Posts filed under 'Beeber McSteebs'
Aaaand, we’re back. That was … special. Some of that is certainly sarcasm, but some of it is also that it WAS special. Honestly, it was fun. We had fun. Sam had a blast running around with her cousins, and even tried surfing a little, if by surfing, you mean standing on a boogie board while the waves came in and ran over her feet.
“I DID it, Mommy! I did it! Like TOODEE!” Oof, my heart. Kid was so proud of her surfing abilities, and honest to God, she really thought she was doing it. Also, errr, that’s how pervasive her Yo Gabba Gabba obsession runs, friends. There’s ONE episode (“Ride”) where Toodee goes surfing with Foofa’s big brother, Foofle (I cannot make this shit up, people), and Sam was OBSESSED with surfing like Toodee. She even made me sing the damn song while she did it. (“Surfing today, sunny day! Into the water to play!” And hahahahaha, I KNOW THE LYRICS OH MY GOD.)
It was actually quite sad that on our first day back, she woke up and asked to go to the beach. Oh darlin’. It’s not warm enough up here, yet.
The bad was … kind of really awfully bad. Over the course of the two weeks since we left our house, Sam had three (3) separate fevers, a horrid cough/cold (separate from the fevers!) and a – oh I can barely type it – a VAGINAL INFECTION FROM THE SAND-SLASH-SWIM DIAPER. HOLD ME. HOLD ME. All this, plus she slept in two separate hotels, a strange house, followed by a DIFFERENT strange house, along with a FOURTEEN HOUR DRIVE, split over two days. I mean, honestly, the kid was a hot fucking mess, and so was I.
I am not even going to pretend that I handled it well, because I didn’t. I cringe at how touchy I was on Wednesday — which, conveniently, was my day to cook dinner for everyone — and how I was chopping onions, sobbing while my kid sobbed and chased after me, stuck to me like glue. That morning, I’d lost it on my poor dad — AKA the man who requires the least amount of sleep of ANYONE I KNOW, EVER — because he rises at 5:30 or 6 and makes coffee, waking up the first floor. Meanwhile, he acquiesced to my demand to come out a LEETLE BIT later and guess what? Sam continued to wake at 6, exhausted and miserable, ANYWAY. (Note: I don’t mind the 6 a.m. wakings, except when they mean that she hasn’t gotten enough sleep, making our mornings EYE-POKINGLY MISERABLE, because all she wants to do is go back to bed, at like, NINE AM. But she won’t, natch, and besides, it would eff her nap for the day.)
Plus, I was alone. I’m alone a lot, obviously, as the primary at-home parent, but it’s too easy to discount the role that Adam plays at home and on the weekends. He plays with her the second he walks in the door. I get extra sleep on the weekends (we alternate days). I get nights out with my friends as often as I want. He can give her a bath if I’m feeling wiped out or lousy or just having a long, tired day, you know? He’s a great dad, and he does a lot, and GOD I MISSED HIM. All of him, obviously, not just the parts of him that help me out. To be clear.
(PS, he cleaned the WHOLE HOUSE while we were gone. I walked in to a SPOTLESS HOUSE. Who does that? HE DOES.)
(He also bought a new TV. Surprise! Oh, wait … )
I was just … alone. Not that my parents and siblings weren’t willing to help me — they WERE — but my kid was so disoriented and cranky and feeling so lousy that she wouldn’t let them touch her. NO ONE COULD TOUCH HER. For two. weeks. And not only was this sucktacular for me, but it was hardly the bonding experience with the rest of my family that you would expect, you know? I mean, the kid just RAGED any time anyone came near her — and this includes my paternal parents, who are the very same people who kept her for a WEEK without incident while we went to Vegas. Was bizarroland. And also, uhh, kind of sucky for all of us.
Mind you, I’m fully aware that single parents do this day in and day out (I WORSHIP AT YOUR FEET), but I will also say there is a difference between having velcro kid in a strange environment and just having a kid at home, doing her normal routine. It was kind of exhausting, and I kind of handled it pretty badly. I was loose with my emotions, and I kind of felt like everything was just there, bubbling so close to the surface that everything exploded at the slightest provocation.
And I just felt ungrateful and awful and UGHHHHH, I know, I sound like I’m just over here self-flagellating (I AM), but there’s something about parenting my kid at her worst in front of people I don’t normally live with, no matter how much they love me (and they do!), that makes me feel so exposed. Especially if those people are other parents and THEIR kids are acting like near-perfect children with only minor imperfections. Meanwhile, I had a kid with an INFECTED VAGINA, FOR THE LOVE.
This is one of those times where I can’t tell if it’s just the snowball effect of, you know, EVERYTHING, or if it was just, hello, a challenging situation that anyone would have broken down in. I was extra-weepy and I let myself lose it in situations — and in front of people — I normally wouldn’t. I mean, not that I’m afraid of being judged by my own FAMILY, but I guess I do have a thing against appearing weak and/or crazy and BELIEVE ME, FRIENDS, I WAS BOTH. Yet, I like to think it was the latter — that is, it was a normally shitty situation to lose it in — but I’m not entirely sure. One never knows these days.
