November 2005 Archives

And what was that lesson, you ask? Save early, save often. Something you'd think I already knew (especially given my Drivesavers friends).

So. I was approximately halfway through a long, chunky post about Thanksgiving and about giving thanks, and the f**king computer ate it (well, Safari crashed, and it's my fault for having been lazy and typing everything directly into MT instead of first in Word or something, but still, GRRRRRRR).

Therefore, having now totally lost the whole mood of thankfulness, I am going to go steam and mope and shake my fist at the sky and all those other things you do when you're mad but there's no one to legitimately be mad at except yourself for being SO. STUPID. Augh.

Hindsight: 20/20.

So the other day we were doing our usual pre-workday morning wrangle (involving much rushing around, packing of things and juggling baby needs while simultaneously noodging and ignoring Eli). Eli had grudgingly gotten dressed and Josh had prepared him his favorite breakfast (bagel and cream cheese) and sat him down at the kitchen table to eat it before he left to go take a shower. I left Eli in the kitchen and went into the living room to feed the baby, who was starting to fuss, and within one minute Eli was in the living room with me, draping himself dramatically over the ottoman, complaining that he was lonely in the kitchen by himself, and why wouldn't anyone come keep him company? I told him I would as soon as I was done with the baby, and that Daddy was in the shower but that he'd be out in a few minutes too, and to please go keep eating because we had to leave soon (it always takes Eli a good long while to actually consume his breakfast...he has never been a quick eater). That's when Eli finally verbalized what no doubt has been churning around inside him for months now:

"How come the baby always gets more attention than me? I *never* get any attention. You never give me what I want."

I tried not to let Eli see me wince as the sharp, sharp knives of parental guilt slashed at my guts and embedded themselves in my heart.

I explained that the baby needed us to do things for him that he couldn't do on his own, but that Eli was a big boy who could help both himself and us with our morning tasks. I told him that I give him as much attention as I possibly can, and that I love him just as much as ever, but that the morning times were not a time for him to choose what he wanted to do or when he wanted to do it. I said a bunch of other stuff too, reasonable, mature, loving parental stuff that probably just sounded like "blablablablabla" to Eli, who really would have just preferred to hear "I'm sorry, here, let me just put the baby back in his playpen and get Daddy and then we'll spend a leisurely hour or two as focused, happy participants in whatever activity you choose."

I know this is a normal, appropriate and totally understandable reaction that all elder siblings must go through, and that Eli will get over it, and that he knows we love him and *do* try to give him what he wants. And as his wise preschool director pointed out to us in a parent-teacher conference earlier this week, once a kid can verbalize an issue, they're much closer to working it through. I'm going to try not to overreact to or buy too far into this kind of statement (just like I'm going to try reeeeeaaaally hard not to get hooked by "I hate you! You never let me do anything!" when he's a teenager). But it's been gnawing at me. I mean, he's not entirely wrong. He *does* get less attention now. We *do* have more distractions, and depend on his increasing independence and ability to take care of himself so that we can be freed up for other things (like taking care of the baby or doing necessary house chores...I'm not talking about sitting around drinking martinis here, tempting though that thought is sometimes). And of course we try to compensate and spend as much time as we can focusing on Eli and his wants, but it's a bleak fact of life that he'll also have to get used to his fall from only-child grace. Even if it wasn't his brother that was stealing what he considers "his" parental attention, he'd be losing it anyway as he got older and more independent (but then, of course, he could be the one controlling how and when to let go of that attention--and therein lies the rub, I think).

