7/19

Going to pick up Zac at his new daycare is like stepping into a refugee camp for people under 3 feet tall. The kids all swarm around my legs and follow me around the room, possibly asking me: "Have you really been to the outside? Did you see my Mom there? Can you help me get more graham crackers?" in a baby language that only dolphins can understand.

I look down at these kids, who range in age from 1-2 years old, and I'm thankful that we can't remember anything from that time period. Who would really want to remember staying in a room all day, playing with the same plastic toy and trying to prevent a large, friendly one year-old (a.k.a. my son) from sitting on you and giving you kisses? Honestly, I think the kids are considering a mass exodus to the 3-4 year-old room where they can at least go outside in the 100 degree heat. Maybe with a makeshift shelter and a canteen of water they would survive. It's questionable though.

Zac's bruise on his forehead from the older woman has turned a lovely shade of green and is now progressing into a yellowish hue. It's right next to his extremely prominent mosquito bite from our walk yesterday and right above the scratch on his eye from being so tired that he tried to rip his eyelids off to get some sleep (it didn't work). I look like the best mother - ever - when I try and explain to people that while I actually don't beat him, I apparently don't do a very good job of keeping him from hurting himself or other vertically-challenged individuals.

Lately, Z. has been so cranky that I'm quite possibly losing my mind, as this post might suggest. Once I wade through the refugee camp and temporary government-in-exile headquarters set up at the intersection of the plastic stove and kitchenette toys to pick him up from daycare, he starts screaming...and screaming....and screaming. He doesn't stop until I put him in the jogging stroller that V. and M. bought be for my baby shower. Out into the bright, evening sun and blistering heat we go! He falls asleep almost immediately while I walk around several blocks, pondering how my weight loss might be attributed to sweating profusely. It appears that I don't even need to be pregnant to sweat profusely - in July - in Houston.

Once he gets back in the house, the screaming continues. Feeding him, burping him, holding him, putting him down, giving him Orajel, giving him Tylenol, bathing him, putting him a dark room and closing the door until I regain my sanity, only help a little. Please, I don't need advice - I need beer. Lots and lots of beer. Afterall, how can you figure out what is wrong with him if he doesn't know and can't tell me?

Someone might need to remind me now, though, why I thought it was a good idea to be a single Mom. Who ever heard of the 'terrible ones'?!?

7/17

Quite possibly he has a future as a professional frat boy.

"Hey man, who turned out all the lights?"

7/15

Blind Date 6.5: SJ’s Kids in the Whitelands

So, with all the family obligations and sadness, I haven’t had a chance to post about a (how do I describe this – not fun, something more like – I’m glad it didn’t kill me) experience meeting the Sarcastic Journalist’s kids. She and the Hubs were looking for a rare night out a couple of Friday’s ago and thought that a shy 12 year-old might possibly get eaten alive by her two under two. I volunteered to bring Zac over and let the three kids wrestle until the passed out on the living room floor.

First off, let me tell you that the Whitelands isn’t all that far away from where I live. It’s just far if you don’t follow directions and instead decide to go pick up more cake as a housewarming present. Getting to the cake made me over an hour late (which conveniently rhymes). By the time I found SJ’s house in the Whitelands, Zac was in total, complete meltdown mode in the backseat. I had picked him day care and driven directly out to SJ’s house. I did not pass go, I did not collect $200, I did not feed him, I did try and give him a bottle which he promptly threw across the backseat in disgust. As we say in my family, he was “not a happy camper”.

Second, SJ is NOT exaggerating about the Whitelands. I have never seen a place like that before in my life. There really is a country club and there really is a giant lake with mansions. I can’t guarantee that everyone who lives there is white, but they certainly make more money than I do, regardless of their race or ethnicity. Pulling up to her house in my crappy car with my screaming child must have shocked many of her neighbors.

