Bah-stin accent

Someone wondered, after watching the first 10 minutes of The Departed (he fell asleep) if I have a Boston accent. I don't.

First, an explanation for those of you unfamiliar with Boston, or Bah-stin, accents. A few of my observations:

1. R's are routinely dropped from words, particularly with the letter A. So car becomes cah, park becomes pahk and carpenter become cahpentah.
2. What happens to all those abandoned R's? They are added to the end of words that don't have R's in them, again involving the letter A. Therefore Lisa becomes Liser and pizza becomes pizzer.
3. And my personal favorite, you cannot tell the difference between a grizzly bear and an ice cold beer to drink. Both are pronounced beh-ya.

So, try your hand at a Bah-stin accent. Repeat after me:

Liser and I were driving the cah to pick up a pizzer and beh-ya when we saw a cahpentah being chased by a beh-ya.

My Southern born and bred parents moved from Lexington, Kentucky to the Boston-area when I was one year old. All research indicates that children develop their accents from their peer groups. That is why a child of immigrants can often speak English without an accent.

In third grade I came home to excitedly tell mom my class was going on a field trip.

"We're going on a field trip to Bah-stin!"

She remained facing the kitchen sink. Her back was to me. "Where?" she said, emphasizing the R.

"Bah-stin."

WheRe?" she repeated, without turning around.

"Boston?" I asked, meekly.

Only then did she turn around, bent down to point a finger at me and declared, "No child of mine will have a Boston accent."

Yes, ma'am. And that is how my mother single-handily thwarted the influence of my peers.

And I am grateful.

Pissing into the Wind

[I'm playing somewhere else today. Read this terrific post and at the bottom find where I am.]

Here's a Link

I was originally going to call this post pissing up a rope, but Mr. Q said he had never heard of the term. Maybe it's not a flat-lander phrase; there's lots of things, apparently, that we each missed out on, what with me having been raised [as all should] in the mountains, and he in the prairies.

But I digress. Neither one of these terms - pissing into the wind nor pissing up a rope - completely describes what I'm going for, but it's the closest thing to the fact that for the past year I have been chronically and unsuccessfully pissing on a stick. [see link above for an example of the stick in question] [And, normally, I would not choose the term "pissing" but use it only for consistency in what is, really, a bad analogy to begin with. But you'll forgive me]

It has now been one year since I took my last little pink oral contraceptive pill and absolutely nothing profound has come of it. But, that's not the problem. Within the past 12 months, my skin has reverted back to it's old, bad self, my presumed pill-weight hasn't gone away, I am [apparently] a teeny wee bit moodier and I have only had 2 partial and guilt-ridden alcoholic beverages. Generally, it sucks.

I'm not upset about the not being pregnant part [okay, only sometimes. just a little during my apparent "moody" phases] since it takes a lot of people a lot longer. Really and truly, I am okay with that. There are those people for whom it doesn't take as long [and I may, occasionally, experience the irrational urge to slap them]. I am upset, though, that I haven't had a beer. The few times that I can, I am almost always on call for work [like this weekend] and, being the lush low-tolerance type that I am, can't freely imbibe. For that alone, I will accept sympathy.

But, I now must come to terms with visiting my doctor in the fall. She heaved a big "finally" last year when I indicated that yes, I was going off the pill with the intent to become pregnant. Now, we'll see what she says when I go in this year, not pregnant. I'm honestly not sure if she's the type who will send me/us for tests right away or have us wait a little longer.

I've decided that tests are all very well and good, but as long as nothing is putting me in harm or does not involve an extremely easy, quick fix, then it ends with the testing. I don't think I'm into any serious fertility stuff. I say that now. We'll see.

Any tests that she orders would at least [hopefully] mean that there would be a conclusion of some sort. And then, at least, we'd know. And then, at least, I could have a beer.

Jenn is posting here today as part of the Blog Exchange. This is one of her favourite posts, originally written August 1, 2005. By the end of September of that year, she was pregnant and the rest is now all history. Read about it, and check out Allison's favourite post, at Quarter Rest.

Tagged twice

First, I must apologize to the patient and talented Kate who tagged me months ago. I explained to her that I don't "do" chains. As in those emails which say if they are not passed along to everyone you know you will either 1) have bad luck for 7 years or 2) your favorite pet will die. Guess what? I never pass those around and have been o.k. (accept my parents' dog died recently. Hmmmm).

So I plead ignorance to the blogging community for not getting it. These exchanges are fun ways to get to know each other and break up the monotony of another cute kid story or rage against the machine.

I was picked by both Gunfighter and Jodifur (I think on the same day) to:

List seven songs you are into right now. No matter what they are. They must be songs you are presently enjoying. Then tag seven other people to see what they’re listening to.

Only seven songs? I cannot tell you how hard it is. I am seriously into music. Those iPod ads with everyone dancing? I have to restrain myself to not boogie on down the road. Or on the commuter train.

And I am picking the tunes that both me and my kids are into. Can you guess which is which?

1.




John Legend - Save Room

2.



Cyndi Lauper - True Colors

3.



Erasure - Love to Hate You

4.



New Order - World in Motion

5.



Ladysmith Black Mambazo - Hello My Baby

6.



High School Musical - Stick to the Status Quo

7. My profound apologies to New Orleans. The band's name is so wrong but the song is so right.



Katrina and the Waves - Walking on Sunshine

Forgive me though for not passing the torch. Most of you were already tagged with this one and the few remaining ones either have a distinct shtick or style or just haven't posted in, oh, a year.

(And a huge thank you to Jodifur both for the inspiring layout and lessons on how to insert videos. Your patience was saint-like.)

Inner Mario faces a speeding ticket

A few days after New Years I was pulled over by a state trooper for speeding. I usually take the commuter train but that day I needed to use our car. Which means a bit of hair raising driving from downtown to our suburb.

Early in my driving days I discovered speed. As in the gas pedal not the drug. I love driving fast. After graduating from college I drove across the country with two guys and acquired the nickname Mario Andretti somewhere in North Dakota. This while driving a 1973 Dodge Dart.

So I was in touch with my inner Mario as I was driving to get the kids. And a trooper pulled me over. He handed me a $170 ticket for going 47 mph in a 25 mph zone. Yes. One hundred and seventy dollars.

What does any self respecting driver do facing $170 ticket and an increase of car insurance? Contest.

In the mail arrived a form with the date and time to appear at a court house. I lost the form.

Not a good start.

On the appointed day, I went through the metal detector and was sent to a bench in a small hallway. I had visions of a judge in a courtroom. I also thought that if the actual trooper who issued my ticket didn't show up for the hearing, I was off the hook. If that didn't work, I was going to plead late-for-picking-up-my-kids.

I was in the first group of 10 brought into a little room with a desk and benches. There was a trooper but not the one I dealt with. Sitting at the desk was a man referred to as "Mr. Clerk" with a stack of tickets.

It became apparent that the trooper was standing in for all the troopers who wrote the tickets. Damn. He would start by saying "Mr. Clerk, the Commonwealth contends that the driver....." Nearly every single one of the situations he described were on a two to three mile stretch of a particular parkway.

The first one was a guy who, among other things, didn't have his license on him at the time of an accident. The clerk dismissed the fine. Awww come on. Even I know you should have your license on you.

The next guy got up. English was not his first language (don't assume it was Spanish. I am guessing he was Lebanese) and he explained he was trying to get to his special needs daughter at after school care. She was sick. Mr. Clerk reduced his ticket to $100 and told him that he could contest that if he chose. The guy paid up on the spot.

