Look both ways, but cross the street

Dear Annabel,

I shouldn't be watching television today. It's not even 8 a.m. and already I've flashed the finger (you will know the one) twice in the direction of the television screen, aimed at Matt Lauer and dubya. (I usually use my index finger during these most egregious gestures of inarticulation, but not today.)

On this day five years ago, at 8:57 a.m., I was sitting in my car in the parking lot at work. Stunned. I thought a small plane had gone off course and struck the World Trade Center. I shut the car's engine off, ran upstairs and told the only other soul in the newsroom to turn on the television because a plane had hit one of the Twin Towers. When the picture faded in, we watched as a second plane hit the other tower.

This was no accident.

I don't think I've ever been so stunned or quiet or uncertain in my life. What was happening?

The day went on like that, and the feeling continued into the next, and the next and the next. Whole months went by in a fog.

Things changed. People were nicer to each other (for a time). We made decisions because of (rather than despite) the tragedy. In my case, the hopelessness I felt made marriage and children important where it hadn't been before. It made YOU important.

Then time wore on and we found ourselves in a war that seems meaningless; a war on the crime of terrorism that is as "winable" as the decades-long war on drugs. We find our constitutional rights eroded, and we accept it as the price of safety. We have gone from a nation united in tragedy to one that is divided by ideology.

You will attend your first day of pre-school on this tragic anniversary -- September the 11th. I wonder what will you ultimately learn from this new milestone, school? I wonder what legacy we are handing you and your classmates?

I know you cannot be safe. None of us can. And yet I am a part of this collective anxiety in which our bodies respond to Code Orange as if it had meaning other than to instill fear and loathing. I want to put it all into perspective, but the constant coverage of what-ifs and could-bes makes it difficult to remain calm.

Home of the free? The brave? Not anymore.

Perhaps this is my cause, Ittybit. Something I want for you more than anything else. To realize our time here is brief and some of it will be tragic. There will be sadness for which we cannot prepare, and yet we have to be brave. To not give in to fear or hatred because it is likely to lead us down the wrong path.

I want to tell you to take chances, my little girl. Play in the mud and the muck and the paint. Get dirty. Look around and take it all in. Take precautions, too, but don't let them take over. Look both ways before you cross a street, but cross the street.

And please, little one, try to play nice, OK? I want you to be aware that you are not alone in this world.

Love,
Mommy.

Toddler Translations - 102

It's been a while since I've updated the AnnabelWebster's all-knowing and powerful toddler dictionary here at Ittybits & Pieces.

Her usage has evolved so quickly in recent weeks that it's been difficult for me to get it all down.

So here it is, the tasty tidbits from the home office in Wanna-see-my-room? PEAS?!?

You wanna have a pop-si-toe?
Translated: I wanna have a popsicle.

"Yes I man!"
(Yes I am) usually said accompanied by emphatic foot stomping and fist wagging to make her point.

"Mama? Who painted the sty?"
Well it wasn't you or your father, little one, otherwise the sky would be purple now wouldn't it? ... Unless she was talking about our house, in which case, Yes, honey. Your dad did indeed paint the sty.

"We'll go to the lipstick store and then see Cinderella. Not the movie one, the REAL one with the singing."
The LIPSTICK STORE would be the Hummingbird Garden gift shop, where I stopped to buy a card to waste a little time because we were early for a children's musical of Cinderella. I wound up impulse buying a compact of lip gloss shaped like a fish. Of course the comment came a full two months AFTER the incident.

"Sing the chichen song!"
Which would be "I've Been Working on the Railroad," but only at the point where "Someone's in the kitchen with Dinah." Don't even try to sing any other part of the song.

"Daddy will be so incredulous."
I'm not sure if she intended to say that her father wouldn't believe she was able to carry the six-pound tricycle up the stairs by herself as these words tumbled out of her mouth, but I'm willing to suspend disbelief if it means H-A-R-V-A-R-D S-C-H-O-L-A-R-S-H-I-P .

Even if she doesn't get a free ride, at least we'll have help moving heavy objects. Perhaps she can take over her daddy's bidness.

THE YAYA REPORT

Finally, I can quit my job ... almost.

ANNABEL: Where's mommy going?

LORI: You know where she's going, Annabel. She's going to work.

ANNABEL: Why?

LORI: So she can take care of you.

ANNABEL: Why?

LORI: So you can have food to eat and a place to sleep with nice warm blankets.
You don't want to sleep outside, do you?

ANNABEL: Yes I do. I wanna sleep OUTSIDE!

Perhaps if Lori had mentioned the health insurance aspects of my job to Annabel, she'd have figured out the national healthcare crisis.

The miracle of life ... and corn dogs

chicks
Originally uploaded by toyfoto.

There was a time (exactly this time last year in fact) that Annabel's love for barnyard animals was trapped in the pages of her story books.

At an early age, you see, she could tell chicks from cygnets, and cygnets from ducklings. Her voice boomed bass (or as low as a toddler can sound) for the daddy cattle while she screeched up high giving a "voice" to the baby ones. Since we'd traipsed through the farmyard, page by page for months, we naively thought she'd enjoy a trip to the fair to see the real things, up close and in person.

But picture books, we learned, don't really prepare tots for the realities of livestock. Toulouse Geese don't make their truck-horn sounds apparent under the bonnet of timid Mother Goose tales, and the size comparison isn't even close. The nearest I think a child's book can really come to life on the farm would be if publishers employed scratch and sniff technology, and let's face it, there are a precious few of us who'd pay good money to give the smell of silage and manure space on our bookshelves.

Understandably, as the year wore on -- after the traumatic experience of screaming and crying from one barn to the next -- her interest in the farm books waned.

So with a little apprehension (and the comfort of a plastic giraffe), we headed off to this year's fair and aimed ourselves in the direction of the livestock exhibits first thing. I figured we could get them out of the way quickly if she decided the animals were too scary and go right to the food. (After all, who wants to eat at the goat barn? Not I.)

It was as if she'd remembered the torture of a year ago, and decided to settle an old score.

"Cows!" She instructed. "Cows, mama." And off we went. Past turkeys, sheep, goats and pigs into the cattle barns. No sooner had we gotten there then she'd reached out her itty bitty hand to give Bessie's head a little pat. "Enough!"

"Chickens! Chickens, mama."
So off we went to see fowl.
"They're funny ... and loud," she laughs.

"Rabbits. Let's go see rabbits next," she instructs, pulling at my pant leg and grunting with exertion. "Ooooh, they're sooooo cute," she squints inside the wire cages, wriggling her nose in imitation.

"What are we gonna see next? How about the chicks?"

And off we go to see something that looks like a popcorn popper containing twelve eggs. Many of them are still whole, but others have large cracks and holes made in perfect circles by the tiny egg teeth on the tops of the chicks' beaks. Some of the babies, still covered in the gook of life, lay spent on the warm grate, resting from their hours-long struggle to get free.

"See that right there," points out a woman at the exhibit. And I look into the incubator to see a foot protruding from an otherwise perfect shell. "I've never seen anything like that in my life. They never come out feet first."

She tells me the eggs came from Cornell, where their genetic codes have been collected and studied. Turns out the University fully expects one of 12 to die -- no more, no less. "That could be one that doesn't make it," she says sadly.

So we leave with a little bit more knowledge of the miracle and mystery of life, but wondering if that little breech chick will survive the night. Annabel wants to stay and make sure the chicks "go to sleep," but we coax her out with the promise of a corn dog I'll have to "peel" and a ride in a tea cup I'll soon regret. By the end of the evening we have an entirely new way to see the fair: A midway adventure; the call of the animals, the lure of the games and the thrill of the rides.

"It's fun here, mama. Let's go again."

Separation anxiety

Dear Annabel,

In a week you'll be starting preschool. In preparation, your father and I have attended three meetings to iron out the details. We've signed up for tasks (your dad has already completed his first chore: powerwashing the playground toys). I've volunteered to be a board member (publicity and grant writing) and we are excited to be involved.

We've even been fighting over which one of us gets to go to school on your special day, which, as you will find out, is when mommy or daddy turns up to assist your teacher for the day. We'll be busy in the kitchen making snacks, cleaning up and helping your schoolmates traverse the tortures of bathroom etiquette and playground protocol while you look on and beam. Or so we've heard. It will be one of the few times in your development when you will be proud to have us around.

I worry how you will get along in school. Children can be mean. There will be those who won't want you to play with them. There will be petty jealousy and nasty looks. There may even be pushing, shoving and eventually trips to the principal's office, or worse, the nurse.

