time

If I had time, this is where I would write about all the latest news in my life in witty and dynamic language. I would talk about our imminent move. How it always rains when we move, how stripping the walls bare does something to me, something sad. I would have something to say about leaving the place where Isaac was born, how I worry about the cats, how I haven’t yet called the utility companies. If I had the time, this is where I would talk about the poetry reading I did a couple nights ago, how much fun it was, how I got to go out like a real adult afterwards, how I adore the cluster of old men poets who tell raucous stories of their decades teaching community college over sushi and chit chat with the waitress in Japanese. If I had the time, I would talk more about these poets, because I really do adore them; I’d talk about their humor and their writing and how I am graced with their support. If I had the time, I’d mention my trip to the east coast, coming right in the middle of our move, how my mom is sick and the doctors have prescribed Isaac, about how my friends pile my arms with snow suits and sweaters Isaac can borrow, about how I feel this tower of fleece and wool as love. If I had the time to write, I’d be sure to write about the three miniature roses I got for Christmas, lined up in white ceramic pots one that says Peace, one that says Joy, and one Love. I’d discuss how the cats attacked Peace, dragged it straight out of its pot and left it in bits in the hallway. How I put it back, knowing it wouldn’t make it, and how the fresh red bud hung like a willow tree, weeping.

little known koans: the sound of one ego deflating

About a month ago, Isaac began pointing. At everything. He wakes up pointing. He goes to bed pointing. And in between, he spends his day pointing. We spend our day naming things at which our baby points. “Lightswitch.” “Computer.” “Bird.” “Door.” “Daddy.”

His world is very concrete at the moment, though sometimes we add commentary. (“That’s a tree, Isaac. Isn’t it pretty?” or “That’s the mail mommy hasn’t opened in four days that lives on the kitchen table. Don’t you want to grow up so you can have mail you don’t open?”)

We name and we name and right now it doesn’t really get tiring. Certainly, for his part, Isaac shows no signs of slowing down in the pointing department.

The other day at the breakfast table, we thought we were witnessing a breakthrough. Not content to wait for Isaac to point on his own (100 million times a day), Mike decided to try to prompt him with a particular direction in mind. “Where’s Mommy?” he asked. “Isaac, where’s Mommy?” he repeated (because you must always say things twice to a baby). Isaac turned right to me with his tiny little index finger outstretched. We got a little excited. Okay, we were bursting. Deciding to push our stupid luck, Mike goes in for the encore. “Where’s Mommy, Isaac? Where’s Mommy?” Without hesitating, Isaac points directly at the plate of toast in front of me.

SSSSSSSSSssssssssssssssss.

boys n toys

“Let’s play train,” my husband says to our 10-month-old for the third day running. He pulls out the wooden three-car block train in primary colors and choo-choos it across the living room floor, ostensibly for Isaac’s benefit.

When it halts within arm’s reach of our baby, my son does what he’s done each time his father has brought the new toy to his attention – he removes the blue smoke stack before losing interest and turning again to chew on the book of jungle animals sent from his aunt in Massachusetts. But it doesn’t matter. My husband has found his in and can now freely play with the train as if the baby were involved.

Mostly I find this scene endearing. Then there are the days when I wonder at boys' fascination with trains. When it begins (apparently after 10 months), how it begins. I wonder when innocent choo-chooing takes on higher stakes - moves into high-speed chugging through mountain passes, ends in derailments. I wonder at what point damsels begin to be tied to the tracks, and if they ever notice.

my big book deal

Today’s idea for a working title is “Bathing my Son in the Sink: Tales of a Renter Mom.” We’re moving again. Third time in two years. Not terribly far. A house with a yard. A rent jump (understatement). Just in time for my little terminator to have more room and his parents to babyproof. Not in time to see my bulbs bloom. Not easy to explain the pain this leaves in my heart. And yet, our new place with have a bathtub. Imagine.

Isaac likes to really "get into" his play time...

