Now They Tell Me

That ice cream increases fertility.

Too late for me to take advantage of that now, as we have hit the end of our childbearing phase of this life. But couldn't I find this out back in 2002 or so, when we were having a little difficulty figuring out why we weren't conceiving? I must note here that our "battle" with infertility was not fought for years upon years, that many people I know have dealt with infertility obstacles much greater than mine, but that doesn't make it any less painful when you are in the throes of the despair and suspense and depression that difficulty conceiving brings.

In all seriousness, I don't think the ice cream would have regulated my whacked hormones, the ones that made my periods do strange things, like not show for three months and make me think I was pregnant, or that made all my exercise and following Weight Watchers to a T be for naught - I still did not lose any weight and wondered what in the hell was wrong with me? I sat around thinking, "Holy shit. I am not only never going to have children, but I am going to be a hairy, menstruation-fucked, hormonal fat ass, too!"

My Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome (PCOS) will not be cured by ice cream, unfortunately. The only thing that cures it? Exercise and diet: "lifestyle changes" if you will, and those just aren't as damn fun as ice cream. But then, who needs ice cream, when I have two lovely children (a complete set!) and the possibility of being thin again.

Go Me

I haven't been running much lately. Up until last week, one or both of the kids had been sick every week since Thanksgiving, which has been fucking awesome, thanks for asking. Anyway, I didn't make it to the gym much, because it pisses me off when other people bring their sick kids to the gym and to school, (and don't even get me started on assholes bringing their sick kids into the well-visit waiting room at the Pediatrician's office) so why should I stoop to their level?

Anyway, that just meant that I didn't quite get much exercise in the last three months. Pretty pitiful, actually, but I made a promise to myself that since we are all better, we will be making it back to the gym regularly. So, today, I only ran 2.5 miles and it sucked. Why does it have to be so sucky to get back into the swing of exercise?

That being said, I have felt great today mentally, and I know it is the exercise. I know it is good for me, that it is good for my mind, and that it makes me a much better parent, wife, and all-around person.

So, i am back on the wagon. Go me.

Salad Sucks, Mama

What Rollie thinks about salad.

I Have a Problem.

Why does it have to taste so good? Why do we have to eat it at all?

This is the Mrs. Winner's leftovers guilt talking. We have a lot going on around the house (we are putting it back on the market next week) and so Todd brought home a bucket of chicken for dinner last night. We don't do this often (like, ever). There were leftovers. Mrs. Winner's is not on Weight Watchers. I think that if you look up Mrs. Winner's in the Dining Out companion that WW gives you, instead of points values for the chicken, it just says, "Give up now."

I woke up this morning. I was really good. Coffee, with Splenda and fat free creamer. Breakfast bar to go as I walked out the door to take Rollie to school. Came home, went to pour one last half-cup of coffee, and stumbled across. . . I can only describe them as two buttery biscuits of love. That reminded me of the chicken leftovers in the fridge. Suddenly, I was putting a chicken wing and two biscuits on a plate and popping them into the microwave. At 10:00 a.m.

I quit smoking. I could quit drinking if I wanted. Food? I have a problem.

Soundtrack: Fairport 1979-1980

I skim the New York Times online just about every day, and the last thing I look at is the "On This Day" feature. From the New York Times today:

"On Feb. 22, 1980, in a stunning upset, the United States Olympic hockey team defeated the Soviets at Lake Placid, N.Y., 4-to-3. (The U.S. team went on to win the gold medal.)

You can see the a picture of the actual front page that day here.

This event, along with the Georgia Bulldogs winning the national championship earlier that year, is one of my earliest sports memories. It also elicits thoughts of the two years I spent living in Fairport, New York, near Rochester. I watched this hockey game at my friend Karen Rapp's house. All of her brothers and sisters and their friends were there and it was the second time I ever heard the F-word. When the U.S. won, all the crazy hockey fans all over the neighborhood ran outside and honked car horns and I just thought it was the best thing ever.

I was in 2nd or 3rd grade at that time and Karen was in Kindergarten or First grade. She was the youngest of one of about 10 kids, and I loved to hang out at their house, because it was kind of like being in an episode of The Brady Bunch or Eight is Enough. She shared a room with two of her sisters and I still remember sitting on her sister's bed while falling asleep, gazing at their Pink Floyd The Wall poster. It creeped me out. In their den in the afternoons, all of the kids and their friends would huddle around a little television and watch M.A.S.H. I hated MASH at the time, but grew to love it later. The other reason that I loved to hang out there was that Mrs. Rapp made homemade pizza for all of the kids on Friday nights. She would slave away making pizzas for the kids and their friends, serve it to us all, and then retire to the living room couch, lay down, put a pair of huge headphones on her head (plugged into the humongous stereo receiver) and listen to Neil Diamond. Mrs. Rapp loved Neil Diamond. She would have left Mr. Rapp, despite his kickass homemade maple syrup, for Neil Diamond.

