Going Home

On our way to my grandfather's funeral, I would periodically grab the camera to snap a shot of a green pasture or an abandoned fireworks shack, or a garishly painted antiques store, trying to somehow capture the feeling of the area. When I pointed the camera at a tire store's hubcap display, the Mr. finally broke his silence:

"Are you going to blog that? Because if you are, you're just feeding the stereotypical ideas that people have about Texas."

"Alrighty," I said, "if I'm going to give a true representation of the region, what do you suggest I photograph?"

Silence. My point exactly.

Before going further, I would like to state for the record that most people from this area are not backwards uneducated hillbillies. But in the unfortunate words of Ms. Spears, "we're country." And after living in a semi-urban area for the last 16 years, I often forget just how country my roots are.

Sure, I return "home" every few months or so to visit my mother, but she and my stepdad live on the edge of my hometown and I would have to deliberately go out of my way to enter the actual "town."

But this week, we had to go beyond just the edge of town. In fact, we had to make our way about 15 miles further to the neighboring town where my father was born and raised and where my grandfather had lived for many years. The sights of the tiny little town brought back memories I had stored somewhere in a corner in the attic of my brain. So little had changed.

We would pass the house where my brother and I had spent all of our Christmas Days and Easter Sundays and where we had played on the swings in the backyard with our cousins, specifically, my two girl cousins who are only one and two years older than I am. Because of divorces and moves and that crazy little thing called Life, I hadn't seen those girls in over 20 years.

When I met my cousins for the first time in many years, I saw that even more remained unchanged--smiles and voices and mannerisms and sweet hearts don't change. Yet the sight of our husbands and children (teenage children, even!) and hairstyles and grown-up bodies and grown-up clothes told me that, of course, we had all changed. Our parents, with hair now gray or gone and faces lined from the years of raising their heathen children, were growing old. Our children were already growing up too quickly. We weren't 12-, 13-, and 14-years old anymore, even though that's how we had remained in my mind until that day.

Back then, while comparing Easter egg designs and competing to see who could keep their eggshells most perfectly intact while peeling those fiercely fought-over hard boiled eggs, we had no idea what another 20 years would bring. Hell, we were kids--we didn't care what 20 years would bring. We were too busy cutting each other's hair and dancing to the Village People and looking for trouble. Yet, I couldn't help but smile a little during GrandDaddy's funeral as we three girls sat in the back of the family section with our three youngest boys, shushing and rocking and whisper-scolding them as they sucked on pacifiers and plotted their own mischief.

We exchanged email addresses and promised to keep in touch, but whether or not we'll keep those promises, only time will tell. No matter what, though, I find it comforting that despite the changes that we have experienced over the years, like that rural East Texas landscape, the connections and memories that we share remain unchanged.

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

For those of you who jumped over from Mom's Daily Dose over at ClubMom, a big ol' hearty welcome! And thanks for visiting! And if you're a complete glutton for punishment repeat visitor, well double thanks. And bless you.

This week has been a crazy cyclone of excitement and drama at our house, not all good and not all bad, but some good, some bad, and some just smooth ugly. And speaking of ugly, Soleclaw, here's a popcorn ceiling. This one is directly above my head right now. I hate it, but the expense and the mess of having the ceiling stripped and refinished would be too much for me to handle.




And now for the rest:

The Good: Well, let me just set the scene for you: Yesterday morning, I woke up determined to finish and publish the 10 Things I Hate post, so that was the first thing I did. As soon as I hit "publish," I went about my usual morning clicking, beginning with my Sitemeter stats. And something was very, very wrong. Not wrong in a bad way, but wrong in a way that made me wonder if perhaps the Blog Rapture had occurred and my site was the only one left behind for the damned to read, because my visits were through the roof. So I checked the referrals, and they had all come from ClubMom.

"Wait a minute. No way. NO WAY!"

Way.

As soon as I picked my teeth up off of the floor and stopped staring at my monitor I phoned my sister-in-law (the only other real-life person I know who reads and "gets" blogs) and screamed at her voicemail "Ohmagod AMY STORCH linked to me in Mom's Daily Dose. She LINKED. TO. ME!! And she said I was FUNNY! I don't even care that my baby is crying right now because Amy Storch put MY site in the Daily Dose. I can die now."

And I did. The end.

