Some weeks stretch on for ever. Other weeks, its hard to find time to eat, or go to the bathroom. Last week was one of the latter.
My job is one of those jobs where its feast or famine. We have certain times when we are overloaded with work, and other times when we're casting about for something to do. Last week three giant projects all came due at exactly the same time -- on the same day, even -- leaving me with little time for anything other than work: household chores, social life, my family, meals, shopping -- all these were cast to second place.
Add to that that E had his two "orientation days" at his new preschool, and the timing belt broke on Josh's car, leaving us with a single car and jobs in two different cities, and its been an exciting adventure.
I'm so fortunate that Josh is both willing and able to simply pick up all the threads when I drop them. E is equally comfortable with Daddy getting supper (which is what happens most nights; Josh is the cook in our house); giving him a bath; doing bedtime (although if I'm there he wants me to do the stories - end of story).
So, anyhow, tomorrow I'll tell you the exciting tale of E's very first day at his new preschool.
Anyhow, here's something to read:
A Former I-Banker Explains Why The "Mommy Track" Was The Right Track For Her
(This article really irks me, because its so judgmental. I'd be interested to read your take on it.)
Its the Childcare, Stupid
“The only reason for time is so that everything doesn't happen at once.” - Einstein
November 22, 2010
Style is knowing who you are, what you want to say and not giving a damn. - G Vidal
November 12, 2010
Not much going on here. Get up, go to work, get home, get hugs, eat supper, go to sleep. Rinse and repeat.
I did get to watch E's swim lesson for the first time last night, which was fine. He made it across the pool himself, with help from a floatie.
Josh has to be away all day Saturday so its just E and me -- and my mother, which should make E very happy.
Monday we have the "orientation visit" at his new preschool, so I'm looking forward to telling you about that. (I'm also looking forward to hopefully telling you that there wasn't any huge disaster, but we'll see.) Hannah has been sending daily "we'll miss you" cards home with him from Daycare, but somehow I think they'll both be better off.
Parents are Junkies from Slate. Its totally true.
"Children regularly give parents the kind of highs that only narcotics can rival. The unpredictability of those moments of bliss is an important factor in their addictiveness."
Have a good weekend!
I did get to watch E's swim lesson for the first time last night, which was fine. He made it across the pool himself, with help from a floatie.
Josh has to be away all day Saturday so its just E and me -- and my mother, which should make E very happy.
Monday we have the "orientation visit" at his new preschool, so I'm looking forward to telling you about that. (I'm also looking forward to hopefully telling you that there wasn't any huge disaster, but we'll see.) Hannah has been sending daily "we'll miss you" cards home with him from Daycare, but somehow I think they'll both be better off.
Parents are Junkies from Slate. Its totally true.
"Children regularly give parents the kind of highs that only narcotics can rival. The unpredictability of those moments of bliss is an important factor in their addictiveness."
Have a good weekend!
"Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves." - C Jung
November 10, 2010
The Fultz Quadruplets Go To School
- Jet Magazine, March 5, 1953
Originally uploaded by vieilles_annonces
The four Fultz girls -- identical quadruplets -- were born in 1946 to parents Pete and Annie Mae, who already had six children. Pete was a tenant farmer. Annie Mae was deaf and mute. The family lived in North Carolina, and, much like the Dionne Quintuplets born twelve years earlier, they were taken from their birth parents and raised by doctors and nurses. In the case of the Fultz girls, their care was subsidized by a company called PET milk - an early formula company.
There is a ton to be shocked by in this story, starting from the doctor who delivered them deciding to name them after members of his own family. But what made me absolutely irate in reading this was not actually the story -- it was the blog author's very casual note, at the end that all four girls had breast cancer (three died from it), and that this was the "consequence" of being formula-fed (rather than breast fed) as infants.
Give me a break.
Lets set aside for a moment (as my friend jenne.heise pointed out) the logistical difficulties involved in a poor woman with six children being able to nurse four hungry infants. Lets set aside, too, any thought that I personally might not feel like "breast is best". I nursed my son as much as I was able, but I also fed him formula. Because he had to eat something and he would have starved to death if his only choice had been the few ounces a day I was able to pump.
I know women who put forth this kind of uninformed, unsourced, judgemental, incorrect hogwash mean well. They want every mother to breast feed and that's a fine and noble -- and totally unachievable -- goal. Breastfeeding does a lot of good things, and protects babies and small children from a lot of things (including some childhood cancers), but it does not protect them from getting Breast Cancer. Rather it is women who lactate for at least 24 months who see the big decreases in breast cancer rates.
But it just doesn't help. I didn't feed my son formula because I wanted to. I did it because I had to -- I had to go back to work and he had to eat something. I'm sure my friend W.'s first choice isn't to formula feed as a stay-at-home mom, but breastfeeding simply wasn't working for her, and so having the option of formula available is keeping her baby happy, well-fed, and healthy.
In trying to find any -- any! -- source studies for her assertion, I discovered this interesting tidbit: in the 1960's, mothers with a family history of breast cancer were advised not to breast feed their daughters, since it was felt at that time that breast feeding might somehow increase the baby's chance of developing the disease in adulthood.
There is so much we can do to increase the rate of exclusive breast feeding in this country -- starting with education, especially for health care professionals and low-income families, right up to the pipe dream of Canadian-style year-long paid leave for new mothers. Scare tactics like this are not part of education. They don't convince anyone. All they serve to do is to increase the guilt and worry all mothers have over whether they are doing every single thing right for their baby.
"You've got the brain of a four-year-old boy, and I bet he was glad to get rid of it. " - G Marx
November 9, 2010
Lest you think its all gloom and doom and angst at my house, I will share with you some of E's verbal gems from yesterday. He's a huge goof, in case you hadn't guessed.....
E, talking about how another child at daycare had a miserable day:
"Hannah used her naughties to make everyone miserable"
(Somehow I think this sounds like she was torturing them with her underwear. But that's not what he meant.)
on his forthcoming new daycare:
"I'm going to be the smartest one at school cause the teacher will show me how to be smart."
In response to an ad he heard on the radio (for a sports bar):
"Daddy did you hear that, football season is back!"
Last night we went out to eat and then out to look at new sofas (super fun for a little guy, actually) and he was just a fount of amusing quotes all night long.
E, talking about how another child at daycare had a miserable day:
"Hannah used her naughties to make everyone miserable"
(Somehow I think this sounds like she was torturing them with her underwear. But that's not what he meant.)
on his forthcoming new daycare:
"I'm going to be the smartest one at school cause the teacher will show me how to be smart."
In response to an ad he heard on the radio (for a sports bar):
"Daddy did you hear that, football season is back!"
Last night we went out to eat and then out to look at new sofas (super fun for a little guy, actually) and he was just a fount of amusing quotes all night long.
