Jonah says:

There are two eyes in the sky.

There is someone in the sky and he is saying something.

God is in the sky.

God is NOT Santa Claus.

What is God?

* * *

I cannot recall any time I have ever discussed God with Jonah, so I’m a bit perplexed, to say the least. I try several times to get him to tell me whom he has been discussing God with, but I don’t get anywhere near an answer.

I do learn these things from discussing God with him, in a question/answer sort of way: God is in the car, God is in the BART tracks, God is not in Jonah or Mommy, God is not love. God is a cat.

* * *

He also informed me today that he is “too little to like skulls. Skulls are not good. Skulls are scary.” I find this incredibly surprising. I ask him where he got this idea and he tells me the name of a boy at preschool.

Later, he tells me he is too big for skulls.

So at least he’s open to two sides of the story?

We caulked the shower over the weekend. Were quite pleased with ourselves but today it kind of peeled off. So back to the drawing board?

2. Chickens

Never underestimate the power of a to-do list. We are now the proud owners of three Black Australorp chicks. Working on more/better photos but these will have to suffice for now (add Camera to the c’s since I took that RAW class, but need to upgrade to Photoshop CS4)

3. Calamity (snail-type)

Our first snail was doing well and then unexpectedly evaporated. One morning, all that remained was an empty shell. Undaunted, we went out and caught another tiny denizen. Replaced the sage with fennel. This snail, unlike previous condo-resident, is a runner, or shall I say, WAS a runner, since after witnessing several impressive long distance sprints from his baby food jar and across the table, he eventually escaped entirely. Not sure where he is, but if I find him, I’m feeding him to the Chickens. Don’t tell Jonah.

2. Join a gym. Or exercise. Something. SERIOUSLY. It’s bad. Gone is the heyday of Pilates classes and private training sessions (back when were were solidly double-income and blissfully vague about our spending). Gone are the nearly daily prenatal or mom-baby classes. Mom-toddler is a MUCH narrower exercise category. Actually I can’t say that for certain because I never tried those jog-stroller exercise classes. I even won a free week of one, once. With a lime green logo’d tank top and orange cap to boot. (Umm… thanks?) Today I toured the neighborhood Y, so that’s a possibility. Now, if I will just use that free-day coupon to see if I actually like it and want to go, gulp, regularly. (Hey Liz, they have Zumba — been thinking about it ever since reading your posts.)

3. Photography. On Sunday I took my first RAW class, my first photography class of any kind in MANY years. I used to be good, I tell people. I used to have a darkroom. Developed and printed my own pictures since I was a kid. Shot photos sort of professionally — a few author photos, a spread in a magazine… It was a good class. And hard. And intimidating. And the subheadings under this to-do item are many: take more pictures, organize the photo files you have, print some of those files, make a photo book or three, upgrade to CS4, get another hard drive for backing-up files, take a Photoshop class… I am signed up to take another digital photography workshop in the end of March.

4. Work. Oh my. Right now, I have two great amazing wonderful I love them clients who need me, at the same time, to write articles for their individual charity/nonprofit newsletters. I’m conducting about six interviews just tomorrow. Okay, four. And two more later in the week. Still… Once March 8 rolls around, it will be crickets until the next quarterly newsletter deadline. Need to update my business website. Need more clients, or a different gig? Train to become a web designer, a somatic therapist, get a job in a bookstore, or something. And need make decisions in conjunction with that as to how many hours I am willing to have Jonah be at preschool and/or can afford to have him there to do said work.

We pause this list for a To-done-do-ed-it announcement: JONAH DID NOT CRY WHEN I DROPPED HIM OFF AT PRESCHOOL TODAY!!!!!!!! He gave me a hug and that was it. Yay!

5. Curtains. The lack of window treatments in this house should be a punishable offense. I think I’ve found a company that makes organic curtains not treated with plasticizers or formaldehyde or silicone. Now I just have to freaking order them. I have commitment issues when it comes to big ticket purchases, decorating decisions, and anything that requires making holes in the walls.

