She Laughs at the Days

I am not a climbing wall. I just thought I'd let you know that since you seem to have mistaken me for one, and my breasts for hand holds. You wake up in the middle of the night, grab onto one of them with both hands and pull yourself up towards it by pinching as hard as you are able and rolling the skin around a little in your tiny grasp. At the same time you use your feet, half kicking half scrabbling for a hold so you can move yourself higher. I'm not sure if you think nursing is a competitive sport, or if you think you ought to be accomplishing more than one thing at a time. If that second things is to cause me pain and exhaustion than kudos, I believe you have this multi-tasking thing down already. So here's a newsflash for you darlin ', I know you're just a baby and don't know this yet so I'll fill you in. NIGHT TIME IS FOR SLEEPING! I know, it's totally shocking, but really it is. You should be sleeping right now, not wandering around on the fl

My neighbors sing Karaoke, loudly and out of tune. You don’t need a degree in music to tell that they are bad singers but having one lends to a special kind of pain reserved only for former voice teachers. I want to run over there sometimes and yell, “Give me that microphone!” or, “You, you’re in tune and your voice is quite pretty. You, you have very poor listening skills and don’t seem to even be aware that you don’t blend with any of the notes, or the other person you’re singing with. Stop, slow down, listen, be careful in how you form those sounds and someday you may sound good.” I could pull out my teaching credential in the hopes that she would listen to me. But I won’t, and I won’t call management to complain, and I won’t do anything but smile and say, “You’re singing again.” Because it seems to me singing together, however badly, is a much better way to pass an evening with family than watching TV. I am filled with nostalgia for the days of singing at my grandparent’s with my v

Wow, you're already 8 months old. How did that happen so quickly? As I type you are standing, yes STANDING!!! in the middle of the living room. You have figured out how to get the top half of your body centered above your hips now and you push yourself up to your feet, hold your hands out in front of you, perhaps for balance, and then you yell at me to look at you. Then you do the happy jiggle which usually lands you on your bum again, but you get right back up. Sitting up is so last month. So is crawling. You would dearly love to be able to walk. You can't talk yet, except to say, "muumumumumumumummmmm," or "dadadadadadadadadada," but you have perfected the use of the raspberry. You use it the way grown ups use cuss words, with great vehemence. If you wake up in the middle of the night and you are not happy about it, you sit up and go, "BTHHHHHP!!!" over and over again before breaking into a wail. You also use it when we take away something you t

You wake up hot and sticky, restless in the cloying heat. Neither of us sleep well here, at your grandmother's house. The bed is too unfamiliar, too narrow, too hard for us but most Fridays find us trying to sleep here anyway. Keeping Sabbath with our family trumps sleep. I take you to the rocker and you nestle into the sling seeking sweet milk, the comfort of familiar scented skin, and breath, and heartbeat. Tonight it isn't enough. You fuss, you struggle against me, against the heat, against your own tired body that wants to melt into me. We move outside into the sweet night air. It is cooler here and you stop crying. I find my way in the dark. Every star seems visible. A wooden swing is tied to one of the branches of the fruitless mulberry tree. We sit on it and gently push off, you tied tight to my chest by the sling. Your wide eyes stare into the dark night. One or two stars twinkle through the leafy dome that encircles us. Crickets and frogs sing you lullabies. Somewher

You may have noticed that I haven't had ads up at this blog. And I don't write pay per posts, and I have resisted doing anything to monetize this site. My reasons may or may not be rational, but that's the way it has been nonetheless. It has felt too personal to post adds on. However, that is all changing today. No I'm not registering this blog with adsense. You see, the Genius Husband has just purchased himself a business. It's a full service travel website. The prices are very competitive, and you can do everything from book plane tickets hotels rental cars and cruises, to send flowers and purchase cars through it. The customer service is guaranteed. And well, since it's good for us if a lot of people use it, and since it is a fantastic site, I'm telling you all about it. And I'm putting up a button in my side bar, which took me a whole hour to learn how to make, good thing it's simple. Oh, and they have 24 hour passport service. I haven't tr

Signing up for motherhood is like AGREEING to cheerfully become a complete loon for the rest of your span on earth. I have got to get my hands on one of Joshilyn's books sometime and read it, because I laugh every time I read her blog. And they are best seller's and she's like famous or something. (Gotta make another Amazon order, and find time to read.) Only she would weave motherhood and learning to shoot a gun into one single post.

