It won't be long now before those reparations are a reality

May 2009

That was then.

 This is now.

The President, Faculty, and Board of Trustees Of Brenau University announce that Chloe Francesca Pamela is a candidate for the degree of Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Arts during the Graduation Exercises Friday, May third, Two Thousand Thirteen At Four-thirty in the afternoon at Brenau University Front Lawn Gainesville, Georgia.

Congratulations, Chloe, on this achievement. It looks like next fall she'll be heading up to the University of New Hampshire to attend their School of Law. I'm so proud I can barely stand myself. And I may just say phew! One down. Two to go.

By years, by inches

Euharlee, Georgia
January 7, 2013
4:44 p.m.

Dear Sophia,

So now you are fourteen. As you reminded me this morning, this time next year you will be pestering Daddy and me to take you to the Department of Motor Vehicles to apply for your learner's permit. But before we plunge into the future, please give me a minute to savor the past. Your past. My past as your mother.

When you were little - oh, three and four years old - I called you boots because you wore nothing but dresses and tights and cowgirl boots. I wasn 't working outside the home so we spent so much time together. You called them our Mommy/Sophie days.

I can still see you sitting at the dining room table in the tiny house in Illinois, eating chicken soup with rice. You insisted on it nearly every day because you loved the Maurice Sendak book. When  you finished, you jumped up and raced around the house singing "hoot hoot zoo pals" and laughing until you were ready for a nap. Or, more truthfully, when I was ready for you to nap.

Back then, we spent an extraordinary amount of time in our minivan where we listened to Jan Brett's The Owl and the Pussycat, rewinding over and over when the piggy says "I will" over and over because it made you laugh. And that made me laugh.

And then when I wasn't looking because I was distracted by cleaning or gardening or running away from home or working or, ahem, blogging, you grew up and up and up until you were taller than me.

And now you're this person who asks tough questions and who makes me think about what it means to be creative and how it feels to find your place in the world. You are witty and draining and manipulative and gentle. Emotionally, you are far more demanding than your siblings. Chloe has a much larger personal bubble and Nathan is a guy. I should neither oversimplify nor compare the three of you, but there is the truth unvarnished and impossible to ignore.

The older you get, the more I go back to my memories of you as a little girl so that I can hold on while you move away to become your own person, independent and confident, intelligent, creative and beautiful.

Recently, we were working together in the kitchen.

"Remember how I used to have to stand on a chair to reach the counter?" You asked.

I remember.

Happy birthday, Sophia.

Love,

Mom

Adventures in Real Parenting: I feel stupid and contagious

"This is a rotting cesspool of social anxieties with an overwhelming smell of adolescence."

This comes from a text I recently received from my precious 13 year old. I'm applying the adjective precious loosely.

She's in the throes of adolescence so I'm surprised, quite frankly, that she can detect the smell of it. Some days it's easier to like her than other days. She's smart and stubborn. A loner who doesn't want to be alone. Unconventional, but sensitive to the reaction of others. A Jew without any religious training frustrated that her school holds its Meet Me at the Pole religious service every year on Yom Kippur, but refuses to speak to her class about Hanukkah when given the opportunity.

My hugs could easily metamorphose into throttles for the ways this child stretches my patience well beyond where it's been pulled before.

I remember telling my mother that I hated her, but loved my boyfriend. Testing my limits with alcohol and cigarettes and hungering to be recognized as the grown up I thought I was.

And yet, there I was, lip-syncing I Will Survive into a hairbrush alone in my bedroom while Andy Gibb peered down, shirtless and tan from my wall when I was home alone.

Oh yes. That.

Suddenly, a little teen angst doesn't seem so annoying. She's on the swim team not choosing between menthol or regular Virginia Slims. She's learning how to make a rag rug out of old t-shirts, not acquiring a taste for beer. She's not hating me with the fury of a thousand Justin Beiber fans.

It could be so much worse.

Adventures in Real Parenting: What comes around

When I was a teenager, I was full of ideas about what my life would be like. My mother would glance up from her novel and listen as I laid out my plans for a beautiful life unmarred by children or husbands or society's silly, oppressive rules.

A perfect apartment in a city wonderland. All white furniture, white carpet. No clutter. No avocado appliances. And for the love of god, no Early American decor.

As I got a older my plans shifted to include a husband with a great job. Travel. Fabulous careers. Eventually plans for children - two, perfect in every way - sneaked in. By the time my first college boyfriend and I had secretly moved in together, we'd already picked out names for our future children - a boy and a girl.

Naturally, I became a pre-child, child-rearing expert and I took a sick pleasure in listing how I would be a different kind of parent. I'd never spank, yell at or nag my children. Furthermore, my life would be so much better, so much more organized and enviable.  My house would always be clean, my emotions in check and my attention unwavering.

Most of the time, my mother's response to my prattling on remained unchanged. She gave a little smirk, a chuckle perhaps, a slight shake of her head. She wasn't taking the bait.

But every once in while, she couldn't help herself. Uh huh, she'd say. We'll see how that turns out. Later, I imagine, when she was alone with my father, she said something like "That Lisa is a piece of of work....."

Now the smirk is on the other face.

Sophie has suddenly started talking about her fabulous future. Her family is going to have traditional holidays. They're going to dress in matching outfits and take photos for holiday cards. Big dinners. Vacations. Game night. Okay, I made that last one up, but it's only a matter of time before she says that.

