Scary and not fun

Alec is in Dallas this morning, and off to Berlin later today. Yes, Germany. Which makes my morning routine very exhausting and rushed no matter what time I get myself out of bed.

It was all going fine - girls were dressed and finishing their breakfast - until the critical moment we had to leave. Suddenly Lauren became a whiny mess who couldn't put on her own coat or backpack while I struggled to get Lindsay into her parka. "Get on your coat...I don't care if it's zipped," I snapped in my drill-sergeant voice, "Put on your backpack, get out the door!" I had Lindsay tucked under one arm with her parka, and the other opened the trunk and unfolded the stroller. "Coat!" Lindsay said. "Yes, I know we have to put on your coat," I said dryly.

"Mom, I need help zipping up."

I put Lindsay's coat on and tucked her into the stroller, zipping and buckling as one motion. "You really need to be a little more independent," I scolded as I struggled with her zipper.

Merrrow!

"Hey, it's Seamus!"

"Stay here, Seamus, I will be back to feed you in a few minutes." I said, pushing the stroller, "Come on, Lauren, we have to hustle or you'll miss the bus."

We made it to the stop with chatting time to spare. Just as the bus pulled to the stop a block away, Seamus walked into the middle of the street.

"Oh my gosh," said one of the dads, "Whose cat is that?"

"Mine," I replied. "Seamus! Get out of the street!" I parked the stroller and ran out into the intersection, scooping up the cat.

"He's sure dressed for Halloween," the dad said.

Of course, now I have a freaking out cat, a kid to put on the bus, and another kid to somehow get home in her stroller. I verbally ushered Lauren on the bus as Seamus finally struggled free and ran back across the street, fortunately traffic still was stopped for the bus, and made his way home.

As he followed me inside, he had the irrepressible arrogant air of a teenage boy. I was really hungry, he meowed.

Thursdays child has far to go

I thought about Joy's comment regarding lack of grace...and that poem popped into my head. It's Tuesday child that's full of grace. I'm not. I am Thursday's child, which suits me. I have far to go.

I am too hard on myself. I am constantly focused on some goal or other and barely notice when I hit milestones because, well, there are just so many other things to do.

I am proud of these accomplishments this year:

• I have not had a cigarette in over six months. Although it had been a while since I'd smoked a 1/4 pack a day, I was still smoking the occasional cigarette. In February, I realized I wasn't enjoying it, so I stopped. It had been a habit for about 15 years.
• I've been going to the gym 4 times a week for the past 6 weeks. I hate and dread it some days, but I still find myself in the car driving there.
• I have an A average in my biomedical issues class. It's not an easy class and it's been a lot of work.
• I completed a speed reading class, and now can read (and retain) at over 700 words per minute reading chapter books of fiction or nonfiction, and 400 words a minute in a textbook.

It's easy to say but I still drink too much and still eat the wrong foods and I have 2 exams and a paper to write. It's easy to diminish the amount of effort that went into achieving those things even if they are just milestones along a very long path.

I'm planning the party for Lauren's class tomorrow, which has been an unnecessarily stressful addition to my already maddening week. I realized that I was probably asked to because my girls have been wearing Halloween clothes since the beginning of the month. I've always liked it. As I was packing the bags for class, I agonized a little about the stuff I didn't get done that I told the teachers I was going to do and I realized it just doesn't matter. Whatever I do, it's stuff they didn't have to plan themselves and the kids will enjoy the break from their day.
See, I carved the rotten pumpkin badly. And what did Lauren say? "Cool! He has Mater teeth!" I so have to stop making mountains out of ant hills...

Can't trust that day

Had you gotten the impression yet that I'm gearing up for NaBloPoMo? Sybil had promised scintillating posts for the month of November, and poor readers of Screw Perfection are stuck watching the bloggy equivalent of a mime having an anxiety attack.

