Signs it's time to wash the car

I recently came across some half-finished blog ideas that I started and then abandoned months ago. This one was from last spring, but since we're currently in the middle of winter car angst at my house, it seemed appropriate to post it now.

Signs that it’s time to clean the car after a long winter:

1)   Your four-year-old says from the back floorboard of the car, “Look mom, I built a sand castle!”

2)   You notice a child eating half a granola bar on the way to gymnastics. The last time you handed out granola bars in the car was when you were visiting the pumpkin patch.

3)   If your children ever go on the lam from the law, the FBI could easily lift their fingerprints off of every interior window in your vehicle.

4)   Now that the temperature has finally climbed above 30 degrees, you find all seven missing mates to the glove/mitten sets you’ve been replacing all winter long.

5)   The dog refuses to get into the car by himself due to an unfortunate experience involving his entanglement with a half-eaten Tootsie Pop.

As it's only January, and we have a good two months before spring arrives, none of this is cause enough for me to run out today and clean my car. But come March, it will undergo the annual scrubbing, vacuuming, waxing routine, and I will threaten my children with a new no-food-in-the-car rule, at which they will promptly laugh because they have heard it a dozen times before and are aware that the first instance in which we're running late will see me tossing a couple of PB&Js into the back seat like it's feeding time at the zoo. But for now, I will embrace the chaos, hang a Sand and Sun-scented air freshener from my rear view mirror, and pretend that the sandcastles in the back seat are part of some bizarre beach vacation.

It's All in the Family

The only explanation for what I'm about to say is that I have finally gone off the deep end. A few weeks ago, I let the kids get a dog. He's a rescue dog from a shelter in the next state over. Obviously someone's family pet, it's possible that he wandered so far from his home that his owners were unable to find and claim him. We named him Oliver Twist because he was in a deplorable state when he came to us. Half golden retriever, half beagle, fur dirty and matted with a nasty infection in one foot where he had been trapped in a hunter's snare before he was rescued and taken to the shelter.

Three weeks later, he is healed, grateful and starved for attention, following us from room to room as we go about the business of life. It's taken me a few weeks to fully trust him around the kids. I initially regarded him suspiciously, lest he should suddenly turn and go all Cujo on one of us.

K however took to him immediately, showering him with hugs so tight I've actually seen his eyes bulge out of their sockets. "Gentle, gentle" is a constant refrain around here, and I'm not talking to the dog. Oliver in return shows extraordinary patience and tolerance toward this loud, bossy little person who follows him around the house instructing him in what to do and what not to do.

A couple of days after he came to live with us, I turned the corner into the kitchen to find K laying with her torso sprawled across the dog's midsection. She was using one hand to pull his upper lip over his canine teeth. All I could see was the face of my sweet daughter inches from the vicious incisors of an uncivilized beast. In my usual calm and unruffled manner, I quietly said, "Let's not play with Oliver's lips K." I immediately freaked out.

ME: "What are you doing?!!!!"

K: "I want to see his teeth."

ME: "Let's not touch Oliver's lips, okay?"

K: "Why not?"

OLIVER: Looks at me as if to say, "Chill out lady."

A few days after that, I turned the corner into the living room and found K using her hair brush to methodically comb the knots out of Oliver's fur. Again, I handled the situation with the kind of serene reaction I would imagine Mother Theresa would have had.  Completely horrified, I grabbed the hair brush from K's hand and began scrubbing it in the kitchen sink while lecturing her on why we don't use our personal grooming tools on the dog.

When I was getting ready for bed that evening, I reached for my toothbrush, which I keep next to my bathroom sink. Oliver stood at the bathroom door watching me. He yawned lazily, and I glanced over at his exceptionally shiny pearly whites and then back down at the toothbrush in my hand before chucking it in the trash can. I decided it would be safer to buy a new one in the morning and resolved to store it much higher up.

The Baby Who Almost Wasn't

Until his or her first shocking gasp of air, the initial glaring preview of bright lights, and the sight of a pair of strange hands reaching out to pull them into the world, a baby shares a kind of secret identity with its mother. She is usually the first to know of its existence, and the first to recognize its unique personality and temperament. A baby whose movements go unnoticed during the day, but who seems to host a dance party each evening will be a night owl, while the child who kicks vigorously whenever mom eats ice cream will have a penchant for sweets.

She alone bears the responsibility of protecting and nourishing her child up until the moment of birth when she must share them with the rest of the world. But for nine months, she has the satisfaction of knowing that her child rests securely below her heart, an extension of her own body.

Just after R’s second birthday, I got pregnant for the second time. My midwife estimated that I would be due around the end of April or the beginning of May. We were very excited that R would be a big brother.

I was about 6 weeks pregnant when I decided to go out and thin the hosta plants on the side of the house. I knew that I would never get it done in the spring when the baby was born, and I had been feeling great (unlike the first six weeks I was pregnant with R, and constantly felt like I was on an ocean liner without any Dramamine). I dug and pulled and split, and when I was happy with the results, I went in the house. That evening, I knew that something was wrong.

An ultrasound the next day revealed a kind of bruise on the lining of the uterus where the placenta had attached. The tech reassured me that this sort of thing was very common and many times healed on its own. Still, the slower than usual heartbeat, and the fact that the baby measured almost a week and a half behind where it should left me with an ominous feeling. They scheduled another ultrasound for a week-and-a-half later and sent me home.

Just as a mother is the first to know of her baby’s existence, I believe that I knew almost immediately when that little flicker of a heartbeat officially stopped beating. I didn’t feel pregnant anymore, even though I had had no more outward signs that that was the case. We waited several more days for the follow up ultrasound, but when they went to look for the heartbeat, the tech turned the screen away from us, and I knew that the baby was gone. I should have been eight weeks pregnant.

First, I was consumed with guilt. If only I had been patient and waited to thin the hostas, I might not have caused the bruising on my uterus. (My midwife assured me that the bruise was there from conception, and nothing that I could have done would have changed the outcome.) Then there were the days that I stayed in bed, unwilling to face the rest of the world, especially the people I felt that I had somehow let down by miscarrying this baby.