But then, I started second-guessing everything I've ever written because company had come over, and just a teensy bit unexpectantly. And I kind of felt like I had a sink full of dirty dishes and a floor in desperate need of a good mopping (which I do, by the way). But then, I decided that if you like me, you like me, and if you don't, you don't.

And that's all good. Really. Well, at least that's what I keep telling myself.

The Bad: My grandfather passed away Sunday evening. He had been very sick and depressed and tired for a long, long time. In a way, I think he gave up years ago and had just been biding his time. The last time I saw him was in March when we took Al to meet him. I am so glad that we made that trip, because even through his pain and fatigue, there was a glint of happiness in his face as he gazed at Al. His wife told me that he had been telling everyone he saw about his great-grandson.

GrandDaddy was a man of many talents--he was one of the best paint & body men in the area, a bit of a local celebrity as a musician, and he was a charmer with the kids. But more than anything, he was a Good Man.

In the wake of his death, I have become reacquainted with aunts and uncles and cousins that I have been out of touch with for several years. That part, we'll definitely file under "good." Of course, my brother flew in yesterday from NYC, and while I know he's having a hell of a time trying to manage the traveling and the working and the mourning, it's been good to visit with him in person. It's just that the circumstances suck.

The Ugly: Y'all my knee. The Mr. is sick of hearing me whine about The Knee, so I'm going to have to turn to you. Sorry. Of course, the bending and kneeling and carrying and jiggling that Al requires has not helped much, but add to that the standing around in heels at visitation last night, and you've got yourself a world of hurt in the knee department.

Also ugly? Wearing funeral clothes (aka suit, stockings, heels) in Texas heat. The forecast for today? ONLY 92 degrees. Holy guacamole.

Also, also ugly? The effects on a 5.5-month-old infant of having his schedule (including bedtime, dear God) interrupted by funeralizing.

Whew.


Today, I'm hoping to gather some down-home rural Texas goodness to share with you. Tomorrow, we will lay up and crank up the a/c and watch television and eat M&Ms.

I'm not crazy. I've just been in a very bad mood for 35 years.

I realize that by many, it's considered pretty damned lame, but Steel Magnolias is one of my favorite movies of all time. Some say that it is a trite and stereotypical view of the South, but y'all, it's not really. I know those people. I relate to them. Especially Ouiser. I know that one day, I am going to grow up and be her. Not because I want to--most Southern girls would aspire to be more of a Clairee--but because it's just the way I am. I burp (loudly), I've grown tomatoes even though I hate them because that what Southern women are supposed to do, and in my single days, I was known to own an ugly and obnoxious dog. But more than anything, deep inside I am a cranky, smart-ass old biddy.

And the fact that Ouiser rhymes with Jezer? Coincidence? I think not.

I'm feeling particularly cranky and bitchy and smart-ass this week. With perfect timing, I was tagged by MotherBumper, so I'm going to take full advantage of this opportunity to bitch and moan. Today, I will let my inner Ouiser loose and give you the Ten Things That I Hate.

1. White trash. For God's sake, people, bathe every now and then and bathe your kids too. There is nothing cute about your kids' snotty noses, dirty faces, and full diapers. Your meth mouth (edit: dudes, careful with that link--'tis icky)is disgusting, and everybody knows that the reason you change jobs every six weeks or so is because you know you're about to be drug-tested. And hell-friggin' NO you may not put me down as a reference. You don't ask family to give references, shithead.
2. People who think they have a right to tell mothers how and what to feed their babies. They need to get over their self-righteous wanna-be-know-it-all selves and get with the program. First of all? Breastfeeding may be natural, but it does not come naturally. If a mom doesn't have the right support and instruction (yes, breastfeeding is LEARNED, idiots) and equipment (I attribute a large part of my breastfeeding success to a $250 breastpump that I am borrowing), the odds of her sticking with it for longer than a few weeks are pretty damned slim. That shit hurts. And it's not easy. Also, this is the 21st century, morons. Many moms go back to work now after six to twelve weeks (don't even get me started there) of maternity leave. "Just pump," the self-righteous wanna-be-know-it-alls say. Just pump? OK. Where exactly do you propose that we do this? In a restroom stall? How would you like for your next meal to be prepared in a restroom? How 'bout a closet? Didn't think so, buddy. Asswipe.
   