Neil Diamond, in turn, reminds me of New York. Except for "Cracklin' Rosie," which reminds me of drinking with Dan and Evan, or "Sweet Caroline," which reminds me of that crappy Jimmy Fallon baseball movie, Fever Pitch, based on the book by Nick Hornby, whose writing I really like, even though he seems to keep writing the same book over and over and just changing the characters' names. Okay, I admit it. I even kind of like the movie, because I could drink with Drew Barrymore, and I would be lying if I said Jimmy Fallon isn't rotated in and out of my top ten every once in a while, and because I would fall in love with a Sox-lovin' Jimmy Fallon type if I was ten years younger and a workaholic Drew Barrymore lookalike.

Which brings me in a very convoluted manner to the rest of the post. A while ago, an acquaintance posted this video from YouTube on his blog. It is Christopher Cross' "Ride Like the Wind," live. Boy did it bring back the memories of living in New York, at about 7 or 8 years old. I thought about my Fisher Price doll house, and turning the lights off for bed, then reading horse books or playing dolls by flashlight till late at night, the radio on so low that only I could hear it.

That was back when you mostly listened to the radio or your parents' albums. (I could and might dedicate a complete series of posts to those.) You had no idea what the musicians looked like, or what an album was. You just liked a song or you didn't, and you'd better hope you liked it, because either way, you would hear it run into the ground for the next year, blaring out of the hard plastic speaker in the side of the faux-wood-sided station wagon as you rattled around to the grocery store in the way back (there were three sections to our station wagon: "Front," "Back," and "Way Back.")

Seat belts? What are seat belts?

Soundtrack: Fairport 1979-1981

"Ride Like the Wind" - Christopher Cross
"Sailing" - Christopher Cross
These two are kind of interchangeable, but i associate both of them inextricably with New York and listening to the radio undercover at night in my room

"Band on the Run" - Paul McCartney and Wings
This came out in like '73, but I distinctly remember it playing on the radio while my sister and I took a bath in our bathroom in New York. The bathroom was brown, and had this weird wallpaper that had a Sherlock Holmes-like character with a brown bloodhound. The toilet seats were plastic and cushioned. Fancy.

"Keep on Loving You" - REO speedwagon
The ultimate Fairport song. Lisa, Karen Rapp, Matt Recht from next door and Jennifer Lofberg from across the street would all hang out in our garage. We were in an airband. We did this song.

"Another One Bites the Dust" - Queen
I remember this song coming out and everyone went crazy for it. I remember Karen's brother, David, talking about it with my babysitter, Sarah. They were in high school. David was holding a Simon. Simon is this weird toy where it plays a noise, and you have to hit the colored bar corresponding to the sound you heard, and it starts playing more and more intricate patterns of sound. The person who can play what Simon plays the longest without fucking up wins. David, nerd that he was, pretended that he was some scientist who could control animals with sound, and the Simon was the sound machine he used to control us. Yes, the rest of the younger kids were animals.

"Another Brick in the Wall" - Pink Floyd
See above mention of the poster.

"Suicide is Painless" - MASH theme song - Mike Altman and Johnny Mandel
Yes, I had to look up the artists' names. Reminds me of the dread i would feel every time I heard it ("Ugh, 30 minutes of complete boredom coming up"), much like the feeling I still get upon hearing the infernal ticking of the 60 Minutes clock.

"Do Ya Think I'm Sexy" - Rod Stewart
Another of the my babysitters, a next door neighbor, was a total stoner, I am pretty sure. She invited her boyfriend over while she was supposed to be watching us, and she let us watch Solid Gold and Rod Stewart did this song live, wearing these tight black pants, shaking his ass and she said she thought he had a cute butt. I thought she was a bad, bad girl for saying that, and I also wondered what could possibly be cute about someone's butt?

"The Devil Went Down to Georgia" - The Charlie Daniels Band
I still love this song. It's like a folk song, but it has that shock factor that you love as a kid ("I done tole you once, you son of a bitch, I'm the best that's ever been.") My parents had the album, and we played it on the record player in the office and totally spazzed out dancing to the electric fiddle bridge in the middle of it.

"Lost in Love" - Air Supply
I am not sure that this is not the same song as the Christopher Cross songs. Same feel. Bedroom at night, radio down low.

"Upside Down" - Diana Ross
Leftover disco 45 in my parents record collection. We wore this baby out. Dance Fever!

"Y.M.C.A." - Village People
I cringe when i hear this now, but god almighty did I like it back in the day. At that time, I thought they just liked to dress as what they wanted to be when they grew up.

"The Winner Takes It All" - ABBA
Off of the album Super Trouper. Thank God I was not a boy, or i would be completely gay now. Village People? Diana Ross? ABBA? Dear God. We sang our guts out on this one. I wanted flowing dresses like the ones they had on the cover. I thought they looked like sexy Greek goddesses.

"Rumours" - Fleetwood Mac
I am not sure where Mom got this from, but i LOVED it. Probably the first album I ever really loved. I have to say, best album on this list. (Todd will probably argue that based on Wings being on here, but he is the only one who really listens to Wings.) I was forever staring at the cover and wondering why that guy's belt looks like testicles hanging between his legs.

Trip down memory lane completed. Please exit the bus in an orderly manner. Maybe tomorrow you will get a recap of my parents' albums' influence on my musical tastes. Or, maybe you will get more ridicule of my sister and husband. Maybe you will be on the hotseat. You just never know with me.

