Mac’s Visit

Getting ready this morning I heard Rosie wake up with a scream.  It was 7:25am.  We were running late, and I needed to get going.  But this was full on crying.  So I snuggled up beside her and pulled her to myself.  Her body melted into mine.

“Mommy!  Are you ok?  Are you going to die?  I don’t want you to die.”  Crocodile tears were coming down her face.

“Rosie, I’m ok.”

I wish I could remember her exact words.  But I can’t.  She was crying.  She was trembling.  She was clinging to me.  And she thought I was dying.

“Rosie,” I said.  “I’m ok.  I’m not going to die.  I’m right here.  You’re ok.”  I know I’m going to die, but hopefully Rosie can progress past four before she has to understand or deal with my mortality.

We rocked and cuddled and held each other close.  Slowly she calmed down.

Sunday Rosie stood on her tip toes on the pew to whisper into Adam’s ear, “Mac comes today.” Rosie was so excited.  Mac’s visits are always a highlight.  She has always adored John and Rosie, and they are like moths fluttering toward the light when she’s around.  Her love has been a constant for them, not to mention that she loves candy and toys.  So Sunday John and Rosie and I were about to drive to Greensboro to get my mother.  She was coming to visit for three days.

The first day she was here, Rosie insisted on being on Mac’s lap.  But this trip has been different.  More confused.  It’s not dramatic, instead it reveals itself in the little moments of the day.  Monday in the doctor’s office as we waited, Mac asked us, “Where is the other little boy who took the dog outside?”

Both kids looked at her.  “Maybe you mean Samson.  (our dog)  He’s a boy.” Rosie suggested.

Then Monday afternoon we went to Duke Park.  The adults sat on a wall very close to the car.  Rosie was on fire.  She discovered for the first time that she could do the big slides by herself.  Running barefoot full speed over the mulch, she wanted to go to the small playground at the bottom of the hill.  This is the same playground that Mac has LOVED playing with Rosie.  This week I told Rosie no, we couldn’t go down the hill.  I told John we couldn’t go watch the lacross players.  I didn’t want to leave Mac, and she couldn’t walk with us.  If I leave her with the other adults, she might not understand where she is.

Then tonight standing at the top of the stairs, kids underfoot, mom asks, “Where are we?”

“At my house.”

“Where?”

“We’re in Durham, Mom.”

“Why?”

“Because I live here.”

“How long have you been here?”

“Eight years.”

John lost Zeddie.  He remembers him, and we have pictures of John watching Zeddie try to breathe, pain on his little face.  John understood that our neighbor Billy died.  And Malvina was like a third grandmother who lived on our street.  She died last fall, and John went to her funeral. In his own five-year-old way, John understands loss.

Rosie lived through all that, and understood very little of it.  She kept asking if Malvina was back yet.  But she understands this.  She is losing her Mac.  Mac isn’t the same person she was even three weeks ago, and it scares Rosie.  Mac has figured large in my kids’ lives.  They’ve seen her a lot, almost every week.  Her home is their home away from home. If your grandma can change, and become someone who doesn’t act like your grandma, what else can crumble?

I’m not sure it was me Rosie was crying about this morning.

Hugs at Christmas, just six weeks ago. Mac gave them two of their favorite presents.

Nascar in the Pit

Life lately has felt rushed.  We get up very early, head to two – sometimes three- schools most days. We go to Salisbury on the weekends.  Oh, we moved out of our kitchen, and now we are back in. Those lazy late morning days of summer feel as far away as the sweaty, hot days that made the pool a relief.  And in the midst, I wonder if we are enjoying each other.

Today was different.  John and Rosie were both out of school.  At breakfast we talked about whether to go see Mac in Salisbury or go to “Life and Science” (our awesome kids museum that’s only five minutes from home).  We settled on Salisbury, but after we got up from the table, we slowly started doing what we do when we have time at home.  I got the kitchen cleaned up.  The kids started playing.

