For Todd, Who Left Forever Ago

In case you miss us a little, in your Fat Tire stupor. . . things have been a little like this:



But mostly like this:



We miss you, too.

A Town With Church Bells Ringing

This past weekend, we spent a couple of days with my parents at the lakehouse. It was cold and windy on Sunday, but we couldn't all six stay cooped up in the little two-bedroom cabin together, so Todd and I took the kids into town to play at the park. Tiller and Rollie ran around on the playground while Todd and I sat on a bench and read. About ten minutes after we got there, it came upon eleven o'clock and the church bells started ringing.

The town is antebellum, set in squares, with a university and many beautifully-restored homes. There is a small downtown area with a few restaurants and bars, two bakeries, and a wonderfully inviting coffee shop.

As I sat in the cool, windy October morning, listening to the sounds of my children squealing on the playground, and the church bells pealing out over the town, I thought, I could live here. I could live in a town with beautiful old houses, a college library, a great coffee shop, a park, and a few bars. I could live in a town with church bells helping me keep time.

And did I mention the new barbecue place? It's Pig in a Pit*. It's good. And with those church bells, you will be able to beat the Baptists to lunch.

*Link provided solely for the purpose of Jason B. seeing what a pink pig mascot looks like riding a four-wheeler.

Sportsmanship and Toeing the Parental Line

So, i know some of you are waiting for pictures from the costume party, but it is just gonna have to wait. I have a little something to get off my chest. It's called, "What the fuck is wrong with you, you sack of shit parents?"

I guess I should start at the beginning. I should mention first that I was not present for the event in question, Rollie's soccer game. It took place Saturday afternoon. His father took him to the game, while I readied our home for being descended upon by eleven costumed children on Sunday.

Rollie is my oldest, so this is my first experience with parenting a child in organized sports leagues. I played sports growing up, and really credit the experiences for giving me much of my self-confidence, and my sense of sportsmanship. I played tee ball, baseball, softball, soccer, swimming, and tennis, and even recreational basketball, at which i was pretty terrible. I am competitive and love to win, but I have never been a sore loser, and am always a gracious winner, except in drinking games, or games played while drinking (beer pong, pool, darts) where "talking shit" is acceptable, and even encouraged, and where it would never set a poor example in front of a child. I have looked forward to my kids playing sports and learning about teamwork, good sportsmanship, doing one's best, and self-confidence.

So, Rollie is playing soccer for the first time this year. He is in a co-ed, under six league. The kids range in age from 3-6 (a huge age difference actually), and they don't keep score. There are no referees, just the two coaches out on the field with the kids, giving them pointers and running the game. It is all about learning the skills, the rules of the game, and sportsmanship. Or so i thought.

Rollie definitely got a competitive streak from me. he likes to win, and we have been working with him on things like, "it is okay if you lose, as long as you give it your best" and "you can't win them all," and teamwork. One problem we have had so far this year is that not only does he want to take the ball away from the opponent, he also will go after the ball if his own teammate has it, and we are trying to teach him that he needs to work with his team, not against them.

Other than that though, we had so far had no real problems. So, Todd takes him to his game on Saturday. None of the kids on Rollie's team have played before, and there is a kid on the other team that is playing circles around the others. He also played pretty rough, throwing elbows, pulling on shirts and pants, etc. I have never seen any unsportsmanlike behavior called at these games. Either the coaches did not see this stuff, or they just let it go. So, Rollie is pretty competitive and started getting mad, and from what I can tell from what Todd said, he kind of did the same stuff, and told the kid to "stop it." Well, this kid said to Rollie, loud enough for Todd to hear, although it seems that other parents and the coaches did not hear it, "Y'all suck."

Now, as I said, Rollie is my oldest, and it doesn't take long after sending your eldest child to school to realize that they are in for quite an education. While they are learning the ABCs and 123s (or not, but that is a whole 'nother post), they are also learning a ton of really neat sayings and behaviors from the kids in their class who are not the oldest; these kids have older brothers and sisters and just aren't as innocent as the eldest siblings. They use words and phrases like, "You suck." "I'm going to kill you." And lots of stuff about shooting and guns. It is frightening the way that influences on your child are suddenly out of your control.

Back the game: This kid says this stuff, plus the other team is scoring a bunch of goals, and Rollie's team, not so much. And the team is getting pretty discouraged. Which is fine. In my opinion, it is just as important to learn how to lose gracefully as it is to win. But then Todd takes Rollie to school this morning, and one of the kids in his class was on the other team. He is a nice kid, and Rollie and he are friends. Well, his mom asks if Rollie had recovered from the drama of the game and it seems that Rollie was snarky with his friend on Saturday. (I guess out of frustration at losing, not that frustration is in any way an excuse for bad behavior.) She then proceeds to tell Todd some further stuff about the "Y'all suck" kid's behavior on Saturday. Seems as he was substituted out of the game, he came out and loudly proclaimed, either to the parents or in front of the parents, that he was "going to kick that kid's ass." We assume he was referring to Rollie. Apparently, no one said anything. At least this one parent heard the comment. Todd did not. We do not know if any one else heard it, but according to this mother, it was loud enough to hear.

I know what I would do in this situation. What would you do? Would you have said something? As a parent, do you rely on a coach to deal with these things? Is it really best to ignore it? What reason would his parents have for not reprimanding him for this behavior? Would you reprimand someone else's child for saying something like this? And what kind of a household is this child living in that he remotely thinks it is acceptable to say something like that, much less in front of a group of adults?

Am I being over-protective and raising a complete wuss of a child? Is it really so wrong to want my child to learn about respect for others, respect for adults, etc?

Most of all, what kind of a child talks like this at age six or under?

I am fuming and just mad I wasn't there to say something to the sorry excuse for parents that poor kid must have. And if I had, would i be labeled a troublemaker or a rabble rouser? And if I was, would i give a shit?

Dogwood Girl Garden. Again. Plus Cats and the Spawn

Yesterday afternoon, Todd called me out to look at some yard work he was doing. Turns out that one of the shrubs we've been basically ignoring until it is cool enough to prune is actually a really huge fall-blooming Camellia. It has about a kajillion buds on it, and just a few blooms yet.

We spent two years at the old house, not wanting to do too much work on the place since it was for sale, but my whole being was aching to dig in the dirt. And now we are here, and we haven't done a ton to the outside yet. (Well, i haven't. I just did a small garden this spring for tomatoes; Todd did a HUGE job clearing out the ivy in the back third of the yard. No small undertaking.)





It is really fun to go through a whole year's cycle and have surprises pop up. We came in April. Since then, we've had a surprise Weigela (sp?), some shrub with a form similar to the weigela or a Forsythia, but with little white flowers on it that bees LOVE. A number of old daylilies that obviously need to be divided, but that i was just ultra-excited were there. Some kind of spring-blooming fruit tree. A cherry, maybe? Awesomely huge tulip poplars that remind me of the old Saddle Creek house. Tons of Azaleas and Hostas. Probably 6-8 Dogwoods. (Dogwood Girl's natural habitat!) We also have two birdbaths that just came with the house. And a windchime. Anyway, i was v. excited to come across the Camellia and the Pyracantha (I think that's what it is) and I am really looking forward to seeing what the winter garden presents me with - I foresee a lot of Holly and Nandina. There is a lot to be said for buying an older home and it's established garden.

Oh, and because THEY deserve equal facetime, here are my kitty cats, watching birds and chipmunks out the window today.














And a few pictures of something else i've been growing, my ultra-cute* kids. I really couldn't pick just one of these shots.




































*They beat the crap out of each other in a wrestling match seconds after I snapped these shots.

Go Rollie Go

Go Rollie Go
Originally uploaded by killmylandlord.

Uncle Mark was nice enough to bring his fancypants camera to Rollie's game last Saturday. This was especially nice, because Todd had gone down to Auburn for the LSU debacle, and I had both Tiller and Rollie for the weekend, a slight wine hangover from my Ya Ya Sisterhood house party on Friday night, and a cooler full of soccer snacks in tow for the game. Lisa and Mark brought Dash, and Mark watched Tills while Lisa and I sat with Dash and cheered for the Cheetah.

Yes, you heard me right: The Cheetah. That is what we overheard someone calling Rollie during the game. Except when we heard it at first, we just thought it was some Yankee calling him a cheater, and . . . well, them's fightin' words.

Okay, i didn't get in a fight, but you pretty much could see it happening, right? I would be the first Soccer Mom kicked off the fields this season for defending her five year old's honor after another parent called him a cheater. Except they were saying Cheetah. As in "boy, that kid's fast."

Anyway, here is a great shot of Rollie breaking away from the pack and headed for the goal. Not that it matters, because THEY DON'T KEEP SCORE. Yes, this drives me crazy.

Complete tangent: Not as crazy as the middle school kids at a private school where a good friend of mine teaches. These kids don't have "Field Day" they have . . . get this . . .

PERSONAL RECORD DAY.

Yep? Why teach middle school kids about gracious winning and losing, when everyone can just compete against themselves? That's JUST like the real world. Don't worry about your score on that SAT!

What the fuck are we coming to? Ridiculous.

Back on track: So, here is my kid, playing in his 2nd ever soccer game. I have some pics from the first game, and video too (highly comical - Wrong Way Corrigans, crying, standing around staring at the ball and not kicking it), but none of them came out as well as this one. Oh, and yeah, there is a shot of me and sis watching the game, but it ain't pretty and it ain' goin' on my blog; I have some dignity.

Thanks again, Uncle Mark.

Experimentation

It wasn't pretty, but it was a W. I'll take it. Go Dawgs!

We had some friends over for the games yesterday and the whole thing kind of snowballed and we ended up with a before-unmet number of children running around. Scarlett and Dash were here, as usual, but then we added in Sheilah's kids, and four of the neighborhood kids and their parents. I think we had nine kids at one point. Plus their parents and some childless friends, adn wow, was it a full house. Sheilah was nice enough to bring an extra TV so the kids could watch a movie upstairs. (Not that tv-watching ever happens like that. It just blares in the background, and it never fails that one poor kid wants to watch, and then cries because everyone else won't be quiet.) And once Garrett and Kayla left and Nolan fell asleep, Rollie ended up being the only boy with five girls. A dearth of riches, for sure, what with the twins, and an older girl, and only one of the females his sister. Everyone knows what this means: Rollie Makeover. (Thanks to Lauren for getting the shot.) And yes, I am aware that we are racking up the photos of Rollie in drag. See, if he ends up going that way, we were cool with it from the beginning, and if he doesn't, we have some great blackmail photos for his teen years.

We are parenting Gods.

More of story unfolded, though, this morning. As Todd and I readied our coffee and the kids ate breakfast, the following discussion occurred:

Todd: Rollie, did I hear that you held hands with T__*? (Tiller had ratted him out a few minutes earlier.)
Rollie: [playing with his cereal]. Yeah. She kissed me.
Todd and I glance at each other.
Rollie: She kissed me a lot.
Todd and I stare at Rollie, mouths gaping open, then glance again at one another and both turn away from the breakfast table, laughing silently, shoulders shaking with the effort at holding the sound in.

Maybe there is no need to worry about the drag pictures, after all. Or, maybe we should be extremely worried about our very adventurous young hero. Maybe he's going to like to experiment.

I joke, but i don't know if I'm ready for all of this. Rewind, rewind! Rewind, Dammit!

It's not working.

*All names have been changed to protect the identities of those involved.

Birthday Braves Game

Birthday Braves Game
Originally uploaded by Dogwood Girl

Video of Rollie showing off his new Braves hat and shirt, and talking about his birthday gift - a trip to the Ted!

It was Tim Hudson bobblehead night at the stadium. Rollie got one for himself and brought one home to Tiller, too!

Rollie thought the seats were pretty good as he settled in.

Cotton candy! (And Dad even gave him some Coke. Note: this is not Dogwood Girl-approved parenting.)

Father and son, so All-American!

p.s. College football starts today. Dogwood Girl v. excited.

Thoughts on Birthday Number Five

Thoughts on Birthday Number Five
Originally uploaded by Dogwood Girl

Dear Rollie,

Last night, when we tucked you in, I held your face in my hands to look into your eyes.

"What are you doing?" you said. "I am looking at you so I'll remember what you look like at four years old." You thought for a minute. "I want to stay four," you said, your lower lip unfurled. I didn't know what to say to that, because I kind of wanted you to stay four, too.

You being four has been a joy and a challenge, more so than any year yet. I really thought that you at three was challenging; I had no idea that four would be more of the same.

Uh-oh. Tiller is helping me write this. About your birthday, Tiller says, "I think i am going to make a birthday present. Tiller is excited about doing the cards." Okay, she's gone.

This time last year, you were just learning the sounds for each letter. You knew all the basics, and you were starting to learn the combination sounds like "br" and "bl." You were doing so well at school, one of the two most advanced kids in your class, but you were struggling with your behavior. You struggled all school year with your behavior, and we finally made the decision to repeat you in Pre-K. At the time, you were at a little Methodist preschool, but we were moving to a new school district and decided to put you in the Pre-K there. Your old Pre-K teacher thought you might benefit from another year to learn the social skills like lining up, raising your hand when you need to speak, not interrupting, and following directions; I don't know where you got it from, but you question absolutely everything. :-)

Daddy and I struggled long and hard with the decision to hold you back, and I am still struggling with it a few weeks into the new school year, because over the summer you learned to read. You are the only one in your class who can read already, and I am terrified that you will be bored and not challenged enough. I am terrified that i made the wrong decision; I am pretty sure that this is normal for a parent to feel, but it doesn't make it any less stressful. Your teachers are nice, and I try not to judge the people who teach you when their pronunciation or grammar isn't perfect, but I can't help wondering if we are screwing up by sending you to a public school. I want to believe that good parenting in conjunction with public schools will win out and that you will be the best you can be no matter where we put you. I hope that being in a racially and culturally diverse class will teach you things that we can't teach you at home. I hope that they are the right things, but you spend as much time at school every day now as you spend with me and Daddy, and that loss of influence is frightening. I hope that one day you will read this and know that everything we did, we did because we thought we were doing what was best for you.

One of the things we struggled most with this year was deciding where to move. When you were born, we lived in East Atlanta. Daddy lived there already when we met way back in February of 1999 (the olden days). We lived there together, then were married, and bought a second house there before you were born because we needed more room. I loved that house. It is the house to which I brought you home from the hospital. It is where we brought Tiller home. We loved our babies in that house. We had to live at the lake for a month while we waited for the new house, and that was quite an experience. You and Tiller loved it.

