I've got sunshine on a cloudy day with my girl

When I was pregnant with Josie and found out she was a girl, I was worried that when she became a teenager, she was going to turn on me. 

The cliche´ of the teenage girl gremlin is so entrenched in the parental ethos. I know I was a little bit gremlin-ish when I was 14, though my mom says that it was more mood-swingy-ness than anything else. Being happy one minute and then crying the next. And it was short-lived. I'm not exaggerating when I say that I haven't really had a fight with my mom in almost 40 years.

As for my own daughter, all I ever wanted was for her to be sweet and smart and funny and happy. 

Holy shit, did I ever hit the jackpot. I keep waiting for the gremlin to appear, but she never has, and I'm getting the feeling that she never will.

I know I overuse the term "delightful" to describe her. Out of curiosity, I checked the thesaurus to see if there was something else that captured it. And the answer was, not really. 

She gets up for school in the morning without a fuss. She is sweet and agreeable in her demeanor - for her to get fussy with me is incredibly rare. She has a tendency to drape herself over me like a sloth. We'll be at the grocery store and she will put her arm around my shoulders and sort of hang there. She has cool taste in music and movies. She studies and gets good grades. She is truly, truly one of the funniest people I know. She surrounds herself with lovely friends. 

She is also beautiful, but to me that is the least interesting thing about her. 

She is extraordinarily sensitive and self-aware in her relationships with people. Last week she came into my room one night, crying and upset about a situation and needing advice. She felt that she was involved in something that wasn't good for her, but also didn't want to give it up. She talked about going back and forth between the two positions in her head and her gut. Her friends were telling her she was messing up and needed to take certain action, but she was at war with herself about what to do.

We talked and I told her that her friends needed to calm down. She wasn't messing up or putting herself in a bad situation. There was nothing about the situation that required any particular action at that point in time. If and when it got to that point, she could figure it out then, but right now, everything's fine. 

I can say with absolute certainly that I never had that level of emotional intelligence when I was her age.

She calmed down and I made her laugh. Then we watched the Barbie movie together.

This past Sunday, it was her 14th birthday. 

A while back, Greg and I had talked about going to Crested Butte for the weekend to do some mountain-biking and hang out at this festival that struck me as supremely silly. When he suggested it, I said, please tell me that we would be attending this ironically, because I am 100% certain that I will find it ridiculous. I took to calling it Woodland Fairy Burning Man. 

Anyway, the weekend coincided with Josie's birthday. Crested Butte is six hours away, and we wouldn't have returned until late afternoon. Josie had made plans to do something with her friends, and I asked her if she wanted me around or if she cared if I was gone that weekend. 

Initially she said it was fine. She said this repeatedly. 

But as the time approached, there was something that felt off to me. Maybe it was my own feelings of guilt. Maybe there was a vibe I was picking up. Maybe both. 

So last week I said, "I want you to be completely honest with me. Would it bother you if I went out of town and didn't make it back until 6 or 7 on your birthday? It will not upset me at all if the answer is 'yes.'"

She was quiet for a second and then said softly, "I want you to stay here. I only said that before because I didn't want you to feel bad."

"Then I will stay here and have a great day hanging out with you," I said. "I can't wait." 

And she gave me a big hug. 

On Sunday a few of her friends came over.  One of them made a piñata for her and filled it with candy. Josie is the absolute queen of trashy snacks - her favorite is Flaming Hot Funions, which should tell you everything you need to know.  So I bought lots of junk food. The girls jumped on the trampoline. They listened to Josie's vinyls (apparently nobody calls them "records" anymore). They gabbed about everything and nothing.

One of her friends stayed for the night. We had birthday cake and Chinese food and watched Some Like It Hot, one of Josie's favorites. She loves Marilyn Monroe movies.

It was a super fun night and I was thrilled that she wanted me to be a part of it. 

Happy birthday, my darling girl. You are one of the great blessings of my life.

Apple, meet tree. Tree, meet apple.

So last week I bought this new mountain bike and she's adorable and cool. I was all excited to ride her. She's mint green and built for a shorty like me and has less than 100 miles on her. Practically new. 

I'm calling her Minty, per my friend English's suggestion

We decided to go mountain biking on Sunday. Greg suggested a ride that he described as mellow and flow-y, and then sent me a link with a description. 

I immediately had a stomach ache. Mountain bike rides are rated similarly to ski runs - this one was rated a blue/black, or "intermediate/difficult." I found a YouTube video of it, and it looked terrifying to me. It still seems daunting, though after getting a ride in, it's definitely something I can aspire to and probably try later in the season. 

But not yet. I asked if we could start with something easier. 

I am a novice mountain biker. I have done it maybe 10 or 15 times in my life. I am a good athlete and always up for a challenge, but mountain biking can be scary and dangerous and it requires technical skill that I do not yet possess. 

This ride would be like a total beginner skiing down a blue/black run after a few days of lessons. No one would recommend it. 

So we decided on a local mountain that is definitely on the easy side. You climb up to the top of a mesa and then it's mostly flat and pretty easy. But it was still a little bit scary. 

We started fine but then headed up a part of the trail that was a bit rocky. I have ridden on rocks before but it had been awhile and I don't have muscle memory built up for this sport the way I do with skiing. I was too much in my head and I couldn't remember what I was supposed to do. Within the first 5 minutes, I fell twice. 

Which made me tense up and feel super anxious. 

Which made me grumpy and disagreeable. 

I caught up to Greg and said, "I think I'm going to sell this bike. I'm not enjoying this."

To be clear, I fully realize how idiotic and unreasonable I was being. 

Predictably, he said, "WHAT??" 

I grumped around and generally acted like a pill. 

I felt stupid and incompetent. I felt like once again, I was in a situation where Greg was an expert and I was a moron who couldn't do anything right. He's better than I am at just about everything.

After a while, we made it to the western edge of the mesa where you can get off the bike and climb up for some great views of the front range. I was still out of sorts and I could tell that Greg was (understandably) annoyed with me. 

But then when I got back on the bike, something clicked. My brain and my body remembered what to do. I started riding comfortably and realized how much fun it was. It was a beautiful day and everything was green and flowery from all the rain we've had. 

When we got back to the car, I said, "that was fun!"

He gave me a look. 

I acknowledged that I had been pissy and childish, and I apologized. 

We decided to head to a local biker roadhouse - like, a legit biker place where everyone wears leather vests with their club's logo on the back and lots of American flag patches - to have some lunch. On the way, I told him the story of when I taught Josie to ride her bike. How crazy and unreasonable she was. 

And then it hit me. 

I had just recreated the entire experience. 

Convincing myself that I couldn't do it? Check.

Getting on the bike and then lacking confidence and making mistakes as a result? ("I couldn't go - the rock was in my way") Check. 

