Reasons Like Seasons

Boy One is being an uncooperative punk, and my husband is mad. Boy One is five, and my husband is an adult, but at the moment, it is hard to tell the difference. Both of them need a time-out, but instead they yell at each other, locked in conflict, for longer than I would wish, neither willing to back down or retire. After far too long, they are calm, and I venture to speak. "Why don't you call your mom and ask her what you were like when you were five?" I suggest. "Why don't you call your mom?" he throws back. "She said I didn't listen until I was thirty," I replied, "and with that, she's being generous." "I'm not calling my mom," he declared. "Have it your way," I respond, grinning. (I bet he was exactly the same.)

I feel as though I am on the brink of something. The brink of what, I can't tell you, but I hope it is something good, something rewarding. I could use something rewarding. Maybe it's the usual excitement of the new school year. As one who longs for routine, the comfort of established daily expectations, I certainly picked the wrong profession. Months of unstructured summers tear me apart, and the despite my constant vigilance, there is too much variation for my liking. I spend more time thinking about what I should do than actually doing it, and the stress builds more than it is relieved. I feel like the only person on the planet who gets stressed out by having too much time off. Maybe it's the promise of finally going back to work. Maybe it's the culmination of the steps I managed to take during my time off to put myself in a better position in my body. I got glasses, so now I don't have to squint and strain to read or write an email. I started going to the chir...

As I waited for the elevator with my wagon, B2, and a pile of empty blue Ikea bags, I cursed myself for thinking it wouldn't be so bad having to share a laundry room with a hundred other people. It was 10:25 and I had washed six loads of laundry. "People all over the world share washers and dryers with others," I'd said. "It will be convenient to have four washers at a time," I'd convinced myself. I was an optimistic idiot. Two kids and two flights of stairs and too little time have robbed me of my best self. I want my own washing machine. B2 clapped his hands as the elevator dinged, and we rolled in to go downstairs to pick up the last two loads. But as I stepped inside, I inhaled an image of Papaw, my mother's father, standing in a kitchen in Dothan, Alabama. It was an image of menthols and humidity and sweat, and there he was, with a blue hat and a half-empty green packet sticking out of his breast pocket. In that moment, I was six year...

I got home from my lovely vacation Friday afternoon and slept in my own bed that night for the first time in almost a week, only to be woken up on Saturday morning by the fact that July is almost over and I have accomplished less than one percent of the tasks I had planned for the summer. (Insert expletive of your choice here.) What on earth have I been doing for the last two months?  (Spending time with my children, packing, and cleaning my apartment are not legitimate answers.) Time to get with the program. My frantic attempt to accomplish tasks is pretty much my husband's worst nightmare. While I endeavor to clean, vacuum, reorganize, wash, and de-own, he longs for two uninterrupted days of sleep and playing Xbox. I feel you, my lovely spouse, but this weekend, things will probably go better for everyone if you stay the (reuse expletive from above) out of my way. I started with beans: almost six cups of Sprout's dehydrated pinto beans. On Friday, I made the mistake ...

I once read that families are comparison machines. In the story, it was argued that the close proximity of one sibling to another drives innumerable comparisons to the surface, often with life-long implications for those compared. For years, during the formidable childhood years, kids are told they are this one or that one: this sister is the smart one; this one the outgoing one. This brother is the funny one; this one is good at math. In the grand scheme of things, it doesn't really matter if both sisters are outgoing and smart in comparison to the rest of the human beings on the planet. It only matters that this one seems smarter than that one, that this one seems more outgoing than the other. In this way, brothers and sisters learn to carry these beliefs like widgets, widgets of judgement and self-limitation. Widgets that help define who they are and how they see themselves in the world. So, of course, I compare my boys. Boy One was an articulate speaker almost  immediately ...

Not A Cat Boy Two has decided that everything on four legs is a cat. "Cat! Cat!" he squeals, pointing excitingly at an overweight golden retriever. "Dog? Do you see the dog? What a nice dog," I reply. (Note proper use of target noun used in context. ) "Cat!" Fine. Sure. I give up. Your ability to identify a large, four-legged, hairy creature walking around the apartment complex as similar to the small, four-legged, hairy creature that roams our apartment has been proven. Good job, dude. Mozel tov. Good luck getting into college.