3. Sissy-ass whiny bands/artists that play sissy-ass whiny music. It's annoying. So you hate me now. Whatever. Just give me some Foo Fighters or Disturbed and we'll be cool. {Another edit: I'm totally rethinking the wisdom of admitting that I don't like DMB and JM (hate is probly too strong a word, but I really don't particularly like their music). I mean, seriously, admitting that was almost as scary as admitting to taking Vitamin Z. And now? Y'all are all probably reading this thinking "what a redneck." Please still like me? Please?}
   
4. I've said it before, but I hate them so much I'll say it again: Wooden popscicle sticks. They make my butt muscles clench up.
5. Knee injuries. Particularly, my knee injury. Yeah, that's right. Little Miss I'm-Such-a-Badass-I-Ran-Three-Whole-Miles-Without-Stopping jacked her knee up so completely that she has been hobbling around and wincing and moaning for the past three days. Yeah, there is no running this week. There may be no more running this summer. But there is much ice and ibuprofen and all-around whining and complaining. Wheee.
6. Caffeine-free anything that was originally caffeinated. Hello?! What's the damned point?
   
7. Miracle Whip and margarine. Mayonnaise and butter for me, thanks.
8. My fat ass. From which the pounds will not fall. Yeah, I know #8 isn't helping much in this area, but still. Damn.
9. The ridiculously fast rate at which my son is growing up and the fact that I can't make Father Time (the jerk) just sit the hell down and be still. Quit passing by so quickly, dammit. Stupid show-off.
   
10. Popcorn ceilings. They're fugly.

Whew. That felt good.

If you, too, would like to take this golden opportunity to bitch and whine and moan and groan, be my guest. Consider yourself properly tagged.

Carb Loading

I don't want to jinx anything, but I ran the entire 3 miles without stopping both yesterday and today. By running the entire course today, I cleared a huge mental hurdle that I had about my friend's neighborhood. Her 'hood was where we ran the first day, and was the site of my oh-hell-no-I-can't-do-this meltdown, and I've had trouble overcoming that. But today, I did it. I had forgotten how mental running really is.

And so, to celebrate that achievement and to prepare for tomorrow's run (hills galore, but we're back on my turf), I'm carb-loading:


















10 points if you can spot and identify a handy accessory for nursing mothers in this photo. (Hint: It's not the beer.)

Oopsy.

This is the report from Al's visit with his pediatrician last month. I came across it yesterday as I was cleaning off my desk. I just throw these things wherever they land--other moms probably design entire pages in the baby book around this kind of thing, but I suck at that. Anyway, the nurse measured his height while he lay (is it lay? lie? ugh--how 'bout sprawled) down on the exam table paper--she made a quick mark at his head, a quick mark at his foot with his leg extended, she measured the distance between the two marks, and that was that.

I'm pretty sure he must have pointed his toe or something because...





...this is the measurement that we took at home a month later. We stood him up to measure first, and then we tried it with him lying down. The measurements were within an eighth of an inch of each other. Surely he didn't shrink during that month. Of course he didn't. We just must be using different methods of measuring.

Who knew it would be so complicated?


But really, that's not the problem here (if, in fact you want to say that there is even a problem).



Here's the "problem."
I just noticed this on the side of Al's infant carseat:
















For today? We'll go with the home measurement. And tomorrow? We'll go shopping.


And yes, I realize that for a whole month, I had recorded data that indicated that the boy is too big for the carseat/carrier, yet it just didn't register. Because I am the sharpest pencil in the cup.

Who's the Biggest Dumbass in Town? Yes! It's ME!

I am about to tell you something that I've told only one other living being (the Mr.).

On one of the last days of staff development at the end of the school year, I attended a workshop that I imagined would be about as fascinating as watching paint peel. Thankfully, I was wrong. But just in case, I brought along with me my handy-dandy all-purpose tote which contained my book of Sudoku, a writing tablet, and my photo album of all the photos I've taken of Alex. I thought some of my coworkers would enjoy ooh-ing and ahh-ing over His Preciousness. They did.

Anyway, that was about three weeks ago. Know what I realized, oh, around last Thursday? I left my tote. At the workshop. Yep, all my photos of Alex--ALL of them--were in that tote.

