wilting

The seven year old is home with his third case of strep throat since January. He started his medicine yesterday but can’t go back to school until Monday. He was feeling better today so I took him to breakfast at McDonald’s this morning (“Why do they want to hire smiling faces, Mom?”). I reached across the booth to butter his pancakes. He insisted the pancake on the bottom be buttered again because I’d not spread the butter to every edge as I had on the top pancake.

Afterward we went to the post office (“How much do you think this package weighs, Mom?”) and to the grocery store (“Can we make a fruit salad, Mom?”). I like to have fresh flowers for the dining room table and I let him pick them out today. I held three bunches of daisies out–red, yellow, and white–for his consideration. “What about these?” He wrinkled his nose, “I don’t like the white.” He picked two bunches of purple irises instead and I nodded appreciatively. We contemplated adding some statice to the arrangement but both agreed the irises needed no complement.

We had the irises scooped into our arms when some pots of cheerful tulips caught our eye. I felt, suddenly, like I couldn’t bear to take the irises home. No matter how beautiful they seemed, there was no escaping that they were, in fact, dead.

How does it happen that such a thing can make my stomach ache?

My son chose some pink tulips–not the color I’d have chosen but that’s neither here nor there– and we headed home. He was tired and I wasn’t feeling so great myself (sore throat and headache), so we took a nap. I slept the heavy, weighted sleep of a troubled person.

Was it the irises that caused my unease? No, of course not.

It’s the still-frequent ache in my pelvis six weeks after my surgery. It’s the fact that my recovery hasn’t been all that smooth. It’s that I am so far behind at work that I may never catch up–except I have to, because there’s no one else to help me. It’s that my husband is under a tremendous amount of pressure right now and I’m seeing less of him than I’d like. It’s that my son keeps getting strep throat and I worry about him. There are other things.

***

I cooked dinner tonight. I peeled and cubed potatoes and set them to boil while I worked on the fruit salad that my little boy asked for. I filled the sink with cold water and added some baking soda in order to soak the wax off of the fruit. I peeled and sliced kiwi and mango. I added blackberries and strawberries. I cubed red and green apples and handed chunks of them to my child as he looked on. He ambled into the family room and turned on the TV. I admonished him (he’d been in front of the TV far too much today!), and became distracted and stabbed myself in the finger with the paring knife in my hand. I yelped and blinked back tears.

My husband set the table and fixed drinks while I drained the potatoes, added butter, milk, salt and pepper. I opened several kitchen drawers in succession and wondered aloud where the beaters for the mixer had disappeared! My husband opened the drawer I’d just searched and quietly produced the beaters. I accepted them from his outstretched hand and looked around the kitchen again, almost frantically. In answer to Brad’s curious look, “Now I can’t find the mixer!”

“Honey, it’s right in front of you, on the counter.”

And with that, I just leaned into him. Right into the hollow of his shoulder. I rubbed my cheek against his T-shirt and tried to just . . . breathe. And he put his arms around me, kissed my temple near my hairline, and let me just breathe.

Something inside me unfurled. My stomach ache became more of a butterfly feeling. I remembered for a moment who I am when I am not recovering from surgery and worrying about work and being uber-cautious with my child’s health.

There’ll be another day when the thought of a beautiful flower wilting and dying will completely undo me. But God willing, there’ll also be a shoulder to lean against at the end of the day that happens to be attached to a man who loves me, even when I can’t see what’s right in front of my face.

Trip to the Art Museum by Bump*

I felt excited as we entered the bus to go to the art museum.  I couldn’t wait to get off and look at the amazing art and photography.

As we walked in, I noticed amazing scuptures in the lobby, such as a man with different colored skin and a strange hat.  We talked about how old some paintings are, such as five hundred years old!

When we entered the gallery there were lights that shown upon the marzoles (?) paintings.  The room had benches at every large painting.

My favorite one was the carp and the cape.  It showed so much detail that the fish looked real!  It had two side dishes, oyster and bread.  The background had pots and pans.

When we got to the next gallery it was large and without color.  It had many pictures of different speicies.  My favorite was the chamillian partly because I have one!

I never had so much fun!

*He made a 100%

seven

Despite the fact that I always swore I’d birth only female children because God wouldn’t be so cruel as to make me raise stinky boys and despite the fact that I cried when my sonographer told me my oldest child was a boy, I must say that I have taken well to mothering male children.

