. I woke up with fussing babies, and washed an endless amount of dishes. I paid the bills and sighed at the balance in my bank account. I snapped at Lucas for throwing a tantrum, and longed for a nap on the couch. As I bent to put the party decorations away, I felt my knees scream in protest, and I realized how fleeting it is. How not long from now, Rhiannon will be my age, with her shoulders broad and strong from having to hold up her little world, and her eyes lined from years of laughter and worry, and her breasts stretched from nursing each baby until they no longer need her and yearn for her. How I will blink today and it will be tomorrow, and those little things that got me down yesterday will be so insignificant, and those same children will be adults.
I realize this more every day that I live, in tiny ways that add up exponentially- life is short. And I am starting to believe (and perhaps this is why so many insist that after 30 is when life suddenly makes sense) that when the doorstep is darkened by the impending realities of responsibility, adulthood and accountability, it is best to pretend not to be home. Allow yourself to be ten as often as possible. And so tonight, I will get my hands dirty and make chocolate with Morgan, and eat too much of it without thinking of diets, and I will wake up tomorrow, giddy as a schoolgirl, as we drive to the infinte ocean in maine. I will build sand castles and eat ice cream cones, and succumb to Drake and josh with the kids in the hotel room. I will forget about realtors, and messy rooms, and agendas and appointments. I will stow away every memory in my mental scrapbook, but more importantly will know that the kids will be doing the same. And that in 22 years time, they will be able to dust each and every memory off and get to be ten again. And again. And again.

Tattooed PTA Moms

2009-06-22T17:22:00.000-07:00

As I have said before, I am a PTA mom (and proud of it). I believe that when one thinks of a suburban mom/housewife, they think of a woman with peaces n cream skin and perfectly manicured hands. They drive spotless minivans, and often feed Koolaid in actual Koolaid pitchers to their overly attractive tweens and their numerous friends after an apparently successful soccer game. After which, she high fives them and they scamper to the yard.
She is the mom who, despite having cleaned all day until there is somehow an audible shine to her counters and floors, shakes her head laughingly as her enthusiastically muddy child comes in, followed by a large dog covered in what appears to be massive amounts of shit.
This woman is happily married to a handsome alpha male named Dan/Rob/Rick, who seldom makes appearances aside from fleetingly in the sidelines. This is the woman who will giggle and swat Dan/Rob/Rick on the hand after he says damn, for she is pure as the driven snow.
She hums as she grocery shops, and knows every recipe for one pot casseroles in existence.
You will find her exclaiming excitedly about new laundry detergent, and horrified about the hidden dangers of salmonella and soap scum.
But, ladies and gentlemen... rest assured, I will never have a Kate Gosselin haircut, look good in a cardigan sweater set or join a mommy and me aerobics class. My minivan has stuff under the seat that may or may not be small animals in hiding. I wear *gasp* sweats to the grocery store and pajamas to get my mail. I have even walked down the driveway in a shirt covered with leaking breastmilk, and felt just a spot of pride in that. I have brought my children to birthday parties at the wrong time, and once on the wrong day. I forget doctor's appointments, and show up to playdates half an hour early.
I have been known to call people a douche nozzle now and again, and my kids are not coordinated enough to chew gum and walk, let alone lead a team of rugrats to the soccer world series (is there even such a thing?) I am pretty sure that my kitchen has all sorts of diseases lurking around, salmonella being the least dangerous among them, some being threats not even yet documented by man.
I have a belly button ring (you would not believe how stretched one little hole could be after having five children- please do not be embarrassed by this double entendre), a tattoo (my son at age two wanted to know where the naked lady on the TV had her lion), and a skeleton or two dancing in the coat closet.
However, I cook like Julia Childs, love like Mother Theresa (without the whole generous saint thing working for me), and have a damn good sense of humor. I could take Stepford by storm, and kick June Cleaver's pearled and perfect heinie with both hands tied behind my back.
This is what I would like to write in our plea for people to join next year's PTA...to those people who occasionally like to do jello shots, or who have actually sunken low enough to watch the sex tape between Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee. All those people who perhaps barely made it through high school themselves, or who cannot for the life of them figure out how to help their second grader do long division. Those same folks who balk at the idea of making brownies from scratch, or who (like the billboards proclaim) can name five supermodels but not their childrens' teachers' names.
For in fact... like the supermom on the Mr. Clean commercials, we all simply put our pants on one leg at a time. We all cry at weddings and funerals and laugh when our kids teeter to the floor after their first glorious steps, with looks of pure astonishment on their faces. Each of us saves up to get to Disney, and splurges on Happy Meals, and loses it when the kids come down for water for the fifth time past "lights out". Regardless of our economic backgrounds or our religious beliefs, we have ridiculously high hopes for these kids of ours. I go to those PTA meetings to be reminded that we are all in it together, it takes a village to raise a child, etc.. and believe it or not, those ladies in their cashmere sweater sets just may have sleeve tattoos under 'em.