Knowing that I needed to return to normal life, I decided one day to go do some early Christmas shopping. I love the Christmas season, and I thought that the decorations and the atmosphere might help snap me out of the funk I was experiencing. I was looking through the ornament section at a local department store when I came across the “Baby’s First Christmas” ornaments. I fled the store, half-blinded by tears and drove home.

One night, R asked me to read the book “Horton Hears a Who” before bedtime. It was a book we had read a hundred times. Horton the Elephant discovers a microscopic world of tiny people called the Whos, and he saves them from certain destruction. There’s a line in the book that reads, “A person’s a person, no matter how small.” When we reached that line, J had to take over and put R to bed that night.

Although we told few people outside of our families and a couple of very close friends, I confided in a friend and colleague at work. His wife had had a miscarriage between the births of their son and daughter many years before. He shared with me how difficult the experience had been on them, especially her. And then he said something that, although I couldn’t fully appreciate the message in the moment, stuck with me for many months. In retrospect, it was probably the most sage advice given to me during that time period.

What he told me was this: “Looking back now, I know that without what happened to us, even though it was so difficult, I wouldn’t have my daughter or my grandchildren. I might have a different child and different grandchildren, but not exactly these ones, and I can’t imagine my life without them.”

K was conceived a few months later, and when I look at her today, I find it impossible to think about my life without her. My sassy girl with innocent blue eyes and full, pouty lips, her blonde curls cascading down the back of her sweet baby neck. The bossy way she reminds everyone to put their coat on before going outside, and how she must identify every person she knows in a photograph before she can move on. What would my life be like without her raspy little voice singing along to “I Love You a Bushel and a Peck” or finishing each line in the Madeline books?

As the months went on, and I confided in more friends and family members, I realized how common miscarriage is, and how many of us had silently gone through the cycle of joy, hope, fear, disappointment and sorrow. I wondered why this wasn’t a topic more widely discussed among women. There are few things worse than feeling alone.

The baby we lost would have been three this May, and even though the hosta-side of the house can still put me in a melancholy mood, and I sometimes wonder whether it was a boy or a girl and what he or she might have been like, I know that if I had been spared the pain of experiencing miscarriage, I would also have missed the elation of being K’s momma. In a roundabout way, I feel gratitude toward that tiny person the rest of the world never got to know, but who for six short weeks lived under my heart, and who will live for the rest of my life inside of it.

Occupational Hazards

When I was growing up, my occupational aspirations changed from year-to-year, week-to-week, and sometimes even from minute-to-minute (thanks to an academic adviser in college who reminded me that I would be expected to pursue whatever line of work I chose for the next 40 years until I retired, upon which time she informed me, I would probably be too old and arthritic to enjoy my retirement, and then could look forward to death. No pressure there. I’m guessing any employee satisfaction surveys she completed were pretty low.)

Starting at about age five, my heart’s deepest desire was to become a veterinarian. I liked to pretend that my grandparents’ dogs had exotic canine diseases that only I could cure. If I found a roly-poly sitting in the middle of the sidewalk where the neighborhood boys were sure to crush it beneath their mammoth bicycle tires, I would carefully move it into a nearby flowerbed. Then, during writing lab in the third grade, when we were supposed to be writing about what we wanted to be when we grew up, the boy sitting next to me looked over at my neatly printed block letters that spelled out VETERINARIAN. “Ew!” he said. “You want to cut off dogs’ private parts all day long?!” And that was the end of a dream.

In the sixth grade, I had an amazing teacher on whom I thought the sun rose and set. I decided that nothing could be better than inspiring a classroom full of students who idolized me and hung on my every word, their attention so rapt that they even forgot about recess until I reminded them that fresh air and sunshine were important for little bodies. I thought maybe kindergarten or first grade would be the place for me. I could finger paint and smell of fresh paste all day. And I loved the sight of a just-opened box of crayons.  (When I actually DID decide to go into education during my junior year of college, the college wisely required all aspiring teachers to observe elementary and secondary classrooms before choosing a grade level. It took me exactly 30 seconds to know that elementary was NOT the place for me. There isn’t enough Xanax in the world, and may God bless and have mercy on the souls of those of you who do this important job.)

Sometime during junior high school, I read my mother’s old Cherry Ames books (she was a fictional character who worked as a nurse during and following WWII and changed jobs every 208 pages) and decided that nursing was a noble profession. I began volunteering at one of the local hospitals during that time, and I loved the atmosphere. So what happened to this plan you ask? Organic chemistry is what happened. Never in my life have I ever been so bored.

I went through a phase when I wanted to major in dietetics, until I realized that chocolate was not a group on the food pyramid, at which time I declared the entire profession a sham and immediately went to my adviser’s office to change my major.

I’ve always loved to write and worked on publications from the time that I was in high school, so I thought, why not try print journalism? I loved the classes and the interesting minds of the people who shared them with me. It was the perfect fit, except that it was 2001, the Internet had been gaining momentum for the past decade, and newspapers and magazines across the country were laying off salaried journalists left and right and using freelance writers instead. When I realized that the only food I could afford on a starting reporter’s salary would be Raman noodles and peanut butter sandwiches, I decided to share my love of writing and literature with others, and became a high school English and journalism teacher.

I may have changed career aspirations as often as Cherry Ames, but one part of the vision that I had for my adult life never wavered. From the time that I was very small, I knew that I wanted to be a Mom. Chalk this up to having a great mom of my own (although I certainly never wanted her to know it between the ages of 12 and 20) or my fondness for the just-out-of the-package-smell of new plastic baby dolls, but I can’t remember a time when I didn’t want to have children. There are pictures of me as a toddler taking my baby doll shopping in a play grocery cart, giving my baby a time out, and pretending to wash tiny baby clothes.

It was the 80s, so I had four Cabbage Patch dolls that were among my favorite playthings. I would dress them, feed them, and rock them to sleep. My reward for such loving attention was the unfaltering painted smiles on their perfect plastic faces. My four angelic babies drank all of their milk and orange juice bottles (the kind that magically emptied when tipped upside down), always stopped crying when I picked them up, AND stayed in bed when put there, sleeping until whenever I felt like getting up to play with them again. By age 8, I figured I had this whole motherhood thing figured out. No problem.