When I got in the playroom, Rosie was balancing on the arms of a chair, reaching above her head to the third shelf for art supplies.  I decided it was time to reorganize and put those scissors, glue and markers within her reach.  So we started moving things around, making masks and beaded necklaces.

And before we knew it, everybody was hungry again.  So, I taught them to crack their own nuts.  One thing after another.  Rosie dug out the playdough while John was immersed in his playmobil pirates and castles.  As I put chairs together for our kitchen, I could hear them discussing whether this particular pirate was dead yet, and if so, if he needed to be buried in the playdough.  It was messy, but they were enjoying each other.

I just listened.  Lately the kids had been fighting so much.  Where was today coming from?  Was it having nothing that we had to do?  Was it my being completely available to them and not worrying about registration glitches  my student’s projects?

I kept thinking we would go outside, but it didn’t happen until 4pm.  We waited for it to start raining.  We finally headed to Life and Science, and when we got there, I herded everyone past the gift shop and the indoor exhibits to go outside.  Even in the rain, we needed to breathe air outside for a while.  I kept saying I wanted to see the bears.  Rosie was chiming in that there’s a new wolf.  So we headed that direction with John whining “Nnnnoooooo, not the bear.”

I didn’t care really what we did.  I just wanted our bodies to move.  After we greeted the domestic animals: the pig, donkey, sheep, cow and goat, John found an old pile of dirt.  It’s a frequent attraction for his friends, and it has shrunk in the last few years.  It’s probably four or five feet tall with a hole in the middle and on one side, as though they’ve used a big shovel to get some when they need it.  So I would say it looks a little like a miniature volcano.

John started running the rim.  Well, why not?  Soon we were all chasing each other around the rim, alternately running, skipping and walking.  ”It’s a volcano!”  Whoa, he’s in the middle!  But you’re the water. (spray with water). Good, all better.  Running, running.  Down in the hole, up on the rim.  All in a circle.

The bear?  ”No, it’s way better to play Nascar in the Pit!”

“OK, tell me more.”

“We’re Nascar drivers,” says John.  He lifts an elbow and uses his index finger to emphasize this point. “And we have to drive the inside of the course.”  He’s running below the rim, in circles. Rosie’s on the rim.  ”No, you can’t run on the rim!”

Yes she can.  She’s the mechanic.  She fixes any of the cars that break down.  ”Well, ok.”  Everybody is back to running.  Breathing hard.

We pause for a minute.  I look up, through the drizzle and see the bank of trees.  ”Look at that, guys.”  Shades of muted yellow, orange, red and brown brown against the deep green of the pines that aren’t changing. We’re alone out there, cheeks are pink, and all I hear is our breathing.  It’s timeless and beautiful.

But it didn’t last long.  Nascar in the Pit is over. “Hey, do you want to be a skier or a snowboarder?  I’m a snowboarder!”  The swishing starts again, around the dirt pile.

“No, I’m a treeclimber,” Rosie says.  She starts marching the rim again, legs high, arms climbing.

“You can’t do that.  We’re on a ski slope,” John says.  Everybody is still going in circles.

“What if she’s on ski patrol?  She climbs trees to see if everybody is ok?” I add that one.

“Great,” says John.  ”Better help this guy over here.  Rosie and I start to help John.  ”No!  Him!”

OK.  Rosie and I carry a stretcher over to the woods and dump our guy into the hospital.  Back to the dirt pile.  Better keep going.  Might be more injured snowboarders.  John hasn’t paused.  He’s going.

Then it’s 5:05, it is still drizzling, and they are closing.  We head home and do the dinner thing with Adam, who reads to them calmly while I cook, and then its time for the bath.  After the bath the kids spring into John’s room and are jumping on the trampoline and the bed….we have one designated old bed we let them jump on….  Anyway, Adam and I both have the half-headache feeling of “why can’t this be easy?  I’m tired.”

They are springing into the air.  Doing somersaults, completely naked.  At least underwear would be nice.  ”It’s time to do get dressed,” Adam says.

“But dad,” John says as his feet flip over his head.  ”This is the fun of my life.”

