May 13, 2008

natural consequences

Tonight Wade and I had a Parenting Moment, you know the kind, where something occurs that seems totally innocuous until you stop for a moment to think about what just happened and you realize that OH MY GOD THIS IS ONE OF THOSE TEACHABLE MOMENTS except that you have NO IDEA what the lesson is so you flounder around until you land on something that seems to reinforce the Golden Rule and then you pat yourself on the back and hope like hell that you said the right thing and won’t regret this when the kids are in high school.

THAT kind of moment.

I will not bore you with the details of what happened (seriously, even as it was unfolding I was thinking how essentially stupid the whole thing was, except of course for the part about how we might do the wrong thing and scar the children FOR LIFE). I will tell you that I was in the kitchen preparing a healthy meal for my family (shut up, I was) while Wade managed The Situation, which meant multiple trips up and down the stairs to consult with me about what we were hoping the take-away was.

All that and no alcohol! Woo!

I’ve been thinking about my parents, about what they were like when my brother and I were kids. When Henry was a toddler, I told my mother-in-law that I felt like I should start every conversation with my parents by saying, “I’m sorry.”

“Why?” she asked. “What are you sorry for?”

“Oh, you know, just EVERYTHING. Things I don’t even remember doing. I’m sure there’s something to apologize for.”

The list is endless, in fact.

What I remember the most about my parents is the way they always had our backs. My mother was always happy to pretend that she wouldn’t let me go out when my friends were doing something I didn’t want to do, or when a creepy boy asked me out. My dad was always reminding us that if we were ever at a party and no one was sober enough to drive home, we could call him and he would come get us, no questions asked.

The night before Wade and I got married, I took him up on that and had him drive Wade and the best man to the hotel where they were staying. I think he liked that.

I remember being Henry’s age and getting into trouble, and having my mother say, “When your dad gets home I will need to talk about this with him.” That always freaked me out, not because my dad was tougher than my mom but because that meant that there would be no end run around the punishment, no claiming to one parent that the other parent had said something different.  I was going to be in trouble and there was going to be NO getting out of it.

They worked as a team, and they played good defense.

I have started, recently, to tell the boys that I will need to discuss things with their Daddy, and I can see the same look in their eyes that my brother and I used to get. My kids don’t get in any kind of real trouble, not yet at least (knock on wood) but Wade and I are trying to be consistent about consequences and privileges, which means we need to talk about things. What the kids don’t realize is that we’re not plotting against them, we’re just completely unable to remember what the punishment is if we haven’t talked about it.  And even then, there’s a 50/50 chance I will have to call Wade at work and confer with him about what precisely it was we told the kids would happen.

Parenting is hard, you know, especially when you have no short term memory.

Tonight when Wade was going up and down the stairs, and we were hashing out the solution to The Moment, I realized how much work it must have been for my parents to present that united front. And now I think that instead of saying I’m sorry every time I call, I should just go right for “thank you.”

So thank you, Mom and Daddy. My boys thank you, too.

Now about all that money you “loaned” me over the years …

May 10, 2008

i carry your heart with me

i carry your heart with me (i carry it in
my heart) i am never without it (anywhere
i go you go, my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing, my darling)
i fear
no fate (for you are my fate, my sweet) i want
no world (for beautiful you are my world, my true)
and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that’s keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)

ee cummings

* * * * *

Charlie has a friend at school, a charming little girl with wispy blond hair and gigantic blue eyes and round pink cheeks. She loves him, and has told her mother that when she grows up she’s going to marry him. He seems to feel similarly about her, too, once writing her a note, all by himself, that said I LOVE YOU in big preschooler scrawl and then asking if we could mail it to her house.

Yesterday we learned that Charlie’s little friend has been diagnosed with lymphoma. At carpool pickup, a small group of mothers huddled together, whispering over the heads of our children, not wanting them to hear our conversation. We shared what little we knew and wondered what we could do for this wee child and her family. Mostly we just stared at each other in complete shock.

* * * * *

Next week, I am returning to ParentDish. When I left, in October, to write for AisleDash, I swore that I was finished writing about parenting, that I was done having complete strangers call me out for being a terrible mother because my children have an early bedtime and aren’t allowed to leave their toys all over the house. And then there was the commenter who, on a random post about Angelina Jolie’s daughter carrying a tiny Louis Vuitton handbag, suggested that I should find something “more important” to write about. Of course, I thought, because all those thousands of words I had written about autism and literacy and breastfeeding weren’t very important.

* * * * *

When I started this blog, in 2005, I was feeling overwhelmed and isolated; I felt like a terrible parent, not because I put my kids to bed early or kept them on a schedule or said no to them, but because being a parent can be overwhelming and isolating. It’s the nature of the beast, I think, even when you have healthy, happy children and a loving, supportive family life. I started blogging because writing about feeling isolated and overwhelmed, putting the words down somewhere, made me feel a little less isolated and overwhelmed. And then, to my great surprise, other people started reading what I was writing, and to my even greater surprise, they understood, they got it, they were feeling the same way or had felt the same way. And it was like a light in the darkness because while I still felt like a terrible parent some days, I felt less like I was completely failing.

