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Hiya kiddo. Eight years ago right now I was walking into the hospital after 13 hours of labor, cussing through contractions and demanding Miss Megan not speak about the candy in the vending machine. In two hours and forty-eight minutes more you were born, all purple and quiet in a room full of people praying you’d make a sound.
If I’d only known how loud you’d be after that first squawk.
I love you Jack. You changed my life irrevocably for the better.
♥
Lando ate Jack’s homework last week, and I actually had to email Jack’s teacher and tell her that.
Epic win or epic fail, I’m not sure yet. But she appreciated the humor of it, so that’s good.
And before you grab your pitchforks to hunt me down for being all evil Momsville, let me tell you that he and Brandon spent a long time on the internet machines going over the rides beforehand, and he was asking for that one in particular. And once again I am amazed by his perseverance. He obviously thought he was going to meet his maker in that picture, yet he was totally fine immediately afterward, telling me that the ride was horrible, and beaugarding my ice cream while suggesting we move on to the Fury of the Nile.
As Lorelei would say, he cracks me out. Sweet heysoos I love that boy.
Coach: “Jack go stand on the field by the ref.”
Jack: “OK, what’s a ref?”
He is not good at all, people. Like, at all.
But I truly can’t explain how proud I am that that has nothing to do with autism, and everything to do with his being related to me.
1. The new health care bill. I have no insurance (for those that might remember that I had gotten that job at the spa, I never bothered to update that for a variety of reasons on their end, it didn’t work out and the insurance was never started. No ill will from either side, but obviously no insurance either. And yes, I’ve tried through the state – but since I am not pregnant, I don’t qualify); I haven’t seen a doctor for the rotator cuff I’m preeeetty sure I tore a year ago. Because, it will then become ‘pre-existing’ for me to qualify to actually get insurance, and that’s just ridiculous bullshit. Plus we all know there are people out there for which naproxen isn’t enough.
2. Jack starts soccer tomorrow. I hope something fierce that he loves it. His friend’s dad is the coach, and that’s a huge relief for me.
3. Lorelei in this video from a couple weeks ago. She had been singing the damn Heyawk song all afternoon, and had just started singing some made up lyrics to the alphabet song. I tried to snag it and obviously my impatience at her Benedict Arnold leanings showed. Check at the end where she tucks her marker – uncapped – into her sleeve before walking off.
4. How far my Cats will go, and how difficult it’s been to not be more of a wench to those KU fans that are so obnoxious the other 97% of the time they don’t dramatically lose.
5. How much the new Gorillaz album kicks ass. This is “On Melancholy Hill”:
6. This nebulous zone I’m at now with old friends. My world has (logically) divided into PRE- and POST-DIVORCE, but I guess I never would have thought I’d lose touch with so many people. For some I’ve tried sometimes successfully to keep up, others I’ve waited on them, and licked my wounds. The rest were not unlike slicing off a tumor, and couldn’t have come at a better time. But I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t fairly hurt I didn’t get more Christmas cards from the people I thought had ‘crossed over’. I admit that this is pretty superficial to care about, but really, aren’t the point of cards simply to acknowledge that someone thinks you count enough to get a greeting? There is no one I want to see that I don’t have some sort of interwebs connection with, so the idea of my being un-findable, sadly, can’t count. I’m thinking about shearing off the hundred or so people on Facebook that I either don’t honestly care about, or I feel relatively confident are just keeping the friendship to stalk my goings-on when they so desire. My boyfriend hates FB, and I can’t say I always blame him. Shrug.
7. Somewhat in the same vein, that Jon and I have decided to throw Jack’s birthday party this year jointly, including new significant others and estranged previous in-laws. Plus all the friends who had to choose Team Jen or Team Jon when this began. We’re hoping that if we can act normally, then everyone else can stuff it and follow along. I personally think handing out shots called Tension Relievers might facilitate this progress, but we’ll see. Either way the intent is good, let’s all hope it can be done.
8. That J. Davo is moving back. Hooray for Kedzie Hall reunions in the near future!
9. How much every year at the beginning of spring I look back and realize just how incredibly affected I was by winter’s lack of sun and warmth. And how every year I tell myself I’ll be better about taking my vitamin D, and YET I NEVER DO.
10. How much I loved the movie Alice In Wonderland. I love Tim Burton. Love, love, love. Also that the main girl looks like the child of Gwyneth Paltrow and Claire Danes. Right?
11. I’ve noticed a few wrinkles lately – which wasn’t a panic of vanity – but was a wake up call that I have got to start being better to my body. There used to be a time when eating Taco Bell would have made me sick. Now it’s gotten to where I look and feel blah all the time. I’m going to try to wean myself of coffee, and along with the CSA we just joined, eat more fruits and vegetables. BECAUSE I’VE EATEN ONIONS RECENTLY, PEOPLE. MORE THAN ONCE. DO YOU KNOW HOW HUGE THAT IS?