Like I was a mildly OCD sufferer bucking against my mother's laissez-faire attitude toward housekeeping, Sophie plans to rebel against the way we've moved away from family and let go of so many of our traditions. You practically have to hold a gun to one of the cats heads to get me to decorate for Hannukah/Christmas. The decorating and the extra activities - they become just another thing I have to do. Funnily enough, my invitation to the other family members to go crazy with the tinsel never spurs them to elvish activities.

So I don't blame Sophie for feeling the way she does.I understand it. So as she lays out her Five Point Plan for a beautiful life, I make an effort to be attentive and supportive. If I feel my eyes about to roll, I look away. A sigh about to escape my lips is swallowed.

I look around my rented, uncluttered split-level with the falling apart dark, faux leather sofa, the stained carpet and the colorful, framed travel posters (I haven't been to any of those places) on the edge of a tiny, rural Georgia village, that I share with my husband of twenty-four years, three kids and four cats and try not to laugh.

Adventures in Real Parenting: What not to shave

Summer Beauty Tip #87 - Lighten up on the lipstick

There are more Adventures in Real Parenting here.

As the youngest of three, my daughter Sophie has a few advantages.

Her father and I, who have been at this parenting thing for over twenty-two years, are tired. Worn down from enforcing rules and shouldering high expectations, we've relaxed. We're less uptight about details, less inclined to over-program or hover like we did when we were new to this adventure.

In other words, well, in the words of Sophie's two older siblings, we've given up. Sophie, in their opinion, gets away with murder.

It's not exactly murder. But a couple of years ago, when she denuded half her eyebrow with a pair of toenail clippers and then tried to glue the eyebrow back with SuperGlu, neither I nor her father shouted or made a scene. The truth is - we were laughing too hard.

But it's not all benign neglect. No. When Sophie asked to start shaving her legs, I treated the subject with seriousness. This was a big step. I remembered the eyebrow incident and my own early experiences with shaving my legs. 

We recently talked about it.

Sophie:  Mom, do you remember when I wanted to shave my legs and you didn't want to let me because you thought once I started, I wouldn't want to stick with it?

Me:  I do. I was worried it would turn out like needlepoint. Or basketball. You know how that went.

Sophie:  I quit those things.

Me:  Exactly.

Sophie:  Kind of like you writing your novel.

Me:  Yes. Thank you for reminding me.

Sophie:  Do you remember how you grossed me out by telling me about what not to shave?

Me:  I grossed you out?

Sophie:  How could you forget?

Me:  I can't believe I talked to you about that.

Sophie:  Mom! Not that. You told me not to shave my toes or my belly button.

Me:  Oh. Right. I'm glad I told you those things. It will save you aggravation in the future.

Sophie:  Why did you shave your toes in the first place? Were your feet that hairy?

Me:  Like a Hobbit. Or so I thought when I was twelve.

Sophie: That's really weird. 

Me:  I didn't like wearing sandals with hairy toes.

Sophie: So what about your belly button? You shaved that?

Me: Yeah.

Sophie:  Why?

Me:  Well, you know how I liked to make my aunt laugh by making my belly button talk?

Sophie:  Yes. You told us about that.

Me: I didn't want my talking belly button to be all fuzzy.

Sophie:  That's even stranger than the toes.

Me:  Which part? The shaved belly button or the talking belly button?

When Sophie decided that she was ready to shave and keep it up so that she wouldn't be a stubbly monster, we got her her own razor. I was using a Venus razor and she picked out the Venus Embrace because it has a Ribbon of Moisture that helps the razor glide over the skin to help minimize the chance for nicks.

Sophie also likes the Soft Grip handle because it has great grip when she shaves in the shower. I like the replacement heads because they're easy to get off and on.

We were all set. I demonstrated on my leg, showing her how to be especially careful on her knees and around her ankles. I reminded her that the shinbone can be a tricky spot as well.

If you have a someone in your house who might be ready to shave soon, here's a link you might find helpful.

Venus is sponsoring a sweepstakes here at That's Why. Enter to win a $50 Visa Gift Card by answering the following question in comments: 

"What's the best beauty tip you have shared with your daughter to prepare her for the summer or share your funniest beauty mishap for the chance to win a $50 gift card!”

This sweepstakes isn't limited to the females among us. I mean, my dad once offered me the best summer beauty tip of all.

"Don't stay out in the sun too long," he warned. "Or you'll ruin your skin."  

But that's a blog post for another day.

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Abdication

Dear Children:

Today I shall read a book. All day. Go ahead and laugh. You don't believe I will or can do it, but my goal is to do what my friends do - read a book in a day.

Let this serve as notice. This will be me doing something for me. All that is required of you is to entertain yourselves and leave me alone. Forbidden activities include, but are not limited to:  Finding me wherever I may be and staring at me. Screaming matches outside my closed door. Text messages and/or phone calls.

There are a limited number of reasons for which you may approach me. They are:

1. Fire that you cannot put out on your own.
2. Arterial blood.
3. Someone ringing the doorbell while holding an enlarged check with lots of zeros at the end. 


Note:  You should involve me only if your father is unavailable. Unavailable is defined as: 1) Away from the house; 2) Comatose; 3) The person gushing arterial blood or; 4) What is on fire.


If this warning is not enough, let me be clear. I don't want to hear from you. At all. I know that our views on what constitutes a legitimate need differ so here is a short list of what I do not consider worthy of my attention.