We were sad to move, but I know we did the right thing, because you are thriving here and you have already made friends. Also? There is a pool here, and this year, you learned to swim. Your swim lessons were pretty pointless. You wouldn't even put your head under the water. But on our own time, we gave you little plastic diving torpedoes; Daddy figured out that if we made it a game, you would start reaching for them deeper and deeper in the pool. He was right, and he played on one of your strongest traits - Your love of competition. You will make a game or race or contest out of anything. Aunt Lisa said she was pumping one time and you and Tiller actually cheered to see which breast would produce the most milk. Again, i have no idea where you got this competitive streak. It is just baffling. :-)

You learned to read and swim, which are two of the most amazing and wonderful things I could imagine for you. You also learned some other things: Jumping down off monkey bars and landing on your feet. How to knock the heck out of a whiffle ball. You almost never miss. You and Daddy play ball at least once a week, and sometimes almost every day. Daddy is taking you to a Braves game tonight for your birthday, but that is a surprise. I hope it doesn't rain.

Things that you love: Shows like Fetch with Ruff Ruffman, Superwhy, and Wordgirl. You have outgrown the shows like Sesame Street and Diego and Dora. You adore Monster Trucks. Anything with cars racing; you will even watch Nascar, much to our dismay. You say you like Tigers the most, but i am hoping you are reading this with a UGA diploma on the wall. We'll see how that one shakes out. You love races. You like reading about cars and trucks and rocket ships.

Your favorite food right now is definitely Cinnamon Rolls. We only buy them for special occasions, like this morning before school.

Your growth has slowed some, but you are tall and thin. No more baby fat - you are a boy now, lithe and fast. You also have become more and more like your Papaw Palmer. In some ways, your personality is like him. Your hair is most definitely his hair. We can pour two buckets of water over your head, and it will just roll off like sheep's wool. It cracks me up.

You are goofy, and fun-loving, and you never stop talking. Sometimes i can't even think straight, you talk so much. You can dress yourself now, and that is a huge change for us. I miss pulling your shirts over your head, or holding your pants for you to step into them, but it is so much easier. You have started doing your own chores: You clear your plates and put them in the sink yourself, without being asked. You help take out recycling, get the mail, and help bring in the recycling bins and trash from the street. You are usually pretty good about cleaning up at the end of the day, which is a big help to us. You love going to the library with Daddy and Tiller to pick out books. This year, Daddy also took y'all to see Wall-E and you both sat there throughout the movie. That is a first, because in the past, taking you to movies has not been as successful. You couldn't sit still.

You and Daddy and Tiller went to Orlando and Cypress Gardens with Grandma and Papaw Johnson this year; I stayed home to be with Aunt Lisa when Dash came. This year, you welcomed a new cousin and now you are not the only boy. We also went to Panama City in the spring, Lake Lure for New Year's, and a ton of lake trips.

One other thing happened this year that I think you will want to read about when you are older. We lost your great-grandmother, Meemaw. She was old, but it was still a sad thing for us all, and it was a new experience for you and Tiller to lose a loved one. I was nervous about taking you to the funeral, but I couldn't have been more proud of your behavior there, and I know that you were a great balm to your Grandma's sadness. I was glad that we took you, and happy that you both got to say goodbye to Meemaw; She loved you both very much. I hope that you will remember, even if it is just a little bit. I never knew any of my great-grandparents, and i think it was an amazing experience for you and Tiller to know two of yours, to see your grandparents' joy at seeing their parents meet their Grandchildren. I hope that I will be that lucky one day.

I have to go make preparations for some Birthday celebrations now. It is a Wednesday, so we are having a pool party on Saturday to celebrate your birthday (no rain, please!), but tonight, I am planning your requested birthday dinner: mac and cheese. I am not even bothering with veggies! After that, we will give you a couple gifts. You are getting a Braves hat and shirt, and Daddy is taking you to the game. Ned helped out by offering up his Turner vouchers and y'all are getting good seats. I wish I could go, but Tiller turns into a pumpkin after seven.

Our life is busy these days, with school, and soccer starting up, and trying to fix up the new house, but i hope that every year on your birthday I will be able to take the time to write this letter to you, to let you know how much you have changed and learned and matured and grown over the past year.

You are five today, no longer my baby, although you will always be my baby. I now know why my Mama and Daddy still say this to me, and I no longer bristle at it when they do; if anything, I sympathize with them, because i know what it means to love you from birth, to nurture you, and to see you no longer be the helpless being you once were, to see you blossom and have thoughts of your own and question our decisions for you. I know what it means to feel swollen with pride at the same time that I am sick with the sadness of knowing you will leave and things will never be this perfect and sweet again. Raising you and loving you is the most exquisite and overwhelming bittersweet pain and pleasure i have ever experienced. I am a better person for being your Mama, and you are everything that I ever could have wanted in a son, and so many other things that I never knew I wanted.

Daddy and I love you so much and we try to savor every last moment with you, but we are also so very excited to see what wonderful things you will do with your life and what a wonderful, independent person you will become.

Love,
Your Mama

p.s. No, you are not getting a skateboard this year.

Bad Kids

I think i have posted this before, but a friend was pondering if it was bad that his young daughter knows all the words to the song, "Greased Lightning." I wanted to find the video of my kids dancing and singing to the Black Lips song, "Bad Kids." Couldn't find it on my blog, so I'm just posting it again for good measure. It still cracks me up, especially that Rollie knows the "Timeout" and "A Penis on the Wall" parts so well. Not bad dancing, either. That boy loves the Dance.

Anyway, Pierce, if you are bad for teaching your daughter about gettin' tit and pussy wagon, well, then, call DFACS on me. The lyrics go a little something like this:

Bad kids all my friends are bad kids
product of no dad kids
kids like you and me

Bad kids aint no college grad kids
livin life out on the skids
kids like you and me

In Class
We are a minority
Got no
Respect for authority
And won't
Play well with others
And steal
From all your mothers
They'll try
To give us pills
Oh wait
Give us all the pills
Go cry
Mom I gotta go to court
Dad won't
Pay his child support

Well you gotta understand
we only do these things because all we are is

Bad kids all my friends are bad kids
product of no dad kids
kids like you and me

Bad kids aint no college grad kids
livin life out on the skids
kids like you and me

At home
he throws a hissy fit
Time out
he doesn't give a shit
Got drunk
Off all of grandmas schnaps
Got caught
Runnin from the cops
Toilet
Paper on the yard
Six f's
On my report card
Smoke cigs
In the bathroom stall
Spray paint
Penis on the wall

Well you gotta understand
we only do these things because all we are is

Bad kids all my friends are bad kids
product of no dad kids
kids like you and me

Bad kids aint no college grad kids
livin life out on the skids
kids like you and me

My Son Creeps Me Out

One of the fun things about having two laptops in the house again is that I can sit upstairs, while Todd hangs out downstairs, and we can email and chat back and forth. Which, also, let's admit, is ridiculous. But we have fun with it. Like this little gem that I just received. Jason B., try not to get too freaked out by this.

Like Sand Through the Hourglass

Uh, yeah. He was pretty excited. He picked his spidey tee out himself the night before (we were very proud and i had inner smug thoughts when hipster dad commented on his shirt). Everything went really well. He was totally excited, got himself up and dressed and even his shoes on without any dramatics, backtalk, or parental command repetition. We gave him a banana, but now he EATS BREAKFAST AND LUNCH AT SCHOOL. That's right - one less piece of wheat bread i have to smear with peanut butter each day. That might not seem like much to you, but i have smeared peanut butter on two pieces of wheat bread for the LAST TWO YEARS, ALMOST EVERY DAY. Cutting the workload in half is exhilarating.

We all four got in the car to go drop him off. The streets were packed with parents walking their kids to school (I love that we have sidewalks!), and cars backed up. I was nervous and he was just so damn excited. Todd and Tiller dropped us off and we walked up past all the patrols (so cute! 5th graders who were taught to say "Good morning!" when you walked in, and "Walk to the right!" when you were in the halls, and "Have a nice day!" when I was leaving. I was very impressed.) Also was impressed with the massive coffee table set up out front of the school. Nice touch, and a quick way to steal my heart.

As we went past the school sign, I asked if i could take his picture, and he said, "not now, mama!" and I agreed, because who am i to ruin his image the first day of school? We went on in and found his class. It was mayhem.

Kids running everywhere, one harried teacher and her harried teacher's aide, and a bunch of bewildered parents. (I guess I am not the only one with a first child in elementary school.) We hung Rollie's backpack in his cubby, which of course had his first name (Charles) instead of the nickname. He dealt, which i was very proud of, because he very well could have lost it. I talked to the teacher and she said she was "sending some typing home with him for me in his backpack." (Remember, I am the unfortunate new mom who got suckered into the Room Mother position. Go ahead and laugh, but I'm helping educate kids, people! Or at least making sure they get enough sugar on holidays.)

There were so many parents hanging around that I had time to shoot a few pictures and I even got a shot of Rollie with a big smile. I introduced him to another little boy, met the boy's dad, then said:

"Okay, Buddy. I'm gonna head out. You have fun, and listen to your teacher, okay? And I'll be here to pick you up this afternoon." I admit, i had a bit of a lump in my throat as I turned away.

"Mama?" he said in a small voice.

"Yeah, baby?" I said turning around. He was holding an hourglass in each hand, the sand just beginning to run through each.

"I need a hug and a kiss first!"

I smiled and said, "You bet," as I crouched down to his level and opened my arms.

He set the hourglasses down and ran into my arms, hugging me tightly and kissing me loudly on the cheek. "Mama? I love you, Mama," he whispered in my ear.

I love you, too, Buddy. I love you, too.

I Can't Believe . . .

That the little man starts real school tomorrow. He will be with his teacher and schoolmates just as long every day as the time he spends with me. I know that this is the moment where it all starts pulling apart at the seams, where his peers start to influence him, where he starts to come home learning new words and asking for a Wii, and dismissing Todd and me more and more. I'm so proud of him, and I know we are a positive influence on him, and he is more prepared than 90% of the other kids starting school tomorrow, but he isn't a number or a statistic; he is my baby.

A photo retrospective of the boy here.

Disaster Confirmed

Okay, not complete disaster. I can do a data transfer from my hard drive to save all my stuff, like the family videos and my writing and stuff like that. Yes, I know I should have backed it up more often. But it is safe. Unfortunately, it's a "bad logic board." Would be almost $300 bucks to fix it, and I doubt the mac is worth that altogether. Ugh.

Bad, logic board, bad! Very bad logic board! [rubbing logic board's muzzle in a pile of it's own shitty logic.]

So, i will be immersed in the vampire book, taking the kiddo to open house (starts school monday!) and . . .what else did i do before internet??

Rollie of the Day

is_00039.jpg
Originally uploaded by Dogwood Girl.

Another old picture of Rollie that just cracks me up. Yes, we were drinking beer while Rollie sat on the beach and ate some kind of seaweed. Good parenting.

This was in Key West. I think later that night Rollie went to his first Fantasy Fest. . . maybe not the best idea for those under 18, but you know we like to live on the edge.

In the Principal's Office

I registered Rollie for school yesterday. I had met his pre-K teacher at the open house in May, and I liked her very much. Yesterday, when we went in the office, there was only one other family (incidentally, a little boy who will also be in Rollie's class). The Principal was working the office and he remembered me from the Open House a month earlier, and explained all the paperwork to me. (I'm pretty sure that it is easier to buy a handgun than to register a 4-year-old for pre-k.) I liked him immediately.

Anyone who knows me is probably aware that I have some serious doubts about how America educates (or fails to educate) her children these days (don't we all, to some extent?) and how much we have agonized over where to send our child to school, where to move, etc. How would we find a school that had decent to good test scores, racial and cultural diversity, but not so affluent that my children would be so sheltered that they wouldn't know that not everyone lives like they do? Most of all, the school had to be safe and in a decent middle and high school district.

Todd and I have decided to have Rollie repeat pre-k this year, since it will not seem to him like he is repeating, as he is going to a new elementary school, and will have a new class. He was having some problems keeping his frog on the lily pad last year, which basically means that while he did fine with the "academic" parts of school, he was struggling to control his behavior, follow directions, and generally play well with others. His teacher thought that it was probably just emotional immaturity and an inability to control his impulses, and that holding him back wouldn't harm him, and might help.

I talked to tons of parents of late-summer boys about the holding back issue: Those that didn't hold their boys back were split down the middle concerning their feelings about it; About half of them regretted not holding the boy back. On the other hand, not one single parent I've talked to regretted holding their son back. It just felt like the thing to do for us.

Fast forward a month to Rollie suddenly reading whole books. We started having doubts about how he would fare in Pre-K if he could read and other kids couldn't. Would he be bored? Would he be a frustration for the teacher? Would he languish without attention or challenge?

This parenting thing, it's pretty complex, and it is a game of stamina, like some mindfuck marathon that you just keep running, with diverging paths, and a finish line that keeps on slipping in and out of sight. Honestly, I think it has finally sunken in that there is no finish line.

I decided to talk to the Principal about my concerns (also making sure that if he needed to, Rollie could move up into Kindergarten.) I was so happy after my discussion with him: He said that they see kids across the spectrum in the Pre-K; that some come in not speaking little English, or not knowing their ABCs. Some know letter sounds. Some are starting to sight-read words. And that some can read sentences and books.

My favorite part? Every Friday, the kids who can read in the Pre-K and K classes come into the Principal's office and read books with him. I like the idea that my child won't be bored or ignored, and that he will be put into a group that is on his level, and that his accomplishment will be rewarded and acknowledged.

Anyone know if this reading group thing is common practice in elementary schools? Does anyone else have experience having been held back, or having held their child back? I'm curious what others have experienced.

A Happy and Safe 4th!

What is everyone doing for the 4th? We're off to the Lake for the weekend, but here's hoping everyone has a safe and fun 4th of July. Good luck to my peeps running the Peachtree!

A few pics from 4ths past . . .

On the Genetics of M and M Sorting

We've been using M&Ms to bribe Tiller into using the potty. (I don't want to hear the "you are going to give her an eating disorder" comments, either.) So far, it's not working well, but I can totally use them as good-behavior-inducing after-dinner treats. I've been counting Weight Watcher's points again, hoping to kick my weight loss back into gear (working out alone just doesn't do crap for me), but when i saw the diminutive little individual bags, i thought, "Oh, I'll just have one and count the points later." Big mistake: Four points!!!! They are the devil.

I went into the den, turned on Jeopardy, opened the bag and dumped them out on the coffee table. I separated the M&Ms into colors, then put each color group into a little line, so that i could see how many of each color I had. Then, i ate from the colors with the most candies, until i had evened out the lines. Then, I proceeded to eat the m&ms one at a time, taking one from each color line (brown first) until they were all gone.

At some point, Tiller came in, having inhaled her M&Ms, asking for more. "Nope," I said, "you need to go put your dishes in the sink and then go up and wash your hands." Finishing up my own neatly-ordered portion, I realized I hadn't heard much out of Rollie. Cleaning up my wrapper and grabbing my drink glass, I walked back into the kitchen, belting out a "Rollie, what are you doing, buddy? It's time to clean up and hit the showers!"