One of the things I love most about boys is how much they love their mothers. It seems to me that mother-daughter relationships are often very close but also can be very tense and dramatic and emotional. I like it that the relationships between me and my boys stay on a mostly even keel. Things are fairly mellow around here.

My youngest son is especially devoted to me. He loves hanging out with me. He still scrambles up into my lap to read books and watch TV. I’ve spent a lot of time propped up in bed since my hysterectomy and he often bustles through the door with crayons, paper and coloring books and we draw and color pictures together. He especially likes to watch me play Scrabulous and has actually come up with some pretty high-scoring words.

He ambled in my room after school this afternoon when I’d just finished chatting with a friend via webcam. We sat for a while making funny faces into the camera. He was being especially sweet at one point so I stealthily snapped some pictures.

And the main reason I did so, is because he turns seven years old tomorrow and I just wanted to freeze his six-year old sweetness and happiness and mommy-love in time.

writing and living

I want to write.  I try to write.

I smile indulgently when the 10 year old Googles the lizards he finds in the backyard to see if the climate in his terrarium might be right for them and I consider writing about his inquisitive nature and his strong sense of responsibility and the pride he takes in caring for his critters, one of which is a chameleon that he purchased with his birthday money.

I contemplate topics while eating Green Chile Stew with cheese melted over the top while our snowman stands squinting forlornly at the patches of grass exposed by the melting snow.

As I soak in the jacuzzi, reading a book by the light of my milk, honey and oatmeal scented candle, I ask myself if I should try to write something witty or something meaningful or something vague and obtuse that has meaning only for me and a few others who know me well.

I wonder, as I step onto the heated tile floor and dry myself with a toasty towel pulled from my newly purchased heated towel rack, if I should write about how comfortable and plushy my life is and how I know I am lucky — I really do.

I lean against the headboard as the 6 year old leans into the crook of my arm and reads his library book with a quiet determination and I think I should write about how I am still struck with love every time I study the roundness of his pink cheeks or the way his eyelashes fan across them when he sleeps.

I prop myself against all of my fluffy pillows and watch a movie on the flat screen TV mounted on the wall across from my bed (that was an early Christmas present for my husband) and I think I might write about how much I love the climate in my bedroom–the textures and deep colors, the high leather headboard, heated mattress pad, the ceiling fan with its remote control that dims the lights and controls the fan speed.

Then, I tuck my kids in to bed and kiss them good night.  I curl up on the couch next to my husband and he casually rubs my feet, strokes my leg, plays with my fingers as we watch Heroes.

Later, I crawl back into my queenly bed, thinking I will take a few minutes to write something –anything– before falling asleep.  Brad scooches over and drapes his arm across my stomach.  I lightly scratch his back and we murmur little things about our day to each other.

And I close the lid to my laptop.  Writing can wait for another day or another handful of days.

Living can not.

on commandos and zombies and being the mom

I picked the kids up from school on Halloween and they could talk of nothing else but the Halloween carnival we would be attending later in the evening. Heck, even I was excited about Halloween after the third grade teacher for whom I run copies every Monday morning handed me a festively packaged jack-o-lantern votive with a handful of Reese’s miniature cups thrown in as a token of gratitude. (Reese’s peanut butter cups. Yummmmmm.)

We sat drinking our sodas together as we de-briefed the day’s events and I yawned and teased, “Goodness, I’m sleepy. How ’bout I go to bed and you and Daddy go to the carnival without me.” The fifth grader hesitated not at all, “Nope. You’re going.” I asked why and he replied, “Because you’re the mom and I want you with me.”

I know it’s a little thing but I was pleased that my children know that having a mom means having someone to spend time with and to take them to fun places. It made me feel like I have done a good job all these years even when I was so tired that I was just going through the motions. It made me wonder if it’s going through the motions even when I feel like I can’t that makes the difference.

At the carnival, we stood in line at the snack counter and I considered whether or not I wanted a coke. Nope, I decided. I don’t want to carry a cold drink around to make me even colder than I already am. Naturally, the first thing that happened after walking away from the snack counter was that the first grader gave me his cold soda to hold while he rode a ride — and he failed to retrieve it afterward.

We played laser tag, we participated in the cake walk, we threw footballs at a board with holes sawed in the middle (I made it, Brad didn’t), we ate funnel cakes and popcorn and nachos and turkey legs, we listened to the karaoke contest.

And we did it all together. Because I’m the mom. Because we’re a family.

Because that’s the way it should be.

logic

My six year old’s powers of logic amaze me. Seriously, he is so intelligent and quick to catch on to things that it is sometimes scary. He does it all the time but usually my mouth is hanging open and I am so awestruck that I forget to take a mental note of exactly what it was he said that was so impressive to me.