Honestly about the Other Thing, I do feel better — I feel more ready to tackle what’s to come, and I feel more focused on what’s in front of me — the life part, that is. Honestly, I suppose it’s hard not to, when what’s in front of you is a sick toddler while you YOURSELF are hacking and wheezing, but strangely, I’ve got a lot of OTHER good stuff to focus on. Friends who claim to have missed me terribly (and I, them), new work projects, an entire summer to play in the water with my kid, an assload of books to read and the resurgence of the Book Lushes, which I SWEAR is coming, but HA HA, UNEXPECTED EVENTS have precluded that little project.
And, uhh, fertility work-up stuff. Again. But even that I feel relatively calm about at the moment. Apparently the whole “one day at a time” mantra really seems to be working. Recovery people! They know what they’re talking about.
Hey, have a happy Tuesday.
June 13th, 2011
Listen, this is a placeholder to inform you that unless you follow me on Twitter, you might not realize that I am not, in fact, dead and/or wallowing in a pool of grief, but am on vacation in North Carolina with my brother and his family, etc etc. (My brother, who informed me when I reached the beach that he’d just seen “three fins, probably sharks” but that I shouldn’t be alarmed! HA HA HA!! NO NEED FOR ALARM IT IS JUST SHARKS HELLO, WE ARE IN JAWWWWZZZZZ.)
Sam and I are flyin’ solo, as Adam is at home working (someone has to!), but hey, we’re having a great time anyway. We are NOW, anyway, after an epically awful road trip to a wedding that seriously left me wondering if leaving the house EVER AGAIN was REMOTELY ADVISABLE. But now? HAPPY HAPPY.
See you next week!
June 6th, 2011
This is going to be all OVER the place, y’all. Just like it used to be! Bullet-style:
- One of the things that plagues me on a fairly regular basis, is when one of your friends — someone you really like, who has proven to be of decent character and all that rot — is ALSO friends with someone who has proven to be morally bankrupt on more than one occasion, in my admittedly-strict viewpoint. Now, before I go on here, I want you to simmer down, Warren Beatty, because this song isn’t about you. I can think of at least two people who would think this is about them, but really, Warren, it isn’t.
But what do you do? I’ve voiced my opinion — even more gently than I normally would, I swear! — once or twice, and I’ve even PERSONALLY been screwed by the person in question and said something and YET THE RELATIONSHIP CONTINUES. Mind you, it’s not that I expect them to CHOOSE ME over them — this isn’t that kind of high school drama — it’s that I am MYSTIFIED how someone can still be friends with someone who has PROVEN to be such an absolute douche.
I DO NOT UNDERSTAND. It is honestly one of life’s greatest mysteries.
- If you’ll indulge me a moment of Glee, I was ALL HOT AND BOTHERED to see the return of Jesse St. James in what is certainly the most ridiculous crush imaginable. Yes, I am a 35-year-old married mother with a huge crush on an openly gay man playing a teenager, and while I have no issue with either of those things, of course, the problem is that no matter how you slice it, the fantasy doesn’t work. I would either have to turn into a man OR a teenager and neither really works for me. Yet, it persists.
However. They turned him into a one-dimensional vapid asshole, when yes, I realize that he royally screwed Rachel over last year, I ALSO thought there was some complexity to him and it’s … gone. I am ALSO angry at how they’ve turned Rachel into a sniveling GIRL who also suddenly turned stupid. Last season, Rachel was multi-dimensional, and what made her amazing was her incredible insight into HERSELF. And now she’s fawning over Jesse and saying things like, “He’s so smart! Can you believe he flunked out of college?” after he says something amazingly inane. And so we’re left with Kurt (and his personal orbit), the only character with any sort of heart, and honestly, it’s pissing me off, because it seems like Ryan Murphy is just re-writing his own history, and the only person he has any sort of generosity to is himself.
Also, uhhh, weren’t they juniors LAST YEAR? How long can they drag this out?
- I also have Strong Feelings on Friday Night Lights, and I’m telling you right now that I’m live-tweeting the episode for my bosses at Smart Pop Books, because an essay of mine is in the upcoming anthology on the show in its entirety. So, you know, fair warning. And while I LOVE this season, I have VERY LOUD OPINIONS on the finale, and as such, I can’t wait until all of you (all, um, four of you who watch it) have caught up so that we can discuss.
- One of the things I am shocked to discover that I am struggling with is getting Sam to enjoy reading. I KNOW. I KNOW. Are you as floored as I am? I am, above all things, A Reader. The periods of my life when I wasn’t relying on a book for my primary form of evening entertainment are few and far between. Even still, I’m usually either reading or writing, even while the TV is on in the background. I mean, I love TV, but if I had to choose, I’d choose a book any day of the week.
So how is it possible that she’s my child? We set aside time to read every day. I read CONSTANTLY. I’ve even taken to reading her books by myself, with rapt enthusiasm, just to make them seem interesting. Yes, we watch TV, but with few exceptions (involving DJ Lance), she’s really not that into it, and she almost NEVER sits still to watch a whole anything unless she’s positively exhausted OR it’s first thing in the morning, so I’m not panicked that she’s a TV head or anything. (I WISH she was one of those children who sat quietly and watched television for more than six minutes at a time. I could use that to my occasional advantage! NO DICE.)
She just … does other things. Swaddles Brobee. Draws. Listens to music and dances. Draws some more. Plays with her animals. Paints. Dances some more. Sings. Dances. Music. God, this kid is SO INTO MUSIC. And when there is no music? SHE MAKES ME SING SO SHE CAN DANCE.