That’s not a new story, I know; mommyblogs are all about community and connection and about a whole generation of women who have found a way to talk about what it means to be the mommy, for better or worse. I am going back to ParentDish because it’s a great job, but I am also going back because that community — the bloggers, the readers who understand, who get it — is an important one and one I believe in, and one that we all need at some point, because the work of carrying someone else’s heart around, all the time, everywhere — and that’s what we do as parents, really — is so very difficult, even at the best of times.

* * * * *

Last night, after dinner, we took the kids to the park. Charlie and my niece were on the teeter totter together, screaming with laughter as they bounced up and down, Charlie hanging on with his one good arm. And my niece said, “Charlie, you are my BEST FRIEND. You are the BEST COUSIN EVER. I love you, Charlie.”

And Charlie said, “Thanks Ellie! I love you too!”

I can’t stop thinking about Charlie’s little friend and her family. I know that the community at our school and at the church will take care of them, I know that people are praying for them and pulling for them. My mommy heart just aches for them.

March 20, 2008

when I was a kid …

Recently I have started spouting off about how things were when I was a kid. I can’t stop myself — no matter who I am talking to or what we’re talking about, I find myself declaring that THINGS USED TO BE DIFFERENT, DAMMIT.

Today we colored Easter eggs with my neighbor and her son. I hardboiled two dozen eggs for three little boys, because apparently I am insane; when I told my neighbor how many eggs there were, she said, “Oh good because I’ve never dyed Easter eggs either!”

Which of COURSE was just the opening I needed to start holding forth about what things were like in MY childhood.

Poor Rita. She has to listen to me and she’s pregnant and can’t even drink. Or at least not enough to drown out my reminiscing.

The dye kits came with all sorts of bling — glitter and special cups for the dye and stickers. I kept announcing, “When I was a kid, my mom just put the dye in a coffee cup!” and “When I was a kid, we didn’t have STICKERS, just DYE.”

I’m lucky no one threw eggs at me.

(more…)

January 13, 2008

it’s only a suggestion, but he thinks its a good one

When Heather B came to visit me last summer, Henry was having a big Milano cookie phase (understandable, really). He was also FINALLY starting to read everything all the time, which included the suggested serving information for pretty much all the food we put on the table.

I typically go with a one (or two) cookies per customer limit at snack time, because the LAST thing my children need is more sugar, but of course Henry got hold of the bag and reported to me that “The suggested serving size for these cookies is THREE cookies.” Which made Heather laugh so hard she had to leave the room, I’m pretty sure.

On Friday morning, when I went to get him out of bed and he burrowed under the covers because maybe MAYBE if he hides THIS will be the morning that I can’t FIND him and he won’t have to get up — when I went and sat on the bed like I always do and patted him and asked what he wanted for breakfast so that he could have five more minutes in bed while I got things going, he said, from under the covers, “I would like some oatmeal.”

“Okay,” I said, “I’ll go put the kettle on.”

And then his little hand shot out from under the comforter with two fingers sticking up in a V, and he said, “I would like TWO ADULT SIZE SERVINGS, please.”

And that is exactly what I gave him. The end.

December 21, 2007

i can haz madd ritin skilz

Laundry list, because the ACTUAL laundry is taking over my house and must be dealt with ASAP.

1. I am going to hire my father to come edit for me at my five million various blogs, because ONLY HE caught the ginormous typo in my last post. I have left it there for your reading pleasure (and also to test you because COME ON PEOPLE!). Good luck!

2. HeatherB is gone, after two days of living the Suburban Mommy life, which consisted of brunch out, a manicure and pedicure, a trip to SuperTarget, watching Backyardigans with the kids, Christmas shopping at a local antiques store, a playdate with my fabulous next door neighbor, and dinner and drinks with Shana and Whoorl. Feel free to imagine that EVERY SINGLE DAY of my life is JUST LIKE THAT.

3. We’re celebrating the Winter Solstice with a high of 67. Chris, that’s for you.

4. I got my hair cut this week. Somehow my stylist heard “leave the length but do lots of texture” as “MULLETMULLETMULLET.” It’s fine right now but in a couple of weeks I will look like an extra from Talladega Nights. If you live in the Oklahoma City Metro and have a stylist you really REALLY love, shoot me an email because I’m looking. Again. Dammit.

5. I ran into my friend Laura at the grocery last weekend; she said, “I have a new favorite mascara, thanks to you!” And that reminded me that I have something to TELL you about the L’Oreal Lash Out mascara! And then I forgot again! And now I am remembering! I’m still loving the Lash Out, BUT — the first tube I had dried out awfully fast (maybe because I didn’t QUITE get the cap on all the way one day, but still) and it was smudging a little, probably because I’ve been mixing a teeny bit of eye cream with my concealer. So I’ve switched to the waterproof formula, which I’m very very happy with, and I’m screwing the cap on Extra Tight every day.

And I think that’s everything! Or nothing, depending on your perspective. Either way, I’m all done now because that laundry’s not doing itself, apparently.

December 18, 2007

devious, not crafty: the sequal (plus, shots of my cleavage!)

Behold my crafting prowess! This is how the kids’ head things turned out; Charlie looked like he was going to play in some sort of theme golf scramble (theme: Drink More Beer!) and Henry looked like a cross between a chicken and an Indian Chief (we were calling him Chief Chicken Head, but he didn’t really like that).

They were excited anyway, even though their mama sucks at the crafting.

And because I promised, the cleavage dress:

Full length shot is here.

And now I’m off to pick HeatherB up at the airport! Woo hoo!