Hunger. Boredom. Exasperation with another sibling. Exasperation with your father. Exasperation with me.  Flea bites. Hungry cats. Lack of clean laundry. Lack of  "food" (read: junk food). The weather. The parsimonious thermostat setting The fact that summer is coming to a swift end and we still haven't done anything fun. The lack of money.


Take a good look at that list. You are all old enough to handle these issues. Telling me about them instead of simply dealing with them in a positive manner reminds me that I've been a failure as a mother and that is not conducive to happy reading. I will become angry at myself which will transform into angry at you which will manifest as slammed doors and shouting of things a mother should never say to a child.


Let's prevent that because it always ends in tears and I look like hell after I've cried.


If you don't think you can comply with my request, I recommend you leave the house. And no, I won't give you a ride anywhere. Look down. See those projections at the end of your legs? They're feet. Use them.


And don't forget to text your father to let him know where you've gone.


Love,
Mom

It's a lot like life

This is how this week feels. I did stuff. I ate stuff. I said some stuff. Chloe is sick, Sophie is bored, the cats are flea'd, and MathMan and Nate are baseballed.

Summer, as determined by human activities and not the calendar, is here and it's the first one since 2009 in which I won't be home with the rest of the gang. It's going to be a little strange. Good strange, as long as they don't turn the house into something fit to be featured on Hoarders.

I've banned their idea for creating a backyard demolition derby track and the scheme for the 24/7 yard sale. They can call me all the names they like. I'm not budging on these issues.

Let's just say I'll be satisfied if they're generally awake before 2pm and we don't get a visit from the PoPo, the Health Department or the Department of Family Services.

Trending! Wives. Not because we're aces at putting our needs last, but because we're THE hot book title. The Soldier's Wife. The Sniper's Wife. The Fireman's Wife. The Diplomat's Wife. The Paris Wife. The Shoemaker's Wife. The Math Teacher's Wife. Well, okay, not yet. But it could happen.

Some bits that have been lying around in my drafts waiting for a chance to embarrass themselves. Quotes heard around the house...

"You have now reached Most Favored Child status. The other two can just suck it."

"I couldn't sleep. I was buried under sixty pounds of, um.......cat. Did you hear that, sick parent? C-A-T."

"I did too take a shower.....well, I mean, I was going to take a shower......it doesn't matter, I swam yesterday."

"I figured 'why dirty a bowl?' I can eat the sherbet from this container just as easily. And look how I can balance it here on my front porch."

"You have to be pretty bored to think that taking a shower should be considered 'something to do.'"

And a bonus vignette which is a fancy word for something......

"Oh my god, you keep delivering the best lines that I can't blog because the context would be either too weird, too obscure or too embarrassing to explain."

He tossed me a glance over his shoulder.  "You're a writer. You'll figure it out."

What a wicked thing to say.

Nevertheless, he's right. Probably. But how can I set up the joke that ends with the punchline "Breast milk makes me gassy?"

Has summer started for you? What does that mean anyway? 

Adventures in Real Parenting: Safe at Home

I've been having nightmares about Trayvon Martin's killing. In the dreams, he's that fresh-faced young man in the Hollister tshirt we've seen splashed all over the media. Then he morphs into Nathan. I stand helpless, unable to move while he's pursued.

On his Monday show, Rev. Al Sharpton played the 911 tapes of the neighbors in that gated community calling to report the disturbance while Trayvon struggled with his murderer. I was not prepared to hear the screaming for help and the gunshot. I was on my way to the post office to drop off a small care package for Chloe. I imagined the horror of Trayvon's parents listening to those tapes.

My cheeks were wet as I carried the box to the door. On the other side of the glass was an African American woman on her way out. Our eyes met. She pulled the door open and stepped aside to let me pass. I thanked her.

I wanted to ask her. Did she have children. Did she have sons? Did she teach them to beware? Did they inherently know they were suspect because of their skin? I asked nothing. She kind of shrugged and turned away.

As I left, she was leaning against her car digging through her purse. I can't find my cell phone, she said. I was so upset about that young man in Florida who was shot, they were talking about it on the news. When I got out of my car, I don't know what I did with my phone.

I was just listening to a story about it, too, I said. The woman looked up from her purse. That poor child. His poor mama. I nodded and opened the car door, slipped back inside.

Thursday evening, Nate's girlfriend and I huddled together under an umbrella. A light rain fell on the batter as he took a swing. His dark skin glistened under the lights. She told me how her teacher asked if anyone knew about the Trayvon Martin case. She raised her hand and was called on to explain it to the class.

I felt so smart, she said. I knew about it.

Isn't that a great feeling? I asked and congratulated myself for doing something right. Which makes me look like a total tool. I know.

She often spends the weekends at our house, using Chloe's empty room, because she lives so far away. On Sunday mornings while I watch Up with Chris Hayes and Melissa Harris Perry, she comes into the living room and hangs out. I thought maybe she was bored by it, but last weekend, when Nate wanted to watch something else, she refused. I like watching this, she said.

She told me how the kids in her class, most of them African American, were outraged at what had happened in Sanford, Florida. Outraged, but not surprised. They're used to the attitudes that separate them from their white classmates. The Rite-Aid across from the school will only let three students into the store at a time. Not that it matters if you're black or white in that case - three students. That's it. If the school were mostly white and upper middle class, would such a rule exist?

