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I escaped off to visit family this week…sorry forgot to post.
We’re having a great time despite this conversation loop on the LONG car trip:
SAM: Knock-knock!
ME: Who’s there?
SAM: Interrupting cow!
ME: Interrupting cow who?
SAM: Wait. Let’s try again. Knock-knock!
ME: Who’s there?
SAM: Interrupting cow!
ME: Interrupting cow who?
SAM: Ugh! Let’s try again. Knock-knock.
ME: Concentrate, Sam.
SAM: Mo-uh-om.
ABBY: Waaaaah!
SAM: Knock-knock.
ME: Abby needs to eat. Who’s there?
SAM: Interrupting cow.
ME: Where’s the diaper bag?
SAM: Mo-uh-om…interrupting cow!
ABBY: WAAAAAAAAH!
ME: Interrupt…
SAM: MOO!
ME: Good job, Buddy.
ABBY: WAAAAAAAH!
ME: We’re stopping, Abby. Sam, are you ready to eat?
SAM: Yes. Hey Mom…Knock knock!
ME: Who’s there?
SAM: Interrupting cow!
ME: Interrupting cow, who?
SAM: Oh, er, moo…wait! Let’s try again.
* * * *
I NEED some new knock-knock jokes. Please help me.
Please, for the love of all things good and light.
Please?
All I wanted was a
cute picture of Sam and Abby.
We had the set-up:
the barn-red wheelbarrow,
the pumpkins,
the yellow and purple mums,
cute little fall-colored outfits for the kids,
emergency binkie for Abby,
bribery candy for Sam.
Mark played goofball behind me
as I snapped, trying to get synchronized
giggles and eye contact.
But I forgot one important thing,
one very important thing:
the camera’s freakin’
MEMORY CARD.
Ah snap.
Abby started fussing,
Sam started whining about
the ice cream Mark had promised.
And we all decided to quit,
because LOOKING happy
and BEING happy
are not the same
thing.
* * * *
Thanks to my friend, Daven, though, we did get ONE family picture this weekend where at least we are all looking at the camera and appear to be reasonably clean, unwrinkled, and the like…
HAPPY FALL TO ALL!
* * *
What’s your best advice about family pictures?
Sam has two volumes:
1) NOT talking, and
2) TALKING
So, on our most recent trip to the grocery store, Sam excitedly pulled on my shirt (thus converting my v-neck tee into some sort of low-cut-not-fit-for-public-peek-a-boo type garment).
“Look at his leg, Mommy! It’s like a transformer robot!”.
I look over to see an elderly man with an artificial leg from the knee down.
Oh help.
“Hush yourself!” I command. Then I tell him that it is rude to point out something different about someone like that. I tell him we’ll talk about it in the car.
“Talk about the man with the robot leg?” Sam asks at full volume.
I suppose I could’ve walked over to the gentleman and told him politely that my son is curious about is leg and would like to ask him some questions. However, I imagined that this man may not want to be the ambassador of all amputees while he’s shopping for food at Aldi.
A few days later, Mark and I had a classic parenting moment with Sam. We told him about people’s abilities and disabilities. We reminded him that he didn’t like when kids pointed out something different with him. We discussed how I had to use a wheelchair when I was pregnant and would’ve been sad if everyone would’ve pointed and shouted about me.
Mark and I were good. We could hear the ‘The More You Know’ theme music and feel magic dust fall from the cartoon rainbow and star panning above our heads.
“Now do you understand, Buddy?”
“Mom?”
“Yes, Sam?”
“Do you think that robot-leg-man has superpowers?”
Sigh. Our son, empathy embodied.
Mark and I forgot the ONE rule of parenting a 4-year old: use SENTENCES not PARAGRAPHS when trying to make a point (ie: NO POINTING AT OTHER PEOPLE).
* * * *
This also holds true for husbands.
* * * * *
Wanna share a ‘The More You Know Moment’ of your own? Or maybe your favorite AfterSchool Special?
A lot of time markers converged this week.
- 9 months since Will went to heaven on the 12th
- 6 months since the twins were born on the 14th
- National Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance Day on the 15th
Yes, today is a day set aside to remember the smallest of our children who have left us far too soon. I plan to light a candle at 7 pm tonight as a way to honor Will’s short little life inside me and recognize the millions of babies that are lost to other parents around the world. Please watch this video to find about more about this ‘wave of light’.
Jess, writer of After Iris made an amazing recording of her reading the carefully chosen names of many, many much-loved babies who have been lost. I had to turn the volume all the way up to hear Jess’ lovely voice and lyrical accent (to me) like music, relishing each syllable and nuance in these precious babies names.
What a gift she has given us.
I will be remembering our William Scott tonight…and I would be honored to remember other babies as well. As Jess as my inspiration, please feel free to leave me the name of your baby(s) for me to read as well.
Blessings,
Eve
Today is the 12th. That means it’s been 9 months since we learned Will died. Huh, 9 months – longer than Will ever lived in me. As long as he was supposed to live in me before he was born a red and screaming boy.
I struggle to find words today.