"Mama, I'm not finished yet!" he yelled back.

I looked at the kitchen table and came to a screeching halt. Rollie was intently looking down at his M&Ms, all laid out neatly in piles, organized by color. I watched him for a moment.

"Rollie, what are you doing?"

"Eating my M&Ms!"

"You put them in little piles?"

"Yup."

"By color?"

"Yup."

"I used to do that when i was a little girl."

"You did, mama?"

"Yeah, I did," I said with a smile. "You come on up and get ready for a bath when you get done with the M&Ms, okay?"

"Okay, Mama," he replied, not once taking his eyes off the little colored piles, his eyes scanning them, as he carefully picked one and popped it into his mouth.

Sometimes genetics are just downright weird. And sometimes they are kind of sweet.

Apple Book

We started reading "The Giving Tree" to Rollie when he was around two. It was a staple in our evening story time for over a year, was the book that he most loved (so far) and is probably in the top three books that I will forever associate with reading to him as a baby.

There were nights when I was exhausted, and I would think, "Please, God, anything but the Giving Damn Tree." Sure enough, he would toddle over with it in his hands, would always ask for it, the book that he called "Apple book." For months on end, we read it every single night. Todd and I could both recite whole sections in our sleep.

And then one day, just like The Boy in the story stopped visiting the Giving Tree, Rollie started to pick The Giving Tree less and less; His tastes changed, and he wanted to read about trains or cars or Curious George.

Tonight, I asked him to pick out a book to read, and that is the book he picked out. I was pleasantly surprised - I no longer think of it as a monotonous chore, as I once did - and told him I would be in when I finished tucking Tiller in. When I went into his room, he was sitting up, reading aloud the page he was on.

I asked if he was ready to read the book. He said yes, and I laid down next to him and went to take them book from him.

"No, Mama. I'm gonna read it to you."

And he did. And it was pretty damn special.

Clear Eyes, Full Hearts, Can't Lose!

I've written numerous times about my mixed marriage. The kids are completely on the fence. They see a G on a car in front of me and yell, "Bulldogs!" or "Georgia for you, Mama!" or they see that AU on a car and say, "Auburn!" Course, Rollie says, "Aubrun," and Tiller actually says, "Bullgogs." Which is really cute.

If they see a G and Todd is in the car, they will ask? "Daddy? You like Bulldogs, right?" And we are good parents, who try to consider if certain things we say might interfere with a child's self-esteem; Who knows if Todd telling Rollie that he doesn't like GA, when Rollie likes both UGA and Auburn, will harm R's burgeoning self-worth?

So we lie.

The standard answer for this from Todd is "Yes, I like them. I like Auburn the best, and then my second favorite team is whoever is playing Bama that week, and then Georgia." Very diplomatic, and not really untrue.

Standard answer from me is also the truth: "Yes, I like Bullgogs first." "Then Tigers, mama?" I think for a minute.

"Well, Bulldogs first, then Panthers, then Tigers.

Everyone in the car, even my 2-year-old, look at me like I am crazy.

"Panthers? Who are Panthers, mama?"

"Dillon Panthers, baby. Dillon Panthers."

Yeah, I seriously have a Friday Night Lights problem, and it's not just about the hot Coach Taylor, either. I cried last night watching them win state in the first season finale. No, I'm not kidding.

Plus, it gives me satisfaction to choose a fictional high school football team over Todd's Tigers. Always the rivalry exists.

Mama's Little Jackass

I was washing something in the sink night before last as I readied dinner. I looked out the window over the sink, which overlooks our front yard, to see my 4 year-old son, astride the white trash car, barreling across the street. As it ran up the curve of the driveway opposite us, then onto the grass, Rollie was catapulted off the car, up into the air a good 3 feet above the car's roof, coming down right on his ass, which was quite a drop considering the neighbor's yard slopes from the top of their drive.

I ran out the door, knocking Tiller over as I came out into the garage, to see him stand up, bawling his eyes out, and scared shitless. That made two of us. I yelled at him to stay where he was, as I didn't want him to run out in the street, and I was still running down the drive at this point. This was pointless, as four-year-olds who are frightened and want their mama are not deterred by things like having their skulls bashed in by oncoming traffic. No matter how I shrieked hysterically at him to stay where he was, he was coming towards me as fast as he could go, and there was no stopping him. He made it across without any problem and into my arms, sobbing uncontrollably, and doing the death grip cling to my neck that terrified kids do.

I am pretty sure I was yelling at him that he wasn't allowed to go into the street and what the hell was he doing in the street? He was crying that Tiller had pushed him into the street ("I was pushed!") and at that point Tiller rushed by me screaming, "my car! My car!" and she darted down the driveway towards the road, not looking either way for traffic, and me yelling my deepest, booming Mama's-gonna-tear-up-your-behind-if-you-run-in-that-street voice, again, to no avail. I had to sprint, with Rollie still in my arms, his legs wrapped behind me so tight i could barely take a breath, and managed to snag her arm at the very end of the drive, at which point i realized, Rollie was not bleeding, swelling, broken, or bruised, and was simply really, really frightened. He was put down, still clinging to my neck as I pried his arms away, and gave her a swat on the behind.

Then both children were dragged up the drive by their arms, both fighting me and screaming their personal grief, "Tiller pushed me! Tiller Pushed me!!!!" and "My caaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrr!!!!" and me still hysterically yelling at them: "Why were you in the street!!? You could have killed your brother, tiller. I don't give a good Goddamn about that car! Y'all are never seeing that car again! You were supposed to be in the backyard with your father! Where is your Father??!" as Todd finally came around from the back, hearing the hollering match, and the screams and probably the absolute "she's completely lost it" tone in my voice, which i admit I must have had.

Todd retrieved the car from the neighbor's yard, and promptly put it in the back of the van. It will be finding a new home, pronto.

Tiller was sent to her room (Todd handled that one, because i was ready to put the shaken baby syndrome on her) and I took Rollie in and sat on the couch with him, checking him for injuries, and just generally hugging his guts out and getting the ful story. It seems Rollie and Tiller were supposed to be watching Daddy put bug spray in the yard, and standing by the gate until he finished. What really happened is that Rollie and Tiller started playing in the garage, and Rollie straddled the white trash car (which is what kids who are too big for the white trash car do when they outgrow it). This means that he was sitting on the roof of it, his legs dangling down to about the doors, but unable to touch the ground. Rollie evidently asked Tiller to push him around the garage and somehow she ended up pushing him into the driveway, which has a slope to it. White Trash Car picked up speed, with Rollie pulling a complete Johnny Knoxville on top of it, and went straight down the hill, across the street (which was where I picked up the visual), and into the neighbor's yard, where he was launched like he was fired out of a cannon.

All I could think about when the initial adrenaline wore off, and when I started shaking, holding my baby on my lap, and crying my eyes out, was that:

a) The little fucker coulda been nailed by a car as he shot across the street and b) The little shithead wasn't wearing a helmet and he's lucky he hit the grass instead of shooting headfirst into the neighbor's driveway, or one of their cars and becoming a vegetable for life.

I am one lucky mom, and the whole thing was such a fluke, pretty much not something you could prevent, or prepare for, or imagine happening. And it just reminds me that all this other crap is just that: Bullshit. We live these tenuous lives and every moment is one second before or after that car comes barreling down the street and takes the important things away. We're all just one little jackass moment away from losing it all, no matter where we live, how beautiful we are, how great our jobs are, or whether we listen to cool music or american idol. The Jackass Moments in life do not differentiate.

Little Grad

So, Rollie graduated from Pre-k. Yeah, it's four-year-olds, but i was pretty damn proud. And he's pretty damn cute.

Yeah, check him out!

New School

7:45 am
[Enter room and see Rollie watching The Jetsons on Boomerang.]

Rollie: Mama, you know what I'm watching?
Me: The Jetsons?
Rollie: Yeah. . . . You like Jetsons, Mama?
Me: Yeah, it was one of my faves when I was a girl. You kicking it old school, or what?
Rollie [staring at me like I am the dumbest person on earth:] No, I'm going to a new school.

Always the little literalist.

Heartwarming Milestone: Rollie's First Bottle of Robo!

Like those other milestones, "First trip to the Emergency Room," or "First Projectile Vomiting Episode," they are so precious. This morning, it was "First Call to Poison Control."

Rollie has a cold and cough. He often wakes up earlier than Todd and me, goes to the bathroom, and then plays in his room until the sun comes up. This morning, I could tell he wasn't feeling good, and he was coughing like crazy, so I made the call to keep him home from school. He was laying on the couch, watching The Flintstones, and just feeling puny. Yes, Mom, his eyes were peaked, too.

It was my turn to get up with the kids, so Todd woke up later and i heard him jump in the shower. Then he came down with the news that someone had gotten into the cough medicine. Now, any parent knows that kids freakin' love taking medicine. It always tastes like Cherry, Grape, or Bubblegum! It's the best! Yes, i realize that kids are not supposed to take the cold and cough medicines anymore, but we never cleaned the old ones out of the medicine cabinet. I mean, who knows? Next month, they might come out with a study that shows children's cough medicine prevents cancer.

We interrogated him for a few minutes, trying to find out how much he took. We had no idea how much was in the bottle in the first place (or how he managed to open a "childproof" bottle.) He kept repeating that he took "four." Four sips? Four chugs? Four teaspoons? Four cupfuls? Sure, his liver might be experiencing irreparable damage, or his heart might be about to explode out of his chest, or he might be about to slip into a coma at any moment, but I still want to throttle him for not being able to express to me exactly how much he took. Mother of the Year!

I got on the phone with the pediatrician's office. When you tell the doctor that your kid ingested poison or got into cough medicine, all you can think is that the nurse on the other end is thinking "why the hell do you still have that medicine in the house, and why weren't you watching your kid? Just another dumbass, crappy parent." They forwarded me to Poison Control. While I waited for them to answer, I looked at the bottle. There was no Tylenol in it. Phew. For Rollie's size, he should have a teaspoon. A cup of it is four teaspoons. 98 pound kids are supposed to get four teaspoons. Rollie only weighs 40 pounds.

Fuck. What the hell is Dextromothorphan.

This is obviously some kind of karmic ass-biting the world is bringing upon me for all the times we shoplifted Robotussin in high school and then drank the whole bottle. I was a terrible kid and now I am the worst mother in the world. What the hell made me think i could be a parent? Just to get it out of the way, I should admit that there was also shoplifting and sniffing of Scotchguard and whipped cream. Maybe a confession here will be considered proactive good karma and the universe won't require Tiller and Rollie to fulfill the "I hope you have one just like you" curse to its full potential.

Poison control guy gets on and asks me questions and then tells me to hold on while they crunch numbers. Seems like forever, and it is not encouraging that Georgia Poison Control is somehow affiliated with Grady Health Systems. I start Googling directions to Children's from the new house.

Guy gets back on the line, and tells me Rollie will be fine. He should not have any other meds today. Drink plenty of fluids. He might be extremely excitable, or really drowsy. (Come on, drowsy!) He is definitely acting a little odd (he called me Tiller and keeps babbling nonsense) and his pupils look like saucers, but he seems okay.

I am so relieved. You forget how much you love the little shits, because you get so tired of the endless questions, and constant chatter, and neverending requests, and the fights, and crying, and messes they make. But when you have ten minutes wondering if you'll be sitting in a hospital that day and if your little man is going to be okay, it puts it all into perspective. You think that sitting on the couch watching cartoons and cuddling with a sick, doped-up kid is pure heaven.

We are sitting here on the couch now, and he is definitely acting squirrely; he keeps repeating "I'm sorry, mama." And I keep telling him that it is okay, that mama and Daddy got mad at him because it scared them, and he just can't ever take medicine without us ever again. Then he says, "I'm sorry I took the medicine, mama." We have been repeating this about every ten minutes for the last hour. I am reminded of the time Mike M. fell off the skateboard and got a concussion. He had no memory of the accident.

He kept asking: "What happened?"
Us: "You have a concussion."
Mike: "How did I get it?"
Us: "You fell off a skateboard."
Mike: "Who the hell let me on a skateboard!!??"

(For those that don't know Mike, he is about 6'8" and should never have been on a skateboard in the first place.) He would seem happy with our answers, and then five minutes later, forgot them and we went through the whole thing again. This happened so many times that da Crease finally wrote "Concussion" and "Skateboard" on his arm and just told Mike to look at his arm when he asked what happened. Still cracks me up to think about it.

The upside to this Robo episode? Rollie is so out of it that I am able to make him watch cartoons I like, rather than the Dora and Diego crap that we usually would have to watch. Right now we are watching The Perils of Penelope Pitstop. He keeps telling me he loves this show. It is his favorite.

Oh, and his cough is gone.

Motivation

Thanks to Maigh for introducing me to this black hole of a time-wasting site. I've made like ten motivational posters for my kids already. Addictive. Might have to do some for myself, too.

First Snow

A little video from our brief snow experience last night.

Things I Forgot About Snow

"Mama, when i was outside in the snow, I made a ball and I threw it on you and it was fun."

Yes, Rollie, it was. It was the most fun I've had in ages. I threw an icy, wet snowball today. But it was a snowball. And I showed you how to make a really sad snow angel. And I showed you how the best place to get a snowball from is a clean surface like the car and then we tried to throw snowballs at Daddy in the bedroom window above while he was on a conference call, while Quint did the low-butt run around the cul-de-sac, like he was a pup.

I had forgotten that snow had a sound and a smell, and that it made dogs frisky, and toes tingle and eyelashes frosted, and that it made little kids and big kids giggle like they were being tickled.

p.s. Mom, I'm real sorry about that mess me and Lisa and Matt and Karen and Sean made in the house, like, every day, throughout the winter in Rochester for two years in a row. We musta been about the biggest pains in the ass ever.

Resolution Broken

One thing that I don't like about having kids is that even on Saturday morning, I sometimes only drink about half a cup of coffee before having to do something like mop the whole kitchen after the kids dump their milk all over the floor for fun. This of course happened while I was in the bathroom for all of about one minute. Look in kitchen and it's perfectly clean. Go in bathroom for a minute, and come out to hear that "not good" silence that all parents dread. Walk into kitchen to find Tiller sitting at the table eating, surrounded by milk everywhere: Covering the table, in both chairs, all over the floor in an approximately 10X10 foot space. Rollie is nowhere to be found, but I finally locate him hiding inside the pantry doors, a sure sign of guilt if I have ever seen one. He proceeds to blame Tiller for the whole thing, and like a good little sheep, when asked about it, she says yes, she did it.

riiiiigght.