I heard that.  In a different way than normal.  Here we adults stand, wishing we could rush through this and get them asleep.  But this is the fun of his life.  We are all together.  He and Rosie are conspirators instead of enemies.  I got it.

But your refrigerator is empty!

Remember that little girl in the movie, Monsters Inc?  She toddles around talking nonsense.  She is very cute but causes lots of mischief.  Yesterday Rosie reminded me of her.

We had bible study meeting at our house last night.  With our kitchen getting very close to functional, I really wanted to make something for everyone.  I had been buying pre-made desserts for three months.  So before taking the kids to a playground around 4pm, I prepped the dry ingredients to make a raspberry/blueberry cobbler.  A friend had served me a cobbler a couple months ago, and she gave me the recipe on a strip of red paper.  So I left the house with bowls of measured sugar and flour on the counter beside the recipe.  Milk, water, etc to be thought about later.

We get home later than expected, and I need to get it in the oven.  Shouldn’t be hard because it’s a matter of putting it all together.  Rosie runs in the kitchen and grabs the recipe.  ”I need this in my kitchen.”  I wasn’t worried about it because her kitchen is pretty small.  She’s back in my kitchen in less than a minute, “Here, you can use this one.”  She hands me a yellow sheet of legal paper with writing.  She got it in the trash.  ”OK,” I said.

A minute later I call her.  ”Rosie, I need my recipe back please.”  She comes running in the kitchen.  ”It’s in my refrigerator.”

“Can you go get it please?”

She doesn’t come back.  I find her playing near her kitchen.  She has carefully lined the entire coffee table with plates, each one containing one piece of food.  We’ve been in the house less than seven or eight minutes, and she’s only played in one room.

“I put it in the refrigerator,” she says, “but it’s not there.”  Mmm.  Her fridge is completely empty.  I look in her stove.  Her microwave.  In her bag of veggies.  In the sink.  The whole kitchen is only about four feet by three feet, so it doesn’t take long.  No recipe.  This is crazy.  It’s gotta be right here.  So I look around, starting to feel my stress level rise.

“Rosie, think back.”

“I put it in the refrigerator.”

I decide to call my friend who gave me the recipe.  Can’t find her number.  It’s not on any of the emails she has ever sent me, dating back to ‘04.  Takes me three mutual friends before someone answers.  I get her home and cell, but she doesn’t answer either.

At this point people will be here in 60 minutes, and the cobbler is supposed to cook for more than an hour.  And the kids are hungry.  It’s dinnertime.

I realized no one was going to help me.  My friend wasn’t available; Rosie had moved onto playing with bunnies, and John didn’t witness any of it.  His head is buried in a playmobile catalogue. (Otherwise, he would have probably been my answer.  He frequently knows what has happened.)  Only thing I have to depend on is my memory…not necessarily a good thing.  I had read the recipe that afternoon when seeing what the dry ingredients were.

So I took a deep breath and thought back.  I remembered being surprised that you put the flour mixture on bottom and pour the fruit on top.  It rises while cooking.  And water on top.  I put it together out of memory, and thought of what Bubie (my grandmother) used to tell me.  How can something with lots of butter and sugar taste bad?

And in the end, it came out fine.  I think I’ll wait until Rosie gets older to lend her any more recipes.

Rosie on Fire

Rosie — sweet little frequently quiet Rosie — is coming into her own.  She has let John talk most of her life.  He has a lot of ideas and got used to having the airwaves to himself for the first two or more years of her life.  She started talking late.  But I think she’s ready for that to change.  She has started to hold up her hand to him and say, “John, stop talking please.  I’ve got something to say!”

John just started kindergarten, and he’s in school until mid afternoon.  Rosie has moved into the space with gusto.

OK, but today.  That’s where I was headed. On the way out the door to get John I asked if Rosie wanted a snack.

“Yes!”

OK, how about an apple?

“Sure, let’s take John a banana.”

