My Kids Say the Darndest Things - Part Deux

Small Fry was in day camp for two weeks recently, which gave Big Stuff and me the chance to spend a few days alone together doing stuff that her little sister and I often do when she's in school....real quality-time stuff like running errands and having lunch at the Atlanta Bread Company. I'm too tired to be creative right now, ya'll. But even lunch at the ABC yields some good mama-daughter talks sometimes. Like this one:
Her: Mama, was Mema your mama when you were my age?

Me: Yes. She still is.

Her: Was she old then? (Apologies, Mom :-))

The mental wrangling she performs as she tries to understand time is hilarious. I'm pretty sure she was trying, in her mind, to stuff my 36-year-old self into a shorter version of me, because of course, shorter equals 6, and she was trying to figure out where grandmother fit into that line-up. In addition to the time and space continuum, she has also become quite interested in the Chinese. A few days ago, she saw some mundane item around the house and she called Small Fry over, reading out loud. "SF, this says Made in China. That means it's verrrryyyy special." Serious as a heart attack. Small Fry also performs mental gymnastics for our entertainment, and some of her best stuff is word twisting. At the pool, Small Fry kept trying to tell Cutie Pie and me something, and she became more and more frustrated that we couldn't understand her. She kept saying, "I've got an egg cake, mama." I would repeat back, "An egg cake?" And she would say, "Noooooooo, an egg cake! An egg cake!" This was accompanied by a look that told me I am surely the dumbest and deafest mama in all the world. Finally, after 8 or 9 tries, I got it. She needed a Tylenol, you know.....for the HEADACHE!! Sheesh.

The Best Time of Day

The best time of day was five minutes ago. That's when you get to lay in bed in the finally quiet half-light, with two wet heads resting on each shoulder, two exhausted little bodies cradled in each arm, and say to yourself: I am so lucky.... I am so lucky.... I am so lucky.....

A Piece of Quiet

When did Mother's Day become more important to me than my birthday, anniversary and Christmas all rolled into one? Oh yeah, six years ago! This one was the sweetest so far as my girls are of the age where they took great pleasure in showering me with gifts, like paintings of their hands made into flower gardens and a "monkey that was a dog but his ears fell off on the bus," and saying Happy Mother's Day to me every 10 minutes or so, a sentiment accompanied by dandelions and lazy susans and any other flower-like species of wildlife they happened to come across. It was the BEST, Jerry. The BEST. Cutie Pie planned (I love him for this) a whole picnic, swimming-in-the-lake, sitting-on-the-fake-lake-beach extravaganza, complete with gifts and child disciplining and decisionmaking for the entire day. I was exhausted, but feeling very appreciated, by day's end. Cutie Pie, as Big Dog in Charge, got the bulk of our usual neverending questions, endless streams of comments, not-always fascinating observations and plethora of circular arguments, all of which started with "Daddy...Daddy... Daddy, hear this..." (usually they start with "Mama....Mama.... Mama, hear this...") He sometimes asks me, "Are they always like this?" Yes, darling, they are. Which is why I'm often sprawled on the couch on my second glass of wine in front of Seinfeld, children banished to some remote part of the house, when you get home. I know. I'm a bad wife. But by 6:30, I'm usually too tired to care. Sometimes, especially in the Silver Bullet after surviving some long, multi-interrupted errand together, I tell them to just Stop Talking, Mama needs some peace and quiet. I know. I'm a bad mother. But they give as good as they get. For example, Big Stuff or I will be saying something to each other when Small Fry suddenly pipes up, "Everyone! Be Calm! I Need A Piece of Quiet." Amen, sister. (Although I think she says this less out of needing quiet time than of needing to be the center of attention). But I'm just sayin'...How can they talk SO much? How can they say the same sentence SO many times? I vaguely remember a time when I was DYING for them to say their first words. Now we have running commentary, all day every day. I also remember being alone with them when they were babies and thinking - geez, hours have gone by, and I haven't spoken words out loud to them (because Mama can easily go for hours without speaking). How will they learn language? I am stunting their growth!! Back then, I always had the TV running, not because we were watching it, but so they could hear someone speaking in the background. I know. I'm a bad mother. Little did I know my girls' verbalization would one day be the least of my worries. Maybe it's all the daytime talk shows they heard when they were babies.

Keeping Me on My Toes

What a strange April! It is still, STILL cold and dreary here and not in the April-Showers-Bring-May-Flowers way. More in the I-thought-we-lived-in-the-balmy-south, not-northern-London kind of way. We uncovered the pool though..."opening" it for the season, in a hopeful gesture. We had to really, since it was turning green and we couldn't see the bottom, which shouldn't have been hard to see since the thing is leaking water like a sieve. However, it just took a little vacuuming and some handy-dandy chemicals from the haughty pool place down the street and voila - it is blue again. An unnatural shade of blue perhaps, but blue nonetheless. It's a good thing too, since the green pool was throwing Small Fry's world all out of kilter. She kept chanting, as if to drive the stake further into our hearts, "Da pool is green, Da pool is yucky, Da pool is smelly." Of course, they now think they will be able to start swimming any day. Highly unlikely, as the temperature of the water is hovering around 54 degrees! It has been a strange spring, there's no denying it. Best event of the week? Small Fry taking her first dance lesson, "just like my sister." The huge grin never left her face as she stood on her toes, "twinkling" to Twinkle Twinkle Little Star...jumping high and obnoxiously loudly in her tap shoes to Itsy Bitsy Spider...and maneuvering her chubby little legs into first position with her hands so Teacher could slide a piece of "Sparkle" Pizza between her out-turned toes. Big Stuff did not handle it as magnanimously as I would have hoped. She tried every trick in her book to derail the whole thing, from crying to complaining to telling her sister where to stand...to finally jumping out on the floor with them and dancing as "Queen of the Three-Year-Olds" when I stepped out of the room for two minutes. It was appalling, yes, but also interesting to see such raw competition and jealousy hanging out there in the wide open. All that stuff usually goes underground and operates well below the surface when you're dealing with grown-ups. I like the idea that I can pretty much read everything going on inside her, although I am occasionally too dumb to get it. She hasn't started hiding things yet. A very good thing. And probably well-designed. It seems like you always get a little time to figure them out before they jump into the next phase, which sends you reeling back into the Land of Inadequacy and Self-Doubt. Keeps you on your toes. Just like April.

Thoughts I Thought Today

I was thinking today, while waiting in the carpool line, of the person I used to be, the person I am and the person I am going to be. (See previous post about becoming decrepit - this kind of news gets you thinking). OK, it was not the most in-depth thinking I've ever done (I only had about 4 minutes). But what I was thinking was...I used to be a much more interesting person! I used to think about things. You know, existentially. Now I'm mostly just a functional model of a person, and that's probably what I need to be right now. What child wants her mother to be interesting? Or eccentric? Or moody? No, what my children, and probably most children, want from me is to BE THERE. Be there to answer my question. Be there to make my juice. Be there to read my story. Be there to kiss my boo-boo. Be there, just be there, just be there. It's not that I've "lost myself" as so many women fear when they contemplate children...it's just that I've tucked myself into a box and placed myself on the shelf for the time being. I still feed that little heart beating away in the box. I give it food, water, nights out with the girls, the occasional lovely piece of literature or gorgeous sunset. It's just not out there on my sleeve at the moment. It doesn't make me sad, exactly...I just miss that girl sometimes!