Things I Love about the South

Rural roadside signs that say things like: "Rabbits for Sale. Pets or Meat."

Memorial Day 2006

We went back to the Lake for the weekend. My dad invited his first cousin and his cousin's wife and their two kids down for a night.

It was pretty cool to see Rollie playing with his cousins, ages six and four (at left - Cash, Rollie, and Christian). My sister has no children, and neither do Todd's brothers, so these are the first cousins Rollie has ever played with. Matilda and Rollie do have a cousin on their dad's side (Jake, who is his second cousin), but he is much older than Rollie. They also have a third cousin Rollie's age on my side, Max, but we have not spent a lot of time with them. I have very fond memories of playing with my cousins, Graham and Adam, as a child. I am glad Rollie is getting to experience that.

I went to the trouble to figure out how we are all related:

• Billy and Daddy are first cousins (share grandparents, parents were siblings)
• Billy and I are first cousins, once removed.
• Billy and Rollie are first cousins, twice removed.
• Billy's kids and I are second cousins.
• Rollie and Billy's kids are Second cousins, once removed.
• I am totally confused.
  

The downside to the weekend was that most of us adults came down with a virus. Lisa and Todd became sick Sunday afternoon. Todd and I decided to leave early for home (we had planned on coming back on Monday) and i managed to make it back to Atlanta, put Todd and the kids down to bed, and then got sick at about 10pm. I was up all night. Fun, fun. Just now feeling better today.

Here are some pics from the weekend!


Matilda wants to play with the big boys










Rollie and Christian on the boat









Captain Cecil

Proud Parent

The other day, Rollie said, "Good song," from the backseat when I was playing "(Drawing) Rings Around the World" by Super Furry Animals. About a week before that, I looked in the rearview to catch him nodding his head to Broken Social Scene's "7/4 (Shoreline)." Today, on the way home from the Y, I was listening to The Editors and he said, "Make it Youder." Great musical taste, not so great at the letter L.

I am so proud. This probably seems silly, but I credit some of my parents' music with influencing my own tastes in music - Otis Redding, Elvis, the Everly Brothers, Gordon Lightfoot, Waylon Jennings, David Allan Coe, The Eagles, the Beatles, Peter Paul & Mary, Jerry Lee Lewis, just to name a few - These all remind me of my childhood, and they are things that I still love to hear today. (Okay, that is not completely true. I have not sought out the Everly Brothers. Ever. But I would love to hear Cathy's Clown!)

I just hope that Rollie and Matilda have fond memories of the music I listen to during their childhood. And I hope that when they think of me listening to it, they smile as big a smile as I do thinking of my Mama driving us around in the red station wagon, singing along with "Peaceful Easy Feeling" playing on the 8-track.

Irony

The realization that you are a stay-at-home mom, doing the dishes for the third time in one day, while listening to Big Black's "Fists of Love."

Produce = Fruit and Vegetables, You Dumb Whore

Does Kroger not train the people they hire to bag your groceries in even the basics of bagging groceries? Even if they don't, haven't most people who are bagging groceries also actually purchased groceries at some point? You would think that was the case, but evidently not.

I piled the kids into the car and headed over to the Edgewood Retail District Kroger here in Atlanta. (I used to go to the relatively new one closest to my house, but since putting in the even newer one at Edgewood, the one closer to me has become the "hood" Kroger, where you have to strap your purse into the buggy so as not to have it lifted. Okay, that is an exaggeration, but i do it anyway.) We got out of the car, went inside, snagged the last of the "racecarts" and were on our way to filling that baby to brimming. Rollie was holding the produce in the cab with him, while Matilda was watching over the bread and my purse up in the top, rear-facing seat.