The first time I saw two pink lines on a pregnancy test, I was overcome with a sense that I was about to do something incredibly important. More important than grading semester term papers. More important than explaining how to diagram a sentence. I was going to be entrusted with a human life. I was going to mold and shape this child into a compassionate, responsible human being. And some day, he would look down at me with gratitude in his eyes and an M.D. behind his name, and a wave of appreciation would sweep over him the likes of which he had never experienced or would ever experience again. I was going to hold the most revered job title in the mammal world- Mother.

The reality is, motherhood is the most difficult job I have ever undertaken. For one thing, most employers are required by law to allow their employees breaks each day. During this time, workers have the luxury of using the restroom in solitude. They are not required to balance a nursing baby in the crook of one arm while holding the toilet paper roll down with the other so that a toddler can’t “mummify” himself while repetitively chanting, “You go pee pee, Mommy.” At work, I am allowed to sit down to eat my lunch. At home, I stand at the counter eating the crusts off of other people’s peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

In motherhood, your employers expect you to report for duty at all hours of the day and night without notice, even when you’ve been puking or running a fever. There’s no complaint box if you find yourself unsatisfied with someone’s attitude or job performance, and you are sometimes required to sleep with the boss, even when he insists on sleeping sideways with his feet digging into your ribs and enough stuffed animals in the bed to suffocate a small elephant.

There are no glowing performance reviews thanking you for all of the hard work you’ve been doing. No one gushes over how you took the initiative to scrape the hardened toothpaste out of the bathroom sink or thanks you for taking the time to make nutritious meals instead of stopping at McDonald’s on the way home after soccer practice. In fact, any performance reviews in motherhood are more likely to include comments on how you could improve. (“Don’t buy me itchy sweaters anymore Mom.” “You made fish AGAIN?!” “Mrs. So-and-so said that we didn’t do my homework right the other night.”)

I liken it to working for Mussolini or Stalin at the height of their power. I sometimes even affectionately call them my little dictators. The other morning around 5:30, K toddled into the bedroom. I didn’t know she was there until I felt warm air on my cheek and opened my eyes to see her own blue ones staring at me from a half an inch away. I nearly jumped out of my skin. “I want eggs for breakfast Mommy.” I tried in vain to explain to my two-year-old that Mommy doesn’t fix eggs until the sun has come up.

Motherhood is also the most rewarding job I’ve ever had. The benefits package can’t be beat. No one at work has ever before stopped me mid-Dr. Seuss to grab my face between two chubby hands, look deep into my eyes and say, “I lub you so, so much Mommy.” No paycheck can compare to a hand-made, albeit slightly crookedly cut get well heart that reads, “I hop you git bedr Mome.” And all of the accolades in the world pale in comparison to your preschooler introducing you to his class by saying with pride in his voice, “This is my Mom.”

I’ve never worked at anything that was as frustrating, anxiety inducing, thankless, and, at times, painful as parenting my kids. I’ve also never dreamed of a job that I wanted to do more than this one, and I never plan to retire.  

Tales from Down Under

Over winter break, there were a few days that I opted to take K to daycare so that I could spend some one-on-one time with R. K has what some might politely call a “strong” personality, and at times can dominate the focus of everyone in a room. It’s nice to be able to give R my undivided attention occasionally.

We found many things to do during our time together that would interest a 5-year-old boy, but that may not intrigue his 2-year-old sister. One day, after we spent the morning doing an R-centered activity, I needed to stop by Kohl’s to exchange a camisole that I got for Christmas to wear under a sweater.

R dreads nothing more than being dragged into a women’s clothing store, so I promised him it would be a short trip. Nonetheless, he complained all the way from the car to the door and from the door back to the lingerie department where Kohl’s keeps their camisoles.

I was busy looking for the size, color and style of camisole that I needed to exchange when I looked up and noticed that R was no longer standing beside me. Panicked, my eyes quickly scanned the area until I found him, three displays away, standing before a rack of very large brassieres. He had the same look of wonder in his eyes as the middle school boy I once caught with a copy of the J.C. Penney lingerie ad tucked into his Trapper Keeper at school.

Me: "R, you scared me. You need to stay right beside me. What are you doing?"

R: (So loudly, I actually looked to see if he was holding a bullhorn.) "What does D-D-D mean, Mom?"

Me: (Looking around to see who is overhearing this conversation, as I’m sure by now even the unliving have been awakened from their eternal sleep.) "It’s a size."

R: (To my horror, he now has his face buried in one cup of the DDD garment.) "Look Mom!" (Gleefully) "My whole head fits inside!"

I quickly rushed him away from the racks of bras, but couldn’t resist stopping at a bin of clearance underwear. (I like a good sale as much as the next gal.) As I picked up various garments and held them up by their elastic waistbands, I could feel R’s eyes watching me intently. A smarter woman would have cut her losses and run, but I’m a glutton for punishment.

R: (Enthusiastically) "Wow, Mom! Are you gonna launch those things across the aisle like a rubber band?!"

Moral of this story: R is now too old to accompany me on any trips that involve undergarments of any kind.

Who's on First?

In recent weeks, the dreaded phrase “that’s no fair” has reared its ugly head at our house. As in, “Mom, that’s no fair that K got in the car first.” “Mom, why does K get more broccoli than me? No fair!” and “K always gets to take a bubble bath. How is that fair?”

I have utilized many tactics in my defense against the “No Fair” assault. I’ve tried telling R that to even things up, he can be the first in bed tonight, an offer that went over like a lead balloon. In what I thought was a diplomatic effort at equality, I have suggested that he might take up wearing diapers again since his sister does. No takers there. Many times, I have bit back the sarcastic response, “It’s because I like her more,” fearing that years of psychotherapy would be necessary to convince him that I was only joking.

After a particularly trying morning, in which I was accused of giving K her breakfast plate, milk cup, vitamin, and napkin first, I had had just about enough of “that’s no fair.”

Me: “Yeah, well you got to use my uterus first.”

R: (With a blank look on his face) “What’s a uterus?”

Me: “It’s the part of the mom where the baby grows.”

R: (Without missing a beat) “Well that’s no fun. It was dark in there.”

Oy vey.

