Brain droppings

• At supper the other night, Paul announced:  "Josie [the dog] is the cutest thing I ever saw."  Then he looked me in the eyes and said, "I'm just joking. You are the cutest."  Watch out, ladies.  This man is coming to kindergarten in the fall.  Sometimes it's gratifying and surreal to the be mother of a young boy at the same time as I'm the mother of a young girl who's working on discovering how she's her own person, mainly by noticing how lame I am.
• That girl slept til 10 AM yesterday.  For those who remember when her grandfather used to try to bribe her to sleep til six in the morning, this development inspires awe.  I nearly went upstairs at 9 to see if she was still breathing, just like I use to do when she was a baby...  if she was asleep when she was a baby.... which she wasn't ever.  And now she's sleeping until ten in the morning.  Times are changing.
• I have begun to wonder if it's possible to have an advanced directive for the dog.  The vet where I occasionally kennel her has  begun to require a waiver stating that I authorize all surgeries if they cannot reach me when she's at the kennel.  I love her, but she's a senior doggie, whose early life was pure suffering.  Even though she's been loved and cared for by us for several years, she is still a neurotic and unhappy dog.  So no, there are not going to be any surgeries for her, for pete's sake.  So I went so far as to google "living will for pets" (which I assure you is a rabbit hole you do not want to go down),  and then the NSA scandal broke.  So now I'm pretty sure I'm on a watch list.  Plus, I'm blogging about it!

Shhh... don't tell mom!

Yesterday, when Elly's friend came over to hang out, I immediately knew something was up.  No Sherlock-type deduction was required. Any time preteens don't come running into the house to raid the pantry, a parent can knows to pay attention. Also, the co-conspirators didn't seem to realize that I could see them through the open living room window as they skulked around the house.

It was clear that they had something they shouldn't have and were taking  a look at it in the hideout formed by the Giant Shrubberies of Doom which surround our house. What was it? A cigarette? A picture of a penis? I thought we were just in the carefree last weeks of elementary school. Instead, we were about to enter all the complications of middle school a little early.

I took a couple of deep breaths and promised myself to handle this right. I would be calm and cool, but firm. I would convey just the right level of parental emotion without making the girls feel ashamed. I would be the picture of sanity.

While I was still breathing and getting up my gumption, Elly's guilt drove her inside. Has there ever been such a self-tattletale on the Earth? She showed me the forbidden fruit.  It was ...


A TWENTY OUNCE PEPSI.

Yes, this is twenty-first America where a soda pop is titillating contraband.

I invited the girls in and cracked open that bottle.  They split the pop into cups, gave little brother a sip, and then enjoyed a cold Pepsi on a warm day.

And then I did what any sane parent would do. I shut myself in the bathroom and laughed at my child and at danger averted in the innocent last days of fifth grade.

A thankful day

Today, I find myself overwhelmed with gratitude  ...

-- that we can walk to school.
-- that we have reached the point of NO STROLLERS in our household.
-- that Eleanor didn't hurt herself badly when she fell outside the school.
-- that Mrs. Richardson, the school counselor, had copious band aids.
-- that Paul got to play at the park with a bunch of kids who will be going to kindergarten with him.
-- that I got to talk with grown ups while he played.
-- that, as we walked back home, the School Superintendent took time out of his day to explain the roof replacement of the school to a curious young boy.
-- that the Superintendent also showed us where the bathroom was in the Board Office.
-- that the Appalachian Center is the perfect place to stop for a water fountain on a hot day.
-- that both kids wanted to make the same craft this afternoon.
-- that the afternoon saw a moment to sit in the shade on the back porch.
-- that a coconut-peach smoothie was a perfect refresher on a stormy evening.
-- that despite, falling earlier today, Elly is back out on her scooter.
-- that Chris could be home for supper.