Acting like a crazy asshole? ("Mama, this bike is broken! It doesn't work! This bike is stupid!").

Lamenting that I was a loser? ("I ride like a baby and everybody thinks I'm stupid")  

Figuring it out and exclaiming cheerily how great it was, thereby giving the people around me whiplash? ("Boy, I sure was complaining a lot, but now I'm doing really well") 

Check check check. 

I don't know why it had never occurred to me. My darling daughter, whom I had always thought of as taking after Jason, is just like me. 

Or I am just like her. 

Greg reminded me that it's a dangerous sport and that he respected the fact that I could do it at all. He reminded me that the hard part is what makes it great. It's something to be conquered. 

He's right, of course. 

I mean, I will still probably act like a crazy person sometimes. It would be boring if I didn't. 

On the way home, we stopped and got ice cream. 

As I told Josie all those years ago, ice cream makes everything better.

The kid is more than all right

Josie turned 13 in late September, and I'm a month late doing her birthday post. 

Birthday posts are hard now because my children are teenagers and their lives are theirs. I have all kinds of funny stories that I might tell my mom or a trusted friend, but I am very mindful of protecting their privacy. Which means that I am not going to tell their stories here, with very limited exceptions. 

In that spirit, here are some non-embarrassing examples of why my daughter is a truly lovely human, in addition to being utterly hilarious and fun. 

She does funny voices and cracks jokes and keeps everyone laughing.  She walks around the house dancing and twerking. She is either super cute in jeans and crop tops, or she goes to school looking like a homeless person, wearing oversize t-shirts and pajama pants. She sends texts that consist of strings of two or three word messages that eventually add up to a full sentence.

This had me rolling

The current thing is to talk like Jennifer Coolidge in Legally Blonde -"I'm taking the dog, dumbass." Her imitation is spot-on, and it's never not funny.

A few weeks ago she decided that she wanted to paint her room a different color. She got some new bedroom furniture for her birthday, courtesy of her extraordinarily loving and generous grandparents, and wanted a new look that was more mature than what she had.

So we walked up the block to the Ace Hardware and studied the paint options. She had a very clear idea of what she wanted, and decided on a pale beige-y grey that has very subtle hints of pink. I tend to gravitate towards bright, bold colors so it felt weird to go with something so muted, but it's her room and she gets to choose, and it looks really great. 

I was telling Greg about this and he was amazed. Not about the color, but about the fact that it took us 20 minutes to pick it out and Josie had no doubts that it was the right one. 

Almost a year ago, he fixed a squeaky stair, which led to a decision to replace the carpet. After months of deciding on a carpet, he had it installed and immediately declared that he hated it. The color (beige) didn't go with the walls (also beige). 

That led to a decision to repaint the walls, and then months of trying to pick out a shade of beige that wouldn't clash with the beige of the carpet (my suggestions to maybe try something other than beige were met with derision). Paint samples were purchased and tested on various walls. "My house looks like a leopard," he said.

Again, making a final decision took months. Thank goodness he likes the way it looks, because at this point if he didn't, my advice would have been to burn the house down.

"So you just went to the store and picked out a color and Josie's happy with it??" he asked.

"Yep."

"And that's it?"

"That's it."

Mind blown.

Anyway. 

Josie and I went home and got out the painting stuff and got to work. I showed her how to use the roller and how to paint edges by placing the paint on a certain part of the brush and holding it in a certain way. It was fun to work on a task together. 

"Why don't we put on some music," I suggested.

She put on the Grateful Dead. 

I looked at her, bemused. 

You have to understand that this is a child who thinks that nine-minute jam band songs are an abomination. She's thirteen. She's supposed to be surly, especially about my generation's musical choices. I'll be listening to Dead & Company in the car and she'll exclaim, "how can you possibly listen to a song that's this long??"

So it was a surprising choice.

She shrugged. "I know you like it, Mom, and I appreciate you helping me. I love you."

She is the sweetest girl. 

She is sweet to everyone.

Yesterday afternoon I picked her up from school and we were talking on the way home. She was telling me about a student in her class who has autism. She understands that autism is a social/communication disorder that makes it difficult for people on the spectrum to understand social cues or how their behavior might be interpreted by others. So he's a little bit awkward, but he's a nice kid and she is friends with him.

"Mom, there are kids who bully him and talk about how he's annoying. They say shitty things and the teachers know about it and don't care. It makes me so angry."

"That's awful. I hate hearing stuff like that."

"I try to stand up for him and tell people to knock it off. But they don't."

"How does he react?"

"He tells me not to worry about it. He says he's used to it and that I don't need to advocate for him because he needs to advocate for himself."

"Ugh, that's heartbreaking."

"I know. I tell the others that it's not ok. IT'S NOT OK! He can't help the way he is. And he's a really nice guy. It's so wrong."

"It's definitely not OK. I'm proud of you for sticking up for him."

The kids in Josie's class definitely need Jesus.

She is a good person. She is decent and kind and principled. She is not afraid to speak up when others are being unfair or unjust or mean.

I'm so proud of her. I have so much respect for her. She always, always keeps me laughing.

I'm lucky to be her mom. 

How to soothe a preteen girl

It's threatening to show itself...

My sweet daughter has had a rough year. She's been dealing with some really heavy shit that has been extraordinarily stressful and anxiety-producing. She has also been forced to talk about it with people other than me, which she absolutely hates. This is a girl who is extremely private and it has been excruciating for her. 

It has also affected school for her. It piled on. So school has been a trigger as well. 

Last week she became free from that process. We are also rapidly approaching the end of the school year. 

For some, this might have brought on a sense of relief. A feeling that you can finally relax and exhale.

For Josie, it has not been that. Instead, all of the tension and anxiety and trauma that she has been holding in for a year have come flooding out. Tears and feelings of despondency. It has been heartbreaking to watch.

Last night she seemed to be doing ok and then when I mentioned going to school, she broke down. The thought of going to school today overwhelmed her. We lay down on my bed and wrapped my arms around her while she cried.

"All of my friends are coming up to me and trying to comfort me, which is nice. But they keep trying to get me to talk about it, and I don't want to."

"Then you don't have to. Just say, 'I appreciate that you've been thinking about me, but I really don't want to talk about it.' That's all. There's nothing else to say. Nobody can make you talk."

She nodded but was still crying on my shoulder. I hugged her and let her cry.

"What can I do for you, honey? How can I help you feel better?"

She shrugged. 

Then the cat jumped on the bed and went into a downward dog position (downward cat?), with his paws stretched in front of him and his ass up in the air. It made me chuckle.

"Shall we ask Scooby if he would show us his butthole?" I asked. "Would that make you feel better?"

She started to laugh a little bit.

"Maybe if we ask really nicely."