Never fear, though, for I emailed the presenter in whose class we convened and asked her to look for the tote and contact me about picking it up. Guess what, folks? It's summer. Noone is checking their work email. So, I'll most likely have to wait until August to find out if my bag and the photo album have been found.

And here's where I sing the praises of digital photography and online photo processing. Fortunately, all the photos were still in my Shutterfly albums. All I had to do was upload a few more that I had had processed elsewhere and re-order all the prints.

All 267 of them.

Five months of photos=267 photos. And that's not counting the ones I didn't print.


So then, I had to put them in order (because Shutterfly sent them in seemingly random order--go figure). Y'all, I don't even remember the first six weeks of his life (OK, I'm exagerrating, but damn, those weeks really are a blur), so how the hell am I supposed to place these suckers in any semblance of chronological order? Well, lucky for me, Shutterfly stamps the date the photo was taken on the back, so, whew.

So let this be a lesson to you. If you carry your photos along to share with friends at lunch or a meeting or a workshop or the pool, don't be a royal idiot (and front-runner for Most Thoughtless Mother of the Year) like me--remember to take them with you when you leave.

A Day in the Life

A few weeks ago, Moxie wrote a great post about her Thursday. I had really wanted to join in the fun then, but frankly, I couldn't get my act together enough to actually 1) do something interesting, 2) take pictures of it, and 3) write about it. But I thought the idea was so fantastic, I was determined to do a "day in the life" entry, boring or not. So, what you have here are photos that I've taken over the course of several days during my comings and goings. I've put them together and tried to give you a pretty good idea of what a typical day (in this case, a Monday) is like for our little family. I live in Texas in an area where there's not much public transportation and there are very few walking neighborhoods. We are very much a car-driven community here. I don't especially love that aspect of our region, and it's the reason you'll see my vehicle in a third of the photos.

So without further ado, and in honor of my 100th post, I present to you:

A Day in the Life of Me

6:00 a.m. The alarm buzzes. I roll over, whip out a boob and top the boy off. If he's awake and talkative, I bring him into the kitchen with me so that he can hang out in his exersaucer while I make coffee and find something to eat--usually toast or cereal. But the most important thing is the coffee. Strong and black, thanks.

6:30 a.m.--Al won't be hungry again for a few hours, but morningtime brings the boob fairy to our house, so I pump and store the milk in the fridge. The Mr. wakes up, gets dressed, grabs his breakfast and heads out the door.

7:00 a.m.--Yes, it's summertime, and yes it's around 75 degrees even at 7am, but my speed-demon-ish running velocity will create such a breeze that the boy will damned near freeze his buns off. No, seriously, he really does get chilly and he thinks blankets are toys, so I have to dress him in long pants and socks to keep him from developing tiny little goose bumps about a mile into the run.

7:30 a.m. We're off and running. Or, I should say, my friend is off and running, and I'm frantically trying to think of a credible reason that I might need to just walk today. Um, I got my period? Yeah, the last time that happened was in 2005. So I run and pant and try my hardest to enjoy the scenery. When we began meeting up in the mornings we came to this park, which has a very nice concrete walking/jogging trail. However, at 7:30 a.m. it is so ridiculously crowded, there is no way in hell that I'd be able to dodge the dog-walkers and the leisurely strollers with the jogging stroller. So, now, we alternate going to each other's neighborhoods, where we have each marked off a 3+ mile course.

8:15 a.m. The clouds part and angels sing because praise be to the Lord God Almighty, the run is over. I put the kid into his carseat, load up the stroller, and we head home.

8:30 a.m. Once home, I usually plop Al down in his bouncy chair in the bathroom and let him listen to the shower as I soap away the sweat. He's usually pretty patient and even will let me shave my legs and exfoliate every now and then. Then, he watches as I dress, put on some makeup and towel-dry and gel my hair (I will never, ever let my hair grow out again. It is too easy to deal with these days. I don't even care if I look like a boy). Also, I apply a generous amount of moisturizer, and lately I've been slathering on the Jergen's Natural Glow. As long as I hit the knees and ankles with a damp washcloth afterward, the results are pretty satisfactory.

9:00 Time for Al's (second) breakfast. During the day, I give him bottles just so he won't get out of practice. So I take the milk that I pumped earlier, pour it into a bottle and feed the boy.

9:30 Al plays and I either a) catch up on some reading, b) clean the kitchen, or c) do some laundry.

