the pieces of my life

Please tell us about your summer vacation in seven minutes or less.

Music from Claire Denamur.

I had the dinner to end all dinners tonight. It was an amazing tasting menu from Grain de Sel. But it was huge.

Usually, after a dinner like that, I complain to Adam, “Why did you let me eat all of that?” and he comes up with some lame excuse like, “Because I’m mean,” or “It’s not my fault!”

Tonight, though, for something different, I asked the boy as we walked to the hotel from dinner, “Why’d you let me eat so much?”

And without missing a beat, he said, “‘Cause I want a big, fat momma.”

That boy is definitely a keeper.

I’m so tired. Really tired. How tired? This tired:

We go to an early dinner, which here means 7 pm. A couple at the next table, which is inches from ours and impossible not to eavesdrop on, starts talking.

Me: What is that?
Adam: What?
Me: What language are they speaking?
Adam looks at me a little funny and whispers something.
Me: What are you saying? Is that German?
Adam mutters something again.
Me: I can’t understand you! What are they speaking? Is it German or not?
Adam, speaking up slightly and with a vague hiss: They’re speaking English! It’s British English!

Oohhhh!

We visited our local market this morning; had a picnic of wine, bread, cheese, and pate at the Pont du Gard; and then spent three hours kayaking on the Rhone. At first I kayaked with the boy, in the double kayak, which was nice. But not as nice as it was for Adam as the girl insisted on doing all the rowing herself.

We passed under the aqueduct that we had visited earlier.
Me: Look, isn’t the aqueduct magnificent!
The boy: Huh?
Me: The aqueduct! It’s incredible to row under it.
The boy, as we pass the massive stone structure above us: What’s an aqueduct?
Me: Are you kidding me? The thing we just visited? The structure we climbed up to view? The massive piece of Roman engineering used to move water?
The boy: Oh, AqueDUCT! I thought you said aqueDECK! I didn’t kniw what an aquedeck was. Yeah, yeah. It’s nice.
Me: ???

After a break for water and a swim in the river, we traded kids in the kayak. And as I was about to lean back and relax and let the girl do her thing, the girl announced she was tired and would no longer row. So instead she sang and occasionally dragged her paddle in the water till I’d yell at her to at least hold her oar up.

And now, after a dinner in which the girl discovered chocolate mousse, we are all overly tanned, overly tired, and very happy.

Bon nuit.

My boy now goes around saying, “Ca va, Papa?” My girl now pretends to smoke. Have we been in France too long?

Nah. St. Remy de Provence is a little heaven. Our hotel is unbelievable with a romantic view (hard for me to capture on the iPhone, but I tried) and a pool. The kids have discovered three sweet shops in a one-block radius. Try getting us to leave.

Of course our bodies are turning to mush. Yes, we walk a ton. But I haven’t run since Paris and I’m guessing I probably won’t. The kids have barely glanced at a vegetable, never mind eaten one. Breakfast has hot chocolate. Often a pain au chocolat. We usually have a midday ice cream. Lunch for the boy is (deja vu?) steak hachette (a burger) and for the girl plain pasta with butter. Cokes to keep them going. Must have a pastry or macaroon or bon bon. Dinner for the boy is steak hachette (a burger) and for the girl plain pasta with butter. Orangina to make sure they’re not caffeinated at night. And it generally comes with dessert.

As hard as it’s going to be for us grown ups, the kids are in for a world of hurt–in the manner of carrots and red peppers–when we return!

No matter how tired your kids legs are or how much their feet hurt, your kids will still insist on skipping the elevator and running up the stairs to our 3rd floor (4th by American standards) room.

The bus is only faster than the Metro to the Beauborg if you’re waiting at the correct bus stop.

The kids don’t listen to “Settle down!” any better in Paris than they do in Boston.

Popping bubbles outside the Beauborg is as much fun as going inside.

Beauborg is actually spelled Beaubourg.

My son is physically incapable of walking in a straight line. My daughter cannot last more than two minutes without breaking into a song.

My daughter is extremely impressed with my French. No one else is.

Adam is convinced his French is as good as mine. “The only problem,” he says, “is when I go to speak French, German comes out.” Huh?

Old habits die hard. I tell Pie to go to the bathroom before we head out to the Louvre. She’s watching Hannah Montana dubbed in French. “How do I pause the TV here?”

There must be something in the Parisian water: Two kids, three lost teeth!

Off to the Louvre!

Give up all semblance of rational parenting, that is. Eating? Eh, whatever you want. Bedtime? What’s that? Kids out of control? Just pour me another glass of wine.

I am writing this blog post courtesy of Comedy Central Osterreich. The boy always begs to watch South Park. I don’t let him. But South Park in German? Sure, why not. If he starts saying, “Du hast Kenny toten gemacht!” then more power to him.

