Party of Six

I'd Have Made a Horrible Time Traveler's Wife

2009-06-30T11:04:00.001-04:00

I was the 5-yr-old pampered baby of the family and I vividly remember peering out of the rear window of Nanny’s cherry red Plymouth Fury, tears streaming down my face as the image of my mother standing in front of our house grew smaller and smaller. I was going on my first out-of-town trip sans my parents and I was unbelievably excited, terrified and devastated. I desperately wanted to go stay with my grandmother in Atlanta but couldn’t imagine being away from my mother for a week…

I was a 9-yr-old tomboy and I vividly remember balancing as high on my tiptoes as possible, trying to keep the plane in sight through the cascade of tears that I had tried unsuccessfully to hold back. My sisters were on that plane and they were leaving, not to go back to the college that only took them three hours away from me but this time they were going much, much farther. They were leaving for the University of Hawaii and I was left behind, suddenly the only child in what seemed like a very quiet home…

I was a sullen 15-yr-old, lying in a strange bed in a strange house in a city I had no desire to live in. I watched as the clock flipped from 10:01 p.m. to 10:02…even the clock reminding me of where I wanted to be, in our old house—my home—at 1002 Ponderosa Dr…

I was a 38-yr-old soon-to-be ex-wife, walking out of my house for the last time. One last walkthrough to make sure I had gotten as many of my belongings as I needed, praying that I hadn’t missed anything important, trying unsuccessfully not to think about all of the memories I had made there. Flashes of the first time I walked into that house, barely hearing the buzzing of the real estate agent’s voice as I looked out onto the front yard and envisioned my future children playing there…and there were good memories and horrible ones. Unrealized dreams. It wasn’t my home anymore and hadn’t been for a long time. Nevertheless, the tears fell as I drove away…

I was a 41-yr-old mom and it was my daughter this time, not me, quietly sobbing in the back seat of the car as I drove her to her father’s. She was leaving for her summer trip to her grandmother’s in New York and she was excited, terrified and devastated. She couldn’t wait to see her grandmother but the thought of leaving her mother was just too much to bear. I wanted so badly to be able to reassure her and convince her that she would be fine, that the time would fly by in a blur of new toys and cookies and hugs and fun, and that when the time came to climb back in the car and come home to me she would once again be excited and sad and yes, she would cry as she pulled out of grandma’s driveway…

I remember being so angry at the teary goodbyes of my childhood. I didn’t understand why all the people I loved couldn’t live in the same place. Who would choose to move away from people who were important to them? What far off place could possibly hold appeal over family? And even now, as an adult who has lived other places and who understands the desire to relocate I still have those feelings. I still want the people I love to be near. I don’t like goodbyes.

Read THE TIME TRAVELER’S WIFE yet? If not, I highly recommend it.

My metamorphosis into a crotchety old person...that's better than a cockroach, I guess.

2009-06-17T12:13:00.002-04:00

After teaching for nearly 20 years you’d think there’d be little that could surprise me in the student excuses arena. And yet, it still happens. Every quarter/term I hear myself saying, “Honey! Listen to THIS email!” I am starting to sound like a really old person, constantly kvetching about the decline in intelligence and worth ethic of today’s youth. And maybe the constant barrage of asinine requests and assumptions have just worn me down. Maybe I was just a “goody-goody” student who wouldn’t have dared to question an assignment or due date or—heaven forbid!—call my professor at home on a Friday night to ask for clarification on a policy. Is it just me?

And let me just say, I am rather type A when it comes to clearly putting in writing my class policies and expectations. For example, if you were a student, would this phrase confuse you at all?

Assignment due dates can be found in the Course Calendar. These dates are not negotiable. Assignment grades are reduced 10 points for each day they are late. Assignments submitted more than 5 days late will not be accepted.

And yet, I continue to get emails such as this:

I know this assignment was due a few weeks ago but I went on vacation with my family and then my kids had soccer games and one broke her toe and then the water heater went out and I had to replace it and boy was that expensive! So anyway, here’s my paper…

One of my recent favorites was actually delivered in person. As she took the final exam instruction sheet from my hand this very sweet undergraduate expressed concern over her ability to pass the final since she was pretty sure she had had the wrong textbook the entire quarter since none of the assignments seemed to match up with the book…

Seriously?

I’ve got dozens of these stories, I tell ya’. But since I have class websites to update and laundry put away and floors that desperately need to be cleaned, I leave you with this last one, paraphrased to protect the not-so-innocent:

I know I missed the final that was on last Thursday and I done let this class get away from me this quarter but I am on house arrest and am taking four classes and have been really stress about me being incarcerated and I can prove all of this if you can just give me a C…

My husband and I are thinking that maybe I should find out what he’s under house arrest for before I turn in those grades…

Lizard Bingrich and Other Charades Failures

2009-06-14T19:49:00.001-04:00

So, if you were in the midst of a fiercely competitive battle of charades (yes, there is such a thing!), and you had the founder of your county’s Republican party AND former governor Carroll Campbell’s director of health on your team, and you drew “Newt Gingrich” as the thing you had to make them guess, wouldn’t you think you’d been handed a gift from the heavens? Wouldn’t you be chuckling to yourself, as I was, thinking that you may set a new family charades low score record? Yeah, well, you know what they say comes right before a fall…

