"I'm bored!"
It's not just the mantra of 7-year-olds during summer vacation.
Sometimes a 34-year-old working mom of two falls finds herself saying
it. Like me, for instance. Like today, for instance.
It's not that I don't have things to do. I have plenty. I have things to
write, things to edit, things to fact-check AND edit, toys to rummage
through for the donation pile, laundry to do, dinner to cook, dogs to
bathe, kids to parent. I have seven years' worth of pictures that need
to get put in rough chronological order in a photo album I haven't yet
procured. My house could stand another vacuuming, even though I did that
this morning. I could scrub the baseboards, for the love of God.
But!
I don't want to. I'd rather just sit here while these things don't get done and think about how bored I am.
And I wonder how much of it is real boredom (if I were really bored, one
might argue, any one of those things listed above would cure me of it
but quick) and how much is that dreaded rut that people sometimes fall
into, when days beget days beget days that all start to bleed into one
another. Get up. Make breakfast. Drink coffee. Clean kitchen. Work. Do
toddler things. Work. Make lunch. Beg toddler to eat lunch. Work. Work.
Prep dinner. Eat dinner. Watch TV while working. Wait for bedtime.
Well, you get the idea. Sometimes I want something crazy to happen. A
ghost sighting, maybe, or to win the lottery. Even finding a lost dog
would up the interest quotient of the average day. Maybe I'll hold a
seance, drive to Georgia to buy some scratch-off tickets, or roam the
neighborhood looking for collarless dogs. We make our own luck, they
say.
Maybe it's just insecurity about mentioning "The Rut," which I think is
sort of a taboo topic, but I can hear people telling me to appreciate
what I've got, to live in the moment, to find beauty in the small
things. Shush, you. I DO. But I have to believe that I'm not the
only person in the world who has a good life and gets bored with it
every now and then. And for some reason the antsiness is at its worst on
Sunday afternoons. (What IS it with Sunday afternoons, anyway?)
This week Alex goes back to school, Katherine starts Mother's Day Out,
and I have about fifteen thousand things to do. I'm betting this time
next week, I'll be missing my rut. Maybe between now and then, I'll win
the lottery. Or see a ghost.
***
WARNING: I've made a halfhearted pledge to blog at least once a week for the rest of the year. I don't know how I'll fare with that, but I feel it's my duty to warn you that the topics might wear a little thin. Or be boring. Not unlike when one WRITES ABOUT BEING BORED.
Sunday, August 19, 2012
Sunday, August 12, 2012
Interest is relative
Parents know their children as the unique creatures they are, beautiful
and charming and intelligent to all kinds of dubious extremes. But to
suddenly and completely come to acknowledge your children as interesting beings, that's a whole new level of appreciation.
Alex saw a couple of meteors last night in the "shower," which, for us, consisted of three and a half sightings, the half being something that might have been a small meteor but was in all likelihood a small plane. Today, he started a meteor collection from rocks he found in the yard that, according to him, "are not the kind of rocks we have around here, and I rinsed them off in Katherine's water table and they didn't dissolve, so they're not just regular sand rocks, don't you think they're probably pieces of meteor?"
Why, yes. Yes I do. I do because one St. Patrick's Day the nice old man who lived behind us sent his granddaughter and me on a fool's errand looking for four-leaf clovers, and when we couldn't find any we tore one leaf of the three-leaf clovers in half to make a fourth leaf and showed him those, and then suddenly a leprechaun started leaving little surprises - like dollar bills! - around the house and yard that our good luck charms had supposedly conjured.
So yes, Alex, those could be meteors. In fact, if it makes your childhood a tad more interesting, they probably are.
Tomorrow we're going to a water park, and I'm silently dreading it. But he read his requisite number of pages in the library's summer reading program, got his free pass, and we're by-golly going. I will galumph around in a bathing suit all the livelong day and probably get sunburned and dodge screaming kids and let Alex splash me with geysers and ride behind him through claustrophobia-inducing tubes because it's his last week of summer break ever when he's 7 and I want him to have FUN. And I guess there's a chance that I might, too. I kind of like the kid.
Katherine, whom I also like but who is plucking away relentlessly at my last nerve tonight is in bed playing with her toy computer. It's barking repeatedly. It's past 9 p.m. She's 2. She should be asleep. Lately that has not been as easy as it used to be. She stands in her crib bellowing for me at the top of her lungs, then when I go in (as I inevitably do), she demands something, sometimes something weird. Sheep, socks, Mommy's book, mac and cheese, flowers, Alex, my phone, or one of the three songs I have it in my limited range to sing: Rock-a-bye Baby, the Elmo song, and the ABCs. I guess I could conceivably add Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star to the repertoire because it's the same tune as the alphabet song, but I only just now considered that.
She's funny, that one. She can be bought with Dora fruit snacks. She hates it when Alex sits next to me. She has four dances: the Princess Dance, arms flung out spinning in circles; the Smarty-Pants Dance, little feet stomping, spinning in circles; the Katherine Dance, wild gesticulations, spinning in circles; and Mickey Mouse's own Hot-Dog Dance, arms flailing, no circles. She puts things down for naps, covering them with a blanket and giving gentle night-night kisses. Not just baby dolls and stuffed animals, but the remote control, her sippy cup, my feet. The first thing she says when we go in to get her out of her crib in the mornings is "I had good nap."
I feel like I have to keep a record of these things, because they change so quickly. It wasn't that long ago that I was bemoaning her slower-than-Alex speech development and marveling over her sleep patterns. It wasn't that long ago that Alex had baby-fine blond hair and toddled through the kitchen in the middle of the night sucking on butter and hiding carrots under his pillow. It wasn't that long ago that the idea of being parents was just that - an idea, albeit a scary and alien one.
And here we are, a second grader and a 2-year-old under our belts and still finding humor in the everyday. They play chess and he gives her pieces to click together so she'll feel like she's playing, too. We cuddle on the couch and make fun of Sprout shows. She whines and whines and then turns on a grin so dazzling, tiny bunny teeth gleaming, that you forget she's been driving you up the wall all day long and scoop her up into a big squishy hug.
