Success

If you've been reading this blog for a while, you may recall my campaign to make G into a fearless air traveler and not a white-knuckled one like me. I've taken her on three flights in the last 11 months (two of them cross-country), using every skill I learned in my college acting classes to appear confident and carefree instead of scared shitless, and now I know it was worth it.

How, you ask?

Because today she turned to me and said, "I think I might be a flight attendant when I grow up."

OMG! I thought. Aloud, I said, "Well, it would be cool to travel to a lot of places."

"Yeah," she said dreamily, "and I'd get to walk all around the plane while it was in the air." Then she paused and said "When can we go someplace on a plane again, Mom? I want to fly."

I win at life! All right, just for today, but still, I win!

On the bad-parent side of the coin, I introduced G to Monty Python's Lumberjack Song yesterday. She thought it was hysterical and has been going around singing "I chop down trees, I wear high heels, suspenders and a BRAAAA" all day. I suppose I should feel guilty about this, but it's my responsibility to introduce her to the classics, right? It's just like when I read her Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and taught her how to play "Ode to Joy" on the piano. Only not.

Secret ingredient

It's 7:30 in the morning and I'm making G's breakfast while she waits at the table ...

G: How do you make the cinnamon toast taste so good?
Me: Must be all the love I put in it.

(pause)

G: Thank you for the love, Mom.

Spirits of earth and air

April 16, 2008:

So the other night (Thursday, I think) I woke up at about 1 a.m. because I had heard someone call my name, loud and close by, as if they were trying to wake me up. I looked around, but obviously there wasn't anyone there, so I went back to sleep.

A little while after that, I woke up again, and as I opened my eyes, I saw something over my bed in the dark, probably two feet above me and the same distance in front of me. I described it as an irregular circle to someone the next day, but it wasn't really round enough to be a circle -- almost a kite shape, but more circular than that. (Vague, I know, but I only saw it for a few seconds and it's been a while since then.) It wasn't very big, and I had a distinct impression that it was flat. It had a glow to it, and there were colors within the glow, green and blue, like the colors you see in an opal.

I was in the process of sitting up in bed as I woke up -- it felt like coming up through water toward the surface -- and as I sat up and got closer to whatever-it-was, it flew backward away from me, as if it were being pulled on a string. (If you've ever had a floater in your eye, it was a bit like that, the way they drift off to the side of your vision as you try to look at them.) By the time I was sitting all the way up, it was gone.

It wasn't a frightening experience -- I just lay down again and thought about it for a minute or two before turning over and going back to sleep -- but it was very odd. I don't really believe in ghosts (I don't not believe in them, but I don't have any real proof they exist, either) but it was almost enough to make me think I'd been visited by some sort of spirit.

Dec. 2, 2008:

... Maybe six months ago, I woke up in the middle of the night and saw a strange, kite-shaped glowing object hovering over me, glowing with half a dozen opalescent colors. I saw it for a split second and then it flew backward and disappeared. I had forgotten about it until last night, when I had a similar experience.

The last time this happened, I had gone to bed fairly late and hadn't been asleep very long, and I woke up because I heard someone say my name. This time, I had also gone to bed late, but I don't know what woke me, only that I opened my eyes and this thing was directly in front of my face. It wasn't solid like the last time, but made up of dozens or hundreds of tiny red and green lights. They were connected in a vaguely spherical shape by strands of something I couldn't quite see, and the overall effect was of a tangled bundle of Christmas-tree lights. I saw it and I said out loud, as if I were answering a question someone had asked me while I was sleeping, "It's because you aren't here. I wouldn't do it if you were here." Whatever-it-was then flew backward over my head and (I assume) disappeared through the headboard of the bed. I looked at the clock -- it was 1:41 a.m. -- and then I calmly went back to sleep and didn't think about it again until I was in the shower this morning.

Time to lay off the crack, eh?

April 20, 2009:

Twice in the past I've written about waking up shortly after falling asleep to see glowing/lighted objects hanging just over my bed. Well, last night my subconscious took it to a new level, because I saw an actual person in front of me. I had fallen asleep about half an hour before, and as I started to wake up I saw a young man (maybe in his early twenties) with short, dark blond or light brown hair, holding something in his hands. He wasn't transparent by any means, but he clearly wasn't solid either, if that makes any sense. I woke up and sat up at the same time, with that coming-up-through-water feeling I've had before, and I tried to grab at him, but he was moving away from me, and my hands went through him. By the time I was sitting all the way up, he was gone and I was fully awake. I looked over at the clock and saw that it was 1:22 a.m. ...