6. Chickens. We’ve been thinking about another pet at some point. There’s Bambino the wondercat, and yesterday Jonah adopted a tiny snail from the garden — who seems to be happily chomping away at the sage stalk and wandering down into the jar for a sip of water at the bottom — a snail condo that we put together for him. Today the nanny texted that she has three chicks that need a home. She knows we’ve been thinking about it…

7. General yard work. The chickens might eat the weeds that have taken over our backyard, so that could be a win-win. Otherwise, this item expands out to weed cloth, mulch, fertilizing, herbs and flowers, soft bark for a play area… and possibly a fence to go with the chickens?

8. Stop feeling sorry for myself. My attitude needs an overhaul. There is so much to complain about. Really. But gratitude and a dash of optimism might be more effective in righting the myriad wrongs.

9. Get tested. 40-year-old mammogram and blood test for general health check-up both have not been attended to yet. Am sliding into 41 soon. Need to get these done. Also need to find those darned forms the doctor gave me to go get said tests…

10. CAULK!!!!!!! When will we ever get to the much needed scraping out and replacing of caulk? I bought some kind of kit around Christmas time.

What’s on your to-do list?

Tonight I went to my first “Parents Action Group” meeting at the preschool. Maybe an agenda item should have been what to rename the group. My sense is that it grew out of a time when parents were frustrated with administrators over SOMETHING or other and needed to see some ACTION.

There are fifty families whose children attend this school. I expected to see a crowd. I expected to meet other parents, do some bonding, make plans for playdates, coffee…

There were six of us at the meeting. Two administrators, one teacher (whose daughter also attends the school), two other parents (not a couple NO ONE gets babysitting to attend this) — and one of the parents is a mid-year starter like me, though in the bigger kids house, and by happy coincidence is someone whom I worked with several years ago and is lovely to be reconnecting with.

We sat in the tiny wooden chairs, around a low hexagonal table. I removed the vase of plum blossom branches from the center so we could see each other better. A square plastic bin of mini carrots and black plastic tongs was passed around. I’m the only one who ate the carrots.

We talked about starting a parents’ newsletter to help create community (my idea, and guess who’s going to be writing it? — pray it doesn’t consume me). We talked about making the preschool a CSA drop off for families whose kids attend. (Don’t know what a CSA is? Click here.) We also discussed the possibility of swapping veggies for those who don’t want what they get and/or collecting excess kale bunches (there’s ALWAYS too much kale) for donation to a local food bank. We’ll also be celebrating the two upcoming Jewish holidays at school (guess who volunteered to take that on; don’t worry, I’ll be recruiting help from the other Jewish families). We talked about worm composting, rotating bin composting (no, I didn’t volunteer for those). I somewhat jokingly suggested chickens but the administrator said it was unlikely because every animal project requires a teacher’s attention which takes away from students. Still — if there was a parent volunteer gung ho on the idea… give me a year, I bet I’ll get someone to build a coop. Maybe. And we also discussed having a parent be in charge of new-baby welcoming, to organize volunteers dropping off food during a family’s first few weeks — again, NOT taking that one on myself.

So that was all very exciting.

What else?

Jonah and I went to music class today. Today he put the drums away, both drums, at the end of the instruments song. No tantrum, no screaming, no desperately clutching, no begging to keep one. Had I told this story here before? The day he not only wouldn’t put the drums back but I decided that I had to not back down because once he starts a tantrum I can’t cave or something like that so the two of us stood next to the instruments bin, him SCREAMING, through two whole songs, to the end of class. At which point the teacher came up to us — we were down to one drum as I’d wrenched one out of his red little fingers (he entwines them in the ropes that hold the skins on) — and told me that we could just stay. Stay through the next class. Stay through the rest of the classes for the day. Eventually he’ll get hungry and want to put the drum down and do something else. Right?

I felt sick. It’s not uncommon that when Jonah is crying, and we’re at loggerheads, I feel like crying too. Actually, come to think of it, I was crying too at that point. And to have this man come and basically tell me to parent differently. I mean he meant it in the nicest way, he wasn’t trying to thwart, he was trying to help, and offering us free classes all day was no small gift. But still I had this feeling like I’d done it wrong by trying to get Jonah to go along with the program like, you know, ALL the other kids.