Damn.

Then a young woman got up with her dad to explain what happened one rainy evening when her dog distracted her causing her to hit a tree and destroy her car. Mind you, the dog was in a travel case. Not sure how a dog in a box could distract you. In your lap, licking your face, pawing at the wheel - that is a distraction. Yipping in a box is a minor nuisance. Mr. Clerk asked if she was o.k. She replied yes and her dog was fine too (Phew!).

She was dismissed without a fine.

Then I was called up and I was ready to plead my case.

"Mr. Clerk", said the fill in trooper, "the Commonwealth has no interest in pursuing this matter since the trooper did not note with what method he recorded the speed."

Some scribbling on a sheet. "O.k." says Mr. Clerk, "you are free to go."

Duh. Thank you, I muttered before bolting in case they change their minds.

But now I'm convinced, just like in Better off Dead, there is a State Trooper looking for my minivan on the parkway ready to pull me over saying "I want my $170....".

Met the Governor

One part of my job I just love is making the government real and meaningful to people. In particular I get a thrill watching people who have been treated unfairly, because they are homeless, or were teen moms or are immigrants - or maybe all three - walk into the State House and have that wonder in their eyes.

"I've never been in here" they say. "It's so beautiful."

It's yours, I reply. Your tax dollars pay for this building. That gold dome over us? You paid for that. The people rushing by you? Your tax dollars pay their salaries. This is your building.

After two hours of my silly stories, tales of legislative success and failures, a couple of them start to believe it.

But this time, nearly 15 women, mostly black (African-American, and African and Caribbean immigrants) got to meet our governor. He was walking the hallway with no body guard and nearly 15 women pounced.

I have met several sitting and former governors. They are all white. And you don't go hugging them. You awkwardly shake their hands if offered, tell them what is important to you and they rush off as if you took them away from some very important. More important than you.

These women pounced on the man, because as one of them said he is "one of them". They hugged him, told him they were praying for him and his wife, told him what his governorship meant to them. He graciously lingered and shook every woman's hand as they told him things I would never, ever encourage. I, being very, very white, stood back, talked to the Chief of Staff and took photos. This was a moment I wasn't going to interrupt.

Why I cannot keep a clean house

On what seemed like the first nice Saturday since the car was invented, my guys broke in their new soccer (for the rest of the world football) gear. One guy is proudly sporting bright turquoise and grey cleats, orange and black shin guards and yellow and grey-black goalie gloves. I hope he ends up on a team that wears red jerseys, just to complete the color scheme.

The grass in our yard is still soggy so after an hour of playing with both soccer and rugby balls they came in pretty muddy. They offered to take showers to wash off the mud. I thought it was a great idea.

Meanwhile little Miss I'm-almost-three-years-old was running around the house in a pink leotard a family friend had just given her. She was "cooking" in the kitchen. As I ran upstairs to start the shower I asked her not to use real water.

So where is my husband on this beautiful Saturday afternoon? Playing rugby. The first sign of spring is also the beginning of many, many weekends in which I become a single parent. As if being alone with the kids nearly every night isn't enough.

My husband is also a neat freak. He's had to lower his standards, or nearly abandon them, during his years of marriage with me. I would rather be with the kids than clean the toilet. If the clothes are washed do they really need to be put away?

Needless to say he comes home late at night or after the matches/drink-ups to find dishes in the sink, clothes on the floor and general mayhem. However, everyone is asleep in their beds, properly fed and happy from a full day of motherly love and joy (or something close to that).

So I run upstairs to help the boys start their shower and stay up there for about 10 minutes. When I come down, my daughter is kneeling on a stool in just her underwear. Her soaking wet leotard is on the breakfast bar with fresh ink stains on it. There is a large plastic bowl full of water, vegetable oil and pink yogurt. Aside from the water she had to actively seek out the other ingredients. Remnants of her cooking can be found everywhere.

Of course I cleaned it up. But will I get credit from Mr. Neat Freak? No, because I'm still ignoring the laundry.

The other side of despair

Is hope.

After attending the rally to support the immigrant families impacted by the March 6th raids on a factory making military backpacks, I took the boys to an evening concert of Ladysmith Black Mambazo. The little lady got a special night with a beloved babysitter while their dad was attending the drink-up for his rugby team.

In the mid-1980's Paul Simon had a huge hit with the CD Graceland. One of the songs was Diamonds on the Souls of Her Shoes which was co-written by Simon with the leader of Ladysmith, Joseph Shabalala. The group also sang the beautiful acapella song "Homeless".

Ladysmith began in the 1950's based on the music sung by South African black men who had to leave their families to work in mines. They were brutally treated and would have to practice their singing in secret. Even the stylized dance moves involved light footwork so the company wardens wouldn't hear. When the men came back to the townships for visits, there would be competitions between different singing groups. They sang in English and Zulu.

Obviously, South Africa shed the apartheid government and continues to build on its economic and political stability. What was particularly powerful about the concert was how the men talked about the history of the music, the pain and sorrow it initially conveyed but also the joys that could still be found. And how hope perseveres.

One of my boys keeps singing snippets from the song Ladysmith wrote for and performed at Nelson Mandela's Nobel Peace Prize ceremony. It talks about struggles, racism and that now all people can vote in their homeland.

I've reminded the boys that even in the sadness of the raids, there is still hope and even some joy. And that some day we'll be hearing beautiful music that inspires us.

Despair

On Tuesday March 6th, more than 500 Immigrant and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents descended upon a factory 45 minutes from my home. Over 300 employees, mostly mothers with young children, were swept up in the raid, shackled together in groups of three by their wrists and ankles and marched to buses which took them 100 miles away. Later, many were flown to Texas. Days past before people knew where their family members were.

A story that has gotten a lot of press here is one of the mothers was nursing a baby. She was was flown to Texas without any consideration that she was her baby's primary caretaker, never mind her sole source of food. The baby became dehydrated and hospitalized. I can't imagine the physical pain (never mind the emotional distress) the mother was in from her milk building up. But I'm sure ICE has breast pumps on hand.

Over the weekend I took the kids and my dad to a rally in the vocational-technical high school of that town to protest the raids, support the families and let the community at large know that we support them in getting through this. Several posters said "Where's my mom?" The boys could read them. "Is someone going to take you away?" they asked.

One of the biggest ironies? The factory makes backpacks for the US Military. That's right. The US Government has a contract with a factory using illegal workers to make backpacks for our troops.

This is not a new story, but the story keeps getting more horrific. In recent months raids have hit nearly every state in the country. Each one of these deportations has a very human element that is about families and children.

Regardless of your view of immigrants, you cannot deny that we are a nation of immigrants. We have got to come up with a sensible policy that allows people to leave their dangerous countries, or countries with limited economies - both often caused by our foreign policies - and be allowed to prosper here. Yes, these women were here illegally. But they were hard-working, making military backpacks and paying taxes.

Train talk

While coming home from Philadelphia, one of my guys started telling me how he likes to make his friends laugh. He described doing silly things at his table and showed me an example of such silliness, complete with wild arm flailing and googly eyes. He talked with admiration of other students who fall off their chairs on purpose to make people laugh.

My little man. The performer.

So we talked about how much fun it is to make people laugh, smile and feel good. He admitted he liked people watching him do silly things. I told him there were times to be silly - recess, free play - and times to be respectful - like when his poor 25-year-old teacher is trying to teach 20 kids. The idea that my guy is one of the class clowns has me mortified.

