June 22, 2007

yes, I DID pretreat, I swear

Last night, when Wade came home from work, Charlie said, “DID DADDY BRING MY PINK MEDICINE?” And when I said yes, he did, Charlie sprinted from the playroom to the kitchen to have some. Unfortunately, the pink medicine in question was NOT the pink medicine Charlie was expecting (Dear pharmacy, it might help if you TOLD parents of small children that NOT ALL ANTIBIOTICS COME PREFLAVORED, love Susan) and so he sobbed and vomited it all over me.

I was wearing a brand new polo shirt, from J. Crew (seriously, I took the tags off YESTERDAY MORNING). Thank god it’s End Of Season sale time and I only paid $15.00 for the shirt, because instead of being a lovely lime green it’s now a lovely lime green with pink(ish) splotches aaaaaaalllll the way down the front. It is entirely possible that while Charlie was sobbing and vomiting I said something really supportive and helpful, like “Dammit, Charlie!” It is also entirely possible that Wade spent the entire time that Charlie was crying and vomiting making dinner for himself (and Henry) because he hadn’t eaten since 5:00 am and was REALLY REALLY HUNGRY.

I kind of lost my appetite after the vomiting of the pink medicine.

This morning, FIRST THING, I called the pediatrician’s office and told the Very Nice Nurse about the ear infection and the medicine and the HURLING and she said, “Oh we can’t have that!” She also told me that kids don’t run a fever with swimmer’s ear, which was a relief because if I can’t take these kids to the pool this summer I will GO INSANE. Then, when I said, “OH please can I take him swimming today because we REALLY NEED TO GO SWIMMING,” she reluctantly admitted that swimming might make the ear HURT again, but wouldn’t make the infection any worse.

Okay then!

By 10:00 am there was a new antibiotic waiting for me at the pharmacy; this one was STRAWBERRY flavored, which seemed better than MEDICINE FLAVORED (hello, spoiled much? when we were kids we just TOOK THE DAMN MEDICINE, or better yet, had a shot in our . . . yes). When Charlie finally came home from his big trip to the zoo with Daddy, I let him smell the medicine (because I’m stupid, or optimistic, or SOMETHING) and he said, “I’ve had that before. Can I take it now?”

Then he slammed back the teaspoon of penicillin derivative and licked his lips and did a little dance, all the while declaring, “I LOVE THIS MEDICINE!” And I had a small glimpse into what his life in the fraternity will be like in, oh, thirteen or fourteen years.

Ear infection is on the mend. We swam for an hour this afternoon. We are saved by sweet strawberry flavoring. The end.

June 21, 2007

Elise, I swear I’m not trying to scare you

Charlie woke up from his unexpected nap yesterday with a fever of 101 point something, which was a surprise, to say the least. We loaded him up with Motrin and I snuggled him for a while, and then Wade started dinner and started a movie and I went to dinner with Christa.

What? You thought I would stay HOME? Dude.

When I got home, the boys were asleep, but around 3:00 am I woke up to pee (Oh, yeah, after you have a baby? you have to pee in the night ALL THE TIME. Or maybe that’s when you get closer to 40. Hmm.) and I went to check on C, who was running a fever, again. At 3:30, HE realized he was running a fever and came and got in bed with me; Wade got Motrin and ice water and went to sleep in the guest bed, even though he had to get up at 5:30 to get ready for work.

And here’s another thing I need to say about being a stay home mom: I wish more people would talk about the Daddies when they’re talking about the Mommies. Leslie Bennetts told us recently that choosing to stay home with our children is the equivalent of dooming those children to a life of poverty because OF COURSE we will wind up divorced and broke. The way to protect ourselves from this reality, Bennetts says, is to keep working, because then we are not dependent on a man who will one day realize that his secretary’s breasts are still where God intended them to be while yours are whacking up against your hipbones.

Or something like that.

This argument drives me berserk. I can’t underline every decision I make with but what will I do when he leaves me? I have to believe that Wade will be there, at the end of the day and in the middle of the night and on the weekends and all the moments in between, to raise these kids with me. Not to HELP me raise them, which assumes that I am in charge all the time, but to do his job as the Other Parent.

