Girl Detective

Even if you don’t think you have six minutes, start watching Evolution of Dance and I suspect you’ll be there till the end, like I was. It’s a hilarious montage of pop dance moves over the last fifty-plus years. I almost spit out my Darjeeling when he did Thriller, though I question his placement of the Oompah Loompah song on the timeline.

My husband G. Grod sometimes uses Youtube videos to entertain the boys while I’m making dinner. 4yo Drake’s favorite is Fatboy Slim’s That Old Pair of Jeans, with juggling by Vova. I think Evolution of Dance will be a hit with the boys, while also giving us ideas for other videos to look up.

Drake’s Aunt Ruthie got him a battery-operated Caterpillar dump truck for one of his birthdays. The batteries operated the dumper, and made loud, raucous sounds, so they “disappeared” before the day was over. Drake complained bitterly about this.

Recently, I agreed to replace the batteries, since Drake had been behaving well and asked nicely. I regretted giving in as soon as the toy’s “voice” shouted, “Caterpillar Power!”, “Move it out” and “Back it up!”, but 4yo Drake and 2yo Guppy were delighted with the “new” toy. It made sounds, the dump mechanism worked, and it went backwards and forwards at the touch of a button. Best of all, though, is a music button that plays a guitar-metal-ish tune while the truck vibrates. Drake yells out, “Dance, Guppy! Dance!”, then they caper around the living room, rocking out.

It amuses me to imagine a real-world counterpart. In the middle of a hot, sweaty day on the construction site, the foreman presses a music button on the dump truck, and orders everyone to dance. The workers toss their hats in the air and get down, much like at the end of the John Waters Simpsons episode.

I’m betting this is not what the makers of the Caterpillar vehicle line thought their toy would inspire.

4yo Drake and 2yo Guppy, voicing frustration on two separate occasions:

Drake: This toy isn’t helping me!
Guppy: This toy isn’t listening to me!

In both cases, they meant the toy was not doing what they wanted it to do. Clever boys, they have picked up some of the ways I articulate my irritation when THEY don’t do what I want them to.

From Sesame Street, that is. Mine used to be Oscar, but Cookie Monster’s charm has increased along with my Sesame Street viewing time as my kids get older. I think he may be the funniest of the monsters, and is certainly the one who gives the most nods to parents, with his impeccably timed injections of advanced vocabulary.

See an example of that in this NPR interview with Cookie Monster (link from ALoTT5MA). FYI pusillanimous means cowardly; I had to look up both the spelling and the meaning.

Did you know that the little plastic spatulas in Play-doh sets are excellent for loosening cakes, brownies and muffins from “nonstick” pans?

Last week I was struggling to put on 2yo Guppy’s fuzzy snow suit.

Me: I do this because I love you! You want love, right?

Guppy: No!

Me (puzzled): What do you want, then?

Guppy: Tooh-tees! (Cookies)

I must admit, sometimes I want a cookie instead of love. Especially if it’s a Thunder Cookie from Positively Third Street Bakery, or a McVitie’s Milk Chocolate HobNob, which one of our grocery stores now carries. (I prefer plain chocolate to milk, but I’ll take what I can get.)

For Guppy’s birthday, I chose to make an old-fashioned double-layer chocolate cake with fluffy chocolate frosting. I’d not used the recipe before, and it was not easy. Things were further complicated because I was baking with the boys (”Drake! Don’t lick the spoon till AFTER it’s in the oven. Guppy, stop eating the flour! Get your hand out of the egg whites!”), an activity much better suited to simpler recipes that don’t have so much hanging on the finished product.

Only after the layers took forever to bake did I realize I’d used the wrong size cake pans–the recipe called for 9″; I only have 8″. I let the long-baking layers cool overnight, then attempted the frosting in the morning. The recipe called for it to be cooled in an ice bath to 70 degrees F, then whipped to a fluffy consistency. This all went fine until I stopped the mixer. The frosting immediately seized, because the room temp was about 65 degrees, as our 1917 boiler struggles to keep pace with the below-zero outside weather.