But I promised him we would find different places for him to perform. I'm not becoming some frightening stage mother with visions of fame and fortune (o.k. - maybe a Tony award). Just a parent trying to channel a kid's energy. And it's that time of year when you have to find summer camps. I'll hold that over his head.

"You can't go to theater camp unless you behave in school!"

Think that'll work for the next three months?

Channeling the inner Black Diva

During their preschool years one of my boys' best friends was the son of a minister. The family was from Holland and while pretty liberal, they took their role in the church very, very seriously.

One evening several years ago we had pizza at the friend's house. My boys, the friend, his mom and grandmother (who was visiting from Holland) all bowed our heads for grace. In our Unitarian house grace, if we remember to say it, is:

We love our family. Amen.

With this family they said a much longer grace in Dutch. The boys and I respectfully bowed our heads over clasped hands to wait it out. They ended with an enthusiastic, Dutch accented,

"Hallelujah!"

Which led one of my boys to throw his head back, close his eyes and with all the passion his three-year-old white body could muster

It's raining men. Hallelujah!
It's raining men.
Amen!

The mother (thankfully a dear friend) nearly fell hysterically into her plate as her mother kept asking "What? What did he say?"

I rubbed his head and told him he did a great job (he actually did. He would've made The Weather Girls proud). Then we passed around the pizza.

Does the end justify

Way back in September, one of my little men fully mastered riding his two-wheel bike. He was getting the hang of it in August but on that day in September he was finally able to start on his own. In case you've forgotten, it is really hard to keep your balance while going from standing to starting.

His twin brother was a bit more stubborn about it. He was almost there. I could feel that he had the balance but he would just out right panic the second he realized I wasn't holding on to the bike. It then became cold, they outgrew their bikes, and months went by without an opportunity to work on bicycle riding.

Suddenly we had a burst of warm weather. Pleas for new bikes ensued and while it is hard to justify the horrid conditions in China for workers, those Toys R Us bikes for $59 beckoned.

But I put my foot down on training wheels. Poor little man who couldn't ride without training wheels heard "You want a new bike? It is without training wheels."

So last weekend, we went to an empty parking lot. Mr. Big-Shot-I-can-Ride went off on his own. The other one nearly drove me nuts.

He had his balance. He just didn't believe in himself. I would run along side him, let go of his seat but keep my thumb on the small of his back and he would keep riding. He only thought I was holding on. And that was his crutch. His huge crutch. He didn't believe that he could do it.

Before you jump on me that I was comparing him to his twin brother I wasn't. If I had been, he would have been forced to figure this out last fall. What was beyond frustration, beyond my comprehension was that he had the skill. He could balance on his bike without training wheels. He just didn't believe in himself.

I finally took my thumb off his back. He rode for 5 or 10 seconds on his own, without me holding him. Of course, when he realized what was happening he promptly let go and fell to the ground. I tried a few times to get him to ride but I finally had to walk away before I said it.

"I can't believe you are such a -----".

I almost called my kid a wimp. To his face. Later there were moments when he expressed fear that he would hit a light pole. A light pole that was 1/2 a mile away. He feared a pot hole. That was no where near us. I could barely keep it together. My kid was not going to feel the freedom, the joy of riding a bike because of fear. If he didn't work through this, what else would limit him? What wonderful opportunity would he lose because he was fearful?

Fortunately, I kept myself in check (barely). And when he did it, finally, there was relief on both of our faces.

But now, there is pride in his face. He brags about riding a bike. He's actually behaving better in school. He seems to hold himself up straighter.

How will my children remember these moments? Will they recall falling off the bike? The getting back up and trying again? Or will they remember their mother, running along side, nearly exploding because they were fearing what if something bad happens?

Twin humor

We've discovered that Junie B. has moved on to first grade. My guys haven't fully embraced chapter books so that is a section of the library we don't usually visit. However, while one guy was finding more books on ancient Egypt, the other was looking at the Magic Tree House books when he grabbed two Junie B. books.

The first book has her starting first grade, relieved to see last year's best friend, Lucille, in her classroom. Lucille won't have anything to do with her because she has new best friends, Camille and Chenille. When the identical twin sisters walk in, Junie B. yells

"TWINS! TWINS! THEY'RE TWINS, LUCILLE, THIS IS OUR LUCKY DAY!"

Then it goes on,

"Come on, Lucille! Let's go touch them! Hurry! Hurry! Before a line forms!"

(All caps and exclamation points are from the book.)

We stared at each other. I immediately thought of all the times people stare and point at the guys. All the times kids yell "LOOK MOMMY THEY'RE TWINS!!" or when adults say "How can you tell them apart?" Or my favorite (hear my teeth grind) "Oh no! Double trouble!" Thanks so much for implying my kids are trouble.

I then burst into side-splitting hysterics. The boys joined in. I sputtered something about how people do this to them all the time. They each yelped "I know!" "Yeah!" and "Ouch, my side hurts."

Thanks Junie B. One good laugh.

Definition of a Fag Hag

I do miss those days. When I would get all dolled up and go dancing with incredibly good-looking men who didn't want a thing from me. Accept maybe to confirm that the cute guy across the room is really cute. And interested in them.

So this from the New York Times about the closing of the Roxy dance club just was too much fun:

The doors opened at 10 p.m. sharp, and a thick column of men and the odd female friend here and there advanced up the sloping entry hall, checked their coats and dispersed on the dance floor.

That's right folks, "the odd female friend". All of us odd female friends should get up on the loudspeakers (or in my case an overturned Lego box) and yell

We're Fag Hags and Proud!

My new (blog) toy

I've got this new toy that is so much fun.

It is a (free) map that shows who is visiting my web site. I've just moved it up from the bottom of the page to under the fancy image of my fabulous red cowboy boots.

Now, a dear friend is reading me from China so that explains the dot over there. And another in New Orleans.

But get this. There is a dot in Spain! And another in South Africa. And India. If any of you have a friend in South America who could look at my site, please promote me. Then I'll have a red dot on every continent (except Antarctica).

Big thanks to Gunfighter for having this on his web site. I've been enjoying his posts in the monthly Blog Exchange (you haven't laughed until you read his March post).

And check out all the hits Jose gets. And yes, his dot in China is a mutual friend.

Ice Cream and Men

As a little girl, before 3rd grade, I have vivid memories of summer evenings walking to the neighborhood Friendly’s for an ice cream cone. We’d get our cones from the walk-up window and then make our way back home, licking our ice cream. An important part of the walk was getting up on the stone wall near a church. My brother and I would hand off our cones to our dad to climb onto the wall.

We could never get the cones back once on the wall. My dad would be busy “cleaning them”. He would lick all the drippings along the side of the cone, half of the ice cream on top and possibly even nibble the cone. All in the name of cleaning up.

“MOM!!” we would both yell. “Get our cones back!”

She would order him to return the cones. While handing them back he would sheepishly say the same thing, “I was just cleaning them up.”

In fourth grade we had a real treat. We were going to an island as a family and our beloved Aunt and Uncle from Georgia joined us. The island had an ice cream parlor. Our uncle offered to share a sundae with my little brother. Talk about a set up. This grown man was going to eat all of the ice cream. Steal from a kindergartner.

Uncle would carefully collect ice cream, hot fudge and whip cream on his spoon. He talked about what a great looking spoonful he had. He delayed putting it in his mouth.

My brother scooped it right off of Uncle’s spoon and gobbled it. My Uncle made another “perfect” spoon. My brother did it again. Here was a man who was willing to let a kid take his ice cream.