Throughout the morning, Al naps, I clean or write or--let's face it--waste away the morning playing Text Twist and looking up recipes for cheap and easy meals (do you have any?). When he's up, we're playing or changing diapers or feeding or fussing. Lately he's been wearing his crankypants pretty regularly. The mornings usually involve our first dose of Hyland's. I don't think this shit does a damned bit of good for Al's teething pain, but he seems to love the taste of the little pellets mashed up in water. Whatever floats his boat, I say.

11:30 p.m. There's more pumping and more bottle-making. Honestly, some days I'm just too damned lazy to pump and feed bottles, so I feed him the old-fashioned way, and he's not about to complain. But usually, I do try to stick to the bottles until about 3 p.m. Oh, and I have no idea what the crud is on the desk. And those Medela bottles are cleaner than they look despite the apparant film on the inside of them. Really, my home is not a pig-sty.

12:00 I feed Al--no hatemail please--in front of the TV. Why? Because "10 Years Younger" is on and kind of have a girl-crush on Jenn MacDonald, the hair stylist. I think she is gorgeous and edgy and pretty much the epitomy of modern, funky beauty. I almost want to dye my hair pink.

1:00 p.m. After eating and burping and changing (both of us), we head to town to buy groceries for the week. The supermarket that I use--mostly because of the one-stop-shopping and cheapest prices in town--is on the other side of town. In case you've been living under a boulder these days, you know that gas prices are a tad high. And I'm one of those excessive dirty Americans that drives an SUV. So shoot me. Anyway, the point is that I try to shop only once a week for all of our food and miscellaneous needs.

1:15 p.m. As soon as Al decides that sitting up isn't all that bad, I won't have to drag the entire infant carrier/carseat out of the vehicle and hoist it onto a buggy (that's shopping cart for those of you not from the South). But for now, I try to find a buggy/cart that's been abandoned in the parking lot near our spot and situate the carrier on it before heading inside. That way, I don't have to lug the carrier for 50 yards from the car to the front door.

2:00 p.m. Once the shopping is done, we're on our way home again. See that palm across the road tree up there? Dude, palm trees don't really grow here. Every winter, they have to wrap the poor things up in some kind of aluminum foil-covered insulation so they won't freeze to death. That's very attractive.

2:14 p.m. God Bless XM Radio.

2:15 p.m. We're home, and you guessed it--Al's asleep. I leave him in his carrier, bring him in, set him down gingerly, and go back for the groceries.

2:20 Once the groceries are in (yes, from the super-big-box megastore--sorry, folks), I try to put Al down to finish his nap, but duh--that's not happening. So he plays some more while I put up groceries and get ready to feed him again. We spend the rest of the afternoon playing and straightening the house before I begin wondering what I'll cook for dinner. Tonight? The Mr. had already had a large lunch and wasn't so hungry, so I made myself some buttered noodles and warmed up some leftover vegetables.

5:00 The Mr. arrives home anytime between 4:30 and 7:00. Once he's home, he and Al have boy-time, and I have a chance to lay around and drink beer. Heh, just kidding. Kind of. Between 5:00 and 7:30 we tag-team getting the boy fed, bathed, and ready for bed. By 7:30, he'll be ready to have one more swig from the boob and it's night-night for him.

During the last couple of weeks, I've been experimenting with energy/granola bar recipes for our grab-and-go breakfasts. These are the ones I made last week. I thought they were pretty OK, but the Mr. said they were too sweet. Too sweet--as if there could be such a thing. Tonight, I'm trying a recipe with significantly less sugar. I'm sure they'll suck.

So there you have it: humdrum o' plenty. I suppose I'll have to write another one of these when school's in session so you can see how I manage to get to work on time and do the daycare drop-off and generally lose my ever-loving mind.

Ahh, I can't wait.

On the Road Again

There are two things that I hadn't done in a long, long time until this past week--painting and running.

For many many months, I've been meaning to design a giraffe cut-out that we would use to track Al's growth. Then the Mr. was going to cut it out of wood and I would paint it.

Well.

The boy is almost 6 months old, and our plan was to make this sucker and have it up before he was born. Heh. Finally, last weekend, the Mr. bullied (OK, not really bullied, just asked if I ever planned to draw that damned giraffe) me into drawing the giraffe and then we headed off to Lowe's for a piece of wood. I traced the outline, he cut it out, and I painted it.