Driving through AP

2009-06-14T19:34:00.000-07:00

As I have spoken about before, I have an impending move on my plate. I will be going with my family to Raleigh, NC, to begin a new adventure. This is not the first time, though I hope it will be my last, that I have taken a leap of faith (in whatever I needed to at the time) and jumped head first into an unknown body of water (or lack thereof). At age 18, I had broken up with my high school sweetheart, both of my grandparents had died, and my parents got divorced, and the only logical thing there seemed left to be, was to move to Arizona. My mother rented a Grand Prix, and she and my sister and I hung my Class of 95 tassle on the rearview and drove...and drove...and drove...I stayed in Arizona for more than 4 years- with the first year and the last being incredibly difficult ones, and let's be honest, so were the middle two. Jake and I stuck Rhiannon in a moving van ( a 14 footer, I believe) and drove suddenly to Tampa, Fl, without jobs, without a home, without a plan. With the exception of the beautiful Atlantic and palm trees lining the streets, we found Florida to be unacceptable. We were young, and impetuous, and this time (after 11 months) it took us the 17 footer to move on up to Virginia Beach. Here, we found jobs, a nice townhouse, had family and loved the area. But four short days after my miscarriage, the restaurant I was managing closed its doors so abruptly that I literally was told I did not have a job an hour before my shift. Meanwhile, Jake had been offered a job working with Homeland Security in New York, and the money was too good to refuse. So, pregnant with Morgan, we rented the 24 foot moving truck and headed up to Stony Point, NY ( a mere stone's throw from Jersey, and a nearly 2.5 hour commute to the city via ferry, train and subways) In the year and a half I lived there, I made one friend, realized I would never be able to afford a house, and saw less of Jake than if we had been separated. He hated his job working for the government, and I found him a job in Albany, my hometown. So, we packed up a 26 foot moving truck and filled our Camry to the rafters and headed north. Once we moved here, I found it blissful to have family members (namely my dad) show up randomly to rake my yard, or play with my kids. I suddenly had my best friends half an hour away, and delighted in knowing most of the roads, the malls, the supermarkets, places to avoid... But as we have proven time and again, jake and I get undeniable cases of wanderlust. He insists he has gypsy blood, I believe we were always taking baby steps for our future, but the honest truth is that we are both most comfortable in static, in chaos, in upheaval. In the 11 years we have been together, we have: had 13 jobs between the two of us, lived in 4 states, bought two houses, bought 5 cars, had a wedding, and last but not least- had 5 children. When our lives go through a small lull, we are lost and bored, so we find ourselves moving to the next best thing. In this case, we stumbled upon Raleigh in our fantasy home searches, and like a boulder tumbling down a hillside, it gathered momentum until both of us were scrambling to catch it (or to avoid getting run over, perhaps) Jake was offered a job from one of the first companies to which he applied, and we were suddenly moving. Definitely.
I have had mixed emotions in all of this, much to his dismay, which I think is entirely normal. I have enjoyed my time at our school, which I do not exaggerate when I say is the most amazing elementary school I have ever encountered. I find completion and satisfaction in the work I do for the PTA, which has become almost a full time job at times. My children are happy, and popular, my home is beautiful, and almost every person I love lives here. Deciding to leave has been difficult, but I know that we will eventually find much to cherish there, as well, for as long as we have each other, it will be all right.
Tonight, I was driving away from my mother's house, down past the Crooked Lake House, past where Gifford's burned down and the Belkes used to live, past Miller Hill Elementary school, and Sand Lake (where I was tortured by Mrs. Koenig), through town, where the locals were eating ice cream at Jiff E Mart, the Averill Park Market was yet another entity, the High School, where I spend 720 days of my life (and enjoyed far more than most do their education), and Millers (now Hannaford), where I watched the clock for each of my 3 hour shifts, hoping the Coupon Lady wouldn't grace my line, or that the man with the one arm whose trailer was filled with girls' panties wouldn't speak to me. I saw that the Mobil was no more- once a beacon for underage drinkers, and the meetup locale for summer parties...gone.
As I drove through, I wondered who was having their graduation parties now. And really, where would they have them if the Harte family no longer opened up their cabin? And if they were celebrating the way we did after senior year, were they still skinny dipping in the lakes, and getting late night food at Kay's or Doby's? Did they know all 216 other graduates the way we did, did Dr. Monahan still ask them not to fondle his cords? Did they all have a designated driver who was happy to open up her red subaru station wagon to the loud obnoxious drunk kids, just to know they were safe? Did they steal kisses near the bonfire and have tantrums with their friends when just the wrong thing was said at just the right time? Did they already plan for their camping trip to Lake George for next year?
As I thought of all this, with the crickets and summer lightning preparing themselves outside my window, my children were dancing in the back of my cliched minivan to music that is atrociously poorly written (nothing like Killing Me Softly by the Fugees) and I felt a little ancient. The saying is true- you can never really go home again. But if I can hold on to one thing...one hope, it would be that when I make the long 11 hour trek from North Carolina up to AP to stay with my mom, and I pass through a town that is ever changing and peeling away, I will be able to forget that saying for just a moment. And I will breathe in the past, with all of its turmoil and simplicity and beauty, and know that home can truly be wherever you lay your heart.