Today, I married a man who eats ice cream on the sly. The kids and I will have carefully kept track of the ice cream, making sure the box lasts the entire week. They will do a good job eating their dinner and run to the freezer, pull out the ice cream, only to find that the box has barely enough ice cream in it to fill a thimble.

So begins their lesson you cannot trust daddies with ice cream.

Luckily for them, Aunt and Uncle from Georgia will join our family for this year's summer vacation on a different island. Thirty-one years after sharing a sundae with my brother. I’m already scouting out ice cream parlors.

This post was submitted to Scribbit's March Write-Away contest. The topic was childhood memories. For more about life in Alaska, check her out.

Bag of worms

I can finally throw away the bag of dead worms in my refrigerator.

For our trip to Philadelphia I brought fruit on the train. Apples and clementines. It was my attempt to have healthy snacks during the ride down. I wasn't sure what would be our food options around the hotel so I wanted some things from the large part of the food pyramid.

They weren't all eaten and ended up in the little kitchenette of our room. The boys actually asked for the clementines on Saturday. I was thrilled! They were asking for fruit.

After eating nearly all but two slices, one guy said "this was in my clementine" and dropped a small thing on the table. It was the length of my pinkie fingernail (I have small nails).

It was a worm. One of the remaining slices looked fine. The other one was full of worms. They didn't move but they were there. In the clementine. That my son was eating.

He thought he ate two worms. So I played it calm. Got them into their bathing suits for the 2nd trip of the day to the hotel pool in the basement. While they changed I left a message with the pediatrician's office that I thought my son had eaten some dead worms in his clementine. Not being an expert on worms I don't know if they can play dead. Or if they could come back to life. In my kid's intestines.

Once down at the pool the nurse called me back. While she thought everything would be o.k. "since they appear dead" she told me to watch my son for stomach pain and bloody stuff coming out of him (oh lovely). She also stressed I should hold on to the remaining worms for a week just in case anything were to happen.

"That way we can test them to see what is going on."

I'm happy to report my son didn't become the host of a colony of resurrecting parasitic worms. I can throw away that bag in my fridge.

Not usually one to plug but...

I don't usually write about things, shows, etc that I like or my kids like. However, I can't let this one slip by without comment.

The Backyardigans is one of those cartoon shows with oddly colored animals (and what is Uniqua?). It attempts to get kids to think of their backyards (if those young viewers are fortunate to have one) as a place of adventure complete with dance, song and some moral about being friends. The animation isn't too bad and those characters can really shake their computer-generated hips.

Last week I nearly fell of the couch as that pink thing Uniqua sang about non-stop rain to the tune of Poor Little Buttercup from HMS Pinafore.

Folks, the same brilliant men who wrote HMS Pinafore wrote The Mikado. And The Mikado is where Three Little Maids is from. That was what I sang in the November show.

Oh be still my little Gilbert and Sullivan-loving heart. I am now a HUGE fan of The Backyardigans. Any kid show that incorporates 19th century show tunes has my heart.

Play Hurt

Our last game of the season was during the second weekend of February vacation while we were in Philadelphia bonding with ancient Egyptians. Last year the game had been the first weekend in March which was much better since everyone was back from vacation. According to the dad who helped me out, only four of our 11 team members showed up.

I'm actually glad we missed the last game. While I got much more out of this year's team (because I was a much better coach) I didn't want to face the last game this year. During our final game of 2006, my dad was watching. While having a heart attack.

Of course, I rationalized his distraught looks. I thought he was utterly horrified that after 3 months these kids still couldn't dribble, pass or shoot. One kid could consistently hit 3-pointers but he ran down the court like a running back. He was the only player who could make a basket.

My other rationalization was that he was completely dismayed that his child was such a lousy coach. My dad played basketball in high school and briefly in college. He coached both my and my brother's childhood teams. He had season tickets to the town team for years.

At one point during that last game in March one of my 5-year-old players came up to me whimpering he had hurt himself. I then said something I thought would never, ever come out of my mouth.

"Play hurt."

I said "play hurt" to a 5-year-old. He looked at me with opened mouth shock. But he turned around and played. I remembered my own open mouth shock when my dad said it to me as a 3rd grader on one of the downstairs courts of the high school gym. I vowed never to say that. And here I did.

So as we were going back to our cars, my dad panting as he was carrying the 30+ pound granddaughter, I told him my horror at saying to the little guy "play hurt". His response was a half-hearted laugh. He was, foolishly, playing the ultimate hurt.

He drove home the 10 miles back to his house (recently a beloved state representative died after her car crashed while she was having a heart attack). He went to the couch to "rest". Finally my perceptive mother called him on his symptoms and got him to the hospital. My brother flew over from the other coast. Five days later he had triple bypass surgery.

This weekend my dad spent time bonding with their new dog, monitoring his basement for flooding and attending church. He is still very much part of our family. And we are all so glad.

Smell of beer

"Mom! They're putting in new soap in all the bathrooms at school!" yells one boy because that is the only way they seem to communicate. By yelling.

"Really?"

"Yeah! Foam soap!" Yells the other even though I am three feet away and there is not another sound in the house. Although with their volume you would think they were trying to talk over a jack-hammer. In the living room.

"Yeah! And it smells like beer!"

This is when I look at my 6 1/2 year old sons and ask "How do you know what beer smells like? Someone told you that."

And this is where I am grateful that they can't pull one over me yet. Their eyes cannot lie. They were clearly in a bathroom today with a friend who made that statement. Maybe he was were trying to think of the yuckiest smell. Or the one that would make grown-ups upset. But they didn't want to rat on their buddy.

Pause.

One finally yells "Daddy did!! He let us smell his beer!"

Really?

Too bad your daddy's alcohol of choice is bourbon.

For Good

I'm writing on someone else's blog today. First read her amazing piece then find the link to mine.

From the Musical Wicked-

I've heard it said
That people come into our lives for a reason
Bringing something we must learn
And we are led
To those who help us most to grow
If we let them
And we help them in return
Well, I don't know if I believe that's true
But I know I'm who I am today
Because I knew you:

Like a comet pulled from orbit
As it passes a sun
Like a stream that meets a boulder
Halfway through the wood
Who can say if I've been changed for the better?
But because I knew you
I have been changed for good

We have all had people in our life who have come and gone, and it hurt. Maybe they left because they died, maybe they left because you had a fight, maybe they left because they moved away. But there is someone, for all of us, who came and went and changed us irrevocably. And we never forget them.

For me, it was an ex-boyfriend from college. He saved my life. I mean literally saved my life. I was having a violent altercation with an ex-boyfriend, and a male friend walked into my dorm room unexpectedly and beat the crap out of him. We started dating the next year.

We had a terrible relationship. He was a rich pretty boy who never really worked for anything in his life. He came from a lot of money. He believed he was just entitled to things. He had graduated and would never call, but would just show up at my door and expected me to be there.

But he loved me, and I loved him. But we fought, not violently, but we fought. We had that kind of ignitable passion that makes for good love and bad arguing. I expected things of him and he had never had anyone expect things of him. He couldn't get fired from the job because it was for Daddy, so he never had to show. We broke up after 6 months and it was bad. It ended with me saying to him in a bar "best of luck to you in life."

For most of my adult life, before I met my husband, I somehow believed we would end up together. I really thought I would walk into a room somewhere one day and he would be there. And that would be it.

I still think about him, because I honestly believe if it was not for him I may not be here. At least not the me as I am now. Something very bad was going to happen to me, and he stopped it. I like to think that he thinks about me, and knows that I am grateful for what he did.

