Thursday, December 13, 2007

The mom hole

So, as a mom, you often find yourself in the midst of rediculous (sp?) situations. Eating smushed banana off of your son's bib, for instance. Or, say, answering the door with your pants undone and hanging off your ass because you were breastfeeding and had to pee so incredibly bad that you had to do it with the baby attached to your boob and couldn't get your pants up in time for the dishwasher repairman. Just as a for instance, mind you.

Tonight I found myself singing (perhaps singing is the wrong word - let's say, intoning operatically) the word "socks" in various pitches, keys, volumes, speeds, tones, voices and with a variety of zany facial expressions. Sooooooooocks! Dylan thought I was hysterical. His giggle is worth a million bucks. But then, he totally stopped paying attention - he was trying to eat the protective foam corners I put on the coffee table - and - here's the insane part - I just kept singing. Soooooockkkkkkkkssssssssss! I even did a little dance. That's a different kind of silly singing and dancing from what happened earlier in the evening, which is that Larry came home to find me dancing up a storm and singing along at top volume to Skip to my Lou. But that's acceptable, because it's on a CD and I was practicing real dance moves (kind of).

Oh, who am I kidding. I've fallen down the mom hole. Where are my sweatpants?

Tuesday, December 11, 2007

Festival of lights

Tonight was the last night of Chanukah (transliterations are so fun- I get to spell it differently each time!) and I was so busy with the baby - then starving and throwing food into my face, that I completely forgot to light the candles. I was folding my 800th load of laundry while watching the real housewives of OC (and actually, they aren't housewives -- most of them have jobs!) and totally enjoying not having anything due for tomorrow, when I realized it was 11 o'clock and no candles.

So, I lit them and watched them burn in the window, the light reflecting in the silver menorah, the whole house quiet and dark except for this beautiful, glowing corner. I was sad at first because Larry is at work and I wanted to be able to share this with someone. It's the only holiday we don't really get together with my family and Larry doesn't know the words to any songs so I never feel like I'm really celebrating it. Either I sing to myself or to the baby, but it lacks warmth -- plus, I'm a terrible singer.

But then, I thought, it's really nice to be alone, just meditate on the calm and the beauty, the contrast of the little lights shining against the dark. Whenever I'm alone, I am always busy, but perhaps it is important to also be alone and not be doing anything more than watching candles burn. No TV, no snacks, no books or chores or schoolwork or projects or internet or phone or even writing - just letting my mind wander, just breathing.

Yoga, which I miss dearly, has taught me the value of letting go and the finger trap mentality of life that always gets me into trouble --- the harder you pull, the more stuck you get. Winter is a time to slow down, to nest, to cuddle, to let go. I'm not sure if that's an official lesson of Hannukka (see!!!), but that's what I got tonight. I know there is an idea of being an empty vessel for God's will. Tonight, I am empty.

Chag Sameach, Hanooocka!

Monday, December 10, 2007

ahhhh, couch!

It's been such a hard semester that I'd forgotten what my couch felt like against my butt, but this evening, my cheeks got a chance to reacquaint themselves with that lovely brown leather. Ahhhhhh. Hooray, I finished my paper! I am glad and I'm sure those of you who have had to listen to me list theories ad nauseum are glad, too. My poor mother - I actually emailed her a copy!!!!! Oh mom, you don't really have to read it!

Anyway, I printed it out and threw in some laundry and performed some other household rescue exercises that can only be done post DBT (that's Dylan's Bed Time) and then I was like, huh, it's only 10:30, whatever shall I do with myself. So i cut a gigantic piece of cake and poured a huge glass of wine and sat down in front of a Scrubs double-header. I lit a candle and felt no pressure or guilt whatsoever. I even called Larry just to gossip and find out how his night was going.

God, I have undervalued television. Maybe Larry's right. Perhaps we are due a flatscreen.

Or maybe I'm due a fabulous trip somewhere. To a place with cake and wine and good reruns. And sleeping babies.

Thursday, November 29, 2007

milk and brain cells

So, I handed in a story for class that we discussed today and no one liked it. My professor told me not to even bother revising it - it was that bad. So, ok, bruised ego aside, I can take that - I wasn't really that invested in it and they made very valid points. But what really freaked me out, is the way they described the main character in the piece. They said she was whiny and shallow and self-centered. They also said she had an unearned sense of entitlement that made her completely unsympathetic. Whew!

I am not upset because that's how people saw my character, but because the character was the closest one to me I have ever written. Of course, no one in the class could have known that and, of course, all my characters are me and not me. The story was about a mother whose friend's child gets cancer and dies. The main character feels trapped by her baby and actually feels jealous of her friend, something she can hardly admit to herself. I can say with certainty that I do not feel this way, but, oh boy do I know what it feels like to just want a day off from a job that has not one single day off ever. I was drawing on that feeling to write about a woman who resents that her baby keeps her from following her dream to open a photography studio.

When the class was discussing the main character, I could not help feeling bad about myself. I felt that perhaps I have been silly and shallow and entitled. Perhaps I was the one who has acted like I'm the only woman ever to have borne the burdens and sacrifices of motherhood. Perhaps I am the self-congratulator, the one who thinks everyone else in the world is just as interested as she is in every moment of her baby's life. I mean, of course I think my baby is the cutest - everyone thinks that of their own babies. What kind of mother would I be if I just thought he was fair to middling? I mean, he may be so as an adolescent or an adult, but as a baby? He's got to have some sort of chance in life - he can't even talk yet!

And yet, these are good things to doubt about yourself. Maybe I need to examine the ways in which I have been all of those things at different times. Maybe I have not been supremely right in all arguments with my husband, my mother, my friends. Perhaps, as I felt today, people from the outside have a completely different view of actions, rationality, psychology. Perhaps I have been a less good person/wife/mother/daughter/sister/friend than I believed. Perhaps I am a jerk.