10 months old.

Happy New Year!

Isaac says to tell you all Happy New Year - May your 2006 be filled with an unlimited supply of Cheerios and always something new to point at.

Mephistopheles Motors, Part II

In the first place, you can’t see anything from a car; you’ve got to get out of the goddamned contraption and walk, better yet crawl, on hands and knees, over the sandstone and through the thornbrush and cactus. When traces of blood begin to mark your trail you’ll see something, maybe.
- Edward Abbey, Desert Solitaire

The first car I ever owned was a dark blue Chevy Nova that my sister had sitting in her driveway. “If you can make it run, you can have it,” she told me. Against all odds, it eventually moved from her driveway and, for a full two months, took me back and forth to work as a hostess at a seafood restaurant where I held my breath in the smoking section and exaggerated the estimated wait time by at least an hour so the customers would just go away. The radio and the speedometer were broken, the left rear tire deflated regularly, and the crack in the windshield only impeded my vision if I turned a sharp right. It let me know I’d gone too far the day I attempted to drive it from Long Island, New York to south Jersey. It wasn’t about drama, this car, it had just done its time and that was that. I stopped to get gas in Toms River and it never started again. My Nova was like sex without any emotional strings attached. When it was over, everyone just walked away, having gotten what they wanted, no hard feelings. A decade would go by before I owned another car.

Upon finishing my graduate program, I landed a job 20 miles away and needed a car. It just so happened that a classmate of mine was selling one. It was a 1989 Dodge. Blue like my Nova, old, like my Nova, but boxy and tough. It had been passed down through many a student. Mike and I went to my friend’s house to close the deal. “We’ve made a decision,” Masako told me as we took a seat on their couch. “We want to charge you $100 less than we told you originally.” “Um….Okay?...” I cocked my head, perplexed. “Because it’s an old car,” Shuji continued for his wife, “and…” He waved his hands in a way that showed me it wasn’t up for further discussion. Next, we were drinking tea. And soon, the “Shuji-mobile” and I were on the road.

The Shuji-mobile and I drove through the fields picked of lettuce, planted with brussel sprouts to teach English. Two years later, one week after I quit my job, the Shuji-mobile met its end. Having reached the end of its duty, it went out like a true hero – full tank of gas, smoke billowing from the engine. Mike was driving. I was elsewhere. It knew I wouldn’t have had the heart to watch. We donated it to the fire station, where they used it to train people on the jaws of life. Honorable life; honorable death.

Five days have gone by since Chris and his sales manager wasted my time at Mephistopheles Motors. I accidentally left my registration at the dealership before I calmly shook Chris’ hand and marched out the door to my waiting, beeping Jetta. In that time, we had gained new energy. Even the baby was feeling better. We devised a new offer. We had to go back – we had the excuse of retrieving the registration. We bring the checkbook. I’m gonna get me a orange car.

We drive halfway there before we realize we don’t have the title to the Jetta. We turn around. Get the title. When we start out a second time, I have just the slightest bit of nostalgia for the Jetta. “Maybe…” I begin wistful. “Maybe the Jetta is just…” Right on cue the beeping and flashing start. “exactly the piece of shit I thought it was!” I finish.

I don’t see the orange Mazda when we pull into the lot. Chris spots me and approaches with my registration. “Did you sell the car?” I ask trying to sound nonchalant. “We wholesaled it. The day after you looked at it.” “What does that mean?” “We gave it to a wholesaler” he offers helpfully. “It’s gone. We got rid of it.”

“They wholesaled it.” I parrot to Mike back in the Jetta. “I think that means they figured out they couldn’t sell it for what they wanted and they took a loss on it instead of selling it to me. Whaddawedo?”

“I guess we go to the Mazda dealer,” says my practical husband.

“Okay.” I am deflated. It’s a beautiful, sunny Sunday. We have plans later.

