The baby girl threw up on me. Hugely. This happened during the first time I held her all day, just before she was ready to go to bed. The sitter handed her over, and I was trying to comfort her because she was crying. I thought maybe her tummy hurt, so I put her up on my shoulder. I was right, her tummy hurt. She regurgitated like Exorcist Baby, whimpered while we wiped her off and changed her clothes (me looking like a refugee from an especially demented wet t-shirt contest), and then giggled and fell fast asleep.
We took all the wet covers from the couch cushions, put the wet clothes and blankets and burp cloths in the washer, and the sitter went home. I washed bottles, pacifiers, chew toys, spoons, bowls, and bibs, and then went, finally, to sit on the uncovered couch cushions to rest my weary bones. And spilled my glass of white wine all over me.
12 June 2008
Picking Up Droppings
Well, it finally happened. Some 19-year-old Salma Hayek lookalike at the Hallmark store (the one at Milestone, Brett, in case you want to head over there) asked me when I was due. Granted, I was wearing a dress with an empire waist that would have fit me in the early stages of my pregnancy, but knowing that I actually still look like I'm in the early stages of my pregnancy was not high on my list of topics for self-discovery. Abby's almost 7 months old. I can't burn any calories, I seem incapable of strengthening my abdominal muscles, and I have never been one to starve myself (or really, deprive myself in any way), so I suppose I should just stop wearing empire waists and be thankful that I don't weigh 200 pounds by now. Still.
This morning I let Bailey the dog out back to relieve herself and, ideally, retrieve a ball a few times, since she's getting only barely more exercise than I am. Unfortunately, our neighbor, who was out planting and apparently is mortally terrified of dogs, attracted Bailey's attention, and Bailey went over to make friends. "Making friends" involves running pell-mell towards someone, barking loudly, tail wagging. People who know dogs would probably realize she is totally friendly and safe, because of the waggy, happy nature of her approach, but this woman stood up, stock still, with her arms by her sides as if she were about to be boiled in oil, and screamed bloody murder.
I was alternating between yelling at Bailey to come back, which was pointless, and calling out to her, "She won't hurt you" and "She doesn't bite", which was also pointless, because there is a significant language barrier (she is, I believe, Chinese). Her husband came out to see why she was screaming, appropriately enough, and I managed to get the dog back, all the while calling out, "We'll go inside right now -- I'm so sorry," over and over again. Then I came inside and sent a pissed-off email to my husband in Germany, because there's oh-so-much he can do about it from there.
Lovely. So, now I can't let the dog out in our own backyard without a leash, and if I take her on the leash somewhere she tries to pull me over in a heap because she's so desperate to roam, not to mention then I have to go around picking up her droppings and trying to prevent her from peeing on other people's lawns. I can tell you that I've learned one thing; it is horrible to be responsible for something that makes another person scream in terror, no matter how unwarranted the scream. I feel terrible. And I'm afraid to go over there, now. I feel like I should take flowers, or cookies, or something, but I'm afraid they'll slam the door in my face or yell at me.
The middle of my day was characterized only by those normal amounts of hair-pulling stress caused by my normal job, without any abnormal screaming or fat-noticing. Later, I went to physical therapy.
I had one of those moments at physical therapy -- one of those moments that I call reflective, and other people might call clinical disassociation. Anyway, I was lying on my back on one of the therapy beds, with my feet on the bed, legs bent, a light-blue elastic band tied around my knees, and then opening my knees against the resistance of the band. Two sets of 20. [If you've been in therapy, you know these elastic bands. They dangle limply from every upright surface, making the room look like a place where balloons go to die.] The light-blue bands (level 1) are so elastic that you'd think newborn baby boys could do these exercises while dressed in the same color, but that's not the thought I was having at the time. I was lying there, looking up at the fluorescent lights in the ceiling with which I have become all too familiar over the past year, and I was thinking about how suddenly, and completely, an entirely unforeseen and novel thing can become such a huge, important and routine part of one's life. The baby is like that, in some ways. Physical therapy is like that. Two years ago, I had aches and pains now and then; my neck hurt, I got migraines, my knees hurt when it rained. I was getting older, after all, and I had used by body up, including through a very stressful career and, long before that, several years as a gymnast. But now, suddenly, here is this whole new life: vinyl-padded tables and rainbow elastic bands; blood tests and MRIs; exercises and walkers and canes and notbendingnotliftingnotcarryingnotwalking. Not doing, in fact. What happened? I felt, suddenly, like I had been hit by this truck called Spinal Stenosis all over again. How did I become this woman, in rehab, trying to re-learn how to move? How did it happen so suddenly? And how did I, a person who could win an international worrying competition, not see it coming?