So, what's up today? I am getting my ass to the gym this morning because I need to sweat out some of this agita. I currently am not going there on the weekend, and I am beginning to think even though that would be somewhat of a logistical nightmare to plan, that I need to do it. I spent 9 hours in class over the weekend. Among my fitness goals is to get to one of the fitness classes, and the two that interest me are yoga and pilates. Yoga class is Wednesday morning, which would be a tough one because I'm in charge of Lauren's class Halloween party. Pilates is Friday morning, which conflicts with Lindsay's doctor appointment. Besides that there are 2 soccer clinics, Lauren's appointment with the cardiologist (she has a heart murmur that they want to make sure is benign), and Halloween. Did I mention I have an exam to study for? A paper to write?

I think I might need a paper bag to breathe into...hang on a sec.

Alec is out of the country most of the week also.

I turned the page in my calendar, and November besides this week and the Saturdays that I have an exam and a paper due looks pretty vacant. As Karen will tell you, the kids don't have a lot of school that month. There are 4 days off in November. Two for a state-wide teacher's conference, and 2 for Thanksgiving.

Not to even open up that can of worms. I'm expecting at least 2 calls from family members irked at me about that holiday. But no, we're not going to talk about that right now. Gotta get through the Halloween planning and making witches, ghosts, black cats, and jack o' lanterns out of construction paper and rubber cementing them to a Twister board.

Is 8:45 AM too early for a nap?

Alright, alright. I'm off to the gym.

Pseudo-emotional psychobabble

The walls in my house are made of plaster, which means it's damn easy to punch right through them. I'm pretty proud of the fact I've gotten better at not destroying things because I'm angry, having broken at least 3 cell phones that way. It's expensive, and replacing things that are perfectly fine is a luxury we can't afford in a single-income household.

So I'm doing the virtual equivalent of pounding my fists into a wall.

I really wish I could write a funny little story about the party I went to yesterday for my friend who turned 40, but I was really out of sorts. My hollow attempts to joke about my parenting were met with criticism and shocked expressions by my friends' neighbors. Or maybe they were laughing on the inside, right? I feel badly that my diaper bag wasn't and I ended up reaching in to come up empty after having deposited a diaper so saturated with urine that the gel had expanded to three times its size. I pulled up Lindsay's yoga pants and brought her downstairs, "We need to leave very soon," I whispered to Alec.

"I'm almost done with my beer," he whispered back.

Lindsay wriggled out of my arms and played under the table. I pressed my lips together trying to recollect exactly how many juice boxes she'd consumed in the past half hour. As she rounded the corner, the wet spot belayed that she had relieved herself under my friend's kitchen table.

I said nothing.

Yes, that's right. As a birthday present, Lindsay peed on his kitchen floor and I said nothing.

"Those are some trim diapers," one of their neighbors commented.

I said nothing.

See, it's not a funny story, it's just sad and pathetic. The diner breakfast we had to have packed in Styrofoam to-go containers because Lindsay spent 10 minutes shrieking? Also pathetic.

I'm frustrated with myself and my lack of focus. I'm overwhelmed and anxious. I need to get back on track.

Just words

The day my parents brought my little sister home, I crept into her room to watch her sleep. She came home from the hospital dressed in a white onesie with little yellow duckies on it with matching booties on her teeny feet. I leaned my chin against the rail of the crib and watched her sleep for a long time, inhaling the scent of powder that hung on the air. I remember feeling she was fragile, and there was some risk she wasn't a permanent fixture in our lives.

She was a scrawny baby with barely any blonde hair atop her head and huge blue eyes. Her first two years were marked with diagnoses I didn't understand at age 12. She spat up every meal and wasn't gaining enough weight.

My most concrete memories of her were when she was 2 or 3 and used to like to dress up in pink and purple, a little blur of sandy ringlets. She was so girly, like a little doll. The sister I'd always wanted.

She was 6 years old when I told her it wouldn't be long before I went away to college. She cried angry tears at me. "You..." She searched for the worst word she could think of, "...bug," she erupted.

I went away to college. I got married. I moved to the Midwest and settled in New York. She was 14 when she came down to spend time with Alec and I in our little apartment, singing Brittney Spears songs. We laughed and laughed. My brothers are really funny people. My sister is genuinely the funniest person I know.