I meet SJ and the Hubs and then I’m quickly introduced to Ellie (the almost 2 year-old) and Sam (the 5 month-old stud muffin, a.k.a: the most laid-back baby in the world). She and the Hubs were in a bit of a rush to get out the door and seemed surprised when I kept asking questions about where to find certain items or how to put the two of them down for bed. I joked that she must not be used to leaving her kids with someone and she gave me a long, hard look that said, “No bio-tch. I’m not. And I hope my kids eat you alive”

With little ceremony, and me kind of wondering where they went, the two of them left for the evening. The biggest surprise of the evening was how well-behaved her kids really are. Really. I’m not joking. She usually makes her kids sound like they are the devil incarnate out to suck the life force from any adult they come in contact with. As SJ told me, though, “Who would want to read about how great my kids are? Come on. That shit would be boring”. So, it was a great surprise to have Ellie cuddled up next to me on the couch, watching Barnie, with Sam doing his best to keep Zac from straddling and suffocating him.

My son appears to really, really like other babies. I mean, “Zac-get-off-of-him-before-he-can’t-breathe,” likes other babies. The whole evening I spent pulling Zac off Sam, who was strapped into his bouncy seat like a turkey around Thanksgiving time in the eyes of my son. Zac wanted to kiss him, hug him, and rub his boy belly all over Sam’s face.

I felt like the best caregiver in the history of the world when I had all three kids under two down for bed at 8:30pm. Zac was in Sam’s crib. Ellie was in her “big girl” bed. Sam was (should I really admit this?) on the floor in his parents’ bedroom. On his stomach. On a blanket. I went in to turn him over and save myself the embarrassment of admitting that I really had killed her youngest child. Sam woke up and started crying. Then Zac woke up and started crying. The two of them were like dueling banjos for the next hour-and-a-half until I finally admitted defeat and called SJ and the Hubs home.

Any woman with multiples now has my utmost respect. I must be out of my freaking mind for ever entertaining the thought of having another child.

7/13

This post could be labeled, "Frustration". I haven't been this frustrated and annoyed in over three months. Can anyone remember what I decided to do three months ago? Well, kudos to those that remember I started Seasonel, the birth control pill that regulates your hormones so you only get your period every three months.

It is the end of the three months. My period is making me a tired, cranky, emotional, vulnerable mess. My insecurity increases exponentially in response to fatigue. I have no idea what chemical changes in my body actually cause that, I just know that I shouldn't handle loaded fire arms during "this time of the (three) months".

Did I mention that Zac has cut two front teeth and I haven't slept more than six hours any day this week?

As he was crying yesterday- mouth opened wide in a gigantic scream, lungs bellowing, tears rolling down his cheeks - I saw that he has two front teeth that have broken the skin. It appears that he will have the same tooth structure as his Mom and perhaps be called "Beaver" until he gets braces in his teenage years. The FOB is 1/2 English, and has horrible teeth as well.

It also appears that the little guy will have the same track record in love as his Mom. Yesterday, at daycare, he was sitting next to an older, cute Hispanic girl (maybe around 1 1/2 - 2 years old). The daycare provider said that he was leaning over "to give her kisses" and reached out "to touch her head". She moved away at the last moment and he fell flat on his head. When I arrived to pick him up, the girl's Mom was holding her, the daycare provider was holding Zac, trying to fill out an injury form. He had a huge knot on his forehead and bruise spreading down around his eye. The kid was still smiling. It's times like that that I'm not really convinced that he came from my uterus.

Then I realized that he was still reaching for the little girl.

Take it from me, Zac, older women will only break your heart. Keep your hands to yourself.

7/10

You know I got in trouble for this photo, don't you? Thank God it was before the days of digital cameras when my petulance would have been immediately noticed. No, I got an eye roll and a huge sigh when the photograph was developed.

That is my Grandma G. on the left, then me, my Mom, and my sister. I'm not really sure why we appear to be standing on the side of a freeway, all I can tell you is that we were in Canada, at the 1988 EXPO, and something had made me very, very mad.

I think this expression has been on my face for most, if not all, of the past weekend. Zac and I finally made it back to Houston after an exhausting four days. He didn't understand why he was castigated to a corner of the hotel room with an uncomfortable crib. I didn't understand why he needed to cry for 45 minutes everytime I tried to put him down for a nap or bedtime. He decided to try out his new standing skills by standing up in his crib, rattling the metal bars, and screaming as loud as his one year-old body could manage. It was an impressive sight to say the least.