I think I'm ready for school to start, but I have found a kind of deep, quiet, sometimes elusive satisfaction in these summer days that I didn't expect. Alex won't always make me heartbreakingly earnest presents of moon rocks and origami hearts. Katherine won't always beg to be picked up and exert her tree-frog embrace when I finally relent. They're fleeting, these times, and precious.
Tomorrow I'll likely be less sappy and more prone to rushing and entertaining small annoyances. That is if I survive the water park unscathed. But tonight I'm just happy for the blessings of my imperfect little family. If only amongst ourselves, we're an interesting bunch.
Alex saw a couple of meteors last night in the "shower," which, for us, consisted of three and a half sightings, the half being something that might have been a small meteor but was in all likelihood a small plane. Today, he started a meteor collection from rocks he found in the yard that, according to him, "are not the kind of rocks we have around here, and I rinsed them off in Katherine's water table and they didn't dissolve, so they're not just regular sand rocks, don't you think they're probably pieces of meteor?"
Why, yes. Yes I do. I do because one St. Patrick's Day the nice old man who lived behind us sent his granddaughter and me on a fool's errand looking for four-leaf clovers, and when we couldn't find any we tore one leaf of the three-leaf clovers in half to make a fourth leaf and showed him those, and then suddenly a leprechaun started leaving little surprises - like dollar bills! - around the house and yard that our good luck charms had supposedly conjured.
So yes, Alex, those could be meteors. In fact, if it makes your childhood a tad more interesting, they probably are.
Tomorrow we're going to a water park, and I'm silently dreading it. But he read his requisite number of pages in the library's summer reading program, got his free pass, and we're by-golly going. I will galumph around in a bathing suit all the livelong day and probably get sunburned and dodge screaming kids and let Alex splash me with geysers and ride behind him through claustrophobia-inducing tubes because it's his last week of summer break ever when he's 7 and I want him to have FUN. And I guess there's a chance that I might, too. I kind of like the kid.
Katherine, whom I also like but who is plucking away relentlessly at my last nerve tonight is in bed playing with her toy computer. It's barking repeatedly. It's past 9 p.m. She's 2. She should be asleep. Lately that has not been as easy as it used to be. She stands in her crib bellowing for me at the top of her lungs, then when I go in (as I inevitably do), she demands something, sometimes something weird. Sheep, socks, Mommy's book, mac and cheese, flowers, Alex, my phone, or one of the three songs I have it in my limited range to sing: Rock-a-bye Baby, the Elmo song, and the ABCs. I guess I could conceivably add Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star to the repertoire because it's the same tune as the alphabet song, but I only just now considered that.
She's funny, that one. She can be bought with Dora fruit snacks. She hates it when Alex sits next to me. She has four dances: the Princess Dance, arms flung out spinning in circles; the Smarty-Pants Dance, little feet stomping, spinning in circles; the Katherine Dance, wild gesticulations, spinning in circles; and Mickey Mouse's own Hot-Dog Dance, arms flailing, no circles. She puts things down for naps, covering them with a blanket and giving gentle night-night kisses. Not just baby dolls and stuffed animals, but the remote control, her sippy cup, my feet. The first thing she says when we go in to get her out of her crib in the mornings is "I had good nap."
I feel like I have to keep a record of these things, because they change so quickly. It wasn't that long ago that I was bemoaning her slower-than-Alex speech development and marveling over her sleep patterns. It wasn't that long ago that Alex had baby-fine blond hair and toddled through the kitchen in the middle of the night sucking on butter and hiding carrots under his pillow. It wasn't that long ago that the idea of being parents was just that - an idea, albeit a scary and alien one.
And here we are, a second grader and a 2-year-old under our belts and still finding humor in the everyday. They play chess and he gives her pieces to click together so she'll feel like she's playing, too. We cuddle on the couch and make fun of Sprout shows. She whines and whines and then turns on a grin so dazzling, tiny bunny teeth gleaming, that you forget she's been driving you up the wall all day long and scoop her up into a big squishy hug.
I think I'm ready for school to start, but I have found a kind of deep, quiet, sometimes elusive satisfaction in these summer days that I didn't expect. Alex won't always make me heartbreakingly earnest presents of moon rocks and origami hearts. Katherine won't always beg to be picked up and exert her tree-frog embrace when I finally relent. They're fleeting, these times, and precious.
Tomorrow I'll likely be less sappy and more prone to rushing and entertaining small annoyances. That is if I survive the water park unscathed. But tonight I'm just happy for the blessings of my imperfect little family. If only amongst ourselves, we're an interesting bunch.
Tuesday, August 7, 2012
Disappointment
Disappointment. It's something we know from the time we know anything,
and something that never gets any easier. Not even when you know that
people are fallible, plans fall through, things break, failure is
inevitable, mistakes are numerous. We can't always get what we want,
what we think we need. It's a part of life, they say, but does it
matter? That doesn't help the heart accept it.
Maybe the worst is disappointment in people. I've been told that I have a tendency to put people on pedestals, and then I'm always, always surprised when they fall from them. The obvious solution is to stop doing that. I'm trying. People are people. People, each in their own way and to varying degrees, sometimes just suck. And I know I'm one of them. I make plans and cancel them, I break the occasional promise, I've been known to tell a lie or two, and not just of the little white variety. I worry that I'm not always good at being a mother, a wife, a sister, a friend. I worry that there are shortcomings I haven't even noticed yet. That I may sometimes be the source of someone's disappointment.
Because tonight I'm disappointed. Specifics aside, it's something that I know will pass in its own time. Maybe tomorrow. Maybe before bedtime. These things are fleeting, more often than not. I hope it is this time.
And if it's not, if it takes longer than I believe it should to shake it off and move on and forgive and forget, then I hope it serves some grander purpose. Maybe to make me stronger, less gullible, less likely to construct those questionably engineered pedestals in the first place. A girl can hope.
