http://www.salon.com/2012/01/16/attachment_parenting_dropout/

It’s fitting that a woman’s hair falls out after she has a baby. It is the perfect physical manifestation of what it feels like to be a mother of young children. Everywhere I go I leave pieces of my DNA – hair, chewed off fingernails, babies – and I often literally feel like I’m losing pieces of myself. My children are infuriating, bizarre, difficult, beastly and draining, but I do not regret becoming a mother, not even for a heartbeat, not even when I’m up for most of the night trying to keep the two-year-old, who somehow managed to finagle her way into our bed, from kicking the four-month-old who is also in our bed for his hourly feeding. Not even when I finally give up on trying to sleep and spend the first two hours of my morning preparing three different breakfasts for my toddler, all of which she refuses. Not even when the toddler is finally off to preschool and instead of being able to relax, I am left with a baby who cries every moment that my boob isn’t in his mouth and a feast of household chores. I do not regret my children. But I regret the kitchen peeler that I murdered.

On the day of the peeler’s death, after my toddler’s ferocious departure to preschool, I put the baby down in his crib to nap and set upon the business of being a stay-at-home mom. I had apples, sweet potatoes and cauliflower set to spoil and the only time I can cook is while my stove-fondling toddler is at preschool. She is only there for ten hours a week, and it is within that time that I transform our weekly box of organic GMO-free hippy dippy farm share vegetables into nourishment for my family. However, it’s a struggle for me because my mother equated cooking with defrosting. She’d plop a freshly thawed lasagna down and quip, “I slaved over a hot stove all day.” Then she’d mix another white Russian. What I mean to say: I never learned to cook.

I turned the baby’s mobile on, ran my finger over the puffy white peaks of his gums, and kissed him sloppily on his soft spot. Before I could even turn off the monitor I could hear him revving up a wail. By the time I made it ten feet out of the bedroom and into our kitchen, or kitchenette as it might more aptly be called, he had succumbed to a hissy fit.

Though I was “against” sleep training my first born, the new baby has me down in his four short months of life. He cries so furiously in my arms that putting him down to cry himself to sleep now seems like the only sane option. At least then his crying has a function. At least then I can do stuff with my hands, stuff like cook, clean and run my fingers over my ever-deepening crows feet.

Hissy fit or not, I resolved to carry on with cooking dinner. I put the cauliflower on the stove to steam (baby still crying), scrubbed the sweet potatoes (still crying), mixed the topping for the apple crisp (still crying), put some stale bread into the food processor to make breadcrumbs for the cauliflower bake (still crying), set foil wrapped sweet potatoes in the crock pot (still crying), removed the hairs that had drifted out of my head and into the crock pot (still crying) and started peeling the apples (still crying).

I peeled the first apple (still crying), the second (still crying), the third (still crying), and then SNAP! I banged that poor peeler on the counter in abject rage and frustration (still crying). It is difficult to describe the rage and panic that a baby’s cry brings out in his mother. Here’s an attempt: it is like watching your pet cat be skinned and thrown, still twitching, into a dumpster.

So before the last apple had been relieved of its skin, I lost my ever-loving mind. I banged that defenseless peeler on the counter until the blade popped off and skipped across the floor like a headless chicken. Then I stormed into the baby’s room and hollered, “WHAT? WHAT IS IT GOING TO TAKE TO GET YOU TO SLEEP?” like he was a prospective buyer in my used car lot who just wouldn’t make up his mind. I fell to my knees outside the bars of his crib and broke down into sobs. “Please. Sleep. Please. I’ll give you $20. I’ll sign a contract to let you have a candy binge five years from today. I will love you forever and ever.”

Turns out, babies can’t be bargained to sleep. I hugged him, apologized profusely, promised to pay his therapy bills until his 30th birthday at least, and left the room, unable to cope with more crying, but still knowing that I had to get dinner cooked.

I have two older sisters each with three kids and I marvel each time I see them at how rapidly my sisters have aged since having kids. It was funny until it happened to me. Mothering a baby, particularly a baby willing to expel lung-tearing cries for much of the day, is the crucible on which many a wrinkle has formed. When I had my now two-year-old daughter I was 28. Now I’m 38.

