I have been struggling with whether or not to blog anymore.  Part of my struggle is the time it takes to write every day has been re-allotted to my digging into a larger writing project.   Another struggle is the idea, possibly only theoretical, of my kid’s privacy.  Have I been invading it?  My last struggle is with my motivation for blogging in the first place.  I may be mildly, just a little, wee, tiny bit narcissistic.  Slightly.  As I wrote this I found yet another struggle.  My use of the word struggle (rhymes with snuggle).  Really?  “Struggle”?  I may, need to get some real problems. 

While I excel at running my mouth about kids and marriage and mememe, I dream of being a novelist.  Instead of dreaming my life away, I am going to give it a whirl.  I have been scraping all my ten minutes together and trying to make chapters out of molehills. 

As to the children’s privacy; I like to pretend such a thing still exists.  As I went along with my blog I began to wonder if having your mother tell the world about every trip to the potty and about that fit you threw in IKEA might be kind of embarrassing.   I would be pretty sad if they started blogging about all of my room cleaning nagging and how I cruise the table after snack time eating grilled cheese sammich crusts and rogue carrot sticks. 

“And then she said ‘In this family we pick up after ourselves’.  Like I asked to be part of this family.  I was in line for movie start parents with maids, and instead I get this old battle axe and Captain Jazzy Pants for parents.”  Ouch.

Narcissism?  Welllll, okay.  Who doesn’t like to go on about themselves?  Guilty as charged.

So, those are my reasons.  Thanks for reading. 

    

While I drive around in my car, I often come across other drivers whose driving style leaves me cold.  Tailgating, meandering, forgetting to use turn signals, these are things I like to grouse about.  My most despised fellow driver though, is the jerk in the big rush.  The guy weaving back and forth in the lane obviously put out by my obeying the speed limit and near perfect lane control.  I enjoy saying things like ‘what’s the big rush jerk? Got to get to your Jerks United meeting?  YEESH!’ 

Today I was returning from an irritating trip to the pediatrician with both the kids in the back seat. Tennessee hopped around from foot to foot the whole time we waited in the tiny exam room peppering me with questions and trying to open all the drawers and touch all the stuff.  Then we made our way up 33^rd Avenue at a snail’s pace, Tennessee announced that he had to pee.  I told him that we were almost there and that he could pee just as soon as we got home.  He wailed that he couldn’t wait.  I started driving like a jerk. 

Not that I haven’t cleaned pee from a car seat before.  Not that I don’t expect to clean pee from a car seat again in the future.  But it is summer, and pee makes the car stinky in the heat, and let’s be honest, I can think of at least forty seven things I would rather do than clean pee from a car seat. 

I gripped the steering wheel and weaved back and forth in the lane, I tailgated, I shook my fist at the guy in front of me.  Tennessee yowled again and I gave him words of encouragement.  ‘Just hang on buddy, we will be home soooo soon!’  He yowled some more, and Lucy snapped that he was hurting her ears.  Finally I peeled into the driveway, tires screeching, whipped open the door to the back seat, got the full bladdered fellow out and hustled in to the house.  I set Tennessee down in front of the bathroom door where he looked up at me and said ‘I don’t have to go now, I wath juth kidding.’  Then he hopped off down the hall on one foot then the other.

Maybe I will be less looky down the nosey about rushing drivers in the future.  Maybe they are being lied to by small children too.  Maybe driving like a jerk to avoid possible pee cleaning duty is dumb.  Maybe it is time for me to teach the kids to pee in a juice bottle long haul trucker style.

Lucy had a fever all weekend.  It is gone now.  She is plucky and giggly, just like she was before the fever started.  I am kind of tired from my hyper vigilant temperature checking.  Fevers are my least favorite of the veritable buffet of childhood ick and sick symptoms.  Barfing is no fun, of course.  Nobody likes to wash linens over and over.  Snotty noses are no prize either.  But neither scares me like a fever.

It may be that I placed too much stock in the Little House on the Prairie books I read as a kid.  The older sister or maybe the younger gets a fever and goes blind. I know, I know, there was no Children’s Motrin on the prairie.  I am pretty sure that prairie children didn’t receive a battery of vaccinations either, but logic and chemistry don’t make me any less fearful of a fever.  My fear addled brain wakes me up every hour to pad in and feel little Lucy’s forehead (as though my palm and fingers are highly calibrated thermometers with blindness alerts built in) to make sure that she hasn’t burned up and gone blind in the night.  Once again, fear beats logic when mothering is at hand. 

Over the weekend Tennessee and his buddy Liam were playing a game of Mean Guys meet Snow
White.  I do not completely understand the rules, but there are many elements to the game.  Both boys take their shirts off and run around yelling “Mean Guy RAAAAAH” a bunch.  The Snow White element is new and involves our completely black cat playing the role of Snow White.  The Mean Guys follow her where ever she goes calling her is high pitched voices “Thnow White!  Come here Thnow White!”  She eventually gets sick of it and hides.  It was at this point that the Mean Guys decided to build a block house in the dining room.  Tennessee asked me to put on a record.

