Uneasy

I am not a squeamish parent in general. I try to tackle questions with as much honesty and forthrightness as I can humanly manage.

Cue recent discussion about what a "douchebag" really was:

Emily: "So boys are school are calling each other douche bags."
Me: "Do you know what a douche bag is?"
Emily: "No - what is it?"
Me: "Well, let's see. Many years ago, it was thought that ladies needed to clean out the insides of their vaginas, so they invented these bags filled with warm water. There was a hose that went inside your body and then you pushed the water into your vagina and let it come out. You know how "douche" is French for Shower? Ok, so essentially that is what they were used for..."
Emily: Silence.

More silence as she processes this.

Emily: "So the boys are calling each other Vagina Showers?"
Me: "Essentially, yes. Not as funny when you know what it means, right?"

Apparently, she shared this knowledge with the boys and the popularity of the word has plummeted.

That's me. Killing playground humor with knowledge.

Tonight however, I was caught off guard.

I can handle douche bag discussions. I can handle "what are penises used for?" and even bite back my smart aleck response of "If you're lucky, some mighty good things".... I can keep my hysteria under wraps when she has tried to massage me with the vibrator she found in my dresser with the phrase "Mama, you seem tense, let me massage you" as the hum of the pocket rocket came to life.

(And Yes, I have prayed, dear sweet jeebus, do not let her recall this when she finally figure out what those things WERE in her mothers dresser, because there is not enough therapy in the world - for either of us)

No, tonight we were watching a mediocre American History Documentary. I have taken to forcing her in front of them when I can find them as I feel slightly neglectful of her American History education. Since she has been in Canada for nearly 4 years now, she can tell you more about the Filles du roi of New France than she can of ANYTHING American.

While I don't view this as a totally bad thing, I also want her to know enough about American History that, should we return to the states while she is receiving her before college education, she would be able to get by without too much trouble. I am perfectly fine in the knowledge that she doesn't need the crazy indoctrination of  grade school history to be a perfectly Fine American. Maybe even one who is a bit more worldly and able to see that other places and peoples have histories as important and rich as our own little nation building fairy tale.

So, we had gotten through the first Europeans...onto the first colonies and into the Revolutionary War with very little problem. As Emily was born in New Hampshire and been through a majority of the New England states, she knew most of the place that were being discussed - Boston, Concord, Plymouth. Even in todays episode when they were discussing the industrial revolution and the fabric factories of Lawrence and Lowell, Mass - we could associate the history with places she knows.

I should have perked up when the building of the Erie Canal was being talked about. Now, we have seen many pieces of the Canal, as we like driving down that part of New York when we drive to the City, so I wasn't entirely tuned in to what was coming up.

Did you guess Slavery? Cause I was oblivious. Seriously.  I mean, as we were discussing why rivers and canals were so important to the economy of the US, no warning bells or whistles started sounding in my head:

"WAH! WAH! WAH! Uncomfortable moment coming ahead."

It was sneaky, this documentary. I was waylaid with a discussion of the wonders of the damn cotton gin when they got me. Bam! There it was. People being sold. Mothers having children taken from their arms. Free Men being kidnapped and sold back into slavery with no recourse.  The vague reference to "Light skinned women" and "breeding".

People who looked like Emily. Like her Father. But not like me.

Emily started to cry. It was the unfairness of it all. The terribleness of seeing women pleading for their children., and her ability to see herself in those children. Between tears she said "I don't LIKE this."

My mother instinct was to turn it off. Shield her from this. Mixed with that? Guilt. A terrible inability to explain Why to her that wouldn't sound apologetic or defensive or patronizing. An inability to vocalize why some people still hold very similar views - that some people are less than because of their skin color, or religion or sexual orientation.

I froze up a little. I didn't have any good explanations at hand.

What I finally came up with was "I know you don't like this - and I don't either - but it is really important to understand all of the parts of how America came to be - even the stuff that makes us terribly sad. The way we treated First Nations peoples...and later the way we treated Africans was just terrible.  But we can't pretend that it didn't happen or was different because we don't like it. Part of America has been thinking that we can boss other people around if we were stronger, or had better weapons, or more people. We got to do what we wanted because someone else was afraid of us and You are right - it isn't fair."

She was quiet.

"The Iraq War?", she queried.

"Yep, kind of like that too..."

and with that the documentary ended at the verge of the Civil War.

Emily Damali

Thank you for choosing me Emily.  Thank you for loving me when I was not loveable, for keeping me as your mother when I didn't want to be kept.

Thank you for being a joyful child, even when your mother could not be joyful.

We muddle through, the best we can, together. Usually laughing at something your father does not find funny.

I love you more than you can know - far more than I can tell you. And while I know that the upcoming years are going to be challenging, I think we can do it. 

Love you ,Schmoopa.  Happy 12th birthday.

Me and The Girls

When did bra shopping become so ridiculously complicated?

Unlike some arenas in my life, I like a very straightforward bra. In fact, these are the basic three criterion:

1. Fits
2. Has Underwire
3. Cotton

In sum, I want a bra that holds up "the girls" AND doesn't make me sweat.

Since I was down to my last three serviceable bras, I knew I needed to make the trek out and secure more. I mean, rotating the same three bras was getting a little depressing. They weren't looking so good and while Terrance doesn't require me to be any kind of Sex Kitten, I still retain some basic female pride in my appearance.

And honestly, I LIKE my boobs. We've been good friends, me and them. They have held up well under the demands of nursing a baby and retained a bit of their youthful demeanor. They aren't "perky" per se, but I stopped being perky about 22 years ago so I really can't hold my boobs up to a standard to which I can't measure anything else.

Imagine my surprise when faced with a sea of padded, molded cup bras...When the hell did THIS happen?? Who needs this padding? What the hell is going on with this scary perma-shape boob thing? Is there not a Bra for an adult woman without bells and whistles? Can I get one that fits the diameter of my body without making me feel as if I am being forced into the throat of a boa constrictor?

Maybe I can blame it on growing up in Vermont and then living in New Hampshire. I need a Yankee Bra, one that I can tend the garden, shovel the snow, wrangle the children and perhaps braid a wool rug if the spirit so moves me. You know - a PRACTICAL bra for PRACTICAL New Englanders.

Maybe I can blame it partially on my genetics - This is not a Victoria's Secret kind of body. My boobs Laugh At those bras. About three years ago, in an effort to make myself a bit more fancy, I tried - honestly I did. I went into the store and started looking and even tried on a few of the "XL" sizes in those types of stores. Not only could I not shove all boobage INTO the alloted space, but usually, I couldn't get the damn thing all the way around my apparently Freakishly huge ribcage.

My foray into the lingerie stores have taught me that I am an Unnaturally well endowed female with the rib cage circumference of a WWF wrestler. There might as well be a flashing sign shouting "THESE BRAS ARE NOT FOR YOU, GORILLA CHEST!" in the window. This does not encourage my shopping for new bras....which is why I was down to the aforementioned three bras. A white one, a pink one and one that had been brown-ish before being washed with a dark blue towel several months ago, so it now has the color of a healing bruise.

SEK-SI!

This is how I found myself adrift in the sea of Padded, Molded, Bedazzled Bras on a Saturday Afternoon.

Pre-Meditation?

Dawn: "Wow, I am really dizzy - This fluid in my ear is throwing me off. I need to lay down for a second."

Emily: "If you die, do you want to be burned or buried?"

Dawn: "First off, the word is cremated, not Burned."

Emily: "OK, Cremated - do you want to be cremated or buried?"

Dawn: "I'm not sure it is necessary to have this discussion right now, at 4 in the afternoon."

My Body is their Wonderland

This morning:

Terrance: Emily, what are you doing?
Emily: I am going to get dressed in Mama's room.
Terrance: Don't go in there and wake your mother up.
Emily: I'm not.  (closing my bedroom door behind her)
Terrance: Open up that door Emily. I know you are going to try to wake your mother up.
Emily: No - I just need to , um, Use her deodorant. Oh, Good Morning Mama!

Later, once Em is at school.

Terrance: Wow. Your boobs are huge today!
Dawn: Yeah, they are really kind of sore

Long Silence.

Dawn: If you come over here and try to touch them, I am cutting off your hands.
Terrance: Ok, Then.

Traitor Tree

There's a lot of stuff to say, but I am oddly tongue tied. Nothing earth shattering, for sure, but there is an obstruction in my brain. I can feel it all IN there. I just can't direct it to move forward, move Out.

Normally, Spring is my most productive time, when the flow loosens like the streams which were frozen over all winter long. And am I productive? Yes, but not in things I should be doing. Which infuriates Terrance. He of the "I am forcing myself to sit here and be miserable until I finish it" work ethic. That is not my work ethic. The more I push, the more granite like the block becomes.  I must walk around the block, whistling, pretending not to be looking at it, at all. I must ignore the block so it does not feel threatened, and therefore will desist, laying back down to sleep.