Which includes fetching Motrin at three am because the baby (who is five, sure, but is still a baby) is burning up with a Mystery Fever.

Of course, it turns out that Charlie has an ear infection, despite the fact that he hasn’t had a cold or allergies or ANY congestion AT ALL (Wade: HOW is that POSSIBLE? Me: I have NO IDEA) and I feel like my $25.00 copay was money well spent because now we have the drugs (or we will when Wade picks them up on his way home) and all is well.

But dammit, I am tired today. I feel like I drank a fifth of vodka last night, despite the fact that I only had two (TWO!) glasses of wine. And I may possibly be having a glass of wine NOW, because I HAVE EARNED IT. Also because the boys are playing a Hot Wheels video game (Henry) and watching a Veggie Tales movie (Charlie) at the SAME TIME in the SAME ROOM and the noise is giving me a weeeeeeee little headache.

Or maybe it’s just being a mommy. Sometimes that makes my head hurt, too.

June 20, 2007

summer should always be exactly like this

This morning, I got up at 5:45 to balance the checkbook. I made coffee and sat at the kitchen table with my laptop and my bank statement and listened to the finches in the yard while I tried to figure out who on earth deposited $705.00 in our checking account on June 4.

It was us, of course. We’re just forgetful.

The boys got up and we ate breakfast and ran errands. Wade went to Phoenix yesterday, but he was coming home at lunch time, so we were trying to Get Things Done before then. We stopped mid morning for a snack and when Charlie was finished he danced around the kitchen for fifteen minutes singing every variation “JINGLE BELLS BATMAN SMELLS!” he knows. I was trying to work, but I kept having to stop what I was doing to answer questions, most of which had to do with when EXACTLY Henry could play on the computer, and hear reports, all of which were about how Charlie didn’t like the way Henry was playing. Finally, after saying, “Just let me FINISH this ONE thing,” 3789 times, I said, “Let’s go feed the critters!”

We took some hot dog buns and walked down to the lake (which is about two blocks away and is really more of a “lake”) and threw bread to the turtles. We’ve done this every day this week, but after last night’s rain, the water was way up and the fish were all hiding. Charlie was disappointed; he likes it when the fish swarm to the surface for the stale bread. We stood and watched the rushing water in the creek for a long time, and the boys threw sticks and leaves and stones and marveled at how they were all immediately lost in the surge.

Wade called, from his cell phone, just as we came in the house, to say that he was leaving the airport and would be home in fifteen minutes. But we talked anyway, about how our bank has already sold our mortgage (after TWO WEEKS!) and about how much rain we got last night. When he came home, the boys ran to get their rubber band airplanes to show him, because he HAD to see them RIGHT THEN.

We had lunch, and then we all went to the pool, and when we came home, Charlie and I sat in the sun porch and had a popsicle (Charlie) and an iced coffee (me). Now, Wade has gone to get a haircut and Charlie is asleep on the sofa in the playroom and Henry is building something with Legos and I’m getting work done. In an hour or so, I’m going to leave to run errands and meet Christa for dinner. By myself.

I might even have a glass of wine with my salad. Imagine!

The other day, Lindsay started a firestorm, with one small sentence: “This I believe: Being a stay-at-home mom, even with four kids and no help with cooking or cleaning, is not that hard, certainly not as hard as many bellyaching moms in magazines and on TV and the Internet (no, I’m not talking about anyone specifically!) would have us believe.” When I first read this, I cringed and thought Oh, Lindsay, have you LOST your MIND?

But then I thought about it, and I think she’s right.

Mostly.

Let’s get a few things off the table: “hard” is a relative term, for starters. What is hard for me (cooking, for example) may be easy for you, and vice versa. And, as Lindsay said in a follow-up post, there are extenuating circumstances that make being a SAHM incredibly difficult.

But what if you don’t have any extenuating circumstances? What if you have a good marriage and healthy children and enough money and comprehensive health care? What then?

