The gift of Four / sis update
Long, long rambling about Noah, followed by sister update.
Four year old boys are, to read certain message boards, pretty well just hell on earth: Defiant, rough, loud. We have a bit of that going on, but oh my. We’re only a little ways into four, so probably I will be eating my words shortly but… I love this stage.
Maybe it’s the little Oedipal comments here and there (”When I was a tiny baby I lived under your skin. Do you think I could go back in there sometime?”) or maybe it’s the 40 hrs of Montessori every week, who knows?
And maybe it’s just the chance to “play swords” every… day. *cough*
Today I took Noah down to Word on the Street which is an annual book fair where writers come out and do readings and signings and any group that can muster some kind of literary leaning hawks its wares. (For me it’s also an annual shame-fest: She Who Has Not Submitted Anything Lately, Nor Written Overmuch Outside Her Job. A little shame is a good thing here and there, despite therapists trying to get you to ditch it.)
The subway ride was intriguing. Noah looked out the window most of the time, and he killed a little spider that was crawling on it. It occurred to me that it’s new that he does things, like bug-slaying, without running a commentary about them. He’s constructing a whole inner self; little dark ovens into which parents cannot peer. And then sometimes he presents you with whatever he’s been baking in there. A couple of nights ago he told me the reason that “bad people” (villains) are bad is because they don’t have any hearts to make them feel sorry, but that makes it okay when you shoot them dead as long as it is in the chest, because it won’t hurt [due to lack of heart].
I’m not sure even 3 years of philosophy is going to get me through detangling that one.
Anyways at the event he displayed wildly crazy taste: he followed Stuart Maclean’s voice across the entire park due to way too much CBC radio on at our house, ignored TVO’s EnviroGirl as a poor imitation of a real superhero, and eventually plopped down in the “baby tent” for a long singing/nursery rhyme/etc. session. He also managed to charm a funnel cake out of me, and was at first stunningly disappointed in the lack of ‘cake’ and then ate half the thing. I’d promised him two books but we only bought one; he figured out pretty quickly that it’s nicer to pick books at the library where no one is jostling you.
The best thing there as far he was concerned though, son of a reader and writer? The red oak trees, so large and gnarly you can climb up the knobby bases of the trunks. So we hugged quite a few trees downtown.
It was a wonderful day. It was the kind of day you think you are going to have when you have kids: out Loving Books! In a park! With a happy child who comes when you call! Except for that funnel cake, which was probably ALL transfat.
Speaking of charming, we shopped for skates yesterday after gymnastics. Yes, this being Canada he needs to hit the ice this winter so he won’t suffer my fate which was, child of ignorant Americans, to spend most skating parties of my life falling on my ass. So one of the big-box sport centres had cheap kiddie skates (by this I mean single-blade) on sale, the sort of nondescript ones that don’t have toe picks so aren’t really figure skates but aren’t hockey skates either, and have plastic boots and are generally kind of crappy.
Well, we got there and for $10 more they had kiddy hockey skates that seemed much better, so I was game to try them on. But they didn’t have his size, so after a whole lot of discussion, trying on of kiddy actual figure skates with picks, I said we’d have to buy the original crappy set, or think about it and come back later.
Noah got a very sad look on his face, one which (I suspect) the manager had seen before perhaps when being handed down white figure skates as a boy. In any case, we ended up with a “let me see what I have in the back” pair of Nike premium youth hockey skates with a 45% markdown in price…. making them, yes, $10 more than the crappy skates. Hmmm. Well the guy was smart because now that Noah will be hooked on the good ones and I know he was kind to my son, he’ll probably be getting a lot of long-term business.
Incidently the reason Carl does not figure in any of this is because he was working all weekend; I haven’t left him out of the narrative or anything.
And for the final leap here - speaking of money! We’ve recently borrowed Ballet Shoes, the DVD, from the library — hey Hermione Granger Emma Watson as Pauline!) and renewed it twice before its tearful return; I kind of consider even a cinema-based love of Noel Streatfeild to be one of my literary duties herewith discharged and besides - a non-animated, non-scary DVD that doesn’t involve cheap-ass footage of construction trucks! That I can stomach! Woo hoo! But anyway, I digress. The movie gave Noah quite a bit to mull over, and now he wants to know more about being poor.