It well may be
That we will never meet again
In this lifetime
So let me say before we part
So much of me
Is made of what I learned from you
You'll be with me
Like a handprint on my heart
And now whatever way our stories end
I know you have re-written mine
By being my friend:

Like a ship blown from its mooring
By a wind off the sea
Like a seed dropped by a skybird
In a distant wood
Who can say if I've been changed for the better?
But because I knew you:
Because I knew you:
I have been changed for good

This post is part of The Blog Exchange. Jodi is mom to an almost 2 year old, a part-time lawyer, and wife. She blogs at Jodifur about all these things and many more. Please visit her terrific site, and you will see Allison's post!

Hostess note: And yes, for those of you that read this blog regularly, I wrote about the same song in November.

Not too bad

I had steal myself that there would be hourly meltdowns during our family vacation to Philadelphia by each of us during waking hours (and a few when everyone should be asleep). Much to my surprise, there were only a few (by each of us) during the entire trip. That includes the two 6+ hour train rides. Let that be a lesson. Set the bar incredibly low and voila you'll be pleasantly surprised. Kind of like me envisioning the flower girl picking her nose during the ceremony. She didn't and therefore my wedding was a smashing success.

The primary reason to go to Philadelphia was for the King Tut exhibit at the Ben Franklin Institute. I was not disappointed. Even though we had a timed ticket, they further controlled the crowd by grouping people into smaller groups. We stood in a holding area and watched a 90-second video showing the Nile basin, pyramids and 1920's archaeologists. Then, a curtain rose to an illuminated statue of Tut's head. It was just thrilling.

My 43 pound daughter spent the bulk of the exhibit on my shoulders. While at times very painful, it kept her in one place and also gave her a vantage point to see the artifacts. She loved pointing out all the scarabs. However there were some patrons that didn't appreciate the constant "LOOK MOMMY ANOTHER BUTTERFLY!!!"

My sons went through the exhibit with my husband in record time. (My honey's text message read: We are in the gift shop at the end of the exhibit. They just gave us an award for the fastest tour. We beat the 130 folks. Our tickets were for 3:30.) One little guy was particularly impressed with the CT-Scan of Tut's mummy. The other thought the little kid chair was cool. They both will tell anyone who listens that intestines look like sausages and were put into a special jar for the afterlife.

Other highlights include the huge Games Pieces spread all over a plaza near City Hall, the giant heart my kids ran inside at the Franklin, and the war ship from the Spanish American War.

Oh, and the hotel pool, constant junk food and the little guys having their own television. Unlimited Cartoon Network. They thought they had gone to heaven.

Brotherly Love

Think it will rub off?

We're getting on a train tomorrow morning for a 6-hour trip to Philadelphia, The City of Brotherly Love. Once we enter the city limits I hope my sons will look over at each other and declare permanent peace and harmony. And include their 2 1/2 year old sister in that mix.

Hey, its a vacation and I can dream.

So I've got the goodie bag already packed. Snacks for the bottom of the hour and a new book/activity for the top of the hour. And before you jump on me for being hyper organized, you try to travel with 6 1/2 year old twin boys and a toddler. One friend commented after spending some time with the boys that "they have enough energy to power a small village in Africa." And she had been to small villages in Africa so she knows something about the power necessary to keep things running.

The big reason for going all the way to Philly in February is to see the King Tut exhibit at the Franklin Institute. I saw the exhibit when it came to my city in the late 1970's. I was 9 years old and it was thrilling. I dreamed about ancient Egypt for years after and still hope to visit the pyramids one of these days (thanks to the various conflicts it will probably be one of these decades).

So while I would love to think that after seeing this exhibit my kids will be enthralled with mummies, hieroglyphics and pyramids, I'm really hoping we all can get through this trip with a few happy memories.

And knowing these kids, those memories will revolve around the hotel pool and when I let them have junk food.

Sledding

Three different days in three different places. Pure winter joy.

Happy Mardi Gras

Do you know what it means to miss New Orleans?

Are you sick of all the news coverage about Mardi Gras? Do you think the media is making too big a deal of "the recovery"?

I graduated from college in 1991, spent a month hanging around my parents' house then jumped into a 1973 Dodge Dart with no air conditioning or FM radio to drive across the country with two guys I barely knew. I'm still wondering what my parents were thinking. I spent the summer teaching in Los Angeles before being placed by Teach for America in New Orleans.

I moved to the City that Care Forgot in August of that year. If I had been placed in Los Angeles I would still be teaching. New Orleans just couldn't be bothered to teach its children. Or provide health care. Or basic safety. I'm being incredibly cynical and certainly there are many people who do care about these things. But certainly not for the poor. Or black. And that was over 80% of the city.

But it is a town that knows how to throw a party. For that day before Lent. For Jazz Fest. For the beginning of crawfish season. For someone's funeral (you haven't lived until you've second lined in a housing project - the music truly goes into your soul). For the Miss High Hair Pageant. You name it, there is a party for it.

Which is why I am so angry at both the "how can they party?" comments during the Mardi Gras coverage. Easily. They party because they are alive and because they can.

And I am also angry at the "get over it" comments. WHAT?!?!? Our government allowed a major US city be destroyed. I knew in 1991 that if a category 4 hurricane came up the Mississippi River and went into Lake Pontchartrain it would destroy the city. And I am a Yankee (as in Northerner, not the baseball team). If I knew that, surely the government did. But then our government "knew" there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

One Mardi Gras tradition that we've introduced the kids to are King Cakes. The bakery we get them from includes little porcelain figurines symbolizing Mardi Gras. In years past there has been a Flambeau Carrier and a Mardi Gras Indian. I love that they haven't switched to plastic figures.

We have ended up with four king cakes this year and the bakery has three figurines for 2007.

CAPTAIN BLUE ROOF... a.k.a 'sub-sub-sub contractor'




KATRINA....lady? OR a hurricane?

And, my favorite, The FEMA Trailer they will live in.

Laissez-les bon temps roulez New Orleans.

If you haven't already given money to the rebuilding efforts in New Orleans or would like to give again, please consider donating to the New Orleans Musician's Clinic or the NO AIDS Task Force.

Never say never #4,702

That "never say never" list is really long.

Like my kids would never watch more than one hour of television a day.

Or they would always eat healthy foods and never, say, have cereal for dinner.

Or that I would never allow the boys to leave the toilet seat up. Now I just hope they get the seat up before the stream starts.

Then there are shoes. Specifically shoes with laces.

I vowed when I gave birth to my sons that they would never, ever, wear shoes with Velcro straps. They needed to learn how to tie their shoes. By age 3. After they swam the English Channel but before they discovered a new planet. I was going to give them until age 7 to win an Olympic Gold medal. In fencing.

Happy Valentine's Day

Last week I was prepared to give up on helping my sons create Valentine cards for their classmates. Up till now they had only given hand-made cards. I can attest that some part of each card was made by them through the years.

But this year the idea of getting them to each make 19 to 20 cards was enough to make me want to run to the local drug store to buy pre-made cards that essentially advertise a show or movie.

Much to my surprise both guys wanted to make their own cards. One guy asked me to write Happy Valentine's Day on each heart while the other did it all on his own. All 40+ cards for the two kindergarten classes pretty much ended up like this one.

That lovely portrait is not Thomas with dreadlocks. It's me. I thought you would like to know how I've aged since my protesting days. After carefully making a rendition of me, my guy decided his friend wouldn't want a maternal portrait so he made another card. And those large things under my hair are ears. He worked very hard on that part of the portrait.

