Which is all to say that of course both children became sick that very same night and of course I eventually found myself using a paper towel to pick chunks of semi-digested god-knows-what out of the bathtub. And may I just add that while a bathtub is certainly a preferable receptacle for human vomit than, say, the living room carpet, being confronted with RINSED SOLID MATTER is sort of a profoundly repulsive experience all on its own.

On Friday morning Dylan looked so incredibly godawful, like something dredged from the bottom of the ocean and heated in the microwave for a good ten minutes, that I dragged him to the pediatrician’s office, where he enjoyed a miraculous transformation the instant we walked through the front doors and he saw the office fishtank. “A FISH!” he blared, clapping his little hands with robust healthy glee, his death-pallor replaced by a pink-cheeked glow, his crusted-over slimenose suddenly clear and dry as a summer afternoon. “An’ ANNUDDA fish!”

He howled lustfully and with great vigor when the doctor touched him with the stethoscope, he thrashed like a wild bull while I tried to hold him down for the ear-inspection, and when I foolishly attempted to pry his angry little jaws open with my hand so the doctor could get the tongue depressor into his mouth, he nearly took my finger off at the knuckle.

All in all, he was PERFECTLY FINE, other than being kind of a raging ASSHOLE.

Eighty thousand doses of Motrin and a few sleep-free nights later, both kids seem to generally be back to normal, except for Dylan’s temperament, which I can only describe as fractious, in the sense that he makes me want to fracture my own skull with a ballpeen hammer. I don’t know if he’s got some residual ear discomfort or if there is an actual rabies-infected badger lodged up his colon or what the deal is, but living with him right now is sort of what I imagine it must be like to hang out with that Leave Britney Alone guy, if that guy also maybe had a chainsaw and his head could spin 360 degrees on his neck.

The child is a little touchy, is what I’m saying. It’s very relaxing to be around.

So let me be a lesson to you—do not under any circumstances break the cardinal rule of parenting, which is that when it comes to good-luck streaks of health or sleep, you NEVER announce how good things are going. Unless of course it’s been a while since you’ve de-puked a tub and you’d like to see just how sharp those skills still are.

The entire thing is genius but lately I’ve been thinking about the Brain Damage routine, which, well, if you haven’t seen it, please enjoy:

My god, this is a perfect depiction of our house.

Didn’t I just TELL YOU not to do that?

*high-pitched chorus* I don’t KNOW!

Everyone knows children’s brains are formed of large chunks of Silly Putty and clouds of easily-distracted bees, but man, sometimes I can’t believe the effort it takes just get someone to carry out ONE directive. I feel like a deranged border collie, nipping and nagging at the heels of my kids in order to herd them towards the thing I’ve asked them to do: “Brush (yap!) your (bark bark!) teeth! Walk to the bathroom (yip!) NOW, and pick UP your toothbrush (nip nip) and—PUT DOWN THE TOY, and (yap!) GO BRUSH YOUR—WHY ARE YOU SITTING THERE AAARRGGGH (bark bark bark *overwhelmed piddle*)”

Anyway, I actually sort of have a serious question for those of you with preschool-aged kids. Is it pretty typical for the 4-5 age range to be, you know, not so great with the focusing skills? Like, I have a friend whose daughter is the same age as Riley and she’s reading entire books and coloring big awesome pictures and, well, in my house everyone’s much more about running pell-mell from one thing to another, and the reading skills are coming along but there is SO MUCH impatience and distraction and NO ONE WANTS TO SIT STILL and every drawing looks like a frenzied tornado because HEY LET’S RIDE BIKES.

I’m kind of exaggerating, but really, I am curious as to what age a person should start expecting and demanding better listening/attention skills from a child, because I really don’t know. I know some kids are naturally more inclined to quiet activities that involve concentration and some just want to fling themselves facefirst off the couch all day long (cough cough cough DYLAN), but when does the Cosby-described brain damage start to recede a bit?

It made me anxious to watch it, but afterwards I felt flooded with all this happy nostalgia. I can remember that feeling of not wanting to leave the hospital, especially after Riley was born. JB was eager to get back to the comforts of our house but man, I was scared to go home. At the hospital we had all kinds of experts checking on the baby, making sure everyone was doing okay, and even taking him to be fed if JB was gone and I needed to sleep. A steady stream of friendly nurses were a button-push away from bringing me ice water, pain meds, and extra diapers.