Clinical disassociation? You decide.
I guess I should point out that we're not out of paper towels. Actually, we have twelve rolls, in a huge Costco bundle, in the basement. I raided the downstairs storage space last night (a space I often avoid, because everything there is about bending, lifting and carrying), and came up with two rolls of paper towels, two of the biggest boxes of Kleenex I've ever seen, and a Smirnoff Ice Pomegranate Fusion. I ate the 5th Lean Cuisine I've had this week with my Smirnoff Ice. There was a sale at the store, you see -- 4 Lean Cuisines for $10 -- because the power outage rendered their frozen stuff horrible-looking, all frosty and melty and miserable, kind of like I feel, so essentially I've spent about $15 on food in 4 days. I bought about 12 Lean Cuisines and about 20 containers of baby food. Possibly the oddest grocery cart I've had yet, in a long history of odd grocery-cart contents.
I want to stop typing because the air conditioning vent is right under my desk and my knees are frozen. Instead, I find myself babbling like you do when you're lonely and the person you miss most is on the phone, wanting to hang up. In that situation, you'll come up with any minor topic of conversation you can in order to keep them talking, like some kind of hostage negotiator, only you're the hostage. Last night I actually told Dave all about King Gyanendra of Nepal, who voluntarily moved out of the palace the other day, when the Nepalese decided that they'd had about enough of monarchies afer 250 years and voted him out. Again, possibly the oddest babble I've had yet in a long history of odd babbling. So that's the kind of babbling I'm doing here. In fact, look, I've just done it again, I told YOU all about King Gyanendra, too.
I should probably try to stop, while I still have a shred of dignity.
This morning I let Bailey the dog out back to relieve herself and, ideally, retrieve a ball a few times, since she's getting only barely more exercise than I am. Unfortunately, our neighbor, who was out planting and apparently is mortally terrified of dogs, attracted Bailey's attention, and Bailey went over to make friends. "Making friends" involves running pell-mell towards someone, barking loudly, tail wagging. People who know dogs would probably realize she is totally friendly and safe, because of the waggy, happy nature of her approach, but this woman stood up, stock still, with her arms by her sides as if she were about to be boiled in oil, and screamed bloody murder.
I was alternating between yelling at Bailey to come back, which was pointless, and calling out to her, "She won't hurt you" and "She doesn't bite", which was also pointless, because there is a significant language barrier (she is, I believe, Chinese). Her husband came out to see why she was screaming, appropriately enough, and I managed to get the dog back, all the while calling out, "We'll go inside right now -- I'm so sorry," over and over again. Then I came inside and sent a pissed-off email to my husband in Germany, because there's oh-so-much he can do about it from there.
Lovely. So, now I can't let the dog out in our own backyard without a leash, and if I take her on the leash somewhere she tries to pull me over in a heap because she's so desperate to roam, not to mention then I have to go around picking up her droppings and trying to prevent her from peeing on other people's lawns. I can tell you that I've learned one thing; it is horrible to be responsible for something that makes another person scream in terror, no matter how unwarranted the scream. I feel terrible. And I'm afraid to go over there, now. I feel like I should take flowers, or cookies, or something, but I'm afraid they'll slam the door in my face or yell at me.
The middle of my day was characterized only by those normal amounts of hair-pulling stress caused by my normal job, without any abnormal screaming or fat-noticing. Later, I went to physical therapy.