I'll be honest here, oh faceless and easily-confessed-to internet: I just don't know how much more of my now seriously fractured attention I can give Eli, much as I want to (and I do, I really do want to...this is my beloved first born child we are talking about here, the child whom I would, without hesitation, walk over hot coals to reach or step in front of a speeding train to save, if necessary). It's not a matter of not having enough love--the love is there, and it's true what they say that love is not a finite pie, but rather a rich unending well that keeps filling up. It really is a matter of attention, of focus. Of that, there really *is* only so much to go around, and like a Republican congressman, I've already trimmed way back on as many areas as I can (including paying attention to my friends, my pets, my husband, and myself). But my attention budget is still not balanced, and maybe it never will be. In fact I think I'm running up a sizable attention deficit (one might even say I've got an attention deficit disorder...badump dum!).

But what am I going to do about it? Attention doesn't just grow on trees, you know. I am already feeling pulled at so hard in so many directions I worry about breaking. I'm not sure there really is a solution to this attention deficit spending (if there was, someone would have written a best-selling self-help book about it by now, don't you think?). I think it's just something that we all constantly struggle with and then eventually learn to live with, until we just can't anymore and something (ourselves? our circumstances? our culture?) shifts.

Sigh. Conscious parenting: blessing and curse, curse and blessing. As always, it's late, and I'm out of brain space, and there are many things to be done before bed. I think I'll go ostrich now and stop thinking about it.

Wow. Today I had one of those severely perspective-shifting, "there but for the grace of God go I" experiences. I was on my way to work, about 5-10 minutes late as always after the usual morning wrangle, and there was a big white monster pickup in front of me which was driving erratically, whipping from one lane to another, the driver gesticulating angrily out the window at the too-slow car in front of him. I remember looking at him and thinking "asshole, I should move up and box him in just to teach him a lesson", but then gave up the idea as juvenile and not worth the effort. Just then, as I was keeping a wary eye on him, he suddenly (and I do mean suddenly, with almost no warning at all) yanked his car over to the left into a left-turn only lane, and promptly WHAMMED into the back of a blue sedan that had been patiently waiting at the light, minding its own business. He'd been going about 40 mph when he swerved, and had barely begun to apply the brakes by the time he hit the blue sedan. The sedan got pushed into the back of the big gold SUV that was in front of it, also sitting patiently at the light waiting to turn. I watched as the glass shattered and popped out of the back window and the whole sedan just crumpled, front and back (which is what it's supposed to do, but still, the ease with which it just smooshed was rather startling). Then I was past the accident, freaked out and wondering whether I should go back and see if everyone was ok, or call the Highway Patrol or 911 or what, but ultimately I dithered and then didn't (and yes, I actually thought to myself "am I just pulling a Kitty Genovese here?").

I got to work a few minutes later, shaken and feeling very, very lucky that it hadn't been me in that accident, and told my boss this story. He offered to drive me back to the scene (which I thought was very thoughtful) and see whether help had arrived yet, and whether or not I could be helpful as a witness. So we jumped in his car and drove back there, and found that there was already a fire truck, an ambulance, and a bunch of police there. (Someone with more presence of mind and/or good samaritan manners had already called them, I guess.) We walked over to one of the motorcycle cops and I told him my story (he took notes) and gave him my contact details. He told us that it seemed pretty clear that the driver of the truck was "totally hammered" (at 9:30am!) and that he would likely get charged with a felony DUI. He also said that the driver of the totaled sedan was being checked out by the paramedics but that he thought she was not badly hurt, that she'd walked over to the ambulance herself. (The SUV was hardly scratched, of course--we watched her drive away from the scene while we were there.) I asked if I would be needed to testify in court or anything like that, and he told me that I probably wouldn't be, since if it was needed he could use what I'd told him in court. I remember joking with him "so can you put in the part about how that truck driver was a total asshole?" He said he'd try to think of a slightly more polite way to put it. We thanked him and took off again.