The kids love Paris. Et porquoi pas? Today alone, each had a hot chocolate, an eclair, a Coke, French fries, a chocolate sorbet, and diablo avec grenadine (aka a Shirley Temple). And that’s only because they didn’t want any of my offered chocolate crepe. Mmmm, chocolate crepe.

I think we’ve learned some of the secrets of traveling with kids. The first, of course, is incredibly low expectations. The second, never save the best for last. Adam and I got the museum pass, which covers multiple museums. Today we went to the Musee D’Orsay and went straight to the Degas ballerina, do not pass go, do not collect 200 Euros.

Once that was viewed, the girl was open to seeing other things, and we actually read about some of the art work, talked about what we thought, and the kids took some time to sketch.

After the Museum, we headed to Notre Dame, where the girl got the much-longed for beret and the boy enjoyed visiting Notre Dame. He liked it because he just finished reading (an abridged version of) The Hunchback of Notre Dame; the girl enjoyed waiting in line to see the cathedral and then, after 3.2 seconds, demanding to be taken to the bathroom, which of course was outside.

The kids are finally on a Parisian schedule, and for our 8:30 dinner, I had the opportunity to eat with abandon: onion soup, foie gras, and lots of red wine. Joy!

Finally, we pressed our luck and took the kids to the 10 pm Eiffel Tower light show. Our kids who have a 7:30 bedtime in their own time zone. (Note, it’s still not completely dark at 10!) I have a feeling we’ll pay for this tomorrow….

But, hey, who cares? This is Paris. And there’s always another bottle of wine.

Disclaimer: I’m updating from my phone while on vacation, so I apologize in advance for typos. Also, I can only post iPhone pics so you’ll have to wait till I can download from my camera for the good stuff. Also, remember, Beetle is at our house, so don’t even think of trying anything!

So many sights. And the most exciting things? One: You have to lick the stamps (and I was surprised to realize my kids had never seen that). Two: Someone made our beds while we were out.

Day one was trying. The kids were exhausted. About 4 1/2 hours of sleep on the flight over. We spent the morning at the Jardin Du Luxembourg where the kids played in the fabulous playground and then we watched (in French) a puppet show. We got into our room, napped, and voila! We were human again. The afternoon was spent lazing about the Champs du Mars, sketching the Eiffel Tower.

Evening time we rode a Bateau Mouche on the Seine.

Kids slept from 11 pm to 10 am when I woke them.

Today we went up the Eiffel Tower, which was way more interesting than I had thought it would be. We had lunch up top, and the girl was gaga over her dessert. BTW, the shirt is from Target back home; the girl insisted she HAD to wear it to the Eiffel Tower.

In the afternoon, it was super hot so we took off our shoes and plunged our feet into the icy Trocadero fountain.

This is what passes for dinner.

Tonight, early to bed so we can have a full day tomorrow. And thus our adventures have begun….

I’m supposed to be packing. (Note to you would-be robbers: We have a house sitter. Beetle will be staying at the house the entire time we are gone, and let me tell you, her bite is much worse than her bark, so stay away!) But instead I’m cleaning Silly Putty from a ballerina blanket; answering the question, “I’m bored. What can I do?” in a million, apparently inadequate, ways; hitting “Get Mail” twelve times a minute to see if my agent has anything to say to me; stressing that I have NO idea what to pack; stressing because I wanted to make somewhat of a plan for our trip because the kids want to do 2,345 things while we’re gone and we’ll have time for about 8; and obviously wasting time blogging to let you know that I’m not doing what I need to be doing.

But it’s okay. Because soon, my kids will be complaining on a completely different continent, a continent where there is enough red wine to keep me in buzzed bliss for the rest of my life.

Where are we going? Ah, I should let that be a surprise. But I will give you a hint. I had the kids decorate the travel journals they’re going to use while we’re there. And this is what they did:

I will have Internet access, but I hopefully won’t be using it too much. I’ll either be posting a ton… or not at all, depending on how my whims strike me.

Á bientôt!

I have a distinct memory from—I don’t know what year, but we were living in the South Florida house, so it was definitely pre-1979—and Rod Stewart’s hit at the time, “Do Ya Think I’m Sexy” came on the radio. I started to sing it within earshot of my mother. I’m 9 or 10 years old. My mom listened, horrified.

“What a horrible message that song is giving!” she said.

“What?” I asked, uncertain of what she meant.

“He’s saying, ‘If you want my money and you think I’m sexy.’ What kind of message is that, that a woman will sleep with him if he’s rich?”

“No, mom!” I said exasperated. “He’s singing, ‘If you want my body and you think I’m sexy!”