The method of execution here, for those of you who have never taken two under three years of age to the grocery store, is to keep both kids in the buggy AT ALL TIMES. This prevents the toddler knocking over displays while running around, and the infant is able to watch your face while you animatedly sing and dance as shopping, preventing her from wailing the entire time. This becomes a balancing act: You must map out your order of objects in the buggy so as to make room for both kids in buggy and keep kids from crushing the soft items, while also making sure that the raw meat doesn't touch produce or children. And you people thought I sat around all day eating bon-bons. Motherhood is enough to make a logistician's head whirl.

I proceed to the checkout, where a youngish (late teens?) girl begins bagging my groceries while I am unloading the buggy. By the time that I finish unloading, pry the candy Rollie has taken off the display shelves out of his hands, (FUCK the person who came up with the brilliant marketing idea of blocking checkouts with an obstacle course of cheap toys and sugary candy) and move up to the counter to pay the bill, I realize our brilliant bag girl has started loading my groceries into another buggy. The other buggy is not a racecar, so only has seating for one child. This means I will have to push a VERY full buggy of food and an infant in the buggy, while grasping the hand of the toddler to get to the car. Anyone who has been to Edgewood retail district can attest to the fact that it is not the most brilliantly planned parking lot in history. They can also attest to the fact that its patrons are predominately single and childless, meaning that in their world, they don't think about things like darting children or runaway grocery buggies while they are rolling through (or completely ignoring) stop signs. I think about asking her to move the groceries back into the racecart, but am completely distracted by her putting the chicken breasts into a bag with the tomatoes!!!!!! WHAT!?

I say: "Can you put the produce and meat into separate bags, please?"
[Brilliant bag girl stares blankly at me, then decides she will "humor" the crazy lady.] As if I am the only person who ever shopped at this Kroger who prefers not to give myself and my family food poisoning.
The cashier says to her, "'Produce' means fruits and vegetables."

Realizing that she is not going to do a great job, i watch as she does things like put canned goods into a bag with my bread, which i promptly save from sure death, or put a 12-pack of Diet Coke on top of the bag of lettuce and mushrooms. (I guess I should just be thankful that she put two vegetables together in a bag instead of taking a pocket knife, cutting open a container of raw beef roast, and pouring its bloody juices into the bag of lettuce.)

I manage to get Matilda moved from the racecart into the new buggy, and then tell Rollie to get out of the cab of the car. He looks at me like I am crazy, as his feet have never actually touched the floor on the inside of a grocery store. We head out to the car, dodging speedy gay men in convertibles and hung over college kids clutching their Starbucks, all the while trying to contain the hawing of the buggy, which, of course, is one of those much-coveted buggies that needs a wheel realignment. Try to steer one of those babies with one hand! I strap the kids in, then unload the buggy with haste, return it to the corral and sink into my car seat with exhaustion.

It's been a long time, baby.

Since I've posted. I've been at the Lake a lot lately (who could turn down free time on the Lake?) and we don't have internet access there. Yikes.

Anyway, I am really glad to be home, and will start posting more this week. I'm looking forward to it, because there is a lot of stuff rattling around in the old mind lately. Now, if I can just find enough time to write it all down! Seems kids get in the way of things like writing down what one is thinking; Rather, the physical requirements of parenting keep one somewhat imprisoned in her own mind, without the time to give those thoughts an outlet. It can be a lonely island of an existence at times.

Not like Charles, who writes the blog Heartache with Hard Work. He obviously doesn't have children, as he has time enough to listen to and rank every Beatles' song, in order from worst to first. Okay, honestly? Even if I didn't have kids, i don't think i would have the time or energy to do something like this. Pretty impressive undertaking, and well-written.

Oh, and while I'm at it, i should give a shout out to Reese, who is back with ShiftyEye. Yippee! Check him out if you are into reading about living in sin, the experiences of an Atlantan in the Big Apple, what it's like to travel for work, or the occasional commentary on music, politics, or sports. Good stuff from a great guy. . . Welcome back, Harris!

Inman Park

From the Inman Park Festival a few weeks ago:

Rollie and Todd cruise the booths. (Note Grup messenger bag on Todd.)
