We've already experienced a little of the communication breakdowns that happen between tots. We winced in pain when your sweet, playful pretending was misunderstood by a child who just didn't "get it," and felt compelled to call you a name and run away. What could we say? Nothing. You didn't seem to need any explanations. "She didn't want to play," you said, not unhappy.

I worry also that you might become one of those mean girls. One of the girls who want to run the show and watch the actors squirm under their direction. In many ways, that would be worse.

So babyofmine, while the idea of school excites you now, we are petrified. You are growing up, making your own decisions and reacting to things we can't control. We hope that we make it easier for you, but not too easy. We hope you make it easier for us, too. But not too easy, right?

Love,
Mommy

An exquisite form

The following is an essay about the (unmentionable) love we feel for our children, prompted by HBM and The Joy Which Can't Be Words*

There's something no one talks about out of fear, even in an age where us verbose types can't seem to stop talking: the physical attraction we have to our children.

We have reason to be fearful.

WalMart, with its strange blend of corporate conscience, has made a name for itself not only by shortchanging employees, meddling in their lives, limiting their access to healthcare and decimating the communities they inhabit by edging out the little-guy, but also by becoming the eyes and ears for police, scouring the prints at their photo departments for exposed skin and potential pederasts.

Under such hysteria, (which admittedly has been around long before WalMart) the bodies of children have become sexualized. But when truth matters naught and appearance is all consuming, how can we ever differentiate between what means us harm and what doesn't?

That has never been more apparent to me than when I first brought my daughter home from the hospital, took off all her clothes and marveled at her lovely and amazing form. How could I not adore each inch of this marvelous body.

Each fold of skin was a masterpiece. I tickled her tummy as I changed her diaper. I bent down to kiss her newly exposed belly button. Her smell was intoxicating, clean and new.

The attraction between mother and child is most definitely physical. It grows in time, too. Not only did I have an urge to touch her, feel her skin against mine, I needed to hold her and squeeze. There was a surprising amount of latent violence in this expression. I held off the full force of my hugs, afraid to break her. My jaws clenched, teeth biting lip. The phrase "I could eat you up" was nearly literal. Everything about her being -- and not merely the idea of her being -- was yummy.

I took photographs of every part. I couldn't believe how defined and perfect her muscles were. I was transfixed by the roundness of her head and the dimples in her soft, full skin. And yet, I remained keenly aware of the danger waiting to tear me limb from limb in this world jaundiced by a sad mixture of superiority and anxiety.

I knew that such images, no matter how innocent, are taboo. I know that should someone with a lascivious mind find pleasure from them, there are those who would call me a pornographer. I hesitated showing my images to anyone, lest they judge. I just thanked the gods of technology for the digital camera I had long eschewed.

But even the mention of such thoughts has the potential to devastate.

When we say "physical love," most people conjure a mental picture of sexual love. Sensual love gets lumped in there, too. We make no distinction superficially, and yet we are all drawn to sensual things, innocently, in ways that no one would ever accuse us of crimes against humanity. Every time I walk past suede in a department store I have an intense urge to caress it. It pleases my senses. But I have no desire to have my way with a coat, I assure you.

In fact, much of my own thoughts concerning physical love have changed since becoming a mother. Since having a child so much of my own body has been transformed from the sexual to something else -- something life giving and life sustaining -- that I've had difficulty reassigning my parts. It's been nearly a year since this baby of mine stopped nursing. And still my breasts are unaware of sexual gratification. Touched in that way, I recoil.

My baby's body, in my thoughts, is the same. Its beauty is more than emotional; it's esoteric. The attraction is so surely physical it's palpable. It offers proof that we have the potential for perfection in all the ways that matter.

The not-so-vicious circle

Mommy, mommy, mommy, mommy, mommy mommy mommy mommy mommy mommy mommy mommy mommmy mommmy mom-meee mommeee mommeeee mommeeee mommeeee mommeeee mommeeee mommeeee ma me ma me ma me ma me ma me ma me ma me ma me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me.

Right now it's all about me.

When I got back from vacation, and back to my desk, awaiting my attention was "Momma Zen," a memoir by Karen Maezen Miller, a mother, writer and Zen Buddhist Priest.

I had almost forgotten the author had contacted me and wondered if I might give it a read and a mention on this here little blog. (Color me happy as well as more than a little bit flattered).

You see, dear friends, I am a yoga practitioner who facilitates a free yoga class for mothers and others who want a little stretching, a little meditation and a little co-misery as they try to get through yet another week. But by no means am I a yogi. I don't talk the talk. I don't walk the walk. And I wouldn't know bliss if it walked up and bit me. I don't even think I've had a real "practice" since Ittybit was three months old.

Let's just say until I ripped open the envelope and tore through the introduction, I was more than just a little intimidated. Who wouldn't be? Zen. Buddhist. Priest. Mother. Writer.

Daunting.

As it turns out, the book was right up my alley.

It wasn't preaching so much as it was lending a branch for support. It wasn't expecting me to 'let it all go.'

I knew life had changed for me when Ittybit was born. I didn't really even mourn how. I didn't miss my single self. I was ready to give her the boot. I didn't pretend to know any answers, and I was willing to ask questions. I didn't have great expectations. But that didn't make me any more ready to meet my isolated self. My selfpity self. My holy-crap-why-haven't-you-combed-your-hair self.

There was a time in all this new mommyhood when I was on top of the world. There was a moment that gave me enough confidence to give the class a go. To brush aside self doubt, ask for use of a studio space, hang up some signs and welcome people who might expect better than me.
I read books, I played with Annabel in experimentation. I devised some things we could do together. I jotted down notes. Was this fun? Is she enjoying this? How do I feel about it? I eventually began to equate this new life of mine with breathing. In and out. In and out. I remembered when, for the first time, my breathing really did flow with the poses, and with the world around me. It changed everything. This was motherhood. It was breathing.

And then she turned two and a half.

Then, somehow, I forgot to breathe.

Staring at the book cover, it's black Zen circle dotted with Cherios, I felt my anxiety ease. I skipped through the first few chapters. 'They're about babies and I've already been there,' I think as I look for the section that will undoubtedly enlighten me on how to ensure my child's life now that her three-year-old self has shown up four months early.

Voila!

Chapter 18

Self-Discipline
DON'T DECEIVE YOURSELF

"Somewhere between last night's bath and this morning's diaper, she had transformed into a fanged menace, a horned demon. I reacted at peak throttle. I slapped her arm, hard, and we both crumpled in a flood of fear and tears."

This is what I was looking for. The part where you are stunned by your own intolerance.

"We are deceiving ourselves anytime we view our children as separate from the conditions that we ourselves still largely create: separate from the circumstances of their environment; separate from the state of their minds, their bodies, and bellies; and separate from the monumental influence we as parents impose. We look at them with loathing, these new, inscrutable children, these other children. In this shift of perception, we expel our babies from the unity of we and engage them in a battle in which they can only get stomped. These are the moments when wakefulness waves its puny white flag. If we can wake up, we will see that we cannot separate self from other. We cannot separate restraint from self-restraint. We cannot separate respect from self-respect. We cannot separate discipline from self-discipline. ..."

And hope returns. I can breathe again, at least for the moment. It's not all about me and what I'm doing wrong. It's okay to make mistakes, it's OK to make LOTS of them.

Miller's book is a gentle reminder that life is all about the practice, not the perfect. Now I can relax and read from the beginning.

Eight weeks

Our hearts are breaking.

Maggie, our old-lady, un-Labrador mutt, is dying.

She's been slowing down more noticeably in recent weeks. A nagging cough that's come and gone for a year or more turns out not to be the result of Lyme disease, for which she was treated last month and which left us hoping that her old self would return. And for a while it seemed as if she would bounce back. On vacation with us in Maine she had more energy, but the cough got worse. We assumed (with hope) it was just the heat and excitement.

She was romping into the sea just the same way she's done since she was a little one, yet her eating had all but stopped. Once we returned I noticed that she was refusing to eat solid food. Her bowls of kibble went untouched whereas in Maine they'd gone unfinished. When she snubbed biscuits, I knew something was really wrong.

It didn't take long for her to look like skin and bone. She was, at 78 pounds last year, already only a shadow of her 100-pound youthful self.

The veterinarian performed an x-ray Saturday morning and found the tumor: a mass taking up all the space in her left lung. He said it was pressing on her esophogus and that was causing her inability to eat. He prescribed adult uncoated aspirin, canned foods and mashed potatoes. He said currently she wasn't in pain, and we could take her home and try to keep her comfortable. He guessed she may hang on for eight weeks.