And forget reading before bed — she’s ALL business. Once she became a prescient human being, she dropped the bedtime reading routine before it really got going. When she’s ready for bed, she wants to be IN THE BED. The second we start the bedtime routine, “BYE MAMA! NIGHT NIGHT!” and she’s finished. She wants to be in bed, lights out, my annoying mug out of her face. It doesn’t seem to matter how early we start — the moment she senses bedtime is nigh, she’s all about it, as soon as humanly possible, and thank you. (Yes, I know I’m lucky. Our bedtime ritual is three whole seconds long. “Kiss Daddy!” “BYE MAMA!” Aaaaaaand, fin.)
I’ve gotten her books on her favorite subjects — animals and bugs — and it sort of works, but man, if I had one trivial wish for my daughter, it would be that she loves to read, and right now, despite my best efforts, she’s not nearly as into it as I’d hoped.
Also, can we talk about the bug obsession for a moment here? BUGS. Ants are “cute!” Worms are “awesome!” She picks them all up and tries to take them home as pets! God forbid we see a bumblebee, because kid is BESIDE HERSELF with excitement. “It’s a BEE! A BEE!” and she lurches toward it, hands open. Explaining that although bumblebees look fuzzy and friendly, they REALLY need to be left alone, was a surprisingly rigorous parenting challenge.
But still. Books. Man. I mean, Adam and I both read. We have stacks and stacks of books and Kindles full of reading material. I have a to-read list that is more than 250 books long and I can’t get my kid to sit still long enough for “No, David!”?
Tell me: is all hope lost? Will she eschew reading forever? Will I be stuck raising an entomologist-slash-oboe player? Any tips are welcome.
- Speaking of TV, uhh, sort of, the only show I’m really looking forward to other than True Blood is “Falling Skies,” and I cannot WAIT.
- Speaking of BOOKS, we have plenty of interest in the book club, so stay tuned for more — as soon as I get it cleaned up and a new spam system in place, I’ll be hitting a re-launch. And to say I appreciate the offers of help is an understatement. I think this time it will probably be better than the last, because there was an INSANE AMOUNT OF INTEREST from people who … weren’t all that interested. I think this time has the potential to be smaller and more engaging. Honestly, even if only two of you said to do it, I would have. Fortunately, we have a bit more — but far fewer than the 600 we had the first time.
Thanks, everyone. I hope you have a fantastic Thursday. We’re getting our beach passes, finally, although it is the furthest thing from beach weather you can imagine. Hope springs eternal, even if spring doesn’t.
*GLEE’S VERSION WAS AWFUL. AWFUL. AWFUL. I liked Haley’s better on American Idol and that is SAYING SOMETHING. Oh, Adele. You are, indeed, incomparable. (I love her.)
May 11th, 2011
We hung out with our friends today, and there was a minor spat, as two-year-olds are wont to engage in (HAAA), and I don’t even know how my mind went from Gracie being annoyed because Sam blew up in her face (mind you, the opposite has happened HUNDREDS OF TIMES) to realizing that one day, these friends that I chose for Sam might not want to be her friends or vice versa, or even if they DO, she will have friends she chose ON HER OWN, and God, these are things I spend time fretting about. It’s all very Sunrise, Sunset in my mind, but when I write it out, it’s the equivalent of a no-shitter Nerf bat to the face. Yes, people grow up, whatever, but I somehow thought my child would be immune, like Benjamin Button. Err, kind of.
But what it comes down to is her inevitable freedom of choice, I guess, and from my perspective, watching her grow into her own person; someone who does things and thinks things that are completely separate from me. It’s crazy that she will some day have secrets from me. Secrets! From me! At this point, the kid doesn’t even fart without my full knowledge of exactly what went IN to that particular cocktail of methane, so this seems completely impossible..
It sucks, this growing-up thing. Well, except for the fact that my God, when you have a child who can TELL you what she needs vs one who just YELLS VAGUELY IN YOUR DIRECTION, there’s really no comparison. No, I would not trade two-year-old Sam for infant Sam, although I MIGHT have traded 18-month-old Sam for infant Sam, because, if no one has told you yet, 18 months is kind of a shitty age.
Anyway, I really came here for one purpose, and that’s to ask you, yet again, if anyone is still interested in an online book club. The Book Lushes died last summer and then was OVERRUN WITH UNMANAGEABLE SPAM ATTACKS (Don’t look now! I’m still cleaning it up!) and I’m working on the latter issue, provided people are still interested. Honestly, I thought we’d died for good, but then more and more people started asking, and I thought, well, HM. LET US ASK. I’m always reading and always willing to participate, so if anyone else is, you let me know in the comments, just to get a wee idea (or you can send me an email) and I’ll figure something out.
So! Book club or no? Tell me. I won’t be offended either way. Probably because I’ll still be here reading It until KINGDOM COME. It’s like chipping away at a MOUNTAIN.
May 10th, 2011
First of all, if you’re thinking about reading It and wondering when, exactly, it picks up and gets really good, the answer is somewhere around page 476. Yes, FOUR HUNDRED SEVENTY-SIX. I was about to give up and just move on to Sookie, when, for reasons unknown, I thought I’d give it another whirl and suddenly, things started moving and happening and it was GOOD and INTERESTING and then I looked and ha ha haaaaa, I was just about halfway through the book. HALFWAY.