The thing I keep coming back to in this whole incident is the idea that the woman in the blue sedan was just sitting there, peacefully, just going about her day, obeying all the rules and doing everything she was supposed to, and then BOOM! her life changed for the worse. She couldn't have predicted it, she couldn't have defended against it, and it was in no way her fault--but still, it happened. It could have happened to anybody, but it happened to her. Why? Bad luck, bad karma...how do we make sense of something so random and arbitrary? Sudden, negative events like this violate the trust we have in social agreements (like traffic rules), and therefore shake up (if not destroy) any sense of safety we might have had. I'm so grateful that I *am* still safe, and my loved ones are all still safe (I had many moments of dark fantasy about what that accident would have been like with kids in the back seat, mine or someone else's), but I can't quite take that safety for granted as much as I did before I left the house this morning. I wish I could just stick my head back in the sand like a good little ostrich. Instead I think I'll just spend extra time hugging my family and waiting for this vertiginous feeling of "that could have been me" to pass.

Josh and I were IMing each other today, our usual brief bursts of logistics (who's picking up cat food, what the plan is for dinner, etc) and some general steam blowing-off. Josh was telling me about all the demands on his time today, and how he had so much work left to do, and I was feeling the same way--like there was more work that I wanted to do than would ever get done in the limited hours (not to mention attention capacity) I had to do it, and that there were too many competing demands on my time.

And I had a sort of mini-epiphany, which in hindsight (like most ephiphanies) seemed perfectly obvious: we've both pretty much shifted into that next phase of our work lives, where we've moved away from your stereotypical Gen-X, Office Space-type, semi-slacker work days, and towards that "I am a productive, full-fledged member of society with an actual career I strive to do well at" stage where we are actually spending most of our work days, well, actually working. Working a lot. Work work working our butts off, within the self-imposed (and really rather stressful) limits imposed by family (and sometimes, social life).

Now, how the hell did *that* sneak up on us? Tricksy adulthood...it just keeps coming and coming. I am every day more of a grownup, and there just isn't any going back. I just know that gray hair is next.

(Yes, yes, those of you who are older than my tender 36 years are now probably rolling your eyes and snorting at my suspiciously Peter Pan-like protestations. But I'm not really protesting. Just trying to be aware of the shift as it happens.)

And on another, completely unrelated note, for those of you who might care: looks like our grand get-our-friends-to-move-in-next-door scheme has been thwarted. We might have done it too, if it weren't for those meddling kids (you know, the kind who bid a gazillion dollars over the asking price). We hates them, precious. But we will try to keep a silver-lining attitude about it all.

What, what, WHAT was I thinking when I so blithely agreed to meet my sister-in-law at the hugemongous Roseville Galleria mall on a holiday afternoon? AT THE JC PENNEY PHOTO DEPARTMENT? Imagine, if you will, about a trillion and a half impatient parents and grandparents with all sorts of kids (from babies to grade schoolers) all dressed up in their fancy outfits, jammed into one waiting room while the frenzied staff tried to maintain some semblance of their required customer-service politeness while at the same time trying to get all the recalcitrant kids to "smile, princess!" And did I mention that they were running about an hour late? Ooooo yeah it was quite a scene. And I must say that my sis-in-law and I (who had a 7 year old, a 4 year old, a 2 year old and a baby between us, and two huge strollers) clearly deserve big, shiny gold medals for our ability to keep it together during this event (not to mention actually emerge with some halfway cute pictures after it was all over). Talk about your grace under pressure. My most inspired moment of invention: I actually threatened to drop my pants and show the kids my butt if they would just sit up and smile at the camera. (No, I didn't *actually* show them my butt. But yes, the novelty of the offer sure did work.)

