Thursday, February 23, 2012

Comes The Dawn


I was driving home after dropping Hadley off at school. It was 7:55 a.m., and I wasn't quite awake. I was certainly in no mood for a million questions when Cameron became curious.

"Mom, why is the sun setting?" she asked. 

"It's rising, not setting." I told her.

"Mom, why are the clouds gray?  Mom, we keep driving towards the sun - but how come we never catch it? Why is that cloud shaped like a boat? Or maybe it's a shark? How hot is the sun? Where does it go at night? Why is it orange? Mom, why are there sooo many colors? They're really pretty." 

Her questions were immediately tiring until it dawned on me (pun intended) that she was really really looking at and discovering the sunrise for the first time. She was mesmerized by it. 

Can you remember the very first time you really watched the sunrise?

I can't. 

But this sunrise - this sunrise -  I'll remember. I'll remember how she appreciated and wondered about the world around her, and I'll remember how she filled me with that same wonder. I'll remember how, for a brief second, she made me feel like I was seeing the sunrise for the very first time again.

I asked her if she wanted to look for a place to pull over and watch the sunrise.

"No," she replied. "I have to go poop."

Yeah, that's what I thought.

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

They Tried To Make Me Go To Rehab.....

If you grew up in Southern Indiana, you can probably remember being young and having your Dad (or perhaps your Mom?) give you a sip of their beer. I think the idea was that you would be so appalled by the taste that you'd never drink again. Or perhaps they just thought young children spitting out beer was funny? In any case....


Since that worked SO well for me, I decided to try it on my kids -  with soft drinks. Since I am a full-blown diet drink addict, I thought maybe I could keep them off the sauce by exposing and, in turn, turning them off the stuff early.


When Hadley was 5, Justin let her have a sip of his Diet Coke. She spit it out and hasn't asked for a soft drink since. She sticks to water. Yes. We are super good parents.


So, when Cameron asked to try Justin's Diet Coke recently, we let her give it a try. She tentatively sucked on the straw...then kept drinking and drinking and drinking. She stopped with a smile. She loved the stuff. Oh damn. Now what?


In the weeks that followed, Cameron asked daily for a Diet Coke to which our answer was always no. I felt kind of bad about it since we were the ones who turned her onto it in the first place....but hey, at least it wasn't beer.


McDonald's Diet Coke is caffeine-free so sometimes, as a treat, we'd let her have it.


We actually rarely buy Diet Coke, but because we were having some good 'ole Diet Coke drinkers over later this weekend, I bought some 2-liters and sat them on the counter. 


Little Amy Winehouse spotted the goods this morning and had a full-fledged melt-down because I refused to serve it to her for breakfast.


She left the kitchen - huddled herself in a quasi-fetal position and cried. Super good parents strike again. 




Shit. This kid was a full-blown addict.


Hadley said, "Mom, I think she just has cravings." Clearly. 


Hadley then promptly turned our toy room into a rehab facility for her sister. I suppose it was really only a matter of time. 




Yes. Super good parents. 

Thursday, February 9, 2012

Thank God for Corduroy

Last year my family celebrated my dad's birthday in the cardiac intensive care unit. After spending a week on a ventilator and a heart pump, he woke up on his 56th birthday. It was quite a celebration. 


This year, we decided to celebrate his birthday at the bowling alley because nothing celebrates being born and surviving 3 heart surgeries quite like wearing ugly rented shoes and drinking Bud Light. Yeah, in my family - that's how you do it. 


So last Saturday, everyone went to the lanes - including Jack. Du-Du-Dun...


Because Jack, at 16 months old, isn't quite ready to bowl, I spent my time at the lanes following Jack around as he explored the alley. He found chex mix to eat off the floor, ash trays to pull off tables, chairs to push around, and a vending machine (which he got his chubby little hand caught in).


Jack was having a real good time. I was having a few beers. Eventually those beers caught up with me and I had to pee --- badly.


Not wanting to interrupt anyone's game, I took Jack with me to the bathroom. Now, this is usually where things go wrong (Exhibit A), but I thought I could lock him in the stall with and let him play with my beer bottle. 


I hurried to the bathroom, locked the stall door, put the baby down and pulled down my pants to pee. Why had I held it so long? As I was about to go, Jack pushed the stall door open. Hadn't I locked it? I guess not, because Jack was sprinting out of the stall. 


Because my son has a history of playing in toilets, I lunged for him with my pants around my ankles to save him from playing in pee. Turns out, I then peed all over myself. Ugh...


I grabbed the little guy by the back of his shirt, pulled him into the stall and securely locked the door while I then used toilet paper to try to dab the pee off of my pants.


Now, lucky for me, I was wearing corduroys so it didn't really show. Who knew aside from being a favorite fabric of preschoolers, corduroy was also good for concealing urine stains....Hmmm, those preschoolers might be on to something there.


I returned to the party and nobody noticed or at least nobody said anything or perhaps, pissing yourself at the bowling alley is perfectly acceptable. 


Whatever the case may be, I suppose I brought this all on myself the day I made fun of this:




What's the weight limit on that thing? I'm done peeing on myself, and grabbing Jack out of the toilet. He's earned himself a bathroom time out - he'll now be dangling from the stall door so I can allow myself the same feeling of peace and calm that everyone has while using a public restroom.




Thursday, February 2, 2012

Saaaaaay Stirrups!

Yesterday I received a friendly phone call from my gynecologist's office reminding me about my appointment today. Like I could forget. 


It was like a dark cloud hanging over my week. I was well aware that on Thursday, I'd be hitting the stirrups. 


I was instructed to arrive ten minutes early as they were converting their files to a new electronic system, and I would need to fill out paperwork and have my picture taken.  Ok, wait - what? Picture?


I hoped they meant a picture of my face and not my vagina. Surely my doctor (who I think is fantastic) wasn't using file photos of his patients anatomy to identify them.....or maybe he was? Kind of like flashcards? 


Was a picture really all that necessary? What did they need a picture for? Who did they think they were - The Gynecological BMV? Were they going to hand me a license? A license to operate a vagina? After three kids, I'm pretty sure I'm vaginally legit.


However, seeing as that I really liked my doctor, I figured I would cooperate. 


Cooperation though proved to be difficult. As I got dressed, I realized I didn't know what to wear for my gynecologist file photo. This isn't the type of fashion situation that I've ever seen addressed in InStyle.


Would this be a full body shot? Shoulders up? It felt a little like school picture day. I changed my outfit three times. 


I felt like Goldilocks trying to get it jussssst right....only there wasn't any porridge or warm bed in my future - just a pap smear. 


Turns out the photo wasn't any big deal. It wasn't even like a real camera - it looked like a scanner, and the receptionist didn't even get out of her seat - she scanned me through her front Plexiglas window like a bar code.  Really? I didn't even get to say Cheese? Or Stirrups? Some photo shoot this turned out to be. Major Disappointment!


I might have taken a wrong turn somewhere in life. I must have made a wrong decision somewhere along the way, because somehow the decisions I have made have led me to being disappointed by the "photo shoot" at my gynecologist's office.


Oh well, at least I had that pap smear to cheer me up.