Eight. Weeks. The same amount of time Jed waited in anticipation to take home a little black-lab/suspected-Newfoundland-that-got-over-the-fence and name her Maggie.

I didn't meet them until nearly two years later, but I was smitten with his enormous, amber-eyed pooch.

She was a different dog back then. Fiercely loyal to him, she seemed to loathe women (though not me) but love other dogs.
In the year we lived together in a tiny apartment, she went from she-man-woman-hater to pack dog (with my Madeline) and people lover. Walks were still interesting. No dog escaped the lunging, loud sniffs. Her deep chested, throaty barks even frightened me from time to time. But slowly she began to change. Even her eyes mellowed into a warm brown.

By the time Annabel came along, I was more than a little worried how our now geriatric dogs would react to being placed in yet a new pecking order.

As one would expect, every infant cry sent Maggie lurching out of the room to a quiet corner. When Ittybit began to toddle, Maggie would move out of her way immediately. Relocating herself to a safe room, where no ears were threatened to be pulled or paws mashed under tiny shoes. Until one marvelous day when Ittybit just sat on the poor old gal just as she was trying to nap. Maggie bravely sat there, continuing her fruitless quest for sleep. Since that day, Maggie has seemed to enjoy the gentle attentions of our little girl.

Maggie has migrated from sleeping at Jed's side to the hallway where she can listen for Ittybit sounds, and now, often, I find her in Annabel's room, curled up in a corner where she can watch our little girl sleep.

Such love this girl has given us. And though I still can't believe we are losing her, and likely well before the time predicted, I can only hope the end is a peaceful one and without intervention.

For now, we'll feed her mashed beef and raw bacon, and dote on her with the force of all the love she's given us for nearly 12 years.

Fourth night

"Look Mommy, I fixed it."

Third night

Are there words for this? If there are I don't know them.

Summer school of hard knocks

As promised here's the rundown of lessons learned during our annual pilgrimage to the southern coast of Maine:

1. Traveling at night doesn't make it easier. The thinking was that she'd sleep on the way and make a seamless transition from car to Pack and Play. Not the case. Instead the four-hour rest gave her sufficient energy to stay up until the wee hours of the morning.


2. Swivel chairs are NOT good for toddlers. At the dinner table, when the two-year-old's hunger pangs have been vanquished in the time it takes her parents to eat three green beans, all it takes is a split second for the little miss to fling herself off the chair and head first into the dog bowl. To be more precise, she smacked down chin first into the pottery. "That's gonna leave a mark," is my first thought.

3. As Ittybit cries hysterically and the redness appears, quite possibly the sweetest thing ever to escape the lips of a 22-month-old cousin toddler is simply this: "Bel. Band-Aid."


4. Then again, the NEXT sweetest thing is when it's Ittybit's turn to be comforting after year-younger cuz (an exceedingly athletic child for his age) unceremoniously, not once but twice, finds his little body hurling off the couch and onto a slate floor. "Don't worry, cousin Elliott. It won't hurt too long."

5. I almost forgot about the splinters. There were three to be exact: two in the hand one in the foot, all presumably acquired in a deck climbing trek in Portland. The surgery that took place in Ama Linda's livingroom required several orderlies, who are now mostly hard of hearing (raises hand), and a surgeon (Jed), who may have to hang out a shingle and start a practice. It's a good thing Auntie Saya is a therapist. Her story about her own experience with a green and pussy splinter really did the trick. We think she deserves some serious combat pay since Annabel made her repeat the story several times, and even required her to drive with us to the beach in order to "Say it again," for the three hundredth time.


6. So you think you can get away by yourselves, and from yourselves, on an island for an overnight stay? HA. Not only will you call home four or five times, but you will also find yourselves twiddling your thumbs in the extravagant hotel room, eating stinky cheese and watching "2 Fast, 2 Furious." Even though we managed to have fun despite ourselves, after we left on the ferry and landed in Portland, got our car out of hock and headed home, I discovered I'd left my wallet in the hotel room. Typical me. I remember holding it in my paws as I was packing my ONE tini tiny bag and thinking, "Whew, this would have sucked if I forgot this."

7. Annabel has the capacity to lie AND feel guilty about it. It's apparently a "pre-school" thing. While we were on an island and I was in the process of losing all my identification, she was playing with a contraband stick Ama took away from her. When I gash appeared on her hip later and Ama Linda asked her if she'd been playing with the stick she immediately and convincingly said "No. I'm okay." Later though she felt guilty enough that she did fess up.

8. Again with the repetition. When we called from the road for the fifth time, Auntie Saya mentioned that the last time we rang the house for an update of her progress, she spent a considerable amount of time recapping the conversation for Annabel. "Let's just say she knows EVERYTHING she did today."

9. Teach kids to sit down in the canoe. It's probably not the wisest of parents who teach them to walk along the midline mid-river.

10. DO NOT put lobsters in a tub and show them to a bath-phobic toddler. To be filed under the heading "What was I thinking?".


11. Ocean, waves, hermit crabs that have invaded this year ... Not her cup of tea.

12. Lobster cookies, on the other hand, are yummy. They go nicely with "hot milk" and cheesy buns (Annie's Cheddar Bunnies). And if nibbled precisely, will last all day and have enough left over to give a claw to the cuz.

13. There is 0 fiber in our cereal. ZERO. ZILCH.

14. Mike Wazowski (from Monster's Inc.) has horns.

15. Jed does dishes. (Related to a wager over #14.)

16. There is such a thing as penis puppetry It's a stage show AND a book. (I will not divulge how I learned this.)


17. Freeport, this year, was not a foreign word meaning more expensive that the real shit. I backed into a $5 pant sale in pretty much every store I shopped. As Jed would (and did) say, it was nickel piss your pant night at the outlets.

18. Pineapples start frothing when they go bad. Just what we need: RABID produce.

19. The cheap diapers are so NOT worth it. The tape on the right side of Target brand diapers SUCKS. SUCKS. (Thank goodness for duct tape.)

20. There is NOTHING better than Ama Linda's wild blueberry bush. Oh wait, I take that back. Her raspberry bushes are THE BEST and just the right height for little hunter gatherers. And for after-dinner entertainment? Have you tried listening to the birds? Annabel, Cousin Elliott and Ama Linda recommend it highly.

A test of the emergency parental sanity system ...

We interrupt this vacation recap with the following public service message:



DO NOT LET YOUR KIDS GROW UP.

I REPEAT: DO. NOT. LET. YOUR. KIDS. GROW. UP.

Today I bought a toddler bed ($49, K-Mart) without even considering the consequences.

I knew it was time; she had climbed out of her crib on several occasions in the last few months, she even broke the top railing in an anger soaked rage trying to get out of her container. Yet, all the while I was assembling the beast, reading the directions as a last resort of course, and thanking the stars above that she was napping in her crib so I could swear unfettered for the hour it took me to turn 17 thousand pieces into one small bed, I never once considered that this milestone for her means a whole new world of terror for me.

I found out at bedtime, which took two hours longer, she didn't want to go to bed; she wanted her crib back (which is now disassembled and in a storage room downstairs); there were monsters; she was afraid of something; she wanted me to sleep in her bed with her.

She even visited my room, all by herself, four times. And each time I checked on her, she was sleeping on the floor three feet away from the bed.

We. Are. Doomed.

So now I can't sleep. Jed's on the road and I'm afraid she'll go sleepwalking down the stairs. (Jed took down the gate so we could have the floors refinished), and if she locks her bedroom door as an experiment I'm nearly 100 percent sure I'll have to get the fire department here to get her out.

So there it is, a turning point inside a turning point. School's coming up next month. *sigh.

And now back to our regularly scheduled programming; Tomorrow, if I get some sleep, I hope to tell you more about the Maine excursion, which will heretofore be known as the school of hard knocks. ...

V-A-C-A-T-I-O-N: It's a family affair

we are family
Originally uploaded by toyfoto.

"Annabel, why don't we let cousin Elliott swing with us on the hammock."

"No. I don't want cousin Elliott on the swing."

"But he's your cousin. He's family. Do you know what that means?"

"Yes. ... I'm stuck swinging wit him."

Oddly enough, the soundtrack for the rest of the day was "I'm so happy to be stuck with you."

Hold on to your boogie boards ...

yellow sea
Originally uploaded by toyfoto.

My husband's birthday is right around the corner, and as is our custom we will be spending our week's vacation 'round about that time with Jed's mother in Maine (provided that my dad is A-OK and he is). Which means if all goes well (and it did), we are leaving tonight after work.

As my gift to him I am not taking my computer.

My love for Jed is SO great, that I plan on leaving you for a week.