Summer, summer, summertime....

2009-05-29T19:28:00.000-07:00

There is a scent in the air tonight, and while it is a little chilly and damp, I recognize it as the smell of summer. When I was younger, my family and I lived on a lake high on a mountain top...miles from civilization. (cue the banjo from deliverance) The winters were harsh, sometimes we would be unable to drive down our road, so we would be forced to trudge through feet of snow for half a mile before getting to our house, only to realize the oil truck also couldn't get down the road, and thus we were without heat. There were several times that our cars skidded off of slick roads, and countless playdates lost because parents did NOT want to venture the roadtrip to drop off their child. As a very young kid, the toboganning and ice skating were enough to make winter bearable, as was the warmth of christmas. But as I got older, it became more and more difficult to accept the way of life the great Northeast had to offer (Hence, the trip to ASU for college) . I longed for summers, which felt free and alive and full of hope. We would spend hours on the beach, with the peaceful sounds of kids catching newts and paddleboats splashing around the lake. I would bury my nose in a Stephen King book, and blister from sunburns that we never quite knew the dangers of, and go home blissfully at dusk to eat. As I hit my later teen years, summer was a time of friends, and parties, and reckless abandon. Sneaking a skinny dip, holding hands with the high school sweetheart under the fireworks on the 4th, driving in the Subaru with the moonroof open and the stars merely an arm's reach away.... One cannot deny that in youth, we feel invincible and unmistakeably effervescent, like a seltzer bottle shaken until it is bursts. Summer brought that out in me, and still does.
As a grown up, my summers have inevitably changed. The summers are more vicarious now, as my own kids are counting down days till school comes to an end. I am sending in checks for camp, and planning our adventure in the Adirondacks, and looking for beach cabanas for our weekend in Maine. I am perfunctorily plotting out playdates and squeezing in time for sand castle building, while my kids wait for the bliss to fall on them like fairy dust. Right now, summers mean swingsets and fireflies and soft serve at Rainbow Delights. It means itchy scratchy mosquito nights at the Drive-In, and eating watermelon in the gazebo. But in just a few short, oh so very short, years, it will mean driving lessons, and flirting with the neighbor, and slumber parties that may (or may not) be supervised by parents. It will be nights of parties that are so thrilling, they may get shivers up their backs, with bonfires that lick the blackest of July nights. It will mean shorts that are too short, and noses that are too sunkissed, and months that pass much too quickly. And then they, too, will eventually outgrow (or be told to outgrow) those immature crazy days, and jobs and school and kids and RESPONSIBILITY will change summers. But the one thing that never ever ever goes away, is the smell.
Like a drug, like a sip from that ever sought after fountain of youth, we will sniff it, snort it, inhale it till our lungs are screaming for release. Our days of warm and pulsating chaos will flash before our eyes, and we will let it go. But every once in a while, you will catch us, after the children are tucked in bed, and the bills have been paid, and the dishes scrubbed, running barefoot through the grass, enveloped in balmy midnight, with our hands wrapped around a firefly.

