the pieces of my life

My children are 5 1/2 and 7 1/2. And already I’m becoming obsolete as a mother.

My kids had a growth spurt. I don’t mean in height—my poor boy is still shorter than some of the kindergartners when he leaves school through the girl’s classroom. But they’re definitely growing. My kids are their own people. This week, Pie had a dentist appointment and I was told, most definitely, that I should stay in the waiting room and not accompany her in. She’s becoming this sporty little creature, feeling sad that hockey was over, but happy because T-ball, soccer, and lacrosse all start up again soon. She brings home private papers from school from her BFF, Jasmine. She has a BFF. She has announced that there are two boys she has a crush on.

And then Doodles. When Pie had to be at the dentist, Doodles had an after school class, so he simply walked over to the neighbor’s by himself when it was done. He rides his bike around the neighborhood with a friend. He puts himself to bed. He gets himself up and dressed in the morning. He calls Tab himself when he wants to play with her. He can change a roll of toilet paper. Recently, it was a gorgeous spring-like night, and my two were simply gone. They left the house and I didn’t see them till it was dark, except for my occasionally peering out the window to see if I could find them. They teemed up with four other neighborhood kids and played basketball in another neighbor’s backyard. When they were hungry, they came home. I didn’t even mention that it was a half hour after bedtime.

I read the entire Little House series to my kids. In These Happy Golden Years, I found myself teary as Laura and Almanzo marry and Laura leaves home. “I’m going to move with you,” I confide in my kids, and while Doodles rolls his eyes, Pie grabs my arm happily, as in “Of course you will.” But, of course I won’t. And she’ll be grateful for that.

But for now, I still relish their childhood. And there’s still plenty of it left. The boy will still, almost without thought, grab my hand as we walk home. The girl still crawls into our bed late at night. And they both still love for me to read to them. The two are currently in competition to see who can memorize the Four Questions in Hebrew because they both want to be the one to say it at our seder. Pretty soon, my youngest won’t be so young anymore and they’ll try to pass the job off onto someone else.

Sigh.

After a week with three time outs, two out-and-out temper tantrums (plus one from the kids), mornings that started an hour before I would have preferred, a switch to daylight savings meaning kids who won’t go to sleep, hockey, a birthday party, two separate visits to the dentist, a playdate, drum lesson, ballet lesson, Hebrew school, and a visit from our friendly, neighborhood fire department, my husband has the nerve to walk into the house after a week in Europe and say, “Wow. It’s been a long week.”

He’s lucky I’m using the corkscrew on the wine and not on him.

On Sunday, I, apparently, did everything wrong. Adam normally takes part in the hauling of children duties on Sunday, but as he was conveniently on the other side of the ocean, I had a full weekend day of managing my children. I:

—Drove them to Hebrew school
—Shopped at the grocery store and Wilson Farm because my kids hate doing it with me
—Ran three miles and showered because the girl hates it when I’m sweaty
—Picked them up from Hebrew school
—Fed them lunch
—Drove the boy to his drum lesson
—Drove the boy to the craft store for some supplies he wanted
—Drove the girl to a birthday party and made arrangements for her to be dropped at a neighbor because I then…
—Drove the boy to hockey, where I finally found a warm spot to watch him, only to have him rotate to another game
—Got the boy dressed after hockey
—Drove the boy home
—Provided dinners, baths, and put children to bed

And the the boy? What was his input for the day? Apparently I forgot to bring his shirt and jacket to hockey. And then when he was taking his hockey shirt off after the game, he moaned at me, “Mom! My pad is on backwards!” To which I could only look at him in an “I don’t give a rat’s ass” way and tell him, “You put on your pads.” Did that silence the whine? I think not.

And today? Today I got:

Me: So you’re buying lunch tomorrow?
The boy: Yes. It’s hot dog. You know I can’t stay away from my meat long.

Me: You missed a few on your homework, there.
The boy: I know, Mom! I’m not done. Your help is getting in my way.

Yes, that’s my boy. Aren’t you jealous?

I know that the Grad Nite of my youth is nothing like the Grad Nite of today (although I will give you that “now is the time! Now is the time! Now is the best time of your life!”), but I still can’t help but feel sad that this rite of passage will no longer be. Disney World has announced it’s canceling Grad Nite after this year.

What’s Grad Nite? Only the coolest night of senior year of high school. When the seniors showed up at Beach High at 5 p.m. to load a bus and drive the four hours to Orlando (okay, Lake Buena Vista, but we’re splitting hairs here). The park is closed from 11 p.m. till 5 a.m…. except for high school seniors. Thousands upon thousands of high school seniors. Taking total control of the park. It was mayhem. It was madness. It was magical. It was Mickey.