Consider Yourselves Guilt-Tripped

So, I wrote here about how I was kind of scared of letting other people read stuff I've written. (By "stuff," I mean fiction. - Obviously, I am perfectly comfortable writing about my vagina, periods, mood swings, sex, drinking, desire to throw my children out of a window, etc.)

Well, I finally finished a draft of a story, and I wanted feedback, so I gave the draft to the two people I trust most in the world and asked for feedback. I received some positive verbal feedback from one of them, and requested that she maybe write some of it down on the pages and give it back to me, so that I could remember them (memory is not what it used to be) and so that I could digest them fully. I have seen nothing. This was weeks ago. The other reviewer, who shall also remain nameless, but who knows who he is, has skimmed it, felt uncomfortable that he might be the basis for a character, and told me verbally that he found parts confusing from a setting standpoint. I asked him to read it fully and write some of the contents down. I haven't seen a thing. It has been almost a month.

What the fuck, people? I put my blood and guts and heart on a piece of paper for you to mark up with a colored goddamn marker (which I would think you would do gleefully), and you don't even bother to return it to me?

I know you have shit going on. I know you are busy/tired/scared of hurting my feelings. You know what really hurts my feelings? That you must understand that this was a big step for me, and you just left me hanging. If anything says, "I don't think you are going to be much of a writer," it is not bothering to take the time to really read what I have written.

I just had to say it, because . . . well, I feel unsupported, and my feelings are hurt. Guilt trip over, but consider your asses busted out on the internet.

p.s. This doesn't get you out of reviewing the thing. I will expect the copies returned, picked apart, within the week.

Our Weekend in Savannah: Part II

As I said, I felt like SHIT on Saturday. Nausea and splitting headache, which i think were due more to lack of sleep than quantity of alcohol. Complete and utter shit, all the same. I told Todd I didn't want to drink a lot, so that I would feel good on Saturday. He made me drink.

We woke up, ate some continental breakfast, then headed out to get a new digital camera. (Ours finally pissed us off enough to be retired.) Then we had a tasty sandwich at a sub place and headed back to the room for naps. I was disappointed that I was so tired on Saturday - I far would have preferred strolling the squares all day Saturday, but knew I must sleep or I would never make it through the wedding on Saturday night.




We slept for two hours, then woke up, had a snack and dressed for the wedding. The trolley (ring! ring! ring! goes the bell) was picking up at 5:40 for the 6:30 wedding. We rushed around getting dressed and got on the trolley. We picked up more wedding guests at the Mulberry Inn and the Desoto Hilton. I have never seen so many women wearing dead animals in my life.

The wedding was at The Oglethorpe Club. Another beautiful house, right across the street from the original Armstrong College, where my father once attended classes. As we pulled up around the corner on to Bull St., we heard the piper playing. I swear to God, they had a bagpiper greeting the guests on the corner.

We got off the trolley, then proceeded up the stairs (festooned in beautiful greenery and white roses - I think they spent more on flowers than I spent on my whole wedding. There were white roses all over the whole house.) We checked my coat, then went up to the second floor for the ceremony. They conducted the ceremony in an upstairs, wood-paneled, long and narrow room. It was dark and candlelit. The bride wore a beautiful dress, and the the whole wedding party was decked out in Scottish tartan. The groom and his family wore their tartan; the bride and wedding party wore their own. Women wore a tartan sash with a brooch, including the bride. Nice, unusual touch. The piper piped as the wedding party entered. They also had a four-piece string instrument thing going on. The ceremony was very short, which was nice, because about half of us were standing in the back of the room.


After the ceremony, it was off to the bar. The Oglethorpe is a men's club. I was a little weirded out about things I have heard about it (no black members, no women allowed to walk up the front steps, etc.) All of that didn't matter - they could have made me crawl around on my knees as long as I could partake of the buffet.

I'm going to throw down the gauntlet: BEST. WEDDING. BUFFET. EVER. There were the usual carving tables, and an open bar, but the piece de resistance was the asparagus/cheese/tomato sandwich/oyster table. If you know me, you know they had me at "cheese," but if you throw in tomato sandwiches with the crusts (I still call them "the bones") cut off, I am yours. There were so many different kinds of stinky, blue-veined cheeses that I would have been sick even trying a bite of each one. Todd, meanie that he is, didn't think it was appropriate for me to put a whole chunk of cheese in my purse at the end of the evening. I am horrified at the thought of the cheese in a trashcan in the basement of the Oglethorpe Club.

Add in a bottomless pan of freshly-fried, hot oysters? Holy crap! I am surprised I didn't get sick. I spent half the evening hovering around the oyster dish with a bunch of old southern men, waiting for the next batch to come out. I think I impressed them with my oyster-eating prowess. I was so tired that night, that i took it easy on the drinking. Well, I did start at 7:00 or so and drink till 3 something in the morning, but i was a good girl. I felt fine on Sunday. One reason? I ate my weight in buffet. The reception lasted a long time, and people were pretty toasty by the end. I was pretty sober myself, having spent more time stuffing my face and looking at old weapons and pictures of Civil War generals.

