Tippy Toes and Tantrums

Seeing Pink

My absentee ballot was mailed off yesterday after delaying it for a few days just to make sure my candidate did not drop out. He said he was in it until the end, which I interpreted as "at least past Super Tuesday" and I cast my vote.

Wasted vote! I knew Edwards wasn't going to win, but I thought my small vote was a show of support for the one candidate who seems like a nice person and the only one to really care about the working poor, but alas... I guess this is what I get for voting absentee.

If that news was not annoying enough, I went to see Clover this morning while she was still reading in bed and she looked up at me with big pink, puffy and crusty eyes. Clearly her love of accessorizing with pink has gone too far.

Off to the doctor - after squeezing in Rocket's swim lesson - and then on to the pharmacy where is took almost three times as long as waiting for the doctor to get Clover's eye drops. People looked at me like I was horrible for being out with a clearly ill kid, but blame the pharmacy. They should have a priority for people who are obviously sick or in pain. My pacing near the counter with a howling Rocket and pink eyed Clover did not seem to bother the pharmacy staff at all, as they went along with business as if we were not there. I made me wish pink eye was a little more contagious.

My Domestic Spying Failure

Before my daughter was born, I was told (or maybe I read it, I can't remember) never to take the baby monitor out of her room because as she grows, she'll forget the monitor is there and someday when she is older, I will be able to eavesdrop on potentially troublesome conversations between her and her friends. I knew that when my daughter was a teenager the monitor would not be in her room, that she would have remembered that it was there somewhere along the way and demand that it be taken out. Yet still I kept it in her room well past the baby stage.  I'm anxious and she goes through stages of night wakings, so I kept it in her room without giving it a second thought despite the fact that she is now five.

During a dinner with some mom friends, one shared that late one night her son had walked in on her and her husband while they were (literally) in an awkward position. The other moms jumped in with stories of similar close calls or precautions they take, then I asked if any of them have monitors in their children's rooms. Apparently I was the only one still using monitors and they all looked at me like I was nuts. I defended myself by pointing out that neither of my kids had every surprised me in my bedroom, but even so, I knew the monitoring could not go on forever. What did catch me by surprise was that my daughter was having similar thoughts about the monitor too.

A few days after the moms dinner, just as I was climbing into bed, I heard my daughter's voice very quietly ask if someone could bring her some ice water. Normally she barks her demands in a loud voice, regardless of the time. I should have know that this was a test and I was about to fail. The night after the water request, as I went to bed I noticed her monitor was off. She had a playdate that day and I assumed it had become unplugged. I let it go, but the next day I mentioned it to her, saying I thought her monitor had gotten disconnected. It didn't. She very sweetly said that she turned it off because she wanted "some alone time." I almost snorted. She's five and she has her own room. How much more alone time can she need? The monitor's receiver stays near my bed, I don't carry it around with me, which means I wasn't going to hear her talk to herself or her Polly Pockets or whatever she would do during this "alone time" anyway.

My next thought was: Holy crap! What am I going to do when she is older? I don't have a Plan B/Post Monitor idea. I told my husband that I am not going to be the type of mom who reads a private notebook or journal kept by our kids, but before I could finish the sentence, my husband was laughing. I would have dropped the subject, but I had just watched a recorded Frontline episode Into the Teenage Brain, and I was in full freak out mode. Apparently my husband thinks I am the type of mom who would plant a GPS chip into our kids while they slept. All I did was keep a monitor in our daughter's room about a year or so longer than needed and now he thinks I am Big Brother. I am sure our kids will agree with him when they are teenagers (assuming I allow them the freedom to read 1984 - just kidding).

In the meantime, I am going to respect my daughter's privacy and remove the monitor. Oddly enough, my daughter pointed out that her brother has a video monitor and she does not. "Don't you want to watch me?" she asked. Great, now I have nightmares of what this girl is going to do with webcams during her alone time when she is older.