I had one of those moments at physical therapy -- one of those moments that I call reflective, and other people might call clinical disassociation. Anyway, I was lying on my back on one of the therapy beds, with my feet on the bed, legs bent, a light-blue elastic band tied around my knees, and then opening my knees against the resistance of the band. Two sets of 20. [If you've been in therapy, you know these elastic bands. They dangle limply from every upright surface, making the room look like a place where balloons go to die.] The light-blue bands (level 1) are so elastic that you'd think newborn baby boys could do these exercises while dressed in the same color, but that's not the thought I was having at the time. I was lying there, looking up at the fluorescent lights in the ceiling with which I have become all too familiar over the past year, and I was thinking about how suddenly, and completely, an entirely unforeseen and novel thing can become such a huge, important and routine part of one's life. The baby is like that, in some ways. Physical therapy is like that. Two years ago, I had aches and pains now and then; my neck hurt, I got migraines, my knees hurt when it rained. I was getting older, after all, and I had used by body up, including through a very stressful career and, long before that, several years as a gymnast. But now, suddenly, here is this whole new life: vinyl-padded tables and rainbow elastic bands; blood tests and MRIs; exercises and walkers and canes and notbendingnotliftingnotcarryingnotwalking. Not doing, in fact. What happened? I felt, suddenly, like I had been hit by this truck called Spinal Stenosis all over again. How did I become this woman, in rehab, trying to re-learn how to move? How did it happen so suddenly? And how did I, a person who could win an international worrying competition, not see it coming?
Clinical disassociation? You decide.
I guess I should point out that we're not out of paper towels. Actually, we have twelve rolls, in a huge Costco bundle, in the basement. I raided the downstairs storage space last night (a space I often avoid, because everything there is about bending, lifting and carrying), and came up with two rolls of paper towels, two of the biggest boxes of Kleenex I've ever seen, and a Smirnoff Ice Pomegranate Fusion. I ate the 5th Lean Cuisine I've had this week with my Smirnoff Ice. There was a sale at the store, you see -- 4 Lean Cuisines for $10 -- because the power outage rendered their frozen stuff horrible-looking, all frosty and melty and miserable, kind of like I feel, so essentially I've spent about $15 on food in 4 days. I bought about 12 Lean Cuisines and about 20 containers of baby food. Possibly the oddest grocery cart I've had yet, in a long history of odd grocery-cart contents.
I want to stop typing because the air conditioning vent is right under my desk and my knees are frozen. Instead, I find myself babbling like you do when you're lonely and the person you miss most is on the phone, wanting to hang up. In that situation, you'll come up with any minor topic of conversation you can in order to keep them talking, like some kind of hostage negotiator, only you're the hostage. Last night I actually told Dave all about King Gyanendra of Nepal, who voluntarily moved out of the palace the other day, when the Nepalese decided that they'd had about enough of monarchies afer 250 years and voted him out. Again, possibly the oddest babble I've had yet in a long history of odd babbling. So that's the kind of babbling I'm doing here. In fact, look, I've just done it again, I told YOU all about King Gyanendra, too.
I should probably try to stop, while I still have a shred of dignity.
10 June 2008
Just Typical?
My dog is literally molting. My cat is peeing everywhere, and also running, pell-mell, around the house like his tail is on fire. My baby is inexplicably blotchy. It is about 8,000 degrees outside. My husband is in Germany. The carpet cleaners (see cat pee, above) forgot to come yesterday. And we are out of paper towels.
03 June 2008
Let's Go Pens!!!
"Petr Sykora called his goal. Marc-Andre Fleury made like Patrick Roy. . . . Ryan Malone was like Rocky Balboa. It was an unbelievable spectacle."
The Girl and The Boy
Our kids are so damned cute. I am having technical difficulties with photo uploading at the moment, for some reason, which is really frustrating because I have some awesome pics to share. I love my Canon Rebel XT. Anyway.