So I swallowed my pride or whatever it was and tried not to cry as we sat down in the circle for music class, round 2. Hello song, all the exact same songs as the previous hour, with Jonah clutching that FREAKING drum. When the instruments bin came out, he got another so he could have his set back. He didn’t even PLAY them. Just held them. You know. Because that’s what you do with drums, right?

At the end of that second hour, I asked Jonah if he would like to go get tacos. He said yes. He took the drums to the teacher who brought the bin down for him. He placed the drums in the bin. And… curtain.

The following week, we went back with a plan. In the car on the way to class, I discussed the ritual of returning the drums to the bin with him. I had a tambourine in the diaper bag to use as consolation prize after he returns the drum(s). I asked the teacher to help me by explaining to Jonah that this is how it’s done (this teacher rarely gives instructions to the kids, they learn by example, by following other kids who have taken the class before). And it all worked. Much to everyone’s relief. There’s been some backsliding — keeping one drum till the end of class. But no more screaming, no double-headers again. And today… Today! With only some cajoling (cheering from behind from me, gentle encouragement from the front by the teacher) he placed the second drum in the bin at the end of the song. Yay yay yay!!!!!

Some of the advice on how to deal with the music class came from a session with the sleep consultant. We went back to her again to find out what the heck we were doing wrong with naps. Nothing, it turns out. Jonah has a will of iron. We’re just supposed to keep trying to give him quiet time midday, and ask the preschool to keep him in a low stim environment if he doesn’t nap. Which may or may not work because for them, if he doesn’t nap, one of the teachers has to basically sit with him for an hour and a half, so he doesn’t disturb the other nappers. This, they are NOT happy about. He is napping for them occasionally — about a 50% success rate. Including yesterday, when one of the teachers sang him to sleep in Spanish, which only took 5 minutes. He is LOVING learning Spanish apparently and when I mentioned that to this teacher, she decided this might do the trick. Although on a previous day she’d sung to him for 40 minutes and he hadn’t gone down, but at least he wasn’t throwing a tantrum.

I think I’m starting to love our preschool. Even though it doesn’t have a “strong parent community” — like one of the top schools we’d visited boasted — (yet). Even though it doesn’t have chickens (yet). Even though it isn’t play based, or “emergent curriculum,” and as a Montessori, the kids rarely do collaborative projects if at all (something the sleep/childrearing consultant had asked about). It doesn’t ban licensed characters. (Yes, we love them at home, but at home I can control his exposure. I fear Dora/Diego. And I need his envy of his classmate’s vinyl Thomas-the-Tank-Engine raincoat like I need a pvc-coated hole in my head.) It isn’t technically a bilingual school (like the super-powered Montessori next door), but three of the six teachers are native Spanish speakers, so that is going well for Jonah who now says agua and gracias and bien and seems delighted every time we talk to him about Spanish, ask him if he knows a word, or teach him a word. Now I’ll have to learn Spanish.

But I also love that they celebrate holidays. Valentine’s was a huge hit. Jonah wasn’t actually in school the day of the exchange so we tried to drop by but our timing was off and we missed it. So the teachers put everyone’s decorated shoe boxes (14 of them) in a row and left Jonah’s valentines in a little pile and we went in together (the kids were playing outside) and deposited his Thomas (yeah, I know, hypocrite) valentines in each little box, and took his home. He LOVED it. Especially loved going through the received valentines, sorting, reading, putting in the box, taking out. Heaven.

Next week we’re going in on our off day to participate in the school’s Chinese New Year parade.

A Jewish preschool we’d considered said on their website that they do not celebrate Valentine’s Day or Halloween. That children can wear costumes at Purim. I’m sorry, I’ll make Purim fun for Jonah with crowns and noisemakers and hamantashen, but suggest that as a viable substitute for HALLOWEEN?????????? Yeah, no.

Similarly, I’d visited a top top top impossible to get into preschool, play based, emergent curriculum, developmental philosophy (feel free to Wiki-search these terms, I’m too tired to explain) on the cutting edge of the latest child-centered research — and I asked the director about Halloween and Valentine’s (now that I know it can be an issue) and she ACTUALLY snorted.