... I know it must have been a dream, but it wasn't like a dream at all because there wasn't any plot preceding it -- he wasn't a character in a dream I was having, he was just there as I woke up. If anything, it was like I woke up because I knew he was there and wanted to get a better look at him, or possibly at what he was holding.

I hadn't been bothered by the two glowing-light experiences, but this one did disturb me a bit -- I wasn't frightened, just a little freaked out because well, I thought I'd seen a stranger in my room. But I was really tired, so after a couple of minutes I just shrugged and went back to sleep. I told my dad about it when he called earlier this evening, and he said I should write it all down and turn it into a best-selling novel. He would say that. :)

April 25, 2009:

... Also, here's something that I have to admit freaked me out a bit. Last Saturday, I had that strange experience, and today, I found out that my mother's youngest brother had died unexpectedly a couple of days before it happened. The last time I saw him, 25 years ago, he was about the age of the young man I saw in my dream, and looked similar, with light hair. But the really spooky bit is that it turns out a few months ago, he had lost the fingers from his right hand in an accident and was deeply depressed about it. I had thought the man I saw/dreamt of/whatever was showing me something in his cupped hands, but maybe what he was showing me was his hands themselves -- that they had been restored and were whole. I generally consider myself to be a skeptic, but sometimes it's hard to be one when weird things like this happen.

Discuss ...

Rollercoaster

I've been all over the place today. I woke up in a strange, reckless state of mind and left home wondering if I was going to say or do something I would regret later. Next I got some kudos and a possible opportunity that put me in a great mood, and then along came an unexpectedly large expense that made me want to tear my hair out. It's getting close to midnight and I still don't know whether to categorize the day as good or bad. Plus, I still feel weird and jittery, as if something big is about to happen. It makes me nervous.

Also today, I got proof positive that I am completely oblivious to other people. When I went downstairs to get lunch, one of the chef guys asked me "Were you at [name of shopping plaza] last weekend?" I said "Yeah, on Saturday night," and he said "I thought so. I was there to see Star Trek, and I saw you sitting on a bench outside and thought 'Hey, I know her,' but I didn't want to bother you."

I said that I had been there to see a movie too and we chatted about what we'd both watched for a few seconds, and then I walked away with my burrito feeling like the most unobservant person on the planet. Not only did I not see this guy on Saturday (I was waiting for a friend and had my nose stuck in a magazine), but if I had, I never would have made the connection that person at the movie theater = person from the café at work, unless someone pointed it out. And yet he somehow managed to recognize me out of context, at a distance, and in the dark no less. Either he's some sort of super-secret super-spy, or I go around completely lost in my own world all the time. I'm thinking it's probably the latter.

And on a final, vermin-related note, I found out that both of our cats have fleas and that G was probably exposed to head lice during her Girl Scout troop's sleepover last weekend. My skin is crawling just thinking about it, especially the lice part -- I've made it through 10 years of parenting without ever having to deal with lice, and I don't want to start now. I already dosed the cats up with Capstar and Frontline, so they should be fine, but lice ... ewwwwwwwww. The girl with the lice is a lot younger and she and G didn't really hang out or sleep near each other, so hopefully we've escaped the scourge. Only time will tell.

Joe Cool

At the dinner table last night:

Me: Who did you play with at recess today?
G: Um, Mom, I don't exactly "play" at recess anymore.
Me: What do you do instead?
G: I hang out.

Survey says

1. How old were you when you started walking or biking to some places (e.g. school or a friend's place) on your own? What were the circumstances?)

I was allowed to play outside on my own starting at about age 7. I started walking to school alone after we moved to Houston, when I was nine and in fourth grade. Around the same time, I also started walking to the park by myself, and I remember very clearly being allowed to walk to the Stop 'n Go down the street for the first time. (I bought a candy bar and a Richie Rich comic book. Good times.)

2. How old were you when you started taking public transit on your own? What were the circumstances?

I started taking the public bus to school at the beginning of ninth grade, so I would have been 13, almost 14. I went to school in another city, and it was quite a long trip -- 45 minutes on two buses.

3. How old were you when you first took a long-distance trip (unaccompanied on the bus, train, or plane, even if you were met at your destination) on your own? What were the circumstances?

I don't think I ever did this as a child. I do remember that when we lived in Houston, my best friend from Louisiana, who would have been about 11 at the time, flew by herself to spend a week visiting me.