We recently moved our record player upstairs from the deep dark basement.  The kids think it is the most amazing thing.  Next week I am going to plug in and rotary phone and totally blow their minds.  Tennessee especially loves all the weird records we have found at garage sales and crusty junk shops.  He is partial to Polka, which makes me love him more than before, which I was sure wasn’t possible.  And because as a parent I get to force my tastes on my children, I have been playing Prince’s Paisley Park whenever I can.  I figured I could bring Liam into the Prince fan fold.  Every boy needs to be exposed to a man that tiny, flamboyant and that secure in his masculinity. 

I put on the first song on side 1.  Around the World in a Day starts off with a high pitched noodle-ee synthesizer impression of a flute from another planet.  Liam’s lower lip popped out and his eyes welled up.  I asked him if he was alright.  He told me in the tiniest of voices (not Liam’s usual holler for all occasion’s style) that the music was very scary.  I moved the needle to the next song.  It was pretty peppy and the boys jiggled their shoulders around and stacked blocks happily.  Then Condition of the Heart began to play.  Liam’s little lip popped out again.  I waited for a minute to see what would happen.  Tennessee noticed the lip too. 

“Liam ith thith one sthcary too?”  Liam just nodded his curly little head and looked as sad as a boy can be.  Tennessee patted him and told him that “Ith okay Liam, I get sthcared too thomtimesth.”  He went on to comfort his buddy, Liam got into the game too and repeated to himself a couple of times “I’n okay, ith not too sthcary.  I’n okay.”  I was so proud of those two little ruffians, taking care of each other in the face of scary experimental pop music.  After that, I put on some Polka and those Mean Guys went crazy shaking their booties.

Yesterday Lucy started her week long acrobat camp.  There is juggling, trapeze, and tumbling; more fun would be hard to find.  I am ensuring against her running off with the circus by condoning it, thereby removing the thrill of rebellion.  Next week she is going to smoking camp. 

Since signing up for the camp, way back when in springtime, Lu has been so excited about the whole thing.  She woke up yesterday morning ready to go.  We chatted as we drove to the theater holding the camp (which she pointed out is a dumb word for a week long class as there is no campfire or tents). We passed Lucy’s school.  She started asking questions about first grade, who her teacher is going to be, where her classroom is going to be and the like.  Her pitch went up a bit and I caught sight of her petrified little face in the rear view mirror and tried changing the subject.  I was too late.  Lucy was on her way into a bit fat freak out.  She has been worried on and off about first grade since the end of the school year.  She started working herself up about the camp. 

“I don’t know any of the kids!  Are the teachers nice?  How do you know?  Do you know the teachers?” By the time I parked she was in tears.  She wailed that she didn’t want to go in.  She begged me to take her home. 

My heart broke a tiny little bit on one corner.  I know just how she feels.  I often get so anxious that I cannot see outside myself.  I have not done so many things in my life because a sweaty panic takes over and I freeze a la deer in headlights.  Over time, I have learned that the only way to come out on top is to take big gulps of air and plunge headlong at whatever is frightening me.  But it sucks eggs.  And I am not very good at it yet.  I am totally unqualified to guide someone through a panic attack, but there I was, compass in hand, guiding away. 

I gently and not so gently tugged her along and made her go to the class.  She cried so hard.  She begged.  I doubted myself.  I doubted myself again.  I felt like throwing up.  I wanted to scoop her up and take her home to hide.  I had to sneak out when she wasn’t looking.  Aaaand, she made it!  Contrary to how she felt, Lucy sat through the class and failed to die from scared.  Today she went willingly and reported having actual fun.  In the words of Lucy’s Godmother Rachel; “What a brave little toaster!” 

As we enter the actual hot part of Portland summer; you know, the three weeks  after the 4^th of July, Kenneth decided  to put the window air conditioners in the kid’s rooms.  Lucy wanted to help.  So, after dinner they went up to get the job done.  Tennessee was trying figure out which words are the best to use to get a second after dinner popsicle and wasn’t paying attention.  When he realized that I wasn’t going to fall for his good looks and charm he gave up and began interviewing me.  “Where’th Daddy and Luthy?” 

“Upstairs.”

“Why?”

“They are putting an air conditioner in your room.”  This last bit made Tennessee go wild.  I have only seen him get that pissed on rare occasion for the most heinous of offenses.  He yelled loud about his feelings on conditionerth and their evils.  He stomped around.  He slapped the sofa, he flopped on the ground and kicked his feet and flapped his arms.  His dad came to the top of the stairs and said,

“Do you even know what air conditioning is?”   

“No.”  Kenneth convinced him to investigate.  He climbed the stairs, grumbling the whole way.

