Ebb Tide

June 28, 2007 | Category: Family, It's a Trip

Living in this chaos is hard. Agonizing. Crazy-making.

But the moment we clear it away, it will be time to put the house up for sale. And I think that's why we're moving slowly these past 2 weeks.

It's here. It's now. Look around. If we clean this up, if we shed this mess then you and he and I will have to say goodbye.

And, we're afraid. Sad. Resentful, or maybe mulish is a better word.

There's always an excuse why we're not quite ready yet to move on. Each morning, he goes off to work. Then it's our turn to get up and get going. Find a path to the fridge and the microwave to make some kind of breakfast. Trip over boxes and crap and God-what-is-that to the basket of clean laundry in the dining room.

Eventually, blessedly, we're off too. Camp, swimming lessons, art class, play date, store.

But then, we come home. And it's waiting for us.

Nearing this ultimate low point. The moment when the tide has slunk completely away. And all that is left is the stench and boil of the muddy ocean bottom.

This is the time, in the deep dark, that you turned to me and said 'it's always darkest before the dawn', and we giggled and made love again.

This is the time, you pulled my hair back off my face and told me close my eyes and rest, that our son needed me strong to be born.

This is the time, you called from far away. Woke me up with that ringing and said please, now, give us another chance. You wanted to come home.

This is the time we stood, lights burning in every room as we waited for the night to turn, as we prayed from our souls that his fever would break.

This is the time we shouted at each other in the rental car, speeding along Seine on stupid skinny streets with a stupid wrong map and trying to stop arguing but not able to, not able to...

This is the time, after all those times, that you gathered me up in bed and said 'Everything's going to be all right.... every thing will be fine. I promise.' and kissed my forehead and I believed you, and could sleep.

Weekend comes with sun and heat and day and we ... paint, spackle, study, eat. Pretend that we haven't missed every deadline we set, that the money will somehow keep stretching, that we have endless more summer days to finish this in between all the other things summer means.

In the night, we know better.

It's an ebb tide, close to bottom now.

Just around the corner. Just around the corner....

Who Doesn't Want to Be Quoted in the Chicago Tribune? Raise your hands...

June 25, 2007 | Category: Not The Nightly News

At the risk of sounding like an ungratfeul wretch...

Which I suppose I am.

Who wouldn't be thrilled, being reviewed by the Chicago Tribune?

Is there something in this green tea making me surly and wiseass?

And if so.... should I drink more?

So. Steve Johnson writes a blog, Hypertext, for the Chicago Tribune.

In addition to sharing the name of a semi-famous Soap Opera character, he's a graduate of Brown and grew up in New Hampshire ['Live Free (or Cheap)']

He was a TV critic until 2005, and his writing still shows that flavor - reaching for a Gilmoresque snark and sometimes landing at game-show precious.

This morning, Steve did a review of a blog community I've recently joined - the Chicago Moms Blog. And, of course, he used my post as his example.

Shocked? Yes. Even with the pink hair*, I'm still a little shocked whenever it's my name being called over the intercom.

So the good news? I am now a mentioned blogger over at the Chicago Tribune.

The bad news? Well first of all, he intimates that Chicago Moms will someday be a commercial enterprise as though that possible eventuality were a BAD thing.

Ah, oh... wouldn't it be lovely if pigs fly, doves cry, and mom-blogs paid a living wage? Because there is some beautiful writing out there, tons of it, freely offered to the universe and created with time carved out of lives balanced on a pin.

It made me want to slap the back of Steve's head and say 'What? Afraid OTHER writers will come along and steal your salary and benefits?'

But, no.

He jumps then straight into being taken aback by my post and the blog in general. Why?

Uh...

"There's certainly a detailed examination of the experience of motherhood..." he wrote.

Um, yeah.

Which is kind of the point.

I mean, it's the Chicago MOMS Blog. Shouldn't the review have started on the assumption that it was gonna go pretty deep into the subject matter of its own title?

Here's what I think.

Blogs are an interesting combination of information and creative expression. Some have the entertainment value of a free real estate magazine at the grocery store where others are proven to be as honest (if not more) and valid as a sculpture in the MOMA or my 10 O'Clock news.

And with so many out there, and thousands more be started every day, blogs have become a ubiquitous expression of self and brand.

There SHOULD be reviews of them. To help sort the offerings for those of us already overwhelmed by our surfing choices. Negative reviews, positive reviews, reviews with lots of evil laughter and helpful categorizations and analogies and stuff like that.