"Do you know what my favorite part of the game is? The opportunity to play." - Mike Singletary
November 8, 2010
Once upon a time at our house, a game of Candyland was the high point of any day. Candyland was all about cooperation, with a splash of figure skating. Candyland represented a colorful oasis of fun on a Sunday morning while Daddy was sleeping, where E and I could play the game without much regard to The Rules and just run around Candyland, jumping over sticky licorice and racing each other to the candy treats.
No longer.
I know he's been playing Candyland at daycare, and sometime over the past few weeks E has developed a (very age appropriate) focus on "The Rules". On Friday night, after dinner, we played Candyland by The Rules, and E lost the game. Twice.
And then -- then! -- Oh, the weeping. Not winning is clearing the Worst. Experience. Ever. Falling off the chair, wailing and weeping, with big fat wet tears running down his cheeks. I'd seen a glimpse of this behavior once before, when he was running footraces with a much older boy at a local mini-park, but at the time I just chalked it up to E being tired and crabby and hot (which he was) and didn't think much more of it.
Now I'm thinking something of it, and trying to sort out what to do. Increasing, E loves to play competitive games. He loves Go Fish, and Candyland, and this fall he's become enamored with football (although I think that's more about falling down than it being an actual game you can win). And he asks - begs - us to play with him. But now its a little nerve wracking to play with (against?) him, because I know the outburst is coming at the end.
I was also an only child, and I remember ever Christmas having a Board Game on my list. I amassed quite a collection of them over the years, but the grownups in my house were always too busy to sit down and play with me. So I particularly, explicitly want to play these games with him, and teach him about "the opportunity to play" and sportsmanship and being a gracious winner and a "good" loser and all the rest of it. But I dread the end.
As his mom, my instinct is to soothe the tears away. But as a grownup, I know that I have to find a way to teach him that this kind of reaction to simply losing a game is unacceptable, so often I'm forced to tell him I'm not going to play any more even as he's tearfully begging me to play with him again, so he can win. On Sunday, he was playing against his Aunts - Josh's sisters - and when the "I wanted to win!!" wailing started, they tried the typical tactics -- "playing is the important part" "we each won one game, so we shared the winning" -- which utterly failed. In frustration or desperation (or, you know, from the experience in being a younger sibling in a family of six), one of his Aunts finally told him "nobody likes a crybaby".
Unsurprisingly, that didn't work either. He ended up snuggled down in Mimi and Poppa's bed for a while - not a nap, but just some "quiet time". And in a bit he was fine, up and running around and wanting to play again.
There's lots of advice out there about this, mostly centered on "redirect him to cooperative play". But it seems like that's just postponing the problem, not addressing it.
I really miss the days when a game of Candyland ended with all the playing pieces holding hands and doing a little dance.
No longer.
I know he's been playing Candyland at daycare, and sometime over the past few weeks E has developed a (very age appropriate) focus on "The Rules". On Friday night, after dinner, we played Candyland by The Rules, and E lost the game. Twice.
And then -- then! -- Oh, the weeping. Not winning is clearing the Worst. Experience. Ever. Falling off the chair, wailing and weeping, with big fat wet tears running down his cheeks. I'd seen a glimpse of this behavior once before, when he was running footraces with a much older boy at a local mini-park, but at the time I just chalked it up to E being tired and crabby and hot (which he was) and didn't think much more of it.
Now I'm thinking something of it, and trying to sort out what to do. Increasing, E loves to play competitive games. He loves Go Fish, and Candyland, and this fall he's become enamored with football (although I think that's more about falling down than it being an actual game you can win). And he asks - begs - us to play with him. But now its a little nerve wracking to play with (against?) him, because I know the outburst is coming at the end.
I was also an only child, and I remember ever Christmas having a Board Game on my list. I amassed quite a collection of them over the years, but the grownups in my house were always too busy to sit down and play with me. So I particularly, explicitly want to play these games with him, and teach him about "the opportunity to play" and sportsmanship and being a gracious winner and a "good" loser and all the rest of it. But I dread the end.
As his mom, my instinct is to soothe the tears away. But as a grownup, I know that I have to find a way to teach him that this kind of reaction to simply losing a game is unacceptable, so often I'm forced to tell him I'm not going to play any more even as he's tearfully begging me to play with him again, so he can win. On Sunday, he was playing against his Aunts - Josh's sisters - and when the "I wanted to win!!" wailing started, they tried the typical tactics -- "playing is the important part" "we each won one game, so we shared the winning" -- which utterly failed. In frustration or desperation (or, you know, from the experience in being a younger sibling in a family of six), one of his Aunts finally told him "nobody likes a crybaby".
Unsurprisingly, that didn't work either. He ended up snuggled down in Mimi and Poppa's bed for a while - not a nap, but just some "quiet time". And in a bit he was fine, up and running around and wanting to play again.
There's lots of advice out there about this, mostly centered on "redirect him to cooperative play". But it seems like that's just postponing the problem, not addressing it.
I really miss the days when a game of Candyland ended with all the playing pieces holding hands and doing a little dance.
Those that despise people will never get the best out of others and themselves. - de Tocqueville
November 4, 2010
Its been a crazy week here. At work, we have our Annual Meeting on Friday, which means that I've been going in early and working until late, late, late - end result being that mostly the only way I've seen E is as you seen him here: conked out, snuggled up with two bears. However, this morning I was able to get him dressed and play a round of "Go Fish" with him before he and his dad left for the morning, so that's a win.
And lets not even mention the election, okay? Okay.
We've finally found a new childcare situation for him; a real pre-school (with classrooms and everything). 16 other kids (including Boys!) in the class. I'll tell you more about that in a bit.
I'm sure you've seen this by now, but if you haven't its worth a read (if only for the awesome photo: My Son is Gay
"If my daughter had dressed as Batman, no one would have thought twice about it. No one."
E wanted, originally, to go as a pink cat for Halloween, but I convinced him that black cats were scarier. Partly its because I was having images of The Pink Bunny Suit from A Christmas Story in my head. But partly its because I knew what his (honestly, really progressive) dad would say. Which he did actually say, when we presented the black cat idea to him (afterwards, out of earshot). "Its kinda girly".
Ahem.
A few days ago a friend posted this link on her blog:
You Might Be a Counterculture Mama if....
Honestly, after reading it, my conclusion was that you might not be a counterculture Mama if you have to work to support your family, since a lot of those indicators are simply out of reach if you work in an office 8 hours a day.
Finally, I said I wasn't going to talk about the elections, but here's something of interest: The Midterms and the "New Momism": The Takeaway for Working Moms.
I've written here before about my mixed feelings about Sarah Palin, and this article touches on that. Politically, I'm about as far away from her as you can get. But I have to admire, a little bit, any woman who can seamlessly combine parenting (including a special needs newborn) with Governing a State. Be sure to check out the New York Times article on the same subject that's mentioned in the text.