The difference between one and five

2009-05-18T17:34:00.000-07:00

With one child, the world is your proverbial oyster. You still own time and can blissfully waste minutes, ignorant to how quickly they will eventually come to pass. You find milestones in simple things, really... the first time they wear shoes, the first time they uncurl their tiny fists to wrap around your finger. You dress the child ever so carefully, donning adorable sunhats when the first days of spring peek around the corner, slathering sunscreen at the mere hint of a less than overcast day, tiny, perfect socks go on clean and shiny feet. You remember to bathe your child consistently, paying special attention to delicate parts and cradle caps and stork bites and chunky folds of pink marshmallow skin. You sing to them while you change them, and take care to Desitin those sweet, forgiving, ever- wet parts of theirs, and to buy the best diapers, the best wipes and the most expensive shampoo. You retain all words spoken to you by the pediatrician, and may even write them in a handly little book in your diaper bag (which is moderately neat and organized with more accoutrements than one baby could ever really need), and quickly jot down the measurements and immunizations to share with grandparents later on. (Oh my, she is __ pounds already?) Your every moment is delicious and kind, and you are pretty convinced they are infinite.
And then, mere seconds later, you suddenly have five. Your photo albums tell you that you had 2,3, and in some cases (not mine) 4 but you are abruptly here at 5, bewildered how it could possibly be so. You decide with severe finality that you will do everything perfectly this time, this very last time, as you have learned with the others how quickly it will go by. You buy every piece of baby equipment known to man and beast, and you even search on Amazon for supplies not even yet approved by the fda or cdc or ama. You fully stock the baby closet while you are still in your first trimester, you set up a nursery when in month four, and resign yourself to the fact that people just don't GET baby showers for their fifth babies, and whip out the credit card and pay for it all yourself. And then you sit and wait. For five months. Your stretch marks get stretchier and your boobs travel farther to the equator, and spidery little old lady veins span across your once lovely calves. But you are beautiful and sexy and round and perfect, and the baby (or babies) coming are miraculous and perfect and beautiful and will eventually be round, and all is truly well with the world. Your good intentions are paving the path...
And then baby 5 is here, and the chaos is loud and frothy and spills over the garbage cans and laundry baskets and car seats and high chairs. Report cards and school concerts and mom-can-you-bring-brownies-into-my-classes and doctor appointments fill the calendar and baby five turns out to be one of those intensely mother-adoring ones, who wants nothing more than constant love, and who really doesn't comprehend the madness unfolding around him. (and baby 4 is content to be the mischievous one that the old ladies predict will be trouble) and the diaper bag begins to resemble a nuclear waste dump, and the car looks like the local landfill (and you are pretty sure there is something living under the seats), and your trendy, urban, expensive equipment gathers dust in the nursery until you sell it remarkably easily on craigslist. And every night you lay down to sleep thinking the same thing- there are NEVER enough hours in the day. And on weekends, you luxuriate while your husband takes pity and lets you sleep in, and makes you breakfast, and you can cuddle nonstop for hours with all five of them- with no alarms screaming at you to get-on-that-damn-bus-because-i-am-not-driving-you-to-school or cell phones vibrating ringing texting emailing all at once to tell you you are late for so very many things. Your world gets to be slow for two full days, and you ignore the calls for playdates and updates, and instead you smell baby heads and make cookies and read Junie B Jones until you are hoarse and give your husband pedicures and forget to get dressed and giggle at the antics of your Five. Amazing. Kids. And every Sunday, you lay back, confident that you have again learned the meaning of life, and you are secure in the knowledge that you are doing exactly what you are supposed to be doing, and that there is no greater life than this. And you happily close your eyes and then....
beeep beeep beeep beeep beeep beeep beeep beeep