OK, so a bit of background to this whole sordid event…my entire family—meaning my parents, their three daughters, daughters’ spouses and children—all spent a week at the beach together. First time we’d all been together and it was fabulous. Many, many blog worthy events but for now I’ll focus on the one night “my” team tried its best to lose the family charades championship. See, every evening, we all rendezvoused at one of the two houses and each family was assigned cooking duties for one night. That was a FABULOUS idea and I highly recommend it. After dinner we divided into teams and played charades. Now, for the skeptics among you, let me just say that when this game was first suggested, I was not enthused. I could not have told you the last time I had played charades and I honestly had no desire to stand in front of my entire family and make a complete fool of myself trying to make them guess “Tess d’Urbervilles”. But ten minutes into the first round and I was a convert.

BRING IT, OTHER TEAM! We’ll take your “Great Potato Famine” and see you a “South Carolina Succeeds from the Union” thankyouverymuch!

Yeah, so things got competitive and fun and two of our four kids were totally into it as well, which brings us to night two and New Gingrich. I figured, in all of my charade-savvy arrogance, that if I got them to say “man” (they knew the category was famous people), and that his last name had two syllabus, the last one “rich”, which they got in less than ten seconds, that all I had left to do was to get them to guess “ging”…so I gave them the “sounds like” symbol and I pantomimed putting on a ring, which they said immediately…”Ring! Ring!…after that, the universe tilted on its access and nothing made sense. I spent the next minute and 20 seconds doing everything in my power to make my teammates—my political savvy teammates—say “Newt Gingrich” and the closest they got was “Lizard Bingrich”. Seriously? Who the hell is that? A professional wrestler?

The only silver lining of the evening was that my husband, who was on the enemy team, had a similar experience, that resulted in his team’s guess as “The Human Toe”, but that’s for another blog on another day…stay tuned!

The Slacker Blogger Returns

2009-06-03T16:31:00.003-04:00

OK, so I’m a fair-weathered blogger. It’s not the first time you’ve seen me write that. When I disappear from my blog it’s a sure sign that life is stable and relatively drama-free…well, as drama free as life can be when you are playing the real life role of Carol Brady. I actually had to go back and read all my previous posts just to see what I had rambled on about oh so long ago…

What’s new in my world? Amazingly, not much, which isn’t a bad thing. Actually it’s a fabulous thing. We are all healthy and happy…yahoo! With all of the financial chaos in the country in the past year, we feel unbelievably fortunate to have bought our house when we did. We feel blessed to still be gainfully employed and to not be facing the crushing financial situations that so many are.

Considering the last thing I blogged about was paint way back in November, I guess I can start there for some semblance of a segue into the present. I did manage to get the girls’ rooms painted. They picked out the colors—aren’t we incredibly brave?!—and they look great. The colors perfectly reflect our children’s personalities. Deep blue for AG, hot pink for A and pale pink for J. I still feel like I need sunglasses to walk into A’s room, but it is a fun space and she loves it, which is all that matters.

We had our first Christmas in our own home. What fun! I loved pulling out the boxes of Christmas decorations and finding places to put each treasured item. We all went to pick out a live tree that the kids decorated. It was beautiful! In spite of saying we weren’t going to overdo it with the gift buying, we did anyway. The major family gift was a trip to Disney World in February, but then somehow there were all sorts of other presents that showed up under our tree, like pink DS’s and a Wii! We may have set a bad, bad precedent.

So Disney…yeah, we did it. Seven people in the minivan driving seven hours to the Magic Kingdom. Was it worth it? Oh yes! We had some rocky moments—you can’t go on a major trip with four kids and not have those—but not many and overall it was a fabulous trip. The kids still talk about it and look at their photo albums on a regular basis. We’re already in family negotiations to determine our destination for next year. So far New York City seems to be the front-runner. Although I’d love to take them to a real dude ranch out west, or one of the amazing national parks in this country, or to the Florida Keys… There are just so many places I want us to go.

Speaking of trips, this weekend we head to the beach for a family reunion with my side of the family. There will be 18 of us in two houses. This will be the first time that my parents will have all three of their daughters and all of their grandchildren in the same place at the same time. My sister has hired a professional photographer to take pictures of our crew on the beach…could be a logistical nightmare but if it works it will be quite the treasure.

We’ll return home after a week at the beach and the usual summer semi-organized madness will commence. Two of our children will head off to NY for two weeks. Then there are summer camps, and work, and hopefully lots of afternoons and evenings out by (and in) the pool. We’re determined to get a few short weekend trips in to the zoo and Six Flags and Stone Mountain as well. I’m also looking forward to getting some more projects done at home. I still haven’t painted that 1970’s brown paneling downstairs…

**Isn’t this just the most exciting blog you’ve ever read?! Aren’t you beyond ecstatic that I’ve started blogging again?!**

I’m sure this weekend will provide me with much blog-worthy fodder. There’s nothing like bringing an entire family together for an extended period of time to produce drama and chaos that is sure to be a combination of “All in the Family” and “My Cousin Earl” with a bit of “Meet the Press” and “The Daily Show with John Stewart” tossed in for good measure. My mother is actually concerned about whether my husband will still be talking to her after this week is over as she is taking full responsibility for coercing him into the total family immersion experiment. I’ll have a bottle of single malt scotch and my therapist on speed dial just in case…

All It Takes Is...Paint?