SNORTED.

(Are you kidding me?)

No, no holidays. “365 days a year, a child can decide that he wants to express his love for his mother by making a heart card, IF he WANTS to,” she said.

How could I be so fascist?

Um, yeah. Crossed that school off my list.

Jonah does still cry in the morning when we drop him off. For a few moments. And then he’s fine. He had a day with his old nanny last week. His BELOVED nanny. And he cried when I left him with her too. For a minute. So I think it’s okay.

He’s also starting to talk more about the other kids there. Even if he may be making the stories up. He said, “Schuyler put you on the tire swing and he pushed it.”

I mentioned this to the Director tonight. She said she thinks Schuyler is probably too small to lift Jonah. But I like the direction his imagination is going.

He next added the old Moby Wrap, which he drags with his other hand (it looks like a mini sleeping bag but I think it’s supposed to be his rolley-bag).

With my sister in town this weekend, they added a new layer to the game. He crawled into the center of his exersaucer, underneath the part he used to sit in, and that was his plane.

We took her back to the airport today.

He LOVED having her here.

After the airport, it’s a straight shot up 98th Avenue directly to the zoo, so that’s where we went. Along with every other resident of Oakland, and their friends and relations. We had a good time, despite the crowds, and he conked out in the car on the way home which led to an all-too-rare-these-days two-hour nap.

Post-nap, he’d forgotten Aunt Michelle had gone home. But we were able to remind him.

A little bit later, he started playing airplane. Marching around with my camera bag on his arm, he stopped short in front of the doorway to the laundry room where one of our soft-sided carry-on bag was on the floor.

An aside: our cat Bambino loves to snuggle up to luggage, computer bags, purses. Scott had put the bag on the floor the last two nights to comfort him since my sister staying with us reduced the cat’s nighttime roaming area considerably.

But back to the story…

Jonah spots the bag. Pulls up short. Transfixed.

“WHAT is THAT?” he demands. I explain. He grabs a handle and drags it into the dining room.

“Need to pack the LUGGAGE. Want to go to the airport and get on an airplane and fly to Los Angeles to Nana and PopPop’s house where Aunt Michelle lives.” (My sister doesn’t actually live with my parents, but they are in the same city and he knows that.)

He proceeds to pack his toy violin and “bow stick” into the bag. He scans his crib, holding his hand above each stuffed animal as he’s deciding what is important to take with him. “Need to bring a blanket!” he says. He decides he wants the white one and the blue one. We pack both into the bag.

“Put on your shoes and jacket! Go to the AIRPORT.” he says. We put on his crocs and a jacket.

He picks up the big bag with his necessities and starts with absolute purpose to head out the door.

The line between play acting and reality is wafer thin.

I have to stop him and explain that we can’t actually go to the airport. “Want to go to the airport RIGHT NOW. Get on an AYUR PLAYNE.”

No.

He sits down and starts to cry.

We call my mom and that seems to help a little.

Then we unpack the bag. He tries to put the blankets back in the crib himself but can’t, quite. He asks for my assistance. I lay them back on the mattress, put the violin and bow stick in the instruments box in the closet.

And then we go out on the porch to look for snails.

Cavalierly, I emailed Leanne and suggested that if she would send me the recipe, we could make it “together” each in our own kitchen thousands of miles apart, and document the experience. Then I read the recipe which involved intimidating things like yeasted dough, and steps that had to be taken over more than one day, and I chickened out; but she followed through — and sent me pictures! I believe that technically, this is Leanne’s first blog post. Perhaps we are witnessing a food blogga in the making? Leanne, what say you?

And now, for your salivatory pleasure, I present The Amazing Kringle Adventure Featuring the Fabulous Leanne…

I’m a mom of 2 (a boy and a girl) who lives in Wisconsin, enjoys baking, and loves to read and write but seems to spend more time reading and writing for others (the children and work, respectively). Also I’m addicted to chocolate. Like the kringle recipe, I got that from my mom

I’ve been wanting to make kringle for a long time, but I was always put off by the recipe. Even my mom would note that it (along with other recipes that she would make and we kids loved) was “putzy.” Over time I’ve decided to embrace “putzy.” I’d like to share these baking traditions with my kids. I’m guessing my mom felt the same way.