The team was stomped. Hard. Slaughter Rule evoked hard. This was a big disappointment because they can play better. We've seen them play so much better.

After the game, they walked by looking all hang-dog. I wanted to stop each one of them and quiz them. Did they know Georgia has one of those Stand Your Ground laws? Did they realize those laws are meant to make "some" people feel safe, but it made them with their not exactly white skin vulnerable to frightened people. Frightened people who believe the law says they can shoot first and justify their fear later.

Do they know how to stay safe? Did they know that they were in more danger in a white, gated community than Nate is when he goes to their homes? Because let's not kid ourselves, if Nate gets shot by a black man  claiming self-defense, the black man is going to spend some time in a holding cell.

MathMan and I drove home and Nate and his friends went out for a bite to eat. I couldn't shake a bad feeling, a sense of something about to go wrong. Antsy and snappish. I was going to spread my misery around to anyone unfortunate enough to have contact with me. I went to my room to worry.

Nate called MathMan. He'd been rear-ended on I75. What should he do? Pull over, call 911and wait inside the car.

Nate did what MathMan said to do, pulling onto the grassy median. The other driver pulled in behind him. MathMan ended the call and went back to lesson planning. I went downstairs to keep busy. A bit later, I asked MathMan if he'd heard from Nate again. He called Nate back. He was on the speaker phone so I could hear what was happening.

While Nate explained to MathMan where exactly he was, the police arrived.

You're gonna get me killed! One of the officers was shouting. You on the phone? Get off the phone!

Yes, sir, I was talking to my father, Nate said. Then he was gone.

I closed my eyes, took a deep breath. Made a wish. Let Nate would remain respectful. A nervous kid who'd just been in a car accident being shouted out by a uniformed person with a gun and all the power. He was on his own. What happened next depended on his ability to stay calm and respectful even if the other person was neither.

I asked how much more precarious the situation would be if Nate were a kid with brown skin.

Later he told us how the officer berated him. Do you even have a license? The cop yelled. Why had he been so stupid to pull into the median? Didn't he know he was supposed to pull over to the right shoulder? Whose car was he driving? Why was he out so late?

Why be like that? Since when does serving and protecting include shouting? I mean, Nate already has a mother for that.

He got home in one piece. I could breathe again. After he went to bed, I stopped in his room to say goodnight. To tell him how much I love him, to make sure he was okay behind that mask of cool, calm, collected.

I had a million questions, but only one thought which gave me little comfort, despite the fact that my sixteen-year-old son was safe at home.

Things could have turned out so differently.

Adventures in Real Parenting: Three Tales from the Chauffeur

On Saturday, Sophie took the SAT as part of a special program through Duke University. When I arrived to pick her up, I asked how it went.

"Fine," she said. "The math part was hard, but the rest went okay."

"That's good," I responded. "Are you okay?"

"Uh huh. I just have to poo. I've had to poo since the test started."

"Why didn't you go?"

"I don't go like that in public restrooms. You know that."

She's right. I do. It's a genetic quirk passed down from mother to child that will only be cured upon entry to university dorm living and several days of constipationally induced ickyness followed by the consumption of many beers.

We drove along in uncomfortable silence for a while until I couldn't stand it anymore. "Hey, Sophie?"

"Yes?"

"Put a bird on it."

"Cacao*, mother."

************

Sophie spent the night with a friend and I as I drove to fetch her, I listened to Raw Dog Comedy on Sirisus/XM.  Patton Oswalt was doing a bit about air travel.

I arrived at the friend's house, parked the car and climbed the steps to ring the bell. Sophie came to the door balancing a plate with what was left of her breakfast.

When we got back into the car, another comedian was telling jokes about shaving his penis area and putting Nair on his balls.

"Wow," I said, "That's pretty raunchy."

"Not to mention I'm trying to eat here," Sophie grumbled.

"Yeah, penis jokes aren't really meal conversation, are they?" I asked as I pulled up at the stop sign and looked at her.

She considered at the sausage link poised between her two fingers and sighed as she dropped it back onto the plate.

***********

Sophie's tail was dragging as she ate breakfast and showered. Fearing she might miss the bus, I went to move the car into the garage so the coating of frost would melt. When I tried to release the hand brake, it wouldn't budge. MathMan was the last person to drive the car and he's like Iron Man when it comes to setting the brake.

I struggled. I broke a thumbnail. I turned off the radio - how that might help, I had no idea, but it made me feel like I was accomplishing something. I cranked the heat. I may have cursed. Nothing. Thinking that once the car warmed up, maybe the brake would release, I left the defrosters on high heat. Either way, I figured, the windows would be frost free.

When Sophie finally succumbed to my hectoring and threats to make her (gasp!) walk the mile to school, we made it out to the car. I turned the radio on and became immediately sucked into a mystery on Radio Classics.

The drop-off line at school crept. The mystery was reaching a crescendo. The inspector was about to reveal who was behind The Voice of Doom. I inched along paying careful attention to the kids crossing over from the far lane. The car in front of us paused for a couple of kids to cross. The line moved and I followed.

"Um, Mom? Are you going to let me get out?"

"Oh! Sorry." I stopped beyond the principal's parking spot so she could get out. She shook her head but said nothing.

"You're welcome!" I shouted as she closed the car door.

I drove home without mishap.