Therefore, I'd like you to have my best photograph from last summer's trip to admire while I'm away. Hopefully I'll have captured another magic moment to upload upon my return. Although I love my husband (and his family) enough to unplug, I don't love any of them enough to abandon the camera.

* Just one last little thing before I go: Annabel put on her shorts yesterday ALL BY HERSELF. And not on her head, either. By the time we return I fear she will be ready for university.

F*ing Hospitals

My father went to the ER tonight with chest pain.

According to my mom, he had been experiencing chest and back pain, which he neglected to mention to anyone, throughout the day, starting at 5 a.m. The pain eventually settled in his left (?) arm, and sometime this evening, when he got around to telling her, she took him to the emergency room.

They performed a CT scan, which showed some plaque but no obvious blockages. She said they also ran some other tests, the results of which didn't indicate anything serious, save some seriously high blood pressure mom insists has to have been the result of a faulty cuff. They gave him nitroglycerin and his pain subsided but they decided kept him for observations. Mom thinks he'll likely be released tomorrow, although he'll have a stress test and (she hopes) an echo cardiogram.

I can't get him on the phone because the hospital turns them off at night.

"I really think he's alright, Siobhan. Try not to worry."

So, I'm trying not to worry.

U P D A T E
7 a.m., Friday. Phones turned back on:
Ring, ring. ...
DAD: Hi, how's it going?
ME: How are you
DAD: I'm fine. I think I'm fine. They haven't really found anything. No more pain since they gave me the nitroglycerin yesterday afternoon. ... so what's Annabel doing?

U P D A T E
10 a.m., Friday. Hospital:
Tests not as good this morning. A second doctor, the first recommended catheterization to test for blockages, was saying catherization was his recommendation as well. So at 1 p.m., dad's getting his heart muscle scoped.

*Side note: Annabel won't make papa a card while he is in the hosispill. "He's be ok, mama. He's be ok."

** Along side the side note: Left the house like an nutbag this morning. Couldn't find my wallet (thought I'd left it at a restaurant last night) and was on the verge of freaking out. I dropped Annabel off at Yaya's (she's back from the Cape) and went to the hospital. When I called Lori at noon, she told me Ittybit was playing dollhouse and when it came time to get into the car, she yelled at the mommy doll: "DON'T FORDET YOUR WALLET. DON'T FORDET THAT, OK?"

That was almost as good as last night when Annabel got home and saw the living room all stripped bare and covered in painting supplies. (We were planning on painting the floors and walls before we go to Maine).

ITTYBIT: Did you say you're sorry, Daddy? Say you're sorry.
JED: Wha ... for what?
ITTYBIT: You made a mess.

U P D A T E - NOT
3:30 p.m., sitting at my desk. Drumming my fingers. Biting my nails.
The procedure was scheduled for 1 p.m. and the phone has been chirping the "I-have-been-turned-off" ring since then. No news. ... Some folks might think no news is good news, but in my world no news is no news.

3:45 p.m. Evidently he's "having the procedure," and they've relocated him. A very nice man in the former room on the former phone told me so, and the nice lady at the information desk gave me the new number. Ring, ring. ... ring ...

U P D A T E
5:30 p.m. Car on the way to the hospital:
Ring, ring. ... ring ...
Hi. I'm fine. They put two stents in one vein. I'm very lucky.
Go to Maine.

Finding safety in a place without walls

My world just got smaller.

Gail Edwin Fielding (flickr folk will know her as Gail on the Web) author of Gail at Large, visited us on the last leg of her impromptu late-summer pilgrimage to the Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome to be with the memory of her husband, David.

Gail is the person I credit with taking me away from the mindless escapism of the anonymous Internet and showing me that my 'imaginary friends' were real.

Her public accounting of David's devastating diagnosis of and subsequent treatment for an aggressive type of lung cancer, and her hauntingly beautiful writing of the horrific experience of watching a wildfire disease devastate her strapping, young love, pulled me out of myself and my self-imposed isolation and brought me to a new understanding of this place without walls: the Internet.

Don't think I wasn't nervous to meet her in person. I was petrified. Would I be myself? Would we have anything to say? I read her writing daily and yet, she is by conventional terms a stranger to me. Would I be my usual deer in the headlights self; better in letters than in person?

It didn't take long before she was talking openly and freely. Her ease allowed me to relax and follow her lead. Before I knew it, it was three a.m. and we're sitting around our rag-tag kitchen island talking about anything and everything; laughing and crying, and sharing a tiny lifetime of memories.

This morning, in my wine-belly haze of energized exhaustion, I could only think of how ugly and clunky I find the term 'BLOG.' But I can't deny the power of it. And I no longer feel a need to defend it. Suffice it to say there is wisdom out there for those who care to see it, and proving it to those who cast aspersions is just a waste of time. This medium has such an amazing ability to allow thoughts and fears and hopes and struggles to work themselves into understanding. It is nothing short of miraculous to me how winning battles and losing wars, and taking control of it all in the first-person voice can slowly heal and inspire.

I think most of us 'cynical folk,' who lament the 21st century as if it were a disease tearing us further apart and solidifying our differences, don't always see how it is possible to meet and forge bonds in total isolation. And in a real way that isolation disappears.

I have never been more convinced that we are rewriting our own histories. And this adopted electronic format helps us organize our thoughts, and categorize, index and recall them as if they were star maps in a fresh, unlit sky. But it is still merely a vehicle by which we can reach out from our solitude and reverse the disconnect.

I just have to say, today, and for the first time in a long time, it just feels good to be in the world. And I now understand hope just a little better.

The PAPA report: A telephone ballet in three parts

While Lori is away on vacation, the Yaya report will be replaced, momentarily, with the PAPA report: a grandfatherly look into the care and feeding of a recently persnickety ittybit.

PHONE: Ring, ring ... ring ...

Ama: Hello, have you heard from your father? He just called, he's probably going to stay at your house all day. She doesn't want to leave, sleep or eat. Just thought I'd warn you.

Sometimes She's Schwan: Thanks, mom. I'll give him a call.

PHONE: Ring, ring ... ring ...

Papa: Hi! Hey what's in that potato salad? It's delicious. Is there ginger in there? Annabel won't eat it.

Sometimes she's Schwan: It has some mango chutney and a little lime juice. How's everything going?

Papa: Well it's really good. Annabel's not going to starve but she's only eaten about six spoonfuls of cereal and five cherry tomatoes. She wants more, but I don't know if that's such a good idea.

I made her a pancake from the leftover batter you made yesterday morning, but she wanted cottage cheese in it. I suppose Jed just puts the batter in the pan and adds cottage cheese to it, because when I took some out and mixed in a bowl, she seemed to think that was the wrong way to do it.

She didn't want any of it once it was done, but I coaxed her into taking a bite by asking her if my pancakes were as good as her dad's.

She said: 'Yours are better, papa.'

I think she just wanted to get me off her back because she wouldn't eat any more of it. Oh, she is a panic.

Sometimes she's Schwan: Oh my god, you're not kidding. That is NOT good news. That means that she's probably plotting how to manipulate her way into later bed-times and finagle an allowance. She'll probably make Oreo cookies her mid-day meal. There will never be another nap, ever! We. Are. All. Doomed.

Papa Oops. Gotta go, now she wants to read her books and watch 'The Nutcracker.'

Sometimes she's Schwan: PLEASE DAD, call me if she tries to choreograph anything or starts a grass-roots campaign of any kind. Don't, for the love of god, let her collect signatures from the neighbors. OK?

U P D A T E

PHONE: Ring, ring ... ring ...

Sometimes she's Schwan: Hello?

Papa: Listen, did you just call here?

Sometimes she's Schwan: No? Why. How's everything going?

Papa: Oh, not so good. Has she ever climbed out of her crib?

Sometimes she's Schwan: Yes. That's why we're getting her a toddler bed when we get back from vacation.

Papa: Well I put her in bed but she wasn't really happy about it. She told me she wanted milk, and that she wasn't going to drink it just hold it, so I went and got some. I heard this bang and then a thump and then she's standing at the door. She wasn't crying although she said she got hurt and pointed to her knee. I didn't see anything and she got back into bed. Now she's sound asleep. Really sound asleep.

Sometimes she's Schwan: Don't worry too much about it dad, her floor is carpeted and she won't likely do it again. She seems to only climb out when she's mad and doesn't want to take a nap. When she wakes up she'll just call for you.

Papa: Oh ... she just rolled over.

Sometimes she's Schwan: Dad? Are you peeking in at her?

Papa: No. I'm sitting on the couch in her room. I didn't want her to climb out again.