I used to paint wall murals for my friends' kids rooms. People used to pay me good money to paint on their walls. They thought my work was adorable. I've always considered it painfully amateurish. But as long as they were happy, I found the process quite therapeutic.

When I was pregnant with Al, more than a few people asked what I was going to paint in his room. My response--nothing--stunned them. What can I say? I'm not a huge fan of my own work.

But we wanted something unique to track Al's growth, and in case we ever move, we wanted the figure to be portable. So, I painted. After an over three-year hiatus from creative painting, I overcame my own criticism and just did it. It's still amateurish, and definitely cartoony, but cartoony is good when you're dealing with a kid's room, right?

Last week, I also returned to running. The last time I ran was a few months before I got pregnant with Al, and he's almost 6 months old, so you do the math. On the last day of school, one of my coworkers and I decided that we would start running together during the summer. She, too, had been out of running for about a year, but she's a former marathon runner. I warned her that I might not be able to hang, and my feelings would not be hurt if she decided that I was just too slow for her. She assured me that everything would be fine.

The first week, we just walked briskly, both to get used to the early morning routine (did I mention that we meet at 7:30am?) and to get to know the courses that we would be running. So far, so good. Then, last week, we stepped it up. By "stepped it up," I mean that while she leisurely jogged along and TALKED, my tongue was hanging out, my quads were burning and I hadn't panted so much since labor and delivery. I barely ran a third of our 3-mile course in bits and pieces. Of course, I blamed that on the 20-some-old pounds of stroller and boy that I was pushing, but the truth was that I was in sad-ass shape. So, my friend decided to become my personal running trainer, and folks, she is good. By the end of the week, I ran over two miles of hills nonstop, and I even went out this afternoon and ran without the stroller to see how my speed and endurance might improve (meh--only a little).


Oh, and one thing about my friend? She had a birthday this week. She's 51 years old.

Yeah, I'll just let that sink in for a minute.




I think it's an understatement to say that pregnancy and childbirth and new motherhood transform a woman. Lately, I'd been feeling a little blah, physically and mentally. Reuniting with those two blasts from the past--as difficult as our reacquaintances might have been--reminded me of who I used to be and how it once felt to be me--strong, creative, able.

I'm learning that I'm still those things, and then some.



Maybe next week, I'll play the piano.

Or not.

In which I post a hideous teenage photo of myself, purely for your entertainment

Thanks to City Lizzy, I took this quiz, which led to shameless singing of some of the best and worst lyrics evah, which led to a nostalgic walk down memory lane, aided by the photo album that only gets dragged out when I'm drunk, or at least mentally impaired--the result of singing too many 80s ditties for the sake of filling in the blanks.
OK, I'll admit it...I got help from the Mr. on two of the songs. Hell, I should have rocked it, considering that the 80s were my teenage years.

Behold, August 1984:
Rockin' hairdo, huh?

Also, note the ginormous earrings that are easily visible even in this shoddily scanned image. They were puzzle pieces. I shit you not. They were made of cardboard, even.

Of course, I had twister beads in every color imaginable. I wore several strands every single day in colors that coordinated with my outfit.

You probably can't tell from this picture, but those pants had multicolored pinstripes. Awwww, hell yeah.

The shoes? Jellies, of course.

You can't judge a book by its cover...

...or a food by its color.


Sweet Potatoes.




Peaches.

Reason #314 for Laid-Back Parenting

Well, I haven't talked about it much lately, but we haven't totally given up The Swaddle. For Al's naps, we still wrap his legs up, because he seems to like the feel of it. We've come a long way from the full swaddle, with a substantial stint with the one-armed swaddle. But sleeping sans swaddle? Well, that only happens at nighttime. With pals.

Until this afternoon, that is. Let me set the scene for you: The Mr. was out in the garage working on a project that we've started for Al's room (I can't wait to show you! I've rediscovered my creativity and it FEELS SO GOOD! Anyway...), and I wanted to go through some photos that I took yesterday. Well, Al was clearly getting ready for a nap (i. e. crankypants o'plenty), so I decided to go ahead and utilize a little of that reasoning shit that we all know does not work with children of any age:


Me: Hey buddy, how 'bout we pop this paci in your mouth and you can sit in Mommy's lap while she looks at these pictures on the computer for JUST A SEC, and then, I promise, I'll wrap you up for your nap? K?