Spent the next 30 minutes cleaning the milk up, then mopping, all the while breaking one of my New Year's Resolutions, the one about raising my voice to the children.

Rhyme Time

Rollie is learning to sound out words, and even recognizes some on sight (like "Max" on the boat in Where the Wild Things Are), and it is fascinating to talk about words and letters and languages and sounds and to see how his brain is grasping things. Today on the way to school, he asked me "What rhymes with caution?" I was stumped. I told him,
"Um, okay, you stumped Mama. I can't think of one. Give me another."

"How about 'mailbox."

Geez, kid, I've only had one cup of coffee! I decided to pull a Seuss.

"Snailfox rhymes with mailbox."

In the rearview, I could see Rollie looking at me with suspicion. Parenting is hard.

Bonus: One smartypants point for each real word you come up with that rhymes with caution or mailbox. . . .

Meowing Love

Rollie saw the cats meowing Jingle Bells. So, the other night, when Todd went to Trivia, and I was putting the kids down, we did our usual night-nights, which include a range of oddities created over the last four years: Goodnight Moon turned into Goodnight Everyone we know and Every Object we have Ever Touched. Then when Tiller was little, I started singing Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star to her, and then she started making requests, so that now she gets three songs every night. Then Rollie realized we were singing with Tiller and he decided he wanted to sing at bedtime, too. The last month or so, it has been Christmas carols at bedtime. Usually Santa Claus Is Coming To Town. But when I lay down in the bed with Rollie on Thursday night, he said, "Let's do Meow Song," nodding as he said it.

"Huh?"

"Meow Santa Claus."

And I thought, "Todd, you fucker. A little warning would be nice when you teach him to meow Santa Claus Is Coming To Town."

Kids are a great leveller, though, a fantastic humbling experiment. So, I took a deep breath, and began to meow. There are times when you are alone in the dark, meowing with your child, and it feels like perfection, and you know that it will be a moment that will bring tears to your eyes 20 years later. But right then, you just feel really, really silly. And you love him so much you just don't care.

My Kid Rocks!

Tiller and Rollie are enrolled in Mother's Morning Out/Preschool at a nearby church. Today was their Christmas program, where the parents dress their kids up in the requisite Christmas outfits and then the kids get up in front of the audience and proceed to have a million different kinds of meltdowns. Kids cry, kids talk to their parents, a few kids do their own dances, and not one of them actually sings the Christmas song their music teacher has been teaching them for the last three months. Some of them pick their noses. Some of them hit one another with bells. It is completely amusing. All of this goes on as the proud parents snap photos and take video of their little darlings as if they were Brangelina's Shiloh.

It has been interesting to sing Christmas carols with the kids this year. We sing with the kids at home, and are constantly looking for music that we like that is also kid-friendly. If I do say so myself, my kids have excellent taste in music; Rollie can identify both Band of Horses and Kings of Leon by ear. He even has this funny pseudo-tough face that he does in conjunction with the heavy metal "devil horns" sign when he's really rocking out to a song. (By the way, that gesture is actually called a "corna" from the Italian for horns. Who knew?) But Christmas carols just don't seem cool, until you have a little one whose eyes are all alight with Christmas joy and visions of sugar plums and all that crap. Then, you just have to bite the bullet and sing the hell out of some Jingle Bells at the top of your lungs.

So, there we were, watching the kids perform Christmas carols at the church program. They finished a song, and the audience clapped for them, and Rollie looked at me, wearing his Three Kings outfit and a huge smile on his face, raised his arm, and gave me the clearest, most awesome Corna you ever saw in a Methodist church sanctuary.

My kid fucking rocks.

Winning the Lottery

You probably would not know it, even if you know me pretty well, but sometimes I get depressed. It's never enough to make me unable to function (well, there was that one time after I had the baby, but that was just the hormones), but I just get down. Blah. Uninterested. Bluesy. I don't really want to leave the house. I don't really want to clean the house I don't want to leave. I don't want to do anything at all. It reminds me of when I was a kid, and it would be raining, and there was nothing to do, and I kept on driving my mom crazy, but whatever she suggested sounded like absolutely no fun to me, and the feeling was just pure frustration.

When I get this way, i think I hide it pretty well from everyone but my sister and my husband. God knows, Todd has certainly been seeing the ill effects of my recent melancholy in the sorry housekeeping I have been doing. But for the most part, I really try to overcome my down days, to find things to do to pull me out of the depression, or at least keep me busy until it passes. Which I guess means that I am not truly depressed at all, because I can still function, can still see the light at the end of the tunnel.

Well, it just seems like lately i have have been bored, depressed, whatever. Maybe it's the holidays, maybe it's watching both mine and Todd's parents deal with their own aging parents, when they should be enjoying their retirements and their golden years. Maybe it is feeling helpless at not being able to make all of the people I love just have it easier, or just get a damn break once in a while.

I am still feeling a little down, but you know what helps? When one of your oldest and dearest friends calls and asks if you can drop everything and help her out by going to New York with her for the weekend. All expenses paid. Because her husband was supposed to go with her and something came up with work and now she will have to go by herself.

Um, okay. I guess so. What? Hells to the yeah, I'll go! What depression? What boredom?

Who won the lottery?

I did. When I was born to the most awesomest, givingest Mama ever. When I started playing rec-league b-ball with Mealby "Take a Look at My Choices" Barron, and when I met the most understanding, laid-back, fun-loving, hysterical - and yet responsible - man EVER and made my smartest life move yet - Marrying his ass.

My Dad and sister and kids and cutest dog in the world? They are icing on my life cake.

Coffee, Santa, Margaritas, and Rudolph = Bliss

Good, hot coffee at Joe's. Tiller and Rollie sitting on East Atlanta Santa's lap, with not a tear. Meeting nice new people in my great neighborhood. Margaritas with the Reids and my family at La Casita Cantina. Mmmm. Pork Carnitas. . . .

Coming home and cuddling on the couch with my eldest, dozing to the sounds of him watching Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.

Bliss.

This Little Guy

Has grown into a little boy who can sound out words. I almost cried last night, I was so proud of him. He sounded out "Volcano" and "Valley" and almost got "Village" in our Caribbean Alphabet book. (Thanks, Lissa and Addie!) He would have gotten "Village" right, but that whole hard G/soft G (oooh, sounds dirty!) thing threw him off, so he thought it was pronounced "villagh." I never realized how difficult and screwy English was until trying to explain the pronunciation of certain words to Rollie.

None of this would have been possible without the Best Bedtime-Story-Reading Daddy in the Whole Wide World, a Daddy who consistently reads to the kids almost every night, and does it with the most wonderful, sweet, indulgent temperament, when I am just ready to have the day be over, throw their asses in the bed fully clothed, and pour myself a glass of wine.

Parenting is a thankless job, but every once in a while, they throw you a bone. It is a nice day as a parent when you can say to yourself, "At least I know we are doing at least one thing right."

All Hallows Eve

Halloween was ultra fun. We carved the pumpkin (yes, I am a total slacker and waited till the last minute) and then went and had pizza at Grant Central. After that, we walked around East Atlanta Village for the Eav-O-Ween celebration.
All of the shop owners hand out candy to the local kids, and the people-watching is pretty fun. The kids were pretty cute, and I have to say that kids don't get hipper than those who trick or treat The Earl and The Flatiron. Nothing like seeing your little ones waltz right up to a bar for trick or treating. Definitely beats the toothbrushes we used to get from Dr. Grove, the dentist who lived down our suburban street growing up.
After that, we came home and Todd traipsed the kids down the street, while I stayed back to drink beer, er. . . hand out candy. There is something so heartstring-tugging about seeing your husband walking down the street, holding hands with the costumed kids, their other hands gripping the pumpkins so tightly and with such purpose. I had a lovely time talking with the neighbors and then Todd and the kids returned, the kids dove into the candy, and we sat around talking some more, while handing out candy. Halloween in the hood is a little different than in the 'burbs. The first few years, you are kind of put out by the older kids trick-or-treating (as one neighbor put it, if you are out on a date, you are probably too old to trick or treat) and the lack of discernible costumes, but you start to realize that it's just the way that folks do things here, and you get into the spirit and go with the flow after a while. And I dare say that this year, it seemed like more people dressed up and that they were trying just a little bit harder.
Todd hosed the children down from layers of stickiness and put them both down. About nine, we closed up shop (lights out, candles out), and Todd walked down the street to check out the Gay Superheroes. It seems that the money house (what I call the neighbor's house where everyone meets to party while handing out candy every year - a jackpot for the trick or treater) was doing a Superhero costume theme this year. I am sure they went all out and I should have sent the camera. Damn.
I'm drinking beer, fucking around with the Halloween photos, and listening to my Creepy mix. Decemberists' Leslie Anne Levine is on right now. Awesome song. Awesome holiday.

Dispatch from Hell

Hell is the wonderful municipality of Warner Robins, GA, a town built up around an air force base. It is full of concrete and really ugly buildings. My father said he would never come back here after he finished high school and moved back to Savannah, where he was born. He is back, because no one counted on my grandfather making it to 92 years old, and Pop still lives here. So, now, mom and dad do too. My sister and I are in complete agreement that once Pop dies and Mom and Dad get out of this hell hole, we will never come back again. EVER.

We are watching Pop this weekend while Mom and Dad get away for a couple of days. So far, today:

5 a.m. I wake up to hear Rollie and Pop talking on the baby monitor. Pop has gotten up to go to the bathroom, which we were under the impression he can no longer do on his own. Evidently, he can, and the walker woke up Rollie, who thought it was Lisa and yelled out, "Lisa!" which promptly woke both Lisa and Tiller. I run upstairs, wondering what the hell is going on. Everyone is awake. Pop is sitting on the toilet with the door open (awesome) and Tiller is crying out and Lisa is asking me what I am doing upstairs. We get everyone calmed back down, with admonitions to Rollie that he shouldn't get out of bed until the sun comes up.

5:15 a.m. I am back downstairs in bed with the dog. My stomach hurts like shit. I am trying to go back to sleep. I realize that my stomach hurts because it is upset and then I spend the next 3 hours in and out of the bathroom. I never fall back asleep.

8 a.m. Everyone is up and clamoring for breakfast and the dogs need to go outside and i feel like crap. I slap raisin bran on the table for the kids, while Lisa takes the dogs out, because I just can't risk being that far away from the bathroom.

8:15 a.m. Pop calls and wants someone to get his breakfast and his insulin shot for him. He gets the shots at every meal and before bedtime. Lisa takes pity on me and takes both kids and her Jack Russell Terror, Emily, with her. I lay on the bed with Quint and try to enjoy quiet despite cramping stomach.

8:20 a.m. My mom calls. So much for my stolen moments without children. She wants to know what Lisa wanted. I don't know, but will have Lisa call her.

8:30 a.m. Lisa yelling, "No, Emily! No! No!" Lisa is saying over baby monitor.

8:40 a.m. Everyone comes back downstairs, except Pop, who never leaves his Lazy Boy. Lisa freaking out. Emily ate rat poison. After determining that children never came in contact with rat poison, I google "Dog ate rat poison."

8:50 a.m. Lisa and Emily get in car to go to vet, where she will be given something to make her puke up the poison, and a shot of something to counteract the effects of the poison.

8:55 a.m. I venture out to the carport so that Rollie can ride his bike and Tiller can play with sharp and poisonous stuff, of which there is a ton, because my grandfather has not thrown out a single item since about 1935. Quint gets his leash caught up in the porch furniture he is tied to while I chug Pepto Bismol. Tiller runs around at breakneck speed with a stick and then falls and skins both knees, just as Rollie barrels down the slope of the driveway, narrowly missing my Grandma's c. 1980s Cadillac with 19,000 miles on it. Yes, Grandma has been dead for five years, but why get rid of a perfectly good Caddy only driven to the Beauty Shop on Thursdays and church on Sundays? Swerving to miss Caddy, Rollie's bike flies out from under him and he lands smack dab on his ass, then gets up wailing. He climbs up into my lap for consolation, as I juggle Pepto and a dog leash, and Tiller then comes over to give him a hug, too, which was sweet, but only makes him shriek in my ear.

That's just a taste of a few moments in the alternate reality that is my Grandfather's house. Things have gotten better since about ten. Emily is going to make it, and the medicine might even make her sleep for the afternoon. Lisa took Tiller and Rollie to the store to get stuff for dinner and to give me a break from them. Both dogs are sleeping. Pop doesn't need lunch and a shot until 1:30. Lunch for him is easy, because he eats the same lunch every day: 1 pimento cheese sandwich, one small can of baked beans, and one can of Vienna sausages, all cold and out of the can. Puke-O-Rama.

Certainly things will continue on this upward trend until 3:30, when Cocktail party kicks off, at which point Bulldogs will disappoint me, and I will hopefully be over my stomach deal, so I can drink my sorrows away with a few Saturday afternoon beers.

Hope everyone else is having an awesome Saturday. With less poison, poop, barking, and did I mention the pooping? than we are experiencing here.

What to Be For Halloween

This morning, I asked Rollie what he was going to be for Halloween.

"Spider Man," he replied.

"Tiller, what are you going to be?" I said.

"Bida Mon." [Spider Man. She mimics everything Rollie does.]

I said, "Well, what am I going to be?"

Rollie didn't even look up, but stated very decisively, "A cow."

Um, thanks.

Back to School

I cannot believe that I dropped off my little Tiller for her first day of school today. Okay, not real school, but the Mommies' Morning Out program. She goes Tuesdays and Thursdays for three whole hours. She was so excited to put on her big girl backpack. Keep your traps shut about the fact that it is Rollie's hand-me-down backpack; He got a brand spanking new Diego backpack for his birthday, and it just seemed ludicrous to throw the old one out, so I just crossed out his name and put hers on the backpack. I also drew her a nifty flower to girl it up a little. Then I felt guilty for not drawing anything on Rollie's backpack, so I drew him a car. Two more fun things about being a Mom - 1) You can guilt yourself about just about anything where your kids are concerned and 2) You will need a Sharpie. Often.

Both kids got out of the van, with Todd's help. He followed us over to school for her first day, since we did it last year for Rollie's first day. Yes, Todd is the best Daddy ever. They were so cute, with backpacks and raring to go. They humored me while we took some pictures to commemorate the big event. Rollie was cracking me up, saying hello to the Pastor and to his friends from last year. We took him to his classroom first. He went right in, found his hook, hung up his backpack, and started playing. He said, "Hey guys!" when he walked in the room. Tiller followed him in at a run, with her backpack too big for her body, and mimicked big brother with a very cute, "Hey, guys!" to the big kids in Rollie's class. Luckily, she was not upset when we put her in the room with kids her own age.

We walked her down to the room, and the door was shut. She went right in, starting to play before we could get her backpack off her. We showed her where her hook was and hung up her backpack, because she wasn't able to reach the hook yet. She went right back to playing with cars. Todd and I said bye-bye, and slipped out. No tears, not even a glance.