On a clear day I can see forever

Dear Annabel,

This isn't about your milestone, really, it's about mine.

I yelled at you the other day in a way I've never yelled before.

It wasn't the happy, over-loud play yell we practice as we bounce on beds or run through the grocery store. Nor was it the exasperated hiss pushed through closed teeth that has started to creep into my voice now that you are well into your testing TWO-year.

Sadly, it was a scream; an all-out, no-words vocal blast that ricocheted through the house and sent the dogs in two different directions. It was a lost-control-and-couldn't-get-it-back, wanted-to-cry-but-didn't howl that sought to break windows with the sheer force of its pitch.

In the instant that followed, all things stopped. And there was silence.

You had been pulling me around with a measuring tape you'd wrapped around my leg. You were pretending I was a horse and you were taking me for a ride. Up and down the hallway we went. It was the same measuring tape that had brought us such joy a few hours earlier.

But I had been tired all day. I was tired of the game. I was tired of playing with you. Tired of begging you to nap, be still or eat something. I was tired and I was sad and lonely and miserable. I was also coming to grips with something I hadn't let myself think before that very moment: 'You may be an only child, not by choice.' And when I put away your crib at the end of the summer, replacing it with a "big-girl" bed, I may as well put away my childbearing days along with it.

As you looked up at me, your eyes were huge but tears didn't fill them. You let the measuring tape drop and you backed away. You didn't want me to come near you. Who could blame you?

But here I am, your mother, a screaming banshee who inwardly wonders whether you need me at all. Knowing that you do, but feeling that you don't. You are such an independent little girl in so many ways. Every "I love you" that escapes your lips is unsolicited, a precious gift that refuses to be forced.

My apology was as quick to come over me as the outburst itself. Patience is something I have rarely lost with you, even in the most trying times. I sat down, put my head in my hands, and cried. Really cried. What goes through me, along with the waves of guilt, is the memories of all the absent times. And not just those hours we spend away from each other. You at Lori's and me at work. The times when all I want is for you to sleep, or play by yourself and leave me be.

You side-stepped the measuring tape, now abandoned on the floor, and came to me. "That's OK, mama. That's OK. You wanna have a possissil with me?"

I went to the kitchen to get the pops and you climbed into your chair.

As I opened the freezer door a photograph slipped from its tenuous letter-magnet mooring and floated to the floor. It was of you almost a year ago. Your little-girl looks were not as chiseled, your elbows and knees still beautifuly dimpled and sweetly ringed in baby flesh. Your hair was just wisps barely visible in the print.

I missed that baby girl; a girl that, squinting through the viewfinder a year ago, I thought was big. I looked up from the photograph and saw you waiting at the table for your treat. I knew that next year at this time you will be bigger still, and if I'm not careful I will be the same person I am right now, lamenting the baby you used to be and missing out.

Perhaps, in some strange way, it's good that I yelled. Perhaps it woke me up. I don't want to sleepwalk through any more years.

Love and endless apologies,
Mommy

measuring tape

measuring tape
Originally uploaded by toyfoto.

We are expecting a special guest on Tuesday and Annabel is all atwitter. Asking each morning upon awaking, "Who's tumming, mama?" just so she can hear me say the name. "I dotta do fis the bed," she says, pointing her finger in the direction of the guest room.

Instead of wanting me to follow her she demands I get the measuring tape, the tool she needs to fix the bed. I can't find the one she wants -- the heavy, square metal carpentry one her father lets her play with -- so I get the minature cloth tape from my cosmetics kit. The one I incessantly use to measure my waist, though I like to think one day I'll use it to measure housewares and furniture (before I buy on impulse).

It occurs to me as she runs off to the place I refer to as The guest prison -- a 7' x 10' room with a trundle bed, a dresser and a child's chair standing in as a bedside table -- that she may have innkeeping in her blood, at least from her father's side.

Jed spent his early years at The Captain's Walk in Kennebunk, an old seafarer's house his parents had bought and his mother ran as a bed and breakfast.

To this day 'Ama Linda' makes common meals taste decidely uncommon. Tasty fish encrusted in slivered almonds and breads pressed with pumpkin seeds. The corners of her sheets are always perfectly creased and her whites are always bright white.

In the room, she wants me to hold the measuring tape while she "fixes" the bed by drawing the line up to the pillow. She smooths it out and says: "There! That's perfect now."

A wrinkle appears in the sheet and she crinkles her brow. She pulls at the edge and it disappears. Now it's perfect.

I turn my head and look at the tufts of dog hair carried along the hallway floor by the breeze of the fan. I am reminded: This is yet another trait she doesn't get from me.

Meet Fudgy

She promised to take care of him and love him for always. Then she named him Fudgy.

How could I not buy the little critter; the first toy she's assigned a name?

Of course, when we got to the car she tossed him on the floor. ... "Uh-oh. I'm sorry, Fudgy. I din't mean it."

Always on the lookout

Farmers' market Saturday. We get all gussied up in the T-shirts we slept in (turned inside-out of course), 2 inches of sunscreen and our most comfy comfortable shoes, before we make our way to the village square. It's like Christmas (or as Annabel would say, Trissmass). We have some idea what will be under the vendors' tents, but there's always some surprises.


Along with the usual mixed greens, carrots, berries, corn and potatoes (I didn't mention tomatoes because we're growing them this year, miracle of miracles, I know) there's always something outside the usual checklist that catches my eye.

Beets: Can't say that I'm much of a beet fan, but I recently attended a backyard cookout in which the host had ground up beets and added them to the hamburger meat. Let me tell you, there's something amazing about a purple burger. *Annabel didn't think so, however. She demanded "torn on the tob" instead.

Edamame: A furry, fresh soybean you cook in the shell. Salted they taste A-mazing. *Annabel hates them. Evidently she's still not over the time I pureed the little buggers, froze them in ice cube trays and switched the peas she was used to eating with the more phosphorescent soy. She probably thought I had mulched Kermit.

Turnips: Tried 'em raw. Not my favorite. Cooked, they seem edible. "Annabel hates them. Tried 'em, screwed up her face, spit them out.

Baby bok choy: "What am I supposed to do with that?"
"I don't know, Jed. Perhaps you should consult your bible, The Joy of Cooking. Why do you let me get vegetables, anyway? You KNOW I'm a carnivore. I don't know anything about the veg." *Rotted in the fridge.

Not in The Book, But at Your Service ...

Editing
Originally uploaded by toyfoto.

There are times when I think I'd make a stunning children's book editor. Oh sure, my copyediting skills may not be top notch, I have no idea where commas go, I don't always catch spelling errors and tense and verb agreement aren't my forte, yet I feel pretty confident I would not let a book about potty training go to press without a little ink paid to handwashing.

Perhaps it's just my neuroses flairing up, but ever since we got the Plop book, It has kind of freaked me out that this sweetly drawn little manual doesn't include a sink for washing after the deed.

I've been editing the missing piece into our readings, but it wasn't until yesterday when she asked me 'where's the sink' that I drew one into the storyline. Of course I tried to emulate other sinks the illustrator had drawn in the Brush book for consistency.

So here's a few delurking questions for all 7 or so of you, my fine readers: How do you edit your children's books? Do you skip the part about the Evil Queen demanding the heart of Snow White; do you fly past the dark and scary forest? Do you ignore the trip to the ice cream store or draw in vegetables alongside the baked goods?
Do you ever feel a little guilty about censoring?

It's really too hot for this ...

But where's the fun in a cold cereal, fruit and juice morning?

A day with dad ...

pretty dress
Originally uploaded by toyfoto.

With Yaya on vacation this week and next, I imagine Annabel will be popping in at some unexpected places. She'll be visiting Amah and Papa for the most part, but today she's at home with Daddy.

By noon he'd already called twice.

"When does she take a nap usually?
For how long?
What should we do for an adventure?
Nevermind, I'll think of something."

I can tell already. This will be fun.


U P D A T E
It was too hot to do much of anything but eat posipples, draw on the walls (on paper of course) and watch MOOOvies.
It was a blissfully unproductive day.

Thankfully, there are no pishers of this ...

This morning I woke up to a bear. And not the cute, cuddly Hunny-eating Pooh kind, neither.

This ursine apparition was the nothing's-going-to-make-me-happy, no-matter-how-many-books-you-read or how-many-episodes-of-Clifford-you-let-me-watch because I-just-had-a-nightmare kind.

Of course, she can't tell me about her distress because A) She's not sure of this "nightmare" thing and B) she doesn't remember why she's upset.

This was a just your average, run-of-the-mill, stand-in-the-middle-of-the-room-and-wail MASTERPIECE.