And these reviews? Should be interesting, informative, opinionated, researched, and constructive.

So, while it was really kind of spike in the day to say - 'Wow, me? The Trib?' Once I read the piece, well....

Or maybe I should shut up and be grateful now, huh? Because all eyeballs on the Chicago Moms' site are GOOD eyeballs - even the furry doubtful ewwwww... kinda ones.

I mean, seriously? My post! Our site! Is in the Trib!

!Confetti!

(* Yes, I'm addicted to it now. Plus streaks of midnight blue. Pictures below the jump.)

Continue reading "Who Doesn't Want to Be Quoted in the Chicago Tribune? Raise your hands..."

New 'Ask Elizabeth' post up at MoGo

June 22, 2007 | Category: Best Of

I have a new post up in the 'Ask Elizabeth' category - about my personal top list of 'WiFi Airports'....

And I'm working on a few real posts, for here. If I can remember how :p

Wait, wait... there's more! Mee.nu has gone live! Our beloved Pixy (he who is king of that funny 'mu.nu' address I have) has created a free, ad-free, oh.. and FREE... laternative to Blogspot, etc.

If you want a blog home, I mean a really GOOD one, get thyself there!

Oh, and to all those who let me split my guts open yesterday and didn't run away screaming 'EWWWW!' - thank you. You know I start to wobble in fright pretty damn easily. And yesterday? Was crazy naked blogging. You made it OK. I don't know how to respond to the comments and emails other than... I love you.

You Don't Have to Like Me

June 21, 2007 | Category: In My Life

This entry was written in the midst of some kind of haze. It is definitely one of those self-flagellating, TMI, bad-language and all sorts of other edgy you-may-not-want-to know posts.

It freaks me out that I wrote it. But I decided not to take it down. So....

Enter at your own risk.

Especially if you know me in real life.

Continue reading "You Don't Have to Like Me"

First Chicago Moms Post is Up

June 20, 2007 | Category: Not The Nightly News

A different take on being.... me?

I’m gonna stand guard, like a postcard of a Golden Retriever

June 10, 2007 | Category: Mother to the First Power

I believe the light that shines on you | Will shine on you forever | And though I can't guarantee | There's nothing scary hiding under your bed | I’m gonna stand guard | Like a postcard of a Golden Retriever | And never leave till I leave you | With a sweet dream in your head - Paul Simon

I'm a little hard of hearing.

It doesn't matter.

In college, I had a routine hearing screening with equipment more sophisticated, I guess, than what I'd grown up with. That's when I found out that I have hearing loss in both ear - much worse in the right.

It doesn't matter.

Except in little ways. Little inconveniences & personality tics. Like I have to use a phone on my left ear, can't switch when it gets all hot and sweaty. Probably done it my whole life, didn't even realize it until I was 21. Then it made sense.

And if you're deaf? You can usually spot me. I don't why. But dozens of hard of hearing and deaf people have approached me over the years.

One obvious manifestation - I'm slower to wake up to sound than CD. In the parent possum game? I was all-time winner. That man did - conservatively - 80% of the night-time diapers.

A few years ago, we shared our life with a Chow-German Shepherd-Mastiff mix named Ragnar. At least until he grew so big that they assigned him his zip code and reclassified him as 'big honkin unknown furry beast'.

He went to live in the horse country that is Barrington, with people who had much wider hallways.

He was CD's dog. Sure Bear and I were 'in the pack' - but CD was shazizzle in Ragnar's eyes.

Now Sara has come into our lives and I guess part of me was expecting 'Ragnar 2'.

I was wrong.

Since we emptied the kitchen for the reno, we had to push everything else everywhere else. Her condo-sized crate needed a new home and the only available real estate was Bear's room (under the window).

Since we moved her in there, she has become smitten with Bear to the point of been a celebrity stalker.

The boy has been known to have to go poop with her paws reaching for him under the bathroom door.

She loves me, she loves CD, she licks the cat unmercifully (which we worry may be confusion that Maggie is somehow a walking appetizer)... but she would, even at only 3 months old and 26 pounds, without a doubt die for my son.

I didn't anticipate this.

I have no idea when she is sleeping.

As I wonder around at night waiting for my insomnia to subside, each time I near my son's room to watch him sleep - there she is.

Keeping watch.

With a fascination that I thought only CD and I had for him.