This is becoming epic, like the months I read The Historian out of some strange obligation to my childhood allegiance to Vlad Tepes.
Anyway, this weekend was, in a word, perfect, and let me tell you, I really needed it. I’ve been under a lot of unmentionable stress lately, and on Friday, I really wasn’t so sure I was going to get through it. The way I roll when times are rough is to first, absolutely FREAK OUT AND LOSE IT ALL CAPS! I think I’m NEVER GOING TO GET THROUGH THIS! And things are going to be AWFUL! And I will be DEPRESSED FOREVER!
And then I do more of this: !!!!
I also think I quite literally rend my garments, or at least the bathroom towels.
Then I buck up, get it together and face shit like a grown-up. And, well, that’s what I’m going to do. Until the NEXT cause for freak out, and I’m guessing before all is said and done, this cycle should repeat itself 5,469,876 times.
But besides all that, this weekend was amazing in that simple way that I dreamed about before I had a kid. Saturday, we took Sam for ice cream and cow-gazing, and for a kid who hadn’t had ice cream since last summer (I never buy it), she sure seemed excited about it. “ICE CREAM? ICE CREAM?” was the refrain in the car, over and over again until we arrived at Richardson’s and she had her chocolate cone in her hot little hands.
There was ice cream and cows and it was perfect, right up until the moment Sam threw a tantrum because we wouldn’t put her IN the calf pen and leave her to roam with the baby cows. (She’s used to Davis Farmland, which reminds me, if you’re a Massachusetts resident, you need to go there. We’re getting a season pass this year, because it is awesome. Roaming animals and a splash pad? SIGN ME UP.)
Mother’s Day itself featured lobster rolls, a new-to-us park where Sam spun herself dizzy-drunk on the merry-go-round, lounging and Indian food. Honestly, it’s weekends like this that make me feel like wanting anything more than to keep the people I have happy and healthy would be overkill. Greedy, greedy overkill.
You know, we don’t have a particularly luxurious life, and we don’t yet have everything we want, and even though what we DO want isn’t particularly egregious (my two family/material goals: Have another baby and buy a little house), sometimes I just feel so stupidly lucky, and so painfully aware at how spoiled I am compared to some. This, perhaps unsurprisingly, leads me down the path of panicked doom, as though taking even one second of the life I have for granted will mean it gets taken away. Like wanting more for us — no matter how mundane the ‘more’ is — will tip the scales and set off an alarm that we’ve overreached.
Irrational and silly, I know — after all, there are as many people who have much more than we do as there are those who have less — but my little family is too good, I guess, to consider taking for granted.
I hope you had a great Mother’s Day, and that you have get everything you want.
*Um, do you guys remember Dido? Yes, I still have her album. And God, what a terrible name she had/has.
May 8th, 2011
Hey, do you guys remember when I was all uppity about girls’ clothes, and how I didn’t want my kid stereotyped and I was all, where are the basic primary colors? Let us all rejoice in neutrals! Down with the princess stereotype, because MY kid will be different!
This is Sam’s favorite shirt in the whole world:
Excuse the funny angle, as it’s half in the sink after taking it off of her, but you get the idea, yes? It’s a silkscreen of a cat with a SEQUIN CROWN on its head — a pink sequin crown, no less — with the words, “Love being a princess” written behind the cat, over and over and over again.
Friends, my kid is the lady with the cat sweatshirt. She LOVES this thing. If it’s clean, she asks for it, and if it isn’t, God help us all. And no, if you were wondering, I didn’t buy it — her auntie Faith, Adam’s sister, did. That it came with a purple velour track suit with sequin tuxedo stripes is almost beside the point at this stage, am I right?
It just makes me laugh, how smug I was. Because while it’s true, I could have hidden the shirt if I was that uptight, I also knew she’d love the damn thing and you know what? She does. I also will admit to secretly hoping this happens to hipster parents who ironically dress their infants in rock T-shirts and funky vintage clothing while crowing about their toddler’s amazing taste in music. (“She LOVES Mumford and Sons! She asks for them by name!”)
Yes, I secretly hope those people wake up one day with a two-year-old who begs for Lady Gaga and dances merrily around the room clad only in a T-shirt with a sequin-crowned kitty on it. Call me petty, but there it is.
ANYWAY, I don’t even know what happened to the last week, there. I went out to dinner with a friend, we spent the weekend driving around and tooling around in this glorious, glorious weather and then, BADOW! it’s Wednesday and we almost have to do it again, and while I love this life, sometimes the weeks just fly by without even realizing it, because nothing monumental was ACCOMPLISHED, you know? Oh, sure, I spent an hour and a half folding laundry tonight, but GOD HELP ME, I WILL DO IT AGAIN TOMORROW.
(Note, this is not unique to at-home people, this is just, sadly, LIFE. I mean, unless you’re a surgeon who saves lives, in which case you can be all, I REMOVED TEN BRAIN TUMORS THIS WEEK. And then I’ll clap you on the back like, WAY TO GO, DEREK SHEPHERD. I UNLOADED THE DISHWASHER THREE TIMES.)
I can’t complain, though, because it’s nice out, and we can go to the park and hang with friends, and I’ll take it, you know? I was reminded today that while it’s nice to want things for your future, if you spend too much time agonizing over them, you miss your life. Which, last time I checked, is happening right now. Silly little platitude, but it really helped.
