Archive for the ‘Kids’ Category
Good lord. How did this get buried in my Picasa files?
This is my daughter’s reaction to the 2008 election.
Alright. Back at it, and this time with a much more sensible Pandora in charge of the musical selection. Spotify requires far too much participation for me. I anticipate using it once a month for alleviating stuck-in-head songs from Journey or The Wiz, rather than letting it manage my musical world.
I do not have my requisite summer evening glass of wine because I am living in fear of fruit flies. It is cherry tomato and gushy nectarine season in the fruit basket. And yesterday we set out to use our new juicer to stop being so goddamn fat all the time, and then realized that Craigslist giveth, and Craigslist taketh away. Earlier this summer I scored so heavily with Michelle Obama the Yamaha scooter that we used up all our karma and now we have a shitty juicer that puts juice everywhere except in the receptacle. Well, we DID have one until this afternoon when I realized the fruit flies had seized the opportunity to do a condo conversion in the leftover carrot pulp and I promptly threw the whole thing in the garbage.
My shredded index finger (for which I will be suing Microplane, or my mother, or whomever is responsible for getting me into the mess of wanting to grate my own cheese with a torture device) is looking more like science fiction special effect today with its white blood cell activating and antibiotic cream lathering. Did you know that the old school of letting a wound “dry out” is not actually a good idea? My father drilled that into my head- exposing your owies to fresh air was the fastest way to healing. Apparently, airing out promotes cell death, the opposite of what you want to facilitate healthy repairing of damaged tissue and it’s best to keep things under a thick layer of ointment and out of sight. Oh, and scarring. Moisture reduces scarring.
Tomorrow is the first official day that the children belong to me all day. We are beginning the non-vacation part of maternity leave with no backup and no plans in place. I’ll either blow it off and set the oldest down in front of Phineas and Ferb and hand the baby his favorite spatula to gnaw on, or rock it out by getting amped early and journeying to the new Boot and Shoe Service Cafe in the old Cafe DiBartolo space on Oakland’s Grand Ave. Oh how I loved their bougainvillea patio. I hope it has been preserved.
I’m leaning toward the latter. After all, what sort of mother am I if I only educate my eldest about the wonder of coffee (she knew how to grind beans and make a single drip cup by age one, and I am completely serious)? The baby must start toeing the family line eventually.
Here’s a soundtrack for the sun tomorrow. May you all have deliriously happy fruitflies in your wine glasses too.
The six year old, whom we refer to as “The Litigator” for her zippy enthusiasm for debate and endless goddamn talking, sat down with me at the beginning of the summer to make a little list of goals.
I’ve spent years and years surrounded by Type A, linear money making MBA-holding power mongers, all of whom have been very successful and lovely, but most of whom led incredibly uninspired lives. They had copies of The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People books lying around in every room like doilies and would draft annual family mission statements because, well, I honestly think that’s the only way left to think about life when all you’ve been thinking about since your twenties is fast tracking, doing it better every day, empowering the paradigms and other awful sounding practices. These phrases are akin to baseball talk to me, which is to say, totally and completely foreign. The communication that happens in that environment is actually soul sucking to me because it’s all about end goals and process, and not about the moment or the experience. I am a savorer. I like the little moments. And the sandwiches.
Anyway, we sat down in effort to make a very non linear free flow list of what might occur this summer in our dreamiest dreams and this is what we’ve concocted. I’ve got several more weeks of maternity leave to make it all come true:
* #3 says Costanoa, which is our favorite easy family getaway just north of Santa Cruz
Burnt shoulders, check. BBQ sauce on my fingers, uh huh.
The ease and delight of summer is here and I’ve climbed on board. The last six months of baby stress have eased somewhat, and recently I’ve begun to participate in normal activities that don’t involve financial fiascos, anti-depressants or mad-dash runs for diapers. I’ve been walking cautiously among those of you with normal sleep schedules and children who at least drink from sippy cups and trying to blend. I’ve even looked cute once or twice, though credit for that is likely due to the new clothes I keep ordering because I’m so deprived of normalcy I can’t remember what’s in the laundry basket, much less keep up with emptying it into that machine in the garage that makes whirring noises.
Sure, I’ve appeared normal to the parents at morning school drop-off. For months, I’ve managed to be chatty and cordial with the friendly parents I know, and aloof in an “I’m staring at my iPhone because I’m receiving critical information in my important job where I run the whole world” way, with the ones I don’t. At work, I’ve appeared as though I easily remember casual requests and have infinite brain capacity and patience for new challenges, even though my to-do list has been the size of Arkansas for months and I often forget whose number I’ve dialed, just as they are picking up.
I have walked the line. The long dark hallway of sleep deprivation and infant-rearing. And it’s high time we got back to business around these parts. It is warm and lovely. I want my life to feel warm and lovely again, not crunchy and gloomy and on the verge of disaster. I would like for my brain, body and level of self-actualization to resemble that which attracted my wife in the first place.
I’m on this kinda-sorta stint of maternity leave and feeling like this is the perfect opportunity for a quickie life makeover. But rather than one where I turn out drastically different, improved and fabulous, like an 18 year old Vespa model in Greece (though, come to think of it, that would work too), I just want things to GET BACK TO NORMAL.
I would like to be able to move my ideas forward, instead of wishing them along on the couch while I do nothing but watch some awful rerun of Laguna Beach and listen to the baby monitor. That’s the jist of it; forward motion. I’m crying out for it. To-do list items crossed off, for once and for all. No more mulling things over. Action time. The house will be lovely, I will take care of myself fully and listen to good music again, actually cook new things instead of relying on standby and brought-in foods and, above all, regain the ability to examine my life.
This will require sleep, breathing fully, eating as though I have more than three minutes to spare. It will require the time to make conscious decisions, rather than issuing quick fight-or-flight reactions. The kind of decisions one makes when one isn’t living in a constant state of panic. I do recall this state of being, but everything has changed with the new baby and now I’ve got to relearn these basic ideas. Like a remedial class on, well, living.
It all begins tomorrow. With the BBQ.
You must forgive my lack of postage. At this very moment I am multitasking with a five-week old baby. I am scrambling to:
- Place the grocery delivery order because if you don’t pack your kid a lunch, they start to wrinkle their brows at kindergarten drop off. Not to mention she eats those organic Satsumas like she’s never had a drop of vitamin C in her body before.
- Place the Three Stone Hearth order for prepared foods because in our state we can’t depend on anyone having both hands free to cook
- Update the credit card for the compostable diaper pickup service because you don’t want bags of those things sitting around and, er, ripening
- Figuring out how to pay the gadzillion parking tickets we amassed this summer
- Trying to get the baby to sleep for more than 10 minutes without releasing a piercing wail
- Trying to get the border collie to stop pacing the first floor
- Drinking PG Tips for the confidence to not freak out
- Wondering if I’ll ever feel warm, rested or in control… ever… again.
I came home from work today and told my wife I feel like a lost puppy.