We spent a few days together when Lauren was about 5 weeks old when I basically ran away from my life for a week, overwhelmed by motherhood, seeking refuge with my mom and my grandmother. It was a few months after she had a terrible car accident and had wrapped her car around a telephone pole. She seemed different, but we watched her run and she smiled and carried baby Lauren around to meet her friends.

It is a lifetime ago.

Lauren's lifetime.

I just wish she could find peace in her life. I want her to live her dreams, whatever they are. Because the idea of a world without her is far too dark for me to even imagine.

Better parenting

One of my dear friends once said that a lot of parenting is an effort to re-parent ourselves - to correct the wrongs of our parents so that each generation is a little smarter, better than the last. He doesn't have children. I add that, not because I think he's wrong, but because it provides some context. In the real world, not every parenting decision falls into this category. A lot of my parenting is down-and-dirty, split second decision-making. I do the best I can. Sometimes it isn't good enough.

I'm going to take a breath here and say this is just an observation. If you happen to be my parent you can probably take this very personally and decide never to speak to me again, but that would really suck so I hope you don't.

The single-most failure of my parents' parenting was in preparing me to have adult relationships. I don't know if they thought they'd have more time to accomplish that and the ill-timed failure of their relationship got in the way, that it was someone else's job (the school), or since no one taught them it was something that I was supposed to learn on my own.

When I was seventeen, I took my first trip to Planned Parenthood. One of my high school friends had just had a pregnancy scare and I decided I didn't want to be in that position. I didn't discuss this with my parents, as I didn't discuss any of the other details with them either. The boyfriend I was with was not my first lover. At that time, you could buy up to 12 months worth of pills directly from them. I bought 6 month's worth because that was how much cash I had on me when I was there. When I got home, I put the box in my bottom drawer under some clothes and put the current pack in my top drawer so I'd remember to take them every morning.

Although it wasn't the usual for my mother to put away my laundry, she claimed she found the pack in my top drawer this way. She screamed. Why had I done this without talking to her first. Didn't I know about the horrible side effects of the Pill? I was too young to be having sex!

I don't think I engaged her in this conversation. I listened to her scream for a while, and then I said coldly, "I'm not talking about this with you. If you want to ground me, that's fine...but I really don't have anything to say."

She threw the pack of pills on the table. "Fine."

We never spoke again about it.

Ever.

Why did I do it without talking to her? We'd had exactly one previous conversation about sex when I was 12. She seemed terribly uncomfortable. I already knew the details, and this conversation was just Hell. When I'd asked her about sex when I was 9, she refused to talk about it, so the awkward conversation 3 years later just sent along the message that she was not someone to talk to.

Did I know about the horrible side effects? Yes. A doctor informed me of some pretty mild side effects as juxtaposed with having an abortion or being a teen mom. I also knew that while condom use protected well against sexually transmitted diseases, it wasn't most effective at preventing pregnancy. I thought, and of course this is some chip-on-my-shoulder teenage impetuousness, that I was making a pretty responsible choice.

Was I too young to be having sex? Probably. I was already doing that though, so it seemed like a dumb topic.

What would I have said to my seventeen year old?

This is the hard one. I'd imagine the teenagers are interested in sex earlier than that these days. I'd like to think I'm not coming off to my girls as being unapproachable (though did my mom think the same thing?).

I'd probably still ask if she was having any side effects from the pill, because they can be common and there are so many formulations now that you can try if one doesn't agree with you. I'd remind her that while the Pill protects from pregnancy, it doesn't against sexually transmitted diseases - the most common of which can be symptom-free in women. I'd say that respect is very important in sexual relationships and to make sure she was being both respected and respectful. Beyond that, I don't know. I probably need to figure it out, because I'll probably have to have this conversation twice.

Friday morning

Some mornings I drive Alec to the train station. On the way back, Lindsay and I discuss which animals say what.

"What does the kitty say?"