4. This set of questions was inspired by a news story about a woman leaving her nine-year-old in downtown Manhattan to find his own way home on transit and the controversy it caused (http://news.aol.com/newsbloggers/2008/04/07/is-9-too-young-to-ride-the-nyc-subway-alone/). What's your reaction to this story?

I think a lot of the people who flipped out about this are from the suburbs. Nine is too young, IMHO, but most of the people I've met who grew up in NYC started using public transit independently at a pretty early age. Incidentally, this is also really common in large European cities -- I used to know someone from Paris, and she said that she and all her classmates were taking the metro to school alone by the time they were 11 or 12. (Now, whether I would let G do this is another story -- see the next question.)

5. At what age would or did you let your kids (hypothetical kids, if you don't have them) do those things where you live now?

G is 10 -- close to 10 1/2, actually -- and she isn't allowed to play outside or go anywhere by herself. If we lived in the neighborhood immediately surrounding her school, where there isn't a lot of traffic and most of the people know each other, I would most likely let her walk to school next year (fifth grade) if she walked with a friend. But, we live on a busy street and don't know our neighbors, so she's not going to be walking anywhere without me in the near future. Maybe when she starts junior high.

As for the other situations, I wouldn't allow her to take public transit alone until high school, and probably not even then. Our bus system is awful and it's easy to miss a connection and get stranded somewhere, plus I have not-so-fond memories of being harassed by men, both in cars and on foot, while waiting at the bus stop. On the other hand, I probably would let her fly alone to visit relatives at 13 or so, assuming someone I trusted was meeting her at the other end.

Could have been worse

I spent quite some time this morning begging G to please please PLEASE go and see a movie with me for Mother's Day. She refused to do that, but she did finally consent, after I told her it was the only way she'd be eating as I wasn't going to cook, to eat lunch at a restaurant in the mall. I don't know why she always chooses Mother's Day to have one of her "I don't wanna go out" days, but she did the same thing last year.

On the bright side, once we actually got to the restaurant, she was very pleasant company, and even agreed to go to the bookstore for 20 minutes when we finished eating. She ended up getting a Webk*nz while we were there, so it was a good deal for her.

Anyway, I suppose this problem will eventually solve itself because she'll be old enough to stay home and do what she wants to do while I go out and do what I want to do, but I'd rather have her spend the day with me. Only, you know, not under duress. Sigh.

Oh good grief

Me: Hey, Mother's Day is this Sunday.
G: We should get a present for Catherine! She's a mom.
Me: Okay, that's great for the cat, but what should we do for me?
G: I don't know.

Aargh.

Here it comes

Friday night is the big annual Fifties-themed sock hop at G's school. She's excited and has already planned her outfit. I'm looking forward to it with all the enthusiasm I would reserve for another root canal. This is because unlike other events, where it's pretty common for one parent to bring the kid(s), the sock hop is a family night, which means that the few people I know well enough to chit-chat with will be with their families, leaving me to languish in total boredom while G alternates between running around with her friends and appearing to announce, "Mom, I need money for popcorn/glow bracelets/root beer floats/raffle tickets/a live raccoon." (OK, I'm kidding about that last one, but if they had a live raccoon booth she would totally be all over it.) I don't mind sitting by myself per se, but three hours is a long time to watch people do the Cha Cha Slide and eavesdrop while they gossip about other people I don't know. I wonder if it would look too weird if I brought a book to read.

How have I managed to have a child in the same school for five years without connecting with any of the other parents, you ask? Beats me. There's certainly a network of parents who know each other, drive each others' kids around, socialize outside school, etc., but I'm not part of it. We went on a big group trick-or-treating expedition last Halloween because G got invited by a friend whose mother is part of that network, and no one except the friend's mother said two words to me all evening. I think it's partly because we don't live in the neighborhood immediately surrounding the school, where most of these relationships seem to flourish; partly because I work full-time and am not at the school during the day; and partly because I don't have much in common with them other than the fact that our kids go to school together.

I know if P were around the situation would be different -- he was the sort of person who could talk to anyone, and if I walked away from him for five minutes in the video store, I'd come back to find him embroiled in a deep discussion with a total stranger about the merits of Jackie Chan vs. Chow Yun-Fat. But, he's gone and I'm crap at small talk, so here we are. It doesn't help that I don't watch TV or follow sports -- he used to say that those were the two golden topics if you wanted to talk to people you didn't know, and from conversations I've overheard, he was right. He also said that most people thought I was standoffish and didn't like them because I didn't jump in and chat, and he was probably right about that too. It isn't true, though; I don't dislike very many people at all. Well, except for those beeyotches from last Halloween. I have a special frowny face for them. Here it is: >:-<

Beware the borborygmi

Today's Word of the Day:

borborygmus

noun: A rumbling noise caused by the movement of gas through the intestines.