Then I went to meet Lisa for coffee and unadulterated adult conversation (can adult conversation be unadulterated?) for over two whole straight hours. It was good. Really, really good.

We Did It! Kept One of These Critters Alive for Four Years!

Dear Rollie -

I cannot believe that you are four years old today. It seems like just yesterday that I was lying around taking naps, and anticipating your arrival. If only I had known how drastically my life was about to change. You turned everything upside down from the moment you arrived, and I will never be the same.

In the last year, you started school for the first time. You just went three days a week from 9-noon, but it was so hard to drop you off that first time. You were so excited, with your little backpack. I don’t know why I worried – you did great, and you made lots of friends, and you loved going to school. You didn’t get in too much trouble, although I did have to go pick you up one time for biting. I was mortified. We talked about it, though, and you never did it again. Your teacher at the beginning of the year was Miss Michelle; you loved her, and sometimes you didn’t want to leave school and would hug her legs and cry and scream when I came to pick you up. After Christmas, they moved the three-day kids into a different class and your teachers were miss Reshma, who was from India, and Miss Janice. Both of them were very sweet to you, and liked you very much, although you went through a difficult stage there for a while. You were pushing a lot. That was our fault, though, because we let you watch the movie, “Cars.” It was a movie about a racecar, and in his races, he and other cars would bump each other, and you started bumping other people in real life, including your friends at school, and your little sister. Any time you ran into someone, you would say that it was “bumping.” We took the movie away when we (finally) realized the movie was causing the behavior.

Your friends at school are Jackson, Reese, David, Ezra, Zoe, Shruthi, Toby, and Sarah. I loved to come pick you up and see you playing happily on the playground. I always had to bring home a pile of artwork that you did at school. The box in my closet is about to explode, it has so much artwork in it. I don’t know what I will do when you and Tiller are both going this coming Fall. The teachers last year always said that you were very smart and doing well with your ABCs and counting and letter sounds. I am very proud of your intelligence and how quickly you learn things, and I know that you are going to be reading in the next couple of years; I cannot wait to see your excitement when you realize that reading a book is like opening a door to a whole new, unexplored world. I look forward to discussing books with you, and to seeing what subjects you get excited reading about.

Your favorite things to play right now are cars and trains. You are a pro at riding your tricycle, and Daddy and I finally got you a new bike for your birthday. It is a Huffy Rockit, and it has flames on it. We took you to the park to ride yesterday and you did great. You were a little scared, and had a few wobbles when your training wheels went off the sidewalk, but if I walked beside you, holding the end of the handlebars, you were confident. If I let go, you would cry and scream for me to hold on to it again. I admit that I was annoyed that you were too scared to try it, but I was proud that by the end of the outing, you were riding without me helping you, and riding ahead of Daddy, Tiller, and I. You showed us how you could ride in circles, and you were so proud of yourself. I know that years from now, I will wish that you need me more often, that I will want to hold on to your handlebars, or help push you up the big hills, so to speak, but I know that part of being your Mama is watching you become an independent little boy.

You received other stuff for your birthday: A bunch of matchbox and hot Wheels cars, an Auburn shirt (I am hoping you will grow out of that ugly thing pretty soon), a game with a monkey, a football set and a cool die-cast truck from Uncle Mark. Uncle Lyle got you a racetrack for your cars, and a cool Snoopy Snow Cone machine. Grandma and Papaw Palmer got you a baseball glove and tee with a whiffle ball and bat. The glove looks so small, and yet it is too big for your hand. We are taking them to the Lake for Labor Day this weekend, and I am looking forward to playing some catch with you and Papaw (when we’re not watching the Dawgs play, of course – Football season starts this weekend!) Your party was a cookout at our house. We filled the kiddie pool up for swimming, and had hot dogs, hamburgers, cake, and ice cream. All of your Grandparents were here, but Meemaw and Pop couldn’t make it. Uncle Mark and Aunt Lisa were here, and also Uncle Lyle. Aunt Denise was sick, and Aunt Suzanne and Uncle Wade couldn’t make it because they had baby Luci on Friday. That’s right! You and Tiller have your first cousin. I am a little sad that you don’t have a cousin closer in age, but you and Tiller are such partners in crime, that I know you will always have each other to play with. Other people at the party were: Harmony, Gabe, and baby Chase; Ned, Vanessa, and Scarlett; cousin Adam, and Jenny and Addie; Matt Stewart showed up in time for a burger, cake, and ice cream.

Let’s see, what else happened this year? Your vocabulary has rocketed. I am amazed when you ask me things like, “Mama, what are consequences?” and you really caught me off guard last week, when you asked me how babies get out of their Mama’s tummies. For the record, I just told you the truth – babies come out of their mama’s vaginas, kind of like when they go pee pee. You looked confused and then asked me if the baby went into the toilet. You like to say that things are “crazy” or “cool.”

You are a great big brother. You teach Tiller lots of games, and you are pretty patient with her, even when she is a complete pest. You both love to dance, and to sing. Your favorite songs this year have been: Just about anything by Kings of Leon, although your favorite is probably “Charmer.” You love to sing to Sufjan Stevens’ “Chicago,” The Decemberists’ “Crane Wife 3,” and Lily Allen’s “LDN.” You totally rock out to MC5’s “Kick Out the Jams” (I am a good mom, and always do something to distract you from the first line, so that you won’t learn that one) and The Stooges’ “I Wanna Be Your Dog.” Your favorite song to dance to is Peter Bjorn and John’s “Young Folks.” The big dance move you do is what we call “The Big Dance.”

You finally potty-trained this summer. I was frustrated as all get-out, and then one day at the lake, you just started pooping on the potty all by yourself. It was like you decided to finally do it once we gave up trying to teach you. I think you may get a little bit of obstinancy from both your Mama and your Dada. Whatever. I am just glad that I am not changing two diapers anymore. You still wear one at night, and during naps. Not that you nap anymore. Unless you fall asleep in the car, or you are sick. I get pretty frustrated with this, because it means that I never get any alone time during the day, but I know that I will miss our afternoons together when you start school for real.

I really, really try to cherish every moment with you, and I think that I do a pretty good job of checking myself when I am not making the most of our time together. Right now you are sitting next to me watching Diego while I type this. Tiller is sitting next to you. You are wearing a purple, plastic lei that you got at the gym this morning, Thomas the Tank engine underwear, and an Auburn shirt. You just turned to me, yawned, and said something about Baby Jaguars.

I cannot believe how much you are the center of my world, how much I love you, and how fast you change. Lately, you have become more pouty when you are mad at us, and sweeter, to the point of saccharine, when you are trying to show us affection. If you are mad at us, you will tell us “You are a joke!” which we reprimand you for, but secretly think is cute. You also sometimes say that “I am not loving you today.” That one hurt the first time you said it, but now it makes me laugh, because you would have to do a whole lot more to make me not love you back. I don’t think I could love you one iota less. I think you yourself have summed up my love for you: You have taken to telling us, when you are being sweet, that “You are my heart, mama. You and Daddy are my hearts.”

I think that people who are not parents cannot possibly understand the all-encompassing love a parent has for their children. It is a double-threat, a totality of body and mind. It is a love that occupies my mind at all times, even stealing into my dreams to wake me in a terror. It is the physicality of the love, though, that awes me so; the physical sense of feeling sick when you are hurt, or even at the thought of you being in pain. The knowledge, fearless and involuntary, that I would take a bullet for you without a moment’s hesitation. I know that I would kill for you, or die trying. I guess it is biology, a primal instinct to preserve my offspring, but I also like to think that there is a bigger power in our world and that it is fueled by loves like the unalterable love that I feel for you and your sister. You are my heart, sweet Rollie, and you will always be my heart.

Happy Birthday,
Your Mama
Annie

The N-Word: The Playground Argument

It took me a day to digest this incident. I think the N-word has so much power that it would be remiss of me to blog about my thoughts on it all willy nilly.

Yesterday, Todd and I took the kids to the Fellini's on LaVista for lunch. We Beat the Baptists, as my Dad always called it when I was growing up. As a kid, after Church on Sundays, we would be ushered quickly out of our Methodist (Baptist Lite) church, and herded to the cars, all of us except Dad just wishing we could go home and change out of the damn panty hose and do something fun with the rest of our Sunday, before the 60 Minutes clock started ticking. Not Dad, though. He had one goal in mind: Beat the Baptists to Morrison's. I may not attend church anymore, but Dad and I have more than a little in common with one another. I still like to Beat the Baptists if I am having lunch out on a Sunday.

We went into Fellini's and ordered. As we waited for our order, we watched Chelsea and Liverpool play soccer on the large TV. Business was slow, as we had beat the Baptists soundly, and the cooks were standing around watching the match, too. Rollie will usually narrate any sport that we watch on TV, even if he doesn't even know what sport it is. I would be lying if I said I didn't filter out about half of everything he says in a day, but Todd and I both were interested when he said the following:

"What is that black man. . . blue shirt doing?"

Todd and I looked at each other questioningly, as if to say, "have you heard him say anything about a person's color before?" We live in a pretty diverse neighborhood. On any given day, there are a pretty equal number of White and African American kids on the playgrounds nearest our house. Same breakdown at the kids' center at the YMCA. Not once has he ever asked me why some people are one color and others are another. It just hasn't happened. It is not for his lack of curiosity, because he has been curious about people in wheelchairs, and he has (quite loudly) asked why the people at the next table in a restaurant are "so big." (As I have said before, parenting is not for the faint-hearted.)

I whispered to Todd, "Maybe he just got confused about the color of the jersey."

Todd replied: "We're lucky he didn't use another word."

"What? What do you mean?"

"He heard a new word at the playground a lot yesterday."

Todd proceeded to tell me about their trip to Kirkwood playground yesterday. They had gone over there, because Brownwood Park was being used for a family reunion. This is a common occurrence, but it is kind of difficult to keep up with two kids by yourself in a mass of people, so he thought he'd be able to better keep up with them at Kirkwood. Turns out there was a family reunion at the Kirkwood park, too. The family reunion was for an African-American family.

Todd said that there were kids of all ages there, and that the boys on the playground were liberally using the N-word.

"You mean there were teens using it?"

Nope, kids. Kids under 8, under six even. He nodded seriously to affirm that yes, there were children using the N-word to each other on the playground.

I looked at Todd aghast.

Todd said that Rollie didn't seem to notice the word at all, but anyone who has a young one learning to talk knows that just because they haven't said something doesn't mean it hasn't been soaked up by their little sponge brains. Exhibit A: Car runs a red light last year and narrowly misses my van as I am taking Rollie to school. I slam on brakes and mutter "Asshole." I look in the rear view mirror and Rollie seems oblivious to the word. Thank God. I get to school and get out to take Rollie in. As I open the van door, I say hello to the woman who works in the church preschool office, who is parked next to us. The door slides open to the sound of Rollie singing, "Asshole, asshole, asshole." Kids have perfect comedic timing. Impeccable. It has been 48 hours since Rollie heard the N-word on the playground, and it has not surfaced, so I am thinking we dodged a bullet with this one. At least, he dodged a bullet.

Me? I feel like I was hit with a silver bullet right through the heart. I have such strongly held emotions about the n-word as it is, but to have my child enmeshed in the discussion makes my blood boil. Three-year-olds should not be presented with the n-word. I am sure there are PhD students writing their dissertations on the origins and power of this word; how on earth is my child prepared to digest the meaning of the word?

I am well-educated. I understand that many African Americans feel that they have taken this word back. I think it is a stupid argument and that people who use the word are ignorant and that the word itself is so fraught with pain that I cannot fathom why someone would want to use it, rather than let it be buried by the sands of time. But I do not think that I can remotely understand what it is like to be African American, and so I tend to just think that it is a word that I myself will never utter, and that my children will never use.

But when I imagine people using the word with one another, taking the word back, so to speak, I imagine that it is teenagers and adults who wield the word; Never in a million years did I imagine that children, some my own son's age, would be using the word on the playground. I shudder to think what would have happened if my son the sponge, with a love for the sound of new words on his tongue and for the plays on words that he so adores, had heard those boys calling one another the N-word, and in his childlike naivete and playfulness, had called one of them by the same word they were calling one another.

What, pray tell, would have been the reaction? I know what my husband would have done. He would have gotten down on his knees and firmly told Rollie, looking him in the eye all the while, that this is not a word that we EVER use. But how do you explain the pain and history of such a word to a three-year-old? How do you explain to a child, one that does not even seem to see the color of skin, that it is alright for one color of people to use the word, to throw it around like a ball at play, but for others to even utter the word is unacceptable?

What would be the reaction from the other children if Rollie had uttered that word? What would have been the reaction of their parents? I would like to think that the parents' reactions would be one of understanding. But in this racially-charged city (and to say that Atlanta is not preoccupied with race is naivete incarnate), I fear that the parents might assume that this is a word that my son learned from us. I am glad that it didn't come up. At times, I prefer being an ostrich, head in the sand. There are some questions to which I don't want to know the answer.

All I know is that I have never liked the word, and I have never used it. I was raised that it was ignorant to use the word. I have never understood why people would want to use it, most especially those for whom the word has such a terrible past. The thing about the word, though, is that it has a terrible past for us all, doesn't it?

I will teach my children that the word is unacceptable and that its users are ignorant. I am sure there are African Americans who would find fault with me calling them ignorant for using the word. I don't know what to say to them; I just know that my heart hurts for those children who know not what they utter on that playground. My heart hurts for my own son, who came so close to having his first introduction to the word, an introduction that I wish would never happen, much less when he is three. I only know that I would be much happier if we all let the word go.

I am one of a multitude of people who have thought about the word, or written about it. My treatment of it here is superficial and barely skims the surface of the myriad ways this word works and thrives and undermines and causes harm in our society. But in everything I have read and watched and heard about this word, I have never found a single argument against any of us using the N-word that is quite as compelling as the playground argument:

Is this a word that we want uttered on our playgrounds? Is this a word that we want little African American boys teaching to their white playmates?

Afternoon Surprise

Not to be confused with Afternoon Delight.

My sister was bummed out about various life stuff and so she came over to destress. Why you would come to the home of two kids under four to destress, I have no idea, but she is a strange cookie.

Anyway, I never even ate breakfast, and then she had me convinced that I should drink a margarita with her, before I had even had lunch. She really had to twist my arm. Ended up having lunch, two margaritas, and hanging out all afternoon in the backyard with the kids, and the two dogs. (She brought her new pup, and once again, I forgot to snap a picture of her.)

The best part was kicking the soccer ball with Rollie. When you have a baby, you just never really let it sink in that they will grow up, start talking, and be able to kick a soccer ball with you in the backyard. It was a little surreal - Just me and the boy, kicking the ball back and forth and talking and laughing.