She giggled some more. 

"I think we should ask him. I bet he'd be willing. You could use it. Buttholes are always funny," I continued. "I think they should be identified as a treatment for depression."

"Take two cat buttholes and call me in the morning," she said.

"Absolutely."

She started laughing really hard. 

"See? It's working already!"

"They should put it in the medical books."

"Here's what we're going to do," I said. "I'm going to take a bunch of pictures of Scooby's butthole. And then at random times during the day tomorrow, I'm going to text one to you. And it will keep you from feeling too down."

We continued that way for a while, laughing and joking around. She calmed down and smiled and went to bed. 

When I woke up this morning, the cat was walking around. I managed to take a few pictures of his butt even though he wouldn't sit still. 

I dropped Josie at school this morning and said, "be ready. They're coming."

She laughed and said, "bye mumsie. I love you."

"I love you too. And so does Scooby's butt."

And all was right with her world, at least for a little while. 

Go shorty, it's your birthday

 My dearest darling Josephine,

This morning I woke up and found that you had crawled into bed with me during the night. I snuggled up close to you and brushed your hair away from your face and started to sing, "happy birthday to youuu..."

Without opening your eyes, you smiled and put your hand on my cheek. 

"Happy birthday, twelve-year-old girl! Do you want to hear the story of the day your were born?"

You nodded, so I told you about getting to the hospital super early and how lovely and peaceful your birth was. Then we got up and picked up Starbucks for the car pool group and drove to school with the other girls, playing birthday songs (everything from the Beatles to 50 Cent) and gossiping about teachers in your school. 

Today is a good day. 

This year has been hit or miss. 

Being 11 was not easy for you. COVID school sucked so much - you were miserable. You felt stupid and overwhelmed and like you couldn't focus on anything. 

Plus ... you were 11. Being an eleven-year-old girl is awful. Your body is changing, your hormones are flooding, you're going through developmental changes that basically render you clinically insane. 

Let's just say that your hair-trigger temper was even more hair-trigger-y than normal. 

But you're still my sweet, funny girl. It's like living with an improv comedian who is always on stage. Crazy voices, sassiness, riffing different scenarios. You always make me laugh.

This school year is off to a much better start. You have good friends, you like your classes, and you're getting good grades. You're much happier.

You've become very interested in fashion and in what you wear. You and your grandmother recently had a virtual shopping trip together and you picked out a bunch of new pieces. Mimi was concerned about the quality and fit of some of the things, but you made good choices. 

You're so cute. 

But note the shoes. Which are mine. Which I did not give you permission to take. 

This is a thing you do and it drives me absolutely insane. I will walk into your room, which is never not a disgusting mess, and see my black suede high heeled boots. 

"Why do you have my boots?"

"They're stripper boots. They're awesome. I like wearing them."

"They're not stripper boots. The heels aren't even that high. And they don't have lucite platforms."

You take my shoes, my shirts, my photographs, my sweatshirts, my makeup. It drives me insane. 

As you know, there are two things that truly send me into orbit. The first is when people grab things out of my hands. The other is when I put something away in the same place every time, but can't find it because some little turkey - i.e., you - has taken it without asking.  

But this is a teenage mother-daughter thing I will have to deal with, and I will. We have may battles and many joys yet to come. 

I can't wait. 

I love you to the moon and back.

Love love love,

Mom

Mean mommy

"Mom, me and Zeke are switching rooms."

I had just walked home from being out for a couple of hours to meet a friend for a drink. The margaritas were making my brain slightly fuzzy.

"What? What are you talking about?"

"Zeke is going to take my room and I'm going to take Zeke's room."

"Wait ... what? Why?"

Zeke saw me and yelled down from upstairs, "hey Mom! Do you have an allen wrench? I need it to take Josie's bed apart."

"What? I don't know. Maybe. I don't know where it would be."

"OK, I'll call dad."

Minutes later: "Dad's got one! I'm going to bike over there."

It was 9:30 at night.

"What? No! It's 9:30 at night, you don't have a light on your bike, and I don't want you riding up Josephine and York streets in the dark."

"But I need it to take Josie's bed apart!"

Josie has an IKEA bunk bed that I can take apart and put back together easily. I am the queen of assembling IKEA furniture - I find it very zen and satisfying. But the bed takes awhile, and if you're 12 years old and impatient and don't know what you're doing and don't have the directions (they were thrown away years ago), you'll make a big fat mess and end up crying. Crying 12-year-olds are annoying as fuck.

"It's 9:30 at night!! You're not taking Josie's bed apart! It's complicated and it takes a long time to do it right, and you'll mess it up and then I'll have to fix it, and I don't feel like it fixing it. I'm tired. It's bedtime. You have camp tomorrow. You need to get ready for bed."

"But we want to switch rooms," they whined.

"I don't care. You're not doing it tonight. You can do it tomorrow. And I'm not helping."

This went back and forth for a while, ending with Zeke saying, "god, mom, why are you so mean???"

I'm mean. I'm so, so mean.

I'm mean when I make them clean their messes up before I turn on the WiFi.

I'm mean when I make them go to bed before midnight.

I'm mean when I don't let them eat upstairs because it's gross and eventually I end up rummaging through the kitchen going, "where the hell are all my bowls???"

I'm mean when I'm on a video conference for work and Zeke starts bellowing at me about something and I'm like, "I'M WORKING!! BE QUIET! I'LL HELP YOU WHEN I'M DONE!!"

 I'm mean when I get irritated that it takes me half an hour to get them out of bed to go to camp.

Thank the little baby Jesus for camp.

Colorado is actually doing pretty well with COVID. Our numbers are declining. Our governor is making data-driven decisions and slowly opening things up while still maintaining certain restrictions and precautions. The one thing I vehemently disagreed with him on was his approach to summer camp.

My kids were registered for two weeks of overnight camp, which they love because it's fun, and while I love because they're gone and I can get some peace and quiet. The gov had delayed making an announcement until late May, but the word was positive. And my assumption was that as between overnight camps and day camps. day camps have exponentially more opportunities for transmission, whereas with overnight camp, you check in, you get your health screening, and then you're captive for 14 days.

But then the overnight camps closed and the day camps opened, so day camp it was.

It's hard for them. Nothing is back to normal - the neighborhood pool is closed, the rec center a few blocks away is closed, most of their friends aren't allowed to play with anyone else. They're restless and antsy and bored.

But it's hard for me too. Zeke has been living here full time, but Josie had continued to go back and forth between my house and her dad's house. And then about a month ago, she started staying at my house longer and longer.

"Don't you want to go see daddy?" I keep asking.

She shrugs and says, "sure, but not tonight."

I think a big part of it is that they like being together. They will fight and bicker, but they really do love each other and take care of each other.