(Spoiler Alert) This blog post discusses details of the plot of the movie Inside Out .  If you would like, please feel free to come back to it after you have seen the film. In an attempt to have a constructive discussion with Boy One over lunch, I asked him which emotion he would want to be from the movie, Inside Out. “What's an emotion?” he asked. “The different feelings,” I replied. “All together, they are called emotions. Joy, Disgust, Sadness...” “Anger!” he interjected. “I would be Anger!” “Anger? Why?” “Because he's so awesome!” Puzzled, I asked, “What do you like about him?” “He's so GRRRRRRRRR!!!!!” Thanks for that articulate clarification, Dude. It has taken me awhile to get over myself enough to watch animated movies with my son. I was never one of those girls who loved the princesses or dreamed of a “Whole New World”  or looked forward longingly to trips to Disneyland. But, admittedly, parenthood has messed me up softened me enou...

Dearest Reader, Tonight, I would like to amuse you with a long, detailed description of my near endless adventures with not one, but two steam-cleaners. Similarly, it would bring me great joy to regale you with my mis-adventures trying to make sense of the gluten-free print-out I brought with me to Trader Joe's. In the same vein, I long to wax poetic about the drama that unfolded as my husband came home, tired and over-worked, to find the boys using a bike lock as a grappling hook from atop our piled-up belongings (see steam-cleaning in sentence one). However, tonight, the best I can do is this lowly paragraph and a new page on my blog documenting my meager attempts to feed my younger child food that does not exacerbate his breathing and skin problems. Watching a child unable to breathe is torture of the cruelest kind. May my efforts bring him, and me, some relief. Sincerely, RL

Yesterday almost killed me. It was Tuesday, which is supposed to by my day with Boy One, but Boy Two has been really sick, so he was home with me as well. Clearly, I am not cut out for having any more children, and may the universe bless the Stay At Home Moms out there, because my people had driven me to the edge before ten-thirty in the morning. Boy Two was up at 6:00, because apparently he did not get the memo about it being summer vacation. He also missed the one about not requiring two doctor's appointments in the same week. Man, I really have to teach that kid how to read his email. Order your own at http://shop.lego.com/en-US/ByCatalog Boy One slept until 9:00, by which point B2 was bringing me my shoes and banging on the apartment door to be let out for the day. B1, cooperative as ever, refused to get dressed and replied to all requests for progress with some variation of, "I'm reading my magazine!" by which he means he is pouring over his Lego catalog...

I am reminded of my age and status by my absolute love for the love of Mr. and Mrs. Bates. He is quiet, brooding, loyal and damaged; she is hard-working, eager to please, kind, and damaged as well. Their love is constant, generous, protective, and bruised, yet they carry on together, comitted to finding some joy in this wide world. Besides the obvious disadvantages of the lives of fictional characters in a drama, they live how I would like to live with my husband: glad of his company, proud of my work, and able to afford a fancy dinner once in awhile. I would also like to have a cook prepare all of my meals, but that is besides the point. I think a younger me would more easily see herself in Mary, tragically flawed by her own relentless fear of what could be if she allowed herself the chance to let go, lost in trying to find her place in the world. But I have a place in the world. I have a job I love and a husband who loves me. I have Boy One and Boy Two, and despite the great...

I'll be doing whatever snowmen do... June...the mixed blessing of months. On the one hand, my students are itchy to be finished with work and get away for the summer; on the other hand, my older son gets out of school, and I have to entertain him 24/7.  Wait. Mixed blessing?! Where is the good part?! (I love my boys, but after about four straight days with them, things start to hit the fan.) Camp. I am calling camp to the rescue. The treacherous balance of quality time, sanity, and cost weighs large. After much careful consideration, I decide to mix things up with a Monday/Thursday/Friday schedule for the big one and a Monday/Tuesday/Thursday for the small fry. That means I get Mondays to myself, Tuesdays with big guy, Wednesday with (gasp!) both of them, Thursdays to recover alone, and Fridays with baby. This schedule costs more than my usual monthly childcare budget, but as I mentioned before, sanity is one-third of the calculation pie, and sanity, appa...