I have tuned out the introspection of grief with the pounding racket that is my life:
Sam and his joyous singing, incessant questioning, and love of popping bubble-wrap.
Abby and her fussy gums and musical giggles.
Mark and his talent to plunk out the chords to just about any song he hears.
Work.
frivolous radio music.
Dumb television.
The computer.
The dog, who needs a good grooming and his shots updated.
The roof that needs repaired.
Family. Friends. Food. Grocery Shopping. Photography. Blogging. Garage Sales.
It is a good life. A great life. A life I wasn’t sure I would have when infertility crammed into our lives the way a swollen river becomes dammed with debris.
And yet, 9 months has taught me this:
There will never be enough laughter or music or busyness or anything that will ever completely drown out the silence that a child’s absence leaves in one’s life.
I have much happiness.
But if I get still enough. And quiet enough. And alone enough. I feel the emptiness suck me back as it was 9 months ago when I watched in disbelief as the ultrasound screen showed Will’s still little heart.
I orbit grief like the earth to the sun. Now is my time to be nearer to the pain. It comes around and feels so surprisingly fresh. I don’t know that I will ever get used to that aspect of grief…the fact that it can feel so real and new again.
Anyway, I miss my William today.
I miss him every day. But today, I miss him with the unprotected heart of new loss. I know this will pass, this closeness to the sun. I’m sure it is necessary, even, to pull out the ear plugs of life and listen to my heart every now and then.
And my heart says this…
Will, your mommy misses you so, so much…and loves you to the sun and back.
********
Upon completion of the online guerilla warfare
training course, Sam set his stealthy trap
using an eyelet bedskirt, dresser drawer handles,
and deadly slinky.
Sam asked me this morning what would happen if you had a brain full of water with a fish swimming through it. Who knows where this kid comes up with this stuff. I told him that this is why he should never swallow a goldfish whole in college.
I’m sure that half the things I’ve told Sam are probably going to come back to bite me. You know what I mean, those little mommy-truth-stretches meant to keep kids walking the straight and narrow. I’ll admit it. Here’s a sampling of mine:
- If you mess with this chemical (insert random poison) you will have to go to the hospital, get a huge tube stuck down your throat into your stomach, and get a big shot.
- The car won’t go unless you have your seatbelt fastened.
- If you sneak out of your bed at night to play with a toy, I’ll know…and so will God.
- You will not grow unless you eat your broccoli.
- The tooth fairy only pays for shiny, white teeth. If you have a cavity, YOU have to pay the tooth fairy to take the tooth away.
- Sam gets ‘vanilla milk’ as an alternative to chocolate. Wink,wink.
- If you don’t wash your hands after you go to the bathroom, you will get sick, and then you have to go to the doctor and get a big shot.
- Kids will not want to be your friend if you don’t brush your teeth.
- Only adults drink soda.
- How were Abby and Will born? Well, the doctor cut a hole in Mommy’s stomach and took them out (c-sections are easy to explain).
- How did Abby and Will get in Mommy’s stomach? Well, the doctor put them in Mommy’s tummy when they were little embryos to finish cooking (IVF is easy to explain, too).
- Anytime Sam tries a new meat, if I put the word “chicken” in front of it, he will try it: chicken-fish, chicken-pork, chicken-turkey…you get my drift.
- If you run out into the street, you could hit by a car and have to go to the hospital and get a big shot. Or you could die.
- Monsters are not allowed to live at our house. Daddy sprayed for them.
- Coffee tastes disgusting.
I am not sure how much money we will be spending on Sam’s therapy bills as he gets older, but we may just have to start saving now. I also realized recently that I need to play down the whole ‘shot’ thing, since Sam has to get an actual flu shot (not the mist) this year and will be getting a whole host of shots at his 5 year appointment.
Any of your own “mommy myths” you’d like to share and make me feel a little better?
Abby woke up at 4AM this morning crying. Well, screaming. It’s those daggum toofers again. I took her to the ped’s last week to make sure it wasn’t an ear infection or the plague or something. It’s not.
So, we’ve been in keep-Abby-happy-and-not-screaming-like-a-newborn-piglet mode this morning:
- Tylenol
- Baby Anbesol
- numerous mini bouts of nursing
- teething ring
- warmed baby applesauce and cereal
- rocking
- shushing
- Mommy singing to Abby
- Sam singing to Abby
- frozen washcloth for chewing
- Valium for Abby
- …just kidding. I don’t even have any valium.
- …I wouldn’t give valium to Abby anyway if I did have it.
- …I’d keep it all for myself and give her a little vodka instead.
- …just kidding.
- …I don’t have any vodka either.
In other random news, I decided that whomever insisted that there should always be a mirror above a bathroom sink never had a four year-old who, instead of washing his hands the way Mommy asked him to, repeatedly sticks things up his nose, sings, and practices all sorts of silly faces at himself for the good portion of an hour…
while the water is running out the sink and down to the floor.
And this from my son who follows me around the house turning off every light I switch on because PBS told him to save electricity.
Abby’s awake.
Wish me luck, patience, and valium.
Lots of valium.
