One of my old friends from university is in town today and coming over for dinner. She lives way up north, like all-day-dark north, and I think Noah half expects she will bring a polar bear to dinner.
As previously discussed, I kind of suck at keeping in touch, but this is one of those friends where we are bonded; a show up at 3 am and be welcome friend. She also knew vintage Shandra, on and off the game, and was there for Teresa’s meltdown with Lyr and was one of the people present for the Hallowe’en we did the errr, “fake” ritual in the cemetery and was one of the first people we came out multiple to and she took it with aplomb.
Oh and she lived with Carl and I for a few months, early 2000s.
In other words she’s a friend to the system, that we don’t get to see much, and the system — for once, not the astral kids; they’re sort of bemused — is totally stoked.
For the menu I am torn; my friend is a meat and potatoes person, so I am either doing hamburgers with alllllllll the fuss and fixings, or a roast. I’ll see what strikes the mood at the store and report back. I am trying to figure out what is priciest up North that is not vegetables, and serve that. Vegetables too, but they are not her thing…regardless, whatever hits the table will be -fresh- as we can get midwinter.
Someone puts in a problem. If you feel like it, you read the problem and then send them a song to lift their spirits (you can send a note too). It’s all anonymous.
That’s it.
Only issue so far; they didn’t have Alanis Morissette’s “Sorry to myself” on there. What??? :)
Well, additional issue: They run out of problems sometimes. Hmmm.
I am skeptical about these sort of one-off, “random acts of kindness” things in that…I think the altruistic urge is human, amazing, and wonderful, but we all need to be careful that we don’t satisfy it by only doing that which is easy.
That said, I still love it. Music is one way we process difficult stuff and this just suits. I’ve been passing on some love today, and I tell you that this is one way I pass on my thanks for the support y’all gave us last year.
Tomorrow V. has a doctor’s appointment in the morning. I will be working from home – or at least giving the appearance of it – with both kids until she gets here as it is a PD day for Noah’s school.
Daycare was a bit easier that way. I do think this is the best configuration for our family right now, but urgh. Carl has had unusual meetings all week, which complicates things, but he also, I realized, is adjusting. For a year he hasn’t had to say no much, or leave on time.
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Avalon was an issue at work today. She decided to hang out with junior staff…no one within my chain of command, praise be, but it was…not me. She has opinions about The Corporation, which she pronounces capitalized like that if you can hear it, and she thinks it is funny. Hilarious really. If I were netting any income outside of my defined contribution pension plan I might be worried, but it does occasionally come to mind that right now, I’m not.
Anyways, so the three young staff really liked her owl necklace, and she talked about shopping for it. And then we got into how cubicles are funny, she hates to eat in case it is too loud, and why every meeting is crazy useless. At which point I had to pull the plug. I’m afraid Nicholas influenced her on the last, not that she could not have drawn her own conclusions.
Then at my desk was a package of the sweetheart collection from…I must de-searchify this…D–avid’s Tea. Hmmmmmmmm. (Promotional package.)
Soooooo happy about not having to go through any surgery, even minor day surgery, with Liam right now.
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We all are still adjusting to the new schedule. I do feel like it’s harder to connect with a pre-verbal kid when the hours are more limited. As a result, Liam is getting used to cosleeping after 10:30 pm, and so am I.
On his end though he seems fine. He flips out when I come in, cuddling and nursing…for 10 minutes. Then he wants to be about his regular business. The problem is at my end more than his, it seems.
Maybe he loves V. more. (Joke! Mostly.)
Noah is doing fine, although I hear less about his school day than I like. Walking was good for that and we haven’t found a good substitute yet. And martial arts really eats into our family time, for all that it is two evenings a week.
I am still a big believer in sleep but I start to see why some parents would keep their kids up later for the time with them. It is a bit different with two; with just one I would just focus on Noah. With two, I feel a bit more stretched as I walk in the door.
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The complaints over, I do like working. I am not loving the corporate stuff but the work, yes, I do love it. And it is fun having more people at work with me, in my head. (Fewer staff though.) Today perhaps wasn’t the best day for the asking though, as I had technical difficulties that ate up a chunk of time.
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I’ve been whacked enough to be going to bed early, or just reading, most nights, after chores. When not writing email to Nicholas, apparently. It’s mostly the adjustment I think, but I am not entirely content with that pattern. We’ll see going forward.
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The email ranges but I’ll toss this excerpt up. It was in relation to the Ferrett’s post on the Muppets and liberal values which Nicholas and I were discussing. I think I am in grumpy mom headspace, the grump being how desperately I am missing being home which really is so not me that I start to wonder if it IS me, or someone else? Or maybe…I finally found a groove as a parent? Or something.
Email, which I have edited slightly for style and because I was oversharing about actual people:
I think one hallmark of Gen-x parenting…is that we absorbed the hippie concept that there is an inherent goodness in children, free range ones, and for people unlike me, who did not work with actual children, there comes a shock between the ages of 4 and 6 that loving and paying deep attention to children, as well as media limiting Haba toy purchasing parenting, does not prevent children from excluding, lying, and so on.
