Stomach Flu Day 3

There's nothing more heart-rending than seeing the typically vivacious Beast slumping over with his head buried into the sofa because it just requires way too much energy to remain upright. It's the saddest, saddest sight.

On the upside, I've gotten more Beastly cuddles in the last 24 hours than I have since he gained the ability to hold that giant noggin upright. When you're sick, nothing makes you feel better than Mama-care. Remember?

Image: Predator and Prey

Lunch Lady

"Food" I never thought I'd allow in my house until I had a child with only 1.25 teeth who insists on feeding himself and who can't eat most of the food we eat because the onions, garlic, curry, and chilies would burn a hole through his high chair tray:

• serving-sized cans of diced fruit (tinier and more expensive than fresh fruit. "lite syrup" isn't that light. do adults actually eat these? )
• canned green beans (mushy, stinky nastiness. in no way resembles a fresh green bean.)
• American cheese (what is this stuff? it feels like plastic. and it smells.)
• Chef Boyardee Mini Ravioli (the meatballs look a little suspicious, but according to the label it is actually beef. smells okay. Harrison likes using the tomato sauce as a styling product.)
• Tuna Helper (haven't yet made this, but aren't I just prolonging the life of that annoying gloved hand mascot by buying this crap?)

Never say never.

MOWBAGUTOF

Has your baby started knocking on the bathroom door and yelling "Mama!" whenever you take a few minutes to pee? Has he learned how to walk in a week? Has he figured out how to use household objects as step stools? Has he suddenly refused to eat baby food? Is today his first day in the big kid's room at day care?

Fear not, because there is help. . .

I am pleased to announce May 12th as the date for the inaugural meeting of Mothers Whose Babies Are Growing Up Too Fast (MOWBAGUTOF). Please spread the word that we will be meeting at Dickey's Pub at 10:34 pm. Bring plenty of tissues and money for hard liquor.

Whether you're in the denial, anger, bargaining, depression, or acceptance stage (or all 5 simultaneously, as I am), at MOWBAGUTOF you will always feel welcomed!

Yes, I am a voluntary sinner

So Ash and I are in the midst of this email discussion about where we're going to send Harrison and Emma to school. It's rather absurd. They're only almost 1 and just 1, respectively, but some of the programs start at age 3 and that's not far off, and anyway, we're both obsessive compulsive and neurotic so we need to make these decisions early, right?

So we're discussing public schools vs. magnet schools vs. private schools vs. religious schools, and because I'm a recovering Catholic and we're both snarky, I joke about sending Harrison to Catholic school. He really needs a good dose of that guilt, you know? And she one ups me and says she's going to send Emma to Baptist school. Of course I start looking at this local Baptist school website and see this, under the "We Believe" tab: "[We believe] That man was created in innocence in God's image but voluntarily sinned and therefore all men are now sinners by nature and choice, utterly devoid of that righteousness required by the law and thus under just condemnation to an eternal punishment in hell."

"Okay, I shouldn't judge," I write to Ashley, "but are they gonna come to your house at night when your child has nightmares because of this?!?!"

And Ash responds, "Wow. No kidding. "Mommy I'm scared." "Sorry kid, but you're utterly devoid of righteousness. You're doomed to eternal punishment in hell. Now go to sleep and when you wake up you can have a fun day at school!"

The Victory Lap

Harrison's new thing is something we like to call The Victory Lap. It occurs occasionally when something particularly exciting happens. Like Doug and I go "Yay!" Or he sees a cat. Or he hears someone laughing. (Apparently, those things are exciting to an 11-month old.)

So what happens is this: The Oh-So-Exciting Thing happens, then Harrison starts this super-turbo speed crawling in a circle, with his head down, facing the floor, all the while yelling"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

The Victory Lap is damn funny, but also a tad dangerous, as the super-turbo speed crawling sometimes leads to Limb Failure (you moms know what I'm talking about), a phenomenon which is normally just slightly problematic but becomes high-risk at super-turbo speed.

Using super-turbo speed whilst crawling with one's head down is perhaps also not the wisest of decisions. Tuesday, during a Victory Lap around the nursery, Harrison must have thought we were playing Charades because he used his head to do a really great impression of a battering ram smashing into the side of his crib. Doug and I yelled, "Battering ram! You're supposed to be a battering ram, right?" But Harrison didn't respond because apparently he couldn't hear us over the screaming

He's a genius. Clearly.

Image: Grandma Naps

For I

It is inevitable that it will happen one of these days—at work or at home, maybe in the middle of the night, or on my lunch hour. Perhaps it will be this weekend, just after Doug and I bring Harrison into our bed for early morning snuggles: My phone is going to ring, I'm going to pick it up, and it's going to be you, or maybe Mike, saying, "Get thee to Buffalo because this baby's on the way!"

I am so humbled to be invited to be with you at this most sacred of times—to see you at your most powerful and most vulnerable. I am excited at the prospect of seeing another life coming into this world, or having just come into this world, but am even more moved that—for the rest of my life—I will be a part of that new being's life. That I will see that same person as they crawl around destroying your house like Harrison does mine now, and play in the yard on a summer evening with the other kids in your neighborhood, and come home from school excited and flushed with the excitement of the day, and hold the hand of their first sweetheart.