I Just Need One Pipe Cleaner...Or Corners of my Clutter No. 2

You know when you need one thing, like a pipe cleaner, and you start looking for it in the cluttered craft closet, pulling out stickers, papers and boxes, trying to get a better view, when suddenly you decide the closet should be cleaned out immediately? I took everything out of these three narrow, but very deep shelves in my office closet thinking that yes, this does need to be cleaned out so I should do it now and then everything will be peachy. However once I got everything out, I realized I no longer wanted to complete the task, but because everything was out, I had no choice but to continue. I hate when that happens.

That was Saturday afternoon and it wasn't until a full day later when I finally had the three (three! only three!) shelves cleaned and organized again. I still have a few things that need to find new homes as the closet was not the right place for them. In a way, this was a preview of my February weekends, when, without football or baseball, my weekends are open for cleaning and organizing. I remember watching a movie in elementary school based on the Aesop fable about the hard working ant preparing for the winter, while the lazy grasshopper lived in the moment and did not prepare for the harsh months. I am trying to be the hardworking ant now, organizing during the dreary months, leaving me time to rest and play during the hot summer, but I am not motivated. I have one more weekend of football (because we are having our annual Superbowl party, it will consume the weekend for me), which gives me a small reprieve from the organizing. Hopefully I can use the time to get fired up for the organizing I have ahead of me, but right now, I just want to be the grasshopper and spend my winter inching through my Netflix queue while snuggled up with a warm drink and a blanket.

I never did find those pipe cleaners either.

Shoes and Surprises

My will power gave out. After years of resistance, I bought my first pair of Crocs. Well, the first pair for me because, to be technical, this is the fourth pair I have bought, I being the last remaining Crocs hold out in our house. I feel like I've stepped out onto a slippery slope. Next I will start wearing sweatpants, I told a mom in Clover's class. "Or not showering," she retorted. Who knows what my future has in store!

Zappos, though, is so addictive. I ordered last night and there they were this afternoon. Nearly instant gratification. I don't plan on wearing the Crocs off of our property - that is what I say now - but there have definitely been times where I've needed to run out in the rain quickly and neither rainboots (too slow) nor shoes (not waterproof) really met my needs. Twice recently I have put on Kevin's Crocs to run outside and after doing so last night to grill chicken in the rain (crazy, I know, but boy did grilled chicken smell like summer), I decided to take the plunge.

Clover is so excited because the girls have pink (hers are cotton candy colored mixed with dirt from school, mine are pink) and the boys have navy. In a house that is 50% female, 50% male, many things come down to boys vs. girls. I imagine one day we will have some sort of Battle of the Network Stars challenge to see which side - boys or girls - reigns supreme in this house. Each of us wearing our Crocs to show which team we are on. Clover will have the girls' team theme song worked out by then. Finding appropriate songs for the situation seems to be her thing. Last night Kevin refused to get her a cup to play with in the bathtub, so she began to sing "We Shall Overcome."

In further shoe news at our house, I bought myself a second pair of rainboots yesterday, which was wise because today it is really coming down and Clover's school is truly a mudbowl. I stepped out the my car and could here the deep squish sound as my foot sunk in the mud a few inches. But, back to the shoe...I grabbed the only size 10 remaining at Target without trying them on. When I got home, I tried on the left foot to confirm that they fit before cutting off the tags. Later I went to move the boots to the door when I see a frog leg peeking out inside the right boot. I couldn't tell if it was alive or dead, real or fake and I was kind of freaked out. I shook the boot, but the frog leg did not move. I took a deep breath and reached into the boot, pulling out a rubbery, sticky fake frog with the Target tag on it. Some kid - or a practical jokester - must have shoved it into the boot. Rocket was in the cart and we did not go near the toys, so I know he didn't do it. Of course this means I am a shoplifter.

Rocket was standing next to me when I found the frog and I showed him that the frog had been shoved into the toe area of my boot. This was stupid, I realized this morning when I put my foot in and felt my toes squish something. All I could think was that this time the frog was real and now I have killed it inside my new boot. I reached in and this time pulled out the large strawberry I gave Rocket to eat last night before dinner. It was soft and mushy and it had turned my white sock pink at the toes, but at least it wasn't a frog.