So what did my kids get? Candy (these parents have got to be kidding - obesity, allergies, the current trend to give children way too much crap - can't these folks just let kids give each other written words?), temporary tattoos (groan), stickers and cards like

Nothing says love like the green and red Power Rangers.

Of course, I am amazed that Hello Kitty is still around.

Or the one that gets the "I'm a better parent because I make the card for my kid" award:

Two different card stock, a ribbon glued on the middle with a puffy sticker on the middle. There was even a candy bar artfully tied to it. Of course, he didn't notice the card. He just tore off the candy.

Misbehaving boy

We're getting to our wits end with one of our guys.

His sweet 24-year-old teacher desperately said to me one evening "do you think he's tired"? She is so nice she doesn't want to imply that perhaps my kid is being a royal jerk.

Last week, my husband had to work late (like most nights) and talked to the guy on the phone. He "helped" him write an apology to his teacher.

This is how it turned out:

He wrote "I am sorry for misbehaving tobay. I will try to bo better."

Oh so wrong. If you are going to apologize, it needs to be sincere. And look nice. So back to the pad. This time with me in charge.

Team photos

We got our basketball photos on Saturday. In January each guy had his portrait taken holding a ball with a backdrop of fans at a game. Then I had one taken of the three of us so I could put it on a keychain. Lastly, the entire team had their photo taken on the court we actually play on.

I played basketball growing up and briefly tried both soccer and field hockey. Something about people gunning at me while kicking or wielding a thick wooden stick just struck me as insane. I remember the fear I felt in elementary school as some girl came down the field with a soccer ball. How I managed to raise two boys who genuinely like soccer is beyond me.

But I played basketball the full 6 years I could in the town youth league and never once was there a day when professional photographers took our portraits. We never had a team photo taken. And we certainly never had the option to put those images on keychains, water bottles, afghans, clipboards, shirts and on and on.

Keep in mind, my guys play soccer in the fall, basketball in the winter and both soccer and baseball in the spring (don't give me grief about "over scheduling" my kids - they are called The Tornadoes for a reason). That means we could have two kids' images on soccer balls in the fall, Wheaties boxes in the winter, and baseball bats in the spring. All for a small fortune.

But we don't buy all those things. They get a team photo and a set of playing cards, complete with their "stats". As many statistics a 6 year old can compile.

Plotting an escape

"Mom, don't work on the computer and don't watch the Daily Show. You need to go to bed right away."

OK. Why?

"Don't ask. And don't go into our room."

So during bath time I did the equivalent of reading the journal. I opened their bedroom door. Their backpacks were packed full of stuffed animals, underwear and light sabers. I returned to the bathroom and nonchalantly asked what was going on it there.

"We're meeting [6-year-old friend's name] outside the house after you go to sleep. We're going to walk to the train tracks and look for bears!!" with all the excitement 6-year-old twin boys can muster (in case you don't know - it is a lot).

Deep breath. Count to ten. Think of this as a test for when they tell me as 14-year-olds they've been invited to a party with no parents in the house. They are trusting me not to lose it.

After (calmly) explaining that it isn't safe for children to be alone outside in the dark, its too cold, they are too young to make plans like that without parents ["But you can come!"], the plan itself was dangerous and, finally, the clincher that I thought their friend was just being creative and dreaming up a scheme that would never happen. Through all of this there was lots of rationalizations, yelling, pleading and crying.

I even called the friend's mother to make sure he wasn't walking on some interstate highway on his way to our house. He wasn't. He hadn't even talked about it with his mom.

Which led to this heart-breaking, bone shaking sob from one guy.

"HE LIED TO ME!!"

Singing Fool

He won't stop singing.

He sings at dinner, loudly.

He sings when we need to get going. He sashays down the stairs, down the hallway singing a made up song about shoes or looking for hats or how his sister has smelly toots.

Loud opera voice, goofy country style, cheesy Disney, old standards. He hasn't discovered Gregorian chants but some day those will be in his repertoire too.

At one point during our trip to the even colder North, he was loudly singing in the bathroom. My husband was worried he was disturbing our neighbors so I went to knock on the door and just ask him to sing softer.

I found him singing naked in front of the sink mirror. (Well not completely naked. He had socks on.) His arms outstretched and he belting out some tune.

He froze when he saw me.

I started to laugh. He started to laugh. We couldn't stop laughing.

Finally I closed the door. And he sang a little quieter. But not much.

They can see

I had everyone in the van barreling home last week. An old van was on the street with us with its lights on in the back. It was one of those vans that has huge windows on the side in the back. There was a girl, about 8 or 9 years old, reading a book.

She was surrounding by stuff. It towered over her. I couldn't really tell what it was but I thought - smugly - that at least my car didn't have that much junk in it.

Then I was asked from the back,

Do they live in their van?

We talked about how some people don't have enough money to pay for rent or a house. Sometimes people do have to live in their cars, or with their family or in a homeless shelter. I said that we shouldn't assume the people next to us were living in their van but that was a thoughtful question to ask.

So much for being smug.

In another voice about a mundane topic

Today I was suppose to be visiting another blog but something happened to my hostess (I hope she's o.k.). The charge was to write in "another" voice. Can you guess who?

I’d be so proud
If the kids had found
That eating green vegetables
Would make them strong.

I don’t like cooking
I just stand there looking
At the limp raw chicken
Sitting in the kitchen.

But a diet well-rounded
The doctors have all hounded
Should be aspired
And highly touted

And hiiiiiigh-ly touted!

I don’t usually write in rhyme but this month’s charge was to write in a famous person’s voice. Can you guess who I am copying? When not attempting bad lyrics, I am a working mother with three kids and often pine for those days in middle school when I sang in operettas(really the only thing I enjoyed about middleschool). Go to http://www.theblogexchange.net/ to learn more about the exchange.

A promise

Sunday evening my husband and I were both exhausted from our weekend excursion up North. We were able to hustle our daughter into bed without a fuss but the boys were wired. It was their normal bedtime, 8:00pm, and my man had fallen asleep.

I usually give them a bedtime snack. Years ago they were waking up hungry in the middle of the night and a breakfast bar or crackers keeps their bellies calm for the arduous 8-9 hours of sleep. But Sunday I could barely keep my eyes open, they were being irritating, and all I wanted to do was sleep.

"Time for bed."

"But we didn't get our bedtime snack!"

"Sorry, you were being too silly and wasted too much time. Time for bed."

"But you promised!"

For the first time ever, both of the grown-ups fell asleep before the boys. While drifting off I could hear them setting up a camp site in the bottom bunk resigned to their hungry state.

When I woke up the next morning, this was on my bedside table.

Cold

Mom.

Yes.

My window looks funny. I can't see out of it.

Yes, honey. That's ice. On the inside of your window. Do you see the temperature shown up here?

Yeah.

What does it read?

13.

What's in front of the 13?

A line.

That's right. It is -13 right now.

And daddy is freaking out right now on this country highway that the engine doesn't freeze.

It didn't. And they got to play in lots of snow. As it fell. We rode in a two-horse open sleigh (through off the Jingle Bells reference) and swam in an (indoor) pool.

Traveling North

As if it isn't going to be cold enough here, we're driving somewhere tomorrow even colder. As in a day-time high tomorrow of 2 degrees. That's the high.

My mother called me worrying that I wouldn't dress the kids warmly enough. Now I know she thinks I am truly incompetent. Because I was thinking of having them run around outside in their bathing suits. Wet.

So we're off to snow country to actually have the kids see some white stuff associated with winter. None of us ski so we were planning to ride in a, yes, one horse open sleigh but it may be too cold for that. Not worth experiencing Jingle Bells if it means losing a nose. This could be a good hang-around-the-resort-kind of weekend. By the pool.