Of course, these are the same reflections I have had about Harrison. I am so excited about the prospect of his life and all the possibility that the world holds for him.

It's beyond poignant that your little one is due to arrive exactly one year after Harrison was set to make his grand entrance. I am so emotional about the passing of this year. Living it has changed me profoundly, and I'm torn between thanking God that it's over, and mourning that it has passed so incredibly quickly. I feel such joy—and a bit of envy—that you have yet to experience this incredible rush—the highs and the lows—this depth of feeling and incomparable love.

I am so excited for you, my darling best friend, and I'm waiting for that call.

Welcome to the Looney Bin

Should I be concerned that I often find myself saying something like this?

"[Improvised royal trumpet flourish] Senior Grabbyhands, I now pronounce you, Freshly Diapered!"

Jack Handy

Have you ever come across an old college paper, read through it, and thought, "Man, I used to be smart. And deep."

Or perhaps you looked that paper over and thought, "The Dialectic of Class in Feminist Pedagogy? Wha-huh? Holy frick! Was I full of some deep doo-doo!"

Well, I have this hypothesis now that motherhood has remade me into a philosophical and high-minded intellectual. I'm constantly reflecting. I'm telling you—I'm deeper than Jack Handy.

Here's are two things that I'm currently cogitating:

1. At some point, Harrison is going to learn that the world is a scary place. There are hateful, evil people in the world that do hateful, evil things. This realization has made me exceptionally sad.

2. I was my mother's baby. Her first baby.

Sarah: Sang :: Harrison: Sarah

I know. This seems obvious, right? But motherhood has shed a whole new light on my own mother, and my daughterhood. It's also made me feel quite guilty about being such a nasty teenager. I need some serious ju-ju to ward off that bad karma.

Another analogy before I go:

Student: Paper :: Mother: Blog

Don't be afraid to call me on it if you think my ramblings are full of doo-doo.

Image: Sun-kissed Auntie

Walker Texas Ranger

Oh my god.

It can WALK.

Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god.

Burp

I am so in love with Harrison and his recent boyishness that I've been thinking lately, "Oh…it would be rather nice if our next baby was a boy too!"

The horror of being the sole female in a house with multiple men, however, became apparent this week, when Harrison made it clear that he finds his father's loud belching absolutely hilarious.

Baby Einstein

Last night, during family play-on-the-floor hour (which isn't really an hour because it only lasts from 6-6:45, because 7 is time for bed, boy---please go to sleep!), Harrison crawled over to me and attacked my head, cuddling close and grabbing handfuls of hair, and murmured, "mama. . .mama" right in my ear. Then he slithered over to Doug, who was laying next to us, hugged him, and hollered, "dada!"

And that would be my heart over there, melting onto the floor in a little puddle.

Image: Ocean Man II

Paging Naomi Wolf!

My vanity is suffering from a multiple personality disorder. On the one hand, I am left with the lowest body image I have ever had. On the other hand, I don't give a fuck.

Let's start with my breasts. (Ooh!) Sorry, pregnant and soon-to-be pregnant girlfriends and their partners, but what they tell you in birth class about how breastfeeding does not de-perkify your boobs is a damned, dirty lie. La Leche propaganda. Don't get me wrong, I would definitely choose to breastfeed again, but if you seriously believe that 3, 6, 12, 18, or 24+ months of your breasts being continuously inflated and deflated like a pair of bellows ain't gonna make your boobs saggy (turning them into what my friend Michelle calls "pancake boobs"), you are living in La La Land. The way I figure it, you have two options: 1. breastfeed your child until he or she goes away to college, thus retaining the biggest, firmest breasts imaginable for the maximum duration; or 2. quit at the right time for you, then fork over some serious cash for a decent brassiere with the power to lift your breasts up to their pre-deflation position. Then never take it off. Except in the dark.

Make sure you leave some time, after getting over the searing pain of engorgement, for a boob funeral. Rest in peace, pre-pregnancy boobs.

On to the stretch marks. I was so smug. I thought I was home free. Then, at 34 weeks, stretch marks started popping up all over my belly and hips like mountains on a relief map. Here I am almost a year later, and they're still there. Sure, they're not a screaming red-purple anymore, but there they are, and the flesh underneath them is just plain weird. Doug calls it my brain stomach (thanks, honey!), and he's right.

Finally: baby weight. Please cursed, cursed baby weight—please go away! I realize that you want to hang around because I don't have time to go to the gym, and I let my membership lapse anyway, and I sometimes have to eat crap because Harrison doesn't always cooperate at dinner preparation time or I am just too too tired, and the kitchen remodeling has consumed our entire house, and it's April already but it just snowed two godamned days ago so how am I supposed to go for walks, but just GO AWAY!

Those are the things that bother me. Those things plus the sanctimonious people that say, "be proud of your stretch marks—those are your battle scars of motherhood and pregnancy." I believe dooce might tell those jerks to "Suck it." So SUCK IT, JERKS!