Matilda checks out the sights from the best seat in the house. We need to figure out how to make Baby Bjorns and slings for adult. How awesome would it be if Todd and I could take turns carrying each other in the sling? You could lean back, pop open a beer, and take it all in, and your feet would never touch the ground.








Rollie plays on the slide (and with a magnolia leaf) at the kiddie area (below).

















Inman Park Festival landscape looks completely different than it used to in my single and childless days. Used to be that Todd and I would grab a beer, peruse the art booths, maybe check out a band or two. These days? We didn't even have one beer, we ate french fries in record time while watching a band, then raced off to the very "cut off" valley in which the kids' area was contained. No music. Just the sound of tantrums interspersed with the occasional calm before the storm that occurs when someone's ice cream falls off the cone and into the dirt.











Mmmm. . . handcut french fries.

















Todd and Rollie force smiles after a diapering battle. (Todd wins!)
















At the end of the afternoon, our star has had a little too much fun, and his handler leads him to the car while attempting to shield him from the flash of the paparazzi.

Things I love about The South

That I can tell someone that "I went to The Pig" and they know where I've been.

Proud Sister

I have never been so proud of my sister as I am today. It is satisfying to watch someone you love decide to make a change in their lives, then work to achieve that change. Lisa has worked her ass off for two years, and she has made her family and friends very proud.

Way to go, Nurse Lisa! We love you!

Your sister (with only one piddly little degree,)
Annie

Life in the Food Web

It's good to have read this article in the New York Times on those days when you want to crate your toddler, or dose your infant with Diphenhydramine, put duct tape over both their mouths, or throw them out of a moving vehicle. I mean, yeah, i think about it, but i would never:

• Feed one while watching the other starve
• Eat my young
• Watch as one pecks the other to death
• Conceive twins that eat each other in utero (??!!!)
• Leave my children alone to fend for themselves while I go out on a date with the new male in town. (Well, what does he look like?)

I guess when compared with the mothers of all species in the natural world, I'm looking pretty good, huh? Tell that to your future therapist, you ingrates.

Oh.

Love,
Mama (Dearest)

Disrespectin' the Hood

What's up, East Atlanta? If you're so fuckin' proud of your 'hood, kindly start picking up your litter. It's pissing me off.

Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About the Rolling Stones

Can be found here.

I was searching the Web for information on an early to mid-60's Rolling Stones' appearance at Georgia Southern College (now, University) in Statesboro, Georgia. Growing up, Dad had told me that he saw them there. He remembers it as being 1962 or 1963, but that isn't possible based on the information I came across on this site. It must have been 1965.

If you have the urge to find out what anyone in The Rolling Stones was doing on any day since they formed the band, this is the place. It contains a mind-boggling timeline, including this little tidbit concerning the Rolling Stones first appearance in the American Southeast:

"May 4-8, 1965: The Rolling Stones perform their first ever concerts in the southeastern U.S., playing auditorium and stadium shows in Statesboro and Atlanta in Georgia, Clearwater and Jacksonville in Florida, and Birmingham, Alabama."

Interestingly, this is what Mick Jagger had to say about America at the time:

"New York (in 1964 and '65) was wonderful and so on, and L.A. was also kind of interesting. But outside of that we found it the most repressive society, very prejudiced in every way. There was still segregation. And the attitudes were fantastically old-fashioned. Americans shocked me by their behavior and their narrow-mindedness. It's changed fantastically over the last 30 years. But so has everything else (laughs)."

Rollie Goes to See Junior Horne

A couple of weeks ago, after spending the weekend at the Lake, I went to see my parents in Warner Robins, about an hour and a half south of Atlanta, near Macon. While down there, Dad decided that Rollie needed a haircut, so we took him to Junior Horne's. Mr. Horne has only been cutting Dad's hair for the few years he has been living in WR, but he has been cutting Pop's hair for almost 40 years. When we talk about getting their hair cut, they don't even have to say, "I went and got my haircut today." They say, "I went to see Junior Horne." Now that's an enduring relationship.