While I want the PhD to be done, my fear of being displaced post degree keeps my other instinct - that of finishing and doing a ridiculously good job - in check.  A small panic attack rose up last week when I was asked first by Terrance what I planned on doing post-degree....then when I was explaining that this was throwing off my desire to write to my supervisor, SHE asked what I planned to do post-degree.

AAAAAHHHHHHH. I don't know. Can't I just do this? Think? Write? Wander? Discuss the uses and place of Memory in  Curriculum Theory?  You know? Stuff?

Terrance will want to move on when I finish, and I love Montreal. I am finally rooted here. The idea of having to be uprooted makes me want to stop growing altogether, like those trees who decide to lose all their leaves in August to prepare for the upcoming winter, the ones I call the Traitor Trees.

He doesn't understand that my need for stability goes so deeply that I would rather shut myself down than be forced out.

After 20 years, he still doesn't understand this.

Shower Musings

Number 1: You are not saving money by using this razor until it is scraping the skin off of your undershaved shin. 

Yes, I know that the winter in Montreal doesn't "inspire" bare legs, and I know that a small pack of razors here is as well protected as the Meth ingredients in American wal-marts...and at 15 bucks for a small pack, doesn't exactly inspire shaving wily nily But WOMAN! There is no reason to experience this level of hell to shave your legs.  Throw the damn thing OUT when you notice it is dull. Don't wait until you peel all the skin off your leg for the third time to make your move. The trash can is RIGHT next to the tub. 

Dos: Whoever keeps moving my toothpaste from the edge of the shower. STOP it. There is One kind of toothpaste I like...and I buy it in abundance.  I also provide a couple of other flavors for the other two people who live in this house.  I leave the toothpaste on the side of the sink I can reach because Yes, I like to brush my teeth in the shower.  Having to get out of the shower to walk across the bathroom to get the toothpaste is counter productive.  Besides, you have at least three other containers of tooth past from which to choose. Leave mine alone. 

Three: There is a bath mat on the floor for a reason. To absorb the water from your sopping wet bodies as you emerge from the shower. It is not meant to be stepped around, nor is it meant to be balled up and kicked to the side of the room, sopping wet.  Come On. If I crack my head open and have to be photographed dead, naked and covered in blood by some freaking Quebecois CSI team, I am haunting the SHIT out of both of you, forever. And this note is to YOU Emily Damali - If I tell you to put the new, freshly laundered bathmat down and I walk in afterwards and find it thrown in the middle of the floor, I will not be pleased. And Yes, I know it was you. See Issue 2. There are only three of us in the house, and I handed you the bathmat. 

We may all now resume our regularly scheduled lives as bedouin housecats.

Early Care and Education Manifesto Part 2

So you all know that I am an actual certified Elementary Education Teacher who turned her back on her profession to lay on the floor with Babies. Wasting my rather pricey University of Vermont education in the opinion of many.

The truth is that I never intended to teach above 2nd grade. I knew long before I graduated that I wanted to be a Kindergarten teacher...MAYBE a first or second grade teacher, but never above that. I may have been the only student to ASK to be placed in a Kindergarten for her teaching internship. Even among my K-6 education student peers, Kindergarten was seen as "not really teaching".....whereas in Early Childhood circles, it can be viewed as the brass ring, the place where maybe your salary may be on the low end of par with others. You know, the REAL teachers.

I was fortunate to slide into my career when I did. It was a strange time in Education, with the Whole Language movement being all the rage in Vermont. I had been trained to be "bi-lingual" in these methods - Both Whole Language and the Basal/Phonics methodologies. While I personally favored Whole Language, I also knew how to implement the other methodology if needed. I also had a very thorough training in assessment of reading skills and difficulties. I have to hand it to the professors at UVM - they made sure we came out with a pretty extensive set of skills - a true teacher education program...but I digress. The point is that there was a moment in education when I graduated in which ideologies were in flux. I landed where I was supposed to land - in the world of Early Care and Education.

At that first child care center at which I was employed, the Director handed me the NAEYC book, Developmentally Appropriate Practice. The OLD one. The Green Book. I read it in one night and came back to her the next day and asked "Where was this in my Teacher Education Program? It is completely RIGHT..." That was 1992. I began a re-education through the NAEYC publications at the center, coming back to Developmental Theory that I had ignored in Undergrad.

Because, I learned, you couldn't understand a child if you didn't already have some kind of template in your mind as to why/how they develop. If you can't understand that sorting objects is the basis of Math, or that a baby dropping things off a table is really the beginning of scientific knowledge and curiosity, then there can be no reason for the choice the items you select for the environment. Coupled with my fortunate and life changing introduction to the philosophies of Madga Gerber and RIE, I would never look at the children in my care with anything less than the belief that they were all VERY bright and capable learners...It was ME who had to catch up, not them. If I stopped and listened, they would tell me what they needed from me.

Magda's Mantra was "Unbusy Yourself". Teachers can find things to keep them Busy all the time. There is never a lack of things to do, and in Early Care and Education there are things to be cleaned, washed, disinfected, laundry to fold, bottles to start defrosting because someone is going to wake up hungry and the breast milk takes at Least 30 minutes of sitting in hot water to thaw.... It is easy to make the adult decision that Management of Tasks is your first priority. It would also be the wrong decision.  Teachers who function like this have very tidy classrooms, very pretty bulletin board displays - but lack a certain connection with the children.  If a child doesn't fit in this teachers world, then there is no place for him or her. If the train leaves and if you aren't in your assigned seat then you are Shit outta luck, my friend.

The best Early Childhood Teachers realize early on that YOUR plans are superfluous. Sure, you can have a vague idea of how the day is going to run...but whether or not these things actually happen depend on a wide variety of factors, most of which are well beyond your power to predict. IF Everyone arrives at school and IF everyone is Healthy, and IF everyone has the clothes they need for outdoor play and IF they have all eaten breakfast and IF they have slept that  previous night.....Oh, the list is Long and I am not even getting into the lives of children who see things they should never see. The boy who comes in after his mother was taken to jail the previous night for stabbing a neighbor....Or the one who comes in smelling very much of marijuana saturating his clothes, or the one who just weeps from the moment her mother drops her off until you can finally calm her down by holding her and keeping her next to you for the first three hours of the day.

Early Care and Education Teachers are on the front lines of some very heavy shit. And don't think it is only in "certain" places in "certain" schools. Young children have not learned to entirely shield their emotions and the things they see and feel are reflected right back through their actions, play and drawings. They will talk about things with peers to try and figure out "normal" through the lenses they possess. The teacher role is to listen and guide and reflect, then hopefully liaison back with the team teacher and  parent ( if possible) to discuss.

If a teacher is so busy making sure all the children have done all of the worksheets, or telling them to color the stop sign RED and then CUT IT OUT, there is no time for that observation to happen. The really important things are shoved aside. And let's be honest - If you can't sit at a table next to a peer without kicking them, or poking them with a pencil, what the hell are you going to do with your cut out red stop sign? If you can't find a way to enter into play with peers without kicking over their sand structure...then your Phoneme sounds are really of less concern than your inability to relate to other people your age.

But it comes back to that Crazy Teacher who likes her plans and her schedules. It's THAT type of person who has gotten into higher positions and is now dictating that the only way to Know if a child has learned something is to measure them all the same way. No room for the messy reality of difference. And let us not even TALK About the way some kids need extra time for things to click...or need sensory input to learn.  And oh, did we mention we are going to base YOUR salary on whether or not Your Kids perform to "standard" on this test?  Because everyone performs better when the giant  barbed stick is waiting to smack them.

This does not, and has never meant that Early Care and Education rooms should be Chaos. That was a side swipe we never effectively dealt with as a profession. That DAP ( Developmentally Appropriate Practice) equaled "Everyone gets to run around and do whatever they feel like doing". Oh No. During the time I was a Validator for NAEYC Accreditation, one of the things I rated very heavily was the "Tone" of the room. It should be busy and occasionally loud....but Not out of control. It shouldn't be too quiet. Children should sound happy...busy....occasionally argumentative, you know - NORMAL.  It should be obvious children live in this room - that the room exists FOR children. Art where they can see it. and obviously made by children. Areas set up so that they can independently choose to be in them or not.  It shouldn't be too messy - children shouldn't' have to root through giant plastic buckets to find the things they need or want. But not too clean either.  If it was too clean, I worried Why.  Usually I would find that there was a teacher who would "Close" areas or toys because they didn't want to deal with the mess.

DAP meant, to me, Would I like to be here? Would I feel valued and known in this environment? Would I have an adult to help me if I needed...but not hovering over me? Would there be things I like to do here - would my interests be listened to and encouraged? Would my humor be encouraged? Would there be boundaries and limits that were there to guide me...not punish me? Would I hear NO or DON'T all day?

In the last part o' th manifesto, I want to address the role of the Administrator in preserving the environment for the teachers to do what they needed to do. Because it is really important - and really, really hard. And throw some questions at me if you'd like. Who knows where the next piece will lead?

Early Care and Education Manifesto: Part 1

You know, SB is completely right in her comment to me about my sticking my big old opinionated opinion into a conversation to which I was no part of in a coffee shop. I was a Supah-huge wench to that woman in the coffee shop. She would have been well within her rights to tell me where to go and how to get there.