12. My beloved friend, the beautiful Miss Emily, has asked me to attend her birth as her doula, and I can’t explain how excited I am. I. Love. Babies. And. Birth.
Happy (sunny, hopefully) Tuesday, y’all.
We celebrated Christmas this weekend with the kids because by the time I get them Friday afternoon, they are going to be CRACKED OUT on events where they open eleventyfourteen gifts. (We told them Santa sent our presents early because we don’t have a fireplace.) And though Jack didn’t get his Death Star (from me, anyway), he did get a Venator-class Republic Attack Cruiser and Vader’s Tie Fighter, which took 6 and 2 hours, respectively, to build. The Attack Cruiser was only just finished at midnight, but Jack promptly woke up this morning and asked if we could dismantle it and start over.
Wherein my attachment parenting failed royally when I essentially gave him a big hell no.
So OK, look. This crappy phone picture doesn’t do justice to this beastly thing. (Click on it.) I swear everyone would be super impressed at its largeness if you saw it in person. And at almost 1200 pieces, I can see why people put these together just to put them on a shelf – because they are a helluva lot more painstaking than I ever remembered from my Lego days of square houses and shutters on the windows.
All of which doesn’t mean that I won’t be OK with Jack dismantling it at some point; it’s soothing for him, and, after all, it’s his toy. But until he is able to do it all by himself – or until at the very least, say, a week passes, I just can’t do it.
I’ve never been wholly down with the whole Santa thing, the least of which because I think the materialism of the holiday is indoctrinated so concretely (not to mention so early) that way. I try – like most parents I know – to teach my kids to be kind, generous people. But the holidays just seem so danged commercialized, and it’s hard to keep focus. I know there are plenty of options for charity and selflessness, but it still often seems to be so, well, tax deductive, and I’m not so sure we haven’t bastardized the entire point by channeling it to a one-month period in the whole year. People need clothing in June, as well, as far as I can see. And for a year or two I tried to muster up the whole Jesus/reason/season vs Santa=satan anagram, but like I’ve since admitted, in the end that indoctrination wasn’t my bag either.
Especially because I could take Jack to church to learn about baby Jesus and then promptly go into the lobby to sit on Santa’s lap.
But I digress.
The truth is I’ve been secretly stoked in the past that Lo was too young, and Jack just never seemed to care, about Santa or the whole production of Christmas. We ran around like chickens with our heads cut off trying to appease family expectations, but overall we didn’t do nearly as much as most Americans seem to during this time. The kids got a shitton of gifts, and many hours were consequently spent donating old toys, but to date they really hadn’t totally lost their minds about wanting things. Mostly because they have no real idea of want.
But my blessedly procrastinated reprieve is over, and at four and six the kids have now fully embraced that bountiful benefactor of booty. No pretense for goodwill or good behavior, Christmas has simply and unabashedly become the ticket to the goods. Jack wants a Lego set that happens to be FOUR HUNDRED DOLLARS. He has no idea of what the cost really means, he just wants it because he thinks it’s cool. But ole St. Nick (and Toys R Us) have full-on convinced my sweetly gullible -and literal- child that all he has to do is write it down on the list and voila! it will be produced.
Because that’s what SANTA DOES, RIGHT?
So what do I do when he’s upset I can’t get him a FOUR HUNDRED DOLLAR Lego set? Tell him it was because he wasn’t good enough? That there was a shortage of plastic up North? I have no idea. But we’ll figure it out because we always do. And he’ll survive because he’s a champ.
And please don’t fully misunderstand me, I’m not really on the train to Cynicalville. I do actually like the holiday season because I get to see my family and friends more, and that always makes me happy. But it’s a hard balance for me as a mother, and I want to do better for my kids.
[I also want a law that declares Christmas music illegal until December 20th. Especially that creepy making-out-with-Santa-song. I mean really, how many confusing messages can we possibly send this time of year?! But I digress again.]
So because our ridonkulously overwhelming and draining year is over, I resolve to expand my kids’ horizons and attempt to dismantle the materialism they swim in so comfortably. Or at least temper it with some of the kindness and giving I’ve seen them possess in large quantities. I look forward to it – it will be good for all of us. And now that I’ve also purged my bah humbuggery for the season, I can happily post the letters the kids wrote today, because all other tiring issues aside, I think they’re hysterical, and the kids will never know they are skipping the mailbox and going into my treasure box.
Welcome to parenting, right?
.
Dear santa.
I want for chrismrs the Legos set 7627 Indiana Jones and the Temple of the Crystal Skull. I would also want the Lego Indiana Jones 2 video game. I want the Legos Star Wars Death Star I want the Ewok set.