Al: Myeh. Ugh. Annnnhh.

Me: Ohhhhkeedohkee!


Just to give you a visual, this was the general position. Except on the other side of the room, and well, Al was in my lap, not the Mr.'s. But you'd already figured that part out, right?

So. I edited a couple of photos, and then looked down at Al, who had become suspiciously quiet, because Hello! He had fallen asleep already.

What to do? I knew that if I tried to wrap him up at this point, he'd wake up, and that would kind of defeat the purpose of naptime, right? But if I put him down unwrapped, he would surely wake up within minutes, maybe seconds of unrestrained sleep.

So I took a chance. I gingerly laid him in his crib and held my breath as I tiptoed out the door.

Just then, the baby monitor fell to the floor (did I ever tell you that I suspect our house is just a wee bit haunted? I'll fill you in later, promise.), and Al's eyes popped wide open. Frantically, I raced back to the crib and patted his belly, and miraculously, his eyes slowly drifted closed again.

And he slept. For over an hour. What we have here, folks, is a genuine Big Boy. Add this to the fact that he no longer needs (or rather, actually never needed) to be rocked to sleep, and I'm dealing with some Growing Up that I most certainly did not authorize. I mean, these things are supposed to be cleared by the Mama, right?

Plerk

So, remember about 12 weeks ago I went back to work? And remember how my mom came to our house during the week to take care of Al? Well, DID YOU KNOW that I am the most spoiled daughter in the history of mankind? Because Y'ALL! Taking care of this kid is, like, hello? WORK! I mean, holy guacamole!

Heh, you full-time stay-at-homes are chuckling, huh?

Well, my first week of summer has revealed to me that while working out of the house is sometimes hectic and tiring and heartbreaking, even, it also affords a mom time to do grown-up things, like oh, eating lunch with two hands. And reading an entire magazine article. From start to finish, even. Granted, I have the best of both worlds--my job gives me the chance to work out of the house and enjoy extended periods of time at home with Al. Just when I'll be about to lay down and die of cabin fever in several weeks, it'll be time for me to go back to work again.

Except this fall? We're doing daycare. Actually, we're going to start in July so that Al and the Mr. and I can get used to the situation. And already? I love our daycare. Of course, we have extended family that works there, so I feel confident that Al will be properly doted upon. Plus, letting him start his "school" early will give me a chance to my school and do all of the back-to-school teacher-y things that we teachers do in late July/ early August. (Oh, who am I kidding? We all go back to the school early so we can catch up on gossip. It doesn't take us that long to put up a couple of sorry bulletin boards.)

But so far, I'm pretty proud of the way I'm handling this whole daycare thing. Maybe it's because I want Al to grow up feeling comfortable in a variety of settings (unlike his mama, who cried every single night of church camp when she was 8 years old because she had never spent much time away from home and missed her mommy. Uh, yeah, I guess that's a defining moment right there), or maybe it's the drugs talking, but I'm actually excited about Al going to "school." He's at the age where he gets really excited about seeing other people, and interaction with kids and adults is one of his very favorite activities. And the Mr. and I? Well, neither of us are very extroverted, and I'm hoping that maybe, just maybe, we're hitting Al's socialization sweet spot, and daycare will be a good thing for him. And if not, well, it will still be Oh. Kay.

The Mr. doesn't even want to talk about it. Which I think is cute.

But the daycare thing is actaully just a tangent here. What I really meant to tell you was how this summer is already the busiest ever. I thought I'd have all kinds of time to update the ol' blog, but nooooo, I'm cleaning out closets, and organizing stuff for a garage sale, and trying to keep the damned house clean, and oh yeah! taking care of an increasingly-more-mobile-every-day hunk of young male-child. It's work, yet it's fun, and even a bit relaxing.

And Al is busy too. The boy goes about his work with a seriousness that cracks me up. Back when I was an undergrad, I had an Early Childhood Development professor who called children's play "plerk." Play + Work = Plerk. I'm witnessing that first hand here.

Behold, the Plerk in Progress:
(Please forgive my lack of flash. Once the boy sees the little flash indicator blinking, he drops everything and poses.)