Maybe the worst is disappointment in people. I've been told that I have a tendency to put people on pedestals, and then I'm always, always surprised when they fall from them. The obvious solution is to stop doing that. I'm trying. People are people. People, each in their own way and to varying degrees, sometimes just suck. And I know I'm one of them. I make plans and cancel them, I break the occasional promise, I've been known to tell a lie or two, and not just of the little white variety. I worry that I'm not always good at being a mother, a wife, a sister, a friend. I worry that there are shortcomings I haven't even noticed yet. That I may sometimes be the source of someone's disappointment.
Because tonight I'm disappointed. Specifics aside, it's something that I know will pass in its own time. Maybe tomorrow. Maybe before bedtime. These things are fleeting, more often than not. I hope it is this time.
And if it's not, if it takes longer than I believe it should to shake it off and move on and forgive and forget, then I hope it serves some grander purpose. Maybe to make me stronger, less gullible, less likely to construct those questionably engineered pedestals in the first place. A girl can hope.
Thursday, July 19, 2012
Happenings
Oh Life. You're a funny thing. You lull people into complacency and
deliver occasional sucker punches, you offer up peace, love, and harmony
and counter it with jolts of drama, trauma, and loss. You put friends
in our lives and stitch up rifts and then new ones open in a place we
haven't even paid any attention to before. You are the proverbial roller
coaster, and we hang on tight and hope the safety bar was latched
correctly, and by someone who knew what He was doing before He set the
ride in motion.
There have been lots of ups and downs lately. Not just in my life but in those of people I care about. But when I examine the patchwork of people, circumstances, and events that make up the day to day, I'm struck by the way the good outweighs the bad, even when the bad is more immediate and determined.
The good is quieter. It comes in the form of books you can't put down, conversations you don't want to end, helpless laughter, deep and well-earned sleep. For me, it often comes on the slap-pat bare feet of a mischievous, towheaded angel, in spontaneous hugs from a relentlessly and dazzlingly growing boy. In the comfortable companionship of a friend I'm lucky enough to call my husband. In years-long friendships proven fireproof and indestructible.
So in the face of a dead car, a full plate, and a near-empty reserve of patience, I really don't have all that much to complain about. It's been my experience that life often pays back what it takes, and then some.
The summer is going by faster than I could have imagined at the beginning of it. As of tomorrow, there is a month until Alex goes back to school. As a second grader. Grade 2. Grade the Second. I don't know why it's suddenly struck me that I have a kid who's the age I was when we first moved to Birmingham, or when my clear and consistent memories begin. But it's creepy.
He's invited to a birthday party this weekend that seems to be some sort of dress-up affair. Not suits and Sunday best, but Star Wars costumes. It's the antithesis of Alex. He's going to hate it. Of course I haven't TOLD him he's going to hate it, but mark my words: He's going to hate it. He hated it when he had to wear a headband at Vacation Bible School. Said it was "embarrassing." All the other kids were wearing them. Didn't matter. I've told him he's going to pretend to like this birthday party even if they make him wear a Darth Vader mask and do the breathing thing. Pretending to like things we hate ... isn't that 82% of being a grown-up? Just me? Shh, I'd rather not know that.
My car has committed suicide. Well, it's hanging on by a thread, but I can't drive it without fear that the engine is going to burst into flames and I'll have to douse it with the half-drunk can of Diet Dr Pepper that always rides shotgun.
Katherine is Katherine, charming and maddening as all 2-year-olds are contractually obligated to be in equal measure. She is a nudist. She is a temperamental diva. She is a tomboy who likes to wear "pwetty dwesses." She is my shadow, my biggest fan and my harshest critic. She spills her bowl of Goldfish and it must have been something I did. She trips from across the room and why the hell didn't I catch her? That kind of thing. But she's also affectionate as can be, generous with big wet smacking kisses on the lips and tree-frog hugs and cuddles. Working on the laptop, I have perfected the art of typing while my left elbow is immobile, because that's where she settles in. What's personal space? I think I used to know. God, I love her.
Our trip to Destin with the Texas family was wonderful, and just what I needed to untangle the mess that my brain had become in the preceding weeks. You can't sit on a balcony 17 stories up from the ocean while the sun comes up on one side of you and a rainbow sweeps the sky on the other, feeling like the only person awake in the world, and not absorb some of that peace. And take it with you. The kids loved being together, looking for fish in the ocean, riding Boogie boards, catching sand crabs at night with their little headlamps, digging holes and burying the coolest uncle in the world in a shallow grave, and of course playing lots and lots of Nintendo DS (we are an electronically inclined bunch). The grown-ups (and who thought we young parents would ever be included in that category?) loved watching the kids have fun, enjoying the occasional (yes, what?) adult beverage and lots of good food, playing board games, and making fun of HGTV. I would say "and relaxing," but between us we had five kids including two 2-year-olds ... 'nuff said. But there was enough relaxation in the between times to make it perfect. I was remade.
Which is perhaps why I'm not a mess of personified anxiety right now. But I won't examine that too closely, because I have a feeling I could become such a thing if I put my mind to it.
There have been lots of ups and downs lately. Not just in my life but in those of people I care about. But when I examine the patchwork of people, circumstances, and events that make up the day to day, I'm struck by the way the good outweighs the bad, even when the bad is more immediate and determined.
The good is quieter. It comes in the form of books you can't put down, conversations you don't want to end, helpless laughter, deep and well-earned sleep. For me, it often comes on the slap-pat bare feet of a mischievous, towheaded angel, in spontaneous hugs from a relentlessly and dazzlingly growing boy. In the comfortable companionship of a friend I'm lucky enough to call my husband. In years-long friendships proven fireproof and indestructible.
So in the face of a dead car, a full plate, and a near-empty reserve of patience, I really don't have all that much to complain about. It's been my experience that life often pays back what it takes, and then some.
The summer is going by faster than I could have imagined at the beginning of it. As of tomorrow, there is a month until Alex goes back to school. As a second grader. Grade 2. Grade the Second. I don't know why it's suddenly struck me that I have a kid who's the age I was when we first moved to Birmingham, or when my clear and consistent memories begin. But it's creepy.