Even before we can park at the Mazda dealership, we see a face we recognize among the salespeople stationed out front. We know Patrick from other venues, not well, but enough. Maybe this won’t be so unpleasant after all.

I tell Patrick exactly what I want. I tell him Mike researched it and there is an orange one about two hours north of here. Get it for me. He agrees, but must show me the BEST deal on the lot first. I MUST drive this stupid sedan. I’ll love it. It’s a better car; a better deal; it’s PERFECT for me. I whine and drag my feet over to the stupid Subaru. All wheel drive. Yawn. “We want a hatchback.” Yeah, but. “We want better gas mileage.” Yeah, but. “Does it come in orange?” Of course not. I drive the stupid sedan and another used hatchback that’s appealing but for it’s souped up exhaust system, it’s bumpers out o’ da hood, and it’s gear shift that aggravates my bad wrist. I’ve wasted enough time; get me my orange car.

Richie is the finance guy. Richie has way too much energy. Richie is 10 feet away in the office next to us. Patrick is his courier. We remain at Patrick’s desk while various versions of the deal arrive from around the corner scribbled on paper complete with upbeat notes from Richie like “We want your business!” which Patrick reads out loud for our benefit. After negotiating half a dozen times back and forth with this mysterious man in the next office, close enough I could have spit on him (and I thought about it), the paper comes back again with “It’s a deal!” written across the top in black marker and a smiley face drawn on it. “It’s a deal!” Patrick reads out. I add horns, a tail, and a pitchfork to the face in blue ballpoint and slide the paper back across the table to Patrick. We move on to Jim, the paperwork guy. While I (literally) attempt to read the fine print and sign my name 100 times, Jim talks in a steady monotone about everything I care nothing about. More than once, I ask Jim to stop talking.

This is more money than I’ve ever spent on anything in my life. More money than I ever expected to spend on anything in my life. Money that could be doing so many other things. I am close to tears. I’m experiencing something like vertigo. I try to tell myself I deserve a new car, but it doesn’t hold up. No one “deserves” a six-CD changer. People deserve enough to eat and a safe place to sleep. People deserve respect and love. No one “deserves” an orange car.

Four long hours have passed since we left home in the Jetta. I haven’t felt this tired since Isaac was born. We trash our day’s plans and head home for a family nap.

The next day, Monday, Patrick calls to tell me my car is here. He sounds much more excited than I could ever be about a car. Nonetheless, I feel ever so slightly proud when he mentions they have it sitting in the showroom with a sign on it that reads “Sorry! This one is sold.” When we go to pick it up after Mike gets home, it’s already dark. As we approach the car I see that it is in no way orange. “This isn’t my car,” I tell them. “This car is red.” “An orangey-red,” Patrick blurts. “They don’t make the orange color you saw in the ’05 anymore.” Now he tells me? Never content to leave any situation without making a fool of myself, instead of walking away from what is obviously not an orange car, I choose to allow him to drive it out, under the lights to show me more closely how my red car is really orange.

It’s a slow night and a gaggle of employees are outside hanging around hoping for a bite. “Great color!” they croon when they see my car. “Wow!” They’ve been coached, I think bitterly. The bloody emperor is naked. The baby is tired; we are all tired. I am unsettled, but leave more or less convinced that while it isn’t the orange of the orange Mazda I test drove last week, it is perhaps an updated version, more in the “burnt sienna” or “rust metallic” family.

In the morning, I go out to look at the car I bought in daylight. I return to the house fuming. “That car is red. Red. Not orange. Not even a little orange. Red.”

“Wait til the sun comes out more,” Mike suggests. I want to kill him with my bare hands and put the body in the trunk of my red car.

It’s not quite 7:30am, but for some reason that I’d rather not ponder, someone actually answers the phone at the Mazda dealership. “I’d like to leave a message for Patrick,” I say in my calmest, sweetest cadence. There is rummaging. Paper. Pen. “Okay, go ahead,” says the voice. “This is Kitty and the message is: My car is red.” “…car…is…red. Got it.” “Thank you,” I tell him. “You bet.”