Everyone says hospital food is awful and I suppose it was, but I have fond memories of the trays of food and a blessed cup of coffee on the second morning. A delicious pushup popsicle a few hours after surgery. A cookie that I gave to JB, reaching over the warm bundle that was snuggled against my side.

I loved the big comfy bed that could be adjusted to suit my needs. It was crisp and white and even when the sheets got all bloody and had to be changed out from under me it felt like this clean, safe, sterile place to be holding a baby. I could crank it into this Barcalounger shape and nestle my child in my lap while holding a book off to the side.

I dozed a lot, especially the first time around when I was recovering from that awful magnesium and since the UW is a teaching hospital it felt like I had a new nurse every time I opened my eyes. They were all nice.

After my second C-section I got unbearably itchy from the morphine and they gave me an IV of Benadryl. I remember lying there feeling an instant whoosh of that glassy-eyed allergy medicine feeling, while Dylan squirmed and gritched nearby and they cleaned him and put a knit hat on him—the one with the little tied-off piece of yarn—and wrapped him like a burrito in that teal-and-pink blanket and the anesthesiologist came by to check on me and there was this bustle of professional good-natured activity in the room and I just felt like we were so cared for.

When Riley was born an older nurse caught us trying to wake him up to feed him and she twinkled her eyes at JB and joked kindly that one of the rules of caring for a baby is that you never wake them up. (We woke him up anyway.)

One of my all-time favorite memories is from when after Dylan was born and we were in the recovery floor and a nurse checked on him and decided his temperature was a little low. She picked him up out of the bassinet and unwrapped him, then told me to open my gown. She firmly tucked his bare little body against my skin, put a blanket around us both, and left us be. The room was quiet and I dozed in and out, just looking at his tiny perfect face, while outside I could hear the murmurs and bleeps of a busy nursing station. All those people ready to help us if need be. It was like being in a pocket, or cupped in someone’s hand.

Poor Jim and Pam had the grouchy nurse, the shared room, the hasty exit thanks to an ungenerous HMO policy. I know a lot of people have unpleasant hospital ordeals, and hate the idea of intervention. I didn’t plan on having surgical births either, but I couldn’t have asked for better treatment. It’s funny, it took a TV show to make me realize how wonderful my birth experiences really were.

Babies are simple, if baffling, creatures; toddlers are delicious pint-sized savages who tend to go through similar stages. Riley’s such a little kid and a giant hulking BOY, all at once, and it seems like an oddly fragile, impossible-to-capture age. I wish I could do a better job, if only for my own memories. It’s awful, isn’t it, to think of all the things that will eventually be lost to time—the way they pronounce certain words, the exact crescent of their fingernails against small, grimy hands.

I haven’t thought of him in terms of milestones for quite a while—I suppose I thought the big Firsts were all behind us. But this weekend I took him to his first soccer practice, and oh. Oh, you guys. I thought I was going to burst into ridiculous, humiliating tears, there on the side of the YMCA gym court. My boy, my boy, looking so grown up. His first team sport. Ah, I don’t know, something about those baggy shorts and the real no-shit coach and the way he ran like he was trying to get somewhere instead of the pinwheeling garage-sale physical chaos that usually happens when little kids run—it just knocked me over. I was so goddamned proud of him, and so overwhelmed by how fast the time has gone.

He did really well, too. There was some hesitation when we first got there—his unsure, reluctant toe-scuffings sort of broke my heart, as I know that new-group feeling all too well—but once things got going he had a blast.

Soccer! My god, I can hardly believe it. I mean, really.

I said as much to the friendly Minneapolis couple I was seated next to on my flight home. They told me I should come do the Twin Cities race in October because the leaves are so pretty, and I said I’d love to, but only if there was a half. “I mean, twenty-six miles,” I said, and twirled my finger next to my temple. They agreed, and we had a hearty chuckle over the batfuck insanity of running for five straight hours. Who DOES that?

. . . you can probably guess where this is going, right?

Yeah.

I really don’t know either, but I’ve got eight weeks to figure it out.

