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.

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.