the pieces of my life

Once upon a time, I was a cool person. Not the hippest. Not the most cutting edge. But I had a cool life. And now? Now I can go on vacation at a quaint farm, be in a room with six adults–writers, musicians, and generally interesting grown-ups–and when I walk outside the farm and see a cat, I exclaim in a falsetto, “Look, a kitty cat!” I then turn to the innkeeper and ask, “Does the kitty cat live inside?” Need I say my son is nowhere in sight? “Kitty cat”? Not once, but twice. In my mommy voice. Bleah.

Anyway, this past weekend we attended the nuptials of Ms. Bear and the Dave Man at Celebrity Dairy in Siler City, North Carolina. I was wary of Doodles at the wedding, but it turned out great. He didn’t make it through the ceremony–when the farm dog ran through, just as the bride and groom made their way down the outdoor aisle, he began to shout, “Hey Rocky! Rocky! Down, down. Hey Rocky!”–and he ended up sitting with Adam on a porch swing in the back singing, which those of us in the back rows could definitely hear, but he was on great behavior the rest of the time.

At the rehearsal dinner, his sandal broke, so he got to run around a Chapel Hill bar barefoot. When he begged Adam for some beer (“Beer! Beer! Beer!”), Adam complied and Doodles had his first taste of alcohol other than the few sips of wine he sucked off a gauze at his own bris. Doodles, I’m happy to say, was not a fan. He made an evil face, although that didn’t stop him from asking for more.

At the hotel, Doodles kept himself entertained playing with the piano, letting a much older woman (over three!) lead him around, and chasing the farm chickens and dogs. The wedding was populated with many baby-crazy people (men and women) who not only tolerated Doodles, but humored him.

At the reception, when Mr. and Mrs. Bear serenaded the guests, Doodles and his older woman led the way in dancing, doing a little shake, shake, walk, shake, shake, walk, shake, shake, walk around the tables. Then the two had some energetic rounds of Ring Around the Rosie. We learned that Doodles is a big fan of bluegrass music and we even let him stay up late to listen to an impromptu Celtic music session.

And I had a blast because Adam volunteered to stay with Doodles in the room, so I could stay out late with the big kids. At the post-wedding bonfire, I ate too much cake, roasted marshmallows, and for the first time didn’t mind being the only sober person, because everyone else’s lips were loosened by the tequila and bourbon, and I got enough dirt on people to make for material for some really fun short stories. Of course, after a rousing evening of rowdy-making, I returned to my room exhausted to discover it was a whopping 11 p.m. So much for my late night out.

Usually these days when we travel with Doodles, I look forward to the vacation and the minute we arrive, I can’t wait to get back home. But the company was so great, the farm so relaxing (the German fruit pancake was heavenly), and Doodles in such good spirits that I actually didn’t want to leave. For the first time that we were away, I thought, “Damn! I don’t want to go home!” The feeling, though, didn’t last. As soon as we got on the plane, Doodles started screaming and he didn’t let up until we landed.

But it was great. Best wedding we’ve attended. And Doodles? He’s still asking for Rocky.

It’s that time of week again: blogging time. I’ve decided I’d like to write about something that has nothing to do with Doodles or my pregnancy… but I’ve been wracking my brain about it all day and I’m drawing a blank. I won’t write about work because, well, I think it’s unprofessional. I can’t write about my friends because if they want to be written about, they’ll start their own blogs. I’ve already stated that I don’t like writing about politics. No point in writing about books or movies: I keep a separate blog for that.

I could write about the fact that our appliances seems to be in mass rebellion. Our scanner died. The oven needs to be replaced. Adam’s car conked out in the middle of the highway. We have a few thousand dollars worth of decisions to make here, but hey, really, I barely have the energy to care about this stuff, so why would you care?

Hmm. I didn’t get into this year’s New York marathon. Not that I would have run it this year, but I’d defer to the following year and run it in 2006. I’ll still try again next year, but it’s easier motivate to train when you’re guaranteed an entry. However, Adam did get in, and he’s already stated that he can run a 4:40 marathon, so we’ll see what happens. Call it a hunch, but I don’t think he’ll be running that 4:40 marathon this year. But there, that’s now been written, so what else is there to say?