2008-11-15T22:35:00.004-05:00

When we were ushered into this house seven months ago by a very experienced and enthusiastic real estate agent, the first thing I noticed were the walls. They were white. All of them. Except for the parts in the bathroom covered up by the 1970's tile (dusty rose, anyone?) and the basement, which is encased in the brown paneling seen so frequently in the now defunct "That 70's Show". So once we signed the papers and were handed the keys my first thought was "Paint!! NOW!!" Fast forward seven months...so little things like moving and kids and work and life kept interfering with my primal instinct to slap some color on those walls, but no more! Ladies and Gentlemen, We Have Paint!

How is it that a coat of colored latex and a few pieces of art and accessories hanging on the walls can so dramatically change a space? I feel home now. I walk into rooms and take deep breaths...not deep "you can deal with this for another day" kind of breath but a "this is what you've been waiting for" kind of breath. Even the kids feel the change and love it...thank goodness! Their rooms are next on the painting wish list and I'm determined to get them done before Christmas.

Today I worked on our bedroom and after six months of sleeping in it and seeing its potential I'm finally loving it. It's our space, our retreat, the place my husband and I desperately need and enjoy sharing. I'll work on our dressing room tomorrow--thank goodness for those curtains that block off the view right now and allow me to pretend it's all finished...

Little by little we are turning this wonderful space into ours, all of ours, and it's fabulous. Maybe by the time Smoof and I are babysitting our grandchildren I'll finally have it exactly like I want it. ;-) Just kidding, Smoof! (Well, sort of.)

Weddings

2008-10-22T13:34:00.003-04:00

So this past weekend I had the honor of being a bridesmaid in one of my dearest friend's wedding. I'd made jokes over the past few months about "The 40-yr-old Bridesmaid" being a sequel to "The 40-yr-old Virgin" and I did have a bit of trepidation at being the old married lady in the group, but I ended up loving the whole weekend.

I got to hang out with some really cool women, eat lots of yummy food, drink mimosas and red wine, wear pretty clothes, and end the festivities on the dance floor with my husband. Who could ask for more?

My dear friend looked gorgeous and by the end of the evening incredibly happy as well. We wish her nothing but the best!

My new favorite word

2008-09-26T19:54:00.001-04:00

"Uxorious"

Fabulous word.
Have a great weekend, ya'll!

Snarky Smoof Has Entered the Building

2008-09-24T14:13:00.003-04:00

His first post, while short and not written by him exactly--except for the end (he always has to have the last word ;-)--sets the tone for what you can expect from him. Most of the time I have to make sure I'm not consuming any liquids when I read his stuff lest my keyboard become showered with diet coke.
Smoof's Blog

Old Married Couple

2008-09-22T16:58:00.003-04:00

So who feels like an old married couple after being married for only 8 months and 20 days? ;-) Actually, I’m not complaining. I love it! This weekend was one of those déjà vu-ish weekends in the sense that I spent much of the weekend saying things like, “Honey, has it really been a YEAR since we did ____?”

In reality our weekend started with a fabulous first. We hosted J’s spend the night birthday party. Was I a bit leery about having my house taken over by a gang of 10-yr-old boys? Uh…duh! But it was totally worth it. We were thrilled that J wanted that kind of party and we were happy to make it a fun-filled event. Of course being married to Mr. Wonderful helped. He was the “cool” dad who played video games and did canon balls in the pool at dusk even though the water was pretty darn chilly. I did lots of cooking and cleaning and picking up and laughing. At one point I was keeping a mental list of all of the things that you’d never hear at an all-girls party:

“Mrs. O, those meatballs were awesome!”

“See, I told you that you’d love Liz’s meatballs.”

“Yeah, I can still taste them when I burp!”

Wasn’t sure whether I was supposed to feel flattered or grossed out, so I settled on a 50/50 combo.

By noon Saturday it was just E and me and after a lazy afternoon of napping, we headed downtown to wander through the Arts in the Heart festival (the first time I had the “Has it really been a year?!” reaction). Last year we had spent the night before Arts in the Heart in a local bed and breakfast—a romantic surprise by E.

After wandering through the various vendors and entertainers at the festival we decided on a rather eclectic, artsy tapas restaurant, and then headed to the Imperial to see the opera, Sweeney Todd. The production was pretty good and it was fun running into former college professors and current students and colleagues. And like last year when we went to see Camelot we once again enjoyed decent red wine served in plastic cups and had fun people watching. It was a fabulous date night that left me feeling blessed and giddy and very much in love with my husband.

Sunday we went to see Burn After Reading, which we’d been wanting to see. Then we came home and were incredibly lazy for the remainder of our weekend. Heaven! I'm looking forward to many years of nights at the opera and days at arts festivals and date nights where I say things like, "Honey, remember the *first* year we did this...?"