Love Jacoby
**********************
Dear Santa,
I would like a dolly to name Lorelei please. And also cute little puppy dogs. And a baby pig for Christmas. And I want a baby giraffe and a baby puppy dog and a little baby giraffe. So I want that. Please. I want to have a baby puppy dog. And a baby ricenocerous. And a bottle for the baby rosernous.
I love you and thank you,
Lorelei Elizabeth
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Happy Holidays, friends. 
Me: Hey guys, is it OK if we just sit quietly for a while? I have a headache and that will make it go away faster.
Kids: Yeah
………………………………………………………....[ 45 seconds pass ]
Jack: Mom, I’m being so quiet for you because I love you and I want your headache to go away.
Me: I know, buddy. Thank you. I love you too.
Jack: I love you too, Mommy.
Lo: And I love you too! And Jack too!
Me: I’m so glad. Can we try to just watch the sun go down and think about our day?
Kids: Yeah
…………………………………………………………..[ 15 seconds pass]
Jack: Hey Mom, do you see how quiet I’m being so your headache goes away?
Me: Oh I do and I appreciate it. But if I can have a little more quiet it will totally go away. OK?
Jack: OK
…………………………………………………………...[ a minute passes ]
Lorelei: MOM JACK’S TOUCHING ME!
Jack: Shh! Mommy has a headache and needs to have quiet!
Lo: Oh yeah. I forgot.
Jack: See Mom? I’m trying to keep it quiet in the car so your headache goes away.
Me: And your heart is in the right place, mister, I love it. But, see, we keep talking and because of that it’s not really very quiet in the car, is it?
Jack: Yes it is! I told you I’m being quiet! I’m being quiet so your headache goes away!
Me: I know you’re trying baby, but when we talk we’re not actually being quiet. Don’t you see? We need to actually not talk at all for it to be silent. No one. Not you or me or Lo. Just everyone thinking their thoughts.
Jack: But I AM being quiet!
Me: Welp. Keep on keepin’ on, then, I guess.
……………………………………………………………[ a minute passes ]
Jack: Right Mom?
Me: Right what?
Jack: That I’m SO GOOD at what you asked me to do. I’m not talking like you asked me to.
Me: *sigh* I know you’re doing what you can to help. Thank you baby.
Jack: You’re welcome.
Lo: You’re welcome!
Uh… I mean…
.
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First, I’ve totally jumped on the Fleet Foxes bandwagon. This is “Blue Ridge Mountains”. Sometimes they sound almost 50s-ish, but I think this song taps into a CSN&Y sound, with Young being the main comparison to me. Regardless, it’s just a cool band.
So I don’t really have a whole lot of time to delve into big stuff, thus this will be another fairly simple post: updates and pictures. Like everyone else, things are just kind of flying along, with periods of quiet when I try to catch my breath and collect my thoughts.
[Speaking of, I've been thinking lately about the benefits of meditation. I get the point, but how does one center themselves smack in the middle of a stressful moment? Don't you need to be able to be still to access that tranquility? I'm curious.]
Things are picking up at work; I’m understanding things better, and for the most part it’s beginning to click. My doula couple is now technically “past due” [insert placemark for future rant here] and I’m never far from my phone (of which I have a new one, and though I dig it, I’m obviously having a hard time mastering the dumb thing, as the picture of Whomp and me below attests). Jack graduated from Kindy last week, and it’s simply surreal to think that three short years ago he was non-verbal. As in unable to talk or carry a conversation at all. It’s just nutso to think how far he’s come, my sweet, tenacious little fartknocker. I went to a Killers concert recently (SO much fun) and hopefully will go to the Ben Folds coming up (come on out, Baby F!). We also have a float trip the first weekend in June (Seriously, Baby F, I’m not kidding.).
And that’s about it. We’re going to my ‘rents today for a cookout to celebrate a belated Mother’s day, and that sums up the rest of my weekend. Hope all is well out there. Ciao amicos!
…
I just can’t get over how she annihilates an ice cream cone.
Meg and I celebrating her birthday. Apparently in mime paint…
Happy, toothless Jack on the last day of school.
1. Welcome, Spring. And thank you for bringing my migraines back. I won’t take drugs for childbirth, but I’ll pop pain relievers like Tic Tacs every year ’bout now. It’s a good thing I can wear hats to my job, b/c I don’t have a C-clamp big enough, and my Royals cap is the closest I can get to that feeling of wanting to squeeze my temples until my eyeballs pop out.
2. My friend Kyle shared this article about auties and degrees of savantism/genius, and though I read it observationally, it still reminded me of just how freaking proud I am of my little stinker. He’ll be six this weekend, and once again I’m amazed by how hard he works to learn and understand and adapt. Man I love that kid something fierce.