Personally, I think "borborygmus" sounds like the name of a prehistoric monster.

"Run, Chet! It's a borborygmus, and it looks hungry!"

"Looks like you got borborygmi in your back yard, ma'am. I'm gonna have to lay down some traps."

"As the juvenile borborygmi left the nest for the first time, the adult borborygmus kept a watchful eye for larger predators ..."

Tee hee!

The whole tooth and nothing but the tooth

A short review of root canals:

They suck. Don't get one.

Yes, yesterday morning I went to the dentist with a throbbing toothache, and five hours later I was at an endodontist's office having a root canal. I can't take regular novocaine because it has epinephrine in it, and the alternative anesthetic isn't as effective, so I ended up getting five injections (two before the procedure and three during it to "top up"), which was loads of fun, let me tell you. I'm not that bothered by needles, so I can't imagine what it would have been like for someone who is.

Anyway, the whole thing was quite unpleasant and I'm very sore and fragile-feeling and can't eat properly today, but even so, the aftermath hurts less than the toothache itself did. The downer is that he couldn't finish the whole procedure yesterday, so I have to go back next week to have my tooth reopened, the roots shaped and the packing stuff put in, and then one more time to get the actual crown.

Oh, and as I was leaving, all numb and puffy, he gave me a prescription for antibiotics, but said not to take them unless I notice swelling or redness. I hate when doctors do that. I don't want the responsibility of deciding whether I need medication or not -- you're the doctor, you tell me! What if I get an infection and don't realize it, and end up maimed or dead because I had the antibiotics and didn't take them? It could happen. (That said, I just checked out my mouth and I don't see anything even slightly abnormal. But I do have a headache which is clearly a rampaging brain disease. :P)

Of course I don't want to take them if I don't have to, since that's how antibiotic resistance happens, but I do question whether my degree in English literature qualifies me to make medical judgments. I'm thinking it probably doesn't. I can analyze the heck out of your short story, though. Ha.

And now for something more cheerful

Totally fab video:



I wish life were really like that!

Tripping in the holes

Sometimes it amazes me that almost three years after P's death, I'm still uncovering new bits of loss. Little things; things I hadn't even realized I'd lost until I thought of them.

Take tonight, for example. I was reading my daily blogs, and I saw a comment from someone that began "My husband and I were lying in bed one night and talking about the kids ..." I thought I remember doing that, and then in the next instant, I will never do that again. And it's true. I can talk about G with friends and relatives and strangers on the Internet, but I will never, ever again lie in bed at night and discuss her -- her education, her activities, her friends, her future -- with her father, the only other person in the world who cares about her the way I do. It took my breath away to think about it.

This whole business of widowhood is like having your house robbed. When it first happens, you come home and see right away that there are empty spaces and useless, dangling wires where the television and stereo and computer used to be, and you flip out and call the police and there's a huge fuss. But then later, over weeks and months and years, you slowly realize that a lot more is missing than you saw at first glance. You go to put on that special necklace, the one you loved even though it only had sentimental value, and you search and search for it before realizing that they must have gotten that too. You need to hang up a picture and the toolbox is nowhere to be found. You go to make a smoothie one morning, and oh fuck, they even took the blender? Surely they wouldn't have taken something like that, would they?

Only they did. They took it all, big and small, important and insignificant.

Everything is gone.

Things you don't see every day

Today I saw a clown randomly walking down a busy street. No sign of a birthday party or circus anywhere nearby -- just a guy in full clown regalia, walking along as if he were heading for the bus stop or the supermarket.

"Hey, there's a clown!" I said to my friend, who was driving. Perhaps not the most astute remark, but what else can you say in that situation?

Anyway, now I want to go back at the same time tomorrow and see if he's there again. I'm imagining him making the same trek every day, sweating under his red nose and greasepaint, off to a destination only he knows. It's the March of the Lone Clown.

How to get a Harry Potter fan to do math

G (face down on her desk): Uuuuugghhhhh.
Me: Just one more problem to go. You can do it. Everyone is counting on you!
G (starting to giggle): Like in Quidditch.
Me: Yes! Grab the Golden Divisor for Gryffindor!
G (laughing so hard she can barely hold her pencil): Okay.
Me: ... And she's done it! Gryffindor wins the Improper Fractions Cup.
G: Can I go start reading Goblet of Fire now?
Me: Be my guest.