Motherhood and Sadness

2008-09-16T12:30:00.002-04:00

Today I was reminded of one of the most painful pieces of falling in love with E. I know that most don't associate falling in love with pain, but when you've traveled the marriage route once and failed miserably, finally finding what you were really after all along can cast a painfully blinding spotlight on the parts of the past that hurt the worst. What reminded me isn’t important to my story except that it focuses on what may be the most emotionally laden issue that women deal with: Motherhood. This other woman has yet to experience what it is to become a mother and is now realizing that she may not ever. Even women who say they never wanted children often go through a grieving process when their bodies make it clear that having a child the “normal” way is no longer an option.

I always knew I wanted to be a mom. Once I hit 30 I was certifiably obsessed with becoming a mother and all things related. As I’ve written before, I made some pretty questionable decisions because of it. But if that’s what it took to get the two fabulous little girls I brought into the world, then so be it. I’d do it all again if need be. I rarely felt supported in that journey, at least by the one person I needed it from the most. I know now that some of his behavior stemmed from a fundamental inability on his part to communicate feelings or make connections. But at the time his attachment disorder wasn’t something I was trying to understand or label or feel sympathy about. I wanted to feel loved and cherished and have someone beside me who was reveling in the whole experience. But he didn’t. At its worst his apathy (?) kept him from keeping up with the basics like doctor’s appointments or from even asking if everything was ok the day I told him I was going to the doctor to see if we could hear the heartbeat. He never even asked…

I pushed his indifference and resentment away into a corner and tried not to bump into it as I navigated my way through pregnancies and infancy and toddlerhood. I focused on the pieces of my life I liked and that I could control and made it through one day at a time. I didn’t realize the emotional toll all of that compartmentalizing was taking until there was E.

Somewhere in the hours upon hours upon hours of soul-baring discussions we had as our relationship evolved I was forced to imagine how different my journey to and through motherhood would have been had I been with E. And the almost unbearable sense of grief and loss descended upon me in a sudden flood. It truly was overwhelming and at the time I remember having to give myself 24 hours to feel unbelievably sad. See, I know how attentive and compassionate my husband is on a regular ole’ day. Imagine how pampered and loved I would have felt if I had been carrying his child…

Over time it has gotten easier to think about without feeling a crushing sadness, partly because I actively choose to think about the differences in our parenting styles and how those differences would have manifested themselves if we had co-parented biological babies. Hey, if I can imagine the good stuff I can imagine the bad stuff too! I’m an equal opportunity daydreamer/compartmentalizer. And I focus on how glad I am to have a communicative partner to co-parent with from this point forward. Heaven knows there’ll be lots of times I’ll need to be comforted and pampered along this journey. And not a day goes by that I don't thank heavens to be making this journey with E.

Hibernation

2008-09-12T10:47:00.004-04:00

So I have a love-hate relationship with autumn. Love the cooler temps in the evening, the technicolor leaves, the sounds of the high school band practicing down the street, the anticipation of all of the various activities, carnivals and holidays that we're barraged with for the next few months. I'm ready to break out the comfy slippers...oh, wait, I can't...our evil moron dog ate my slippers last year...I'm ready for E to buy me some new fuzzy slippers so I can sit out on the deck in the evenings, wrapped in a throw blanket, drinking a glass of red wine and enjoying the crispness in the air. I'm ready to turn the air conditioner off for awhile and open the windows. There are lots of good things about the fall.

But darn it I'm also ready for mother nature to get with the program and catch up with the times. Does she not realize that most of us have more than enough calorie-laden food at our disposal? We aren't hunting-gathering-foraging anymore--well, it may feel like we are at Sam's or Costco. I don't need for my body to suddenly crave everything that slightly resembles food. I'm not hibernating, dammit! Want to see a funny sight? Observe our faculty workroom these days. It's like the Serengeti. Employees prowl through there on almost hourly schedules, hoping that someone has made the mistake of leaving food out on the table. Just yesterday I came in to get my 3rd cup of coffee for the day and caught three people circling a box of two-day-old croissants...those stale pastries never stood a chance. Oooops...gotta go...It's been 42 minutes since I patrolled the workroom and I heard that one of the teachers had left over chicken biscuits...

Casa de Owens

2008-09-06T19:06:00.007-04:00

Weekends around Casa de Owens tend to be busy and productive with just the right amount of relaxation thrown in to keep everything in balance. And this weekend is turning out to be no exception.

This morning E & I headed out in search of broccoli plants. I knew I had to get them in the ground this weekend if I was hoping to grow any this fall. Then we headed over to my parents’ house and we all rode over to the “Aiken’s Makin’” arts and crafts festival. This is one of those big annual events that we as locals know all about but none of the four of us had ever actually attended. So we wandered down the crowded, tree covered aisles, looking at the various handmade goods being offered up for sale. Naturally we hadn’t been there more than five minutes before we ran into someone my parents knew (I actually meant to set the stop watch on my iPhone when we got there to see just how long it would take). After determining that there really wasn’t anything we wanted to purchase, we chose to skip the abundant fair type foods for a sit-down lunch at one of the nice restaurants in downtown Aiken. Funnel cakes and sausage dogs are great, don’t get me wrong, but they don’t hold a candle to the blackened Ahi tuna wrap I enjoyed in the lovely air conditioned Davor's.