Two hours go by. Isaac takes a nap. I find myself with time enough to dwell on how I felt cheated. Patrick calls. “My car is red, Patrick. And you knew it was red.” “I’m a little color blind,” he starts. We wrangle about for a while, each defensive and unsatisfied, he with a commission on the line, me with god knows what. “What do you want?” he asks me finally. “What color do you want?” “Orange.” “It doesn’t come in orange anymore. It doesn’t come in pink either,” he jabs. “Sell many cars mocking people?” I inquire.

Two days go by in which I cry often out of frustration, exhaustion, and anger, then rebuke myself severely for getting so wrapped up over a car, knowing all the while it is not about the car. I decide I can’t afford to spend more precious life moments car shopping and decide to keep some version of the Mazda. I think about getting a blue one. Patrick offers me all-weather floor mats if I keep the car I have – “an 80 dollar value!” He offers me another car wash. I could give a rat’s ass about either of the above, but finally, feeling broken and tired, tell him I’ll keep the red car he insists on referring to as “copper.” He thinks he has won and tells me where to find my floor mats if he’s not there when I come to get them. In my people-pleasing voice, I thank him. We hang up.


Isaac can sort of crawl now. Lots of babies younger than he is have far surpassed him, but my son does a wounded soldier, commando drag that gets him around. He finds all kinds of things I don’t this way – strands of hair he picks up and presents me with (his manual dexterity is quite impressive), the phone I’ve tried to hide away behind everything in the world. Apparently, he has the right vantage point for finding the tiniest things, the details, and as a poet, I tend to believe that details are what matter. But for the rest of us, we can all go home now, stop rubbernecking. There’s nothing to see here.

crazy talk

I’ve made a decision. I’m going to treat people to a dose of themselves. I’m going to go out of my way to say things like “You had your baby in a HOSPITAL?? Are you CRAZY??!” and “What?!? You mean to tell me your baby sleeps through the night?! At THIS age?! That’s just not normal!”

What if. What if the norms were shifted just a bit off center. It wouldn’t take much. Who decides what to measure against? Well, what if I took on that decision. Then what would our conversations sound like? Who’d be crazy then?

Mephistopheles Motors, Part I

The devil owns a car dealership.

Hell is not fire and pitchforks. Clearly, it is a car lot – a mangled mess of interest rates, credit checks, sticker shock, and hubcaps. I am in hell.

While my baby struggles with a fever at home with his dad, I have packed up my soul and headed out in search of semi-reliable transportation. I have my eye on a slightly used Mazda 3 hatchback 5-speed in orange. Yes, I am ashamed to admit that I care what color my car is. I don’t tell them this at the dealership. I carefully avoid including note of the color when I tell them which car I am interested in, but I’m sure they can read it in my eyes. I begin to see that the open-toed sandals showing off my orange toenails were a bad choice. I reassure myself that men don’t notice these things, look them in the eye and ask about the "Mazda with standard transmission." If they hear me use big, manly words like "transmission," hear me bypass the lay term of "stick shift," will I gain enough respect to be taken seriously?

Although I didn’t plan it, I had begun this dangerous adventure earlier in the day. A friend and I have been trying out a baby exchange. Once a week, her little boy comes over our house for an hour while mom takes a breather or runs some errands; and once a week, I leave Isaac with her. We pretend they will play together, making incredible advances in their development, but at this age they mostly drool on each other until they discover mommy missing, then cry until she returns. It was Isaac’s turn to cry.