3. On principle I’m right-clicking the hell out of this PC currently. I work with Macs all day long, and sometimes their functionality totally blows.
4. Totally digging this song by Johan Johannsson (whose name still sounds as lame in another language as it would if I’d written the English version John Johnson) called Fordlandia. I would like to use it in a documentary someday. It’s a super long song, so give it a minute to build. So pretty.
5. Speaking of functionality, I saw one of those Easy Rider bikes today, and I legitimately don’t get why the handlebars are built like that. How does that not make your arms ache? I can’t imagine driving cross-country on one of those. What am I missing?
6. I have a sweet couple due in a month and I’m super excited. Births and the miracles within are incomparable, and I could use some rekindling of my faith in humanity lately.
And that’s all I can think of for now. I was going to launch into a been-brewing rant, but my head just simply hurts, and I don’t have the clarity I’ll need. Maybe I’ll try to come back later tonight.
Hope your worlds are well, friends. Feel free to respond to the random post with random thoughts; I’ve been missing a few of you lately.
Get over.
Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over Get Over.
In other news, seriously, look at my halflings:
You know you wish you had the courage to eat ice cream with such abandon.
1. This article is pretty cool. The epidural rate here is in the 90th percentile, and surely – surely – if you think about that you’d have to realize that that’s illogical. There are myriad risks associated with epidurals, and for it to be treated with the casualness of a Tylenol is ridiculous. A medical necessity, absolutely. But not for 90+ women out of a hundred.
2. It’s bitter cold and slushy and after 17 years of defending my love of chilliness based on some native Colorado elitism I am ready to admit that I AM FREAKING TIRED OF THIS WEATHER.
3. My kids were puketastic all weekend (the pic of Lo is from a few weeks ago) and I am wiped today. But can I say again, in full-on guilt mode, that I cherish when Jack is not feeling well? He’s just cuddly and, well.. calm when he’s sick, and after relieving any mama worry that he’s in any danger, I just get to relax and spend quiet time with him. Such a parental paradox. Shrug.
Happy Monday, all.
So, I have the best ruminations while I’m driving, and always have a tentative outline for the thoughtful and amazing philosophical ideas I’d like to talk about… and then by the time I get to the computer I’m reduced to staring at it dumbly and thinking about lolcats. Sigh.
But, OK, here’s a real topic I’d like opinions on. The kids and I have been hanging out with friends who have Xboxes, and Jack has picked up his mad gaming skills remarkably fast. It’s kind of cool to watch him, because historically physical prowess was not on his short list of accomplishments. Unfortunately I’m unsure what I think about it. I know there are many people who think television et al for children is mentally stunting at best and possibly neurologically damaging at worst. (And to be clear, the whole tv=autism theory makes me snarl, so that’s not what I’m validating.) I concede at a basic level why the utopian ideal can include kids running around and free playing their childhood away, but I also know quite a few wickedly smart people who spent their formative years in front of electronic devices, so I’d also concede the argument that technology doesn’t have to be the Bradbury-ian doomsday harbinger.
Whatever, point is, I’m hesitant. First because he’s only 5, and I just never thought that would be an issue already, the whole video game fascination. His perserverations can be stunning, and this seems like it could be Pandora’s Box. Secondly, and the actual crux of my concern, is whether to shell out the money to buy one of these systems. I’m not too worried about how much time he spends on it (for now), we’ve hashed out roughly 30 minutes each time he has the opportunity to play it, but those babies cost a couple hundred dollars, and I’m conflicted about buying one just because he assumes he’ll get one, or because it gives me a small measure of pride to know he excels at something so… blerg.. normal.
Does that make sense? Basically I don’t want to give in to his confident (and increasingly materialistic) entitlement to everything he wants, but man it makes me happy to see him happy and developmentally ahead at something. That poor monkey struggles with so many things kids his age wouldn’t even realize they do intuitively, and maybe this could be an opportunity for some self confidence. Or, it will be the beginning of a long and obnoxious fight with a time-sucking obsession.
So there you go. I’m not panicked, just thinking about it and wondering what you all think about gaming, kids, parenting and why Sheryl Crow is popular when she’s always off-key and annoyingly screechy in parts of every song she sings. I had quite the phenomenally shitty day yesterday, and I’m jonesing to have a stimulating conversation.
[And if nothing else, everyone should read this and laugh, because it reminds me of the notebooks my girlfriends and I would write in during junior high classes, giving them back to each other during passing periods - though let me be clear we were FAR more innocent than this group. In fact, if you're lucky, I'll post a picture I have on my hard drive of me in 7th grade in one of those black and white photo booths. Big bangs? Braces? Making a goofy face that somehow resembles palsy? So hot. Good times.]
Ready.. go.