We returned home and Mom and I headed for a local antique furniture store while Dad retreated to his study and E headed out to run some errands. We really need a bigger kitchen table, and after wandering through what seemed like several acres of furniture we found a couple that we liked. I wasn’t ready to commit yet, though, so instead I came home and planted my broccoli plants and bottle fed the runt kitten…oh yes, the ‘ho cat returned after an extended absence and once again I played midwife. Five little tiny black kittens. I’m thinking we can market them as Halloween black cats at the girls' school fall festival next month.

Tonight we plan on a quiet night at home. E is apparently cooking dinner for me tonight and then we’re watching a movie. He is still horrified by my limited exposure to what he considers “must see” cinema. Let’s hope whatever I’m subjected to this evening isn’t a western or doesn’t involve talking French fries.

Moronthropes

2008-09-03T10:07:00.007-04:00

Yes, we've coined a new term. Because some days "misanthrope" just does not describe us precisely enough. And it really isn't people in general that I don't like (that's E's department ;-). It's just the moronic, irresponsible, myopic ones (and no, I'm not discriminating against those who need glasses. Stop being so literal, people). E and I are starting an official Moronthropic Society. It's quite entertaining to think up official slogans for our cynical little club. Just try it. See if you aren't laughing within minutes. And it's not making fun of others if the "others" don't know. Don't act like you never do it.

Aren't you glad I got over my Pollyanna phase? ;-)

I've started about 15 blogs over the past two weeks. And I've lost steam before the conclusion of any. Life has just been moving at warp speed lately. The only piece of "writing" I've managed to complete in the past month--other than lots of really snarky comments on the essays of my college comp students' papers--is a very sing-songy, Dr Seuss-esque birthday invitation for J's 10th birthday party. I don't think that counts. Just. Need. Sleep. Maybe then I'll be less moronthropic and more productive.

Here's a cute picture of one of our cats to make up for the lack of substance today.

School Days

2008-08-16T14:37:00.001-04:00

I’m feeling Pollyannaish again this morning, so just bear with me. If it gets too trite take solace in knowing that within the week I’ll be back to my slightly cynical self.

We went to open house at the girls’ new school yesterday. We didn’t know enough to celebrate or groan when we saw whose class each had been assigned to and from the reactions of the other students pouring over the posted class lists, the opposing reactions seemed to have more to do with what classmates were or were not sharing teachers than what teacher was actually assigned to the room. We saw that as a good sign and headed off, chanting class numbers and teacher names under our breath so we wouldn’t forget them in the midst of the throng and have to return to the posted lists.

We trekked the short distance to Little A’s classroom where her excitement immediately evaporated, replaced by paralyzing shyness. She did manage to mumble a few required responses to her teacher’s polite questions, but for the most part she twirled her hair with one hand and reached for me with the other. “Mom, I’m scared!” she hissed at me as soon as the teacher walked across the room. We did lots of exploring of her pretty classroom, trying to be reassuring.

Next we navigated the twisting hallways to J’s classroom. I think the stack of books on each desk gave her momentary pause, but after chatting with her teacher for a bit and discovering that her teacher’s mom had been my 8th grade math teacher, J seemed reassured and quite comfortable.

We made our way—albeit the circuitous route—to the library, where we talked with the librarian who also has a daughter J’s age. J and Holly have the same piano teacher and we really like Holly’s mom, so at least they are looking forward to library day as well as the two book fairs. Then we ran into another family friend followed by another and then another…yet further reassurance to me that we made the right decision to move back to my home town and to move the girls into this school. There are already teachers we know and who will keep an eye out on our children. There are other parents there with whom we have a relationship. We feel part of the school community and the school year hasn’t even started yet. I even feel good about the after school program—very structured, very professional, seemingly very caring and competent staff.

It was also fun to sign up for various volunteer duties just as “the mom”. There were certainly things I loved about having the girls attend the school where I teach and undoubtedly there will be times that I’ll miss them being with me, but I also love my work life and my children’s school life being separate. I really have the best of both worlds. Because of where I currently teach, I have more flexibility than most teachers do. If one of the girls has something special going on that I need to attend, chances are I’ll be able to. I was even brave enough to sign up to help with the fall carnival AND to be a room mother in one of the rooms.

Will this new experience be all sunshine and roses? No, but it's not supposed to be. We'll all have challenges. But I don't want my children to never struggle, to never be frustrated, to never have to deal with uncomfortable social or academic situations. I want them to experience all of that "unpleasantness" of life stuff while they are in a supportive, relatively safe environment, and while they are under our roof and are still willing to talk to us about all of the stuff that gives them pause.

Oh—and Little A has returned to being excited. She was most concerned about what doors to enter in the morning--oh, if all problems could be resolved so easily! And once she learned that she gets to earn “money” to spend in their class store just by completing her reading assignments each day, and that she can earn a trip to an indoor playground by completing a certain number of reading tests, she declared her class to be both “the BEST!” and “Awesome!” Even her brother said that was a pretty great way to get kids to read. Oh, who says bribery and education don’t go hand in hand.

Kittens and puppies and pets...oh my!