The Recipe: Danish Kringle

Day One

Filling
12 oz. dates, pitted and chopped into pieces
2-3 tsp sugar

Place dates into a pot. Add just enough water to cover the dates. Add the sugar. Cook the dates until the water is nearly gone (about 30-45 minutes). Refrigerate the cooked dates overnight.

Dough
4 c. flour
2/3 tsp. salt
3 Tbsp. sugar
1 c. shortening

Combine flour, salt, and sugar. Cut in the shortening. Set aside.

Scald 1 c. of milk and cool to lukewarm.

Meanwhile, prepare a yeast mixture. In a measuring cup, measure 1 inch of hot water; add 2 packages of dry yeast and 1 tsp. sugar. Add the yeast mixture to the lukewarm milk.

Taking 4 eggs, separate the egg yolks and egg whites (save the egg whites in the fridge for the next day – my mom likes to divide the egg whites into 2 containers as she finds it easier to prep 2 kringle at a time, rather than 4 all at once). Add the egg yolks one at a time to the milk-yeast mixture.

Finally, add the milk-yeast-egg mixture to the flour-salt-sugar-shortening mixture. Chill the dough overnight.

Day Two

The next day divide the dough into 4 parts. Roll out the dough into a rectangle, about 9 inches by 15 inches.

Whip the egg whites til you get nice white peaks that are fairly stiff. Dab the eggs whites onto the dough, leaving room around the edges. Top with the cooked dates. Sprinkle with a little brown sugar.

Fold the dough into thirds, making the first fold smaller than the second fold. Seal the edges.

Let the dough rise for 2 hours.

Bake for 20-30 minutes at 375.

When the kringle has cooled, frost it. (my mom combines powdered sugar and milk to make her frosting – about that much powdered sugar and easy on the milk so that you don’t add too much and then need to add more powdered sugar. Been there, done that.)

The Execution:

Day One

What was I thinking?

Just start assembling the ingredients, Leanne. That’s not so hard. You can do this.

This will be like making cinnamon rolls.

But cinnamon rolls don’t take TWO DAYS.

This is crazy. Also, I’m hungry. I need a snack. Yes, I need a snack before I get started. Oh, and I’m supposed to be taking pictures to document this experiment

I’m not procrastinating. I’m documenting. And snacking.

So making the filling (at least the date part) wasn’t so bad. Dates, water, sugar. Cook. I can do that.

And even making the dough wasn’t so hard. Except for the glitch. The recipe calls for 1 cup of shortening. I had half a cup (why, oh, why didn’t I check before I started? It’s a nasty habit of mine – I have ingredient “X” so surely there is enough). So I substituted some butter. Please let that be okay.

I put everything into the fridge to wait for Day Two.

Day Two

Today is the day when I find out if this really was a crazy idea. Though I’m pretty sure I know the answer. Yes.

I pull out the dough and it’s quite sticky. Maybe too sticky. I work in some flour as I prepare to roll it out. I manage to roll out the 4 rectangles, but all the while thinking something isn’t quite right with the dough.

But it’s time to whip the egg whites. I have never whipped egg whites in my life. Ever. I just start giggling nervously as I turn on the mixer. I whip and whip and pretty soon they look good enough to me. They seem stiff.

I’m supposed to “dot” the egg whites on to the dough, but smearing seems like so much more fun. So I smear. And giggle some more. I do “dot” the date mixture – smearing the dates only further smears the egg whites and not in a good way. More giggles. It looks a bit goofy on the dough, but I just keep going.

Now I must fold the dough.

The dough is stuck. Too sticky stuck.

I try to massage the dough up with some flour. It sort of works, but by now I’m laughing hysterically. The dough is tearing. It doesn’t look pretty. I somehow manage to fold the dough into kringle-like form. But I must still get the forms onto the cookie sheet. The forms that are still pretty well stuck onto the table. I am so glad that no one is home to see what I have done.