As I passed the overflowing trashcan near the door, I decided that since no one else was going to handle it (there's my personal motto if ever I had one), I would tie up the bag and put in a new one. I started to tug the heavy bag from the can and a mouse jumped out just missing me.

I screamed and wet my pants a little. The mouse, unharmed and dry, scurried behind the furnace.

The end.


*Cacao (Not safe for work)

Things you should check out because they are way cooler than this post:

Like something out of Dr. Who.

Amanda Fucking Palmer

Adventures in Real Parenting: Occupy

It's that time of year again. I'm thinking about bringing the holiday decorations up from the garage and contemplating the green and red boxes for a couple of days before finally opening them up and remembering why it's fun to have the house looking festive.

We're stocked up with Hanukkah candles this year so I'm actually ahead of the game. Now I just need to find out when Hanukkah starts.

Chloe has returned home from school and is conducting her own form of Occupy. She's occupying the living room sofa.

The cats are occupying Chloe. She's warm and that horrid Lisa keeps the thermostat set way too low for their comfort. "If we had our own laptops to keep us warm," they mew petulantly, "we wouldn't complain about the 62 degree setting either."

They are not fond of the phrase hard cheese.

Sophie, who typically is Queen of the Living Room, is occupying her mother's side. She's disgruntled that her big sister has control of the television and the cats and she's determined to keep me informed of this fact. I respond unsatisfactorily  in her opinion. Read a book, go outside, find something to do, watch Reverend Al with me, but for the love of bob, stop complaining or you will be occupying your bedroom with no electronic devices to keep you company.

I must admit, her tactics are wearing me down. Today I will likely insist on some sisterly compromise. Sophie totally gets the idea of protest. Make enough noise to get power's attention. Make change.

I'm occupying a space somewhere between optimism and freaking the fuck out. I still haven't heard about the job, but remain positive. I've got one week left before I'm one of those 99ers you hear about. I'll have exhausted my unemployment benefits.

MathMan occupies his Calculus books. Or perhaps they occupy him.

And this kid:

 Is now occupying the driver's seat. He got his license yesterday.

Your turn.

Adventures in Real Parenting: Intense

My youngest daughter and I were watching television when this commercial came on.

She cleared her throat and said, "Okay, so I get the message that it's supposed to enhance satisfaction, whatever that means, but what exactly is the point of KY?"

Blink, blink.

"Rub your hands together. See how that friction feels?"

"Uh huh."

"Okay, now imagine if you were to put some lubrication like oil on your hands, what would happen?"

She looked at her hands for a moment then said, "There would be less friction."

"Right. Do you need me to explain further? You know, you make your own. When a woman is sexually aroused---"

She cut me off. "You can stop right there. The last time we had a conversation like this, you ended up telling me about nipple clamps."


"Oh. Right. Hey, you started it. Did you need me to explain what they mean by satisfaction?"

Under her breath. "My future therapist is going to be one busy person."

You think the honey badger cares?

So Chloe, my oldest, is home for a few days on a break from school. I'm so glad to see her, but having her here means a few changes in the home dynamic.

1. Her iPhone takes up an enormous amount of broadband and thus my online activities are curtailed. This is not necessarily a bad thing. I'm getting lots done on my WIP. Thanks to the beta readers, this thing is really improving. (Thanks, betas!)

2. Chloe's presence upsets the sibling dynamic resulting in all sorts of jockeying for attention. Again, this isn't exactly a bad thing - I quite like hanging out with my kids once in a while, but there's a shelf life to sibling rivalry and I expect to reach my limit by about 6pm tomorrow. She's staying until Sunday. So....I'll be chewing Xanax and washing it down with a cheap red on Saturday. Be sure to come back and read that blog post. It promises to be a dilly.

2.1. The cats aren't sure what to do with this person who is actually interested in picking them up and carrying them around like babies. I've heard talk of dressing them in doll clothes and enacting scenes from Jane Austen novels. And the cats thought the fleas were nuisances.

3. I get to hear what's going on with Chloe and her friends. I'm sure this is heavily filtered. As it should be. I can still remember the look on my own mother's face when I tried to explain to her what a ......well, nevermind. Let's just say her response began with "Is that legal?"

4. We get to discuss Pinterest and read recipes aloud to each other. The result? A chocolate chess pie in the oven.

5. I cook more. More specifically, I bake more. (See above.)

6. I get to experience new things. Like this:

And this:

 

After that honey badger video, you'd think I wouldn't be hungry. You would be wrong. Who's ready for some pie?

30 Day Photography Challenge - Not We Are The World

When he was little, he would lay his chubby, baby-soft hands on my cheeks and say "I look like Mama" in his gravely voice. When he was about two, I put a real baseball into his outstretched hand and in return he gave me a black eye with it. Now I watch his hands steer the wheel of the car with ease. Almost a man. I see him absentmindedly pet a cat who's taken up residence on his lap as he watches Top Gear and get a glimpse of how tenderly he might treat his own child some day.

May that day be far far off. I'm just putting that out there because there's a condom on his dresser in plain sight. Better that he has one, I tell myself. It does, however, beg the question - should I ask him if he needs it every time he leaves the house? A recent search of old Ann Landers' columns holds no clues. Useless, Ann.

