5/27/07 - The business of being not-busy

It's almost midnight . . . why do I wait until it's so late at night to start these things? I like to think that I'm a productive person, but secretly I'm actually not. Let's see . . . what have I accomplished tonight? Laundry, no. Dishes, no. Cleaned house, no. Sat in front of computer with trail mix and soda, yes. Fiddled with ceramic tiles in kitchen to try and fit the odd shapes into just the right spot, yes. More time on the computer, yes. I have to face the music - maybe I'm not a productive person. Actually, I think that most days my productivity gets eaten away little by little, until there's just nothing left to work with. As I'm outside with Joshua, keeping guard against the fierce barrage of roly-polies and butterflies, I'm wishing I were inside wiping off the kitchen countertops. As I'm desperately trying to find something both quick and healthy to fix for dinner I'm actually wishing that I were soaking the socks in Oxy-Clean. Bathtime rolls around, and as Joshua and Jonah are being sudsed up, I'm thinking of the sheets that I haven't changed in, um, weeks. All that thinking of what I would like to be doing wears me out so, and then I don't have energy left to actually do those things.

It's also very possible that I'm missing out on enjoying my children because of my inability to just be in the moment. It's all very yoga-zen-taoish, I know, but as I recall the day, I wish I'd just relaxed - played a little more, laughed a little more, lived a little more. While all I did through the day was prepare for what came next, I was missing out on life all around me. It's so fleeting, this time that we have while the kids are little. We have no actual responsibilities, and can spend countless minutes snuggled on the couch, then dashing to the sandbox, back inside for that one special toy, and back out to play with the water hose. It's a flurry of passion and breathlessness, and it will be over before we know it.

Tim is a much better zen-master than I'll ever hope to be, which is good for the kids since they get a balance between the two of us. Tim takes them for a walk so that I can be deliriously task-happy. Tim and Joshua go to the park so that I can plan our meals for the week. The only moment that I'm great at being in (I hate to boast, but I would actually call myself an expert) is naptime. Not only because I really, really, really like to sleep, although that's a small part of it, but because I love to nap with Jonah. I can almost always get him to sleep during Joshua's naptime, by lying in bed and nursing him into oblivion. I remember it being the same with Joshua, both easier and more frequent since he was the only baby, the two of us napping together in bed, on the couch, in the papasan chair. Is there really anything more wonderful than a cuddly milk-drunk baby cradled in the hollow place of your arms, warm and squoshy and fast asleep? I think not.

So maybe there is a part of me that can embrace life with these kids as much as I embrace my trail mix and computer time. Maybe I can learn to sit outside and play without the burning desire to pull weeds or sweep the driveway. These tasks will always be around, but there is precious little time to enjoy the kids at this age. To marvel at Joshua's intellect and curiosity, and to breathe in the smell of Jonah's baby scalp. I know it gets easier, the older they both get . . . but I don't want to spend my days waiting for them to get older, all the while missing out on the here and now. Waiting for it to get easier, but forgetting to see the joy around us.

I'll keep working on it; and if I ever learn to stop and take a breath, I'll let you know.

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5/15/07 - The people in our lives

Joshua's friends have been coming over to play. I use the term "friends" lightly, since some of the neighboorhood kids are a far cry from who I imagined Joshua would bring over. Not the nice little boy from across the street, necessarily. He's such a polite little thing whose only downfall is the googly-eye glasses he has to wear. And not the small sweet lispy girl from next door, either. She can come over anytime and tell me that she likes my "houth." Namely, I guess, is the little girl from the end of the block. We'll call her "Ricky." Well, okay, that's actually her name. I figure it's okay since only 4 or 5 people read these posts anyway. What, oh what, do I do with Ricky?


She's the kid who has to be in charge, at all costs. She's the one that weasels her way into your house when you open the door, no matter how you try to block the entrance with your body. She's the one who comes over and uses words to which your sweet little boy has not yet been introduced, and is not, as a matter of fact, allowed to use. She'd eat the apples right out of your basket of fruit without asking, then leave the core lying on the living room floor. If, of course, she were even allowed into your house. Which, by the way, she is not. See the picture up there? She's the one that you have to keep reminding to pull up her pants, since you can actually see butt-crack every time she bends down.


Yikes. What a dilemna. Why, I lament, has Ricky picked our house to bestow her presence upon? Do the other parents on the block have the same problem? Regardless of whether or not they do, we have to find a way to be kind and diplomatic while still guarding our precious and naive little boy for as long as we can. And I guess in the meantime, we'll keep reminding Ricky that she's not actually allowed to sneak into our backyard without us there, and she really only has to ring the doorbell once for me to hear it, and when I say that Joshua can play in "a little while" she doesn't have to sit at the door and stare into our house until the elusive "little while" comes to be. Oh, don't worry. I'll do it all with a smile on my face and kindness in my voice, since she truly is somebody's little girl, somebody's baby, even if she is currently the thorn in my side.