On Happiness

K turned two a couple of weeks ago. As I watched her savor cupcakes and ice cream and rip into presents, I was struck by how much joy children find in the simple acts of living. I can’t remember the last time that I stuffed an entire chocolate cupcake into my mouth with abandon.

Children are notoriously impulsive. R shows no hesitation flying down the driveway on his scooter or throwing his body to the ground during a soccer game. K’s recklessness in the swimming pool would drive any parent to require her to wear a life jacket until she’s 30. The risks that adults carefully weigh and consider are only after thoughts in a kid’s world.

Somewhere along the road to adulthood, we grow into individuals who are self-conscious and afraid to take chances and fail. Some might call this good sense. Nobody wants to get hurt, and bones heal more slowly when you’re 40 than when you’re four.

But this indecision creates many roadblocks in our quest for happiness. The very act of risking without knowing what the outcome will be is what makes life exhilarating. Without change and risk, we are destined to live in a perpetual state of monotony. I’m certainly not suggesting that my children (or anyone else for that matter) race trains, play Russian roulette or get tattooed while inebriated. But there's got to be a happy medium between reckless irresponsibility and paralyzing caution.

One day, when R and K have reached adulthood, and faced with a major life decision, frantically find themselves conducting risk-benefit analysis in their heads, here are some of the things I would tell them about what I’ve learned on my own quest for happiness:

-Try new things. Order something you’ve never had before at a restaurant. Take a yoga class. Have a conversation with a stranger (in a well-lit, busy location). Get a new haircut. Go somewhere you’ve never been.

-Live with abandon. Jump into the pool without checking the temperature first. When a good song comes on, sing out loud in a public place. Wear white to a barbecue. Laugh until you snort milk out of your nose.

-Take risks. Accept a new job. Choose the red shoes instead of sensible beige. Say, “I love you” without wondering if the other person will say it back. When we stop risking, we deny ourselves the opportunity to live fully.

-Know yourself. Know who you are all alone without anyone else’s expectations. Take time to do things that make you happy. Throw off the idea that it’s selfish to take care of your own needs. When we do this, it allows us to give to others willingly, not resentfully.

When our founding fathers penned the Declaration of Independence, they valued happiness so highly that they called the pursuit of Happiness an unalienable right. We aren’t guaranteed happiness, only the right to pursue it. I would tell R and K to avoid being their own biggest obstacles to that pursuit. When happiness floats into view, grab onto it with both hands and hold on tight. Don’t let go and don’t look backward or forward. Just savor it like a fistful of chocolate cupcake.  

 Don’t wait around for other people to be happy for you. Any happiness you get, you’ve got to make for yourself. –Alice Walker

Fecal Matters

Last night, I was paying bills when J came into the kitchen laughing so hard he had tears streaming down his face. I asked him what was so funny. Words escaped him as he attempted to gasp out an answer, so he simply handed me a small, photo copied book that he had found in R’s backpack.

It was bound neatly at the top by two staples, clearly the work of an adult. The front cover featured two cartoon children, one a boy and one a girl. Above them, the book read My First Day of School By R. R had neatly printed his name on the line provided and colored the pictured children in with crayons.

“What a fun idea,” I thought, making mental note to add it to his box of keepsakes.

I continued to flip through the book. There was a page with a picture of a red schoolhouse. R’s teacher had neatly written the name of his school at the bottom of the page, and again, crayons were his choice of medium. A self-portrait of R followed, and then a page with his teacher’s name, and another page that listed the number of boys and girls in his class.

By this point, I was feeling pretty warm and fuzzy about his upcoming kindergarten experience. With a sentimental smile on my lips, I flipped to the next page, and this is what I saw:

Stunned, I wasn’t sure I had read it correctly the first time, but after looking at the accompanying drawing, there was no doubt about it. It was what I thought it was, and it explained J’s uncontrolled mirth.

After I recovered from my own uncontrolled laughing, crying, gasping fit, (trying to be as silent as possible so R couldn’t hear me from the next room) I went from feeling amused to mortified. Had his teacher seen his all-too-accurate depiction of a pile of feces? Perhaps if she had just seen the drawing, she thought he wanted to learn more about baking bread. However, R had left nothing to chance by carefully printing the word P-O-O-P at the top of the page.

I composed myself, banished J to our bedroom (he can’t keep a straight face when dealing with situations like this to save his life) and sat down to have a chat with the R-man.

ME: “R, I really like this book that you made at school today, but there’s something that I want to talk to you about.”

R: “What?”

ME: (Holding up page in question): “Why did you write that you want to learn more about poop?”

R: “It’s the word I can spell and write the best besides my name.”

ME: “Why did you need to write it out? (Pleading tone enters my voice.) Couldn’t you have just drawn a picture?”

R: “I wanted to make sure everyone knew what it was.”

The conversation ended with us brainstorming (with J’s help) other topics that R would like to learn more about this year (dinosaurs, volcanoes, counting money, and reading) and outlining the only occasions in which “poop” will be an appropriate response to a school assignment in the future (while studying the digestive system or dissecting owl pellets in science class).

Luckily, I think R’s teacher has been working with 5-and-6-year-olds long enough to find a modicum of humor in this situation. The next time I see her though, I will be wondering if the twinkle in her eye has anything to do with the first assignment R did in her classroom. To all of my elementary teacher friends, there is a special place behind the pearly gates for you someday.

A New Beginning

Before he finally crawled, R spent months on his hands and knees, hind end in the air, rocking back and forth. Occasionally his top-heaviness would get the better of him, and he would lean too far forward and tumble over. The first time he managed to coordinate hands, knees and feet in a way that allowed him to move across the living room floor, I startled him with my sudden shrieks, urging his dad to come and see what he was doing (I’ve found that subsequent children don’t suffer nearly the level of post-traumatic stress that first-borns are subjected to, not because we aren’t just as excited by their feats, but because we’ve seen the effect too much enthusiasm can have). After he recovered from his shell shock, R continued across the living room floor, but paused to look back over his shoulder at us, as if to reassure himself that we were still where he had left us, grinning like idiots.