He's invited to a birthday party this weekend that seems to be some sort of dress-up affair. Not suits and Sunday best, but Star Wars costumes. It's the antithesis of Alex. He's going to hate it. Of course I haven't TOLD him he's going to hate it, but mark my words: He's going to hate it. He hated it when he had to wear a headband at Vacation Bible School. Said it was "embarrassing." All the other kids were wearing them. Didn't matter. I've told him he's going to pretend to like this birthday party even if they make him wear a Darth Vader mask and do the breathing thing. Pretending to like things we hate ... isn't that 82% of being a grown-up? Just me? Shh, I'd rather not know that.
My car has committed suicide. Well, it's hanging on by a thread, but I can't drive it without fear that the engine is going to burst into flames and I'll have to douse it with the half-drunk can of Diet Dr Pepper that always rides shotgun.
Katherine is Katherine, charming and maddening as all 2-year-olds are contractually obligated to be in equal measure. She is a nudist. She is a temperamental diva. She is a tomboy who likes to wear "pwetty dwesses." She is my shadow, my biggest fan and my harshest critic. She spills her bowl of Goldfish and it must have been something I did. She trips from across the room and why the hell didn't I catch her? That kind of thing. But she's also affectionate as can be, generous with big wet smacking kisses on the lips and tree-frog hugs and cuddles. Working on the laptop, I have perfected the art of typing while my left elbow is immobile, because that's where she settles in. What's personal space? I think I used to know. God, I love her.
Our trip to Destin with the Texas family was wonderful, and just what I needed to untangle the mess that my brain had become in the preceding weeks. You can't sit on a balcony 17 stories up from the ocean while the sun comes up on one side of you and a rainbow sweeps the sky on the other, feeling like the only person awake in the world, and not absorb some of that peace. And take it with you. The kids loved being together, looking for fish in the ocean, riding Boogie boards, catching sand crabs at night with their little headlamps, digging holes and burying the coolest uncle in the world in a shallow grave, and of course playing lots and lots of Nintendo DS (we are an electronically inclined bunch). The grown-ups (and who thought we young parents would ever be included in that category?) loved watching the kids have fun, enjoying the occasional (yes, what?) adult beverage and lots of good food, playing board games, and making fun of HGTV. I would say "and relaxing," but between us we had five kids including two 2-year-olds ... 'nuff said. But there was enough relaxation in the between times to make it perfect. I was remade.
Which is perhaps why I'm not a mess of personified anxiety right now. But I won't examine that too closely, because I have a feeling I could become such a thing if I put my mind to it.
Thursday, May 24, 2012
Summer's here, kill me!
I'm staring down the barrel of summer break. What's three months, anyway? Surely I can manage to occupy and mentally stimulate a feisty 2-year-old and a 7-going-on-16-year-old 24 hours a day, 7 days a week from now through mid-August, while keeping up a stream of work steady enough for us not to starve or be forced to farm out child labor. Right? That's what I'm telling myself.
Alex is frequenting every vacation bible school known to man. He's also going to at least one week of camp, thanks to his doting grandparents, a family trip to the beach, and two church day camps. In his spare time there will be reading (he's determined to read 300 pages in the library summer reading program for the sole purpose of earning a ticket to the park formerly known as Alabama Adventure), workbook doing, sprinkler playing, and various and sundry other things that will keep him entertained without forcing me out into the unbearable summer heat. When the temperature gets above 85, I spontaneously combust.
But what of Katherine? She's been in Mother's Day Out two days a week since September, and I've kind of gotten spoiled by the arrangement. If there's something I can't squeeze in on a Monday, Wednesday, or Friday, either because I'm juggling fifteen fruits or because she decides not to let go of my right elbow, I stick it in the Tuesday or Thursday to-do pile. This summer there will be none of that. I'll have to suck it up, detach her little hands from my elbow, let the fruits fall as they may, and muddle through.
By the time 2nd grade kicks off, about seventy-two years from now, I'm betting I'll be ready for a fresh start. Maybe a job outside the home, with structure and steady pay. Maybe a new haircut. Maybe I'll take up dancing, or get a bird. (I won't get a bird; I hate birds.) Maybe if I survive the summer, I'll be ready to take on the world. After all, no matter how long and hot and boring and challenging it gets, it's the stuff of their childhood. And I wouldn't dare forget that it's supposed to be fun.
Alex is frequenting every vacation bible school known to man. He's also going to at least one week of camp, thanks to his doting grandparents, a family trip to the beach, and two church day camps. In his spare time there will be reading (he's determined to read 300 pages in the library summer reading program for the sole purpose of earning a ticket to the park formerly known as Alabama Adventure), workbook doing, sprinkler playing, and various and sundry other things that will keep him entertained without forcing me out into the unbearable summer heat. When the temperature gets above 85, I spontaneously combust.
But what of Katherine? She's been in Mother's Day Out two days a week since September, and I've kind of gotten spoiled by the arrangement. If there's something I can't squeeze in on a Monday, Wednesday, or Friday, either because I'm juggling fifteen fruits or because she decides not to let go of my right elbow, I stick it in the Tuesday or Thursday to-do pile. This summer there will be none of that. I'll have to suck it up, detach her little hands from my elbow, let the fruits fall as they may, and muddle through.
By the time 2nd grade kicks off, about seventy-two years from now, I'm betting I'll be ready for a fresh start. Maybe a job outside the home, with structure and steady pay. Maybe a new haircut. Maybe I'll take up dancing, or get a bird. (I won't get a bird; I hate birds.) Maybe if I survive the summer, I'll be ready to take on the world. After all, no matter how long and hot and boring and challenging it gets, it's the stuff of their childhood. And I wouldn't dare forget that it's supposed to be fun.
Thursday, March 22, 2012
Spring broke
Oh yes, I used to have a blog. Here it is!
I've dropped the ball on lots of things lately. Blogging. Writing that story that all both of my fan-friends are clamoring for me to finish. Cooking real meals. Working. Dressing in grown-up clothes. Those kinds of things. Lucky for the family, I haven't given up showering or brushing my teeth.