Whenever I think these bad things about myself, I think how good it is for those around me to put up with me. I am embarrassed sometimes to recall all the times I've gone on and on to my husband or my mother or my friends. Why would I think anyone would be interested in these banal details of my life and how dare I present them as special? Why do I feel the need to give other people advice in terms of my own experiences? Can't I ever see them on their own terms? Why would I think that other people care at all? What about the big issues? Why can I not see beyond the narrow confines of my own small life? WIll I ever be able to do anything well or will I be a failure my whole life. Sometimes, I think life would have been easier psychologically as a charwoman. No it wouldn't - there goes my sense of entitlement. Even writing this blog is the essence of pondering my navel. It's not that cute a navel (though Dylan did try to nurse it today - but there I go again with the boring details). Ok, I'm ending before my brain fries.

Monday, October 15, 2007

daddy works nights

so, here are a few things I don’t think you know about that are so cute. First, he loves his little Ikea star lamp on the wall. It has these little pinholes, you know, that let the light out and make bird V patterns on the wall and ceiling. As soon as I turn it on he starts laughing and hopping up and down in my arms and reaching for it. Tonight, I wanted to distract him, so I put him on the other side of his bedroom and turned it on and he crawled over as close as he could get and tried to climb up the drawers on his dresser/changing table. God it was cute.

Today we tried Cheerios again. On Saturday, I gave him some bits of apple because you were taking a while smashing his avocado and he was getting really fussy. I just had the apple in his little mesh bag “lollipop” and I cut it up right there at the table in your restaurant. I was excited because he was picking up the pieces and eating them on his own, and I even said, “Cool. Now, I don’t have to feed you anymore,” and that’s when he started choking. But tonight, I decided to give Cheerios another go anyhow. So far, he hasn’t been that interested, but tonight he dove right in and smushed them all up in his little gums and swallowed them almost without incident (he coughed once) and I could barely get his yams in. I was like, wow, the first time he actually eats them and he KILLS em – I had to get him a second handful! – but then I went to take off his bib and I realized most of them had ended up in a little cereal pool in his lap. Ok, so he’s not ready for a pie eating contest, but still, good show!

We met a Mexican family in the playground today. I used my rusty, barely existent Spanish to chat with the mom about her younger child, a baby just two weeks younger than Dylan. His name was Jhon – she pronounced it “Yan” and I kept trying to ask if it was Swedish or something, but apparently they don’t call Sweden Sweden in Spanish and I don’t know the Spanish word for that country. Also, I couldn’t remember the Spanish for love or like or anything, because I wanted to explain that Dylan loves other babies. He pulled himself up on Jhon’s stroller – he even climbed onto the footrest!- and was smiling and laughing and jumping up and down, grapping for the other baby’s head and hand. At one point, when he was pulling himself up, he grabbed Jhan’s little foot in its little red leather shoe and tried to eat it. I was laughing so hard!

Then he crawled all around and turned the knees of his baby blue pants black and was following around some big kids. First, they were on the swings so crawled right over and sat below them. They were about 9 or 10 and were so good about not hitting him or stepping on him. They were getting up a game of tag and I said to him to make them laugh, “What, do you think you’re going to play tag, too?” Then they went and stood in a little circle a bit away from the swings and don’t you know, Dylan crawled right up to them and sat down right next to their feet as if he really was ready to join the game. I had to swoop him up to keep him from being trampled. He’s quite the social baby. Remind you of his mommy?

I love your body

Consider this an open letter. Consider this my heart. Consider this the smooth round cheek of my baby son when he's concentrating hard on picking something up and his lips stick out like little pickles and his eyes are cast downward upon his work. Consider this the wart on my husband's middle finger where it joins his hand and I love when I feel it tickling the inner pad of my hand, my breast, the hard line of my aging jaw. Consider this the smell of shampoo in the thick hair of my stepson, tousled so it shows that little streak of premature gray. Consider this the hot stars shooting out from my hips and buttocks after a hard, uphill bike ride, the raw cavity of my throat, glowing red, a heat wave around my head, the world still and solid once again below my feet. Consider this real.

Friday, July 6, 2007

My outer lip

I just emerged from my darkened childhood bedroom in which I just danced my beautiful baby boy to sleep to the tinny music of his mobile. What a love! Down in the basement of my parents' sprawling suburban estate my step-son is playing on his new X-box with his friend Phillip. They were such good boys tonight. They came to my grandparents' house and ate pizza (Phillip only eats pizza and fries, which I find kind of cute) and swam in the pool at their complex and then played at the playground and didn't complain about not having their video games or about being in their house of strange old people they barely know.

It's amazing how close I am at this moment, with the fireflies in the grass outside and no children playing stickball in the middle of the street, to the life I never thought I'd have. Perhaps because it is borrowed (we'll be back in the city as soon as my kitchen is done in a few weeks), it's not so terrible. Plus my parents have mega-cable. Very nice when breastfeeding.

So I just took down a post about all the anxiety my husband's job and spending habits are causing me. I actually only posted it because I never actually think anyone reads this stupid thing. But apparently, you do. I was shocked - shocked - to see that some of you have even posted comments! I was also thrilled because it's nice to know I am actually communicating with people. But I've always thought of this thing as more of diary that gets housed in cyberspace and I don't think I would have actually posted some of that dirty laundry had a I realized.

So, I took it down for that reason, but also because I feel like it's unfair to Larry. Everything was true when I wrote it - the anxiety, the anger, the hopelessness. But as soon as I wrote it down, most of that dissappeared. The events are there and the bank account is still low, but writing down my bad feelings has always helped me to overcome them.

And the thing is, I get it. I understand completely that my husband is absolutely drained after working for 12 hours straight on his feet without so much as a lunch break. I get that that's why he needs to smoke - to relieve stress and to stop working for 10 minutes. I get that on his days off, he can barely move, let alone wake up early and head out for an all-day hike. And I know why he bought Marley that X box - he wants to make up for not seeing him enough, for dragging him between so many houses and people, for more dissapointments than any 10-year-old should have to bear.

There is also one thing I didn't mention about buying the X-box. He called and asked me if he could buy it before he did. I didn't feel like I could say no, but I could have. And we have plenty of savings. I don't really want to dip into them and I think the Xbox is an extravagance that we shouldn't even consider if we can't afford to fix my car or go on vacation, but if he really feels like its that important for his son to have this, how can I say no? How can I? And, after all, it's just money. It means nothing. I won't even notice it's gone a year from now. And the two of them will enjoy it for much longer than that.