He was not nearly so cautious a few months later when he started walking. With the abandon of someone who has never fallen from an upright position before, R would suddenly let go of the furniture that separated him from disaster and attempt a step. I once thought that stretching one’s arms out in front of the body in an attempt to protect it from hitting the ground was an in-born reflex, but it’s not. It turns out that it’s a learned response to painful stimuli. There’s really no other way to teach this important life lesson. I would follow him as he barreled around on his toddler legs, trying to anticipate any unsteadiness that might lead to a face-plant, but in the end, I had to let him fall a couple of times before he understood the arm-face-pain connection.

Having mastered the art of bipedalism, the world was R’s oyster. He no longer cared for being confined to a stroller or held in someone’s arms. With the ability to propel his own body forward, he could now go where HE wanted to go to see the things that HE wanted to see. Shopping malls, parks, the grocery store parking lot and our own front yard became meccas for his exploration and exercises in terror for me when he would wander too far away. I wanted to run after him, scoop him up and keep him close to me.

One day several months ago, I took R to an empty parking lot with the intention of teaching him to ride his bike without training wheels. He insisted that I absolutely not let go of the seat of his bike. He even made me promise that I wouldn’t let go before he would agree to pedal forward. Dutifully, I held on to the seat while he wobbled along, painfully slow, trying to find his center of gravity. I noticed that the tighter I held on to his bike seat, the wobblier the bike became. When I loosened my grip and rested my hand lightly on the seat, R adjusted his weight so that he was centered on the bike and pedaled forward smoothly. After several rounds of practice, R’s riding had improved so much that I was having trouble keeping up with him to hold on to the back of the seat at all. I let go, and he took off across the parking lot, pedaling as fast as his little legs would allow him. At some point, he realized I wasn’t behind him, looked back to see where I was, and crashed.

Of course, he was really mad at me, and reminded me repeatedly of my promise. Looking sullenly at his scraped knees and hands, he insisted that he was never going to learn how to ride a bike. I reminded him that he WAS riding his bike until he stopped, but that we could pack his bike up and go home now if he didn’t want to ride anymore. (Never challenge a kid who likes a good challenge by implying that he CAN’T do something.) Twenty minutes later, R was flying across the parking lot while I cheered him on. I was thrilled that he had come so far in one afternoon, but as I watched his retreating figure grow tinier and tinier, a little voice in my heart wanted to shout, “Too far, come back to me!”

Tomorrow, J and I will drop R off at the doors of his elementary school and watch him as he makes his way into the gymnasium to join his kindergarten class. I will stand there with other mothers of ingoing kindergartners (We’ll be the ones with runny eyeliner, clutching fistfuls of Kleenex like security blankets). Amidst the excited commotion of a new school year, alongside sixth graders who will be twice his size, and under the supervision of what I believe will be a delightfully fun, but firm teacher, R will begin a new journey that will take him a little farther from us.

Parenting is a constant cycle of holding on and letting go, of pushing forward and pulling back. Sometimes the lessons are painful, and sometimes they are triumphant. I guess the best we can hope for is that our kids know that we will stay constant, so that when they need to look back and find us, we will be right where they left us.

So, here’s to a new beginning and 13 years of science fair projects, field trip permission slips, and finding out at 11 o’clock the night before the school chili feed that your kid was supposed to ask you to bake 6 dozen brownies.

Perspectives

It’s been one week since the verdict in the George Zimmerman trial was decided. J and I were out with friends to celebrate his birthday when the verdict was announced. I was on my way to the restroom of a crowded venue when I heard shouting and glanced up at a TV mounted on the ceiling to see Zimmerman’s face and the word “acquitted.” I will admit that my first thought was that there might be rioting, much like what occurred in L.A. after the Rodney King case was announced in 1992. I hurried on to the restroom to be on the safe side. Over the past week, I have read commentary and watched interviews from both sides, seen long diatribes on Facebook outlining people’s reactions, and discussed the case with family and friends.

This case has captivated many because it is so multifaceted. Issues of race, age, character, and the rights of gun owners were thrust into the spotlight. As I followed this case in the aftermath of the verdict, it struck me that one conversation that seems to be missing is our ability as human beings to look at a situation from a perspective outside of our own life experiences. As a nation, we have become less empathetic toward one another in exchange for a false sense of security. When I think too long on this, it distresses me to imagine the kind of society we are leaving for future citizens of this country, including my own children.

As a mother, I feel compassion for any woman who has ever lost her child, but especially for mothers who have lost children unexpectedly and to violence. To have invested all of your love and energy to this life, and then to have that life taken by another would be truly devastating.

I can never know what it feels like to be a young, black man in the United States walking alone at night in a predominately white neighborhood. But I do know what it’s like to be a woman walking alone at night in a rough neighborhood. Gripping car keys between tensed fingers, always anticipating what’s around the next corner, heart thumping in ears, the constant urge to turn around and see what’s behind you. I grew up with cautionary tales of girls and women who had been overpowered, violated, or left for dead. Every news story about sexual violence and every date rape episode of Law & Order reminded us that the world could be a dangerous place to be female. If I had grown up listening to the Rodney King story or felt like I was under a cloud of suspicion every time I wore a hoodie, I might feel the need to defend myself if someone approached me in the dark to ask me what I was doing. I’ll never know for sure, but I can imagine it. That’s part of our humanity; being able to imagine what an experience must be like for someone else.

I find it interesting that the characters of both Zimmerman and Martin have been so thoroughly dissected by the general public. Neither man would have been in the running for sainthood, but I know very few adults or teenagers who are perfect. Their characters, beyond what happened the night of the run-in, seem irrelevant to me. As a former high school teacher, I once taught a first hour English class in which I am fairly certain ¾ of the students were high each morning. These were low-to-middle income white and Native American students from a rural area. While I don’t condone the use of illicit drugs, marijuana is not associated with increased aggression, so unless we are trying to prove that Martin was doing something that many of his adolescent peers try at one time or another, I really don’t think we have proven much.

Zimmerman had lawfully applied for and obtained a firearm, and according to the laws of his state, had the legal right to carry it and defend himself. Feeling threatened, Zimmerman produced his firearm and shot. There’s a reason that when individuals enter into careers in law enforcement, they are required to have extensive training in conflict resolution, mediation, and acceptable situations in which to discharge a firearm under extreme emotional stress. As far as I’m aware, there are no such demands put on individuals who are applying for permits to carry. As a citizen of this country, I’m not comfortable with the idea that the average layperson has the skills necessary to make decisions under extreme emotional stress whose consequences have such potentially grave outcomes. That certainly seemed to be the case in this situation, as it was later discovered that Martin was unarmed.