"Mee-yow."

"What does the cow say?"

"Mu-ooo."

We drove to Target this morning to buy paper goods. As I went to take Lindsay out of the car seat she said, "Crackers?"

"No, honey. We've got to go into the store."

She put on her biggest, fake-est cry. Then she slapped the top of her head and pulled her own hair.

Seriously.

What IS that?

The difficulty with writing a blog is that after not posting for a few days, when I open "Create New Post" my brain sort of shuts down.

Can't talk about that.

Hmm. What about...

Nope.

Today I am listless. I drank too much last night. Oh, partying with friends? No. Just sitting in my living room watching television. I have too much to do to waste an evening watching three episodes of a soap opera. I have too much to do to drag around the next day hungover, trying to sweat it out on the elliptical machine just make it to 20 minutes...just make it to 2 miles...just make it to 300 calories...30 minutes...3 miles. I lasted the full 40 minutes, but it was torture.

I managed to buy bread and milk at the grocery store while Lindsay complained loudly about being hungry. We got back into the car and she caterwauled for the entire 15 minute drive home. After lunch, we both took a nap. She arose from hers in a better mood, mine was about the same.

There's a woman at the bus stop who bugs me. It's a daily drive by where she lets me know she thinks I am very irresponsible for not waking my sleeping toddler to stand in the rain and wait for the bus. About a week ago, when she asked, she said curtly, "Well, schedules must be rearranged..." Yesterday she asked if Alec works for Rutgers. The theme of our conversations is starting to irk me. I don't feel I need to explain that Lindsay isn't ever awake when I get home five minutes later. I just get a nagging feeling every time the conversation repeats.

Picking the perfect pumpkin and other alliterative adventures

"I'd like a thermos made out of steel, like that one Nicole has..."

"Oh, ok. We can get one at Target the next time we're there."

"I think we should pay for it."

"Hmm?"

"I think we should not steal it."

"Oh, I see you're pointing out that steel, the metal, and steal, take something sound the same."

"Yes."

"That's called a homonym."

"Oh?"

"Yes. Homonyms sound the same, but are spelled differently and have different meanings."

"Cool."

Creative time

I've been working on the outline for my research paper all week long. I've hemmed and hawed about it to anyone who will listen. Since Monday, I've been up every morning at 4 AM with thirty diverging thoughts in my head. Maybe I have too many sources. Maybe not all of them meet the academic qualifications. Maybe my subject is too narrow. Maybe my subject is too broad. I've tossed and turned until I fall back to sleep.

My outline wasn't coming together and it was maddening. I'd sacrificed housekeeping, laundry, and countless precious Lindsay moments. At 4 AM yesterday, I saw it clearly in my minds eye, came downstairs, and blogged instead. Of course, those ideas were gone. When the muse stirred this morning at 4:37 AM, I rushed downstairs and wrote until a page miraculously unfolded. I removed all of my study notes cluttering the bottom of the paper, and set up the first page of each article to print before I climbed back into bed at 5:30 AM. As I printed everything just now, it isn't a remarkable job, but it's at least organized and cohesive.

I'm tired this morning, but it's done and I can move on to some quite important stuff like sweeping, washing, and cleaning before either the board of health or the department of children and family services stops in.

On a parenthetical I probably won't explain to its fullness, I would like to get through this unblogginess to overcome that if I'm in a department store and hit the button that sends a couple of calls directly to voice mail I don't start having anxiety that there were two family members who called within a few minutes of each other and surely this is news of the worst kind.

Clarity

I appreciate all the responses received to Why Blog. It was nice to hear why some of you read this blog and the other one to which I contribute. Rest assured, faithful readers out there - anonymous or not, my blogging silence of late has more to do with the general unblogginess of my life than what anyone has to say about what I'm writing. In the face of some of the day-to-day bullshit, I find no words to offer to explain it. Maybe once I wrap my head around it, I can offer some clarity, but as for right now I just have to put on my high boots and keep walking.