Who am I to Judge?

After dropping Clover off at school, Rocket and I listened to public radio on the drive home and the host asked a caller if the name she used was her real name (I think she said her name was Lilith, which was on the long list of names for Clover) and the caller said no, hesitated and then quickly said that the name came to her in a vision. As I rolled my eyes. So Bay Area, was my thought.

Later I was thinking about something, when I realized that I had this thought as I was falling asleep and maybe I shouldn't be making fun of the vision lady. My thought wasn't crazy, but it is my response to it.

Yesterday I received a forwarded email from a news agency looking to interview people who were against Oprah's support of Obama. I ignored it because I think it is Oprah's right to support anyone she wants and I believe that she isn't merely attracted to Obama's skin color, but also to his beliefs and in his potential to govern. If she merely wanted a black candidate, she would have supported Alan Keyes years ago. I pick a candidate based on who I think would best represent my beliefs and I assume that is how most everyone votes. Obama's lead among black voters isn't because he's black, but because he is black and shares their views.

As we edge closer to the Feb. 5 primary, I cannot decide how to vote. I was going to vote for a white male because I like him best and think his positions are closest to mine. But then sometime last night, as I was on the brink of sleep, it suddenly hit me that a woman has a real chance of winning. A woman! This isn't new to anyone, but I suddenly stopped thinking about the person and more about her sex. It was hard not to cry just thinking about it. When thinking about it again this morning, I feel myself start to shake and hyperventilate. I thought this would happen in my lifetime, but to think that it could happen while I am in my thirties is mindblowing. More important, Clover - and Rocket for that matter - would grow up thinking that this was ordinary, of course a woman could be president! Not the I expect or want Clover to grow up to be president, but this would make it very clear that she could.

Because I am indecisive, I still haven't decided from whom to vote. I took a quiz linked to by a friend, which said my views were closest to Hillary's, but the other two democrats were right behind. So, if I do vote for her, I'm not a hypocrite voting based on a physical similarity and not shared beliefs...okay? Like Lilith, maybe what to do came to me in a vision.

A Hairy Sunday

From the Sunday New York Times' wedding section: Do you think their hairstyles brought them together?

The best thing about the freezing weather football this weekend was that it forced Bill Belichick to wear a jacket, covering up his typical cut-sleeve sweatshirt look that he loves. Why is it that the NFL tries to discourage Mike Nolan from wearing a suit, but allows Belichick to look homeless? And do the players not get paid enough to afford regular haircuts? Or some of the broadcasters, for that matter. Hey Terry Bradshaw, just because you don't have hair on top doesn't mean it isn't growing long in the back.

After a roller coaster second game, I watched a recorded Project Runway, then a recorded Frontline on Inside the Teenage Brain. It really wasn't the restful day I had wanted.

Wednesday's Child is Full of Woe*

I am a bit weepy today in one of those moments where exhaustion and a long to-do list of things that require quiet concentration collide with a jerky comment said by someone (Kevin!) meaning to be funny. I'm tired from all that I do for my family and the list of things I want to do for myself (1. update the look on this blog), get pushed aside constantly because I rarely get a moment of quiet to myself. Even when I type blog posts or emails, there is someone sitting next to me, usually on top of my desk, pillaging through my papers, while another person is asking me how to spell a never-ending list of words. What brings on the tears for me is not the tiredness or frustration, but the realization that no one really gets it. And yes, tons of mothers do get it because they are living it too, but I mean the people closest to me, my family. They do not get it.

This week I got into my car and saw Clover's ballet shoes on the floor of the passenger side. Instead of thinking they belong in the glove compartment (which is where I store them so I do not forget to bring them to her class), I saw the beauty in my every day, in these small pale pink ballet shoes on the floor. Seeing the smallness and knowing that it doesn't last long, puts things into perspective quickly and I am happy I was able to see them that way as opposed to misplaced shoes and a messy car. I love that I get to be with these kids all the time, I know I am lucky to be able to do it, but that doesn't mean I don't cry over wanting a break from it sometimes.