And as if our experience in the picture-taking circle of hell wasn't enough mall-crawling fun for two moms and four kids, we then took everyone to the food court for lunch. The food court, my friends, in a mall approximately the size of New Jersey, on a holiday weekend, is not a friendly place. Finding a table and chairs for the 6 of us was the first part of the triathalon; waiting in incredibly long lines for the 3 different kinds of food the kids all wanted was the second part. And the third part, of course, was getting the kids to all *eat* their food, while sitting, and not killing each other (or us). But I like to think that we were again handed the double gold here not just for these big accomplishments, but for the little details which make all the difference in an experience like this: had we brought snacks to head off meltdown? Check. Did we get everyone to go potty when needed? Check. Did we invent games and activities to make the waiting less painful? Check. Did we remember to wipe table, hands and faces with antibacterial wipes? Check. Did we deal swiftly and painlessly with spilled lemon chillers? Check. Did we fend off tantrums over not getting McDonald's Happy Meals with the strategic and repeated use of that most powerful parental word ("NO")? Check. Did we head off any fighting over who got to eat the last piece of corn dog? Check. Did we coerce everyone into finishing their own meals while gobbling down our own at the speed of light? Oh yes. Yes we did. And we even emerged from this experience relatively unscathed, though definitely exhausted. We were rockstar superheroines, parental olympians of the highest quality.

And I have to say that my sister-in-law wins the special Gunga Din award for bravery, because after we spent 4 hours at the mall doing all of the above (plus a carousel ride and much additional wrangling), she then took my 4 year old and his car seat and drove him away to their house for the weekend. I can only imagine the chaos and the din of that drive home, with three kids in the back seat. The baby and I drove the two hours back (through rush hour traffic) to our house in relative peace, given that the baby conked out as soon as we left the mall parking lot.

So yeah, those of you who think you can parent, and parent well under pressure? I dare you to compete against me in the Olympic Mall-Crawl event. (And no, Rebecca, this is not a *real* dare. Just a metaphorical one. So don't worry.) I am a world champion.

You know what always makes me just a little bit melancholy? I mean, not sad exactly, and not bummed out enough to actually ever do anything about it (I mean I *am* a big girl and have learned to get over these types of things), but just a twinge-y bit of "awwww"? I'll tell you: getting off a plane and having no one there to greet me. It makes travel a whole different thing when there's a familiar and happy face to anchor to as soon as you get out of that metal box with wings.

Anyway, that being said, my there-and-back-again work trip to Vegas today went fine. A decent amount of business was conducted, and things look positive from a work point of view. I didn't do anything fun or see anything in Vegas besides the airport, the taxi, the convention center, and a little bit of the strip on the way back to the airport, and I didn't bother with the slot machines at the airport. I barely got a chance to pump today (I had to bring a hand pump with me and use it in a stall in the women's bathroom at the trade show--not exactly a situation that encouraged me to pump) so on the flight and then the drive home I was really uncomfortable until I finally got home to my trusty Pump In Style (don't *even* get me started on that stupid product name, I'm just not up for a rant right now). I'm tired but not *completely* exhausted, which is good. My feet and back hurt, but it's nothing a night of lying in bed won't cure. Wait, did someone say "bed?" I'm outta here.

There are some days that go by so fast I truly don't know how I could possibly have packed in all the things I did, nor could I probably even give an accurate recounting of all the things that happened. Today has been one of those days. I woke up early, did dishes, made baby food, picked up the house, voted, did the daycare dropoff, went to work and wheeled and dealed and talked on the phone for hours and prepped for a trade show, zoomed home and did the evening wrangle with both kids by myself while Josh went to yoga, tucked them in and did some work, and now it's getting way too close to my bedtime and I have miles to go before I sleep (laundry, dishes, making more baby food, packing). And then I'm waking up way too early in the morning tomorrow and flying to Las Vegas for a long exhausting day (work trip), and not returning until bedtime.

I'm pretty sure I'm going to look back on this in 20 years and wonder "how exactly did I DO all that on only two cups of coffee a day?"

I think the only way to get over not writing in the blog, is to start writing in the blog.