… some people truly believe the natural child is a version of, well, Jesus I suppose, the nice Jesus who loves everyone and only tosses moneylenders around, or mini Dalai Lamas. As Anne Lamott says, you know you have created God in your own image when he hates all the same people you do, and I think people do that with their kids: if ONLY the Big Bad world does not get its hooks into them they will need no instruction.
[I just realized I never finished the thought which is, then you love your kids so much, they must be god-like.]
[and then to summarize: I think this leads to moral instruction AFTER the fact, like your kid hits someone and then you tell them not to hit. While shocked that they did.]
As a reminder there is a cast page up at the top there.
I am all zen-like and peaceful these days, the ones filled to the brim with work and home and family and sweetpeas and friends.
And then… I ask my girls about chess. Both are wild to learn chess and Nicholas volunteered (or was volunteered) to try online chess at the sort of glacial pace one would expect from two sets of childrearing multiples trying to find time. But Bree told him they wanted to see if he would stick around, first. And there it’s been for a couple of months.
Silent months I should add; my girls were not hugely into Xmas or feasting. But now it’s work and starting to sort out how we will get a little exercise (the very worst part of working is having to sit). And…chess. And friends. And mum’s whatever.
And my girls are in a mess.
I raised my twins like warriors; I didn’t really keep them as close as Lyr and her kids or even Mags and Lynn and theirs. As babies there were two, so it was kind of just astrally juggling them (I know how weird that sounds, but it felt that way) and since I have basically literally an army of babysitters, whom I trust like myself (ha), I handed them over. They grew up with me, but largely spending their days doing what young warriors do, kind of training. I suppose this is the downside to conceptualizing oneself as a warrior queen; you might make warrior queen mistakes.
Lohr wasn’t particularly snuggly either; unlike San he was more traditionally father-like, even reaching for spanking when my girls went after Dominic once. (Dominic invaded their turf, in their view. In Lohr’s view it was Lohr’s turf and Dominic an honored guest.) He wasn’t mean or absent or anything; it’s not a criticism. It’s just he was an ice lord or whatever, himself.
Anyways, all of which is to say I don’t think Lohr and I raised them to feel like they could come home and be hugged for all their boo boos so much, which San did where Mags wouldn’t have, and Lyr would, etc. If Lyr is a sunny hippy California mom, I am an uptight Northeastern NYC mum. I suppose in this analogy that makes Mags Texan and Lynn Mexican (Day of the Dead) but I digress. There is, or was, no question about love, but it was that rhythm you can fall into where the -conversation- is more about doing/achieving/etc. My mother once told me, in contrast to a grave situation with my sister, that she never had to worry about me because I was born capable. And if one really considers all the pluses and minuses of that viewpoint…I guess I passed that along to my girls.
(Let us pause to be grateful we parent collectively, and I turn down evening events because Lyr has to go home and play with the boys.)
Anyways now my girls have a primal boo boo. I realize any therapist would insist it is my boo boo, since ELL chose not only to paint me as evil but to drive everyone’s relationships off the cliff in the wake of that perception. But I can only tell you how I experience it is truthfully as possible.
And how I experience it is…I had a relationship – relationships – that were adult and I am not writing about in this entry.
And then Miri and Bree had a relationship with their dad, who dumped them twice, the second, final time because they wanted to email him from and about their experiences in our body and life. And he either did not believe them, or did not want to hear it.
Not only did he dump them, but all the dads dumped everyone, because Bree said she did not trust him enough to give up on email, and Miri agreed.
And unlike when Avalon was feeling somewhat the same, And howled and got hugs, my girls don’t howl. They kind of endure, emotionally. And take it out physically by climbing to the 10th floor rather than taking an elevator or whatever. But you know, there comes a time when it might be helpful to have friends, or even friendly adults, to relate to. Even astral twins, who are really closer than normal ones, are social creatures.
I can feel mine making steps – their poor neglected blog, opera, chess, Wii with Carl, etc. – and then, that space comes up and they back off.
I am just expressing, not problem-solving. And…Liam wakes up there so off I go with a click on the publish button.
Outside the RCM each week before and after Noah’s music class we’ve been seeing the same homeless guy (or so his sign says). We give him a dollar instead of buying a snack, some weeks. Between that and the foodbank Noah has conceptualized a tiny bit about poverty.
Not enough because today he approached the guy and told him with great solemnity that his problems are over because he can just buy the house next to ours, as it is listed for sale. (the previous owner sadly passed away this fall; the heirs have been renovating to sell.)
….
I drafted this earlier. Now I just add that I was just rudely told to get off the computer so the fae (largely Lyr, Saria, and Loryn, i think) can make quick fudge for our friends who moved from behind us to across the street (lakeside!) – sort of a housewarming. It may not be funny in 15 min but I wanted to record…woe to she who comes between fae and fudge. Must work this into that book.
I will state flat out that my house is nothing close to Martha-Stewart perfect. I like it hygienic and not a disaster, although sometimes the insides of things actually are disasters. My sister, on the other hand, keeps an immaculate home. I don’t personally find that achievable for me and I’m at peace with that mostly. But let’s just frame this whole post in the context of “reasonably clean and comfortable.” That’s how I like it, and it is in no way a moral judgment. It’s just how I function best. One – no, two – of my favourite safe places growing up were very, very messy and sometimes downright dirty homes and what I remember is the safety and love.