But I need a break, so I told them that I need every other weekend to myself. Two days out of every fourteen. Zeke suggested that I got plenty of alone time when they're at camp - i.e., WHEN I'M WORKING. I expressed outrage at that suggestion. They were thinking I was mean but they were smart enough not to say it. So I'm getting my weekend in three days.

Last night their dad brought over the allen wrench and they got to work. Zeke tried to take Josie's bed apart and got a little turned around about exactly which pieces needed to come apart in order to move the bed, and which could stay intact, So of course I helped. We took the bed apart and moved it and put it back together. We figured out how to move Josie's enormous dresser (but not before they accused me of being mean when they insisted on trying to do it in a way that was never going to work and I said, "it's not going to work that way").

Zeke said, "isn't this fun, mom? We're bonding!"

I went back to my room and got into bed. The kids were excited about their new rooms.

Ten minutes later Josie poked her head around the door. "Can I sleep with you?"

She crawled in, threw an arm around me, and went to sleep.

We're gonna break out the hats and hooters when Josie comes home

My wonderful, colorful, hilarious, delightful Josephine,

Today you are 10 years old. I'm excited to be writing this birthday post for you because I know you are going to read it. The other day I was writing a blog post and you were sitting with me on my bed. You asked me what I liked to write about, and I told you that writing annual birthday letters to you and Zeke is up there on my list of favorites. I showed you some posts that I had written to you and you were utterly tickled by them. So I will show you this one.

I thought it would be fun to post a picture from each year of your life, so here they are:

Fresh out of the box



One year

 

Two - at the science museum

 

Three - awesome hair and face paint



Four - looking fancy at the museum

Five - school picture

Six - of COURSE you are wearing an eye patch to go to camp

Seven - newly pierced ears

Eight - boat ride along the Cinque Terre

Nine - hanging out with me at the mall

Just about ten - first day of fifth grade

So, double digits. Ten years. It's hard to fathom. People say, it all goes so fast, blink and you miss it, and tropes to that effect. But I don't always find that to be true. Ten years is a long time. Giving birth to you was a long time ago. Thinking about you as a baby or a toddler does not feel like thinking about yesterday.

As always, the past year has brought on changes and challenges. A year ago, when you were with your dad, you were living with him and Zeke in a house in Lowry. Today, he is remarried and you live with a new stepmother and four new stepbrothers.

You are not thrilled by this. When you were told that within three weeks your dad would be getting married and you would be moving into a new house with five additional people, you said, "Ugh. I don't even get a sister out of it!"

But you deal, because that is what you do. You deal.

Even as you get older and (somewhat) more mature, though, there are certain things you cling to. You still suck your fingers when you're tired. You don't like being away from me - when we're home, it distresses you if I go into a different room. You still sleep with me when you're with me.

I feel like I should mind this. Like I should insist that you're old enough to sleep alone, in your own bed. But I don't. You and your brother have had a lot of turbulence in your lives since the divorce. Your living situation with your dad has been in a constant state of flux for the past 5 years - different houses, different women, and now four additional children.

My house, on the other hand, has stayed the same. It's comfortable. It's relatively quiet. It feels like home. I know that to you and to Zeke, I feel like home. You tell me all the time how much you love me and how much you trust me. So if cuddling up with me at night gives you a sense of peace, that's fine with me. Getting whacked in the face in the middle of the night when you stretch out your arms is a small price to pay.

Something that has really blossomed this year is your insane sense of humor. You're constantly putting on voices and characters, and providing hilariously random commentary on everything you see. You'll do things like starting calling your grandfather "The Elegant Elderly" and saying, "hello, my good man" in a funny voice when you talk to him on the phone.

You've turned into a reader. You constantly carry books around with you. I finally gave you one of my old kindles so that you wouldn't have to lug around anything too heavy. I love lying in bed with you while we both read.

You like cool music. You change your hair color every other month. Your fashion choices are on the bold side. You walk around the house singing and dancing.

You make me smile and you make me proud.

You are with your dad this week, so I stopped at your school before the bell rang so that I could give you a hug and say happy birthday and tell you about the day you were born. You greeted me with love and joy. I hate not being with you on your birthday, but we will celebrate this weekend when Mimi and Papa are visiting. I can't wait to paint pottery with you, to make a cake with you, to snuggle with you.

I feel extraordinarily lucky to be your mother and to guide you through your childhood.

All the love in my heart,

Mom

Hannukah music

I've written before about my love of bluegrass and how, at the age of 27, my particular love of the banjo spurred me to ask for one when my mother asked me what I wanted for Hannukah.

At first, I played all the time. I was young and single and childless and had endless time to hang out with my musician friends, singing and playing and drinking bourbon. Then I got married and had children and didn't live in places where my circle of friends all played the guitar or the fiddle or the upright bass or the mandolin.

That's still where I am. I pick up the banjo from time to time. My kids ask me to play songs for them. But my friends are almost all married with kids, and my limited social life does not involve picking parties full of song and bourbon and bonfires. And banjo isn’t really a solo instrument.

I love music, though. I always have it playing, often I'm singing along, often my kids are often singing along. It turns out Zeke has a beautiful voice. He's in choir and was selected to be in the all-city choir group and is going to audition for the Denver School of the Arts. I don't know if he'll get in, or even if it's a good fit for him, but it's cool that it's an option.

It also turns out that he's taken to playing the piano. His after-school babysitter has a piano in the house and she encourages the kids to bang away at it. Zeke has learned/taught himself a bunch of songs, and is always fiddling. Let's just say that while we were at my parents' house for Thanksgiving - they have a piano - we heard a LOT of "Heart and Soul."

We didn't mind too much. It's catchy.

Hannukah is early this year. When we got back from Thanksgiving, it was upon us. Like my mother did for me 21 years ago, I asked Zeke what he wanted for Hannukah. Like I did 21 years ago, he responded that he wanted a musical instrument - a piano.

I looked on Craiglist. Turns out you can get a rehearsal piano for practically no money. And I would have happily bought one, except that I don't know where I would put it. We could put it in Zeke's room, which is huge, but that would entail getting up the stairs. No thanks.

But there were also a gajillion electric keyboards for sale. Some people the next neighborhood were getting rid of theirs. It's in perfect shape. It has a ton of different settings. It came with the stand and a seat. I got some cash out of the machine and Zeke and I went and got it.

It's in his room and he loves it. And best of all, it has a volume button.

When Josie came back to me after being with her dad, I asked her the same question. "What do you want for Hannukah, JoJi?"

She thought about it and said, "a guitar."

So today we went to Guitar Center and got her a guitar that's the right size for her. My parents gave her a set of lessons that will start after the new year. She has a case that allows her to carry the guitar on her back. I got her a book to get her started, and I'm teaching her the basic chords.