What to do? The cold, unyielding mess would tear apart the tender layers if I attempted it. A birthday cake with no frosting? I asked G. Grod to take the boys out of the kitchen so I could think. I then replaced my ice bath with a hot water bath, and asked G. Grod to get me the hair dryer. With a frosting spatula in one hand and the hair dryer in another, I frosted Guppy’s cake, while Drake watched quietly. The cake was saved; we all enjoyed it soon after that.

“Baby” Guppy is two today. He is a sweet, good-natured toddler with a sturdy build, and already has lost a great deal of his baby roundness. Like his older brother Drake, (or more likely, in imitation of him), Guppy loves cars, music and books. Unlike Drake, though, he loves to color. He’s long been talking, and does a pretty good job of making himself understood. I cherish the mispronunciations that I know will pass so soon, like buh-bloon, senk oo (thank you), fots and big pi-yuh (big pile), which signifies a large amount of any item (cars, milk, mac and cheese, books, etc.) Two years ago our lives developed new depth when Guppy arrived to complete our little family.

I was putting together tea and a snack for our family, when Drake called out, “Mom, I want toast with butter and honey.”

Since I’m trying to discourage “I want” and encourage asking politely, I didn’t answer immediately.

“MOM! I want toast with butter and honey! I want toast with butter and honey!”

Pause, as he waited for a response that didn’t come.

“MOM! DO YOU HEAR ME?”

My husband G. Grod and I started to laugh. I’m sure half the block heard him, at that volume.

“Yes, Drake.” I said. “I heard you before, but I didn’t hear you asking nicely.”

Drake’s voice dropped to a normal level. “Oh. PLEASE can I have toast with butter and honey?”

“Yes, dear, it’s coming.”

But by that time, 2yo Guppy started a refrain. “Buddah an’ hunny! Buddah an’ hunny!”

I looked at G. Grod. We sighed in tandem.

Me to 4yo Drake: Would you like to go outside?

Drake: No

Me: Would you like to call G-G (great grandmother)?

D: No

Me: What would you like to do?

Drake: (Pause) Do we have a hose?

I can’t even recall the specific incident that started it; they happen so often. 22mo Guppy did something that 4yo Drake didn’t like. Drake hit Guppy, who started to wail. I dragged Drake away from Guppy, and Drake began to wail.

Me: Drake, hands are not for hitting. Hitting hurts. When Guppy makes you angry, take a deep breath and use your words.

Drake: I CAN’T DO THAT! (imagine a crescendo from ff to fff from beginning to end of that statement.)

Me: Sigh. Yeah, buddy. I know. It’s hard. I feel like hitting too.

Poor Drake. He gets so angry so quickly, and of course his 4yo self can hardly process it. My nearly 40yo self often can’t. At my psychiatric checks, my doctor asks if I ever think about harming myself or others, and I feel like asking, “Is that a rhetorical question?” Are there parents out there who NEVER feel like banging their heads against the wall, who are NEVER tempted to give their kid a spanking?

As I was trying to shove a wiggling 22mo Guppy into footie pajamas, 4yo Drake jumped on the bed in the room, then climbed onto the adjacent bookcase.

Me: Grr! Argh! Drake, you are a…

Drake: Joy and a wonder! (what I often say to him when I’m in a better mood)

Drake then jumps into, and out of Guppy’s crib and back to the top of the bookcase.

Me: Um, no, I was thinking more, “piece of work.”

Drake: Nope. Joy and a wonder. (Jumps down from bookcase to floor)

From my struggles with post-partum depression and anxiety, I learned I’m not well suited to caring for small children all day, every day. I’d probably not even be much suited to it as an 8-hour-a-day job with regular breaks. I dislike noise, mess, and chaos. I like to focus on one thing at a time; I don’t pretend to like or practice multi-tasking. I prefer reading and writing to playing. And, let’s face it, no one likes crying, diapers, or snot.

Several thing I read at the end of last year reinforced my growing desire for professional work instead of childcaring.

Kyra Sedgwick, quoted in a feature in Newsweek 10/15/07 on Women and Power:

I had this dream that when I had my children I was just going to want to be with them, and I wouldn’t want to work. And that was sort of this ideal, in a way, based on nothing, because my mother always worked.