2008-08-10T14:03:00.001-04:00

So our last little stray kitten is heading off to his new home today. We couldn’t be happier about who is new parents are. J & C are both smart, funny, compassionate, animal-loving people. Kiki (or after today, Mr. Moog) is one lucky kitty.

I must say, though, that for the first time everyone in my house is sad to see one of our foster babies leave. Yes, even DH, who has bonded with Kiki in a way I never believed would happen with a cat. He is a self-proclaimed cat hater. And yet, where does Kiki sleep? Curled up next to DH, who often encourages the arrangement. Just yesterday he wondered out loud whether or not we could trick J & C into taking one of our other cats instead of Kiki. Yes, DH is going to miss the Kikster just as much as the kids and I, maybe even more. I think he’s taken as much video footage of the kitten in the last month as he has of the children. Of course Kik is pretty entertaining, in a clumsy, wide-open kitten sort of way.

I’m almost hoping that J & C’s dog will have an instant and unrelenting hatred (or maybe just an allergic reaction?) to Kiki so they’ll have to bring him back. Or maybe kitty and people personalities just won’t mesh. It happens. And we’ll make sure J & C know that Kiki has a full refund policy attached. He can return here anytime.

Sometime I’m going to sit down and try to make a list of all of the animals I’ve owned. It would be an impressive record. Everything from pregnant hamsters, birds and ferrets to chinchillas, turtles and rabbits, to cats, dogs, frogs, fish and horses. And I’ve had my share of buyer’s remorse. Actually we are having it now with our dog. It’s not the dog’s fault, really. He just needs more attention/training than we have time for right now. It makes him pissy and destructive, not to mention defiant, which are not traits I tolerate well in children or animals. With the right family, though, our dog would be a phenomenal pet. So we’ve either got to find a way to spend more time with him so he’ll stop destroying everything that he can get his teeth on or we are going to have to find a better home for him. It isn’t fair to him or us to continue on status quo.

OK, going to hang out with Kiki and wait for J to arrive. Too bad cats can’t understand English. It sure would be nice to be able to tell him about the impending changes. And to teach him my cell number so he could call if he wanted to keep in touch.

Mental Whiplash

2008-08-08T21:30:00.002-04:00

Do all divorced parents who have some sort of joint custody arrangement feel like they have split personalities? I swear there are times that my life gives me mental whiplash.

Dh and I have our children every other weekend and half of the week during the school year (we’ve had them more during the summer because I work from home and can provide cheap childcare. ;-). So we may have three or four days in a row (or as is the recent case a week and a half) when we are all kids, all the time. Our lives are completely consumed by parenting and family activities. The only way dh and I have an uninterrupted conversation is if I manage to stay awake past ten p.m., which is a rare occurrence after a full day of domestic management activities.

And then suddenly it ends. All four kids disappear, off to their other lives in other places with other family. The change is abrupt and sometimes quite jarring. Now I’m not going to say it isn’t quite often a welcome change because it is. But no matter how challenging the children have made our lives in the days, hours, minutes leading up to their departure, it is also a bittersweet change. We miss them but that’s not always such a bad thing. Mainly because we know they miss us too and are looking forward to being back with us when the time comes. And there are also the benefits such as suddenly dh and I can sit across from each other in a restaurant and focus on just each other rather than on making sure the crayons are evenly distributed and no one spills a drink. We can hold hands in a movie theater and watch something that isn’t animated. My house becomes a “clothing optional” zone and suddenly I’m more inspired to drink a glass of wine and stay up late rather than drink a glass of wine and pass out as soon as the kids are in bed ;-). The changes in our life, our daily (and nightly) routine are quite striking.

But it can be tough knowing that when our children aren’t under our roof, they are in houses where the rules, the values and priorities aren’t quite the same as ours. We do the best we can with that, and thank heavens dh and I can vent and empathize with each other, but we do worry that in some ways that will only get worse as our children get older. Heaven help us when the teen years hit. Then the varying levels of parental controls in the various homes becomes a much more serious issue than the major annoyance it is now. I try not to think about it too often. And it’s not that we feel like we have all the answers and the other parents in our children’s lives are complete screw-ups and are going to ruin our children’s lives. But we do feel like we spend an awful lot of time having to compensate for things that our children are allowed to do (or by the same token not encouraged to do) when they aren’t with us. It’s a type of parenting pressure I could do without in all honesty.

Actually I think I’ll go curl up on the bed, eat something totally unhealthy and watch the Olympic opening ceremony with my dh…and enjoy not having to remind anyone to brush their teeth, or tell anyone they can’t sleep in the dirty t-shirt they’ve been wearing for two days straight, or order someone to get *back* in bed and go to sleep for the fifth time…at least not for a few more days. I hope the kids are watching the ceremony too; I can almost hear the comments and exclamations that each one would make, knowing who would like the drummers most or the flashing lights in the stadium the best or who would love the pyrotechnics. Of course dh is trying to figure out where we could put a 500 ft LED screen.

Summer is almost over! Yay? Yay!