I suppose sometimes, I feel like Larry doesn't consider how I'm going to feel, but do I always consider his feelings? What about posting a mean entry about him? Is that kind? I always want him to show up with flowers or some sort of surprise, but I do remember what it's like to go to work (it wasn't THAT long ago) and just want to get home and hit the couch.

Really, I am just lonely and not lonely for people, because my friends and family are great and always around - which is a luxury he does not have these days. I am lonely for him. I just miss him. I miss being able to laugh with him because he doesn't get to do much laughing these days. But that's because of his schedule, not because he's a bad husband. It's because he's working hard, not out partying or seeing other women or even abandoning me for his buddies. My god, his buddies must think he's dropped off the edge of the planet. I never really thought about the fact that he not only gets no time with his sons, but also no time with friends or any of the rest of his family.

I guess there's this evil little part of me that just wants him to miss me as much. And I think he does.

If I were a kind wife, I would probably arrange some sort of guy party so they could all veg out on the couch together and make stupid boy jokes. If I were a wife that didn't think about herself and dirty socks all the time.

He said to me a few weeks ago that I was the only reason he was able to hold this job- that without my support he'd have to quit. It made me feel so good. Maybe that just has to be enough for now.

Monday, June 18, 2007

Wardrobe Complications

So, I always knew I'd need a separate wardrobe for pregnancy and with maternity clothes so cute these days, I was totally looking forward to that shopping spree. By my third trimester, I was, of course, sick to death of maternity wear, especially the pants that never stayed up and especially because the wardrobe consisted of so few choices, since I only bought a few things. At the end I told anyone who would listen how I couldn't wait to get back into my regular clothes.



So it was a major dissapointment to realize that, having gained 40 pounds, I was not going to fit right into my "regular clothes." I refused to buy more than two pairs of pants two tops. That combined with some super stretchy long t-shirts and an old pair of fat jeans lasted me all spring. Eventually, I began to shed the weight. I am now 12 pounds from my old weight and the baby is three months old. I swear, next time I will only gain 25 pounds, I absolutely swear -- no cheese doodles! I finally fit into my larger jeans and can just barely zip my smaller pair. But now I have a bigger problem. I suddenly realized I have only two pairs of jeans!



I know that might not seem like a huge problem. After all, I've had two pairs of jeans for years - a casual pair and a "Saturday night" pair. (I had that old pair of fat jeans, too, but they didn't count because I pretty much used them for painting in or cleaning the basement and chucked them as soon as my real casual pair zipped up.) It was never really a problem, but that was when I could only wear jeans in the evenings and on weekends. To work, I wore slacks and skirts. Now, suddenly, I find myself living in a jeans, t-shirt, and shorts kind of world. Mine is a world of sweat, spit up, and breast leaks. Every day the effluvia of my child find their way onto my clothes. Although I have never been a big clean freak, showers are now my favorite time of day. Whereas I used to wash my clothes after several wearings, now I often have to change several times a day.



I have to say, it was kind of a thrill to find myself in front of the graphic T shirt display at Old Navy, a location I always avoided in favor of the sweater set aisle. It made me feel young to dress like a teenager again. I can't even remember when sneakers and flip flops were my staple footwear. The last time I was out of work I still got "dressed" every day, but suddenly, I can barely manage to change my earrings every few days, let alone organize outfits. Plus, almost every day in the city means miles of walking and pushing a stroller. I had no idea that motherhood was so physical. The thing is, I spent my 20's contstantly trying to find a job that didn't put me behind a desk all day. I was miserable doing that unsuccessfully for 8 years. Now, it looks like I've finally found that job - only I don't get paid for it. It feels good to go to bed tired from a hard day's work, but not zombified by having stared at a computer screen for hours and hours.

But I do miss my wardrobe. I never get to wear my red, high heeled sandals. I sometimes stare at my closet and stroke my beaded evening camisoles. And I am still waiting to squeeze into the pencil skirt larry bought me the day after our wedding, the only week in my adult life that I weight less than 130 lbs.

There has to be a mix, right? A job that includes quiet work and physical activity, a life that includes work and family, a wardrobe that includes tank tops and kitten heels?

Thursday, May 17, 2007

Magnolias revisted

By the way, i figured out the difference between Magnolias and Dogwoods. Duh, Rachel!

Oh, and it continues to rain petals and every day I am grateful to be outside with my baby.

My grandmother sent me a mother's day card with only one line: Enjoy Dylan every day. I'm trying, Grandma.

Bedbugs

It's true. I was changing my sheets yesterday (for the first time in a MONTH!!!) and I saw this little doodley bug doodling its way across my pilllow. Then another one on my mattress cover. Finally a dead shell of one, which I carried into the office and looked him up online and there he was: teeny, round, stripey - a bedbug. The disgusting thing (if it can get more disgusting) is that the exterminator can't come until tomorrow, so I had to sleep in that bed last night and will again tonight. Eeek, heebie jeebies!

Of course, the more upsetting part of this story is that my little bedbug has to sleep there, too. I mean, it's one thing for met to get some little itchy spots, but I keep checking Dylan to make sure he's ok and thankfully, so far he is. Unfortunately, he is also far more annoying a bedmate than the bugs. He is kicky, scratchy, restless, and regurgitative (if that's a word). I know I should be keeping him in his co-sleeper, but lately he's had some real trouble going back to sleep after waking up to nurse. This keeps me awake. I do not like that. Therefore, at the risk of being yelled at by my pediatrician, I sometimes let him sleep on my chest. Then, sometimes, I feed him lying on my side and then we both fall asleep that way. I am not a big fan of this, both because of the aforementioned kicking and also because I often wake up with my fingers tingling because I have to keep my arm above my head. And, of course, I worry about the baby suffocating or some other horrible thing involving my pollow top mattress and my feather douvet. Now, I get to add being bitten by icky vermin to the list.