I had this dream that somehow I’d be so fulfilled, and I wouldn’t need to work. I bought into this ideal that one should just stay home and be with one’s children, that that should be enough. It’s taken me a really long time to embrace my ambition and to embrace my need to express myself and to accept it in a loving way as part of who I am, instead of putting myself down for it.

From “The Whole ‘Working Mother’ Thing Actually Works,” by Carol Lloyd at Salon:

Based on surveys of 10,000 individuals, the British study found that mothers with jobs are significantly happier than their nonworking counterparts….The evidence paints a bleak picture of the toll that a stay-at-home life can takes on a woman’s satisfaction….working outside the home seems to improve the level of satisfaction among women with children. Moreover, it seems that women experience improved satisfaction associated with having children only when the kids go off to school (i.e., when their mothering job becomes a little more part time).

And a slightly different view, from a post at Mental Multivitamin:

I’ve learned that many women, homeschooling and not, feel all but enslaved to their homes and their families — even women who are also working traditional jobs!

Simply put, even as they acknowledge that they have good husbands, nice homes, and decent kids, they also admit that they feel like it all falls to them to keep it going. This, I think, is one of those gender-specific issues. I have never met a man, for example, who frets, “How will I get all of the laundry done!?”….I don’t know how other women escape the malaise that can suck the color from their lives, but I have always clung to the conviction that while I am a wife and a mother, I am also me first.

I wonder at the serendipitous synchronicity that brought all three of these pieces to my attention within a short time. They affirm my experience that motherhood is not fluffy bunnies and sunshine, and go a long way to breaking down that romantic stereotype and re-humanizing mothers, much as Marrit Ingman did in her funny, brutal memoir Inconsolable, which I read last year.

And from the same post at Mental Multivitamin, some practical advice for emerging from the day-to-day grind, and to reclaiming work and joy for oneself:

I have always made time to pursue those things which contribute to my self-definition, including work, yes, but also things like music lessons, reading (and I don’t mean books for the kids), ornithology, and more.

Finally, is it ironic, or merely interesting, that it has taken me weeks to write this post, since I have been so consumed with childcare and my Christmas cold since Thanksgiving?

This is the kind of thing that they don’t include in most baby books, but I remember clearly with both boys. Drake had been talking, with words and short sentences for a while. A friend of his grabbed the toy he was playing with and ran off. He turned after her and shouted, “M! I was HAVING that car!”

I was reminded of this recently as my husband, G. Grod, urged 22 mo Guppy to eat more of his apples (and cabbage). Guppy wasn’t fooled. “I don’t WANT apple, Daddy!”

Both boys’ responses were loud, clear, and full of passion. I can’t be sure what their “real” first sentences were, but the first angry ones were quite something to witness.

This Scientific American article (link from the Freakonomics blog) shows me, yet again, an instance of parenting that makes sense when it’s explained, but isn’t necessarily intuitive.

Praising children’s innate abilities….reinforces this mind-set, which can also prevent young athletes or people in the workforce and even marriages from living up to their potential. On the other hand, our studies show that teaching people to have a “growth mind-set,” which encourages a focus on effort rather than on intelligence or talent, helps make them into high achievers in school and in life.

Left to my own devices, I’d praise my kids as clever, not praise them for their hard work.

Some days I believe that if I were to truly trust my instincts, all I’d be doing all day would be saying “Shh!”, “Stop that!” and “Argh!”

My son Drake will turn five late next August, which makes him eligible to start kindergarten at our local, public schools. A few years ago, I read Beth Hawkins’s excellent article on her challenges with the Minneapolis school choice process. I thought, oh, I’m glad I don’t have to think about that for a while. Well, time’s up, and the choices, they are myriad.

Choice: home school or school-school. I briefly considered teaching my boys at home, for three main reasons. One, I had a terrible experience in public schools, and felt I got a crappy education. I’m skeptical that my boys, already demonstrating brilliance, (I’m sure I’m the ONLY mom who thinks this about her kids) will have a much better experience. Two, most schools start super early, which isn’t good for kids. Three, my admittedly non-comprehensive research shows that early education favors the attention and learning styles of girls, not boys. (The tables turn at adolescence, though, when the boys get the advantage.)

