the pieces of my life

I have no freakin’ idea where Waldo is because I don’t have time to look for him, never mind time to blog about it. I don’t know where I am at this point. Despite that I’ve finished both the 5th grade yearbook and the school literary journal, I still have, between now and June 23: four Brownie events (a meeting, a bridging to Juniors, a trip to an animal shelter, and–help me now–an outing to a water park); finish the 5th grade slide show (you would think that by the 40th time I’d run through the movie, I’d stop tearing up; you’d be wrong); volunteer at field day; attend Doodles’s viola recital; host my monthly movie night; attend the 5th grade “Celebration of Learning” (don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t cry); attend a baby shower; get children to soccer games, movie outings, math class, laser craze; and, oh, my darling daughter said to me this morning, “I hope you don’t mind, but you know that trivia bee I’m organizing at school”–my daughter may have inherited a gene or two from me; she went to the town trivia bee, loved it, and she and a friend decided to put one on at the school for 2nd through 4th graders–“I hope you don’t mind, but I volunteered you to help out at it.”

Did I mention I’m rewriting my novel? Because, yeah, I’m doing that too.

So when you don’t hear from me until June 23 (last. day. of. school!!!!), you’ll know why. I owe you some good stories. I’ll make them up. Promise.

In our house, the children were capable of earning e-mail once they were in third grade. The thinking is, if they are old enough to attend Hebrew school three days a week, they are old enough to earn the privilege of e-mail. The requirement to get the account is the child must demonstrate the ability to touch type. Nothing extreme. But if they can manage 10 words a minute without looking at the keyboard, they can have the account.

Doodles was motivated. He practiced and practiced and received his account within the first week of third grade. Pie was motivated, but not quite as focused. So she dillydallied. And complained. And said it was “sooooo hard.” And we were “super unfair!” But a weekend with my mom and she practiced and practiced until she hit 13 words a minute. And she has an e-mail account.

Which was fun for me on my trip to New Orleans. I sent the kids a ton of pictures. And they wrote back…

Me, to the kids:
“Pie, don’t look! I don’t want you to have an allergic reaction. Doodles, this was my afternoon snack. Way better than Goldfish!”

And my daughter responded, demonstrating her strong grasp of punctuation and grammar:
“looks yummy were you drinking don’t get too drunk”

And then I sent a picture with the subject, “The Mighty Mississippi,” and wrote: “It’s more muddy than mighty, I’m afraid.”

To which the response from the girl was: “you were in mississippi i thought you went to new warlands.”

Some might agree with her interpretation.

Of course, the boy wasn’t going to be outdone. All over New Orleans, music is played on the streets, in the bars, at concerts. Almost every group had a violin/viola and a bass, so I took photos to send to the kids. I pointed out that even Bruce Springsteen had a violin player. I wrote the boy, “So freakin many of these awesome bands have violin/viola players and upright basses. You guys could totally go rock or funk or blues…”

He wrote back: “I don’t wanna be a musician for a living. If you want me to you might just say hey, heres some ecstasy you wanna snuff it?”

Have I failed as a parent? How have I raised children who don’t understand the concept of apostrophes, capitalization, and an old fashioned map? How have I raised children who don’t see the value of the artistic life? Most importantly, how have I raised a son who thinks the best way to take ecstasy is to “snuff” it?*

Maybe I’ll send them an e-mail and find out.

*Confession: I Googled “how to take ecstasy” and the consensus is swallowing is the easiest method, sniffing it burns like hell, and the most effective way is to, no joke, stick the pill up your butt.

Our house broke last week. Normally our house has this special feature, in which I place my clothes in a container in my closet throughout the week, and then on Sunday night, the clothes appear on my bed fresh and folded. That didn’t happen last week. I went to pack on Tuesday night for my trip and all I found were stinky, gross clothes.

On a completely unrelated note, Adam was out of town all weekend, not getting home till Wednesday morning.

I had this dilemma of what to do. I gathered the absolute clothing essentials in my arms and then wandered, confused, from room to room. Finally I discovered this strange box in our basement and I tossed my clothes inside of it. Sure enough, a bit later, my clothes came out of the box smelling better. It’s nice to know that this can be done, but I found the process so mentally taxing that I don’t think I’ll try it again.

Of course the entire process was an exercise in futility because within minutes of arriving in New Orleans, I was covered in butter, beer, and sweat.

And now I’m headed back and I
really hope the house is fixed. Because I’ve got a suitcase of smelly and not an extra brain cell to spare to figure out what to do with it.