In the end, the bride and groom came down the wide front steps of the club as we showered them with white rose petals. Both had changed: The groom was wearing ridiculous plaid pants, a bowtie, and a tam. The bride wore pants and sweater, along with a wide-brimmed hat and her tartan sash as a scarf. The "getaway" car was not a car at all - Definitely the cutest "Just married" getaway ever: They climbed onto a vintage tandem bike, complete with basket and bell, then rode off into Monterrey Square. (I think it was Monterrey Square). Adorable. I got a little choked up, and I don't even know them.

We took the trolley back to the hotel, then changed, and met people at the bar the wedding party had chosen. I am going to go ahead and say it was possibly the most hideous place I have ever been. Some kind of karaoke bar, attached to a bar that looked just like an Applebee's. I guess I am a snob, but I am picky. It is bad enough hearing the original versions of crappy rock songs (think Creed or one of those bands with numbers in their names), but hearing drunks butcher them even further was downright painful.

I drank PBRs with Kate (the bride's sister and Todd's friend), her husband, and her lecherous uncle from Bogota. They gave up the ghost and headed home. Todd was just kicking it into high gear (for those of you who know Todd, this is the part where he starts stirring his drink with his fingers, and then licking them merrily one by one) and so despite the fact that I was ready to fall into bed, I took one for the team and accompanied him for a few more hours.

We finally found a couple other like-minded guests who decided to venture with us to another bar, Hang Fire. My friend Donnie had recommended this place as having an excellent jukebox, and so when a fellow wedding guest mentioned it as a place where they might go, I jumped at the chance. It was pretty cool, but by the time we got there, everyone was wasted, and they had a band playing, so I didn't get a chance to check out the jukebox. I did get to see the shocked look on the face of the little South Carolina girl who had joined us, when she saw two girls making out in the corner and about ten guys taking camera phone pictures of them. That actually made the trip worthwhile. She then got into an argument with her date, who had somehow offended her by putting down "Carolina" and "the status quo in Columbia." They were a riot. We met a very nice Chicago girl who had been living in Savannah for a couple of years and tried to convince us that since we like Wilco we like jam bands. Ain't gonna happen. We finally walked back to the hotel with the feuding Columbian (of Columbia, SC) couple. I was asleep within five minutes.

I woke up feeling wonderful; Todd, not so much. Ah, sweet feeling of a Sunday morning without hangover or regret. We looked around in vain for somewhere neat to eat, then in desperation and hunger, I phoned my friend Jason, who recommended The Firefly Cafe, which looked awesome, but had a wait of what looked like hours (think Flying Biscuit waits). We went down the street to a J. Christopher's, which was actually really good, and had IHOP-style bottomless coffee on the table.

On the way, I caught sight of this guy who was carrying an interesting sign. I am guessing he strolls the streets every Sunday to put fear of God into Saturday night's hangover victims roving the streets searching for a cure; Everyone out on Sunday morning seemed to be a slow-moving student, or a well-dressed churchgoer in a fancy hat. It was Sunday, crisp and bright, and the people were walking their dogs with coffee in hand, and the church bells rang at noon. Lovely morning. Todd looked like death eating a ham sandwich, which only cast into relief my elation at having a sunny morning without kids or hangover.

Some things are indescribably perfect. We had a wonderful time (hard not to without kids), and I didn't even mention all the six degrees of separation, or the menage a trois come-ons (or so we like to flatter ourselves,) or the Episcopal Mafia. You can see more of our pictures from the trip by clicking on my Flickr link to the right. They should be up some time today.

Oh, p.s.! On Saturday, even with my hangover, we "discovered" an awesome artist at Chroma Gallery on Barnard. I posted about it here on Atlanta Metblogs, as the artist is an Atlantan. If you ever want to see what I am saying about Atlanta, there are links to my posts on Metroblogging Atlanta to the right.

Our Weekend in Savannah: Part I

We arrived in Warner Robins Friday afternoon, and dropped off the kids. We just about left skid marks on my parents after setting up the pack'n'play and saying hello to my grandfather. We took Mom's Honda Pilot, which drives great and is much nicer than our Honda Odyssey. Todd and I have decided that 75 South to Florida is far more boring than driving 16 to Savannah; 16 contains nothing of great interest to look at, but 75 contains a continuous string of eyesores.

We arrived in Savannah around six or so, and had to be at the cocktail party at 7:30, but the trolley (ding ding ding) was picking us up at 7:00, so no shower. You might think that I could get ready in one hour, but I wear it so rarely that I am nearly incapable of putting on makeup by myself. You can ask Todd; It really does take me that long. I would show you how horrible I am at it, but we deleted all the pictures for fear that they would give the children nightmares. Todd, however, looked great. (That's him at the left.) In fact, he looked so good that the groom's mother, upon seeing him, asked the bride's mother, "Who is that handsome man?" We are now working a scheme to knock off the groom's father, wed my husband to the widow, and put the kids and I up in a Savannah apartment until she kicks the bucket. I promise I am not going to end each paragraph in this post with someone dying off.

The cocktail party was held at The Harper-Fowlkes house, which is owned by The Society of the Cincinnati. I had no idea what this thing was, and I actually really dig genealogy and history: Seems that to be a member of the SOC, you have to be a first-born male descendant of an American or French Revolutionary war officer. Each officer can only have one descendant at a time represent them, so in order for a son to take his father's place, the father must kick the bucket first. (Left: The Harper-Fowlkes from the enclosed garden in the back.) The house was gorgeous and the food rocked. It was pretty cold, so people pretty much stayed inside, but the smokers (and me) spent a good deal of time on the back porch and in the garden.