After much more flour and laughing, the forms get transferred to the sheet where they will rest and then bake. I think I should have used two sheets instead as they are awfully cozy on the one sheet.

After two hours of resting and rising, they are beginning to become one kringle.

I bake the 4-in-1 kringle.

It smells heavenly, reminding me of when my mom used to make kringle.

Once the kringle is out of the oven and has cooled some, I frost it while my 5 year-old son, who is now home from school, hovers. He can’t wait to have a piece for snack. Though I do warn him that I will try it first to see if it tastes okay.

And it tastes pretty good. Not quite like mom’s (it’s the dough that seems most off), but not bad for my first attempt. Though I learn it tastes even better when it’s completely cooled. My son asks for more and I feel pleased.

The first kringle is nearly gone, and three more wait in the freezer. When they are gone, I’ll try again.

Not feeling verbose lately. Preschool transition is hard on both of us, it turns out.

But… There is a guest post coming to this space soon, so keep your eyes peeled!

And then I hope to catch up on all the drama, and resolution, shortly.

My hope is that some other parent who is out there googling cirque with toddler or ovo take my 2-year-old? will come across this post and get half price tickets and some courage.

There wasn’t much info for me on the internet when we were trying to decide. Could a young 2-year-old sit through a two hour show with a half hour intermission? Would the darkness, the stage lights, the loud music, the smoke machines, scare him?

This is what I knew: Ovo is a show about bugs, starring a Ladybug and an Egg. A LADYBUG. And a GIANT EGG.

Come on, people. How could we not give it a try?

As previously mentioned in this space, we took the least possible financial risk, scoring half-price tickets from Goldstar for a matinee show in the cheapest section. We considered pretending Jonah was under 2, and thus taking him for free, but in retrospect, we were glad we’d gotten three tickets; him having his own seat was worth the extra dough.

Our seats were in the last row of the far corner of the circus tent. An usher gave us the most wonderful booster attachment that raised Jonah to the perfect viewing height. Possibly the best part about our seats is that we were right next to the cucarracha-costume-clad orchestra, which featured a bebopping bouncy violin player. VIOLIN PLAYER! Yes.

Jonah sat utterly and completely still the entire first hour, hands in his lap, eyes traveling from the action on the stage, to the musicians, and back. Personally, I thought the costumes could have been more bug-like, but Jonah had no problem identifying the ladybug. Some others, he’d ask and we’d guess. They’re rather avant-garde.

There was a giant furry flower hanging from the ceiling that Jonah decided was a lion and no amount of argument from us would convince him otherwise.

Occasionally he would ask where the ladybug or the egg went, when those items/creatures were not onstage.

At intermission, we asked him if he wanted to go home or stay. Definitely stay. He was, again, remarkably still and rapt through the entire second half. I wondered what all the contortioning and flying around and high wiring and trampoline bouncing seemed like to him. He doesn’t have the context to know that these are unusual behaviors for human bodies, does he? Didn’t matter. He liked it.

With about 15 minutes to go in the second half, he started to get squirmy, crawling around on me, on the chair. Turned out what he really wanted to do was bum rush the stage and GET AT THAT LADYBUG, which I discovered as soon as he got himself down the stairs — we were trying to leave during the finale, figuring his patience had gone thin. He slithered out of my grasp and took off; but I caught him around the waist, his arms and legs pinwheeling “Laydeeeee BUGGG!!!” he cried.

The actors gave their bows and exited the stage. Jonah was desolate. Where did she go? Would she be coming back? “We should see the show again!” he declared.

Do you know the way to San Jose?

We bought the book on the way out, definitely a worthwhile purchase. He LOVES paging through it and talking about how the grasshoppers bounced off the wall. It’s nice for us to know now that those yellow/red people were fleas, and anybody with fur on their legs was a spider.

I’d consider going again. It might be fun to get seats a little closer to the stage and more towards the center. The costumes were much more exciting close up. The back row may have helped it be a less overwhelming experience for Jonah though. A pole did obstruct our view slightly through a couple of acts but nothing too terrible. I personally could have completely done without the (seemingly obligatory — this is my fourth Cirque show) overlong clowning segment with audience participation in the late-middle of the show.