He sleeps in the heat, partially covered in one of his dad's old t-shirts. Snoring and peaceful.

There she is, chin on paws. Listening to him breathe.

I lean against her crate, in the soft glow of his night light. "He's out cold," I tell her. Laughing at his frog-legged sprawl. "You should sleep, too."

And Sara gives my fingers a lick and then settles back down, 'hrf' she says softly.

That's when I realize that even though I sometimes worry that I won't hear him in the night - she will.

Without a doubt.

Somehow, that revelation comforts me. I slip Sara a treat and pad out of the room.

I can sleep.

A Day in the Life

June 08, 2007 | Category: Family, It's a Trip

Here's how I never end up posting...

Yesterday morning, after some homeschool and then parking Bear in my room with some lunch and the Fairly OddParents. Sat down and started to respond to my emails, catch up on people's blogs, and check out the other places I write.

Yes, I prostitute myself. For a little bit of money, but it makes a huge difference these days. I write this blog, contribute to this blog, and as long as I'm sharing...for no money at all, I just joined this blog too.

A couple of the long emails I'd written looked like they had the seeds of Corporate Mommy post in them, so I began a draft.

Then I decided that it was too mundane. I mean, really. Who cares about our kitchen renovations and cardboard castles when the G8 summit is underway?

But I had to stop my dithering because I realized that suddenly and literally? I was panting with heat.

Feeling like someone had stuck the sun down my shirt. I could not get cool.

I decided I must be having some kind of premature hot flash and jumped into a shiveringly brisk shower.

I got out and felt about as cool and refreshed as a Bayou swamp in August.

"Bear..." I shouted as a I walked and toweled and panted. "Are you feeling..."

And there, hugging the box air conditioner like a crack monkey, was my son.

"It's hot," he huffed, his Captain Obvious cape firmly attached.

"No Duh!" I agreed, snatching up the thingy that tells me the temperature inside and out - and YES, dammit, feeling relieved that it wasn't just me.

"Well?" he demanded. "Well? Well? Well!!!"

"You don't even know what the numbers mean!" I scoffed, wishing I knew where my glasses were cuz the display is itty-biity. What? It IS!

"Mom... it's at least a 100, right?!"

(When the hell did he learn temperature?!) "Um, 94."

"OK, I think we should got ot the pool now! Do you, Mom?"

I just stood there and dripped.

Pleasant? No.

"Mom!! Puhleeeeeeze! Hurry!" he shouted, his naked fanny wiggling as he pulled up his Transformer's swimsuit.

"Uh... OK."

I grabbed a handful of towels out of the basket, dug up the pool bag, and started packing it while (at the same time) sitting in my office chair and wondering if I should save my draft or hit 'Delete'.

Started typing again, a little inspired, while out of the corner of my eye my son lost his patience. A few moments later, I was racing him out the door.

We were at the pool for almost 5 hours. Yes, with copious sunscreen, cover-ups, and even a cabana boy who chased us around with a big ol' palm frond.

Did no good. I'm pink.

When I got back to my computer last night, I didn't even check half my open windows. Yawning, crispy, I had minimum energy left.

This morning, I decided that I was glad I hadn't published what I wrote yesterday because in my time away, I had come to firmly believe that the trivialities of my life were ridiculous.

I looked at what I wrote before we'd bugged out to the massive Rehm pool yesterday.

And wondered why I felt everything I had to say since I left my job has seemed increasingly.... un-postable.

There's something important here. Part of peeling back the cover of my life and seeing the broken bits.

But I just...can't. At this moment.

(deep breath)

Here's what I found on the screen, though. Unchanged from yesterday. Silly...

.Change in plans, as always.

Instead of putting away the laundry, or prepping the kitchen floor, or finishing the homeschool chapters, or even finishing the gardening and weeding... we're heading over to the pool.

It is infinity degrees out today and the cicadas are roaring and Bear and I are going to kill each other if we don't get relief because even the box air conditioner can't keep up (we need fans to help move the cool air around).

The kitchen was demo'd a couple of weeks ago. Upper cabinets are installed. Lower cabinets are dry-fitted. Primer paint is up - we're keeping the tile, losing the wallpaper. Two-tone (cream and darker cream) paint job this weekend, if, you know, we don't decide to go to Blues Fest downtown or Midsommarfest in Andersonville. Or both. Heh.