2008-08-06T09:57:00.003-04:00

I know the first day of school for our Brady Bunch tribe is still a week and a half away but I decided yesterday morning to sort school supplies. I looooovvvvee sorting and organizing stuff and I have to admit, I’m rather looking forward to school starting. I love the kids being home for summer…well, most of the time…but feeding and entertaining four kids is expensive and mentally taxing much of the time. And I won’t even start discussing cleaning up after four…By the way, did you know that if a six-yr-old squeals loudly enough at just the right pitch she can set off a wireless doorbell? Oh yes, it’s true. I’ve heard the evidence over and over and over…

Anyway, DH purchased and then stuffed bags of school supplies in the bedroom closet a couple of weeks ago. Bags and bags of school supplies! So this morning I broke out my four separate lists and started separating all the loot into organized little piles, transferring them into plastic bags and tying the handles closed with name tags I had made for each of the clan. So cute! ☺ Of course with the sheer volume of stuff we had to buy there were the inevitable missing or wrong items…the 6 red, 4 blue, 5 green, 2 yellow and 1 white pocket folders were supposed to have brads…darn! It’s a 1-inch binder, not a half-inch. Grrrr. OK, so one more trip to the store.

Then there were the requisite haircuts. Our clan looked like shaggy, unkempt homeless kids, especially after all the pool time they’ve had this summer. So we marched them into the really cool kids' hair salon and were greeted by the nice stylists who asked, “Which one needs the haircut?”

“All of them!” we happily replied.

So the assembly line of combing and cutting commenced, and one by one our children once again looked like they were decently cared for. After handing the nice stylists a not-so-small wad of cash we headed out to the store to look for the elusive white folders with brads. What the heck? Apparently that is an extinct species of folder because we’ve looked at four different stores to no avail. Oh well, I’m trying not to let it drive me nuts.

Now I’m officially ready for school to start—they look good, they have all of the supplies they supposedly need (well, almost), and we’re all ready to meet new teachers, make new friends and have a great school year.

If I never was graceful to begin with...

2008-07-30T10:18:00.000-04:00

...how can I be expected to age that way?!

I have a love hate relationship with aging. I’ve never been one to stress over birthdays. I’ve always figured that I had some control over the way I aged. And I actually am more confident and have a healthier body image now than I ever did when I was in my twenties and early thirties and could still fit into my size 2 clothes. Oh the irony...

I was doing just fine with journeying into my 40s. That was until I caught a glimpse of myself laughing in the mirror the other day and realized I could smuggle Tic Tacs in my crows feet. Egads! But, OK, I guess I can live with that. Although I must admit I pay more attention to those wrinkle reducing cosmetic commercials now.

And I did switch not so long ago to a new foundation targeted at those of us with “mature” skin. It came with a little application brush, which looked dainty and cute until I actually dipped it into the jar of rich, moisture-infused cream. You know what the feathery brush turns into? A spackle knife. Yep, trowel it on and smooth it out, baby! Gone are the days of hurriedly dabbing on a bit of make-up with a triangular sponge and rushing out the door. Now I need a contractor’s license and a tool belt to execute my morning routine.

Off to do Pilates (yes, I have forced myself to get back into a daily Pilates routine again—yay me!) and hope that I don’t break a hip.

Who comes up with this stuff?

2008-07-22T14:19:00.001-04:00

This is more of a passing snarky comment than a blog, but seriously, who sat around a giant, highly polished mahogany table in the inner sanctum at Apple and pitched the idea, "Hey! Let's change our name from 'dotmac' to 'mobileme' so everyone's email addresses will now end with 'me.com'! Won't that be cute?"

Uh. No. Not cute. Maybe if this were email addys by Fisher Price. But seriously, "me.com"? It's the email provider for narcissists. Thanks, Apple.

Hometowns

2008-07-20T12:28:00.000-04:00

Now that I’ve officially lived back in my hometown for a couple of months I must say that we definitely made the right decision. I was a bit nervous to come back “across the river”—would I miss living in the larger city? Would my hometown feel too small and cliquish? Within a few days all fears were allayed. Driving up the tree-lined streets past all of the beautifully manicured lawns that lead to our house puts me in a more tranquil state of mind regardless of the day I’ve had leading up to that point. We now live on one of those streets that people say things like, “I bet this would be a great neighborhood to raise a family…” Lots of friendly neighbors who can be seen taking evening walks or working in their yards daily. Even the downtown area is pretty and inviting—they’ve done a lot of work on it since I was a kid living here. Just yesterday Dear Husband (henceforth DH) remarked on how nice everyone in this town seems to be; after his car broke down just after he crossed into the city limits he immediately had people stopping to offer assistance. Within minutes four guys helped him push his car to the gas station on the corner—one guy actually popped the hood and tried to diagnose and repair the problem.
If that happened on the other side of the river, depending on the part of town you were in, you could be standing there for a very long time before anyone would stop. And there are other parts of town that you’d be hoping no one stopped. Where we lived previously, I didn’t feel comfortable letting my kids play in the front yard unless I was sitting on the porch watching them. And our neighbors were hardly of the desirable type, unless your idea of desirable is loud country music blaring at 2 a.m. through the bedroom window or the dream-shattering sounds of a motorcycle engine revving at 0-dark-30. We hadn’t been in our new home more than a couple of days before we had neighbors introducing themselves, making sure we knew we could knock on their doors or call if we needed anything…there’s a certain feeling of comfort and security that comes from living in that sort of neighborhood. I had it as a child and am so thrilled that our children will get to experience it as well.