Eat breakfast? NO!
Get dressed? NO!
Read a book? NO!
Go back to bed and get up when you feel better? NO!
Maybe the potty would help? NO!NO!NO!

So I did what any at-wit's-end, 20-minutes-until-I-have-to-leave-for-work mommy might do; we went to the car wash.

What is this?
It's like an amusement park ride.
What's an asmuseman part ride?
Nevermind, it will be fun. It's like a shower for the car.
Oh ... it's dark in here. .. ooooh there's soap and water. ... and we not getting wet, mama! This IS fun!
Let's do it again, okay?

I just feel stuck sometimes

Her new hero, Pat Ferri of Wreckage-O-Rama, gave Annabel a clown nose of her very own. And though she won't wear it she also won't let it out of her sight. Her favorite thing to do with her "nose," is to hang it from the dimmer switch in the dining room, and use it as she might a sling shot.

Often the motion of drawing it back by the bulbous red orb and letting go doesn't bring about the desired result. Instead of flying through the air and smacking me square in the eye, the gag appendage just wraps around the post tighter. No laughter ensues.

That's kind of how I felt this weekend when dinner and a movie turned into dinner and a documentary.

Jed WANTED to see this film, and I wanted to AVOID this film, but in the end An Inconvenient Truth won out.

See my husband and I are on the same page when it comes to the science of global warming. We each believe that the way we live now is killing the planet. We each believe there are things we can do as individuals to mimize our impact on this Earth. But where we disagree is our personal reaction to the information as presented.

Even before the film, Jed was ready to install solar panels and a wood-fired boiler to reduce our dependance on oil. Even before the film, we were shutting off lights and recycling. With the cost of petroleum through the roof, we've been cutting out unnecessary travel. He's even considering the consequences of his trip into Chatham with Annabel for an ice cream.

But where he is seeking out the things we can do, I look at what we can't do and what we won't be doing: We can't give up Jed's big diesel engine rigs, after all they are how he makes his money; I am still going to drive more than 50 miles a day (after all, that's how I make my living and keep our health benefits); We are still going to be burning wood, it alleviates our dependence on oil but it still puts carbon into the air; we are still going to live in a suburb where driving is necessary for virtually all trips.

In a nutshell, he is optimistic and I, apparently, throw in the towel.

I don't think that my shutting off the lights and deciding not to go to yoga on Sundays (75 miles round-trip) will do as much to save the planet as the people at the TOP finding alternatives to gasoline-powered cars, not to mention coal- and oil-fired energy plants.

But it's not that I'm throwing up my hands and saying "global warming be damned, pass the Hummer." It's not as if I were saying just let the lights burn day and night. I just think putting the onus on the individual is in the same family as "Just Say No" was in the War on Drugs. It just ain't enough.

So as we bickered all the way home, I just felt more an more helpless. "Look at the mess we're in," I scream. "We have people in our own country who are still homeless a year after Katrina; we have a government that squanders and misuses it's place at the helm and then tells us we need less of it; we have corporations guaranteed individual rights and there are people who can't afford to eat decent food, let alone buy a hybrid car. Why are we pushing hybrids anyway? Why aren't we looking past oil altogether? Why? because there's still enough oil for the people in power to make a killing. They don't care that it won't last forever or that it's killing the planet because it will last for now and when the planet implodes they won't be around to clean it up."

Maybe I'm missing the point. In all reality, I'm sure I am. But I can't help but think the world needs people like both of us: I'll be the letter-writer and he'll be the one who turns off the lights. And we will tip the balance eventually.

Of course, as we agree that we are, in truth, of the same mind when it comes to the issue at hand, I can't help but fume at the nice evening lost in argument.

"THIS WOULDN'T HAVE HAPPENED AT ALL, YOU KNOW, IF WE'D SEEN 'THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA'."

Welcome back, Ubermale

As Matt Lauer heralds the end of the Metrosexual Male in some fluff piece on morning TV, and my husband strutted around the kitchen, a cock in celebration, I could help but cheer for his return, too.

You see, I secretly hope the return of the retrosexual means the fashion of "DAD as the NEW MOM" is on its way out, too.

Don't get me wrong, I love that my husband is the primary cook and that he's as comfortable with Annabel as he is with his soccer pals, it's just that I think society's urge to make him new-age-sensitive-dad is sometimes making it unnecessarily difficult for me to be a mom.

I got to thinking about this as a result of a bulletin board posting about one husband in particular, whose need to share in the experience of parenthood 50/50; even-steven; 'I am father, hear me roar,' from DAY ONE was tearing apart this family not yet delivered. Instead of a laudable urge to be an involved parent and protector, he wanted equal opportunity for his family tree to root at the hospital and in their home because it played to his thoughts of what was fair and equitable. 'Why should MY family be turned away? Am I not important? This isn't just happening to YOU you know, It's happening to me, too."

While he fought for his parents to have equal and unfettered access, his wife's emotional well-being crumbled as the clocked ticked down on her gestation.

I wanted to be snide. I wanted to put this man in his place with a sledgehammer. This new-age-sensitive-man who feels that the woman he married is dissing the woman who raised him and usurping his rightful place as a 50-percent equity parent in the birthing room. I wanted him to realize, that an ounce of sperm does not a equal partner make when it comes to pushing out a phesant-shaped someone from a hole roughly the diameter of a lemon.

I formulate a list of things I want him to understand:

1. No one is going to be peering into your vagoogoo every half-hour to see how big it is.

2. No one is going to cut your vagoo so a baby can come out after hours of painful labor, then stitch it back up.

3. No one is going to cut open your abdomen and take the baby by force if numbers one and two have to be abandoned.

4. YOUR hormones won't fluctuate uncontrollably, making it 1,000 times more difficult to act human for at least a few days. Being NICE to the mother-in-law isn't going to be in you're wife's ability. Sorry, but no matter how well they get along normally, civility won't be possible.

5. Unless you have incontenance troubles, it is NOT likely that you will soil the sheets or vomit during the course of the labor.

6. You will not be having a baby sucking on your tits for the next six months (not to mention RIGHT now when it's new to the two of them and there is a steep learning curve). ANY Helpful suggestions, be they nursing, swaddling or diapering, will feel like admonishments. I reiterate. Civility won't be within her reach, it's NOT her FAULT it's HORMONAL.

7. WHY, if you love her and want to be a family, would you PURPOSELY make it MORE difficult to have that bond? Your wife DOESN'T HAVE THE SAME relationship with your mom as she does with her own. And SHE is going to PHYSICALLY go through a rollercoster ride of not-so-pleasant things? Why on Earth would you even consider making that HARDER?

Let me explain more from a personal standpoint: As a pre-natal and post-natal patient, we women undergo some seriously daunting hormonal challenges, and we are likely to be in a situation that makes us feel terribly vulnerable. For instance, I'm not ashamed of my body, but I don't want to be exposed in front of my husband's father. I don't want to vomit in front of my mother-in-law. I still had a need for dignity and privacy, especially when these are people I see at holidays. The last thing I want to think about at Christmas dinner is whether my father-in-law saw my vagoogoo or if I swore a string of explatives in the direction of my mother-in-law while I was being possessed by the demon hormones.

We don't want to believe we, in this day and age, have roles that are gender based. But I assure you, we do. There will always be exceptions. There will always be circumstances that buck the norm, but for the first few months, usually it's mom at center stage.

I think what's happening is that men have gotten confused about their roles, and fear that if they don't assert themselves somewhere in the family early on they won't have a place other than the distant, breadwinner they might remember their fathers to be. The problem is that they want 50 percent of the baby and not 50 percent of the family. Sometimes they want to have a say, even to the extent of being contrary, just to have a voice.

It comes down to this: Perhaps a reason more men are flexing their parent muscles in the wrong direction is that they are physically unable to tend to the needs of newborns the way birth mothers can. Here the "OTHER" parent often feels unnecessary. And that, I think comes from their own insecurities rather than immediate external sources. Patience and understanding, and trust that the other "OTHER" parent isn't going out of their way to undermine you is what family building is all about, isn't it?

So I've revised my snide list to something that might be more helpful:

WHAT TO DO WHEN YOU ARE A NEW DAD:

REALIZE THAT YOUR MOM AND DAD AREN'T UNLOVED or SECOND CLASS FAMILY. But don't compare them to HER parents at a time like this. They didn't raise her, nor do they have the same feelings of unconditional love for her that they have for you. This is a potentally life-threating situation, even in this day and age, and it's only NATURAL for a daughter to want her parents. Have your parents stay in a hotel, let them visit occasionally and then make them understand that your wife and you need time to bond with each other and the new soul. There is a lifetime when it won't be as difficult to show off the kid. Why risk bad feelings that could last its duration? It's time to protect your new family from bad feelings, and realize what it's really all about.