Prom

2009-05-16T19:18:00.001-07:00

She stands before the tiny mirror attached to her door, and turns from side to side. Her hair is not quite as she planned, and the dress is not the one she imagined, but at this particular moment, while her hemline swishes like the spring breeze outside, it is all inconsequential. She bought the tickets the day they went on sale in the cafeteria, the money earned at her after school supermarket job dwindling with each preparation for this day. A dozen stores were ransacked, in search of the dress she envisioned, and had pictured herself in every day for the two years she had dated him. A deep passionate purple, off the shoulder, and just lovely. The one she ended up with was what one may call last ditch, at the last store, and more than a little disappointing- a bit of foreshadowing of her wedding. But she still feels young, and beautiful, and optimistic and nervous: all the required emotions of a girl at her prom.
The neighbor girl who was paid to dress her hair has left, and her mother has not yet come home, so she is left with hours to spare, tickets in hand and an imagination. I assume every girl imagines her prom in a similar way... equal parts romance novel (with heaving bosoms and throbbing passions), chick flick (with witty dialogue and uber sweet come on lines) and teen comedy (with the underdog tossing about witticisms while he watches the Prom Queen of his dreams take the throne with his archnemesis, the quarterback). She is no different. On a day like this, when limos have been hired, and stylists required, and complete outfits purchased (even the dyeable Thom McAnns), perfection is not only desired, but necessary. There is no margin for error- he must say the right things, the corsage must be vibrant and saveable, there must be photo after photo she would deem magazine-worthy. But in a world created and run by the teenage mind, standards are set too high, and falls from the pedastal much too hard. She will be appalled by the drunken crowd who waltz in, loud and entitled. She will be aghast at the rumors of what girls are doing inthe restrooms, and will be horrified at the congealed blob they are trying to pass off as cordon bleu. At one point, she will be standing in the courtyard near the pillars, with the music behind her, looking into space and knowing full well she has entered a "movie moment" and her date will come up behind her and instead of lovingly embracing her, or saying the right thing, he will laugh and make a terrible joke, and at that very moment she will know. She will tell herself that getting on the court is unimportant, but will find herself green with envy when the gawky girl gets picked. She will patiently for the beautiful song she thinks of as the quintessential love song, but will realize that the horrendous theme song will be played repeatedly instead. She will allow herself moment by moment to be dragged into an insolent tantrum, and will watch as not one, or two but threee fistfights are brought outside, her boyfriend will dance with two girls who are most certainly not his date, and the couple sitting next to her at the table will be preparing for their breakup du jour. It is only in the last half hour when her caution is thrown to the wind, and she allows herself to just accept c'est la vie, and prom is quasi-redeemed. But the night ends, the limo whose side door is broken will drive through the night, and the dress will be hung on a hanger (though the hair will not be budged for days, coated as it is with product)
Many years later, when she has grown and seen life for what it is, and known responsibility and grief, and yearning for youth, she will pass a group of girls on prom day, eagerly heading into the salon, whose dreams are all but scrawled across their flawless faces, and she will find herself smiling and reflecting on her own prom in a surprisingly non-cynical fashion. She will mentally wish the girls all the best, and head home to make cordon bleu.

Hitting the high notes...

2009-05-08T17:57:00.000-07:00

Sometimes, it takes one mere note, a single line or verse, and you are immersed. Heartbreak, nostalgia, joy, hope...they all creep up like a serpent through your soul when an amazing song is on. And obviously, music is purely objective: beauty is in the eye of the beholder. A truly good song will haunt you, will raise the tiny hairs along the nape of your neck, your arms like static on a warm night. You may feel as though your heart is growing with the crescendos, beat by beat. I have been known to sob along with a particularly relevant song: Children by Robert Miles when Rhiannon was small, Nothing Else Matters by Metallica during a nasty breakup, Heaven by Beam and Yanou at the wedding of a childhood friend, Breathe Me by Sia at the finale of 6 Feet Under, etc...
Tonight, I am listening to Love Story redone on cello and piano by Jon Schmidt. A song I am quick to change when on the radio by a droning Taylor Swift, whose lyrics are as cheesy as my infamous chimichangas, but when played like this renders me speechless. The season finale of Scrubs showed JD with the movie screen of his future life in front of him, with Book of Love by Peter Gabriel (who is the master of inspirational epic songs) playing, and the waterworks were practically instantaneous.
Then there are the songs that are so remarkably upbeat and cheery, you are lifted into an absurdly inappropriately good mood. You could be in the midst of a funeral, surrounded by the bereaved, and if Feist's 1234 works its way into your head, like a relentless mole digging through my husband's vegetable garden, you cannot help but become a bobblehead with soul tapping feet. Likewise with almost any of Madonna's earlier material (circa 1984-85) How could one not want to don a tutu and fingerless gloves when Like a Virgin pipes through the minivan speakers in a traffic jam?
Nostalgia may be the most difficult when listening to music. The ache and yearning of the music, sawing away at your resolve to be grownup, cracking at aging bones to reveal a core of youthful marrow... when the song ends, you are stranded in this sea, feeling more than a little lost and confused. I find movie soundtracks to be the biggest culprits of this time robbery- many are soundtracks to movies that are forgettable or plain old rotten, but whose music producer knew their stuff.
And I suppose I am not the only one who has a long drive ahead of them, or mostly under their belt, winding through monotonous scenery, or nauseating mountain curves, making up the very soundtrack of their lives. Trying to pick music that as John Cusack so wisely states in "High Fidelity" begins great, gets better and then sinks a bit so as not to peak too soon. Would a snappy Cyndi Lauper fit into those teenage years, lightening the mood in the movie of my life when things were getting rough? And could we subtly add in some Bob Marley without seeming trite and posey? Is U2's Joshua Tree album overused, and would the Shiny Toy Guns be too obscure for the older crowd, who would be the ones who would buy the tickets to this slow moving life story. (the younger ones would be purchasing tickets to Wolverine 7, Twilight 5 or Zach Braff's remake of Grumpy Old Men)
In a way, the thing most amazing about music is the universal factor- that every one in the world has it to turn to in times of peril, strife, exhultation, ecstasy... regardless if your fondness lies in gospel, reggae, rap, rock, oldies, you know the escapism that comes along as a two for one when you turn on your radio for simple distraction. The native americans used music for rain, the africans have used it for rites of passage, women use it to pass through the hardest of labors, men use it in wartimes. And I, alone while my children sleep, am using it to pass minutes by until everything makes sense again.