I marched back into the kitchen with a mixture of Zen and resolve. I turned on music. Then I turned the music louder. Then I jammed my finger down on the volume button until I was sure I had maxed out my flimsy little MP3 player. I put the player down in the corner next to the dog’s ceramic water dish, which was the only available space because all four square feet of kitchenette counter were taken up with the sweet potatoes in the crock pot, the cauliflower in the steamer, the half peeled apples, and the food processor full of bread crumbs.

But the damned MP3 player kept turning off. I fumed. What the hell am I doing cooking dinner at 11 a.m.? (I turned the MP3 player back on.) Why is dinner two kinds of vegetables and dessert? (Back on.) If ever there was a time to defrost a lasagna and pretend I slaved over a hot stove all day then mix a stiff white Russian it’s when I have two very young children. (Turned the player on again.) How could I possibly be standing here slaving over a literal hot stove making DESSERT when I haven’t slept more than five hours a night in months? (Flailed my foot around the on button until the music came back on.) What obscene ambition! Why am I not laying on the couch right now eating frozen mac n’ cheese, watching last night’s “Glee” and cuddling my nap-less punk of a baby. I adore that kid so much that my head will literally explode if he is so much as mildly displeased. Why am I sitting here listening to him cry while I cook heartless vegetables?

In between softening the butter, mixing the crisp topping and peeling apples clumsily with a paring knife, and realizing that in trying to succeed I had failed my son, I moved to tap the MP3 player on one more time, but instead kicked it as my last nerve went “poof.” Batteries and ceramic shards flew as that piece of crap MP3 player broke apart and shattered the dog’s water bowl.

So there is one more thing I regret: the dog bowl. But I do not regret the MP3 player. Fuck that bitch.

As the water spilled out of the dog bowl carrying ceramic chips in its floes, I just stood there and watched. The water crawled across the floor picking up strands of my used-to-be-thick hair as the puddle yawned across the length of my house forking around the scattered batteries. For a moment there was impossible stillness as my home was baptized in dog water. And I realized: that little punk was fast asleep.

[Written 2/2011. The baby is now 14 months old and far more approachable.]

I am pleased to announce that I am one of the ten runners-up in the Your Life… The Reader’s Digest Version contest for my entry “Primatology.” My entry will run in the March issue of Reader’s Digest and I received a $2500 cash prize. Thank you to everyone who voted!

Maintaining that degree of superiority was stressful, so during my junior year of high school some of my honor student pals and I hauled off to Scandia Family Fun Center to blow of steam on the Lil’ Indy Raceway.

As a child I was a nationally ranked runner, so I learned from a young age that winning was everything. As my dad always said, second place is for losers. I applied this adage to everything, even go-karting.

It’s key to watch a few heats before you race to determine which karts have the best acceleration. Before my friends and I even got in line, I had my sights set on Lucky Number Four. “See number four guys? Number four is mine.” The nodded, but almost in a way that suggested they didn’t care what car I got. I reiterated, “I just wanna be super clear here guys. Dibs on four.”

Just then I heard a snort from behind me in line. A mere child, maybe about twelve — he was barely clearing the height limit — was smirking at me. I glared at him to make sure he knew I meant business, both in general and specifically about Lucky Number Four. I kept my eyes fixed on that particular vehicle as its previous driver, an unworthy middle-aged woman in mom jeans and bedazzled ankle boots, parked it neatly in line, ready for the next race.

As the attendant opened the gate that little punk tore ahead of my friends, then elbowed me in the tit on the way to Lucky Number Four. In the tit! Cheap shot. What kind of punk elbows an innocent-looking 17-year-old girl in her fucking tit?! I don’t recall specifically, but it’s entirely possible that I was wearing Heidi braids that day. It’s not like I was some drunk tramp with hair-sprayed bangs and a tube top. I bet those cheap whores get their tits elbowed all the time.

I stood authoritatively over him, waiting for him to surrender what was obviously mine. “Get outta my kart you little shit.”

He smirked like he’d seen one too many Dennis the Menace cartoons. “Suck it bitch.”

My first urge was to lean into that kart and pull him out by his hypercolor tee, but I was pretty sure that kind of move would get me kicked out of a family friendly establishment like Scandia. I swallowed my profoundly informed sense of justice, and took the kart behind him. Game on, brat.