Alright, well maybe I want one to.  So I grab an apple and taste it.  Blech.  Soft, mealy, bland.  ”Rosie, how’s your apple?” I ask.

“Great!  Want a taste?”  Hers is crisp, sour but sweet, tangy.  Mmm.

I grab another apple.  Not a great habit, but obviously I got the bad one in the bunch.  My second one is as bad as the first.  OK, forget that, let’s go.

Half-way to get John Rosie asks how I got finished with my apple before her.  Well, I explain, mine weren’t like hers.  I go into the mushy vs crunchy, sweet vs nothingness.  I didn’t eat them.  I’ll cook them later I tell her.

She thinks.  ”Well, if that happened to me, I would stomp to my room and go to sleep! Yeah, go to sleep with one of my animals.”  (This sounds like “tomp to my womb.”)

“Not a bad idea,” I say.

“You should stomp to your room, then and go to sleep.”

“Rosie, if I do that, who will pick up John?”

She paused.  It was silent back there.  I thought she was off onto another idea.  Then she finally answers, “Well, somebody who isn’t eating an apple.”

When it’s over….

Much of what I wrote about last summer celebrated the new experiences of life.  Firsts.  Bearing witness to the passage of time.  I could do that now.  We just went skiing for the first time with our kids and were amazed that we spent the whole day skiing together…and had fun!  But something else is on my mind.

 

A much more subtle aspect of the same truth has been hitting me lately.  It’s exciting when your child does their first bike ride without training wheels, their first steps across the kitchen floor, their first day of school, proud smiles on their faces.  The passage of time is both beautiful and painful, and what’s been eating at me lately is that the ending of things also marks an important passage of time. It’s not often something I notice.  Or rather in the moment I don’t know it’s the last.  I just wake up six months later and realize something precious hasn’t happened in a while.  Let me explain, or at least describe, what I mean….

 

It’s 4am.  I hear my name and pull myself out of bed, head down the hall, and slip into bed with John.  I pull his little warm body into my own.  I feel him relax and drift back to sleep.  The next day I think I’m tired. I had to get up in the middle of the night.  Then one day I realize it’s been months, and my name is no longer being screamed in the middle of the night. In that moment, the sweetness of that middle-of-the-night connection seems more poignant than the next day’s weariness.  

 

When is the last time a baby nurses?  It’s another of those middle-of-the night experiences with children.  Seems like we all talk about wanting these to end.  But once it’s over, or even promising to be over, I savor those moments when the world is still, and Rosie and I are all there is.

 

How about the last conversation with your mom or dad — the kind of conversation where you feel that connection that goes back to childhood?  That feeling that all is right with the world, and this is a safe space.  Or even just the everyday type of conversation about who you saw or what you did.  When does it happen last?  Seems like it’s not the day they die or the day we die.  It imperceptibly slips away before then, without warning or fanfare.  And then we are the grown ups without that parent to talk to. And their voice on a tape, or notes about their childhood take on different meaning. 

 

When does “yittle” become “little?”  And “I hate it the cheese” become “I hate the cheese?”  Or the screeches of “I do!  I do!” — Rosie’s claim that she wanted to be part of things back before she could talk well — become sentences, normal sentences, like “I want the front of the bath.”  What day will she stop looking at my food saying, I yike toast, or whatever is on my plate, and just start asking if she can have some.  Language at three-years-old is like the inside part of a celery stalk…sweeter, more tender, worth enjoying.

 

One of the things that left me without my realizing it was singing songs to John at night.  Every night we rocked and sang. John had a bottle until he turned three, and I would sing to him while he drank it.  And then as he got older, he would request songs until we had to stop. He learned about Easter and Christmas, all through music. When the bottle needed to stop, the bedtime stories, a beautiful thing of their own, stepped in.  The songs remained part of the routine for a while, but eventually without the intimate quiet of the bottle, the songs slowed and stopped.  The rocking chair still sits in his room, now filled with whatever someone needed to put down.  The new routine is also wonderful….everyone piles onto one bed – one parent per child — the chosen books are stacked and have to be read in the right order.  When done, they are dismissed to the floor.  It’s a family affair, two stories going at once.