Twins, it's what's in...

2009-04-30T17:31:00.000-07:00

Right after Rhiannon turned two, Jake and I planned and became pregnant. At ten weeks (New Year's Eve, to be exact) we discovered not one, but two miscarried fetuses, and I spent weeks hollow and tortured by the idea of my lost babies. Six weeks later, I became pregnant again, again with two fetuses, and only one survived- her name is Morgan. When Lucas came along, I think jake and I were both shocked to realize there was only one baby, and for quite a long time, we thought ourselves finished as breeders. But in October of 2007, we both came to the realization that we were not done, and tried once...and succeeded in getting pregnant a fifth time. At three weeks, my mother called to tell me of a premonitory dream she had, in which I had twins. I scoffed at her vision and assured her it was only one. For weeks, I saw my obgyn and as my stomach began to expand in truly amazingly warped speeds, I hinted that perhaps my mother was a seer after all. The obgyns waved me away when I asked the first time if they could hear two heart beats. "It's not twins", they asserted. And I believed. Sort of. Then, at ten weeks, when I started weraring maternity pants and Jake began rubbing the bump, as he does when I become buddha-esque, I really became intrigued. "Could you please measure my uterus? I feel like the fundus is quite high, and I am already showing", I said at mt 12 week checkup. My obgyn once again said, "It's not twins", as though I had suggested that my bump was, in fact, a Jeep rather than a fetus. So I left it alone, and Jake and I coasted through the next six weeks of intense growth, and pretended it was merely because it was a fourth baby stretching me thin. I started feeling the flutters of movement, like wildly caged Monarch Butterflies, eager for flight through the great meadow of life, and I pondered the oddity of feeling movement both at my navel and by my rib cage at such an early stage in the pregnancy.
At 18 weeks, a solidly 8 month along- looking Kerensa walked into the ultrasound room for the first time, and the tech said( before even saying hello) "How far along are you???" To which I answered truthfully, and she eyed my belly dubiously. She swung the wand along my stomach, and a gleeful little Lucas, who was beside me clutching legos, pointed at the screen and announced "Those are my brothers!" And sure enough, they were.
Nolan and Liam are now 9 months along...though surely it was only yesterday that I frantically snapped photo after photo of their funny little naked bodies that so resembled Perdue chickens. They have each come into their own personalities. Nolan tends to be louder and more aggressive, but also more sensitive and needy. Liam, though tiny and thin, is quicker,more joyful and more independent. Nolan is almost a solid head taller than Liam, and has intensely warm hazel eyes. Liam has piercing blue eyes, even more so than his sister or his father, and wispy blonde hair. At times, having twins is exhausting, especially when with their older siblings. Nursing them is more intense, changing them requires more patience, and certainly getting them to bed can be a challenge. But the joys of watching their interaction is unparallel to any other experiences I have had. It is not an exaggeration to say I could watch them for hours, exploring each other, and even separately, moving about the house like funny little zombies. While a parent may became overjoyed at a baby's first crawl, or first tooth, to have it happen to two different babies within a week, it becomes breathtaking. There is such a sense of cosmic awe at twins. They have known each other since the zygote stage, since conception....they are no more related to each other than to their other siblings, and yet they will forever be bonded in a way other siblings cannot be. They will forever share a birthday, and perhaps clothing, and it is with a bit of envy that Jake and I watch this unfold, as both of us were far spaced from our own siblings.
We are a bit of a spectacle in public, as if we had spawned aliens or the aforementioned Jeeps. People crawl out of the woodwork to ask questions, give me props or sympathy, or to relay their own multiples stories. I have been asked if the babies were from In Vitro, as well as being told "after this many, you would think you would know how to stop yourself". People are convinced they are identical, though really the eye color, size and weight should be a clue otherwise. (though I do dress them alike for the extra cute factor)
The other day, the boys found a yellow cup, and what began as a simple tug of war over it, became a teasing fest that caused the three older kids to double over with laughter. Little Liam would play psych repeatedly, yanking the cup away from Nolan after offering it pleasantly, and then holding the cup over his head triumphantly, like a little fedora, and cackling wildly with his six tiny teeth perfecting the picture. Today in the bath, they shared the shampoo bottle, passing it back and forth like offering a peace pipe, and happily grinning and grunting at each other.
My ninety two year old uncles are twins. They raised their children together, lived together, went to OTB and lunch every day for years, and at times, they only have to sit next together without saying a word, to communicate. From the back of their tiny little heads, Nolan and Liam resemble the little old men. I can only hope that the next ninety years of their life will see them be just as close as my uncles, and perhaps even still dressed in matching sweater vests.