Yes, yes, must spin the barrel of monkeys, and oh, my, this elephant has not been chewed on in quite some time. Must take care of that.


OK, elephant has been taken care of...now, what else needs attention?


Oh, yes, the lion! This lion situation must be resolved at once!



Next on the list? Yes, yes, the carousel. A boy's work is never done, I tell you!

Just another day at the office, Mom.
(See what I mean about the flash? Heh.)

Zoloft Baby

A year ago, I was eight weeks pregnant and muddling through the second most horrifying bout of depression of my life.

I have battled depression and anxiety for all of my adult life. It’s clearly inherited. My most frightening episode came in 1999, triggered by a painful breakup. I still thank God that I just happened to have an annual exam scheduled three days after that event. I had barely managed to shower and dress and drag myself to the doctor’s office. She noted my state and promptly prescribed counseling and Zoloft. With those two pieces of equipment, I managed to dig myself out of hell and move on with my life.

I stopped the counseling after a few months. I never stopped taking Zoloft, though.

Six years later, I found myself contemplating giving up that pretty little blue pill. I had married the Mr., we were about to buy a home, and things were good. Very good. When I mentioned to my doctor in January that we were thinking about trying to conceive, she said that ideally, she’d like for me to be off of all medications and supplements. That included Zoloft. Shit.

I told myself I’d give it a go, but I was nervous. I gradually went from one pill a day to alternating days of whole pills and half pills. Then, half a pill every day followed by alternating days of half pills and no pill. Then finally, no pills. I was Vitamin Z-free. I braced against the anxiety and the depression that I was sure would return. They didn’t. Other than some crazy full-body electrical “zaps” and dizziness every now and then, I felt fine. The physical withdrawal symptoms disappeared within a few weeks. By the middle of April, I was pregnant.

Then, one evening in May, I made baked potatoes for dinner (that was one of the few things I could stomach during those first several weeks, and it amuses me that I remember that detail of the evening), and as I sat down to eat with the Mr., I felt a familiar, inexplicable, gut-twisting sadness wash over me.

It was back.

Several days later, the sadness was still harassing me, and it was rapidly getting uglier. Soon, my old friend Anxiety decided to join the party and I began to cycle between heart-racing, blurry-visioned panic and deep, dark, sob-inducing sadness. Still, though, I chalked it up to hormones and decided to try to ride it out.

Over the course of a few weeks, my thoughts became riddled with phrases like “I have ruined my life,” “why did I let this happen?” “I can’t do this,” and worst of all: “I don’t even want this baby.” I hated my life, I hated myself, I hated everything. I routinely responded to the Mr. with either venom or robotics or sobs. All day long, I tried to navigate through feelings of hopelessness, fear, anger, and sadness. And this was a planned pregnancy. A wanted pregnancy. Looking back now, I can hardly believe that that was me. But it was.

Finally, the Mr. and my mom both urged me to call my doctor. I did, and I had a fresh new bottle of blue pills that afternoon. I’ve taken them ever since.

Once I got back to normal (well, as normal as you can be while pregnant), I had to deal with the implications (i. e., Guilt!) of taking antidepressants during pregnancy. I compulsively googled “Zoloft pregnant,” and “Zoloft breastfeeding” and I quizzed my doctor about the effects of Zoloft on the unborn, and later breastfeeding, baby. She assured me that this was one antidepressant that she did not have any misgivings about prescribing to expectant moms. Given the alternative, I could deal with that.

After Al was born, I had a particularly bad time emotionally, but I can’t begin to imagine what that period might have been like without medication. At least I could function somewhat. My doctor sees me every three months now to monitor my progress and to check for signs of PPD. The last time I saw her, I admitted that I will probably never be ready to completely stop taking Zoloft. At least not any time in the near future.

I have often wished that I could cope with normal life without drugs. I sometimes feel weak for not being able to survive one of the most common and sacred life events without being medicated, and I pray that my intake of this drug does not harm my child. But the truth is that I am not OK without it, and the boy deserves a healthy mom. Does he deserve a drug-free mom? Yeah, he does. Does it eat me up that I can’t give him that? Sometimes. But most of the time, I thank my merciful God for a drug that has helped me to grow and mother this precious little dude the very best that I know how.

Surely I'm Not Alone Here

Is there anyone else out there who sees this:





And automatically begins to hum this?

Just checkin'.