It's made me want to pick up my banjo again. We can have a family band and go on the road.

I'd need to learn "Heart and Soul" on the banjo.

Happy Hannukah, everyone. May your lives be full of music.

Joy to the world

Josephine, my sweet love. My delightfully funny, beautiful darling girl.

Today you are nine years old.

You are with your dad this week, so I went to school this morning to find you and wish you a happy birthday. I was already having a frazzled morning and I wandered around school, not able to find you. I was about to leave when I got a message from your dad that you had come to school late. So I got out of the car and went back in and had to wander around some more because you had left your classroom with a math group you're in.

Something about all the wandering around, not able to find you, made me feel weepy. I wanted to say to everyone I encountered, "where is she?? I just want to wish her a happy birthday, dammit!"

So when I finally found you, I did weep a little bit. I wrapped you up my arms and hugged you and kissed you.

You shouldn't have been that hard to find. Your short, blue-green hair stands out.

We did your hair two weekends ago. You really really really wanted blue hair. I had no problem with blue hair, but I really really really didn't want to spend hundreds of dollars, and many hours in a hair salon, in order to achieve it.

So I did it myself.

The bleaching part was easy, though there were gaps in my application. So when we rinsed and dried it, there was a little bit of a tiger stripe-y effect. Which was kind of cool, honestly.

Then we applied the blue dye. After 45 minutes, we rinsed it out. I realized that when you're paying all that money at the salon, what you're really paying for is access to a salon sink, in which you can tilt your head back and rinse the dye directly down the drain, rather than having to kneel in the shower as blue runs over your hands and your body and gets on everything.

But it was worth it. It looked super-cool.

You're super cool.

You're in fourth grade now. You have tons of friends. Everybody loves you and thinks you're delightful.  You're funny and goofy and strong.  You keep getting taller and taller.

Your brother is having a rougher time right now - he frequently feels like you're the favored child. And he's probably right, for some people. It's not fair, but it's true. You're easier than he is, at least for the time being.

The two of you bicker and get on each other's nerves, as siblings do. But when you were at your dad's this weekend and Zeke was with me, I had a feeling you would miss him. I wasn't surprised when you texted last night asking to talk to him.

You are a kind soul. You still say, "AAWWWWW!!!!" every time you see a dog anywhere, anytime. You're sweet to your friends.  You're funny as hell.

Even though you now have your own room with two beds, you still always sleep with me. "I don't like being away from you," is your rationale. And it's OK. I don't mind. I love waking up with you. You put your hand on my face and say, "I love you."

I love you, too.

There was something about your new hair color that was reminding me of something, but I couldn't quite put my finger on it. Then the other day, in an "ah-ha" moment, I realized what it was - the character of Joy, from the movie Inside Out. With her optimism and cheerfulness and zany side.



 You are Joy. You are joy.

I love you to the moon and back.

Love,

Mom

Will you be my bodyguard? I'll pay you 50 cents every day.

As you all know, Josie has always been full of sass. She lives her life as if she's on stage, hamming it up for any audience, real or imagined. She's fearless and protective of her friends, unafraid to speak her mind or take on confrontation. .

Before, she didn't have much to back it up. She's tall and insanely skinny but not particularly threatening. You wouldn't look at her and worry about meeting her in a dark alley.

But now, she has the skills. The skillz. She's really good at taekwondo, which she has been taking since the beginning of the school year. Her forms are perfect and her kicks are beautiful, high and precise. She can spar and scrap.

Sometimes these factors - the protectiveness and the fearlessness, plus the skillz - coalesce in ways that are not so positive, at least as far as school is concerned.

Josie has a group of friends she hangs out with. Many of them are African-American. And one day, a bunch of boys from another grade were harassing Josie and her friends, calling them names and using racial slurs.

I got a call from the principal later that day. I sighed, bracing myself for the news. My kids don't get in trouble that much, but enough that I feel like a day without a call from the school is a good day.

Turns out, Josie was not a fan, at all, of her friends being called nasty names. She and her friends told the boys to stop, but they didn't stop. So Josie decided to take matters into her own hands.

Or more precisely, her feet. Because when one of the boys wouldn't stop with the name calling, Josie hauled off and clocked him in the side of the head with a perfectly placed roundhouse. And then maybe a few well-placed punches.

This is a no-no at school. And a no-no under the tenets of taekwondo - it's only to be used for defensive purposes.

I was proud of her for sticking up for her friends, but I knew she needed to be punished - you can't just go around beating people up.

The thing I had a problem with was the punishment itself. Rather than suspend her or make her participate in some restorative justice efforts, she was barred from recess, couldn't go to "specials" - art, gym, that sort of thing - had to eat her lunch in the office, and couldn't hang out on the playground after school. So basically, if she wasn't in class, she was spending the day in the office.

FOR THE REST OF THE SCHOOL YEAR.

I call bullshit.

This happened in late February. By the time spring break was rolling around in late March, she was a basket case. She cried before school, she cried after school, she missed her friends, she couldn't play, she got no exercise during the day.

One of her good friends - the same one who asked me if I was ever going to get married again - said to me, "Wendy, I think Josie really needs some therapy."

I set up a meeting with the principal, basically to say, enough is enough. She's learned her lesson. And the punishment is destroying her.

To her credit, the principal agreed. She and Josie drew up a behavior contract together, decided on rewards and consequences, and Josie got her privileges back.

"Ok, Jos. Remember, you can't use your taekwondo to beat people up. I know your friends were getting picked on, and it's always important to stand up to bullies and to stick up for your friends. But no matter how justified, kicking a kid in the head at school is never going to end well."

"OK, Mom."

Fast forward a week or so. Zeke is having his first experience playing organized youth soccer. For the past five years, he's only played flag football, but all of a sudden he's crazy for futbol. He watches Cristiano Ronaldo videos and teaches himself dribbling skills. He's really good.

"Where'd you learn how to do that?" I ask.

"Self-taught. YouTube," he replies.

So I signed him up to play soccer with the Colorado Rapids youth league. He was so, so excited.

His coach was a complete dick. He didn't teach them anything about the game. He didn't teach them about strategy or how to move on the field, how to play their positions, stuff like that. And he spent the practices yelling at the kids in a nasty way.

At the first game, the coach told Zeke to play defense. Zeke went and stood where he was told. And he tried to play the ball, but he didn't really know what he was doing, and he made mistakes.

The coach's response was to scream at him, and say that he was a terrible player, the worst kid on the team, he should never be allowed back on a soccer field. The other kids were yelled at too, but Zeke was standing the closest to the coach, so he bore the brunt of it.

Yeah. I know. I wanted to throttle the guy, too.