It's not that I don't have things to talk about--in fact, life's been in that Chinese-curse type of "interesting" mode lately. Like I said last time, it's really more of an attitude problem, created/compounded by the swamp o' suck-it-up that I've been slogging through for what feels like the last, oh, 7 or 8 months (I was going to say the last 5 years but then I thought that might be a tad unfair). But even though the cocoa is still bleak, and I'm still engaged in a protracted battle with that big fat pachyderm of depression which keeps threatening to squeeze all the joy out of Mudville, that's still no reason not to write. I keep being afraid that once I start writing all I'll do is whine, but you know what? Even if that was true (and it might be--I'm just warning you), at least I'd be writing, and not just stuck and flat and blocked. I've had enough experience by now in my life to know that often it is the starting of things that is the most overwhelming to me--that once I get started (or re-started as the case may be), I am left wondering what took me so long or what was so hard/threatening/overwhelming in the first place. So I am once again going to try to trust myself and take that leap of faith and just. write. anyway.

That being said, I'm much too exhausted tonight from a long hectic day at work to really accomplish much in the way of actual writing tonight. I think the most I can manage is a non-comprehensive list of what's been going on lately:

-The baby is crawling! And now that he's crawling, he wants to stand all the time. (I sense this one is going to be an early walker.) He is just so alive and energetic and grabby and so bursting with excitement about everything he comes into contact with. It's a fun stage (although we'd better get going on the childproofing or it won't be so fun). And is he ever cute! Holy Moses, I'd better not post pictures here yet or people's eyeballs might melt from the white hot super shiny cuteness of that baby with his big wide 4-tooth smile and round chunka cheeks. Maybe next time. Get your sunglasses.

-Halloween was great. Eli was Darth Vader and Isaac was Yoda. (I'm willing to share pictures if you ask nicely.) Most of the candy is finally gone by now, but whew, what a sugar fest this last week has been. We never quite got around to putting up all the decorations (probably because the one who acts as the motivational center of the household for this kind of thing, i.e. yours truly, has been so distracted and generally overwhelmed this year), but we haven't put them away either. At least they're mostly all in a single pile now. Maybe I'll put them away when I get around to taking out the Christmas/Hanukkah deco. If I get around to that either. This year all bets are off.

-After two weeks of varying textures, colors and amounts of phlegm, I think I'm finally getting over this stupid cold I got from the baby. I was really down for the count for quite awhile there but am feeling better now that I caved and got antibiotics (as well as a tiny bit more rest over the weekend).

-Our dog, Tomo, had another surgery, and is recovering nicely. (Did I even mention the first one, where she got out one night and apparently tangled with a raccoon or something which shredded her left ear? Sheesh.) But this surgery was for an impacted and infected butt gland (!). Apparently this is a common problem for dogs. Oh, if only I had the time and energy to really rant about this one--but I'll leave it at this: when I asked the vet what we could do to prevent this from happening again (because this was at least the second time in recent memory that we've had this problem), he said: nothing. "It's bad design" was his actual comment. I told him I'd like to take this up with the so-called Intelligent Designer then. Grrr.

-We're embroiled in a grand scheme to get Dri and Jim to move in next door to us. There's been a whooooooole lot of unanticipated distraction (mostly of the good variety) involved in this project, which should all come to a head by this Friday. Wish us luck.

-I have truly gone fallow on the novel writing. I am trying not to be alarmed (or ashamed) and to just let fallow be fallow, until it's not.

-Make sure you all go out and vote tomorrow, dammit! Civic duty yadda yadda. Them that don't vote can't complain, and I'm big on complaining. :)

-I've continued to go to physical therapy for my shoulder, but I'm not sensing much in the way of improvement. I'm still halfway in denial about the whole thing, truthfully, so I'm sure part of this is my own fault for not doing my exercises etc. It's hard to take my own health (and this particular problem)seriously enough to actually make the time to do the exercises and take proper care of myself right now, which is stupid--I know, I know.

Ok speaking of which, I just realized (AGAIN--I mean, how many times do I have to realize this in my lifetime? Apparently somewhere along the lines of 6 trillion times) that if I really want to take care of myself, it has to start with enforcing bedtime. So even though there's more I could write, I'm not going to. I'm going to bed.