“Oh!” my mom said, clearly not sure where to go with this. “Well, I guess that’s okay.”

My mother was never one to censor what I listened to/read. I remember during the Colorado years—so about ages 11 to 13—I checked Judy Blume’s Wifey out from the Boulder Public Library.

“This is not a children’s book!” the librarian said to me and my mother sternly.

“I do not censor what my daughter reads,” my mother told her back, just as sternly.

The librarian was correct. But then so was my mother.

Flash forward thirty years or so. On one hand, I try not to censor my children’s pop culture consumption, as evidenced by the F bomb my daughter dropped in the car today with two friends and their mother. I thank Cee Lo Green for that one.

On the other hand, I do try to warn them of road bumps. For instance, my not-yet-eight-year-old son saw a sign at the library of good books for boys. But this list was in the teen section.

“I think I’d like the book Spanking Shakespeare,” he tells me. “I saw it on the library list.”

I read the Amazon reviews. I make note of comments such as “obsession with masturbation, sex, drug-use and alcohol.” I tell my almost-third-grader, “You know how you hate it when people kiss on TV?”

“Yeah,” he says.

“Well, they do a lot of kissing in this book.”

“Ewwww!” Book effectively dismissed. At least for now.

But then there are times when things sneak up on you. The boy, the girl, and myself are all hooked on the upbeat song “Pump Up the Kicks” by Foster the People. I downloaded it onto everyone’s iPods and play it all the time in the kitchen. Who doesn’t dance to this song?

The other day, as I heard Pie singing the words, I started paying more attention. And I realized this chirpy little song is actually a horribly morose story about a kid shooting kids at his school, a la Columbine. Granted, this isn’t something I’d shelter them from, but I would think twice about singing it at the top of our lungs while we do our kitchen dance or at least I’d have thought of a good explanation for the lyrics that wouldn’t terrify them.

To censor or not to censor, that is the question. I prefer to err on the side of “not,” but then the world seems much scarier than it was when I was a child. School shootings, 9/11, cyberbullying, AIDS, all those things that simply didn’t exist when I was a kid.

How do you protect your kids yet still enjoy a great dance beat?

No, seriously. Tonight a bunch of girlfriends got together and we watched The Big Chill. Have you watched this film lately?

I can’t remember the first time I saw this film, but it must have been in college. The film came out in 1983, when I was 15, and I definitely didn’t see it in the theaters, at least not first run. What I remember about the film, is that it it was about a bunch of old people, and while I thought it was an interesting film, I definitely couldn’t relate to it because everyone was so, well, old and staid, and that was not going to happen to me.

And, now, watching the film, the characters are all a good six or seven years younger than I am now. How did that happen? They watched those crazy black-and-white monster films on the Late Late Show. What happened to the Late Late Show? No one shows those movies anymore. And what did happen to quaaludes? I remember hearing about them constantly in the 1980s; they were all the rage. Remember “Puppy Uppers” and “Doggie Downers”?

And those shoes! I got my first pair of Nikes in 8th grade, when I joined the track team. They were $40, but my father said that was okay, because if you were running, then it was important to have shoes that were good for feet, so I didn’t need to worry about how expensive they were. They were brown. With an orange swoosh.

1983 seems both so remote and just a few days ago. Looking at the VHS tapes, the bulky video camera, that padded shoulders, the short shorts, the big curly hair brings me right back to my room in our house on Miami Beach. At the end, Mary Kay Place (who is practically unrecognizable from her latests role as Roman Grant’s wife in Big Love) passes around a pen and address book and promises to write back to letters. Girl, just text each other your 411 and drop an e-mail once in a while. Or just friend each other on Facebook!

Not that long ago, I was talking to someone about the cliche of the character discovering pertinent information on an answering machine when someone doesn’t answer the phone. This is completely obsolete today. The new cliche is the dead cell phone battery. So many vital parts of movie making are falling by the wayside. The Big Chill couldn’t happen today. “Well, he checked in a couple of days ago on Foursquare at the hardware store.” “Yeah, and just last night he sent a tweet from that party.” “Dude, I totally saw about your marriage falling apart on TMZ.”

Odd to think that someday my kids will watch movies like High Fidelity and Oceans 11 and Mean Girls and say the exact same thing… except they won’t. Those films will be ancient to them, like Easy Rider was to me. The films they’ll be saying these things about haven’t even been shot yet. The boy’s Big Chill won’t even be made for another seven years.

Next time, we’ll be watching the Gen X version of the Boomer’s The Big Chill, which is, of course, St. Elmo’s Fire.

One thing I’ll say about The Big Chill. I was humming “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” for a week the first time I saw it; I’m pretty sure I’ll be humming it for the next week now. Some things never change.