Don't worry. It is indoors.

Kissing Asses

One of the songs given to my family last month is the Dixie Chicks' Taking the Long Way Around. My friend told me that we "were one of the families who wouldn't care that they say 'ass'" in the song. Apparently he and his wife were concerned about some of their family and more conservative friends.

They didn't realize my kids get sent to their room for saying butt instead of bottom when referring to the part of the body that is sat on. Ass would just send me over the deep end. I get laughed at about this but I feel like allowing butt is a slippery slope to butthead. And the idea of hearing a six year old yell "Mom he called me BUTTHEAD!!" over and over is enough to send me into the bottle of gin.

So my boys are singing perfectly in harmony to the following lyric:

I drank with the Irish
Smoked with the hippies
Moved with the shakers
Wouldn't kiss all the asses that they told me to

And not once they have asked about asses or what it means to kiss an ass.

But one day my daughter, clear as a bell said, after singing that lyric:

"She kisses asses."

To which I replied:

"Actually, no, what they are saying is she DOESN'T kiss assess"

"Oh"

And that was that.

Saying goodbye

How do you say goodbye to someone before they go into a casket?

That was the question posed from the back of the van.

I told them about Frank and his call from the hospice. It was a Monday evening when they were four and a half years old and the baby had turned one year old. We had all just walked in the door. I was still in my suit when the phone rang. No one had been fed. I broke the family rule of turning on the TV before dinner to keep the kids quiet.

We talked a little about our shared memories. We met in Florence during my junior year abroad. He and his wife were American ex-pats and would take me in when I wanted to get away from the other students. Whenever we went out for a cappuccino he would always pay with a loud "Let your father's tax dollars pay for this!" He was retired from the Foreign Service and told wonderful stories about bringing his piano to Afghanistan, speaking fluent Hindi in India or getting drunk with Soviet operatives.

That night, with the kids watching television, I asked him how he felt. It was hard for him to speak. The cancer was eating away at his brain.

Frank was in his 70's so some may say he lived a long life. But he still composed symphonies and recorded them in Prague. He was working on several compositions. He had to cancel a trip to Europe because he was too weak.

He said "I'll see you this summer when I visit" I knew this wouldn't be true. That this was good-bye.

"That's right. I'll see you. Bye."

I hung up and burst into tears. He died that Wednesday morning, 36 hours later.

I told the boys this story. Crying while driving.

It's hard to say good bye to someone before they go into a casket. Very very hard.

Yucky white shirts

We played the green team again this past Saturday. This was the team we played against for our first game of the season. The "White Ghosts" just kept scoring white the green team looked lost. There was even the little guy who circled our team and called us the "yucky white team" with tears in his eyes.

Little green guy was Mr. Confidence on Saturday. This kid, who is shorter than my toddler (more a comment on the size of my toddler), scored two baskets during the game. He got past or around much taller kids and just nailed the basket. He's not on my team. I don't coach this kid. But I was so proud of him. So happy for him. And he looked like he had won Olympic Gold.

I swore never to do it

I wasn't going to compare them.

I wasn't going to talk about bodily functions.

But this cannot go without mentioning.

My guys, my six-year-old guys, are still incapable of "holding it". When they realize they have to go to the bathroom, it causes absolute panic. They scream bloody murder until they get to a bathroom, or at least a bush on the side of the road. And that has been done. On the side of very, very busy highways. With me declaring that if our van is hit they are responsible. Start that therapy fund now. For all of us.

So my daughter, my sweet, smart, funny, sophisticated daughter, has started to officially "potty train". She is 2 years old, 8 months and 26 days. Her brothers started (yes on the same day) at 3 years, 3 months and 3 days (I kid you not). Blessedly they actually finished it all in 5 days. She's taking a bit longer. But that is all forgiven in light of this actual event.

Tonight, after we got in the van to go get her brothers, she announced she needed to go back into her school to "go potty". We were late to get them. I asked her to wait. Blessedly she said "o.k." and sang along to YMCA (played 5 times). It took us about 15 minutes to get to their school. I expected her pants, underwear and seat to be wet. Soaking wet. I was just grateful she didn't scream the entire ride.

She was dry.

Completely

bone

dry.

"Honey. Do you want to use the bathroom in your brothers' school?"

"Yes."

And she did.

How can a two and a half year old girl keep her wits about her with a full bladder while two six year old boys can't?

Armor museum

Last month, my brother and sister-in-law did their annual holiday trek across the country to visit 97 family and friends in 10 days (only a slight exaggeration).

Much to my surprise and the kids' joy, we got them for an entire day. Uninterrupted.

This is the special aunt who caused the boys at age 2 years old to scream at the top of their lungs at the entrance of a fine arts museum because they were so excited to see her. This is the uncle who buys the cool shirts. These are the folks I flew across the country to visit for a long weekend so they could spend time with their then 8-month-old niece. I love these folks.

So what did we do after picking up the boys from the half day of school before Christmas vacation? We took a road trip to an armory museum an hour from our house.

It was terrific. I love bizarre museums. Do you have any?

Because you asked

Well at least Kate and Chelle did after reading Powder before the Protest. That is me holding up the blue circle in all my 1992 splendor.

Two basketball games

We went to two basketball games in less than 24 hours. Friday night we went to a professional game. It was one of those evenings that made my husband's frequent late nights more bearable. We were in the firm's suite overlooking the court. To give you a sense of where we were, the television cameras were to the right of us.

So we had food, drinks and our own bathroom. We did share the space with 8 people in their 20's. They pretty much left us alone. Or rather we gave them the space to be in their 20's at a game with free beer.

The boys were just thrilled to watch grown-ups play. I would've been too if those grown-ups actually played well. When a teammate threw a pass, and it bounced off the other player's back, in disgust I told the boys they play better.



For the most part, our daughter entertained herself with the Internet access. Which made me realize that is what we need at the little court we play kindergarten basketball on. That or leave her at home with a babysitter so my husband can watch the boys play and I don't have a ruptured disc. Essentially she wants to be held by me while I am coaching. Which means all 39 pounds of her are riding piggy-back as I am running up and down the court. Or else crying hysterically on the sidelines as my husband clutches her. At one point last week he took her to the playground outside the gym. Cars were slowing down because she was yelling at the top of her lungs "Don't take me!! I want my MOMMY!" He brought her back in the gym and I lugged her around so her father, my husband, wouldn't be accused of kidnapping.

Saturday's game with the kindergartners was a good game (especially since Little Miss Internet spent it with a babysitter at home). Lot's of passing and some of them are understanding dribbling. The two superstar shooters keep running with the ball as if they are on the football field, or couldn't be bothered with bouncing it a couple of times. Next week, I become the hard-nosed coach who demands dribbling. Baskets don't count if there wasn't some ball bouncing before the swish.

Powder before the protest

I've dragged my sons to a couple of rallies, generally to protest cuts in government programs. There are photos of them as 10 or 11 month olds wearing stickers on their hats showing support for the state Medicaid program.

What I haven't shown them is an AP photo of me from the Washington DC pro-choice rally in 1992. I'm clearly visible holding a blue "Keep Abortion Legal" sign. My mouth is wide open in mid-shout.

By then I was not a regular reader of fashion magazines. A friend called the house in New Orleans and told one of my housemates that there was a photo of me in a magazine. I wasn't home so he ran to the store and bought me a copy. He left it on my futon (don't laugh, you had one too) with a note:

How to powder before the protest, see page 36.