I folded and put away laundry this morning while I was crying (even Cinderella had a better attitude...) and I saw a drawing Clover was working on, which made me feel better. The small beauty in the every day things, once again, helped.

*When my sisters and I were young, an aunt gave my mom frames with our birth information on them as a gift. Being born on Wednesday, mine said "Wednesday's Child is Full of Woe." Is that really an okay baby gift? My middle sister's said "Thursday's Child has Far to Go." Another disappointing prophecy for a newborn.

Cute for 100 Yen (and Slightly Up)

We picked up two wooden boxes at Daiso last month that make me happy every time I look at them. How many $4 purchases can do that? The second box is a hedgehog, but sadly it doesn't have the French name for hedgehog, so I fill in an exaggerated French pronunciation of hedgehog to make myself laugh. Both boxes had a tag with the price that also said in English, "Your day is filled with happiness and love. life was beautiful then. I remember the time." The tag makes me laugh even more. I walked around Daiso looking for other awkward Japanese to English translations, but only came up with a few. I was hoping to find a crazy sign or shirt, but alas I found nothing. I think Daiso is missing out on a huge humor market.

I buy small, but nice Japanese notebooks from an upscale Japanese stationary store in the Bay Area that I cherish much more than I should. Rocket took a green crayon to one of them and I almost cried. One notebook says "Hope Clover. Selection of dreams. I hope a big dream." In reality, it only contains my to-do list, but sometimes with two small kids, a to-do list is frequently a big dream. My smaller notebooks have French writing on them, which Kevin translated and assured me the Japanese is just as awkwardly translated into French.

First Quarter Death Quota Met

It's sunny and beautiful and lovely here, much like a March day, which is a little worrisome because it is January. A week ago when it was foggy and cold and raining, I glanced out the front window on my way to my room and the fence around our deck was so wet and gleaming that it looked white, like it was dusted with snow. I almost yelled out "snow!" which is ridiculous, even though last year we got a light dusting, just enough to make a few small snowballs and to let Clover think we live in a place that gets snow. When I paused to get a good look, it was clear that there was not any snow, but the more obvious thing I noticed was that our azalea plant is really dead. For how long, I don't know, (before Christmas?) but there is no denying it or holding out hope it will come back in the spring, which is usually my lazy gardening philosophy.

Kevin is even worse. A plant can stay dead, dry as a bone, no sign of life, for months, but he will insist it is still alive. Two years ago when I went crazy at the nursery, picking out tons and tons of plants, I stopped and asked if this was going overboard. Kevin's response was "How else are we going to meet our annual death quota?" That seems to sum up his gardening philosophy.

Corners of My Clutter

Some time back, several blogs would post a weekly Corners of My Home, showing a small peek at some part of their house. I loved the glimpse into other people's lives and it was what I thought of when I encountered my desk the other day, but a more embarrassing "Corners of My Clutter" came to mind. I think I am relatively neat and I know I cannot work when things are messy and disorganized, so this is definitely not how I keep my desk. It is the work of Rocket. In fewer than three seconds, he climbs up onto my desk and starts knocking things around or off the walls. Pretty much his way of saying "you thought you could let me out of your sight for two minutes? Screw you!" (I learned quickly to close my computer before leaving my desk.)

Twice this week I bought more baby proofing equipment and each time he quickly rendered them useless or he proved there is nothing that can hold him back. This morning he climbed to the top of his changing table, grabbed onto the knobs at the bottom of a wall-mounted shelf designed for a jacket or hat, pulled himself up and then with one hand, while holding himself up with the other, he grabbed the robots off the top shelf. This is probably about seven feet off the ground where I thought the tin toys would be safe. Sucka! The changing table must go.