And lets not even mention the election, okay? Okay.
We've finally found a new childcare situation for him; a real pre-school (with classrooms and everything). 16 other kids (including Boys!) in the class. I'll tell you more about that in a bit.
I'm sure you've seen this by now, but if you haven't its worth a read (if only for the awesome photo: My Son is Gay
"If my daughter had dressed as Batman, no one would have thought twice about it. No one."
E wanted, originally, to go as a pink cat for Halloween, but I convinced him that black cats were scarier. Partly its because I was having images of The Pink Bunny Suit from A Christmas Story in my head. But partly its because I knew what his (honestly, really progressive) dad would say. Which he did actually say, when we presented the black cat idea to him (afterwards, out of earshot). "Its kinda girly".
Ahem.
A few days ago a friend posted this link on her blog:
You Might Be a Counterculture Mama if....
Honestly, after reading it, my conclusion was that you might not be a counterculture Mama if you have to work to support your family, since a lot of those indicators are simply out of reach if you work in an office 8 hours a day.
Finally, I said I wasn't going to talk about the elections, but here's something of interest: The Midterms and the "New Momism": The Takeaway for Working Moms.
I've written here before about my mixed feelings about Sarah Palin, and this article touches on that. Politically, I'm about as far away from her as you can get. But I have to admire, a little bit, any woman who can seamlessly combine parenting (including a special needs newborn) with Governing a State. Be sure to check out the New York Times article on the same subject that's mentioned in the text.
"I wouldn't want to be accused of taking part in a rumble. " - Sally Brown
November 1, 2010
Here he is, the warmest kid on Halloween:
After all the work I put into "a black cat with pink ears" we had a momentary scare when E told us he would prefer to wear his pirate costume from last year, but we were able to arrive at a compromise.
He has a small posse of friends (he's the youngest) that we've been lucky enough to go Trick or Treating with every year. There are a couple of neighborhoods around here that go all out with decorations and whatnot, and I'm so happy that he has the sort of "Norman Rockwell memory" of being able to run from house to house to house with a gang of other ghosts and goblins and coming home with a bucket of candy.
And, because I am a trusting parent with the courage of my convictions, I even let him eat an apple given at one of the houses. (I washed and inspected it first.) Actually, it was the first thing he wanted out of his bag.
Our house is always a Jack o'Lantern extravaganza. This year we had a total of eight. For a number of them, Josh was able to translate E's "pumpkin face" drawings into terrific Jack o'Lanterns. You can see two of them on the ends here, flanked by the happier face I requested.
A good night. I hope he's able to hold these memories fast when he's older.
I don't see how a pumpkin patch can be more sincere than this one.
October 29, 2010
E drew a picture and Josh translated the picture into this terrific pumpkin.
Have a great weekend!
"How to help your Husband Get Ahead" - Title of a book by Mrs Dale Carnagie
October 28, 2010
Blogger Jen Byck spent two weeks back in May living the life of a 1950's housewife. Apparently she had so much "fun" (note the quotes) that she's doing it again for another week.
Check it out. This is awesome stuff.
Check it out. This is awesome stuff.
Tomorrow night is nothing but one long sleepless wrestle with yesterday's omissions and regrets. - Faulkner
October 27, 2010
Yesterday, we made the gruesome error of letting E remain asleep after he fell asleep in the car on the way home from daycare. Typically when we do this its no problem; he just sleeps through until a stupid-early but basically reasonable hour of the morning. Last night, not so much.
Instead, he woke up at around 11:30 and came downstairs. Now its so happens that we had some friends over, and had just finished watching Glee, so not only was he disoriented and cranky, but he found it doubly (triply?) weird that the house was full of people and we had the TV on.
"But we can't watch TV after supper time. Its a rule!"
We had to come clean to him that his father and I do, in fact, sometimes watch TV after supper. Another childhood illusion destroyed, I guess.
We fed him a Peanut Butter sandwich (yes, I feed him PB&J - I wonder if, these days, this is a mark in the "bad mother" column) and sat up with him while he ate. So, more than an hour after I had intended to go to bed I was snuggled up with him, reading.
At 1 am I told him "I'm turning off the lights and going to sleep." And that's what I did. I stayed in his room, because I knew if I didn't he'd be up and playing for most of the night, and I had hopes that he would fall back asleep.
For two hours (at least) he squirmed around. He played with his teddy bears. He would periodically lay his (very heavy) head on my head. I believe he fell asleep by 3:30.
This morning, I was wrecked. He was chipper and cheerful and ready to go. Tonight, as we wait for dinner to finish, I'm still wrecked.
I wonder if employers take into account the fact that parents just don't ever, ever, ever get enough sleep. I wonder how much more productive I could be at work if I did?
Instead, he woke up at around 11:30 and came downstairs. Now its so happens that we had some friends over, and had just finished watching Glee, so not only was he disoriented and cranky, but he found it doubly (triply?) weird that the house was full of people and we had the TV on.
"But we can't watch TV after supper time. Its a rule!"
We had to come clean to him that his father and I do, in fact, sometimes watch TV after supper. Another childhood illusion destroyed, I guess.
We fed him a Peanut Butter sandwich (yes, I feed him PB&J - I wonder if, these days, this is a mark in the "bad mother" column) and sat up with him while he ate. So, more than an hour after I had intended to go to bed I was snuggled up with him, reading.
At 1 am I told him "I'm turning off the lights and going to sleep." And that's what I did. I stayed in his room, because I knew if I didn't he'd be up and playing for most of the night, and I had hopes that he would fall back asleep.
For two hours (at least) he squirmed around. He played with his teddy bears. He would periodically lay his (very heavy) head on my head. I believe he fell asleep by 3:30.
This morning, I was wrecked. He was chipper and cheerful and ready to go. Tonight, as we wait for dinner to finish, I'm still wrecked.
I wonder if employers take into account the fact that parents just don't ever, ever, ever get enough sleep. I wonder how much more productive I could be at work if I did?
"One need not be a chamber to be haunted; One need not be a house" - Dickinson
October 22, 2010
Josh and I bought this spooky Halloween tree the first year we were a couple. Its up now, in a corner of our front hall, with that house (actually a votive holder) that fits just right below it.
This weekend I make a black cat costume and finish decorating. Halloween is our favorite time of year!
This weekend I make a black cat costume and finish decorating. Halloween is our favorite time of year!
“Habit and routine have an unbelievable power to waste and destroy.” - H de Lubac
October 21, 2010
There is an overwhelming sameness to our days.
Morning. Josh sleeps through his alarm again (though I do not) and we let E sleep until the last possible minute we can. I dress him, in a rush, while wondering how he will ever learn to dress himself, realizing he probably already can but it’s a skill I don’t let him practice much on these rushed mornings, electing to give him every second of sleep he can. They bundle at the door a few minutes past 7:30 and I am alone in a cold house, trying to motivate myself to start the day.