Junior Horne's has a barber shop pole (kicking myself for not getting a picture of Rollie's reaction to that, and is located in a 50's-style strip mall that my Dad claims is where he saw Jerry Lee Lewis play on the back of a flatbed pickup truck. This is right up there with Dad's claim that he drove the Rolling Stones from the Savannah airport to Georgia Southern when they played there while he was in college. I love my Dad, and one of my favorite things about him is that you never quite know if he's telling the truth, but you sure like the sparkle he gets in those green eyes while you're trying to figure it out. Update: Check this and this out. Could it be true? Look and sound familiar, Daddy? Ah, the power of the Internet.
Okay, so not only does my Daddy have mysterious, beautiful green eyes, but he saw some kickass shows!

Mr. Horne has obviously cut toddler hair before, as he did a great job, and it was virtually painless for everyone involved. (Most importantly, it was not a screamfest display for the other patrons waiting patiently to see Mr. Horne on their lunch break.) He has a television and promptly turned on some cartoons for Rollie as he climbed up on the board set across the arms of the barber's chair. (Remember that? Or was I so freakishly raised that no one else's Daddy took their little girl to the barber shop to get her hair cut?) He also has pictures of old cars and military aircraft (there is an Air Force base in town) framed on every space of the wall. Little boy heaven. It even went so well that I took Matilda in the Baby Bjorn to the music store next door. We played percussion instruments, which she really dug, and she now has her eye on a Hello Kitty strat.

After the haircut, we thanked Mr. Horne and then headed over to NuWay Weiners. NuWay Weiners is kind of Macon's answer to Atlanta's The Varsity. They also have one in Warner Robins.

I've Been Classified and Tagged

So, my parenting breed has been studied, classsified, and tagged. Seems that Todd and I are Grups. The linked article by Adam Sternbergh has been floating around on the internet for a few weeks now. (Okay, a month. Can we say "Slacker parenting?") Todd first sent it to me weeks ago, and upon reading it, my first reaction was protestation. "Who does this guy think he is? He doesn't know me." After reading the whole article, I knew I must blog about it. I mean, how can i not comment on something that was so truly dead-on about parenting in the 21st century? Anyway, it took me a while to get around to writing this up, though, because damn! i am so busy being a hip Mom that I just haven't gotten around to it until now. The article specifically discusses Grups in NYC, but Todd and I, and many of our friends with kids, are evidence that they exist in excess in most urban areas.

You can read all about it in the article, but here's the Grup criteria, in a nutshell:

Owns eleven pairs of sneakers
I own seven.

Hasn't worn anything but jeans in a year.
True, not counting maternity clothes and workout clothes, and then there are cute skirts. I think the point is that i sure as hell haven't worn a suit, nor has my dear husband. Oh, except for Lisa's wedding.

Won't shut up about the latest Death Cab CD.
Okay, a little off on this one, as i think most self-respecting Grups can agree that it was not as good as their earlier efforts.

Walks around with an IPod listening to the latest from Bloc Party.
Check.

Buys clothes at Urban Outfitters.
Uh, would if I could fit into the fucking stuff. T's been on a freakin' old school Goodwill kick lately. Making me want to hit Potter's House Thrift Store in Athens. If i could fit into the fucking stuff.

Takes Toddlers to mommy's happy hour.
As far as I know, we can't do this in Atlanta, especially because Atlanta is not much of a walking city, but sign me up if they start one up. Let's be honest - Baby Bjorns and Hotslings were made for freeing up drinking hands.

Stays out till 4 am seeing New Pornographers.
To be truthful, we don't see shows like we used to. . . guess I am not as Gruppy as I thought. We do try to switch off the big shows, so as to avoid babysitting issues. The Pixies reunion was a bit problematic.

Pays $250 for a pair of distressed jeans.
Totally off on this one, as Todd and I would never pay that much for a pair of jeans, but wouldn't have at 25 years old, either. I mean, we don't live in New York, for God's sake. Do people pay that much for jeans anywhere else?