Might have been the margaritas, but I think it was more that he is just growing into such a nice little boy. Into someone that in twenty five years or so, I might actually be friends with.

A Sad End to an Idyllic Aerie

Things came to a sad end here this morning. A few years ago, we planted Evergreen Clematis at the base of our porch, and trailed the vines up the pillars and along the edge of our porch roof. As evidenced by the name, the vine is evergreen, giving us green foliage right out our window, all year long. The Clematis blooms, with big white flowers, once a year, for an all-too-brief period of time.

The plus to this Clematis has been the unexpected families of birds who have set up shop in the vines. Clematis is strong, and it is strong enough to hold a nest where it runs across the corners of the porch. At one time, we had three nests, all bustling with birds. Okay, it isn't all zippity-doo-dah; The birds occasionally swoop at us as we try to get in our front door, but it has been more than worth it to hear the babies chirping in their nest as we sit in the rockers on the porch at day's end.

This morning, as Todd was leaving for work, and I was being roped into a game of trains with Rollie, Todd knocked on the window from the porch, a disappointed look on his face, and then pointed down at the porch floor.

"The Birds?" I asked?

Todd nodded. He held two fingers up.

Just Saturday night, Todd and I were sitting on the porch, having a couple of beers after the kids went down, and before Todd went out to see bands (lucky bastard). We sat in the fading light, and as we did, a bird kept swooping in the side of the porch, a worm in its mouth, then flying back again to sit on the fence next door. She would sit there, trying to look nonchalant about not being able to get us to move. We took pity on her and moved to sit on the porch steps, away from her nest.

It wasn't readily apparent what happened to our birds. The two babies were just lying on the ground, and they had been there long enough that the ants, who also live around and in our porch vines, had come to take what was there, swarming all over them. There was no sign of Mama Bird. My heart hurts for her. I wonder if she has moved on, this once idyllic aerie no longer holding any joy for her.

We brought Rollie outside to see the scene, and talk about what happened to the birdies, and how they are going to Bird Heaven, where they can fly fast and forever, without having to come down for a rest, where the worms are plentiful, and the nests are safe.

Why, Yes . . .

That was my almost-four-year-old son spectacularly showing his ass in the Barnes and Noble at Edgewood Retail District. He was the one running up and down the aisles from me (as I dragged his poor sister along by the arm) and screaming at the top of his lungs, "Don't get me! Don't get me! Don't get me!" and then screaming, "Nooooooooooonooooooooooooo. Nooooooooooooooooooo. Nooooooooo!!!!!!!" as I dragged him kicking from the store, with an embarrassed look on my face, muttering "I'm sorry" to every patron we passed along the way.

My apologies to anyone who suffered permanent hearing loss, or who will need therapy before deciding to have children of their own.

The perpetrator is now sitting in his room, thinking about the consequences of his behavior (No storytime, no haircut.)

Look, Mama

"Look, Mama," Rollie says from the kitchen table. I am sitting at the computer in the den and I can't see him. "I made something!"

[momentary pause]
Me: "As long as it isn't a mess, that's awesome."

Memorial Day. Lake. Again.

We pretty much go to the lake every Memorial Day. Especially now that we have kids. It is free, sunny, and not home.

Todd and kids with vintage Coleco Turtle pool (mine and Leelee's as a kid). Yes, I watch too much Antiques Roadshow.

Tiller and Rollie in Pool. If I could only get both of them to look at the camera at one time, much less both to smile.

Some pastimes are classic and affordable. Like blowing bubbles, running races, and eating melon in the grass.

Tiller wearing "Grandpa's Sidekick" hat.

Hope everyone had as lovely a holiday as ours.

Field Day

Yep. You heard me.

"Field Day."

Conjures up some memories, doesn't it? Hot May days, red clay on your tube socks, popsicles, tug-of-war, relays, and ice cream. My friend Vanessa, a schoolteacher, gleefully tells me come every May about what they call Field Day at her school. I think she enjoys watching me roll my eyes. I kid you not, they call it "Personal Record Day." Because God forbid that we might have kids who are actually winners over other kids, because . . . well, then there would be losers. We wouldn't want to teach our little ones that sometimes people win, sometimes they lose. Even worse, what if they were to learn that classic lesson about being a gracious loser? Nope, much better to let them run around a field like chickens with their heads cut off, achieving nothing, learning nothing, but with their precious self-esteem intact.

Oops. Totally got off the subject. This was about Rollie, and about his first field day. In his own words.

I Hate Nature

I thought that I liked nature, but I was wrong. We got home late last night (9 pm, go ahead and snicker - Todd and I already had a good laugh at ourselves and the sorry state of our Friday nights) and put the kids down. They usually go to sleep between 7:30 and 8:00, but last night didn't go down until 9:00. I foolishly thought this might mean I'd get an extra hour to sleep in this morning. I will never know if that was possible now, because at 6:30, Rollie came into our room complaining about a little noise that was "making me not sleepy." After much discussion, during which I may have been still partially asleep, we came to the conclusion that we have a Goddamn woodpecker.

Little fucker. The woodpecker, not Rollie.

I hate nature.

On the Cusp of A New World

More often than not, Todd will read to Rollie before bedtime, and I will read and put Tiller down. When I do get the opportunity to put both kids down for the evening, like last night when Todd went out with friends, I am always amazed at how far Rollie has come in his reading.

Okay, he can't really read, but he already knows his ABCs (big whoop, right?) and he knows all of the sounds that the letters make which is a little more impressive. He is driving me crazy asking what letter words start with, and in addition to being able to spell his own name, he can also spell mine. (He doesn't forget the E, either.) Last night he wowed me, though.

Damn can that boy memorize. I mean, when I think about the fact that I know every word to "Licensed to Ill" and "Paul's Boutique" and will probably be on my deathbed and still remember them, well, that kind of amazes me, because I was one class away from a minor in French, and the only thing I remember from that is how to say cheese. ("Fromage." Impressive, no?) I think I thought that repeated listenings while smoking cigarettes and drinking heavily were responsible for my remarkable memorization skills, but maybe it was just my inner child that accomplished the searing of whole albums' lyrics across my brain.

Because my little man can recite Where the Wild Things Are from beginning to end, with little to no prompting. He is a wonder. And there is nothing sweeter or cuter than a three-year-old reciting Where the Wild Things Are from memory. Must get on video. Must show the world my child genius.

In all seriousness, I am so proud of the boy. He is sweet and smart and funny and compassionate. And the three things that I want most for my children is to be happy, healthy, and lovers of the written word. I can feel that he is just on the cusp of making the leap from memorization to reading, and I am so excited for him that this whole world is about to open up for him when he cracks a book.

I think we are doing pretty good so far. Yay us. Yay Rollie.

Blood Will Out

[Rollie swings silver plastic strand of beads around his head like he is going to lasso Tiller, or maybe whip her with the beads.]

Rollie, stop that this minute! You're gonna put an eye out!

Not only is this one of those things that I promised myself I would never say, but when I said it, I sounded for all the world just like my Grandma Palmer from South Georgia.

Blood will out, I suppose.

The Freedom to Make One's Own Mistakes

When I left the Dogwood Festival for the ER last week, I failed to get this up on Dogwood Girl first. It is too good to pass by, though.

I am not a fan of The Grateful Dead. All that noodly jam stuff drives me cuckoo. So, it was funny that my best friends from college were Grateful Dead fans. We still joke around about it. I think that they will find this humorous.

I go to the Dogwood Festival with the family. Tiller and I sit and watch the dog frisbee competition, while Todd takes Rollie to get his face painted. Five bucks and the kid gets to pick the theme. Hundreds of choices.

He chooses the stupid Grateful Dead Steal Your Face thingie. Then I have to walk around the Dogwood festival with this hippie three-year-old, people possibly thinking that I chose it for him. It is a testament to my love for him that I would even hold his hand in public.

I guess you have to let kids make their own choices, and the irony of parenthood is that even when they make the choices you don't want them to make, you still stand by them.

A Couple of Firsts

Rollie had his first field trip today. I had my first experience chaperoning a group of three and four year olds. Me being in charge of a group of kids is kind of funny, as I think I still need a guide when I am out in public. I had total flashbacks of my middle school getting kicked out of the Atlanta Symphony Hall one year for bad behavior.

It was also pretty scary to put other people's children in my car and drive them around, even if I do drive like a Grandma. I had two other kids in my van, in addition to Rollie and Tiller, who seemed thrilled to be hanging with the big kids.

Note to parents: If you want someone else to take your kid in their car, do that person a big favor and know how to install your own car seat.

Note to self: Next time you volunteer to chaperone a group to a puppet show, or to anything else for that matter, don't stay out till one a.m. drinking wine with the girls the night before.

I thought sleep-deprivation and a slight hangover were bad with two kids. If I had three-year-old triplets, i would never touch a drop of alcohol ever again for fear of experiencing what I experienced on the 15 minute ride to the puppetry theater. Every time I write "puppet," i keep thinking Metallica's Master of Puppets, which my friend Owen blasted for a good year in the car on the way to high school, which was actually quieter than what I experienced this morning. Those three wouldn't shut up for a minute. There was one point where I was trying to merge onto 85 South and all four kids were screeching and screaming at top volume, and I thought momentarily about driving the van off an overpass just to shut them up.

Also, while one kid was a joy, the other one kept saying things like, "Rollie, why does your Mom drive so slow?" and "My Mom's car is faster than yours" and I know it is not a sign of maturity that I wanted to tell the kid to shut the fuck up before I kicked his mom's ass. Instead, I made myself feel better by telling him in a sweet voice, that "Yes, I think your mom is fast."

Phew! I'm Back.

You might be wondering what happened to me. Spring Break happened to me. Rollie had a week off from school, so we took the kids and went to the Lake for a week. It was nice, at least for a day or two, then it was freezing. Anyway, we got back yesterday and I am just getting back into the swing of things, but thought I'd let anybody who cares know that I didn't die or anything. I just spent a week with the family.

Oh, and I didn't get on a computer for seven whole days. Kind of refreshing to remember what it is like to live unwired for a week. I read, I cleaned house. I took a few walks. I sat in the yard and watched the moon rise. I drank not as much as one might think I would.

Of course, it was so cold that I also watched a shit load of television and somehow got addicted to a show about working on Alaskan crab boats.

But no email. No cel phone. And I mostly listened to the radio, which might sound terrible, but the local station out of Eatonton, Georgia is about the funniest thing ever. The commercials star people's grandchildren, like Lydia and Hannah (of "I'm Hannah, come see my Nana!" fame) and a commercial they play over and over for a butcher shop, I guess, with a theme song containing a chorus of "It's the meats, It's the meats, It's because of the wonderful meats!!!!"

Good stuff. Anyway, I'm back and I'm overwhelmed. Laundry, email, getting Rollie to school, worrying about frozen plants. Mold on the bread when I've already promised the pbj. Crises of that sort.

Kinda missed this place.

Call Me Tipper

Yesterday, Tiller and I dropped Rollie off at school, then headed for the gym. We were coming through Oakhurst and were on 2nd Ave. We stopped at the four-way stop at Oakview. This intersection is across a two-lane street (Oakview) which has a grassy median in the middle. So, when you are crossing on 2nd, you go across one lane of traffic, then there is an area that cuts between the grassy median, and then you cross the other lane of Oakview. We were the first car there, then two other cars pulled up: One at the Stop to our left, and one at the Stop directly across from us. There was no one at the Stop sign to our right. We began to cross and as I reached the beginning of the middle of the intersection, a truck (Ford F150-sized, I'd say) came blowing through his Stop sign on my right. He was going about 40-45 miles and hour and didn't even slow for his Stop sign. I slammed on my brakes, and skidded a few feet in the median section, coming to a stop only a few feet from where the truck passed. I sat on the horn, taught Tiller how to give the bird, and then started shaking. If we had been one second faster, the truck would have hit the front, right side of my van. Another two seconds, and it would have t-boned us on Tiller's side of the van. Either way, it would have fucked us up, if not killing her.

I spent the next hour or two just thinking about the tenuousness of our existence on this earth, the preciousness of a baby girl, and how quickly the rug can be pulled out from under us, control completely out of our reach. I was FREAKED. Today, I am not so shaky and wigged out, but still kind of scared and angry when I think about it.

Anyway, we picked up Rollie from school and found out that he has been acting out in class. He is hitting, kicking, pushing, and won't stay in line. They also informed me that Rollie was the most difficult child in the class. Great. Just what a conscientious mother wants to hear. Sure, the teacher added that it was most likely his age - he is the youngest child in his class, and he is within a week of the birthday "grade cutoff" in the state of Georgia.

We have been seeing some of the same behavior at home. Todd and I have been at our wits' ends (albeit, our wits don't encompass that much distance) trying to figure out the origin and the solution. Along with this more physical behavior, he has been saying things like,

"I wanna be first."

"I win."

"I wanna be in front."

"You are a joke!"

Rollie continues to bump and cut in front of us. Not a big deal for us, as I know who is going to win if we have a Rollie/Daddy collision; A little bit bigger deal when wobbly, only-walking-for-a-few-months Tiller is the one being bumped and cut off. We have tried taking away privileges and toys. We have tried consistent time-outs. We have, on occasion, tried spanking for extremely blatant and strong physical behavior. Nothing has worked.

He has also been asking us repeatedly "Mama, why do cars bump?" We would answer, "It is not nice to bump." We had long conversations about how good cars do not bump, and that bad cars bump, and that we will not accept the behavior. In one ear and out the other. He still asked about why they do it, as if I am capable of explaining good and evil?

It became obvious to me after talking to the teachers yesterday, and giving good thought to his behavior at home. It is the influence of that seemingly-innocuous, Oscar-nominated movie "Cars." His favorite movie. The one he once watched three consecutive times in one day while sick on the couch. The one that is going to break his heart, because we are not letting him watch it anymore.

Yep, it seems that Rollie is questioning us about the behavior, because he can't watch the movie and tell that some of the cars are good, and some are bad. He is not capable yet of drawing that line between acceptable and non-acceptable behavior. And so it begins: We have now censored what he watches to the extent that we are not allowing him to watch something that he wants to watch. As I type, he is laying on the couch watching that little PBS pussy, Caillou. Sigh.

Wow. Call me Tipper.

Salad Sucks, Mama

What Rollie thinks about salad.

Rollie on Valentine's Day

What Rollie thinks about Valentine's Day:

Same Old Same Old

Rollie came down with another ear infection last night. That makes, oh, the 4th or 5th one he has had since Thanksgiving. Poor little guy is piled up on the couch watching Cars and saying, "I'm a little bit sick," every five minutes.