Ah, god it feels great to write. I just paid all my bills, cleaned my floors, did my dishes and laundry, made the beds and organized. I am almost a real human being here. I feel like I can start taking on freelance work again. Maybe I should say yes to some of the projects I've been hemming and hawing on. I'm definitely going to go to that interview with the Tribune. Some days I have no idea how I will be able to go to school in 3 months, and other days (usually the days my mom comes to help me and the days the baby crashes out early/easily) I can't imagine why not. Next task - find childcare/write novel. That's all I got in me tonight ...

Saturday, April 21, 2007

Magnolias

So, I'm beginning to come out from under the baby haze. I even have Dylan lying on the bed next to me while I type this and he's totally entranced by Larry's belt or something else sitting in that general direction.

Yesterday was the first glorious day of true spring, a little late in coming, but welcome nonetheless (however you spell that word!). Dylan had a doctor's appointment in the morning and I had a midwife appointment in the afternoon, and it was so nice out that I decided to just spend the whole middle of the day wandering around. As a result Dylan got to breastfeed in a number of interesting locales, including on a bench next to a smoking, but very polite homeless man.

Magnolias and Dogwoods are my favorite trees -- although I can't tell the difference between them. I love their lush flowers that shade from deep pink to white, but they die very quickly. First the flowers open too far, like a middle aged woman who still relies on the makeup routine she used when she was 20. Then, the tender white ends of the petals turn yellow and thin, as if someone has smushed them on purpose. Finally, the petals fall off individually and the branches, while still in bloom, but lacking any of the green that will come later to fill them up, looks scraggly, naked, while beneath the tree a carpet of rotting petals builds. It is one of the hardest trees to catch at its perfect peak, but when you do, it's breathtaking.

There is a magnolia garden in the middle of the colonial section of Philadelphia, one in a string of connecting gardens that run throughout the old city. I love to walk that route and yesterday, Dylan and I meandered through it, taking the time to stare at the daffodils -- ok, I stared and he slept -- and rest under arbors. It was delightful. It felt so great to stretch my legs and take advantage of one of the best parts of the city -- one I don't often get a chance to appreciate -- especially with my little son in tow.

The best part was the magnolia garden. I had Dylan in his baby carrier at that point, so I left the carriage at the foot of the stairs and strolled slowly through it with the baby. We just stood under the trees and felt the breeze. There were people reading on benches and there was a hushed sense of being in a quiet, contemplative place in the middle of the city. No one was talking and all cell phones were silent. The trees even blocked the sounds of the traffic. The magnolias were just a hair past their prime, but still lovely. I sat on a bench, kissed my baby's head and teared up at the beauty of spring. I decided I would go back to school in the fall and this summer I will make it to Montana. After all, I've turned 30, had a baby, started my own business and am married to the man I love. Now I just have to lose the last 20 pounds of baby weight and I'll be a chick lit heroine. Ok, maybe not, but standing there beneath the blue sky and the floral crosses of pink and white, I felt like life is pretty damn good.

Saturday, April 7, 2007

new life

This is my first post since having the baby and it is such a respite to write. I am typing as fast as I can because I can hear him stirring downstairs - our little dylan henry. He's great. But he hasn't let me put him down in days. except the last hour and I finally got my bills paid and my dinner eaten -- first things first. well - I hear crying. looks like second things second will have to wait ...

Wednesday, March 7, 2007

Speach

Larry's sisters and mom are throwing me a baby shower this weekend and I cannot wait. I hope they won't think it's too corny, but I want to give a little speach. I don't know if I've ever given a speach before. We didn't do anything at our wedding or even, I think our rehearsal dinner. I guess I've spoken at friends' weddings and at my grandmother's funderal, but that's different. Anyway, this is pretty much what I want to say:

When Barb called me to tell me she and Jeannie and Eleanor were making me this party I was so touched. It was so important to me to share this really special time in my life with the important women in my life and I'm so excited you are all here.

Larry is always talking about how much he loves my family -- and that's such a blessing for me. He gets job advice from my dad and they chat about music all the time and he gets cooking lessons from my mom and grandmother. And I'm always telling Larry I actually married him for his sisters. When I was having job trouble this winter I kept Barb on the phone for hours and Jeannie's talked me through every moment of pregnancy hysteria. Sometimes I think Kevin is the only one who gets my sense of humor and Eleanor is, of course, the most supportive mother-in-law I could ask for. The only person that I miss - of course - is Nancy, but I know she's thinking about us, just like we're always, always thinking about her.

And all his wonderful cousins and aunts! I was telling Larry the other day that I was daydreaming about all the parties that are about to happen - all the graduations and first communions that bring everyone together in the spring - and I said I can't wait to be there and play pass the baby with all your cousin and aunts. It's going to be so great - Ryan and Jayden will be just this baby's age and they're going to grow up together. Because of the war, my family is very small and I grew up without any cousins - barely even any second cousins, so it's so wonderful to me that my children will have that.

And I also have to say that it was Mary Pat who actually convinced Larry to let me try natural childbirth -- so if I'm screaming bloody murder a week from now it'll be all her fault!

Anyway, I just could not ask for a more caring, more forgiving, more amazing family - on both sides - to bring this baby into. Thanks you guys so much for doing this for us. I love you!

Well, admittedly, it is pretty corny, but that's ok, I think. Showers by their definition are pretty corny, no? So, oh well, I give into the cheese. After all, it really is what's in my heart.

Friday, February 23, 2007

The Evil Eye

I just got off the phone with my sister, who is not sure she wants to come to my baby shower. She says she is superstitious, but I really don't undersand why. I've never been much for superstition, although I do read my horoscope sometimes. Anyway, I never even knew Jewish women didn't have baby showers until 2 years ago when my friend Nitza was pregnant. I was like, oh, let's make her a baby shower, and everyone was like, no, you can't because of the evil eye.

The evil eye is very annoying and inconvenient, if you ask me. When my mother was born, my grandparents kept her in a drawer. A drawer - I swear to god! When I was a kid, I always thought they meant that they pulled out a drawer, stuck her in it, and then closed it back up, still full of socks and everything. I guess they must have kept it on the ground by their bed and had it lined with blankets and stuff. Actually, it probably made quite a cozy little bassinett, but that's not why they did it -- they did it out of fear.