Not to pull out my big fat diva domme Lady Epiphany persona, but obviously I can delete comments on my own blog. I can choose not to allow people who don't identify themselves not to comment. I can shut down blog comments all together. The only comments I've ever deleted have been blatant and irrelevant blog advertising or duplicates. And as for anonymous commenters, whether they use their status to compliment or criticize, I assume they have their reasons. The only times on this blog I've considered not allowing them were when someone used their anonymous status to make it known that they know me without revealing him/herself, which frankly I found creepy. Anyway...I'm getting a little pedantic, so let me reign it in...the anonymous commenter who pointed out that the blog that does reviews only reviews blogs that request it wasn't incorrect. I submitted my blog for review in February, so I wasn't registering surprise that I was reviewed initially, nor that I received a bad review. I reacted to receiving a second scathing review, but if you'd read all the words you'd have realized that.

There were four in the bed and the little one said

"Hi, Kitty. Me-yow!"

Why blog

I got a call last night around 8:30 from Karen. "The plumber AND PSE&G?! What the heck happened to your house?!"

PSE&G came to replace a length of very old pipe and add a shut off at the street. They've been doing the same for my neighbors also. It's really only been problematic to have the excavator directly in front of my driveway In the process, they broke my gas meter, and a separate repairman had to come out and fix it.

The plumber came out because I've had a wet patch of wall in my living room for several months now, so he suspected that one of our pipes had a slow leak. It turns out the pipe he exposed is not being used, so he didn't have any guesses as to why my wall is wet. He suggested we wait a few weeks before repairing the hole.

Dramatic pictures. Not exciting stories. I've had it pointed out recently that my blog is boring. I'll include a warning that language some might find offensive is peppered in here.

Dammit. With a title like “Screw Perfection” I thought it was gonna be an erotic blog, porn, something, but fuck me, it’s another “Mommy Blogger” blog. Complete with big ass (scary) pictures on the sidebar and in posts.

Um, yeah. Thanks for that. I needed to see your kid bathing, in beer, naked of course, in a puddle of cat water.

Perhaps instead of blogging you should clean your fucking house??

She clearly states in a post Right now, if I update three times a week, that’s a lot. Yep. You’re right. It’s a lot. I say it’s TOO MUCH.

The design is basic blogger crap. One of the more used templates. Ick. If you’re going to screw anything, screw a designer and get a decent template.

I received a similar review from them in April:

The template is, I believe, one of the default Blogger ones. One of the better ones at least. Eh. Whatever. The posts are about as inspiring. There’s introspection, which I often find interesting, but it’s not written in a way that draws me in. I find myself skimming quickly to try to find something of interest, but I never find it. The writing isn’t bad, but damn is it boring. Not in a textbook kind of way, but more like that boring, monotone friend who likes to talk a lot and you try to avoid phone conversations with because they always put you to sleep. Friendly, but boring.

Cool. If you know me, I enjoy a good trainwreck as much as the next person. But if you thought my blog sucked and was boring the first time, and you bitches claim you don't do re-reviews, why are you bothering? Surely you must have a list a mile long of blogs lined up for your witty reportage. No? I can't imagine why not.

I started blogging as an outlet. It has evolved into 622 (to date) little snippets of my life. Some of them are even kind of funny. A lot of them are little more than navel gazing. I have no aspirations of supporting my family on blog revenues. I write because I enjoy it. People read it because...well, I have no idea. Maybe like you they're hoping I might eventually take my clothes off. Well, except my dad because that would just be really creepy.

Oh, and I'm sure Auntie Jules has a blog out there somewhere. I have no idea if she babysits. If you track her down, tell her she should call me.

Signs that it's not going to be a very good day

Unrelated stuff

Yes, I am participating in National Blog Posting Month. You should too. It's a good challenge. It will be harder for me this year. Last year, I was already in the habit (uh...addiction) of posting a couple of times a day. Right now, if I update three times a week, that's a lot.