At one point, I went to find a bathroom and entered the "off limits" upstairs of the three-story house. There was a really cool open area in the center of the 2nd floor hall that looked down on the entrance hall to the house. I was able to stand in this dimly-lit area and overhear everyone's conversations; unfortunately, it was mostly old people talking about boring stuff. I wandered around, looking at the oil paintings and weird Society "stuff" - old medals, books, and pins enclosed in glass cases. There were two bedrooms, impeccably furnished, with their own fireplaces, and a society library. The hallway was lit, but the rooms were not. I ventured into them, but frankly, I was a little creeped out. I also went to the landing halfway up the stairs to the third story, but could not see a thing further, and did not want to draw attention to myself by turning on a light. (Note to self: When going to parties in creepy old houses, make like Nancy Drew and bring along a spare flashlight in my clutch purse.) This was all even more disappointing when I spoke with a teenage boy, son of the host and hostess, who told me that he has explored the third floors, attics, and basements of every old house in Savannah - evidently, he has been dragged to a hell of a lot of boring society parties. (That's a picture of the bride and groom above.)

After the party, we went back to the hotel to change, then met other wedding guests in the lobby. We were kind of hoping to hit some off-the-beaten-path watering holes, but of course we ended up going to some "Irish" bar on River Street, because it was just plain easier than convincing people to go somewhere else and then getting them there. It ended up being pretty fun, and we had a whole upstairs bar to ourselves. (That's us on the left.) There were probably 15 to 20 of us. We knew two of them, but as the evening wore on, we met every Rhett and Scarlett in the place.

B.T. and Kate, with Todd. The only other two people we knew at the party.
No, I'm not kidding, one of them was really named Rhett. Okay, no Scarletts, but any other family name you can think of, there was someone with that name in the room: I met Rhett and Reeve, Dallon and Porter. Even the women with regular names had another name appended to the first, so that they became Kimberly Gay or Mary Ellen or Emma George. I felt so plain when I had to tell people my name: "Anne." They looked expectantly at me until they realized it was just that one syllable. I guess I should have been sticking that middle name on the end the whole time, just to not mess with their world.
I am joking, of course - they were all lovely people. One of the wonderful things about a wedding where you don't know anyone is that you get to meet so many great people, and learn such interesting things about them. (Geologists! Creative Writing PhDs! Lawyers! Insurance Salesmen!) As the evening wore on, we lost most of our party to sleep, and they closed the upper bar, so we headed downstairs for one more drink at that bar. On the way down, I met an audiologist (read: Hearing Aid Salesman) and his two coworkers, who were in Savannah for a convention. They were from Montreal, but one of them was a Frenchman from Lilles. I wowed him with my incredibly terrible French; No, all the alcohol in the world could not give me the gift of comprehensible French. He turned up his nose at my pronunciation until we finally hit upon a common bond - Our children are the same age and it seems that in any language, kids are a pain in the ass, and parents will compare pictures of them anyway.

While talking to the Quebecois and Monsieur Lilles, I overheard the guy on my other side saying into his cellphone, "No, I'm in Georgia." He sounded like he wanted to blow his brains out. I said, in my bitchiest drunk voice: "Is it really that bad?" He met my eyes and looked like he was about to cry. I said, "Oh my God, are you okay?" Turns out that he and his sister were in Savannah for his sister's wedding, which isn't that odd, except that it is his half-sister, whom he had never met before. They have the same father, and they found each other on the internet. While he was at the wedding, he received a phone call from his home town of Portland, and was informed that one of his best friends was killed in a car wreck. So, he was sitting beside me at the bar, drinking to his dead friend, when he received a call that the whole thing had been a horrible mix-up; The friend was not dead at all. He was so relieved he was about to cry. I was drunk and gave him a ridiculously huge hug. He hugged back. Ah, the friendships I have made in bars. He ended up walking back to the hotel with us (he was staying there, too) and bitching about how Savannah didn't know their cocaine. We bid him farewell in the lobby, and he looked like a lost little boy. (That's him at the left.)
Anyway, perfect example of the fun and interesting conversations you have when you go to a wedding and hang with people you don't know. I should point out here that his sister who was married in Savannah is not the same as Todd's friend Kate's sister, Emily, whose wedding we were attending. That is how rumors get started.

All in all, a wonderfully fun evening, and did I mention that I felt terrible on Saturday? I felt terrible. Part II to come tomorrow!

Road Trip! Again.

We are off to Savannah, hometown of my Daddy and his peeps, for a wedding. I am really excited, as it is one of my favorite places in the world. Kids are being dropped off about an hour down the road (don't worry - we are leaving them with my parents, not just putting them out on the side of the road, although that is sometimes tempting) and then I get a much-needed weekend of relaxation with my husband.