 

So there it is.  When a child clings to you, burrowing his or her face in your shoulder, needing comfort from the fireworks or the guy dressed in a costume, you tell them the guy is not going to hurt them and that the fireworks are far away.  You want them to be ok with the world.  You want them to be independent.  You want them to turn, face the world, and walk on their own. 

 

And eventually they do.  Eventually they can pedal their own bikes, run into class without even a glance, go get the paper, and embrace all that life has to give them.  Their bodies lose that baby fat and get lanky.  It’s beautiful, and bittersweet.  We celebrate those victories and their pride in what they can do, but it also hurts to see the baby in them slip away.  Rosie is three, and she takes ballet, which was her own idea, has a pink baseball glove and knows how to use it.  John is almost five, a little boy with opinions, a love for baseball and six books under his belt.  (They’re way short, but he can read them.)  Adam and I can’t hold onto it. We don’t want to.  Or maybe we would want to.  But as my dad said, “It doesn’t matter how much you love them.  They grow up anyway.”

 

Summer’s over….

I just came home, and the house is empty. And quiet. It hits me the way a familiar smell or song from years ago takes you to that time and place. I lived in a house by myself for ten years while in Pittsburgh. I was not lonely, and I actually loved the lengthy hours of quie. I worked at home, and the days took shape in whatever way I wanted. Today feels that way. It takes me back to a different life — one that was mine.

School started two weeks ago. John was ecstatic to see his friends. But Rosie was reticient. She kept saying “Mommy and me,” and I finally figured out that she wanted me to go with her. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to go. So John had the idea to focus her on all the books they have at school. He tells her how much fun she’ll have. On the first day of school she was very excited. First thing we sat down and read a book. Then I got her involved in coloring, and told her bye. She did great. She even played with John on the playground that day.

At this point, she’s only been to two days on her own. As the newness has worn off, she’s started saying, “Mommy, I want to stay home.”

John and I keep telling her what a fun place school is, and this morning, even though she was saying she didn’t want to go, she put on one of her best outfits. Down to the shoes. She looked topnotch, in a two-year-old sort of way.

We got to school, and John was off and running. Literally. That’s always been John. He gets involved, quickly. Rosie on the other hand stands and watches for a while first. She observes before she gets going. As we’re going in the classroom, she asks, “Where’s my brother?” On the playground.

We go in and there are babies to be washed. There’s actual water and sponges. First Rosie watches carefully. She won’t engage. Meanwhile other children are dropped off, and there are two little girls crying, tears running down their faces. It can feel unsettling, and another two-yaer-old very seriously tells me, “I going to help the baby stop.” But Rosie decides these baby dolls need to get out of the water. Where are their clothes? We dress one of them. Crying continues in the background. We dry the next baby. Rosie decides she has this under control.

Se pipes up, “Bye mommy.”

I get a full body hug, and a loud smacky kiss on my nose.

And now I’m in the empty house. I like this quiet. I like the peace. Everybody is still here, even when they aren’t. I thought this transition would be sad, but it is ushering back something I know, like an old friend. The dog is at my feet, and I can do what I want.

So we are in a new era.

I guess the truth is that the new era is a time of growth, not a time of school. Right at the end of summer, John went off the high dive. A new lifeguard — whom I later learned was 16 — told me she thought he could handle it. And she was right. He went up to the top, hesitated only for a second, then went to the end and jumped off. Just amazing.

Rosie’s started jumping into the “deep pool” from the edge. That’s a big step from the baby pool. Adam’s book is out, and he’s had two readings. My class at Duke has started. Bottom line….summer’s over.

The sweetness of summer. We tasted it this year. We threw out the routines, went to bed late, slept late, swam until after dark, listened to the crickets and got soaked with the hose. It was a time of hanging out with each other and letting the kids play “boomba” in the tub at 2pm. Noone has been hurt yet, so we’re ok.