Tiller woke up this morning walking! Last night when I left the house, she was still in carry me or I cry until you want to blow your brains out mode. Then, today, she just started walking. Not two or three steps like the last month or so, but circles around the kitchen, through the dining room, and back into the kitchen.

I am a little scared, as she likes attention, and now she can actually chase us down. Lucky for us, she doesn't come close to Dwight Shrute's 2/3 scale rule.

Young Folks

We had a bit of a dance party last night after dinner. Rollie, in particular, loves The Dance. I don't care how shitty your Monday is, if you can watch this and not crack a smile, you are a cold, soulless bastard. Or bitch, as the case may be.

You Are a Joke

Rollie's latest thing, other than learning the word "Dammit" from his Grandma, is to say to people, "You are a joke." The first time he said this to me, I even kind of had my feelings hurt. He just hadn't said that many mean things before. I got over that, though, and explained to him that it wasn't nice to say that to people, and that it would hurt feelings, etc. He looked at me blankly, laughed, and said, "Mama, you are a joke."

I am so good at this job.

It seems that he picked this little gem up from (where else?) t.v. He loves the movie Cars, and in fact, it was the first movie Todd ever took him to see in the theater. (He made it about 20 minutes.) We have it on DVD. It is a pretty benign movie, rated G, but the cars race and bump into each other and say things like "You are a joke." There is a laughably "mean" car, too.

It is scary how easy it is to imprint things upon the blanket of freshly fallen snow that is the mind of the three-year-old. They are without a single imperfection, and then language begins to assail them from every side, and suddenly, they are saying, "mama, You are a joke," or "We're home, dammit!"

This is a very heavy job, raising a kid. For a perfectionist, or even a failed perfectionist, it is really difficult to know that there are no A +s in parenting. Parenting involves watching the slow erosion of a perfect being into an imperfect person, and simply trying to prevent them from sliding below average into sociopath. There is no other way. It is terrifying and beautiful, and the weightiest responsibility I have ever felt.

There are small victories, though. Like getting to wipe your son's ass after he poops in the potty. Because at least he pooped in the potty, instead of in the diaper, or in his Batman undies, or crouched under the kitchen table hiding from you.

How on Earth?

Wake up. Wake Todd up to feed kids so I can clean blood that stained my inner thighs during the night. Jump in lukewarm bath to rinse, then dry off and throw on clothes. Run downstairs. Make coffee, then pack backpack and diaper bag. Drink cup of coffee, poop (I mean, shit) and then put jackets on everyone, get them to car, strap in carseats, and drive 30 minutes to Rollie's school. Drop Rollie off. Go to local coffee shop. Drink cup of coffee. Get back in car with Tiller. 10 am meeting with todd to look at house. Leave there to go to grocery store. Go pick up Rollie, and then drive 30 minutes back home. Take kids inside, where todd serves them lunch. Unload groceries. Choke down microwave lunch. Put kids back in car. Drive to Sandy Springs for matilda's 15 month checkup. Dr. Jeff checks her ears. Ear infection. I ask him to re-check Rollie's ears. Ear infection. Drive back to East Atlanta, drop prescriptions off, take kids home, give them snacks. Do dishes from breakfast and lunch. Start planning dinner. Blog.

How on earth is it 5:39?

Why Cats are Superior

They know when to cut their losses. When things are going kinda crappy with the offspring, they just go ahead and eat the little fuckers.

My day started with hunger, because I am dieting, and then I am not allowed to eat anything until the lady gets here to take my blood and urine for the life insurance policy we are taking out on me in case (duh) I die, which of course doesn't give one a whole lot of incentive to fast, because what the hell are you going to get out of it, anyway. Todd is a sweetheart and got up with the kids so that I could sleep as long as possible and not have to sit around hungry. I got up at 9 a.m. (the high point of the day). I started my period.

I proceeded to drink black coffee until the nurse arrived at 10. The kids cried and whined and bugged the crap out of the nurse while she asked me about every runny nose I have ever had, and the name, number, and address of the doctor for which I saw each runny nose. She then tried to take blood from one arm, then the other, then my hand. It was awesome. I peed in a cup and there was blood in it and i had to explain to her that I was on the rag. Lovely. Did I mention she brought her own scale? It said I was 9 pounds heavier than my scale says I am. Fucking great.
Todd called to say that he wouldn't be home for lunch. By the time the nurse left it was noon. I put lunch on for the kids. I ate my crap diet lunch. I tried to watch Antiques Roadshow while the kids ran around pushing their cars and shopping cart and couldn't hear a thing. I shut off the t.v. and finished eating while staring out the window at a squirrel. I did the breakfast and lunch dishes, and put on dinner. I changed two poopy diapers.

Went upstairs, read to the kids, and then put them down for their naps. This consists of putting down Matilda, and then tucking Rollie in, shutting the gate, blowing kisses, asking him to please, please, please not wake Tiller because Mama will be mad, and please stay in bed, and don't make any noise, and maybe when we get up we will watch Curious George and eat snacks, Yes, raisins, and please? And then i hope for the best.

I laid down for an hour, and I could tell Rollie wasn't asleep, because he was talking the whole time, but it never occurred to me that he was up there taking off his diaper, putting the poop into the back of the remote control truck, and then taking little pieces and running them over with the treads of his monster truck and smushing them into the carpet, and running the truck roughshod over the books he had pulled off his shelves, which were now empty.

When I finally went up to check on him, he was standing naked at the gate, smiling at me. He went over and picked up two little pieces of poop, one in each hand, and held them out to me, palm up, as if in offering. When I opened the gate, he cheerfully walked around the corner and turned his palms over above the toilet, neatly depositing them into the bowl, then turning to me in expectation of approval.

I think he may be slightly retarded.

After that, I gave him a bath, put Batman underwear on him, and with the exception of the times when we are out, at school, napping, or sleeping, he will Goddamn be wearing them, until he is potty trained. So help me God, amen.

Pure

Pure Christmas magic.

Free Santa!

On Saturday, we took Rollie and Tiller to see Santa at St. Paul's Methodist in Grant Park. Although I am unsure about my thoughts on God, I am sure about one thing; I love old, beautiful churches. St. Paul's is really gorgeous, but in a lived-in, non-museum-like way. You actually feel welcome and warm when you are there.


Santa was upstairs in a back room and you had to wait in a not-too-long line to see him. The line wrapped out the door and down the stairs. Rollie and tiller were excellently-behaved, much to my surprise; I guess they were mesmerized by all of the other kids. Living in East Atlanta, I often feel cut off from other people with children, until we attend something like this Santa event. Then I realize just how many young children are living and being born here and I realize that in ten years, this will probably be a really family-friendly neighborhood, and a great place to raise kids. I sometimes wish that I had the confidence to make my children urban pioneer children, working to make the schools in this area better, but I just don't think that is going to happen, nor do I think I am the Mom to attempt it. I just don't want my precious little ones to be guinea pigs in an experiment that might fail. Selfish, I know, but also my decision and we are the ones responsible for their educational raisin', as they call it here in the South.

I digress. We finally entered the Santa room, and then rounded the corner, where we could actually see Santa. He was a great-looking Santa in a traditional Santa suit with the belt and all. He had his own Santa chair and a Christmas tree and we were allowed to take pictures with the digital camera for free, which is really more in the Christmas spirit than those mall Santas. Plus, less waiting in line.

When it was our turn, Rollie hopped up in his lap without hesitation (unlike last year - tears and more tears, making for hysterically funny Santa pics) and told him what he wanted for Christmas (choochoos and cars). We snapped some pictures of them together, then threw Tiller up with them. She was surprisingly good, too, and in fact just seemed enthralled with his beard and stared at him. We had a hard time getting both of them to look at the camera, and of course, our camera acted up throughout, so the shots aren't great. But hey! They are free!

Cheap Santas are great. Free Santas are the best.

Still No Basement Post: My Day

12 a.m. - Wake up to Todd shaking me, Rollie crying. Go into Rollie's room, give him some water and vaseline for his chapped lips. Go back to bed.
3 a.m. - Rollie cries again. Complaining of his cheek hurting. Realize he probably still has the ear infection for which he has already been through two rounds of antibiotics; Give him Ibuprofen, go back to bed.
7:30 a.m. - Wake up, pee, brush teeth, put on deodorant, put hair in ponytail, pull on jeans and tee-shirt, go into Tiller's room, pick her up, grab one diaper, one pair of jeans, one tee, one pair socks, one pair shoes. Carry all downstairs. Todd already has Rollie eating breakfast at table in pjs.
7:45 a.m. Change Tiller's diaper, realize pants are too small, put on her teeshirt, put her in highchair, throw down Cheerios for her, open fruit cup and dump it on tray. Run upstairs to get Rollie's school clothes and another pair of pants for Tiller.
7:55 a.m. - Kiss Todd goodbye, start coffee, bolt down breakfast bar, change Rollie's diaper and put on his clothes, including shoes.
8 am - Pour cup of coffee, read email from Honey.
8:05 a.m. Pack Rollie's backpack for school, pack my diaper bag for Tiller, gather starlight mints for Rollie's teacher to use for gingerbread houses.
8:10 a.m. - Realize Quint hasn't been let out. Let him out.
8:13 a.m. - Sit down to finish cup of coffee.
8:15 a.m. - Turn on Thomas the Tank Engine dvd so Rollie will shut the hell up about it.
8:20 a.m. - Realize Rollie has dirty diaper, then pick him up and realize he feels slightly warm. Remember ear infection suspicions. Run upstairs to get thermometer and vaseline, along with Ibuprofen, just in case.
8:22 a.m. - Take rectal temperature (always wait till after first cup of coffee), 100.9, dose with Ibuprofen and decide to send to school anyway.
8:25 a.m. Put dog in crate, turn off lights, pour coffee into travel mug, turn off coffeemaker, look at house that looks like tornado hit it and pray that buyers do not come to look at house while I am gone.
8:30 a.m. - Pick up Tiller off floor, along with shoes she has taken off, put diaper bag over shoulder, finger through keychain, put rollie's jacket on, then his backpack, which he insists on wearing, even though we are only walking out the door and to the car, where we will have to take it off again before getting in carseat. Hit alarm, get Rollie to open door, because my hands are full with diaper bag, keys, coffee, Tiller, and Starlight mints.
8:32 a.m. - Lock door, tell Rollie to stop trying to open automatic door on van while I am trying to unlock it, put Tiller into her carseat, then walk around to strap Rollie into his.
8:33 a.m. - Put diaper back and starlight mints into passenger seat. Get in car. Start car. Get back out of car to walk around to tiller's side of car where I left coffee sitting on roof of car. Get back in car.
8:34 a.m. - Leave neighborhood. Drive to Rollie's school in Decatur.
9:01 a.m. - Arrive at school. Get out, get Rollie out, walk around to Tiller's side, get her out.
9:02 a.m. - Talk to parent of child in Rollie's class about whether I am pissed about decision to split 3 and 5 day kids into two classes.
9:03 a.m. - Drop Rollie into class. Remove backpack and jacket and help him wash hands, all while holding Tiller at the same time. Kiss Rollie goodbye.
9:10 a.m. - Drive to new primary care physician's on N. Decatur road. Park, get Tiller and stroller out of car, put her in stroller, find doctor's suite.
9:20 a.m. - Check in with receptionist for 9:30 a.m. appointment. Sit down and try to keep tiller occupied.
9:30 a.m. - Receptionist asks for insurance card, driver's license, and for me to fill out new patient paperwork. Pay $40 co-pay. Attempt to fill out paperwork, while keeping 13 month old occupied in boring waiting room. Get stared down by humorless, crotchety old people. Cough a lot.
10 a.m. - Wonder if Tiller and I will grow old in waiting room of unseen doctor's office. Watch every fucking old person in Decatur get called in before us.
10:30 a.m. - Get called back. Nurse takes temperature, pulse, bp. Tiller seems okay. Nurse leaves and shuts door.
10:45 a.m. Tiller starts crying.
10:46 a.m. Crying becomes total freakout. I take her out of stroller and walk her for 15 very long minutes, back and forth, three little steps to a length of the room. Sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, Starkle Starkle Little Twink (a post unto itself), Jingle Bell Rock, and Winter Wonderland. Big yellow snot comes out of her nose and runs all over my shirt, which was dirty when I put it on this morning anyway.
11 a.m. - Realize I have to pee, that Tiller will not be falling asleep, and that I am tired of holding her. Open door in frustration to see pitying look on nurse's face. I say i have to pee. Nurse takes Tiller while I go to bathroom, then when I come out, they are gone, so i start looking down hall. Find Tiller with nurse in a doctor's office and they give her a bear. Nice gesture, big points for nurses, big fucking lot of good it does me, though, as I still had to wait another 25 minutes for doctor to show and by that time she had lost interest in bear and was crying again.
11:25 a.m. - Doctor comes in. Immediately likable, as he looks like real-life Santa Claus, but it becomes quickly evident that reason he made me wait one hour and 55 minutes is that he likes to talk. A lot. Doctor talks to me about symptoms, his grandchildren, get up on the table, look at ears, nose, throat, What is the little princess getting for Christmas this year?, you obviously have bronchitis, a lot of malflora (sp?), and a grungy tonsil, and back in my day, we made our own Christmas gifts. We made boomerangs, and we would cut them out of plywood, and boy, if you throw one of those up and it comes back, you don't want to be in the way, and here is your prescription.
11:45 a.m. - Finally get out of black hole doctor's office, get back to car, go through drive through pharmacy at kroger to drop off prescription, then drive to Rollie's school.
12:00 a.m. - Get Tiller out of carseat. Pick up Rollie at school. Bring both back outside, strap Tiller in, then Rollie. Drive back to Kroger on N. Decatur to pick up Pharmacy. (Only bright side to day - Kroger on n. Decatur has parking spaces especially for Walkup Pharmacy, so you can walk to the window and not have to take kids out of car.) Go up. Pay for prescription. Walk back to car. Open bag and realize only one prescription was filled. Go back up to window (Praise Jesus for walkup pharmacy window and walkup pharmacy window parking!!!!). Explain to Pharmacist about two prescriptions rather than one, then wait while he searches for script. Wait while he fills script. Pay for another prescription. Go back to car.
12:15 Drive back to East Atlanta.
12:45 p.m. - Get back to house. Rollie has fallen asleep. Carry Rollie into house and put on couch. Rollie wakes up and requests pillow, blanket, Thomas dvd. Obviously doesn't feel good. Go get screaming Tiller out of car. Bring her in and plop her on floor.
12:50 p.m. - Make pbj for Rollie, cheese toast for tiller, soup for both. Serve all of this, plus two waters (because I didn't get to go to grocery because fucking Dr. Santa wanted to discuss handmade toys for an hour), which Rollie then proceeded to lecture me about: "Water is for snacks. Milk is for lunch and dinner." Heat up pasta from last night for me. Bolt down. Start getting requests for blanket fixing and more dvd.
1:30 p.m. - Go to fluff Rollie's pillow, realize he is burning up. Change both kids' diapers, and take Rollie's temperature - 103.9: Fucking awesome.
2:00 p.m. - Call Pediatrician for sick visit appointment. Make appointment for 3 p.m. Put poor dog in crate. Go through same rigamarole about packing shit up, minus backpack and starlight mints and coffee. Put kids in car. Drive to Sandy Springs.
2:45 pm. - Arrive for appointment. Get both kids out of car and put Tiller in stroller, then Rollie says he needs to be carried, so I carry 36 lb son while pushing 26 lb daughter in stroller. Fucking awesome.
2:50 p.m. - Check in. Go through more insurance shit, even though i have already been there twice this week for flu shots, and the week before that for ear infections, the week before that for the first of the ear infection, and the week before that for the first goddamn flu shot. Take kids to sit down. Rollie's tylenol kicks in and he starts jumping around like his not sick at all. Tiller starts screaming because she has either been in a carseat, a highchair, or the fucking stroller all day and who the fuck can blame her?
3:30 - Finally get taken back, 30 minutes after appointment time. See nurse practitioner; ear infection still remains, and she prescribes another (3rd) antibiotic. We check out at front desk (40$ co-pay!) and head for the car.
3:45 pm. - Sit in traffic all the way back to East Atlanta, where we go to Edgewood Kroger.
4:45 p.m. - Hit Kroger right at the same time as everyone else. Drop off prescription at Pharmacy. Go do grocery shopping. Amazingly have few fights between kids sitting in the car shopping cart together. Usually, someone would have an eye gouged out or something. Go back to pick up prescription. Deer in headlights look on pharmacists' faces. "This medicine, after insurance, is going to cost you $90 dollars." I am speechless, and then let loose with a "holy shit." Say excuse me to old black lady wearing "Southern Belle Chattanooga" hat. She says, "Honey, I woulda said a whole lot more than Holy shit." I feel ya, sister. DAMN.
5:00 pm. - Pay for prescription, which of course I have to pay for at pharmacy, then still sit through checkout line to pay for groceries.
5:10 pm. - Rollie has meltdown over cheap dumptruck toys set up right by checkout counters (those fuckers!). Check out and take groceries to car. Put groceries in car, then kids.
5:15 pm. - Sit in traffic on Moreland.
5:45 pm. - get Home. Unload kids. Set Rollie up on couch with Thomas dvd and blankets. Tiller follows me around, trying to hold on to my legs while I put away groceries I unloaded from car, and while I try to put dinner on (fish sticks and frozen french fries). Cut up pear for health purposes, and nuke broccoli. Balanced meal.
6:00 p.m. Attempt to right disaster that is house, especially kitchen. Unload dishwasher, and do dishes from both lunch and breakfast. Lunch dirty dishes are still at the kitchen table where I left them when I realized Rollie had high fever. Everything looks disgusting. Cannot believe people are not trying to look at house right now, because that is just the way it usually is.
6:20 Throw kids up at table with culinary masterpiece. Sit down with glass of water and then plug in Christmas tree, so as not to want to blow brains out.
6:40 - Kids finish meal. Get them down from table, then tell Rollie to clean up. Proceed to clean up kitchen from dinner, then help Rollie clean up his toys. Take kids upstairs.
7:00 pm. Contemplate not bathing kids tonight, but then realize that really need a HazMat crew to come in and hose us down after all the doctor's offices we have been in today. Throw kids in bathtub. Scrub them too hard and make them cry. Get Tiller out, then put her diaper and pjs on. Go back in. Get Rollie out, help him brush his teeth. Fold towels, clean up tub. Help Rollie rinse. Brush his hair. Give him Tylenol. Realize I forgot to give him golden antibiotics. Go back downstairs, measure 1 teaspoon of meds, come back upstairs to have him insist on doing it himself. He spills the whole fucking thing on the bathroom floor. Go back down to get another dose. Take dose back upstairs. Force him to take it from me, amidst vocal protest.
7:20 pm. - Get his diaper, temperature stuff, and pjs and take into Tiller's room, where the two of them have pulled all of the socks out of her lowest drawer and are now pulling her toys out of her closet. Take his temp (101) while fending her off as she tries to get into vaseline jar, then put on his diaper and pjs.
7:30 pm. - Read duck book and Goodnight Moon to Tiller while Rollie complains that HE wants to read the duck book. Ignore him. Put her down. Thank god.
7:35 pm. Go to his room. Read four fucking longass Thomas the Tank Engine stories, while he interrupts me the whole time. Try to shortchange him out of his usual three stories. He insists on the duck book too, which he has taken from Tiller's room and brought into his room. I start to read it, and he argues with me about the fucking number of ducks that swam over the pond and far away. he also adds fifth quack to Mother Duck's refrain, which everyone knows is only four quacks. I humor him, because sometimes it will be over faster that way.
7:50 pm - Kiss him goodnight, turn off light, tell him to sleep tight and don't let the bed bugs bite.
8:15 pm. - Finally sit down to eat dinner. Eat quickly. Take decongestant. P0ur glass of wine. Watch two old episodes of Supernatural.
10:30 Pour another glass of wine. Post about this stupid day, because somehow complaining about it makes me feel better.