After sitting in front of his “conditioner” for a while, Kenneth asked him what he thought.  He rolled his head back and forth, letting the cool air blow on his mosquito bitten summer face and said, “Ith good.”

This piece of cardboard here on the floor it two feet tall by four feet long.  One side has been watercolor painted with an undersea garden theme.  There is a chunk out of the corner.  The other side is resplendent with stickers and glitter glue.  Today alone it was a rug, a house for a three year old, a house for Barbie and all her friends, a skirt, a surf board, and I am pretty sure I caught Tennessee trying to tent the dog with it.  It came out of the packaging of an IKEA dresser I put together in front of the kids (no cussing allowed, or at least no F word). 

I have slipped on this stupid thing more times than I care to share.  It is trash night.  If I sneak it out of the house in the setting sun, I have pretty good odds that I will not be seen by the children. I will put it in the recycling bin, I promise…quit with the eyebrows already.  I meant trash and recycling night.  If I recycle it, Tennessee will surely forget it ever existed.  Lucy, and her giant 5.5 year old brain will not.  I will have to tell her I recycled it.  Then she will say, “Mama!  I was still reusing that!  Mama it is good for the earf!”  Cotton picking do-gooder kindergarten teacher and her earthy, earthingston ways.  The cardboard will live another day, but I swear, if I slip on it one more time, it sleeps with the fishes.  (Oh stop, I am not really going to throw it in the river.)

Lucy has been begging me to let her dye her hair.  I have been hiding behind “your school doesn’t allow blue hair dear” but to be honest, it makes me uncomfortable.  Hair dying that is.  It is not that I think that having blue, or pink, or even green hair will make her into some sort of degenerate gutter punk.  It is not that I don’t think dyed hair is pretty or interesting to look at.  I am having a hard time putting my little pointy finger on the feeling that I have about the whole thing.  It is kind of like a sore tooth, or one of those tiny slivers you get from bark dust.  It feels just bad enough to tell me not to do it, but not bad enough for me to understand why.

Part of it for certain, is the feeling that she will have the rest of her life to wrestle with vanity.  Drawing and re-drawing her lines in the sand about what she is willing to do to feel beautiful.  First there will be make-up, which she is already obsessed with, then come hither outfits.  Teeth whitening?  Peircing ears and other bits?  Maybe some fake boobs?  Who knows what the next phase of beauty trends holds for my sweet baby. 

Lucy will probably doubt the shape and/or size of her body at some point too.  Even the most self confident and smart women I know pick apart their physical flaws from time to time.  So why not open the flood gates now and get started?  Why not let her have a fun summer of punk rock hair and lip gloss (worth its weight in gold to the almost 6 year old set)?  I feel the need to protect her young-ness.  Protect the time before she falls down the rabbit hole of vanity and self doubt that is sometimes a part of being a young woman (or middle aged woman for that matter). 

Yesterday I compromised.  Lucy and I went to Walgreen’s and bought some pink spray on hair color.  Lucy and Tennessee took turns in the Mommy’s Beauty Parlour, aka the back yard.  Lucy has pink streaked tresses, and Tennessee has, what else but, a pink mohawk.  It didn’t feel bad or icky.  It felt like having fun and dressing up weird.  But I do think that pink hair spray for a day or two is about as far as I am willing to go for now.  Tune in next week for temporary lip piercing…. 

So, if you have been following along in my saga of potty training, you may remember that I promised Tennessee a dog if he started pooping on the potty.  He did, so I did.  She was found outside of Portland proper near a vineyard.  After much debate, we named her Minnie.  She is bigger than small and smaller than big with a black coat and a ginger undercarriage.  I am afraid that I am already terribly in love with her.  She is a menace to dear Sally Alice the cat, and she has no respect for the potential danger of a car, and she is kind of smelly (I figured I should wait to give her a bath until she got used to living with us), but she is the cutest dog I have ever met.  Ever. 

Now I have a whole other being to feed and clean up after.  I thought I would feel a little resentful.  Before we committed to keeping her I thought long and hard about all of the drudgery involved in dog ownership.  But the truth is she is so sweet that I don’t really mind.  She doesn’t screech and bicker with her siblings (I have no idea where her litter mates are and quite frankly I do not care).  When I ask her to do something, she doesn’t always listen, but she never says “Awwww, but momma I don’t wanna sit or stay!”  She waits until I get out of bed to start making requests.  She doesn’t leave cast off articles of clothing strewn hither and thither.  In fact she abstains from wearing clothes at all, thus creating no laundry what so ever.  I like that about Minnie.  The very best part about having this new fancy dog though, is that just when the top of my head is about to fall off from a day full of family life and the joys of rearing small children, I get to take her for a nice loooong walk while Kenneth holds down the fort.  I think once we get this cat vs. dog thing worked out, this Minnie dog may be my new best friend.