 So, Zeke is standing on the field crying and being berated. The coach then pulls him from the game and continues to yell at him while Zeke sits on the ground with his head in his hands, sobbing.

Jason and I watched this unfold, horrified. We both had tears in our eyes.

I said, "this is awful. I can't stand to see him treated this way."

Jason said, "me either. I'm going to go get him. We're done."

So we went and got Zeke. Jason had a few choice words for the coach. We left, and told Zeke he never had to play for that team again.

Josie, as it turns out, had a few choice words for the coach as well. Zeke was riding with me, so we had already gone towards my car. Jason was driving with Josie, and they had to pass the coach again on the way to his van.

Josie went up to the guy and said, "you can't treat my brother that way! My brother Zeke is the best brother in the world and if you're mean to him I'm going to use my front snap kick [she actually used the Korean name for it, but I don't remember what it is] and kick you right in the nuts!"

So.

Maybe she still needs to internalize the lessons of her past a bit more.

But still. In a fight for justice, physical or otherwise, I want her on my side.

I see who I want to be, in my daughter's eyes

My dearest Josephine,

This past Thursday, when I was driving you and Zeke to school, we were getting close to the carpool drop-off lane and I saw a dad and his son heading toward the school. The kid was wearing a tie and my heart immediately sank.

"Guys, is it picture day today?"

Zeke said, "yes."

You, with your purple-y mauve-y hair, clean but frizzy and sticking up from having taken a bath and then gone to bed with a wet head, started to cry. You were wearing leggings and a t-shirt. You looked fine, but it wasn't one of your more glamorous days.

"I don't look nice for picture day," you wailed. " I don't look pretty."

"Honey, you do look pretty. Your pictures will come out fine. Don't worry."

"No, I don't. I look ugly. My pictures will be terrible."

I dropped you and Zeke off and then parked the car. I needed to go up to the front office get the forms to fill out so that you could get pictures taken at all.

As I walked through the playground, I saw you with your arms around one of your friends as you sobbed with your head on her shoulder. A gaggle of little girls surrounded you, all rubbing your back.

"It's OK, Josie. It'll be OK."

It was utterly pitiful.

When you saw me there, you came and buried your face in my belly as you cried and cried.

"I can't go to school. I don't look pretty."

You were inconsolable.

"Don't worry, sweetie. It's going to be ok. I'll fix everything. I'll go home and bring you a pretty dress and something to fix your hair. I promise you'll look pretty. I'll take care of it."

I walked you up to your classroom when the bell rang. As I went to leave, I saw Zeke in the hall.

"Is JoJo ok?" he asked.

"She'll be fine. I'm going to go home and get her something to change into."

"Can you bring me a nicer shirt?" he asked. He was wearing a plain blue t-shirt.

"Sure. I'll bring something with a collar."

He smiled at me and went back to his class.

Two hours later, after I had delivered to Zeke his Polo shirt, I stood with your class as it lined up for pictures. I pulled you into the girls' bathroom and helped you change into a dark pink polka dot dress. Back out in the hall, in line with your class again, I gave you one of my old necklaces to wear, brushed your hair, smoothed it down with a de-frizzer, and clipped it back with a big flower barrette.

I felt like a stylist at a photo shoot.

It did the trick. You looked beautiful and polished and photo-ready. You and your friends giggled and held hands.  You were happy again, which was what really mattered to me. Looking pretty was important to you, so I didn't hesitate to make you feel that way.

I thought about that today, your eighth birthday, when I was thinking about writing your birthday post.  That incident, and its juxtaposition with your birthday party today, in which you fearlessly climbed walls while dressed in a Wonder Woman costume, encapsulated what you are right now.

Thursday you were all uncertainty and nervousness, worried about not looking pretty. Today you were all fierceness and confidence. Two sides of yourself, often at war. Sometimes you need me to boost you up, to convince you that your confidence is warranted. Other times you flex your muscles and acknowledge me from afar with a sly wave, as if you know that I'll be there, but you don't need me right at that exact moment.

I try to gauge where you are and adjust my behavior accordingly. I push you to have strength and independence, but will be there if you need to fold yourself into my lap.

I cheer you on when you're riding your scooter with the stoners at the skate park.

I wrestle and do gymnastics with you while we wait for Zeke to finish his football practice. I encourage your means of self-expression, be it pink or purple hair, leather skirts and motorcycle boots and crushed velvet baseball caps.

I feel a great responsibility to let you figure out who you are while making sure you know that I'm here to help you if you need me or want me. It's a beautiful dance that we do.

And you make me so proud. You're so funny. You're such a kind friend. You're so clever. You're so brave. You're such a sassy monkey. You're such a weirdo.

Being your mother thrills me. I absolutely adore you.

Happy birthday, my love. Spread your wings and fly. Be bold. Know that I'm here to catch you if you fall.

All of the love in my heart,

Mama

The summer of love

The sun was shining and the air felt pleasantly warm, but not too hot, as I walked across the street and into the YMCA to pick up the kids. It's already mid-June, but there's always a feeling of "already?" when summer weather finally hits. Invariably, there's a snow storm in mid May (as there was this year), and then the lingering chilliness of spring that lasts right up until the time that it's 60 degrees and cloudy one day and 90 degrees and sunny the next, and then it's summer.

Last Friday was the last day of school, and this past Monday was the first day of camp. The kids were excited. They like school, but they were ready for a break from the grind, particularly Zeke. Summer is when they get to go to YMCA camp, where they hang out with friends and have a different fun field trip every single day - "and we get to do lanyards, Mama!!" They get to ride their bikes around the neighborhood and hang out at the pool, which is three blocks from my house and one block from their dad's. They get to go on vacation - the Outer Banks with me, and then somewhere else with dad. We go hiking and camping in the mountains. I take them to a Cirque du Soleil show.  On super hot days, we might seek refuge in the air conditioning of the the art museum or the science museum or the movies.

Done with school and ready for summer.

And even though my life doesn't change that much during the summer - I still go to work, I still have the kids according to the same schedule - the kids' sense of happiness and relaxation makes me more happy and relaxed, and nowhere is that more evident than in our morning routine.

Here's what most mornings are like during the school year:

I get out of bed at 6 to exercise. I shower. I try to wake up the kids.

"Good morning, kiddies. Time to get up."

"Mamaaaa..." Zeke will groan.

"Come on honey, it's time to get up. You too, Josie."

"No. I'm tired." She burrows under her blankets and sticks a pillow on top of her head.

"I know, sweetie, but it's time to get up. Come on, I'll get you some clothes to put on."

I go pick clothes out for them.

"Come on, guys. Let's go." My voice is not quite as sweet as it was before.

They flop around in bed, moaning about being tired.

I tell them to get up and get dressed, and then I go to brush my teeth.  When I come back, no one has stirred.