I somehow managed to rally when my alarm went off a few hours later, until I poked around for my wallet and discovered it was MIA, at which point I fell into a deep terrified pit of despair, remembering the hellish nightmare when I lost my wallet in Austin last year and wondering just how in blue fuck I’d managed to repeat that kind of stupidity. I was on the verge of calling the local cab companies, thinking it must have fallen out of my backpack while I was en route to the hotel, when during one of my frenzied pacings around the room I literally stubbed my toe on it from where I’d apparently tossed it on the floor the night before.

Pro tip: if you’re thinking of running your first half marathon, I really, really don’t recommend an exhausting pukefest the night before, then a full blown panic attack the morning of. Just a little piece of advice from me to you.

I’m happy to report things improved after that, thank god. I walked to the starting area with Katie, Danielle, and Erin, and it was amazing to see so many people milling around—the race was much bigger than I’d imagined it. (I think something like 18,000 people ran today.) It took 45 minutes from the time the gun went off for our group to actually get to the official start, and I’ll know this for next time: there is plenty of time to visit the porta-potties.

The race itself was . . . man, I don’t even know how to describe it. It was wonderful, it was hard, it was fun, it was grueling. I loved running through such pretty streets, I loved all the fantastic people cheering us on. I felt okay until the last few miles, and the last mile in particular was a bitch. I tried to pick up my speed but I just couldn’t, I was running on fumes and the repeated mental mantra that it would all be over soon.

I didn’t stop, though, aside from a couple speedwalking breaks at the water stations once I realized I couldn’t run and drink from a cup at the same time.

My final time was 2:17, and I crossed the finish line exactly how I’d predicted: hurting, but so happy. Katie took my picture for me:

Riley will be glad to know that yes, Mommy did in fact get a medal. Never mind that everyone got one, okay?

As far as things I do recommend when it comes to preparing for a long race, I heartily endorse putting your name on your shirt, even if it makes you feel like a total cheesebag. Because people yelled “Go, Linda!” at me, and that. Was. Awesome.

After we’d taken a shuttle bus back and cleaned up a bit, a bunch of us went and had an astoundingly delicious meal at Acme Oyster House. I got to spend time with AB and Eliza, whom I haven’t seen since Journalcon in . . . what, 2003, or some such craziness. Oh, I was in such good company today.

Photo ganked from AB’s Twitter: me, AB, Erin, Alice, and Katie. Please note how everyone’s hair looks lovely while mine lurks, a matted rat’s nest of post-race horror, under a hat.

We ate until there wasn’t room for a single more bite, then we went and got beignets. My god. Heavenly.

I’m so wiped out (and, um, FULL) I plan to crawl into bed soon and sleep for at least 12 or so hours, then tomorrow I’m going to explore the city a bit. I’m feeling like eight million blistered dollars, my friends, and I cannot thank you enough for all the encouragement you’ve given me, here and on Twitter. It made a difference, it really did.

Oh! I almost forgot to tell you. So you know JB’s big fight last night, well, he knocked the guy right the fuck out in the first round. It was the best fight of the night, according to the folks watching. How about that?

When you believe you have been treated poorly, it is incredibly validating—and comforting—to have people agree with you. But there’s an inherent risk in painting a partial, biased picture when you involve other people, and it was almost certainly the wrong thing to do to invite criticism and outrage on my behalf.

(No matter how good it felt.)

Anyway, I’ve gone through a nearly pitch-perfect Kübler-Ross model of processing Monday’s bombshell, from weepy devastation to white-hot fury to a kind of wary acceptance. It’s funny, I was just thinking about the nature of impermanence and unpredictability and I’m now in a position to try and take my own advice: to let go of what has already happened (an enormous challenge at the moment, when I’m still feeling so much resentment) and move on. Start doing what it takes to move things forward in a positive way.

I feel like something unpleasant but necessary happened to me this week. I feel like I have a new perspective that includes the sincere belief that I am capable of better things and that is is my responsibility to seek out the future I want to have instead of waiting for it to happen to me.

Danny linked to this video today and I startled myself by bursting into overwhelmed, grateful tears while watching it.

Listen to the lyrics:

It’s not where you are
it’s where you’re going
It’s not about the things you’ve done
it’s what you’re doing now

Yes. Just: yes.