Before every Passover I make a list of dinners I’ll make during the holiday. This year I had quite a nice list:

• Baked flounder over tomatoes
• Kale salad with Meyer lemon vinaigrette
• Cauliflower-crust pizza
• Cauliflower cous cous
• Quinoa-stuffed peppers

Which would have been fantastic if we hadn’t ended up eating matzah pizza every night.

This may explain why, when we visited my folks in New York over April vacation, we overindulged in the carbs (but maybe it doesn’t explain–I’d probably have eaten the same way even without Passover just ending). Our first day there, the kids and I started with bagels from Murray’s.

From there, we had a very special lunch at Sugar Sweet Sunshine. (No, there’s nothing other than cupcakes, pudding, and cookies on the menu. Why do you ask?)

For dessert we went to Economy Candy.

And for a snack we had bialys from Kossar’s.

Adam wasn’t with us during the day, but that evening he arrived, we ditched the kids, and went out for pasta.

Luckily, I made up for it all by… well, not exercising. The kids ran around a lot. We are big playground explorers in New York. But as for me, I meandered. And I ate. And I ate a little more.

(And come someone explain this phenomenon to me? No matter how much sidewalk there is–note the photo below–my son is compelled to walk in the plantings. This happens on the walk home from school when the sides are covered in snow, in the rainy season when there’s mud in the side patches, in gardens where there are fresh fragile plantings, in the streets where there’s plenty of traffic. No matter how much I yell at him to get back on the sidewalk, he gravitates toward the sides. This photo was snapped right after I told him to get out of the newly budding tulips.)

So the food intake hasn’t been great. Although I did finally get the perfect Peeps. A friend gave me Peeps during Passover, which I put away for after the holiday. And then the Tweedle Twirp gave me some Peeps. The key is opening both so they are stale. While I can’t resist eating the first box before they get properly stale, by the time I get to the next box (the next morning), the Peeps are perfect.

The Duchess and I have sworn we’ll get back to our healthy eating. We keep track of each other. And we will. Right after I get back from New Orleans…

*Yes, I know, that should read “With What I Have to Deal,” but I’m taking poetic license here because it just sounds too snooty the proper way and I’m going to be writing a snooty post as it is.

First, though, I’d like to ask why, given my love of baking and my fondness for my religion, no one has bought me one of these tzizit baking pans (it’s even nonstick!):

C’mon, people! Get your game on!

Now, to the heart of the matter. As amazingly hard as it is for me to believe, in about two months, my Doodlebug is done with elementary school. Not really sure how that happened, but apparently it is so and there is nothing I can do about it.

We are considering–just considering, mind you–the idea of private school for middle school. Our town’s middle school is a fine school, and if it were Pie who were finishing elementary school, I’d have no qualms sending her there. But Doodles is a quirkier kid who needs different things than what our middle school may be able to provide. He’s asked a number of times over the years to be homeschooled, and while I’m not willing to go that route, I’m open to seeing what our other options are. He’s the driving force behind this and will have a large say in whatever is decided.

The process, however, is all me. Researching the schools, making the boy study for the tests, getting him to those tests, touring the schools, arranging for his visits, getting him to those visits, filling out applications, sending in fees, giving teacher recommendation forms to fill out, having transcripts sent. It’s not a quick process, but to be honest, it’s a lot more time consuming than I had originally thought it would be. So in the morning, when the boy has trouble getting up, and his father says, “You know you’re going to have to be up and out the door about an hour earlier if you’re in a private school,” and the boy responds, “That’s not going to be my problem,” I can be excused from smacking him in the head a couple of times.

His father, though, is not much better. This morning the two of us went to look at a school that is a significant commute away. However the classes are small; the math is differentiated so the boy could be exactly where he should be; they study Latin, which is something high on the boy’s list; they have a 40 book challenge to read 40 books a year in eight different genres; they have a campus on a gorgeous setting in the woods; terrific technology; and class sizes of no more than 15.

Adam and I got into the car to drive back home. “So,” he said. “What did you think?”

“I think there’s a lot to like there, but we’d have to weigh the commute against the advantages of other schools.”

Adam nodded.

“What did you think?” I asked him.

He hesitated a moment, and then he said, “Yeah, it looks good. But…”

“But what?” I asked.

“Did you notice,” he said, “that they were all drinking Dunkin Donuts coffee? I mean all of them! I can’t help but judge that.”

Getting to what’s really important. That man should be the poster child for Starbucks. Meanwhile, I’m not letting coffee selection dictate my child’s educational future. Coffee is a value that should be taught at home, anyway, and not in the schools. And I’m pretty sure I’m not inviting Adam along for the next school tour.

*You must be humming Marvin Gaye while reading that, please.