It is because I have a lot going on that's not terribly interesting to read about, I joined the Y in August and have been slowly turning into a gym rat. There are a couple of friends who I bore with my workout summaries. I've got a long way to go with it. I started out doing it for my kids, because I want to be able to run around with a soccer ball without getting winded after a minute. It seems already it's my me time, which is interesting.

Paige, I cheat on the linked photos. I don't really know how to do a banner, so I created a post with the linked picture, and then pasted it into an html sidebar section.

Alright, kiddos, I'm off to the gym.

From shotgun camp

Sunday's soccer game

That's Lauren kicking the ball. Andrew is mostly obscured by Ely, and Paul is standing on the right.

I don't know who those two moms are in the background wearing white shirts and jeans. They look buff though.

As part of my campaign

I'll let you know right now that it did flit through my head yesterday morning that I couldn't remember how many diapers I'd been through the day before. I usually tote around 3-5 of them and a package of wipes. Not those polite little recyclable containers, because I find they don't dispense moist wipes at critical moments.

It was a particularly stinky mess I'd cleaned up when I reached into the diaper bag and drew back empty handed. "Oh no." I said.

"What's up," Karen asked from the kitchen.

"No diapers." I was thinking, oh right, one change at the gym, two at Kim's yesterday. Three diapers gone.

"Oh," Karen said casually, "No problem. I might have some."

Karen is the quintessential hostess, so it would not surprise me if she did have a package of diapers even though her baby is nearly seven in the same way that my Gramma Jean (whose birthday is today - Happy Birthday, Gramma!) always has several different brands of cigarettes tucked away in her freezer in case you should run out even though she hasn't smoked since she was in her thirties.

"No," she said. "I'll just send Chris to get some at CVS."

The menfolk with Ross in tow went to get some diapers while we kept Lindsay in the kitchen. Karen was preparing salads for dinner and I was enjoying a beverage. Lindsay splashed happily in Pixie's water dish.

"I can move them if you'd like," I said.

"No need." Karen replied. "There's not much damage a little bit of water's going to do to the kitchen."

Lindsay wandered back and peed on the floor a couple of inches from my feet. "Oh, I see we didn't make it to diapers." As I stood up, I noticed that she'd also fertilized the floor. "Oh no." I said. "Poop."

"No problem," Karen said. We cleaned the mess together with paper towels. She sprayed the floor with some Method cleaner and all was right with the world, until we realized that poop had just been a distraction.

Why yes, that is my naked toddler giving herself a beer bath in a puddle of cat water.

Another day, another Mommy driveby

Lindsay has learned when we approach a counter when doing errands that she gets a lot of attention if she says "Hi!" loudly. She's reluctant to say "Bye!" although she can. Sometimes she gives a little waves, but oftentimes she just sort of stares.

It's a beautiful autumn day here - the leaves are starting to fall from the trees in shades of tan, yellow, and orange, and it's a humid 75 degrees. Lindsay's dressed in a pink t-shirt and a floral skort (skirt with shorts underneath).

As I was signing the "I don't want to talk to the pharmacist" paperwork for the 3 prescriptions I was picking up, an elderly man began talking to Lindsay.

"Why don't you have on your shoes?"

I didn't turn to acknowledge the speaker, because he hadn't asked me a question. I could've explained that she just takes off her shoes and that she'd managed to lose one of her shoes (purchased at Nordstrom) 2 weeks ago when the weather was cool enough to worry about socks. I took a step back so that I could keep Lindsay in my line of sight, but continued signing forms.

"It's silly that you don't have shoes on! A baby needs shoes!"

I handed the cashier my credit card.

"Your feet must be cold. Is that why you're holding them?"

I picked up the pen to sign my receipt.

"What's he got on his eye? A stye?"

"She has a hemangioma." I replied with my back to him, as I handed the cashier my receipt. "Thank you," I said as pleasantly as I could muster to the cashier.

"Bye bye," the man said to Lindsay flapping his hand at her. She stared back. "He doesn't say much does he?"

I narrowed my eyes at him and left without a word.

From her highchair perch

"Daddy? Mama? Daddy? Mama? Wuv ooh."