I am liking how our chores routine is holding up even to two working parents in our entire…1.5 weeks of experience here. (But it built solidly I think.) And for me to be feeling this way, is kind of miraculous. Remember that I/we used to scream about chores, wonder how you manage chores, waffle between despair and mania, and although we certainly learned to clean, growing up, we did not learn how to manage things. And Carl has his own baggage, which also has begun to recede somewhat.
Also last time I went back to work I used to get up at 5 to clean, or clean at 11 after dates, and made myself sick.
Basically, my philosophy boils down to:
- small bits are less fraught
- make it fun
- make it a habit
So from an early age, we’ve tried to get Noah to clear his place to the counter or sink or dishwasher, as appropriate by age and mess quotient. Does he? Not all the time. This not all the time is also something I have kind of come to peace with. Do I want to make a huge deal out of the no times? I admit: No, I do not. If the no times come in a slew, then I start to insist. But pretty much if we hit once a day, I’m good.
I extend this to all the little parts that help life: Hanging the backpack and coat up (hooks at child level), using one’s cup to rinse the sink after brushing teeth, hitting the hamper with the dirty laundry, hanging up the towel, etc. I am not aiming for perfection, not an iron-clad habit (as an adult I hope that comes). I am just aiming for more of that rather than less.
At the same time, I have had to try to develop these habits myself and they are hard. I tend to dump my coat on a chair (adults need to use the closet) and leave my mug in the living room.
So on top of these, I try to build in regular times to address the deficiencies. The most successful is the “5 minute tidy up.” Something like 4-5 evenings around dinnertime, usually afterwards, I put on some music and we tidy up the hall and living room in under 5 minutes. I have baskets for the toys, and no, it doesn’t have to be perfect. But at the end things should be more or less in their spots (you will see in the video that today we only achieved this at the floor level, but that’s okay; it’s Friday.) In the mornings we do the bedrooms and bathroom. On weekends or as necessary we do the rec room downstairs.
5 minutes just doesn’t sound scary. And it actually is not a bad length of time; if you do it each day for 5 days that’s 25 minutes. The trick really is to stop. (Unless you are grown up, in which case, by all means, finish up. :))
We also do the dishes as a family sometimes…working puts a strain on that because we’re bumping up against bedtime a lot. Ideally it would be every night, and I hope it will be again when the boys are older or we gain breathing room in other ways (i.e. no martial arts). But when we do (one person playing with Liam) we put on music or play a word game or recite silly poems or put on a book on CD, and it is…believe it or not…fun.
For other chores – vacuuming and scrubbing and laundry and all – I do mostly invite Noah to help, although my sense is that he’s almost ready to own responsibility for a beyond-himself chore. He loves to run the vacuum cleaner and the steam mop, and can do a decent job at using those in a basic way (maybe not the fine edges but do I care?). He also folds laundry well (thank you Montessori) and dusts like a pro. When Noah says no, I generally let it go. I say “oh, too bad,” but I believe…he’s 6. It’s not letting him off the hook entirely.
Decluttering is not a good task with a 6 year old. Mostly he ends up falling in love with everything all over again. I still include him, but it doubles the time. That said, decluttering is worth every minute. Each month I get rid of 41 things (my age) and he gets rid of 6 (his age).
To me, this peace about the whole thing is gold. Therapy gold, family gold, expert gold (Don Aslett’s books on cleaning and FlyLady’s site — that I could only hack so long but it was still great — the chief ones. The cleaning one was mostly to figure out what we could slack on, believe it or not.)
Just don’t look in my drawers. :)
So this video is how we frolic after, sort of. (And I have rare permission from Noah to share) We’d danced all together before, and this is kind of winding down a bit. This is tonight. The choice of music here is Lynn’s and I’d like to blame her for the shaky camera but that’s…my weak hand, right now. Sigh. The abrupt end is because Liam and opened the control panel for the gas stove right then. Typical!
It is amazing to me that we can clean up as a family and not end up crying, yelling, and isolated from each other. I mean…not amazing in that, this is a choice Carl and I have made. But amazing from where I came from.
I do have shots of the boys’ rooms that I’ll try to get up this weekend.
(As a side discussion…I kind of wanted to hire cleaners, this round, and ended up having to roll that money into the nanny budget. And V. does tidy toys – not Fridays as she leaves early – and do the daytime’s dishes _if_ she has time, and she might do laundry in the future if Liam ever naps properly. I am all for doing that if people can afford it, in theory.
In practice I have to admit that whenever I have really come down to paying for it – it is cheaper than therapy, illness or divorce – I have felt like I was sucking it out of RESP money (college fund for you US types). When I say I can’t afford something sometimes I really can’t, but sometimes it is that I don’t want to allocate the funds in that direction. But I have to admit that in the back of mind I do think that if the house ever really got away from us — I thought it would when I was on bedrest but it miraculously didn’t — I would just pay for people to come get it back up to standard. And might, at any time.)