Busses drove seniors up from as far south as the Keys, busses came down from Georgia and Alabama. For one night, the seniors ruled the Magic Kingdom. We all got frisked going in, to make sure we were drug, alcohol, and weapon free, not that it stopped that certain herbal smell in It’s a Small World. (And when you think of how far those drugs had traveled, it kind of proved the point of the ride, didn’t it? So all it all, it was not just fun, but educational.)

Bands played; my year had Animotion (“You’re my obsession. My obsession. Who do you want me to be, to make you be with me?”), Ready For The World, Rene & Angela, Nu Shooz, Starpoint, Klymaxx, Miami Sound Machine, Sly Fox. No, I didn’t remember that. But there are lists out there to look these kinds of things up. The bands and dance floors were placed strategically around the park.

The tickets were about $35—I think about $18 to get into Disney World and another $15 or $20 for the school bus ride up there. We were required to dress up. And I mean dress up. Sundresses without a jacket were not allowed. Casual skirts were not allowed. We could wear party dresses or dressy pants suits. And shoes. Real shoes. No sneakers. No sandals unless they were dressy. The boys were required to wear ties (although they could choose regular or bow). Have you ever tried to ride Space Mountain in a dress? I have. It’s not easy.

I’d say that night was full of memories for me, but the truth is, I barely remember it. Hey, it was senior year of high school. I hung out with a boy named Tiger (whatever happened to Tiger?) and I remember having my picture taken multiple times, but for the life of me I don’t know where those pictures are. Probably with my high school journals. Which I still can’t find. My father did recently give me my college diploma, which he had been storing, only twenty-two years after the fact, so that gives me hope that things of mine are still rattling around my parents place. Am I getting distracted here? Promise there’s no herbal smell in the house. That scent is pure rank hockey clothing and a bit of spilled red wine. The point is, while I may not have specific memories of that night, I do have generic memories of fabulous night. In other words, Grad Nite was a lot like the rest of my childhood. One fuzzy memory filled with lots of emotion.

But now Disney is shutting the proverbial doors in order to keep their nonproverbial doors open—spring is too busy of a time to take the financial hit of Grad Nite. Mickey is worried about his bottom line. And the best high school tradition ever comes to an end.

“Forever hold your banner high.” Or at least, hold your banner high till the real paying guests come.

Continuing the trend in which I expose my children to things which are not completely age appropriate for them (the “F You” song, which Pie has deemed too offensive for her to sing even alone in the house with me; The Princess Bride, which scared Pie; The Wizard of Oz–a children’s play version–which scared Pie), I allowed my children to watch the TV cut of School of Rock… which scared Pie.

Yes, that’s right. My girl jumped at School of Rock. When kids were disobeying. “Scary!” When it looked like Jack Black was going to get into trouble? “Scary!” When he got caught? “Scary!” She didn’t want to leave the room (with me), but she didn’t want to watch it either. Up till the end. When the kids rocked out. At which point, she “loved it!”

The boy was a little bored by it at first, but by the end, he was dancing around the family room, shirtless, in his pajama bottoms.

For tomorrow’s movie night, I’m thinking Fast Times at Ridgemont High. It’s about a school, so it’s fine, right? Right?

Yes, my husband did go by the store today for an iPad 2. The AT&T store was supposed to get in a shipment, but alas, they had not. They could order one for him… that would come in two weeks. No thanks, he said. He’s going on a business trip overseas and he’ll simply buy one when he returns.

He didn’t want to deal with the mall lines, so he came home without one, much to the distress of my children. “The iPad 2 came out today?” the little one asked with wide eyes.

“Yes, it did,” he said.

“And you didn’t get one?”

“No,” he told us. “And, you’ll be disappointed to hear that the St. Patrick’s Day version of Angry Birds came out.”

“I want to play it!” yelled the boy.

“Too bad,” I said. “Daddy is going out of town.”

“So? Can’t I still play it?”

“The iPad goes with Daddy,” I told him.

“Harumph,” both kids said.

“You can play it when I get back and I get my new iPad,” Adam told them.

“Who gets your old iPad?” they asked.

“I do,” I said to their disappointment. Until…

A thought occurred to me. “You know,” I told them, “just because Daddy’s going away doesn’t have to mean anything. Daddy isn’t the only one with a credit card.”

“So?” asked the boy.

“So, we have a whole week to go buy us a new iPad 2. And then Daddy is the one stuck with the old iPad.”

And, once again, I am the most loved parent.

It is currently, per the weather channel “11 degrees, feels like -3.” The girl likes to wear dresses with leg warmers. Just leg warmers. Which leave half of her leg bare.

Me: It’s really cold out today. You need to wear tights.
Pie: I only like to wear tights once a week and I already wore them!
Me: But it’s butt-cold out there!
Pie: NO!
Me: Your teacher won’t like it. You won’t be able to go out for recess.
Pie: I don’t like recess.
Me: You must wear tights! It’s simply too cold!
Pie: Fine!

I should have known she agreed too easily…

That’s right. Bare legs. Scarf of… tights. If a new kindergarten fashion trend sweeps, don’t blame me!