Rollie on Valentine's Day

What Rollie thinks about Valentine's Day:

I Still Want My Mommy

In case you don't know, or don't read Dogwood Girl regularly, parenting is hard as fuck. The hardest part, by far, is the worry in the back of your mind that something might happen to one of your children. It is constant. It never goes away. One can imagine losing a parent, sibling, or spouse. Losing a child is unimaginable. There is a saying, and I'm not sure to whom it is attributed, that having a child is forever having your heart walk around outside your body. You are helpless in protecting it. I can imagine no more frightening exercise in letting go of one's fear than seeing a child walk away from you for the first time, or seeing a child drive away alone in a car.

The second hardest part is the sheer relentlessness of the physical requirements of caring for a child. You can schedule it to death, but the unscheduled will occur, and you will have to take care of it, right then and there. You can plan to write for an hour while the children watch Sesame Street, but they will make countless requests for snacks, diaper changes, channel changes, outfit changes, toy dispute reconciliations, and the occasional refereeing of to-the-death grudge matches. Having children means that things that usually take one minute will take ten. Things that take an hour will take at least two hours. It is a job that starts around 7a.m., but might start at 5:30 a.m. some mornings. (No advance notice is given if that is the case, but you can rest assured that if you stay out dancing with the girls until 5:30 a.m. the night before, that your son will wake up at 5:30 the next morning.) You do not get a breakfast, lunch or dinner break. You do not get an anything break. You are lucky if you get to take a shit by yourself, or if you do not have to cut that short to make sure that after you heard that shattering glass noise your child is not now eating glass. You are lucky if you get to wipe before getting up from the toilet. I have actually stood up from the toilet and not had the time to pull up my pants before rushing out of the bathroom to check on the latest catastrophe, my pants still around my ankles. The day usually ends at 7:30 or eight for us, but if someone is sick, or teething, or scared, or cold, or wets the bed, then you might have wakeup calls at any hour of the evening. And you still might have to get up at 5:30 a.m. the next day. So, you have anywhere from 12 to 14 hour days, with no breaks, and with being on call 24 hours a day. And weekends. In a good, healthy, sane week, you might work about 85 hours. Unpaid, but for the satisfaction of a snuggle here or a kiss or hug there. There is also the laughter. Kids say some damn funny stuff, and you have to appreciate that the laughter is part of the payoff, or you would be left with nothing.

And here is what to me is the next hardest part of parenting: Being sick while you are a parent. It sucks the biggest cock EVER.

It started Friday. Rollie was being a total shit, and even had to be taken out of the restaurant at dinner for his behavior. I should have known what was up, because he wouldn't eat anything at dinner, including french fries, which is Mommy 101 for "You are going to be up all night with a puking kid." Sure enough, we put the kids down Friday night at the Lakehouse, where we were staying because we were having the downstairs walls in our house painted. Now, the heat died this fall at the Lakehouse, so it is heated by only gas logs, but if you dress like lumberjacks and keep the logs on all the time, and sleep in two or three quilts at night, you are okay. It is not, however, conducive to being a sickhouse, where one has to get up out of bed multiple times in a night to clean up pukey kids, change puked-on sheets, and make up clean beds. Todd shivered the night away on the couch next to a drafty window, while I slept in his bed, and got up with Tiller who awoke crying multiple times. We made it through the night, thought maybe Rollie had just had too much chocolate milk at dinner, then he puked up his breakfast. Did I mention that the Lake has a washer, but no dryer? We dry the clothes on the line outside. It was about 30 degrees and cloudy. Time to go home. Todd packed up Rollie, while I cleaned up at the house with the help of my Dad, then followed with the still-healthy Tiller.

We came back to the house, and unpacked everything, starting to do laundry, while William, our painter, finished up painting downstairs. Todd and I, in our great wisdom, do not have a television in our bedroom. We feel it promotes a healthy marriage, where we talk or read before going to bed, rather than flipping through channels, or one of us watching something downstairs, while the other watches t.v. in bed.

We are idiots. It is pure hell to be stuck in a sickroom with two puking kids, and NO TELEVISION. Pure. Hell. Yep, Tiller went down for a nap at about 2 pm and woke up screaming bloody murder five minutes later. Covered in puke. I almost threw out her pitiful Hello Kitty doll, the one where kitty is wearing a Jackie-O pillbox hat, and carrying a cute pocketbook, and has a poodle on a leash. Very cute. Doesn't machine wash. (Note to non-parents: Gifts that do not machine-wash end up in the trash.)

Diarrhea began not long after that. That was Saturday. No more puke out of either of them, but diarrhea continued through Sunday at 5 pm, when I started puking.

You know when you are really sick? I mean uncontrollable puking until the dry heaves hit, and you are still nauseated, when you start throwing up bile and possibly cracking ribs in the process? That's when the diarrhea hits, and there is a lovely crossover period where you are sick from both ends, and you wish that your toilet was withing puking distance of your bathtub, so that you could do both at once. Then the vomiting subsides and you are left with an emptying diarrhea that lasts for hours and you shiver and are cold and you break out in a cold sweat and then the covers are too much, but it doesn't matter because you can't lie in bed for more than five minutes before having to rush back into the bathroom, and you are spent and so dehydrated and thirsty, but you are scared to drink anything, because every time something enters your mouth, it comes directly back out the other end.

Most of all, you want your Mommy, and unfortunately, you are the mommy.