Unfortunately, it is not enough to stop me from continuing to slog through Stephen King’s It, and hey, anyone want to talk about a book that was published almost 25 years ago? NO? After loving the shiznit out of my very FIRST Stephen King, Bag of Bones (seriously, in my top five favorite books ever. SERIOUSLY), Adam was up my ass to read It. “Have you read It? Have you read It?” So I, after finishing The Passage on vacation, and continuing with a nice, if unremarkable diversion of Neverwhere and The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie, finally started It.
And now, what, two weeks later? I’m 400 pages into it, which, if you can believe it, IS NOT EVEN HALFWAY and I … NOTHING HAS HAPPENED. Also, I BLAZE through books, usually, so for me to only cover 400 pages in two weeks is Not Good. And then it turns out that Adam doesn’t think he was thinking of It when he was so effusive in his recommendation and, in fact, has never even READ THE BOOK, and might have only seen the movie (miniseries?), and I AM VAGUELY MURDEROUS OVER HERE, because now I am IN THIS SHIT, but also procrastinating like a mo’ fo’, because NOTHING IS HAPPENING.
The last time I felt this way was when my book club picked Margaret Atwood’s Alias Grace, which I HATED, despite my love for literally every other thing the woman has ever written. I wanted to give up so many times, but NO! My devotion to book club kept me going. Naturally, I arrived at book club to find that I was the ONLY ONE TO HAVE MADE IT THROUGH, as every other person in the room gave up.
While Jesus may have turned water into wine, the real miracle is that I didn’t throw my wine at the room at large, because MY GOD. MY GOD.
Besides, the new Sookie Stackhouse is here, but NO. I AM STILL READING IT.
I hope you have a great Thursday.
(PS, if you’re wondering, yes, I added ads back. I joined Federated Media via the Clever Girls Collective and … I hope they aren’t making your eyes bleed too much.)
*Lady Gaga, natch.
May 4th, 2011
I just have to get this off of my chest while I’m thinking about it: No one can tell you how many children to have. There is no “right” answer. No, for some people one isn’t enough. Yes, for others, it is. For still more people? Seven isn’t enough.
It struck me after I miscarried how many people — even people I love and trust — had the attitude of, well, at least you have Sam! Which is true. In many ways, having a miscarriage or infertility after already conceiving a child on your own is … well, at least a little different, and I know from both sides. This time, I didn’t have to wonder what direction my life would go: would I EVER be a mom? Would I ever know what giving birth feels like? Well, yes, now I do, and I don’t have to wonder if I have to fill my life with other things to create meaning in an empty hole I wanted fill with something else.
But I still want another one, and no, I wouldn’t be okay if I couldn’t have one. Sam is enough — on a thousand levels, she is enough. She is the sun, moon and the stars; she is everything. Of course she is.
(And of course she’s better than your kid. Of all kids, really. SHE IS THE KID TO END ALL KIDS.)
(That was a joke.)
But having her doesn’t make wanting another one any less aching, you know? There’s a thousand reasons I want another baby, and giving Sam a sibling is a huge part of it, and that, actually, makes it even harder than I ever expected. So much of what I want for my child includes having someone to grow up with; someone to bear witness to her childhood in a way I didn’t really have, despite my vast number of blended-family siblings, both biological and not. (It’s complicated. Lovely, but complicated.)
In some ways, it’s harder than it was before I had Sam, in that I know precisely what I’m missing, and though I know a second child would be different than she is, I know, at least, exactly how much I will love that kid, how much I love being a mom and how much I’ll revel in their own little personality. So yes, you know, I want another baby, and no, having one baby already doesn’t necessarily make it easier on me, at least if it turns out to be hard, and I know that’s a complicated concept to write out, but that’s the best way I can put it.
It’s hard and heart-wrenching and difficult and someone who wants a THIRD baby and is struggling is suffering just as much as someone who doesn’t yet have any babies at all. This isn’t the pain olympics. Everyone suffers. Everyone wants the family they always dreamed of, and everyone deserves it, but not everyone gets it. It’s just the way it is, and it sucks, but everyone deserves to try, and everyone deserves to be upset when their dreams didn’t work out or are hard to come by.
On the flip side, my friends who DO have one child and ARE happy with it, it’s … well, it’s almost as bad to hear what they go through from other people. I don’t know why it’s considered rude to comment on another person’s parenting when it involves things like breastfeeding and discipline (and it IS rude), but it’s perfectly acceptable to tell someone who has or wants an only child that they will grow up deprived and self-centered. Oh hey, thanks for telling someone that they’re screwing up their kid because they’re SELFISH. It’s … kind of amazing, and I firmly believe it isn’t true.
We — the people building the families — get to decide what we want, what we will try for, what to be upset about. Everyone is different. There is no sliding pain scale. Nobody wins. Like I said, if you have five kids, and desperately want a sixth, but it’s not coming easily? You get to be upset, and you get to be just as upset at someone who’s never had kids. No, you don’t get to be talked into any, “Well, at LEAST you have ONE. I don’t have ANY! Therefore YOU cannot be UPSET!” bullshit.
Well, now that’s out there. Happy Friday to you.
*Britney Spears. Not the classiest title I’ve ever come up with, eh?