In the shower by 8. Out the door by 9. Sometimes a stop before work, sometimes not. Drive the mile and a half to work. Sit in my office, watching other mothers and fathers walk by with their children. Wave to babies who toddle by my office window and wave to me. Wonder what E is doing. Wonder if he’s ok. Wonder if its raining.
I know Josh leaves at 4:30 (-ish) to collect him from Sarah’s house. Sometimes when Josh arrives E runs and hides and fights going home. Sometimes, increasingly, he does not. They drive half an hour, maybe talking, maybe singing to the radio. I know that around the time they pass through Yarmouth Josh will reach back with his right arm and hold E’s hand while they drive.
With driving and pickup antics and more driving and whatnot they arrive home just before 6. At some point earlier in the afternoon Josh will have called me to have a somewhat futile conversation about dinner, but mostly it is Josh’s task to start cooking immediately when he gets home in hopes that we can eat by 7. E plays downstairs or watches TV, or helps with dinner, as the mood strikes him. Our parlor is taken up with a huge train table, as it has been since Santa brought it ten months ago. Soon we’ll need to move it upstairs and then Josh fears that E will go upstairs with it in this precious hour when they are home together, and he will never see E again.
I try to leave the office by 6. I don’t always manage that, but I try. Home by 6:30, ecstatic greetings from E who runs from any corner of the house shouting “Mama! Mama!” but as soon as I am hugged and kissed he returns to whatever he was doing. I try to play with him, but sometimes the mail, the meal, the laundry, my husband, sometimes those things take up the precious rationed minutes until supper and I don’t mange to lie on the floor in the parlor to admire E’s latest stadium or destruction project.
Dinner is served. We eat, all together, E eating from his red plate. I try to use the slip of paper Sarah sends home to guide my questions to him, but often I can elicit zero details about the day. Often dinner is a struggle – here, have a bite, another, three more, two more, just one more. Although he can feed himself, he will often eat those last few bites only if I feed them to him. This weekend, a friend observed us and remarked, not unkindly “young man, can’t you feed yourself?” to which I replied “Can and Will are two separate things” and the questioner agreed this was true.
No movies after supper is a firm house rule. I will clear the table and wash the dishes while his father plays with him or bathes him. Sometimes, rarely, we will finish supper in time for me to wash the dishes and come play. More often, I finish just as bedtime is announced and we all run up the stairs racing, while E shouts “I’ll win! I’ll win!”
Bedtime. E is better at undressing himself than dressing. I get him into a diaper (yes, still, at night) and PJs and send him off with his father for tooth brushing and a final potty break. E chooses books, or I do, and we climb in bed together, often me in my PJs as well, completely surrounded by stuffed friends – two bears, a star-belly sneech, pooh friends, a rabbit, a snoopy that plays Linus and Lucy when you squeeze his hand. Three books (if he hasn’t lost any for bad behavior), and then the light goes out and he falls asleep next to me, warm and heavy, he and I cocooned against the chill of the drafty house, wrapped up in quilts together. More often than not I fall asleep, although I hardly ever mean to. If I escape the lure of Morpheus, I can go downstairs to visit with my husband a little, watch some TV, explore the internet, be companions together. If Morpheus wins, I often wake around 1 in the morning, get up, take my contact lenses out, shout downstairs for Josh to come to bed (he might be asleep on the sofa, watching TV, reading, allegedly ignorant that its gotten so late). I may at this point slip into my own bed, or just give up and crawl back into E’s. E likes it best when I’m there next to him in the morning. I have to confess, I like it best that way too.
And then the cycle begins again.
I can’t imagine what he learns from us in those few hours filled with dressing and eating, eating and undressing. He asked me tonight why he doesn’t sleep at Sarah’s, and I was not surprised. She is more of a mother to him than I am most days. But he doesn’t seem to think of her as a mother, just someone’s mother, not his. We’re in the process of moving him to a new daycare, an actual preschool, likely after the first of the year. He knows the change is coming and he doesn’t seem heartbroken. Its funny to me that despite the fact he’s been ‘in care’ with Maddie since he was 12 weeks old he almost never talks about her, unless asked directly. He talks more about Hannah, our caregiver’s daughter, but virtually always in negative terms. He never asks for them on the weekends, never has stories to share about them, never seems to miss them the way he misses our friend’s children or his aunts or even the other kids at swim class. Maybe its that they’re so familiar. And yet I sort of sense in him that he’s done with them, that he’s ready to move on, make new friends, “go to school”, learn new things.
Over the weekend a friend, a new father, was marveling to me how some of his co-workers “only” see their children “two or three hours a day. Can you imagine?” I gently reminded him that the schedule he was marveling at was my regular life. He’s a teacher, so he can be home before four, and they’ve worked out a way for his wife to stay home, at least for a while. He talked about how he has been rushing home each day as soon as the final bell rings (he’s a teacher) so he could spend as much time as possible with his infant daughter. She’s a tiny infant, born just this past July. At that age, I actually found our schedule easier with E, because as long as he was safe and warm and cared for it didn’t matter so much to me who was holding him. Now though, as he soaks up the world and tries to work out his place in it, its harder – even and despite the fact that I’m ‘only’ working one job and am home for dinner virtually every night.
I started writing this entry (which has turned into an opus, really) as I thought about other blogs I read, with their daily stories of parenting success and failure. I was watching E sleep (unusually, he’d conked out mid-story) and I was thinking again (as I have been all week) about the comment my friend made, about the parents I see all day, about my choices, about how we live our life.
A couple of weeks ago, I heard an amazing speech given by Robert Reich (its available as a podcast behind the link, scroll down to October 8th) all about the economy and the history of “crashes” in America. I’m not going to get this exactly right, but part of what he talked about was the fact that “real” wages haven’t risen much (or at all) in this country in several decades, and that families have tried to compensate for this lack of rise in wages through several strategies, including taking on debt, working longer hours, and both parents working. He quoted a statistic (and, again, I’m likely to get this wrong) that in the ‘70’s only about 25-30% of mothers with small children worked for wages outside the home, and now that percentage is closer to 70%. He made the point that this wasn’t really about the rise of feminism - although certainly women have made enormous strides in the type of work available, the salary for that work, and the general social and societal acceptance of women in the workplace – but rather it was a result of simple economics. Families, many families (my own included) must have two wage earners in the home in order to survive. (Listen to the whole thing; it’s a great speech, making some tough stuff easy to follow and comprehend.)