I told him we have ENOUGH money but we don’t have LOTS of money and strangely enough, this has made pretty much every shopping trip both wildly amusing and easier. Amusing because he tries to define value based on desire (”mummy! these fancy cookies are good for poor people because they are free” (err no)) and because he’s taking me at my word when I make statements like “you can have this, but not that.” Thank god for Brit Kid Lit.
(If I were a braver soul, I’d consider trying A Little Princess at this point but I am too scared to take on colonization as a theme. Maybe I need to re-read the Prince and the Pauper?)
All in all Noah is just delightful. I wish I could bottle these days.
Now for the update about my sister: everyone is doing really well. My sister is recovering although it hasn’t been easy either physically or emotionally. Because of the cruel, cruel American policies, she had to go back to work last week, and I think this makes it a little bit more wobbly for everyone. But overall it’s a total win. Total. Win. This is extremely happy-making. And I get to see her in a couple of weeks which will be really nice.
Growth and change
I’m at a strange point in my job: past the two-year mark in employment; past the one-year mark in actually running the darn site. And still feeling pretty new. But maybe not new enough; this week I have had two very different experiences.
One is that I went to a beauty event - and I am starting to get used to saying that, which is practically a whole blog - not just a post - in itself. The event was for Major Product Line; you would recognize it. It’s all about nails and so it was a manicure and a pedicure. (My second professional manicure and my first professional pedicure, actually. Why yes, I am a beauty minimalist.)
I forgot to shave my legs, which was sad, and also I picked pink as a colour, which is a summer colour and not a winter one. In other words, I am still the geek girl at the table. But I didn’t actually mind all that much.
So as a part of the event we got makeup cases - I mean the big square boxes. And I was dragging mine along in Yorkville when two girls came up to me and asked me if I was a stylist at the film festival. Why yes, I’m about to do Oprah’s nails! Ha. Anyways, that is seriously the first (and last, I’m betting) time anyone has mistaken me for a celebrity’s stylist.
Tomorrow I will in fact be at the film festival interviewing.
The other thing is more sobering. I actually got to the point I generally get to at jobs; the one where I walk where angels fear to tread. In this case it involves a talk with a VP. I really don’t want to be fired, but I also find that when I really care about something, and someone claims to want input, I take them up on it. I think I have to accept that at 38 years old, this is me.
I would have done better under a tenure system. What shocks me is not so much that I find myself doing this — this is, after all, me, and me involves a certain formerly gifted child(tm) need to see justice prevail — but that I’m doing it NOW. I think in a way this is all part of my recovery from whatever malaise or depression or physical ailment has characterized the last year. I have the energy and creativity to be rocking the boat.
Although seriously? Dumb time to do this in media.
It might mean no more free manicures! And err, poverty.
CSA bliss
You know you’ve achieved solid middle class when your reaction to an overly wet, overly cold growing season is: Cool! My farm is having trouble! I am so close to the land!
But this has been me, this year. We ponied up about $525 for 22+ weeks of produce from a local organic farm, plus free range turkey in October, including delivery to my actual porch, and it has been a revelation. Reading Michael Pollan’s In Defense of Food as well as The 100-Mile Diet has only confirmed my experience, to wit:
- we eat more variety when we either get a CSA delivery or an organic food box. Not only is this personal, like getting out of a food rut, it’s also kind of a side-effect: Purple carrots, heirloom tomatoes, and orange cauliflower are just a few examples. And Savoy cabbage. I also saw tomatillos for the first time and made potato-bean enchiladas, which were super yummy. Garlic scape pesto also makes the list and no, I had never seen a garlic scape before either.
- food grown locally tastes better. I’d say it was the placebo effect, but I have fed it to guests unawares and they agreed. Tonight was sweet corn, eaten on the day of delivery, and it was so. fucking. yummy.