During the school year there are places to go. Routines to follow. This summer Rosie, John and I were a team. It’s been a treasured time. One day Rosie just started talking. It had been coming, but one day she just said everything. And it turns out she has lots of fun ideas for her and John. So they have become good friends. Now it’s time to move on into a routine of school, for all of us.

But something magic happened this summer. Something special. We got out of the rhythm of life and let our time together take its own shape. I hope what was formed stays with us.

Here are a few photos from this last week or two….

Ready for the first day of school!

Becoming friends….

Boomba!!!!!! (I know it’s not the smartest thing to let them do, but they love it….)

bacon

Did you ever see that movie My Big Fat Greek Wedding? We have tinges of that feel in Salisbury with my family. We visited my mom this weekend. Breakfast is always a treat. She has taught my kids to love fried eggs. They even think they know how to flip them because she lets them help. There’s also always bacon, fruit, bread, juice and usually some sort of cake. Although today there was no cake.

This morning Rosie and I got up two and a half hours before everybody else.  So we had eaten when the big event was unfolding.  Sammy and Emma showed up just as Adam, John and mom were sitting down for breakfast.  So it turned into a party.

Sammy sits down at the table, picks up a piece of bacon. Sammy is a vegetarian, and this bacon is the precooked stuff that you microwave for five seconds per peice. So whether it’s really meat is questionable, right?

Emma — Sammy’s daughter — looks at what he’s doing and says, “Daaad! That’s bacon.”

“No way,” says Sammy. “This can’t really have bacon in it.” Granted, there is a factory in New Jersey where they can make anything taste like any food, so it’s possible….

“Yes, dad. It’s bacon.” Emma says.

“MMmmmm….” Sammy.

“You’re a vegetarian.” Emma adds.

From behind, where I’m cooking, it looks like Sammy just took a bite.

John is across the table. “Bacon comes from a pig! Bacon comes from a pig!”  We visited an organic farm this fall, and he’s excited to explain that he understands what they’re talking about.

Just then Rosie starts to choke. She’s eating bacon. Her face turns red. I think she’s breathing, but she’s upset. It’s hard to get to anyone in my mom’s kitchen. So I tell Adam to hand her to me. He lifts her over several people.  She carefullyputs down the end of her bacon, then she throws up all over me and the floor.

Mom’s dog Zellie thinks this is great.  Bacon on the floor!  Emma is not having any of that.  “Get out of here Zellie.  Shoo.  This is gross.”  The dog comes anyway, takes one bite and decides it’s not worth it.  Mom shows up with a towel to get it cleaned up.  Our dog Samson pushes past her with the same idea.  Bacon!!!!  One bite.  Definitely not worth it.  He leaves too.

I take Rosie in the back to see if she’s ok. And to clean up. She curls in my lap, tucking her head under my chin.  A moment of peace.

Nothing like a a little bacon to start the day.

Time

I don’t have babies any more. It seemed like that season would last forever, but it didn’t. I have two kids now. They have started conspiring to run off together in secret. It’s a transition I’m thrilled about because they are becoming friends. I want to encourage it, while still protecting them and the house. I’ve gone up to find my bed stripped, to find them hiding in places where I genuinely can’t find them until I hear the tiny “that way”, and to find sixty or seventy books piled on a bed with John “reading” to Rosie.

This morning I gave them ten minutes while I loaded the dishwasher. Then I went up to see what was happening. John was looking a little guilty as he lugged Adam’s hiking boots out of the closet. Rosie was still in the closet, visible only from the chest down, drowning in Adam’s shirttails.

“We’re going to wear Daddy’s clothes,” he said with a question in his voice.

“OK by me. Which ones do you want?” That one. No I want that one. This was clearly fun.

This is the result. It’s an exciting thing to be in something that engulfs you, wraps you, comforts you. The only glitch is that when Rosie insisted on standing right in front of the window, I asked if they would wait for me to run downstairs and get a flash. Rosie’s answer – with her actions not her words – was no. So the three frames I took before going to get more equipment was all I got. Gotta shoot it while it’s there. Wasn’t I supposed to learn that a million years ago?