Or maybe it's the third glass of wine.

Rollie's First Snow

Only in Atlanta would a child's first snow be faux. Todd, Tiller, Rollie and I headed over to the Atlantic Station California Pizza Kitchen last night for dinner, then headed out to see their huge Christmas tree and the 7 P.M. snow machine display. I really thought it would hokey, and it was, but also a little contagious. At first, Rollie didn't like it very much and was maybe even a little scared, but I picked him up and we practiced catching snow on our tongues and shook it out of our hair, chanting "Snow head! Snow head!" at one another.

It was pretty fun to run around, chasing him around the tree in the snow. Tiller just looked sleepy. I had a coughing fit afterwards that gave me a headache.

Here's to my cough going away soon, and to having a real snow this year.

Dear Santa

Todd and I have been enjoying the advent of the Christmas holidays, because this is the first year that Rollie has really started to get the concept of Santa Claus. Although he is still a little confused. Yesterday, when we talked about it, I asked him if he knew about Santa and he said, "Yes, he comes in? And he goes into the fireplace?"

Close enough.

While we were eating Thanksgiving dinner, Rollie, Matilda, and our friend Kate's daughter, Laura Catheryne, were running around in their diapers. (It is a laid-back family we have here.) Todd and I were telling my parents and Kate about our discussions with Rollie about writing to Santa to tell him what he wants for Christmas. Todd decided to illustrate this by example.

Todd: "Rollie, come here. Remember how we talked about writing a letter to Santa to tell him what we want for Christmas?"

Rollie [Obviously brightening at the mention of Claus:] "Yep!"

Todd: "What do you think you want Santa to bring you for Christmas?"

Rollie: "Pants."

I Don't Know What to Say

That's why I haven't written anything this week. See, I mostly write about what I know: The little things my kids do every day that drive me crazy, or make me laugh, or make me cry; the things that make me angry about this world; the things that scare me about the future; A book or movie I enjoyed; Fun trips and events.

All of that stuff seems unbelievably small and inconsequential in the face of the death of a child. A close friend of mine lost her nephew to bacterial meningitis this past week. A mother and father lost the center of their world. A child lost a brother he will never know, much less remember. Anything I write here, even the most irrelevant little tidbit, like what shape pasta Rollie and Tiller ate for dinner, will be something that the child's family will never be able to write about him again.

So, i have spent these last few days talking, and hugging, and kissing a little bit more than usual. I have been more forgiving, and more patient, and more lenient, and more indulgent; I have cherished.

Why don't I do this every day? I should do this every day for the rest of my life.

Rollieism

Rollie: "Mama, I sick."

Me: "What's wrong, sweetie?"

Rollie: "I have a cough, bless yous, and hiccups."

The Rise of Why

Let it be noted that this week was the beginning of the neverending whys. Why, why, why? Rollie asks why 100 times a day. I never knew my world could be so confounding. Sometimes there just aren't any good answers to "why?" Example:

Rollie: "Yoda is a Jedi."
Me: "Yes, Rollie, Yoda is a Jedi."
Rollie: "Luke is a Jedi."
Me: "Yes, Luke is a Jedi."
Rollie: "DarFader is a Jedi."

I pause to ponder how to explain this one, the concept of someone with so much promise going over to the dark side. How to explain how it comes about that someone chooses darkness?

Me: "Well, Darth used to be a Jedi, but he isn't anymore."
Rollie: "Why?"
Me: "Well, he went bad."
Rollie: "Why?"
Me: "Well, the dark force pulled him."
Rollie: "Why?"

[sigh]

Me: "You are just going to have to trust me on this one, until you get a little older and can understand about The Force, and good, and evil."
Rollie: "Why?"

Next week, Rollie and I will discuss why there is evil in the world if there is a God. How can that be? Why? Also, why is the sky blue? Why do cats have tails and people don't?

The Things We Don't Say to Our Children

I went to pick up Rollie today from Mommies' Morning Out. When I got there, he was pouting, and when I told him it was time to go, he threw a fit. Both the teacher and the aide looked concerned, and the aide said, "We have Lunch Bunch today and he heard the kids talking about it and then saw them pull out their lunches, and he got really upset." Lunch Bunch is this thing where you pay extra for your kid to stay there from noon til 1pm, thus giving moms an extra hour of freedom. I told Rollie he needed to put on his jacket, so that we could go see the doggie in the car (Quint always rides with Matilda and I to pick up Rollie). He began crying pitiful, tortured tears of sorrow at not being able to eat with his classmates.

I felt the heat of tears welling up in my own eyes, and struggling to fight them back, I clutched Rollie to me with one arm (the other occuped with Tiller) and held him to me as he struggled. I managed to get his jacket on him, and grabbed his hand to take him to the car, Matilda still in my other arm, and Rollie struggling all the while. He managed to break free, screaming "I want Miss M____" (his teacher) and threw himself into her legs. She picked him up and offered to take him to the car, but i declined and said it was okay, he needed to learn that he couldn't stay.

I knew that i had about five seconds to make my way out of that classroom before I burst into tears, and I managed to make it out the door and around the corner before the dam burst. Tears began flowing freely down my face as I struggled to get the keys out of my pocket and open the van doors. I fought them back and then realized it was no use and began angrily wiping them away as soon as they fell, finished strapping both kids into their carseats, and got into the driver's seat. There is a point when tears come, at least for me, when I know there is no turning back, that once i give in to them, they will not stop. Everything in me wanted to lay my arm across the steering wheel and sob my guts out right there in the church parking lot, with all the well-meaning do-gooders coming in and out with kids in tow, but for a proud non-cryer like me, there is nothing more horrific than the thought of being comforted by church ladies with their well-meaning pats on the back, and their concerned looks, and, God forbid, their attempts at giving me a hug.

I had to get the hell out of there.

I drove to the end of the parking lot, and knew I was in the clear, as it is one way during pickup time. As I rounded the corner out of the lot, the tears came on full force, and Rollie said wonderingly from the back:

"Mama, what happened?"

"Mama's sad."

"Why you sad?"

"Because I love you."

Great, i think to myself. Now he thinks it's his fault.

The tears came harder, and became sobs, with my voice sounding to me like someone else's, coming forth of its own volition. I just gave in to it, and I cried the whole way to the light, where I sat and sobbed and snuffled and sniffled, and wiped snot on my sleeve and rubbed my eyes roughly, and did all sorts of undignified shit until I got the left turn signal, where I wiped away the tears, turned left and headed straight for McDonald's drive-thru. Sometimes your son just deserves the chicken nuggets, with the fries rather than the fucking killjoy apple slices, and with chocolate milk instead of white milk (the annoying term for regular milk that drive-thru employees in the 'hood call it. Those of us with an education call it "regular milk.") Sometimes his Mama deserves to say, "FUCK WEIGHT WATCHERS. I WANT A NUMBER 2 VALUE MEAL, PLEASE." That's just the way of the world.

Rollie says, "Mama, you like chicken?"

"Yes, Rollie, I like chicken, but i am going to have a hamburger."

"Tiller badiller likes chicken. She not like chocolate milk. She likes regular (yes!) milk."

"Yes, Rollie, she likes regular milk and chicken and french fries."

"Mama, french fries make you happy?"

"Yes, Rollie, they make me very happy."

"Mama?"

"Yes, Rollie."

"Why you cry in the car?"

"Because I'm happy. Sometimes mamas get sad. Sometimes they are happy."

Sometimes you don't tell little boys that you are crying because you are sorry that the house hasn't sold, so we live 30 minutes from the school and if he stayed for Lunch bunch, he and matilda would fall asleep in the car, and then there would be no nap, and how could i have the silence necessary to figure out the budget in a vain attempt to find some miraculous way of allowing me to stay home with them longer? Sometimes you don't tell him that even if we lived five minutes from the school, we probably couldn't afford the Lunch Bunch, and that he is never going to get to do Lunch Bunch with his new friends, because in less than two months, we are going to have to yank him out of that school and put him somewhere that will take him all day, and hopefully it will be somewhere that will also be able to take his sister, but it probably won't, and so they won't see each other all day long, and we will have to figure out how to get him to one place, and her to another and me to an office, and I fucking hate offices and their fucking fluorescent lights, and I hate that i will have to get up two hours or more earlier than I do now and that I hate that I won't be able to see him at lunchtime, or drive him through McDonald's, or yell at him to stop trying to hold hands with his sister, because she doesn't want to hold hands right now and that is why she is crying. I hate that I will get back two tired, over-stimulated kids, who will argue and cry over dinner, and I will be tired and not even have time to play with them or just sit and watch a cartoon on the couch with both of them in my lap. That I hate that now I have them from 7:30 a.m. until 7:30 p.m. every day and that the times that I don't have them are like magic, not torture, but that will change, and it will all be torture and the maybe two hours i have with them every day will be sweet torture, too. I don't tell him that I will think a hundred times a day how much i miss him annoying the shit out of me with wanting me to build the choochoo tracks and give him snacks, and how much i will fucking hate those people who give him his snacks every day when he should be trying to get them out of my fridge at home with me trying to stop him. I don't tell him that I feel like Tiller is completely getting the shaft, that he got me for over three years, and she barely got me for over one year. I don't tell him that I am scared of the people who will be talking to my baby, who is just learning to speak, and who knows what kind of frightening grammar they might teach her? Or that I read to her in the morning, and before quiet time, and before bedtime, and it is our special time, and we have a routine and she is warm and she laughs when I nuzzle her ear as I whisper into them some of the words.

"Mama," Rollie says, "why are you crying?"

"Because I love you, and I am happy, and I am sad."

I don't tell him that it is because my heart feels like it is about to break.