While its sort of comforting to know I fall into such a big group (70%!), I’m afraid I don’t have any pat way to wrap all this rambling up. There is an overwhelming sameness to our days. I will never be the parent that has a funny story to share each day, a new adventure, a new milestone. So many weekdays are just about dressing and undressing, eating and reading, playing trucks while dinner cooks. The reality of being a dual-working parent household is that its mostly dull. For us, for you as a reader, but not, I don’t think, for E. Somehow, I feel more and more that he finds pleasure in the routines of home. I don’t know why I think that, but I do. Its stable. Its normal. It’s the way he’s always known his life to be.
But I would change it, if I could.
Morning. Josh sleeps through his alarm again (though I do not) and we let E sleep until the last possible minute we can. I dress him, in a rush, while wondering how he will ever learn to dress himself, realizing he probably already can but it’s a skill I don’t let him practice much on these rushed mornings, electing to give him every second of sleep he can. They bundle at the door a few minutes past 7:30 and I am alone in a cold house, trying to motivate myself to start the day.
In the shower by 8. Out the door by 9. Sometimes a stop before work, sometimes not. Drive the mile and a half to work. Sit in my office, watching other mothers and fathers walk by with their children. Wave to babies who toddle by my office window and wave to me. Wonder what E is doing. Wonder if he’s ok. Wonder if its raining.
I know Josh leaves at 4:30 (-ish) to collect him from Sarah’s house. Sometimes when Josh arrives E runs and hides and fights going home. Sometimes, increasingly, he does not. They drive half an hour, maybe talking, maybe singing to the radio. I know that around the time they pass through Yarmouth Josh will reach back with his right arm and hold E’s hand while they drive.
With driving and pickup antics and more driving and whatnot they arrive home just before 6. At some point earlier in the afternoon Josh will have called me to have a somewhat futile conversation about dinner, but mostly it is Josh’s task to start cooking immediately when he gets home in hopes that we can eat by 7. E plays downstairs or watches TV, or helps with dinner, as the mood strikes him. Our parlor is taken up with a huge train table, as it has been since Santa brought it ten months ago. Soon we’ll need to move it upstairs and then Josh fears that E will go upstairs with it in this precious hour when they are home together, and he will never see E again.
I try to leave the office by 6. I don’t always manage that, but I try. Home by 6:30, ecstatic greetings from E who runs from any corner of the house shouting “Mama! Mama!” but as soon as I am hugged and kissed he returns to whatever he was doing. I try to play with him, but sometimes the mail, the meal, the laundry, my husband, sometimes those things take up the precious rationed minutes until supper and I don’t mange to lie on the floor in the parlor to admire E’s latest stadium or destruction project.
Dinner is served. We eat, all together, E eating from his red plate. I try to use the slip of paper Sarah sends home to guide my questions to him, but often I can elicit zero details about the day. Often dinner is a struggle – here, have a bite, another, three more, two more, just one more. Although he can feed himself, he will often eat those last few bites only if I feed them to him. This weekend, a friend observed us and remarked, not unkindly “young man, can’t you feed yourself?” to which I replied “Can and Will are two separate things” and the questioner agreed this was true.
No movies after supper is a firm house rule. I will clear the table and wash the dishes while his father plays with him or bathes him. Sometimes, rarely, we will finish supper in time for me to wash the dishes and come play. More often, I finish just as bedtime is announced and we all run up the stairs racing, while E shouts “I’ll win! I’ll win!”
Bedtime. E is better at undressing himself than dressing. I get him into a diaper (yes, still, at night) and PJs and send him off with his father for tooth brushing and a final potty break. E chooses books, or I do, and we climb in bed together, often me in my PJs as well, completely surrounded by stuffed friends – two bears, a star-belly sneech, pooh friends, a rabbit, a snoopy that plays Linus and Lucy when you squeeze his hand. Three books (if he hasn’t lost any for bad behavior), and then the light goes out and he falls asleep next to me, warm and heavy, he and I cocooned against the chill of the drafty house, wrapped up in quilts together. More often than not I fall asleep, although I hardly ever mean to. If I escape the lure of Morpheus, I can go downstairs to visit with my husband a little, watch some TV, explore the internet, be companions together. If Morpheus wins, I often wake around 1 in the morning, get up, take my contact lenses out, shout downstairs for Josh to come to bed (he might be asleep on the sofa, watching TV, reading, allegedly ignorant that its gotten so late). I may at this point slip into my own bed, or just give up and crawl back into E’s. E likes it best when I’m there next to him in the morning. I have to confess, I like it best that way too.
And then the cycle begins again.
I can’t imagine what he learns from us in those few hours filled with dressing and eating, eating and undressing. He asked me tonight why he doesn’t sleep at Sarah’s, and I was not surprised. She is more of a mother to him than I am most days. But he doesn’t seem to think of her as a mother, just someone’s mother, not his. We’re in the process of moving him to a new daycare, an actual preschool, likely after the first of the year. He knows the change is coming and he doesn’t seem heartbroken. Its funny to me that despite the fact he’s been ‘in care’ with Maddie since he was 12 weeks old he almost never talks about her, unless asked directly. He talks more about Hannah, our caregiver’s daughter, but virtually always in negative terms. He never asks for them on the weekends, never has stories to share about them, never seems to miss them the way he misses our friend’s children or his aunts or even the other kids at swim class. Maybe its that they’re so familiar. And yet I sort of sense in him that he’s done with them, that he’s ready to move on, make new friends, “go to school”, learn new things.
Over the weekend a friend, a new father, was marveling to me how some of his co-workers “only” see their children “two or three hours a day. Can you imagine?” I gently reminded him that the schedule he was marveling at was my regular life. He’s a teacher, so he can be home before four, and they’ve worked out a way for his wife to stay home, at least for a while. He talked about how he has been rushing home each day as soon as the final bell rings (he’s a teacher) so he could spend as much time as possible with his infant daughter. She’s a tiny infant, born just this past July. At that age, I actually found our schedule easier with E, because as long as he was safe and warm and cared for it didn’t matter so much to me who was holding him. Now though, as he soaks up the world and tries to work out his place in it, its harder – even and despite the fact that I’m ‘only’ working one job and am home for dinner virtually every night.
I started writing this entry (which has turned into an opus, really) as I thought about other blogs I read, with their daily stories of parenting success and failure. I was watching E sleep (unusually, he’d conked out mid-story) and I was thinking again (as I have been all week) about the comment my friend made, about the parents I see all day, about my choices, about how we live our life.