What I really want to say is hard for me to put into words. This time is bittersweet. It’s flying by. A week ago we got home from our yearly beach trip. We’ve been doing it every year since before I was born. It’s a measure of time because the ocean stays relatively the same while our lives are transformed. Time is so elusive. Even when you value and treasure your time with your parents, your kids, or your friends, you can’t hold onto it. They grow, change, move and die. I’m not trying to be morbid, but I’m acutely aware lately of the passage of time with those I love. Not just my kids. I wish I could hold these moments, tuck them away to return to in the future. But you can’t. I can’t. I can just live them now.

I run into people who want to talk to me about traveling for the Geographic. Out of the blue, someone brought it up two days ago. There is no way to explain that this time is as amazing. As impressive. And in some ways, more powerful.

The night before Rosie came home from the hospital, I wrote a letter telling our friends and family she was coming home. She had been there two months, and I emailed photos of my “chubby” three-and-a half-pound baby. My brothers Jonny and David wrote me back with brotherly advice. It was good, and they expressed what I’m trying to say more beautifully than I can right now. Jonny told me, “Everyday I look into the eyes of Abraham and Simon, and I am just blown away by the life inside; the words, the expressions, the miracle of activity inside those little bodies. You didn’t ask for it, but my advice is: Try to enjoy the ride, and minimize the stress. It’s all about the kids. Don’t look over the top of their heads as you deal with life. Find the time to get inside them.”

David used more words, and they are worth reading.

It’s been an amazing two months which, as time fades into the past, will both grow and shrink in your memory. I know how amazed you are at the photos, but you will not be able to imagine how much Rosie will grow over the days and months ahead. One day, you are going to look at her as she begins to crawl, see a picture of her at two months, and not be able to remember (other than the lack of sleep) where the last 8-10 months went. Then, she will head to kindergarten one day, mom will write her beginning of the school year thing (which I wanted to send you but cannot find right now), and you’ll see a cute little picture of her in a Halloween costume at age 3 and just wonder where the time went. And a few years after that, she will get dressed up to go to a dance, she’ll have cute little curves you never really saw before, and you’ll wonder where that little girl went. Time is such an elusive process, both to our bodies and to our memories.

I know that these next few months are going to be bone-wearying. That’s just the way it is with newborns. You are going to be sleep deprived and there’s no way around it. But, the flip side is that the bonding (which happens anyway — all this literature about bonding time is fooey to me) that occurs by being so close to your baby so much generates feelings of love and awe and overwhelming emotion that you’ll never experience for the rest of your life. To this day, I remember Ari getting up each night, walking into our bedroom, crawling into bed with me, and cuddling into the nook of my body. I remember Annie sleeping on my tummy with her arms “around” my neck — to the extent that they could reach. Those are feelings of closeness that you just never have again. Or at least, I’ve never been able to find them or feel them again. And, it’s so fleeting. So fleeting.

Big Day

Today was a big day for us. Life is lived in the moments of the ordinary around here but today we had lots of firsts.

John is very interested right now in signs, especially signs that say you are not allowed to do something. Every time we see a red circle with a line across a picture, John asks “Mom, what’s against the rules here?” Frequently the answers are things like, “This car seat can’t face backwards” or “No trucks on this street.” Once someone around you is really looking, you’d be surprised at how many of those signs surround us.

Well, one of the new ones, both at home and at the pool, is “No diving allowed here.” I have thought about hanging one in his room. It would have a picture of a child upside down, landing on the floor headfirst, then putting a red circle around it with a line across it. He likes to jump off things. Anything. Especially high things. So it’s been a tough job to convince him that he shouldn’t jump off his bed and dive headfirst into the floor. This is a child that jumps of dressers, couches, trampolines, walls. Today he jumped off something downstairs that made the house shake. He refused to tell me what it was. So — we’ve talked about broken necks, and after that he points to people in wheelchairs in the grocery store and asks if they have a broken neck. I hope you’re getting the picture.