Historically, when mothers and babies survived childbirth far less often than they do today, I suppose it made sense. After all, how terrible to have to return all those gifts and furniture and everything. But I was always taught to prepare well ahead of time for new situations and this seems like a situation you'd want to be really prepared for. You don't want to be out shopping for a crib 3 days after giving birth, when you're sleep-deprived and just learning how to breastfeed and stuff - right?

But the thing I was trying to explain to my sister is I don't want the baby shower for all the presents -- as my mother pointed out, people are going to give us plenty of stuff no matter what. And whatever we don't get, we'll just buy on Craigslist (much to my grandmother's horror). For me, the party is right of passage, a welcoming into this stage of womanhood. My sister pointed out that some Jewish people have parties after they give birth with men and women and the baby there -- but that's really a party for the baby, not the mom. This is really about femaleness and fertility. I don't know if it's corny or too anthropological to describe it this way, but I would be so sad not to have this little celebration. I am completely grateful to Larry's sisters for organizing it for me. It also really means a lot that my mom is going to come - even if she's not going to bring a present (actually, she already sent me a stroller/car seat, which I promised to keep in the basement until the actual arrival). Anyway, it means a lot to me, even if it's cheesy, so I hope she'll change her mind and come, because that would be really sweet and it would be so nice to have her there.

Wednesday, February 7, 2007

A Quail's Coffin

I watched Babette's Feast tonight. Good winter movie. I was making beef stew. It's not quite the lush perfection of the Cafe Anglais, but it smelled good and I know it will warm Larry's belly when he gets home soon.

It's so cold out and he has to wait alone for the subway. It makes me feel like some sort of prarie wife, waiting for her man to come in off the barren plains. It is nice to be home, covered in a blanket like a shawl, having put in a hard day's work myself. I love working from home, even if I do get a little lonely sometimes. I have a new peace.

I think it's like the movie - how good food links the physical with the spiritual world and breaks down the stoicism of this religious community. Sometimes we get so caught up in the rat race of it all, it's hard to remember the joys of earthly basics like good food and it's hard to remember that so many of the things that seem like such big deals don't really matter in the end. I choose a bread and chocolate life.

I looked deep into the mirror as I was brushing my teeth just now. I get lost like that sometimes, wondering who that woman on the other side is and what she has to do with me, other than a snaggletooth that needs fixing and some chin hairs that need desperate plucking. For the first time in a long time my eyes don't have bags; its the third trimester exhaustion and the former job stress --- but that feels lifted. I saw my big eyes and my round face and the zits by my hairline. I saw the blond streaks growing out and the shiny brown coming in. The elastic of my black shirt caught the hollow light of our tiny bathroom because it is stretched so thin across my belly and breasts. I looked at that woman in the mirror, a woman who makes mistakes, but, I think, a good woman, and I thought, I am ready to be a mother. For the first time in a very long time, that thought didn't scare me.

My baby is all but bursting out of me already (so it's a good thing I'm getting used to the idea of him in my life). I am all belly. I am a ripe fruit. He bolts around inside me like a torpedo. I think he must be very squished in there.

We need to come up with a middle name for this baby. Dylan is such a hard name for an infant, I think. I know it will suit him later on - I still love the name - but when he comes out all tiny and bloody, when he's screaming and cold and wrinkled, I think it will be too solid a name just yet. Larry still won't go for Sawyer as a middle name. It's still my favorite, but I guess I can't win all arguments (even though we all know I should!!!). So, I've been thinking Solomon, Sebastian, Stefan, Sagi. Sagi means strong - and that would certainly be a name to do justice to my grandmother's dirt-tough legacy - but I'm not sure I love the sound of the name. Sebastian sounds like a young, royal paige with blond bangs flopping in his eyes. It was also the name of the boy in the Never Ending Story, and I would love for my child to grow up with that sense of wonder, imagination, fortitute, and, of course, indulgence in the power of the written word. 'Course that kid was also a dork that had to hide from bullies and I don't want a sissy for a son (or a daughter).

The other thing we still have to figure out is the ceremony of it all. Larry convinced me to do a bris. It wasn't hard, because it would be such a fight with everyone not to have it, but I really don't see much of a point to it. It's weird to me to decide to chop off a piece of his little body - especially as I consider the "natural" alternatives of not giving him every vaccine on the list. I also don't think he needs a nicked noodle to be a part of the Jewish people. I mean, I know rabbis would say he does, but shouldn't religion, faith, and peoplehood emanate from the mind and spirit? Then again, Judaism certainly teaches a strong connection between the two hemispheres - something I believe in strongly -- I'm just not sure I see this particular connection. I mean, is he going to think about being Jewish every time he pees or has sex?

Well, Larry should be home soon, and I should get this belly to bed. I was up at 6:30 this morning, working on a spec assignment. I feel good about that. I like working for myself. It feels so much more meaningful. It feels solid, rooted. I just hope I can keep up that feeling as I enter this sacred, liminal space of emergence and life. Namaste, I guess.