"We will not listen to the Wiggles in this house."
Or his purple fucking dinosaur friend, either.

Wears sneakers as a fashion statement.
Rollie and I have matching navy Chuck Taylors. Check Tiller and me out.












Wears sneakers to the office.
What office? Oh, you mean the hip Inman Park loft office where Todd works? The one our friend Brian refers to as "the Cartoon Factory?"

Wears a Misfits shirt.
The Cramps.












Makes his two-year old wear a Misfits shirt.
Rollie doesn't have a Misfits shirt, but he does have "Daddy Drinks Because I Cry" and both he and Matilda wear the same Standard Deluxe tees that Daddy wears.)

Messenger Bag?
Duh. Only losers use real diaper bags.












The article goes much more in-depth about the Grup clothing, career attitude, and musical taste, but you get the picture. The fact that I relate to the likes and dislikes of this bunch isn't what this is about. Blogger Que Sera Sera's take is that she finds it annoying that people are making their offspring into Mini-Mes. I disagree, leaning more towards the author's arguments. Sternbergh points out that this phenomenon is somewhat about "stuff" - IPods, Macs, clothing, shoes, accessories, etc., but also thinks that on a deeper level, it is about being able to enjoy the good parts of adulthood (as he puts it: "a paycheck, family") and none of the bad stuff ("Dockers, management seminars, indentured servitude at the local Gymboree.") Amen, Brother!

Mostly, though, the author points out that the phenomenon is about passion:

"There's that tricky word again: Passion. What's with the Grups and passion? It's all anyone wants to talk about. Passionate parents, passionate workers, passionate listeners to the new album by Wolf Parade . . . . And I start to realize: Under the skin of the iPods and the . . . ripped jeans, this is the spine of the Grup ethos: passion and the fear of losing it."

And for me, that is what struck a chord when I read this article. I do fear the loss of passion. I want my children to see me excited about things, and about new things, not just the things that used to excite me before I had children. I'm not saying I want my children to like the same things, but that i want them to inherit the desire to seek out things that interest them, to stay true to their ethics and aesthetics, whatever those may be. I want my kids to know that while they are my world, they are not the only thing that I love in this world.

Wait a minute. I draw the line at Barney. There will be no Barney in this house. Period.

When the Boys are Away, the Girls Will Play

I'm a little behind, but here are pics from our girls weekend at the Lake. Okay, well, Rollie was there, but he played along nicely with our girly games. (See picture, below.) I had decided that single parenthood was more fun at the Lakehouse than at home, so I took the kids down while Todd went to Mexico with his boys. Here are the sons of bitches at a bar on the island. (From left: Todd, Jonathon, Ned, and Scott.)


Here is the aforementioned picture of Rollie, with Lisa and Matilda. Yes, Nemo swim diapers are the appropriate bottoms for a toddler to wear with his first bra. (And yes, those are Lazy Boy recliners, in brown and brown, along with the "mediterranean-style" end table that my parents bought when they were first married. They went with the green and white mediterranean-style couch that my sister, poor soul, is still using to this day. Evidently, at the time, they were "the In thing." Anyone else's parents have late 60s/early 70s Mediterranean-style furniture, or did my Mama make that one up?)















Tiller and Scar - fast friends.














Rollie fills the turtle pool (our location of choice for the weekend, as Rollie stayed in one place while Lisa, Vanessa, and I had margaritas) with Quint lounging in the background. Also note old-school clothes on the line and fabulous septic tank, oh-so-well-camouflaged by, what else? brown lattice, in the background.















Scarlett and Quint lounge by the pool as Vanessa looks on.















OTTER POPS!!!!!


















Rollie, Lisa, and Tiller by the pool.














Rollie, Quint, Lisa, Vanessa, and Scarlett feed the geese.














Tiller and Rollie were unimpressed with her first boat ride. If only I could bottle the nap-inducing powers of the boat - Rollie was out before we left our cove.