I left him with a kiss and headed out to look at some apartments for rent. After driving by the first place, my faithful (read: piss-poor piece of shit) Jetta began beeping loudly at me. I noted the flashing oilcan on the dashboard and pulled into the drugstore. Hey, I needed diapers anyway. Since the Jetta has a history of oil leaks and other oil issues, I didn’t worry myself that I couldn’t find a cloth or paper towel to wipe the dipstick and check the oil level properly. I just poured in my two quarts and headed out again, determined to make a car decision soon. A quarter mile down the road, the beeping resumed. Maybe it was just hot and needed to settle down. On I drove. Beep Beep. Flash Flash. Not far down the road, I could see the giant sign for the lot where the orange Mazda we’d been sniffing around the day before lived. Reminded of my husband’s story of how his old truck died for good in the driveway of the Honda dealership, I took my cue and decided car shopping might trump apartment hunting for now. I pulled into the dealership and shut off the motor before anyone could detect where the beeping sound was coming from. I met someone named Chris and got my credit check started. I’d be back that evening.

So here I am. Driving around making small talk with Chris, my escort into Hell. He is working me, hard. I hear over and over again about his dogs, about how he hates sales pitches too. About how many hours he works. Why do people wear these things like a badge? Tell me all about how they come in on their day off? Are we giving out medals for being stupid these days? I remember reading an article some time ago about a man who had been killed. The writer had interviewed his boss from the grocery store where he’d worked. This man, who had friends, family, dreams was remembered as a "hard worker" who was "always willing to stay late or come in early." No wonder we cannot save the world.

"So, did your husband say if you liked it you could have it?" Chris asks me. So much for using the word "transmission." Though I am distracted thinking about Chris’ story of how just yesterday he told his wife he’d be "home when he was home" and finally closed his last deal at 10:00pm, I manage to focus long enough to see that I do like the car.

As much as I like any car, that is. On the phone with another dealer recently, I was just trying to find out if they had what I wanted to test drive. Jesse, my bud on the other end of the line, was working himself into an orgasmic lather telling me about some silver Pontiac Vibe with GPS tracking. "Look," I interrupted, "I hate cars, so let’s move on." "You told the car salesman you hate cars?" My husband shakes his head at me and shovels a spoonful of spinach into the baby’s waiting mouth. "Yeah, so?" I demand of him. And then, turning to Isaac, "Mommy hates cars, Little Guy! Yes, she does; yes, she does. Cars suckety suck suck, don’t they, Sweetie?" Isaac lets out a happy scream and spreads the green puree around his face.

It’s come to this. I am sitting at Chris’ desk, staring at a picture of his cocker spaniels, waiting. I wait. And I wait. And, I wait. It’s a bit like a police interrogation room – no stimuli to speak of, bright lights, mind games. Chris breezes back to tell me they almost have it – the deal. I wait some more. This must be what it feels like to be his wife. I start to read the email that is printed out and hanging next to the dogs’ photo. The subject line is "Affirmations." The body of the email includes a list of "positive" thoughts for the car salesman in your life, things like "I can sell anyone, anytime!" "Think win!!!!" and my favorite: "Fear Eroads (sic) Courage."

Another tidbit to live by, "I create positive relationships where everybody wins" is crossed out. When Chris returns again to check on me - the jackal to the carnage – I am chuckling merrily and pointing. "Whatsa matter?" I ask him. "You’re opting out of positive relationships, are you?" "No! No!" he tells me, seeming in a hurry to right my impression, "I didn’t do that. Someone else did." "You don’t have to pretend for me," I jibe him. "It’s all right there. I can read the writing on the cubicle wall." "No, no!" he repeats. "See these check marks next to each one? These are mine." He sounds so concerned. So sincere. In the back of my throat I taste something like pity. I decide to drop the joking.

This is just one example of the creepy, culty feeling I get over my time at Mephistopheles Motors. Chris tells me all about the trainings they get to go to on Fridays. How the boss, who, he reports proudly, asked him personally to take this particular job, pays for everyone to go, "even the receptionists." The latest training session was about balancing your personal and professional lives.

I am in awe of just how spot on our cultural caricatures of car salesmen are, how I can’t think of a more morally bereft and spiritually bankrupt profession.