It takes a strong woman to be a wife. I think anyway. Especially to be the wife of a particular type of man. I started thinking about this when I went to see 300 with the GH and his brother earlier this year. I remember thinking the role of the queen wasn't all that believable because it wasn't likely that a woman in ancient Greece would have that kind of freedom. I saw in it a scriptwriter's attempt to broaden the movie's appeal, to assuage the politically correct police and to elevate the film above it's video game testosterone filled bloodbath status. That's why I found it amusing when my husband's cousin went to see it, after we said it was good, and came back ranting about how offended she was by it. What I saw as an attempt to write a woman's role into a man's film she saw as degrading and sexist. The problem is, history, and the role of women through out history is largely offensive to the modern day woman, and I don't think a scriptwrite

The Genius Husband has just started a new business and wants to have a party this weekend to tell every one about it. Which means of course that I am planning a party, inviting people, making food, ordering business cards, you know, all the stuff that is hidden in the subtext of the wife contract, secretary, event planner, nurse, and personal assistant. I must have missed reading that part before I signed on and the wife of the GH. I don't mind though. So yesterday I was calling the last people on the list to make sure they knew about it, and trying to think of anyone that we'd forgotten. My morning went like this. Pick up phone and head to computer to get phone number. Put the phone down and rescue small choking size item from baby's mouth. Pick up baby and move her to a place where she can't so easily find breakfast crumbs. Look for phone. Stop to tell child who is playing with the baby too exuberantly to stop. Pick up baby who is now crying. Nurse for a while to

I have a secret. I barely ever wash or comb the Girl's hair. After I wash it I put it in braids, and then I leave it for a day, or two, or three, or... well, I've gone more than a week before, and then I notice that she has little bits of dirt building up near the top of her braids. It shows quickly in almost white hair. Often I just brush these out and then re-braid it if I'm in a hurry, and I'm usually in a hurry. Her braids often look messy as a result. But I like to think that it is more of a playing hard since the morning type of messy rather than looking like her mother has neglected her hair for a week. I'm probably fooling no one. Recently I've seen some little girls with chin length bobs that are adorable. I keep staring at the Girl, and her white halo of hair around her perma braids and wondering if I dare give her one too. I hesitate because if I do, that means I won't be able to tie it up for almost a year, and I might miss those braids. I thi

When I was very young and growing up in Canada, long before I even knew what a green card is, I watched Green Card , the movie with Andie MacDowell and Gerard Depardieu. It's still a great show, even after all this time and while getting ready for our interview today scenes from that movie kept flashing through my head. I imagined they would take us into separate rooms and ask the GH what brand of moisturizer I use. I knew he would respond, "Why the heck would I know that, I don't use it?" Instead I made a last minute run to kinko's to photo copy everything I was taking in because I finally read the part that said take copies or they may keep originals for their records. I didn't want them keeping originals of the kids birth certificates and our marriage license so I scrambled to be ready in time to leave. On Friday we went in for the kids to be interviewed for their citizenship certificates, which was a sad failure and another story for another time, so I as

Seven years ago today the Genius Husband and I were married. We were giddy with excitement. He cried. I'll always remember that. I need that memory to balance some of the not so romantic moments that all marriages encounter. He wanted to marry me. He was excited to join his life to mine. We both naively thought that it would be easy to chase down our dreams and do what we wanted together. I don't know if he realized how much of a sacrifice it would be for him to support a family, to stay in one place for longer than a year, to be responsible for more than his own well being. It has been a sacrifice for him to see the things he dreamed of doing get further out of reach as time goes by, instead of closer, and to wonder if he'll ever be able to do them. I read once that when woman marries she gives up her life and dreams to support a her husband's and make his dreams hers. I suppose in a more traditional marriage this would be the case, and I have felt some of that death

We almost didn’t go to the beach today. Even though we decided that for the summer Thursdays would be beach days, even though we usually meet friends and make a day of it, we almost didn’t make it. Our friends didn’t come, for one reason or another, and I was ready to cancel because the Baby didn’t go back to sleep until 5am, and she had woken up just as I was going to bed. I just wanted to stay in bed. The Boy also didn’t want to go. For whatever reason he began announcing that he just wanted to stay home. We almost didn’t go. We almost didn’t spend a lazy afternoon near the waves in the perfect weather, hot sun, cool breeze, and just a touch chilly if we sat too long in the shade. The girl almost missed out on sitting in a sand throne, made just for her near her princess castle, by her aunt, uncle, and brother. She almost didn’t recline regally watching the waves and surveying her faithful and devoted subjects. The Boy almost didn’t learn how to skim board. How to time your run to

Last week I read a post by Melodee who writes at her blog Actual Unretouched Photo. It was titled I Quit, and in it she resigns from her job as a parent due to the fact the she is not qualified for the job. "Nuff said" It was funny and honest, and I thought liked it enough to put it up there for a perfect post this month. So head on over and have a read. Be sure to check out the other perfect posts hosted by Suburban Turmoil and Petroville too for some of the best blogging this month.