Brady is the boy across the street. He's a middle child, and six years old. Why, you wonder, would he want to play with an almost-three-year-old? I ask myself the same question, and can only figure that Joshua is the only other boy on the block that will play with him. Whatever the case may be, I've often thought that he's the best first friend that Joshua could have. I mean really, who else would let you bring them your pants and underwear, insisting on help from nobody else to put them on you, even when your very own mother has offered this same service? And who else would say nothing (though obviously disgusted) when you strip off all of your clothes, pee in the grass, then come to the sandbox naked? What a great friend, I think.


Kayla is the sweet girl in the pink, with the Barbie umbrella. Friend to Joshua? Not really, but she's along for the ride, anyway. She's more a casual acquaintance right now, but might eventually turn out to be the pretty girl next door that Joshua pines over in his teen years. I've entertained the thought in a weird and somewhat miserable "my boy is growing up faster than I ever thought he would" kind of way.


The long and short of it all? Joshua now shoots the basketball from, say, 4 feet away and says "long range, man." He rides his scooter through the living room and tells me he's "just ridin' around." He runs around the driveway, shouting with glee, "my friends are here, my friends are here!" And lastly, best and worst of all, he stands in the middle of the driveway, yelling "RICKY" over and over, until she shows up to play.

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5/6/07 - The mom in me

I'm not very far into this voyage of being a parent, and I find myself constantly trying to figure out who I am in the ebb and flow of motherhood. I look around and see other moms, the ones who have it all together just a little more than I do, or maybe a little less . . . am I like them?

There's the mom sitting just down the row at church - you know the one I'm talking about. Somehow she manages to be picture perfect, with the hair flowing over her shoulders, the expensive clothing, yada yada yada. How, I wonder, does she manage to wear her hair down like that and not have it pulled and yanked by grubby little hands? I think of my own hair, pulled back as always to try and escape the inevitable weaving in and tangling of little fingers. My hair that, as a matter of fact, did not even get blow dried before church today. At least people know I shower, right? And the clothes? How can a mother of a baby less than six months old be so, so skinny? Because the clothes that this mom wears fit her so nicely, and are a far cry from my brown cotton maternity pants I'm wearing. I hate to spend money on clothes that aren't (hopefully!) going to fit me in another six months to a year, but the inevitable downside to this is that I'll be wearing maternity clothes long past the point that seems socially acceptable, to me anyway. And look at that little baby girl sleeping so soundly in the seat next to this mom. With her rosy cheeks and perfect little nose, how is she sleeping without being held? Oh how I love my fat baby Jonah, but we just can't seem to keep it together for public appearances. Somehow we're suave and debonair when we're at home, but once in the outside world we become a little bumbling and awkward. Jonah cries, so I comfort and console him only to have him emit an earth shattering belch, while the spit up cascades down my arm and back, making icky splattering noises as it hits the ground. Are people looking yet? Because then he decides it's time to poop, which is another loud event in itself. As this other little baby sleeps in her doll-like state, mine has overflowed his diaper, causing a giant stain of yellow to spread across his back - don't worry, we carry 6 to 8 extra changes of clothing with us everywhere we go. This isn't an uncommon event. I forrest-gump my way out of the pew with my backpack, bible, carseat, diaper bag and baby, and hope to make it to the nursing/changing room before anything else catastrophic can take place. The worst that will happen in the nursing room is that the other mom will come in and quietly nurse her little doll-baby, designer blanket draped easily over one shoulder, while Jonah loudly smacks, sucks, gulps and burps our way into total embarassment.

But this is our life and we do the best we can. There's the other mom, the one at the La Leche League meeting. You know that one, too. She is the one that already has four other kids, and they all wear organic clothes and eat hummus and celery for snacks. McDonald's? Perish the thought! She manages to walk around and corral her other children, all while nursing her baby in the tye-dye sling she wears. I venture into a conversation about extended breastfeeding, and though I'll never be as earthy and granola as this mom is, at least I did manage to nurse Joshua until he was a little over two years. There is a sparkle of approval in her eyes, and then the conversation goes awry. We're talking about nursing pads - my preference, Lansinoh. Her preference? Wool. Yes, you heard right, she owns a very expensive pair of wool nursing pads. It gets better, though. It turns out that it's okay that they are expensive, since you only need one pair that actually never needs washing. At this point I turn my head and vomit a little in my mouth . . . well, not quite, but I think that my eyes do glaze over as she extols the wonders of self cleaning wool, and how she only has to scrunch her nursing pads around a little and viola, they're as good as new.

So I'm not the clean and pressed sophisticate mom, and I'm also not the all natural tree hugger mom. Which leaves what? I guess it just leaves me - the jeans and t-shirt mom with spit-up all over one shoulder, failing to nurse discreetly but giving my baby what he needs nonetheless, showing up at church with damp hair and flip-flops, and fumbling my way through these awkward times. What happens next? Only time will tell. And I'll just keep trying to be me.