The house is loud when they're around. There's no mistaking it when they offer commentary for everything on the television. No one is safe from their razor sharp tongues. Not Anthony Bourdain, not arod or is it A Rod? Whatever.  If they think you're doing something wrong - and there's lots of wrong being done in this world - they're going to point and laugh and holla. With the volume cranked up to eleven.

Guys, let me take some photos of your hands.
Not like that! That's too We Are the World!
What's the statement you're trying to make, Mom?
Do a handshake.
A white guy handshake or a black guy handshake?
There's a difference?
Pay no attention to her, Torezz. She doesn't know what she's talking about.
You can't do a black guy handshake right.
Do this. No this. This. Wait. Let's do this.
Are those gang symbols?
Maybe.
Um....
We won't throw gang symbols on your blog. Jeez.

And when it was done, they took their show into the kitchen and used those hands to grate potatoes to make themselves hash browns to go with their frozen waffles and half a gallon of syrup.

UPDATED!


Randal does a cover up.
Geoffrey on what makes us - us.

UPDATED ENCORE
Summer and the little artist.

Don't Go Jason Waterfalls

Chloe goes back to school today. She's the last one to get back to some semblance of real life. Now it's just me and the cats. Sigh. Hand to the forehead. (Lisa's conscience here. If you're believing that self-pitying  hogwash, do not operate heavy machinery, try to cross the street alone, or answer any emails from Nigerian lawyers because one of those brain hamsters has sneaked out the back for a smoke break.)

I'm helping her move in today. Every year when we do this, I'm reminded of just how quickly the time passes. Considering we started out this summer break with the mess about Cambridge, things turned out pretty nicely. We hung out quite a bit and I'm really digging the grown-ass woman she's become. I'm not losing a little girl, I'm gaining a friend.

One of the best parts of the summer was a long discussion about what she remembered from her childhood. We remember different things, but I had the clear advantage of being the Mom. It was a treat to hear what she remembered and to see how it aligned or didn't with my memories.

She shared with me a little story about a song we used to listen to a lot when she was just a tiny thing. She thought the lyrics were "Don't go Jason Waterfalls....." That drew us into a rambling conversation about what it's like to want your kids to fly while you stand on the ground holding the net behind your back. You want them to know that you believe they can fly.

Which took us into another more grown up convo about chasing waterfalls versus sticking to the rivers and the lakes that you're used to. I know I pretend to be all laissez-faire and shit with my Parenting by Benign Neglect, but you have to know that it's a lot of bravado. In other words, I have a Ph.D. in Worrying. Alas, they grow and all you can do is hope they heard you you saying the right things often enough.

Even so, I'm keeping that net handy. Maybe more for me.

Steve Poltz covering TLC's Waterfalls

Miles and miles in my barefeet

I know, I know. It looks like slacking. But what if I told you I'm about 100 pages away from completing the revisions on my novel? That I plan to have the work done by Wednesday. And when that's done, I'm sending it out to a couple of readers for feedback and then the search for an agent begins in earnest. And one of those fuckers amazing  people better like this damn book enough to take me on as a client or I'm going to start copping an attitude when people ask me what I do all day.

What do you mean, what have I been doing? I've been working damn hard, thank you. A novel doesn't write itself, you know. Just like a lawn doesn't mow itself, a resume doesn't submit itself, dinner doesn't prepare itself and laundry sure as hell doesn't put itself away.

Did you ever notice how closing the deal on laundry is the hardest part? You wash it, dry it, and fold it, but everyone else thinks it's a huge fucking inconvenience to jam it into a drawer or hang it the hell up.

Which reminds me - I'm very ready for everyone to get back to school so I can have some peace and quiet after high noon. Sophie and MathMan are back to it, but Nate and Chloe remain.

Meanwhile, my new parenting mantra has become "Don't be an asshole, y'all." Charming, right? It's got its good points. It's concise. It's solid advice. No one likes an asshole, no matter what they may say to the asshole's face. I came up with that mantra a couple of days ago when the kids were conducting a reenactment of a Session of Congress.

"Don't be an asshole, y'all," I shouted from where I sat chewing my thumbnail and trying to come up with another word for wormhole.

"Mom! Nathan is acting like a Tea Partier. He won't compromise!" I'm not sure which daughter that was. They sound so alike these days.

"Don't be an asshole, Nate!"

He started to boo me, but I shut the door with my foot (my desk is strategically placed) and opened my email. It was high time someone told my Congressman Phil Gingrey (R - Dipshitville) to not be an asshole.

And besides that little foray into some high-minded parenting, I've pretty much been pointy nose to the grindstone. I am so ready to finish this book and move on to the next glacial project that I'm willing to let a bit of life pass me by while I type, type, backspace, type.

Anyway, I'm sorry I haven't been here or at your place leaving comments. I hate being all focused and out of touch, but it's better than being an asshole. I think.


What's your mantra?

Why we listen for the Calypso music

When I was a girl, the ice cream truck would come down our street at the edge of town. Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star. It's a Small World....The man smiled as he handed us our cones. We sat on the edge of our driveway, licking as fast as we could, soft serve dripping down our wrists and onto our knees.

The little girl from next door - Kelly, hair cascading straight down her back like a golden waterfall, would approach the window and hold out her hand. Mr. Ice Cream Man traded her a cone for the handful of gravel, his grin never wavering. Who could resist those big blue eyes anyway?

How are you keeping cool? What's your favorite snow cone flavor?

There's a new vintage Adventures in Real Parenting here.