When the numbers finally make it to paper, they begin with the original sticker price and end with a 14% interest rate for financing. If my joking hadn’t fallen away before… I’ll spare you the details and just tell you that Chris handed me over to his sales manager, who played bad cop, didn’t talk about his dogs, and after a certain amount of debate, I left in my beeping Jetta, my soul safe for another day.

Mamas, don’t let your babies grow up to be car salesmen.

sick

I rush out of the house trying not to be late since they had to do the proverbial "squeeze us in" move. I have barely managed to get dressed; showers are for sissies; and let’s not talk about my hair.

The doctor’s assistant, who also happens to be his wife and at least ten years his junior, is tall and lithe, wears clothes that flow but never hang. She greets us smiling. Her hair is graceful on her shoulders and her figure - that of a woman’s half her age. She always fusses over Isaac, plays peek-a-boo, makes him grin, which is why I forgive her for being beautiful.

You think you know what kind of parent you’ll be. The kind that shrugs and says in a dispassionate voice, "All kids get sick." The kind that wants the fever to "do its job" and not be stymied by things like medicine. Then your baby – the one you tend to every day, the same one that left your body in a rush of blood and cord just months ago, that does that funny thing with his tongue when you feed him the first bite of anything, that is learning to wave bye-bye – leans against you solemn and lethargic, whimpers in the carseat he despises without the energy to fight off the five-point harness, wakes screaming in the night burning hot with fever, and see, see what you’ll do, how early you’ll have the doctor paged, which medicine you’ll reach for.

Even these times arrive with their own brand of comedy. Mike reads the thermometer to me. "100.8"

"108!??!" I shriek. "Call the doctor! Call the doctor!"

In the struggle to decide whether to make the doctor’s appointment, I have waited long enough that things are apparently on the upswing. Isaac bangs on the doctor’s desk with the flat of his palms and babbles a steady stream, seemingly reading him the riot act for poking around in his ears earlier. I leave with a baby that is still red-rimmed around the eyes, but the assistant’s black and red flowered skirt flares jauntily as she wishes us a good day and turns away down the hallway, and I’m pretty sure things will be all right.

snacking between meals

Everyone I talk to in my life that knows I write keeps asking me if I’ve been able to get back to writing since the baby. I tell them yes, a little. I have a regular sitter now and…blahblahblah…trying to create a schedule…yammer yammer... And then I tell them even when I don’t get to anything else, I am keeping up with my blog…they nod vacantly…which I’ve had since I was pregnant…they add in an idle "Oh."…I try to write in it as regularly as I can. … (silence)…about my experiences…(become distracted by street noise) …I mention that I’m trying to use some of the pieces I started on the blog and revise them to submit to various mama publications … "So, how’s Mike doing?" they want to know. …

I find it fascinating that all these people are so supportive of my passion, but none of them would really go so far as to engage me in further conversation about what I tell them I am writing or, I know it’s nuts, actually READ what I write.

Am I to assume that blogging is something like potato chips? It’s kinda food, but it doesn’t count as lunch.

sweetness

Thanksgiving weekend five years ago I got a call from the SPCA to please take in a mama cat and her kittens as fosters. That was my Zap Mama, already showing us how she liked to be "different" – skipping the usual kitten season and instead getting knocked up over the fall and giving birth in the coldest time of the year.

We tried not to name the kittens, so as not to get too attached. A laughable concept. We identified them by their physical appearances – Grey Baby, Stripey, and Tuxedo Baby. Essentially, we named them. By the time they were two weeks old, Zap couldn’t lift them anymore, being – at the time – so tiny herself. So she sat back, playing nagging mother, while her children ran wild through our bedroom. Stripey was the only female and smart, smart, smart. She was the first to learn to do everything, taunting her brothers from her perch atop the bookcase, or racing through the blinds slalom-style. Cute as could be, but not the brightest bulbs, Grey and Tuxedo spent their time eating each other’s ears and falling off the bed. Stripey won her fans over with her cunning and then added a dash of darling. She climbed anyone and anything until, exhausted, she curled into the crook of my arm and slept. She’d need a special place to grow up.