Otherwise, two enthusiastic toddler and parent thumbs up!

He wasn’t buying the hey-come-read-a-book thing today so we had to do it more forcefully, uncurling him, still crying as he was being carried to the reading nook. I stood at the front door, listening to what seemed like a subsiding protest, and then I left.

I posted about my insecurities on Facebook today and received the most amazing support and advice from friends. I do believe the things they told me, that this type of behavior is normal, that he’s just finally realizing that preschool isn’t going to go away, that he’s really going to benefit from the social interaction and the independence, that his crying is even part of the separation — letting me know I am still needed. And that Scott and I are great parents and he’s an amazing kid.

But man, this still sucks.

I was consoled by the fact also that on previous days he’d been difficult to dislodge when I’d arrived to pick him up. But I did the math today and realized that was only the case on days when I was picking him up earlier, either between art class and lunch, or between lunch and nap. Picking him up at 3:00 has been different. He’s in a funk post-nap. I finally saw the chart today and he’s been falling asleep at around 1:20 or 1:30 which means when they wake him, sometime before 3, to put away his mat, put on his coat and boots, he hasn’t gotten a full two-hours which — when he naps — is his norm. This could be contributing to the subdued-to-weepy demeanor I’m witnessing.

Or it could be the rain. Because that first day, when 3pm meant he was in the yard with other kids, he’d been fine and had wanted to stay and have his snack with the group.

But the other thing, and this is part of what is so tough, is that tonight at bedtime, he kinda freaked out.

After the usual books, potty, songs, crib, he didn’t want me to leave the room. “I’ll be in the hallway” he usually says, giving me my line, which I say back to him. Tonight it was all manner of protest “No hallway! One more song! Want a snuggle. Mommy stay in the room. Bring the chair in the room.” I said no, that I would be in the hallway, that it was time for bed. I bent over the crib for a kiss and a hug and left. He started crying hysterically and screaming. This hasn’t happened in MONTHS. Scott and I were momentarily stumped.

The whole fear of caving in to tantrums had me stuck in the hallway for a few minutes. Then I went back into the room and had another talk with Jonah. I told him I’d heard him crying, that I was just in the next room, that I loved him no matter what, no matter where I am. He made it clear that he was not happy with me for leaving, and that he wasn’t terribly impressed that I could hear him cry and NOT come to his aid.

I said, “Daddy and I are going to stand in the doorway for a minute and talk, okay?”

He assented.

We the parents looked at each other quizzically. Then inspiration. “Jonah, I am going to sit in a chair in the doorway, okay? Right where you can see me.”

Again, he assented. This was basically us taking a step/scooch backward from when we’d done the sleep-consultant prescribed training technique. Scott and I both sat in chairs outside of Jonah’s door and meditated there together. We could hear him whisper-chatting to himself. After meditation, I grabbed the new book I’d picked up for myself from the library and even after I was pretty sure he’d fallen asleep, I stayed put for a while. There was something soothing to me about sitting in that chair and reading.

I want him to love preschool. I think I’m still afraid I may not have chosen the right place, and on some level he’s keying into that insecurity, reacting by not feeling settled, and using it to his advantage in his overall protest against being without me for any portion of the day. I am also pretty sure he’s having a good time there when he gets over my exit, and that he’d withhold that information if it meant making me feel guilty.

Sure, these are complex psychological manipulations that I am attributing to a 2-year-old. I’m just being silly, overthinking, the usual stuff. Or am I? (Duh duh duh…..)

Today, after school, I asked him what I’ve been asking every day, “So, what did you do today at preschool?”

He smiled and said/asked, “Anything?” — perfectly mimicking the hopeful/fearful tone and word that I usually say next when he doesn’t respond.

And then he did what he has done several pick-ups running. He only reported on the remark-worthy details of my arrival at the end of the day.

“Mommy brought you a sippy cup with juice in it.”

Ah well. Some things I guess I’ll never get to know.