I also know that SB knows and loves me Long time in bloggy and even Real World, so I can take her criticism with the grain of salt it is intended. Had someone tried to do that same to ME in a coffee shop, I can assure you that there would be one verbally battered patron exiting...and it wouldn't have been me.

But let me tell you WHY it is important - that term "Day Care" as different from "Child Care" or even better: "Early Care and Education".

After I graduated from the University of Vermont in 1992, in the Upper 1/3 of my graduating class with a Bachelors of Science in Education and a minor/concentration in English Literature, my first job was at a child care center. Due to some very strange economic issues, there were NO teaching positions when I came out of college - particularly for beginning teachers. We couldn't even get subbing work. Many of us were funneled into Child Care positions. Similar skill set, after all.

In hindsight, one of the more amusing things to me is that vast hand of destiny in my future career and professional life. I would have never chosen to work with infants, yet that is what I ended up doing. Most of the other "Real Teachers" in Child Care wanted to at LEAST have the kindergarten age kids. I mean, then they could use their knowledge of lesson plans and academics to feel like they hadn't wasted ALL of the money.

A rare few of us migrated to younger children. We found we had talent. We found that this age - this Infant through Two Year Old group - Well, if you could manage them successfully, you could do ANYTHING.

By this I mean, they had the most challenging Parents. The relationship with parents, by virtue of their child's still developing communication skills, had to be close and personal. Furthermore, parents are SUPER vulnerable to judgement in these years. Even if a family had more than one child, each child was completely different and new. Almost nothing that THIS child did was the same as the previous and/or subsequent child. This uneven ground that constantly shifted and changed made parents, in particular, feeling like they never really Knew what the hell was going on. Every time they thought they figured it out....It changed.

Then there was the observation skills. The best lessons I ever learned about observation and recording were learned on the floor of the infant room at Alphabet House. We watched the children. We lay on the floor with the children. We wrote down what we saw. We discussed it as peers with each other to gain other opinions about any concerns or general observations. As an infant caregiver, I had to set aside anything I knew and simply Watch. I had to formulate and reject or accept theories based on all the developmental knowledge I had accumulated to that point. I learned to watch the children and ask "Why"....because there was always an answer.

In this group of infants, I also honed my presence with children. If there is a Tough Crowd in any situation, it is a group of 12 infants. You show fear...or disrespect and they will eat you alive. They will refuse to eat. They will refuse to sleep. They will refuse to allow you to touch them to change their diapers. Infants and Toddlers are the absolute personality detectors. Later on, I could often tell if someone was even going to get an second interview by watching them approach an Infant or Toddler in the room. 90% of the people came directly AT the child, with some crazy fake voice...which tells the child to RUN AWAY, THIS UNKNOWN ADULT IS CRAZY! 10% may sit down on the floor and wait for a child to approach them ...those were the ones with potential.

So, imagine my surprise when people would hear that I worked with Infants and ask me "So you are a babysitter? When are you going to get real teaching job?"

That was my first glimpse into the fact that the work that I did, everyday, was not valued. It was throw away work, that Anybody could do, and which certainly did not require a Bachelor's Degree in Education! In the years I worked as a Child Care provider, more people than I can count told me I was wasting my talent, or asked when I was going to leave to get a "real" job. Many more were stunned when they learned I had a University degree. I mean, I COULD be working in an office photocopying and making more money than I was making caring for children.

And it was true. It was awful to see people being offered 10 dollars an hour to deliver pizzas, when I was earning 7.50 per hour caring for people's infants. And paying for my own health care.

Oddly, I remember the day that something in my brain switched over. I was calling a parent to tell her that I was pretty sure her daughter had impetigo, and needed to be seen by her Pediatrician.

This baby, in particular, had been a tough nut to crack as she had been a VERY HIGH NEED child, and by the time she got to me at age 5 months, had been asked to leave three other child care situations since she screamed ALOT. I carried her in a sling for a month to prove to her that I was a trustworthy adult, something she had not had a great deal of in her previous child care situations. Needless to say, this baby eventually attached to me - as did her parents - and we had a great relationship.

The mother's assistant answered the phone and I explained who I was and that I needed to speak to the Mom. The assistant paused and asked, "So this is her babysitter?"

CLICK in my brain.

Babysitter? I had been screamed at by this baby for a solid month. I had worked with her and gotten her to trust me so that she could now easily go down for naps...or play on her own...or smile and laugh! I had worked with her parents so we had a routine for separations which were neither Sneaking away (I'm being abandoned by the adult I love most) nor Endless lingering (Are you happy? I'm going to stay until you get upset, cause I need to see you upset to see me go or I can't separate!!!)

"No.", I calmly said. "This is her Child Care Professional."

When the mom got on the line, she was laughing. "She'll never call you a babysitter again!"

SuperPower

Have I mentioned my super power? The one in which I can offend nearly anyone new - somewhat unintentionally - within ten minutes of being introduced to that person? If I am drinking, that time can be cut down to maybe three minutes.

Being a rather hermit-like girl, I forget sometimes about this particular power. I avoid new people like the LITERAL plague. Every Leap Year, something awakens in my reptilian brain and I make a new friend...to be kept - FO-EVER! Like Sartre, there is no exit from being friends with me once I have decided we are friends. I also Imprint on people in service industries....as evidenced by my recent proclamation to "Glen" that he is my new Hair Stylist. When my old stylist went on Maternity leave and never came back, I waited 2 years until I couldn't stand it and found Glen. But let's leave that little creepy tidbit aside for the moment.

This morning after I dropped Em at school I swung by Second Cup to grab my perfectly brewed coffee. Yes, these kind souls will BREW me single cups of the coffee I like. In return, I will never buy coffee anywhere else in the city. Yep, they are stuck with me. For whatever reason they seem to like me. I fit in with the humor and tone of the joint. Therefore I forget that others may be unfamiliar with my essential "Dawn-ness"

Hence, today's vignette:

I walk in and wait in line. Chris, the owner, is chatting with a middle aged woman in her early 60's. She is talking to him about "day care" for his three year old son. After several repeats of the word "Day care", I can no longer stand it and butt in to say in what I thought was a semi-friendly/joking tone:

"As an Early Childhood Professional, I would just like to say that we prefer the term "Child Care" as we have never cared for a "Day"..."

I trail off and smile.

Chris, the owner laughs. This woman does not. She stares at me.

"Are you correcting me as I get my coffee", she asks.

"Well, Yes. Yes I am. As someone getting a PhD in Early Childhood, I feel strongly that terminology defines the importance of the work we do..." I trail off again.

"It's my field too", she counters, handing Chris her Card with the Moniker of a Large well known provider of Child care in many countries.

She turns back to him - "You should get your son on the list for preschool, like Yesterday..."

Not in the least deterred I pipe up, "I put Emily on the list at the Child Care I directed when I was two weeks pregnant!"

This was said to convey empathy for the plight of searching for the right child care and camps and programs and how you simply don't KNOW about this little kitchen nook of Hell until you try to navigate it.

Here is where she thinks she is going to Get me, I later realize. She is preparing to deliver her parting Blow.

"I stayed at home with my kids when they were little until they went to school and I just loved it."

And because I didn't hear the slam until later, I responded "If I had stayed home with my daughter, it would have been a crime scene. A terrible, bloody homicide scene. Me, Her, my husband and the Cat would have all been killed. No, I speak for the Moms who would be a TERRIBLE stay at home Moms..."

Chris, the owner, is now in full guffaw. I am still smiling oblivious of the attempt on my dedication/ability/expertise as a Mom.

She shoots me a terrible parting look that clues me in that I was Supposed to be insulted instead of cheerfully detailing the ways in which I would have disassembled my family.

I stand, waiting for my coffee. I am now in internal dialog with myself and am coming to realize that this all went very, very poorly. Chris continues to laugh. I look up and say:

"And you just witnessed my superpower in action. The ability to increasingly offend any stranger in ten minutes or less..."

He smiles at me. "That was spectacular", he says.

Men Kill their weak; Women Kill Their Strong

There has been alot of noise about the ever-circular in-fighting in the world of Mommy Blogs. It isn't new, and it surely isn't NEWS, but hey, we all love a good catfight. Add in that the catfight includes getting to call someone else a Bad Mother and WHOO-HOO! It's GOLD, Jerry, GOLD!

I've been at this blogging game for awhile now. I've had my share of shit thrown at me in public and private for my decision to write about my life, family and permanent seat on the train to crazy town in this forum. And while 90% of what you read is True ( to my specifications of True), 10% is exaggerated. It's kind of what being a writer IS - blending truth and fiction, telling a story which captivates while still imparting some kind of truth.

And here is where I tell you something you already know: Truth is Terrifying.

Not just "Hey, don't go up those stairs, cause the killer is hiding in the shadows" terrifying but Entirely, "I just realized I am human battery in the Matrix" terrifying. Soul Changing. World Blowing Up. Core shaking.