My latest harebrained scheme: Nerd Scouts

Earlier this school year, I had had hopes that the Boy Scouts of America were going to join the rest of us in the 21st century and that we would be okay with Paul joining the Scouts when he got older.  But if I understand their new proposed policy correctly, the organization is planning to allow openly gay boys to join scouting, but to continue to ban gay Scout Leaders.  This policy sounds even more bigoted to me than their current outright ban.  At the very best, I read this policy as an attempt to assuage both the gay-friendly and the homophobic troops that exist within an organization that comprises almost all American males at some point in their lives.  At worst, the policy sounds like a token bowing to social and cultural pressures while still promoting the ideas that (a) being gay is a phase people grow out of and (b) adult gay people are pederasts who will prey on scouts. 

So even though I know lots of liberal-lefty scout groups and even though I know several gay families involved in scouting, I'm afraid it's a "no" on scouting for Paul at least during his first years of scout eligibility.    There are some fights I'm willing to fight from the inside of an organization, but this is not one of them. 

I don't care about the Boy Scouts that much.  AKA I don't personally care for camping and uniforms and ceremonies enough to get involved in their internal fight. 

Anyway, but I'm all in favor of the camaraderie and skill-building of the Boy Scouts; I just don't want the yucky politics.

Add these recent developments in the  national news to the family realization that Paul is already a huge nerd, and a new idea has been born in my head.

NERD SCOUTS!

Not called that, of course.  I learned my lesson when I tried to refer to Eleanor's D&D group as "Geek Girl Gamers."   It's only we adults who embrace and own the terms "nerd" and "geek."  The young children don't see those words as cool, and they dislike them almost as much as those of us who grew up in an earlier era hated them then.

But.... something not called NERD SCOUTS!

A little camping, a little LARPing, a little knot tying, some Quidditch, a little zombie tag, a little robotics, some electrical wiring, some whittling, some cooking over a camp stove and a group of young kids.  Maybe only boys, maybe co-ed, I don't care.  I envision a group of parents who want to get their kids together in a troop and do nerdy, practical, fun activities on a semi-regular basis. And maybe have silly badges. 

Maybe Nerd Scouts already exists in Berea?  If it does, somebody tell me because there is a lot of spare geeky energy in this household.  The parental units in this family cannot burn all that energy off.    If not,  are there families around who are interested?  If so, let's spend the summer on some planning and make it happen.  Who's in? 

GO NERD SCOUTS (not called that)!!

Requiem for a vacuum

Friends, it is with sadness that I report:

The Household Kenmore Progressive Elite vacuum cleaner passed from this earth yesterday evening in a haze of smoke at her residence.  She leaves behind her devoted owners after five years of service. Although short-lived for an appliance, she packed a multitude of experiences into her short tenure as family vacuum cleaner. She began service with thrice daily cleanings of a carpeted kitchen and went on to enjoy a brief respite when linoleum was installed during her middle age. She continued her champion suction on stairs and bedroom carpet and made the transition from cleaning cat hair to dog hair. She is fondly remembered as agitating the carpet so hard and fast that she drew baby socks across the floor and sucked them up before her operator knew what was happening. In her later years, she slowed as her furniture bumper broke off and as her stair attachment cracked in half.  Although she continued the good fight against household dirt, she frequently required declogging with a 14 inch knitting needle. At the end of her life, she faced new challenges in a move to a house with a carpeted dining area.  Charged again with vacuuming  three times a day, her motor gave out. She went as she would have wanted to, valiantly sucking up one last batch of pet hair.  She is survived by her longtime companion Jenny and by a shoulder-mounted shop vac. The shop vac will be taking up the Kenmore's duties during this time of mourning.  The family  requests no flowers be sent as, frankly, the shop vac is not up to the task of suctioning fallen petals.

Marching

Deep breath... I turn 40 tomorrow.  Okay, in around 7 hours, I turn 40.

So in this quick moment, while my husband and children are off acquiring birthday presents, let me reflect just a minute.

I came across some wedding pictures yesterday, and I got them out because I've been telling Paul stories about the wedding.  I thought he'd like to see what that day looked like.  The particular book I found was of some shots our friend Dan Dalstra  took (now a very successful wedding photographer  -- how lucky is that for us and our uber-cheap hippie wedding!).