As for excuses, I've got a laundry list that I won't bore you with. Feeling run-down is among them, and that kind of encapsulates all of the NOTs I've been busying myself with nicely. I could blame Katherine, who has us staring down the barrel of Two with trepidation and sometimes outright soul-sucking panic. She's going to be a sight more difficult in this phase than her brother was, I daresay. I think it's payback for what an easy baby she was. How she slept from the minute she popped out straight through her newborn days and up to around 6 months of age, when she woke up only to grace us with smiles and sunshine until we were coddled into believing we'd never know what it's like to deal with a temperamental small person with a personality the size of Texas.
But I won't blame her, because that would be supremely unfair. She's doing what she's supposed to be doing, and is entitled to a mother who meets tantrums with calm, whining with a deaf ear, inexplicable sleep disturbances with grace and boundless energy. Oh, those mothers don't exist? Well that does make me feel better.
If I'm being honest, I haven't stopped working. On the contrary, I've been doing more than I comfortably can, and so arises the key issue of working from home, when you never leave the office and therefore forget that you should really set hours for yourself and allow for the occasional cuddle with the toddler when she's allowing people to touch her and the occasional game of Chinese checkers with the big kid when he's in the mood to refresh you on the rules without rolling his eyes too much. Or even to catch the occasional episode of The Office, The Walking Dead, or Judge Judy (don't judge me).
But not being able to do it all leads one to believe that one is not doing enough. And feeling like one is not doing enough compounds the problem by making it more and more difficult to be satisfied with what does get done, and more often than one would admit, pretty darn competently.
I'm trying to cut myself some slack. It's easier said than done.
In the meantime, Alex's spring break is almost over and I couldn't be more relieved. (Cue mommy guilt.) It's just that I feel bad when I don't keep him occupied and supply the "fun" that is supposed to be had, in theory, during spring break. I've taken them for game playing at Chuck E. Cheese and an impromptu (and ill-conceived) side-jaunt to the state park's fake beach. We walked to the park and played even though Katherine fell and scraped both knees on the way there and her diaper fell the heck off when she came down the slide. I invited their cousins over for pizza and rowdy X-Box play. We tried bowling today but were turned away because the leagues were dominating all the lanes (shame on the leagues; it's a rainy day during spring break!). So instead we ate cookies and watched a movie. All written out like that, it doesn't sound like I exactly neglected the kid, but then again I suffer from often-baseless guilt and was born with no gauge of enough.
It was a taste of the summer, and made me want to redouble my efforts to keep Alex occupied for most if not all of it. My boss insists that I stop playing and get back to the grind, and that can best be done when I'm not dreaming up ways to prevent two kids from getting (gasp!) bored. Perhaps the funniest part is that Alex is so easygoing, he wouldn't mind if his summer was a 24/7 three-ring circus or an endless loop of Nintendo DS and an occasional trip to the pool. It's all me and my misconceptions and misperceptions and mis ... givings?
I think I need to try harder to go easier.
I've dropped the ball on lots of things lately. Blogging. Writing that story that all both of my fan-friends are clamoring for me to finish. Cooking real meals. Working. Dressing in grown-up clothes. Those kinds of things. Lucky for the family, I haven't given up showering or brushing my teeth.
As for excuses, I've got a laundry list that I won't bore you with. Feeling run-down is among them, and that kind of encapsulates all of the NOTs I've been busying myself with nicely. I could blame Katherine, who has us staring down the barrel of Two with trepidation and sometimes outright soul-sucking panic. She's going to be a sight more difficult in this phase than her brother was, I daresay. I think it's payback for what an easy baby she was. How she slept from the minute she popped out straight through her newborn days and up to around 6 months of age, when she woke up only to grace us with smiles and sunshine until we were coddled into believing we'd never know what it's like to deal with a temperamental small person with a personality the size of Texas.
But I won't blame her, because that would be supremely unfair. She's doing what she's supposed to be doing, and is entitled to a mother who meets tantrums with calm, whining with a deaf ear, inexplicable sleep disturbances with grace and boundless energy. Oh, those mothers don't exist? Well that does make me feel better.
If I'm being honest, I haven't stopped working. On the contrary, I've been doing more than I comfortably can, and so arises the key issue of working from home, when you never leave the office and therefore forget that you should really set hours for yourself and allow for the occasional cuddle with the toddler when she's allowing people to touch her and the occasional game of Chinese checkers with the big kid when he's in the mood to refresh you on the rules without rolling his eyes too much. Or even to catch the occasional episode of The Office, The Walking Dead, or Judge Judy (don't judge me).
But not being able to do it all leads one to believe that one is not doing enough. And feeling like one is not doing enough compounds the problem by making it more and more difficult to be satisfied with what does get done, and more often than one would admit, pretty darn competently.
I'm trying to cut myself some slack. It's easier said than done.
In the meantime, Alex's spring break is almost over and I couldn't be more relieved. (Cue mommy guilt.) It's just that I feel bad when I don't keep him occupied and supply the "fun" that is supposed to be had, in theory, during spring break. I've taken them for game playing at Chuck E. Cheese and an impromptu (and ill-conceived) side-jaunt to the state park's fake beach. We walked to the park and played even though Katherine fell and scraped both knees on the way there and her diaper fell the heck off when she came down the slide. I invited their cousins over for pizza and rowdy X-Box play. We tried bowling today but were turned away because the leagues were dominating all the lanes (shame on the leagues; it's a rainy day during spring break!). So instead we ate cookies and watched a movie. All written out like that, it doesn't sound like I exactly neglected the kid, but then again I suffer from often-baseless guilt and was born with no gauge of enough.
It was a taste of the summer, and made me want to redouble my efforts to keep Alex occupied for most if not all of it. My boss insists that I stop playing and get back to the grind, and that can best be done when I'm not dreaming up ways to prevent two kids from getting (gasp!) bored. Perhaps the funniest part is that Alex is so easygoing, he wouldn't mind if his summer was a 24/7 three-ring circus or an endless loop of Nintendo DS and an occasional trip to the pool. It's all me and my misconceptions and misperceptions and mis ... givings?
I think I need to try harder to go easier.
Sunday, February 12, 2012
What's on my mind
I got up at 4 a.m. this morning, and it's now 6:08, so you'll forgive any nonsensical rambling on my part, I'm sure.