In contradictory conjunction with all of this beauty-myth obsessing about my body (to the point of even entertaining the idea that plastic surgery maybe isn't the sexist, evil thing I used to think it was…at least the kind that puts things back, not the kind that adds new, weird materials not normally encountered in humans), I have also found that my standards for what is acceptable in terms of grooming, cleanliness, fashion, and sanitation are much, much lower.

On the weekend, I will often leave the house without brushing my teeth or taking a shower. There have been many, many weekends where I only shower once. I know daily showering is not the norm in the majority of the world, but it was always the norm for me. (Can I still come over on Saturday, Ash? I promise to spray some extra perfume on my stinky parts!)

When I go out now, I sometimes wear—gasp!—sweatpants. And, yes, I know that Jerry told George that people who wear sweatpants in public have given up on life, but I swear that I haven't! It's just that Harrison best tolerates the Sunday trip to the grocery store right after he's eaten and well before he's ready for a nap, and to avoid subjecting the rest of the shoppers to a deafening and very irritating whine in the checkout aisle, we need to go NOW, not an hour later when Mommy is all put together. So, I will go out in sweatpants, or with drool, spit-up, or dried up Cheerios (that were previously in Harrison's mouth or sweaty hand) stuck to my shirt or tangled in my hair. Just so you know, they are at least cute sweatpants. They don't have elastic on the ankles or anything. And they don't have words like "HONEY" or "SWEET" on the ass.

My eyebrows haven't been tweezed in a few weeks, and my toenails were unpainted the entire week in Florida even though I wore my flip-flops everyday. This is shocking, I know. I also reckon that my foot pumice hasn't been touched since September 2003.

Everything that requires ironing or dry cleaning has been pushed to the back of my closet (doesn't fit anyway). I bought the same Old Navy long sleeve T-shirt in four different colors, and I take advantage of my workplace's Friday dress-down day every day.

I have more important things to do with my time than remove unsightly body hair on a daily basis or go to Banana Republic to check out their spring line. Still, I wouldn't mind getting a pedicure before sandal season or taking up NIA again. And it might be fun to break away from the T-shirt uniform. And now that I think about it, I really do need to do something about these eyebrows.

For now, how about you don't address me as Sarah. Just call me Sybil.

Thank you so much, Doug.

Just got back from dropping Harrison off at daycare for the first time, and after seeing him turn red, scream, and try crawling after me as I went out the door, am feeling very good about my decision to be the designated picker-upper.

Choking back tears and waves of guilt—what a way to start the day!

Image: Ocean Man

Image: On an Island in the Sun. . .

Benjamin Franklin was a bastard

This article from the New York Post asserts that Benjamin Franklin dreamed up Daylight Savings Time because, "[He] was not a fan of morning light [and] liked to play chess until 3 or 4 in the morning, then sleep until the afternoon."

If Franklin was sleeping in every afternoon and goofing off until 4 AM with his buddies, then he was obviously not taking care of any one of his three children. It was the late 18th century, people—childcare was for wives and nursemaids.

If Franklin and his wife took turns getting the baby settled, as Doug and I do, then I can promise you that DST would not have happened. Franklin would have known that, even to a ten-month old, day time is clearly play time: time to clap two Cheerios together between tiny fingers, time to peek under the bathroom door while Mommy goes pee, time to terrorize the cats, time to pull Daddy's glasses off, time to squeeze yourself under the dining room chairs to get at that lone clump of cat hair that Mommy and Daddy missed while they were vacuuming the hardwoods—TIME FOR ANYTHING BUT SLEEPING.

Sure, the same article also claims that one study found a correlation between DST and energy savings, a drop in traffic accidents, and a reduction in crime, but clearly the scientific community didn't see the need to sink precious grant money into a study that would legitimize the link between DST and sleep deprivation in parents and children.

Most people think that Franklin was a Renaissance Man, but I believe I have just proven he was a lazy, misogynistic moron.

I do not work for General Mills

Advice for new moms of self-feeders:

Bored baby? Self-fed Cheerios
Tired baby? Self-fed Cheerios
Cranky baby? Self-fed Cheerios
Baby sick of being in plane/restaurant/Exersaucer/highchair/car? Self-fed Cheerios/Cheerios/Cheerios/Cheerios/Cheerios

You get the point.

God exists and he or she invented Cheerios.

Question for experienced moms:

Is it possible for a child to overdose on Cheerios?

Poor Kiddies

Last week, our daycare provider Miss Maureen asked me if we have cats.

"Oh God," I thought, "It's the cat hair. He's covered in it. He eats it. He hacked up an entire hairball today, and she's going to call Child Protective Services and have Harrison removed from our custody to a sanitary home where he can't eat clumps of cat hair or try and stick his fingers up a nasty cat butt."

But no…that wasn't it. Apparently, Harrison occupies himself by crawl-chasing Baby Andrew around and around the room—just like he does at home to Boog and Claus.

"Andrew sometimes gets annoyed," Miss Maureen said.

Note to self: buy extra pouch Whiska Lickins' Tuna-Flavored Hairball Treatment Treats to mix with Harrison's Cheerios