Tell me what’s going on
I’ll tell you ya, what’s going on

My to-do list is a mile long, and while I’ve accomplished a lot, none of it has actually been on my list, so my new to-do on my to-do list is to add all the non-listed to-dos I’ve done just so that they can be crossed out. Only I can create more to-dos merely by doing to-dos. Did that make sense? How much wood could a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood? Exactly.

The first order of business is I need to acknowledge the events of the past Saturday. Three momentous things happened on March 29. The first, in 1917, the magnificent Thoroughbred Man o’War was born. The second occurred in 1940, when my father, just as magnificent, but not quite so thoroughbred, was also born. The third happened two days ago, on this March 29, when my newest niece, hence forth to be known as Lalune, was born (brother-in-law, do you need me to explain that to you?). I’m sure you too, Lalune, will be magnificent.

The next order of business is to express my love for my town. Our town is run by a Town Meeting (and Selectmen), and my town meeting representative sent out the list of warrants up for consideration. Nothing gives me more pride than reading all of the important things my town is up to. This, my friends, is Article 42 (which means you can imagine how spellbinding the first 41 are!):

ARTICLE 42 APPROPRIATION/RESTORATION OF UNCLE SAM TO TOWN STATIONERY
To see if the Town will vote to restore the phrase “Birthplace of Uncle Sam” on all applicable
town stationery, to appropriate funds not to exceed $500.00 for this purpose, to be implemented as
current supplies are exhausted; or take any action related thereto.

Personally I’m much more fascinated by this than I am of the consideration of rezoning for medical marijuana dispensaries.

Next, let’s turn to my son. Oh, my charming son. First off, my son has an e-mail account. We gave it to him in third grade after he had proven he could touch type. Note, the girl is now in third grade, but she refuses to learn to touch type, so she is e-mail-less. This causes many fights and tears. Learn to freakin’ type, girl!

Anyway the condition of the e-mail account is that I get to see every e-mail sent. It’s a Gmail account, so all e-mail is forwarded to me as well as appears in his account. I have the right, on demand, to see any outgoing e-mail I would like. So far things have been going well, and he’s proven to be responsible with his e-mail account.

Recently he’s decided he wants to build a web site with a friend. Adam set up a domain for him. The boy was testing out the e-mail (an info@ address that is forwarded to his Gmail account), but they weren’t getting through to him. They were coming to me, though. In one of them he wrote, “YOLO.” He was at the computer in the front room and I was on my laptop in the kitchen, so I yelled to him, “Do you even know what YOLO means?”

If eye rolling had a sound, he made it. “No, Mom! No one knows what YOLO means.”

“Huh, that’s funny,” I said. “Because I do.” I educated my son on YOLO [you only live once]. Do I get thanks? No. What I get is:

Boy: I can’t figure out how to make the e-mail work.
Me: Well, what seems to be the problem?
Boy: I’ll just wait for Dad.
Me: Why don’t you explain to me what the problem is?
Boy: Mom, it’s okay. We can wait for Dad.
Me: I had a computer before your father was born! [Perhaps a slight exaggeration?] What the freak is wrong?
Boy: I think we should wait for Dad.
Me: AAAAARRRRRRGGGGG! I can fix this too, you disrespectful dolt! [Or something to that effect.]
Boy: Okay, okay! I’m sending e-mails but they’re not going through.
I fuddle a moment with his computer.
Me: Do you think it’s because you’re sending and receiving at the same account?
Boy: I’m not! It’s the Web site and Gmail.
Me: Yes, but they both end up in Gmail.
Boy: Huh, maybe.

And that’s when my boy screwed himself.

Boy: Yeah, Mom, you were right! That was the problem.

I looked in my e-mail. And there is was. An e-mail forwarded to my boy. From my boy. FROM A SECRET E-MAIL ACCOUNT! I checked with Adam. It was unauthorized. And now I am ALL OVER that boy’s computer. Secret e-mail accounts MY ASS! He just guaranteed I monitor his every computer move from now until he’s fifty.

And to end this all, my dear friend Lady Chardonnay directed me to this fabulous site of Classic Children’s Books Retold for Adults. And so I leave you with a heartfelt tale from Frog and Toad.

Ta ta.

No, Sergeant Pepper didn’t teach the band to play. That was twenty years ago. Fifty years ago, another act made its debut. You don’t know which one? Don’t worry, neither did my kids, and it’s a heck of a lot more relevant to their lives. When asked what happened fifty years ago today, Doodles said, “World War II? Your birthday?” Pie didn’t do much better with “Um, it’s probably not Earth Day. Was it the Boston Tea Party?” Thank you, public school system.