The kittens were ready to be adopted in January. There were no other kittens to be had at that time of year. Everyone wanted these little fur balls. Being the spaz that I am, I couldn’t just return them to the SPCA to be adopted by whomever happened in. No, I advertised my little ones and carefully interviewed perspective families. Tuxedo Baby was adopted by a young couple who gushed over him in Polish. Grey Baby went to a socially awkward computer geek who shared his kitten’s startled look and seemed to be in need of the company. A perfect fit. And Stripey. She was the pick of a family with two teenagers and an incumbent housecat. I weighed the situation. Were they the right ones for our girl? After spending a long time with the kittens (with Zap cowering under the bed waiting for the intruders to leave), the mom announced it was time to go. The son, about 17 I’d guess, was holding Stripey in his palm. On hearing his mother’s command, the boy kissed the top of the kitten’s head and placed her gently down. "Did you see that?" I whispered to Mike as we ushered them out. "Yeah, I saw it." "I think they should get Stripey," I told him. "Yeah, I think they’re okay."

There is an automaticity in affection that you can’t fake. There is a sincerity in certain gestures that are tell tale. One of the most loving things I have experienced since having a baby is the genuine affection he is sometimes shown by people unrelated to us. I don’t mean the passers-by who tell me they like his hat. I mean the parent, his own child inches from him, who reaches out and touches Isaac’s head, sweetly, contemplatively, for no good reason.

Right now, my bathroom smells like jasmine from the back fence. My kitchen smells like guava from the farmer’s market. But the clearest sign of sweetness in my life is the memory of that hand, smoothing my baby’s hair.

the gift

So, I’ve been trying to think about motherhood as a form within which I need to write, like a sonnet or a slam poem. There are parameters, and, as some of you I’m sure are aware, structure can be freeing. My son affords me the opportunity to stretch my talents within an established framework. For example, I get to write in very small increments of time. I must write with little sleep under constant pressure of interruption. Babies, at least mine, don’t generally require iambic pentameter. According to Isaac, the rhyme scheme would be something to the tune of "Ba, ba, ba, Ma, ma, ma, mum!" (And for the record, every syllable is stressed).

Here’s my reality check: Had I never gotten pregnant and decided to have a baby, chances are good that I still would not have written the Great American Novel by now. So, Baby is not holding me back so much as he is propelling me forward, with all the grace of a human canon ball act perhaps, but forward nonetheless. And still I am held to this form, lest my trajectory be thought of as completely aimless.

Of course, on the average day, it can feel like the Universe approached me as I stood at the starting line of the obstacle course and presented me with a potato sack that She instructed me to put on, then walked away with her shoulders shaking from laughter. But at other times, I think what She handed to me was something very different. In my daydream, I can’t quite make out what’s in the tiny box, but from all accounts, it appears to be a gift.

my expertise

Some days – especially with the teething – the only way Isaac gets a decent nap is on our walks in his carrier. However, he’s not the itty-bitty baby that sleeps through anything anymore. There are many obstacles (read: people) in the way of Iz staying asleep.

My first problem here is that this is Touristville. If you live in a town where the stores have signs in their front windows enthusiastically advertising the fact that they sell batteries, you live in a tourist area. The rec trail is full of laughing or bickering families riding those rented bike surreys, all ready to spring my boy awake from his midday snooze. It is also filled with couples dying to stop someone and ask him or her to take their picture. More times than not, that someone seems to be me. And there is any number of folks in a day who need directions to places that range from the beach to the drycleaner.