When I started True Wife Confessions, I knew that there were secrets and omissions we keep from the partners we love. I knew that we keep those secrets for Lots of reasons, some universal and others entirely personal. Some shit just HAS to go under the rug to keep day-to-day life running smoothly. Every Dirty dish left on the counter, or pair of underwear on the floor can not be your relationship Waterloo.

To believe that Motherhood is any different is insanity. Yes, it is a Job - just like marriage - that many of us skipped towards, sprinkling rose petals and lavender in our wake. For women who struggle with infertility or pregnancy losses, I can imagine it looks downright fucking ungrateful to occasionally complain about Motherhood. And, in part, I would agree. It IS Ungrateful. Maybe even Selfish.

However, Truth is rarely pure. Truth is almost always wrapped up with tinges of ungrateful and swaths of selfish. This is because truth is Intimate. Personal. Even in a marriage, The versions of events that make up my Truth and those that make up Terrance's are fundamentally different.

Yes, when I was handed Emily after a ridiculously short labor ( I know, I can seriously Suck it), I felt....Curious? Glad that the Pain had stopped? A Bit perplexed? I mean, I was aware that a baby had just been placed on my breast and was now moving like some kind of crazed animal towards my nipple, but Did the Sky part and Angels burst forth with my Mom Certificate? No, not really. I was, dare I say it?, ambivalent.

Post Partum Depression aside, I obviously grew to love my daughter. To say that she has so firmly wrapped herself around the core of being that I can not imagine life without her existence in the world is utterly true. To admit that I have considered punching Teachers and small children ( and occasionally her Father) directly in the face for upsetting her is wholly true.

However, the lesson I learned in those moments, days, months and years after her birth was that Motherhood was a Job that many of us take On, but not all of us are entirely Suited for having. That doesn't mean we shouldn't have children...just that the experiences is going to be different than what the popular concept of "Mothering", distilled down from those crazy Victorians, has come to mean.

Like any job, there are days when I am really good - really on top of my game. I can multi-task, soothe hurt feelings, manage to get food on tables, pets fed and watered and encouraging words said over homework. Maybe I will even have sex with my husband later on!

Other days? Well, you can take this job and shove it so far up your intestinal track that it tickles your duodenum. These are the days when I am Done. I want a Drink. I want to Sleep. I want to be LEFT ALONE. I want to be selfish and ungrateful and work out whatever I need to work out in my juvenile temper tantrum. I don't want to be a mother or a wife or anything that owes anyone any kind of explanation.

Rather than deny myself those thoughts, as I once tried with disastrous results, I let them Rage. Roar. Rumpus. After twelve years of parenting and twenty of togetherness, Terrance no longer tries to cajole or chastise me out of those feelings. He knows better. I will return in my own good time.

Which bring me back to the Mommy-Haters.

In my experience, the thing I hate or react to the most tends to be the thing I need to face in myself. Just as when I watch the people who loudly defend marriage as being between a man and a woman, I often wonder how long before we see them in a gay sex scandal, or hear of how they like to have their diapers changed by prostitutes. I can't tell you how many people have told me I am destroying marriage with TWC, only to find out later they are all having affairs. I mean, it's almost like a pre-written Greek play to watch this stuff play out. Rather than be deeply angry with this type of person, I tend to pity them.

Fear is a powerful motivator. Fear of Truth is the most powerful motivator. My empathy comes from my knowledge that the fear of speaking the truth out loud to others - that these women sometimes hate their children, hate their husbands, hate their lives - is so powerful that it threatens their own very carefully constructed self images in such a way that the only choice is to divert this to other women. The "Look over there" strategy which is defined by many feminists, like Dr Lyn Mikel Brown as "horizontal aggression"

Girlfighting gets acted out horizontally on other girls because this is the safest and easiest outlet for their outrage and frustration. Girls are essentially accessing and mimicking the male violence they sometimes know all too well; and they are choosing victims that are societally approved— other girls. This pattern of horizontal aggression has long characterized subordinate groups since it manages the inevitable anger in the group being controlled without jeopardizing the over all structure of male privilege.

Its Easier to rip apart another woman than to face the issue within - that Motherhood is, at times, a thankless shitty job. It can put you in some blender of the cult of motherhood which strips away things about yourself that you value and allows others to assign you roles, ideas and feelings which you may not wholly believe. When you see a woman who has clawed her way out of the mold, she must be stopped because then, well, then what will everyone know about you - About ALL of us?

I know that I, and many other Women Bloggers, will never stop speaking our truths. Including those on motherhood and the many other stages of women's lives. When those other women are done raging against our uppity, ungrateful, selfish ways ( which again, means to me : "I wish I had the cojones to do/say what you are doing/saying") I am happy to welcome them into the fold.

Forgiveness through empathy trumps pooping on peeps any day.

What Fresh Hell is This?

I got lost in some seriously messed up rabbit hole within Facebook over the past couple of days.

It starts, as it always does, innocently enough.

Step One: Dawn Forgets about Facebook because she almost never remembers to go ON Facebook and check anything. She could be 1) walking around Montreal in fancy rainboots taking pictures; 2) reading graphic novels in the sunshine in her bed 3) figuring out other ways to avoid writing her Methodology Comp including, but not limited too: Cross Stitch, Deciding to Make a quilt out of vintage Chenille Squares and spending hours looking at these vintage chenille squares online, writing to a rug hooking expert in Nova Scotia to buy kits, perusing Etsy for hours on end bookmarking "favorite" artists that she will someday buy art from, hanging out on the "BinkyBunny" forum chatting about rabbits ( I shit you not, I do this), checking my ratio on some private torrent groups to which I belong, or last, but certainly not least...checking Perez Hilton a couple of times a day.

On Fridays, I get extra excited because a new FreakAngels issue gets published, so I always rush to read it.


Step Two: Dawn writes something on her blog that automatically gets published to her Facebook Feed. This is good as it just DOES this with no additional effort. It is also good because it allows her friends and the family members to whom she still speaks to know what is going on in the Hobbit Cave of her life.

Step Three: Friends and Family Comment! This reminds Dawn that, Holy Shit!, she has a Facebook page and maybe she should get off of her ass and respond to the people she genuinely LIKES in her life.

And here is where it goes terribly, terribly wrong.

Step Four: Dawn goes to the Facebook page and starts poking around. "Oh", she thinks,"I wonder how that person listed on my 100 friends list is doing, I should pop over and check them out". She pops over and sees a Name listed as a Friend of THAT friend and thinks, "I am pretty sure I KNOW that name....I wonder if it is who I think it is...." and clicks on over onto THAT page. At this juncture, it is safe to assume that the next Four hours are going to be spent meandering from page to page, looking at pictures in peoples albums.

Many times, it is Nice to see Friends. How they have changed, their husbands, wives, life partners, children, parents, brothers and sisters you recall from 20 years ago.

And then you click on a photo album, and there it is. A past that you were part of, but not part of. A past where you recall being friends with Many of the people pictured, but are noticeably absent from all of those pictures. Maybe your high school boyfriend appears like some kind of Dickens Ghost, replete with Chains a-rattling, before you and you feel the same surge of rejection when he dumped you after 5 years of dating, the same hurt as you had to redefine your life and most of your in-common friends seemed to choose Him. Except for the one who waited until the Boyfriend had dumped you so he could make his move to fuck you, first literally then more figuratively, of course. But That particular one, pictured in these photos, is remembered fondly by the friends. You however, remain absent.

If you are Dawn, you mope for a day. You may even chat at length with a friend who grew up in Europe to explain this tangled personal purgatory you have submerged yourself within. This friend will mock you mercilessly, and deservedly so. It is, as my daughter would say, Ree-donk-ulous for you to go wallow in a bath of 22 year old photos, feeling aggrieved and wronged.

"They didn't know you then and they sure as hell don't know you now, Dawn. Whatever recognition you are looking for can never be gotten and whatever apology you want is never going to be had, and even if it Was, they wouldn't mean it"

And here is where Dawn splits into the two. Logical Dawn KNOWS this. Logical Dawn wants to smack the ever-loving shit out of Emotional Dawn when she brings out the sack cloth and ashes and begins her self flagellation down memory lane. At the very least, Logical Dawn thinks she should just set a bottle of vodka in front of Emotional Dawn let her have a good cry and a hella hangover and be done with it. In fact, reminds Logical Dawn to Emotional Dawn, you were kind of a surly bitch during High school...Many of those people, you were not particularly NICE to. You were extremely wrapped up in your boyfriend, and when you weren't naked in his bed taking advantage of the last of the Pre-AIDS, only on the Pill dayz, you were wildly protective about who could be around the apartment. You were, in short, kinda a be-yotch. A Pretentious Be-yotch.

Emotional Dawn stares, quite balefully I assure you, at Logical Dawn.

Logical Dawn refills the glass, this time with the good dark Rum and a lime slice.

"No wandering off the fucking path.", she states.