- I suspect that locally grown food also satisfies cravings better. This is pretty much hogwash scientifically, but it’s still my experience. It tastes so full and rich that a little goes a long way.
- except canteloupe which we can eat by the bushel, apparently. And yes, it grows in Ontario.
- it’s worked out reasonably close to what our usual budget would be, and when you include that it’s organic, it’s a good deal. But learning to preserve would be good. I am renting space in my parents’ freezer for cabbage-based dishes (6 cabbages! in two weeks!) but I wish that I had been more on the ball with setting myself up for pickling, and also having a freezer of my very own (not attached to my fridge) is a definite item on the wish list. We are doing some apple butter and port wine jelly this year for Xmas gifts, but next year if we do the CSA I will be a bit more methodical. As it is we’ve wasted some eggplant and beans and peas (shameful) and also supplied neighbours with produce.
Mostly though, it’s just freaking fun. It is. It arrives on Wednesday, with an email from the farmer, and it feels like Christmas every time.
Groove, back; holiday weekend - perfect
I am slowly getting my groove back. This has been happening for a while but I haven’t wanted to jinx it too much. As far as I can tell, time has mostly done it. Sleep has helped; possibly upping my B vitamins helped. I have gained a bit of weight so I do wonder if there’s been a thyroid adjustment, but I will take happy and a little fatter over depressed and thinner. Although I will be addressing the weight issue over the next few months now that I can: breathe, laugh, and drag my ass to the pool.
I took two days off last week to make this a 5-day weekend. Thursday Noah and I had a mom-son outing to the CNE, low-stress style. (The CNE is pretty much a fair, but a whopping big one in the middle of Toronto, which preserves Exhibition Grounds.) I have videos to upload but in brief:
- we took the GO Train there which is always a score with my train-obsessed kid
- we were early enough that the petting zoo was not mobbed and we did that first; hilarity ensued
- the Lego room and music booth were hits. Because we do not have enough Lego at home (*cough*)
- Noah tried out the rides and loved. them. He didn’t need me on them (he did kiddy ones; at 40 inches he wasn’t allowed on anything too crazy). I was surprised; I didn’t think he would be going on those yet.
- we ate pierogies and cabbage rolls and of course, Tiny Tom doughnuts.
- the Farm exhibit was great fun and we watched the bees make honey
- we also hit the Firefighter and EMT areas and they were fun
- that was about it, and that was just fine with us; we came home a bit darker from sun, heavier from food, and laden with blueberry honey, fudge, and maple-roasted soy nuts as well as various stickers and one fingerpuppet won fair and square at a game
It was great. He’s so much fun.
Friday we cleaned in the morning and then went to the library and the pool. Then two COUSINS came, along with a grandma, and Noah was in bliss. I love the cousins and grandma too, so that was cool. Saturday we hung out and then one cousin and I hit the Danforth for lunch and shopping; the boys went swimming, and we all met up at the beach and ate pseudo-Chinese for dinner. Sunday the kids and Carl went a-comic-and-toy shopping and I saw Julie & Julia with grandma (for the second time, but I really like that movie - the Julia parts anyway).
Today cousins left, and Noah collapsed and had a three-hour nap. I roasted my first tomatillos ever (go CSA!) and made potato and bean enchiladas and also pasta al forno, so we have dinners for the week to heat up.
Then we had dinner at the nuclear reactor bay (I’m not really kidding; there’s a fabulous beach right by the Pickering power plant) and now Noah is having a bath to get the sand off.
Carl managed not to work the entire weekend and that in itself is like a holiday.
I am really very happy at the moment. I got my feet under myself enough to create fun, and so we did.
And I am working on my book again a tiny wee bit and tomorrow night is booked for that, if I can not fritter the time away.
It was a very good weekend.
Going to hell
Eating Michael Pollan’s In Defense of Food… while eating a DQ Dilly bar.
I agree with Pollan and our CSA this year has truly be a revelation. But still, the Dilly Bar remains.