Thanks to years running track, I was a solid starter, and I knew how to pass on the inside. Once the attendant waved our line of karts on the track, I gunned it and careened for the inside on the first turn. I got enough of my nose in ahead of him so that with a quick flick of the steering wheel I was able to send him into a tale spin. That was for calling me a bitch.

I easily took the lead, leaving behind both that punk and all my friends, but I got a little ahead of myself and blew an S-curve, giving a few of the more assertive racers a chance to pass me. The only thing I could hear over the roar of the go-kart was my dad’s favorite saying: there’s only one number one. 

I honed in on the karts ahead of me, passing one, then another to take second position. Just as I was about to slip into the lead, I was needled out of the turn on the inside by my kart, Lucky Number Four. That fucker may have won my kart from me, but he sure as shit wasn’t going to win the race. I quickly recovered and stayed on his fender, then geared up to pass him on the final curve.

As he was leaning into the turn, I nosed my way between him and the curb then gave him a hard knock to the far end of the track, where he was T-boned at full-speed by another driver. I easily coasted to victory then panned around to see the kid still at the site of his collision, rubbing his neck while his kart faced the wrong way on the track. Loser.

My friends gave me luke-warm high fives and we gathered to watch an attendant push Unlucky Number Four into the maintenance section. The little boy shuffled off the track while I literally pointed and laughed at him. His face reddened; his hypercolor shirt blanched at the pits. He collapsed into his dad, hiding his tears. Then his old man looked up at me and saw a probably Heidi-braided girl laughing at his kid. He nudged the boy away. ”Shit. You got beat by a girl. You know how that looks?”

Man, with a dickhead dad like that I hope that kid has some test taking skills. He’s going to need to beat the shit out of the SATs.

Image: Jon Whiles / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

So you like your venti soy cappuccino bone dry? Not just dry, but bone dry? No milk, just foam. And I am using the term milk loosely. You get that right? You get that soy milk isn’t milk? That it’s a sweetened bean puree? You know that soy nuts don’t have milky centers like coconuts? That to get what looks like milk you have to process soy beans in any number of nasty chemicals? And that the beans are extensively genetically modified Monsanto strains grown with an abundance of pesticides? So you get that soymilk isn’t necessarily better for the environment or more ethnical than cow milk, right? But provides a decent alternative for lactose intolerant people? What? You’re not lactose intolerant? You just like the taste? It makes you feel crunchy, but in a lean and sexy way? Fine. Just don’t look at the nutritional information. Good for you – your venti bone dry soy cappuccino contains a serving of vegetables. You go girl!

But let’s talk about soy foam. Let’s do the match on this. Your venti bone dry soy cappuccino is a 20.5 ounce beverage. About four of the ounces are taken up with your two espresso shots leaving me to create 16.5 ounces of soy foam. What the hell are you doing with 16.5 ounces of soy foam? That’s not a drink. It’s cotton candy with espresso buried at the bottom. Do you just sit there and lick the soy?

And you realize that in order to make all that soy foam I have to steam several pitchers of pseudo-milk? And that by the time the next pitcher is ready the foam in the first one has broken down and milked up your shots? That a venti bone dry soy cappuccino is a chemical impossibility unless I simultaneously steam three pitchers of milk and even then your cappuccino will only remain unmilked for about five minutes before the soy collapses and you have an 8 ounce soy latte, which by the way is a much cheaper and more reasonable drink?

You realize it’s gonna take me a while, right? That all the people who have the misfortune of coming in after you are going to have to wait for ten minutes while I get your drink together? Right. Not your problem. I get that. But do you understand that if you don’t want me to spit in it you should toss a little something in the tip jar?

Fine. So you’re not into tipping for counter service. That’s fine. I actually get a kick out of spitting in drinks. What? You’re going to stare at me through the plexi-glass like I’m a zoo animal for entire time that it takes for me make your drink? I’m alright with making everyone wait twenty, thirty, forty minutes for their drinks so at some point you’ll look away. It only takes a moment to spit.

Enjoy!

xoxo,

Your Barista

Image: Paul / FreeDigitalPhotos.net