MAKE SURE RELATIVES REALIZE that while their advice MAY be welcome in the future, your wife has instincts and you need to protect her ability to exercise them. Hold off on dispensing pearls of wisdom until asked for them.

ACTIVE HELP: Make dinners, do laundry, wash dishes, change diapers. Make sure mom has the opportunity to eat, have liquids and bathe. Let her sleep a little longer. Be vigilant about not allowing guests to overstay their visits. There will be plenty of opportunities down the road, when things aren't so hectic.

I guess that list still doesn't sound too manly. But rest assured, to your wife you'll never look like a bigger man.

Pride and prejudice

ITTYBIT: Mama, wiwl you tum ere. I dot to show you sompin. I colored sompin fo you.

SOMETIMES SHE'S SHWAN: On the wall? Oh, baby, we don't write on walls. Only paper. Ok? Only Paper.

ITTYBIT: Oh. I'm sorry. I done know what I'm doing.

She's a bad, bad, mean mommy ... like me

And so, it has come to pass that Ittybit, Tigger, Eyore, (Raspberry Bear) Pooh and Lullabee have finally sat down for nice meal together. But all was not cosy in The Hundred-Acre Wood. As insects are wont to do, Lullabee's table manners tore the evening assunder.

"You hafta eat your dinner. ...
No. No. No. Not like that. Like this. Here, watch.
You are not making me very happy, Lullabee. You need a time out."

An eye-opening experience

"My daddy was a baby, too," Ittybit tells the nice woman who takes our paperwork and looks it over for any spaces left blank. "That's right. He was a baby, too," she adroitly replies, rustling through the sheets, not finding the small card: "For Emergencies, Contact ... "

"Oh that one always gets caught on the bottom of the envelope," she chuckles.

As I fish it out from underneath the flap and hand it over, I think about all the things Ittybit's statement doesn't explain. It doesn't explain that her father slept in the cradle that she slept in when we brought her home from the hospital, or how wide her eyes got when he told her the story. It doesn't explain how miraculous such a notion must be to her that she's announcing it to the world in six itty bity words -- my, daddy, was, a, baby, too.

It also doesn't explain the mind boggling reality that Ittybit is now, officially, a pre-schooler. And that, come September, she'll be attending the same nursery school I attended as a tot.

She's looking forward to school, I could tell. Her eyes were as wide as mine as I looked around at the tiny chairs and tables, feeling like a giant remembering being a lilliputian.

She runs and plays with the toys as I speak with the intake coordinator about what our new roles will be as pre-school parents. The school is a cooperative, which means the tuition is reduced for parents who pitch in to assist in the classroom, fundraise or maintain the property as needed.

The intake coordinator's eyes open wide when she sees what I've checked off on the "expertise" portion of the form.

"You have a power washer? Oh that's great. That's wonderful. We were worried about that this year. We have to clean all the playthings in the backyard and no one seems to have any abilitiles in that department. We were sure we'd have to hire a professional."

And off we go to check out the yard, which is filled with all manner of ride-on toys, climbing towers, slides and playhouses. There is even a real fiberglass boat sunk into ground at an angle that makes it look as if it were sailing an imaginary sea. Again, Ittybit's eyes bulge from their sockets as she stands stock-still, not knowing in which direction to hurl her tiny body first.

The DAD's eyes lose their usual almond shape and turn into saucers, too, as he surveys all the tiny repairs that need attention. "Something tells me I'm going to be very popular around here."

Laugh tracks

A friend of ours, Pat, is planning to perform at the Fringe Festival in Edinburgh next month, and he wanted me to make a slick magazine advertisement for his show. So, last night we spent an hour in the "studio" trying to get the story straight and make it look funny.

Annabel watched the photo shoot holding Milton's red nose and laughing as Rory got pummeled, but good, by Phillipe, the gay dancer, over the wily charms of the fair Helga.

"You funny, Pat."

Clearly, this is an improvement from the day before at a planning session when she demanded he BE funny. (Never ever, under any circumstances, tell a comedian to be funny ... bad juju.)

Jed helped out with perspective by wearing a white Tyvek suit and taking part in the "fight scene." When I processed the pictures as she slept, using a little Photoshop magic to expel Jed and paste Rory in his place, and showed her the results in the morning she was not convinced I had succeeded:

"That's Phillipe's beating up my daddy," she said pointing to Rory in the shorts.

"No honey, they are all Pat now. I took daddy out.

"No, dis is daddy. Pat's Funny. Daddy's not funny."

THE YAYA REPORT
What's happening at the other mom's house ...

Ladies and Gentlemen ...
LAAAAY DEES and GEN. TLE. MEN ...
Ladies AND GENTLE ... MEEEEEN

She's practicing intonations, just in case Ringling Bros. calls.

Next weekend we're taking her to a strip joint

I'm having a bit of trouble with the appropriate-inappropriate dynamic as it pertains to toddlers. When my husband's right eyebrow arches upward, I know I've dropped the ball and it's rolling away faster than you can say: "That's prolly not a good I-D-er."

Some folks outside of our household have already expressed surprise at the following parenting faux pas:

• We take Annabel to the pub on a weekly basis.
• She has eaten cake for breakfast on more than one occasion.
• We let her watch Shrek (even though the characters are rude to each other). Ditto for Pinky and the Brain (brain, brain, brain).

I try to answer her questions as accurately as possible, although I often slip up with things having to do with science, mainly because I don't think my answers are adequate. When she says she doesn't want it to be dark out, I watch the hairs on Jed's neck stand up as I tell her the sun has to nap sometime, otherwise it couldn't shine as brightly.
And so, another note for her future therapist must go on the permanent record:

"Mama? You wanna see a stulpture, mama? Tum on."

Art Omi's Open Day. Thirty artists from around the world spend three weeks in this adult summer camp making art that will help them make the transition from emerging to established in the art world.

Every year there's something that makes your head spin: A memorable one a few years ago came from a woman from Tokyo who stained Kotex mini pads with a red substance and affixed them to the wall of her studio. That was fun.

This year's eye-popping works were life-sized, papier mache body casts of people writhing in pain. One showed its head exploding from the back. Another had two men in a pose that appeared ... to be ... well.

... Damn Jed for foisting this studio visit off on me.

"Mommy what is that man doing with the baby?"

"Uhm ... that's not a baby, baby. It's another man. And-what-he's-doing-is-called-fallatio. ... Oh look, lemonade ... Let's go get some, OK?"

"Mom said he was doing fat-a-pio, daddy!"

"O ....K ... You explain fellatio but you tell her the sun takes a nap? What's up with that?"

Yeah ... Tune in next week when we'll be taking ittybit to a strip joint. ... Can you say 'They're playing my T-H-O-N-G?'

So much for culture.

Heritage, Part II

All she wanted to do was dance with Cinderella. From the moment she woke up this morning until the lights dimmed on her first live theater experience, all her thoughts were dancing with the princess. She even washed her face, picked out her prettiest dress and planned on wearing her purple "slippers." As serendipity would have it, one was even missing.

Oh the questions:
"Can we taked the errplane, mama? "
"Can I dance wit her? I wanna dance wit Cinderedda."
"Where are we? What is this place? Who are all these people?"
"Where is Cinderedda?"

And the comments:
"Hey, they ripped my chicket."
"I wanna sit with you, Mama."
"Hey. I tant see. TURN ON DE LIGHTS."
"FAIRY DOD-MOTHER."
"He's a good guy, Mom. De Prince(ess) is a good guy."

So, in addition to sleeping in a crib her father slept in (something she understands and now informs me of daily) and being enrolled in a pre-school I attended as a tot, Annabel has now been in the audience of a theatre I went to for the first time when I was a few years older than she is now (I saw Sleeping Beauty). And no. It wasn't the same. After the show, there were so few audience members they'd invite us on stage and we'd all dance. I even remember the rust-colored corduroys I wore as I held hands with Beauty and skipped a circle around the stage. Storybooks come alive, it seemed, just for me.

These days the audience is packed. Wall to wall children, and taking a turn on the dance floor with the star of the show just isn't practical. Instead they gather outside to sign autographs. We file outside and wait in crazy lines that overlap and move to the left when we weren't looking. As I stood there pining for Annabel to have the experience of my childhood, she broke free from me and, holding her pencil and her autograph book against her chest, tunneled her way through legs and elbows right up to Cinderella.