I think Lindsay’s point was this: it’s incredibly chic these days to talk endlessly about how isolating and frustrating and, yes, hard it is to stay home with children. It is less cool to say I love being home with my kids, unless you’re saying it in an ironic sort of way. Recently a reader at Judith Warner’s New York Times blog remarked that Warner always seemed discontented with her life. But maybe, the commenter theorized, Warner was emphasizing the worst parts of parenthood because she was a writer and that’s what writers do. There is truth in that, I think; the hard days make for better content than the easy days. I think it’s too simple to say being a SAHM isn’t THAT hard but I don’t know that any of us has the language–yet–to talk about what we actually DO all day, and how we measure it.

Today was a good day with my kids. Most of the days, honestly, are like this. But we have a beautiful home and plenty of money in our checking account (an extra seven hundred dollars, in fact!) and a Daddy who can–and will–take off work on a Wednesday just because he misses his kids. And honestly, it’s not the hard days that are hard to write about; it’s the easy days. Discontent makes for better content. But it doesn’t really make for a better life.

June 18, 2007

I am crabby, so here are more pictures from my childhood

This is my brother, John; he is maybe nine months old here (I am probably almost three). My mom always said that he looks like he’s scared I will crush him. And frankly, if I had those chins behind me, I would be scared, too.

Clearly we were not underfed as children.

For everyone who mocked my pants, let me just say I GOT OFF EASY.

John’s pants had a WIDE white belt on them, and I SWEAR there is a picture somewhere of him in these SAME pants and a plaid shirt. My mother says I’m making that up but I am MOST CERTAINLY NOT. Why on earth would I make that up?

I don’t know when this picture was taken, but I think we’re about the same ages that Henry and Charlie are now. Sometimes Charlie looks so much like John that it scares me. If you gave the boy in the photo a buzz cut, he would look exactly like my son. Meanwhile, my brother and I look NOTHING like each other, and were once asked which one of us was adopted.

I just want to know who bought us those pajamas.

June 17, 2007

Happy Father’s Day, Daddy

Pittsburgh, PA, 1970-ish,

This is probably my favorite picture ever of my dad and me. I can’t put my finger on why, precisely; something about how young he is, and now much this looks like just a normal day. Like we were just outside talking a walk and someone took our picture. Like this is just a little slice of what life was like when I was little.

I love you, Daddy. Happy Father’s Day.

June 14, 2007

damn you, Steve Jobs

For my birthday, Wade got me a Dyson. Various women friends, when they heard about the Dyson, said, “It will CHANGE YOUR LIFE.” And I would nod and smile and think Girlfriend, you need to get out more.

Because IT’S A VACUUM CLEANER, you all. Not a sex toy.

And then I brought mine home and started vacuuming with it and dammit if it hasn’t changed my life.

Chris called me on my cell phone, the weekend we moved, and I said, “I’m in the plastic dinnerwear aisle at Target! With a Dyson in my cart!” And she told me about how she gets hers out and vacuums three or four times a day. And after I thought dude I’m going to share a HOTEL room with her this summer? I reminded myself that she has SEVEN KIDS so OF COURSE she needs to vacuum a lot.

I was missing the point.

The Dyson is addictive. It has that nifty little clear canister where you can see ALL the stuff you are sucking out of your carpet and honestly, the view of the stuff is mesmerizing. You’re vacuuming what looks like a COMPLETELY CLEAN swath of carpet and yet! stuff is getting sucked into the chamber! Really gross stuff! And you realize I CAN’T STOP VACUUMING BECAUSE THERE IS STUFF LIVING IN MY CARPET!

And yes, you will have that fleeeeeeting moment where you will think about ripping up all the carpet because OH MY GOD THE STUFF YOU ARE SUCKING OUT OF IT IS GROSS, but then you will realize that’s not going to happen any time soon because your husband loves the carpet and also you want a new sofa more than you want new carpet and so you just keep on vacuuming. And then perhaps you pour yourself a drink at ten am because OH MY GOD THE DYSON HAS CHANGED YOUR LIFE.

Where was I going with this? I have no idea. Stupid Dyson.

I’ve been seeing a lot of commercials for the iPhone, and while I was skeptical at first (because it’s a phone, people! A PHONE!) now I’m starting to think that I should learn from my Dyson experience and go for it. Because if a vacuum cleaner can change my life, imagine what the iPhone could do for me. Just imagine!

And it’s so much cheaper than tearing up the carpet.