A couple of weeks ago, I heard an amazing speech given by Robert Reich (its available as a podcast behind the link, scroll down to October 8th) all about the economy and the history of “crashes” in America. I’m not going to get this exactly right, but part of what he talked about was the fact that “real” wages haven’t risen much (or at all) in this country in several decades, and that families have tried to compensate for this lack of rise in wages through several strategies, including taking on debt, working longer hours, and both parents working. He quoted a statistic (and, again, I’m likely to get this wrong) that in the ‘70’s only about 25-30% of mothers with small children worked for wages outside the home, and now that percentage is closer to 70%. He made the point that this wasn’t really about the rise of feminism - although certainly women have made enormous strides in the type of work available, the salary for that work, and the general social and societal acceptance of women in the workplace – but rather it was a result of simple economics. Families, many families (my own included) must have two wage earners in the home in order to survive. (Listen to the whole thing; it’s a great speech, making some tough stuff easy to follow and comprehend.)
While its sort of comforting to know I fall into such a big group (70%!), I’m afraid I don’t have any pat way to wrap all this rambling up. There is an overwhelming sameness to our days. I will never be the parent that has a funny story to share each day, a new adventure, a new milestone. So many weekdays are just about dressing and undressing, eating and reading, playing trucks while dinner cooks. The reality of being a dual-working parent household is that its mostly dull. For us, for you as a reader, but not, I don’t think, for E. Somehow, I feel more and more that he finds pleasure in the routines of home. I don’t know why I think that, but I do. Its stable. Its normal. It’s the way he’s always known his life to be.
But I would change it, if I could.
"To him he was always beautiful, and that was all that the little Rabbit cared about."
October 20, 2010
Every Tuesday night, Josh has practice and so is gone from about ten minutes after I get home until after 11 pm. I've really come to savor this evening when its just E and I, because it has a totally different dynamic than our other evenings at home. I come home, start a simple dinner (sometimes E helps, sometimes he's not interested), we eat together, just he and I, then he helps me with the dishes, we play some, then sometimes a bath (there was one last night) and bedtime - PJs, teeth, stories, snuggles - a pretty typical night really, but for some reason it seems simpler, closer, and more streamlined with just us two. I wish I could put my finger on why that is.
Recently, E has been all about Football. His aunt introduced him to the game on TV and my mom gave him a Football, and now all he wants to do is watch, play, eat, breathe, and sleep football. (And Pooh. And Trains. So, I guess, its not really all that as obesssions go, but its now on the list of things I hear about every single day.) In cleaning our house this weekend I unearthed a "7-in-1 Family Games Set" that we'd gotten as a gift at some point. Two wooden boards, and the games are checkers, chess, backgammon, Chinese checkers, mancala ... and, umm, two others that I can't remember. E broke into the box and has been playing with it ever since. His dad taught him to play checkers - an interesting experience, as E did well but then burst in to (very real) inconsolable tears when he didn't win, and E asked me to teach him Chess, which I did, but which he quickly lost interest in.
Now, the chess pieces are football players, and E and I spent nearly an hour after supper last night playing 'football' on the chess board and talking about this and that. Because we're apart so much of the day, its a constant source of surprise to me to see the length and breadth of his knowledge on some topics, and to note the (sometimes age appropriate, sometimes not) limits of his knowledge or imagination in others.
One item that came up last night was, for lack of a better phrase, "the souls of toys". E is remarkably cavalier with his toys, which horrifies me, in large part I think because as an only child growing up in a very rural area (I was the only child I'd ever seen "live" until I was four) my toys easily "became real" for me, so much so that I continue to see their real-ness as a 40-something year old adult parent. For E, toys are toys - inanimate objects that exist as entertainment, not much more.
I suppose I shouldn't be surprised by this, but I still wonder if some irreplaceable part of his childhood is missing because his toys aren't real to him.
Recently, E has been all about Football. His aunt introduced him to the game on TV and my mom gave him a Football, and now all he wants to do is watch, play, eat, breathe, and sleep football. (And Pooh. And Trains. So, I guess, its not really all that as obesssions go, but its now on the list of things I hear about every single day.) In cleaning our house this weekend I unearthed a "7-in-1 Family Games Set" that we'd gotten as a gift at some point. Two wooden boards, and the games are checkers, chess, backgammon, Chinese checkers, mancala ... and, umm, two others that I can't remember. E broke into the box and has been playing with it ever since. His dad taught him to play checkers - an interesting experience, as E did well but then burst in to (very real) inconsolable tears when he didn't win, and E asked me to teach him Chess, which I did, but which he quickly lost interest in.
Now, the chess pieces are football players, and E and I spent nearly an hour after supper last night playing 'football' on the chess board and talking about this and that. Because we're apart so much of the day, its a constant source of surprise to me to see the length and breadth of his knowledge on some topics, and to note the (sometimes age appropriate, sometimes not) limits of his knowledge or imagination in others.
One item that came up last night was, for lack of a better phrase, "the souls of toys". E is remarkably cavalier with his toys, which horrifies me, in large part I think because as an only child growing up in a very rural area (I was the only child I'd ever seen "live" until I was four) my toys easily "became real" for me, so much so that I continue to see their real-ness as a 40-something year old adult parent. For E, toys are toys - inanimate objects that exist as entertainment, not much more.
I suppose I shouldn't be surprised by this, but I still wonder if some irreplaceable part of his childhood is missing because his toys aren't real to him.
If you don't already know, I'm not going to tell you....
October 19, 2010
I've linked to A Room of Mama's Own before, but her post today "Why you are a bad parent (mother) and how to fix it" exactly hits the spot for me, especially this:
"Next, focus your complete, perfect, developmentally enriching attention on your children for some unknown ideal number of hours each day. Too much or too little and we are right back to friendless alcoholic. If you don't already know that perfect number, I'm not going to tell you; all good parents already know it. If you don't, you were clearly raised by wolves yourself, so there's no point. You're beyond hope, and so is your child. You'll have to skip to Option 2."
"Next, focus your complete, perfect, developmentally enriching attention on your children for some unknown ideal number of hours each day. Too much or too little and we are right back to friendless alcoholic. If you don't already know that perfect number, I'm not going to tell you; all good parents already know it. If you don't, you were clearly raised by wolves yourself, so there's no point. You're beyond hope, and so is your child. You'll have to skip to Option 2."
"It can be a verb and a noun, meaning that it can be a mother, all things motherly, or even the action of mothering."
October 8, 2010
iMama - a tale of parenting in the age of the smartphone. (from Slate)
I totally get this. It falls in the "sad but funny" category. Also, its interesting to me that so many parents (including us) do what is described here - do the thing (say, go down the slide), video it, then watch it immediately, then do it again. Its a fundamental change, I think, in the way our children will remember their childhoods vs. the way we remember ours.
"Don't ignore your son's tender years" - Juvenal
October 7, 2010
Some nights when I get home from work E and I simply don't interact much at all. I always try to find time to lay down on the floor with him and play trucks or trains for a half hour or so, and probably 5 days out of 7 bedtime is our special time to talk together, but some nights (like last night) events conspire against us and our entire interaction for the evening is sitting together to eat supper and a quick hug and kiss before bed.