Tonight as we read If You Give a Mouse a Cookie by Laura Joffe Numeroff, he was perplexed by this part:

If you give a mouse a cookie

he’s going to ask for a glass of milk.

When you give him the milk,

he’ll probably ask you for a straw.

When he’s finished, he’ll ask for a napkin.

Then he’ll want to look in a mirror

to make sure he doesn’t

have a milk mustache.

The child waited until I had finished reading the book before he frowned slightly and remarked, “That doesn’t make any sense.”

“What doesn’t make any sense, little one?”

“If he drank his milk through a straw,” he mused, “Why on earth would he think he might have a milk mustache?”

I opened my mouth to speak, closed it, opened it again and said, “Why indeed?”

He frowned once more, shrugged his shoulders as if to say, People can be so silly! and kissed me goodnight.

I’ve read that book to my older son a million times. Why did I never think to question how a mouse would get a milk mustache when he drank milk from a straw?

Why indeed.

sweeter

So.

I pull into the pick-up lane at school this afternoon. It’s the one designated for parents to pull up, let the kids hop in, and pull away again. There’s no parking allowed. Bump walked to the car alone and I held up my hands in the, “Where’s your brother?” body language. Because he’s actually forgotten that he has a brother several times this year. Seriously. He gets in the car and I say, “Where’s your brother?” He looks at me blankly for a sec and then exclaims, “Oh, yeah!” and runs over to the first grade line to get Crash.

Anyway, so he signals for me to roll down the window and says, “Crash’s teacher says she has some news for you.” I sigh a little. I was sick today. I managed to throw a little bit of make-up on before I left the house but I am wearing a pair of shorts and a gray cami tank without the appropriate undergarment required for being seen in public. But I pull to the other curb anyway, grab a little fleece jacket from the backseat and pull it on over my tank despite the fact that it is 90 degrees outside.

She was chatting with the other teachers and smiled when I walked up to them. She pulled me aside, grinned mysteriously and stage whispered, “Crash doesn’t know it yet, but he made a 100 on his Spelling test today.”

It took a few seconds for it to sink in. When it did, I felt a smile spread across my face and I held up my hand and gave the teacher a high five. I looked down at my son, who was sitting cross-legged on the grass with his classmates, oblivious of his accomplishment. He sensed my presence and turned his little face up to me, “Mom! Hi Mom!” I bent down for my customary after-school hug and he held his arms wrapped around my neck even as I straightened back up. He giggled and buried his face against my shirt when his feet swung up off of the ground.

I wanted so badly to tell him that he’d made a perfect grade on his Spelling test. He’s been working so hard to learn to read and spell. Last week, he thought he’d only missed one word and was a little crestfallen to learn he’d missed three.

The three of us went out for ice cream. Pink bubble gum for Crash, chocolate almond for Bump, and chocolate chip for me. As he scraped at his ice cream with his little taster spoon, I asked him, “How do you think you did on your Spelling test today?” He smacked his lips and said, “I think I made a 90. I think I missed one.”

That’s why I won’t tell him that he made a 100%. I want him to be pleasantly surprised when his teacher hands the test back to him. I want to see the look of triumph in his eye when he proudly presents his perfect grade to me after school.

We will celebrate with ice cream again on Monday. I suspect it will taste all the sweeter to him.

conversation with the 6 year old

Crash: Mom, what was your favorite game when you were little?

Me: Hmmmm, I liked Hungry, Hungry Hippos.

Crash: No. I mean, once you had electricity.

The Great Virtual Breast Fest

Breastfeeding my children is at the top of my list of the most beautiful, amazing, miraculous experiences of my life. Despite being a young mother, I knew from the moment I saw the positive pregnancy test that I would breastfeed. Always a voracious reader, I had already devoured every pregnancy and parenting book I could get my hands on and was determined to give my child all of the health benefits that breastfeeding could provide. Not to mention the fact that I was determined to return to my pre-pregnancy size PDQ and breastfeeding moms lose baby weight easier than non-breastfeeding moms. Or so they say.

My first attempts at breastfeeding were clumsy and awkward. My oldest son didn’t just instinctively latch on. No matter how I positioned him, it seemed impossible for him to nurse. My mother-in-law saw my frustration grow and gave me the benefit of her experience by reaching over and cupping my breast in her hand and guiding my son’s mouth to it at the same time. It was magic. I never had trouble with him latching on again after that.