I'm always big with the disclaimers. I've been working on a story since Christmas, and every time I send a chapter out to my guinea pigs (er ... ever-so-kind friends and family who read and send me such constructive criticism as "It's good!," which is what we amateur writer-types want to hear anyway), I usually preface it with "I was up early," "I went to bed late," "I have a fever," "I got hit by a Mack truck" or the like. Just in case it really IS terrible, you see, and they're gentle enough to pretend my reason is valid.
So I woke up at 4 to whispering in my ear. I flipped over in bed and saw a shadowy figure inches from my face, and I screamed. I screamed. I'm not proud of it, nor am I not still feeling guilty about the fact that I woke my husband up so early on the morning he's running his first half-marathon in sub-freezing temperatures. The shadowy figure jumped about two feet in the air and only then did I make out the mass of bed-head and the small stature and realize it was only my firstborn ... not my worst nightmare come true. He would be thrilled for me to tell the world this, but since I daresay the world doesn't read my blog, I don't feel too bad saying that he was up (and whispering at me in the dark) because he wet his bed. "Because I was asleep," he said. Maybe that tendency to disclaim is hereditary.
And then when I probably should make excuses I can't find the right ones. Yesterday Katherine was all Linda Blair from the time she woke up at 6:30. She seemed to blame me personally for the fact that she was up too early and proceeded to whine ceaselessly for most of the morning. It finally occurred to Steven that her behavior was so unlike her that she must not feel well. So I gave her some Tylenol and bam! Happy girl. Next time I should go to the "sick" place before the "demon possession" one.
Alex ran the last mile to complete his cumulative marathon yesterday, and it was seventy-five degrees below zero. Or maybe it was in the 40s, but that WIND. He was very proud of himself, though, and has no idea that his audience of admirers (his dad, his sister, me, and his grandparents) didn't actually SEE him run. Steven took a picture over the heads of all the parental onlookers and I'm going to pretend that counts so that I'm not actually lying to him. Here, he's the one behind the kid in the lead.
I've started to think about the summer and what I'm going to do with no school and no Mother's Day Out. Short of shipping them off to the Houston family who probably isn't prepared to keep them for the FULL three months, I'm at a loss. There are church camps and VBSes galore, and I'm going to pounce on all of them that I can scrounge up even if it means Alex goes for a week or so to one of those snake-handling establishments (just kidding?), and there's the Y day camp, although I went there when I was a kid and have a distinct memory of sitting alone next to the pool and daydreaming about digging under the fence, below the highway, and halfway home, where my best friend would meet me underground for a day of 11-year-old debauchery. I also remember playing up my phobia of thunderstorms for an excuse to play damsel-in-distress to the counselor I had a ginormous crush on and feigning headaches when we played team sports, which have never been my forte. But I digress.
As long as I can keep him busy I think Alex will have a good summer. Perhaps more important is my continuing to keep up the volume of work I've been blessed enough to shoulder up till now. I'm trying to unload the guilt I have when I work all day and don't have time to take Katherine to the park or for any other age-appropriate outing. If I were at work, I rationalize, I wouldn't have that luxury. Of course, if I were at work, she would be with people who would ensure that she saw the light of day at least a few times before dark. It's something I struggle with. Not, however, enough to send me in earnest search of an office job just yet...
I was sick for three weeks recently and am now living in fear of germs. I guess that happens. Where I used to wipe Katherine's nose with my hand if there were no tissues or sleeves or shirttails or spare gum wrappers in sight (hey, you do what you gotta do), I now ... well, still wipe her nose with my hand. But I do so with trepidation that didn't used to be there. I cough and envision raw noses and Neti-Pot therapy, cough drops and chapped lips and insomnia born of breathing dusty dry air through my mouth until my throat caught on fire. It was my own fault, anyway, and accuse me of magical thinking if you will: The week before I got taken down by this plague I spoke the doomed words "I never get sick."
My quiet early-morning time is over and I have to go get ready to take the kids down to watch Steven run by. I hope he runs his heart out and that his knees don't give him any trouble and that if he runs out of steam around mile 7, he doesn't blame Alex's bladder or my overly vocal startle response.
I'm always big with the disclaimers. I've been working on a story since Christmas, and every time I send a chapter out to my guinea pigs (er ... ever-so-kind friends and family who read and send me such constructive criticism as "It's good!," which is what we amateur writer-types want to hear anyway), I usually preface it with "I was up early," "I went to bed late," "I have a fever," "I got hit by a Mack truck" or the like. Just in case it really IS terrible, you see, and they're gentle enough to pretend my reason is valid.
So I woke up at 4 to whispering in my ear. I flipped over in bed and saw a shadowy figure inches from my face, and I screamed. I screamed. I'm not proud of it, nor am I not still feeling guilty about the fact that I woke my husband up so early on the morning he's running his first half-marathon in sub-freezing temperatures. The shadowy figure jumped about two feet in the air and only then did I make out the mass of bed-head and the small stature and realize it was only my firstborn ... not my worst nightmare come true. He would be thrilled for me to tell the world this, but since I daresay the world doesn't read my blog, I don't feel too bad saying that he was up (and whispering at me in the dark) because he wet his bed. "Because I was asleep," he said. Maybe that tendency to disclaim is hereditary.
And then when I probably should make excuses I can't find the right ones. Yesterday Katherine was all Linda Blair from the time she woke up at 6:30. She seemed to blame me personally for the fact that she was up too early and proceeded to whine ceaselessly for most of the morning. It finally occurred to Steven that her behavior was so unlike her that she must not feel well. So I gave her some Tylenol and bam! Happy girl. Next time I should go to the "sick" place before the "demon possession" one.
Alex ran the last mile to complete his cumulative marathon yesterday, and it was seventy-five degrees below zero. Or maybe it was in the 40s, but that WIND. He was very proud of himself, though, and has no idea that his audience of admirers (his dad, his sister, me, and his grandparents) didn't actually SEE him run. Steven took a picture over the heads of all the parental onlookers and I'm going to pretend that counts so that I'm not actually lying to him. Here, he's the one behind the kid in the lead.