While many will disagree, it’s my assertion that this is the failure of a society, which in its attempts to feel secure in a post-9/11 era, has created a monster by loosening gun control policies. Like an overzealous parent, intent on protecting their offspring, we have created a nation that is anxious, suspicious, and quick to react. Benjamin Franklin once said, “Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.” (Like the liberty to allow your 17-year-old to walk to the Quick Shop for a snack without getting shot.)

If I leave out matters of race, personal character, and gun control, this case boils down to one thing for me: Trayvon Martin was not an angel, but he was an unarmed, 17-year-old kid. I’m gonna go out on a limb here and predict that there aren’t many of us (myself included) who can say that we always thought clearly or made good decisions at 17. George Zimmerman was a 28-year-old man who had undertaken the responsibility of owning a potentially lethal weapon. That kind of responsibility should dictate that when a 911 dispatcher tells you to get back into your car and go home, that the police are on their way, and there is no imminent bodily threat, you do it. You don’t get out of your car and follow the person of concern on a misguided vigilante mission. If Zimmerman had acted with the kind of maturity I expect from someone allowed to carry a loaded weapon, Trayvon Martin would be alive today.

It’s important to me that J and I raise R and K to be the kind of people who have empathy for others. When they’ve hurt someone, we ask, “How would you feel if…?” We try to teach them to look at situations from many perspectives before making rash judgments, even if those perspectives are outside of their personal experiences. We ask, “What would it be like to…?” I wonder what the world would be like if more adults asked themselves these same questions.

The Family Vacation

Long the hallmark of the middle class, the family vacation provides hard-working men and women a week each year to focus exclusively on making memories with their spouses and offspring. Without the distractions of texts, e-mails, bills, work or school, moms and dads set out to provide memorable, enriching life experiences that their children can carry into adulthood and reflect upon fondly in coming years. Suitcases (or, as R calls them “case suits”) are packed, itineraries are made, and mail is stopped.

Each February, I turn to my husband and ask him where he would like to go on vacation for a week in the summer. “Somewhere close” is usually his reply. (One has to wonder about the person who first decided that confining family members to a space the size of a Johnny on the Job and driving several hours was the recipe for relaxation and domestic harmony.)

Amidst flying snowflakes and subzero temperatures, usually while nursing a head cold, I eagerly research hotel rooms, cabins, or condominiums and dream of warm summer nights and walking hand-in-hand along a shoreline. Our children, dressed in white, K with a pinafore and bow in her hair, skip ahead of us looking for shells or pinecones or other treasures of nature. The temperature is always a perfect 76 degrees in my fantasy, and we seem to be the only people present in our vacation sanctuary.

Returned from an actual week of vacationing with my family, I have come to the conclusion that reality is the nail in the coffin of expectations. Don’t get me wrong. There are moments from this vacation that I will cherish for the rest of my life. Last year, K was still too young to interact in a meaningful way with her brother. This year, they delighted in plotting against us from the backseat. (Think repeated singing of playground songs and crude noises made by the mouth.) They reveled in discovering new places and seeing things they hadn’t seen before (like the inside of a cave. Evidently, bat poop is endlessly fascinating.) And when I’m an old woman, the image of two happy, smiling faces jumping into my outstretched arms from the side of a swimming pool will sustain me. To quote J, “It seems like we always come away with great memories, but sometimes it’s just so dang stressful.”

Last summer we chose a vacation destination that required us to cross three states and drive approximately 13-hours. That experience fresh in our minds, we decided to stick closer to home and drive east to a popular vacation destination about 5 hours away. R took advantage of his close back seat proximity to his sister to enhance her toddler vocabulary. The “Can You Say?” game took off from the start and was mutually entertaining for both kids. Our not-yet-two-year-old can now utter such helpful conversational phrases as “I farted” and “Where is your butt?” (R’s success rate is even better than Rosetta Stone, which promises that you will be conversationally proficient in a language of your choice in as little as five lessons.)

When they tired of the “Can You Say?” game, R turned to his old standby, tormenting his sister by holding things just out of her reach, and then mocking her when she cried. J and I shut this down quickly by distributing snacks and crayons, which K promptly spilled all over. (I recently found violet lodged in a crack in the console, oddly warped by the July heat.) K also decided that vacation was the perfect time to reveal her intense aversion to wearing shoes, so that I lived in perpetual fear that we were going to leave strays at every rest stop along the way.

Like Lucy and Ethel, Abbott and Costello, Bert and Ernie, and Thelma and Louise (okay, bad example), J and I each play a role when it comes to vacation transportation. I’m terrible at reading maps and giving directions and prefer to drive, while J revels in finding the best, most direct route to our destination. Most of the time, this division of responsibility works well, J calling out directions, me turning left here, merging onto a highway there. As all couples that have travelled together know, even the most solid relationships can bend under the strain of heavy traffic, whining children, and lack of sleep.

My husband is the king of the imaginary brake pedal. If he has even an inkling that you might not see the gigantic semi idling at the stoplight in front of you and brake soon enough to avoid hitting it, he will brake for you. Early in our marriage, I found this charming. It was almost a reflex, like he was involuntarily programmed to keep us safe. Seven years in, I find his sudden foot and knee flexing to be a silent commentary on my driving abilities. That, along with his charming habit of leaning slightly to one side or the other in an effort to guide the car where he thinks it should be going, has led to many choruses of “Would you like to drive?”

This year, I booked a condo with two full bedrooms and two full baths. Sharing a hotel room with two small children means that J and I either have to go to bed at 10 PM or keep the kids up and deal with the consequences the next day. When we discussed these reservations back in February, I pictured us putting the kids to bed side-by-side in one of the spacious king-sized beds, and then having time to relax and have grown-up discussion before we headed off to bed in the second room. As it turns out, kids don’t sleep well alone in strange places, even when they have each other. J ended up occupying one of the king-sized beds while I awoke each morning to R’s bony knee in my ribs and cries of “I pottied Mama!” from K.