I try to tell myself that its balanced out by days like Saturday (when we went to the Cumberland Fair -- just the two of us -- and rode the Ferris Wheel and petted goats and hung out together for hours and hours) and that spending one-on-one time with his father is equally valuable as spending time with me, but there is always a tiny voice inside me that says "you're his mother, damnit. Be more present for him."
Very recently our family had a financial windfall, which, if we really wanted to, could have been used for me to quit my job for a year and stay at home with E until he starts Kindergarten in the Fall of 2011. (Class of 2024 - wow, its the future!) Its very tempting to do this, enormously tempting, as in "don't press the big, red, candy colored button" kind of tempting. Josh and I talked and talked about it, and have come to the conclusion that, although it might be emotionally satisfying for me, its not strictly necessary and would be a step backwards for our family, leaving us, in a year, basically where we are now but with even less savings and less of a safety net. What if I couldn't get a new job next fall? What would be the financial impact to our insurance? What if one of our cars finally fails and we really need to replace it? So we decide to maintain the status quo, but I find myself keenly aware that its a choice that, in some ways, is putting our desire for a certain kind of middle class lifestyle above what may (or may not) be best for our child. And I get, too, that its a luxury for us to even be having this conversation -- that for many families its not a choice, not a conversation, not a discussion. Working is simply survival -- as it has been for us too, for a while now.
So, today being Thursday E and his dad are at E's swim lessons, while I work late. After lessons E and his dad will go for dinner together and perhaps some climbing on indoor play equipment. While I work late. And then they will go home and E's dad will tuck him into bed and read him stories and I will (hopefully) arrive home in time for a sleepy kiss before E drops off to dreamland.
And then I will go downstairs and wonder how different our problems would be if we made different choices in our lives.
I try to tell myself that its balanced out by days like Saturday (when we went to the Cumberland Fair -- just the two of us -- and rode the Ferris Wheel and petted goats and hung out together for hours and hours) and that spending one-on-one time with his father is equally valuable as spending time with me, but there is always a tiny voice inside me that says "you're his mother, damnit. Be more present for him."
Very recently our family had a financial windfall, which, if we really wanted to, could have been used for me to quit my job for a year and stay at home with E until he starts Kindergarten in the Fall of 2011. (Class of 2024 - wow, its the future!) Its very tempting to do this, enormously tempting, as in "don't press the big, red, candy colored button" kind of tempting. Josh and I talked and talked about it, and have come to the conclusion that, although it might be emotionally satisfying for me, its not strictly necessary and would be a step backwards for our family, leaving us, in a year, basically where we are now but with even less savings and less of a safety net. What if I couldn't get a new job next fall? What would be the financial impact to our insurance? What if one of our cars finally fails and we really need to replace it? So we decide to maintain the status quo, but I find myself keenly aware that its a choice that, in some ways, is putting our desire for a certain kind of middle class lifestyle above what may (or may not) be best for our child. And I get, too, that its a luxury for us to even be having this conversation -- that for many families its not a choice, not a conversation, not a discussion. Working is simply survival -- as it has been for us too, for a while now.
So, today being Thursday E and his dad are at E's swim lessons, while I work late. After lessons E and his dad will go for dinner together and perhaps some climbing on indoor play equipment. While I work late. And then they will go home and E's dad will tuck him into bed and read him stories and I will (hopefully) arrive home in time for a sleepy kiss before E drops off to dreamland.
And then I will go downstairs and wonder how different our problems would be if we made different choices in our lives.
"You will never stub your toe standing still." -- Charles Kettering
September 14, 2010
E has an ingrown toenail on his left foot. He doesn't complain about it, but when I look at it (when he lefts me look at it) its clearly an angry red with a little peeling skin. I have to confess that I don't look at his toes much (anymore) - his father noticed it before I did, at bath time, and we've soaked it and sort of hoped it would resolve itself, but it hasn't. I'm not really surprised at this development. E was born with the strangest shaped big toes I've ever seen on a person, and the real surprise is that we haven't faced something like this sooner.
So, last night, after bath time, his father tried to "do something" about it. I had known he was going to do this, and had hoped that he would let me know before he started, but instead I was alerted to the "something" by the shrill screaming that began to emanate from E's bedroom. When I got upstairs Josh was sitting on the edge of the bed with E's left leg clamped firmly under his right arm. E was pushing on Josh's back with his other foot, and laying back on the bed, a Thomas train playing card clutched in each hand, and he was SCREAMING. Heartbreaking, earsplitting screaming. Screaming as I had never heard from this child, not even as an angry infant. Tears running down his face, breath hitching, the whole thing.
Then I realized with a start that there were also tears streaming down Josh's face as he diligently worked at E's toe.
E's dad is a huge man. He's 6'6", broad shouldered, bearded, and slings boxes around all day for a living. when E was a tiny infant, Josh used those microscopic infant clippers they give you to try and cut E's fingernails, and ended up cutting into the tip of one of E's fingers. He was shaken when that happened, but I've never seen him quite as upset as he was last night.
I probably shouldn't be surprised at anything Josh does anymore, but somehow I found that I was surprised. And moved. We do thing together, he and I, as a team. And as stoic as he can be, I need to remember that all the pain and anger and anxiety I have as a parent lurks in him below the surface as well.
PS: We took E to the doctor today, and the doctor just told us to continue to soak it. That's money we could have saved.
So, last night, after bath time, his father tried to "do something" about it. I had known he was going to do this, and had hoped that he would let me know before he started, but instead I was alerted to the "something" by the shrill screaming that began to emanate from E's bedroom. When I got upstairs Josh was sitting on the edge of the bed with E's left leg clamped firmly under his right arm. E was pushing on Josh's back with his other foot, and laying back on the bed, a Thomas train playing card clutched in each hand, and he was SCREAMING. Heartbreaking, earsplitting screaming. Screaming as I had never heard from this child, not even as an angry infant. Tears running down his face, breath hitching, the whole thing.
Then I realized with a start that there were also tears streaming down Josh's face as he diligently worked at E's toe.
E's dad is a huge man. He's 6'6", broad shouldered, bearded, and slings boxes around all day for a living. when E was a tiny infant, Josh used those microscopic infant clippers they give you to try and cut E's fingernails, and ended up cutting into the tip of one of E's fingers. He was shaken when that happened, but I've never seen him quite as upset as he was last night.
I probably shouldn't be surprised at anything Josh does anymore, but somehow I found that I was surprised. And moved. We do thing together, he and I, as a team. And as stoic as he can be, I need to remember that all the pain and anger and anxiety I have as a parent lurks in him below the surface as well.
PS: We took E to the doctor today, and the doctor just told us to continue to soak it. That's money we could have saved.
"Heaven is not a place, and it is not a time. Heaven is being perfect.” - R Bach
September 13, 2010
Saturday, while walking in the park, we saw a dead seagull.