So what does that mean? It means I’m stuck writing about Doodles and my pregnancy. My neighbors very kindly threw me a shower this past weekend, and suddenly, there is a wealth of pink in this house. It occurs to me, I have no idea where to store Sugar Face’s stuff. Doodle’s stuff is everywhere. There’s no room for anything else! I keep thinking, “Oh, I still need to clean Doodle’s old clothes and toys/wash the new clothes/read up on labor (since I didn’t go through it the first time)/plan what to do with Doodles when it’s time for me to go to the hospital/set up the cosleeper/find a doula/etc…Oh, but there’s plenty of time!” It occurred to me just the other day, “Hey, it’s third trimester time! Time’s running out!” While Doodles was a planned C, it was an unplanned planned C when my water broke at 37 weeks and 1 day. Which means if Sugar Face comes on the same time frame, I’ve got about 8 1/2 weeks. And unlike my first pregnancy it means I have an hour here and an hour there, which adds up to about 8 1/2–maybe 10–hours between now and d-day or b-day, as I suppose it should more appropriately be called. Of course, I don’t know why, but my hunch is that Sugar Face is going to be late. Which means I’ll hurry up and prepare and then have lots of time when I’ll be sitting around twiddling my thumbs.

Hey, as I’m sitting here typing, my belly is moving all by itself. Thump, thump, thump. Doin’ a little dance all on it’s own.

Yeah, I know. I really didn’t have anything to write.

I feel like every week I say, “Doodles is more of a toddler than ever,” but I swear his energy level has soared. He’s running and screeching and stealing toys and interacting with kids and generally being your absolutely stereotypical toddler. He hates being confined to his car seat and screams when I try to put him in it. Clothing is an issue. As in he no longer wants to wear it. Which is fine when we’re at home, but I do insist on clothing on when it’s time to go out. Call me a prude. But at home, he starts to wiggle out of his shirt, yelling out, “Shirt off! Shirt off!”

I feel bad, as it seems life has become one big “No!” “No jumping down the stairs!” “No running into the street!” “No poking your eye with the fork.” We’ve started to have to make use of “naughty time.” Naughty time is restricted to when he is physical with someone. At a playgroup last week, a boy was playing with Doodle’s kitchen set. It wasn’t enough that Doodles knocked him out of the way to get to it. Doodles then squarely planted both his hands on the other boy’s shoulders and shoved him. And again. And again. By the time I made my way across the yard, I thought Doodles had most likely shaken the kid down for his lunch money. So, naughty time. Doodles also gets naughty time for hitting, pulling hair, and kicking.

Of course, not all of the behavior is bad. He’s singing lots more. He’s playing somewhat nicely with friends (“playing nicely” can quickly devolve into “shoving match,” but it’s generally out of fun that malice). He’s talking a lot more to us, requesting favorite books by name. He’s interested in longer stories. He’s becoming more involved when we go to singalongs and story times. He says, “please” and “thank you,” and even remembers some of the time to say, “bless you” when someone sneezes and “excuse me” when he burps or “toots.” (See, Tweeds, I am teaching him some manners. “Burp!” will come later.)

He’s changing so fast. I keep looking at him, getting teary eyed, and thinking, “Where did this little boy come from? What happened to my little munchkin?” And then, suddenly, it’ll hit me: “Oh, hell! We’re going have to go through this all over again with number two!”

For all those who were, um, disturbed that we are calling our child-to-be The Occupant, you will be happy to hear that she’s acquired the name Sugar Face, due to her obvious love of sugar. When I oblige my sweet tooth–which frankly is often–she goes wild. And as neither “sugar” nor “face” is a trigger word for Doodles, we can freely speak of the baby.

Posts will most likely be getting shorter, as, only days away from my third trimester, the third trimester woes have set in. Which means that only a few sentences into any post, I’ve got to go pee again. It tends to make one lose interest in posting much.