I love to document our family travels through pictures, and we have albums full of vacation photographs, first as a couple, and then with R as a grinning toddler, and now the four of us. What I’ve noticed is that not unlike my February fantasy vacations, I tend to photograph the idyllic moments, when everyone is smiling for the camera, as if to prove that this vacation was perfect. This year, I decided to bring out the journalist in myself, dust her off, and strive to capture the truth (good, bad or ugly). Here are a few of the highlights:

-A charming photo of K, on her back on the ground, kicking her feet because her mini-golf ball had to be returned to the clubhouse at the end of the game.

-R melting down on the floor of a conservation center because he was ready to go on the hike we promised and tired of all the “boring” stuff we wanted to look at.

-K pouting in front of a wooden ship’s wheel because she wanted to have complete control over turning it, as her brother stands in the background smiling.

-After an hour of getting everyone ready to go mini-golfing, buckled in, equipment rented and paid for, train taken to get to hole #1, the skies opened up and a torrential downpour of rain soaking the four of us as we scrambled to get back to the car.

-R’s tear-stained, powder sugar-covered face, comparing the amount of funnel cake he got to the amount everyone else got (despite the fact that he ate ¾ of it).

-My husband, looking dazed, as if he has just walked out of a combat zone as he struggles to fold the stroller and load it onto the tram after a long day at an amusement park.

When the photos came back a couple of weeks after our return, I flipped through them, recalled the stories that went with each, smiled, and turned to J.

“What a great vacation! Where do you want to go next year?”

A New Kind of Clean

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Before I had children, I spent one morning each weekend cleaning my house. I would de-clutter, dust, vacuum, do laundry, scrub, and polish. When I finished, I’d look around and marvel at the general order of my life. I basked in the glow of an entirely clean house. When R was born, I tried to keep up with my pre-child standards of cleanliness and soon found the practice to be discouraging, but accomplishable. By the time K came along, I found it to be downright impossible.

The problem is, as soon as one room has been cleaned to my satisfaction, I look behind me and find that my children have not sat idly by while I strived for cleaning perfection. Instead, they have dumped an entire bucket of Legos in the middle of the living room floor and strewn half-naked dolls down the hallway, their underutilized clothes lagging behind them.

Better Homes and Gardens and HGTV rarely feature glossy photos or spotlight homes decorated with The Avengers action figures and varying shades of Disney-princess pink. Not once have they addressed how to arrange light sabers on your living room couch for maximum impact. In fact, the houses they feature must not be occupied by anyone under the age of 21 (or anyone who actually likes to EAT at a dining room table for that matter, because seriously, who actually has time to put napkin rings on cloth napkins?)

I’ve reached a new stage of acceptance though, and now realize that my entire house will never be simultaneously clean again. Instead, I spot clean (this usually happens when something in the house gets so messy or cluttered that I snap). For example, when I can no longer find the kitchen counter to slice an apple, it’s time to sort through the mail, art projects, tools and toys that have accumulated there. (My husband tends to keep his distance when I fall into one of these moods, lest he be unwillingly recruited. He’s a wise man.)

Good Housekeeping magazine has a featured column each month that lists the “best” way to clean something, and also the “good enough” method for the same task. I really took to this idea the first time I saw it. I think it appeals to my perfectionistic side, while also acknowledging reality. So, I’ve decided to try my hand at it. Let’s call this the “BEFORE KIDS” method vs. the “AFTER KIDS” method:

LAUNDRY

BK:  Laundry days were Wednesday night and Saturday morning. All laundry was collected, washed, dried, and folded while enjoying favorite television shows. Laundry was then promptly put into dresser drawers and linen closets and clean towels were hung in the bathrooms. Iron-able items were creased, pressed, and hung in closets.

AK:  Laundry days are whenever someone complains that they’ve run out of clean underwear. Also, how many times can a load of wrinkled clothes be run through the permanent press cycle before you absolutely must take them out and fold them? If your kid wants a particular article of clothing and it’s 10 o’clock the night before they need said article, is it acceptable to pull it from the bottom of their laundry hamper, check for stains, not find any, and then throw it in the dryer with a wet washcloth and a dryer sheet to “fluff” it up? (Not that I have ever done this.) Iron-ables? HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

BATHROOMS

BK:  Bathrooms were cleaned every other weekend unless it was deemed that they needed additional attention on weeks off. Clean counters, mirrors, toilet, and tub. Vacuum up lint and hair and mop bathroom floors. Polish fixtures with a paper towel so they are shiny. Empty wastebasket.

AK: Bathrooms are cleaned when I can no longer stand the sight of them. Quickly wipe counters off with a piece of toilet paper. Check around toilet for pee stains. (SIDE NOTE: If a woman can accurately polish her pinkie toenail with a tiny nail polish brush without getting any polish on her toe, why can’t a five-year-old boy hit the inside of a 1-foot wide opening in a toilet seat while he’s standing directly over it? Mothers of boys, you know EXACTLY what I’m talking about here.) Wipe toothpaste spit splatters off of ceiling (How does that stuff get up there?!)

TOYS

BTK (Before two kids): “There’s a place for everything, and everything in its place” was my motto. I attempted to buy tubs and organizing systems. At first, we tried to sort all of the kids’ toys out so that pieces of sets stayed together. After all, the world would come to a halting stop if Trio blocks were mixed in with KiNEx pieces.

ATK:  In our attempts to get everyone into bed before the 10 o’clock news anthem starts, we have resorted to just throwing things into toy boxes and bins and letting them fall where they will. You can imagine the scandal when Shredder spent the night in the same tub with Cinderella.

DUST

BK:  Dust all surfaces at least once per week. Pick up objects on top of surfaces and dust those as well.

AK: Dust builds up healthy immune systems, right?


BED MAKING
BK: I loved the crisp feeling of hospital-corner sheets and the sight of duvet covers and pillow shams before falling into bed at night.

AK:  Check to make sure I'm not going to be eviscerated by the spiky tail of a plastic dinosaur who got lodged between the sheet and comforter before falling into bed at night.