Decision: school-school. After some soul searching, I had to admit that I’m too anxious and irritable to school my kids myself. Perhaps when they’re older, and less about the screaming and crying. (My psychotherapist didn’t hide her relief when I came to this decision. She’d known before I did that I’d benefit from help in schooling my young kids.)

Choice: now or later. Because of Drake’s early birthday, he can start kindergarten just after he turns five. Whether this is a good thing is a subject of hot debate among parents. Do I start him early, because he’s smart, or wait a year, so his social and emotional skills catch up? Also, half day or full day?

Decision: not final, but leaning to later. Other mothers whom I trust are nearly unanimous in their advice to wait a year with a boy. Our pediatrician thought it was a no-brainer–if Drake had been born two weeks later it wouldn’t even be an option. If he does start next year, I’ll do half day. If we wait, I’ll probably do full day.

Choice: School A: K through 8, “open” philosophy, arts focus, start time 8:40am. Bus stop at end of block, then short ride. Most families we know choose this school for their kids.
School B: 5 blocks away. K through 6. Math and science focus. Pretty conventional public school. 7:30am start time. A few people I know choose this school.
School C: 9 blocks away. No specialty. K through 6. 9:10am start time. No one I know has chosen this school.

Decision: On the advice of a friend, I did school tours rather than a fair. I liked A best and B least, even aside from the absurdly early start time. C is a good backup, I think, especially given the later start time, but it was unremarkable in many ways, and I think I’d prefer a K-8.

No, you may not take that as a title for a children’s book; it’s mine.

Yesterday, nearly-two Guppy demonstrated some of the oppositional behavior he’s learned from his big brother Drake. I did something that displeased him (oh, like trying to get him out of an overly wet diaper, or picking him up when he wanted to be down or vice versa, or some other heinous crime) and he smacked me in the face. With a hippo. So hard that he knocked one of my eyeglass lenses out. And they’re my old eyeglasses, because he already damaged my best, most attractive, very expensive, pre-kid pair.

To add further insult to the pile of injury, that hippo used to be worth a lot of money, and yet I chose to give it to him to chew on and snuggle instead of selling it on Ebay.

It’s incidents like this that come to mind when people gush romantically over how joyful motherhood is. Rubbish. It’s hard work, frequently irritating, often menial, yet periodically rewarding. Like I said: work.

I made dinner last night, and was rewarded twice. First, it was very good. Since it was a casserole made out of the previous night’s quite unpleasant lamb and cabbage stew, my husband and I were relieved that we didn’t have to choke down bad leftovers. Second, when 4yo Drake sat down, he looked at it and announced, “I don’t like it.” A little while later, he took a bite, then exclaimed, “Mom, you were right! I _do_ like shepherd’s pie!”

I was toy shopping for the boys when I discovered that what seemed like a basic box of Legos costs $100. WTF?

I watched Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer with my 4yo son Drake yesterday. I’ll stop sometimes and ask him what’s happening. “I don’t know!” he says happily.

The story of how a band of misfits come together and find strength in their unique selves is a timeless one. But a few snarky comments floated through my head, as I watched through adult eyes:

Hermie the dentist: if you substitute “gay” for dentistry, it still holds together. I’ve recently watched Season One of Project Runway. Hermie reminded me a lot of Austin Scarlett.

What women are up for, part I: When Rudolph runs away, his dad, Donner, says he’s going to look for him. Mom offers to go, too, but Donner declares, “This is MAN’s work!” Then Rudolph’s mother and girlfriend go off to look for him anyway.

Curious timing: Over a year, Rudolph leisurely grows up on his own, then returns home to find everyone is still gone, looking for him. He proceeds directly to the lair of the Abominable Snowman, who is just about to eat his parents and girlfriend. Why don’t the kids see how contrived this is?

Dental work without consent: Hermie and Yukon’s plan is to pull all the Bumble’s teeth while he’s unconscious? Animal cruelty!

What women need, part II: After they escape the Bumble’s lair, the deer return to Christmastown immediately; the males decide “that’s what would be best for the ladies.”