Adam had a black tie wedding to attend in Long Island this past Memorial Day weekend. Originally I was going to go with him, but then we started to think about it. First of all, I’d have to buy a black tie maternity dress. Um, let’s see. I won’t spend $20 to buy myself a long sleeved maternity shirt even though we haven’t had a day over 60 degrees yet. You really think I’m going to spend $150+ on a black tie maternity dress? Then there was the issue of the babysitter. The Tweedle Twirp was willing to come out to sit with Doodles, but was she going to share our hotel room (the LIRR doesn’t run that late) or would we have to get her her own room. And what about the rehearsal dinner? Was I just going to sit in the room with Doodles while Adam went to that. The more we thought about it, the less sense it made for me to go.

Meanwhile, my friend J. had asked me and Doodles to meet her and her daughter in the Hamptons, at her dad’s place. I had originally said no, because the idea of me and Doodles alone for a three hour car ride and a one and half hour ferry ride was less than appealing. However, as long as Adam was going to Long Island anyway, Doodles and I might as well hitch a ride to the Hamptons.

Doodles was on remarkably good behavior. He fussed for maybe 5 minutes of the car ride, which was about 63 minutes less than what I fussed for. Mostly he played with his toys, ate his snacks, and hummed to himself as he looked out the window. He adored the ferry ride (New London to Orient Point), as there was an arcade on the boat, Adam let him sit at one of the car games and turn the wheel. Of course for the rest of the ride, we were subjected to demands of “Car! Car! Car!”

We made it to J.’s place without any major incidents (except that one very public meltdown on the ferry when Doodles wanted to walk around outside and we wouldn’t let him go without his jacket on, which he had no intention of wearing), and Adam left us to head off for boozier grounds.

The day was a rousing success. I got to catch up with J., who I hadn’t seen in over a year. Doodles got to taunt J.’s daughter, who at 14 months, was fascinated by the much older, obviously more sophisticated, 21-month-old Doodles. My favorite moment was when it was time to say night night and J.’s daughter chased Doodles around the house trying to give him a kiss good night while Doodles just ran for cover. Someday he’ll be girl crazy, and I’ll remind him how many pretty girls he refused as a child (and if he ends up boy crazy, well, this will all make sense).

The trip kind of fell apart for me when it was time to put Doodles to bed. I brought a travel trundle for him (borrowed from a friend) that I thought would work. At day care, Doodles sleeps on a mat, so this would be nothing new for him. But I guess a nap at school is different than a mat at a strange place. We went through his bedtime routine and at the appropriate time, he pointed at the mat and went to lay down. I sang his songs and his eyes got heavy. And then I started on my bedtime good nights–“Nighty night time!”–and he freaked out. Stood up and started screaming, which wouldn’t have been terrible if J.’s daughter wasn’t already asleep in the room next door. He was miserable. I tried taking him downstairs (where J. and her dad were holding up dinner for me) and putting him in the Pack N’ Play. No going. I tried bringing him back up and laying down with him. Uh uh. What finally worked is I laid down with him, called Adam on his cell phone, pulled him out of his rehearsal dinner to go into the hall of the hotel to sing Doodles his bedtime songs (at home, Adam always puts Doodles to bed). That did it. It calmed Doodles down enough to cuddle into me, and I just laid on the floor until he fell fast asleep. After over an hour, I finally made my way back downstairs for adult company.

But that wasn’t the hardest part. The hardest part is when I came back into the room and found that Doodles had rolled off the travel trundle and was on the floor, halfway under the bed. Okay, I can sort of scoot him back. Not a problem. But when he got fussy around midnight, I quickly grabbed him and pulled him into bed, as I didn’t want him waking up the rest of the house. We were staying in a beautiful guest room with, what to me looked like, an antique bed that was quite high off the ground. What that meant was that every time Doodles scooted over to curl up with Adam–who of course wasn’t there–I woke him up to scoot him back over to me. Which means he didn’t get a lot of sleep. And I got almost no sleep.

The next day, J., her daughter, Doodles, and I spent a lovely morning playing on the beach. But I was on a fast downhill trajectory in my sleep deprivation, the night before being simply the final straw in a week of no sleep (from work, from Doodles, from the Occupant, from no reason at all), so I bailed on my friend and her beautiful summer home, and made Adam trek all the way back out to the Hamptons to pick us up and bring us to his hotel in Long Island.

In the long run, it turned out to be just fine. Doodles and I got to spend some time with nearby cousins. Doodles went to sleep just fine with me in the room. And I got to take a nice long shower, order room service, and eat dinner in bed while watching trash TV until I was too tired to keep my eyes open. These days, that’s what passes for excitement in my world.