April 28th, 2011
I don’t know about you guys, but I’m sitting here wondering how to keep myself from dancing until the world ends. Or — OR! — waving my drink in the air and getting sick on the floor! In IBIZA!
Clearly I’ve been listening to too much Kiss 108 (the Young People’s radio station here in Boston), because I just can’t stop marveling at the number of songs that imply that we all live to dance and — AND! — harass the DJ until they put our song on. Or maybe that was just Madonna in “Music.” I can’t remember.
Either way, I am shocked and a wee bit embarrassed by my reaction when Jennifer Lopez and/or Britney Spears start singing about getting wasted, rubbing up on dudes and dancing on the floor until their tatas fall off. I just … well, I go all, WON’T SOMEONE THINK OF THE CHILDREN? And also, last time I checked, Brit-Brit, you were on a family vacation to the most mundane of destinations: the Grand Canyon. Were you in an RV, hmmm? And JENNIFER! Good sweet GRIEF, your kids are THREE. And you’re 42! I’m all for dancing, but maybe curb the clubbing to a reasonable hour?
This sounded a lot less dowdy when it was just in my head. I won’t even bother to discuss my feelings on Flo Rida’s “Club Can’t Handle Me,” where he talks about “zoning out” and somehow making everyone else jellus of his dance moves, then.
Speaking of children (eh?), I talked to a nurse at my doctor’s office today, and reached Maximum Frustration Level when she tried to say that my (totally justified) reaction to something was MY HORMONES. “Oh honey. It’s probably just HORMONES.” I just … you know, there’s really no appropriate time to suggest that it’s a woman’s HORMONES that are making her react a certain way. Especially someone like me, who is basically walking around in a state of PTSD when it comes to health issues (OK ANY ISSUES) after the year I’ve had, WHICH SHE KNOWS ABOUT, HA HA, I DO NOT WANT TO TALK ABOUT MY “STRESS HORMONES” WITH YOU, CRAZY LADY.
(Do I sound sane there? Or just hopped up on hormones?)
What killed me, however, was that just before I replied, my center of gravity shifted from Chatty Nice Patient Jonna to Enraged Jonna, and at the precise moment the shift happened, Sam’s eyes got very wide and she warned, “UH OH! UH OH!” like some kind of tsunami detector. Mama’s pissed, and she knows it.
See, nurse? My KID knows when I’m about to get serious up in here, so perhaps you want to save the hormone talk for SOMEONE ELSE. Or actually, no one. No one deserves to be invalidated in such a totally dismissive way, and GOD, WHO HIRED YOU, NURSE?
Meanwhile, have I TOLD you guys that I’m driving a Mercury Grand Marquis, because my tree-smashed car is STILL not repaired? And that it’s been … let’s see, TWENTY SEVEN DAYS?
Do you know what a Grand Marquis looks like? No?
Yessss. Oh, I’m sure it doesn’t seem so bad from that angle, but it’s a boat, and I have yet to park it straight. Oh, and it doesn’t have automatic locks, and it ONLY has a key entry on the driver’s side, which means every time I get in or out, I have to haul EVERYTHING to the driver’s side (including Sam, if we’re in a parking lot), open the door, then unlock all the doors, THEN go back to the other doors. Also: NO CUP HOLDERS. Oh, and the trunk is key-accessible only, which makes grocery shopping more of a workout than is necessary. And! AND! it has NEW JERSEY plates, which is basically the worst thing you can have in Massachusetts. This car could get me KILLED in a MAFIA TURF WAR, for chrissake. I WANT MY HONDA BACK, MY SWEET GOD.
Upside: it’s a smooth ride, and I am shamed to admit I was doing 80 on the Pike today and didn’t even notice, but like the old lady I am, I slowed it down right quick. Like buttah, you Marquis de Minx.
(PS, I was driving to see Nic, one of my longtime internet besties, for the first time. And it was great. Do you know what it’s like to finally meet someone you talk to at LEAST four times a DAY? IT IS AWESOME. Who cares if Sam pooped in her hotel room? OH GOD.)
Have a great Thursday.
*Jennifer Lopez featuring the horribly named PIT BULL. PIT BULL. First of all, the word ‘pit’ is disgusting and reminds me of ACNE BITS. And then BULL? Really? No, I don’t think about the dog, I think about an ACNE-PITTED BULL. GROSS.
April 27th, 2011
First of all, I think it’s absolute CRUST that people are behaving as though they are above the royal wedding. Now, listen, I get if it’s Not Your Thing, but you don’t have to act like you’re cooler than me because you’re not interested. Come on! COME ON! It’s this bizarre antiquated institution full of bizarre mores and customs and yes, Charles and Diana’s wedding was a TOTAL SHAM, but for the LOVE, it’s still stupidly exciting. It’s watching CELEBRITIES GET MARRIED, and if you think I wouldn’t have tuned in when Jennifer Aniston and Brad Pitt got married (RIP, Brad & Jen), you are seriously off your rocker.
I’m not even a WEDDING PERSON, but if I can tune that shiznit in from the comfort of my own home, with Twitter at the ready and perhaps a mimosa? I am so there. In fact, if you follow me on Twitter and don’t want my unsolicited, unfiltered opinions on the wedding, perhaps it’s best if you unfollow me on Sunday FRIDAY DUH SORRY. I won’t be offended, so long as you come back when it’s over.