The funeral itself was a small service at my Grandma's church, about an hour east of Pittsburgh. Not much has changed in that town since my Dad grew up there. My uncle has never lived more than five miles away from the hospital where he was born. My aunt made the move to Pittsburgh, but traveled frequently back to the town to see my Grandma with her husband and two children. Somehow the young, female pastor managed to say, "in the green Lutheran Book of Worship" at least ten times during the service, as if we needed to be reminded of the color or name of the book we were holding and following along in.

The most touching part of the week came when we watched an amazing video of my Grandma performing a flapper dance routine for a Mom-Daughter tea at her Lutheran Church. It was one of those videos where I expected her to speak directly into the camera at the beginning and announce, "If you are watching this, then I have passed from this Earth onto a better place because there is no way in Hell that you should be watching this if I'm still alive". Oh, it was so good to see her in her youth (at 70!), kicking, dancing, lip-synching, and playing to the crowd.

That is what I will remember about her. Well, that and the really good chocolate-covered peanut butter balls that she always sent us at Christmas.

7/03

When I first found out that I was pregnant, sitting in a Planned Parenthood examining room in early fall 2005, my whole body started vibrating and all I heard was a loud humming sound in my ears. It was like in the movies when the main character stops hearing what the person sitting across from them is saying, but they can see their mouth moving and forming words.

As the weeks and then months went by, I started feeling the changes in my body progress. A deeper, primal sense of understanding began to dawn on me. If I had to put it into words, it might sound something like: "Women throughout history have gone through these same changes, felt what you are feeling, and have been just as excited and scared as you are." I imagined women in Elizabethian robes, pregnant and round, wondering what their little ones would look like. I tried to imagine women in the time before we started wearing clothes and using fire to cook, fiercely protecting her swollen belly from predators.

My experience connected me to the line of women going back beyond any timeframe that I could even contemplate.

I imagined my mother, pregnant with me.

I imagined her mother.

And the mother before that and then, again, before that.

All of us connected through our bodies that produced the spirits and minds of those that would come after us. Early in the morning on July 8th, before the doctor decided to retrieve Zac through the road less traveled under my belly button, I suddenly understood how women could die in childbirth. My body was in pain, even with an epidural. I was afraid and tired. Zac couldn't descend into my birth canal. For all practical purposes, he was stuck, as was I. Before the practice of medicine, before Ob-Gyns, C-sections, and intensive care units, both he and I might have died that morning.

We didn't. We continue on.

The memory of Zac's birth and my part in the continuation of the generations is what I keep thinking about as I try to understand and grapple with the death of my Grandma.

My Dad's Mom, Freida, died early this morning. Although no one has told me what from exactly, I know that she refused to go to the hospital for pneumonia late last week. She slipped into a coma this weekend and passed away surrounded by most of her family. My Dad and Mom flew separately to be with my Dad's family today and Zac and I will be going on Wednesday for the funeral.

Every kid should be so lucky to have someone like my Grandma G. We talked once a week to her on the phone, even though as kids my sister and I never, ever had anything to say. She baked us our favorite cookies, breads, and chocolate during the holidays and marked every occasion with a card and a $5 or $10 bill. I saw her infrequently growing up - our family didn't have a lot of money and her health rapidly declined in my junior high and high school years. She lost some of her mobility, but I swear that woman never lost her fight. She would say that she wasn't too old to give us (usually my Dad) a good whippin' if we (or he) mouthed off to her. When you asked her how she was feeling, even in the nursing home she hated, she would answer: "Still kicking. It's better than the alternative." She could beat the pants off of a whole room full of seniors at Bingo, laughing while she told you the story and how lucky she was.

Last week I got a birthday card for Zac from Grandma G., written in my Uncle's handwriting. He had even included a $5 bill and as soon as I opened it, I started to cry. That she would be facing so much, yet still remember her "little man and her dolly" was too much for me.

I'm going to miss her and the little reminders that she loved us all so well.

7/02

It has been much too long since I've posted pictures of the Z-man. The countdown to his birthday is on - 6 days until he turns the big 1.

Here is a fairly recent picture of him, taken at my apartment:


And I just found this one of him and my Dad, this time from the front:



Then there is the requisite, "happy baby" photo:



"Ahhhh... I'm so happy it hurts. I hope that all of you that have to go to work on July 3rd can be this happy!!!! " Just kidding.