The next morning, to break up our trip, we decided to stop off in NYC to have breakfast with the Tweedle Twirp. The entire hour to get to her apartment, Doodles practiced saying, “Hi, Tweedles.” He got it down pretty well and we made our way to the East Village, found a parking spot right outside her apartment, and when she came out… he refused to speak with her.

“Doodles, can you say, ‘Hi, Tweedles'”?

“No!”

“Are you sure? Do you want to try?”

“No!”

Which I could have lived with if it weren’t for the fact that not two seconds later, Doodles started accosting strangers on the street, bombarding them with “Hi! Hi! Hi!” and refusing to stop until they acknowledged him back. All the while, with the Tweedle Twirp pushing his stroller, keeping him out of traffic, holding his snacks. Did she get a “Hi” when she took him to Central Park Zoo? Well, the sea lions got a “Hi.” The polar bears got a “Hi, hi, hi!” The monkeys got an “Eeee oooo!” And the fish got lots of “Hellloooooo fish!” And Tweedles? Tweedles got squat.

It’s a fickle world when you’re dealing with an almost-two year old. A lesson we seem to be getting a crash course in. But regardless, the Tweedle Twirp took it all in good spirit and after the zoo, we scooted our little monkey home. Despite it being Memorial Day, traffic was almost completely clear, and we made it home in under four hours.

Traveling with Doodles is always an adventure. And at the end, I swear I’ll not do it again for many more years to come. Yet within days of my return, I find myself thinking, “Hmmm, where can we go next?” I guess it’s a fickle world when you’re dealing with an almost-37 year old as well.

You can tell Doodles is the son of a Harvard MBA: he has his manipulation skills down pat, and he’s only twenty-one-months old. Doodles hates having his diaper changed. So when I put him on the changing table, he’s learned the one thing that will delay poop removal. He looks up at me, smiles, and says, “Cuddle? Hug?” That kid knows I’m am absolutely sucker for the cuddle and that we have a never-refuse-the-cuddle policy in this house. He’s learned how to work me.

However, it’s causing problems because Doodles needs to stay in his room at night now. For starters, I don’t want his staying in his room all night to coincide with the birth of his sister. We coslept with Doodles for six months, so we will do the same with The Occupant. However, it’s too dangerous to cosleep with a newborn with a toddler in the bed. So Doodles needs to stay all night in his room. Then, there’s the fact that I’ve now entered that well-known stage of pregnancy called sleeplessness. Lower backaches and the need to pee three times a night (I seem to remember it happening much later in my pregnancy with Doodles). Which doesn’t affect Doodles except that I wake up a ton and it wakes him some, so neither of us are getting a lot of sleep.

Ferberizing a baby is terrible. The screaming, the tears, the guilt. And the baby gets upset too. But as miserable as Ferberizing a baby is, Ferberizing a toddler seems near impossible. The other night Doodles woke up around 1 a.m. And he began to cry. Loud, snotty, tearful crying. I tried not to listen. But then he starts in with the “Momma! Momma! Momma!” Gets me right where it hurts. Adam went in to try and calm Doodles down and to explain that Doodles needs to stay in his room, but Doodles simply tries to talk louder. “Up! Up! Up!” And then, the killer. “Cuddle?”

Aaarg! How do you turn down the cuddle? The cuddle is sacred and can’t be refused! Which is why Adam goes in at night instead of me. Because that way Daddy is the evil person who refuses to pick up Doodles and Mommy can still be the loving, warm, giver of all cuddles.

Hmmm, I guess it turns out that Adam and Doodles aren’t the only masters of manipulation in the house. At least we know Doodles comes by honestly.

I’m trying a new technique that the Y-chromosomed folk in my immediate family have perfected: selective hearing. Doodles is proving that it’s a skill the men are simply born with; I plan to prove that it can also be acquired.

For instance, right now Doodles is sitting in his favorite perch–behind the cushion on our living room chair–and he’s saying desperately, as if his life depended on it, “Signing Times! Signing Times,” which is his favorite video series. Doodles, however, is allowed between a half hour and one hour of television a week, and I’m not about to blow that at 8:39 in the morning midweek. So while I can hear perfectly when he says, “Stuck! Stuck!” as tend to happen when he gets behind the cushions and his feet get stuck between the back of the chair and the bottom cushions, I don’t hear at all the tearful, “Signing Times! Signing Times!”