S is about as outgoing as a 6-year-old can be (which is saying a lot). She is often breathless, dirty, tangled, and scraped. She runs and talks and invents games and jokes and stories so fast that I imagine her little brain in there smoking. Sometimes she can be too rough, tactless, pushy, and whiny. This weekend I noticed that she's taken to overreacting to things sometimes. For example, we were travelling and she couldn't figure out how to turn on the cold water in the sink, only the hot (the plumber had the thing on backwards), and she started getting almost hysterical over the fact that the water was too hot to use for hand-washing. I'm not sure why, but my instinct was not only to fix the water, but to hug her long and hard, and to tell her, low, in her ear, that she needn't be afraid, that everything's okay, that Daddy and I are going to take care of her. Maybe I related to the generalized anxiety I felt in her tearful response to an uncontrollable sink.
R took the opportunity, during a get-together of grownups, to take a portable DVD player into his room and hide inside a sleeping bag with it, watching Little Einsteins. Yes, a bit anti-social, but appropriate, no? Should a 4-year-old really want to hang out with all adults? Anyway, I don't think the reason that R watches TV is to tune out -- I think he does it to develop role models, to further explore how the world works, and to provide a springboard to his imagination. All of which are okay with me. Well, except maybe for finding it funny to kick his sister after watching Tom & Jerry. I think that particular DVD is going to get "accidentally" lost. R wins the prize for saying the most amazing things. He has a habit of boiling things down in ways you never thought of, which I guess is the best by-product of constant learning. He also would run you over in his bicycle to get to some carbs -- cake, cookies, candy, mac & cheese, bread . . . he takes after me in this. He recently "graduated" at pre-school to the pre-K class. At graduation these dozens of kids of all tiny ages paraded down a church aisle past all their parents and well-wishers. I often can't attend these things, but this time I did, in a bright green shirt. R caught my eye from far away, his face lit up with his huge smile, and he blew me a kiss. I thought I could die on the spot, a happy woman.
S is about as outgoing as a 6-year-old can be (which is saying a lot). She is often breathless, dirty, tangled, and scraped. She runs and talks and invents games and jokes and stories so fast that I imagine her little brain in there smoking. Sometimes she can be too rough, tactless, pushy, and whiny. This weekend I noticed that she's taken to overreacting to things sometimes. For example, we were travelling and she couldn't figure out how to turn on the cold water in the sink, only the hot (the plumber had the thing on backwards), and she started getting almost hysterical over the fact that the water was too hot to use for hand-washing. I'm not sure why, but my instinct was not only to fix the water, but to hug her long and hard, and to tell her, low, in her ear, that she needn't be afraid, that everything's okay, that Daddy and I are going to take care of her. Maybe I related to the generalized anxiety I felt in her tearful response to an uncontrollable sink.
R took the opportunity, during a get-together of grownups, to take a portable DVD player into his room and hide inside a sleeping bag with it, watching Little Einsteins. Yes, a bit anti-social, but appropriate, no? Should a 4-year-old really want to hang out with all adults? Anyway, I don't think the reason that R watches TV is to tune out -- I think he does it to develop role models, to further explore how the world works, and to provide a springboard to his imagination. All of which are okay with me. Well, except maybe for finding it funny to kick his sister after watching Tom & Jerry. I think that particular DVD is going to get "accidentally" lost. R wins the prize for saying the most amazing things. He has a habit of boiling things down in ways you never thought of, which I guess is the best by-product of constant learning. He also would run you over in his bicycle to get to some carbs -- cake, cookies, candy, mac & cheese, bread . . . he takes after me in this. He recently "graduated" at pre-school to the pre-K class. At graduation these dozens of kids of all tiny ages paraded down a church aisle past all their parents and well-wishers. I often can't attend these things, but this time I did, in a bright green shirt. R caught my eye from far away, his face lit up with his huge smile, and he blew me a kiss. I thought I could die on the spot, a happy woman.
02 June 2008
She, Too?
"At work, you think of the children you've
left at home. At home, you think of the work
you've left unfinished . . . . Your heart is rent."
-- Golda Meir
left at home. At home, you think of the work
you've left unfinished . . . . Your heart is rent."
-- Golda Meir
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