And as insane as it might seem, I can’t end this ode to my hometown without talking about trash day. Yes, trash day. DH thinks I’ve lost my mind but I love Thursdays. Obviously it is nice to be able to get rid of all of the trash that has accumulated throughout the week, but it’s more than that. First of all, unlike at my previous place of residence, I can put out anything and the sanitation workers in our fair city will whisk it away. And believe me, I’ve tested them—all of the carpet I ripped up from our bedroom? Gone. The 30-ft swath of old giant Redtip hedge that I hacked down? Vanished. The lumber and construction debris from the deck rebuilding? Carried away. And it’s more than that. It’s the apparent orchestration of the pick-up that intrigues me. I refer to it as “the swarm”, which makes DH’s eyes roll to the back of his head. But seriously, there is a choreographed flock of varying types of sanitation trucks that swoop through our neighborhood with an air of efficiency and purpose that is fascinating. It’s like the sanitation workers scoped out the neighborhood the night before, surveying the various types of debris they would need to collect and then planned out an exacting schedule of pickup. You can almost hear Olympic synchronized swimming music wafting through the air as suddenly each street has a large rumbling truck cruising down the block--there never seems to be more than one on a street at a time. They have three or four different types of garbage trucks too. There is the regular one, the open flat bed variety and the giant construction site looking behemoth that comes complete with a giant steam shovel looking thing (Remember Mike Mulligan and the Steam Shovel? Loved that book as a kid...). Within a couple of hours of the swarm’s arrival, the sidewalks and curbs have been cleared of any sort of unsightly debris, at least for another week.

OK, so sometimes it's the little things in life. Just humor me. ☺

Summer is a Terrorist Plot

2008-07-17T12:11:00.000-04:00

Ah…working from home. What could be better? I can roll out of bed, shuffle to the kitchen while still wearing my Winnie the Pooh PJs, fire up the laptop and scroll through emails allowing the heavenly scent of coffee to start my synapses firing. If I want to take a break to go outside and work in my flowerbeds or start a load of laundry, then I can do so. No boss peering over my shoulder making sure I’m staying on task. If I want to grade essays at 11 p.m. while sitting in my bed, then I can…oh, the visions of amazing efficiency and productivity.

WAKE UP, YOU FOOL!

Yeah, that’s the lure of the whole working-from-home fad. And yes, I admit, I fell for its snake oil promise of productive bliss many years ago when I was determined to find a way to keep working and stay at home with the babes. Thank heavens now it’s only something I must endure from June until mid-August. But after ten years of mind-numbing multitasking I have the nervous twitches, gray hairs and hair trigger temper that come with a decade of trying to compose a logical sentence to my boss via email while simultaneously yelling at one child to stop banging on the piano, and listening to another contemplate (and by “contemplate” I mean “sing a song about”) the best way to remove the peanut butter that she accidentally smeared all over the front of the stove.

“Mom!!! Look at my drawing!”

“That’s great…hey, where did you get the paper you used for that drawing…looks like my course syllabus…”

“Mom!!!! I’m REALLY hungry! Is it time for lunch yet??”

“It’s 9:30 in the morning and you just ate breakfast ten minutes ago…”

“Mom!!!! I think the cat just coughed up a hairball on the chair!!”

“Awesome…Was it the brown chair that’s the same color as the cat or the green chair? If it’s the brown one I’ll get it later…”

“Stop spinning the chair…please stop whistling in my ear…those are really great songs but do you think you could both pick ONE song and sing it at the same time?...no, don’t put fairy wings on the cat…”

I used to consider myself a serious badass in the work place. Ah, the days of having my own office, teaching three or four college courses while also managing a dozen or so adjunct staff, scheduling courses, heading up three different departments…what happened to her? That person wouldn’t take twenty minutes to compose a four-line email or worse, send an email and forget to include the important attachment.

Whoever invented summer vacation for school children was an evil, sadistic human being. Forget nuclear weapons and bio-terrorism. Summer vacation was Al-Queda’s attempt to collapse the economy by bringing the American workforce to its knees for three months out of the year. I wonder if that has anything to do with the price of gas…

Bouncing Blogger

2008-07-17T12:04:00.000-04:00

So I've bounced around the Internet posting blogs in various places for an embarrassing number of years now. I admit, I was a fair weather blogger but part of my flakiness came from both the increasing availability of blogging spots over the years and, well, the fact that my birthdays keeping happening regardless of my cease and desist orders. For a 40-something year old to continue blogging at MySpace seems a bit creepy, even to me, so here I am, once again building from scratch.

I keep thinking that I'll quit blogging at some point, but my life is just so darn insane most of the time that I feel the need to share, or at the very least write it all down so when I'm really old and reminiscing with my husband I can pull out a blog and say, "Hey, Smoof, remember when you did that really crazy thing?!"

Actually, too, I'm hoping to lure the Smoof here to post as well. He thinks he's much too cool to blog, but he writes really, really well, so maybe I can convince him to post here occasionally since it won't really be like he has a blog of his own... :-)

Let the postings of randomness begin.