Potty Talk

The husband and I have a few standard fight scripts. Some are most likely familiar to everyone. The Money fight. The "Who is working harder at {fill in the blank, parenting, the marriage, achieving world domination...} fight. The "OHMYGOD Didn't you Notice the Spiderwebs up there on the ceiling as you lay in bed reading graphic novels and Now I must go get the dustbuster to suck them up, while simultaneously talking to my clients on my earpiece and giving you dirty looks" fight.

Oh, wait. I think that one may be pretty unique to Terrance and I.

But it is This one that drives me really crazy. Like "I will fight you with a toothbrush shiv" angry. In his defense, he is AS angry when this fight happens. It exasperates him beyond words. For Terrance, the sheer horribleness of this very conversation is antithetical to his very belief in adulthood.

I am, of course, talking about the "Flushing Discussion".

Terrance likes a pristine bowl. As in sparkling clean, free from any type of paper, or other refuse. He likes a Lid down on this pristine bowl. If he is going to be accessing the facilities for any length of time, he locks the door. Regardless of the fact that in nigh unto 20 years of togetherness, I have never busted in on him. Never. He also will wait until we are all out of the house and THEN decide to use the bathroom. As in, Emily and Dawn are sitting in the car waiting for Terrance to come out of the house, only to realize that it has been 15 minutes and WTF is he doing in there? OOOOOhhhhhh. Using the bathroom.

Now Dawn...truthfully, I am not all that worried about the toilet. I go in - I use it, I flush and wash and give nary a backwards glance. Aside from the times I have escaped in the bathroom to avoid my spouse or daughter for a little peace and frakkin quiet, it exists as a functional space.

And in this space, two worlds collide.

The phrase "You are nearly 40 year old and should be responsible for the complete disposal of all of your waste" has actually been said at me. and Yes, we actually talk to one another like this. You think I make all this shit up? Hardly.

In truth, it is the fault of the old toilet. The one with NO suction. The one that in order to GET the proper amount of suction, one has to remove the top lid, hold down the float until the water reaches a certain high level, then flush...holding the handle down somewhat longer than you would normally, so that all of the water gets sucked out of the tank....except that Sometimes the plug doesn't seal up, so you have to reach down and re-adjust it so it snaps closed over the drain.

Dawn Rouse, Near PhD and novice toilet technician, at your service.

After one particularly hostile toilet fight, I messed with the float. I figured if I bent it up a bit more, it would naturally fill up with more water, thereby creating the necessary amount of suction to remove my "refuse" , or monstrous spiders, or whatever else I feel the need to flush away.

Because Honestly. I hate this discussion. I hate standing in the bathroom for an Hour flushing Over and Over so the bowl is up to Crazy Boy's standards. I could be doing other important things in that time...like shopping on Etsy for Quirky art, or planning my next 12 craft projects to avoid writing my dissertation. Plus it wastes toilet paper. The GOOD toilet paper that I buy, because if I left it up to Terrance, we would be wiping our delicate nether regions with the pine bark equivalent of toilet paper. Dammit, I am a grown woman. I will spend the extra money on the GOOD SOFT toilet paper. Which gets wasted as I throw it in the bowl in my fruitless flushing campaign.

This counter-move sent Terrance, PhD for real and man with NO household repair skills, on a three to five hour journey to figure out WHAT I had done to the toilet which now made a noise that only he could hear. There was a great deal of heavy sighing, glaring and forceful door closure.

He didn't speak to me for a full day. I pretended to have no idea what he was upset about. Which, from previous Dawn and Terrance stories like this one, you know that it is a skill in which I excel.

Late the following day he appeared at my bedroom door to say these words:
"Don't mess with the float again."

To which I nodded....cleverly neither admitting nor denying anything.

The fragile toilet truce remains intact.

Parental Kryptonite

Yesterday, Em had Teacher Workshop day.

I decided we would do errands and shopping first thing in the morning.

The errands usually become some kind of mental death match between me just trying to get THROUGH it without becoming the "Crazy mom beating her child in the Wal-Mart parking Lot" and my just handing over my Debit card and whimpering for quiet.

Not yesterday. Yesterday I unveiled the strength of my "L'il Jon" impression to my astounded daughter.

By answering "What?!", "Bring it Back", "I ain't Scarrred" and "OK!" to just about every utterance out of my daughters mouth, I was able to render her fairly quiet.

This is not something I shared with Terrance. He has to find his own way with her. I can't be giving away all my secrets, and he can probably do a Much better "L'il Jon" than me...you know cause of the dreads and blackness and maleness and all.

As I lay my sad and sorry achey, period starting self in the bed this morning, I hear his secret weapon unveiled.

"Emily wants to party all the time,party all the time, party alll the Tiiiiimmmmmmmeeee."
He does a pitch perfect Eddie Murphy in red leather Rick James pants impression.

Emily groans. "Stop it, Daddy!".

He does it again.

I smile.

We have found a chink in her armor. Parental singing.

A love I dare to name

After sleeping on the same pillows for over 15 years, no strike that....I had at least one of those pillows in College which was 1988-1992 for the undergrad...So let's generously say say 20 Years.

The same pillows that I am not entirely sure Where they came from, but I am certain that if I DID buy them, they didn't cost over ten bucks. Some I am sure I stole from various lodging establishments that really couldn't be called "Hotels".

All of them have been copiously drooled on, by me. (see example below, taken by my husband who thought it was super funny to document his wifes droolery, not to mention that all of our pillow cases have rabbit bites from when they fall off the bed and the rabbits attack them)

Place this mess of motley pillows on a pillowtop mattress that Terrance bought when I was pregnant with Emily. A Mattress that came mysteriously one day while I was at work. A Mattress which, at best, was most likely a "Factory second". A Mattress with no box spring, but was a step up from the futon we were sleeping on in 1997. A Mattress which, 13 years later, has craters indented into my side of the bed...which, after flipping, turning and changing means there are 4 craters, Two per side.

Place this mattress on a couple pieces of particle board that has been improvised as a "frame" for 13 years.

Now, mix in a person who LOVES to be in Bed. I mean really, really LOVES it. As in, to quote my best friend, "If you could rule the world from your bed, you would be the happiest person in the world".

I write in bed, I quilt in bed, I watch TV and movies in Bed. It is my nest of comfort and security. Most recently, I wrote the theory comp for my dissertation in this bed:

Do you see that nest? This was at the end of the writing....the stacks of books, the unseen stacks of paper coffee cups overflowing in the trash. I am a human Crow, stealing shiny bits and string to decorate my environs.

Add in the two free roam rabbits and frankly Terrance doesn't even try to live in this part of the house. He "visits" with me...then heads to his bed in the other room for the night. We think this has helped to extend our marriage, this giving up of space, since he isn't breathing loudly in my ear and I am not flopping all over, bumping him.

It with all of this in mind, I introduce my new beloved:

Two hours spent in the store, testing different models. Then pillows. Testing pillows on the chosen bed.

The 4 pillows I bought ( why Yes, I do need FOUR pillows ) are heaven. Yes, at 200 bucks for the four, they were the most expensive pillows I have ever bought in my life. I could hardly look at the receipt for shame. But Oh. The difference already!

The bed gets delivered on Wednesday, and I can hardly wait. I may have to write an ode to my new bed to express my joy at its wonderfulness.

And to you I say, Spend the money on yourself. Sure, it will make you sweat as you consider that this money could be paying bills, or sending your kid to camp for the summer, or a million other things - like your tuition. However, the money I will save on seeing the chiropractor because my mattress is killing me combined with the sheer happiness I will experience by laying on these pillows in that bed is worth it.

I'm worth it, dammit.

Grabbing the Bull

So, after my perpetual whining about how I should be more popular as a Blogger and  my infernal waffling on whether I am any good as a writer, I present This:

I thought about nominating myself, but then I got all weirded out about doing that. It just seemed a bit Gauche. And God knows, I swing between not wanting to be Obvious and screaming "LOOK AT MY BOOBS" in any given week.

So I leave it to you, my gentle readers. If something I have written has touched you, or made you laugh, or just made you feel good - or shit, even if it made you feel kind of bad, but you learned something....consider nominating one of my posts. Or all of them. Or none of them. Entirely up to you. Following the link will take you to the page which describes the categories, and a place to submit your nominations.

I'm not the most bubbly blogger on the internets, a lousy team player, and my attitude has never been one which is described as "peppy" BUT I am a damn fine writer. Even I, in my waves of self flagellation and doubt know this deep down.

Thanks.

Management Strike

There are stories that are scratching to get out.

I woke this morning, a bit disoriented and foggy. The places I have been in my dreams that last few nights are unfamiliar ones. Normally, my dream landscapes are wholly familiar. The last several nights?

In one, I was at my first job out of college. A place I have not dreamed about in easily 18 years. Last night? Summer camp circa 1986...playing four square (badly). Before that? My grandmothers bedroom circa 1975.

Perhaps it is part of my psyche approaching 40, pushing some of these memories to the forefront of my brain, demanding attention like petulant two year olds. Perhaps something is coming out of the fog of my life that will be entirely unexpected.

The lesson on "Not expecting" is one I have yet to master. Shit, I have yet to scratch the surface on that particular beastie. Therefore, when these unsettling dreams filter through my neural passageways, I awake waiting for the big reveal.