2009-04-15T10:34:00.000-07:00

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Twittering,Hunting and Gnawing

2009-04-15T10:10:00.000-07:00

Today, I suppose, begins the journey. Months ago, Jake and I laughingly discussed the possibility of moving to a land far, far away... and so suddenly, I have clicked these Ruby slippers and home has become anew.
I am sitting at Jake's atronomically large computer in Greensboro,NC, with little else to do. Rhiannon is playing the new DSi behind me, pretending to be immersed in a Sonic game, but secretly plotting a fate worse than death on her impetuous parents. Morgan is lying on a makeshit bed in this furniture-less temporary home, watching Nolan sleep. Lucas is engineering the lastest gadget that is sure to one day be the technological breakthrough of its lifetime. Jake is at his new job, wowing them, and finding the credit he much deserves after a vast wasteland of ingrates and sore losers.
I just signed on for a twitter account, after reading that one Barack Obama has one...figuring if it is good enough for him, it is, quite possibly, good enough for me. I am not sure I am cool enough to get the hang of the tweets and widgets, but whatever coolness eludes me, savvy shall make up for.
We spent the day yesterday hunting for a house. And when I say house, read mini-mcmansion. I spent the better part of my childhood being slightly poorer than my peers, and gazing upon these houses is remedial, where one grown up Kerensa can time travel to one little Kerensa and tell her that one day she will find out what a coffered ceiling is, and quite possibly have it be her love at first sight. One drawback to this hunt, is the five little critters squirming in the back seats, watching Madascar2 for the seventh time. But we have such limited time to hunt, and being both predator and prey at this point is alarmingly unnerving. Time has begun to tick in the harshest of fashions.
I find myself being disgusted at my eating habits of late. I have turned to comfort foods, as many will in times of crisis. Jake is now living in Greensboro alone, while I fare alone in my house with the kids, and Ben and the incredible Jerry of "Everything But the..." fame have kept me company, alongside feta and onion pizza, caesar salad and chimichangas. I have described to Jake this fantasy of mine... I suppose many an amateur psych student would read much into this.... I am in my new north carolina home- alight with late morning sun, sipping on a mug of what must be tea, as I do not drink coffee, with a luxurious throw over my lap in my sunroom. For the moment, I have forgotten that I am a stranger in a strange land, and more alone than ever in my life, and miraculously enough (in this fantasy alone), I am not only elegantly posed, but thin and quite gorgeous, to boot. It turns out, when one moves to a new Southern town, one becomes the quintessential Suburban Desperate Housewife, and I expect that late in this fictional day, the ladies of the auxilary will be ringing my bell with sweet tea in their sundresses, with invitations to Bunko and Bridal showers galore.
Alas, I am now awake, and in the real world, still in pajamas at 2pm, and alas even still, at Jake's astronomical computer screen, spilling my proverbial guts.