The cabinets are mid-grade; a medium-brown maple. Pretty. Floor is peel & stick, but not criminally ugly. Pale browns, greens & blues. Countertop's Corian and being professionally made & installed with an under-counter sink - colors a little darker than floor.

That's gotta wait until after the lower cabinets, plumbing, electric is finished and inspected. Yes, we finally got a permit - with caveats for about a dozen inspections on it. "It's an old kitchen, you need to bring it up to modern codes," the lady told me with a fake smile at Town Hall.

"Do you have those written down for me?"

"You can find them online."

"Where?"

"Oh," she sighed like I'd asked her to give me her firstborn. "I'm not good with computers. Just look. Come back some other time if you can't find them."

(Note: HATE the people who work at city hall.)

No idea about roof yet - money dwindling, we're thinking how to get it done.

Downstairs basement - room just under stairs back to windows completely cleaned out, washed (mostly). That will be the staging room - all the packed up stuff will be put there so we can completely empty the other rooms and wash the basement.

Upstairs, kitchen stuff EVERYWHERE. Ugh.

Otherwise, clothes are all washed, sorted, organized. All that is left is what we wear. Bear? Has PLENTY of clothes.

He has built a HUGE castle structure out of the empty cabinet boxes in the front room - complete with turrets, periscopes, secret windows.

Tomorrow is officially our 'last day' of homeschool. Although truthfully? We'll kepp going on his reading, writing, and some of the other basic stuff - like time & money math. But that won't stop us from having a party to celebrate.

Tomorrow night, I fully expect to be doing the limbo down the sidewalk and singing shanty songs loudly to myself and the eleventy gazillion cicadas.

Sara is fine. She had a urinary tract infection that made it impossible for her to hold her pee so despite coming to us fairly housetrained, she had a bunch of accidents for a few weeks. Now we need to re-housebreak her, which means a lot of time in her crate. She gets pissed and tries to break out because if she isn't THIS CLOSE to HER boy at all times, her heart breaks and she's miserable.

Also? She likes to get her water bowl in her teeth and dump it on her head.

She's doubled in size, is very soft and sweet and smart and has the goofiest personality. And LOVES to retrieve!

OK, he has RUN OUT OF PATIENCE. As I type this, he is looking for my car keys.

OH MY GOD, he's found them and I think he's serious. Just what was my frelling my husband thinking? Showing a 6-year-old the workings of a 2-ton automotive?!

Dagnabbit, Bear's heading for the...

Gotta run.

Love,

Me

The problem.

June 06, 2007 | Category: In My Life

I never expected to resent him.

For 5 years, our relationship was mostly brilliant hued dates. Family dinners and funny anecdotes. Long afternoons snatched out of our regularly scheduled programming, playing and laughing and nodding at how happy we were.

Oh, I'd say. I want this all the time.

Your freckled smile, your sly wit, your intelligence and goofiness. I don't want to miss another day.

Almost a year and a half ago, I woke up and stretched and realized - "This is IT!"

Bouncing around like cartoon character to be free to be with my son without all the other priorities ripping me away.

A year and a half.

I'm a wreck.

Not from being his mom. This kid? Is a rock star. So many months spent has only confirmed his Twinkie goodness. Even at his absolute worst - overtired, bratty, and manipulative in a way only a 6-year-old can be - he's a walking miracle.

I'm a wreck from ME.

Working a highly demanding career, loving a complicated man, mothering an amazing son, propping up a crooked house, and juggling fire sticks all one after another left me with a razor-sharp wit and a lean, swift imprint on this Earth.

But behind that blur that was me there was a secret: I rarely did it all, all at once.

My sequencing came in hours-long stretches. Yes, with overlapping moments of multi-tasking. But by and large, when I was working - I was working. When I was walking with him under dusky sky to the library, I was with him. When my husband and I sat side by side, on the front steps, bumping shoulders and exchanging anecdotes at the end of the day, it was just us.

I thought it was chaos.

I was wrong.

THIS? This is chaos.

There is a titanium structure underneath the seemingly loose and flowing life of raising children. And I didn't build mine well, at all.

My fault.

My consequences.

Except it has also been all the people who love me who have paid. As I've flailed about, exhausted and confused... they've had to watch me. Like a bad movie. Maybe one of the strange Keanu Reeves flicks.

So many times I've tried to figure out how to fix it...and?

I still don't know the answer.

But I thought I'd start this morning by defining the problem.