"something is coming", shouts the Dawn voice in my head. "Get Ready! Plan! Prepare! Anticipate!"

But, for the first time in a very long time, I don't want to.

There is a comfort in this in-between place that I currently inhabit. Not the willful deafness I have occasionally turned to my life, pretending that if I didn't acknowledge it, it simply wasn't happening. Nor is this the dreamy state of "living in my head", which has been another way for me to disconnect with the world at large and pull the comfort of my thoughts over me.

As a manager of people and situations and occurrences and utterances, a vast chunk of my energy is invested in my ability to predict and anticipate and prepare. It is an inheritance of my parents, this over vigilance, to know where their unorganized and impulsive selves may wander to next required a singular focus.

Perhaps it is the purposeful disconnect from my mother which has allowed me to let go of the tether and float downstream. Making that decision last year was incredibly hard. Coming to terms with the fact that your mother can never love you the way you need to be loved, as a child, is soul shattering. Nearly a year later, the peace in not having to manage her feels guiltily relieving.

She has called me all the names. I have been the bad daughter. I have not sought reconciliation. I require no forgiveness.

On the other side of all that tumult, my life is more peaceful now that in the previous 39 years.

I think I might be growing up.

Nice Try

And the best new "Worst excuse to try to get out of doing your homework" goes to:

Emily for this response to her parents telling her to go sit at the kitchen table and finish her $%^$%&#$%# homework:

"I can't! That calendar in the Kitchen Creeps me out!"

Doppleganger

My brother and I have a joke that if any two siblings from our family are within 50 miles of each other...then the 3rd is forced to the outermost edges of North America in order to keep the triangular cosmic balance. This is the reason that my sister, my brother and I have only come together in the same place in 1996, 1997, and 2001. My Wedding, Donnie's College Graduation and Jessie's High School Graduation. We don't tend to congregate much and I sense that we all get wary when forced into family like situations, like rangy low-status wolves anticipating our death match.


I have not untangled my fear of family - My own or others. Some of this fear seems to be a protective measure - my fear based in some infant decision to join or stand apart. I wonder if I observed the infant Dawn if I would note the security of her attachment, as I sometimes think that I fit the reactive profile. The disconnect, the dislike of being touched, the doing better with strangers than family, masked with a great deal of intelligence. A savant who succeeds in spite of her own best efforts because while she is socially inept, the intellect moves her forward.

I once asked my therapist if she thought it was possible I could be a sociopath. This led her - like every therapist in the world - to ask me why I believed I might be a sociopath.

Its hard to explain, really. Some of this question lies in my understanding that I just don't "get" it in the same way other people may understand humans. My ability to observe the behavior of others is most likely a survival trait. My father was unpredictable and my mother had me highly attuned to her every nuance. As such, I can tell you alot about peoples body language and if they are going to be a threat to me. The "normal" stuff - like how to remember to ask about peoples kids or remember birthdays or show interest in peoples health? I suck ASS at that stuff. That circuit just never got switched on in my hyper attuned brain. Telling you the layout of my elementary school in Jacksonville North Carolina? That I can do.

Seeming interested in personal lives of people with whom I am not intimately involved? I can't even fake it. I used to watch the secretary, Angie, at the child care. She was amazing with people. She remembered all sorts of personal details and would ask people about their lives. I was transfixed. Which is why I was not the best manager of people. Want me to plan out strategy? Implement policies? Move towards a vision of quality through sheer force of will? I'm your gal.

Oddly, the other place in which I excel? Being with children. I always fancied it was my lack of artifice that drew children to me. I was a very safe adult. I said exactly what I felt and thought. I didn't hide behind false words or actions. I told a person who was interviewing me for a job once that I didn't soften myself with my children, and I was sorry if she and other adults found me too abrasive, but if Infants and Toddlers could embrace me, it was really her issue if she couldn't.

I didn't get that job.

And now, I see the same patterns emerging in my daughter. She tells me every other day about someone else she considered a friend who was "mean" to her, or otherwise wounded her sensitive self.

Is she alot like her mother? Um, yeah. She is chatty and loud and opinionated. Where I am physically reserved, however, she is effusive. Her sense of being in other people's personal space has never been good and she just doesn't clue in that it is annoying - even when the person is SAYING that she is annoying.

Do I hold myself accountable? Come on. It's a new way to torture myself, of COURSE I hold myself accountable. I fret that if I were more adept socially, she would be too. If I were a normal adult, she would be a more normal kid.

We lay in bed last night, talking about things. Part of the problem, see, is that my kid is VERY like me. She wants to chat about Monty Python. She wants to discuss the Tiffany exhibit we saw last week. Or the Greek Mythology books.

Her peers? They want to discuss Twilight, or The Simpsons or scary movies I won't let her see, nor does she want to see.... Em has no stomach for the scary, and we aren't just a TV watching family. There are a multitude of pop culture references she has no idea about since she is ensconced in this world of Dawn-ness with a hearty splash of Terrance-ness too. The child never stood a chance.

To reassure her that people will "get" her later in life is really not enough. I remember how badly I wanted to be like other kids at her age. So, I do what I do in all situations that I don't quite understand...I research them. I turn to books. I make a plan of research attack. How and what to observe. what I plan to do with that information once I have amassed it.

This time, however, I am teaching her my method. We started the book "The Unwritten Rules of Friendship" last night. While it was written as an advice book for parents, she and I are reading it together. As we finished "The Different Drummer" section last night, I gave her homework for today. Observe. Figure out what things people seem to like and then we will strategize as to how to find things she likes and intersect the two. The goal isn't to change Emily - I like my quirky sweet girl who still loves her Playmobil at almost 12 and can chat with you about the River Styx.

The goal is for her to figure out how to manage the puzzling world of social interactions, while still fully knowing herself. Maybe I will finally figure it out too.

Same as it ever Was

So Em and I were laying in bed tonight and we were talking about the past week, which has been her school vacation. She made a comment and I said the very typical "I can't wait until you have a child of your own...You'll call me and I will be all "She won't sleep in her bed? Isn't that awful...now I am going to have another glass of wine...Click." mother response.

She laughed. "You make me sound like I am a demon child", she laughs.

"Oh, honey - Why do you think I wrote it all down in a blog? So I can remember EXACTLY what it was like..."

"Like what?", she challenges.

I pull up the blog. I roll to 2005 and I begin to read. She laughs. She laughs until she weeps as I read the adventures of Emily, Dawn and Terrance.

At the end of the third blog post, she pauses and says "Well, I guess I was Kind of a demon child."

and this was what I read to her:

My morning has started like countless other mornings. I wake up – the alarm is on and NPR is wafting toward me. I have intentionally put the radio/alarm clock on the OTHER side of the room on a high shelf. I do this because if it were next to me I would turn it off. I know this about myself. I admit it. I have to outwit my reptilian self in the wee minutes of my awakening. And Yes. I also set the alarm clock 20 minutes ahead of the real EST to fool me into thinking I am waking up early….only to lay in bed for 20 minutes coming to conciousness. If you look closely, you can see the faint “L” on my forehead.

That is when I realized that my daughter was kissing me. At first, it was sweet. A little kiss on my arm. A little kiss on my back. Then it became torture. This is for two reasons. I don’t like to be touched in the morning. I want to wake up slow and get myself in the shower. The second reason is that she was doing this to wake me up. And yes…I know it SEEMED sweet, but it wasn’t - it was evil. She knows that she can’t turn on the television until I am awake and having snuck successfully into my room YET again ( for the eight billionth time in her life) she now has the goal of watching some ungodly loud show at 6:30 in the a.m.

As soon as she has determined that I am awake, even if my eyes are closed and I am pretending to be sleeping, she starts the rambling:

“Mama. Daddy said I could come into your bed last night. He said it was Ok. Mama, daddy said it was OK that I come in your bed. Mama? Mama, Daddy said OK.”

Now – let me give you the background on this. Getting into and sleeping in our bed has been Emily’s #1 life goal. We have tried a variety of tactics, which have failed. These include a gate on her door and a gate on our door (she kicked them down) Locking my door at night (until I forgot one night), we ferbered her as a baby and she outlasted us after 4+ hours of SCREAMING. Loss of priviledges, loss of her bitty baby…. you name it. And where does she end up? Next to me in my bed. She is the master. Last night Daddy told her (as she produced a hail of tears) “No Chinese food for dinner tomorrow night if you don’t stay in your bed tonight”
She wants to confirm with me that Daddy gave her permission, so this negates his threat of taking away Chinese food for dinner. This is her first concious thought.

“Mama, Mama, can I turn the TV on? Mama? Can I? Can I turn the TV on? Mama, Mama – can I watch TV? Can we turn the radio off? Mama – can we turn the radio off?

I hate the TV on in my bedroom in the morning. I actually resisted having a TV in the bedroom at all, as I think it is a little funky. I gave in about 8 years ago. BUT no TV when I am sleeping – or falling asleep. I like it quiet and dark. I prefer to read in bed, or play video games.