Close to my heart

I've been going through old posts from PoliTits to repost now that the old blog is live again. Six years of words. It reminds me how much we've all grown. Grown means different things when applied to different people.

What makes you want to swing for the fences?

Adventures in Real Parenting: You can't do this when they're little

Wednesday is penny coupon day at the grocery store so last night I was busy getting my coupons and grocery list together. As I pawed through the Smart Source coupons I called out the more "interesting" ones to Chloe.

A housecoat? You want one of those, right? They're plaid!

 (No reply. She was too busy looking at Pets Who Want to Kill Themselves)

Oh, and Trojans! Do you need any condoms?

Not if you're buying me a housecoat.

She's right. Her anti-depressants have improved her comedic timing.

What are your favorite guilty pleasures on tumblr? Also, what do you need from the store?

Adventures in Real Parenting: Alone in a darkened room

 

As happens most summers, Chaos is once again in charge. Days go unstructured and we become the playthings of inertia. There's a lot of deciding at the last minute to do things or not do things. A lot of slow-talking about what we might could be doing if only we could get up off the couch and unglue our eyeballs from Hot in Cleveland. A lot of listening to the iPod while waiting for the inflatable kiddie pool to refill. A lot of mixing concoctions made up of the remains of the liquor cabinet. The occasional act of kindness when one of us gets up to go to the kitchen for something and offers to bring back beverages and a nosh for whomever else is lying around in the dark even in the middle of the day.

Our sleep habits are disrupted in disturbing and sinister ways. Once Doug and the kids stop having school, it's anything goes. It's kind of like living in a dorm the day before Spring Break when people are in various states of undress, inebriation and panic because they forgot to turn in their English paper that counts for ninety percent of their grade except the panic has more to do with the paying of bills than it does academics. Thankfully, strongly mixed drinks transform panic into singing and dancing on tabletops with trusted reliability.

Each of us reacts to this lack of routine differently. For example, Sophia has metamorphosed into a vampire. She stays up until I don't know when and wakes at 2:30 or 3:00 p.m. at which point she lumbers down the stairs all small-eyed and long-legged asking what's for breakfast. I look up from my book, finish chewing what's left of my afternoon protein bar and announce she's grown a bit more since I saw her at about midnight. (Petty sidenote:  This sudden litheness of body and legginess has created a sour jealousy among the other females in the household who are forced to move through this world on stubby stumps with a bit too much thigh.)

Since Sophie has become a child of the night, it's rather a good thing we continue to draw the Blackout curtains against the sun for energy efficiency purposes. Otherwise, she might turn to dust in the glare or blind us all as she stands glittering in the living room that normally gets a ton of natural light.  Pick your vampire lore, my friends.)

Anyway, I call them Blackout Curtains, but they're actually a mismatched assemblage of dark-colored sheets, duvet covers and discarded bleach-speckled shower curtains thumbtacked over the miniblinds. I've refrained from using beach towels because the backside of the now classic Budweiser can towel just screams white trash and I have my pride microscopic though it is.

I've also discovered that with a bit of patience, sobriety and certain evoked oaths, a twin-sized fitted sheet stretches perfectly over some of our window casings.

It looks like hell from inside, but our thermostat is set at 79 degrees and no one has been diagnosed with heat exhaustion yet. We did encounter some controversy over the psychological effects of the red sheet tacked over the window and filtering a disturbing red light into the room kind of like the Kenny Rogers Effect, but we eventually hit upon a reasonable solution.

When teamed with the somewhat threadbare navy blue sheet over the opposite window, the red sheet's effect is less disconcerting and more patriotic. So much so that I find myself resisting the urge to recite The Pledge of Allegiance each time I enter the bedroom.

The cats, of course, despise having their one method for reassuring themselves that there is a indeed a world beyond this dreary split-level obliterated. They're inconsolable. You can tell by all that sleeping during the day and general lack of interest in anything except sniffing one another's backsides. Which reminds me - why do they do that? In all my years as a slave to cats, I've never figured that odd habit out. I mean, these are the same five cats who have been living together for years. Regarding butt smell, what's going to change?

Anyway, kitty anti Ds are being administered and the bum sniffing as a way to constantly reacquaint themselves with one another continues unfettered by the Summertime Blues.

But I was telling you about Sophie the Creature of the Night. Yes, I'm concerned. While the neighborhood can always use another method for controlling the rat population, I don't like the idea that while her father and I sleep in the Grand Old Flag Suite, our youngest precious is wide awake watching DVDs of the original Upstairs Downstairs, playing First Person Shooter games on her iPod Touch, rearranging furniture, shopping in Chloe's closet and raiding the pantry.

Evidently, twelve year old female vampires don't crave blood. They crave JIF peanut butter straight from the jar. And they don't appreciate being nagged by their mothers to brush their fangs.

We've discussed the messed up sleep rhythms, but reached no conclusions. I'm already fretting about the nightmare it will become in early August when Sophie has to return to the routine of school. Mathman, always the pragmatist, suggests I close my trap and reminds me that at Sophie's age I, too, was a raging insomniac.

Oh, he's heard the stories about how I would lie in bed as the hours crept by. I'd entertain myself with reading by flashlight, mentally creating elaborate designs for tiny houses with not one inch of space wasted, or just counting to sixty as I tried to time it just right when the next glow in the dark number of my sister's white clock radio would flip over slower than anything I'd ever seen in my life.