"Can we go swimming?" asks Boy One. My heart rate soars and breathing enters hyper-drive. Few things bring greater terror than the one activity (other than riding in my car) in which my children are most likely to die. "It's too cold to go swimming." "It's not too cold for me!" "Can we just go to the park?" "Plllleeeeeaaaaaasssssseeeeee can we go swimming?" "Okay, fine. But you are not allowed to drown. There will be absolutely no drowning! Otherwise, I am going to have to resort to cutting off your Netflix privileges." "I promise I'm not going to drown, Mom." I must be overreacting. Things can't possibly be that bad. I should check an authority that can soothe my inflated sense of dread and foreboding. I am clearly being irrational. According to the CDC (Center for Disease Control), "Every day, about ten people die from unintentional drowning. Of these, two...

A friend of mine recently posted on Facebook that she had, " determined there is no discernible difference between being a first-time home buyer and having an existential crisis." I think she just about hit the nail on the head with that one. I wish her luck in her quest, but can offer no satisfactory response to her 21st century housing crisis. And yet, I muse on. There is no practical way that I am ready to buy a house. I can barely keep the living conditions in my apartment under control. What with work and children and laundry and four trips to urgent care in the month of May alone, I am already well beyond my zone of proximal development. Yet I dream of owning my own home. When houses in my neighborhood go up for sale, I drive past them slowly, longingly, dreaming of the lives of the people who live there and imagining myself opening the front door to visitors, walking my older son to school, and choosing my own native-inspired, drought-resistant landscaping. Th...

Me: When are you old enough to drive? Boy One: When you are older than one-hundred. Me: Then why am I allowed to drive if I am not one-hundred yet? Boy One: Are you ever going to be one-hundred? Me: I hope so, but it will be a long time before that happens. Do you think you will make it to one hundred? B1: Um-hum. Me: What makes you think so? B1: Because! Me: What do you think you will do when you are one hundred years old? B1: I think I'll have a wheel-chair. Me: Where do you think you'll go in a wheel chair? B1: I want to go on an airplane. Me: Where do you want to go on the airplane? B1: To visit you, but not if you're dead. Me: If were dead, where would you want to go? B1: To visit my kids, if I had any. Me: How many kids do you think you want to have? B1: A googol! Me: That's not going to work. B1: Fine. Like three. Me: That sounds more manageable. Where do you want to live with your kids? B1: In South America. I want to li...

5:05 Baby cries. Nurse baby. Baby sleeps. 5:15 Try to sleep. 5:20 Try to sleep. 5:25 Try to sleep. 5:30 Give up on sleep. Make coffee. Make lunches. Drink coffee. Check e-mail. Get dressed. 5:50 "Wake-up" alarm goes off. Make more coffee. Put lunches and work bag on stroller. 6:00 Get boy clothes. Change toddler. (Toddler remains asleep. Good sign.) Attempt to cloth Boy One. Boy One refuses to cooperate. Drink coffee. Regroup. 6:20 Peruse Facebook. Ponder the significance of my friend's post about which Disney Princess she is. Decide I would like to be Mulan. (That girl kicked ass.) 6:35 "Wake up the Boys" alarm goes off. Attempt to pry Boy One from bed. Resort to bribing Boy One to get up with promises of a yougart smoothie for breakfast. "I hate yougart smoothies!" Drink more coffee. 6:40 Toddler wakes, demands to be carried around the house. Boy One resigns himself to the day. Husband readies. 6...

A coworker of mine is getting married next week, and as a ten-year veteran of this institution we call marriage, I felt it my prerogative to offer her some unsolicited advice: When you move in with your husband, there will be things about him and the way he lives that you will hate. These things that you hate will scream at you, drowning out all else, while the many layered things you love about him will only whisper. The constant love of a life is quiet, comfortable, unseen. Listen to the whispers when faced with the screams, and make them the loudest things you hear. Squint at the rest: the problems may not go away, but neither do you always have to see them.

Another trip to Walgreen's for the cream And application as the doctor said Then off to have my weekend as designed To have some peace: my un relinquished dream. Sunday and Monday come, and then, they go. Then Tuesday and we all go back to work But after school, Boy Two is doing worse. His skin is his irreverent, constant foe. His dad agrees to take him the next day To see the doctor yet another time If I can call and make an appointment And I promise to call without delay. At work, 6th period was soon to start When my cell phone began to ring and ring. I answer, and my husband's voice I hear I interrupt his greeting: "I forgot." So, here I think a side-note is in store, Where I lament the trials of my fate: To love, to tend, to work, to earn, to be, The challenges I hope I’m cut out for. Each time I try to call someone at school, I always get distracted by my job, I love my work, and phone calls slip my mind ...