one plus one plus one

Which John Cusak are you?

Got this from alimum.

Which John Cusack Are You?

Totally not surprised!

Sorrow

Shortly after my grandma died we were reading Goodnight Moon and on a whim I told Jamie that the old lady whispering hush was Granny, the official "great grandmother" title in my mom's family. He thought this was funny and I decided it would be a small way to remember her.

Tonight not only did he use a preposition perfectly (clue on white coat), and play a little joke on me by inching his fingers toward mine bit by bit, making the "oh, oh, ooohh" noise that I make when getting ready to tickle him, AND call me "eee-sha," but he also asked to read Goodnight Moon and then repeated each line back to me as I read it. When we got to the end and told the old lady goodnight, we both said "nigh nigh granny," and, like it has so often in the last month or so, my grief rose up in my throat and threatened to choke me. As I laid next to him in the big bed* while he wiggled himself to sleep I wanted to scream and cry from the sorrow that comes from knowing he'll never remember granny other than as a character in a much loved book and that she won't ever have the pleasure of having a joke played on her by her two year old great-grandson.

After Grandma died and I went back to work I simply put it all out of my mind. I was extremely busy at work and wondered if maybe this once what we say to comfort ourselves - she's no longer in pain, she's happy now - might actually shield me from the pain of losing her. Then almost exactly a month after she died I was talking to C and telling her that the reason we hadn't been buy to pick up the rest of our boxes from Grandma's was because Jamie had been so sick and I had been sick and MD's leg had been hurting him, and while she did nothing wrong, her response, a kind of gruff, "what a sick house you live in!" made me realized just what I had lost. Grandma would have said, "oh dear," and clucked her tongue, tsk tsk tsk, and said, "ooh, I'm sorry. i hope you all feel better soon. i wish there was something I could do." and more than the words the tone of her voice, the automatic desire to make it all better, is what I have lost.

And so when I talked to C today and she sobbed and said how hard everything has been and how she needs to know if we are going to have a relationship or not because she can't take the stress and how not matter what I think she adores me, and that she wants me to always remember that my mother loves me, I felt nothing. Nothing but sadness that my grandma's prediction, that she would outlive C, hadn't come true. Sadness that I'm left with this mess of a person who has given me little and taken much. Sadness that doing the right thing and doing what is best for me seem to be mutually exclusive and knowing that somehow I will have to balance the two.

*About five minutes after we turned out the light tonight, Jamie picked up his pillow, marched over to the door, and demanded to sleep in "mommy's bed." Oookay.

Weekend wrap up

What a perfect holiday weekend. Thursday and Friday were spent with family, Saturday with friends, many visiting from out of state, and today, a rare Sunday with just the three of us. We had a lazy morning, ran one errand, then came home and played and watched Finding Nemo. Jamie was entranced.

So how was your holiday (if you're in the states)?

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I'm about halfway through Your Two-Year-Old and this classic series is still dead on (except for the 50s like references to mother and father's roles in baby's life). I started using some strategies this weekend and they've been a huge help. These books are so easy to read and are crammed full of useful information that is several parts science and several parts common sense. My kind of parenting.

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My night out last night was very fun. Unfortunately the big fun didn't start until about a half hour before I promised md I'd be home, but still, lots of fun. Jamie has a nasty cough and was up half the night so I was half dead from exhaustion today but it was well worth it. (MD is taking vicodin at night for his hip pain and so is definitely out of the picture for nighttime parenting. And that's why I promised I'd be home by midnight, so he could take a pain pill and get some sleep. And I was 20 minutes late. Oops.)

Yes!

I have even more friends in from out of town and I scored a night out with the girls tonight. It's been 3 or 4 years at least since I've been out with this particular mix of friends, maybe even longer. And we're going to a local rock & roll bar to see my friend A's brother's band play so it's even more like old times. Of course, I promised MD I'd be home by midnight in case Jamie has a bad night, but I'll be barely awake by then anyway.

No time

To write. We're having way too much fun! Jamie is having a ton of fun with his cousins from Nashville!

Give thanks

From our turkey to yours:

Have a peaceful and safe Thanksgiving.

All aboard, choo choo

Ready or not, the weaning train has left the station.