I've started to think about the summer and what I'm going to do with no school and no Mother's Day Out. Short of shipping them off to the Houston family who probably isn't prepared to keep them for the FULL three months, I'm at a loss. There are church camps and VBSes galore, and I'm going to pounce on all of them that I can scrounge up even if it means Alex goes for a week or so to one of those snake-handling establishments (just kidding?), and there's the Y day camp, although I went there when I was a kid and have a distinct memory of sitting alone next to the pool and daydreaming about digging under the fence, below the highway, and halfway home, where my best friend would meet me underground for a day of 11-year-old debauchery. I also remember playing up my phobia of thunderstorms for an excuse to play damsel-in-distress to the counselor I had a ginormous crush on and feigning headaches when we played team sports, which have never been my forte. But I digress.
As long as I can keep him busy I think Alex will have a good summer. Perhaps more important is my continuing to keep up the volume of work I've been blessed enough to shoulder up till now. I'm trying to unload the guilt I have when I work all day and don't have time to take Katherine to the park or for any other age-appropriate outing. If I were at work, I rationalize, I wouldn't have that luxury. Of course, if I were at work, she would be with people who would ensure that she saw the light of day at least a few times before dark. It's something I struggle with. Not, however, enough to send me in earnest search of an office job just yet...
I was sick for three weeks recently and am now living in fear of germs. I guess that happens. Where I used to wipe Katherine's nose with my hand if there were no tissues or sleeves or shirttails or spare gum wrappers in sight (hey, you do what you gotta do), I now ... well, still wipe her nose with my hand. But I do so with trepidation that didn't used to be there. I cough and envision raw noses and Neti-Pot therapy, cough drops and chapped lips and insomnia born of breathing dusty dry air through my mouth until my throat caught on fire. It was my own fault, anyway, and accuse me of magical thinking if you will: The week before I got taken down by this plague I spoke the doomed words "I never get sick."
My quiet early-morning time is over and I have to go get ready to take the kids down to watch Steven run by. I hope he runs his heart out and that his knees don't give him any trouble and that if he runs out of steam around mile 7, he doesn't blame Alex's bladder or my overly vocal startle response.
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Tiptoeing through the bad patch
Things have not been going so well here at the old Bosche stead. Sickness has permeated our home. I spent one week being so inexplicably nauseated that I took four pregnancy tests just to be sure. (Granted, two would have sufficed, but I like to be thorough when it's even remotely possible there's a person growing inside me.) Thursday of that week, Katherine came down with a nasty cold, and I got knocked down by it two days later. Neither one of us have yet to shake it. Her fever is gone, but her cough still comes from the depths of hell and she's not eating, drinking, or sleeping well. The first two are new developments. Tonight she had a handful of shredded cheese, a little Gatorade, and some melted vanilla ice cream, just for its caloric purposes. Desperate times...
Last night she started screaming around 1 a.m. and wouldn't stop until we brought her in bed with us. She finally fell asleep sitting on my head.
Today there was non. stop. whining. She's clingy, and she wants me, but at the same time I can't do anything right by her so she's as frustrated with me as I am with her, minus, on her part, the guilt that comes with that frustration.
The bank messed us up, work hit one of those dry spells I've been told about but which I've been fortunate enough not to experience until recently, and things just generally and unequivocally sucked. I'm not sure, in this moment, if that should be present tense.
Bad times they do pass. I've taken on four decently sized work projects this week alone, and I have hopes that once we get Katherine's probable ear infection(s) squared away, she'll remember how to smile and return to her happy-go-lucky self. As for me, surely even the flu can't last much longer than two full weeks, and if you know different I beg of you not to douse my blue-moon burst of optimism.
Tomorrow Alex's school arbitrarily celebrates the 101st day of first grade with a hat parade through the halls that's scheduled 30 minutes before Katherine's doctor's appointment. I'm going to make it. He's proud of that pimp hat and I'm going to make it.
I find good in the fact that Steven and Alex were (knockonwood) spared this whatever-it-is, that I have work to do again, and that my in-laws are already planning our next beach vacation, which makes me think of warm sunniness, 4 o'clock happy hours, and games of '90s trivia at which no one, ever, will beat my husband.
For now, I'm just taking it minute by minute. Right now that means Caillou, Kleenex, and, as evidence suggests, an imminent diaper change.
God, grant me patience.
Wednesday, January 11, 2012
Laughter, the only medicine that makes a dent
Sometimes life is kind. The stars align in a pleasant way, the rain is pretty but not drenching, the dogs smell good and the kids act right.
And then sometimes none of those things happen. And they all not-happen all at once.
That's all I'm going to say about that, because I like things to be neat and preferably not too woe-is-me. It's just ... I'm ready for the lined-up stars and the pretty rain. More than ready. Nails dug in, feet planted, ready.
But even when it's not running as smoothly as one might have hoped, life does its thing. Alex gets bit by a horse and loses two teeth in two days, Katherine's feet grow a full shoe size overnight and she finally has enough hair for (tiny, sticking-out, hilarious) pigtails, Steven pretends that the remote-controlled helicopter he buys is for Alex but we all know better, I take on more projects than is maybe prudent because one day the well might run dry and try to weave sanity faster than it unravels.
It's probably bad form to find humor in your children's little mishaps, but I figure humor in just about any form is to be embraced, so in light of that I have to admit that it was not-not funny when Alex got bit by the horse. Only AFTER, mind you, once I'd ascertained that he was physically okay and suffered mostly from hurt feelings. After stewing for a few minutes, he came to tell me he'd forgiven the horse ("He's just an animal; he didn't know any better," he told me), and then I was more touched than concerned and "Alex got bit by a horse" became a funny phrase.
I've never liked horses. Crazy, I know. It's akin to disliking puppies, I hear. They're big, they're beautiful, they're helpful if you find yourself without appropriate transportation in the middle of a ... well, a field. They have big brown eyes and pretty tails. I had one or two in pastel rainbow colors with glitter on their plastic flanks when I was a kid.
When I was in eighth grade, I fell off a horse. It then kicked me as it bolted toward the horizon. Embarrassing enough when you're 13. Factor in that it happened in front of my entire church's youth group, including the guy I had a massive crush on, and it made me want to die. Twice.