That experience, embarrassing as it could have been — I mean, it’s not every day I let a family member cup my breast in their hand– brought home to me the beauty of motherhood and power of womanhood. I realized that no pregnancy book or parenting book or lactation book could bestow upon me the wisdom that comes with experience or the instinct that’s been built into mothers by God. I felt connected to all of the women who’d felt the pins and needles, tingly sensation of milk letting down as their babies softly rooted against their breast. I felt connected to all mothers past, present and future.

My oldest son weaned himself from the breast at ten months and it was a sad day for me. I would have nursed him longer than that. It was our time. I rarely multi-tasked or watched TV while breastfeeding. Instead, I preferred to look down at his tiny face. I loved it when he was wide awake and his big, blue eyes blinked up at me and his little hands clutched at my breast or, later, gently tugged at my long hair. I loved it when he nursed himself to sleep and I got to see his face in repose, his silky eyelashes fanned against his baby cheeks, his forehead smooth. That his baby’s instinct kept him sucking at my breast even when he was deeply asleep seemed a wonder to me.

I was magical. I was a giver of life. I didn’t have to do anything but eat reasonably healthfully. My body knew what to do. I could hear my baby sigh in his sleep and my milk would let down. My mother’s body instinctively pushed my baby’s nourishment to the top of its priority list. To try to ignore it would be to experience achy, heavy breasts and milk-soaked blouses. Even if I hadn’t already been willing to step up to the plate and put my child’s needs before my own, my body would have done it anyway.

I don’t understand why anyone would sexualize breastfeeding or demonize women who breastfeed in public. I had a lightweight little nursing cape that snapped around my neck and covered my breast and my son’s head when he nursed in public but there were times when I forgot to pack it in the diaper bag and it certainly didn’t stop me from feeding my child–no matter where we were. I was always discrete. I got a few uncomfortable glances–mostly from men– but never faced any overt hostility.

I guess I was just lucky because it would seem that many other mothers have been and are still currently being harassed and persecuted for exercising their legal right to breastfeed their child in public. Facebook has banned photos of children at their mothers’ breasts. Bill Maher has stepped in doo-doo (he has no idea how deep) by condemning those who would dare to feed their child from nature’s oldest bottle, the BREAST, in public. Read more about it here.

To anyone who is immature enough to make it all about boobs and sex, I say, Grow Up. To anyone who is uncomfortable seeing a woman’s breast (or the little bit of flesh not obscured by a feeding child’s head), I say, Get Counseling; You Probably Suckled At Your Mother’s Breast Too.

Mostly, to anyone who has a problem with breastfeeding in any way, shape or form: Pffffffffffffffffffffffffttttt! Get a Life.

And SUCK THIS!

away he goes

The 2007-08 school year has been rough for our family thus far. On registration day, I was rear-ended in traffic, the babysitter canceled due to an emergency, and I had an alpha female stand-off with the principal over my son’s transfer status.

On Meet The Teacher day, I took the kids to the doctor for a routine checkup and the first grader ended up having several tubes of blood drawn and an abdominal ultrasound because the doctor thought he had liver disease based on a high urine bilirubin.

I have to believe that such speed bumps were ominous because this year so far? Elementary school has beat the stuffing out of me.

The situation that has caused me the most frustration and heartbreak has been that my first grader can’t read. And yes, I know that lots of first graders can’t read. But he has been at the bottom of his class in every reading benchmark that has been administered. (But he’s aced every benchmark test for Math.)

I have been meeting with his teacher twice a week. She’s giving him extra instruction in the classroom and I am trying alternative learning methods and interventions at home. I’ve made appointments with eye doctors and asked the school counselor for help.

More than once (many, many times more than once), Brad has came home from work to find me in tears after spending hours helping Crash with his Spelling and Reading homework and making no progress.

But.

The night before last, something seemed to click for Crash. We sat down on the couch with his library book, took a deep breath, and . . . he started reading. Just like that. Oh, it took him awhile, he had to work hard to sound out many of the words, and he still has trouble with the “w” and “u” sounds.

But still. He was reading.

The importance and excitement of the moment was not lost on Crash, either. The phone rang once or twice but he didn’t pause in his reading even while I was talking to someone else. He just kept following the text across the page with his little finger and every “s” sound whistled through the gap where his bottom tooth used to be only a few days ago.

He leaned against me and lisped,

Away I go.

Away I go,

To see what I can see.

Indeed, little one.

Away you go.

And I couldn’t be more proud.