It is 6:43 a.m. and I am already feeling beaten into submission. I roll over to get away from her. She scoots over like a lamprey and re-attaches on my back. I am now on the very edge of my bed. Finally, I can take it no more. I sit up; take my med’s and wanders to the bathroom.

“Mama, where you going? Mama?”

Our entire house cannot be much more than a thousand feet of space. There are a total of 4 rooms: The Living room/Kitchen, her bedroom, the bathroom and our bedroom. That is it. It is not a palatial estate.

I murmer and move to the bathroom. She bounds out of bed and leaps into her father – who is on the couch. I am now in the relative safety of the bathroom. While this sanctum is occasionally breached now, it’s integrity remains intact today. About a year ago, I threw a fit because as soon as I said I was going to the bathroom, her little ass would dart past me and throw herself on the toilet. Without fail. I would be standing speechless in the door of the bathroom watching my daughter smile at me, on the only toilet in the house. I finally flipped out. I now enjoy a child free bathroom experience.

But today, as she is bouncing off the walls, and my husband is grumbling and I am just trying to get pantyhose on that isn’t ruined and find something I don’t have to iron, and get her clothes laid out on the bed and maybe do her hair if I have time, and pack her a snack, and make sure that all things are in her backpack, and get her medicine in her, and do my hair so that it looks vaguely presentable, and now my husband is in the bathroom with the door shut and my eyeliner is in there, so I either go to work without eyeliner OR wait until he finishes to run in and put eyeliner on, and Emily is asking my about a fruit roll up she mysteriously produced since I don’t allow this level of fake food to be purchased and consumed, and I finally grab my purse and get out the door after blowing kisses at my husband and kissing my still chattering child, and close the door.

I get into the silence of my car and smile. I love going to work.

Yet another question for which I am totally unprepared

It is a typical afternoon. I have to pick Em up from school and then swing over to put gas in the car. If it ends up snowing as much as I think it might, then the last thing I want to contend with is the insanity of Montreal gas stations in the morning.

She hops in and begins the rambling debrief of her day. If you know the mind of an 11 year old, the abilty to leap from topic to topic with absolutely no linearity of thought is breathtaking. She crams everything into under five minutes - social problems, homework, gossip, opinions AND her sing song version of whatever song is "cool" at this point.

I only half listen. It is difficult to keep up with her mind, and I am lost in my own world of nearing the end of this phase of writing. I am living in theory of mind and meta-cognition in the academic parition of my mind. That, jumbled with Vygotsky and the social origins of human conciousness make me a little foggy when faced with real world issues. Like say Eating, or Bathing.

I pull up to the gas station and wait behind a woman who seems confused as to why she has pulled up to the pump.

"Lady", I say in the car, "One would think that you had a firm grasp on the Hows and Whys of a gas station before you got here. Get a Move on!"

Emily laughs.

"You're kinda cranky", she laughs.

"No, I don't think so - but COME ON! It's a gas station. You drive up, you get out, pay and pump gas. There is no philosophical component to this exchange."

We listen to the radio. I wait, staring at the back of the minivan. The driver finally seems to decode the mystery of the Gas Pump and finishes.

I pull up and open my door.

You'd think that with the number of times this kid has ambushed me with questions, I would have learned to expect the unexpected. But I never do.

"Hey Mom - You're turning 40 this year right. Is it true that you stop getting your period when you turn 40?"

My door is open and I have one foot out of the car. The best I can do is to say, "What?"

Em: "Doesn't your period stop when you turn 40?"

Me: "It's called Menopause and we will talk about it when I get back into the car after pumping the gas - just give me a few minutes..."

I stand outside in the cold pondering the question. Honestly, I don't know all that much about Menopause, but I am pretty sure that my upcoming birthday doesn't signal the end of my fertility. Furthermore, my Mom didn't really talk about her menopause so I don't have a real good family historical record. All I know is that my crazy ass mother got REAL crazy and ditched her husband of 20 years to act like she was 19 and wear belly shirts.

I finish with the gas pump and get back into the car.

Me: "When your period ends, it's called Menopause and while the age for every woman is different, it doesn't usually start until you are closer in age to 50, so I have a few more years left before I am in Menopause. Why?"

Em: "I just thought it ended when you turned 40. And maybe you wouldn't be so cranky near your period."

Me: "Nope. It doesn't work that way. It takes time for your body to rev up to having a period, and time for your body to wind down. And I am not that cranky near my period. But if I am, I suggest you just keep it to yourself if you know what is good for you."

Bruised Ego

Ego is a funny thing. Usually, just when I think I am past it, it jumps up and smacks me in the face.

Of course, because I believe that I am so very good in so very many ways, I can be easily shocked when someone doesn't just naturally acknowledge the quirky greatness that is ME.

Also of no shock to any of you, I don't run with the "Big Dog" mommy blogger crowd anymore. By my own choice I stepped back, over and out and frankly have not regretted the decision. I am all right with not writing books or spending every moment of my day devoted to my blog ...which isn't to say I don't love you all. I DO. But just like Mommies have real lives which don't involve their kids, so do I have a life which doesn't involve Blogging. I'm too busy with my man-whores and abuse of perscription pills.....I kid, I kid.

Again, a Choice. No condemnation there for those who chose to put their energy into those venues. But it just ain't Me.

I resist being part of a crowd in some odd and fundamental way. It seems to be ingrained in my DNA, and I imagine that my ancestors were the tenacious people who kept saying "Hey, let's see what that is Over THERE..." or "Hey, cook it and let's see what it tastes like...." or most of all "Hey, You're kind of cute, wanna roll in the hay?"

Not the ones who said "Watch this" before being eaten by the alligator hiding in the mud....My genetic marker is of those who watched those peeps get eaten and then said "I don't think that was a good idea and we should avoid poking the mean gator with a stick....and you wanna roll in the hay before we go cause we're down a member now?"

Now, the honest truth is that I am a bit of an attention whore. Who has two thumbs and loves attention? That's right. MEEEEEEE, That's who! I suppose my therapist would tell you it comes from my seeking recognition and approval and then punishing myself so the rejection and disapproval running right behind feels less painful.

And I am not saying she isn't on to something there, but Dude. I don't want to have to work too hard for it here. If I make the most tenative of movements out of the cave, I expect the person towards whom I moved to rejoice. And Rec-O-Nize.

It's the curse of the talented but crazy.

Don't poke me or shine too bright of a light ONTO me, cause I will bolt under the permafrost with a bottle of gin and a demerol drip only emerging when everyone has cleared the hell Out. Of course, don't ignore me either cause then I will get all supa-needy and offer to show you my boobs.

I wonder if I will ever get past this feeling in my life. It is a massive pain in the ass to live betwixt and between. It has not, does not, and will not serve me in my very promising academic career any more than it has served me in this Blog-o-verse. I am, as my advisor tells me, doing "Innovative and Brilliant research". I am, as my dear Internet friend tells me a "very talented writer" (Smooches to the dirty slut who told me that - she gets to totally see my boobs next time she sees me)....

My problem? An ego that is simultaneously too big...and tender to move out further into the world at large. Paired with some kind of genetic resistance to playing like a nice girl while channeling my inner ennui, it is a minor miracle that I have survived to adulthood, married and reproduced; let alone managed any KIND of professional career.

And here is where I throw an Edna St. Vincent Millay reference at you:

My candle burns at both ends;
It will not last the night;
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends--
It gives a lovely light!

A Parable

One of the many gifts I have been given as an educator and edu-carer for other peoples children is the gift of perspective. There is very little about child development and the educational process which I believe is set in stone. Furthermore, when you toss family dynamics and cultural, religious or moral values into the mix - Well. You have a billion right ways to raise a child.

One of the gifts I have been given as a Researcher and Academic is skepticism. Not disbelief, but skepticism. Until I have done my own research, I rarely assume what someone else has done meets my standards of academic rigor. That doesn't mean that I have to re-do Piaget's conservation experiments to believe his results. (Although, as an aside, these are Fascinating things to do with your own child - like a living textbook in action) Furthermore as a researcher, I have been taught to Look at any data or study and SEE if the data stands up. Who paid for the study? Was it purely an academic study or grant-funded by a specific group? Is the Primary Researcher a true "expert" in his/her field? And most importantly - Who will gain and who will lose with this study?

In every research project lies the very real possibility that harm can come from your results. Intentional or not. The researcher should be vetted and held accountable for the results of the data AND the interpretation of the data.

This is why - as a whole - Ethical, conscientious researchers are careful...very,very careful about making broad statements. If I say, for instance, that car seats Kill infants and every parent who places their baby in a car seat is taking a 50-50% chance with the life of their child - you would assume that I had a whole hell of a lot of data from which to extrapolate these claims, right?

What if I failed to mention - or failed to highlight - that the data I collected was of infants whose parents were drunk at the time of the accident? That My data Set was of 10 babies...5 of whom died in the crashes, and five of whom did not.

In truth, it IS 50%. And In truth, all babies were in Car seats when they died.