Of course, I haven’t quite figured out what we are going to do of day five of Nor’Easter weather. I finally relented and pulled Doodles’s winter coat back out. Digressing a little here, I, the consummate Floridian, like warmth. It’s just ingrained. And yet I have this total objection to turning on the heat in May, never mind May that is not even a week shy of June. Adam thinks this is ridiculous and has no qualms turning on the heat whenever he feels cold. However, since I’m having such success with my selective hearing experiment on Doodles, I think Adam will be my next victim. You told me to turn the heat on an hour ago? Oh, I’m sorry, I simply didn’t hear you.

Yesterday was a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day (and if you don’t know that reference, read this book immediately!). It was one of those days that truly wasn’t so bad when you try to lay it out, but when you add in the pregnancy fatigue and hormones and stress, just pushed me to the brink.

First there was the no sleep. Doodles woke up twice, but was relatively easy to get back to sleep. What wasn’t so easy to fall back asleep from was Adam has these incredibly vivid dreams–usually that Doodles needs something–that cause him to leap out of bed and proclaim something loudly, which he did. It always startles me into alertness. And then, just as long as I’m awake at 3:42 a.m., I might as well stress about all the work I’ve got to get done and the fact that we’re going to have a baby, and who did I think we were that we could handle a second baby, and how are we going to afford a second baby, and damn! I forgot to call back the folks from Early Intervention…

So yesterday morning, I barely was able to force my eyes open. I realized that it was more than simply sleep deprivation. My throat was sore, my head was stuffed, and I was oozing more mucus than Doodles’s Friday playgroup. “Ugh!” I moaned. “Can’t move!” But when you have a toddler, you have to move whether you want to or not.

We headed to our Music Together class, where I was forced to dance, swing my child, sing loudly while discreetly trying to plug up my nose and save my poor voice. When we got home from our morning, I called Adam to complain. “I have so much work to do! Three deadlines next week. But I’m exhausted. I know I should work during Doodles’s nap, but I’m probably better off sleeping and then being refreshed to work tonight.” Adam offered to come home and work so I could rest up, but I felt bad asking. Pregnancy and illness and toddler isn’t a fun combination, but I thought I could manage it. Besides, I could make it through nap time.

What was I thinking!! Did I actually utter those words out loud? I should have known better. Because I put Doodles down for his nap, crawled into my bed, and waited for him to stop crying. And I waited. And I waited. Normally, Doodles cries for about fifteen minutes at nap time and then goes off to sleep for anywhere between one and two and a half hours. But yesterday, he wanted nothing to do with the nap. And he screamed for forty-five minutes. “I need this nap,” I thought. “I can power through and sleep through the screams.” Um, yeah right. So I gave in and brought him into bed with me. Do I need to say that this didn’t work at all?

Then we got his charming mood. The “No no no no no! Mine!” mood that involves much screaming and kicking the floor because I’m certainly not giving in once that starts. And what did he want? Who knows? Because nothing I gave him was what he wanted. He pushed and kicked and got himself two timeouts because “When we’re frustrated, Doodles, we can kick the floor, but we can’t kick people.” And you certainly can’t kick your poor unborn sister who hasn’t done anything to you (yet).

Sigh. Well, I needed to go to the store and buy him bed railings anyway, so might as well get a start on it. Decided to go to Right Start as the selection at Babies R Us is pretty minimal. Packed us up, put him in the car, and made what Mapquest said was a twenty-four minute drive. Which it would have been if it weren’t for the construction. And the fact that I got lost. I’m tired. I’m sick. And I’m determined for one–one!!!–stupid car ride I’m not listening to the Music Together c.d., which isn’t truly accurate because all Doodles wants to hear is the “Hello” song. Over and over. The second it’s done, he starts with, “Hello? Hello? Hello?” So for the entire 18.63 miles plus whatever zillion miles I covered when I got lost, I got, “Hello? Hello?” until he realized I wasn’t giving in and I got a full-fledged temper tantrum. Screaming, yelling, flailing in his car seat until literally one block away from the store, when he finally fell asleep (and I never use literal in a figurative sense, so you know my timing is accurate here).