I hadn't thought about that in years, but the day the horse bit Alex, it renewed my intense! dislike! At any rate, you won't catch me near one of those long-nosed beasts for quite a while, and I'm going to teach my children not to pet strange horses. You never know when the temptation or the opportunity might arise here in Nothing-Ever-Happens, Suburbia, USA.
But it's not funny that my kid got bit by a horse. That would make me a bad mother, right?
Just as it's not funny that Katherine is afraid of that remote-controlled helicopter I mentioned. At least, it's not very funny. But she gets so excited, and squeals and reaches for it, and then it swoops or moves toward her and she gets spooked and you can hear her little feet slap-slap-slapping away down the hall. Or she just barrels into the nearest pair of legs and grabs on for dear life. Or she ducks and covers, usually in the safe little nook under the slide of the climber she got for Christmas.
Funny in a good way, you see. Good for the mental memory book, for the psyche, a reminder that things don't have to be so serious all the time.
Unrelatedly, I've figured out one of the keys to the mysteries of childhood and plan to become a millionaire on the book deal: Teeth.
Besides the fact that I don't imagine a liquid diet would be terribly satisfying, I have renewed appreciation for them because Alex and Katherine are both growing them, and Alex is losing them (Sidebar: The child has really lost two in two days; why didn't anyone tell the Tooth Fairy not to set the bar at a dollar per year of age? Because he's got a lot more teeth and he's not getting any younger). Teeth have more power than we give them credit for. Alex cried when his second tooth was preventing him from eating his sandwich and then informed me when I cut it up into little pieces for him that he is not Katherine; he doesn't need little pieces, this is JUST TEMPORARY. (Yes, he really said that.) Ask your parents; I bet teeth once were the center of your universe, too.
Sorry if this blog post is worse than usual. I'm distracted by Katherine's playing with her doll and doll stroller. I hope her pretend-parenting skills aren't a reflection of our real ones, because if so, we need to go to classes or something. I don't recall picking either of my babies up by their ankles to toss them into the grocery cart head-first, chewing on their hands, or sending them sailing across the room in their strollers and cackling like a crazy person when they hit the wall.
But could be I just forgot.
And then sometimes none of those things happen. And they all not-happen all at once.
That's all I'm going to say about that, because I like things to be neat and preferably not too woe-is-me. It's just ... I'm ready for the lined-up stars and the pretty rain. More than ready. Nails dug in, feet planted, ready.
But even when it's not running as smoothly as one might have hoped, life does its thing. Alex gets bit by a horse and loses two teeth in two days, Katherine's feet grow a full shoe size overnight and she finally has enough hair for (tiny, sticking-out, hilarious) pigtails, Steven pretends that the remote-controlled helicopter he buys is for Alex but we all know better, I take on more projects than is maybe prudent because one day the well might run dry and try to weave sanity faster than it unravels.
It's probably bad form to find humor in your children's little mishaps, but I figure humor in just about any form is to be embraced, so in light of that I have to admit that it was not-not funny when Alex got bit by the horse. Only AFTER, mind you, once I'd ascertained that he was physically okay and suffered mostly from hurt feelings. After stewing for a few minutes, he came to tell me he'd forgiven the horse ("He's just an animal; he didn't know any better," he told me), and then I was more touched than concerned and "Alex got bit by a horse" became a funny phrase.
I've never liked horses. Crazy, I know. It's akin to disliking puppies, I hear. They're big, they're beautiful, they're helpful if you find yourself without appropriate transportation in the middle of a ... well, a field. They have big brown eyes and pretty tails. I had one or two in pastel rainbow colors with glitter on their plastic flanks when I was a kid.
When I was in eighth grade, I fell off a horse. It then kicked me as it bolted toward the horizon. Embarrassing enough when you're 13. Factor in that it happened in front of my entire church's youth group, including the guy I had a massive crush on, and it made me want to die. Twice.
I hadn't thought about that in years, but the day the horse bit Alex, it renewed my intense! dislike! At any rate, you won't catch me near one of those long-nosed beasts for quite a while, and I'm going to teach my children not to pet strange horses. You never know when the temptation or the opportunity might arise here in Nothing-Ever-Happens, Suburbia, USA.
But it's not funny that my kid got bit by a horse. That would make me a bad mother, right?
Just as it's not funny that Katherine is afraid of that remote-controlled helicopter I mentioned. At least, it's not very funny. But she gets so excited, and squeals and reaches for it, and then it swoops or moves toward her and she gets spooked and you can hear her little feet slap-slap-slapping away down the hall. Or she just barrels into the nearest pair of legs and grabs on for dear life. Or she ducks and covers, usually in the safe little nook under the slide of the climber she got for Christmas.
Funny in a good way, you see. Good for the mental memory book, for the psyche, a reminder that things don't have to be so serious all the time.
Unrelatedly, I've figured out one of the keys to the mysteries of childhood and plan to become a millionaire on the book deal: Teeth.
Besides the fact that I don't imagine a liquid diet would be terribly satisfying, I have renewed appreciation for them because Alex and Katherine are both growing them, and Alex is losing them (Sidebar: The child has really lost two in two days; why didn't anyone tell the Tooth Fairy not to set the bar at a dollar per year of age? Because he's got a lot more teeth and he's not getting any younger). Teeth have more power than we give them credit for. Alex cried when his second tooth was preventing him from eating his sandwich and then informed me when I cut it up into little pieces for him that he is not Katherine; he doesn't need little pieces, this is JUST TEMPORARY. (Yes, he really said that.) Ask your parents; I bet teeth once were the center of your universe, too.
Sorry if this blog post is worse than usual. I'm distracted by Katherine's playing with her doll and doll stroller. I hope her pretend-parenting skills aren't a reflection of our real ones, because if so, we need to go to classes or something. I don't recall picking either of my babies up by their ankles to toss them into the grocery cart head-first, chewing on their hands, or sending them sailing across the room in their strollers and cackling like a crazy person when they hit the wall.
But could be I just forgot.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)