I’ve been telling him that one of the only places he can safely dive is in the deep end of the pool. So today when he said he wanted to learn to dive, I said great! (It’s so good to have him want to do something I consider safe—at least if you think diving at age 4 is safe!) We started on the side of the deep end. Put your hands over your head. Cross them over each other. Then fall into the water headfirst. Piece of cake. So we went up to the diving board.

John could barely contain his joy. He almost ran to the end of the diving board. He looked at me for assurance, got the stance right, gave a very appropriate jump and went head first into the water. Perfect dive.

Some twelve-year-old girls who were diving off the side of the deep end looked up. How old is he? One of them said, “I just learned to dive today,and I’m 12!”

I would have thought that was our big news for the day until Rosie told me she had to go pee pee. That’s really big news around here. On July 4th we had some friends over, and the dad of the family was in our kitchen. Rosie came in, stopped, put her hands on her hips, made direct eye contact, and using a voice that is about two octives lower than mine, said “I go pee pee.” Our friend didn’t know what to make of this pint-sized person delivering such a serious announcement. He stammered and said, “Well good.”

The potty training is an on and off thing, when she feels like it. We haven’t been pushing.

So that was a few weeks ago. Lately we’ve learned it’s best to follow her into the bathroom quickly, or who knows what will happen. So I was right behind her tonight, and she made it clear she wanted to be alone. I told her that I wanted to come in with her, and begrudgingly she let me in.

I tried to help her onto the toilet. “No, I do it.”

She’s so short that she uses both hands and both feet to crawl all the way up on the back of the seat, like a dog on all fours. Then she stands up in order to turn around and sit, legs going at almost a 180 degree angle across.

At that point, she grabs the shower curtain and pulls it around herself. It’s white, and you can’t see through it. So there she sits, wrapped in a shower curtain, ankles and feet poking out. I was laughing so Adam grabbed the camera.

Only afterwards did I realize she was asking for privacy during her first poop in the potty.

(This was a day this past week. I wrote it the day it happened, and it inspired me to start the blog.)

This was the congratulatory hug — or squeeze depending.

Welcome!

Doggies figure large in our world. You might think I’m talking about food, but I’m not. Obviously Samson is our star doggie — our first of all doggies. He sets the tone. But that’s just the beginning.

We have So Big Doggie, a gift that Sasha, Annie and Ari brought John as he arrived in the US. So Big Doggie is the name John gave him when he learned to talk, and the dog was still almost bigger than John. They still sleep together every night. John played soccer with the Big Red Chicken Dogs.

But Rosie really ushered in the era of doggies. She LOVES doggies. As she was learning to talk and realized she could have conversations with people, she would ask, “Where your doggie is?” After getting a response, she would pause, look you in the eye again and ask, “Where your doggie is?” We read doggie books. We put on doggie diapers until she moved on to Pooh diapers. Now when you pull out a doggie diaper she says, “I want to hate it, the doggie!” John was reticent to join in the fun at first. He wanted me to make her stop loving dogs, but now he’s given in to the doggie craze. We make friends with any doggie we see. When Rosie started saying, “I want to eat it the doggie,” I thought she was hungry — until she grinned and said, “I funny.” So now that’s the humor among the under-four crown at 911 Urban.

Lately the biggest attraction in our backyard is to swing high. And I mean high. Underpushes are preferred. My kids seem to have missed the cautious gene. So if you’re willing to hold on and run all the way under the dangling feet, you are likely to hear a child above you yell, “Hot Doggies!!!!”

So that’s how the blog got its name. Welcome to our world.

Trains are almost as big around here as doggies. When John was two, they were bigger. This is my mom’s favortie picture of the kids.

That train picture is a few months old, and Rosie has grown up so much. She LOVES my mom, who is reading to her here.

And John loves his cousins, especially the ones that race him like Ari. This is John’s way — he is fast moving. But normally he’s not wearing a tie:-).