This weekend I wrapped up a couple of work proposals, and I realized today that if they come through, I might … um, hire someone to help with part-time child care. I just … well. It dawns on me that most people do their work during the day and are sort of kind of done at night, save for some loose ends, and don’t spend every minute of their free time trying to cram an ENTIRE DAY’S WORTH OF WORK into four hours every nap/night, and wait wait, this is why people have work days and … hm, maybe I want to reevaluate some things here, eh? I’m not talking a LOT, just a few hours here and there and … well, I popped the childcare panic-cherry by enrolling her in preschool and apparently it’s a slippery slope that I’m pretty comfortable with, and also, this is a no-shitter to most of you, but forgive me, I AM SLOW.
Speaking of slow, on at least two occasions recently, I have been reminded of and/or once again experienced the type of parents who, and I hope I explain this properly, seem to actually believe that their kids really ARE superior to every other child on earth, and fail to grasp that it might be — just a little — colored by the fact that they are the parents, you know? Like, I’ve had multiple conversations, and I KNOW y’all have too, with parents who talk about their smart, glorious children in a way that suggests, somehow, that I’m supposed to be jealous of their children? As though I would … trade my child for theirs, or somehow think that my (perfect, brilliant) offspring is INFERIOR to theirs and I got a dud model? Or … that your parenting MUST be better than mine, and OH TEACH ME, JEDI.
Look, we’re all proud of our kids. I think Sam is the most amazing person I’ve ever met, or likely ever will meet. I find her endlessly fascinating and funny and of course, I believe she’s exceptionally smart and beautiful, but I ALSO recognize that I am her MOTHER and thus, it is my job to believe those things. And as a mother, I also realize that you, a bystander, might not feel the same way, because it’s not really your job to feel that way, and honestly, I might find it a little creepy if you did.
Am I … making sense? I mean, yes, I share stories of her, and how funny she is, but I recognize that *I* think she’s funny, and I would never talk about her as though she is the FUNNIEST CHILD WHO EVER LIVED, because I realize that’s probably not true (there are other mothers out there, of course), and also, that’s obnoxious. And yet, you would be amazed at the number of people who do NOT recognize this fact.
Further, this is what I want for my daughter in life: I want her to be happy. I want her to do her best and achieve things, and reach her potential and all that Tiger Mother bullshit, but most of all, I want her to be happy with herself, her choices and her life. I’m not sure any of that is fully realized at age two, you know? I don’t care if your two-year-old is a Mensa candidate and can speak four languages beyond the fact that it makes you happy, and hopefully she’s happy … it has really very little to do with MY kid and how I perceive her successes and failures.
Even if your kid can speak Mandarin while painting elaborate Ukrainian eggs and knitting a sweater, I am STILL going to prefer my kid to yours, sorry. The same way that, say, I might possess more self-awareness than you by not rubbing my kid’s accomplishments in your face like an obnoxious one-upper, by some strange miracle, your child will still prefer you to me. THIS IS HOW THINGS WORK.
I’m rambling, and it probably isn’t making any sense. I just find some parents amusing is all, I suppose. Because once again, are we supposed to be JEALOUS of their CHILDREN and want to TRADE OURS IN FOR THEIRS? If only … If only I’d given birth to THAT KID instead!
Oh God.
You know what else is amusing? When Sam wakes up, she demands that Sunny get up too. Girlfriend is SO! EXCITED! about! Sunny! that she can’t keep it together until the dog comes out, reluctantly and very slowly. Mind you, this is a dog who, up until recently, woke up FOR THE DAY no earlier than noon, and now Sam’s rousing her by 7 at the latest. She’s … very tired. Sam, ever perceptive, realizes this, and by 8, is usually trying to make things right by giving Sunny a fluffy pillow, blanket, her juice and both remote controls.
“There you go, Sunny! There you go! Rest up!” She then covers Sunny with the blanket and tries to force her to take a drink from her sippy cup. “REST UP, SUNNY! JOOOOOOOOSE?”
Meanwhile, Sunny’s wondering what the hell happened to her cushy life. Having a baby hardly changed it at all, but having a toddler rocked her whole world, and not in a good way.
Hey, I hope you have a great Tuesday.
*Muse
April 25th, 2011
Oh, did you think I disappeared?
(What an egomaniacal thing to say, really, because come on.)
BUT DID YOU?
THAT’S BECAUSE I DID. I wasn’t hiding it or anything, as I tweeted often enough, but we went to Vegas! We went to Vegas! And it was, in a word, perfect. Honestly, it was Vegas, and it was six days, but it didn’t feel that way at all. It was really quite perfect. I suppose I get why people were all, “STOP WITH THE SIX DAYS IN VEGAS OH MY LANDS!” because if I’d been drinking and/or gambling heavily for any part of that trip, I’d be all, GET ME OUT OF VEGAS OH MY LANDS. But instead, neither of us had a drop of alcohol, and we gambled modestly, much to the disappointment of the casinos, I’m sure and we … well, we were in bed no later than 11 p.m. most nights, and up with the chickens. Oh, we adjusted just fine to the time change … eventually. Like, on the last day. HELPFUL.