He's right, of course, but I like to point out that I stayed in bed and didn't wander the house, leaving a trail of mess and peanut butter smeared spoons. My dad worked the swing shift and you never knew when he would be coming through the door. The man who worked sixteen hour days so we could wear clothes from Shillito's instead of Kmart would have had a thing or two to say about insomnia.

To be continued.......

Adventures in Real Parenting: The Generational Trekker

Source: Facebook page creeping

Twenty years ago I was hugely pregnant with Chloe and pretty much scared out of my head because I hadn't a clue about what I was going to do with a baby. She was one of those things that sounded good in theory, but as the reality drew near, I wondered how I could have ever been so arrogant to think I could raise a child. At the time I wouldn't have believed you if you'd told me I would eventually help raise three. "Yeah, right," I would have said. "Now hand me that diaper, I have to practice folding it before this baby arrives."

While I waited for Chloe to arrive, I hid my fears by having Big Ideas. I would speak to her in French. We were going with cloth diapers. None of those nasty landfill cluttering disposables for our little cherub's perfect bottom. She would be as unfamiliar with McDonalds as a child born in 1850. Every day would be a new opportunity to expose her to rich language, images and music that would set her little synapses on fire, high culture. Television? Obviously not. I was going to make her baby food when she started eating solids. I was going to nurse her until she was old enough to speak in a full sentence to ask, "Mother, may I have some coffee with this milk, please?"

The big day came. She was born at exactly 1 p.m. which was when As the World Turns came on in Chicago and so I wouldn't get to see it that day. Dang it. After suffering the indignities of being cleaned and measured, the nurse deposited Chloe into my waiting arms. Instead of that picture perfect, tears springing to your eyes moment, all I remember is thinking that when she cried in my face, her breath smelled like my favorite turkey with mayo on rye.

By the time she was two weeks old, we'd developed a mother/child rhythm that included lots of lying on the bed while she alternately dozed and nursed and I watched a lot of Designing Women and old movies on AMC. I never spoke French to her and breastfeeding ceased well before she spoke in full sentences. When Chloe was six months old, we moved in with MathMan's sister Mary and her family and suddenly Chloe's circle of influence exploded. She began clicking through the milestones so fast I could barely keep her baby book up to date. It wasn't just Mother and Daddy celebrating the firsts. It was a roomful of adults and two adolescents. Chloe found her first audience.

Although I'd failed to follow through on speaking French or daily visits to some museum, library or opera, I did manage to shield my precious darling from the evils of fast food. Her babysitter Joan introduced her to McDonald's and I only found out when we were driving by the Golden Arches and Chloe chirped from her carseat in the back "Frenfry Coke!"

Recently, as I was cleaning out the garage, I found the Rubbermaid container holding all the Happy Meal toys we collected over the years. Big ideas.

The only synapse stimulating happened when MathMan, who worked horrifically long hours at a Radio Shack back then, took Chloe on his lap and read to her from his college Trigonometry and Calculus text books. I was teaching her that the cow goes moo and Daddy was teaching her about sign and co-sign. I'm not even sure I typed that correctly, but the hell with it. MathMan can't spell definitely correctly so we're even-ish.

And now she's turning twenty. I am so proud of this girl who, despite my housecat-like mothering skills, has grown into an intelligent, thinking, creative, beautiful and funny woman. She's now blogging so you might get glimpses of her side of things. I read her posts and I'm quite blown away by her writing skills. I'm also a little miffed that she refers to me as Mother, but then the truth is she does call me Mother. She's embraced the southernism of calling her father Daddy, and I am Mother. It's a little weird. My mother always called my grammie Mother. I suppose Chloe could call me much worse.

When Chloe was little and still an only child and MathMan was working those long hours, she and I spent a lot of time together. We played together or she played alone near me as I did things around the house. We played lots of dress up. Well, she did. I applauded her quite a bit.

Every once in a while, I ask her if she remembers something specific like when we would go to the beach in Evanston where she would play on the shore and we'd build sand castles and then she'd run back and forth from the water to me where I sat on a folding lawn chair sometimes smoking and reading books like Anais Nin's biography. To me the memories are still so fresh. To her, they're fuzzy although she remembers that I used to hold Barbie on the steering wheel of our car and let her drive. Maybe she remembers other things? The sentence usually ends with an upward inflection. That's okay. I remember for the both of us.

It's still hard to accept the fact that Chloe is going to turn twenty on Friday. We talk about political systems and Jane Austen characters. We look for lost books and laugh at the same scenes in Upstairs Downstairs. She recommends books to me. She still falls down and I hug her - oftentimes now, figuratively -  and try to make it better even when I can't or shouldn't. I'm learning to balance holding on and letting go.

I can't help but think that at her age, I was working full time and going to school and living with Craig and sorta kinda lying to my parents about it. Within five years, I'd be a mother. Now that's a scary thought.

I've made it clear to our kids that, given the opportunity, I intend to be the best grandmother ever. However I am in no rush to get there. Thankfully, Chloe seems to be on a different life timeline than I was at her age. She has plans that don't include getting married and having babies. I've heard noises about a dog and cat and a nice Jewish boy who plays football for an SEC school and will be making bushels of money when he gets out of school (does he exist?), but no serious talk of marriage and babies.

For that I am grateful because I still have a lot of growing up to do myself.