This is the weekend of my race, the goal I have been training for for so long, and I am convinced the timing has happened this way for a reason. When I run those miles I will be reminding myself with every step how hard I’ve worked and what I’m capable of when I try. When I cross that finish line my body will surely be hurting but my heart will be flying. I will know the truth of dreams becoming reality.

I feel much better today, and I want to thank you for your supportive words. You guys have always helped me through the tough times, and I cannot express how much I appreciate it.

I think things will be okay one way or another. I’ll keep you posted.

He’s got his first official fight this weekend; a big event at his gym with lots of fighters and an actual paying audience and everything. It’s the culmination of weeks of hard training and I wish like hell I could be in the bleachers cheering him on. Unfortunately, this also happens to be the weekend of my half marathon, so while he’ll be stepping into the ring here in Seattle, I’ll be en route to New Orleans.

Talk about your crappy timing, right? It’s a bummer not only because we can’t be present at each other’s goal events—well, it wasn’t likely that JB was going to be able to be in New Orleans anyway, but I definitely would have been at his fight—but also since as the final days tick down before the weekend we can’t even really properly commiserate with each other.

JB: “Man, I’m stressed about the fight.”

Me: “Whatever. At least you don’t have to fly across the damn country to get to it.”

JB: “At least you won’t be on a stage.”

Me: “At least your fight won’t last, like, two and a half hours.”

JB: “At least you don’t have to just wait around for half the night beforehand.”

Me: “At least you don’t have to worry about a catastrophic gastrointestinal malfunction occurring at mile eight and you’ve still got 5.1 miles to go, motherfucker.”

Etc.

In all honesty I think JB’s got the harder task, if only because he has to make weight before the fight. He gets weighed on Friday morning and the scale has to read 145 or ELSE. He’s within spitting distance of that weight right now, thanks to a few weeks of extra vigilance, but these last few days are a big back of suck. No carbs, no starch, no salt, no snacks. I put him on the diet at the end of Jillian Michaels’ Making the Cut book, which features the world’s most depressing seven-day eating plan designed to cut any and all excess water weight. He’s basically allowed egg whites, plain chicken breast, and low-sodium tuna; meanwhile, I’m shoveling entire bags of salty popcorn in my fret-hole and wondering out loud through mouthfuls if I should eat spaghetti like all week to carb load or just augment my regular meals with, say, a steady influx of M&Ms.

A few years ago I don’t think either one of us would be able to believe the sorts of goals we have today. It feels amazing, really, to share these feelings—of having worked so hard, and aimed this high—with my partner and best friend. Whatever happens in that ring or on the race course this weekend, I know we have one thing in common: we are incredibly proud of one another.

Him: “Any fevers, aches, DIARRHEA?”

Me: “Nope.”

Him: “So no digestive issues, like DIARRHEA?”

Me: “Ah . . . no. All good.”

Him: “Great! Some people experience DIARRHEA, so—”

Me: “OH MY GOD MY POOPS ARE MAJESTICALLY SOLID CAN WE MOVE ON.”

JB took me to the Salish Lodge for dinner, a place where the spectacular view is legitimately trumped by the food. I can’t even begin to describe how good it is, except that it’s worth every single one of the many dollars it costs to eat there. I think my favorite dish is the apple/squash bisque, which is poured over this amazing piece of goat cheese that has been caramelized with one of those crème brûlée torch whatsits and thus every spoonful is a transcendently creamy melted sweet/savory explosion that makes me think of the dancing-flavor animations in Ratatouille.

Today is another spectacularly gorgeous springlike day and after breakfast I ran the six miles from our house to an enormous new-to-us park where I met JB and the kids, and we spent our morning playing on all the weird equipment and climbing rocks and tromping around in the fields in the glorious sunshine.

When we got home I opened my presents with the boys and then we all ate a bunch of delicious fattening sugary things. Riley hugged me and said that since it was my birthday I could do whatever I wanted, although he clarified that that did not include eating the cake he had deemed as his, and Dylan repeatedly announced that he would like to “HAVE . . . MO’ . . . CHOCLIT, PEASE?”

Not bad, 36. Not bad at all.