I managed to transfer him to his stroller and at least got to roam the store unbothered. Which would have been great if they had had stock on bed rails. They had one, which wouldn’t fit our style bed. But I wasn’t about to ruin a good nap, so I browsed the maternity store next door. Finally, I decided I’d risk the double transfer and move him back to the car. Since I was having such a lousy day and I was already not too far away, I decided to splurge and go to Zaftigs and get us chicken soup and rye bread for dinner. Nothing is better on a sick day than chicken soup!

I got Doodles in the car–no luck keeping him asleep–and he began his fussing. I drove to the corner, about to get on the highway, when I noticed the light saying my trunk was open. I put the car in park, ran to the back of the car, waved quickly to the car approaching, opened the trunk, and slammed it shut. Which is when the rear glass shattered. Just completely. No reason for it to happen. The window didn’t have any cracks, it didn’t hit on anything. It simply just shattered into a zillion pieces of safety glass and a huge gaping hole in my window. I’m stuck in Natick, about twenty miles from home, with a screaming toddler, a runny nose, total fatigue, a gaping hole in my car, and flying glass if I try to drive over five miles an hour. This is when I gave in. “Adam,” I wailed into the phone. “Come get us!”

Adam, thankfully, did, although I was worried he wouldn’t find us, as I could see him drive right past us, and when I went to call him to tell him so, remembered that he’d forgotten his cell phone that day. But he found us and he took the gaping-hole car and let me drive Doodles home in his intact car. And to avoid any problems, I put the “Hello” song on repeat. No Zaftigs, but at least the day was over and I could relax.

So, this morning, Doodles actually slept till the more-than-reasonable 6:30 a.m. (believe me, 6:30 a.m. is cause for celebration in this household). Adam brought him into bed with us so Doodles and I could have a little chat.

Me: So, Doodles let’s talk. Yesterday wasn’t a very good day for either one of us, was it?
Doodles: Yeah.
Me: Are you going to nap today?
Doodles: Mia, burbble, burble.
Me: I couldn’t understand that. Are you going to nap today?
Doodles: Yeah.
Me: Are you going to be nice to Mommy today?
Doodles: Nasty.

And, not too surprisingly, I’m more annoyed at Adam for that response than at Doodles.

On Sunday, we made the trek to Jordan’s Furniture, which for those who don’t live in the area, is Massachusett’s answer to Disney World. There are trapeze artists and light/water shows. The kids get carted around in little taxis or fire engines. Huge displays made of jelly beans grace the walls. There’s an IMAX theater. And, oh yeah, they sell furniture.

Sometime within the next year, Doodles will need to move to a big boy bed and relinquish his crib to The Occupant (which is what, for lack of a better term, is now what we’re calling our daughter-to-be). He has plenty of time; as I said The Occupant will cosleep with us for six months, which means Doodles has about nine months before we need the crib back from him. But I wanted the bed to appear in his room (they’ll be sharing) long before The Occupant appears. I want no connection between the bed and the baby. So we went on our quest for the bed.

We decided on a twin rather than a toddler bed, as we think toddler beds are a pretty dumb idea. We knew exactly what we wanted: a twin bed with drawers underneath and a bookcase headboard, as space will be at a premium in the room (we have another bedroom for Doodles, but it’s downstairs and our bedroom is upstairs; I figure when Doodles is old enough to ask for his own room, he’ll be old enough that I’ll be okay with him on another floor).

After putting Doodles in his little taxi, we drove him around the store asking his opinion on different beds. “Doodles,” we asked, “what do you think of this bed?” “Snacks! Snacks!” he said. “Cup!” (meaning his snack cup) “Doodles, do you want to try this one?” “Efent! Efent!” (pointing to the large elephant painted on the wall) So we finally just chose one without his input. Years later when he complains that we got him the cheapest bed (the fake wood kind), we can say, “Hey, you were given the choice!”

Adam thinks I’m nuts, but buying the bed made me sad. I mean, he’s my little Doodlebug! Today, the big boy bed. Tomorrow, college. Waaaa!