Saturday, January 27, 2007

my famous blue raincoat

I am standing in a CVS in Boston with my brother buying junk food and pre-natal vitamins when a magazine cover catches my eye. It is a photo of the young actress Scarlett Johansen, who I like because she chooses good roles and plays them with depth. The headline says that Cameron Diaz’s boyfriend has left her and he has hooked up with Johansen instead. It describes Johansen as Diaz’s enemy, which certainly juices up the story. Since I do not follow Hollywood gossip, I have no idea if this is remotely true or has even been long-rumored. What catches me off guard is the idea of Johansen, whose character I imagine to be sweet and down to earth, with an enemy. It occurs to me that part of the reason I like Johansen is that I feel a kinship with her; I picture her as a beautiful, actress version of myself: smart, funny, buxom, unafraid to embrace her inner dork. This impression is based on flimsy information gathered mostly from the characters she’s played in movies, and yet it moves me to think: Scarlett Johansen has an enemy and I do, too.
This is the first time in my life I have had an enemy and I find it hard to get used to the idea. This is also the first time in my life I have ever disliked a person so much. I will not say I hate her, because hate is a word filled with a high level of anger I do not posses. Stunned would much better describe how I feel. I am both stunned by my feelings of dislike and by my own actions. The actions that lead this person to become my enemy were predicated not on my dislike, but almost wholly on my fear and a sense of survivalism. As in, if I didn’t act, I feared this person would hurt me far worse than I was hurting her. In the end, I may have been wrong about that, because we both ended up getting burned, but I do feel sure I was right to fear her, that she is a bad person, that she wanted my destruction far more than I wanted hers, that she would have stopped at nothing to get it, and that she had better means to do so than did I. All of these things are what make me dislike her so much. It is a ridiculous revelation for me each time I realize how much she must hate me back.
In my dream last night, my enemy tried to trick me, but I didn’t see the ruse until I woke up in the morning. Our devolution from friends to enemies was always predicated on her trying to help me. I am not a cynical person, and I always believe people are who they say they are, offer what they mean to offer, are as honest as me. It never occurs to me that people I trust - and I trust almost everyone - are out to hurt me, have ulterior motives, or mean anything other than the good they profess. My grandfather always says not to trust anyone an inch, but since he also focuses on bitter family feuds that took place more than half a century ago, I have always laughed at him. Now I wish I had listened.
Before I tell the dream, here is a case in point, a very small point, which, by its very smallness shows how endemic is this enemy’s insidiousness. Before I told this person I was pregnant, she was constantly showing me photos of her cousin, who was about to give birth. She asked me how big pregnant women were supposed to grow, since her cousin had gone from skinny to huge, and a number of other pregnancy-related questions, none of which I knew the answers to, because I was so newly pregnant myself. I was always afraid of answering her questions because I was afraid she would find out I was pregnant before I wanted to tell her, which could have had very bad consequences for me, but it never occurred to me that she actually suspected I was pregnant and was trying nearly every day to get me to admit it so that she could use that information against me. After the incidents that made me her enemy occurred, a friend pointed out that that had been exactly her intent all along. I felt so stupid for not having noticed or even suspected. I thought this person would be able to see beyond politics and be at least a little happy for me and the new family I was starting. I was so naïve.
In my dream, I was naïve again, and it felt like relief. My enemy was suddenly in the picture and was talking to me normally. She was going about work in her usual way, giving me too much information and extolling her accomplishments. She told me she had a job working for the business desk of the Philadelphia Inquirer and she’d brought a number of people from our old situation with her, mostly students and cloying underlings. She says she knows we’ve had our differences, but says I should talk to her new boss, explain that I’m with her, and he will give me writing assignments. I am glad for the openness, but not sure I want the assignments. In addition, her boyfriend is there and he is following me suspiciously. He is a nice guy and I hope that in real life he won’t be hurt by her. In the dream, my enemy is telling me how our new life together will go, the only detail of which I remember is that I am supposed to move in with her. I do not want to do that because her place is a mess, full of shoes and clothes, and because I do not like the way she is laying out the future. She is not order me around outright, but assumes I will do what she says. I begin to have the vague notion that if I do what she wants now, I will be doing what she wants forever. Then there is the impression of someone else, and I remember that I am married. Larry certainly can’t move here with me. I tell her quietly thanks but no thanks, that I have another writing assignment from another desk at the paper -- which is true in real life -- and that it was nice of her to think of me. Then I walk out of the room and out of the dream calmly, as she stares resentfully after me. I wake up feeling even more relieved.
If this situation doesn’t represent plotwise what happened between us in real life, it certainly represents it symbolically. I trusted her instead of myself and when I finally realized how dangerous she is, I was honest to a fault and left. In life, the situation was much more dramatic and full of gray areas, but it felt the same. I beat myself up daily for the real life situation, like a soldier who survived war but had to kill men. In both the dream and real life, ridding my enemy from my life is still the source of my greatest relief. I am so thankful, even as I sort through the emotional, financial, and bureaucratic debris of the fallout, that I do not have to deliver my baby with the black cloud of my enemy in my life. The fact that the pale memory of her will always be with me is like a battle wound. Luckily, having wounds means you’ve survived the battle.

Wednesday, January 10, 2007

Wordsmith

To grow up Jewish is to grow up in awe of words. Had I grown up Catholic, I believe I would have become a painter, a mosaicist, or a jewelry maker. I remember seeing the Vatican in Rome and the Sisteen Chapel and thinking, Oh, I get it, this is what makes people believe in God. I did not grow up Catholic, nor did I grow up to believe in God in any traditional sense. I grew up to believe in words.

I remember in college, I would dream in typewriter. That is, as I thought the thoughts that lead me into sleep or those that woke me from it, I often saw them typed out, each letter hit on an imaginary keyboard in my head.

Now I make my living with words, weaving them into stories and eliciting them from people whose stories are locked deep within them. One of my greatest feelings of accomplishment at my present job came after I finished interviewing a man who has lived for decades with full blown AIDS. This man is a motivational speaker for a local AIDS group, so he's comfortable talking about hard subjects, including the details of his own disease, but usually he speaks as an educator, divulging his status simply to make a point. During our interview, we talked about his life, his lovers, his drugs (his prescription drugs, that is), and his struggles. We went into deep detail and the detail was fascinating to me (and hopefully later to the website's listeners, as well). Afterwards, the man thanked me for my questions and I felt wonderful. He was so happy to tell this much more personal story and we both agreed it would make a difference to whoever heard it.

Though I no longer dream in typewriter, I do often still dream in words. Sometimes, I wake up and can barely describe the colors and voices and smells of my dreams. The plot is completely tangled. But often there is one word or a feeling of a word that sticks with me, makes me see the waking world differently.

My writing guru, Mary, has explained that in stories dialogue is action. That words can be considered action is so revolutionary to me. Recently, I heard a lawyer who is also a novelist interviewed on a radio show. He related how his law school professor told the class that the law, after all, is only a collection of words. This stunned the man, because in his mind, the law is so powerful. But, of course, these are words that describe actions, and, more to the point, words are powerful. So, words = law = power or law = words = power.