And that, my friends, is how I ended up in Glamour magazine.

Bodily bracelets

I was putting one of my brass bangles from China on my two-year-old's wrist. Etched in the middle of each one are dragons and birds with their swirling tails extending out. A colleague from a different job brought them back for me after she visited family in China. I was trying to explain to my daughter the significance of the bracelets.

"Someone gave me these bracelets."

"Some one (pause) gave them to you?"

"Yes. They're from China."

"They're from vagina?"

"No. China. The country. China."

"Bracelets from vagina" and she walked away.

HSM in my head

I'm not sure who to blame.

I've kept the wonderful world of Disney out of our lives (Beauty and the Beast and Mary Poppins don't count). I'm particularly horrified for what passes as music on the Disney radio station. What little I knew about High School Musical ensured my kids wouldn't hear it.

But I forgot about the school playground.

So when a friend (or at least I thought she was a friend) sent us her kids' favorite songs on a CD as a holiday greeting I was flattered. She had received our various birthday CDs for years and said those compilations were some of her kids' favorite discs. They in turn had been nagging her to make their own and specifically wanted us to have it. They even had songs from our CDs (Sweet Caroline and Fly Me to the Moon). There's Barbra singing Jingle Bells. Now my kids are learning "Love that dirty water."

And then there are these two songs from High School Musical, or HSM. One about being in this together (whatever this is) and keeping your head in the game (complete with squeaking sneaker sounds). Surprisingly my guys knew the songs. They claim other kids sing them on the playground. Alright, I can deal with the music.

Then the goddess truly conspired against me.

My brother's wife's cousin (got that?) works for a marketing company that promotes movies. She invited the boys to her office and let them walk into a room full of movie posters, promotional materials and DVDs.

She handed them High School Musical - the 2-DVD Remix. And we've watched it. Multiple times.

During the third viewing in four days I had an inspiration. The director-choreographer (really, watch the credits) must have made this to be fodder for a drag show. Seriously - who would come up with "Sharpe" as the Queen of the Drama club, or have the heroine writhe around on a school stairwell during her big emotive song if he didn't want it to be recreated by elegant men in high heels with better waists then most women? I have visions of Velveeta La Plauche returning to the stage.

Now I can barely contain myself. The kids can't figure out what is so funny.

A Kind [future] Man

Basketball started up this past weekend. Everyone was a bit rusty. One poor kid returned after missing all but the first practice. He had a minor surgical procedure requiring him to lay low for a few weeks. This truly tiny guy just looked so lost as everyone ran up and down the court, passing, getting rebounds and generally hustling.

On the other end of the spectrum was kid with the awesome name. He was also a bit rusty ("only" making three baskets instead of his usual seven) but there were these moments of sheer brilliance as he faked left only to go right (remember this kid, and everyone else, is six years old).

At one point, awesome name had a perfect breakaway and I yelled to him to stop. He looked at me blankly. I told him to pass the ball to tiny guy. He turned toward his teammate, gave him a big grin and gently passed the ball. Tiny guy got it and promptly threw it into the hands of the other team. Perfect breakaway ensued with a basket. For the other team.

What did awesome name kid do? He didn't complain or get mad. He kept passing to other kids. And he eventually got another rebound. I yelled "All yours!" He got his perfect breakaway.

Back in Black (AC/DC style)

She was a hit at the annual big city arts festival ushering in the New Year. Groups of people would stop, look at her, then laugh. Some even hung by her to be near and point. Was it her big blue eyes? The curly blond locks that make her look like a Botticelli cherub? Her bubbly personality?

No, it was her AB/CD shirt. Yet another cool gift from her cool Northwest Uncle and Aunt.

If you don't get this reference, click here. And if your child doesn't have a cool Northwest Uncle and Aunt to purchase this, you can find it here.

Inauguration

I went to the Deval Patrick Inauguration. While I couldn't see the proceedings, it was still a sight to behold.

Good luck Governor. Many of our hopes, wishes and dreams are on your shoulders.

Three troupes

The kids and I took my mother into the big city for the annual New Year's First Night arts celebration (she was a trooper). The convention center is turned into a multi-floored festival of all things artistic - music, film, crafts, fine arts, dance and singing. We saw hundreds of people watching improv and sneaked the boys into a packed room for a percussion demonstration. We also watched skateboarders and cyclists do aerial stunts and trampoline dudes do a very funny act (involving bouncing very high off their bellies then pretending to be Superman - alright it was funny at the time).

Then there were the dancing troupes that rotated on a stage in the same room with craft tables. One group was the "Latin" group. Girls (and a few boys) ranging from ages 5 to 21 (according to their announcer) did mambo, salsa, merengue and other dances from Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic and other places. It was funny how they were all pretty ho-hum during the performance. You could tell they had been swinging their hips, working those feet and tossing their heads since they were two weeks old.

The "black" group was also made up of girls (and a few boys) ranging from 5-ish to older teen (no announcer for this one). There was more energy in their steps. You could tell there was a comfort in their movements. They also looked like kids who had been dancing since they were born. And not in that taking-classes-forever sort of way. What they were doing was second nature.

Then there was the "white" group. Oh, the white group was made up of nine pre-teen girls (no boys) who, well, were ridiculous. They sang covers and their own songs with headsets and coordinated dance moves ("Girls Just Want to Have Fun" will never be the same). The dance moves didn't have the fluid ease of the earlier groups, rather a crazed urgency of LOOK AT US WE CAN DANCE!!!! There were some parents dressed up in crazy I'm still cool outfits and it just had a general freakishness about it.

But what was gross were the little girls in the audience - 4, 5, 6 years old - staring up at them on the stage. And the performers were winking, smiling and pointing. I hope these little girls were told later that this group wasn't talented. And then listened to Sarah Vaughan, Rebirth Brass Band or Cole Porter on the car ride home.

Because the Erasure shirt is too small

Huh? The Erasure shirt?

Change

Life is all about change. Isn't that an old cliche? My life seems to be in a constant state of change. This coming year is no different and it has me freaking out, well just a little.

Not only are we expecting our second child, we are expecting to move. The baby is exciting, wanted so badly and loved. The move, well is scary and unknown. Now sweet readers of the blog exchange, you may be wondering where we are moving this year. Me too! The location of the great, life changing move is unknown.

Sounds a little crazy right?

I am having a lot of anxiety about the vague nature of our future. My amazingly smart and dangerously handsome husband has been applying for academic positions in Canada, to take us home again. Unfortunately, the nature of his field dictates that he spend two years doing a post-doc position first. We have been in California doing just that, for a year and a half. So he *might* get an interview in the next few months or we officially apply for another post-doc in another location in the US.

Ultimately, change is in the air. Either way once our baby boy arrives we are heading on out. Hitting the open road of adventure. In the meantime I am going to try to not panic. Change is good.

Right?

My husband and I have moved a few times over the course of our marriage. Every time it gets harder to leave behind the amazing mothers I meet along the way. California has been harsh on us laid back Canadians. Neither my husband and I are cut out for this high paced, uber intense lifestyle. It really just is not our speed. Our daughter does not remember a life with out traffic jams, palm trees, beaches, zoos and Disneyland. Yet our son that will be born this year will never remembering being here at all.

Change.

Chelle, a Canadian girl living it up California style with her husband, daughter and pregnant with a son. Staying at home, keeping sane with her Apple computer, designing blog templates and going on endless adventures with a smart, shy toddler. You can find Allison, your blog host, over at http://soodz.com/blog.

And click here for more information about the Blog Exchange.