"Guys!! Let's go. It's time to get up!"

I get dressed, go downstairs to make myself some coffee, assemble lunch for Zeke (Josie likes to buy it at school), find socks and shoes and books and jackets.

I look at the clock and realize we need to leave the house in 20 minutes if they're going to be on time for school.  I run upstairs. They're still in bed.

"CHILDREN! YOU NEED TO GET OUT OF BED! IT'S TIME TO GET UP!"

"You're so mean!" they respond. But they finally get up.

The next 20 minutes is a flurry of me making breakfast, drinking coffee, putting on my makeup, finding my car keys, "shoes! where are your shoes??" "where's your backpack?" "do you have your Thursday folder?" "the bell is going to ring in 8 minutes, WE HAVE TO GO!!!"

They bicker and dawdle. As we're leaving the house, someone decides to race upstairs to find three things they need to put in their backpacks. Without fail, they are things that do not need to be taken to school.

We finally get in the car and I drop them off with no time to spare, feeling frazzled and tense. Every day, no matter how early I get up, no matter how early they go to bed the night before, no matter how organized I think I am, it's down to the wire every. single. day.

In contrast, this is what it's like in the summer:

I get up at 6 to exercise. Then I shower. By the time I'm out of the shower, they're up, bustling around happily.

"Hi, kidlets! I washed your camp shirts and they're downstairs. Don't forget to brush your teeth."

"OK, Mama!" they chirp.

They get dressed without incident, they eat their breakfast without incident, there's no bickering.

"What are you guys doing today at camp?"

"We're going to Garden of the Gods to go hiking. Yesterday we got to go to the Celestial Seasonings factory in Boulder. It was awesome!"

"Oh yeah? what was it like? what did you see?"

"We got to taste different kind of herbal teas. And we got to go in this room where they process peppermint leaves - it smells so strong that my eyes watered."

"Cool!"

We walk out the door and head to the bus stop. We leave early because the kids like to get to camp with enough time to play before the day officially starts.

"Love you, Mama!" Zeke says.

"I love you too, babe."

"Mama, did you know that herbal teas aren't actually tea?"

"I did know that. They have different kinds of plants and flowers in them."

"Yeah, tea is actually a plant that grows!"

We get on the bus. Sometimes we chat, sometimes the kids strike up conversation with other riders, sometimes they read books, sometimes they play on my phone. We get off at my stop downtown, I walk them to the YMCA, bid them good-bye as they ignore me and race off to see their friends, and then walk across the street to my office.

Everyone is happy and relaxed.

Josie chills out on the sidewalk and plays with her fidget spinner as we wait for the bus.

Yesterday was the first day I had the kids since camp started. I picked them up and they were playing cards and making lanyards with their friends. They were happy and a little tired. We rode the bus home and they told me about their day. We went to the Greek diner on the next block for dinner. No one fought or bickered. Everyone was cheerful. Lovely manners were used at every turn.

Back at home, we watched a little TV (they're obsessed with World Wide Dance), read books for awhile, and went to bed early.

They were content so I was content. There's a sense of calm and peace in the house. I didn't feel as anxious.

When I'm with my children, they center me. They make me laugh and smile.

I'm working the knots, just a little bit.

Who run the world? Girls. Who run this mother? Girls.

My darling, sweet, crazy Josephine,

My Josie, Josie-jo, JoJo, JoJo-Bean. Little Monkey. Sweet Pea.

Guuuurl.

Today you are seven years old.  It's crazy to think that it's been seven years since I checked myself into St. Joe's at the crack of dawn so that I could meet you a few hours later. Happy birthday to you. Happy birth day to me.

It's been amazing fun hanging out with you and watching you grow. Last year when I was writing your birthday post, you were just starting first grade and it was a little daunting for you. Though you like to ham it up and act like the life of the party, I could tell that being the youngest kid in the class at a time when so much of learning is developmental was hard. Other kids were getting comfortable with reading and you had fallen a little bit behind and sometimes it made you feel stupid.

Reading is one of those things that kids get when they get. One day it just clicks. I knew it would click for you eventually and that you'd be fine.  But seeing you struggle in the meantime was hard.

Of course, it did click for you and then you were off and running, getting a reading award for your class by the end of the year.  It was another opportunity to watch you go from "I'm stupid and I can't do anything" to "Mama, look how great I am" in the blink of an eye.

You continue to be this warm, friendly, outgoing social butterfly. On the first day of school, after being all anxious about whether anyone would like you or be happy to see you, as soon as we got to the playground you saw some of your girlfriends and the three of you immediately threw your arms around each other and started jumping up and down and squealing. When I'm dropping you off before school, I'll run into the parents of friends of yours and they all laugh about how funny and amazing you are. "We need to set up a play date! Snowflake never stops talking about how hilarious Josie is!"

You walk around cracking jokes and making funny faces and goofing off with people, young and old. You're affectionate and sweet and generous. You'll sit on my dad's lap and give him kisses and scruff up his hair and say, "Papa, you're so cute! I love you so much!"  When Lisa and her kids came to the Outer Banks with us, you adopted four-year-old India as your special charge, holding her hand in the water and snuggling with her during quiet time.

You have recently developed this urge to give people money. You're constantly sticking coins or dollar bills in your backpack because you want to give money to your teachers, or your friends, or to Mimi and Papa.  When a bunch of my India peeps were visiting and I was having a get-together at the house, you brought your piggy bank downstairs to give to my friend Rob - the image of him sitting in the living room chatting with people while holding your big ceramic Minions bank in his lap is one that cracks me up to think about.

Another new thing is that you have developed a, shall we say, interesting relationship with the truth. You seem to have no compunction at all about making up random shit when the mood strikes.  My favorite recent example involves your new second grade teacher. The first week of school you came home all excited to tell me that Mr. O is Australian.

"Really?" I asked. "That's so cool. You guys have that in common."

"Weeeell, he's not all the way Australian.  Just half, like me. I know he spent a bunch of time teaching and traveling there."

"You'll have to tell him about your trips there," I said.

That night I relayed this story to my mom.

"Do you think she's telling the truth?" she asked.

She knows you.

"I think so. It strikes me as a weirdly random and specific thing to make up," I answered.

A day or two later when I was dropping you off at school, I walked up to Mr. O to say hi.

"I hear you and Josie have Australian heritage in common," I said. "She told me you're part Australian and that you spent time there."

He gave me the blankest look imaginable.

"Noooo," he responded.

I looked down at you. "Girl, what's the deal?" I asked.

You smiled and shrugged.

Mr. O offered, "my father is from Nigeria."

He and I had a good laugh about it.

Your relationship with your brother continues to bring me great joy. The two of you are each other's best friend.  You look out for each other and play and giggle and conspire together.  And also fight.