Now imagine being that sick, and having two kids who are also sick. To give credit where credit is due, my dear husband took care of me and the kids while we were all sick this weekend, but just the guilt alone of being sick and not feeling like taking care of the little ones when they are sick is terrible. I was sick all night Sunday. I was weak and spent all day yesterday. The other bad part of being a sick family is when you are the non-sick one: All chores fell on Todd Sunday night and all day Monday. Not only are you responsible for puke and diarrhea cleanup, but you are responsible for planning and preparing meals (a land mine field of menu planning that dictates what kind of puke and diarrhea you will be cleaning up in the coming hours), laundry detail, and the gnawing fear that you have a toilet with your name on it in the future.

I started feeling better yesterday afternoon, but I was still weak and tired and unable to eat much. The kids seemed to be feeling better, but everyone was kind of laying around. Todd fixed dinner and Tiller puked it up. Both kids had more diarrhea after dinner. They had baths and went to bed. I made it till about 9 and then hit the hay myself, hoping to get a decent night's sleep and recoup some energy. Tiller puked at 10, awakening with a cry. It is hard to describe how pitiful kids are when they puke in their beds: They wake up scared and in the dark and covered in their own sick. It is also hard to describe the sinking feeling you get as a parent when your kids wake up sick. Let's just say that when I heard Todd utter "crap" upon checking on Tiller, I knew what had happened. She woke up puking again at 11. Luckily, she slept through the rest of the night uneventfully, because we only had one clean sheet left for her crib. Rollie crawled into bed with us at 6:30 a.m. All in all, a fairly decent night's sleep.

This morning? Both kids have had breakfast and still no puke or cha-chas. (My sister and I call diarrhea "cha-chas". We got it from Beavis and Butthead - they ridiculed their friend Daria by singing "Diarrhea Cha Cha Cha," and it stuck with us. It makes something terrible sound so much cuter, no?)

Anyway, wish us luck. Todd is still healthy. I think i am feeling better. Tiller is asleep on my lap, as I type this w1H.

But I still want my Mommy.

Heartwarming Story of the Day

This one was lost in the shuffle of my trip to Orlando. It happened a few weeks ago.

Todd helped me dye my hair and took his wedding ring off to do it. He set the ring on the counter, then helped me with the hair, then put the ring back on. Or so he thought.

After going to the hardware store, then coming home and putting pine straw out over the entire area of beds in our yard, he came inside and realized he was not wearing his ring. He sheepishly informed me. I think he thought I was angry that he lost the ring, but I wasn't. As the day went on, we turned the house upside down looking for the ring, and I became more and more aware that I was a little upset that he had lost the ring. Not upset with him, but upset that it was gone. Sure, we could replace it, but it wouldn't be the same ring that he had slipped on my finger that April day back in 2001, as I giggled and cried and he sweat nervously. It would have to be newly-engraved with our mysterious code word and the date. It just wouldn't be the same.

We looked on the floor of the bathroom. We looked in the drain. We looked in the bathtub, the trash cans. We looked on the floors upstairs. We gave Rollie the Spanish Inquisition, and still i think he had no clue what a wedding ring even is. I even kept an eye on Tiller's poop for a couple days. We walked the yard, and looked in the cars. We pretty much gave up. Oh, well. C'est la vie. It is only a ring. It is replaceable, and it isn't platinum, just white gold.

Todd had decided that it was lost while he was putting out the pine straw. Talk about the proverbial needle in a haystack. He had traversed every square inch of the beds putting out the straw, so it could be anywhere. On the off chance that someone had one, he posted on the East Atlanta community board to see if anyone had a metal detector. As if.

Sure enough, there was a guy who owned one in the Village. Seems that he asked for it for Christmas so that he could search for civil war artifacts in his yard. (The Battle of Atlanta took place right here in East Atlanta. People find bullets and the like all the time here.) So, this nice guy agreed to come out and help us look for the ring. He took the time out of his Saturday to help strangers find a wedding band. Pretty nice.

The guy showed up, he showed Todd how to work the metal detector, and Todd started scanning the beds, while me and the guy chatted. Turns out he's a Cartographer - never met a Cartographer, and it sounds really archaic, but was actually really interesting to talk about.

He was here for a good thirty minutes. Todd finished two the beds and was about halfway through the third one. I had given up hope, but was appreciative of the guy coming out to help, and of Todd for giving it the old college try in finding the ring, even though there was a snowball's chance in hell of finding it. Then the detector beeped again (we had false alarms all over the yard already - there is an old t.v. buried back there, for god's sake) and Todd leaned down, and stood up in triumph. There it was, sitting right next to the Gardenia the whole time.

I almost cried, I almost hugged the stranger, Todd and I kissed. It was like movie for a moment.

When you have been married for five years, even the little things become meaningful. They may even become more meaningful than the big ones.

And here's a big Thank You! to our Good Samaritan neighbor, the Eros of East Atlanta, the metal detector guy.

Same Old Same Old

Rollie came down with another ear infection last night. That makes, oh, the 4th or 5th one he has had since Thanksgiving. Poor little guy is piled up on the couch watching Cars and saying, "I'm a little bit sick," every five minutes.