But my very favorite episode so far of someone unthinkingly approaching the woman with the sleeping child was the old lady walking her dog who stopped me to help her get a tissue out of her pocket. "Excuse me!" she said, the old lady tremble in her voice raised to a pitch that made Isaac stir and frown, though his eyes stayed closed. Her small dog jumped up, reaching my knee and bumping Isaac’s feet in his excitement.

I may have wanted to pantomime my dismay, to tell her I couldn’t do it, that if he woke up I’d want to die, that this half hour was the peace I had been waiting for since 5 am. But I smiled, imagined arthritis, whispered "Sure." I reached into her windbreaker to retrieve the Kleenex she’d asked for. Afterwards, she was ever-so grateful. Only then did she reveal to me that she’d needed my assistance because she’d managed to dip her fingers in dog poop, and so couldn’t reach in herself.

I guess I must have looked like someone who knew about poop.

Too cool for Mommy n Me.

Too cute for Mommy n Me.

we're breaking up

I’m reminded through motherhood just how many people find it virtually impossible to do anything alone – including having a baby. I’m done with the mommy cliques. I’m done with the little circles of women too insecure to sit across the room from their friends, who wouldn’t dare bring their babes to mommy n me class in the onesie with the poop stains – only the latest matching, overpriced outfit, who, actually print and wear tee shirts that read "Olivia’s Mommy", who are free of dark rings under their eyes because of the mercy of grandparents in close geographic proximity or lots of make up they somehow have time to put on. Have you noticed I haven’t even really blogged about the mommy n me class? It’s not even material.

"Does anyone have any questions?"
As a matter of fact…
Why aren’t women treated like the goddesses they are?
How is it that doing the dishes has come to take precedent over finding time to maintain your relationship?
Why does thinking about immunizing my baby feel like closing my eyes and crossing my fingers?

My "classmates" clap hands over budding "toofies" and confess to each other how they "don’t want to miss a thing!"

Do I have to say it again? I love my baby. However, early motherhood to me is nothing less than an insane onslaught of exhaustion and emotion punctuated by flights away from my baby toward chocolate. When I can’t get back to sleep at night, I create acronyms of imaginary disgruntled mom’s organizations, like BOOBS: Bothered by the Oodles of Outrageous Bullshit in Society. I don’t fit in. (BTW, Brain, Child magazine’s current issue has a feature on the why/when/if of a mommy’s "revolution".)

We’re breaking up. No more mommy n me. Isaac and I will spend Mondays at the park and call it even.

electing chaos

I suppose the signs had been made well beforehand.

In the last month, my town has been covered with political signs for a candidate who was running for the school board. It was a little disarming. Everywhere I turned there they were, in front yards and vacant lots, lined up along the side of the road, vibrant red and white signs on small wooden posts, calling out in their mission of recruiting one more vote. I normally dislike this form of political advertisement anyway, but this time there was more at stake. I mean of all things the school board?? I couldn't help wondering if the signs were a sign...are they speaking to me of things to come? the challenges of having a child in school?

It's years in the future - roughly four or five, of course - before Isaac walks through the doors of an elementary school, provided we choose to send him and not take some alternative route to education for our boy. Nonetheless, this year is flying by - what's four or five more but a blink of the ever deeper set eye ringed by black circles?

So much to consider. Will his teachers have a clue? Will he make friends? Will he love it? Hate it? Understand enough to transcend it? Will he tell me what he really thinks about all these new influences on his little mind? And now, the school board to worry about.

The signs urged: Elect Katrina!

cleaning up the spam

alright. it stops here. not only have i figured out how to delete the dorky spam comments from my blog, i hope we (and when i say "we" i mean my husband the computer whiz) have successful set things to avoid them in the future. i still have more to delete - they are all over my old archived pieces, but we're on our way. there will be no more ads for scrapbooking websites thinly disguised as new readers (do people really fall for this crap? does this work?? i need to know!) i know you are all disappointed but you'll just have to google on your own if you want more info on scrapbooking and stretchmarks.

and now, of course, my boys have awoken and here i go...