As Chanukah approaches, I think of the story of the Maccabees, their war, their miraculous oil, the lesson that we are all vessels, empty oil jugs, and that God - however we conceive him - is here to fill us, to light our flames. As a kid, I used to wonder how much of these fairy tales could be true (I was a rather cynical kid). Now I realize it doesn't matter. It is the words that fill us with light against these short days and long, dark nights.

Poor Nutrition

Today I ate French fries and shared an ice-cream topped blondie. My poor baby is going to come out a junk food junkie. And I will be fat fat fat.

Rainy Winter Dreams

Since this is a dream blog, let's interpret loosely. Larry's dream is to own his own cafe. On rainy nights like these, when I picture this family that's coming and he's sick and sleeping in sweat and my heart just goes out to him and i can't stop hugging him, my solace is this vision in my mind of me and him in this cozy winter scene. We're behind the counter and the cafe is filled with people and a dog (our dog, the one we'll have someday) is lying in front of the fireplace on the frayed oriental rug. Larry hands me the baby as I ring someone up. He's busy making one of his signature sandwiches and cutting the cucumbers for the side salad just so - he's such a perfectionist. The Old 97s play low in the background. Everyone is reading or typing or chatting and sipping tea and lattes and eating yummy baked goods and everyone is happy to be in our safe little nest.

Dylan Sawyer Howe

Dylan: D for David after Larry's dad, who passed away when he was in college. It's controversial in his family because one of his sisters has major issues with their dad. I think it will mean a lot to his mom, brother, and other sister's though, even though they, as all children and widows, have their own issues with him.

This is what I know about Larry's father. He took cake decorating classes. He was absent minded. He lost his job with the state when he blew the whistle on corrupt managers. He lived his life in the shadow of his father - a grad of the University of Pennsylvania who started his own accounting firm and made lots of money. He loved sports. He had a desk job in the army, which he left with honors. He loved to sing while he did the dishes and would wear an apron. He had six kids, one of whom died as a little boy, one of whom suffered from childhood diabetes, and one of whom was so badly burnt as a little girl that she never really recovered. He was not open about his emotions. He was super-involved with his church and helped to start a vibrant community in their brand new parish. He suffered from depression. His widow never has one bad thing to say about him. He worked two jobs most of his life, including a candy store that never really made it. Larry's favorite memory of him is staying overnight with him in a state barracks on Penn's Landing. They had the whole place to themselves and they played the most amazing, echoing game of catch with a rubber Spalding ball.

I want Dylan to have David's senses of play, of generosity, of honesty, of accepting loss, of community, of pitching in, and of morality. I also want him to have David's legendary sweetness and good looks.

Dylan is also Bob Dylan, Dylan Thomas, cowboy boot wearing, dust-trudging, poetry reading, quietly singing, a little bit shy with a very sweet smile. A guy who makes all the girls crazy without having to try, who loves rivers and mountains and dogs and fires and mission furniture and wrapping gifts and keeps all his crayons in order by color and intensity.

Sawyer: S is for Sarah, my grandmother, who lived well into a tortured old age and was known as a difficult woman until the end. My grandmother was not a pretty woman, with a big nose and a sallow complexion, but then again, I don't think she ever cared very much for looks. She was known to be slightly off in her hometown, a little shtetl in Poland. The details of her life are fuzzy because she wanted them that way, but the timeline goes something like this:

She came to America, to Chicago, as a teenager on her grandmother's dime in hopes of going to school and making lots of money. Her grandmother, though, wanted her to help keep house, and so Sarah left, went to business school (I would guess an associates degree) and married a man. That's all I know about him, that he was some man somewhere in the mid-west. That didn't last (something about a mother-in-law?) and she left him and went to nursing school (another associates degree? She only ever worked as a nurse's aid). Somehow she ended up in New York and when the Holocaust ended, she found out most of the people in her town had died. My grandfather was on the list of survivors. Thinking he was in fact his older brother, she contacted him in Palestine and said, hey, we're from the same town and we're both alive, let's get married. He agreed and they were married in New York with no pomp and little circumstance. He wanted to live in Israel and she said, as soon as the baby's born, but then my mother was born and she wanted to stay in New York and make money. They owned a nursing home and real estate and she worked as an aid in people's homes. My grandfather never called her anything but Mrs. Strenger and she had several boyfriends on the side. They made a lot of money and moved to New Jersey.

So what could I want my child to inherit from such a cold, calculating woman? Her strength, of course, and her shrewdness, her sense of entitlement and the ethic of hard work she coupled with thriftiness. In her own way, too, she was loving. She never stole or cheated or shortchanged to make her money, but she was exacting, demanding, and stood her ground always. She knew who she was and she made her dreams come true.

This is what I remember of my grandmother. She never gave us presents but put all her money into trust accounts for me, my brother, and sister. She ate directly out of pots kept in the refrigerator. She drank borcht out of jelly glasses. She had the smoothest skin of anyone I've ever touched because she used Nivea cream obsessively. She gave me a jar of anti-wrinkle cream the day I turned 21. She wanted my mother and then me to be a lawyer. Once, when she was very old, I came to her house unannounced. She was wearing a horrible green sweater, a turban, a nightgown wrapped around her neck - as was her custom - and nothing on her lower half. She was dusting something and singing in Polish. She was very happy to see me. When we were kids, my mother used to take us to her house deep in the Pine Barrens - or so it seemed to us then - to swim in our underwear in the kiddie pool and swing on the hammock she kept in her sandy backyard through which deer foraged and which always smelled of pine. Once, we pulled up and she was standing by the side of the house completely naked, bent over a garden hose, which she was using to wash her enormous, hanging breasts. She waved to us, smiling. She used to call us Shenkshicks, Shinebudgela, Shinechuchela and kiss us with her sunken in mouth, staring out at us from beneath her thick, rose-tinted, cat's eye glasses. She loved turqoise. She always watched her weight. She had terrible arthritis. She called things a "dois" when she couldn't remember the right name. She once told me her kindly neighbor, a farmer who raised hounds and cranberries, was rooting through her trash and calling her on the phone to harrass her - sexually. She told my mother that's why she was continually changing her phone number. The phone company told my mother they would cut her off if she tried to change her phone number one more time. Once, on a New York subway in the dangerous early 80's, en route to visit an accountant and carrying a paper bag full of cash, she loudly said to my father, There sure are a lot of Hispaniolas on this train. Another time, apropos of nothing, she asked my mother - who she once accused of being a member of a girl gang in her mid-30's - How 'bout that Gorby? Her favorite store was Clover because they made the softest nightgowns to wrap around her neck. She loved a sitz bath.