But back to fifty years ago. Fifty years ago today, my mother went to her class at Tulane with her hair in curlers, which was strictly against the rules. She got sent to the dean’s office. The dean told her curlers in class were not allowed. “Yes,” she said, “but I’m getting married tonight.” The dean let her get away with it but warned her not to do it again.

The wedding, originally planned for June, was put together in a week when they realized they could take advantage of Tulane’s spring break for a honeymoon (and don’t think that the June planning was all that long–they had only met the previous December). The wedding happened so fast, my father’s father couldn’t get off of work to attend. My mom’s mom bought the only white dress she could find, a size 12 cocktail dress, which she altered down to my mom’s size.

And against all the odds, they are still together. Not WWII (although a few moments could possibly be described that way–hey, Tweeds, remember 4th of July fireworks on the Beach? Yeah, me neither.). Not the Tea Party. Definitely not Earth Day. It’s the day that made all this (hands spread wide toward my own family) possible.

A very public happy 50th anniversary to my parents. Let’s celebrate this summer in Europe somewhere.

The holiday of Purim just passed and one of the traditions is the giving of mishloach manot, which are baskets of food, traditionally hamantaschen cookies and other yummy things. I’d like to tell you I’m not sitting here working my way through the cookies and candy, but you wouldn’t believe me anyway, so what’s the point.

Last night we had a “Wine and Smell” party at the house. Pie and a buddy (I’m going to call her Monet) are doing a project for the school science fair. They recruited six friends and gave each of them a T-shirt. The kids (including Monet and Pie) slept in the T-shirt for five days and then they all came to our house so that each mom could sniff the shirts and see if she could tell which one belonged to her daughter. So they all came over last night. Juice boxes for the kids. Wine for the moms. Hamantschen for everyone.

And the little scientists went to work. Sort of. Three moms sniffed shirts. And then I heard Pie say to Monet, “Let’s go par-tay with the other kids downstairs!” as they clomped down to the playroom.

“Um, excuse me?” I yelled. “Don’t you need to finish your experiment?”

Deep sigh. “Oh, okay.”

Back to work. “We’re interviewing people after they smell,” Monet said. Sounds good. I heard Pie interview one mom: “So are you confident in your choice?” When my turn came, Monet asked, “Do you think that you were involved influenced your ability to pick the right shirt?” Why, no, I said. And I waited for the next question. “No, that’s it,” Monet said. To both of them, I asked, “But aren’t you going to ask everyone the same questions? How are you going to get statistically significant results if we all have different questions?” To which they looked at me and said, “Huh?”

It was all very scientific. And while I don’t want to give away any results before the science fair, I will say that, no, I could not pick out my own child. But that’s only because we were smelling shirts. Had it been socks, I could have picked Pie out at 10 paces. Stinnnnkkkky!

Pie is having a problem with her butt. Excuse, not her butt. Your butt. Your anus, to be precise.

“It’s pronounced Yur-uh-ness!” she screeches from across the house.

Whatever. Planets were chosen while we were on vacation, so Pie was assigned hers. Yur-uh-ness. Models must be made. The ring of Yur-uh-ness isn’t staying up well (in deference to the abilities of the sculptor and the limitations of Model Magic, Yur-uh-ness‘s eleven rings got mushed into one), and we apparently are a house full of ten year olds.

Uranus. Hee hee.

The girl deserves it, though. She’s become a mouthy little thing. In the car, I said to Pie and Doodles, “No bickering, you guys! This is a bicker-free zone,” to which she instantly shot back, “I don’t see a sign.” We’re entering the tween years folks. For the teen years, I’ll be renting her out as birth control.

And the boy? He thinks if he steals cookies but leaves one in the package, no one will notice. Hey, Butch Cassidy. We’re on to your tricks.

The boy just had his first experience of school sex-ed. What’d he learn? “Oh, hormones and crap. Oh and we’re supposed shower. And use deodorant. Every day!” Gasp! The expectations! Not that he’s following orders.

Mouthy and smelly. Five more and I’ll have a full set of dwarves.

We arrived at Newark at 4:20 a.m., after I sat in a middle-middle seat, between my two children for twelve hours. Pie had her head on one leg, the Boy has his on the other, and my butt was numb for about a good four hours while they snoozed. The rest of the time they watched TV and kept me running to the back of the plane for snacks for them. It worked out, though. One snack for them, two for me.

We arrived home at 8:30 this morning. Adam showered and went to work. Pie decided to go to school. Doodles wanted to stay home so he finished up his homework and practiced his viola.

And me? I accidentally opened the emergency gummy bears.

Note to Adam: We need more emergency gummy bears.

Re-entry is hard.