All white in the green grass, looking for all the world as if it had tumbled directly out of a tree and landed inches from the trunk. It was unmarked, its wings half folded like the eagle on the back of the quarter, head turned to the left, beak open.
E and his father were so busy watching the antics of a squirrel a little way ahead of us that I think they would have stepped on it had I not said something.
We, of course, tried to bustle E around it, but as we passed it he turned and craned his neck for a good long look. I found out later he knew its eyes were closed, which is something I had not noticed.
I don't think E has ever seen anything dead before, certainly not anything larger than a bug. I was not surprised he had questions - why is it dead, how did it die, where is its family? - what really surprised me was our inability to answer his questions to either his or our satisfaction.
Given the events of our week (I had been ill, in the hospital for a couple of days) "it got sick and died" wasn't really a good answer. Josh ventured that it might have been hit by a car, but E noted (logically) that it wasn't in the road, but was rather far from the road, near a tree. I talked with him some about steam engines, and how their parts wear out and need to be replaced, but parts on people and animals can't be replaced (an oversimplification). I talked with him about how no one knows what happen when you die, how Sarah or his Grandmother might say you go to heaven (yes, even seagulls) but that no one really knows - but that I was sure that nothing hurt after you died, and that no one was lonely.
He seemed very concerned that it would be lonely, laying there in the field. Concerned that its seagull family would be looking for it, but also that it would miss them, that it would have no one to play with. This is an ongoing theme with him, Strange, I think, for a child who has other people around him constantly - this fear of being alone, of loneliness - although as I look back now I suppose you could call my only-child childhood lonely as well. But E's driving concern is that no one he loves (parents, toys) be lonely. Its the reason I still co-sleep with him almost every night, the reason its important to him that someone be in the room with him, his concern about his grandmother (who lives alone) and his primary concern about me in the hospital (that I would be lonely, with only the doctors and nurses to keep me company - "but no one to sleep with" he says). Its the reason he has three "best toys" so that one can be with him while the other two keep each other company. It comes up, daily, and I don't know where it comes from, but its a strange dark hole inside my otherwise joyful little boy.
All white in the green grass, looking for all the world as if it had tumbled directly out of a tree and landed inches from the trunk. It was unmarked, its wings half folded like the eagle on the back of the quarter, head turned to the left, beak open.
E and his father were so busy watching the antics of a squirrel a little way ahead of us that I think they would have stepped on it had I not said something.
We, of course, tried to bustle E around it, but as we passed it he turned and craned his neck for a good long look. I found out later he knew its eyes were closed, which is something I had not noticed.
I don't think E has ever seen anything dead before, certainly not anything larger than a bug. I was not surprised he had questions - why is it dead, how did it die, where is its family? - what really surprised me was our inability to answer his questions to either his or our satisfaction.
Given the events of our week (I had been ill, in the hospital for a couple of days) "it got sick and died" wasn't really a good answer. Josh ventured that it might have been hit by a car, but E noted (logically) that it wasn't in the road, but was rather far from the road, near a tree. I talked with him some about steam engines, and how their parts wear out and need to be replaced, but parts on people and animals can't be replaced (an oversimplification). I talked with him about how no one knows what happen when you die, how Sarah or his Grandmother might say you go to heaven (yes, even seagulls) but that no one really knows - but that I was sure that nothing hurt after you died, and that no one was lonely.
He seemed very concerned that it would be lonely, laying there in the field. Concerned that its seagull family would be looking for it, but also that it would miss them, that it would have no one to play with. This is an ongoing theme with him, Strange, I think, for a child who has other people around him constantly - this fear of being alone, of loneliness - although as I look back now I suppose you could call my only-child childhood lonely as well. But E's driving concern is that no one he loves (parents, toys) be lonely. Its the reason I still co-sleep with him almost every night, the reason its important to him that someone be in the room with him, his concern about his grandmother (who lives alone) and his primary concern about me in the hospital (that I would be lonely, with only the doctors and nurses to keep me company - "but no one to sleep with" he says). Its the reason he has three "best toys" so that one can be with him while the other two keep each other company. It comes up, daily, and I don't know where it comes from, but its a strange dark hole inside my otherwise joyful little boy.
But more wonderful than the lore of old men and the lore of books is the secret lore of ocean. - Lovecraft
June 18, 2010
Wednesday night we took E up to Popham to spend a few days with my mom at a cottage she is renting there. He's told us steadfastly for days that he doesn't want to go, but he's a kid that has trouble with change and spending days on that beach is one of my favorite childhood memories, so our hope was that he'd like it once he got there.
There has been terrible (and totally natural) beach erosion at Popham Beach State Park in the past couple of years (Very interesting MPBN piece on the how's and why's of this) but the "private" part of the beach is untouched. However, the beach is empty. EMPTY. My mom says she's probably seen less than 100 people enjoying the beach for the entire week she's been there (including last weekend). Which is sad, but also kind of good from a "hey I get to play on this wide open beach" perspective.
Over the past two days I think I've done well. I called her five times yesterday but only once today. It was a rainy day yesterday, so they did rainy day things (like visit the fort). Today, however, is glorious and my mom says she has trouble getting him out of the water. Josh and I went to dinner with friends last night and will again tonight. Our house is achingly empty without the E there - in some ways its like a time warp, just Josh and I together, but there is an astonishingly large hole in our lives without The Little Boy.
I have to admit that there is a growing part of me that thinks its important that E had this time at the ocean, and I'm praying he remembers it. Because I'm not convinced that a year from now the ocean will still be swimable. Or five years, even.
There has been terrible (and totally natural) beach erosion at Popham Beach State Park in the past couple of years (Very interesting MPBN piece on the how's and why's of this) but the "private" part of the beach is untouched. However, the beach is empty. EMPTY. My mom says she's probably seen less than 100 people enjoying the beach for the entire week she's been there (including last weekend). Which is sad, but also kind of good from a "hey I get to play on this wide open beach" perspective.
Over the past two days I think I've done well. I called her five times yesterday but only once today. It was a rainy day yesterday, so they did rainy day things (like visit the fort). Today, however, is glorious and my mom says she has trouble getting him out of the water. Josh and I went to dinner with friends last night and will again tonight. Our house is achingly empty without the E there - in some ways its like a time warp, just Josh and I together, but there is an astonishingly large hole in our lives without The Little Boy.
I have to admit that there is a growing part of me that thinks its important that E had this time at the ocean, and I'm praying he remembers it. Because I'm not convinced that a year from now the ocean will still be swimable. Or five years, even.
The Grass is Always Greener....
May 12, 2010
How Michelle Obama Made Me a Bad Mother
(No, not me personally). An interesting set of thoughts on one woman's work/life balance.
(No, not me personally). An interesting set of thoughts on one woman's work/life balance.
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