Now, what if I failed to mention that I did this research after getting a grant by the anti-car seat lobby? People who were trying to get laws passed, or repealed so that they would monetarily benefit from babies not being in car seats? Perhaps they are auto makers and the harnesses cost an extra 10 dollars per car to install. If you project to manufacture a million cars at 10 dollars saving per car ... Well, it is cost effective for me to give you 4 Million dollars for a study to save a net gain of 6 Million for Myself, isn't it?

But of course, the news that CAR SEATS KILL BABIES is sexy. Sexy in that news business kind of way. Sexy in that "I bet we can really crank up our viewer or readership by printing/reporting this" kind of way. And really sexy in that "We can prey on the deep fears of every parent that they are doing it WRONG" kind of way. Sexy in the "Maybe we can even try to tie it into the unease of a post-Watergate and Vietnam generation that corporations lie and governments and authority are not to be trusted" kind of way.

Oh, yeah. This becomes big news. People split on this issue. Friends split into car seat versus non-car seat people. Mothers have out and out arguments with other mothers. Parental Judgments reign supreme. Maybe even Oprah does a whole Show about the dangers of car seats!

But I - the researcher - knew that this was all bullshit. I knew how to conduct a proper experiment. I knew I was being paid and continued to be paid to be the front line Expert for a specific point of view. I knew my study could not be replicated because the results were...well, kind of made Up or at the very least Badly mangled as to skew them. However, for 12 years, parents held up my study as the reason - the EVIDENCE for why they didn't use car seats. In those 12 years, the rates of children dying in car crashes has indeed risen, but I mean - who is to say that this wasn't just an unfortunate side effect? In fact, I bet the government and manufacturers of car seats manipulate the data to make it seem more than it really is.... And anyway, my lawyers have told me not to comment, and my bank account is safe - so really, what is to be done?

***********************************************************************************

I knew that this MMR link to autism study had been discredited ages ago. I mentioned the flaws in the data methodology and design to hard core true believers who preached to me about the chances I took with Emily. I also pointed out that the reason vaccinations had been discovered was because Millions of children DIED from these diseases. Walk into any old Boston cemetery and find the gravestone of a mother - now find how many of her children lived Past the age of 5. Odds weren't good.

I explained the concept of "herd immunity" - how these diseases were now re-emerging and were becoming more dangerous to the people least able to manage the disease - Pregnant women, Infants too young to be immunized, elderly and immuno-suppressed people (Why yes, children on chronic asthma medication, I am talking about you!).

Did it matter? Did logic and common sense and the history or human kind mean anything to the true believers? Hell No. Did the fact that their decision was putting MY child and the general population that much more at risk mean anything? Nah. They had their parental rights and they were doing what THEY thought was best.

But now? The research is False. The doctor Lied. For his own personal profit and gain. Not because he cared so deeply about children with autism or any link between a vaccine and the (most likely genetically based) disorder. He - and the others who have profited by propagating a lie ( Um, Jenny McCarthy? Totally looking at You) - are going to defend themselves with silence. After preying on ANY parents worst fears - the ones around taking care of our children , of doing the best for them - and perverting them into profit while both actively selling a lie - Or not being intelligent enough to educate yourself about the philosophy you espouse?

My contempt is not great enough.

Where I was

Dashing into the Blog room to say - Hi there.

No, I haven't forgotten you all. Yes, there is more to tell of the teacher battle stories. Some of it will even end up over at Canada Mom Blogs, where I wrote a little piece (Jury of Peers) about more recent events.

Tomorrow we have a meeting with the Principal, the teacher, the Special Ed coordinator and Terrance and I. I am going to try to behave myself. Honestly.

Terrance was in New York for a week, which meant that every possible thing that could be thrown at me in fact DID get thrown at me including my car deciding to not start at the gas station. There was a fairly funny moment with me having my hood up and jumper cables in hand having an African Man speaking at me in Very rapid French asking me to move my car. You know, cause I was blocking other people.

Really? Well, no shit. Ergo the hood up and cables in my hand. No, don't offer to help me or anything, just make me aware of how I am inconveniencing You.

This was followed by Emily developing some hellacious vomiting virus. Like the puke your guts up every 40 minutes, regardless of if your guts have anything in them to puke, kind. Like the "I'm sick, so I need to lay next to you after you have stupidly taken your sleeping meds because you had no idea I was about to unleash this viral destruction upon your household" Sick. Coupled with the "I am too sick to move to the toilet, so I will puke into a bucket which you will need to hold and rinse and return to me every 45 minutes...Then I will lay there moaning and breathing my puke breath onto you as you wiggle around trying to get out of the way of my viral laden breath while both fighting the sleeping meds and trying to maintain enough coordination to manage the puke bucket...."

Fun times.

And when I had stabilized her to the point where I could run out and get her some Gatorade ( and lets be honest, I needed coffee. Like Junkie need for coffee) the car wouldn't start again. With Terrance micro-managing me on the phone from New York as to how to possibly get the car started and should I take Em to the hospital and did I try this....

The fact that I didn't curl into a ball and weep can only be attributed to my extreme exhaustion and post-vomitfest induced shock.

So, that's where I was.

Tomorrow, the school meeting. I'll let you know how it goes.

Fatty Owls

There are things that you hope for your child, when you are in that dreamy stage of the last trimester...or even when you are laughing at the beginnings of their attempts at humor. Things that you want to give them, things which were important to you.

Of course, you can't be sure that your child will like the things that you treasure, be that Winnie the Pooh, or The Red Sox. Sure, you can surround the baby with those items. You can show them your enthusiasm, sharing your love and excitement for the idea with them.

BUT...You can never be really sure if the child is merely going along with it, trying to keep their poor pitiful parent happy under whatever delusion they may be suffering, or if the kernel of the love is truly in there.

Over the past Christmas holiday break, I did a little experiment. I borrowed the Fawlty Towers series from a friend with the idea of watching them with Emily.

It will shock none of you that Terrance dislikes British humor, particularly that related to Python or offshoot projects. Vehemently dislikes it. I - in the long standing traditions of spouses who are diametrically opposed to their partners tastes - LOVE British Humor.  Monty Python, in particular, was formative in my humor development and I have gone on to love everything up to the delicious absurdity of "The IT Crowd".

But would Emily like it? Would she latch onto the absurdity of the situation? The facial expressions? The wordplay? Would the physical comedy prove too dated  for her?

She loved them. While she didn't entirely understand some of the references ( I had to do a lot of explaining about the Second World War and any "adult" humor flew right over her head), she really enjoyed them.

I was tickled. I was beyond tickled. I was glowing with pride. I had done that most mysterious of things - passed on a love of British Comedy to my child. I had done this directly in the face of a Non-believer with a gene pool of which 50% did not understand or enjoy Monty Python AT ALL.

Which leads me to my next project:

After the first disk last night, I am pleased to report that her favorite bits have been the Funniest Joke in the World and the Famous Deaths. Dirty Fork also produced some hearty guffaws, as did the Musical Mice.

I am so proud.

My Weeping Heart

For all my bluster and bravado, at the end of the day, I am still Emily's Mom.

Part of the contract that I seem to have signed when she was born was that she would exist as my Achilles heel in the world at large. If you want to put an arrow directly into my soul, wound her.

While I have well established and heavily fortified defenses around my own persona, when it comes to Emily there is a decided wide open space with a large bulls eye painted directly in the middle.

Now, this isn't meant to paint Emily as an Innocent living in a world of wolves, in perpetual danger of being eaten alive.  I think more highly of my daughter than that. She is a typical 11 year old girl. She knows how to work her father and I like the Parental Meat Puppets we can be. For her father, it is a specific tone of voice that she takes. She can get him to move through the house at light speed with a tone. For me, its tears. Not the normal "I don't want to do my homework/clean my room/eat my salad" tears...I am immune to those tears.  No. It's the "My soul hurts" tears. The "I am bewildered as to why people are being unfair/unkind" tears.

THOSE tears get me. As in "I want to immediately and unthinkingly go out and hurt the person who has caused my daughter to have these feelings - even if it is another child, adult or inanimate object. It does not matter - they must be stopped."

That feeling arose in me last night.

Now, I can't speak for every parent, but I try to not get to that place terribly frequently. It does not show my best, most rational side to my child. It does not make me feel comfortable to be in that place. As such, I will weigh the other facts that I know :
Emily has been tired this week. It is the first week back to school after a 2 week vacation and her sleeping patterns are out of whack.
It has been very cold and snowing every day. That is enough to make anyone feel rotten.
While I have not discussed the specifics in front of her, Emily knows I don't love her teacher.

Again I say, My daughter is not stupid. She knows that the way to get her mother to become an unholy angel of revenge and fury is to plead injustice at my breast while crying, deep mournful sobs. I, in turn, will morph, black wings unfurling from my scapula, eyes beginning to glow with righteous fury. I will soothe her as I summon her father to the room, and when he arrives, I will have her lay out the case and stare at him, waiting for affirmation and permission to seek the vengeance which now rightfully belongs to me.

Last night, however, he stopped me.

"I'm going in to speak with the teacher in the morning", he says.