What we did do was lie about a lot, rising only to do important things like eat, take baths and go to the pool. We did mix in the occasional roulette game in, and yes, we saw Cirque du Soleil (Ka), but other than that, we did a lot of nothing, which is precisely what we wanted to do. Plus, it was easy — encouraged, even — since our hotel (Bellagio) upgraded us to a suite the size of my entire house. I’m pretty sure this means we used up all the good luck we’ll have for the entire year. Look for another season of miscarriages and illness, coming to you direct in 2011/12! (I hope not, but I’m not convinced, because I tell you, THAT STUFF DOES NOT HAPPEN TO US, EVER.)
I think, too, one of the best parts about Vegas is that you can just let go and be a stupid tourist. There is no pressure to fit in as if you are a local. Gawking is encouraged. You don’t have to pretend to be cool, because NO ONE is cool in Vegas, and if they are, they’re faking it. Everyone is a goofy tourist gazing up at a fake Statue of Liberty with a weird sense of displaced awe.
Honestly, I don’t understand how ANYONE drinks a lot of alcohol in Vegas. This isn’t a judgment, but more of a physical observation. Isn’t alcohol … dehydrating? And MY GOD, PEOPLE. It’s the desert! The desert! If I had any complaints about the trip at all, I’d say that I wanted to hook an IV of saline to my arm, because I was so! thirsty! ALL THE TIME. I COULD NOT GET ENOUGH WATER. Cocktail waitresses were coming around non-stop to supply me with nothing more than Fiji water for a handsome tip. And yet, there were people drinking GIANT BONGS of daiquiris and bloody marys and I’m like, HOW ARE YOU PEOPLE NOT DEAD? You must be so THIRSTY! The thought of even a glass of wine made me shrivel up in desperate thirst, and you guys, I LOVE WINE.
Oh, and here are the pictures I took while on vacation:
Aren’t they awesome? Yes! I took so many! SO MANY PICTURES OF NOTHING. This is why I’m not a photographer. I cannot be relied upon to remember to do anything of the sort, and by that I mean, I never charged and/or brought my camera anywhere with me.
Vegas is, obviously, just! so! much! It’s funny how certain cultures have fashion standards that in other parts of the country would be considered unacceptable and/or easily mocked. Hell, I see many of the get-ups hawked by my comrades in San Francisco, and invariably think that if ANYONE wore that here in Boston, things would … not be met with the same enthusiasm. People may be quietly shuffled off to asylums, in fact, although they look perfectly normal in San Francisco. Ditto other parts of California. The brightness of LA and Orange County always looks so, so right in context, but so garish when put in contrast with the darkness of New York. (These are things I learn from the Real Housewives.)
Conversely, Boston’s tendency toward staid, classic neutrals (Look out! Muffy’s got a new LL Bean tote!) and the occasional foray into the hilarious world of preppy chic (I had a boss who wore pants embroidered with PUPPIES from Vineyard Vines) is equally laughable out of context. Yet in the summer here, Nantucket reds are almost de rigueur, particularly on the Cape and the islands. For God’s sake, I HAVE A PAIR. Throw an outfit like that together in some parts of the country and people would assume you were being ironic, or at least pretending to do a Pretty In Pink re-enactment, because why ELSE would you be wearing wide-wale cords with … are those ANCHORS on your pants, or are you just happy to see me?
And then there’s Vegas, where things that fly there would fly … well, honestly, I am hopeful that some things are only in Vegas, because, SERIOUSLY. I saw more stripper heels worn by non-strippers than I ever hope to see again. God, does everything need to be sequined? Why so loud, Vegas? Dresses coming up higher on women’s backsides than my UNDERWEAR. And oh my good grief, I played roulette next to a man wearing a rhinestone SHIRT and he didn’t even look that out of place. A RHINESTONE SHIRT.
A mom — A MOM, A VERY OBVIOUS MOM — wearing clear high-heeled platforms with light-up soles approached her daughter in the pool. THE POOL. IN THE MIDDLE OF THE DAY. LIGHT-UP STRIPPER HEELS. The fact that she was wearing a hot pink sequin monokini cut to her appendectomy scar is almost unremarkable in comparison. And yet, she really didn’t look that odd. No, you guys, it was ME, in my navy and red-striped Ralph Lauren tank who looked lamely subdued and terribly un-fun.
The best part of all, is that it was really special and important to just hang with my husband, alone, without any distractions or small animals or small people yelling, “MAMA, WHERE IS KITTY?” and hearing, “Gabba? Gabba? Gabba? GABBA SPACE?” on repeat. It was something we didn’t know we needed, but did, and it turns out I still really like the guy, quite a bit in fact. And it made me realize that it’s important to spend more time, just the two of us, and I’ve promised myself to book a babysitter once a month to get out and remember what that feels like. It’s the least we can do for each other, I think.
Most importantly, however, Sam was fine. More than fine, actually. Happy and thrilled and in totally capable, loving hands. My parents were amazing — they came here, spent the week at our house, took her to all of her regularly scheduled events, plus the park, active play-time, etc. etc. She was loved, she was happy, and we are very, very lucky and grateful. (Thank you again, Mom & Dad!)
I have to tell you, though, seeing her this morning for the first time in a week? Best thing ever, even if she did cling to me with the tenacity of a spider monkey for eleven consecutive hours. Worth. It. Man, I love that kid.
I hope you had a great week.
*Sara Bareilles
April 20th, 2011
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