Tiller woke up this morning walking! Last night when I left the house, she was still in carry me or I cry until you want to blow your brains out mode. Then, today, she just started walking. Not two or three steps like the last month or so, but circles around the kitchen, through the dining room, and back into the kitchen.

I am a little scared, as she likes attention, and now she can actually chase us down. Lucky for us, she doesn't come close to Dwight Shrute's 2/3 scale rule.

Young Folks

We had a bit of a dance party last night after dinner. Rollie, in particular, loves The Dance. I don't care how shitty your Monday is, if you can watch this and not crack a smile, you are a cold, soulless bastard. Or bitch, as the case may be.

We Are All Some Sexy Motherfuckers

Todd made a little fun of me for tearing up while Prince did his Super Bowl half-time show finale. But seriously, like, have you never seen Purple Rain?

That performance brings back all the pain and the Mom and Dad stuff, and feelings about Apollonia, and always being second best to Morris Day and The Time, and taking it out on Wendy and Lisa, and on the song they wrote, and on the rest of The Revolution, like Dr. Guy, and you could just let it destroy you, how angry your are, wearing your purple and being short and driving a motorcycle to compensate for it.

But when Prince performs that on stage, it is total catharsis. For all of us. We are all forgiven and cleansed and now we're hanging out in Miami with the NFL, and a marching band, and wearing some Aunt Jemima thing on our head, and a suit bordering frighteningly on Florida Gator colors, and you know what? We can pull it off, cause we're Sexy Motherfuckers.

Love me some Prince.

Our House

"(fade in music: Our House by Madness)

danboo wears his Sunday best
annie's tired she needs a rest
keith and ray are playing up downstairs

elke's sighing in her sleep
graham's got a date to keep
He can't hang around"

I cannot take credit for this - my smarty pants friend and former roommate, Dan, came across an interesting link in the AJC, prompting him to write the above lyrics. This is a house in Midtown, just blocks away from the big Park. I lived here with Dan and Graham for a lovely year before moving to Denver. There was nothing like the stuff that is on Tenth now: mostly there was Outwrite and Gay institution Blake's. It was pre-kids, pre-marriage, pre-pets, even. I think my sister was still in college! It was a great house, great location, great roommates, but it looked NOTHING like this. Totally wild. Let's put it this way: Graham said he was "flabbergasted" by the picture. For those of you who know Graham, little would "flabbergast" him.

You Are a Joke

Rollie's latest thing, other than learning the word "Dammit" from his Grandma, is to say to people, "You are a joke." The first time he said this to me, I even kind of had my feelings hurt. He just hadn't said that many mean things before. I got over that, though, and explained to him that it wasn't nice to say that to people, and that it would hurt feelings, etc. He looked at me blankly, laughed, and said, "Mama, you are a joke."

I am so good at this job.

It seems that he picked this little gem up from (where else?) t.v. He loves the movie Cars, and in fact, it was the first movie Todd ever took him to see in the theater. (He made it about 20 minutes.) We have it on DVD. It is a pretty benign movie, rated G, but the cars race and bump into each other and say things like "You are a joke." There is a laughably "mean" car, too.

It is scary how easy it is to imprint things upon the blanket of freshly fallen snow that is the mind of the three-year-old. They are without a single imperfection, and then language begins to assail them from every side, and suddenly, they are saying, "mama, You are a joke," or "We're home, dammit!"

This is a very heavy job, raising a kid. For a perfectionist, or even a failed perfectionist, it is really difficult to know that there are no A +s in parenting. Parenting involves watching the slow erosion of a perfect being into an imperfect person, and simply trying to prevent them from sliding below average into sociopath. There is no other way. It is terrifying and beautiful, and the weightiest responsibility I have ever felt.

There are small victories, though. Like getting to wipe your son's ass after he poops in the potty. Because at least he pooped in the potty, instead of in the diaper, or in his Batman undies, or crouched under the kitchen table hiding from you.

I Know

I should not look a gift horse in the mouth, or be ungrateful, but when you leave the vacuum cleaner, broom and dustpan, windex, paper towels, and furniture polish all over the house, it is pretty obvious what you think of my housekeeping skills. That is okay - I will overlook the insult as long as you keep my kids. Even if you did stock my pantry with vanilla wafers, double stuff Oreos, two kinds of jelly with sugar (even though we had two sugar-free versions already), a tin of Hershey's kisses, Rice Krispies, and two new containers of pourable sugar (as opposed to the cheap bagged type I use). I mean, if I wanted my kids to eat that crap, it would probably be in the pantry already, but whatever. More with which Mama can sabotage her diet after 8 pm.

Seriously: I cringe at the thought of what has entered my children's mouths throughout the various times they have been taken care of by their grandparents. I know it will not kill them, and the free time is worth a cavity or two, but the worst part? I cannot physically bring myself to throw out those Oreos. A full bag? I cannot do it. They will sit there and slowly ruin my weight loss until Todd comes home on Saturday, when they will succumb to one of two scenarios: 1)Todd shows extreme willpower and kicks them to the curb. 2) Todd goes out for drinks with the boys, and then comes home, skulks around the kitchen as the rest of us sleep, then eats Oreos in one sitting with a peanut butter jelly sandwich.

I know this is our weakness, and not theirs. Why does it have to be so hard?