And cliche alert, Chris and I looked like babies.  We looked so young.  Our faces looked so bouncy.

So that was kind of weird to think about as I try to wrap my mind around being 40.

It's been a little weird thinking about my looks and about being middle-aged.  My hair hasn't started to turn gray yet;  apparently, I have just enough red in my hair that it's going to do that weird red-head thing of leeching out its color.  That phenomenon freaked me out as a kid, and I was scared of one older red-headed gentlemen in our church just because of it.  This seems like good and ironic payback to my childhood self..

My hands are starting to look ropy, and the old cleavage is getting leathery.  My eyelids are drooping.

And you know what, I think this is a good thing, these changes.  Maybe it's the life stories that Paul demands I recount daily, but time has gotten weird lately.  I'll tell a story and find my mind dropping into a high school classroom or my grandparents' long gravel lane, the specific lighting in the 4-H exhibits hall at the county fair, the smell of soap in France.  Or even more near to home, one minute Eleanor is fighting some preteen battle with me over cell phones; the next, she's cuddled up on the couch next to me as if the last 8 years had never happened.  So time gets weird.  It doesn't stay put like it did when I was a young adult, and time was a line between what had happened and what was going to happen.

But  time on the body is inexorably forward-moving.  Memory gets weird; but each year, my hair fades a little and the crinkles next to my eyes crinkle some more.  I look more and more like Weird Al and Howard Stern's love child when I first see myself in the morning.  And when I laugh and think, "Oh shit, Weird Al," I know where time's arrow is pointing.  My face and my ropy hands moor me in time, while my mind wanders  more and more.

And as the kids and the husband come running in the door to hide whatever presents they've found, I'm not just okay but happy about turning 40 tomorrow in this body that time is marching upon.

 

A house divided

A few days ago, it dawned on me that I have spent the whole of my married life in the South.  Or call it  "South-ish" if you want.  I don't know what you want to call Kentucky and southern West Virginia.  They're certainly not the deep South, but I can testify that life south of the Ohio River has some differences from life north of that river.

The point is that I've spent fifteen years "South-ish.," 37% of my life below the Ohio River.  It's certainly not the future I might have anticipated as a child, if only because I like winter and I loathe being hot. After fifteen years, my accent has migrated a bit -- I'm more like to turn the word "well" into two syllables than a terse, barely uttered"welp" these days.   And finally, it took the whole fifteen years, but I like grits now.  I am genuinely pleased to see them on a brunch spread.  I do not choke them down with my beverage (stage one) or eat them but wonder what people see in this bland mess (stage two).  I've even passed beyond stage three (liking grits) to stage four (purchasing grits at the grocery store).  Soon, I will hit the fifth stage of preparing and serving grits in my own home.  

Still, it's clear to me and everyone that I'm not "from around here," and not just because I pronounce words "wrong," according to my children.  The culture wars are raging in our household, and it's all about "ma'am."

Eleanor's school has started a new push to get the children to say "yes, ma'am" and "yessir" to adults at all times.  I get that it's a traditional Southern thing and it's a sign of respect.  I've been encouraging the children in the yes-ma'am-ing for years just I would encourage them to kiss people's cheeks if we lived in France.  I've taught the children to call all adults "Mr and Ms. So-and-So" even though I grew up calling adults by the first names.  So I'm all for it.  Yes, ma'am, I am.

Until Eleanor calls me "ma'am," and then the Yankee blood rises in my brain and clouds my vision. Then I snap, "What did you just call me? Don't you call me, ma'am, Eleanor Hale!"  Because in the North, "ma'am" is reserved for older adults whom you don't know well enough to call by name.  So even though, living in Kentucky, children are calling me "ma'am" all the live long day and it doesn't bother me, not even when a babysitter calls me "ma'am" in text messages, I get up on my high horse when my child says it to me.  Even though I should be hearing "respect," all I hear is "I don't know you very well."  

It probably doesn't help that she only remembers to say "ma'am" when she's mad at me.  Maybe I'm not the only one culturally divided in this house.  Ma'am.