The fights can get interesting.

The other night you and Zeke were arguing about something - the basis of the dispute was the inability of any of us to remember whose turn it was to sit next to me while watching a movie.

This is something that must be diligently tracked.  God forbid either of you should get one more moment of snuggle time with me than the other does.

I was exhausted and irritated by the entire argument, so I left the room and told the two of you to figure it out.  You and Zeke proceeded to scream furiously at each other at top volume.  It was so loud and awful-sounding that I half expected the police to knock on the door.

After five minutes, Zeke came and found me. He was crying.  I opened my arms and he crawled into them, despondent.

"What happened, honey?" I asked.

"Josie screamed at me that I have a terrible memory, and then she called me a fucking idiot," he sobbed.

Yikes. Damn, girl.

You came into the room a couple of minutes later, also crying and terribly upset.  I gathered you on the other side of me and the three of us sat there quietly for a minute.

"You guys need to make up," I said. "You need to get over this fight. Josie, you can't swear at Zeke and call him names like that.  You guys can't scream at each other like that.  Take a deep breath and let's calm down.  Can you do that?"

The answer was yes. You calmed down. You apologized to Zeke and gave him a hug.  We went into my room and snuggled up to watch Mythbusters (your favorite show).

I think seven is going to be an interesting year.

As ever, I consider it a great privilege and blessing to be your mother, and to usher you through childhood and into adulthood. You make me happy and proud. You're great company. You make me laugh and cry.

And you make me drink a little.  Let's be honest.

 Happy birthday, sweet baby girl. I love you to stars and back.

Mama

And you may ask yourself, well, how did I get here?

I was talking with my brother Sam over the weekend, just catching up and chit-chatting about this and that. I mentioned that I had been sick for two weeks and after kvetching about the various drugs I'm on and the various symptoms I'm still experiencing, I shrugged and said, "well, it'll go away eventually.  I'll live."

"Or not," he said.

"You're right!" I acknowledged. "It could go either way. I'll get better or I'll die."

"Yes," he said. "One of those two things will happen. You never know."

"But one way or the other, it'll resolve itself."

This is how we talk - you say "yes, and.." and keep it going.

We both laughed and continued talking about a book that he recommended that I'm in the middle of, about how throughout human history, mankind has made all of these changes to it's economic and cultural structure that have come under the guise of progress but that have actually altered the course of human history - and of the Earth's history - for the worse.

It's actually super-interesting and not depressing, though I know it sounds that way.

The conversation (both about potentially dying of a sinus infection, and the book) got me thinking about life in general, and how so much of what we do every day is in service to materialism, or to obligations that we are bound to because of our choices. We've created this mythology that allows us to believe that we are special and every minute is special and that life is to be cherished and every day is to be seized, and that we are not only entitled to happiness, but that if we don't feel happy we somehow aren't trying hard enough to embrace gratitude or whatever.  Then we feel inadequate and stressed out because we're not approaching things the way we're supposed to be approaching things, so we're failures at the happiness game.

But the truth is, life is often cruel and throughout human history, people have lived their entire lives in miserable conditions and without any notion of happiness as we view it today - it wouldn't occur to them that happiness was anything to be valued or sought out.  The point of living was to keep living until you died, and maybe propagate the species along the way.

Again, it wasn't a depressing chain of thought.  It was just ruminating on something that's interesting to me and that I think about sometimes -- that the way our culture approaches happiness as a goal of life is both a totally artificial construct that keeps us going, and also a source of enormous stress and dissatisfaction because it's such an elusive goal.

Anyway.

The end of summer and the focus on a new school year reinforces the speed with which time passes. I sometimes feel old and like I'm approaching the end of my shelf life and that I haven't accomplished anything of note.  Other times I feel good about where I am. But the number of my age is frequently in the back of my mind - I'm racing against a clock and it's ticking along but I don't know how much time is left on it.  And the fact that my kids are getting ready to turn 7 and 9 is weird to me - on one hand, it feels like they were just babies, but on the other, the baby and toddler years feel like eons ago.  They are such fully formed people now.  The barely human little amorphous blobs who needed to be swaddled and jiggled and shushed in order to calm down or get to sleep are, at this point, as familiar to me as aliens.

What's fascinating is that they also are so cognizant of the blazing speed at which time passes.

The night I was thinking all of these Deep Thoughts was the night before the first day of school.  The kids were excited and nervous and wired and anxious.  I was trying to put them to bed and sing to them to soothe them (badly, because my voice is still froggy and fucked up - I have no sense of my range and can't control the way it sounds), but they couldn't calm down.

Zeke said, "I'm nervous about school, and I'm also sad about it being the end of summer. It felt like it went so fast."

"It did, honey. And the truth is, you're going to realize that everything feels that way. You're going to start school tomorrow and before you know it, it'll be your birthday and then Halloween, and suddenly we'll be at Mimi and Papa's for Thanksgiving, and it's going to speed by and you're going to be amazed at how quickly it feels like summer arrived again."

He nodded and was quiet, clearly thinking about it all.

"I know you're feeling anxious, and I totally get that.  But tomorrow will be here before you know it, and once you get to school you won't even have time to be nervous because all of a sudden you'll be in the middle of greeting your friends and meeting your teacher and everything else.  So the day will quickly be over and you'll have dealt with it.  And the truth is, you do like school, so chances are it's going to be a great day."

He agreed that that was the likely outcome, but he and Josie were both restless and really wanting to talk through what they were thinking about, so I let them get in my bed so that we could talk quietly in the dark and fall asleep together.

We talked about the specific things they were worried about - would they make new friends, would their teachers like them, would they be able to learn new things and not feel stupid, would anyone be happy to see them.  Josie in particular has an ability to be anxious about something and then talk herself into a state of extreme agitation until she ends up sobbing, so I was trying to keep things light and make jokes and be silly.

But they were both wound tighter than the strings on my banjo, and I didn't realize how close to the edge they were.  And sometimes I forget how innocent and impressionable they are.

In the midst of all this, they asked me what were the things that made me nervous or anxious.

Half joking, I responded, "I worry that no one will ever love me again and that I'll die alone."

At which point, they both burst into tears and climbed onto me, smothering me with hugs and kisses and tears and drool.

"Nooo! Mama, why would you say that??  Why would you die alone?  You have us! We love you so much! Why would you think no one will love you??  Aaaaaauuuuuugggghhhhh!  We love you Mamaaaaaa!!!"  

They were seriously distraught and it took a few minutes to reassure them that I'm fine and that I know that their love for me is boundless.

I realized I need to leave those comments for conversations with my brother, who will know to respond, "yep, it's a distinct possibility!"

I also realized (for the millionth time) that these beautiful little people fill me with happiness, as elusive as that feeling can be.