"My name is Annabel. Tan you sign this peas?"

It was a remarkable display of tenacity for such an otherwise shy little girl. But as her idol signed, I could see this new nerve drain away.

"I wanna da dance with Cinderedda," she whispered as we walked to the car.

"What if we go back and dance next to her. How would that be?"

"Oh, I like that."

So that's what we did. And it was wonderful, too.

Stop the ride, I wanna get off

I can't believe I'm "going there." But as I've established previously, I have a tendency to rubber neck at train wrecks.

Early this morning, (insomnia early) a reader commented on a post I wrote months ago in homage to our beloved babysitter, "Yaya."

This is what she wrote:

yada yada yada. Beautiful story- but it will end bad. Trust me. I know. Anyone willing to take care of children is untrustworthy by definition. Maybe it will end with her sleeping with your husband. Just trust me. For a long time I thought I had it good and considered my nanny my best friend. Then my boyfriend told me to put spyware on her computer and holy hell- She was sending emails to my sister about my "neglectful" parenting. She was tattling on me for calling my five year old a "fat ass". A home is a very private thing and one thing I demand from my servants is absolute respect. And no questions asked and no judgement. Good luck to you. My advice is just to hire a new nanny every year or so. My kids were way too attatched to my nanny. She had been with us 8 years when I fired her and the girls cried for months. Months. Do you know how insulting that was to me? Their mother?

Blink. Blink-blink-blink.

I wasn't sure how to react. Was this a joke? Could someone actually write:

• Anyone willing to take care of children is untrustworthy by definition
• She was tattling on me for calling my five year old a 'fat ass
• My kids were way too attatched to my nanny. She had been with us 8 years when I fired her and the girls cried for months. Months. Do you know how insulting that was to me? Their mother?
  

and be anything other than a satirist?

Blink. Blink. Blinkity-blink-blink-blink.

So I followed her trail here, and damn if my eyes aren't stuck in flutter mode. Reading her blogger profile, which lists her occupation as "heiress," I can't help but think this is definitely The Onion of all mommy blogs.

The trainwreck just worsens, and I continue to wonder 'is this for real?' and alternately doubting my sanity and my ability for reasoned thought.

A quick and dirty Google search get's me here, and I read through more heart-wrenching stories from the perspective of the fired nanny.

I considered what to do. Had this been some site I stumbled upon accidentally in my neverending search for comfortable shoes, I wouldn't have felt the need to gossip this way. But she came to my little backyard in the ethosphere and, like some tea-cup pooch, dumped the tiny load on my lawn.

So, taking the tact that this is, in fact, legitimate (I wince as I use that word under the circumstances) I have spent much of the day pondering the arguments and the counter arguments. Not to mention the mother's seemingly masochistic tendency to dot the internet with kernels of incriminating blog comments, which, incidentally, bring attention to her rivals' point of view.

But no matter how much I bristle at the attitude of this sad figure, who demands respect as if it too were a trust fund -- inherited and not earned. And no matter how much I feel for nanny, who was spied on and fired, the only side I can truly understand is the children's. Everyone in their life -- even the people who cared for and about them -- ultimately let them down.

I still cling to the hope that this is some kind of comedy satire gone awry, especially since mommy dearest bemoans "home is a very private thing," then goes on to blog about what happens there, presumably, herself. Nevertheless, even if it is a farce and none of the characters are real, it has me thinking about my own public journal.

I have to wonder: What will Annabel think when she finds her named splattered all over the internets one day? Even with the best of intensions, is it really the best idea to tell the world (or the world that's reading) what she said to the neighbors or the toll-booth collector or the amas and papas in her life?

Perhaps a detox is in order.

Yes, Annabel, dogs have their own doctors

This morning, after two days of preparation, Annabel and I took the dogs to the veterinarian. I usually let this task fall to the man, mainly because his schedule is more flexible than mine but also because I can't take the anxiety. (For the record, I think it's patently unfair that dogs have a beach-romp life of 15 years if they are lucky while a tortoise can lounge around for 150 years with hardly a pat on the head.) But it was past due, and I couldn't, in good conscience, leave it any longer.

What follows is an edited transcript of our discussions:



PREPARATIONS (LAST NIGHT):

Sometimes She's Schwann: Tomorrow we're going to take Maddy and Maggie to the doctor. They have to be examined.

Annabel: Oh, Ok. Tan we do now?

Sometimes She's Schwann: No, honey. We have an appointment for tomorrow morning.

Annabel: Who's dare doctor?

Sometimes She's Schwann: The animal doctor is called a VET-ER-IN-ARIAN, and she's a special doctor for animals.

Annabel: Vetidarian? Who aminals?

Sometimes She's Schwann: VET-ER-IN-ARIAN. ... A doctor for dogs and cats.

Annabel: Who else?

Sometimes She's Schwann: Sometimes farm animals, like horses and cows. Sometimes exotic pets, like snakes and birds.

Annabel: Oh. Tan we do now?

Sometime She's Schwann: Their appoinment isn't until tomorrow. How about we read to them about Corduroy's doctor's visit.

Annabel: OK. So they won't be stared of the doctor?

PREPARATIONS: (6:45 a.m., appointment at 9:45):

Annabel: Mama. De dogs hafta do to the doctor. We dotta do NOW.

Sometimes She's Schwann: We have to wait a while before it's time. Let's get them ready, ok. We need to brush them and take them for a walk.

THREE VERY LOOOOOONG HOURS LATER:

Annabel: Who's her. Is she the doctor?

Sometimes She's Schwann: Yes, baby she's the veterinarian.

Annabel: What is her doing?

Sometimes She's Schwann: She's listening to Maddy's heart and her lungs.

Annabel: Now what is her doing?

Sometimes She's Schwann: She's taking blood for tests, and she's giving them a shot.

Annabel: They not like that.

Sometimes She's Schwann: No ... but aren't they being brave?

Annabel: Yeah, they are. (To veterninarian) My dogs are my best friends. I lub them.

$200, five tests, 20 toe-nail clippings, one lyme disease diagnosis (Maggie) and three prescriptions later:

Sometimes She's Schwann: So what did you think of that?

Annabel: Pretty good, but Torduroy's doctor is a bear.

Some lives are simply worth more than others

It is a sad day for science. It is a sad day for Americans.
Today, President Bush brandished a pen, which, as it turns out, was mightier than any sword in striking down legislation to ease limits on federal funding for embryonic stem-cell research.

What scientists already know is that stem cells have the remarkable potential to develop into many different cell types. Serving as a kind of repair system, stem cells can divide without limit to replenish other cells as long as the person or animal is still alive. When a stem cell divides, each new cell has the potential to either remain a stem cell or become another type of cell with a more specialized function, such as a muscle cell, a red blood cell, or a brain cell. The thing is, only embryonic stem cells do this indefinitely. Adult stem cells and those culled from cord blood, while important, are not as encompassing.

There is enormous potential that could come from the study of these amazing cells, specifically embryonic cells. But Mr. Bush seems to be worried about only one: Cloning.

Instead of saddened, Americans should be irate.

The only thing Mr. Bush has done by vetoing this legislation is send a clear message that the United States of America cares only about the potential for human life and not the quality of life for humans.

The problem is that we do care. We care deeply. The mainstream wants to make life better for the living, too. We want scientific discovery to continue to serve us as we struggle.

What we should be looking at is why should he care? He is not a man of science. He is a man of religious conviction, which includes an End Times belief widely held by Evangelical Christians called The Rapture. The Rapture is an occurrence wherein all properly saved Christians will be taken from Earth by Jesus Christ into Heaven by a celestial force. Only the non-saved will remain to deal with Gods wrath. No, he's definitely not a man of science.

Nor is he, it would seem, a man of complex morality. Isn't it ironic that Mr. Bush will fight tooth and nail over frozen embryos that will never become living breathing people but he is willing send young men and women to war, prisoners to death, and thwart research that might ensure a better quality of life for people with debilitating disease? And yet, by his own accounts, he sleeps well at night.

I think it is unconscionable to value life so narrowly. To look at the babies born from invitro fertilization peppering the audience behind him for effect as he addressed the press with his signature smirk, one can only imagine he would advocate next that every drop of sperm in this country be federally protected, too. Rest assured, embryos will not disappear for those who wish to conceive.

Perhaps federal funding of stem cell research won't come about under his watch, but the research will continue privately and in other countries. And eventually, under another administration, our government will get onboard and pony up some cash. And I trust when it does, and when cures exist because of the research, Mr. Bush will not avail himself of the fruits of this labor should the need arise. Afterall, he's got his moral standards.