Sawyer means woodcutter. I love the idea of my child having a name connected to nature and the outdoors. I want him to be healthy and wild and filled with the language and scent and sound and solitude of the forest. Very zen, no? Strength and gentleness, genrosity and self-reliance, survivalism and drive. He has a very big name to grow into.

And Howe: Howe is Larry's name and I love him for too many reasonson to list. And that is enough.

posted by Fictionchick @ 10:43 AM 0 comments links to this post

Gray morning, bloodshot eyes, mushroom hair. Sometimes the routines of the day seem like such a hassle. Every time I floss my teeth, they bleed - pregnancy. Instead, I dream of Cuba, Brazil, Naples. I have always believed I was meant for a hotter climate, for hot blood, for tiny bathing suits, a life of fresh fruit, salty air, crisply fried fish, lemons all around me. Philadelphia is so even, so calculated, as is my life within in, doled out like the city blocks, each a tenth of a mile, separated by squares. My life is bills, work, exercise, television, dinner, regimented social activity.

I need to dance more, to throw my hips toward the walls, to unscrew all the clenched inside parts of me. Does passion die at 29? Do I live inside my library books? Is it because I read the newspaper and the New Yorker instead of poetry now?

The other day I dreamed I was Vincent D'Onofrio, saving a little girl given the evil eye by a Santaria, who appeared in scratchy black and white (the rest of the dream was in color) covered by a cowl, a henchwoman of Darth Vadar. I can't tell my own life from TV anymore.

The sky is my favorite this morning, a blanket of clouds cut in regular patterns by the sun, small pillows of bluish gray, each surrounded by a mystical gold. I have to go and take the trash out.

List Mani

So, to continue with the dream theme, I don't know what I dreamed last night, but I know I woke up feeling amazingly positive once again. Even got to work on time - major accomplishment: I was the first one in. I spent the weekend writing (new story, almost done) and also spray painting a crib for the little octopus swimming ungainily inside me. Aside from the bruise on my trigger finger (yo! Spray painting is hard work.) I think it's coming along really well.

It's really amazing how great I feel when I get things crossed off my to do list. Larry thinks I'm nuts (actually, Larry generally thinks I'm nuts) because I feel so releived when it's all done, but come on, we just this weekend went to pick out a door for Marley's bedroom. The kid hasn't had a door on his room for over a year now. He's 10 and very shy. When we were in Home Depot, he wanted to know if he could have a lock on the door. I think he's really looking forward to being able to change his underwear without having to worry who's on their way up the steps to use the bathroom (which is right next to his room and gives a great view all the way in).

Of course, I also feel really good right now, I think, because of the second trimester euphoria. All those books and predictors are so accurate that I sometimes feel like a case study. Pregnancy brain, check. Humungo boobs (that just keep growing!), check. Unreasonable happiness, check. I didn't think I was depressed during my first trimester, just a little emotional (double check!), but now I realize I must have been. Now I see the world in a totally different light and all the things that seemed impossible 6 weeks ago now seem imminently do-able. Like getting an MFA even though we're just about to have a baby and it would definily mean not being able to work full time. In fact, not working full time suddenly seems possible, too, even though my credit card bill takes up my ENTIRE monthly salary right now (of course, it the credit card I share with Larry, so it's like it takes half my salary - ok, no justification is going to work here, so I'll just stop). Anyway, eating well, budgeting, planning for a happy future - I think it might work out. Now, just add those to my refrigerator list ...

Swimming with Dolphins

Ok, I finally got a blog. Whoo hoo, about time. So what's with the dolphins? Reminds me of some lady on Clean House who won't give up her collection of glass marine figurines. But actually, it comes from a dream I had a few nights ago.

Actually, last night, I had - yes Larry - one of my usual, horrible dreams. I dreamed we barbequed our cats. God, don't even ask why, but I suddenly realized what was going on and I ran back to rescue them - they looked so peaceful curled up on the grill, like they were near a big, cozy fire - but it was too late. Some annoying man was eating Magic's tail and said it tasted like a cheese doodle. So I took a bite and then threw up.

That would be a typical dream, the kind that leaves me shaking with dread for the day when I wake up, the kind that brings me to a sea of wakefullness frought with half-solutions to impossible problems. This morning, I woke up kicking the covers and contemplating how to bring Larry's sister Nancy back into our lives. I keep thinking I can show up to her house with my big belly and tell her all about the little neice or nephew she should be expecting in March and she'll come back to us. But I know I won't go through with it and even if I did, she probably wouldn't come running back to the family fold.

But Sunday night, I dreamed I was working for the Philadelphia Inquirer as a lowly copyeditor. In real life, they're all about to go on strike and in my dream that lead to huge layoffs. I was somehow elevated to a full reporter and asked if I would take on the now vacant Paris beat, to go live there for a year just as soon as I felt comfortable travelling with my new baby. Larry, who loves Paris, was ecstatic and so I went for a short trial visit, to find an aprartment, meet colleagues, etc.

Except when I got there - this is a dream after all - Paris wasn't just beautiful buildings and romantic rivers, it was also like Tahiti, on a tropical beach and Sarah was out swimming with the dolphins. She was riding one and the others were swmming all around her and she wanted me to come out with her. I was walking toward the water and that's the last thing I remember, except this feeling of absolute freedom, of safety and and of soft, calming, crystalline beauty. It was the smell of turkey cooking for a holiday, of Larry's arms around me, of laughing so hard my belly hurts. And I woke up and carried that sense of hope throughout the day.