After I got back from Boston we nursed as a part of our bedtime routing for two nights and it was clear to me that it was no longer a positive part of the evening. Trying to return to pre-tonsilectomy limits was resulting in tantrums and the whole thing was turning into a major power struggle. So we stopped. Without warning actually, and all things considered, he's gotten over it pretty quickly. He's asked a couple of times during the day and I've agreed, but Sunday afternoon was the last time that's happened and he didn't actually nurse. He wiggled and laughed and patted my chest gently and when I said, "ok, you're not nursing, all done!" he jumped off my lap and went to play. "Bye-bye nurse," I said, "Bye-bye nurse!" he replied.

He didn't ask that night, or Monday. Instead he asked to snuggle or for his water. Last night he asked, pissed and moaned for about a minute when I said no, and asked for his water.

This is turning into a case of the anticipation being much worse than the reality. If he truly wanted to nurse during the day I'd be willing  but he doesn't. And while I am very glad we held out until surgery - I'm pretty sure nursing was the only thing that saved us from dehydration and a return trip to the hospital - he's obviously more ready than I thought. I've been done for a couple of months now, to the point where I've been dreading it at night and it makes me want to jump out of my skin when he's doing it.

I am...proud, yes, for what we accomplished. And I'm sad. It's like when I went back to work after Jamie was born and I felt so lonely with no baby kicking inside of me. I miss my lactating breasts, their shape, their fullness. I miss relishing in my body's functioning as it was designed, in the ability to not only conceive and grow life, but to sustain it. I'm lucky things worked out this way, and I am sad that this chapter of my life may be closed for good.

But mostly, I'm relieved that I am able to simply hold and cuddle my child without him yanking on my shirt or trying to dive down it. It is a new kind of closeness and I am relishing it.

And a new day dawns

This morning, as we're running late and trying to get out the door.

Me: Jamie! Time to get dressed!
Jamie: Nononono! No dressed!
Me: Jamie, time to go bye bye. Time to go to daycare and see all the kids.
Jamie: No bye bye. Nononono.
Me: Jamie, mommy is going to pick you up tonight.
Jamie: unimpressed (hey, it worked right after I got home from Boston)
Me: And we're going to have pizza for dinner!
Jamie: Pizza, dinner! Jamie, shirt ON!

Bribery, huh? Let the negotiations begin!

The end of the world as we know it

Unlike many moms, I've generally enjoyed bathroom breaks uninterrupted. Either because MD's home to run interference or because I, I don't know, I've gotten lucky. No more. Jamie can now turn doorknobs with ease and besides the ones that are protected with childproof covers, no door in this house is safe to hide behind, whether both parents are home or not.

Yes, I could put a cover on the outside of the bathroom door, but I think Jamie's current need for mommy is stronger than my desire to poop in peace. Damn.

Weekend book talk

The other night before bed we read Tanka Tanka Skunk (new) and Dr. Seuss's ABC (favorite for at least 6 months). During both Jamie pretended to read along, mimicking the cadence of my voice perfectly. He's doing the same with the ABC song. He's also still insisting on reading long-time favorites himself (like Biscuit-we have a board version that I don't see listed). Tonight I dug out In the Big Red Barn, and the recognition on his face was priceless. We haven't read it in months. I got sick of it and I think he did too. But now he's bow-wowing, and mooing, and cock-a-doodle-doing along and it's like reading a brand new book now.

As for me, I bought Breathing Lessons at the hospital gift shop last month and just finished it in Boston. I enjoyed it until the last third. The two main characters face a situation from the past and I knew the resolution wouldn't be satisfying- it wasn't and it was quite cliche as a matter of fact - and it diluted the focus of what until then had been a very dense character study. I picked up Faith and Politics while in Boston (along with the current issues of the New Yorker, the Economist, and Us -- guess which magazine has been read from cover to cover) and I don't think it's going to work as a steal a few pages while I can type of book.* I think I'm going to take it to work and kill a few lunch hours. It goes quickly and is written in an engaging matter, but given the subject matter I want to be able to stop and think about and it is taking to long to pick up my train of thought from the last reading. I finaly finished Bushwacked last month, just a few years late, and that was perfect bathroom material because it was so damn depressing I could only handle it in small chunks. Half chapters.

If I can ever find the damn Justin Roberts cd I owe the library I need to get down to the main branch and look through the new sci fi. I need something to balance the non-fiction and regular fiction has never been my favorite. I'm partial to good young adult, fantasy (less so these days, I feel like I've run through all the possible scenarios and formulai), and more and more, "near future" or speculative sci fi. Any recommendations?

*meaning of course, my current bathroom book.