(I should add that, yes, I let her go like this. She followed my request. She can’t be blamed for being smarter than her mother!)

Apologies to my Facebook friends who have already seen this, but I’m a proud mama. My boy’s band, actually called The Colored Toasters of Raining #7 (“Mom, don’t forget it, it’s that lines with the crosses, not the word ‘number'”) performed at the end of the School of Rock February vacation camp. He was so excited to have his friends and us come watch (Tab, Jasmine, and Jasmine’s older sister joined us). He totally rocked out. And he loved it. The second he was done, he asked, “Can I do it over April vacation?” Here’s a short video of my little rocker-in-training: Whoo Hoo.

I watched with the kids the final shuttle launch of Discovery.

Me: This makes me a little sad.
Pie: Why?
Doodles: Pie, this is what’s called the end of an era. It’s the end of an era of space shuttles.
Pie: Oh! Now I’m getting teary.

***

The boy has been attending School of Rock for vacation week. Tomorrow his band performs at a club in Cambridge. He’s been listening to the songs he’s doing over and over and over. (He’s playing drums on Blind Melon’s “No Rain” and singing on Blur’s “Song 2” and Ozzy Osbourne’s “Crazy Train.”) He’s been jumping up and down on his bed every night and every morning, yelling, “A whoo hoo!”

I can’t get “Song 2” out of my head now. So I put it on and said to the kids, “I can’t get this song out of my head!”

The boy looked at me and said, “Mom! It might help if you stopped playing it!”

Gee, why didn’t I think of that?

****

For the big show, the boy wanted another stripe in his hair, like he had last year. (This time, though, he wanted green.) So I took him to the hair salon. While he was getting it done, the girl piped up.

Pie: Mommy, I want a stripe, too!

This isn’t the first time she’s asked. I’d gotten her some colored hair extensions last year, but it’s something that comes up every now and then.

Me: Are you sure? The only reason I hesitate is your hair is so long that it’ll take a long time for it to grow out. The boy’s hair is short, so it ends up getting cut out before it looks too funky.
Pie: No, I want a stripe , too!
Me: Well, okay. Let’s go find the other stylist.

We walk over to the other stylist. We all get our hair done at this salon, so they know us pretty well. I say to the stylist, “She’d like to get a stripe in her hair.”

Stylist: Yeah? Sure, we can do that.
Me: It’s going to take a while to grow out though, no?
Stylist: Yes. But it’ll be okay. Pie, you sure you want a stripe?
Pie: Yes!
The stylist smiles at me and then turns to Pie.
Stylist: Would you like me to put in a stripe or would you rather I paint your nails?
Not even a second’s hesitation.
Pie: My nails!!
Stylist: Let’s go!
She turns to me and whispers, “That works every time.”

***

The name of the boy’s School of Rock band? Raining Colored Toasters #7

I hate revising. I mean I really, really hate revising. Well, except when I love it. When I love it, revising is wonderful. But today I hate it. Today I feel lost in the morass of words that make up my novel. My novel is now about 6,000 words longer than it was. But are they good words? Are they words that further my plot, enhance the mood, create tension? Or are they just 6,000 more words?

To relieve the stress, I should go for a run. But, really, why? Because complaint number two is that my shot at Boston is gone. Okay, realistically, it was gone a long time ago, but I still had these dreams. My marathon PR is 4:13:46. I’m 42 1/2. At 45, the qualifying time for a woman is 4:00. Before I hurt my foot, that felt doable. Post-foot problems, I still thought I’d get my mojo back and succeed.

Not anymore. Oh, I still think I could make 4:00 by the time I’m 45. But 4:00 is no longer a Boston qualifier (BQ). Because the BAA deemed that too slow. Apparently, just anyone can run fast and the race sold out too quickly last year. So they made the times faster. And created a rolling admission. So even if, by some miracle, I could run the 3:55 that is now the BQ for 45 year olds (which I can’t), they’re going to let those who run it faster in earlier. Those who beat their required BQ time by 20 minutes or more or going to be allowed to enter the race on September 12. Those who beat it by 10 minutes, can enter on September 14. On September 16, those who have beaten it by 5 minutes get to register. On September 19, all those plebeians who just made the BQ are allowed to register. If there’s still room.

Complaint number three? My boy is sitting here and won’t get his finger out of his belly button. He is going to be in braces the rest of his life because he won’t get his finger out of his mouth, either. Seriously. That kid is not going to ever get a date for the senior prom at this rate. Because you can’t dance with one finger in your mouth and the other in your belly button. [He’s reading over my shoulder and says, “I don’t care! I hate the senior prom! Whatever that is.” Maybe I’ll remind him that there are no great rock and roll singers who suck their fingers. At least not in public.]

But it all leads back to complaint number one. I hate revising. Really really hate revising. Maybe I should start sucking my finger. Apparently it makes everything bad go away.