Cleaning your house while your kids are still growing is like shoveling the sidewalk while it's still snowing.  ~Phyllis Diller

The Diet Plan

Last summer, K was too young to understand the concept of ice cream. If it was just she and I running errands, I could stop by the DQ or get some frozen yogurt, and she was blissfully content to watch as I spooned creamy deliciousness into my mouth, none-the-wiser as to what she was missing. I will admit that even in recent months, I have taken advantage of the fact that her car seat is still rear facing and quietly consumed a frozen treat out of her eyesight. (All mothers have done this at one time or another.) However, this chapter is quickly coming to an end, replaced by a cry for “I kem! I kem!” if we even pass within several yards of a Dairy Queen sign. (Maybe that’s a sign I should lay off the “I kem.”)

A couple of nights ago, I was sharing a cup of chocolate and peanut butter with her. I took a bite, and then spooned a bite into her mouth. We went on like this for several minutes. A bite for Mommy. A bite for K. She was really getting into the pattern and began opening her mouth as soon as I had consumed my preliminary bite. As she was chewing a particularly large spoonful, I took two bites in a row. She raised her tiny index finger, looked at me from under scowling eyebrows, and screeched, “No Mommy!” Kind of like this:

I think I’ll call it the “I-HAVE-A-TODDLER-WHO-NOTICES-EVERYTHING-PLAN.” I’ll let you know how it works.

The Story of Us

Fifteen years ago this spring, my husband and I went on our first date. He sat behind me all year in Mrs. S’s Sophomore Honors English class, and I could tell when he was concentrating really hard due to an increased intensity in his gum chomping. We exchanged relatively few words throughout the year, except to discuss class-related topics like which pages were due in the novel we were reading, or whether or not we needed an annotated bibliography for a research paper. (What can I say? We’ve always been big on the romance.)

I would like to say that I fell for his brains (he graduated with top honors, and I’ve always preferred smart guys, even at 16), but the combination of dark hair and green eyes with laugh crinkles didn’t hurt. He played football, and ran around with some of the same people I socialized with, but our interactions were mainly relegated to English class.

One day, I was complaining to my friend across the aisle about how far behind I had gotten in A Tale of Two Cities. (In my defense, it was basketball season, and I had after-school practice or games five nights a week.) J leaned over and handed me his copy of Cliff’s Notes. I don’t really remember that he said anything, just handed it to me. (For all I know, he just really wished I would shut up about the damn book.) I passed the final test for A Tale of Two Cities, and J and I broadened our conversations to include topics outside of participial phrases. However, not in the way one might imagine.

Instead of face-to-face conversations about music and movies and teachers and mutual friends, J began e-mailing me. At first, just three or four words at a time. This was back in the days of dial-up connections and AOL. I would rush home after cheerleading practice, boot up the computer, listen to the weea-weea-weea sounds of the modem, and then hold my breath until the e-mail screen popped up. If I heard “You’ve got mail,” my heart would jump into my throat with excitement. All for a message like, “How was your day?”

This went on for months, business-only conversations at school, and then the e-mails when I got home. I was really puzzled. Did he like me? Or did he just want me to return his Cliff’s Notes and was sending subliminal messages through cryptic e-mails? Finally, one day I decided to type out, “Maybe we should do something some time.” I quickly hit the send button before I could change my mind. I waited, and almost immediately, saw his earth-shattering response: “Okay.”

There was just one problem. My parents. They had this Draconian rule that anyone I was going to ride in a car with had to come to the house, have dinner, and meet the family. (Now that I’m a parent, this seems much more reasonable than it did at 16. I even think full criminal background checks will probably be in order when my kids start dating.) There was no way I was going to go through the humiliation of telling J that he had to come to my house before we could go out somewhere. So I did what all 16-year-olds do in these situations. I found the loophole. Instead of having him pick me up at my house, I told him to meet me in the parking lot of a local grocery store. I don’t remember that he ever questioned this, although it must have seemed like a strange request at the time.

I was almost 30 minutes late for our date. As I drove to the grocery store that night, my brain raced with the thought that he might have left. Maybe he thought I stood him up. But when I pulled into the parking lot, there he was. We saw a movie on that date, and while I can’t say that I knew that I loved him then, I was definitely in serious like.

We dated throughout high school, and then chose different colleges our senior year, making the mature, adult decision to go our separate ways and experience college life unfettered. (The actual truth is, I was too proud to be that girl who follows a guy to college, and I went away to school broken-hearted over this “mature” decision.) There were friendships to be made, flirtations to pursue, and relationships to explore (and I guess we studied somewhere in between). Two years passed quickly.

One night toward the end of spring semester in our sophomore year of college, we found ourselves at the same party. Some old, mutual friends were getting together to celebrate the coming of spring and the end of another school year. I was dating someone at the time, and for weeks after that party J would call my cell phone during the most inopportune times (Thursday night bar-night, Friday night date-night, Saturday night movie-night, you get the picture). He was nothing if not persistent, and it took its toll on the relationship, which ended. I still refused to go out with him though (I know this will surprise those who know me, but I can be very stubborn.) He persisted, and I finally agreed to Round 2 the following summer, more than a year after that party.

We dated another 2 ½ years until we were both graduated and gainfully employed. I was living and teaching in our hometown, and one day, J came over to my duplex, and handed me an old scrapbook that I had made of our high school and college days together. Puzzled, I flipped through the photos, old ticket stubs, and the cover from A Tale of Two Cities. At the very back of the scrapbook, a 1x1” square had been carved into the remaining blank pages, and inside the hollow opening was an engagement ring. It was the next chapter in our scrapbook.

On days like today, when the weather is still feeling spring-like, I often think about the decisions we made that led us to where we are today. At 16 and 21, you really don’t think about how the choices you’re making will shape your life going forward. What if Mrs. S had sat us across the room from each other in English class? What if I had been a model student and actually read A Tale of Two Cities as I was assigned to do? What if I had never agreed to go out with him again in college?

Some day, R and K (Okay, probably only K. Do boys care about this stuff?) may ask to hear the story of how we went from being J and S to being their parents. I hope they will identify with parts of this story as they go out into the world and make their own life-defining choices, and that they will recognize that their parents were young once, and felt all of the things that young people who are first falling in love feel. And I hope they will feel a connection and sense of understanding from us when they experience love and heartbreak, and that they will have the perseverance to persist when they find the kind of love worth persevering for.